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@ Farley
2025-03-06 19:43:51
Futures markets are built on a paradox: they claim to predict the future, yet their speculative bets actively shape the present. By trading contracts based on hypothetical future outcomes, these markets create a feedback loop where fictional narratives about a time that does not yet exist dictate real-world prices today. This is not just irrational—it is fundamentally absurd.
Consider how this works: a group of traders speculates that the price of oil will rise in six months due to a potential conflict. Even though no actual shortage exists, their bets drive up present-day oil prices, impacting consumers and businesses. In this way, the present is held hostage by fictional stories about the future—stories that are often wrong, manipulated, or driven by greed rather than reality.
This system prioritizes speculation over real value, creating a disconnect between prices and the tangible realities of production and consumption. A farmer’s actual crop yield or a company’s real production capacity becomes secondary to the speculative narratives created by traders. The result is a distorted economy where prices are no longer grounded in reality but are instead shaped by the whims of those who profit from uncertainty.
By allowing futures markets to dictate present prices, we have handed over control of our economy to a system that trades in fiction. This is not just economically unsound—it is morally indefensible. The future cannot be owned, predicted, or commodified, yet we have built an entire financial apparatus on the premise that it can. It is time to question this absurdity and reclaim our present from the grip of fictional futures.