• lurch (he/him)@sh.itjust.works
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    17 hours ago

    IMO with stocks, one is only responsible when buying from an IPO or other emissions directly from the company. otherwise the buyers money goes to another investor, not the company. at least unless one buys enough that votes actually make a difference.

    • the_wise_wolf@feddit.org
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      13 hours ago

      That doesn’t make any sense. That way you could only buy stocks and never sell them. Then what’s the point of investing? Also you couldn’t just leave the company behind if you stopped believing in it and its leadership.

      • lurch (he/him)@sh.itjust.works
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        13 hours ago

        Then what’s the point of investing?

        It’s basically gambling, getting tiny dividends and getting votes in the shareholders’ meetings.

        That way you could only buy stocks and never sell them.

        No, you can sell them to other gamblers, like trading cards.

        • the_wise_wolf@feddit.org
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          12 hours ago

          No, it’s not gambling. It’s people coming together in order to build something. And a place where people can sell their stocks is a stock market.

          There are many problems in this world. But there existence of stocks and the fact that they can be traded is not one of them.

            • the_wise_wolf@feddit.org
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              11 hours ago

              Alright. Your messages sounded a bit different to me at first. You can certainly gamble with stocks. But you can also invest more or less safely.

          • lurch (he/him)@sh.itjust.works
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            12 hours ago

            stocks are only sold after the company is up and running. it has nothing to do with building anything. the money raised by the IPO is usually blasted away in top manager fees in the following coupla years.

            • the_wise_wolf@feddit.org
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              12 hours ago

              Early investors geht stocks. And they can even sell them before the company goes public (if it ever does). The IPO or direct listing or whatever process is chosen, brings the stocks to an open exchange. And a company usually issues new stocks during an IPO and can issue new shares at any time.

              The fact that IPOs are overpriced and kinda shady is true, but that’s one of those problems I meant, which are not explicitly due to the existence of stocks.

    • Quacksalber@sh.itjust.works
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      17 hours ago

      You may not pay the company when you buy shares from another trader, but you buying the shares drives the price of the shares and with that it makes the company more valuable.

      • lurch (he/him)@sh.itjust.works
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        13 hours ago

        no, the share price doesn’t reflect the worth of a company, but the worth of the shares. if all shares just suddenly vanished, the company would still be there and still be worth the same. the share price may just increase the money they can make by emitting more shares.

        • Quacksalber@sh.itjust.works
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          11 hours ago

          The share price does reflect the worth of the company in that a low share price will prevent companies from taking on loans to expand or keep operating. That was the whole idea behind the GameStop shorting saga. Also, the share price also benefits those that hold a majority of the shares. Musk is the richest man on earth because he holds the most Tesla shares. He can use the fact he owns these shares in order to take out loans with great conditions and to buy influence.