Believe in the Imaginary

It amazes me when I meet people like me. Truly childish, yet functioning, adults. Although it may not be true, I like to think that I bring the strangeness out of others. It’s like HEY, I’m weird. Be weird with me. It’s okay, come on. Yeah! Now, isn’t that better. Now, smile. Hold your arm out and then stick out your tongue. Perfect!

Anyway, the fantasy world that I live in, where people believe anything is possible and do all sorts of crazy unimaginable things, is coming in to fruition. Maybe this is just blind optimism, but I believe everyone in the world is insane. Wonder why I say that? Cause I finally understand stocks . . . I think.

Stocks.

It’s been about a year but I think I get it. . . . I think. Ever since I got this one job with these business people and their finance degrees, I never truly grasped this concept.  Ya know, they just explain things so strangely. But I got some physcisists to explain it to me and then walah! #Comprehension

Scenario:

So pretend you are a person trying to buy a house. You say you want to purchase it from a merchant. You give them money and they give you a receipt, a deed, and a set of bricks. Boom! So what in this purchase is analogous to a stock?

A.      The receipt

B.      The Deed

C.      The bricks of the house

D.      The idea that you own the house

Correct answer is D.
- See a stock, from what I think I know, is not proof of purchase. So, it’s not the receipt.
- And you don’t get a representation of your purchase. So, it’s not the deed. (think like a birth certificate and a birth are not the same thing. One is a little administrative proof of a person being born, the other is a little human).
- The stock isn’t the bricks of the house cause that would be the actual company.

- So, the stock is just the idea that you own something.

Moving away from the scenario, a stock is the monetary exchange for a pretend portion of a company. To own Apple, for example, you only need to purchase stocks. You don’t necessarily own Apple, but the money you give them will grow or un-grow, depending on the world’s perception of Apple.

See, initially, I thought stocks were like a gamble. But it’s much worse. Gambling is based on odds of dice, cards, horses, or a spinning roulette top. Stocks are based on what people think about a company. And you know people are stupid so good luck predicting that.

Then, I thought stocks were analogous to insurance. But insurance is placing money into a pool of other people’s money, for a price. But the money you get back is based on what’s in the pool. In stocks, since the ownership is fictitious, the money you get back is based on what someone else is willing to pay for that ownership.

So really stocks are betting your real money on the opinions of people you don’t know, based on a set of imaginary valuation. It’s kind of confusing, especially my over-complicated train of thought, but I think that’s the gist of it. And here it is simply:

“Stocks are like money.”

You know why? Because money isn’t real. Money is fictitious. Money is tree bark that we gave some fictitious representation. When we moved away from exchanging 2 lambs for a daughter and a box of apples (before Jesus but after cave people), we created money! We said this tree bark with the inked version of the side profile of a dead, old White Man is worth $100. Your ox is worth $100. I will exchange this tree bark for your ox. . . sucker!

Seriously though, it really is that simple. Money represents ownership. Stocks represent ownership. Money isn’t real. Stocks aren’t real. Both are used to purchase things. Both are concepts that are kind of insane if you sit and think about it. #MindBlown

BASE-ically, the world has convinced itself that these little pieces of tree are worth the same as a television that took 2 days to manufacture, ship, and sell. I mean, it makes sense sort of. Anyway, I have to go now. I am using my money to buy a unicorn so I can visit Santa and talk about the Japanese word for Love.