iff Posted November 23, 2020 Share Posted November 23, 2020 Purely hypothethical, if a person perfected time travel and then used this to travel to the future to know what companies would be successful and gives a good return on investment, would this be then illegal stock market manipulation? Would there be a difference if instead of going to future, you went to the last and with knowledge of the future returns, told your younger self the shares to invest in? Link to post Share on other sites
LeChat Posted November 23, 2020 Share Posted November 23, 2020 9 minutes ago, iff said: Purely hypothethical, if a person perfected time travel and then used this to travel to the future to know what companies would be successful and gives a good return on investment, would this be then illegal stock market manipulation?... Yeah; that sounds, to me, like it would be considered "insider trading," which is considered illegal, because the person time-traveling in the future would have personal, insider access to knowing which companies' stocks would profit in the future (while others who don't/wouldn't have the ability to time-travel wouldn't have that knowledge, at all). Insider trading - Wikipedia Link to post Share on other sites
iff Posted November 23, 2020 Author Share Posted November 23, 2020 1 minute ago, LeChat said: Yeah; that sounds like "insider trading," to me, which is considered illegal. Insider trading - Wikipedia I did think about insider trading, though usually that is based on the information received from people on the inside of the company. Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Posted November 23, 2020 Share Posted November 23, 2020 I wouldn't tell anyone. Would just privately gather info and diligently invest in said companies. Anyone trying to get in the way, would have me egg their homes in the future. Link to post Share on other sites
Abigail Rose Posted November 23, 2020 Share Posted November 23, 2020 @iff Here is an interesting article that I thought of as soon as I saw your thread. https://mysteriousfacts.com/andrew-carlssin-the-time-traveler/ Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Posted November 23, 2020 Share Posted November 23, 2020 If you were able to do that you'd be "sued" by the universe and not by the stock market. The universe doesn't allow the manipulation of causality. Thus, time travel to the past is not possible. Travelling to the future is "easy", but you can't get back. But, if it was possible to build time machines I wouldn't use the time machine itself. I would make money by selling stocks of it. There are probably many people out there that would buy such a machine. You might make more money that way and you won't be sued because of stock market manipulation. Link to post Share on other sites
timewarp Posted November 23, 2020 Share Posted November 23, 2020 Well, I guess it counts as insider trading. It's much easier than what you suggest though - just pick a selection of some companies that actually survive the entire time period and you can be almost certain that compounding alone makes you rich. That said, if you come across a producer of Hollerith machines called the Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company on your time travels, I would strongly recommend buying as many shares as you possibly can. People will tell you that you're completely nuts, but you should know better. Link to post Share on other sites
Iam9man Posted November 23, 2020 Share Posted November 23, 2020 For either option, could it be argued that they didn’t change anything as they would have travelled to a future/past where someone had already done this (i.e. their own future, so they would have done it)? Or could the mere fact of them doing so alter the timeline to one where those stocks became worthless? Interesting question on whether a court of law can try something that hasn’t happened yet though. Technically they’ve got information from the future; could a court prove in the present that using this information is manipulating the market? 🤔 Link to post Share on other sites
Blaiddmelyn Posted November 23, 2020 Share Posted November 23, 2020 5 hours ago, iff said: Purely hypothethical, if a person perfected time travel and then used this to travel to the future to know what companies would be successful and gives a good return on investment, would this be then illegal stock market manipulation? Would there be a difference if instead of going to future, you went to the last and with knowledge of the future returns, told your younger self the shares to invest in? Well, under MAR, might depend on the context in which they did the time travel. Say it was their job, or the time travel itself was criminal, you might get into insider dealing (for example, I'm subject to loads of insider dealing restrictions because of my job even though I don't work in a listed company. I decided the easiest way to comply was to never buy shares) Suppose you might fall in Market Manipulation depending on what you did. Link to post Share on other sites
Skycaptain Posted November 24, 2020 Share Posted November 24, 2020 Or you could create a time paradox where your actions stop what would happen and create chaos. If you really want to make money then see what's hot 40 years into the future, then go back and fund the start-up Link to post Share on other sites
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