No, the market isn’t rigged

There’s no cabal of satanic bankers rigging the market. You just need a better strategy

Earlier this month, shares of GameStop, a video game retailer, rose 219% in just two days. Punters poured into the stock after the X/Twitter account of Keith Gill, the fellow made famous by spruiking the stock during the pandemic, started posting again. The account had laid dormant for the last few years. The flurry of mysterious and nonsensical posts drove speculators wild. But the folks who bought GameStop shares during the two-day hype lost at least half their money in the next three days. Cue the tears. Many of these punters complained that nefarious bankers manipulated the stock market and were out to get them. But is the stock market a scam? No, the stock market isn't rigged. The folks proclaiming it is just got caught up in the moment.

The market isn't a scam because, simply put, it's far too big to be. There are also far too many individual participants for any few to make a noticeable difference. There are more than 54,000 public companies worldwide, and all together, they hav…