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To answer you, and the other responder: I hear the point that you feel there isn't a separate legal category. I'm not convinced. I see an argument to be made,

by jpitz 9y ago

To answer you, and the other responder: I hear the point that you feel there isn't a separate legal category. I'm not convinced. I see an argument to be made, to the effect that there's plenty of statutory ink on paper detailing rules for how various investment vehicle transactions may be handled. It seems clear to me that perhaps they do have a special space carved out in the legal system, at least in the US. I do still feel like I need to emphasize - I'm not condoning any situation where a company offers lifetime service, and then goes back on their word. I do think a lot of companies try to extract value from the margin between a broken contract and the pain of enforcing that break.

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
> I see an argument to be made, to the effect that there's plenty of statutory ink on paper detailing rules for how various investment vehicle transactions may be handled. It seems clear to me that perhaps they do have a special space carved out in the legal system, at least in the US. Well, yes, there exist some special legal constructs just for investment purposes--but that by far does not encompass all of the things that you would commonly consider "investments". Most of the legal stuff around investments is regulation of market places and banks, to create a safe environment to do investment transactions in--but that's mostly orthogonal to the actual investment vehicles. Like, you can buy shares of a company in a regulated market place through your bank. But you can also buy shares in a one-on-one transaction from someone you know in cash, without the involvement of any bank or stock exchange. The laws that govern the resulting (co-)ownership are the same, whether you bought the shares this way or that way. And many of the laws are the same that govern the ownership of cars and shoes and bread.

by jpitz 9y ago

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago

> I see an argument to be made, to the effect that there's plenty of statutory ink on paper detailing rules for how various investment vehicle transactions may be handled. It seems clear to me that perhaps they do have a special space carved out in the legal system, at least in the US. Well, yes, there exist some special legal constructs just for investment purposes--but that by far does not encompass all of the things that you would commonly consider "investments". Most of the legal stuff around investments is regulation of market places and banks, to create a safe environment to do investment transactions in--but that's mostly orthogonal to the actual investment vehicles. Like, you can buy shares of a company in a regulated market place through your bank. But you can also buy shares in a one-on-one transaction from someone you know in cash, without the involvement of any bank or stock exchange. The laws that govern the resulting (co-)ownership are the same, whether you bought the shares this way or that way. And many of the laws are the same that govern the ownership of cars and shoes and bread.