That is not completely true, options a by-and-large used for hedging purposes to mitigate losses in the event something goes wrong with your principal. Of cours

That is not completely true, options a by-and-large used for hedging purposes to mitigate losses in the event something goes wrong with your principal. Of course, there will also be long plays in options, but that is not the majority. This is evident from the fact that there is generally higher implied volatility for puts rather than calls, which implies more contracts on the put side than on the call side. That would not be the case in any other zero-sum investment - say, forex. Also generally the stock market is by nature a long market so the options market should have been long-heavy. The reason for this is because the options market is saturated with huge portfolio holders are using it merely to hedge against their long investments.