5 ms·
Why on earth is trading onion futures illegal in the us
by klysm 3y ago
Why on earth is trading onion futures illegal in the us
- rbetts 3y agoA long history of rapscallions.
- all2 3y agoWell, some kind of scallions anyway.
- isoprophlex 3y agoI looked it up, the story is pretty hilarious. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onion_Futures_Act https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onion_Futures_Act
- klysm 3y agoWow I’m surprised the reaction was to ban futures on just onions specifically due to some market manipulation occurring. Surely this kind of manipulation wasn’t restricted to just onions? It seems incredibly short sighted
- cryptonector 3y agoIt's bloody stupid is what it is. Knee-jerking like that is really terrible.
- klysm 3y agoKnee-jerk is definitely the right term for this kind of legislation. I’m confused about how it has persisted. Do onion producers not want to be able to hedge out some price exposure?
- paxys 3y ago> The Onion Futures Act is a United States law banning the trading of futures contracts on onions as well as "motion picture box office receipts" Wut
- LordDragonfang 3y agoTo use a metaphor more appropriate to this site, US legal system is the smelliest, most hack-and-bodge-filled legacy codebase most people will ever interact with.
- MawKKe 3y agoit always takes just one a-hole to ruin it for everyone else
- klysm 3y agoI guess? I would attribute this to poor regulation of the market as opposed to the market itself being bad
- HDThoreaun 3y agosomeone cornered the onion market and instead of of prosecuting them the government decided to just make the whole thing illegal.