You’re using a tool and choosing to give the tool different names based on how you feel about it. If I’m the landlord of a pub in Glasgow, and Scotland get to

You’re using a tool and choosing to give the tool different names based on how you feel about it. If I’m the landlord of a pub in Glasgow, and Scotland get to the finals of Euro 2024 (we won’t, but work with me here), betting on Scotland losing the final is a reasonable hedge against the profits you’ll lose when everyone goes home depressed after the final rather than buying another round. Is that a contrived example? A little bit, but it’s structurally reasonable. (If you’re a sponsor of the Scotland team, gambling on the result could be hedging media risk). Can you leverage yourself up? Yes, but you can do that in the stock exchange or futures market too. They’re all the same thing.