this is not about n=1
this is about the stock market AS A WHOLE.
companies merge, some fail, some succeed, etc.
that is tangential to the reality. i agree with the others. there is no use discussing things with people who ignore facts while engaging their cognitive dissonance engine on overdrive.
i strongly suggest either a course in basic economics, or a discussion with any finance professor worth his salt. maybe an "argument from authority' will convince you because certainly an argument from rationality has not
to give another analogy, although i doubt it will help. zero sum game necessarily implies a "closed system". the market is not a closed system. companies grow. what are stocks. stocks are a PERCENTAGE ownership in a company.
i am not going to get into the issues of survivorship bias, but of course that is taken into account regarding the ENE's of this world.
i'm pretty darn good at game theory if i don't say so myself (i just did). i strongly suggest a study of game theory. game theory makes clear cut distinctions between zero sum games (the very term "zero sum GAME" comes from game theory) and non-zero sum games.
markets diverge from their means. that's what makes successful trading possible. if the market was purely rational, it would be boring as hell to trade, and all prices would instantly readjust to the intrinsic value of the entity underlying the security(ignoring for a second that the only way to determine the intrinsic value is really via a classic two sided auction).
if you can get it through your head that a COMPANY can create wealth, then it should not be hard to understand that a market of company shares can also gain growth.
when apple makes a computer, they create value by taking sand (silicon), plastic, etc. and making an item out of it that is greater than the cost of assembling these parts and their cost as raw product.
the market does a similar thing, but im getting tired of explaining it to you.
if you WANT a zero sum game, then look at the futures markets. fwiw, i do MOST of my trades in futures, and most of myinvestments in stocks.
there HAS to be a corresponding loss for every corresponding gain in the futures market. necessarily. it is the structure of the market. however, a futures contract is nothing more than an agreement. a stock is more than an agreement. it is a PART of a company. at a bare minimum it is the value of the buildings , free cash, and land value of the plants.
if you are a sucessful trader, more power to you. generally speaking, those who myopically stick to their opinions, when they have clearly been proven wrong, tend to make poor traders. but maybe you are an exception
in this marketplace, the marketplace of ideas, your idea that the market is a zero sum game is more than a falling knife. it is a rocket propelled bayonet, and trust me all you are doing by holding on to it, is shredding your hands and providing entertainment for those watching you on video.