RE: Despite my misgivings23 May 2018 18:14
Are you sure anyone actually owns the minerals in the ground?
And that whilst the minerals remain in the ground that they have any value?
Surely they might only own the rights to attempt to extract the mineral (subject to certain conditions) .
Then once they have extracted some of the mineral to the surface, they might own the right to attempt to sell the mineral (subject to certain conditions), at which point the extracted mineral becomes an asset with value.
--
In the following example who is richer?
Imagine there are two towns, in each town there is a large box containing 1m CE (One thousand Chocolate Eggs).
In one town lives Person A, who is told that he owns the eggs is his town's box. He thinks "Great I'm rich to the value of 1m CE".
But he does not own the box that contains them, or the rights to open the box, or the strength to move the box, and he cannot eat or feed others the eggs whilst they are inside the box.
What value are those eggs to person A?
In the other town lives Person B, who is told that she owns a permission to extract eggs from the box in her town. She thinks "Great I'm rich to the value of 1m CE".
But when she reads the terms and conditions of that permit, she discovers that she may only try extracting those eggs:
For a maximum duration of 2 minutes
During which she must be blindfolded
And she must have one hand tied behind her back
And she will have pillows and cushions thrown at her by her drunken friends
What value are those eggs to person B?
--
Do we own the air inside or outside our lungs?
Or just the right to attempt to extract some oxygen from it for a while?
What value is a sky full of air to someone trapped one foot underwater? Answer depends on whether they can reach the lucky snorkel that eventually floats by.
Sign In
Follow the stocks
