[David Sklansky]

You haven't changed my stance. But I thought of a different way to explain what my stance is (one aspect of it anyway) to those who may still not be following me.

Also the following is true regardless whether there is non public information or not.

Imagine an astute stock handicapper/bookie, living on a colony on Mars, that doesn't get stock quotes but does get all the public information about some twenty companies. With this information he allows his co colonists to "buy" or "short" any of these twenty stocks at the price he puts up. And he takes a 5% commission. When they get back to Earth, years later, they settle up based on that future price after discounting interest rates and whatever.

Now this guy is really good. His prices are close to perfect. Meaning that both buying and selling at his price will usually have a break even EV on the settlement date and cost you 5%. But he is not perfect. If he was, he would be unbeatable. But since he isn't, the colonists try to figure out a way to take his money. So what they do is establish contact with an earthling who DOES see stock quotes. Most of which, by the way, are quite similar to the Martian bookie's. But a few are not and when this happens the other Martians take the side that the quotes would indicate to. Either "buying" when the quote is higher or "shorting" when the quote is lower. If the bookie is indeed not perfect (and we bar super weird graphs regarding his skill) then this method will rate to beat him. That's my basic contention.

BUT. Just to make things clear. Suppose the Martian bookie was a different guy who knew nothing about the market. Except unbeknownst to the other colonists, he had tapped in to someone who knew the market prices. And that was his "line". He would rate to beat his typical co colonists out of the 5% commission on average. And this time those colonists who could find out market quotes would be among those losers. BUT WAIT. Suppose that first bookie went home with his tail between his legs and the colonists now, ironically, instead of beating him with their knowledge of market prices, solicit him to help beat this second bookie who knows the market prices. When he agrees, the colonists now buy or short in the direction of the disgraced bookie and away from the market price of the second bookie. And they beat this second bookie EVEN WORSE.

You don't think Buffett would agree with all that?