Bitcoin Forum

Many of us are fascinated by the profit we get from Gambling through slot machines, card games, dice, and more. But is it rational to think of trading as a form of gambling especially if someone is not really knowledgeable in technical analysis and just trades their cryptocurrencies?

IMO, trading with the default list cannot be considered as a form of gambling as the odds of winning are completely different. In gambling, there's a probability of winning, but in trading, this probability can be amplified depending on how experienced we are in analyzing the market and predicting where the graph could go depending on the market trend, news, and issues about a particular cryptocurrency.

But there's one feature in trading that makes me believe that it is somehow a form of gambling. If you are partaking in some sort of margin trading such as Futures wherein you amplify your risk and profitability in the form of increasing your leverage and you have the chance to go long and short, it gives me the feeling of a 50/50 win rate whether your predictions will be true or not.

Rationally thinking, trading, and gambling have a key difference:
You need not pay taxes in trading or it depends on the jurisdiction of a country, gambling on the other hand requires us to pay huge taxes. Trading's chance of winning can be increased with experience, timing, and knowledge. Gambling has a fixed chance of winning. And lastly, the chance of losing everything in trading is very low compared to gambling which could make you bankrupted in just a day. What are your thoughts?

Err, in its simplest form, I'd recognize Gambling and Trading as both the same tbh, It's like a 50/50 chance always no matter what, of you winning or losing, no matter the influence of whatever outside factors people take into account. Ofc, that is looking only at the result. The process? Well, there's where the difference lies imo. The process is like building the foundations of what you think is right, wherein gambling it's like threading off of a thin path towards a profit, while in trading, you build the blocks for the path you would take. Ofc you can possibly use the process used in trading in gambling, but in the end, gambling is a game of luck, where it's only a 50/50, while in trading, the chances are also the same, 50/50, but traders could find a way to turn that loss into a profit, and vice versa.

Trading requires a higher skill level so it is not classified as gambling even though there are many similarities. They both require a certain degree of risk in order to make a risk. Exchanges make money off of fees so they don't need to fix the odds in their favor which is what you get with casinos. That is one of the key differences. Trading is more regulated so even if there is risk there are also protections for customers.

The thing is What kind of Trader are you pointing here? because there are types of traders and not all are gambling connected .

But those we called "Risk takers" ? I'm sure they are one of those we can say Considered as gambling because they are only Looking to the possibilities of Increase but smaller chance of gaining,
Not like those "Buy Low Sell High" chances of Gaining is higher but of course Needs Long time to have a result ,not like in Risk taking it can be in shorter time.

In my opinion, gambling is making decisions based on speculation, and investing based on skills and systems that can be learned and besides that Gambling wants instant returns and investments require time and patience.
gambling is usually triggered by the desire to make a profit in a short time, is strongly influenced by emotions such as greed and fear and without prior analysis, whereas investments are made based on a strategy and decided based on research data on market conditions.

If you trade without knowing how to analyze the market and only use your luck to make a profit, I will call gambling because you only predict where the price will go.
Even if you use leverage to trade, that will be the same as gambling if you do not have the right info to analyze.
We risk our money in trading and it can lose to make money from trading if we make a wrong analysis, so that is not gambling because we already analyze where the market will go. If we are wrong in analysis, our skills need to improve, and that is not gambling.
But we might have a different opinion about trading is considered as gambling or not.

I never consider Trading as gambling because In Trading we have patter and graphs in which we can use for our activities ,Not like iN gambling that most of the chance to win is Luck and Skills and Knowledge has Limited help.

Maybe at some chances it can be Gamble but Majority of traders i met has a Knowledge and ability to make Money though small amount sometimes.

I do not think you can so much relate trading to gambling because it just doesn't feel to be in the same bracket; why do i say this ? In trading there are several obvious procedures, processes to be followed to ensure that you are end up with profits; but gambling, you do not even have to understand how it works; you can randomly stake on a tie and care less about it winning or losing, because you simply tried your luck. Trading on the other hand does not believe in emotions; hence you cannot rely on luck but reality.

Well if you used your emotions specially in predicting your trading activity then it is considered as gambling. But we all know that many traders uses technical analysis and doesn't just trade on hunch and I think that's the main difference with gambling. And the stakes are different though, regardless if it is a sport bet on playing based on pure luck.

In my country I actually have to pay taxes on investing. The tax rate on gambling is higher than for investing, but is still hurting our winnings. If you can get a tax relief on investing this is awesome in my opinion. Taxes are a huge factor in wealth management. With the possibility to get around it I would try to focus on investing more.

I consider trading as a form of gambling, you can win and lose on both, and experts in both fields advise players and traders to only invest what they can afford to lose, both are on a field that has uncertainty on the outcome, even the best traders are losing because, in any volatile market, there is no such thing as a sure direction or perfect prediction, and both players on their fields are guided by greed.

Trading and gambling are. both different things, it uses different strategies to take advantage of winning or in profit but they have somehow similarities, both are risky even though you have the knowledge or no knowledge for both things.It's true, but there are still some games that require skills to take advantage of, if you have enough knowledge and skills for both gambling and trading then it would be enough for you to win.

Life is a gambling, so trading as well. We do choose either to gamble or not to take risk at all so I personally consider trading as gambling, they are not just the same on making money but its totally the same for me and it will always be. We make and lose money on both ways, and if we do more greedy then the same result will happen, we will lose money.

This has been discussed several times before here and I think that many will agree that trading is exactly like gambling in my opinion.In both cases you are predicting the future which no one knows so in both cases we gamble.Although in trading you can say that you can make analysis the bottom line is 99.99% have lost money from trading which again make it just like gambling.

The risk one has to go through if he trades is high. But in trading, once you know your strategies then for sure you will always "win", or make a profit. You make calculated risks and execute it perfectly that you will earn even with a high "gamble". Trading might be related to gambling, but the skills needed to trade can be developed. So in the long run you will not lose.

technically you can consider it gambling when you transfer your fund and risk your money hoping that you will get profit just like the gambling the only difference is that in gambling you will have the entertainment while in trading it's more on the technical analysis.

I would say day trading is gambling while long term trading (holding) is investing. Trading can be completely gambling when you do it based on your gut feelings only without proper researches. One other thing I'd also say that when you are dealing with odds such as binary trading, it is a gambling.

Leverage/Options/Future = This is just only my own view and opinion but i do somewhat treat or do have impressions that these are just nearly like with gambling
but somehow you can lessen up the risk if you do really know on what you're doing but i cant really just able to accept the odds on profiting.
There might be traders who do actually make out some bucks but majority do losses on this one.

Spot/swing trades is much preferable but depending on someones risk management because not all would really be that too patient on waiting for long time to see their trade results.
This is why they do really end up on this kind of option.

Trading is never been a gambling but if you do engage on it without proper knowledge or you dont know on what youre doing then it would be consider as one.

Yes, it could be just like a prediction game. If you are good in predicting bitcoin market movement then you can earn. There are some traders here that are only buying and selling bitcoin holding it for short term like selling it when they had achieve earnings from the bitcoin market movement. I had done this strategy before but you know it so hard to predict bitcoin market and I just made some loses instead of getting profit.

There are too many types of trading, as far as I know, there is day trading and there is long term trading for the basic trading. For the day trading, this is I considered gambling because you are willing to risk an amount like gambling.

However, trading isn't worst than gambling, because trading isn't a pure lack, you can apply technically or even fundamental strategy when you are in trading to increase your chances of winning. Not like gambling that you need, I guess fighting the house edge which only for pure luck.

I don't think they are the same in gambling there is uncertain outcome of the game while in trading you would be able to distinguish the possible outcome by reading the previous charts and the signal indicators.

Just as "life is a gambling so" also is Trading, that's correct. Well, i can't very vivid differentiate between these two: Gambling and  Trading. This two are more risky and it's advisable to trade that which one can afford to loss likewise in the gambling language. Though there are expert in Trading who sometimes do great in terms of profit taking which in the gambling world we'll depend on luck and not in our skills.

Winning in gambling is mostly by luck but trading needs enough knowledge in technical analysis to have a smart basis for making wise decisions. They're both risky but the outcome or the result may differ based on our knowledge and experience. Trading needs a broad understanding while gambling needs luck and perfect timing.

As long as you risk something and there's no exact result of what will happen it is considered as a gambling even investment can be considered as gambling.

There are varied opinion on this it could have been a good discussion if there's a poll on this, I can consider trading gambling because not all who trade are making money, there are people losing money on trading and, we have this kind of gambling like sports betting where gamblers analyze the team that they are betting, but they are not guaranteed to win, so are on trading you can analyze but you are not guaranteed to make a profit, you can still incur losses.

If you look into the meaning of the word gambling, it defines that it is a games that involve playing money, its either on horses, cards, sports or anything that money will involve. Trading is a kind of profit making but not a game. When you look into the definition of trading, it is a profitable way that buying or selling some orders in order to gain some profits as well as loses. Trading for me isn't consider as a gambking because the more you look into trading it can be consider as work or hobby. Yes, I understand that it involves money but you ain't playing only money but building or constructing some strategies in order to reach and gain the expected profit that you may earn within the time span of your orders. In trading you need to have more strategic opnions and sharp analyzations.

Actually it depends on how you take it since there are some critical points that needed to consider about this since mostly if we talk about gambling the one we think are the casinos, but in trading we will think exchanging our assets to other assets to gain profit, But the end point there is we are risking our money and we will tell that its a gamble and we can risk to lose any of those. So for that its up for us on how we take those two comparison since for me both of them is the same.

In gambling, you are gambling against a casino, and the odds of winning are not great, especially when it comes to the long term, where the player always loses in the end... The same can be said for trading, where you play against the algorithms of the exchange, and in the long run a few percent of traders can make money!

If we comparing the risk we know the more risk if you play gambling but in trading the risk is also there but not like in gambling is who have high risk but the good to this is you will earn money in a short period of time only but you lose also money fast. Both trading and gambling have risk and have own advantanges and disadvatanges it depends your luck and strategy if you are going to lose or earn.

It has similarities but it depends on what kind of trader you are. There are traders who dont have concrete plan and strategy to follow and just going with the flow depending on the current trend on the market. These kind of traders are likely to lose their money for not exerting an effort to learn. Its like gambling for not knowing the outcome resulting to a small chances to gain.

On the other side there's a way to maximize the possibility to be a successful trader and that is giving yourself a time to learn by gaining knowledge and through experience. Anything that we're not certain for the outcome can be considered gambling but trading is different in a way that you can do something to not lose your capital unlike in gambling that is relying more on luck.

It's depend on what kind of trading you are doing . Spot trading no, I cannot call this as gambling it is like buying and selling and you will not lose all your money in spot trading it may lost its value but still there are chance to recover it.
trading that looks like gambling to me is the future trading where you bet and predict where the market will go and your money can disappear if you make a wrong prediction in just a day. It will lessen the risk if you know how read chart.

Trading can be considered as gambling when the trader does the buying and selling based on random picks. Pro traders always have certain ideology and the learning about the market whereas the Beginners always follow the luck. With trading the experts and the beginners prediction at times succeed and loses unexpected. This is the reason people always relate trading with gambling.

There's money involved and people are buying because of speculation, they are both gamblings, trading is not a quick and easy profit venture they worked like sports betting you have to fully analyze all the subjects and come out with the best possible results, we mean possible but not guaranteed, but if there are guaranteed profit then it's not gambling.

I'm a trader and also a gambler and for me trading is not the same as gambling. The truth is the view of the persons through it are different to each other and for me you can only considered trading as gambling if you do not know what you are doing. For example you enter in a trade wherein you do not have conviction or reason why you bought that certain cryptocurrency then it is considered as gambling. Trading is a game of rules wherein you should have plan in different scenarios in order for a certain trader to react easily when the market moves. The risks can be lessen if you know what you are doing wherein you know your RRR or the risk reward ratio and of course the allocation that you will put in trading or in gambling.

Trading is not the same as Gambling, because in gambling most of the time you rely on luck while trading is not, instead
you are analyzing the chart in the graph of when to buy and sell in which you think is the right time to do it. But there is risk because
its money involve too just like in the gambling platform.

yes also there's trading gambling such as binary options well all of the things are mostly considered as gambling. investment, sports betting, trading, casino all of them are considered as gambling.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gambling

in theory, trading is more inclined towards betting (because based on skill and analysis then produces predictions).  A professional trader will make predictions and analyzes before deciding to make a purchase or sale, but trading can lead to gambling when the trader does not have analytical skills and only relies on his/her luck..

for me, it is consider gambling because you are using money and at the same time you lose money when you bought something and its value goes down,
putting money on a stock, is consider betting, and betting is considered gambling right?
as long as you put your money into something, that has a chance to gain profit or loses its gambling.

They have their similarities like what you have mentioned but for me, they are somehow on a different level so I don't consider them as something really similar. They both have risk and you either win or lose when you trade or gamble but I guess I can say that we can assume that trading is like gambling but gambling is not like trading. Trading is like gambling because you are risking your money for the aim to earn profit but gambling is not trading because it does not require market analysis and such.

You've explained it already, in gambling there's a huge risk to lose the whole amount that you're using to play slots and dice with but in trading it depends on your choice, the graph and the analysis. I'm sure that trading can be considered gambling when traders just jump into the exchangers without any knowledge or experience, it's clear that there's a risk pourcentage that could lead into a loss but in general, gambling's risk is higher than the trading involved risk, that's the difference.

Well, gambling does have they called "strategies", like learning the probability of increasing the rate of your winning (I mean not all the games though but there few) which can be compared to market analysis in trading. I agree that trading can be assumed as gambling but gambling cannot be like trading. Trading is more like gambling because even though you possess a lot of knowledge and experience, how does the market does work or creating your own TA based on the trend and such, still it is not 100% certain that your analysis would work especially in this kind of market and we know how unforeseeable the market is. Thereby, IMO, trading is more like another form of gambling.

I do not think that you can consider trading Gambling. Gambling is more of so like :- Lucky Money but when it comes to trading you have to analyze each and everything and then reach a decision which is more or so more not dependent on odds but is rather an outcome of the market moving up and down.
Similarities are ofcourse genuine but if we consider them , you can actually take the whole life as a Gamble.
Risks are much less in Trading if you play your cards right and in the gambling unfortunately I do believe the risks are dependent on where , how much you are placing the bet etc.. gambling is riskier no doubt.
Even though no one knows what's going to happen with the market I do believe that there is a trust factor when it comes to trading your money , for example in Bitcoins. You know they are going to give you good returns , maybe not tomorrow , maybe not this month but yes , it's going to happen and it's a long process whereas Gambling is a short process.

I have this in my mind recently because I have seen in some of my trading groups that they have been rekt many times in Futures Trading with BTC. They trade a lot but keep on losing because there is a tendency to overtrade and not mind how much you risk totality. It's greed and fear what drive us to trade and continuously fuel the wants to trade. It's actually gambling, to be honest if what you are aiming for is just earning money and not applying different principles that could help you win in trading.

Trading will become gambling if you don't apply these principles

• Risk Management
• Have a trading plan
• Emotionless Trading

It's essential to remember the balance between money management and sticking to your trading plan. Like gambling, if you are losing, you tend to become even more annoyed and tendency to overbet. I think that's what is the same. It's the human emotion that drives us to the end. Make sure to overcome it if you want to win.

The same principle is applied at both, "analyzing and using all references to somehow predict the outcome".

Each has its own factors to be followed that will serve as an ingredient to make a good recipe.

To answer the subject directly, yes, trading can be considered as a form of gambling but there's an associated "only if" - depends on the person's approach. It's no secret that some traders are basing their predictions based on their instinct and that's gambling already.

That's correct. Actually many don't even know that they enter into trading with a gambling mentality and may not understand that even after they get burnt.
I've done that myself some years ago. Luckily I got to understand at some point that what I was doing is too risky and... since then I turned into HOLDer.

I agree, some people relay on their instinct, some relay on other things, but doesn't matter on what you relay on when you are making a prediction, you are still trying to guess the future! When you are trying to predict the future you are gambling! Now with more facts and factors considered when you are making prediction, the risk can be lowered, but in the end some level of risk is always present, so it's gambling when you play safe at lower odds, and it's gambling when you play for big payouts, and you risk big time!
For me everything can be considered as gambling, life itself is gambling! Simply we make choices and decisions every day, if you decide to turn left instead of right, you are doing that because you believe that left will be an easier way, or more profitable, maybe you will meet someone or not...you are gambling whenever you make a choice, and it's happening all the time! Now try to think about all the choices you made in your life, how many times you choose good and how many times you choose bad! Could it be different? Just if you played it differently...

Well, its actually more of a risk than gambling and yes, you are right that analyzing the market that we are in is better since we really can get profit from Daily Trading. There are a lot of news about Alternate Cryptocurrencies that we can use to our advantage but we should be always ready to accept the risk that it might present along the way.

To help you understand it better, trading is somehow like a gambling if a trader doesn't consider risk management as part of their daily basis to minimize the losses. You know when you are gambling you tend to lose yourself and sometimes bet unconsciously bet out of all the results of your emotions and ends up losing. This applies too in trading which if you see that you lose to a certain trade you risk too much because you are irritated by the results. That's why having a risk management is a very useful tool you can use to trade with caution.

Depends on who does it really. Normally if you are a veteran trader who knows what he is doing, that is not gambling because they are trading very well since they are veterans and even on bad trades that is just tough luck and happens but mostly they know what they are doing so that is why it is not gambling.

In gambling you have no idea what the result will be, you can play on a 99% win chance game and in that 1 chance you could lose on the first try. This is why I think it is quite important to realize that we should probably not consider trading gambling. However if it is a newbie, and he doesn't know what he is doing and buy something because "he read somewhere it will go up" and that's it? That is pure gambling.

When it comes to any investment or any sort of entertainment then theres always accompanied by risk which isn't something new.

Thing here is that you should really accept those risk and trying to suppress it via your own knowledge and skills which would really vary
or differ in each individual because we do have different level or knowledge when it comes to trading.

When we do trade then of course its understandable that price is way too unpredictable and if you don't know on what youre doing then youre
simply gambling out your money.

Risk management which do includes

~Profit taking measures
~Proper allocation for each position you do made.
~Decision making in times of sudden dip or rise.

These are common factors to consider and if you dont mind about these things then you arent doing trading but rather
doing gambling.

I think it is possible, but this topic is very complex because its defining concepts are very vague and can be disputed. For example, where do you draw the line between trading and investing? Different schools of economics look at this issue in different ways and it is very difficult to find this border.

This is what I consider. It may look as you are gambling because you're putting it on a risk. That's the same in trading but playing in casinos and trading in exchanges are different.
It all depends how you look things differently with trading and gambling. IN gambling, it is not only entertainment but there are serious gamblers that also make it as a source of income but they are few. In trading, there are day traders/scalp traders that also make money that deal risks everyday.

I have ever read this interesting article about is trading a gambling (https://www.dailyforex.com/forex-articles/2018/10/is-trading-gambling/105092).
Basically, gambling and also trading have similarities and also differences. the similarities lay in the way they put the psychological fortitude to prepare even they will get loss or event profits, sometimes based on luck. There is also not a certain 100% guarantee about the future result of gambling or trading.

However, there are also some differences between these two. If you are a professional trader, you will not lay the result based on luck. It is more likely based on the analysis that is done, skill, strategies, and also the right decision at the right moment. This is more likely as a science, not luck or gambling without any analysis.

So, it will depend on who you are. if you are only trading not based on analysis, it is true that you only gamble on the results. But if you are doing exact analysis, having certain repeatedly strategies and professional skills, you are a true trader, not a gambler.

Not all types of trading are considered gambling, only trading without a strategy and hoping for luck is considered gambling.
Usually a newbie without expertise and experience who is trading can be considered playing gambling, because the opportunity
win is 50-50 chance. Meanwhile, if we trade by doing good risk management and doing market analysis first, this cannot be
considered gambling. Therefore, it is necessary to prepare before trading, and there are basic trading rules that must be obeyed.
This is what can differentiate between trading and gambling.