A fanciful exercise......................

     "Indeed, one of the chief points on the agenda of the S. E. C. has been to work toward the ideal of a 'completely informed investing public.'  This is in every way laudable, and progress, though necessarily slow, should be assured.  However, just as a fanciful exercise in paradox, let us consider what would happen if on some miraculous dawn the entire investing public work up to find itself 'completely informed.'  That would certainly be the end of an orderly market, for a panic, either bull or bear, would ensue.  Everybody would know whether to buy or sell, and whichever it was, everybody would be trying to do the same thing at once. And there would be no one to complete the other side of the trade!  Orderly markets, like horse races, exist on difference of opinion.
     "Wall Street needed the S. E. C., just as baseball needed Commissioner Landis.  But people who are interested in baseball are more realistic than people interested in Wall Street..  The fans did not expect that Judge Landis would do more for the game than keep it reasonably honest.  They did not expect him to improve the quality of the fielding and hitting.  Nevertheless, a considerable part of the public seems to be expecting that the S. E. C. will make speculation and investment safer.
     "These hopeful individuals are reminiscent of the benevolent soul who said at the beginning of the poker game, 'Now, boys, if we all play carefully we can all win a little.'"
-Fred Schwed, Jr., Where Are the Customers' Yachts? (1940)