Investing and gambling share key features, in that both involve risk, the coming together of two or more people, and both are voluntary activities. However, investing is generally a much better way than gambling for the average person to make long-run profits. This paper reviews evidence on two types of "gamblified" investment products where this advantage does not hold for investing: high-frequency stock trading and high-risk derivatives. This review defines a gamblified investment product as one that leads most investors to lose, that attracts people at risk of experiencing gambling-related harm, and that utilizes product design principles from gambling (either by encouraging a high frequency of use or by providing the allure of big lottery-like wins). The gamblification of investing produces novel challenges for the regulation of both financial markets and gambling.
Keywords: betting; financial markets; gambling; traders; trading.