Rien,
The point I was making reduces to the following:
1 I define the probability of a high ROI as Y
2 I define the probability of the other thing happening as X(The risk of not getting a high ROI).
In this, my argument is simply that in order to maximize Y you must minimize X as
Y + X = 1
Within this the order of magnitude of the ROI is not defined, simply the chance of it being high.
So, AIMing for a high probability of making good profits, implies Aiming for High Return investments(on the average).
Now, high risk investments perform poorly(on the average). It is therefore a contradiction to propose that Profits are the Reward of Risk as a Generality.
The issue that is possibly missed in these discussions is that if one focuses on what I call an idiotic proposition such as that "profits result from risk" then one does precisely the opposite as to what should be done. One should AIM for High-Yield investments rather than Aim for High-Risk investments.
The only thing that I add to this is that with skill one can seek out high-yield investments within a high-risk category, and that fundamentally means that all these investments that score well consistently are fundamentally low-risk investments.
How you identify the winners, and how you avoid risks, is a good question, but not relevant in this debate.
This is the last this I will say on Risk....(on this Board).
