Source : Wikepedia
Options traders today have a lot to thank a man for. His name was Thales. In fact, he was both a mathematician and a philosopher who lived in a Greek city known as Miletus from 624 to 547 BC. Thales, who was known for his reputation of wisdom and astuteness decided to acquire the rights to olive presses for use during the subsequent year. As he acquired the rights to the olive presses, it was winter time and the demand for olive presses was low. As such, he acquired these rights at very low prices. The following year proved to be a bumper harvest for olive farmers. For those who wanted to use the olive presses, Thalese decided to exercise his options to the olive presses and in turn charge hefty rentals to any farmer wishing to rent out these presses.
In the process of doing so, Thales became a wealthy man.
This was the beginning of options trading and the idea of buying and selling “rights” began to spread across Europe.
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