The Corner's Curse
- A "corner" means buying so much of an asset that you control the market and can dictate prices
- Every major corner attempt in history has failed — often catastrophically
- The pattern repeats: Early success → Overconfidence → Rule changes → Forced liquidation → Ruin
- Markets adapt faster than manipulators — exchanges change rules, regulators intervene, new supply appears
- The bigger the corner, the bigger the collapse — success becomes the trap
The Dream of the Corner
The fantasy is intoxicating:
Buy enough of something — wheat, silver, copper, stocks — until you own it all. When sellers run out, you become the market. You set the price. Everyone must pay what you demand.
It's the ultimate power move. The financial equivalent of checkmate. And throughout history, brilliant, wealthy, and ruthless people have tried it.
They've all failed.
"The corner is the siren song of speculation. It promises godlike power over markets. But like all Faustian bargains, the price comes due — and it's always more than you can pay."
— Trading historian, 1920s
Let's examine why, through the graveyard of failed corners.
The Hunt Brothers: Silver Thursday
The Heist That Wasn't
Bunker and Herbert Hunt tried to corner the entire world silver market. They came terrifyingly close. Then they lost everything.
Nelson Bunker Hunt and his brother Herbert were sons of the richest man in America. By 1979, they believed the U.S. dollar was doomed and silver was the only safe haven.
So they did what any billionaire brothers would do: they tried to buy ALL of it.
📈 The Rise: 1979-January 1980
Starting Price
$6 per ounce
Early 1979
Hunt Holdings
100+ million ounces
1/3 of world supply
Peak Price
$50.35 per ounce
Jan 18, 1980
Paper Profit
$4.5 billion
At the peak
Silver rose 733% in one year. The Hunts were the richest men on Earth. Their strategy seemed genius.
Then the rules changed.
💀 The Death Blow: COMEX Changes the Rules
On January 21, 1980, the COMEX exchange did something unprecedented: they banned new buying of silver contracts. You could only sell.
"They changed the rules in the middle of the game. We were winning, so they flipped the board."
— Bunker Hunt
This is the corner's fatal flaw: markets have referees, and referees protect the market, not the manipulator.
The Rule Change
COMEX Rule 7.16: "Liquidation Only Trading"
New long positions banned. Only selling allowed.
Margin Requirement
Raised from $1,000 to $6,000 per contract.
Then to $75,000. Hunts couldn't pay.
On March 27, 1980 — Silver Thursday — silver crashed from $21 to $10.80 in a single day. The Hunts couldn't meet their margin calls.
The Hunts were bailed out by a consortium of banks — then spent the next decade in court. They eventually declared bankruptcy.
The Anatomy of Corner Failure
The Hunt Brothers' fate wasn't unique. Every major corner in history follows the same doom loop:
Accumulation Phase
The would-be king begins buying quietly. Position grows. Prices rise. Everything looks brilliant.
Control Achieved
Position becomes so large that normal market function breaks. Short sellers get squeezed. Victory seems certain.
Rules Change
Exchanges raise margins. Regulators investigate. New supply appears. The system fights back.
Forced Liquidation
Can't meet margin calls. Banks demand repayment. Must sell — but now everyone knows you MUST sell.
Catastrophic Loss
The position that was supposed to guarantee wealth becomes the weapon of destruction. Total ruin.
The Graveyard of Corners
The Hunts weren't the first. They won't be the last. Here lie the other kings who tried to corner markets:
🌾 1868: The Great Wheat Corner
Benjamin Hutchinson tried to corner the Chicago wheat market. For months, it worked. He controlled 3 million bushels and squeezed prices higher.
Then the harvest came in — the largest in history. New supply flooded the market. Hutchinson was crushed.
🥚 1956: The Onion Corner
Two traders, Sam Siegel and Vincent Kosuga, cornered the onion market so successfully that Congress banned onion futures trading entirely. The Onion Futures Act of 1958 — still in effect today — exists because of their corner.
Siegel and Kosuga made money. But they also created the only commodity banned from futures trading in U.S. history.
🏦 1991: The Salomon Brothers Treasury Scandal
Paul Mozer, a Salomon Brothers trader, tried to corner the U.S. Treasury market. He submitted fake bids to buy more than allowed.
Result: Criminal charges, $290 million in fines, and Salomon almost collapsed. Warren Buffett had to personally intervene to save the firm.
🛢️ 2008: The Oil Corner That Wasn't
Amaranth Advisors, a hedge fund, took such massive positions in natural gas that they controlled a huge percentage of the market.
In one week in September 2008, they lost $6.6 billion — one of the largest trading losses in history.
🟣 2020-2021: The Nickel Squeeze
Xiang Guangda, known as "Big Shot," accumulated the largest short position in nickel history. When prices spiked after Russia invaded Ukraine, he faced a $15 billion margin call.
The London Metal Exchange did something unprecedented: they canceled $4 billion in trades and let him off the hook. Even so, his company Tsingshan reportedly lost billions.
"The LME saved Big Shot by destroying their own credibility. They proved corners can't win — but neither can the market when a corner gets too big to fail."
— Commodities Trader, 2022
The Five Reasons Corners Always Fail
Referees Exist
Exchanges, regulators, and governments protect the system — not you. When your corner threatens market function, they'll change the rules.
New Supply Appears
High prices incentivize production, recycling, substitution, and selling by holders. The world finds more of whatever you're cornering.
Leverage Kills
Corners require massive leverage. One margin call unravels everything. You can't hold a position you can't afford to fund.
Exit Is Impossible
You bought all of it. Who are you going to sell to? The moment you try to exit, prices collapse. You're trapped by your own success.
Time Is Finite
Storage costs money. Interest accrues. Carrying costs eat profits. The longer you hold, the more you bleed.
"Every successful corner contains the seeds of its own destruction. The very act of achieving control ensures you cannot maintain it."
— Richard Ketchum, Former FINRA CEO
The Modern Corners: Crypto & Meme Stocks
The corner dream hasn't died. It's just found new markets.
Crypto Whales
Large holders try to manipulate thin markets. Works briefly — until exchanges delist, regulators investigate, or selling pressure overwhelms.
Meme Stock Corners
GameStop (2021) was a collective corner attempt. Briefly successful — then brokers restricted buying and the squeeze collapsed.
GameStop is the most instructive modern example. Retail traders collectively cornered the stock, forcing a legendary short squeeze. But:
- Robinhood and other brokers restricted buying
- The SEC investigated
- Most retail buyers who entered late lost money
- The institutional shorts eventually covered without bankruptcy
Even a crowdsourced corner by millions of people couldn't overcome the system's defenses.
The Eternal Lesson
Every few decades, someone rich enough and arrogant enough believes they've found the formula to corner a market.
They see the prize: unlimited profits, total control, becoming the market itself.
They don't see the trap: the very success of a corner creates the conditions for its destruction.
The Paradox of the Corner
You can only corner a market by becoming so big that you threaten the market's existence. And markets — through exchanges, regulators, or simple supply/demand — will always protect themselves from you.
"There's no way to corner a free market. Because the moment you do, it stops being free — and the referees intervene. That's not a bug. It's a feature."
— Anonymous CFTC Official
The crown of market king is a curse, not a blessing.
Every throne built on a corner has crumbled. Every king has fallen.
And somewhere, right now, another king is rising — and falling.
Understand the Patterns That Destroy Fortunes
Corners are just one pattern in the eternal dance of markets. Learn the others before they catch you.
Explore More Patterns