The person you are replying to deleted so I can’t see what they said, but options trading is not a zero sum game.

Take a credit spread for instance.

Person 1 owns 100 shares of XYZ and decides to sell a far OTM call option.

Person 2 buys said far OTM call option and sells a much closer OTM call option both on XYZ.

A month goes by or a day whatever and XYZ doesn’t move.

Who did not make money?

Let’s use straight stocks now.

Person 1 buys AAPL for $100. AAPL then goes up to $120 then back down to $110 person 1 promptly freaks the fuck out and sells making $10.

Person 2 buys AAPL from person 1 for $110 thinking it’s a pullback but the dip keeps dipping down to $105 and then jumps to $111 and person 2 promptly sells for $1 profit happy to be out of the trade

Person 3 buys AAPL at $111 as it’s now breaking past its previous high of $110 signifying a possible bullish trend person 3 then sells AAPL at $121 as that was their target.

Person 4 buys AAPL for $121 as it’s now at its ATH and person 4 is a breakout trader. AAPL goes to $151 and person 4 sells

Person 5 is Warren buffet who entered the chat because now that AAPL is a quadrillion dollar corporation he’s going to buy half their company and force them to offer a dividend on the shares he just bought further pushing the price up because buffet bought them and because retirees love dividend buffets. Warren is ecstatic because he says AAPL price to book is $130 a share and the dividend is $20 a year so he practically stole these divitendies from those asshole hedgies.

“By the way fuck Ebita.” - W. Buffet