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The usefulness of rules and the simultaneous importance of individual liberty for challenging them are well illustrated by the world of finance. The complex financial institutions that have developed over the past two centuries – from those governing shares of stock and stock exchanges to those generating financial derivatives – are based on rules accepted by market participants. Indeed, following rules is considered so important by them that they tend to focus on knowing the rules, whatever they are, provided that they are reliable. They tend to forget that reliability is not the only desirable characteristic of rules: rules also have to adapt to changed circumstances and market demands. Now, such flexibility is only possible in a context of individual liberty, i.e., in free financial markets, where rules are voluntarily agreed, and generated, by contracting parties. When financial executives are willing to accept any kind of rules from the state (like those enforced by the Securities and Exchange Commission) provided that they are clear, they are cutting the branch on which their efficiency rests.