Some are in it just for the money, others to help buy a meal. Then there are those who trade for fun or to spend time among friends. Millions of investors – pensioners, security guards, high-school students – dominate China's stock markets, conducting about 80 percent of all trades. Retirees gather in brokerage houses dotted around China also to enjoy some company and savour the air conditioning on hot days. Some start as young as 13, trading from home with an eye on future careers in finance. Winning isn't guaranteed. This year, among the most turbulent in China's financial history, its stock markets more than doubled in the six months to May, only to crash amid concerns that growth in the country, which makes everything from cars to steel, is slowing faster than previously thought. (Photo by Aly Song/Reuters)

A girl walks past a destroyed mosque in the town of Mararaba, after the Nigerian military recaptured it from Boko Haram, in Adamawa state May 10, 2015. (Photo by Akintunde Akinleye/Reuters)

Civilians are led by members of pro-Russian self-defence units as they run outside a military base during an assault in the Crimean town of Belbek near Sevastopol March 22, 2014. Russian troops forced their way into a Ukrainian airbase in Crimea with armored vehicles, automatic fire and stun grenades on Saturday, injuring a Ukrainian serviceman and detaining the base's commander for talks. (Photo by Vasily Fedosenko/Reuters)

A policeman aims his weapon in Istanbul, Turkey July 16, 2016. Members of Turkey's armed forces said they had taken control of the country Friday as explosions, gunfire and a reported air battle between loyalist forces and coup supporters erupted in the capital. President Erdogan remained defiant and called on people to take to the streets to show support for his embattled government. (Photo by Kemal Aslan/Reuters)

A person waves a drum while other people wearing traditional Russian village-style clothes celebrate the summer solstice near a bonfire in the village of Okunevo, about 200 kilometers (about 125 miles) northeast of the Siberian city of Omsk, Russia, on Wednesday, June 21, 2023. The festivities of Ivan Kupala, or John the Baptist, are similar to Mardi Gras and reflect pre-Christian Slavic traditions and practices. (Photo by Evgeniy Sofiychuk/AP Photo)

Cats gather in front of a house damaged by shelling in the town of Dokuchayevsk, south of Donetsk, February 12, 2015. (Photo by Maxim Shemetov/Reuters)

A caterpillar driven ferry with a 24 horsepower engine takes holidaymakers from the mainland at Bigbury in Devon to Burgh Island, a quarter of a mile away. (Photo by Reg Speller/Fox Photos/Getty Images). 4th April 1935

A Houthi follower with fake blood on his clothes lies on the ground to represent a victim as others perform a war dance during a ceremony marking the first anniversary of the Houthi movement's takeover of Yemen's capital Sanaa September 21, 2015. (Photo by Khaled Abdullah/Reuters)