The planet had two unique elements. One was that it produced the galaxy's most desirable hallucinatory drug. The other was that it was a stock broker's paradise.

The world was split into rich men's holdings - and every hour, every minute these were being traded on a continuous stock-market. Up and down went values as men conspired to seize others' properties, to push prices down and costs up. Their money game controlled everything else - the common people, workers, farmers, homes, lives, poverty and luxury . . .

Earl Dumarest went there to find his next stake. Find the drug-gem or manipulate the market - two possibilities. But behind the scenes stood the advisors of the inhuman Cyclan, determined to fix the odds against Dumarest . . .

(First published 1981)