OT - Dow plunges 1,175 - worst point decline in history

[the bottle ride]

Originally Posted by Mr. Pink

Warren Buffet has a PHD? Who knew?

That's "long term" btw, not ten years. The last ten years, like most decades separated out from market history, is quite unique, and pretty much the past at this point, thanks to Jerome Powell. No more free money for tech bros.

And, as always, nobody can predict the future. Fools game, talking their books.

I am not talking about Warren Buffet-
I worked for the largest individual investor in Tesla and the 14th biggest institution (same entity- this includes passive firms): their understanding of the EV marketand conviction was startling.
I would not bet against them. (I would not buy the stock)

Regardless of how we may perceive a particular market regime- some investors got it right and others did not. My point about the 10-year success ratio is just a data point that highlights who has been successful in the last 10-year. It’s not a qualitative assessment as to whether it was easy to make money or not.

[Mr. Pink]

Originally Posted by the bottle ride

I am not talking about Warren Buffet-
I worked for the largest individual investor in Tesla and the 14th biggest institution (same entity- this includes passive firms): their understanding of the EV marketand conviction was startling.
I would not bet against them. (I would not buy the stock)

Regardless of how we may perceive a particular market regime- some investors got it right and others did not. My point about the 10-year success ratio is just a data point that highlights who has been successful in the last 10-year. It’s not a qualitative assessment as to whether it was easy to make money or not.

You used the term long term investor. Buffet is a long term investor, not someone who rode the wave of zero money over the last ten to fourteen years. The tech bros tried to bury him in the late ninties, calling him out of touch and old fashioned. How'd that work out?
The last decade will go down as one of the most excessive and bizarre in markets, all due to tax free money chasing yield. I mean, I thought the WeWork story was the absolute low, with that Neumann kid walking away with a billion, (and even Andresson giving him 300 million to start another fantasy!), but FTX went straight to number one with a bullet. But, theres also billions made by hucksters pushing robot cars and all sorts of other tech dreams, with millions throwing money at them because, easy gains. Until they turned into losses. You know, the swimming naked cliche.
Even though I've been hurt as a conservative geriatric investor, I sort of welcome higher interest rates. It will help solve America's biggest problem, inequality. No more kids playing with funny money. Soon, maybe, you can actually get 5% on a money market, no risk.

[the bottle ride]

Originally Posted by Mr. Pink

You used the term long term investor. Buffet is a long term investor, not someone who rode the wave of zero money over the last ten to fourteen years. The tech bros tried to bury him in the late ninties, calling him out of touch and old fashioned. How'd that work out?
The last decade will go down as one of the most excessive and bizarre in markets, all due to tax free money chasing yield. I mean, I thought the WeWork story was the absolute low, with that Neumann kid walking away with a billion, (and even Andresson giving him 300 million to start another fantasy!), but FTX went straight to number one with a bullet. But, theres also billions made by hucksters pushing robot cars and all sorts of other tech dreams, with millions throwing money at them because, easy gains. Until they turned into losses. You know, the swimming naked cliche.
Even though I've been hurt as a conservative geriatric investor, I sort of welcome higher interest rates. It will help solve America's biggest problem, inequality. No more kids playing with funny money. Soon, maybe, you can actually get 5% on a money market, no risk.

I never brought up Buffet- but I get it; you are fan boy and a Dodd and Graham acolyte.

Every generation has bubbles, but to broadly discount the tech that has been developed for the last 10-years (and has been invested in) is tremendously short sighted and fails at the understanding of how the capital markets work.

schadenfreude tastes great!

[notsew]

Originally Posted by Mr. Pink

Wait. Hard right? ***?

Well, I guess it is indeed all relative, but I'd say most would consider his particular brand of libertarianism on the far right of the spectrum, at least that's what they taught in poli sci. Add that to his obsession with the hunter biden laptop business and tweets like this: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1607997591870124032?s=20&t=lfHSndUxB67T2GGl8DAzGw

and one could certainly get the impression.

But really, I digress to avoid devolving this conversation into something lockable. Maybe we can just agree that his politics have become more vocal and polarizing and maybe not consistent with tesla's target customer.

[likebikes]

sp500, nasdaq worst year since 2008.

[azrider]

I've learned a ton and reference this thread a bunch.

Can we please keep it civil?

[verticaldoug]

Originally Posted by Mr. Pink

You used the term long term investor. Buffet is a long term investor, not someone who rode the wave of zero money over the last ten to fourteen years. The tech bros tried to bury him in the late ninties, calling him out of touch and old fashioned. How'd that work out?
The last decade will go down as one of the most excessive and bizarre in markets, all due to tax free money chasing yield. I mean, I thought the WeWork story was the absolute low, with that Neumann kid walking away with a billion, (and even Andresson giving him 300 million to start another fantasy!), but FTX went straight to number one with a bullet. But, theres also billions made by hucksters pushing robot cars and all sorts of other tech dreams, with millions throwing money at them because, easy gains. Until they turned into losses. You know, the swimming naked cliche.
Even though I've been hurt as a conservative geriatric investor, I sort of welcome higher interest rates. It will help solve America's biggest problem, inequality. No more kids playing with funny money. Soon, maybe, you can actually get 5% on a money market, no risk.

VC made a lot of money on exits, but a lot of VC's did not exit yet. If you mark to market fairly all their funds, even someone like Tiger Global may be net negative for investors. WeWork and Uber were less the monster of US VC's, and really became monsters when Softbank Vision fund set a new bar for VC investing. Masayoshi Son wanted to make larger splashy investments in VCs so they could grow faster, and exit faster. After Softbank monster investments in WeWork and Uber, the market really exploded. On a side note, the Saudi PIF was the largest investor in Softbank Vision. They massively over valued WeWork and Uber. Lost money on both investments, Historically, Softbank had made two massively successful investments (Yahoo and Alibaba) but this was at very early stage and took years to develop. Softbank thought it had the magic touch and could accelerate VC growth by throwing large sums at it. It did not work out. Fortunately, both WeWork and Uber survive at lower valuations.

Uber does provide a valuable service. My daughters are definitely better off being able to hail a uber or lyft on nights out.

WeWork survives and thanks to the money from Softbank, they changed the shared office space in large cities, and the quality and type of properties have improved. It was a business area ripe for some change. The valuation was just wrong.

Airbnb is another business in this mix. It was over valued, but the business is not valueless. . . and we have a lot more choice travelling now.

If you really want to focus on the NINJA LOAN equivalent in VC space, I think it was the SPACs craze from 2020/2021. Ultimately VCs need an exit, and SPACs and the overheated equity market, allowed companies to exit earlier and at much higher valuations than previously imagined. It was a proverbial gold rush with people paying fortunes just to own a shovel and pan.

If you really want to focus your scorn at someone (there are lots of candidates) it should be the pied-pipers of the financial press- CNBC, Jim Cramer and the rest of the clown show.

They really try to sell financial investing as entertainment and all kinds of charlatans appear on that show.I watched an interview on CNBC with Chamath Palihapitiya explaining why he sold some shares in Virgin Galatic (remember that listing). The man lied through his teeth with a straight face. It was almost criminal, and CNBC hosts just smiled and nodded. Muddy Waters referred to Chamath as SPAC Jesus.


If you really want to swim naked, go for a swim with Cathie Woods on her ARKK. If you look at the average price of her ARKK units when created, I think it is a little above $90. With the current price of the ETF, I think she has net loss for investors over $12b USD. Yet, she still preaches the new new.

As for higher interest rates fixing the wealth gap, I am not sure that is going to happen. The real issue for creation and maintaining the wealth gap is the tax code. Capital and Labor are taxed at fastly different rates. As long as these tax advantages remain, capital will do better than labor. The one year labor does better than capital in the past 25 years does not mark a change in trend.

What you are really angry at is Wall Street and general and the buyer beware. The 'game' massively favours the insiders. If you want to read three fun and classic books read- 'Where are the Customer's Yachts?' originally published 1940, 'The Money Game' by Adam Smith (pen name) 1968 and 'Reminisces of a Stock Operator' 1923 . In Stock Operator, you can just swap Bucket Shop, and stock plunger with Crypto Exchanges and Hodlers. As the book says, speculation is as old as the hills.

[Mr. Pink]

I point to Chapelle's monologue on SNL a lot recently, although many are trying to destroy and cancel Dave for telling the truth. https://youtube.com/watch?v=_m-gO0HS...SIkaIECMiOmarE Start at 8:29. Brilliant. The reason taxes are so low is because our entire system is owned by those that dont want to pay a penny in taxes. Hell, they want billions of that tax money as backup, like the banks and airlines and weapons makers. So, my argument is, less rich people created by free money, maybe, just maybe, life could be a tad more fair. You know, Hope for Change.
And, in the end, Uber is a taxi company, Wework is a real estate sublet company, and Airbnb is an illegal real estate venture in many of its markets (which I have used a lot). Yes, it's the Jim Cramer clowns of the world who act as carny barkers for them, but, he's just the most outrageous. I watch Bloomberg a lot, and a lot of times I'm shocked at the pumping before the dump I hear. Just yesterday I listened to some fellow in a slick suit tell me that Tesla is the most disruptive company in the last thirty years! Tesla! Not Apple, Amazon, Walmart, even Craigslist. He at least disclosed that he held a lot of Tesla (remember how that was a habit on the airwaves?), and predicted a big jump in '23. Good lord. Right out in the open.

[Clean39T]

Originally Posted by likebikes

sp500, nasdaq worst year since 2008.

Worst year since 2008.... so far.

[Clean39T]

Originally Posted by Mr. Pink

Buffet is a long term investor, not someone who rode the wave of zero money over the last ten to fourteen years.

Scratch a little deeper on Buffet and his companies and what they've done and are doing - and you'll come to find he's just as big a pile of excrement as those other folks you mentioned.. he's just been doing it longer.

To wit. PacifiCorp (a Buffet company) has a 15% rate increase going in here in Oregon - that's a $20/mon increase on average customer bills.. while the company is paying record dividends to shareholders. :eyeroll:

[Clean39T]

Edited: Can’t believe everything you read on the internet I guess..

[fa63]

I don't love everything Warren Buffett says or does, but I do like this one:

"The stock market is a device for transferring money from the impatient to the patient".

I would add "for those able to play in it, and have a well-diversified portfolio". And of course everyone's patience and timelines are different.

[Mr. Pink]

Originally Posted by Clean39T

Scratch a little deeper on Buffet and his companies and what they've done and are doing - and you'll come to find he's just as big a pile of excrement as those other folks you mentioned.. he's just been doing it longer.

To wit. PacifiCorp (a Buffet company) has a 15% rate increase going in here in Oregon - that's a $20/mon increase on average customer bills.. while the company is paying record dividends to shareholders. :eyeroll:

I try not to. If you want to survive in this world, you have to play the game, an disregard the sins all around you in this economy. Sad, but, true. The biggest farce is socially responsible funds. Run away from those. Capitalism is a rough game.
He owns BNSF, and went to court over draconian attendance rules and won. No sick days from one of the richest men in the world.

[Clean39T]

Originally Posted by Mr. Pink

I try not to. If you want to survive in this world, you have to play the game, an disregard the sins all around you in this economy. Sad, but, true. The biggest farce is socially responsible funds. Run away from those. Capitalism is a rough game.
He owns BNSF, and went to court over draconian attendance rules and won. No sick days from one of the richest men in the world.

Very true. If we knew and chose to think about the ramifications of all the choices we make every day and the systems we participate in, it'd be tough to make it out of bed. And if you can't make it out of bed, you're not going to survive this rough game we were all born into. There is a wide gap though between us peons just living our lives and the likes of Buffet or Musk or Bezos. With great power comes great responsibility, and they all are failing to live up to it, with the help of an entire class of power-hungry people who enable them to be who they are - changing regulations and tax codes, skirting rules and exploiting loopholes so they can get a bigger handout and stay a few steps ahead of whoever they think they need to be ahead of.. Where then is the dividing line between them and us, the corrupt politicians and the second- and third-tier leaders of industry? Am I enabling Bezos by shopping at Whole Foods? What's my alternative? Kroger? Oooff, time to go work on bikes.

[Ozz]

Originally Posted by Clean39T

....
To wit. PacifiCorp (a Buffet company) has a 15% rate increase going in here in Oregon - that's a $20/mon increase on average customer bills.. while the company is paying record dividends to shareholders. :eyeroll:

If you enjoy John Oliver....he had a good bit on electric utilities earlier this year:

Utilities: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)

Skip to 5:20 see explanation of how electric utilities set rates and make money....solar panel discussion starts at about 8:00.

It's probably more complicated than explained on a comedy show...but probably some nuggets of facts...and entertaining.