Gregmal

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/30/ray-dalio-says-cash-is-not-a-safe-place-right-now-despite-heightened-market-volatility-.html A good summary just today from Dalio. There is this grand illusion that money in your checking account is not losing value just because the number doesnt change. Even outside that, theres literally millions of different near riskless things one can do to generate mid single digit returns in a non correlated way. Separately, but relatedly, about this time last year I facetiously responded to a "cash" and "market top coming" topic by saying an idiot could just cover their eyes and go 80% long BRK, 30% long MSFT, and be 10% short ZM and make money while gasp! being on margin. Wouldnt you know, the idiot woulda done just fine. Same thing applies today. People just perpetually over estimate risk and probability and give too much anchor faith to "their" assessments which on a general basis, are typically off quite significantly.

But thats not whats being said, and additionally thats a bad comparison. I think tech is toast and have been rotating between heavy and moderate short exposure since this time last year. However I just see being in "cash" as both lazy and unintuitive and shooting yourself in the foot for false security. I mean if you expect inflation, theres literally tons of different investment options out there, and not much is 50-100x sales crazy. If you expect deflation, theres ways to play that too. If you expect stagflation, even better. In between theres a plethora of ways to play all the in between that over time will do well too. Holding cash is basically saying "I dont know what to do" and "I have conviction in nothing", in which case, just stick to indexing. JMHO. Also, in 2011-12, much of the smart money who was bearish said shit like "14x is the norm and we're at 17x and due for a 20% correction"...LOL, yes, that was the smart money. Academic and all. There was also the European Debt Crisis crash in 2H 2011 which was basically a spitting imagine of whats happening now. GFC fresh in everyones minds and of course the situation in EU led everyone to go down this wild 2008 inspired rabbit hole which led to shit like BAC going from $12 to $5 but it was really the PTSD that fucked those people and it wasn't GFC 2.0 just a massive fat pitch BTFD opp. Same here today. Its not March 2020 2.0. A bigger pullback in select stuff, ironically some of the best inflation protected stuff, is another fat pitch.

Its like people rather lose money via the inflation monster because "the number in my checking account is still the same" and it makes them feel better than seeing a temporary red down arrow....I think its all but a certainty that the top is/was in(IMO it was Feb 2021, not now or whenever) for most of tech and high growth, high multiple stuff. But a new horizon is emerging and there's a good bit to eat there IMO.

So then certainly there would be beneficiaries of this? Rhetorical question. But we both know the answer. So again, why be in cash LOL?

Yea everyone has a different strategy but holding large amounts of cash is both bizarre and inefficient. I know plenty of people and even active managers who sold because they were scared of COVID in February, March and April 2020. No one that I am aware of became fully invested again until the market had already surpassed previous highs and even a year later most of them still weren't back to being invested. Over time Ive learned to hedge whenever some sort of short term uncertainty arises. Selling long term holdings to avoid 3-6 month paper losses is dumb.

More DIS, also a little more FRFHF. This has been my portfolio lately....and so I oblige.

Closed for ~$2.8. Not bad for a few weeks work.

It is somewhat true. This past January I left NJ where I couldn't go to a restaurant or a reasonably expect to socialize publicly. Still mask central as well. A week later I was in FL bar hopping and dining out 2x a day with no restrictions. Not coincidentally, it was a mere week or two after inauguration when NY and Co started announcing reopening plans. There was certainly coordinated efforts to stunt things. How coordinated, I dont know. I didnt really care because where I live in NJ no one followed that stuff anyway and then I spent a lot of time in the South so it didnt effect me. But I just remember driving back and crossing into NJ on the turnpike and laughing because after getting totally back to normal then the first thing I see is a HUGE government sponsored billboard saying "traveling from out of state? Call xxxxxxx or text "ABC" to find out how long you need to quarantine"....and just being like "yea fuck this state". That said, relevant to this topic, covid poses no threat to the market, other than short term opportunity for people who arent scarped of a short term paper loss IMO. Its done and people still worrying about it and selling their stocks in fear of the next variant should just index or something. The threats to the market IMO are still rate and inflation related and this holiday season should give a good indication of where the consumer really stands. If we can bulldoze through this and then get some pricing relief into Q1 there may be some opportunities. Either way though I still think theres lot of shit masquerading around that is going to have a very hard time.

4 horseman with a weight toward the ones in locations that value freedom + JOE, ALCO, DIS. We already have the playbook here, and if the covid nonsense doesnt repeat, the dip is just a blip on the radar. If lockdowns happen again, something like JOE benefits, no reason for -8% today. Bring it covid queens.

And definitely agree on tax considerations. I know I’ve talked with a bunch of folks here about this recently, but if you have a lot of capital gains this year….I’ll just speak for myself actually…I’d rather have some big short bets on into end of year and pay less taxes than just do nothing or sell and generate more tax liabilities.

Hedging is so complex and not really one size fits all so it’s quite hard to really give a good answer. generally though I like 20-30% OTM VIX calls with 4-6 weeks of time in front of them. If I’m feeling extra bearish I’ll also add 40-50 strikes which are often had for next to nil. On top of that you can pick your spots with longer dated puts. Then layer accordingly. PLTR for instance I have $25 puts. AAL $25 and $10 strike. SPCE $10. It’s late and I don’t have time to get into the logic behind all but as you can see some you just want to mimic an outright short while other instances you are playing for a complete blowup. Happy and Healthy Black Friday to all!

China/Didi delisting rumors, China RE, next round of Covid variant hysteria, and earnings void + blackout periods…. Got VIX? Will be an interesting December

That’s been the point I’ve raised quite often with this stuff. Who really notices the incremental difference enough to warrant a waste of time calling and dealing with the provider(an experience that often times is downright awful)? Let alone paying more? I have Sprint and am fully aware how awful sprint is for phone service especially in my area. I have Optimum and they are mediocre too. But “awful” is what? Occasionally a dropped call or static for a few seconds or a couple seconds extra to load a webpage? That’s really not that big a deal and to me, not worth wasting time and money to change.

Got deez today as well

Yea whats kind of funny, in light of the content @LearningMachine mentioned, is that in the situation I shared with the fiber rollout at the HOA....the details werent exactly great and there wasnt much else given, but when people heard "fiber" it was met with a lot of "ooh, ahh, yes sign me up"... in relation to the current service, one word sold them on parting ways with $1200.

Lifestyles of the rich and famous eh? Could be worse. How many stories do we have to hear of these billionaire finance guys who abuse or beat the shit out of hookers in penthouse dungeons or secret mansions? Howie likes to play cops and robbers…to each their own lol

Am I misremembering or was Howard speculated to be part of some horseback riding border patrol group a few years back? Vaguely remember reading something about a wealthy guy and his buddies roaming around with night vision goggles and guns in Arizona or something like that.

I own a bunch of places within a community that was built in the 1980s. The area is/was very boom/bust. As a result there were literally only two internet options for decades. A shitty little local provider and Century Link. Both terrible. But people managed. A third company has started going in and soliciting down payments of $1200 which is refunded via first year's service credit once buildout is complete for the whole fiber network. About 1/3 of the community pre-registered(~150 population total). Interestingly enough, Optimum came in shortly after and bought out the local company that presented an alternative to CTL. Myself Ive lived on the shitty Sprint network for 15-20 years. Its not great but is so much cheaper than T and VZ that I have no problem dealing with occasional headaches from service issues. I need talk, text, and internet. So Ive never bothered to move and probably wouldnt either unless something severely drastic happened although Ive noticed over time Sprint has gotten better so theres that too. People talk about faster or cleaner service but I cant envision that to a degree that enhances my life enough to pay more for it. Maybe if I watched more TV but I dont.

https://seekingalpha.com/news/3774056-average-monthly-rents-increase-slows-in-october-but-metro-areas-see-yy-jumps https://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory/october-existing-home-sales-hit-fastest-pace-january-81328263 LOL still waiting for those slow downs folks keep talking about. Seems when we say words like "stalling" or "lack of demand" we simply refer to month over month or year over year increases of mid single digits.....not real, actual lack of demand and/or prices cratering. These sort of trades are so fun because you know some folks have an agenda and an incentive to distort the narrative. Just like with inflation being transitory and oil prices having to come down, they lie, lie, lie, but the data is easy and obvious to read and the trades are often fish in a barrel.

@John Hjorth He basically lied/misrepresented/something-along-those-lines his having achieved such a silly qualification...

LOL The MBA fiasco! I totally forgot about that! Everyone fussing over whether its real or not....meanwhile in my head I'm like "wait, it says more to me in terms of his approach, that this guy thinks having an MBA is even worth bragging about in the first place!" Oh man.

Thanksgiving Bombergers

No opinion or anything to add on the above other than that its a great little gimmick, but congrats on the place!

Needham analysts Vincent Yu adjusts BABA price target from $330 to $230. Quite timely. Wonder how much this guy makes? EDIT: ZM too! Keybank $398 to $344, maintains overweight Guggenheim $370 to $300, maintains buy? Barclays $270 to $245 None of these guys had this "inkling"ahead of the stock falling off a cliff? Useless fools. Bet they all make over $150k a year too.

Agree with Spek. Having come into my investing heyday over the past 15 years, I was at various point quite fascinated by the idea of John Malone. Unfortunately, the ideas and stories are way more interesting then the current iteration. Is it another example of a guy who's process worked in one environment but not in another? IDK. He's a genius and deserves the praise, but I dont understand the infatuation from an investment perspective anymore.