Gregmal

With a little bit of inspiration from @BG2008, a few calls, and some additional datapoints, Gregmal has determined those 10,000 shares aint gonna cut it. If this fucker decides to trade below $8 tomorrow, adding 20,000 shares are gonna be in order, maybe more.

Come on Sanj, they lost an entire decade of obscenely good market returns because of the short bets. You cant just say, "lets not count those".

Theres always the strip club index. There is virtually a 100% correlation with strong RE trends and the quality of the strip joints in the area. Vancouver has been world class for the last decade in both. Honorable mentions NY, Vegas, Miami.

No love for Westchester? And I'd definitely mess with a chick from Brighton before Staten Island. Staten Island chicks you've seen one, you've seen them all. Actually, if you've seen one second of the old MTV show Jersey Shore you've seen them all.

Haha good stuff BG, appreciate it. Some of the sentiment is justified and there's also some stuff that I just throw against the wall playing devils advocate to really see what sticks or where the stronger arguments are. Oddly enough, it seems consensus the CLPR is indeed the best way to play this. Hence I've owned it. Just curious outside of CLPR what folks think is the best way to play a recovery, because outside of CLPR, IMO the options suck. I also got kinda amped about CLPR reading your stuff LOL. Had a brief thought of like "yea lets put 10,000 more shares on margin"...Have it small right now at about 3% and would generally have it much bigger but its kind of my general take that covid created a perfect storm for what is and will continue being the golden age of small cap real estate investing. Anyone who says they cant find stuff worth buying is crazy. Look across the board at stuff like CLPR, like MSGE, or AIV, ALCO, FRPH, PCYO, JBGS...just to name a few. Just kind of stupid risk/rewards that all skew highly favorable with very minimal long term impairment risks at these valuations. So for me its just a shuffling game, although focusing on a couple specific works too.

Yea maybe my comparisons were put together lazily. I posted earlier the 3 year on VNO vs HIW/CUZ which IMO is fair as is CLPR vs APTS as both are basically highly levered MF with optical issues for investors. For sure a lot of the asset classes with respect to coastal have and will continue to recover. Part of the appeal in AIV is the mix of exposure. Maybe I'm too dour on urban office which converts into skepticism of the primary NYC based public market investing options. Its also clear the divergences(similar to tech vs brick and mortar) started before covid and accelerated since..rather than this being some new or temporary phenomena. All I'm looking for is a way to skin the cat or something to put on the radar so when we see a real pulse you can hit it. As Spek mentioned, perhaps there's just not really that great of an option. MNPP funny enough is probably what I consider best positioned but good luck with that for obvious reasons. The perfect asset IMO for some sort of gentrification or economic recovery would be multifamily or specific types of retail RE. I wouldnt touch any office with a 10 ft pole.

Haha I look forward to your skepticism so when I see it I pay attention. Interesting to see all the Sun Belt on those lists......thought for sure we'd see some blue coastal cities.... Anyhow, on NYC...once again, its simple. Show me the motherfuckin money! If I claim tech stocks are on fire...I can point to FANG or QQQ and its decade of returns. If I say Sun Belt is ripping, I can give you a chart for MAA or the head to head of CUZ vs other office stocks. Where's the green paper trail? For some reason I keep hearing about this NYC renaissance and yet no one can point me to a damn thing thats NYC-centric thats really done that much better than a modest investment alternative. To boot I own things that should be sensitive to a NYC recovery and they've been underwhelming. If there's a real recovery multifamily should be the first to go, and it hasn't. Maybe someday.

I think the biggest thing you are missing is that there is still a lot of demand that has yet to be unleashed. Regulation on mortgages is still relatively firm. What happens when everyones who's as colored as Elizabeth Warren is indigenous can get a 0% down mortgage? Or a $50k credit for being an "underserved" participant? If theres one thing Trump taught Republicans, its that the lemming vote can be bought. The CLF vaccine initiative is further evidence of that. So the stimulus will not likely stop. Housing is the easiest area to goose. I'd also add that you're overlooking investor demand as far as supply increases goes, in terms of its effect. Last year supposedly investors made up about 20% of the market which is down substantially from a decade ago and well below the 2007 levels. What happens when all the liquidity in the systems moves into housing? Anecdotally, I know tons of folks who are waiting for the 10-20% pullback to start jumping...myself included. Also, why cant the Canadian cycle occur here as well? This is not to say there won't be slowdowns or dips, but what makes housing a bad investment? I dont see it.

Probably next week. Maybe Wednesday.

@LearningMachineposted some interesting data although I dont see it anymore. But besides that, are any of the NYC is back crowd actually investing in anything relevant to this? I see a ton of cheerleading and yearning for it, like people are trying to will it to fruition, but the bottom line is its by and large, category wide, been a shitty investment space. I own CLPR because its really cheap and MSG stuff because its irreplaceable, but after the "everything" rally started to fade earlier in the year, I haven't really noticed this stuff catching. Of course, that doesnt mean we arent right around the corner from a huge inflection and period of outperformance, but I dont see it. The talk and whatnot reminds me of the same stuff around the B-malls and non class A office space. I had a friend who was constantly pumping CBL and WPG and outside of a small trade here or there I never really found comfort owning them because the narrative wasn't getting fixed and the fundamentals were mediocre at best. It seemed every time he came to me with a "see malls arent dead" piece the share prices were the same or lower than the last time. And my thoughts were always like "yea, ok malls arent dead. The Simons are fine(the same way you're fine if you own One Vandy or a giant new FB leased asset), but everyone else is kind of in no mans land.. and more importantly, your universe of potential investors is limited and your multiple is going to continue to be shit"....so, what fixes the structural issues with respect to investing in NYC? Why in the world would the common investor, or even the REIT focused one want to deal with all the headwinds when they can get better returns with less risk and less headache elsewhere? I say this in the context of looking for investments, which is the only thing that matters to me. Its great if we get back to $3000 studio apartments and whatnot, but if the market is just perpetually going to ascribe crap multiples to this things then who cares and why bother? Ive wanted to play around with ALX, but same thing. If its just going to hang around in mediocrity, ignoring positives until things deteriorate more and then its gets penalized for that, then whats the point? Honestly outside of a few folks, most of the NYC crowd I know is cheering from the sidelines.

https://seekingalpha.com/news/3733763-toll-brothers-q3-results-better-than-expected-lowers-full-year-2021-delivery-guidance "Our FY 2022 margins will significantly exceed the strong margins we project for our FY 2021 fourth quarter and that our return on beginning equity will exceed 20% in FY 2022 and beyond," Chairman and CEO Douglas C. Yearley Jr. said in a statement.

https://austonia.com/line-204 That kind of thing aint stopping. NFLX is crushing it utilizing a studio in New Mexico!

Eh I think thats largely true in an academic sense but not entirely the case. First, there isnt unlimited land supply in Orlando(just as an example). You can go 45 minutes out there the same as you can go 45 minutes out from NYC. Second, for every "new build" in Orlando, you'll have 80% of the folks scoffing at the price of the land and thinking theyre savvy waiting out the price spikes that may or may not ever come back down. The other 20% will be BlueRock types that will build out to the 9 with no cost awareness and still take 3 years to even think about a lease up, IF they can find labor and building material which are currently in short supply. During this time net migration continues, there continue to be bidding wars for rentals, and the party rocks on. The ultimate driver is something that won't be fixed any time soon. Taxes, hostility to business, stupid policy, crime, weather. Again, see CLPR vs APTS or VNO vs HIW or CUZ. There may be periods of mean reversion but there isnt a scenario I see where the NYC/CA does better, consistently, than the others. Both can do well. But there's also plenty of scenarios where the non coastal does well while the NYC/CA stuff keeps faltering. I know plenty of folks who are chomping at the bit to make the big urban city recovery trade...most are massively biased. Myself, having grown up around NYC have a bias as well, but thankfully my bias to making money trumps my bias for areas I have a personal connection to.

Rents everywhere are going nuts. It seems natural that even the laggards eventually come back. The problem in NYC is twofold....1) Office continues to be...troubled, to say the least. That has ripple effects, especially on the higher end. And 2) while there may be a crazy demand rebound from renters, this still is totally different than being on the other side, which inversely is...do you want to be a landlord? There's still rent controls worse than most other places in the country and they're still carrying on with the eviction moratoriums. In its best case scenario, its like selling tickets to a concert/event where the pricing is fixed...You can have a million strong on the demand side at $100 a ticket, but if there's strings attached...IE no more tickets can be sold and regulation that keeps you from raising prices...does it really matter to the owner? Its kind of funny but in a way a lot like the Chickfila franchise concept. It looks great from the outside, but once you start seeing the details, its so much less attractive. From a bottom of the barrel investment perspective, I think DC stands head and shoulders above NYC and CA in terms of future prospects.

Found White Lotus to actually be quite entertaining. Only 6 episodes. Definitely does a good job of highlighting the world we live in. Folks with everything still find ways to manufacture problems for themselves and be petty and unappreciative and folks on the bottom just seem to go through life thinking the world is out to get them and that its everyone else's fault. The latter perspective probably being somewhat accurate but still just a losers mentality when it comes to overcoming an obstacle.

Deal dead. https://www.cnbc.com/2021/08/20/topps-spac-merger-with-mudrick-is-dead-because-of-mlb-trading-card-deal.html

Short MUDS warrants SPAC supposed to merge with card giant Topps. Topps for those that dont know, along with Upper Deck have basically held duopoly or even monopoly on specific sports for the trading card licenses...for years. Decades even. Despite this, both have on and off flirted with or filed bankruptcy protection, along with tons of others past like Fleer, Bowman, etc. Typical SPAC fashion they consummated this merger at or near a top of a generation boom for trading cards. In a vacuum, this seems OK. However this afternoon WSJ broke news that Fanatics had likely poached the MLB deal from Topps after like a 70 year marriage. Without MLB, Topps is pretty much worthless. There is NO WAY any right minded shareholder should vote in favor of this deal now. If they do, its almost certainly IMO a 0. Either way, the warrants IMO are worthless. Early bird gets the worm. They traded in 2s after news broke but due to holder base will probably have some value left tomorrow in the AM. Now life lesson for market speculators.....someone at Topps/Mudrick is probably VERY pissed this leaked a week before shareholder vote. But just getting back to SPACville, you better believe Topps, which has a 70 year relationship with MLB, knew this was real or even happening long ago. On the surface, shareholders, many institutions may have looked at this and seen the obvious..that you may be buying the cycle top if you participate, but the devils lurking beneath turned out to be far more ominous. And you just never know when its coming, but with SPACs its almost always there. Something to remember next time you think a SPAC looks good(and for those of you that know, yea, Im kind of working on a pre deal SPAC long idea right now but dont hold it against me LOL will post that here when I'm ready)

shorted a few CLF $22 puts for 8/27

One of the exercises I often try to do that Ive found helpful is to place things in the context of what the history books will say 10 years from now. As everyone above had already said, its easy to end up calling 10 out of the last 1 recessions over the past 3 years. You kind of want to avoid doing that or at least acting on it. However when within the moment you can extrapolate data and event sets in enough situations, sometimes the bells start ringing loudly and your trading sense begins to kick in. A great example of that was December-February of this past year. You had ETFS like ARKG gapping up 5% a day, spacs IPO-ing +20% and deal announcements doing 50-100%, you had short sellers crying mommy, and those short sellers brave enough to hang on got hung, drawn, and quartered in late January and February...enough for me to have as bearish a positioning as Ive ever had and its worked for a little bit. A lot of times it doesnt. I dont get a crazy sense of any sort of earth shattering event being at our doorstep, but if we get one... 5-10 years from now the stalling out of bull market darlings like AMZN, TSLA, NFLX, etc will certainly be pointed out by some as the writing having been on the wall. All are fine companies and I'm short TSLA and NFLX, but I wouldnt go crazy because you still need to respect the last 10 years of ass raping these things put on naysayers.

Just as far as a trading pattern would go, the not moving for a year thing within the context of a multi decade run to one of the most valuable companies in its space(or the world) is probably consistent with what I'd expect with a so called "top". The long haulers passing the baton to all the geniuses on Sum Zero and VIC who now(after 20 years) "get it"...I think the same is even more true for NFLX. Classic case of the last remaining incremental buyers stepping in..whether its the top, who knows? Could also just be a long period of underperformance which would probably be more in line with what I'd expect of this market cycle and massive liquidity in the system. Housing I would kind of agree. Seems like just yesterday, although it was 6-12 months ago now where myself and maybe a small handful of others were pounding the table on housing and RE, amongst a sea of negativity and naysayers. Now its much different and probably more specific in terms of where you have to be. But housing in itself is unique and has a lot of secular tailwinds. A 30 year mortgage, a decade of vacuum in terms of building, and for god knows how long, lack of foreclosure/evictions will act like a boa constrictor for new supply. Especially in desirable areas. There's definitely a lot of areas that got a covid boost, pretty much across the board in commodities, but there's also market specific setups that can buck the trend of "temporary" for far longer than most think, steel is a good example of this. With the housing boom a solid example Ive used is CLPR vs APTS ytd performance wise. Or for RE in general retail vs office. There's plenty of markets within markets, which I guess was my original point...I dont really expect the entire market to melt down the way a lot of folks do. Just a stock pickers market.

If you are still worried about covid.....suggestion for ya +++++

Oh yea, CDC has continuously lied or at best misrepresented data to fill a narrative. See the recent FL case data. I as well know plenty of vaccinated folks with have gotten covid in the last 4-6 weeks. A few said it was brutal but none were in the hospital. Once again, there's people who want to mouth breathe about OMG 600k dead! but if you're healthy, and vaccinated...at this point its a nothing burger..if it ever was one. Find me a person who got the flu and was like "yo. second best week of my year outside of going to Disney World!"....its not ever gonna be enjoyable, but its no reason to alter your life. I have yet to see any data at all that vaccines haven't at least provided ample reason for folks to move on. Personally, I'll probably get a booster in November or so.

I agree with @musclemanto a certain extent. There is no better example of the cycle playing out than AMZN. Every last incremental buyer now thinks its consensus. However that is not to say the whole market needs to implode. I think its possible but more likely we just keep seeing rolling bear markets within sectors like we've seen for the past decade.

Yup. Major new fundamental development lol. Morgan Stanley says underweight. IF, you believe the Boyar Value rhetoric on MSGN, you're basically buying the entire thing for less than Boyar thought the Network piece was worth. Disclosure, I do not. I think Boyar was frequently wrong about the value of the Network...as Ive detailed several times in other threads. But I do think its both easy to justify the price action(poor sentiment, muddled merger financials, covid, NY, shit technicals, etc) and also hard to justify it(now arguably trading at less than the value of EITHER the Garden or the Networks)...personally I dont care. Its good to have something thats an obvious buy in a market full of whats largely meh...

More Z + MSGE