Gregmal

+1 of the curveball with kids and WFH. I literally was doing 9:30-4s from my car w/ WiFi for good chunks of the year. Always adapting lol.

^ Yea I slept in this morning a bit...when I did my usual account checks, saw BTC move, shrugged shoulders, and said "Happy New Year"...good times.

What if after picking door 3 they show you door 1 is empty? Will you change your guess?

I think this is a very strong takeaway that cant be stated enough. Over the years Ive become more and more grateful for flipping my "value investor" position on the concept of "trading". For a long time I subscribed to the notion sold by people like Buffett that "short term trading is a fools game". There is a huge contingency of "value investor" who are almost willfully proud about being stupid and dismissive of the idea of trading. They're kind of like anti vaxxers or Earth is flat folks. But the truth is that managing investments with a trading angle is a massively beneficial tool in terms of managing risk and being opportunistic. Ive read in a few places that like 85% of the markets returns occur during something like 10% of its trading days. Even with respect to this year, I had many reminders of this. Selling DDS puts and buying calls a few days before the short squeeze thesis played out after Teds 13G netted over 800% and buying $100 MSGE calls while the stock languished between $65-75 just seemed too good to be true...and paid off between 170-1600%. Being flexible in philopshy and dynamic in application was a lesson that 2020 cemented in me. Trading in a sense, is really just monetizing volatility. @John Hjorth. Sorry for your loss. It is easy to look at things in the simple good/bad context. Ive had a number of events in my life that most been would describe as "not good" or probably even much worse. At the time they are unpleasant. Painful even. But as you get through them I find them just as valuable and even more so than "good" events or memories. I dont think Id describe any of them, in hindsite, as "bad" experiences though. Same with 2020. Everything one experiences in life molds that person and their pool of wisdom/understanding. Like a video game, as you advance, having conquered past levels, you inevitably carry with you those lessons. Hopefully you and your family are well in the new year and may your brother rest in peace.

Agree that BABA is positioned nicely. Not too keen on the current market setup. But otherwise, I think you can throw darts at Sun Belt related real estate and housing stuff and make 10-15%+. Similar to last year, I'd say if you're being conservative, Berkshire Hathaway has a lot of unique things collectively converging and I am expecting it to break out in a major way. If you're willing to take a little more risk, Hamilton Thorne.

Happy New Year to everyone. 2020 wasnt a bad year, it was just a life experience. What doesnt kill you, makes you stronger and wiser. Hopefully 2021 is the start of the Roaring 20s. Cheers

Oh what a year!

Added some ARKG April puts.

Agree on giving it first to indigenous. People really dont seem to understand how far removed from the general population and societal norms most are. I remember awhile back an issue with a Bible thumper getting murdered by the Sentinelese and how they didnt even want to bother retrieving the body because of the risk of exposing these people(I think 2-3 dozen remain) to normal disease/bacteria.

Personally, after Joe won, I felt that I could trust the science again and therefor get the vaccine. Whew!

Why wouldn't we apply the same scrutiny we do to others, to the government officials who held this up for so long? Its like they're still, with some of these, dicking around and wasting time because "despite 95% efficiency, oh, 1/50,000 might get temporary Bells Palsy or have an allergic reaction", meanwhile, they continue to tell us how dangerous the world is with covid, bc 300k(1/1,000) folks have actually died. The bigger picture of all of this is utterly insane and disgraceful.

I think we can take comfort in the fact that all those people who spent 6 months politicking and spreading fear about the vaccine, cough certain politicians, made it a point to jump the line and get vaccinated....that its probably a good idea for the rest of us.

That's wild. Where did you get that information? https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/360574

What is interesting is that supposedly the Moderna vaccine was developed within 48 hours of getting the sequence, back in JANUARY! This aligns with the idea that China and others also had a vaccine quite early. So it really is true when people foot the blame on government and regulation/bureaucrats. We had the answer before a single person died of this...yet nothing was done.

Joking aside I do think the $600-$2000 of money going to poor people will actually have a more material/actionable effect on BTC than any etf index.

Just donated. Thanks for bringing this up. A truly worthwhile cause.

NY will get worse, but I dont ever see it being less desirable than Chicago. I've shifted my exposure from the office stuff to residential/retail. Blue collar jobs will still be there, as will tourists.

That seems reasonable to me. A chance to cool down. I think Cardboard added value on the investment side, and it'd be a shame to lose him permanently. Obviously this place belongs to one person, and it isn't a democracy. So that is just a suggestion not a vote. Yup. At one of the first firms I was at, one of the BSDs used to routine say to the younger guys "you know who they listen to? The producers, not the bitches in the back office"...At least there, the back office actually provided some, albeit marginal value. By and large Ive found that the people who complain or report posts, such as Sanjeev alluded to, provided little, or in many cases, no value to the site themselves. I bring this up, because just within the past page on FFH, I can highlight Viking and SharperDinegaan as folks who I know I have quite different political views from, at least in some instances. They both bring significant value on the investment side. When I see posts of theirs that lean political, the last thing on my mind is crying like a baby. I respect them as individuals and they are entitled to their views as I am mine. Even if I was appalled by the politics, without question the investment value outweighs whatever nonsense one could just easily ignore. It takes a certain mentality to be successful investing. These folks have it. I would bet bigger money most of the complainers dont. I have never in my life blocked anyone or reported a post, and I would be shocked in either of the above mentioned individuals had either. My point, is to reiterate what I asked in the prior post. What is you goal for this website Sanjeev? Is it to be more like Facebook, or VIC? Because if its investment related I'd say with confidence that the 5% of Cardboard posts relating to investments significantly outweighs what many other folks and complainers bring in their entirety, in terms of value. No one is forced to be here, but I do think there should be more skew towards being like VIC where others can watch but if you dont produce you dont have any say. Cheers. EDIT: just for honesty's sake, I will clarify that one time I reported someones post, but only out of pettiness and spite since they did it to me first.

Next legs of the recovery money flow. CLPR and IMAX(LEAPs).

It depends what markets people are referring to. The broader market? Real companies? IE S&P components? Sure. But there's plenty of signs that some of the other stuff is beginning to crack and its been occurring for weeks. For instance, there is an inevitable shift in supply demand that occurs. Over time, companies realize an outsized demand, and something as simple as an ATM will soon tap that out. A lot of the more speculative names Ive been following dont even do secondaries anymore. BEAM did an offering at 23.50 a few months ago and the stock then went to $90. So now you have companies like that just signing brokerage arrangements that are going to flood the market as long as prices stay where they are. This is just one example/data point of many. HTZ didnt stay at $5 for similar reasons. Just like AMC is inevitably going to 0 as well.

I'm sure I am up there as well. I even from time to time get DMs from people asking about stocks or wanting to shoot the shit and then I go to respond and it says they have me blocked! I dont think rubbing people the wrong way should be held against anyone. Its the internet and we(try) to deal with investing/financial markets, which is like the UFC for smart people. Folks need to toughen/lighten up. Nothing should be personal. People who complain about what others are posting are even more of a problem than those that post. It is a message board after all, no?

Jeez Sanjeev. Thats harsh. Especially when Cardboard does contribute and engage on the investment side of things. Particularly even here on FRFH in a way thats at least presenting differing viewpoints. There's so many others who dwell here that dont do shit or bring even pee wee level investment insight to the table. You've generally been fair, but occasionally, IMO, things like this go overboard. You've said for the better part of 4 months now that the new website will be up and no politics. And that until then, this site is what it is. The covid thread was allowed to be a political thread for the entire year. Getting into macro stuff begs for political pondering; I dont think thats unreasonable. Of all the shit Ive heard from Cardboard, I think banning him for this is quite petty. Sometimes its Jeckyll & and Hyde with you in regards to the bans....I say this wondering if this will be my last post as well, even though I am certainly not crossing any lines with what I am currently writing. If you dont think Prem's bearishness up to 2016 and then bullishness(under Trump) wasnt somewhat politically inspired....then I dont think you're assessing the entire picture in a thorough manner. Even if it wasnt, it certainly isnt outside the realm of consideration to try and account for that going forward. Will Prem be bearish under a regime change with the rumored objectives? IE increase taxes and greater social programs plus widespread debt relief? If you invest in fixed income this is very relevant. FFH invests in fixed income. But its your site, you do what you want. I just question whats the purpose? Investing? Or something else? I can probably list a dozen people ahead of Cardboard on the "they offer nothing" if the goal is to build an investing community....but maybe Im missing something.

ARKK, what else? My dad was asking me about a Vanguard Discretionary Consumer ETF. I looked at the thing, and 31% of the fund was Amazon and Tesla. He said it had returned 45% for the last 3 or 4 years. I told him congratulations on riding Tesla, but sell the POS immediately. All the Arks. SPAK is juicy as well. To me, its almost eerily similar to the mortgage bond stuff in a poetic sort of way. People are demanding something and the banks/firms, who give zero shits about quality, are building them these mega steaming piles of poo-poo. As a short seller, I hate the risk of single stock shorts, although I will do it anyway from time to time. So having a diversified poo-poo basket is just awesome.

Sold this, rolled profit into MSGE Feb $100 calls. Sold all but 15 contracts here. Who says you can be north of 75% of open interest on an illiquid OTM option? Also bought some mid January VIX calls, shorted some ARKK, added small amount of AMT and a few NATH. Covered the ARKK and rolled profit into ARKK puts. Bought a few CLPR with some MSGE call proceeds. Gotta keep the NY recovery theme going. Just slide further down the ladder. Also added to ZM short.

Yup. Its been topping out in slow-motion. I wouldn't fuck with the FANGs. I have a small AAPL put position and own GOOG and MSFT. The stuff you want to be hedging with and/or outright shorting is all conveniently placed inside a few of the worlds greatest ETFs.