Gregmal

Kinda but not all teaser. Toll is offering 5.5% fixed on a lot of inventory homes. There’s again this recurring theme that the big will just get bigger. How does a local builder compete with that?

Yea this is kinda emblematic of the decades old problem. Fortune 500 America has systematically ground employees down to where they just don’t have a real career path upward unless they move. Made them truly believe they are interchangeable and replaceable. I’ve mentioned before my sister at Lockheed has a good job. But is probably paid 80% of the fair market rate for her job. If you go to management and ask for a raise they just tell you to wait til next annual review except even those never eclipse 3-5%. My wife was super loyal to a similar large corporation because there was a decent work/life balance. She got offered 35% more from a headhunter with the catch being she had go in full time. So she went to HR and said she’d stay for a 15% raise as long as she could continue doing hybrid. They agreed and then 3 months later reneged and said everyone back to the office 4 days a week. See ya. She left. Establishment corporate America is finally getting what it deserves. There’s reasons wages haven’t kept up with inflation now for 5 fuckin decades! It’s got nothing to do with anything occurring in the last 3 years. Hopefully the Fed isn’t fully able to stop the current momentum in favor of their lobbyist and corporate friends.

Yea outside of now even the people calling for a housing crash seeming to have pulled a 180(lol), the report today seemed perfectly consistent with what a more or less best case scenario would be. Jobs still strong. Wages moderating. Seems perfect setup to get the Fed their pointless but desired final 25 bps hike. I wouldn’t be shocked to see a bit of a flare up, but then you turn around and apparently $10 a barrel fell off the past week. Gas prices at the pump are coming down. Rents are solid but not moving anywhere really. I haven’t really been doing a ton lately in the market other than cleaning a few things up and cashing in hedges, I have what I like and otherwise it just seems there’s a ton of people screaming for attention with their forecasts but most of it is more geared towards next week or next month and I just don’t care about that stuff at all. My guess is the outlook everyone had in July is still the outlook. Solid economy, solid jobs, one more hike, then hold for a few years. Not something that should be creating brown stains in ones undies.

The other issue is that most of these guys are egomaniacs and even when you do get some turbulence just never know when to stop. We saw it all last year. Even after 20-30% drawdowns they just couldn’t help themselves and stocks were “still expensive” and whatnot. It’s just a passion for them. They love attention. They love the highs of getting that 1/20 call right where everyone goes wow these guys made a ton of money when everyone else lost their shirt. It’s just another equivalent of having your own art museum or putting your name on a building. A pursuit for those who’s egotistical satisfaction supersedes their desire for more money.

No news the company is aware of, per the Chief Executive.

Didn’t see anything. Dropped Wolf a quick message but I’m out shopping for a solid slab of spare ribs to smoke this afternoon so pretty much just going off the tape in front of me. $1.07-1.12 got a handful.

Bought some more HTL on the dip

What puzzles me is why people and outlets keep getting away with making all these “economy is in free fall” claims? Like that’s clearly not the case. Most of the economy is showing it’s both sound and resilient. And despite this, for the past two years we ve had people unaccountable for repeated claims to the contrary. I guess this is why I just prefer the stock market vs listening to every asshole looking for attention, or subscribers, or just ego stroking. In the market you can typically see the value of your opinions. Everywhere else it seems people just become broken records figuring hey or I hold on long enough eventually I’ll get to take my victory lap. It’s pathetic.

For all the bond fanfare, it honestly seems no better or different than stocks in that it’s a pickers market. The arguments so far have been bonds did great “here or there” but it then gets diced up and turns out long bonds did well here but lost 50% last few years. So then it’s short term bonds and notes but then you expand the timeline and those do terrible over the long haul. It’s no different at all than stocks. Buyer beware. The search for a magic cure all within the investor world continues. So far the one winner unfortunately seems to be index trackers and Berkshire.

Humor often adds context but it’s true. Like the best compliment most of these guys can receive is some variation of “oh you’re so smart” or “wow that’s a really insightful bit of analysis”….stuff that gets other people talking about them. Much is marketing because they are analysts; they don’t actually lift weight. Ask for performance numbers or even just a lame, raw, aggregate of hit rate of their predictions…eh we don’t go there. Example right now? See all those people who were super bearish sub SPY 4000 claiming “called it’s” and “told you sos” about the yield curve correcting and resulting in a market decline? They werent right. They missed the money making opp. But that’s not what they were ever after.

Yea watch long enough and you’ll see that the urge to be bearish, let alone really bearish, is often symptomatic of a small penis and a really deep need to be viewed as highly intelligent and sophisticated. Those things trump the urge to make money, which put those people in direct contrast to why most of us are in the market.

Those experts also bid DHI do like $70 last year and one Im pissed I didn’t pull the trigger in, FOR to like 40% of book. It’s really just another example of how quirky short term can get when the end product(listed stock) is basically just some vehicle for every two bit chump to gamble on a macro trade. Housing cant break because the Fed trapped everyone. My area is probably the poster boy for this. Not a ton of space to build, but there is some. Most of it though is zoned for AG or non residential use. The cost to build is too prohibitive, so no one is doing that. Inventory of homes is down 60% from pre COVID. People have both huge amounts of equity and sub 4% mortgages…the hell they’re ditching those. Easier to just tap a heloc if need be. Prices keep rising. Despite what the people staring at stock prices have to say.

It’s all just about routine and discipline. For a while I had a really easy one down. Breakfast, 4oz package smoked salmon and an avocado, 550 calories, costs less than $10. Lunch, some variation of a chicken Caesar Salad, 650 calories, costs like $5. Dinner, half pound of shrimp with a bit of rice or pasta. 600 calories, $12 3 Natty Light, 300 calories, $2.25 Was the shit. Might start again.

I mean if you stay under 2000 calories a day it’s incredibly hard to gain weight, especially with modest movement. The problem is, go to any restaurant, and you’ll see everyone’s been conditioned to eat 1500 calories a meal. And then snack in between.

Is it that hard to just walk 10,000-15,000 steps a day and stick to 3 meals? Even if 2-3 of those meals are fast food you’re probably ok. It’s like everywhere you look, government spending, personal consumption, even the sizes of the dishes you see at restaurants, cars, the obsession with social media, the shoes people wear these days….it just screams no self control or discipline.

Closed this out which now makes the higher leverage MGK puts totally on the house and then some. Also funded more Nintendo

And there exactly is the somewhat higher level truth. Which, not that I totally agree with it, is why there’s actually a decently logical case for owning some of these mega caps like Apple over bonds. Inflation protection. That and then there’s also the whole “hold to maturity” thing. Everyone thinks it’s just as easy as “holding”, but then the clock starts. How many 15/20/30 year horizons does one get in an investing lifetime? You can’t really find a single 20 year stretch in history where purchasing power didn’t greatly erode over a couple decades. That’s when you realize stocks are obviously better.

Think again, surprise, surprise, Tepper is pretty on point. No need to shit your pants, just recognize this ain’t the market of the most recent decade. Similar to what Ackman has said in its basis. You can absolutely own stocks. But fundamentals and valuations need to be in line with the current environment. My interpretation, fundamental investing matters once again, and that’s great.

This is the risk I see over the next 6 months or so. Nothing to do with PE multiples or bond rates or any of the smart guy stuff. It’s now psychological. No one’s made money in many stocks now for years. The shorts got wrung out, frustrated, and many even then went long. The longs got crushed and then got their recovery exit bounce. I don’t think prices are extreme by and large, but who’s left to buy here? Anyone really super excited about Apple or Amazon here?

Herman Wiemer Riesling is terrific

You must be wealthy. I do it up with Natty Light. Loved it as a kid. Never really understood why I needed to arbitrarily find something else to like just cuz I got older LOL. Although my bourbon habit has gotten a little fancy lately. Cant win em all I guess.

I agree to an extent but I think the real problem is whats "sinister" and whats being used as an excuse for the "inflation" handwaving. The issue is there has been no wage growth. For decades now. In 2007 a 30 pack of Natty was $15 and today its $19. so I guess where you get your beer depends. But in terms of life and living? Most people have been raped by big government/corporations and institutional wealth accumulation. Wage growth has really gone nowhere because the dynamic of power never lies with the laborers. GFC happens, largely caused by big corporations and government officials, and whats the end result? Many people lost their jobs and those that didnt took huge paycuts and were told to be grateful. At best, unless they are ladder jumping aggressively, the best they can hope for annually is 3% raises but unless you worked for a government agency, you didnt even get that. Most spent the past decade being told to take 2% and like it. We FINALLY just had a situation where the laborer was in control, finally about to turn the tables a little bit, and these guys used fake inflation driven predominantly by supply chain and covid restriction related issues, as the excuse to deliberately put an end to it. Its a real tragedy.

Generally speaking? Yes. Thats what happens when you have a government and their cahoots openly boasting of their desire to destroy jobs, crush wages for 90% of the population, and promote energy policies that will ultimately just cripple the affordability of whats left for anything else.

Devaluation of cash is just part of life and living in a developed society; its been occurring forever. My father still talks about how you used to be able to buy hanger steaks for $5 a pound too. Its like yea I know, and Im sure you also used to walk 7 miles a day to get to school, in the snow. What was happening pre covid, was never an issue. The issue and where everyone got up in arms, was what happened during and following covid. Except thats entirely over and all thats left hanging around is directly caused by these people. And yet they are still feeding us this stuff that just doesnt add up and defies logic.

I mean the answer is as old as time and no one has ever really presented any sort of valid point saying anything BUT THIS should be done. Build more! Riddle me this, with prices so high, why arent builders blasting out homes like theyre Big Mac meals? Because rates are too high for it to make any sense. Why are rents "stubbornly high"? Well cuz no one can afford to buy a home. Remember all the concern in 2021 that we were headed for a housing crash because experts like Ivy Zelman were projecting a 2M per year build rate? Jerry took care of that. Why? Especially if he's trying to solve the largest contributor to inflation...housing.