Gregmal

I was looking at this stock for some year end dislocations, but there isn’t much volume. I don’t think their last acquisition indicates that management is selective about where to put their money either. Shopping malls in Jacksonville ? http://ir.ctlc.com/file/Index?KeyFile=401493134 The main driver right now, as you pointed out, is probably the volume. Any half observant investor sees that, yet Mr. Institution somehow just decided to blow out 250k+ shares in what seems to be a few days...genius. I wanted to double check my cynicism, but a look at the rest of the V3 portfolio was just as baffling and confirmed that these guys just have poor judgment. I am having a hard time reconciling the volumes, so perhaps the company took some of the shares privately, although Im almost positive theyre currently in a blackout, so not sure how that works. But what an idiot. They've been monsters repurchasing shares since Winters left and would have happily taken down those shares if this guy wasn't interested in packing up and going on vacation....I'm all for using 4% debt to buy as many shares $15+ below the low end of NAV. The Jacksonville purchase isn't totally out of nowhere. They already owned several outparcels at St Johns from another deal. Simon owns the other half and its a very upscale retail corridor. I can live with it at a mid-high single digit cap rate and their track record in Florida, which is very good. I'd rather they stick to Florida than try to be heroes buying crap like Party City and Joanne's up in NY and MA...I also think the property serves other purposes; mainly I believe it will be mortgaged in order to retire the convertible note in early March. Getting rid of that poison pill is huge and basically puts the company in play. Either way, at a $280M m/c and a few upcoming catalysts, its one of the few things not nosebleed expensive right now I justify chucking money at a little bit.

Added a little CTO. Always amusing how the brainiacs at these "institutional" firms can be so stupid. Yea...great time to liquidate your funds position; 3 days before Xmas, during blackout... LOL dopes

Whoa whoa whoa... you mean to tell me that as an established fund manager with a real business you don’t live in a giant mansion paid for by extracting fees from people?? All jokes aside it’s refreshing every once in a while running into someone in the financial industry who isn’t a totally selfish piece of shit only concerned with stuffing as much money as possible into their pockets. Cuz it’s like 98.5% of them.

You can find a $1500 garage door and a $5000 entry door just as easy as you can find a $10,000 garage door and an $800 entry door. The prices will vary but if you shop around you can get to wherever you want on pricing on the hardware. Installation is always where people get fleeced. For certain tasks, such as something like this, I ve had much better luck ordering the part and having it shipped to the house, and then paying a quality handyman any variation of an hourly rate or a per day rate. ($40-$75 per hour and $300-$600 per day would be a reasonable range)

Maybe its over simplifying it, but my understanding of outflows has always related to ETF and funds and is as simple as the net of new investor money vs existing investor money. You have $1M of new shares issued but $5M worth of existing investors requesting redemptions... thats $4M net outflow. This wouldn't be something that applied to individual securities IMO.

I would add this useless but fun supplementary note on the WFC trade, relating to a scenario mentioned in terms of theoreticals... something Ive done once or twice with similar situations... should the stock somehow blow up($45 as I mentioned is a very powerful support level) you can always run it back so to speak and then go short the long dated $55 puts as well. I like scenarios where worst case is you own a quality company. A lot of my MSG exposure over the years has been rolling very deep in the money calls and shorting deep in the money puts.

sold a little TPL at 765 into the closing spike

I am in total agreement. I bought MO $52.50 Jan 2020 Calls in late July of 2018 (equity was at $58) for a premium of $8. They went up slightly after purchase & then plummeted along with the equity. If I would've just bought the equity, I would've been able to hold on for what will probably hopefully be a gain over the next few years. I also bought MO $50 Jan 2021 Calls in late Nov of 2018 (equity was at $53 BTFD) for a premium of $7.50. I have watched a similar but less drastic drop in these options & a slight recovery since. If I'm lucky the 2021 Calls will get me close to breakeven on the option debacle. I was trying to replicate my luck years before with Edwards Lifesciences Calls, where the options nearly paid for my equity. This was an expensive, but not debilitating, lesson & I believe that from now on I'll leave the long Call trading to the experts. Not every situation is right. Especially with a big dividend player like MO, with that type of premium and only a 6% floor(53 spx - 50 strike) puts you at a disadvantage. Ideally you want as little premium as possible. The $45 WFC calls are about $9 vs a $53.7 spx. If it goes up your pretty much getting 1 for 1 returns vs having to calculate for premiums and whatnot. If it goes down, then you still, and also beneficially, have some protection, IE if it went to $45 your $9 call would be greater than 0 assuming its a short term move and a longer dater option.

Not to sound like RuleNumberOne, but theres not too much to be high conviction on here, right now, when the market is going up .5% every day. I expect WFC to rally a few bucks into the January earnings. I retain the option to maintain a position thereafter via the calls, but have some flexibility in between without a big capital outlay. Theres worse things to own than a small bit of WFC

Hopefully the new CEO won’t do write downs, like many new CEOs like to do. Yeah, or set the future bar low, so he can easily jump over it. FWIW, I don’t like banks right now - potential for lower NIM and higher loan losses. Greg, why the 45s? Just leverage ? A few reasons, women similar to what Dynamic stated. First, it is leverage, yes. Second is that $45 is where you had all that support during the worst of times right after the account opening scandal. If it held there, then, it would take one hell of a meltdown to take it below there on a short term basis. It hasn't done anything the past month or so; my hope is that something will give. The big banks are still modestly inexpensive and reasonably high quality. So there could be some catching up to do, especially with Wells. I dont entirely anticipate holding it through earnings. We've got a nice runway until then. One of the easiest and most repeatable trades ever was buying Apple a few weeks before earnings and then flipping it the day of, between 2012-2014 it worked like clockwork. You could always still hold, especially if you get yourself a big enough cushion. So basically, with the $45s, I have enough leverage where a move of a few bucks up can work, but enough of a cushion where if it doesnt do anything or goes down a bit, I can always just exercise the call and hold the position. In which case I own WFC- theres worse things in the world. AND if there is such a scenario where the $45 mark comes into question, then it'll obviously be something extraordinary, in which case having the position on will likely prompt me to dig into the potential opportunity much more thoroughly than if I just had it on the potential watch list with a gazillion other companies, while at the same time still limiting my losses.

Bought a few WFC $45 calls. Looking for a run into earnings.

PACB, HHC, 700.hk

I'm in Northern NJ, so probably a little different than the Westchester/White Plains area, but similar characteristics. I haven't noticed or heard much about the rent control effects, but 10000% have seen the impact of SALT. Any home over $500K is impaired. Which is not to say it doesnt move, but you've seen a major slowdown with anything in that price range and up. Especially the McMansions. The machine looks like it will keep moving, but is taking time to digest the fact a lot of buyers are leaving the market. By me(Morris/Sussex/Warren Counties) you're basically able to buy homes that several years ago were $700-800k for high 500s/low-mid 600s. A $500K home in this area carries about a $17K+ annual property tax bill. Which for my rentals, works great, because its increased the demand for the lower tier properties. And also given me a speculative angle to acquire more properties with the eventual assumption that Washington repeals the $10K SALT deduction limit. Bergen County, for the most part, has slightly lower taxes, but that $800k-$1.2M range has gotten whacked. I would think the closer to NYC you get, the less obvious the effect, but its still there. And on a side note, regarding really low end, my brother in law was recently telling me about owning/operating trailer park rentals in Florida...the returns would blow your mind....

It all depends but Ill typically look at 15-20% LTV. My objective is to maintain a reasonable(and stable, meaning I keep buying semi regularly) allocation to this stuff but not allocate too much of my cash to it. So maybe in one instance I'll do 15% with a 15 year mortgage and after 12 months the PMI falls off and I get a favorable tax reassessment and year two my numbers look much better. Or in another I'll just do a traditional 30 yr knowing my payments will be nothing and eventually Ill get the taxes dropped 15% and a tenant in there on a 2-3 yr term and just throw the extra cash back against the principal. My first one I bought in my mid/late 20s was as follows $140K purchase price 20% down @4.875 rate, total nut about $1100 + $335 HOA 2 weeks to find tenant @1575 per month(first year I own the unit I try to stay 1yr or less on term so I can feel things out better and line up future tenants) appealed taxes and dropped assessed value from $165k to $145k 5 years or so later they're selling maybe mid $160s, rents are ~$1700, monthly mortgage is a hair under $1100 and HOA is $344. Typically Ive been able to find tenants within 7-14 days. Longest it ever took was about a month, but my pricing was aggressive. Ive found lowballing your ask on the rent is useful because it creates a rush of demand. You can then instruct your agent to either have a bidding war or negotiate a longer term multi year lease at the ask with higher quality prospects. But that is also out of the gate after taking ownership. As bizaro said, once someone is in there, its easy to show the place once you have 30-60 days notice. What I'd point out, as a born and raised Bergen County guy and life long NJ/NY area fellow, is that what Bronx/Brooklyn/Queens etc benefit from on a hyper growth scale, the suburbs do too in a much more subdued fashion. I remember playing hockey up by the Pallisades in the mid 90s and driving through Mahwah NJ. It was basically farmland and considered the boondocks. Today its multi million dollar homes. Oakland and Hawthorne were for poor people. Now they're $600K for a 3/2 1500 sq ft home. Its the NYC worker drift. That band of commuters to Bergen County and NYC keeps getting pushed out. Further down 80 and 287. I know people who commute to NYC from Hackettstown and even parts of PA. So the area I live/invest benefits from that and also having a great school system. Always buy the lowest cost admission ticket to the best show in town. People will always need a place to live, people will always aspire to live in nice neighborhoods, parents will always want the best schools for their kids, and old people will always want to hang around but downsize. I want nothing to do with traditional single family. The cost, whether financial or time wise of having to do something as simple as mow a lawn once a week is a major pain in the ass. Let alone the real shit. Roofing is a nightmare. So are many other major things that as a homeowner I dread and dont want any part of when managing my properties(Plus a good HOA manager will get community discounts for those services as well). Again, I dont try to do anything heroic; I started simply figuring I'd throw low 5 figures into something and hope it paid for one of my kids college tuition. But like anything else where theres money to be made I got addicted when I saw it work.

From that, I'll just point out the following.... 100% of the outcome will be determined by these few things. 1. What boxes are checked on your investment objective profile you filled out? 2. How long did you hold the investments in question? 3. What type of trading arrangements(if any) do you have for the account? Did you consent to purchasing those securities? If you've been with this advisor for a while, had lets say "speculation" as your IO, held the stocks in question for several months or more, and gave the OK to purchase them, Im sorry to say, but you're wasting your time pursuing this. If you have Income/preservation of capital checked for IO, bought the securities a few weeks/maybe months ago, had a discretionary arrangement, and no knowledge of the purchases, then you've got a pretty good case. Usually things are somewhere in between. I'd also add, go to the firms compliance first. Dont go to FINRA. The reason is simple. The firm is 1000% required to disclose any written customer complaint to FINRA. And you can always go to FINRA later. But should they rebuff you, and then later on it is disclosed that they never disclosed the complaint to FINRA, thats just another instance of wrongdoing and negotiating chip in your corner. Quanitify the amount of alleged damages as well. Anything over $5000 they must update on their BrokerCheck profiles.

As follows 1br $1600-1700(towards the lower end you can take your pick of high quality tenants with 700+ credit scores), HOA $330-$350, taxes ~$4700, market value currently ~$160K per(pre 2008 sales where mid 200s) 2br $2200-2400(same as above wrt tenant quality) HOA $400 or so, taxes $6500, market value currently around $250-270k (pre 2008 300s) Here's the reason those numbers work though.. theres ZERO market for $3000 per month and up rentals here. So under $2500 and especially $2000 per month is super competitive. This is just a specific community I have multiple properties in, but by and large those numbers are in the ballpark for what I look for. Again I would reiterate that the way I am investing in the stock market, I need to be consumed by it and its heavily taxing mentally. So with these, Im not looking to have ridiculous returns, but simply have something simple that takes care of itself and does better than the passive 3-5% I'd get elsewhere putting in no effort. I also try to stay disciplined and avoid concentration risk. I'd like to get a few mil face value of properties; ie something that spits off a decent chunk of cashflow, but also something that is reasonable enough in size to offload to a local HNW investor if I ever wanted liquidity and found selling more attractive than the alternatives.

Gregmal, can you elaborate at all on this? Do you tend to buy homes, townhouses or apartment style condos? Do you rent the whole unit out or split it up? I tend to stick to condos. Its incredibly useful x-ing out many of the traditional home owner problems. Roof, siding, decks...not my issue. Everyone pays in and then you also get the added property manager benefit. It also helps when you have relationships within the community(for instance I had the old, underperforming property manager fired and brought in my choice for a replacement). For me, it is a must to have knowledge of the area and reliable vendors. Good HVAC people are money in the bank. A sub $50 an hour handyman; gold. Perhaps I'm just biased because of where I live, but Ive found the sweet spot for renting in being in an area that is fringe. Closer to big cities you have rower rents relative to purchase price. Too rural and your rents are a tad higher(on a % basis) but you won't ever really get appreciation. So stay in between. Sweet spot IMO is 1-2br floor units in good areas. Good for old people with accessibility issues(ie stairs), great for divorced people in transition, and good for small families looking to get into a good school system.

No I have never been a part of one, but as an advisor, I can tell you how to get it going. The easiest step would be to email compliance@ the firm with your complaint. They MUST document these when received in writing. What is the nature of your alleged complaint? In many cases, the firms will offer to settle if there is any wrong doing. If you can not agree to settle, then the arbitration process will be next. Although often arbitration is a pain and there s a lot of grey areas where you may think you were harmed but nothing happened that technically broke the rules. You also end up paying lawyers quite a bit of money. So it s important to make sure your case is valid, and that its worth pursuing from a time and money perspective. And like I said, often, the firms will just look to settle it. I know several dudes who own firms that describe paying fines as just another cost of being in the biz. Sad but true.

Sold small PLCE position from yesterday. Not looking to make anything retail a core position, so Ill just take 6% in 24 hours and call it a day.

Which will then become the crescendo; the blow off top; the euphoric rally that signals the end is near!

Started a small position in PLCE under 55. May write it up later... Interesting company in an interesting space. Yes...retail

closed for $1.5 in a half hour

shorted some EVER

Exited BLUE trade from Friday and trimmed a bit more CLF

PureCycle Now derisked with Phase I concluding in the next year, phase II overlap starting in the summer, almost $2B in eventual asset value, a debt free balance sheet, no question about profitability, and earnings that should compound impressively for the next decade at least...all taking place in a top MSA, 4 miles from DIA...