Gregmal

You’d have to be on the very short duration side then though. Longer duration will get blasted if there’s real inflation. Rate increases or not.

Took some of these off and split the proceeds into Fairfax and some Novembers.

The GFC 2.0 narrative was and is very popular and I guess I took it at face value and saw how preposterous that was fundamentally. But maybe I missed it. What was one of the underlying mechanism the propelled GFC….banks, hedge funds, academics telling the Fed and treasury… “bubbles are regional, defaults are rare. Housing only goes up. Derivatives don’t need to be regulated, they only stabilize the economy”. Just as they bet on the exact opposite. Same stuff seems to be going on here and while I don’t think it’s occurred yet in the real world, we are seemingly getting close to seeing some real destruction. What a shame it would be if we killed one of the greatest economies we ve had, because the jobs market was so good folks were telling Howard Hughes to fuck off at their $25 an hour waitstaff positions…

You see it all over. Folks who says they believe in inflation sitting on cash and buying bonds lol. My guy I just shared the email from…”in the 80s they had to raise to double digit so they have to do that again. Inflation is 8%. Buy me 5% bonds!” LOL obviously you either don’t understand inflation or don’t believe you’re really losing 3% purchasing power.

Exactly and if you look at the positioning that’s exactly what everyone lobbying the inflation narrative is really betting on. It’s remarkable how rigged this stuff can be once you step back. They’ve got Powell thinking he s saving the poor people who are both too dumb to ask for raises but simultaneously getting massive raises and driving a non existent wage price spiral lol.

If this were true, and there was real genuine inflation like in the 70s, how do we explain the wide scale collapse in demand for mortgages, or even more broadly plenty of other things that should be beneficiaries of such accommodation? This all again just points me to the fact that the academics and folks talking up inflation are really just betting on the opposite. Otherwise, wouldn’t all these things be behaving the way they did in the 70s. Over the last 6-9 months we ve run fully through just about everything, from 2x4s to used cars, then to mortgages, then to wheat and gas, only to have the same thing occur. Now we re on the last leg and trying to kill jobs. Seems 100% like a let’s manufacture a recession playbook than a let’s stop inflation one. I got a pretty remarkable email from an old investor asking about buying tons of US based bonds at 4-5%. This guy missed the entire decade rally owning cds and crap like that. Right now it’s a full blown case of the revenge of the savers dominating the narrative lobbying for more interest.

NG was a big deal but what about wheat? Wasn't the entirety of the supply supposedly in Ukraine and Russia and a crisis on our hands as far as food went? There are definitely complexities specific to each of these things, but generally, stuff thats never really been all that hard to produce isnt going to all of a sudden become so by orders of magnitude, and then just stay there. You need a long term imbalance coming from something sustainable.

Machismo and war tend to go hand in hand. Whomever thinks theyre winning typically thinks they'll win. Same with sports. Its why the top investment firms often looks for athletes from the top universities to hire.

Biden meddling again? You dont say.

I am probably more multiple personality disorder in terms of some of the variances and contradictions with my investment strategy. But a huge part of that is compartmentalization. More core stuff I almost never trade. Just look to buy stuff you can own for decades and always be accumulating.

Let’s be fair here, there isn’t a whole lot Howard Hughes can do competently, outside of maybe the MPC game. Even there, they sat on some of the most desired locations and markets going into COVID and have produced significant per share losses in value. If you want to see what the real players in the NYC restaurant game do, I can probably make some introductions. But it’s certainly not HHC you want to use as a bell weather.

https://www.homedepot.com/p/2-in-x-4-in-x-96-in-Prime-Kiln-Dried-Douglas-Fir-Stud-785326/202046915 Not long ago these bad boys were $12 and people thought it was because….well, I don’t know what they thought but apparently the supply chain getting fixed wasn’t enough, until it was. Shortly thereafter most were convinced used cars were appreciating assets. Target and the like then shocked the world ordering wayyyy too much stuff that couldn’t be produced in an overheated economy…until it was. Inflation is sinister because it’s like looking for something that keeps changing.

Outside the box thought. NYC specifically has a pretty big labor shortage problem and a pretty big homeless problem….hmmmm. I don’t think you need a Ron De Santis to solve this.

It all depends on case by case but the larger question is how unique are the assets, how severe the downturn, and whether you like the way the company is managed. JOE was at $22 pre COVID and if you don’t think 170k acres and some trophy resorts has seen some value increase in an area where home values have increased 2-4x then just move on lol. Fundamentals are great and just cuz folks who would have rather owned HHC 100% higher than JOE 50% lower still feel the same way doesn’t mean anything more than that….i kid, I kid, I know! AIV a monkey can look at, see Jon Litt…and get to 12/13 minimum. The assets are greatly spread location wise and you have hard catalysts. A sale probably occurs and if not you still just own great assets at a discount to a fast growing NAV. Housing is fundamental to everything and so systematically important it’s probably one of the least risky places to be IMO, especially longer term, especially in light of the overall shortage, and especially in good areas. So just do what you are comfortable with and try to carve out the noise and focus on what’s really important.

All you need to do to see how this plays out without some sort of academically inspired interference is look at tech and see what happened to all those companies that 12-18 months ago totally misread the COVID inspired demand surge and hired way too many people only to start laying them off a mere 3-6 months later. Before rate hikes and all. Peloton and Zoom certainly didn’t need the Feds help with anything. Supply and demand usually work on their own if given appropriate time.

This again though is where it’s like ok wait a minute, can we apply some common sense here….look at that time line…is it really shocking that in city like NY, which only went full open around…March or so, that demand is off the charts for restaurant and entertainment? This is unhealthy and needs to be stopped? I mean I’m sure you recall that even as recently as December and January the city was forcing closures and carding 5 year olds. Now these businesses get to have their day and the academics say it must be stopped? Look at the reporting segments at MSGE or if you know anyone in the restaurant space ask them…and tell me the labor shortage is really hurting business. These business are finally open and able to literally charge whatever they want for the time being, after enduring absolutely ridiculous circumstances, and folks want to take that away too? Again, some of this shit is just beyond comprehension.

Bad news for everything but AIV. Since obviously stocks are down on the year and short term stock market prices apparently equal the fundamentals. Only AIV is doing well by that metric. Thankfully you and I know how to pick ‘em @Ulti

This was last trip with Paul.

Few cod and a blue shark on a day trip with Dave. Which are awesome eating(the cod). Always wanted to try Thresher. Fun fact is Paul Hebert who is a fishing genius got into trouble claiming disability while the fucker was fishing on the show. Gives perspective to how fortunate people like us are while guys like that deal with real shit just hoping to make a few hundred bucks. My main guys I fish with are in the Keys are never on shows like that; Paul Ross on Relentless is a fishing god as is Nick Stanzyck. But TJ and Tyler from Tuna most of their money not related to the show is out of Florida.

Maybe it’s Toll or Lennar short term, but long term those getting fucked and going out of business are the ones like my buddy who’s a three man construction shop seeing demand in his are go to zero because his market is folks who think the system is about to shut down

Those are indeed mediocre; they can’t really compete with big established ones, and most were either destroyed or put on life support with COVID. I’ve mentioned before all the great little toy stores my kids loved pre COVID. They were on life support before, obliterated during, many left, and what’s left is hanging on by a prayer and currently getting hammered by their higher end customer pulling back because of fears of the “great reset”. Perception after a while matters. Especially with such a narrative consuming MSM. If you don’t think do, see how many financial firms were harmed during GFC on little more than rumor.

What’s cool if you’re really into it and live somewhere around the northeast is you can book those guys for fishing trips at not much more than you’d pay for a regular trip anywhere else. Dave Marciano and Paul Hebert are awesome dudes.

^^ Yup. People forget that this was the first summer much of the country was fully free and open again. Theres an immediate rush. You'll pretty much pay any price to go do those experience/lifestyle things again that were taken away from you, and then you get over it and revert to how you lived pre covid. Especially when prices in the long run are exaggerated to the upside. This is like capitalism and economics 101. I would have paid $1000 to go to a baseball game in 2020. When I was able to again, I did. Then it was out of my system and I haven't been back even for $250. Im at Crystal Springs this weekend with the family for Oktoberfest. No joke crowds are like triple what they were when they had it last year as a scaled down half assed event. Probably a little bigger than 2019. Its again, normal and expected human behavior to want to play rather than work after the past 2 years. But eventually they'll need to pay for it consistently, or stop. The free money stopped last year. Probably by Spring '23 things across the country look like 2019, IMO.

Wicked Tuna is neat too. Many of the same characteristics. A bunch of rich kids but also some of the old timers. Spend a week at sea, hope for no mechanical issues and reasonable weather, spend 5 hours fighting a 200-500 lb bluefin, come back and hope for $5k gross before crew splits and fuel/bait costs.

I mean we don’t recall when March/April 2020 rolled around and folks were flabbergasted there was soup can and toilet paper shortages? Prices went through the roof. Where were the academic studies calling for rate hikes because of insidious inflation? Were we still waiting on Fred Mishkin and the like to ink their consulting contracts before taking our short positions? Or maybe we just realized it was a product of the time and would pass in time….