lnofeisone

Interesting move by Exxon. $2B is a lot of motivation to hire a lawyer. https://news.bloombergtax.com/daily-tax-report/exxon-sues-eu-in-move-to-block-new-windfall-tax-ft

AMZN, GOOGL, BX, BAC, and trying to fill ORG but it may take a second.

Definitely a feat but mostly in bureaucracy. It's incredible how fast they got permits but all they did was build around 30 km of pipeline. The actual gasification is done by a ship from Hoegh. Germany did bring it online quickly which is what they needed. In 10 years, the math starts to favor land-based facilities but those take a lot longer to build and by then who knows what gas utilization will be like?

I got this using ChatGPT asking the same prompt: Unfortunately, I am not able to browse the internet or access images to assist with drawing ASCII art. I am a large language model trained by OpenAI and I can answer questions and provide information on a wide range of topics, but I am not able to access external resources or generate images. Is there something else I can help you with? And I get using OpenAI's DALLE. The hips, the face, and the positioning of people leave a lot of room for improvement.

Humans are far more nuanced than this. Let me give you an example. I get in the call and say things I want to say and don't say things I don't want to say. AI only learns based on what it sees and can't infer what I don't say. Unless you go full Bridgewater and record every call, you won't get what you need. Furthermore, how senior leaders communicate to each other is different than how they communicate to front line staff. Long waybof saying, we are still in very easy stages of ai replacing expertise. Also, check out the drawing capabilities of GPT and ask to draw people. Say something like people playing golf. Tell me what you get.

Domain specific (that's what you are referring to wrt mcat and lsat) have been a thing for 4 years or so. Google, not gpt, leads this. There are several applications used by the us govt outside of intel and dod. They are still work in progress. Don't get me wrong, for general stuff gpt is absolutely awesome but to claim it revolutionary is absurd. I think non coders were finally given a clean interface and they all think they are mathemagicians now. Great marketing, yes. Cutting edge, no. Does it have the potential to leapfrog Google, maybe. Does Google know about gpt. You bet.

I'm using Germany as proxy. Right now Germany is at roughly 15% goal of saving for household and industry. Industry is doing way better than households. Last week average temperature dropped by 0.2C and household consumption shot up. This week is expected 2C lower than average. We are in early innings of winter. So far it's been warmer but the trend has reversed. Looking at first derivative of how much gas is in storage vs. 5 year average doesn't paint a good picture. Germany publishes very good numbers if anyone is looking (https://www.bundesnetzagentur.de/EN/Areas/Energy/Companies/SecurityOfSupply/GasSupply/start.html)

Not selling is the new refilling. TIC

WE warrants. 4 years left, truly pennies. Simple theory, remote work is here to stay. Remote work will lead to lower office rentals. Office landlords will need to figure out ways to adjust (convert to residential, flexible rental models, etc.). WeWork has the infrastructure to manage buildings and do flexible demand. Who knows how much they can earn (too hard to figure out pile) but I visited a couple of offices and they are packed.

I somewhat thought that but then was wondering why not just modify the policy without all the kabuki theater.

These clowns were hilarious. Their network of wallet clusters (they had that many) and businesses were flagged and being monitored but the government only had a vague idea it was them. Ilya had a poorly encrypted file with crypto addresses and list of all the businesses through which he was laundering money in cloud storage. Getting access and decrypting the file by gov't confirmed it was all them. The file was meticulous, organized, and even color-coded. Hell, they had a ziploc back labeled "burner phone" somewhere in their apartment. Can't make this stuff up.

It's a bit more nuanced. Big fish criminals prefer to use crypto, but they don't want to hold it as an investment. Part of the reason is how aggressive (see the authorization of John Doe summons that IRS got around August this year wrt SFOX) and how capable US is in pursuing and freezing these assets. The other bit is volatility. Here is a company that does this work and publishes regular reports. It's incomplete but gives you a glimpse of what is tracked. https://blog.chainalysis.com/reports/2022-crypto-crime-report-preview-ransomware/

If inflation ticks down, TIPS principal value will go down and can go sub $100 in the interim. TIPS holder would need to hold through maturity (1/15/26 in the example above) to recover and that would make this a non-ideal situation if someone is looking to reposition from bonds to stocks.

I've heard about simulated kidnappings - where you pay someone to kidnap you. I wonder if we could have simulated communism. You know, put them into one of those east European-style communist 5 stories buildings, cut off water and electricity. Have them commit to how many days they want to spend in that heaven and don't let them out until the time is up. Winners get a one-way ticket to North Korea. I jest of course. I think Spek is right on. I had a friend in high school was an "anarchist" and didn't believe in Gov't and today he is a Gov't consultant. I think being contra is the popular thing, especially when few people know much about one's position.

What did you think of the ER? Lots of questions for this one and I'm watching form the sidelines until they provide new guidance.

Started to gently unload my CVE warrants and rotate into REITs (and looking at banks).

AIV and JOE.

I wonder if i-bonds will have a higher fixed component in the future and aren't TIPS a major tax hassle (i.e., you have to pay taxes on your principal adjustments?).

I'm chipper as well. Overall, I'm down 10% from all time high but 0 to slightly positive overall for the year. VET and CVE have been holding me steady. I've been trading around some other energy names selling a bunch during peak in the summer. Could've sold more ahead of the sell off. Getting whacked on some of the tech and other stuff (e.g., ABNB, ATUS) but sizing has been key here. Unfortunately, I didn't get on the VRE component of Gregmal ETF but starting to look post energy (maybe Feb/March) to start rotating into the likes of Joe and BAC/WFC.

I would certainly not oppose it if someone could swoop in and buy it out at $100/share. Realistically, I think it will be a slow and steady grind and maybe we get to $40 but the rest will be driven by NBP/TTF. Too much of VET's earnings is beholden to it.

That would be interesting for sure. I think banks will first lend at high rates while suffer losses. At some point, the economy starts to rebound and losses diminish and that's when earnings are going to start really coming through. My guess (hope)6-9 months. My strategy is to redeploy energy sells into banks and slowly building out few large positions in things like JOE.

7 hours?!?!?!? I like his data-focus but always bucket him as "top range" of the valuation spectrum. Wasn't he the one that thought VET will be at least $50 by DEC and worth $100 or so. I'm a seller at $35-40.

China has the largest extraction capability but they also have the largest reserves. 20x of what US has (on average across all rare earths) Sure, a lot of extraction IP and tech went to China, but it was only a matter of time before they would dominate. In fact, having them export as much as they can makes everyone else's resources more valuable.

Probably related to our last few posts. Looks like the energy companies are stepping up their PR game just in time before the elections. In the last few weeks I've heard a lot of commercials on the radio and billboard from companies that have no business advertising to general public highlighting energy affordability and reliability. For example, energy transfer, enbridge, Philips 66 on the radio. There is a huge poster right on north capitol st ne, a mile north of the capitol with tellurian advertisement. I asked people I'm with I'd they know any of these concerns and the answer I almost always a resounding no. Also, nobody in DC would ever be a direct consumer of any of these.

@Sweet - it's not uncommon for EM to have growing economies while stocks underperform. Brazil is a good example. Mexico too. Mexico has a couple of airports discussed on the board but investing in them doesn't guarantee anything. The investment is beholden to political whims and currency issues. If China's GDP is indeed 40% of what it is today, that has some very serious ramifications for companies like BABA/TCEHY as they are much bigger and much more important than we understood them. That's a big deal and provides a new light as to why Xi cracked down on them so much.