Sweet

A couple of years ago I had all sorts of people telling me they owned crypto. Mail man, guy who did building work around the house, most shocking of all was a few girls in work. I asked each of them whether they owned stocks and none did, one even replied they were too risky. This a long way of saying that I don’t think Bitcoin is in the early adoption phase as all.

The high price second hand car market was helping their earnings since they were getting higher prices for their rental cars. That’s likely gone and not coming back. They should have paid down debt.

Volatility is just crazy on these, worse than oil and gas and that’s saying something. I think if there is a play here is Hertz warrants. No position and none likely, but still watching, if it gets very low there may be a way to play it.

What his management fee lol?

These things are not the same.

I don’t know why all these hedge fund guys love China so much. Yes there are stocks that look appealing there but the country is run by Xi and your investments are at risk to his whims. Some will say the same kind of risks exist in the West, in some ways yes, but there is a strong rule of law that’s a pain in an ass to change with adversarial politics and journalism. You don’t have those protections in China. Your beloved CEO could disappear of the face of the earth. I could never understand why Warren and Charlie invested there, always felt it was hypocritical and in contradiction to some of the other values they espouse because when you buy China you’re partnering with the CCP whether you want to admit it or not. What have Charlie and Warren said repeatedly for years about picking partners?

Can’t remember the posters name, but there is a guy in the Citi thread who believes Buffett has been buying the stock.

I don’t think the Fed should cut too much. Definitely not below 4%. I don’t think we should ever go back to super low interest rates as a ‘normal’. The economy is looking strong at the moment. The biggest risk potential risk to that is reducing the deficit spending which has got to happen some time. Deficit is now 6.3% of GDP it needs to come below economic growth for debt-GDP to start dropping.

Watched these years ago when I was a 20 something. Friedman tackled a range of beliefs I had at the time and just undressed and exposed how silly some of them were. I think what u learned most is that there are a whole load of secondary consequences that Friedman could see and understood that I didn’t. Clever guy.

Read as much as I could from his Twitter post. He’s right about the media unfortunately.

Thanks for the explanation

Can we really call this an approach when it’s pretty much what everyone is doing? Approach is just as much the how than the what.

What do you mean by this mattee? I think it is possible we have a decade of sideways movement which is fine so long as you can pick your spots. I do think we aren't going to get the 7-8% return buying at this level unless the economy kills it.

I haven’t crunched the numbers in this so it might be worth digging a little deeper for yourself: ”The S&P 500 has a forward price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of about 15.5x excluding the Magnificent Seven, while the Magnificent Seven has a P/E of about 35x, according to data compiled by FactSet as of January 2, 2024.” https://www.capitalgroup.com/institutional/insights/articles/magnificent-seven-chart-diversify.html#:~:text=The S%26P 500 has a,as of January 2%2C 2024. It’s not hard to find sectors at single digit or low double digit PE’s if you go looking. AI type stocks are a bit speculative however I’m not see a broad market bubble.

Deficit spending probably can’t continue if rates remains high either, new debt will be a much more expensive. They need to get it below GDP growth and keep it there for a while.

Immigration to the US was a lot more restrictive than you seem to realise. Originally nearly all migrants came from the British isles. Then it was ‘white person’ for a time. There were at times quotas, such as those placed on Germans. And even outright bans of certain ethnic groups - Asians were prohibited.

Should we just let anyone in? I doubt the board would say yes. So there should be rules and a process to migration - so figure out what a large majority agree on and work from there. What is certainly not ok is to just allow millions of people to ignore all those rules, break the law by entering illegally, and skip in front of those who have the decency to go down the proper legal avenues. What’s this got to do with the top though? Unless some are predicting the end of America?

I’ve thought about just putting a chunk of money into Pershing and Ackman. He has at times lost his shirt which makes me pause but he has stopped shorting and he has good ideas.

So you aren’t a John Maudlin subscriber then?

I said "it isn’t tethered to the US economy like it once was" and that "largest US companies are now truly global". I'm really trying to say that the so called Buffett rule, which Buffet used as a crude estimate of where valuations of US stocks lay, is probably less relevant now than when he first uttered it. Maybe, I'm really not sure. It all depends on future growth of the companies, interest rates etc.

What has the stock market valuations in those countries got to do with US companies? Global GDP is growing despite the problems in Europe and China. My only point is that yes the US economy is still the most important but the biggest companies are global in their footprint and that matters. Name another country with the equivalent to the so called Mag7.

There is something else too. In years gone by the US stock market was closely aligned to the US economy. The largest US companies are now truly global and it isn’t tethered to the US economy like it once was.

Don't know anything about the guys work, but the meme is funny. Wouldn't surprise me at all. These same guys who warn people off the market seem very happy every time it goes down.

Didn’t see that news.