Posted on 01/28/2021 8:13:12 PM PST by SeekAndFind
I remember despising the 2015 movie The Big Short for its cavalier representation of what was truly terrible carnage. Like many, the 2008 shorting of mortgage stock, and the pooling of solid mortgages with garbage ones, was devastating on the economy, and upended people’s lives. This is probably why what they have sought to do to us during the pandemic hasn’t completely taken me by surprise; I have already been chewed up by someone’s idea of gaming system.
Between 2008-2010, my husband and I had lost two residences, our jobs, and our lives were reduced to our two dogs and what we could fit into a 2‑bedroom apartment. It felt like being raped repeatedly, then thrown into the street. I sometimes still get angry thinking about it.
My colleague Bonchie very ably explained how history is repeating itself this week, only it’s the little man bending Wall Street over.
“The talk of the stock market right now involves GameStop (among other stocks) and a group of Reddit users that decided to play Wall Street’s own game against them. If you don’t understand stock trades, it can be a bit in the weeds, but the general idea is simple. A bunch of hedge fund managers shorted stock trying to make money. In response, a group of Reddit users banded together to legally buy up those stocks and squeeze the short.
“This has some hedge funds in dire financial straits because there’s insufficient money to borrow and keep the short afloat.”
So the SEC doesn’t like the little guy controlling the market and openly discussing what they plan to buy on socials driving the market, but Billionaires and TV shows have done this for decades…. Market manipulation is always happening! #wallstreetbets
— Kojo Ebro (@oldmanebro) January 28, 2021
The article is a good breakdown of what is going on, and why the Elites: Democrat, Republican, and Agnostics, are pissed and trying to bite back. I have watched most of the action on Twitter, and the popcorn, I must say, has been plenteous, and quite good.
Being one of those little guys who was wrecked in 2008, I'm feeling very schadenfraudelicious right now. Yes, I made up that word. #writersprivilege https://t.co/MRjB6yghRM
— Jennifer Oliver O'Connell, BA, MPW, Eata Bita Pi (@asthegirlturns) January 28, 2021
You see, my husband and I started our American Dream later in life. We married for the first time in our forties, and combined our financial fortunes, which wasn’t a lot. My husband had a pristine credit score which allowed us to buy the house of our dreams and rent out his condo. I had a good law firm job that paid extremely well, and that I planned to parlay into a growing career.
Because of some hedge funder’s grand idea to make massive money off innocent people’s backs, we were swept up in a maelstrom of financial losses that we didn’t foresee or plan for. We were unaware that our perfectly sound mortgage agreement had been sold off and grouped with other people’s unsound subprime mortgage agreements. We ended up emptying our savings to try to save our homes. I was laid off my plum gig because, last hired, first fired, and the firm partners were trying to cover their own assets, with little concern about my mortgage.
Our first foreclosure was on the dream home, and we ended up leaving half the stuff we had behind. Two days after we crammed ourselves into a dank little apartment, I rushed my husband to the emergency room, and we came out a week later with a diagnosis of ulcerative colitis. He ended up on disability for four months because, just like the COVID-19 lockdowns, the cure was worse than the disease.
Because our tenant couldn’t pay the rent on my husband’s condo, and Bank of America are corrupt mofos, we were foreclosed upon again, and lost that home. We cashed out our 401ks to try and survive the aftermath. My husband’s health still is not what it could be. Yeah, had this not happened, a breakdown may have happened through something else, but the 2008 ordeal was the proverbial straw that broke his health’s back.
Twelve years later, we are only now starting to turn a corner where we aren’t scraping pennies together and borrowing money from relatives. We aren’t great—but we’re not living pillar to post either. In this Biden regime, it’s still precarious, as it is clear he is intent on destroying the little guy: and we are it.
Which is why the Hedge Funds vs. Reddit WallStreetBets/GameStop battle resonates with me.
One of the WallStreetBets Redditors, “SSauronn”, explained the reason why he was taking on the business as usual, destroy and conquer greed of the hedge funds. It brought back that anger and flood of memories mentioned in the preceding paragraphs.
An Open Letter to Melvin Capital, CNBC, Boomers, and WSB from wallstreetbets
Financial specialist Dr. Boyce Watkins had this assessment of the Hedge Fund/WallStreetBets affair.
“We saw in January a siege on the CapitOL. Now we’re seeing a siege on the CapitAL.”
Dr. Watkins sees it as a financial version of the rioting we saw this Summer, and history in the making.
“It’s a better version of Occupy Wall Street,” he concluded.
I do not totally agree with Dr. Watkins take, but I am definitely among those who wants to see the Redditors expose in real time the corrupt Wall Street practices that leave Main Street hung out to dry. How the Haves do all they can to marginalize, reduce, and toss aside the Have Nots in order to hold on to their market share, their piece of the pie. The Have Nots simply chose to beat them at their own game, and now the enablers in the Fed and Big Tech (them again) are doing all they can to not fight fair and square, but reduce the Redditors to ashes.
#RobinHood confirming it has restricted trade in #GameStop #AMC #blackberry #express #koss #Nokia 👇 https://t.co/Oz04vkivpK pic.twitter.com/tdQgUB0Fqm
— Susan Li (@SusanLiTV) January 28, 2021
Sound familiar? The 2008 Mortgage Crisis. The 2020 COVID Pandemic. Who knows what else they have up their sleeves. If we’re fortunate, some industrious trolls will unearth that plot before the powers get it wound into action. Ma tha Siobhan.
Same ideology as the US Government. Can’t give them too much stimulus or unemployment because they may actually be able to take care of their families and have a little extra to better their personal circumstances.
— Dean Martin (@deanomartin007) January 28, 2021
But I don’t see it as unhinged, “Eat the Rich” Marxist foolishness spouted by AOC and her ilk, but a rallying cry for correction, and dare I say it, equality. Either the market works for everyone or it doesn’t, and right now it’s the latter. The Elites, enabled by a complicit Fed manipulate the system to only work for some and not for others, while also playing a game of tank and destroy an economic engine that will leave the control to the individual and surpass those in power.
Crypto and WallStreetBets have the same spirit: a vision of truly free markets where *everyone* plays by the same rules.
We’re all seeing the thumb on the scales for stock prices today. And we’ll see it for dollar prices tomorrow. https://t.co/PXrNrg0RGn
— balajis.com (@balajis) January 28, 2021
HaHa! That Hedge Fund guy just lost 1 billion.
Yeah, he lost a billion, on paper, out of net worth of, billions. He still has 4 homes, a giant yacht and a jet. He's still winging to Vale this weekend to ski.
The end result will be more regulations aimed not him, but at you— Dr JimmyToons (@JimmySportToons) January 28, 2021
I love what SSauronn had to say to those out there condemning them and clutching their pearls. The Baby Boom Generation who, from my perspective, have benefited the most from this unequal system. Take a look at Nancy Pelosi, the fossils in both houses of Congress, and Biden’s cabinet and tell me that I’m wrong.
“To the boomers, and/or people close to that age, just now paying attention to these ‘millennial blog posts’: you realize that, even if you weren’t adversely effected by the ’08 crash, your children and perhaps grandchildren most likely were? We’re not enemies, we’re on the same side. Stop listening to the media that’s making us out to be market destroyers, and start rooting for us, because we have a once in a lifetime opportunity to punish the sort of people who caused so much pain and stress a decade ago, and we’re taking that opportunity. Your children, your grandchildren, might have suffered as I described because of the institutions that we’re fighting against. You really want to choose them, over your own family and friends? We’re not asking you to risk your 401k or retirement fund on a single GME bet. We’re just asking you to be understanding, supportive, and to not support the people that caused so much suffering a decade ago.”
The beneficiaries are obviously not pleased.
#BREAKING
Rep. #MaxineWaters, House Financial Services Cmte chair, issues stmt announcing a cmte hearing re: "short selling, online trading platforms gamification and their system impact."This comes amid the #GameStop "#GameStonk" #WallStreetBets (#WSB) stock-trading situation. pic.twitter.com/by3wDFqkOY
— Devon Heinen (@DevonHeinen) January 28, 2021
And they thought getting rid of Donald Trump would solve all their woes. Welcome to the age of pissed-off Americans.
“This, simple conversation narrative that even a moron like me understands.”
Thanks, but most likely your are very intelligent. You’ve just been treated “like a mushroom” in regards to how it really happened.
So, we're on the same page, just maybe not on the same paragraph.
The term "creative destruction" gets thrown around a lot (always as a good thing), but maybe we should take a closer look to determine if it is ALWAYS good.
GameStop was not on its last leg. Just because the game market is moving from physical media to downloads doesn't mean GameStop couldn't have pivoted also. After all, Netflix went from a renter of DVDs to a streaming service.
But, once GameStop got shorted, the die was cast. They were going out of business, the shorters would make sure of that.
And that's my problem. When investors have a vested interest in the business failing, something's wrong with the system.
“ So, we’re on the same page, just maybe not on the same paragraph.”
An excellent observation.
So long as the stock market does not materially interfere in standard, long-term stock investments, it is pretty much doing what it was designed to do.
If you evaluate a company, and think it has good prospects, and are correct, and buy the stock, and hold it, nothing done by short-sellers, reddit anarchists, or idiot day-traders will really matter.
The key is to never get in a position where you are forced to buy or sell.
THe “sell and disparagement” campaign is illegal, and the SEC has, and does, and always will, go after that with vengeance.
Assuming the disparagement is false. If it is truthful statements, that is called “people warning owners of a company that the company sucks and is not worth what they think it is”.
FOr an analogy, imagine going after and prosecuting people who told their friends and family to stop spending hundreds of dollars for beanie babies, because the whole thing was a giant scam?
Would you also make it illegal for people who own a stock to sell it at a loss if they think it is going to tank?
Or are you only mad if someone else who doesn’t own the stock does it?
Because it is basically the same thing. And everybody can ignore the short sellers if they want — the Gamestop thing shows that.
THe reason short sellers often “succeed” is that people are idiots who hang onto stocks they already own way past the time they should sell — often because institutions encourage them to do so, because it helps rich people.
Short selling is one of the few ways informed people can tell the market “you are all a bunch of idiots, and this stock is a dog”.
I’m all for regulating it, making sure people don’t lie about a company to make it’s stock drop. We should be watching carefully for example for short sellers using social media to either pump up, or talk down, a stock with false narratives.
Interestingly, I read that it is extremely difficult to do short selling with stock you own, because it is a way to avoid taxes. If you own a stock for 5 months, and think it is ready to tank, but you don’t want to pay short-term capital gains, you borrow someone else’s stock, and short-sell it. IN a couple of months, you can deliver your shares to them, and you’ve got long-term gains instead of short-term.
See: “Covered puts and calls”.
That should not be legal.
Is there some site that will still let you buy GameStop and the others?
I quoted this article in a post I made on another board.
http://www.ballparkguys.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=615030#Post615030
I read that robinhood let people buy again. Idk about etrade and the others
What happened in the recent GA runoff election? Did Kelly believe the Dominion machines would pick her over the dems or did the dems have several other avenues of cheating that overtook Dominion.
No one ever said the people who own and run hedge funds are stupid or fail to get top of the line legal advice. However how much imagination does it take to identify some issue with a company and then begin surretitpously an opinion narrative that is retold and exargerated in the form of tips anf “If I were you” advice from “knowlegable” brokers and investment counsellors to nervous investors. Its not that hard to start a snowball rolling down a hill, but its very hard to legally prove that the avalanche was started by people who planned to maliciously drive the market for their own purposes. Initially the people who sold their stock are grateful to the brokers and investment counsellors who advised themto sell a stock that declined. They don’t even know that they were fleeced.
My WAG is that “their elite interests” were better served with the Democrats in power so she took one for the team.
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