Posted on 03/13/2023 9:42:26 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
I am not a major consumer of financial news. I have a sense of how the economy works, in broad strokes, but as for the specifics of how particular sectors of the economy are doing at any one time, and what is happening at individual companies, I just am not up to speed.
In general, I rely, as most people do, on the reporting we get from the media. How else are average people supposed to get information? Pour through the financials of corporations and try to put together a patched-together picture of the whole? Not going to happen.
I let others manage my meager investments, and they are in relatively safe and unimpressive mutual funds.
Still, I like to get broad strokes, and I often have read articles in Forbes, as have many of you. Forbes’ batting average every since a Chinese firm bought a majority interest in the enterprise has been particularly awful, hyping firms which turn out to be frauds.
— Freezing Cold Finance Takes (@FreezingFinTake) March 13, 2023
I admit that I haven’t done a deep dive into the complete landscape of financial news, and other publications have similarly awful track records (Sam Bankman-Fried and Elizabeth Holmes were everybody’s favorites, but the New York Times is hardly as relied upon for financial coverage as Forbes). Perhaps nobody is any good at covering business.
But Forbes’ failures are striking, not only missing big stories that could have avoided disasters but doing the opposite: helping fuel hype that ultimately made the inevitable downfall of bad companies much worse.
Forbes is known for its commitment to capitalism–a commitment that I share. But the foundation upon which capitalism is built is not the free flow of money, but the trust in the institutions that allow people to make smart decisions regarding how the free flow of money takes place.
Money itself is built on that trust, and investments of that money take place in a murky world of limited information. Investors rely upon analysts (almost none of whom advised getting out of SVB while you could) and the financial press to make decisions.
SVB was an All-Star, alright, but not in the way that Forbes implied. Weeks after being named an all-star it became the star of a very bad show indeed, becoming the second-largest bank collapse in history.
Predicting bank runs is a fool’s errand since they depend upon unpredictable psychology, and any prediction of a bank run becomes self-fulfilling, making doing so irresponsible.
But SVB’s troubles were caused by an underlying weakness that a financial magazine is particularly well-placed to discover. By falsely reporting what is manifestly not true–that SVB was a particularly strong bank–Forbes participated in misleading investors who were at great risk.
SVB’s stock value when Forbes made its endorsement of its particular virtues as a bank was $310/share. They are now worth effectively zero.
Two things, in particular, stand out about SVB: its concentration in a volatile industry–startups–that is highly dependent upon a roaring economy, and its wokeness. Neither recommended the bank as a sound investment. Add to that the fact that Cramer promoted it and you knew it was in trouble.
One of Forbes’ Board members lamented after the collapse of the bank that the Left was losing one of its greatest allies, which strikes me as a rather weird take given the scale of the disaster. Was the new commitment of Forbes’ Board to woke ideology related to its judgment that SVB was a particularly great bank? I don’t know, but I have my suspicions.
SVB was very woke, and a Forbes Board member seems more concerned about the Left losing access to capital and power than the collapse of the bank itself.
The focus on ESG and woke politics is a threat to capitalism, and it is scary to see a magazine as prominent as Forbes apparently fall under its spell.
Elitist power structure at work.
I guess they didn’t look at Silicon Valley Bank’s exposure to the technology sector, bond positioning, the Central Bank’s interest rate hikes, and whatever caused large withdrawals from depositors.
Other than these “small issues” Forbes is an economic oracle.(sarcasm)
Be something if they were covertly dumping any stock they held in that month.
Gee...we have noooooo idea why.
They're probably the biggest single entity behind all this "diversity" "equity" and "lbgtqrstuvwxyx+-?!" garbage that has infected our country.
They understand by doing so, they will undermine our country from within.
Any chance it was orchestrated?
Forbes was taken over by GOP Establishment boobs?
Forbes has been a leftist rag for some time now!!!
Just look at the stupid, lying face of sociopathic Elizabeth Holmes. She fooled a bunch of rich old geezers into thinking she was a female version of Steve Jobs, inventor of the device on which I type these words.
I note that when I type the name of its inventor, my iPad automatically capitalizes his surname. Someone at Apple must have programmed it to do so.
Forbes went woke - that’s what happened.
They were dazzled by meaningless woke policies and ignored the important basics.
The business of businesses should be business, not social polict fads.
This orchestration idea has been on my mind...on two levels.
First, it would require someone in a position of authority to massively buy into the fed bond situation, having some insider fed knowledge that better paying bonds would arrive on the doorstep in the near future. You would think that the mega-banks would have insider knowledge to avoid screwing up.
Second, via HSBC buying SVB...I would suspect for the past six to twelve months, they saw the trend and knew that the bank would reach failure status. Maybe they had all the reports, knew the value, and how to purchase the bank for literally nothing.
Oddly, the key folks with zero knowledge or hints of trouble? Treasury Department.
Did the failure pay to play (advertisement) ???
On Sundays Meet he Press Maria Teresa Kumar said....... “Silicon Valley Bank is the “Democrats’ ATM”
Say whut??? I am baffled and flummoxed! I am removing $$$ from Wells Fargo. I don’t trust these rats
“On Sundays Meet he Press Maria Teresa Kumar said....... “Silicon Valley Bank is the “Democrats’ ATM””
SVB was loaning the most for solar panel installations. It was a solar panel ATM machine.....
______
SVB’s website says the bank worked with more than 1,550 clients in the climate-tech and sustainability sector, particularly community solar. The bank also says it led or participated in 62% of community-solar financing deals, worth about $3.2 billion in total. And according to ImpactAlpha, SVB was a leading provider of venture debt to climate startups.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/other/svb-s-collapse-could-make-it-harder-for-climate-startups-to-get-the-funding-they-need/ar-AA18zWeN
Forbes went deepstate a long time ago. They report what they are told to report.
SVB funds a lot to dark people.
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