Gregmal

Flirting with putting on a short FSR common and long the warrants pair here. Currently at ~$20 on the shares and warrants only at $5.30. Happens somewhat frequently with these names.

Not trying to be the smartest guy in the market was some of the best advice I ever received when it came to investing. You kind of want to be a jack of all traits but a master of none.

I'm looking at and been buying stuff typically 20-30% OTM. I dont know if I'd expect them to necessarily get there, but if the current trend and unwind continues I think these will be effected more than most. The market in general is pretty euphoric right now. Kill two birds with one stone by hedging through some of the high beta names. A simple 10-20% drop in the next month or so on some of these should payout reasonable well.

Bought some March puts on BYND, PTON

Humble mans got the #2 trade Ive seen on COBF quietly and without much bragging. NIO at what? $1.50 I think you said, now at ....dont even know anymore as if goes up $10 a day but last I checked like $50 or something. Second only to this fella https://www.cornerofberkshireandfairfax.ca/forum/investment-ideas/enph-enphase-energy/

Glad to be (marginally/minimally) helpful. Yea EquityZen lets you do $10k for the first investment. Then minimum is $20k til you've done 5. Then you can do $10 again. And agree on the other stuff. You're kind of triangulating things in the dark while knowing roughly what neighborhood you're in, if that makes sense. Definitely some sleuthing involved. On Synthego specifically, there's definitely not a perfect public comp(part of the uniqueness of the company), but you can look at anything from CRSP, to NVTA, to even probably a better overall comp is something like SDGR, which has been around for 2+ decades and still only has $100M in sales and a $4B+ valuation. Although the simplest way to look at it is that a few months ago they just did a funding round at ~$500M. End of the day I take into consideration a little bit of everything but wouldn't place 100% of faith in any one thing specifically.

Ive used a number of places over the years and IMO Interactive Brokers sucks but you cant beat their margin rates and also margin reqs. Overall though, I really like Fidelity. The layout is simple. Customer service is great. I trade a reasonable amount and pairing tax lots is also very easy/simple, especially vs IB. Oddly enough, I hate all the professional service platforms Ive ever used. Thomson One, Sunguard, etc....Stone Age stuff.

LOL yea I had them doing $5 given the potential tax change and massive cash build over the past 2 Qs...these guys operate to the beat of a different drum for sure.

I will say, as a RE investor, the past month has now made me capable of understanding what it feels like to have been a tech investor for the past 10 years! Hopefully we get the same.

A congrats to BG for sure and a wish of luck fitting a camel through the eye of a needle trying to pair down 1%+ of a micro cap RE company at full(maybe even a hair overvalued!) FV...something I dont think Ive ever seen anyone do successfully. Usually, its at 80% of FV for these type of names...which sadly is what I ended up selling this for. Anyway, I didnt think he could top FRP on a start to finish basis, but somehow did. Whats the 3rd act now?

Yea I'm in this too, so Im not trying to be too much of a negative Nancy. But I am just a tad annoyed because this used to be an investment you didnt have to do anything with. Now you have to keep an eye on it. I still think it does well but the management/trustee behavior during the proxy fight was horrible and its very easy for companies to get carried away with "growth". I also didnt like how they just straight up stopped repurchasing shares even though its been a mandate seemingly forever. Just a little cold water on the bull case, thats all.

So just to highlight maybe for those interested in the process...got notification today from EZ another fund launching for Synthego. Fund size is expected to be about $1.1M. Most likely, an existing employee needs some holiday cash or is freeing up some shares to cover taxes...a lot of times these offering are seasonal and for those types of reasons. Tax is almost always the biggest one as folks who get paid in stock need to monetize illiquid assets. So I decide to take down a bit more of this; I already have a decent sized investment, but am doing $20k more just cuz; its been a good stretch run into year end and I freed up some cash recently. Synthego did their most recent funding round in August..they raised $100M in a series D with Wellington joining the party as a lead investor and the same heavy hitter group thats been a part of this for a while also taking part. Founders, Menlo, Intel, 8VC. Valuation was said to be ~$500M. This deal is offering shares at a $400M valuation, so about a 20% discount to the most recent funding. This is pretty standard as the one off employee sales never get a full share of the currently assumed funding valuation, its almost always at fairly large discounts unless there has been a huge time lapse between funding rounds and major narrative change. Otherwise, they just have to accept liquidating into a limited market and pay the price for it. There is more on the research side but thats irrelevant if you're simply interested in the process. So I sign a term sheet today. I have 5 days to read everything over and complete the binding subscription agreement. Then order period ends Dec 15. Then probably a few weeks after I wire funds to their account. From there, the ROFR period is typically a few weeks out. The deal would then probably close sometime in early February. After that, I own shares in the EZ Growth Fund 1234 LLC(or whatever number) and thats basically it.

Going the route of corporation is *potentially* positive. Its also potentially negative. Thats the issue. Its brings into the equation execution risk. When you are a trust you have a clear outline of what you need to be doing. Granted, part of the issue the activists had, is the current team trying to take credit for things they didnt/dont deserve credit for....but by amending the structure you are opening up a different can of worms.

I dont, and have never had a position in STNE. I dont follow the company...Why would I comment on it? I have traded in and out of BYD and otherwise hold small basket positions in that and other Asia based companies like Xiaomi, Tencent, Baidu and Razer....theres hardly any talk of these here...why is that my cross to carry lol? When there's interesting discussion, or reciprocation from others, I engage. My opinions on GM are hardly that controversial, and as everyone has seen, have evolved over time. Why are you so hung up on "name a 3rd company or else"! Ive said EV universe. So you could put something like BMW or VW in the same category as GM, or you can look at things like Panasonic, or you could look to other types of suppliers or beneficiaries like MGA. Whats your fixation on GM? So "calling out the bs"?....please...on one end you portray this hard nosed, silver haired, by the book value investor and on the other you're talking about how short term trading makes an otherwise lousy investment attractive! We can agree to disagree thats fine, but you dont need to get so self righteous because something thinks Mary is a bozo for her handlings with institutional investors, her mediocre investments in their technology, her focus on the balance sheet only to be flirting with junk anyway, getting bent over by the unions, and her desperation Nikola deal that she seems to have lucked out on only because of a short seller... Its important to remember that pretty much everything under the sun has been going wild this year. That doesnt mean this turd turned a corner...

For FY 2017 G&A was $1.8M. For FY 2018, it was $4.7M. Salaries and wages in 2018 where $18M vs 3.2M in 2017 and $1.2M for 2016. Now we're at $7.2M for just 3 quarters on G&A and $27.2M for salaries and wages....but hey, its your money. Pretty soon we're going to be talking about "cycles" and headcount reduction, and bloated expenses...all the things that makes every other O&G name great!

I guess if you are a newer shareholder and used to corporate structure/risk its no big deal, but for the past decade this thing did A-OK as is, delivering pretty remarkable returns in a very choppy O&G market during the same span. But yea, bring in employees, high paid executives, start up new divisions, Wall Streetify the thing...you know the saying...if it aint broke, fix it anyway.

The great thing about protections that are 10 years out....not many current shareholders will be around then to hold you to them.

Yea this is kind of my problem with what TPL has recently turned into. They shouldn't be doing anything. They became one of the best and most unique assets in the market by function with the purpose of slowly selling land, collecting royalty revenue, and buying back stock. Now you have employees, and operations, and discussions about "lets get into this and that biz" and its just a totally different ballgame so to speak.

Trimmed SPG, ESRT, both about 10%, sold all VNO(smaller trading position), exited all SBE.ws, and most of PIC.

Jeez! Always so much hostility Radman. As most here know, I was a GM shareholder for a while. A little more than 6 years. I bought in around $30 during the ignition switch scandal and was quite pleased with the work of Ms Barra for awhile. But the information does change sometimes. I hedged out my position and sold out at $35 at the beginning of the year as it became clear to me that there are better uses for the money, which there have definitely been. If, as you allude to, you're up 50-100% on GM or whatever, thats only really possible if you've been trading the name...a big no no for real value investors. If you've simply been holding(we know you didn't initiate your position in March/April, and maybe you're up 50% gross over a many year period but thats not really anything special) the returns haven't been great. Unlike Xerxes, I am fairly certain you've been here much longer than 2 years. I dont get why you lose your shit or get so offended at opinions or analysis that differs from your own...You do the same shit in other threads as some have pointed out. Its not really a controversial statement or "trolling" to point out that if you are speculating on EV stuff there are better ways to do it than GM. In fact, just yesterday there were multiple EV universe companies who's returns in one day exceeded anything you would get out of GM. Its great GM is up 100% or whatever from the lows, the same way its great SRG has tripled from the short term lows, but its disingenuous as a multi year investor to sit here and pretend its been a good investment. When trading the crashes is the only way you are making money in a name, thats typically a bad sign. I know, because I did it in GM for years.

Bubble, yes. Looks very similar to previous blockchain and cannabis bubbles over the past half decade. Still my favorite way to play is through pre deal announcement spac and even post announcement, pre deal close names as you still have a hard floor of $10. But yea, these arent good investments...with the occasional exception of course.

Yea, SPG funding TCO with shares at $72....rub it in...yuck.

I agree this is super cheap, but a management team that gives zero shits about its shareholders and behaves in this manner just isn't really worth it, IMO, when you can still pick up better assets with better managers at the current valuations. When 40% of your shareholders express concern about something, who do you think you are just going about business as usual? I also think the mechanics of the spin, and effectively sticking shareholders with a tax bill while not paying out a higher percentage(or all of it) in cash, is scummy.

Rejoice basement dwellers! The only true vaccine is a mask, remember? At last, we have this breakthrough! https://narwallmask.com/products/narwall-mask This puppy will at least make it safe to venture into the living room.

and with narratives around POTUS change, for special dividends. What are peoples speculative hunches or names they follow where they'd expect a surprise check from corporate? Costco last week announced one. Another one I am keeping a close eye on due to historically awesome capital allocation, high short interest, and supremely healthy balance sheet, is National Beverage. Thinking we could see something like $5+ a share announced. What else should be on the radar? ALX has been mentioned as well.