Gregmal

Killing people passively is far easier to take than killing them aggressively. People were going to die here, regardless. Which is why everyone was in between a rock and a hard place. Its why many countries delayed, because the choice was not easy. But it seems many took the gutless approach...passively via economic suicide, akin to tossing a living person off a boat without a life raft in the middle of the ocean and driving away while they are still alive, vs, dealing with the repercussions of "you didn't lock down the economy and a bunch of old people died as a result of getting the virus"... we are continuing to see that the elder and at risk will die regardless, but now the economy is hitting hard all people, from infant to elder in its effects.

Deep down, everyone just wants to get paid and get laid. NY, LA, SF, Miami... all the same in that respect. Probably chuck Chicago, Orlando and certain Phoenix markets in there as well. You dont need big tech for this, you just need jobs that support the lifestyle of the folks who also want to have social lives. Orlando and Disney are a good example of this. People go to work at Disney because they pay well enough to live, and life over in that area is like a never ending frat party.

No insight on the merger but a scumbag move by a scumbag firm. Do we give everyone a mulligan on stocks they bought in January/February? They made a move they now regret and are trying to weasel out. Hopefully a judge sees this and makes them pay.

I cant say I'd ever go long this because I dont understand the advantages and technology to the degree I think one should if you're doing anything more than swinging a momentum trade. Originally, I'd say a large market wide selloff and steep decline, but that just happened and I stuck to shit like GOOG, MSFT, CIBR in the tech sphere. At the same time, what would make me bullish is the continued bang the head against the wall pundits and people who's surface understanding of how markets work let that compel them to short away on valuation or fall into the same bear traps you see over and over with stocks like this. Of course, when the market(and everything else crashes) those folks are there to say "I knew I was right", but then weeks later the resiliency of stocks like this, and Tesla, and big tech, is on full display again, but at or near the highs, having outperformed all the "value" stuff that was supposed to be a safe haven. At which point we start up the "its a bubble" rhetoric to justify being wrong again. As I said, no position, but the narratives and market fodder is always entertaining. If you understand these types of companies and what drives them, you've got the tiger by the tail. Most dont. I dont. I've had similar luck trading with companies like NVTA. 100x revenues is absurd. But its not as reason to immediately write anything off. Like I said, I laugh at the folks who are NOW "enlightened" with Amazon, etc... you dont get multi baggers unless there is some sort of degree of skepticism and controversy around a compelling. Usually "valuation" debate is the major provider of that.

Yea.... first, shorting this on valuation is stupid. But some never learn. Second, this is the type of company old fashioned value investors will buy 10 years from now at much higher prices because all of a sudden it "makes sense" to them, just the same as they are currently doing with Netflix and Amazon.... I dont own this, if I had a gun to my head, I'd be short, but the "valuation" thesis is just evidence that people dont learn from their mistakes.

Hold $100B in cash? He says bullish stuff all the time. What do folks here say about him? Read into what he does, not what he says. The investments he's made for the most part come off as pressed and for the better part of the last decade have been poor ones. The issue of what to do with the cash isn't new. And his long made comments that beyond a certain point its not productive. And then blows past that and builds up more. We're not asking him to follow the Apple playbook, but it wouldn't hurt either if he cant seem to find worthwhile investments...keep a $100B cushion and then use the excess to grow per share value.

I think thats a possibility. They touched on a lot of this today. The clinic mix is about 70% private operators with all currently deemed "essential" businesses. That a lot of the clinics have ultimate authority on what they wish to do but that protocol for most right now is to continue existing cycles and accommodation and then either put off, or prioritize new ones. Mainly, a late 30's woman may be green lighted due to Mother Nature being less favorable to her, than say a 25 year old in good health. They indicated that running the business as normal, with no revenue, they've got about a year and change worth of cash and liquidty before needing outside financing. Applied for $1m ppp loan on day 1 but bank ran out of funds but are optimistic about the second round of funding just approved by congress. They touched on V shaped business and U shaped business as well as the rebound currently occurring in China/Asia and kind of using that as a look thru for what should occur here. One analyst also asked about the recession effects, to which they brought up data from 07-10... US did show cyclicality, however Canda, Europe, and Asia, a lot less, primarily because those countries had a higher rate of assitance/insurance programs...something we've seen develop quite a bit since then over here is the US. So I suppose we'll cross that bridge if and when we get there, but the most important take away form the call is that they are in position to benefit from the aforementioned scenarios because of the balance sheet strength. AND basically laid it out that they are only going to be looked at bolt on acquisitions, rather than anything transformational, given the current risk environment is far different than normal. Basically stuff in the $1M-$5M is what I got out of that.

I appreciate the perspective! No problemo. All I'd add, something I struggle with, at least in terms of struggling to get granular on a valuation gap that is massive, is the overlap with incorporating stadium/venue values into the sports teams. Its hard to look into the data of past sales because market/region is the driving figure and comps on 1/1 assets are tough. To be safe I'd probably put MSG dirt at $2B, air rights at $500M, and Knicks at $4.5, Rangers at $1.25B, but again, its all perspective and can be tinkered with and is now even more complex with the arena in one entity and sports in another. Actually quite smart. Nets I found to be a good floor marker.

Another great call today with tons of details. Lots of breakdowns on the biz, application for PPP, China look through, cell media expansion opportunities, and lines of business were they are seeing little disruption. Worth a listen. Q1 est. looked solid, obviously effected by last couple weeks of slowdown, but also some large orders getting pushed through. Only hesitation on my end is ?-ing why they give revenue figure(which was nice) but no adj. EBITDA... I dont think anyone would be shocked if it dipped or hold it against them if its COVID related...maybe since its preliminary they are still "adjusting". Will find out in about a month. Overall one has to be pleased with these guys.

Except the same things were said in 2015 and prior. Its just only after markets peak that people feel comfortable saying I told you so. When in reality markets are still indicative of gains that were made even a couple years ago by those that didn't sit on their hands. Not sloppy speculative gains, but gains even Buffett has admitted to missing. You like AMZN or GOOG but cant get interested after a 20-30% decline? You bought SRG at $35 but cant find a single share of a RE company to buy right now? It doesnt add up. I think they've probably done some buying, but its just a guess and has zero to do with the criticisms that have developed now for nearly a decade. Its also easy to talk about new/old economies...look at what they own? Going into this year, financials, airlines, autos....what is there to even defend? You cant have this extreme bearishness and still hold some of that stuff? Its as laughable as someones who's only mantra has been pumping Tesla and being a shining example of "be more fearful when others are fearful" now lecturing on Buffetism's and value investing...

Replace the big city mayor or governor with "The President of the World's largest economy could have done...(fill a thousand blanks).", maybe the picture will get clearer for you. Ah, not really, Ive already stated, as have others, that theres plenty of blame to go around, including Trump. But nothing is ever enough for you guys because regardless of whats said, it somehow always leads back to nothing but a raging desire to bitch about Trump..... oh well. If you dont understand WHY mayors and governors exist, and WHY they bear certain responsibilities, rather than the Federal government, then theres no point in having a discussion until you revisit 3rd grade social studies.

Perfect cop out. Now shift blame to the states. Totally. And exactly whats deserved. A big city mayor or governor should be aware that the entire state is not simply where the largest congestion of peoples, and that the largest congestion of people is not necessarily indicative of the entire state. FL for instance, has been handled much different than NYC... and is not decimated.

VNO and SPG should just merge and create the ultimate real estate monster. Personally I hate office about as much as some of you hate retail, but I also think they are both probably tied to the same type of trends. Smart managers will navigate this and create value. You can always do "something" with well location dirt.

If you can carry it in a margin account at a 1% annual borrow, those return expectations should go up.

Please specifically state what would cause you to change your mind I dont know. If things turned out anywhere remotely near all the doom and gloom projections(projections of course that now are denied or revised/edited/deleted and were never committed to with hard numbers anywhere) posted here 4-6 weeks ago? We all love our elders, but Im sorry...shutting down the entire country because the 60+ population with underlying symptoms carries greater risk is doing significantly more damage than just proposing stay at home orders for those most at risk. As some have pointed out, it didn't need to cost $2T a month to approach this rationally. Tell me why we're shutting down business in Oneonta, NY and telling 25 year olds they cant work? Because someone from NYC goes to Oneonta to avoid lockdown conditions because they felt healthy and were in the epicenter. Because the large majority of 60+ year olds have a pre-existing condition. Letting millions of them die (ignoring the obvious issues with that) will destroy the life insurance industry and cause a domino effect. There's no pain-free option and there never was. It's not going to cost $2T every month because we have loans and grants of that amount one month. We have enough fear mongering and unnecessary panic as is. It's pointless to have rolling shutdowns if you allow travel. If you don't allow travel then the economy is already taking a big hit everywhere. The resistance to the lockdowns doesn't have much common sense support. Over the last month, major trade countries and manufacturing countries were shutdown, travel was heavily restricted ex-US, and people were self-quarantining in greater numbers. There was (and still is) no government response to improve testing capacity to renew confidence. The lockdown didn't cause the economic response, the lack of confidence and foreign lockdowns did. The closing of service businesses was just visible icing on the cake. Opening service businesses doesn't fix the underlying problem. I don't get how people don't see that. Without testing, air travel and large events are not coming back any time soon. If federal leadership defiantly threatens states, it will lead to exceedingly risky behavior by 50% of the population and overly cautious behavior by the rest due to a lack of trust. It will exasterbate our economic problems. It's frustrating those that complain about the economic pain don't see that no one is happy about it. Shutdowns shouldn't be indefinite if it's not clear. It's frustrating we shut down for a month and accomplished nothing during that time because of federal resistance. For $25b/mth, we could've sparked US manufacturing and conducted 100's of millions of tests a month. Instead we are fighting again. Fighting still. It's such a waste. I posted earlier. But if you go to worldometer and check tests/million population vs deaths/million population, there is no correlation. You can check that. I requested in this group before to show evidence that higher testing leads to lower deaths and I am always given an opinion but no evidence. Germany supposedly tested a lot. But they tested 20629/million (Worldometer), or 2% of their population till date and got 61 deaths/million. You are talking about testing atleast 30% of population a week or something. And Japan with only 985 tests/million (0.1% of their population) or about 100K tests in total till date got very low 2 deaths per million . Japan did not have lockdown. They are cold, crowded and old people. No one wants to talk about Japan. Infact its a taboo to talk about Japan. Can you please talk about evidence that tests relate to less deaths? It's a trivial amount of money, experts are saying it will help with health outcomes, and it seems like it would help with consumer confidence in the US since there's infighting. Who cares if it's testing per se. Make enough masks to send every household several a month. Maybe some idea I can't imagine. You seem focused on a specific solution that will definitely work. I obviously do not know that solution. Experts suggest testing/masks will help so I support it. I know they don't actually know for sure. Similar to Fed injections, efficiency/best solution is not necessarily important. It's about reversing the decline in confidence. https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/493722-us-needs-to-conduct-20-million-coronavirus-tests-per-day-to-fully-open 20m tests/day is not possible in the near-term. Current capacity is something like low-to-mid millions/month right now (manufacturing/procuring, testing, and processing). I'm trying to be realistic with a ballpark number. I don't know exact capacity. I don't know what's possible. I'm just trying to be realistic with my guesses. Someone from NYC can go upstate but the living dynamics alone, make it much harder to spread. Thats largely the problem with places like NY. Every decision is made selfishly considering only the people who live in the 5 boroughs, whereas 95% of the state is much more comparable to Nebraska than NYC. You can make the case cases for California and even Texas to a degree. Most folks I know who are in the city take the subways. Everyone outside the city drives their cars. That right there, outside of hanging out in a hospital, eliminates possibly the biggest spread risk. City restaurants are significantly more prone to being capacity packed. Outside of there city, even the best ones, typically dont have the same type of traffic. I am not saying shutdowns weren't necessary in some places, but Trump put the responsibility to states, state governors largely overreacted and the ones who didn't the media did their best to shame into submission.

The only thing I am confused about is the absolute certainty and conviction that was put behind the idea that this was massively mismanaged and that deaths would be hundreds of thousands and probably even millions and yet, a few weeks of shutdown and all of a sudden we're talking about 40,000 deaths(forget that the bulk are because of NY, a city thats been begging for a health/sanitation related crisis for ages) almost entirely consistent of elderly and at risk? Obviously we would like to be safe than sorry, but you have to be completely ignorant to just assume collapsing the economy and destroying jobs EVERYWHERE, with no respect for circumstance, has no consequence? Certainly not one equivalent to a few percent of a few percent of the population(that isn't part of the contributing economy btw) being affected. The net consequence, longer term, is that more lives are ruined via crushing the economy than it will be from the virus. Some of you seem to think there is zero consequence because for whatever reason you cant equate economic duress, job loss, wealth destruction, etc, with death and despair.

Please specifically state what would cause you to change your mind I dont know. If things turned out anywhere remotely near all the doom and gloom projections(projections of course that now are denied or revised/edited/deleted and were never committed to with hard numbers anywhere) posted here 4-6 weeks ago? We all love our elders, but Im sorry...shutting down the entire country because the 60+ population with underlying symptoms carries greater risk is doing significantly more damage than just proposing stay at home orders for those most at risk. As some have pointed out, it didn't need to cost $2T a month to approach this rationally. Tell me why we're shutting down business in Oneonta, NY and telling 25 year olds they cant work?

For the 320 million who don’t have it, well, most, might as well. The panic and fear is far greater and crippling short term in economic respects than the toll on the 1m who tested positive and 40k or whatever who died. If you're old this is bad. The rest? All evidence seems to indicate its a glorified nothing burger. I thought the Bill Maher rant nailed it. The media is obsessed with finding young people who died from this. The real numbers? like 800. Compared with the flu, which we have a vaccine for, at 3,000 annually. Not long ago we were talking about the dire consequences of kids going wild on spring break and how Florida was the next Italy... yea..about that.

The damage is psychological much like a shark attack at the beach. The day after, only a couple people there. A week later, a few more. A month later, back to normal assuming there are no new attacks. Same thing will happen here. At this point the damage is done and it doesnt matter that there was a total overreaction and coordinated media effort to make this the scariest thing in the history of the world. And yea, De Blasio wants a parade! Go figure. NY, NY!

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/29079303/a-rod-j-lo-retain-jp-morgan-possible-bid-mets-per-reports Recession? Economic slowdown? As long as there are rich people with egos there will be demand for sports assets. It will be interesting to see if the Mets get the $2.5-$3B that Cohen tentatively offered. Nets got $2B and the stadium $1B, there is no reason the Knicks + Garden arent at least double that.

That was the argument he gave for buying IBM. Exactly. Someone who's a real value investor, like Buffett at one point undoubtedly was, takes value where ever it is. $50B, $5B, $500M... he s still pulling the trigger because thats the game. So, "I cant find size" is BS. "I cant find value" is BS too. For better or worse, I think he's either disinterested at this point in his career, or knows he's lost his touch as the businesses and markets he knew, arent the ones we see today. Which all things considered, might not be the worst thing. Look at his track record the past decade...outside of Apple, its quite poor. Heck he even bought SRG at $35 or whatever in his personal account years ago. Now look at all the other "value investors" and how they've struggled. As a shareholder, I just want him to buyback stock in reasonable % and if he's comfortable, pull the trigger on one of these index type big tech names. I mean the BRK portfolio even has VOO for gods sake. Dragging "that" much cash is a waste($100B+), especially when Berkshire could probably borrow infinity dollars at pretty much zero rates. Keep the company in tip top shape, and then let the new guard take over and make BAM and BX look like minor leaguers.

They must have gotten Elon's ventilators.

I'd certainly hope so. They had a buyback in place, although I dont recall if they ever used it, at about $12 CAD. Even if they arent using it here, it'd be a pretty big leap to justify issuing stock at $7. All this said, I've never met a CEO or management team that told you "we're going to wreck the company making acquisitions". Sandelman has a financial background, so I know he gets it. But people with financial backgrounds also "get" how to maximize their pay as well. As soon as MA opens back up sales will be astronomical. I'd also gander the shut down impaired and or finished off quite a few rinky dink pot companies.

Spoke to IR about SBC. The way he described it is that when the company made the acquisitions it used stock. Accounting standards require the company to amortize the stock based part of the acquisitions. The shares have already been issued, so the majority of the SBC isn't new shares, it's old shares getting amortized. I was initially skeptical about adding back SBC, but think its a fair practice in this case. I worry a bit about the company acquiring just to get larger. When I asked "why do you want to acquire other companies?", IR was confused. His answer... "to grow." Overall I've come to like the idea as it seems like a cheap valuation in an area people like to speculate in. Sandelman touches on the acquisition focus on the calls, especially IIRC last Novembers. Of course this is just what he "says", but he seemed quite adamant they have no desire to take on other companies problems or jeopardize their profitability and any deal that would is a non starter. He's the largest shareholder here, and I dont think they are looking to do anything crazy. These market conditions are heavily favorable to a company like this.

https://seekingalpha.com/news/3562741-publicly-traded-companies-raided-ppp-pantry The majority of these companies are garbage serial equity issuers and stock promotions. Great oversight.