Liberty

I'm a little late on this one, but I can recommend the documentary series on Michael Jordan and the Bulls 'The Last Dance', and I don't even watch any sports. It was quite excellent. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8420184/ Currently watching 'The Innocence Files' (Netflix) with my wife, and so far it's quite good too. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt11958922/

https://www.statnews.com/2020/08/10/winter-is-coming-as-flu-season-nears-americas-window-of-opportunity-to-beat-back-covid-19-is-narrowing/

MGM investment. Interview with David Faber:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-vertafore-m-a/exclusive-tpg-explores-sale-of-insurance-software-firm-vertafore-sources-idUSKCN0X92RW It's dated but Vertafore EBITDA of $180 million in 2016 prior to a large acquisition of VUE Software in 2019. It's tough to know what EBITDA is now, but its probably north of $300 million. If ROP paid $5.5 billion, that would be 18x $300 million in EBITDA, so hopefully ROP is not paying much above that. If this is correct, ROP EBITDA would increase by about 15% (compared to 2019 EBITDA). Hard to know if these acquisitions are creating value when paying that much and w/o knowing growth numbers. I also have to wonder if ROP is prepared to compete against VC-backed competitors (though I'm sure they already do). It's kind of strange for a company like ROP to be able to successfully milk their software portfolio companies for cash flow while their competitors spend every last nickle they have on growth. How does the combination of those two strategies not result in ROP's companies over time losing share in their industries? They're very specific about what they buy and what characteristics (financial, cultural, industry dynamics, etc) they look for, that's why it works. You can't just buy a random asset in the sector and get the same results.

Two good podcasts with Charlie Songhurst and Matthew Ball: http://investorfieldguide.com/songhurst/ http://investorfieldguide.com/matt-ball-the-future-of-media-movies-the-metaverse-and-more-invest-like-the-best-ep-185/

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-vertafore-m-a-roper-tech-exclusive/exclusive-roper-technologies-in-5-5-billion-bid-for-vertafore-sources-idUSKCN25510P That’s big!

I've heard this every year since the original Roadster came out. To me, it's vaporware until it's available for sale in most places in decent quantities. Too many automakers have come out with these compliance-cars that went nowhere and never sold in any numbers and were impossible to find in most markets...

FWIW, the speed of testing seems to vary a lot from state to state. In MA, my wife went to a testing station and got the results back in less than 24h. There are also CVS rapid test stations around that are even quicker. Yeah, it's a mess because there's no federal leadership and resources to help places that fall behind or get the right incentives and guidelines uniformly. I'm hearing about a lot of places where it takes 10-14 days to get a result. By the time you get a "negative" result, you've had time to get infected, and you think you're negative (oh, I'm feeling bad, but it can't be COVID..) so you're even more dangerous because you may not quarantine even when feeling some symptoms..

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc2025203 “ Successful Elimination of Covid-19 Transmission in New Zealand”

Bill Gates interview: https://www.wired.com/story/bill-gates-on-covid-most-us-tests-are-completely-garbage/

Money matters to attract and retain the good leaders. But paying someone a lot doesn't make them a good leader. There's a lot more high-paid CEOs out there than there are good CEOs worth their salaries... Necessary condition, but not sufficient.

Pathetic. Ford's Mach E is still not for sale yet either... so much vaporware. Model S came out in 2012.

I was kidding. It's a pet peeve of mine, every time I hear about "missing targets" I can't help but translate it in my mind into "analysts missed reality". I mean, I get that the market is largely influenced by analyst targets so when reality comes out different the price will adjust, sometimes violently, but I still think it's a weird way to phrase things, to say that it's the company that missed the targets that others were trying to guess about it.

So you're saying the analysts missed reality with their estimate?

Q2: https://www.csisoftware.com/docs/default-source/press-releases/csi---press-release-q2-2020---final.pdf Plus some acquisitions that I don't think had been posted here: https://www.fogsoftwaregroup.com/fog-software-group-announces-acquisition-of-quadrature-winpro/ https://www.unibiz.com/announcement.html

FT reporting that MSFT is trying to buy all of TikTok: https://www.ft.com/content/45d739f5-37cc-4957-874d-a310c2ac8e07

Bill Gates short interview on TikTok: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2020-08-05/bill-gates-says-tiktok-s-u-s-data-safe-with-microsoft-video?sref=cSRHqDay

Dr. Fauci saying he's getting death threats, his daughters getting harassed, had to get security..

Ben Thompson wrote: "Microsoft is likely banking on the fact that any payment to the U.S. Treasury will be appealable, but that is small solace to anyone concerned about freedom generally and the unintended consequences of this decision specifically."

David Faber:

Matt Levine on the whole bribery thing: https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2020-08-04/trump-on-tiktok-sale-payment-do-we-really-have-to-talk-about-it Funny stuff

Deliveroo approval: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/amazon-finally-wins-approval-from-regulator-to-gobble-up-minority-stake-in-deliveroo-11596565315 Launching in Sweden: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-amazon-com-sweden-idUSKCN2501OA

New acquisition in a new vertical at TSS: https://www.totalspecificsolutions.com/about-us/transaction-updates h/t @Negative_GW

https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/04/americas/brazil-us-hydroxychloroquine-doses-intl/index.html