Whitney Tilson on shorting

[SpecOps]

I found this presentation given by Tilson interesting http://www.scribd.com/doc/215835994/Shorting-Whitney-Tilson-ValueWalk

 

I'm not a shorter myself but his logic is interesting. I agree with him that in shorting you not only need to be right on fundamentals but timing is also important. It can take years of pain for ideas to play out.

 

He says it allows him to be more "aggressive" on the long side which I guess means he can make more assumptions about economic growth and general market trends and gives his Netflix position as an example (but that doesn't seem like value investing to me) and sees shorts are more of an insurance against market collapse.

 

He does say his shorting has cost him and his investors a fortune over the last 5 years.