Tesla's April Fool's Joke Spoofs Market Algorithms

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Tesla's April Fool's Joke Spoofs Market Algorithms

Posted by timothy on Thursday April 2, 2015 @05:50AM from the be-prepared-for-next-year dept.

Okian Warrior writes Yesterday, Tesla's twitter feed and blog announced the new "W" Model. Meaning "Watch" (as in "wristwatch"), the announcement Included a photo of a watch spouting a cumbersome "Big Ben" glued to the face and including this text: "This incredible new device from Tesla doesn't just tell the time, it also tells the date. What's more, it is infinitely adjustable, able to tell the time no matter where you are on Earth. Japan, Timbuktu, California, anywhere! This will change your life. Reality as you know it will never be the same." Clearly, this was an April fool's joke as anyone who reads more than just the headline would immediately guess. The problem is that Bloomberg's fast response team did not. The algos, on massive volume, spiked TSLA stock higher by nearly 1%.

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Wow, a whole 1%? by Enigma2175 · 2015-04-02 05:53 · Score: 4, Interesting

A 1% move on an individual stock is not that much, is this really a big problem?

--
Enigma
1. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 05:56 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  When you're trading in volume by the millisecond for pennies, a $2 swing for an April Fools joke would be a pretty big deal I'd think.
2. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Defenestrar · 2015-04-02 05:57 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  1% in a day is more than enough for a pump and dump! I'd love a portfolio which could make me 1% per day. Generally I'm happy with anything above 7% in a year. Good news here is that the increased volume didn't trigger additional artificial pumping by other auto-buyers.
3. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by gstoddart · 2015-04-02 05:59 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Well, think about it ... say you could pretty much push the value of any stock by 1% just by having your idiot boxes start actively trading.
  If you're the brokerage house, you can make a lot of money by planning to cause the price to briefly blip and then make money on the differences.
  A brokerage house shouldn't be able to change the price of a stock like that.
  Doing it based on a joke tells me just how damned broken that method of trading is. And since all of the trading houses have these algorithms, it's not unprecedented for them to set off a chain reaction.
  Basically a bunch of self-serving greedy bastards can materially impact the stock market any time they like .. even if they don't intend to. All to try to rip off money from the market
  
  --
  Lost at C:>. Found at C.
4. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Okian+Warrior · 2015-04-02 06:01 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  Check out the actual bump.
  Anecdotal of course, but it sure seems like the announcement caused a massive spike in trading.
  Also note that TSLA is up $4 over yesterday's close, so that's a total of 3%.
  This is not nothing, given the scope of effort they made (a simple blog post and twitter announcement).
5. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Amorymeltzer · 2015-04-02 06:06 · Score: 2
  
  1% increase a day is almost 38x by year's end, fwiw.
  
  --
  I live in constant fear of the Coming of the Red Spiders.
6. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by geekmux · 2015-04-02 06:07 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  When you're trading in volume by the millisecond for pennies, a $2 swing for an April Fools joke would be a pretty big deal I'd think.
  Excuse me while I play the worlds smallest violin for the financial addicts on Wall Street.
  You want to gamble by the millisecond, learn to live with winning and losing at that same rate.
7. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 06:07 · Score: 0
  
  It's not the price bump that is noteworthy, it's the spike in trading volume. But for lay readers a change in trading volume is too technical to be interesting, thus the unfortunate emphasis on the change in stock price.
8. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 06:23 · Score: 5, Interesting
  
  Anecdotal of course, but it sure seems like the announcement caused a massive spike in trading.
  Once the algos learn to discount press releases on April 1st, that's when companies start scheduling their bad news for that date.
9. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by ceoyoyo · 2015-04-02 06:30 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  That's how stock markets work - the price is set by a bunch of greedy bastards. If you're also a greedy bastard (or you're the original one) you might lose money trying to get in on these things. If you're not, you don't really care. Unless you make a point of selling on the spike and taking advantage of the greedy bastards.
  Of course someone throwing enough money around can change the value of a stock. That's the point of a stock market. This story just says bad things about Bloomberg. You should think twice about buying into anything they manage.
10. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by ShanghaiBill · 2015-04-02 06:33 · Score: 2
  
  1% in a day is more than enough for a pump and dump!
  Most stocks fluctuate more than 1% in a day. Right now, Tesla is up 2% on their opening.
11. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by shaitand · 2015-04-02 06:36 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  It's not the like the normal up and down swings are based on anything beyond the emotional state of traders anyway.
  
  As for users of fast trading algorithms getting burned... yay?
12. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by CaptainLard · 2015-04-02 06:38 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Indeed. That high frequency trading has resulted in a single point of failure is the real story here. If bloomberg announced this to a bunch of humans, some would buy without thinking, a smaller amount would buy cause they're stupid but most would just laugh at bloomberg's mistake. Computers don't get jokes. Every time a previously unknown trigger occurs there is a chance a feedback loop will blow something up.
13. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by shaitand · 2015-04-02 06:42 · Score: 2
  
  If you aren't running a fast trading scam you aren't being hurt by this.
14. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Thelasko · 2015-04-02 06:51 · Score: 1
  
  I've been watching Tesla stock since its IPO. 1% for some stocks is a lot. However, Tesla frequently swings 10% in a single day. I would say this was less volatility that usual.
  
  --
  One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
15. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by njnnja · 2015-04-02 06:58 · Score: 2
  
  Anybody can push the price of a stock up 1%, you don't have to be a brokerage house. All you have to do is place a buy limit at 1% above the current stock price. But then you would have just spent $101 on a share of stock that you could have bought for $100. That's kind of what happened here - computers that thought the joke was a real product were willing to spend $101 on a stock that everyone else know was still just $100. So the point is that they didn't make money off this, they lost money off this. Which is exactly how it should be.
  
  And as for how broken this system of trading is, a 1% change based on a joke is nothing compared to the 600 point drop in 5 minutes, which was reversed just as quickly as it dropped. Even humans could have fallen for a good April fool's day joke, but it takes computers to mess up a system that much.
16. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Defenestrar · 2015-04-02 07:01 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Ever hear of a mutual fund, 401k, 403b, IRA, etc... When an auto-trade algorithm hits an action point - lots of people far removed from the system are affected. The effects can be quite serious when one trader's algorithm triggers another's... etc. There have been some very bad days on the stock market triggered by such events.
17. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 07:01 · Score: 0
  
  Don't trade in volume by the millisecond. Problem fixed.
18. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by TWX · 2015-04-02 07:06 · Score: 2
  
  I don't get why you were modded funny. Your comment deserved to be modded up, but I didn't really find it that funny.
  
  --
  Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
19. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by cdrudge · 2015-04-02 07:15 · Score: 1
  
  1% increase a day is almost 38x by year's end, fwiw.
  Might want to do the math on that. It's already April so you're losing 3 months of compounding.
20. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by sjames · 2015-04-02 07:21 · Score: 2
  
  It goes a long way to putting the lie to any claims of the market being anything but a casino driven by random fluctuations.
21. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by HornWumpus · 2015-04-02 07:28 · Score: 1
  
  Depends on how you define 'most'. Most over the counter and listed stocks, probably. Most listed stocks, maybe. The majority of the capitalization, not likely.
  
  --
  John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
22. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by HornWumpus · 2015-04-02 07:30 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Investors are not hurt. Speculators are. I'm good with that.
  
  --
  John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
23. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Immerman · 2015-04-02 07:31 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  380 days? That's not how exponential functions work. They clearly assumed 365 days: 1.01^365 = 37.78 (an extra 0.6 day would hit 38 exactly). With 380 days you'd be at 43.87, or with only 260 trading days that would be 13.29x
  
  --
  --- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
24. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by geekmux · 2015-04-02 07:52 · Score: 2
  
  I don't get why you were modded funny. Your comment deserved to be modded up, but I didn't really find it that funny.
  Dunno. Neither did I.
25. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 08:11 · Score: 0
  
  Telsa stock is $190 per share. If you are rich enough to buy the volume needed (say $1mil) and to risk it making a significant gain on 1% of that ($10000 gain), then yeah cry me a river.
26. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 08:17 · Score: 0
  
  Play me a tiny violin. Also, shut up and stop looking the gift horse in the mouth.
27. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by ShanghaiBill · 2015-04-02 08:22 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  Most stocks fluctuate more than 1% in a day.
  Outside of a market crisis, they sure as fuck do not.
  Yes they do. Besides Tesla, other companies that fluctuated more than 1% today include Microsoft, General Motors, Exxon, etc. Small companies tend to fluctuate even more. Perhaps you are thinking of the overall market average, which tends to fluctuate far less, because the individual companies generally do not move in unison.
28. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 08:32 · Score: 0
  
  LOL, the big speculators are never hurt. When the shit hits the fan, they turn the fan on everyone else. They do multi million dollar transactions every few minutes so the exchanges are all too happy to bend over backwards for them to halt trading and roll those trades back when their computers fuck up.
  Some piddling investor with less than 6 figures invested in TSLA? You're nothing. You're the account that has to pay back that profit you got when you sold your shares to the machine. Oh you reinvested that in AAPL? Make the big men whole, little boy.
29. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 08:35 · Score: 0
  
  A 1% move on an individual stock is not that much, is this really a big problem?
  However, if I could know for certain that a particular stock would move up 1% in a day, I would be be a very, very happy camper.
  It would not have to be even one every day. I would settle for one a week.
30. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 08:38 · Score: 0
  
  When you're trading in volume by the millisecond for pennies, a $2 swing for an April Fools joke would be a pretty big deal I'd think.
  Excuse me while I play the worlds smallest violin for the financial addicts on Wall Street.
  You want to gamble by the millisecond, learn to live with winning and losing at that same rate.
  Why, exactly, are you playing a violin for the HFT people who are paying themselves millions of dollars a year doing this soft of thing?
31. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by HornWumpus · 2015-04-02 08:47 · Score: 1
  
  You don't know the difference between an investor and speculator do you?
  
  --
  John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
32. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by khallow · 2015-04-02 11:37 · Score: 1
  
  It goes a long way to putting the lie to any claims of the market being anything but a casino driven by random fluctuations.
  Because a small fluctuation on a single stock is damning evidence for the market casino?
33. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by sjames · 2015-04-02 11:53 · Score: 1
  
  When it's in response to an obvious joke, yes. Look at the volume and tell me that's not a lot of so-called level headed serious investors acting like someone yelled BOO in a henhouse.
34. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by khallow · 2015-04-02 12:19 · Score: 1
  
  When it's in response to an obvious joke, yes. Look at the volume and tell me that's not a lot of so-called level headed serious investors acting like someone yelled BOO in a henhouse.
  Again, the price only shifted 1%. That indicates to me that this casino attitude was not widespread.
35. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by fractoid · 2015-04-02 13:35 · Score: 1
  
  Best April Fools' prank EVER, I'd think.
  
  --
  Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
36. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by sjames · 2015-04-02 13:57 · Score: 1
  
  Again as well, supposed serious grown-ups investing other people's money.
37. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 14:30 · Score: 0
  
  Or you could look at it as: we've been in market crisis since year 2000 or so, when Greenspan thought he could stave off recession caused by the dot-com implosion by fucking with the economy and every low forehead in office since them has just kept repeating the same sad mistakes.
38. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 14:34 · Score: 0
  
  So funny that you think Wall Street insiders are actually supposed to lose.
  Only you schlubs with your 401ks lose.
39. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by shaitand · 2015-04-02 20:14 · Score: 1
  
  "Ever hear of a mutual fund, 401k, 403b, IRA, etc"
  
  Ever hear of a bond, a commodity, a long term investor... When an auto-trade algorithm hits an action point... it has no impact on any of them. This only potentially impacts high risk investors and by definition they've opt'd in to the risk and have the burn coming.
  
  Anyone else either isn't speculating by gambling in the stock market or is at least trading on longer scales of time that erase momentary blips in a stock price like this.
40. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Stuarticus · 2015-04-02 22:03 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  Who says they got burned? The whole idea of these trading algorithms is that you can make money from any movement in the price due to your rapid response times, price instability like this is what they thrive on. That's exactly why they should be banned, they are the highest volume traders and they are motivated to destabilise prices which is the exact opposite point of the market.
  
  --
  If you think someone isn't free to have a different definition of "freedom" you may be a tyrant.
41. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 23:52 · Score: 0
  
  At some point you have to sell. HFT algorithms and speculators are taking a cut in your benefits, like it or not. HFT and intraday should be banned: if you don't want to buy/sell stuff in dollars you shouldn't be allowed to buy and sell dollars You're essentially taking a commission on international commerce for doing absolutely nothing, no value added. And people complain about taxes... usually the same people who speculate with FOREX and HFT, laughable...
42. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Paradise+Pete · 2015-04-02 23:53 · Score: 1
  
  A 1% move on an individual stock is not that much
  1% in a minute? That's a pretty good annual return. But seriously, anybody fooled into buying by that tweet deserves losing a little cash. Had I seen it in time I'd have sold into it.
43. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Paradise+Pete · 2015-04-02 23:58 · Score: 1
  
  For sufficiently small values of "most". A 1% daily move in a well-traded stock, while not uncommon, is nowhere near a 50% probability. If it were you could make a fortune in options.
44. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-03 00:32 · Score: 0
  
  lol I love this argument, in other words "I'm too stupid/lazy to understand the thesis behind my long-term mutual fund/ index fund approach, hence I have no real understanding of the gains I leave on the table due to my lack of participation and loses due to increased beta fueled by speculation"
45. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-03 00:46 · Score: 0
  
  What it indicates to you is irrelevant, you clearly are ignorant of this entire subject, but in typical slashdot fashion seem to have some inflated sense that your ignorant opinion matters. Um get level 2 access and you will quickly see than most of the volume is algos trading back and forth to each other. Or pick a few high profile securities and log options, specifically look at monthlys for the 2 months surrounding quarterly financial reports. you will be able to deduce from this data approximately the hedging and gambling that takes place. compare the speculating with the market capitalization of each security. prepare to be dumbfounded.
46. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by khallow · 2015-04-03 01:04 · Score: 1
  
  I'm aware that HFT and similar frequent traders generate the lion's share of the trade volume. It's irrelevant to me how big that share is, be it 90% or 99.9999% because volume is in itself a pretty useless metric.
  
  You are explicitly speaking of "algos trading back and forth". That would naturally generate a lot of low relevance volume.
  
  I see no evidence that any of these market games is at all harmful to outsiders. Sure, someone probably lost some fingers and toes in this goof, but so what? I find it remarkable how little damage people can point to in these accidents.
47. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by HornWumpus · 2015-04-03 02:39 · Score: 1
  
  I'll take that as a no.
  
  --
  John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
48. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-03 06:14 · Score: 0
  
  Really modded "Insightful" I understand.
49. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by NatasRevol · 2015-04-03 07:27 · Score: 1
  
  One day of data = anecdote
  
  --
  There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
50. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-03 08:41 · Score: 0
  
  Quite the same as the stockbrokers.
51. Re:Wow, a whole 1%? by shaitand · 2015-04-06 03:30 · Score: 1
  
  If you are going to do that you need to ban chart trading and day trading as well and get back to people investing based on actual fundamentals. Good luck with that.
  
  In the meantime the stock market is nothing but a game that has little to no relation to the success or viability of the businesses and in that world the fast trading algorithms serve to provide liquidity.
Holy crap ... by gstoddart · 2015-04-02 05:54 · Score: 4, Interesting

The problem is that Bloomberg's fast response team did not. The algos, on massive volume, spiked TSLA stock higher by nearly 1%
So the stock market is being actively manipulated by idiots?
As usual, these people are just parasites on the financial system looking to skim off money before everyone else has a chance.
High frequency trading is essentially skimming off the top for yourself without having done ANYTHING other than having a faster connection.
I hope these clowns bankrupt themselves one day with their stupidity.

--
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
1. Re:Holy crap ... by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 06:00 · Score: 0
  
  If it's a bad bet, then they lose their capital.
  What's your problem?
2. Re:Holy crap ... by fightinfilipino · 2015-04-02 06:01 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  The problem is that Bloomberg's fast response team did not. The algos, on massive volume, spiked TSLA stock higher by nearly 1%
  So the stock market is being actively manipulated by idiots?
  As usual, these people are just parasites on the financial system looking to skim off money before everyone else has a chance.
  High frequency trading is essentially skimming off the top for yourself without having done ANYTHING other than having a faster connection.
  I hope these clowns bankrupt themselves one day with their stupidity.
  this already happened, in 2008. except it didn't bankrupt the bankers, it bankrupted the rest of the U.S. and major parts of the globe.
3. Re:Holy crap ... by Nutria · 2015-04-02 06:12 · Score: 1, Insightful
  
  it bankrupted the rest of the U.S.
  Amazingly, I didn't go bankrupt, and neither did anyone I know, and nor did any business that I know of.
  IOW, stop regurgitating manifestly false FUD.
  
  --
  "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
4. Re:Holy crap ... by romanr · 2015-04-02 06:17 · Score: 2
  
  If it's a bad bet, then they lose YOUR capital.
  What's your problem?
  FTFY
5. Re:Holy crap ... by fightinfilipino · 2015-04-02 06:25 · Score: 1
  
  it bankrupted the rest of the U.S.
  Amazingly, I didn't go bankrupt, and neither did anyone I know, and nor did any business that I know of.
  IOW, stop regurgitating manifestly false FUD.
  sigh. can you take a little joke? sarcasm? hyperbole?
6. Re:Holy crap ... by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 06:29 · Score: 0
  
  I worked for one of the companies that went bankrupt because of this. As in no longer exists. Losing $40 Billion on paper within a few weeks tends to have that affect on a company. Sure as hell was not FUD to me.
7. Re:Holy crap ... by ceoyoyo · 2015-04-02 06:35 · Score: 1
  
  That wasn't high frequency trading, it was bad loans. Bad loans to people who wanted to buy houses. So the greedy children who just had to have that house they couldn't afford caused an economic crash. The clowns just let them do it.
  The unfortunate thing about the whole scenario is that the clowns got bailed out so everyone who invested their money with them didn't get burned. If some idiot loses your money it's supposed to hurt so that you don't give that same idiot more money to play with.
8. Re:Holy crap ... by Nutria · 2015-04-02 06:36 · Score: 1
  
  Losing $40 Billion on paper within a few weeks tends to ...
  tends to indicate to me that the company was too leveraged.
  
  --
  "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
9. Re:Holy crap ... by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 06:40 · Score: 0
  
  Yes, but surely GPs anecdotal experience is far more valid for this argument that your measly facts?
10. Re:Holy crap ... by gstoddart · 2015-04-02 07:04 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  That wasn't high frequency trading, it was bad loans. Bad loans to people who wanted to buy houses. So the greedy children who just had to have that house they couldn't afford caused an economic crash. The clowns just let them do it.
  It wasn't only bad loans.
  It was the wholesale fraud which happened when bankers packaged up bad loans, and with the help of ratings agencies passed them off as AAA investment, and then hoodwinked the rest of the world into buying it. It was a scam on a massive scale.
  Essentially Wall Street and the financial industry made HUGE mistakes in who they loaned money to, and the lied to everybody else as they pawned off the debt.
  It was a fucking pyramid scheme, ran by con artists, and then foisted off onto everybody else.
  Had it only been bad loans, the idiots who made those loans would have been the ones to get hurt. But this was basically kiting checks and outright falsifying documents.
  This wasn't caused by people who bought houses they couldn't afford. This was theft by the financial industry to cover their own stupid losses.
  The scam could only have worked because the ratings agencies are complete whores who don't actually do anything meaningful other than "if you pay us, we'll say anything you want".
  
  --
  Lost at C:>. Found at C.
11. Re:Holy crap ... by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 07:09 · Score: 0
  
  Millions of people had their retirement portfolios devastated at a time when they were liquidating and drawing down on their investments. Their vulnerability to market volatility exacerbated by the move from pensions to 401(k)s and individual retirement accounts. The plummet in real estate values also hit millions of others at a vulnerable time in their lives. Those people were irreparably harmed by a systemic shock that was theoretically avoidable. [Insert famous Keynes quote about time, volatility, market correction, and relevance to _actual_ people's lives]
  In any event, the financial crisis did cause a measurable increase in bankruptcies. But don't forget that in 2005 Republicans changed bankruptcy law to make it more difficult to file. There was spike in bankruptcies before the law took effect, which was about 2 years before the crisis. That had the effect of purging households with marginal or perilous finances, and also making it more difficult to file. This makes comparisons with earlier trends more difficult, and makes it easier for people to revise history and claim that things weren't as bad as they really were.
12. Re:Holy crap ... by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 07:22 · Score: 0
  
  > So the stock market is being actively manipulated by idiots?
  Yes.
13. Re:Holy crap ... by MasseKid · 2015-04-02 07:26 · Score: 1
  
  "High frequency trading is essentially skimming off the top for yourself without having done ANYTHING other than having a faster connection." It provides market liquidity, that is the service is provides. In an increasingly liquid market the amount of money available to be "skimmed off the top" actually goes down, not up so they're actually making the market more efficient (i.e. making the market take less money from you, not more). This is a well studied problem and isn't as horrible as most people think. The real problem with these HFTs is spike crashes that inadvertently trigger stop loss orders (automatic sell orders) from people who aren't engaging in HFT. Without deliberately initiating such a crash, you can not profit from the crash, and it's quite illegal to manufacture such a crash deliberately.
14. Re:Holy crap ... by sjames · 2015-04-02 07:29 · Score: 2
  
  I hope these clowns bankrupt themselves one day with their stupidity.
  Sadly, all that would mean is that you'll be 'asked' to tighten your belt so their constant stream of hookers and blow can continue through a massive bailout.
  These people are truly the scum of the Earth.
15. Re:Holy crap ... by sjames · 2015-04-02 07:32 · Score: 1
  
  Try looking beyond the gates sometime.
16. Re:Holy crap ... by sjames · 2015-04-02 07:38 · Score: 1
  
  It was bad loans that financially naive people accepted on the knowingly bad advice of mortgage brokers who needed fodder to fraudulently sell off as AAA investments.
17. Re:Holy crap ... by HornWumpus · 2015-04-02 07:41 · Score: 1
  
  I'm sorry, but national reserve banks are not children and are responsible for managing their own risk. See also how the German banks are managing the Greek deadbeats.
  One good thing happened, even idiots don't trust big accounting firms, ratings agencies or government sponsored loan clearinghouses anymore .
  The real bubble is in Treasuries. That one will be UGLY. (Unless the Euro or Pound pops first.)
  
  --
  John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
18. Re:Holy crap ... by Nutria · 2015-04-02 07:45 · Score: 0
  
  An analogy: a severe hurricane does not mean that the world is coming to an end.
  
  --
  "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
19. Re:Holy crap ... by sjames · 2015-04-02 07:51 · Score: 1
  
  Analogy, overly pedantic kid in middle school who starts every sentence with "Well technically..."
20. Re:Holy crap ... by ceoyoyo · 2015-04-02 08:52 · Score: 1
  
  Sounds like bad loans to me. It most definitely was people buying houses they couldn't afford, although you can make the argument the the average person is too dumb to know if they can afford a house or not so the size of the loan they can take out should be limited.
  The banks that issued those loans played some games, but other banks and insurance companies bought it. They should have known better. If I tell you I've got a AAA bridge to sell, do you buy it without doing a little checking? Either way, everyone involved should have lost their money so that they'd be a little less trusting in the future. If you're investing money you should know what it's invested in, what the risks are, and who's managing it if it's not you.
21. Re:Holy crap ... by HornWumpus · 2015-04-02 09:06 · Score: 1
  
  Someone so naive they can't read and understand a fair lending disclosure should have a trustee manage their money.
  
  --
  John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
22. Re:Holy crap ... by sjames · 2015-04-02 09:23 · Score: 1
  
  Who says it wasn't one of 20 sign here's somewhere in the middle. Did I mention these brokers were fraudsters?
23. Re:Holy crap ... by HornWumpus · 2015-04-02 09:39 · Score: 1
  
  Mortgages are not for children. They should have read what they signed. Their own fault.
  
  --
  John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
24. Re:Holy crap ... by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 09:45 · Score: 0
  
  Either way, everyone involved should have lost their money so that they'd be a little less trusting in the future. If you're investing money you should know what it's invested in, what the risks are, and who's managing it if it's not you.
  But they didn't, See "Too Big to Fail" and "The Government Bailout".
25. Re:Holy crap ... by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 09:56 · Score: 0
  
  So it is the position of asshole Americans that if Americans scam you by lying you should suck it up?
  This is precisely why the world things Americans are useless sacks of shit who think themselves special.
  And this had nothing to do with national reserve banks, and everything to do with Americans selling fraudulent vehicles on the open market and lying about what they were.
  I hope the next time the market goes to shit you find yourself homeless. It sounds like you deserve it.
26. Re:Holy crap ... by sjames · 2015-04-02 10:03 · Score: 1
  
  Good for you! Pin a rose on your nose! A lot of otherwise reasonable people got sucked in to this by trusting that the person who is supposed to be constrained by ethics was actually constrained by ethics.
27. Re:Holy crap ... by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 12:46 · Score: 0
  
  They're both anecdotal, genius.
28. Re:Holy crap ... by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 15:08 · Score: 0
  
  The direct loans themselves were relatively non-threatening, at least at the systemic level. There simply weren't that many idiots trying to buy $400,000 homes while earning $40,000/yr. What you had was one of these dopey mortgages, and then any number of derivatives written against it. If the loan went bad, which of course it was going to as the buyer was hopeless and couldn't pay even the interest in many cases, the guy holding the loan was at a loss, but the guy with the 10 CDS's against that loan might well make millions.
  The multiplication brought on systemic risk. 25,000 shitty mortgages worth $400,000 each is only $10,000,000,000 in losses. It's enough to bring down a couple of banks, but that's it. And you run out of idiots trying to buy houses they cannot afford. But when you have over 100x that loss amount in derivatives... and now we are talking trillions of dollars in losses... that's when you're a few moves away from Mad Max.
29. Re:Holy crap ... by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 15:31 · Score: 0
  
  it bankrupted the rest of the U.S.
  Amazingly, I didn't go bankrupt, and neither did anyone I know, and nor did any business that I know of.
  IOW, stop regurgitating manifestly false FUD.
  You could have said the same thing more succinctly by stating "I'm completely ignorant about the financial crisis of 2007-2008"
  Perhaps stated even more laconically you could have said, "I'm completely ignorant".
  Just for starters, the crisis began with a bankruptcy.
  Are you saying that you never heard of the fourth largest investment bank in the USA, Leman Brothers?
  Here's some more for you.
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L...
  It's a very long list.
30. Re:Holy crap ... by stdarg · 2015-04-02 16:20 · Score: 1
  
  A point of clarification, technically it wasn't just people who couldn't afford the houses they bought, it was people who chose not to afford the houses they bought. It's perfectly legal to refinance and max out your LTV, use the cash to buy a new car and pay off credit cards, then walk away. I mean, depending on where you live, if your mortgage is a non-recourse loan then the bank gets the house back and your credit score is trashed for a few years, and that's about it.
  I almost bought a house from such a person. The house was in preforeclosure, they were seeking a short sale, and they had a brand new Mercedes in the driveway (still had the paper temporary tags on). I declined to proceed, realizing they were horribly irresponsible people and probably hadn't maintained the house well, and a month later the bank had foreclosed and they were gone.
31. Re:Holy crap ... by stdarg · 2015-04-02 16:37 · Score: 1
  
  It was the wholesale fraud which happened when bankers packaged up bad loans, and with the help of ratings agencies passed them off as AAA investment
  No no. I wish people were more familiar with statistics. It should be a required math course in high school, rather than geometry.
  Look, if I package up 100 subprime loans paying 12% interest with an expected delinquency rate of 10% (which is really bad, historically), I can do the math and figure out a 99% confidence interval on making *some* amount of money. I can turn around and say, I bought these 100 loans paying 12%, and I'm writing a derivative that pays 1% interest but I'm 99% confident that it WILL pay 1% with no delinquency. Because the high interest rate from the payers masks the non-payers. Plus what we estimate we can recoup from foreclosures, etc. Plus we can buy some of the loans at a discount because the original lender wants to get rid of them, etc. There are many factors.
  This is real, sound math, and it works as long as you have the numbers right. There's nothing wrong with it, and there's nothing unethical about doing such math and selling products based on it.
  The problem with the financial crisis was (to extend the example) rather than a 10% delinquency rate, they got 15% or whatever. So we fell into that 1% case where the "virtually guaranteed" payout fell below 2%.
  It happens. There was a gas crisis. There was government intervention to promote loans to people who shouldn't get them. Etc. There's always a chance that something goes wrong instead of right.
  Yes, that's right, even a completely sound, 100% legitimate AAA-rated investment... CAN LOSE MONEY. So just because these investments did in fact lose money does not mean the AAA rating was unwarranted.
  
  Essentially Wall Street and the financial industry made HUGE mistakes in who they loaned money to
  Don't forget quasi-government agencies like FNMA which lost $23 billion in one single quarter (http://money.cnn.com/2009/05/08/news/companies/fannie_mae/?postversion=2009050812) on bad loans.
32. Re:Holy crap ... by stdarg · 2015-04-02 16:50 · Score: 1
  
  How were these reasonable people hurt? They traded their credit scores for a few years of living in subsidized housing (not government subsidized but investor subsidized), they cashed out their equity based on ridiculously inflated appraisals, they bought new cars and paid off their student loans, etc.
  Many of these "victims" were not "otherwise reasonable people." They saw dollar signs and correctly concluded that they could pull a fast one, and only the bank would get hurt. How many? I don't know. It's not something that's received a lot of scrutiny, because people prefer blaming evil bankers.
33. Re:Holy crap ... by sjames · 2015-04-02 17:17 · Score: 1
  
  What equity? They were under water. That means negative equity. It means sell the house and you still owe money.
  What they lost is a chance to buy a starter home that they would actually build equity in and actually be able to eventually pay off (or trade up).
  There were some speculators that did quite well during the bubble, but that wasn't for a first home. They got HUGE loans and flipped the properties near their inflated peak value.
34. Re:Holy crap ... by HornWumpus · 2015-04-03 02:32 · Score: 1
  
  You are trying too hard to squeeze everything into a fairy tail morality.
  The people that bought on the peak were the same population that bought two years before. One was not evil and one was not a victim.
  They were both a bunch of optimists. Those that agreed to loans they knew (or should have known) they could not afford have only themselves to blame.
  Those that bought before the peak, took out equity as cash then lost the house were in fact winners and came out ahead on the deal. The fact they might have squandered the money is not material to the discussion. They still got over on the banks.
  Also in almost all states in the USA mortgage holders have no recourse beyond taking the house and wrecking the borrowers credit. In the few states were they have recourse they end up unsecured lenders, so the borrower just declares bankruptcy. The only case where the lender has to pay off negative equity is when he/she is in a recourse state and has resources to pay off the loan (decided by a bankruptcy court).
  
  --
  John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
35. Re:Holy crap ... by sjames · 2015-04-03 05:37 · Score: 1
  
  Where did I call the house flippers evil? They did nothing wrong. It's the loan flippers I have an issue with.
  You seem pretty eager to hang a halo on the banker's horns for some reason. They're the ones who talked first time buyers into the bad loans and then sold them off like a hot potato to someone else who sliced and diced it and mashed it back together with other loans, slipped a fiver under the table to get that glop stamped AAA, and finally sold it again to experienced professionals in finance who ACTUALLY should be expected to know better.
  All but those first time buyers had every reason to understand that one day the music would stop and that an awful lot of chairs had been removed.
36. Re:Holy crap ... by HornWumpus · 2015-04-03 06:30 · Score: 1
  
  True some of them should never have qualified. Your issue is with the feds, they wrote the underwriting standards.
  Social engineering fail. You know this, much as you are in denial.
  The fact remains that anybody who went into these loans unaware should have a trustee appointed to manage their money. They aren't equipped to deal in the real world.
  There are only two possibilities; they were party to the fraud or they are incompetent to manage their own money. Assume everything they claim is true, they just signed the fraudulent applications. Trustee required as the price to stay out of jail.
  
  --
  John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
37. Re:Holy crap ... by sjames · 2015-04-03 06:53 · Score: 1
  
  Blame the victim all you want and look at the bankers with rose colored glasses all you want, but you are in fantasy land.
  Don't try blaming the feds either. Would you blame the feds if they don't have a law against sticking your head under a running lawn mower? If they don't specifically say you shouldn't wedge a fire hose into your mouth and turn the hydrant on full?
  While we're at it, it's also not the fault of the Easter Bunny, Santa, or Cupid. It's not because their parents didn't buy them a pony.
38. Re:Holy crap ... by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-03 21:31 · Score: 0
  
  "High frequency trading is essentially skimming off the top for yourself without having done ANYTHING other than having a faster connection"
  Well, there's the price of a stupidly low latency connection, plus a few million dollars in hardware to make the trades in milliseconds, then there's millions in 'cash' to cover the traded positions. If it was easy we'd all be doing it.
  From an economics perspective it's far more interesting. They are providing liquidity which makes the whole market work more efficiently, as well as providing a handsome dividend for their shareholders (our pension funds).
  Not just a simple case of people raking in a fat pay cheque for nothing.
39. Re:Holy crap ... by stdarg · 2015-04-06 08:06 · Score: 1
  
  What equity? They were under water.
  Exactly. Some people before the financial crisis refinanced their mortgage and, due to higher appraisals, were able to cash out their equity while still retaining an acceptable LTV. Then the value of the house declined faster than they paid down the mortgage.
  Those people were not hurt.
  Like I said, I don't know what proportion of people fell into that camp vs the one you're describing. It's just not something that has been studied and publicized much.
lesson learned by turkeydance · 2015-04-02 05:54 · Score: 1

anyone need a quarterly "bump" before the stockholder meetings?
1. Re:lesson learned by gstoddart · 2015-04-02 06:20 · Score: 1
  
  On Wall Street? Of course they're taking a bump.
  Wait, we are talking about cocaine, right?
  
  --
  Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Is that a watch in his pocket? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 05:59 · Score: 0

Or is he just happy to see me.
You don't get how Wall Street works by Aqualung812 · 2015-04-02 05:59 · Score: 5, Insightful

I hope these clowns bankrupt themselves one day with their stupidity.
No, based off what happened last time, they don't go bankrupt. They don't go to jail.
Everyone else's retirement funds take a huge hit and lose value, but assholes^H^H^H^H business leaders like this are too important to fail.

--
Grammer Nazis - I mod you "troll" unless you actually add something on-topic. Yes, I know I have mispellings in my sig.
1. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by Gordo_1 · 2015-04-02 06:07 · Score: 1
  
  Your retirement portfolio is only affected if it's on the wrong side of one of their trades. Index long-term my friend and fuggetaboutit.
2. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by gstoddart · 2015-04-02 06:13 · Score: 2
  
  And, for anybody who hasn't thought of this ... don't take random financial advice from the internet, talk to a professional.
  There are quite a few scenarios in which indexed funds took a complete bath with the downturn in oil.
  Indexing is no magic bullet either, just a bet that in the long term things go up and keep doing so.
  
  --
  Lost at C:>. Found at C.
3. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 06:27 · Score: 0
  
  Um, long term stock indexes have never "taken a bath" over the longterm, no matter what happens with oil.
  Yes, indexing is as close to a magic bullet as you are going to get. If the indexes don't go up in the long term, most likely other fund will do even worse.
4. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by ceoyoyo · 2015-04-02 06:33 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Why? The professionals' performance is pretty much the same as random.
  Realize that investment carries risk and some kinds carry more risk than others.
5. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 06:41 · Score: 0
  
  Any kind of investment is also a bet that the sun is going to come up tomorrow. Using the term "bet" to equivocate different strategies is kind of misleading. The stock market is a store of wealthand an equity stake in the most wealth-producing sectors of our economy. And this will remain so as long as we maintain a capitalist economic system.
  But, FWIW, I think the only real rule of investing is to never try to time stock prices. You invest in index funds when you don't have the time to pick stocks or to diversify into other asset classes. And the vast majority of people don't have the time, including myself. Heck, most investment advisers don't have the time--they apply strategies and purchase portfolios handed to them by specialists.
6. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by Will.Woodhull · 2015-04-02 06:52 · Score: 2, Interesting
  
  [of comment subject] You don't get how Wall Street works
  Wall Street doesn't "work". It never has. There is no "work" being done by anyone involved solely with Wall Street activities. None of that activity produces actual goods or services. A laundromat contributes more to the real USA economy than all the mutual funds ever have, or ever will.
  The main problem with capitalism today is that it is a religion that has been completely subverted by heretical money changers from the original visions of John Locke and others.
  The most exciting and beneficial economic activity of the last ten years is the development and distribution of free open source software, which is putting the tools of production into the hands of everyone who is living above abject poverty. The impact is huge. Yet this is a gift economy that does not fit the capitlalistic model and has nothing to do with "finance".
  The age of finance is drawing to a close, and good riddance. It belongs in the history books, in a chapter after the age of slavery, along side the chapters on the age of colonial oppression and the age of consumerism. (The new ages of ecological balance and anonymous gift exchange ("freeware") are the first emerging ages of the anthropocene epoch).
  
  --
  Will
7. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 06:55 · Score: 1
  
  The stock market is a store of wealth and an equity stake in the most wealth-producing sectors of our economy.
  At least you didn't attempt to make an outlandish claim like associating the price of the stock with the value of the underlying corporation.
8. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by tomhath · 2015-04-02 07:25 · Score: 2
  
  None of that activity produces actual goods or services.
  I suppose it depends on how you define "services". But most people would consider the capital markets a service:
  
  Capital markets are vital to the functioning of an economy, since capital is a critical component for generating economic output. Capital markets include primary markets, where new stock and bond issues are sold to investors, and secondary markets, which trade existing securities.
9. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 07:45 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Wall Street doesn't "work". It never has. There is no "work" being done by anyone involved solely with Wall Street activities. None of that activity produces actual goods or services. A laundromat contributes more to the real USA economy than all the mutual funds ever have, or ever will.
  
  It certainly works when taking a good company idea and getting investment needed for that company to grow and build more things. It also works pretty well when you want to mitigate risks associated with changes in things like raw material costs or certain business scenarios.
10. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by Will.Woodhull · 2015-04-02 07:53 · Score: 1
  
  You are missing the point.
  The tremendous success of FOSS-- including its adoption by major corporations like Google, Microsoft, and Ubuntu-- proves that capital markets are not necessary for a vibrant economy. The growing success of crowd-sourced projects are another and more direct challenge to the myths that capital markets are based on. Like a mud and wattle palace of an ancient Middle Eastern empire, capitalism, and capital markets, are crumbling. There has not been a "devine right of kings" for centuries. Soon the myth of the capitalist as the necessary kingpin to a modern economy will also fade away.
  You might see that happen during your life time. It seems that basic changes in world views that used to take hundreds of years to change everyone's life are now happening in a couple of decades. Sometimes faster. Just saw a remarkable first hand report of people driving donkey carts in the outback of Timbuktu while using cell phones to broker deals on their goods while still hours away from the market.
  The world is changing. Visualize whirled peas.
  
  --
  Will
11. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 07:58 · Score: 0
  
  You also invest in index funds when you believe that central bank interventions directly support the equities indexed. In essence, such a strategy supposes that, in an age of such data processing that indexing the market is irrelevant when the entire market could be sampled instead, the index provides instead a small basket of stocks that can be targeted for intervention, to ensure that the viewers at home see a green upwards-pointing arrow every evening on the news, regardless of the overall health of the market.
12. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by Will.Woodhull · 2015-04-02 08:28 · Score: 1
  
  [Wall Street] certainly works when taking a good company idea and getting investment needed for that company to grow and build more things. It also works pretty well when you want to mitigate risks associated with changes in things like raw material costs or certain business scenarios.
  Crowd-sourcing is better.
  FOSS is very good.
  Before these and similar developments in SOHO bookkeeping and financial planning, capitalism was necessary. But just as Quicken, Peachtree, etc put probably a hundred thousand bookkeeping operations out of business in the last thirty years or so, so too do recent technological developments show the age of the capitalist is drawing to a close. Capital markets work with convenient fictions that we no longer need.
  
  --
  Will
13. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 09:29 · Score: 0
  
  Even with overlap between the situations where crowd-sourcing works and where capital markets work doesn't mean they are mutual replacements, or that one is better in general. They do different things, and can work quite differently in different situations, often at very different scales.
  FOSS doesn't address the manufacturer of physical things, even if the design is completely open source.
  And neither addresses the ability to mitigate risks. A lot of large scale or long term projects would not happen otherwise.
14. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by tomhath · 2015-04-02 09:47 · Score: 2
  
  The success of FOSS is due in large part to corporate sponsorships. It has changed the game, but in no stretch of the imagination does it pose any threat to capitalism.
  
  Just saw a remarkable first hand report of people driving donkey carts in the outback of Timbuktu while using cell phones to broker deals on their goods while still hours away from the market.
  
  Good example of capitalism and free enterprise at it's finest. Not sure what it has to do with Wall Street or FOSS though.
15. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 10:41 · Score: 2, Interesting
  
  Believing that stocks are supposed to mirror some sort of intrinsic underlying value is just wrong-headed. Nothing has intrinsic value. The price of a stock certificate, like the price of a diamond, is based on supply & demand.
  And like a diamond, people have varying reasons to own it, which might not have anything to do with any practical function of the thing. Which isn't to say that practical applications don't effect the price.
  Supply & demand--it's a seemingly simple concept but in reality the vast majority of people just don't _get_ the concept, including many economists. People just can't wrap their heads around the notion that an object might not have any inherent purpose or inherent value separate from how it's treated in the market.
  It's kind like the concept of a soul. Even most atheists fall into the trap of believing that a soul exists. I think it's a limitation of our brains. We presume there's some kind of agency or other fundamental character of things independent from the interactions it has with the environment.
16. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 11:11 · Score: 0
  
  Stock (and bond) index funds are not oil futures, that's a separate topic (futures do not track spot price and many future "indexes" were horribly easy for everyone to front run when they rolled contracts once a month). Also, no one said index funds are a magic bullet, that's a straw man. They are however superior to active funds. Why? Because most active funds under perform index funds and the small percentage of outperformers is a changing and unpredictable set. And most active funds charge outrageous fees. Most people are too dumb to understand that just 1% of principle every year in fees, over say 30 years, is a huge amount of money. Enough to buy a house or maybe retire 10 years early.
  A great forum is: bogleheads.org
  or if you're interesting in a static risk parity trade: gyroscopicinvesting.com
17. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by khallow · 2015-04-02 11:51 · Score: 1
  
  Crowd-sourcing is better.
  
  FOSS is very good.
  
  Neither one is even remotely a replacement for traditional capital markets and crowd-sourcing is a capitalist system.
18. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by stdarg · 2015-04-02 16:14 · Score: 1
  
  Crowdsourcing and open source have nothing to do with capitalism, either for or against. They are orthogonal.
  
  But just as Quicken, Peachtree, etc put probably a hundred thousand bookkeeping operations out of business in the last thirty years or so
  That's hilarious, you're using an example of one product of capitalism (like QuickBooks) supplanting another product of capitalism (like small accountancy firms) to show that capitalism is obsolete. Do you see why that makes no sense? That is how capitalism is supposed to work. Your example shows that capitalism is thriving and continues to show resiliency and ability to adapt over time.
19. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-03 00:52 · Score: 0
  
  this isn't true at all. the returns of private equity funds dominate market performance for all time. also, keep in mind that private equity funds are heavily cross pollinated with hedge funds, which minimize downside. It makes for a very nice wealth ratchet. But please don't let me stop you from believing in the popular full-tard simplified tripe about the random performance of money managers and the superiority of index investing, which remains only approximately true for the tools at the bottom of the food chain. Think of it as more like a strategy for minimizing retail's losses to the wealth ratchet that always wins.
20. Re:You don't get how Wall Street works by radl33t · 2015-04-03 01:07 · Score: 1
  
  How you otherwise shore up the necessary capital resources for global/monumental industrial change without charging for access to them. Risk is everywhere. Failure is frequent. How do you overcome that inevitability without assigning a cost to borrow resources to try? Who would lend the resources to create economies of scale necessary to make semi conductors, solar energy, and (soon) batteries affordable? Are you suggesting volunteers in their basement can collectively get together and somehow develop a billion(s) dollar battery factory or an entire city dedicated to the manufacture of polysilicon solar panels?
Goebbels would've been proud... apk by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 06:05 · Score: 1

"I can make a triangle into a square if I just repeat it enough" - Joseph Goebbels, Minister of Propoganda Nazi Germany
* :)
(This isn't THAT 'far off', when you think about it...)
"Newspaper taxis appear on the shore, waiting to take YOU away..."
(That last line's the POWER of 'p.r.' & psychology via mass-media exploiting it to stir you to THEIR ends...)
APK
P.S.=> "Look for the girl, with the sun in her eyes - & she's GONE..." - Elton John, Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds (my tune for today, listening to it now in fact, due to 70 degree F weather after TOO much below zero here "in the great white north" of the USA - later)... apk
1. Re:Goebbels would've been proud... apk by The+Grim+Reefer · 2015-04-02 06:37 · Score: 1
  
  Â"Look for the girl, with the sun in her eyes - & she's GONE..." - John Lennon
  
  FTFY. If you're going to go for a cover version, William Shatner covered it six years earlier than Elton John, and Shatner's version was funnier.
2. Re:Goebbels would've been proud... apk by jason.sweet · 2015-04-02 06:40 · Score: 1
  
  Elton John, Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds
  I weep for this generation.
3. Re:Goebbels would've been proud... apk by Will.Woodhull · 2015-04-02 06:59 · Score: 1
  
  Hey, Dude, go easy on that stuff.
  At best you are confusing a derivative with the original. Otherwise your mind seems to have cast Elton John as the fifth Beetle, which while an intriguing fantasy in some ways, is sort of at right angles to ordinary reality.
  So please ease off before your head 'splodes and messes up the interior decorating.
  
  --
  Will
4. Re:Goebbels would've been proud... apk by mrchaotica · 2015-04-02 08:01 · Score: 2
  
  Wait, you say that in response to an APK post, and a misattributed quote is the part you're worried about?!
  
  --
  "[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
5. Re:Goebbels would've been proud... apk by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-03 07:11 · Score: 0
  
  Right: There's trolls like you that wish they were apk stalking him that show up.
Why is it a fake? by allo · 2015-04-02 06:05 · Score: 0

Not the ad, but the function seems plausible. Doesn't your handy do this as well? Every device with gps and a rtc can tell you the correct time whereever you are.
April Fools by BurfCurse · 2015-04-02 06:05 · Score: 2

This article is dated 4/1 submitted by Tyler Durden. You sure the joke isn't on us?
1. Re:April Fools by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 06:40 · Score: 0
  
  The name "Tyler Durden" (obvious reference to Fight Club) is used to post all articles at Zero Hedge.
2. Re:April Fools by blueg3 · 2015-04-02 06:41 · Score: 1
  
  It's Zero Hedge. Every article is submitted by Tyler Durden.
3. Re:April Fools by CaptainLard · 2015-04-02 06:46 · Score: 2
  
  Good thought but a bunch of outlets are reporting that TSLA volume did indeed shoot up by almost a factor of 20 yesterday (and I checked for myself as well). So no, this story doesn't mean we're fooled, it means we're fucked.
4. Re:April Fools by gstoddart · 2015-04-02 07:10 · Score: 1
  
  LOL, I assumed you were joking until I checked back on the site.
  That's awesome, I may have to add this to my daily sites.
  
  --
  Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Quants don't get a joke?!? by NotDrWho · 2015-04-02 06:07 · Score: 2

The hell you say!

--
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
Busted and busted by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 06:11 · Score: 0

The stock market is broken, and we're supposed to put our life savings into it.
1. Re:Busted and busted by Thud457 · 2015-04-02 06:38 · Score: 1
  
  You can't seriously propose that companies pay money into employee pensions as they contractually agreed to, now can you?
  What are you, some sort of caveman from the 20th century?
  
  We're much more enlightened and self-reliant here in the 21st century. Employees are responsible for taking their own money and invest in the only game in town.
  The fact that the game is designed to be rigged six ways from Sunday is beside the matter.
  
  --
  the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
2. Re:Busted and busted by stdarg · 2015-04-02 16:58 · Score: 1
  
  You can't seriously propose that companies pay money into employee pensions as they contractually agreed to, now can you?
  
  Hah, forget companies, if you can get the government to fully fund their pension promises you'd get the Nobel prize. I mean for God's sake look at the hoops people jump through to argue that the USPS is paying too much into their retirement funds. They come up with bogus arguments like "They are paying for employees who aren't born yet." Ummmmm nooooo, they are paying an extra catch-up amount because it's underfunded to begin with. The catch-up amount is equivalent to them paying the normal amount for additional employees that don't exist, but that's not what is *actually happening.* It's like talking to a wall though... they will insist that, no, the evil Republicans are bankrupting the USPS by making them pay retirement benefits literally earmarked for people who are not born yet. It's so funny, but also really sad.
  Seriously though, the lack of private pensions is small potatoes (I mean, we do have Social Security for those private sector employees) compared to underfunded pensions in federal and state governments. That is a looming crisis.
OP got fooled on April 2 by April Fools Joke by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 06:12 · Score: 0

Title says it.
A Tesla Weber? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 06:19 · Score: 0

A tesla (T) is one weber (W) per square meter. A loudspeaker magnet can have a strenth of 1T. How amplified is this wristwatch?
Maybe it was the Autopilot "Ticket Avoidance Mode" by AaronW · 2015-04-02 06:26 · Score: 1

I woulder if it could have been due to the "Ticket Avoidance Mode" in the upcoming software update? Video here.

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This post is encrypted twice with ROT-13. Documenting or attempting to crack this encryption is illegal.
No by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 06:38 · Score: 1

That's not Big Ben. That's the Westminster clock tower. Big Ben is the largest bell inside.
1. Re:No by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 06:57 · Score: 0
  
  That's not Big Ben. That's the Westminster clock tower. Big Ben is the largest bell inside.
  ITYM Elizabeth Tower
The joke's on us. by 140Mandak262Jamuna · 2015-04-02 07:02 · Score: 4, Insightful

Don't laugh, cry. We slog all day and then dutifully maxout our 401Ks and "invest" in mutual funds and other such instruments.
While these thieves on the other end are high on opium (OPM= other people's money) rolling high, taking insane risks, and all the profits and bonuses are theirs. If they make a loss, they are too big to fail and our taxes will bail them out. If they blatantly lie, cheat and commit felonies, they are too big to jail too.
Realize this. The. joke. is. on. us. They are laughing all the way to the bank (which they own probably).

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sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
1. Re:The joke's on us. by kamapuaa · 2015-04-02 08:52 · Score: 1
  
  That had nothing to do with the article, but I'm glad you were able to get that off your chest!
  
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  Slashdot: providing anti-social weirdos a soapbox, since 1997.
2. Re:The joke's on us. by 140Mandak262Jamuna · 2015-04-02 09:14 · Score: 1
  
  They are buying the stock without knowing anything about what the news is. You think it is just limited to Tesla? Every damned trade they make is equally precipitous, unthinking gamble. Their reward structure is, if there is a profit they get a share of it. If there is a loss, someone else will bear it. The traders are not trading on their money.
  
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  sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
3. Re:The joke's on us. by stdarg · 2015-04-02 17:01 · Score: 1
  
  That's way too simplistic. If there's a loss, of course they bear it. Bailouts happen when the loss is so large it's going to overwhelm the particular bank plus other big companies connected to them (such as insurers like AIG).
  While I agree that's not fair, it's also not as bad as you're pretending.
I like Elton's rendition of it... apk by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 07:08 · Score: 0

See subject: & yes, Mr. Shatner's is funnier than hell for sure, agreed 110% - but, it's SO BAD, lol, I wouldn't subject anyone to it is all...
APK
P.S.=> "And, there ya go" - thanks for the 'fix' on that line, but it always seemed to fit for me (I've sung along w/ that tune for decades the way I wrote it - guess I got it wrong, oh well!)... apk
Meanwhile down at the track... by WinstonWolfIT · 2015-04-02 07:09 · Score: 2

Unless you have 20 hours weekly to become an expert in an investment sector, the only winner when a small investor buys and sells stocks is the bookie. Er broker. Managed funds are better. Or was it diamonds. I can't remember which.
1. Re:Meanwhile down at the track... by HiThere · 2015-04-02 08:03 · Score: 1
  
  Not diamonds. Diamond prices are whatever deBeers says they are. ... Synthetic diamonds, now, possibly. But their prices are lower. If you want comodities, then iron is fairly good, but storage prices are high. (Notice I didn't say comodity futures?) A few decades ago I thought that monocrystalline silicon would be a good commodity to invest in, but I'm not sure that would still be a good long-term choice.
  
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  I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
2. Re:Meanwhile down at the track... by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 09:32 · Score: 0
  
  Er broker. Managed funds are better. Or was it diamonds. I can't remember which.
  Unless your name is De Beers, diamonds are worse. Much worse. Much, much worse. You are hard pressed finding investments that perform worse on average than diamonds.
  Why? I hear you ask. Simple. It's because no one professional will buy your diamond with anything close to the price that you paid for it (you are lucky to get 1/3), and no sane private individual buys an expensive diamond from a random member of public.
3. Re:Meanwhile down at the track... by WinstonWolfIT · 2015-04-02 10:28 · Score: 1
  
  Game Set Match. I love it when the point is missed.
4. Re:Meanwhile down at the track... by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 11:21 · Score: 0
  
  Low cost index fund and ETFs are the best.
5. Re:Meanwhile down at the track... by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 15:13 · Score: 0
  
  Hmm, experts work close to 60 hours per week...
6. Re:Meanwhile down at the track... by stdarg · 2015-04-02 17:07 · Score: 1
  
  20 hours a week?? Maybe if you want to do day trading. Then you should expect to put in those kind of hours, and you'll probably lose anyway.
  It's sad because this myth that investing is a rigged game really hurts a lot of naive people who are susceptible to being scared. Maybe some poor guy reads your comment and says "Gee willickers, I better cash out that 529 account for my son's college and put it under my mattress. Can't trust them darn bankers!" Yay for you, you screwed someone.
  I honestly can't understand how people like you have the balls to give actual, actionable investment advice. And yeah, your depiction of the entire market as out of reach of the average small investor is as incorrect and arrogant and dangerous as some other guy who pumps some specific investment that "can't lose". "Can't win" is the other side of the exact same coin.
7. Re:Meanwhile down at the track... by HiThere · 2015-04-03 07:54 · Score: 1
  
  I didn't exactly miss the point. There are reasons why I only speculate about what would be a good thing to invest in, and I'm well aware of them, but diamonds was such a spectacularly bad choice.....
  FWIW, what I really think these commodities should be is the basis for a monetary system. I really dislike the floating dollar, even though I understand why the gold and silver standards were bad. Monocrystalline Silicon is something that can be manufactured as needed with sufficient effort, and which has intrinsic value (currently). The problem, of course, is that it's value could disappear if there were some technological advance that obsoleted the use if silicon wafers in computers. A few decades ago that looked quite unlikely. Now....well, not so much so. But wheat doesn't store well, etc. But I agree that they aren't practical for individuals.
  
  --
  
  I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Caught the "bolds" I see: Ok.. apk by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 07:15 · Score: 0

That was more in reference to how crazy it is concerning mass-media, p.r. + psychiatric sciences used in them is all - It's as big a mind-game as LSD, & imo, JUST as 'trippy'!
* :)
(Disclaimer - I don't "DO" that stuff, personally...)
APK
P.S.=> "Onwards & UPWARDS" - Well, outwards actually - did some exterior spring-cleaning + small home repairs, & NOW getting ready to play a game of chess w/ my roomie "IN THE SUN!!!"
MAN!
It's SO nice today out there @ 70f, for once, I've GOT to get out there & enjoy it now, with a couple beers...
(About time too: We get "shut-in" up here in the Upper Northern U.S. for the winter, for the most part, it makes you 'stir-crazy', but you really enjoy & appreciate it when spring comes though, so I've got to take advantage of our 1st TRULY nice day outside in months...)
... apk
On "going easy on that stuff"? Ok... apk by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 07:21 · Score: 0

Catch this http://tech.slashdot.org/comme... & I just like Elton's rendering of the "LSD" tune the best of them all - even vs. the original by the Beatles (whom I liked VERY much & I was raised on them pretty much by my Sis playing them a LOT when our Uncle gave us ALL their albums (I actually have them as BOTH true Capitol thick as stone tile + Apple produced albums from the 1st one onwards (it's in TOTALLY 'beat' shape though)).
APK
P.S.=> Like I told others in that link above? I don't "DO" that crap personally - life 'trips me out' enough - & that's SORT of what I meant using it really... the power of psychiatric sciences utilized by mass-media IS 'trippy', powerful, & truly a mind-game to the max... apk
Is that a watch in your pocket, or by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 07:26 · Score: 0

Is that a watch in your pocket, or are you just glad you own Tesla Stock instead of Dice.
time it takes to trade stock vs. send money by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 09:10 · Score: 0

I wish they reversed the time it takes to send money (3 business day this day and age?) and the the time it takes to trade a stock (milisecond?). Ofcourse the interest of the current financial system resists such a change.
Not Big Ben by Forthan+Red · 2015-04-02 10:35 · Score: 1

Just because I'm in a nit-picky mood - That's the Elizabeth Tower photoshopped on the watch. Big Ben is not the tower, or even the clock, but the largest of the bells inside the tower.
spoofs? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-04-02 11:38 · Score: 0

no. the word you're looking for it "trolls".
tune in your geek card.
mortgages and financial crisis of 2007-2008 by clovis · 2015-04-02 16:15 · Score: 2

I see a number of posts blaming the financial crisis of 2007-2008 on the sale of bad mortgages.
If you are not familiar with the terms listed below, then you should not attempt to discuss the financial crisis of 2007-2008 because you would be wrong.
If you are reading an article about the financial crisis, or listening to someone discuss the financial crisis, and you do not hear these terms then you should assume they are either ignorant or lying.
hypothecation
140% rehypothecation rule
credit default swap (CDS)
collateralized debt obligation (CDO)
synthetic CDO
repurchase agreement (especially internal repo and repo 105)
Tautology by Shompol · 2015-04-02 17:07 · Score: 1

People think they are smarter than they are always and independently of any other variables.