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Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

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Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#761

Post by hinkley »

NoOneNew wrote: post #568
vegesm wrote: post #488

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would shorting Gamestop mean making it to go bankrupt? The falling stock price of a company doesn't cause a company to go bankrupt, the causality is in the other direction. Putting downward pressure on price is useful only if you want to do a hostile takeover.

Hi, let me google "how short sellers hurt companies" for you. First link of one practice: short and distort https://www.investopedia.com/articles/analyst/030102.asp You can google more yourself.

I believe I learned the term Short Squeeze while holding Maxwell (MXWL) shares. I sold that position years before Tesla bought them, but one thing I recall is that there were a few people on the message boards that were pointing out how silly-high the short interest was, and that was, IIRC, in the 30% of float range.

As we all know, MXWL wasn't bankrupted, but neither did they thrive on their own. GME also has 4 times the short interest that those people were talking about. It also lacks a trove of patents that are worth something even in a fire sale. In fact the only thing they really have, IMO, is ThinkGeek, and the last time I looked they had fucked that up by merging its catalog into their own hamfisted storefront.

Honestly, given the current generation of consoles, I think they may be better off rebranding as ThinkGeek and having a Gamestop section at each store. We'll see if the new guy has any ideas like that.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#762

Post by whimsicalism »

kchr wrote: post #629
whimsicalism wrote: post #430

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it wasn't. Melvin has definitely closed, although Citron may still be in partially. Why are so many people repeating the same misleading talking points over and over?

> Melvin has definitely closed, although Citron may still be in partially. Source?

The original CNBC article that was never retracted.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#763

Post by btilly »

Chris2048 wrote: post #693
btilly wrote: post #594

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He is disliked for different things by different people. See https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/physicists-critic... for scientists dismissing his theories of physics.

Maybe, but I was talking about ppl on HN

People on HN are merely a (rather biased) sample of people in the world. Just as people in general can dislike him for different reasons, people on HN do as well.

I respect him for his work in programming. I dislike him for assuming that success makes him correct in whatever theories he comes up with in physics. Particularly when he has failed to produce any testable predictions.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#764

Post by dragonwriter »

grahamburger wrote: post #754
cactus2093 wrote: post #647

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have sources for your claims? I've also looked into it a little and come to the opposite conclusion. Here is one study from Singapore in 2014 that showed surgical and n95 have about a 68% and 95% efficacy respectively at preventing SARS transmission https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4293989/ Masks have also been shown to provide protection against the common cold (many strains of which are also coro…

> But by far the likeliest explanation in my mind is that these institutions knowingly lied to the public in an attempt to manipulate people into not buying masks, As I remember it, the advice wasn't "don't wear masks," the advice was "stay home." If they said "go buy masks," that would mean leaving your house to get a mask, which would directly contradict the more important advice of staying home. Also if they said…

> As I remember it, the advice wasn't "don't wear masks," the advice was "stay home."

There was “stay home” but also “stop buying masks because you are stopping medical, first responder, etc. personnel from getting them and they aren't useful for the general public” during the initial PPE supply shortage and hoarding.

This wasn't a lie, AFAICT, but Aa statement that was completely correct public health statement in the context it was given that was widely interpreted as an individual health statement.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#765

Post by robntheh00d »

dang wrote: post #704
jancsika wrote: post #121

A Moment in the Life of an HN Genius: 1. Reads a technical document outside their domain. 2. Feels dumb because they don't have a grasp on any of the concepts. 3. Too busy to use the very internet which some of them probably helped build to magically render learning materials to the screen in front of them at zero marginal cost. 4. Sees the word "manipulation" 5. Substitutes the laymen's definition of "manipulation"…

" Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community. " " Be kind. Don't be snarky. " https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html If you know more than others, that's wonderful. Please share some of what you know so the rest of us can learn. None of what you wrote here helps anyone learn—it just puts others down, makes you sound supercilious, and makes the community worse. A comment like this stuck at th…

Everyone’s brain is a time series database of experience, with a variety of heuristic shorthand’s built in. Presuming they should all consume and process information the same way is arrogant.

Perhaps take some of your own advice; one comment in this thread has not damaged HN.

Consider; for me OP did not leave as painful an impression as the helicopter parenting and scolding that followed. Trigger the Streisand Effect at your own risk.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#766

Post by dang »

relaxing wrote: post #758
dang wrote: post #704

Earlier quoted context omitted.

" Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community. " " Be kind. Don't be snarky. " https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html If you know more than others, that's wonderful. Please share some of what you know so the rest of us can learn. None of what you wrote here helps anyone learn—it just puts others down, makes you sound supercilious, and makes the community worse. A comment like this stuck at th…

I feel like “resist the urge to post claims about concepts outside your domain/grasp” is clear, actionable advice that improves the community. What if you spent more time policing that, instead of policing of tone of people trying to make it better? Take care of the commons earlier, and then these type of posts wouldn’t be necessary. I’m not sure why you would question the intentions of the upvoters - do you believe…

There are other ways to make such points which don't break the site guidelines. You're ignoring the damage to the community that I'm writing about, which is much more important. Massive, low-information, vicious flamewars are the biggest existential threat to the community.

I don't believe that either the commenter or the upvoters wanted an off-topic flamewar to be pinned at the top of the most popular thread on HN's front page. That would be malice! Outcomes like this happen on the internet, not by deliberate malice, but because a large number of small contributions—usually made without much attention, and without thinking of the overall health of the community—compound into a damaging outcome.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#767

Post by caffeine »

numair wrote: post #107

Okay kids, story time. After the crash of 2008, I spent some time working with Dick Fuld. Yes, the former head of Lehman Brothers. Yes, the one people describe as “disgraced,” among other terms. Here’s the irony, though — Dick was one of the only people I encountered at that level of business/finance who wasn’t a scumbag. Unlike so many virtue-signaling Silicon Valley darlings, the guy behind the curtain was an honor…

This "wild new phenomenon" is just boring old market manipulation. The only thing new about it is that the perpetrator is a subreddit instead of a licensed broker/dealer or other regulated entity.

The appropriate thing to do is for the SEC to subpoena Reddit and RobinHood, correlate trades with posts to prove intent to manipulate the price (which IS illegal), and charge every individual with market manipulation.

Just like any other individuals guilty of market manipulation (Libor riggers, Navinder Sarao, etc).

Robinhood should probably also be investigated for abetting this, although it's a gray area.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#768

Post by archibaldJ »

dang wrote: post #704
jancsika wrote: post #121

A Moment in the Life of an HN Genius: 1. Reads a technical document outside their domain. 2. Feels dumb because they don't have a grasp on any of the concepts. 3. Too busy to use the very internet which some of them probably helped build to magically render learning materials to the screen in front of them at zero marginal cost. 4. Sees the word "manipulation" 5. Substitutes the laymen's definition of "manipulation"…

" Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community. " " Be kind. Don't be snarky. " https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html If you know more than others, that's wonderful. Please share some of what you know so the rest of us can learn. None of what you wrote here helps anyone learn—it just puts others down, makes you sound supercilious, and makes the community worse. A comment like this stuck at th…

been loving HN for 8 years (n coming!) mostly due to the self-constraints commentators here generally have on the amount of meta-nastiness they (accidentally/intentionally) leak out

and as the population grows am hugely thankful for the moderation too

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#769

Post by dang »

robntheh00d wrote: post #765
dang wrote: post #704

Earlier quoted context omitted.

" Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community. " " Be kind. Don't be snarky. " https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html If you know more than others, that's wonderful. Please share some of what you know so the rest of us can learn. None of what you wrote here helps anyone learn—it just puts others down, makes you sound supercilious, and makes the community worse. A comment like this stuck at th…

Everyone’s brain is a time series database of experience, with a variety of heuristic shorthand’s built in. Presuming they should all consume and process information the same way is arrogant. Perhaps take some of your own advice; one comment in this thread has not damaged HN. Consider; for me OP did not leave as painful an impression as the helicopter parenting and scolding that followed. Trigger the Streisand Effect…

I don't think I disagree with any of that. But if you're implicitly arguing that more of the GP would be just fine for HN, then I do have to disagree.

Moderation comments are an unfortunate evil. To some extent they do the very things we're scolding others for. I don't feel very good about that and I'd love to find a better way—especially because they're even more tedious to write than they are to read. https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so... Unfortunately, the system doesn't regulate itself with community and software mechanisms alone. There needs to be a moderation mechanism as well, i.e. humans who are giving the system their primary attention and giving feedback to it. I'd never claim that the way we do it is the only way or the best way, just that it's better than nothing.

While I have you: could you please stop creating accounts for every few comments you post? We ban accounts that do that. This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

You needn't use your real name, of course, but for HN to be a community, users need some identity for other users to relate to. Otherwise we may as well have no usernames and no community, and that would be a different kind of forum. https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#770

Post by opo »

mikestew wrote: post #702
mjburgess wrote: post #562

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. Even then, as a term, it refers to a specific regan-era tax policy. What many on the left assume it means, is a sincere description of growth "raising the tide"; and how ridiculous an idea that is. Of course the tide has risen to an unprecedented degree in human history both since the term "trickle down" was invented; and moreso, over the last 40 years.

Even then, as a term, it refers to a specific regan-era tax policy. The term was coined by Will Rogers about 90 years ago.

The usage goes further back then that. The first use was in 1896 by William Jennings Bryan in his Cross of Gold speech:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trickle-down_economics

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