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Bed Bath and Beyond files for bankruptcy

nytimes.com

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Re: Bed Bath and Beyond files for bankruptcy

#321

Post by astura »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #314
astura wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$2,000 for a queen sized mattress? No thank you.

It's funny how you wouldn't blink at a $20,000 car, but $2,000 for a mattress that you'll use for eight hours every day for the next several years is "No thank you." A good mattress can make your life better in ways that few other things will, on a dollar-for-dollar basis. Sleep is important.

Difference is there's not a car I can buy for $2,000 that's just as good (and maybe identical) as the $20,000 car in all aspects.

Re: Bed Bath and Beyond files for bankruptcy

#322

Post by wesapien »

spaceman_2020 wrote: post #118
neurobama wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole stock market in 2023 makes no sense to me, not just Bed Bath and Beyond. So many companies no longer pay dividends. So many classes of stock are now non-voting shares. Common stock shareholders usually get nothing if a company goes bankrupt and liquidates. So if I don't get dividends, can't vote, and am not entitled to a share of the company's assets, what is the actual value in owning stock? Do I just wait…

Everything has been fundamentally detached from reality, from stocks to housing. Houses can sit empty without tenants for years but they’ll only go up. Companies can be unprofitable for literal decades but they’ll keep finding funding and buyers. Commercial properties can bleed tenant but the prices will only be up. In a world of shrinking growth , stalling productivity, and dying demographics, the market behaves lik…

If China didn't control the outflow of Yuan, then real estate everywhere would be much higher than it is because they will just park their wealth there far away from the hands of the CCP.

Re: Bed Bath and Beyond files for bankruptcy

#323

Post by red-iron-pine »

neurobama wrote: post #52
humanlion87 wrote: post #8

I find the whole situation fascinating. Bed Bath continued to sell hundreds of millions of shares while they were preparing for bankruptcy and retail investors (or meme stock investors) continued to buy them. I assume Bed Bath did all the paperwork that is necessary (like calling out risks, that the raised capital will go to creditors first, etc) for such a stock sale. But it is clear they were doing it out of bad-fa…

The whole stock market in 2023 makes no sense to me, not just Bed Bath and Beyond. So many companies no longer pay dividends. So many classes of stock are now non-voting shares. Common stock shareholders usually get nothing if a company goes bankrupt and liquidates. So if I don't get dividends, can't vote, and am not entitled to a share of the company's assets, what is the actual value in owning stock? Do I just wait…

> So if I don't get dividends, can't vote, and am not entitled to a share of the company's assets, what is the actual value in owning stock? Do I just wait for the share price to go up, sell at the peak, and pass my shares on to the greater fool? That's starting to smell a lot like the worst sort of crypto trading.

Basically. Classy gambling at this point.

Re: Bed Bath and Beyond files for bankruptcy

#324

Post by cratermoon »

hef19898 wrote: post #79
cratermoon wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My favorite of the moment is 'gluten free'. Seen on things that physically cannot have gluten in them, unless it's contaminated somehow.

It started with vegan and then lactose free. But hey, free marketing for a ton products, right?

Way back in the day, it was "sugar free". There was much less shady labelling before the Reagan era, so it wasn't common, but there were a few things so marketed even though they had never had sugar before. Today I usually only see "no added sugars".

Re: Bed Bath and Beyond files for bankruptcy

#325

Post by mosdl »

Encrypt-Keeper wrote: post #106
mosdl wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed, you basically now only have discounters who sell in store small appliances/kitchen supplies. It must not be profitable enough since there are really no other stores in that market other then BBB.

Not sure what you mean, most if not all department stores today sell small kitchen appliances and supplies. From Target and Walmart to Macys

Target/Walmart are discounters and their variety, stock and quality are not good. I always forget about macys!

Re: Bed Bath and Beyond files for bankruptcy

#326

Post by cudgy »

spaceman_2020 wrote: post #118
neurobama wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole stock market in 2023 makes no sense to me, not just Bed Bath and Beyond. So many companies no longer pay dividends. So many classes of stock are now non-voting shares. Common stock shareholders usually get nothing if a company goes bankrupt and liquidates. So if I don't get dividends, can't vote, and am not entitled to a share of the company's assets, what is the actual value in owning stock? Do I just wait…

Everything has been fundamentally detached from reality, from stocks to housing. Houses can sit empty without tenants for years but they’ll only go up. Companies can be unprofitable for literal decades but they’ll keep finding funding and buyers. Commercial properties can bleed tenant but the prices will only be up. In a world of shrinking growth , stalling productivity, and dying demographics, the market behaves lik…

“Houses can sit empty without tenants for years but they’ll only go up. Companies can be unprofitable for literal decades but they’ll keep finding funding and buyers. Commercial properties can bleed tenant but the prices will only be up.”

This is not sustainable over the long haul and is basically asset holders holding out for better days (e.g. waiting for the Fed to lower interest rates to recreate the frenzy). In the meantime, cash flows and operating profits are going to get hammered until those with the shallowest pockets can no longer keep up the charade, and the fire sales begin.

Re: Bed Bath and Beyond files for bankruptcy

#327

Post by cudgy »

cycomanic wrote: post #248
FredPret wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> don’t follow any rationality anymore Anymore? When have markets ever been rational? Markets only line up with reality over the long term. You can point to any instant, and even any decade in time, and point major inaccuracies in the public's collective financial thinking. > Houses can sit empty without tenants for years but they’ll only go up. Do you have stats for how much of a problem this is? The problem seems t…

> > Houses can sit empty without tenants for years but they’ll only go up. > Do you have stats for how much of a problem this is? The problem seems to be vacancy rates that are too low, not too high. No stats on my part, but I have some anecdotal evidence from Australia a couple of years ago. I definitely knew of several apartment complexes which were significantly empty, but advertised rents did not go down. The rea…

DR Horton (largest US home builder) is doing something similar right now. Instead of lowering the prices on their homes, they are including incentives by buying down the interest rates on the mortgages of their home buyers. This helps keep the prices of housing higher, which likely allows them to keep borrowing against their inventory, avoid credit calls, and await the Fed to lower rates and return to the good old days.

Re: Bed Bath and Beyond files for bankruptcy

#328

Post by cudgy »

sharkweek wrote: post #246
spaceman_2020 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everything has been fundamentally detached from reality, from stocks to housing. Houses can sit empty without tenants for years but they’ll only go up. Companies can be unprofitable for literal decades but they’ll keep finding funding and buyers. Commercial properties can bleed tenant but the prices will only be up. In a world of shrinking growth , stalling productivity, and dying demographics, the market behaves lik…

I live in Seattle. There was a house on my street that had been torn down in maybe 2013-2014, that the owner of the lot sat on for a bit (it was one guy). He spent the next five-ish years slowly building a big, new house. I’d laugh at how long it was taking him on a week-by-week basis while taking my dog on a walk. There it is, the house that will take almost half a decade to complete. Well he finally does, and he se…

He still likely lost money. What if this guy did this process 5 times over the 5 years (build/sell) instead of sitting on a single property, taking his time?

Re: Bed Bath and Beyond files for bankruptcy

#329

Post by dragontamer »

criddell wrote: post #320
dragontamer wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Each time someone buys a stock, the stock value rises (meaning the next secondary offering will be able to achieve more money raised with less shares issued). The stock value rises because you didn't buy 100 shares from me per se. You bought the 100-cheapest shares on the market, which naturally raises the price. ---------- Lets say the market depth looks like the following: * 5 shares available at $95.20 * 15 shares…

So it’s not very different from the used book market. A book that sells well on the secondary market might get another printing which benefits the rights holders.

The... opposite.

Additional printings of stock devalue the current stock / shareholders. Its a way for the company itself to raise money, but at the cost of everyone else.

What you hope for is for the company to do a "share buyback", which effectively destroys shares. The company goes to the market, buys up a bunch of stock and then locks it away. It means all the shareholders become collective owners of those old shares, so everyone's value goes up.

But yeah, you're close. I guess my point is that the shareholders are a complex-piggy bank for the company. Shareholders like it when they get money, they (usually) don't like it when they get devalued. (This odd case with BBBY aside: where meme-stock buyers cheer at the printing of stock that devalued the company)

Re: Bed Bath and Beyond files for bankruptcy

#330

Post by paulddraper »

vkou wrote: post #275
paulddraper wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Licence to create money out of thin air is like license to steal. Is the purchasing power of your savings account shrinking 6% a year from inflation, or it is shrinking 6% a year from bank robbers? Same effect either way.

If I'm sitting on a mountain of corn/a pile of gold/a warehouse full of NVIDIA GTX 3080 cards, and someone else starts growing corn/digging up gold/selling 4080 cards, my savings' purchasing power is going to drop, but it would be disingenuous of me to complain that I'm being robbed.

There you are producing something, which is a worthy endeavor.

I think a closer analogy would be spreading a corn disease.

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