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Everybody's Lying to You

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Re: Everybody's Lying to You

#11

Post by mynameishere »

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #8
mynameishere wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quick point: Having money, a depreciating asset, forces everyone into being a speculator. You have to make prophecies, because the alternative is an assured -2.0 percent return (roughly). Here's why the long term outlook is bad: An aging population will necessarily convert assets of all classes into money in order to finance their retirement. Simple as that. Short term, who the hell knows? Buy Citi on margin short te…

As the aging population uses the money to finance their retirement, where do you think it goes?

It chases goods and services.

Re: Everybody's Lying to You

#12

Post by TomOfTTB »

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #10
TomOfTTB wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, pardon the sarcasm here, but what exactly do you think the word "probably" means? Because to me it means "the author is stating an opinion and is in no way saying that opinion is authoritative" In other words I don't "know", I never claimed to "know" so you shouldn't accuse me of it. If you're going to go so far as to quote the line at least read it first and try to look at what the author's actual meaning was. F…

A house (or anything else) is only worth what someone will pay for it. If houses are selling for $750k, by definition they are worth $750k . You can hate it and refuse to think that anyone should ever pay more than $100k for such a house, but as long as people are willing to pay the price, that's the value.

But that's the point, no one was paying that much for it. It was inflated by a speculator's market. That's what a correction is. It's the market re-evaluating assets and reassessing their price based on what people are actually willing to pay and not what some real estate speculator or junk bond salesman said it was worth.

Re: Everybody's Lying to You

#13

Post by mattculbreth »

They left out another big lier: themselves. The financial media are as much to blame as Citigroup, the government, and whoever else. Hell, perhaps even more so given the press's traditional role of watchdog and investigator.

Re: Everybody's Lying to You

#14

Post by villageidiot »

mattculbreth wrote: post #13

They left out another big lier: themselves. The financial media are as much to blame as Citigroup, the government, and whoever else. Hell, perhaps even more so given the press's traditional role of watchdog and investigator.

->Hell, perhaps even more so given the press's traditional role of watchdog and investigator.

I'm not sure if you were being sarcastic here. Alternatively, perhaps you're not from the United States.

Re: Everybody's Lying to You

#15

Post by ryanwaggoner »

mynameishere wrote: post #11
ryanwaggoner wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As the aging population uses the money to finance their retirement, where do you think it goes?

It chases goods and services.

And much of that money will get poured back into assets...young professionals who work at firms that cater to retired customers will buy homes, retirement communities will expand and build more buildings, older people will sell their assets and rent instead, which means that someone will buy homes and turn them into rentals. I agree that many older people will be liquidating assets, but it just seems they'll shift to other parts of the population.

Re: Everybody's Lying to You

#16

Post by HSO »

mynameishere wrote: post #6
villageidiot wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

-> it'll probably be a decade before we reach pre-bust levels. How do you know? The same people who didn't see it coming are all of a sudden experts on when it's going to end.

Quick point: Having money, a depreciating asset, forces everyone into being a speculator. You have to make prophecies, because the alternative is an assured -2.0 percent return (roughly). Here's why the long term outlook is bad: An aging population will necessarily convert assets of all classes into money in order to finance their retirement. Simple as that. Short term, who the hell knows? Buy Citi on margin short te…

"Having money, a depreciating asset, forces everyone into being a speculator. You have to make prophecies"

You're exactl yright. Perhaps this is why people are almost asking to be creamed on their finances. The classic condition for stress is having to do sth and not being able to do it. People who have spent tens of years doing "economics" are none the wiser for it, their forecasts are about as correct as those of a bunch of taxidrivers: Zero, no statistical significance. And still everybody must do it or, even worse, judge the ability of others to do it. No wonder the snakes thrive. In my experience, people who are blunt and truthful to clients have a really hard time to get heard.

Re: Everybody's Lying to You

#17

Post by HSO »

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #10
TomOfTTB wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, pardon the sarcasm here, but what exactly do you think the word "probably" means? Because to me it means "the author is stating an opinion and is in no way saying that opinion is authoritative" In other words I don't "know", I never claimed to "know" so you shouldn't accuse me of it. If you're going to go so far as to quote the line at least read it first and try to look at what the author's actual meaning was. F…

A house (or anything else) is only worth what someone will pay for it. If houses are selling for $750k, by definition they are worth $750k . You can hate it and refuse to think that anyone should ever pay more than $100k for such a house, but as long as people are willing to pay the price, that's the value.

This is a very naive (or doctrinaire) view. Please read one of the canonical value investing books, or Cunningham's book of excerpts from Berkshire Hathaway's annual letters by the chairman. For a more scientifically minded angle to this topic, please see Didier Sornette's "Why stock markets crash" (PUP 2003). Price and value are two different things, at least in my representation of the world...

Re: Everybody's Lying to You

#18

Post by Tichy »

"Everybody is lying to you [...] Our stock experts, David and Tom Gardner, avoid fish tales. These are two straight shooters who take their big catches in stride and don't lament the ones that got away."

Right...

Re: Everybody's Lying to You

#19

Post by berntb »

villageidiot wrote: post #14
mattculbreth wrote: post #13

They left out another big lier: themselves. The financial media are as much to blame as Citigroup, the government, and whoever else. Hell, perhaps even more so given the press's traditional role of watchdog and investigator.

->Hell, perhaps even more so given the press's traditional role of watchdog and investigator. I'm not sure if you were being sarcastic here. Alternatively, perhaps you're not from the United States.

The US media looks better than my local Swedish one.

In a small country, the interests are more aligned, for good and bad.

For instance, the US media have different opinions on lots of subjects! Here, you get at most two opinions.

But mainly, the US media seems to find lots of real scandals in your president administrations. That doesn't happen much with the local government and media...

Maybe there aren't any scandals here to find? (And if you believe that, I have a bridge to sell, if you want to make a good deal?)

That said, there are lots of crappy media in the US. But obviously, some of the world's best ones, too.

Re: Everybody's Lying to You

#20

Post by ilitirit »

> one-half of 1% per year

What's the intent here? Why not say "0.5% annually"? And why do people say "one-half"? Is this typical of economics journalism?

[edit] The whole sentence seems redundant anyway.

the average annual investment return from 1950-2000 was less than one-half of 1% per year

"annual investment return" implies "per year" and vice versa.

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