Today Market

This is a pretty good summary.
I heard from one person a long ago that thing in the favor of small investors is that they can come in and out of the market without affecting the market price. Big players cannot do that without causing a visible price move. Big investors takes months to do what retail will do in a day. It will be interesting to see how it pans out.

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100% correct.

If a big player, like WB (or mutual funds/Hedge funds) needs to buy $5B worth of AAPL, his brokers (multiple) need to slowly accumulate the shares for many days. The brokers(or BRK) hedge with calls(buy side)/puts(sell side) first to lock the rate and then exercise the option. The option premium is tiny compared to the stock price move. This is handled by broker’s trading desk.

As investment worth increases, it is hard to handle the investment and esp outsmart S&P. We need to know more about what we are buying/holding/selling.

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Exactly why it gets harder and harder for Buffet to beat the market. He’s admitted as much over recent years.

It also why some people just screen for unusual options activity and piggy back in those trades. It’s not insider trading, since the trades are public knowledge.

Wells said. In other words, Warren Buffet himself is the market because he gets to choose the price. So, if WB has to beat market, he has to beat himself.

Now for practical skills. How do you track unusual option activity?

I said that first :slight_smile: echo chamber repeated it till even I am told about this!

Also need to negotiate with market makers. Another way to accumulate large block is to buy from another big guy.

I piggyback2 if I detect those activities :slight_smile: Work most of the time.

You think owning a stock is speculating, and trading options based on unusual activity is fine?

The quickest way is look at top options activity and compare it to the average for that option. Some will pop with at least 10x normal activity.

Did I say owning a stock is a speculation?

Anything (even the safest asset) can be speculation or an investment depending upon the understanding of two things:

  1. Safety of Principal
  2. Rewards/Risk Ratio

Speculating or investment is not the character of an asset but of the thinking that goes behind the money paid in to acquire that asset.

For example, if 9/10 startups fail, can investing in a startup be a speculation? But, it can also be rewarding. Can it be investing then?

What about the options? What about the penny stocks? What about the junk bonds?

Position sizing is important in situations like these. The amount and possibility of risk (loss) vs the amount and possibility of the gain.

Now you’re just going in circles contradicting yourself back and forth.

Screen Shot 2020-01-28 at 3.09.28 AM

We’re already bouncing back. That was quick.

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How long do you want? Coronavirus scare is BS. Director CDC thinks China is overdoing it, so far it doesn’t seem any worse than common flu. Probably just err on the safe side since it is unknown, behavior and effect are yet to be determined. Better safe than sorry.

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Question for all the Chinese folks here. This started as an animal virus spread under the filthy conditions in “bush meat” markets. Same as SARS. The economic damage to China is substantial - in fact at least one source I read indicated it had already eclipsed the damage caused by Trump’s tariff war.
In a totalitarian state with the power to imprison and harvest the organs of political dissidents how hard can it be to put a stop to those filthy markets? The ruling elite are educated people. They know you can’t cure cancer or impotence or protect yourself from all the diseases in red light districts with pangolin scales, rhino horn, bat soup or cobra gall bladder shooters. Herbal medicine has it’s place - but not “medicine” based on animal parts. This is the 21st century. With the risk already known how hard is it to just put a stop to those markets? What they are doing is already in many cases illegal since the SARS problem. Just raid them, put a few violators up against the wall and televise their executions. It’s a police state. Why is it so impossible to get a handle on this? This is the one sort of thing police states are good for.

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But…but…they’re dying everywhere. Bodies stacked up. Starving people eating their own dead to survive.
Or…maybe not.

No new info? Just a video that try to evoke pathos? I am a robot so this pathos thingy won’t affect my logical and rational thinking. Allow me to repeat, Director CDC thinks China is unnecessary draconian.

The latest numbers: At least 132 people are dead and more than 6,000 cases have been confirmed in mainland China, as the Wuhan coronavirus spreads across Asia and the rest of the world.

The median age of deaths is 75 and most have pre-condition like high blood pressure.

Compared to Americans dying from common flu, 2019 nCov is very mild. People scare of the unknown! Everything they don’t know is going to destroy the world. AI would destroy the world. Some aliens will come to Earth to destroy the world. Flood, famine, typhoons, hurricanes, earthquakes, … are God wrath against human brutality and cruelty.

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How did you forget to add the two most serious threat that will destroy the world:

  1. Global Warming
  2. Climate Change

I was thinking about this after seeing a Starbucks sign about partnering with customers to reduce climate impact. You have to ask to get a straw. All the climate stuff companies support lowers their operating costs. I can’t think of a single one that increases operating costs. It seems more like a way to get customers to expect less in the name of saving the environment. That or companies want a pat on the back for initiatives that lower cost. It really is genius.

I was being sarcastic. If you look at the whole video they don’t even appear to have food shortages and there’s no evidence of widespread panic presented.

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“The spread of the Wuhan virus isn’t accelerating, but markets becoming more concerned about future earnings and economic growth as companies implement work stoppages to reduce the chance of the disease spreading,” said Tom Essaye, founder of The Sevens Report.

Today is the day when you wish you own lots of TSLAs and NOWs.

I don’t think the market has fully grasped the seriousness of the outbreak yet. It’s more viral than SARS but less lethal. From a personal safety perspective that makes it less of a threat. But from a economic and financial perspective that makes it more so.

When AIDS first came out in the 80s it was an almost certain death. For arguments sake let’s say it’s 100% lethal. But it’s also difficult to spread. You have to be a druggie or have unprotected sex. You can’t just catch AIDS when someone sneezes. Market didn’t care one bit.

With the Wuhan virus people panicked. You may say people overreacted but the fact still remains that people are panicking. China has put its economy into deep freeze. The entire country shuts down.

In six months it will be old history and people will have moved on. But in the short term there will be a lot of turbulence.