Investment BS Thread - Stocks/Futures/Mutual Funds/Bonds/Commodities/Options/ETFs/401ks/Etc

I am concerned that all this puppet mastery of the economy will exasperate the correction, they should have let the interest rate stand and let natural market forces do there thang...as uncomfortable that maybe the inevitable I feel will be made worse...

 

Thoughts on this?

CPI being a bullshit measurement:
http://www.shadowstats.com/article/no-438-public-comment-on-inflation-measurement

Takeaways - the CPI calculation has been adjusted which has resulted in decreased social security payouts, pushes people into higher tax brackets (to collect more taxes) and decreases living standards by adjusting from a fixed price and weight cost of goods to a "subsitution" or "hedonic quality" measurement.

I am now reading about unemployment being a bullshit measurement:
http://www.shadowstats.com/article/c810x.pdf

 

I think they're good metrics, but they're lagging indicators. By the time they tell you "something," the market is already on its way down. I look more to the yield curve as letting us know what's coming.

 

Oh I'm not talking about with the market, I'm just talking about with the economy in general. This seems like a rather dubious method to distract people from understanding that the dollars they make today will be far less next year than is reported, and has the added "benefit" of inflating GDP figures.

I went down this rabbit hole after hearing Powell speak multiple times about inflation being in their "target 2%", "excluding volatile goods such as food and gas".... yeah okay... I could smell that he was desperate to have people buy into this. Same with "GDP is growing at a moderate pace"... he said it so many times that my bullshit meter was registering some readings!

 

Oh yea, I don't disagree there. What numbers aren't manipulated in some way for some benefit? I think it's going on with just about every public company when they report earnings too. Maybe not on an Enron level, but they're manipulated. Hell, even I do it when I apply for a loan and have to show income, debts, etc. Nothing illegal, but you can make things benefit what you need them to benefit.

 

The government is writing checks that their ass can't cash, even with reduced SS and increased tax collection. Meanwhile they are pointing citizen's noses to some kind of fake measurement in order to coerce them into thinking everything is okay. Eventually something is going to break.

 

People have been talking for decades (centuries?) about the debt and how something has to give. I'm sure it will, couldn't even imagine what will happen. I think the question is, when?

 

The thought process used to be that CPI measured a fixed weight and basket of goods. Steak, milk, eggs, that kind of shit. How much does it cost now vs then? Makes sense. It is all purely based on the market and is measured as such.

Then it became "the quality of these items has gotten better" (by some sort of non-quantitative metric - a metric that was then forced into CPI figures in a quantitative manner)
Then it became "well, if consumers can't afford steak, they will buy hamburger. If a steak costs $12, but then the steak goes up to $20 and hamburger is now $12, then inflation hasn't gone up at all"
Where does that end? Consumer "substitution" can end with dog food. This is all a terrible idea!

 

Is the U.S. one giant ponzi scheme? lol

 

In a sense yes.

They are collecting more and more in taxes, but less and less of it is going to social security.
It's no wonder the smart money offshores their accounts.

 

It kind of is. Gotta get more money (taxes) to pay off old investors (Social Security), while the total debt keeps rising.

 

I have always been told that as long as our yearly GDP = our total debt then we are okay. However, I am now beginning to wonder what our real GDP is.

 

What a yuck day!
Who thinks it will rebound tomorrow?
Who thinks this is the start of something bigger?

 

It may go up or down tomorrow!

 

Interesting chart I saw on fintwit



this could spell trouble for overall equity prices. No more fake gains.

 

I think it’s a blackout period right now for buybacks.

 

for the whole year? Generally they are blacked out before earnings reports. Which is fairly normal, and would be muted in the trendline due to so many companies having different earnings report dates throughout the year. There looks to be a big decline in buybacks this year in general

 

No, it was early when I posted that. I didn't see that the dip was so long, thought it was just a blackout. That's true, I wonder what's going on?

Maybe because the market is up so much this year, companies don't want to buy back at these prices? They were buying AAPL at around $150, I doubt they want to buy now at $220. Just a theory..

 

A little late, but I came across this:

http://openinsider.com/

 

NIO puts looking mighty tasty