Gates shorts $TSLA?

[Sirfun]

What about investors who are actively manipulating stocks with false news and stories bent to serve INCREASING stock price?

Why does adding the position to short make manipulating stock evil. If you manipulate stock for gains, is the activity heroic? Or, is the act of manipulating detestable regardless of investing position?

The discussion reminds me of merging lane dilemma.

Heavy traffic, lane merges to one to the left. A car in front decides to merge early pressing way in while holding traffic up in the lane. A gap is created in front as the car waits for someone to let him into the lane to the left. Once let in, there is a sizable gap in front before the lane officially merges.

Dilemma: Does the next car merge at that point or does the next gate travel past ten cars or so to merge at the designated point?

Further compounding, car goes to merge point, a car to the left goes half into my lane and stays half into their lane blocking me. They do so because they feel s9 one is cutting in line traveling the empty lane while they wait. Do I go around and merge at the designated spot, honk my horn or merge in behind the guy who thinks he is being wronged while having his car take two lanes.

Analogy is meant to show some may have passionate conflicting viewpoints with others on the matter.

My feeling is that manipulating, and telling false stories, are wrong, no matter what purpose it serves. However, if we compare the 2 strategies. The person trying to short the stocks has one goal and outcome in mind, MONEY. The outcome of a stock gaining can have positive incomes for the company and society as a whole. It still doesn't make it heroic by any means, though.

 

[Crissa]

It is unethical and rightfully illegal to manipulate the market. Unfortunately, when obviously done, investigations and punishment cannot be done,

While I do not have interest in borrowing stocks to short, how is doing so hurting the company when they do not see any money on publicly traded shares?

I am attempting to separate and understand the evil from a disliked practice.

As you said, Lemming effect. Following the herd. Enough stock shorted creates the impression that there is something wrong with the company, whether or not it is fundamentally sound.

They give the example of knowing the stock is going to contract due to something being fundamentally unsound, such as Nikola, but... That's the rare case, not the common one.

Commonly, it just makes it difficult for a company to finance itself and work around the realities of the marketplace. For instance, Game Stop can't afford to transition its locations to more online shopping if someone shorted its stock and made financing even its day to day difficult.

The big problem is that everyone depends upon finance, and finance always pretends that 'risk' means it should be paid more for less work - whether risk they claim is borne out or not. Their higher charges and rates create risk.

-Crissa

 

[John K]

As you said, Lemming effect. Following the herd. Enough stock shorted creates the impression that there is something wrong with the company, whether or not it is fundamentally sound.

They give the example of knowing the stock is going to contract due to something being fundamentally unsound, such as Nikola, but... That's the rare case, not the common one.

Commonly, it just makes it difficult for a company to finance itself and work around the realities of the marketplace. For instance, Game Stop can't afford to transition its locations to more online shopping if someone shorted its stock and made financing even its day to day difficult.

The big problem is that everyone depends upon finance, and finance always pretends that 'risk' means it should be paid more for less work - whether risk they claim is borne out or not. Their higher charges and rates create risk.

-Crissa

I am interpreting the response as the problem is not the short position but the short position is public knowledge? Whale Bull positions also become public knowledge.

Herd mentality often gets hit by the wave instead of riding the wave.

 

[Nolacyber]

Boner Killer

 

[John K]

Boner Killer

I understand the words individually and when strung together. I do not understand the post in the context of this thread.

Please elaborate.

 

[Crissa]

I am interpreting the response as the problem is not the short position but the short position is public knowledge? Whale Bull positions also become public knowledge.

Herd mentality often gets hit by the wave instead of riding the wave.

Yeah, that may be, but keeping it unknown would pose difficulty in keeping those betting, honest.

I am for taxing high frequency trades and banning proximity trading; perhaps we could make a SLAPP-like restriction on shorting stocks. But if we can't, it should go away. We need to give a different method for rewarding Cassandra.

-Crissa

 

[John K]

Yeah, that may be, but keeping it unknown would pose difficulty in keeping those betting, honest.

I am for taxing high frequency trades and banning proximity trading; perhaps we could make a SLAPP-like restriction on shorting stocks. But if we can't, it should go away. We need to give a different method for rewarding Cassandra.

-Crissa

We currently have long term Investing, held greater than one year taxed at a reduced rate.
Short term, one year or less taxed at income bracket rates. Losses are factored in.
Day trader labels, taxed at income bracket levels and not supposed to have their losses factored.

I agree and pitfalls keeping data private.

I also have issue, not mentioned yet in the thread, of paid celebrities shilling an investment when we have experienced masses lost their shirts and some underwear to blindly following what the TV said.

I just don’t find the concept of shorting evil nor bad. I do find how some go about trying to manipulate to their ends utterly detestable. As mentioned prior, I have no plans to short any stock as the action goes against my personal principals of investing on company success versus banking on others losing.

If you disagree with me, 5 digit reservation number should cancel due to holding the reservation keeps the stock artificially high… blink… too obvious?

 

[Crissa]

We currently have long term Investing, held greater than one year taxed at a reduced rate.
Short term, one year or less taxed at income bracket rates. Losses are factored in.
Day trader labels, taxed at income bracket levels and not supposed to have their losses factored.

Those are all bad, though.

The big investors act like stock isn't fungible, so the first one doesn't touch them. The second one double-taxes the small investor and stock options of small holders. The last one they just get taxed on what they take home, so they pretend they're trading someone else's stocks (the guy in the first row) unless they're making a killing on a deal.

It's all bad and doesn't touch the bad actors I pointed out, nor does it reward those who foresee and act upon warnings and risk that becomes realized.

-Crissa

 

[Ogre]

It is unethical and rightfully illegal to manipulate the market. Unfortunately, when obviously done, investigations and punishment cannot be done,

Shorting brings the share price down. It also creates a whole class of investors who are motivated to sabotage the company’s reputation. Short the stock, leak a bunch of false information about the company, cover your short. Repeat. That is why it is hated by so many people in the Tesla community hate shorts.

Any investors who close their positions during these windows of artificial uncertainty are screwed. Any employees whose shares vest when shorts are pulling down the stock are screwed. If a company tries to raise capital, they are screwed. On down the line.

While there is regulation about stock insider trading, using media connections and misinformation campaigns when you are short a stock is mostly legal (there are definite limits).

Also, often shorts do not actually have shares to borrow against but are able to do it regardless. This is called naked shorting. While it is technically legal, it is not enforced by the SEC so quite rampant in the industry. Essentially shares are borrowed that don’t exist. This is a thing which should not even be possible, but the system is built to favor the wealthy and Wall Street insiders.


Finally, it’s something few retail investors would actually allow when we know the impacts it has. But because it is difficult to purchase shares and avoid places which will allow shorting against shares.

 

[Ogre]

Would you let someone sell your Cybertruck without your permission?

Don’t worry, they’ll give it back when you need it.

 

[jerhenderson]

What about investors who are actively manipulating stocks with false news and stories bent to serve INCREASING stock price?

Why does adding the position to short make manipulating stock evil. If you manipulate stock for gains, is the activity heroic? Or, is the act of manipulating detestable regardless of investing position?

The discussion reminds me of merging lane dilemma.

Heavy traffic, lane merges to one to the left. A car in front decides to merge early pressing way in while holding traffic up in the lane. A gap is created in front as the car waits for someone to let him into the lane to the left. Once let in, there is a sizable gap in front before the lane officially merges.

Dilemma: Does the next car merge at that point or does the next gate travel past ten cars or so to merge at the designated point?

Further compounding, car goes to merge point, a car to the left goes half into my lane and stays half into their lane blocking me. They do so because they feel s9 one is cutting in line traveling the empty lane while they wait. Do I go around and merge at the designated spot, honk my horn or merge in behind the guy who thinks he is being wronged while having his car take two lanes.

Analogy is meant to show some may have passionate conflicting viewpoints with others on the matter.

examples?

I always laugh how the Tesla shorts post nonsense a day or two before an earnings report......

 

[JudgeMetal]

I understand the words individually and when strung together. I do not understand the post in the context of this thread.

Please elaborate.

 

[John K]

examples?

I always laugh how the Tesla shorts post nonsense a day or two before an earnings report......

Breaking news, Tesla will be replacing Stainless Steel for the Cybertruck with Titanium to be acquired from Russia next month.

When an anonymous Source at Tesla was questioned, “Why the move to titanium?”

Anonymous source responded, “Since everyone thought it was too easy to fold 3 mm SS, we switched to more of a challenge.”

Bill Gates chimed in, “I don’t know why we would use anything else but wood.”

Mary Barra stepped into the article, “you know, GM led the way under my leadership in titanium body construction.”

Youtubers, “Titatian is the savior of the universe“ other YouTubers, “ Titanium will cause the apocalypse

Elon Musk responded just before article is published, “you guys are crazy, seek help.”

 

[John K]

With Elon Musk’s haircuts, can he really cast stones?

 

[ÆCIII]

I hate the anti-competitive actions of Gates/Microsoft and the weak security of their software products over the last 35 years. There were better products that died because of anti-competitive actions of Gates/Microsoft.

I don't think Gates is short Tesla today (I don't think he is that stupid).

The questions were was Gates shorting Tesla in the early days (before 2019) when Tesla was financially vulnerable and was needing to raise capital. The huge amount of stock shorts during those days made it much more difficult for Tesla to raise capital and probably was a major reason Tesla almost went under.

Based on interviews I have seen of Gates and his evasiveness when answering this question I think he did short Tesla in the past. Gates claims he will talk about his investments when asked about shorting Tesla but just minutes before in the same interview Gates was volunteering investment info & even bragging about some of his investments.

Agree totally on your pointing out Microsoft's anti-competitive actions. WordPerfect was/is one (of those better) products that Bill Gates sought to eliminate from mainstream use back in the 80's. WordPerfect has always been a better and much more powerful editing and publishing app, albeit with a steeper initial learning curve. Microsoft did everything possible to suppress the growth of that application, forcing it underground within umbrellas such as Corel.

Microsoft has always sought to exploit market width and sound byte the masses, rather than make a technically dense product with deeper substance. Bill Gates was after money and control, rather than to actually make something the best it could be, or sustainable. So, he would always tout ease of use while ignoring depth of features or advanced functionality.

If Bill Gates decided to make a car like a Tesla, it would have a similar touch screen, but with a much more cumbersome UI, and a myriad of charging and drive train problems - in other words it would be like most Microsoft products implemented for shallow max marketing width while lacking depth of integrity, durability, or sustainability. This is what I see as obvious differences between Bill Gates and Elon Musk - shallow psychosis versus depth of substance.