@guyyeomans @tazwake @DanielGDresner @ciaranmartinoxf @Tob1Leron @TheEPS1 1/ x Cc @DuncanChapple Long intake of breath as I realise I have recently started the wrong MSc....
@aj66inuk and I have been discussing that whilst the world has changed, some things have not. #Sabotage is an outdated concept unless you think that Cyber is an extension..

@tazwake @DanielGDresner @ciaranmartinoxf @Tob1Leron @TheEPS1 @DuncanChapple @aj66inuk 2/x an extension of what our former Cold War adversaries were trying to do to us. In 1982 Duncan Campbell spelled out where adversaries would try to attack us. But with Glasnost this became unfashionable and apparently unaffordable.

@tazwake @DanielGDresner @ciaranmartinoxf @Tob1Leron @TheEPS1 @DuncanChapple @aj66inuk 3/X Defector information in the public domain gave us some insights was to what the Warsaw Pact threat to our CNI might look like. Discussions with former adversaries, now Polish, (East) German and Czech allies wld be informative here.

@tazwake @DanielGDresner @ciaranmartinoxf @Tob1Leron @TheEPS1 @DuncanChapple @aj66inuk 4/X Believing there is a credible threat has always been our challenge here in UK. Understanding how a nation state adversary would come at us would be the next step.
It will be persistent, an adversary like the GRU will have been analysing our CNI for over 70 years

@tazwake @DanielGDresner @ciaranmartinoxf @Tob1Leron @TheEPS1 @DuncanChapple @aj66inuk 5/x They will have formed physical and logical plans to attack us. It some cases they may know our assets and our vulnerabilities better than we do. CARVER Shock is an old-school tool that gives an idea how they will come after us. You can apply

Time for a Scorecard📊and thesis📑updates for purchases done in Feb/Mar 2020. Last review done in late April. How far things have come since then.😯

Not taking any drastic actions, other than few sells in fully valued, slower growth Co.'s.

Events since then
✔️Co's reporting two Qtrly reports
✔️Accelerating growth for few sectors
✔️Understandable problems for few others
✔️Crazy run-ups & valuations in the last 9 mo's, supported by biz growth in some cases, but mostly due to Monetary factors & Investor enthusiasm...

I usually buy for two scenarios

1⃣Leading Co's within strong secular trends, that also have strong Management Teams and solid Financials (Rev growth, Profitability or improving Margins/FCF prospects, no balance sheet risk...).

These are bought with the intention of holding for the long-term as long as the thesis is intact or getting better. Strongly intend to add along the way. Ex : $ROKU $PINS $TWLO $DOCU $W $NOW $WDAY $NVCR $MTCH in the above table.

2⃣More mature and stable Co.'s but with some growth left (no Financial risk), mainly bought for their current under-valuation, with the intent to sell when the Market or those stocks recover. Ex : $BIP $BUD $VTR $BR $BA in above table.

American collapse is gonna be a horror show because we are an economic parasite on the world, and collapse will be the host cutting off our proboscis. We cannot self-sustain.

Robert Reich once bragged that our economy was transforming into one where 20% of us would be well compensated "symbolic analysts" and everyone else would be servants to this class.

This is echoed in Primary Colors where Fake Clinton tells the shipbuilder union to get ready to go back to school because making things is over. We are all "symbolic analysts" now.

That's only possible because the rest of the world makes stuff for us to consume. On a net basis the world makes while we take. Capitalism is the international legal system which ensures this will happen through the enforcement of investor and property rights.

This is the "system of international rules" that Biden has warned China must be obeyed. Or else.

The world makes, we take (and pay in USD).

Hancock: "It's your actions now which can make a difference."

Plays down prospect of immediate introduction of new restrictions.

Few doubt the public must play its part. But legitimate questions about whether the govt has made/is making public's task harder in two key respects:

1) For some there's still a major economic disincentive apropos self isolation. Sick pay still poor. Savings for many exhausted.

Imminent prospect of Universal Credit cut would make this worse. Some people have fallen through the gaps of government support throughout. Though government support for (effectively) laid off people, a full economic bargain to universally support self isolation still...

...does not exist. Rishi Sunak just made a statement to the House which offered nothing new on any of these fronts.

And 2) The job for individuals is now made harder as a result of prevalence as a result of the delay in full lockdown in most of the country between the...

...point ministers were informed that the new variant had greater transmissibility (December 18th) and full lockdown (early January). We can't interrogate the micro decisions of the public alone, we must look at the macro decisions of ministers too.

Wait … so … how much worse could the pandemic response and unprecedented death rate get?

How much farther shall our economy crater?

I wonder what it will feel like to get better.

I wonder what it will be like for things to get better after being arguably as bad as they have ever been.

Wait … sooo … were things this bad in 2016?

Wait … things were good? After eight years under a democratic administration?

Huh.

I wonder how all those falsehoods will play after things start to get better.

I wonder how many full fledged COVID deniers will finally encounter this deadly pandemic.

I wonder if red states will continue to suffer needlessly under Trumpian COVID policies.

I wonder what the recovering blue states will look like from those red states.

I wonder how much aid these red states will require from said blue states.

And I wonder what it will feel like to those red state constituents when the aid forced upon them makes things a bit better?

"Fail to prepare, prepare to fail" has gone from being an irritating statement trotted out on a training course to a description of the UK government's modus operandi. And as well as on covid restrictions we're seeing it in EU negotiations - deal or no-deal. And here's why... 1/

The UK's goal in EU negotiations is to declare victory / sovereignty. Sounds good. But the problem is that there will always be winners and losers in a big trade deal, because it covers everything and involves compromising with the other side. An immediate problem. 2/

Take fish, on which apparently talks are stuck. No deal means we regain full control of our waters. Victory! And sell the fish where? EU tariffs and checks. Not victory. So share waters? But then, defeat! Point being, if you don't explain, the result will disappoint. 3/

We don't want the EU setting our rules and regulations. So minimal sovereignty provisions. No-deal and victory! But then what about the car manufacturers no longer viable? Ok, compromise. But then no win on sovereignty, or perhaps call it "freedom clauses"... 4/

Northern Ireland, customs checks, rules of origin, security cooperation and so on... all inevitably to require compromise. But if your game was all about victory and sovereignty, then what? Not make a decision perhaps? 5/

#WealthOfNations I.ii is all about the secret sauce origin story: why does the division of labor happen in the first place? #AdamSmith illustrates (in part) with doggos to hold our attention. (I.ii.2,5) 🐶 #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets #DoggosDontTrade

Divsion of labor, Smith said yesterday, is responsible for a whole heckuva lot. But who thought of it? Nobody! It's "not originally the effect of any human wisdom, which foresees and intends that general opulence to which it gives occasion." (I.ii.1) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets

There's no mastermind behind economic exchange, our "propensity to truck, barter, and exchange one thing for another" (I.ii.1) arises out of our natural tendency to persuade one another and better our condition. #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets

Yeah, there's a lot in that first paragraph. #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets

You know what's coming, right? 🍖🍻🍞 Butchers, brewers, bakers: they don't make us things because they love us. They're not our moms. (I.ii.2) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets

In the months prior to the most ferocious stock market crash in history and the eruption of the biggest #publichealthcrisis of our generation, we witnessed the biggest exodus of corporate CEOs that we have ever seen. And as you will see below, corporate insiders also sold

off billions of dollars worth of shares in their own companies just before the stock market imploded. In life, timing can be everything, and sometimes people simply get lucky. But it does seem odd that so many among the corporate elite would be so exceedingly “lucky” all at the

same time. In this article I am not claiming to know the motivations of any of these individuals, but I am pointing out certain patterns that I believe are worth investigating.

One financial publication is using the phrase “the great CEO exodus” to describe the phenomenon that

we have been witnessing. It all started last year when chief executives started resigning in numbers unlike anything that we have ever seen before. The following was published by NBC News last November…

Chief executives are leaving in record numbers this year, with more than

1,332 stepping aside in the period from January through the end of October, according to new data released on Wednesday. While it’s not unusual to see CEOs fleeing in the middle of a recession, it is noteworthy to see such a rash of executive exits amid robust corporate earnings

THREAD - (Short term Options)

Many of the messages I get regarding options are referencing outside the money (OTM) calls w/ expirations a week or two out (or less)

It's no wonder these traders are often very concerned (even frantic) about the outcome of their trades.

Unless you are an expert technician, and/or have serious market knowledge and intuitive skills, I recommend buying *at least* a month or two of time, and not holding through an earnings report unless you've trimmed your position at a significant profit, or are playing LEAPS.

(LEAPS = Long-term Equity Anticipation Securities
a.k.a. Long term options typically w/ an expiration of longer than a year)

While playing OTM weekly options has the potential for huge returns, & will undoubtedly get your adrenaline pumping, it's also an easy way to lose your💰

*IF* you insist on playing OTM weeklies, be very cognizant of your position sizing.

Each trade should be a *very* small percentage of your account, and you should assume that every trade you make is going to zero.

However, you don't need to play short-term options to make *serious* money over time...

You can still make massive returns on options that have expirations that are 2+ months, even 2+ years out without taking on so much immediate risk.

@Lol_0fficial @HoodieMorr @shoe0nhead Oh my goodness. Economic interests -absolutely- tie into this. You need to think about 1) that there are different factions involved & 2) people see economic interest more broadly than just govt spending. On the first point, evangelicals have been part of the Republican base B1/X

@HoodieMorr @shoe0nhead since the party became identical with movement conservatism, but movement conservatism only became significant as an ideology because of coalition building. Movement conservatism brought together the hawks, laissez faire economics, and cultural conservatives. B2/X

@HoodieMorr @shoe0nhead Evangelicals have always been the best organized element of the cultural conservative faction. Trump's coalition is a new one and it includes cultural conservatives, but that is the only element that is unchanged - and really even it is somewhat different.
B3/X

@HoodieMorr @shoe0nhead A minor difference is accepting Obergefell (which has made it possible for openly gay people to be highly visible members of the new coalition), but the main difference is that social conservatives no longer make a priority of the politician as an individual
B4/X

@HoodieMorr @shoe0nhead as opposed to focusing on politicians merely as conduits through which government is affected. The foreign policy contingent changed completely. The hawks are just gone from Trump's coalition. Instead there's a deep skepticism of interventionism, but without the desire B5/x

Today’s GDP release, and in particular how the economy has adapted, a thread.👇

After 6 months of growth, the economy started shrinking again in November as tighter restrictions were in place. (Though there were variations across Wales, England, Scotland and Northern Ireland.) (1/n)

The economy shrank by 2.6% in November. In normal times this would be a significant downturn, but it is much smaller than the falls seen with the first restrictions in the spring: April GDP fell by around 20%. In that sense it is good news. But why the smaller fall? (2/n)

Firstly, some industries remain very depressed. Airlines (air transport in the chart) for example, were operating at very low levels in October so there wasn’t much further for their output to fall. This is different from the picture in Mar/Apr. (3/n)

The same is true, though perhaps less pronounced, for bars/restaurants and other parts of the service sector. (4/n)

The problem with (and for) #SiliconValley is their lack of #entrepreneurship. Yes, really: they're bad at being entrepreneurs, at providing the entrepreneurial function in the economy. To put it differently, they are technology driven in their profit-seeking but not consumer

driven. The difference is monumental both for the economy and the companies, and this is why they're failing. No, failing doesn't mean they are necessarily losing money, but that their profits are short-term and that they are undermining their own market positions. The business

they are in is not sustainable. This goes way beyond the selling of eyeballs, which is the focus of Facebook, Twitter, Google, and others. As it's often said, if you are not the paying for the product you *are* the product. Facebook is selling you, and your future purchases, to

their advertisers. The service the company provides is to lure you in, keep you busy, and make sure you don't leave while they feed you ads and collect data on who you are. It's the same with Google's search, maps, etc. But my point is not this, but that the focus by these

technology companies, more broadly, is unentrepreneurial--that they have lost sight of the consumer and, therefore, the real value they facilitate. They're not entrepreneurial. This, in turn, explains their behavior in everything from attempting to steer, direct, if not censor