Soros has placed a bet - a big bet - that the US stock market will fall. The bet is more than 10% of Soros's net worth.
[T]he “Soros put”, a legacy hedge position that the 83-year old has been rolling over every quarter since 2010, just rose to a record $1.3 billion or the notional equivalent of some 7.09 million SPY-equivalent shares. Since this was an increase of 154% Q/Q this has some people concerned that the author of ‘reflexivity’ and the founder of “open societies” may be anticipating some major market downside.A man who became fabulously wealthy by understanding currency and markets and risk placed a whopping bet against the US stock market. What message should you take from that?
Perhaps his funding of American politicians who seem intent on ruining the American economy is a way of hedging the hedge bet he's already made. The hedge-hedge strategy.
Following Soros's lead, I have placed a bet equal to 10% of my net worth against the US Stock market. That one hundred eight dollar position is going to pay off, big time.
34 comments:
The trouble with Soros isn't his liberal politics, it's that his primary goal seems to have always been currency manipulation. He's a profiteer and uses politics to bring chaos into the game that serves his purposes.
That's the crazy thing about Progressives to me. They go on and on about the Koch brothers, who make money elsewhere while at the same time being entirely blind or deaf to the fact Soros makes his money by messing with economies. He profits on people's gains and pains. With the US economy he has done what he can to enforce the pains. I hate the use of hyperbole, but it really does seem to approach the definition of evil to me.
Even as so many who use his money are quite earnest in their politics. Tools for the profit of the fabulously wealthy, working mostly to repress the middle and lower classes, even as they use class rhetoric to support the policies.
Patrick O makes good points. Soros is betting against the U.S. market. His betting against the U.S. market may cause the market to fall. Soros wins. The rest of us lose.
I also agree with Patrick O, except I'll add one thing to it. Soros doesn't just screw with the US economy to make his billions. He's a worldwide plague.
Rachel maddow adores soros.
Patrick paints with a broad brush here. Occupy Wall Street was hardly supportive of financiers in general and Soros in particular.
To understand this bet it would be necessary to know how much he has bet on the stock market rising. Hedging is called hedging for a reason.
No enemies on the left.
The occupy movement was faux outrage based on what the puppetmasters engineered. Economic ineptitude and ignorance mixed with emotional bad faith and hypocrisies all tethered to one particular dying ideology. Brown shirt.
soros is the north Korean dictator of the financial world.
It surprises me how easily he seems to get various governments to do what he wants.
He seems to be the CEO of the developed world, in some ways.
People should click on the link before getting too agitated about this.
I know it's a hedge, Chip. I'm referring to his known currency manipulations and political interference in many countries.
A good hedge for the common man, would be to have more bullets than G Soros.
A good hedge for the common man, would be to have more bullets than G Soros.
KILL! KILL! KILL!
Just teasin'.
Patrick paints with a broad brush here. Occupy Wall Street was hardly supportive of financiers in general and Soros in particular.
Um, TheCarelessPerson... Patrick never mentioned OWS. When you are looking for painters with broad brushes, you might check youself.
Seriously ARM. You know it is all Bush's fault.
Get with the program buddy.
Leland said...
Patrick never mentioned OWS.
So your argument is that OWS were not progressives?
The thing that will crash the markets and the country is the deliberate implementation of the Cloward-Piven strategy by the progressive/marxist/socialist party, aka the Democrats. Soros may be an evil bastard but betting on that inevitable implosion isn't the cause of the implosion.
Patrick:
Exactly right. Soros has bought the left wing, so the left wing can *wink wink* rail against the monetary policies that are good for America.
So your argument is that OWS were not progressives?
I'm having a problem understanding how you made that leap in logic. But perhaps you think Patrick is wrong about Soros and Progressives. Perhaps he got the idea from the New York Times and people like John Podesta: Podesta explained how he would recruit hundreds of fellows and scholars -- some in residence and others spread around the country -- to research and promote new progressive policy ideas. American Progress is slated to operate with a $10 million budget next year, raised from big donors like the financier George Soros.
OWS, what's that? Oh, the people who camped out and raged against increasingly incoherent enemies because they were essentially defanged from the start? They would go against all the vaguely evil bankers. But not politicians, not media, not think tanks, not any of the many who facilitated the fraud. Well, they'd take on politicians out of office or not in power, but the thought of actually going up against the Progessive establishment? Horrors!
OWS wasn't funded, as far as I know, by Soros. It's also not at all relevant.
If the OWS people ever realized they were the Left version of the Tea Party and actual sought real reform it would still be something. That's why Soros makes sure to only fund Progressives who will demonize the right while supporting the Establishment's grasp for power and wealth.
Soros is betting against the U.S. market. His betting against the U.S. market may cause the market to fall.
$1.3 billion sounds like a lot of money, but it is only 0.007% of the value of the US stock market. Soros has manipulated smaller markets, but the US stock market is too big.
It is a smart bet, though. Not because of any of the usual left-wing or right-wing bogeymen, but simply because the empirical evidence is that neither party cares about reigning in our deficit. It isn't a question of *if* the value of the dollar will collapse, just of when.
It is only the left that has consistently criticized the financial industry and called for measures to reform the industry. My personal view is that the industry is a cancer whose machinations inflict a tax on legitimate businesses and individuals. Yet, this consistent position of much of the left doesn't count because … ?
Try to find consistent criticism of the financial industry on the right, it exists but it is rare. This is much like the left's criticisms of the Iraq war or the Patriot Act/NSA. They are invisible to most on right because they can't see past red team/blue team bullshit.
It is only the left that has consistently criticized the financial industry and called for measures to reform the industry.
The Wall Street bailouts received a higher percentage of Democratic votes than Republican ones.
But your point is technically correct in the sense that the left defines "reform of the industry" as "changes to the industry supported by the left". It is basically a tautology. But there are obvious reforms that are either occasionally or firmly opposed by the left, e.g. ending corporate bailouts or revoking government support for mortgage loans.
"It is only the left that has consistently criticized the financial industry and called for measures to reform the industry."
Call for it from one side of their mouth, then vote to put in and keep in the worst offenders. That brings us back to Soros, whose fortune is built on currency valuation. Who funds so many Left organizations that call for supposed reform, and in doing so manipulates the conversation into chaos, as people become tools for his wealth accumulation, focusing their attention on the entirely less significant differences in political allegiance. OWS and the Tea Party are much closer together on the topic of financial reform than Soros and Chris Dodd and Barney Frank and Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are. But, the Left has been trained to demonize the Tea Party and ignore the traitors, hoarders, and manipulators on their own side.
It's crazy to say that only the Left cares about financial reform. The whole Tea Party movement was focused on taking out corruption and lobbyist focused politicians. The whole movement was to clean up the Right. The trouble is that "financial reform" becomes narrowed in definition to whatever it is Soros et al. want their tools to talk about, not because they care about reform but so that in the face of "talking about reform" they can clean up for themselves, pushing for regulations they can manipulate, favors they can grant. That's why the best way to become rich these days in this country is to be a Liberal politician. They're not looking for reform. They're looking to make use of idealism and keep people down.
Vote those people out of office, clean house, and I'll believe the Left really cares about, rather than just talks about, financial reform.
"Soros has manipulated smaller markets, but the US stock market is too big."
That's the key part, I think. Smaller markets collapse. The parasite kills the host.
The best parasite just feeds off the host, affecting but killing.
In other words, Soros is the national tapeworm.
It is only the left that has consistently criticized the financial industry and called for measures to reform the industry.
Well, maybe half right. Only the left wants to manipulate the financial industry. It was the "far right" that consider the solution to the financial meltdown was to let the market correct and for the big companies to fail for the mistakes they made. The left and moderate conservatives coined "too big to fail", and left the financial institutes that screwed up in power. As Patrick points out, this is one of the things that propelled the TEA Party into being.
Prior to the Housing bust that brought down the financial markets in 2008, it was the "Right" that pushed for getting rid of Freddie and Fannie, while it was Frank and Dodd that kept protecting them. Countrywide financial? You really want to claim that the left criticized companies like it?
Let us never forget Mr Schwartz (his real name) got his start delivering deportation notices to Jews in Budapest and then looting their homes after they'd been trucked away to Auschwitz.
A walking malignancy if ever one existed.
Let us never forget Mr Schwartz (his real name) got his start delivering deportation notices to Jews in Budapest and then looting their homes after they'd been trucked away to Auschwitz.
That is true in the sense that "Pope Benedict was a Nazi" is true. Which is to say that it isn't, really.
Soros was 14 years old when the war ended, and survived by posing as the Christian godson of a man who confiscated property from deported Jews. If you want to spin "how an 8th grader avoided being murdered by Nazis" into "how an international currency speculator got his start", well, that's on you.
It is only the left that has consistently criticized the financial industry and called for measures to reform the industry.
Untrue, as has been pointed out. The Tea Party started with Bush and TARP. The reason OWS never held any sway for me is because it became a "Kill the rich!" siren song (but lay off my ipad). The interviews Peter Schiff did seemed to point that out more than anything. Most Republicans hate crony capitalism and too big to fail as much as those OWS guys---the OWS guys just don't understand what crony capitalism is.
Revenant said...
Let us never forget Mr Schwartz (his real name) got his start delivering deportation notices to Jews in Budapest and then looting their homes after they'd been trucked away to Auschwitz.
That is true in the sense that "Pope Benedict was a Nazi" is true. Which is to say that it isn't, really.
Soros was 14 years old when the war ended, and survived by posing as the Christian godson of a man who confiscated property from deported Jews. If you want to spin "how an 8th grader avoided being murdered by Nazis" into "how an international currency speculator got his start", well, that's on you.
No, it's one thing to pass, particularly if you're trying to save your life.
It's quite another to actively help the bad guys do their thing. Delivering deportation notices is not something he had to do, nor was going along on the looting expeditions.
As I said - soros can operate as he pleases with the no enemies on the left rule.
Excellent points, paddy o.
So, I went to an academic conference last week. Theology stuff. One of the presenters, from Union Seminary, talked about a project she is participating in focused on economics and theology, bringing together folks from those separate fields. The whole project, which involves conferences, papers, etc. and so on, is funded--she noted--by George Soros. When talking about an expression of "community" that sought to bring a new ethics into finances, she pointed to OWS as an example.
OWS is the pride of people who are funded by Soros to support the structure he manipulates. Good people in their own right, but I was surprised there's just no awareness about his underlying goals. He funds stuff. Academics, professional thinkers and organizers need someone to fund stuff. It's a cozy relationship. Actually addressing poverty or corruption is not really the goal. It's privilege-seeking. Some through money, some through academic influence.
And thanks April!
It's quite another to actively help the bad guys do their thing.
Like joining the Hitler Youth, for example? :)
Delivering deportation notices is not something he had to do
The actual story, as related by Soros, is that the Jewish Council asked him to deliver notices to Jews; his father recognized them as deportation notices, and had Soros warn the recipients not to show up for the meeting.
Now, you could say "he's lying to protect himself", but my reply to that would be "so why'd he tell anyone about the deportation notices at all"? Nobody knew; Soros mentioned it himself in an interview with The New Republic, as an example of why he doesn't trust Jewish organizations to protect Jews.
nor was going along on the looting expeditions.
And your basis for that claim would be what, exactly? Soros' father bribed a Christian man to act as Soros' guardian. Hungarian Christians were enthusiastic supporters of the Nazi purge of Hungarian Jews. So what, exactly, is your reason for being so certain that Soros could have begged off from any involvement in something his Christian "peers" were enthusiastically engaged in without drawing suspicion on himself? For that matter, what makes you think he was given a choice in the matter by his guardian?
Soros as done plenty of wrong in his life. But condemning him for what he did as a 14-year-old in Nazi-occupied Hungary is asinine, especially when the vast majority of Hungarians did worse.
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