Member Info for fela96

I'm not arguing Enron wasn't a fashionable stock, I'm arguing Enron didn't have any positive impact on the world (or a very minor one), so I'm less willing to forgive its transgressions.

Did Enron have any redeeming features? Tesla have arguably made sustainable energy and transport fashionable, which is a biggie if you ask me.

Well, colour me shocked that a company that grew from nothing to the largest auto company by market cap in the world, in 10 years, has done some dodgy stuff to get there.

Hmmm, wasn't there a huge lawsuit against Microsoft in the 90s where they were found to be breaking antitrust law by packaging IE with MS Windows? IMO Bill Gates was every bit as ruthless a businessman as Musk. You can't get to $100bn net worth without treading on a few people. Gates' work on disease prevention is more admirable though I'm not sure how much success he's had with it. Mars rockets and electric cars are still cooler, sorry 😛

Lolly, I actually do believe that a lot of laws are either unenforceable or counterproductive. Two examples being laws criminalising drug users, and speeding on motorways (in fact, hard and fast speed limits anywhere seem pointless to me). Don't want to derail the discussion too much though. I'm not that hopeful of a fruitful debate going forward here.

shortwhacker, i definitely would not subscribe to the idea that elon musk is a perfect role model for everyone to follow, however, is anybody? isaac newton was meant to be a very unpleasant guy, as was beethoven, but the world is a better place with calculus in it (though the 5th symphony is overplayed enough nowadays that i'm ambivalent to beethoven 😉 and yes leibniz' notation was better, blah blah - it's not the point). the point is, often you can't achieve great things without ******* off a lot of people along the way. you can't judge the character of such important people and institutions in such simple moralistic terms imho. it's a bit like when people talk of empires and countries only in terms of what they did, good or bad. the usa forced native people from their land and killed them, it also put men on the moon. if elon musk puts humans on mars, or solves global warming, then i can overlook his foibles, not to ignore or downplay them but just to recognise they are eclipsed by his accomplishments. and let me say that being obnoxious on twitter is not as big of a foible as committing genocide. yet i consider the us a great, flawed civilisation as i consider elon musk a great, flawed man. is that fair in your view, or do you think that some of musk's flaws are so beyond the pale that even saving humanity from itself wouldn't offer redemption?

lolly, i couldn't agree more that china getting their hands on intellectual ideas is not always in the best interests of humanity. however, the idea that a law within civilised countries to prevent the unlawful spread of ideas, would stop a country like china from getting their hands on them, seems as absurd to me as the idea that stopping somebody suffering from ms from obtaining cannabis treatments, would prevent anybody from smoking marijuana. and by the way, i am talking about the chinese communist party here of course. a point of nuance that is often lost here is that within the chinese system, if you don't displease the politburo then you're pretty free to do as you wish. china has been very successful with the innovation of payment systems and drones for instance, could this be due to the fact nobody gives a monkeys about intellectual property? in any case, assuming china is a rogue state and doesn't give a flying fig about violating us/western patents, what are the upsides of having patents in your view?

I haven't heard a critique of Elon Musk which doesn't pale in comparison to his achievements. There's a lot of "rich man bad", or "he's just the CEO it's not like he actually achieved anything himself". The worst one I've heard is "he's taking rich people to Mars and leaving everyone else behind on Earth", as if it would be better for everyone to die than for a few people to escape to Mars (accepting the premise that Earth is dying for the sake of argument).

Bill Gates is someone who contributed negatively overall imo, he pushed an (in my view) inferior product and managed to make it dominate the marketplace. Microsoft became a much better company without him (and Ballmer). But Musk believes in "the best will win out", he's a strong critic of patent trolls and intellectual property in general, as am I (I think patents in general are a drag on innovation).

Alright Walp, fair point about the tide, I agree it's futile trying to work against natural human tendencies*. Then again, another natural cognitive bias is herd mentality. According to Warren Buffett, in order to invest successfully you should try to overcome this one (be greedy when others are fearful). But I guess that's more about trying to benefit one's self rather than appeal to a crowd? Food for thought anyway, maybe.

By the way, you're right, I do suffer from excess narcissism, it's the quality I most dislike in myself (ironically?).

* this is actually a hugely important point. It's why I believe communism fails for instance. The most efficient way to make the world a better place is to make it very profitable to do so. It's actually why I'm invested in SMT, it's people like Elon Musk getting very rich which will solve climate change if anything does (IMHO, I welcome opposing views needless to say).

Yep I'm aware of primacy vs recency bias. Isn't this just a cognitive bias though? Basically a way to judge friend or foe which benefited our ancestors (because a lion is not going to magically experience a Damascene conversion to vegetarianism?). But is it really something to be proud of as thinking people in the 21st century? Would you proudly announce that for you, once a clumsy statement is made or misunderstood (over the medium of text no less - lacking the full context of body language which I'm sure you're aware is highly important for an accurate reading of someone's attitude) - that a person is then forevermore tainted and to be judged more harshly?

Walp, I mean consider this: "Dontshootme, what are the figures backing up that claim of RSI over 70 leading to a sell off?"

That was my first response to DSM which received immediate negative response. It's a really simple and honest question. Sure, the discussion devolved from there and I'm partially responsible for that. But how the heck is the above question inviting negativity is something I will never understand.

OK Mr Lolly, so in that case could you at least accept that I'm not actually trying to create animosity, I.e. I'm not a troll (as others have accused me of)?

Walp, regarding your insights on psychology: do you think it's possible that you (and others) are misreading me? I understand that you feel I'm being competitive as to who is right or wrong. But that's not the case from my point of view. I'm genuinely curious about others' point of view (example: I might even do a backtest analysis of RSI when I get the chance, to see if I'm wrong). I genuinely feel people like DSM might be right but I would like to know more about their position and the reasoning behind it. And yet whenever I express these ideas and questions, I'm met with immediate emotional negative responses which to me feel unwarranted. Maybe it's because I always call out what I consider to be faulty reasoning? I genuinely have no clue what all the animosity is about.

DSM, let me explain. You can't say "RSI is high, there has been a sell off, therefore high RSI implies sell off". It's a non sequitur argument. The sell off could have been for any number of reasons. In order to prove a link between high RSI and sell offs, you need to actually look at past data and check that sell offs regularly occurred after a set period of high RSI. If it turns out that the RSI has remained elevated for long periods of time without a sell off, then clearly high RSI doesn't (on its own) cause sell offs. Anyway my point isn't really whether RSI is a reliable indicator of imminent sell offs. I suspect it isn't, because it would be too easy if so (free money simply by shorting at high RSI). My point is you can't just say "Investopedia says something therefore it's true", you should look a bit deeper into whether or not what you're saying actually makes sense.

Mr Frogster, it certainly seems to me that you're more troubled by the manner in which I ask for someone's evidence for their claim, than the fact that they point blank refuse to bother to back up their claim. What's more corrosive to healthy debate in your view?

In my opinion, making a claim and then refusing to give evidence for it when asked, should make anyone an absolute laughing stock.

Mr frogster, would you agree that part of healthy debate is asking someone to back up a statement with evidence?

What is the point of a forum where whatever people say can't even be held to account, let alone questioned? All I did really was ask for evidence for an assertion, I didn't even claim he was wrong.

The Earth is flat and the world was obviously created in six days, therefore SMT will rise this afternoon by 6%. None of you can question this claim because it might come off badly and make you look like you're itching for a fight. Better?

Clowns the lot of you.

There are lots of things which might sound true but if you can't be bothered to back your statements up with evidence then they don't really hold any water.

Here's something which sounds true: there is no trading strategy which an individual can utilise to beat the market, because the market is too efficient. Oh, you disagree? Well, like you I can't be bothered to provide any evidence for my assertion so will leave it there.

Ultimately it comes down to whether you want to educate and be educated by others, or if you want to convince others of your own preexisting opinions, like a preacher on a soapbox.

Yeah I'm just wondering if you've actually backtested that hypothesis to check if it's actually true, because it seems incredibly outlandish. Why wouldn't a HFT have taken advantage of it yet? Fair play if it is actually true, I'm just wondering if you've got any figures to back up your claim.

It all seems a bit hand wavey. Have you actually backtested any of these strategies to see if they yield a consistent profit? If they don't, then it's pure gambling, isn't it?

Well, if you backtested the share price and it turned out the RSI had no such correlation to subsequent moves, you'd want to know, right?