Good afternoon beautiful people :))
I’m excited for a picnic at Hyde Park tomorrow with Jess, who interned with Realm last summer, hear about her new law career successes, and catch-up on lost time. Fingers crossed for good weather!
Favourite Quote of the Week:
“It is a part of the practice to fall off balance. That is how you learn where centre is.”
—Said last night by my yoga instructor
3 Favourite Thoughts of the Week:
1. People got confused if Musk was confused.
Friday 8th of April, 2022
Apparently Elon Musk filed the number of Twitter shares he owned wrong on his first filing on Monday, so when the Tuesday filing was made public, people thought he had made a sale of some of his Twitter stock. But all filings need to report transactions in the last 60 days, so even if he did sell some stock, the number of shares reported would have had to be same.
Elon tweeted to resolve the confusion. All this filing shenanigans seems just like the kind of drama he’d love to stir-up. Musk is too smart to “accidentally” list the wrong number of shares.
Also, I don’t think Musk would make as big a decision as joining Twitter’s board in one night, especially as he notably resigned from another company’s (Endeavor) board a few weeks ago.
The timing of the disclosure is also convenient for Elon Musk. He bought the stock at $39 per share and once the disclosure happened, the stock went up to $50. But he filed late, and basically earned $156 million. It remains to be seen what the SEC might do about that. Twitter shareholders can’t do anything about the issue, as the law is only a regulatory requirement.
(But aren’t regulatory requirements made to protect people like shareholders? And like people in general? Isn’t that the whole point of having regulations in the first place? It can’t just be some fucking formality… or maybe it is and Musk just profited off of this bullshit bureaucracy.)
Musk purposefully files late, writes the wrong number of shares, and uses the wrong form. I’m sure his lawyers and his brokers are all in on this shit too. But they are all too smart for there to be any real consequences for towing around with these narrow legal lines.
I 100% agree with Matt Levine’s conclusion that “it is possible to explain events in the financial world in logical and intuitive ways,” especially those that are triggered by Elon.
Elon almost definitely does plays around with laws and regulations just for funsies and maybe to show that he can. Is this just some weird flexing of his muscles? Like the man does not want or need to do this shit for money.
People are also joking about an Elon Musk division at the SEC. ahaha it’d be the most fun division to work in. Elon would ensure them a good time on some interesting and nuanced issues. I’d love to debate Musk on regulatory loopholes and justifications.
2. Startups fuck up the third world.
Thursday 7th of April, 2022
Companies providing pay-as-you-go power brought the third world hope, and then they brought them down. After being locked in, in some areas, half of loans go unpaid, and 43% of paygo customers sacrificed food to come up with the money. It seems very coercive to me that the system leverages short-termist mindsets, everyday utilities, and limited financial literacy of those in the third world.
The startups funded by VCs, Elon, and touted by the UN and the US Government have proved willing to forego ethical boundaries in their pursuit of the third world market. Continuing to prey on the weak, many of these startups are infiltrating refugee camps.
“Move fast and fuck things up.” is the motto these startups have gone by it seems. Their model has come back to bite them as well because these paygo startups often end-up on funding treadmills. Sad business model. The incentives are all fucked. I don’t know how entrepreneurs like these go to bed at night.
I think something like this will only work if the paygo system is centralised and standardised by one organisation. I mean maybe someone like the World Bank or IMF can coordinate this kind of thing? But maybe just wishful thinking…
There should at least be caps on debt accumulation and collection for people who have been targeted though.
3. Back at home…
Thursday 7th of April, 2022
Houses in Vancouver were already at a ridiculously high level when I lived there, but apparently they have gone to the next level and risen over 50% in the past 2 years. Pretty insane stuff.
In an attempt to combat the persistent rise of real-estate prices, the Canadian government is implementing a 2-year ban on foreigners from purchasing properties & putting billions into construction in efforts to increase housing supply.
Firstly, it’s not that hard to get a permanent residence in Canada, and I’d assume a lot of those buying properties already have one anyway? Also, 2 years does seem like a rather short amount of time, especially since people have already been stocking up on Canadian properties, in light of coming rate increases. And 2 years seems like a ridiculously short amount of time considering the snail-like pace of Canadian construction work as well —so doesn’t seem to me like the supply problem would be fixed in time either. 😕
Not sure how much damage the policies can really undo or prevent… Looks more like virtue signalling to me. Seems like they just want to cover their backs against political backlash from inflation and housing prices.
To be fair, “helping local governments update their systems to allow faster construction of new properties” is technically a part of Freeland’s new plan. But what the fuck does that even mean. Sounds vague and not practically helpful to me.
I’m honestly just a bit worried the Canadian government never really knows what they are doing. But I do think they mean well!
Thanks for keeping me company this week!
I hope you enjoyed this selection of thoughts and I’d love to hear your opinions as well. Feel free to reply to this email or shoot me a text ;)
With love,
Angeline 🤍