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Either that, or he'll just break his promise and let it go through.
by beedogs 10y ago
Either that, or he'll just break his promise and let it go through.
- r00fus 10y agoBingo. Promises, for Trump, are fulfilled upon announcement, and then forgotten. The examples are legion.
- cryptrash 10y agoYeah, most billionaires have no idea what they're talking about. All luck. Yup. /s
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- jackweirdy 10y agoDonald Trump would have more money now if he put his inheritance in an index fund. http://fortune.com/2015/08/20/donald-trump-index-funds/ http://fortune.com/2015/08/20/donald-trump-index-funds/
- tanderson92 10y agoI continue to be mystified by this take. The S&P 500 index is usually the benchmark cited here. But the S&P 500 is tremendously diversified over sectors, factors, you name it. Trump managed to create actual wealth in our economic system at a rate slightly less than the S&P 500. If anything the people who invest in index funds are freeloaders on the economic engine that Trump is part of (full disclosure: I use index funds without exception for my investments) Another thing bothers me: you're supposed to look at risk/return, not simply return, in evaluating investment strategy.
- paulddraper 10y agoInvesting in the S&P 500 delegates the "actual wealth creation" to others by providing them with the means. And they, on average, would have done a little better than Trump did.
- tanderson92 10y agoNo, it really does not. The S&P 500 inclusion criteria[1] states: > Treatment of IPOs. Initial public offerings should be seasoned for six to 12 months before being considered for addition to an index. So if the S&P 500 explicitly excludes equities to IPO into the index, then how is it that an investor in an S&P 500 index is delegating wealth creation? They're just trading the returns with other investors. And to be clear, this is totally great for the investor! But it shouldn't be confused with actual business. [1]: https://us.spindices.com/documents/methodologies/methodology-sp-us-indices.pdf https://us.spindices.com/documents/methodologies/methodology...
- icebraining 10y agoYou can't ignore the indirect influence. The same way people care about resale value of their car or house, the investors that purchase at an IPO know that index funds will buy their shares and can therefore make more and bolder investments.
- tanderson92 10y agoOf course I can ignore the indirect influence; if the company had no actual value at IPO its share price would plummet. Also, by definition the S&P 500 only includes companies which have had 4 consecutive quarters of positive GAAP earnings, so the shares would have value on the public markets. Specifically, they'd have to have enough value to be among the 500-or-so largest positive-earnings companies by market capitalization. Hardly value that can be attributable to indirect influence of an index fund.
- icebraining 10y agoYou're looking at it too statically, and ignoring the full ecosystem. If I'm an investor that buys at IPO time, how many companies am I willing and able to invest in if I have to wait for the profits to come in through yearly dividends? And so, if I'm a VC, how many companies am I willing and able to invest in if the IPO market is much smaller? And so, if I'm an entrepreneur, how many companies can I found and create value from if I have very little chance of selling them off? The index funds are the terrain that sustain the "wealth creators".
- icebraining 10y agoIf anything the people who invest in index funds are freeloaders No. How much wealth could those individuals create if they couldn't sell the companies on the market and invest that money, and had instead to accumulate dividends? The relationship is symbiotic. Yes, Trump created wealth, but the point is that his peers would have created even more if he hadn't used that money himself. To make an analogy, I can swim a few laps, but you wouldn't want to have me replace Michael Phelps on your team.
- tanderson92 10y agoI may have been a bit hyperbolic about freeloaders. The bigger point I want to make is that the standard deviation on returns of a single venture like Trump's is so large that you cannot meaningfully compare it to a highly-diversified basket of stocks. To use your analogy, it'd be like evaluating the effectiveness of a coach in a swimming event by picking a single one of their swimmers and comparing them to the average times of the U.S. Olympic team. Does this necessarily imply anything at all about the skill of the coach?
- asdfasdfa11112 10y agoIt does not, but it is a useful benchmark to evaluate the claims of a swimmer with below average times who insists they become team captain.
- zaphods-towel 10y agoI feel like you're making an argument against your thesis instead of for it (?). With higher risk, you expect higher return... so isn't that another tick against Trump's "success"? His ventures were way riskier than an index fund (see bankruptcies and losses), yet they had a markedly lower return. That means they were not good investments.
- tanderson92 10y agoWell there are two possibilities: 1) Trump's businesses are lower risk and so the lower realized return is as expected 2) there is significant idiosyncratic risk in a single company which can diversified away with the S&P500 while maintaining the same expected return. I disbelieve (1) because of his multiple high-profile bankruptcies.
- cardine 10y agoWouldn't that be true of ~50% of companies by definition? After all an index fund is basically just the average of all of the investments inside it.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- iopq 10y agoThat's assuming he spent nothing at all, which I find to be a ridiculous assumption.
- saghm 10y agoI don't think calling someone a liar is the same as saying they don't know what they're talking about
- xenadu02 10y agoBillionaires that received millions in loans from their daddy? Not so much. Great respect to all who went out and built something great. Trump is not one of them; he would be penniless if his dad hadn't rushed in and saved him on at least two separate occasions.
- fny 10y agoI think, despite political affiliation, it's our obligation to hold him to the promises we believe in and galvanize his fired-up base to do so as well. I voted for Clinton and volunteered for the campaign, but I'll gladly push him to keep his word on this promise and the others that I believe will benefit our country.
- r00fus 10y agoConcur wholeheartedly. Just not very optimistic. But who knows?
- fny 10y agoIf he doesn't keep his word we'll have ammo to oust him in 4 years, perhaps impeach him sooner, perhaps revise congress in 2 years. Otherwise, we get the change we want.
- ianamartin 10y agoBe careful what you wish for. I can't stand Trump and don't support him at all. But he's got a damn good insurance policy against impeachment in the form of Pence. Pence is a religious nutbag and would be a million times worse than Trump, if you can comprehend a level of bad that awful.
- fisherjeff 10y agoI have serious doubts. I think the one thing that this election has proven is that fact-checking is dead. PolitiFact rated 70% of Trump's reviewed statements as at least "mostly false" and there were basically zero consequences. The next election cycle is going to be brutal.
- rjeli 10y agoPolitifact is blatantly biased. Bernie and Trump made the same claim about african american youth unemployment, and they rated Trump a liar and Bernie honest [0][1]. [0]: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/jul/13/bernie-s/bernie-sanders-says-real-unemployment-rate-african/ http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/jul/... [1]: http://www.politifact.com/virginia/statements/2016/jun/20/donald-trump/trump-misleadingly-puts-black-youth-unemployment-r/ http://www.politifact.com/virginia/statements/2016/jun/20/do...
- megablast 10y agoSo, he is already a real politician. Any different to Obama promising to close Guantanamo bay? And I say this as an Obama supporter.
- tdb7893 10y agoI agree that not all promises can be filled but I do credit Obama with having taken a run an most of his other promises. Trump made a lot and they are kinda all over the board so I'll be curious to see what he does
- eggy 10y agoYou nailed it; I never take campaign promises from anybody that serious. I think Bernie had enough integrity that he would have at least tried, and then given excuses as to why not. Bush, Bill Clinton, Obama, Trump, all the same.
- __derek__ 10y agoFor one, Obama has actually made progress towards accomplishing that, despite the Congress's efforts to block it.
- spoiledtechie 10y agoBull. There aren't examples and for you to say hat, speaks falsely to honesty and openness. Check your lies at the door.
- burkaman 10y agoA few forgotten promises from the campaign trail: "I will release my tax returns when Obama releases his birth certificate." - http://blogs.abcnews.com/george/2011/04/donald-trump-interview-transcript-part-two.html http://blogs.abcnews.com/george/2011/04/donald-trump-intervi... "If I run for office I will absolutely release my tax returns." - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hg-5KEt1Abg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hg-5KEt1Abg "Melania will hold a press conference on questions about her immigration." - https://twitter.com/JDiamond1/status/763158326653882368 https://twitter.com/JDiamond1/status/763158326653882368 "I will pay the legal fees of the man who punched a black guy at my rally." - http://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/meet-press-march-13-2016-n537476 http://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/meet-press-march-13-20... "I will self fund my campaign." and other related promises - http://www.npr.org/2016/07/14/485699964/every-position-donald-trump-has-taken-on-how-he-is-funding-his-campaign http://www.npr.org/2016/07/14/485699964/every-position-donal... I'm not very familiar with his life before the campaign, but I'm sure there are more examples.
- noobermin 10y agoTrump University? How he stuck contractors he hired and managed to get out of paying them their due? Trump is a huckster and given his track record, I cannot believe he is going to sober up and be fair and honest here.
- Buge 10y agoThat first tax returns quote is wrong (or the source is wrong). He said he might do it, not that he would do it.
- burkaman 10y agoI'm sorry, I paraphrased. > We’ll look at that. Maybe I’m going to do the tax returns when Obama does his birth certificate. I may tie my tax returns. I’d love to give my tax returns. I may tie my tax returns into Obama’s birth certificate. This is how Trump talks. For the entire campaign he talked about what he "might" do and backtracked if people didn't like it, so this is what we have to work with.
- pinkrooftop 10y agoSo you're saying he's like every politician that has ever made a promise
- noobermin 10y agoWhich contradicts what many of his supporters claim is his main allure, that he's real and "tells it like it is."
- LargeCompanies 10y agoJust like every politician before him and after.
- postcarnival 10y agojust like every politician there ever was?
- matt_wulfeck 10y agoHonestly what else is new? I voted for Obama on pledges he'd end the war in Iraq and close down the constitutional abomination that is Guantanamo. 8 years later and here we are.
- vacri 10y agoThe president can't do anything if Congress opposes him.
- Buge 10y agoWhen it comes to Trump, that could be a good thing.
- threeseed 10y agoRepublicans control the House and Senate. And Trump isn't going to veto conservative signature pieces like repealing ObamaCare.
- Buge 10y agoDemocrats controlled the house and senate Obama's first term.
- vacri 10y agoThe first half of the first term. Republicans have controlled the House for the past 6 years. Interesting, isn't it? Presidents aren't autocrats. The Republicans play obstructionist politics, the people get pissed off at a government that's not doing anything, and then blame the wrong party. The do-nothing government that the people have just voted against? It's the government they've just voted for...
- Buge 10y agoAnd in 2 years Democrats might control the house.
- davorb 10y agoCharles De Gaulle once said: "Since a politician never believes what he says, he is quite surprised to be taken at his word."