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My favorite thing about the public markets is that it doesn't matter how much hype a company garners on TechCrunch, where the founders went to school, or how sl
by whitepoplar 8y ago
My favorite thing about the public markets is that it doesn't matter how much hype a company garners on TechCrunch, where the founders went to school, or how slick the company office spaces are. A piece of shit is a piece of shit, and conversely, a diamond is a diamond. That's not to say that public companies can't run on hype--they absolutely can--but eventually hype wears off and a company must show that it's a real business.
- paxys 8y agoHave you met TSLA? Public markets are as much based on hype than anything else.
- adventured 8y agoTSLA... the company that doubled its sales in the last three quarters and is outselling BMW and Mercedes in the US?
- markus_orlandis 8y agoJust because they've been performing does not imply that they're not overvalued. TSLA has been overvalued for years. That doesn't mean it's a bad investment, it just means it brings along higher risk.
- sethherr 8y agoHave you seen https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18618365 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18618365 ? It brought interesting insight into additional factors in TSLA’s valuation
- isoskeles 8y agoI don't understand how this brings insight into "additional factors" in their "valuation", as the article mentions nothing about their valuation, just that they have efficient batteries.
- krn 8y agoMany people think of Tesla as a car company, when actually it's an energy company. Other car manufacturers are not.
- azhenley 8y agoReminds me of a quote I once heard (but can't find now) about Ford or GM, that they aren't an automobile company but rather a finance/loan company.
- taneq 8y agoKind of like big mining companies aren't actually mining companies, they're finance and investment companies. The actual mining is done by contractors three or four tiers down in the contract stack.
- quickthrower2 8y agoNo company is a what it actually does company.
- sah2ed 8y ago> No company is a what it actually does company. Or perhaps that companies, like individuals, have facets. Someone calling Google a search engine company is no more correct than you saying they are an advertising company, technology company etc, or in a negative sense, a monopoly. Each of these epithets refer to the same entity, it's just that each emphasizes a particular trait over other traits for the point being made. A regulator is more much more likely to use "search engine" in conjugation with "monopoly" to characterize Google than with the term "technology company" since their goal is to highlight a potential case of abuse that is known to stem from such market power.
- taneq 8y agoTrue, but I'd phrase it as "no big company is actually a what-you-think-it-is company."
- a_t48 8y agoIf that’s true, couldn’t you short it?
- admax88q 8y agoShorts only work if the market corrects fast enough for it to be worth while.
- artursapek 8y agoTesla is definitely hyped, but that's not the only reason for its market value right now. They are _the_ electric car company, nobody wants other electric cars nearly as much as they want a Tesla.
- paulcole 8y agoYes, no stock has ever been affected by hype. It can take YEARS for the market to get things right.