3 ms·

I'm not even sure, but can private individuals engage in price fixing? The owners are under no obligation to even sell at all, let alone at a "market price" tha

by flutas 3y ago

I'm not even sure, but can private individuals engage in price fixing? The owners are under no obligation to even sell at all, let alone at a "market price" that a hedge fund determined is their sweet spot.

giantg2 3y ago
I have no idea. Historically granges performed similar coordination for local farmers to determine who is planting what and even lumping together harvests to get better pricing from processors. I would think there should be some case law on how price fixing relates to that. Or maybe belonging to a grange or association sheilds them somehow.
- flutas 3y ago
  I actually thought of a good example of this exact thing happening, with the exact same good (land). Disney and Florida. Disney bought much of the land in secret, but when it got out land shot up in price. Nobody got sued over it. > Walt knew that an announcement that his company would be building a resort in Central Florida would have caused land-costs to skyrocket as speculators and smaller developers would have swooped in to make a killing. To make sure that this didn’t happen, Walt set up several fictitious companies to buy up land. One of these was cheekily named the “M.T. Lott Real Estate Corporation” and the “Latin-American Development and Management Corporation” as the supposed buyers. > Overall, the company bought 27,400 acres of land from 51 landowners for over $5 million. The land cost $182 per acre after the deal was done. > Of course, once it was revealed that Disney was behind the purchases, the prices of land jumped more than 1000%. That’s partially why Walt bought his first acre of land in Florida for Walt Disney World for $80.00 and his last for $80,000.00! For full context, Flannery is mad that they want more than $15,000/acre. > Yet even when Flannery increased its offers to over $15,000/acre, which would have given these Conspirators a profit of up to approximately 32,000% (32 times) on their investment in only a few years, they countered Flannery's offers by demanding even higher payments.
  - giantg2 3y ago
    But there's no example of any price fixing type of there (or maybe it's just not presented here). Of course prices go up once people know you want the land. Also, most of the land Disney bought was not good land, but rather swampy or underutilized. I wonder why these tech billionaires don't buy cheaper land in a more rural area instead of focusing on the Bay area. I believe Bill Gates is one of the main holders of land in the US. Perhaps they could buy some from him? Dealing with a single person would be ideal.

by flutas 3y ago

giantg2 3y ago

I have no idea. Historically granges performed similar coordination for local farmers to determine who is planting what and even lumping together harvests to get better pricing from processors. I would think there should be some case law on how price fixing relates to that. Or maybe belonging to a grange or association sheilds them somehow.

flutas 3y ago
I actually thought of a good example of this exact thing happening, with the exact same good (land). Disney and Florida. Disney bought much of the land in secret, but when it got out land shot up in price. Nobody got sued over it. > Walt knew that an announcement that his company would be building a resort in Central Florida would have caused land-costs to skyrocket as speculators and smaller developers would have swooped in to make a killing. To make sure that this didn’t happen, Walt set up several fictitious companies to buy up land. One of these was cheekily named the “M.T. Lott Real Estate Corporation” and the “Latin-American Development and Management Corporation” as the supposed buyers. > Overall, the company bought 27,400 acres of land from 51 landowners for over $5 million. The land cost $182 per acre after the deal was done. > Of course, once it was revealed that Disney was behind the purchases, the prices of land jumped more than 1000%. That’s partially why Walt bought his first acre of land in Florida for Walt Disney World for $80.00 and his last for $80,000.00! For full context, Flannery is mad that they want more than $15,000/acre. > Yet even when Flannery increased its offers to over $15,000/acre, which would have given these Conspirators a profit of up to approximately 32,000% (32 times) on their investment in only a few years, they countered Flannery's offers by demanding even higher payments.
- giantg2 3y ago
  But there's no example of any price fixing type of there (or maybe it's just not presented here). Of course prices go up once people know you want the land. Also, most of the land Disney bought was not good land, but rather swampy or underutilized. I wonder why these tech billionaires don't buy cheaper land in a more rural area instead of focusing on the Bay area. I believe Bill Gates is one of the main holders of land in the US. Perhaps they could buy some from him? Dealing with a single person would be ideal.