How's Your Investment Portfolio?

[LivingnLA]

It's times like this that I wish I was religious so I could believe that a man like this would rot in Hell. It's bad enough that he doesn't give a shit about how his grotesque spending habits affect his own children. Just to think of all the lives that could have been saved by the $5 million he shot into the sky for absolutely no reason. What a despicable excuse for a human being.

 

While he certainly wasted money, $5 million is nothing compared to what ultrarich people spend, like the hundreds of millions spent on a private yacht or even what governments waste, like the $21 trillion of unaccounted for pentagon spending over the past two decades.

 

http://blog.world-mysteries.com/science/how-billionaires-spend-money/

 

https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-pentagon-cant-account-for-21-trillion/

[+ E.T.Bass]

How will markets behave if/when the finance gurus begin reporting how Trump has created a world class deficit, one of the best deficits, a really bigly one.

 

The best thing for folks in debt is inflation right? The Trump clan is up to their assholes in debt. I expect they might be thrilled to see double digit inflation.

[samhexum]

A historic drop in Facebook stock pulled technology stocks lower on Wall Street, even as other sectors climbed.

 

Facebook plummeted 19 percent Thursday after warning of slower growth ahead, erasing more than $100 billion in value.

 

The drop was the largest one-day loss in value of any publicly traded company in history.

 

Jeff Bezos is the world’s richest person — and it’s not even close

 

The first $30 billion is the hardest. Just ask Jeff Bezos.

 

The billionaire Amazon founder just saw his wealth climb from $120 billion to $150 billion over the last six months — a mere fraction of the 49 years it took him to gain his first $30 billion.

 

Bezos crossed over the $150 billion net worth mark as his shares were lifted in part because of Amazon Prime Day.

 

And so far, it’s unlikely that anyone will overtake the tech titan’s spot as the world’s richest person.

 

Bill Gates holds the No. 2 spot with a middling $95 billion — leaving him $55 billion behind Bezos.

 

Berkshire Hathaway’s Warren Buffett and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg hold spots 3 and 4, respectively — each having a net worth of roughly $83 billion, according to Bloomberg data.

 

Bezos, 54, hit the $30 billion mark in October 2013 — when shares of the e-commerce giant were trading for roughly $360 apiece.

 

His next $30 billion ascent took about two and a half years — to May 2016 — as Amazon’s share price doubled.

 

But 2018 has clearly been Bezos’ year, as Amazon shares gained 57 percent in just seven months — quickly adding more than $50 billion to his net worth.

 

If Bezos, who holds a 16 percent stake in Amazon, were his own company, he would rank 37th on the S&P 500 by market capitalization, according to Bloomberg data.

 

And the chances of Bezos outlasting his wealth are slim. Assuming he lives to 100, he’d need to cash out of his Amazon holdings and spend $9 million a day to die with nothing.

 

 

 

http://37.media.tumblr.com/b1a7ed959b2518df2a355568f4f8ecbc/tumblr_mlnylnFBx41rp0vkjo1_400.gif

Edited July 26, 2018 by samhexum

[samhexum]

It must be nice to have a few million $ spare pocket change to invest...

 

An investment made by Kobe Bryant has yielded more than 30 times its money in fewer than four and a half years.

 

On Tuesday, Coca-Cola announced it had purchased a minority stake in sports drink BodyArmor.

 

Bryant made his first investment in the brand, for roughly 10 percent of the company, in March 2014, putting in roughly $6 million over time. Based on the valuation of the Coca-Cola deal, his stake is now worth approximately $200 million, sources told ESPN.

 

Bryant is now the fourth-largest investor in the brand, marketed as a healthier competitor to Gatorade, behind the brand's co-founder Mike Repole, Coca-Cola and Keurig Dr Pepper. When Bryant invested in BodyArmor, the brand had just come off a year of $10 million in sales. BodyArmor is projected to top $400 million in sales in 2018.

 

And the rich get richer...

[samhexum]

[+ FrankR]

Good luck!

[+ VictorPowers]

What goes up usually comes down at some point! While it's up at the moment no doubt it will fall shortly.

 

Oh, and in related news my investment portfolio is on a tear this year, too...up 25%.

Love to pick that financial brain of yours come April in PS:)

[Beancounter]

Love to pick that financial brain of yours come April in PS:)

You have yourself a deal. Something tells me you would be a great investment.

[samhexum]

[gallahadesquire]

Good luck!

This is exactly what my investment guy tells me. Diversify, diversify, diversify!!!

[Guest]

Good luck!

Then you want to get an index fund. They have low fees, too.

[instudiocity]

25% growth mutual funds

25% aggressive growth mutual funds

25% growth & income mutual funds

25% international mutual funds

 

More important to salt money away than watching what happens day by day or even week by week.

[+ FrankR]

25% growth mutual funds

25% aggressive growth mutual funds

25% growth & income mutual funds

25% international mutual funds

 

More important to salt money away than watching what happens day by day or even week by week.

Dave Ramsey? Is that you??

[+ FrankR]

Then you want to get an index fund. They have low fees, too.

Indeed - in my personal opinion a broad based index fund with a low expense ration (think Vanguard S&P 500 for example) is tough to beat. Even for the pros. It has been well proven and in this regard I eat my own cooking.

[samhexum]

The only thing I want at the moment is a Steinway Model L (used is fine).

 

Angry buyers of Steinway pianos say they were duped by salespeople who told them the instruments would increase in value, though they actually plunge in price by 50 percent or more as soon as they leave the showroom floor, according to a report Saturday.

 

Owners of the ultra-expensive instruments, which cost between $70,000 and $150,000 when new, said salespeople lied to them about what their pianos’ worth in the future, the Hatch Institutereported Saturday.

 

Customers said they were shown charts of steadily rising prices for new models and were told that buying a Steinway made a better investment than Wall Street stock, the investigative journalism site said.

 

One Steinway brochure, titled “Your Steinway Investment,” claims that “for more than a century and a half, every handmade Steinway has increased in value,” adding that their pianos were “an investment instrument unique in all the world.”

 

But when owners tried to sell, they learned their Steinways were worth tens of thousands less than what they’d paid, even when the pianos were just months old or had never been played, the site reported.

 

One customer never took home the piano she purchased for $78,000 in 2013 after she agreed to accept an inexpensive upright while paying down a layaway loan that pushed the total cost to $100,000.

 

Kelly Kilrea made $68,000 in payments but when she could no longer afford them, she looked into selling the instrument, only to learn that she wouldn’t get more than about $33,000 from a used-piano dealer, which is what still owes Steinway.

 

“I said, `Are you kidding me? How is that possible when it’s supposed to appreciate.’ It was in showroom condition.”

 

The Steinway Gallery in Virginia, where she bought the piano and where it has remained all these years, then repossessed it. Kilrea is trying work out a deal to complete the sale, but she needs to borrow from a third party to pay off the loan.

 

“They use the word investment,” said Ronen Segev, who owns Park Avenue Pianos, which buys and sells used Steinways. “Steinways go up in value. It’s part of the expectation. Then you look at the secondary market and you see what prices are. It really shocks people.”

 

Company spokesman Anthony Gilroy conceded that Steinways “go down in value significantly right off the bat.” He said claims by salespeople that the pianos increase was “a very rare occurrence.”

 

As for the brochure making that statement, he said he “pulled it months ago from the website.” But Hatch found it was still widely in use.

 

Steinway, a central part of Astoria since 1870, when founder William Steinway set up shop there, is one of the few manufacturing plants still in New York. All new Steinways sold in the U.S. are made at the company’s headquarters.

 

The firm, which also once owned a palatial Victorian mansion with turrets and a tower a block away, is now being shopped by its owner, hedge fund billionaire John Paulson, who is asking $1 billion. He bought it for $513 million in 2013.

[jawjateck]

I took advantage of December's sell-off, bought stock like crazy Christmas week. I sold most of those shares recently and pocketed the proceeds. 2019 is off to a good start, and I'm on my way to beating the S&P again.

 

Those gains will come in handy just in time for Palm Springs weekend.