Doesn't compute. One of most expensive places on the planet, but you can get an apartment for $400/month? I couldn't find you a small apartment in the worst neighborhood in Philadelphia for $400.
Read your JCP writeup on SA. http://seekingalpha.com/article/104...-can-go-to-50-or-more-a-quantitative-analysis You disclose that "we are long JCP with a price target of $50" This is unfair to your readers. You should mention you have been long and wrong on the stock from the $40s all the way down to its current teenage level. Full and honest disclosure is always best. Just a line - "I have had this thesis for about a year and it's been a costly one. The thesis remains today, only the stock price is cheaper." Otherwise, someone, somewhere will figure it out (no, I will not be commenting on SA on your work!). Best to get it out there upfront.
Does the cost price really matter? If the investment thesis is the same as it was when the stock was $40, then all it means is that, if and when JCP reaches $50, people who bought it at $20 made a bigger percentage return than those who bought it at $40.
+ 1 . Not sure of the latest rankings, but it looks like a ranking of cost of living for expats. Where I live you would be lucky to get 8 or 9 sqm for this price, and you might expect a couple of sqm more in the seedy parts of town. As of living with 20k a year, even without kids, you would be hardly above the poverty line - actually if living downtown you would be poor.
I got him on ignore so I only saw his post now. He is wrong again as usual, its funny HE is the one who was long JCP in the 40's and 30's and said Ackman was the best HF manager of his generation. He puked in the 20s and said the thesis was over. The first time I ever bought JCP the stock was in the $26-27 area not 30's or 40's I made money in JCP in 2012 by buying the panics and selling during rallies (still keeping a core position). I got rewarded by having stomach there. I have plenty of losing trades but JCP wasn't one of them and I'm still long stock+calls and I'm expecting more this year If he wants to see some of my losing trades check my short journal, almost everyday there is a stock up some ridiculous amount but its part of the strategy
I suppose this distortion is caused by the way they calculate the rankings. The cost of real estate in Sao Paulo or Rio is quite high, thats why I rent. Everything else tends to be cheap compared to the US (except electronics). My health insurance costs $100 a month and it covers a lot of stuff
Usually the rankings not only include the price of prime real estate but but also of goods expats consume at home, which tend to be expensive imported goods outside EU and US. Shenzhen used to come up pretty high in those lists as well when I was there regulary,and I had a hard time understanding how it was so high, as even modern accomodation was pretty cheap, and excellent cantonese food in posh restaurants *very* cheap. Luanda was the most expensive city in The Economist or Mercer's ranking last year, yet the PPP per capitain Angola is only 5900usd/year, so it can't be so expensive for locals
Of course it matters. A newsletter writer sums up his year ... "we made a killing on XXX buying at $15 and selling at $30." Are you willing to declare this guy knows what he's talking about without knowing any other information? If you read his bullish article at $15, would you want to know he was bullish for the same reasons at triple the price. Check out Neiderhoffer's chapter on oracles. He covers all the tricks of the touts. Stopped clocks are always right occasionally. I have no doubt JCP will pop to $30 at some point and then the writer can declare victory and go home. As for his claim he was long all year and somehow made money, it's simply unbelievable. I have no beef with JCP or Ackman (who I'm a fan of). My beef was owning something just because some guru touted it. My beef is getting involved in these high-profile, picked-over stocks just to try and be a hero (we should give it a name: Tilsoning). I don't remember ever owning JCP, but I'm willing to concede I might have been long at some point. If I was, it couldn't have been for more than a few days and couldn't have been a significant loss or gain, or I would remember it.
I agree with all of this, if there's one lesson of the last few years it's that there's no practical alternative to being invested and maintaining some exposure to risk, even with capital that's "off the table" for trading or speculation activities. Any tinkering with the portfolio construction IMO ought to be kept to the barest minimum, shifting allocations by 10-25% at most - the whole point of sideline money being to mitigate the risk of poor decisions on your part screwing things up.
I'm not sure how confident you can be in this statement. It's true in terms of absolute numbers, certainly, because of the scale provided by OPM or institution-level capitalization - but in terms of trading acumen?