Porsche crashes into controversy in the ultimate 'short squeeze'

[BrilloPad]

Listen, if hedge funds deem that VW shares are overvalued they should not invest any money in them and go invest somewhere else. Just how hard is it? What they do instead they borrow shares to attack companies perceived by them as weak and somehow strangely enough it so happens that many hedge funds attack at the same time using leverages to multiply their effect and clearly (in my view) using naked shorting by selling shares they don't have! That's just gross - they basically manipulate market hoping that their leveraged punch and gang attack would ensure they walk away with profits from thin air. That's not right - the only profits that people should make from shares are in case of dividends or share value increases, it should not be possible at all to profit from share losses.

You can argue all you want for free market and all that bulltulip, but hedge funds specifically will get what they deserve very soon - I think 2009 is when it happens, if you work for a hedge fund in any capacity I suggest you start looking for a new job because there won't be much work for you soon.

You seem to think that hedge funds talk to each other!

And you have a very naive view of the world - humanity progresses by the strong driving out the weak.

Nevertheless at the end of 2009 there will be 25% of the hedge funds there were at end of 2007. Too many on the bandwagon. But the way to sort them out is the market - not be recuction to the lowest common level.

[AtW]

You seem to think that hedge funds talk to each other!

Why is it multiple hedge funds got caught in VW debacle? I don't know if they talk on the golf course or via email, or even if they don't talk at all - their shorting operations using borrowed shares are negatively impacting real companies and their long term investors and such actions by hedge funds bear no economic sense, in fact their very existence goes against economical development.

And you have a very naive view of the world - humanity progresses by the strong driving out the weak.

So, the mob should be allowed to racket businesses and what Al Capone did was just fine? No it wasn't - we have laws that are there for a reason - generally guide progress forward, avoid scum like Al Capone whose existance is challenging the whole system, the same is with the hedge funds - they fook over just too many things now in the name of profit and bring nothing good from themselves, this can't be allowed to continue and we will see them become extinct very soon.

Nevertheless at the end of 2009 there will be 25% of the hedge funds there were at end of 2007. Too many on the bandwagon. But the way to sort them out is the market - not be recuction to the lowest common level.

New Bretton-Woods like agreement is going to put an end to the kind of scam those guys were pulling out - they are not cause of credit crunch, but active members of the scam group that did a very good job at fooking people out of their money and getting away with it.

[Cyberman]

It's so sad to see the demise of those parasitic, shorting, hedge-funds.

[HairyArsedBloke]

Question for Atw:

1) What is a hedge fund
2) ..... oh I can't be arsed to come up with a second because he wont answer the first one.

[BrilloPad]

Question for Atw:

1) What is a hedge fund
2) ..... oh I can't be arsed to come up with a second because he wont answer the first one.

He doesn't seem to answer your questions.

Anyone would think you had asked if he wanted unprotected anal.....

[sasguru]

atW - your rants are getting dull now. You're about as significant as a fart in a hurricane in the great scheme of things and your views have a corresponding importance in the great scheme of things.

[d000hg]

if you bought shares last week you should expect to pay 99% capital gains tax. If you had shares for long term then tax should be low.

Of course. All problems are solved.

[darmstadt]

Alan A Ryan, who controlled the company through family holdings, secretly started buying stock, often through options and opaque holding companies until, in 1920, he announced he controlled 105pc of Stutz.

I presume pc means percent, could someone please explain to me how you can own 105% of something?

[PRC1964]

I presume pc means percent, could someone please explain to me how you can own 105% of something?

Imagine that you own all the shares in your company, and you also own a lot of IOUs from investors who can now no longer buy the shares they owe you on the free market because you own them all.

[ASB]

You should ask Gordon Brown, I'm sure he could do it...

After all his predecessors achieved a marginal tax rate of 102% back in the 60s/70s...

102% never. It was worse than that....

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/history/taxhis7.htm

Special rates have been introduced twice within the post-war years, causing income tax in certain circumstances to exceed 100%.

* For 1947-48 a special contribution was payable when a person’s total income exceeded £2,000. For investment income over £5,000 it was 50%. So with income tax at 45% and surtax at 52.5%, the effective rate was 147.5%.
* In 1967-68, the special charge was imposed. For investment income over £8,000, the rate was 45% which - with income tax at 41.25% and surtax at 50% - meant a total rate of 136.25%.

With substantial investment income tax rates were "only" 98% in the mid 70s.