28 Comments

“you have lost more than 200% of your investment potential.”

Sorry, but would you kindly explain to me, an investing dummy, how you can lose more than 100% of anything? I’m afraid I’m struggling to see it.

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Because your money could have gain invested in something else.

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Oh, I think I see. You’re saying that not only did you lose your money, you lost the opportunity to make money.

I normally think of opportunity cost as being a part of my investment: if I buy asset X, there are thousands, if not millions, of assets whose purchases are forgone by that act.

But if my investment in X goes to zero, am I correct in thinking that you would therefore reckon my loss as not only my investment in X, but in addition some arithmetic combination of all the gains I might have made had I invested otherwise? I wonder if the IRS would allow me that accounting treatment. How would I calculate that? Or is it just a rule of thumb to calculate my loss as double the cash loss? Is this a way to convert any gain to a loss by finding that I could have made a better investment?

Thanks for your always interesting and provocative posts; I enjoy reading them and always look forward to them.

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You've got it now. I had fun teaching my sons that zero is not a number, too.

I have $20 dollars and give you $20. How many do I have?

From a realmath standpoint, I'm down $20 bucks, so I have -$20 dollars.

Weird, right?

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It depends on the terms under which you transferred the money to me, of course. If it’s a loan, then you still have $20, but it’s in a different asset class.

But say you give me $20 with no strings attached. Is your assertion that your position goes from +$20 to -$20 therefore you’re down 200% or $40? To whom do you have to pay the additional $20?

You might be confusing your position with the change in your position.

I would say you’ve gone from $20 to $0 — you’re down the $20 you gave me, no more and no less. If all you had was $20 to start with, you’re down 100%. At least that’s what I learned in accountancy school, which was admittedly before basic arithmetic became synonymous with white supremacy. It might be different now.

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Right, of course. But let's say that you, and the $20 bill I gift to you disappear...

A realmath accounting would count the -$20 as -$20... and under the gift, apply it to the +20, and under the loan... in reality, it is 0+ $20 + interest charged if the loan in paid back, and 0-$20 if the loan is defaulted.

My point is the potential futures are not included in accounting, but they COULD be, just like Bayesian priors, and just like $ or €, etc, and dimensions (e.g., inches) convey additional information, a richly annotated symbolic mathematics could keep track of potentialities -

If formalized, decision-making could be better informed, more quickly.

Credit card debt, for example

$4,555 on Card 1

$5,555 on Card 2

Which do I pay down fastest?

Missing the interest rate and other terms, who knows?

(BTW, fun fact, zero is only a number because Peano updated his axioms and made it axiom #1)

How do we know we're not stuck in a rut cognitively with the math we have inherited?

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The only real winner is the banker creating new money out of nothing and issuing it to you as debt that you must repay at interest.

Then as in 2008 when it all goes bang you get to pick up the tab via your taxes.

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now (May 1, 2023) ... you meant Feb 1 2023?

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Ok. thanks. :)

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Could not agree more.. Wise and actionable data... Big Pharma is on the verge of Big Karma in every way... This is the beginning of the Covid Vaccine manufacturers END.. Big Pharma finance has already started to exit [Gates selling] yes sir.. the Ministry of Truth has run out of ammo....

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Good to hear! Billy Gruff run for the hills!

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We have around half a million additional disabled people on welfare since the vax rollout in the UK (nerver mind the dead) can you guess who will pay for them?

It won't be Billy or the pharma men will it.

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Gates and Everyone who contributed to this Crime of the Century has Big Karma in the pipeline now... No Escape.. a Tidal Wave of Bad Juju headed their way...

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I fervently hope and pray that your assessment is correct.

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I hope you are right

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This scam cannot go on forever but I am not as optimistic as you are.

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They're transitioning to other scams. Genetic manipulation under the guise of targeted treatments being one such scam. If they remain in control of the technology through their enormous wealth & patents it'll just be more of the same.

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Dumped my PFE last March. Did make a few bucks, but (and I am not a social justice investor), I felt besmirched by owing Pfizer, and anticipated its fall.

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Damn, I hope you're right about the changes in regulatory structure, etc. I expect nothing to change. In CA I vote for people who would be interested in such things, but the blue swamp is so secure here, there's no hope. We couldn't even get that lizard Newscum recalled after all his hypocritical actions.

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one can only hope

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I would literally invest in cigarette companies over pharma. At least with cigarettes, everyone is aware of the danger and the companies no longer deny it.

But the list of great things at the end of the article sounds far too good to become reality. There are a lot of Democrats who will never believe vaccines can cause harm who will block those common sense proposals for fear of “causing vaccine hesitancy.”

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Like putting Jeffrey Epstein in charge of child welfare.

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.....Jamie, want to say that I'm EXTREMELY grateful for notifications of your VERY valuable work - but, for reasons STILL yet to be made clear, HAVEN'T been for a WEEK now (Substack HAS acknowledged SOME sort of related problem; not sure if it's a form of sabotage, or what) - PLEASE investigate, as there appears to be NO way for ME to directly communicate with them.....thanks; it's again, MUCH appreciated!

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Biden is a SOB!

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I sure hope you're wrong about reforms 1-6. That might be just enough to keep the corrupt ship afloat. I want to see a much more radical restructuring, such as removing the power from Congress that allowed them to get us to this place where those kinds of reforms are needed.

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If number 6 were to become reality I’d be the one celebrating loudest and hardest. Unfortunately, I don’t see it ever happening. It’s been almost 40 years and no one has ever tried to change that.

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