Finance Trends Letter

Well the long knives were certainly out for Tesla ( TSLA ) and its CEO, Elon Musk this week. Wall Street, legal firms, the SEC , and media talking heads were all roused to action (or comment) over Musk's recent proposal to take the company private at $420 per share. After floating the idea (via Twitter) of a private buyout of Tesla on August 7, Musk wrote to Tesla employees and shareholders about his vision for running Tesla as a private firm in a blog post entitled, "Taking Tesla Private" . Among the advantages of operating Tesla as a private firm (as well as the disadvantages of being a publicly traded company), Musk lists the following:  "... First, a final decision has not yet been made, but the reason for doing this is all about creating the environment for Tesla to operate best. As a public company, we are subject to wild swings in our stock price that can be a major distraction for everyone working at Tesla, all of whom are shareholders.  Being...

Tiger Mgmt. founder, Julian Robertson chats with Bloomberg TV about the changing landscape of the hedge fund industry, the impact of the SEC's case against SAC Capital and Steve Cohen, and his thoughts on Apple and Google.  Last week, I tweeted a link back to our post, " Insights from Hedge Fund Legend, Julian Robertson " for his thoughts on the hedge fund industry and the changes that size and increased competition have brought. This latest Bloomberg interview is a worthwhile update to this discussion. Here are the clips (part one: JR on hedge funds , part two: Julian on Apple, Google ) and a few quotes below.  Julian Robertson on the Steve Cohen case and info flow to hedge funds: "I think hedge funds are generally extremely careful that they adhere to rules [concerning inside info]." Doesn't think it will impact the industry much. Tiger cub Nehal Chopra of Tiger Ratan Capital agrees. On Steve Jobs and Apple : "I read the book on Steve Jobs an...

  Steve Jobs on failure : "You've got to ac t ... and you've got to be willing to crash and burn."  Apply to entrepreneurship, trading (try to manage risk to avoid complete crash and burn of your account), talking to that pretty girl... life. Related posts :  1. Steve Jobs: Billion Dollar Hippy (BBC documentary) . 2. Steve Jobs PBS interview from 1990, recently surfaced .

Steve Jobs' brilliant life and entrepreneurial career are profiled in this BBC documentary, " Steve Jobs - Billion Dollar Hippy ".  Today is a big media day for Apple, given the hype surrounding the release of the new iPhone 5. A fine time to look back on the Silicon Valley landscape of the 1970s and the counterculture and tech hobbyist environments which inspired Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak to start their own little computer company (now valued at over $600 billion dollars , market cap).  This is a great overview of Jobs' rise and fall at Apple, his entries into the realms of interpersonal computing and filmmaking at NeXT and Pixar, and his triumphant return to Apple that kickstarted its reinvention as a design-focused electronics company.  Enjoy the video, and check out our related items below for more on Steve Jobs and the tech revolution. Related posts :  1. Steve Jobs PBS interview from 1990, rarely seen . 2. Interview: Steve Jobs and Bill Gates a...

Came across this clip of Apple CEO, Tim Cook complaining that the ongoing tech patent wars are a "pain in the ass" . Granted, this is a topic that's recently been covered by Mark Cuban , or going farther back, by Bastiat in his "Three Stages of Invention" . However, one could look beyond Tim Cook's complaints to examine the very idea of the supposed necessity of patents and copyrights. The book, Against Intellectual Monopoly does just that, arguing: "Patents and copyrights do not promote economic progress but impede it." Note this passage, from the same book, which calls attention to the fact that patents can block the market's progress by preventing product imitation, development, and refinement:    "Imitation is a great thing. It is among the most powerful technologies humans have ever developed … imitation is a technology that allows us to increase productive capacity. Innovators increase productive capacity directly......

  Steve Jobs talks about the future of computing in a rare 50 minute TV interview aired on PBS.  When asked how computers have changed civilization, Steve begins by noting how humans were able to leapfrog the more efficient locomotion of other animal species by using tools, or technology.  Offering the example of how a human on a bicycle could easily surpass the locomotive advantage of the most efficient animal, a condor, Jobs concludes:  "We humans are tool-builders. And we can fashion tools that amplify these inherent abilities that we have to spectacular magnitudes. So for me, a computer has always been a bicycle of the mind: something that takes us far beyond our inherent abilities. I think we're just at the early stages of this tool." You can see by the re-do of his 1st interview response that Steve was always "on message" and rehearsing and delivering the exact points he wanted to make when selling his vision of how we use technology and Apple ...

Here's a look at some charts shared recently on Chart.ly and StockTwits. Think of it as a quick follow up to our Steve Jobs and Bill Gates post from last Friday, looking back on 30 years of technology innovation. The long view of Apple: monthly chart of AAPL stock price dating back to 1984. That's shortly after the Mac was introduced ( click to enlarge chart ). The following chart shows a comparison of Apple and Microsoft's share performance from 1986 (the year MSFT went public) to 2011.  On this timeframe, MSFT trounces AAPL from the early 1990s on to the dot.com bubble peak.  Still, Apple shares gain momentum in the 2000s, finishing the 25 year period with a more than 15,000% gain. Microsoft achieved a 25,000% gain in its stock price for the same period (down from its 1999 peak near the 50,000% mark).  Finally, we see the same two stocks measured from 1997, the year of Steve Jobs' return to the company he co-founded. The second act of Jobs at App...

So this week's resignation announcement from Steve Jobs has many of us looking back through the archives, compiling old interviews and articles, and summarizing the accomplishments of Apple and its iconic co-founder.  It's prompted me to look back not only at what Steve and Apple have done in the past 30-plus years, but what the tech industry as a whole has created in that time. We're all familiar with the stories of famous rivalries and stolen (or "borrowed"/cheaply purchased) technologies in the PC and software industries. It hasn't always been pretty. It's quite interesting then, to find two of the tech industry's most famous sparring partners (and sometimes, business venture partners), Steve Jobs and Bill Gates , sharing a stage and chatting about their careers in this D5 (All Things Digital, 2007) conference panel interview.  The panel discussion begins when the two great entrepreneurs are asked to describe the other's impact on ...

"The things I've done in my life have required a lot of years of effort before they took off." - Steve Jobs $AAPL Tue Jan 18 20:16:32 via web David Shvartsman FinanceTrends Just a cool quote from Apple CEO, Steve Jobs. Found it while reading O'Neil's How to Make Money In Stocks , of all things. Sometimes people forget that there is an unseen foundation of hard work (and earlier failures) that lies beneath any great success.

Get set for our, "Features of the week" . 1. Consumer prices show smallest gain in 54 years . 2. The bailout endgame : drama of Citi and Bank of America. 3. Audacity defined: David Kotok on Geithner and Obama . 4. Stimulating comments: Bernanke on further bank bailouts . 5. Joseph Dancy's market outlook for 2009 . 6. Credit crisis watch : gaining positive traction. 7. There's unemployment, and then there's unemployment . 8. John Paulson : "the man who made too much" (Portfolio). 9. Long ring finger may point to wealth in traders, study finds. 10. Gary Shilling says banks may need more federal bailouts (video). 11. Wilbur Ross considers buying large banks (video). 12. Security net wraps capital for inaugaral. 13. Pension pandemic: part one , part two . 14. Apple's Steve Jobs takes leave of absence to deal with health. 15. Are too many people going to college ? 16. Hyperinflation: Zimbabwe's worthless trillion dollar notes . 17. Mish on the mo...

I have to tell you: I'm kind of surprised that last week's news of the Congressional hearings on hedge funds and the financial markets didn't get more attention in the blogosphere and the non-business press. It sounds a bit funny to say that, as the hearings did secure front page attention from several newspapers (that I happened to see) the following day. This coverage was probably due, in no small part, to the snapshot images of five highly successful and media-shy hedge fund managers being brought before a congressional committee and a bevy of photographers. Despite this momentous occassion, the hearings did not exactly attract a whirlwind of coverage from bloggers outside the financial sphere, although several business and investing blogs were live-blogging the event . It could be that the weight of this event was lost on bloggers less familiar with the hedge fund industry and the spectacle surrounding some of its prime players. Still, I have to think that last week...

Please enjoy our, "Features of the week" . 1. US Q2 GDP revised up to 3.3% on higher exports, spending. But is the BEA measuring growth or inflation ? 2. As the credit crisis continues , consumers will be forced to save. 3. Merrill losses wipe away longtime profits. 4. Credit crisis has produced some surprising winners and losers . 5. Derivatives law sheds light on the financial ripple effect. 6. Pressure mounts on Thailand's PM as protests spread. 7. Reports of Steve Jobs' death are greatly exaggerated. 8. Economist: Is farmland overvalued? 9. FT dopes out the long-term outlook for emerging markets . 10. China's tallest skyscraper meets surging office demand (video). 11. Skyscrapers and Business Cycles - Mark Thornton. 12. Cambodia is building up its economy and attracting investors. 13. Mark Mobius finds Vietnam's stock market attractive. 14. Brother, can you spare some gold coins? 15. "GSEs: too big to survive" , says Michael Pento. Thank...

Bloomberg reviews a new biography about inventor Thomas Edison, which portrays the famous inventor as a tireless worker and endless promoter. The book also details Edison' s shortcomings: his lack of savvy in business matters, and the liberal manner in which he bent the truth. An excerpt from, "Thomas Edison Hoodwinks Reporters, Misjudges Markets in New Bio" : Edison persuaded a toadying press and eager investors that his rollout of this or that revolutionary invention was days or weeks away, chronically ``blurring the distinction between what he hoped for and what he had achieved.'' Anyone in business knows the phenomenon. One day, he switched on a prototype light bulb for a visiting reporter. ``Sitting in front of the bulb that would burn out in a couple of minutes were he to leave it on beyond the brief demonstration, Edison was asked, `How long will it last?' He answered, `Forever, almost,''' writes Stross, a business professor at San Jose Stat...