THREAD
The remarkable @ninaandtito posted some suggestive potential links between Mercer's RenTech and the Russian RenCap. A deeper dive on how firms of this nature might be linked, and where the scarce evidence might lie. /1
The remarkable @ninaandtito posted some suggestive potential links between Mercer's RenTech and the Russian RenCap. A deeper dive on how firms of this nature might be linked, and where the scarce evidence might lie. /1
She seems to know a lot about how hedge funds work. I think of them by analogy with the racetrack. That may give some people an easier way to think them. I never bet the horses, but I spent time at the track. Nevermind why. /2
I was fascinated by the handicappers, pros who picked winners. They were the humanoid big data machines. They started with the horse racing newspapers which gave publicly available info like pedigrees and track records. That's where "track record" comes from. /3
But they were eager for other info. They hired runners to watch the workouts and time the intervals. They wanted to know about injuries. The trainers were tough marks, but they had better luck with the grooms. /4
Some would work together, talking and share some info. You could watch them think as the post time approached. They, bet at the last minute. The smart money comes in late. /5
I knew a young lady who liked horses but didn't bet. She rode and jumped them. She was a great handicapper. She would ignore all the data, and watch them walk before the race. She could spot a horse that was eager, in a good mood. /6
Word got around and the pros asked me how she did it. I told them what she told me. She watched the ears. They didn't buy it but I knew that was a tell for the horse's mood. She didn't always have a winner, but you could have made a living betting her picks to show. /7
Disclosure: I learned to ride at the track. But what does this have to do with hedge funds? Well, instead of horses, they bet on stocks (and other stuff). And they don't have to pick winners, they can also pick losers. /8
Handicappers and hedge fund managers can't win consistently unless they know something that everyone else doesn't know. If a horse is a big favorite, the odds come down and you don't win much. Stocks work the same way, the good ones get expensive. /9
RenTech was founded by genuine geniuses. I know their work. They hired hundreds of other geniuses. They bought the best computers and every imaginable kind of data. So maybe their success comes from hard work and good math. /10
But if a hood could shove a secret hedge fund and make a deal, there are a lot of ways they could conspire for profit. Think like a hood and you'll see where the evidence would be, and why it could be hard to find. /11
One route is asset stripping. A hood in a failing country steals $10 million in gold. But his troubles are not over. If he just holds it, some other hood will steal it back from him. He's in a failed state. /12
Our hood would like to move his loot to a safe country, earning it legally, maybe even paying tax on the income. So he has some local company steal the gold instead. But at first, it's a secret. /13
When word gets out, the company is worth $10 million more than it was. He can whisper to the fund that they should bet on this company. He can own shares in the fund, bought with some of his clean offshore cash /14
If the fund owned every single share of the company, they would profit the full $10 million. But they don't have to. Through the magic of derivatives, they can earn much more than the gain on whatever number of shares they can buy. /15
The fund can buy options, calls if they know the stock is going up. That's how amateur insider trading crooks get caught. The brother-in-law of the file clerk, who never bought an option in his life, loads up on options a few days before the news breaks. /16
It's easy for the SEC to find these amateurs, and they go to jail all the time. But our hedge fund regularly deals in derivatives. And it can make complex bets on the company months before the news breaks. Hard to convince a jury it was an insider trade. /17
It works in the other direction. The hood, or the failing state, which may be he same thing, plans to take some action which will wreck a company. The fund bets against it. /18
Well that's all well and good, but wouldn't the word get out? These fund employ hundreds. Except they chop up their book into domains for individual managers, who may be very secretive about their strategy. /19
For me, the most telling evidence against Mercer, and Murdoch, who seems linked to him, is not the corporate relationships or the financial transactions. It's their political activity. /20
Mercer, through his funding of Cambridge Analytica, SCL, and Breitbart, and Murdoch, being Murdoch, have consistently advanced Russian interests and echoed their propaganda. Why? Cui bono? Who benefits? /21
Based on Mercer's published remarks, I think he's a genius with sick and twisted values. Just my opinion. Maybe he thinks destroying America is a good thing that will save Mankind, or something. Or maybe he's compromised. /22
You see, the Mob has a better memory than an elephant. Once they are into you, once you deal with them and are compromised, they have you, and you do what they say. Or you disappear. /23// End//
Another possible mode of conspiracy is corporate espionage. The hostile information service penetrates a pharmaceutical company's systems, and learns that the clinical trial is not going so well. The fund bets against it.
