John T. Reed’s news blog

Stock investors believe sales growth automatically means future profits and rising stock price. This was the story of the late 1990s dot-com boom of which Amazon was the leader. Most dot-coms flopped in 2000. The public still believe rapid sales growth = earnings and stock price growth..In fact if you buy the business like Amazon and Uber and Lyft, that produces TWO things: rapid sales and market share growth and growing losses. The public is simply still too ignorant and credulous to understand that buying the business is fraud and Ponzi-scheme like..Another factor is VCs running around looking for Harvard...

I have an idea for how Amazon can move to NYC as planned. . The problem is NYC unions and politicians are sleazy scum. NY State are the same but not as bad. . The basic deal is the same only Amazon will be able to leave on six months notice. . Amazon will buy or lease or build as before. . However, this time, the NY State government will be required to buy the owned buildings from Amazon at Amazon paid for them. This will cost NY state nothing because it is simply moving an asset on the NY...

Dem presidential candidates have to win CA on Super Tuesday. That means they have to solve the housing "affordability" crisis here, or seem to.   Limits on supply High prices of anything are caused by insufficient supply in relation to demand. Insufficient supply of houses in CA is caused by land-use regulations like zoning and the CA Coastal Commission.   The only real solution is to reduce land-use regulation—drastically.   But one man's affordability is another man's home value. Owners of existing homes, like businessmen, want government regulators to prevent anyone from competing with them when they sell their home,...

Further on the sale of rare coins. I called Heritage San Francisco. They only accept coins for auction if the predicted sale price is $5,000 or more. The first one I want to sell is appraised at $625 by PCGS—1928 Peace Dollar, minted in Philadelphia, not San Francisco, with a grade of MS 63.So I cannot sell THROUGH Heritage, but I can sell TO Heritage. I doubt they would be the high bidder.So that takes me back to the Internet. I have never sold anything on eBay so I have no reputation there. But I have been in business selling...

Smollett may be in bigger trouble for the threatening letter “sent” to him ostensibly by white supremacists. According to the Washington Post, Smollett’s recent fame was a three-step process:1. He was unhappy with the amount 20th Century Fox paid him for his work on the Empire TV series.2. In an attempt to pressure Fox to increase his pay, he sent a threatening letter with white powder to the Empire producers.3. When that got little publicity, he staged the MAGA Country assault on 1/29/19.The letter, which arrived at Empire on 1/22/19, used letters cut out of a magazine like a ransom...