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The Scam-plosion
This Week on The Compound
This Week on The Compound
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This week on TCAF Josh and Michael were joined by Jurrien Timmer, Director of Global Macro at Fidelity Investments. They discussed the ethos of Burning Man, the Fed's first cut, the state of the labor market, and the fall of Carl Icahn. (Listen)
INSIDE THE COMPOUND
This week on WAYT, Josh and Michael discussed the online investment ‘scam-plosion.’ Specifically, the scammers’ relentless use of the name/image of high-profile people in finance, like Josh’s, to sell everything from useless stock trading systems to, at worst, try to scam unsuspecting people out of their crypto. To be super clear, no one involved with The Compound will ever DM you trying to get you to join one of the schemes. Just block and report. Nick Maggiulli at Of Dollars and Data wrote about the indifference of the big platforms, like Meta, to help stop this wave of fraud.
The people being scammed out of their money are the ones who need it most. The victims of these schemes aren’t multi-millionaires losing a small fraction of their net worth. No, the people that are attracted to these scams likely don’t have much to begin with and want a better life as a result. They are losing money that they can’t afford to lose.
FRIENDS OF THE COMPOUND
Hardly a day goes by without a new ETF getting approved. Often, they are simply clones of existing mutual funds. Increasingly, however, they include all manner of leveraged and single-stock ETFs. Fund sponsors are now even trying to shoehorn illiquid asset classes, like private equity, into the ETF structure. This week, Jason Zweig at the Wall Street Journal wrote about this trend.
An ETF works well if its holdings trade transparently and frequently, so investors know exactly what’s in the fund and what the market says it’s worth moment-to-moment. That’s all but impossible with buyout funds that hold entire nontraded companies.
COMING SOON
Next week The Compound crew will be at Future Proof 2024. Josh and Michael are set to speak live with Peter Mallouk, President & CEO of Creative Planning.
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