Waste, Negligence & Cronyism: Inside UK’s Pandemic Spending - The New York Times

I see the US has picked up the UK Pandemic spending scandal whilst our Gov claims there’s nothing to see ⁦@JolyonMaugham⁩ ⁦@DamianHastie⁩ ⁦@allthecitizens⁩

1) Let's talk about a key part of the Chinese creator economy. The creator management and incubator agencies known as Multi-Channel Networks (MCN). We''ll summerise key lessons for the western creator economy.

And know how Li Ziqi got her 12m YouTube subscribers

2) MCNs are modern-day talent agencies (but more) who target influencers and creators as their clients. It originated in the US but has proliferated in China, with industry estimates of 5k-7k Chinese MCN operating as of 2020.

3) Typically, as creators gain enough following, they find it difficult to be an-all-in-one content creator, editor, customer support rep, accountant, lawyer, and marketing guru that the job demands.

Enter the MCNs who offers the creator the following:

4) Audience and traffic growth, PR management, monetisation through ads & e-commerce and support with retail fulfillment.

Their services are more holistic than western MCNs, who's offerings are more domain-specific.

5) Agreements between Chinese MCNs and creators can get into guarantees of the number of followers provided, copyrights, subtitling and distribution help, as well as providing analytical feedback on their content.

A thread on an interesting report by Goldman Sachs' Peter Oppenheimer, the bank's chief global equity strategist. He points out that Goldman's "Bear Market Risk Indicator" is looking ominous.

There are three factors that suggest that the recent stability could evaporate and that equities are "about to enter a sustained bear market", Oppenheimer says.

First is the fact that growth, inflation and interest rate outlook is unfriendly for equities.

Second is that greater volatility, such as multiple corrections and new peaks (which we've seen in 2018) tend to presage a full bear market.

Here is Goldman's data showing how falls and bounces tend to come ahead of "the dramatic final fall".

Thread – Why the Latest Pelosi-backed $2T Stimulus Bill Went Nowhere

1. The Dementiacrats have been holding more virus relief hostage in order to force Republicans to cave and vote for another $2T Dementiacrat porkulus bill instead.

2. Senate Dementiacrats have voted against the Republican’s $500B relief bill targeted at REAL PEOPLE (small business and the jobless) multiple times.

3. A $2T virus relief bill was ramrodded through by House Democrats in March through July when it was signed into law by the President. It contained junk that had nothing to do with virus relief but was the price that Republicans had to pay to get relief to suffering Americans.

4. Dementiacrat bill that San Fran Nan wants to push down our throats now contains $2T more of this crap, as well as relief directly targeted at Blue states to cover pension shortfalls and other past Dementiacrat mismanagement.

5. It’s no wonder why Republicans are telling her to “piss off” on the latest $2T porkulus bill.

SALUTATIONS you fantastic denizens of the internet! The first #FridayNightHistory of 2021 is here! This week, a new mystery: the true name of "John Williams," Japanese Veteran of the American Civil War.

Yeah, you heard right. And he's not the only one, either.

Now-- I know, I know. Ordinarily you see me talking about the Japanese aftermath of the US Civil War, in the form of people and surplus equipment from the US that ended up there during the Boshin War.

I find myself in pursuit of the opposite, today. @DuPertweet brought a tweet by @KyleMizokami to my attention, with photos of an article talking about Asian-American/Pacific Islander veterans of the US Civil War in general and 2 Japanese vets in particular.

I'm starting from one of those two, and seeing how much I can reconstruct, because there really weren't that many Japanese people outside of Japan in the timespan of the US Civil War (1861-1865), so I think it should be possible to narrow down their precise names and identities.

And this week I want to start from one. What do we know about this person who American records call John Williams?

On Sep 3rd 2020 we closed on a 120k sf glove factory built in 1890 in a small NY town.

Has 45k sf of self storage inside and had $14k a month of net operating income at closing.

Let's breakdown this deal.

A THREAD on creating $2 million out of thin air in 18 months...

👇👇

First saw the property on Loopnet in mid 2018. I ignored it. Who wants to try to operate a business in an old factory in a dying NY town.

A few months later I reached out. Broker sent me financials. They were good. $24k a month in revenue and $10k in expenses.

So I visited the property. It was old. Needed a new roof. Full time manager. Only accessible to customers 9am-5pm M-S. No autopay. A lot of folks paying 1/2 market rent.

I loved everything about it.

But I knew they were going to have trouble selling this thing no matter the profitability, so on July 1 2018 I made a low offer. $750k + seller pays for new $250k roof + $20k in environmental work.

Countered at asking price + $100k credit towards roof.

I ignored the response.

Broker called me back mid September of 2018. Make another offer, he urged.

I knew it was a good biz so I got more aggressive - $1MM + seller pays for roof / environmental.

Declined. Countered with $1.2MM but they'd give me a new roof and do the environmental.