GameStop hearing has begun here, I'll be intermittently live tweeting if anything interesting

One thing so far, Waters announces this is the first of a series of hearings, and future ones will include regulators and policy discussions.
Remarkable pronunciation of "Dough-GEE-coin" from ranking member Patrick McHenry (R-NC)
McHenry taking the pose of a futurist triumphalist lauding the glories of financial innovation, tinged with a little populism
"We can't lock investors out of the rich possibilities of useless over-speculation!" McHenry, approximately
Rep. Sherman (D-CA) talking about best execution and payment for order flow and long settlement times. The compensation model and potential skimming is interesting, but it speaks to the inessential nature of secondary market trading
I think real-time settlement is fine, it'll make it easier to tax trades quickly and efficiently
Keith Gill: "I am not a cat"
#BREAKING
Enjoying the granular discussion of GameStop's long-term earning potential.
But in general, if "talking about stocks" is illegal make the stock market illegal, which considering that it's not a source of capital for companies might not be a bad idea
Waters asks Robinhood if not having enough capital is a liquidity problem. That being the definition of liquidity.
Vlad Tenev filibusters, and Waters reclaims her time.
Now we're getting somewhere, as Waters starts talking about Citadel about dark pools.
How uncouth to post comments of an august hearing, he said while live tweeting
https://t.co/ArMxI1vOKo
So McHenry comes out of the gate attacking the accredited investor distinction, demanding that everyone be allowed to get onto the craps and baccarat tables
I've had it with people decrying Robinhood for "treating trading like a video game" when the biggest investment on Wall Street is in SPAC companies with no products or sales driven on the strength of having like Colin Kaepernick's name attached to them
Ann Wagner, maybe the biggest Wall Street mouthpiece in Congress, echoing McHenry on adding the ability for retail investors to trade, so I guess that's the conservative talking point: open the casino, burn the velvet rope!
Not two, not three, not four,
https://t.co/Cmb1f8Z1rK
I don't really feel a disquisition on the best way to investors to pay for a stock trade is the best use of hearing time when you have two hedge fund guys across the table.
The extreme pride that retail investors comprise 20 instead of 10 percent of total market activity I think misses the point?
Look, 2 of the last 3 Democrats who have spoken in this hearing chair other committees and are reading rote, superficial little speeches about disclosure.
You want a committee that can regulate Wall St, make it at least a few members' full-time job.
Now, Meeks has stumbled upon a point, this margin trading and options trading is useless, not just for Robinhood investors but really anyone. What purpose does it serve? It's a prop bet.
Boy that Reddit CEO must be lonely. Hasn't been asked a question yet and shouldn't be, really.

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1/ Some initial thoughts on personal moats:

Like company moats, your personal moat should be a competitive advantage that is not only durable—it should also compound over time.

Characteristics of a personal moat below:


2/ Like a company moat, you want to build career capital while you sleep.

As Andrew Chen noted:


3/ You don’t want to build a competitive advantage that is fleeting or that will get commoditized

Things that might get commoditized over time (some longer than


4/ Before the arrival of recorded music, what used to be scarce was the actual music itself — required an in-person artist.

After recorded music, the music itself became abundant and what became scarce was curation, distribution, and self space.

5/ Similarly, in careers, what used to be (more) scarce were things like ideas, money, and exclusive relationships.

In the internet economy, what has become scarce are things like specific knowledge, rare & valuable skills, and great reputations.
So the cryptocurrency industry has basically two products, one which is relatively benign and doesn't have product market fit, and one which is malignant and does. The industry has a weird superposition of understanding this fact and (strategically?) not understanding it.


The benign product is sovereign programmable money, which is historically a niche interest of folks with a relatively clustered set of beliefs about the state, the literary merit of Snow Crash, and the utility of gold to the modern economy.

This product has narrow appeal and, accordingly, is worth about as much as everything else on a 486 sitting in someone's basement is worth.

The other product is investment scams, which have approximately the best product market fit of anything produced by humans. In no age, in no country, in no city, at no level of sophistication do people consistently say "Actually I would prefer not to get money for nothing."

This product needs the exchanges like they need oxygen, because the value of it is directly tied to having payment rails to move real currency into the ecosystem and some jurisdictional and regulatory legerdemain to stay one step ahead of the banhammer.