Where does the rule even come from, and what purpose does it serve, to have employees get permission before investing in another fund? It's garbage.

I know some firms that have rules like this, and they probably don't realize that I realize they're control freak scum bags.

This part is what the law actually requires:

The term "best practices" is toxic waste. Do not let the regulators and compliance industrial complex push you into following their made up rule set. Instead, read the law and obey that.

How did $GS survive the 1930s after catastrophically bad decisions?

The family bailed the company out for 15 years (!) using their personal wealth!

And it wasn't the last time the company nearly failed.

This is my take. This is how I'll shape my firm.

I think we already have too many rules today. Over time I intend on weeding that down to what actually makes the company work better and be more ethical. It's the opposite of what most firms do.

I stopped reading the book about Goldman Sachs pretty fast.

The story of $GS summarized:

1. A couple of families created a great commercial paper business that went well for decades.

2. They began outsourcing the firm's decisions to outsiders, which led to repeated blow ups.

3. After each blow up, the firm "learned something new and important" and added more dumb company wide mantras.

Which is why they ultimately blew up again in 2008, and will most likely again in the future. Unfortunately, the government will likely bail the company out long term unless they're particularly awful, because companies like this as seen as too big to fail now (even though they're not).

It's funny that ChatGPT gets it just from that one image.

The second point is important. The firm's incentive isn't, "Create value for the client." It's "Extract value from the client."

The tell is that the firm prioritizes covering its own ass legally, over letting staff be nimble and risk taking.

If you invest with a firm that has rigid and dense compliance rules:

1. The firm will usually perform in line with the market, minus whatever fees they're extracting from you.

and

2. The less likely the staff will actually adhere to those compliance rules.

Another part of the numbers that seem goofy: equity is double 2019, they have a supposedly very diversified portfolio of cases, yet operating income is much lower than it was 5 years ago.

Combined with the above...

An important thing here: Both the assets and the liabilities are L3. So I don't even go off L3 / equity. It's more like I'm going off L3 / gross (not net) L3.

They can say whatever number they want.

$BUR reeks of bull shit. But I'm not short sure since I'm not that sure.

If it's a coinflip that the numbers are real vs made up, the company is ~fairly priced. Most likely it's either worth $20/share or zero.

Monkeys really are making the investments at Greenlight.