The Strategist
The long view, patient, analytical, playing several moves ahead.
Jim Chanos qualifies as The Strategist because he maps markets rather than reacting to them. The Kynikos Associates founder and financial fraud investigator finds profitable courses through deliberately obscured corporate terrain by analytical rigour, reading distortions and intentional misdirection as signals in themselves.
“So to that end, Coinbase, based on fourth quarter numbers, Coinbase's cost structure was 10% annualized of customer AUM under the umbrella, and their revenues were 5%. Now we think with depreciation of crypto, their cost basis is somewhere around 7% of customer AUM. So they think about that.”
“And yet the company still traded for two more months at about 100 euros per share after KPMG said the company wouldn't cooperate before they themselves finally came out and said, oh yeah, there's missing money. And then the stock went from 100 basically to zero in a handful of days.”
“Opinions about facts are what set prices. And so I've said that for years. And only hearing one set of opinions may give you a very misguided view of facts and ultimately prices. And so I think that you ignore short sellers and skeptics at your own peril.”
“I remember getting a phone call from a reporter from a major business daily right after Sarbanes-Oxley was signed. And she said, well, what are you going to do for a living now? And I said, what do you mean? She said, well, fraud's been outlawed.”
Masters in Business: “Jim Chanos on Financial Fraud (Podcast)”
LISTEN AT THE SOURCE ↗THE RECORD IS CHECKABLE