Dirty Money Series on Netflix

If anyone has some spare time I would suggest watching the "Dirty Money" series on Netflix.

Each episode is a separate 1 hour documentary about a separate topic. I watched two of them, one on how the short sellers figured our valeant pharm. and the other about the Trump empire.

If you're into stocks, or equity research I would highly suggest the valeant one, goes into good detail about the research involved and how the short sellers were able to connect the dots to the scam.

The Trump one shed some good light on the life of Trump and his business; specifically linking how "The Apprentice" basically led to the presidency.

 

The valeant shorts got a bit lucky. And they never really touched on why valeant stock price really crashed.

Truth is the payout/payee relationship changed in pharma and that is really why it crashed. The issues the shorts bring up wasn’t even 10% of valeant revenue.

They played a lot of the same games Shkreli did. And that business model got crushed. They were highly leveraged so stock crashed.

Truth is every specialty pharma stock has crashed. All to some extent played similar games which are not illegal. You had consolidation on the payor side and they fought the price increases etc. teva myland etc etc.

Ackman does have some interesting morals. He had no problem investing in a company that hiked a drug price from dollars to 260k a year but thought Herbalife was the devil incarnate.

 

Or how do you have a criminal trial with all the evidence requirements when the argument is effectively “they should have known better”.

Like the branch manager could be arrested. The wire person who changed the OFAC names could be arrested, but at some point it’s just vengeance.

If I sell drugs at work do they arrest my boss? I mean it’s not like these bank leaders just focus on money laundering. Furthermore, while everyone is demonizing these banks, let’s not forget the real cause of all these deaths - US consumers and US government failed drug policy.

 

Neither one of those, although interesting, there have been several politicians who traded on inside info. More along the lines of lavish contracts in interesting countries for shady people for her time in the state dept and corresponding donation to the CC fund. Always concerning when you hear the net worth of (Republications and Democrats) politicians on a gov. salary.

26 Broadway where's your sense of humor?
 

Very true. I'm glad they sticked away from the politics. After watching that I think Trump should be worth $10B+, Trump did some shady deals with weird guys. I can see where the Russia stuff is coming from now though.

 

The Trump made me think about a lot of things, but one thing I related it to was Malcolm Gladwell's book "Outliers". In the book he talks about how Steve Jobs and Bill Gates were able to take advantage of the computer race because they had access to computers at early ages and developed a mastery in them before they became such a commercial business.

Trump was effectively developing a mastery in self-promotion, and was able to take advantage of it during the infancy of self-promotion.

 
trustmeimanengineer:
I was pretty disgusted with the one about Tucker/Pay Day loans. It's a sleazy business, but I came away with the impression they made an example out of him, not that his business was illegal

I felt the same way about his specific case. Even if the whole "SWAT team breach" story was an exaggeration, I really got the feeling he was being made an example of rather than getting to some real justice.

It really contrasts with the way the HSBC-Cartel Banking relationship was handled.

Not "too big to fail"..well, we're coming after your everything you got then

 
Best Response
trustmeimanengineer:
The Valeant episode was fantastic. Honestly learned a lot.

I was pretty disgusted with the one about Tucker/Pay Day loans. It's a sleazy business, but I came away with the impression they made an example out of him, not that his business was illegal... I am from Oklahoma, and I can tell you that this is not the only thing running through the tribes there.

Maybe I like corporate America too much to see why they came after him. His whole business preyed on the stupidity of the population. They signed contracts without reading them. Would I be in this business? No, but I don't think he should have been crucified like that.

I agree with some of your points: From the episode, it's clear the contracts people signed laid out the exorbitant effective interest rates, fee schedules etc. I can't feel bad for these truckers, single moms etc that take out loans but can't afford them.

The shady/sleazy part is the way this business was effectively "hiding" through so many shell corporations, through Indian tribes, etc. Dodging regulations is sketch and should be punished.

 

I agree with this as well.

I think both sides are to blame. Tucker should definitely not have been charging the high rates, he knew what he was doing, and he knew the more lending he does to people who can't handle their own finances, the more money he will make. It's similar to credit cards, they need the undisciplined people to keep the money coming in. Duping the clients and the government about where he was operating was also a poor choice.

However, though those are all bad, he never forced anyone into signing the document, and it's not his problem to educate someone about how rates, payback works, or how to correctly their statement. The initial document was definitely sleazy written, but the people did sign it.

Which leads to my other point; I understand there are definitely, DEFINITELY, people who can't make ends meet and need these loans. However, I think this is a small percentage and most people just live beyond their means. The truck driver gentlemen they presented appeared to be smart, but I felt he made enough money to save in good times for the bad times (again I don't know that for a fact).

My point is, it's hard to point the finger; Tucker knew what he was doing; people need to be better with their finance and I think Tucker should have been punished, but he got the wrong shake of the stick.

 

Watched the episode on Trump, didn't tell me anything I didn't already know. Politics (and policy) aside, he represents some of the worst character traits a person can have. Impulsive, callous (the conversation surrounding the helicopter crash where he (allegedly) lied about almost being on the flight/ tries to blame the dead for his failure in atlantic city made me sick) , vengeful, arrogant, oblivious. Wrap all that up into a dad complex (he so much wants to be self-made like his father that he's convinced himself he wasn't born on home plate but instead hit a home run) and you have the Donald.

Also watched the HSBC episode, pathetic ending. HSBC should not be allowed to do business in legitimate countries and executives should've seen jail time. I can understand a mistake but apparently this was just one in a pattern of not giving a fk about money laundering.

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Before watching this (only saw the Valeant episode) I said I would give the person I watched it with $10k in cash if they mentioned “toxoplasmosis encephalitis” once during the part where they had Shkreli lol, wonder if that big lobbying group phRma helped finance it and made them scapegoat Shkreli more

Obviously they didn’t and got a lot of the stuff about the VRX short itself wrong (or just didn’t cover it)

Just seems like a show for ideologues who want to justify their agenda with false information and bad research, I’m scared to even watch the Drumpf episode they will say “he’s not a real billionaire xD” or “he’s so mean and bad xD” lol

 

I’ve watched 4 episodes- Valenat, Payday lending, HSBC, and Trump.

HSBC is the best and the Trump one is clearly the worst. It doesn’t even belong in this series imo. Half of the episode is about a failed casino in Atlantic City; the other half is pundits clutching their pearls about stuff Trump said/did in the media in the 90s and 00s. It was like watching a YouTube video of bad things Trump said as a media personality.

It’s mostly editorial and exaggeration- for instance, one of Trump’s former business associates claims he’s lying about being offered a seat in a helicopter that crashed. The guy doesn’t offer any evidence of why this might be a lie, he just says it is, so this felt really out of place compared to the rest of the show’s episodes which typically sourced claims with evidence.

They also don’t really provide evidence of any criminal activity, unlike the rest of the episodes, and just try to tie Trump to being “shady”. Are we supposed to be shocked that a real estate developer took a lot of risk and burned bond holders? Come on.

HSBC is very good on the other hand as it sources claims and has interviews from US attorneys and provides documentation from court cases, depositions, etc.

 

1.) Of course they included the one on Trump, it'll be the most watched of the series. 2.) Pundits like who? There wasn't a single person that I would consider a pundit that was interviewed. 3.) Trump University was some pretty illegal shit. They defrauded people. 4.) Why would his former business associate lie? How could he possibly provide evidence? From what you know of Trump, are his business associate's allegations not very plausible?

Telling the story of Trump the huckster is important, America believes he is Stephen Ross when he's closer to Don King. I think you're letting your bias show here (and I might be too).

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