Consume
financial media with chopsticks. Spoon fulls deliver vast amounts of nonsense. Lloyd Blankfein may be gone, yet the sweaty smash-mouth profit-by-any- means culture blasts on like a lie train in broad daylight.
CNBC’s Joe Kernen might tell you such, if you have the time. Prefer efficiency? There’s Squawk Box leading host Becky Quick.
Unlike Kernen, Quick does not cheat off to one side, mug at the camera, dangle half-sentences, or pretend to ask questions while choking the air with chalk. But then, filling the air is the business. We are the target–oops, customer. Do you really care what ex-fed heads think about pro-am golf?
Felons are felons and advisors are felons. No? Bernard Madoff now lives in federal prison. Madoff changed U.S. history and so did Charles Ponzi–and the Glock 17. Goggle Bernard Madoff and look below the picture. It says “American investment advisor.”
Fun is fun and television is more fun when financial. True television is like “All natural OJ.” It contains a “legally allowed” percentage of added sugar. Goldman Sachs and every other financial crew operate like that. Ever read the ingredients list on a collateralized Debt Obligation?
That
chipper parade of money managers and financial advisors streaking you TV screen are plugging, nonstop. That’s what keeps them in business. Appearances on CNBC are free advertisements. Why else would any financial crew free their people from their cubes?
If you like efficient listen to Bob Pisani. We love CNBC, except when David Faber’s obsessing over media. The investing world’s a hall of mirrors tucked inside a maze. It takes financial journalists to explain financial news. If you like general stories, listen to generalists.
Truth in television does not include guests. Did you buy Citi, Morgan Stanley, or Wells Fargo, or Goldman? Are you satisfied? Investors must rely on something–including companies like Goldman. They tell us their company results. No legal dodge exists for that. It’s our job to chopstick the story from that data. Not so with “opinions.”
In the financial world you often don’t even get what you pay for. So where does that leave free televised drive-by advising?
Blankfein
is gone now yet much of that crew and culture remain. Lying is a skill position. Who sold wealth management vehicles to naive clients, while betting against the very same? “Well yes–but it’s just business.” Sicario’s say that too, just before pulling the trigger. How is that substantially different from a pump-and-dump? Ask Wells Fargo. They know all about that stuff.
Thanks for reading.
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