So, finished David Einhorn’s book over vacation. Pissed me off…
Let’s just put aside the whole “short seller” argument. Like I have said before, I do not care how folks make money, short, long, whatever. Short sellers, when wrong, get creamed and can make longs tons of cash in a very sort time when the shorts cover en mass.
Now, Einhorn was right about Allied. What pissed me of was the “regulators”. Far from being asleep at the wheel, it is their abject ambivalence at the Allied situation that ought to infuriate people. They just did not care. Both the SEC, SBA and Congress (surprise!!) are to blame here. Einhorn painstakingly details his efforts to bring the Allied fraud to regulators who just did not care…..
Now we are talking about further regulating capital markets? Why bother? We do not even enforce the regulations we have now!! Why add more regulations that can be ignored by the very folks who are supposed to enforce them? Why?
Do not feel bad for David though, the publicity he has gotten has vaulted him to “famed” status and now his picks and thoughts are sought after. Shorting a stock successfully just became far easier for him now that millions believe in him. Now, this is warranted given his 20% plus annual returns at Greenlight, it is just that a whole lot more folks are listening to him now.
Too bad Lehman’s (LEH) Erin Callahan was not one of them…
Read Einhorn’s book. It is an eye opening and sobering experience.
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