About an hour ago, I finished my business and finance exam. In this course, the main takeaway was how much to value a firm, profitability of taking on a project, and learning about prices of the firm on the stock market (through EPS, book value, etc.). While taking the exam, a thought occurred to me.

Why exactly am I studying this?

To be exact, why exactly am I studying how to value a firm, and how the valuation of a firm affects it's stock market price and dividends, when the top 0.1% can simply manipulate the value of a firm's stock?

What would be the point of saying that a medical firm on the verge of releasing some cure for cancer and showing great financial accounts is doing extremely well, just for HFs to come and short the shit out of its stock into bankruptcy?

What would be the point of working for a company that is small but having great results but on the other hand, a HF putting artificial buying pressure on a much bigger company with not so great results?

For the rest of my life, I can guarantee the answer to every question I have will be somewhere along the lines of power and greed.

What I have learned in my bachelors degree so far is that without manipulation, things that are happening right now, should be happening differently. And it is sad to see that the majority of my classmates are unaware of this. Studying this degree only seems to actually prove useful in a non-existent society where the ultra wealthy do not take advantage of the systems made for society. This is why we need a market reset. To bring everyone as close to the same level as possible. And to finally make the world aware of how much fuckery has been going on since the start of time.

Thanks for coming to my TED talk.

Are you all aware of any colleges which offer computer science + business or economics or finance undergraduate courses. Like the business + computer science course in Stern or CS + X in UIUC.

For those that don't know me I run Australia's largest crypto channel. I've been advocated for crypto adoption in Australia since 2012. Today I woke up on Xmas to a strike warning from Youtube for harmful or dangerous content. Checked my email, nothing. A few hours later after Xmas lunch, another strike. I hadn't even done anything on Youtube since the first strike. Still no email. I cover a lot of topics related to finance, economics, housing market, stocks as well as crypto related content. We don't do paid ICO or token promotion. I have done tutorials on leverage trading platforms. I'm really not sure what to do. If the trend continues most crypto youtubers will be affected. I get there's plenty of bad guys out there, but there's plenty of good ones who have been big advocates for Bitcoin & crypto for years. Wish us luck...
Edit: Yes I already post to & support decentralised platforms but the fact is users aren't there yet.

I have examined how finance capital has transformed into a type of socialism for the rich. The feedback I received from the post was valuable, and I have taken it into consideration for this post.

In this post, I will attempt to present a summary of my research on the economics of finance capital, specifically since many of you have commented and tried to refute the following sentence:

The mode of accumulation of finance capital is parasitic on the productive economy.

I am NOT claiming there is no use to finance at all - finance, accounting and recycling of savings is a necessary function. I am not ontologising finance. My point is to show how privatized finance capital interferes and suffocates the ability of the economy to grow. If finance is treated as a public utility to benefit all, none of the below will apply:

I. PRODUCTION AND WEALTH AS ABUNDANCE

Production of commodities

Wealth and abundance go hand in hand - wealthy society is one with a great abundance of commodities - stuff, products, gadgets, things. The production of things is the production of abundance and thus, wealth. Money is a claim on some portion of this wealth, a claim for some fraction of this stock of products.

Services

A service doesn't directly produce wealth. Services may be in demand because they augment the production process, or because they are in demand by the producers of commodities. For example, accounting doesn't directly produce bread at a bakery, but it is key in being able to organise the production of bread. Likewise, a massage does not increase material abundance, but people may be willing to exchange their claim on stuff for a massage. The production of an abundance of wealth therefore is complemented with the ability of society to put aside surplus resources to enjoy massages, poems, shows etc.

II DEBT, BURDEN AND DRAG

One man's spending is another man's income.

We can also say that consumer spending corresponds to sales revenue on a balance sheet, an asset with a corresponding liability.

Likewise, debt has a corresponding asset - debt service. Debtors debt liability is a creditor’s asset.

Debt service is thus a form of savings/revenue for the creditors, the more the debtors are in debt, the more corresponding assets creditors have. Debt service usually involves the charging of interest, or usury. Interest rate compounds (compound interest), which is an exponential function, with compound interest over 30 years of servicing debt you may end up paying the bank 2 or 3 times the amount borrowed.

Since finance and debt do not directly produce any commodities, they refer to claims on the surpluses of the production of commodities.

Here we come across the first contradiction - claims on production by finance grow by the exponential function, but production does not expand by the same mathematical laws. This means growing debt obligations function as a drag and an overhead on the productive economy, a growing cost producers must bear. This growing cost burden on producers halts real growth and can trigger defaults and bankruptcies, in which banks seize the collateral, foreclose on the property and seize the assets directly, dispossessing industry and production. But in so doing, banks undermine asset prices and the stability of production, and thus their own assets.

III FINANCIAL CANNIBALISM OF INDUSTRY

An even more direct and antagonistic contradiction between finance and industry is as follows. In an idealized world and economic models and textbooks, banks, investors and holders of capital would lend this capital or purchase equity in a company to expand its production and to recover their spent capital via profit revenues and dividend/ equity.

However, what we have seen rise since about the 1970 is a phenomenon called . A corporate raider is an investor who seeks to (or threatens) to purchase a large share of equity in a firm and use that equity for purposes that don’t benefit the business.

A corporate raider frequently uses the newly acquired equity to force the company to push up dividend payouts by taking on debt or selling off assets. This is called , and the sale of assets generates short term revenue the firm can use to push up dividends and buy back its own stock, increasing its price. This operation recovers the raiders investment, and he can either then sell his equity at a new high and pocket the difference, or wait for the dividend stream to dry up and move onto the next company. The raider can also push for reduction of staff and burning up of company reserves and inventories. All of these have very negative impacts on the long-term sustainability of the business, but the plan is not to generate money through sustainable production but to earn more money by cannibalizing the firm. This is moreless what Sam Zell did to the

In an article we see the following:

The allocation of corporate profits to stock buybacks deserves much of the blame. Consider the 449 companies in the S&P 500 index that were publicly listed from 2003 through 2012. During that period those companies used 54% of their earnings—a total of $2.4 trillion—to buy back their own stock, almost all through purchases on the open market. Dividends absorbed an additional 37% of their earnings. That left very little for investments in productive capabilities or higher incomes for employees.

According to GMO, the asset manager, profits and overall net investment in the US tracked each other closely until the late 1980s, with both about 9 per cent of gross domestic product. Then the relationship began to break down. After the recession, from 2009, it went haywire. Pre-tax corporate profits are now at record highs – more than 12 per cent of GDP – while net investment is barely 4 per cent of output. The pattern is similar, although less stark, when looking at corporate investment specifically.

These changes in the investment structure in the economy follow a sort of revolution in the corporate world, with debt leveraged buy out and short term investment as outlined above. Publicly traded companies fall prey to corporate raiders or recently to which often leverage their shares to push short sighted policy that leaves the company insolvent or uncompetitive.

The idea behind debt leveraging is to borrow money at a low rate to buy shares that pay a higher return or dividend to replace debt with equity. For example, borrowing at 3% to buy shares which pay out 8%. This drives up debt/equity ratios and is why stock buybacks have soared in recent decades

Both Apple and IBM may be used as good examples here, from Killing the Host (ch8):

In August 2013, Apple was the highest-valued company in the US with about $170b in sales and with some $137 billion mound of cash. It was here that shareholder activist Carl Icahn bought over $1.5 billion of Apple shares and exerted pressure on Apple to take on debt to push the stock price up. Icahn demanded apple spend $150b in buying back its own shares, and Apple promised to buy back some $40b of its own shares in a year and pay out $100b in dividends. This excessive dividend payout and stock manipulation diverted huge amount of money reserves and burdened Apple with debt that was unnecessary for the production or research of new technologies and products.

IBM is an even starker example of this financial takeover of the company.

The company’s revenue hasn’t grown in years. Indeed, IBM’s revenue is about the same as it was in 2008. But all along, IBM has been buying up its own shares as if they were a hot item. Since 2000, IBM spent some $108 billion on its own shares, according to its most recent annual report. It also paid out $30 billion in dividends. To help finance this share-buying spree, IBM loaded up on debt. While the company spent $138 billion on its shares and dividend payments, it spent just $59 billion on its own business through capital expenditures and $32 billion on acquisitions

IBM has long ceased to expand its business and is just being consumed by shareholders. The aim is to squeeze out of IBM more than was initially put in, recover the investment and move onto another company, leaving IBM debt ridden and insolvent.

All this is to say, the financialisation of industry has led to the consumption of the assets needed by the company to expand and innovate, shareholders are put above growth which has very negative impacts on the company’s ability to be sustainable. Here as well, outsourcing has been a good way from a company to cut costs to spend even more money on stock buybacks and dividends, two prongs by which de-industrialsiation has progressed.

Jack Welch has pushed stock value from $14b to $400b . It is not trade unions but financial predators that have de-industrialised America and Britain

IV FINANCIAL TAKEOVER OF THE STATE

From this, it follows that the policy of the government and central banks to bail out banks and push up asset prices during times of recession largely helps financial predators preserve their wealth and asset values. Economic theory says investment is driven by profitable opportunities on one side and the cost of capital on the other. High profits suggest there are decent opportunities to make money; historic lows in interest rates and highs in the stock market mean that capital is dirt cheap. Low interest rates lower the cost of borrowing, and hence supposedly the cost of new investment. Yet the type of investment that results is not one that is conducive to growth and production but to speculation and deindustrialization. This is not surprising. Low interest rates provide easier credit for raiders to attack companies, or simply for mergers and acquisitions and debt/equity leveraging. Once we understand how money is made today and how since the 1980s wealth creation is defined, we can see and explain how and why it is that the stimulus has not seemed to trickle down at all.

From the book Killing the host:

National policy in today’s world is planned mainly by financial loyalists to serve financial interests. Central bank and U.S. Treasury officials are on loan from Wall Street, above all from Goldman and Citigroup. Goldman Sachs’s roster of CEOs in public service is hallmarked by Treasury Secretaries Robert Rubin (1995-99, at Goldman 1966-92) and Hank Paulson (2006-09, at Goldman from 1974 to 2006). At Treasury, Paulson was aided by Chief of Staff Mark Patterson (Goldman lobbyist 2003-08), Neel Kashkari (Goldman Vice President 2002-06), Under-Secretary Robert K. Steel (Vice Chairman at Goldman, where he worked from 1976 to 2004), and advisors Kendrick Wilson (at Goldman from 1998-2008) and Edward C. Forst (former Global Head of Goldman’s Investment Management Division). Goldman Sachs kept Paulson’s successor Tim Geithner, a protégé of Robert Rubin, close by with the usual reward tactic of paying lucrative speaking fees. Federal Reserve Bank of New York Chairman Stephen Friedman (2008-09) was former Co-Chairman at Goldman Sachs, where he had worked since 1966. Its president after 2009 was William Dudley (at Goldman from 1986 until 2007). Former New York Fed President Gerald Corrigan (1985-93) “descended from heaven” to work at Goldman Sachs, as did former Treasury Secretary Henry Fowler. Other Goldman Sachs alumni implanted in high positions include White House chief of staff Joshua B. Bolten and World

Despite criticism of these trends a generation ago, corporate raiders gained enough political power to block regulation and tax penalties for their debt leveraging. It took until March 2013, thirty years after the trend gained momentum, for the Federal Reserve and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) to announce guidelines for leveraged buyouts, advising banks to “avoid financing takeover deals that would put debt on a company of more than six times its earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, or Ebitda.” Their suggestion did not prove effective. “So far in 2014, 30% of new U.S. leveraged buyouts have been financed at a debt-to-Ebitda ratio of more than six times ... The most recent peak was in 2007, when the percentage reached 52%.”

Moreover, rising imputed rents and financial penalties on credit cards are considered part of the domestic product or GDP, so GDP growth often times works as smoke and mirrors hiding what is really happening - the looting of businesses, soaring debt and financial penalties on consumers and rising cost of business. This is why the recovery since 2008 has been so "sluggish"

V CONCLUSIONS AND SUMMARY

Finance nominally serves and important role in allocating credit, in accounting and in investment, and for better or for worse, we are stuck with it. However, when analysed as a separate interest group, finance capital behaves and acts in a predatory manner on the productive economy. The high symbiosis between high finance and government has allowed financial experts and lobbyists to effectively hijack the state to pursue their short-term financial gains, beginning roughly in the late 1970s and 1980s.

This corresponds to one of the biggest scams in economic history, the rise of the neoliberal school of economics, of Reaganite and Thatcherite economics which dissolved classical definition of wealth and value into something utterly substanceless and baseless to legitimise this parasitic mode of extraction. This anti-intellectuallism and drivel, which when taken to its logical conclusion would tell you wealth is how you feel and being rich or poor is subjective and indeterminate. Spending money on drugs and alcohol doesn't impoverish you because you have a corresponding "service" or "satisfaction", and this is somehow lauded as the most fundamental truth upon which all else needs to be built. Needless to say, you can't build on sand, let alone air, and this is why nothing concrete can be built from neoliberal subjectivist "economics"

Rising debt burdens, falling ratios of productivity:wages, rising ratio of home prices:income all follow from the same root cause: financial capital's quest to find and expand its assets. Each asset has a corresponding liability, a dollar spent is also a dollar saved, debtors burden is creditors asset. This circular flow is the basics of economics. As the production of real wealth is slowed down and burdened with debt and with predatory shareholders, the surpluses of production are siphoned off from the producers to the financial giants under the guise of quid-pro quo goods for services. Yet as I and the classical economists would argue, interest charges, rents and monopoly charges are not creating wealth but merely redistributing/taking from the already created wealth. Futurists of the early 20th century would be shocked that despite all this productivity people still have to take on two jobs to pay bills. As the economies seem to be squeezed for revenues and forced into austerity, productivity seems to be lost somewhere. Everyone except the fortunate few seem to be short of money ans spare funds - governments, firms, individuals. The numbers and statistics do not seem to reflect the reality millions are living in every day, its as if the numbers are forged or there's an embezzlement taking place

But it doesn't have to be this way. When we take finance and credit to be a public utility to be used to benefit the public, we can once again use credit to fund production and not corporate takeovers. When private debts soar the debts don't have to be collected and properties foreclosed and collateral seized. The debtor's burden can be a public asset, not a private asset.

Any help is appreciated!

I'm wanting to go back to school and would like to start at a local community college to knock out gen eds. I have a few completed from schooling back around 2009-2011, so not starting completely from scratch assuming those credits will transfer.

I'll be pursuing a degree in Economics, but potentially double majoring with a Business or Finance related degree since my long-term goal is to become a CFP. I have a couple FINRA licenses currently (6 & 63).

I've compared cost as a WyCo resident: KC is $105/hr and JC is $116/hr. Aside from tuition cost, what is everyones experience at either of these local community colleges? I've heard positives on both from some people I know but would love to know more from others as well! I'd like to hear about both online and on campus experiences since I'm not certain yet if I'll need to be mostly online or if I'll have flexibility for being on campus.

TIA for anything shared!!

TLDR: Feedback on both JCCC and KCKCC, virtual and/or on campus experiences for someone with a couple gen eds done and transitioning to a four-year for econ/business/finance degree.

I'm not sure if this is an appropriate place to ask, but i've applied to university recently for Business Administration and have heard nothing but bad things about the employability of the degree. A Business Administration program is generally harder to get into so I assumed it world be more scarce and henceforth more valuable. But from posts I've read around the internet most people argue that Finance and Economics degrees are more valuable, due to their specialization. From your experience which major is the most employable?

CFA, CPA, and CHRP are all available in Business Admin programs which could bring some specialization to the table, but I assume those are available to Finance and Economics majors as well.

Thanks for the help!

So after 2+ years of doing DD and contributing to others' DD, I've learned a few things. The three that are the most staggering are

1. You don't own your shares - everything in your brokers account is an IOU.

2. Your buying pressure is likely being suppressed due to dark pools

3. Hedge funds can and will short stocks down with their total capital to take money from retail investors and companies that are viable and can do good if left alone.

I had dinner with an old business prof a little while back. Now, you have to understand this person has always been a trusted source for business and finance information. Our conversation led us down a market structure conversation, and the 3 points above about blew his top as he doesn't short or play options anymore.

His response was this, "Do you know what would happen to the markets if every retail investor knew this?" To which i replied Yes.... it would be a fucking nightmare for the markets, people would look elsewhere to fund their retirement. He said they would stop investing in the markets, invest everything in real estate/land and that would be that.

Leaving a potential finance industry and banks in the lurch, this would also remove the ability for central banks to draw on your registered funds, removing spendable money from the treasuries.

Well damn that would be bad.

This prof also asked very clearly as anyone who has critical thinking skills would do... "How do i get my real shares like when i had my old certificates sent to me?"

I laughed and said, "Find the transfer agent, tell your broker you want your shares to be directly registered with the transfer agent. I also confirmed it must be in BOOK.

He's going to follow the bread crumbs and confirm for himself. "If this happens to be the case, he will begin adding this into curriculum".

Now, wouldn't that be a way to spread knowledge. He also asked that I come and speak to his classes.

Edit1 - small grammatical errors. Edit2 - Prof. is personal finance

At my Canadian school I have options of Honours Economics, Economics, and Finance as majors. Finance is not an included minor but I could major in Finance and minor in economics.

Does it really matter what what major I have if I want to get into banking? How much does one limit me?

Disclaimer - I haven't lived in India since I was 17, so I cannot answer questions in an Indian context. I'm not an expert in either of these fields but probably have above average knowledge in these. If you have questions, take my answers with a pinch of salt. I could very well be wrong

Other tips

I cannot predict which stock will go up or down. Invest in yourself more than you invest in stocks. If you think you are going to Warren Buffett yourself to riches, you are mistaken.

You are your biggest asset. I don't mean this in an inspirational way. But what you earn (salary) over your lifetime will be more valuable than your house/car. Take care/protect of yourself healthwise/insurance wise over your assets.

Maximise your earning potential. Because up to a limit, a lack of money will cause unhappiness.

Unpopular opinion

I am a neoliberal on economics and hence don't think government should play any part in industry. Govt should play a role only in education, healthcare and infrastructure on the economy side. Complete free trade with all countries (doesn't need any reciprocity) will increase the country's GDP massively. Regulations need to reduce. India has a lot of regulatory burdens - it has a first world country style list of regulations but the government isn't strong enough to enforce this.

Misconceptions

A popular one for me which I see repeated every day. GDP is not the same as asset value. I see lazy journalists equating Value of company to the GDP of Country. For e.g. Apple's market value is the same as Poland's GDP. Market value is like an asset value while GDP is more like an annual salary. It's apples and oranges. For a better comparison, profit should be equated to GDP.