Hah, this reminded me that Dave Portnoy bought $500k of Rheinmetall stock about a month ago. He was copying the trade of a congresswoman who happens to be on the house subcommittee of military construction. Hard to imagine her trade wasn't related to this news
Rheinmetall's stock value looks like it's down 6% in the last month, I doubt this news will do much to it. Her trade was probably related to Rheinmetall being one of the world's biggest weapons manufacturers and well positioned when Germany and other European countries are putting a lot of money into their military spending.
Rheinmetall's stock's development during the last five years closely matches that of Saab, another big European weapons manufacturer. You don't have to be a political insider to guess that the stock will increase in value.
>You don't have to be a political insider to guess that the stock will increase in value.
having non public information about a company that is also doing well publically is still an effective trading strategy. the value of a company like Rheinmetall is the sum of it's sources of profit.
Of course, but that buy isn't necessarily an indication that she had insider knowledge about this deal. These kind of deals happens all the time, and this particular one hasn't moved the stock value enough to make insider trading worth it or even to make the accusation.
That stock is slightly down over last month even with this press release 5 days ago, so the larger investment community seems less than sold on this news...
One wonders if people on that committe would naturally be more inclined to trade in the defense industry; like how people on HN seem to have a lot of SV tech investments.
People tend to overestimate the profitability of defense contractors. Operating in a heavily boom-bust market, with high capital expenditures and high operating costs (the entire supply chain and final manufacturing is done almost exclusively in high cost-of-living western countries), and dealing with massive quantities of politics and regulation eats away at those margins.
And Rheinmetall is in Europe, not America, where all of these things are 100x more true.
I think this post is more focused on nuclear defense in space. Which also changes the whole mutually assured destruction dynamic. Until 2002 we were in a treaty that limited anti-ballistic missile systems
Yes, SpaceX is said to be developing something more akin to Brilliant Pebbles, eventually using kinetic interceptors like https://castelion.com is developing. (team at company are all SpaceX starshield people). Intercepts ICBM in "boost phase" launching from enemy territory (vulnerable / no decoys possible). Mike Griffin is Castelion advisor (enough said) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career
No, they were a competitor that pivoted away from government contracts to more commercial applications because there was too much red tape (palantir had some features that were interior according to our contacts but basically was already entrenched in the space by that point).
It has been a long while since I worked with them- the basic idea was that you could identify how people related to each other via their public posts, identify communities by topic, then identify how people influenced each other.
Some topics were harder to automate- if we took as an example b the keyword "abortion" you'll find multiple opposed groups. Searching for terrorists was somewhat similar- their public mouthpieces would use certain words, and their detractors would use the same words in opposition.
I won't go into too much further detail because while the company closed in 2022 I really respected the owners and I suspect they're going to find a way to bring the idea of the company back in a new form.
I can't take these EU leaders seriously when they clamor for increased Chinese imports while continuously adding new sanctions on items they won't sell to China
If wanting better conditions in the US is something Gen-Z wants, that does not make them anti-American. Criticism of our government and corporations is one of the most pro-American action one can be.
They want an America that is humane and cares for its citizens. Good for them. Anything less makes for a subhuman individual.
I get the impression it's less about constructive criticism and more about hating America by the scenes of young protestors in America burning the flag of the United States. Both the left and the right should be mindful of not becoming traitors giving comfort to enemies that would like to destroy our goverment and make America their colony.
This is supposed to get everyone's attention. Symbilolicly it represents the betrayal the protester feels from the government. Sadly, too many people are desensitized to this. I guess if the only thing that will get real attention is burning yourself in protest, then there will be fewer protesters and the government and corporations can continue doing whatever they want.
I guess my point is: it seems like a lot of people believe China is subtly manipulating public opinion via TikTok, but I think it's more likely that these feelings are just organic and they surface in TikTok because people agree with them.
Gen Z is the future of the US and I'm glad for it. The kids are alright. They want better conditions and a better future for themselves and others. This isn't anti-American at all.
I think ignorance like this is the true source of many problems in the US. Maybe its a side effect of our individualistic culture to not consider what another group might be going through?
>It'd be nice if Gen Z became less anti-American.
It'd be nice if Gen Z wouldn't have to graduate with a ton of college debt into a post pandemic job market that now treats their newly minted CS degrees as worth less per day
It'd be nice if Gen Z could have a viable pathway to live in an area with the remaining good jobs and be able to buy a home to start a family
>America deserved it in the Vietnam war. Now, not so much.
I came of age in the 70's with the fallout from the Mai Lai Massacre, oil embargoes, 16% inflation, high unemployment, New York City going bankrupt (Gerald Ford to NYC: Drop Dead). That's why I joined the military. It never occured to me to become anti-American. Other countries weren't doing so hot either. What does blaming "America" for my problems get me? "America" is not responisble for the pandemic or greedy colleges that prey on vulnerable high school students who want to get ahead. We need new laws to fix these problems, which means electing politicians who will fix these problems.
I don't recall a lot of violent protests against the war in Iraq after the initial protests. It seems young people lost interest. They certainly care very little for the vets that return broken.
Forgetting the 99 WTO protests? going into the 00s there were scores of cancellations and career ending events during the early years of the Iraq war. Remember Bill Maher, the dixie chicks etc.?
Also consider, it was more difficult to organize due to lack of ubiquitous broadband and tooling. Now with the democratization of information and tooling to organize protests (things like Slack, Discord, Google Docs sharing features all running on a super computer in everyones pocket) it has grown in scope.
Finally Gen Y and Gen Z took different paths. Gen Y graduated into the new great depression, got duped by Obama's Hope and Change, and then when they finally got back on track headed right into the post-pandemic economy. GenZ never had any illusions given what they saw their older siblings go through.
If India wanted to enforce the sanctions they would. I'm sorry but what America found out is they can't just enforce sanctions across the globe in the way they thought they could.
USA never thought, or even wanted to block the sale of Russian oil completely. That would raise global oil prices too much, which would be political suicide, and a problem for the world economy.
The only point of the sanctions is to make Russia sell their oil for less, to lower their profits. Yeah, India buys their oil, but Russia doesn’t have that many other buyers anymore, and it’s a lot less convenient for India to buy Russian oil, so India can really pressure Russia on the price of their oil.
I don't think it's that America can't enforce sanctions, it's that sanctions don't work against countries with valuable resources (because everyone else wants to buy them), or against many countries at once (because you've just created an alternative trading bloc), or against very populous countries (because companies will go far out of their way to be able to access large markets).
https://x.com/stoolpresidente/status/1795810560677749078
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