Posted by MikeT23 on 9/3/2015 10:24:00 AM (view original):
Maybe he just knows how to work the law.

In 1991, Trump's Taj Mahal located in Atlantic City was in debt for billions of dollars. As a result, Trump's corporation filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The Bankruptcy court allowed Trump to reorganize his corporate debts and allowed the casino to keep operating. Trump did surrender half of his ownership interests in the Taj Mahal. He chose to sell his yacht and airplane to help make loan payments.

In 1992, Trump filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on his Trump Plaza Hotel in Atlantic City. At this time, Trump owed $550 million on the Trump Plaza Hotel. As part of the restructuring, Trump gave Citibank a 49% interest in the hotel. He was given a lenient repayment plan. Trump was able to stay on as CEO but he had to give up his salary.

Trump Hotels and Casino Resorts filed for bankruptcy in 2004. The corporation had $1.8 billion dollars of debt. Trump reduced his share in the company to 25% thereby surrendering his control of the corporation. The corporation received lower interest rates and another loan to upgrade the properties.

In 2009, Trump Entertainment Resorts filed bankruptcy after missing a large bond interest payment. Trump was not able to agree with his board of directors on a repayment plan so he resigned as chairman of the board and retained only a 10% ownership interest in the corporation.

The thing about investing is that no one has a crystal ball. There will inevitably be poor investments. Let's be realistic - Have you ever met anyone that had gains on every single stock they invested in? I haven't. Trump lost on those deals, he cut bait, and is back out there investing in other places rather than dwelling on the 4 bankrupcies he had out of 100s of real estate investments. Notice the time frames of the bancruptcies as well. Early 90s Recession. Early 2000s Recession. 2008/9 Worst Recession since the Great Depression.

Another successful investor who has made bad investments --- Warren Buffett took a bath on Dexter Shoes, ConocoPhillips, US Air, and Energy Future Holdings ($2 billion investment recently entered bankruptcy).

Posted by moy23 on 9/3/2015 10:19:00 AM (view original):

Posted by bad_luck on 9/3/2015 9:25:00 AM (view original):
Donald Trump isn't rich because he's a great investor. He's rich because his dad was rich.

http://www.vox.com/2015/9/2/9248963/donald-trump-index-fund

But if you compare Trump's performance since 1982, when the stock market started to take off after the early-'80s recession, it looks pretty abysmal. Forbes estimated that Trump was worth $200 million that year. If he'd put that money in an index fund that year at a 0.15 percent fee, he'd have $6.3 billion today after dividend taxes, almost certainly more than he actually does. This jibes with analyzes prior to Date's which have found that Trump has underperformed compared with the market since 1988; an AP analysis found that if he'd put his money in an index fund that year, he'd have $13 billion today; the S&P calculator similarly suggested he'd have $11.3 billion, after fees and dividend taxes.

But the exact numbers aren't the point. The point is that after decades of touting his business acumen, his ability to negotiate tough deals and spot good investments, and after spending this entire campaign season arguing that he's qualified for the presidency based on his skills in the market, Trump nonetheless has an investment record that at best roughly matches and at worst underperforms the market. He did only as well or possibly worse than a retiree with a Vanguard 401(k) did.

that might be the dumbest article I have ever read. NOBODY puts ALL their money in one index fund to track the market. The goal of long term investing is to grab respectable gains while MINIMIZING downside risk. The article might as well suggest he put all his money in Apple stock in 1987 - then he woulda coulda shoulda been worth $14.8 billion today. Trump is a successful investor - bottom line. There are some 1600 billionaires in the ENTIRE WORLD which says a lot about how difficult it is to get into that 'club'. A quick look online shows how quickly one can fall out of the 'club' with poor investing -- http://www.therichest.com/rich-list/world/10-former-billionaires-who-lost-their-riches/?view=all

The point of the article is that Trump is rich today because his daddy was rich. Not because he's an awesome businessman. He's actually a not-great businessman.

That's not really impressive. Worse, it suggests that his success is almost entirely the result of having inherited money from his father. His own actions might have even cost him money.

 

Don't be like Trump. Put your money in low-fee index funds from a company like Vanguard or State Street Capital; Vox's Tim Lee has a good explainer of how to do this. Other presidential candidates are smart enough to take this approach. Hillary Clinton's savings are primarily in index funds, including Vanguard's S&P 500 fund.

As really rich” as Don­ald Trump is today, he might have been even rich­er if, in­stead of dab­bling in sky­scrapers and casi­nos, he’d simply taken his eight-fig­ure in­her­it­ance dec­ades ago and sunk it in­to the stock mar­ket.

...

While many Trump sup­port­ers be­lieve he is a self-made man, it was ac­tu­ally his fath­er, Fred Trump, who built the real-es­tate em­pire that Don­ald Trump took over in 1974. It was worth about $200 mil­lion at the time, which Trump and his four sib­lings ul­ti­mately in­her­ited after en­joy­ing siz­able trust funds for years.

(Co­in­cid­ent­ally, there was a self-made busi­ness­man who was also worth about $40 mil­lion in 1974: War­ren Buf­fett. Had Trump al­lowed Buf­fett to man­age his for­tune, too, Trump might also be worth what Buf­fett is today: about $67 bil­lion—or about 22 times bet­ter than what the stock mar­ket would have pro­duced.)

Posted by bad_luck on 9/3/2015 11:49:00 AM (view original):

Posted by moy23 on 9/3/2015 10:19:00 AM (view original):

Posted by bad_luck on 9/3/2015 9:25:00 AM (view original):
Donald Trump isn't rich because he's a great investor. He's rich because his dad was rich.

http://www.vox.com/2015/9/2/9248963/donald-trump-index-fund

But if you compare Trump's performance since 1982, when the stock market started to take off after the early-'80s recession, it looks pretty abysmal. Forbes estimated that Trump was worth $200 million that year. If he'd put that money in an index fund that year at a 0.15 percent fee, he'd have $6.3 billion today after dividend taxes, almost certainly more than he actually does. This jibes with analyzes prior to Date's which have found that Trump has underperformed compared with the market since 1988; an AP analysis found that if he'd put his money in an index fund that year, he'd have $13 billion today; the S&P calculator similarly suggested he'd have $11.3 billion, after fees and dividend taxes.

But the exact numbers aren't the point. The point is that after decades of touting his business acumen, his ability to negotiate tough deals and spot good investments, and after spending this entire campaign season arguing that he's qualified for the presidency based on his skills in the market, Trump nonetheless has an investment record that at best roughly matches and at worst underperforms the market. He did only as well or possibly worse than a retiree with a Vanguard 401(k) did.

that might be the dumbest article I have ever read. NOBODY puts ALL their money in one index fund to track the market. The goal of long term investing is to grab respectable gains while MINIMIZING downside risk. The article might as well suggest he put all his money in Apple stock in 1987 - then he woulda coulda shoulda been worth $14.8 billion today. Trump is a successful investor - bottom line. There are some 1600 billionaires in the ENTIRE WORLD which says a lot about how difficult it is to get into that 'club'. A quick look online shows how quickly one can fall out of the 'club' with poor investing -- http://www.therichest.com/rich-list/world/10-former-billionaires-who-lost-their-riches/?view=all

The point of the article is that Trump is rich today because his daddy was rich. Not because he's an awesome businessman. He's actually a not-great businessman.

Newsflash: Only 1/3rd of the 1600 billionaires - so a little over 500 people in the WORLD - have become a billionaire because of daddy's inheritance which means 2/3rds of them are self-made. Almost seems easier to be a self made billionaire like Zuckerberg than to do it on on daddy's dime, No? Truly though - to say Trump is not a great businessman is asinine. He's one of the world's premier businessmen. You sound stupid when you say things like that.

Posted by bad_luck on 9/3/2015 11:52:00 AM (view original):

http://www.vox.com/2015/9/2/9248963/donald-trump-index-fund

That's not really impressive. Worse, it suggests that his success is almost entirely the result of having inherited money from his father. His own actions might have even cost him money.

 

Don't be like Trump. Put your money in low-fee index funds from a company like Vanguard or State Street Capital; Vox's Tim Lee has a good explainer of how to do this. Other presidential candidates are smart enough to take this approach. Hillary Clinton's savings are primarily in index funds, including Vanguard's S&P 500 fund.

You are suggesting Trump did not grow his family inheritance fast enough.... But I bet you don't know that 70% of family inheritance money is lost by the second generation, 90% by the 3rd Generation - Yet Trump has grown his inheritance to over $4 billion? Most people can't even grow their inheritance $1, nevermind over $3.8 billion.

I'm suggesting that a blind squirrel with zero social awareness and a bad toupee could start where Trump started and end up as well off as he is.

Posted by bad_luck on 9/3/2015 12:27:00 PM (view original):
I'm suggesting that a blind squirrel with zero social awareness and a bad toupee could start where Trump started and end up as well off as he is.

yet the FACTS will tell you that 70% of people that receive inheritances could not... and 70% of lottery winners end up broke. Within 5 years, 44% of lottery winners have spent all their winnings.

There's a pretty big difference between how a lottery winner behaves and how someone who grew up rich, with a successful family business behaves once they get the money.

Sure, maybe the blind squirrel would have lost Trump's daddy's money, but I'm thinking it's unlikely since the blind squirrel wouldn't have been able to spend it. He would have had to just stick it into an account and let it sit. If he had chosen a low cost index fund, he'd be richer than Trump.

You are pretty much making the argument that because Magic Johnson or Larry Bird didn't have a career like Michael Jordan did they are 'not-great' basketball players.

Buffett is a rock star. So are many other businessmen. Trump has also been super successful throughout his career. Just because he didn't grow his wealth as fast as Mark Zuckerberg or Larry Page or Warren Buffett does not make him a 'not-great' businessman.

Trump is a smart man who employs smart people.    If BL is arguing that it was either luck or daddy's money, he's a dumbass.

Oh, wait, we determined that BL is a dumbass long ago.    It's best to ignore him.

Posted by moy23 on 9/3/2015 12:47:00 PM (view original):
You are pretty much making the argument that because Magic Johnson or Larry Bird didn't have a career like Michael Jordan did they are 'not-great' basketball players.

Buffett is a rock star. So are many other businessmen. Trump has also been super successful throughout his career. Just because he didn't grow his wealth as fast as Mark Zuckerberg or Larry Page or Warren Buffett does not make him a 'not-great' businessman.

I'm not saying Trump sucks because he didn't keep up with Buffett. I'm saying that Trump is not successful just because he has a lot of money. Anyone that took his inheritance and stuck it into an index fund would have more.


“All of the sudden, I’m 22 years young, and I’m worth $1.2 billion. Now a couple decades later… I’m worth $1.4. You do the math.”

Posted by bad_luck on 9/3/2015 1:00:00 PM (view original):

Posted by moy23 on 9/3/2015 12:47:00 PM (view original):
You are pretty much making the argument that because Magic Johnson or Larry Bird didn't have a career like Michael Jordan did they are 'not-great' basketball players.

Buffett is a rock star. So are many other businessmen. Trump has also been super successful throughout his career. Just because he didn't grow his wealth as fast as Mark Zuckerberg or Larry Page or Warren Buffett does not make him a 'not-great' businessman.

I'm not saying Trump sucks because he didn't keep up with Buffett. I'm saying that Trump is not successful just because he has a lot of money. Anyone that took his inheritance and stuck it into an index fund would have more.


“All of the sudden, I’m 22 years young, and I’m worth $1.2 billion. Now a couple decades later… I’m worth $1.4. You do the math.”

Anyone who took his money and stuck it in apple stock would have more as well. You are playing the 'hindsight is 20/20' game. Let's say the market crashes.... Or better yet real scenario.... On April 14th, 2000 he invested all his wealth on an index tracking the Nikkei Stock Market... 15 years later on September 3rd, 2015 he'd have LOST 12% of his wealth. The stock market is not a guarantee that's why smart people don't put all their eggs in one basket. Trump has created an income stream of $400,000,000 annually plus his wealth will grow in other investments. That's a SMART play which has paid off nicely for him.

You know the difference between an indexed mutual fund and a single stock right?