Dumb Money (2023 film)
Sep. 8th, 2024 08:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
schneefinkThree days of eight-hour-classes this weekend and it was not as exhausting as I feared, yay. In preparation for an exam in October that I found out I will have to take in February because I missed the sign-up deadline, oops.
For scheduling reasons this was the first of my classes that I could take in person instead of as a webinar and I much prefer that.
I finally watched Dumb Money on Friday. (It was also my first time going to the "cinema on the roof" above the main library and that was very nice, next year I need to check what other movies they are playing there.) It's about the GameStop short squeeze in 2021 and I was very curious about it. It would be a vast exaggeration to say that I "was there," but I did check the subreddit regularly when things got heated back then.
I enjoyed it, and I'm glad I watched it. So much about Wall Street sucks and it is full of assholes, no surprise, but that makes it nice to watch when they get a bloody nose, at least.
I didn't find it entirely satisfying but I think a lot of that were too high hopes and me overthinking.
There was quite a bit of focus on the class warfare part of it that fueled many of the small investors and they did a good job showing the unfairness on the stock market and the different positions of various actors. I wish there'd been a bit more focus on the stock market itself and what the stock rising means: at the beginning one of the reasons Kitty says he believes in the stock is that he thinks the company itself is undervalued despite its recent losses and leadership problems, but then at some point the stock value skyrocketed. The brief glimpses we get of a GameStop store throughout always show it as the same not-doing-very-well business, at some point it seems impossible that the stock value hasn't far exceeded the actual "value" – except what is value even, when it comes to the stock market? The current state of GameStop as a company was notably missing during the "where are they now" segment at the end.
I also wish there'd been a bit more focus on Kitty as an influencer. We repeatedly see the other small investors say "if he´s holding, I'm holding," but we don't really see Keith realize, much less grapple with the fact that he has this huge influence over the financial situation of thousands if not millions of people.
I liked that it was often pointed out that having millions in stock means nothing but a fancy number on a screen if you're not selling and converting it into money, but I was then surprised when Keith bought his brother a fancy car at the end. Right after he doubled down on buying more instead of selling! And where did he get the money from to do that, come to think of it? At the very beginning it was pointed out that most of their savings were in stocks already, and he even lost his job. To be fair it's plausible that he earned quite a bit of money with videos/streaming/etc. as well but that was never mentioned.
Watching this reminded me of watching "Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room," the movie that played a big role in me staying interested in accounting many years ago. (That is one of those movies I'm not sure I want to rewatch because it might not be as good as I remember it being, but otoh it might be very motivating when I need to start studying IFRS.) I do like a good business ~documentary.
For scheduling reasons this was the first of my classes that I could take in person instead of as a webinar and I much prefer that.
I finally watched Dumb Money on Friday. (It was also my first time going to the "cinema on the roof" above the main library and that was very nice, next year I need to check what other movies they are playing there.) It's about the GameStop short squeeze in 2021 and I was very curious about it. It would be a vast exaggeration to say that I "was there," but I did check the subreddit regularly when things got heated back then.
I enjoyed it, and I'm glad I watched it. So much about Wall Street sucks and it is full of assholes, no surprise, but that makes it nice to watch when they get a bloody nose, at least.
I didn't find it entirely satisfying but I think a lot of that were too high hopes and me overthinking.
There was quite a bit of focus on the class warfare part of it that fueled many of the small investors and they did a good job showing the unfairness on the stock market and the different positions of various actors. I wish there'd been a bit more focus on the stock market itself and what the stock rising means: at the beginning one of the reasons Kitty says he believes in the stock is that he thinks the company itself is undervalued despite its recent losses and leadership problems, but then at some point the stock value skyrocketed. The brief glimpses we get of a GameStop store throughout always show it as the same not-doing-very-well business, at some point it seems impossible that the stock value hasn't far exceeded the actual "value" – except what is value even, when it comes to the stock market? The current state of GameStop as a company was notably missing during the "where are they now" segment at the end.
I also wish there'd been a bit more focus on Kitty as an influencer. We repeatedly see the other small investors say "if he´s holding, I'm holding," but we don't really see Keith realize, much less grapple with the fact that he has this huge influence over the financial situation of thousands if not millions of people.
I liked that it was often pointed out that having millions in stock means nothing but a fancy number on a screen if you're not selling and converting it into money, but I was then surprised when Keith bought his brother a fancy car at the end. Right after he doubled down on buying more instead of selling! And where did he get the money from to do that, come to think of it? At the very beginning it was pointed out that most of their savings were in stocks already, and he even lost his job. To be fair it's plausible that he earned quite a bit of money with videos/streaming/etc. as well but that was never mentioned.
Watching this reminded me of watching "Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room," the movie that played a big role in me staying interested in accounting many years ago. (That is one of those movies I'm not sure I want to rewatch because it might not be as good as I remember it being, but otoh it might be very motivating when I need to start studying IFRS.) I do like a good business ~documentary.
