Capital Lore

Money, markets & the stories behind them.

[Capital Lore @devb332]

2011. Bloomberg asks Elon Musk about a Chinese EV maker called BYD.

He starts laughing before he even answers.

The reporter presses: "Warren Buffett owns 10% of that. Why do you laugh?"

Musk, still laughing: "Have you seen their car?"

He goes on: "I don't think it's particularly attractive, the technology is not very strong... their focus should be on making sure they don't die in China."

BYD didn't die in China. In 2025, it became the world's biggest EV maker, selling more electric cars than Tesla.

Munger and Buffett had bought that 10% stake three years before this interview. While Musk was laughing at the car, Berkshire was already holding it.

In 2023, someone posted the old clip. Musk replied himself: "That was many years ago. Their cars are highly competitive these days."

He wasn't wrong that the car looked rough in 2011. He was wrong about what "not attractive yet" was going to turn into.

Laughing at a competitor is easy. The hard part is guessing which rough draft becomes the finished product.

[Capital Lore @devb332]

In 1989, Billy Joel discovered that $30 million was missing from his bank accounts.

The man who stole it was his manager, his brother-in-law, and the godfather to his only child.

During the 1980s, Billy Joel was one of the biggest rock stars in the world. He wanted to focus entirely on his music, so he handed complete control of his finances to Frank Weber.

Joel trusted his family blindly. He gave Weber full power of attorney and never audited the books.

Behind closed doors, Weber was treating Joel's accounts like his own personal casino.

He secretly diverted tens of millions of dollars to fund his own failed businesses. He bought real estate, invested in oil wells, and bred racehorses.

When those investments collapsed, Weber became desperate.

He began forging Joel's signature on massive bank loans. He even secretly mortgaged the copyrights to Joel's biggest hit songs just to cover his tracks.

When an independent audit finally exposed the theft, Joel sued him for $90 million.

But the legal system provided the ultimate insult.

Weber simply filed for bankruptcy. The millions were already gone. The court system shielded him, leaving Joel with almost nothing to recover.

In the clip below, Frank Weber gives his side.

At 40 years old, Joel was forced to exhaust himself on a grueling global tour just to pay off the massive debts his own family had created.

Fame can make you untouchable to the outside world. But it leaves you completely defenseless against the people sitting at your own dinner table.

[Capital Lore @devb332]

@soncarius that's not a marriage. that's a life built on lies with a complete stranger.

[Capital Lore @devb332]

@paxmlian what the hell is that

[Capital Lore @devb332]

@batagonx money management matters more than how much you earn

[Capital Lore @devb332]

@batagonx fair point, there's more to the story

[Capital Lore @devb332]

In 1977, a judge ordered Marvin Gaye to pay his ex-wife $600,000 in alimony.

He was facing bankruptcy and did not have the cash. So he paid her with an album specifically designed to fail.

His lawyers had negotiated an unusual settlement. Gaye agreed to pay the $600,000 debt directly from the advance and royalties of his next release.

His ex-wife was Anna Gordy, the sister of the founder of Motown Records. She expected a massive commercial hit that would pay her out quickly.

Gaye had a different plan. He decided to record a completely uncommercial album so the royalties would dry up immediately.

He went into the studio and poured every bitter, ugly detail of their failed marriage into a double album. He literally named it "Here, My Dear."

There were no radio hits. There were no upbeat pop songs. It was a 73-minute emotional breakdown set to music.

The plan worked. The album was a commercial disaster. Fans were confused, the record tanked, and his ex-wife received a percentage of a flop.

But the story did not end there.

Decades later, music critics and fans revisited the record. Stripped of the expectations of the 1970s pop charts, they realized Gaye had not just made a bad album out of spite. He had captured raw vulnerability.

Today "Here, My Dear" is widely considered one of the greatest soul records ever made.

[Capital Lore @devb332]

@soncarius talent made her famous, but the wrong people got rich

[Capital Lore @devb332]

At CES 2014, Michael Bay panicked on stage promoting Samsung's 105-inch TV and walked away after just one minute.

Samsung had hired the Transformers director because they wanted someone who understood cinematic visuals to showcase their new curved television.

He opened with a big statement about creating cinematic worlds.

Then his teleprompter malfunctioned.

Bay tried to continue without the script, but quickly lost his place. Samsung's executive tried to help by asking him how the new TV would change the movie-watching experience.

Bay struggled to answer.

"Excuse me. I'm sorry. I'm sorry."

Then he walked off, leaving the Samsung executive alone on stage.

The entire moment lasted barely a minute.

Later, Bay admitted he had embarrassed himself, explaining that the teleprompter had gone wrong.

The man who built his career on explosions, car chases and giant robots couldn't improvise a short presentation about a television.

[Capital Lore @devb332]

@Pixel_Neuron building your own way to move the product is a huge competitive advantage

[Capital Lore @devb332]

@soncarius the tricky part is admitting that your current approach isn't working

[Capital Lore @devb332]

@paxmlian octopuses are basically aliens

[Capital Lore @devb332]

In 2019, the CEO of Nissan and Renault smuggled himself out of Japan by hiding inside a black audio equipment box.

Carlos Ghosn was one of the most powerful executives in the world. But after being charged with financial fraud, he spent 13 months under house arrest in Tokyo.

So he paid two American security contractors $1.3 million to get him out.

Ghosn crawled into a large musical instrument case with breathing holes drilled into the bottom. The contractors loaded the box onto a private jet as cargo and flew him to Lebanon.

Days later, Ghosn held a massive press conference in Beirut. He didn't apologize. Instead, he aggressively attacked the Japanese government.

"I didn't escape because I was guilty," he told the cameras. "I escaped because I had zero chance of a fair trial."

The American contractors who pulled off the stunt weren't so lucky. The FBI arrested them, and they were sent to a Japanese prison.

Ghosn is still in Lebanon today.

The man who once ran two global car empires is now a permanent fugitive. He lives freely, but if he ever steps outside the country, he will be arrested immediately.

Was he a victim of injustice, or did he escape justice itself?

[Capital Lore @devb332]

@batagonx yeah. even great innovators can underestimate the next big shift

[Capital Lore @devb332]

In 2007, Steve Ballmer laughed on camera when he was asked about the iPhone.

"There’s no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share. No chance. It’s a $500 subsidized item."

He was running Microsoft. He wanted Windows Mobile on 70-80% of phones. He figured Apple might get 2–3%.

People love to call him dumb for it. But his math wasn’t crazy at the time. Windows Mobile really was everywhere. And the iPhone really did cost more than most phones people were buying.

He was looking at the market that already existed. He just didn’t see the one Apple was about to create.

Today Apple is worth close to $5 trillion. Microsoft is worth around $3.7 trillion.

Ballmer later admitted it himself: "People like to point to this quote where I said the iPhones will never sell… it was business model innovation by Apple.”

[Capital Lore @devb332]

@kulon077 that's how disruption happens

[Capital Lore @devb332]

@soncarius it's tragic how quickly a life can change forever

[Capital Lore @devb332]

@paxmlian I get the science, still scary

[Capital Lore @devb332]

@soncarius a car is one of the few things people proudly overpay for

[Capital Lore @devb332]

@gosh_sol_eth Microsoft probably wished they'd thrown the deal away too

[Capital Lore @devb332]

In March 2013, Nokia's CEO grabbed a TV host's iPhone and threw it on the floor.

Six months later, Nokia sold its phone business.

Stephen Elop was on a Finnish talk show. The host pulled out his iPhone and said he wished he had a Nokia instead.

"I can take care of that," Elop said with a smile. He took the iPhone and tossed it onto the floor, then promised to send him a Nokia Lumia instead.

Nokia was rapidly losing market share to Apple, but Elop wanted to project absolute dominance.

Instead, the stunt became a symbol of a dying giant in denial.

Just six months later, Nokia surrendered and sold its entire mobile phone business to Microsoft for $7.2 billion.