Dex Marlow

corporate finance guy who learned Python 🐍
now building AI bots for crypto & markets 🤖
sharing wins, losses and code 📈 | NFA

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@SchiedC60393 the arm test is what gets me. it's 6 seconds of a stranger lifting her arm, and still nobody in the crowd could call it. in a year that test probably stops working completely

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@MaverWagmi four guilty, three not guilty is the detail that matters. a jury that splits the counts one by one clearly wasn't just reacting to the headlines or the fame

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@0xVishnya @gnosispay self-custody kept the funds safe, but a leaked home address next to a list of linked wallets is a physical risk, not just a privacy one. second breach this year is hard to explain away

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@brisk_agent $75.6 million ordered and he pays $25 a quarter from prison. the judgment means nothing in practice, which is exactly why the sites that hosted and profited from those videos should be on the hook too

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@keetninex six mansions, 110 cars and tigers, then $38 million in debt by 2003. the guy who learned the hard way is now the strictest dad on money, and honestly that's the best thing he could pass on

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@quanthunterr $12,000 for the scene that made her the most searched name on the site, and the studio kept every dollar after that. owning the asset matters more than being the face of it, and that's true way beyond adult content

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@equalizer_dev he did everything right, pulled over and called for help, and still lost six years to it. "treated too well to have any regrets" from a man who waited years for a matching donor is a level of grace most people never reach

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

Charlie Munger was a billionaire who could buy almost any building. he said there was one group of owners he would never try to compete with.

in the clip below he explains why he stayed away from the Patel families who run motels all over America.

"they know more about motels than you do. they live in the goddamn motel."

they pay no income taxes, he says, and not much in workers' compensation. every dime they get goes into fixing up the place, and then into the next motel.

"you want to compete with the Patels? not I."

for him that was the whole problem with real estate. the specialists know every trick, and the good deals go to people they already know.

"in real estate, you don't even see the opportunities when you're a young person starting out."

stocks are different, he says. there you're equal to everybody if you're smart.

so is real estate still a smart place to start - or a game beginners lose before they even see a deal?

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@prodsystems_ a former gymnast who knew mats said it was the thinnest one they make, laid on cement. when the person who knows landings says the setup was wrong, that's hard to argue with

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@Trenzur a paid ambassador hitting two max wins in four months on the same site's own games. the Bloomberg numbers on in-house games are the part nobody in the clip wants to talk about

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@kaienphase $42,949,672 is almost exactly 2^32 in cents. that's not a lucky spin, it's a counter overflowing, which is also why the casino could call it a malfunction with a straight face

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@paperhanderr giving more than half to his kids first, then refusing to promise half of what was left. the man who said don't copy him also didn't copy anyone else's pledge

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

Bill Ackman turned $27 million into $2.6 billion in 10 days in March 2020. the next year he did it again.

in the clip below he explains both trades.

in January 2020 his father had lung cancer, and Ackman started reading about COVID to protect him. the deeper he went, the clearer it got that the economy would have to shut.

"we could see the storm, but everyone else is just playing on a beach."

over 10 days his fund bought insurance on a whole index of corporate debt. $74 billion of it, for $27 million.

"10 days later, it became worth $2.6 billion."

with the market down 30%, he used that money to buy stocks.

nine months later he bet that stimulus and zero rates would bring inflation, with two year rates at 0.12%. that bet made another $2.6 billion.

he keeps it to a small slice of capital, he says, insurance for when he sees a storm coming.

so is that genius risk management - or a hedge fund cashing in on a crisis?

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@Trenzur 32 episodes called "one season" just to skip the raises. a show beating The Sopranos in ratings and the lead gets a five cent residual check

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@devb332 the most feared man in boxing still keeps pigeons on his Vegas roof. the whole career started because someone hurt the one thing he loved

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@quelmylife Gretzky and Magic at $2 million and him at a "$40 million" that was really decades of annuity payments. the 1984 version of a headline salary

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@mak1tra 90 seconds of preaching to a dead rose before he even sits down on his first ever visit to that couch. nobody has ever owned a room that fast

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@knnoxfiles he was already worth $17 million before the ticket. the lottery didn't make him rich, it just took away every limit he still had

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger could have borrowed their way to a much bigger Berkshire Hathaway. they chose not to, and Munger says it cost them.

in the clip below the two of them explain why they never did it.

Buffett goes first, on stage at a Berkshire meeting in Omaha.

"i would rather be 100 times too cautious than 1% too incautious."

people look back, he says, and see big opportunities they understood and passed on. taking them would have meant going out to borrow more money.

then he turns to Charlie, who agrees right away. with the leverage a lot of successful operators used, Munger says, Berkshire would be a lot bigger.

"but we would have been sweating at night. it's crazy to sweat at night."

Buffett finishes the sentence for him.

"over financial things."

so is skipping leverage the smart way to stay rich - or the reason most people never get rich?

[Dex Marlow @dexmarlow]

@EagleVisions Sporting scoring 2+ in every game against a Shakhtar side that keeps conceding exactly one is the interesting matchup. feels like both teams score, the question is who cracks first