Donald Trump


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2 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

 

As to your Perigo comment, I find other differences than you do between Trump and Perigo (i.e., habits about drinking alcohol and ranting).

For instance, I see that Trump builds skyscrapers and Perigo doesn't. Trump makes gobs of money on the open market and Perigo doesn't. Trump cultivates a large beautiful family and Perigo doesn't. Trump is successful as a TV celebrity and Perigo isn't. And so on...

Oh... I forgot.

Trump wins elections and Perigo doesn't...

But you left out Pigero's greatest accomplishment! He has achieved the greatest consumer tastes in music, ever. No one, not even Trump, and not even Ayn Rand, can match Pigero's awesomeness at liking the music that he likes, which is objectively superior music because he likes it. He is the greatest music consumer that world gas ever known, or ever will know.

J

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11 hours ago, 9thdoctor said:

I beg to differ.  Christie left out the best rebuttal: if Trump had a $900M+ loss in one year, he presumably had $900M+ income in prior years. 

Non sequitur. A loss can result from investing other people's money.  Suppose John Doe sells bonds or stock, spends the proceeds in order to make whatever, and the venture quickly becomes a big flop (little or no revenue). Income statement accounting rules say the spending must be recognized as expenses (as opposed to being initially treated as assets), and the result is negative income.  

Spinmeister Christie is mostly full of crap.

 

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52 minutes ago, merjet said:

Non sequitur. A loss can result from investing other people's money

This is from his personal tax return, right?  He had to have Basis to claim the Loss. 

I'll try to explain in greater detail later.

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5 hours ago, 9thdoctor said:

This is from his personal tax return, right?  He had to have Basis to claim the Loss. 

I'll try to explain in greater detail later.

The tax forms here are only 3 pages, all state returns and no federal Form 1040. The Connecticut return nevertheless shows federal adjusted gross income (AGI) from Form 1040 of -$915,729,923. I guessed that loss came from Form 1040 Schedule C or E, but the New York form says no. Line 15 of the NY form (-$909,459,915) is a mystery to me.

I can only guess what your comment is suggesting. Anyway, yes, the effect of capital losses (Schedule D) on AGI more than $3,000 is limited to the extent they are offset by capital gains (also Schedule D). Indeed, the NY return shows a capital loss of $3,000. But Schedule E, Schedule D, and the mysterious line 15 loss are very different things.

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Now this is interesting:

10.03.2016-09.37.png

The theme running throughout is that Hillary Clinton is the one who has waged a campaign against Bill Clinton owning up to the paternity of his half African-American son.

:) 

There are three links in that headline: 

The Facebook page of Danney Clinton-Williams

10.03.2016-09.50.png

 

A tweeted video by Danney Williams saying he is real:

I thanks everyone for supporting me! #ClintonKid pic.twitter.com/qWex9lQi6c

 

A video between Alex Jones and Roger Stone

This is from January. They discuss the case of Danney Williams and mention that a falsely claimed DNA test by a Clinton friend doesn't exist (discussion starts around 1:40):

Heh...

:)

Michael

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And now it starts.

From the Daily Mail:

Man claiming to be Bill Clinton's illegitimate son via a prostitute continues campaign to have the former president recognize him

The Drudge headline was changed to add a link to this article. The following line with the hyperlink was added "I WANT TO MEET MY DAD."

:evil:  :)

Michael

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The following is not the new Wikileaks dump, but it is an interesting tweet:

As Secretary of State, Clinton floated the idea of droning Assange, calling him a "soft target."

I wonder what she would do to her political enemies with the power of the presidency in her hands...

Actually, I don't wonder...

Michael

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20 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

I'm not sure that what you wrote following the quote above will have any resonance with the public at large.

I discussed it this morning with some knowledgeable finance pros, albeit not tax pros like myself, and was a bit surprised that they didn't understand it as readily as I expected.  So I think you're right.  Someone on Trump's team can maybe package it in a way that will work for the general public.  They're not doing a good job so far.

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10 hours ago, merjet said:

The tax forms here are only 3 pages, all state returns and no federal Form 1040. The Connecticut return nevertheless shows federal adjusted gross income (AGI) from Form 1040 of -$915,729,923. I guessed that loss came from Form 1040 Schedule C or E, but the New York form says no. Line 15 of the NY form (-$909,459,915) is a mystery to me.

I can only guess what your comment is suggesting. Anyway, yes, the effect of capital losses (Schedule D) on AGI more than $3,000 is limited to the extent they are offset by capital gains (also Schedule D). Indeed, the NY return shows a capital loss of $3,000. But Schedule E, Schedule D, and the mysterious line 15 loss are very different things.

My understanding is that it's an NOL.  My point is that you have to have Basis to claim such a Loss.  How do you get Basis on this kind of scale?  One way would be to earn $100M a year for 9 years, leaving the earnings in the business (reinvesting them, while paying some tax along the way), then have a loss of $900M in year 10.  Note this wouldn't involve Other People's Money in any way. 

The way I suspect it did happen, and of course I don't know this, I'm speculating: he executed a personal guarantee on a big piece of debt, the business(es) collateralizing it went bust, and it suddenly became his liability.  That would also provide Basis for Loss.  So: he invests some amount of equity in a deal, say $100M, and takes out a $900M mortgage.  He personally guarantees the mortgage.  It defaults.  Now what?  Well, if they do a workout he'll have Forgiveness of Debt Income in a future year.  If they write it down to zero the NOL would be wiped out.  If he has to pay the debt, he gets to, in effect, do so with pre-tax dollars.  He's going to have to earn money and hand the cash over to the debtor.  The tax on those earnings will be offset by the NOL, until it's used up.  And after that, he's working for himself again...well, himself and Uncle Sam. 

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21 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

As to your Perigo comment, I find other differences than you do between Trump and Perigo (i.e., habits about drinking alcohol and ranting).

For instance, I see that Trump builds skyscrapers and Perigo doesn't. Trump makes gobs of money on the open market and Perigo doesn't. Trump cultivates a large beautiful family and Perigo doesn't. Trump is successful as a TV celebrity and Perigo isn't. And so on...

Oh... I forgot.

Trump wins elections and Perigo doesn't...

:)

Michael

Is that the best you can do?  Are you unwilling to acknowledge that Trump is making an ass of himself, pointlessly?  That this reflects badly on him?  That it reinforces the instability meme? 

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4 minutes ago, 9thdoctor said:

Are you unwilling to acknowledge that Trump is making an ass of himself, pointlessly? That this reflects badly on him?  That it reinforces the instability meme?

Dennis,

To whom?

To anti-Trump people?

Those folks are the only ones complainin'... 

As for the rest of mankind, what's there to acknowledge?...

5 minutes ago, 9thdoctor said:

Is that the best you can do?

Well, yeah...

I'm not smart.

:)

Michael

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As an aside, as people who have followed me on OL know, I've had a strong resonance with Sarah Palin ever since she appeared on the scene.

Ditto for Donald Trump (just look at this thread! :) ).

President Obama sees a connection (from New York Magazine): 

Obama sees origins of Trump's rise in Sarah Palin

Man, does that make me feel deplorable...

:)

Michael

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23 minutes ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

I'm not smart.

And neither are the rest of the Trump supporters.

:evil: 

Here's Trump "making an ass of himself" at his latest rally about benefitting from the tax code:

Direct quote from The Donald:

Quote

I have been saying from the beginning of this campaign how ridiculous, complex, and, yes, unfair the tax system is. It is an unfair system. And so complex that very few people understand it. Fortunately, I understand it. 

. . .

The unfairness of the tax laws is unbelievable. It is something I have been talking about for a long time, despite, frankly, being a big beneficiary of the laws.

But I'm working for you now. I'm not working for Trump...

And the crowd of "not smart" Trump supporters goes wild.

:)

Michael

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9 minutes ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

And neither are the rest of the Trump supporters.

:evil: 

Here's Trump "making an ass of himself" at his latest rally about benefitting from the tax code:

 

The "making an ass of himself" episode (let's call it the "Fat KASS incident", for short) I was referring to was the Miss Universe weight gain Twitter storming all night thing. 

Anti-Trump people are the only ones complaining?  Come on.

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17 minutes ago, 9thdoctor said:

The "making an ass of himself" episode (let's call it the "Fat KASS incident", for short) I was referring to was the Miss Universe weight gain Twitter storming all night thing. 

Anti-Trump people are the only ones complaining?  Come on.

Dennis,

I was more into the tax thing, but as to Machado, some of the elite public personalities who support Trump are bitching a bit.

As for normal Trump supporters, they think Trump vented. Who cares?

I just don't hear anyone at his rallies say he makes an ass of himself...

Not even women.

In fact, I think they are still going to vote for him...

:)

You comment is leading me to something I've seen a lot, but never thought about before, though. Trump supporters tend to call each other "fat-ass" when they are overweight. The snowflakes on the Clinton side talk about "fat shaming."

:) 

Michael

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11 hours ago, 9thdoctor said:

My understanding is that it's an NOL.  My point is that you have to have Basis to claim such a Loss.  How do you get Basis on this kind of scale?  One way would be to earn $100M a year for 9 years, leaving the earnings in the business (reinvesting them, while paying some tax along the way), then have a loss of $900M in year 10.  Note this wouldn't involve Other People's Money in any way. 

The way I suspect it did happen, and of course I don't know this, I'm speculating: he executed a personal guarantee on a big piece of debt, the business(es) collateralizing it went bust, and it suddenly became his liability.  That would also provide Basis for Loss.  So: he invests some amount of equity in a deal, say $100M, and takes out a $900M mortgage.  He personally guarantees the mortgage.  It defaults.  Now what?  Well, if they do a workout he'll have Forgiveness of Debt Income in a future year.  If they write it down to zero the NOL would be wiped out.  If he has to pay the debt, he gets to, in effect, do so with pre-tax dollars.  He's going to have to earn money and hand the cash over to the debtor.  The tax on those earnings will be offset by the NOL, until it's used up.  And after that, he's working for himself again...well, himself and Uncle Sam. 

I suspect it was a NOL, too. Here and here are articles about NOL. The 2nd may require a WSJ subscription to read the whole thing.  You may be correct about how the 1995 NOL came about for Trump, i.e. that he made personal guarantees on loans taken by his businesses, and he had to pay up on said guarantees. If that is what happened, then it would have involved Other People's Money -- that of the lenders. 

I still don't agree with your first post where you say that Trump would have needed enough AGI in prior years in order to take an NOL of more than $900M in 1995. Neither of the articles I linked mention such a requirement for reporting an NOL.   

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1 hour ago, 9thdoctor said:

The way I suspect it did happen, and of course I don't know this, I'm speculating: he executed a personal guarantee on a big piece of debt, the business(es) collateralizing it went bust, and it suddenly became his liability. 

BTW, in real estate personal guarantees are avoided like the plague, and if your lender is requiring one, it's a sure sign they lack confidence in your business plan.  In my experience they're quite unusual.  But there's a very typical type of personal guarantee, what we call a "bad boy" guarantee.  It triggers personal liability only under certain circumstances, not necessarily illegal acts (though they're included), but definitely violation of the loan provisions.  Whether this has anything to do with Trump, I don't know.  Maybe The Art of the Comeback has something about this, though his self-aggrandizing prose is beyond my intestinal fortitude.

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2 minutes ago, merjet said:

I still don't agree with your first post where you say that Trump would have needed enough AGI in prior years in order to take an NOL of more than $900M in 1995. Neither of the articles I linked mention such a requirement for reporting an NOL.   

Yeah, it's not the only way it could have happened.  I hadn't thought it through enough. 

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9 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Assange teased about a crapload more of documents to be released about Clinton.

I got up at 4:00 AM to see this thing and Assange just trolled everyone.

He got the entire world looking at him so he could go on and on about the history of WikiLeaks, fund-raise and plug a book.

:) 

Information-wise, he basically announced that he is still going to release some documentation before the election, some supposedly this week. And then data-dumps once a week for 10 weeks.

Maybe he's got something hot on Clinton, maybe he doesn't.

(yawn...)

Anti-Trumpers and Clinton supporters, rejoice.

They got me on this one.

Dayaaamm!

LOL...

:) 

Michael

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