The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 10 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Ackman: 90% of Pershing Square Investments Over 20 Years Were Profitable
“The reality is, 90% of the investments we've made in the last 20 years have been profitable. In fact, meaningfully profitable.”
Ackman: Pershing Square Lost $400 Million Exiting Netflix Position
“So we took about a billion dollar position in Netflix after the stock fell about 50%. And then, you know, we're a long term investor, but we learned information within a few months of the initial investment, i.e. The next quarter's results at Colt, caused us t…”
Ackman: Pershing Square has never gone long or short regional banks
“We have never been short regional banks. We've never been long regional banks.”
Ackman: Timidity in position sizing held back Pershing Square's results
“It was less than, it was about a point and a half of our, a little under two percent of our capital, but could it have been three percent? Could have been four percent for sure. And so when I look back at something like that, I would have been willing to lose …”
Ackman: Pershing Square made $2.8B hedging interest rates but was "timid"
“We should have made ten billion dollars on, on hedging interest rate risk. Instead we made 2.8 billion because we were a little timid.”
Ackman: Pershing Square holds fund cash in U.S. Treasuries to avoid bank risk
“Other than cash we need for daily needs, we keep that number pretty small everything else is in a U.S. Treasury money market account, or we own U.S. Treasury bills directly. So we're not taking bank risks, we're just facing the U.S. Sovereign. And then the cas…”
Ackman: Universal Music Group has very little debt and high predictability
“If you're investing in the world's most dominant music company, Universal Music, it's, has very little debt. It has a great market position. You can predict business with a very high degree of confidence, and you're buying it at a fair price.”
Ackman: Pershing Square bought interest rate options striking above 93 bps
“We bought, in effect, the way to think about it is we bought a call option. That paid off when two-year interest rates went above 93 basis points, and we had about an eighteen-month term. And at the time we bought that instrument, two-year rates were at 12 bas…”