Thanks for your thoughts about Livedoor TJ.
<I dunno, it seems Livedoor makes a living by selling ... paper. This is definitely neither an original nor an exotic business model>
Their business model seems to be a lot like yours, except that they add value by managing the companies, reducing costs, increasing brand value, scaring the target management and developing lots of software and stuff.
Tarken-san built an excellent search engine for the Livedoor site which saved them heaps of money, which was gushing out each month, and improved the results and speed. So it's not just waving magic wands and swindling ignorant shareholders, contrary to what news reports might suggest. He helped get the Skype agency for them. Among other stuff. There really has been a lot of value added other than buying this, selling that, and frightening Fuji TV management.
Which is not to say they weren't also very keen on selling paper at what the market would bear, which the USA has done on a megagrande scale, to great benefit of said paper sellers.
I'm not much interested in financial voodoo. I like real stuff, albeit ethereal and abstract, such as currencies made of nothing more than scarcity value of pixels, and cyberspace made of phragmented photons.
I'm thinking of the Livedoor tranche as an investment, with dividends to come in happier times. Of course, if it is bid way back up to excessive P:E levels, I might be tempted to sell and invest in something else.
I suppose the infamous Yakusa is real enough, just as the Mafia was real enough and is supposed to have rattled cages around Washington at levels as high as the presidency. I don't think the Yakusa has had too much of a hand in the dramas around Livedoor, but I have seen enough in my time to know that lots is possible and probable when $billions are swirling around looking for somebody to own them.
With QCOM on a P:E of 37 and Livedoor on a P:E of 5 or so, I am happy with my tranche which is not QCOM. Note that the value of the companies owned by Livedoor has been going UP.
The big unknown known is what the Japanese legal system will do with Horie and the assets of Livedoor. I am guessing that a wrist slap is about all they can do. But "they" know the answer [more or less] and I don't. I remain interested in why the executive died by bleeding to death, or maybe from heart stoppage due to knife wounds - the investigation continues.
It is NOT a business that is comparable with QUALCOMM.
Mqurice |
