Spotify Opens For Trade at a Very Reasonable Valuation

The world’s largest streaming music provider is open for trade and it’s blowing the fucking barnyard doors clean off their hinges.

Music streaming company Spotify now public at $165.90. @FoxBusiness #spotify $spot pic.twitter.com/uOQm2Rf463

— Partsinevelos (@KristinaParts) April 3, 2018

The company came public via direct listing, the first of its kind.

We $SPOT something exciting happening tomorrow pic.twitter.com/5zXEiuBrUE

— NYSE (@NYSE) April 2, 2018

Sweden-based Spotify is available in 61 countries with an overall user base that includes ad-supported free listeners of 159 million, and 70 million paying users as of January 2018. The company was founded in 2006 by Martin Lorentzon and Daniel Ek, who remains its current CEO.

Spotify’s IPO paperwork showed that it is going through a tremendous amount of cash — posting revenue last year of €4,090 million (nearly $5 billion) and a net loss of around €1,235 million (or about $1.5 billion) for the same period — but its gross margin is growing, thanks to newly negotiated licenses with the major labels. These deals not only reduce Spotify’s royalty payouts, but will allow the company to predict their music costs for several years.

With over 70m subs and a rapidly expanding revenue base, I’d venture to say this is the closest thing we have that compares to NFLX. The only problem, of course, is the fact that it already trades with a market cap of $30 billion. However, at 6x sales, it’s not exactly overly expensive, in spite of the fact that it’s quickly burning thru cash. But who cares about profits, nowadays?

I’ve just awoken from the deepest of slumbers. The kids are on vacation and by the grace of God, my coyote didn’t growl and bark at me this morning for her morning expedition to terrorize the neighborhood. I woke up past 11am and felt generally well spirited. I then walked the coyote and she attacked three moving cars. There’s something wrong with her brain, as she enjoys to be hyper-aggressive a bit too much.

I see markets are higher, but the breadth is weak and I do not think it’ll last. It might be wise to stay in cash.

Here’s the President shorting AMZN again.

I am right about Amazon costing the United States Post Office massive amounts of money for being their Delivery Boy. Amazon should pay these costs (plus) and not have them bourne by the American Taxpayer. Many billions of dollars. P.O. leaders don’t have a clue (or do they?)!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 3, 2018

And here’s the President threatening NAFTA and cutting off aid to Honduras over the fucking caravan of folks streaming into the country.

The big Caravan of People from Honduras, now coming across Mexico and heading to our “Weak Laws” Border, had better be stopped before it gets there. Cash cow NAFTA is in play, as is foreign aid to Honduras and the countries that allow this to happen. Congress MUST ACT NOW!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 3, 2018

Let’s get a live shot of this caravan and their demands.

Look at all them lawnmowers

“We demand of the Mexico and the United States: that they respect our rights as refugees and our right to dignified work to be able to support our families,” according to their statement.

The second demand is “that they open the borders to us because we are as much citizens as the people of the countries where we are and/or travel.”

Quit worrying about the caravan. Those lads are simply coming to do the jobs that you don’t want to do. They’re coming to wash your dishes, mow your lawns, and cook your big fat steaks so that you can chew it with your big fat fucking jowls.

What else is going on?

Not much else. We’re doing Exodus trials and I need to answer about 200 emails. Also, we’re implementing Sharpe ratios into the platform this month. Let me go fetch myself a large mug of black coffee and get back to you later. I’ve invented a new way to drink my coffee, which is essentially Illy espresso dark coffee, but brewed like regular coffee in a pour over or french’d press. It is quite literally the best tasting coffee I’ve ever had.

I had a 2 hour walk with my dogs this evening, through the woods — attacking feral animals and random people. They came back covered completely in mud, as well as myself. These are some of the things I like to do when I’m not flying in my space capsule.

The overnight session is soft and it certainly looks like we’re barreling towards perdition. The Trumptarded market can’t stop tripping over itself and is bound to have a fantastical conclusion. If it trades up tomorrow, fade it. If it gaps down lower — get in on the momentum train lower and short the shit out of stocks — because margin calls are just around the bend.

All faith and confidence has been removed from the market. The FAANG trade is dead and Jeffrey Bezos is one tweet away from being arrested by order of the President. There is political risk in the tape — something we haven’t dealt with since Bush the Idiot kept attacking oil rich countries in the Middle East.

It’s a slow day and spring is here. Email me at Flybroker at gmail.com for your FREE Exodus trial — no strings. It’ll last for 3 days and then you can either join the league of distinguished gentlemen (membership does have its privileges) or be killed. The choice is yours.

Good nite and sleep tight.

About 20 minutes ago, when the market was off by 650, I made my quantitative purchases for the month of April. I didn’t want to do it — but rules are rules and Exodus has made its recommendations by which I am obligated to follow.

It should be noted, this strategy has beaten the SPY ever month of 2018 and is +2.1%, even after today’s setback, substantially better than the loss of 4%.

Over in my trading account, I am much more reserved, long three stocks, one of which is ERY, a downside play on oil stocks. The majority of my account is in cash and although it’s tempting to buy this dip — I see no reason to get involved in this shit-storm in any significant manner.

As you wallow in your misery, might I entreat you to an old classic?

Enjoy.

You might want to bookmark this one for future reference.

Tesla Goes Bankrupt
Palo Alto, California, April 1, 2018 — Despite intense efforts to raise money, including a last-ditch mass sale of Easter Eggs, we are sad to report that Tesla has gone completely and totally bankrupt. So bankrupt, you can't believe it.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 1, 2018

Now look at this.

Tesla bonds keep falling. pic.twitter.com/sdcZaGDRWc

— Lisa Abramowicz (@lisaabramowicz1) April 2, 2018

Here is the issue at hand.

Tesla has more than $10 billion in debt and a shrinking capital base, as the stock descends into anarchy.

With the recent fatal accident involving a model 3, which led to a recall of 123,000 vehicles. Many believe this will hurt sales. If sales are hurt, then the burn rate increases. If that happens, TSLA will need to raise cash, which will be hard to do as the stock banks lower and the bonds drop in value.

This is, essentially, a death spiral.

More from UBS.

“Not only do you need to ramp this product, but you are going to have to make sure the quality improves as you ramp it,” Langan told CNBC Monday.

“[There are] a lot of challenges ahead. This is really a very important year. This is the future of the company with the Model 3, and it’s not starting off very well,” Langan said on “Squawk on the Street.”

“The Tesla Autopilot crash … is obviously raising concerns about that system, whether it’s fully safe,” said Langan. He said having the word “autopilot” as part of the name may not be wise since drivers are still required to have some level of awareness while driving in autopilot mode.

“That raises concerns about liability and that system,” he said. “Maybe it needs some form of driver monitoring to ensure that the driver is aware.”

Langan said investors are also worried about Model 3 production.

“And on top of it, some of the initial reviews from customers, they’re finding issues with this car,” he said. “They’re going to have to work those out.”

Langan said Tesla should increase production of the Model 3 by 2018’s third quarter or it will have to raise capital.

“I think the way that they’d like to do it is ramp the Model 3 and then raise the capital for the Model Ys,” Langan said. “If they can’t get it ramped that puts them in a more challenged position than [Tesla has been] historically.”

He said Tesla will likely have to raise more than $1 billion.

“The billion will keep them going,” he said. “It bides them more time to ramp the Model 3.”

On April 1, Elon Musk tweeted an April Fool’s joke that Tesla had gone bankrupt.

Langan said the company is far from going bankrupt.

But he said, “I don’t think it’s something I would be joking about.”

Markets are now crashing lower in a most heinous manner. Early this morning, I bowed out of my position and bid them a good day. Even though the losses were upsetting and ruined my breakfast, I now feel better, seeing my ERY climb higher.

Listen to me: these are dark days. The President is quite literally insane. War and clown punches are just around the bend.

Be you diving into today’s ‘dip’, running fast down the block. You pivot and angle yourself sideways readying to turn the corner, but run into a fucking clown who punches you out and slaps the shit out of your face as you lay there stupefied by the blow.

Both GLD and TLT are safe havens. See to it that you have some and say your prayers for tomorrow will bring a great doom and apocalypse to your poorly constructed portfolios.

Top picks: cash, TLT, GLD, ERY

As Zerohedge reported earlier, a giant shitstorm is brewing in the markets. Your only solace is to hold tight for lower prices, hedge your bets, and allocate into gold and bonds — for when the end of the world comes they will be the only things worth anything at all.

The destruction of Bitcoin has given new life to the safe haven status of gold, an ancient metal used in medieval times to pay for swords and shields, which were to be used to kill and maim. Nowadays, morons wear it around their necks, or around their pinky fingers; but it still has value.

In other news, the President issued another short report on AMZN. Let me know when you think this is getting ridiculous.

Only fools, or worse, are saying that our money losing Post Office makes money with Amazon. THEY LOSE A FORTUNE, and this will be changed. Also, our fully tax paying retailers are closing stores all over the country…not a level playing field!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 2, 2018

He’s also tweeting a storm about the caravan of people heading towards the country. How can this be happening? This is a wet dream for Trump, thousands of illegal migrants barreling towards America and the Mexican authorities do nothing?! If you crafted a scenario to energize Trump’s base to press for the wall, you could not write a better script than this. If they let these poor souls into the country, it would likely set a terrible precedent and lead to a African into Europe scenario this summer — something I fully support — but only if we can send them into La Jolla and Santa Barbara for asylum. That’s a fuckload of lawnmowers, believe me.

Look, if you really need to reconcile all of this horseshit, quit thinking of America as a sovereign nation — because it isn’t. It is an amalgamation of states without borders or sovereignty — operated by corrupt bureaucrats — financed by industry. Anyone can settle here and suck off the government tit, as long as they stay in line and vote for the right people. Believe me, if Mexicans were Russians we’d have a border wall 50,000 feet into the sky. Alas, America is a business and right now our business is focused on other countries, because that’s where the money is. Now if the people living inside these states have a problem with it, they should probably do something about it. Problem is, they’re lazy and slothful, because, more or less, people are comfy. Even the poor people in America live fairly festive lives, drunk and fat, watching the teevee for aspirational entertainment.

The markets have crashed into a giant fucking orange balloon named Blohnaldo Drumpfskin and nothing more can be said about it.

More from Fast Money.

So many things happening today. Let me start with the easy stuff for those of you keeping score.

For Q1 2018, my Quant strategy in Exodus netted ~+3%. For the month of March, it gained ~0.5%, beating the SPY by 200bps. For the quarter, the gains were similar vs the SPY: 200bps. However, due to today’s extreme FUCKERY, I shed nearly 1%, which will be applied to net quarter’s returns. As of now, I am only in TLT and GLD, due to defensive measures set in the strategy and will be purchases the rest of my positions for the month soon.

Also, the SPY purchases for the Oversold signal was sold at a slight loss today.

Over in my tactical account (aka retardo trading), I cleaned house and took HARROWING losses in LABU, SOXL and a sundry of low browed stocks. Although I had gains in a few, the losses far outstripped the good ones and now I am left with two illiquid small cappers and ERY — betting that oil plunges lower, helping me recover some of my drawdowns.

I’m basically all cash and ERY now.

Markets are getting hit for one very specific reason: Trump.

He’s a doubled edged sword. His retardation makes the good times better and the bad times so much worse. The China trade war spat deepened today with China affixing tariffs on another $3 billion in products. This, as you know, is absolutely nothing. But they’re doing this methodically, just to fuck with our media, and they should be bombed for this.

Also, his nonsensical tweets about Jeff Bezos and Amazon has a socialist feel to it, overtly anti-capitalist. While his point about Amazon taking advantage of the post office might be true, it serves no good by tweeting about it — like an absolute creamsicle ape.

Trump has single handedly destroyed the FAANG trade — which is off by another 2% this morning. It’s worth noting that mega caps underperformed in a big way in March, thanks to FANNG destruction. The juxtaposition between small caps and large were great last month, with 1% gains in smalls and 1% losses in large. As such, I will re-allocate the quant account into small caps for April.

For the quarter, just about all quintiles performed poorly — especially mega cap — which posted a loss of 1.75%. The best performers were found in the mid-large caps, ranging in cap from $10-50b. All in all, I am please with the systematic strategy — but woefully angered by the fucking moronic trades I just closed out.

Nothing like a clean slate to switch things up.

I hope you’re all enjoying your day, dressed like literal fags — decked out in the bright pastel colors of Easter. Men, unironically, prancing about in pink blouses, yellow pants, blue shoes — because when they were young they used to color hard boiled eggs those fanciful colors.

Last night you made believe you were a gigantic rabbit, breaking into your own house, leaving poison inside a basket for your children to eat. Like idiots, your children took the bait this morning and gave themselves cavities, and quite possibly diabetes.

After that, you pranced on over to the local church to pretend to believe in Easter — a day when Zombie Jesus came back from the dead to exact harsh revenge on his enemies. Then you did some stupid shit, like eating lunch at some church diner — sipped on some coffee and ate some toast, listening to fellow church goers talk trash about thy neighbors.

As you read this, especially if you’re Italian, dinner is about to be served. Who eats dinner at 2pm you ponder? Fucking Italians on a Sunday, especially on Easter Sunday — a day made for manicotti, stuffed shells with extra gravy (morons), fucked up pastry with hard boiled eggs embedded in them, anti-pasta — because fuck carbs.

After supper, the lot of you will sit down to watch the tube, drinking spirits, enjoying the banter between indecorous family members. In my opinion, this would be a good time to discuss your religion of atheism, one that eschews traditional beliefs, such as flying Gods and Zombie Jesus.

At any rate, I don’t want to get too heatheness on this holy day, since you never know. One day I might have to pay for these sins and I’d rather hedge my bets here and wish you all a happy easter, even though you look like ridiculous pastel colored jackasses.

Enjoy some 6ix9ine. Be sure to play this video for grandma.

You’ve got to be shitting me. Imagine if Obama did this. You Trumptards would be shouting ‘communist muckraker’ from each and every roof top.

Here’s the President tweet storming his hatred of Jeff Bezos, menacing him with billions in additional expenses.

While we are on the subject, it is reported that the U.S. Post Office will lose $1.50 on average for each package it delivers for Amazon. That amounts to Billions of Dollars. The Failing N.Y. Times reports that “the size of the company’s lobbying staff has ballooned,” and that…

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 31, 2018

…does not include the Fake Washington Post, which is used as a “lobbyist” and should so REGISTER. If the P.O. “increased its parcel rates, Amazon’s shipping costs would rise by $2.6 Billion.” This Post Office scam must stop. Amazon must pay real costs (and taxes) now!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 31, 2018

Not only is Agent Orange demanding Amazon pay more in taxes, but he’s also literally demanding they pay more in expenses. What the fuck? I’m not apologizing for Amazon, but they’re merely playing the game according to its rules. If Trump wants more money, he should change the fucking laws and quit interfering in markets. This is going to have a negative impact on shares of AMZN, and possibly the market, and that’s bullshit.

HAPPY EASTER FUCKED FACES.