The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age

    This time Trump was telling the truth

    By Flavius on Thu, 05/09/2019 - 11:41pm |

    Wasn't he?  

    Surely he wouldn't  lie about his billions of losses..I mean why would he?

    Well yes he would have wanted to avoid taxes but...Well yeah he would have really wanted to avoid taxe......OK I agree he'd have done almost anything ...ok anything..to avoid taxes. But how.........

    Well now that you suggest  it  he could have diverted  5% of his receivables to the Grand Cayman or Roadtown or where-ever thus recording a tax free"book keeping" result without  the automatic cash crisis  inevitably resulting from the string of unbroken losses published by the Times . And its automatic stifling of his credit.

    And he  wouldn't have needed to worry about  at least  our challenging the dismal results. As he'd  have recognized we'd have been so enthusiastic about his "black eye" from the string of  "reported" losses we'd never have thought   to   "kick the tires " of those results.

     

    Comments

    Trump is a horrible businessman. His business losses are historic. His supporters will still stand by his side. They do not care that he lies. We are nearing a Constitutional crisis. If the courts do not support the attempted oversight by Congress, the crisis will be punching us in the face. Some Trump supporters may realize that they are supporting a con man, but most will not. Democrats will have to mobilize other Democrats and Independents to vote Trump out of office. The bulk of the Republican Party has joined the cult.


    by rmrd0000 on Fri, 05/10/2019 - 8:51am

    I agree with every word about Trump' s  character but go tilt about his ability to operate  that long with the losses reported in the Times. Since he lies on everything else why think he told the truth to the IRS?


    by Flavius on Fri, 05/10/2019 - 10:49am

    We need the taxes to see if he is being supported by dubious financial institutions or foreign governments. The idea that losing $1 billion is a wise tax avoidance strategy is insane. He would have made a profit leaving the money untouched in a savings account or investing in other corporations.


    by rmrd0000 on Fri, 05/10/2019 - 11:23am

    If I understand you correctly, the generally adopted methods of cheating on taxes at the time were designed to avoid the stifling of credit.

    So this was something else. And some banks saw it as an opportunity.


    by moat on Fri, 05/10/2019 - 9:57pm

    Yeah.

    1. Decrease your income by depositing receipts  elsewhere, away, 

    2.Taxes eliminated, but then how do you pay the creditors- and your book keeper?

    3.So  replace the missing cash with opaque loans . low interest because secured ,back to back , by those offshore funds . 

    There's no such thing as operating year after year at a loss.

     


    by Flavius on Sat, 05/11/2019 - 10:43am

    Thanks for the clarity.

    This reminds me that there have been a variety of attempts to look into the use of shell corporations by Trump Org. But this is a well protected area of business law. The offshore banks who do that sort of thing are only exposed if money laundering reaches such a scale that the chain of ownership is revealed.

    In your experience in corporate finance, was this method of hiding wealth something "everybody" did or a playground for outliers?


    by moat on Sat, 05/11/2019 - 6:46pm

    Humph!


    by Flavius on Sun, 05/12/2019 - 8:15pm


    by artappraiser on Sun, 06/30/2019 - 10:22pm