The Motive File @TheMotiveFile

In 2012, JPMorgan traders breached all five major risk limits on a portfolio. Instead of cutting the trades, the bank raised limits and changed risk models. The trades eventually lost at least $6.2 billion. The warning signs were there. The bank just didn’t act on them.

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@JohnLeFevre The first two are probably more accurate than people want to admit. A lot of interviews are just someone deciding whether they’d enjoy working with you. But number three is where I’d draw the line. Being likable can get you hired. Getting caught lying can get you fired.

@DOGEQEEN What gets me is how calm and smart these guys were about it. They didn’t try to be heroes by confronting anyone. They just used what they had, blocked the exits, and gave police enough time to get there. That little girl is going home because a few ordinary people paid attention.

Going from $32 billion to $62 billion in seven years is a huge jump. I think taxpayers deserve a clear explanation of where that money is going. Property values have changed, sure, but that doesn’t mean every increase in tax revenue should automatically become a permanent increase in government spending.

@sylithon Rom

August 1, 2012. Knight Capital updated its trading software. One of its eight servers missed the update. In 45 minutes, the system executed millions of unintended trades. Loss: over $460 million. The SEC later found that 97 error emails had gone out before the market even opened.

MoviePass offered unlimited movies for $9.95 a month. Then it started trying to stop its own customers from watching movies. I’m not kidding. In 2017, the company launched a subscription that let people see a movie in theaters almost every day for less than $10 a month. Customers loved it. There was just one problem. MoviePass was losing money when people actually used the service. According to the FTC, the company eventually started invalidating subscribers’ passwords, blaming suspicious account activity. It also introduced ticket verification requirements that made it harder for customers to use what they’d already paid for. Some of the biggest movie fans became the customers the company wanted to avoid. Think about how backwards that is. You build a business promising people something they’ll love. Then the people who love it most become your biggest financial problem. At what point does a great deal for customers become a terrible business?

@SamaHoole I believe he genuinely loved those bears. That’s what makes this so sad. But the bears had no idea they were supposed to be his friends. They were just being bears. He spent 13 years getting comfortable around them and somehow mistook that for being safe.

@DoctorFishbones The funniest part is that roughly $72 billion of that loss came from accounting charges tied to its rising valuation. Imagine getting so valuable that your financial statements make you look like you’re going broke. AI economics are getting ridiculous.

@AGGancarski That last part is interesting. People talk a lot about how good it feels to break an old habit, but almost never about missing the highs that came with it. Getting healthier doesn’t necessarily mean every part of the process feels good.

@NoLimitGains Forget the dramatic mortgage claim for a second. If France has to borrow at these rates, imagine what that does to everyone else trying to get financing. That’s the part I’d be watching.

@eMTBrides Three hours of crying while her husband slept peacefully three rows away? 😂 I’m starting to think he was perfectly happy with the seating arrangement. You can ask someone to switch seats, but you can’t expect them to give up a seat they paid for.

@unusual_whales The interesting part is that Meta actually created a new class of shares so Zuckerberg could raise cash without giving up voting control. Most people can only respond to a tax bill by paying it or moving. He can negotiate an entirely new financial arrangement.

The part about banks refusing to foreclose because the borrowers are big clients is what caught my attention. If lenders don’t want to recognize losses, owners can’t afford repairs, and data providers are paid to stay optimistic, who actually has an incentive to admit how bad things are?

@JoePompliano The smartest part is that the NFL isn’t just investing in these companies. It can actually help make them more valuable by doing business with them. And if the investment profits really sit outside player revenue sharing, I can see why the owners love this setup.

Imagine going to work expecting to spend the day helping little kids learn, and ending up on the floor pretending to be dead just to survive. No teacher should ever have to experience that. My heart breaks for those families, and I hope Becky gets the care and support she needs to recover.

@Abbywillia69841 The part where Maya asked if the doctor was mad at her broke my heart. And what really gets me is that the parents asked for help multiple times, but nobody actually checked what was wrong. Seven hours of waiting because of one mistake that could’ve been caught in minutes.

@EricLDaugh I’m curious who he actually means by “the people pulling the strings.” If he’s got evidence of someone secretly calling the shots, I’d love to see it. Otherwise, this is going to turn into a whole lot of political drama.

In 2017, Equifax exposed the personal information of roughly 147 million people. Names. Birth dates. Addresses. Social Security numbers. And here’s what bothers me most about this story. Most of those people never chose to become Equifax customers. The company collected their financial information because that’s how the credit reporting business works. Then hackers got in. Federal regulators later alleged that Equifax had failed to take basic security precautions, including patching a known vulnerability. In 2019, the company agreed to a settlement worth at least $575 million. But think about the people whose information was stolen. You can change a password. You can’t just get a new birthday or erase your Social Security number from the internet. I find it strange that a company can hold so much information about your life when you have so little say in the relationship.

In 2019, WeWork was valued at $47 billion. Four years later, it filed for bankruptcy. And here’s what still gets me. WeWork wasn’t selling some revolutionary technology. It was renting office space. The company signed long-term leases, turned the buildings into attractive shared offices, and rented the space out on much shorter terms. Customers could leave. WeWork still had to pay the landlords. In 2018 alone, the company reported about $1.7 billion in operating losses. Yet investors kept pouring money in, and the company was being valued like a massive tech success story. I understand why people loved the idea. The offices looked great. The founder was charismatic. Everyone was talking about the future of work. But somebody still had to pay the rent. That’s the part I find fascinating about business hype. Sometimes the numbers are sitting right there, and people would rather believe the story.