Mark Cuban seems to have a good grasp of social mood. He profited handsomely from the upswing with his technology company Broadcom. Now it looks like he wants to profit from the downswing in mood by funding a company that will root out fraud and corruption at corporations - and he will get a cut from the resulting collapse in their share price. Note that it is founded on the premise that there will be plenty of corruption to profit from.
--Michael Flagg
We talked about the potential for a “new and improved” wave of corporate scandals on May 27. Since then we’ve gotten “The Next Options Scandal” (Washington Post, June 10, 2006). Cuban’s right; this is only the tip of the iceberg. But I’m not so sure about his grasp of social mood. The problem with Shareslueth, as its described here, is that in trying to cash in on its research, Cuban may get dragged into the scandals he hopes to profit by. The potential for conflicts of interest is high. Besides, shorting stocks right “before the information is made available” is a rude way of taking advantage of subscribers. |
