Search Results for: palo alto

About My $17,00 per month Office

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I was intrigued to read this article a few days ago that the most expensive office space in the country is here in Palo Alto. The most extreme is up on Sand Hill Road, which is venture capital-land, and nearby on University Avenue (which the article incorrectly states as the headquarters of Facebook, which was never true).

It brings to mind a vivid memory for me. As you no doubt recall, the NASDAQ bubble burst in March 2000. At the time, I was running the company I had started, Prophet Financial Systems, and we needed office space, since the delapidated hair salon (seriously………) we were using as office space was going to be demolished.

The interesting thing is that even though the bubble had clearly burst, the demand for real estate for startups had not. It's sort of like the commercial real estate market didn't get the memo that the bubble had popped. I spent the summer looking for office space, and let's just say the pickings were slim. At one point, I even considered a smelly, greasy abadoned restaurant space for our office.

I finally wound up renting a century-old house in Palo Alto. Here it is:

0915-everett

The rent was $17,000 per month, and at the time, I was glad to pay it! Just to be clear on this, it's not like we had millions of dollars of VC money in the bank. Those dollars really mattered, and it weighed on me to pay that much, but – well – we needed somewhere for our people to sit.

When we had out-of-town visitors, I could tell they felt a little sorry that we were living "on the cheap" in such a run-down place. Little did they know that we were paying far more than they were for their midtown Manhattan "A-class" office space.

It didn't take long, though, for office space to start getting back to reality, as more and more startups went belly-up. Even during our lease, I negotiated the monthly rate down to $15,000, then $12,000, then $10,000. I don't remember the precise figures, but I do know that, even though we were contractually obliged at a given rate, I was still able to get things trimmed to more realistic levels.

By late 2003, when we were ready to move again (this time, to a really, really nice office in a proper building), the rate was very reasonable again, and we were able to have a much nicer, much bigger office for a small fraction of what I had been paying before.

My point in this is that I am getting a sense of deja vu about this valley. The bubble has burst, but people haven't really accepted it, and there is still, in some quarters, a sense that things aren't just good, but better than ever.

If nothing else, I'm sure glad I don't need office space. I'd rather keep the cash for myself.

Labor Flavor Saver

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Well, I've been watching the ES chip, chip, chip away all through Sunday evening and Monday morning, and it is a good, happy thing. It is 6:55 in the morning in Palo Alto as I am typing this, and a few minutes ago, I took a screen shot showing that the ES was at its last support level before breaking beneath an important trendline.

Well, I took a fresh look at it, and the ES had dropped another 6 points, and that trendline I mentioned was shattered. So the focus is no longer on support but instead on how far this thing could drop.

Let's take a look at what happened last time important support was violated.

0905-es

I think the likelihood of the ES making its way to my target of 1050 this month just went much higher. The most likely market to lead the way there is our new friend the Euro. Again, by the time you are reading this, these charts could be incredibly stale, but here's what I'm looking at now:

0905-EURO

This is a huge, huge month for news. Shalom's big announcement on September 21st might be what pivots the market to its last hurrah before the ferocious bear market I've been dreaming about kicks in. The monster event closest to us is the German high court's decision on Wednesday which could drop a nuclear bomb on the Euro. Then both Shalom and the POTUS are yacking it up on Thursday with their usual crap that won't make any difference to anyone.

Look, the market is doomed. The bulls are going to be completely mauled, and this market isn't going to bottom until February 5, 2013. We have to deal with the crap that the politicians are going to hurl our way in order to "save" the market, so my main goal is to not get badly hurt during those instances when the Washington wackos try to muck the natural cycle up (which they did in a horrendous way from September 2010 until July 2011). This bear market is natural and necessary. The politicians trying to get in its way are heretics against the forces of what is right and proper.

You can't stop what's coming.

The tricky thing is that profit opportunities are swift and usually hard to predict. I consider myself well-positioned right now, with about 100 shorts and 0 longs, although I wish my commitment level was 200% instead of 70% (naturally), but risk management is an important part of the equation as well. Who knows – by Tuesday morning the ES might be in the green, although I think it's about as likely as Oprah trimming down to an attractive waist size and keeping it there indefinitely.

As I type my last paragraph, the Euro seems to be steadfastly refusing to crack 1.4053, which is the oh-my-God level on my chart. There are a lot of fun posts from this weekend, so I'm sorry to jump in like this and stomp on them, but I wanted to share my thoughts on the latest drop. I personally think Tuesday is going to be terrific for the bears, but my don't-get-too-greedy level is 1050 on the ES.

POTW: Combovers

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The Peeve Of The Week (POTW) is an occasional feature on Slope which allows me to (a) gripe about something which bugs me, whether justified or not (b) put up a post when there's nothing in particular I want to say about the market. In spite of its moniker, the POTW may or may not shown up weekly. In any event, here's a new entry:

I have a deep fondness for authenticity, and in a world increasingly saturated in fakeness, those things that are genuine are increasingly precious.

Much of the fakery in the modern world relates to physical appearance. Women have fake boobs, fake rears, and fake faces. Men have fake chests, fake foreheads, and – – all too often  - fake hair.

Perhaps I'm being insensitive, blessed as I am with a very full head of hair at whatever ripe old age I currently am. However, one thing worse than masking baldness with a rug is to take whatever surviving hairs you have and draping them over the top of your head in an effort to simulate follicular fullness. There are 45,000 people in Palo Alto, but there's this one chap I remember seeing many times, only because his massive combover is so obvious and sad.

If your hair is falling out, don't worry about it! It's no sin to be partly or wholly bald; just take a look at all the shaved heads in modern culture to see how sexy some people consider this look. But if you want to announce to the world that you desperately crave their approval, just do a combover. It works every time.

Hair-Donald-Trump1

Hunkered Down

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There probably won't be all that many posts during trading hours today for several reasons:

(1) The market is – at least as I'm typing this – down hard, and that's going to occupy a lot of my attention;

(2) The overpriced dimwits at Palo Alto Utilities are shutting down my power for four hours, and I'll be doing all kinds of MacGyver-ish manuveurs to keep my trading systems running;

(3) There's no guest content in the hopper.

So you can occupy your time by clicking ads (which has been awfully sparse lately!) or chatting amongst yourselves. See ya later!

0711-outage