Sugar daddy goes away
Donald Trump’s real estate empire could collapse “like falling dominoes”, experts believe, following a New York judge’s ruling that the former president’s business fortune was built on rampant fraud and blatant lies.
According to Michael Cohen, his former attorney and fixer, Trump is already effectively “out of business” in New York after Judge Arthur Engoron on Tuesday rescinded the licenses of the Trump Organization and other companies owned by Trump and his adult sons, Eric and Don Jr.
“Those companies will end up being liquidated … the judge has already determined that the fraud existed,” Cohen told CNN, hailing Engoron’s pretrial ruling in a civil case brought by Letitia James, the New York attorney general.
On Wednesday morning, in a confrontational post on his Truth Social website that branded the judge a “political hack”, Trump said Engoron “must be stopped”.
Trump on the other hand is an everything hack, an omni-hack. Everything he touches turns to hackery.
In his post on Wednesday, Trump decried the judge’s $18m valuation of Mar-a-Lago, claiming it was worth “100 times more than he values it”.
Attaboy. Continue as you began: inflate everything.
William Black, a white-collar criminologist, corporate fraud investigator and distinguished scholar in residence for financial regulation at the University of Minnesota law school, said: “In finance, once the dominoes start falling, it becomes basically impossible to save it.
“These properties are even more damaged goods today because of the success in demonstrating they are massively overvalued. The most likely thing, if you get an honest agent or receiver, they’re going to sell the properties at a loss. And when you’ve got a whole bunch of properties, with the first one you just desperately need to get some action and that gets discounted the most.”
Black, who helped expose congressional wrongdoing in the Lincoln Savings and Loans scandal of the 1980s, in which the financier Charles Keating inflated his company’s worth to bilk taxpayers for billions, called Engoron’s ruling “devastating”. He believes Trump insiders and employees would have incentive to come forward with more information if he loses his wealth and influence.
“What we experienced in the Savings and Loan debacle, we would put in an honest manager and employees would start coming to that person over time and say, ‘You know, you really ought to look at this,’” Black said.
“Trump is monumentally, stupidly greedy in that he isn’t actually paying for a number of key lieutenants in terms of their legal needs, and they’re facing financial collapse of their own, [such as] the Rudy Giulianis of this world. But a lot of folks can sink Trump.
“Having this ability to control all these assets, even if they’re massively overvalued, meant hope springs eternal among the Trump folks that he can use that money and influence to help them, but if Trump instead ends up bereft of control over the overwhelming bulk of his assets, and has lots of liabilities, sugar daddy goes away.”
Thoughts and prayers, people, thoughts and prayers.
When he was first elected, somebody in the backroom of my office was trying to tell me how he had been so successful at building immense wealth from nothing. I guess he didn’t realize how literally he meant it.
Trump certainly believes that the games he’s played with valuations and tax are smart – he’s said so often enough. A lot (most?) of his fans seem to believe that as well – We’ve all seen interviews with the ‘men and women on the street’ – and heard them say he’s smart to play the game, not a crook. The IRS and Banks/Insurance companies are never going to be the public’s favourites, so it’s hardly surprising that crimes that harm those institutions are excused by many. Very few people understand just how much crimes of this type harm all of us by distorting the financial markets (let’s not pretend Trump is alone, he’s just been too blatant about it).
I hope the stupid, evil fucker is forced to crowdsource funding to buy his goddamn groceries.
I’d like to start a Gofundme account to raise the money to buy Mar-a-Fatso and turn it into a low income housing complex.
Pliny, much as that appeals (and would burn Trumps desiccated and shrivelled soul), apparently there is a covenant on the land preventing further development. Exactly the reason the Court determined that Trump’s valuation of the land was fanciful, given that the rationale was specifically based on intensive development for residential. I might add that Trumps claim of 100x the $18M Court valuation is fanciful bullshit even by his standards.
I mean, there’s this large, luxury home just a few minutes walk away…
https://www.fancypantshomes.com/luxury/mar-a-lago-neighboring-mansion-sells/
Just weeks ago it sold for US$50M, sitting on a 2347m2 (0.58acre) site. Mar-a-lago is 5806m2, so even fully developed with equivalent properties it’s just US$124M. Not relevant though, because he can’t develop further as of right.
Then pony up the taxes on the 100x value, cheater.
Hah! Trump is eventually going to realize that he’s up against far smarter people than he’s got.
Back in the 70s and 80s there were these things called mini-computers: smaller than a mainframe, with maybe a five-figure price tag. There was a whole industry that built them: DEC, Prime, Wang, Data General…
In the 90s, PCs got powerful enough do the jobs that mini-computers did and the entire industry promptly collapsed. Wang left behind its offices in Lowell: three towers on 15 acres, 1.2M sq ft, originally built for $60M.
They sold in bankruptcy for $525K.
That’s mark-to-market. And there wasn’t even any fraud or malfeasance: just a company that went out of business.
Trump could be facing similar valuations for his properties.