Somehow, we'll find something to charge you for.

How do you know that?

Really? Meet my friends in counter intelligence. They'd like a word with you. They have a comfy room for you in GITMO while they're talking.

Any reasons I'd have for traveling to Monaco would tend to make the actual travel expenses look like loose pocket change. I'd much rather (illegally) characterize a trip as recreational than have to explain to Herr TaxMan what kind of business I was conducting. After all, we are living in a regime of strict capital controls. On the other hand, those who don't know how to move assets other than to stuff them into carry-on luggage don't deserve to keep them.

Anyone?

Asking for a friend in Chinese intelligence.

It's not the company's information. It's mine.

... have its own in-house AI program? Like Google has Gemini and Microsoft has Copilot and (to a degree) OpenAI.

It seems to me that Oracle is just some rich sucker that got invited to a back-room poker game. Like Warren Buffett said: If you're playing poker and after 15 minutes you don't know who the patsy is, you are the patsy.

AI is just a shakedown.

More vulnerable, yes. But if you put it up to a popular vote, the nursing home residents get the PPE and the hospital staff, exposed to higher viral loads don't.
Sorry to break it to you. But grandpa is probably going to die if he catches Covid, masks or not. But the hospitals have to stay open for a lot more people than just the Covid patients. There are heart attacks, traffic accidents, industrial injuries. And yes, here in Seattle, the public hospitals have more then their deserved share of drug overdoses. (My opinion: Outlaw Naloxone. Users demonstrated a desire to die when they took the drugs. Leave them on the sidewalk.) If you put it up to a vote, grandpa wins. The hospital staffs stay home. Lots more people die. This is where the experts were right*.

The whole "listen to the people" exercise is well known here in Seattle. It's a process wherein you have public comment. You sit on the city council and nod your head. And then you ignore the people's shrieks and do the right thing anyway. But this is why we limit the power of bureaucrats. They have their areas of expertise, but we don't want them to accumulate power beyond those we granted to them, which is human nature. So; Sorry. We all know that the people would vote in UBI. But there's this little issue of property rights. And we can't just go squeezing a smaller group of people to keep the majority of voters happy.

*The PPE problem was pretty dire in NYC. Where they came within weeks of running out at city hospitals. Until an NGO stepped in, bought a load of it and contributed it. So my question is: Clearly the supply was there if the NGOs could buy it. Why couldn't the city? My guess: They are a bunch of cheap bastards that refused to pay retail.

One of the closest governments to a "pure democracy" is Switzerland. Where the cantons hold citizen initiative votes about half a dozen times a year. But that's only on major issues. Do you think the people show up for weekly town meetings to decide the priorities for fixing potholes? Doubtful. But that's where most of the work governing occurs. The people just don't have the time for that level of detail.

Democracies work when everyone can sit around the campfire and come to a concensus about what work needs to be done tomorrow. That group size is limited by Dunbar's Number. Interestingly, Native Americans are quite proud of the fact that they were democratically governed. Not a surprise when you look at how large their typical villages were.

Outright? Not very much. Most of their holdings are through mutual funds and other types of equity holding structures. Pension funds are really big in that much-hated segment of the market: private equity. Good luck even trying to track those investments down.

... which they manage on behalf of their investors. The funds don't actually own the underlying securities.

Question: When your mutual fund sells 100 shares of Apple, who is responsible for paying tax on the capital gains?

Answer: You are. Because those shares were held beneficially for you. They didn't actually belong to the fund.

I'm thinking you had better stick to a 0.5% interest savings account. The equity investment landscape is pretty confusing for people who are the product of the modern communist school systems. Where they preach: Workers should own the means of production. I just checked my portfolio. It turns out I do own those means.

The largest single investor in US markets is Warren Buffet, at $147 billion at the end of 2024. CalPERS has $500 billion in assets (pension and health funds). And that's just one pension fund of many. Individuals hold 38% of the market equity. People like Bezos and Musk might appear to own billions individually. But much of that is in their own companies and is relatively illiquid as a result.

If your financial planner doesn't know how the equities markets look, I'd take my money elsewhere if I were you.

Where do you think pension funds put their money?

The largest (wealthiest) block of shareholders in this country are the pension funds. Don't like the way business is being run? Complain to your union rep.

Actually, the delegation of powers to various government entities and the people is arguably just as important. That's why we have democratically elected representatives instead of a pure democracy. Or founding fathers feared the resulting mob rule.