If something sounds too unbelievable to be true, then it’s probably because it’s not true. Even if it’s printed in the mainstream media.
So the story about the kid at Stuyvesant who made $72 million in the stock market is complete fiction.
Thank you “McFly” for the link.
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Lion of the Blogosphere 
I want to personally thank these two young men for doing their little part to degrade the reputations of the media.
Dan
December 16, 2014 at 7:01 AM
It is noteworthy that right-leaning websites did a lot better. They reported it as, ‘Here’s this story making the rounds, which we are highly skeptical about.’
Dan
December 16, 2014 at 9:38 AM
Perhaps part of the problem is that the kid’s name is “Mohamed Islam.” The media is really hungry for stories which put Muslims in a positive light.
Anyway, my rule of thumb is close to yours but a bit different: Any self-serving, uncorroborated story is most likely false.
sabril
December 16, 2014 at 7:17 AM
I believe the surname Islam is the Anglicization of the Eslami, which is a common last name among Iranians. Never had any problems with Persian folks, they come across as more affable than your average East Asian in America, and that says a lot.
The recent Sydney, hostage killing, involved an Iranian man with Jihad leanings. Australia is a place where misogynists make their case. It’s worse over there!
JS
December 16, 2014 at 10:11 AM
“I believe the surname Islam is the Anglicization of the Eslami, which is a common last name among Iranians”
The article seems to indicate that this person’s family is from Bangla Desh.
“Never had any problems with Persian folks, they come across as more affable than your average East Asian in America, and that says a lot.”
Possibly that’s because a lot of the Persian people you meet in the US are from the elite families which fled Iran in the late 70s when the Shah fell.
sabril
December 16, 2014 at 12:50 PM
Possibly that’s because a lot of the Persian people you meet in the US are from the elite families which fled Iran in the late 70s when the Shah fell.
And why do Asians irk me, including those with wealth? Not only do Asians make boring elites, Asian elites, are far from being affable (especially Chinamen with deep pockets who come over for school and buy up our real estate). HBD? I think that’s the answer, since Asians have a tendency to be less “pro-social”, even comparing to Muslims.
JS
December 16, 2014 at 4:00 PM
I agree that Iranians are nice people.
Yakov
December 16, 2014 at 10:19 PM
Yup. Media credulity is always enhanced for positive stories about non-whites or females, and media skepticism and hostility is always enhanced for whites or males. It’s all pretty funny when you think about how people from totally low-trust societies with ages-old histories of cheating and chicanery (Asians, Middle Easterners, Africans) are given a pass whenever possible, when they should be treated with the utmost skepticism. So here we have “Mr. Islam and his friend Damir Tulemaganbetov,” and naive white girl reporter Jessica Pressler falls for it. But then, she only went to Temple and not the Ivy League, so you know. There’s that.
The About Me page on her website (which contains nothing else) prominently features an aggressive and threatening image of a large black man.
http://jessicapressler.com/
There is so much crazy in white women these days.
peterike
December 16, 2014 at 11:57 AM
Wow! That is really quite appalling.
Dome_Town
December 16, 2014 at 1:33 PM
America is always a high trust society under the supervision of low trust individuals.
JS
December 16, 2014 at 2:04 PM
And if you followed my comments, I said earlier in the year, that White America has partially assimilated with black america.
JS
December 16, 2014 at 2:06 PM
And further, Peterike, I think this country is becoming a Brazil; the difference is that White females are the only ones who seem to take the multiracialism in this country with enthusiasm. By the way, those people you’ve mentioned are a lot more tribal as well.
JS
December 16, 2014 at 2:22 PM
Yep, just yesterday I stated that it’s a fraud to an incredulous audience of HVAC workers wanting to put money into stocks. My twenty years on Wall Street taught me something, lol.
Sabril, bingo. Seeing the name Mohammed Islam immediately heightened my suspicion.
Yakov
December 16, 2014 at 7:41 AM
Yakov, the NYT had a great article yesterday about your thriving busboy friend!
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/15/nyregion/a-growing-economic-recovery-bypasses-low-wage-workers-and-their-tables.html?_r=0
Fiddlesticks
December 16, 2014 at 9:00 AM
I’m looking forward to de Blasio to come out and say “value transference industries” are nothing but another apartheid, White racist paradigm, to keep racial minorities oppressed.
JS
December 16, 2014 at 12:08 PM
In the context of a post about seeing beyond the media hype and manipulation your comment is funny. A couple each making $450 a week is doing OK even assuming that they really only make that amount. There is nothing wrong with working for a living.
Yakov
December 16, 2014 at 1:14 PM
Thanks. By the way, one story which received surprisingly little attention was that of the English schoolgirl who saved the lives of many people on a beach in Thailand just before the big tidal wave a few years back. Apparently, she was on vacation with her family and she had learned about tidal waves in school just a few weeks earlier. When the water started pulling back, she told her parents who told the lifeguards that this was a sign of big trouble; the beach was cleared and many lives were surely saved.
I think there is much less hunger for stories which demonstrate superior European/Western thinking.
sabril
December 16, 2014 at 11:46 AM
Truth can be stranger than fiction but this story set off my bs detector. I mean, you can’t even make gold that quickly off the AH if you start with limited initial investment (and if he didn’t, why is he going to stuy which is 40% free lunch?).
slithy toves
December 16, 2014 at 9:17 AM
The stock market is rigged. Otherwise more high IQ people would get rich
pumpkinperson
December 16, 2014 at 10:00 AM
I’ve been a reader of Ben Edelman (the Harvard prof who had 15 minutes of fame last week for arguing over $4 on Chinese takeout) for years, and he built a strong case that a lot of GOOG’s ad revenues are derived from deception.
Never stopped the stock from blasting into the stratosphere.
Fiddlesticks
December 16, 2014 at 12:01 PM
but High IQ people do get rich, either by managing money or with special strategies
grey enlightenment
December 16, 2014 at 1:03 PM
High IQ people do get rich but not as often you would expect given that the stock market seems like an ideal way for someone who is good with numbers & information to make a ton of money really quickly, so why aren’t more of them smart enough to take advantage of it? Why isn’t everyone with a 180+ IQ a multimillionaire by 25 just from investing on the side given how effortless it would be to people at that level. One reason might be that the information needed to make smart investments is not very accessible to the general public
pumpkinperson
December 16, 2014 at 2:31 PM
they do. there’s many instances of high-IQ ppl turning thousands of dollars into hundreds of thousands by trading stocks and option. high-IQ people are good at recognizing patter and interpreting the macro econ events in ways the lower IQ people miss
grey enlightenment
December 16, 2014 at 3:44 PM
There are also many instances of high-IQ people turning hundreds of thousands of collars into thousands of dollars by trading stocks and options.
Lion of the Blogosphere
December 16, 2014 at 4:29 PM
“The stock market is rigged.” That’s a bone headed thing to say. If what you mean is that the biggest firms use their great means to achieve their desired results, you’re right. But that doesn’t mean the whole thing is “rigged.” It just means that they’re very good at their jobs. Is the medical industry “rigged” because the best treatments are many times prohibitively expensive?
Dome_Town
December 16, 2014 at 1:29 PM
The average investor can’t even set stop or limit orders without the info being viewable by traders with Level II quote access.
The Abbot of Lufford
December 17, 2014 at 4:59 PM
Where are the customers’ yachts?
Glengarry
December 16, 2014 at 6:38 PM
Things have gotten so bad with the inaccuracy of reporting, clickbait and sensationalism. The “Yellow Press” of the early 20th century is now back.
There’s probably an opening for a website that brands itself as the go-to site for providing in-depth, factual reporting. .
I’m a fan of Lion and Sailer because they both write about the world the way it actually looks from the office, getting in line at the store, walking down the street, or the way you describe things in conversation with family and friends. Without all the special-interest strictures filtering and distorting everything.
Not a coincidence that Lion and Sailer both credit realist author Tom Wolfe as an influence.
Ava Lon
December 16, 2014 at 10:34 AM
I was reading Wolfe’s book From Bauhaus to Our House this week. Hope to finish it.
Lion of the Blogosphere
December 16, 2014 at 11:49 AM
“There’s probably an opening for a website that brands itself as the go-to site for providing in-depth, factual reporting.”
Yes, that would be the New York Times. Now you know it’s not true, and I know it’s not true, but most people don’t know it’s not true.
peterike
December 16, 2014 at 11:59 AM
the same for reddit and 4chan. the people there do a good job debunking the lies and omissions from the MSM
grey enlightenment
December 16, 2014 at 1:05 PM
I’m not sure why so many people have such a strong impetus in defaming this kid, almost like a personal vendetta. According to his own statement, the number was taken out of context, and now the left is making him their latest target in their war on success even though he’s not even a millionaire.
It is possible to turn thousands of dollars into millions in the stock and futures market in a short period of time, and to do so with skill instead of luck. There’s thousands of professionals who do so on a consistent basis, although they don’t go around bragging about it. Its not by statistical chance either, but by innate skills and talent in much the same way some people, by virtue of genetics, excel at math, athleticism, or any other ability. This is why the left was so eager to trash this kid because they hate it when someone succeeds without their government help.
grey enlightenment
December 16, 2014 at 11:00 AM
Professionals at places like Goldman Sachs have a lot of inside info that a high school student doesn’t have access to.
As I say over and over again, the way to become rich in the stock market is to get an MBA from Harvard or Wharton, get into the industry, and then start your own hedge fund where you get to keep 20% of OTHER PEOPLE’s profits, with no downside risk when your fund has a bad year.
This is mostly how Warren Buffett did it.
Lion of the Blogosphere
December 16, 2014 at 11:51 AM
Or know people who manage a hedge fund. No need for a Harvard or Wharton credential, if your parents know someone who is TOOS in that industry. What many upper middle class SWPL parents do to their kids, by sending them to such prestigious institutions is just nothing by icing on the cake.
JS
December 16, 2014 at 12:06 PM
Most normal people would feel extremely embarrassed and mortified about losing other people’s money or even underperforming, which are inevitable over time. And the kind of people with enough cash to be allowed into hedge funds tend to be vocal and entitled. You have to have a lot of alphatude to get past that.
Fiddlesticks
December 16, 2014 at 12:09 PM
All super-rich shamelessly rake in huge money while contributing nothing to society.
Lion of the Blogosphere
December 16, 2014 at 1:13 PM
yeah that’s also a good way to beat the market
grey enlightenment
December 16, 2014 at 12:12 PM
Warren Buffett got rich because he deeply understands monopolies of all kinds. There are far more monopolies than just the phone company.
For example, he got into Coke beverage co early on because he understood that they are a dominant brand that grows stronger because they are already strong. Because of their size, there are very low costs per bottle (production and distribution) and huge free advertising in the form of people already walking around drinking Cokes. And then they could become instantly big in every country, rapidly becoming the number one beverage company in every market.
Whether railroads or Fruit of the Loom underpants, Buffett is really good and finding companies where for various reasons a competitor would have a really hard time knocking off the leader. I guess brands of underpants are like polical parties: people don’t like to switch. Buffett probably found that out when nobody else was paying attention.
Dan
December 16, 2014 at 12:37 PM
And perhaps if he was investing only his own money that he earned from a middle-class job, he would have funded a decent retirement fund, but he wouldn’t have become a billionaire.
Lion of the Blogosphere
December 16, 2014 at 1:15 PM
Sociopath is the appropriate word. All value transference niches (including Politics), are only for sociopaths who would lie to their teeth and have no remorse for their greedy yet bad behavior.
I see this country in a complete moral dissolution, as scheming is at an all time high across all boards.
JS
December 16, 2014 at 3:48 PM
“This is why the left was so eager to trash this kid”
Were they?? The original story was part of a set of stories called “Reasons to Love New York.” The kid was presented as a genius immigrant hero. He was set to appear on CNBC. Where was he trashed?
peterike
December 16, 2014 at 12:05 PM
CNBC is generally right wing. The immigrant genius success story fits squarely into the neo republican talking point. But on comment sections ,especially after it was revealed to be a hoax, the scorn was considerable. No one gave him the benefit of the doubt.
grey enlightenment
December 16, 2014 at 1:33 PM
“It is possible to turn thousands of dollars into millions in the stock and futures market in a short period of time, and to do so with skill instead of luck.”
I’m skeptical of this claim – can you provide proof? (Unless “skill” includes things like insider trading)
sabril
December 16, 2014 at 1:51 PM
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Dennis there’s many more, but that was the most obvious . people don’t realize how much leverage you can get with options and futures
grey enlightenment
December 16, 2014 at 2:04 PM
From your article:
“The exact system taught to the Turtles by Dennis has been published in at least two books and can be back-tested to check its performance in recent years. The result of such back-test shows a drastic drop in performance after 1986, and even a flat performance from 1996 to 2009.”
Assuming that he was not cheating somehow, it sounds like he was simply lucky.
sabril
December 17, 2014 at 2:03 AM
Have we already forgotten the Manti Teo Story from two years ago. The sports media loved the story without realizing that Samoan are notorious for being pranksters, that they math and geography did not add up, and that it could be easily checked.
What is amazing is how people are so bad at estimating or understanding the scale of things that they fall for obvious lies.
superdestroyer
December 16, 2014 at 12:40 PM
That fat little wanker has transformed himself into the Stephen Glass of finance.
Saskatoon Sammy
December 16, 2014 at 1:15 PM
how can one be fat and little? some of you guys are acting like he screwed your girlfriend/wife or something
grey enlightenment
December 16, 2014 at 1:36 PM
One can indeed be both overweight and diminutive – and I am more amused by Mr. Islam than offended by him.
Saskatoon Sammy
December 17, 2014 at 11:33 AM
Based on my experience, most women fall for sensationalism quite easily, if its about money, and all the crass materialism and status whoring that this country pushes to the T.
JS
December 16, 2014 at 2:37 PM
You’re welcome, Lion. Thanks for the recognition.
There is a gap in the current news eco-system for on-the-ground details about stories.
I’m reading up now on how the forgotten Wikipedia co-founder Larry Sanger is investing in a news website called Infobitt that aggregates facts from articles that are on the web, which is interesting and is relevant to this discussion because Sanger is trying to deal with the problem of the media’s systemic biases
http://www.newsweek.com/wikipedia-news-becomes-open-public-292613
Sanger’s doesn’t get to heart of the problem; There are already millions of people out there aggregate and interpret the information that is placed on the web–but that information only comes in dribs and drabs from sources.
Despite the incredible advances in information-sharing, there is still is very little actual fact-gathering done in the first place (probably less now than before as newspapers go out of business). And 99% of it still happens under the editorial direction of MSM.
The real innovation would be a way present information online gathered by people who know what they’re doing who take photos, video, do interviews, obtain documents and put it all online with little or no editing for content and space. One of the reasons VICE media has made such a big splash is that they’ve done something a little like this with video.
McFly
December 16, 2014 at 11:08 PM