Grant, it's rare to get us in a room together, let alone in the same country or continent
together.
These days, it's-- yeah, it is a rare occurrence.
So I think people will be really interested in getting some of the perspectives of some
of the things you've done this year.
Because you've been doing all sorts of amazing stuff, meeting some amazing people.
You've done some kind of epic presentations that people really loved as well.
So I'd love to just start with that, and we'll just get into-- just shoot the breeze, and
see what's on both of our minds, and where we're going, and what's interesting us, and
stuff like that.
These conversations are always so much fun.
We haven't had a chance to have one for such a long time.
So the fact that everyone else gets to listen in on it will be, actually, really good.
I think it might have been this time last year.
I think you're right.
I think it probably was.
Well, you kick off-- you start, and then I'll take you in a completely different direction.
How's that?
Yeah.
So I think everybody's been fascinated with the "In Conversations With" interview.
And it started off with-- I think, one of the best pieces of kind of immersive journalism
of any form was the Marc Cohodes.
Yeah, that was something.
It must have scared the shit out of you thinking, how am I going to do that again?
No, do you know what, it did.
But it's funny, because it's one of those things that-- I didn't know Marc.
I'd seen Marc present at Jim Grant's conference.
And like Joe Duran, there's sometimes you just get this one little piece of someone
that you just kind of go, wow, that's interesting.
And Mark was such a real guy.
He's honest, he's open, he's balls to the wall.
He doesn't care what anybody thinks.
But there's a truth to him that is just amazing.
And that's what we wanted to do, right, was let's get to the truth about this stuff.
Who better to do it with than Cohodes.
So we went out there to his farm.
And he and his wife, Aurora, and his son, Max, just couldn't have been nicer to us.
They said, right, the place is yours.
We'll take all day.
And he's just one of those guys you sit down and you connect with.
And that conversation, I'm getting goosebumps thinking about it just now.
There was one point in that where we were in his stables, and we were talking about
the '08 crisis, which for a short seller should have been the happiest days of his career.
And I kind of knew the story.
I knew roughly what had happened, but not the detail.
And I just kind of wanted to mention it, because I knew people at home would be watching and
going, well, '08, surely that must've been a good time for you.
So I kind of just said, tell us about your experiences in '08.
And when Marc started telling this story about what had happened to him and his fund during
that period, he had tears in his eyes.
I had a lump in my throat.
And I could see Franz, behind the camera, also getting a bit choked up.
It was so powerful, but real.
It was real.
It was an honest reaction to an honest question.
And you know we kind of had to cut afterwards.
And we're both being very sort of Planes, Trains, and Automobiles, "how about them Cowboys"
about it all.
But it was so powerful.
And you're right.
When we finished that-- Franz and I-- when we finished editing it and putting it all
together, we both looked at each other and said, this is a high bar.
But the guests have been just fantastic.
What was also great about the Marc Cohodes interview is that teed off a story that we've
been able to follow on Twitter.
And I know Marc's going to come back.
Talk a bit about the MiMedx story, and that whole perspective.
Because I don't know whether people have followed it, but that teed it up.
He kind of introduced that thing.
And then that whole thing's been playing out.
Well it's a phenomenal story.
And Marc has done this for his entire career.
And he said to me-- at the time, he said, this is the biggest fraud I've ever seen,
hands down, bar none.
And subsequent to our visit, literally a week later, he had two FBI agents show up at his
door-- I know.
you know, basically threatening him.
Prompted by MiMedx, right?
Prompted by the CEO of MiMedx calling the senator for Georgia, who's calling the FBI.
I mean, it's-- I mean this is what Marc feels he has pretty strong proof of.
And we will film the story.
We're literally working the dates out now.
We'll film it sometime in January.
Because he's saying there's a whole lot of stuff we don't know that went on that he can't
reveal.
Well, and I've been privy to it.
We've become very good friends after this.
And he's shown me some of this stuff.
It's extraordinary.
And this story is going to bring down an awful lot of influential people.
And when they talk about the end of cycles and when all the corruption and stuff comes
out, this is going to be such an incredible lightning rod for people to get a look at
what happens in the good times, and how it unravels in the bad times.
And this has taken a toll on Marc and his family.
I saw them a couple of months ago.
And it's been a really tough, tough year for them-- as a family, as people.
And Marc did a Periscope recently saying, I'm done with short selling.
I'm not going to do this anymore.
Really?
Yeah, because it's just-- although we'll see.
He might be back.
Because it's so deep within him, this hatred of fraud.
But it's been a brutal year.
Because it's like being an investigative journalist with your money on the line.
Yeah, exactly-- exactly right.
And that's really hard to deal with, particularly when what you're doing is fighting people.
It's not like short selling as, I think this stock's going down.
Correct.
It is having to build an intense case, and then going to battle to try and bring it out.
I mean, that takes a different kind of gumption.
It does.
And you're always aligned against, not only powerful interests, but also nobody in the
market wants to hear "fraud."
To that point-- you and I spoke to this so many times-- about, when it turns, it turns,
and this stuff all comes out.
So if you start to see fraud appearing, people know this is, we're turning; we're getting
to that point where people suddenly care again.
When the good times are rolling, no one cares if there's fraud.
It's just going up.
Let's buy it.
So to take a stand-- and the abuse Marc has had, on Twitter and places like that, and
he sticks his chest out and says, look, I'm here to be shot at.
Say what you want.
The truth will out.
But no one should have to go through that.
And there are other things that hopefully we'll get into today where this is happening.
But thank God for people like Marc as well, right?
So, I mean, that's been one of your themes.
I think if there's a theme that I look at amongst the "In Conversations With," you have
a love of the short seller, and you have a love of the value guy.
I do.
And I wear that on my sleeve.
So talk me through why.
Where does that come from?
And talk us through some of the guests that you've had that have kind of inspired you
in that journey and discovery of those two things.
The value thing has always resonated with me.
And there's a truth, and an integrity, and an honest to that, that I think is important.
And again, this is why you and I connected over Real Vision because it's something that's
important to us, this idea of truth, and fairness, and equity in that sense of the word is important
to us.
And so when I talk to these guys, the value guys, it's something that you can see, and
you can quantify, and you can make a judgment on what is value.
Value is subjective, but if someone tells you, this is how I measure value, it takes
away a lot of the opacity, a lot of the unknowns.
And you can say, OK, fine, if he's valuing it on that basis, do I agree with him, do
I not agree with him, do I think that is the correct way to value it.
It's a yardstick.
The short selling side of things, I find fascinating, because it's the hardest thing to do.
I've done it throughout my career-- sometimes successfully, sometimes terribly poorly.
But oftentimes, it's just timing.
You can get the story right-- like MiMedx went up after Marc brought this stuff out,
before it crashed to earth.
And when I talk to these guys, I want to understand, how do you get this right?
How do you do it effectively?
How do you not get carried away with the emotions of it.
Because it is an emotion thing.
Because you are saying, OK, you're all wrong, and I'm right, and this is why.
And if it's just a case of over-evaluation, that's a really dangerous hill to want to
die on, because valuations can get nuts.
If it's a fraud-- our mutual friend Rodney Boyd has been through this, and I know you've
spoken to him a bunch, and I've spoken to him a bunch-- you're basically out there saying,
look, everybody, and waving flags that no one wants to listen to.
So I'm fascinated how you deal with that, mentally, being set against everybody else.