• UnspecificGravity@piefed.social
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        2 days ago

        Only for normal people. If you are rich or a company like this you can leverage assets for a rate lower than the rate of return on your investments and come out ahead by financing over paying cash. Rich people don’t pay cash for anything.

      • IWW4@lemmy.zip
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        2 days ago

        The people buying it don’t give a fuck… it will be repaid by the company they are buying

          • pankuleczkapl@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            2 days ago

            Well, in fact it’s not that complicated - shareholders literally own the company - and this ownership results in both the right to decide what happens to the company and receiving dividends, which are supposed to come from the company’s surplus funds. In reality it’s not that straightforward, but that’s the general idea. So if a company spends money, you can think of it as spending shareholders’ money allocated in the company’s assets.

              • pankuleczkapl@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                2 days ago

                Sorry, I meant the whole idea is simple, but in reality capitalists exploit every single loophole to gain even more money, so there are laws against a lot of stuff - it would be that simple if people were trustworthy.

                • The_v@lemmy.world
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                  1 day ago

                  Originally shareholders received a part share in the total profitability of the company. A dividend was the main source of income from investing.

                  It didn’t take them long to figure out that buying and selling shares of a company to other investors was usually more profitable than dividends. Its a hell of a lot easier to lie about potential value of the company than it’s current reality.

                  So for the past 100+ years the market value of the shares are often separated from the reality of the company. The value of the shares only exists because people or automated programs are willing to pay the amount. This is how companies who are operating under a huge deficits have increasing stock prices.

                  Since the value of the shares can be so easily manipulated, market manipulation is the normal way investors make money today. It also means that major stockholders don’t give a fuck about long term value of the company, the employees, or the damage to society & the environment they cause. They only care about making quickest profits, then passing the dumpster fire they created onto somebody else.