AAA

fannypackbuttsnack

Indie games are where it's at these days imo, AAA games are mostly corporate sludge

MadHaterz

Happy to see others seeing the light with Ubisoft. The last title I played was Black Flag and that was ok. Their games have always been clunky and rough around the edges. It seems like they put in just enough effort for it to be a "game" and nothing more. I haven't seen any titles that go above and beyond, Far Cry doesn't count. It's basically been the same copy pasted game since Far Cry 3. Assassins Creed games have been ass and near copies of each other for the longest time, Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon was dog shit, WatchDogs had potential and they fucked that too. I don't know who buys their games anymore. Ubisoft is just a weird company to me, never been a AAA studio in my eyes.

No_Annual_6059

My opinion is AAA game aren’t what it used to be before, Ubi is still called as a AAA studio but the profit ain’t there anymore, some independent studio are doing way better with less budget. Ubi as one of the “smallest-big” studio is within the firsts to get rekt.

Shokeybutsi

The only AAA game studios I trust these days are Rockstar, CPRD.l and larian studios.    Indie developers are way better.  

deukhoofd

People are really overestimating how rare kernel drivers are. They are extremely common. Installed an AAA game that has anticheat (EasyAnticheat, Battleye, etc)? You probably have a kernel driver running that checks if you're running cheat software. Like [here](https://www.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/news/dev/dev-null-anti-cheat-kernel-driver/)'s an article from Riot Games mocking people worrying about the new kernel driver anticheat they were introducing.

tennesseespring

Why does anyone buy AAA corporate debt at 5% when money markets pay more?

Boogerhead1

Was going to say this, the value is based off scarcity and not any value it creates.  If I buy a 20 year AAA bond with a 5% coupon I know that I will get 5% a year in interest and my principal back after 20 years. With metals it's like it may rise 10% over 10 years or it may slow burn -5% for 30 years. Zero value assets have no place in one's portfilio especially when the enemy is inflation.

bhutams

Graphics designers are not graphics programmers. In the industry, software engineers that specialize in computer graphics are called graphics programmers. We make the software your graphics designers use. You’d know that if you had any depth in your education/workplace. I work at AAA studios on games, you use a toy language to work on microcontrollers. We are not the same.

novalain

Godot is great for smaller projects but honestly Unity is miles ahead in terms of features, build support etc. For serious studios within mobile and XR/AR Unity should be the go-to choice for years ahead. Also Unity and Unreal serve different use cases, there’s market for both. Lastly, for existing projects, you just dont ”switch engines” unless you’re a very small studio. You simply can’t afford that. That said, management have handled things horribly last couple of years. Hopefully new CEO can turn things around. / AAA mobile game dev

WackFlagMass

Far Cry 6 sold so poorly Ubisoft stopped their annual milking of that series. Tom Clancy Splinter Cell is dead. Ghost Recon is meh and too niche, with the recent two games having mediocre sales. Division is very mixed in reception. Literally their only poster child left is the Assassin's Creed franchsie. Also I'm not sure if you are aware but console sales have been declining rapidly. In fact the whole AAA industry is declining overall, due to it being too reliant on older adults... most of whom eventuslly quit the hobby. You are tossing money into a wastebin here

Thee_Sinner

A couple years ago when people were getting all upset with Bezos buying a big yacht, I decided to calculate what sort of purchase that would be equivalent to for me. His $500m super yacht was the equivalent of me buying a AAA video game.

BuyTheDipShit

I think this is the most concise insightful answer in the thread. To expand on it a little, there is significantly more scarcity related to AAA corporates than treasuries. If an investor wants AAA corporate credit exposure (for any number of reasons) their options are limited. Corporations control their debt issuances, whereas there will generally be treasuries available from new issuances in perpetuity (theoretically).

JeffB1517

There is a bit of a technical problem going on with AAA debt. Essentially the difference isn't enough to be worth arbitraging and there is Though given the Republican Congress' regular threats of default I feel safer holding AAA (or for that matter AA or A) than treasuries. Treasuries in theory are have 0 credit risk, given the level of political risk I don't think that is true. > Also, another question. Do CDs (upto FDIC limit) have exactly the same guarantee as treasury bonds. Very good question. The FDIC claims it is "full faith and credit". The technical meaning of "full faith and credit" is that the nation not just the state is liable (i.e. after a revolution the new government would be expected to honor the debt). I'm not sure how a program that applies only to deposits under $250k and domestic would meet that. So my opinion is no CDs don't excluding the political risk. I don't take the FDIC's promise seriously there. Including the political risk I think they are likely safer.

rando1219

I struggled with this to. I think the only explanation is that if they play chicken with the budget, payment on treasures may get delayed by a few months until they agree on a budget. Perhaps market thinks a AAA company is less likely to not pay on time.

kenseyx

AAA corporate is a tiny and not very liquid market. Schwabs overview actually tells part of that story with various durations not even available. I would not trust proper price discovery in such a market. There may be market participants (like some pension funds) who have to hold them because of a specified strategy regardless of bad pricing.

Responsible-Honey780

Coupon is the % of face value payable over one year. YTM is more of an intangible / hypothetical rate, whereby accounting for price paid vs par value ($1,000 generally)and remaining coupon payments until maturity, with the interest of each coupon paid reinvested at the same rate. In actuality you can’t buy less than 1-5k$ of munis at a time so you can’t really ‘reinvest’ the coup interest back into the bond (but you could do so in a muni etf). I try to focus on the coupon %, current yield %, high credit ratings, diversity between revenue and GO, focus on top 10 wealthiest counties in my specific state, A - AAA rates (IG only), and not paying a large sum of accrued interest up front at purchase. Low duration and laddering maturities over next 10 years. Happy to chat thru any questions via dm. I’m in a high tax state and munis make sense for me but they’re not without risk.

lufisraccoon

The US government no longer has an AAA credit rating. There are exactly two companies with AAA credit rating - Microsoft and Johnson&Johnson. The better credit rating makes a (small) default price premium on the corporates not crazy. In addition, Treasuries don't pay state tax. There may be a (small) tax preference price premium on corporates to compensate in general.

Own_Hat2959

Banks in general are in a pickle. The amount of debt they hold that is stuck with low interest rates is just going to hammer on them as unrealized losses until things turn around with interest rates dropping. So much of what banks hold as reserves is just underwater. All of the CDO's, CLO's, treasury Bonds, corporate bonds, commercial mortgages, auto loans, etc are just stuck on their balance sheets with 3-5% interest rates locked in from the 0% rate era, and the only thing that is going to fix that is time and lower interest rates inducing entities to refi/sell. In the commercial space, high interest rates are creating distress. Commercial mortgages are becoming more and more attractive to default on as the value of office buildings plunges and vancancy rates escalate, and commercial bankruptcy is being instigated by high interest rates making it much harder for business to roll over and refinance all kinds of corporate debt that is coming to maturity. The whole US economic system is in sort of a vice, stuck between high interest rates fucking all the debt they currently hold(including the Fed, they are "losing" hundreds of billions a year in funny money from their treasury bond holdings), and the need to stop inflation with high interest rates, because inflation ... it also fucks banks holding mountains of fixed rate debt. The sort of flip side is that inflation helps the federal government debt problem in the long term, and anyone who owes low fixed interest rate debt. Ultimately, it would help to pull some juice out of the economy while also cutting rates. The way to do that is to cut government spending and raise taxes and drop interest rates by increasing market demand for US treasury bonds by constraining new treasury supply and increasing market confidence in the US ability to repay(Ya, the US is AA-AAA, and widely considered risk free, but realistically, confidence can still improve and push rates lower), but it won't happen. None of it will, and the best we can hope for is that the sick man is carefully managed and can take enough steps to stabilize the situation and grow out of the problem given 20 or 30 years time, and let inflation and GDP growth erode and reduce the real value of of debt slowly enough to not cause an economic calamity.

cantadmittoposting

$U might actually recover. They took a lot of hits as market share swung around, Unreal became the de-facto commercial engine for AAA, and then they made some incredibly shit decisions.   But memories of that are fading. If they somehow beat expectations there should be a big upside... but, I'd have to do more research to see if that seems likely. Looking like a run-up to ER is in progress, but there's so many ERs coming up, U being 2 weeks out makes it hard to commit to the play when there will be other opportunities before then

Lost-Practice-5916

Guess what he also does? Break all his own rules. He sells derivatives. He shorts currencies like his entire Japanese buying spree was funded by proceeds betting against the Yen. He uses a ton of leverage to juice returns. Buffett is more WSB than you think: >Without leverage, however, Mr Buffett’s returns would have been unspectacular. The researchers estimate that Berkshire, on average, leveraged its capital by 60%, significantly boosting the company’s return. Better still, the firm has been able to borrow at a low cost; its debt was AAA-rated from 1989 to 2009. >″[Investor] Cliff Asness and the team at AQR did some great research and showed that what you accounted for the leverage Buffett applied through his reinsurance company. If you bought an index of stocks that had these same characteristics, you would have matched Buffett’s returns virtually,” said Swedroe. “Now today, every investor can own through ETFs or mutual funds the same types of stocks that Buffett has bought through companies that apply this academic research — companies like Dimensional, AQR, Bridgeway, BlackRock, Alpha Architect and a few others.”

Efficient_Being_2603

If you have AAA and your car is crappy enough, you get an escort through each state like the ambulances that follow the prized race horses. Irony

Paullybaxx

AAA would be the flip side of that btw

nyse125

that sounds like a boomer's wet dream from 2021 who's already out of touch with how disconnected crypto and the AAA games industry actually is

jusjones314

>AAA forecasts a record **71 million people traveling 50 miles or more** through the weekend after the holiday, beating pre-pandemic numbers. Over 60 million people will hit the road. More than 57 million will take to the air, and almost 5 million will be cruising or taking buses and trains. Calls on oil, air and lodging 07/19 expiration.

goodbodha

To everyone making fun of the OP I have 4 things to which I would like to hear your response too. 1. Yield curve in the bond market is still inverted. History says that will be a big deal when it uninverts. No idea when it will happen but does that give you pause? 2. Japanese carry trade is having problems. For those that don't. Know the Japanese bank have been borrowing yen and buying assets around the world for decades that yield a better rate of return. That was profitable and now appears to be a problem that is costing them money. To unwind the trade they have to sell stuff. A lot of stuff. Estimates are that the entire trade involves around $20 trillion in assets. If they dump a bunch of it then the supply of assets for sale goes up dramatically so prices probably go down. Any thoughts on that? 3. Florida and California housing and insurance. The number of people using the state insurance of last resort has ballooned. That is a problem because the insurance of last resort doesn't have sufficient reserves to pay out large amounts of claims. I won't be surprised if a lot of turbulence in home demand occurs as people move due to this. My thinking is that prices there will collapse when the inventory of homes in those impacted markets start rising dramatically. On the other hand people have to live somewhere so a lot of those people are going to end up moving to other places and driving prices up there since demand will exceed supply for years. 4. CRE office , bonds on them, and banks. It appears that much of the CRE office issues have been rolled over the past 18 months or so. No one wants to face the music. The few instances where it has gone to market the losses have been incredibly high. I saw the other day that a particular building sold so far below the previous price that all the related bonds below AAA went to zero and the AAA took a big loss. Maybe it's just me but that sounds like an issue where a bunch of big institutional investors are going to take major losses at some point. They haven't taken the losses yet, but it's going to be really ugly when they do. How do you think that will play out? Please keep in mind that many of these losses are going to hit a bunch of people with bonds in their retirement portfolios who likely don't realize how much exposure they have.

HolaMolaBola

Opening up a High Yield account somewhere has just always seemed an inconvenience to me. Here are a couple of ETFs I like to use, which I just purchase inside my brokerage account. SGOV is AAA rated Treasury Bills. And PULS is AA+ rated corporate obligations. Bond Sleeve Weights Std. Deviation Weighted Duration Coupon Yield to Average Std. Dev Payment Maturity Maturity Ultra Low Duration Treasury Bills 45day AAA SGOV 0.00% 0.67% 0.00% 0.09 yrs 4.96% 5.36% 0.09 yrs Ultra Low Duration Credit 1yr AA- (32% AAA 0% junk) PULS 0.00% 0.97% 0.00% 0.30 yrs 5.15% 5.38% 1.30 yrs

FatherJackal

A desk slapper for me. Oh god i needed that. AAA.

refreshmints22

The only AAA rated stock, higher than the US Gov

Shapen361

I sold some at $350 thinking it would dip. Microsoft is a primo stock and the only AAA corporate by all three ratings agencies.

AvengerDr

>Horizan and Alan Wake are both games that are acknowledged as good, but don't get much traction because they're not good. Says who? HZD is one of my all time favourite games. >American games like COD or Diablo consistently out do them. The point I was trying to make was not about numbers of copies sold, but about cultural impact. But anyway it's pointless discussing with people who will dismiss the importance of games like CP77, BG3, HZD and so on. If you don't like them or don't play them, fine. But there are tons of people who do. Do you play any grand strategy game? I do and I have spent countless hours on Crusader Kings, Hearts of Iron, Stellaris and so on. All made in Europe. >Also, nice job ignoring that I said japanese games along with American games. I haven't ignored them. We know Japanese games are good and have always been. But many Americans as you are proving have trouble admitting that Europe too can make great games. Like I said, I'm having trouble remembering any AAA game I played in the last few years that was made in America. Only Jedi Survivor (which was good) and Starfield come to mind (a disappointment) . Oh yes Last of Us 2 but I found it more of the same (and a lot of your fellow countrymen "for some reason" absolutely hated it).

AvengerDr

Oh you're never going to admit it, right? This year I played Horizon Forbidden West and that is also a European game. Alan Wake 2? European. I haven't played Helldivers 2, but that too is a European game. Are those all coincidences? I really am struggling to think about the last big American title I played that could be considered a masterpiece like Cyberpunk 2077. The last American AAA game I played was Starfield, which was a huge failure at least in terms of critical reception.

CrispyCriv

not even close to AAA game. it was very unrefined, the concept was honestly quite boring, and overpriced as hell

consumervigilante

Muni bonds. There are plenty tax free on the federal & state level. You can find them on any broker platform like Schwab or Fidelity. Even the ones with credit ratings AAA are paying in the 4% range which is probably higher than you'd receive from a CD after taxes since interest from a CD is taxable. Those are fairly safe. For the time being you also have money market paying over 5% & high yield savings.

Femtow

Someone else mentioned books, I would suggest this: >"The Simple Path to Wealth: Your road map to financial independence and a rich, free life" by JL Collins, Mr. Money Mustache. >Start reading it for free: >https://read.amazon.co.uk/kp/kshare?asin=B01H97OQY2&id=bqowbapqmrhwhg62qoo3ofngv4&ref_=r_sa_glf_b_0_hdrw_ss_AAu4AAA A lot of it applies to the USA, but investing is investing regardless of where you are. To invest you need some money (starting from a dollar or so, depending on your broker) and some knowledge. Don't blindly invest in something someone, somewhere told you to. Learn, educate yourself and make your own decisions. You said : >I am thinking right now the only way to make money is offering online services for outside and keep saving money as always Lots of people do that, remote online VA , web designer or whatnot. It may be harder as you are doing so remotely, so nowadays it's quite common. And a half price compared to market value in the USA may be a high wage for you, depending on your country of origin. Good luck!

DarkRooster33

Intels market share is impressive up to this day even if its dropping past years, as far as i can see, AMD has never had majority market share in any of the fields, its usually 20-30% market share from AMD while Intels is 60-70%. For a person who is terminally online or tech savy it might come as huge surprise how much of a world trusts Intel for some fucking reason and how much it distrusts AMD, its complete opposite of any comment section you will find. It even shows again in AMD GPU venture. Nvidia can milk and shit on their customers as much as they want, but for some reason there are way more horror stories about AMD drivers than there is Nvidia though raw data wouldn't support that in reality. But i already said Intel fumbled the bag completely by sitting on their laurels, but if they didn't establish such a market share and trust, i imagine the results would already been way more criminal. Shareholder value is a tricky subject though, this subs most hated Tesla stock and gaming stock has been my biggest shareholder values for obvious reasons, does any of this casino really translates to decent companies in any way? Also Intel was dividend stock for some reason, that also muddies this shareholder value topic because they did provide good value for plenty of people. AMD in retrospective provided great shareholder value because they were a dogshit bankrupt company that did a huge unexpected turnaround, but if i now had to bet who is sitting on their laurels its AMD at the moment. Declining sales all around, 123 million net income on a 260B market cap company, can't even catch up to Nvidia in cutting edge GPU tech for quite a long time. Will not offer even a % of AI in future what Nvidia already offers right now. It will be interesting to see if Nvidia can turn something around with building fabs. Only moral here is don't marry stocks, especially billion dollar companies. I am selling and buying these as the tides turn, it has been the most lucrative and enriching thing to do. Long ago when Ryzen just came out, there was wave of angry mob for who AMD burned down their PCs, not a single living sould could be seen believing AMD over Intel. But i still don't see why be married to anything here, even AMD would hire a private army to gun down unionizing child slaves given the opportunity, that is just the nature of things, they would done and will do everything to Intel what Intel did to them given the opportunity. We can already see this attitude in their first sponsored big hit AAA title, they even bundled Starfield for free with AMD purchases at the time, they were really betting on it also with dirty tricks i already provided example of before.

GraceBoorFan

I don’t think I ever had a 900 series card, but definitely wanted one back in the day. I did eventually get a 1060, before upgrading to a 2070, eventually swapping out to the 4090 I have right now. And yeah, I definitely remember those days with the scalpers on the 4000 series. I actually waited a few months hoping for prices to come down and they were still elevated. Of course, eventually demand waned and supply was less constrained and I was able to pick one up from my local MicroCenter. Can’t wait for the 5000 series though. I’m currently running a 49” Ultrawide at 240fps and the 4090 performs fairly well at medium/high settings in some games but I don’t think I can push ultra/max settings in most AAA titles. The next generation monitors are probably going to be 4K 240fps, and a 4090 will not be sufficient enough.. Speaking of PC builds, I recently decided to swap out my aging 2950X that I bought back in 2016 for an Intel CPU. Never thought I’d be going back to Intel, but their Raptor Lake CPUs seem pretty good for productivity, which is right up my alley. I would’ve love to stay with AMD’s Threadripper CPUs, but unfortunately, there aren’t any motherboard manufacturers that make a form factor suitable for mATX/mITX, so in a way I was forced to go with Intel. https://preview.redd.it/gls1hxrym17d1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=09ee3d0a240830499ce65c41d5835b20d312f6e8

Mango-Bob

You’ll skip AAA straight to the majors, homie.

furry_tail_lover

Boeing quite well known for Diversity Equity Inclusion policy, so it looks like materials are under that umbrella too. The titanium in question definitely identified with being AAA grade material, so what's the problem? It's 2024, let's not discriminate FAA. At least give me a chance to sell some calls, PLEASE.

hendrix-copperfield

It is very simple: AMD and Intel are exchanging their leadership position every 5 to 10 years. Before Ryzen, AMD was bad and not really competitive. Now Intel has to catch up. But Intel invests heavily in manufacturing in Europe and USA while AMD is solely depended on TSMC for producing its advanced chips. So when China finally invades Taiwan in 5 or 10 years, AMD can shut down (or needs to buy producing capacities from Intel) while Intel will have a kind of a monopoly. Because outside of Taiwan - who produces chips in that quality? South Korea, Japan, USA. So in the worst case (for the World) china will invade Taiwan and Intel will swoop in and take over most of AMDs market share, because AMD can't produce anymore. In the worst case for Intel they are creating chip production capacities that are needed worldwide. Even German companies producing 30 or 40nm chips are sought after for car parts and what not. Also AMD is now doing what Intel did when they were in the lead: Not really innovating anymore. The Ryzen 8000 mobile processors have the same speed as the Ryzen 7000 processors (they just added AI). A Ryzen 7950x is only 30% faster than a Ryzen 5950X. So AMD slowed down its improvement rate to a similar rate we saw with intel between the 6000 and 9000 versions where improvements from generation to generation where around or under 10%. Hell, even an Intel i7-4770 would run okay for every casual user and with the right GPU even can run AAA games in Full HD. A i7-13700k is just 100 to 200% faster, a CPU that is 10 years younger. So if you solely look at AMD vs Intel - they will exchange market leader ship somwhere in the future. Now - other players are entering the market stealing the Cake from Intel and AMD. Apple with its M-Processors, ARM and co. and they could disrupt the market. But they also all need to produce their microchips and they don't have foundrys. And when China attacks Taiwan again - Intel is there with its foundries in Germany, USA and co.

econkle

Steam is the #1 online retailer for online game distribution at the moment. Steam is owned by Valve which is a private company (they can't be bought by traditional means). They are a AAA game studio that owns IP like Half Life, as well as the online platform "Steam". There is another company just like that, and is a competitor that is CD Projekt. CD Projekt also owns The Witcher and [gog.com](http://gog.com) the only threat to Steam at this time. CD Projekt is a public company unlike Valve and could be acquired. Sporting goods is a play on the theme. GameStop can expand it's offering from playing games inside to playing games everywhere including outside, which is why I think sporting goods would be a good acquisition. Power to the players no matter what game you play whether it be call of duty or basketball. Either play in my opinion would be explosive, whether GameStop extends it's current play offerings, or goes 100% balls deep into digital offerings either scenario is the perfect opportunity. Thank you for asking. I appreciate the opportunity to explain the reasoning.

Life-Industry-1131

Awww no I procrastinated and now I can’t do the things I needed to do like go to AAA…. Fuck… Looks like I’ll just watch baseball and play video games. FUCK. Didn’t want to do this.

BHOmber

Selling AAA weed at 40 an eighth in fancy mylar/jars will get you 350/oz

GodEmperorNeolibtard

# I am from the Year of our Lord 2006. I have insider knowledge concerning a vast number of sub-prime mortgages being bundled into AAA-rated securities. These are insured. The systemic risk is off the charts. I would strongly advise selling everything and shorting the housing market.

Calm_Leek_1362

I mean… this is how financial markets work. The reason 2007 happened wasn’t because they were bundling mortgages (they had been for decades), it was because massive fraud in rating the securities. The AAA securities were full of houses that were bubbling in value. As long as low income people taking out $70,000 truck loans are considered high risk and appropriately rated as junk (and have corresponding high yield) this is all going to be fine.

Error_404_403

Anything, any group of people that promises to pay money is a natural security as long as the promise is not by an individual and as long as the payment can be made to anyone. Here is a bright idea: securitize payments of retirement funds. Recipient writes a note giving the ownership of some fraction of the pension they receive to the note holder. The notes are bought by the investment company for little money, packaged and re-sold as AAA bonds. Hundreds of billions to be made.

AccidentallyBacon

are they paying ~~$MRKT~~ ~~$INFO~~ $SPGI to give these bundles an AAA credit rating, knowing full well they're full of shit? sounds like peak 2008

_learned_foot_

AAA, who is definitely not all fancy, along with Google and maps and every atlas company, also have all that data.

Worried_Quarter469

DFV vs RC was a billionaire civil war RC sent DFV back to millionaire AAA league

DoggedStooge

AFAIK, they've recently re-filed as a holding company. It's less likely they're merge with anyone, and more likely they'll take on controlling interest in other companies. As for what company they could possibly merge with? Well tbh, I'm a bit surprised they haven't tried to make their own video game IP yet. Unless there's some contractual 'non-compete' clause in their distribution agreements, I would've figured they would dedicate some of their cash on hand to making their own video game. AAA games cost a few hundred million, and now they have multiple billion.

Ferkinator442

Batteries in the thermostat. usually AAA, need replacing every couple of years

AnotherThroneAway

They are different because some AAA bonds are getting downgraded, and some real estate bonds normally rock solid are even defaulting. Don't get me wrong; it's probably just fine, but the near-zero risk is slightly less close to zero, and the real estate bubble could be a problem for some bond holders.

Lost-Practice-5916

And all the greats use leverage: >Without leverage, however, Mr Buffett’s returns would have been unspectacular. The researchers estimate that Berkshire, on average, leveraged its capital by 60%, significantly boosting the company’s return. Better still, the firm has been able to borrow at a low cost; its debt was AAA-rated from 1989 to 2009. >″[Investor] Cliff Asness and the team at AQR did some great research and showed that what you accounted for the leverage Buffett applied through his reinsurance company. If you bought an index of stocks that had these same characteristics, you would have matched Buffett’s returns virtually,” said Swedroe. “Now today, every investor can own through ETFs or mutual funds the same types of stocks that Buffett has bought through companies that apply this academic research — companies like Dimensional, AQR, Bridgeway, BlackRock, Alpha Architect and a few others.”

rockandchalkin

Literally right now you can get AAA partially tax exempt 20 year agency bonds lol. It’s not that far off

Horusisalreadychosen

0% down on a primary residence is not a huge risk. This is already possible for some borrowers (in fact it’s usual for first time Vets getting a VA loan). People do not want to be homeless and take pride in owning homes. They have to be in extremely dire straits to not pay on their primary home. Investment properties is another story. And even then, that was only a problem because sub prime loans were being slapped together into “AAA” credit risk investment vehicles when there had been two years of declining new home sales and that market was in a clear bust. In 2024 there is nowhere near enough housing to meet demand, totally different national context.

LandofBacon

You could look at corporate loans. There is a product called a CLO that aggregates hundreds of corporate loans. I personally like CLOA for AAA relaunches and CLOZ for BBB traunches.

wild_b_cat

>AAA CLO ETF provides 6-7% return with little risk.  Depends on what you mean by 'little'. CLOs aren't as dangerous as they were in 2008 (one hopes) but they're not guaranteed by any means. You're getting a couple points more than the risk-free rate but with assets that are subject to significant default risk. That particular ETF is barely a year old. I would not make it a central part of your portfolio just yet. If you want tax advantages, that is really only possible through government bonds right now, particularly munis.

Lost-Practice-5916

Haha bro.. if only you knew that Buffett is more WSB than you think. >Without leverage, however, Mr Buffett’s returns would have been unspectacular. The researchers estimate that Berkshire, on average, leveraged its capital by 60%, significantly boosting the company’s return. Better still, the firm has been able to borrow at a low cost; its debt was AAA-rated from 1989 to 2009. >″[Investor] Cliff Asness and the team at AQR did some great research and showed that what you accounted for the leverage Buffett applied through his reinsurance company. If you bought an index of stocks that had these same characteristics, you would have matched Buffett’s returns virtually,” said Swedroe. “Now today, every investor can own through ETFs or mutual funds the same types of stocks that Buffett has bought through companies that apply this academic research — companies like Dimensional, AQR, Bridgeway, BlackRock, Alpha Architect and a few others.”

hydrocyanide

Doesn't have an impact. Look at the price of a AAA CLO over the last 3 years compared to the 5 year rate. No change in one, lots of change in the other.

Lost-Practice-5916

Psychology, fear, lack of discipline and greed are the biggest obstacles to successfully using leverage. Buffett used it constantly. The key is to use very small amounts to outperform consistently, and only truly ramp it up when the world appears to be ending. Rebalance frequently, secure profits and move back into safer strategies. But when things go down, you have to be unemotional and add. >Without leverage, however, Mr Buffett’s returns would have been unspectacular. The researchers estimate that Berkshire, on average, leveraged its capital by 60%, significantly boosting the company’s return. Better still, the firm has been able to borrow at a low cost; its debt was AAA-rated from 1989 to 2009. ... >″[Investor] Cliff Asness and the team at AQR did some great research and showed that what you accounted for the leverage Buffett applied through his reinsurance company. If you bought an index of stocks that had these same characteristics, you would have matched Buffett’s returns virtually,” said Swedroe.

QuantWeekly

If you need this money for a down payment you will need it to be liquid and you need the investment to be safe. A year is not actually that long in long-term investment terms and if you have a fixed timeframe I actually think etfs would be the wrong choice here for once. I would suggest you look into a few short term highly rated bonds. For AAA rated bonds the default rate is given by S&P as well as Moody's as [literally 0.0%](https://quantofstocks.wordpress.com/2024/04/29/bonds-default-risk-by-rating-and-how-to-size-your-investment/) however AA, A and BBB rated bonds are all under the 1% mark for a single year. Because the timeframe is so short treasury bills (or your country's equivalent) may also be a better option for you. You should make sure that the bonds mature before you need your money back. The yield on a bond tells you how much money you will make on that bond per year. This is not to be confused with the coupon which is the annual payout divided by the bonds nominal value. You should also compare these options to a savings account. No joke. You need this money at a fixed time in the relatively near future. This is almost perfect for a savings. They tend to have a pretty low yield though.

mrkaluzny

It’s much better to go into CD Projekt, I’m slowly accumulating into it, there are some short sellers there, but the price is super attractive for a long run. We only have information about Witcher remake, but Cyberpunk is the best game I’ve ever played, that’s the only studio releasing AAA games that are awesome (beyond Rockstar). If Cd Projekt can make Cyberpunk 2 with GTA-like multiplayer, they will turn into a money making machine with strong brands. It’s a 5-6 years away, but that might be an absurd run. Also the game development industry in Poland is a bit down, so it’s a great chance to hire talent at better rates

devereaux

I wouldn't ever short Realty Income. They are loaded to the gills with long term leases with credit-quality tenants and keep increasing their dividend which pays monthly. O is as close to a AAA bond as you can get in equities. If anything, it's a point now to buy long term calls

OppositeReasonable97

VIX at 13. First AAA CMBS loss. Go figure

Competitive_Ride

I am AAA rated (Autism ADHD Anxiety) 

WendysSupportStaff

I flash my AAA card.

gaslighterhavoc

Yup. Meanwhile studios like Supergiant Games with the Hades games (Hades 2 is amazing) and Larian with Baldur's Gate 3 and Arrowhead with Helldivers 2 is just killing it. Want a great story with mutating choices? You won't ever get it from the big AAA corporate publishers but Black Tabby Games with Slay the Princess has exactly what you need. Want a top-tier lovingly crafted medieval city builder? Manor Lords made by a single guy is your game. Want the best political visual novel/simulator ever? Suzerain by Torpor Games is the best game in this genre. My point is that the AAA publishers are seriously slipping in customer goodwill and game quality and the indie scene is becoming powerful competition and catching up fast with more creative, more fun, less BS and less expensive games.

vergorli

On what do you bind the overvalued assessment? AAPL still has >7% revenue. If you target long investments you can easily get 5-6% p.a. with just AAA shares. Of course the bs revenues of 20% and more are over. That was a curisorium of the ZIRP.

BarbellPadawan

Our MODs are prime, AAA rated

ptown2018

I don’t think this is a wash sale yet. Wash sale would be if buy the lot at 100 sell at 93 for loss., FIFO. Then buy AAA again for less than the 100 within the window.

skiviz

Apple silicon got some potential with AAA gaming. Might not be the best performing, but it's playable. Would it bring significant revenue growth? Probably not.

narrowbuys

Pretty sure Apple revenue is much larger than the entire AAA gaming industry. They don’t have 40 years of experience in it either

Temporary-Sun-7575

They are so categorically behind on purpose i dont think they'll ever want to change their mind about it in a way that allows them to be taken seriously as anything in the gaming industry. Offering support for AAA titles would have been them playing catch up 14 years ago.

JustAnIdea3

The party don't stop till the fed rate drop It's weird that Dimon talks about WWII, because AAA corporate debt rates dropped from 1932 till 1946, exactly after the war. If you ask me inflation is way out of hand, and the fed should probably up rates even more, because the consumer does not care.

aregulardude

They overproduced medium grade. There’s still plenty of demand for AAA

Sandvicheater

Gaming development these days budgets and development times are spiraling out of control that even makes Hollywood big budget movie gape open their mouths. Coupled with the fact every AAA needs to sell like a billion copies just to break even gives very low profit margins per unit sold. Until the tech improves to cut down on both development time and costs this is gonna be the new normal. My bet is Sony is gonna utilize either Google Gemini or Microsoft ChatGPT to streamline the development process.

Torczyner

It's not the bank defaults. It was the layers of insurance, binding bad debt into supposed AAA debt, and people losing their homes with high interest rate ARMs etc. Big banks like BoA and Wells didn't even need TARP money when that was happening. You think without that level of fraud they'll need it? Hell no. Right now, a commercial property goes to the bank, and the bank owns a decent asset that's not being looted for appliances and copper.

RollyHuxley

A big portion of analysis missing here is the tranche system of CRE-CLOs. Investors can pick different tranches that have different risk factors. The bottom tranche is an equity tranche that is losses are recorded on the underlying real estate they are effected. However, higher tranches such as the AAA rated tranche have multiple levers in place. They can redirect lower tranche cash flows to theirs and get paid first. They are overcollateralized, and there are more assets than there is the size of the tranche. Those big firms you mentioned (blackrock) will own much more of these higher tranche holdings. Not to say a CRE CLO issue cant/wont happen and be a huge issue for investors, but I think in this scenario, the downside is better capped and real losses will accumulate to firms who invested in some of the lower tranche issues without really understanding the risks. Real estate also has higher recovery values given the real nature of the asset, so in a bankruptcy, there is still hope that the defaulted securiites aren't worth 0 and that investors can recover some value on the investment.

mashpotatodick

What are talking about? 10 year tsy is about 4.5. Corporate AAA is 5.25. Other than Apple, a negative credit spread would be arbitraged.

jman7784

Prior to the first movie being released Nintendo purchased an animation studio and renamed it with their name. After the success of the first movie the stock has risen. Nintendo is a solid company… no crazy movements. However Nintendo wants to be identified as a “entertainment company” and is making a major push into that field with their partnership with universal. 2024 is questionable for what’s gonna happen this year. 2025 will see new hardware release with exclusive AAA titles, later in 2025 universal will open Nintendo world park in Orlando, April 6th 2026 is the release of Mario movie 2…. So that leaves a lot of empty holes in their calendar for perhaps the Zelda live action movie and other unannounced projects

3050_mjondalen

Ye, this is one of the reasons I mostly buy indie games these days. Just sick of the "AAA game" developers tbh

Sandvicheater

I saw all the gaming subreddit lit up like a Christmas tree most against the mandatory PSN login. This is one AA game not even AAA level game and arguably has been going downhill in popularity even before the PSN login controversy as Steam DB number clearly shows the game is just another flavor of the month game like so many others before it like lethal company or Palworld. Sensation news overblown and outrage baiting nothing more. That being said I wouldn't go long on either Nintendo or Sony stock as they both have dog shit performance 42% & 61% in 5 year chart VS MSFT 215% in the same time frame.

indignant_halitosis

The Mariners are the Yankees AAA team. It will never, ever be the Mariners.

FaeThorn

Disney doesn’t look bad they just did that huge investment with epic games ( Fortnite ) and has a lot of green volume that has been adjusted yet from this year I’m not sure about Reddit since I’m not sure about their future plans as a company. TDW the post company is an offshore tow company think of it as the AAA company of the oceans it doesn’t matter about the other companies or major changes because their business will always be needed

Either-Wallaby-3755

Just like those mortgage backed securities that were rated triple AAA in 2007 by credit rating agencies.

c-ray

how much indoor AAAA and AAA is clever leaves growing?

4score-7

No doubt. It goes way on back. All the three letter agencies communicate and compete. Hell, even AAA is probably throwing nails on the highway around here.

high_af_bear

AAA 🆙⬆️⬆️. LFG, at least we agree on 1. Holding calls on AMD, AMZN and AAPL

knowledgebass

Most AAA games are $500 million to develop at the most, so they could have developed ~100 very high budget games. Yet they were so proud when the avatars finally had legs like this was some truly bitchin' technology they had developed. I'm wondering what exactly is going on over there...

Redpanther14

Basically we are talking about the time value of money and opportunity cost. If you hold a ten year AAA rated bond with a 5% interest rate premium, and suddenly interest rates on similar bonds fell to 2%, people would be willing to pay you more than you initially paid for your Bond because the interest rate on it is higher than they could receive with a newly issued bond. This principle works in reverse as well, if interest rates increase after you purchase a bond, the amount another person is willing to pay will drop below the face value of the bond (so a 1 million dollar bond might get discounted to $850,000 or something similar).

CodeMonkey1

I think he's talking about the AAA battery simulator, where you virtually replace the batteries on your virtual TV remote. I hear it's enthralling.

Wyzen

What game is the good "AAA" game?

TheChickening

Are you guys really thinking that money went all into that one ugly app?! That's R&D for the headsets, does include multiple games including one extremely praised and good "AAA" game, and everything else that is VR.

somekindofdevil

Out of $184 billion generated in 2023 by all types of games, the mobile game market share is 49% or $90 billion. In other words, almost half of all gaming is mobile. And Unity has no rival in the mobile gaming scene. So their engine is generating much more revenue for the game studios than AAA titles combined. I’m not even counting indies.

HeresAnotherAnswer

Atlus used Unity for the SMT3 remake. It's not AAA but it is a large developer. That said, I agree that Unity is a black sheep in the indie scene right now. A lot of big indie devs moved from Unity, such as Slay the Spire 2.

Kafanska

Here's the thing - no big studio is using their engine. If I ask you to name a few AAA games made with Unity or ones made with Unreal, which list can you fill up? Yeah, switching from Unreal to something else would be a longer process, but from Unity it's not a big deal as it's mostly smaller projects anyway, made by indie devs.

Abysswalker794

I have a quite big position so I am biased. Still I see a 3-5x Bagger in the next 10 years. I agree that we are in the middle of a transition phase for Nintendo. It was always a matter of time before they start utilising their strong IPs to establish diversified income streams. Nintendo Online services will also be a big factor for growth and stabilisation. At this time Nintendo gets very few third party AAA games, and often times need to „encourage them“ due to the lack of power the Nintendo Switch has. I expect that raw power will be less and less important in the console market going forward, as publishers are more and more interested to maximise the customer base. We already seeing this with how they have a hard time of letting go the 120 million PS4 installbase, even Sony itself. There will be a time when Nintendo will get more and more if not nearly all major 3rd party releases. This will be another growth/earnings drivers as they will get a cut out of every sold game, for only existing. Similar to PlayStation and the Call of Duty franchise the last 15+ years. I am very bullish on Nintendo. For me the only videogame company with a wide and powerful moat. Good luck competing with Mario, Zelda, Pokémon(the most valuable entertainment IP - Nintendo holds about ~32% and has all games exclusive), Animal Crossing, Donkey Kong and Nintendos brand itself. $12B cash which alone would cover about 5 years of operate expenses, without doing anything. One last thing I want to highlight which is overlooked many times: Nintendo is one of few companies in the world, which gets paid to advertise. They released the Mario Film and got a share of the profits and a bit for licensing the IP. Immediately after the movie, sale figures for Nintendo Switch AND various Mario games received a massive boost. The Movie was an 2 hour ad for the game, and the game is an ad for the movie (not even talking about merchandise here). This going forward could be massive. In 10 Years we will be talking about the 2020s, when Nintendo became the new Disney (Disney Shareholder myself). I think this should absolutely not be overlooked. I am monitoring this from two perspectives. One as a Nintendo shareholder, and one as a Disney shareholders, as I am very curious if Nintendo has the power to challenge Disney and give them a much needed competition, in their most precious family entertainment space.

Lost-Practice-5916

Yea you can do that. I like juicing returns a little bit with responsible leverage. All the greats used some to achieve their results: https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2013/02/08/explaining-the-secret-of-warren-buffetts-success-double-leverage/?sh=5bffcf5179ac >Without leverage, however, Mr Buffett’s returns would have been unspectacular. The researchers estimate that Berkshire, on average, leveraged its capital by 60%, significantly boosting the company’s return. Better still, the firm has been able to borrow at a low cost; its debt was AAA-rated from 1989 to 2009.

buffaloranked

Terrible advice man. Buy at 750 and again at 500 real talk value investor you are broke as fuck and 18 with no money don’t lose what little you have on some fomo bullshit. The market is spent nvda is the 3rd largest market cap in the world it doesn’t have much more to grow sector is overbought hard and needs time to fall and bounce back again. Just look at supports and resistances and invest accordingly. Right now is not forever. You won’t lose money sitting this play out wait until it’s AAA play not the c+ play. This ain’t baseball you don’t have to swing you get as many strikes as you want,

pipasnipa

JNJ isn’t consumer though. Its a healthcare conglomerate that spunoff its consumer segment so it could focus on pharma/medtech. It’s a slow grower for sure although it has a AAA balance sheet and is is a Dividend King paying a 3%+ yield. Something to think about. No idea what the cost basis is for these investments either.

Tendie_Tube

1) The US's credit rating would return to AAA across all ratings agencies (is currently split) 2) The budget deficit would decrease 3) As noted in the OP, the inflationary effect of lower rates would be offset by a reduction, at some minor level, of economic activity due to tax "deadweight losses", which would be disinflationary. I question how powerful the disinflationary aspect would be, because tax rates were a LOT higher in the 1970s and early 80s than today and they didn't squash inflation. 4) The effects on the value of the dollar are unclear. The dollar should rise if deficits and the liquidity they create is reduced, but should fall because of lower rates. It would depend a lot on what other countries do. 5) As others have noted, real estate would appreciate from lower rates - not just because of mortgages but also because depreciation is a powerful tax shelter. The housing bubble would get worse. 6) In theory, much of the economic growth of the past 45 years has come from the government borrowing money instead of collecting taxes, and the government building a $34T national debt. The raise-taxes-lower-rates policy would in part be a reversal of this trend. That could be a good thing, because an out of control national debt will eventually lead to a financial crisis or currency devaluation. However it could come at the expense of the debt-fueled GDP growth we are accustomed to.