The didactic value of Wave's saga is immense. It's extraordinary to follow some investors violating EVERY rule of sensible investing AND every rule of sensible tax planning and maintaining that errant path for years until, in one case, it leads to suicide. All of us make a few mistakes. But few get everything so utterly wrong as some here did.
Virtually all investors start out naïve and suffer accordingly, but they improve with experience. Some newbies read books and learn from others. Others suffer more costly personal lessons; the Dot Com Crash and the Great Recession were more effective lessons than anything to be gleaned from texts. Yet a few here continued to believe... to average down in recent years, apparently borrowing more and more funds to finance that folly. Here you see atrocious investing coupled with atrocious tax planning. You don't want to take a 7-figure tax loss to your grave especially when you have a wife and kids.
I've been sharing these posts with a graduate level accounting student. Wave's story is a doozy for what it teaches. I hope this board is preserved.
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Because the Good Life is Just a Pump or Two Away
