Many so-called teachers from the outside world usually just quickly withdraw to reap a wave of benefits, or they have long been ambushed in advance, just to entice everyone in high positions to enter and lock in profits for them. In contrast, Chongzi sincerely hopes that everyone can calm down and carefully analyze the fundamentals. After all, the essence of stock market games boils down to the relationship between supply and demand.
A few years ago, there was a prevalent view in the industry regarding Pinduoduo, which was theoretically based on Huang Zheng's article "Turning Capitalism Upside Down."
At that time, many media interpretations suggested that merchants on the Pinduoduo platform provided discounts to consumers in a manner similar to selling insurance, selling surplus production capacity to users at low prices through a supply chain reservation model. This logic seemingly solved the problem of merchants' inventory backlog and assumed that consumer demand was infinite, but this perspective actually has obvious flaws.
To delve into the biggest difference between Pinduoduo and Alibaba's Taobao and Tmall, it actually lies in the fact that Pinduoduo views merchants as consumables, while Alibaba sees consumers as consumables.
In the Taobao and Tmall system, white-label merchants often imply low added value. Combined with the traffic added value logic led by Alibaba Mama, and Alibaba's long-standing reliance on large-scale external procurement without producing traffic itself—this has given it a massive budget, making it appear as China's number one public relations company. Based on this background, Alibaba views consumers as consumables, while merchants are the source of its cash flow. In such an environment, merchants who do not invest in traffic find it difficult to maintain a competitive advantage in the long term. Understanding this, you can comprehend the conditions under which Alibaba's motto, "Let there be no difficult business in the world," was born.
Therefore, Alibaba has a strong motivation to clear low added value white-label production capacity from the platform, otherwise it would face the risk of counterfeit goods, which is also the reason why market regulators have repeatedly rectified it. This logic is quite similar to the capital's decongestion of non-core functions. Once this part of the production capacity is expelled, Pinduoduo takes the opportunity to establish its operational logic of viewing merchants as consumables.
A more reasonable explanation for Pinduoduo's rise is their assumption that consumers are limited. As a company that highly pursues efficiency, constrained by daily active user numbers (DAU) and customer lifetime value (LTV), Pinduoduo has a gap in user volume and purchasing power compared to the Taobao and Tmall systems. Naturally, to compete for Alibaba's users, it can only rely on low-priced product strategies, forcing merchants to provide discounts. They adopted a strategy of surrounding the cities from the countryside, continuously absorbing white-label production capacity eliminated by the market, and transferring benefits to consumers, after all, the final payers are the consumers, just as the saying goes, "wool comes from the sheep."
This is not only the fundamental logic that enables Pinduoduo to grow and thrive but also explains why, despite continuous alliances of small merchants to resist, they ultimately still have to submit to Pinduoduo's traffic allocation mechanism.
As for the often-criticized negative evaluations regarding cut-throat marketing, employee exploitation, long working hours, and the debate over whether Pinduoduo is a proper company, these do not affect its essence. Pinduoduo is still a proper company because its core focus is solely on one thing: how to extract more benefits from merchants and transfer them to ordinary consumers, even if this means that the quality of the products may not meet the highest standards.
Frankly speaking, I have always lacked enthusiasm for getting involved in commodity trading. After all, researching regular commercial companies is relatively straightforward; the core logic is nothing more than studying financial statements and understanding market demand.
However, the commodity sector is much more complex. It requires you to pay attention to macro-level fluctuations, as often a sudden economic data release can trigger significant changes, involving the interplay of interests between different countries. The most critical risk is that, in this market, the main buyers are often state powers. This means your trading counterpart has absolute dominance; if they decide to sell off, it can lead to significant price drops at any time.
Moreover, such state-level operations often occur quietly, with no announcements made before purchases. This is why many investors find themselves trapped at high points in commodities like silver, with no hope of getting out anytime soon.
Speaking of the uniqueness of relevant institutions, my good friend, who grew up with me, has been completely out of touch since starting work at the central bank. No replies on WeChat, no phone calls going through; it feels as though they have evaporated from the world, and this sense of losing contact is incredibly frustrating and helpless.
Frankly speaking, I really have no enthusiasm for getting involved in commodity trading. In contrast, analyzing conventional businesses is much simpler; the focus is simply on studying financial statements and assessing market demand. However, the commodity market is completely different; it not only requires investors to pay constant attention to macro-level fluctuations—often a sudden economic data release can lead to a drastic change in direction—but also involves complex games between countries. What is most daunting is that the core participants in this market are usually state entities. Imagine your opponent having the power to dramatically drop prices in an instant, and they will never leak any hints before taking action. This is also the fundamental reason why those who were trapped at high silver prices often waited for many years. In other words, if the national level decides to operate on a certain asset, the outside world cannot predict it in advance at all. This reminds me of a very close childhood friend; ever since he started working at the central bank, I haven't been able to contact him via WeChat or phone, and he seems to have evaporated from the world, which is truly helpless.
Looking back to when the price of ordinals was at 60 yuan, several of my friends planned to sell when it reached 100 yuan. However, time has passed, and now looking back, its price has turned into 3 yuan. This drastic change is a typical characteristic of the cryptocurrency field.
Regarding crcl, the current value has reached the 50 range. It is recommended that everyone remain patient, wait for the right moment, and observe when it can enter the ideal hitting zone. It is worth noting that those core key players will never choose to stand by idly; they have actually been actively preparing and practicing on the sidelines.
Regarding the Hype project, my initial hesitation and reluctance to invest were primarily due to Wan Hui. After all, GMX once quietly exited the market, and only later did I learn that Wan Hui was in charge of market making. Such an experience inevitably leaves a psychological shadow, making me fear that the same market-making team is behind Hype. It's like having the same script and still insisting that this time is different. Now seeing her switch to the prediction market track indeed leaves me feeling somewhat at a loss. It is worth noting that even though Binance has launched Hype's contract trading, its trend remains strong and has not been crushed. Facing the current situation, I really don't know what to do; it seems that the time for verification has already arrived.
Today, both Tencent and Alibaba's stock prices are showing a downward trend. The main reason for this fluctuation is that the market is once again disturbed by rumors about increased taxes on internet companies. In light of the pullback triggered by this news, I took the opportunity to buy a portion of Tencent's position.
Excuse me, everyone, which carrier providing eSIM services for the Hong Kong version of the iPhone is currently recommended? My main usage requirement is solely to receive SMS verification codes.
Imagine if you had an Agent as a digital avatar that matched you perfectly in personality and various traits. What would that experience be like? This virtual avatar could represent you, making initial contacts and dates with other people's Agents. This model not only frees you from the moral constraints of traditional social interactions but also allows for efficient parallel processing, enabling you to interact with multiple targets simultaneously. Once this screening process is complete, you can decide whether to meet the real person behind the other Agent in the real world. What do you think of this entirely new way of socializing?
At this stage, firmly investing heavily in the liquor sector is the absolutely correct strategy. The reason for this judgment is that it is expected that after tomorrow, there will be a large number of people who unfortunately encounter situations that require handling funerals.
Everyone please be patient, the market is about to rebound. The key to the current situation is that we must first fully digest the impact caused by the bulk aspect. If we consider from the perspective of liquidity, the levels of 73000 and 74000 are basically in place. It is worth noting that since last year, many liquidity logic within the crypto space has actually changed.
When the BTC price reaches the bottom position of 75500, the market shows an extremely unusual sign. Those experienced traders who have withstood the test in past markets, maintaining a high profit-loss ratio and high win rate for a long time, have an astonishingly consistent strategy at this moment; they are all closing short positions and entering long.
Zhong Shanshan has expressed his views on the growth logic of small enterprises. He believes that for such enterprises, since there is no so-called scale effect to support long-term capital accumulation in the initial stage, achieving expansion and growth comes with extremely rigorous requirements in product selection: the categories they operate in must not only ensure uniqueness but also be able to bring extremely high profit returns.
Recently, I have received enthusiastic invitations from several friends, all of whom hope that I can participate in entrepreneurial projects in the AI field.
This is to correct a piece of information that was sent out this morning. Due to a hurried departure this morning, I was unable to carefully verify the information, leading to inaccuracies regarding silver. Here is the accurate situation:
CME actually started adjustments on January 13, changing the original fixed dollar margin model to a percentage-based calculation method. The initial ratio was set at 9%, which was later raised to 11% or above 12%.
Especially during the week of January 27, CME raised the percentage twice in a row. Statistics show that within a short 9-day window, a total of five margin hikes were executed.
This series of measures led to severe chain reactions: as prices fluctuated, investors holding leveraged positions faced enormous additional margin pressure or were forced to liquidate. For example, when the silver price reached $120, the margin requirement for a single contract skyrocketed to $54,000+, and this financial pressure triggered a chain liquidation, ultimately causing a collapse in silver prices.
In summary, the real driving force behind last night's market was actually CME. Earlier, I hastily published information based on a quick glance, which was indeed my oversight, and I apologize to everyone for that.
In response to the sharp decline in silver prices last night, the real driving forces behind it can be summarized in the following three aspects:
1. Changes in exchange rules have constituted major pressure. CME not only significantly increased the maintenance margin standard for silver by more than five times but also changed the interest calculation method to a percentage basis. This move directly forced investors holding long positions to liquidate their positions.
2. There has been a change in the market liquidity. Speculative longs who entered the market earlier chose to take profits at this moment, executing profit-taking operations.
3. Although macroeconomic policies have had an impact, with the new Federal Reserve chairman nominated by Trump proposing a policy of reducing the balance sheet alongside interest rate cuts, this is actually the least important point among all the reasons for this sharp decline.
Instead of blindly seeking a seemingly compromising move to go public on the US stock market, it is suggested that each cryptocurrency exchange should use a certain proportion of profits to increase their holdings of BTC spot. Since Binance has already taken the initiative to buy, are you all not preparing to follow suit? Or do you all think that the cryptocurrency industry has no future?😅
Anyone attempting to profit by shorting gold and silver will ultimately have to bear heavy consequences. The reason is simple: those on the opposing side are not ordinary investors, but various sovereign nations. In such a complex geopolitical situation, it is clearly unwise to engage in a game against these global heavyweight bulls. For commodities, it is permitted to maintain a bearish view, but in practice, establishing short positions is inadvisable. In contrast, the situation for BTC is entirely different. The early profit-taking group does not provide buying support; they tend to hold onto their coins and wait or cash out a small amount, so the market's support mainly relies on external inflows of funds. The only thing we need to do now is to patiently wait for the market cycle to change. Before this turning point arrives, the market situation for gold and silver remains bullish, while BTC is in a bearish pattern.