The Long Term Investor

WELCOME........Funchaiski. Value investing is.........of course.......one of the most significant types of fundamental analysis based investing. A LIFETIME of value investing........over the long term.......will pay off very nicely. Feel free to post your moves, portfolio, results.........anything you feel interested in posting.

 

WELCOME........to Washington DC CHAOS and the election preview. THREATS......of violence, packing the court, impeachment, overthrow of the constitution, etc, etc, etc. I WILL NOT mention..........WHO it is........making these threats. This is the BEGINNING of the election CHAOS. AND......I anticipate that it WILL NOT lessen till many months after the election.......perhaps well into 2021.

I believe it will be WAY WORSE than anyone imagines.........unless there is a MASSIVE landslide one way or the other.......that cuts it short. BUT.......even with a massive landslide.......I fully expect that........an unnamed party.......will STILL bring MAXIMUM CHAOS to the country........anyway.

The GOOD NEWS...........this will be the buying opportunity for those that have waited to get in. I anticipate........baring a unassailable win by one side or the other.......that the markets post-election will DROP by 30-50% by the time it is all said and done. The GOOD news......it will ALL be totally UNRELATED to the companies that you own and their business models. THIS will be a TOTALLY event driven market collapse.

The BAD NEWS.......those that have been AFRAID to get back in the markets will STILL not get back in because they will continue to be afraid to get back in during the massive CHAOS that the politicians are about to unleash on the country.

SO.......what to do. ACTUALLY that is an easy solution. I will do NOTHING. I will continue to be fully invested for the long term as usual. There is ONE event that can cause me to sell off all positions..........a significant possibility......or.....probability of a collapse of the banking system and the entire economy. We are going to go through investor HELL........but.......it will be a political driven event and I DO NOT see ANY potential for a complete economic collapse.

Fun stuff.........I PITY the poor young investor that has only been investing since about 2008. They have lived through many HISTORIC negative market events .........in only 12 years........ that the typical investor might NEVER see in a lifetime. The near economic collapse of 2008/2009, The virus economic shutdown, and now the election CHAOS.

 

The ABOVE is my BEST CASE projection of the next 6-8 months............sorry.......just kidding.....could not resist.

As a tie-in with the post above about election chaos........here is a nice little, simple, article. these types of articles are SO SIMPLE and usually totally ignored. BUT.......also usually totally true:

Opinion: Want to retire rich? Start by unlearning some conventional wisdom

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/w...conventional-wisdom-11600439080?mod=home-page

(BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content)

"To manage our money better, often we don’t need to know more. Instead, we need to unlearn what we think we already know.

Here are just some of the things that, at various points in my 35-year investing career, I’ve thought I’ve known:

• Which fund managers will outperform.
• Which way the economy is headed.
• What’s next for interest rates and share prices.
• Whether the overall stock market is overvalued or not.
• Which individual stocks will beat the market.
• Which stock market sectors and national stock markets will fare best.

Fortunately, this “knowledge” never greatly influenced my investment strategy. Still, I have little doubt that my portfolio’s performance would have been better if I hadn’t imagined that I knew these things—and I certainly wouldn’t have wasted so much time and mental energy.

Why do we think we know such things? It’s partly because Wall Street and the financial media talk endlessly about these issues. The financial media needs to fill airtime, websites and printed pages. Meanwhile, Wall Street wants to convince you that you know something about the future, so you actively manage your portfolio and thereby fatten the Street’s coffers.

But not all the blame belongs to others. Our belief that we have knowledge also partly stems from the way we’re wired. That wiring leaves us vulnerable to a host of behavioral mistakes, including extrapolation, overconfidence and recency bias, which together conspire to convince us that we know what the future will bring.

The problem: When we think we know something, we’re inclined to act upon that knowledge. In the financial markets, action almost always triggers investment costs and perhaps big tax bills. If we mess with our basic mix of stocks and conservative investments, we may miss a big market move—and any time we opt to reduce our overall stock exposure, we also lower our portfolio’s expected long-run return. And if our purported knowledge causes us to make narrow investment bets, we risk a permanent loss of capital, as we bet on stocks and market sectors that could potentially plunge—and never bounce back.

Even if we put our hands on our heart and we swear we aren’t inclined to forecast, predictions often creep into our behavior. We hold off investing because we sense share prices could fall. We tilt toward U.S. stocks because we think that they’ll always outperform foreign markets. Instead of prudently diversifying, we hang on to the employer shares we’re granted, because we can see that the company is prospering and we believe the stock price doesn’t fully reflect that.

What if we thought harder about such issues? No matter how much we analyze individual stocks, different market sectors and the overall market, there’s no evidence we’ll come up with a better forecast. Instead, our best bet is to not forecast. We need to unknow these things that we think we know, and instead focus on facets of investing where we have some control and where we truly can add value. We’re talking here about the amount of portfolio risk we take, the investment costs we incur and the taxes we pay.

There are also other areas of our financial life where hard work and more thought can pay handsome dividends. We can substantially improve our financial life by figuring out which debts to pay off first, what sort of home it makes most sense to buy, when to claim Social Security, what insurance we need and what estate planning steps we ought to take. We can also improve our life by spending more thoughtfully and saving more diligently—and by putting in the hard work needed to change our own damaging financial behavior.

To be sure, none of this has the seductive pleasure of making forecasts and imagining we’ll be proven right. But over a lifetime of investing, that pleasure, alas, almost always carries a steep price tag—and that’s one thing we all need to know."

MY COMMENT

Portfolio risk will be front and center over the next 8 months. In addition it will be CRAZY times for the new era options day traders. IF........there are any left by the time the election happens. They may ALL be broke by than.

 

This next article I post........NOT for the political content........both parties are subject to bouts of INSANITY. With the demonizing of the rich and the constant HARPING on the WEALTH GAP this sort of "stuff" is where you end up. It will be interesting to see if this gets any traction. What a nightmare........AND.......if it does, like the income tax......it is just a matter of time till it moves down to the "regular" people.

California Tax Hikes
California Progressives Go Bigly on Tax Hikes

https://americanconsequences.com/california-tax-hikes/

(BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content)

"If California were its own sovereign territory, there’s a good chance President Donald Trump would’ve already added it to his list of [bleep]hole countries.

From rolling energy blackouts induced by green-energy boondoggles to streets littered with human waste and needles because of lawless homeless encampments… to social justice no-bail policies that release prolific offenders back into communities to reoffend… to artificially inflated costs of living because of inept intervention into labor and housing markets… California has unintentionally provided the rest of America with a valuable lesson of what awaits other states when unhinged progressive politicians take over.

And we can’t forget the taxes – the onerous, through-the-roof taxes that are designed to penalize residents who have the nerve of attaining financial success.

Californians, for their part, are voting with their feet – leaving the Golden State en masse, with one local report observing that more people have left the state over the last seven years than have migrated to it. A shrinking population means a diminishing tax base, and with California currently struggling to offset a $50 billion budget deficit amidst the coronavirus pandemic, perhaps this moment provides an opportunity for Democrat leaders in Sacramento to reevaluate their obsession with soaking “the rich,” and in its place pursue policies that are more welcoming to high earners?

No? What a shocker…

How Much Wealth Is Too Much?
Legislative Democrats have instead proposed the nation’s first-ever wealth tax, a scheme that would expand the state government’s reach to cover a person’s combined assets. After all, why bring spending in line with tax revenue – also known as responsible governance – when it is far easier to treat “the rich” like a bottomless ATM?

Yet what makes this legislation truly alarming is that it would apply to former residents, as I’ll explain in a bit.

Normally, it’s risky to quote from legislation at length. The text is both painfully boring and intentionally opaque. It’s written by lawyers, for lawyers. But in this case, while the wording is still obnoxiously clunky, the intention of the text is abundantly clear. So we’ll reference large swaths of it to give a full picture of how progressives are planning to go after everything you own if you haven’t already waved goodbye to the Hollywood Hills.

With that said, let’s dive right into Assembly Bill No. 2088.

It starts with the fundamental conceit that lawmakers have been given the Solomonic wisdom to judge how much wealth is too much wealth. The words “excessive” and “extreme” as it pertains to wealth appear throughout the bill.

“For the benefit of accumulating excessive wealth in this state there shall be imposed an annual tax of 0.4% upon the worldwide net worth of every resident in this state in excess of the following… For married taxpayers filing separately, fifteen million dollars… For all other taxpayers, thirty million dollars.” (emphasis added)
Here’s State Assemblyman Rob Bonta of Oakland explaining the nuts and bolts of his proposal. Take note of how cavalier he is about what would otherwise be straight-up theft if he didn’t carry the government’s imprimatur…

If you’re a married couple filing jointly, if you have $30 million in joint assets, the amount over $30 million is what is taxed… So you get your first $30 million untaxed. Your next $10 million is taxed at about $40,000. Your next $10 million after that, another $40,000.

Bonta downplays anxiety over adding another tax to an already overtaxed state by relying on liberalism’s predictable battle cry… Marxist class warfare: “It affects about 0.15% of the California population – not the top 10%, not the top 1%, the top 0.15%… about 30,000 people.”

Of course, if you think that politicians who currently show no restraint with spending money they didn’t earn won’t eventually lower that threshold to entangle even more families, I have a totally on-budget, on-time high-speed rail project in California that would make for a great investment!

There’s a reason why the wealth tax has had very little success in other countries… It’s a logistical nightmare. Bonta may be surprised to learn that “worldwide net worth” isn’t like determining how much money you have in your savings account… It’s a little more complicated than that.

Or it could be that Bonta is aware of the nuances involved, and the sprawling bureaucracy that would be needed to enact his agenda is exactly the type of adrenaline rush that gets a power-hungry political junkie like himself out of bed in the morning.

Loopholes Beware
Regardless, here’s how Bonta envisions California defining wealth for the purpose of taxing it:


• Stock in any publicly and privately traded C-corporation


• Stock in any S-corporation


• Interests in any partnership


• Interests in any private equity or hedge fund


• Interests in any other noncorporate businesses


• Bonds and interest-bearing savings accounts


• Cash and deposits


• Farm assets


• Interest in mutual funds or index funds


• Put and call options


• Futures contracts


• Art and collectibles


• Financial assets held offshore


• Pension funds


• Other assets, excluding real property


• Debts other than mortgages or other liabilities secured by real property


• Real property


• Mortgages and other liabilities secured by real property

This list isn’t even the final word, however, as the bill makes clear: “Assets that must be reported separately shall include, but shall not be limited to” (emphasis added). Say what you will about Bonta, but at least he understands that folks smart enough to amass $30 million in assets are likely smart enough to identify loopholes that his enforcers are not.

Folks smart enough to amass $30 million in assets are likely smart enough to identify loopholes that his enforcers are not.

Speaking of enforcers, Bonta’s legislation would empower the aggressive Franchise Tax Board (California’s IRS) to “adopt regulations to carry out these provisions, including regulations regarding the valuation of certain assets that are not publicly traded” (emphasis added).

The political party that trips over itself to condemn any restriction on abortion as an abridgement of privacy rights sure is comfortable mandating an intimate relationship between you and the IRS…

The erasure of economic liberty aside, directing government pencil pushers to determine the value of personal possessions could be problematic, as David Kline of the California Taxpayers Association tells American Consequences…

The Franchise Tax Board would have an impossible task – attempting to accurately value assets whose values could not possibly be known unless they were offered for sale in an open market. The value of a work of art, for example, depends on what a buyer would be willing to pay at a particular point in time, and a tax auditor would not have a crystal ball to make such a determination.

Moreover, Kline says, high-income households socked with the wealth tax would end up spending “an outrageous amount of time and resources trying to estimate the value of their assets every year – with the additional risk of audits and penalties if the state disagrees with their estimates.”

To be fair, Bonta does leave room in his bill for taxpayers to appeal the state’s arbitrary assessment. Just don’t get your hopes up… “The burden shall be on the petitioning party” to demonstrate that the methodology was “unfair.”

Also be prepared for the Franchise Tax Board’s attempt to nullify a legal sale if it happened to decrease a person’s overall net worth. “Any transaction, a primary purpose of which is to reduce the valuation of a taxpayer’s worldwide net worth as of December 31, shall be disregarded.” Apparently, that’s considered “evasion.”

‘Hotel California’
Yet as I mentioned earlier, these clauses aren’t even the most disturbing parts of the bill. That award goes to the section that targets those who are no longer California residents.

If passed, the wealth tax would hit affluent individuals who have lived in California over the last 10 years. “Avoidance,” asserts Bonta, “is not as simple as moving to another state. “We have a phased-in approach, whereby, if you move, in year one, 90% of the tax bill still applies to you. In year two, 80%, and so on, for ten years until it phases out.”

“Their wealth was accumulated during their time in California, during the nexus that they had with the state of California, and that is what we are proposing in our bill.”

I’m reminded of the lyrics from that famous Eagles song, “Hotel California” … You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave.

This obvious overreach flummoxed Fox Business host Neil Cavuto, who seems to agree with my Eagles reference… “It sounds like they would be prisoners of California… you’re not letting them leave.” Cavuto then asked the California Democrat the obvious question of how this tax would be legally binding. A person living outside of California is no longer subject to its jurisdiction, is he? “We believe we can do that,” responded Bonta. “Certainly, we’re open to dialogue and discussion as we move the bill forward. But we think it’s a sound approach and has a strong legal foundation.”

Jim Burling, who is with the Pacific Legal Foundation, disagrees. He tells American Consequences that, while California “may be able to tax wealth within the state just like it can tax real property within a state, there is no basis for taxing nonresidents for wealth not located in the state,” adding that any attempt by lawmakers to tax the wealth of nonresidents could “violate the dormant Commerce Clause [of the U.S. Constitution] – a doctrine that holds a state cannot adopt laws that hinder the free flow of commerce across borders.”

As of right now, Burling says, there’s no case law on the constitutionality of a state wealth tax “because no state has yet been so craven as California to have adopted one.” Because California’s constitution “nowhere expressly refers to the proposal’s taxation of ‘worldwide wealth,’ there is a good argument that there is no state constitutional authority [to implement] such a tax.”

Unintended Consequences
A wealth tax may be legally dubious, but by pressing for one, progressives don’t fully grasp how economies work. Economies are not static like a math equation… Rather, they are dynamic, representing billions of daily interactions that are impossible for control freaks like Bonta to regulate. When laws change, people alter their economic behavior and investment strategies to reflect their best interest under the new rules. It’s called human nature.

Bonta understands this reality on some level, or else he wouldn’t plan on harassing nonresidents for money once they’ve left California. Still, he largely believes that “the rich” will stay put to take it in the shorts rather than hightail it out and roll the dice in court when Bonta’s enforcers come knocking.

The great escape, however, appears to be in the works…

Dennis Brager, a Tinseltown tax attorney for the rich and famous, remarked that he’s “hearing from clients who would like advice on how to break ties with California in order to avoid paying what will amount to confiscatory taxes on their income and wealth.”

Echoing those concerns was Mauricio Umansky of the real estate company The Agency, telling one news outlet that “there is certainly a lot of conversation about getting out of California because of how expensive it is, but really more about the taxes – the fear of the new California taxes as well as the fear of the new wealth tax.”

Even the Los Angeles Times – no friend of free markets – dinged the wealth tax for rosy projections, arguing that it may have the unintended consequence of bringing in less revenue to state coffers. The Oakland Democrat optimistically claims that his wealth tax would generate $7.4 billion a year in revenue, but the Times notes that it could force “people to sell assets potentially at a loss in order to pay their tax bills.” Would such a scenario, the paper asks, cut “into the capital gains revenue upon which California is inordinately dependent?”

Sound tax policy, it writes, “requires more than just deciding which trees to shake.”

That advice, though, has fallen on deaf ears. The Democrats who’ve co-sponsored this legislation (at least a dozen of them) are intent on shaking as many trees as they can get their grubby hands on. As Bonta concedes, “Asking these well-resourced Californians to give a little more to keep our people working and support our most vulnerable is the right thing to do.”

Bonta has called his tax “patriotic” and “fair,” which are curious adjectives to describe what he’s trying to get passed. The demonized “one percent” already shoulder nearly 50% of the income tax burden.

Are they presently not patriotic? Does fairness require rendering that ratio more lopsided than it now is? Apparently so…

California is a laboratory for bad ideas. And these bad ideas have a habit of spreading across the country. Case in point, Governor Andrew Cuomo is fending off efforts by leftist politicians in his state to adopt a wealth tax for New Yorkers. Cuomo wisely maintains that such a tax would only accelerate the great pilgrimage down to Florida.

It’s uncertain whether California Governor Gavin Newsom will show similar resolve.

And although Joe Biden hasn’t endorsed a national wealth tax, progressive leaders in his party like Elizabeth Warren and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez continue to make a punitive wealth tax central to any tax-reform package. Your stuff is their stuff, or so they think…

What’s wild is that the wealth tax may only be an appetizer for California’s Democrat Party. Simultaneously, it has introduced legislation that would raise the state’s current top marginal tax rate of 13.3% to a mind-boggling 16.8%. And it would apply retroactively, from the start of 2020.

Fairness, baby!

Progressives in the Golden State seem intent on putting Margaret Thatcher’s observation on what ails socialism to the test… “Eventually, you run out of other people’s money.”"

MY COMMENT

I have tried to NOT emphasize the political portions or comments in the above article. I am discussing this tax concept.....which.......will EVENTUALLY in some form be passed in some state. THIS is the ultimate END GAME of the WEALTH ENVY and flirting with SOCIALISM that we are seeing now. I would be surprised if this passes.......at the moment. However this state does have LITERAL.........one party rule.

I WILL STATE........LUNACY........knows no party line with politicians. They are a DANGER..........regardless of party........to EVERY CITIZEN when it comes to taxes and thirst for POWER.

 

GOOD FOR YOU......Zukodany........optimism is a good thing. And.......If you have a long term horizon.........ALL things pass eventually. Part of the GLORY of long term investing.

 

AMAZING........after Zukodany mentioned that his portfolio was positive today......I looked at mine. I am ALSO green today.......slightly. I forgot to look at my result versus the SP500. Will do so now.

Edit: Just looked and I KILLED the SP500 by 1.23% today. I had no idea......I was out and out of touch all day......I expected a bloodbath.

 

Tomorrow.......at the open.........I have an order in to purchase 100 shares of Snowflake. Just a flyer........usually I dont purchase a company this young in its business life. This will be a VERY LONG TERM investment. I am SURE I will have to ride out many time periods of growing pains along the way.

 

OH NO...........I refuse to be banned.

AND.....(seriously).......you guys know that I always try to follow the research about market timing and buying all in all at once. SO.........even though I anticipate CHAOS and a down market due to the election turmoil.......when it comes to buying a (small) VERY LONG TERM position.......I do not try to time the markets....especially 1 or 2 or 3 months out. The key for me on this purchase will be for me to have.......the PATIENCE to ride it for the VERY long term.......since this is such a young company and.........no doubt..........it will hit a few rough sport along the way.......as always happens. (for example APPLE)

Since this purchase is such a young company and will take a while to mature......I will STRICTLY LIMIT.......this holding to the original 100 shares. Purchase price $230 per share and change.

 

AND........as a reminder to myself and anyone else..........here is yet another very simple "little".......but oh -so-true......article:

The Young Bull’s First Correction?

https://www.fisherinvestments.com/en-us/marketminder/the-young-bulls-first-correction

(BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content)

"Stocks had another rocky day on Monday, with the S&P 500’s -1.2% drop bringing it -8.4% from its September 2 high—nearing correction territory. (Corrections are sharp, sentiment-driven drops of around -10% to -20%.) But in a fresh twist, Tech and Tech-like stocks didn’t lead the way down. Instead, Financials took the reins as investors punished banks over allegations of money laundering published by a group of investigative journalists. Beyond that, news featured more of the same: jitters over oil prices, potential new lockdown restrictions and all things election-related. Our opinion of headline news items hasn’t changed: We think all are too widely known, too small or too sociological (meaning, disconnected from economics or markets) to impact much beyond investor sentiment. These are the kinds of stories you get in a correction, not at the beginning of a bear market, in our view. Corrections begin at any time, for any or no apparent reason. While they can be painful to endure, they are normal. In our view, reacting to one is probably more detrimental to your long-term goals than staying put.

Same goes for reacting to big stories like this week’s sweeping money laundering allegations, which ensnared dozens of banks globally. Investigative reporters obtained access to suspicious activity reports banks submit to regulators when they suspect a large transaction relates to illicit activity. In many cases, the banks reportedly executed the transactions anyway, fueling accusations that they are winking at money laundering instead of trying to curtail it. Headlines warn banks will eventually face regulatory fines because of this, but we think this is quite speculative. For one, these submissions aren't proven cases of fraudulent activity by bank customers. They are actions banks flag to regulators, who may or may not use them to open a broader investigation. In some cases, regulators may inform banks not to take action blocking illicit transfers as part of a follow the money operation. Media allegations of bank wrongdoing are also common, and many don't lead to regulatory action. In our view, it is wildly premature to presume this story leads to material action dinging banks’ profits or ability to transact globally.

As for broader volatility, it isn’t unusual for one or two (or three) big stories to collide in a correction—regardless of how young a bull market is. Considering we are just two days shy of this bull market’s 6-month anniversary, we suspect many investors—some who disbelieve in this bull market anyway—fear that this is too soon to be just volatility or a correction.But as Exhibit 1 shows, if this pullback does reach correction territory, it would not be the earliest one ever to arrive—despite its coming on the heels of the fastest-ever bear market and fastest-ever recovery. Three other corrections arrived sooner, less than two months after their respective bear market lows.

Exhibit 1: A Look at the First Correction in Every Post-War Bull Market


Source: Global Financial Data, Inc. and FactSet, as of 9/21/2020. S&P 500 price returns in the periods shown, with 30.5 calendar days used to approximate 1 month. Price returns used in lieu of total due to data availability.

As the table also shows, the length of time it takes a bull market’s first correction to arrive isn’t telling. Not about the correction’s length, not about its magnitude and not about the returns over the rest of the bull market. Exhibit 2 shows this last item another way, using our least-favorite chart format ever: the dreaded scatterplot. We like scatterplots best when they show zero relationship, and that is the case here. Note how there were five corrections that began a year or so after the prior bear market ended. The returns from their low to the bull market’s eventual peak ran the gamut.

Exhibit 2: Nothing About Corrections Is Predictive


Source: Global Financial Data, Inc. and FactSet, as of 9/21/2020. Based on S&P 500 daily price returns, 6/13/1949 – 2/19/2020, with 30.5 calendar days used to approximate 1 month. Price returns used in lieu of total due to data availability.

About the only consistency is that, with one exception (1990), big returns loom after the correction’s end—sometimes really big returns. Reaping these returns is critical to earning stocks’ long-term returns, and reacting to a correction or near-correction is very often a path to missing gains. Because corrections start without warning, once you realize you are in one, it could very well be nearly over. Selling then would lock the declines in and leave you with a critical question: When do you get back in? Corrections usually end as suddenly and randomly as they begin. By the time you deem markets stable, stocks could be up 5%, 10% or more off the low. That basically amounts to selling low and buying higher. Those missed returns can add up over time, making your long-term goals that much harder to reach.

Therefore, in our view, the best course of action when sudden volatility strikes is to do nothing. Be patient, keep your long-term goals first in mind, steel your nerves, and don’t react. Remember corrections are normal and accepting their temporary declines goes hand in hand with reaping stocks’ long-term rewards.

MY COMMENT

EASY to say and often hard for......even long term investors.......to follow. That is one reason......even after 45+ years of investing........I tend to emphasize and repeat the same simple guidelines over and over and over.

 

BUMMER.......that the DOW is slightly down right now. BUT......really dont care........since, my portfolio has a nice gain.......right now. I HOPE we can hold in there.......and.......perhaps build on where we are right now........... till the close today.

 

WOW......great turn-around to the close today. Very POWERFUL.

MUCH green in the old accounts today. PLUS a very nice BEAT of the SP500 by .82%.

This is the ONLY time (LOL) I am going to mention my Snowflake purchase of 100 shares..........the ultimate short term report.......one day change for me +1.95%.

I had a very strange experience today at TACO TIME. It was actually pretty funny if it was not so IDIOTIC. My wife wanted a Quesarito. We were at the drive through. I gave our order and told them we also wanted one Quesarito. They said......."Sorry you can only order that online". I replied......"I am siting right here......... with cash in my hand........talking to you.......placing an order........and you can not sell me one unless I place an order online? 'Yes, that is right".......they said......so I told them "Ok" cancel that item.

When I got to the window I asked the guy working it......."why cant you sell those in person or in the drive-through" He had no idea. The manager than came over and said he would sell us one if we still wanted it. He again explained that it could only be ordered online. The window employee as he said it could only be ordered online said......." that is a bunch of sh$t".

The poor manager, he felt so dumb.....having to turn down a paying customer in the drive through. We were just laughing........and joking, not making a scene or giving them a hard time since they do not set policy.

WHAT KIND OF A CORPORATE MARKETING MORON.........puts a policy in place that a popular menu item can ONLY be ordered online at a fast food place? How frustrating if you are the franchise owner to have to tell a customer standing in front of you............with cash in their hand.........that you can NOT sell them something. We were like.......let me understand you........I can NOT place this order in the drive through but if I was siting in your lot on my phone I COULD place it?

As I said we were openly laughing at the IDIOCY of a fast food place not being able to sell something UNLESS you order it online. It was not like it took a long time to make........once the manager said they would sell us one IN VIOLATION of the policy, it was handed to us within about 10 seconds.