Elon Musk Grills Robinhood Co-Founder Vlad Tenev on Clubhouse

Most of Vlad's statements while factually correct are BS.

The formula that the NSCC uses to calculate margin requirements from brokers is not opaque. It does have a discretionary factor which they can turn up in volatile times.

Most brokerages can forecast their margin requirements. The simulation has has a few free parameters - percentage buckets of trading in different brackets of volatility vs. trading volume.

Robinhood chose to be a thinly capitalized business because it leverages returns. Vlad can act as the aggrieved party as if this was the first time it happened to any brokerage - ever. No, high volume trading on high volatility has been happening since the beginning of the stock market and most brokerages are prepared for it. Same goes for Hedge funds and proprietary trading firms which trade on margin with leverage as high as 5-10x. They prepare for their worst margin calls or risk going out of business. Source of knowledge - worked at several HF including some that (in)famously folded after failing to meet margin calls.

Vlad is is just using the SV playbook of playing fast and loose and then blaming legacy systems and opaque formulas when shit hit the fan.