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Comment by sschueller | Hacker News Reader

The US getting 10% of Intel without any payment is very bad. Was there no shareholder vote?

If I was pharma I would think twice before investing In a factory that can be taken by the state just like that.

EDIT: I was not aware that something was paid. Every time I saw trump on TV he said he got it for nothing. Yeah I know he lies a lot and I should have checked more into it. This is dangerous however as internationally you don't always get the details right away and generally one believes what a head of state says.

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> The US getting 10% of Intel without any payment is very bad. Was there no shareholder vote?

I know that this is how it was reported everywhere including here, but I recently learned that it's apparently false. The US just bought shares. From https://www.reuters.com/business/us-take-10-equity-stake-int...:

> Under the agreement, the U.S. will purchase a 9.9% stake in Intel for $8.9 billion, or $20.47 per share, which represents a discount of about $4 from Intel's closing share price of $24.80 on Friday.

So they bought a 9.9% stake at a slight discount. (And just have to go back a couple of weeks to find Intel's stock price at under $20.47 per share, so I'm not sure you can really call it a real "discount").

Much of that money is money that was granted by Congress already.

> Much of that money is money that was granted by Congress already

Not to buy shares.

> "Not to buy shares."

And therein lies the problem. Trump and his cult up and changed the terms of the grant after the grant had already happened.

> The purchase of the 433.3 million Intel shares will be made with funding from the $5.7 billion in unpaid grants from the Biden-era CHIPS Act and $3.2 billion awarded to Intel for the Secure Enclave program, also awarded under Trump's predecessor, Democratic President Joe Biden.

Quote from the article

How is $4 off the closing price not a discount?

I don't know when the deal was agreed. Two weeks ago, on august 8th, the share price was $19.95, so if the price was set then, the US over-paid a bit.

I don't know how long it takes between when the price is set and when the deal becomes public. If the final price was set on friday, then yeah, there was a slight discount (though even then, the discount was within Intel's normal random short term share price fluctuations).

Maybe it's completely fair to call this a proper discount, I'm genuinely not familiar enough with the finance world to say. Regardless, I feel that this is important context; it's not like Intel's share price has been stable at between $24 and $25 per share for years and then the US comes in and buys at $20.

I suppose it’s a difference of viewpoint, but I understand what you’re getting at. Thanks for explaining it. I wouldn’t consider locking a mortgage at 6% and then having rates rise in the interim as a discount, maybe a lucky break!

ah, so the government missed a dip and made their own. nice.

> The US getting 10% of Intel without any payment is very bad. Was there no shareholder vote?

I assumed they were buying shares like any other investor. How are they getting it for free?

I just want to point out ther the government buying shares just like any other private investor would have been roundly condemned across the political board even a year ago.

they were bailing out Intel. they have bailed out Intel

If they bought market shares, the funds didn't go to intel, but to the share holders.

From an article which I lost the link to. Their logic of free is that those grants are approved already, before Trump's intervention US gets nothing, after US gets 10% of Intel.

They are buying the shares like any other investor, but the white house lied about that. Plenty of people just repeated Trump's Truth Social post which claimed: "The United States paid nothing for these Shares, and the Shares are now valued at approximately $11 Billion Dollars".

In reality, the US bought a 10% stake for roughly $8.9 billion, paying market price for the shares.

Best as I can tell, the weird, broken logic is "these funds were already allocated via the chips act and another act, but we axed that, so buying the shares instead is free".

So sure, no new funds, of which "free" is a nutty, insane interpretation, but whatever.

Weird ways to convey it aside, I do like shares as a guarantee for grants, which is not a new thing, but I'd still like to enforce funds allocation for those funds. Not sure if that's happening still.

Thanks for clarifying

It was essentially bribery.

Under Biden there was money to be granted (as in: via a grant, Congressionally approved) to Intel. Trump then held the grant hostage in return for government ownership of Intel shares.

There's also a threat that this deali supposedly eases around the Intel CEO that Trump said was 'too connected' to China.

It's either borderline or blatantly illegal, but there are likely no parties eligible to contest, or interested in contesting, it in court.

(Based on my memory of someone's breakdown of a few examples like this - there's a chance I'm conflating a couple of different but related things, the deal with Nvidia to allow selling of some more advanced chips to China being another)

Where did you read there was no payment? That's not true, the US is not Russia. Not yet at least.

This was in the “truth” posted by Trump on his social media announcing the deal:

> It is my Great Honor to report that the United States of America now fully owns and controls 10% of INTEL, a Great American Company that has an even more incredible future. I negotiated this Deal with Lip-Bu Tan, the Highly Respected Chief Executive Officer of the Company. The United States paid nothing for these Shares, and the Shares are now valued at approximately $11 Billion Dollars. This is a great Deal for America and, also, a great Deal for INTEL. Building leading edge Semiconductors and Chips, which is what INTEL does, is fundamental to the future of our Nation. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN! Thank you for your attention to this matter.

“The United States paid nothing for these Shares”

https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/1150744446179...

> The United States paid nothing for these Shares

The president has been known to not know all the facts or exaggerate about what is known. Personally, and sadly, his tweets are worthless than my fortune cookies.

> https://finance.yahoo.com/news/trump-says-everybody-eggs-now...

There is an important difference between these scenarios:

1) A member of the opposition party tweets "The president stabbed a kid" without any proof. I go on facebook and post "WTF why did the president stab a kid? He is so evil."

2) The president tweets "I just stabbed a kid" without any proof. I go on facebook and post "WTF why did the president stab a kid? He is so evil."

Right now I'm more likely to believe #1 than #2.

In general its a good rule to avoid using any politician's quote as fact. Especially at the federal level, they've all made a career of exaggerating and telling partial truths to earn media coverage and votes.

Let’s not “both sides” his behavior. This president lies about everything, and actively causes harm by lying maliciously about people he would like his followers to target.

I'm not "both sides"-ing it. Presidents all lie frequently, I'd argue they lie about most things. Without knowing what the truth actually is we would have no way of knowing who lies more, and at the end of the day my concern is with them lying at all rather than to what degree they lie to the public.

There is quite a difference between. exaggeration and blunt lies.

Also most exaggeration happens during campaigns for getting votes, but rarely the result is a strong enough mandate to push all things through, thus one has to compromise ... but campaigning on "well, realistically my options will be limited" doesn't really work, especially as the campaign promises form the negotiation base lateron.

But in that regard Trump is special, also.

What you point to is an odd reversal for sure. Trump is actually doing many of the things he campaigned on while most candidates lie during the campaign. Trump now lies about seemingly obvious or unimportant things now in office, where many presidents either wouldn't waste a lie on something unimportant or wouldn't bother acknowledging the topic at all.

They all still lie though. Whether a particular lie can be considered an exaggeration boils down to how strict a line one draws around what a lie is. To me, if a president speaks only a partial truth or a misrepresentation if information they very much have access to, its a lie.

He told the truth, but also many lies in parallel. Where is the wall that mexico paid? Where is the peace in Israel and Ukraine? 6 days are over. The truths in between this are useless.

Can you find a president in recent history that didn't fall short of many or most of their campaign promises?

I don't say that to defend trump, the guys is a narcissistic asshole. I only say that to point to the fact that he's doing what any other politician does - say what it takes to get elected then play the game that makes you the most money.

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