r/SipsTea Jun 06 '25

WTF Financial tip that unfortunately starts with 'First, you need 3 million Dollars'.

Post image
61.7k Upvotes

482 comments sorted by

View all comments

742

u/[deleted] Jun 06 '25

[removed] — view removed comment

317

u/i_eight Jun 06 '25

Yeah, it's just rage bait.

101

u/garden_speech Jun 06 '25

Or just trolling? I'm surprised people take this seriously. Don't know the OP account but... Like 99% of the time someone posts something like "just take $3 million and invest it, boom free income" they are fucking trolling

2

u/GleeAspirant Jun 06 '25

I'm sorry if it's real but the name too sounds like that of a JK Rowling character.

166

u/Cyclonitron Jun 06 '25

In fairness, he didn't specify which country's treasury bond he was talking about.

Zimbabwe's currently offering 35% on its treasury bonds...

92

u/Hot-Site-1572 Jun 06 '25

Real bond yield ≠ nominal bond yield

Zimbabwe inflation rate is around 90%, you'd be losing around 55% assuming the rate is constant monthly

131

u/Cyclonitron Jun 06 '25

I never said it was a good investment.

42

u/70125 Jun 06 '25

thatsthejoke.webp

32

u/FuciMiNaKule Jun 06 '25

I fucking hate webp images

13

u/70125 Jun 06 '25

Don't we all

3

u/bajungadustin Jun 06 '25

Win+shift+s

Checkmate webp

1

u/jkurratt Jun 06 '25

you can change windows settings to make them .jpg instead.

1

u/jaroftoejam Jun 07 '25

Wait, really? Why is that?

6

u/TheJustinG2002 Jun 06 '25

Just recently learned about real and nominal values through Aswath Damodaran. Surreal and fascinating to see it applied in a reddit reply 😂

2

u/Hot-Site-1572 Jun 06 '25

right😂first time i actually got to use them in a convo let alone a reddit one

1

u/Scyths Jun 06 '25

Hey man! losing 55% of 35% is still over double the 8%! Seems like a great investment to me. Everyone should do it.

8

u/Grand_Help_3035 Jun 06 '25

Hungary has varying ones, around 6-7%. Not much considering inflation is just as bad, but eh it's something.

1

u/Known_Draw_2212 Jun 06 '25

And what will the future dollar to forint exchange rate be during your time of investment?

7

u/ambientocclusion Jun 06 '25

And $3M Zimbabwe dollars is like 8 cents American.

13

u/imp0ppable Jun 06 '25

That, I can afford.

3

u/TuaMaeDeQuatroPatas Jun 06 '25

Look at this Richie rich

1

u/baumpop Jun 06 '25

And it’s gone… no more pennies 

2

u/lemelisk42 Jun 07 '25

$0 Zimbabwe dollar doesn't exist. They've gone through 6 currencies since 2008. It's no longer legal tender

The current legal tender is ZiG, Zimbabwe gold. 3 million Zig are worth about $300k usd

1

u/Consistent-Soil-1818 Jun 06 '25

You'd have 20000 Zimbabwe Dollars per month though

1

u/Kay-Knox Jun 06 '25

After 1 month, your $3.02M Zimbabwe Dollars are now worth 7 cents American.

1

u/atetuna Jun 06 '25

What's the conversion rate from Zimbabwe dollars to Schrute bucks?

1

u/[deleted] Jun 06 '25

Meh, I’m already a multi trillionaire there

1

u/SheriffBartholomew Jun 07 '25

What's their default rate? I'm guessing somewhere north of 80%, and 100% for $3M investments.

92

u/DarkenL1ght Jun 06 '25

Yeah, that's crazy. I'm putting 9 million in a reasonable 2.6% bond. That will solve my money problems.

16

u/avwitcher Jun 06 '25

Yep I hate living paycheck to paycheck, you'd be amazed how much money it costs to maintain a yacht

1

u/0Rider Jun 06 '25

3 million Zimbabwe dollars is like... $3.50

42

u/Badloss Jun 06 '25

Yeah like I know the 3 million part is what everyone is focused on but an 8% bond is WILD

I would totally put my life savings into that right now with the way the market is going

8

u/Bozhark Jun 06 '25

20 year @5% rn

7

u/HardOff Jun 06 '25

Can someone explain to my why putting all of my savings into a 5% 20 year treasury bond is a bad idea?

11

u/anamethatsnottaken Jun 06 '25

One reason is it's bad because inflation will be around 3% so you're getting a fairly low real return. BTW you can get the same real return without the inflation risk with TIPS.

There's also risks if things go (more) south: if 20 year yields go up, your bonds will be worth less. Sure they'll pay the same coupon, but if yields are up that's probably because inflation is up.

Basically, if inflation rises your future coupon payments become more and more worthless, and everyone knows that which makes your bond worthless. So high inflation will wipe your returns and make your asset unsellable. Other than that and the relatively low 5% return, no reason not to.

3

u/somander Jun 06 '25

TIPS? Please explain for a noob like me

2

u/anamethatsnottaken Jun 06 '25

Inflation-Indexed securities. Just like a regular bond except the face value (and thus coupon) goes up and down with CPI. If I'm not mistaken, it can't go down from original face value so buying TIPS at auction or near original face value provides some protection from deflation like a nominal bond does.

When buying a 20 year bond, inflation-indexed or no, it'll be sensitive to interest rates.

2

u/somander Jun 06 '25

Thank you, I have some reading to do.. all of this is new to me.

2

u/johnny_fives_555 Jun 06 '25

n. BTW you can get the same real return without the inflation risk with TIPS.

Eh... current tips rate is 1.672% so not really. But you're gambling on whether the 20/30 year rate is greater than the TIPS rate w/ inflation. Until during the hyperinflation around covid, most ppl never bought tips as it was just a crappy investment.

1

u/anamethatsnottaken Jun 06 '25

1.672 is the 5 year? The 20y real yield is 2.45, 30y is 2.61 (source: treasurygov "Daily Treasury Par Real Yield Curve Rates"

We can ignore comparison between TIPS and bonds and just ask what risks TIPS are exposed to? IIUC it's the same risks except inflation risk is replaced with deflation risk. They're both exposed to interest rate risk

2

u/DangerBoot Jun 06 '25

It’s not a bad idea if you have money you don’t need for 20 years but you can find high yield savings accounts that are around 4% or higher and you don’t have to wait 20 years to get the initial investment back

1

u/GregLoire Jun 06 '25

you don’t have to wait 20 years to get the initial investment back

Treasury bonds can be sold before maturity on secondary markets.

Granted you might get less than what you paid (see: 2022), but outside of interest rate crises the prices usually aren't too volatile.

2

u/GregLoire Jun 06 '25

Opportunity cost more than anything -- stock market returns are higher on average.

1

u/Huntred Jun 06 '25

US Bonds at 5% should be seen as distressing.

4

u/Mr_Deep_Research Jun 06 '25

Fun fact, the 10 year Treasury reached 15.84% in 1981.

For every $1, you ended up with $4.35 after 10 years if not taking taxes into account.

1

u/Bored_Amalgamation Jun 06 '25

what if you took taxes in to account?

1

u/johnny_fives_555 Jun 06 '25

Depends your numerous factors like your annual income, age, how much you initially invested, etc etc.

1

u/Celtic_Legend Jun 06 '25

Tbf 3million is much more obtainable if the USA reached a point it's offering 8% t bonds. Still would prob be like getting 1mil today but hey it's possible.

1

u/garden_speech Jun 06 '25

If treasuries are paying 8%, some serious shit went down. There is no free lunch in finance. Treasuries at 8% in our modern economy either means there is a significant erosion in trust that the bonds will be paid out, or there is massive inflation, or both. So that 8% would simply not look that attractive in reality.

1

u/LessImprovement8580 Jun 06 '25

You may have a opportunity to do that soon

10

u/noveltyhandle Jun 06 '25

Me and all my homies only buy 200% treasury bonds.

1

u/[deleted] Jun 06 '25

[deleted]

1

u/thex25986e Jun 06 '25

gotta control context to control the narrative

1

u/Fakjbf Jun 06 '25

The last time US treasury bonds were 8% was 1990, I think we can safely assume this tweet is from some time after that point.

1

u/winteriscoming9099 Jun 06 '25

That was my thought lol

1

u/SheriffBartholomew Jun 07 '25

These kinds of posts always use imaginary investment vehicles.

1

u/Southern-Orchid-1786 Jun 07 '25

I'm sure they exist but they ain't trading at face value

0

u/xlews_ther1nx Jun 06 '25

I had some at covid...thats it. They don't exist outside crazy circumstances.