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mostlysignssomeportents · 3 months ago

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Leveraged buyouts are not like mortgages

I'm coming to DEFCON! On FRIDAY (Aug 9), I'm emceeing the EFF POKER TOURNAMENT (noon at the Horseshoe Poker Room), and appearing on the BRICKED AND ABANDONED panel (5PM, LVCC - L1 - HW1–11–01). On SATURDAY (Aug 10), I'm giving a keynote called "DISENSHITTIFY OR DIE! How hackers can seize the means of computation and build a new, good internet that is hardened against our asshole bosses' insatiable horniness for enshittification" (noon, LVCC - L1 - HW1–11–01).

Here's an open secret: the confusing jargon of finance is not the product of some inherent complexity that requires a whole new vocabulary. Rather, finance-talk is all obfuscation, because if we called finance tactics by their plain-language names, it would be obvious that the sector exists to defraud the public and loot the real economy.

Take "leveraged buyout," a polite name for stealing a whole goddamned company:

Identify a company that owns valuable assets that are required for its continued operation, such as the real-estate occupied by its outlets, or even its lines of credit with suppliers;

Approach lenders (usually banks) and ask for money to buy the company, offering the company itself (which you don't own!) as collateral on the loan;

Offer some of those loaned funds to shareholders of the company and convince a key block of those shareholders (for example, executives with large stock grants, or speculators who've acquired large positions in the company, or people who've inherited shares from early investors but are disengaged from the operation of the firm) to demand that the company be sold to the looters;

Call a vote on selling the company at the promised price, counting on the fact that many investors will not participate in that vote (for example, the big index funds like Vanguard almost never vote on motions like this), which means that a minority of shareholders can force the sale;

Once you own the company, start to strip-mine its assets: sell its real-estate, start stiffing suppliers, fire masses of workers, all in the name of "repaying the debts" that you took on to buy the company.

This process has its own euphemistic jargon, for example, "rightsizing" for layoffs, or "introducing efficiencies" for stiffing suppliers or selling key assets and leasing them back. The looters – usually organized as private equity funds or hedge funds – will extract all the liquid capital – and give it to themselves as a "special dividend." Increasingly, there's also a "divi recap," which is a euphemism for borrowing even more money backed by the company's assets and then handing it to the private equity fund:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/09/17/divi-recaps/#graebers-ghost

If you're a Sopranos fan, this will all sound familiar, because when the (comparatively honest) mafia does this to a business, it's called a "bust-out":

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bust_Out

The mafia destroys businesses on a onesy-twosey, retail scale; but private equity and hedge funds do their plunder wholesale.

It's how they killed Red Lobster:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/05/23/spineless/#invertebrates

And it's what they did to hospitals:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/28/5000-bats/#charnel-house

It's what happened to nursing homes, Armark, private prisons, funeral homes, pet groomers, nursing homes, Toys R Us, The Olive Garden and Pet Smart:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/06/02/plunderers/#farben

It's what happened to the housing co-ops of Cooper Village, Texas energy giant TXU, Old Country Buffet, Harrah's and Caesar's:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/14/billionaire-class-solidarity/#club-deals

And it's what's slated to happen to 2.9m Boomer-owned US businesses employing 32m people, whose owners are nearing retirement:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/16/schumpeterian-terrorism/#deliberately-broken

Now, you can't demolish that much of the US productive economy without attracting some negative attention, so the looter spin-machine has perfected some talking points to hand-wave away the criticism that borrowing money using something you don't own as collateral in order to buy it and wreck it is obviously a dishonest (and potentially criminal) destructive practice.

The most common one is that borrowing money against an asset you don't own is just like getting a mortgage. This is such a badly flawed analogy that it is really a testament to the efficacy of the baffle-em-with-bullshit gambit to convince us all that we're too stupid to understand how finance works.

Sure: if I put an offer on your house, I will go to my credit union and ask the for a mortgage that uses your house as collateral. But the difference here is that you own your house, and the only way I can buy it – the only way I can actually get that mortgage – is if you agree to sell it to me.

Owner-occupied homes typically have uncomplicated ownership structures. Typically, they're owned by an individual or a couple. Sometimes they're the property of an estate that's divided up among multiple heirs, whose relationship is mediated by a will and a probate court. Title can be contested through a divorce, where disputes are settled by a divorce court. At the outer edge of complexity, you get things like polycules or lifelong roommates who've formed an LLC s they can own a house among several parties, but the LLC will have bylaws, and typically all those co-owners will be fully engaged in any sale process.

Leveraged buyouts don't target companies with simple ownership structures. They depend on firms whose equity is split among many parties, some of whom will be utterly disengaged from the firm's daily operations – say, the kids of an early employee who got a big stock grant but left before the company grew up. The looter needs to convince a few of these "owners" to force a vote on the acquisition, and then rely on the idea that many of the other shareholders will simply abstain from a vote. Asset managers are ubiquitous absentee owners who own large stakes in literally every major firm in the economy. The big funds – Vanguard, Blackrock, State Street – "buy the whole market" (a big share in every top-capitalized firm on a given stock exchange) and then seek to deliver returns equal to the overall performance of the market. If the market goes up by 5%, the index funds need to grow by 5%. If the market goes down by 5%, then so do those funds. The managers of those funds are trying to match the performance of the market, not improve on it (by voting on corporate governance decisions, say), or to beat it (by only buying stocks of companies they judge to be good bets):

https://pluralistic.net/2022/03/17/shareholder-socialism/#asset-manager-capitalism

Your family home is nothing like one of these companies. It doesn't have a bunch of minority shareholders who can force a vote, or a large block of disengaged "owners" who won't show up when that vote is called. There isn't a class of senior managers – Chief Kitchen Officer! – who have been granted large blocks of options that let them have a say in whether you will become homeless.

Now, there are homes that fit this description, and they're a fucking disaster. These are the "heirs property" homes, generally owned by the Black descendants of enslaved people who were given the proverbial 40 acres and a mule. Many prosperous majority Black settlements in the American South are composed of these kinds of lots.

Given the historical context – illiterate ex-slaves getting property as reparations or as reward for fighting with the Union Army – the titles for these lands are often muddy, with informal transfers from parents to kids sorted out with handshakes and not memorialized by hiring lawyers to update the deeds. This has created an irresistible opportunity for a certain kind of scammer, who will pull the deeds, hire genealogists to map the family trees of the original owners, and locate distant descendants with homeopathically small claims on the property. These descendants don't even know they own these claims, don't even know about these ancestors, and when they're offered a few thousand bucks for their claim, they naturally take it.

Now, armed with a claim on the property, the heirs property scammers force an auction of it, keeping the process under wraps until the last instant. If they're really lucky, they're the only bidder and they can buy the entire property for pennies on the dollar and then evict the family that has lived on it since Reconstruction. Sometimes, the family will get wind of the scam and show up to bid against the scammer, but the scammer has deep capital reserves and can easily win the auction, with the same result:

https://www.propublica.org/series/dispossessed

A similar outrage has been playing out for years in Hawai'i, where indigenous familial claims on ancestral lands have been diffused through descendants who don't even know they're co-owner of a place where their distant cousins have lived since pre-colonial times. These descendants are offered small sums to part with their stakes, which allows the speculator to force a sale and kick the indigenous Hawai'ians off their family lands so they can be turned into condos or hotels. Mark Zuckerberg used this "quiet title and partition" scam to dispossess hundreds of Hawai'ian families:

https://archive.is/g1YZ4

Heirs property and quiet title and partition are a much better analogy to a leveraged buyout than a mortgage is, because they're ways of stealing something valuable from people who depend on it and maintain it, and smashing it and selling it off.

Strip away all the jargon, and private equity is just another scam, albeit one with pretensions to respectability. Its practitioners are ripoff artists. You know the notorious "carried interest loophole" that politicians periodically discover and decry? "Carried interest" has nothing to do with the interest on a loan. The "carried interest" rule dates back to 16th century sea-captains, and it refers to the "interest" they had in the cargo they "carried":

https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/29/writers-must-be-paid/#carried-interest

Private equity managers are like sea captains in exactly the same way that leveraged buyouts are like mortgages: not at all.

And it's not like private equity is good to its investors: scams like "continuation funds" allow PE looters to steal all the money they made from strip mining valuable companies, so they show no profits on paper when it comes time to pay their investors:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/20/continuation-fraud/#buyout-groups

Those investors are just as bamboozled as we are, which is why they keep giving more money to PE funds. Today, the "dry powder" (uninvested money) that PE holds has reached an all-time record high of $2.62 trillion – money from pension funds and rich people and sovereign wealth funds, stockpiled in anticipation of buying and destroying even more profitable, productive, useful businesses:

https://www.institutionalinvestor.com/article/2di1vzgjcmzovkcea8f0g/portfolio/private-equitys-dry-powder-mountain-reaches-record-height

The practices of PE are crooked as hell, and it's only the fact that they use euphemisms and deceptive analogies to home mortgages that keeps them from being shut down. The more we strip away the bullshit, the faster we'll be able to kill this cancer, and the more of the real economy we'll be able to preserve.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/08/05/rugged-individuals/#misleading-by-analogy

#pluralistic #leveraged buyouts #lbos #divi recaps #mortgages #weaponized shelter #debt #finance #private equity #pe #mego #bust outs #plunder #looting

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hannahssimblr · 10 months ago

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Chapter Three

The air is still sweet and warm enough the following week to leave the windows of the print studio open, and in between my cleaning sessions, in particular the area around Gabriel’s desk which looks like an avalanche of cardboard and loose paper has crashed around his feet, I work on my Christmas card designs and occasionally gaze outside over the street below, cracked, patched pavements and sturdy old red brick council houses that belonged, once upon a time, to the lived in by workers from the biscuit factory and the brewery, but now have been purloined by the middle class.

Simon comes over to check how I’m doing from time to time. He has the type of presence that makes me want to sit up very straight and address him like he’s a teacher at school about to quiz me on my multiplication tables, but Simon’s not really like that. He’s so chilled out he might as well be horizontal, and all he ever really does is say “cool.” or “looking good.”, so eventually, after some days the sharp edges of my terror of criticism fades and I stop freaking out every time I see him get out of his seat. It is art, after all. The most subjective thing in the world.

“So this is design two? Or three?” He’s saying to me today, pausing at my desk on his way to the printing press. I hold up two fingers.

“Right. I’d love it if we could have six by the end of next week, if you can hack that. Just like, with the suppliers…” He trails off and I nod enthusiastically like I know what he’s talking about. “Of course, I think I have enough ideas to get six designs.”

“Cool, and at some point today could you pop downstairs to the shop and talk to Petra? She was asking if you’d do a favour for her.”

“Yeah, of course.” I resist grilling him about what she wants or rushing downstairs and insisting that she talk to me immediately, because I’m trying very hard not to be a person who seems desperate for anything lately. Even though I frequently am.

“Thanks.”

He heads over to the press next to Izzy, and moments later Michelle comes into the studio with a coffee and a paper bag in her hand. He grins at her and leans down to kiss her cheek. “This is a nice surprise.”

“I can’t stay long, Jen and I are heading into town for lunch but I know you’re working through it today so I thought I’d just get you a sandwich.” The idea of Jen standing outside this very shop at this very moment makes my heartbeat quicken.

“You’re a lifesaver.” Simon says to her. “Saves me making the intern get it for me.” He winks at me so that I know he’s only joking, even though he’s actually not, and that’s exactly what would have ended up happening, he just doesn’t want her to know about it, most likely.

“Can you stay for lunch?”

“No, I have plans with Jen, but I’ll see you later on.” She glances around the room at everyone else. “I suppose I’ll probably see you all later on.”

“At Izzy’s gig!” Gabriel whoops. “Yes you will.” I smile at her and nod, already trying to come up with a plan as to how I will wrangle Shane and Claire into coming with me. It’s out of pure social anxiety, not because I think they’ll enjoy the music.

When Michelle heads out and the rest of us start making moves for our own lunch break, Izzy asks if I’ll get food with her, since Simon and Gabriel are too busy. She says she knows a nice takeaway spot nearby, and I trust her because she seems like the kind of person who would know the best places to eat and drink in every corner of the city.

The streets are busy that afternoon, the last gasps of tourist season leaving the foot traffic heavy enough to have to stop and start behind the people who want to take photographs of things like fan windows and the fronts of pubs. Izzy stops me to let a middle aged couple take a picture next to a statue of a teapot. I think about how that was nice of her, to stop walking for them when I’m sure I would have barrelled through and ruined the photo. I don’t think I’m the type of person to do things like that anymore, my patience has worn too thin over the last two years I’ve lived here.

“Cute.” She comments as they smile and let us pass them by, and then we continue down a street that opens onto the Liffey. It really doesn’t smell very good on warm days, and as I peer down into it I count two shopping trolleys and a child’s bicycle. I wonder what else they’d find if they did an expedition of that river. Considering the possibilities of what could lie there under the silt kind of makes my stomach turn, and draws to mind the time I saw a dead poodle floating in a river on a family expedition to county Cork. Izzy guides me around a corner and up a hill to a cafe, and the sun is in my eyes.

My gaze slips over the people eating outside the restaurant as we approach. There’s a woman with a small baby who is kicking and writhing in her arms, fat little legs creased adorably at the knees. An elderly man on the next table tries to enjoy his newspaper, only he can’t help but glance over his shoulder at the infant when she babbles and shrieks, interrupting his concentration. There’s a girl with her back to me, long, wavy blonde hair that spills all the way down her chair, and a man sitting across from here with dark hair and sunglasses. He’s handsome, well dressed and has an upturned, clever little mouth that sends a jolt of recognition through me. I almost gasp out loud, but then I remember that it couldn’t be him. It never is. This city is full of good looking, dark haired men, and not one of them has ever been the one that I hoped. As if he’s ever going to be here…

And then he lifts his sunglasses to pinch the bridge of his nose, and those brown eyes could only belong to one person. My breath catches in my throat. I can’t look away from him, and I stand at the door of the cafe frozen still in anticipation of the moment he’ll see me too.

His eyes flicker over the blonde girl’s head for a second and then widen with surprise. He practically shoots out of his seat, the metal legs of the chair shuddering across the concrete behind him, and the look on his face is astounding, like he can’t believe I am real. “Evie.”

“Hi.” I say, and then somehow I am next to him, wanting to launch myself into his arms, but I stop myself. His fingers twitch outwards too, like he’s reaching for me but his hesitation matches my own. He doesn’t know if he’s allowed to touch me anymore.

“What are you doing here?” I manage. Jude looks the same as he did the last time I saw him, but somehow I’m surprised. I don’t know how I keep forgetting how gorgeous he is, as you’d think that something like that would be permanently imprinted in your memory, and yet it’s like every single time I’ve ever turned my head to speak to him I’ve been whipped across the face by his beauty.

“I… we…” He’s flustered. He’s never seemed flustered before, and seems bewildered by himself. I watch a blush come over his nose and cheeks. “College doesn’t start for a few weeks.” He manages. “And I needed to help out with something at home, so we decided to make a holiday of it.”

We. I look to my right where his girlfriend is sitting. She is an unmistakable presence, and yet at first I almost missed her. She’s head to toe in black. They both are, as though they plan to attend an extremely fashionable funeral. Her clothes are so contrasting to her hair which is the whitest, blondest blonde I’ve ever seen. She’s slim, languid, long hands and wrists and sharp collarbones, full lips and a button nose, the kind of pretty that makes ordinary girls feel like monsters in comparison. I imagine a photo taken of both of us side by side, and how I’d never look nice next to her, my dull, limp brown hair and unremarkable features would make me vanish into the wallpaper while she would positively glow with beauty.

I’m caught up in the situation, looking at her and looking at him, and I forget all about poor Izzy waiting for me at the door. She clears her throat gently and tells me she’s going to go inside and order her lunch. I feel a bit embarrassed that this significant moment happened right in front of her without her knowing the context of any of it, but I tell her I’ll follow her soon.

“This is Astrid, by the way. My girlfriend.” Jude says, as if she needed an introduction, as if I didn’t know that already, and I smile at her. “Evie.” The smile she returns is a bit thin and lukewarm, and she doesn’t take off her sunglasses so I can’t really read her face at all. My skin prickles, and for the first time I start wondering if I’ve made my return appearance at the wrong time.

“I never expected to just run into you.” Jude says with eyes that leap all over my face.

“Me neither, I…” I feel bad about cutting him out of my life for a guy who almost ruined my life. “It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”

“It has. Over a year now.”

I grimace as the most egregious moments from our last conversation float into my mind and I feel as though I have to blink them away. “I hope you’re doing well.”

“Yeah, I’m doing fine.” He pauses again, like he’s not sure how much I even want to hear. “We’re around for the next week. We’re going to be hitting some of the main spots in Dublin before flying back to Berlin. ”

“Touring around. Like tourists.” I cringe at myself.

“Yeah, it’s Astrid’s first time in Ireland.”

I look down at her and smile and tell her that she’s welcome, because that’s what I feel like I should say, but she doesn’t smile back, takes a berry from the top of her pancake stack and nibbles on it.

“I think that tomorrow we might do the whole Trinity library tour thing. It’s hard to come up with things to do when you, like, lived here for so long, you know?”

“Yeah I know, I couldn’t think of much either. But it’s not like you ever really do all of the touristy things when you live here, do you? Like the leprechaun museum or whatever.” We pull identical faces of disgust at each other and I find myself laughing. I look at Astrid. “What kinds of things do you like to do?”

She leaves a reluctant pause. “I’m not sure.” and her voice is gentle, accentless. She doesn’t even seem interested in looking at me, and then doesn’t say anything else when I leave the space for her to elaborate, so Jude finally explains for her, albeit a touch impatiently. “In Berlin we normally go out. Like, bars and clubs and concerts. We have a mutual love for music, so.”

“Oh, that’s so funny, I’m actually going to a gig tonight.” I point at Izzy through the café window. “Izzy is the singer, she’s playing later on, and actually I think Jen is going too.”

“Oh, well, she didn’t say anything to me about it.” A line appears between his brows.

“Maybe she forgot?”

“Yeah, maybe.”

“Well, I’m inviting you. Inviting you both.” I attempt yet another smile at Astrid who is now scrolling on her phone and feel a bit rattled by her, aware of her displeasure at my interruption. I give Jude the breeziest smile in my repertoire. “You better get back to your lunch, or your food will get cold.”

“Yeah, yeah, sure. Okay.” Jude says, still watching me with some disbelief. “Maybe we’ll see you later on?”

“If you’re at the gig, you will.” I give them a rushed goodbye and hurry inside after Izzy, my skin buzzing all over, heart thumping inside my rib cage.

“I’m sorry if that was awkward.” I mutter to her as I join her in the queue. “That was just my old friend, I haven’t seen him in a while. I think I should have just introduced you.”

“No it’s okay, it wasn’t awkward because you didn’t introduce us, I just felt weird about interrupting an argument like that.”

I blink. “Were they arguing?”

She looks out the window to where they’re sitting, their food uneaten, and it’s suddenly obvious. Their body language is tense and they’ve turned so that their torsos are angled away from each other, Astrid says something to Jude, and he says something back with a furrowed brow and a swipe of his hand. I suppose I didn’t notice it at first but now it’s so obvious, and I feel stupid. “Oh, they were.”

“Don’t feel bad. You didn’t know. What are you ordering?”

“Oh, um, whatever you’re having. I’ll just have the same.” I drag my eyes away from them. Whatever it is, it’s nothing to do with me.

Beginning // Prev // Next

#lucky girl part 3 #he's back!#I always loved that shocked/enamored expression he has when he first sees her #and how nervous he is hehe

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ravendruid · 2 years ago

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Since a couple of people were interested. I'm going to post a few inspiration boards for Be In My Eyes (you can read it here or on AO3), starting with the inspiration for Glorious.

Glorious is located on a nondescript street near the campus. The outside of the building is just like the others in its vicinity, with dark red bricks that blend too well with each other. Above the wooden door hangs a sign with a golden unicorn over a dark background with the world Glorious written above it in gold calligraphy.

On the other side of the wooden door is a curtain of beads of different shades of purple and pink, and a few golden and white. The inside looks bigger than the outside, and the purple aura underneath the door comes from the purple glow of lights spread around the area. The first floor is the main bar area, with wooden tables and booths that have seen better times, the black leather seats at the boots are worn but not ripped, and the chairs have matching cushions. Each table has a bowl with floating purple candles and rose petals, and the walls are adorned with various curtains and fabrics in shades of purple, lilac, soft pinks, and golden accents. On the opposite side of the entrance is a wall displaying dozens of bottles behind a long wooden counter. To the right of the entrance is a set of doors that lead to the bathroom and the employees' area, and to the left is a wooden staircase with deep purple carpet and golden trim that leads to the first floor.

The upper floor of Glorious looks even bigger than the lower floor due to the mirrored wall behind the DJ Booth on a small stage. A few microphones and musical instruments are set aside on the stage, and there is a small Karaoke machine in the corner. The dancefloor takes most of the center of the room, with a disco ball spinning above it on the ceiling, creating light effects. Around the dancefloor are several alcoves, with couches and armchairs, surrounded by white and light purple curtains and gold string lights hanging from the ceiling, creating some sort of privacy. Each alcove has a small table in the center, a very comfortable lilac rug, and several comfy pillows with different colors within the bar's color scheme. Although the music is louder on this floor, the curtains help dampen the sound.

Check below for a sneaky surprise about Gilmore's backstory.

Shaun Gilmore was born in a small village in Marquet named Shandal, and he moved to Emon shortly after finishing high school. All he had on him was a small backpack with clothes and his belongings, a pouch with some gold, and all the dreams in the world.

Because he couldn’t attend university, and to be honest, he wasn’t really that interested in it, Gilmore quickly found work within the city, aiding store owners by running errands for them, cleaning up the shops, and restocking overnight. He climbed his way up the ladder until he earned a job as a counter clerk at a bookstore during the day and a barman at night.

A couple of years after handling two jobs at the same time, Gilmore realized that being behind a register was not something he wanted to do forever and that he really enjoyed his time at the bar, where he got to meet many interesting people around his age and hear stories of many different backgrounds. His love and dedication to the establishment drove him to pick up more work in the back room: he learned the ropes of ordering goods, establishing contacts with suppliers, and managing stock and personnel. It didn’t take long for him to be promoted to manager and to learn how to handle the books from the owner.

A year and a half ago, the bar owner decided it was finally time for retirement. The bar had done well in the past twenty years he owned it, and he had a decent amount saved for his retirement. So, without a second thought, the keys were handed to Shaun, and the deed was signed in his name. For the next month, Gilmore worked tirelessly in redecorating the establishment to his vision. Due to his love and respect for the place and the person who had welcomed him with open arms, Gilmore kept some of its characteristics, like the wooden tables and counter, the booths and their worn leather seats, and the small stage on the top floor.

Somewhere in the back room, in the office Gilmore now calls his own, is a secret binder with ideas, plans, and graphs for his next project.

#critical role #cr fic #vox machina #shaun gilmore #bime #modern au #college au #y'all can blame crispysnake for this <3

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karimnagarredbricks · 3 days ago

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micupgro · 1 month ago

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From Tradition to Innovation: The Evolution of Building Materials in Saudi Arabia

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ABCO is proud to be a leading supplier of these modern building materials in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. We provide a wide range of premium-quality cement, steel, and other construction materials that ensure the strength and longevity of your projects. Our products are sourced from trusted manufacturers and meet international standards, helping Saudi Arabia’s construction industry grow while maintaining the highest levels of quality.

6. Glass and Aluminum

In recent years, with the growth of modern architecture and skyscrapers in cities like Riyadh, Jeddah, and Dammam, materials like glass and aluminum have become prominent. Glass is widely used in office buildings, residential towers, and shopping centers for its aesthetic appeal and ability to allow natural light to flood into interiors. Aluminum, often used for cladding and window frames, is lightweight, corrosion-resistant, and ideal for the hot Saudi climate.

ABCO also supplies high-quality glass and aluminum for construction projects, ensuring that builders have access to the latest materials that meet both functional and aesthetic needs.

7. Gypsum for Interior Construction

Gypsum has long been used for interior construction, particularly in the creation of partition walls, ceilings, and decorative elements. In Saudi Arabia, gypsum is a popular choice for its ease of use, fire resistance, and aesthetic appeal. It provides flexibility in designing intricate moldings and ceilings that are common in homes and commercial buildings across the country. ABCO offers gypsum products that are ideal for interior construction, helping contractors create beautiful, durable spaces.

Conclusion

The materials used for building in Saudi Arabia have evolved significantly over time, from traditional adobe and coral stone to modern steel and concrete. While the techniques and materials have changed, the goal remains the same: to build durable, efficient, and aesthetically pleasing structures that can withstand the Kingdom’s unique climate.

As Saudi Arabia continues its rapid development, companies like ABCO are at the forefront of supplying the materials needed to shape the future of construction. With our comprehensive range of products, from steel and cement to modern innovations like glass and aluminum, ABCO is committed to providing builders with everything they need to bring their projects to life. Whether you're working on a small residential project or a large infrastructure development, ABCO has the materials you can trust for quality and durability.

Explore our full range of building materials today at ABCO Saudi and build the future with us.

#building materials #construction #hardware

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patent-registration-services · 2 months ago

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Greenstone AAC Blocks: Revolutionizing Eco-Friendly Building with Advanced AAC Solutions

Introduction:

In the construction industry, materials that offer sustainability, efficiency, and long-term durability are in high demand. One such innovation is the use of AAC (Autoclaved Aerated Concrete) blocks. Among the leading manufacturers, Greenstone AAC Blocks has emerged as a reputable name, known for producing high-quality AAC blocks that cater to the growing demand for eco-friendly building materials. As one of the prominent autoclaved aerated concrete block manufacturers in Hyderabad, Greenstone continues to expand its market across various regions.

What are AAC Blocks?

Autoclaved Aerated Concrete (AAC) blocks are lightweight, precast building materials that offer superior insulation, fire resistance, and structural strength. Made from a mixture of cement, lime, sand, water, and an aerating agent, these blocks undergo a process where the mixture is poured into molds. Once set, it is cured under high-pressure steam in an autoclave. This curing process provides the blocks with their unique properties, making them lightweight, durable, and energy-efficient.

Benefits of AAC Blocks

1. Lightweight Nature: One of the most prominent benefits of AAC blocks is their lightweight nature. These blocks are approximately three times lighter than traditional red bricks. This reduced weight allows for faster construction, reduced structural load, and easier handling during building processes.

2. Fire Resistance: These blocks are fire-resistant, making them a safer choice for construction, particularly in areas prone to fire hazards. AAC blocks can withstand temperatures as high as 1600°C, providing superior safety for structures.

3. Eco-Friendly: AAC blocks are made using non-toxic materials and are 100% recyclable. Their manufacturing process requires less energy, and the blocks themselves are made using fly ash, a by-product of coal combustion, helping reduce industrial waste. Greenstone AAC Blocks ensures that their manufacturing processes are eco-friendly, contributing to sustainable construction.

Greenstone AAC Blocks: Commitment to Quality:

Greenstone AAC Blocks is a trusted name in the AAC block manufacturing industry, known for its consistent quality and innovative production techniques. Their state-of-the-art manufacturing facility is equipped with modern machinery, ensuring that each block meets the highest standards of precision and durability. As one of the leading AAC bricks manufacturers in Bangalore and autoclaved aerated concrete brick suppliers in Vijayawada, Greenstone continues to meet the growing demand for AAC blocks in major cities.

Applications of Greenstone AAC Blocks:

1. Residential Buildings: AAC blocks are widely used in residential construction due to their thermal efficiency and ease of installation. Homes built with Greenstone AAC Blocks are more energy-efficient, cost-effective, and environmentally friendly.

2. Commercial Buildings: Commercial projects, including office buildings, malls, and educational institutions, benefit from the strength and sound insulation properties of AAC blocks. Greenstone AAC Blocks ensures that their products provide the structural integrity needed for large-scale commercial projects.

3. Industrial Constructions: For industrial facilities, fire resistance and durability are critical factors. Greenstone AAC Blocks' fireproof nature makes them a reliable choice for factories, warehouses, and other industrial structures. As one of the trusted AAC blocks suppliers in Vishakhapatnam, Greenstone is committed to providing construction solutions that meet the unique needs of industrial projects.

Conclusion:

Greenstone AAC Blocks has established itself as a leader in the production of AAC blocks, meeting the demands of modern construction with a focus on sustainability, durability, and efficiency. As one of the top autoclaved aerated concrete block manufacturers in Hyderabad and AAC bricks manufacturers in Bangalore, they are committed to providing innovative building solutions. Their reach extends to being trusted autoclaved aerated concrete brick suppliers in Vijayawada and reliable AAC blocks suppliers in Vishakhapatnam, helping drive eco-friendly construction across key regions. With their commitment to quality, Greenstone AAC Blocks continues to play a significant role in the evolution of the construction industry, offering products that not only meet but exceed expectations in terms of performance and environmental impact.

#aac blocks suppliers in Vishakhapatnam

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metrials · 1 year ago

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https://www.buildersmart.in/bricks-blocks-price-list

Buy Bricks & Blocks Online at Best price in Hyderabad | Bricks Price

Were you looking for high-quality bricks and blocks in Hyderabad for your construction needs? Look no further than our online store. We offer the best prices and the convenience of online shopping with free Cash on Delivery (COD) for your peace of mind. Our extensive range of bricks and blocks in Hyderabad, sourced from trusted suppliers, are perfect for any construction project, whether it is a new home or a renovation. Our bricks and blocks in Hyderabad are durable, dependable, and sourced from trusted suppliers to ensure that you get the quality materials you need to complete your project successfully. With our easy-to-use online platform, you can browse, select, and order the materials you need with just a few clicks. Our website provides you with complete information about our products, including detailed descriptions and images, so you can make an informed decision about your purchase.

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rodi-dust · 2 months ago

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AAC Block Supplier in Gurgaon, Faridabad, Delhi : AAC Block. — Rodidust.

AAC blocks or Autoclaved Aerated Concrete blocks, one of lightweight building material, made up of sand, calcined gypsum, lime, water, aluminium powder and cement which is heated under pressure in autoclave. These blocks are used for both interior and exterior construction. It is greyish-white in color and has thermal efficiency three times higher than clay bricks. It is 50% lighter than red bricks and also one-third of cost those bricks. Its sound insulation is approximately 42b and water absorption of about 10% of its weight. AAC Block Supplier in Gurgaon.

Advantages of AAC Blocks.

✓ AAC blocks are light in weight. It weighs almost 50% less than other bricks. Hence its light weight leads to reduce transportation and labor cost. Not only this, its lighter weight makes the blocks easy to handle and also increase the chances of survival in seismic activity. Hence it is earthquake resistant also.

✓ Usually, AAC blocks are larger in size which leads to faster masonry work hence reducing the construction cost of project.

✓ While looking upon construction-design, moisture protection is the important factor that is taken into consideration. AAC blocks have porous structure. The macro pores present in AAC, makes it moisture-proof.

✓ It allows diffusion of water hence the usage of AAC blocks leads to great ventilation. It absorbs all the moisture and releases humidity.

✓ As compare to other concrete, it produces 30% less solid waste along with decrement of 50% of greenhouse gas emission. So, AAC blocks are environment- friendly.

✓ Talking about longevity of AAC blocks, they are not affected by harsh climates. Also, it does not get degrade easily by normal climate conditions. Hence, AAC blocks are long-lasting.

✓ When fire-safety point of view is taken into consideration, AAC blocks can be looked upon because of their non-combustible property. It can provide fire-resistance for upto six hours.

✓ In the manufacture of AAC blocks no toxic substances are utilized which further do not attracts pests. So, AAC blocks are also termite-free.

✓ AAC blocks allows temperatures to be warm in winters and cold in summers because of thermal insulation property which is gained by the formation of hydrogen in production process.

✓ AAC blocks are much stronger than other building materials as it have average compressive strength of 3.5 N/mm2.

Also Check this post: AAC Blocks Supplier in Delhi AAC Block Supplier in Faridabad

Key Features of High-Quality AAC Blocks.

Density and Strength

High-quality AAC blocks should have a uniform density and high compressive strength to ensure they are durable and capable of withstanding structural loads.

Thermal Performance

Good AAC blocks provide excellent thermal insulation, helping to maintain comfortable indoor temperatures without excessive energy use.

Moisture Resistance

Look for AAC blocks that are moisture-resistant, which helps prevent issues like mold growth and structural weakening.

Dimensional Accuracy

AAC blocks with accurate dimensions make construction more efficient, reducing the need for excess mortar and ensuring precise alignment.

Conclusion.

Choosing the right AAC block supplier in Gurgaon, Faridabad, and Delhi can make a significant difference in your construction project. AAC blocks are revolutionizing the building industry due to their eco-friendly nature, thermal insulation, lightweight design, and cost-effectiveness. Whether you are working on a residential, commercial, or industrial project, selecting a reliable supplier ensures you receive high-quality blocks that meet local building standards and certifications.

#AAC Block Supplier in Gurgaon #aac block #AAC Block Price in gurgaon #AAC Blocks Supplier in Delhi #AAC Block Supplier in Faridabad

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buildersmarthyd · 3 months ago

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Bricks and Blocks Price in Hyderabad Today

Buy Bricks & Blocks Online, get high-quality bricks & blocks at the best price, We offer High-quality Flyash Bricks, AAC Blocks, Lightweight Bricks, and clay bricks procured from trusted vendors across Hyderabad, Telangana

Want to buy bricks and blocks online? You have arrived to the correct location! BuildersMART provides a large selection of high-quality bricks and blocks at the best prices in Hyderabad, Telangana. Our broad range includes flyash Bricks, AAC Blocks, Lightweight Bricks, and Clay Bricks, all of which are purchased from reputable vendors to assure high quality for your construction needs.

Flyash Bricks are environmentally benign and offer exceptional strength and durability, making them a perfect alternative for modern projects. AAC blocks are lightweight, thermally efficient, and easy to handle, making them ideal for decreasing construction time and costs. Lightweight bricks have excellent insulating capabilities, which contribute to energy-efficient constructions. Clay bricks, noted for their traditional appearance and strength, provide a timeless touch to any structure.

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#red brick #accblocks #construction materials #concrete blocks #cement blocks

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mostlysignssomeportents · 1 year ago

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How Amazon transformed the EU into a planned economy

Amazon is a perfect parable of enshittification, the process by which platforms first offer subsidies to end users until they’re locked in, then make life good for business customers at users’ expense, until they’re locked in, then claw back all the value they can for themselves, leaving just enough behind to keep the lock-in going.

In a new report for SOMO, Margarida Silva describes how the end-stage enshittification of Amazon is playing out in the EU, with Amazon repeating its US playbook of gouging the small businesses who have no choice but to use the platform in order to reach its locked-in customers, making European customers and European sellers poorer:

https://www.somo.nl/amazons-european-chokehold/

The mechanism for this isn’t a mystery. Amazon boasts about it! They call it their flywheel: first, customers are lured into the platform with low prices, especially through Prime, which requires pre-payment for a year’s shipping, which virtually guarantees that customers will start their shopping on Amazon. Because customers now start their buying on Amazon, sellers have to be there. The increased range of goods for sale on Amazon lures in more buyers, who lure in more sellers, with both sides holding each other hostage:

https://vimeo.com/739486256/00a0a7379a

This flywheel creates a vicious cycle, starving local retail so that customers can’t get what they need from brick-and-mortar shops, which funnels sellers into offering their goods for sale on Amazon. The less choice customers and sellers have about where they shop, the more Amazon can abuse both to pad its own bottom line.

There are 800,000 EU-based sellers on Amazon, and they have seen the junk-fees that Amazon charges them skyrocket, to the point where they have to raise prices or lose money on each sale. Amazon uses both tacit and explicit “Most Favored Nation” deals to hide these price-hikes. Under an MFN deal, sellers must not allow their goods to be sold at a lower price than Amazon’s �� so when they raise prices to cover Amazon’s increasing fees, they raise them everywhere:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/25/greedflation/

It’s not hard to understand why Amazon would raise its fees: the company has an effective e-commerce monopoly. Like Ozymandias, they have run out of worlds to conquer, and so their growth has to come from squeezing suppliers and/or raising prices, not from bringing in new customers. This is likewise true of mobile companies like Apple and Google, who have run out of people who are so excited about incremental mobile hardware gains that they’ll buy a new phone every year, which means that growth has to come from squeezing app vendors:

https://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/202x/2023/06/09/Pixel-4-to-7

This is likewise true of the streaming companies, which is why Netflix is cracking down on “password sharing”:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/02/nonbinary-families/#red-envelopes

It’s true of the movie studios, which is why they want to zero out their wage bills by replacing writers with automatic plausible sentence generators that will write stupid movies that they think we’ll still pay to see because there won’t be anything else:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/06/people-are-not-disposable/#union-strong

It’s certainly true of Uber, which is why they’ve double the cost of a taxi ride and halved the wages they pay drivers:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/12/algorithmic-wage-discrimination/#fishers-of-men

Monopolies “grow” by making their customers and suppliers worse off. But they have to be careful about this: if it’s obvious that you’re using your market power to screw buyers, you can get in trouble with competition regulators. That’s because the only part of antitrust law that the neoliberal project left intact is “consumer welfare” — the idea that monopolies should only face enforcement when they raise prices and/or lower quality:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/10/play-fair/#bedoya

This focus on price-hikes has given monopolists a free hand to squeeze suppliers and workers, because a monopolist — from Walmart to Amazon — can claim that squeezing your workers and suppliers is necessary to enhancing consumer welfare. The less you pay to produce a product, the cheaper you can price it.

When a company has a lot of seller power, we call it a monopolist. When it has a lot of buying power, we call it a monopsonist. No one ever made a bestselling, family-destroying board game called “Monopsony” so most people haven’t heard of the concept. But monopsony is every bit as dangerous as monopoly, and monopsonists find it far easier to acquire market power than monopolists. Few suppliers can afford to have even 10% of their sales disappear overnight, so a buyer who accounts for 10% of your sales can demand deep discounts and other favorable terms.

Amazon is a monopolist, but it’s also a very powerful and ruthless monopsonist. For example, its audiobook division, Audible, has a 90+% market-share, and it used that market-power to steal at least $100m from audiobook creators, in a scandal dubbed Audiblegate:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/09/07/audible-exclusive/#audiblegate

For Europe’s 800k sellers who rely on Amazon to reach their customers, the monoposony conditions are blatant and shameless. Take listing fees: Amazon’s “flywheel” pitch claims that as the company grows, it achieves “economies of scale” that can lower its cost basis. But Amazon’s listing fees haven’t changed, even as the company experienced explosive growth in the EU (remember, sellers whose Amazon fees exceed their margins have to pass those fees onto buyers, and also raise their prices everywhere else to satisfy the Most Favored Nation requirement).

Amazon books the revenues from these fees — and other junk-fees it extracts from sellers — in Luxembourg, an EU member nation that provides a tax haven to multinational businesses that want to maintain the fiction that they operate their businesses out of the tiny kingdom. There is sharp competition in the EU to offer the most servile, corrupt environment for multinationals, and Luxembourg is a leader, along with Cyprus, Malta and, of course, Ireland:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/15/finnegans-snooze/#dirty-old-town

But at least listing fees haven’t gone up, unlike other fees, which have climbed sharply. Amazon falsely claimed that its additional revenues from fees were the result of growth by independent sellers, which Amazon pegged at 65%. Later, the company admitted that the true growth figure was 22%. Meanwhile, fees are up 85%.

The true growth figure might be lower still. Amazon refuses to show the math behind its growth figures, or even say which sellers and sales are included in the figure.

The SOMO report cites research by Juozas Kaziukėnas of the e-commerce research firm Marketplace Pulse, who finds that sellers are now giving 50% of their gross revenues to Amazon, an increase of 10% over the past five years across the whole EU. However, different EU (and ex-EU) countries have experienced much steeper increases in fees — in the UK, fees have nearly doubled (up 98%), and in France, fees more than doubled (up 115%).

Many of these increases come from the Fulfilment By Amazon (FBA) program, which is promoted as an optional service, but which is really obligatory — careful research shows that sellers who warehouse, pack and ship their own goods get banished to the depths of search results, even if they have ratings, costs and times that are competitive with FBA. This is especially true of the “buy box” that lands at the top of most searches. The company refuses to disclose how buy box positioning is determined, but 90% of products in the buy box pay for FBA.

Amazon has used excuseflation to hike its FBA prices, blaming higher energy prices for price hikes that predated the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and blaming covid for price hikes that predated the pandemic.

Italy’s competition authority did yeoman service in uncovering the sleaze of FBA, publishing an investigation that showed that Prime and buy box made the notionally “optional” FBA into a must-have for merchants, meaning that Amazon could jack up FBA prices without losing business.

Another notable source of gouging came in response to the UK and France adopting digital services taxes, which were meant to make up for the tax-base erosion enabled by Luxembourg’s flouting of EU tax law. Amazon passed these taxes straight through to its merchants, without seeing a comparable decrease in the number of sellers using its platforms — an unmistakable sign of market power. If you can raise prices without losing customers, then, by definition, your customers have nowhere else to go.

I’ve previously written about how Amazon’s $31b/year “advertising” market isn’t really advertising — rather, it’s a payola scheme that auctions off the top of a search-listing to the merchant with the most to spend:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/28/enshittification/#relentless-payola

This is how you get a simple search like “cat beds” returning results whose first screen is 100% ads, and whose next five screens are 50% ads, many of them for dog products:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/interactive/2022/amazon-shopping-ads/

Auctioning off search results means that every time you search for something you want, you have to wade through screen after screen of listings for products whose vendors spent more on advertising, leaving less to spend on making quality goods.

This is as true in the EU as it is in the USA. The SOMO report shows that European merchants are required to spend ever-larger sums to show up in results for the exact products they sell, leaving them with a choice between making less money, raising prices, or skimping on quality.

But even the “winners” of Amazon’s gladiatorial combat among vendors can still lose. Amazon uses an automated product removal process that can delete some or all of a merchant’s products, without warning or explanation, and no one at Amazon will explain what a merchant did wrong. That remains true even if a vendor pays for Amazon’s “marketplace consultant” service — ask these paid Virgils why you’ve been cast into Amazon’s pit, and they’ll shrug their shoulders (and bill you for it).

And even if you can navigate the junk fees, the Kafka-as-a-service removals, the war of all sellers against all sellers for search primacy…you still lose. Merchants told SOMO that a product that survives Amazon’s gauntlet is likely to be cloned by Amazon and sold as an Amazon Basic or other house-brand product. Amazon doesn’t charge itself 50% junk fees, so it can always underprice the vendors it knocks off, and give its own products permanent top-of-search placement.

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos once testified under oath before Congress that this doesn’t happen — and then refused to return to Congress when multiple vendors showed evidence that he’d lied:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/10/18/amazon-congress-letter-third-party-data/

He definitely lied:

https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/amazon-india-rigging/

Amazon has faced investigations and enforcement in the EU over this, and settled a claim with a promise to “not use non-public seller data to compete with sellers,” but given the company’s record of broken promises on this score and the difficulty of catching them cheating, it’s pretty naive to think they’ll stick to this.

The report quotes Thomas Höppner, a lawyer who has represented small businesses that Amazon screwed over. Höppner says the problem is that the EU evaluates Amazon’s bad deeds on a “case-by-case” basis, missing the big picture: “By the time one identified problem was seemingly solved, Amazon had long made amendments elsewhere with the same effect. We require a more holistic approach that considers the entire Amazon ecosystem and the various interdependencies within.”

But the EU’s enforcement approach is about to change significantly. The EU just passed the Digital Markets Act (DMA), which imposes a bunch of obligations on Amazon:

allowing sellers to offer their products on other marketplaces at different prices (Article 5.3),

not obliging business users to pay for one of its services in order to use its platform (Article 5.8),

limiting the way Amazon uses non-public seller data to compete with them (Article 6.2)

preventing Amazon from giving top billing in search results to its own products or sellers that have acquired extra Amazon services (Article 6.5)

The report concludes with a suite of recommendations for improving EU enforcement. First, they argue for a return to traditional competition law, abandoning the “consumer welfare standard” that is so friendly to monopsonies and their abuses of suppliers and workers.

They call for a probe into Amazon’s Most Favored Nation deals (“fair pricing policy”), the practice of sponsoring search results, and spiraling fees. They want the EU to adequately fund DMA enforcement, with “measures to prevent regulatory capture.” And they want Amazon to publish clear explanations for how search results, buy box placement, and other practices hidden behind a veil of secrecy.

Amazon will doubtless claim that disclosing how those systems work will make it easier for spammers and scammers to game their way to the top of search results. We should be skeptical of this claim — content moderation is the last domain where anyone takes the bankrupt idea of security through obscurity seriously:

https://doctorow.medium.com/como-is-infosec-307f87004563

Finally, the report calls for breaking up Amazon, forcing it to choose between being a platform seller or a platform user, calling this the only way to “prevent the conflicts of interest between its role as a platform intermediary, seller, and service provider.”

The technical term for this measure is “structural separation” — a rule that bans platform companies from competing with their business customers. This is the principle at work in the US bipartisan AMERICA Act, which would force Google and Meta to spin off the parts of their ad-tech business that put them in a conflict of interest. Right now, Googbook represents both publishers and advertisers, while operating the marketplace where ad sales take place, and they take 51% out of every ad dollar:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2023/05/save-news-we-must-shatter-ad-tech

Structural separation hasn’t really been applied in the US for a generation, but it’s gained currency in recent years, for the obvious reason that the referee can’t also own one of the teams. I was in Germany last week speaking to regulators and politicians, and they espoused skepticism that the EU would embrace structural separation anytime soon.

But they were wrong! Today, the European Commission announced plans to force Google and Meta to sell off their conflict-of-interest ad-tech lines of business, mirroring the provisions of the US AMERICA Act:

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2023/06/google-may-soon-be-ordered-to-break-up-its-lucrative-ad-business-eu-warns/

Structural separation really is the policy we should be demanding. It’s amazing that lawyers who would never argue a case in front of a judge who was married to the plaintiff will turn around and defend the idea that Amazon can fairly operate a marketplace where they compete with other sellers.

With Amazon dominating online sales, and with in-person retail cratering, Amazon’s decisions have the power to determine the outcome of whole swathes of Europe’s economy. This is the “planned economy” that the EU claims it detests and seeks to prevent — but it’s an economy planned by distant autocrats in a Seattle boardroom, for the purpose of extracting the surpluses needed to launch an endless procession of penis-rockets.

If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this postto read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/06/14/flywheel-shyster-and-flywheel/#unfulfilled-by-amazon

[Image ID: A desert ruin. In the foreground is a huge Amazon box, with an EU flag in place of its shipping label. Atop the box are the feet and partial legs of an Oxymandias figure.]

Image: Rama (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gladiator_with_sword-Louis_Ernest_Meissonnier-MG_1216-IMG_1223-white.jpg

CC BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/fr/deed.en

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