MyRacehorse and Monomoy Girl/Got Stormy

[moses]

Originally Posted by Merlinsky

They're not being duped. There's no trick. It's right there upfront. You know what you get and if you're fine with that, so what? It's like saying Disney is duping people into crowdfunding their theme park. Not everything is about obtaining profit. Thinking you can make guaranteed bank on a racehorse is rather optimistic. Actually purchasing an individual racehorse is still not likely to result in you counting the bucks. Technically you co-own Monomoy Girl if you have so much as one share, and from what I can tell if she had a big year and makes another million (not far fetched given her past record), you'd come out even.

This isn’t what I said.

MyRacehorse seems to offer a deal where it is nearly impossible for the MRH shareholder to ever make a profit (even with a horse as successful as Authentic) based on the ridiculous valuations of the horse and provision in the agreement that the shareholder pay interest on money “borrowed” from another owner (in the case of Authentic, Spendthrift entered into an agreement with itself agreeing to the valuation and breeding rights that it is turns around and charges interest on the MRH shareholders for). Meanwhile, the MRH shareholders do not get the same rights/benefits as usual horse owners.

The fact that they advertise this as “ownership” is fraud. The fact that spendthrift sets the valuation and charges interest to MRH shareholders pursuant to an agreement that it entered into with itself is unconscionable.

As for the Disney comparison, it doesn’t stand. When I buy a ticket to go to Disney World, they don’t tell me that I own a percentage of the park. I’m there for a specific, advertised reason. If MRH were advertising this as entertainment and not “ownership,” then I think it would be slightly better.

All that said, lots of MRH shareholders seem happy with their “investment,” so I guess good for them.