Twitter Fight: Roubini Vs. Business Insider

A wonkish spat erupted Friday between economist Nouriel Roubini and blogger Joe Weisenthal, all in 140 characters or fewer.

It started Friday morning when Weisenthal, deputy editor of Business Insider, pointed out (with only a small dose of snark) that Roubini, co-founder and chairman of Roubini Global Economics, who predicted Friday that the U.S. economy was headed for a "fiscal train wreck", had tweeted in August that the third quarter Gross Domestic Product growth would be close to zero percent. In fact, the number released today (subject to revision) was two percent.

Roubini quickly took to the tweets, calling Weisenthal an "idiot" for not recognizing that the two percent GDP growth figure is misleading: It was boosted, Roubini tweeted, by a glut of unsold goods. A better indicator, he explained, is the "pathetic" 0.6 percent rise in prices.

"My forecast of stall speed of economy (btw 0 and 1%) on the mark," he confirmed, via Twitter.

When Roubini then decided to predict the fourth quarter's GDP growth (which David Kotok, chief investment officer of Cumberland Advisors, told Politico will matter more than the third quarter number), Weisenthal saw it as backpedaling, and he summarized the economist's tweet thusly: "Okay, It's NEXT Quarter That We'll See The Double Dip."

Then Roubini really unleashed his fury, taking pot shots not only at Weisenthal but at his publication:

Buz [sic] model of Business Insider: pay writers near slave min wages, push them to write gossip garbage & have them earn extra pennies on traffic

And later:

Those who dont know even Economics 101 should stick to their comparative advantage: writing garbage junky business gossip paid in pennies.

Those are just the tweets he didn't delete. According to Business Insider, which has a screen grab, Roubini insulted Weisenthal "off the record," apparently intending to send the note to somebody via Direct Message. The tweet was later deleted.

Off the record:Because he is a loser and like all parasite losers he hopes for attention and traffic.

Business Insider saw a teachable moment! Apparently inspired by Roubini, it offered readers a sermon on Twitter 101.

Comments

[vippy]

05:31 AM on 11/02/2010

Roubini predicted Germany's downfall and the death of the EU - neither had happened.

[wtf-please]

08:49 AM on 10/31/2010

We need to remember Enthusiasm helps Media Ad Revenue.. or else who would want to participate in the ponzi style american economy.. yes virginia taxes will go up a lot, dem or repub

[wtf-please]

08:46 AM on 10/31/2010

GDP numbers are almost always revised downward lately.. usually on slow news day tuesday.. same with unemployment numbers being revised upwards..

[Cougar29]

10:30 PM on 10/30/2010

A parasite named Weisenthal?? LOL!!!

[reasonshouldrule]

09:06 PM on 10/30/2010

Roubini may be right about all this, but his temper and language reduced his credibility to the point that I distrust what he is saying. If he had any integrity, he would avoid these kinds of interchanges, especially in a public medium.

[DD2005]

05:25 PM on 10/30/2010

When guys like Roubini, who has been right to date to date I ight add, make their forcasts, they are not meant to be "next week's events". Roubini is absolutely right. The GDP numbers are a crock...anyone following the economy the last 3-4 years knows how the revisions get burried with everything, knows that over 85% of analysts missed profit forcasts for publicly traded companies and that the numbers that the Government gives us are meant to keep optimism alive. Roubini is absolurely right. America's money printing policy is a train wreck waiting to happen. What's left to stimulate? With 75% of the American Economy basded on consuption (consumer spending) how are you going to get people back to work spending. Quick answer? It's time for America to start becoming a nation of producers again. The money is going to all the wrong places. First stimulus was a bust. Have they not learned their lesson? The second stimulus or QE2 whatever you call it will also fail unless there is a fundamental shift in how that money is to be used.

However, it will fail because the money is not being printed to create jobs ... it is being printed to continue to debase the american dollar in an effort to tackle the debt. That is the real travesty going on. So what! Stocks go up another 20% ... everyone "feels" wealthier. It will still cost $5.00 for a loaf of bread though. Listen to Roubini.

[CarmanK]

04:30 AM on 10/30/2010

Roubini must be a real loser after reading his remarks. He is just another right wing stooge collecting a pay check for intellectual dishonesty. Shame, when this nation needs real help, we get garbage. I wonder if Murdoch runs a pool on who will tell the biggest lie each week. There are so many nominees from Media Matters, that he really could have a contest. Best Liar of the Month: give that worthy employee a bonus, or perhaps that would be too generous for the multi billionaire, maybe he could order out to McDonalds or give a gift certificate to his other multi billionaire creeps at WAL MART.

[Howard Covitz]

12:51 PM on 11/09/2010

Roubini a RIGHT wing stooge? huh? I guess you'd say the same thing about KRUGMAN. Anyone who is a Keynesian these days should be considered left of center and I welcome them.

[max08]

04:02 AM on 10/30/2010

If a responsible journalist, or the public, had listened to Roubini five years ago, we might not be in this mess. Instead, they called him Dr. Doom. And he was right.

[vippy]

05:33 AM on 11/02/2010

5 years ago no one, but no one mentioned the upcoming crisis. Bush wanted only positive news.
All the economists came out after it happened.

[max08]

09:06 PM on 11/02/2010

Dead wrong, vippy.

In 2008, Fortune magazine wrote: "In 2005 Roubini said home prices were riding a speculative wave that would soon sink the economy. Back then the professor was called a Cassandra. Now he's a sage".[1]
[1] "8 who saw the crisis coming..." Forbes Magazine, August 2008
http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2008/fortune/0808/gallery.whosawitcoming.fortune/2.html

[max08]

09:08 PM on 11/02/2010

TIME Magazine"
"Economist Nouriel Roubini, chairman of New York City – based research firm RGE Monitor, earned the nickname "Dr. Doom" by warning as early as 2005 that America's speculative housing boom could trigger an economic crisis. At the time, he was dismissed by many as a perpetual pessimist."

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1882729,00.html#ixzz14B3IGUxX

[Mik McAllister]

02:15 AM on 10/30/2010

Twitter is the Paris Hilton of the a-social networks.

[OnlineMike]

06:20 PM on 10/29/2010

I was thinking about this today, watching CNBC I noticed that there was no mention of Roubini's failed prediction on GDP, and I was thinking to myself that maybe CNBC tries to avoid embarrasing the important people that they interview so that they can get them back on their shows. I remember the CNBC interview about two months ago when Roubini made the prediction with all certainty and gave a breakdown and everything that GDP growth was going to be close to zero. Now he is trying to justify his mistake with excuses and with different inside numbers. He's been right before, more than most, but he should accept that he made a bad call this time around.

[richardgordon]

06:54 PM on 10/29/2010

Anybody who knows anything about economic forecasting knows that it is virtually impossible to predict actual GDP figures. The problem is Economists are put on the spot and asked to come up with a number. Fact is that your guess is as good as Nouriel Robuini's. So why does Roubini get drawn into such nonsense? Because the Public demands it. They naively believe that economists can predict the future. They can't. Economics is not an exact science. Economics is a social science that can explain and analyse and help guide an economy but it cannot predict with certainty a specific number. Its like the stock market. Its virtually impossible to predict for certain where a stock is going to be in 6 months or 6 years. What one can do, is to evaluate a company and determine if it is either undervalued or over valued. If you buy the stocks of undervalued companies and hold them for a period of time then the probabilities are in your favour that you'll make money. If you sell the stocks of overvalued companies then chances are you won't lose all your hard won profits. But even the smartest investors or economists cannot predict hard and fast numbers. That is simply impossible to do.

[Veri]

09:26 PM on 10/29/2010

It is not even a science. Economics is a voodoo science. It is more like psychology - very subjective and interpretive. Take a patient to a psych- and try and get a diagnosis. You can't.

Economics is like that. Science provides for concrete predictions that are replicated 100% of the time as best we know it. Economics is 0% - that is not a science.

[valkyre]

08:36 PM on 11/01/2010

Also, anybody that knows anything about economic forecasting knows that GDP is a very poor measure of anything that will matter about an economy.

[plumbergirl]

05:29 PM on 11/02/2010

I remember CNBC after the market crashed. That just kept on saying duh duh duh, with fear in their eyes.

[verycold]

05:31 PM on 10/29/2010

"Experts" have huge egos. I can't imagine getting my panties in a bunch because somebody disagreed with my projections. But then....I am not expert, and I certainly have a small ego. Life makes me humble.

[reasonshouldrule]

09:09 PM on 10/30/2010

Small egos make room for large brainpower. :-)