It's a play on words. The snail wants the s put on his car. Escargot is a cooked land snails dish, and is also the French word for "snail". Eaten by the French as an appetizer(hence the pronunciation) the joke would be the snail essentially saying look at me in my own vehicle.
Vagrancy: Minor offense. Panhandling: So far, this trend has included measures making it illegal for persons to ask for money in public, as well as measures prohibiting activities such as sleeping/camping, eating, sitting, and begging in public spaces.
The Dukes hired Beeks to steal the top secret government orange crop report which was a detailed forecast of how the new year's orange harvest was supposed pay out: if the weather in Florida and other orange producing states (like California) was cold in the winter, it would have an effect on the orange crop: oranges might freeze on the trees and be unusable to make orange juice. Therefore, the price of orange juice for the new year would rise. Billy Ray & Louis steal the crop report from Beeks on the train and replace it with a fake one that told the Dukes the orange harvest for the year would produce fewer oranges. When the Dukes arrive at the stock exchange, they tell their buyer in the pits to keep buying stock in oranges which drives the price of oranges up. However, when the real report is read and the Sec of Agriculture says the cold weather will have no effect on the orange crop, the price starts coming down and Billy Ray & Louis start buying up the stock futures from the sellers, driving the price of oranges down again. They end up cornering the market and earning hundreds of millions of dollars and also gain their revenge by forcing the Dukes to come up with the money they accumulated while buying the orange stocks and driving the price up. That amount, as read by the stock exchange manager, is $394 million ($1.164) BILLION in 2022 adjusted for inflation). The horrified Dukes say they don't have the money and they wind up with their assets frozen, their seats on the exchange put up for sale and their possessions seized to pay that amount. The final insult to the Dukes is how Billy Ray and Louis made a $1 bet ($2.96 in 2022 adjusted for inflation) to see if they could do it and how they flaunted that to the Dukes on the floor.
The actual amount isn't given but the Dukes had to pay $394 million ($1.011 BILLION in 2019 adjusted for inflation)
In the movie, the Dukes "shorted" oranges in a "margin" trade, using leverage.
In a margin trade, you may bet $100, but you multiply your risk in the event you made the wrong bet. In some markets you can leverage it by 50x or 100x. In some forex market, they'll even let you do 200x.
This means if you made the right bet, your profit is much greater than had you simply done a standard trade; however, you made the wrong bet, and you bet $100, you OWE the exchange $10,000 (assuming you bet only $100 and leveraged it 100x).
Since the Dukes were trusted in the exchange, their leverage would have been very high.
Though the movie doesn't say how much Billy Ray and Louis made in their scheme, we know how much they bet. As I recall it was somewhere around $100k or $150k (Ophelia loaned them ~$50k, and there was another ~$50 from someone in the group).
I don't recall whether they used margin trading, but they sold at the top at around $140+ per share, just as the price peaked. Then, they "caught the falling knife" (trader's terminology for trying to time your buy when the price has reached its bottom) by purchasing the shares back at $29 per share.
The $29 per share ($74.47 in 2019 adjusted for inflation) was an artificially low price and temporary, as a result of the Duke's influence on the exchange floor. That changed when the news reported that winter would have no effect on the supply of oranges; so the price would climb back up (and Billy Ray and Louis had lots of shares bought cheaply by that point).
In a margin trade, you may bet $100, but you multiply your risk in the event you made the wrong bet. In some markets you can leverage it by 50x or 100x. In some forex market, they'll even let you do 200x.
This means if you made the right bet, your profit is much greater than had you simply done a standard trade; however, you made the wrong bet, and you bet $100, you OWE the exchange $10,000 (assuming you bet only $100 and leveraged it 100x).
Since the Dukes were trusted in the exchange, their leverage would have been very high.
Though the movie doesn't say how much Billy Ray and Louis made in their scheme, we know how much they bet. As I recall it was somewhere around $100k or $150k (Ophelia loaned them ~$50k, and there was another ~$50 from someone in the group).
I don't recall whether they used margin trading, but they sold at the top at around $140+ per share, just as the price peaked. Then, they "caught the falling knife" (trader's terminology for trying to time your buy when the price has reached its bottom) by purchasing the shares back at $29 per share.
The $29 per share ($74.47 in 2019 adjusted for inflation) was an artificially low price and temporary, as a result of the Duke's influence on the exchange floor. That changed when the news reported that winter would have no effect on the supply of oranges; so the price would climb back up (and Billy Ray and Louis had lots of shares bought cheaply by that point).
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- How long is Trading Places?1 hour and 56 minutes
- When was Trading Places released?June 8, 1983
- What is the IMDb rating of Trading Places?7.5 out of 10
- Who stars in Trading Places?
- Who wrote Trading Places?
- Who directed Trading Places?
- Who was the composer for Trading Places?
- Who was the producer of Trading Places?
- Who was the executive producer of Trading Places?
- Who was the cinematographer for Trading Places?
- Who was the editor of Trading Places?
- Who are the characters in Trading Places?Coleman, Louis Winthorpe III, Randolph Duke, Mortimer Duke, President of Heritage Club, Billy Ray Valentine, Ezra, Officer Pantuzzi, Officer Reynolds, Todd, and others
- What is the plot of Trading Places?A snobbish investor and a wily street con artist find their positions reversed as part of a bet by two callous millionaires.
- What was the budget for Trading Places?$15 million
- How much did Trading Places earn at the worldwide box office?$90.4 million
- How much did Trading Places earn at the US box office?$90.4 million
- What is Trading Places rated?TV-PG
- What genre is Trading Places?Comedy
- How many awards has Trading Places won?3 awards
- How many awards has Trading Places been nominated for?11 nominations
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