I think you might be interpreting the original claim too harshly. Yes, literally parking $15 billion in the SPX wouldn't have worked (or at least, he couldn't have done so immediately without altering prices).
But attacking that example doesn't diminish the spirit of the claim. If we step back from the SPX and talk about investing in a diversified portfolio of equities in general, it's fully possible to quickly invest $15 billion without meaningfully altering the price. The reality of the past decade's bull market is that Michael Dell could have invested $15 billion into the market and turned it into $26 billion.
Of course, that's just the positive claim; it remains a normative as to whether or not he should do anything. But from a purely numerical perspective: yes, he could have invested in diversified stocks and gotten a comparable return.
Responding to your edit:
> So it's clear the SEC at least doesn't agree with the premise that a single billionaire cannot affect the market.
Rule 13h-1 isn't a useful heuristic here, for two reasons:
1. It was philosophically inspired by, and designed to track trading activity of, HFT firms. In particular, the idea is to keep a closer eye on very fast trading activity which could suddenly correlate in the same direction. If the aggregate activity of many amateur investors begins to correlate it's not necessarily a problem; it is a problem if many traders over a certain threshold begin to correlate strongly. Notably, this is why the rule includes a "circuit breaker" clause for halting trading.
2. The rule specifically excludes ETFs exchanging hands. In other words, this rule wouldn't apply to someone who approached a very large firm with billions of dollars to pour into a collection of ETFs.
I agree that with _a lot_ of effort Dell could have invested $15B in the stock market in 2013 and done well for himself.
My objection is to the claim that he's somehow incompetent because he didn't outperform the market with his activity. He basically got the same returns for himself as he would have "in the market", and created economic opportunity for tens of thousands of people in the process. To me, that's a great success.
Could you have made $2700 in 2018 out of $1500 in 2013 easily by investing in an index? Yes.
Could Michael Dell have used the exact same method to make $27B in 2018 out of $15B in 2013 by investing in an index, without changing the conditions of that index such that the method wouldn't work? Yes.
You seem to now be focusing on the question "Is Michael Dell a stupid dumb idiot or a saint?"
But attacking that example doesn't diminish the spirit of the claim. If we step back from the SPX and talk about investing in a diversified portfolio of equities in general, it's fully possible to quickly invest $15 billion without meaningfully altering the price. The reality of the past decade's bull market is that Michael Dell could have invested $15 billion into the market and turned it into $26 billion.
Of course, that's just the positive claim; it remains a normative as to whether or not he should do anything. But from a purely numerical perspective: yes, he could have invested in diversified stocks and gotten a comparable return.
Responding to your edit:
> So it's clear the SEC at least doesn't agree with the premise that a single billionaire cannot affect the market.
Rule 13h-1 isn't a useful heuristic here, for two reasons:
1. It was philosophically inspired by, and designed to track trading activity of, HFT firms. In particular, the idea is to keep a closer eye on very fast trading activity which could suddenly correlate in the same direction. If the aggregate activity of many amateur investors begins to correlate it's not necessarily a problem; it is a problem if many traders over a certain threshold begin to correlate strongly. Notably, this is why the rule includes a "circuit breaker" clause for halting trading.
2. The rule specifically excludes ETFs exchanging hands. In other words, this rule wouldn't apply to someone who approached a very large firm with billions of dollars to pour into a collection of ETFs.