The Big Short (2015)

Tracy Letts: Lawrence Fields

Photos 

Quotes 

• Lawrence Fields : Your big mortgage bet concerns us. We have no confidence in your ability to identify macroeconomic trends.

  Michael Burry : You flew here to tell me that? Why? I mean, anyone can see there's a real estate bubble.

  Lawrence Fields : Actually, no one can see a bubble. That's what makes it a bubble.

  Michael Burry : That's dumb, Lawrence. There are always markers. Mortgage fraud - it's quadrupled since 2000. Average take home pay is flat yet home prices are soaring. That means homes are debts not assets.

  Martin Blaine : [sarcastically]  So Mike Burry of San Jose, a guy who gets his hair cut at SuperCuts, and doesn't wear shoes, knows more than Alan Greenspan and Hank Paulson?

  Michael Burry : Dr. Mike Burry. And yes... he does.

• Lawrence Fields : Are you being sarcastic with us, Mike?

  Michael Burry : Lawrence, I don't know how to be sarcastic.

• Michael Burry : It's only a matter of time before someone else sees this investment. We have to act now.

  Lawrence Fields : And how do you know these bonds are built on subprime crap? Aren't they filled with hundreds of pages of mortgages?

  Michael Burry : I read them.

  Lawrence Fields : You read them? No one reads them. Only the lawyers who put them together read them.

  Michael Burry : I don't think they even know what they made. The whole housing market is propped up on these bad loans. It's a time bomb, and I want to short it.

  Lawrence Fields : Through what instrument, Michael? There are no insurance contracts or options for mortgage bonds! The bonds are too stable. No one would buy them.

  Michael Burry : I'm going to get a bank to make me one. Then I'm going to buy a ton of them.

• Lawrence Fields : How big is your short position right now?

  Michael Burry : Uhh... 1.3 billion.

  Lawrence Fields : And the premiums?

  Michael Burry : Well, we pay roughly 80 to 90 million each year, which is high but I was the first to do this trade. Watch, it will pay. I may have been early, but I'm not wrong.

• Michael Burry : Lawrence, I found something really interesting.

  Lawrence Fields : Great, Michael. Whenever you find something interesting, we all tend to make money. What stock are you valuing?

  Michael Burry : No stocks. I want to short the housing market.

• Lawrence Fields : [barging in]  We have no confidence in your ability to identify macro-economic trends.

  Michael Burry : You flew here to tell me that? Why? Every, e-e-anyone can see there's a real-estate bubble.

  Lawrence Fields : Actually, no one can see a bubble, that's what makes it a bubble.

  Michael Burry : That's dumb, Lawrence. There's always markers.

• Lawrence Fields : Michael, give me my money back. Michael, do you hear me? I want my money back. Give me my fucking money back, you motherfucker.