After Burry criticized index funds and hyperlinked to Vanguard on his website, Vanguard's attorneys told him to cease and desist.

True: contemporaneous or reliable accounts (Burry's own earlier writings from that time, Vanguard records, press reports) show that Vanguard or its lawyers sent Burry a cease-and-desist or similar legal demand after he criticized index funds and linked to Vanguard on his website. Mostly true: a legal demand from Vanguard is documented, but a minor detail differs, for example what exactly prompted it (the hyperlink rather than the criticism, or a related use of Vanguard's name) or whether lawyers or other Vanguard staff sent it. Mixed: Vanguard contacted him to object but there is no evidence of a demand to stop, or the link to his index-fund criticism is unclear. Mostly false: Vanguard did make some contact, but it was a different matter (for example unrelated to his site or his criticism). False: evidence shows no such contact by Vanguard, or that the demand came from another firm. Burry's 2011 retelling on its own is the claim itself and does not settle it unless other evidence supports it.

Set before the research began.

1. E1 Betting on the Blind Side Vanity Fair · 1 March 2010

   “One day he lit into Vanguard’s index funds and almost instantly received a cease-and-desist letter from Vanguard’s attorneys.”

2. E2 Dr. Michael Burry -- Part One: Starting Small Hedge Fund Alpha · 20 July 2026

   “The first time Michael Burry realized that other people were reading his work, was when he wrote a post criticizing Vanguard and some of their funds. Soon after, a cease and desist letter arrived from Vanguard’s lawyers.”

3. E3 Michael Burry Resource Page | Hedge Fund Alpha Hedge Fund Alpha · 19 December 2011 Own record

   “I knew I was getting attention when I said something I think in late 1999. I said that Vanguard funds are the worst funds to invest in now. Those index products are going to do horribly over the next decade and I linked to the site and I got a cease and desist from Vanguard.”

E1 is a Vanity Fair article published in March 2010, before the claim was made. It says that after Burry criticized Vanguard's index funds he almost immediately got a cease-and-desist letter from Vanguard's attorneys. E2, a later third-party write-up, gives the same account. Neither independent source mentions a hyperlink to Vanguard; only Burry's own retelling (E3) does, and the criteria say his retelling cannot settle the claim. Because the core claim is backed by an independent press account but the hyperlink detail is not confirmed independently, the verdict is mostly true.