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LewisBraham
Hi Hank,
Your satire came across very well. Don't worry about the user name.
Best,
Lewis
Don't worry, the rest will get in just in time for the crash, just like they'll start to vote Republican and complain about wasteful government spending after they begin receiving Social Security and Medicare. By the way, I would take the improvemen…
When the U.S. economy sneezes .....”. If the S&P takes a sudden 25% haircut, EM’s will follow, likely loosing even more.
That is a fair point, but much depends on the nature of the cold of flue so to speak on whether or not it's contagious and t…
The thing is, none of these concerns may manifiest themselves imminently, but low valuations combined with a strong balance sheet are supposed to act as a "margin of safety" in classic value analysis. The higher valuations get and the more leveraged…
@davidrmoran That I have a harder time believing as inflation tends to be outside of corporate and government control at some points. There is a belief though that low rates will be here for a while, yes, but "permanent?" like you said, with quotes …
@hank Actually, since you mention T. Rowe Price, I would think PRIJX would be interesting for this specific situation: https://morningstar.com/funds/xnas/prijx/quote
If you go to the fund's Portfolio page: https://morningstar.com/funds/xnas/prijx/po…
@davidrmoran Interestingly, GMO's Grantham made one of the most plausible albeit depressing explanations for such a permanent shift, which involves increased monopolization and corporate influence in the political sector: csinvesting.org/wp-content/…
1987 crash is a weird one but also kind of a blip as it was over so quickly. But many argue it was technological in nature due to computerized program trading: https://investopedia.com/ask/answers/042115/what-caused-black-monday-stock-market-crash-1…
Agreed their forecasts have been inaccurate of late, but I have been around long enough to know that wasn’t always the case, particularly in the post 1999 era when GMO’s predictions were spot on. It comes down to that terribly difficult question: Wh…
But the proviso to his statement is: If you only index, you'll never lag the market by more than a sliver or not at all if you buy a now free index fund. The vast majority of managers and would-be stockpickers lag by a lot more than that.
My god, what a lot of nonsense. The author concludes: The uber-wealthy don't always live the high life, which helps them stay rich. The frugal billionaires listed above all came from modest means, where frugality was learned and practiced by their f…
Look at the post directly above yours called 2019 Capital Gains Distributions. December is distribution season. It didn't really drop 7%. You will receive a dividend or gains payout for much or all of that amount.
@Mark
I was wondering why they would do that.
Insourcing or vertical integration perhaps:
https://vox.com/the-goods/2018/12/26/18156857/amazon-flex-workers-prime-delivery-christmas-shopping
https://techcrunch.com/2019/05/13/amazon-offers-employee…
This thread began on December 12th, almost two weeks before Christmas. It seems "the season" begins earlier each year, with a barrage of advertisements, sacchrine music and 24-7 light displays. While I appreciate what I think is the underlying messa…
Good article that summarizes the fundamental problems and potential solutions with poor proxy voting records, but the author makes it sound as if results of proxy voting studies are "startling" and new when I and others have been writing about this …
Often it seems like pure laziness and indifference to one's shareholders to me, but sometimes it's because managers will post quarterly or even monthly commentaries on their web sites instead of in the semiannual report. There is also less frequentl…
Also, the examples provided didn't go back prior to 1986. (I find the reasoning for this--that some fixed income categories didn't exist prior to 1986--a bit dubious, but nevertheless.) I believe most of the rate increases after that period were gra…
No question it's a good fund, although I'm not sure all-seasons is correct. It might not work so well in a rising rate environment that punishes income oriented funds.
I would argue that people lose far more in terms of depth and diversity of knowledge of their communities than what they gain in speed from information disseminated via social media. Aside from misinformation on social media, there is also the echo …
@Gary I don't know how any one can legitimately argue that the old-school media outlets "have done it to themselves." :https://theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/12/post-advertising-future-media/578917/
It’s tempting to think that this is the inevi…
Unfortunately, Mencken wasn't a truly honorable misanthrope as he didn't hate everyone equally:
https://apnews.com/e64e97725923bb7b64aa8e054aabe4b2
https://latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1989-12-05-mn-198-story.html
https://theparisreview.org/blog/…
A few things I would note are:
1. There wouldn't be much click-bait journalism if Google/Facebook/Amazon hadn't killed journalism and basically bankrupted many publications.
2. Publications are now desperate for clicks to sustain their remaining …
Kudos, David, for discussing liquidity risk. It seems like the one risk I don't see discussed enough in the press. It also isn't analyzed particularly well or often enough in funds. It's funny to me no one else has complimented you on that part of y…
Economic theory and practice is simply reflecting the real world.
The whole point of the article is that for many decades economics hasn't reflected the real world at all.
Good interview. Only thing missing is a more detailed analysis of technology's impact on value stocks and growth stocks. Touches upon it, but not enough. Otherwise, some very interesting analysis.
As a child, I liked imaginary superheroes. Then I grew up and started to like real heroes instead. This fixation on superheroes today by grownups is getting tedious and is a sign if you ask me of an enfeebled culture desperate for imaginary saviors.…
@Benwp The interesting thing is there are many "non-profit" hospitals that operate in the U.S., rake in tons of cash but pay no taxes because of their non-profit status. All for-profit means is you have shareholders, public or private ones, who get …
More troubling to me is paying 1% fees for a manager to put 25% of assets in Google, Berkshire Hathaway and Mastercard. There are thousands of stocks in the world and yet I often see these concentrated managers put significant assets in the most obv…
@Crash Sure, but for every Leonard Cohen there are many more trust fund kids who behave like this: https://theguardian.com/us-news/2018/oct/19/billionaires-wealth-richest-income-inequality
And lest we forget, the Beatles and Jimi Hendrix came from h…
@Rono Though I disagree with it, I understand the logic behind the argument that income taxes stifle innovation, but the notion that inheritance taxes stifle innovation seems utter hogwash to me. How is a trust fund kid incentivized to innovate? If …
@dryflower
The "draconian" estate tax affects less than 0.1% of the population and allows for an $11 million exemption from the tax per person: https://cbpp.org/research/federal-tax/policy-basics-the-federal-estate-tax
Taxable estates will owe 16.5 …
If we get rid of the inheritance tax and now believe that children and grandchildren and great grandchildren, etc. should inherit massive sums of wealth they never earned or worked for themselves but simply possess because of their lucky genetics, c…
@davidrmoran I am intimately familiar with the Shell Cracker/Plastics plant in Western, PA. The sad part is while the construction of the facility has created about 6,000 jobs, once it is built, it will only offer 600 long-term positions: https://po…
@Crash I think many people see through him and just don't care so long as the tax breaks keep coming, zygotes are protected and non-Caucasians are kept out of the country.
