February 2010
18 posts
4 tags
Warren Buffett's 2009 Letter To Shareholders Is...
Warrent Buffett published his annual Berkshire Hathaway shareholder letter (pdf). A couple of quotes:
Those who invest only when commentators are
upbeat end up paying a heavy price for meaningless reassurance.
In my view a board of directors of a huge financial institution is derelict if it does not insist that its
CEO bear full responsibility for risk control. If he’s incapable of handling...
2 tags
2 tags
“In the absence of substantive measures to reduce the structural elements of the...”
– PIMCO - PIMCO Viewpoints Crescenzi Feb 2010
5 tags
The global economy is messing up GDP and balance of payment accounting. Think about US companies building their factories in China, whose revenues are included in the Chinese GDP and whose exports from China are added in the Chinese current account.
For all the huge trade surplus that China is purportedly ‘enjoying’ it turns out that little benefit is being derived from it. Over 50%...
4 tags
“Shirakawa noted that monetization is happily chugging along: “We are...”
– “If The US Can Do It, So Can We”: Japan To Keep Pumping Cash And Monetizing Debt Until Deflation Goes Away | zero hedge
4 tags
Japan 2.0
Uber-deflationista and bond bull Dave Rosenberg has this interesting piece of data in his “Breakfast with Dave” newsletter:
Have a look at the household balance sheet:
Households own $18.2 trillion of residential real estate, even after the value destruction of the past three years.
Households own $18.1 trillion of equities, despite the vicious bear market.
Households own a...
4 tags
“There is no means of avoiding the final collapse of a boom brought about by...”
– Ludwig von Mises 1881-1973
4 tags
Central Bank Of Italy Watch
As I previously pointed out, balance of payments issued by Central Bank of Italy (english) had massive amounts reported under “errors and omissions”. I could not find any mention of this topic on the internet or in the national press, please comment below if you find any relevant article.
I am closely following these monthly reports because I am curious to see the impact of the...
3 tags
Back To The Future
Albert Edwards of SocGen thinks it’s too late (disturbing piece, read at your peril).
Ultimately economic prosperity over the past decade has been a sham: a totally unsustainable Ponzi scheme built on a mountain of private sector debt. GDP has simply been brought forward from the future and now it’s payback time.
3 tags
Profit Maximization vs Debt Minimization
Awesome inteview with Nomura’s Richard Koo (full text).
Maybe you didn’t know that:
the value of land collapsed 83% in Japan since the top of the bubble in 1989
total amount of wealth destruction since the bubble burst equals 3 years of GDP vs 1 year of GDP in the US during the Great Depression
nevertheless, nominal and real GDP of Japan never went below its 1989 peak thanks to...
3 tags
“That leaves just three possibilities: one of the most excruciating fiscal...”
– FT.com / Comment / Opinion - A Greek crisis is coming to America
2 tags
The 2009 U.S. Digital Year in Review - comScore,... →
Free report from ComScore on 2009 key figures on the online space.
4 tags
Social Graph Clustering
If someone had doubts about the value of the data that can be inferred from the social graph, take a look at this clustering of the US: PeteSearch: How to split up the US.
4 tags
Social Agents In A System Dynamics Environment
Since I read Social Atom by Mark Buchanan, I have been investigating agent-based models applied to economics and finance. Andrew Lo at MIT is working on behavioral finance models based on adaptive agents that evolve and are selected in a “survival of the fittest” environment. Rajiv Sethi refers to a Nature article applying agent-based models to macroeconomics.
What is interesting...
2 tags
Charles J. Brown: Obama in Europe: Systems Theory... →
System dynamics makes it to policy making. Go MIT!
3 tags
The Bond Vigilantes Spared Italy. Why?
I am quite astonished that Italy was mostly left out of the government government debt scare of the past two weeks. Today I even saw a blog post where the “I” in PIGS meant mostly Ireland … Even Paul Krugman initially forgot about how bad our situation is. With public debt above 100% GDP and for over 50% financed by foreign investors, I would argue that we are in a shakier...
4 tags
Facebook And Twitter Will Always Be Crappy... →
Insightful post by Tripod founder Bo Peabody on social networks and the online media business.
3 tags
Dividends vs Tech Companies →
The conundrum of mature tech companies that refuse to return cash to their shareholders as an equity agency problem.
January 2010
47 posts
2 tags
“The shift in the investment characterization of Greece, from being primarily an...”
–
PIMCO - Viewpoints January El-Erian Greece Sovereign Debt US