“Our obsession with being informed makes it hard to think long-term. We spend hours consuming news because we want to be informed. The problem is, the news doesn’t make us informed – quite the opposite. The more news we consume, the more misinformed we become.” – FS Blog

My reading goal of 30 books in 2023 has been achieved – in a large part due to the Slough House series from Mick Herron.

From time to time, I post some excel tools for folks to take advantage of.  In most cases, I am just making those available to save people some time.  But tips are always welcome.

Here are my most influential reads for the month – in no particular order:

1. Can’t Escape the (Capital) Cycle – “Marathon Asset Management did not invent the framework, they just clearly articulated it in their letters and used it to navigate markets. “
2.  The Tide Is Going Out – “While this will likely still take time to unfold in the private markets, it appears to already be well underway in the public markets with the average small-cap stock in the Russell 2000 down more than 33% from its 52-week high.”
3. Can Economists Predict Recessions? – “Short answer: Maybe a quarter ahead (but not always). Beyond that short time frame, it’s simply too variable.”
4. 6 Reasons Why a US Recession Is Likely — and Coming Soon – “… typically the US consumer keeps buying right up until the brink.”  SMS: This has been my view for awhile – the U.S. consumer will spend until stopped.
5. What goes down must come up – “But more likely we are in a new regime, with more volatility at the very least.”
6. Further Thoughts on Sea Change – “No one cites my candidate: the 2,000-basis-point decline in interest rates between 1980 and 2020. “
7. Housing Market: 1981 Vs. 2009 – “Have people forgotten how bad the real estate market crashed in the early 1980s? Apparently so.”
8. Weekend Thoughts – Inflation Hedges, Bonds & The “This is Fine” Economy – “The main reason I take it personally is because the Fed has broken a whole bunch of stuff and I don’t see how anyone can frame it any other way. “
9. Something “Big & Stupid” Is Coming…– “So there are two ways to deal with excessive debt: fiscal discipline and inflation.”
10. The Power of Morning Pages – “There really isn’t much to lose by sitting down and writing for twenty to thirty minutes every morning.”

Note: This is based on when I read the article, not necessarily when it was first published.  Unfortunately, my backlog of things I would like to read always seems to dwarf the amount of time I can devote to reading.

Updated stats:

Reminder: I learned way back in 2000 not to give investment advice, especially to people I know well.  So please do not take anything in any of these posts as financial or investment advice.

© 2023 Something For The Effort LLC – All Rights Reserved

“One of the most important parts of developing an identity that can thrive, persist, and endure change is to diversify your sense of self. You can think of identity like a house. You want the house to have multiple rooms. Perhaps there is a “parent” room; an “athlete” room; an “employee,” “entrepreneur,” or “executive” room; a “community member” room, and so on. It’s okay to spend a lot of time in just one room, but you’ve got to ensure you keep the others in good enough shape. This way, when you experience a massive change or disorder event in one area of your life, in one room of your identity, you can step into other areas to gain your footing and stability. Like a diversified portfolio in investing, diversifying your sense of self makes you more rugged and flexible in the face of change.” — Brad Stulberg in Master of Change

Welcome to Q4! September was a month, for reasons that I won’t go into.  I guess I should have just T-Billed and Chilled.

Actually, I’ve been doing that for quite some time.  See this post.  All the recent publicity around that makes me a touch nervous.  I have gotten so used to being wrong, that apparently being within the consensus makes me uncomfortable.

There’s probably some sort of lesson in there somewhere.  One day, I might figure it out.

Here are my most influential reads for the month – in no particular order:

1. Of boiling frogs and underperforming investments – “There are so many areas in life where we know we can reduce losses and avoid harm by taking preventive action, yet we wait and wait until it is too late.”
2. New 20+ year record high mortgage rates begin to impact home sales; bifurcation in new vs. existing home prices continues – “As per usual, interest rates lead sales…Further, sales lead prices.”
3. Should You T-Bill and Chill? – “You have a significant amount of reinvestment risk.”
4. Why TIPS Look Attractive – “Given recent events, as well as the ever-rising level of national debt, it seems prudent to treat future inflation prospects from a neutral perspective rather than being distinctly optimistic.”
5. Ray Dalio All Weather Portfolio Review, ETFs, & Leverage – “Utilities provided the lowest volatility, smallest drawdown, highest return, and highest risk-adjusted return:”
6. Fewer Losers, or More Winners? – “Neither maximizing winners nor minimizing losers is necessarily enough. It’s all in the balance. “
7. The Bond Bear Market & Asset Allocation – “The bond returns have been higher most of the time but it’s not a huge difference.”
8. Asset Class Correlations Convict Central Bank Activism – “While central bank largesse may undergird returns (at least most of the time), it does so while increasing portfolio risk by increasing asset class correlations. There is no free lunch, indeed, even when it looks like there is.”
9. Our future is Japan – ” In Japan, the central bank has been manipulating the bond market through its interest rate targeting policy for years. This has kept long-term bond yields close to zero and helped the government sustain debt levels well in excess of 200% of GDP.”
10. Have Bonds Finally Reached Escape Velocity? – “In short, bonds with a duration under 5 have likely already reached escape velocity. T-notes in the 5-10 year duration range are close to escape velocity, but not quite there yet. And long bonds are still far from escape velocity. “

Note: This is based on when I read the article, not necessarily when it was first published.  Unfortunately, my backlog of things I would like to read always seems to dwarf the amount of time I can devote to reading.

Updated stats:

Reminder: I learned way back in 2000 not to give investment advice, especially to people I know well.  So please do not take anything in any of these posts as financial or investment advice.

“If you simply do what everyone else has already done, you will be rewarded with the same mediocre results everyone else has already gotten. The only model for success is to avoid most of the world’s models for success.” – Mark Manson

We were mostly in place back in Utah for August, after being on the move from essentially mid-May through July.  However, not too much notable to report.  Lots of riding mixed with a bit of Coursera studying (Contract Law 1 by Yale).  Online learning has to be a major component of the future of our education system – to expand access to larger portion of the population and reduce the costs and other impediments to education.  The admissions practices of elite private universities and student loan forgiveness are a distraction.

Here are my most influential reads for the month – in no particular order:

1. Common Probability Errors to Avoid – “If you’re trying to gain a rapid understanding of a new area, one of the most important things you can do is to identify common mistakes people make, then avoid them. “
2. The Intel Split – “Intel’s factories, denied monopoly access to cutting edge x86 chips, will now have to compete with TSMC to earn not just 3rd-party business, but business from Intel’s own design team.”
3. On the business, strategy, and impact of technology – “Smartphones, though, provided a reason to build up the software layer from scratch, with efficiency, not performance, as the paramount goal.”
4. Blackstone ❤️ private credit – “the simple fact is that institutional investors like the smoothness of private markets.”
5.  The Tide of Price over Volume – “There are very few chances to find the elasticity of demand. And – for the time being – there are ample excuses to figure it out.”
6. Bear market investors think different – “And it is this lack of overoptimism why investors who have learned their trade in a bear market have slightly better performance on average than investors who have learned their trade in a bull market, as I have discussed here.”
7. A giant wealth transfer is why the economy isn’t responding to Fed – “it is virtually certain that central governments’ fiscal deficits will be large, and it is highly probable that they will grow at an increasing rate as the increasing debt service costs plus increasing other budget costs compound upward, and, as they increase, governments will need to sell more debt, so there will be a self-reinforcing debt spiral that will lead to market-imposed debt limits while central banks will be forced to print more money and buy more debt as they experience losses and deteriorating balance sheets”
8. John Eastman Comes Clean: Hell Yes We Were Trying to Overthrow the Government – “The Declaration of Independence has no legal force under American law.”
9. Guest Contribution: “The End of Zero Interest Rates” – “US short-term rates had been near-zero for nine years [2009-15 and 2020-21] out of the preceding 13 years, since the Global Financial Crisis of 2008. “
10. Have Bonds Finally Reached Escape Velocity? – “In short, bonds with a duration under 5 have likely already reached escape velocity. T-notes in the 5-10 year duration range are close to escape velocity, but not quite there yet. And long bonds are still far from escape velocity.”

Note: This is based on when I read the article, not necessarily when it was first published.  Unfortunately, my backlog of things I would like to read always seems to dwarf the amount of time I can devote to reading.

Updated stats: