70% of people don’t read beyond the headlines. I don’t know if this is true or where I saw it but it feels right. Footnote reading has got to be a rare sport. Perhaps one in a hundred do that. Some deep understanding requires footnote experience. We’re overloaded with a world run by clicks and…
Read MoreCategory: Macro Trends
Surprise Bills Shake Firms’ Debt
Bond markets, while boring and somewhat aloof for most people, are a source of early signals and key news. When bond investors make big moves to discount a specific bond’s price, be careful (as they say in Mexico, aguas). Such is the fate of a few private equity owned healthcare companies. This week the FT…
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Healthcare Costs In Retirement
Nothing shows aspirational retirement imagery like convertibles, park benches, golf, and beaches. To add a dose of reality, $280,000 is a number that’s referenced in many studies. It comes from a rigorous report from Fidelity as the amount an average couple retiring today at 65 would need in today’s after-tax dollars to cover future health…
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Weighing Machines
Without Benjamin Graham we may not know the name Warren Buffett. Graham was an investor, professor, and practical philosopher. He wrote the masterpiece Security Analysis during the midst of the Great Depression, as well as The Intelligent Investor, and was a professor, mentor, and employer to Buffett. Graham wrote that the markets in the short…
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Costco: Lessons from Member Obsession.
Some call them ‘clients,’ others, ‘guests’ or ‘customers.’ Costco (Ticker: COST, revenue $141B) calls them ‘members,’ a term that makes you feel like you’re part of a special club. It’s a club that will not sell you junk. They do not exaggerate. Theirs is not fake-Enron-style-ethics-virtue-signaling, and they actually list shareholders’ interests last. Focus on…
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