My Two-for-Tuesday morning train WFH reads:
• Jimmy Carter, Home Builder: The former president’s missions with Habitat for Humanity took him to 14 countries and built thousands of homes, bringing much-needed attention to the affordable housing crisis. (CityLab) see also How Jimmy Carter inadvertently shaped the 21st century economy: Inflation beat the 39th president, but today we’re using similar tools to fight it. (Grid)
• Hopes for Lower Interest Rates Fade as Inflation Doesn’t. It’s Bad News for Bonds and Stocks. Blame it on Punxsutawney Phil. Since the furry varmint poked his head out of his den on Feb. 2, there has been a wholesale reassessment of the outlook for the economy and interest rates. Maybe it wasn’t his shadow that the famous groundhog saw, but a slew of indicators that showed unseasonably hot economic readings with no cooling in inflation. (Barron’s)
• Markets History 101: It’s Time to Buy Bonds: Investors who rightly abandoned bonds when yields were stupidly low should add them back as ballast to their portfolio. (Wall Street Journal) see also Farewell, TINA: For years, we have heard that “there is no alternative” – TINA – to equities, and that thanks to the Fed, “Cash is trash.” No longer. Today, there is an alternative to stocks: Bonds. (The Big Picture)
• China’s Tech Rainmaker Vanishes, and So Does Business Confidence:Bao Fan’s firm says he’s unreachable, and others in the tech sector are worried for him and fear what his disappearance says about China’s heavy hand in business. (New York Times)
• The Road to Disinflation: Inflation is Coming Down, but the Journey Now Looks More Bumpy (Apricitas Economics) see also How ‘Base Effects’ Trip Up Our Understanding of the Economy: Sometimes, the most widely cited inflation figures tell us more about the past than the present (Wall Street Journal)
• Would You Trade Places with Warren Buffett? The relationship between time, health, and money. (The Long Run)
• ‘We just discovered the impossible’: how giant baby galaxies are shaking up our understanding of the early Universe: At this distance, the light took 13 billion years to reach us, so we are seeing the galaxies at a time when the universe was only 700 million years old, barely 5% of its current age of 13.8 billion years. If this is true, this galaxy has formed as many stars as our present-day Milky Way. In record time. (The Conversation) see also There is no evidence for a Universe before the Big Bang: Nobel Laureate Roger Penrose, famed for his work on black holes, claims we’ve seen evidence from a prior Universe. Only, we haven’t. (Big Think)
• The Cure for Hiccups Exists: First, exhale completely, then inhale a deep breath. Wait 10 seconds, then—without exhaling—inhale a little more. Wait another five seconds, then top up the breath again. Finally, exhale. (The Atlantic)
• Tucker Carlson told his producer Trump is ‘the undisputed world champion’ of destroying things and could ruin Fox News if it didn’t back his election lies: Tucker Carlson called Trump the “undisputed world champion” of destroying things, per a new court filing. He texted a producer after the election that Trump could “easily destroy” Fox News if “we play it wrong.” Carlson’s text came after Fox News ignited Trump’s fury by being the first to call Arizona for Biden. (Business Insider) see also Off the air, Fox News stars blasted the election fraud claims they peddled: In the days and weeks after the 2020 elections, Fox News Channel repeatedly broadcast false claims that then-President Donald Trump had been cheated of victory. Off the air, the network’s stars, producers and executives expressed contempt for those same conspiracies, calling them “mind-blowingly nuts,” “totally off the rails” and “completely bs” — often in far earthier terms. (NPR)
• Superhero Fatigue Threatens Marvel’s Multiverse: Saga Phase 4 saw Marvel Studios densely pack (too many?) new projects into the MCU. At the height of ‘Quantumania,’ are fans still along for the ride? (The Ringer)
Be sure to check out our Masters in Business interview this weekend with David Layton, CEO of Partners Group. The firm is the largest listed PE/Buyout firm in Europe, managing $135 billion in assets in Private equity, infrastructure, real estate and debt.
Why Disinflation Remains the Trend: One-off re-inflation reports have never ended a disinflation cycle
Source: Investor Place
