My mid-week morning train reads:
• Charles T. Munger, Much More Than Warren Buffett’s No. 2, Dies at 99 A billionaire himself, he was the witty vice chairman of Mr. Buffett’s powerhouse investment firm Berkshire Hathaway. But he had far more influence than his title suggested. (New York Times) sse also Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett’s Partner and ‘Abominable No-Man,’ Dies at 99 As Berkshire Hathaway vice chairman, his sharp wit dazzled generations of investors. (Wall Street Journal)
• Is Short Selling A Dead Industry? Fund management is about two different things – making money and raising money. To make money in short selling you really want to see bankruptcy. Bear markets are ok, but you really only make a small amount of money relative to the risks you are taking. Shorting in the US for the last 10 years has been very difficult. (Capital Flows and Asset Markets)
• The World’s Largest Buyer of U.S. Debt Isn’t Going Away: The end of zero-rate policy in Japan seems like a risk to American bonds. In fact, they may already have passed the test. (Wall Street Journal)
• Microsoft’s Satya Nadella Is Betting Everything on AI: The CEO can’t imagine life without artificial intelligence—even if it’s the last thing invented by humankind. (Wired)
• There’s Never Been a Better Time to Buy an Electric Car: As US production volumes catch up with demand, a glut of electric vehicle inventory is leading to decent discounts. But lower prices won’t last long. (Bloomberg).
• In the Gut’s ‘Second Brain,’ Key Agents of Health Emerge: Sitting alongside the neurons in your enteric nervous system are underappreciated glial cells, which play key roles in digestion and disease that scientists are only just starting to understand. (Quanta Magazine)
• No one’s promising you can keep your doctor anymore: Democrats and Republicans agree that the primary care system needs an overhaul. They’re encouraging nurses to do more and embracing virtual care. (Politico)
• NBA Stars, Fix Your Free Throws With One Easy Trick: Across the globe from the NBA, players in the Korean Basketball League are using physics, and the glass, to boost their foul-shooting. (Wall Street Journal)
• The Bee Gees’ Barry Gibb has written more hit songs than almost anyone: The last surviving Bee Gee left his aural imprint on six decades of popular music. (Washington Post)
Be sure to check out our Masters in Business interview this weekend with Peter Atwater, who teaches confidence-driven decision-making as an adjunct professor at William & Mary and the University of Delaware. He coined the phrase “K-Shaped Recovery” to describe the confidence divide between the top and bottom of the economy post-pandemic. His new book is The Confidence Map: Charting a Path from Chaos to Clarity.
Pauses after hiking cycles don’t tend to last that long — “higher for longer” is not usually associated with end of cycles
Source: Jim Reid, Deustche Bank
Sign up for our reads-only mailing list here.
