Month

Hope all goes well… Dusted off an anecdote about the point of this ride (see below). Back next Sunday with full weekend notes. Week-in-Review (expressed in YoY terms): Mon: China/US announce trade war détente,   Japanese exports +5.7 to +7.8% (imports +6.5 to +5.9%), Iran rejects 12 new US demands for new nuclear treaty, Turkish lira -2% (10yr bonds +35bps to 15.00%), Italy’s Five Star and League propose Giuseppe Con

On he walked. So many charts swirling in his mind, each its own story, all somehow connected, everything is. Major highs and lows are rare moments of wild hope or great fear, vivid, mistaken. He’d lived the 1989 Nikkei high, that euphoria, the hysteria, Japan’s Rockefeller Center purchase. He’d experienced every turn since. While it’s impossible to pick a high or low, the character of each is distinct. In 1989, with

Hope all goes well… “Teddy was talking in his sleep again,” said Charlie, stumbling into the kitchen, eyes bloodshot. “He kept saying, ‘That was such a great idea, I should’ve done it.’” I felt Teddy’s pain, haunted by that same recurring nightmare; the unavoidable consequence of 28yrs trading markets. “But I didn’t want to wake him up even though my mouth was really dry, and figured if I got a drink in the bathroom

Hope all goes well… “It’s no longer the case that the US will simply just protect us. Rather, Europe needs to take its fate into its own hands, that’s the task of the future,” said Chancellor Merkel. “Washington has lost vigor, and because of it, in the long term, influence,” said Jean-Claude Junker. “It is dangerous and devastating that the US is challenging the WTO’s fundamental guiding principles,” said Beij

“Americans are unwilling to save,” said the CIO. “The Japanese and Germans are unwilling to spend,” he continued. “If the latter two could generate exceptional investment returns on their savings they’d have all the money in the world within two business cycles.” They haven’t, and won’t. “The US model is credit-driven, with Americans in perpetual search of the sucker, like buyers of Tesla and Netflix bonds.” They loo

In Chicago’s commodity pits, we measured risk by calculating how much we’d personally lose if we got stopped out. Clearing firms stood in the shadows, scythes sharpened, Grim Reapers. At Lehman in the early 1990s it was no different. Then in 1995, management gave us a tool called Value-at-Risk (VaR). It seemed foolish at first, because it was. VaR calculated past correlations of each position to all others, observed

Hope all goes well… “What are you going to focus on in today’s game?” I asked. “Driving hard to the inside, picking my spots, making goals,” answered Jackson. He was behind the wheel, a full license just months away now. “What are your coaches telling you to focus on?” I asked. “Driving hard to the inside, picking my spots, making goals,” he said, smiling. “I feel like I’ve been too tentative the last couple games, a