Hope all goes well… “They’re all arriving in ten minutes,” said Mara, prepping for another graduation dinner in our yard, popping her head into my office. “I’ve asked all the fathers to prepare a last-minute speech, to talk about what makes them most proud about their sons.” And knowing that meant me too, I closed my laptop, wrapping up weekend notes prematurely, to refocus on my first boy for a few precious minutes.

America has entered a mass hysteria Hope all goes well… “I bought an AR-15 today,” said the investor. “And my neighbors bought guns from their friends who have stockpiles,” he said. “It takes a few days to get one through a gun store.” Buying a firearm in a private transaction from a friend is the fastest way to go. “Our neighboring town center was looted, it’s a wreck,” he said, living a 20-minute train ride outside

A“Maybe we can afford a brownstone in Harlem,” said Mara in 2001, expecting our first, ready to nest. “We could fix it up.” So off we went, house hunting. Harlem’s magnificent single-family structures were built in the 1910s-1920s, but the Great Depression left the place mortally wounded. A series of crises, each reinforcing the next, drove it to destitution. By 2001, the grand old homes were mostly carved up into ti

Hope all goes well… “This game is about inches, little decisions, luck, never forget that,” grunted Bulldog, one of the great trading talents. “I saw that Wuhan mess in late Jan and bought S&P puts,” barked Dawg. “By mid-Feb they were pretty worthless.” From Jan 31 through Feb 19 the S&P rallied 5%. “Once the market started to puke those puts came back to life, and with days left to expiration I sold them and

“Nothing is so painful to the human mind as a great and sudden change,” wrote Mary Shelley in 1818, exploring our humanity through her hideous creation, Frankenstein. And ever since, we’ve leapt from one change to the next, those periods in between marked by an eerie calm that we desperately embrace, mistaking stability for reality. “We’ll continue to point out incorrect or disputed information about elections global

Hope all goes well… I’ve always dusted off an old anecdote for Memorial Day. But departing from tradition, I wrote something new, a glimpse of the next generation, a brighter future (see below). Enjoy your long weekend. And see you next Sunday with full wknd notes. E Week-in-Review (expressed in YoY terms): Mon: Japan Q1 GDP -3.4%, Security guards drag HK opposition lawmakers out of parliament, India extends lockdown

AOf the many unintended consequences of relinquishing global leadership to central bankers, the most ironic is that monetary-policy dominance ultimately denies both the future and the present of prosperity. In its fullest expression, not only does it entirely pull economic growth from tomorrow to today, but it does the same to investment returns. 30-year US Treasury bonds now yield +1.32%. Japanese 30yr bonds yield +

Hope all goes well…  “Asset prices remain vulnerable to significant price declines should the pandemic take an unexpected course, the economic fallout prove more adverse, or financial system strains re-emerge,” wrote the Fed on Friday, already orienting its efforts on fighting the last battle. Which is not to say these risks have passed. They haven’t. But with 80k Americans dead, when nearly one-third of our 330

AI’ve always turned up the volume when writing, never listening to anything new. Fresh lyrics are distracting. But after the hundredth time, a song’s words disappear and all that remains is mood. Immersion. From that place things open, creep out, connect. And truth be told, the most fun part of writing is never quite knowing where it will lead. Stephen King writes to music, in a trance. Metallica is his favorite, tur

Hope all goes well… “First off Olivia, I’m proud of you for passing the exam,” I said. She smiled. “Now let me say that to become the person you want to be, you can’t handle yourself like that again.” She apologized, having spent the previous day locked in her room, crying, indulging in drama, worried she’d failed. “No need to say you’re sorry, it’s not about me. It’s about you, what you want to achieve. And no matte