Overall: “Fly me to the moon… OK,” tweeted Elon Musk, an American original, an immigrant. “This should be a really exciting mission that hopefully gets the world really excited about sending people into deep space again,” said Musk, announcing plans to send the world’s first two private citizens on a journey they’ll never forget. Nor will we. Because it’s the breaking of boundaries that propel us forward. Inspi

Hope all goes well… “Un peu,” I answered. That means ‘a little.’ Which is about how much French I’ve retained after all these years. I’ve snuck into the Alps for a couple days with an old friend, 7th generation high-altitude mountain guide. And he’d asked if my legs were tired after five hours, knee-high in the forest, a late-season blizzard upon us. “Mon petit nature,” I continued, breathless, beating him to the pun

“When they laugh at your idea,” said the esteemed investor. “That’s usually a good place to start,” he continued. We were discussing thematic investing. “The first stage of any paradigm shift is a humiliating period for those who see a different future.” There are a wide range of factors that drive investment themes, trends. Of course monetary policy drives many. For reasons we may never fully understand, when centra

“You either have risk on, or you do not,” said Simplicity, walking Occam’s Razor, “There are only these two states, nothing more.” He lifted both hands, palms up, to illustrate the point. “Now, reflect on the levels of anxiety you have experienced in each state throughout your career.” And decades of an agitated existence flashed before my eyes. “There are times when you are carrying an enormous amount of risk and sl

Hope all goes well… “You know the thing about being in the middle?” asked Teddy, over a one-on-one dinner. “I annoy Jackson, Jackson bullies me. I bully Charlie and Charlie annoys me,” explained my middle son. “So out of the three of us, I’m the only one who gets annoyed and bullied.” I laughed, as did he. You see, Teddy finds the humor in things. It’s there for those who look. He falls asleep reading comic books, wa

Overall: “The media has not reported that the National Debt in my first month went down by $12 billion vs a $200 billion increase in Obama first month,” tweeted our president, his latest work of high art. The ability to express concise complexity is a sublime talent. Of course, Hemmingway rises above all others, and wrote a great American novel in 27-characters – “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.” But Trump’s

Week-in-Review (expressed in YoY terms): Mon: Chinese iron ore and copper prices jump 7%, Japan GDP -0.3 to +1.0%, India CPI 3.17% (5yr low), Macron says Russia is hacking his campaign, German wholesale inflation 4.0% (6yr high), OPEC cuts Jan oil output 1.1mm barrels, EIA says US oil production to jump 80k barrels in March, Mnuchin confirmed as Treasury Secretary, S&P +0.5%; Tue: China PPI +6.9% (5yr highs), Chi

Hope all goes well… Dusted off an anecdote from 2015 about the power of patience (see below). Back next Sunday with full weekend notes. Week-in-Review (expressed in YoY terms): Mon: Chinese iron ore and copper prices jump 7%, Japan GDP -0.3 to +1.0%, India CPI 3.17% (5yr low), Macron says Russia is hacking his campaign, German wholesale inflation 4.0% (6yr high), OPEC cuts Jan oil output 1.1mm barrels, EIA says US oi

“The UK, US and Italy have rejected the established orthodoxy of the post-1979 period,” said the CIO, in one of those English accents that make American’s feel stupid. “Prior to 1979 it was accepted that the overriding aim of economic policy should be the pursuit of full employment.” Post-1979 the only object of government policy has been the pursuit of a declining inflation rate. “The former (full employment) bias s

Hope all goes well… “All further migration from mainly Muslim countries should be stopped,” was the statement published by Chatham House, a prominent London-based independent think tank, before Trump announced his Muslim ban. 10,000 Europeans responded to the poll as follows: EU Total (55% agree with the statement, 20% disagree, the balance neither agreed nor disagreed), Belgium (64% agree, 15% disagree), Greece 58%