weekend notes

Hope all goes well… I take late-summer off from writing weekend notes. Reading more, recharging. And I’m working on a longer-form piece about a favorite strategy for the wild decade ahead. A scalable opportunity whose star is rising. Something overlooked, unloved. Be back with it in early September. In the meantime, dusted off an anecdote that preceded the 2018 VIX debacle – exploring Goodha

Anecdote: Each generation believes it can create a better world. Were it not so, we would still live in caves. Some generations thirst for change through revolution. That probably has to do with longer term economic and political cycles. But for whatever reason, amongst these revolutionary generations, some are more determined, effective. The 1960s-70s youth seemed radical, but they were far from

Hope all goes well… “Each player has one thing that makes him insanely special, almost inhuman,” said Jackson, my oldest, the two of us lying on the sidelines in the sun, talking competition, developing excellence, watching Charlie play 6th grade summer lax. “That’s the difference between good and great – just one special thing,” he said. “The margin of error in everything you do collapses in Divi

Hope all goes well… Dusted off an anecdote from 2017 about risk taking, examining anxiety, and learning how to tell the few opportune times from all the others. See you next Sunday with full weekend notes. Happy 4th. E Week-in-Review (expressed in YoY terms): Mon: Delta variant ravages UK – most daily cases since January – Portugal requires non vaccinated UK travelers to quarantine – H

“Reality is I was not put into any leadership positions,” said Jackson, “That’s not what being a plebe is about.” Mara and I dropped off our oldest at the Annapolis gates last July in a N95 mask, with $100 and a small backpack. We just picked him up an inch taller, thirty pounds of new muscle, our car filled with naval uniforms and lacrosse gear. “To learn to lead, you need to first learn to follo

Hope all goes well… “In 18 incidents, described in 21 reports, observers reported unusual Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP) movement patterns or flight characteristics,” wrote the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI). “Some UAP appeared to remain stationary in winds aloft, move against the wind, maneuver abruptly, or move at considerable speed, without discernible means of prop

Congress mandated that the Federal Reserve promote maximum employment, stable prices, and moderate long-term interest rates. That was in 1978. Unsurprisingly, the nation was reeling from years of high unemployment, rapidly inflating prices, and soaring long-term interest rates. In the decades since, the Fed has done a remarkably good job at meeting their specific mandate. But like all systems buil

Hope all goes well… “A nation’s exchange rate is the single most important price in its economy; it will influence the entire range of individual prices, imports and exports, and even the level of economic activity. So it is hard for any government to ignore large swings in its exchange rate,” said Paul Volcker, Federal Reserve Chairman from 1979-1987. Overall: “It was meant to be a tool providing

“Feels like we’re at a historic crossroads,” said the CIO, an early venture investor in digital assets and the blockchain entrepreneurs who engineer them. “The rise of China, their deliberate advance, their vision for humanity, their disregard for human rights,” he continued. “And here, the inequality, growing division, political conflict, social clashes. We struggle to find common ground on even