The Zeitgeist
A Cycle of Addiction
Negative rates create a cycle of addiction to even more negative rates in the future.
Why? Because captive buyers like pension funds require capital appreciation to make up for negative yield, so central banks must guarantee a commitment to still more negative yields.
New from ET contributor Pete Cecchini!
By Our Own Petard
Fiduciary standards, prudent man rules and client sensibilities compel us toward fervent pursuit of “alignment.” There’s just one little problem: we can never be aligned with our agents.
ET In Full
Yeah, It’s Still Water
You know, everyone is all in a tizzy about Softbank paying Adam Neumann $1.7 billion just to go away.
My unpopular opinion: the Adam Neumann story is repeated in a non-infuriating and non-obvious way every day in every S&P 500 company. And it’s been going on for a DECADE.
One day we will recognize the defining Zeitgeist of the Obama/Trump years as an unparalleled transfer of wealth to the managerial class.
The Long Now, Pt. 3 – Is This Normal? Asking for a Friend
I believe that we are on the cusp of the Long Now becoming irreversible. Or at least irreversible without a cataclysmic Fall.
Why? Because they have mastered the art of stealing our tells. At scale.
Here’s how we start to confound the stolen tells. At scale.
It won’t be noticeable at first. And then it will. And then it becomes a self-sustaining narrative. And then the world starts to change.
Rust and Blight
In an orchard, it isn’t always easy to tell the difference between rust and blight. The same goes for our cultural institutions.
Some should be pruned.
Some should be ripped up root and stem.
It’s not always easy to know which. But if we want our sons and daughters to sit in the shade of our trees, we must learn.
The Long Now, Pt. 2 – Make, Protect, Teach
It’s time to start a fire. To burn, yes, but also to illuminate.
My advice? Abandon the political party as your vehicle for political participation.
My alternative? Find your Pack.
My platform? Make – Protect – Teach.
Notes from the Diamond #8: Room For Doubt
In both baseball and in investing, we need an all-purpose test of excellence, not just for identifying MVPs like Mike Trout, but for seeing how all of us mere mortals stack up.
ET contributor David Salem makes the case for an investing corollary to baseball’s Wins Above Replacement (WAR). It’s a defense of value investing, but with a twist.
License to Kill Gophers
The desire of central banks to forestall recession at all costs reminds us of the war that groundskeeper Carl Spackler had with the gopher in Caddyshack.
Sure, you can defeat the gopher. But you’ve gotta blow up the golf course with dynamite to do it.
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ET Live!
ET Live! – 11.19.2019
It’s the November 19th, 2019 edition of Epsilon Theory Live! Be sure to join Ben and Rusty for a discussion of all things narrative in the world of politics and markets.
ET Live! – 10.22.2019
In which Ben and Rusty discuss the three Ps of the narrative of a functioning government – and why their cartoons are being stretched to the limit.
ET Live! – 8.27.2019
It’s the August 27th edition of Epsilon Theory Live! In which political, economic and markets nihilism are the order of the day.
ET Live! – 7.30.2019
It’s the July 30th, 2019 ET Live! Today, we’re all MMT’ers, or at least that’s the narrative in political space. But what about markets?