All Epsilon Theory Content
Everything we have published at Epsilon Theory since 2013, an archive of more than 1,000 evergreen notes.
Regardless of your personal views pro or con, if you don’t see that a powerful Narrative backlash is forming against corporate management enrichment, you’re just not paying attention.
ET contributor Demonetized creates his own koan in this very personal note.
Is morality socially constructed through a process where biological systems are socially conditioned to respond in particular ways to particular stimuli, or is morality an innate moral compass manifested in Kantian ethics?
Yes.
Sometimes you really have to wonder how on earth an article makes its way into the Zeitgeist. Sometimes it’s best not to know.
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!
It’s so weird that everyone who would throw an unholy temper tantrum at – gasp! – rent-controlled apartments is just fine with rent-controlled money.
“Yay, crumbs!”
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.
It’s the November 19th, 2019 edition of Office Hours! Be sure to join Ben and Rusty for a discussion of all things narrative in the world of politics and markets.
I’m a fan of FedEx the company and Fred Smith the founder. I think they are both crown jewels of Western capitalism.
But if I hear another lecture from Fred Smith and his fellow billionaires on trickle-down tax cuts and the “benefits to the United States economy, especially lower and middle class wage earners”, I’m going to lose it.
To receive a free full-text email of The Zeitgeist whenever we publish to the website, please sign up here. You’ll get two or three of these emails every…
I’m old enough to remember when Donald Trump, the President-elect of the United States, and Masayoshi Son, CEO of Softbank, had an impromptu press conference in the Trump Tower lobby to trumpet the FIFTY THOUSAND JOBS and FIFTY BILLION DOLLAR INVESTMENT that Softbank would be bringing to the US.
All based on a powerpoint deck.
I think it’s impossible to separate management self-enrichment through stock-based comp from the practice of stock buybacks.
The missionaries are out, and guess what? They want you to do a lot of trading and portfolio repositioning. How thoughtful!
Today’s Zeitgeist brought back a blast from the past, an early encounter with the distinction between narrative and other, more common, measures of what the crowd thinks.
One day we will recognize the defining Zeitgeist of the Obama/Trump years as an unparalleled transfer of wealth to the managerial class.
Every now and then we come across an article or blog post that’s directly relevant to what we’re trying to say on Epsilon Theory, but is too big and thoughtful to be carved up for a Mailbag note or Zeitgeist post.
Make / Protect / Teach is a Big Tent.
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.
The NBA, Blizzard and others are in hot water after kowtowing to the Chinese government. America will have forgotten about both within weeks. But the awareness of just how long the CCP’s reach has become? That can’t be unseen.
If Carl Icahn calls up the CEO of GM and asks her how the UAW talks are going, it is illegal for Mary Barra to tell him anything that she does not also tell everyone else.
If Carl Icahn calls up the President of the United States and asks him how the China talks are going, it is perfectly legal for Donald Trump to tell him whatever he likes without obligation to tell anyone else.
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.