The new Zeitgeist is here! Now with all the snippets and twice the snark.
Every morning, we run The Narrative Machine on the past 24 hours worth of financial media to find the articles that are representative of some sort of chord that has been struck in Narrative-world. They’re not the best articles – often far from it – but they will arm you for the Narrative wars of the day ahead.
Why are institutional investors in trouble with the new Zeitgeist of capital markets transformed into a political utility?
Because everything you think you know about portfolio diversification will fail. Because emerging markets are going to be crushed before this is over. Because everyone’s inflation-investing muscles have atrophied to the point of helplessness. Because you think long-vol and crisis-alpha are things.
BATs vs. FAANGs, trading against institutions, trading with institutions, why Americans buy cars and a shocking J.C. Penney news bulletin.
The problem isn’t that we derive too much of our worth and value from work. The problem is that our jobs are becoming increasingly abstracted from work. Friends: Your work is holy.
Lots of Blockchain, UK house prices subdued, trade talks weigh, idol worship perilous, a rich kid buys gold and why Nintendo goes back to Pokemon.
Now that Jay Powell’s semi-annual Congressional testimony has finished up, it’s time for a brief walk down Memory Lane.
As with everything else in our Washington clown show, nothing really changes. This has all happened before.
A World Full of Elons, the unrevolutionary foldable era, the fastest strike in history and more arbitrary causal links in financial media.
Markets ‘seek clarity’ on China/US trade, fire engine manufacturers, drug price hearings, and lowball hostile bids.
The hobbyist farmer can afford to spread wildflower seeds to the wind and the elements. The professional farmer, on the other hand, doesn’t have this luxury. Neither do any of us as investors.
Whether it’s ITT and Hal Geneen, or Teledyne and Henry Singleton, or GE and Jeff Immelt, or Berkshire Hathaway and Warren Buffett … at some point these companies get too big to continue growing through acquisition. There’s no more step-function P/E growth to be had on the E side of the equation. So they ALWAYS start focusing on the P side – the multiple – which is entirely a creature of narrative.