In this news cycle, if an issue sticks around for more than a week, you can be sure that it isn’t by accident. It’s because it represents an abstraction, and because those in influence like how that abstraction changes our behavior.
The greatest risk to your portfolio is a change in the zeitgeist. A change from deflation to inflation. A change from cooperative international games to competitive games. A change from capital markets to political utilities.
I think it’s all happening.
Distillation isn’t a process of concentration. It isn’t a natural progression. It is a violent changing of the underlying thing. So, too, is portfolio construction.
It’s easy to convince ourselves that the opposite of being Narrative-driven is being data-driven. This is a lie. The most common way that narrative influences our behavior is through unadorned data, presented with the unstated implication that it is necessary, sufficient and explanatory.
Neville’s favorite links from recent months, including an interview with a collector of mathematical toys and an ode to the hack.
In the big picture, we’re still in the middle of a technically uncertain game of Chicken between the U.S. and China. But Powell’s VERY public about-face on Friday, coupled with the VERY strong jobs report, creates a VERY different investment backdrop for the US-China trade impasse.
Access this month’s monitor slides in Powerpoint and in PDF. Access the monitor values in Excel. As we noted in November, missionaries in force were a leading indicator for…
Access this month’s monitor slides in Powerpoint and in PDF. Access the monitor values in Excel. Fiscal policy in the US remains a largely low-attention topic with little in…
Access this month’s monitor slides in Powerpoint and in PDF. Access the monitor values in Excel. The focus on a China Trade War narratives accelerated even further in December.…
Access this month’s monitor slides in Powerpoint and in PDF. Access the monitor values in Excel. Attention to central bank narratives rose sharply in December, with a renewed attention…