PIMCO’s Bill Gross has his July commentary up on the web and his perspective is, as always, no-nonsense and interesting. He begins by graphically describing the circumstances that led to the obesity-related death of a baseball umpire as his set up: “Kill the umpire,” the fan cried to open the 1996 baseball season in Cincinnati, and…
Joshua M Brown
Skimping On Our Patriotism This July 4th
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWzUumHhcGg] (The NYC Fireworks Display of 2007…in better times) July 4th has always been and will always be my favorite holiday. It combines my favorite things in the world: American pride, BBQ, warm and sunny weather, a day off from work and loud noises/ flashing lights. Unfortunately, this year there will be considerably less oohing…
Wade Slome, Welcome to the Blogosphere (i hate that word too, sorry)
I have a new blog for all of you financial blog groupies, it’s called Investing Caffeine and it’s written by Wade Slome. You may have heard of Slome before, as he’s written a book called “How I Managed $20,000,000,000.00 by Age 32“. The book centers around Slome’s road to professional money management, which included a…
We're All Correlated Now
Lockstep Main Entry: lock·step Pronunciation: ˈläk-ˌstep Function: noun 1 : a mode of marching in step by a body of persons going one after another as closely as possible 2 : a standard method or procedure that is mindlessly adhered to or that minimizes individuality — in lockstep : in perfect or rigid often mindless…
Madoff Gets a Buck Fifty
Today, Judge Chin meted out a sentence of 150 years to convicted ponzi king Bernard Madoff. A buck fifty, that’s as symbolic a sentence as you’ll get. A punsihment of a buck fifty has another meaning on the streets, where it’s also known as Uno Cincuenta. The Urban Dictionary defines a buck 50 thusly: A tear inflicted by…
The Case of the Mysterious Wendy's Bond Issuance
Barron’s devoted quite a bit of space to an update on the combined Wendy’s/ Arby’s merger that Nelson Peltz and his Trian investment vehicle put together last year. They didn’t manage to explain the mysterious bond offering from Wendy’s (WEN) but I will attempt to add some dimension to that story here. The big question…
Breakfast Links: Madoff, Google and Swiss Banking
Breakfast Links for June 29, 2009 It looks like the Suisse banks may have had enough in the US: UBS AG and Credit Suisse Group AG, the country’s biggest banks, have told Americans to move their money into specially created units registered in the U.S., or lose their accounts. Smaller private banks such as Geneva-based…
Hedge Funds and the Gloved One
That Michael Jackson‘s finances were a mess was always very well known. What many don’t know is that some of our favorite financial runaway trains were active participants in Jackson’s monetary fantasy world. The Fortress Investment Group (FIG), which went public in one of the most spectacularly horrible IPOs of all time, was at one…
Hot Links: Appraisals, iPhones & Dinner With Gasparino
Hot Links for Weekend Reading… Baruch gets the new iPhone but is disappointed that it fails the cafe table test. (Ultimi Barbarorum) Rick Bookstaber writes the definitive checklist of suspicious things a hedge fund will do when it’s in trouble and desperately flailing to dig out. (Rick Bookstaber) Barry Ritholtz uncovers an attempt by the…
Goodbye, Michael
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15SxqqwF63U] One of the most talented entertainers in the history of the world has passed. The above video shows Michael Jackson at the pinnacle of his career, on the Motown 25th Anniversary Special in 1983. That’s how I choose to remember him. Here are some of the biggest stars in the world and their reactions yesterday…
