You can learn a lot by watching puppies. Barley, here, is sporting the "Cone of Shame" … which was our attempt to stop him from licking his nether-region till it was swollen and raw.
Despite our best efforts, Barley has figured-out how to contort his body and use his prehensile tongue to get the job done anyway.
I guess Charles Darwin was right … "It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change."
Most find a way to get what they musthave.
Here are some of the posts that caught my eye. Hope you find something interesting.
What happens doesn't matter nearly as much as what you what make it mean … and what you choose to do.
Dallas got about an inch of ice and snow towards the end of last week, and we are still at a virtual stand-still five days later.
Growing up in New England, this would have been so minor that people wouldn't have called it a 'storm'. Because ice is so rare here, and we don’t have sanding, salting, or scraping capabilities (or people skilled enough to be comfortable driving in it) this was a Storm.
As a result, the best plans gave way to the shut-down.
Snow isn't 'good' or 'bad' … and neither was the change of plans.
Perspective.
Fund managers recognize the importance of sensibly diversifying risks and opportunities.
Be that as it may, as MotherJonesreported in the wake of the financial crisis, the nation's 10 largest financial institutions held 54% of our total financial assets (compare that to the 20% they held in 1990). Meanwhile, the number of banks has dropped from more than 12,500 to about 8,000.
Here is a map, from the Federal Reserve, that shows the consolidation. Click to see a bigger version.
Many people are shocked by a chart like this. It must be 'bad' to have so much controlled by so few, right?
But it isn't hard to find a version of this story playing-out in other industries: Print Media, Music, Broadcast Channels, Consumer Products … this type of consolidation happens for a reason.
A firm that marshals that more resources gains competitive advantage and has more ways to win.
They benefit from economies of scale, transactional leverage, better distribution and partners, and more ways to diversify risks. In addition, if they work to communicate, collaborate, and coordinate their actions (and data) they can unlock opportunities that others simply don't have (or can't see).
Here is a Chart Showing Some of the 'Winners' at that Game.
Here is a more specific example. You probably think you are familiar with Nestlé. It is famous for chocolate; but did you realize it was $200 billion-corporation … and the biggest food company in the world? Nestlé owns nearly 8,000 different brands worldwide, and takes a stake in (or is partnered with) many others. Included in this network is shampoo company L'Oreal, baby food giant Gerber, clothing brand Diesel, and pet food makers Purina and Friskies.
The Federal Open Market Committee's surprise decision to refrain from announcing a tapering down of its quantitative easing program on September 18 has given a lift to a variety of markets around the world.
The chart below highlights returns across asset classes — both in the year to date and since the September 18 decision.
The orderly returns by asset class surprised me (Equities, Credit, Debt, FX, then Commodities). It also surprised me that the biggest winners since the Fed decision were Spanish and Italian equities.
The Stock Market tends to be 'mean reverting' … meaning when the pendulum swings too far in one direction, it makes sense to expect it to swing back in the other direction.
Recently, the equity market rally has surprised people with its size and duration. Seemingly everywhere I go, there are traders talking about how they expect a 'Top' but "don't want to fight the Fed."
Yes, price is up and so is the trend …but how unusual is this year's big move up?
Stores are becoming showrooms for consumers to find items to buy online.
Coming into Black Friday, a new version of the the increasingly popular game "Internet Destruction" is about to let consumers take another shot at destroying Retailing (like they have already done to newspapers, magazines, music and book publishing).
Here are some of the posts that caught my eye. Hope you find something interesting.
This phenomenon of prices rising faster than earnings is referred to as multiples expansion. In other words, valuations are rising as reflected by an increasing price-earnings ratio. However, price-earnings ratios are drifting farther and farther away from their long-term averages, causing some market watchers to warn that we are in a bubble.
According to FactSet, The forward 12-month P/E ratio for the S&P 500 now stands at 15. This is the highest forward 12-month P/E ratio logged by the S&P 500 in more than four years (September 2009).
Given the high values driving the “P” in the P/E ratio, how does this 15.0 P/E ratio compare to historical averages? Is the index now overvalued?
On one hand, the index is now trading above both the 5-year (13) and 10-year (14) average P/E ratios. On the other hand, it is still trading below the 15-year average P/E ratio (16.2), and is not close to the peak P/E ratio of 25 recorded in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s.
Stock market bears looking for a sell-off are waiting incredulously ; price is the primary indicator (and it is still implying that there are more buyers than sellers).
Before its IPO, last Thursday, Twitter reacted to the strong demand for its initial public offering by raising the price range for its shares (from $17 to $20, as initially planned) to $26 per share.
As a result, Twitter raised over $1.8 Billion … thus valuing the microblogging platform at over $14 Billion.
The seven-year-old social network saw its stock price soar from an
initial public offering price of $26 to $44.90, a 73 percent increase.
After one day of trading, Twitter already had a greater valuation than
currently hot tech companies like Netflix and LinkedIn.
Even though Twitter’s initial public offering appears small compared to Facebook’s blockbuster IPO a year ago, it is still larger than many high-profile tech IPOs over the past few decades.
When Amazon, a company now worth $163 billion, went public in May 1997, the online retailer raised no more than $54 million. Even Google's IPO, arguably the second-largest internet IPO behind Facebook’s, raised less capital than Twitter is now planning to.
As impressive as Twitter's Initial Public Offering was, here are some reasons that it was different (and smaller) than Facebook's IPO.
