Capitalogix

Here Are Some Links For Your Weekly Reading - June 9th, 2019

Tuesday was the 30th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Protests. Here's a video of Chinese college students being asked about the event. It is a pretty interesting look at censorship and fear of government consequences for lack of free speech. 

Here are some of the posts that caught my eye recently. Hope you find something interesting.

 

Lighter Links:

• China's Big AI Advantage: Humans. (News)
• The Natural Genius of Ants is Helping Us Build Better Algorithms. (Wired)
• 5 Myths about Strategy. (HBR)
• Percentage of Americans Who Never Traveled beyond the State Where They Were Born? A Surprise? (Forbes)
• At Disneyland's New Star Wars' Attraction – Brace Yourself for $200 Lightsabers, $42 Cocktails and 4 A.M. Lines. (MarketWatch)

 

Trading Links:

• Billionaire Mike Bloomberg Tells Harvard Graduates that Money Isn't Important. (TheLadders)
• The Radical Plan to Change How Harvard Teaches Economics. (Vox)
• Apple Patents the Foldable iPhone Display; Here's What It Looks Like. (ValueWalk)
• Quantum Computing Will Change the Digital World beyond Recognition. (Metro)
• Atlanta Fed President Bostic Does Not See a Rate Cut this Year like the Market is Telegraphing. (CNBC)

 

75th Anniversary of D-Day

June 6th, 1944 ... the day we stormed the beaches of Normandy.  It was the largest seaborne invasion in history. The invasion created a foothold that allowed Allied forces to expand through France. 

The memorial in France this year was a particularly touching event with the many surviving World War 2 soldiers being well into their 90s. 

"A generation whose unconquerable spirit shaped the post-war world. They didn't boast. They didn't fuss. They served" - Theresa May

A 97-year old veteran paratrooper, Tom Rice, commemorated the day by once again dropping into the field he landed in on that fateful night. 

Check out the video. It's an inspiration. 

 

via TIME

Seems like a friendlier welcome than a sea of German soldiers. As an extra fun fact, Teddy Roosevelt stormed the beaches of Normandy at 56 with a heart condition,  arthritis, and a cane. He was the oldest man to take part in the invasion. 

Our society is built on the backs of many strong men! I'm thankful for their sacrifices. 

Here Are Some Links For Your Weekly Reading - June 2nd, 2019

Toronto plays Golden State in game two of the NBA Finals tonight. Tickets were a little pricey!

Here are some of the posts that caught my eye recently. Hope you find something interesting.

 

Lighter Links:

• This is Why Einstein Knew that Gravity Must Bend Light. (Forbes)
• The Lucrative Black Market in Human Fat. (The Atlantic)
• Goldman Sachs's Chief Critic Picks New York's Top New Restaurants. (Bloomberg)
• Amazon Working on Wearable Device that Will Track Your Emotions. (News18)
• Harvard Spent 80 Years Studying Happiness, and We Now Know the 1 Key Habit that Makes People Happier. (The Problem: Most People Never Even Try). (Inc)

 

Trading Links:

• Al Gore Keeps Beating the Stock Market. Here's What He's Buying and Selling. (Barrons)
• Big Revenues, Huge Valuations and Major Losses: Charting the Era of the Unicorn IPO. (TechCrunch)
• Musk's SpaceX Raised over $1 Billion in Six Months: Filings. (Reuters)
• Texas Set to Become 11Th State to Ban Red Light Cameras. (Gizmodo)
• Alibaba Billionaire Jack Ma: I Know Nothing about Tech or Marketing – This Is the Secret to My Success. (CNBC)

 

 

Here Are Some Links For Your Weekly Reading - May 26th, 2019

Theresa May has just announced her resignation as UK Prime Minister. She's faced massive criticism for an inability to come to a resolution on Brexit, and missing two deadlines. A new PM will be appointed in July.

Here are some of the posts that caught my eye recently. Hope you find something interesting.

 

Lighter Links:

 

• Our Coming DNA Nightmare, as Outlined by a Dystopian Graphic Novel. (FastCompany)
• Google May Know You Better Than You Know Yourself. (Wall Street Journal)
• Leonardo Da Vinci Designed an Ideal City, Centuries Ahead of Its Time. (TheConversation)
• U.S. Among the Ten Most Stressed Nations Worldwide [Infographic]. (Forbes)
• Princeton Valedictorian Gets Engaged to Her 71-Year-old Former Professor. (FoxNews)

 

Trading Links:

• Economics in the Age of Big Data. (Science)
• These are the 20 Highest-Paid World Leaders. (CNW)
• America's Strong Economic Growth this Year Surprises Economists. (Economist)
• Millionaires Flee Their Homelands as Tensions Rise and Taxes Bite. (Bloomberg)
• This Map Showing the Fastest and Slowest Internet Speeds in the US Could Predict the Path of a Silicon Valley Startup Exodus. (BusinessInsider)

BBQ Fest - A New Tradition

Once a year, I go to the World BBQ Championship at Memphis in May. 

It's three days of friends, food, fun, and bad puns (like #AporkalypseNow and  #MeatDrinkAndBeMerry).

You've heard the phrase  "Put your money where your mouth is ..."  This year we sponsored a tent and brought some of the Capitalogix team to enjoy the festivities. 

 

 

Here's a look at what was cooking in our tent.  It had Brazilian "churrasco" flair. 

Our Grill Master was Blake Carson, who took a traditional Brazilian Steakhouse cooking style – and innovated upon it – creating the Carson Rodizio kit (which started as a Kickstarter project).  It is a multi-rotisserie rack that converts your favorite backyard grill into an open and spinning Brazilian style Steakhouse.  It's clever, functional, and cool... and it's been used to win multiple barbecue championships.

I love to experience an entrepreneur's mind at work.  

It's not always about what you add.  Sometimes, it is about what you take away.  Less is often more. 

Here is a one-minute interview I shot with Blake.

 

 

Innovation, like opportunity, is all around you.

It's not there for you if you don't see the opportunity, and seize it.

How Warren Buffet Got His Start

Warren Buffett is a legend for many reasons. Foremost among them might be that he's one of the few investors who clearly has an edge ... and has for a long time. From 1976 to 2017 his Sharpe ratio (excess return relative to risk) was approximately double the overall market. Berkshire Hathaway now has over $700 billion in assets – and is still performing well. 

While many people consider Buffett to be an investor,  I also consider him to be an entrepreneur.

At the age of six, he started selling gum door to door. Obviously, selling gum wasn't the key to his path to riches.  So, how did he make his first million?  Here's a video that explains it.

 

via Coolnimation

For context, he made his first million at age 30, which was in 1960. For context, a million dollars in 1960 would be worth about $8.5 million today.

Buffet has always been honest about his bread-and-butter "trick" ...  he buys quality companies at a discount and holds on to them.

It is fascinating to recognize how much the world has changed – and yet how much it stayed the same.

For extra viewing: Warren Buffett, Charlie Munger, and Bill Gates recently did a full 2-hour interview with CNBC. You can watch it here.

Here Are Some Links For Your Weekly Reading - April 12th, 2019

Here are some of the posts that caught my eye recently. Hope you find something interesting.

Lighter Links:

• Here's How Google Knows in Less Than 5 Minutes If Someone Is a Great Leader. (Inc)
• What Amazon Knows About You. (Axios)
• Julio Iglesias Has an Absolutely Massive Net Worth and Owns an Airport.(CNW)
• Scientist: Alien Life Now Seems Inevitable and Possibly Imminent. (Futurism)
• This Trick Helped 96% of WWII US Military Pilots Learn to Fall Asleep within 2 Minutes, Even After Drinking Coffee. (BusinessInsider)

 

Trading Links:

• One Out of Every 11,600 People in San Francisco is a Billionaire. (Vox)
• Here's Who Stands to Get Rich from Uber's IPO. (ComplianceX)
• Vegan-Friendly, Celeb-Backed Beyond Meat Has 2019'S Best U.S. IPO. (Time)
• If You Invested $1,000 in Apple in 2009, Here's How Much You'd Have Now. (CNBC)
• Man Credited With Calling the 2008 Crisis Says the Next 20 Years in the Stock Market Will Break a Lot of Hearts'. (MarketWatch)

Happy Mother's Day

 To those of you with young children, here's a peek into your future.

After years of hard work and your best efforts (OK, mostly your best efforts) ...
I predict that your adorable bundles of joy will someday wish they could send you this card.

So, take a moment to think about your Mom ... and remember that she was very young when she did those things to you ...

... and what you make them mean is up to you.

Here's a funny clip from SNL in honor of Mother's Day.

 

 

Here Are Some Links For Your Weekly Reading - May 5th, 2019

 

Here are some of the posts that caught my eye recently. Hope you find something interesting.

Lighter Links:

• These are Amazon's 38 Rules for Success. (FastCompany)
• Amazon Used an AI to Automatically Fire Low-Productivity Workers. (Futurism)
• Cornell Scientists Create Living' Machines that Eat, Grow, and Evolve. (TheNextWeb)
• Drinking Tequila Could Help You Lose Weight. (Elle)
• Is It True that It's More Painful to Come Second Rather Than Third? New Insights from the 2016 Olympics. (Digest)

 

Trading Links:

• Making Sense of the Market in the Age of Algorithmic Trading. (Barrons)
• The next Gig Economy Will Be On-demand Knowledge.(WEForum)
• Central Banks Extraordinary Policies: What Could Go Wrong.(SeeItMarket)
• Super Rich Ditching Jet Ownership for a Portfolio of Aviation Options. (Bloomberg)
• If You Invested $1,000 in Microsoft in 2009, Here's How Much You'd Have Now. (CNBC)

 

 

Social Media Is Changing Everything: A Reprisal

I came across a post from 2009 about social media. 10 years later, with the knowledge of how much data we use today, it's quite a read.

Here it is in its full glory. 

Social Media Is Changing Everything: October 18th, 2009

My son won't use e-mail the way I did. So how will people communicate and collaborate in the next wave of communications?

Here is a peek into the difference that is taking hold.  I was looking at recent phone use.  The numbers you are about to see are from the first 20 days of our current billing cycle.

• • My wife, Jennifer, has used 21 text messages and 38 MB of data.
  • I have used 120 text messages and 29 MB of data.
  • My son, at college, used 420 text messages, and is on a WiFi campus so doesn't use 3G data.
  • My son, in high school, used 5,798 text messages and 472 MB of data.

How can that be?  That level of emotional sluttiness makes porn seem downright wholesome. 

But, of course, that isn't how he sees it.  He is holding many conversations at once.  Some are social; some are about the logistics of who, what, when, where and why ... some are even about homework.  Yet, most don't use full sentences, let alone paragraphs.  There is near instant gratification.  And, the next generation of business people will consider this normal.

Is social media a fad? Or is it the biggest shift since the Industrial Revolution?

Welcome to the World of Socialnomics.  This video has a bunch of interesting statistics ... and is fun to watch. 

 

 

Other Resources:

• • Here is a link to a short-version of this video.
  • This reminds me of the "Shift Happens!" video.
  • Worth Looking At ... Here are the Stats.

Social Media Is Changing Everything: April 20th, 2019 

Looking at the stats from 2009 is pretty funny

• My son was using 472 MB of data a month
• Hulu had grown from to 373 million total streams in April 2009
• Only 25% of Americans in the past month said they watched a short video on their phone

For some context, I looked up the comparative numbers for 2018. 

• I picked a random month in 2018 ... in August my son used 10.85 GB of data. He doesn't text as often - but has sent/received 282,000 snapchats since downloading it 5 years ago.
• Hulu has over 20 million subscribers who streamed more than 26 million hours a day in 2018 
• People spend over five hours a day on their smartphones on average. 70% of web traffic happens on a mobile device, and more than 50% of videos are watched on mobile (93% of twitter videos). 

Here's what happens every minute of every day on the internet

via Lori Lewis and Chadd Callahan

 

A little different than 2009 ...