“Fad companies are companies with good business models or good products. So, why would we be interested in shorting a company that has a good product? Because of the threat it presents to others and their likely response to that threat. For example, Netflix had a terrific idea of renting DVDs through the mail, which […]
Category: Bruce Packard
Weekly Commentary: 12/10/20 – On content, distribution and kurtosis
Last week the FTSE recovered to just over 6000. The (perhaps inappropriately named) Bond film No Time to Die, was postponed until next year by its Hollywood studio, MGM, which has left cinemas in trouble. Cineworld is on the brink, a victim of an overly leveraged balance sheet but no product to distribute. Up until […]
Weekly Commentary: 05/10/20 – On uncertainty and confidence
Last week Andy Haldane at the Bank of England gave an interesting speech on “Economic Anxiety” noting that pessimism can be as contagious as the disease. Haldane is most famous for his “Dog and the Frisbee” speech, which he co-wrote with the famous psychologist Gerd Gigarenzer in 2012. Catching a frisbee is difficult; theoretically it […]
Weekly Commentary: 28/09/20 – Beginner’s mind and Buy and Build
Markets sold off last week as virus case rises rose (FTSE 100 fell to below 5800 before recovering slightly later in the week, Nasdaq down 4% to 10,800). The virus itself seems reasonably predictable, everyone has been expecting cases to rise as summer turns to autumn. What hasn’t been predictable is Government responses around the […]
Weekly Commentary: 21/09/20 – The long journey to exoneration
The FTSE 100 just about held its level above 6000 last week. Last week was Chilean Independence Day. It is a little known footnote in history that Lord Cochrane, who was involved in the great Stock Exchange scam of 1814 (accused of starting rumours of Napoleon’s death via the Admiralty’s semaphore telegraph) helped not one, […]
Weekly Commentary: 14/09/20 – Americans on AIM
The oil price fell to a 3 month low in the middle of last week to below $40 a barrel. Oil is in contango (futures price higher than spot price) which suggests that despite production cuts, traders are still worried about demand over the next few months. Ironically Tesla shares were off even more sharply […]
Weekly Commentary: 07/09/20 – Come back on St Leger Day
St Leger Day, as in ““Sell in May and go away, don’t come back till St Leger Day”, is approaching. I’ve always wondered who St Leger was, and why a saint might have had a horse race named in his honour. Was Saint Leger the patron saint of book making? Well no, it turns out […]
Weekly Commentary: 31/08/20 – Let the future ≠ the past
Nasdaq continued to hit new highs, at 11,666 up +30% from the start of the year and up 2.5x in the last 5 years. I can’t think of anyone suggesting in January that all three of I) Gold, II) Govt bonds and III) Nasdaq would be up strongly from the start of the year. Such […]
Weekly Commentary: 24/08/20 – Searching for uncorrelated returns
Rightmove released a survey showing that the UK housing agreed sales picked up strongly to a record £37bn. A day later Persimmon reported half year results to end of June, adding that reported sales since the start of July were up 49% vs the same period last year. This would not have come as a […]
UK banks – in the eye of the storm?
Every crisis presents opportunities. A contrarian strategy of buying bank shares during the point of maximum gloom during a recession has often, but not always, been a good idea. It most definitely failed in 2008 when banks needed to raise capital and had to rely on Government bail outs. But it has worked in previous […]
