Book notes:
Marko Dimitrijević’s Frontier Investor: How to Prosper in the Next Emerging Markets “is a well-researched book, complete with detailed examples. It belongs in the library of every global investor.” (Reading the Markets)
Quote of the day:
Fred Wilson, “I think selling is the hardest part of investing.” (A VC)
Chart of the day:
Bonds have become a hedge for risk. (Bank Underground)
Markets
Taxable munis are a better deal than corporate bonds at present. (Barron’s)
Muni bond prices are well off their highs. (FMD Capital)
Why the election doesn’t matter to the stock market. (A Dash of Insight)
Kurtosis is the new volatility. (FT Alphaville)
Strategy
You can’t make it to the long-term without surviving the short-term. (Collaborative Fund)
Don’t buy a stock just for its dividend yield. (Institutional Investor)
Anecdotes are the fuel of confirmation bias. (A Dash of Insight)
Why technical analysis gets a bad rap. (Irrelevant Investor)
Offers
If you’ve read Thinking Fast and Slow you will likely want to read Michael Lewis’ forthcoming The Undoing Project: A Friendship That Changed Our Minds. (amazon.com)
Try Audible.com and get two free audiobooks including the new memoir by Bruce Springsteen, Born to Run. (amazon.com)
AT&T-TimeWarner
Mega-merger Monday: AT&T ($T) is buying Time Warner ($TWX). (Bloomberg)
Why AT&T ($T) may want to own Time Warner ($TWX). (Recode)
The AT&T ($T)-Time Warner ($TWX) may be a strategic mistake but it isn’t anti-competitive. (Marginal Revolution)
Companies
Microsoft ($MSFT) is doing fine without LinkedIn ($LNKD)… (Recode)
Can GoPro ($GPRO) turn itself around? (Fast Company)
Chipotle ($CMG) is between a rock and hard place. (Wired)
Twitter ($TWTR) has been valued as a tech company when it really is a media company. (WSJ)
Twitter ($TWTR) is stuck between a rock and a hard place. (Reuters)
Apple
How Apple ($AAPL) plans to make its way into the video business. (Above Avalon)
Apple ($AAPL) could do itself some favors with a bundle of ‘Apple Prime’ services. (Fortune)
Apple ($AAPL) is pulling back on its self-driving car ambitions. (Bloomberg)
Apple ($AAPL) has lost the thread on software. (Seth Godin)
Finance
Is the balance on your Starbucks ($SBUX) card money? (FT Alphaville)
Warren Buffett’s favorite, the reinsurance business is plagued with oversupply. (Bloomberg)
Private equity’s vitality has seen it replace investment banking as the most sought-after job in finance. (Economist)
Brexit loser: London. Brexit winner: New York City. (Bloomberg)
Big trades are a rarity these days at the big banks. (Business Insider)
SoFi wants to buy you a drink….and may be a loan. (NYTimes)
Financial media
The new StockTwits home page is the new ‘front page’ of the financial web. (Howard Lindzon)
Money.net is aiming to be a full-fledged Bloomberg terminal competitor. (NYTimes)
Hedge funds
Yet another threat to investment managers: clients, like Calstrs, bring money in-house. (FT)
The hedge fund industry is undergoing an existential crisis. (Bloomberg)
Family offices are the new hedge funds. (Bloomberg)
Quant hedge funds want more data. (FT)
Hedge fund launches are at a 16-year low. (Bloomberg)
Endowments
Harvard’s endowment is thinking about dumping its private equity holdings (at a discount). (Ritholtz)
Harvard’s endowment has lost whatever organizational culture it had. (A Wealth of Common Sense)
Asset allocation matters for everyone, including the Ivy League endowment funds. (MPI)
Passive vs. Active
‘Core and explore‘ has been flipped on its head. (Morningstar)
How do indexers do better than average, on average? (Pragmatic Capitalism)
DFA has quietly become the sixth largest mutual fund manager using index-like techniques. (WSJ)
The index fund revolution was accelerated by the rise of the Internet. (Nerd’s Eye View)
Stockpickers are optimistic their way of doing business will return. (WSJ)
Nevada’s state pension takes a stripped down approach to investing. (WSJ)
Quantitative Momentum
Despite some skepticism about individual stock momentum, Gary Antonacci still recommends Wes Gray and Jack Vogel’s new book Quantitative Momentum. (Dual Momentum)
You can get Quantitative Momentum: A Practitioner’s Guide to Building Momentum-Based Stock Selection System for only $14.99. (Alpha Architect)
ETFs
Don’t confuse ETFs with indexing. (WSJ)
The ETF Deathwatch for October 2016. (Invest with an Edge)
ETF statistics for September 2016. (Invest With an Edge)
Launching an ETF is no small (or cheap) endeavor. (ETF)
Funds
Blackrock ($BLK) now manages $5 trillion, yes with a T, in assets. (Dealbook)
A new framework for analyzing liquid alt funds. (Morningstar)
Merger arb fund returns have been squeezed down to next to nothing. (Morningstar)
Will Danoff of Fidelity is a rarity these days. (WSJ)
Self-indexers, like WisdomTree ($WETF) are on the rise. (Barron’s)
Summing up a series on smart beta from the perspective of an index investor. (Canadian Couch Potato)
Global
It’s hard to find a currency doing worse than the British Pound YTD. (Free exchange)
Emerging markets still trade at a discount to developed markets. (ABGlobal)
Remember Peak Oil? It really should be Peak Oil Demand. (Bloomberg)
Economy
15 important charts. (Calafia Beach Pundit)
A recession is coming! A recession is coming! Who cares… (Ritholtz)
Demographics help explain the downshift in US economic growth. (SSRN)
What CEOs had to say about the economy this week. (Avondale Asset)
A succinct summary of the week’s economic events. (Big Picture)
The economic schedule for the coming week. (Calculated Risk)
Earlier on Abnormal Returns
Saturday links: wet wipe woes. (Abnormal Returns)
Personal finance links: an act of rebellion. (Abnormal Returns)
Where are you going to apply your passion? (Abnormal Returns)
Mixed media
Why you should do your most distasteful task first thing in the morning. (The Mission)
Four ways to achieve your dreams. (What I Learnt on Wall Street)
There’s nothing wrong with being early for an appointment. (FT)
Stop beating yourself up. (Seth Godin)
