Tom Lauricella at WSJ.com profiles the head of Wake Forest’s endowment fund who is adding value by actively managing (gasp) a portfolio of mutual funds.

Greg Newton at NakedShorts asks “What is a SIV?” See also WSJ.com and FT Alphaville on the problems facing ‘conduits.’

Mark DeCambre at TheStreet.com notes the “housing bailout chatter” is growing louder.

Jeff Miller at A Dash of Insight on predicting recessions and why “Anyone trying to predict unlikely events will have many errors.”

Real Time Economics highlights a research paper into the ability of the yield curve to forecast recessions.

Doug Kass at TheStreet.com thinks the Fed is “finally waking up” to how bad things are out there.

Calculated Risk makes the distinction between the ‘liquidity crunch’ and the ‘credit crunch.’

James Hamilton at Econbrowser on a slight return to normalcy in the Fed funds futures market.

It seems like everyone is raising a fund to invest in ‘market dislocation vehicles’ like high-yield loans. (via FT Alphaville & DealBook)

All About Alpha writes “What’s the quickest way to goose the alpha of any fund – mutual or hedge? Easy. Slash fees.”

Mebane Faber at World Beta looks at some listed hedge funds trading outside of the U.S.

Hedge funds do nearly 30% of U.S. bond trading. (via WSJ.com)

Barry Ritholtz at the Big Picture passes along a historical perspective on recent bear markets.

Bespoke Investment Group asks “How important are financials to the market?”

Jim Wiandt at IndexUniverse.com with five ETFs he “really likes” and five “big developments” in the ETF business.

Brett Steenbarger at TraderFeed on signs of somewhat rare “herd-like” behavior.

CXO Advisory Group on research into the difficulty of distinguishing expert and non-expert performance in investing.

As summer comes to an end, a Freakonomics Quorum on “family vacation nightmares” seems all the more timely.

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