The problems at Freddie Mac (FRE) were foreseen all the way back in 2004.  (NYTimes.com also Calculated Risk, ClusterStock.com)

The European high yield bond markets are frozen.  (Telegraph.co.uk)

A closer look at GMO’s 7-year asset class expected returns.  (Fundamental Insights)

“Carl Icahn has lost a lot of money in WCI Communities (WCI).  (Floyd Norris also Crossing Wall Street)

Is the criticism of Merrill Lynch (MER) CEO John Thain justified?  (Dash of Insight also ClusterStock.com)

“Just because an ETF specializes in a strategy that seems attractive doesn’t make it a good investment.”  (Bespoke Investment Group)

Is value just a big bet on financials?  (Humble Student of the Markets)

It’s not easy being a merger arb these days.  (Deal Journal)

Expect more investment managers to change hands this year.  (DealZone also DealBreaker.com)

“(U)nderperforming fund managers generally have 3 distinct responses when delivering unpleasant news to our investors…”  (Ultimi Barbarorum)

Do you need a long-short fund in your portfolio?  (Morningstar.com)

“Gaming the direction of an earnings reaction has extremely little edge.”  (Daily Options Report)

“When we trade size that is too large for our account size, we subject ourselves to drastic swings in P/L, and that subjects us to drastic swings in mood.”  (TraderFeed)

The story on return predictability keeps changing.  (CXO Advisory Group)

Are Mondays and Fridays more volatile than the rest of the week?  (MarketSci Blog)

What exactly are you trading when you trade the ‘recession contract.’  (Big Picture also Market Movers)

“The stage is getting set for a major move in the FX markets, and currency traders around the world are starting to smell blood in the streets. Lots of blood.”  (Random Roger)

Will lower oil prices affect consumer behavior?  (MarketBeat)

“Every really good venture fund I have been involved in or have witnessed has had one or more investments that paid off so large that one deal single handedly returned the entire fund.”  (A VC)

“Even on my best Fisher equation days, I never doubted that break-even rates also include a risk premium to compensate for avoiding inflation risk.”  (Free exchange)

Check out the traffic growth at TimSykes.com. (TimSykes.com)

Research suggests humans intuitively think in logarithmic terms, not linear.  (Scientific American)

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