Quote of the day
Barry Ritholtz, “With their [Pimco’s] foray into hedge funds, any suspicion you may have had that the bond bull market was in the 9th inning should be laid to rest.” (Big Picture)
Chart of the day

NLY Total Return Price data by YCharts
Jeff Gundlach likes mortgage REITs. (Income Investing)
Markets
The big tech sector companies are really big. (Avondale Asset)
Investors are fleeing muni bond funds. (WSJ)
Putting the bond market decline in perspective. (Pragmatic Capitalism)
Why low CNBC ratings are a good (contrarian) sign. (Schaeffer’s Trading Floor)
Strategy
What is a neutral weighting to emerging market equities? (Capital Spectator)
What should investors do with TIPS? (Morningstar)
Market closures don’t mean much to long-term investors. (Rick Ferri)
Companies
A big deal brewing: Verizon ($VZ) and Vodafone ($VOD) are talking a wireless deal. (Bloomberg, FT Alphaville, MoneyBeat)
Starbucks ($SBUX) is transforming itself into a packaged food company. (Businessweek)
Three things Twitter should do to avoid a Facebook ($FB) IPO debacle. (FT)
Twitter needs big growth leading up to an IPO, hence conversations. (GigaOM)
Finance
Peer-to-peer lending is becoming increasingly mainstream. (Reuters)
The online-only investing space is attracting venture capital and competitors. (Financial Planning)
On the returns to venture capital (and startups). (SSRN)
Funds
How do bond ETF premiums/discounts resolve themselves over time? (Turnkey Analyst)
Pimco is making a big push into alternative asset funds. (WSJ)
Global
India has two not-so-great choices. (Quartz also Alpha Now)
Emerging markets need to avoid big policy errors. (Free exchange)
A look at two big emerging market currencies. (VIX and More)
The consensus surrounding Norway’s sovereign wealth fund is fracturing. (FT)
Economy
Q2 GDP revised higher while weekly initial unemployment claims come in near trend. (Calculated Risk, Bonddad Blog, Bespoke)
Small business optimism is picking up. (WSJ)
Should we worry about recent housing data? (Business Insider, ibid)
Earlier on Abnormal Returns
What you may have missed in our Wednesday linkfest. (Abnormal Returns)
Mixed media
On the end of The Oil Drum and why some good blogs don’t last. (FT Alphaville)
Songza is the best streaming music service. (Slate)
Google Hangouts is going HD. (GigaOM)
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