Quote of the day

@Jesse_Livermore, “(I)f you’re patiently waiting for 10% equity returns to be offered to you, you’re either waiting for some kind of crisis that puts investors in an irrational state of mind (the state of mind they’ve been working off since Lehman), or you’re waiting on a significant Fed tightening…”  (Philosophical Economics)

Chart of the day

ETF100_0114

The Top 100 ETFs doubled the return of hedge funds in 2013.  (ETF Replay)

Markets

Jason Zweig, “The clearest lesson from history: Worries about a bubble matter less than how the investing public reacts to those worries. ”  (WSJ)

Has the improvement in economic strength translated into higher corporate profits? (A Dash of Insight)

Health care and financials are dominating the tape.  (Dynamic Hedge)

There have already been some huge winners this year.  (Bespoke, ZorTrades)

Strategy

How to get the most out of hedge fund internship.  (Aleph Blog)

How your “lizard brain” hijacks your investing.  (Investing Caffeine)

2013 was not a good year for the Permanent Portfolio.  (Crawling Road via @monevator)

A quick review of John Wasik’s Keynes’s Way to Wealth: Timeless Investment Lessons from the Great Economist.  (NYTimes)

Companies

Why isn’t the conglomerate dead yet?  (Economist)

A review of the Post Holdings ($POST) annual report.  (The Brooklyn Investor)

ETFs

The ETF Deathwatch for January 2014.  (Invest with an Edge)

Worth perusing: ETF Award finalists.  (IndexUniverse)

Economy

Pundits are discounting the weak NFP report.  (Econbrowser, Pragmatic Capitalism, Rational Irrationality)

The labor market is tightening faster than you think.  (Conor Sen)

Why we shouldn’t be all that surprised by falling labor participation rates.  (Fortune)

A look back at the economic week that was.  (Bonddad Blog)

The economic schedule for the coming week.  (Calculated Risk, Turnkey Analyst)

Earlier on Abnormal Returns

Our take on the value of “investment mediocrity.”  (Money)

Top clicks this week on the site.  (Abnormal Returns)

What you missed in our Saturday linkfest.  (Abnormal Returns)

Mixed media

What will happen to television if Aereo wins in the Supreme Court?  (Businessweek, CNN)

Do we really want all our appliances to be “smart”?  (ArsTechnica)

New energy-efficient lightbulbs don’t need to be ugly.  (Slate)

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