A good read according to Reading the Markets: GDP: A Brief but Affectionate History by Diane Coyle.
Quote of the day
Morgan Housel, “Not realizing the difference between luck and skill puts you on a road to ruin. ” (Motley Fool)
Chart of the day
The Russian stock market has been going down for while even before the issues with Ukraine. (Quartz)
Markets
Stocks have been the tough trade in 2014. (All Star Charts)
Stocks and bonds can go up togehter for long stretches of time. (Dragonfly Capital)
Healthcare and staples stocks have diverged. (Crossing Wall Street, ibid)
Why muni bonds have benefited in 2014. (WSJ)
Junk bonds have been on fire. (Bonddad Blog)
Strategy
On the dangers of overfitting the data. (Tim Harford)
Fun with data: out with the January barometer in with the February barometer. (Quantitative Edges)
What is probabilistic absolute momentum? (CSS Analytics)
Companies
Why Allegheny ($Y) is a buy under book value. (The Brooklyn Investor)
Tesla ($TSLA) is a textbook bubble at work. (Daniel Gross)
IBM ($IBM) is a card-carrying member of the “cult of shareholder value.” (The Guardian)
Berkshire Hathaway
Berkshire Hathaway’s ($BRKB) one great business advantage. (Business Insider, Conor Sen)
Eight lessons learned from Warren Buffett this weekend. (The Reformed Broker)
Apple ($AAPL)
Apple CarPlay wants to turn your car into a big iPhone accessory. (TechCrunch, ibid)
Apple is no slouch when it comes to acquisitions. (AppleInsider)
What is the business model for Apple TV? (Asymco)
Finance
Where the Tiger Cubs are investing. (II Alpha)
George Soros is not a gangster. (Barry Ritholtz, The Epicurean Dealmaker)
Funds
The March Mutual Fund Observer commentary is up and includes a discussion of ‘active share.’ (MFO)
Global
Two myths about the Ukraine conflict. (Sober Look)
Pimco has a problem with Canada. (FT)
Economy
Joshua Brown, “Private equity is the economy-on-steroids and benefits immensely from an easy Fed.” (The Reformed Broker)
The ISM manufacturing report for February showed continued resilience. (Business Insider, Bespoke, Crossing Wall Street)
Personal income and spending jumped in January. (Calculated Risk)
Household formation is still holding back home sales. (Sober Look)
Earlier on Abnormal Returns
What books Abnormal Returns readers purchased in February 2014. (Abnormal Returns)
What you may have missed in our Sunday linkfest. (Abnormal Returns)
Mixed media
Why we need to learn to embrace failure. (BBC)
Bees are using plastic waste to build their hives. (Modern Farmer via @digg)
Hipster alert: the Pabst Blue Ribbon brand is on the block. (Reuters)
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