Review: Ten Great Ideas about Chance by Persi Diaconis and Brian Skyrms is “a history book, a probability book, and a philosophy book.” (Reading the Markets)
Quote of the Day
"Opacity might not be good for our financial health, but it sure does taste sweet. Sugar is not an acquired taste."
(John Rekenthaler)
Chart of the Day

The rise in high yield bond spreads is not all that spectacular.
Markets
- How much stock should we put in the S&P 500's twelve month positive streak? (bloomberg.com)
- Oil stocks are still lagging the rise in crude oil prices. (topdowncharts.com)
Strategy
- Why Ted Seides lost his famous bet with Warrren Buffett (advisorperspectives.com)
- How to define an asset class in four steps. (windhamlabs.com)
Muni bonds
- Why taxable investors should put a big slug of their bond money into munis. (blogs.cfainstitute.org)
- Muni bond investors would do well to avoid tobacco-backed bonds. (advisorperspectives.com)
Kindle offers
- "Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman" by James Gleick is just $1.99 for the Kindle. (amazon.com)
- "Dollars and Sense: How We Misthink Money and How to Spend Smarter" by Dan Ariely was just released. (amazon.com)
- "Eat Pray Love" by Elizabeth Gilbert is just $1.99 for the Kindle. (amazon.com)
Cryptocurrencies
- Some thoughts on the ICO bubble. (hackernoon.com)
- If you love volatility, you are going to love Bitcoin Cash. (fortune.com)
- Why Bitcoin won't become a medium of exchange. (bloomberg.com)
- Open a Coinbase account, trade $100 in crytpo and get $10 in Bitcoin free! (coinbase.com)
Companies
- Roku's ($ROKU) post-IPO trading has been unusual to say the least. (businessinsider.com)
- Would you buy stock in a public Reddit? (variety.com)
- Malls are looking to the hot, Millennial brands to bail themselves out. (wsj.com)
Fund management
- Why picking a good liquid alternative fund is so difficult. (beta.morningstar.com)
- Single-family offices LOVE alts. (thinkadvisor.com)
- Is AI-based stock trading overhyped? (venturebeat.com)
Support
- Stay up-to-date with all of our posts: sign-up for our daily e-mail newsletter. (abnormalreturns.com)
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- Love Abnormal Returns? Like us on Facebook. (facebook.com)
Global
- The German economy is doing just fine, thank you. (fortune.com)
- Venezuela officially defaulted on its bonds. (qz.com)
- Around the world, cash is losing out to electronic payments. (nytimes.com)
- The US will become the undisputed global oil and gas leader for decades to come. (bloomberg.com)
Economy
Earlier on Abnormal Returns
- Research links: catching up with the news. (abnormalreturns.com)
- What you missed in our Monday linkfest. (abnormalreturns.com)
- ETF links: the new active. (abnormalreturns.com)
Mixed media
- Bloomberg is launching a 24/7 news network on Twitter ($TWTR). (axios.com)
- Philo is a new entertainment-focused streaming service for $16 a month. (wsj.com)
- People watch Netflix ($NFLX) pretty much everywhere. (qz.com)
- Is Apple ($AAPL) making a mistake betting on a Reese Witherspoon-Jennifer Aniston vehicle? (slate.com)