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Unlike music, books, or movies which can make the musician/writer/director/actor fantastically wealthy while simultaneously providing enjoyment to millions, a non-fungible token (NFT) of the identical movie or piece of music creates value purely because it is scarce. While contrived scarcity…

The Friday File: The hottest temperature recorded in North America is 56.7C (134.06F) in Death Valley. In Africa and Australia, the mercury hit 55C (131F) in Kebili and Oodnadatta respectively. In Asia, peak heat is 54C (129.2F) in Mitribah, while…

In yesterday’s Fed announcement, there was no mention of tapering, twisting, let alone rate raising, and rate liftoff is still not expected until 2023. Moreover, despite trillions in stimulus, Fed forecasts of GDP, inflation, and unemployment for 2022 and 2023…

This year, 49% of us are celebrating St. Patrick’s Day, albeit in slightly subdued fashion, down from 57% last year, and 60%, the recent high, in 2018. Celebrants will spend an average of $40.77 on Guinness, corned beef and cabbage,…

After peaking in the early 1970s at 13%, the US personal savings rate steadily declined and bottomed at about 3% in the run up to the housing bust. Subsequently, rates quickly rose to 7% and remained there through early 2020.…

In 2020, 60% of US large-cap stock-picking mutual funds lagged the unmanaged S&P 500. Regrettably, this underperformance isn’t new. 2020 was the 11th straight year a majority of actively managed funds underperformed the index. Of all large-cap actively managed funds…

The Friday File: During 2020, the Knight-Frank Luxury Investment Index rose just 3% after declining 1% in 2019. The top performer for the second year in a row, Hermes handbags (think Birkin bag) up 17%, bettering their 13% jump in…

A year ago today, the WHO declared Sars-CoV-2 a global pandemic. Lockdowns commenced and prices of many goods and services collapsed, airline tickets, clothes, oil, as examples, and M-o-M inflation readings went negative in March, April, and May. Comparing those…

The Powell Fed has made it clear it will continue purchasing Treasuries and MBS for the foreseeable future and keep short-term rates at rock bottom levels, but will not counter rising long-term rates. This is because financial conditions are loose,…

In 2020, motor-vehicle crashes killed 42,060 people, up (yes, up) 8% from 2019. Moreover, vehicle miles driven dropped 13% last year. This means that the rate of road deaths per million miles driven rose 24%, to 1.49, the biggest annual…