Spekulatius

At some point diplomacy will take over but I don’t think it’s now. Diplomacy typically takes place when either one side has won or when it’s very clear to both sides that they can’t win. To me, it seems that Russia believes it can win or at least that they can last longer than the western aid. Without western aid, Ukraine will collapse and it will become a Russian vassal state like Belarus . Putin knows that western states have elections and every elation is roll of dice for him and he can hope that sixes (for him) come up. That‘s not a problem he has to content with. So perhaps after elections, some means of diplomacy are more likely or perhaps the election solves the issue for him.

What we the metal shavings for? Aluminium for reduction? I want to repeat this experiment.

One of the greatest sketches ever:

Like always , we need to look at what’s happening rather than what XI saying. it is probably true , that an attack on Taiwan is not imminent, but there is no question that they regard Taiwan as theirs just like Russia believes Ukraine is theirs and sooner or later, we will see action, imo. https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/taiwan-reports-surge-chinese-warplanes-off-its-coast-2024-09-26/ Autocrats tend to do what they believe in over a long enough timeframe. In my opinion, the Chinese stock market surge should be sold (sell the rip, buy the dip) because China has a history or rips as the stock market it highly speculative and we have no idea if any of this action really sticks and Chinese really buying $5k handbags from stimmi funds. Much of this may be spent to buy defunct buildings and blow them up and to rescue banks with now worthless loans that need to be written off.

Yeah, that Rush piece is pretty good. When you watch the rush piece (which is real Hard Rock, imo) you can see the evolution from the early Hard Rock of 1970‘s Deep Purple (still a bit embryonic) to the 1976 Rush version. What I found happening now availability of music streamers and YouTube, that many musicians I glossed over because ai listened to a few things on record and just didn’t like then and never revisited again now check out again and like it a lot. RAMMSTEIN is one example where I downloaded their entire catalogue. I knew them more than 20 years ago, but their Metal wasn’t my thing. Now I find them awesome. I guess I just didn’t have the right mood when I checked out an album in a record store back then. Break out to the other side is one my favorite Doors records and yes the Organ makes the song so remarkable with it providing the sound harmonies and the beat at the same time. Awesome stuff.

I love this old restorations old performances on YouTube. This one is a classic from Deep Purple when hard rock as we know it was born : The vocals and the classic organ are awesome.

That seems like a rather simple view. NATO introduced a no fly zone which no doubt accelerated Gaddafi’s loss of power in 2011, but this may have happened anyways as a result of the Arab spring. The civil war started years later when the ruling party (basically the rebels that disposed of the Gadafinrefime) could come to terms and instead of resolving their difference piecefully decided to go into a full blown division war. Is this the US of Clintons fault? I don’t see it that way. It is true that the west was enthusiastic about the Arab spring and for the most part it didn’t work out, but is this the west fault or are these countries really not capable of running a democracy? Should they not even try? I think blaming Clinton for what happened is nonsense. I think it was right to help the rebel dispose of Gaddafi who was a major jackass and terrorist sponsor. I think it would be right to help an opposition on Iran to dispose of the Ayatollahs too when it can be done, especially since th e Engagement (No fly zone) was very limited in scope and duration. The outcome however isn’t predictable and we may end up at the same place but with different faces. C’eat la vie. But you can get lucky too if you roll the dice. Game of a thrones, here we come.

Sudan is an interesting case, a war that has been going on for a decade (lost count) and probably killed hundred of thousand. however, what is the what is the west supposed to do here? What about the African neighbors Egypt, South Africa ( a bit away but still closer than we are). I think it’s their job to do something here and maybe the west can help? Is the US supposed to go with an army there while neighbors do nothing? I don’t even think we know whom to back here? None of the parties in this civil war are aligned with the US really. On Jemen, I agree. Backing the Saudis should be so over. Its less of a high spheres thing, it’s more that you got to pick your fight.

This guys is pretty good:

Lifted from the Massimo account from X:

The more I think about it the more I believe that the CCP putting money in banks is more of a salvage operation than stimulus. For stimulus the CCP needs to give money to consumers who hopefully spend it, but that’s not what we are seeing here This seem tells us that the CCP is afraid of their financial system falls apart, just like when Congress decided on TARP in 2008. Not exactly bullish.

It’s cyclical, always has been.

Banks too?

If only ignoring problems (moving on) would solve them. Doesn’t work in engineering that’s for sure. Ignoring a problem has never worked for me there and likely grows into a larger problem. I guess I should have studied sociology and politics instead. So simple. Also, Russia will run out of sons too. Demographics are terrible and not in Russias favor. Russia can’t keep this up forever. They recruit 30,000 mean/ month for the war. Thats gives you an idea about the consumption rate this war has for the Russians. Also, the Rubel is back to trash levels of about 93 Rubel for he $ on grey market. Roughly 2 x Pre war. that means imports cost 2x too. The price economic data on the surface does not look to bad with ~3% GDP growth but that’s because the Russian economy has to switch to a war economy, this growth does not go into consumer goods and services. Interest rates were raised to 18%. An interesting stat from another war - German production of goods was rising until 1944 - with pretty much everything going into war efforts directly and indirectly. In 1944 much of Germany was already destroyed and the war was lost. I am just putting this out there k because some people claim the the economic data proves that Russia is doing well economically.

This is a classical case where you need an activist. On the topic of FI I f management a bit of keep away, I would agree with this, but I think they really have proven that they have no cause what they are doing in the US. Current management bought this, so I don’t buy excuses here. Now it’s the time to do a change because post season is pretty much done, so if management is booted now, the new management can put some things in motion for next season over winter. Otherwise there a risk that we get that we get another tardy trading update late ins print that ahem things yet didn’t not work out again, excuses of this and that and the stock is dead for another year. Also, I want to point out that the people who create a mess are rarely the best people to fix it. I still have a very small starter position in this because of above concerns but I think this is a fixable situation- it’s not like we are trying to send humans to Mars here.

Up 5% today. Should have waited a little longer…

A first grader with a map can figure out that there is not going to be a war between an Israel and Iran. How do you make war with a county ~600 miles away? Sending a couple of drones won’t so much and and sending troops though 600miles through hostile counties isn’t really possible. Iran does not have the air power, they just get 5x what they sent over in return. Hezbollah is on its own, the Iranians pretty much signaled such. There will be some symbolic acts of retaliation and that will be pretty much it.

Sold most of my $BABA. Worked well enough. While a I don’t mind smaller portfolio position , that particular one does require more ongoing research to keep current than it’s worth for me.

I am not sure either. I think the chance that a Democratic Revolution swipes away Putin isn’t large, but surprising things have happened - Ceaucescu was one of those. I think there is a much higher likelihood that a coup sipes away Putin and somebody close to his inner circle eff’s him off, but that’s not something we can predict , much less count on. Andy Grove famously said “Only the paranoid survive” and that’s true even more so for dictators & autocrats than for business.

Putins idea how this works is you play by my rules but none apply to me. <<insert nuclear saber rattling sound here>> Obvious play on gullibility. There are some nice mushroom clouds from Russian ammo depots in YT. Imagine what Ukraine could do with a few hundred cruise missiles.

Pretty good summary how Russia tries to reroute trade flows. Easier for some goods than for others: https://www.wsj.com/world/russia/putin-russia-trade-routes-charts-maps-921aa78b?mod=finance_lead_pos3

Looks like the UAE is the hub and the Indians are well knows to buy Russian oil too. Saudis aria is is greenwashing the discounted Russian oil too, they use it domestically so they can export more of their own. How to prevent his from continuing is a challenge because you would need to effectively sanction UAE, Saudi Arabia and India as well. I also want to point out that both Biden and a Trump have avoided a direct confrontation with an Iran Trump did not respond when Iran shot down an US drone over international waters. So I doubt he would deal much more aggressive with Iran than the current administration. All these conflict do not seem to change the demand and supply solution for energy in the longer run. In the short run, they leads to disruptions until the flows get rejigged but at the end, the volumes always seem to get to market.

@LC I do much more work when I start a position then I do later after I own a stock for a while. I really only pay attention when the stock moves a lot and take a second look. LW is one where I averaged down but not to a large position. After looking at the new info that caused a drop, I am just staying put since I do now know yet, if the issue is more temporary in nature (meaning it takes less than 1-2 years to play out) or if the business is worse than I assumed.

The Iran has more money because crude prices are higher than 4 years ago. The US and Europe does not buy Iranian crude but others do (Chinese, Oman, Bangladesh and who knows who else). The rest of the world does not follow, they sell a commodity and for a discount you can sell almost any commodity on size , somebody will buy it. Russian crude finds buyers too despite being sanctioned by western world, they just have to sell it at a discount. India is a big buyer. The nuclear treaty does seem to not work out. I agree on that but that’s a different issue from above.