Spekulatius

@no_free_lunch I think the sanction are working, but it takes time to kick in. The oil is hard to sanction, but the European can and will reduce depends from NG. It just takes time and doing this all at once would hurt the Europeans just as much than the Russian, so it’s not a good tradeoff. The technology part of the sanction is working and there have been news here and there that military complex is starting to hurt. Their airplanes, helicopters tanks all function with western parts and electronics and at some their areas running out. It’s probably already happening because supply chains tend to have parts for maybe 1-2 month but once they are gone, they have are done until they can replace them perhaps with some chines stuff, but that’s not always plug and play, if they even can get it. I think in a few month, the Sowjet economy will be short so many things that even the military complex will stop functioning. Maybe not quick enough to stop this war but for sure will prevent them from a redo.

I expect a regrouping and a new attack, presumably in the east. As for regime change, I don't think that's something one can bet on and it's quite unlikely.

You could well be right. Ukraine and Russia are both fighting a propaganda war, but Ukraine is much better at it. You would think that they at least have decent rifles. I have seen some videos from the Russian side, showing house to house search in Mariopolis mostly. A lot of those are Chechen and they don’t look that impressive either, but they do have decent weaponry. Russia has definitely fielded a lot of conscripts and Putin calling up 135k more in a hurry shows this as well. I don’t think that part is propaganda.

Happy April 1st fools day, Vladimir!

It’s 3/31 so I have to say it. Great quarter Z-guys:

I also wonder if we could end this war in one hour if we gave the Ukraine a few dozen of tactical and ballistic nukes. Edit: I am surprised Bill Ackman hasn't floated this idea

Without nukes, we would have a parade of Bradley's and Abrahams tanks on the Red Square by now. It's just a 10h drive from Latvia or Estonia to Moscow and there wouldn't be much to stop them, since they are busy beating up their neighbor in the south.

Reducing BAH in my IRA. Edit: Also ABEV and V.

Will be interested to see who flinches. Germany insists on paying for NG from Russia in Euro's or USD (as is written in the contract), Putin wants payment in Rubbles, via a trust account at a Russian bank: First Litmus test is tomorrow.

Holy crap. I feel sorry for these guys. There were rumors that some conscripts got Nagant bolt action rifles (WW2 standard edition). That may be almost true (the fellow in this clip shows a rather worn AK47). I also see news that Putin conscripted 135k new soldiers - more cannon fodder.

I like the frugal aspect of using Costco and TJ ingredients. I think I am going to try this recipe.

I read up on the Wagner group and I don't think sending them will make a lot of difference. Yes, they model themselves after the SS (the skull symbol is similar to the Totenkopf SS), but they are just mercenaries for dirty work and not really trained like an army on heavy equipment etc. Based on their track record in Africa, it seems that they have a mixed record at best and tend to get their asses kicked once they meet some skilled counterparts. They also seem to have very high loss rates. It's sort of ironical to sent mercenary Nazi's to de-nazify a country.

Annual report is out: https://www.otcmarkets.com/otcapi/company/financial-report/324942/content

It’s also public opinion and pressure. The Ukraine war is the most televised war in history and there is social media, Tik Tok (the Chechen actually have a battalion there that is called Tik Tok battalion. Ukraine plays thr Underdog well. Then affects people that are much like us ( white people). Do the same thing in a Dschungel in Africa and it’s won’t that big of a deal. There will be some articles in the Washington Post etc but that could be it. In a way that has something to do politics but also how humans are wired.

Well Putin is not a communist at all, as far as I know that party is pretty much dead in Russia. On a related note, the head line that Russia will reduce the assaults around Kyiv after they have been on the defensive there anyways could come right from a German Wochenschau newsreel ca 1944. They will probably shift to Donetsk area where they still had some success recently. I also doubt that this war comes to a conclusion very soon. Putin / Russia is still moving fresh troops from elsewhere into this meatgrinder as we speak. They also got the Wagner (great name) mercenaries in the backhand. I am not sure Putin want's to spent his private army though, as it is needed for insurance.

The Lindy principle applies to Dictators too. Putin has been around for a while, which means he is good at staying alive and my guess is he will hang around longer. He also has quite a bit of support from the population still, at least amongst the older people, who grew up when the Soviet union was still around. The younger crowd not so much. The 1420 channel has great interviews giving a view on how Russian's think. The people younger than 30 are not all that different from Millennials here. https://www.youtube.com/c/1420channel

I would be very surprised if Berkshire would want to fully own Oxy. It seems that this would come with a lot of headaches - a deeply cyclical and not that great business over the long run, pot. environmental liabilities m ESG issues of the successor. I just don’t see it happening. He does own enough shares to have quite a bit of effective control, This could mean that he could sell his shares to a suitor or carve out Oxychem which might fit well with Berkshire’s other chemical business.

You may want to read up on "Greater Serbia" and Milosevic. Bosnia Herzegovina would not exist according to this plan, even though Serbians are the minority there. This war went on for a long time , starting in 1991 and NATO / the European did nothing. US under Clinton went in and finally put an end to this tragedy. About 200k people were killed in this war and if it weren't for US intervention, there would have been a whole lot more. All the while, the Serbian got massive help / weapons from Russia. Russia apparently liked to stoke this war in Europe. Right now, the Serbians are about the only country in Europe that sticks with the Russians after the Ukraine invasion. That's why the straw man arguments that's it's all the same are weak.

@mcliu Mosul was indeed a mistake (imo), but you realize that many civilians died not because of the bombing, but because of secondary explosions from ammunition cache stored in civilian housing as well as from a bomb truck that happened to blow up as well. In a war and with enough fire power, you are going to hit targets that you don't want to hit. That's different than deliberately targeting civilians like the Russians are doing. Also China was aligning themselves with the genocidal Serbians at that time, same than the Russians. Doesn't justify the bombing, but again you have to ask yourself what business they had in this and there was debate whether they supported the Serbians with Weapons as the Russians did.

Zelensky interview in the Economist: https://www.economist.com/europe/volodymyr-zelensky-on-why-ukraine-must-defeat-putin/21808448

Great trailer. Can’t wait for the movie to come out.

If someone wonders why mortgage rates have gone up so much someone on twitter (forgot the link) posted that there is a feedback loop going on that causes falling prices for MBS. Since almost every mortgage is going to be packaged into MBS, the decline in MBS (mortgage backed security) prices causes higher yield spreads over treasuries and therefore higher mortgage prices. the feedback loop has started with the interest rate reversals and outlook from the treasuries. MBS are a peculiar paper because their duration floats with the direction of interest rates. This is because prepayments (resulting from refinances) slow down during rising interest rates. the Feedback loop is actually a triple whammy where 1) Rising interest rates ---> Increase in MBS duration ---> Institutional investors selling MBS (to reduce risk from rising duration) --> increased spreads to treasuries. So in other words, mortgage rates will go up much faster than you would think if interest rates trends reverse, because they are tied to the pricing of MBS. I think it makes sense that this is what we are seeing here. one would at some point think that the spreads at least stop rising but it's possible that ongoing rate rises cause new waves of selling in these MBS. I possibly got it all wrong since I am not an expert, but these credit markets often work in peculiar ways, because most parties involved are just "Automatons" that do whatever meets their mandate, rather than taking contrarian stances.

The above was actually recommended from an Ukraine poster on FB and Nextdoor and it's on Klitschko's (Myor of Kyiv) list as well. in the meant time, these guys are doing the real work: There should also be Ukraine organizations in your area. They know what to do I assume. I donated to #Mightycause (UCCA -Ukrainian Congress Committee of America) as well. Hope they put the money to good use.

I never donated for armed forces before, but here we go: https://bank.gov.ua/en/news/all/natsionalniy-bank-vidkriv-spetsrahunok-dlya-zboru-koshtiv-na-potrebi-armiyi