Spekulatius

If you believe what Dahlio writes is true, then as investor living in the west, you want to sell any Chinese investment. Similarly as a Chinese person, you want to pull your investment out of the western hemisphere and particularly the US and Europe. Otherwise, if the war (economic or even military) indeed breaks out, you will find yourself on one side of the fence and your money and investments on the other. That pretty much means you lost control over your investments and it is likely a total loss for you. This is true regardless of whether your think what the US or China does is right or justified. You invest in the world as it is, not in the world you want.

Been rediscovering Joe Jackson - blast from the past (Stepping out): Favorite albums: Look Sharp Night and Day Body and soul Big World if you like piano pieces, then the newer one " Rain" is great too.

Yep, they are upside down, negative NIM. Borrowing at 5% and lending out at a fixed 3% or thereabouts. It’s just a matter of time until they fold.

I love Natalie Merchant. I have their essential playlist downloaded on my phone. Tigerlily is my favorite album. I will have check out the new one.

@dpetrescu thanks for writing this up in a more detailed. I am way more constructive on ADSK than TYL because ADSK's growth rate is higher (mid teens) than TYL. I agree on ADSK's moat. I am less sure about TYL.

Pretty solid looking results from $BRO for Q1: https://investor.bbinsurance.com/news-releases/news-release-details/brown-brown-inc-announces-first-quarter-2023-results-including My only holding in this space and a small one at that. But now I can cheer for them: Go Bro!

Sold my GEF-B position in my tax deferred accounts. The stock did well and met my valuation target.

You are probably correct - i can't find even the post any more. the Nazi's analogies can be taken too far of course, but the Nazi can also helpful in terms of how to deal with a ruthless autocrat that is hell bend on expansion of the sphere. There are similarities in thinking between Hitler and Putin - both think very much in territorial terms for example and there are also the idea of revanchism (Hitler WW1, Putin to restore the Russian empire). If you are neighbor of Russia, it's legit to be frightened, imo. In that terms, I think its likely that the Ukraine eventually joins Sweden and Finland into the NATO although there is a lot of pushback in the short term. But a decade from now, I think this is going to be likely trajectory.

I think it's likely that without NATO, there would be more wars, not less. @Xerxes claims many are biased here but then goes on to say that Kiev is run from Azov battalions, which is essentially the Nazi boogeyman, despite the fact that right wing parties got flogged during the last elections in Ukraine (check the electrion results) and the country is somehow run by a Jew. This does not make any sense to me. On European wars versus elsewhere - of course Europeans are more worried about a war in Europe than le's say the war in Sudan. it's simply because Ukraine is at the doorstep and Russia is a threat while Sudan isn't a direct threat (except being a harbor of terrorists of various sorts). Not sure what can be done in Sudan either. This has nothing to do with brown versus white either, it's just common sense.

Absolutely fascinating documentary about the polish sculpture artist Szukalski on Netflix: https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/struggle_the_life_and_lost_art_of_szukalski

A multiple expansion from 2x EV/revenues to 8x EV/revenues in a decade does wonders for returns, the reverse not so much. I could easily see both EW and TYL trading for 4x revenues rather than 8x. In the medical space, it happened to MDT for example.

To abuse an Andy Grove proverb, the paranoid are pretty good at surviving though.

I would also like to know how any outcome in the Ukraine war is going to negate the nuclear threat. If Putin, wins, gets a draw or loses the war - he still has his nuclear weapons and can make threats or pull the trigger any time he likes. If anything, if he wins or sees his threats going to have an impact on what the west is doing, it will lead to more threats. On a more interesting note, there seems to be some significant recon activity going on around Kherson where Ukrainian troops have established footholds eastern banks of the Dnipro river. Whether that means anything in terms of the expected spring offensive remains to be seen.

ADSK and TYL competitive advantage is very well known. For once Morningstar and other wide known services like Motley Fool write about them. Especially with TYL and their relatively slow growth, I would be concerned about getting no return for a decade while the company continues to grow but gets a much lower valuation multiple.

For financial news: cnbc.com capedge.com (for specific stocks, if you create a watchlist) podcasts. Morgan Stanley - Thoughts on the market ( just a couple of minutes each day on investment stories ) https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/thoughts-on-the-market/id1466686717 WSJ Online (through my library) For general news, I like DW (Deutsche Welle) on YouTube.

@John Hjorth The Chuck Akre talk is great. FWIW, there are several lengthy podcasts and YouTube clips from Chris Mayers explaining his investing process. I have read the book, but you can get a pretty good idea how he thinks and what he is looking for watching one or two of these, if you prefer the visual/audio version or learning. I did get one stock - $BRO (also inspired from @dealraker of course) from his talks. I think his style is not for everyone, but you can learn a lot from his way of thinking and just boot this on your own investment process. I particular think it’s whether just thinking through what stock could become a 100 bagger, if you look into small caps or maybe mid caps and make it part of your investment decision.

I added a bit more $ELV

Yes, Dylan Patels is stack is worthwhile if interested in semis. I personally found it more efficient to go through his Twitter feed every once in a while.

I have some free subscriptions on substack and they sent me email summaries. i sometimes open them and I am almost always disappointed with the content. I never found a substack that I would be willing to pay for. Some do have good takes but the issue is that writers run out of steam, as you noted.

How much of the improved sentiment in homebuilders and construction related stocks is due to the long and of the interest rates curve and with it mortgage rates falling? I think it's the main factor, if the long end of the rates goes up again and mortgage rates with it, then these stocks will get another flogging.

Any change in regulation will be phased on over many years, so imminent capital raises due to a change in regulatory treatment is unlikely. The second issue is that it's not clear to me at all why the regulator would distinguish between HTM and AFS securities at all - it's all the same stuff. The only difference really is that BAC moved their AFS to HTM once they started to get into a loss situation and they did that to avoid a hit to regulatory capital. They did that because the >$700B banks and the smaller ones are treated differently with respect to AFS AOCI losses in terms of regulatory capital - the large banks they take it a hit and smaller banks they don't. But how does it make banking safer if any bank going forward puts securities into HTM to begin with or they move them there once they start to lose value? If they want to make banking safer they need to treat both HTM and AFS the same way, imo.

Insane footage of close up trench warfare. I count 4 Russian killed in a few minutes. Looks exactly like WW1:

If you want to look at bank that that took some damage from the recent banking crisis, look at $KEY's report: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/keycorp-reports-first-quarter-2023-103000897.html Their cost of deposits doubled from ~0.5% to almost 1% from Q42022 to Q12023 and that compressed NIM. They also have a relatively large fixed income portfolio.

Yes, that’s about correct.

Small add to $USB after earnings.