Spekulatius

I looked at $CFG, which is a local bank to me and did not like their reports all that much. I agree its cheap though, but it does not look all that well run.

I also bought back a chunk of GOOGL (which I had just sold at close to the top) in my tax deferred accounts. Also added some financials (PYPL, DFS, BAC) and a tiny add to CRL.

I think to really define decade, a show needs to play in the present. So SciFi or Fantasy shows can’t really define a decade. That’s why Yellowstone or The Bear are sort of iconic shows, as Sopranos was 20 years ago. They play in a subculture, but the characters live in the present and are relatable. Yellowstone plays a bit into flee the city narrative. The Bear is just the opposite about the City of Chicago. Come to think about it Reservation dogs maybe such a show. I have not seen it, but it does get good ratings and is definitely designed to capture Zeitgeist.

I think "The Bear", The Expanse" may be decade defining TV for me. In terms of Zeitgeist, the "Yellowstone" western universe is hard to beat right now. "Stranger Things" is probably second. The last decade was really about "Walking Dead" which set us up for a Zombie Multiverse. I think it has been more decade defining that "Game of Thrones" in a way. This decade is just getting started, so who knows what else is coming?

It is remarkable that the two largest oil majors do a merger only a week apart and paid for in stock, not cash. I am guessing they don't think their stocks are all that undervalued and probably are unwilling to lever up. Both XOM and CVX have very little net debt, so they could have easily done the merger in cash without really encumbering their balance sheet much.

Yes the Azerbajiani/ Armenian conflict showed the impact of drones for the first time and I think since then, drone countermeasure and small drone development has really picked up. Ukraine has showed it much more, since it is a much larger conflict and very much the center of attention unlike the A-A conflict. From what we know China is also very strong in small drone development and they have a large industrial base of a consumer drone industry to draw from.

This is also an all stock deal. CVX also pays no premium although I think HES had already an takeover premium build in https://finance.yahoo.com/news/chevron-buy-hess-corp-53-090551430.html HES interesting assets are their exploration assets in Guyana, the biggest oil finds of the last decades if you don’t count shale.

Cost to buy vs rent at record level: https://www.wsj.com/economy/housing/theres-never-been-a-worse-time-to-buy-instead-of-rent-bd3e80d9?mod=economy_lead_story

@RedLion I do not think that replacement cost protects your downside as much as you think. There is plenty of commercial real estate valued below replacement cost. It all depends on the supply versus demand situation. Obviously if you do value add deals then it’s a totally different story and very much project dependent. I do not know housing demand, but I think it’s way more eslasric than people think. Maybe the millennials will just rent instead of buying. There is plenty of new multi family housing supply coming online in 2023 and 2024 before it will tail off in 2025, especially in growth markets like the Southwest and Texas. I do not think I have any crystal ball on housing ,others are way better. I just don’t think it’s a good bet because I think the value metric is affordability and we are at a 25+ year low on this metric.

Interesting story here - the surge in GPT-1 drug could really benefits PBM (or insurers with PBM’s) https://www.wsj.com/health/healthcare/ozempic-boom-is-an-opportunity-for-health-insurers-26ea9a42?mod=finance_lead_pos1 Could be good for CVS and CI specifically. ELV also has Carelon as their own native PBM but it’s still small.

Definitely true. In 1943, the production of war material from the allied did exceed the Axis production by 10:1 in many cases. For example at the beginning of the war, it took 3 years to build an aircraft carrier in the US and field it and in 1942 it was down to 12 month. The US build 17 carriers during WW2 while the Japan build 6. I read that the Russian army in 1943 (with help from Land Lease and the HS) would field 10x more tanks than the German: The stats below are mind boggling - 300,000 airplanes build, 86,000 tanks in WW2. Sure, the hardware is much more complex now, but somehow, we need back to getting the ability to ramp production again. If you assume that at some point China is become if an military adversary , well I am sure they could ramp to build a lot of ships and airplanes in relatively short order nd potentially could outgun the US. The ones who actually do that well are the Koreans. They sort of have been able to produce tanks, artillery pieces and even ships with relatively short lead times. They basically have sort of an assembly line approach to this, while in the US the stuff is produced in very small serial runs. The large defense contractors themselves want asset light during the roast few decades and have little real production capacity and rely on a network on contractors that do the stuff for them, while they develop the stuff, manage the supply chain and assembly and test the components. This has shown very fragile during COVID even without additional demand from any wartime engagement. https://www.pbs.org/kenburns/the-war/war-production

One reason why the US is doing so well relative to Europe is that the deficit spending in the US is increasing while in Europe it is shrinking. I was not aware on how much the government spending has been diverging lately:

I actually believe in a culture like Japan, simply shaming these companies and management teams by the stock exchange officials might work. Part of the reason why many of these smaller company management haven’t done anything is because nobody rattled their cage. The larger cos have been feeling the pressure more because they have to compete internationally amongst other reasons.

I am guessing we really need to give Ukraine airplanes such that they can gain at least local air superiority to win this. The current stalemate situation on the ground makes offensives difficult, so we basically have a WW1 like situation. This situation advantaging the defender was broken in WW2 with tanks and motorized infantry but also combined warfare with air support. The later part is lacking the Ukraine forces and it shows. Then we need to figure out to make more “stuff” when needed. Now everything is produces in planned lots but we have no flexibility to make more, if we run out of something. Thats hard to solve with the complexity of defense hardware, but we need to figure out a way to do it. We can’t just find ourself in a situation where we lose a bunch of fighter plans and then it takes 2 years to replace them. Thats a sure fire way to lose a war, because let’s face it unless a war is totally asymmetrical , a war tends to be a drawn out affair (years, not weeks) and stuff happens that you can plan for or predict and we need to be prepared for that. I think the plan to invested $50B in the industrial base of the defense industry is targets just for that.

This is nuts. Video shows a Russian attack in Avdiivka. Cluster bomb ammo is used here by Ukrainians. When it works, it really works:

Well they have lifted restrictions and what you can see as a freeloader at least. For a while you could not access articles written further back. Most of the value in SA lies in the comment section.

I would be careful betting on anything house related now. Buying a house at 3.5% Cap rates when mortgages are at 8% seems like a loser proposition. Housing prices are auction driven (just like anything else) but value is affordability and we are at a 25 year + low on that metric.

TDG may be great for equity investors, but is a lousy bet for bond investors with their leveraged cash out strategy. I would not touch it's bonds unless the yield is much jucier.

What's up in London? 1/3 of the riff raff stonks I follow there are halted.

To sum it up: We are screwed if interest rates are at zero. We are screwed if interest rates stay where they are. We are screwed even more if interest rates go higher.

Same here. I also added to DFS.

I misinterpreted what @Gregmal was saying. I read " moving off ZIRP was unhealthy" rather "ZIRP" being unhealthy.

Why was getting of zero unhealthy? I would argue that ZIRP was unhealthy and an abnormality.

yes, we should stop the ME discussion here (deleted my post). there are a few good "Osint" accounts - this is another one I follow: https://twitter.com/UKikaski

I added a bit TIPS (fund) in 401k yesterday. Also added some $LUV.