tede02

I have some stuff in a free version of dropbox. In the last year I finally broke down and purchased 100GB of storage via Google One mainly for pictures and video. I'm a business owner and use Onedrive for that. It's kind of amazing how managing data can turn into a burden as it gets spread out across various cloud platforms and or devices. Over the last 5-10 years I recall reading many articles of how big cloud storage is going to be, etc. and I never fully grasped the magnitude but I definitely see it now. Probably a decent runway still.

One thing thing I don't quite understand is why they are searching thousands and thousands of square miles. Intuitively, I'd assume the mother-ship was parked directly above the Titantic ship wreck and the sub would essentially descend vertically on the shortest possible path which would provide a relatively defined area to search. Maybe there are strong ocean currents in that area or something but the sense I get is they have no clue where the submersible is.

This 2020 documentary was eye opening to me. It covers the history of the ufo/uap topic going back to WWII. Prior to a few years ago, I gave no thought to this subject other than figuring it was nothing more than tabloid/click bait trash. But after seeing this documentary, hearing from navy pilots and other credible observers, plus watching the constant drip of new videos leak out of the department of defense, it's persuaded me to keep an open mind that there may be something to all this.

When I realized NVDA was selling for around 40X SALES, I bought one Jan 2025 far out of the money put just for kicks.

From everything I read, the source, David Grusch, is highly credible. He was literally one of the people in-charge of the President's Daily (intelligence) Brief among other things and numerous high-ranking people have vouched for his integrity. His claims haven't been proven but, according to the Debrief Article and other reporting, he has provided the congress program names, who's running them and even physical locations where these objects are stored. Will be unreal if this proves to be true.

I share most of this sentiment. AI definitely seems to be a new story people are excited about and I'm not sure we even know what the business model looks like. NVDA is selling for over 30X SALES! LOL. I bought a tiny amount of long waaay out of the money puts for amusement.

This is basically spot on for my wife and me. I was just doing the mental math on the expense of my two young kids the other day and the number was easily $30-40k annually. Nearly $20k of that is childcare.

I bought a trivial amount of far out of the money puts on NVDA.

The last 18 months have really been fascinating and humbling. It's been a great reminder that no one ever consistently knows where things are going. The recession that everyone has been predicting keeps getting pushed out. I distinctly remember one prominent fixed income manager boldly predicting the Fed would never make it to 5% (and yet here we are). And then of-course there is the huge rally in equities this year despite the Fed continuing to hike and inflation staying stubbornly persistent. I reduced exposure to tech and shortened duration in fixed income in the early months of 2022. Those turned out to be good moves. But the bottom presently appears to be Oct/Nov 2022 and I definitely wasn't smart enough to reallocate in the opposite direction at that point. Maybe the Fed is forced to go to 6%+ as Jamie Dimon pondered and the economy does hit a wall at some point. I wouldn't be surprised if the lows in equities are re-tested and long-rates drift up. But who knows. I certainly don't.

Rates are marching up again. The 2-year is over 4.5%. I've been much more interested in the fixed income markets in recent years. It's a different game. Financial media often treat the bond market as a fortune teller. An inverted curve has been historically good at signaling before recessions but in the short-run, the bond market doesn't seem better than anyone else. In March, just before banks started failing, the 2-year broke through 5% when the narrative was inflations is stil hot and the Fed may have to go to 6%. Then the 2-year cratered into the 3s when the narrative flipped to "things are breaking" and recession is imminent. Now we're back to economy still appears resilient so Fed may need to hike a few more times and the entire curve has moved up. LOL. Amusing. Just random musings. I picked up some more short-term treasurys this week with rates popping up. For the hell of it I grabbed a few of the ultra short maturies that gapped out because of showmanship in Washington, etc.

This is just an anecdotal observation from me, but one thing I'm observing in the suburban area I'm in is there is very little office space available. I'm 15-20 miles outside of Minneapolis and there is not much space available, particularly quality buildings. The pain is really concentrated in the urban areas. Will be interesting to see how it all plays out over the coming 3-5 years. Bargain hunters seem to be seeking opportunities: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-05-09/new-york-s-empty-office-buildings-lure-rich-families-hunting-bargains.

Removing the politics section is a good idea. Reminds me of the old saying parents tell their kids, "nothing good happens after midnight." Likewise, there is nothing good that comes out of a political message board. If you need venom or want to spew it, go to the comments section on foxnews.com or msnbc.com.

I also thought Warren and Charlie spoke much better this year than last. Warren especially seemed sharper. I feel very fortunate that these two have been around for the first, call-it, 1/3rd of my career. People in college today won't have the same benefit. Both Buffett and Munger are one-of-a-kind in their own ways. What's especially unique about them is their combined record of success and adherence to principles and ethical conduct. It such a positive example for the world.

For ideas, I was looking at the holdings within the iShares preferred ETF. The fund holds hundreds of preferreds. If you go to the end of the list where the smallest positions are, you'll find the stuff that is the most bombed out. You'll find First Republic all the way at the end! LOL. It's an interesting list to review. Basically all financials, REITs and some misc. stuff sprinkled throughout.

This Bloomberg article caught my attention: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-05-07/preferreds-get-burned-in-historic-rout-spreading-from-banks?srnd=premium. Basically all the carnage in banking and real estate has hit the associated preferred stocks. I've dabbled a little bit in preferreds. I just find these less popular securities interesting. There can be some attractive opportunities for double digit returns when you buy during periods of distress. Probably need to be very careful with banks presently. I found Buffett's comments at the annual meeting striking. There are probably a lot of banks with negative equity right now which means the preferreds are also worth zero. But there may be some REITs with preferreds that will come back to par on the other side of the cycle. I have a position in SRG preferred and a tiny position in SYF preferred presently. Both yielding around 9% based on my average price. Total return will be much higher if they ultimately come back to par.

I found Buffett's comments about declining earnings across their businesses as very likely this year notable. The subsidaries touch so many different industries. It really provides insight into the broader economy. I also found the disagreement between Buffett and Munger with respect to investing opportunities intriguing. Basically Munger said (and has been saying this for a number of years), that investing is a lot harder now because there's so much more competition scouring over everything. But Buffett disagreed a bit and said he still thinks there are plenty of opportunities especially in smaller stuff. I also enjoyed their comments on the banking system and all the insurance businesses that have started and failed over the last decade or so. The commentary around these issues were striking to me. Buffett and Munger must be unmatched in terms of managing risk considering the length of their investing careers. After the AGM, my respect for Buffett's depth of business knowledge always increases. It's probably not a stretch to say there isn't anyone better and may never be.

WSJ had an article on falling diesel prices as a sign that demand for durable goods (and therefore freight) has significantly slowed. The data is noisy but I charted it. There's clearly correlation between recessionary periods and diesel prices. That said, the drop probably wouldn't be as fantastic had the Ukraine war never occured.

Interesting discussion about state of office market with Boston Properties CEO. He suggested that work from home trend has plateaued or moderately reversed with more people in the office in 2023. Also echoed some points of other industry players including the major bifurcation between A properties and lower tier stuff (high quality doing relatively well with lower quality seeing lots of vacancies). Also struck me his point around the public REITs being off 50% meanwhile the ncreif index, which is based off appraisals, is down 5-6%. Very interesting market.

This is from last fall, near the bottom of the equity markets. I've gone back to it several times. The first thing PTJ talks about has happened, short rates are no longer moving up. But the equity markets (according to Jones' articulated model) are ahead of where they should be. We've already seen a big rally in the stuff that was beaten down last year. But, maybe the recession starts to show prominently and earnings take a hit pulling equity prices down before the Fed cuts, then we find bottom. I'm no market timer but it is fun to talk about.

Bond market seems convinced of significant downturn. Equity market doesn't know what the hell to do.

Yesterday I bought a tiny position in the common and preferred of SYF.

I bought some more brokered CDs (1, 2 & 3 yr) yielding over 5% with idle cash.

Interesting! I really enjoyed his book. I got a signed copy at the Berkshire annual meeting. I constantly see the automatic behavior he describes in the book (click whirl if I remember right) in myself. It's helped me out.

It's interesting that despite treasury yields cratering over the last week, yields on brokered CDs are holding up. I've bought some call protected 2 and 3 year issues over the last few days at 5%+. Apparently banks want deposits again...LOL.

Sounds interesting. Where do you get the fund-level YTM figures?