Dinar

In my opinion, either Israel or Iran or both are preparing for war and trying to lull the other into thinking that they are not by saying that Iran was not involved, or either Iran or Israel or both don't want escalation, hence denials from Iran and no accusations from Israel.

You are right, but why do you think Israel will take "measured" revenge? Given that in the past "measured" revenge was taken and did not work, why would it work this time? Something has to change, otherwise what happened on Saturday will keep recurring.

@Viking, why do you think it will become a wider war and who do you think gets involved? Also, why would that impact world economy? @Sweet, what makes you think that Israel will let hundreds of murdered civilians go unavenged? Moreover, there is an argument to be made that past policies did not work and either some drastic has to be done, or the massacre that we saw on Saturday will recur.

There are a number of write-ups on VIC over the last two decades

You are competing with the company - they bought back 0.5% (18K shares in Q3)

Wow, you got some pretty impressive friends. None of my friends have seen net worth 2.5x since 12/31/2019. Hell, I do not think anybody's net worth doubled since then. Most people cluster around 1.5x or below.

Iran is already involved. Keep in mind, as Hamas figures have stated before, Israel is just the first domino. The rest of the world is next.

Why? Ground invasion will cost a lot more in casualties than all the hostages. By the way, here is a take from a Russian paper: https://www.gazeta.ru/army/2023/10/09/17706481.shtml For those who do not read Russian, the military observer for the paper states that the only solution is to destroy Gaza and deport the entire population, otherwise this continue forever. By the way, if you read interviews with people from Gaza and West Bank, they don't want just Gaza and West Bank. They want the entire state of Israel, including all the territory that UN assigned to the Jewish state during the partition. I don't know what the Israeli government is thinking, but how can peace be possible with people who consider themselves occupied as long as one inch of the Holy Land is in Jewish hands? There will always be war unless either all the Jews are kicked out of the Holy Land or all the Muslims are kicked out of Israel, including Gaza and the West Bank. Look, Czechoslovakia deported all Sudeten Germans post WWII, King Hussein did the same during Black September (although he killed like 25K). It is not as if this is without precedent.

@Spekulatius, why do you think defense stocks should go up on this? Heck, if the Israelies are smart, which I doubt, they would hardly need to replace any equipment. Ammunition yes, but no tanks, planes, artillery, et all. Just blockade Gaza, and watch it surrender, tactics used successfully for millennia.

The sad part, aside obviously from all death and destruction, is that Russia has a lot more ability to endure than Ukraine.

Is it really 500K dead? Not that 100K is too little, 100K dead is a tragedy, I hope it is not 500K dead.

When in January of 2020 (before Covid), in NYC, with every block posting job openings offering $20 per hour + benefits for unskilled work, 25% of the city was on food stamps, it has to stop. It cannot continue on this trajectory much longer. Bill Clinton did his welfare reform and was re-elected, Giuliani made welfare recipients clean parks and was re-elected.

The best solution to the government deficit problem is to slash welfare, food stamps, Medicaid and similar programs, including end government guarantee of student loans. The result will be a reduction in government spending (a very substantial one), increase in taxes as employment will increase materially, lower inflation as the wages will not have to compete with very generous social benefits. In addition, it is better for society when people work rather than collect welfare, including fewer children born to unwed mothers.

https://aswathdamodaran.blogspot.com Take from Damodaran

He is absolutely correct, however I think that there are a couple of nuances that ought to be addresses. a) If and when in say five to ten years, you no longer can get ten percent on super high quality private credit, will that cause the equity market to reprice higher, and will the returns be higher in equities over that five to ten year period than in private credit? b) When PM is borrowing at say 6-6.5% for ten year paper, I wonder how good credits are that are paying ten percent plus? c) Lastly, I am not sure that ten percent plus is available for the investors. OCSL, which is an Oaktree vehicle is not generating ten percent on unlevered capital, it is generating much less due to rather high in my opinion, management fees. So he is essentially comparing apples and oranges: credit product before fee (which is only available on a post fee basis) and equity product that can be purchased with no fees (index.) While returns on credit product might be competitive with equities, what investors will receive will probably be much less and not competitive with equities.

@Gmthebeau, sure, if you hold bonds to maturity, you don't lose money in nominal terms, you actually make money. However I presume that most people care about purchasing power=real wealth, and once you take inflation and taxes into account, you can easily end up with a huge loss in real terms even if you hold long term bonds to maturity. TIPS, in my opinion, are a different story.

@thepupil, so I would agree with you that bonds are beginning to look interesting, particularly TIPS - 2.4% real yield, although I would still prefer to own PM or L'Oreal than TIPS. However, where I disagree with you is your point that it is very hard to lose money in bonds. In your 08/06/2020 example, in real terms, you are down another 20%+. To be down 35% after-tax is gigantic for supposedly a "safe" asset. By the way, that's probably for the index. The long bond is down 50% before inflation and 60% after. From here yes, I think you will do well in TIPS in a tax indifferent account or to preserve wealth. To grow wealth for a taxpayer, I don't see how it can be done given 40.8% marginal tax rate (37%+3.8% Obama surtax) when say 30 year pays 4.85% (so 2.9% post tax but before inflation.)

What one would describe as office furniture - desk, et all

IKEA is now running sales in NY, I have not seen that in years.

Sold MSGE Nov 30 puts at $1.15 today.

Yes, people know the drivers of inflation - deglobalization, increased government spending in the US, rising oil price, aging population, more aggressive labor unions and workers, green new deal. What about drivers of deflation in the US? Reduced demand for goods and services in the US driven by student loan repayments - $70bn per year as well as higher interest rates (car payments are going up, so are new mortgages), perhaps flat government spending in the US in nominal terms if Republicans can hold the line on spending. Automation. Perhaps if the pendulum starts swinging the other way and soft on crime policies reverse, then losses & inflation due to theft will go down, and people might actually need to get a job rather than steal with no consequences? Rising debt burden - inflationary or deflationary? Inflation is almost always with us due to loose fiscal and monetary policy (look at Switzerland to see how to avoid inflation). I think raising rates here is a huge mistake, the full impacts have not worked through the economy yet. Between increase in rates & Fed shrinking portfolio, tightening has been faster than due Paul Volcker era if I am not mistaken.

Where did you see that major weapons budgets are doubling over the next four years? Thank you.

Putin is a degenerate, and should not have invaded, nor has he any right to dictate to free nations how to behave, but you lose all credibility with posts like this. Poland was part of the Russian empire, so were the Baltic States and Finland. Western Ukraine (Galicia) was not.

@John Hjorth, as US taxpayer, I do not have a problem with welcoming Ukrainian refugees to the US. I think US will gain mightily from these mostly highly educated and hardworking people. I do have a problem with a porous border, that allows millions of people from Haiti, Yemen, Africa, Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Latin America to cross into the US, people who at best will be a drain on society, and at worst will commit crimes and terrorist acts. Keep in mind, unskilled immigrants also destroy job prospects and wage growth for unskilled Americans, creating all sorts of social problems - alcoholism, drug addiction, broken families, fatherless children, and the list goes on.

You are right, I should have been more explicit. I am assuming that all FFO gets paid out as either dividends or share buy-backs, and there will be no more acquisitions. In reality, they have opportunities to invest some capital at 10%+ yield on development, and they will probably acquire property over time. Assuming acquisitions are not very big and value destroying my approximation should hold.