Sportgamma

Found this talk on Crypto by Hyun Song Shin from the Bank of International Settlements quite informative:

Ignorance alert: Just a novice thinking out loud: I wonder to what extent the economics of mining affects the price of Bitcoin. Take for example the mining operations of FRMO. They want to create some sort of variable fixed income instruments based on mining (and they have already to some extent). They could offer a closed-end fund that would facilitate a mining operation. The fund converts rewards to USD to pay for costs and distribute proceeds to unitholders. Miners, in general, receive their rewards outside of the secondary market and need to convert, at least, some of their holdings to cover costs. As such, you should have a relatively consistent base of sellers in the market. Non-miners, in theory, should not have the same pressure to buy (except if the size of the non-miner pool is consistently growing). A major cost component for miners comes in the form of graphics cards. Earlier this year there was a shortage of cards and the prices shot up. As apparent from the latest NVIDIA conference call, there now is excess inventory in the market and prices have gone down considerably. It is also interesting to note that the Bitcoin mining difficulty rate has dropped as the network hash power had decreased. Could it be that supply/demand forces in mining are affecting the market price of Bitcoin?

At this point, anything that stops the cash drain is good news for shareholders. This, as well as the Delonex deal, are very positive indicators in my opinion.

- Tay, March 26, 2016 Whenever I need a laugh, I just look up tweets by Tay the Microsoft AI chatbot or scripts from that AI that was assigned to watch Seinfeld and to write new episodes. Jokes aside, I do recommend this EconTalk podcast with Rodney Brook: http://www.econtalk.org/rodney-brooks-on-artificial-intelligence/ It's refreshing to listen to amidst all the AI bullshit being peddled in the (social) media.

CAD

I've been adding.

Every time this book comes up, my mind goes:

This is precisely what I find so appealing with this situation. Not everything has to go right. If some things go right or at least revert back to adequacy this would be a positive outcome.

I second that, it's a great series.

I would say that the structure of the pitch really depends on what you are pitching. For example, is the investment thesis concept-driven or data-driven? My favourite piece on investment pitches is Reid Hoffman's thoughts on his Linkedin pitch to Graylock: - http://www.reidhoffman.org/linkedin-pitch-to-greylock/

Isn't this summary missing some non-core portfolio investments? According to the Q2 filing, public securities alone had a fair value of $164 m.

A few thoughts on a special situation bank stock in Iceland (it does come with is a Swedish Depository Note): [iurl=https://fundamentalfinanceplaybook.com/2018/07/29/the-arion-bank-ipo-and-what-happens-after/]The Arion Bank IPO and what happens after[/iurl]

The old guy at the meeting was pretty funny.

Now there's a visual..... ;D https://content.dollarshaveclub.com/sitting-toilet-long-will-wreck-butt

A fundamental analyst and a technical analyst are having cake. They are in heated debate when the TA accidentally hits the knife, causing it to fall off the table and into the foot of the FA. "Why didn't you catch it?!" the FA cries out. "I don't catch falling knives!" the TA replies. "Why didn't you?" "I didn't think it would fall that low!"

Hi guys, Can somebody help me out with a dumb question: Are loss ratios reported by FFH (or any other insurer) the cash cost of claims paid out in the period, the estimated cost of premiums sold in the period or something else? Also, what is the relationship between reserves (and redundancies/deficiencies) on the loss ratios if any... Or put it another way, where are redundancies recorded on the income statement? TIA

How Lee Kuan Yew-ian

Great comments. Here are a few debating points: 1. A new education system should be "lean" in the sense that it would be highly adaptable. It should be a system that learns and then adapts with each iteration. 2. It should be a "modus operandi" and applicable in various environments (f.e. USA vs Scandinavia vs Ethiopia). 3. It should be "on-demand" as opposed to "linear". Individuals would learn in a problem solving manner as opposed to following one size fits all curriculum. 4. The system would stimulate "learn by teaching" between students (f.e. older students would teach younger ones). This is both effective and efficient. 5. The effectiveness of the system is determined by how well it serves the needs of the local work environment / industry. 6. The effectiveness of the system is determined by how well graduates perform in life. 7. The effectiveness of the system is determined by the total cost of graduate that the system outputs. 8. The value that a good teacher brings to a system can be greater in orders of magnitude than the value that a less competent teacher brings. The system should be able to incentivise teachers accordingly. 9. There should always be several education systems competing against each other. 10. Education should be free for the consumer (read parents). 11. Parent involvement is crucial to the effectiveness of the system. 12. The teaching environment has a significant effect on its effectiveness (think metal detectors, mold, cacophony etc). I'm guessing everyone agrees with this statement. But the debatable point here is that in general, these things are not getting the attention that they require (thus any investment on this side is high ROI).

This is a thought exercise. Imagine that you were tasked with designing an education program - lets say for kids from 6 years to 16. There are no restrictions and you are not limited by any current system. You can design it from scratch. The only objective is to maximize the effectiveness of it. However, you also have to set the criteria for what you define as effective. So, how you define effectiveness and how would you design the system? I'd be very interested in hearing ideas from this board on this matter. Also, references to any related material or persons who are outspoken on this topic would be very valuable.

Stuur mij maar een bericht als je zin hebt in een kop koffie in Reykjavík.

I don’t know where you live… So I guess your country has benefited much from this “so-called” EU… And I won’t speak for Greece, nor Spain, nor Portugal, nor France, because I have never lived there (actually I have lived in Barcelona for two year, but let’s disregard that!)… I speak for Italy though: if you think this “so-called” EU, or worse still the Euro!, have “brought jobs, well being and prosperity” to Italy… well then, believe me, you have no idea what you are talking about. Cheers, Gio Any idea how Italy would have looked outside the EU? Ok, first of all being in or out of the Euro is not the same discussion as being in and out of the EU. Regarding Italy without the Euro two things we know for sure. - It would have been harder for the Italian government to seek finance from other countries. This is directly related to the theory of The Original Sin. - The other thing is that the flexibility of an own currency would have counteracted the the lack of productivity compared to the west of Europe. Since Italy does not have control of monetary policy the only outcome is unemployment. Think about this. When an economic shock hits a system (like it did in 2007-09) monetary policy can be used to (1) increase the money supply when the velocity of money falls and (2) adjust the currency rates to balance the economy and keep employment levels from falling. It does not make the economic prospects better but it dampens the shock and ensures people are employed. The policy in Europe has been to implement austerity and with a fixed currency the only outcome is unemployment. Compare this to the USA. When a shock hits the system or a part of the system, the federal government has the power to jump in and bail out. The prime example of this is the Savings & Loan crisis which was primarily a Texan problem. The current situation with Greece only goes to show how fragile the current Euro system is.

Penman was quite helpful to me. He has a few good books. http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00SB1H4XQ/ref=mp_s_a_1_18?qid=1431301992&sr=8-18&pi=SL75_QL70&keywords=penman+financial

Brookfield Asset Management Ichan Enterprises Exor FRMO Liberty Media Liberty Ventures

http://frmocorp.com/indexation.html http://frmocorp.com/reports.html

Congradulation Gio. What I'd be even more interested to kbow, is how you went from 25k to 1m in 6 years. That's a phenomenal performance.