Perspectives
Madness & Manias Part 2
November, 2019
Following on from last week’s Thought, we received various questions regarding the practical implications of ‘Madness and Manias’ for our investment approach at what is a confusing time for many of our clients. In reality, politics and newsflow in the modern world are volatile. The 24 hour news flow generated for the digitally connected world […]
Madness and Manias
November, 2019
“People, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly and, one by one.” Charles Mackay was a nineteenth century Scottish journalist who made that comment in his influential book, “Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds” that […]
Money Illusion
October, 2019
Money is a more slippery concept than you might imagine. The story goes that money was invented to replace barter. It’s clearly very hard to make an estimate of how many shoes are equal to a bushel of wheat although I was once offered “two camels for my wife” on a trip to Egypt. On […]
Rembrandt’s & Perception
October, 2019
Why do people sometimes spend lavish amounts of money on pieces of art? It could be for purely personal reasons; they like the painter. It could be for aesthetic reasons; they like the painting. It could also be for financial reasons; they believe it can be sold at a higher price in the near future. […]
Stay Focused on your Objective
October, 2019
With the focus very much on short term issues in the UK and US, we believe investors are missing key longer-term implications being highlighted in government bond markets. Government bond yields around the world have continued to fall even whilst economic growth has rebounded over the past decade. This puzzles most investors as the standard […]
Bayes’ Rule
September, 2019
Thomas Bayes was an English Presbyterian minister and statistician known for formulating Bayes’ rule. Its practical application has been very useful since it was published in 1763. It was partly responsible for cracking the enigma code during the Second World War and tracking Russian submarines during the Cold War. In the modern world, its applications […]
Forced Sellers
September, 2019
One of our analysts recently tried to buy a house plant for the office. These however don’t come cheap if bought new from a garden centre or plant shop. Being a value investor on the hunt for a quality bargain, searching for forced sellers comes naturally. People moving houses or offices often sell their plants […]
It’s A Looking Glass World
September, 2019
The period in which we live is drenched in contradictions; political, economic and financial. The poor old White Queen has been dragged from the pages of Through the Looking Glass to declaim on believing “six impossible things before breakfast” more times than we can count. Most recently on the Today programme this week. The financial […]
Beware the Noise
September, 2019
Over the last few days, the news has been largely negative – from the rising risks of a no-deal Brexit to Boris Johnson’s suspension of parliament and a falling sterling. We have highlighted many times before that the noise created by political events must be blocked out when making longer term investment decisions, no matter […]
Rational Optimism
August, 2019
Blaise Pascal, the French mathematician and philosopher aptly diagnosed the human condition over 300 years ago. “All of man’s miseries derive from not being able to sit in a quiet room alone”. This is because we hate being bored and can’t stop ourselves from worrying. Boredom and worry are not the ally of the investor […]