I’ve done lots of things in my life in financial businesses. It’s given me a chance to see a lot of different businesses from different angles. One thing that surprised me as I learned, was how many places the...
Read MoreWhen I worked at a life insurer that was in the pension business, we would sometimes get asked to quote on business where termination of the existing plan would result in a surrender charge. Now no plan sponsor would ever...
Read MoreThe rating agencies are the whipping boys of the market. Like princes who had a whipping boy to take the hit for their transgressions, so the rating agencies take the hit that should go to the regulators, which delegated...
Read MoreThis is an unusual book. Like most books that involve the internet, the pace of change is so rapid that it will probably not be valuable two years from now. But in the short run there can be benefit. The book is 46...
Read MoreAs a nation or a corporation moves from being a safe credit [borrower] to being an unsafe credit, often the transition is more rapid than one would expect. Success has many fathers, and people are reluctant to change their...
Read MoreThe current book I am reading is Lords of Finance: The Bankers Who Broke the World. Great book, long book, and I am one-third through it. Britain and France borrowed a lot of money from the US to fight WWI. After the...
Read MoreLiquidity is underrated. What’s that, you say? You are earning nothing on your slack cash balances? Well, welcome to the club. I am earning nothing there as well. To earn money on short duration...
Read MoreWhy did Madoff’s Ponzi scheme last so long? He didn’t take that much from it. If the gross exposure was $60 billion, he took only 1/2% of it’s $300 million. The growth rate was high enough to attract investors...
Read MoreThis is the best book that I have read on the Madoff scandal so far. Why is it great? It is well written. There are few if any factual errors in the text. She talked with a wide number of people to try to get the full...
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