Links

For those interested.... The 5th Annual Value Symposium is back on. Not in Toronto (as originally planned), but via video and scheduled for May 27, 2020. The event has several portfolio managers scheduled to discuss their favorite ideas in a TED Talk format along with ample Q&A time for all attendees. You can buy your ticket ($29) for the virtual event HERE. For more information on the event and speakers, you can email info@YYXToronto.ca.

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Gabelli's Omaha (Virtual) Research Conference | Berkshire Hathaway Valuation | May 2, 2020 [with Chris Bloomstran] (video) (LINK)

Lollapalooza Time (LINK)

The Song Remains the Same (LINK)

Related book: Where Are the Customers' Yachts?

Princes of the Yen: Central Bank Truth Documentary (video) [H/T @hendry_hugh] (LINK)

Related book: Princes of the Yen: Japan's Central Bankers and the Transformation of the Economy

Bill Gates' summer reading list (LINK)

The books: 1) The Choice - by Dr. Edith Eva Eger; 2) Cloud Atlas - by David Mitchell; 3) The Ride of a Lifetime - by Bob Iger; 4) The Great Influenza - by John M. Barry; 5) Good Economics for Hard Times - by Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo

Not even wrong: ways to predict tech - by Benedict Evans (LINK)

Chips and Geopolitics - by Ben Thompson (LINK)

Facebook Launches Shopping Platform for Small Businesses ($) (LINK)

Spotify Strikes $100 Million-Plus Podcast Deal With Rogan ($) (LINK)

Be Careful Handling White-Hot Moderna Stock ($) (LINK)

Invest Like the Best Podcast: Hamilton Helmer – Power + Business (LINK)

Related book: 7 Powers: The Foundations of Business Strategy

The Meb Faber Show (podcast): #221 - Chris Davis, Davis Advisors (LINK)

Against the Rules with Michael Lewis (podcast): The Coach in Your Head (LINK)

Hope, Through History Podcast: 5 | The 1918 Influenza Pandemic (LINK)

The Three Sides of Risk - by Morgan Housel (LINK)

Links

Amid the Coronavirus Crisis, a Regimen for Reëntry - by Atul Gawande (LINK)

Scanning for answers to a pandemic - by Bill Gates (LINK)

David Tepper says this is the second-most overvalued stock market he’s ever seen, behind only ’99 (LINK)

Druckenmiller Says Risk-Reward in Stocks Is Worst He’s Seen (LINK)

Daniel Yergin at The Economic Club of New York (video) (LINK)

Related book (September release): The New Map: Energy, Climate, and the Clash of Nations

BIS paper: US dollar funding markets during the Covid-19 crisis - the money market fund turmoil (LINK)

BIS paper: US dollar funding markets during the Covid-19 crisis - the international dimension (LINK)

Dithering and Open Versus Free - by Ben Thompson (LINK)

Steven Kiel interviews Harris Kupperman as well as Calvin Froedge about the opportunity in tankers.

Steve Vafier with the investment case for Stitch Fix (video) (LINK)

Invest Like the Best Podcast: Tobi Lutke – Building a Modern Business (LINK)

Acquired Podcast: Adapting Episode 3: Intel (LINK)

TC's Chartcast Podcast: #25: Josh Wolfe (LINK)

Against the Rules with Michael Lewis (podcast): Don’t Be Good – Be Great (LINK)

Hope, Through History Podcast: 4 | The Cuban Missile Crisis (LINK)

Eat Rat, Make New Body: Easy Stuff for Pythons - by Carl Zimmer (LINK)

Book of the day (released yesterday): No Rules Rules: Netflix and the Culture of Reinvention - by Reed Hastings and Erin Meyer

Links

"Speculators may do no harm as bubbles on a steady stream of enterprise. But the position is serious when enterprise becomes the bubble on a whirlpool of speculation. When the capital development of a country becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done. The measure of success attained by Wall Street, regarded as an institution of which the proper social purpose is to direct new investment into the most profitable channels in terms of future yield, cannot be claimed as one of the outstanding triumphs of laissez-faire capitalism which is not surprising, if I am right in thinking that the best brains of Wall Street have been in fact directed towards a different object." --John Maynard Keynes

Warren Buffett’s Optimistic? Pessimistic? No, Realistic - by Andrew Ross Sorkin (LINK)

Sam Zell on Market Valuations, Real Estate, Post-Virus Economy (video) [H/T Linc] (LINK)

Spring 2020 issue of Graham & Doddsville (LINK)

Content, Cars, and Comparisons in the "Streaming Wars" - by Matthew Ball (LINK)

Invest Like the Best Podcast: Ali Hamed – An Update on Private Credit (LINK)

Against the Rules with Michael Lewis (podcast): The Invisible Coach (LINK)

The Case for Deeply Negative Interest Rates - by Kenneth Rogoff (LINK)

MacroVoices Podcast #217 Dr. Lacy Hunt: The Road Through Deflation Toward Eventual Hyperinflation (LINK)

Hope, Through History Podcast: Episode 3 | The Polio Epidemic (LINK)

The Daily Stoic Podcast: Ask Daily Stoic: Ryan and Robert Greene Talk Plagues, Politics, and Polarization (LINK)

All You Need Are a Few Small Wins Every Day - by Ryan Holiday (LINK)

Our message to the class of 2020 - by Bill and Melinda Gates (LINK)

It is time to take seriously the link between Vitamin D deficiency and more serious Covid-19 symptoms - by Matt Ridley (LINK)

Links

Invest Like the Best Podcast: Chris Bloomstran - An Update on Public Markets (LINK)

Related previous post: Semper Augustus Investments Group: 2019 Annual Letter

Grant’s Current Yield Podcast: Class is in session [with Bruce Greenwald] (LINK)

Broyhill Portfolio Update (LINK)

Boyar Quarterly Letter (LINK)

Greenhaven Road Capital Q1 Letter (LINK)

[More Q1 letters can be found HERE and HERE.]

The Investing Edge Podcast: Value Investor’s Edge Live #18: On The Water In The Tanker Markets With Frontline’s CEO (LINK)

Matt Ridley on The Glenn Beck Show on BlazeTV (video) (LINK)

68 Bits of Unsolicited Advice - by Kevin Kelly (LINK)

It’s my birthday. I’m 68. I feel like pulling up a rocking chair and dispensing advice to the young ‘uns. Here are 68 pithy bits of unsolicited advice which I offer as my birthday present to all of you.

I Am So Lucky - by Trey Mancini [H/T Linc] (LINK)

What you need to know about the COVID-19 vaccine - by Bill Gates (LINK)

Links

"We pay some very big money. We have managers that have made and will make in the tens of millions annually, and we have managers that, when we suffer, they suffer. But you’ve got to treat people fairly. Even though they don’t need the money, everybody wants to be treated fairly. And so the rationale for how you’re doing it should be understood, but there is no cross-Berkshire rationale at all.... The main thing to do is, in terms of market position and all that sort of thing, the real thing I really want to pay managers for is widening the moat that separates our business from our competitors’ businesses over time. Now, that gets very subjective, so I don’t have any perfect way of doing that. But that is always going through my mind in trying to design compensation systems." --Warren Buffett (2010)

Warren Buffett will soon tell us what he really thinks about stocks investing and the coronavirus pandemic - by Lawrence Cunningham (LINK)

The Anti-Amazon Alliance - by Ben Thompson (LINK)

When You Have No Idea What Happens Next - by Morgan Housel (LINK)

Wizards of Dalal Street: Mohnish Pabrai on COVID-19 and world economy (video) (LINK)

Martin Stopford on "Coronavirus, Climate Change & Smart Shipping: 3 Maritime Scenarios 2020-2050” (video) (LINK) [Related paper HERE.]

State of the Cloud 2020 · Bessemer Venture Partners (LINK)

Invest Like the Best Podcast: Josh Kopelman - The Past, Present, And Future Of Seed Investing (LINK)

Stoicism in a time of pandemic: how Marcus Aurelius can help (LINK)

The Ezra Klein Show (podcast): Bill Gates’s vision for life beyond coronavirus (LINK)

Antibody Tests Won’t Get Us Back to Normal - by Sarah Zhang (LINK)

Why the Coronavirus Is So Confusing - by Ed Yong (LINK)

A guide to making sense of a problem that is now too big for any one person to fully comprehend

Links

"Unfortunately in this kind of work, where you are trying to determine relationships based upon past behavior, the almost invariable experience is that by the time you have had a long enough period to give you sufficient confidence in your form of measurement, just then new conditions supersede and the measurement is no longer dependable for the future." --Benjamin Graham ("Securities In An Insecure World")

Bill Gates on coronavirus: ‘It’s going to be a while before things go back to normal’ (video) (LINK)

Related article: The first modern pandemic - by Bill Gates

Horizon Kinetics Q1 Letter (LINK) [Audio review available HERE.]

Thoughts on Berkshire’s Deployable Cash (LINK)

A Historic Opportunity in Small Cap Stocks (LINK)

‘The American Tailwind’ - by Frank K. Martin (LINK)

Paul Singer's April letter to Elliott investors (LINK)

Raoul Pal's April Global Macro Investor newsletter is now available for all to read (LINK)

Understanding Money, Credit, and Debt - by Ray Dalio (LINK)

BIS paper: Insurance regulatory measures in response to Covid-19 (LINK)

My Restaurant Was My Life for 20 Years. Does the World Need It Anymore? (LINK)

With 100,000 stores set to close by 2025, mall owners face this legal hurdle next (co-tenancy clauses) (LINK)

A Shift in Investment Strategies Post-Coronavirus — COVID-19 Virtual Roundtable (video) (LINK)

Recode Media Podcast: Matthew Ball on how the pandemic will remake TV, movies and video games (LINK)

MacroVoices Podcast: #216 David Rosenberg: Stagflation is coming but not yet (LINK)

How I Built This with Guy Raz (podcast): How I Built Resilience: Live With Guy and Simon Sinek (LINK)

Conversations with Tyler (podcast): Philip E. Tetlock on Forecasting and Foraging as a Fox (LINK)

Infinite Loops Podcast: Morgan Housel – The Psychology of Money (LINK)

Related book: The Psychology of Money: Timeless lessons on wealth, greed, and happiness

The first modern pandemic - by Bill Gates

Link to: The first modern pandemic: The scientific advances we need to stop COVID-19.

The coronavirus pandemic pits all of humanity against the virus. The damage to health, wealth, and well-being has already been enormous. This is like a world war, except in this case, we’re all on the same side. Everyone can work together to learn about the disease and develop tools to fight it. I see global innovation as the key to limiting the damage. This includes innovations in testing, treatments, vaccines, and policies to limit the spread while minimizing the damage to economies and well-being. 

This memo shares my view of the situation and how we can accelerate these innovations. (Because this post is long, it is also available as a PDF.) The situation changes every day, there is a lot of information available—much of it contradictory—and it can be hard to make sense of all the proposals and ideas you may hear about. It can also sound like we have all the scientific advances needed to re-open the economy, but in fact we do not. Although some of what’s below gets fairly technical, I hope it helps people make sense of what is happening, understand the innovations we still need, and make informed decisions about dealing with the pandemic.

Links

CNBC's full interview with Bill Gates (video) (LINK)

GMO White Paper | It’s Always Darkest Before the Dawn (LINK)

Too Big to Fail, COVID-19 Edition: How Private Equity Is Winning the Coronavirus Crisis - by Bethany McLean (LINK)

Fed Expands Corporate-Debt Backstops, Unveils New Programs to Aid States, Cities and Small Businesses ($) (LINK)

Jim Chanos on PE Push for Help and Still Shorting Tesla: Full Video Interview - Bloomberg (LINK)

Universa Investments Q1 2020 Letter (LINK)

What Next? (Two Questions) - by Morgan Housel (LINK)

Infinite Loops Podcast: Michael Green: Evolving Market Structures and COVID-19 (LINK)

Hidden Forces Podcast: The Impact of COVID-19 on Global Supply Chains with ISM CEO | Tom Derry (LINK)

Wimbledon paid pandemic insurance for almost 20 years. Now it’s getting $141 million [H/T Linc] (LINK)

Most New York Coronavirus Cases Came From Europe, Genomes Show - by Carl Zimmer (LINK)

The Bats Behind the Pandemic - by Matt Ridley (LINK)

Links

Bill Gates speaks with Trevor Noah about coronavirus testing, accelerating vaccine development and how the world will rebound (video) (LINK)

Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Sells Huge Blocks of Delta, Southwest Stock (LINK)

Oaktree Insights: Risks and Opportunities in EM amid a Global Slowdown (LINK)

The Shock Cycle - by Morgan Housel (LINK)

The High Cost of Low Interest Rates (LINK)

A Pandemic and a Price War Have Together Brought Energy Markets to a Crisis - by Daniel Yergin (LINK)

The Most Profitable Trade: ‘Oil All Over the Oceans Right Now’ (LINK)

Value Investing with Legends Podcast: C.T. Fitzpatrick: Value Investing in Times of Deep Distress (LINK)

Exponent Podcast: 184 — Good is Better than Perfect (LINK)

Ben Carlson sits down with investor, author and market historian William Bernstein (video) (LINK)

Bad News Wrapped in Protein: Inside the Coronavirus Genome (LINK)

The Lucretius problem

From Nassim Taleb in Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder:

Indeed, our bodies discover probabilities in a very sophisticated manner and assess risks much better than our intellects do. To take one example, risk management professionals look in the past for information on the so-called worst-case scenario and use it to estimate future risks—this method is called “stress testing.” They take the worst historical recession, the worst war, the worst historical move in interest rates, or the worst point in unemployment as an exact estimate for the worst future outcome. But they never notice the following inconsistency: this so-called worst-case event, when it happened, exceeded the worst case at the time. 

I have called this mental defect the Lucretius problem, after the Latin poetic philosopher who wrote that the fool believes that the tallest mountain in the world will be equal to the tallest one he has observed. We consider the biggest object of any kind that we have seen in our lives or hear about as the largest item that can possibly exist. And we have been doing this for millennia. In Pharaonic Egypt, which happens to be the first complete top-down nation-state managed by bureaucrats, scribes tracked the high-water mark of the Nile and used it as an estimate for a future worst-case scenario. 

The same can be seen in the Fukushima nuclear reactor, which experienced a catastrophic failure in 2011 when a tsunami struck. It had been built to withstand the worst past historical earthquake, with the builders not imagining much worse—and not thinking that the worst past event had to be a surprise, as it had no precedent. Likewise, the former chairman of the Federal Reserve, Fragilista Doctor Alan Greenspan, in his apology to Congress offered the classic “It never happened before.” Well, nature, unlike Fragilista Greenspan, prepares for what has not happened before, assuming worse harm is possible. 

If humans fight the last war, nature fights the next one.

.....................

Directly-related links:

The Lucretius Problem: How History Blinds Us

Latticework Of Mental Models: Lucretius Problem

Indirectly-related link:

The man who's tutoring Bill Gates (2010 article)

Prof. Smil's 24th book, Global Catastrophes and Trends: The Next 50 Years, has just been published in Canada. It offers a numbers-heavy but compact guide to all the main things we should be worrying about (or not), from natural disasters to population trends. Although he deliberately stays away from predictions, he concludes from the evidence that climate change is nowhere near the top of the list. What is? A genuine flu pandemic, which, he says, is a 100 per cent certainty. What we can't predict is how bad it will be. Prof. Smil is no alarmist, but he warns that even a least-worst-case epidemic "would pose challenges unseen in most countries for generations." 

Bill Gates has read it, and says it's great.

Bill Gates op-ed: Here’s how to make up for lost time on covid-19

Link to: Bill Gates: Here’s how to make up for lost time on covid-19

There’s no question the United States missed the opportunity to get ahead of the novel coronavirus. But the window for making important decisions hasn’t closed. The choices we and our leaders make now will have an enormous impact on how soon case numbers start to go down, how long the economy remains shut down and how many Americans will have to bury a loved one because of covid-19. 

Through my work with the Gates Foundation, I’ve spoken with experts and leaders in Washington and across the country. It’s become clear to me that we must take three steps.

Links

CNN coronavirus town hall Part 4: Bill Gates explains why he sounded the alarm about an impeding pandemic in 2015 and lessons the US can learn from responses in other countries. (video) (LINK)

Ed Yong was on both the Social Distance podcast and the Reset podcast discussing his article, "How the Pandemic Will End," and other things.

Wounds Heal, Scars Last - by Morgan Housel (LINK)

Steve Bregman on What to Make of the Market Right Now (audio) (LINK)

Oaktree Conversations with Portfolio Managers - Emerging Markets (video) (LINK)

The Oil Glut Is Filling Up the World’s Supertankers Fast (LINK)

Policy in a World of Pandemics, Social Media and Passive Investing (LINK)

Yaron Brook Interviews: Matt Ridley on his New Book -- How Innovation Works (video) (LINK)

A Spur to the Biotech Century Ahead - by Walter Isaacson ($) (LINK)

Carolina Stories with Steve Vafier (podcast): 2: Mills Snell – Learning in the Trenches (LINK)

Links

Bill Gates speaks with TED's Chris Anderson about COVID-19 (video) (LINK)

How Will the Coronavirus End? - by Ed Yong (LINK)

Atul Gawande on PBS NewsHour (video) (LINK)

Related article: "Keeping the Coronavirus from Infecting Health-Care Workers"

Against the Rules with Michael Lewis (podcast): Bonus Against the Rules: Help in a Crisis (LINK)

Masters of Scale with Reid Hoffman (podcast): Special: Danny Meyer on the wrenching decision to do layoffs (LINK)

David Remnick speaks to the historian John M. Barry, the author of “The Great Influenza,” about parallels between the Spanish-flu outbreak of 1918 and the current coronavirus crisis. (video) (LINK)

Marc Andreessen’s Blog Archives (LINK)

Links

Bill Gates reddit AMA about COVID-19 (LINK)

Tom Russo on Intelligent Investing in Crisis Mode (audio) (LINK)

GMO White Paper | Memo to the Investment Committee: Dare to Be Different - by James Montier (LINK)

The conventional 60/40 portfolio of today is not going to generate the kind of returns that investors say they need. Investors must seek to embrace the terrifying concept of being different. As the ghosts of many great investors past have amply demonstrated, being different is the path to investment success. However, such advice falls into the simple but not easy category, to borrow Warren Buffett’s expression.

GMO Asset Allocation: COVID-19 Update - by Ben Inker (LINK)

Common Enemies - by Morgan Housel (LINK)

Coronavirus – getting angry - by John Hempton (LINK)

Oaktree Insights: Assessing Relative Value in Credit amid Coronavirus Uncertainty (LINK)

Jim Grant on CNBC (video) (LINK)

Kyle Bass on CNBC (video) (LINK)

Tyler Cowen and Russ Roberts in conversation about COVID-19 (podcast) (LINK)

Links

"In the main, therefore, slumps are experiences to be lived through and survived with as much equanimity and patience as possible. Advantage can be taken of them more because individual securities fall out of their reasonable parity with other securities on such occasions, than by attempts at wholesale shifts into and out of equities as a whole. One must not allow one’s attitude to securities which have a daily market quotation to be disturbed by this fact." --John Maynard Keynes

Gates to Leave Boards of Microsoft, Berkshire Hathaway (LINK)

Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates is stepping down from the company’s board of directors, marking the biggest boardroom departure in the tech industry since the death of longtime rival and Apple Inc. co-founder Steve Jobs. 

Mr. Gates, who also is vacating his board seat at Berkshire Hathaway Inc., intends to focus more on his philanthropic efforts. He will continue to serve as a technical adviser to Microsoft Chief Executive Satya Nadella, the software company said late Friday.

Coronavirus and Insurance Policies: What Is Covered? ($) (LINK)

Stocks Are in Chaos. Control the One Thing You Can. - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

Remember: You Don’t Control What Happens, You Control How You Respond - by Ryan Holiday (LINK)

Himalaya Capital Hosts Discussion on COVID-19 with Experts from China (video) [H/T @ShaiDardashti] (LINK)

Li Lu, Founder and Chairman of Himalaya Capital, hosted a video conference on March 13th, 2020 between three leading COVID-19 experts from China to share their valuable experiences fighting the virus on the frontlines over the past two months with leading scientists, health practitioners, and policy makers in the United States.

How A Country Serious About Coronavirus Does Testing And Quarantine (video) (LINK)

Inside the Rope with David Clark (podcast): 59: John Hempton - Central Banks aren’t the answer to Coronavirus (LINK)

Hidden Forces Podcast: Passive Investing’s Role in the Coronavirus Market Melt-Down & Prospects for a Melt-Up | Mike Green (LINK)

The Peter Attia Drive Podcast: #97 - Peter Hotez, M.D., Ph.D.: COVID-19: transmissibility, vaccines, risk reduction, and treatment (LINK)

The Peter Attia Drive Podcast: #98 - Peter Attia, M.D. and Paul Grewal, M.D.: Coronavirus (COVID-19) FAQ (LINK)

The Man Who Saw the Pandemic Coming (LINK)

Links

"In the world of modern finance, a love of numbers has replaced a desire for critical thinking. As long as something has a number attached to it, then it is taken as gospel truth. Research shows that people are often fooled by the use of pseudoscience. Simply making things sound complex makes people believe them more! Risk managers, analysts and consultants are all guilty of using pseudoscience to promote an illusion of safety. We all need to be on our guard against the artificial deployment of meaningless numbers. Critical thinking and scepticism are the most unrated (and scarce) tools in our world." --James Montier ("Mind Matters," April 29, 2008)

How to respond to COVID-19 - by Bill Gates (LINK)

The Great Buenos Aires Bank Heist [H/T Linc] (LINK)

Gotta Go Fast: Why Gaming IP Is Finally Taking Off in Film/TV - by Matthew Ball (LINK)

Exponent Podcast: 182 — Scale Scale Scale (LINK)

The Disruptive Voice Podcast: 48. Disrupting Healthcare with Dr. Mahek Shah (LINK)

Grant’s Current Yield Podcast: The Empire Strikes Out (LINK)

Know Your Risk Radio (podcast): Raoul Pal (LINK)

The Coronavirus and How Political Spin Has Worsened Epidemics - by Evan Osnos (LINK)

Freeman Dyson, Visionary Technologist, Is Dead at 96 (LINK)

Related previous link (other links and books included): Freeman Dyson on Living Through Four Revolutions (2011 lecture)

"I don't particularly care [if the things I'm doing] are important or not. I'm not driven by a passion to dig out the deep secrets of nature. I'm much more interested just in exercising my skills as best I can and enjoying life." --Freeman Dyson

Links

Famed investor Charlie Munger shares insights into the ‘basic math of life’ at Redlands Forum [H/T @robertmackenzie)] (LINK) [Hopefully a video of this conversation, as well as the Daily Journal Annual Meeting occurring later this week, will become publicly available.]

The Gates Foundation's 2020 Annual Letter from Bill and Melinda Gates (LINK)

The Coming Retirement Crisis Part II - by Raoul Pal (video) (LINK)

Why We're in the Biggest Financial Bubble in History (w/ Steve Bregman & Mike Green) (video) (LINK)

Odd Lots Podcast: Why The Rise of Passive Investing Might Be Distorting The Market (w/ Mike Green) (LINK)

Hidden Forces Podcast: The Hundred Year Portfolio: How to Grow & Protect Generational Wealth | Christopher Cole (LINK)

Related paper: "The Allegory of the Hawk and the Serpent"

EconTalk Podcast: Marty Makary on the Price We Pay (LINK)

Related book: The Price We Pay: What Broke American Health Care--and How to Fix It

The Ezra Klein Show (podcast): Tim Urban on humanity’s wild future (LINK)

Related link: "The Story of Us"

In Praise of Irrationality (LINK)

Related book: Alchemy

Mental Models in Space (LINK)

Related book: An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth

Yuval Noah Harari Gives the Really Big Picture (LINK)

Related book: Sapiens

Links

"Ben Graham always used to say you can get in more trouble in investment with a good premise than with a bad premise, because the bad premise will shout out to you immediately as being fallacious, whereas with a good premise it’ll work for awhile. Businesses are worth more money if interest rates fall and stocks rise. But then eventually the market action of the securities themselves creates its own rationale for a large crop of buyers, and people forget about the reasons and the mathematical limitations that were implied in what got them excited in the first place. And after a while, rising prices themselves alone will keep people excited and cause more people to enter the game. And therefore the good premise, after a while, is forgotten except for the fact that it produced these rising prices.... People tend to forget about the importance of the price they pay as the experience of a bull market just sort of dulls the senses generally." --Warren Buffett (1997)

What I’m thinking about this New Year’s Eve - by Bill Gates (LINK)

As the year comes to an end, I reflect on how we can make our tax system more fair.

I've posted these before, but they are once again making the rounds, so in case anyone hasn't seen them yet.... Joel Greenblatt 2005 class videos (LINK) [And related to these, there are also old Bruce Greenwald lectures online, and more recent lectures from Aswath Damodaran.]

The Market is Huge! Revisiting the Big Market Delusion - by Aswath Damodaran (LINK)

2019 Position Review - by Harris Kupperman (LINK)

As Shale Wells Age, Gap Between Forecasts and Performance Grows ($) (LINK)

The 2010s Killed the Cult of the Tech Founder. Great! - by Steven Levy (LINK)

Imagining Our Future Through Tech (video) (LINK)

Grant’s Current Yield Podcast: Home Alone (LINK)

Acquired Podcast: The Lean Startup and the Long-Term Stock Exchange (with Eric Ries) (LINK)

Books for our time: seven classics that speak to us now [H/T @jasonzweigwsj] (LINK)

10 Important Lessons We Learned from the 2010s - by Mark Manson (LINK)

Links

"Many people believe that investors must make the macro decision to be either bullish or bearish. Our preference is to be agnostic, objectively finding absolute bargains, and in their absence, holding cash. In short, we are neither bullish nor bearish. We are value-ish." --Seth Klarman

Peter Lynch: How to Find Growth Opportunities in Today’s Stock Market (LINK) ["My best stocks have been ones where I didn’t have to worry about the big picture."]

Fidelity’s Peter Lynch: Do your research, don’t ‘play’ the market (video) [H/T Linc] (LINK)

Value Investing with Legends Podcast: Bruce Greenwald - Staying on the Right Side of the Trade (LINK)

Masters of Scale with Reid Hoffman (podcast): Bill Gates — The biggest success story you haven’t heard (LINK)

Fall 2019 Exhibit | Finding the Edge: The Work and Insights of Edward O. Thorp (video) (LINK)

Druckenmiller on 2020 Outlook, Monetary Policy, U.S. Election (video) (LINK)

All Asset All Access – Insights from Research Affiliates (LINK)

Could It Be That a Minsky “Moment” Lurks in the Shadows? - by Frank K. Martin (LINK)

11 Lessons from the Success of Disney+ - by Matthew Ball (LINK)

SoftBank Vision Fund Employees Depict a Culture of Recklessness (LINK)

Key Countries Aren’t Ready for Historic Ship-Fuel Switch (LINK)

The Market Huddle Podcast: Christmas with Kuppy (LINK)

Acquired Podcast: Convoy (with CEO Dan Lewis) (LINK)

The Disruptive Voice Podcast: Choosing College: Bob Moesta and Michael Horn on Why We Hire Education (LINK)

Doctors Prescribe More of a Drug If They Receive Money from a Pharma Company Tied to It (LINK)

Farnam Street’s 2019 Annual Letter to Readers (LINK)

The Infinite Game - by Blas Moros (LINK)

I wrote an essay I wish I had been given when I graduated from college, retired from tennis, and began the transition from student-athlete to the “real world.” 

Through this essay, I hope to provide some awareness and tools, namely around self-reflection and self-awareness, how to think about how to spend your time, what to look for in a job, and the importance of coaches and mentors. 

While written through the lens of a student-athlete, hopefully some of these principles and tools apply to a broader audience.

Links

It's that time of year when Boyar Research is getting ready to publish The Forgotten Forty, which features one-page reports on the forty companies that they believe have the greatest potential to outperform the leading indices in the year ahead due to a catalyst that they see on the horizon. The report has a successful track record and, once again, they're providing a link to receive a complimentary sample from last year’s publication with free registration to their email list.... Link to: Sign-up for complimentary sample report of The Forgotten Forty. The companies included in the sample report are Acushnet Holdings, Discovery, Bank of America, Dollar Tree, Western Union, Starbucks, and Legg Mason.

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From the archives [H/T Linc].... Benjamin Graham: The Father of Financial Analysis (PDF, Free Kindle Version)

5 books to enjoy this winter - by Bill Gates (LINK)

The books: 1) Growth by Vaclav Smil; 2) Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker; 3) These Truths by Jill Lepore; 4) An American Marriage by Tayari Jones; 5) Prepared by Diane Tavenner

Energy (r)evolutions take time - by Vaclav Smil (LINK)

The Sage of Baltimore (LINK)

Related book: T. Rowe Price: The Man, The Company, and The Investment Philosophy

Invest Like the Best Podcast: Jeff Ma – Making Decisions with Data (LINK)

Short Wave Podcast: Aluminum’s Journey From Precious Metal To Beer Can (LINK)

A galaxy with three supermassive black hole hearts - by Phil Plait (LINK)

"Considering the downside is the single most important thing an investor must do. This task must be dealt with before any consideration can be made for gains. The problem is that people nowadays think they’re pretty smart because they can do something quite rapidly. You can make the horse gallop. But are you on the right path? Can you see where you’re going?" --Irving Kahn