Links

“Instead of a discussion of risk (which is both predictive and sissy) I advocate the notion of fragility, which is not predictive—and, unlike risk, has an interesting word that can describe its functional opposite, the nonsissy concept of antifragility.” --Nassim Taleb (Antifragile)

The Acquirers Podcast: Tulip Mania: Chris Bloomstran on Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway (LINK)

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

Oaktree’s Howard Marks Says Fed Support Isn’t Forever, Distress Coming (video) (LINK)

Apollo Asia Fund: the manager's report for 1Q20 (LINK)

When Failure Is an Option: A Trading Strategy Soaks Investors - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

To Hedge or Not to Hedge - by Frank K. Martin (LINK)

Media, Regulators, and Big Tech; Indulgences and Injunctions; Better Approaches - by Ben Thompson (LINK)

Exponent Podcast: 185 — Open, Free, and Spotify (LINK)

Strategy under uncertainty - by Jerry Neumann (LINK)

Covid-19: Big shifts in the entertainment industry - by Sangeet Paul Choudary (LINK)

Innovation Can’t Be Forced, but It Can Be Quashed - by Matt Ridley (LINK)

Related book (released tomorrow): How Innovation Works: And Why It Flourishes in Freedom

Fed Chair Jerome Powell on "60 Minutes" (video) (LINK)

The Pomp Podcast: 294: Cullen Roche Explains The Ultimate Breakdown Of The Federal Reserve (LINK)

Hidden Forces Podcast: How the Wealth Gap Drives Imbalances in Global Trade & Finance | Michael Pettis (LINK)

The Grant Williams Podcast: Super Terrific Happy Hour Ep. 2 - Inflation/Deflation (LINK)

The Daily Stoic Podcast: Ask Daily Stoic: Ryan and Historian Andrew Roberts Talk Leadership, Character and How One Person Can Change The World (LINK)

Recode Decode Podcast: Jon Meacham: America’s history can teach us how to hope for our future (LINK)

The Twilight of the Iranian Revolution - by Dexter Filkins (LINK)

Some Zoos, and Some of Their Animals, May Not Survive the Pandemic (LINK)

What's Different About the Coronavirus in Kids - by Sarah Zhang (LINK)

Mental Models For a Pandemic (LINK)

A review of The Great Mental Models, Volume 2 (LINK)

Links

"As I've gotten older...I could not help but notice the effect on people of the stories they told about themselves. If you listen to people—if you just sit and listen—you'll find that there are patterns in the way they talk about themselves. There's the kind of person who's always the victim in any story that they tell—always on the receiving end of some injustice. There's the person who's always kind of the hero in every story they tell. The smart person—they deliver the clever put-down. There are lots of versions of this. And you gotta be very careful about how you tell these stories because it starts to become you. You are, in the way you craft your narrative, kind of crafting your character. And so, I did at some point decide: I am going to adopt self-consciously as my narrative that I'm the happiest person anybody knows. And it is amazing how happy-inducing it is." --Michael Lewis [Source]

The Tim Ferriss Show (podcast): #427: Michael Lewis on the Crafts of Writing, Friendship, Coaching, Happiness, and More (LINK)

Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting Transcript 2020 (LINK)

The Investor’s Podcast: TIP295: Mohnish Pabrai on Value Investing & Philanthropy (LINK)

Masters in Business Podcast: Jim Chanos on Financial Fraud (LINK)

Finding Your Balance in a Topsy-Turvy Market - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

Beyond coronavirus: The road ahead for the automotive aftermarke [H/T @chrispavese] (LINK)

How Greenwich Republicans Learned to Love Trump - by Evan Osnos (LINK)

The iconic brands that could disappear because of coronavirus (LINK)

Price Gouging Could Actually Fix Our Face Mask Shortage - by Russ Roberts (LINK)

Old Drugs May Find a New Purpose: Fighting the Coronavirus (LINK)

Why Weren’t We Ready for the Coronavirus? - by David Quammen (LINK)

Making Sense with Sam Harris (podcast): #201 [with Yuval Noah Harari] (LINK)

Hope, Through History Podcast: Episode 1 | FDR and The Great Depression (LINK)

Hope, Through History Podcast: Episode 2 | Winston Churchill and World War II (LINK)

The Man Who Thought Too Fast (LINK)

Book of the day (recommended by Michael Lewis): The Long Ships

Links

Information Regarding the 2020 Berkshire Hathaway Annual Shareholders Meeting (LINK)

Warren Buffett may have ditched airline stocks and spent $20 billion on stock buybacks, investor Chris Bloomstran says (LINK)

What the Coronavirus Crisis Reveals About American Medicine - by Siddhartha Mukherjee (LINK)

Medicine is a system for delivering care and support; it’s also a system of information, quality control, and lab science. All need fixing.

Nassim Taleb on warnings over systemic risks from global pandemics (video from last week) (LINK)

When Your Fund Beats the Market, Ask: Which Market? - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

Brent Beshore chats with Tobias Carlisle on The Acquirers Podcast (LINK)

Macro Voices Podcast: Hot Topic #14: Crude Oil BLACK SWAN ALERT with Jim Bianco (LINK)

Today's Audible Daily Deal is worthwhile: Skunk Works: A Personal Memoir of My Years of Lockheed

The contenders – and challenges – in the race to cure Covid - by Matt Ridley (LINK)

A Complete History of Pandemics - by Vaclav Smil (LINK) [Excerpted from his 2008 book, Global Catastrophes and Trends: The Next 50 Years.]

Related previous post: Vaclav Smil on pandemics and growth

And for those analysts and aspiring analysts out there that may have missed the Friday afternoon post: Behind the Balance Sheet

Links

Charlie Munger: ‘The Phone Is Not Ringing Off the Hook’ (LINK)

"The Practice of Value Investing" by Li Lu (November 2019 speech, translated) (LINK)

Has This California Lab Fixed America’s Covid Test Problem? - by Michael Lewis (LINK)

Who Pays For This? - by Morgan Housel (LINK)

Rob Arnott: Why the Stock Market Hasn't Even Gotten Cheap Yet (video) (LINK)

The NBA and Microsoft - by Ben Thompson (LINK)

Mohnish Pabrai and Francis Chou Q&A with Harvard class (podcast) (LINK)

Value Investing with Legends Podcast: Dan Davidowits & Jeff Mueller – Compounding with Polen Capital (LINK)

MacroVoices Podcast #215 - Chris Cole: Dragon portfolio revisited in the eye of the storm (LINK)

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

The Peter Attia Drive Podcast: #107 - John Barry: 1918 Spanish flu pandemic—historical account, parallels to today, and lessons (LINK)

Related book: The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History

Links

"Stocks got much cheaper in 1974 than they are now [in May 2009]. But you were also facing a different interest rate scenario. So you could say they really weren’t that much cheaper. You could buy very good companies at four times earnings or thereabouts with good prospects. But interest rates were far higher then. That was the best period I’ve ever seen for buying common equities. The country may not have been in as much trouble then as we were back in September. I don’t think it was. But stocks were somewhat cheaper then.... We don’t try to pick bottoms. We don’t have an opinion about where the stock market’s going to go tomorrow or next week or next month. So to sit around and not do something that’s sensible because you think there will be something even more attractive, that’s just not our approach to it. Anytime we get a chance to do something that makes sense, we do it. And if it makes even more sense the next day, and if we’ve got money, we may do more. And if we don’t — what can we do about it? So picking bottoms is basically not our game. Pricing is our game." --Warren Buffett (2009)

The Long View Podcast: Chris Davis: Banking on Boring, Reliable Franchises (LINK)

Easter on the Sidewalk - Jason Zweig (LINK)

Coronavirus Clarity - by Ben Thompson (LINK)

Railroader - Learning from Hunter Harrison (LINK)

Walter Isaacson: This is going to be a new century of biotechnology (video) (LINK)

Venture Stories Podcast: How COVID-19 Impacts Startups and Venture Capital with Ali Hamed and Brent Beshore (LINK)

Our Pandemic Summer - by Ed Yong (LINK)

Links

Jamie Dimon's 2019 Letter to Shareholders (LINK)

Coronavirus and Credibility - by Paul Graham (LINK)

The Bare Necessities You Need for a Bear Market - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

Daniel Kahneman: Why We Underestimated COVID-19 (LINK)

The World Has No Pause Button (LINK)

Unlikely Optimism: The Conjunctive Events Bias (LINK)

Links

"I think it’s hugely a mistake to think only about your probable misfortunes. You should also think about what’s good about your situation." --Charlie Munger (2009)

We Can’t Prevent Market Panics. We Can Control How We React. - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

The Corona Crisis is Not a Black Swan: Nassim Nicholas Taleb (video) (LINK)

Viral Prohibition, Eminent Domain, and the Path Ahead - by Brent Beshore (LINK)

COVID Impacts [on media & entertainment businesses] - by Matthew Ball (LINK)

Unmasking Twitter - by Ben Thompson (LINK)

Socializing Corporate Risk-taking: Moral hazard 2.0 - by Frank K. Martin (LINK)

Absolute Return Letter, March 2020: The Economic Cost of Social Distancing (LINK)

The Oil Glut Is Getting Critical ($) (LINK)

Pressure Mounts on Insurance Companies to Pay Out for Coronavirus ($) (LINK)

Lawmakers and regulators are pressuring insurers to go beyond the legal language of policies to get cash to Americans amid the mounting cost of shutdowns from the coronavirus pandemic.

What happens to mortgage-investment firms will shed light on what may be in store for the rest of the market ($) (LINK)

The Acquirers Podcast: Long Term: Tweedy Browne (LINK)

Capital Allocators Podcast: Ben Inker – Value Investing at GMO (LINK)

Invest Like the Best Podcast: D.A. Wallach – Investing in Healthcare (LINK)

Political Economy Podcast: Ben Thompson: Big Tech monopoly, data privacy, and the rise of China (LINK)

Acquired Podcast: Adapting Episode 2: Sequoia’s Black Swan Memo (LINK)

As research progresses, the nature of our enemy is becoming ever clearer - by Matt Ridley (LINK)

Links

Keeping the Coronavirus from Infecting Health-Care Workers - by Atul Gawande (LINK)

Why the Coronavirus Has Been So Successful - by Ed Yong (LINK) [Yong also wrote a long-form article in 2018 that is worth reviewing, "The Next Plague Is Coming. Is America Ready?," in which he quotes Anthony Fauci, who is now a household name given his current role and efforts, as saying: “It’s like a chain—one weak link and the whole thing falls apart. You need no weak links.”]

How the Coronavirus Became an American Catastrophe (LINK)

This Is Your Brain on a Crashing Stock Market - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

Anatomy of Fear and Greed - by Frank Martin (LINK)

Data Update 6 for 2020: Profitability, Returns and the value of Growth - by Aswath Damodaran (LINK)

Data Update 7 for 2020: Debt Delusions and Reality - by Aswath Damodaran (LINK)

Invest Like the Best Podcast: Brent Beshore – Update on Small Business and Private Equity (LINK)

Carolina Stories with Steve Vafier (podcast): 1: Josh Glover – Brilliance in the Basics (LINK)

Acquired Podcast: Adapting Episode 1: Canlis (LINK)

Stock Market Valuations - by Meb Faber (LINK)

The Meb Faber Show: #206 - Meb’s take on Investment Plans, Building and Maintaining Wealth, How Meb Invests, and Investing in the time of Corona (LINK)

Crude Contango… - by Harris Kupperman (LINK)

Harris Kupperman on Intelligent Investing in Crisis Mode | MOI Global (audio) (LINK)

The Peter Attia Drive (podcast): #99 - Peter Hotez, M.D., Ph.D.: Continuing the conversation on COVID-19 (LINK)

A vaccine for coronavirus isn't going to ride rapidly to our rescue - by Matt Ridley (LINK)

Five Good Questions Podcast: Matt Ridley - How Innovation Works (LINK)

Matt Ridley Discusses Health, Innovation, and Risk (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

What Benjamin Graham Would Tell You to Do Now: Look in the Mirror - Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

The great investors and extreme volatility (LINK)

Different Kinds of Decline - by Morgan Housel (LINK)

Why Democracy Is on the Decline in the United States - by Evan Osnos (LINK)

Invest Like the Best Podcast: Peter Zeihan - Dis-United Nations (LINK)

Related book: Disunited Nations

Coronavirus: The Real Risks and Human Biases behind the Panic - by Mark Manson (LINK)

Coronavirus is the wolf on the loose - by Matt Ridley (LINK)

Rory gets a good read (LINK)

Books helped fuel last year’s PLAYERS win and now Rory McIlroy has moved on to other titles in preparation for his title defense

Links

"Our approach is really to try and learn vicariously. But there’s a lot of mistakes that I’ve repeated, I can tell you that. The biggest one, probably — or the biggest category over time — is being reluctant to pay up a little for a business I knew was really outstanding, or to continue to buy it at higher prices when I knew it was outstanding. The cost of that has been many, many billions. And I’ll probably keep making that mistake. The mistakes are made when there are businesses you can understand and they’re attractive and you don’t do something about it. I don’t worry at all about the mistakes that come about because when I met Bill Gates, I didn’t buy Microsoft or something. That’s not my game. Most of our mistakes have been mistakes of omission rather than commission." --Warren Buffett (1997)

The Hollywood Drama That Cost a BlackRock Fund $75 Million - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

U.S. Airlines Face Test as Epidemic Spreads ($) (LINK)

We all need to change how we live our lives to fight this generation of pandemics - by Matt Ridley (LINK)

Corona Panic - by Morgan Housel (LINK)

How the Horrific 1918 Flu Spread Across America (2017 article) [H/T @rationalwalk] (LINK)

Related book: The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History

1997 article from Malcolm Gladwell: "The Dead Zone" (LINK)

Seven bodies buried in the Arctic tundra might solve the riddle of the worst flu pandemic in history—and might help us prevent it from happening again.

Absolute Return Letter, March 2020: Five Lessons from History (2/5) (LINK)

Innovations in payments (BIS Quarterly Review) (LINK)

Stripe Teardown: How The $35B Payments Company Plans To Supercharge Online Retail [H/T @david_perell] (LINK)

The Acquirers Podcast: Passive Agro: Michael Green on the looming threat from passive indexing, shorting XIV and what value guys can do (LINK)

Hidden Forces Podcast: Disunited Nations: The Scramble for Power in an Ungoverned World | Peter Zeihan (LINK)

Related book: Disunited Nations

Dan Carlin's Hardcore History: Addendum Podcast: EP10 Strangelove Whisperings (LINK)

Origin Stories Podcast: 41: Tribes Old and New (LINK)

The Five Revolutions in Cancer Treatment (LINK)

Jack Welch, Legendary CEO of General Electric, Dies at Age 84 (LINK)

Links

Howard Marks on investor psychology during coronavirus fears (video) (LINK)

How to Write Usefully - by Paul Graham (LINK)

100 Little Ideas - by Morgan Housel (LINK)

Finite and Infinite Games: Two Ways to Play the Game of Life (LINK)

What the E*Trade Deal Tells You About the New Investing Game - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

13 Metrics for Marketplace Companies (LINK)

The Future Will Be Genetically Engineered (LINK)

Exponent Podcast: 181 — Competing with Spotify and Regulating Acquisitions (LINK)

Related article: "The Daily Update Podcast"

Venture Stories Podcast: Scaling and Network Effects with Anu Hariharan (LINK)

Highlights from Matt Ridley's reddit AMA (LINK)

Why have so many of our recent viruses come from bats? - by Matt Ridley (LINK)

The Strange Influence the Sun Has on Whales - by Ed Yong (LINK)

Links

"The basic reason for the cyclicality in our world is the involvement of humans. Mechanical things can go in a straight line. Time moves ahead continuously. So can a machine when it’s adequately powered. But processes in fields like history and economics involve people, and when people are involved, the results are variable and cyclical." --Howard Marks ("The Most Important Thing")

Bond Funds Are Hotter Than Tesla - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

Dan Rasmussen - Five Investing Heresies (video, from last year) (LINK)

The Next Frontier in Storytelling Universes and the Never Ending Desire for More - by Matthew Ball (LINK)

The concentration of economic power has led to spectacular investment returns (LINK)

Technocracy: Will What We Love Ruin Us? - by Frank K. Martin (LINK)

History is Only Interesting Because Nothing is Inevitable - by Morgan Housel (LINK)

Grant’s Current Yield Podcast: Impossible is extinct (LINK)

The Disruptive Voice Podcast: Micromobility and The Future of Transportation: A Conversation with Horace Dediu (LINK)

"Shall I tell you now, in a word, the sum of human duty? Patience, where we are to suffer; and prudence in things we do." --Seneca

Links

"One can see the investment universe as full of certainties, or one can see it as replete with probabilities. Those who reflect and hesitate make far less in a bull market, but those who never question themselves get obliterated when the bear market comes. In investing, certainty can be a serious problem, because it causes one not to reassess flawed conclusions. Nobody can know all the facts. Instead, one must rely on shreds of evidence, kernels of truth, and what one suspects to be true but cannot prove." --Seth Klarman

Masters in Business Podcast: Christopher Davis Discusses Smart Value Investing (LINK)

The Stock Got Crushed. Then the ETFs Had to Sell. - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

Ray Dalio Is Still Driving His $160 Billion Hedge-Fund Machine ($) (LINK)

Useful Laws of the Land - by Morgan Housel (LINK)

Tankers Are Tanking - by Harris Kupperman (LINK)

An anonymous, detailed short thesis on Luckin Coffee [H/T @muddywatersre] (LINK)

Exponent Podcast: 180 — It’s Been a Week (LINK)

The Young IPA Podcast Episode 143: We Just Had The Best Decade In Human History with Matt Ridley (video) (LINK)

Hardcore History Addendum Podcast: EP9 Glimpses of Olympias (LINK)

The Sun, up close and very personal - by Phil Plait (LINK)

Links

I released my year-end letter over the weekend. For those not yet on that email list, you can find it at this link: Sorfis 2019 Year-End Letter.

**********

There are also some good collections of Q4 and year-end letters HERE and HERE.

Why Invest? A 22-Year-Old’s Tough Questions About Capitalism - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

2019 Project Punch Card Conference notes (LINK)

Data Update 2 for 2020: Retrospective on a Disruptive Decade - by Aswath Damodaran (LINK)

Exiting Stage Left… - by Harris Kupperman (LINK)

Systemic Risk of Pandemic via Novel Pathogens – Coronavirus: A Note [Taleb, et al.] (LINK)

The Recycling of Ships [H/T @the5hippingman] (LINK)

Related link (book PDF): Maritime Economics 3rd Edition

Business Wars Podcast: Boeing vs. Airbus (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7)

Alpha Exchange Podcast: Michael Green, Chief Strategist, Logica Capital Advisers (LINK)

September stress in dollar repo markets: passing or structural? (BIS - December 2019) (LINK)

DoubleLine Round Table - Segment 3: Best Ideas (video) (LINK)

The Sherman Show (podcast video): David Rosenberg (LINK)

The Peter Attia Drive: #90 - Ryan Holiday: Stillness, stoicism, and suffering less (LINK)

Related book: Stillness Is the Key

The Positive Side of Shame (LINK)

The (simple) secrets of superconnectors - by Khe Hy (LINK)

Jim Lehrer’s 16 Rules for Practicing Journalism with Integrity (LINK)

Clay Christensen on Business and Life (LINK)

From the archives.... How Will You Measure Your Life? - by Clayton M. Christensen

"I have self-doubt. I have insecurity. I have fear of failure. I have nights when I show up at the arena and I'm like, 'My back hurts, my feet hurt, my knees hurt. I don't have it. I just want to chill.' We all have self-doubt. You don't deny it, but you also don't capitulate to it. You embrace it." --Kobe Bryant

"Have a good time. Life is too short to get bogged down and be discouraged. You have to keep moving. You have to keep going. Put one foot in front of the other, smile and just keep on rolling." --Kobe Bryant

Links

"When Charlie and I ran funds, we didn’t worry about whether something was up or down. We worried about what it was worth compared to what it was selling for. And we tried to have most of our money in a relatively few — very few — positions which we thought we knew very well. We do the same thing now. We’d do the same thing a hundred years from now....... We would own the half a dozen or so stocks we like best — and it wouldn’t have anything to do with what our cost on them was. It would only have to do with our evaluation of their price versus value." --Warren Buffett (2009)

Apple and Microsoft Are Dazzling Investors. That Won’t Last. - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

The shiniest stocks are driving the bull market higher. But rusty old bargains will eventually have their day.

The Only Constant Is Change… - by Harris Kupperman (LINK)

Prognosis Podcast: How U.S. Health Care Broke The Bank (LINK)

20 Books to Help You Live Better in 2020 - by Ryan Holiday (LINK)

Links

"When we own stock, we are not there to try and change people. Our luck in changing them is very low, anyway. In fact, Charlie and I have been on boards of directors where we’re the largest shareholders and we’ve had very little luck in changing behavior. So, we think that if you buy stock in a company, you better not count on the fact that you’re going to change their course of action." --Warren Buffett (2009)

The Financial Lesson of 2008-09 That Most Investors Have Forgotten - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

If your memory minimizes how much you lost in the last bear market, you can easily overestimate how brave you will be in the next one

CFP Board to Tighten Oversight of Financial Advisers ($) (LINK)

Understanding Money (LINK)

The Financial Illiteracy Epidemic (LINK)

The 2019 Stratechery Year in Review – by Ben Thompson (LINK)

Jobs-to-be-Done - by Mike Dariano (Kindle ebook, PDF, Podcast)

What Does an Oil Refinery Do? (podcast) (LINK)

The Cutting Room Files, Part 6: The Future of the China - by Melissa Taylor and Peter Zeihan (LINK)

Related book: Disunited Nations: The Scramble for Power in an Ungoverned World

How to Fix Our Prisons? Let the Public Inside [H/T @RogerLowenstein] (LINK)

Across the Universe, it's the normal galaxies doing all the star-making work - by Phil Plait (LINK)

Extraordinary Routines [H/T @ChrisPavese] (LINK)

A couple of books mentioned by Marc Andreessen in his recent chat with Kevin Kelly: 1) VC: An American History; 2) More from Less: The Surprising Story of How We Learned to Prosper Using Fewer Resources―and What Happens Next

"There is so much that’s false and nutty in modern investment practice, and in modern investment banking, and in modern academia in the business schools, even in the Economics departments, that if you just reduce the nonsense, that’s all I think you should reasonably hope for." --Charlie Munger (2009)

Links

"I would argue that differing people learn in differing ways. With me, I was put together by nature to learn from reading. If some guy’s talking to me, he’s telling me something I don’t know, I don’t want to know, I already know, or he’s doing it too slow or too fast. In reading, I can learn what I want at the speed that works. So, to me, reading is what works for my nature. And to all of you who are at all like me, I say welcome. It’s a nice fraternity.... My father was the type that always did more than his share of the work and took more of his share of the risk. All that kind of example was, of course, very helpful, and you learn it better from a person close to you. But in terms of the conceptual stuff, I’d say I learned it from books. Now, those are fathers in a difference sense." --Charlie Munger (2008)

Marc Andreessen and Kevin Kelly: Why You Should Be Optimistic About the Future (video) (LINK)

How You Can Get Big Gains That Wall Street Can’t - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

Acquisition Vehicle EverArc Raises $340 Million ($) (LINK)

EverArc Holdings Ltd., a British Virgin Islands-based acquisition vehicle, said it raised $340 million in an initial offering in London. 

The company said in a filing that it expects to use the proceeds to “acquire a business with a significant proportion of its activities in North America.” It didn’t offer further details. The firm said it expects its shares to begin trading on the London Stock Exchange on Dec. 17. 

EverArc’s board includes Tracy Britt Cool, one of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Chief Executive Warren Buffett’s key lieutenants in recent years. She announced in September that she plans to leave Berkshire next year to create her own investment firm.

David Perell's Coolest Things Learned in 2019 (LINK)

David Rosenberg on the WealthTrack Podcast (Part 1, Part 2)

The Tim Ferriss Show (podcast): #401: Gary Keller — How to Focus on the One Important Thing (LINK) ["My life is better when I'm spontaneous after I've done my most important thing. Being spontaneous before that, that's where it becomes a distraction and does me harm." --Gary Keller]

Related book: The ONE Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth Behind Extraordinary Results

So, about that 'too massive' black hole… yeah, not so much. - by Phil Plait (LINK)

The Startling Secret of an Invincible Virus - by Ed Yong (LINK)

Links

"I'm not saying there's no such thing as genius. But if you're trying to choose between two theories and one gives you an excuse for being lazy, the other one is probably right." --Paul Graham ("What You'll Wish You'd Known")

Overconfidence: An Autobiography - by Jason Zweig (LINK)

How to Read: Lots of Inputs and a Strong Filter - by Morgan Housel (LINK)

Survivorship Bias: The Tale of Forgotten Failures (LINK)

Yes, You Can Get Free Trading. But There’s Often a Catch. (LINK)

Startups and Uncertainty - by Jerry Neumann (LINK)

Blood and Soil in Narendra Modi’s India - by Dexter Filkins (LINK)

Masters in Business Podcast: Joe Ricketts Discusses Trade and Deregulation (LINK)

Starting Greatness Podcast: Sarah Leary of Nextdoor: “The Moment You Know You’ve Created Something Valuable” (LINK)

EconTalk Podcast: Gerd Gigerenzer on Gut Feelings (LINK)

COMPLEXITY Podcast: Olivia Judson on Major Energy Transitions in Evolutionary History (LINK)

Links

The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius - by Paul Graham (LINK)

It’s Slow Going, but Stuff Like Wheat and Oil Can Spice Up Your Returns - by Jason Zweig ($) (LINK)

The best time to get interested in an investing strategy is when its performance is at its worst. By that standard, commodities are starting to look intriguing.

Everyone Gets Paid in CBS-Viacom Except Shareholders [H/T @JohnHuber72] (LINK)

Health Care Without (much) Government - by Russ Roberts (LINK)

How to Reverse Engineer Biology (LINK)

Full Disclosure Podcast: The Overachieving Underwriter [H/T @rationalwalk] (LINK)

Markel Corp vice chairman Steve Markel on the insurer and investment shop as it approaches its 90th year in business. Worth $15 million when its shares debuted on Wall Street in 1986, Markel Corp is now a Fortune 500 member in 18 countries that is valued at more than $16 billion.

Grant’s Current Yield Podcast: It’s a gusher (LINK)

Exponent Podcast: 178 — More Ergonomic (LINK)

The Knowledge Project Podcast -- Scott Adams: Avoiding Loserthink (LINK)

One Man's Wild Quest to Reach the Bottom of Every Ocean [H/T @MebFaber] (LINK)