Author Archives: Felix

A large part of the cachet of the Hamptons is that the money there is quieter, more understated, than in other well-heeled enclaves. The houses are ridiculously expensive, to be sure, but the architecture is low-key, and the interior decoration … Continue reading →

Steve Jobs has never been a normal CEO. He’s best known for running Apple, of course, but that hasn’t stopped him from starting up enormous side projects like NeXT and Pixar. He’s now the single largest individual shareholder in Disney, … Continue reading →

Most of my blog entries are prompted by something I read. If I think it’s wrong, I’ll put up a blog saying why. That’s all fine as far as it goes, but it does mean that if you just went … Continue reading →

I very much admire the anonymous chart-makers at the New York Times. They generally do a magnificent job of presenting information in a clean, easy to understand, and often very clever manner. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that they’d … Continue reading →

Economists are pretty bad at predicting the future (how fast will the economy grow next quarter?). They’re also pretty bad at predicting the present (how fast is the economy growing this quarter?). And, it turns out, they’re equally bad at … Continue reading →

Some kind of genius: Stock or Not? Josh Reich has written a lovely little web app which puts two charts side by side. One is a real stock, the other is randomly generated. Can you tell which is which? I … Continue reading →

I think we should implement a new corollary to Godwin’s Law — call it McArdle’s Law, after this blog entry at Free Exchange — saying that any time someone mentions “Economics 101” in a debate, they’ve automatically lost. The point … Continue reading →

Merrill Lynch is worried that too many people are reading its research. Yes, too many. Reports DealBook: Merrill Lynch said it plans to eliminate all access to its research from nonclients and to put new restrictions on the media’s access … Continue reading →

Whenever there’s a banking crisis, there seems to be a very good chance that preceding it came some kind of property bubble. Banks have a habit of assuming that secured loans are secure loans, and loaning out enormous chunks of … Continue reading →

In a post last year, I looked at the value of parking spaces in Manhattan — at least there was a lot of discussion on that subject in the comments. The general upshot was that parking spaces seem to be … Continue reading →

An interesting comment just appeared on an old blog of mine: Can you explain, how can a individual investor borrow yen to buy CAD$? It’s a good question. The fact is that there is a huge universe of investment opportunities … Continue reading →

Via Alphaville, I found myself today at Decanter’s wine investment guide — something which made for a very interesting read, given that I have just finished a book on Robert Parker. Parker will tell anyone who’ll listen that they should … Continue reading →

I popped over to Breaking Views just now to see what they had to say about Barclays buying ABN Amro, and what’s the big top headline? “Subprime meltdown echoes dotcom death spiral“. The story itself is pretty smart and sober, … Continue reading →

Me, yesterday: The chances of a nominal fall in house prices over the next five years are, I think, de minimis. Well, I certainly seem to have got that one wrong. First dsquared and then BR, in the comments, pointed … Continue reading →

I have a lot of respect for the research of Christopher Cagan at First American CoreLogic. His latest paper, a 118-page study of the impact of ARM adjustment, was picked up by the Wall Street Journal, in a story which … Continue reading →

Markets fell on Tuesday, on fears, we are told, about weakness in mortgages and housing; this prompted Brad Setser to ask me whether I’m still as sanguine as I used to be on such matters. I couldn’t reply on Wednesday, … Continue reading →