monsterHash

Why do wages rise in a recession?

Demian Perry — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 13:08:10 +0000

This morning, Rutgers University released its Labor Scorecard, which confirmed the high unemployment figures published by the Labor Department earlier this week. Someone in the PR department at Rutgers caught this report on its way out the door and added a little spice to the press release, noting that “though unemployment has risen in 2009 [...]

How is a stock like an equity bond?

Demian Perry — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 03:01:52 +0000

Warren Buffett described his philosophy of viewing stocks as ‘equity bonds’ in a 1977 Forbes magazine article and subsequently in a speech at Columbia Business School. In her book, Warren Buffett and the Interpretation of Financial Statements, Mary Buffett attributes the concept to Buffett, which is interesting considering that the title of her book is [...]

Yahoo grows up, or loses its cool?

Demian Perry — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 19:46:03 +0000

The one time I met Jerry Yang, I’ll never forget what he said to me. He said: “MBAs…I guess we need them.” I was just one of a crowd of MBA interns, most from Standford GBS, but a smattering from some east coast schools as well. It was an awkward meeting. Yang had nothing to say [...]

Linkbait: the ‘dearth’ of news?

Demian Perry — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 17:46:39 +0000

The media industry is locked in a struggle akin to the legendary competition between John Henry and the steam drill. If online upstarts such as The Huffington Post are the steam drill, the part of John Henry is played by the tired media behemoths of old: The New York Times, National Public Radio, and even, it seems, CNN. In our hearts, most of us want John Henry to win, but none of us expects him to survive the struggle. None of us, that is, except John Henry.

Bubble-boy and the toxic masses

Demian Perry — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 16:13:29 +0000

The fear of communicable disease seems almost undemocratic. Certainly it is elitist. During the bubonic plague, the rich fled to the country to avoid contamination, while the huddled masses were left to share a painful death in the city. But times have changed.

Top 14 Financial Resources on the web

Demian Perry — Sat, 16 May 2009 15:19:17 +0000

Special thanks to Andrew, and to our Economics Editor for their contributions. Real Clear Markets Topics and discussions of market-related news from the world of business, economics, finance, and the political economy. Financial Times The latest US and international business, finance, economic and political news, comment and analysis from the Financial Times on FT.com The Economist [...]

Everything I didn’t learn in B-school

Demian Perry — Fri, 01 May 2009 18:10:32 +0000

I have been justly criticized by my friends for having a ‘man-crush’ on Warren Buffett. I find that my mind is stretched more by reading past copies of the Berkshire-Hathaway Annual Report than it was in B-school. More gut-renching for me is the realization that most of what I learned in b-school was proven wrong [...]

Is book value meaningless?

Demian Perry — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 20:31:53 +0000

In Warren Buffett and the Interpretation of Financial Statements, the price to book ratio is not presented as a particularly useful metric for investors. But studies show that stocks with low price to book values, when held for a long period of time, will outperform the market. Who is right, the academics, or the billionaires? Even [...]

Confessions of a Day Trader, Part 4: Conclusion

Demian Perry — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 17:51:19 +0000

The graph above shows a clear connection between a leading indicator and future stock returns. That leading indicator is not related to anything technical analysts measure, and there’s a twist in the data that reveals everything that is wrong with technical analysis and day-trading. I set out on this project a few days ago to test [...]

Confessions of a Day Trader, Part 3: The Myopic Market

Demian Perry — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 16:10:51 +0000

This morning I crunched more than twenty thousand days of stock market history into excel to see whether the market was totally random, or whether, as I suspected, there were some occassional patterns to be found. Whether you think the market is totally random or you’re a day trader trying to make a buck off [...]