THE SPIRAL CHARTIST

A SIMPLE DILEMMA

2011-08-07T17:49:00.000-04:00

And the wise men don’t know how it feels…to be thick as a brick” -Jethro Tull Keeping ideas in simplicity is not an easy task and was never intended to be. But there is a reason to see it as an intellectuals nirvana because it is the true essence of the mantra that analysts and pundits alike seems to cling to, that persuasive and compelling evidence

OFTEN WRONG, BUT NEVER IN DOUBT

2011-07-24T22:38:00.002-04:00

There is very little we can do to affect the broad markets since most of what does influence emanates from emotion. But just in case we loose sight of the very reason we invest in the first place we should remember that the essence of long term discipline is that short term effect is more distraction than substance. That distraction however is especially potent these days as more and more

CONSERVATIVE WRAPPED IN EXCITIMENT

2011-07-13T23:32:00.003-04:00

Everyone knows that in the world of financial services there are good clients and not so good ones. That being said the not so good ones can’t be faulted for their place in line. They simply are not open to trusting the advice they hear preferring instead to reach out to friends and family for what is often perceived as unbiased delivery. Well, I’m here to say that sometimes that makes good sense

SHAREHOLDERS vs. PARTNERS

2011-07-03T21:05:00.002-04:00

Much is written these days that maligns the shareholder in favor of the less conflicted private company owners, otherwise known as partners. Well to cut to the chase, I think it’s a lot of baloney for the simple reason that self regulation, the ultimate bane of wall street, doesn’t work no matter how noble the endeavor. Companies that tout the superiority of partnerships over shareholders often

IT IS SIMPLE...

2010-12-15T23:32:00.005-05:00

That fact is I’ve spent most of my life talking to people with the respect that they intellectually deserved. But all along the way I've been told that I needed to “dumb down” (a vile term if I do say so myself). And while I’ve resisted the temptation of simplify my writing I have recently come to the conclusion that my clients deserve two tings:1. Keep it simple, because it usually is.2. Unless

IF IT LOOKS TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE, GUESS WHAT?

2010-11-13T10:37:00.002-05:00

What is it in some that decides the rules when it comes to presenting oneself as a savior of the investor? First of all show me an advisor that isn't an investor and I’ll show you a poor advisor, or for that matter a source of poor advice. The lies that are perpetuated in the name of sound thinking are beyond the pale of sociopathic babble. With all the guidance offered by technology each of us

PLEASE DON’T BELIEVE EVERYTHING YOU READ

2010-08-15T11:08:00.000-04:00

“I have new for you” said AndreAnd as I peered through his bad hair weave, and “coke bottle”” glasses I realized he was right. Nowhere in our collective memories do we ever fully understand the workings of our mind. Driven not by the collective accumulation of information but rather defined by the processes eternally influenced by the random cocktail of chemicals in our heads and poisoned by the

WHO PAYS THE BILL WHEN EVERYTHING’S FOR FREE?

2010-08-15T11:07:00.002-04:00

There is very little that captures the attention of the committed consumer, otherwise referred to in political circles as the American people, than the offer of something for free. In fact it could be anything that might appear tangibly seductive but offer a result that is plainly elusive. Simply stated most people will enter into an agreed offer for free of something in exchange for nothing

ART FOR ART’S SAKE MONEY FOR GOD’S SAKE

2010-06-29T23:13:00.000-04:00

I’m a math geek. A certifiable, jargon infested babbling four eyed math geek. And while I view nearly everything through a statistical haze I view the economy and the ensuing markets as incompatible arts. My family on the other hand is cool artists. Certifiable, jargon infested stylish cool artists. And while they view nearly everything with prejudged recklessness they view the economy and the

ARE YOUR EYES BLUE, THEN I HATE YOU

2010-06-23T22:19:00.000-04:00

What distinguishes the truth from a lie? When an athlete enters a match claiming victory in his grasp and looses, is he a liar? What is it that compels so many to be so guided by philosophy that to debate an alternative point of view is not to disagree but to be maliciously lying? The manner in which our society chooses to separate the realty (circumstance) from fact (the outcome) is

IS FUNDAMENTAL ANALYSIS MAKING A COMEBACK?

2009-04-11T16:12:00.003-04:00

I had a wonderful exchange the other night with a friend who is soon to graduate with an MBA from the prestigious University of Chicago. Now one might ask what anyone gains from an MBA in these times where the financial industry is under the scorn of public scrutiny. But I bring this fact up only to illustrate how the assumptions about the army of MBA’s that are accused daily in the populist

DIVERSIFICATION ISN’T A SCAM IT’S JUST MISUNDERSTOOD

2009-04-05T22:47:00.006-04:00

There was a terrific editorial written by David Brooks the other day where he touched on a subject we’ve been discussing here on TSC, namely the two schools of thought regarding how to fix the financial markets. One obviously being the road the Fed has chosen to take which is to partially bail out the banks and the other which is to take aim at the folly resting on the belief that the future can

TOO MANY CHOICES

2009-04-03T00:23:00.000-04:00

I have news for everyone, the stock market can’t recover without the help of the economy. The reason lies in the enormous changes that are occurring in our economy that are affecting it’s number one resource, the consumer, otherwise known as you. This has been driven home during the G20 meeting whereby the rhetoric that preceded the meeting gave way to more realistic behavior. In short the

GOOD HELP IS(‘nt) HARD TO FIND

2009-03-23T00:09:00.001-04:00

Our economy is in for a big surprise. The army of unemployed in this country are looking for jobs wherever they can find them, and that extends, according to the NYT (so it’s gotta be true), to entry level positions. Well for anyone in this country who’s ever bristled at the glib slackers with their incessant jargon infested blabbering trying to show civility towards you, but your not old (or

WHO’S THE BIGGER SUCKER

2009-03-16T23:46:00.001-04:00

There is no shortage of people who ascribe to the notion that the behavior of the capital markets can be directly tied to the length of skirts, the color of clothing and numerous other mannerisms and aspects of our culture. But people who read this column often find my point of view more focused on circumstances than people when it come to looking for clues to the forces that will drive the

SOME SIMPLE SOLUTIONS TO HELP RALLY STOCKS

2009-03-13T09:08:00.001-04:00

900…you heard me…900, that’s how many people CNBC announced are going to be laid off from Conoco Phillips, an energy company with 33,000 employees worldwide, and it sounds almost pointless. I think there are trends taking place in this country that are undermining the possibility of growth , the stability of the housing markets and the confidence in the capital markets. Its solution needs to move

WHY MOST PEOPLE GET MOST THINGS WRONG MOST OF THE TIME

2009-03-09T20:37:00.003-04:00

One of the biggest tragedies of modern day investing is that most people get it wrong and I don’t just mean the casual stock watcher, I mean the traders and portfolio managers and advisors and brokers and all the other professionals who bank (no pun intended) on their collective skills in predicting future events. These days much of that skill is embedded in the notion that an academic credential

THE SLOW DEMISE OF FACT

2009-03-08T21:28:00.007-04:00

It used to be widely assumed that Bloomberg News was considered to be the absolute worst of all news, But I’ve found that in many respects the news that we see on television, whether on CNBC or other affiliates of the networks and their various partnership incarnations, is so competitive in “trying to outsmart” one another to deliver the excitement and emotional thrill that really gets viewers

THE COMPUTER IS A MORON (Peter Drucker)

2009-03-06T09:29:00.001-05:00

I often use this space to reference the methods I use when interpreting data and putting my conclusions to work. It doesn't take a genius, it's better to be lucky than smart sometimes I always say, but it does take a certain type of character. Am I more well adjusted than most people, I don't know? Do I control my temper, not all the time? What I believe separates me from most of my

I THINK IT’S TIME I GET A HOBBY

2009-03-05T14:03:00.001-05:00

The amount of politics that swirls around the markets theses days is actually trumping the markets themselves. I wake up in the morning and check out some headlines on my CFA feed and when I’ve had a cup of coffee I turn on CNBC and ready myself for the onslaught of self-aggrandizing ranting and opinionating. Now I’m a blogger so I have an excuse since, at least until I reach 15K viewers a day, I

LIVE AND LEARN

2009-03-03T20:56:00.000-05:00

What is it about this business we’re in that everybody seems to know everything about everything? In particular, as a bond manager, I can’t recall a time when most of my equity colleagues didn’t overtly suggest that they knew as much about bonds as I do (in addition to nearly everything else). Even after 25 years of experience there always seems to be the ever present need for debate. Don’t get

I B!#*$ FOR A LIVING

2009-03-02T10:40:00.004-05:00

Not really, but I’d like to. The problem is I don’t search, or that is to say I don’t search for this blog. I do search, regularly so, with the same vigor that I flip though a news paper. I have my pet subjects, finance, art, and sports, politics (not necessarily in that order) I never look at real estate and I never look at style articles. One of the reasons I don’t search for this blog is

HEROES, LOST & SURVIVOR

2009-02-27T18:56:00.007-05:00

It’s pretty much a common understanding that the driving appeal of money management is always given both a lift and a bashing when some celebrity of the profession gets busted. The bashing is of course an obvious reaction since the majority of clients, (and most everyone else) firmly believe that if they had more time on their hands they could manage money better than their brokers. The reason

THE STORY OF THE JUNKIE AND THE PUSHER

2009-02-24T22:02:00.003-05:00

How did we get into this mess? Well to begin with it started with housing. In America it has been thought of for quite a long time that the American dream (security and prosperity) was synonymous with owning a home (mortgages and repair bills). I’m getting ahead of myself, but the truth be told there was never a time when owning a home had anything to do with security at least until the months

THE BIG LIE

2009-02-23T12:47:00.001-05:00

This blog isn’t called the spiral chartist because I think it’s a cool name (although it doesn’t hurt), its called the spiral chartist because of the concept of a spiral made up from a sequence of numbers that contain characteristics that are both unique in relation to one another and to the world as a whole. I use it as a tool to determine the behavior of the markets, not because of my love for