Mauldin Newsletters

Mad Hawk Disease Strikes Federal Reserve

2017-06-25T14:12:00+00:00

“A serious writer may be a hawk or a buzzard or even a popinjay, but a solemn writer is always a bloody owl.” – Ernest Hemingway

Secular Stagnation?

2017-06-21T19:21:00+00:00

In today’s Outside the Box my good friend Charles Gave shares an instructive “Tale of Two Countries.” Since 1981 in the UK and France, structural growth rates have diverged: The rate has fallen by two-thirds in France, while in the UK it has risen. Why? Well, to begin with, in the UK Margaret Thatcher was elected prime minister in 1979 and almost at once reduced the role of the bureaucracy in managing economic activity and dialed back government spending as a percentage of GDP. Meanwhile, in...

The Next Minsky Moment

2017-06-17T22:35:00+00:00

“China’s economy has entered a state of new normal.” – Premier Li Keqiang, 2015 “Success breeds a disregard of the possibility of failure.” – Hyman Minsky

Where’s My Productivity, Dude?

2017-06-14T09:00:00+00:00

One of the true conundrums in the macroeconomic world is the continuing drop in total global productivity over the last few decades, in spite of the growing use of computers, robotics, and artificial intelligence. Theoretically, productivity should have gone up. Professor and Nobel laureate Robert Gordon and others have speculated the GDP growth is going to decline to less than 1%, and they have all sorts of maps to back up their claim. I’ve taken issue with their reasoning, but they makes...

What, Me Worry?

2017-06-12T01:11:00+00:00

“Forget the past. The future will give you plenty to worry about.” – George Allen, Sr. “I try not to worry about the future, so I take each day just one anxiety attack at a time.” – Tom Wilson

Finding High-Quality Companies Today

2017-06-07T09:00:00+00:00

Last week in Outside the Box, Jim Mellon shared some good advice on picking stocks in the Age of the Index Fund. Jim said, [C]ommitted investors should make a list of companies that they really like, know about, and want to own – at the right price. If the shares of those firms are too high, put in limits, possibly 20-30% below current levels, and wait. Don’t let cash burn a hole in your pocket – let the stocks come to you, and don’t chase. Within a day of publishing Jim’s piece, my friend...

Can You Afford to Reach 100?

2017-06-03T14:54:00+00:00

“I often joke that 100 years from now I hope people are saying, ‘Dang, she looks good for her age!’” – Dolly Parton “Just because you live 20 years or 100 years doesn’t make it less meaningful. They’re both short amounts of time. So all we can do is just live in that time, whatever time we’re given.” – Ansel Elgort “If I had more time, I would have written a shorter letter.” – Blaise Pascal, 1657 (and a few score other later attributions)...

Assume the Brace Position

2017-05-31T09:00:00+00:00

My friend and British investor extraordinaire Jim Mellon, who made a large amount of money traveling the world doing real estate, is now focused on thinking about and investing in life extension and its derivatives. But he's also worried about what happens when a lot of people live longer and how we pay for it. He shares my concern about the demographic bubble that we are already in becoming even worse as we live longer than we expected. Further, he points out the same thing I have about the...

The Great Reset, Part Two

2017-05-27T18:29:00+00:00

“Premature optimization is the root of all evil…” – Donald Knuth, from his 1974 Turing Award lecture

International Inflation Cycles Sync Up

2017-05-24T05:40:00+00:00

My friend Lakshman Achuthan, Co-Founder & Chief Operations Officer of the Economic Cycle Research Institute (ECRI), has done some really interesting work on international inflation cycles, and in today’s Outside the Box he shares it with us. This is a special treat – ECRI does not normally make its material available outside of its client base. I am truly grateful that he allows me to share this. Lakshman will be joining us at SIC this week in Orlando, to the great benefit of the attendees. It...