I think Seykota's observation is better taken as a food for thought exercise than a truism. But in respect to your question, I wonder if it's a trade-off: The pain of losing is deemed an acceptable sacrifice for whatever other motive is being fulfilled. Think of the biotech investor who consistently loses money on fly-by-night startups, but gets to bitch about his stocks on the golf course all the time, and occasionally brag about the ten-bagger he picked up on FDA approval. That whole experience, including the entertainment aspects, the conversation, the martyrdom, the glory, may all be worth the financial pain of consistently losing year after year. And so on.
True. But such goes back to price. Imagine if you could buy the textile business in a distressed asset fire sale, at such price as to make a 15-20% return on capital invested by selling off the machinery and inventory. Or imagine if you discovered that the business, while worthless, was actually worth purchasing as a hidden real estate play, or for a few hundred thousand acres of timberland sitting on the books. Broader point being, it generally pays to be curious, creative and inquisitive...
Time frames are key here, as they often are... we were more interested in bonds as a short-term swing trade idea than a longer-term trend trade idea for now.
I like Hofstadter's definition: Consciousness is "a hallucination hallucinated by a hallucination." Or the slightly more down-to-earth perspective of Jeff Hawkins: "Consciousness is what it feels like to have a neocortex."
Similar thoughts, we're not really looking to short PMs at this juncture because the macro backdrop is just too squirrelly (better ideas out there)
Agree - silver is gold on steroids: More hot money, more leverage to the global reflation case, and bigger potential downside as a result...
Yeah... Jack in the Beanstalk is a second cousin, and Jack In the Box is a brother-in-law (though he's a bit of a black sheep, we don't talk about him)
We are always evolving... but it's not so much a "more" emphasis on bottom up value investing, as adding that capability to the repertoire. Trading is the bread and butter and will produce the strongest risk-adjusted returns by a country mile. The advantage of adding post-crisis value investing to the mix, under very select circumstances, is a significant expansion in strategy capacity -- from, say, $100MM to $500M, $1B, or more -- and the capability of deploying conservative long-term funds in times of max opportunity.
Also re, Claugus lifestyle, I can confirm - working from a home office (most of the time) is pretty cool. Been doing it for 7 years now :)
Thanks, will take a look - not sure I'd agree prices are "divine," but price action certainly deserves a lot more respect than it gets...
No position in USTs at moment -- high uncertainty and plausible scenarios for a next leg either way. Waiting for more clarity before getting involved again there.
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Thingamajig