This is an interesting essay that frames Xi as potentially making the same mistake Germany and Japan made before. Read it before reflexively objecting to the premise.

wsj.com/articles/chall… “What is America but beauty queens, millionaires, stupid records and Hollywood?” Hitler remarked

This was awesome. The melding of sports and data and multidisciplinary thinking from @dmorey was so good. Even if he’s a wee bit harsh on soccer IMO, it’s in the context of how to optimize all games. Very fun read.

joincolossus.com/episodes/50823… “Basketball lives in this perfect niche of data and art”.

I think that’s a great of putting it and why data/analytics hasn’t seemingly sucked the soul of the game out of basketball like it has baseball.

omg. Andy Florance and the NAR being partners, NFW.

https://twitter.com/GregRoumeliotis/status/1618023303213617153

it makes strategic sense because the other strategy did not. but still, how tf is going Florance going to manage the NAR relationship.

https://twitter.com/modestproposal1/status/1496303259924979712

Netflix allowed a New Yorker reporter to trail Bela Bajaria, and the obvious Q is why. Given the timing, post Q1 blowup at the trough of despair, with stories about how content had changed/worsened under Bajaria, it was meant to be a show of support?

newyorker.com/magazine/2023/… Here's Sarandos essentially validating the be everything everywhere strategy. So have to believe that this was the intent.

Was curious the relationship between core PCE and the GDP deflator. Pretty tight. Which I think means we can use proxies for NGDP and sustainable RGDP growth, to back into steady state core PCE, i.e. if NGDP is 6 and realistic RGDP is 2-2.5%, then core PCE is 3.5-4. Have looked at proxy for NGDP growth, which given nature of economy is not surprising how well Personal Income (ex covid) and wages and salaries track.

When people talk about regimes post GFC, I dont view it as all one up to the vaccine or 2/12/21. I think either Vixplosion or for sure 1/4/19 Powell speech as beginning of hyper TAM regime. Yes, tech did well the whole time, but it was short sharp period 19-21 that was outlier. Had this thought swirling around, but a couple charts from MS software deck really showed it. Can see where the number of 10x sales and really 15x sales companies just exploded.

Pretty wild that Messi has averaged scoring or assisting on more than a goal per game for 1000 games Argument Messi is 🐐 regardless of tomorrows outcome ft.com/content/9d158d…

This is why Twitter is undefeated. Last night a Philly Fed paper is posted that employment growth was 10K not 1M for Q2. Possible given CES tends to miss turns, but also entirely at odds with almost every other labor indicator. Heres one possible and very reasonable explanation.

https://twitter.com/modeledbehavior/status/1603004146612944899

For those not following in real time here’s the underlying source philadelphiafed.org/-/media/frbp/a…

Different markets, same vibes I know less about video games market structure than multichannel video, but the logic against a vertical merger seems fairly similar. Would love to see someone do the math on economic harm that MSFT could impose on Sony vs cost it would incur via foreclosure. Genuinely curious.

Amazing to read the raw material here. Amazing how close we came to an absolute disaster. Amazing there’s been no repercussions.

https://twitter.com/hunterw/status/1602440606197989377

When you’re dumb enough to put this in writing but smart enough to spell it wrong

On a Q/Q annualized basis, NGDP was growing 14.3% in Q4 2021 and RGDP was growing 7%. In Q3, NGDP was growing 7.3% and RGDP was growing 2.9%. Today, it seems like NGDP is growing 6% and RGDP is growing 2-2.5%. The economy has dramatically slowed, but it is still quite strong. There were people thinking that we were in a recession, or would be by now. We're adding 3M jobs annualized and growing 150bps faster NGDP than the 2010-2020 cycle. The economy still has underlying strength, but also is slowing at a near record clip.

https://twitter.com/modestproposal1/status/1485426579438280710

Uncomfortably large increase in Personal Income (8.8% annualized) but 2.7 percentage points is Government Transfers category "Other". Do any of the stats nerds know what that is and why it jumped so much? @M_C_Klein @pearkes Wages & Salaries are growing 5.6% and 5.7% on a 1 and 3 month annualized basis. That seems like a better proxy for NGDP growth. And tbf, Personal Income on a 3 mo basis is growing 6%. All signs point to slowing NGDP, but still want to see it get to < 5% in relatively short order.

How broad a catch all is "Information" in the CES? Are there tech jobs captured in some other services category (e.g. Amazon corporate in Retail Trade or FinTech in Financial activities, etc)? I'm surprised if employment is down in tech vs 2001 so I prob screwed something up. Ok, so this is a useless classification and has no bearing on employment in tech. The decline is from telecomm and publishing. And this doesn't appear to have much if any "tech" in it tbh. h/t @pearkes

This by @benthompson

“To put all of this a different way, if Iger is coming back because he disagrees with Chapek’s tactics, well, that strikes me as a bad idea: Chapek played the hand that was dealt him by Bob Iger.” “To put it another way, the worst news for Disney would be if its imminent struggles are not due to Chapek’s tactics or Iger’s strategy but rather a secular change in the market that no CEO could ultimately outrun”

“At some point that afternoon, though, Platini’s reservations melted away. What happened to change his mind over lunch with a late-arriving Sarkozy and the two Qataris remains, more than a decade later, resolutely obscure and fiercely contested” “Even the Qataris believed his verdict was a crushing blow. One official who worked on Qatar’s bid admitted the evaluation report was “embarrassing.”

Oooh boy there’s a lot going on in this story. More than anything though, Stephenson, Stankey and AT&T are who we thought they were.

nytimes.com/2022/11/19/bus… nytimes.com/2022/11/19/bus… “Widely admired” 😀

O M

Have complicated and in some cases conspiratorial threads. But isn’t this most likely explanation? They were overlevered, illiquid and suffered losses. Thought they could trade their way out of it or buy time to make it whole. Not at all an excuse. But isn’t it most likely? Plenty examples of frauds and ponzis that didn’t set out to defraud. Had an idea, maybe worked for a little, but at some point losses suffered and fateful decision is made. Instead of fessing up, raise new money or improperly use others to paper over it, hoping to make it back.

I am new to rails, so prob a dumb Q. But is there risk these cos have over optimized the last decade+? Longer trains, smaller crews, etc all make sense from an inefficient starting point, but can be taken too far. STB seems to think so. And then you're reliant more on volumes? I get the market structure, pricing power, FCF generation, and strong ROIC. Just wondering if some of the huge tailwinds that were in their control turn neutral or potentially into headwinds, and the earnings algo becomes more reliant on things less in their control like volume.

Incredible scenes “There is often no one to kill” ☠️

It's interesting that software multiples are now at the 5 year average of 2014-2018. Maybe not cheap, but fully reverted from craziness of 18-21. Only the 5 highest multiple stocks have not reverted and remain 40% above 14-18, while < 30% growers trade below that 5 year average. I still think the open question for so many software companies though is how many can actually get to sustained cash flow generation before their "competitive advantage period", to the extent one exists!, is competed away either by commoditization or next gen innovation.