Here is a thread describing 10 investment strategies to take you through the current economic situation: 1. Worry macro and invest micro.

To have an intellectually honest debate or conversation you have to enter it with a willingness to learn. Here are the 6 rules for an intellectually honest debate. 🧵 1/ Be Honest With Yourself. To have an intellectually honest debate or conversation, you have to enter it with a willingness to learn. Here are the rules for an intellectually honest debate:

I enjoyed reading "Lessons from the Titans" and would recommend it to everyone. Here are 8 key lessons I took away from the book: 1/ Management is Key. "Companies usually fail because of the incompetence and arrogance of a complacent management team, not because they struggled to predict the future."

We are horrible with our time. Our initial reaction is to blame it on Netflix, Instagram, or TikTok. I get it - but at the same time, I don't. Seneca shared some great advice; he said to live each day as if it were a separate life. Here is how: 1/ The first letter in the book "Moral Letters," Seneca writes, "The largest portion of our life passes while are doing ill, a goodly share while we are doing nothing, and the whole while we are doing that which his not to the purpose."

I did not understand the true benefits of meditation until I started meditating again. Here are 3 benefits I discovered: 1/ Meditation reduces suffering. Our thoughts are chronically stuck in the past or the future, but ironically, life happens in between - in the now. Sam Harris says that people who don't meditate experience unnecessary suffering.

Meditations by Marcus Aurelius provides a number of strategies to deal with anger. In @DonJRobertson wonderful book "How To Think Like a Roman Emperor" he unwraps them for us: 1/ We are social animals designed to help each other. I often remind myself that one of my values is to leave the world a better place than I found it. Reacting angrily to people I don't like or agree with doesn't help with that.

I've attended the annual Berkshire Hathaway shareholders meeting for over a decade. Here is what I learned this year 🧵: 1/ When asked about the future of value investing, Buffett answered, "Value investing will be fine; people will continue to do dumb things." I agree; I came to the same conclusion when I wrote Active Value Investing almost two decades ago.

I love reading and re-reading "How To Win Friends and Influence People" by Dale Carnegie. Here are some of my favorite quotes: “If you teach a man anything, he will never learn."

"Only knowledge that is used sticks in your mind."

"By criticizing, we do not make lasting changes and often incur resentment."

“It’s a great business.”

“Massive moat.”

“The TAM is huge.”

"Long reinvestment runway."

For years, this kind of analysis worked.

Until it didn’t.

Here’s why.

THREAD👇 (more like a tsunami) We’ve seen this movie before.

Many times.

Two recent examples:

The Nifty Fifty era of the 1960s.

And the Dot Com Mania of the 1990s.

Let’s be honest: volatility sucks.

I am obviously just talking about downside volatility. 🤣

Everyone knows that volatility should be your friend as an investor.

But in practice it is far more complicated than that. Let’s say you buy a $10 stock that you think is worth $20.

It goes to $8.

You’ve found the deal of a lifetime. You load up!

You’re (future) rich, and a genius.

Then it goes to $2.

Now you fear you've made a terrible mistake.

1. We’ve been looking at some insurance names recently, so we went back and re-read Buffett’s old letters from the 1970s and early 80s, the last time inflation was rampant.

Here’s what stood out: 2. First some context. Here are historical inflation rates:

Seth Klarman, we worry macro, invest micro (my summation):

"We see today’s market as characterized by stretched valuations, deep complacency, and a host of looming risks. But we also know how hard it is to make macro forecasts. While we have significant concerns, we can also make a case that the U.S. economy will remain strong for some time, since corporate, consumer, and financial institution balance sheets are healthy.

Good insights from Seth Klarman:

Market participants with less than 12 years of experience have never been burned and have no idea how hot the stove can get. No investor under the age of 60 has lost money on a bond due to a general rise in interest rates; indeed, an entire generation has no direct familiarity with interest rate risk.

I am a year late to the "short ladder" party. Never knew what it was until today.

I don't understand how would anyone possibly could execute it in practice. But I am not a short seller, here is what short sellers think about it:

institutionalinvestor.com/article/b1qdq0… Jim Chanos: “Can anyone explain to me what a ‘short ladder attack’ is? I have seriously never heard the term before this week.”

A few years ago, my older kids, Jonah and Hannah, and I went snorkeling in Fort Lauderdale. We went out on a big boat that could probably carry up to 80 people, but there were only eight snorkelers (including us) on board and two crew members.

THREAD We went about two miles off the coast. (We could still see the city skyline.) The captain dropped anchor. We put on fins and life vests. The captain told us to inflate the vests only about a third of the way, so we would still be able to put our heads in the water and snorkel.

Investing in the stock market doesn’t need to resort to the binary extremes of Fool’s Gambit and Market Timer’s Gambit. There is a different game available: One Stock at a Time. That is the game we play at IMA.

THREAD Even in this insanely overvalued market not all stocks are overvalued and in search of a greater fool.

Inflation will benefit some companies, be indifferent to others, and hurt the rest. To understand what separates winners from losers, we need to understand the physics of how inflation flows through a company’s income statement and balance sheet.

THREAD Let’s start with revenue. Higher prices across the economy are a main feature of inflation. We want to own companies that have pricing power.

James Clear summarizes @danbharris book, 10% Happier. My favorite parts from @JamesClear summary and my thoughts: Many people assume they must be paranoid and worry if they want to stay at the top of their game.

VK: In biz you need to be paranoid. Identify risks. Address them. BUT should not have constant anxiety. Meditation helps to identify that anxiety.

I realized over the years that our wants are unlimited and will always exceed our income.

No matter how much money you make, be it $100,000, or ten million, without a system your insatiable wants will always outpace out your income. You think if you double or triple your income you’ll be happy, you’ll have enough? Unless you keep your expenses the same, which most us of will not do, then you won’t have enough.

We tend to appreciate what we have only when it is taken away from us. In what I am about to say, I am going paper over the fact that people are sick and dying and that millions have (temporarily) lost their jobs. But a supermajority of people have been impacted by COVID-19 in a more superficial way – we are locked down with our loved ones at home.

Wonderful Wall Street Journal columnist @jasonzweigwsj wrote great column titled “What Benjamin Graham Would Tell You to Do Now: Look in the Mirror.” Here are some excerpts: Forget about what the stock market is going to do. Instead, focus on what you, as an investor, ought to do….