Cutting Through the Noise
December 3, 2010
Is it a long-term trend or an investment truth? In my last Globe and Mail column (Much-maligned Greenback is Looking Increasingly Cheap), I held this question up to a number of economic factors - the declining supply of oil, China’s growth, Japan’s...
Read MoreDecember 2, 2010
There was a story in the ROB today about how Prem Watsa’s investment acumen has made a huge difference to the Sick Kids Hospital Foundation. By reducing equities to 35% of the portfolio in 2007, the foundation held up well when markets were...
Read MoreDecember 1, 2010
Here are a few quotes from the comments posted on the Globe and Mail's website following my column on the U.S. dollar: “... with a spendthrift administration and Helicopter Ben clearly willing to throw as much increasingly worthless paper as is...
Read MoreNovember 26, 2010
In investing, it’s easy to mistake a transient trend for an eternal verity. Right now, for instance, many investors are tacitly assuming that China will grow at 10 per cent forever. Same goes for the notion that we’re running out of oil, that gold is the best store of...
Read MoreNovember 18, 2010
My posting last week (A Simple Risk Management Tool to Avoid the Next Bubble) garnered lots of comment. In one of the kinder emails, a reader asked what weaker performing assets I would consider to be an attractive balance to the current high flyers...
Read MoreNovember 17, 2010
In response to my post last week, a friend and former partner, Dan Lewin of Lewin Capital Management, sent me a clip on gold. It came from a conversation between Ben Stein and Warren Buffett for Fortune magazine. When asked, "What about gold? Is this a classic bubble or what?", the Oracle of Omaha responded with the following...
Read MoreNovember 12, 2010
It’s only been 18 months since the nadir of our once-in-a-lifetime financial crisis, but it feels like we’re already forgetting some of the lessons learned. I’m referring to the fact that, in this market full of cross currents, we have another major asset class getting...
Read MoreNovember 11, 2010
In his monthly letter, Bill Gross, the Managing Director of PIMCO and acclaimed ‘King of Bonds’, suggested that the Federal Reserve’s QE2 announcement last Wednesday (the second round of Quantitative Easing) “will likely signify the end of a great...
Read MoreNovember 10, 2010
When there is a message on voicemail for me to call my bank, I ignore it. I didn’t used to, but I do now. In the past, if I got one of those calls, it was because I was overdrawn or someone in Des Moines was using my credit card. There usually was something I needed to know or deal with. The urgency of the call was appropriate. In...
Read MoreNovember 8, 2010
Last week a friend asked me what his daughter should do with her mortgage. The bank was giving her the option of going with a variable rate mortgage at 2.85% or a 5-year fixed at 3.5%. Investment professionals get asked this question all the time by friends...
Read MoreNovember 4, 2010
At the risk of alienating some of our clients and my Bay Street friends, I admit to being happy that the BHP takeover of Potash Corp was turned down. I keep wondering if it’s just my prairie roots (I want desperately for Saskatchewan and Manitoba to have...
Read MoreNovember 2, 2010
In recent years I’ve had the pleasure of getting to know Danny Bubis, President and Chief Investment Officer of Winnipeg-based Tetrem Capital Management (anyone from my home town is a great person). Tetrem manages private and institutional...
Read MoreOctober 29, 2010
Whenever one investment theme, strategy or person is in the spotlight, it’s important to look in the shadows for a different perspective. That’s because as voices get louder and more confident, a consensus emerges that makes it harder to find the...
Read MoreOctober 22, 2010
David Rosenberg, the economist, is bearish on the economy and he’s very persuasive. His view is that we’re heading into a period of subdued growth at best, and another recession at worst. His 2011 earnings estimate for the S&P 500 is $75, well below...
Read MoreOctober 18, 2010
“I’ve been shaking all night long, but my hands are steady” - from ‘Three Pistols’ by the Tragically Hip. David and I have been doing presentations over the last few weeks and we’ve talked about the notion of a ‘steady hand’. The company name came...
Read MoreOctober 15, 2010
When investors open their quarterly statements this month, they’ll be pleasantly surprised. Despite all the doom and gloom, the last three months have brought a year’s worth of returns. But despite the fact that the most recent quarter will bring...
Read MoreOctober 12, 2010
Michael Nairne of Tacita Capital recently published an interesting piece on inflation. He pointed out that the bond market has been a lousy predictor of where inflation is going. He showed that the holders of both long and medium-term bonds failed to...
Read MoreOctober 1, 2010
“Maybe you might have, some advice to give, on how to be insensitive.” The chorus from this great Jann Arden song speaks to where the investment industry has gone over the last 20 years. I’m not referring to touchy-feely, relationship stuff, but rather a hard...
Read MoreSeptember 30, 2010
It’s not very often that we get to say we’re #1 at anything, whether it be on a personal level or as an organization. In this regard, we’re having an unusual year. In June, Steadyhand was at the top of the list on Morningstar’s Stewardship Grades. In...
Read MoreSeptember 24, 2010
Writing about the unfairness of closed-end funds has been a lonely vigil. Despite the fact that the last year has been a robust period for new issues of these funds, there have only been a few other commentators taking on this egregious industry practice. In...
Read MoreSeptember 23, 2010
ING has a TV ad running right now on their Streetwise mutual funds. I don’t have any issue with ING or the funds (quite the opposite), but I do think the messaging is misleading. Before I go there, I should provide a little background. Since...
Read MoreSeptember 20, 2010
To me, the media coverage on the new banking regulations laid out by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision misses the point (Basel was established in 1974 to improve the quality of banking supervision worldwide). The commentary has focused...
Read MoreSeptember 18, 2010
Every summer Lori and I make a pilgrimage to the famous Highland Cinema in Kinmount, Ont. This summer’s movie was Inception. While I had mixed feelings about the film (movie – 2 stars; conversation after – 4 stars), I found the...
Read MoreSeptember 16, 2010
We continue to be barraged with negative news. Even the most positive economists are projecting slow growth for the next few years, and the bearish ones, whose names all seem to start with ‘R’, send chills down my spine. One sentence in Connor...
Read MoreSeptember 13, 2010
At Steadyhand, we’re big on client-manager alignment. We think it’s important that investors work with professionals who share their interests. As clients and regular readers know, we walk the walk in this regard. Each year we publish the...
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