JasperCapital

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 1 hour ago

Re: Macro environmental on science page

>>It is alarming to see the vast area of the U.S. that is in drought, including the entire Great Plains and West, the breadbasket of our country. If this is a permanent climate change, not a cyclic drought, depletion of groundwater could mean a [more]

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 11:37 AM

Re: Tirade against public education

It seems to me that the idea of universal education is just utopian. Rather than no child left behind, it should be, well, if you don't turn and burn, you are out at 16.


I call the US educational system "the most expensive [more]

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JasperCapital replied to the Real Estate Inv. Trusts: REITs board. 5:27 PM

Re: Famous FAILED REIT short

David Einhorn at Greenlight Capital just closed out a long-term short position in AVB, discussed in their annual letter out today (PS: they lost money on the position)

[more]

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 11:33 AM

Re: METAR Contest- Cinco de Mayo edition

has there ever been a year that the board's picks have outperformed the S&P500?

There has never been a year where the METAR contest entries could reasonably be referred to as "the board's picks".


it is an [more]

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 1:13 PM

Re: An interesting hedging strategy...

Another allocation could be:

1/4 GLD
1/4 SPY
1/4 USD
1/4 US Treasury Bonds (or TIPS)

I wonder if anyone has been so bold as to allocate their assets in such a way.




that's pretty close to [more]

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 1:11 PM

Re: METAR Contest- Cinco de Mayo edition

has there ever been a year that the board's picks have outperformed the S&P500?

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 1:26 PM

Re: Taibbi: Everything Is Rigged

>>social safety net



but social security isn't sold to the public as a disability insurance program (which it in part is)..... it is much more often sold as a mandatory retirement savings program.

My point was that if [more]

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 11:00 AM

Re: Taibbi: Everything Is Rigged

>>Are there any truly voluntary participants in Social Security left? ("Voluntarily" signing up to get back some of what you didn't volunteer to have taken from you, doesn't count.)


very true.

I made the [more]

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 7:17 PM

Re: Taibbi: Everything Is Rigged

>>Social Security was originally set up to give lower wage earners a fair shake

People wouldn't want it if it was only a fair shake. You can already get that in the market, without requiring contributions through [more]

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 11:23 AM

Re: Why austerity is still alive

austerity: it is a consequence, and not a punishment

you either go through austerity on planned terms, or you go through it via market-imposed terms.

But it won't ever be Easy

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 8:22 PM

Re: "Glitch" shuts down the CBOE...

I found out about the outage firsthand when trying to place an options trade. I listened in disbelief when the broker said they couldn't even get quotes or place a trade on CBOE-only options (those that don't trade on any other exchange). My comment [more]

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 8:12 PM

Re: Can 1/3 support 2/3?

2/3 looks like a voting majority to me

so looks like the 1/3 are screwed, hate to say

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JasperCapital replied to the Real Estate Inv. Trusts: REITs board. 12:34 AM

Re: BDCs on Barrons

>>David's big complaint was that ALD did NOT accurately mark all of their investments to market


more to the point, there is basically no market in these underlying debt instruments - they mark to "model" in most cases

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 8:13 PM

Re: Boston Bombers

None of the people I talked to were outraged by the coverage.

Outraged by the bomber's acts yes, but not the coverage.


no, I meant the feigned outrage was about the bombs themselves.

While we hate that someone [more]

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 6:14 PM

Re: Boston Bombers

>> The news media's mantra has changed from: "If it bleeds it leads" to "If we've got video of it it leads."


Don't give too much credit to the media.
They're just giving the public what it wants
While [more]

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 12:24 PM

Re: So, this isn't the first time

And now the last idea, that there’s a debt-to-GDP threshold that is true for every country, falls apart now that researchers are finding the causation is backwards. ...


well, since we aren't acting in a manner as a nation that [more]

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 12:20 PM

Re: Boston Bombers

>>There's probably a point in here somewhere. I just have no idea what it is.

I think the point is that a story that include a major metropolitan area, intentional bombs, and Muslim connections (however remote), and an OJ-Simpso-esque [more]

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JasperCapital replied to the Macro Economic Trends and Risks board. 12:15 PM

Re: OT: Boston lockdown

<I.OK. What I'm thinking is that there would have been no point, since at that point the police didn't know what they were looking for. One guy? Or two? White? Brown? Pipe bomb? C4? On foot? In a car? Pressure cooker? Domestic? Foreign? What good [more]