On the 5th of May, the NY Times published this story; Professors in 179 Colleges and Other Leaders Assail Rise in Rates as Harmful to Country and Sure to Bring Reprisals. The article quotes from a letter signed by 1028 economists across America urging the President not to proceed with... Show More

For my regular readers, this month’s note is a little different. Briefer with one myopic focus. This month I am going to focus on Australia, and specifically the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA). For the first time in over 2 years, we had a very “live” RBA meeting on May... Show More

The year is 1991. I’m trading Australian interest rates on the proprietary desk for Bankers Trust. The desk is headed by Richard Farleigh. And the quarterly CPI number is about to be released. In those days, there was 3 opportunities to “trade” a CPI number. First our economist, Andre Morony,... Show More

How good are you at reading people? How about a large frightened animal? It’s an interesting question, in today’s tech driven social world, to consider the skill of “reading” the situation. Is it being lost? Does it matter? Hold that thought, and consider the following. You are asked to step... Show More

A good chart distils terabytes of data into a small image that delivers a big message. And to cherry-pick the messages investors need to hear most right now, we asked some of Australia’s top managers to nominate one chart above all others. Mik Case from Schroders and Chris Rands at... Show More

January 1996. My wife was 8 months pregnant with our first child. I was a proprietary trader at Bankers Trust (had been since 1991), meaning I took macro views on interest rates and currencies. Indeed, very similar to what I do now, but with the bank’s capital rather than investors’... Show More

In October the whole firm was rounded up and marched over the road to the grand ballroom of the Wentworth Hotel to hear about the launch of the new US Technology Fund. And I must say it sounded very exciting. Our US equity portfolio manager outlined the penetration of technology... Show More

We are all familiar with the Maginot line. A fortified defence on the border of France and Germany, built by France mostly in the 1930’s to prevent a German invasion. Show More

If 2018 were a boxing match, you would be Mundine and Mr. Market would be Horn. It only took you 96 seconds to be battered and bruised to the floor. What went wrong? What did you miss? Like Horn, markets have been unforgiving. Globally, we have seen one of the... Show More

There was much fanfare on the 22nd May 1994 when millionaire Japanese dentist Akihiro Kabe and co-driver Takeshi Okano approached the start of Australia’s inaugural Cannonball run in a $750,000 Ferrari F40. At the time the most expensive new Ferrari in the world, it was about to tackle Darwin to... Show More