'I Have A Dream'... Authored by 'no01' via Gold and Geopolitics substack, I have a dream where politicians live next door to you... Not metaphorically. Literally... The man who voted to rezone your street works three doors down. His kids go to the same school as yours. When he raises the local tax rate and the potholes don’t get fixed, he drives over those same potholes every morning. And when the...
'I Have A Dream'... Authored by 'no01' via Gold and Geopolitics substack, I have a dream where politicians live next door to you... Not metaphorically. Literally... The man who voted to rezone your street works three doors down. His kids go to the same school as yours. When he raises the local tax rate and the potholes don’t get fixed, he drives over those same potholes every morning. And when the community has had enough, they let him know. Loudly. Personally. The way humans have held each other accountable for most of history, before we invented the beautiful abstraction of “institutional distance”. I know. It sounds naive. Let me explain why I don’t think it is... We live in an era that treats political monopoly as completely normal while losing its mind over market monopolies. Regulators drag Google into congressional hearings for owning search. They fine Microsoft for bundling browsers. They write entire legislative frameworks to prevent one company from becoming too dominant in any given market because we all understand, instinctively, what monopoly does: it kills accountability, it kills innovation, it raises prices, and it entrenches mediocrity. The monopolist has no reason to improve because you have nowhere else to go. And then we hand the same monopoly structure to the people who control our laws, our taxes, our foreign policy, our money supply, and we call it “democracy”. The irony is immaculate. The European Union is the cleanest example of what happens when you take this logic to its conclusion. The European Commission - the body that actually initiates legislation - is not elected. The Parliament, which is elected, cannot propose laws. It can only approve or reject what the Commission puts in front of it. The commissioners are appointed by national governments, serve five-year terms, and answer to a structure so opaque that most Europeans couldn’t name a single one of them without Googling. This isn’t a flaw in the design. It IS the design. Unaccounta...
AnthonyRosenberg/iStock Unreleased via Getty Images The S&P 500 has fully recovered all of its year-to-date losses, with investors hopeful that talks with Iran will produce an end to the conflict and restore oil prices back to normal. What has not recovered, however, is tech stocks. The stock market is still confused about how to treat AI: is it a tailwind or a headwind? In the meantime, the data ...
AnthonyRosenberg/iStock Unreleased via Getty Images The S&P 500 has fully recovered all of its year-to-date losses, with investors hopeful that talks with Iran will produce an end to the conflict and restore oil prices back to normal. What has not recovered, however, is tech stocks. The stock market is still confused about how to treat AI: is it a tailwind or a headwind? In the meantime, the data center building boom continues in full force, skyrocketing the price of its most constrained component: memory. Add memory to the list of problems at HP Inc. ( HPQ ), the maker of PCs and printers. Despite a rebound in PC sales and slight improvement in printing trends, HP's stock has declined ~15% since the start of the year. The question for investors now is, is it an appropriate time to buy the dip, or is HP a falling knife? Data by YCharts I last wrote a neutral article on HP in December, when the stock was trading in the low $20s. At the time, I had cautioned that the company's withering profits in its PC division, coupled with secular tailwinds in print, would cause challenges for the company. But at the same time, a low valuation and rich dividend yield made up for those risks. Today, with HP trading much lower, the compensation from a valuation angle is much more appealing, pushing me to be cautiously optimistic on this name: I'm upgrading HP to a buy. At current share prices, I see more potential tailwinds for this stock than headwinds. The core upside drivers are: HP has returned to earnings growth. With the company effectively driving a flat business mix (PC sales strength offset by slight declines in print), the company's generous share buybacks over the past few years are finally driving HP to achieve positive earnings growth, which makes its single-digit P/E ratios look off. Strength in PC unit sales. HP has recently accelerated to double-digit unit sales growth in PCs, which is notable in a tougher consumer economy. The company benefits from having a broad po...
zi3000/iStock via Getty Images Nobody has a perfect track record when it comes to investing. Having said that, in most instances, I turn out to be right. But every so often, the market disagrees with me, sometimes by quite a bit. A good example of this can be seen by looking at Mama's Creations ( MAMA ), a food-centric business that focuses on producing and selling fresh, deli-prepared foods. Its ...
zi3000/iStock via Getty Images Nobody has a perfect track record when it comes to investing. Having said that, in most instances, I turn out to be right. But every so often, the market disagrees with me, sometimes by quite a bit. A good example of this can be seen by looking at Mama's Creations ( MAMA ), a food-centric business that focuses on producing and selling fresh, deli-prepared foods. Its products can be found in more than 12,000 grocery chains, mass sellers, clubs, and convenience stores all throughout the US. This is not a fast-growing market. But management has done a fantastic job of expanding the business in recent years. In my last article about the company, published in September of last year, I reaffirmed it as a ‘sell’ candidate. It's not that I had a problem with the overall fundamentals of the business. In fact, the firm was growing at a rather rapid pace. My problem, instead, was just how expensive the stock was. Yes, management was forecasting significant growth over the next few years and has delivered on some of that expansion. But unless you expect everything to go perfectly, the end result here is a business that is drastically overpriced. Shares are up 72.2% since then, drastically outperforming the 5.2% increase of the S&P 500 over the same window of time. Looking at the picture again, I see an enterprise that is doing quite well. I can understand why investors are enthusiastic. However, the stock is still incredibly pricey. And unless you expect rapid growth without meaningful additional debt, I don't really see a realistic scenario where the company comes out looking like a good prospect. Because of this, I firmly believe that maintaining it as a ‘sell’ candidate makes sense. But with earnings around the corner and analysts expecting a big improvement in revenue and profitability, I am willing to admit that I could be wrong if the data justifies a change in opinion. A Wild Ride for Mama's Creations Operationally speaking, I would say tha...
US and Iranian delegations fail to reach common ground after 21 hours of negotiations, with both sides blaming the other for unreasonable demands Hello, and welcome to our live coverage of events in the Middle East, as US-Iran peace talks in Islamabad seemingly broke down on Sunday. After a marathon 21-hour first day of talks, US vice-president JD Vance announced on Sunday that his negotiating tea...
US and Iranian delegations fail to reach common ground after 21 hours of negotiations, with both sides blaming the other for unreasonable demands Hello, and welcome to our live coverage of events in the Middle East, as US-Iran peace talks in Islamabad seemingly broke down on Sunday. After a marathon 21-hour first day of talks, US vice-president JD Vance announced on Sunday that his negotiating team was leaving Pakistan without reaching a deal. High-stakes negotiations between the US and Iran appeared to break down on Sunday, despite the historic and face-to-face meetings marking the highest-level direct engagement between Washington and Tehran in decades . The talks in Pakistan were aimed at securing a peace agreement to end the weeks-long war. The core US delegation was led by Vance, who has now left Pakistan. The Iranian foreign ministry had warned earlier that the success of this weekend’s talks depended on Washington avoiding “excessive demands” and “unlawful requests”. Among issues discussed were the strategic strait of Hormuz, nuclear development, war reparations, and sanctions. The strait of Hormuz remains among the main points of “serious disagreement” , Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency reported on Saturday. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Saturday that Israel remains committed to keep fighting Iran . “Israel under my leadership will continue to fight Iran’s terror regime and its proxies,” Netanyahu wrote on social media. Israel was not present at the US-Iran talks. Donald Trump told reporters outside the White House that it made “no difference” to him if a deal was reached with Iran . “Regardless of what happens, we win,” Trump said. “Whether we make a deal or not, makes no difference to me.” The latest Israeli attacks on Lebanon have pushed the death toll to more than 2,000 with more than 6,300 wounded, according to the health ministry. Earlier, the Iranian negotiators demanded a ceasefire in Lebanon, reparations and commitment to ...
There are plenty of things to like about 401(k) accounts, including their hands-off nature, company matches, and the ability to lower your taxable income. For many Americans, they're synonymous with saving for retirement, which makes sense because it's by far the most widely used retirement account type in the Unites States. A 401(k) is great, and rightfully the main retirement account people use,...
There are plenty of things to like about 401(k) accounts, including their hands-off nature, company matches, and the ability to lower your taxable income. For many Americans, they're synonymous with saving for retirement, which makes sense because it's by far the most widely used retirement account type in the Unites States. A 401(k) is great, and rightfully the main retirement account people use, but an individual retirement account (IRA) is an underrated option that can supercharge your retirement savings and offer a bit more flexibility than your 401(k) does. Image source: Getty Images. Continue reading