Brain Food
Untangling_Skill_and_Luck_-_Mauboussin 7-15-2010
Schumpeter – In His Own Words – M Cox Dallas Fed 4-6-2010
Who’s Afraid of a Sideways Market – Legg Mason 1-2010
Growth post Crisis C Perez 6-2009 jbt marks
The Mind Set of Great Investors 11-13-09
Friends :
Warren Buffett and Bill Gates were recently presented on CNBC at forum held at Columbia Business School (my alma mater BTW).
As Warren answered questions about what made him such a good investor I was reminded of a very interesting piece written by Michael Mauboussin back in 2007 which I have attached herewith. You may recall Michael’s name from other “brain food” messages I have sent in the past. He is Chief Investment Strategist at Legg Mason Capital Management.
Michael’s piece was occasioned on the announcement in 2007 that Mr. Buffett was formally seeking his successor(s) as the chief investment officer at Berkshire Hathaway. It has many choice nuggets of Warren’s wisdom as well as insights from a famous experiment on whether great traders are made or born that was started in the 1970’s. Two well known commodities traders – Richard Dennis and Bill Eckhardt – determined to see if they could train a group of inexperienced individuals to be successful in the Chicago trading pits. The story was told in a book written by one of the candidates – Curtis Faith – entitled Way of the Turtle.
It is my hope that you will recognize some of the traits described in the piece as being practiced here at Aberdeen. We cannot control price but we can control our process. We make a conscious and accountable effort to measure risk and reward and publish our results weekly. We are committed to transparency. I do not know of any other investment manager that adheres as openly and publicly to our disciplines.
A particularly pertinent quote can be found on page 5. “A trader, or investor, can put on a positive expectation bet (correct process) and still have poor results (outcome) for some period of time due solely to randomness. But many investors attribute bad outcomes to bad processes, which leads to substantial error. As insidious is attributing good outcomes to a good process. A thoughtful investor must carefully consider process and recognize long-term outcomes will follow.”
I hope you enjoy the piece as much as I did. As is my practice, I have marked some lines of interest. You will find application of these thoughts in all of your business endeavors . . . and for that matter – your life.
Mindset of Great Investors JBT marks 5-23-07
Cheers
Jeb
More Brain Food:
Kurzweil’s “The Web Within Us” – Selected charts from Telecosm 2009 11-12-09
I have selected a set of charts from Ray Kurzweil’s presentation at George Gilder’s Telecosm 2009 conference. Ray’s data and views are always enlightening. I have edited his 122 page slide deck down to 28 and added some comments. It is presented below in three parts due to size constraints. – Enjoy!
Kurzweil Selected Charts Telecosm 2009 (PART 1 OF 3)11-11-09
Kurzweil Selected Charts Telecosm 2009 (PART 2 OF 3) 11-11-09
Kurzweil Selected Charts Telecosm 2009 (PART 3 OF 3) 11-11-09
Prior Brain Food:
Long-Term_Investing_Short-Term_World JBT Marks
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