The Philosophical Investor's Blog

A Wonderful Trip - My Travels Through Greece, Italy and Israel

Greece Vacation

Socrates said that “wonder is the beginning of wisdom.” In my book, I talk about the importance of wonder in the context of leading a fulfilling, meaningful, and interesting life. One of the best ways to keep wonder alive is to get outside of our normal environment and travel.

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Who Would Have Thunk it?

COVID 19 in Texas

Texas becomes the first state to reimpose restrictions after lifting stay-at-home order April 30

I can’t say I’m surprised that states that had itchy trigger fingers to reopen (e.g. Texas, Arizona, Florida) are seeing a surge in new COVID-19 cases and a higher positivity rate among those tested. The following graph from the Wall Street Journal shows how the number of new cases is hitting a new peak after having come down.

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Interest Rates: Lower for How Much Longer?

variable interest rates

“We’re not thinking about raising rates — 

we’re not even thinking about thinking about raising rates,” 

Jerome Powell during 6/10/20 press conference

With interest rates at record lows, this is a time when many people are strongly considering locking in long-term,

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It's Time to Get Serious About Laughter

Gary Zoom Laughter

At the end of last week’s blog, I mentioned that I would be writing about laughter. I thought it was important to not stay on only one end of the spectrum despite these very turbulent times. A fascinating new interview with Bob Dylan came out last week and this caught my attention that I thought was very relevant to my pivot towards laughter for this blog.

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Hello Darkness My Old Friend

suicide Anthony Bourdain

For this week I was originally going to continue my analysis of interest-rate cycles since last week, I looked at increasing interest rate cycles and I was intending to look at decreasing cycles this week. In light of the widely reported and fairly startling suicide of Kate Spade and now Anthony Bourdain,

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Wading into Turbulent Waters

Black Lives Matter equality for all

Turning and turning in the widening gyre   

The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed,

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What's Going On? America in Crisis, in the Lyrics

America-In-Crisis

I was intending to write about the tremendous drop in interest rates around the world in the wake of Brexit, the dramatically improved jobs report, or the $20+ billion that is now frozen in UK property funds. And then the shocking execution of five Dallas police officers shortly after the death of two seemingly non-threatening African Americans in Louisiana and Minnesota took place.

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A Return to Tennis - Lessons Learned

COVID19 Tennis Pandemic

I was able to finally return to playing some competitive tennis last week. This is something that I was eagerly awaiting. On one of my daily walks ascending the very steep hill near my home I was reflecting on this and how could I best position myself to hit the ground running when I returned to the court.

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So Much for That? Is The Floating Rate Still a Winning Bet?

So much for that-Bond Market Carnage

This is what I wrote in my blog of May 7, 2018:

So up until this point having bet on floating rate has been a winning bet. The question now is whether it will be going forward. Before answering that,

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The Positives of Being Negative

LIBOR Variable Interest Rates F

Ok, let’s get this out of the way first since this blog has a subliminal purpose of being a diary for major economic and financial milestones so this is one I can’t ignore.

April Unemployment Rate Rose to a Record 14.7 2020

Now to the subject at hand.

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