Blog Archives

Built To Last - Finite vs. Infinite Games

Finite and Infinite Games

I had the pleasure of seeing Crazy Rich Asians last week. It was quite enjoyable and I very much recommend it. There is a scene in the movie that represents the clash of values between generations and cultures (Chinese and Chinese American) in which the matriarch criticizes her son’s Chinese American girlfriend for being fixated on the American obsession of happiness and wanting to be happy.

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In Zambia Honoring Roneet With an Agricultural Training Center

Zambia Gary Carmell

Overnight, The Saudis decided to ignite a price war which was the catalyst for oil prices crashing, stock futures imploding, and bond yields going through the floor, as reported by Bloomberg, Sunday, March 8, 2020. This was on top of last weeks dramatic drop in interest rates as exemplified by the 10-year Treasury yield dropping below 0.5% for the first time and 30-day Libor collapsing to below 1%,

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Forces of Fortitude and Fulfillment in the Face of Freakish Fatalistic Fury

Roneet Carmell

Now that the one-year anniversary of Roneet’s passing has taken place I wanted to take the opportunity to reflect on some of the strategies, tools, and approaches that I have taken to move forward in life in the absence of her physical absence.I do emphasize her physical absence because her spirit is still with me and so is her voice in my head,

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The Positive Power Of Network Effects on Real Estate

Network Effects

Network effects are extraordinarily powerful. The more people that join the network, the more valuable it becomes to be part of the network, which leads to more people joining. Entrenched, valuable networks are very hard to dislodge and offer great competitive advantages. Think of Facebook,

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See and Wait

See and Wait

Not surprisingly, the Fed pulled the trigger and raised short-term interest rates by 0.25% for the first time since last December. I thought I would convey what I think are the most pertinent variables to be monitoring in the wake of the Fed tightening. I’m calling this blog post “See and Wait” as I will be showing many charts and opine on some of the ramifications but we will have to wait to see how it unfolds in the real economy.

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Safe Space - Can We Watch Things Unfold from a Safe Distance?

Safe Space - Gary Carmell

I recently read about Tesla’s autopilot software update being able to look one and two cars ahead to determine if they are safe or at risk of an accident and, if so, this would then trigger the Tesla to slow down to avoid it.

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COVID-19, Catch-22, Treasury-117

COVID 19 Coronavirus

With over $6 trillion in global stock market losses in one week, it’s clear that investors have woken up to the real risk that the coronavirus is not contained, somewhat akin to the subprime crisis that Ben Bernanke famously said was and led to massive financial losses around the world.

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Finding the Bottlenecks and Pain Points

removing bottlenecks

CWS has a sister company that focuses on corporate housing. They provide temporary housing for business people, interns, long-term, special projects for companies, etc. I am one of the advisory board members and it’s been such a treat to see how the company has grown and prospered over its 25 years in business.

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And Kobe Lived

Kobe Bryant Lived

I want to start off by expressing my deepest condolences to the families of the nine victims of the devastating helicopter crash that took the lives of Kobe Bryant and his daughter Gianna.

I imagine that the death of Kobe will be one of those events in life that we will always remember where we were when we heard the news.

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The Power of Mindset

CWS State of the Company Mindset

Last week we completed seven of our eleven State of the Company meetings that Tracy Hayes, the president of our sister company CWS Corporate Housing, and I have been doing for 26 years. And while it’s a lot of travel in a relatively short period of time,

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