MaoXian.com -- Archive > September 19, 2005

Reading Roundup - NYTimes Shuts Readers Out; Classic Mr. B; Bachelor Bomb; Maintaining Technical Virginity; N-Plus-Two Reliability; Housing Busts; Monthly Rebalancing (Guffaw)

Articles I've recently read with my comments in italics, and other miscellany:

NYTimes.com Idiotically Locks Up More Content

I know the beancounters have run the numbers and it makes sense to lock up more of the site, but I think it's a terrible idea. Opening up the archive for $50 a year is smart, but cutting me off from Krugman and Rich and Dowd and the other columnists I read regularly makes no sense. I won't read (or link to or email) any of their columns ever again. (Maybe I can still read them for free at the IHT site?)

"As part of TimesSelect, The Times is also opening up its vast archive of articles reaching back 25 years and eventually back to the paper's founding in 1851. TimesSelect subscribers can read up to 100 articles from the archive a month. For many years our readers have asked for seamless access to The Times's historical archive, and we are now making this available as part of TimesSelect."

Mr. Buffett on the Stock Market, by Carol Loomis.

The classic article from the November 22, 1999 issue of Fortune. It was widely derided at the time as being "out of touch," but we know who has had the last laugh.

China: Bachelor bomb, by Dudley L. Poston Jr. and Peter A. Morrison.

"... China has departed markedly from this natural pattern since the 1980s. Its sex ratio at birth has hovered between 115 and 120 baby boys for every 100 baby girls in recent years, a level that renders roughly one of every eight men in a generation 'surplus.' Many Chinese refer to the surplus boys as guang gun (bare branches)."

I think about the surplus of boys every time I visit my local newsstand and see one wall covered with magazines devoted to guns, tanks, mercenaries, and military strategy. I plan to take a picture of the newsstand sometime and post it -- it will scare the bejesus out of you.

Results of U.S. sex survey surprise the experts, by Tamar Lewin.

"The report offers new information about homosexuality in America. Almost 3 percent of men between 15 and 44 and 4 percent of women reported having a sexual experience with a member of the same sex within the past year, and over their lifetimes, 6 percent of men and 11 percent of women reported having such experiences. About 1 percent of men and 3 percent of women said they had had both male and female sexual partners within 12 months."

Pay special attention to what Dr. Manlove (I'm serious) has to say about oral sex.

Nasdaq: The World's Best Backup, by Karlin Lillington.

An old Wired article on Nasdaq's infrastructure... I wonder how much it has changed in the last seven years.

"In the seconds before trading begins, the system idles at about 10 percent of capacity. But the instant the market opens, at 9:30 a.m. EST, bar graphs on one monitor skyrocket up from the bottom of the screen, changing from white to flashing red, as the system's Tandem computers are slammed with millions of simultaneous bids, offers, and sales. For half an hour, says Hickey, the machines run at 90 percent of capacity until the opening peak subsides. That represents more than 5 million trades per minute, with an average daily volume during the 390-minute trading day of 780 million trades."

Housing Bust Ahead, by Gary Shilling.

Shilling's old schtick: the good deflation of excess supply will become the bad deflation of deficient demand. I'm a bit more sanguine than he is, despite the fact that the homebuilder stocks have probably peaked.

"History also suggests that a housing boom does not have to end violently. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. counted 63 home-price run-ups in various cities over the last 30 years, but so far just 9 of these ended in busts, and all of those were regional. Oil-patch real estate rose with energy prices in the 1970s and followed them down in the mid-1980s. Southern California housing jumped with aerospace in the Reagan-era military expansion and collapsed in the early 1990s with the Cold War's end."

Contrarian selection might not be rock solid, but it has legs, by Harry Domash.

"As of Sept. 9, Contrarian Opportunities still led the field, but this time with an astonishing 1,349 percent cumulative return. By the way, Reuters computes the returns assuming that each portfolio is rebalanced monthly, meaning that a new portfolio is selected every month ... It's amazing that Reuters is still giving the lists away for free."

Um, it's not the least bit amazing that Reuters is giving away the lists for free... the returns aren't risk-adjusted and monthly rebalancing is only practical in a world without taxes or transaction costs.

via Infectious Greed

Posted on September 19, 2005 at 7:30, GMT


	Monday, September 19 Reading Roundup - NYTimes Shuts Readers Out; Classic Mr. B; Bachelor Bomb; Maintaining Technical Virginity; N-Plus-Two Reliability; Housing Busts; Monthly Rebalancing (Guffaw) Articles I've recently read with my comments in italics, and other miscellany: NYTimes.com Idiotically Locks Up More Content I know the beancounters have run the numbers and it makes sense to lock up more of the site, but I think it's a terrible idea. Opening up the archive for $50 a year is smart, but cutting me off from Krugman and Rich and Dowd and the other columnists I read regularly makes no sense. I won't read (or link to or email) any of their columns ever again. (Maybe I can still read them for free at the IHT site?) "As part of TimesSelect, The Times is also opening up its vast archive of articles reaching back 25 years and eventually back to the paper's founding in 1851. TimesSelect subscribers can read up to 100 articles from the archive a month. For many years our readers have asked for seamless access to The Times's historical archive, and we are now making this available as part of TimesSelect." Mr. Buffett on the Stock Market, by Carol Loomis. The classic article from the November 22, 1999 issue of Fortune. It was widely derided at the time as being "out of touch," but we know who has had the last laugh. China: Bachelor bomb, by Dudley L. Poston Jr. and Peter A. Morrison. "... China has departed markedly from this natural pattern since the 1980s. Its sex ratio at birth has hovered between 115 and 120 baby boys for every 100 baby girls in recent years, a level that renders roughly one of every eight men in a generation 'surplus.' Many Chinese refer to the surplus boys as guang gun (bare branches)." I think about the surplus of boys every time I visit my local newsstand and see one wall covered with magazines devoted to guns, tanks, mercenaries, and military strategy. I plan to take a picture of the newsstand sometime and post it -- it will scare the bejesus out of you. Results of U.S. sex survey surprise the experts, by Tamar Lewin. "The report offers new information about homosexuality in America. Almost 3 percent of men between 15 and 44 and 4 percent of women reported having a sexual experience with a member of the same sex within the past year, and over their lifetimes, 6 percent of men and 11 percent of women reported having such experiences. About 1 percent of men and 3 percent of women said they had had both male and female sexual partners within 12 months." Pay special attention to what Dr. Manlove (I'm serious) has to say about oral sex. Nasdaq: The World's Best Backup, by Karlin Lillington. An old Wired article on Nasdaq's infrastructure... I wonder how much it has changed in the last seven years. "In the seconds before trading begins, the system idles at about 10 percent of capacity. But the instant the market opens, at 9:30 a.m. EST, bar graphs on one monitor skyrocket up from the bottom of the screen, changing from white to flashing red, as the system's Tandem computers are slammed with millions of simultaneous bids, offers, and sales. For half an hour, says Hickey, the machines run at 90 percent of capacity until the opening peak subsides. That represents more than 5 million trades per minute, with an average daily volume during the 390-minute trading day of 780 million trades." Housing Bust Ahead, by Gary Shilling. Shilling's old schtick: the good deflation of excess supply will become the bad deflation of deficient demand. I'm a bit more sanguine than he is, despite the fact that the homebuilder stocks have probably peaked. "History also suggests that a housing boom does not have to end violently. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. counted 63 home-price run-ups in various cities over the last 30 years, but so far just 9 of these ended in busts, and all of those were regional. Oil-patch real estate rose with energy prices in the 1970s and followed them down in the mid-1980s. Southern California housing jumped with aerospace in the Reagan-era military expansion and collapsed in the early 1990s with the Cold War's end." Contrarian selection might not be rock solid, but it has legs, by Harry Domash. "As of Sept. 9, Contrarian Opportunities still led the field, but this time with an astonishing 1,349 percent cumulative return. By the way, Reuters computes the returns assuming that each portfolio is rebalanced monthly, meaning that a new portfolio is selected every month ... It's amazing that Reuters is still giving the lists away for free." Um, it's not the least bit amazing that Reuters is giving away the lists for free... the returns aren't risk-adjusted and monthly rebalancing is only practical in a world without taxes or transaction costs. via Infectious Greed Posted on September 19, 2005 at 7:30, GMT Checking on Toll Brothers I follow Toll Brothers very closely (What to Watch for in Toll Brothers & TOL Weekly Grail Triggers; Will It Quickly Fail? & TOL Gaps and Craps on Record Results: Fugly). The daily chart continues to fall apart and the July high of $58.67 may indeed mark "The Top." TOL, Daily Chart Posted on September 19, 2005 at 7:00, GMT Previous Entry >>> Utilities SPDR Closes at All-Time High		Home Archive © 2000 - 2005 Chairman MaoXian

Reading Roundup - NYTimes Shuts Readers Out; Classic Mr. B; Bachelor Bomb; Maintaining Technical Virginity; N-Plus-Two Reliability; Housing Busts; Monthly Rebalancing (Guffaw)

Checking on Toll Brothers