Pandemiconomics

Oops, Apocalypse

The pandemic that’s upon us is – obviously – a complete surprise, one that couldn’t be planned for. Understandably governments are reacting in real-time to an unfolding threat in the best way that they can. It’s – as they say – a Black Swan event.

Only – it isn’t. Pandemics are not unknown unknowns, they’re known unknowns. Just as in 2008 when governments had started to forget the lessons of the Great Depression so they have forgotten the lessons of the Spanish ‘flu pandemic of 1918. History will not be kind.

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The Future is Made in the Bedroom, Not the Boardroom

RIP Hans Rosling

Hans Rosling was, if you’re a data geek like me, a hero. His life was spent not just combating fake facts and opinion based decision making but also in finding new and imaginative ways of visualising real data. And he was in demand by corporations across the world because his work showed them where to invest.

So obviously Rosling wasn’t an economist: he was a population statistician who built his ideas on data, rather than models. And what his data suggests is that the future is made in the bedroom, not the boardroom.

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A Load of Bull

Sporadic Bull 

In a recent (very nice) review the writer described me as a “sporadic blogger” which is, I suppose, nothing more than a statement of fact.  It’s nicely circular, though, as the one of the reasons for the infrequent posting was the subject of the review … 

The book, Investing Psychology: The Effects of Behavioral Finance on Investment Choice and Bias (Wiley Finance), is a review of the current state of behavioral finance for the non-expert – a task born out of hope as much as expectation, I should add, as the subject moves almost as fast as you can research it – and a plea for investors to take care, to avoid the less-than-well-signposted traps.  Finance is a world dominated by people whose relationship with the truth isn't so much tenuous as trivialized.  And a bull market attracts bull merchants like no other.

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Bad Press: The Sad Demise of Financial Journalism

Free Speech

The press have always had a key role to play in the maintenance of democracy.  They have free speech rights which are protected by the courts - in particular they have the right to protect their sources – which other people aren’t afforded.  However, there’s a view that this power brings responsibility, and that responsibility is to hold the rich and the powerful to account.

Yet financial journalists have, with a few exceptions, been conspicuous by their absence when the great financial scandals of the twenty first century have unfolded.  Indeed they’ve often been implicated in the issues, egging on investors with hyped up stories of superpowered CEOs and overly optimistic forecasts.  And, frankly, if financial journalists aren’t able or willing to exercise their duties, should we continue to allow them the rights to do so?

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