August 9, 2013 By Steve Blumenthal (from the 361 Capital Weekly Research Briefing) Every quarter for as long as I can remember, I anxiously await Jeremy Grantham’s quarterly investment letter.  Jeremy’s firm manages more than $100 billion.  I remember how he stuck to his disciplined process in [...]Read More >

August 2, 2013 By Steve Blumenthal Like the Wile E. Coyote, we have raced ahead and are finding ourselves out over the cliff.  Slower growth, manipulated GDP, underfunded pensions and unprecedented global currency manipulation…we are far from normal conditions – too much debt remains the major [...]Read More >

July 26, 2013 By Steve Blumenthal Sometimes I sit back and reflect on just how grateful I am to be in this business.  Challenging? Yes, but very intellectually stimulating.  I am extremely excited today after a productive meeting focusing on how to better manage fixed income portfolio exposure.  [...]Read More >

July 19, 2013 By Steve Blumenthal I have been feeling more and more uneasy; much like I did in 2007 when I got my arms around sub-prime mortgages and those packaged pools of AAA rated sub-prime junk.  The liquidity it provided fueled an inflating real estate bubble.  “The real estate market had [...]Read More >

July 5, 2013 By Steve Blumenthal Money will move to where it is treated best.  One needs to have a global view and understand that we are deeply interconnected.   The grand experiment moves forward and we are not alone in the chemistry lab.  Europe, Japan, China and the U.S. are all printing on [...]Read More >

June 28, 2013 By Steve Blumenthal This week, I discuss two relevant thoughts and first share a few thoughts on the recent spike in interest rates: Total Credit Market Debt is still too high The Tipping Point The big headwind to growth remains debt, deficits and entitlements.  At the [...]Read More >

June 21, 2013 By Steve Blumenthal This week, I discuss four relevant thoughts: Fisher and Volcker – Some common sense exists China - Japanese-style deflation Italian Showdown with Germany over Euro is Near One more to celebrate – Stephen Mittel Dallas Fed President Richard [...]Read More >

June 14, 2013 By Steve Blumenthal This week, I discuss five relevant thoughts: Dallas Fed President Richard Fisher on “The Grand Experiment in Modern Monetarism” El-Erian on “What the Markets are Telling Us” John Mauldin on Japan AQR’s Cliff Asness showing the forward return outlook of [...]Read More >

June 7, 2013 By Steve Blumenthal “A Race to the Bottom”.  It was April 2, 2011 and the call came.  I had just gotten off the ski lift at nearly 12,000 feet on top of Snowbird mountain (Utah).  “Are you sitting down?” No, I answered, what happened?  Mauldin was to fly up to have dinner with me [...]Read More >

May 31, 2013 By Steve Blumenthal Paul Volker - Volcker Weighs In on Limits of Fed's Easy Money Policies  On Wednesday Former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker waded into the debate over when to reduce today's ultra-easy U.S. monetary policies, contending that the benefits of bond buying [...]Read More >

May 24, 2013 By Steve Blumenthal PIMCO’s Blender Being the investment geek that I am, there are several annual research meetings that I eagerly await to read about each year.   One of which is PIMCO’s Annual Secular Forum.   Picture a room full of some of the industry’s brightest thought [...]Read More >

May 16, 2013 By Steve Blumenthal High Yield bonds - Some Insight from a 20 year HY veteran The yield on the Bank of America - Merrill Lynch High Yield Bond Index moved below 5% recently. Just a month ago it set a record low yield by moving below 6% for the first time.  The Fed’s plan of a [...]Read More >

May 10, 2013 By Steve Blumenthal Hyperinflations, Hysteria, and False Memories - James Montier, GMO “To say that the printing of money by central banks to finance government deficits creates hyperinflations is far too simplistic (bordering on the simple-minded). Hyperinflation is not purely [...]Read More >

April 19, 2013 By Steve Blumenthal On portfolio construction – Engineering Targeted Returns and Risks – Ray Dalio explains how to structure a portfolio that targets a 10% return with a 10-12% risk “Most investors have backed into a mix dominated by betas, especially equities. Because the [...]Read More >

April 12, 2013 By Steve Blumenthal “A man should look for what is, and not for what he thinks should be.” — Albert Einstein (1879-1955) I smiled when I turned on the Masters Championship today.  It was two years ago this weekend that I snuggled next to my father on his hospital bed.  Some of [...]Read More >