10 Weekend Reads
The weekend is here! Pour yourself a mug of
Tucson Coffee Roasters Monsoon coffee, grab a seat by the fire, and get ready for our longer form weekend reads:
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The Essex Boys: How Nine Traders Hit a Gusher With Negative Oil “
They had balls of steel. It was quite unbelievable to see.” Among the many previously unthinkable moments of 2020, one of the strangest occurred on April 20, when the price of crude oil fell below zero. Over the course of a few hours, a guy called Cuddles and eight of his pals from the freewheeling world of London’s commodities markets rode oil’s crash to a $660 million profit. (Businessweek)
ECB expected to expand and extend stimulus Uncertainly remains over U.S. stimulus
LONDON, Dec 10 (Reuters) - Bets on more European Central Bank stimulus kept Europe’s main stock markets and the euro steady on Thursday, but Britain’s pound saw its biggest drop in almost a month after overnight Brexit talks turned sour.
It had been a mixed session for Asia amid a surge in coronavirus cases and the ejection of some Chinese stocks from S&P Dow Jones’ indices, so there was little surprise when Europe struggled to add to recent highs.
The pan-European STOXX 600 index was flat, though London’s FTSE 100 did score its eighth straight gain as the Brexit uncertainty pushed the pound down 0.8% to just under $1.33 and 90.95 pence per euro.
10 Friday AM Reads
My end of week morning
train WFH reads:
Asset Destruction: “
I am so sorry.” These are the only four words that come to mind. I don’t know what else to say to an investor who’s been sold a load of garbage by a life insurance agent. I can no longer keep quiet as I witness this silent epidemic of bad incentives, high pressure sales tactics, and the destruction of investor’s hard earned money. These expensive life insurance products are asset destruction. (Belle Curve)
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Home Equity Reaches Record Highs: Homeowners Gained Over $1 Trillion in Equity in Q3 2020 U.S. homeowners with mortgages (which account for roughly 63% of all properties) have seen equity increase by 10.8% year over year, representing a collective equity gain of $1 trillion, and an average gain of $17,000 per homeowner, since the third quarter of 2019. This marks the largest average equity gain since the first quarter of 2014. (CoreLogic)
Illuminate Financial invests in Net Purpose, pioneer in impact data
LONDON, Dec. 10, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) Net Purpose, a global impact data provider, has completed a $2.5m round led by Illuminate Financial, with participation from Revent Ventures; Jim O Neill, former Chairman of Goldman Sachs Asset Management; Kevin Gould, Co-Founder of Markit; and J Jeffry Louis, former chairman of Gannett Co
. They join existing and new investors, including the Louis family; Matt Cooper, Co-Founder of Capital One Bank and Chairman of Octopus Investments; Sari Miller, Managing Partner, Impact Ventures LLC; Stefano Bernardi from Atomico s Angel Programme; Matt Robinson, Founder of GoCardless and Nested; and Vlad Tropko, Managing Director of Digital Horizon.
Bets on more European Central Bank stimulus kept Europe's main stock markets and the euro steady on Thursday, but Britain's pound saw its biggest drop in almost a month after overnight Brexit talks turned sour.