Top Podcasts of the Week

November 25, 2019

Below is our “Top Podcast” episode with our new curator, Colby Donovan! Holler with any feedback!

Today we have an episode warning us about China, two great value investing episodes with Joel Greenblatt and Charles de Vaulx, and an episode on the future of education in the U.S.

Business***Must Listen*** The Long View: Charles de Vaulx: Why Value Investing Has Slumped but Will Rebound. De Vaulx is the CIO and PM at International Value Advisers, where he is a quality-oriented value investor focused on taking advantage of cyclicality. He discusses on the underperformance of value, which he believes is due to 1) the low interest rate environment, 2) vast amount of buybacks, and 3) lack of any business cycle since 2009. As an investor that has the ability to invest anywhere in the world, he provides some unique perspective on where he specifically sees value across the globe. He also talks about his focus on protecting the downside and having a margin of safety and the fact that he and his team do not perform DCF models and instead use multiples from M&A transactions. [November 20, 2019–58 minutes] iTunes Podcast | Spotify | Overcast | Breaker | Website LinkHidden Forces: The Present Danger: America, China, and the Second Cold War | Kyle Bass. The episode is with Kyle Bass, who is the CIO of Hayman Capital Management and founding member of the “Committee on the Present Danger: China,” and was featured in The Big Short. He talks about the threat of the Chinese Communist Party to Western democracy, the social issues occurring in China with both the situation in Hong Kong and the Uyghurs which are being held in “re-education camps” and having their organs harvested. He also addresses the threat of having the Chinese government control the 5G network and having access to Americans genomic data. He then ties all of this into what he sees as an impending recession in China and issues with their banking system, and how the societal issues could exacerbate some of these issues and tension between China and the rest of the world. [November 18, 2019–55 minutes] iTunes Podcast | Spotify | Overcast | Breaker | Website LinkCapital Allocators: Steve Rattner — Overseeing Michael Bloomberg’s Family Office. Rattner is the Chairman and CEO of Willett Advisors, which invests former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s personal and philanthropic assets. He covers his wide-ranging career, which has included journalism, investment banking, private equity, and serving in the Obama administration as head of the successful restructuring of the automobile industry after the financial crisis. He talks about each stop of his career and then turns to managing Michael Bloomberg’s family office. He then discusses asset classes and how he and his firm view and allocate to each, including hedge funds, private equity, emerging markets, venture capital and public equity, and then wraps with his political involvement and thoughts on the situation with China. [November 18, 2019–53 minutes] iTunes Podcast | Spotify | Overcast | Breaker | Website LinkVenture Stories: Investing in Education, ISA’s, and Bootcamps with Ruben Harris and David Phillips. This is a great episode on the future of education why the ability to educate and re-educate people is going to be paramount going forward. They address the current state of coding bootcamps, what they think the next couple of waves and iterations will be (more niche as time moves along), and apply the coding bootcamp model to other vocations. They also discuss income-sharing-agreements (ISA’s), specifically with The Lambda School, which is a nine month coding program that has had a lot of success. They then dive more into Lambda School and how they have succeeded to date (you can listen to a podcast with their CEO here). [November 19, 2019–49 minutes] iTunes Podcast | Spotify | Overcast | Breaker | Website LinkValue Investing with Legends: Joel Greenblatt — Investing Off the Beaten Path. Greenblatt is the Founder and Managing Partner of Gotham Asset Management, author of multiple books, including The Little Book That Still Beats the Market, and a well-respected value investor. He begins with his background and becoming an investor, starting out in merger arbitrage and then broadening his focus to special situations (an idea he discusses in his other book, You Can Be a Stock Market Genius: Uncover the Secret Hiding Places of Stock Market Profits). He explains the importance of valuing a business, his process of doing so and emphasizes the importance of applying that skillset to multiple situations in the market. [November 15, 2019–50 minutes] iTunes Podcast | Spotify | Overcast | Breaker | Website LinkRECOMMENDATIONSBooks

Joel Greenblatt (Founder and Managing Partner of Gotham Asset Management):

  1. Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell — Described how a high percentage of NHL hockey players were born between January and March which allowed them to have an early advantage since they were older than their peers. The book showed there is a lot of luck involved in life, and he was lucky enough to start investing when there was a bull market.

Michael Lombardi (Former NFL Executive, New England Patriots):

  1. What You Do Is Who You Are: How to Create Your Business Culture by Ben Horowitz — Incredible book on how to create business culture.

Jack Vogel (CIO, Alpha Architect):

  1. Your Complete Guide to Factor-Based Investing by Andrew Berkin — Very readable, gives a high level overview, walks through what is factor investing, what are factors, which ones do we think can work and why.

Documentaries

Demetri Kofinas (Host and Editor-in-Chief, Hidden Forces):

  1. The China Hustle — A documentary about fraud within Chinese companies.

Ruben Harris (Founder, Career Karma):

  1. College Inc. — Explains for profit universities grew by acquiring accredited schools and hired great sales and marketing staff to advertise towards poor people that qualified for student-loans. His takeaway is that their sales and marketing tactics could be applied towards individuals that need this type of support and that is something that really excites him.

—-Here’s ours:

Good investing,Meb Fabertheideafarm.com