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To most people (particularly non-smokers), the idea of picking up a cigar butt from the gutter would rank fairly high on the ‘disgusting’ scale. Lighting it up and taking a few puffs - even more so. After all, there’s a reason people throw things away. Usually, it’s because they’re unloved, unwanted, or worthless. Often all three apply.
Benjamin Graham lost around 70 per cent of his wealth in the Wall Street crash of 1929. Despite that, nearly a century later, he’s still regarded as the father of Value Investing. To provide some perspective, Graham fared better than the average punter. Within three years of ‘Black Thursday’ in 1929, the overall market had fallen by 89.2 per cent. Fortunes had been lost, and the Great Depression was well underway.
32 years ago, everybody who held a Commonwealth Bank account received a hefty document in the mail. It was an invitation to become a shareholder in the bank, which until then had been government-owned. The minimum investment was 400 shares at a price of $5.40 – a total of $2,160. The canny people who wrote out a cheque for $2,160 and put their share certificate in the bottom drawer are today sitting on a holding worth around $52,500. That’s a 1,700 per cent return.
Economic forecasts are rarely accurate. Any Federal Treasurer will tell you that. Just four years ago, then-Treasurer Josh Frydenberg forecast a surplus of $7.1 billion for 2019/20. After paying for the unexpected impacts of bushfires and the Covid crisis, that predicted surplus turned into an $85 billion deficit.
In 2016, Hillary Clinton was a clear favourite to become the 45th President of the United States. Most pundits were amazed that her Republican rival, Donald Trump, had progressed this far in the contest. He wasn’t considered a serious contender. We all know the outcome.
Nearly twenty years ago, 34-year-old Londoner Ashley Revell made a bet few of us would ever even consider. He sold everything he owned – his house, his car, even his clothes – and took a flight to the United States where he checked into a Las Vegas casino. The he headed for the Roulette wheel, where he gambled every cent he’d scraped together (a total of US$135,300 to be exact) on a single bet. Revell put his chips on red, his reasoning being he had a 50:50 chance of winning. To some people, that sort of punt is no different to investing in shares. But as we’ll see, it’s a totally different scenario.
If you’re reading this and you’ve already reached the age of 50, then you know a bit about inflation. You’ll remember the 1980s, when inflation peaked at 11.35 per cent, way ahead of wages growth. It took years to bring those spiralling price increases under control.
Jim Millner wasn’t your typical corporate executive. Then again, Washington H. Soul Pattinson (WHSP), the family business he ran for nearly three decades is also far from typical.
So far, 2023 hasn’t been a happy new year for workers in technology. Actually, the latter part of 2022 wasn’t too great either. As both interest rates and inflation began their upwards march, the global tech giants started trimming the size of their workforce.
It’s been used as a symbol of prestige and authority for thousands of years. The earliest coins minted by a central bank were made from gold. It has applications in electronics, dentistry, aerospace and medical industries. Demand for gold as a decorative item hasn’t waned since the time of Ancient Egypt. But given most gold is just hoarded in the vaults of central banks, is it actually useful?
The typical CEO is around 50 years of age, and stays in the position for an average of five years. Then there’s Warren Buffett. Buffett will turn 93 this August, and he’s held the top job at Berkshire Hathaway for over half a century.
You’ve heard it all before – young people saying they’re priced out of the housing market because Baby Boomers and their Gen X partners in crime own all the good property. In response, plenty of older people argue that it’s always been a slog to buy a house, often pointing to 17% mortgage rates in the early 1990s.