Institutional Investor (May 5)
“The adoption of technology, including blockchain, artificial intelligence, and big data, has made it possible for private-equity and hedge-fund managers to reduce their fees, placing competitive pressure on rivals still using a traditional fee model.”
Tags: Adoption, AI, Big Data, Blockchain, Competitive pressure, Fees, Hedge-fund, Private equity, Rivals, Technology
USA Today (May 4)
Kim Jong Un “governs the cruelest and most tyrannical regime in the world, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea…. And President Trump would be honored to meet him.” Trump also called the tyrant “a pretty smart cookie” since “at a very young age, he was able to assume power.” Kim Jong Un is a disgrace. To host him “in the nation’s capitol would be unacceptable, because it would give him undeserved approbation and put his rogue nation on an equal footing with our allies.”
Tags: Allies, Cruelest, Kim Jong Un, North Korea, Regime, Rogue, Trump, Tyrannical
The Week (May 3)
“The takeaway from Trump’s first 100 days in office isn’t a list of accomplishments or failures but rather a nugget of hard-won knowledge about the president himself: He is so comprehensively ignorant of policy and history, so thoroughly lacking in a core of settled beliefs or convictions, that the Oval Office might as well be unoccupied.”
Wall Street Journal (May 3)
“In a year filled with European elections, no one wants another debt crisis—even if this requires pretending that Greek politicians will implement pro-growth reforms they’ve repeatedly shunned.” To reach a tentative agreement, “Athens has agreed to make certain reforms in exchange for an approximately €7 billion disbursement from a 2015 bailout package so Greece can meet July debt repayments.” Once again, the can is kicked a little further down the road. “The one certainty is that Greece and its creditors will be back at the same stand a year from now.”
Tags: Bailout, Creditors, Debt crisis, Elections, Europe, Greece, Pretending, Reforms, Repayments
CNN (May 2)
President Trump said “that he would be ‘honored’ to meet with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un under the right circumstances, the latest in a series of odd moves that suggest Trump may still not grasp the power and signal-sending of such a gathering.” Meeting with Kim Jong Un, the Philippines’ Duterte or other dictators creates the wrong optics. “The visuals are all to the good for these men. It puts them on equal footing with the leader of the most powerful nation in the world…. It’s odd that someone as image conscious as Trump doesn’t get that.”
Tags: Dictator, Duterte, Image conscious, Kim Jong Un, North Korea, Optics, Philippines, Trump
The Economist (April 29)
“Those who doubt the power of human beings to change Earth’s climate should look to the Arctic, and shiver…. In the past 30 years, the minimum coverage of summer ice has fallen by half; its volume has fallen by three-quarters. On current trends, the Arctic ocean will be largely ice-free in summer by 2040.”
The Independent (April 28)
“There can be no doubt that the UK’s economic situation is much more likely to deteriorate than improve in the next few years.” Higher taxes and/or lower benefits will be essential to strengthening the Treasury. “All of this adds to stagnant or declining living standards…. No wonder, then, that consumer confidence is likely to become weaker as the uncertainties crowd in.” But the biggest economic hurdle will be crimped investment. “Business does not want to invest in Britain unless they can be sure of a return on those funds after the UK loses its easy access to the single market.”
Tags: Benefits, Consumer confidence, Deteriorate, Investment. Brexit, Living standards, Single market, Taxes, Treasury, UK
New York Times (April 27)
President Trump’s tax plan can hardly be called a plan, but it certainly takes the cake… and serves it up to the rich. “The skimpy one-page tax proposal his administration released on Wednesday is, by any historical standard, a laughable stunt by a gang of plutocrats looking to enrich themselves at the expense of the country’s future.”
