Barron’s (March 17)
“They’ve gone from the Mag Seven to the Lag Seven.” Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, Amazon.com, Alphabet, Meta Platforms, and Tesla collectively represented over “half of the S& P 500’s gain of 23% in 2024 as they rose an average of 60%.” This year they are “down an average of 15%” and “now account for about 95% of the index’s decline of 6% in 2025.” However, the Mag Seven “aren’t destined to fail or fade into insignificance. They remain too dominant…and too reasonably priced, with six of the seven trading for 18 to 30 times projected 2025 earnings. (Tesla, at 85 times, is the notable exception.)”
Tags: 2024, 2025, Alphabet, Amazon.com, Apple, Decline, Dominant, Earnings, Fade, Fail, Lag Seven, Mag Seven, Meta Platforms, Microsoft, Nvidia, Reasonably priced, S&P 500, Tesla
Financial Times (February 27)
Although “some demographic experts had been hopeful of a pent-up baby boom in Japan following the pandemic,” 2024 confirmed the worst. “The number of babies born in Japan last year fell to the lowest level since records began 125 years ago as the country’s demographic crisis deepens and government efforts to reverse the decline continue to fail.” For nine years straight, “the decline in births has continued unabated…. Combined with a record 1.6mn deaths last year, the figures mean Japan’s population shrank by almost 900,000 people, net of immigration.”
Tags: 2024, Babies, Baby boom, Births, Deaths, Decline, Demographic crisis, Experts, Fail, Government, Immigration, Japan, Pandemic, Pent-up, Population, Record
Washington Post (July 16)
The extreme heat events “should not be viewed in isolation.” They are “virtually impossible” to explain except for human-caused climate change. “Slashing greenhouse gas emissions and transitioning to a greener economy at the scale and pace needed would require creativity, innovation and political courage. But the cost if we fail is far more daunting: a future in which climate disasters, and all the damage and instability that come with them, become the new normal everywhere.”
Tags: Climate change, Climate disasters, Cost, Creativity, Daunting, Extreme heat, Fail, GHG emissions, Greener economy, Innovation, Isolation, Pace, Political courage, Scale, Transitioning
Wall Street Journal (December 28)
PG&E was a “plodding utility” virtually “wired to fail.” As a result, it “has sparked deadly fires and pipeline explosions, left millions of Californians in the dark and gone bankrupt twice in less than 15 years.”
Tags: Bankrupt, California, Explosions, Fail, Fires, Pipeline, Plodding, Sparked, Utility
