(Au)our Insights

It is hard to shake a stick without hitting an economist these days. And given how lousy a job they have been doing forecasting the economy, we would argue that a giant stick is needed so that we can hit more of them! We want...Read More

We would like to introduce Nobuya Nemoto, our guest for this month’s newsletter. Nobu has been a great resource to Auour for the past year as we all navigate a unique economic landscape. “Inflation is the tiger whose tail central banks control,” according to the...Read More

Let’s start with a few historical observations: Equity markets have gone up 80% of the time when viewed on a 6-month rolling period. They have experienced 10% or greater declines over a 6-month period approximately 10% of the time. Of the worst downturns over the...Read More

“It is more sekyr [certain] a byrd in your fest, Than to haue three in the sky a‐boue.” – John Capgrave’s The Life of St Katharine of Alexandria, 1450 The last four months have seen investors move from a futurity (new word for us) approach to...Read More

“So I just don’t think a lot of people have seen this. When’s the last time anyone here has seen interest rates up 2 years in a row and 6 or 7 times this year and 4 or 5 next? Nobody has seen that. Nobody...Read More

Two thoughts from Oliver Burkeman (h/t @jposhaughnessey) “True security lies in the unrestrained embrace of insecurity—in the recognition that we never really stand on solid ground, and never can.” “Uncertainty is where things happen.” Over the past two long-drawn-out years, we have discussed the idea...Read More

The world’s addiction to low interest rates reminds us of the Sirens of Greek mythology who allegedly (never convicted) inhabited an island between Aeaea (and you thought Auour had a lot of vowels) and the rocks of Scylla. Their sweet songs (low interest rates) attracted...Read More

In our May 2021 newsletter, Breaking Windows, we discussed inflation and its impact on the investment markets. We said the primary drivers of inflation were the large stimuli injected unevenly into the global economic system through governments and central banks. That newsletter focused on one...Read More

We recently watched a TED talk by fiction author John Green. He opened his talk by discussing Agloe, a made-up town in New York that he used in his book Paper Towns. Agloe was created by the cartographers who made Esso maps in the 1930s...Read More

We are keeping with our summer series of more charts and fewer words. Most of this newsletter will be discussing interest rates, inflation and why many fear the eventual monetary stimulus unwind. The chart above attempts to rebuild a history of U.S. interest rates over...Read More