Skills That Separate You as an Investment Manager: Introspection

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Apr 8, 2014 in Best of the Blog, Blog, Skills That Separate You as an Investment Manager | 0 comments While I have written advice on how to become a research analyst before, I have not talked about the skills that truly separate you from the crowd once you have your coveted research analyst position. Having hired research analyst interns, research analysts, a portfolio manager, and even my own successor when I retired from investment management in 2005, I have gained a fair amount of knowledge...
read more

How Understanding CEO Candor Can Make You Money

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Feb 12, 2014 in Blog | 0 comments My experience in investment management has taught me that half of the analysis battle is waged in the qualitative realm. Chief among these qualitative concerns is the honesty and character of management. Are they representing the truth of their firm’s past, present, and future? When character meets communications you have candor. Laura Rittenhouse, CEO of Rittenhouse Rankings, founded her...
read more

Top Anecdotal Signs of a Market Bubble

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Feb 10, 2014 in Best of the Blog, Blog | 0 comments At the risk of further inflating the bubble in discussion about whether or not global equity markets are in a bubble, I think it is worth discussing the topic from a qualitative point of view. Most of the talk of bubbles is data-driven analysis focusing on things like multiples, profit margins, revenue growth, historic equity market tops, equity risk premiums, and so forth. But having worked as...
read more

Uber’s Surge Pricing a Study in Important Investment Topic: Consumer Surplus

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Jan 27, 2014 in Blog | 0 comments Uber, the San Francisco–based start-up whose mobile app allows people to hail taxis on their smartphones, has had its fair share of bad press lately. (See: “Is Uber’s Surge-Pricing an Example of High-Tech Gouging?” and “Taxi Drivers Turn Violent against Uber in Paris.”) At the heart of the issue is something known as “surge pricing.” Without commenting on the merits of...
read more

Making Sophisticated Financial Models Available to All: Thinknum

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Jan 13, 2014 in Blog | 0 comments Whether you are a seasoned fundamental investor struggling to keep on top of mountains of disparate global data sources, a quantitative analyst looking for distributed computing power to run your models, or a candidate for the CFA charter, chances are you will appreciate Thinknum  and its radical new business model: making sophisticated financial models available to everyone on an open,...
read more

Can Financial Engineering Cure Cancer?

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Dec 3, 2013 in Blog | 0 comments This may seem an odd question, but can financial engineering cure cancer? No less of an intellectual light than Andrew W. Lo of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and member of the Future of Finance Advisory Council believes financial engineering may be a potent weapon in the quest to find a cure. In fact, this was the topic of Lo’s presentation at the recent Fixed-Income Management...
read more