Liberty

Gotta get your edge where you can! It all compounds!

Canadians are getting screwed, probably because there's a lot less competition in most industries up here. Retailers might complain about the US being over-retailed, but it has benefits for customers.

Yeah, the realtor boards are shameless, but honestly I can't really blame them... their job is to sell houses, not provide an objective view of the market. Nobody expects a car salesman to give you objective and unbiased advice. Blaming realtors for pooping out dubious market data is like blaming a bird for pooping on your car. That's their job... it's just what they do. Now the media on the other hand... their job is to inform the public and to ask hard questions of authority. So seeing the media just regurgitate the realtors' bad data without questioning it at all is pretty galling. They are either complicit or lazy. And the CMHC, well... I'm not sure even they know exactly what their raison d'être is anymore. But you'd think an agency that is ultimately backstopping most of the residential mortgages in Canada would have some decent data on the internal dynamics of the housing market. But apparently not. I also blame the media and the regulators, but I don't think realtors are blameless, even if there's no surprise in their behavior. Lying isn't a good thing, y'know.

I think we're about to see the benefits of controlling a tightly integrated ecosystem: http://daringfireball.net/linked/2014/08/28/september Gruber's not the kind of guy who makes a lot of predictions, so I trust he has a pretty good source for this. Wouldn't it be neat to have a phone with a secure enclave, a good fingerprint scanner, and NFC to allow you to quickly and securely pay for stuff, and a wearable that also has that secure enclave and NFC so you don't even have to take the phone out of your pocket/purse? Maybe there's even a fingerprint sensor on the wearable? iBeacon tech would also be really useful for retail. Now that's the kind of mobile payment system that would be secure and convenient enough to get widespread adoption. If Apple were to charge a tiny fee to vendors to support it, they all would, because who wouldn't want to support the most profitable customers out there? That could be a pretty huge and very profitable business; ask Visa and Mastercard. Update: Gurman tends to have decent sources too: http://9to5mac.com/2014/05/29/apple-discussing-iphone-payments-service-with-high-profile-retail-brands/

Good post, looking back on 10 years since IPO: http://basehitinvesting.com/10-years-of-google-and-the-importance-of-long-term-thinking/

Timing is always hard. A lot of people thought there was a tech bubble in the mid 90s and had to wait for years before it burst. Some even changed their minds, capitulated, and bought near the top. What we have to remember is that the market doesn't have to do anything on a schedule that is convenient for us, but the laws of economics haven't been repealed either.

http://www.bloomberg.com/video/aig-ceo-robert-benmosche-exit-sped-up-amid-cancer-prognosis-WV5E85M3So6SEufeE5XwYg.html I wish him the best.

Vancouver's the worst in the country, but the epicenter of a crisis doesn't even have to start there. It's about sentiment (certainly not about fundamentals -- look at multiples of incomes and rents), so if the market blows up first in Toronto or elsewhere, you can be certain that Vancouver people will take note and proceed to freak out in turn.

This. Exactly this. But what we do know is that if most of the data comes from realtors, it's going to be heavily biased to help them, not the other way around. That's why they quietly revise last year's numbers downward to make this year's numbers look better or double and triple count sales just because they've been listed in more than one place and stuff like that.

Garth Turner writes a lot about the so called 'hot-asian-money' and how it isn't nearly as much as most people think. Lots of media and realtor hype and little substance on a scale that could prop up the whole market. Many Canadians of Asian ancestry are being mistaken for foreigners too.

In the same way that the stock market is (somewhat) forward-looking, I think the RE market is. So you won't need a lot of people to lose their shirt before things turn, you'll just need a change of sentiment; people who don't think anything bad can happen change their mind and realize that trees don't grow to the sky. Anything could be a catalyst. Then the marginal buyer who doesn't think twice today about getting a gigantic mortgage will evaporate. Otherwise, what will it be? In 10 years everybody making 65k will live in 2-3 million dollar houses? While similar houses in the U.S. go for maybe 400k?

And where is Japan's real estate market now compared to where it was at its peak? Not that it matters. Canada is very different from Japan on so many levels, I don't think it's a very useful country to compare it to.

Thanks for sharing. This is what capitulation near the top smells like, I think. Reminds me of the Citigroup exec: "As long as the music is playing, you’ve got to get up and dance."

http://www.howmanyarethere.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/munch_scream.jpg ;)

DONE :D

Looks like there's a chance the special meeting will be before December 18: http://online.wsj.com/articles/judge-fast-tracks-valeant-pershing-suit-versus-allergan-1409156501

Sadly, a lot of stuff makes more sense when you think of it from the point of view of financial journalists and financial media consumers rather than from an investor's business-like point of view. We're not really the target audience, and things usually aren't written by people with an investor's mindset.

I also saw this and thought: Revenue is kind of meaningless when you compare a hardware company with service companies. Maybe you can compare Apple with Tesla, but where's the point comparing it to the social networks? This is a completely different cost structure. AMZN's revenue is greater than BAC's – so what? My theory: Empire builders (and imaginary/wannabe empire builders, as most financial media readers are) care about size, and revenues leads to bigger numbers. That's why revenues are constantly used everywhere, even if they are not that meaningful. In this specific case, I think they just found a bunch of well known tech companies that their readers would recognize. Also, if they had used profits, they would have to cram like 50 companies in the comparison and the graphic wouldn't be as legible ;)

To be fair, Dediu probably agrees with us, and he's just wondering why things are happening this way. But less smart people who read him probably won't get that and think this means that the iPad is somehow doomed, despite stuff like this: http://recodetech.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/ipad_1-crop-promovar-mediumlarge1.png (except that's just revenue, and if we looked at profits it would be much bigger than those) http://recodetech.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/kpcb-internet-trends-007.jpeg

Models are neat, reality is messy.

Some good stuff in there: http://recode.net/2014/08/26/in-defense-of-tablets/

Let me suggest an appropriate title for the review: "Intern reviews boss's book and likes it" You're absolutely right.

WSJ reporter tweeting that meeting will be set for December 18: "Allergan sets shareholder mtg for Dec 18. Valeant & Pershing Sq hoping for an early Christmas present (an expensive one, at $53b) $AGN" Update: "Allergan (NYSE: AGN) set a special meeting on December 18, according to Bloomberg, citing court documents. The meeting relates to proposals by Valeant Pharma (NYSE: VRX) and Pershing Square." http://www.streetinsider.com/Hedge+Funds/Allergan+(AGN)+Special+Meeting+Set+for+Dec.+18+-+Bloomberg/9783902.html http://nypost.com/2014/08/26/allergan-shareholders-to-meet-in-december-amid-lawsuit/

Review of the book: http://www.beyondproxy.com/book-review-education-value-investor/

Have you looked into low-lying plants that cover the ground and never grow much? http://eartheasy.com/grow_lawn_alternatives.htm http://www.gardenista.com/posts/fields-of-green-5-favorite-lawn-substitutes