Author: Emily Carter

Don’t underestimate the power of compounding; a seemingly small increase from 7.5% to 10% yields 2.5x the initial investment over 20 years. Many UHNW individuals unknowingly lose substantial wealth long-term due to disorganized financial affairs (Hayden Capital via The Curious Mind). Rates forecasts illustrate the unpredictability of the future (@Aureliusltd28). Great weekend listen. Will make you a bit worried about the direction of equity markets. Your periodic update on the Toronto condo market. It will get worse before it gets better. Paying over $1M for 585 sqft is where this went wrong in the first place (@BenRabidoux). The broader real…

The February NFIB survey indicates small business uncertainty is nearing record highs since the 1970s (Apollo). The Presidents chaotic behavior is crippling business decisions. Plans for expansion are at their lowest level since the pandemic. I still believe it is by design to slow the economy (@dailychartbook). Businesses are increasingly mentioning tariffs, uncertainty, inflation and immigration (@TheTranscript_). Credit card data in the DC area corroborates the employment concerns in the region (@rev_cap). There appears to be a cost to countries who have decided to aggressively decarbonize their grids (@Schuldensuehner). The next mega trend in renewables is utility-scale batteries (@Guay_JG). Anecdote…

The charts below are from Michael Mauboussin’s latest paper. I believe most UHNW individuals would benefit from having the chart below printed out for when venture deals come across their desks. Over 31,000 observations of returns from global venture capital deals, covering the period from the mid-1990s to 2018, indicate that 62% of venture deals lose money, with more than half losing 50 to 100% of the invested capital. However, the potential rewards are significantly greater than those in public equities or buyouts, leading to fatter tails in the distribution of returns. In over 15,000 observations of returns from global…

New construction homes are accumulating in the US, leading to the highest inventory levels since the global financial crisis, which will put pressure on prices. Canadian housing market bubble continues to deflate. House in Niagara region sold for almost $1.4M in 2022, sells for $920k this week. Safe to say, there is no equity left in the deal. Here are the top 5 companies in Canada and the US, highlighting a lack of innovation. Aside from Shopify, Canada’s leading companies largely originate from the 1800s. For Canada to become a global leader, this must change. This problem plagues many nations,…

The S&P 500 rose 1.6% Friday, trimming its February losses. Uncertainty remains around tariffs on Mexico and Canada. Trump spent most of last week cozying up to Russia. Rate sensitive sectors were the top performing last week and Technology struggled led by Nvidia. 10Y yields were down more than 20 bps in the US and Canada, resulting in a strong week for fixed income. Awful week for crypto until Trump pumped the market on Sunday. Precious metals and commodities struggled. Nvidia’s rough day has brought the US exceptionalism trade back to square one, the S&P 500 is now lagging behind…

Hedge funds have been reducing their exposure to global equities at the fastest pace in over a decade (@TheShortBear). This is from a week ago, I imagine it has only accelerated. Below is a list of top hedge fund holdings from Goldman. Amazon was the hedge fund favourite at year end (@ecommerceshares). US stocks are crowded, likely due to recency bias, as the past 15 years have been their best performance 15 year stretch since 1970. (Bridgewater). The market remains extremely concentrated and dependant on the largest 10 stocks to drive index returns (UBS Returns Yearbook). Since 2020, in 3…

The President the market thought it was getting vs the President the market got (wsj). While European stocks have recently outperformed, they have 15 years of underperformance to make up for (TS Lombard via ). Spoke with a couple from DC who worked in government (one Democrat, one Republican) over the weekend; both expressed serious concerns about US government cuts and were rushing to reducing their DC real estate exposure. DOGE seems to be mirroring Elon’s Twitter slash and burn approach; time will tell if service levels can be maintained with a smaller workforce (Apollo). Over the past two years,…

Even before taking office, the new German government’s massive debt plan is making waves. German bonds suffered their worst day since 1990, with 10-year yields spiking 30 bps. Market is expecting the EU defense sector to be a major beneficiary of stimulus. The majority of Europeans feel like Ukraine isn’t getting enough support but they don’t want to be the one to actually support! China is also hopping on the stimulus bandwagon. For 2025, they are targeting the largest deficit in more than 15 years. All roads lead to more spending! Given the failure of Trump’s initial trade war to…

18 hours of panic? Few expected it to reach this point, yet tariffs are now in effect, but rumors suggest a deal may be announced today. Below are the additional tariff threats pledged by Trump. I understand Trump’s desire for factories in the US; while it might negatively impact the global economy, revamping supply chains will take decades and may lead to stagflation in the short term. China should be the priority, so I’m unclear why Trump is targeting his allies. The tariffs hurt rest of world economies but they also cause chaos for US domestic manufacturers. The comments below…

Looks like Trump is moving forward with tariffs on Canada and Mexico. The auto manufacturers will be one of the hardest hit industries. Bernstein estimates that the tariffs will add $2700 per vehicle, for an incremental $110 million per day. The dreams of a pro-business administration are fading as uncertainty wrecks havoc. Bain released their 2025 Private Equity report. The exit enviroment remains the number 1 concern for LPs and GPs. While deal value was up and exits were up, private equity distributions as a percentage of NAV declined further in 2024 to a new decade low. The J-curve for 2020-22…