Blog Posts

More tech startups are opting for direct listings instead of initial public offerings as the preferred way of going public. In this article, we’ll cover what direct listings are, how they work and why they’re popular among high growth companies, the pros and cons relative to the traditional IPO route, sustainability of this shift, and […]

This article was published on November 5, 2020 First, I’ll start with my opinion on bitcoin, then cryptocurrencies in general. Later on in the article, we’ll look at the path forward for cryptocurrencies more broadly. This will include the financial and non-financial uses and applications of crypto assets, and how traders and investors will need […]

This article was published on October 19, 2020 The fed funds rate is the base rate that influences many other interest rates, including the cost of debt and equity for businesses as well as the rate of return on cash and rate at which investors can borrow. The effect of lower interest rates on earnings […]

The risk management strategies of Japanese life insurers are slightly different from those of other investment managers given the nature of their business model and low-return realities of their domestic market. Traders and investors can always learn something from other types of investment managers. There are multiple ways and strategies to make money and manage […]

Option values are based on the price of the underlying asset or exchange traded product (ETP). Accordingly, once the underlying asset stops trading, there is no need for options to continue trading. Nonetheless, many underlying ETPs are now being traded in after hours sessions until at least 4:15 PM ET that are open to both […]

A market neutral strategy involves selecting individual securities to buy and short-sell such that roughly equal amounts of money are both long and short the asset class. The market neutral strategy is typically applied to equities, given the vast selection to choose from. Though it can also pertain to other asset classed like fixed income […]

Making better decisions trading involves knowing how markets function and what they value. Markets are information discounting mechanisms. Where markets go is not based on what things are at face value but what transpires relative to expectations that are already built into the price. To better illustrate this concept, let’s first consider an example. On […]

Who doesn’t want to invest in the stock market and make a “full” passive income? Everyone in the markets, from individual traders and investors to institutional funds, has the goal of generating income with the least risk. For the sake of this article, we’ll assume a “full” income of $50,000 per year. We’ll also assume […]

Approaching trading from any narrow vantage point is difficult. Financial markets are a mix of different players with different motivations and different sizes. Some traders will use price levels and a mix of different indicators of where price and/or volume has been in the past. While markets can be responsive to those in a self-fulfilling […]

This article was published on September 11, 2020 At the Federal Reserve’s 2020 Jackson Hole symposium, Fed officials announced a new way of managing inflation, now called average inflation targeting, or AIT for short. The market basically ignored the announcement, as it didn’t seem entirely consequential with any near-term effects. But arguably it’s a notable […]