Pods & Recs: No. 181
Today we have Meb Faber sharing his investment philosophy, Marc Andreessen on the history of Silicon Valley, a way you can invest in wine, and an interview with Angels manager Joe Maddon.
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Investing
The Long View: Meb Faber: ‘To Be a Good Investor, You Have to Be a Good Loser’. Faber is an author, podcast host, and CIO of Cambria Investment Management. In this episode, he discusses current market valuations, trend-following and where it fits into his investment philosophy, and how history can make you a better investor. [September 7, 2021–65 minutes] iTunes Podcast | Spotify | Google | Breaker | Website Link
The Knowledge Project: #119 Todd Simkin: Making Better Decisions. Simkin is Associate Director at Susquehanna International Group, a privately held trading and technology firm. He’s responsible for SIG’s firm-wide education and trader development, where he taught the company’s new traders what questions to ask and what criteria to weigh before making hugely impactful decisions for the firm. In the episode, he shares his framework for decision-making in both investing and life, the strategies he uses to teach others to improve their decision-making, and what he looks for when hiring. [September 7, 2021–73 minutes] iTunes Podcast | Spotify | Google | Breaker | Website Link
“It’s really hard to say anybody is wrong about a single probability prediction unless they said that something was 0% or 100%.”
Infinite Loops: Rob Henderson — Evolution of Social Hierarchies (EP.64). Henderson is one of my favorite thinkers — he grew up in foster care, served in the military and is now a Ph.D candidate in Psychology at the University of Cambridge. He covers the differences of the lower and upper class from his perspective, his idea about ‘luxury beliefs,’ and America’s export of cultural ideas to the rest of the world. [September 9, 2021–75 minutes] iTunes Podcast | Spotify | Google | Breaker | Website Link
“And so to hear people say like, ‘Oh yeah, my family, I think it’s $500,000 a year but that’s middle-class. We’re scraping by.’ That just completely blew my mind.”
The Rest Is History: 93. Silicon Valley Part 1. This two-part episode with Netscape and a16z co-founder Marc Andreessen is about the history of Silicon Valley and it’s role in the world we live in today. This episode covers the trend of people going west in the U.S., the importance of Stanford to the Valley, the start of both Hewlett-Packard & Apple and the role they played, and Andreessen’s role in creating the Internet. [September 5, 2021–45 minutes] iTunes Podcast | Spotify | Google | Breaker | Website Link
The Rest Is History: 94. Silicon Valley Part 2. This episode starts with the role of social media in society today, Andreessen’s 2011 article (and thesis) Why Software Is Eating the World, and the role of the Internet in helping the economy function during the COVID lockdowns. They finish with Andreessen’s thoughts on the Internet enabling ‘cults,’ with recent things like the $GME/Reddit ordeal, wokeness, and QAnon. [September 6, 2021–43 minutes] iTunes Podcast | Spotify | Google | Breaker | Website Link
The Meb Faber Show
#348 — Zach Coelius, Coelius Capital — I Like To Play Where It’s Still Qualitative. Zach Coelius is the Managing Partner of Coelius Capital and angel investor in early-stage startups, currently leading one of AngelList’s top syndicates. He shares his investment philosophy and the benefits of being stage agnostic as a VC. Towards the end of the episode, they talk about some of Zack’s portfolio companies, including $30 billion autonomous driving company Cruise and MUD/WTR. [September 6, 2021–67 minutes] iTunes Podcast | Spotify | Google | Breaker | Website Link
#349 — Anthony Zhang, Vinovest — You Should Separate Your Drinking Preferences From Your Investment Preferences. Anthony Zhang is the founder and CEO of Vinovest, a platform for investing in a managed portfolio of fine wines, and a Thiel fellow. Anthony shares the investment case for wine and how it compares to stocks and bonds. Then he walks through the process of investing in wine through Vinovest, which does the analysis, bidding, inspection, and storage on your behalf. He touches on the different offerings, taxes, fees, risks, and trends affecting the industry today. [September 8, 2021–63 minutes] iTunes Podcast | Spotify | Google | Breaker | Website Link
The Best Investment Writing Volume 5: Campbell Harvey and Michele Mazzoleni, Research Affiliates — Breaking Bad Trends. In the first episode of the Best Investment Writing Volume 5, listen to Professor Campbell Harvey & Michele Mazzoleni read their piece, Breaking Bad Trends. [September 10, 2021–32 minutes] iTunes Podcast | Spotify | Google | Breaker | Website Link
The Rest
Game Changers with Molly Fletcher: Joe Maddon on Why Leaders Must Think Outside the Box. L.A. Angels Manager Joe Maddon shares his approach to creating an environment that allows your players to perform at their peak. He covers the importance of discomfort and ways he gets players out of their comfort zone, like doing themed road trips. He emphasizes the need for players to sleep well, eat healthy, and meditate. He even shares some “Maddonisms” like “try not to suck” and “do simple better.” [September 2, 2021–36 minutes] iTunes Podcast | Spotify | Google | Breaker | Website Link
“When you choose to not take chances and just stay with the status quo, you’ll never be satisfied internally.”
BOOK RECOMMENDATIONS
Jack Devine (Former CIA; Founder, The Arkin Group):
- Grant by Ron Chernow
- The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism by Doris Kearns Goodwin
- The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics by Daniel James Brown
- The Pioneers: The Heroic Story of the Settlers Who Brought the American Ideal West by David McCullough
- Polk: The Man Who Transformed the Presidency and America by Walter R. Borneman
- The Human Factor by Graham Greene
Robert Hormats (Managing Director, Tiedemann Advisors):
- The Future Is Faster Than You Think: How Converging Technologies Are Transforming Business, Industries, and Our Lives by Peter H. Diamandis and Steven Kotler
- The Sultan and the Queen: The Untold Story of Elizabeth and Islam by Jerry Brotton
- The Complete Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant by Ulysses S. Grant
- Those Angry Days: Roosevelt, Lindbergh, and America’s Fight Over World War II, 1939–1941 by Lynne Olson
- Partners in Command: The Relationships Between Leaders in the Civil War by Joseph Glatthaar
