The Big Picture |
- ECB: “Fragmentation in the Euro Overnight Unsecured Money Market”
- Tina & Amy Host The Golden Globes
- Islam in Europe
- Cornucopia: Stockpiles of Foodstuffs
- Bill Gross: “I was Fired From Pimco”
- Bill Gross Defends His Record
- 10 Monday AM Reads
| ECB: “Fragmentation in the Euro Overnight Unsecured Money Market” Posted: 13 Jan 2015 02:00 AM PST
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| Tina & Amy Host The Golden Globes Posted: 12 Jan 2015 03:30 PM PST And they say women can’t be funny. Once upon a time we looked up to movie stars, they were royalty we emulated and adored. Now they’re fodder for derision. They don’t realize we don’t care about their high concept films. That’s right Nic Cage, you were a star, now you’re a punchline. We revere money and actors ain’t got much, which is why your agents are all invested in tech and sports, furthermore you know nothing about investments, constantly losing your shirt on real estate deals, leasing worthless cars, believing that life is about looks and not power, and then Tiny Fey and Amy Poehler go on to shoot it all to hell, they make us believers, illustrating the power of art to ridicule, inform and tickle our funny bone all at the same time. We adore the NFL because life doesn’t make sense. Unlike television, there’s a limited number of teams. Sure, they’re beating each other to hell, but at least we’ve got something to root for, something to believe in while America goes down the tubes. And if you don’t think America is busy dying, you don’t realize the dream is over, that if you make it from the bottom to the top you’re the exception, not the rule. But that doesn’t keep everybody from praying for success, when the truth is if you weren’t born on third base, you might as well give up right now. So the NFL gets stratospheric ratings because we feel involved, we know the teams, if not the players. It makes sense to us. But Hollywood stopped making sense years ago. Which is why movie grosses are down. As far as television…we may be in a golden age of drama, but no one’s got time to watch it all, and you need a subscription to not only cable and HBO, but Amazon and Netflix, the landscape is incomprehensible, but don’t tell that to Amy Pascal who thinks running a studio counts. The public has got no idea who runs the record labels and they don’t care. Because if it’s all about the billions and you haven’t even got the potential of making ten digits, we’re not interested. We’re only interested in ourselves. Everybody is a star. And Jennifer Aniston may be labeled America’s sweetheart, but we gag on the overhype of her latest flick, and feel sorry for her evaporated biological window, because, after all, if life isn’t about reproduction, it doesn’t make biological sense. And then come two girls you wouldn’t date in high school, who joked with the boys who held all their romance in the palm of their hands, and they proceed to skewer the audience and lift this entire half-baked show off the ground on their very narrow shoulders. First you have to disbelieve. That’s what America is all about, believing. Did you read James Fallows’s essay about how we lose wars because we’re not hard enough on the troops? We’re not hard enough on movies and music, we don’t demand enough, everybody tells us to be satisfied and we’re not. But then we’ve got these two women making fun of the institution. And then they break the cardinal rule of modern communication, they deliver a joke without explaining it, requiring those at home to fill in the blanks. That’s right, Tiny and Amy made a joke about cake without stating the obvious, it was only implied…THAT THOSE IN ATTENDANCE ARE SO BUSY DIETING THEY’VE NEVER TASTED IT! And there you have it folks. Despite their self-anointment as royalty, the stars are missing out. Not only on the big money, but food, which is much more of a hit than any flick. They think it’s about the exterior when we all know it’s about what’s inside. And then Tina and Amy go into a routine of who would you rather… This is Howard Stern territory. Who you’d rather screw. But they’re doing it on national television. Titillating the audience as it squirms in its seat. Proving once again, if you’re talented enough, if you’re willing to test limits, you can go to the head of the class. Tina Fey can be absent from the airwaves and reclaim her throne in ten minutes, just by doing her act, spectacularly. It’s not about the hype, but the work, what a concept. It doesn’t matter who wins. Trophies might be taken home, but we forget the victories almost instantly. It’s about impacting people’s lives, making a difference in the culture. And it’s not that hard if you’ve paid your dues and have the skills. But we don’t want to focus on that. Not in the entertainment industrial complex. We want to focus on your ass, your malleability, we don’t want something too edgy. And then these two middle-aged women take the international stage and blow us all away. WTF? “The Tragedy of the American Military”: http://theatln.tc/13DY2ek
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| Posted: 12 Jan 2015 12:00 PM PST
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| Cornucopia: Stockpiles of Foodstuffs Posted: 12 Jan 2015 09:30 AM PST |
| Bill Gross: “I was Fired From Pimco” Posted: 12 Jan 2015 09:00 AM PST On "Before The Bell," Bloomberg's Betty Liu, Olivia Sterns and Bloomberg View columnist Barry Ritholtz run down the top stories of the day.
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| Posted: 12 Jan 2015 06:00 AM PST Last year was a time of change and controversy for Bill Gross: His unplanned exit from Pacific Investment Management Co. in September, a whisper campaign before the palace coup, a new job at Janus Capital. Amid all this, Gross is most upset about one thing: Despite 40 years at the top of the fixed-income world, he believes his recent track record has been misunderstood or misrepresented. After we published a column last year on his compensation at Pimco, he wrote me to complain that his performance numbers were much better than reported, especially for Pimco’s flagship Total Return Fund (PTTRX), the world’s biggest bond fund. He wanted to know if Bloomberg was willing to look into the data and "set the record straight." Since we splashed his 2013 bonus of $290 million all over the Internet, it seemed only fair to do so. Hence, today's column deals with three things: Total Return Fund’s performance during the past few years, the performance of the five closed-end funds Gross managed at Pimco, and the strength of Pimco as an asset gatherer, driven in large part by Gross, particularly since 2011.
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| Posted: 12 Jan 2015 03:00 AM PST Reset: A new week begins, a fresh chance to see what will be. Oh, and our morning train reads:
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