Slope of Hope Blog Posts

Slope initially began as a blog, so this is where most of the website’s content resides. Here we have tens of thousands of posts dating back over a decade. These are listed in reverse chronological order. Click on any category icon below to see posts tagged with that particular subject, or click on a word in the category cloud on the right side of the screen for more specific choices.

When “Umm” Gets You Fired

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Years ago, when I was a kid, a friend’s father told me that his wife got dragged in front of human resources to defend and explain herself. The reason? She told a non-white colleague that she didn’t have a strong work ethic. The recipient of this information, apparently being none too bright, apparently couldn’t distinguish between the meanings of “ethic” and “ethnic” and, thus, complained loudly to HR about discrimination. (This was, incidentally, in an academic setting).

Not only has nothing changed, but it’s radically worse. Allow me to introduce to you one Professor Greg Patton, an esteemed professor at the University of Southern California’s business school:

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Striking Oil

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I believe we are at the start of a new bull market in oil.  In the famous words of Dave Chappelle, “Oil?  Oil?  Who said anything about oil?”  Isn’t the world swimming in oil right now?  Isn’t every possible tanker and storage facility filled to the brim?  Why on earth do I believe that oil is starting a new bull market?  I’m glad you asked.  Let’s take a look.

Since this is the one and only Slope of Hope, let’s begin by taking a look at some charts.  After that we’ll examine the geopolitical and monetary fundamentals that I believe will also play a role.

Earlier this month Jesse Felder penned the article, “A Generational Opportunity in Commodities?”  He discussed the idea that rising U.S. fiscal deficits is bearish for the U.S. dollar, with one of the consequences being a return to a commodities bull market.  The chart that caught my attention the most in his article is the chart shown below.  This chart compares the Commodity Stock Index vs. the Dow.  As you can see, the last commodity bull market ended in 2008, and commodities have been in a bear market ever since.  This data goes back to 1937, and commodities are now the most undervalued relative to the Dow in that time span.

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