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.
As some of you know, my options portfolio is quite simple: an octet of puts, ranging in expiration from June to next January, anchored to the eight equities below. There’s been a change or two, so I thought I’d give you the latest makeup of my never-say-die bearish portfolio:
If there’s one ETF that neatly captures the entire US stock market, it is the oldest of the old, and the biggest of the big: the SPYders (S&P 500 ETF symbol SPY). Here is a quintet of this symbol, flanked by a variety of indicators:
If you want some long-time perspective as to how ghastly-high the stock market is, look at this dividend yield chart dating back to 1871. It’s clear that the classic purpose of stock investing – – the dividend yield – – is about as out-of-style as buggy whips and your old grandpappy’s handlebar mustache.
Long-time readers know I have an adversarial relationship with boredom. I can’t stand it. There’s a reason I wrote twenty published book by the time I was twenty years old. I get antsy. I’ve got to be creating.
Thus, last night, I was going out of my mind. There was nothing left to clean. Nothing left to organize. Hell, I’ve already done all my personal and corporate taxes months before they are due. So I decided to prowl our bookshelves for something to read. What else was I supposed to do? Watch an idiotic TV show? Come on.
I found something interesting that I had originally bought years ago for one of my beloved children. It is basically a 300 page comic book (oh, sorry, graphic novel) about Economics called, appropriately, Economix. It’s absolutely superb, and this ‘comic book’ imparts more information than over 99% of the American public understands.
I’d like to share one snippet with you in particular, which for some odd reason I find germane to ours times. The tinting is my own:
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