A Few Random Observations

During my week-long hiatus, I stumbled across a few random observations during my travels. First of all, the demise of the US economy has been greatly exaggerated. Judging by the number of Americans willing to shell out fairly obscene amounts of money to take a February vacation, it would seem to me that things are not as bad as the instant gratification media would have you believe. The corollary to this that things on Wall Street aren't as bad as we are being led to believe, as most of the people I ran into during my time off make a living on the Wall Street gravy train. After being intensely wrapped up in the investment world for over 20 years, it is necessary and positive to step back from it all and see what is going on elsewhere.

The second observation is that the current value of the dollar is really paying off for this country. Sure, I know your thinking, "What about the imported inflation that a weaker dollar is creating?" Of course, it's something that needs to be monitored, but, with economic globalization it is dubious as to what can be done about it, short of throwing the worldwide economy into recession. What I'm referring to is the relative to the export boom; the number of foreigners visiting here, and spending money, is skyrocketing. Even in my little corner of Vermont this week, I met numerous foreigners, and not just Canadians. People from far-flung places like South Africa and Australia, as well as many Europeans. Let's face it, these people could probably go skiing anywhere, but chose the US, and in particular, Vermont. Certainly the Europeans have closer, easier to get to, and probably better (sorry, Vermont) ski options than Vermont. This is just a testament to the strength and attractiveness of the US.

Finally, as a few of you may already know, people with serious and insightful fixed income knowledge are being treated like rock stars, after years of being shunned to the periphery of the investment conversation world. For the past six months, the media has bombarded the world with overly complex definitions and acronyms, making all bonds and all bond markets seem sinister. Unfortunately, those people being interviewed are the same one that dumped us into the current situation. This past week, I had numerous conversational snippets with all sorts of people. Without exception, I was thanked for providing a straightforward and common sense explanation for what is happening, followed by the handing out of my business card. The bottom line is that the market for valuable advice regarding current market conditions is vast, and the supply is limited because the "experts" concentrated all their efforts on equities and basically ignored what is really important.