PE4FAMs Blog

As a recent user of ChatGPT I was not aware my version 3.5 which is free is much less powerful than version 4.0 which costs $20/month. So, I bought the upgrade and put it to a test. I have been slightly disappointed with Chat’s ability to search data and synthesize financial information. For example, its

Can you recall your first experience with bubblegum in your hair? It was stickier than you thought and your attempts to eradicate it only spread it more? More painful, however, was you looked like a dork for two weeks after your mother cut out patches of your hair. Inflation is a lot like bubblegum in

Howard Marks, the founder of Oaktree Capital, is a prolific communicator. He has written letters to his investors since he began managing capital in the mid- 1980’s. While he started with a very stable asset class – corporate bonds – over time he moved into a much riskier neighborhood called “distressed debt” and high yield-aka

This was the first summer I can remember when there was not a stretch of good weather for more than 5 days in a row. What I mean by good weather is also being redefined. Endless rain, big winds, small craft warnings almost every day, and serious flooding were commonplace in New England. But you

Depending on whom you ask you will get a different perspective about having the U.S. Dollar as the reserve currency for the world and the medium of exchange for oil and other essential commodities. If you live in Turkey, Venezuela, or Argentina, and have persistent, high double-digit inflation, holding U.S. dollars as a store of

One of the smartest investors I know taught me “you don’t bank percentages” so even if your bonus is ten percent, if it is applied to below market base pay you likely would be earning less than someone who got 5 % bonus on a higher base. In addition, the base number is a fixed

Chevy Chase immortalized the American vacation with the Griswold family’s cross-country journey to Wally World.  That was the travel scene in the 1980s before Covid-19, inflation, forest fires, thermal inversions, flash floods, passport processing snafus, sold out National Parks, double digit lodging taxes, shortages of hospitality workers, road construction delays, crime in major cities, summer

When I was first introduced to the stock market by my aunt, a securities analyst for a leading regional securities firm, her formula for success was picking companies that were growing revenues fast and also paying dividends. In the 1960’s the so-called “Nifty Fifty” had many of those attributes and, like millions of Americans, I

This Monday I was anxious to scour the news for one of the greatest emerging conflicts of my lifetime. I raced right past the war in Ukraine, tensions in the South China Sea, the Wagner Group’s march to Moscow and China’s burgeoning spy base in Cuba. The real news of the day is Zuckerberg v.