Author Archives: jfrankel

Will the GameStop game stop?

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February 6, 2021 — Whether one thinks that the overall equity market is currently valued properly or not, something very unusual happened in the last week of January to GameStop stock.  Its price rose 323 percent for the week, and 1,700 per cent for the month (that is, an 18-fold increase). This was a speculative bubble. That is, the price departed from fundamentals.

Some investors who got in early and got out early made a lot of money. Just as many people, who got in too late or stayed in too long, lost a lot of money, as valuations came back to earth. read more

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Republicans fight deficits only when a Democrat is President

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January 28, 2021  —  High among the many priorities of newly-inaugurated US President Joe Biden are the challenges of an economy that appeared to be slowing down as the new year started, with the latest employment numbers looking bleak.  A fourth-quarter slowdown in the US recovery from the horrendous second quarter could be attributed to the expiration of some of the bipartisan stimulus programs that were passed by Congress in March of 2020, or to the third wave of Covid-19, or to both factors.  Even if Covid-19 abates during the course of 2021 and pent-up consumer demand then kicks in, the US faces challenges right now, in such areas as schools, infrastructure investment, state and local finances, and especially the fight against the pandemic itself. read more

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The Year 2020 in Three Phrases

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December 31, 2020 —  Consider the past year through the lenses of three phrases: “witch hunt,” “black swan,” and “exponential.”  Each of these terms is widely applied, but not necessarily in the most useful way.

  1. Witch hunt

Donald Trump has used the words “witch hunt” approximately once every three days on average during his presidency, just counting tweets alone.  It wasn’t just his impeachment trial, which ended with the Senate voting to acquit on February 5 of 2020. He continued during the year to use “witch hunt” to describe accusations that he mis-managed the Covid-19 response (April), inquiries into his tax returns (July), investigation into alleged criminal conduct at the Trump Organization (August), and other challenges. read more

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