Utopia, you are standing in it!

In the post-referendum turmoil facing the Labour Party, there are increasing questions about whether the party might split. Despite shadow cabinet resignations and a Parliamentary Labour Party vote of no confidence, Jeremy Corbyn seems determined to hang on, and to force a contest if necessary. If that proceeds, a split looks very likely. But what would this mean in organisational terms: both inside parliament and beyond? Meg Russell investigates.

Events in the Labour Party over the last week have been extraordinary. Accused of a lacklustre performance in the Brexit referendum, party leader Jeremy Corbyn has lost the majority of his frontbench through resignations – sparked by his dramatic sacking of Shadow Foreign Secretary Hilary Benn. Labour MPs have now agreed a motion ‘That this PLP has no confidence in Jeremy Corbyn as Leader of the Parliamentary Labour Party’, by 172 votes to 40. Yet still Corbyn seems determined to…

The Labour Party’s current crisis is often characterised as an ideological dispute between the Parliamentary Labour Party and a membership that is significantly more left-wing. But, as Javier Sajuria demonstrates, it is hard to stand this up. The ideological distance between Labour members and MPs is in fact smaller than that between Conservative members and MPs. To explain why many are now suggesting that Labour is on the verge of splitting it is necessary to look at party rules as well as ideology.

The situation within the Labour Party has been described by many as a dispute between the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP) and the membership. The en masse resignations from the shadow cabinet, followed by a vote of no confidence from 81 per cent of MPs, shows that Jeremy Corbyn has lost the trust of his peers (or perhaps he never really managed to obtain it in the first…

John C Bogle, the founder of Vanguard is becoming one my my favorite speakers on financial markets. His speeches are really thought provoking and gives many simple ideas. His speeches are available on his blog.

 I just read this excellent speech where he revisits various concepts of finance. He discusses valuation really well:

By the late 1980s, based my own first-hand experience and my research on the financial markets, I concluded that the two essential sources of equity returns were: (1) economics, and (2) emotions. What Keynes had described as enterprise I called “economics.” What Keynes termed “speculation,” I found well-defined by “emotions.” The former I defined as investment return— the initial dividend yield on stocks plus the subsequent annual rate of earnings growth. The latter I defined as speculative return—the change in the price investors are willing to pay for each dollar of earnings.

Simply adding speculative return…

A super interview of Eugene F. Fama by Robert Litterman.

What was his switch moment which led to development of his core ideas? Well, it was his work experience as a stock market analyst:

By iMFdirect

A suitcase filled with multiple passports? That’s not just the stuff of spy movies anymore. Increasingly, a growing number of high-net worth individuals are looking to have a passport portfolio. This has led to a proliferation of so-called citizenship-by-investment or economic citizenship programs that allow individuals from all over the world to legitimately acquire passports.

Some folks find ride sharing services like Uber to be a threat. Here’s my view:

• Uber doesn’t drive past me to pick up other customers.
• Every time I call them, they show up.
• They take all credit cards.
• They give me a receipt for the exact amount.
• I have never been yelled at by an Uber driver.

Not a bad deal, if you ask me.

50+ chapters of grad skool advice goodness: Grad Skool Rulz ($2!!!!)/From Black Power/Party in the Street