cri de coeur

I came across an interesting phrase in an interesting sentence in a Bloomberg news review of Andre Agassi's autobiography today.

Phrase: Cri de Coeur = "cry from the heart" / a passionate outcry
Sentence: "The whole book is a cri de coeur, and this may be one of the few cases where the reader concludes that the examined life is not worth living." (ouch)

Per Economist

In the Economist's commentary on the Gaza conflict they say, "In general, a war must pass three tests to be justified. A country must first have exhausted all other means of defending itself. The attack should be proportionate to the objective. And it must stand a reasonable chance of achieving its goal." I wonder whether the majority of previous wars meet all three criteria or the emotionally charged nature of conflict makes these criteria more theoretical in nature.

Hi Jed. i guess I should probably sign up for a facebook account, myspace account, plaxo business card manager and all of the junk e-mail invitations i've been avoiding....

Contumacious

Brilliant but bitter people are often the most annoying contumacious employees; you can't fire them despite the fact they deliberately provoke you.

Platitudinous

Another new word! Dan Loeb used the word platitudinous in his letter to the BOD of Nabi Biopharmaceuticals. "We received a terse note dated May 1, 2006 which addressed our specific issues and concerns in a perfunctory and platitudinous manner."

I wonder - how important is financial modeling relative to tracking fundamentals. If you take forensic accounting firms such as CFRA that do deep dives into the financials and compare their performance to someone who has very little financial knowledge but almost perfect insight into fundamentals -- it would seem that the fundamentals person would have the edge. If that is the case, how important really are excel models. (Beyond just being a security blanket... "this is the WORST case I can think of... (until it gets worse than these numbers.")

NYC

One surprising thing that I will miss about New York City is the bagpipes. There is an annual series of parades that are held (in conjunction with all of the street fairs) in NYC each year on the weekends. A distinctive and distinguishing sound that marks these processionals is the sound of the bagpipers. Bagpipes are a bittersweet instrument. They make a beautiful sound, but the sound is beautiful only because it is so sad.

Schadenfreude

I learned a new word today.
schadenfreude – A malicious satisfaction obtained from the misfortunes of others.
There is a bit of schadenfreude involved when hedge fund traders review quarterly 13F filings and see competitors that have lost a lot of money.