They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? In 1969, at the end of what seemed like a very long decade that began with great optimism and economic strength, the world was drifting into what would become the era of the stagflation of the 1970’s. We had shaken off all of our dreams of the pie-eyed sixties with Woodstock and the Apollo 11 moon landing. We were the racing dog that had caught the mechanical rabbit. We stood…
The Righteousness of Failure I watched a screener last night that my wife gets as a member of the SAG/AFTRA Nominating Committee. It’s the movie called Dark Waters starring Mark Ruffalo and Anne Hathaway and I have been seeing trailers of it lately, so I was anxious to see it. It comes nineteen years after Erin Brockovich showed the world the power of class action suits against corporate polluters. This excellent new movie has a…
Growing to the Sky Have you noticed that there is a lot more talk these days that involves the word Trillions? I see that the largest IPO ever, the public sale of the Saudi Arabian oil company called Aramco, is being debated as valuing the company between $1.5 and $2.0 Trillion. Let’s put that into perspective for a moment. Aramco is touted as the world’s largest company with revenues of over $350 Billion and…
Three Calls and Six Texts I don’t do business dinners much any more. There was a time when it felt like I had one every night. I’m not sure I remember which job had the most of that, but I’ll bet it was during my private banking days. That was between 1994 and 1999 when I was 40-45 years-old and my children ranged between young and younger. I mention the children because what you mostly…
Donna Azucar In 1974 I was a student at Cornell majoring in Economics and Government. My studies had taken a decided focus on development economics and third-world government. It’s not complicated, my mother was a UN diplomat living in Rome and serving as a director of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). She was the dominant force in my life, my role model, my muse. I assume I wanted to follow in her footsteps. …
Thick as Thieves Bankers stick together. The concept of a Club Deal and a Syndication were both invented by bankers. They love to hang together so that no one looks too stupid when a deal goes bad. Everyone likes to free ride on the other guy’s diligence or smarts. I should know, I was a senior banker for over forty years. And you’ve heard the expression “honor among thieves”? That implies that one banker would…
Limping Towards Greatness We all want to believe that the path to success is about moving in a straight line towards our goal, gaining momentum as we go and charging across the finish line with a building sense of certainty and satisfaction. That may happen for some people, but I would like to meet them. Success is far more often a four-cushion shot or even a random walk. I have even seen people accidentally…
Downtown Bombshell Yesterday was another day of rest for me. I was enjoying being back home after three weeks away, so I just lazed around opening mail, sorting through motorcycle gear, organizing stuff, watching a bit of MSNBC to catch up on the news (though I must say these days none of us is further away from it than our smartphones) and waiting for our evening adventure. Kim had booked us for another SAG/AFTRA…
I Walk the Line No, this is not a piece about Johnny Cash, though I imagine that his song by the same name talks to a similar problem we all face in one way or another. And there’s yet another song title. What exactly is a line? Is it simply a demarcation or is it a barrier not to be crossed. Is it about providing guidance and directionality or is it a warning not to…
Hospitality in the Modern World Back in 1975 I was asked to teach hospitality economics to the students at Cornell’s Hotel School, arguably the best school in the world for hotel management. It was not so challenging devising hospitality examples or cases to highlight important economics principles, though getting these abstract concepts into the heads of students fixated on “flush and gush” courses and wine-tasting was a bigger obstacle. The concept of mean reversion and…