Nerds, Ninjas & Neutrons: the Story of NEST (Nuclear Emergency Support Team)
Authors: Jay Tilden (Deputy Undersecretary for Counterterrorism and Counterproliferation, US Department of Energy/National Nuclear Security Administration) & Dallas Boyd (senior advisor, US Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration’s Office of Counterterrorism and Counterproliferation) Source: Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (https://thebulletin.org/premium/2023-03/nerds-ninjas-and-neutrons-the-story-of-the-nuclear-emergency-support-team/?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email) This long essay by two American civil servants specialising in nuclear counterterrorism seems destined […]
A Simple Approach to Valuing Financial Services Companies
Valuing lenders and insurance companies is tricky as the well accepted principle of discounting future cash flows does not work for Financial Services companies. These companies work under a regulatory framework which requires them to maintain a minimum capitalization level and also reinvest a large part of their earnings. Technically these firms have no/negative free […]
India’s High Corporate Tax Rate is Holding Back Corporate Capex
Courtesy the face-off between China and the United States, India has a once-in-a-generation opportunity to become the factory of the world for knowledge-intensive light industrial manufacturing in sectors such as electronics, pharmaceuticals and specialty chemicals. However, India’s competitiveness is hindered by an effective corporate tax rate that is 4%-points higher than America’s or China’s. This […]
Outsized Earnings Growth Alongside Falling Share Prices
In this month’s newsletter, we ask whether the Rising Giants (RG) stocks were ‘richly’ valued when we bought them? Using an earnings growth of 20% (5% for the terminal year) and cost of capital of 12%, the median longevity implied by the then prevailing market prices for the RG portfolio rose from 8 years as at FY18-end […]
It’s not a funnel, it’s a filter
We at Marcellus have great admiration for the team at Ritholtz Wealth Management, an American financial advisory firm, primarily because of their ability to articulate their philosophy and approach through their prolific writing of numerous blogs and books. We found this article by their CEO resonate with us, as much like them we believe our […]
IPL 2023: MS Dhoni stands firm… Sandeep Sharma holds his nerve
With MS Dhoni playing in what appears to be his final IPL, we have one last chance to appreciate one of the master strategists of our age. As Vinayakk Mohanarangan explains in this short piece “So much has changed, but MS Dhoni taking a chase deep and playing with the mental makeup of the bowler hasn’t.” […]
Illeism: The ancient trick to help you think more wisely
David Robson, a science writer and author of ‘The Expectation Effect: How Your Mindset Can Transform Your Life’, says that ‘illeism’ is a proven technique which has proven to be very useful for him. So, what is illeism? “…illeism is the practice of talking about oneself in the third person, rather than the first person. […]
The Gambler Who Beat Roulette
The casino business has to be one of the most attractive ones – getting to set the odds in its favour yet see many hopefuls come enrich them. Therefore, it is fascinating everytime you learn that someone has figured a way of beating those odds. This is a riveting true story about a Croatian gambler […]
America, China and a Crisis of Trust
The new Cold War has meant that the globalisation trend over the past five decades since China opened up is unwinding. And it is only apt we feature a piece on the current context by someone who wrote a book about globalisation and how it was changing the world two decades ago – Thomas Friedman’s […]
We must slow down the race to God-like AI
This is an incredibly interesting long essay in the FT on what is likely to be defining tech dilemma of our times – how much to let AI rip apart the world we live in. The writer, Ian Hogarth, is an investor in 50 AI start-ups, the co-author of the annual ‘State of AI’ report […]
The ‘Pick & Shovel’ Strategy
Marcellus’ Global Compounders Portfolio (GCP) invests in 25-30 deeply moated global companies listed in North America and Developed Europe. We employ a bottom-up company selection methodology that includes conducting primary research on moats, capital allocation, longer-term opportunities, and risks in order to comprehend the growth of cash flows over the long term. The nature of […]
A Letter A Day: Don Valentine (2000) – Real VCs help build great companies
A Letter A Day is a nice little blog posting timeless letters from great investors and business leaders alike. This one’s from the legendary Don Valentine, founder of the iconic venture capital firm, Sequoia Capital. But first, the author Kevin G’s introduction to why we must pay attention to Don: “Don founded Sequoia Capital in […]
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