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My finance professor handed out a fantastic article called " The End " written by Michael Lewis, the writer of Liar's Poker , about the mortgage melt-down and some reasons for what fueled the bubble on Wall Street.  The main take-away from the entire article for me is that incentives on Wall Street are totally mis-aligned - as I'll talk about shortly. In the article, Lewis tells the story of Steve Eisman.  Eisman started his career as a corporate attorny, then turned to become an equity research analyst at Oppenheimer, and finally moved on to a hedge fund (Front Point Partners).  At Front Point, Eisman built up short positions across the entire subprime mortgage lifecycle - mortgage originators, homebuilders, mortgage bonds, CDO's, etc.  The article describes in colorful detail Eisman's journey in uncovering the roots of the industry and at every turn how shocked Eisman himself is. Eisman repeatedly questions how it was even possible (or legal for that matter)...

I read in VentureBeat that a start-up called Better Place is going to partner with California to build a $1B electric car infrastructure for the Bay Area.  It sounds like a pretty ambitious plan.  It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

This presentation from Sequoia was mentioned several times in the media, so I finally got around to Google'ing it and found it off of VentureBeat.  Good times.  Oh, I mean RIP good times.  It's actually a really nice macro-economic summary (albeit incredibly depressing).  I love the "let's get drinks" slide at the end. Sequoia Capital on startups and the economic downturn View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: depression recession )

I came across a research article in Knowledge@Wharton titled " Show Me the Money: Aura of Top M&A Banks Often Obscures Low Returns for Clients " about how the league tables ranking investment banks don't necessarily correspond to post-M&A performance of the banks' clients.  In fact, the study finds that there's actually a negative correlation between the league tables and post-M&A performance.  That's obviously counter-intuitive.  One possible reason is as follows: Banks are simply responding sensibly to industry practices. "Since clients ignore the very measures that do predict future performance [i.e. past performance] and instead focus on market share, it is entirely logical for banks to maximize their league table position -- in particular, by accepting even value-destructive mandates," he and Bao write. "Not only will the mandate boost fee income today, but it will also increase market share and the ability to generate income ...

I read an article about 4 months back in the WSJ (" Study Refutes Niche Theory Spawned by Web ") regarding a debate between traditional marketing theory where businesses focus on producing and distributing blockbuster products (that have significant marketshare) vs. a new paradigm where businesses shift production and distribution to a vast array of products tailored specifically to the individual tastes and needs of consumers.   The latter theory is generally referred to as the "Long Tail", but a recent study by a Harvard Business School professor seems to refute that theory.  Adding to the discussion, I just watched a fascinating interview with Eric Schmidt , the CEO of Google, in The McKinsey Quarterly where he talks about why businesses should not focus their strategy on the long tail. First, what is the "long tail"? We can summarize the long tail as follows (here we draw on a few sources including HBR - The Long Tail Theory in Short , WSJ - see link a...

Someone recommended I read the NY Times Magazine article from a few weeks ago called " Capitalism to the Rescue " about how venture capital money is fueling the so-called green-tech economy.  The article almost entirely focuses on Kleiner Perkins.  The article includes quotes from John Doerr and Aileen Kim (one of the Green VC Stars ) among others.  The article talks at length about how KPCB finally made its foray into green-tech in the last few years and why they did so.  Surprisingly it was Bill Joy that led the way with a "map of grand challenges" in the energy space: Then, in late 2006, at one of Kleiner’s corporate retreats, Bill Joy, a founder of Sun Microsystems and a new partner at the firm, displayed what later became known within Kleiner as “the map of grand challenges.” This was a matrix of colored squares that itemized the firm’s progress in locating potential investments in about 40 different categories: water, transportation, energy efficiency, electri...

I watched this 7 min video from the McKinsey Quarterly and thought it was pretty good. It focuses on the urbanization that China will undergo over the next decade as hundreds of millions of people flock to urban centers. It also deals with how China should build those urban centers - lots of mega-cities of 10 million+ vs. some mega-cities surrounded by mid-size cities in a hub-and-spoke model vs. proliferation of small townships. Here's the video: The accompanying article on the topic covers the same material in a little more analytic detail.  Beyond the exact format the urbanization will take, what I think is more interesting is the implications that any mass urbanization will have on the economy there.  Here are some areas of concern: Land - with urbanization and development comes urban sprawl and the loss of arable land - which means heightened concerns over food security Energy - the demand for energy and energy resources will more than double (from 60 quadrillion Brit...