The medieval knights of Europe wreaked havoc on the Levant’s kingdom of heaven in their quest for the holy grail. The leveraged gunslingers of Wall Street wreak havoc in currencies and countries at the speed of light in their quest for alpha. The hoof beats of the smart money herds often take me to places where I find Santa, since he never came to visit me because Karachi and Dubai do not have a white Christmas. The closest I came to Santa‘s lair on the North Pole was a due diligence visit to a mobile phone start-up in northern Finland just below the Arctic Circle. My Finnish host offered me reindeer steak but my love for red nosed Rudolph was so great that I declined and opted for a vegan dinner.
The smart money herds convinced me that a serious pot of gold is waiting for those who chase Santa across the bombed out $1 trillion US commercial real estate (CRE) industry on Wall Street. CRE has faced three macro financial neutron bombs in the past three years.