A satirical commercial real estate proposal in the tradition of Jonathan Swift. Originally published February 2022. Fellow citizens of the real estate investing world, may I submit for your consideration that the time has arrived to discard and dispatch the long held, well trusted, underwriting standards that have governed commercial real estate investment for so […]
Building a bridge is costly: it takes labour and machinery and raw materials that have alternative uses. Does it follow that building it is a waste? No. Waste occurs when the cost incurred exceeds the benefit attained. Cost greater than zero does not imply cost greater than benefit. Does it follow that the bridge is worth building? […]
Everything old is new again: Inflation plagues the US economy. The Consumer Price Index is up 7.9% from a year ago. The Personal Consumptions Expenditures index is up 6.1%from a year ago. We haven’t seen price pressures like these in 40 years. If we want to understand inflation, we need a framework to organise our […]
As we’ve seen in previous articles, liquidity is ‘good’ only if your need for it isn’t shared by most other market participants at the same time. If everyone else wants to liquidate at the same time you do, liquidity can be a very bad thing. But if liquidity isn’t always good, how did we get […]
Why you should donate money rather than supplies. The humanitarian crisis in Ukraine and its effect on neighbouring countries has inspired people to collect donations. But these well-meaning efforts can cause headaches for those helping locally. In aid circles, the mantra has long been “cash is best”. Cash donations may feel impersonal. It is much […]
Following an unprecedented crisis due to Covid, Italy became Europe’s largest beneficiary of the EU’s €750bn recovery plan designed to “emerge stronger from the pandemic, transform economies and create opportunities and jobs.” In return, Italy has pledged to (i) invest in promoting the uptake of digital technologies and (ii) implement solutions to secure the green […]
…but it won’t wreck Russian sanctions. War is expensive. The United States spent about US$1.1 tn (£830bn) on the 2003 Iraq war in today’s money, while the Falklands war cost the UK the equivalent of about £2.6bn. Funding is therefore an important resource in any conflict, similar to that of artillery, fuel and boots on the ground. […]
US officials are keeping very busy in the world. Yet very few of Washington’s actions have much to do with protecting America. Instead, the foreign policy establishment believes that its primary role is to run the world. The Department of Defense was originally known as the Department of War, a far more accurate name. If […]
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is horrifying. Western leaders, fearing a broader war, are responding primarily with economic sanctions. A prominent economic sanction has been Russia’s exclusion from the international payments messaging system Swift, presented as a powerful means of undermining its economy. But for a payments expert such as myself, this is something of a […]
Climate change and the ESG agenda are changing the way we think about places and their relative attractiveness to real estate occupiers and investors. Gone are the days when property investors could rely on a quick contaminated land survey, a check on the local zoning plan and a comprehensive insurance policy for their acquisition due […]
