Odd Lots

What if there were a bank that could never experience a run? And furthermore, what if it paid higher interest rates on deposits than what you could get at other banks? That sounds pretty good, right? Well it might be possible. On this week's episode of the Odd Lots podcast, we talk with Jamie McAndrews, the co-founder and CEO of The Narrow Bank. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This podcast explores the correlation between bonds and stocks in investment portfolios, discussing the challenges of modeling this relationship and the importance of diversification. It also delves into the dynamic nature of correlation regimes, the impact of inflation on portfolio durability, risk parity strategies, and famous miscalculations of correlation throughout history.

Companies have all kinds of discretion in how they recognize revenue and costs. Some of this is legit. Some of this is fraud. On this week's episode of the Odd Lots podcast, we speak with Howard Schilit, an expert in forensic accounting and the author of “Financial Shenanigans: How To Detect Accounting Gimmicks & Fraud in Financial Reports.”See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

There's been an intense debate about what Tesla CEO Elon Musk meant when he tweeted in early August that he was taking the company private and that funding was "secured.” Bloomberg Opinion writer Matt Levine discusses how securities regulators might view such a comment.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Joe Weisenthal is a co-host of the Odd Lots podcast. He also once launched his own cryptocurrency called Stalwartbucks. On this week's episode, we speak with Guan Yang, who along with Weisenthal helped launch Stalwartbucks in the early weeks of 2014. We talk about how they did it, what they learned, and why, sadly, it ultimately failed.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Are you confused about the crisis in Turkey? Today's episode will get you cleared up. This week on Odd Lots, we spoke to Paul McNamara, an investment manager at GAM Investments, and a long-term veteran of the emerging markets world. He explained the mechanics of the Turkish currency plunge, and what aspects of the turmoil are unique or similar to other emerging markets crises that he's seen in his career.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Open any financial publication and you'll see ads for investment products: exchange-traded funds, mutual funds, and the like. Those ads can tell you a lot about what investors are currently thinking and feeling about the market. But did you ever wonder how Wall Street came to be advertising these prepackaged products? On this edition of the Odd Lots podcast, we speak with Eric Weiner, who leads ETF coverage at Bloomberg and also wrote a book on the history of Wall Street. We talk about the first ever modern advertisement for market investing, a 1948 ad in the New York Times, and how Charles Merrill applied grocery store economics to financial brokerages.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Srinivas Thiruvadanthai is the Director of Research at the Jerome Levy Forecasting Center, and one of the most interesting commentators on markets and the economy. He's also an economist who fits into the post-Keynesian school of thought. The post-Keynesians -- a group that has a growing following -- argue that the economy is not self-correcting, that central banks have limited influence on the economy or inflation, and that large government debts can be a stabilizing force. In our conversation, he explains his world view and how he uses it to interpret markets right now. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Here's some good news for investors: If you've ever made a disastrous trade, you're not alone. All of the greats have made horrible moves as well. On this week's Odd Lots podcast, we speak to Michael Batnick, the director of research at Ritholtz Wealth Management, and the author of a new book 'Big Mistakes: The Best Investors and Their Worst Investments.' We talk about great errors from the likes of Warren Buffett, Bill Ackman, Jesse Livermore and many others. In addition to going through their blunders, Batnick explains some basic lessons that investors can take away from these going forward in their own money moves.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

If you want to understand how the human body works, you can't just look at healthy humans. You need to examine the ill, so you can see how the body breaks down and where its weak spots are. And so if you want to understand how business works, it makes sense to look at financial fraud. After all, financial fraudsters work by getting to know a business really well, in order to take advantage of how it operates. That's the gist of our discussion this week with Dan Davies, the author of "Lying for Money: How Legendary Frauds Reveal the Workings of Our World." In our conversation, Davies shares with us his favorite fraud of all time, what all frauds have in common, and what people can do to avoid them. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.