Excess Returns

Retiring fund manager Joel Tillinghast, with an impressive track record, discusses his approach to finding undervalued stocks, lessons learned from Peter Lynch, evaluating value investments, the impact of technology on stock picking, and navigating inflation in investing.

Bloomberg's index construction expert, Athanasios Psarofagis, takes a deep dive into popular market indexes. Topics include the details of how indexes like S&P 500 and NASDAQ are built, the Russell and S&P value and growth indexes, and how index construction impacts investor returns.

Jim O'Shaughnessy, founder of O'Shaughnessy Ventures, discusses his transition from factor investing to venture capital. He talks about the current state of factor investing, his approach to venture capital, and the attributes of successful founders. They also touch on custom indexing as a new asset class, the potential of podcasting as a massive industry, and the value of embracing mistakes as learning opportunities.

Warren Pies and Fernando Vidal from 314 Research discuss their systematic macro process, treasury issuance, Fed policy, changing correlation between stocks and bonds, drawdown prediction model, and outlook for housing. They also emphasize the importance of commodities in macro research and share insights on the challenges in the housing market and implementing their drawdown risk model.

Asterozoa Capital CIO Joe Hegener discusses the basics and current state of the credit market, the potential refinancing wall, and the fundamental criteria he looks at when evaluating companies. They also discuss the limitations of passive investing in credit, the importance of bifurcating the cyclical and secular horizon in macro analysis, and the process of analyzing distressed businesses. They touch on the benefits of ETFs and the challenges of using AI models in investing.

Meng Wang, a PhD student at Georgia State University, analyzes and quantifies self-attribution bias among fund managers using ChatGPT. He discusses his research process, findings, and their implications for investors. The episode also explores the benefits of using prompts in modeling, visual analysis of corporate images, and the advantages of non-native English speakers in language systems.

Eric Crittenden, expert in all weather investing, discusses the case for an all weather strategy, challenges of looking different from the market, international diversification, leverage, and the characteristics of a good back test.

The podcast explores the impact of options on the stock market and how long-term investors can better understand it. They discuss topics such as options analysis, the influence of options expiration on market behavior, the S&P variance premium, the effects of realized volatility and VIX collapse, the impact of rising rates on rate-sensitive assets, the Ozempic trade, and recent market movements.

Corey Hoffstein, host of the Flirting with Models podcast, discusses the origin of the podcast and how he selects guests. He also shares insights on interviewing, podcasting as part of a business strategy, and his previous podcast, Pirates of Finance.

Guest Jerry Parker, founder of Chesapeake Capital, discusses his trend following approach, problems with the 60-40 portfolio, building a trend following strategy, charitable giving, leaving money to children, and more.