The Meb Faber Show - Better Investing

In episode 191, we welcome our guest, Simon Hallett. Simon and Meb start off the conversation with a run-down of Simon’s firm, Harding Loevner, cover its quality growth investment approach as well as its long-term focus. Simon gives some insights into “short-termism” and what it takes and the incentives in place to keep everyone at Harding Loevner focused on long-term investing.Simon walks through the investment framework at Harding Loevner in detail. From a high level, they care about growth, quality, and price and beyond that, Simon walks through the details and what it looks like as ideas work their way through the process.Next, Simon and Meb get into skill vs. luck. Simon emphasizes the role process plays in skill vs. luck, and the post-investment review he and his team go through to analyze the role skill vs. luck played in the outcome of a position.As the conversation winds down, Simon and Meb touch on behavioral finance, and Simon discusses introducing behavioral aspects to the investment process wherever they can. He mentions he think there is a behavioral edge in any market.All this and more in episode 191, including a discussion about Simon’s football club and his most memorable investment. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Episode 190 has a radio show format. We cover a variety of topics, including: Buying stocks at all-time highs 2010 Fund Manager of the Decade Jim Simons Year-end questions for advisors and brokers There’s this and plenty more in episode 190. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In Episode 189 we welcome our guest, John Parise. John and Meb kick off the conversation with the idea of the family CFO and wealth planning. As John gained experience in financial planning, he investigated the family office model, and he consistently saw a lack of planning. That eventually led him to the foundations that helped him eventually form his firm, Copper Beech.Meb and John then cover to the process of what planning looks like at Copper Beech. John describes the interview, discovery process, and the types of conversations the firm has with families. They then get into some examples of the mechanics of what the planning process really looks like, and some methods to pay zero estate tax.The pair then shift to talking about teaching young generations to handle wealth.As the conversation winds down, John covers some of the major items people can consider to improve their planning outcomes.All this and more, in episode 189 including John’s most memorable investment. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Last year when we published The Best Investment Writing Volume 2, we offered authors the opportunity to record an audio version of their chapter to be released as a segment of the podcast, and listeners loved it.This year, we’re bringing you the entire volume of The Best Investment Writing Volume 3 in podcast format.You’ll hear from some of the most respected money managers and investment researchers all over the world.Enough from me, let’s let Ray take over this special episode. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In episode 188 we welcome our guest, Andreas Clenow. Meb and Andreas start the conversation with a hat on what hooked Andreas on trend following, and his book, Following the Trend.Andreas discusses running trend following as a portfolio strategy, not something that is optimal to run on a single market. He talks about some basic fundamentals of trend following, including the premise that it’s about taking a lot of bets on a large number of markets independently.Meb then asks Andreas to get into some detail about risk management and position sizing. Andreas defines the way he thinks about risk, and goes back and forth with Meb about the reality of return expectations and compounding. Meb follows by asking what has changed with his approach over the years. Andreas responds with the idea of realizing it’s about strategy and business, and the business has changed a lot.The conversation transitions into how trend following can fit into an investment portfolio. Andreas offers that the strategy can serve as a core building block of a larger portfolio. He talks about some of the environments where trend following has done particularly well, and the challenge with diversification in equities.As the conversation winds down, Meb asks about Andreas’ new book, Trading Evolved: Anyone can Build Killer Trading Strategies in Python. Andreas describes the book as a guide for readers to build backtests and strategies in the programming language, Python.All this and more in episode 188, including Andreas’s most memorable investment. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Last year when we published The Best Investment Writing Volume 2, we offered authors the opportunity to record an audio version of their chapter to be released as a segment of the podcast, and listeners loved it.This year, we’re bringing you the entire volume of The Best Investment Writing Volume 3 in podcast format.You’ll hear from some of the most respected money managers and investment researchers all over the world.Enough from me, let’s let Jack take over this special episode. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In episode 187 we welcome our guest, Kevin Carter. Meb and Kevin start the conversation with some background on Kevin’s career, getting to know Burton Malkiel, and launching EMQQ. Kevin offers some of his thoughts on investing in China, including his initial thoughts about the prominence of state owned enterprises. Kevin mentions that a key component to investing in emerging markets is that it’s about the consumer. He notes that emerging and frontier markets are 85% of the world’s people and almost 90% of the people under the age of 30, the GDP of those people are still growing twice as fast as the rest of the world, and their incomes are growing. Kevin discusses that once he figured out that the indexes that were available to invest in these markets were allocated relatively heavily to the legacy, inefficient, state owned enterprise portion of economies, he got to work on building indexes that were more targeted to capture emerging market growth. Meb and Kevin then discuss the reality of emerging market allocations for most investors today, and talk about the current weights of emerging market indexes and the implications for investors. Kevin gets into launching and running EMQQ, and how the index is constructed. He follows with a discussion on emerging market internet company valuations and the current pace of revenue growth. Meb then poses what he thinks is some of the most common “pushback” he hears about why people can’t invest in China. Kevin addresses some of the arguments he hears for not investing in China, including made up numbers and communism and explains why he doesn’t think there is a lot of merit to those arguments. As the conversation winds down, Kevin covers his thoughts on India, which he thinks is a particularly interesting opportunity from the standpoint of population size and growth. All this and more in episode 187, including Kevin’s most memorable investment. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Last year when we published The Best Investment Writing Volume 2, we offered authors the opportunity to record an audio version of their chapter to be released as a segment of the podcast, and listeners loved it.This year, we’re bringing you the entire volume of The Best Investment Writing Volume 3 in podcast format.You’ll hear from some of the most respected money managers and investment researchers all over the world.Enough from me, let’s let Scott take over this special episode. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In episode 186 we welcome our guest, Carter Malloy. Meb kicks off the conversation with Carter’s background in finance and growing up in a farming family. When conducting research on the asset class. He saw attractive returns historically, but there wasn’t a great way for most people to invest in it. That insight spurred the idea for AcreTrader.As Meb and Carter dig a little deeper into farmland, they discuss the return drivers, yield and asset appreciation, and the imbalance of demand vs. supply as a driver of returns.Meb then asks Carter to get into the cycles of farmland investing. Carter covers leverage and cycles. The pair explore the Macro themes that have been in play over the last few years. Carter comments that it has been tough for farmers, and commodity prices have been low. He clarifies that if you separate the farmer from the land owner, the land owner has continued to do great.The pair then get into the ideas behind Carter’s firm, AcreTrader. Carter walks through the inefficient nature of farmland investing, the platform, and the process AcreTrader goes through to bring investment opportunities to market as well as the ultimate vision for the platform.Next, Meb and Carter also get into some examples of additional opportunities for farmland property including potential income opportunities like wind farms, solar farms, and mining that may be available to some properties.As the conversation winds down, Carter lays out his thoughts on how farmland fits with investment portfolios and highlights the role it can play from a wealth preservation standpoint as a noncorrelated asset class in addition to providing protection from inflation.All this and more in episode 186. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Last year when we published The Best Investment Writing Volume 2, we offered authors the opportunity to record an audio version of their chapter to be released as a segment of the podcast, and listeners loved it.This year, we’re bringing you the entire volume of The Best Investment Writing Volume 3 in podcast format.You’ll hear from some of the most respected money managers and investment researchers all over the world.Enough from me, let’s let Larry take over this special episode. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices