17 Jul The Weekend Starts Here...
I start every weekday morning with the FT’s UK Morning Headlines email. Browsing the headlines of the day not only keeps me informed, it’s also hugely entertaining – thanks to the Comments section (especially with any articles related to Brexit or the pandemic 😉).
This morning it was the article ‘Johnson suffers ‘back to work’ blow from chief scientist’ (paywall) which got the commenters out in force and while putting together this post I’ve listened to Johnson’s latest announcement in which he definitely seems to be encouraging people to go back to their workplaces.
I fully understand why the government wants people to go back to their places of work – when I think of the number of sandwich shops and other fast food outlets, bars and restaurants just within spitting distance of our office, I can’t see any way they will all survive if more people aren’t going back to the office. But realistically, my view is we’re never going back to how it was before (and until people feel safe taking public transport to work the numbers going back will remain low).
None of our clients currently want face to face meetings, and so, for now, our policy remains that working in the office is voluntary. We plan to review the position again at the beginning of September.
Ok, on with this week’s links…
Wild bison are to return to the UK for the first time in 6,000 years [4 min read]
“To have any hope of making sense of what’s happening in 2020, we have to pay attention to a bunch of seemingly unrelated stories that began before anyone had heard of Covid-19.” Here We Are: 5 Stories That Got Us To Now [Morgan Housel 8 min read]
What will bounce back after the pandemic, and what will never be the same? [Tim Harford 3 min read]
Ignorance can be bliss [Carl Richards 3 min read]
A thought which has been running through my head a lot lately: “Given the US is a complete basket case, why is the US market still doing so well?” Well, here’s one possible explanation. (The follow-up post is here) [Barry Ritholtz 4 min read]
Covid-19 Risk/Non-Covid Risk chart. Personally I think ‘Axe throwing contest’ should have been higher up the risk scale 😁 [visual]
5 Money Topics to Discuss Before Marriage. Some cracking advice here 🤚 [Thomas Mullooly 3 min read]
“Speculation can and will pay off for some tiny subset of the population through a combination of luck and good timing, but it never lasts.” The Greatest Danger Investors Face [Ben Carlson 3 min read]
The future of food: inside the world’s largest urban farm – built on a rooftop [6 min read]
A bit of mental gymnastics for you. [Drew Dickson 5 min read]
The FCA has recently introduced the ‘Assessment of Value’ (AoV) regime. It requires fund managers to show what value their funds deliver to their customers. Where value is shown to be lacking, firms must take corrective action, potentially including fee reductions. [Robin Powell 3 min read]
And finally. These stunning photos of Vermont, taken from the air [Photos]
Whatever you’re up to this weekend, I hope it’s a good one.
Carolyn