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TLC Weekly Update August 6, 2022

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This NFP week was full of surprises. First, everyone keeps paddling that Fed will “pivot” very soon and economic data will be weaken so much that Fed may even restart QE again. Then on Thursday, people get all hyped when they see an unimportant economic data confirming their wet dreams. By Friday, the wet dream ended with a slap to their faces as NFP reported a figure that is almost double the estimate. Yet, the stock market recovered most of its losses by close.

So, does NFP really matter?

Of course not. Crowd madness is real and when people want to believe the stock markets has already bottomed in June, they will only think of their potential gain and reject any idea that they could be wrong.

Another big name, Chamath Palihapitiya, joins the game of calling the bear market and global economic downturn. His argument is different from Dalio. I think it is worth watching.

Even though I don’t agree with everything Nassim says, this thread on Twitter is an important reminder for all investors and traders how to apply proper logical analysis when making a trading decision.

For chess enthusiasts, the Chess Olympiad 2022 is the ongoing biggest event now. This one particular game is very interesting, because, it tells us mistakes can be very costly.

This week my server at the ISP faced a major outage thanks to someone at the ISP changed the security rules of our server without approval from us. We have to scramble to figure out what happened. At the end, it is the experienced tech from our cloud firewall service that traced down the problem and gave our ISP instructions that eventually fixed the problem. Well, on the bright side, the servers are now working perfectly and better than before.

I have a lot of catch up to do with my projects after spending so much time to tackle the server incident.

Have a great weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update July 30, 2022

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Just gone through another hectic week with so many things to take care of and running out of time everyday.

Latest talk from Tony Robbins with Ray Dalio. Nothing much Dalio has not explained before. It is just an update of his views at this point in time. If you have not read his book on the subject or any other talks he gave on the subject, this is a great starting point.

For the aspiring traders, this interview with Gareth Soloway is a good one reminding you what you must master to becoming a good trader. The question Kevin raised on a bet, is nothing new. It is given to many people to see if they can answer this correctly. The problem is that in real life you can’t look at the question as if it is a pure probability question and Gareth gave the best answer I have seen.

Another video about Michael Burry’s bet with speculation on what he is really doing at the moment. Well, it is a speculation of what he may have done with the rest of his trading capital. What I find interesting is that this is the first time I have seen a layman video that paid attention to what Burry said about how expensive option premiums have become. That matters a lot in real life trading and that alone tells you how the market makers view the level of risk going forward.

Coming week we start with a new month that is jam packed with major geopolitical events. Just the US sending Pelosi to visit Taiwan is enough to trigger WW3. That coupled with Russia, China and many other countries going to do a military drill next to US west coast, I see these countries all walking on a dangerous path.

I pray that nothing bad happens … I still want to enjoy my summer.

Got to go.

Let’s have a great weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update July 24, 2022

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Drank too much after birthday dinner with friends. Woke up late this morning. Should be more careful next time when the night is expected to be long …

Thank you to everyone who sent me well wishing emails. My dad is now out of the hospital. He has recovered a lot since.

Inflation has been the hot topic since central banks started hiking interest rates. This video has a very interesting take on the situation.

A very interesting documentary of Bill Ackman. One thing that I do not agree with the video in the beginning is the comparison of Ackman to Buffett. Buffett is not really a good role model for normal people who has no serious capital backing yet wants to make a killing from the stock market.

A year since the collapse of Archegos, it is a good time to learn about it from afar. Over leverage, given enough time, will always end badly. It is a classic fattail problem.

Another escalation of geopolitical tension is happening. This time it is between China and Indian. Check out this video for more details. This is important because both India and China are founder countries of BRICS. This can affect the ambitious plan of BRICS to introduce a new global currency to replace US dollar later this year.

So much is happening around the world making it looks like the dawn before darkness for humanity. I am not sure how bad things may get geopolitical. One thing I notice though is the rise of violent crimes in Toronto and pretty much everywhere in Canada. And this idiot Trudeau thought that banning guns is the solution. All guns the thugs used in the latest violent crimes are either from black markets or home made. This satire video sums it up nicely.

Back to work.

Have a nice weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update July 16, 2022

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I am fighting wasps at my cottage at the moment as I type this piece up. Don’t know how it happened but sudden they found my place and built a nest here. Need to learn to deal with them quickly!

For those of you following the Musk vs. Twitter drama, here is a sarcastic take on the subject by Patrick Boyle. Personally, as I explained again and again, all social media will fall out of favor when new technology arrives. Thus all of them will worth nothing. In this case, Twitter, is even worse because it is really a political weapon and a scam with significant number of its so-called users are bots. Just imagine the lawsuit Twitter will face when its advertisers found out the actual percentage of users are bots …

A short clip about Dr. Huberman studying David Goggin. The story is so cool that as a fan of either one of them, you will enjoy this.

An informative video about the economy and among other things, bitcoin. A very balanced approach in applying economic indicators the right way that economists from big financial institutions would never do because they have to work from the agenda of their firms.

Enjoy this nice summer weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update July 10, 2022

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A busy week ended with me no internet access all day Friday thanks to the now world famous 2022 Rogers Communications outage. I have no cell phone and internet access for the whole day. Many others are still suffering though as service is not restored everywhere yet. It is a Canada wide outage that also led to many government services not accessible and retail stores not able to accept any kind of electronic payments.

Don’t know what to say about the mess they caused. I am glad that I finally get some internet access as of Saturday even though it is not stable.

A story about the q-tips from CNN. I don’t understand why many people and especially the so-called doctors telling everyone it is dangerous to use q-tips to clean their ears. I suspect it is probably the earliest form of wokeness b.s. that we see everywhere now.

For some mysterious reasons I was caught in an unnecessary discussion with some left leaning people who think communism is the solution to all the “wrongs” they see everywhere. After the discussion this new clip on communism just came up from Jordan Peterson. This is one of those subjects that if in depth history study is a requirement in school, the dumb idea of idolizing communism would never happen.

Well, there is no need to be so serious over the weekend. Here is a nice video on how hateful white men are.

Have a great weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update July 3, 2022

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Long weekend for both Canada and United States this year. I finally take a break yesterday to enjoy an afternoon with some friends. Then the news came my father caught Covid and was hospitalized in Hong Kong. Don’t know what to say … just hope my father tough it out.

A good read about the Beer Game. It is an old article about this MIT tradition. If you are interested in trading or management of your own business, this article gives you a glimpse of how our world really is – a very complex sets of dynamic systems for which no one has real control over what happens around them.

Not many of you are believer in astrology, but this video about the coming development of the world based on the combined reading of major countries and their leaders painted an ugly picture that we should all be aware.

A nice chess game between Magnus Carlsen and Anna Cramling. And of course, Magnus won.

For my fellow Canadians, belated Happy Canada Day!

For my US readers, Happy July Fourth!

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TLC Weekly Update June 25, 2022

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Can’t believe I have forgotten to write my weekly update last week. I don’t even remember what I did last week over the weekend until I checked my daily notes. It turned out I was doing all kinds of chores from fixing up my cottage to building a storage facility in the basement. I guess this is what happen when I do not put this writing task on my schedule …

The most time consuming task, though, was that my internet access was very unstable for weeks. Not until I use hardcore network packet tracing I could not pinpoint the problem. It just happens that the two major internet service providers in Canada are engaging in packet snoping and mess with my connections to my servers. I am not even having a server at home for outside connections. I know they block that since many years ago.

This is a whole new level of f**k up by these companies. And obviously calling these companies resulted in no help at all. So, instead of wasting more time, I chose to have these companies install the commercial version of their internet services through their business division. Fast forward to today, I am paying double for pretty much exactly the same freaking service and all the bullshit problems are now gone.

Of course, anyone trying to put blame on these companies will be labelled misinformation spreader and than they are honorable companies that never engage in illegal activities or invading your privacy …

While waiting on the phone for countless hours, I watched this video on fight scenes with spear in movies. I like the guy’s comments. It is hard to find action movies correctly depicting the proper use of these long range weapons.

I was asked a lot about the current geopolitical situation and my response is something no one wants to hear. I told everyone that given the current trajectory of how things are developing everywhere, the outcome is pretty much set in stone – US and all those countries that choose to be its goons will fall economically and politically. It does not matter what these countries do now, the way how they conduct themselves over the past two years already planted the seed of their ultimate decline.

I am not someone who gains anything from saying this. I live in Canada with a f**king idiot elected as the prime minister. Everything he does is against any lowest level of common sense. I have no business ties with Russia or China, unlike Dalio. I do not stand to gain anything telling the world that these hated countries by the West are the ones likely coming out ahead in a few years time. I hate what I see is coming but it is better to be prepared for the future than to live in an illusion.

Let’s get off this heavy topic and watch an interesting game of chess here. These two grandmasters duel it out in the FIDE Candidates 2022 tournament and according to computer analysis, both of them achieved like 99% accuracy in the way they carry their games. Super human indeed!

Here is a video explaining something I told my premium subscribers for a long time. And may I add the quantity needed to break the world right now – 2%. That’s all it takes to completely collapse the world financial system at this point.

Enough dark thoughts from me.

Have a great weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update June 11, 2022

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Another hectic week ended and I am very glad that it is over – I completely forgotten one video meeting which is something that never happens before, then my trusted router fried and Amazon don’t know where my package has gone …

Many investors around the world are wondering what to expect in coming months as the US stock markets have erased all its gains made just 2 weeks ago. Well, for a longer term outlook, you can watch this discussion by Joseph Wang “Fed Guy”. One thing why it is so hard to understand what is going on is that it is not the usual interest rate going up or down situation. Joseph Wang gave a very detail explanation of what Fed is going to do. With a better understanding of the mechanism behind, I hope you will be prepared.

Don’t know how I bumped into this story. Interesting read about two girls born together yet leading completely different lives. Good example of awareness and having the right mental model will determine the outcomes in life … not your birth time.

For those of you who is interested in human history, you can check out this video. What is presented poses a serious challenge to the so-called “accepted science” of human history. Whether you think what he said is correct is a separation discussion though.

I was asked a lot lately about my view on bitcoin and crypto space as a whole. My take is simple. All ground breaking technological breakthroughs go through the boom and bust cycle. Go read up about the mass production of calculators or more recently the public adoption of internet. It will take time before the crypto space mature and who knows how it will look like in the future.

One thing for sure is that I don’t like people comparing crypto with gold. Physical gold does not need electricity to “exist” like crypto. Gold is a universal medium of exchange. Gold is also a form of insurance when the government cannot be trusted.

Got to play catch up this weekend.

Have a great weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update June 4, 2022

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The Non-Farm Payroll report released early this morning has stopped the US stock market from making a second week of positive gain. For perma bears, it is a sign of market weaknesses and next week everything may fall off the cliff. Objectively, however, we have the biggest one week rally just a week ago. Isn’t it normal that the stock market may need to take a breather before making its next move?

For doomsayers, the paper published by Gaya Herrington back in 1972 and an update done some 30 years later, has made quite a buzz lately. More and more people mention this work as the projection of our collective future can turn real bad starting pretty much now. For those of you who are not familiar with the work, here is an article trying to explain what the paper is all about.

If you are still not doing exercise regularly, may I convince you with this video clip from Joe Rogan’s podcast with Peter Attia? You don’t need to do crazy level of exercise to get things going. Starts with only a few minutes a day and you will see the difference.

I know many people who have problems sleeping. There are so many things that can affect us to get a good sleep that countless studies are done to figure out what helps. This short video caught my attention because the gadget mentioned is not expensive and can help one quantify the sleeping environment being good or bad instantly. I will actually get one of these devices and test it out.

Mercury retrograde since May 10th is now finally over. Over this period of time, I have one monitor died and countless paperwork delayed by third party for no reason. I expected that and did my best to avoid initiating any new projects. Now that it is over, I will schedule new projects again.

Have a great weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update May 30, 2022

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I started writing this on the 28th and now it is already the 30th. I definitely have time management issue lately.

This US long weekend gives me the chance to do more clean up of my messy workspace. Paper works, research documents, etc. all pile on while the leftover boxes I cleared from my workspace are hiding in plain sight outside. They are still there. It is still necessary to figure out what those boxes are and put them away properly.

A funny (and sad) story of how the modern gem theories were validated by bullshit experiments. No wonder nothing we see from the medical research over the past 50 years making any real breakthrough. Garbage in, garbage out.

Great video on the subject of Russian Oligarch for those who want to understand how these people became so rich and powerful.

If there is one thing people like Bill Gates or the World Economic Forum really want to do to improve the well being of people around the world, it is not developing vaccines or other expensive medical treatments. It is simply stop obesity today. But do they really have the best interest of the people in their minds?

It’s been a long time since I write about specific subjects that I am interested in. Maybe it is time to write on a random topic to get things rolling. Let’s see what idea I can come up with today.

But first, I have to finish my chores.

Happy Memorial Day to my US readers!