11 Dec

Posted at 13:27h in Credit Spectrum
Our title is but a thinly veiled allusion to the hero of the namesake novel [Герой нашего времени] by the illustrious Russian novelist and poet Mikhail Lermontov who, on the death of the legendary Alexander Pushkin, assumed the role of Russia’s leading poet. The hero in question (Pechorin) is not the kind of heart-throbbing, virile, impeccable stud personified by a fictitious character, like James Bond. On the contrary, Pechorin is a deeply flawed, some would even say amoral, man. It may surprise you that the quintessential hero of 19th Century Russian literature is not someone we would want as Santa Claus.

11 Dec

Posted at 13:15h in Credit Spectrum
When an airplane crashes, people always die, which is not normally the case when a car crashes. Compare these outcomes to what happens when a structured deal crashes, a now unremarkable event during which no one has ever died. The point is this. The average intellectual ability that can be reasonably expected of senior executives in any industry is directly proportional to the severity of the empirical consequences of a crash in that industry. The aerospace industry is arguably the most demanding, sophisticated and rigorous of all simply because amateurishness cannot be tolerated there for the same reason it is so commonplace in finance. A case in point is the fate and fiscal health of Ford Motor Company, which of course makes cars. As a CEO, Mulally professes expertise only on the left side of Ford’s balance sheet. By contrast, most of us in attendance that evening claim expertise on the right side. Thanks to his relentless work, Ford’s asset side now seems to be in great shape, but what can be said of its liabilities? According to Wall Street, not much except the perennial and naïve buy recommendation. Much more could be done by research analysts to benefit Ford directly and significantly, at literally no expense to Ford or the investor public.