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Odd Lots

Bloomberg

Bloomberg's Joe Weisenthal and Tracy Alloway explore the most interesting topics in finance, markets and economics. Join the conversation every Monday, Thursday, and Friday

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Nov 11, 2016 · 27 min
54: How Trump Did Something Yellen, Draghi Could Only Dream Of
There's a lot to process from last week's U.S. election. One surprising thing already is the market reaction. Equities surged following the vote, and interest rates are sharply higher. Market measures of inflation expectations and Fed hikes now suggest that people see more inflation and more rate hikes in the future. This is something our top central bankers have had a very difficult time in doing. How come? On this week's Odd Lots, we spoke with David Beckworth, a research fellow at the Mercatus Center, about Trump, fiscal policy, monetary policy and the changing market outlook for interest rates and inflation. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Nov 4, 2016 · 30 min
53: Why We Stopped Trusting Experts
One could argue that "expert" has become a bad word. People routinely roll their eyes at the advice of experts and sometimes mock them. Perhaps nowhere is this more clear than the Federal Reserve. In the 90s, Alan Greenspan was lauded as the author of the great economy. Today, the Fed is a political punching back. On this week's Odd Lots podcast, Joe Weisenthal and Tracy Alloway talk to Sebastian Mallaby about Greenspan, experts and the huge changes at the Fed in the last couple of decades. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Oct 28, 2016 · 31 min
52: What Math Models of Herding Cows Can Teach Us About Markets
Investors are often said to exhibit herding behavior when they follow each other into crowded positions — creating market bubbles that are susceptible to sudden pops when everyone begins stampeding for the exit. This week we take the analogy literally and speak to three professors who have created a mathematical model to examine why cows synchronize their behavior and — crucially — why they stop. Jie Sun, Erik Bollt, and Mason Porter, the authors of "A Mathematical Model for the Dynamics and Synchronization of Cows," extrapolate their findings to humans and modern markets. This episode is co-hosted by our resident bovine expert, Lorcan Roche-Kelly. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Oct 21, 2016 · 33 min
51: Why Everyone Is Freaking Out About Globalization
Dani Rodrik, a professor of International Political Economy at Harvard University, was writing about the downside of globalization before it was cool. The rise of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, the U.K.'s decision to leave the European Union and the expansion of nationalist political parties around the world has since given fresh impetus to the notion that globalization isn't working for everyone. In this episode we discuss how we ended up with 'hyperglobalization,' what the technocrats got wrong, and what exactly can be done to fix it. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Oct 14, 2016 · 31 min
50: What Slavoj Žižek Would Say About Poker and the Peso
What does psychoanalytic philosophy tell us about capitalism? In this edition of Odd Lots, we speak to Ole Bjerg, a professor at the Copenhagen Business School. Bjerg studies the work of Slavoj Žižek, a Slovenian philosopher, and also writes about matters of finance, markets and money. In this episode, Bjerg discusses the game of poker and what it says about capitalism as a whole. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Oct 12, 2016 · 35 min
49: The Man Who Wants to Better Trading by Slowing It
Brad Katsuyama has racked up oceans of newspaper ink since being propelled into the public spotlight as the protagonist of Michael Lewis's book on high-frequency trading, Flash Boys. The 38-year-old co-founder and chief executive of IEX, an exchange with a 'speed bump' designed to slow down lightning-fast traders on behalf of longer-term investors, won U.S. regulatory approval in June. In this special edition of Odd Lots, Katsuyama speaks with Bloomberg View Columnist Matt Levine about the next big steps in stock market structure. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Oct 3, 2016 · 27 min
48: The Lost History of Financial Market Modernization
How is it that stocks are traded on electronic exchanges in the blink of an eye but bonds still trade over-the-counter by phone and sometimes even by fax? Today we discuss one of the most pervasive mysteries of market structure with Chris White, the former Goldman Sachs executive who's now CEO of ViableMkts, and his old boss, Les Seff, COO at AIMPaaS LLC, to discover why bond trading remains so darn old-fashioned despite numerous attempts to pull it into the 21st century. Looking back at history, we can see a pattern to market modernization that was initiated by the OTC equity market almost 50 years ago. Can this history provide us with insights that can put fixed income markets on a path to modernizing? See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Sep 23, 2016 · 27 min
47: Why it's Time to Stop Using the Word 'Disruption'
"Disruption," "incubation," "innovation"... you hear these words nonstop these days as people talk about the incredible changes taking place in society thanks to technology. This week on the Odd Lots podcast our guest tells us we all need to stop. Or at least use these words a lot less. Lee Vinsel is a professor of science and technology studies at the Stevens Institute of Technology and he explains the harmful impact of language and buzzwords, and why we need to focus more on "maintaining" the infrastructure and technology that sustains everyday life. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Sep 16, 2016 · 28 min
46: Space Robots Are Helping Hedge Funds Invest
The most valuable commodity for investors is information, and hedge funds and asset managers are going to great lengths to get it -- even to outer space. This week on the Odd Lots podcast, Tracy Alloway and Bloomberg View columnist Matt Levine are joined by James Crawford, a former NASA scientist who founded Orbital Insight. Crawford's company uses satellite photos to do things like track retail sales by studying parking lots and track oil supplies by scanning global oil tanks. He explains how his company figures out what to look for and how to look for it, and how investors and governments use his information to make decisions. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Sep 12, 2016 · 33 min
45: Why A Whistleblower Walked Away From Over $8 Million
Could you walk away from a reward of over $8 million? The guest on our latest episode of the Odd Lots podcast did just that. Eric Ben-Artzi was a risk officer at Deutsche Bank who concluded that his bank was mis-marking the assets of part of his derivatives portfolio to a significant degree. When he couldn't get his colleagues to reprice the derivatives he called a hotline and blew the whistle, ultimately leading to a huge reward. In this episode he explains what he saw that was wrong and why he ultimately didn't take the money. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Sep 2, 2016 · 32 min
44: What a 12-Year Knows About Money That an Economist Doesn't
"What is money?" This seemingly simple question has the ability to drive people crazy. Is it a unit of account? Is it something about exchange? Does it have to be blessed by the government or backed by something hard? On this week's podcast, we speak with fund manager Eric Lonergan, the author of "Money (The Art of Living)," to answer this question as well as the other vexing ones that spring from it. Ultimately we get an answer that's as simple as the question itself, one that would make more sense to a typical 12-year-old than an economist. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Aug 29, 2016 · 21 min
43: Seinfeld Can Teach You Everything You Need About Economics
The hit show Seinfeld is often referred to as the show about nothing, but maybe it's actually a show all about economics. Alan Grant is an associate professor of economics at Baker University and a proprietor of The Economics of Seinfeld, a website that catalogues all the ways the legendary sitcom imparts valuable economic lessons. In the latest edition of the Odd Lots podcast, Grant talks about what you can learn from watching the show, and the specific lessons of various episodes, including The Chinese Restaurant (a lesson in opportunity cost), The Contest (a lesson in time preference) and the apartment (rationing mechanisms and rent control). See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Aug 22, 2016 · 26 min
The Millennial Generation Is Stagnant And Older People Are Part
In developed economies, younger generations have faced stagnant wages, mediocre employment prospects and dizzying costs of homeownership. One culprit: The generations that came before. Policies that helped older generations recieve strong pensions and affordable housing have made life more difficult for the young. In this week's Odd Lots podcast we talked to Laura Gardiner of the Resolution Foundation about her new report on "renewing the generational contract" between generations. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Aug 15, 2016 · 31 min
41: Billionaires Help Tell the Story of Brazil's Boom and Bust
The 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro have been tainted by protests, economic slowdown, and a massive political scandal. In this episode we take a look at Brazil's boom and bust as told through the prism of the country's elite. Alex Cuadros is the author of "Brazillionaires: Wealth, Power, Decadence, and Hope in an American Country." He tells how a commodities boom gave rise to larger-than-life Brazilian billionaires including mining mogul Eike Batista, soybean farmer-turned-senator Blairo Maggi, and beer-and-burger-king Jorge Paulo Lemann. He tells us why 'Brazillionaires' sometimes argue over their place on public wealth rankings, what happened when Batista's Porsche went missing, and how Brazil's billionaires favor dead bugs in their decorating. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Aug 8, 2016 · 20 min
40: Why Summer Has Just Gone on Sale
This week is the summer edition of Odd Lots and we're talking about the market forces shaping the price of two essential ingredients for any pool party: inflatable toys and barbecue meat. Bloomberg Reporter Polly Mosendz walks us through the $4 million dollar battle blowing up over the inflatable pool toys popularized on Instagram and now the subject of a major dispute between retailers vying for the top sales spot on Amazon Inc. Then Bloomberg's Lydia Mulvany tells us why meat prices are cheaper than ever and the cost of grilling staples including burgers, ribs and pork chops could go even lower. So grab your inflatable donut, pick up your BBQ tongs, and join the Odd Lots fun. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Jul 29, 2016 · 21 min
39: The Insurance Market for Modern-Day Pirates
This week Odd Lots takes to the high seas to discuss how modern-day pirates in the form of illegal fishers are able to take out insurance policies on their blacklisted boats. We speak with Dana Miller, a marine scientist who published a study last month showing a significant number of insured illegal vessels. We discuss how one of the world's most regulated financial industries interacts with one of the world's most lawless and whether new processes introduced by insurers could help boost the world's supply of fish. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Jul 25, 2016 · 26 min
38: The Fed Made a Massive Mistake Letting Lehman Go
There's nothing better than financial crisis hindsight and earlier this month we got a big dose of it in the form of a 218-page paper by Laurence Ball, Department of Economics Chair at Johns Hopkins. In the paper, Ball makes the case that — contrary to statements by some policymakers — Lehman Brothers could have been rescued back in 2008 and the U.S. made a massive mistake in choosing not to do so. We talk to Ball about the genesis of the paper and what it means for markets today. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Jul 18, 2016 · 23 min
37: Why We Are Increasingly Divided Into Ideological Bubbles
The result of the U.K.'s Brexit referendum blindsided many and led to acrimonious accusations by supporters on either side of the vote. In the U.S., the rapid rise of Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders as presidential candidates has similarly surprised. Those able to properly gauge the public mood have made money, while those without their fingers on the pulse have lost it. This week we speak to Sean Blanda, editor in chief of 99U and the author of a recent article on why "The Other Side Is Not Dumb." We discuss the balkanization of world opinion, why the proliferation of social media ends up dividing us instead of bringing us together, and how best to break out out of one's own ideological bubble. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Jul 11, 2016 · 29 min
36: How A Quant Saw Huge Changes That Took Place on Wall Street
Emanuel Derman was one of the pioneers of quantitative finance, having gone from studying physics to working on Wall Street in 1985. His memoir, My Life as a Quant, is a must-read book that tracks the evolution of finance in recent decades as it's become more and more driven by mathematics. In the latest episode of Odd Lots, Derman discusses his career, the difference between finance models and physics models, and where Wall Street is going next. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
- Transcript
Jul 11, 2016 · 29 min
36: How A Quant Saw Huge Changes That Took Place on Wall Street
Emanuel Derman was one of the pioneers of quantitative finance, having gone from studying physics to working on Wall Street in 1985. His memoir, My Life as a Quant, is a must-read book that tracks the evolution of finance in recent decades as it's become more and more driven by mathematics. In the latest episode of Odd Lots, Derman discusses his career, the difference between finance models and physics models, and where Wall Street is going next. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
- Transcript

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