Behind the Balance Sheet

Regular readers know I publish these round-ups twice a year. This edition arrives before the summer holidays in case you’re looking for something to pack in your suitcase; the second appears before Christmas for gift ideas. As always, the affiliate commissions go to Duchenne UK and our other supported charities. I’m considering starting a Behind the Balance Sheet Book Club. We’d read one book every few weeks before meeting on Zoom to discuss it.

This month’s podcast guest is Jeremy Grantham, co-founder of GMO and famed for his work on bubbles. He is still intellectually sharp at 87, experimenting with AI and continuing to work. He has written a book (The Making of a Permabear: The Perils of Long-term Investing in a Short-term World) with Edward Chancellor. In a similar vein to Capital Account and Capital Returns, Chancellor mined his past writings for material, as well as interviewing him extensively.

The first Berkshire AGM of the Abel era felt… flat. Watching remotely, it was striking how little energy there was both on stage and, from what I could gather, in the room. This year, I didn’t go to Omaha, but I attended three events virtually – the AGM itself, the Gabelli conference and Guy Spier’s Value X conference, both on Friday. This will therefore be a shorter report than I usually write.

This month’s podcast guest is slightly different. Instead of an investor, I spoke to Rory Sutherland - Vice Chairman of advertising giant Ogilvy, behavioural science guru, and author of the excellent book Alchemy. If you spend time on Instagram or TikTok you may well have seen one of his clips - he is a master of the memorable soundbite. But investors should pay attention to people like Rory. Behavioural science has quietly become one of the most important disciplines in investing.

There is a lot of talk about the huge sums being spent on AI chips and data centres by the hyperscalers, much less about the related depreciation.