This Sunday was supposed to be the 50th running of the City2Surf, but unfortunately Covid has put paid to that like so many other things we had thought certain. While in the grand scheme of things a run is not that important, it is one of the highlights of the year for many – and for an ever shrinking group of ‘Legends’ who’ve featured in every running of this great race it’s a significant blow. Hopefully they are still all able to line up at the next (official) running – they’ll all deserve a gold Garmin (a running watch)!
The loss of certainty feeds into this week’s discussion about forecasting. While predicting the future has always been fraught with danger we look at why it’s increasingly difficult – and why I regular mention that my crystal ball smashed years ago so I don’t try to. But one of our roles is to help you prepare for an uncertain future, so how do we do this?
In the last few days I’ve also read two very interesting articles. The first is from one of my favourite commentators Howard Marks, the founder of Oaktree Capital. This article appears to have been written as much for his own benefit as ours, as he seeks to make sense of the rise in the sharemarkets over the past few months, despite the global pandemic. He explores the cases both for and against the market strength, and like most things in this world each side has valid points – meaning the reality is likely somewhere in the middle. You can read more here.
The second article is written by Barry Ritholtz who’s thoughts I also respect. While written from a US market perspective, he breaks down the market performance and compares this to the reality many people are seeing on ‘Main Street’ – and explains why the markets could be right. Read it here.
