My morning reads:
• What Are Bond Markets Telling Us? Interest rates are up — but don’t panic: I have a message for future policymakers: Don’t let the usual suspects undermine your policy agenda by scaremongering about interest rates and government debt. I say future policymakers because in the United States there is no point in offering sensible advice to current management. Paul Krugman on the global rate surge — long-term government yields in many countries are back at levels not seen since the mid-2000s, before the financial crisis. He argues deficits are only part of the story. (Paul Krugman)
• The Ultrawealthy Tax Maneuver That’s Spooking Schwab and Fidelity: Two Wall Street heavyweights are passing up a chance to add billions in assets, a sign the booming tax-aware long/short strategy may be too good to be true — even for the 1%. (Bloomberg)
• Long TIPS Yield 3%. Time to Buy? Edward McQuarrie on the history of the last time real yields looked this good. In late 2008, TIPS yields rose past 3.0%, a juicy rate that lasted barely a month. By 2010, yields had fallen below 2.0%; by 2011, below 1.0%; and just before inflation exploded and the Fed tightened in 2021, the 5-year TIPS yield fell to -1.76%, and even the 30-year sported a negative yield. As we write this, long TIPS yields once again yield 3.0% and, as in 2008, these rates may not last long. That means: You snooze, you lose. The time to buy TIPS is now. (Advisor Perspectives)
• Elon Musk Broke the FAA — Palantir Is Picking Up the Pieces: On August 6 the Minneapolis air route control center lost radar and communications for two hours, disrupting more than 1,100 flights across a 330,000-square-mile, nine-state sector. Musk’s DOGE was supposed to rebuild the nation’s air traffic control system, but it ended up paving the way for Peter Thiel’s company to take over. (The Verge)
• Ordinary Abundance: Edward Bellamy once imagined that music on demand would be “the limit of human felicity.” A modern apartment is full of things that once drew the same kind of awe. Edward Bellamy once imagined that music on demand would be “the limit of human felicity.” A modern apartment is full of things that once drew the same kind of awe. (Ordinary Abundance)
• A.I. Detectors Are Supposed to Make Our Writing Better. It Might Be Doing the Opposite. If you’ve been avoiding the em dash and words like delve and tapestry, you’re not alone. If you’ve been avoiding the em dash and words like delve and tapestry, you’re not alone. (Slate) see also Anthropic’s ‘Watermark’ Text Adulteration in Claude Is a Perversion of Writing. They say “imperceptible” and “doesn’t change the meaning, quality, or readability”. Their words. Not almost imperceptible. Not slightly changes the meaning, quality, or readability. John Gruber on the announcement that all Claude models will begin watermarking everything they generate, text included, to comply with EU regulation — with no description offered of how it would actually work. (Daring Fireball)
• Americans are destroying license-plate cameras as surveillance backlash grows: The Washington Post on the Flock vandalism wave — the cameras coming down by bolt cutter and spray paint as the surveillance backlash turns kinetic. Flock cameras have been shot, spray-painted and cut down as how-to videos spread online. “People are fed up,” one suspect said. (Washington Post)
• Experts raise alarms over Census Bureau report Trump is touting on noncitizen voting. A highly unusual Census Bureau report that President Trump is using to reup dubious claims of widespread illegal voting by non-U.S. citizens has ties to a Trump-aligned think tank, NPR has learned. Work on the analysis was not conducted by career civil servants at the Census Bureau, and the team behind it included individuals affiliated with the America First Policy Institute, a think tank started by officials from Trump’s first administration, according to a Census Bureau employee who NPR has agreed not to name because they fear retaliation at work. NPR finds the highly unusual Census Bureau report behind the president’s claims has ties to a Trump-aligned think tank. (NPR)
• When Your Brain Is in Your Arm: Two-thirds of an octopus’s neurons live in its arms, each operating independently — including the one it uses to have sex. (Wired)
• Every Madonna Interview That’s Ever Been Published in Interview: We unearthed from our archives every single moment we’ve ever spent with the music icon. Below, find the Queen of Pop in her own words, from 1985 to today. The full archive, 1985 to today, in her own words. Set aside three and a half hours. (Interview)
Video of the day: The Epic Story of Rice: Gods, Conquests, and a Food Trip Through History
Be sure to check out our Masters in Business next week with Alex Morris of TSOH Investment Research. He is the author of “Buffett and Munger Unscripted: Three Decades of Investment and Business Insights from the Berkshire Hathaway Annual Shareholder Meetings.” The book was named one of Amazon’s “Best Books of 2025.” To write it, he reviewed every Berkshire annual meeting from 1994 through 2024 — 100s of hours of video covering more than 1,700 shareholder questions over 31 years — after Berkshire released the meeting archives.
Sports inflation is getting out of hand. It would cost $800 to watch every professional LA basketball team from the comfort of your couch
Source: Bloomberg
Sign up for our reads-only mailing list here.
