Housing Starts and Building Permits

Housing starts (well, technically, building permits) by US Metro areas can be found here.

I like how they include counties and smaller cities as well. Oh yeah - "they" are the US Census Bureau.

Here's the link to the main Census New Residential Construction Page. There is a helpful explanation of methodology and a few other categories like Quarterly Starts by Purpose and Design.

Business Passings: Andy Grove, CEO of Intel

All of our books about Andy Grove here.

Andy Grove was a Hungarian born refugee who joined Intel - one of the first companies that made the processors for computers. He eventually became the head. A fascinating classic business American success story. Read the books above for a glimpse of how Silicon Valley worked in the early days.

Freeters - Japan's Part Time Underclass

There's a growing underclass of part-time workers in Japan.  Called Freeters, they tend to be intelligent, educated university graduates from middle class homes, but cannot find fulltime positions.

Update: the original video I embedded has been removed but here's a link to all YouTube videoes on freeters.

Money Changes You (but not the way you think): The Case of Ancient Sparta

Many societies have attempted to control how money is earned, saved and spent.

This seems to have been an attempt to create a centrally planned economy, to create a certain psychological state in the citizen, and to keep wealth within the national borders.

Here is the case of ancient Sparta.  According to Plutarch, the semi-legendary founder of Sparta, Lycurgus, mandated that money be iron trinkets rather than the more common gold and silver of the time.

You couldn't possess gold and silver, or any other objects that conceivably could store value, And the iron trinkets themselves were treated in such a way they could not be melted down and made into other iron objects.

It was difficult to earn, spend or save other kinds of money outside the official rules. It might be done, but was difficult and also illegal. 

So you're stuck doing what the system wants you to do.

And most people won't even think to notice this.

Business Statistics Demystified

You need a good introduction to a HARD topic. Written to get you started, and as intelligent as you are.You already know what the median and mode are; you need a discussion of Bayesian probability, or 12 ways of looking at correlation, or population distribution, etc.

Enter the wonderful Demystified series.

We're looking at business stats today. So check out these out and get caught up:  


Business Stats Demystified.
Stats Demystified
Probability Demystified

Where to Research Bonds @ Alkek

Here's how to find current bond prices, specific securities available (including corporates, sovereigns, municipals and more), coupon rates, CUSIPs, upgrades and downgrades and more.

Mergent Annual Bond Record (print): Corporate, Municipals, government plus exhaustive entries for these categories. Moody's ratings, bond coupon rate, CUSIPs, ratings up and downgrades,

Mergent Bond Record (print/recent): Corporate (including international), Government, Convertibles, Features Moody's ratings, when issued, amount outstanding, currency,  etc.

Mergent Manuals (electronic resource - industrials, municipals, utilities and more) should have complete issuance up to the date, plus 52 week high and low for those.  

Standard and Poor's Netvantage (electronic): Features a corporate bond screener. Search by parameters if desired or by issuer/CUSIP. Current trading price, yield, etc.

PLUS DON'T MISS:

The Bloomberg Terminal in 4^th floor Alkek  Computer Lab. Features current trading conditions on any security you could want.

You could also search back issues of the Wall Street Journal. You can oftentimes find the original issuance announcement as well as other information.  

Bowie Bonds

David Bowie pioneered the use of intellectual property and royalties as a security.

From the article linked above:
"...Investment bankers helped Bowie raise $55 million by selling royalties from songs and 25 albums, such as "The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars." It's a way for the 50-year-old Bowie to raise money upfront and then pay off the bonds with royalties from his music as they come in.

The bonds, which have an average life of 10 years, were priced in February to pay investors 7.9% interest. The benchmark 30-year U.S. Treasury bond on Monday was yielding 6.90%. Prudential Insurance Co. of America, the nation's largest insurance carrier, bought the entire issue."