My Amazon Review of Gary Sernovitz's "The Counting House"

 An Endowment CIO under Stress

 

Private equity investor Gary Sernovitz has written a disappointing novel about the trials and tribulations of college endowment chief investment officer. (CIO) The idea for the book, which focuses on the stresses and strains of a CIO as he goes through a year of underperformance. The book excels when it discusses how endowment investments are made and it demonstrates the folly of having 60 separate investment managers to run a $6 billion portfolio. We witness meetings with promoters of every endowment investing fad of the past two decades. All of this is interesting to a finance geek like me.

 

However, this is a novel. The characters are one dimensional. We really don’t get to know the CIO, the college president, and the head of the academic senate with his zany social investing ideas. We hardly get to know his small staff who has to put up with the CIO destroying his laptop computer in a fit of rage.

 

There is also a reclusive hedge fund billionaire alum who refuses to give money to the school. Given the characters in the book, who would give them money and given what is going on today at many elite colleges, it makes no sense to give money to any of them. The billionaire’s role in the book is to highlight the absurdity of the fee driven asset management industry to come up with niche products, that at the end of the day, likely detracts from investment performance.

 

My suggestion is that the book would have been better as nonfiction than fiction.

For the full amazon URL see: An Endowment CIO under Stress (amazon.com)

Joe "No Win" Biden

President Biden has done it again. He doesn’t believe in winning. Just as at the start of the Russia-Ukraine War when the Biden provided enough aid to prevent Ukraine’s defeat, but not enough for Ukraine to win, it now appears he is doing the same thing with respect to the Israel-Hamas War. Last night he announced on CNN that the U.S. will stop the shipments of offensive military aid to Israel should it invade the heart of the Hamas stronghold of Rafah. He also has suspended the shipment of 3500 bombs and thousands of artillery shells.

 

To be sure civilian casualties have been high in the Gaza War, but it is in the nature of the Hamas enemy who cares little about the death of its own people. To them every casualty makes Israel look bad in the eyes of the world. Thus, it is in their interests to increase the body count. When facing an enemy like this, what choice does Israel have?

 

If Biden thinks that will hasten the cease fire negotiations with Hamas, he is sorely mistaken. Hamas will continue to play its waiting game in the hopes that Israel will cave under U.S. pressure. Meantime more Israeli hostages will die in captivity, and it will likely make Hezbollah more aggressive in the north. Remember those bombs and artillery shells are needed to defend Israel in the north.

 

All Biden’s actions will do is to prolong the wars in Ukraine and Gaza. The quicker Hamas is defeated in Gaza the quicker the war will end. Never forget that Hamas is the aggressor. ( See: Shulmaven: Hamas Aggression Must be Punished ) A partial arms embargo on Israel is perhaps one of the most counter-productive things Biden has done. Selling out an ally does not do Biden proud and his action will have consequences around the world, especially in Taiwan.

My Amazon Review of Kevin Baker's "The New York Game: Baseball and the Rise of a New City"

Play Ball

As a kid growing up in 1950’s Queens, I was totally immersed in baseball, especially the Brooklyn Dodgers. Kevin Baker has written a marvelous history of the game against the backdrop of a growing New York City. He starts out by refuting the idea that Abner Doubleday invented baseball. Indeed, it was invented as a street game in 1840’s New York and grew from there.

 

Though interesting the history of the early game didn’t hold a candle to what came in the early 1900’s. His description of the early New York Giants with its great manager John McGraw and its great pitcher Christy Mathewson is fantastic. McGraw’s teams dominated the game for two decades. All the while New York City was exploding with dynamism by building subways, the Hudson Tubes (now PATH), East River bridges, Penn Station, and Grand Central Station.

 

Of course, all of this development was under the aegis of Tammany Hall with all of the corruption that entailed. In the siting of all three New York ball parks, Polo Grounds, Ebbets Field and Yankee Stadium the fingerprints of Tammany Hall were present. Baker highlights the role of Tammany’s Big Tim Sullivan, the vice-lord of lower Manhattan. However, he fails to discuss the role of his boss, Charles Murphy, the chief sachem of Tammany Hall with no explanation given.

 

Although the White Sox were located in Chicago, the big fix of the 1919 World Series originated in New York under the auspices of Arnold Rothstein. In the early days of baseball corruption was more than casual.

 

As we go into the 1920’s the Yankees catch fire with the arrival of Babe Ruth. In the celebrity culture of the 1920’s Ruth was one of the greats, blasting home runs in every major league ballpark. The 1927 Yankees with Ruth backed up by Lou Gehrig, was perhaps the greatest team ever. Rivaling the 1920’s Yankee team was the late 1930’s Yankee team that feature jolting Joe DiMaggio who brought joy to Great Depression New York.

 

There is little discussion of the Dodgers until the Brooklyn Trust takes over the team and installs new management in 1938. From there on the Dodgers become a dynasty especially after luring away Branch Rickey from the St. Louis Cardinals to become its general manager.

Baker highlights the Jim Crow rules of baseball that kept African American players off the field. He discusses the great stars of the Negro Leagues who would have had fantastic careers in the major leagues. Unfortunately, that won’t be remedied until 1947 with the arrival of Jackie Robinson. Baseball and New York post-1945 will be the subject of volume two.

 

There is also a very important business lesson to be learned from the book. The Yankee’s Jacob Rupert continually reinvested in the team, built a farm system, and heavily invested in scouting for new players. Branch Rickey did the same thing at St. Louis and brought that magic to Brooklyn. Rickey signed players in the early 1940’s knowing that they would be drafted. Yet when the war ended, they would become the core of the new Brooklyn Dodgers. In contrast the Stonham family who ran the Giants failed to invest in the team, despite having great players like Carl Hubbell and Mel Ott, to regain their successes of the early 1900’s.

 

Kevin Baker’s history is lively and keeps the reader engaged. If I had one bone to pick, I would have displayed the annual statistics of the key players he discussed. Perhaps in volume two he will do that. 

For the full amazon URL see: Play Ball (amazon.com)