Max Gokhman

You should listen to Nathan Geraci and I leverage VettaFi sentiment data to talk #ETFs for ‘25. But it’s ok to read the recap Nicholas Wodeshick from the show too. . - Use case for defined outcome, structured protection, and covered calls from NEOS Investments Calamos Investments Innovator ETFs® - Growing interest in CLOs and bank loan #ETFs from Janus Henderson Investors Invesco US Panagram BondBloxx - #Dividend strategies from SS&C Technologies and ProShares - Plus Ben Johnson, CFA commentary Zachary Csillag Troy Cates Tim Urbanowicz, CFA Andrew Nelson, CFA Matt Kaufman, CETF® Frank J. Tirado, MS Jessica Fernandez Michelle DeWitt, CIMA® Rob Stewart Danielle Gilbert Christopher Murphy Paul Baiocchi, CFA Steve Munroe JoAnne Bianco, CFA Joanna Gallegos Colleen Kapoor Cole Feinberg

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Why is #GDX from VanEck in focus for VettaFi? Learn more about the #ETF in this segment. Kendall Harrow Laura Jones Edward Lopez https://lnkd.in/eaQ5zgA6

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Despite the recent Non-Farm Payroll (NFP) reports being lauded as "strong" and "solid," a critical underlying metric tells a different story. The Implied Hiring Rate has actually plummeted in the last two NFP reports, exposing a glaring disconnect between surface-level praise and deeper labor market dynamics. Is this time different?

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AI isn't magic—it's advanced statistical analysis. Joe Lonsdale, at SIC 2024, reminded us that models like ChatGPT predict words and actions based on vast data sets, making them seem intelligent. It's a powerful reminder of the technology's roots and potential. #AI #MachineLearning #Technology If you are interested in these topics, I invite you to read my letters and join the conversation. You can subscribe to my free weekly newsletter, Thoughts from the Frontline. https://lnkd.in/ecpVCyuN

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Our special day this month is October 8, when the Nobel Prize in Physics will be announced. While many people follow their favorite college sports teams, I graduated from Caltech, and so Nobel Prize week is like the bowl games and March Madness rolled up into one giant geek fest. Since this series commemorates days that are both STEM and investing related in a nerdy way, I'll specifically focus on the physics prize of 1907, awarded to Albert Michelson for his experimental work measuring the speed of light and the failure to detect the luminiferous ether through which light was thought to propagate. This work led to Einstein's theory of special relativity, and ultimately to general relativity, the field of study for my PhD thesis. Thank you Albert Michelson! What does this have to do with investing? Quite a bit, in fact. Michelson made precise measurements of the speed of light, which at about 300,000 km/s is the fastest that information can be transmitted. And investors have long been concerned with getting information quickly, from faster boats in the 1700s to carrier pigeons in the 1800s to ticker tape in the 1900s. Today financial information is transmitted by technology such as fiber optics where the speed of light becomes the limiting factor. But while physics makes it tougher to gain an advantage with speed, what does very much still matter is the skill with which one interprets and uses that information. So as we find out the Nobel Prize winners this year, let's recognize their achievements in taking existing knowledge and furthering our understanding through their insights. And yeah, I'm rooting for Caltech to take some share of the prizes.

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=> The U.S. labor market report produced a knee-jerk reaction among major FX – but MXN, COP, BRL, and ZAR are bucking the trend => MXN clearly likes the idea of a stronger growth in the U.S. Further, President Sheinbaum continues to send orthodox policy signals (including the post-election fiscal adjustment), and there is now a possibility that parts of controversial judicial reform might be revised => BRL/COP/ZAR’s outperformance is even more interesting – Domestic factors still getting noticed? (chart’s source - Bloomberg LP)

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𝗕𝗿𝗶𝗱𝗴𝗲𝘄𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗻𝘀 𝘀𝘁𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗴𝘆 𝘁𝗼 𝗿𝗲𝘁𝗮𝗶𝗹 𝗶𝗻𝘃𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗿𝗼𝘂𝗴𝗵 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝗦𝘁𝗿𝗲𝗲𝘁 𝗘𝗧𝗙 https://lnkd.in/dCYdE-zK   Risk parity funds for retail investors have not worked well over the past decade or so (and Bridgewater’s All-Weather strategy has also underperformed for some time): the pioneer in the industry (Wealthfront Risk Parity Fund with $1.3bn in AUMs) is going to be liquidated in January https://lnkd.in/dya2H6SZ , and other products have also failed to beat a simpler 60/40 strategy.   This despite the carnage in bond markets in 2022 and the elevated asset correlations (or, more likely, because of…).   I guess it all boils down to the specific strategy used: this product will also use leverage in an ETF, so it will be interesting to see how it plays out. 

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Check out my macro notes just released:) Some interesting insights from the Snb and Norges decisions today along with thoughts on the S&P 500's outperformance in the last month against global asset classes. Enjoy:) https://lnkd.in/gcaEFYje

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"Nvidia's reinvention has paid off: on June 18, 2024, the company surpassed Microsoft to become the world's most valuable company, at a market capitalization of $3.3 trillion. It reached that milestone on the back of the immense demand for its AI chips; the company's stock price had tripled over the previous twelve months.To call Nvidia's stock a historically, good investment is to understate things. Between its IPO in early 1999 and the end of 2023, Nvidia investors enjoyed the highest annualized compound return for any U.S. stock in history through a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of more than 33 percent. If an investor had purchased $10,000 of Nvidia stock when it made its market debut on January 22, 1999, that stock would have been worth $13.2 million on December 31, 2023." -- Tae Kim, The Nvidia Way

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It's cool to be different, but why's alternative data so hot right now? Today, we're seeing an explosion of datasets that are completely outside the realm of traditional financial data. New models are based on unconventional metrics like geolocation and foot traffic, patent filing counts, and credit-card transaction spend. https://ow.ly/1gSm50UgPzj

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"Is the rate of AI capability growth accelerating or decelerating?" I often get asked questions like this during meetings with customers (who are typically hedge funds and asset managers). And as someone who spends most of my day thinking about and working with AI, it's one of my favorite topics to discuss. Something I've always found interesting was that OpenAI did not expect ChatGPT to become such a viral hit when released in Nov'22. And neither did I for that matter. When I first came across it, less than a year into starting Portrait, my initial thought was "Oh, they've taken GPT-3 DaVinci-002 and fine-tuned it to act like a chatbot. Cool, but nothing new from a capability perspective*". Researchers and practitioners in the NLP world seemed to have similar initial reactions. Boy, was that view misguided. What I failed to appreciate was that the chatbot UX created a gateway for the world to experience, for the first time, all the progress that had been made with language models since the transformer first emerged in 2017. GPT-3 wasn't new to me. But it certainly was new to friends working as analysts at hedge funds that didn't spend their Saturday mornings reading ML papers or experimenting in the OpenAI playground. Which brings us back to the question at the top and the discussions I have with customers. Today, folks largely recognize that the pace of AI advancement matters. The fate of quite literally trillions of dollars rests on just how useful and powerful AI turns out to be. But even now, there aren't great resources out there for non-engineers or researchers to stay close to the key developments before they're widely understood. It's been a goal of mine for some time to contribute to public forums with some thoughts from building Portrait. And so this is how I intend to do it. At least a few times a week, I'll be posting a short write-up discussing noteworthy learnings or research I've come across. My goal is to shed some light on what’s happening beneath the surface in the AI world, so that when the next ChatGPT drops, it is not such a surprise. I’m looking forward to sharing my learnings with you as we ride this rollercoaster of AI over the coming months and years. And of course, if you want to learn how we’re leveraging cutting-edge AI for investment research and thesis generation at Portrait Analytics, please reach out! *As it turned out, the underlying model powering ChatGPT in Nov’22 was a step-up from GPT-3 to GPT-3.5, though this was unknown at the time.

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As the Bulls retreat, TC Options Insight helps tame the bear. Options offer versatile strategies that can profit from both upward and downward market movements. TC Options Insight was designed to show retail stock traders that have never considered trading options, the benefits of options strategies that replicate being long or short stock with less risk while learning the importance of volatility and expected price movement in the strike price selection process. Here's how it works. https://lnkd.in/g73CPRmK

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Jake Dollarhide, CEO of Longbow Asset Management explains why he thinks Alphabet Inc. is a leading value tech stock and examines its position in the #AI competitive landscape. (This is not a recommendation to buy or sell any particular security.) CNBC CNBC Overtime CNBC International The Wall Street Journal The New York Times New York Post The University of Tulsa: Collins College of Business The University of Tulsa Tulsa Remote Rotary Club of Tulsa City of Tulsa Tulsa Regional Chamber Bloomberg Reuters University of Oklahoma Rotary International Oklahoma State University Oklahoma State University-Tulsa The University of Tulsa Graduate School Gathering Place Student Investment Fund The University of Tulsa Tulsa World Media Company The Oklahoman The Journal Record NYSE Federal Reserve Board Federal Reserve Bank of New York YMCA of Greater Tulsa YMCA of the USA World YMCA Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis ICE 36 Degrees North Tulsa Innovation Labs Friends of the Katy Trail Harwood International

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With Nasdaq strength masking some deterioration in breadth indicators, we're looking to redeploy cash from recent sales across multiple equity strategies. Meanwhile, this week's CPI & PPI reports relieved some pressure on bonds, as our team awaits another big reinvestment period for Munis in July. Watch "Positions in Transition" here:

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My friend Doug Kass raised an alarming point recently: Moore’s Law—the idea that the number of transistors on a microchip doubles every two years—is breaking down. This isn’t just a tech problem; it’s a potential game-changer for the future of AI. If we can’t make silicon chips smaller and more powerful at the same rate, the foundational technology for generative AI might not work efficiently. This could mean AI's exponential growth may hit a wall sooner than we think. What does this mean for the tech sector and the broader economy? If you are interested in these topics, I invite you to read my letters and join the conversation. You can subscribe to my free weekly newsletter, Thoughts from the Frontline. https://lnkd.in/ecpVCyuN #MooresLaw #AI #TechTrends Chart Source: Our World in Data

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🚀 "Our Biggest Fight" – An Interesting Read on Reclaiming Liberty in the Digital Age 🚀 Just finished reading "Our Biggest Fight" by Frank H. McCourt, Jr., and the subtitle "Reclaiming Liberty, Humanity, and Dignity in the Digital Age" really struck a chord. As #Bitcoin price soars and catches a lot of attention, this book reminded me of the deeper use cases of the Blockchain technology beyond price surges. 📈 Here’s a quote that resonated: "Think of your data as your digital DNA...as important as the biological DNA you're born with, if not more so." – p. 15 This book sheds light on how today's internet—controlled by a few major players—has shifted from its liberating vision to a model that often manipulates our data and creates a toxic space. It’s a call to rethink how we interact online and reclaim our digital identities! 🔍💡 Key Issues: 🔔 Our centralized internet is shaped by a few corporations, impacting democracy, trust, and mental health. 🔔 Rather than freedom, today’s web often drives addictive behaviors, eroding personal autonomy and open discourse. For anyone interested in the promise of a decentralized, fairer digital world, "Our Biggest Fight" is a great, accessible read. Highly recommend! 📚 #DigitalTransformation #Blockchain #DataPrivacy

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