Posted by mark.
Results > Posts Filed Under > Business
Jul
29
Posted by mark.
Based on recent events I suspect an investment axiom might exist that says: The further an investor is abstracted away from the underlying asset they’re investing in, the greater the risk.
This has been shown recently to be true with Mortgage backed securities, credit default swaps, the black box that is the hedge fund industry and even sovereign debt may qualify.
When you are shielded from your investment by layers of structure, marketing, repackaging and sales teams, you are too far away …
May
3
Posted by mark.
Facebook has over 400 million active users and members spend over 951 man-years on the site each month. Facebook is passing Google this year as the most visited site in the US and is going to earn somewhere between $710M and $1.1B in revenue this year.
Google on the other hand have a $27B revenue run rate for 2010 [based on Q1 2010 earnings]. With similar on-site traffic they are doing 25 times Facebook’s revenue. Google have had a long time to …
Apr
9
Posted by mark.
Being over 35 has it’s advantages. Us old(ish) timers have lived through Microsoft using their platform to beat the hell out of Novell, Netscape, Real Player and others. Watched Eric Schmidt’s ascension from platform victim to platform player. And learned that platforms are honey traps that give good honey but you might get caught.
Twitter Investor Fred Wilson wrote a much talked about post earlier this week that sparked a discussion about whether Twitter would implement critical apps themselves. Seesmic founder …
Mar
16
Posted by mark.
In a press release from HitWise published on CNN Money a few minutes ago, Facebook.com just overtook Google.com as the most visited domain in the USA. This is possibly the most significant milestone in Facebook’s history as a large company. Here’s why:
Most of Google’s revenue comes from their Ad business. Half of it comes from their own properties and the other half from a distributed network of sites. (sounding familiar already I’m sure).
There is a lot of noise around Google’s …
Oct
8
Posted by mark.
A little bird was flying along one day heading North. As he flew it started getting colder and colder. Soon it started raining. The rain turned into freezing hail. His wings froze and he fell out of the sky like a stone. He thought to himself “Oh lordy I’m frozen stiff, I can’t move, I’m falling at 200 miles an hour and when I hit the ground I’m going to shatter like a piece of glass.”.
As he finally lost all …
Aug
3
Posted by mark.
Marc Andreessen has a great post on the collapse of the Sowood hedge fund recently. Reading this I have a weird sense of deja-vu. LTCM collapsed while I was working at Credit Suisse First Boston in Canary Wharf, London. CSFB lost about $700 million. Around the same time the Russian economy took a dip and they blew another $600 million. There were no layoffs and no pay cuts.
If I ever decide I need the security of a day job I’ll …