What we’re reading (3/22)
“The Stock Market Is Set For More Short-Term Upside After Wall Street's Fear Gauge Falls 5 days In A Row, Quant Trading Firm Says” (Insider). “There could be more short-term upside ahead in the stock market based on the five-day decline in Wall Street's fear gauge, according to Chris Murphy of Susquehanna International Group. The VIX, which is a volatility index that helps measure investor fear on Wall Street, has fallen five days in a row to below the 25 level. According to Murphy, that setup has led to strong short-term gains in the stock market, looking back over the past 30 years.”
“‘A Very Significant Moment for Business’” (DealBook). “The S.E.C. voted yesterday on sweeping rule changes that would require public companies to disclose climate-related risks and greenhouse gas emissions. Though many already report some of this information, no mandatory standard exists, making it hard for investors to compare data across companies.”
“When Being One Of—If Not The—First Call A Banker Makes Is Not Such A Great Thing” (Dealbreaker). “[U]nbeknownst to [Frank] Fu [formerly of Laurion Capital Management], the year before he left Laurion the Securities and Exchange Commission and Justice Department began taking a little look at the world of block trades to see if, say, shorting the hell out of a name that the equity syndicate desk at, say, Morgan Stanley just floated as one that might just potentially be on the block might well just constitute insider trading[.]”
“Koch Industries, Built On Oil, Bets Big On U.S. Batteries” (Wall Street Journal). “A Koch Industries unit has made at least 10 investments worth at least $750 million in the U.S. battery supply chain and electric vehicles in the past 18 months, regulatory filings, news releases and FactSet data show. Koch’s battery investments are among the biggest from outside the auto industry, analysts say.”
“The Education-Innovation Gap” (Biasi and Ma, NBER). “Comparing the text of 1.7M syllabi and 20M academic articles, we construct the ‘education-innovation gap,’ a syllabus’s relative proximity to old and new knowledge. We show that courses differ greatly in the extent to which they cover frontier knowledge. More selective and better funded schools, and those enrolling socio-economically advantaged students, teach more frontier knowledge. Instructors play a big role in shaping course content; research-active instructors teach more frontier knowledge. Students from schools teaching more frontier knowledge are more likely to complete a PhD, produce more patents, and earn more after graduation.”
