These are two writers I admire and follow, plus a sort of random, bonus recommendation.
Boondoggle
Pat Garofolo follows the path of traditional journalism. He’s a U.S. News & World Report alum and his writing has appeared in a variety of mainstream publications including The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Newark Star-Ledger.
Every issue of his Boondoggle newsletter is, for me, another eye-opener. His reporting covers issues such as how online information sharing among landlords is, in effect, price-fixing that drives up prices for renters. He has been covering the way that “private equity” has become a growing force in medicine and the negative impact that is having on healthcare. And he has a special place in his reporter’s heart for government subsidies handed out to sports teams to construct stadiums.
The latest issue of the newsletter celebrates a victory for the anti-boondoggle forces—a recent decision by the owner of the hockey and basketball teams in Washington D.C. to keep the teams in D.C. rather than moving them to northern Virginia. Here’s a link to the story.
Money Stuff
Money Stuff by Matt Levine is a Bloomberg newsletter.
Levine writes about some things I know about and lots of things about which I haven’t a clue. He does it in a way that is consistently illuminating, even if I still don’t fully understand him in the end. Here’s a clip from the lede of the latest issue of his newsletter:
Hunterbrook!
We talked in November about Hunterbrook, a hedge fund that is also a newspaper. These are mostly tough economic times for the news industry, and Hunterbrook hit upon a differentiated media business model:
They would start a newsroom (Hunterbrook Media) to publish general news and investigative journalism.
There’s no paywall and no advertising.
But before each investigative piece is published, the newsroom would send it to Hunterbrook’s affiliated hedge fund (Hunterbrook Capital), which could trade on the news.
The hedge fund’s trading profits can — they hope! — pay the journalists’ salaries.
One way to think of this business model is that Hunterbrook is essentially an activist short-selling hedge fund, like Hindenburg Research: It investigates companies, finds problems, shorts the companies, and then noisily publishes its investigation to draw attention to the problems. But whereas Hindenburg is straightforwardly a short-selling firm, Hunterbrook’s news site is at least theoretically independent of its hedge fund, and if it publishes enough good general news then perhaps it can become more widely read and trusted — and have more stock-price impact — than a pure hedge fund.
Another way to think of this business model is that it is a salary arbitrage. It is expensive to hire hedge fund analysts to investigate companies all over the world. It is cheaper to hire journalists! You might find more tradable signals with 20 journalists than you can with one hedge-fund analyst.
Hunterbrook launched today
The stories are filled with links so you can further explore the topics.
His newsletter leads off today’s issue with an overview of the Trump Media SPAC, describes its relationship to a meme stock, and explains how the former president can profit immensely from it.
It’s not investment advice. It’s not “lessons in management.” It is, as the title suggests, just Money Stuff. Subscription info is here.
Bonus Track
Hey Pop is a newsletter I subscribed to . . . I don’t know when. It’s a “one in a while” sort of venture. The subscription is free. There are posts for paid subscribers, too.
I started reading today’s issue (which must have been a freebie) and I just kept reading. And reading. And a bit more. On to a full circle, satisfying conclusion. Here’s a link.
Good stuff. Home for his Substack is here.
Anon.
Ridge