It is Rafa again at Rolland Garros. The final had no real competition and Rafa gives you the impression that he will be back again and can win it again even on one leg. With 14 wins in Paris, more than half his grand slam wins out of 22 came at Rolland Garros. Rafa is the ‘king of clay’ and the emperor of grand slam wins.
In modern sports, no individual has shown the resilience, determination, and competitiveness that Rafa has. Look at the way he won the last Australian Open and the US open before the last one. Both times he came back from the dead after being two sets down.
When he had his knee operation more than a decade back I thought he was done but he proved us all wrong. More than anything as his wealth and grand slam collections started to rise he has shown more humility, kindness, and love. A very rare quality in an individual.
Recently, there was an excellent article on CNN hailing him as a ‘philosopher’. I highly recommend the article. For that matter, Djokovich and Federer have displayed great sportsmanship and character on the court and are no less affable. Gone are the days of arrogance, tantrums, and foul language on the court when McEnroe, Connors, and Natasha ruled the roost. Sports is not just about winning but being a good ambassador of the game and being a role model for the rest of the world and these three men - Rafa, Djokovich, and Federer - have exemplified it in abundance. Sans arrogance in victory and graciousness in failure.
These rare qualities make them formidable world-beaters and there is much to learn from them. Now to markets.
The jobs report last Friday was mixed. But we are at a point where any bad news is good news. That is the way Fed wants it. Even though the Fed gets many things wrong, they are never short of creativity. The Fed wants to bring demand down as it is the one thing that they can control. In a globalized economy, they don’t have much say on the supply side.
To this particular point, the Fed is targeting employment, as a tool to influence demand lower, mainly through correcting the imbalance between job openings and job seekers. There are two openings or more for one job seeker which has enabled the job seekers to negotiate and demand higher wages.
How do the employers cope with this? They pass this on to consumers through higher prices basically higher inflation. What the Fed is doing now is not something they have done before. I mean explicitly trying to destroy demand and jobs but they have to as the other options have much bigger negative ramifications.
The Fed is trying to influence the markets more verbally and if they are successful, the less they will have to do on the interest rate front. The rapid rise in ten-year yields and 30-year mortgage rates is not something the Fed is happy about but they really have not much control over it.
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Abraham George is a seasoned investment manager with more than 40 years of experience in trading & investment and multi-billion dollar portfolio management spanning diverse environments like banks (HSBC, ADCB), sovereign wealth fund (ADIA), a royal family office and a hedge fund. Currently, he is a co-founder of a new hedge fund where foreign citizens can invest in Indian growth stocks like Tanla operating in hyper-growth markets like CPaaS.