James Grant
James Grant
James Augustus Grant, CB, CSI, FRS, FRGSwas a Scottish explorer of eastern equatorial Africa. He made contributions to the journals of various learned societies, the most notable being the "Botany of the Speke and Grant Expedition" in vol. xxix of the Transactions of the Linnaean Society. He married in 1865 and settled down at Nairn, where he died in 1892. He was buried in the crypt of St Paul's Cathedral. Grant's gazelle, one of the largest and handsomest of that...
ProfessionExplorer
Date of Birth11 April 1827
numbers people gold
To me the gold price takes the form of a very uncomplicated formula, and all you have to do is divide one by 'n.' And 'n', I'm glad you ask, 'n' is the world's trust in the institution of paper money and in the capacity of people like Ben Bernanke to manage it. So the smaller 'n', the bigger the price. One divided by a receding number is the definition of a bull market.
weed red-flags growth
Growth at an exceptional rate is a red flag in banking. It is hard enough to manage an ordinary bank; to control a sprouting weed is well-nigh impossible. If loans are expanding too quickly, the lending officers have probably been saying 'yes' too frequently.
running art safety
The art of banking is always to balance the risk of a run with the reward of a profit. The tantalizing factor in the equation is that riskier borrowers pay higher interest rates. Ultimate safety - a strongbox full of currency - would avail the banker nothing. Maximum risk - a portfolio of loans to prospective bankrupts at usurious interest rates - would invite disaster. A good banker safely and profitably treads the middle ground.
mind credit
Credit is money of the mind.
writing people knows
In general, markets know more than the people who write about them.
debt creditors paid
Every debt is ultimately paid, if not by the debtor, then eventually by the creditor.
gold cash littles
Nothing beats a little cash in a bear market, of course, and the oldest form of cash is gold.
banking causes failing
It is an axiom nowadays that no bank fails for lack of capital; unprofitable lending is always the underlying cause.
misplaced recessions
Hope sustains life, but misplaced hope prolongs recessions.
doubt banking firsts
[T]he first bad bank loan was no doubt made around the time of the opening of the first bank.
debt borrowers lenders
Debt is always repaid, either by the borrower or by the lender.
want purpose kind
It's about bums on seats. If nobody wants to listen to what you are doing, it kind of defeats the purpose really, doesn't it?
chooses confidence interest level market measures move rate risk
What the MOVE index measures is the level of complacency or confidence in the interest rate world. The market chooses not to see much risk in anything.
complete investment law marginal prudent supposed
The prudent law of investment is you're never supposed to make a complete decision, no or yes. It's always a marginal one,