CHISWICK, WEST LONDON – My core investment stance in one paragraph:
We are in the final stage of an epic debt bubble. The best thing we can do is cash out and keep our savings under the mattress in gold and other hard currency proxies… and go fishin’ until the world is back in balance.
That said, I’m an inveterate speculator. And I love attempting “hero trades.”
(I’ve written about some of my hero trades before, here and here.)
I’m currently considering my next “hero trade”…
(More below.)
Exploring the Museum Capital of the World
Greetings from London, the museum capital of the world…
In 2018, Kate and I chucked it all in and went traveling. We’ve been living out of a suitcase, homeschooling our kids, and living on the fringes ever since.
We’re having the time of our lives… and because we spend ALL our time together, we have become very tight knit as a family, like a small wolfpack.
We’re currently staying in London at my late mother’s mansion, making the most of the homeschool opportunities around us.
(Our timing is lucky. Because of COVID-19, there aren’t many tourists in London. And as the local children are all still in school, we have the tourist attractions largely to ourselves.)
Last week we toured Hampton Court and Oxford University. Today, we visited the British Museum, home to more than 8 million objects documenting human history, art, and culture.
Here we are…
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With Kate and the kids outside the British Museum
We homeschool the kids. So we’re a little sensitive to the thought that we may be screwing them up by not doing the same thing that everyone else is doing (i.e., sending them to school).
The opposite of that is, when we get good results, we feel really proud. That’s what happened today…
A Day Full of Learning
One of my mother’s dearest friends – Mary – is a professional tourist guide in London. Mary met us in central London and took us on a tour of the British Museum.
She focused the tour on the ancient cultures of the Egyptians, the Assyrians, the Romans, the Greeks, and the Anglo-Saxons.
We saw many amazing artifacts, including the Rosetta Stone, the famous Greek and Roman marble statues, and the treasures taken from Egyptian tombs.
And because Mary is a history expert, we got the backstory and historical significance for each artefact.
Here we are at the Rosetta Stone, the key which allowed historians to decipher ancient Egyptian scripts and the most visited object in the museum…
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Mary shows the kids the Rosetta Stone
And here we are looking at stone panels taken from the North Palace of Ashurbanipal, in modern-day Iraq…
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Stone panels taken from the North Palace of Ashurbanipal
We had visited all of these regions on our travels.
Also, the boys have read all the Rick Riordan novel series, which he sets in these ancient cultures.
Finally, Kate made the children watch online videos about the exhibitions in the museum before we went. We were well-prepared.
Here is Penny (8) admiring a 2,000-year-old marble statue made by the Romans…
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Penny admires a 2,000-year-old Roman statue
Despite walking 6,000 steps around the museum over about three hours on a really hot day, the kids never lost their focus or got bored.
They asked lots of good questions and seemed fascinated by what they saw. (Having a world-class guide showing us around didn’t hurt, either.)
Penny was so tired after all that learning, she fell asleep on the Tube ride home…
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All the learning wore Penny out
My New “Hero Trade”
Back to the new “hero trade” I’m working on…
It seems to me that stock market values are fully inflated. If I’m right about this, over the long-term, the only direction valuations can go is down…
Especially if I’m right about us being in the final stage of an epic debt bubble, in which case valuations will collapse.
The hero trade I’m considering is shorting stock market valuations. It’s not an easy insight to express in a portfolio, because of how hard it is to get the timing right on the short side and how hard it is to manage risk.
I’ll explain my ideas on this trade in more detail next week…
– Tom Dyson
P.S. I love seeing the kids enjoying reading. This month, the boys are reading the Inheritance Cycle tetralogy by Christopher Paolini, which they love.
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Dusty and Miles read the Inheritance Cycle tetralogy on the Tube
Like what you’re reading? Send your thoughts to [email protected].
FROM THE MAILBAG
Kind words for the Dyson family… and one reader agrees with Tom’s homeschooling approach…
Reader comment: I love reading your unique perspective on life. Thanks for all of the knowledge you have shared with me.
Reader comment: I have watched your family travels almost from the start and applaud your family. You are and will continue to be close for many years because of the foundation you ALL have created. I have some experience in life insurance as well as investing in gold and silver.
Reader comment: Really enjoy your Postcards – a term which does not do justice to the depth of the issues, insights, and thoughts you communicate. I’ve been a university professor for decades and have watched as education has been taken over by a management-style “bums in seats” approach, which has progressively devalued qualifications.
Now, I train kids for future jobs in the digital world. There is now much more emphasis on skills and micro credentials (available cheaply through the internet). CVs are out and portfolios of work are now the way smart employers seek talent. You are on to it! Be blessed.
Tom’s note: As always, thanks for your messages! Please keep writing us at [email protected], and I’ll do my best to answer your questions in a future Friday mailbag edition.