I have a weakness for trying to analyse networks and systems, even if they have no particular relevance to my life. This Flash presentation on Social Finance: The New Influentials was referenced in Mindful Money, mapping the connections and super connections among a number of financial blogs. Their thesis, that blogs were a more accurate predictor of the financial collapse than the MSM, will be familiar to anyone who read posts here leading up to the disaster. Many of the financial diarists have left, though there are a couple of thoughtfulones still here. Even so, some additional links might come in handy.
Due to the limited resolution of my computer (and yes, DK4 works on it just fine), the map itself was generally unreadable, though HuffPo sort of stood out as an outlier. The written information was interesting enough that I thought I would share, for those of you who find it useful. Even the rest of us can profit by knowing what threats or opportunities are coming our way.
Many of the following blogs have been quoted widely here; some have not. Some seem to come from the left, others from the right, but editorial position can be discounted if the information is good enough. Links to all of them will be found at the end of the post..
The number 1 blog, Naked Capitalism, will be familiar to you through references from posters here including bobswern, who quotes from her extensively. Other people who link to her might not be so obvious. The Federal Reserve is one; the Financial Times is among eight others. Infectious Greed is written by Paul Pedrosky, a Bloomberg columnist who used to work for CNBC. Five people link to him including the well known blogger Mish Shedlock. The Big Picture is another biggie. Nouriel Roubini reads it; seven people link to it.
Some of the others, such as Jesse’s Cafe Americain were unfamiliar to me, but look intriguing. The presentation describes it as
A reflective take on market coverage, with a lot of charts and vintage posters. An antidote to the breakneck real time financial news.
Three people link to him including Zero Hedge and Naked Capitalism.
The Financial Times Alphaville blog is influential and seems to have a one week jump on market behaviour on average. The presentation claims that this kind of predictive behaviour isn’t common to all of these blogs, so they have particular use if one is an investor. Many of us here, myself included, don’t have the income to take advantage of this, but for those who do: enjoy.
Ludwig von Mises Institute is a think tank grounded in classic liberalism and the Austrian School of economics. They are located, oddly enough, in Alabama.
In the interest of keeping this diary relatively short, the next ten will be up to you to research. I will say that the Epicurian Dealmaker sounds intriguing, as it is written by a New York investment banker. The title and the source seem to make going there a form of reverse slumming.
Here are the links to all of Mindful Money’s top twenty. Do read the original if you have something larger than a 15” laptop. It’s worth reading in full even if you don’t.
The top twenty:
- Naked Capitalism
- Infectious Greed
- The Big Picture
- Jesse’s Café Americain
- Zero Hedge
- Mish’s Global Economic Analysis
- Calculated Risk
- Paul Krugman’s Blog
- FT Alphaville
- Ludwig von Mises Institute
- The Market Trader
- WSJ Blogs
- The Epicurian Dealmaker
- Credit Writedowns
- Dealbreaker
- China Financial markets
(not too sure about this one. Michael Pettis seems to be the expert. this is his blog. The top three pages using Google searches on "china financial markets" plus "blog" got adds for viagra! Any corrections would be fine with me.)
- Max Keiser
- Angry Bear
- The Economist (paywall)
- Jr. Deputy Accountant