The MercadoLibre Paradox
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Over the past five years, MercadoLibre has grown both revenue and profit dramatically — yet its stock price has gone nowhere. Could this be an opportunity?
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Insights Blog
News, insights and thought leadership from the City Different team.
The MercadoLibre Paradox
What Investing Can Teach Us About March Madness
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We've officially entered my absolute favorite time of the sports calendar year. As millions of others around the country have done this past week, I sat down to fill out my bracket for the annual Van...
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Are Treasuries Still Safe?
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Since April, I've had a lot of conversations about whether Treasuries are still a viable safe haven investment. After “Liberation Day,” 10-year Treasuries sold off by ~50 basis points, creating a...
The MercadoLibre Paradox
![]()
Over the past five years, MercadoLibre has grown both revenue and profit dramatically — yet its stock price has gone nowhere. Could this be an opportunity?
What Investing Can Teach Us About March Madness
![]()
We've officially entered my absolute favorite time of the sports calendar year. As millions of others around the country have done this past week, I sat down to fill out my bracket for the annual Van...
.png)
How Boutique Fixed Income Looks Different
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Fixed income is one of those corners of investing where process matters a lot more than people realize. On the surface, many strategies appear similar. Same benchmarks. Same sectors. Same language...
Are Treasuries Still Safe?
![]()
Since April, I've had a lot of conversations about whether Treasuries are still a viable safe haven investment. After “Liberation Day,” 10-year Treasuries sold off by ~50 basis points, creating a...
.png)
Wall Street vs. Main Street: Private Markets Recap
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After a few years of rate shocks, inflation whiplash, and underwriting gymnastics, 2025 felt like a year where dealmakers could finally take a full breath… and then immediately remember there’s still...
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The Morning Jerry Investor
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One of my favorite Seinfeld standup routines compared “Morning Jerry” or “Nighttime Jerry.” Well-rested Morning Jerry was rational and responsible; he made decisions that benefitted himself in the...
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Ladder Strategy Supremacy (by the numbers)
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Most fixed income conversations spend a lot of time on what to own (e.g. credit quality, duration, sector exposure) and not nearly enough time on how the portfolio is put together. But structure...
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IHS Towers: A Comeback Story for 2026
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Shares of London-based IHS Towers crashed during the post-COVID turmoil of 2022-2024. But could they rise again? Cell towers are a critical element of communications infrastructure, enabling the flow...
One Portfolio or Two?
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Why We Believe SMID Cap Core Can Beat Separate Small & Mid Allocations Many investors instinctively split their equity sleeve into a “small-cap fund” and a “mid-cap fund,” assuming that...
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Staying Invested
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Why Time in the Market Beats Timing the Market You might think investors unequivocally love periods of sustained market strength. But, that’s obviously not the case. Money managers fret about market...
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Popping Tags
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At dinner the other night, my youngest daughter asked what I actually do all day in my office. I work from home pretty often, so from her perspective, I just disappear behind a closed door for hours...
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Other Signs of the Apocalypse
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No one likes an alarmist know-it-all (except maybe the folks riding Michael Burry’s coattails through the 2008 financial collapse… but even a lot of those folks thought he had lost his mind). I know...
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The Alphabet Soup of Profitability
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Profitability sounds simple: add up what comes in, subtract what goes out, and you know where you stand. But anyone who has ever prepped their business for sale (or kicked the tires on a potential...
Turning Macro Anxiety into Portfolio Opportunity
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Everywhere you look right now, headlines seem dour: the dollar is weakening, inflation is simmering, geopolitics are rocky (at best)... it’s enough to worry even seasoned investors. But there’s...
What The “One Big Beautiful Bill” Means For Small Businesses
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In July, Congress passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA). The name sounds like it was a placeholder until they came up with something better… then just forgot to rename it before launch, but...
Is the Market Rhyming with 2008?
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I’ve been feeling uneasy about financial markets lately… not because I think we’re headed for a carbon copy of 2008, but because a few old patterns are starting to bubble back up. Not in the same...
What's That Junk Bond Worth Really?
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There’s a line from the movie The Last Boy Scout that’s always stuck with me: "Water's wet, the sky is blue..." (gunna add my own spin on it here) ... and market risks, Jimmy, they’re out there and...
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Hug an Economist
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Connor and I both majored in economics. We spent four years steeped in macro theory, poring over models of trade, labor, and monetary policy. Since then, we’ve found… let’s say, limited use for most...
Performance Art is Killing Actual Performance
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I’ve worked in this industry for 25 years at this point. I’ve seen trends come and go, asset classes boom and bust, and countless firms try to differentiate themselves on everything from process to...
Informed Investor: Total Return
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Why we focus on ‘total return’ (and what that means for your portfolio) When evaluating the performance of our strategies from our fixed income desk, we focus on total return. In our view, it’s the...
AI For Small Businesses
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Open the Wall Street Journal today (or yesterday… or the day before…) and you’ll find some breathless headline about how AI is transforming the global economy. That’s not wrong, necessarily… but it’s...
The Biggest Investment Firms Get This Totally Wrong
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I’ve been in this business for almost 25 years. And I’ve seen the same thing happen over and over again: firms get big, add layers, professionalize everything to death… and in the process, completely...
Postcard From The UK
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Jong recently traveled to the UK with his family over Easter. And because he can never stop thinking about investing, below he describes how a trip that started out as a soccer fan’s pilgrimage to...
When Lower Beta Still Outperforms
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There’s always a case for owning small and mid-cap U.S. stocks… but right now, it’s hard to ignore just how compelling that case has become. Small and mid-cap U.S. stocks are currently trading at a...