Weekend Update #018
Welcome to Blue Room's Weekend Update. Each week, we're sharing what companies we're researching and the what, the who and the how that we think makes the companies interesting and unique. This roundup is brought to you weekly by a group of interns, creative minds, artists and investors who believe that through best in class investing along with the democratization of financial education we can do great things together. Enjoy, Explore and Share.
Blue Room SLACK CONVERSATION Sunday pm
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02.01.21 / 7:58pm
Silver might be (rocket ship emoji) tonite.
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Bye bye sleep (sleep emoji). This email sent out by APMEX about an hour ago tells you all you need to know about the direction of silver prices in the immediate future.
// APMEX PDF //
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Friday the ETF $SLV saw inflows of about $1 billion (it is backed by physical silver in vaults so it must purchase the metal when it receives new investments). The media is saying the inflows into SLV is from another Reddit "short squeeze" - I'm not sure how much credence I give to this but nevertheless the demand is there. Futures markets opened Sunday afternoon so I imagine part of the buying is from SLV trying to lock in physical delivery and the rest from people trying to capitalize on the momentum. And there's a solid case for silver besides all of this - itself and gold are seen as "inflation hedges" and even more importantly, it is a critical component of EVs and charging stations, and with Biden's push for climate change, all of these factors are putting upward pressure on the metal. Friday's inflows seem like the catalyst for a silver price rebound, which appears to be happening. (rocket ship & car emoji)
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Forgot to mention silver miners' reserves have been depleting faster than their mining activity has been able to replace them, so there is also an element of supply constraint as well.(surprise face emoji)
Monday’s #bullpen discussion about the silver market manipulation:
How Blue Room Brought Humanity Back to Investing
— A Short Piece from 2031 —
Machines had taken over trading and the fight was thought to be over. But it turns out a system served to benefit only itself was destined to fail spectacularly. The aspect of investment that was invisible to machines – personal value – was dormant but never fully gone.
Turns out this whole time people never only cared about financial return: they cared about personal return and personal value maximization. Something algorithms could never capture.
Starting with maximizing humanity first. Blue Room unlocked its own algorithm of value, which resonated with employees and investors. They were overrun with applications for employment from all walks of life – and from investors clamoring for more than financial upside.
This shift began moving the market in unexpected ways. And as the algorithms became less predictive, their actions became more erratic as they attempted to insert human behavior into their predictive model without actually understanding the root of that behavior, leading to Blue Room taking advantage of those missteps through its open, transparent and human-focused methodology.
Once experts postulated that the algorithms could never mirror the processing abilities of a completely transparent human-based supercomputer, outflows from algorithms accelerated, leading to further loss of value.
Blue Room never wavered on valuing people first. Who knew this was the most efficient way to predict success of companies within a human-based society?
ON FEBRUARY 13TH NATHANIEL RATELIFF MAKES HIS SNL DEBUT
Chapter Two
(of Three)
With Nathaniel’s record deal and debut on Rounder in full swing, his career became more and more his full-time commitment. As Joseph Pope recalls from their youth, “We would walk around these deserted country roads and talk about music all the time, how it can change the world and how it could change our world. Music was what we thought would save us.” And now music was changing their world. Nathaniel was touring with a band comprised of Pope and other Denver musicians, but the change was not a smooth one. The person who signed them to Rounder lost his job and Nathaniel was dropped from the label. Nathaniel recorded a brilliant record ‘Falling Faster Than You Can Run’ with no label in hand the album was self-released with the help of new management. The album was met again with high critical acclaim and the team around Nathaniel’s career was strengthened, not only with new management but also with the addition of one of the industry’s top publicists. The publicist saw Nathaniel perform by chance in Manhattan around 1 am, at the end of a long night of bands, and she was blown away; the next day asked to work on the project. The word on Nathaniel continued to grow and at the same time something new was growing inside of Nathaniel musically, something new and rooted.
Nathaniel grew up with church music predominantly but after his father’s passing he found a record collection at home and began his journey into classic bands like Sam & Dave, The Band and Van Morrison. Nathaniel had always wanted to pursue that sound and have a bigger band. With that in mind in 2013, a friend encouraged to Nathaniel to lay down some demos in that vein. A small circle of trusted friends reacted strongly to the demos and Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats was born. A new record deal was secured — Nathaniel and the band now recorded for the legendary Stax record label. Nathaniel went to producer Richard Swift to make the debut record for the band — the album was mostly recorded in two weeks in Cottage Grove Oregon. Released in August 2015, the album included “S.O.B.” — a slightly comical look at Nathaniel’s struggles with drinking.
“S.O.B.” caught the eye and ear of Jimmy Fallon through a friend of the manager; Jimmy became obsessed and booked the band on The Tonight Show two weeks before the release of the record. The band’s performance was a break out and caused a reaction not seen in years from a television performance in the U.S. Sirius XM was an early adopter and then all radio stations across the states, and eventually Europe, UK, Eire and Australia, came on board. Reviews of the record were exceptional. The rocket boosters were ignited. The first Night Sweats’ tour in the fall of 2015 was a sold-out success and in most cities the show was moved from the 300 capacity club to the 600 capacity room and again to the 1000 capacity venue before the band got to town. Every festival around the world wanted the band for the summer of 2016. In that summer the band would sell out the legendary, and hometown, venue Red Rocks to 9400 people, play festivals around the world such as Newport Folk, Jazzfest, Bonnaroo, Coachella, Glastonbury, sometimes to crowds as big as 30,000 people. At the end of that year Colorado Governor Hickenlooper declared December 17, 2016 Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats day citing 208,000 miles, 246 shows and a cumulative live audience of more than 700,000 people in 2016. The self-titled debut album went Gold in the US and sold over a million copies worldwide. The career was on fire. Meanwhile, behind the curtain Nathaniel was ending a ten year marriage, living in his drummers’ basement, starting a foundation for economic and social justice reform and buying his mom a house.
During that evenings’ show which was Nathaniel’s annual holiday benefit show for the Denver community an emotional Rateliff addressed the crowd. “We made this record and I never thought that any of this would ever happen,” Rateliff said. “We had the great experience of having the Denver community help us along the way through so many different musical projects. Maybe on this Night Sweats Day, we’ll all plant a tree or do something good. But let’s continue to move forward in this year with love and hope and faith and remember that we are all one and we are all in this human experience together.”
( TUNE IN NEXT WEEK FOR )
Chapter Three
PART ONE
About 4.6 billion years ago, floating in the ether was a solar nebula - a cloud of dust and gas - that collapsed in on itself as the forces of gravity took hold. The sun was formed in the center, and the remaining elements and gases clumped together to form asteroids, comets, moons and planets, including Earth.(1) Among the elements that clumped together were copper, silver, and gold- three of the 118 known elements that comprise what we know today as the periodic table of elements, listing its components from lightest to heaviest; from most common to most rare.
At 10 PM on Thursday, October 11, 1492, as the Santa Maria, Pinta and Nina sailed westward towards the Orient, Christopher Columbus saw a light “like a little wax candle rising and falling.”(2) Four hours later, at 2 AM on Friday, October 12, 1492, Rodrigo de Triana reported seeing land. Later, having mistaken the land for the East Indies, now the modern-day Bahamas, Columbus called the indigenous people he encountered indios. One of the peoples, the Arawak, wore gold ear ornaments. This minor detail was not lost on Columbus.
During the 16th century, it didn’t take long for the people of the Iberian Peninsula to colonize the Americas - ostensibly to convert the indigenous people to Christianity - but in reality, to plunder the mountains of Mayan gold that was there for the taking.(3) In Mexico, Hernán Cortés conquered the Aztecs between 1519 and 1521. About a decade later, Francisco Pizarro conquered the Incas in Peru. The latter, with a crew of sixty horsemen and ninety footsoldiers, was eventually able to subjugate the Andean empire consisting of between 5 to 10 million, thanks to the invisible weapon they unwittingly brought with them - smallpox, influenza, measles and typhus in addition to the horses, guns and crossbows that were far superior to anything in the Incan armoury.
Pizarro captured the last Inca emperor Atahualpa in 1532. In a vain attempt to secure his own freedom, Atahualpa filled his cell once with gold and twice with silver, which only served to pique the interest of the conquistadores even further. The 13,420 pounds of 22-carat gold and 26,000 pounds of pure silver instantly made every man in the expedition rich.
I see ye visibly, and now believe
That he, the Supreme Good, to whom all things ill
Are but as slavish officers of vengeance,
Would send a glistening guardian, if need were
To keep my life and honor unassailed.
Was I deceived, or did a sable cloud
Turn forth her silver lining on the night?
I did not err, there does a sable cloud
Turn forth her silver lining on the night,
And casts a gleam over this tufted grove - John Milton, 1634
The Spaniards found gold in modern-day Haiti and Dominican Republic, and vast deposits of silver in Zacatecas (my parents’ home state) and Potosí in the Bolivian Tin Belt. The precious metal was originally plundered, and later mined. Output rose from 50 tons a year in the early 1500s to over 900 tons by 1780. Between 1500 and 1800, precious metal worth the modern-day equivalent of £109 billion was shipped between the New World to Europe or via the Pacific to Asia. This is how a tiny, wealthy Spanish-born elite laid the Crown’s foundations for a new civilization, running it from a few splending cities, including Mexico City and Lima.
1 How Was Earth Formed? - https://www.space.com/19175-how-was-earth-formed.html
2 Christopher Columbus Discovers [sic] America - http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/columbus.htm
3 Niall Ferguson, Civilization: The West and the Rest (Great Britain: Allen Lane, 2011), 99, 101, 102.
2021 02 04 Blue Room Meeting #037
Thursday
February 4, 2021
NOON MST BLUE ROOM
MEETING NUMBER
Thirty Seven
__________ __________
Groundhog Day /
Groundhog Week
Things are just getting started at Blue Room.
23” over 24 hours
Overzealous in handling the conditions,
Blue Room skier with a broken nose
after a failed flip attempt.
MANY IDEAS on what the LO in the x-ray could mean…
We are so proud of Min’s involvement as President of the Economic Club of Colorado. He spends time elevating programming for the community — this week we tuned into two fantastic interviews. Please join us in watching the segments below.
During the previous impeachment, Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell abused executive privilege and procedural tactics to shield cabinet members and intelligence officers from revealing what they knew of the President’s misconduct. In the abortive Russia probe, Robert Mueller settled for written responses to his inquiries from the occupant of the Oval Office – and the special prosecutor was powerless to act when those responses contained distortions and misrepresentations.
Accepting this level of evasion from the executive branch deviates sharply from precedent. At the height of Watergate, Richard Nixon was compelled to turn over the recordings made during all of his private White House conferences. During the Iran-Contra investigation, Ronald Reagan testified under oath about his involvement in the arms-for-hostages transgressions of his administration Bill Clinton, embarrassingly, was compelled to divulge the details of his extramarital intimacies under a special counsel deposition.
Hearing from Donald Trump about his two months of dissembling over the “theft” of the 2020 election would clarify what happened on January 6. Listening to him account for the hundreds of millions of dollars he raised to “stop the steal” while only spending a small fraction of that money on court challenges would enlighten America about his motives. Watching him squirm beside a video timeline documenting the violence perpetrated by his supporters as he declined to respond for hours would speak volumes about his culpability.
On the morning of January 6, Donald Trump warned his supporters: If you don’t fight like hell we’re not going to have a country anymore.” Then he retired to the White House to watch them assault the Capitol on TV.
While Congress can’t compel Donald Trump to speak, the Senate should subpeona him to appear. As a private citizen, he’s free to invoke his right against self-incrimination, but he may no longer bluster and bray about his privilege in defiance of the will of the first branch of our government. With McConnell and his other protectors suddenly in the minority, it’s time for Trump to speak for himself, provided he can find the words to justify his demolition of faith in our democracy.
He perpetrated a fraud to bilk his devoted followers. Hearing him elect NOT to defend his actions, when he has so pointedly spoken up against all the great injustices done to him over the years, would do more to establish innocence or guilt than any manager’s speech from the floor of the Senate. The people who believed him, and continue to believe in him, deserve to hear from Trump now.
Let him explain, under oath, what he’s done. Or let him decline to do so for fear of incriminating himself. Either way – and I can’t believe I’m writing these words – America wants to hear from Donald Trump: In his own words, sworn on any bible he likes. Let Donald Trump explain how this insurrection happened when the Senate trial begins.
THE PARTISANI MILL HAS BEEN ORDERED!
This is a big moment in time for Dry Storage as we grow production with intention.
Tradition, passion, innovation. Three values that have made Partisani a reference point in Italy and internationally in the production of mills and plants for stone milling.
The continuous search for quality and the care to customer’s needs are the basis of every project and milestones of a nearly 90-year history.
Every chapter in Partisani’s story tells the story of the desire to continually put ourselves to the test, facing new challenges and always setting new goals.
The company Partisani was founded in the 1930s from the idea of Aldo Partisani who joined the business of miller to that of manufacturer of milling machines.
In 1955, after the entry into the company of his son Ernesto, the production of milling plants, is accompanied by the distribution of electric motors of the best brands.
The company Partisani specializes more and more in the production of stone milling plants for the production of truly integral flours and begins to export its machines all over the world. Currently the Partisani family has successfully reached the fourth generation in the management of the company, its mills and plants are all designed within the company and assembled and tested in the facility of Forlì.
Having embraced a different logic in the production of mills, compared to the large multinational companies, Partisani is today the world reference point of stone mills. Thanks to its experience, the company has established itself in over 40 countries around the world.
YOU SAID YOU WOULD:
A) Rather have one piece of the world’s best sushi:
42%
B) Enjoy all-you-can-eat tacos:
58%
Adam Lerner
Founding Executive Director
MCA Denver
in Guadalajara at
Eduardo Sarabia’s Studio,
which he (ES) graciously
calls Blue Room Mexico.
Would you rather…
A)
Be a Rockette for one holiday performance — perfect high kicks, no prep and no body shaming?
OR
B)
Go to the Kentucky Derby?
This week we recommend a new must see — the movie Palmer — a beautiful story, artfully made, featuring original song Redemption by Nathaniel Ratcliff.
“I grew up in rural Missouri, you just see a lot of people struggling to have opportunities. People who, every time they seem to get ahead, they stumble right back. People who can’t seem to get away from bad situations even if they’re great people. I’m certainly familiar with that, and just the idea of having to live with family.” Nathaniel shares in his exclusive interview with American Songwriter.
Hello everyone! I’m Claire McKenna, one of the new winter interns. I am from Cleveland, Ohio and currently am a sophomore at Dartmouth College. I am an Economics modified by Computer Science major and English minor. I love problem-solving, exploring different programming languages, and reading new books (always looking for recommendations!). Outside of class, I am an active member of several clubs on the Dartmouth campus, including club lacrosse, the ski instructing program, a mentorship program in the Upper Valley (DREAM), and Women in Business. From the slopes to business seminars, each activity allowed me to find other students drawn to topics I am passionate about.
Additionally, the different activities on campus helped me join more communities outside of Dartmouth. Participating in Women in Business led me to the amazing internship program at Blue Room. I am beyond grateful that I have been given the opportunity to work with the Blue Room staff and collaborate with the other interns. Each morning I arrive at the Investment Team Bullpen prepared to listen, learn, and grow. The Blue Room staff and other interns inspire me to work hard and communicate my ideas clearly. I absolutely cannot wait to spend the next six weeks absorbing more knowledge, diving into new areas of research, and cultivating relationships with the wonderful Blue Room community.
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