SEARCH
At precisely 11am on November 11, 1918, in a nondescript railroad car in northeastern France, a group of senior military officers and government officials signed an armistice agreement that effectively ended World War 1. The Great War had killed a staggering 9 million soldiers in four years. That’s more than nearly every major
We don’t know what the near future will hold. Discover why proper estate planning is essential in 2021. I’ve been thinking a lot about death lately… A very good friend of mine, who is also an executive at the agricultural company I founded here in Chile, was in a terrible accident with his
File this one away under ‘utterly repulsive’. As you probably heard, yesterday the US-based credit reporting agency Equifax announced a massive cyberattack that affects as many as 143 million consumers. Names. Birth dates. Addresses. Social Security Numbers. Even some credit card numbers were stolen. Literally over one third of the entire US population
I just got back from Caracas, Venezuela, a city so dangerous that every time I left my hotel, the staff would warn me against even going outside. It’s an incredibly difficult reality to reconcile. People hate the fact that they may get robbed or killed just steps from their front door when they
July 14, 2015 Yangon, Burma When I first came to Burma (Myanmar) several years ago, there was scarcely an ATM to be found anywhere. It was primitive. And frustrating. After all, most people coming from the West tend to think their banking system is robust and highly advanced. And that’s true to a
While I was in Mexico for our Global Offshore and Investment Summit in Cancun in 2015, I was approached by Forbes Mexico for an interview on some of the key trends in the global economy as well as internationalization strategies for investors. You can read the full article here in Spanish, and below I’m
March 12, 2015 Willemstad, Curaçao One of the largest telecommunications companies in the world is now offering a unique new ‘feature’. For “only” $29 per month, AT&T is promising customers of its new broadband service that it won’t track their search and browsing history. How magnanimous. First of all, privacy shouldn’t be a
February 20, 2015 Los Angeles, California File this under ‘you can’t make this stuff up.’ Lenovo Group, the largest computer manufacturer in the world, has made a rather stunning admission that they have been pre-installing tracking software on their PCs. The tracking software is made by a company called Superfish, which apparently paid
January 14, 2015 Santiago, Chile Well at least someone finally had the candor to just come out and say it. In the wake of recent terror attacks in Europe, British Prime Minister David Cameron has called for an end to secure communications technology. In other words, he wants to ensure that you will
December 17, 2014 Castries, St. Lucia As he speculated on the ethics of society, Aristotle found himself naturally led to the study of politics. Putting together his observations, he wrote a treatise on political philosophy (cleverly entitled Politics), in which he describes how a tyrant abuses power for personal benefit at the expense
December 4, 2014 Santiago, Chile On May 15, 1855 one of the greatest gold robberies in history occurred. Three British firms had arranged for some of their gold to be sent from London to Paris by ferry and train. The gold was stored in solidly built boxes secured within iron safes with two
November 5, 2014 (Remember, Remember) Santiago, Chile Long ago when I was a fresh young Army lieutenant straight out of the academy, I spent six months at Fort Huachuca, Arizona, learning how to be an intelligence officer. Fort Huachuca (pronounced wah-CHOO-kuh) is nestled snugly on the Mexican border, so there were a lot
March 26, 2014 Sovereign Valley Farm, Chile Every organization has a unique way of measuring its own success. Apple tracks very closely, for example, how many iPhones and iPads they sell. Facebook monitors how many total users they have. And for the brand new Cyber Crime Unit (CCU) of the IRS Criminal Investigative
February 24, 2014 Sovereign Valley Farm, Chile It’s like 34 drunken sailors holding each other up. That’s the best way I can think of to describe the latest product from the good idea factory that is the OECD. Over the weekend in yet another cushy five-star hotel, representatives from this unelected supranational bureaucracy
January 6, 2014 London, England [Editor’s Note: Tim Price, Director of Investment at PFP Wealth Management and frequent Sovereign Man contributor is filling in for Simon today.] On December 31st, 1964, the Dow Jones Industrial Average stood at 874. On December 31st, 1981, it stood at 875. In Buffett’s words, “I’m known as
