Paul Jones on the Beatles debut on the Ed Sullivan Show (1964)

Why [Ed] Sullivan found it necessary to aid in the phony promotion of four rock 'n roll exponents, all of whom represent Moe of the Three Stooges, is beyond comprehension.  Any why he felt it necessary to "load" the theater with screaming teen-age girls when he normally restricts his audience to grownups, is also a mystery.

It was obvious to those who say the Beatles, four fellows from Great Britain, that they have not attained their present notoriety on the basis of their musical talents, for the sounds emanating from their mouths were anything but melodic.

Shorn of their mop-like hairdos they would look and sound like many other inferior rock 'n roll groups which are still attempting to keep alive the fad which died when Elvis Presley joined the armed forces.

~ Paul Jones, "Sullivan Wasted Time with Beatles," February 11, 1964

Brian Tycangco on investing and turning off the news

Everyone needs to not just listen to the news.  I think you have to be able to be willing to step out of your comfort zone.  A lot of us just want to be told what to do.  We have to be able to step out of our comfort zone and look at what's really going on in the world.  Just doing that simple thing is going to help us... make better investment decisions.

~ Brian Tycangco, interview with Dan Ferris and Corey McLaughlin, Stansberry Investor Hour, 1:01:40 mark, February 6, 2023

Brian Tycangco on outlook for China according to business tycoons from the Philippines

Brian Tycangco: When you are here [in Asia], you don't get the same sense of foreboding that you do when you listen to all these crazy headlines in mainstream media.  I must say everything is not rosy, but everything is not as bad as it seems...  Speaking with some of the biggest tycoons in the Philippines who have a lot of businesses in China, they've always had this great outlook for China.  This is the place to be.  And they don't look at it as "Oh, this is a great place to be just as long as blah, blah, blah, blah."  This is really the place to be.

Dan Ferris: Unconditionally.

Tycangco: When you look at how entrepreneurial they are, you put a Chinese guy anywhere on the planet, they're going to find a way to make money.  They're just so entrepreneurial and resourceful, and most of the Asian economies really are dominated by either Chinese families or families with Chinese linkage.  They [Philippino tycoons] see the dynamic going on here and they see how important China will continue to be, not just to business, but to both stability in the region and just the outlook itself.  I'm not at all getting any signs of alarm from our end.

~ Brian Tycangco, interview with Dan Ferris and Corey McLaughlin, Stansberry Investor Hour, February 6, 2023

Brian Tycangco on Chinese companies adapting to new rules

Nobody knew what kind of new regulation was going to come out next, especially with Ant Financial, the Ant IPO being pulled back in 2019, what would've been the worlds largest IPO ever.  That just set the tone for the next couple of years.  What appeared outside of China was, basically, "You can no longer do business here" are the new rules.  And nobody knew if these companies were going to be able to adhere to these new rules.  Which is a big question mark, right?  What is coming to be known now, slowly, is that, yes, one by one these companies are able to adhere to these rules and... finding ways to grow their business within these new parameters.

~ Brian Tycangco, interview with Dan Ferris and Corey McLaughlin, Stansberry Investor Hour, February 6, 2023

Eric Boehm on the Chinese balloon incident

On Saturday, the F-22 [which officially entered military service in 2005] scored its first-ever victory against an airborne adversary when it shot down…a balloon.  There may not be a better metaphor for the costly grandiosity of the American military than the use of a multi-million-dollar fighter jet to dispatch an unarmed, unmaneuverable opponent.  But the fact that the F-22 had never won a dogfight before its decisive victory over what may or may not have been a Chinese spy balloon is a nice illustration of why the United States has the world's most expensive military by a massive margin.

~ Eric Boehm, "By Shooting Down Balloon, the Expensive, Useless F-22 Fighter Finally Won a Dogfight," Reason.com, February 6, 2023

Warren Buffett on business motivation

As a practical matter, we need management with the businesses that we buy.  And 3 times out of 4, or thereabouts, the manager is the owner and is receiving tens of millions, maybe hundreds of millions of dollars.  So they don't have to work.  And we have to decide in that time when we meet them whether they love the business or love money.  We're not making a moral judgment... but it's very important for me to know which of the two is the primary motivator with them.  And we have had extremely good luck in identifying people who love their business.

So all we have to do is avoid anything on our part that diminishes that love of the business or makes other conditions so intolerable that they overcome that love that love of the business.  We have a number of people working for us that have no financial need to work at all and they probably outwork 95% or more of the people in the world, and they do it because they love smacking the ball.

~ Warren Buffett, "Why I Fire People Every Day - Warren Buffett," YouTube, 0:20 mark, November 16, 2021

Mike Bell sees economic recovery in 2024

You will see a recession in all major economies this year, but the market spent 2022 pricing that in and will spend this year looking ahead to an economic recovery in 2024.

~ Mike Bell, global markets strategist at JP Morgan Asset Management, January 6, 2023

(As quoted by "How ETF Investors Are Playing ‘the Most Anticipated Recession of All Time’," ETF.com, February 06, 2023)