Friday Music Fest - Archie Shepp

Another jazz giant who will land in São Paulo (May 28 and 29).

I'm back (and so Keynes vs Hayek)

I'm still struggling to return to blogging; meanwhile, stay with the second part of the amazing MC Keynes vs MC Hayek battle, via EconStories:

Holiday, oh holiday...

I'll not be blogging for a while, for the best of the reasons. I should be back by the end of the month.

This picture is from Tulum, Mexico, but I'm not going there.

Friday Music Fest - Vampire Weekend

Coming...

Chart of the day - music & casual sex

Data confirms: Nirvana and Metallica are rock n' roll. Source: tastebuds blog.

Wednesday morning readings

My creativity is hitting new lows; fortunately there are several better minds around the world deserving a reading:

- Tyler Cowen is around here, and dares to answer the multimillion dollar question: why real interest rates are so high in Brazil? (Marginal Revolution)

- Wanna raise profits by 67%? Cut provisions for credit losses by 83%. Banks' balance sheets are pieces of fiction (Bloomberg).

- 120 years of home prices in US (The Big Picture).

- Schroders discusses Germany and the future of the euro (Scribd).

- The Economist's forum discusses capital controls, their utility and application (Economics by Invitation).

- Dani Rodrik, his meeting with Saif Qaddafi and the moral dilemma of helping dictatorships (Project Syndicate).

- A good summary of Scott Sumner's defense of nominal GDP targets (Adam Smith Institute).

Japan - is the sun rising again?

Edward Chancellor, author of the quasi-classic Devil Take the Hindmost, provides an unusual bullish view on Japan.

Edward Chancellor - Japan

Subtitle contest

I'm short on creativity today, any ideas?

I still haven't found what I'm looking for...

From G1 (in Portuguese), Mantega meets Bono in São Paulo.

Monday morning readings

- Trend has been a friend since David Ricardo (Au.Tra.Sy).

- PIMCO is net short U.S. Treasuries (Yahoo! Finance).

- Barry Ritholtz updates his great list of trading books, rules, and aphorisms (The Big Picture).

- Commodities behemoth Glencore to make a record listing in London (Financial Times).

- Barry Eichengreen believes in a more stable world, but possibly only after three more crises (Project Syndicate).

- Raghuram Rajan and the three paths for indebted democracies. None of them looks particularly sanguine (Project Syndicate).

- Globo TV's Glória Maria went to Singapore to interview the legendary Jim Rogers. It's priceless to watch a multimillionaire bringing the kids from school cycling in the rain while some in Brazil say it's "impossible" to grow a child without a full-time nanny (Globo, audio in Portuguese).

- New economic thinking = reading old books (Mark Thoma).

- Iceland rejects another deal to compensate Icesave creditors (WSJ).

- The tight race for Peru's presidency (El Comercio).

- Another great director leaves the world without winning an Academy award: Sidney Lumet. His most famous works (Telegraph) and his paradoxical connection to the Reaganism (New Yorker).

Comrade Renato, tortured and banker

Meet the second most famous former VAR-Palmares guerrilla (the first is called Dilma Rousseff and is president of a country south of the Equator): Persio Arida, one of the greatest Brazilian economists, former president of Brazil Central Bank and one of the main partners of BTG Pactual bank. At 18, in 1970, Persio was arrested and tortured by the military dictatorship. The thrilling story (though I didn't like the style), totally unknown till now, is the chapter of an autobiography to be released yet this year, and fills a good part of the latest piauí magazine. It's not yet on the website, it'll probably appear there soon (in Portuguese), and it's definitely a worth reading.

Friday Music Fest - Gal Costa

Some 40 years ago, long before twitter and people who use it to huff the air conditioning repairman who missed an appointment, Gal Costa was the queen. This song is often quoted in the crazy (and superb) novel Pornopopéia, by Reinaldo Moraes.

Carlos Slim and Eike Batista are out

Scrooge McDuck is back at the top of The Forbes Fictional 15. Well... depending on the criteria, mr Eike could be at that list, too.