January 2015

I saw the movie Imitation Game last weekend, which is the story of Alan Turing and his role in breaking the Enigma Code which shortened World War II and saved millions of lives.  (Spoiler Alert:  He did it, we won.)  Turing, played by Benedict Cumberbatch, was terrific, even if you’re not a certified “Cumberbitch.”  It got me thinking that to actually navigate this economy, you have to be pretty good at code breaking.  There’s always a lot of code speak.  First, there’s the code of each of the hermetically sealed subcultures of business and markets (recent example on my desk is a note entitled:  Response to BCBS/IOSCO Consultation Document by GFMA, AFIRE, ASIFMA and SIFMA).  We will come back to this in a later commentary, but today let’s focus on officialdom when the often intentionally obscure or misleading Orwellian doublespeak of politics and policy achieve its higher expression.  Is it getting worse?  Well, it’s certainly not getting better.
Continue Reading Breaking The Code

For those of us living in the northeastern U.S., last week’s Commercial Real Estate Finance Council (CREFC) January Conference could not have been better timed to escape the brutal cold for the tropical beaches of Miami.  We were joined at Miami Beach by a record number of attendees at this year’s conference.  The mood of the attendees was overwhelmingly positive, which translated into a number of lively sessions, and even livelier social gatherings.  2014 was a great year for the commercial real estate finance industry, and most industry insiders expect 2015 to be even better.  Our industry continues to grow like a rolling snowball, with no end in sight for 2015.
Continue Reading CREFC January Conference – Rolling into 2015