Wolf Money(book recommendation)

 

I pick up the book from the National Library initially drawn by the alluring title “Post Corona Crisis to Opportunity” by Scott Galloway.

Who could be worse off wanting to know more about the opportunities available in this corona virus era? After reading the book, It had a more profound impact on my thoughts on two fronts. First it changes how I will invest in the future, I will be certain some tech companies are likely to appear in my portfolio in the future given I am always been a hunter for value stock, the high and sometime ridiculous valuation in some tech stocks are in conflict with my value investing thought process. Second it changes how I view my consumption of social media and the need to keep it in check.  I was pleasantly surprise it was the same book which my friend had spoken passionately about the good content. One of the best book he had read all year.

WFH a.k.a work from home, zooming, those words which we would have been very familiar by now. Nothing unusual I first thought. Then I took a look at the publishing date. The conceptualisation of the book occured at the early part of March 2020, at height of  Pandemic outbreak in US where politicians in US were still in denial of the huge social and economic destruction the pandemic brings. Big trend of corona virus are barely visible when the book went on sale.

The author was quick to spot the huge increase in advantage and dominance by the big tech. He spoken about the need to break up the big tech companies like what Congress did to break up the monopoly of Standard Oil cartel in the 1911 using the anti trust law even thou he was an active investor of tech companies. In his opinion, the overwhelming dominance of big tech bring about the widening of social gap in the United States. The advancement by big tech produce fewer winners and many losers as company like Amazon destroy small businesses. Even big companies like Fedex are under threat from Amazon expanding clout in the delivery chain. Amazon are buying their own planes to better scheduled their delivery which could potentially cut FedEx off as it vendor in the future . Google and Facebook having 60 percent of the world advertising market would have consider a monopolistic cartel far greater than the Standard Oil Company in the early 1900. Google and Facebook forced thousands of media and newspaper companies to fold as advertisers shifted online in the era of “product age”. Our National paper, The Straits Times felt the competition and falling profit too. Uber without the need to own assets put millions of freelancers on meagre wage without benefits and insurances. 

There is no doubt in the author’s mind about the massive advantageous position big tech had entrenched on the economy especially during covid 19. He is worried about private tech enterprises replaced government function due to lack of funding given to government agencies. The pandemic mishandling by the US government gave rise to Tesla and Amazon increasing their clout by providing ventilators and giving medical support to patients which was suppose to be a function of any responsible government. The author has no doubt those companies will be given goodwill to pursue their own business agenda. Social media can have an impact on election which might result in tech friendly candidates elected to office which could aid big tech agenda further.

There are troubling trend of people having an addiction in the area of social media. (I can see a few zombies with hands shaking when wifi connection is down 😁) “We use to trade time for value, now we are trading data for value” lambasted the author. Suicidal case went up substantially in recent years for teens below the age of 20 due to the ills of social media. 

The author singled out a few tech companies which will do well even after the pandemic. I find the book having an impact on how I think about social media and big tech going forward. It is a mind boggling book to read. I can confidently concur with my friend, this is one of the better corona related books written in recent time. In summary, technology is a good servant but bad master.  “ Post Corona from Crisis to opportunity” goes onto Lone Wolf Investor highly recommended list for a peep into the future of tech and how it influenced our decision making process on a daily basis. Electronic gadgetry for your kids to keep them busy and entertained? That might be worth reconsidering.

(Contents)

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