Issue 4 - The Billboard Hot 100

John Coffey

Volunteer Consultant

I help Corporations & Financial Institutions increase Brand Awareness & secure CRA Benefits & Volunteering Opportunities

I also comment on Financial Markets

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The Billboard Hot 100

I normally post about fairly serious stuff. Usually Stock markets, Bond markets, Real estate the Federal Reserve or Crypto. As this is the first newsletter of 2022, I thought that something more light-hearted might be in order.

I decided to take a look through my 8,000 strong, iTunes collection, pick out some of the better-known songs and select individuals whose faces might fit those song titles better than the original artists

I guess it's borne of my rather warped sense of humor but perhaps some of you might enjoy it. Some of the individuals were so noteworthy that they were associated with several titles. Some of the references are more subtle & a little nuanced but I think that there are enough of you out there who will spot the linkage

I'm sure there are many of you out there who are more musically attuned than me so please add your suggestions, for any additional songs, in the comments section

We will get back to the serious stuff, next week when I plan to write about Wall St and the investment process

The Billboard Hot 100 ( in no particular order )

1. Life in the Fast Lane - Max Verstappen
2. First, we take Manhattan - Andrew Cuomo
3. Bridge over Troubled Water - Chris Christie
4. Back on the Chain Gang - Elizabeth Holmes
5. Brass in Pocket - Nancy Pelosi
6. I wanna be sedated - Seth Rogen
7. Don't take your guns to town - Kyle Rittenhouse
8. Sorry seems to be the hardest word - Donald Trump
9. It's only make-believe - Cathie Wood
10. Before the Deluge - Cathie Wood & ARK
11. Sweet Child of Mine - Hunter Biden
12. FreeBird - Britney Spears
13. Should I stay or should I go? - Donald Trump
14. Money, that's what I want - David Cameron & Nancy Pelosi
15. Life on Mars -?Elon Musk
16. Rocketman - Jeff Bezos
17. I can't get no Satisfaction - Donald Trump
18. Lying Eyes - Boris Johnson
19. I Lost it All - Bernie Madoff
20. Fox on the Run - Ghislaine Maxwell
21. ?Tears of a Clown - Matt Hancock
22. I won't back down - Cathie Wood
23. Crisis, What Crisis? - Janet Yellen
24. Everything I Own - Jeff?Bezos
25. I fought the Law - Jake Angeli
26. Let's just kiss and say goodbye - Kim Kardashian & Kanye West
27. Only Women Bleed - Elizabeth Holmes
28. Angry all the time - Donald Trump
29. Games Without Frontiers - Vladimir?Putin
30. We Didn't Start The Fire - Alan Greenspan & Ben Bernanke
31. Up Where We Belong?- Jeff Bezos & Elon Musk
32. Stuck in the Middle with You - Joe Manchin & Kirsten Cinema
33. High Cost of Living?- Jay Powell
34. Running On Empty - Joe Biden
35. You're So Vain - Donald Trump
36. It's Too Late, Baby - Jay Powell
37. Cold as Ice - Melania Trump
38. Pocahontas - Elizabeth Warren
39. Long May You Run - President Xi
40. Carry on my Wayward Son - Joe & Hunter Biden
41. Take it to the limit?- Janet Yellen
42. The First Cut Is The Deepest - Elizabeth Holmes
43. Take it Easy - Jay Powell
44. The Winner Takes it All?-??Jeff Bezos
45. Living on a Prayer - Jay Powell
46. Back in the USSR - Vladimir Putin
47. Cleaning Windows - Bill Gates
48. Don't fear the Reaper - Jeffrey Epstein
49. The Man who sold the World - Jeff Bezos
50. Don't stand so close to me -?Dr Fauci
51. The Fool on the Hill - Chris Christie
52. I Shall be Released - Elizabeth Holmes
53. If You Know What I Mean -?Alan Greenspan
54. I Don't Want to Talk About It?- Satoshi Nakamoto
55. You Can't Always Get What You Want - Joe Biden
56. Under Pressure - Jay Powell
57. Every Little Thing She Does is Magic - Cathie Wood
58. Lone Star State of Mind - Greg Abbott
59. Across the Great Divide - Joe Biden
60. Some Guys Have All The Luck - Paul Pelosi
61. I Can See Clearly Now - Dominic Cummings
62. A Thin Line Between Love and Hate - Donald Trump & Mike Pence
63. Please don't let me be misunderstood - Jay Powell
64. Can't take my eyes off you - Mark Zuckerburg
65. Please Don't Stop the Music - Chuck?Prince
66. Since You've Been Gone - Ghislaine Maxwell
67. Walking on The Moon - Jeff Bezos
68. In The Air Tonight - Dr Fauci
69. All-TimeThe High - Rita Coolidge and the Nasdaqs
70. Don't Look Back in Anger - Donald Trump
71. I'm a believer -?The Meme Stock Crew
72. He ain't Heavy, he's my brother - Chris Cuomo
73. Honesty -?Robert Kaplan
74. Don't Come Around Here, No More -?Liz Cheney
75. if You're Looking for a Way Out - Jay Powell
76. Killer Queen - Caitlyn Jenner
77. A Most Peculiar Man - Elon Musk
78. Don't You Forget about Me - Donald Trump
79. Still Crazy after all of these Years - Bernie Sanders
80. Straight Outta Compton - Serena Williams
81. Another Brick in the Wall - Donald Trump
82. Its only make-believe - Bitcoin
83. Tears on my Pillow - Mike Lindell
84. The Great Deception - Cathie Wood
85. What's Mine is Yours?-?Bernie Sanders
86. Dirty Little Secret - Elizabeth Holmes
87. Bird on a Wire - Nancy Pelosi
88. Get back to the centre - Joe Manchin
89. The Needle and the Damage done - Elizabeth Holmes
90. White Liar - Donald Trump
91. Back on the chain gang - Elisabeth Holmes
92. King of the Road - Elon Musk
93. Steamy Windows - Satya Nardella
94. Bad Moon Rising - Jeff Bezos & Richard Branson
95. I don't want to go to Chelsea - Roman Abramovich
96. Pocahontas?- Elisabeth Warrren
97. Puppet on a string - Mike Pence
98. I Pity the Poor Immigrant - Chris Christie
99. It's Too Late - Jay Powell
100. A Message to you Rudy - Rudy Guiliani

Life Lesson #4 - 1973

When I was young, I did a lot of summer jobs. Starting at age 13, I worked in bars, hotels, supermarkets & garages. Employers were pretty relaxed about checking your age & fake birth certs were commonplace.

The best job of all came when I was 14. My uncle, John Fitzgerald, was Managing Director of the local dairy company, Premier Dairies. Premier had 3 dairy plants in Dublin and my mother managed to wangle me a summer job, as a helper on the trucks that made deliveries, from the Northside depot to all of the local shops & supermarkets.

We had an early start, as we had to be at the dairy at 6am, to load up the trucks with crates of milk bottles. The loading usually took about an hour. Then each driver would select a helper to come with him on the truck.

This is where things got interesting. Trucks were not allowed to leave the depot without a helper. With a bunch of 14 year-olds, there was always a risk that some idiot wouldn't turn up so the dairy's solution was to employ 13 helpers for the 12 trucks. Now, at 14, I wasn't the sharpest tool in the box but I spotted this opportunity early on and it seems that many of the others failed to do so.

So, every day that I arrived at 6am, I made a quick headcount. If we had 13 helpers, I would do my loading as quickly as possible and then hide behind the big racks of empty crates. The drivers would come, one-by-one & pick a helper each before heading off for their day of deliveries. As ' the last man standing ', I was then entitled to head home, ' on my merry way ', at 7am, with my day's work done. I got great pleasure, cycling against the traffic, watching ' all those poor suckers ', heading off to their days work while I had another full sunny day ahead of me to play soccer with my buddies.

That was when I started observing simple discrepancies. Ten years later, when I was working on the trading desk, spotting discrepancies, between markets became enormously important and a source of significant profitability. Only then, we called it Arbitrage.