The Two Johns

But we're going to talk more broadly about the sort of big picture in the first part of today's podcast.

And

it's based on a speech I think you gave, John,

recently at...

Yeah,

yeah.

We'll introduce that.

And then

we're going to sort of move on to a related topic in the second half, which is inflation and our view of where that might be heading.

I won't give the game away now, but I think it's consistent with what we would have said before.

So let's start with a look at the big picture, where we are in a grand sweep of history.

And it's quite an interesting time.

And as I mentioned, you based your latest commentary piece on a speech that you gave, the subject of which is resilience.

So that is what we're going to be talking about.

And it's something that seems very important at today's geopolitical juncture, which is which is not pretty, to say the least.

So, John, perhaps sort of start by introducing, you know, the speech itself.

What was the sort of the base of this?

Well, it was occasionally I'm invited to speak and And this was addressing the Ward of Cheap Club to a business community breakfast, which was kindly hosted by Commerce Bank, the ward being one of the ward clubs in the city of London, which does a lot of good charitable work.

So their theme for the year and their talks was resilience.

So I used the opportunity, John, as you've rightly said, just to revisit our portfolio positioning, because one equates resilience with diversification.

These are turbulent times.

And while not doubting the case, long-term case for well-chosen equities, we are underweight equities.

So it seemed to be an apt moment to revisit how we are constructing our portfolios and how we are seeking to achieve that resilience, which was the subject of the talk.

I think diversification resilience is something that... going back the many years that I've been reading your columns, has always been a feature of the way that you invest, and sensibly so.

But do you think perhaps now, in particular, is a time when this matters more? Are we really in an investment era that is more volatile, less predictable than it has been before? Or are we just sort of caught in the news at the moment and thinking things are terrible when you look back through history? It's been full of interesting times.