● The Web Beneath the Waves: The Fragile Cables that Connect our World
Samanth Subramanian
Review via Los Angeles Review of Books
Nearly twenty years ago, during a congressional debate over net neutrality, Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska described the internet as a “series of tubes.” The remark became an instant meme, a rhetorical relic that suggested an antediluvian age when telecommunications depended on switchboard operators, wires, and cables.
In retrospect, Stevens’s statement was far from absurd. For, as Samanth Subramanian’s excellent new book The Web Beneath the Waves: The Fragile Cables That Connect Our World makes clear, the internet does indeed consist (at least in part) of a vast network of glass tubes—fiber-optic cables. We think of the internet as an abstraction, a view reflected in the lexicon of the data economy—the cloud, AirDrop, even the Ethernet cable. But, though cyberspace may be virtual, it relies on earthly infrastructure. The apparent weightlessness of the internet depends on very physical cables, the most important of which run deep under the world’s oceans. Ninety-nine percent of the world’s data zips through these filaments, which are only three inches wide. These threads on the seafloor are the world’s information superhighways. They are also tremendously fragile, exposed to natural disaster, marine accident, and sabotage. Indeed, the most vulnerable part of the global data infrastructure may well be the part that has been submerged.
Author Archives: James Picerno
Major Asset Classes | December 2025 | Performance Review
Global markets endured a volatile run in 2025, but when the last trades closed on Dec. 31 all the major asset classes posted gains for the year, based on a set of ETFs. As a result, outperforming passive global asset allocation strategies was unusually difficult in 2025… again. All the more so for portfolios that were heavily weighted in US assets and downplayed international diversification.
It’s Time To Deck The Halls, Raise A Glass, And Make A Quick Exit
The Capital Spectator is drifting into holiday mode as our editorial engines power down for the rest of the year. After the elves crunch the numbers and tally the market mischief, we’ll return on Friday, Jan. 2, with a recap of how the major asset classes fared in 2025.
Buon Natale e Felice Anno Nuovo!
Will The Bond Market Help Keep Stocks Humming In 2026?
Identifying the reasons why the stock market rises or falls is challenging, if not impossible, but the slide in interest rates has surely bees a non-trivial factor in lifting equities this year. A key question for 2026: Will the tailwind continue?
Macro Briefing: 22 December 2025
US is pursuing third oil tanker linked to Venezuela, highlighting escalating tensions between the two countries. The “active pursuit” pursuit of the tanker by the US Coast Guard is related to a “sanctioned dark fleet vessel that is part of Venezuela’s illegal sanctions evasion”, a US official said. “It is flying a false flag and under a judicial seizure order.” The news is a factor that’s lifting oil prices today. “The market is waking up to the fact that the Trump administration is taking a hardline approach to Venezuelan oil trade,” said June Goh, senior oil market analyst at Sparta Commodities.
Best Of Book Bits 2025: Part II
Here’s part II of our year-end review of Book Bits columns published in 2025, the counterpart to last week’s prelude. Happy reading!
● Rethinking Investing: A Very Short Guide to Very Long-Term Investing
Charles D. Ellis
Summary via publisher (Wiley)
In just 10 short, accessible, and inviting chapters, Rethinking Investing: A Very Short Book on Very Long-Term Investing presents straightforward steps that ordinary people can take to better invest their money. This book dispels myths about the value of investment managers, highlights emotional tendencies that can cloud our financial judgment, explains why index funds are a savvy choice, and reveals secrets like why it’s better to wait until age 70 to receive Social Security benefits—along with the calculations that make this decision crystal-clear. Written by renowned investor and popular author Charley Ellis, this must-read resource shows you how to set yourself up for investment success.
Market Premium For 10-Year Yield Holding Near 2-1/2 Year Low
The market premium for the 10-year Treasury yield continues to trade at a narrow gap over a “fair value” estimate, based on the average estimate for three models run by CapitalSpectator.com.
Macro Briefing: 19 December 2025
US consumer inflation’s annual pace slowed more than expected in November, the Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics said. Headline CPI dipped to a 2.7% increase vs. the year-ago level while core CPI fell to 2.6%, a four-year low. Some analysts raised doubts about the numbers, citing the disruption in data collection due to the government shutdown. “The report wasn’t just noisy and full of gaps, it provided a downwardly biased perspective of inflation,” said Gregory Daco, chief economist at EY-Parthenon. “The downward bias stemmed from the carry-forward methodology that assumed an unchanged price index in October for all surveyed data – imparting a downward bias to inflation dynamics.”
Foreign Bonds On Track To Outperform US Fixed Income In 2025
Echoing the strong run in foreign equities in 2025, bond markets ex-US are also having a good year. Using a set of ETFs to track the major international buckets of fixed-income securities shows across-the-board outperformance over a popular US benchmark through Wednesday’s close (Dec. 17).
Macro Briefing: 18 December 2025
Business inflation expectations in December remained steady at a 2.2% pace for the year-ahead outlook, according to the Atlanta Fed’s latest survey data. The current estimate is relatively middling for the range of results reported in 2025.
