
The so-called “Magnificent Seven” stocks, for example, are currently valued as if they hold the patents to gravity itself. At a combined price-to-earnings ratio hovering around 28, they seem to be betting heavily on humanity’s continued ability to ignore basic economic principles. As the late, great Warren Buffett (a man who clearly understood the universe’s inherent unfairness) observed, popularity and sensible investment rarely coincide. The truly productive positions, as a general rule, are the ones everyone else has forgotten about, or, preferably, never even considered. (This is largely because the universe is a profoundly illogical place, and things only become valuable when someone decides they are. It’s a system fraught with peril, frankly.)