Introducing the Investment Filter for Evaluating World Events and Trends

Ever since we were children our brain has been building up a schema or filter upon which we perceive external reality. Sometimes it helps to try on someone else’s filter to process new information in a different way. To that end, here at TrendScan we are introducing our new Investment Filter for processing stories about news, events and trends.

How we will use the Investment Filter

The investment filter will allow us to apply a lense or frame to evaluate trends and events in a dispassionate way and without necessarily offering an opinion of whether they are good or bad, simply whether they offer an opportunity that is tradeable and what the risks / rewards might be in making bets on these trends or events going forward. Over time, we hope to refine this lense to provide a unique angle that you don’t get anywhere else. 

How you can benefit from the Investment Filter

Over time we believe you will benefit from this unique insight into how trends we cover could be profited from. An additional benefit could be simply a respite from the highly-charged political environment that is seemingly couching everything in specific narratives. To the degree that narratives are relevant to the arc of specific trends and their likelihood of occurring we’ll call them out but will try as much as possible to not add any color beyond that or relay our personal feelings about those narratives. To the degree that the reader thinks narratives don’t exist or that they are not being purposely put forward by different news media or other parties then this could come across as political on its own but in that case let us declare that bias up front that we believe in bias and self-interest on all sides and believe that factoring those in will help to tune the investment filter.

Where we got the inspiration for the Investment Filter

The inspiration for the investment filter is the persuasion filter from Scott Adams. Adams is the cartoonist behind the massively popular Dilbert cartoon, as well as an accomplished author, speaker and entrepreneur. With the persuasion filter, he successfully shows that facts don’t matter when it comes to persuasion and that applying his filter helps to predict how things will turn out in a dispassionate way (i.e. not necessarily how you want things to be, but how they are most likely to be given current persuasion being put out, and somewhat hopefully what you can do about it).

Look for Investment Filter in our upcoming articles and let us know what you think!