Investing

Mark Gilbert: Bill Gross, the world's best-known bond investor, tweeted Tuesday that betting against German government debt is the trade of a lifetime. "Gross may well be right. If he is, investors will find themselves in the midst of a financial Armageddon that could make the Great Crash of 1929 look like a walk in the park." Read more...

Declassified

Eli Lake: "The announced end of Saudi Arabia's bombing campaign in Yemen may provide a window for thousands of U.S. citizens to leave the war-torn nation. Yet the State Department shows no sign it will begin rescuing the thousands of Yemeni-Americans there, drawing ire from the Arab-American community." Read more...

Tech

Katie Benner: The momentum behind PowaTag -- an unprofitable, privately held British startup -- is emblematic of the trends that make private markets such a hot place to be for tech companies. "Those currents are swept along by a clamor for anything consumer-oriented and mobile, companies raising huge private investment rounds, and U.S. investors looking overseas for deals." Read more...

2016 Elections

Mohamed A. El-Erian: "Expect income and wealth inequality to be a prominent theme for the candidates who declare an interest in running for president in 2016, whether they are Republicans or Democrats. The issue is important on its own merits, but also because of its connections to economics, politics, demographics, race, gender and geopolitical extremism." Read more...

Europe

Leonid Bershidsky: "The trial of Oskar Groening, a 93-year-old former Auschwitz guard, goes far beyond questions of absolution and punishment for a single German. ... The trial's aim is to send a message to future generations while not seeming like a show trial -- a difficult task for Judge Franz Kompisch, born in 1967." Read more...

Clive Crook: "The brinkmanship over Greece and its debts continues. ... The European Union isn't deviating, and neither is Athens. Before much longer, though, something really will have to give -- and it seems ever more probable that, when it does, the news will be bad." Read more...

Culture

Ana Marie Cox: "It is not surprising that the follow-up to the wildly popular true-crime podcast 'Serial' found its way to the top of the iTunes podcast charts after its debut last week. (It's now at No. 2.) What is surprising is that the new podcast is not a creation of the 'Serial' team. In fact, it is part of precisely the kind of celebrity-driven listicle culture to which 'Serial' seemed an antidote." Read more...

News Roundup

Barry Ritholtz (Read the news roundup)

• A bot made millions on Wall Street by reading tweets. Read more...
• Yes, millennials, please invest in your 401k. Read more...
• Is government debt too low? Read more...

Benner (Read the news roundup)

• VMWare's first-quarter profit beat analysts' estimates, even though the software maker's revenue growth has slowed. Read more...
• Path is in talks to sell Path Classic, a social networking app that never took off in the U.S. but has done well in Indonesia. Read more...
• The Justin Bieber-backed selfie app Shots is doing well. Read more...

Money Stuff

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