A Davos First-Timer’s Notes on BorgWarner, Thermo Fisher, Blackstone, and Nasdaq

Top of mind for leaders attending the World Economic Forum’s yearly conference in Davos, Switzerland, this past week was finding stability in a challenging environment. I don’t mean financially: It’s a ski village with an indifferent approach to ice removal, so first-timers in dress shoes can go arsch over ohren straight down Tobelmühlestrasse. Nothing punctuates a company’s presentation on Sustainable Progress Through Impactful Collaboration like an unrehearsed C-suite luge from the promenade to the Hard Rock Hotel.

Three years ago in this space, I proposed an alternate economic forum at Ski Butternut in Massachusetts for those of us who aren’t important enough to go to Davos. I might have poked some fun at ironies that pop up when elites jet off to the Alps in January to discuss equality and global warming. But I take it back, and not just because Barron’s sent me this year.