Well, that got things kicked off with some bite, because Steven has really sort of established a position as THE guy when it comes to international indexing, and Steven, frankly, does not say things lightly. He can be bold, but he's always measured and aware of what he's saying. So is it true that EAFE is obsolete (or "dead" as I paraphrased for him to his dismay)?

Well, the way everyone is moving in the international space, I guess you'd have to say so. Even MSCI has radically changed the look of its international benchmarks, and—what a concept—the idea of size and style abroad has begun to enter people's thinking in how they look at international markets. And on the country level, the division between emerging and developed is again in the limelight, with people now beginning to look another level down at the countries AWAITING emerging status.

And there's a ton of new competition in the international space and a lot of VERY solid next-generation indexes out there in the space now ... Russell, DJ, FTSE all.

Anyway, lots of fun ... and it's always great to catch up with everyone at these events and hear what's going on ... and we certainly did that in Washington D.C. Gus Fleites is BACK. Great article by Matt talking about Gus' hire by IndexIQ. And it's good to see Gus so excited about something. We'll be really watching IndexIQ.

We had dinner w/ the S&P crew, Gus and a bunch of others, and Adam Patti, who heads up Gus' new company, nearly choked to death on a fish bone. That would have put Gus straight at the top on the day of the official announcement of his employment. But it was not to be.

Another fun aspect was that on the same day I got to catch up with Gus, I also had a lengthy and enjoyable conversation with his old employer Michael Sapir at ProFunds/ProShares—who's quite an interesting guy with a wildly successful franchise. $8 billion in assets going on $9 billion in ETFs ... and I guarantee you they'll do gangbusters w/ the international offerings.

But the contrast was interesting. Matt said in the Fleites article that we didn't know what had happened at ProShares. Well it must have had something to do with money, right? I always thought with two strong personalities like that, you never know how things are going to go. But I suspect it will be a case of all's well that ends well for both.

Let's see ... yeah, more travelling, more talking ... Jan Van Eck made a passing comment about me "two-timing" my family with all this travel. Ouch. Well—I've had a decent run of family time, though the fall will be brutal. I'd certainly never have thought I'd be living this kind of odd life.

But it's fun—particularly w/ all the buzz in the index industry. It's like the wild, wild West with all the innovation and competition going on. All right—well it's more or less time to get on a plane and make my way to the West Coast for the rest of the week. I'll leave the rest of the conference summary to Hougan, who's making his way back to Maine.