58 Comments
Jun 28, 2022Liked by BowTied Bull

One other incident of note was in the fall of 2019 when the repo market started to blow up. Seemed like the first major cracks in the system were showing and covid was a great excuse to cover up the decades of bad monetary policy

Expand full comment
author

Good point

Expand full comment
founding
Jun 28, 2022·edited Jun 28, 2022

Basically forcing them to come up with and play out the biggest hoax of the decade known as COVID 19 + lockdowns.

Expand full comment

It’s interesting timing on this esp considering Luke Gromen called repo market issue approximately 6 months in advance. If i remember which podcast episode I’ll share.

Expand full comment
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
founding

Yep yep and they want to make legalized suicide available (see Canada MAID) as well as legalization of hard drugs

Shitty economy/lockdowns -> people with mental health issues -> drugs -> suicide for metal health reasons legalized -> de-population of the lower (and possibly middle) classes

Expand full comment

Yeah, really can't trust anything coming from major intuitions now, maybe always been that way. Everything presented to us has some hidden agenda behind it. I try to not give it much energy and focus on what I can do personally. All you can do is adjust and plan accordingly

Expand full comment

Obvious to me and most readers here but unfortunately sounds like crazy gibberish to most folks who get high-fructose information from 30 min of half-digested "evening news" telling you *how* to feel about something.

Everyone do yourself a favor and learn how to *think*. That means reading financial data (doesn't lie) and trying to figure out the story they portray. Bull is talented at this, hence why he's so right on with macro 80%+ of the time.

Meanwhile, watch out for the Midterm elections as a distraction. Republicans should win both houses big and Biden will effectively be a lame duck with no power. Right will celebrate, left will be furious, but what will actually get done?

Will we be in an stagflationary recession by that point? Regardless of who wins the election, what does that lead to...? BFF J-Pow da real prez now and even he can't control energy prices. Hmmm...

Expand full comment
author

The last part is most important, the inflation issue is now out of their hands.

No where to hide

Expand full comment

I hate to sound like that conspiracy theorist type but at this point, I'd be shocked if the Republicans had that big of a win. Expect the Roe v. Wade to cause an uproar in women voters who will turn out to go to the polls. I also doubt the Democrats give up power that easily, they could do some fuckery in the mid-terms.

Expand full comment

Possible, but way more people affected by rising costs, urban crime, and open borders than abortion, including Latinos (many of which are Catholic and pro-life).

Doubt abortion will rally swing voters, as most women don't support late-term abortions anyway. Red states (more restrictions) still vote red, blue states (expanding abortions) still vote blue. Swing states blame the party in power for economic woes.

But don't want to get too deep in the weeds on the political issue. My point is even if the Republicans win big and try a supply-side policy approach with tax cuts, austerity, freeze federal spending, etc., they're actually powerless with a Prez who won't sign their bills and we're stuck on this road for at least 3 years, barring some major event like a war or economic collapse (or both).

Just focus on saving yourself and stacking that paper...ahem...computer coin.

Expand full comment

Rs doing everything they can to not win by too much. Need to keep up appearances for the grift.

Expand full comment

Yes sir, all we can do at this point, shit is surely hitting the fans and we can only look out for ourselves.

Expand full comment

Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if R v. W was a Dem move.

There is no low for Dems, they will do anything and everything to get/stay in power...

And they knew the entire blame would fall on Republicans.

Brilliant 10 D chess tbh but will it work come mid terms?

Inflation hurts every voter, not just pro-choicers.

Expand full comment

Well, they do have their best friend in mail-in ballots. Anything is possible for a party that is willing to do anything to win while the other clings to their pointless morals.

Expand full comment
Jun 28, 2022Liked by BowTied Bull

Stuck in my head while reading: “I was farming yfi while you were rioting for blm.” -defigod

Expand full comment
author

Save yourself. Champions adjust.

Expand full comment

Moved from NYC to Miami last year, the same apartment which I got last year is $800 more expensive now. The average STUDIO in Brickell is about $3,000 per month in rent. Before the pandemic, you could get the same studio for $1,800.

I am afraid that at this point, even Texas and Florida are living on borrowed time. It used to be that back in the day, old more sane New Yorkers flooded to Florida and they were usually from Long Island or Upstate. Now, every spoiled woke normie brat is flooding to South Florida on Daddy's money and then crying that it is not woke like NYC.

I feel like Florida right now feels like California in the 70s or 80s. It is literally a bad governor or two away from turning into the California of modern day and it can easily happen in less than a decade. With the amount of techies, woke warriors, and virtue signaling yankees on daddy's money flooding in, do not expect it to stay the way it is for long.

Expand full comment
founding

The best theory I heard is to be prepared to be mobile with remote income and able to move within a 6 months time frame. Gives way to the question where would you go.

Expand full comment

Try to put yourself in a position where your capital and income can relocate faster than they can legislate.

Expand full comment

We are running out of places, maybe Idaho if we are lucky but Californians are flooding in there too.

Expand full comment
founding

Correct. Many West Coast socialist types who couldn't hack the last two years in their "Utopia", have flooded the Rocky Mountain states (Idaho, Utah, Montana, Wyoming etc.) Unfortunately their politics and love of government didn't stay back in Washington, Oregon or Cali.

Expand full comment

This I am terrified for. Where else would there be to turn?

Luckily I'm not in Miami (can't stand Miami) but still only an hour away.

But, once a place gets infected it inevitably branches out to surrounding areas and further infects.

Expand full comment

There is no more running. If you can’t leave US for whatever reason it’s time to start getting really involved with local politics like your life depends on it - because it does. Unfortunately, the days of being neutral are gone. You will have to choose a side.

Expand full comment

Maybe Idaho but TBH, perhaps it is Asia itself, they seem to shoot down radical liberalism fast.

Expand full comment

One thing more- we can at least be happy to be in US. Everywhere else (except maybe Russia ironically) is in way worse situation. Europe is absolutely fucked.

Expand full comment
author

For sure, maximize what you can while you can

Expand full comment

Yeah but expect Eurotrash to come to America and lecture us on morals and how much better Europe is....while they flood into America. Way to kick off July 4th though lol, so happy to be in the US where every state is its own entity as opposed to totalitarian Straya.

Expand full comment

Too dangerous. Never know when you pass by a school and get shot at 😉

But in all seriousness, EU is fucked. The decision to be 100% reliant on Russian gas… and then sanction it during a financial crisis is insane.

Germany is talking about limiting how hot you’re allowed to have your home in the winter to save gas.

Obviously this is never going to happen, but the implication for industry is huge. So much of Germany’s industry is reliant on gas for either electricity or direct usage. If pensioners struggle to heat their homes, German products will be too expensive on the world market.

This is huge as the German industry essentially pays for everything the EU does. The ECB is still keeping interest low and Germany will do anything to save the manufacturing industry so I expect subsidies to come, increasing inflation.

Be happy you’re in the US or Aus.

Expand full comment

We're all waiting for the revolution coming this winter when gas will cost more than a normie monthly wage. Will be fun.

Expand full comment

It’s tragic. At least in the US there’s a certain expectation that you have to make it on your own and their domestic economic policy has had some continuity through the last 100 years.

In Europe you have several generations, in several countries (West and East), that grew up in a more or less socialist regime. These are people who have no other choice than to rely on their governments for pensions in old age.

That those people will be at risk of freezing in their homes due to economic policy is a real tragedy. The only EU leader that really seems to consider this is Orban and he’s being vilified for not picking enough of a side.

Don’t get me wrong, I 100% support Ukraine in this. Their millennial and Gen-Z will have grown up seeing a dysfunctional government in their own country and a rapidly increasing standard of living for their EU-member neighbors in Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania. While they don’t have EU membership, they have a president that seems popular and wants to bring western prosperity to Ukraine through oil & gas exploration in partnership with western companies.

Putin has robbed that generation of a potentially prosperous future and forced them into an unnecessary war.

My problem with it all is that the EU started an economic war against Russia without considering the effects on their own people if this economic war drags out. They don’t have a backup plan and they don’t understand that Putin can’t lose. Not because his army is good, but because he simply can’t afford to.

Expand full comment

Incorrect. America is hell hole of school shootings, heroin, public defecation, bad healthcare, Donald Trump and white supremacists. Stay far away

Expand full comment

Every time I read the stack I feel like I’m way ahead of the crowd. And that’s because I am thanks to you guys.

Expand full comment

You can’t go on stage and say no one needs the vaccine. You also can’t go on stage and say the virus is not as deadly as we thought. Both of those admit incompetence so better to be *right* on something big and major (Russia attacking Ukraine) to gain credibility while brushing the prior decisions under the rug. Can’t be an admission of bad decisions if no one remembers. - Just perfect analysis.!

If you can't see this is by design , I don't know what will show you.

Also note the Covid vaccine ID will be instrumental to future digital IDs / linked to digital CBDCs. They are just prepping for this.

Expand full comment
founding
Jun 28, 2022·edited Jun 28, 2022

Ed Dowd has some good content (only on Gettr after Twatter banned the dude) about all this.

As more time goes on, more people will (and are) realize that COVID is actually just a population control / placation mechanism because no governments are willing to admit that the system is FUBAR and may collapse. Look at China and its harsh lockdowns in Shanghai, one of the most economically productive regions - completely about control as they were likely trying to reduce demand / inflation / resource scarcity of some sort.

COVID also proved to the govts that 90%+ of their populations are sheep and once the next plandemic rolls around they will happily accept whatever imprisonment...errm lockdowns they impose and take more poison jabs up the ass if their daddy govt forces them to.

Expand full comment

Lockdowns or masks will likely return this fall in USA. Only one prominent D politician (Polis) has come out against lockdowns/masks/forced vax. The rest are abiding by and promoting CDC guidance And it's not cuz they are stupid, they're not. They gotta know their mandates are useless. But the media traumatized an essential portion of the Dem base who would have abandoned voting D if they reversed mask/vax policy.

But now RvW is more important than covid. D's are attempting to leave covid behind and make the election about abortion, no longer covid.

Expand full comment

This is very good. As a companion, everyone should be familiar with Michael Chrichton’s classic, Why Speculate?

http://web.archive.org/web/20070714204136/http://www.michaelcrichton.net/speech-whyspeculate.html

Expand full comment

Thoroughly good read. Great reminder of the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect. For me it was tech journalists - then I extrapolated, contrary to the effect, and basically never took media seriously ever again.

"There comes to be a perception-convenient to the media-that nothing is, in the end, knowable for sure. When in fact, that's not true. "

This is the idea which has the world in its grip. The agenda is to deny your ability to access reality so you can be more easily managed.

Expand full comment

Appreciate the share. Two special lines

“If you believe in nothing, then you’ll believe in anything” - Chesterton.

“That’s what you get when you elect a dovish president, war.”

Wonder when “Gell-Mann-Amnesia” will apply to anon cartoon on the internet. “Well, Bowtied______ has indicated that...”?

Expand full comment

Great summary, it’s scary how many don’t already know this. Stagflation seems inevitable. Don’t see how they can fix the energy problem quickly since they haven’t even started to try. Diesel rules everything around me (DREAM lol). All they can do is kill consumers w/interest rate hikes.

Expand full comment
author

Yeah could be a pivot to stop hiking interest. But won't stop the real pain which is energy input cost

Expand full comment

Bull have you done a post on all the essentials you would buy for prepping?

So far, I’ve got a couple years worth soap, toothbrush, toilet paper, etc. About a years worth of canned goods. Several gallons of water and a freezer full of ground beef. Just wondering you could expound on this topic.

Expand full comment
author

Sounds like you're pretty much good to go?

Maybe throw in some rice and beans (long shelf life)

Paper, cleaning, canned, frozen. Stick there and you should be able to worry a lot less. This also gives you time to think about where you want to place your bets in the future.

Expand full comment

Never let a good crisis go to waste!

Expand full comment

Measured on that basis, this administration has the most opportunity of any group in the last 70 years!

Expand full comment

Agreed. If I had to guess US politicians took full advantage of epic lab blunder. Hard to imagine China orchestrated the whole thing due to the epic disaster and political instability they are risking with perma lockdown state.

Expand full comment

Bull, do you agree with Burry that major retailers (Target, Walmart, Best Buy, etc.) face a major inventory GLUT and this will cause a "bullwhip effect" (deflation in consumer products)?

What are the implications even though headline inflation (food, energy, etc.) will continue to rise due to shortages?

And do we see lots of housing sales / foreclosures if recession = layoffs = levered up folks can't make their monthly payments? There goes middle class's main store of wealth...

Expand full comment
author

No clue we gave three potential cover ups. Could allow the fed to pivot, could be war spending, could be recession. Our only point is to just think for yourself and watch out for a sudden sneaky change in financial policy

Same story from us, Energy = input cost so we'd wage food/energy continues to go higher.

Levered up people in homes better be able to pay the debt or else they are screwed, goal is to try and minimize price of home going up (they practically stated this). But. If you're like us you just buy primary residence and stay for 10 years if you did that price doesn't matter since you have to rent somewhere.

Expand full comment

Crazy times. Just need one bad hurricane in the Gulf (refineries) or something go boom in Kaliningrad and the "current thing" will be something mean DeSantis said about a cat.

Expand full comment
founding

Inventory/demand planners in large retailers aren’t actually good with demand planning. They don’t look at the macro. (Built one of these departments) They look at historical trends only which you can’t do in this environment.

I know 2 different retailers($1B+), like Anon212 said, that are filled to the brim with declining sales. As soon as Q3 hits in a few days, they’ll be starting their biggest promotions of the year to try to drum up demand and release inventory.

Expand full comment
author

The thing is food inventory isn't inflated because it expires. So it means CPI of the stuff that people don't need to buy to survive goes down

Meanwhile the stuff you need to survive goes up. Lotts of pressure on low end

Expand full comment
founding

This. My restaurant chain friends are losing their mind over inflation right now while normal retail thinks the worst of it has largly passed.

Expand full comment
founding

And by worst of it I mean the very large shocks.

Expand full comment
founding

From first hand experience can agree, we are in the Ecom space and I know other sellers (they are doing 10mm+/yr) have reported they are experiencing a post covid drop in sales. we ourselves are also full to the brim with inventory and are seeing weaker sales than last year so far.

Expand full comment
founding

Spot on spot on spot as usual. Hopefully scares normies the hell out of here...you can still find comments discussing why Roe will make dems win the midterms and how Europe is better than America bc of mass shootings and bla bla bla bla

Hopefully all posts become paid and price tag on substack skyrockets bc of inflation

Expand full comment

Also - Watch this cap on Russian Oil prices.

If Europe puts caps on Russian oil price near the low cost of production. How much could be shipped to a non Euro 3rd party before going back out at market price?

For example:

🛢Oil $120

🛢Russia cost $60

🛢3rd party buys for $100 sells for $120

Seems easy to send oil east or south before sending it west...Or at a bare minimum allow non-Euro countries to buy slightly discounted oil ($110 vs $120 market price). There is some amount of fungible-ness with oil right?

Now add in the unintended consequence of this driving the overall market price of oil up...Now if in 3 months oil is $150 cuz of new sanctions... Russia sells for $130 which is >$120 market price they would have got without sanctions

But politicians can point to doing something and pootin to hide the ever increasing price of energy that is likely largely due to poor policy decisions

Expand full comment

Already reports that Russian oil is being sold to India who then flips it to Europe.

No way around it short of WWIII, and it’s clear US doesn’t have appetite for that

Expand full comment
Jun 28, 2022·edited Jun 28, 2022

Post War II Crisis

1. US come off gold standard, Inflation

Solution diplomacy Kissinger petrodollar

GOV that was a lot of work

2. S&L crisis, 8k+ banks fail, GOV holding the bag on ridiculous amounts of RE

Solution sell RE to first hedge funds

GOV that sucked

3. 2001 Tech Crash/Recession

Solution drop Rate below 2%

GOV felt better, less work, less pain

Repeat #3 for future crisis...

Expand full comment