The stagflation narrative dominating financial social media isn't completely wrong. That's what makes it so dangerous. After more than 30 years of managing client portfolios through actual inflationary cycles, not watching them on YouTube,
The commodity supercycle thesis is everywhere right now. Bank of America's Michael Hartnett, one of the most widely read strategists on Wall Street, recently declared "commodities the biggest trade of the next five years," anchoring the call on deglobalization, chronic capital underinvestment, and a world drifting away from dollar dominance.
Robots are coming to the economy. It is inevitable, really, and there is nothing that will stop it. At some point in the not-so-distant future, robots will infiltrate every aspect of our lives, from office work and manufacturing to service work and trade skills, and even your home. Here are some numbers for you.
Every few years, someone discovers that the United States government owes a very large amount of dollars and concludes that Rome is about to fall. A recent piece in RealClearMarkets by Nash, Thomas, Lang, and Rastin does exactly this.
"March's 178,000 BLS jobs report came in nearly three times Wall Street's 60,000 estimate. Markets celebrated. Almost nobody mentioned the entire beat traced back to doctors returning from a strike and weather rebounds. That's not strength. That's noise — and it's a pattern we can no longer afford to ignore."
That article digs into the plumbing behind oil shocks and recession, and exposes why, over the years, I've learned to distrust the loudest voices in the room. Right now, some of the most prominent macro commentators, the "Persistent Purveyors of Doom," are making a variation of the same argument:
After more than three decades of watching oil markets upend economies, one pattern keeps repeating: investors learn the wrong lessons from the last shock. The 1973 OPEC embargo taught us that geopolitical disruptions are temporary. That lesson then got everyone killed, financially speaking, in 1979.
The fiat currency collapse narrative is one of the most emotionally satisfying arguments in all of financial punditry. It feels intellectually rigorous, draws on genuine history, and speaks to deep and legitimate anxieties about government overreach, monetary recklessness, and the long-term consequences of unlimited debt creation.
Every few months, a headline appears declaring that the U.S. dollar’s reign as the world’s reserve currency is over. China is dumping Treasuries. Central banks are hoarding gold.