Precious Metals: Extended discussion on gold vs. silver dynamics, debasement hedging, Asian buying, and volatility signaling risk-manager-driven de-leveraging.
Dollar Weakness: Guest argues Trump’s policy mix implies a structurally weaker dollar, with implications for flows out of USD assets and into gold and non-U.S. equities.
Oil Bull Market: Case made for higher oil due to industry supply discipline, geopolitical risk premium, and the inflation/volatility feedback loop impacting broader markets.
AI Capex: Shift from software to hardware/memory profits noted; financing moving from internal cash flow to debt as market becomes more selective across the AI value chain.
Emerging Markets: Weak-dollar beneficiaries and commodity-linked equities highlighted as leaders YTD, with caution about short-term de-risking as cross-asset volatility rises.
Japan and China: Guest sees both as investable on capital rotation from U.S. assets, Japan’s deficit spending/repatriation tailwinds, and China’s quieter but persistent policy moves.
Market Volatility: Warns of a regime where commodity and FX vol bleeds into equities, forcing de-grossing; emphasizes risk management and potential for episodic deleveraging events.
Transcript
Hit it. It's Friday, January 29th, 2026, episode 284. I'm Patrick Szna. And I'm Kevin Mure. This week, we welcome Craig Shapiro to the show. We have a fantastic discussion where we discuss the state of macro markets, where the opportunities lie going forward, and what it was like working with Steve Cohen. Then Patrick is back with talking charts and it's a spicy spicy session. So we've decided to go a week early. >> We had to get we had to get some talking charts. Patrick and uh folks uh I'm going to have to have a beer here dur during this session. And uh Danny, normally I tell you to introduce the beer, but I wanted to leave it a surprise for you here. I'm having the sages, but >> look at the size of this bad boy. Today was quantity over quality. It's uh it's one of these days in the markets where you're gonna need to go big. But like what's what's your uh what's your call on this beer? >> You know what? Like when you when you bring out the liter bottle of Sagrash, you know, you know the session is on. >> That's uh the way it works. All right. >> What happens when gold starts moving in $400 increments? Uh, no buddy. No All right, give us some uh side effects, bud. >> Nothing in this podcast should be viewed as investment advice. Listeners should consult an investment professional before making any decisions regarding topics mentioned in this show. Side effects of too much huddle may include the gold parabola parabola parabola. I can't even say it. Psychosis. And I know you're going to leave all that in there. Uh, geopolitical oil oil shock syndrome. Just having trouble with my words. This is what you do when you make me go on an off week. And finally, the FOMC irrelevant syndrome. >> Well, that one is very irrelevant today. >> It's so irrelevantly relevant. All right, so uh let's uh let's get the guest on. >> Before we get to our main guest, we thought we'd take a moment to play a brief clip from our Christmas special where Marvin Bar made the absolutely terrific call that Kevin Walsh would be picked as Fed chair. Well done, Marvin. Do you think the market's got it wrong with Scott Beth, sorry, with um Kevin Hasset being the leading contender right now? Um well, I'm I'm glad they've moved that way. I I've been saying that all along. I said it was either going to be Bessid or or or Worsh. Um and um you know when markets were at their peak with Hassid I was saying nope it's going to be Bessent or excuse me it's going to be uh Wars Bessent has dropped out for me. Um I would have thought that he was going to choose himself >> and Cheney move. >> Yeah, exactly. I think we talked about it last time. Um, the reason why I've I've sort of pulled back on that one is I've learned from a variety of different sources that Scott Besson is really deeply involved in national security policies. >> Ah, >> perhaps maybe more so than Pete Hex. And that means he ain't going anywhere. One, because the president ain't going to let him. And two, because he's clearly he sees other things he's doing that are much bigger than anything at the the the Fed, which is where normally you think a macro guy would want to go. So I I think it's going to be worse. >> Oh, you think it's worse? So you think Hass is wrong like that the markets over? No, >> abs. Absolutely. I think it's definitely going to be worse. >> And that would be I'm I'm 99% sure it's not going to be hassle. All right, it's our great pleasure to welcome to the show Craig Shapiro. Craig is the macro strategist at Ninja Trader Live. Craig, thanks for coming. >> Thanks for having me. Really appreciate it. >> Uh, you know what? We were chatting a little bit before getting to know each other and I was going through your career and this is going to be tons of fun. You have must have a million great stories. Um, before we get to them, why don't you tell us like where did you grow up? Like did you go and you study un like in markets or economics a school like did you always know you wanted to you know end up in finance? >> Yeah I mean I grew up on Long Island um and you know my father was an entrepreneur but he was always kind of uh you know in the markets and and so I had an affinity for that you know with my bar mitzvah money I invested you know into some stocks. I think they, you know, you know, generally did pretty poorly. And it's funny because someone actually gave me uh, you know, like five shares of Philip Morris for my my bar mitzvah, which doesn't really make a lot of sense because I don't know why you give a kid a cigarette stock, you know, for but but I I think that was that was by far the best performing stock that I think I had through the, you know, the following 10 years. But, um, you know, so that, you know, that was kind of the background. I went to Cornell uh, graduated in 2001 kind of, you know, during the, you know, during the recession. And so wasn't a great uh you know wasn't a great time in markets but was hired into um basically Credit Swiss's uh merchant banking group in 2001 and 2002 not a ton of deal flow going on a little bit you know boring and so thankfully at the end of uh 2002 I was able to move over and I joined a hedge fund called Osprey Management towards the end of 2002 which founded by Dwight Anderson and uh became the largest commodities hedge fund in the world basically over the course of the next uh seven eight years and So >> great great experience there. Yeah. >> And that was a terrific time to be at a commodity hedge fund because that's like in the midst of the bricks, right? Like uh >> I mean it caught the bottom there pretty well. I mean basically, you know, shift out of dollar, you know, out of dollar assets, you know, uh into commodities, China entering the WTO, massive commodity demand explosion, limited supply response, oil was moving, plenty to do in natural gas and and copper and and everything really. And so it was a great it was a great run there uh from 2002 through you know really the financial crisis. We had a very well publicized uh blow up in the summer of 2008 unfortunately a little bit before kind of everyone else was blowing up but we had a a tremendous basis mismatch trade going on. We were long stocks and short commodities. If you remember like the most of the equities kind of did incredibly poorly first while commodities continued to rip through the summer uh through June and July and we also had a liquidity mismatch whereby we were long a ton of illquid crap I mean real real garbage right talking about the end of a commod you know towards the end of the commodity cycle harder to find cheap stuff in the big cap name so you move down the liquidity curve you start buying you know uh resources in Sierra Leone and in Kazak an in Russia and a lot of esoteric places with high uh geopolitical premiums and so when the you know when liquidity starts to uh tighten up those things go to zero and that's basically where they went and so yeah >> unfortunately the equities fell uh first and we had to basically stop out of most of our commodity trades which ultimately really would have paid off through the summer and into the fall of 20 uh of 2008 fund shut down and so um yeah I had to uh find something else to do I was 28 years old I was a partner there was the head of research and uh had to had to reinvent myself and so um you know it was >> I should ask actually like what your role there was. So you were the head of research and so when you first came on did you come on as like a a research associate? >> I came on as a as a research analyst covering largely covering equities in uh commodity industries that did not have tradable commodities. So think chemicals, paper, steel, shipping. Uh that was my you know that was my bread and butter. Obviously the firm broadly speaking did everything in energy and metals and a too other people covered those and we traded all the commodities. So uh was there for about you know five years and then the most senior analyst and head of re head of equity research left they went to start their own firm. I got promoted into the director of equity research role, became a partner, uh had a couple good years, we had a good run, made, you know, made some good money and then, you know, that 2008 experience, you know, for a lot of people was obviously incredibly challenging and and, you know, for us, you know, clearly was uh right, >> you know, it was unfortunate. I was pretty young, too, was youngest partner and my life got turned upside down. Just had my second kid in the summer of 2008 and uh then all of a sudden um you know, it was all gone. So, >> yeah. >> Terrible. >> You learn lesson. you learn a lot, you know, when you learn a lot of lessons at a at a young age, it's uh, you know, typically helpful. So, you know, right, >> I'm fortunate for the journey. >> Uh, well, um, you have a good attitude about it. And you also, that's your second kid at 28. You had kids young. Um, I do remember that period, though. And you, it's funny, you were saying how you were surprised about the liquidity that disappeared. I remember I was playing a lot of uh like just Canadian like small cap resource names and and a lot of them would come out as private placements that you have to hold for three for four months or whatever. And I remember saying to myself like I got nervous about the markets and I was like okay I got to stop doing these because I don't want to be stuck into paper that I can't trade. And I thought I had done everything great and I thought I had like, you know, really trimmed everything up and that there was no extras. And I was like, how did I lose so much money on so few positions like and and it was kind of shocking how quickly they went from like, you know, two bucks to 20 cents. >> It it was really it was really unbelievable. I mean, because because we had such a a large fund, we had a huge uh public's fund and a private equity fund as well. you know, anybody with a story, anyone with a deposit anywhere in the world, you know, or anybody with a farm anywhere was coming into our office pitching a story. And, you know, we were still kind of in that, you know, tail end of the commodity bull market, but still, you know, things seemed pretty good. And so, you know, we found ourselves becoming three and four and 5% investors in a lot of these, you know, smaller exploration type vehicles and thinking the, you know, the China story was going to continue, you know, forever. And so um but in the you know first and second the first half of 20 of 2008 it it when we saw the liquidity start to move out we thought okay we could hedge a lot of this risk with with commodity shorts right we could be we could be long junior copper miners trading you know at very very uh discounted valuations as long as we're short copper you know we'll be okay and so you know and the the mistake obviously is that basis mismatch of equities versus commodities But really it's, you know, also the the liquidity profile of being long small caps when the liquidity is going out the door. You know, you can't be short enough copper, right, against Yeah. against your positions. And then from the timing perspective, a lot of these names started to roll over and you know, it's the first half of the year and and particularly in July and August. And you know, crude made a new high in July, I think at 145 or 148 bucks. And I remember also we we were short we were short dry freight forward freight agreements. I don't know if you remember those those are, you know, dry bulk and like those were trading, >> you know, we probably started shorting them at $80,000 a day. They went through 125 or $150,000 a day. Th >> those contracts ultimately went to basically zero. Um, you know, in September and October, we were gone. We we had to cover all, you know, because the the losses in the equity book over were overwhelming everything. And so, right, you know, huge lessons learned there on those basis mismatches and liquidity profile of your portfolio, your ability to get out. We couldn't get out of 5% positions in junior minors, right? It would just take huge haircuts. We wound up having to trade out of a lot of those things. And after we had already shut the fund down and we gated people, >> you know, it took took months, it took months, quarters to get out of some of those positions. >> And back to your point about this, the idea that you can't be short enough copper. The unfortunate part is that if other people are doing the trade with you and then all of a sudden they start, you know, they liquidity contracts, they're actually covering their like as they sell their stocks, they're covering their copper, it's actually going the opposite way on you. So, not only is it not a like a good enough hedge in terms of it not falling fast enough, in extreme cases, it's actually rising on you. >> Yeah. That that's that basis mismatch that that can, you know, it could be toxic, right? And so >> and the industry is also at least back then I suspect it's you know similar now it's not that big of an industry. So when people understand that you know large hedge fund New York hedge fund commodities hedge fund has significant short exposure in XYZ commodity you know that news that news gets out and obviously there's been well publicized you know other funds that have gone through similar types of things in different commodities whether it be not gas or copper or whatever and so your positions kind of get out you kind of get you kind of get screwed. So, um, yeah, that was >> that story that story from Long-Term Capital that I love in the book When Genius Failed and it's when Merryweather's in all sorts of trouble and he calls his, you know, his ex Wall Street, you know, broker from someone and he's this Italian dude that comes and he's, you know, on the street forever and he tells Merryweather, "Okay, show me your book." And Merryweather shows it to him and he says, "Well, what are you down?" And he says, "We're down 50." And he goes, "You're done." And they say, "Why?" He goes, "I got we got Buffett, we got this, and we like all these things he's trying to save." He goes, "Once people realize that you're in trouble, they're going to squeeze you the whole way." Y >> and then he was bang on correct. Okay. So, so that was obviously traumatic experience, but you end up going to another terrific shop and I I just I'd love to hear the stories about this next one. Um and and tell us where you end up and kind of give us some flavor about what it was like moving from Osprey to this new place. >> Yeah. So, you know, after after Osprey trying to refine, you know, redefine myself. I I I wound up joining an exartner of Osprey for a couple years at a small fund and then >> was able to actually move over to a SACE um spin-off fund first and then when that fund, you know, didn't make it, I was able to kind of move over to SACE and so I worked with with Steve >> uh towards the end of 2012 through really the end of 2015. And so three, you know, very good years uh at at SACE, which then transitioned to 72 while I was there, running a commodities equities portfolio across those same industries, you know, industrials, materials, energy, had a team of four analysts working with me at the peak, managed a good deal of capital, had three very good years with Steve. It was an incredible experience. And you know the low net community often at least back then it was harder to find um you know long short portfolio managers that could be successful because the correlations are not necessarily in the idiosyncratic right. You need to get the commodity right. You need to get the macro right. You need to get the dollar right. And a lot of folks who traded these spaces kind of didn't do that. They were busy trading Rio versus BHP or IP versus packaging corp or DAO versus Lionell whatever. But Steve allowed me the opportunity to be a bit more directional which was great which is why we were you know pretty successful because my you know prior experience of nailing the commodity cycles was very helpful. So we had you know very good years you know trading these commodity related equities in a more directional basis and were able to you know balance the risk balance the nets balance the beta with you know using index hedges or at times commodity hedges. So uh it it was great we had a great uh a great run there. I sat, you know, for three years behind Steve in his in his trading row in in Connecticut. Um, you know, learned a ton from him and really just a tremendous tremendous experience. >> So, what what would you say was the biggest surprise going there? Like you say you learned some things. What was the one that you were like, "Oh, I I never would have thought about that." And that was kind of a big shock. >> Yeah. I mean, I think one of the the things I didn't necessarily appreciate just kind of listening to Steve and overhearing him is, you know, kind of his myopia on on execution and on trading. I mean, I had thought kind of, you know, been an investor, been more I've been more of an investor than a trader, right? And so, more thematic, more not really caring as much about exit and entries and and so and you know, really you learn when you manage a large pool of capital and at one point we were, you know, north of a half a billion dollars of capital. um you know getting in and getting out of things really matters um and there's a lot of slippage if you if you kind of screw it up and Steve was obsessed you know with execution and so kind of definitely drilled that into you know drilled that into me just making sure I was aware of that. The other thing too is booking profits, right? He was, you know, you're up, you book, you know, make sure you're booking profits. Always putting, you know, P&L behind you. And so, um, you know, he didn't really love draw downs. No one does. But, I mean, if you've been on a good run and then you have and you draw down, you kind of take it all back. He's he's not tolerant of that, right? And so, you got to you have, you know, he's happy to let you let your winners run, but when the trend starts to move the other direction, you need to derisk. You need to gross down. You need to have booked some of that P&L so that you could keep growing your portfolio over time. And so um you know th those risk management things were very helpful for me you know particularly from my prior experience where you know the fund blew up. So I I definitely didn't want to I definitely didn't want to do that again. Um but uh you know Steve you know Steve was great in that in that regard for me. >> And so what are you a Mets fan? >> I am I've always been a Mets I've always been a Mets fan much to my you much to my sugarin. I think it was uh yeah, I think it was in 2015 when we were last in the World Series against the Royals and I, you know, brought my daughters to game five and the Mets lost at home and I had to carry my daughter like two miles back to our car. This is before Steve bought the Mets, but um but uh yeah, it's it's a labor of love. At least I'm a I'm a New York Giants fan, which at least for some years had been good. I'm not a Jets fan. That would be horrible. But more recently, the Giants have >> And so what do you think about Steve's moves recently with the Mets? Yeah, I think look, I mean, he's trying to, you know, I think they've been, you know, they've been good. I mean, he's doing what he can. I think he's trying to run the team a little bit more like a business in some degree, but I I've like the moves they've they've, you know, but look, some and he's I think the other thing, too, is when he buy, you know, he makes if he makes mistakes, he cuts risk, right? He makes him he makes an investment, it doesn't work, whatever. He's paid a lot of money for it, but he's like, "Look, this isn't working for us. Like, how do we cut it?" And I think that you know that portfolio the risk manager philosophy you know it's hard to say you should you could do it with people too but when you're the owner of a baseball team you you can. So um I you know hopefully uh hopefully the next couple years we'll uh you know we'll get the job done there. >> My favorite Steve story is um in in the GFC I think he was having all of his traders and a lot of them were kept trying to buy the buy the the dip and they kept getting run over and eventually I don't know if this is true or not. This is the story I heard. Eventually, he just said to everyone, "You go home. It's me and whatever. This guy, we're trading the book for now." And for like six months or whatever, as they kind of went through the the really turbulent po points, they just he took over. And I think that that, you know, uh discipline in terms of the risk is really truly what made him different. >> Yeah. He's just he's maniacal about risk management and execution, you know, trading execution. Yeah, I think I mean look, he gets obviously, you know, he's got 100 plus portfolio managers delivering him great ideas, you know, kind of all the time. So, he's got he he's playing with, you know, the the the better names or worse names if he's on the short side, but still, you know, exit and entry and reading the tape. I mean, he's been doing it forever. He's the best that he's probably the best that's ever done it um from that perspective. And so, yeah, when it's time for him to take over, he just, you know, he takes over. And, you know, probably the same thing with the Mets, right? Like he makes, you know, he's like he's not afraid to make decisions. He's not make afraid to make hard decisions, make cuts, reorg, red, you know, and re, you know, redistribute capital and, you know, kind of keep it moving, keep reinventing himself. So, um, okay, you know, yeah, it was it was a good run. And basically what wound up happening at the end towards the end of 2015, >> um, I went with him to the idea and said, "Look, I want to run a little bit more directional, a little bit more volatility." Um, and we'd love to do that, you know, with you internally. And the firm at the time had been going through some transitions. and he was like, "Yeah, look, we're, you know, that's not the really direction I want to set a precedent, but I'm happy to have you. If you want to go launch your own fund, I I'll support you in doing that." And so, he did. He gave me his blessing to do that. I was able to take my track record with me um and and one of my analysts with me and who became a partner and we, you know, tried to run a more directional strategy uh in 2016 and 17 and 18 and and it didn't really, you know, look, it didn't really go according to plan. I wish it would have went better. um messed up the the Trump election night scenario uh to some degree. And so uh looked, you know, the made a made a bet, tried to get the fund off the ground. It did, but it didn't really work out. And so by the end of 2017, we shut the fund down. And then I've just kind of been bouncing around, uh >> doing a bunch of different things. Yeah. Basically, for the last few years, kind of just been trading my own account, my own family office money. Um and then more recently I've been doing some more financial consulting um more strategy work very active obviously on uh on social media and on my Substack and then you know very recently kind of joined up uh with Ninja Trader which is the largest futures uh retail broker in the country and have become the macro strategist there. So been there for you know as a consultant for the last three months and then joined full-time earlier this year and uh you know trying to just give expert guidance crosset macro guidance to uh you know the retail trading community. I'm on the live show in the mornings and uh do a Sunday show and so yeah it's been very continue writing and so it's been a very uh you know very good experience. >> All right so there's lots to talk about in terms of the market because it's quite a week that we've chosen to have you here. It's perfect. Um, I guess let's just start with the gold and the silver. Um, today we're taping this Friday after the market closed. I would Is that the largest one day move ever in silver? >> I was someone reminded me today that the in that that the move lower in silver today is equivalent to where silver was trading at a year ago. So, you know, basically we were, you know, we wound up being at one point today. I think we were down 40 bucks. Um, and silver was 40 bucks. So, less it was in the mid20s, mid-30s about a year ago. So, I mean, what a historic uh run in in silver in precious um you know, even more commodities lately. I mean, it's been kind of wild. And, you know, look, I mean, part of it obviously is supply demand driven fundamental base. Part of it is this dollar debasement, you know, phenomenon going on. Part of it is just leverage and speculation and everything that's going on there. So it kind of has hit the hit the trifecta of of euphoria and the volumes have just exploded, right? Futures volumes, options volumes today, I don't know where they closed. I saw at one point SLV had traded like over five million options contracts mostly for expert today. So it's been a it's been a pretty crazy uh pretty crazy run and huge reversal now we're seeing in in pressure. So now do you feel that the the rally and obviously it became a speculative you know frenzy towards the end but let's you know the one of the things you mentioned was the debasement trade. First of all do you think that that was a legitimate worry and then with wars coming is the debasement trade off like off the table? Um where do you stand in terms of like how much of this is just a correction in a in a in a larger you know move that we should be like you know expect these sorts of corrections or is this the final end of this kind of frenzy? >> Yeah I mean look I I do think that there is obviously precious as an asset class trades highly correlated but I do think there are some differences between the gold component and the silver and etc component of it. Um now I I think there is you know I think silver really did kind of drive a lot of this you know higher because of the supply demand imbalances and and you know how much um silver is needed in solar panels and in AI and so there's a dynamic in play I think about the needs for silver in the future um and the physical needs and you know whatever China is doing on export controls or not and obviously there's been a a shift kind of in the mentality of countries wanting wanting to procure and hold their own resources. So there there's some dynamic in you know further dynamic in play there potentially in silver. I think silver is less of a debasement trade. Gold to is clearly more of a fiat debasement trade. Um look we've seen you know really since you know probably the the first quarter of 2022 with the the Russia move on Ukraine and the sanctioning of reserves. We've seen how uh gold has been reintroduced as a neutral reserve asset. Um and treasuries and sovereign bonds have have declined in in that in that role. If governments can kind of just come in and expropriate your reserves, you're as a country, you're going to hold rest reserves in that country. Um and so I think that dynamic really surprised probably the rest of the world when the US and EU kind of decide to do that to Russia. And so I think gold has disconnected from you know real the real rates trade because of that and that trend has been in place for the you know the last whatever close to four years and I think with respect to what Trump has been doing more recently um look he's in favor of a weaker dollar in order to bring back manufacturing reshort America bring back jobs and the only way we're going to do that is with a much weaker currency. uh he wants rates lower uh he wants to you know put up export barriers and trade and tariffs and so in order to do that and so we're seeing uh again another reason to uh have the dollar be debased and so gold kind of picks up some benefit from that as well more recently too this move in Venezuela of you coming in there and just kind of taking the oil right well I mean it wasn't really our oil you know to to be taken right other countries have investments including China have investments in Venezuela And so if if the US is going to be more aggressive in just going out in the world and taking things from other people, well, those other people who own things in dollars are going to think, well, maybe I need to own less dollars. I maybe I have to have my my excess trade balances stored away from anything that's, you know, tied into the dollar. So gold really picks up, you know, the the incremental from that, too. And so I think you know gold was you know silver was driving gold higher and then then gold kept helped drive silver higher and kind of was this back and forth you know dynamic in play. And then look, I think the, you know, the the comments earlier in the week from Trump about being um okay with the dollar moves kind of led to this, I don't know, it just led to this kind of maybe his final, not his final, but certainly it's what seemingly a blowoff top in in gold the other night. Kind of got I don't was that last night? It was two minutes ago at this point, but kind of got like up to I think we got up to like 5,600 um in the in the Asia session. And clearly what we've been seeing right is we've been seeing Asian demand for for precious has been strong like every night we come in and the prices are up and then in the US it's you know we kind of check back a little bit. So clearly the metal is flowing east. Uh Asian countries are trying to procure more resources store more wealth in away from dollars into precious. And so is it over? I don't think it's over, but man, I mean, the moves today are, you know, have to be uh clearly we're historic. Um, and the volatility has just been, you know, face ripping, right? And so, if you're a >> if you're a risk manager and you're looking at guys and who trade these metals, you know, you're telling you got to take your risk now, right? I mean, the VAR shock potential is elevated um with volatility this and so I think you you just kind of got to the point where the risks were too high. you know, my friend who was who trades this stuff pretty actively. Some of these like bid ask spreads in silver options are just it's you could drive a truck through them, right? >> This is happening in natural gas also early in the week just so volatility across the commodity space has just gone through the roof. And so I think though through the course of the week we've start probably started to see risk managers given taps on the shoulder to folks to start de-risking these portfolios which when there has been such a highly correlated move to start the year between weak dollar trades, precious metals trades, emity trades kind of all moving together. You know you start to now have a little bit of a crescendo effect here, right? As the the dollar stopped falling and started to have a little bounce, then you get volatility in precious and some turnaround there. And then today, you know, you're finally starting to see the last couple last two days, EM equities starting to underperform. You know, Aussie had a had a blowoff top the other night has corrected. Mexican Peso blowoff top has correct. Right. So, you're starting to see a little bit of a crescendo here of riskoff mentality over let's say over the course of the last 48 hours. I think that's likely to continue into next week. the war stuff maybe has a little bit to do with it, but I think really more it's about portfolio de-risking, deleveraging, you know, similar to like what we saw in August of 2024 with the yen carry trade unwind or even February of 2018 with the Volmageddon, right? Just, you know, these episodic V events that force system deleveraging over a very short period of time to cleanse positions. I think we're we're in one right now. Do you think it expands to even equities? >> Well, look, I mean, I what I I How are you I I I tweeted this earlier today. I was just kind of think like if you're a business that buys that needs to buy commodities and commodities are whipping around with 100, you know, 100% realized volatility. Well, how do you make how do you make decisions about how much you're going to buy this next month, the month after? And so, I think you you have a little bit of an uncertainty uh dynamic reintroducing itself. So I do think that this commodity va which is filtering now into FXV is likely to filter into equity vault. And so under the hood, >> look, it didn't really hasn't really shown up yet in in NASDAQ and and the S&P. I mean, they're both trading, you know, still up on the year. But under the hood, you know, over the course of the last several days, there's been violence in >> in meme stocks, in the most shorted names, in unprofitable tech, right? things that led to start the year when people were believing in a broadening out rally. >> Yeah. >> Have been faceplanted, right? Because these are the things that are people don't really know as well. Uh they are beholden to a low vault. They need they need a lowvall environment to work. >> And so when you start to see this vault pick up, these things have been destroyed. And so that rotation to start the year now has been going kind of back the other way, right? NASDAQ has outperformed the Russell now for, you know, I think six days in a row after basically three weeks of of the other way. So, I think we're starting to see that the bleed into equity markets and I think as we come in next week, >> I I think we're going to see more of that. >> Okay. Um, I want to go backtrack to the dollar because you made a comment and I I thought spot on correct and I get a lot of push back when I make the same arguments and I just love to hear your thinking. Um I do think Trump wants a lower dollar and even though he says oh no no no I really want a strong dollar ultimately like if you listen to what he believes that in terms of uh you know selling to the rest of the world and uh what what's happened to uh the manufacturing base all those things need a lower US dollar and so although we have gotten a lower US dollar against some currencies it's actually been pretty Like yes, there's been some volatility, but it hasn't been as there hasn't been as much friction on the dollar as I would have figured. And I'm wondering if that's actually the next round of real FX, sorry, the real volatility is going to come in the FX markets and we're actually going to get foreign currency wars. I was just wondering what you're thinking about that. >> Yeah. Yeah. Look, I mean, I don't know. I thought that well I have a couple things but but what what kind of comes to mind is Trump makes this uh you know you know the announcement about this whole Greenland stuff right and so you know we're going to tariff Europe um if they don't just give us Greenland and then he goes to Davos and you know gives a reasonably hawkish speech about the state of the the world and this where the US fits in and you know has some meetings um I suspect with you know leaders you know, and wealthy people and, you know, market makers and movers and everything. And then ultimately a few hours later basically decides, okay, we're actually like we're we're good. Like we're not going to take Greenland and I'm not going to tariff anybody and I'm just going to go I'm just, you know, it's all good again. And so and and I and I wonder did he you know is he walking away from the do from Davos like in a position of power or did the rest of the world kind of tell him to f off and I'm not really sure but the reaction from the currency market was that the rest of the world is kind of telling to f off or that there's a that there's a consolid coordinated effort now across multi you know a multitude of the west to allow for a weaker dollar because the reaction of the DXY and basically every currency since last Wednesday up until today was dollar weak, right? And very weak, right? I mean, so we saw a very big breakdown in the dollar over the course of the last, you know, week. So, I don't know if it's because, you know, there's a Davos accord or a Mara Lago accord that was reached or if it was the rest of the world kind of fed up with with Trump and just saying, "Let's start the process of selling US dollar assets um now uh because this guy is out of control." I don't really know what what the reality is, but I do know that the president has a view about what makes America great, what makes America strong, and it's making things right. And and he believes that we can reshore manufacturing imminently and that we should be able to get, you know, a restoration of manufacturing jobs like tomorrow. And really there we we need in order to be competitive globally the dollar needs to depreciate massively. >> Yeah. >> 50%. >> Yeah. So so I don't know that you know if he knows the numbers or not but what I do know is what he wants. And so the only way to get what he wants is to have a reasonably weaker dollar. Okay. Now I think the issue is if we get an accelerated pace of dollar decline then you get weeks like this where commodity prices roof right and so then you bring back >> inflation expectations you bring back you know worries about the future state of the dollar and >> and look I think the American public is you know maybe you know American public understands I think this weak dollar story and they they know what happens when the dollar is weak and gold prices rip and oil prices rip and natural gas prices have the kind of week that they had. people see that the dollar weakness is going to bring back inflation and so maybe we can't have a a massively decelerating dollar uh quickly uh but I think the trend will be lower and so I don't know I do think it's interesting that he made those comments the dollar kind of makes a new low and then all you know immediately almost immediately after Besson come out and like that you know that's not true you know yeah we we we always savor a strong dollar u Hasset was out this morning kind of saying they we favor a strong dollar and then the Worsh pick. I don't know. I mean, I don't necessarily think the Worsh pick has much to do with the dollar move today. I think that, you know, it's really more about unwind. But if you think about Worsh, I think he's for lower rates, but a smaller balance sheet, right? But he's also he's also been at the Fed. So, I think there's a dynamic in play here where Powell, who has largely threatened to stay on for another 18 months because he was concerned about the Fed pick, now I think has a really more difficult time staying on and justifying that decision because Gors is clearly qualified. He's already been at the Fed. I think it would be bad form and practice for Powell to stay on just to fight independence when the guy who's being put in there was already on the Fed. So yeah, >> I think that, you know, I think potentially what happens here is there was some sort of deal that was made. Um has Wars was picked, Powell leaves, they also drop the DOJ case. Powell goes off and and you know into the sunset and then Trump's able to you know bring Myron back in for Powell seat uh you know later on and then you have you know a a a larger component of the Fed uh where there's doubves and they do drive the front end yields lower >> and they do work to actually lower interest you know lower interest expense and bring down um you know the the budget deficit that's associated with interest and So um but again I and I think that that you know helps kind lower rates will help bring the I think will help bring the dollar down too in their mind. So um I I see the dollar as continuing to weaken. I mean I look back to where we were in you know end of 2017 and DXY was under 90, right? I mean and so we're at 97 change now. I think you know I wouldn't wouldn't be surprised if we saw you know a reasonably weaker dollar here um over the course of the you know let's say the next uh six months or so. One of the things about Wars though is if you look at the history of of where he's been, >> he's generally on the more hawkish side >> and so it's kind of a lot of folks were scratching their heads going, why did he pick him? He doesn't seem like it's really what Trump's looking for. >> Any theories? Oh, any conspiracy theories or just any just theories in general? >> Just comments like about >> Yeah, look, I mean, I I think I think Hasset was a very tough pick because he I think he's seen as more of a a lackey for the president. >> Yeah. >> Um and I think the bond market was more would be more concerned about him. So, I don't I don't think he would. And I I think I think Reer was probably an interesting pick, but I don't think he know I don't think Trump knows him, right? >> Um per se. And so I don't think I think Trump kind of feels like he was kind of forced into Powell even though he didn't know him and I think he regrets that decision. And so >> and I think you know look he put Waller out the Fed too but I don't know I don't get the sense that there's much uh much uh affinity between Waller and and Trump. And so Worsh is a Trump guy right there. There is, you know, a long history between Trump and Worsh's father-in-law. And there's Wars is kind of in the in the know. And Worsh, you know, knows Duck and Miller and Bessant worked with Drunken Miller. And I mean, so there's a there's a reasonably incestuous relationship between all them. So I think Worsh, you know, was a pick that Trump could feel very comfortable with. And look, over the course of the last several years, Wars has been has shifted from, you know, that that original hawkish bias into, you know, something something a little more different. I don't think it's necessarily because he was advocating for um the Fed chair, you know, exclusively, but look, I I think it he brings there's an interesting dynamic here where if you lower rates and you bring down the balance sheet that you're actually achieving more of a main street over Wall Street dynamic. And if you believe that that's what Trump is actually wants to do and we could argue maybe he doesn't really want to do that. I think he was elected to do that. >> Um but he did get >> but he did get concerned about that in April right with liberate you know with the follow on of liberation day and so he did taco on that that view. But I do think he is you know wants to be seen as more of a populist and wants to make more strides for Main Street. So, look, I think part of the the issue for Main Street is that asset prices are are way too high, >> right? >> Um, and so >> he can't like he can't make Main Street win without Wall Street losing, >> right? >> Because of the the pricing of the stock market, >> right? So, I think there's a there's a an argument to be made that if you can bring interest rates down and lower the cost of borrowing for the government and also for people that you'll reduce the deficit which can help control the long end. Um, in and you reduce the size of the balance sheet, you take some of the froth out of the asset markets and you know, look, is is it going to work? I don't know. But it it's it's better that we've seen tremendous, you know, the K-shaped economy is is growing even wider, right? I mean, the disparity between the 1% and everybody else is growing to never before seen levels. So, it's not clear that continuing on a path of trying to just push the stock market higher >> um and have more and more people fall into lower shape, lower case, lower part of the K is going to work. So, this is another work. And so I think Wars a plan to reduce the size of the balance sheet would also bring rates down actually, you know, could fit in with what the the president is uh wants. And if you think about what Bessent can do, right, if you think about the shifting the size of the balance sheet lower, people are concerned, well, that means the long end's going to blow out um and yields going to move higher. But if Bessant controls the supply of duration, meaning he doesn't ever really turn the debt out, he stops issuing 30s, he issues less tens, then that, you know, we'll be a little bit more starved for the long end. That should put a bid under the long end. So you could actually kind of, you know, down, you know, phase shift the entire curve lower. Um maybe maybe we can maybe maybe it would work. And I think that in that environment, the dollar probably will continue to grind lower, but it won't um collapse. We won't have this hyperinflated commodity uh environment that people are concerned about. And so, I don't know. I think uh you know, for 24 hours of thinking about it again, I'm like, I I don't know. I think this is a I think this is a good pick if you are of the view that Trump wants to care about Main Street over Wall Street, wants to uh address the affordability issues and wants to get reelected because right now the polling data is is not working in his favor and so he needs to do something to help address that polling data. Can he pull off a asset price decline that doesn't really screw everybody over in that way? I don't know. Um but is it worth a try? I I mean I think so. >> You know what the funny part about it is? I just I was smiling because this idea about starving the long end of duration was what uh Bessant and Moran were having fits about in terms of Yellen doing it. And the ironic part was she wasn't even doing it at the time. The balance sheet the the Treasury the stock of Treasury debt was the longest in history and she was just trying to pull it back from this extreme longness. And now, so they sitting there all over her, talking about all that, you know, how she's irresponsible and now they're going to do it, which I have no problem with them doing it. I just I the the hypocrisy bothers me. That's what bothers me. >> Yeah. I mean, no, I I I I agree. I mean, but I think and look, as a country finances itself more in the front end, um that that's going to be that that's going to be bearish for the for the currency, right? So it actually kind of serves it serves the purpose right and so as long as they can control inflation which is a tough ask but they they'll have to you know look what's Trump trying to do right he's coming after profit margins right he's coming after the drug companies he's coming after the insurance companies he's coming after the banks on credit cards he's coming after defense companies right >> hypocrisy though if imagine if Biden had that you know like isn't Elizabeth Warren all for the 10% uh you know limit on the credit card because it's it's a very leftist policy and I I have no problem with it fine choose it but just be honest about you know don't be against it just because someone else is against it and you know it's only when you're in power anyways let's let's let's go move it away from politics and let's go to back to the stock market and I thought you had some really interesting things about the pain that's happening below the surface and like underneath the covers. Um, what do you see there? What are you worried about? And what are you watching? >> Yeah, I mean the what what we had, you know, obviously the AI story has been the the the story or at least was the story last year. Um, Mag 7 and and affiliated names and and so look, as we kind of entered 2026 though, the the narrative on the AI capex story had begun to shift, right? We've moved from an environment of funding all this growth with internally generated free cash flow to one where hyperscalers are hitting the debt markets more. Um and so we are you know needing more capital uh from external parties to finance this growth. And so the markets have have figured this out to some degree and have been a little bit more discriminating in the way that they are buying the, you know, the Mag 7 or tech broadly speaking and are really trying to focus in areas where the profits are going. And so we've seen, right, software has really gotten hit. Microsoft's gotten hit um in a big way. Oracle's gotten hit and we've seen some transition into memory names which have done really well. uh Micron and um you know and SanDisk and some of these other names, right? So we're moving uh up the value chain to some degree where the profit where the profits are. Um but the other thing we've saw is just a broad shift out of tech into other areas, right? And a broad shift out of let's say the dollar US exceptionalism trade to em equities to commodity related equities to energy related equities to power, right? things that are going to power and grow the AI capex materials part of it um have been big winners this year and also uh EM equities and dollar week beneficiaries have really you know performed exceptionally well this year as well and so those have been really the the leaders you know for the last you know really for the last three three weeks or so. Um, but this week I thought was a interesting transition week and we started to see a little bit of a shift back into uh quality over crap uh into some of the mag seven into NASDAQ out of Russell. But really under the hood what we've seen is some of these leaders have really gotten you know destroyed. I mean unprofitable tech um is now down 12% on the year after being up 12%. Um, high beta momentum today was down five and a half. I'm just looking at my screen right now. High short interest names down 5% today. Um, low value down 5% today. Said profitless tech meme stocks down 4% today. And this trend has been going on now, you know, for the entirety of this week. And I think it's a reflection of the fact that volatility kind of crosset volatility is starting to pick up. Um, it's picking up in commodities. picking up a little bit in FX. Uh it's not necessarily showing up to the degree in NASDAQ and and and S&P yet because those those are driven daytoday by the exorbitant amount of capital that's in the zero data expiry sell valve strategies, right? And so you have this kind of weird dynamic where the indices daytoday are driven by this cell volatility trade but under the under the hood we get kind of you know violent rotations and violent dispersions. um implied correlations have largely been you know through the floor low um because we get you know the indices are kind of pinned at a certain level and day-to-day one stocks up one sector's up the other one's getting killed and it kind of creates this balance of the overall IND indexes but I think we're starting to see and this week the last couple days with the indices being a little bit weaker I think we're starting to see this cross asset volatility seep into uh the equity market and I would expect that next week if the dollar continues to rally then the crowded trades that have worked this year are going to continue to underperform and I think are going to start to drag down everything else right weak dollar trades precious metals trades em equity trades have been highly correlated they kind of all started to break this week and I think next week and the dollar continues to rally uh we're going to see a broader kind of vol up environment uh that is more concerning for equities as an asset class uh you know over the course of the next couple weeks I think >> you touched upon the dispersion trade there and the fact that that we've had this extreme low correlation amongst the index and I've been fascinated by it and it's truly just like dominating the way that things trade. Do you have any theories on what's causing it? You mentioned zero DTS. Do you think that that you know obviously you think that's a factor? Is that the main factor? Are you worried about those auto callables or is it just a larger macro issue? And more importantly, what do you think might cause this low correlation, low index v trade to break? >> Yeah, I wouldn't I wouldn't characterize myself as an expert. It's more of I'm I'm watching it and seeing it. And I know Jim Carson talks a ton about structured products issuance um and the dynamic in play there and how much money is tied into, you know, the S&P uh and the index. And so um and I think zero data expiry has a big impact on this because every day, you know, we have crazy amounts of capital that are just in selling VT, you know, selling V strategies um and selling options. And so it kind of makes the makes it more difficult for the indexes to really move uh you know in a large way. And clearly there there are certain times of the month when these flows matter more than others. Um as you get closer to Xirie that they're even you know the pin risk is even higher. When we get through Xbury you know the window of potential weakness where other things can matter is is higher but still you it makes it you know more difficult for the indices to break. So I don't I don't necessarily know um you know what's going to break it. But what I do know is that what you need is a pickup in volatility. And so the question is where can we get uh who are the volatility accelerators, right? Like where what are the actors in the global economy that can help reintroduce volatility back to the markets? Because once we get volatility moving higher, then the impetus to just sell volatility every day gets declined. Those people start to lose money. uh vault control funds who are tied into volatility de deleverag their portfolios that could lead to some selling pressure and so where are the volatility um uh accelerators well Trump is one right he clearly at times will introduce volatility you know into the tape and I actually think to start the year uh after you know four or five months toward to end last year where he was a volatility suppressor he's actually become more of a volatility accelerator now I think it's because the polling data is terri terrible. And so he's trying to do things now to shake things up, whether it's again the credit card caps, um the defense stuff, the home building stuff, um even the geopolitical stuff. Obviously, that's not necessarily markets, but that does introduce volatility. And then Treasury has the ability to introduce volatility. I don't think they're really doing much, right? Um they they're kind of uh have their plan for issuance. They they announce another QR, quarterly refunding announcement update next week. I don't suspect that they're going to do anything there. uh to increase or decrease the supply of bonds, but we'll see. Uh the Fed is another potential. Um but as we saw earlier this week, Fed's not cutting rates, Fed's not raising rates, they're not really introducing much volatility. The place that I think you could get more volatility is in the oil market. And so I think it's very interesting that oil prices have been grinding higher, moving higher. There's obviously a very high correlation between oil price momentum and and and yields. Um, and I think it's interesting, you know, three weeks ago, oil company CEOs were all summoned to the White House to speak with the president about investing capital in Venezuela. And I think he thought he was just going to force them to do it. And most of them came back and said, "Yeah, we're not doing that for you." And oh, by the way, when you keep talking about oil prices in the low 50s, we're just not going to drill at all. >> I'm sure you saw Harold Ham has talked about shutting production uh in the Bakan for the first time in 30 years, right? I mean, Harold Ham is a he's a Trump guy. >> I mean, and so I think, you know, the oil industry has spoken and has informed the president that oil prices are too low. Um, and so he, you know, for the course of the last couple weeks, you don't really hear him talking about getting oil back down to 50 um as as loudly as he as he had been before. Now, some of the oil stuff is probably tied into the war premium from Iran. Who knows what will be the ultimate decision there. Part of it's probably tied into the cold weather. heating oil has followed natural gas uh over the course of the last few days. So part of it's that. But I think it's a it's a there's a growing realization that if you want the oil industry to actually invest capital, 50 is not the number. They need higher prices. But >> higher oil prices are going to make it more difficult for the Fed to ease is going to reintroduce inflation expectations moving higher. And I think that's a type of dynamic where that's the type of volatility that could disrupt some of this kind of constant sell volatility dynamic in play. So, um that's one area that I'm watching that can help break this kind of cycle of lower uh volatility in the equity market and selling volatility every day. >> That's a great answer. Um what other opportunities should investors be looking at? Like what are there some of the other things that might be not getting the attention they deserve? Ah, that's that that's a good one. Um, you know, I think that there's the low part of the K-shaped economy. You know, the the story is is well known, I think. Um, and so I I imagine and I haven't really done a ton of work yet and I I've been focusing a little more on the sector and macro level. I haven't gotten into the micro, you know, individual idiosyncratic names, but there are probably a lot of very beaten down uh consumer-facing valueoriented, you know, names that h have struggled because of the association with the lower part of the K. >> Okay. >> But we're we're moving into an environment where Trump realizes that that that that dynamic has to stop, right? We can't just keep uh you know, crushing the lower part of the K-shaped economy. And so um maybe there are some opportunities there on the consumer staple side or low-end retail side um you know dollar stores what think you know things like that where um can benefit from an eventual flow of capital away from some of this high uh high-end consumerf facing names and lowerend consumerf facing names a shift out of the AI capex story into some valueoriented names. I think that's an interesting area that's maybe getting a little bit of a that's not really discussed all that much. >> Um because look I think the AI story is discussed ad nauseium. I think people do understand the resources the resource constraints from power from materials um from you know from copper for you know uranium for silver people are are discussing these things. I think there are opportunities here >> because I don't think the story is going to end but um I think people kind of going to know about them. So, >> all right. Um, one final question I have for you is if if you were interviewing yourself, like what would be the question that I missed that you would ask yourself? Um, I mean, we we talked about we've talked about the dollar, but I think, you know, the the understanding or the like what's going on with I'm not an expert in Japan, but I I do think it's important to have an understanding of what's, you know, dollar yen and the dynamics there. You know, are we are we, you know, due for dollar yen to go to 200 or are we going to check back here to 100? the dynamics in play there between the US and Japan I think are of paramount importance. Um and certainly as it pertains to you know also China. We haven't really talked about China all that much which is interesting because um China's a big economy and so um you know we really haven't hit on that which is you know and look I think China has been kind of operating a little bit in the in the background here. Not too many headlines, not too much you know but they're kind of just doing their thing right. You know, I think people would have expected them to have more of a reaction to what happened in Venezuela and they just, you know, haven't had an outward reaction. I suspect they are doing things behind the scenes. You know, export export controls, restrictions, different things with the R&B, um, and such. And so, um, you know, those are probably some areas that, you know, we should talk about or we could talk about in let's get into it. So, China and Japan, are they both investable? I I mean I think so. >> Yeah. >> I I think we're going to continue to see capital shift out of US assets because of what the administration wants and is doing and also because of the allocation to US assets across global portfolios is just way too high. >> Yeah. And so, you know, it's and as we move small bits of capital out of Nvidia and Apple and other names, it can create large uh percent returns in some of these other markets. And so I think if what what could happen here in the course of the next few weeks is if we get a check back you know in the dollar where the dollar rallies for a period of time kind of cleansing out some positions people should be thinking about you know buying the dip in Japan and maybe Chinese equities you know sooner than uh they're looking to buy the dip back in in mag seven let's say and so I mean Japan has deficit spending going on you know re-industrialization military you know variet a variety of things um and repatriation of capital that's going to be going back like yields on JGBs now are enticing for Japanese insurance companies versus you know currency adjusted yields in US treasuries. So I think we're going to continue to see that kind of flow that can you know help finance what the deficit spending in Japan is going to do and I think the NK probably um you know does a lot better over time after you know 30 years of doing not a whole lot. So um I think there are interesting opportunities globally which you know as as a more of a US focused investor I need to get smarter on right and I think more people need to do more work or you know find managers who are focusing in those areas and the capital is going to continue to look to shift um you know out of the US and into some of these overseas markets. >> So that's great. One last question we'll get you with here is um instead of uh doing my trader desert island we're going to do an old one. we're going to do um throughout your career, if you could tell us a story about at one point somebody that was kind and helped you and uh kind of just share that, you know, what they did for you and why it was important. >> Yeah. No, I I think I mentioned um so after the whole Osprey experience, I bounced around um a little bit. I joined a firm called Plural Investments was run by um a guy his name is Matt Gman who actually had worked at SACE prior and he tried to launch and and ran a multi-management portfolio. He gave me the first opportunity really to run my own portfolio um by myself and so um you know at Osprey I had run a carveout but you know Dwight was still the overall portfolio manager. Matt gave me the opportunity to um run my own portfolio plural in these industries. just kind of taught me about risk management, taught me about portfolio construction, and then when he wound up shutting the fund down in the summer of 2012, um I was one of the three portfolio managers with him kind of at the end when we tried to, you know, run a centerbook portfolio and he decided he didn't want to do it anymore. I was like, "Look, I mean, I need I need some help." He's like, "Don't worry, I'll make a call for you." And he is the one that called Steve um and said, "I have one portfolio manager from you. You have to hire him." Um, and Steve hired me without ever meeting me. >> And so it was, um, Matt I owe a lot of my career, uh, you know, to that that transition of events, Matt calling Steve. I eventually did meet Steve and we did talk, but he but he really did hire me before we ever met. I had met several other people internally at Sack, but >> but that that decision-making process uh, and Matt's, you know, generosity, even though it didn't work with him, him kind of paying it forward and helping me get land on my feet, um, you know, I'm forever grateful for that. Oh, that is a great story. All right, so before we let you go, why don't you tell us about your current gig uh plug what you want to plug? Uh you have a Substack. You're on uh Twitter as you mentioned. Give us the whole spiel. >> Yeah, I recently mentioned I recently joined Ninja Trader Live. Ninja Trader is the largest uh futures broker in the country for retail investors. And what we have is uh you know I work as the macro strategist for Ninja Trader Live which is our media facing presence. We host a, you know, live streaming uh trading channel on YouTube throughout the course of uh every trading day. I'm on in the mornings from 8 to 8:30. We do a macro panel every morning. Me, Anthony Credelli, and Shy Girl, who most people are probably familiar with. And we have uh we talk macro every morning and then throughout the course of the day, we have traders live streaming uh their trades and their ideas. I also host a a Sunday show uh kind of a market prep show uh with a couple of the traders. It's it's great. I'm also on uh on X at CES921 and I occasionally write on my Substack. It's called the Altha Narrative, which is named after my wife and it also means truth in Greek. And so, uh yeah, come find me. I love to mix it up on Twitter. Uh get into some, you know, of the hot Finn Twit debates and uh I really appreciate you, uh you having me on here. It's been a great conversation. >> It's I've really enjoyed it. And my trouble was I was sitting here going, "Geez, I agree with too much of it all." Uh we very much think alike. Uh, Craig, thank you very much for your time today. >> Thanks, Ev. >> All right, Patrick, time for talking charts. Lots to talk about. >> Kev, I I'm going to need to get the neck brace from the serious whiplash that uh that is that is occurring. Like, is this not insane? Okay, first of all, I'm just going to do a courteous shout out to you. Right. Now, you made the bold call, which inevitably had every chance of happening, but you always made the bold call that there's going to be a week we're going to rip like a $1,000 an ounce. >> Yeah, we didn't get it, though. >> Well, you know what? >> We're close. >> Here's here's where I'm going to give it to you. >> Okay. >> It was a,000 in nine days. >> Okay. >> Right. Like Okay. So, that's very kind. >> You know what I mean? Like 1,000 in nine days. Thousand in five days. I mean, yeah, I get it. But we did have a 500 point move in um in a incredibly short window of time on gold. So anyway, uh kudos like we finally have seen like this parabolic move in precious metals. Um you know, I I I want to save it. We'll talk or do you want to start with precious metals? We might as well. >> We might as well start with it. >> Like because this is where the action like unbelievable. It started first with silver. And let's let's start with silver because that move happened on uh uh in the Asian session going into Monday morning uh where silver went up to like uh 117 bucks on the upside. It was insane. just like here I'm going to put on a 4 hour chart but like in this bull impulse uh from from trough to peak it was a $27 advance in four days including that one last kind of blowoff impulse push but it was insane how uh silver was being pumped that last day was a $14 upday a $16 $17 high when it was up at that one point it was crazy something like it traded uh I I was reading somewhere it traded spy volumes. >> Yeah, it's crazy. Even today, by the way, we're we're we're recording this. I'm having trouble with the words today. Um we're recording this on Thursday and I saw something that uh one of the my brokers sent me. He said that GLD has already traded $25 billion worth of shares today, which is a daily all-time daily record. And it's only 1 pm. >> Yeah. >> Like the volumes out there are just obscene. >> It is like this is this has gone full mental. Everybody needs a piece of the action and uh everyone's trading it and it's it's going. So silver had and this is the crazy part. Okay. So, after that move on Monday, uh I'm going to put put on a one hour chart, but after that move on Monday, uh it blew off that peak at uh on Monday and then sold off $16 14% from peak to trough in three hours. >> Yeah. >> In three hours. Uh like absolutely insane. And then you know when you think that oh the you know you're getting that blowoff top. No, it rips right back up like just unbelievable. >> It is true. That is actually the most surprising part of the action. Don't you think? >> Yeah. >> It had every It looked like that was it. It looked like a climax that you know was going to be and then boom it just sprung back right back into action like a 60. >> You know what? Oh, I'm wondering and I'm curious if could be one of the contributors was that when silver made that reversal, gold didn't and kind of gold kept going up and it was and I wonder how much it played a role from a sentiment perspective where people are like no clearly a precious medical thing just silver went out too far to buy and dip. Like I I'm just wondering how much that could have played. No, >> I have no idea. People are asking me now like about stuff and I said like the reality is that this is pure emotion. There is like I have no value ad to to actually add because the truth of the matter is that nobody really knows what's going on out here. It's just it's the it's the hysteria of the masses and where it ends. Who knows? Like we could be recording this at the day of the top. We could do the same thing could happen to us. Like right now it looks like we had this big huge emotional upday today in gold and then it went down you know a couple hundred bucks or 400 from the highs but now like what if we just rip back tomorrow? Who knows? >> So but then it repeated again today. So, uh, today, uh, silver was ripping to 120 bucks, uh, and, uh, hitting a high after the market opened near 120 plus on the upside and then a peak to trough, uh, drop in like an hour and a half. By the time I was finished my webinar uh, for what I do for Big Picture Trading members, the thing dropped 15 bucks in an hour. >> Yeah. in an hour. The other one took three. Like this. This is like this is insane. Now, what's what what's going to be the big tell here, Kev? I'm going to give some market timing right here. This rally on silver was just a Fibonacci bounce uh on the upside and it's rolling. If the the the silver bulls here need to make uh a save the way they did back over here, which is they got it above the fib zones and then got it out of the danger zone to imply that the prevailing bull trend remains intact. Uh and uh and like you notice every moving average test was supported, every Fibonacci zone was supported, dips were being bought. In other words, it was one day one like a a three-hour drop, but then the price action actually went back to an accumulation thing that we're about to get to tell right here. Maybe even while we're recording this live, we can come back to this in 20 minutes and we'll see. But like uh but if this thing rolls over, I my call here is if we're under 110 uh um and we're by the way recording this Thursday uh in the late afternoon. So, if Friday we're breaking below 110 on the downside, odds are we're gonna potentially tomorrow be even at 100. >> Like uh like it's it's one of these things where if this was uh the swing high of this parabolic move, these things don't correct sideways and the drops are often twice as violent and fast as the rises. Um, it's just that old adage of markets rise on an escalator and drop in an elevator and uh, and when everyone smells that the blood is on the streets, then they can't hit that exit fast enough and it creates that liquidity air pocket that always blindsides everyone. >> All I can say is that's not an escalator that I want to be on because that's one steep escalator. >> That's you got to hold on, be strapped into this thing. But anyway, back to gold. So, silver had this move. gold joined the party goes like we were above 5600 this morning and um and then down to 5,100 within like uh a couple hours like again like actually it was all mostly in one hour uh I mean we hit 5600 but we were down about 5550 and one hour we were down to 5100 um uh just a an insane drop back on the downside on precious metals now look I'm a long-term bull in gold. The obviously the the theme behind gold is that there's generally a a debasement uh drift of of currencies over time. The gold rises over time. It's bullish long term as a a preservation of capital asset. But this is not a capital preservation move. This is this is a speculation move. And you have to differentiate the long-term drift higher versus uh short-term speculative peaks and these things overshoot mean revert find the that kind of average point over uh over a little while and then go back to resuming. So, I'm not in trying to boogeyman people out of their long-term physical bullion holdings and stuff, but as speculation, if you're using uh any degree of margin or leverage uh in the futures market here, you have to be uh very delicate here. Like this is this is the kind of that uh where where um you know the widowmaker happens uh like the knack ass market behavior or comes over here to uh to the gold and and silver markets. Uh any comments you want to make before we move on? >> No, I was just telling the folks in my chat I was saying this morning I think I was saying time stamp a ticket and keep this in your mind because this is a period that you're going to look back and be able to tell your grandkids about. It's going to It's like when the >> kids >> Yeah. It was like this. It's that big a move. I I don't think people appreciate the enormity and the craziness of this past, you know, month or two in in precious metals. >> It's funny that I I said that similar statement to my members to write it down and look at it in six months. I wasn't telling them to look at it and for grand grandkids, >> but I think it's going to be it's going to be a story you tell your kids or grandkids about. >> But we were on the same track. I just my my time horizon was just a little bit more narrow than your than your grandkid storyline. Um, but you're almost a grandfather. So, I mean, it's not that >> hopefully not for a while yet. >> So, let's let's uh talk some of the other crazy stuff. We'll we'll talk equities in a moment, but we have to just go to the commodities that are moving. We have to talk about geopolitics and this little bump in oil. Uh and the interesting so oh by the way no sorry reverse gold volatility the this is the uh the the implied on gold uh and we're at 45. >> It feels like it's not high enough though. >> Yeah. But you know what is insane? So when I put on a weekly chart this is the same level we traded at during COVID but that was because gold was going down not up. This is a crash to the Honestly, that feels like V is cheap. Like COVID V was either COVID V was too expensive or this one's cheap because I agree with you that this is nowhere near the same sort of danger market in terms of gold that we saw during the co. >> Yeah. Like >> but that was a downside danger. But this is this is an upside meltup. This is >> I know. There's going to be, listen, there's still, you just talked about how it's going to correct and it's going to correct, you know, >> $500 in a day and like there's there's big moves happening. These are these are large moves. I'm with you. The VIX isn't high enough. Sorry, the VIX of gold is not high enough. The implied volatility of >> Well, you know, no know what uh was insane. Let's let's take a a a peek at it. But this is the implied on the SLV. But what's more even more insane is you go to the very short-term options like this Friday's expiration. We hit 140% implied on Monday on the weeklies. >> But I think that's right. >> I I bet you for$15 in an hour of Yes. Yes. >> I haven't done the math, but I bet you those aren't those aren't as ridiculous as they sound. it they're probably right pricing but like you know the the part that I'd like you to to kind of give me your take on it because to me when V gets this high um like I feel that uh a lot of people uh seek to participate in bubbles through the convexity they get in being long gamma so they'll go and buy these options to participate on the upside of markets using these um using these options to get that extra kick and move on there. But when volatility gets this high, so dealers obviously are short these calls that everyone is buying and dealers have to hedge and they become uh a marginal forced buyer to actually contribute to the the the basic grabbing on the upside of the market and they are just fuel. They're fuel that's an additional contributor to the overall uh advance of this market. Now you have these weekly uh roll offs and all this happening. But when V spikes to these ridiculous levels, it's very hard and a very bad payoff profile for people to be buying new gamma to replace these calls that are about to expire because they're seeing how expensive they are, widespreads, all of these crazy things. Is there that flip moment where the dealers uh suddenly are now going to unwind all of their long hedges because like just >> so first of all the dealers are short gamma and you were correct that as it rallied they were getting short stock so they had to chase >> no no they no they're short calls so they're long stock they're buying >> no they're long stock but they need to buy more as it goes in the money so they're chasing they're chasing so they're short gamma on the whole. They're short options assuming that the public is buying them and I would assume that's probably a good assumption right now. >> So, they're short volatility. They're short gamma. They're chasing on the upside. But part of the reason that you saw this huge selloff today was that on the way back down, they're also chasing. They're having to sell the stock that they bought and they're hoping that their amount that they are chasing back and forth is going to be less than the what people paid for the options. And as they do more of it and as people buy more options, it actually becomes self-fulfilling that volatility being ends up being higher because there's more market makers that are chasing upward and then also chasing downward. So, it's almost a self-fulfilling prophecy in terms of it does hit a level where you're right, it makes no sense to to be long because it's too much. >> I I would say that >> you it's probably a little more complicated than that. Like, I was looking at one-year option V in silver and it was kind of shocking to me because you could go and sell 180% of the strike call So something that's 80% out of the money, >> you could sell a one-year call for that and then you could buy a 20% out of the money put for the same amount. >> Yeah. >> And that to me was like, oh, >> that's the skew. And and that that's the that's the second thing. Actually, I want to talk about the skew particularly on oil, but the skew 100% is insane on precious metals right now. Um, and we can >> if you were a long that wanted to keep it to me that trade makes a lot of sense. You go, you sell 180 like 80% out of the money calls, right? So, it has to go, let's just assume, oh, let's just say silver's at $100 just to make it easy. So, you're selling the 180. So, you're giving away upside above 180. >> At the same time, >> giving another 80% upside. >> Yeah. At the same time, you're protecting yourself on below 80. And you can do that for zero. Like like to me, that's the trade that folks should be doing. And maybe I'm wrong. No, no, the collar collaring is all we're doing at Big Picture Trading right now. like these these SKs are so favorable that you you need to find ways to secure the profits you've made and continue to participate on the upside because you don't know how stupid things can still get. Uh but there's a point where you it's stupid not to sell. Like if silver went another 80% in a short window of time, that probably becomes a logical place where you know if you sold everything that would be uh that would be good. this the the deterrent of that strategy going that far out uh Kev is that if uh silver for instance got up there too quickly and that V uh you would be less inclined to want to profit take your position because you're sitting on this big loss in the call and you feel like you almost need to see the trade through and you might want to hold for another nine months till you hit the expiry. Yeah. And and a lot of time like so what you're doing is you're you're giving up uh a little bit of that flexibility to being able to uh make your decision uh quite freely. You feel like it's you're almost cuffed in uh and and the time horizon of going out a year. Luck can happen in a year. >> Yeah, I get it. I'm just saying that there's trades like that that exist out there >> and in terms of and and the the trouble is that over the short run I think that the the silver will continue to be volatile. >> Yeah. >> So I don't want to be selling that much like options unless I was long. But I wouldn't want to be short any options that that we're going to expire like in like in the at the kind of low shorter end of the spectrum because I think that the volatility is going to be large because all these market makers are short this thing and eventually it will settle down. We'll have some sort of flush and then it'll settle down and then hopefully it kind of goes back and people stop talking about that and we move on to the next thing. >> Yeah, I think so. So, let's talk about crude oil and uh the um ob geopolitical insertion of a potential Middle Eastern flare up um and a potential attack. Obviously, uh oil markets um responding with now what's been a $10 rise from trough to peak uh over the last uh month and really the biggest part of the move happening in the last few days. uh and uh and so first of all uh do you feel that there's enough risk premium being put in or is this surprising you how little it's moved in in spite of all of the what's happening? Um no opinion? No, I I have an opinion. I I hear you about the risk premium about the potential of Iran. I also think that people are waking up to the fundamental story that oil is cheap and that what happened was all the different commodities were starting to go and people were looking at this and realizing okay listen silver is going gold's going copper's going you know uranium is going a lot of these commodities are going eventually oil gets dragged along and I think the oil you can make a bold case and you know I did a couple months ago and I'm I'm a big fan of oil um and I think that it's it's one of the things that um you can actually hide like right now it feels scary to me Patrick because all the materials are bid so much and there's a frenzy going on out there and I don't feel comfortable going out and buying like software stocks cuz they're look like death and everything looks like So what do you own as someone that's kind of being partial to the hard asset world and to me oil is a natural place to hide. It feels to me that that's something that not a lot of folks own and that if we did get a severe like correction in the gold, silver, uranium, copper trade, I think that oil will do much better. >> So I think that there's a little bit of a little element of that. So when you ask me about the risk premium, I don't know if it's too much, too little. I I just think that over the longer term, it's a bull sto bull market story. And that even though it's rallied $10 to me it's >> we are we are always we are always in agreement on this and that's the scary part but the point being uh that uh I've generally we've been generally bullish oil about the same time but the thing that uh I want to highlight which is interesting about this market is literally that same skew you talked about on silver um it exists right now in oil because of that premium. So, first of all, let's have a look here. The implied have gone from like 25% to 55% out to the February options on crude oil futures. But there is a very clear I I don't know why there's this kind of weird blip here on it, but there is a very clear fat right tail uh on um on the uh upside of crude oil options. Uh that allows you to do some pretty insane uh um uh option collars the way that we were talking about on silver. Like we're talking about you could be going up to75 and $80 strikes out for uh the just a month and financing 60 and and $55 strike put options below like a total skew where you know you're having like a $15 upside and a $5 downside near zero cost. Uh and so and that's obviously because they're they're pricing in that uh uh geopolitical escalation knowing that you got to you got to price that right tail um to have some some risk premium in it. Uh but that allows you to actually construct some super interesting hedges around this. Oh well listen, I'll leave that to you. I personally don't wouldn't want to give it away yet. So, when I'm talking about silver, we've run from $15 to $115 or whatever the number is, right? Like, so it it it feels later in the game when it comes to >> I'm talking about a 20 I'm talking about a 22-day option. I'm talking about >> Oh, okay. I'm talking about three weeks of price action. >> I just worry that if there's actually an event that you won't have wanted to give away that right tail. >> Okay. you. So, if there's an event, if you made um10 to $15 upside in crude oil in two to three weeks, tell me you wouldn't be profit taking. >> No. Oh. Um depending on the event and and depending on what my other parts of my books, I might not be. >> Yeah. Like if there was like if if and if listen if we went up $15 because there was no event and everyone was just talking about it and there was all sorts of finit guys talking about the imminent, you know, destruction of Iran and it was just all hype, then yeah, I probably would be taking profit on it. But if there was an actual like closing of the Straits of Hormuz, I don't know if I would. >> But but okay, that that I agree. But is what's the likelihood happens in a >> No, no, I listen. I'm just I'm just telling you me personally and I'm not disputing your trade. I I I I hear you. And in this in the grind higher in in in the scenario I gave you earlier where I said it's a bull market. It's headed higher. That is a great trade to do. >> Yeah. >> Right. Like that is the trade you want to do. You're protected on the downside and and you're getting paid to own it. So I hear you and I'm not disputing that. I'm just saying that for me I just I'm just it's to me it's early and I'm just not ready to give away any right tales yet. >> Absolutely. Moving on. Let's uh let's talk uranium. And um so we have this uh this is the U38 U308 futures contract. I'm put on a weekly chart just so that it closes that less illquid uh kind of price action. But we went through what was essentially a 15month bare decline that was giving back gains all through 2024 into uh early 2025. And uh it started to improve through 2025 but really the last five six weeks we have seen a material advance in uranium and that has woken up uh the spud uh and the sput uh the spat physical uranium trust and uh and things have really started to get going. What's interesting is that while uranium stocks have been buzzing for a long time, this is just starting to wake up. And I'm curious whether or not we still have some big upside coming here on uranium. Uh from a physical perspective, any comments before we move on? >> I think it can be squeezed. I think that um the reality is that all of the dgens that have squee they figured out they can squeeze silver. They figured out that they can move gold. I think uranium is even smaller than both those markets by a factor along. Yeah. Like even more. So it is the potential to get squeezed and it's it's an important commodity. And you know there's another one of right tail I wouldn't give up. Like the reality is that you could wake up and that thing could double even though it seems like it's gone a long way. It's a very little part a very little small input part of the cost of rent of running an actual nuclear facility. It doubles and it really doesn't mean anything. So if you get situation where people start stockpiling these things and I think that Patrick the what's really pushed this recently was for a long time the um SPAT wasn't buying >> and they were issuing shares they were trading above NAV and then all of a sudden they issued a prospectus and now all of a sudden they went in there and they were the ones moving the actual underlying commodity and there was it was amazingly thin on the upside. >> Yeah, absolutely. And you know when there's a technical breakout and the thing trades uh up to it or above its net asset value suddenly that discount gone uh this becomes a player on the field right and um and so we're definitely seeing the uranium market waking up. So, I'm going to use Kamico as uh as the kind of um proxy stock of what's going on in the broader uranium stocks. And they've been bullish uh for well over a year or close to a year now. Um and they've had an absolutely amazing run like uh this this Chemico's gone from 35 bucks to $135. And um and the thing is is that you know how the they've almost started going parabolic here. And so while uranium hasn't really been squeezed yet, uh we it feels like it's sort of like uranium's in the third inning of its game uh and uranium stocks feel much more kind of seventh eighth inning of the of their moves. Is that your vibe as well? >> I I don't know. Maybe I I I guess I don't really have a view except that it's part of this this move in the new year that we've seen this huge rotation and we've always talked about this Patrick is that when money starts coming out of those big software and mag seven stocks and it starts going into these underlying you know resource stocks and different you things of that nature. They're so small compared to those big stocks that they're going to send them a long way. And if there's anything we've learned from silver, it's that we should never underestimate the kind of ability for markets to take things way further than we ever could imagine. And so one of the things that I'm going to just be careful about is saying this has gone too far too fast. Yeah. Like of course as a trader I sit there go look it's gone a long way. It's gone too far too fast. But I thought that at at silver at 90 bucks and then it went another 20. So it feels to me that maybe if the if the material trade continues and if we continue to see selling of the mag 7 and the softwares these things could go even further. All right. Well, uh let's let's talk another stock or commodity that has just gone mental and that's uh copper. uh like like literally one after another the the commodity space someone just took billions of dollars and dumped and said give me everything and and it's all all ripping like uh it's insane but we saw a move in copper go up to four uh to up to 650 and then reverses and drops to like six 610 in a in a heartbeat in that whole drop. But like literally as all of these things went mental, um copper joined the party. Like at this stage, uh like it wouldn't shock me if we saw $7 copper here. >> Yeah. Like it's it's nuts. And then one of the things I think you should do instead of looking for the ones that are moving, you should be going and scouring the ones that haven't moved yet that might be the next to move. Right? And I I really do think and I talked about this way back when >> a great example. Can I just give the example of that? Yes. Platinum and platium. >> Yeah. Well, that was one of Yeah, I was gonna say >> you go like gold and silver started moving first and then it was like well these things are just waking up and uh and when they finally joined the party back in December, they never looked back. And uh and it's like you're trying to find which are these lagards that that have been left behind that no one is talking about that that is going to get uh uh you know join that party >> and and I remember talking about that we had used to have these series of rolling mini bubbles. >> Yeah. >> I think that you can apply that to commodities now. One of the things that I've been saying is that it they're just going to go through them one by one and they're going to go and whenever all of a sudden that commodity gets a little tight and then there's some extra demand, it's going to go up and it's going to be the commodity of the of the quarter or maybe of the of the year and then meanwhile 6 months from now it'll be something else. >> Yeah. >> Like like one of the things I'm confident about is that >> six months from now it won't be silver that we're talking about. it that won't be the the the one with all the zip that that is the the kind of the go-to commodity where all the speculation is happening. It'll be something else. >> Yeah. Yep. All right. Well, uh let's talk about the Widowmaker, I guess. >> Now, uh what's >> Big Shout out to our buddy Paulo Macro that nailed this, by the way. He was uh he was standing in there like >> he he was he's a weatherman. He knew those. >> He was he was sitting there and he was he went against him for a while and he was stood there like a champ and he's and he's a little bit of a lunatic. He doesn't just play n gas. He plays like like nickel options way out of the money like a complete DGEN. Anyways, he nailed it. Good for him. Well, proper DJ. All right. Well, listen. Uh what was insane though was that this weather move happened um uh in the um uh what's it called in the uh February contract. Uh and the biggest part of the move all happened in the final days before um it's uh um it was rolled. Obviously this contract still trades by the way, but like it's insane. But this February contract makes a rip. the continuous contract rolled obviously uh to the March contract, but that's insane that that we had this kind of backwardation where we're literally seeing uh the one contract trading virtually double the other one month apart. And what was really frustrating was that the boil didn't own the Feb because the boil is the double or the triple. I don't know what it is, but it's the it's the levered ETF. And I went and looked because when when Paulo was telling me, I'm like, "Okay, do I like go do some boil because I was expecting like an XIV situation because if you had that sort of move >> and with some leverage, you could have a situation where they'd actually the ETF gets stopped out, right? That they just have to they just have to get it in because they are short volatility at the close. Um, so in essence, I was hoping that they would have the the the February and we would have a a wild situation, but it wasn't. It was March and it so it wasn't as fun. It was insane to say none le uh like this is truly this is, you know, mo most people say, "Oh, ho, you guys call it the widowmaker." But if there was ever a an example of widowmaker price action, the thing went to five and a quarter, dropped down to three bucks and went from three to seven uh in in a span of like less than two months. >> Oh yeah. And it and it was and it happened because of like one storm. >> It like it's a wild listen gas traders are a different breed. They're just I I don't really like I don't understand them. And the real problem about Nack Gas trading it is that the the the the proper serious professionals, you'll see all of a sudden Nack Gas will get surprisingly weak or strong midday and you'll be like, "What the hell's happened?" And what you don't realize is that they've all gotten subscriptions to this some sort of service and all that's happened is that the forecast for the weather for like two weeks out has changed. So you never really truly know what's going on in terms of trying to figure out what's going on because you need to have that access to the to the weather data and so you're really trading what people are expecting this forecast to be as opposed to the actual weather to some degree. >> Absolutely. Okay. We can't we can't go this far into the show without circling back to S&P the MAG7s and uh and obviously touching on the FOMC. Well, first of all, let's just get the FOMC out of the way. Clearly um whether Powell stays on or not, there is a new Fed chair coming and uh at least what the markets are pricing in is that uh that um the the FOMC is going to take the knee and remain unchanged for the the first quarter going into the April meeting. Uh I think that last time I checked the probability was like a 73% probability that there is no rate cut move. I was thinking at least some sort of guidance could have caused some sort of a a move in the markets, but nothing. That was uh that was truly in my mind uh a nothing burger kind of FOMC meeting. Uh is this paint dry meetings for the first quarter? >> Well, is is Powell going to be there for two more or one more? >> Uh I thought it was May. So, so the so he's going to be there uh until the April 30th meeting or I think there's like a meeting at the last >> so it is two more. So he'll uh so he'll have the March and the April. Uh >> yeah, I actually thought that this meeting was a little more hawkish than the market did to me that they took the balance of risks and they tilted them back towards neutral as opposed to they were leaning a little bit um to the to the balance of risks being to the downside on the economy and they made it firmly more neutral. I'm not saying that's incorrect, but it seemed to me that that was actually uh a shift from the FOMC and I guess the stir people they the all those traders had already priced that in because it didn't seem to to really affect it. Uh I guess also that the stock traders just didn't care. Like they were too busy trading gold, silver, and and just having fun with everything. Like they just really nobody cared. Like I I like have you ever seen an FOMC meeting that people cared less on? No. No. Uh well, I I personally was paying more attention than I should have because the rates markets have been so dead. Um the the the bond markets have been so trade rangebound that I was I'm just like, what the hell is going to wake them up? What where it's going to get us moving again? And the FOMC just simply offered something that could have played the role of a trigger. And so I was kind of uh I'm waiting to see whether something ever starts up because when the currencies are moving this much and um and you have uh you know uh the commodity markets moving this much you you'd think that um the rates markets would at least be responsive to the type of uh intermarket relationships that are that are emergent and the bond markets just don't give a >> No, they don't. the >> and I would argue that even though you said that the currency markets are moving a lot, they they perked up a little bit >> that you ain't seen nothing yet. >> That that was just that was just the start. >> First inning first inning. >> First I I you know what that's just the that's just the warm-up pitch. >> That's not that's just the warm-up pitch. >> You're crazy. We'll talk about Okay, Steve, I want to talk currencies in a second. All right. But uh but just touching on uh the equity markets, um one thing that I've been very adamant about uh when talking to members and other things is that um while the S&P could let's say gravitate to 7,100 in order for us to have an advance to like 7400, we would need the MAG7s to make a rebound. And I'm not talking a new bull market advance in them, but they were so incredibly oversold that even if they just 50% retraced their losses over a one-mon period, that might be enough to have the tide the water uh level rise enough to get the index to a upper level like 7,400. But so far, uh it was a bit of a mixed bag. Microsoft shot the bed here. I have a I have a heat map here showing what's going on. Um but uh uh Microsoft shot the bed down 12% in its earnings. Uh we >> you shot. >> Yeah, it's the same she can conjugate that verb for me. >> Yeah, absolutely. So the uh uh and so uh we had Meta do the opposite. Up 10% uh on the upside uh on that move and Tesla relatively flat. I mean, it's down 3%, but I wouldn't call that a big earnings reaction on it. So, so far it's kind of a mixed bag. We get Apple in a in an hour or so when we after we're recording this before the Apple earnings and next week we're going to have Google and Amazon. uh and uh and if to me I think for those hanging on for a bull thesis that the market cap weighted indices have another leg higher in the first quarter will at this point in my opinion need the mag sevens at least um rebounding some of their incredibly oversold levels if we have uh the scenario where only two of them uh uh gapped up like meta and um and a the rest of them are either flat or down. There's just not going to be enough uh enough momentum to get these indices higher. And I mean, literally uh the the we were down a 100 S&P points. All the only thing red on the screen were the MAG7s. Everything else was green. Like literally, we were down a 100 S&P points because the MAG7s were selling. And um and so to me th this earnings is really important. We already just got three of them, but if we don't see at least a solid two, three good more beats that really kind of get some money flow back in there. I I whether I think 7,100 could still be printed, but that we are we're getting to a heavy level that's going to be an upper ceiling on this S&P. Whe whether that trigger to begin a a market selloff kicks in imminently is something I'm not ready to make stick my neck out to make a call on. But I don't think there's going to be much money uh made on the S&P longs at this stage. there's going to be a ceiling and and a lot of uh distribution up ahead driven by probably that rotation that we keep talking about with the mag seven selling and but the one thing that's interesting is that you know whatever I I hear different estimates whether it's 300 billion or 500 billion of all the systematic traders between uh between CTAs and uh risk parity and vault targeting funds uh a lot of the trigger points on many of these start around the 6,800 level on the S&P uh on a a weekly basis where uh where at least a lot of the CTAs will start flipping. We'll see whether V realize V increases to to trigger some V targeting fund selling. But we could we could obviously at any point trigger uh systematic selling. And so the balancing act is is well if there's a ceiling and the market isn't able to progress higher the floor keeps rising behind the market uh and we get in a tighter and tighter range making more fragile which is all it needs is one little push something that triggers the systematic traders and we could be in the midst of some sort of a correction. Um you know will that happen in the first quarter? Well I'll tell you this. If the MAG7s can't punch this market to new highs after this earnings, then uh the first quarter will have a correction, uh it's just a matter of will it be in February or March or or what will be the catalyst, but something will inevitably trigger those systematic cycles and we'll have one of these five to 10% corrections that could be bigger if all the wrong things or right things are lining up, which depends if you're bullish or bearish. Um but uh that could get uh some downside momentum. Do you have anything to add to that or? >> Yeah. So um I love repeating the Bruce Ker line which is what I'm really looking for is a market that is not confirming consensus. And what's consensus right now? Consensus is that everything's great. The US economy is about to explode higher. You got to own stocks. You got to be all in on risk. Trump won't let it go down. Uh yada yada yada. Meanwhile, you look at this thing and it isn't like the spoo the spoos looks better actually than the Q's. Q's hasn't hit a new high for three months or four months. >> Um. >> Oh yeah. >> Markets. >> Well, that's because 65% mag sevens. >> Yeah. And uh the reality is that this market is is tired and yet everyone is max bullish. I think there was a chart the other day from the Bank of America that showed how few people are hedging and like buying protection on their portfolio was all-time lows. Um, in terms of >> That's the irony, isn't it? >> Yeah. >> The irony. >> The expectations about the economy are all-time highs. I've, you know, I've anecdotally heard of people that are going to conferences and they were saying how, you know, kind of macro conferences and how everyone's so bullish. And it reminds me very much of last year. Um, in January when I went to the StoneX guys conference, I got there and I suggested that that stocks might go down and that the US dollar might go down. I felt like I was going to get booed off the stage. I haven't gotten invited back. They were going to stone you off the stage. >> Exactly. Imagine the US dollar going down. Imagine US stocks going down. And the thing about the US stocks is everyone keeps you know saying oh all you panickins that are talking about the US stock market and saying sell the US stock market. The reality is that last year uh almost every you know country beat the US stock market in terms of returns and that's just in nominal terms and then when you converted it to US dollar terms it's quite obvious that almost everyone beat them and then when you look at it on a volad adjusted basis it's even more so. So it's it's just to me back to your point that there's market feels like there's a potential uh accident waiting to happen. I completely agree. It feels like everyone's bullish and the market's not going up. That's that's how it feels to me. >> So, uh let's talk about canaries in the coal mine that uh have have or have not been triggered on there. First of all, the breath of the market generally has been rising uh but it's slightly rolled but that's no nowhere near you know alarming that we're we have serious deterioration and divergences of breath. But it'll be very curious to see whether breath starts to deteriorate. We had really nice moves in that equal weight index and uh in the small caps like you could see the money distributing but will we see uh this trend uh uh kind of conver uh diverge back or head back down and not be working as well. That's a canary number one which has not been triggered. I'm just saying things that I feel that need to be watched. Uh the the second thing that I think is the credit markets and the junk bond market has been behaving very well. Things have uh at least on a price level basis, you know, there there is no alarm bells being rung by um the the high yield credit uh stress points showing distribution. That's another canary. And the last one that I'm want to watch is the XLF, which is the financials. So far when they disappointed on their earnings, they retraced, but it could be just a Fibonacci retracement. That could be still uh a bull advance back above the 50-day for another run. But if we see uh financials putting in a topping formation, we turn around see MAG7s not participating, we see credit markets start to roll, we see breath start to deteriorate, then you're going to start seeing uh I'm getting pretty bearish, Kev, uh kind of tone, I I feel like there's a lot of reasons to be bearish, but we haven't seen any canaries start dying in the coal mine that that are the alarm bells that it's imminent. Um, and so, uh, >> so I'll I'll push back on that a little bit. IGV, pull up the software like ETF. >> So, IG >> GV. This is a software basket. >> Yes. >> This is this is stuff that people were long. This a lot of these names are are stuff that, you know, were everyone was telling us were must owns before. Microsoft, Palunteer, Salesforce, Oracle, into it, Apploven, Palo Alto, Adobe, Crowdstrike, Service Now. That's what that basket looks like. And when you pull up the chart, it looks terrible. >> Okay, I'm not going to dis. >> So I I'm I'm going to >> that that Okay. No, but this is Okay, this is the first canary that's dead in the coal mine, which is is No, no, no. Because are you you would have to argue that the >> mag say there's a little herd of canaries or little like cages >> there's different things there's thing there's things that thing like but what you what what becomes more worrisome is when they're start all like dying because like that there's different things >> but I would argue it's a horrible it's not it's not time to buy your insurance when there's like you know eight canaries on the on the floor you know like No, no, then it's too late. >> Yeah, the the insurance company isn't very keen on selling you insurance then. >> So, go buy your insurance. Buy your straw hats in the winter or whatever they say. >> Now, we saved the less the best for last. >> Okay. What is it? >> Cuz what is the most important thing to watch this week? >> The US dollar. >> That's right. And we saved it right for the end. Those listeners that were willing to ride it out right to the end of the show. Um, and but Kev, look, uh, back back in December when the dollar turned up and when it turned up back in October, I was tactically bullish only because I felt from such an oversold state and a basing formation, there was room for the dollar index to do a 50% retrace. So like that we would have just a tactical retrace not a some structural bull market but rather simply what markets do and eb and flow. Uh the dollar index couldn't muster up even a a 38% retracement like it could not uh even get back to a basic fib zone. Then I'm going to put this on a weekly chart. There was basically a a solid base that was established all through the two years of 2023 and 2024 that had the 100 to 10 and 203 level acting like a key support. When this was broken on the liberation daydriven drop on the downside, we weren't able to to beat that. And there's a technical saying that uh what was previously support when broken acts as overhead resistance. This uh the fact that the dollar index spent six months trying to base and turn and couldn't, that's to me a sign that this distribution is still incredibly dominant. And the fact that we've broken down this way, it's when the the yen intervention happened. I want you to have talked about that because I don't know know the story as well as you do probably, but when um we had all of the cross currencies suddenly all moving together. This is a this is when big currency moves happen. uh at minimum uh the the the measured move uh is a direct hit of the 2021 and 18 2018 lows near 90 and that obviously you you would argue that there's a bigger macro story where they could go way lower than that over the long term but I think from a trading perspective um a move down like a six handles further down to the 90 level on the dollar index at this point truly is the path of least resistance. Um, and uh, and the thing is is that like the the currencies like you go through them all and I'll let you talk to ones you want, but like the euro broke out like we could be heading right to 125. Uh, the um, uh, pound uh, broke out of uh, uh, of its uh, June high. You have that big reversal in the yen. I'm going to look at the yen so that we can see it. um not the dollar yen but the inverse and you can see the yen intervention came in right along where all the previous support lines have come in the past. This could be just the beginning of a of a yen move. You have the US dollar CAD breaking back down to lows that we saw over the last two years. The Aussie dollar a fresh breakout like everything is moving. The dollar is getting killed right across the board. You can't ignore this What do you which one do you want to focus on? >> Uh listen, I I don't I the fact that I've chosen the yen over the last year shows you how useless I am at that because my main point was that the US dollar was headed lower and I thought that the yen would be the one that would experience biggest alpha and it wasn't and in in hindsight that was a terrible call. Um I I just want to remind folks though of the fact that they're sitting around and they're looking at uh the changing nature of relationships with the US dollar and the US bond market in terms of when stress happens in the financial system. And uh you know someone said me said to me today, "Oh gosh, it's weird that we're we're having a situation where there we're going to go bomb Iran." Not not you and I, but like US because it was American I was talking to. We're going to go bomb Iran and the US dollar is going for sale and bonds are going down. And I keep, you know, stressing that the reality is that the US is running the a monstrous capital account deficit. They need to you they need to fund it each and every day. And as the um as the world becomes more uncertain, capital is flowing back to the home countries for a variety of different reasons. And I think that this has just started. I I really do. And what's interesting to me with the fact that you highlighted the intervention, there's some debate about whether that the it was definitely done by the Americans. Uh there's some debate if it was Fed or Treasury. I don't know if that matters. To me, the real question is usually they do it on the behest of the Japanese. And did they do it on their own this time? Did they just go screw this, I don't want the yen any weaker? And that's the part and because we saw a day or two later Trump said something like no you know I I think the US dollar is is is fine going down and at his heart I believe that Trump does want lower dollar. I I think that the problem is that once the dollar starts selling off US financial assets are going to go with it. And that is the dilemma that they're facing is that they want a lower US dollar to make it so that their goods are more competitive so that they can, you know, make tractors and compete against the Japanese and the Koreans. And and there's there's nothing wrong with that. Like like the world is imbalanced. The US does have too large of a capital account deficit and it does need to rebalance. The problem is that people want it to rebalance without there being any pain in the financial markets. And that's the part that I'm just pushing back on and saying, "No, you know what? It's going to rebalance." And the rebalance is going to mean lower US stocks. And at the same time, it's going to mean more jobs for middle America. And it's just that that process is not something everyone wants. And people have rightfully said, "Oh, but Trump won't want to take the pain. Maybe he won't." But there's there at the same time, Patrick, people aren't going to continue funding the largest deficit in the world when you go around and you start threatening your allies, right? Like like that's that's the problem. Like they're sitting there running the largest, you know, capital account deficit in the world and then they're threatening the very people that are lending them the money. And so put aside your politics. Put aside, you know, what you want to be done. put aside what you think is fair whether you know I you know people say you know the US has been paying too much of NATO and and sure maybe that's the case put away all those things and just ask yourself what is the market going to do based upon what is happening trade the market you you not the market you want the market you have in front of you and to me with this sort of volatility and this instability in terms of global politics it's pretty clear to me that eventually that's going to mean a flight out of the us by the very people that are funding those deficits. >> There you go. You heard it from Kev. All right. Listen, Kev, just one closing thing I want to show you. >> Okay, >> look at Bitcoin the bed. Well, like but but what what's what's crazy to me is uh I always actually suspected that there would be uh some sort of correlation between gold and bitcoin because there's sort of this alternative to the dollar thing. But Bitcoin is literally selling while gold is going parabolic and the dollar is weak. It's like uh it it it someone's hitting the bid. >> Yeah. The other thing is Patrick, have you seen all this like brew haha about how much gold Tether has bought. >> So Tether has gone and invested I can't remember what the number is. There was an article article in FT some crazy number. I don't know what it is. 16 tons. I don't know what the it's just some obscene number like basically the largest uh individual kind of uh corporate or or government buyer has been Tether over the last year of gold. So they're just buying and storing it. So it's kind of funny like what if they're turning their their digital assets into hard assets, right? And like what if that's the transfer that's going >> Yeah. And I and I think that there's more to that story than we than we know and that we should probably all pay attention to it because I suspect that the that Tether was going to like we're going to look back and go, "Oh, Tether was a big part of this this precious metal rally." >> Yeah. Kev, listen, me and you, we could honestly talk for two hours. Like there's shitloads of charts we didn't even touch on, but like uh we got to keep this a little bit tighter. So, like I I I I I'm going to have to just basically stop stop us here and uh and we'll we'll continue talking charts in the next episode. Anyway, um >> all right folks, thanks for tuning in. >> Yeah. >> Um you know, bull market, bare market, we're just happy to spend some time together on this crazy ride. Before we sign off though, Patrick, where can they find you? Uh you can find me at bigpicturetrain.com or uh and follow me on my YouTube channel patrick_suresna. It's uh uh I'm now started Kev uh doing a little macro outlook every morning Monday through Thursday at uh uh at 9:30 a.m. just to give everyone a a live stream of what's going on in the markets. So if you guys want to check out my uh morning updates, check out my channel. It's live streaming every morning at the open. That's awesome. I'm sure Danny's very pleased with that. Uh, more work for the poor guy. Uh, so listen, it was >> his idea. >> It was his idea. Okay, we'll have to learn find out more about that. All right, bare market, bull market. We're just happy to spend some time together now. Stick around for the after show. >> Kevin, and where can they find you? >> Uh, don't worry about it. Everyone knows where they can find Danny. How you doing, buddy? >> I'm good. How are you? >> Does he need help doing the live stream? He must, right? It's much easier on Danny. >> Yeah, he he needs a fluffer. >> Danny is an amazing fluffer. >> Jesus Christ. This This went dark really quick. >> All right. Um, what are you guys up to in terms of your like anything exciting? >> I'm heading I'm heading out to uh Mexico City. I'm going to do a week-long mastermind out there with my uh uh flying in my inner circle of members. Uh be trading live for an entire week. Uh and I can't think of a more interesting week to do it in. Like it's going to be uh like uh a lot of action and uh I'm going to have a lot of fun. >> Patrick, by the way, you chose a good week to not be coming home to Canada. Did you see what happens in terms of the snow? >> We got a lot for Toronto. We got like a couple of feet plus. But the other thing about it though is you know how usually our snow is so um wet and gross like kind of like that Whistler terrible snow. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Send your hate mail to P Patrick. He hates Whistler. Um uh the All the Vancouvers are going to be mad at me for that comment. Um so it's usually really really slushy snow cuz it's like by the lake. This was so cold, Patrick, that it was the fluffiest like, you know, rebel stoke high up in the alpine snow I've ever seen in Toronto. >> You know what's crazy is my my son sent me a video uh of him uh there was a huge snow drift out his on his balcony and he just basically went and jumped in and he just disappeared. Just like he sunk right into it like >> it was actually awesome. Gone. I I was actually in Ottawa though visiting uh my daughter and uh it was so cold there Patrick it was Winnipeg cold like it was like it was approaching the minus30 handle >> like without without windchill like it was like >> and that's Celsius everyone. >> Yeah, but actually they converge at that point. It's not much different. Um the uh so it was really cold. It was like long underwear cold. It was cold. Anyways, Danny, what are you up to? Um, what am I up to this weekend? >> Nothing. Oh, boring, isn't it? >> Yeah, that is boring. You're just going to be splicing videos. >> Yeah, pretty much. I mean, we've had we've had a bad storm here, so there's not really much we can do. >> What? What? What? You're in Portugal. Like, what do you mean a storm? Like, it's raining. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's like It's like monsoon like hurricane >> wind. We were we were we were doing uh uh the interview with Chase and um and Danny uh had to stop the interview halfway through cuz he he was traveling when he we had when Chase was available and so he had to do it from his car. >> Yeah. >> And uh and the storm was so bad he thought he like you tell the story Danny. I'm not I don't want to >> Yeah. So >> that's fine. But you know as you do you know you can do the huddle from from your car just so everybody understands that that is possible. But um yeah the wind was so bad that um yeah the whole the whole car was just like rocking back and forth to the point where I was like oh I need to everybody around >> embarrassing. >> Yeah. Yeah. I know >> that is okay. Well, anyways, listen. We'll take have a great time in Mexico. Danny, I hope that the uh the car rocks back and forth for other reasons apart from your snow your storm next. >> And everyone, stay safe out there. Trade smaller. It's a very volatile market. Be careful out there. And thanks for tuning in. We'll see you in a couple weeks. >> Thanks everyone.
THE OIL MARKET HAS SPOKEN (Guest: Craig Shapiro)
Summary
Transcript
Hit it. It's Friday, January 29th, 2026, episode 284. I'm Patrick Szna. And I'm Kevin Mure. This week, we welcome Craig Shapiro to the show. We have a fantastic discussion where we discuss the state of macro markets, where the opportunities lie going forward, and what it was like working with Steve Cohen. Then Patrick is back with talking charts and it's a spicy spicy session. So we've decided to go a week early. >> We had to get we had to get some talking charts. Patrick and uh folks uh I'm going to have to have a beer here dur during this session. And uh Danny, normally I tell you to introduce the beer, but I wanted to leave it a surprise for you here. I'm having the sages, but >> look at the size of this bad boy. Today was quantity over quality. It's uh it's one of these days in the markets where you're gonna need to go big. But like what's what's your uh what's your call on this beer? >> You know what? Like when you when you bring out the liter bottle of Sagrash, you know, you know the session is on. >> That's uh the way it works. All right. >> What happens when gold starts moving in $400 increments? Uh, no buddy. No All right, give us some uh side effects, bud. >> Nothing in this podcast should be viewed as investment advice. Listeners should consult an investment professional before making any decisions regarding topics mentioned in this show. Side effects of too much huddle may include the gold parabola parabola parabola. I can't even say it. Psychosis. And I know you're going to leave all that in there. Uh, geopolitical oil oil shock syndrome. Just having trouble with my words. This is what you do when you make me go on an off week. And finally, the FOMC irrelevant syndrome. >> Well, that one is very irrelevant today. >> It's so irrelevantly relevant. All right, so uh let's uh let's get the guest on. >> Before we get to our main guest, we thought we'd take a moment to play a brief clip from our Christmas special where Marvin Bar made the absolutely terrific call that Kevin Walsh would be picked as Fed chair. Well done, Marvin. Do you think the market's got it wrong with Scott Beth, sorry, with um Kevin Hasset being the leading contender right now? Um well, I'm I'm glad they've moved that way. I I've been saying that all along. I said it was either going to be Bessid or or or Worsh. Um and um you know when markets were at their peak with Hassid I was saying nope it's going to be Bessent or excuse me it's going to be uh Wars Bessent has dropped out for me. Um I would have thought that he was going to choose himself >> and Cheney move. >> Yeah, exactly. I think we talked about it last time. Um, the reason why I've I've sort of pulled back on that one is I've learned from a variety of different sources that Scott Besson is really deeply involved in national security policies. >> Ah, >> perhaps maybe more so than Pete Hex. And that means he ain't going anywhere. One, because the president ain't going to let him. And two, because he's clearly he sees other things he's doing that are much bigger than anything at the the the Fed, which is where normally you think a macro guy would want to go. So I I think it's going to be worse. >> Oh, you think it's worse? So you think Hass is wrong like that the markets over? No, >> abs. Absolutely. I think it's definitely going to be worse. >> And that would be I'm I'm 99% sure it's not going to be hassle. All right, it's our great pleasure to welcome to the show Craig Shapiro. Craig is the macro strategist at Ninja Trader Live. Craig, thanks for coming. >> Thanks for having me. Really appreciate it. >> Uh, you know what? We were chatting a little bit before getting to know each other and I was going through your career and this is going to be tons of fun. You have must have a million great stories. Um, before we get to them, why don't you tell us like where did you grow up? Like did you go and you study un like in markets or economics a school like did you always know you wanted to you know end up in finance? >> Yeah I mean I grew up on Long Island um and you know my father was an entrepreneur but he was always kind of uh you know in the markets and and so I had an affinity for that you know with my bar mitzvah money I invested you know into some stocks. I think they, you know, you know, generally did pretty poorly. And it's funny because someone actually gave me uh, you know, like five shares of Philip Morris for my my bar mitzvah, which doesn't really make a lot of sense because I don't know why you give a kid a cigarette stock, you know, for but but I I think that was that was by far the best performing stock that I think I had through the, you know, the following 10 years. But, um, you know, so that, you know, that was kind of the background. I went to Cornell uh, graduated in 2001 kind of, you know, during the, you know, during the recession. And so wasn't a great uh you know wasn't a great time in markets but was hired into um basically Credit Swiss's uh merchant banking group in 2001 and 2002 not a ton of deal flow going on a little bit you know boring and so thankfully at the end of uh 2002 I was able to move over and I joined a hedge fund called Osprey Management towards the end of 2002 which founded by Dwight Anderson and uh became the largest commodities hedge fund in the world basically over the course of the next uh seven eight years and So >> great great experience there. Yeah. >> And that was a terrific time to be at a commodity hedge fund because that's like in the midst of the bricks, right? Like uh >> I mean it caught the bottom there pretty well. I mean basically, you know, shift out of dollar, you know, out of dollar assets, you know, uh into commodities, China entering the WTO, massive commodity demand explosion, limited supply response, oil was moving, plenty to do in natural gas and and copper and and everything really. And so it was a great it was a great run there uh from 2002 through you know really the financial crisis. We had a very well publicized uh blow up in the summer of 2008 unfortunately a little bit before kind of everyone else was blowing up but we had a a tremendous basis mismatch trade going on. We were long stocks and short commodities. If you remember like the most of the equities kind of did incredibly poorly first while commodities continued to rip through the summer uh through June and July and we also had a liquidity mismatch whereby we were long a ton of illquid crap I mean real real garbage right talking about the end of a commod you know towards the end of the commodity cycle harder to find cheap stuff in the big cap name so you move down the liquidity curve you start buying you know uh resources in Sierra Leone and in Kazak an in Russia and a lot of esoteric places with high uh geopolitical premiums and so when the you know when liquidity starts to uh tighten up those things go to zero and that's basically where they went and so yeah >> unfortunately the equities fell uh first and we had to basically stop out of most of our commodity trades which ultimately really would have paid off through the summer and into the fall of 20 uh of 2008 fund shut down and so um yeah I had to uh find something else to do I was 28 years old I was a partner there was the head of research and uh had to had to reinvent myself and so um you know it was >> I should ask actually like what your role there was. So you were the head of research and so when you first came on did you come on as like a a research associate? >> I came on as a as a research analyst covering largely covering equities in uh commodity industries that did not have tradable commodities. So think chemicals, paper, steel, shipping. Uh that was my you know that was my bread and butter. Obviously the firm broadly speaking did everything in energy and metals and a too other people covered those and we traded all the commodities. So uh was there for about you know five years and then the most senior analyst and head of re head of equity research left they went to start their own firm. I got promoted into the director of equity research role, became a partner, uh had a couple good years, we had a good run, made, you know, made some good money and then, you know, that 2008 experience, you know, for a lot of people was obviously incredibly challenging and and, you know, for us, you know, clearly was uh right, >> you know, it was unfortunate. I was pretty young, too, was youngest partner and my life got turned upside down. Just had my second kid in the summer of 2008 and uh then all of a sudden um you know, it was all gone. So, >> yeah. >> Terrible. >> You learn lesson. you learn a lot, you know, when you learn a lot of lessons at a at a young age, it's uh, you know, typically helpful. So, you know, right, >> I'm fortunate for the journey. >> Uh, well, um, you have a good attitude about it. And you also, that's your second kid at 28. You had kids young. Um, I do remember that period, though. And you, it's funny, you were saying how you were surprised about the liquidity that disappeared. I remember I was playing a lot of uh like just Canadian like small cap resource names and and a lot of them would come out as private placements that you have to hold for three for four months or whatever. And I remember saying to myself like I got nervous about the markets and I was like okay I got to stop doing these because I don't want to be stuck into paper that I can't trade. And I thought I had done everything great and I thought I had like, you know, really trimmed everything up and that there was no extras. And I was like, how did I lose so much money on so few positions like and and it was kind of shocking how quickly they went from like, you know, two bucks to 20 cents. >> It it was really it was really unbelievable. I mean, because because we had such a a large fund, we had a huge uh public's fund and a private equity fund as well. you know, anybody with a story, anyone with a deposit anywhere in the world, you know, or anybody with a farm anywhere was coming into our office pitching a story. And, you know, we were still kind of in that, you know, tail end of the commodity bull market, but still, you know, things seemed pretty good. And so, you know, we found ourselves becoming three and four and 5% investors in a lot of these, you know, smaller exploration type vehicles and thinking the, you know, the China story was going to continue, you know, forever. And so um but in the you know first and second the first half of 20 of 2008 it it when we saw the liquidity start to move out we thought okay we could hedge a lot of this risk with with commodity shorts right we could be we could be long junior copper miners trading you know at very very uh discounted valuations as long as we're short copper you know we'll be okay and so you know and the the mistake obviously is that basis mismatch of equities versus commodities But really it's, you know, also the the liquidity profile of being long small caps when the liquidity is going out the door. You know, you can't be short enough copper, right, against Yeah. against your positions. And then from the timing perspective, a lot of these names started to roll over and you know, it's the first half of the year and and particularly in July and August. And you know, crude made a new high in July, I think at 145 or 148 bucks. And I remember also we we were short we were short dry freight forward freight agreements. I don't know if you remember those those are, you know, dry bulk and like those were trading, >> you know, we probably started shorting them at $80,000 a day. They went through 125 or $150,000 a day. Th >> those contracts ultimately went to basically zero. Um, you know, in September and October, we were gone. We we had to cover all, you know, because the the losses in the equity book over were overwhelming everything. And so, right, you know, huge lessons learned there on those basis mismatches and liquidity profile of your portfolio, your ability to get out. We couldn't get out of 5% positions in junior minors, right? It would just take huge haircuts. We wound up having to trade out of a lot of those things. And after we had already shut the fund down and we gated people, >> you know, it took took months, it took months, quarters to get out of some of those positions. >> And back to your point about this, the idea that you can't be short enough copper. The unfortunate part is that if other people are doing the trade with you and then all of a sudden they start, you know, they liquidity contracts, they're actually covering their like as they sell their stocks, they're covering their copper, it's actually going the opposite way on you. So, not only is it not a like a good enough hedge in terms of it not falling fast enough, in extreme cases, it's actually rising on you. >> Yeah. That that's that basis mismatch that that can, you know, it could be toxic, right? And so >> and the industry is also at least back then I suspect it's you know similar now it's not that big of an industry. So when people understand that you know large hedge fund New York hedge fund commodities hedge fund has significant short exposure in XYZ commodity you know that news that news gets out and obviously there's been well publicized you know other funds that have gone through similar types of things in different commodities whether it be not gas or copper or whatever and so your positions kind of get out you kind of get you kind of get screwed. So, um, yeah, that was >> that story that story from Long-Term Capital that I love in the book When Genius Failed and it's when Merryweather's in all sorts of trouble and he calls his, you know, his ex Wall Street, you know, broker from someone and he's this Italian dude that comes and he's, you know, on the street forever and he tells Merryweather, "Okay, show me your book." And Merryweather shows it to him and he says, "Well, what are you down?" And he says, "We're down 50." And he goes, "You're done." And they say, "Why?" He goes, "I got we got Buffett, we got this, and we like all these things he's trying to save." He goes, "Once people realize that you're in trouble, they're going to squeeze you the whole way." Y >> and then he was bang on correct. Okay. So, so that was obviously traumatic experience, but you end up going to another terrific shop and I I just I'd love to hear the stories about this next one. Um and and tell us where you end up and kind of give us some flavor about what it was like moving from Osprey to this new place. >> Yeah. So, you know, after after Osprey trying to refine, you know, redefine myself. I I I wound up joining an exartner of Osprey for a couple years at a small fund and then >> was able to actually move over to a SACE um spin-off fund first and then when that fund, you know, didn't make it, I was able to kind of move over to SACE and so I worked with with Steve >> uh towards the end of 2012 through really the end of 2015. And so three, you know, very good years uh at at SACE, which then transitioned to 72 while I was there, running a commodities equities portfolio across those same industries, you know, industrials, materials, energy, had a team of four analysts working with me at the peak, managed a good deal of capital, had three very good years with Steve. It was an incredible experience. And you know the low net community often at least back then it was harder to find um you know long short portfolio managers that could be successful because the correlations are not necessarily in the idiosyncratic right. You need to get the commodity right. You need to get the macro right. You need to get the dollar right. And a lot of folks who traded these spaces kind of didn't do that. They were busy trading Rio versus BHP or IP versus packaging corp or DAO versus Lionell whatever. But Steve allowed me the opportunity to be a bit more directional which was great which is why we were you know pretty successful because my you know prior experience of nailing the commodity cycles was very helpful. So we had you know very good years you know trading these commodity related equities in a more directional basis and were able to you know balance the risk balance the nets balance the beta with you know using index hedges or at times commodity hedges. So uh it it was great we had a great uh a great run there. I sat, you know, for three years behind Steve in his in his trading row in in Connecticut. Um, you know, learned a ton from him and really just a tremendous tremendous experience. >> So, what what would you say was the biggest surprise going there? Like you say you learned some things. What was the one that you were like, "Oh, I I never would have thought about that." And that was kind of a big shock. >> Yeah. I mean, I think one of the the things I didn't necessarily appreciate just kind of listening to Steve and overhearing him is, you know, kind of his myopia on on execution and on trading. I mean, I had thought kind of, you know, been an investor, been more I've been more of an investor than a trader, right? And so, more thematic, more not really caring as much about exit and entries and and so and you know, really you learn when you manage a large pool of capital and at one point we were, you know, north of a half a billion dollars of capital. um you know getting in and getting out of things really matters um and there's a lot of slippage if you if you kind of screw it up and Steve was obsessed you know with execution and so kind of definitely drilled that into you know drilled that into me just making sure I was aware of that. The other thing too is booking profits, right? He was, you know, you're up, you book, you know, make sure you're booking profits. Always putting, you know, P&L behind you. And so, um, you know, he didn't really love draw downs. No one does. But, I mean, if you've been on a good run and then you have and you draw down, you kind of take it all back. He's he's not tolerant of that, right? And so, you got to you have, you know, he's happy to let you let your winners run, but when the trend starts to move the other direction, you need to derisk. You need to gross down. You need to have booked some of that P&L so that you could keep growing your portfolio over time. And so um you know th those risk management things were very helpful for me you know particularly from my prior experience where you know the fund blew up. So I I definitely didn't want to I definitely didn't want to do that again. Um but uh you know Steve you know Steve was great in that in that regard for me. >> And so what are you a Mets fan? >> I am I've always been a Mets I've always been a Mets fan much to my you much to my sugarin. I think it was uh yeah, I think it was in 2015 when we were last in the World Series against the Royals and I, you know, brought my daughters to game five and the Mets lost at home and I had to carry my daughter like two miles back to our car. This is before Steve bought the Mets, but um but uh yeah, it's it's a labor of love. At least I'm a I'm a New York Giants fan, which at least for some years had been good. I'm not a Jets fan. That would be horrible. But more recently, the Giants have >> And so what do you think about Steve's moves recently with the Mets? Yeah, I think look, I mean, he's trying to, you know, I think they've been, you know, they've been good. I mean, he's doing what he can. I think he's trying to run the team a little bit more like a business in some degree, but I I've like the moves they've they've, you know, but look, some and he's I think the other thing, too, is when he buy, you know, he makes if he makes mistakes, he cuts risk, right? He makes him he makes an investment, it doesn't work, whatever. He's paid a lot of money for it, but he's like, "Look, this isn't working for us. Like, how do we cut it?" And I think that you know that portfolio the risk manager philosophy you know it's hard to say you should you could do it with people too but when you're the owner of a baseball team you you can. So um I you know hopefully uh hopefully the next couple years we'll uh you know we'll get the job done there. >> My favorite Steve story is um in in the GFC I think he was having all of his traders and a lot of them were kept trying to buy the buy the the dip and they kept getting run over and eventually I don't know if this is true or not. This is the story I heard. Eventually, he just said to everyone, "You go home. It's me and whatever. This guy, we're trading the book for now." And for like six months or whatever, as they kind of went through the the really turbulent po points, they just he took over. And I think that that, you know, uh discipline in terms of the risk is really truly what made him different. >> Yeah. He's just he's maniacal about risk management and execution, you know, trading execution. Yeah, I think I mean look, he gets obviously, you know, he's got 100 plus portfolio managers delivering him great ideas, you know, kind of all the time. So, he's got he he's playing with, you know, the the the better names or worse names if he's on the short side, but still, you know, exit and entry and reading the tape. I mean, he's been doing it forever. He's the best that he's probably the best that's ever done it um from that perspective. And so, yeah, when it's time for him to take over, he just, you know, he takes over. And, you know, probably the same thing with the Mets, right? Like he makes, you know, he's like he's not afraid to make decisions. He's not make afraid to make hard decisions, make cuts, reorg, red, you know, and re, you know, redistribute capital and, you know, kind of keep it moving, keep reinventing himself. So, um, okay, you know, yeah, it was it was a good run. And basically what wound up happening at the end towards the end of 2015, >> um, I went with him to the idea and said, "Look, I want to run a little bit more directional, a little bit more volatility." Um, and we'd love to do that, you know, with you internally. And the firm at the time had been going through some transitions. and he was like, "Yeah, look, we're, you know, that's not the really direction I want to set a precedent, but I'm happy to have you. If you want to go launch your own fund, I I'll support you in doing that." And so, he did. He gave me his blessing to do that. I was able to take my track record with me um and and one of my analysts with me and who became a partner and we, you know, tried to run a more directional strategy uh in 2016 and 17 and 18 and and it didn't really, you know, look, it didn't really go according to plan. I wish it would have went better. um messed up the the Trump election night scenario uh to some degree. And so uh looked, you know, the made a made a bet, tried to get the fund off the ground. It did, but it didn't really work out. And so by the end of 2017, we shut the fund down. And then I've just kind of been bouncing around, uh >> doing a bunch of different things. Yeah. Basically, for the last few years, kind of just been trading my own account, my own family office money. Um and then more recently I've been doing some more financial consulting um more strategy work very active obviously on uh on social media and on my Substack and then you know very recently kind of joined up uh with Ninja Trader which is the largest futures uh retail broker in the country and have become the macro strategist there. So been there for you know as a consultant for the last three months and then joined full-time earlier this year and uh you know trying to just give expert guidance crosset macro guidance to uh you know the retail trading community. I'm on the live show in the mornings and uh do a Sunday show and so yeah it's been very continue writing and so it's been a very uh you know very good experience. >> All right so there's lots to talk about in terms of the market because it's quite a week that we've chosen to have you here. It's perfect. Um, I guess let's just start with the gold and the silver. Um, today we're taping this Friday after the market closed. I would Is that the largest one day move ever in silver? >> I was someone reminded me today that the in that that the move lower in silver today is equivalent to where silver was trading at a year ago. So, you know, basically we were, you know, we wound up being at one point today. I think we were down 40 bucks. Um, and silver was 40 bucks. So, less it was in the mid20s, mid-30s about a year ago. So, I mean, what a historic uh run in in silver in precious um you know, even more commodities lately. I mean, it's been kind of wild. And, you know, look, I mean, part of it obviously is supply demand driven fundamental base. Part of it is this dollar debasement, you know, phenomenon going on. Part of it is just leverage and speculation and everything that's going on there. So it kind of has hit the hit the trifecta of of euphoria and the volumes have just exploded, right? Futures volumes, options volumes today, I don't know where they closed. I saw at one point SLV had traded like over five million options contracts mostly for expert today. So it's been a it's been a pretty crazy uh pretty crazy run and huge reversal now we're seeing in in pressure. So now do you feel that the the rally and obviously it became a speculative you know frenzy towards the end but let's you know the one of the things you mentioned was the debasement trade. First of all do you think that that was a legitimate worry and then with wars coming is the debasement trade off like off the table? Um where do you stand in terms of like how much of this is just a correction in a in a in a larger you know move that we should be like you know expect these sorts of corrections or is this the final end of this kind of frenzy? >> Yeah I mean look I I do think that there is obviously precious as an asset class trades highly correlated but I do think there are some differences between the gold component and the silver and etc component of it. Um now I I think there is you know I think silver really did kind of drive a lot of this you know higher because of the supply demand imbalances and and you know how much um silver is needed in solar panels and in AI and so there's a dynamic in play I think about the needs for silver in the future um and the physical needs and you know whatever China is doing on export controls or not and obviously there's been a a shift kind of in the mentality of countries wanting wanting to procure and hold their own resources. So there there's some dynamic in you know further dynamic in play there potentially in silver. I think silver is less of a debasement trade. Gold to is clearly more of a fiat debasement trade. Um look we've seen you know really since you know probably the the first quarter of 2022 with the the Russia move on Ukraine and the sanctioning of reserves. We've seen how uh gold has been reintroduced as a neutral reserve asset. Um and treasuries and sovereign bonds have have declined in in that in that role. If governments can kind of just come in and expropriate your reserves, you're as a country, you're going to hold rest reserves in that country. Um and so I think that dynamic really surprised probably the rest of the world when the US and EU kind of decide to do that to Russia. And so I think gold has disconnected from you know real the real rates trade because of that and that trend has been in place for the you know the last whatever close to four years and I think with respect to what Trump has been doing more recently um look he's in favor of a weaker dollar in order to bring back manufacturing reshort America bring back jobs and the only way we're going to do that is with a much weaker currency. uh he wants rates lower uh he wants to you know put up export barriers and trade and tariffs and so in order to do that and so we're seeing uh again another reason to uh have the dollar be debased and so gold kind of picks up some benefit from that as well more recently too this move in Venezuela of you coming in there and just kind of taking the oil right well I mean it wasn't really our oil you know to to be taken right other countries have investments including China have investments in Venezuela And so if if the US is going to be more aggressive in just going out in the world and taking things from other people, well, those other people who own things in dollars are going to think, well, maybe I need to own less dollars. I maybe I have to have my my excess trade balances stored away from anything that's, you know, tied into the dollar. So gold really picks up, you know, the the incremental from that, too. And so I think you know gold was you know silver was driving gold higher and then then gold kept helped drive silver higher and kind of was this back and forth you know dynamic in play. And then look, I think the, you know, the the comments earlier in the week from Trump about being um okay with the dollar moves kind of led to this, I don't know, it just led to this kind of maybe his final, not his final, but certainly it's what seemingly a blowoff top in in gold the other night. Kind of got I don't was that last night? It was two minutes ago at this point, but kind of got like up to I think we got up to like 5,600 um in the in the Asia session. And clearly what we've been seeing right is we've been seeing Asian demand for for precious has been strong like every night we come in and the prices are up and then in the US it's you know we kind of check back a little bit. So clearly the metal is flowing east. Uh Asian countries are trying to procure more resources store more wealth in away from dollars into precious. And so is it over? I don't think it's over, but man, I mean, the moves today are, you know, have to be uh clearly we're historic. Um, and the volatility has just been, you know, face ripping, right? And so, if you're a >> if you're a risk manager and you're looking at guys and who trade these metals, you know, you're telling you got to take your risk now, right? I mean, the VAR shock potential is elevated um with volatility this and so I think you you just kind of got to the point where the risks were too high. you know, my friend who was who trades this stuff pretty actively. Some of these like bid ask spreads in silver options are just it's you could drive a truck through them, right? >> This is happening in natural gas also early in the week just so volatility across the commodity space has just gone through the roof. And so I think though through the course of the week we've start probably started to see risk managers given taps on the shoulder to folks to start de-risking these portfolios which when there has been such a highly correlated move to start the year between weak dollar trades, precious metals trades, emity trades kind of all moving together. You know you start to now have a little bit of a crescendo effect here, right? As the the dollar stopped falling and started to have a little bounce, then you get volatility in precious and some turnaround there. And then today, you know, you're finally starting to see the last couple last two days, EM equities starting to underperform. You know, Aussie had a had a blowoff top the other night has corrected. Mexican Peso blowoff top has correct. Right. So, you're starting to see a little bit of a crescendo here of riskoff mentality over let's say over the course of the last 48 hours. I think that's likely to continue into next week. the war stuff maybe has a little bit to do with it, but I think really more it's about portfolio de-risking, deleveraging, you know, similar to like what we saw in August of 2024 with the yen carry trade unwind or even February of 2018 with the Volmageddon, right? Just, you know, these episodic V events that force system deleveraging over a very short period of time to cleanse positions. I think we're we're in one right now. Do you think it expands to even equities? >> Well, look, I mean, I what I I How are you I I I tweeted this earlier today. I was just kind of think like if you're a business that buys that needs to buy commodities and commodities are whipping around with 100, you know, 100% realized volatility. Well, how do you make how do you make decisions about how much you're going to buy this next month, the month after? And so, I think you you have a little bit of an uncertainty uh dynamic reintroducing itself. So I do think that this commodity va which is filtering now into FXV is likely to filter into equity vault. And so under the hood, >> look, it didn't really hasn't really shown up yet in in NASDAQ and and the S&P. I mean, they're both trading, you know, still up on the year. But under the hood, you know, over the course of the last several days, there's been violence in >> in meme stocks, in the most shorted names, in unprofitable tech, right? things that led to start the year when people were believing in a broadening out rally. >> Yeah. >> Have been faceplanted, right? Because these are the things that are people don't really know as well. Uh they are beholden to a low vault. They need they need a lowvall environment to work. >> And so when you start to see this vault pick up, these things have been destroyed. And so that rotation to start the year now has been going kind of back the other way, right? NASDAQ has outperformed the Russell now for, you know, I think six days in a row after basically three weeks of of the other way. So, I think we're starting to see that the bleed into equity markets and I think as we come in next week, >> I I think we're going to see more of that. >> Okay. Um, I want to go backtrack to the dollar because you made a comment and I I thought spot on correct and I get a lot of push back when I make the same arguments and I just love to hear your thinking. Um I do think Trump wants a lower dollar and even though he says oh no no no I really want a strong dollar ultimately like if you listen to what he believes that in terms of uh you know selling to the rest of the world and uh what what's happened to uh the manufacturing base all those things need a lower US dollar and so although we have gotten a lower US dollar against some currencies it's actually been pretty Like yes, there's been some volatility, but it hasn't been as there hasn't been as much friction on the dollar as I would have figured. And I'm wondering if that's actually the next round of real FX, sorry, the real volatility is going to come in the FX markets and we're actually going to get foreign currency wars. I was just wondering what you're thinking about that. >> Yeah. Yeah. Look, I mean, I don't know. I thought that well I have a couple things but but what what kind of comes to mind is Trump makes this uh you know you know the announcement about this whole Greenland stuff right and so you know we're going to tariff Europe um if they don't just give us Greenland and then he goes to Davos and you know gives a reasonably hawkish speech about the state of the the world and this where the US fits in and you know has some meetings um I suspect with you know leaders you know, and wealthy people and, you know, market makers and movers and everything. And then ultimately a few hours later basically decides, okay, we're actually like we're we're good. Like we're not going to take Greenland and I'm not going to tariff anybody and I'm just going to go I'm just, you know, it's all good again. And so and and I and I wonder did he you know is he walking away from the do from Davos like in a position of power or did the rest of the world kind of tell him to f off and I'm not really sure but the reaction from the currency market was that the rest of the world is kind of telling to f off or that there's a that there's a consolid coordinated effort now across multi you know a multitude of the west to allow for a weaker dollar because the reaction of the DXY and basically every currency since last Wednesday up until today was dollar weak, right? And very weak, right? I mean, so we saw a very big breakdown in the dollar over the course of the last, you know, week. So, I don't know if it's because, you know, there's a Davos accord or a Mara Lago accord that was reached or if it was the rest of the world kind of fed up with with Trump and just saying, "Let's start the process of selling US dollar assets um now uh because this guy is out of control." I don't really know what what the reality is, but I do know that the president has a view about what makes America great, what makes America strong, and it's making things right. And and he believes that we can reshore manufacturing imminently and that we should be able to get, you know, a restoration of manufacturing jobs like tomorrow. And really there we we need in order to be competitive globally the dollar needs to depreciate massively. >> Yeah. >> 50%. >> Yeah. So so I don't know that you know if he knows the numbers or not but what I do know is what he wants. And so the only way to get what he wants is to have a reasonably weaker dollar. Okay. Now I think the issue is if we get an accelerated pace of dollar decline then you get weeks like this where commodity prices roof right and so then you bring back >> inflation expectations you bring back you know worries about the future state of the dollar and >> and look I think the American public is you know maybe you know American public understands I think this weak dollar story and they they know what happens when the dollar is weak and gold prices rip and oil prices rip and natural gas prices have the kind of week that they had. people see that the dollar weakness is going to bring back inflation and so maybe we can't have a a massively decelerating dollar uh quickly uh but I think the trend will be lower and so I don't know I do think it's interesting that he made those comments the dollar kind of makes a new low and then all you know immediately almost immediately after Besson come out and like that you know that's not true you know yeah we we we always savor a strong dollar u Hasset was out this morning kind of saying they we favor a strong dollar and then the Worsh pick. I don't know. I mean, I don't necessarily think the Worsh pick has much to do with the dollar move today. I think that, you know, it's really more about unwind. But if you think about Worsh, I think he's for lower rates, but a smaller balance sheet, right? But he's also he's also been at the Fed. So, I think there's a dynamic in play here where Powell, who has largely threatened to stay on for another 18 months because he was concerned about the Fed pick, now I think has a really more difficult time staying on and justifying that decision because Gors is clearly qualified. He's already been at the Fed. I think it would be bad form and practice for Powell to stay on just to fight independence when the guy who's being put in there was already on the Fed. So yeah, >> I think that, you know, I think potentially what happens here is there was some sort of deal that was made. Um has Wars was picked, Powell leaves, they also drop the DOJ case. Powell goes off and and you know into the sunset and then Trump's able to you know bring Myron back in for Powell seat uh you know later on and then you have you know a a a larger component of the Fed uh where there's doubves and they do drive the front end yields lower >> and they do work to actually lower interest you know lower interest expense and bring down um you know the the budget deficit that's associated with interest and So um but again I and I think that that you know helps kind lower rates will help bring the I think will help bring the dollar down too in their mind. So um I I see the dollar as continuing to weaken. I mean I look back to where we were in you know end of 2017 and DXY was under 90, right? I mean and so we're at 97 change now. I think you know I wouldn't wouldn't be surprised if we saw you know a reasonably weaker dollar here um over the course of the you know let's say the next uh six months or so. One of the things about Wars though is if you look at the history of of where he's been, >> he's generally on the more hawkish side >> and so it's kind of a lot of folks were scratching their heads going, why did he pick him? He doesn't seem like it's really what Trump's looking for. >> Any theories? Oh, any conspiracy theories or just any just theories in general? >> Just comments like about >> Yeah, look, I mean, I I think I think Hasset was a very tough pick because he I think he's seen as more of a a lackey for the president. >> Yeah. >> Um and I think the bond market was more would be more concerned about him. So, I don't I don't think he would. And I I think I think Reer was probably an interesting pick, but I don't think he know I don't think Trump knows him, right? >> Um per se. And so I don't think I think Trump kind of feels like he was kind of forced into Powell even though he didn't know him and I think he regrets that decision. And so >> and I think you know look he put Waller out the Fed too but I don't know I don't get the sense that there's much uh much uh affinity between Waller and and Trump. And so Worsh is a Trump guy right there. There is, you know, a long history between Trump and Worsh's father-in-law. And there's Wars is kind of in the in the know. And Worsh, you know, knows Duck and Miller and Bessant worked with Drunken Miller. And I mean, so there's a there's a reasonably incestuous relationship between all them. So I think Worsh, you know, was a pick that Trump could feel very comfortable with. And look, over the course of the last several years, Wars has been has shifted from, you know, that that original hawkish bias into, you know, something something a little more different. I don't think it's necessarily because he was advocating for um the Fed chair, you know, exclusively, but look, I I think it he brings there's an interesting dynamic here where if you lower rates and you bring down the balance sheet that you're actually achieving more of a main street over Wall Street dynamic. And if you believe that that's what Trump is actually wants to do and we could argue maybe he doesn't really want to do that. I think he was elected to do that. >> Um but he did get >> but he did get concerned about that in April right with liberate you know with the follow on of liberation day and so he did taco on that that view. But I do think he is you know wants to be seen as more of a populist and wants to make more strides for Main Street. So, look, I think part of the the issue for Main Street is that asset prices are are way too high, >> right? >> Um, and so >> he can't like he can't make Main Street win without Wall Street losing, >> right? >> Because of the the pricing of the stock market, >> right? So, I think there's a there's a an argument to be made that if you can bring interest rates down and lower the cost of borrowing for the government and also for people that you'll reduce the deficit which can help control the long end. Um, in and you reduce the size of the balance sheet, you take some of the froth out of the asset markets and you know, look, is is it going to work? I don't know. But it it's it's better that we've seen tremendous, you know, the K-shaped economy is is growing even wider, right? I mean, the disparity between the 1% and everybody else is growing to never before seen levels. So, it's not clear that continuing on a path of trying to just push the stock market higher >> um and have more and more people fall into lower shape, lower case, lower part of the K is going to work. So, this is another work. And so I think Wars a plan to reduce the size of the balance sheet would also bring rates down actually, you know, could fit in with what the the president is uh wants. And if you think about what Bessent can do, right, if you think about the shifting the size of the balance sheet lower, people are concerned, well, that means the long end's going to blow out um and yields going to move higher. But if Bessant controls the supply of duration, meaning he doesn't ever really turn the debt out, he stops issuing 30s, he issues less tens, then that, you know, we'll be a little bit more starved for the long end. That should put a bid under the long end. So you could actually kind of, you know, down, you know, phase shift the entire curve lower. Um maybe maybe we can maybe maybe it would work. And I think that in that environment, the dollar probably will continue to grind lower, but it won't um collapse. We won't have this hyperinflated commodity uh environment that people are concerned about. And so, I don't know. I think uh you know, for 24 hours of thinking about it again, I'm like, I I don't know. I think this is a I think this is a good pick if you are of the view that Trump wants to care about Main Street over Wall Street, wants to uh address the affordability issues and wants to get reelected because right now the polling data is is not working in his favor and so he needs to do something to help address that polling data. Can he pull off a asset price decline that doesn't really screw everybody over in that way? I don't know. Um but is it worth a try? I I mean I think so. >> You know what the funny part about it is? I just I was smiling because this idea about starving the long end of duration was what uh Bessant and Moran were having fits about in terms of Yellen doing it. And the ironic part was she wasn't even doing it at the time. The balance sheet the the Treasury the stock of Treasury debt was the longest in history and she was just trying to pull it back from this extreme longness. And now, so they sitting there all over her, talking about all that, you know, how she's irresponsible and now they're going to do it, which I have no problem with them doing it. I just I the the hypocrisy bothers me. That's what bothers me. >> Yeah. I mean, no, I I I I agree. I mean, but I think and look, as a country finances itself more in the front end, um that that's going to be that that's going to be bearish for the for the currency, right? So it actually kind of serves it serves the purpose right and so as long as they can control inflation which is a tough ask but they they'll have to you know look what's Trump trying to do right he's coming after profit margins right he's coming after the drug companies he's coming after the insurance companies he's coming after the banks on credit cards he's coming after defense companies right >> hypocrisy though if imagine if Biden had that you know like isn't Elizabeth Warren all for the 10% uh you know limit on the credit card because it's it's a very leftist policy and I I have no problem with it fine choose it but just be honest about you know don't be against it just because someone else is against it and you know it's only when you're in power anyways let's let's let's go move it away from politics and let's go to back to the stock market and I thought you had some really interesting things about the pain that's happening below the surface and like underneath the covers. Um, what do you see there? What are you worried about? And what are you watching? >> Yeah, I mean the what what we had, you know, obviously the AI story has been the the the story or at least was the story last year. Um, Mag 7 and and affiliated names and and so look, as we kind of entered 2026 though, the the narrative on the AI capex story had begun to shift, right? We've moved from an environment of funding all this growth with internally generated free cash flow to one where hyperscalers are hitting the debt markets more. Um and so we are you know needing more capital uh from external parties to finance this growth. And so the markets have have figured this out to some degree and have been a little bit more discriminating in the way that they are buying the, you know, the Mag 7 or tech broadly speaking and are really trying to focus in areas where the profits are going. And so we've seen, right, software has really gotten hit. Microsoft's gotten hit um in a big way. Oracle's gotten hit and we've seen some transition into memory names which have done really well. uh Micron and um you know and SanDisk and some of these other names, right? So we're moving uh up the value chain to some degree where the profit where the profits are. Um but the other thing we've saw is just a broad shift out of tech into other areas, right? And a broad shift out of let's say the dollar US exceptionalism trade to em equities to commodity related equities to energy related equities to power, right? things that are going to power and grow the AI capex materials part of it um have been big winners this year and also uh EM equities and dollar week beneficiaries have really you know performed exceptionally well this year as well and so those have been really the the leaders you know for the last you know really for the last three three weeks or so. Um, but this week I thought was a interesting transition week and we started to see a little bit of a shift back into uh quality over crap uh into some of the mag seven into NASDAQ out of Russell. But really under the hood what we've seen is some of these leaders have really gotten you know destroyed. I mean unprofitable tech um is now down 12% on the year after being up 12%. Um, high beta momentum today was down five and a half. I'm just looking at my screen right now. High short interest names down 5% today. Um, low value down 5% today. Said profitless tech meme stocks down 4% today. And this trend has been going on now, you know, for the entirety of this week. And I think it's a reflection of the fact that volatility kind of crosset volatility is starting to pick up. Um, it's picking up in commodities. picking up a little bit in FX. Uh it's not necessarily showing up to the degree in NASDAQ and and and S&P yet because those those are driven daytoday by the exorbitant amount of capital that's in the zero data expiry sell valve strategies, right? And so you have this kind of weird dynamic where the indices daytoday are driven by this cell volatility trade but under the under the hood we get kind of you know violent rotations and violent dispersions. um implied correlations have largely been you know through the floor low um because we get you know the indices are kind of pinned at a certain level and day-to-day one stocks up one sector's up the other one's getting killed and it kind of creates this balance of the overall IND indexes but I think we're starting to see and this week the last couple days with the indices being a little bit weaker I think we're starting to see this cross asset volatility seep into uh the equity market and I would expect that next week if the dollar continues to rally then the crowded trades that have worked this year are going to continue to underperform and I think are going to start to drag down everything else right weak dollar trades precious metals trades em equity trades have been highly correlated they kind of all started to break this week and I think next week and the dollar continues to rally uh we're going to see a broader kind of vol up environment uh that is more concerning for equities as an asset class uh you know over the course of the next couple weeks I think >> you touched upon the dispersion trade there and the fact that that we've had this extreme low correlation amongst the index and I've been fascinated by it and it's truly just like dominating the way that things trade. Do you have any theories on what's causing it? You mentioned zero DTS. Do you think that that you know obviously you think that's a factor? Is that the main factor? Are you worried about those auto callables or is it just a larger macro issue? And more importantly, what do you think might cause this low correlation, low index v trade to break? >> Yeah, I wouldn't I wouldn't characterize myself as an expert. It's more of I'm I'm watching it and seeing it. And I know Jim Carson talks a ton about structured products issuance um and the dynamic in play there and how much money is tied into, you know, the S&P uh and the index. And so um and I think zero data expiry has a big impact on this because every day, you know, we have crazy amounts of capital that are just in selling VT, you know, selling V strategies um and selling options. And so it kind of makes the makes it more difficult for the indexes to really move uh you know in a large way. And clearly there there are certain times of the month when these flows matter more than others. Um as you get closer to Xirie that they're even you know the pin risk is even higher. When we get through Xbury you know the window of potential weakness where other things can matter is is higher but still you it makes it you know more difficult for the indices to break. So I don't I don't necessarily know um you know what's going to break it. But what I do know is that what you need is a pickup in volatility. And so the question is where can we get uh who are the volatility accelerators, right? Like where what are the actors in the global economy that can help reintroduce volatility back to the markets? Because once we get volatility moving higher, then the impetus to just sell volatility every day gets declined. Those people start to lose money. uh vault control funds who are tied into volatility de deleverag their portfolios that could lead to some selling pressure and so where are the volatility um uh accelerators well Trump is one right he clearly at times will introduce volatility you know into the tape and I actually think to start the year uh after you know four or five months toward to end last year where he was a volatility suppressor he's actually become more of a volatility accelerator now I think it's because the polling data is terri terrible. And so he's trying to do things now to shake things up, whether it's again the credit card caps, um the defense stuff, the home building stuff, um even the geopolitical stuff. Obviously, that's not necessarily markets, but that does introduce volatility. And then Treasury has the ability to introduce volatility. I don't think they're really doing much, right? Um they they're kind of uh have their plan for issuance. They they announce another QR, quarterly refunding announcement update next week. I don't suspect that they're going to do anything there. uh to increase or decrease the supply of bonds, but we'll see. Uh the Fed is another potential. Um but as we saw earlier this week, Fed's not cutting rates, Fed's not raising rates, they're not really introducing much volatility. The place that I think you could get more volatility is in the oil market. And so I think it's very interesting that oil prices have been grinding higher, moving higher. There's obviously a very high correlation between oil price momentum and and and yields. Um, and I think it's interesting, you know, three weeks ago, oil company CEOs were all summoned to the White House to speak with the president about investing capital in Venezuela. And I think he thought he was just going to force them to do it. And most of them came back and said, "Yeah, we're not doing that for you." And oh, by the way, when you keep talking about oil prices in the low 50s, we're just not going to drill at all. >> I'm sure you saw Harold Ham has talked about shutting production uh in the Bakan for the first time in 30 years, right? I mean, Harold Ham is a he's a Trump guy. >> I mean, and so I think, you know, the oil industry has spoken and has informed the president that oil prices are too low. Um, and so he, you know, for the course of the last couple weeks, you don't really hear him talking about getting oil back down to 50 um as as loudly as he as he had been before. Now, some of the oil stuff is probably tied into the war premium from Iran. Who knows what will be the ultimate decision there. Part of it's probably tied into the cold weather. heating oil has followed natural gas uh over the course of the last few days. So part of it's that. But I think it's a it's a there's a growing realization that if you want the oil industry to actually invest capital, 50 is not the number. They need higher prices. But >> higher oil prices are going to make it more difficult for the Fed to ease is going to reintroduce inflation expectations moving higher. And I think that's a type of dynamic where that's the type of volatility that could disrupt some of this kind of constant sell volatility dynamic in play. So, um that's one area that I'm watching that can help break this kind of cycle of lower uh volatility in the equity market and selling volatility every day. >> That's a great answer. Um what other opportunities should investors be looking at? Like what are there some of the other things that might be not getting the attention they deserve? Ah, that's that that's a good one. Um, you know, I think that there's the low part of the K-shaped economy. You know, the the story is is well known, I think. Um, and so I I imagine and I haven't really done a ton of work yet and I I've been focusing a little more on the sector and macro level. I haven't gotten into the micro, you know, individual idiosyncratic names, but there are probably a lot of very beaten down uh consumer-facing valueoriented, you know, names that h have struggled because of the association with the lower part of the K. >> Okay. >> But we're we're moving into an environment where Trump realizes that that that that dynamic has to stop, right? We can't just keep uh you know, crushing the lower part of the K-shaped economy. And so um maybe there are some opportunities there on the consumer staple side or low-end retail side um you know dollar stores what think you know things like that where um can benefit from an eventual flow of capital away from some of this high uh high-end consumerf facing names and lowerend consumerf facing names a shift out of the AI capex story into some valueoriented names. I think that's an interesting area that's maybe getting a little bit of a that's not really discussed all that much. >> Um because look I think the AI story is discussed ad nauseium. I think people do understand the resources the resource constraints from power from materials um from you know from copper for you know uranium for silver people are are discussing these things. I think there are opportunities here >> because I don't think the story is going to end but um I think people kind of going to know about them. So, >> all right. Um, one final question I have for you is if if you were interviewing yourself, like what would be the question that I missed that you would ask yourself? Um, I mean, we we talked about we've talked about the dollar, but I think, you know, the the understanding or the like what's going on with I'm not an expert in Japan, but I I do think it's important to have an understanding of what's, you know, dollar yen and the dynamics there. You know, are we are we, you know, due for dollar yen to go to 200 or are we going to check back here to 100? the dynamics in play there between the US and Japan I think are of paramount importance. Um and certainly as it pertains to you know also China. We haven't really talked about China all that much which is interesting because um China's a big economy and so um you know we really haven't hit on that which is you know and look I think China has been kind of operating a little bit in the in the background here. Not too many headlines, not too much you know but they're kind of just doing their thing right. You know, I think people would have expected them to have more of a reaction to what happened in Venezuela and they just, you know, haven't had an outward reaction. I suspect they are doing things behind the scenes. You know, export export controls, restrictions, different things with the R&B, um, and such. And so, um, you know, those are probably some areas that, you know, we should talk about or we could talk about in let's get into it. So, China and Japan, are they both investable? I I mean I think so. >> Yeah. >> I I think we're going to continue to see capital shift out of US assets because of what the administration wants and is doing and also because of the allocation to US assets across global portfolios is just way too high. >> Yeah. And so, you know, it's and as we move small bits of capital out of Nvidia and Apple and other names, it can create large uh percent returns in some of these other markets. And so I think if what what could happen here in the course of the next few weeks is if we get a check back you know in the dollar where the dollar rallies for a period of time kind of cleansing out some positions people should be thinking about you know buying the dip in Japan and maybe Chinese equities you know sooner than uh they're looking to buy the dip back in in mag seven let's say and so I mean Japan has deficit spending going on you know re-industrialization military you know variet a variety of things um and repatriation of capital that's going to be going back like yields on JGBs now are enticing for Japanese insurance companies versus you know currency adjusted yields in US treasuries. So I think we're going to continue to see that kind of flow that can you know help finance what the deficit spending in Japan is going to do and I think the NK probably um you know does a lot better over time after you know 30 years of doing not a whole lot. So um I think there are interesting opportunities globally which you know as as a more of a US focused investor I need to get smarter on right and I think more people need to do more work or you know find managers who are focusing in those areas and the capital is going to continue to look to shift um you know out of the US and into some of these overseas markets. >> So that's great. One last question we'll get you with here is um instead of uh doing my trader desert island we're going to do an old one. we're going to do um throughout your career, if you could tell us a story about at one point somebody that was kind and helped you and uh kind of just share that, you know, what they did for you and why it was important. >> Yeah. No, I I think I mentioned um so after the whole Osprey experience, I bounced around um a little bit. I joined a firm called Plural Investments was run by um a guy his name is Matt Gman who actually had worked at SACE prior and he tried to launch and and ran a multi-management portfolio. He gave me the first opportunity really to run my own portfolio um by myself and so um you know at Osprey I had run a carveout but you know Dwight was still the overall portfolio manager. Matt gave me the opportunity to um run my own portfolio plural in these industries. just kind of taught me about risk management, taught me about portfolio construction, and then when he wound up shutting the fund down in the summer of 2012, um I was one of the three portfolio managers with him kind of at the end when we tried to, you know, run a centerbook portfolio and he decided he didn't want to do it anymore. I was like, "Look, I mean, I need I need some help." He's like, "Don't worry, I'll make a call for you." And he is the one that called Steve um and said, "I have one portfolio manager from you. You have to hire him." Um, and Steve hired me without ever meeting me. >> And so it was, um, Matt I owe a lot of my career, uh, you know, to that that transition of events, Matt calling Steve. I eventually did meet Steve and we did talk, but he but he really did hire me before we ever met. I had met several other people internally at Sack, but >> but that that decision-making process uh, and Matt's, you know, generosity, even though it didn't work with him, him kind of paying it forward and helping me get land on my feet, um, you know, I'm forever grateful for that. Oh, that is a great story. All right, so before we let you go, why don't you tell us about your current gig uh plug what you want to plug? Uh you have a Substack. You're on uh Twitter as you mentioned. Give us the whole spiel. >> Yeah, I recently mentioned I recently joined Ninja Trader Live. Ninja Trader is the largest uh futures broker in the country for retail investors. And what we have is uh you know I work as the macro strategist for Ninja Trader Live which is our media facing presence. We host a, you know, live streaming uh trading channel on YouTube throughout the course of uh every trading day. I'm on in the mornings from 8 to 8:30. We do a macro panel every morning. Me, Anthony Credelli, and Shy Girl, who most people are probably familiar with. And we have uh we talk macro every morning and then throughout the course of the day, we have traders live streaming uh their trades and their ideas. I also host a a Sunday show uh kind of a market prep show uh with a couple of the traders. It's it's great. I'm also on uh on X at CES921 and I occasionally write on my Substack. It's called the Altha Narrative, which is named after my wife and it also means truth in Greek. And so, uh yeah, come find me. I love to mix it up on Twitter. Uh get into some, you know, of the hot Finn Twit debates and uh I really appreciate you, uh you having me on here. It's been a great conversation. >> It's I've really enjoyed it. And my trouble was I was sitting here going, "Geez, I agree with too much of it all." Uh we very much think alike. Uh, Craig, thank you very much for your time today. >> Thanks, Ev. >> All right, Patrick, time for talking charts. Lots to talk about. >> Kev, I I'm going to need to get the neck brace from the serious whiplash that uh that is that is occurring. Like, is this not insane? Okay, first of all, I'm just going to do a courteous shout out to you. Right. Now, you made the bold call, which inevitably had every chance of happening, but you always made the bold call that there's going to be a week we're going to rip like a $1,000 an ounce. >> Yeah, we didn't get it, though. >> Well, you know what? >> We're close. >> Here's here's where I'm going to give it to you. >> Okay. >> It was a,000 in nine days. >> Okay. >> Right. Like Okay. So, that's very kind. >> You know what I mean? Like 1,000 in nine days. Thousand in five days. I mean, yeah, I get it. But we did have a 500 point move in um in a incredibly short window of time on gold. So anyway, uh kudos like we finally have seen like this parabolic move in precious metals. Um you know, I I I want to save it. We'll talk or do you want to start with precious metals? We might as well. >> We might as well start with it. >> Like because this is where the action like unbelievable. It started first with silver. And let's let's start with silver because that move happened on uh uh in the Asian session going into Monday morning uh where silver went up to like uh 117 bucks on the upside. It was insane. just like here I'm going to put on a 4 hour chart but like in this bull impulse uh from from trough to peak it was a $27 advance in four days including that one last kind of blowoff impulse push but it was insane how uh silver was being pumped that last day was a $14 upday a $16 $17 high when it was up at that one point it was crazy something like it traded uh I I was reading somewhere it traded spy volumes. >> Yeah, it's crazy. Even today, by the way, we're we're we're recording this. I'm having trouble with the words today. Um we're recording this on Thursday and I saw something that uh one of the my brokers sent me. He said that GLD has already traded $25 billion worth of shares today, which is a daily all-time daily record. And it's only 1 pm. >> Yeah. >> Like the volumes out there are just obscene. >> It is like this is this has gone full mental. Everybody needs a piece of the action and uh everyone's trading it and it's it's going. So silver had and this is the crazy part. Okay. So, after that move on Monday, uh I'm going to put put on a one hour chart, but after that move on Monday, uh it blew off that peak at uh on Monday and then sold off $16 14% from peak to trough in three hours. >> Yeah. >> In three hours. Uh like absolutely insane. And then you know when you think that oh the you know you're getting that blowoff top. No, it rips right back up like just unbelievable. >> It is true. That is actually the most surprising part of the action. Don't you think? >> Yeah. >> It had every It looked like that was it. It looked like a climax that you know was going to be and then boom it just sprung back right back into action like a 60. >> You know what? Oh, I'm wondering and I'm curious if could be one of the contributors was that when silver made that reversal, gold didn't and kind of gold kept going up and it was and I wonder how much it played a role from a sentiment perspective where people are like no clearly a precious medical thing just silver went out too far to buy and dip. Like I I'm just wondering how much that could have played. No, >> I have no idea. People are asking me now like about stuff and I said like the reality is that this is pure emotion. There is like I have no value ad to to actually add because the truth of the matter is that nobody really knows what's going on out here. It's just it's the it's the hysteria of the masses and where it ends. Who knows? Like we could be recording this at the day of the top. We could do the same thing could happen to us. Like right now it looks like we had this big huge emotional upday today in gold and then it went down you know a couple hundred bucks or 400 from the highs but now like what if we just rip back tomorrow? Who knows? >> So but then it repeated again today. So, uh, today, uh, silver was ripping to 120 bucks, uh, and, uh, hitting a high after the market opened near 120 plus on the upside and then a peak to trough, uh, drop in like an hour and a half. By the time I was finished my webinar uh, for what I do for Big Picture Trading members, the thing dropped 15 bucks in an hour. >> Yeah. in an hour. The other one took three. Like this. This is like this is insane. Now, what's what what's going to be the big tell here, Kev? I'm going to give some market timing right here. This rally on silver was just a Fibonacci bounce uh on the upside and it's rolling. If the the the silver bulls here need to make uh a save the way they did back over here, which is they got it above the fib zones and then got it out of the danger zone to imply that the prevailing bull trend remains intact. Uh and uh and like you notice every moving average test was supported, every Fibonacci zone was supported, dips were being bought. In other words, it was one day one like a a three-hour drop, but then the price action actually went back to an accumulation thing that we're about to get to tell right here. Maybe even while we're recording this live, we can come back to this in 20 minutes and we'll see. But like uh but if this thing rolls over, I my call here is if we're under 110 uh um and we're by the way recording this Thursday uh in the late afternoon. So, if Friday we're breaking below 110 on the downside, odds are we're gonna potentially tomorrow be even at 100. >> Like uh like it's it's one of these things where if this was uh the swing high of this parabolic move, these things don't correct sideways and the drops are often twice as violent and fast as the rises. Um, it's just that old adage of markets rise on an escalator and drop in an elevator and uh, and when everyone smells that the blood is on the streets, then they can't hit that exit fast enough and it creates that liquidity air pocket that always blindsides everyone. >> All I can say is that's not an escalator that I want to be on because that's one steep escalator. >> That's you got to hold on, be strapped into this thing. But anyway, back to gold. So, silver had this move. gold joined the party goes like we were above 5600 this morning and um and then down to 5,100 within like uh a couple hours like again like actually it was all mostly in one hour uh I mean we hit 5600 but we were down about 5550 and one hour we were down to 5100 um uh just a an insane drop back on the downside on precious metals now look I'm a long-term bull in gold. The obviously the the theme behind gold is that there's generally a a debasement uh drift of of currencies over time. The gold rises over time. It's bullish long term as a a preservation of capital asset. But this is not a capital preservation move. This is this is a speculation move. And you have to differentiate the long-term drift higher versus uh short-term speculative peaks and these things overshoot mean revert find the that kind of average point over uh over a little while and then go back to resuming. So, I'm not in trying to boogeyman people out of their long-term physical bullion holdings and stuff, but as speculation, if you're using uh any degree of margin or leverage uh in the futures market here, you have to be uh very delicate here. Like this is this is the kind of that uh where where um you know the widowmaker happens uh like the knack ass market behavior or comes over here to uh to the gold and and silver markets. Uh any comments you want to make before we move on? >> No, I was just telling the folks in my chat I was saying this morning I think I was saying time stamp a ticket and keep this in your mind because this is a period that you're going to look back and be able to tell your grandkids about. It's going to It's like when the >> kids >> Yeah. It was like this. It's that big a move. I I don't think people appreciate the enormity and the craziness of this past, you know, month or two in in precious metals. >> It's funny that I I said that similar statement to my members to write it down and look at it in six months. I wasn't telling them to look at it and for grand grandkids, >> but I think it's going to be it's going to be a story you tell your kids or grandkids about. >> But we were on the same track. I just my my time horizon was just a little bit more narrow than your than your grandkid storyline. Um, but you're almost a grandfather. So, I mean, it's not that >> hopefully not for a while yet. >> So, let's let's uh talk some of the other crazy stuff. We'll we'll talk equities in a moment, but we have to just go to the commodities that are moving. We have to talk about geopolitics and this little bump in oil. Uh and the interesting so oh by the way no sorry reverse gold volatility the this is the uh the the implied on gold uh and we're at 45. >> It feels like it's not high enough though. >> Yeah. But you know what is insane? So when I put on a weekly chart this is the same level we traded at during COVID but that was because gold was going down not up. This is a crash to the Honestly, that feels like V is cheap. Like COVID V was either COVID V was too expensive or this one's cheap because I agree with you that this is nowhere near the same sort of danger market in terms of gold that we saw during the co. >> Yeah. Like >> but that was a downside danger. But this is this is an upside meltup. This is >> I know. There's going to be, listen, there's still, you just talked about how it's going to correct and it's going to correct, you know, >> $500 in a day and like there's there's big moves happening. These are these are large moves. I'm with you. The VIX isn't high enough. Sorry, the VIX of gold is not high enough. The implied volatility of >> Well, you know, no know what uh was insane. Let's let's take a a a peek at it. But this is the implied on the SLV. But what's more even more insane is you go to the very short-term options like this Friday's expiration. We hit 140% implied on Monday on the weeklies. >> But I think that's right. >> I I bet you for$15 in an hour of Yes. Yes. >> I haven't done the math, but I bet you those aren't those aren't as ridiculous as they sound. it they're probably right pricing but like you know the the part that I'd like you to to kind of give me your take on it because to me when V gets this high um like I feel that uh a lot of people uh seek to participate in bubbles through the convexity they get in being long gamma so they'll go and buy these options to participate on the upside of markets using these um using these options to get that extra kick and move on there. But when volatility gets this high, so dealers obviously are short these calls that everyone is buying and dealers have to hedge and they become uh a marginal forced buyer to actually contribute to the the the basic grabbing on the upside of the market and they are just fuel. They're fuel that's an additional contributor to the overall uh advance of this market. Now you have these weekly uh roll offs and all this happening. But when V spikes to these ridiculous levels, it's very hard and a very bad payoff profile for people to be buying new gamma to replace these calls that are about to expire because they're seeing how expensive they are, widespreads, all of these crazy things. Is there that flip moment where the dealers uh suddenly are now going to unwind all of their long hedges because like just >> so first of all the dealers are short gamma and you were correct that as it rallied they were getting short stock so they had to chase >> no no they no they're short calls so they're long stock they're buying >> no they're long stock but they need to buy more as it goes in the money so they're chasing they're chasing so they're short gamma on the whole. They're short options assuming that the public is buying them and I would assume that's probably a good assumption right now. >> So, they're short volatility. They're short gamma. They're chasing on the upside. But part of the reason that you saw this huge selloff today was that on the way back down, they're also chasing. They're having to sell the stock that they bought and they're hoping that their amount that they are chasing back and forth is going to be less than the what people paid for the options. And as they do more of it and as people buy more options, it actually becomes self-fulfilling that volatility being ends up being higher because there's more market makers that are chasing upward and then also chasing downward. So, it's almost a self-fulfilling prophecy in terms of it does hit a level where you're right, it makes no sense to to be long because it's too much. >> I I would say that >> you it's probably a little more complicated than that. Like, I was looking at one-year option V in silver and it was kind of shocking to me because you could go and sell 180% of the strike call So something that's 80% out of the money, >> you could sell a one-year call for that and then you could buy a 20% out of the money put for the same amount. >> Yeah. >> And that to me was like, oh, >> that's the skew. And and that that's the that's the second thing. Actually, I want to talk about the skew particularly on oil, but the skew 100% is insane on precious metals right now. Um, and we can >> if you were a long that wanted to keep it to me that trade makes a lot of sense. You go, you sell 180 like 80% out of the money calls, right? So, it has to go, let's just assume, oh, let's just say silver's at $100 just to make it easy. So, you're selling the 180. So, you're giving away upside above 180. >> At the same time, >> giving another 80% upside. >> Yeah. At the same time, you're protecting yourself on below 80. And you can do that for zero. Like like to me, that's the trade that folks should be doing. And maybe I'm wrong. No, no, the collar collaring is all we're doing at Big Picture Trading right now. like these these SKs are so favorable that you you need to find ways to secure the profits you've made and continue to participate on the upside because you don't know how stupid things can still get. Uh but there's a point where you it's stupid not to sell. Like if silver went another 80% in a short window of time, that probably becomes a logical place where you know if you sold everything that would be uh that would be good. this the the deterrent of that strategy going that far out uh Kev is that if uh silver for instance got up there too quickly and that V uh you would be less inclined to want to profit take your position because you're sitting on this big loss in the call and you feel like you almost need to see the trade through and you might want to hold for another nine months till you hit the expiry. Yeah. And and a lot of time like so what you're doing is you're you're giving up uh a little bit of that flexibility to being able to uh make your decision uh quite freely. You feel like it's you're almost cuffed in uh and and the time horizon of going out a year. Luck can happen in a year. >> Yeah, I get it. I'm just saying that there's trades like that that exist out there >> and in terms of and and the the trouble is that over the short run I think that the the silver will continue to be volatile. >> Yeah. >> So I don't want to be selling that much like options unless I was long. But I wouldn't want to be short any options that that we're going to expire like in like in the at the kind of low shorter end of the spectrum because I think that the volatility is going to be large because all these market makers are short this thing and eventually it will settle down. We'll have some sort of flush and then it'll settle down and then hopefully it kind of goes back and people stop talking about that and we move on to the next thing. >> Yeah, I think so. So, let's talk about crude oil and uh the um ob geopolitical insertion of a potential Middle Eastern flare up um and a potential attack. Obviously, uh oil markets um responding with now what's been a $10 rise from trough to peak uh over the last uh month and really the biggest part of the move happening in the last few days. uh and uh and so first of all uh do you feel that there's enough risk premium being put in or is this surprising you how little it's moved in in spite of all of the what's happening? Um no opinion? No, I I have an opinion. I I hear you about the risk premium about the potential of Iran. I also think that people are waking up to the fundamental story that oil is cheap and that what happened was all the different commodities were starting to go and people were looking at this and realizing okay listen silver is going gold's going copper's going you know uranium is going a lot of these commodities are going eventually oil gets dragged along and I think the oil you can make a bold case and you know I did a couple months ago and I'm I'm a big fan of oil um and I think that it's it's one of the things that um you can actually hide like right now it feels scary to me Patrick because all the materials are bid so much and there's a frenzy going on out there and I don't feel comfortable going out and buying like software stocks cuz they're look like death and everything looks like So what do you own as someone that's kind of being partial to the hard asset world and to me oil is a natural place to hide. It feels to me that that's something that not a lot of folks own and that if we did get a severe like correction in the gold, silver, uranium, copper trade, I think that oil will do much better. >> So I think that there's a little bit of a little element of that. So when you ask me about the risk premium, I don't know if it's too much, too little. I I just think that over the longer term, it's a bull sto bull market story. And that even though it's rallied $10 to me it's >> we are we are always we are always in agreement on this and that's the scary part but the point being uh that uh I've generally we've been generally bullish oil about the same time but the thing that uh I want to highlight which is interesting about this market is literally that same skew you talked about on silver um it exists right now in oil because of that premium. So, first of all, let's have a look here. The implied have gone from like 25% to 55% out to the February options on crude oil futures. But there is a very clear I I don't know why there's this kind of weird blip here on it, but there is a very clear fat right tail uh on um on the uh upside of crude oil options. Uh that allows you to do some pretty insane uh um uh option collars the way that we were talking about on silver. Like we're talking about you could be going up to75 and $80 strikes out for uh the just a month and financing 60 and and $55 strike put options below like a total skew where you know you're having like a $15 upside and a $5 downside near zero cost. Uh and so and that's obviously because they're they're pricing in that uh uh geopolitical escalation knowing that you got to you got to price that right tail um to have some some risk premium in it. Uh but that allows you to actually construct some super interesting hedges around this. Oh well listen, I'll leave that to you. I personally don't wouldn't want to give it away yet. So, when I'm talking about silver, we've run from $15 to $115 or whatever the number is, right? Like, so it it it feels later in the game when it comes to >> I'm talking about a 20 I'm talking about a 22-day option. I'm talking about >> Oh, okay. I'm talking about three weeks of price action. >> I just worry that if there's actually an event that you won't have wanted to give away that right tail. >> Okay. you. So, if there's an event, if you made um10 to $15 upside in crude oil in two to three weeks, tell me you wouldn't be profit taking. >> No. Oh. Um depending on the event and and depending on what my other parts of my books, I might not be. >> Yeah. Like if there was like if if and if listen if we went up $15 because there was no event and everyone was just talking about it and there was all sorts of finit guys talking about the imminent, you know, destruction of Iran and it was just all hype, then yeah, I probably would be taking profit on it. But if there was an actual like closing of the Straits of Hormuz, I don't know if I would. >> But but okay, that that I agree. But is what's the likelihood happens in a >> No, no, I listen. I'm just I'm just telling you me personally and I'm not disputing your trade. I I I I hear you. And in this in the grind higher in in in the scenario I gave you earlier where I said it's a bull market. It's headed higher. That is a great trade to do. >> Yeah. >> Right. Like that is the trade you want to do. You're protected on the downside and and you're getting paid to own it. So I hear you and I'm not disputing that. I'm just saying that for me I just I'm just it's to me it's early and I'm just not ready to give away any right tales yet. >> Absolutely. Moving on. Let's uh let's talk uranium. And um so we have this uh this is the U38 U308 futures contract. I'm put on a weekly chart just so that it closes that less illquid uh kind of price action. But we went through what was essentially a 15month bare decline that was giving back gains all through 2024 into uh early 2025. And uh it started to improve through 2025 but really the last five six weeks we have seen a material advance in uranium and that has woken up uh the spud uh and the sput uh the spat physical uranium trust and uh and things have really started to get going. What's interesting is that while uranium stocks have been buzzing for a long time, this is just starting to wake up. And I'm curious whether or not we still have some big upside coming here on uranium. Uh from a physical perspective, any comments before we move on? >> I think it can be squeezed. I think that um the reality is that all of the dgens that have squee they figured out they can squeeze silver. They figured out that they can move gold. I think uranium is even smaller than both those markets by a factor along. Yeah. Like even more. So it is the potential to get squeezed and it's it's an important commodity. And you know there's another one of right tail I wouldn't give up. Like the reality is that you could wake up and that thing could double even though it seems like it's gone a long way. It's a very little part a very little small input part of the cost of rent of running an actual nuclear facility. It doubles and it really doesn't mean anything. So if you get situation where people start stockpiling these things and I think that Patrick the what's really pushed this recently was for a long time the um SPAT wasn't buying >> and they were issuing shares they were trading above NAV and then all of a sudden they issued a prospectus and now all of a sudden they went in there and they were the ones moving the actual underlying commodity and there was it was amazingly thin on the upside. >> Yeah, absolutely. And you know when there's a technical breakout and the thing trades uh up to it or above its net asset value suddenly that discount gone uh this becomes a player on the field right and um and so we're definitely seeing the uranium market waking up. So, I'm going to use Kamico as uh as the kind of um proxy stock of what's going on in the broader uranium stocks. And they've been bullish uh for well over a year or close to a year now. Um and they've had an absolutely amazing run like uh this this Chemico's gone from 35 bucks to $135. And um and the thing is is that you know how the they've almost started going parabolic here. And so while uranium hasn't really been squeezed yet, uh we it feels like it's sort of like uranium's in the third inning of its game uh and uranium stocks feel much more kind of seventh eighth inning of the of their moves. Is that your vibe as well? >> I I don't know. Maybe I I I guess I don't really have a view except that it's part of this this move in the new year that we've seen this huge rotation and we've always talked about this Patrick is that when money starts coming out of those big software and mag seven stocks and it starts going into these underlying you know resource stocks and different you things of that nature. They're so small compared to those big stocks that they're going to send them a long way. And if there's anything we've learned from silver, it's that we should never underestimate the kind of ability for markets to take things way further than we ever could imagine. And so one of the things that I'm going to just be careful about is saying this has gone too far too fast. Yeah. Like of course as a trader I sit there go look it's gone a long way. It's gone too far too fast. But I thought that at at silver at 90 bucks and then it went another 20. So it feels to me that maybe if the if the material trade continues and if we continue to see selling of the mag 7 and the softwares these things could go even further. All right. Well, uh let's let's talk another stock or commodity that has just gone mental and that's uh copper. uh like like literally one after another the the commodity space someone just took billions of dollars and dumped and said give me everything and and it's all all ripping like uh it's insane but we saw a move in copper go up to four uh to up to 650 and then reverses and drops to like six 610 in a in a heartbeat in that whole drop. But like literally as all of these things went mental, um copper joined the party. Like at this stage, uh like it wouldn't shock me if we saw $7 copper here. >> Yeah. Like it's it's nuts. And then one of the things I think you should do instead of looking for the ones that are moving, you should be going and scouring the ones that haven't moved yet that might be the next to move. Right? And I I really do think and I talked about this way back when >> a great example. Can I just give the example of that? Yes. Platinum and platium. >> Yeah. Well, that was one of Yeah, I was gonna say >> you go like gold and silver started moving first and then it was like well these things are just waking up and uh and when they finally joined the party back in December, they never looked back. And uh and it's like you're trying to find which are these lagards that that have been left behind that no one is talking about that that is going to get uh uh you know join that party >> and and I remember talking about that we had used to have these series of rolling mini bubbles. >> Yeah. >> I think that you can apply that to commodities now. One of the things that I've been saying is that it they're just going to go through them one by one and they're going to go and whenever all of a sudden that commodity gets a little tight and then there's some extra demand, it's going to go up and it's going to be the commodity of the of the quarter or maybe of the of the year and then meanwhile 6 months from now it'll be something else. >> Yeah. >> Like like one of the things I'm confident about is that >> six months from now it won't be silver that we're talking about. it that won't be the the the one with all the zip that that is the the kind of the go-to commodity where all the speculation is happening. It'll be something else. >> Yeah. Yep. All right. Well, uh let's talk about the Widowmaker, I guess. >> Now, uh what's >> Big Shout out to our buddy Paulo Macro that nailed this, by the way. He was uh he was standing in there like >> he he was he's a weatherman. He knew those. >> He was he was sitting there and he was he went against him for a while and he was stood there like a champ and he's and he's a little bit of a lunatic. He doesn't just play n gas. He plays like like nickel options way out of the money like a complete DGEN. Anyways, he nailed it. Good for him. Well, proper DJ. All right. Well, listen. Uh what was insane though was that this weather move happened um uh in the um uh what's it called in the uh February contract. Uh and the biggest part of the move all happened in the final days before um it's uh um it was rolled. Obviously this contract still trades by the way, but like it's insane. But this February contract makes a rip. the continuous contract rolled obviously uh to the March contract, but that's insane that that we had this kind of backwardation where we're literally seeing uh the one contract trading virtually double the other one month apart. And what was really frustrating was that the boil didn't own the Feb because the boil is the double or the triple. I don't know what it is, but it's the it's the levered ETF. And I went and looked because when when Paulo was telling me, I'm like, "Okay, do I like go do some boil because I was expecting like an XIV situation because if you had that sort of move >> and with some leverage, you could have a situation where they'd actually the ETF gets stopped out, right? That they just have to they just have to get it in because they are short volatility at the close. Um, so in essence, I was hoping that they would have the the the February and we would have a a wild situation, but it wasn't. It was March and it so it wasn't as fun. It was insane to say none le uh like this is truly this is, you know, mo most people say, "Oh, ho, you guys call it the widowmaker." But if there was ever a an example of widowmaker price action, the thing went to five and a quarter, dropped down to three bucks and went from three to seven uh in in a span of like less than two months. >> Oh yeah. And it and it was and it happened because of like one storm. >> It like it's a wild listen gas traders are a different breed. They're just I I don't really like I don't understand them. And the real problem about Nack Gas trading it is that the the the the proper serious professionals, you'll see all of a sudden Nack Gas will get surprisingly weak or strong midday and you'll be like, "What the hell's happened?" And what you don't realize is that they've all gotten subscriptions to this some sort of service and all that's happened is that the forecast for the weather for like two weeks out has changed. So you never really truly know what's going on in terms of trying to figure out what's going on because you need to have that access to the to the weather data and so you're really trading what people are expecting this forecast to be as opposed to the actual weather to some degree. >> Absolutely. Okay. We can't we can't go this far into the show without circling back to S&P the MAG7s and uh and obviously touching on the FOMC. Well, first of all, let's just get the FOMC out of the way. Clearly um whether Powell stays on or not, there is a new Fed chair coming and uh at least what the markets are pricing in is that uh that um the the FOMC is going to take the knee and remain unchanged for the the first quarter going into the April meeting. Uh I think that last time I checked the probability was like a 73% probability that there is no rate cut move. I was thinking at least some sort of guidance could have caused some sort of a a move in the markets, but nothing. That was uh that was truly in my mind uh a nothing burger kind of FOMC meeting. Uh is this paint dry meetings for the first quarter? >> Well, is is Powell going to be there for two more or one more? >> Uh I thought it was May. So, so the so he's going to be there uh until the April 30th meeting or I think there's like a meeting at the last >> so it is two more. So he'll uh so he'll have the March and the April. Uh >> yeah, I actually thought that this meeting was a little more hawkish than the market did to me that they took the balance of risks and they tilted them back towards neutral as opposed to they were leaning a little bit um to the to the balance of risks being to the downside on the economy and they made it firmly more neutral. I'm not saying that's incorrect, but it seemed to me that that was actually uh a shift from the FOMC and I guess the stir people they the all those traders had already priced that in because it didn't seem to to really affect it. Uh I guess also that the stock traders just didn't care. Like they were too busy trading gold, silver, and and just having fun with everything. Like they just really nobody cared. Like I I like have you ever seen an FOMC meeting that people cared less on? No. No. Uh well, I I personally was paying more attention than I should have because the rates markets have been so dead. Um the the the bond markets have been so trade rangebound that I was I'm just like, what the hell is going to wake them up? What where it's going to get us moving again? And the FOMC just simply offered something that could have played the role of a trigger. And so I was kind of uh I'm waiting to see whether something ever starts up because when the currencies are moving this much and um and you have uh you know uh the commodity markets moving this much you you'd think that um the rates markets would at least be responsive to the type of uh intermarket relationships that are that are emergent and the bond markets just don't give a >> No, they don't. the >> and I would argue that even though you said that the currency markets are moving a lot, they they perked up a little bit >> that you ain't seen nothing yet. >> That that was just that was just the start. >> First inning first inning. >> First I I you know what that's just the that's just the warm-up pitch. >> That's not that's just the warm-up pitch. >> You're crazy. We'll talk about Okay, Steve, I want to talk currencies in a second. All right. But uh but just touching on uh the equity markets, um one thing that I've been very adamant about uh when talking to members and other things is that um while the S&P could let's say gravitate to 7,100 in order for us to have an advance to like 7400, we would need the MAG7s to make a rebound. And I'm not talking a new bull market advance in them, but they were so incredibly oversold that even if they just 50% retraced their losses over a one-mon period, that might be enough to have the tide the water uh level rise enough to get the index to a upper level like 7,400. But so far, uh it was a bit of a mixed bag. Microsoft shot the bed here. I have a I have a heat map here showing what's going on. Um but uh uh Microsoft shot the bed down 12% in its earnings. Uh we >> you shot. >> Yeah, it's the same she can conjugate that verb for me. >> Yeah, absolutely. So the uh uh and so uh we had Meta do the opposite. Up 10% uh on the upside uh on that move and Tesla relatively flat. I mean, it's down 3%, but I wouldn't call that a big earnings reaction on it. So, so far it's kind of a mixed bag. We get Apple in a in an hour or so when we after we're recording this before the Apple earnings and next week we're going to have Google and Amazon. uh and uh and if to me I think for those hanging on for a bull thesis that the market cap weighted indices have another leg higher in the first quarter will at this point in my opinion need the mag sevens at least um rebounding some of their incredibly oversold levels if we have uh the scenario where only two of them uh uh gapped up like meta and um and a the rest of them are either flat or down. There's just not going to be enough uh enough momentum to get these indices higher. And I mean, literally uh the the we were down a 100 S&P points. All the only thing red on the screen were the MAG7s. Everything else was green. Like literally, we were down a 100 S&P points because the MAG7s were selling. And um and so to me th this earnings is really important. We already just got three of them, but if we don't see at least a solid two, three good more beats that really kind of get some money flow back in there. I I whether I think 7,100 could still be printed, but that we are we're getting to a heavy level that's going to be an upper ceiling on this S&P. Whe whether that trigger to begin a a market selloff kicks in imminently is something I'm not ready to make stick my neck out to make a call on. But I don't think there's going to be much money uh made on the S&P longs at this stage. there's going to be a ceiling and and a lot of uh distribution up ahead driven by probably that rotation that we keep talking about with the mag seven selling and but the one thing that's interesting is that you know whatever I I hear different estimates whether it's 300 billion or 500 billion of all the systematic traders between uh between CTAs and uh risk parity and vault targeting funds uh a lot of the trigger points on many of these start around the 6,800 level on the S&P uh on a a weekly basis where uh where at least a lot of the CTAs will start flipping. We'll see whether V realize V increases to to trigger some V targeting fund selling. But we could we could obviously at any point trigger uh systematic selling. And so the balancing act is is well if there's a ceiling and the market isn't able to progress higher the floor keeps rising behind the market uh and we get in a tighter and tighter range making more fragile which is all it needs is one little push something that triggers the systematic traders and we could be in the midst of some sort of a correction. Um you know will that happen in the first quarter? Well I'll tell you this. If the MAG7s can't punch this market to new highs after this earnings, then uh the first quarter will have a correction, uh it's just a matter of will it be in February or March or or what will be the catalyst, but something will inevitably trigger those systematic cycles and we'll have one of these five to 10% corrections that could be bigger if all the wrong things or right things are lining up, which depends if you're bullish or bearish. Um but uh that could get uh some downside momentum. Do you have anything to add to that or? >> Yeah. So um I love repeating the Bruce Ker line which is what I'm really looking for is a market that is not confirming consensus. And what's consensus right now? Consensus is that everything's great. The US economy is about to explode higher. You got to own stocks. You got to be all in on risk. Trump won't let it go down. Uh yada yada yada. Meanwhile, you look at this thing and it isn't like the spoo the spoos looks better actually than the Q's. Q's hasn't hit a new high for three months or four months. >> Um. >> Oh yeah. >> Markets. >> Well, that's because 65% mag sevens. >> Yeah. And uh the reality is that this market is is tired and yet everyone is max bullish. I think there was a chart the other day from the Bank of America that showed how few people are hedging and like buying protection on their portfolio was all-time lows. Um, in terms of >> That's the irony, isn't it? >> Yeah. >> The irony. >> The expectations about the economy are all-time highs. I've, you know, I've anecdotally heard of people that are going to conferences and they were saying how, you know, kind of macro conferences and how everyone's so bullish. And it reminds me very much of last year. Um, in January when I went to the StoneX guys conference, I got there and I suggested that that stocks might go down and that the US dollar might go down. I felt like I was going to get booed off the stage. I haven't gotten invited back. They were going to stone you off the stage. >> Exactly. Imagine the US dollar going down. Imagine US stocks going down. And the thing about the US stocks is everyone keeps you know saying oh all you panickins that are talking about the US stock market and saying sell the US stock market. The reality is that last year uh almost every you know country beat the US stock market in terms of returns and that's just in nominal terms and then when you converted it to US dollar terms it's quite obvious that almost everyone beat them and then when you look at it on a volad adjusted basis it's even more so. So it's it's just to me back to your point that there's market feels like there's a potential uh accident waiting to happen. I completely agree. It feels like everyone's bullish and the market's not going up. That's that's how it feels to me. >> So, uh let's talk about canaries in the coal mine that uh have have or have not been triggered on there. First of all, the breath of the market generally has been rising uh but it's slightly rolled but that's no nowhere near you know alarming that we're we have serious deterioration and divergences of breath. But it'll be very curious to see whether breath starts to deteriorate. We had really nice moves in that equal weight index and uh in the small caps like you could see the money distributing but will we see uh this trend uh uh kind of conver uh diverge back or head back down and not be working as well. That's a canary number one which has not been triggered. I'm just saying things that I feel that need to be watched. Uh the the second thing that I think is the credit markets and the junk bond market has been behaving very well. Things have uh at least on a price level basis, you know, there there is no alarm bells being rung by um the the high yield credit uh stress points showing distribution. That's another canary. And the last one that I'm want to watch is the XLF, which is the financials. So far when they disappointed on their earnings, they retraced, but it could be just a Fibonacci retracement. That could be still uh a bull advance back above the 50-day for another run. But if we see uh financials putting in a topping formation, we turn around see MAG7s not participating, we see credit markets start to roll, we see breath start to deteriorate, then you're going to start seeing uh I'm getting pretty bearish, Kev, uh kind of tone, I I feel like there's a lot of reasons to be bearish, but we haven't seen any canaries start dying in the coal mine that that are the alarm bells that it's imminent. Um, and so, uh, >> so I'll I'll push back on that a little bit. IGV, pull up the software like ETF. >> So, IG >> GV. This is a software basket. >> Yes. >> This is this is stuff that people were long. This a lot of these names are are stuff that, you know, were everyone was telling us were must owns before. Microsoft, Palunteer, Salesforce, Oracle, into it, Apploven, Palo Alto, Adobe, Crowdstrike, Service Now. That's what that basket looks like. And when you pull up the chart, it looks terrible. >> Okay, I'm not going to dis. >> So I I'm I'm going to >> that that Okay. No, but this is Okay, this is the first canary that's dead in the coal mine, which is is No, no, no. Because are you you would have to argue that the >> mag say there's a little herd of canaries or little like cages >> there's different things there's thing there's things that thing like but what you what what becomes more worrisome is when they're start all like dying because like that there's different things >> but I would argue it's a horrible it's not it's not time to buy your insurance when there's like you know eight canaries on the on the floor you know like No, no, then it's too late. >> Yeah, the the insurance company isn't very keen on selling you insurance then. >> So, go buy your insurance. Buy your straw hats in the winter or whatever they say. >> Now, we saved the less the best for last. >> Okay. What is it? >> Cuz what is the most important thing to watch this week? >> The US dollar. >> That's right. And we saved it right for the end. Those listeners that were willing to ride it out right to the end of the show. Um, and but Kev, look, uh, back back in December when the dollar turned up and when it turned up back in October, I was tactically bullish only because I felt from such an oversold state and a basing formation, there was room for the dollar index to do a 50% retrace. So like that we would have just a tactical retrace not a some structural bull market but rather simply what markets do and eb and flow. Uh the dollar index couldn't muster up even a a 38% retracement like it could not uh even get back to a basic fib zone. Then I'm going to put this on a weekly chart. There was basically a a solid base that was established all through the two years of 2023 and 2024 that had the 100 to 10 and 203 level acting like a key support. When this was broken on the liberation daydriven drop on the downside, we weren't able to to beat that. And there's a technical saying that uh what was previously support when broken acts as overhead resistance. This uh the fact that the dollar index spent six months trying to base and turn and couldn't, that's to me a sign that this distribution is still incredibly dominant. And the fact that we've broken down this way, it's when the the yen intervention happened. I want you to have talked about that because I don't know know the story as well as you do probably, but when um we had all of the cross currencies suddenly all moving together. This is a this is when big currency moves happen. uh at minimum uh the the the measured move uh is a direct hit of the 2021 and 18 2018 lows near 90 and that obviously you you would argue that there's a bigger macro story where they could go way lower than that over the long term but I think from a trading perspective um a move down like a six handles further down to the 90 level on the dollar index at this point truly is the path of least resistance. Um, and uh, and the thing is is that like the the currencies like you go through them all and I'll let you talk to ones you want, but like the euro broke out like we could be heading right to 125. Uh, the um, uh, pound uh, broke out of uh, uh, of its uh, June high. You have that big reversal in the yen. I'm going to look at the yen so that we can see it. um not the dollar yen but the inverse and you can see the yen intervention came in right along where all the previous support lines have come in the past. This could be just the beginning of a of a yen move. You have the US dollar CAD breaking back down to lows that we saw over the last two years. The Aussie dollar a fresh breakout like everything is moving. The dollar is getting killed right across the board. You can't ignore this What do you which one do you want to focus on? >> Uh listen, I I don't I the fact that I've chosen the yen over the last year shows you how useless I am at that because my main point was that the US dollar was headed lower and I thought that the yen would be the one that would experience biggest alpha and it wasn't and in in hindsight that was a terrible call. Um I I just want to remind folks though of the fact that they're sitting around and they're looking at uh the changing nature of relationships with the US dollar and the US bond market in terms of when stress happens in the financial system. And uh you know someone said me said to me today, "Oh gosh, it's weird that we're we're having a situation where there we're going to go bomb Iran." Not not you and I, but like US because it was American I was talking to. We're going to go bomb Iran and the US dollar is going for sale and bonds are going down. And I keep, you know, stressing that the reality is that the US is running the a monstrous capital account deficit. They need to you they need to fund it each and every day. And as the um as the world becomes more uncertain, capital is flowing back to the home countries for a variety of different reasons. And I think that this has just started. I I really do. And what's interesting to me with the fact that you highlighted the intervention, there's some debate about whether that the it was definitely done by the Americans. Uh there's some debate if it was Fed or Treasury. I don't know if that matters. To me, the real question is usually they do it on the behest of the Japanese. And did they do it on their own this time? Did they just go screw this, I don't want the yen any weaker? And that's the part and because we saw a day or two later Trump said something like no you know I I think the US dollar is is is fine going down and at his heart I believe that Trump does want lower dollar. I I think that the problem is that once the dollar starts selling off US financial assets are going to go with it. And that is the dilemma that they're facing is that they want a lower US dollar to make it so that their goods are more competitive so that they can, you know, make tractors and compete against the Japanese and the Koreans. And and there's there's nothing wrong with that. Like like the world is imbalanced. The US does have too large of a capital account deficit and it does need to rebalance. The problem is that people want it to rebalance without there being any pain in the financial markets. And that's the part that I'm just pushing back on and saying, "No, you know what? It's going to rebalance." And the rebalance is going to mean lower US stocks. And at the same time, it's going to mean more jobs for middle America. And it's just that that process is not something everyone wants. And people have rightfully said, "Oh, but Trump won't want to take the pain. Maybe he won't." But there's there at the same time, Patrick, people aren't going to continue funding the largest deficit in the world when you go around and you start threatening your allies, right? Like like that's that's the problem. Like they're sitting there running the largest, you know, capital account deficit in the world and then they're threatening the very people that are lending them the money. And so put aside your politics. Put aside, you know, what you want to be done. put aside what you think is fair whether you know I you know people say you know the US has been paying too much of NATO and and sure maybe that's the case put away all those things and just ask yourself what is the market going to do based upon what is happening trade the market you you not the market you want the market you have in front of you and to me with this sort of volatility and this instability in terms of global politics it's pretty clear to me that eventually that's going to mean a flight out of the us by the very people that are funding those deficits. >> There you go. You heard it from Kev. All right. Listen, Kev, just one closing thing I want to show you. >> Okay, >> look at Bitcoin the bed. Well, like but but what what's what's crazy to me is uh I always actually suspected that there would be uh some sort of correlation between gold and bitcoin because there's sort of this alternative to the dollar thing. But Bitcoin is literally selling while gold is going parabolic and the dollar is weak. It's like uh it it it someone's hitting the bid. >> Yeah. The other thing is Patrick, have you seen all this like brew haha about how much gold Tether has bought. >> So Tether has gone and invested I can't remember what the number is. There was an article article in FT some crazy number. I don't know what it is. 16 tons. I don't know what the it's just some obscene number like basically the largest uh individual kind of uh corporate or or government buyer has been Tether over the last year of gold. So they're just buying and storing it. So it's kind of funny like what if they're turning their their digital assets into hard assets, right? And like what if that's the transfer that's going >> Yeah. And I and I think that there's more to that story than we than we know and that we should probably all pay attention to it because I suspect that the that Tether was going to like we're going to look back and go, "Oh, Tether was a big part of this this precious metal rally." >> Yeah. Kev, listen, me and you, we could honestly talk for two hours. Like there's shitloads of charts we didn't even touch on, but like uh we got to keep this a little bit tighter. So, like I I I I I'm going to have to just basically stop stop us here and uh and we'll we'll continue talking charts in the next episode. Anyway, um >> all right folks, thanks for tuning in. >> Yeah. >> Um you know, bull market, bare market, we're just happy to spend some time together on this crazy ride. Before we sign off though, Patrick, where can they find you? Uh you can find me at bigpicturetrain.com or uh and follow me on my YouTube channel patrick_suresna. It's uh uh I'm now started Kev uh doing a little macro outlook every morning Monday through Thursday at uh uh at 9:30 a.m. just to give everyone a a live stream of what's going on in the markets. So if you guys want to check out my uh morning updates, check out my channel. It's live streaming every morning at the open. That's awesome. I'm sure Danny's very pleased with that. Uh, more work for the poor guy. Uh, so listen, it was >> his idea. >> It was his idea. Okay, we'll have to learn find out more about that. All right, bare market, bull market. We're just happy to spend some time together now. Stick around for the after show. >> Kevin, and where can they find you? >> Uh, don't worry about it. Everyone knows where they can find Danny. How you doing, buddy? >> I'm good. How are you? >> Does he need help doing the live stream? He must, right? It's much easier on Danny. >> Yeah, he he needs a fluffer. >> Danny is an amazing fluffer. >> Jesus Christ. This This went dark really quick. >> All right. Um, what are you guys up to in terms of your like anything exciting? >> I'm heading I'm heading out to uh Mexico City. I'm going to do a week-long mastermind out there with my uh uh flying in my inner circle of members. Uh be trading live for an entire week. Uh and I can't think of a more interesting week to do it in. Like it's going to be uh like uh a lot of action and uh I'm going to have a lot of fun. >> Patrick, by the way, you chose a good week to not be coming home to Canada. Did you see what happens in terms of the snow? >> We got a lot for Toronto. We got like a couple of feet plus. But the other thing about it though is you know how usually our snow is so um wet and gross like kind of like that Whistler terrible snow. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Send your hate mail to P Patrick. He hates Whistler. Um uh the All the Vancouvers are going to be mad at me for that comment. Um so it's usually really really slushy snow cuz it's like by the lake. This was so cold, Patrick, that it was the fluffiest like, you know, rebel stoke high up in the alpine snow I've ever seen in Toronto. >> You know what's crazy is my my son sent me a video uh of him uh there was a huge snow drift out his on his balcony and he just basically went and jumped in and he just disappeared. Just like he sunk right into it like >> it was actually awesome. Gone. I I was actually in Ottawa though visiting uh my daughter and uh it was so cold there Patrick it was Winnipeg cold like it was like it was approaching the minus30 handle >> like without without windchill like it was like >> and that's Celsius everyone. >> Yeah, but actually they converge at that point. It's not much different. Um the uh so it was really cold. It was like long underwear cold. It was cold. Anyways, Danny, what are you up to? Um, what am I up to this weekend? >> Nothing. Oh, boring, isn't it? >> Yeah, that is boring. You're just going to be splicing videos. >> Yeah, pretty much. I mean, we've had we've had a bad storm here, so there's not really much we can do. >> What? What? What? You're in Portugal. Like, what do you mean a storm? Like, it's raining. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's like It's like monsoon like hurricane >> wind. We were we were we were doing uh uh the interview with Chase and um and Danny uh had to stop the interview halfway through cuz he he was traveling when he we had when Chase was available and so he had to do it from his car. >> Yeah. >> And uh and the storm was so bad he thought he like you tell the story Danny. I'm not I don't want to >> Yeah. So >> that's fine. But you know as you do you know you can do the huddle from from your car just so everybody understands that that is possible. But um yeah the wind was so bad that um yeah the whole the whole car was just like rocking back and forth to the point where I was like oh I need to everybody around >> embarrassing. >> Yeah. Yeah. I know >> that is okay. Well, anyways, listen. We'll take have a great time in Mexico. Danny, I hope that the uh the car rocks back and forth for other reasons apart from your snow your storm next. >> And everyone, stay safe out there. Trade smaller. It's a very volatile market. Be careful out there. And thanks for tuning in. We'll see you in a couple weeks. >> Thanks everyone.