← Doug Casey's Take
Doug Casey's Take
The Era Of Big Man Politics
00:27:30
Article Mentioned: https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/every-fkin-day-bro-glimpse-life-hedge-fund-manager-under-trump-20 Join us in Uruguay for our Plan B Conference: https://www.crisisinvesting.com/p/the-plan-b-uruguay-conference-with-72c In this...
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- [00:02]
A
All right.
- [00:02]
B
Good morning, Doug. We are going to talk about the confusing life of a hedge fund manager. And I really think Everybody under Trump 2.0 is a friend of yours whose, I guess his tweet was shared on Zero Hedge. I'll share with people here, the title of it was Every Effin Day, Bro. A Glimpse into the Life of a Hedge Fund manager under Trump 2.0. And he goes through and basically describes the insanity he's trying to deal with with the news flow and trading it. You know, wake up. Check what Trump tariffed overnight. Cambodia up 200%, Paraguay down 3%. Brew some coffee, et cetera, et cetera. You forwarded this to me because you thought it was pretty amusing and it is. And we'll share in the link to this so everybody can check it out for themselves. But, yeah, what are your thoughts?
- [00:51]
A
Yeah, well, it's hilarious and it kind of underlines the fact that the whole world revolves around Trump these days, which is pretty, pretty much the way Trump wants it. Because I have no question that, of course I, I think that psychiatry and most of psychology, it's all, it's all made up stuff. But some of the terms that they've coined are descriptive and accurate. He's an egomaniac. No question about that. He's a megalomaniac. The way he thinks gigantically big and not just with his own assets, but with everybody else's assets. But, you know, he's got to think big these days because when he's out of office, the people that don't like him are going to counter attack. So he's got to. The next thing that's going to happen in the, over the next few years is, is he's going to have to prosecute and jail and massively fine lots and lots of people that are currently in the government to defang them so that they don't put him in jail when, when he's out of office. But this is all part of a general syndrome. The constantly doing things and the taxes and the tariffs and the sanctions. It's, it's actually chaotic.
- [02:20]
B
It's chaotic and it seems intentional. Bill Bonner refers to it as like, I don't know if he calls it big man politics, but he says essentially that we're in a, we're in the rule of a big man and he just does things. And I mean, it's quite chaotic and confusing. And we were talking before we started about the, you know, signal to noise ratio, basically that it's just, it keeps, you know, initially it was The, The Doge stuff you saw kind of maybe kept the Democrats, like, on their back foot, but now I feel like the news, all the news flow basically keeps everyone on their back foot not knowing what the hell's really going on. And there's one new thing after another that sort of jumps into the, you know, media sensation for a period of time. I mean, it was the Epstein thing, which was bad for Trump, but for. For a week. And then. So then they, you know, rolled out this. We're going after Obama and look at all the stuff they did here at Russiagate, you know, and then the DC Home rule stuff comes out, and then the peace deal all of a sudden with the Congo, and then this Trump corridor in Azerbaijan and Armenia, and it's just wild. I mean, how much the news flow. It's impossible to keep up with. And they even know what's meaningful.
- [03:36]
A
Yeah. For. For a theme song, I. I like ymca, which is kind of the regime's current theme song, but he could easily replace it with Billy Joel's We Didn't Start the Fire, where they're naming all these crazy things that are going on. So where's the. Where. Where is this. Where is this going to end? One thing that's for sure is that creating all this chaos, it's impossible to plan. And if you're going to run a business or. Or life is going to proceed, you have to have some kind of plan. But when things. When you feel like a bear in a shooting gallery getting hit, going back and forth and trying to dodge things constantly, it just doesn't work. And, you know, imports to the US Are going to collapse because if you're shipping things, you don't know what's going to happen to the costs and the tariffs. By the time you get there, businesses won't be able to export. I mean, anything can happen at any moment. It's crazy.
- [04:53]
B
Yeah. I think what people don't understand is there's actually. It's very difficult to find out what exactly the tariffs would be on certain goods that you're shipping into the US like if you're shipping something from China that also has steel components in it, you know, hey, it's special. So, like, how do you break that down. Exactly. And present it to the customs officer appropriately so that it'll get through.
- [05:20]
A
Yeah. And then he interprets things differently. So it's tied up in customs while it's argued out in the courts or whatever. I mean, this is the best thing to do, is not do anything until there's some Stability so you can act. Best thing is not to do anything so you don't get caught in the switches too badly.
- [05:42]
B
Right. Because if you're going to put something on a boat from China, it's going to take two months or whatever for it to finally arrive at dock or however long. And how can you be sure that the things won't totally change between now and then? And then, if they, like what, what happens if, you know, if the deal totally changes, I would assume some customs official or doesn't like the documents and it ends up sitting in a warehouse that you have to pay fees on until it gets resolved. You know, it's, it's impossible, I think, to plan well.
- [06:13]
A
Well, customs officials, maybe they're going to have to hire a lot more customs officials. And speaking of customs officials, they're closely related to ICE officials, of which am I, am I correctly informed? They're supposed to be hiring 100,000 new ICE people.
- [06:32]
B
That sounds right, because of, I remember the increase in budget was going from like 6.7 billion to 70 billion for.
- [06:43]
A
ICE, something like that. An unbelievable number. And, and the other thing is, I understand, of course, you don't know what information comes out as a troll and how much of it's just misinformation or disinformation, but I understand, or I've been told that there's a $50,000 bonus to people that sign up to be ICE agents. Have you heard that?
- [07:07]
B
Really? I haven't.
- [07:10]
A
Well, it's just like, just like Cuppy's very funny article points out, it's impossible to keep up with the news cycle.
- [07:19]
B
I mean, I, Yeah, I have no idea. Is there a hiring bonus? I mean, that would be wild if that's true. So, yes. Assigning bonus of up to 50,000 for new hires across roles like deportation officers, criminal investigators and attorneys.
- [07:50]
A
That's amazing. I mean, they're gonna, they're gonna be able to round up the lame and the halt and the blind to collect that $50,000 bonus and get to boss around their fellow citizens and arrest them. But know, I always look at the bright side on things, and I see a possible bright side. It's that TSA will empty wholesale to join ICE to collect that bonus. So at least there'll be less TSA agents because.
- [08:19]
B
Yeah, just, just mean, longer lines, though, Doug.
- [08:23]
A
Well, I don't want to fly anymore, but although I, I, I guess, I guess other than flying back to the US Which I'm going to do Friday, the next trip I make after that, I guess we're both going to go to Azerbaijan in October, so, so that I can collect my honorary degree from the university there.
- [08:53]
B
Honorary doctorate, no less.
- [08:55]
A
No less. At least I hope it's no less. And I hope I can read the degree in addition. And while we're there, perhaps we'll pop across the border to Armenia. Two countries that were deadly enemies that are now bosom buddies. And that's something that Trump has arranged too. Of course. The question I have is, well, how did he manage to arrange this? You know, two perpetual lifelong enemies are now bosom buddies. And the only the Trump court, or what is that thing that he's. Is a country divided in two. They have an enclave or an exclave actually, that is divided by Armenia. That's one of the things they're fighting over.
- [09:44]
B
So Trump is, it's called the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity that will now join those two.
- [09:52]
A
Yes, that's great. Well, and it's called Trump. He likes that too. But the, the question is how much is he having to pay the Armenians and the Azerbaijanis to make nice with each other? I mean it just how much is he having to pay the Congolese and the Rwandans? And of course it's kind of stupid talking about the Congolese and the Rwandans because there are so many gangs and private armies and breakaway groups there. Who's getting paid off to stop fighting, at least for a while. So that's not going to last. But it's costing the US Lots of money to pour oil on the water at these places. That's the only way you can stop these people is by paying them off.
- [10:40]
B
Yeah, and we don't hear about, you know, we only hear about the high level deal terms. You know, we don't hear the other side of the transaction. So it all looks like just more winning for Trump, you know, like the, like the European deal where Europe was going to pay tariffs and then they're going to force their companies apparently to buy double the energy from the US and their other companies to invest directly into the US but there was nothing shown for what Europe is getting out of it. But I think in all these deals that are done, the other party must get something out of it. And I think that's left off the page.
- [11:19]
A
Yeah, totally. And, and the, the threats and, and the under the table payoffs to high government officials in those places because, you know, Rwanda and Congo, they're not, they're kind of like not real countries to start with. So some the officials want to profit and get paid off. You know, hopefully it'll come out sometime. It'll be a comedy.
- [11:44]
B
Yeah, but it's wild. It's just, it really is hard to keep up with it all. And you know, so like, you know, when you look at signal versus noise going to that, one of the things that is still clear in all of this, we see some things and maybe some of it's good that Trump's doing. I mean, obviously if you do get Rwanda and Congo to stop killing each other, that's a good thing. Right. And if you get actually do resolve this apparently intractable problem with Armenia and Azerbaijan, that's great. But we don't really know the other side of those deals that we already talked about.
- [12:18]
A
What's, what's Trump doing in Sudan, which is another area of chaos?
- [12:24]
B
You know, I haven't, but it doesn't mean that something hasn't been announced. I just could have missed it.
- [12:30]
A
Listen, if he's going to hold down the Nobel Priest Peace Prize, which he apparently desperately wants, he's going to have to solve that, too.
- [12:38]
B
So he's got to solve this problem with Ukraine on Friday, I think, to really. In order to get that Nobel Peace Prize. Yeah, that's the big one. And that, and that, that whole situation is very weird, too. All of a sudden they're going to get together and, you know, Zelensky says we're not doing anything and, you know, we're not going to give up those lands or whatever, the Donbass, I guess. And it's just really, it seems, it seems last minute thrown together, you know, and I'm surprised that Putin would agree to it even. But it's all very strange.
- [13:15]
A
One thing that it seems to me is they've got to cut Zelensky out of the equation. Not just because he's still wearing these, you know, full combat T shirts everywhere, which is kind of inappropriate, quite frankly. I mean, beyond a certain point. I mean, enough is enough of that. But he's a multi billionaire at this point. He doesn't need this stuff. And not that I care about popular elections anywhere, but he's ruling the Ukraine illegitimately. He's not the president. He kibosh that. So they ought to just cut him out of the. Anyway, the polls, if you can believe them. But I believe these says that almost none of the Ukrainians want to keep this war fighting. And why should they? Because they're all basically Russians in those provinces that Putin was rescuing from the attacks of the Ukrainian government before. So people probably finally figured that out. So maybe Trump can solve this by cutting out Zelensky.
- [14:25]
B
Well, all you have to do is stop giving them military support or intelligence support. Right. And that would end right away. So, I mean, there's a way he could have ended it.
- [14:35]
A
Yeah, it could have. Could have ended this months ago, But. But who. Who knows? We're dealing with. We're dealing with the schizophrenic. Although what I read. And of course, who knows the quality of anything that anybody reads? They say that on a personal level, that Trump. Trump is reasonable and. And mild and nice and good company. Personally, he's not the bombastic idiot that he comes across as a lot of the time in public. So who knows who we're dealing with here?
- [15:13]
B
Yeah, it's hard to know, but we do know that our national debt crossed 37 trillion. I mean, but it seems like it used to be a major milestone. Every time we added a new trillion, now they just kind of go by basically unnoticed because it's happening so fast anymore.
- [15:31]
A
Yeah, deficits. Deficits don't matter. So Dick Chase was apparently right about something.
- [15:37]
B
He was right about. I guess he was. Hate to admit that, but. Yeah, but the thing is, is that, you know, there's a signal through noise. Signal noise. Thing is that despite Doge, despite the efforts to. Despite all the revenue that's been raised through tariffs, which has been a lot. Bill Bonner, I think, calls it the largest tax increase on Americans in history, actually. But despite all that, they still added since the day they raised the debt ceiling, which was when the big, beautiful bill was passed. $780 billion in new debt. That's like over four or five weeks.
- [16:20]
A
Yeah.
- [16:21]
B
That's shocking.
- [16:23]
A
Well, and the thing with the tariffs is that it's presented as a good thing that this money is going to the government, but that's a bad thing. I want to deny revenue to the state. I don't want to see the state get any money at all. So it has to fire all of its employees and minions and bureaucrats who serve no useful purpose. They make things worse. But. But, you know, Trump sells this, like, more revenue to the government is a good thing. Like it's solving something. But he's not cutting taxes to make up for the extra income. It's.
- [17:04]
B
No, he's not at all. And I just want to go back quickly, this ICE thing, because I. I looked it up. You know, the $50,000 signing bonus. They also get student loan repayment and forgiveness options. They can get a 20. They get basically a pay increase. If they have law enforcement background, they get administratively uncontrollable overtime pay for enforcement removal operations and enhanced retirement benefits. So those are all benefits they get.
- [17:39]
A
That sounds like a good deal. I mean, it does. Forget about the preparation. Just.
- [17:49]
B
Exactly. I know, it's amazing. So, so while we're. So we're not firing government employees, we're hiring government employees, spending the money everywhere and we're, we're hiring them with fifty thousand dollar signing bonuses. I mean, that's actually shocking. And the thing is that he's British. You know, I remember we were talking about the idea of a sovereign wealth fund that, well, the country being in debt shouldn't have a sovereign wealth fund. But it makes sense within the thinking that Trump seems to have because, you know, again, he's looking at trying to like revenue drivers, this Golden Visa thing, stuff like that. You know, what can I sell, where can I generate the revenue? And also how can I do a deal that generates revenue? And he did these two deals with AMD and Nvidia, that kind of, I mean, hardly. I mean, I barely came on my radar about it, but it's pretty amazing actually. So, you know, they were, there was a ban where they couldn't sell these processors to China and China didn't like that. And of course, neither did Nvidia and amd. It was bad for business for them to lose that market. So Trump basically said, okay, you're an American company because they are registered in the US but they make their products in Taiwan. He said, so any product that you sell, any of these processors you sell not to the US Basically that you export, you now have to pay the US Treasury a 15% royalty on. So 15% of the revenue goes to the federal coffers now of any chip sales by Nvidia or AMD, not to.
- [19:30]
A
The U.S. but wait, that's not a law that's gone through Congress. Not that I care about that, but this is just an arbitrary imposition on Trump's part.
- [19:41]
B
Yeah, well, he strong armed him into a deal. They agreed to it. But yeah, yeah, it's, I'm sure they probably felt like they probably did the math and said, well, we really want access to the global markets and it's just do a basic, you know, it's worth it to them to do it, I guess.
- [19:59]
A
Well, you know, I guess in this crazy world, it's better than cutting China off from these chips because that would act as an impetus for China to develop its own chips and its own bigger and better chip industry because they'd have to do it and they can do it. So I suppose this is the, you know, the best alternative. But it's more money to the government and it's. I'm afraid Trump is going to get out of control. I mean, I think he sees himself as being on a roll where everything he does matters a lot and it does matter a lot. But this could get very serious. He's only six months into his reign.
- [20:48]
B
Yeah, it's wild and I, but I just wonder. There's a lot of complicating factors by all the major changes he's making. You talked about how, you know, imports into the US are probably going to collapse because of the uncertainty that everyone has. But also just even the like, how do you get these, what are the details of how who's going to actually make this Trump corridor in, you know, Armenia work? You know, like who's going to do like all because they sign an mou, basically is what they leave with. But like all the details, stuff to be done and I just wonder if they even have the, the people that, you know, they can actually even do the deal beyond the headlines. You know what I mean?
- [21:34]
A
Yeah. How does it work? Is it, I'm sure that there's already a road, but in the end make it a four lane highway with a wall on both sides to keep people from jumping the border. Who the hell knows what they're going to do, but the fact that they have a deal. Somebody's getting paid off.
- [21:57]
B
Yeah, definitely somebody's getting paid off. Doug, any tips for how you cut through the noise and what to focus on to even understand what's happening and to make reasonable decisions?
- [22:11]
A
Well, I'm a fan of classical music and I would much rather here when I look at or listen to what's going on in the world today, I'd much rather hear a Beethoven or a Brahms symphony than I would chaotic static and noise as opposed to the symphony. So I think it's going to get more chaotic and I think the way that governments usually settle these things in the long run are by fighting it out with wars. So who's going to be next? I don't know. From an investment point of view, I remain long gold and long silver and.
- [22:55]
B
Long.
- [22:58]
A
Gold mining stocks and copper mining stocks for that matter. I think they're both, they've been doing, they've been doing great in the last few months and they're going to do better. So, you know, that's, that's good because all we can do as little people is insulate ourselves as best we can from these Elephants running around crushing everything.
- [23:22]
B
Yeah, they really are crushing everything. So it's hard to.
- [23:27]
A
And I'm happy to be here in Argentina, where I am at the moment, or in Uruguay, where you are right now. So good place to be, it's mellow, things are going in the right direction, you know, and looking at other speculations, I'm thinking, you know, since Trump is going to dethrone Powell and replace him with somebody that'll do as he's told, we can presume that the US Government is going to do their best to drop short term interest rates, which the Fed can do to half their current level. Something like that. Okay. And at the same time, the way they'll do that, the consequences of it are to create more money, which means more inflation, which means that long term interest rates are going to go up as a, for a lot of reasons. So that would be a good long term speculation to be short, short term interest rates and long, long term interest rates, betting that they're going to go up. Not easy to do because of a lot of slips between the cup and the lip. But if you look down the road a couple of years, I think that's going to work out as a really good trade.
- [24:50]
B
Yeah. And it also definitely means, though, the dollar is going to continue to disintegrate under all of this.
- [24:58]
A
Yeah, no question. There's no way around it. The dollar is going to, it's going to have its appointment in Samarra.
- [25:10]
B
Yeah, it's coming. So I mean, if there's one trade you can bet on that any of the dollar is going to go down. And so try owning real stuff. Makes sense. So.
- [25:20]
A
Yeah. And the only danger in that is perhaps there will be a credit collapse in the short run. So much debt in the world if the government doesn't bail out entities and then it's a daisy chain of collapse. But in the long run, yeah, the dollar is going to reach its intrinsic value.
- [25:42]
B
But you got to imagine that they would do given the precedent that has been set by Trump, you know, these extraordinary measures he seems to be willing to take, that they'll bail out whoever they need to along the way, don't you think? I mean.
- [25:57]
A
Yeah, yeah, I think there's no doubt about that. And it sets up a very bad precedent for the next president who's going to come into office in a really, really chaotic environment. And of course he'll do even more. So, you know, the U.S. republic is dead, dead, dead. And the empire, everybody will recognize that's really the case now.
- [26:22]
B
A collapse. All right. Well, I guess on that note, I think we'll wrap up for today, Doug, but you're, you're, you're going to be traveling on this week, so we won't be back till next week, I guess, for our next episode.
- [26:39]
A
Let me see. The driver is going to pick me up here at 5 o' clock for a 9 o' clock plane because it's Friday on a long weekend in Buenos Aires. So it's going to be a hassle getting to the airport and blah, blah, blah. So we could probably do something on Friday if anybody has any questions to send in.
- [27:01]
B
All right, well, if you've got some good questions for Doug, make sure you go to crisisinvesting.com if you're a subscriber. You can post them there in the chat actually that we have or on file, you can produce on file co. So send in your questions and we'll save them for Doug. So, yeah, if you're up for it on Friday, we can do it or maybe over the weekend. But either way, we'll get one in this week.
- [27:24]
A
We'll figure it out. Ok.
- [27:27]
B
Thanks, Doug. Appreciate it.