| | | In This Issue | 8 min read |
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Grand unifying theories |
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| |  | | Ever notice how the kookiest ideas about how the world really works come from mega-rich men? And doesn’t Marc Andreessen look a little too much like Dr. Evil? | Warner Bros. Pictures | | | The Week in Markets | | What’s going on with gold? | Last week presented a financial riddle, wrapped in a market mystery, tucked inside a geopolitical enigma: if investors buy gold when they’re nervous — and they’re definitely nervous right now — then why did gold just have its worst weekly loss since 1983? And why is it down nearly 15% since the U.S. and Israel began attacking Iran? Especially since stocks keep falling and energy prices keep rising? All that should, in theory, drive people to their favourite OG refuge from inflation, war, and stock turmoil: gold. And yet!
An old investing aphorism has been popping up lately that might explain this dark and confusing moment we’re in: “When people are worried about the future, they buy gold. When people are worried about the present, they sell gold.” Yes, folks are scared about the war’s long-term fallout, but they’re also getting mighty spooked that the belligerents have no obvious off-ramp, so it’s increasingly difficult to guess when things might calm down. In the meantime, investors want plenty of cold, hard cash close by in case of a margin call, for instance, or in case the violence gets even worse.
| | | | | | | The Chart of the Week |  | | |
BYD Watch: rolling out the red carpet for cheap EVs. On the heels of PM Mark Carney’s recent deal with China to bring down tariffs on 49,000 Chinese electric vehicles per year, EV giant BYD is planning a major push into Canada, including up to 20 dealerships in the GTA within the year and perhaps a wholly owned factory within a few more. The factory plan is bound to become a flash point: unions will fight to keep foreign competition out, so Ottawa is likely to insist on a joint venture, which BYD says is a nonstarter. Demand for cheaper electric cars is heating up, so we’ll see who blinks first. | |
Two Canadian crypto bros sold token shares of low-income rental properties in Detroit. Guess what happened next. Beginning in 2019, two Canadians — “literal crypto bros,” according to this Wired investigation — began buying up hundreds of Detroit properties, which they converted into rentals, then they sold shares in them for as low as $50 in crypto. The conditions of the homes plunged — one reporter documented rats, roaches, mould, non-working appliances, and freezing conditions — and now the brothers are facing lawsuits, as well as millions in overdue property taxes, water bills, and blight tickets. |
the hottst new rich-guy powerr move: not fxing your typos.. according to both the wsj and business insider, the “global elite’ have lost all interest in spellng & punctuating proprly, citing jack dorsey’s almost entirely lowercase mimo laying off nearly half of brick’s workforce, david ellison mispelling his own name in a text to fellow hollywoood ceo “daivd” zaslav, and, of course, the almost performatively sloppy emails of convicted sex crepe jeffrey epstein. is it evidence,, as insidr posited, of “an inverse correlation btw power and proper punctuation”? Or — maybe they just dont want anyone ot think AI wrote there emails.
—Claire Porter Robbins
|  | | The FOMO Index | | by Stacey Woods | | Important | | ☕ | Tim Hortons mugs recalled for breaking when filled with hot liquid. In fairness, hot liquid in cups has never been their strong suit.
Source | | | | 🏭 | American factory pays human worker to oversee robot worker. Looking to hire a cyborg to fire them both.
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| 💬 | Study finds texting strangers is better for lonely people than talking to chatbots. And nothing’s better for everyone else than texts from lonely strangers.
Source | | | | 🎬 | First-ever app for vertical indie films launches. Wes Anderson wondering how he’ll fit ensemble cast and all their vintage suitcases into 9:16.
Source | | | | | | Crash & Burn | |  | | To the Moon | | | 🤬 | Software company Atlassian accused of illegally firing employee for suggesting CEO is a rich jerk. C’mon, an insult that lazy only deserves a warning.
Source | | | | 👗 | Mathematicians determine clothes come back in style every 20 years. They proved it with the complex Euclidean Look Around You theorem.
Source | | | | |  | |  | | ⭐ | Woman furnishes her apartment with piece of Oscars red carpet she found in the dumpster. See? Hollywood still matters.
Source | | | | 😸 | B.C. cat flouts international law by crossing the border several times a day. Not to mention she’s keistering tons of catnip.
Source | | | | | | | Who Cares? | | | The Big Important Story | | The super-duper rich guy theory of everything | | Throughout history obscenely rich business guys have held and espoused some awfully esoteric views. Shipping and railroad tycoon Cornelius Vanderbilt believed that he could communicate with dead business rivals through mediums. Henry Ford thought that in a past life he had died in the Battle of Gettysburg. These days the super wealthy and powerful seem bent on one-upping the oligarchs of yesteryear by expressing ever-stranger ideas about the world and the future. A sampling: | |  |
Big idea: Don’t fear AI; fear the Antichrist
If Thiel, a venture capitalist and PayPal co-founder, has taken anything away from the past 300 years, it’s that democracy has been a big, embarrassing mistake. Progress is the by-product of singular breakthroughs, and the only way to make such gains is to let visionaries like, natch, Peter Thiel do more or less whatever they want. The problem with democracy is that it leaves the future up to peons who let concerns over climate change, AI, or nuclear war stifle progress. Another related problem is the Antichrist, a figure (maybe Greta Thunberg?) who convinces the public that regulation will lead to peace and safety but instead drives nations into stagnation and decline. |
Big idea: Everyone, especially Elon, needs to have more babies
Musk’s worldviews are so inconsistent they require their own Wikipedia page. One conviction he doesn’t waver on is that civilization will crumble if people don’t have more children. To be sure, he doesn’t necessarily want everyone having more babies — mostly just folks of high intelligence in developed nations. He has done his part by fathering at least 14 mini-Musks and has plans for more. “To reach legion-level before the apocalypse, we will need to use surrogates,” he reportedly texted one of his baby mamas. |
Big idea: No! More! Countries!!!
According to the former Coinbase CTO, there’s no problem that decentralization can’t solve. Like: the problem of running a thriving country. In his vision of the so-called Network State, people will connect online and form a decentralized nation that will not be hemmed in by pesky old-world obstacles, like living on the same geographic land mass. Through collective action and shared national identity, Balaji’s blockchain nation will earn diplomatic recognition from preexisting states and grow into a global power. He calls it “tech Zionism.” |
Big idea: Introspection is for build-nothing crybabies
Andreessen, a VC and an early Facebook investor, has been espousing techno-optimist hot takes for years — like when he claimed that “any deceleration of AI will cost lives” and that anyone who blabs about the importance of “social responsibility” or “tech ethics” is an enemy of progress. Just last week he claimed that introspection literally did not exist 400 years ago when “the great men of history” were shaping Western civilization. That’s why he self-reflects “as little as possible” — so he can help humanity march toward its AI-powered paradise without worrying about tech’s dystopian fallout. |
Big idea: the world runs on a big cycle that no one can stop
The founder of hedge fund Bridgewater has spent his career predicting American and/or Western decline based on the belief that the world runs on a Big Cycle. Empires rise, debts accumulate, conflicts emerge. Eventually a new empire rises, and so on every 50 to 100 years. His conviction that the U.S. will soon become a Big Cycle victim helps explain why he has predicted 20 of the last two recessions. Doom is always close at hand for Dalio! Fortunately, he published an entire book of business bon mots to help us thrive amid the upheaval — like “dreams + reality + determination = a successful life.”
—Mia Mercado
| | The Big Read | | 🌴 I taught my son everything except how to take a vacation | We adore Taffy Brodesser-Akner for her celebrity profiles and world-class storytelling, but her latest piece is more personal: she takes her college-bound son on his first-ever tropical getaway and tries to teach him how to relax — something she has never learned. | NYT*
*Article is paywalled, which, yeah, is kind of annoying. But we think good journalism is worth paying for.
| | | Post of Wisdom | |
 | | Thoughts on Today’s Issue? | | | | | This week’s newsletter contributors: Brennan Doherty (writer), Devin Gordon (writer), Claire Porter Robbins (writer), Stacey Woods (writer), Ambrose Martos (fact checker), Ciara Rickard (copy editor), Maude Campbell (copy editor), Sara Black McCulloch (fact checker), Eva Grace Clement Cruz (specialist, product engagement), Setareh Sarmadi (senior editorial producer), Matthew Karasz (markets editor), Jared Sullivan (senior editor), Peter Martin (senior editor), and Devin Friedman (editor-in-chief).
TWIM: Total returns shown in local currency, via TradingView. | | | |
