The ACID Capitalist Podcast

Send us a textMacro Confessions Part XXXII, The Sweeney Alchemist (@writes_sweeney) is worried that the Acid Capitalist (@hendry_hugh), has been detained in Kyiv en route back to his Blessed isle. Recent images reveal a stark concrete bunker. Just where is he this week? He calls upon the aid and inspirational insight of the political economist @MkBlyt, The Tangerine Bishop of Dundee. It's an unforgettable, Scottish ménage-à-trois that will have you reaching for the closed caption service sooner rather than later.Men in finance have a tendency to talk to themselves, to be swallowed up in a grey, prohibitive universe to the exclusion of the rest of us. Not here...the bunker gets the spray can graffiti treatment, bass guitars are played loud and badly by the Acid Cap and with a swinging rhythm by The Bishop.What wanna hedgie can resist the exploration of money by those in the know. The contracts governing the external economic relationships of sovereign nations are revealed for all to see. Myths are exploded. Gold, Bretton Woods and the Eurodollar system are assessed and judged. The boys can see a fourth turning point emerging in this mysterious chess game between continents. But what will replace our dying monetary order? The question is pursued with vigour.Take red pills, get angry, get even...a market based system that seemed set to reset asset values to zero was effectively rescued by a put option, previous generations called it a cross of gold. A system of winners and losers. Where asset values have to be maintained to support the debt, a support system paid for by the serfdom of the working classes.Either divide our monolithic world into smaller pieces that aren't too big to fail or award asset values to the debtors, to those unlucky enough to be unable to afford assets. Rather than have the Fed accumulate $7 ton of useless laundromat tokens via QE, lets distribute economic tokens to the 99%. Thatcher did it with the public assets. All privatised. The public housing stock, returned to the home seekers. Awarding assets to the majority sparked the moribund economies of the 1970s back into life, could it work again?? The Bishop has a proposal...⬇️ Subscribe on Patreon or Substack for full episodes ⬇️https://www.patreon.com/HughHendryhttps://hughhendry.substack.comhttps://www.instagram.com/hughhendryofficialhttps://blancbleustbarts.comhttps://www.instagram.com/blancbleuofficial⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Leave a five star review and comment on Apple Podcasts!🧢 Hats & Merch 📸 Instagram 🐦 Twitter / X📩 Substack👂Listen and 🔥 Subscribe📺 YouTube🎧 ...

Send us a textMacro Confessions Part XXXI,  a very tired Acid Capitalist, having flown half-way across the globe, joins the The Sweeney Alchemist (@writes_sweeney), in London Town to review the week when risk markets rallied.But first Chris is intrigued by the re-emergence of Adam Newman and his crypto plan to save the planet. We Work for the Planet but really? The idea is rubbished by a sceptical Acid Capitalist as way too many blue pills and not enough red. And the boys start quoting Madonna, "How High can we go". This graced the cover of the Eclectica April 2007 investor letter just 4 months before depositors at the failing bank, Northern Trust, formed orderly British queues to withdraw their savings as the financial world tilted into a devastating crisis.Chris pursues his journalist's curiosity. How are Hedge Funds trading the war? Are they redeeming wealthy Russian clients? Why bid for soccer clubs? And just how many computer screens does a manager need to take on holiday? Twitter is celebrated. Hugh reveals he spends more time scrutinising the platform than traditional newspaper outlets. Did you know that the Russian foreign minister's flight to China was aborted mid way into its journey?But the big news is China. Has China pivoted from its allegiance with Vlad the Mad? Is it the allure of the $85 trillion global economy versus exclusive rights to Russia's imploding $1.7 trillion?  Or was it stark signs of the dreaded economic dominoes starting to crash and set off a chain reaction that could humble the mighty Chinese economy? Is this the real explanation behind the 25% reversal in the oil price?War propaganda, objectivity, dark political arts...just how high can we go? In the week that Bono's peace poem was ridiculed by many, the Acid Capitalists concludes, "Like a thief in the night, see the world by candlelight". No wanna be hedge fund student wants to miss this provocative take on the week's events.⬇️ Subscribe on Patreon or Substack for full episodes ⬇️https://www.patreon.com/HughHendryhttps://hughhendry.substack.comhttps://www.instagram.com/hughhendryofficialhttps://blancbleustbarts.comhttps://www.instagram.com/blancbleuofficial⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Leave a five star review and comment on Apple Podcasts!🧢 Hats & Merch 📸 Instagram 🐦 Twitter / X📩 Substack👂Listen and 🔥 Subscribe📺 YouTube🎧 ...

Send us a textMacro Confessions Part XXX,  the Acid Capitalist is joined by his trusted lieutenant, @ToStRo and together with The Sweeney Alchemist, they brew a heady mix of Putin Put Downs and attempt re-set the global macro chessboard. Chris busies himself with a meaty cheese burger..Convexity has jumped from our computer screens to the theatre of war. The asymmetry of urban war was well understood by all those not intoxicated by the greed and fear of fascist states. Urban assaults favour the defenders, but like a Bloomberg scenario analysis, convexity has leapt from the city to the surrounding fields and outer limits of the metropole. Anti-tank and anti-aircraft technology supplied liberally to the democracy of the Ukrainian statehood is making this war more asymmetric than any one could ever have hoped for. Putin hasn't lost his marbles. Rather his gangster political system has left him bereft of proper intelligence. State corruption has fostered an almighty state failure in intelligence. It's as though the former KGB has been transformed into mammoth PR agency intent on amplifying the wishes of its only client.Ok, enough war-war. Bretton Woods died in the 1960s. Those that seek to right off the hegemony of the dollar collateral system owing to the escalation in the world's first truly global war are mistaken. Is the world shifting, tilting on its axis? You bet! But not as the apologists and doomsayers would have you imagine. The axis has always been defined by the supposed might of the current  account surplus nations versus the receding power of those nations succumbing to current account deficits. Think again...Channel all your paradoxical thinking. It's been a Wizard of Oz illusion all along. To quote the mighty Wizard, My people have been wearing green glasses so long that most believe this really is the Emerald City. The Acid Capitalist spells it out. Having assets that people crave, that they must own, gives you power. If you can't create enough assets in your own currency that outsiders really want then you never had wealth in the first place. This chimera of wealth is simply the confiscation of other nation's benevolence. The world is changing, hallelujah! The mighty Sampson like China. What should it do? It should revalue its currency higher to⬇️ Subscribe on Patreon or Substack for full episodes ⬇️https://www.patreon.com/HughHendryhttps://hughhendry.substack.comhttps://www.instagram.com/hughhendryofficialhttps://blancbleustbarts.comhttps://www.instagram.com/blancbleuofficial⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Leave a five star review and comment on Apple Podcasts!🧢 Hats & Merch 📸 Instagram 🐦 Twitter / X📩 Substack👂Listen and 🔥 Subscribe📺 YouTube🎧 ...

Send us a textMacro Confessions Part XXIX,  the Acid Capitalist is mad as hell. Bewildered and traumatised by the human catastrophe in Ukraine, he's left exasperated by sinister political forces seeking to stymie the advance of the European carbon trading platform to advance their own selfish causes. Carbon permit prices have fallen sharply.He mans his pulpit. An uncommon occurrence. Rarely can one say that you can do-good and make money. The Exchange Trading Scheme has pursued truth via the price discovery system. Competing exchanges in America limit speculation, limit truth seeking activities. The result? The precious resource of the depleted ozone layer trades for just a third of the European scheme. Truth is always the victim.But Europe's political class teeter on the brink. States fail when they neglect to replenish their energy supply. Having allowed the region's mighty energy reserves to dwindle to less than five years' worth, the Acid Cap fears the euro will spiral lower. Fight them on the beaches, fight them in the markets...but look after your pennies.Energy? It's still all about energy. Why is OPEC not pumping more oil demands the Chief Disciple, Chris? Because we shouldn't equate oil reserves with brains, snaps Hugh. Warming to his subject, he proclaims that the Dawn of Chaos will wipe out all dollar pegs, even that of the mighty oil sultan. You see, high oil prices are DEATH to price cartels. He elaborates on his thesis.Everyone is asleep. Time to take the red pills, time to wake up and seize the trading opportunities. Every wannabe hedge should take note. There's work to be done. Hugh declares himself an intellectual psychopath, whatever could he mean? But he's not tempted to buy Alibaba, the once mighty Chinese retail platform. For whom the gods would destroy they first make mad. He's not buying.No he's starting a hedge fund cult. He's reeling from Cotard Syndrome. An uncommon malady were the victims believe they've died and gone to hell. It seems an apt metaphor for the last week witnessing the Russian advance on Kiev. Contentious narratives that might form the accepted belief system of the future. Carbon offsets are the blue pills of the dozing masses. Cap and Trade is a red pill means to evade The Matrix and protect the planet's future. The Acid Mast⬇️ Subscribe on Patreon or Substack for full episodes ⬇️https://www.patreon.com/HughHendryhttps://hughhendry.substack.comhttps://www.instagram.com/hughhendryofficialhttps://blancbleustbarts.comhttps://www.instagram.com/blancbleuofficial⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Leave a five star review and comment on Apple Podcasts!🧢 Hats & Merch 📸 Instagram 🐦 Twitter / X📩 Substack👂Listen and 🔥 Subscribe📺 YouTube🎧 ...

Send us a textMacro Confessions Part XXVIII, projecting forward from the macro year 2007. Chris finds a Hank Moody like Acid Capitalist holed up in his friends' beautiful villa in St Barts. staring wistfully at the surf. The unthinkable has happened, Russian tanks have broken ranks and are moving in on Kiev.Risk becomes philosophical. The Dice Man declares that if you can't think then you have no soul, for a soul is something subject to reflection. Little thinking seems apparent in this modern outbreak of war within the central theatre of Europe and so emotions will determine the landscape of European markets. The boys begin with a push back on the comments from Shell's trading desk. They claim that speculators are pushing energy prices up to levels that will impact harmfully on ordinary citizens. Pas de tout claims Hugh. It is the long awaited entrance of price discovery that reveals the lamentable record of Europe's leaders. No foresight, no courage has bequeathed a  generation with an acute shortage of local energy sources and no infra-structure to link with democratic suppliers. Fight them on the beaches, fight them in the markets...Gas? It's still all about gas. The High Priest presents a detailed look behind the futures market for energy and the perils of trading commodity futures. He concludes that the blip in energy prices is most unlikely to prove transitory but will be levitated for much longer to encourage better political energy sourcing and to accelerate much needed energy infra structure.When will the macro reset end? Hugh estimates that one has to keep an eye on mean reversion in the zeitgeist stocks of Apple and Meta. Are times changing? It does look like a return to a time of chaos. The 1970s had an energy crisis, the Russians ignored sovereign niceties and invaded another country and gold? Gold went to the moon. It bares close attention.Tune in or miss out.⬇️ Subscribe on Patreon or Substack for full episodes ⬇️https://www.patreon.com/HughHendryhttps://hughhendry.substack.comhttps://www.instagram.com/hughhendryofficialhttps://blancbleustbarts.comhttps://www.instagram.com/blancbleuofficial⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Leave a five star review and comment on Apple Podcasts!🧢 Hats & Merch 📸 Instagram 🐦 Twitter / X📩 Substack👂Listen and 🔥 Subscribe📺 YouTube🎧 ...

Send us a textMacro Confessions Part XXVII, projecting forward from the macro year 2006. Chris finds a dishevelled Acid Capitalist holed up in his cement bunker in St Barts. The initial salvos find the boys reminiscing about the Fight Club, The UNIBomber, Nirvana and bereaving the passing of Agent 007 as one of their own.Hugh picks up the pace, sharing how he bought the chip company AMD and shorted its larger, more successful competitor, Intel simply because he thought the pattern reminiscent of the gold price's resurgence.  Oh Gosh, Oh Gosh I'm Juliette Binoche whispers a wistful Hugh as he confesses to inherent flaws in his trade, but the Dice Man vows never to stop throwing.The child like wonders of curiosity, Hugh was always asking why the sky was blue? However, he's still furious about environmentalists seeking to prevent all new permitting and exploration for hydrocarbons. Such anarchy is driving energy prices higher. Europe's profound lack of resources is seeing governments subsidizing household energy bills. Could this be the fabled "helicopter money"? Will persistently higher and higher oil prices create permanent and rising  cash subsidies. Is this how inflation finally emerges?A liberty Gas Pipeline from the US to Europe? The boys ask, would this not be a more elegant solution to confronting Russia's bear hug on the European energy market; better than NATO raising defence spending by $100 bn ? The Acid Shamen levitates with excitement at the notion of what a Europe with a cheap source of energy could achieve for the world.Gas? Chris couldn't let the opportunity pass without asking about the 2006 hedge fund disaster, Amaranth's $6bn implosion, one of the largest ever. Hugh confesses that he too was long nat gas, just not that long!! Why? Because the price of oil had exceeded $40 per barrel for the first time in 25 years. Hugh explains the perils or opportunities from trading commodity futures curves, beware contangos at the short end. Gas prices rise from $1 to $6 per btu and yet you lose 80% trading futures. The boys explain why.And finally, the Acid Capitalist reveals his new macro trade.Tune in or lose out. ⬇️ Subscribe on Patreon or Substack for full episodes ⬇️https://www.patreon.com/HughHendryhttps://hughhendry.substack.comhttps://www.instagram.com/hughhendryofficialhttps://blancbleustbarts.comhttps://www.instagram.com/blancbleuofficial⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Leave a five star review and comment on Apple Podcasts!🧢 Hats & Merch 📸 Instagram 🐦 Twitter / X📩 Substack👂Listen and 🔥 Subscribe📺 YouTube🎧 ...

Send us a textMacro Confessions Part XXVI (somewhere in the future) This week the camera never lies. Hugh is trotting out responses under cross-examination from Chris. Bridgewater, Ray Dallio, Is he the greatest hedge fund manager ever? He's certainly made more money than anyone else...And then, Hugh goes freestyle. You can literally see the moment when the Acid Capitalist forms a new idea in his head. You can share that light bulb moment. Be in the room as Hugh brings down absurdity to try save the planet.No new Hedge Fund wannabee can afford to miss this journey from the past to the present. Our resident Time Lord reveals his trippy macro insights and explains why his own endorsement of EU carbon trading permits from last year may now be bearing fruit.This week, Hugh aims his sights against Extinction Rebellion. Just what purpose does it serve? It feels more like fin de siècle, Dadaism than a logical plan to reduce carbon emissions. He snorts, it's more like the great generational swindle. Kids seeking to make a difference should spend their money buying closed end mutual funds designed to permanently reduce the number of available pollution permits. Stick it to the guy, we should buy the permits before the polluters. It's totally absurd...They wince as they consider the zero tolerance for new oil field exploration. 6.5 billion people on the planet consume 3 barrels of oil per person per year. We consume 13. Are they to live in poverty, denied our lifestyle? Or will oil demand double before 2050? What to do, pleads Chris? Corner the market for permits, drive the pollution cost higher demands Hugh. And get smarter, use renewable energy to fuel oil and gas exploration. Don't ban oil, that's suicide, find lower carbon oil instead. Only by being smart can we avoid oblivion.And NFTs, vouchers, permits. nothing is considered out of bounds. Hugh proposes a radical idea to enfranchise all of us. Distribute pollution NFTs to every household for free. Then start issuing fewer and fewer of them and demand that households pay for their own carbon footprint with such vouchers. Those that pollute less will own more vouchers and accrue a very valuable asset. Use crypto technology to spread ownership of the planet's problem, to create the love-cult 2050 with smart people solving the world's greatest pro⬇️ Subscribe on Patreon or Substack for full episodes ⬇️https://www.patreon.com/HughHendryhttps://hughhendry.substack.comhttps://www.instagram.com/hughhendryofficialhttps://blancbleustbarts.comhttps://www.instagram.com/blancbleuofficial⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Leave a five star review and comment on Apple Podcasts!🧢 Hats & Merch 📸 Instagram 🐦 Twitter / X📩 Substack👂Listen and 🔥 Subscribe📺 YouTube🎧 ...

Send us a textMacro Confessions Part XXV (APRIL,2012) This week Hugh felt a movement in the time-expanse of the financial universe. In a land far, far away, an elderly, wise man of his acquaintance, his Master and Macro overlord bore testimony to a prophecy of bad tidings.Despite their evident excitement, the boys compose themselves and set about deciphering the godfather of macro, George Soros, and his latest missives delivered in a face-off challenge to China's President Xi. No new Hedge Fund wannabee can afford to miss this journey from the past to the present day where the Time Lord reveals his trippy macro insights and explains why his own apocalyptic warnings from 12 years ago may now be bearing fruit.This week, in the high stakes game of international trade, they ask, is China the nation that reneged? Does history repeat? Has the Chinese property market mimicked the unstable rise of the DJI in the 1920s? Will there be blood? They wince as they consider the ramifications and ponder how best to start a mania.Regrets for being 10 years early? Perhaps, admits a frank Hugh, if only he had used the Chinese zodiac. Can the world save China, asks Chris? Hugh compares it to the gripping finale of The Squid Game. The curious tale of the Brazilian Icarus, Eike Batista, is revealed as well as the Soros Open Society. Just why do America's right revere Vlad the Blunderer? And will the rubble's gold backing protect the expansive Putin's flank? Not bloody likely! Snorts a dismissive Acid Capitalist.In probably the best of the series, Hugh takes us from the Gold Standard to Bretton Woods and now the last days of the EuroDollar Standard. A China reset will likely usher in the end of the dollar hegemony, how will nations reconfigure after the great crash?Chris continues to spin his wheel...Can you dare miss this special issue..?⬇️ Subscribe on Patreon or Substack for full episodes ⬇️https://www.patreon.com/HughHendryhttps://hughhendry.substack.comhttps://www.instagram.com/hughhendryofficialhttps://blancbleustbarts.comhttps://www.instagram.com/blancbleuofficial⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Leave a five star review and comment on Apple Podcasts!🧢 Hats & Merch 📸 Instagram 🐦 Twitter / X📩 Substack👂Listen and 🔥 Subscribe📺 YouTube🎧 ...

Send us a textMacro Confessions Part XX IV (2006) This week risk is resetting. Things changing. There will be opportunities. There will be blood. Let it be the other guy. Let's get absurd. The boys review the slaughter of the innocents, namely the abject poor performance of some of last year's most hyped new companies to emerge on the stock market.The conversation is fast paced. Chris has led Hugh to the Valley of Happiness but he wants to know more about what's causing the melt down in high profile stock names Peloton, Deliver and Oatly. No new Hedge Fund wannabee can afford to miss this journey from the past to the present day where Hugh reveals his latest macro insights and explains his Quantity Theory of Insanity. The Alchemy of Finance, it is not...This week they consider The Secret Policeman's Macro Ball, an annual illuminati gathering of the great minds in macro hedge fund management. The event you are assured not to receive an invitation to. Just why do the greatest minds share their best-ideas with their competition?Regrets, Hugh has a few and he travels back to December 2008 to confront his younger self. You see back in early 2006 he predicted a deflationary event that would send Treasury bond prices surging and the gold price crashing. But when his prophesy came true, he failed to load up on gold. Hugh is raging mad with his younger self.And with markets in turmoil, the chart rotator returns to examine the Dow Jones constituent 30 stocks to determine where prices are versus their slower, longer-dated moving averages. Hugh invokes his Acid Capitalist powers to draw predictions and stock ideas for the coming year. Chris continues to spin his wheel...Tune-in or be square...Charts can be found here https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCs4X8HJf2dQog8-CCaDBlsg⬇️ Subscribe on Patreon or Substack for full episodes ⬇️https://www.patreon.com/HughHendryhttps://hughhendry.substack.comhttps://www.instagram.com/hughhendryofficialhttps://blancbleustbarts.comhttps://www.instagram.com/blancbleuofficial⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Leave a five star review and comment on Apple Podcasts!🧢 Hats & Merch 📸 Instagram 🐦 Twitter / X📩 Substack👂Listen and 🔥 Subscribe📺 YouTube🎧 ...

Send us a textMacro Confessions Part XX III (November 2005) This week the boys kick back. Inspired by Jeff Bezos, and his recent jaunt to St Barts, Hugh reveals his 20 hour fast and avocado regime. He believes that longevity and contrarian investing are bedfellows. Chris shakes his head in disbelief.The conversation is fast paced. Chris has his runner's legs on and wants to know more about what's knocking the capital markets this week. Bonds, not James but the ongoing disturbance in the US Treasury market are discussed. Better to construct an inventory of ideas than trade a market whose long-term trend has yet to change course, cautions Hugh. Check your premises!No new Hedge Fund wannabee can afford to miss this journey from the past to the present day where Hugh reveals his latest macro insights and explains how sometimes he outwitted the market's smartest minds.This week they take on The Raiders of the Lost Ark, via Cathy Wood's flailing tech fund, and ask why markets generate mysticism to create retail super-star managers and why their unwieldy funds often hit the skids.Shorting is this week's focus. Why do it? The epic short squeeze of Volkswagen in the midsts of the chaos of October 2008 is explored. Hugh shares his November 2005 Eclectica investment letter to lavish praise on John Armitage, a legendary British hedge fund manager who stopped shorting entirely. The cautionary tale of AW Jones, the manager who first brought  L/S strategies to the public's attention, is examined. You wont believe the paradox of what befell him in 1969.No one is spared. Hugh loved Ken Fisher's book Superstocks but less the man himself. The gloves are well and truly off and at the end Hugh confesses that he's starting to see a re-awakening in the gold sector. Really? Is that possible?  Chris' insatiable curiosity remains dialled to the max. Tune-in or be square...⬇️ Subscribe on Patreon or Substack for full episodes ⬇️https://www.patreon.com/HughHendryhttps://hughhendry.substack.comhttps://www.instagram.com/hughhendryofficialhttps://blancbleustbarts.comhttps://www.instagram.com/blancbleuofficial⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Leave a five star review and comment on Apple Podcasts!🧢 Hats & Merch 📸 Instagram 🐦 Twitter / X📩 Substack👂Listen and 🔥 Subscribe📺 YouTube🎧 ...