In Episode 132 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with Tom Derry, CEO of the Institute for Supply Management and publisher of the market-moving ISM Manufacturing Index about the impact of COVID-19 on global supply chains. This is a deep-dive into how the  intricate world of just-in-time manufacturing, outsourcing, and globalization has been impacted by the world-wide disruptions caused by the novel coronavirus. In recent years, global supply chains have been in the process of a fundamental shift, in part to strengthen their immune systems to mitigate the risk of multiple threats — unprecedented trade turbulence, as well as economic uncertainty, geopolitical events and rising labor costs. COVID-19 (novel coronavirus) has provided a severe new test to these global supply chains. Since its genesis in the manufacturing hub of Wuhan, China, in December, the outbreak has resulted in more than one million documented cases and nearly sixty thousand deaths worldwide, quarantined workers, temporarily shuttered factories, canceled high-profile events, shaken markets and handcuffed supply management organizations at many companies. The gravity of the situation was exemplified in a survey by Institute for Supply Management, which found that nearly three-fourths (72%) of U.S. companies have experienced supply chain disruptions due to coronavirus-related transportation restrictions, and 81% of organizations expect their procurement operations to be impacted by COVID-19. For some of those companies, the infection goes beyond the supply chain, as 16% of survey respondents report lowering annual revenue targets by an average of 5.6%. More than half (53%) of the 628 respondents in ISM’s recent survey said their companies are having trouble getting supply chain information from China. You can access the episode overtime, as well as the transcript and rundown to this week’s episode through the Hidden Forces Patreon Page. All subscribers gain access to our overtime feed, which can be easily added to your favorite podcast application.

In Episode 131 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with Hari Krishnan, a portfolio manager at Doherty Advisors responsible for the VXR (VIX replication strategy) and hedging solutions business. The two discuss Hari’s thesis around risk management, portfolio construction and positioning once a market downturn is already underway. Although the content discussed in this episode is considered “sophisticated,” we try and make it accessible to the average listener. Topics include the investor mindset, protecting against systemic risk, options pricing, the role of credit in the market cycle, endogenous vs. exogenous risk, agent-based modeling, exchange traded products, volatility, and trend following strategies.  The overtime includes more detailed examples of tactics and strategies that can be deployed in service of risk mitigation and profit making during the type of market-downturn that we are  now experiencing. You can access that overtime, along with the rundown and transcript to this week’s episode through the Hidden Forces Patreon Page. All subscribers also gain access to our overtime feed, which can be easily added to your favorite podcast application.

In Episode 130 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with Gillian Tett, chair of the editorial board and editor-at-large of the Financial Times about America’s new “wartime economy” and the unspoken consequences of the most radical financial and political crisis since World War II. Demetri starts the conversation by asking Gillian what it’s like to run the largest financial newspaper in the world during the greatest economic and political crisis in three generations. The two discuss the latest central bank policy actions, fiscal stimulus, and a series of other timely topics ranging from distressed corporates, emerging markets, dollar funding, and much, much more. If you want to read the transcript to today’s conversation or gain access to the rundown for this episode head over to the Hidden Forces Patreon Page and subscribe to one of our three content tiers. All subscribers gain access to our overtime feed, which can be easily added to your favorite podcast application. By becoming a monthly subscriber you are helping to make this podcast possible. Producer & Host: Demetri Kofinas Editor & Engineer: Stylianos Nicolaou Subscribe & Support the Podcast at http://patreon.com/hiddenforces Join the conversation on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at @hiddenforcespod

In Episode 129 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with Josh Crumb, founder & CEO of Abaxx Technologies, which is launching a new commodity futures exchange in Singapore over the next year. Josh was formerly a macro economist and commodity strategist at Goldman Sachs, where he was the head of metals strategy. He is also a co-founder of gold bullion dealer Goldmoney, and Jewelry company Mene.  In their conversation, Josh and Demetri discuss a curious case of backwardation on the COMEX, which is the futures and options market for trading metals in New York. The price of gold in near-dated futures expiring at the end of March spiked by almost 10% to $70 an ounce above the price of obtaining physical gold in London. Only on a handful of occasions since 2000 have gold prices risen more in a single week, including immediately after Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy in September 2008. Josh Crumb explains what really happened in the early hours of March 24, how disruptions to global supply chains caused by COVID-19 factor in, and why it matters to you. If you are interested in becoming a supporter of Hidden Forces, head over to our Patreon Page and subscribe to one of our three content tiers, giving you access to the overtime, transcript, and rundown to this and all prior episodes. All subscribers also gain access to our overtime feed, which can be easily added to your favorite podcast application.  Producer & Host: Demetri Kofinas Editor & Engineer: Stylianos Nicolaou Subscribe & Support the Podcast at http://patreon.com/hiddenforces Join the conversation on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at @hiddenforcespod

In Episode 128 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with George Selgin, director of the Center for Monetary and Financial Alternatives at the Cato Institute about the recently announced monetary and fiscal policy measures being undertaken to stem the economic fallout from COVID-19 and the government mandated shutdown of the American economy. This is a deep-dive into the specifics of the Federal Reserve and US government’s policies, including the mechanics of the monetary and fiscal stimulus. We are living in unprecedented times. The closest analogy to what we are experiencing is the mobilization undertaken to fight World War II with one crucial difference: this is a radical demobilization of the American economy. To fight the virus, Americans are being asked to stay in their homes and move about as little as possible. In order to survive a prolonged period of commercial inactivity governments have moved swiftly to pass monetary and fiscal stimulus measures that are themselves as unprecedented as the current lock-down of the global economy. How far will these measures go and what will Western countries like the United States look like on the other side of this crisis? Answering this question may prove more important than any other we have posed before on this program, and we try to answer it today. You can access the overtime, transcript, and rundown to this week’s episode through the Hidden Forces Patreon Page. All subscribers also gain access to our overtime feed, which can be easily added to your favorite podcast application. By becoming a monthly subscriber you are helping to make this podcast possible. Producer & Host: Demetri Kofinas Editor & Engineer: Stylianos Nicolaou Subscribe & Support the Podcast at http://patreon.com/hiddenforces Join the conversation on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at @hiddenforcespod

In Episode 127 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with Ben Hubbard, the Beirut bureau chief for The New York Times about Saudi Arabia and the rise to power of Mohammed bin Salman. Topics include the ongoing oil price war, tensions with Iran, the war in Yemen, and the geopolitics of the Middle East. The two also discuss the impact of coronavirus for the region’s politics and security. According to Ben Hubbard, when King Salman of Saudi Arabia ascended to the throne in January 2015 and began bestowing enormous powers on his 29-year-old son, Mohammed bin Salman, it sent minds reeling. Given Saudi Arabia’s importance as the wealthiest country in the Middle East and a key partner of the West, foreign officials, journalists, experts, and spies had long scrutinized the Saudi royal family to anticipate who might come to power in the future—and MBS, as he was known, had remained far off the radar. Who, they wondered, was this inexperienced young prince who swiftly asserted his control over the kingdom’s oil, military, finances, and domestic and foreign policy? And could he be trusted?  Ben closely tracks MBS’s trajectory to shed light on the man and the critical country he controls. He explores Saudi Arabia’s closed and opaque society and tracks Mohammad bin Salman from his earliest days in power. With vows to diversify the kingdom’s economy away from oil, loosen its strict Islamic social codes, and champion the fight against extremism, the young prince won admirers on Wall Street and in Washington, Silicon Valley, and Hollywood with his grand visions for a new Saudi Arabia and a reordered Middle East. In 2017, Saudi Arabia made global headlines by announcing that it would lift its long-time ban on women driving and hosting a lavish “Davos in the Desert” conference, where MBS wowed international financiers with plans for a new $500 billion city that he said would be powered by sustainable energy and staffed by robots—serving as “a roadmap for the future of civilization.”  However, Hubbard’s reporting from a half-dozen countries and hundreds of interviews with a range of sources reveals that a harsher reality was building quietly behind the hype. To secure his path to the throne and quash opposition to his plans, the young prince empowered a covert team to silence critics at home and abroad while deploying new technologies to consolidate his authoritarian rule. He soon made headlines again, for forcing the resignation of the prime minister of Lebanon; locking hundreds of princes, businessmen, and government officials in the Riyadh Ritz-Carlton on allegations of corruption; for the hacking by Saudi operatives of cell phones of Saudi dissidents, journalists (including a suspected attempt on Hubbard himself), and others who supported views critical of the Saudi regime; and most infamously for his links to the operatives who killed Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.  Their conversation explores these palace intrigues, as Ben and Demetri consider how this bold (and perhaps dangerous) new leader is changing the face of the Bedowin kingdom, both for the better and for the worse. If you are interested in becoming a supporter of Hidden Forces, head over to our Patreon Page and subscribe to one of our three content tiers, giving you access to the overtime, transcript, and rundown to this and all prior episodes. All subscribers also gain access to our overtime feed, which can be easily added to your favorite podcast application.  Producer & Host: Demetri Kofinas Editor & Engineer: Stylianos Nicolaou Subscribe & Support the Podcast at http://patreon.com/hiddenforces Join the conversation on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at @hiddenforcespod

In this Special Episode of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with Yaneer Bar-Yam, President of the New England Complex Systems Institute. Professor Bar-Yam studies the unified properties of complex systems as a systematic strategy for answering basic questions about the world. His research is focused both on formalizing complex systems concepts and relating them to everyday problems. In particular, he studies the relationship between observations at different scales, formal properties of descriptions of systems, the relationship of structure and function, the representation of information as a physical quantity, and quantitative properties of the complexity of real systems. Applications have been to physical, biological, and social systems. He has applied this background to COVID-19 by not only studying the virus, but by actually launching endCoronavirus.org, a website built and maintained by NESCI whose “goal is to minimize the impact of COVID-19 by providing useful data and guidelines for action.” Yaneer and his colleagues have put out more alarming numbers than those often cited by public officials in recent weeks and months. According to Yaneer’s research team, which has co-faculty, students and affiliates from MIT, Harvard, Brandeis and other universities, “COVID-19 is a rapidly transmitting disease that evolves in 20% of cases to require extended hospitalizations and roughly 2-4% of cases result in death, with risks increasing rapidly for those over 50 years old. It can transmit even with mild symptoms (coughing, sneezing, or elevated temperature) and perhaps before symptoms appear.” He believes that reducing the likelihood of transmission requires everyone to reduce their likelihood of contact not only so they aren’t infected but also so that they don’t transmit the disease to others. If everyone got tested for COVID-19, according to Yaneer, we could temporarily separate the infected from the uninfected, and this would help reduce the spread of the virus and allow for societies to function normally. If you are interested in becoming a supporter of Hidden Forces, head over to our Patreon Page and subscribe to one of our three content tiers. All subscribers also gain access to our overtime feed, which can be easily added to your favorite podcast application.  Producer & Host: Demetri Kofinas Editor & Engineer: Stylianos Nicolaou Subscribe & Support the Podcast at http://patreon.com/hiddenforces Join the conversation on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at @hiddenforcespod

In Episode 126 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with David Kilcullen, a theorist and practitioner of guerrilla and unconventional warfare, and counterterrorism. David has amassed extensive operational experience over a 25 year career with the Australian and U.S. governments as an army officer, analyst, policy advisor and diplomat. He served in Iraq as senior counterinsurgency advisor to U.S. General David Petraeus and was senior advisor to U.S. Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice. He has served in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia, Libya, and Colombia. He's Professor of International and Political Studies at the University of New South Wales, Canberra. He's also the author of five prize winning books on terrorism, insurgency, and future warfare, including his latest, “The Dragons and the Snakes: How the Rest Learned to Fight the West.”   This episode deals mainly with the evolution of warfare and the threats we currently face, including an extensive analysis of Chinese and Russian conventional and unconventional methods targeting the West. The two also discuss the emergency measures currently being put into place across the world in response to the spread of Coronavirus and the implications of those measures for the future of liberal democracy. The second hour of Demetri and David’s conversation includes a deep-dive into Russiagate, as well as the types of strategies of liminal warfare being employed by Putin and the Russian Federation against America and the West. The two also speculate about how Western adversaries may inflict further damage upon them during the 2020 election, capitalize on internal divisions, refugee crises, as well as this latest, global pandemic. You can access the second hour, as well as the transcript and rundown to this week’s episode through the Hidden Forces Patreon Page. All subscribers also gain access to our overtime feed, which can be easily added to your favorite podcast application. Producer & Host: Demetri Kofinas Editor & Engineer: Stylianos Nicolaou Subscribe & Support the Podcast at http://patreon.com/hiddenforces Join the conversation on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at @hiddenforcespod

In this Special Episode of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with Chief Strategist & Portfolio Manager at Logica Capital Advisers, Mike Green, who returns for a timely conversation about the recent market melt-down, the fundamental economic and political impacts of coronavirus, and prospects for a stimulus-driven melt-up that may bring about the greatest bout of inflation in more than a generation. Hidden Forces is made possible by listeners like you. Please take a moment to support the show by subscribing to one of our three premium content tiers.  You can access the rundowns, transcripts, and overtimes to our weekly episodes through the Hidden Forces Patreon Page. All subscribers also gain access to our overtime feed, which can be easily added to your favorite podcast application.  Producer & Host: Demetri Kofinas Editor & Engineer: Stylianos Nicolaou Subscribe & Support the Podcast at http://patreon.com/hiddenforces Join the conversation on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at @hiddenforcespod

In Episode 125 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with Harvard’s Laura Huang about her research into intuition and behavior as it relates to investing and entrepreneurship. Rather than focus on our shortcomings, Laura teaches us how to turn adversity into advantage. The title of Laura’s book is an acronym that stands for four different words: Enrich, Delight, Guide, and Effort. The foundation of our edge, according to Laura, comes from our ability to provide value to and enrich those around us. Those who have an edge find ways to enrich and bring value to others rather than posturing about the supposed value they bring (we all know people like that). Those who have an edge, however, are also able to demonstrate and effectively communicate the value they bring, rather than leaving it up to others to guess. However, before we can enrich others, we have to be let in. Those who already have an understanding of how they enrich are most equipped to delight. Delighting isn’t synonymous with being charming or entertaining, or charismatic in the typical sense. And everyone has the power to delight. Delight can help pacify skepticism and misgivings. The third letter stands for “Guide.” When we know (and can figure out) how others see us, it gives us the capacity to guide and redirect that perception, so that we can influence how they grasp and appreciate the value we command and the edge we bring. Finally, Laura points out how “Effort” and hard work reinforce the edge that we create for ourselves. Sometimes it’s as much what we do as it is the effort that we put into not doing other things. Don’t be mistaken—hard work is critical. But ultimately, gaining an edge requires hard work, plus. This is a great episode for anyone struggling with figuring out how to turn hard work into success. You can access this week’s overtime segment, transcript, and rundown through the Hidden Forces Patreon Page. All subscribers also gain access to our overtime feed, which can be easily added to your favorite podcast application.  Producer & Host: Demetri Kofinas Editor & Engineer: Stylianos Nicolaou Subscribe & Support the Podcast at http://patreon.com/hiddenforces Join the conversation on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at @hiddenforcespod