Hidden Forces

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

In Episode 124 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with Peter Zeihan, a geopolitical strategist who combines an expert understanding of demography, economics, energy, politics, technology, and security to help his clients prepare for an uncertain future. Before founding his own strategy firm, Peter helped develop the analytical models for Stratfor, one of the world’s premier private intelligence companies. He’s also a critically-acclaimed author whose first two books — The Accidental Superpower and The Absent Superpower — have been recommended by Mitt Romney, Fareed Zakaria and Ian Bremmer. His latest book, “Disunited Nations: The Scramble for Power in an Ungoverned World,” hits bookstores tomorrow. This is one of the most educational conversations that we have ever recorded on Hidden Forces. The episode is meant to provide you with a comprehensive overview of Peter Zeihan’s work and outlook on the subjects of foreign affairs, economics, and geopolitics. The goal is to help you understand just how abnormal our world has been for the last 70 years and what a return to a more “normal world” is going to look like. America’s withdrawal from the world has consequences for governments, business people, retirees, and especially for anyone who is living or invested in countries that have been the primary beneficiaries of the American lead international Order of the past three generations. In the first hour, Peter lays the foundation for what this new world is going to look like, how it differs from the world we’ve inhabited since the end of World War Two, and what sorts of forces will be driving the changes that we can expect to experience over the next few decades. Towards the end of the episode we start to get into specific countries and regions, exploring the types of changes that we can expect to see economically, politically, geographically, and militarily in the not-too-distant future.  The future that Peter lays out is one of both risk and opportunity, and we explore many of these opportunities in the second half of this episode, including those dealing with Turkey, Argentina, and perhaps, most importantly, the United States and what Americans and their nation’s regional partners can expect to experience in the scramble for security, resources, and power in the world to come. 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 Episode 123 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with two guests who have each made one prior appearance on Hidden Forces: Grant Williams and Ben Hunt. Ben is the founder of the widely read Epsilon Theory, a newsletter and website that’s become popular for its insights and analysis into markets and society with a particular focus on how narrative drives our perception of the world and our place in it. Grant is the long-time publisher of a popular financial newsletter, the host of a phenomenal sports podcast, and the co-founder of Real Vision, a financial media company that offers in-depth video interviews with some of the world's most thoughtful investors. Today’s conversation is broken into two parts, the second hour of which is available to our paid subscribers. In the first part we discuss a philosophy that Demetri calls “financial nihilism,” which treats the objects of speculation as though they were intrinsically worthless.  We are witnessing price movements characteristic of a raging bull market without the euphoria that typically accompanies them. The rationalization that governments will "fix the mess" and that central banks will "buy the dip" channels a deeper sense of existential meaninglessness. Whether it's the decline of religion, the dismantling of the nation state, or the commodification of the self, something feels lacking.  In the second hour, the three continue their discussion about markets but also delve into more personal stories from their lives and careers. Grant shares anecdotes from his experience interviewing some of the most brilliant minds in finance and Ben shares insights from his own creative process and what motivates him. All in all, this is one of the best conversations we’ve ever released. If you are interested in accessing the overtime, transcript, and/or rundown to this week’s episode, you can do that 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

Demetri Kofinas makes a guest appearance on TC’s Chartcast, a boutique podcast for short sellers hosted by Tesla Charts and Georgia Orwell. Demetri shares stories from his life and career in markets and the media, including lessons learned from his experience overcoming dementia in his early 30’s. TC’s Chartcast is available on most major podcast platforms and you can follow TC and Georgia on twitter at @TeslaCharts and @Georgia_Orwell_.  If you are interested in learning more about Demetri’s podcast, head over to HiddenForces.io and subscribe to our free email list. You can access the overtimes, transcripts, and rundowns to our full 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

Christopher Cole, founder of Artemis Capital Management, discusses the concept of the hundred year portfolio and the importance of maintaining asset allocation for long-term wealth. He emphasizes the need for true diversification and assets that can perform during market crises. Cole explores the challenges of market timing, risk parity strategies, and the impact of historical trends on investment decisions.