Animal Spirits Podcast - The Tariff Tantrum (EP.403)

Episode Date: March 12, 2025

On episode 403 of Animal Spirits, Michael Batnick and Ben Carlson discuss: a healthy correction in the stock market, growth stocks getting slaughtered, bonds are working again, recession worries are back on the table, international stocks are outperforming, the slowing labor market, AGI is coming, millennials are going to be waiting for their inheritance, how Covid changed everything and much more. This episode is sponsored by Betterment. Grow your RIA your way at: https://www.betterment.com/advisors Sign up for The Compound newsletter and never miss out: thecompoundnews.com/subscribe Find complete show notes on our blogs: Ben Carlson’s A Wealth of Common Sense Michael Batnick’s The Irrelevant Investor Feel free to shoot us an email at [e-mail] with any feedback, questions, recommendations, or ideas for future topics of conversation.   Investing involves the risk of loss. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be or regarded as personalized investment advice or relied upon for investment decisions. Michael Batnick and Ben Carlson are employees of Ritholtz Wealth Management and may maintain positions in the securities discussed in this video. All opinions expressed by them are solely their own opinion and do not reflect the opinion of Ritholtz Wealth Management. The Compound Media, Incorporated, an affiliate of Ritholtz Wealth Management, receives payment from various entities for advertisements in affiliated podcasts, blogs and emails. Inclusion of such advertisements does not constitute or imply endorsement, sponsorship or recommendation thereof, or any affiliation therewith, by the Content Creator or by Ritholtz Wealth Management or any of its employees. For additional advertisement disclaimers see here https://ritholtzwealth.com/advertising-disclaimers. Investments in securities involve the risk of loss. Any mention of a particular security and related performance data is not a recommendation to buy or sell that security. The information provided on this website (including any information that may be accessed through this website) is not directed at any investor or category of investors and is provided solely as general information. Obviously nothing on this channel should be considered as personalized financial advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any securities. See our disclosures here: https://ritholtzwealth.com/podcast-youtube-disclosures/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Clients of Britholz wealth management may maintain positions in the securities discussed in this podcast. Welcome to Animal Spirits with Michael and Ben. This is going to be a healthy show, a long show. We've got, how many pages in the dot? 38. Not quite a record, but I would say approaching 20-20 highs, maybe. The higher the VIX, the higher the clicks.

And then for us, what is it? I'm trying to think of a phrase here, but in a correction, the Google Doc just grows and grows. It's a great phrase. Right? Yeah. All right, question for you. So this is through the close on Monday.

The S&P was down 9%. We're doing this right before the open on Tuesday. NADSEC 100 down almost 13%. Russell 2000 down 17%, almost in a bare market. Is this a better short-term outcome than just taking off to Boomtown? Because that's what everyone thought was going to happen. I think this is actually a better scenario. Yeah. To me, this is, I'm so glad you asked. To me, this is, this is a glass half fall

pullback, a glass half fall slowdown, if you will. I think people forget the stock market was up 20 plus percent in 2023, up 20 plus percent in 2024, sky high expectations coming into 2025. And I think it feels, people are really nervous. And I think a lot of that is due to political feelings. I'm not super duper nervous, and it's not because I'm like cavalier about the risks. I understand that the economy is slowing down. I see that the stock market is getting bludgeoned certain areas more so than others. But I almost always view the reintroduction of risk as a good thing. Now, if this spirals into a deep recession, I will eat my words. I don't want a deep procession at all. But I view this, and we'll get into all the details. I view this. And again,

my forecasts are just as bad as everybody else is. So I take this with a great assault. I'm not like dying on this hill. But for now, I think that this is a correction in a secular bull market, a healthy reintroduction of respect for risk. And I think we're going to get through this. I think we're going to be okay. It's weird that I was more worried when people were talking about taking off like to the moon. That worried me more than this. Agreed. Yeah. I didn't. I didn't want to see that. So I'm not a big fan of this line looks like that line, but I was talking to Chart Kid Matt yesterday.

You know, I have a minor bone to pick with you. Because Chart Kit said Ben asked me for this chart and I said, why? This isn't a Ben Carlson chart. It's not. So let me, so I just said, you know, the speed of this correction, this correction is happening fast. We hit a new all-time high February 19th, I believe was the last one. And that is, we topped out of.

the COVID in 2020 and February 20th, I believe. So that the timing of it is very similar. And then since then, straight down. Wait, I think there's been one up day. The calendar timing? You were saying COVID was a February peak. This is a February peak. And also it happened fast.

And I just said, I wonder if this looks like the initial falling off of the cliff there, the, you know, Wiley Coyote in midair suspended. And so he said, I was actually just doing this. And again, you're right. This is not a Ben Carlson chart at all because I don't think you could, because the one people use- If this comes to fruition, I'm going to hold you personally responsible. No, the whole reason I wanted to do this was to see how quickly this correction is and also put it into context of this is nothing.

So, yeah, for people that are listening and not watching, Ben had ChartKit overlay, the 2020 plunge versus where we are today. And I don't like it. Okay. That's, that's, and I thought I get some pushback from on this. And I just put it on here to show this is a very, this is a very, very quick correction, just like that one was. But this is, this is, again, just a minor.

This is like a, you have a cuticle on your finger. That's all this is. This is not severing the finger or cutting off your arm. Speaking of severing the finger, we'll get to this later. The pit? What a, that's a gruesome show, huh? They get into it, yes. I have to look away.

You have to look away when you watch a horror movie. I have to look away when I see gory stuff for a hospital. That's why I could never be a doctor. I could never broken the medical profession because I'd get too squeamish. I'd be the one, the intern, who puked on the first day. and everyone would be calling me puke face or whatever. That'd be my nickname.

I'm a look away too. Not two squirmish for me. There's some silver linings to this correction. Bonds are giving you diversification, finally. Yesterday, according to Mike Sikardi, bonds, the ag, had the best day versus the S&P 500 in 25 years, which is nuts. That has more to do with the decline of the S&P

than it does with the return in bonds. But nevertheless, massive spread. I think it was like 3.5%. Yeah, because year-to-date, so bonds are up, I don't know. So if you look at the ag, it's up 3% year-to-date or something. It's not a huge number, but two months into the year, that's a pretty big return for bonds. So if you add the price appreciation with the yield you already started with, it's shaping up to be a pretty decent year in bonds. And yes, bonds are a hedge again.

Yeah. If you gave up on bonds because 2022 was a bad year for them as a diversifier, now they're coming back. You know, one of the reasons why we love the stock market so much is because, Because we're just like chasing our tail trying to figure out what's going to happen next and we're always wrong. And there are people, one of the phrases that is common in the investing world is, I've seen this movie before and I know how it goes or how it ends. And no, you don't. So, for example, had you thought that Trump 2.0 or the second Trump term was going to look similar to the first Trump term in terms of policy, his obsession with the stock market as a scoreboard, you would have been 100% wrong, as most people were.

A lot of people did say that. Well, if we look at the tariffs from the first time around, or we look at his, yes, a lot of people said that. So Tom Lee put out a few charts comparing Trump 1.0 versus 2.0. Looks at the S&P and the Ross and he did a bunch of other charts. And everyone stole this chart from him, I think. I think he was the first one, but I've seen a version of this chart a million times now because it's a really good chart.

Yeah, I don't know who came first. This is not, it's an easy chart to... Doesn't matter. But it's, it just shows, yeah, the first time versus now, and it's complete, complete divergence, obviously. Yeah. Good, good, sure. All right. So what are we calling this?

The Trump dump, tariff tantrum, what sounds good? I like the Trump dump. Trump dump. Okay. I also like, so to your point about the folly of forecasting, Sam Rowe, every year, friend of the show, does this thing where at the end of the year, heading into the new year, he looks at all of Wall Street's targets for the S&P. and he did him from all the firms and they were all very clustered at say 10 to 12, 8 to 12% gain

like just steady Eddie and maybe we still get there but it is just kind of funny I'm sure all of these targets are going to be ratcheted down immediately right? Like they're going to throw these out the window and say I'm sitting over. They got to come down so we can bring

them back up. Yeah. So the recession calls are back. You said everyone's getting nervous. I found a few headlines. This is from the financial times. the U.S. economy is heading for a recession. This is from Politico. Trump won't rule out a recession in 2025. And Wall Street Journal, Wall Street fears Trump will wreck the soft landing.

And obviously, all these articles kind of talk about the same stuff. Tariffs and uncertainty and austerity and all these things. You know, I'm surprised that, so Trump was talking to Maria Barter Romano, and he said he's not ruling out the possibility of recession. That kind of shocked me. I would have thought that he would be like, there's not going to be recession. Like, just given everything the way that he speaks, you would think no recession, beautiful booming economy. And I don't know if it's like credit to him, but he's, I would not have predicted him ruling out of, not ruling out of recession.

We've certainly never seen anything like this before where usually there's a transition period where the one presidential term ends and the other one begins. And whatever, it takes a while for things to take shape. This one, it was like an immediate, this is it. We're slice. Yeah. We're moving on it. And then things, but you're right. That, that, can I, can I offer a theory?

So the, the economy has been doing fine. Some people don't like it. The economic data was pretty good. I think he did not want Biden's economy. And I think he is actually okay with a slowdown or even a recession. So he can say, starting from now, this is my economy. He's saying that. That's not a theory.

They're saying that. They're literally saying that. I can't believe that he wants a recession to do that. That's the thing that is crazy to me. I don't think that he wants a recession. I think he kind of does at this point. I think I think that he has to talk about the recession because of the market's reaction. Like if the market was not reacting so negatively to his new policies, he wouldn't be saying, yeah, we're gearing up for a transition period.

He has to explain it. But I think that he's like he's very much trying to create a new economy. That's not a theory. They're saying that. Besson saying that, Lutnik's saying that. The three of them are saying that. Yeah, but I feel like they're kind of back filling in. I feel like if they are, they're reacting to the headlines because they have to.

Yeah, yeah. Price is driving the narrative. Yeah, big time. If the economy would have reacted positively, look, I'm sure they wanted it to. Right. Then he would have said, look what we're doing. We're creating billions and trillions of zillionaires. So our inboxes have been full for, I don't know, at least the last two years,

probably the last five years from people saying, I've been owning these things that are going up a lot. Tell me when to sell. Like, help me. I don't want to sell because I think it could keep going up, and maybe it turns into a 10-bagger, but I've got huge gains. What do I do?

And this is the kind of thing where we've always said, we can't offer you advice on this. Like, we can't tell you the best time to sell because if we tell you, fine, you need to diversify if you're that worried about it, and the stock keeps going up, then you say, that's bad advice. Yeah.

Right? but the thing about those, that, why you don't ever try to time it is because you just never know when it's going to happen. So I just pulled up a few growth stocks. Through yesterday, Tesla was down 54% from the highs in a hurry. Robin Hood was down 45%. And video was down almost 30%. Coinbase was down almost 50%. Draft Kings was down over 30%. I mean, these things happened immediately. And some of these stocks are probably still up over the last couple of years. But this is why you can't you just can't time these things ever well and so fast they are the epitome of stairs up elevator down they don't they go down when they when it breaks it breaks so fast

and a lot of people probably feel like it's too late to sell and listen if i if i own whatever pick a coin base down 48 i probably wouldn't sell it's like we sell now i missed it you missed your window okay so it's not and it's not to say that like it can't go a lot lower but this is the psychology of investing in a silver lining. And again, I never like to see people lose money, is that for younger people especially that are new to the market that have seen nothing but gains, you can't learn what risk and losing money feels like in a textbook. You have to experience it. And we all have and we all eventually do. Yes. That's the Fred Schwed line, right? There are certain things that can only be lived. Right. Yeah. So micro strategy, which I guess is now just

strategy. Sorry, I'm going to always call it micro strategy. It was down 16% yesterday. The two times levered one was down 33% yesterday. That's MSTX. I looked at this thing, and obviously the volatility is killing it. Since basically the end of the December, the two times micro strategy ETF is down 89%. Yeah, this thing will never make a new high. It's, so obviously the volatility, this is why the levered ones on single stocks are even worse for you than the, the index ones. The index ones, I think you get a decent, it's not perfect. You get it okay. On these, remember we had the guy who emailed us or DM'd us and said, we talked about it like three months ago. Remember, he put all of his parents' retirement assets into micro-strategy and then the levered and.

Anyway, all right, I think the international stuff is feeling real. H.SBC's on my corner now. This is, again, from friend of the show, C.M. R. So you can be in a manmy with us? corner. You act like you've been like, you planted this flag like two years ago. I think I was early on the international thing here. I'm just putting it out there. Someone said, give us receipts. And I said, is Europe a buy like five months ago? Actual blog post I wrote. Okay. So you planted your flag. You wrote a blog post. Okay. All right. So this is from HSBC. Prior to the U.S. elections, we assumed a Trump victory would reinforce U.S. exceptionalism.

Today we are upgrading Europe. It's funny. He says. ex-UK, for some reason, to overweight from underweight. To overweight from underweight, downgrading the U.S. to neutral. What we underestimated was how the U.S. is wavering support for NATO and Ukraine would trigger a watershed moment for the Eurozone, but Germany expected to also follow through with sizable fiscal stimulus. It is important to stress that we are not turning negative in U.S. equities, but tactically, we see better opportunities elsewhere from now.

No one would have ever predicted that two or three months ago. Never. And I think it's, again, could be another. head fake. I think that this is the first time the catalyst actually kind of makes sense. And the funny thing is, if let's say Germany goes on a fiscal spending binge and they bring all the European Union countries with them and their stock markets do outperform, you're going to have people say, well, it's all fake. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, I thought you were going to say, I think U.S. investors will not care. If you, it would have to go for a long time probably for U.S.

investors. Yeah, like, I'm making this up. If international stocks are up 12% this year and the U.S. I don't think all of a sudden there's going to be like a tidal wave. I could be wrong. But I think for the average U.S. investor, it's going to take more than 12 months after 15 years of sucking wind. You know what I mean? Okay, look at the numbers from Luke Kawa from Sherwood. He shows fund flows into the biggest U.S.

listed European equity ETF, which is Vanguard, have taken off pretty good. They're the highest they've been since 2018-ish. Yeah. So there's some money flowing there. But you're right. Because you'll be able to look at a five or 10-year chart, no matter how, if this goes on for two years, you'd still be looking at a 10-year chart and go, well, so what? The U.S. killed international.

Well, yeah, if you zoom out, there's been a million of these headfakes or international outperformance along the way, whether or not this one sticks, we'll see. But certainly, I would agree with you. Out of all of the bounces, this one looks to the most sustainable, and it's not just the stocks, it's the dollar falling, too. Yes, it would be a double whammy. There's a card to the euro had the best weekend against the dollar since 2009. That's last weekend the weakness and the dollar strength of the euro continues.

So hopefully you people got your European vacations in while they were cheap. because they're not going to be cheap anymore, maybe. So I was looking up yesterday. This is kind of a different mood than we're in right now, but it was the 16-year anniversary of the bottom in March of 2009. And since then, even with the minor little hiccup we've had recently, the S&P is up over 1,000 percent, 16.3 percent per year. Bridgewater actually looked at this,

and they said out of any 15-year period to be invested in equities dating back to 1970, the one we've just lived through, was the best, 2010 to 2024, and I think they looked at real returns above cash. Okay. This is why I think these corrections are going to happen so quickly in the future. I don't think we're going to be in a world where we ever have these slow, drawn-out corrections anymore. I think the combination of higher valuations and the fire hose of information means when

these corrections happen, they don't wait around. They're just going to happen in a split second, basically. Last week on the show, we said, are we going to be in a correction next week? And I think I said, probably not. I don't know what I said. But that happened fast, right? We also said last week, I think I asked you, are we going to hit a new all-time high last year? Is the S&P going to hit a new all-time high this year?

What did we say last week? We said, if the tariffs come off, then yes, we'll hit an all-time highs. I, again. Here's the thing, though, if you, I don't have the exact stats in front of me, but this is directionally right. in years in which the S&P 500 has finished up double digits over the past 100 years, half of all years have had a double-digit correction along the way to hitting those double-digit gains. So this is, the reason always feels unique, and it's like in the moment you think, well, this has never happened before, but the downturn itself, it always happens.

So I will offer a Grand Rapids hedge. I do think that there will be an all-time high in the S&P 500 later this year. But if it doesn't happen, and the market is down, let's say that we get continued volatility, we get a pause year, the market's down 8, 9%, 11%, God forbid. Again, I'm not trying to be cavalier about risks, so please don't misunderstand me. But if you just zoom out and say, all right, here's a deal. We just had a 15-year run that has no comparison in U.S. history. We're coming off a back-to-back 20% plus year.

Like, rewind back to 2023, and somebody said, hey, we're going to give you a plus 20, plus 25, minus 11. Do you take it? F*** yeah, you take it. You know what I mean? Right. So I know it never feels good to lose money, but I think perspective here is really, really important.

And if the S&P is down, like you said, 5 to 10% is here, let's say it's just a minor correction in total. And bonds do well, and international stocks do well, financial advisors are going to be celebrating in the streets. Yeah. Right? At least the ones who didn't completely give up on diversification. Yeah.

And investors who have had a diversified stance, for them, it'll finally feel like vindication. I think the reason this feels worse for people that are feeling horrible. It's the political stuff. You know, it's like the person that I didn't vote for, the person that I think was going to tank the economy is tanking the economy and it's going to get so much worse. Alternatively, the person I voted for who said he was going to bring the economy to New Heights, now he's actually actively tanking the economy, it seems like.

So it's almost like both sides could be feeling a little buyer's remorse. I don't know. So if 2023, remember Derek Thompson put us on the spot, is there going to be a recession this year? I think you've said this year, that'd be too quick. But in the next three years we're going to have a recession, I think it's higher than the economies, like the economists that say 40% all the time. I would put it at like 65%. Maybe. Listen, again, who knows?

We're just as bad at making predictions as everybody else. I think the camp that I'm in. That's why I put on a probability on it. The camp that I'm in right now and we'll get to the same. in a little bit. I think it's a slowdown out of recession. Maybe we're splitting hairs here, but... Oh, wait. Duncan did a, did a poll. Will we see new all-time highs is here? The compound people. What do you think people said? Yes or no. When did the poll go up? 17 hours ago. Okay. So like right after the market closed.

I would say 23% said yes. 52%. So people are still feeling a little... All right. People need more slaps on the wrist. We need to like a 15% plunge here at least. Okay. All right. Yeah, that's not great. Not enough pain yet. No, you know what? We've got smart investors. We've got smart investors. I think this, well, it's true, but I think this kind of dovetails nicely with what we've been saying about needing to get a slap on the wrist. So the S&P does their annual SPIVA did any professional funds outperform.

Hang on. That's not the S&P. It's S&P global. Yeah, sorry. What's the difference? Well, when you say the S&P, it's like this not. Oh, sorry. Standard impores the company, yes.

So they look at, you know, all these different kind of funds. All domestic funds, large cap, small. cap, all these different U.S. funds. And over 10 and 15-year periods, it's basically like 85 to 90 percent of professional money managers underperform their benchmark. And this is not just the S&P. This is the mid-cap 400. It's a small-cap 600. It's all these different, and it's a very high number. Is this the, did retail outperform the pro professional investors by the most in history in this period? Because if you think about all the retail investors who just bought some, a handful of growth stocks or a handful of big, the biggest companies, and I know exactly

what they do, and so I'm going to buy them. It feels like this has got to be the widest spread in history between professional money managers and retail investors. Yeah, no doubt. Right? Like this, but will this ever happen again? Well, like, well, we look back at this as an anomaly. Like, can you remember that period in the late 2010s and early 2020s, when you could literally just buy the biggest best companies in the world and outperform everyone? Like, is that going to be an anomaly? I don't know. I don't know that it's over. I mean, it's certainly taking a pause, but but yeah, this is a unique, this is a unique period in time. Yes. All you had to do. I'm using all. I know it was hard because I certainly didn't do it.

But all you had to do is buy the biggest companies. Yes. And the companies that you know and used, right? It's the total Peter Lynch strategy of him going to them all and buying legs panty hose that his wife liked. Yeah. All right. So let's talk about the economy. Because I feel like for the last 20 minutes, we've been talking about like pretty high level stuff like people's interpretation of the economy, how people feel stock market's reaction. And the stock market does not always predict the economy. Put that out there. We got an email that I want to read.

I graduated in college in December with an accounting degree past level one of the CFA and have been looking for a job in the world of finance. It has been rough to say the least. It feels like job posts are few and far between for entry-level positions. I am not alone on this. Several friends of mine, a few years older than me have been laid off in the past few months. Several engineers and a couple working in finance all have been the result of broader cuts at their companies and not have individual performance.

They also have been struggling to find new jobs. On top of this, in a class I had full of different business majors, accounting, finance, marketing, et cetera, of the 55 students in the class, only nine had jobs lined up post-graduation. My professor said that was the lowest he had seen in years. My dad works out a Windows manufacturing company, and they just have to lay off 40% of their workers because their orders are slowing down big time. Their competitors are doing the same. They've been hiring to fill positions at the office, a few engineers and marketing personnel,

all entry level compared to the last time he hired these positions. is receiving four times many applications and many applicants who are way overqualified. This is why the economic data is absolutely mind-boggling to me. My situation in those around me does not inspire confidence whatsoever, but the data tells me that I'm absolutely wrong. My takeaways that companies don't want to take on new hires or cutting the newest hires and the people who do have some form of experience are okay taking jobs they are overqualified for.

Maybe this is just a product of where I live with not a broader theme. Maybe it's short-term uncertainty. I just see my situation in those around me and it gives reason to worry. So I think this is a really good take on how the labor market has evolved because even when people thought there was going to be a slowdown in 2022, the labor market was so hot coming out of the pandemic that companies did not want to fire people because it was so hard to hire them in the first place. Because people, it was, if you change jobs, you made more money. I continue to believe that was the hottest labor market we will ever see in our lifetime. Yeah. I don't see how it's ever equaled.

And if you change jobs, you got like a 20% or 15%. percent raised or whatever it was, the wage growth for changing jobs was insane. And so even though companies kept saying, we think a recession is coming, they wouldn't lay people off because they were worried, what if we have to just hire them back? And now the labor market dynamic has shifted where the labor is not in control anymore and the company is back in control. And I think that's probably why you're seeing this. And even though this is anecdotal, I'm sure that there's a lot of other anecdotes that are just like this. Correct. So the question is like, what do you do with this? What does it mean?

How tight is the economy and this person experience to the stock market, right? That's a big question. Main Street versus Wall Street. A couple of weeks, months ago, you were talking about consumer spending and you were like, I just don't, like, what slows this down? I just don't see people changing their spending. Well, here's what slows it down. There was a potential recession.

So this chart is from the conference board via the Washington Post. The percentage of consumers who believe there will be fewer jobs in six months is at the highest level since 2013. And this is definitely going to change people's spending habits. There is a slowdown in the economy. The labor market is cooling off. So again, don't misunderstands. I am not naive to the risks that the economy is facing. I'm, I guess through the lens of the stock market, I'm only saying that 15%, whatever we end up getting, listen, I don't want a 30% decline. It's not the end of the world. That's the lens of the stock market. The lens of the economy, I'm viewing this as a slowdown more than a recession.

So NFI-based, small business optimism, falls to a four-month low. Here's a quote from Sam Rowe. Uncertainty is high and rising on Main Street and for many reasons, how future developments are resolved will shape the economy's future. Confidence that the economy will continue to grow is fading. Chamath tweeted, I really don't like to mention individual names, but in a negative tone, but I can't help it with this one. He said Long Main Street, short Wall Street, the spread tree.

trade of our lifetime has started. And I just don't know what he's talking about. I mean, I think I know what he's doing. I think he thinks we're all really stupid. That makes no sense, though, in a slowing labor market. It makes no sense. So, okay, how's this for long, main street, short Wall Street? Americans fall behind their car payments. Their percentage of borrowers at least 60 days late on their car payment is at the highest record, highest on record. This is the subprime 60 plus delinquency index. People got to start buying sedans. Wait, wait, before we miss it, I want to go back to the person who wrote in that email. Okay.

I'm going to offer them some personal advice. They got an accounting degree, but they're going for the CFA. If you want to get a job, get your CPA. You will get a job in the accounting field. Yeah. Great advice. There is a lack of accountants right now. Maybe you don't want to do that with their life, but if you really just want a job,

become a CPA. Honestly, that's what my dad told me when I couldn't find a job out of college, and I basically told him to screw off because I was going to be a CPA. But, all right, so getting back to stress in the market. So last night, Delta adjusted their outlook for the first quarter. And the securities filing, the outlook has been impacted by the recent reduction in consumer and corporate confidence caused by increased macro uncertainty, driving softness and domestic demand.

The stock was down 50% of the after hours. The market just opened, it's only down 5%. So it's on 30% from the highs. Yeah, but here's a quote that I highlighted. it. So Ed Bastion was on CNBC. He's this CEO of Delta. And Phil Leboe said, do you get the feeling that we potentially are heading towards a recession? And he said, I don't feel it. As you just said, we're growing 4%, not 8%. If it was a recession, we'd be down 10%, right? So again, things are slowing down. And the market is going to react to that very quickly as it already has and is. But there's a big

difference between growing 4 to 8% and contracting. Right. And it also could mean there's going to be places in the economy when we have normalization like this or a slowdown that are going to feel like they're in a recession, even if the whole economy itself isn't technically in one. Right. And I still do think that housing could be the savior here. If rates plunge very quickly and mortgage rates fall, I think housing could be the shock absorber.

Ben, one thing that we didn't talk about, which I guess I can't. keep, I keep, like, dropping hints, like, don't, don't freak out. Don't do something that you're going to regret. If you are, like, really nervous now and you're afraid the market's going to go lower, which very well may, and then you're going to get even more together, so you go even lower, which it may. And you're having those feelings of, I just, I just want to feel better. I want to feel safe. I want to go to cash. Please don't. This, again, please don't. This is not a comment on where the market is going. The market may go lower. It may go higher. It may not go lower.

But the problem with getting out, and we've said this a million times, but it always bears repeating a correction. It's so easy to sell, right? It provides instant relief. But getting back in is so hard because either one or two things is going to happen. Either the market is going to go lower confirming your suspicions that the market is going to go lower and you're going to feel great that you got out. Ah, I avoided 4% downside. I avoided 10% downside, right? It's going to reinforce it.

You were right. and you're going to wait for it to go lower or you're going to wait for the dust to settle, L.O.L. before you get back in. That's one scenario. And then you're not going to get back in lower, let's be honest. Or worse, I guess, if I don't know if this is worse or better, you sell near the bottom, at the bottom, whatever.

Market gets high, goes higher. Are you going to get back in? The market doesn't bottom on good news. It's not like the good news is going to come and then you're going to get the old. Okay, great. Like the market doesn't wait for you. The market bottoms on bad news, not good news. It doesn't let you back in.

in. So please, if you have to, because you're legitimately having trouble sleeping at night, fine, you're taking too much risk and dial it back. But do not go to cash. Do not. Right. If a 10% correction scares you that bad and your 90% in equities, dial it back to 80 or 70, but don't go all in or all out. That is just cash becomes so seductive, to your point, that it's just this gateway drug to constant market timing. And it's just, it's a bad, like, over-rebalancing. I don't even mind over-rebalancing occasionally, even though you could make a, you probably should be leaning into the payment stocks are falling, but I'm okay with that as long as you're

not just going to the extremes of all in or all-out. That's the bad, that's a bad part. Joe Wisenthal tweeted, virtually every comment in today's ISM manufacturing report is about uncertainty or hesitancy in doing business on account of tariffs, and he highlighted a bunch of them. Do you think a lot of this, because it feels like a lot of the 20-22 recession stuff for CEOs, it's not like they were necessarily predicting recessions, although some of them certainly were. It's kind of like they were saying, throw us a bone here, help us out, right? We don't want to go under recession. We don't want

to lay people off. And I think that's what a lot of these surveys now and the CEO's coming out saying the slowdown is coming, they're signaling to politicians like, hey, if you don't want this thing to turn into a recession, do something, please. That's kind of what it feels like. I know you're really good to short corporate America. How much... Not for long. Like, how much evidence do you need that they're really good at figuring it out and

navigating challenges? Do you know what I really like, though, about the stock market? And I feel like the stock market is the least political place on earth now. Because everywhere else you go, there's on social media and on the news, there's spin or there's, you know, platitudes and there's lies. Yeah. And you can, whatever, there's confirmation bias. But the market does not care about politics or

messaging or spin. If the market doesn't like your policies or what you're saying, it's not going to give you the benefit of the doubt. The market's going to react first and then ask questions later. It's such a great point. It's just pure fear and greed. And that's some of that obviously is politics like bleeding into it. But, but you're 100% right. You can't, you can't lie to the stock market. Right. You can't say this is a great policy. Just wait, the stock market, no, show us first. How's this for a spin? I saw somebody tweet this. Yeah, the Dow is plunging. This is happening because we have a precedent with the balls to undo a globalist economic agenda

that's decimated American wages and quality of life. This is the pain that comes from real change. It's must easier to just pass the buck. Sure. Guess what? The stock market doesn't care about your feelings. We do have to add some context, GDP now from last week. We said GDP now fell off a cliff.

It looked like the economy is really, really slowing. Matthew Klein, were a really good piece on the thing on the overshoot. And honestly, the funny thing about where, we are in the information age today is 30 years ago, we never would have had GDP now tell us. GDP is going to slow. But we also wouldn't have had the substack, really smart econ guy who knows everything about how it's constructed to tell us. Actually, how did he figure this out? So he says, well, a lot could happen between now and the end of March, I would be extremely surprised if the current GDP now correction for 2025 Q1 turns out to be accurate by the time

the official growth numbers are published at the end of April. And he said basically Americans imported $28.7 billion worth of gold bars in January that is up for a monthly average of less than $1 billion. And so raw gold imports are also up. So it's saying this big import of gold, which I don't really understand why there was all this, maybe just because gold's at an all-time high. There was this massive importing of gold bars. And I don't even know what that means, but he figured it out that this dynamic changed the import-export balance that that throws off the calculation of GDP now. I guess even Josh said the GDP now guy who created it, said, yeah, this was a problem. So that's going to be reversed. So the economy looked

like it was falling off of a cliff from that. And technically, it's not really. So thank you to the wonks. I actually put the, so I get the, I get the overshoot into my email inbox because it's a substack. And then they have the Gemini thing for AI. And it says, would you like us to summarize this email? I said, sure. And they say, Klein suggests the model misses subtracting gold imports leading to an overstated goods trade deficit and a projected economic downturn. good job jemini i don't the thing is i don't have any loyalty to any of these AI programs or models and i i feel like people keep well this is the best one and that's the best one aren't they all kind of the same no you don't think so no i don't think so i i've noticed

jemini's kind of stinks look how uh it gives you one sentence well that's what it said it was a summary yeah that's not no so there was another one but i just put that one i don't know i just What are you just partial to chat GPT? I like chat GPT. Okay. I'd probably use that one the most, but I don't... Anyway. I'll be honest.

I haven't even tried the others. But I've used Gemini because it's in my Google and I chat GPT is where I started. Okay. So we've talked a lot over the years about the huge inheritance money that's coming. I've heard estimates anywhere from like $50 trillion or $100 trillion in the next 20 to 30 years. I hate to raid on parades, but it's not going to really happen for a lot of people until they're way older. So this is from JP Morgan Guide to Retirements, which is. just came out the other day, came out this week.

They looked at today, if you're 65, the probability of living to a specific age or beyond. And they say if you're a non-smoker in excellent health, there is a 43% chance, at least one, if you're a married couple, at least one of you is going to live to 95. 73% chance someone's going to live till 90. And even if you're not in excellent health,

because obviously not everyone is, there's a, you know, almost a 20% chance someone's going to live to 95, 44% chance one of them is going to live to 90. the millennials who are waiting on their parents to die to give them their assets, which we've talked about, there's some people who, that's their retirement plan at the back of their head, right?

I help their parents live forever. But you're not going to receive the money when you really need it. Now, maybe some will need it if they don't save for retirement, but you're going to get it when you're like 65. Yeah. Yeah, it's not like you're going in, yes. And so maybe that's why we need more conversations. I also do think that the wealth transfer will occur during the lifetime of these people.

You know, let's be honest. And also these millennials that are waiting for the parents to die, they're going to get everything paid for. Probably. Right? Camp, family vacations and down payments. All right. So we've talked a lot about the economic uncertainty and the short-term slowdown. And I feel like everything that we're talking about right now is definitely short-term in nature.

It's not necessarily like this is for sure going to change the long-term. Well, that's the thing. Like, if we zoom out, how many events have there? been over the last 15 years like this. Not exactly like this, but events that scare the market and we laugh about it a year later, right? Maybe this is different. Maybe this tanks the economy and changes the trajectory of the AI explosion. And I just don't think it's going to. And I could be wrong, obviously. So as Recline at the New York Times had this podcast and he transcribes it to, and he said, there's so much else going on in the world right now to cover, I do think there's a good

chance that when we look back at this era of human history, AI will have been the thing that matters. And so he says, for the last couple of months, I've had this strange experience. Person after person from artificial intelligence labs from government has been coming to me saying it's really about to happen. We're going to get artificial general intelligence. And he kind of goes through what this all means for the labor market. And again, it's all speculation. But I do wonder, I still think AI is going to be a thing. So if we have a really bad downturn this decade, it's probably going to be because AI doesn't come through like people think it's going to. I think it might be the opposite. I think maybe what if like, what if, what if

we have the downturn because AI is so effective that it's like really impacting the labor market and putting people out of work. Well, that would be the crazy thing is if we get a recession and people are lose jobs and then AI hits big time and then a lot of these people don't get hired back. Right, exactly. That's the nightmare scenario. Well, that's the- And by the way, that scenario is not like that hard to imagine either. No, not really that people that corporations would use the excuse of laying people off and just filling their positions with AI. But I think if we get a big bus or a big boom the rest of this decade, AI is the thing. Yeah, I agree.

I agree. All right. So we got the crypto reserve. Let me read a tweet from the crypto czar, David Sachs. Just a few minutes ago, President Trump signed an executive order to establish a strategic Bitcoin reserve. The reserve will be capitalized with Bitcoin owned by the federal government that was forfeited as part of criminal or civil asset forfeiture proceedings.

This mean it will not cost taxpayers a dime. It is estimated that the U.S. government owns about 200,000 Bitcoin. However, there has never been a complete audit. The executive order directs a full accounting of the federal government's digital asset holdings. The U.S. will not sell any Bitcoin deposit into the reserve. It will be kept as a store of value. The reserve is like a digital fort-knock for the cryptocurrency often called digital gold. Premature sales of Bitcoin have already cost U.S. taxpayers over $17 billion in lost value.

Now the federal government will have a strategy to maximize the value of its holdings. the Secretaries of Treasury and Commerce are authorized to develop budget-neutral strategies for acquiring additional Bitcoin, provided that these strategies have no incremental costs in American taxpayers. In addition, the executive order establishes a U.S. digital asset stockpile consisting of digital assets other than Bitcoin forfeited in criminal or civil proceedings. The government will not acquire additional assets for the stockpile beyond those obtained through forfeiture proceedings.

The purpose of the stockpile is – I'm almost done. The purpose of the stockpile is responsible stewardship of the government's digital assets on the Treasury Department, all caps, promises made, promises kept. Are you fucking kidding me? This is the biggest nothing burger ever. They didn't do anything. We got mad last week. We got done using taxpayer funds to buy, so at least they're not doing that.

Listen, I own a lot of Bitcoin. I loved seeing it dump on this news. This is such bullshit. Promises made, promises kept. You didn't do it. thing. You're keeping the Bitcoin that you have. Now, listen, I'm not like completely minimizing it. I understand like this, the symbolic, important nature of like establishing. It's a, it's a nothing. But it's, what a hilarious spin. Uh, yes. So Cliff Asness actually

wrote a piece of up. Taking a victory lap for not selling the Bitcoin that we forfeited, that we, that we got from, from Silk Road and wherever else we got it from. Yeah. Yeah, they're just not selling it. So Cliff Aznes, not a big fan of crypto, usually. He's a quoth guy. He says the new crypto Fort Knox is as dumb as it sounds. And he wrote a whole piece on this. And he, this is, I think, the best point of, like, why we shouldn't have been buying it. And again,

I'm glad that we didn't just buy it. He said, finally, and perhaps most obviously, even if crypto is a viable long-term competitor to the U.S. dollar, why on Earth would we be promoting this direct competitor to ours being, to our being the world's reserve currency? Something that conveys upon the United States exorbitant privilege. Like, we shouldn't trying to compete with the dollar. It's one of the biggest benefits and advantages that we have over the rest of the world. I don't understand how proponents of Bitcoin as an alternative

to the dollar is anti-America. Am I missing something? Why would you want anything to compete with the dollar other than because you want to get rich personally? Well, that's it. It's the bad thing. That's it. Give me a fucking break. There's no spin zone in which in which competition for the dollar benefits our country. And we've seen, yeah, and we've seen that, like, the reason that stable coins work so well is because it gives people in other countries access to the dollar, right? That's why stable coins are so popular.

Again, I'm not, I'm not anti-crypto. I just, I don't see it that way. By the way, I was, I dipped the toe. I put some really low limit orders in when crypto started crashing. Do they get filled? Some of them got failed. One of them almost last night, I put it in for like 77, and I got close. But, yeah, because I was sitting on a big cash pile, Mr. Market Timber guy here.

And we say, don't do. This is my brokerage account. I'm okay market timing and crypto, okay? Okay, that's fair enough. All right. Rocket is buying Redfin. What is your take on this? Makes sense to me.

TechCrunch reports that the new combined entity essentially pulls the two companies respective strengths and home search services and financing, bringing everything together under one virtual roof. It's an all-stock deal for $1.7 billion. Redfin's market cap at the peak was almost $10 billion. But it was a meme stock. I mean, this thing went crazy. What is Redfin?

Is it just shitty Zillow? Well, I wonder if this is Rocket just trying to compete with Zillow. But I love, Redfin has amazing research. Like, their weekly pieces on the, is amazing. And it sounds like the CEO is going to continue to keep to stay on, at least for a while. So, yeah, I don't know, not being a...

I shouldn't say shitty Zillow. I don't know anything bad. I would just say it's like second-tier Zilla. Yeah, I really like Redfino. They have great research, and I hope they keep putting it out. Okay, there was an article in the FT by Robin Wigglesworth, and it's a great chart showing private market marks of the private equity companies, two of which I own.

Are you viewing this as a buying opportunity? Yeah, I think there's an... They're not getting slaughtered, but they're... down pretty good. They're getting hit pretty hard. I think some of them are down. Remind me which ones you own. I own Blackstone and Blue L.

Okay. But it's funny because it shows KKR, Blackstone, Carlisle, Apollo, Ares, and Brookfield. Then the stocks are getting slaughtered. And then it shows private market marks, just straight flat. I know people get really upset, like, this drives cliff nuts, and I understand exactly why. But this is like the benefit of private markets. This is why people do it, right? And I know it's, not the whole reason.

And I know it's like a charade, but like, sorry, this is one of the benefits of not market to market. It is what it is. It's not going to change. I had a tweet that went a little viral the other day. I'm going to throw it in here right now and see if you laugh or not. I mean, it's not necessarily my best work, but this is, this is okay. All right. I put in it right underneath the chart here.

What do you think? You know what really sells it is a plus zero percent, right? That was good. That was, you're right. So the tweet is current drawdowns down S&P 500, the NASDAQ, the Russell, and then private credit is plus 0%. You're right. That was very good. I did it.

That was very good. Oh, so the way back machine, usually we look at our old charts, but Josh sent us this piece in New York Times that was like 30 charts for how COVID changed the world. And I pulled a couple out. And I still think the craziest, maybe the craziest chart of all for this decade is oil prices that went negative. And then Russia invaded Ukraine and went crazy. and then it's still just kind of normalized. I think it's back to $66 a barrel. Almost where Billy Bob says the perfect price is.

Did you say the perfect prices? 67? I forget. 70. And this one I'd never seen before, alcohol sales in the pandemic. I had never seen this before. Went absolutely bananas in 2020.

I think I was tricky every night. Oh, yeah. For like eight months, maybe even two years. Who's to say? I do remember you telling me, like, I'm, what are you doing now? I'm pouring myself a drink. It was like 6 o'clock at night or something.

But I didn't really. It was like being at a hotel every night. It's on the pre-pandemic trend now, but it went up massively through like 2021, 2022. I never see. Did you see any of these charts that stood out to you? I mean, there's a lot of good ones in you. I haven't looked in them yet.

Okay. That's all I got. All right. You know, I'm not, I'm not usually a self-help guy. In fact, some of the self-help nonsense that eat people up, that people eat up. makes me a little angry, but it's not really fair because I do know that there are people that take a lot of comfort in the self-help stuff. I know that it helps people get through some hard times. So I do wonder though how much, because there's so much of it coming out

all the time. I just wonder what percentage of people that actually helps and what percentage of people just consume and consume and consume because it makes them feel better, but doesn't actually change their behavior. Yeah, I don't know. I guess the reason why I have like even a little bit of a soft spot is I remember Tony Robbins' book, Awaken the Giant Within. Like, my mom had it on her nightstand when my parents got divorced a long time ago. Like, I just remember that book being there. And so maybe that's why I have a little bit of a soft spot for it. But I think it's mostly bullshit, even if it does help people.

But anyway, I say all that to say that this tweet, I liked. Somebody tweeted, Blue W missed. I'm 37. Instead of regretting that I can't wake up age 18 again, I pretend to. myself that I'm 90 and I've woken up at age 37 and then I get to magically, wonderfully have the next 50 years again. That's a good perspective. It's good perspective, right? Yes. So I was driving, I don't know where I was, but you know when you drive through kind of a rural area and there's that one house that has just a million things strewn about the lawn. There's like cars on

cement, you know, there's stuff everywhere. It's like a house from like 40 years ago. It doesn't belong in modern civilization. And so I saw this Pontiac. transport minivan. Look at a picture of this. You remember these things? And the one that I saw was like red with a gray. I just,

I, so I went down a little rabbit hole of 1990s minivans and I can't believe how ugly some of the cars were that we used to drive in. They were just, remember like the astro vans

and look at this thing. It was just. The Bewick Aztec or was it, the Aztec, was that the ugliest car? That was like around 2000. It was like, oh yeah,

that was Walter White drove and Breaking Bad. Yeah, that was pretty bad. But the 90s had some, just the minivans were just awful. The Plymouth, there was like a weird, like, box-shaped little car. Was it a Plymouth or a Chrys? I can't remember.

Oh, yeah. There's some bad. Yeah. Ben, as we've said a bunch, we're not spring chickens anymore. I just saw an Instagram reel where it was a couple of dudes and they were doing a reel of, did you know the president of the Boston Bruins, this former hockey player Cam Neely? was Seabass and Dumb and Dumb and Dumb and their minds were blown, like, how'd you know that? And like, they didn't know.

Well, because we all knew it. Everyone who was eight years old, but they saw it. Like it was a big thing at the time. That guy over there was Seabass. I still contend that's the, on Wayne's World a couple weeks ago, Kyle Brandt said, Wayne's World is the most quotable movie all time. It's Dumb and Dumber. Absolutely false.

Dumb and Dumber is the most quotable movie in history. All right. This was a good one from a YouTube comment. I bet most of you wouldn't think of this as a top recession proof job, but it's definitely up there, a casino dealer. My mom has been working in a casino for 20 to 30 years and no matter the economy, people always find a way to gamble. Yeah. I do wonder if that will be put to the test, though, of the draft kings and fans, because draft kings has already done a lot, the stock. I wonder if that will be put to test in the next actual recession. Yeah, I think

so. The fan duels and I think so. But it is funny to think the casinos might be a little different than that. This is a great email. I don't really, I don't know that I have a great response to this, but I thought it was cute. Inspired by Ben's great take on eggs being a great cheap source of protein. I want to challenge you guys to come up with top 10 bank for your buckway to feed a family. I mean, I know you're going to say Little Caesars. Oh, that's it. I was going to say, I was thinking eggs, bananas, little Caesars, and pasta.

Jimmy Johns. Oh, wow. You have eggs, bananas. You can't feed a family of mom, banana. I guess you do breakfast bananas. Bananas for breakfast. Bananas are so cheap. Yeah.

Every time. I just got three pounds of bananas yesterday for like a dollar-fif. What are you, a gorilla? Three pounds. How much is that? Me and my son and my kids, we all love bananas. How much is the three pounds? But the thing is, it's like two big things of it.

The thing is, I get a lot because everyone's, you know, one or two of them is going to be bad, and you're going to throw them out. But who cares because they're so cheap. So I just buy extra. You don't throw out the bad bananas. You make a smoothie out of it. Come on. Well, my wife does that.

She freezes them and they make banana bread, too. My kids love banana bread. So we do a lot of that. Okay. I'll think about that. Okay. Story time. I guess we can talk about this.

So you came to visit me this weekend For reasons that are uninteresting We put off my brother's funeral service He didn't want a regular funeral So we put it off and had it this weekend And so I don't know It was maybe a month after he died or so And I was kind of excited for at the beginning

And then I dreaded it as it was approaching Because I knew I was going to see all the people I know my life that like mean something to me Into him And it was definitely an extreme day. So I appreciated you coming, for sure. And it was funny how many friends and family afterwards came up and said, so I talked to Michael and I felt like I knew him already. Everyone already felt like they knew you, which was funny. So you did a good job fitting in and literally meeting everyone

in my family. But, yeah, I mean, the most profound thing was the fact that we'd set it up for this. He didn't want a regular funeral, so we just had a, what we thought was going to be an open house for like in a big event hall and uh we did it for three hours because we figured people are coming to go and like everyone just stayed everyone came and nobody left it was i don't know 300 350 people stand near him only um so that part of it was like i don't even think he had the realization of what a profound impact had on people you know so that part was cool it was uh but just seeing the looks on people's faces that was the worst yeah my uncles my aunts, cousins, his friends.

And so that part was just, it was all, like, that was awful. I, like. You know, it's the most contagious thing in the world, tears? Yes. If somebody comes up to you with tears, you're not going to be like, you're not going to laugh. That's what happened to me. Like, in his friends seeing me for the first time, they were feeling bad for me.

I was feeling bad for them. And so, yeah, there was a lot of tears shed. It was, but it was, you know, it was great to see. the impact he had, it was still, it was just a very, very hard day. And I've just been thinking a lot. And I don't know if this is true for you because I think one of the things that I've always thought was like a very positive about you is like you, I think Tim Ferriss said this once, and this is getting back to that self-help stuff.

He said, like, the only way to make it through life is like the ability to have difficult conversations. And I feel like whenever we partner up on something, I'm the good cop and you're the bad cop, like you don't mind having difficult conversations with people. Like you actually like flourish in those moments. But only in business. Not of my personal life. Well, maybe that's part of it.

But I'm like that in all aspects of life. Like, I don't like having difficult conversations. That's just my- Yeah, you climbed out of your car instead of honking. Right. But I feel like I've had so many conversations with friends and family members that I never thought I would have in the past month or so that, like, I feel like nothing can, I feel like I have this armor on now.

Like, I don't, there's nothing that can make me not willing to have a conversation with someone about something. Because you hear other people. people opening up, and it's just like, there's so many of it that. I told you, I'm totally desensitized now, maybe for right or wrong. It just, it totally has taken a layer of something off of me. So I think that's going to be good and bad in certain ways, but anyway, it was you did great. Your speaking was incredible. Yeah, it was, I put a lot of work and thought into that. So I was glad people liked it. But I just, yeah,

I wanted to get a good sense of him. And I tried to make it more upbeat and positive because I didn't want to just sit there and cry the whole time. So my son told me that I can't, I can't weep up there. So I did what I could. Did George have fun with me? George had fun with me, yes. I told you, my kids were very excited to meet you

because they've heard so much about you and they've seen on YouTube. And George goes, so he's bald, right? That was the, but there was a few people who said, I've only heard Michael I've never seen because they don't watch the YouTube or whatever and so they were trying to pick you out and some people were way off

right because there was a few I have a few people who are like New Yorkers that were there and so anyway yes but it is like the one of the best parts about this that you never want to go through a situation like this but you just it makes you realize how much love and support you have

from people and that is like the thing you don't want ever have to feel that but knowing it's there is wonderful yeah so um So I'm an emotional person, as you know. I like to feel the feelings. And I've been on a lot of airplanes over the past couple of weeks. So I've had time to get into some things.

And for the first time in my life, I've been binging a podcast. Thanks to you. I'm a huge fan of Neil Brennan's comedy. I love his Netflix specials. Three mics, I think, is an all-time or comedy special. It's incredible. And so he has a podcast called Blocks, which was one. one of his Netflix specials, where the blocks are things like anxiety and doubt and depression,

all these sort of whatever, whatever you feel. He's a very deep guy. Yeah, whatever we all feel in our daily lives that inhibit growth and whatever. Right. So he has a podcast where he interviews friends, comedians, actors, and for the first time in my life, I binged a podcast. I didn't listen to all of them because there's over 100 episodes, but I think I'd listen to like 10. Just pick out the best guess basically, right?

So I started from the most recent one, Billy Macy, William H, and just worked my way backwards. And then I skipped around that I went to the beginning. But one of the, so I can't recommend it highly enough because it's not a typical interview. Oh, tell me about this time that you got this job. Who else almost got the job? What, you know, it goes deep and you get to see that like all of these people are people and to hear them talk about just life. I just, I enjoyed the shit out of it.

But I also noticed that I really enjoy, and I think especially because tears are contagious and so is laughter. Like when you're listening to a podcast and it's emotional and especially when it's funny, like you want to see people, you want to laugh with them. And so I understood for the first time why people watch us. And you can now watch us in Spotify, by the way. But I was upset because the first interview with Letterman, there's no video

and so it didn't really hit me until I was like oh man I wish this this is disappointing they wish I could watch it So are you watching the Spotify one while it's on Is that how you did it? Well I'm not like sitting down on my couch But I was on the airplane And so

And if it's in the car You know just to glance over So I very much enjoy Not that I'm going to ever sit down And watch a podcast on my couch Although I know a lot of people do But I get it like it's a much richer experience If you didn't listen to

I like the Jerry O'Connell one, actually. Okay, I skipped over that one. I like Jerry. He's a funny guy. All right, so, Ben, I want to give you credit. The pit is my favorite Ben Carlson recommendation. I love Pittsburgh. I've only been there once, but I had a great time there,

wonderful city. It's such a fucking good show. It's just so high quality. I don't like the squeamish parts, as we mentioned earlier at the top of the show. I look away. but my God is it good. So here's my take, and this may be a little hyperbole,

but they have the Oscars for movies, and they have the Emmys for TV. I feel like every year, this sounds like a Bill Simmons take in a way, but every year they should have a heavyweight belt. And the heavyweight belt goes to the person who is the best actor or actress that year. Like the best performance of anything.

So it could be a movie, a TV show, it could be SNL, any of this stuff. And I feel like Noel Wiley as a doctor on that show right now is the best performance on anything right now. He is so good and believable. And again, I think it's because he was on ER. But yeah, it's very good. You know, one of the things about the show that I really like is like, I have a pretty good life. And I think I'm very aware I wake up every day thinking about how lucky I am to be where I am given my shitty background and whatever.

But this is such like a great reminder of like how great we have it. The people, both the stories and the people in the emergency room that are, like, obviously happens all day across the country and across the world. Like, these are real stories. Yes. And the doctors that have to deal with this trauma on a daily basis. Like, you cannot begin to imagine what those people, what those, like, real heroes do. It really makes you appreciate doctors and nurses and anyone in the healthcare profession

a lot more, doesn't? Like, can you imagine if every day you had to deal with that much? No. Oh, my God. Yes. I have a friend whose wife is an ER doctor, and I thought about it. Like, oh, my gosh, I can't. It's obviously not always that hectic.

But there are obviously times when it is very hectic like that, and you're constantly going from one trauma to the next, and I can't even imagine the amount of stress that puts you under. And I talk to people who say, like, listen, because I've had a lot of doctors reach out, actually, because of my brother and say, like, listen, we, because we do this all the time, we have to, like, separate our thoughts and feelings.

But every once in a while we have these feelings that creep in, And that's when it's hardest. And they show that on the show? Yes. My God, is good. Lastly, I finished Paradise on Hulu, and I enjoyed the hell out of it. I wasn't looking forward to season two, but now I am. Did you like it or no?

I think I liked it too. I think season two could be a bare market. It happens a lot, but I don't know. We'll see it. I have faith in the creator, the guy that did This Is Us. Yeah, it was, it's very well, it was better than I thought would be. Once, when they make the reveal of what's going on in the first episode, I kind of thought like, oh, really? Well, because you're like, is this going to be super cheesy?

Yes, that's what I thought. And it was, it was pretty well done. So I watched a Michael movie this weekend on HBO. I watched Heretic with Hugh Grant. Yeah, I don't think you liked it. Nah, I didn't like it. It wasn't for me. Just, like, it's kind of like I knew it was coming and what's happening.

Those, that kind of movie just doesn't, doesn't, like, I knew, I knew what was going to happen. Because it's one of those, like, hey, idiot, get out of the house. I thought the end, it was. was really dumb, like it totally fell apart. But I enjoyed the first 80% of it. You didn't enjoy it at all? I mean, he was a good performance by him. Yeah.

But just not my thing. It's okay. No big deal. I want to end with two things. One, I want to make the prediction that we make during every correction, which is that at some point when you have such a big, like you have so many big down days, like we're down 3% yesterday, the Nazek was down 4%.

We're going to get a face Ripper one of these days. That's obvious, right? in corrections, even if the correction still goes down, you get one big face ripper along the way. Always. And then, too, we're going to be in Miami next week, which I'm really excited about. I can't wait to be in the sun.

And we're going to be at Futureproof Citywide. I really hope the market stabilizes for many reasons. Like, I don't like seeing the market go lower. I also really don't want to be, like, having a good time and, you know. I do remember Josh was saying this the other day in our firm call that. And it was like September 2022, which is like the height of, the inflation. That was where we had the first city future proof in California. And, yeah, I don't know. I kind of like having a little more excitement in the air about it. You're right.

It's more fun and it's just laid back. But I kind of like having people little on edge thinking about this stuff. Really? But I just, I don't want to be like, because we have a good time there. We do. You know, and I don't want to be having a good time when like the world is or the market is imploding. Okay. So you want to see a, you want to see a rally. I just want to say, could we just not, not, we just chill out, stop the selling? for a second. I didn't look. So the market is open. It's 10 o'clock Eastern or so. That's a piece down 30 basis points. Okay. Yeah, not great. But I don't know if this is good or bad. The selling is very orderly.

You're not seeing, like, Nicole was talking to Josh about this. It said, like, you don't want to see the VIX grind higher. Like, you want to see a VIX spike to, like, really get a flush. Like, a higher grind is, like, just indicative of, like, uncertainty. And it's just, it's not good. You haven't seen. seen, but on the flip side, you haven't seen like the credit market react. That's when you really start worrying about a recession when the spreads finally blow out. Right. So we'll see where this goes. We'll see where this goes. We'll see you next week. I don't know what time of show we're doing a live. Well, we're

doing a live animal spirits at future proof. So if you're there's a regular show. Are we just going to do a regular show? I think we do, especially if there's a question going on. I think it'll be plenty to talk about. Yeah. We thought about trying to do something different, but I think we're going to have to do just a regular piece going on because it's going to be a crazy time. all right well market drives narrative all right animal spirits at the compound news thank you for

listening everybody stay safe stay sober uh don't overreact we'll see you next time