ROLLUP: Trump Tariff Crash | Circle IPO | CoreWeave IPO | FDIC Crypto Greenlight

Bankless Nation, welcome to the weekly roll-up. Each week I'm bringing on a different co-host to help me go through the news. And this week I have the pleasure of being joined by Alex Thorne, head of research at Galaxy Digital. Happy Friday, Alex. Happy uh Liberation Day. Do you feel liberated today?

I feel liberated from my stock games, David. But yes, happy Liberation Day. Thanks for having me.

We are going through some of the most uh chaotic uh news events uh in recent memory at the very least, uh, maybe marked by this extremely iconic photo that I have up on the screen of Trump holding what looks like a photoshopped like board in his hands, but it is actually real, and it is a poster of reciprocal tariffs of just basically every single country in under the sun. Uh, and so we'll kind of go through some of the facts and I'll get your takes on it, uh, Alex. So yesterday, April 2nd, Donald Trump declared liberation day by announcing a series of significant tariffs aiming at reshaping US trade policy. Uh, these measures included a 10% universal tariff on all imports with higher reciprocal tariffs targeting specific countries based on their trade practices. Uh, for instance, China faces a 34% tariff, the European Union Union has 20%, Japan has 24%. So some of our largest United States uh trading partners got hit with tariffs that are much higher than I think anyone could have like reasonably expected. Uh, and Trump just touted this as just the new dawn for America. Um, while this was going on, at 4.25 p.m., or like five minutes before markets closed, the SP futures were trading at 1.7% higher. Uh, and then by 442 p.m., just under 20 minutes later, the SP 500 had erased over true trillion dollars in market cap on the news of all of these uh reciprocal tariffs. All the tariffs that are being announced by this Liberation Day announcement, over 180 countries are being impacted, which is like all of them.

Uh, and then there's also sector-specific tariffs, uh, mainly the automobile industry. The idea, the strategy, the stated strategy by the White House on these tariffs are one, a decrease United States dependence on imported goods, which Trump is citing as a national security issue. He wants to boost domestic manufacturing and jobs by encouraging companies to relocate production into the United States. He wants to address trade imbalances by penalizing countries that he thinks are engaging in unfair trade practices like currency manipulation or high foreign tariffs that disadvantage American exporters. And then also he wants to generate revenue so that he can fund domestic tax cuts. Uh, like I said, stock market futures fell in real time as uh uh Donald Trump was reading off some of these, uh some of these tariffs. Uh crypto hasn't been impacted too much. We are definitely down. Bitcoin's down 3% to $82,000. Ethereum is below $1,700 or $1,800. But I would say the stock market continues to decline while crypto is just rebound, uh re finding lows that it has already seen. Uh, Alex, what's your digestion of all of this news? What's your take?

Yeah, it was a volatile day yesterday, right after the close, right? Uh the president started talking in the Rose Garden at 4 p.m. So, you know, traders, investors everywhere, including here at Galaxy and our on our trading floor, very rare, but that the biggest sort of moment of the day was after equity market close. Um, look, I think dollar traded down to start and and thing risk traded up. Bitcoin went up up to like 88.5, right? So again, still sort of in that range. I I agree with your point here that even at these levels of 1777 and 82.1 where Bitcoin is and Eth and where Eth and Bitcoin are, like

still kind of in the chop range we've been in. I wouldn't say it's like a a a it's not yet something that's like wildly outside of the range we've been trading in. But anyway, as Trump held up that poster that you were showing,

Mm-hmm.

That's when you saw the risk reversal happen. And I mean Bitcoin dropped from 88 to 85 in about like 30 seconds, um, dropped down later, kept dropping. Um, that's when the you know, the SP futures and and other and other risk futures, I mean, big name Fang stocks or Mag Sevens were down, you know, almost, you know, five to ten percent uh aftermarket trading. Um, and it's because the the board that he holds up,

this is but it's become clear now, they aren't reciprocal reciprocal tariffs. Those numbers are effectively the trade imbalance between our countries and those countries multiplied by completely different numbers.

Yes.

Yes, these are um

Trade imbalance times 0.05. So, or or if that formula results in less than 10%, 10%. So it's it's actually solely the difference in our imports and exports with those countries, which is signific typically significantly higher than expected the tariffs would be. So what what we thought we were gonna get was that they went country by country and said, okay, on corn, like I don't know, India, you tariff us 50%. So we'll tariff you 50% on corn, or generally, or whatever, right? Or if it's a non you kept talking about the non monetary trade barriers. Oh, okay, you don't let us bring in our corn, right? Well, then we're not gonna let you bring in your corn. And that it would be matched like one to one with the actual, you know, actual reciprocity between what these countries are tariffing us. Um, and it just doesn't look like that's what they've done. They've instead done sort of classic protectionism here.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think this is the thing that is really confusing and frustrating investors, policy people, because there's no coherence in like why we are doing the action. So Trump, Trump wants to impose tariffs, and his justification is reciprocal tariffs. But what they are actually measuring downstream of this like interesting calculation that there was some drama on Twitter about, which we'll talk about, is actually it's just a trade imbalance, is the motivation behind these crazy high tariffs. And the stated actions is not actually lining up with the words. And so this maybe to go through some of the drama that uh was on Twitter, everyone was confused about the numbers going on behind these boards, right? Tariffs charged to the United States, China, 67%, European Union, 39%, Vietnam, 90%. And people were confused about like how did they come to the conclusion of what these tariffs are? Because the actual average tariffs charged to the United States are something much lower. Like China's actual is something around 7.5%, European Union, something around 5%. And so what they realized, this this kind of just reverse engineering the math, is exactly what you said. The math going into this is something much different than any sort of tariff input. It's actually just looking at the trade imbalances and saying that, oh, if there is a trade imbalance, we are going to increase the tariffs. And so it's fundamentally going after trade imbalances, not any sort of reciprocal tariffs. But this is, it's there's just a gap between the actual stated rationale versus the end number, which is just confusing everyone as to like what happens next, how do we respond to this? Uh yeah, I know the Switzerland made a statement as basically to the effect of we don't know how to respond because this is incoherent. Uh and I think that's also kind of the sentiment of uh domestic investors as well.

Yeah, some some early responses. EU preparing retaliatory tariff measures if talks fail. China firmly opposes tariffs, will respond. Japan calls tariffs regrettable, seeks exemption, promises swift action. Germany calls for the EU to pressure Trump. South Korea orders emergency support for their affected industries. Canada vows strong countermeasures. Some exemptions remain. Mexico rejects tit for tat tariffs and plans a broader response. UK is seeking a trade deal but keeps its options open. Australia will negotiate, avoids counter tariffs. Brazil evaluating responses might go to the World Trade Organization. Israel planning measures to counter 17% tariffs. So like it's rippling out. And I agree, like if the, you know, we do have trade imbalances, right? Like we are often net importers because of the the triffin dilemma, right? It's the it's the global reserve currency. We are net exporters of dollars and net importers of goods. Like, and that is sort of the price you pay to be the globe global reserve currency. And and wanting to reverse that is uh, you know, could be a noble policy goal, but it isn't exactly what the president has been saying he was gonna do. He was saying that we were being unfairly taxed. Like, why would we have to pay, you know, inbound tariffs to some country if they're not paying them to us, right? Which, you know, they're they're related. Those are related topics, but solving for the trade imbalance is different than, you know, retaliating for these unfair trade practices that the president has been talking about. So I think that that um you know the difference between why he was saying he was doing it and then what he actually has done so far. It's not clear that they have actually, I don't think they take place yet. I think some start April 5th, which is what, Friday or Saturday, Saturday, I guess. Um, and some start April 9th, which is like early next week. Like um, maybe they won't start. I mean, I don't know. But basically that that disparity, I think, is what really accelerated the the sell-off and and the fears about risk assets, because you know, there was, I think, a a view forming that maybe Monday was of this week was peak tariff FUD that basically this could be a this could be a um sell the rumor by the news event, if like because they have been signaling about the tariffs for now months. So it's not like it was new information, but then it I think I mean I don't know if this was a mistake, if they did the messaging poorly or what, but they really did sort of drop a bomb with this like different math than was expected.

Yeah, this uh just a very large like gap between the the tariff charges. That is a great photo.

Oh that's a great

This is an iconic photo. Again, this is Donald Trump just holding off, holding up this board. Um like I said, it's confusing to investors because the math going into the tariffs charged to the United States number is not correct math. And also there's just some fundamental inconsistencies about Donald Trump's motivations, right? Like if this is just posturing, if we are posturing as the United States to try and just come up with a very large, sticker-shocking number about large tariffs into the United States to use that as a bargaining chip. That is a short-term bargaining chip. But if Trump wants domestic manufacturing to return, if he's trying to incentivize Nike to build and you know manufacture their shoes in the United States, that is a multi-year-long transition. Like that doesn't just happen overnight. And so there's some time frame dislocations here that don't really line up. And overall, I think like one of the reasons why stock markets are just taking such a big hit right now and also continuing to go down is that this is just very hard. This is even more uncertainty when there is just a chaotic input into the calculation that people can't really understand how it really got there. That is just uncertainty into the market. And if you look around uh crypto Twitter, this is a Geiger Capital who is a commentator around like general markets. Uh, he says, I won't delete this tweet because I'm a man of honor. But yes, I was wrong on the tariffs in November. He has indeed put blanket tariffs on every country. Trump 2.0 is very different. And he is retweeting a tweet that of him saying, no one other than fairly stupid partisans on the left think Trump is going to implement 20% tariffs across everything on the board, which turns out to be exactly more or less what's happening. Uh, and I kind of think that this is sentiment that everyone who is looking at the stock market sharing right now is no one really thought that Trump would actually go this far. But he is indeed going this far off of inputs that no one could have really like predicted or seemed comprehensible.

That's right. That's right. And the surprise, the surprise on the inputs yesterday, I think it became pretty clear that he was going to go pretty blanket over the last month and or or two, right? Like it it was not maybe clear in November to Geiger Capital's point. But again, the surprise of the math is I think what really spooked the market here. Like um, and I mean you're looking at the the you know, the major equity indices down, I mean five percent. I was looking at um as we record this, like on a daily for

And down three percent. The SPX had dropped three percent on the open and since open it has dropped another percent and a half. So we are down uh four percent on just uh the SPX, SP five hundred.

Yeah, and and I'm looking at Nasdaq is down four point eight percent. I mean, this makes it an I don't have the numbers in front of me, but it's certainly one of the you know, reddest down, biggest down days in in years. So um

You know, I I d I don't know what to make of it. I think this is I think people were thinking that, um, like I said, that perhaps like peak FUD uh had already occurred and that if, you know, he came out and did

You know, something s sounded angry, but was to stake out a negotiating position to your point, posturing that like maybe we had had priced in the fear about tariffs, but it it just, you know, we're we're still having it priced in for us, basically. So I, you know, you you're looking at a very uncertain like next couple of months for sure, not just in risk markets, but also in the American economy, right? Because there's also been, you know, some tricky data here, right? You've got the Fed, you know, discounting, lowering its GDP forecasts, you've got weak manufacturing data, you've got um high like delinquencies and and credit delinquencies and mortgage delinquencies, and you've got like so so there is material weakness appearing in the US economy outside of the markets, too. Um, so you've got this, that's a tricky situation, right? And and meanwhile, you've got Bessin and Trump basically saying we're not looking at the stock market right now into the short term. And you know, I was at a I was at the Cherry Blossom Summit in DC on Monday, which is a private conference hosted by Senator Bill Haggerty, where Bessin talked, and he said that the stock market is like a micrometer of the of sentiment. It shouldn't be paid too close. I mean, he's they're downplaying what like this day that we're talking about, where stocks absolutely risk reversed, huge, um, they're they're downplaying still. So there it it doesn't sound like they're close to.

You know, the pain that they that they know the economy, uh, the markets need to feel in order to get rates where they need to be and to sort of work on things like the deficit, there's more they can bear, is what they're signaling. And to me, I think that's really what the market is going to be hunting out here. Like, will they bear a 20% stock market decline? What's the number? 30? At what point is it too much to bear? And nobody knows yet, but they're holding pretty strong for now. So I I wouldn't expect any kind of like dovish language coming out of Treasury or commerce or the White House anytime soon.

Yeah, I think vet investors are looking at Donald Trump's statements and his actions and his words and are trying to under ascertain do we take this man at his word, or is he trying to play 3D chess? Like, is there a hidden agenda behind the scenes? Or when he says, I like tariffs and I want to implement, you know, broad 20% tariffs across the board.

Do we take him at his word? And like, granted, if you go back to the 80s, you can go and find Donald Trump like uh like records of him talking about how much he enjoys tariffs, how much he wants to tariff other countries. It wasn't China back then, it was Japan, was like our big like foreign um domestic, not a foreign like trading adversary. Now it's China. But he has been like very consistently into the concept of tariffs for decades now. Yeah. And he is very simply saying, I like tariffs. I want to implement very high tariffs across the board. And now he is following through with that. And it seems to be if you are an investor who literally just takes Donald Trump at his word, not assuming that there's actually a 3D game being played behind the scenes, that has actually has been the correct way to interpret the markets uh ever like almost the entirety of Donald Trump's uh position, both in in this um administration and the last time he was president.

Yeah.

Yeah, I you're right. He has been there's actually fascinating

quotes from him in like the eighties talking about this. So

look, I I I think in in that sense it is fair to say that like he is basically doing what he said he would do. I just to your point, I don't think people really believed that he was gonna do it. And

And now the market is wondering, you know, how long can they keep this up, basically? And and they're saying we're gonna hold strong. So I I don't know. I if you read The Art of the Deal, which I did go back and read, I think Trump is pretty clear about his strategies generally to ask for everything, right? To come out super hard with an implacable position, but he almost always caves and does a deal. And so, like you have to assume at some point something.

gets done with the with all of these countries to you know reach some kind of at least an accommodation where we're no longer tit for tatting, right? Because like we're now expecting retaliation for a lot of these tariffs. And then are we going to retaliate on that? And like you're that is why it's called a trade war. Like it escalates like a kinetic war. Right. So at some point, I assume we will get to a stasis here where we stop just, you know, one-upping each other. But where that is, I mean, and and that's the thing too, by the fact that Trump is very focused on the manufacturing industry and domestic, you know, production, which I respect. Like I th there we have hollowed out our domestic manufacturing in the United States. And it like I said, it kind of flows from the global reserve currency by nature. It's kind of natural that that can happen. But wanting to repair that is different than being um complaining about the unfair practices we've been subjected to. And it really does look like he he is much more serious about he he does want to change the trade imbalance. That's actually what he wants to do. He wants America to build more and and I respect that but this is that is where the messaging here was confusing, I think, because this those numbers that he's proudly holding up and you're right people were literally brute forcing the number to try to figure out where he got these numbers. And the White House I saw that thing the guy James whose tweet you showed that did figure it out he put it to the White House deputy press secretary who

sort of unb it almost seemed unbeknownst to the to that press secretary, um, admitted that that's what they did, basically. So so now it's confirmed that that's what they did. They this is actually tr tariffs that are taxing the trade imbalance. They're not tariffs that are re s reciprocal for those against us.

Yeah, so this was kind of the drama that was going on on Twitter. People were reverse engineering how we got to the numbers that is the calculation for what we think is our uh the the tariffs being charged to the United States by our foreign trade partners. Uh and people figured it out that it's actually just uh if what what is that calculation? It's something very simple. Uh you just is you just

They just like import it's the ratio of like imports to exports and then they found that they just multiplied it by point five to reduce it. So it wasn't as big, right? But like I think that's

On Twitter, Kersh uh Kush uh Desai, who's the White House Deputy Press Secretary Secretary, is declining, is saying, like, no, we actually literally calculated tariff and non-tariff barriers. And then he tweeted out a link to the approach, including this like algorithm. This, like, this just algorithm, uh, it's basic algebra with some uh figures in there that go in into the summer. And then people look at this Greek letter uh algebraic equation and be like, yes, that's exactly what we are saying you guys did. You guys just did it in Greek letters and trying to like make it super like genius level IQ, but in fact, no, you guys are just admitting that the reverse engineering of what we did exports minus imports divided by imports is actually exactly how we we came to it.

So and and look, the market had been even before this is really a strange, by the way, this is among the best, like hive mind. This is like where social media and the internet was at its best. I think figuring this out. It's a great example of like just absolutely figuring it out and telling truth to power, basically getting it confirmed. I mean, we we considered this tweet from the depth effectively confirming what they did, right? So like now we it wasn't just people on Twitter reverse engineering. This was legitimate journalism that ended up happening. Um very exciting. I I think the big problem with tariffs, right? Like is that they they they broadly reduce global efficiency, right? They are taxation, right? Either we're taxing them, question of who pays is always the question. But like typically the foreign manufacturers are going to end up selling adding the cost of those tariffs back to the goods they produce and sell to us. So like there's plenty of historical evidence of tariffs that we impose actually being paid for by American consumers, right? Ultimately, like the the just like taxation in general. When you tax a corporation, oftentimes they'll just pass the cost of the tax down to their consumer if they can, right? So that that is always the big question. The raising the revenue is it ends up being both um you know tax a tax for everybody. Um, it also reduces the global efficiency. It's in general, it's stagflationary because um

It's more deflationary for the tariff pro the tariffed producer, but it's more inflationary for the tariff imposer, right? So it it creates a situation where we're we will see inflation in sort of the CPI sense, right? Not like monetary debasement, but um cost of goods will go up, right? And I'm already saying, telling you that like employment data hasn't totally turned, but like manufacturing looks shaky. Like the US economy labor data doesn't look that good. By the way, the government, which I think the federal government has like two to four million employees, and they're firing a lot of them, right? Like, which again might be a good thing, but those are people that now become unemployed. And that's a lot of people. And these are not, for the most part, like very low-paying jobs. They're they're not bad jobs in terms of salaries. So, like, you've got all those people now with less money to spend, um, you that may seek unemployment benefits, that have, you know, their their credit, you've got student um student loan stuff is now gonna start hitting people's credits. There would have been a moratorium if you didn't pay your student loans on it affecting your credit score, but that's now being lifted. So you're gonna get millions of people whose credit scores drop like a hundred points, right? That's gonna be less purchasing power. So all of this combined with the possible inflationary nature of the tariffs are what people that this is all what's creating that risk atmosphere. But I think yesterday, like we've talked about, it was a shock about that number situation. But like still, it doesn't, we're still just in this period where you're looking at a possible stagflationary economic situation. And, you know, cryp cryptos like Bitcoin and ETH are just sort of like.

in in the range trying to you they're kind of along for the ride right now. These are macro assets at the moment.

Yeah. Here's something that here's here's what I think that is a problem about the strategy. I think the strategy of bringing man manufacturing home to the United States is a noble goal. And that is something that has been persistently and growing a growing problem of America. Like you said, to the due to the Triffin dilemma, we export dollars. We export financial services. We don't do a very good job exporting manufacturing product like shoes. And if you go and look at this like reciprocal tariff in the board that Donald Trump is holding up on screen right now, Cambodia, we're hitting them with a 49% tariff. Malaysia, 24% tariff. Indonesia, 32% tariff. Thailand, 36% tariff. These are all textiles, and this is where this is why Nike stock is being hit like negative, like 12% on the morning, I think. And if the goal is to convince Nike to move their uh manufacturing onshore, that that means that Americans are going to get those jobs. But I would contend that that's not jobs that Americans really see themselves enjoying. Cause that can't like what is the salary cap on somebody who's working in a Nike shoe manufacturing facility that's on like at some point Americans just aren't interested in that kind of job. In addition to that, like robotics is going to take over. Like we're gonna automate that job much more than we're going to be able to afford a United States citizen, you know, making Nike shoes domestically. And so the again, the idea of moving manufacturing onshore is noble. I do not think that this is going to have the desired outcome of simply taking like Nike factories and putting it in like the Midwest to somewhere.

Yeah, it's a really good point. I mean, the the automation and robotics is uh also a good point, but I think you're the question you're asking about, you know, do Americans want these jobs or do they see themselves, I think actually isn't a very important is a very important question. And I think when you have decades of your economy focused on sending everyone to college, you know, thinking about things like technology, IT, like um finance, right, m medicine, like these big, you know, everybody, it's sort of like a multi-generational thing, right? Like my grandparents came here in 1956 from Hungary and they were just happy to survive, right? They wanted to give their daughter, my mom, a good life. And they did. And she she had to try hard, but but then the millennial generation, which I am a member of, and I think you are too, David, right? Um, we our parents kind of wanted us to have everything, right? And so, like, and and and as you cascade away from, you know, World War II and the boomers and all the struggles that, you know, they were satisfied doing, you know, having freedom. They they probably are much more likely to to you know, build you know, manufacture shoes. But our gener, you know, take it three generations later of all of that exporting and sort of high intelligencing of our economy. And you've got now like people whose parents also probably weren't making shoes, right? Like it's you're you're removed from that manufacturing base as a culture and as a and generationally. So I I think that you look at it like all the people that take out enormous amounts of debt to go to college. And like I went, we went to college, like it's not that like helpful. I mean, it was fun. I learned a lot, I guess, but like I'm not using like that much of what I learned in college in my career. And I think if you get a liberal arts degree, which so many of the student loan holders have, like, is that they but they were told like you have to go to college, you have to go to college. And so, like, you're you're looking at a this could take a long time, right? To re-architect the economy, to explain and exalt the the nobility and the career advancement opportunities of the trades, right? Of manufacturing. Like the the country, a large parts of the country are not prepared to realize. And by the way, ask your HVAC guy or your plumber how much they make. If they tell you, I think you'll be surprised it's a lot. So like these are great jobs. But like, you know, or or even like, you know, manufacturing high end goods. I mean, that like they're they're not low paying jobs, all of them. Maybe so, you know, some are, maybe, but like um.

But the country like has been for at least like I don't know, at least since like 1990, it's been like op like hammered into every child that they have to go to college, right? And like, but the college jobs aren't the ones that are in domestic manufacturing. Like you don't need a a liberal arts degree to work at US steel. Like, you know, and that's okay. I'm saying that's like a good thing. You you really shouldn't. Like, what do you care about, like, you know, reading like, you know, poetry and stuff if you're gonna be building stuff with your hands? I'm saying it's a different trade, right? And like the the the the US is not really like culturally architected around the trades like we used to be. And I I think that is something that really makes this tricky as well.

I think the the last uh point of conversation I want to bring up when we talk about this uh uh Liberation Day. Yeah, the United States, we represent 26% of global trade. We definitely punch a budget above our weight class in terms of how much trade we represent across the entire globe. 26% just from one country, that's us, you know, USA.

It's not a majority, it's one quarter of global trade. Uh and

Donald Trump is playing these, making these moves, make with the, in my opinion, the appearance that we have a lot more leverage than we might actually do. And I'm worried that we don't have the global trade dominance to just slap hairy terror heavy tariffs on the rest of the world. Because that's what we did. 180 countries that we just put at least minimum 10% tariffs on. That's all of the world. 180 countries is all of the countries. And it really just seems to me that the rest of the world is just going to trade around us. Like there, we don't have that much of a bargaining stick that I think Donald Trump thinks that we do. And I think the next part of this conversation comes from uh how unified will uh the response be from the rest of the world? We already see the EU is responding as a unit. That's what the EU does. Uh, we also saw uh Japan, China, and I think one uh one other country uh respond as a unit. So how South Korea, how well the rest of the globe will unify against the United States, I think is gonna be the next like course of action to watch here.

I agree completely and I'll keep it short, but I I think you are absolutely right. That by the way, that China that was from Chinese state media. I saw that headline. So I I'm not discounting it, but China

If if it's true that Japan and South Korea huge U.S. allies, I mean Japan, possibly the single most important U.S. ally, right? They literally own most of our debt, or they are the by far the largest holder of US of U.S. sovereign debt. Um, if it's true that they are going to act in concert with China, like that is a massive deal. It's, I would say, very bad for American geopolitical positioning because it means that um we are pushing our allies into the hands of our antagonists, right? And so

I think China is stoked right now.

I mean, yeah, look, everyone's mad at us right now, right? And it's a maybe a nice change, or like, I mean, I I agree. I I think there's look a big takeaway, regardless of whether the goals are noble or whether the tariffs will work or whatever, whether it's reasonable to do or whether it's disruptive. Many of the answers to those are yes, by the way, or or no, you know, like but um this undeniably accelerates the multipolar

shift happening in global geopolitics, right? Like this is going to force a realignment, this and other policies of this administration. And and again, maybe some of maybe that's good. I'm just, but it, I I think it's it's very obviously.

a multipolar world and it's very obviously going to f further deteriorate into blocks, right? And, you know, we do have the most purchasing power. We still have the best market to sell your goods in. So there there is some leverage there for sure. But

You're right. We're we're daring people to find other markets, right? I mean, that's what we're effectively doing here. Um, and they might. So, like, that's that doesn't mean America won't be powerful or even still maybe the most powerful, um, or even the biggest or best economy. We probably will be for the foreseeable future, but it does mean that our influence is gonna wane, right? Like, but by choice. I mean, that that's what we're saying. America, that's what America first means, is that like we don't want to have that influence anymore. We want to focus our energy at home. It's just a big idea. I don't think people are he is following through on it. And and that is a this is about, you mean you're if you think that the Cold War ended in 1989, right? And and then the sort of Goldilocks period of American Empire ended in 2001 on 9 11, and we then we sort of entered this, you know, we had the war on terror period, and then like the, you know, and then COVID, like we this is definitively the start of yet another new era, is sort of my point. The the sort of post post war.

Everything on monetary policy gonna be true on Bretton Woods probably, right? Like the post war order from World War Two is over.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Maybe the the last comment I'll make before we move on to uh talk about the circle IPO. Um, there was a quote going around from Donald Trump uh ahead of the actual Liberation Day. Um, like actually the the talking about the tariff numbers was that he said something to the effect of the globalists are not going to be happy with what I have to say on Liberation Day. That's not that's a huge paraphrase, paraphrasing, but that's what he says. It's like people are going to resp people are not going to like what I'm about to announce, and they're all globalists. And he's like positioning anyone who's unhappy with this as a globalist, uh, and kind of just trying to nip the criticism in the bud, saying, Hey, if you're not happy with with this, you're just clearly a globalist who's not putting America's interests first.

Mm-hmm. Uh I I I'm not even necessarily opposed to be clear with what they're doing. I I find the volatility exciting. Fuck it. You know? Something does I something does need to give on the driver.

I

don't know the outcome.

Agreed, it's uncertainty in that, like, you know, people are investors. Your your listeners are investors, so I get it. Like it's and and so are my clients, right? Like

Right.

but something's gotta give, honestly, on the debt and the deficit. I respect their trying, honestly, because like we have no ability to have long term thinking in this country because of the electoral process. And so like it's nice that someone's finally gonna try something different. It'll probably fail, and in like three years they'll just reverse everything and then we'll go back to normal and we'll just rack up debt to a hundred trillion and that'll be that probably. But like

Yeah.