Odd Lots

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Why the Trump Administration is Now Taking Equity Stakes in American Companies Oct 16, 2025

Show notes

It's nothing new for the US government to use public money to support private American companies. The Biden administration, via CHIPS and the Inflation Reduction Act, was aggressive about using loans and grants to accelerate US industry. But the Trump administration has been engaged in something more novel: taking direct stakes in US companies like Intel and MP. But what is the legal basis for such action? And what are the advantages and disadvantages of direct equity stakes? On this episode, we speak with Peter Harrell, visiting scholar at the Georgetown Institute of International Economic Law. We discuss the structure of these new arrangements, and the advantages and disadvantages for the government to be a minority shareholder in publicly-traded companies.

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Why Argentina Needs Bailout After Bailout After Bailout Oct 15, 2025

Show notes

Argentina is getting bailed out again, with $40 billion of help from the Trump administration. Of course, this is a recurring phenomenon for Argentina, and this time it's happening under the free market-oriented Javier Milei, who has slashed spending to bring down inflation. So why is it in trouble again? And why is this such a recurring feature of the Argentine economy? In this episode, we speak with Greg Makoff, the author of Default: The Landmark Court Battle over Argentina's $100 Billion Debt Restructuring. In this conversation, Greg explains the domestic political context for why Argentina hasn't been able to establish a sustainable economic footing. We discuss the legacy of Peronism, Milei's efforts to sharply change course, and the challenge of seeing any economic reform project through to completion, given the pain required get into fiscal balance.

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Andrew Ross Sorkin on the Stock Market Crash That Shattered America Oct 13, 2025

Show notes

Almost everyone is talking about us possibly being in a bubble. Regardless of how AI investment ultimately pan out, there is an incredible amount of retail speculative mania in the air. So, how does this environment compare to past periods of exuberance? On this episode, we speak with Andrew Ross Sorkin, the editor of Dealbook, the co-host of CNBC's Squawk Box, and the author of the new book 1929: Inside the Greatest Crash in Wall Street History--and How It Shattered a Nation. Sorkin, who previously wrote Too Big to Fail (chronicling the Great Financial Crisis of 2008), went into the archives to discover just how in thrall the American public was to the market on the eve of the great crash. We discuss lessons from the time, similarities, and differences.

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John Ganz on the Era When America Was Consumed by Panic With Corporate Japan Oct 10, 2025

Show notes

These days, there's a non-stop drumbeat of concern that China and its dominant companies will eat America's economic lunch, so to speak. Of course, this isn't the first time in our history that there were worries about a rising Asian industrial power. In the 1980s and early 1990s, there was a lot of concern about the rise of corporate Japan. And that fear was seen all over movies and pop culture, from Die Hard to the Michael Crichton novel Rising Sun. This time there is one big difference: Chinese dominance doesn't permeate our pop culture in the same way. And furthermore, the US has long had military bases in Japan, so that dimension was quite different, too. To understand this period further, we talk to John Ganz, who writes the Unpopular Front newsletter, and is the author of the recent book, When the Clock Broke: Con Men, Conspiracists, and How America Cracked Up in the Early 1990s. We discuss how this fear came about and disappeared, but also how it still influences American politics to this day.
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Why the Price of Money Surged in the Last Six Years Oct 09, 2025

Show notes

What changed between 2019 and 2025? Why are interest rates so much higher? Why does it seem virtually unfathomable that the Fed will return to ZIRP anytime soon? Why do investors expect this rate cut cycle to be so shallow? The answer, theoretically, is that the neutral rate of interest has gone up. But what is the neutral rate of interest, and why has it moved? On this episode, we speak with Jamie Rush of Bloomberg Economics and Tom Orlik, the Chief Economist at Bloomberg Economics. They, along with Bloomberg's Stephanie Flanders, are the editors of a new book titled The Price of Money: A Guide to the Past, Present, and Future of the Natural Rate of Interest, in which they attempt to directly identify what the neutral rate of interest actually is. We discuss the big changes over the last several years, including deglobalization, demographics, and datacenters, that are pushing this number higher.
Listen to our sister show Trumponomics: Trump Isn’t the Only Reason the Price of Money Is Rising
Read more:
Trump’s Contradiction: Demanding Steep Rate Cuts for a ‘Booming’ Economy
Fed Set to Drive Global Rate Cuts as Europe Shifts to Pause

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James van Geelen on the Next Phase of the AI Buildout Oct 06, 2025

Show notes

Money has been flowing into the AI space, with billions pouring into GPU clusters, data centers, gas turbines, and the infrastructure needed to train and deploy bigger and bigger models. So what comes next? On this episode, we speak with James van Geelen, founder of Citrini Research. We talk to him about his latest field trip to one of OpenAI's new massive Stargate data centers in Abilene, Texas. We also discuss the increasingly complicated financing arrangements that are funding some of these mega projects and the energy needed to power them. Finally, we ask the question which everyone seems to be asking right now: is AI in a bubble?

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Lots More with Joe Abate on the Fed's New Target and the Rising Price of Money Oct 03, 2025

Show notes

We're used to talking about the Federal Reserve changing "benchmark interest rates." But the mechanics of how the central bank actually tightens or loosens policy are a lot more nuanced. For years now, the Fed's been doing this through the federal funds market — where US banks lend and borrow their excess reserves. But that could be changing. Last week, Dallas Fed President Lorie Logan argued that the fed funds target is outdated, and the central bank should be looking at alternatives. So what would those alternatives actually look like, and why do the intricacies of these short-term funding markets actually matter? We speak with Joe Abate, head of macrostrategy, at SMBC Nikko about this and the broader liquidity picture.

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Terry Duffy on the CME's Big Push into Retail Trading Oct 02, 2025

Show notes

CME Group is one of the oldest exchanges around, tracing it's history all the way back to the late 1800s, when it specialized in agricultural commodities. It's best known for things like futures and interest rate swaps that tend to be favored by professional traders. But as retail trading becomes big business, the CME is expanding its footprint in the space, including a recently-announced partnership with sports-betting platform FanDuel. So how does a marketplace that built its reputation on professional hedging and risk management now try to capture the attention of everyday investors? In this episode we speak with Terry Duffy, CME Group chairman and CEO, about the exchange’s push into retail, new competition in the Treasury futures space, and much more.
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Tarek Mansour on Kalshi's Plan to Create Markets in Everything Oct 01, 2025

Show notes

For over 20 years, people have been talking about prediction markets or event markets are the next big thing. But mostly, with some niche exceptions, they haven't taken off, in part due to regulatory constraints. But now they seem to be booming, and the regulatory environment has gotten much more friendly. On this live episode recorded in Chicago, we speak with Tarek Mansour, the co-founder and CEO of Kalshi, one of the prediction market platforms that's booming. One reason it's doing so well is because it's gone big into sports, which of course gets into its own regulatory thicket. In this conversation, we talk about the future of these markets, the prospect for markets other than sports and presidential elections, and Kalshi's overall plan to let its users to eventually trade everything.
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The King of Chicago Trading Wants to Build a GPU Market Bigger Than Oil Sep 29, 2025

Show notes

Don Wilson has built a career diving into some of trading’s thorniest problems, including figuring out ways to trade new and niche markets. Now, the founder and CEO of DRW has his sights set on the GPUs powering AI, which he thinks could end up being a bigger market than crude oil. In this episode, which was recorded live onstage at our show in Chicago, we talk about how such a market would work, including ways to ‘standardize’ the vast array of different types of semiconductors, and how this could change the capital stack of the industry. We also talk the evolution of trading over Don’s storied career and why he thinks most assets (and maybe even all of them) will be tokenized within the next five years.

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