Real Vision: Finance & Investing

Latest Episodes:

Finding Relative Value Amid Credit Market Madness (w/ Boaz Weinstein and Ed Harrison) Dec 31, 2020

Show notes

Boaz Weinstein, founder and CIO of Saba Capital Management, made a name for himself at Deutsche Bank in the early days of credit derivatives. Since leaving to start his own fund he has continued to make a name for himself as a master of credit derivatives and relative value. In this interview with Real Vision’s Ed Harrison, Weinstein discusses how the current environment of tight spreads for pristine balance sheets and vulnerable companies alike is presenting some interesting relative value opportunities. Harrison and Weinstein also discuss Bill Ackman's recent reup on the same big CDS trade that has helped Saba return over 70% YTD, the Fed’s role in credit markets and credit ETF liquidity problems, and the opportunities Weinstein is seeing in closed-end funds. Key Learnings: The credit of companies with close to zero percent chance of defaulting is trading at the same prices as companies with serious COVID risks is presenting RV opportunities. Closed-end funds trading at discounts to NAV are also presenting rare opportunities for yield in this low-rate environment.

Recorded on November 23, 2020.

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Silicon Valley Innovation in the Covid Era (w/ Raoul Pal and Keith Rabois) Dec 30, 2020

Show notes

Venture capitalist Keith Rabois, a general partner with Peter Thiel's Founders Fund, is widely known for his early-stage startup investments and his executive roles at PayPal, LinkedIn, and Square. He sits down with Real Vision CEO and co-founder, Raoul Pal, to discuss the evolution of innovation in Silicon Valley over the last two decades, highlighting its entrepreneurial spirit and the revolutionary power of technology. They dive into the shifts in consumer behavior amid the coronavirus pandemic, the IPO market boom, the rise of SPACs, and how COVID-19 could transform higher education.

Recorded on September 28, 2020.

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The Winklevoss Twins: Bitcoin Is The "Trade of the Decade" (w/ Raoul Pal) Dec 29, 2020

Show notes

Tyler Winklevoss, CEO and co-founder of Gemini, and Cameron Winklevoss, president and co-founder of Gemini, join Real Vision CEO Raoul Pal to discuss how they first discovered Bitcoin, their exploration into other crypto assets, and market psychology. They explain the importance of network effects for Bitcoin, noting that it is a type of social network. The Winklevoss brothers share their grand vision for Gemini and how they plan to shepherd the next wave of adopters away from legacy finance and fully into crypto. Key Learnings: The crypto asset class is very small and, because of this, institutional investors have been unable to get exposure to it. Bitcoin is a very young asset with enormous upside potential. Many people are just starting to get their feet wet in crypto, and the Winklevoss brothers believe that eventually people will leave the legacy financial systems fully for crypto infrastructure with Gemini helping to facilitate this migration.

Recorded on December 7, 2020

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Chamath Palihapitiya on SPACs, Bitcoin, and the New World of Finance ( w/Raoul Pal ) Dec 28, 2020

Show notes

Chamath Palihapitiya, CEO of Social Capital, gives Raoul Pal, Real Vision CEO, an inside glimpse of the seismic forces that are radically transforming the investment landscape — from SPACs and tokenization to data autonomy and virtual learning. Palihapitiya argues that old structures of capital formation, which prioritized buybacks rather than Research & Development (R&D) and "efficiency" rather than resiliency, will give way to a new future in which fintech companies will replace "too big to fail" banks, green energy will de-escalate geopolitical tensions, and tokenization will serve as a digital ledger for every financial transaction. Palihapitiya and Pal discuss the role of Bitcoin in this new world, and Palihapitiya advocates for a form of Universal Basic Income (UBI). Key Learnings: The old ways of managing companies and allocating capital were unsound, and COVID-19 has laid bare the fact that the "emperor has no clothes." With radical change is on the horizon, investors should embrace these technological transformations in order to become a magnate of the future.

Recorded on November 16, 2020.

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What Does It Take to Invest in Russia? ( w/ Harvey Sawikin ) Dec 27, 2020

Show notes

Harvey Sawikin, co-founder and lead portfolio manager at Firebird Management, a fund dedicated to investing in frontier and emerging market equities in Eastern Europe, joins Real Vision editor/reporter Haley Draznin for a conversation about the development of emerging markets over the past several decades and the sector outlook. Firebird started out as the first Russian portfolio equity fund and has since expanded to include other countries in the region such as Kazakhstan, Georgia, and Romania. Sawikin shares why his investment strategy differs in more mature and developed markets, how a typical investor in emerging markets has evolved, portfolio repositioning amid the Covid-19 pandemic, and the value of travel in investing. . Key learnings: Emerging markets are often a blind spot for investors—finding them requires assessing liquidity risk and geopolitical climate. Dollar strength and weakness is the macro factor that has the biggest impact on emerging markets. The disinflationary environment has led Firebird to reposition its portfolio towards more growth stocks in the Eastern European region and less towards cyclicals.

Recorded on December 18, 2020.

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The Central Banks' Easy Money Experiment Will End Badly (w/ Jim Grant & William White) Dec 26, 2020

Show notes

William White, former central banker at the BoE, BoC, and BIS and senior fellow at the CD Howe Institute, has been a thorn in the side of his central banking colleagues for decades, questioning their hubris and pushing hard for a paradigm shift from within. Together with legendary financial commentator Jim Grant of Grant’s Interest Rate Observer, White explores the difficulty of paradigm shifts within central banking and the overwhelming historical evidence that this easy money experiment will end badly. White also expresses what he believes to be the core problem with central bankers' analytical framework — namely, that it assumes that the global economic system is "comprehensible, understandable, and controllable" rather than a complex, adaptive system with characteristics that are not present in the models that attempt to decipher it. As well, Grant questions White on his views on Bitcoin, how he personally invests, what he would do if he were running the Federal Reserve, and if there is any possible way out of our current predicament. . Key Learnings: Central Bankers' neglect for history will be their ultimate undoing, and although new, previously unthinkable policies have been enacted recently, it can hardly be considered a paradigm shift but merely a more extreme implementation of the same flawed analytical framework. The outcome of the deflation vs. inflation debate is not cut and dry even to someone as learned as William White, and he himself has for decades implemented a barbell strategy of cash and property as a way to position for this uncertainty.

Recorded on November 16, 2020

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The Controversial STABLE Act & Its Implications for Crypto Dec 24, 2020

Show notes

Rohan Grey, president of Modern Money Network & doctoral fellow at Cornell Law, joins Santiago Velez, co-founder and R&D division lead for Block Digital, to discuss the controversial STABLE Act, the history of private and public monies, and the future of stable coins. Grey gives a detailed history lesson on money and its relationship to government. They talk through the key tenets of the STABLE Act and its implications for the crypto space over all and stable coins more specifically. Grey explains the differences between Central Bank Digital Currencies and E-Money and touches on the importance of privacy for financial transactions. Key Learnings: The government and public monies are strongly connected, and Grey believes that there are major systemic risks presented by assets aiming to disrupt the government's oversight of the issuance of its money with history providing strong evidence of these risks. For those investing in the crypto space, the passing of the STABLE Act may negatively impact certain types of stable coin projects as some may fall under the umbrella of this bill. Higher regulatory burdens may force some crypto projects to shutdown while those who are capable of meeting the higher bar may flourish with regulatory backing.

Recorded on December 14, 2020.

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Ed and Ash's Holiday Send-Off: Looking Ahead to 2021 Dec 24, 2020

Show notes

Special Edition of Daily Briefing with Ash Bennington and Ed Harrison. They will answer audience questions, provide an update on what they're seeing in markets this holiday season, and look ahead to the opportunities and macro risks for 2021.

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Taking Things in Stride: Stimulus, COVID-19, and Inflation: DB- Dec22, 2020 Dec 22, 2020

Show notes

Real Vision senior editor Ash Bennington joins Tony Greer of TG Macro to discuss the new fiscal package from Congress, the macro signals Tony has his eye on, and his outlook for the new year. Tony discusses how the spending package is insufficient, especially for American families, and describes the markets’ reaction as slightly “sell the fact” as made evident by the DXY’s modest but noticeable bounce. After Ash reviews some of the current data for COVID-19 hospitalizations in the U.S., Tony says that markets are still looking past this information and are more focused on the reopening. He also describes the relationship of the dollar and equities as it relates to the Fed’s modus operandi to create inflation with a weaker dollar. Finally, he shares the new opportunity that he sees emerging for U.S. financials, what he’s looking out for in the new year, and why he’s holding onto more dry powder during this holiday season. In the intro, editor Jack Farley covers Ripple's SEC investigation, U.S. bankruptcies, as well as market flow data.

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The Investment Portfolio that Grows and Preserves Wealth for 100 Years (w/ Jason Buck & Chris Cole) Dec 22, 2020

Show notes

In the grand finale to “The Big Picture,” Jason Buck speaks to Chris Cole, founder and CIO of Artemis Capital. Chris is one of the sharpest players in the volatility space and has made his name by playing risks and opportunities that others can’t see. An outspoken critic of the 60/40 equity/bond split, Chris is an advocate of what he calls “the dragon portfolio,” which consists of gold, long volatility, and commodity trend-following in addition to stocks and bonds. Chris gave a glimpse of the dragon portfolio when he spoke with Danielle DiMartino Booth on Real Vision in February 2020. Since then, volatility has exploded, both during the massive sell-off in March as well as in the shocking market melt-up since then. Simply put, the dragon has been unleashed. The twin risks of the left tail (deflationary deleveraging) and right tail (inflationary deleveraging) loom large. As Chris wrote in his 2020 report, "to thrive, we must embody the cosmic duality between the hawk and the serpent." For access to Chris’ 2020 report, “The Allegory of the Hawk and the Serpent: How to Grow and Preserve Wealth for 100 Years,” click here: https://docsend.com/view/taygkbn

Recorded on July 27, 2020

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