Never Make A Decision In The Room

Yeah.

Greetings and welcome to Inside Baseball with Old Chestnut. I'm Liam Allen with my friend Morsex. How you doing, MB? Quite a week, my friend. Quite a week, huh? Yeah, I mean I I we had kind of an exciting Friday. Don't sound like uh you were stuck in a mud puddle all week. Well, you know, those who know me and those who know me best know there's nothing like Friday afternoon sell-offs that put a grin on my face. Um And uh Friday was a rough day for the longs. It was ugly. Um it was very ugly. Uh

The NASDAQ has entered correction territory. Um, so the old you know, the strategy of hit triple Q and press buy has worked. Um Quite for some time. So really like 10% off of whatever it is. But uh but yeah, uh that was a good that was a good Friday king. Yeah, who doesn't love a sale? I was um as is my habit, I was thinking throughout the week of things we could talk about. And you know, I think Trying to predict. Where the markets were gonna end up is a mugs game.

And so I sort of settled on, and I probably won't be able to find it now that we're in process of putting together a a small list of some of these phrases that I've accumulated over the years and um share them with the listeners because sometimes they're of value. Um

I think uh, and I've discussed this with the executive producer, life coach Leslie Harris. One of the most valuable sayings is Beware a market that doesn't go up on good news. And the corollary would be, you know, beware a market that doesn't go down on bad news. And So sitting in my kitchen table Friday.

Um you know, we didn't have time to put together an emergency podcast, but when I read uh Powell's statements where he talked about you know the dual mandate and the notion of Yeah, not quite certain we've got inflation to two percent, yet payrolls are indicating some slowing. I uh I thought that was the perfect comment for risk on.

And the long end of the yield curve uh did a little bit better. I I I can't tell you at this second whether the curve steepened or flattened, but the long end hung in. Pretty well, which sort of validated my thesis. But uh uh was it Thursday morning? I'm sitting at the kitchen table talking to Cheryl.

And uh I said, you know, the stock market trades like shit and it had good news. And there's a saying. Beware Mark that doesn't go up on good news. And she repeated to me something she had said a number of times in the last few months. She said Mark didn't feel right to her. We're overdue for a correction. So I claudically. Got my broker on the phone and I bought some puts. And lo and behold. He who has n no name. Shine a light in my direction.

Thank you, Cheryl. Oh, I I got news for you. She should have her own podcast. She picked up Nvidia before the fucking thing took off. And she turned bearish. ahead of almost anybody. Of course, you know, um You know the budget doesn't allow Yeah, her V. So um we will have to carry on as best we can, um between you and me, but uh Yeah. So um a couple of my buddies have been bearish for a while. Um

One guy in particular who we we had a a good chuckle. He was a uh a frequenter of your favorite place. Tequila Mockingbird. Oh yeah. New New Canaan, right? He was telling me how he was out with a bunch of Wall Street guys. And he was drinking his margarita. Apparently margaritas are the favorite drink of the well healed, if remember. His Sir Um

Um Rich Handler was drinking a spicy margarita during the unwind. Anyway, at this dinner apparently one of the salesmen was drinking quite drunk and he made the comment Hindsight is fifty fifty. My friend said he blew his marguerite out through his nose. It's almost as good as when I was on the floor at the Deutsche Bank and two repo traders. We're arguing. Yeah. One guy, did I tell you this one? I don't know. One guy says...

I got two words to say to you. Shut the fuck up. The guy replies, that's three words.

Incredible. Yeah. That will live that will live in infamy. Um so um yeah, I thought the statement by the Federal Reserve guy was pr was was I don't remember I think I had said I didn't think they should ease, but I thought they probably would. So I guess if we go into a hard landing, you can blame me. I accept full responsibility, but I'd like to see us get to that.

percent inflation number because it's it's really showing up in my life not that it's changing my behavior um Because, you know, being a a white man with all the privileges that come along with it, um, you know, it doesn't matter. But you can't especially being Jewish Exactly, exactly. Talk about starting out on third base. Yeah, really. Like like our friend Phil Ackman, who had a little little So here's there's a thing I won't pronounce it right, but apparently

If this a German phrase, of course all the phrases are in German. A Gdenkin experiment? Oh, I thought we were gonna do Schadenfreud. Come on. Now you throw out Gdanken on me. Don't jump ahead of the script, okay?

Go ahead. Good dang. Go enlighten me, please. It's a thought experiment. So you give yourself a question, you think it through. So Okay, here's the thought experiment. If Bill Ackman is the best trader ever, and if you have any doubt about that, just ask him, um, why would you take the other side of his trade? Really? No question. Yeah. So if you gave an order that Santiago wasn't to be touched. Dude, I do some other math on uh on Bill. Um

Because he was like, you know, he I told you, he's really popular on Twitter and he's got like this is his fifteen minutes of mainstream fame. But that was like two months ago, unfortunately. Um And I did I was like, you know, he's got a million followers and he and he tossed out the number twenty five billion. I was like, y you c if if even every one of your followers kicked in kicked in a few bucks, you're not hitting your target, pal.

Well that that that went quickly from from twenty-five to zero twenty-five. And I'm glad and I and I gotta thank you. This is a this is a classic like behind the scenes inside baseball that I'll give the listeners. From the beginning, MB has said no guests. Okay. Like like we toyed with the idea in the beginning of having guests, but the bottom line was we decided we were never going to do guests.

But when Bill announced he was gonna do the road show, I talked to the to the producers and I said, look, I don't ask favors. We could get him on the show. M B said no. Said no. I said, Okay, very good. Little did I know that the foresight okay, because we we would have had him on shilling the IPO doing the roadshow, and then a week later he pulls the rug out from under it.

Well I you know Yeah look I've I've talked in the past about my intersections with William Ackman and I think I've always Attempt to express my You know benefit of his generosity in working with You have spoken very high forget about speaking highly. You've never trashed So there we've done four seasons. Okay. We've got the law the list is long and distinguished of people that have gotten the bullseye.

Not only has Bill never got the bill died, but we have applauded and supported and enjoyed and used him as content. And more, but most importantly, when you have spoken seriously about him, you have said lovely things about him, about how he did the right thing and so on and so forth. So that we have to be crystal clear that everything we say is with is based in love for for Bill. Well I and and not that he's ever sought out my advice, I can tell you far from it, but you know

A little humility will go a long way. Twitter does the dude Twitter, like you've said, you were right about Twitter, dude. If there was no Twitter, I don't think he would have followed this path. I think Twitter blew up his balloon. Okay. And just like on the bike ride where he drilled the front and he you know, I'm gonna make the break, I'm gonna do the solo break from mile two. No, no, no, no, no, come back. Well look at look at you and I.

Luckily we're married to two strong willed, successful women because the success of this podcast really, you know, has gone to my head. I don't know about you, I No, my w my wife keeps me very well grounded. Yeah. That makes two of us. What podcast? Yeah. Yeah.

I don't want to hear about that fucking thing again. Um well anyway, the listeners had sent in a few notes that uh I wanted to bring up because I think a couple of them um were particularly insightful to the gentleman who felt I stepped over the line criticizing George Bezos girlfriend referring to my attempt at being a father. I by the way I am the world's greatest father. And you know how I know that? I got a mug that says it.

You got three girls that talk to you still, okay? And you're and you're not the easiest to get along with, okay. So you've got Three girls over thirty, they gotta deal with you. Okay. And they and they talk to you daily. That that's a win. It's a blessing. It's it's a blessing. Yeah, this thing in the the Chinese culture where they only want boys this or that. I mean, you're fucking nuts. Wrong. Yeah.

Boys are nothing but trouble. J you know, just ask your mom. Like, sorry doesn't fix the lamp. Exactly. Exactly. What what's that you can't take the hole out of the coffin nail or something? You can take the nail out of the coffin, but the hole's still there. Okay. Thanks, Mom. That's gruesome. Yeah. Dude, isn't that the worst? Like, yeah, like, yeah, not only was your apology like doesn't fix the lamp, but like the hole is there forever. Dude, Irish Catholic guilt.

special. I will I will tell you that uh from my lens both your parents did an excellent job. Thank you. I appreciate Um

Well yeah, what else did you get from the listeners? Other guys that was bent about you calling Bezos is uh I was curious because I don't want to repeat it because it's so vulgar. But with what I said about the speaker of the house using the C word, that didn't cross the line. No. And and because we're so funded. The fact that he's not gonna continue to listen, um, i is not really a needle mover. Um

Look, you know, we operate in a competitive environment like everybody else. You know, if we don't hit the numbers, coal ace is gonna be calling. But um, you know We'll be okay. We'll be fine. So um yeah, w we maintain our position on that woman's comportment. She's entered the public domain. Absolutely. And you know, on purpose. Yep. And uh I've surveyed a number of women I respect and uh both related and unrelated and you know I get that look on the face.

It's like, how does she open her mouth? I don't know, but I got a hunch in that relationship, she must.

Oh boy, oh boy. Okay. So let's get to something that's a creative. Um these sayings. Uh of course now that we're at game time, the the intern didn't write them down separately for me, so I'll try to remember them. But they all have A place in my thought process, the most important of which, of course, was what I already said. You know, the market tells you a lot.

based on how it moves after it gets different types of information. And that's the the truest indication of the positions in the market. And you know, you can have all these great macroeconomic theories. Um which is why predicting where rates are gonna be or the stock price is gonna be. You know, at best they're spurious because in the end, if you wanna sell, you gotta find a price that someone's willing to buy it at.

uh his model may not agree with your model. And so that's where the rubber meets the road. And why a day like Friday, um By the way, I'm I'm delighted in in this is not hopefully falling into the trap of a hava, but I'm delighted I acted on my instinct. 'Cause, you know, I mean, obviously But more importantly it They kind of gave me some uh needed self-affirmation. Um so um things like don't be short a quiet market.

Now, you know, I've heard that for as long as I've been doing this, and I've always wondered.

Where that came from, well mostly'cause I've observed it's true. The the the the natural process of Wall Street is just to move product. And so you have all these salesmen uh that are getting paid on moving product. So you got guys working their ass off to sell stuff. And when they sell it, the price goes up. So you can get a a a natural drift higher. Plus every day money sitting in a money market fund is accruing interest.

And people, especially people like myself, like to have their money working hard. So you're always putting money to work, which is gonna drive a quiet market um higher.

Another one I particularly like, especially once I got to be a large institutional trader, a man who I never met. But I believe his name is Bob Steele. He said, if you don't know your position, don't trade. Now I I took that in two ways. One was knowing the balances of your position. So for instance the market would be moving, there'd be a flurry of activity, you know, you're you're selling blocks of this and that and you know

because we couldn't do it simply. Everything had to be at some sophisticated ratio. And so after twenty minutes, thirty maca minutes when the tickets would go in. You'd need to take a look at your position and balance out and make sure you were balanced not only for the level of the market. But the shape of the curve and short-term interest rate sensitivities. I mentioned this before. One of the biggest

Shocks and disappointments in my life was when I went to work for one of the major league hedge funds. And the risk man, both risk managers there didn't understand that using a futures contract. Or a swap, interest rate swap, created a short term overnight rate liability. And um uh it took weeks for them to come around to my way of thinking. And you know, one of these guys had the um

Bachelor's or PhD in electrical engineering. And and I mean we're talking about calculations. Literally, you could take your shoes and socks off and do on your toes. Um But you know, when you're busy and the market's moving, that's the thing about um relative value trade. You don't know where the profit's gonna come. Is it gonna come from the options you buy to hegetarisk? Is it gonna come from futures richening up?

Is it gonna come from your front end hedge moving? Um My uh first trading manager, Earl Spencer. He's not the royal Earl Spencer, but his name was Earl Spencer from I think um Muncie, Indiana, maybe. He had this thing called Spencer's rule of uh rule of arbitrage, which irritated me to know and I I I finally had to give it up because it's just not right. But he would say if you had a profit on both sides of an arbitrage, you should take it off.

And I'd be like, Why would you do that? And his point was That's as good as it's gonna get. Well, I I'm afraid respectfully to say I ha I found that not to be true. So I've dispatched with Spencer's rule of arbitrage. But the Bob Steele thing When and I don't know in this era with all these you know systems that you know consumers have access to.

today. You know, the um those platforms, um Robin Hood and E Trade and all that stuff. Yeah. Yeah, or um e trade interactive yeah, interactive. I I don't work in that world. Um But I suspect by the way you enter the orders. If you entered it right, your positions right. Now here it would be a great lesson because if you entered it wrong in a clear as it'll be in your book.

So you should be checking your book to make sure that you know it's what you think it is because You know, in the process of decision making, everyone operates under the notion like, oh, if if that were me, I'd do this. And I've made a point of saying that just not that ain't how it works. You're not accustomed to making decisions. under stress, in a hurry Taking things on your own time.

Which is why I I've tried to beat into my children mostly to some success. You know. Unless there's a gun at your head, never make a decision in the room. Get out of the room. Get a clear thought, you're gonna make a better decision. And anyone that's rushing you probably. That's an indication that it's not in your best interest. I mean, good deals trade. Yeah, bad deal.

Get jammed down people's throat. Fuck, you wait ten years to tell me this? You don't you could have you couldn't tell me this like fifteen years ago? We've done four years of the show and I only get now I get g step out of the room to make a decision. You've been holding on to this?

This diamond this diamond. I've I'm sitting here under the gun. I I've apparently I've had a gun to my head for every decision I've made for the last fifteen for the last fifteen years. I can't remember the last time I stepped out of the room and said, Let me think about this. Instead it's go to your room and instead it's go to your room and think about this. And don't touch yourself while you're there. That's good, dude. That's yeah. That's a good one.

Thank you. Not that the other ones weren't, but like that's a that that dude let me say this. Listeners. are going to think about that and a listener is going to do that. I know I'll get emails that'll that'll got somebody's going to thank me a year from now and be like, oh, I was thinking about something. I remember MB saying, step out of the room and I stepped out of the room.

Well remember that the one I had where I was talking about being a risk manager and having to give some guys some news about You know, I don't like the position. You're gonna have to take it down. And I said, look, if it were me

I'd love to let you run with it, but you know, it's just the numbers. Right. And somebody wrote us and said, you know, he found that very accretive. I mean Yeah, I've had the good benefit of traveling and doing a lot of things in You know, most of my lessons have come with tuition, but I've especially in the area of decision making. I've had a lifetime of watching people make bad decisions. And the the biggest mistake, and I give you a good example of this, is

You know, you'd be talking to a buddy and you'll say, Well, this happened and I did this and the buddy'll go, Well, if it were me, I would have done that. Okay. So Years ago, Cheryl and I are at dinner with a couple that were on the Gimbals ride and um the The concept of infidelity came up. And the woman at the table saw well, so and so was unfaithful, that would be the end of it. And at this point I I n I knew based on watching his pictures on Facebook

He had crossed the border. And I just said, look, I won't mind saying names. I said, trust me when I tell you. You never know what you're gonna do till it's you. And I remember at the moment thinking When she finds out, okay, this is how it's gonna go. There's gonna be a big fight and ultimately. She's gonna... Blame herself. Okay. So I'm riding one day down Riversville Road and I bump into this woman. And you know, she flags me down, we stop and you know how much I like stopping on a bike ride.

Anyway, she said, Yeah, so and so and I are back together. You know, I realize, you know, for the last nine months I've been pushing him away and it's really Uh all I could think of the back of my mind is, you know, once again, you know, you don't know how you're gonna act. And and that's why I've really liked some of these extreme experiences. You know I go on and on about You know, it's like that saying from Dodgeball, it doesn't uh create character, it reveals it, you know, and um

Or another significant one. I was disappointed to see a couple of alpinists died over the weekend climbing one of the mountains in Switzerland. And you know, I've done some of that. keep in mind, you know, like most things, I get to be competent, but I never get to be great at anything. But showing up is happening. So we'd get up to twelve, thirteen, fourteen thousand feet and you know the air up there is pretty thin and it's cold. And the height aspect of it.

actually doesn't bother me very much provided I'm, you know, locked in. I can get very comfortable with the what they call exposure. Mm-hmm. I've come to realize is When you're that high, you're not getting the same amount of oxygen you are at sea level. The brain needs oxygen. Right. you're you're not thinking rationally. And again, food tastes different. You lose your sense of thirst, hunger, at a time when you need to be eating and drinking.

So when you go through enough of these life experiences, you get to know how your body feels at 14,000 feet or after you've ridden a hundred miles. in the dead sun. And uh you know, when you've accumulated that data, then you have a better sense of

What you're supposed to do. Whenever we would have a problem with the position, I r I remember this distinctly. uh situation we had a trader who was a a journeyman, very senior trader, successful. But he he he he he got shoehorned into our group because of the, you know, we got need more traders, we need more assets uh. Successful guy went on to be successful, but He never really embraced working for me'cause we kinda came onto the scene at roughly the same time. And um

He had a very different style of trading. So at one point He um this is a technical term. H his position shit the best. And of course, being the omega sector, the last line of defense, it was on me. And so you know, I excused him and got the positions printed out and Eiji and I went in a conference room and put it on the whiteboard and calmly I think I called the process we re-underwrote the position. Let's just put this position up on the board, start from zero, see how we feel.

So my purpose was to get out of the trading room with the noise and the phone ringing and the people yelling and screaming and try and bring it down to a normal competent, thoughtful conversation. And every time we did that, we'd come out fired up with an action plan ready to go. And that's why I like When the markets get chaotic is because People are generally under capital. Are making decisions under stress. that they're not familiar with. And when they make decisions they're usually bad ones.

And I mean that's the nature of the market, right? It's a competitive thing. If you don't like comp competition. join a book club. I don't I don't know. I can recommend some good ones. Um but you know you gotta go at this because you know it's the best game on earth. I don't know why anyone would ever walk into a fucking casino. This is the this is the best action around, you know? And um

You get health benefits. Yeah, it's got you buying puts on Friday mornings. Thursday mornings still got its claws in you. It's the action. I know what it is. I I am not gonna make the rookie mistake of going I didn't buy enough. No.

Anyway, enough about me. Um there was an excellent question. that I would like to uh bring up and explain because I think it might help some people. So one of the listeners wrote in asking I don't know whether he called me MB or Morris, but I'm I my preference is MB, but he asked Did I say in one of the podcasts that I had a wealth manager? And if so, why?

And I thought that was a great question. And the answer is I've had three wealth managers. Uh I think one was very good, but I was too young and immature to understand. I think one was adequate and the last one who I recently parted ways with I thought was spectacular. Now why do I Think that there's a place for this kind of person. Cause you know, my my Pensioned isn't to embrace brokers. Right. Um well, let's say for a moment.

Yeah, what I did, I was one of the the the better guys in the business. It has to be just because I look at where I ended up and where everyone else ended up. So I was in the top 10. Others may argue higher, but we'll leave that to Bob Cobb. So I knew how to trade. But I had never been wealthy before. And I will leave it to the collective group to decide what level is wealth, but

You know, there was some saying, rich people aren't like you and me. And it took me a long time, hence my comment, the first guy I met, I wasn't mature enough to appreciate it. Was, you know, I thought I developed a sinus infection, which they put me on steroids, which is the last thing I need. Nice one. Nice. When Cheryl heard that, she said the podcast's gonna be four hours.

All right, so what so what how old were you when you when you got the guy? And how did you get did you go get the guy or did somebody give you the guy? I I I I got the guy. The first time was um I was in London and um I wanted I thought about going out on my own and um I needed what was called an ISDA. That's a contract that allows you to trade these specialized structure products.

So because of my institutional relationships, I asked them to introduce me to somebody in London at the firm of Goldman and Sachs. And So I wasn't all that wealthy at the time. But the funny part was it was a long arduous application project uh process. And so I'm in the meeting finally when they're gonna anoint me a client. And the head partner says So what's it like to work for John Merriweather? I said excuse me.

Guy's like, don't you look at long work at long-term capital? I go, no, I I work at Grunge Capital. The room room goes silent. And um Anyway, uh so anyway. I didn't end up taking advantage of that relationship. Again, because I was young and arrogant, I thought I knew better. And um any event. As time went on uh I realized, you know, that saying, it's now what you know.

That gets you in trouble, it's what you know for sure. And because of all the success I had in raping and pillaging of widows and orphans in the municipal bond market. Paying very little income tax, realizing income tax rated 50% in my world gives you a huge margin of error. So I I talked to a couple of people and I I landed upon a guy who was absolutely fantastic and we only uh went separate ways because

you know, where he was working, I I I wasn't happy with their approach. And you know the the salesmen, the wealth managers of these firms, they will fight for you. tooth and nail, but in the end the firm is gonna override anything they want to do. Yep. And and I appreciate that. But so this fellow

He was patient and smart, and I just I was a total asshole. But he got through to me the notion of You know, and and this is some of the the the uh wisdom I've tried to it's arrogant to to call it wisdom. Maybe Bill Ackner would call it wisdom. Um Define your objectives. So we we had a meeting, and it would be like, well, let's talk about your family, let's talk about your assets, all things with which I was not comfortable talking.

to an outsider with because I never shared this information with anyone other than, you know, Cheryl. Yeah, yeah, of course. She's obviously well schooled on all these things. Um, I mean, easily as well as I am. But it got me to understand. You know, the the like you know, if you don't know where you're going, how do you get there, right? Or Nate Fick, one of the great quotes of all time, turn the map around, right? And so

You know, this is who I am, this is what I have, this is what I'd like my life to look like when I'm this edge. And and so we start to build a concept. of these tools that I didn't know existed. And you know about them not because I I perseverate on them, but estate planning or life insurance.

Yeah, I had and to this day I have a huge bug up my ass about life insurance because the freaking commission is so high. Okay. But you know, eventually after numerous conversations with Edward George Fisher the Fourth, that, you know, you pay the the commission because Congress has created a tax hour for you that overwhelmed the commission. Again, you know, this is not investment advice, consult your financial person, but you know, these are all perfectly legal tools.

That I have used with this person's guidance over the years that have really created. substantial and again substantial is relative but in my world you know there's gonna be enough money for my kids my grandkids their grandkids and You know, when you come from a tribe where every twenty years they're trying to eliminate you, I felt like if I could leave enough of a nest egg

that might help them in a dire time, I really would have done something good with my life. And through all these tools, you know, whether it's these grants, life insurance trusts, uh life insurance, you know, we've achieved that. And um

Again, that I would not have learned without working with a wealth manager. Now I was always very difficult because these things have um You know, feat big fees. I was just gonna say fees. I was waiting for it. I was gonna say waiting for the fee. Let me get tell me what's the catch. What's the catch? It's gonna cost it's gonna cost you. Yeah, yeah, it's fees. You know, I guess it's one of these things that

You have to pay for, right? Priceless. My feeling was I was much happier knowing I was paying five cents a share on a stock trade too much. than paying fifteen basis points on that asset value. Just pick your poison, right? Yeah, yeah. Yeah. The you know, I tried to push enough business around that kept everybody happy. Um So that's why I ended up with a with a wealth manager and and especially in this era where there's so much financial fraud.

The good thing about working with a wealth manager from A well-regarded institution is the regulatory process has gotten so strict. It keeps you from getting sucked in to send money to that disabled veteran in the Philippines or the the um The princess who's trapped and needs to get out of her country. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because they'll see that wire instruction and they'll go, Yeah, I don't think so. Nice. Yeah, yeah.

But you know, their prediction is to rate. They're no better or worse than any. Uh I think as you've opined, I think for free. Torsen Slock provides almost as much value as Zublock does. Um Well yeah, he's got charts. He's get we just don't do the charts because the charts just don't work on radio. But like he's got he's got his foot in the door with the charts.

Yeah. Dude, seven days a week. Seven days a week for Dr. Slock. Dr. Slock, thank you very much. How hope you have a nice weekend Saturday morning. You did great as well. The daily and weekly indicators. This is just exactly what you care about in My four-year-old daughter could read the Doc Slock email and give me an economic report. Restaurant bookings, strong. TSA air travel, strong. Tax withholdings, no signs of a slowdown.

Total occupancy, bank lending, growing, bankruptcy. You know, he just he just kills it. And so you throw a few of these hackneyed phrases around. You read Doc Slock, the day the daily shot. know shots been good too yeah i i i love the daily shot there's my new favorite is um Oh, the science guys. What, Doomberg? Yeah. Doomberg. Doomberg is spectacular. And they're reasonably priced. I think it's a hundred bucks. Yeah, I know. You love them. You know, I remember the

The rude comment I paid my good friend Leslie when he sent me a a newsletter. He said, This is a hundred bucks a month. What do you think? And I wrote back it's a hundred bucks a month. What do I think? A man a man who's been nothing but a dedicated lifelong friend and that's the reply I give him. I'll never I'll never get over that. But that's just a glimpse of what the real me is like. So I asked Leslie about the yen.

You want to talk about the end before I get the you're I have no uh no value to add there. Okay. Cause I asked him about the yen. I said, do I have to talk about the yen? I was like, you know, is the Japanese yen gonna is that a big deal? Because like, you know, Thursday and Nike wiped out five percent or whatever, you know, the yen from one fifty or from one sixty back to one fifty, the interest rate hike. And I said, Leslie, I said, all I said was, do I have to talk about the yen on the show?

I said, is the yen important? This is what Leslie wrote back. I didn't get permission to use it, but it's coming. It's just it's a backlog. In my honest opinion, this is Leslie, all right. Not m not me or Morse, right? Leslie's under the gun here. In my honest opinion, the simple catalyst explanation for the move this week was interest rate differential.

Tenure rates going up in Japan, plus a bit of QT, U.S. tenure rates going down in the US. However, I would argue that technically the move started a few weeks ago. Yeah. So yeah, it's like the yen, you know, it's not really much to do with the yen. It said the c the catalyst explanation for the move this week was interest rate differentials. Tenure rates going up in Japan, tenure rates going down in the US. Well, you can look it up, but there's the interest rate differential theorem.

And I believe uh Professor Harris is a big believer in that. The reason I always have a little bit of my ear listening for the yen is I like to compare The yen is the canary in the mineshaft. For those of you who don't know what that means, they would take a canary down the mineshaft because if there wasn't enough oxygen the canary would suffer much more quickly than a human would. Um

Which by the way is why Payne Stewart died. Come on, let's go. I know why Payne Stewart. Go ahead, please. Can we not talk about this? Did you fly first class? Have you been flying first class? Have you been prying pli private since you brought up private jets? What are you doing since I said to Cheryl on the last time we were on a private jet i said this is what this is what i want my epitaph to review He died like he lived, flying on a challenger, short the SPs.

No, but Leslie and Leslie had this term. I hope he doesn't mind if I share. Let's just trademark it, called it the death cross. It w it's the Euro yen. And when something weird would happen in Euro Yen, your antenna would have to go up. That there was some

tectonic plate shifting going on. And so that's why we follow the end. I think Kevin Muir uh did a piece talking about the Japanese government set up sort of some sort of savings program which incentivized through tax incentives Japanese people to parked money away for retirement. And of course they got all caught up Putting money into it, and then they bought the Mag 7, which is what created the huge disparity between those uh.

Um fascinating. Yeah. So one of the other phrases I like so much. is they don't ring a bell at the top. but sometimes they ring a bell and one of the bells that got rung is the guy from Nvidia autographing as you pointed out some woman's boobs. That's a bell. Okay. That yeah that's a bell. Not a good sign, yeah. The other thing, I want to go back to um William Ackman. Again, um if he's so bullish on stocks, why is he selling?

I you know, again the Gdankin experiment. I and and one one of the greatest compliments paid to me was, you know, I had mentioned I had uh uh boss slash mentor Greenwich, big tall guy. And I was really trying to move some risk. This is back when we were gambling a lot. And I said, uh, hey, make me a price in this. And he said something like, I've seen what's happened to people for years who take the other side of your trade.

Which was a polite way of saying no thank you. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. If Bill's got such a great business and such a great following, why why sell it? And in our But behind the scenes, I sent to our little uh troop a note that uh when Blaupost pulled out, I mean that was That was game over. Yeah, that was it. Yeah. Because you can debate whether Bill is the best trader of all time. And I would say probably not. But this guy, Seth Klarman.

He's in the sphere of Warren Buffett and it's to go in and to back out is worse than knocking. And once you saw that and then um apparently somebody did a hit piece talking about all the fees oh wow who's trying to monetize. You know what I mean? Look, I don't blame'em, but you know, that the whole uh Bad luck apparently. Um Somebody put a Twitter post of Bill dressed up as a gladiator leading the charge. And this is this is the bad juju.

He uses the phrase let's roll. Can't say that. Which, if memory serves, was correct what the passengers said on a hijack 9-11 flight. So bad optics. Yeah. Bad optics. Poor choice. Stay off Twitter, Bill. Stay off Twitter. Get off Twitter. It's a parallel, it's a parallel dimension, okay, that is not based in reality. Okay. And it got you in trouble. Yeah. So, you know, he's a billionaire. Um I I I think that's plenty. Trust me. It's enough. It's it it's enough. Um

Did you read uh did you read uh did you read Jamie Diamond's op ed in the Washington Post today? Did you did you get to that?

No, I didn't I didn't get that. I I I'm just physing finishing up the Israeli Times and I my degree isn't great, so I Has there been an attack yet? Has the Ayatollah sent the attack? I don't know, but I I tell you what, as a person who likes espionage, the way these Israelis have planted booby traps waiting for the right moment to kill these people. You know, go watch the movie Munich a couple of times. These guys are dead. It's just

It's almost kind of fun watching them pick'em off one at a time. It is a but it's just It's an o i it's just bizarre, dude. It's just it's just an ongoing soccer. I don't understand that Israel Israel whacked the guy that was gonna make peace. Like they're like, Yeah, never mind that peace talk. We're gonna we've been we've had we've had the bomb sitting for two months for you. See. I don't know. a difference of opinion.

These people are not interested in peace. They're fighting a war of attrition. I remember, I don't know whether it was the um biography of FDR. Um but there's a statement Democracies can't fight long wars. the public doesn't have the patience for it. And especially when you get into the news cycle. What I was delighted to see, and I again Because of the the rampant anti Semitism in the press, one of the guys they killed

was one of the guys who planned the nine eleven attack on the United States. I would have thought that might have been a nice little Bull appointed to say, Oh by the way. It's not just the Israelis. If they ever get through with them, they're coming for us. Yeah. Which I th I think is true. So um I don't know. We we didn't talk about this in person, but you know how much I love living in Greenwich. Um two no two bits of information. A Greenwich nanny was driving an SUV.

The door slid open and one of the kids rolled out. He'll be fine. Fortunately, no one was hurt in the making of this video. But the police get hold of the situation. She had left three other kids. at home with a pot with chicken and boiling. Okay. Which kind of reminds me of an episode of Breaking Bad, right? Where he put a frozen turkey in a fryer because it would explode. Yeah, yeah.

Um, and then I didn't get to dig down, but apparently a child was admitted to Greenwich Hospital, not my favorite place, as you know, because I've talked about it many times. Um The kid found a bag of fentanyl in a park in Greenwich. No. Yeah. Nations going down the tubes. Yeah, make America great again. Coscob is spreading north. Well, I don't know I like it'cause it's near my kids. Right, right. Um I I'm happy um

I'm happy that you enjoyed your Friday and that your day trading went well. Um, but like I said, all credit must go to where credit credit is due. It's obviously your wife as usual. Okay. You know, Jewish women, especially Jewish mothers, are bright, strong-willed, intelligent, and they they care for their family. And you know, um I I gotta tell you, I I I'm I'm very impressed. I've been I've been a fan for a long time. Of course I had no alternatives.

I think one of her favorite lines was your next wife wife may be beautiful, but she won't be rich. See where this goes. See where this goes past an hour? Okay. I told you they put me on the steroids for the sinus infection. That's great. That's that's what you need. It's just what I need. Yeah.

All right, well try to enjoy your day. You've you've succeeded I just I I just got a sign from the booth. It's time to wrap it up. Yeah, she heard you talking about Israel and then then talking about her. It's over. Okay. Well right pal. Um I'll see you next week. I'll see you next week. Um if if if there's any else. Huh. Waity, she's gonna beat me when you hang up. All right. Well it's good to see you. And uh Yeah, we'll be in touch.

Yeah. Don't call us, we'll call you. We'll see if we have a show next week. I think we did a nice job. Okay. Can we get off the air before we have this discussion? Okay. Goodbye. Take care.