Video & Podcast Of The Week
Saving A Rant For Tomorrow, Rolling Crackups In Commodities & The Intersection Of Oil And Geopolitics In Venezuela
It’s been an interesting week with a couple different things I have been watching, but I will get into it more detail with the video tomorrow. I will probably lead off with a rant on Sable Offshore’s 10-Q, equity raise, and why I bought some puts (a very small position). This thing only seems to get more interesting, but I didn’t know halting a stock for a press release was a thing until Friday. I also will get into a couple different ideas I have been looking at, recent trades, and why I think 2026 is going to be a very interesting year across the commodities space.
Money Of Mine w/ PauloMacro
This was my favorite video of the week because it hits on a bunch of different commodities that I think are worth a look right now. In the last commodities cycle in the 2000s, the rising tide of Chinese demand was lifting all boats as far as commodities were concerned. Now it’s more sporadic where different commodities work at different times (Paulo calls it rolling crackups). The first commodity they discussed was copper, and the importance of the Grasberg mine collapse. It will be interesting to see what happens with supply and demand over the next couple years, but they also hit on COMEX copper vs. the LME, the impact of tariffs, and the importance of jurisdiction.
Uranium was one that I have been digging into some more this weekend, partially because of this video. They didn’t talk much about any specific names, but they did get into the potential for a strategic uranium reserve or a potential price floor to incentivize US production. The last and most interesting part for me was on oil. Paulo thinks oil in 2026 will be like gold in 2025. The Saudis have been unwinding their production cuts, and we are seeing inventory builds, but I don’t think we will see anything close to what the EIA is projecting. He points out that China has been filling up their tanks, and if they thought we were going below $50 a barrel, they probably wouldn’t be at record inventory levels. A lot of the equities have also been showing signs of life, and I’ll talk more about the topic in my video tomorrow.
Oil Ground Up w/ Francisco Monaldi
There has been a lot of chatter about what is going on in South America with Venezuela, and this podcast is a timely one for anyone interested in energy and geopolitics. They talk about the ongoing military buildup, and why the motivation is probably closer to regime change instead of drug operations. There have been some changes in sanction policy in recent years, and they discuss which companies are in the clear to operate in Venezuela (primarily Chevron).
A lot has changed with the energy industry in Venezuela over the last two decades. The US was receiving 2M barrels a day from Venezuela in the late 90s, and that is down to a trickle with Chevron getting a small amount into the US. Most of their exports go to China due to sanctions, at a steep discount due to the crude quality. In recent years, their crude sometimes traded at a 30% discount to Brent, and by the time they laundered the cash (due to sanctions), they might only be receiving 50% of Brent for a barrel of oil. They also talk about how things could play out from here, what might happen to Maduro, and how it will impact Venezuela’s oil production.
The rolling crackups concept for commodities is a smart way to think about the current cycle. Rather than everything moving together like the 2000s, were seeing more selective oportunities. Paulo's call on oil for 2026 mirroring gold in 2025 is intriguing, especialy with China building inventory. Looking forward to your toughts on uranium and the potential strategic reserve angle.