What The Hell Is Going On?
The General Sense Of Uncertainty, Tariff Day Approaching, Geopolitics & The Power Players In Different Positions
I have been writing this piece for the last four days, cutting and adding sections, and rewriting other parts. Some of these thoughts rattling around since Trump was inaugurated, and it took some time to organize them simply due to the pace of everything going on. At the highest level, I think we are seeing the competition of different powerful factions across the world right now. This has created a lot of uncertainty, as the lines between geopolitics and financial markets have become blurry since Trump was inaugurated. From tariffs to rapidly shifting situations on the ground in Ukraine and the Middle East, there are a ton of moving pieces that has led to an information overload for many investors, including myself. I have talked to a bunch of people on what they are seeing, and the high levels of uncertainty can be boiled down to one broad question:
What The Hell Is Going On?
The oversimplified answer to this question is that all roads lead back to the Trump administration’s economic and geopolitical agenda. Whether it’s the revival of the Monroe Doctrine and the focus on Greenland, Canada, and the Panama Canal, to reciprocal tariffs on Liberation Day (April 2) this week, or trying to resolve things in Ukraine and the Middle East, the geopolitical agenda is another important piece of the puzzle. I have a fuzzy picture in my head of what the Trump administration master plan looks like, but it’s clear that the status quo is not it, and they have had four years to build a plan of attack.
I try to stay up to date on everything going on around the world, and it seems to me like things have accelerated since the start of 2025. The headlines have been coming fast and furious, and are showing no sign of slowing down. We aren’t even done with March, and Trump has only been in office for two months. The California fires that were two months ago feel like they were two years ago, unless you live in the area. We have seen a flurry of executive orders, which is setting up a showdown between the executive and the judicial branch.
Apparently removing people that are in the country illegally using laws that already exist, and not allowing people that don’t know their own sex to serve in the military are problems for district court judges in DC (1/3 of which weren’t even born in the US). How the Trump administration navigates this problem will be interesting to watch, but he will have to figure out how to deal with these clowns in the judicial branch that want to run the executive branch. Feel free to dig into the Plenary Powers of the President when it comes to the military and immigration if you need a legal rabbit hole to go down.
Unlike the recent Signal chat leaks (literally more noise than signal if you ask me), the judicial system interfering with Trump’s agenda will be something to watch moving forward. That is important, but I think one of the most important things to watch will be what the Trump administration does to cut wasteful and fraudulent government spending. As they say, follow the money. Two notable Department of Government Efficiency targets have been USAID and the National Endowment for Democracy. Cutting off the funding for these so-called Nongovernmental Organizations is going to have a lot of interesting downstream effects, and I think it is near impossible to even map them out today. Going after “media” like NPR, PBS, and other outlets that have been receiving funding, and shutting down the Department of Education are two other examples that I will be keeping an eye on.
All Roads Lead To Trump & The US
For better or worse, the Trump Administration has become the center of the universe as far as geopolitics and financial markets go. A lot of sharp people think that we are going to see one (or both) of the current major conflicts expand, and from some of the stuff I have seen coming out of Europe, it looks like Ukraine might be the leading candidate on that front. We are seeing a massive amount of gold flowing out of Europe into the US, which is something that also happened ahead of WWI and WWII. It’s enough that it is actually having a material impact on GDP, and there has also been talk of issues at the LBMA. On top of that, there have been rumblings of gold revaluation. Other people are more qualified to talk about those topics than I am, but you can go back to podcast a month ago with Vince Lanci if you want a refresher.
WHO IS IMPORTING SO MUCH GOLD INTO THE US THAT IT IS CUTTING GDP IN A $27 TRILLION ECONOMY BY 2.0%, AND WHY ARE THEY DOING IT?!!
Tariff: The Most Beautiful Word In The Dictionary
The constantly changing nature of the tariffs are a big driver of the uncertainty that many investors are feeling. A couple guys that I talk to think that Trump wants the tariff uncertainty to bring the stock market down (without crashing it), and send bonds up (yields down), so they can refinance the long end at a lower rate. That might be the case, but I think we are watching a shift from economic policy to economic statecraft. I stole that from a future podcast guest, but it looks like national and economic security will be a priority, while financial markets going up and to the right looks like it might take a backseat for the foreseeable future.
A lot of people have argued that tariffs are a tax, paid by the producers of a product. They will try to pass as much of those costs on to consumers, and prices go up. Some say tariffs are inflationary, while others will say that it’s a one time step up in costs. Some things will get more expensive. Which products, and by how much, is something I will leave to someone else to figure out. I’ll let other people pontificate on tariffs being a horrible idea (though these people only complain when the US is implementing tariffs and are quiet when other countries implement them), but one thing I will point out is that paying the tariffs is optional.
If you want to build products and components here in the US, congratulations. You have just opted out of paying the incoming tariffs. Admittedly most businesses cannot make these changes overnight, but the motivation behind the tariffs is pretty clear: the Trump administration wants to shift things away from a hyper-financialized economy (where you can now buy Doordash burritos on installments), to an economy that creates things again. They want to create jobs and bring back industries that have left over the last four decades, some of which are crucial for national security. We will see if this reorganization of the economy is successful, but here is a list of tariffs that should be in place by April 2. Admittedly this list will probably be out of date in a week or two due to the rapidly changing nature of the tariffs, but here goes:
Reciprocal tariffs (raising tariff rates to match other countries on specific goods)
Rumors of 200% tariffs on European wine (just to piss off the cat ladies)
We will see how long some of these tariffs are in place, but Vince’s piece linked above is worth checking out. When you combine tariff uncertainty with Treasury Secretary Bessent talking about a detox period in markets, and tack on geopolitical uncertainty, it makes it a hard environment to read as an investor. I’m going to jump into the three regions that are in flux right now, which is another source of uncertainty.
The Americas: Return Of The Monroe Doctrine
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