The Breakdown

Last October, Ikigai Asset Management’s Travis Kling predicted that Central Banks would have to “juice QE to infinity” in order to save markets from recession. Yesterday on 60 Minutes, Fed President Neel Kashkari said “there is an infinite amount of cash at the Federal Reserve. We will do whatever we need to do to make sure there is enough cash in the financial system.”  This was followed this morning by an announcement that the Fed was giving itself effectively unlimited capacity to intervene in markets. Markets were...still not impressed. In less than two hours, an initial gain had entirely retraced.  On this episode of The Breakdown, @NLW looks at: Specifics details of the Fed Announcement Why FinTwit and Bitcoin Twitter are focusing on inflation  Why some think that this action amounts to a nationalization of markets How the ‘money printer go brrr’ meme is taking hold

The week's episode, in one convenient file. Also including short clips from CoinShares CEO Jean-Marie Mognetti and SwanBitcoin CEO Cory Klippsten.  Monday | Can $700B in Quantitative Easing Calm The Markets? Feat. CoinDesk’s Michael Casey and Noelle Acheson Tuesday | Gov't Stimulus Goes BIG and Why Bitcoin Is the Only Truly Free Market, Feat. Dan Tapiero Wednesday | Is the COVID19 Fiscal & Monetary Response An Overreaction? Feat. Bruce Fenton Thursday | Off Friday | State Power & Authoritarianism After Coronavirus featuring Peter McCormack

Peter McCormack is the host of What Bitcoin Did and the Defiance podcast. He recently returned from travel to a number of countries in South America including Venezuela and Colombia as well as the Turkey-Greece border.  In this off-the-cuff and wide ranging conversation, Peter and @NLW discuss Bitcoiner politics and the bitcoin community’s reaction to the potential for increased state power in the wake of Coronavirus Which types of state power growth we should be most concerned with  How to push governments to retract power growth on the other side of crisis  How travel around the world has informed Peter’s perspective on bitcoin and politics Why nuance is both disincentivized and sorely needed in times of crisis

In his daily Coronavirus press briefing today, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said “our main scramble now is ventilators.” The state anticipates that within 45 days, it could need 37,000 ventilators. It currently has 3000.  Bruce Fenton was one of the early crypto community canaries in the coal mine warning of the impending threat of Coronavirus. As the world has caught up to the warning, he has shifted his attention to helping coordinate an open source network that is trying to address that exact problem.  On this episode of The Breakdown, Bruce joins to discuss: Where the US is in its awareness cycle  Why bitcoiners are worried about the long-term economic ramifications of massive stimulus What a voluntarist alternative to government intervention might look like How an open source network is trying to solve the ventilator shortage  What regular people can do to contribute to the fight against Coronavirus

President Trump and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin announced a significant slate of upcoming stimulus measures, including deferred taxes and direct payments to Americans (although those details remain to be seen).  On this episode of The Breakdown, 10T holdings CEO Dan Tapiero joins to discuss: How this forthcoming stimulus might impact the bitcoin narrative Why some traditional safe havens like bonds might not fair well in the coming markets while others like gold are poised to thrive  Why markets could be positioning for a major bounce back Why the Fed has more tools in its toolkit than popular media and opinion are suggesting  Why the dollar’s global strength is a major concern  Why bitcoin is the only truly free market in the world

Over the weekend, the Fed decided it couldn’t wait for Wednesday’s planned meeting to act, cutting interest rates to nearly 0%. It also announced $700 billion of direct capital injection through the purchase of Treasury securities and mortgage-backed debt.  The question is whether this action can actually calm markets? So far, it’s not looking great. Within minutes, emergency circuit breakers were triggered again. Markets are down more than 9% on the day.  In this episode, @NLW chats with CoinDesk’s Chief Content Officer Michael Casey and director of research Noelle Acheson about: Why the market isn’t impressed with Fed action Why no Fed response will be enough on its own to solve the health crisis and the resulting economic dislocation Why we’re going to see more conversations in the coming weeks about UBI, MMT and other direct citizen stimulus 

The entire week's shows in one convenient file: Monday | What the Market Crash Means for Bitcoin, Feat. Delphi's Kevin Kelly Tuesday | Crypto Fundraising and the Nothing-Is-Safe Haven Wednesday | Ben Hunt on the Clash of Narratives in the Age of Coronavirus Thursday | 6 Good Reasons for Bitcoiners to Keep Calm and HODL On Friday | What Happens When Currencies Fail? Featuring Preston Pysh

Yesterday, the Federal Reserve announced more than a trillion dollars in liquidity injections into the market. In the coming weeks, many observers expect trillions of more in stimulus in a variety of exotic new intervention tactics.  While this will (hopefully) stem the still emerging economic fallout from the pandemic, it creates its own new set of problems. In this episode of The Breakdown, @NLW is joined by “We Study Billionaires” host Preston Pysh to discuss: How bond markets will react to the wave of stimulus  The challenge of global coordination for a new Bretton Woods Why in the wake of stimulus some governments might turn to bitcoin  The three factors that lead to currency failure 

The Coronavirus got really extra real today for markets. A two and a half week selloff was tipped to the next level by a major ratcheting up of action from the US government (which still seemed clearly to be not enough to calm markets).  In bitcoin, this meant a drop from around $8000 yesterday to under $6000 today - a head-spinning dump, especially for those who are more recent to crypto.  Still, in this episode, @NLW argues that there are 7 good reasons to keep calm and HODL on: It’s not just bitcoin  Correlation means infiltration Peak fear  Asia on the upswing  Buy order behavior  Bitcoin’s been dead before   And a bonus: this environment is exactly what bitcoin was built for

The week of February 12, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was reaching new all time highs. Meanwhile, China’s quarantine of the 11 million people in Wuhan was three weeks old and expanding to other parts of the country.  While the global equities markets have finally started to catch up to the fear of a global pandemic, the Coronavirus has been one a profound case study in the power of narratives to shape behavior. Even now, those seeking to contain the spread in the US are fighting against narratives from leadership that range from “it’s just the flu” to “it’s a hoax from the media.”  On today’s episode of The Breakdown, NLW speaks with Epsilon Theory co-founder and market theorist Ben Hunt, who makes it his business to understand how narratives are shape and shaped by the world around us.  Since the beginning of the Coronavirus outbreak, Ben has been a clarion voice in the chaos. This episode is no exception.