My subscription to Real Vision – with its long-format interviews featuring some of the brightest minds in the investment community – was by far my top trade for the year 2015, learning so much in the process. Additionally, it landed me a student job at the company later in 2017. If you get a 14-day free trial pass, I would highly recommend you to start with my favorite list of interviews below. (Some interviews have also been made available to the public by RV or have been summarized by other media outlets, c.f. corresponding links.)
Similar interviews are now often also to be found on the Grant Williams Podcast, Macro Voices, Hidden Forces or TC’s Chartcast (some on a freemium based).
Unfortunately, most of the finance world is utterly oblivious to any environmental issues, so don’t except much on this front here, on the contrary. For reasons why, you may want to read this or this. Actually, you really want to read this.
***
Last updated: Dec. 13th 2019.
List now also available in Google Sheet format [work in progress].
***
FORESIGHT FROM PRESENT INSIGHT
Daniel Want, CIO of Prerequisite Capital Management, is a master of interpreting liquidity trends and his last presentation on the shortage of global collateral in the economy blew Real Vision viewers away. Daniel contends that the popular reflationary narrative is transitory and the falling trends in productivity, liquidity and velocity provide greater insights into the contracting global system, incapable of creating net high quality assets.
[And his previous excellent Think Piece]
CHRIS COLE – TAKING THE LONG ROAD WITH VOLATILITY
Chris Cole, Founder and CIO of Artemis Capital Management is one of the pre-eminent managers of volatility and he brings great insight and clarity to volatility as an investment strategy and the benefit of a bias towards convexity in the portfolio. With tail risk compressed and pushed out into the future, Chris questions the wisdom of an industry that is collectively short volatility on a major scale.
[RV YouTube link, also all of Artemis Capital’s research is must read, in particular the paper on which the interview is based and ZH’s take.]
EXPAND YOUR CAPITAL FOR THE NEXT CRISIS
Chris Martenson, author, independent thinker and co-founder of PeakProsperity.com has some firm ideas on how to prepare for the next crisis, based on the inexorable rise in debt and the future challenges for the planet with energy and ecology. Change begins within, according to Chris, with a focus on social, living and emotional capital, as well as financial, to be in position to take advantage of the opportunities in alternative energy and food for the future.
VENTURE CAPITAL SECRETS FROM SILICON VALLEY
Macro manager Michael Green interviews Silicon Valley venture capitalist Josh Wolfe for Real Vision TV in a fascinating discussion, as Josh reveals where the capital is coming from that’s funding some of the most incredible technologies set to shake up the world. Bridging the ever narrowing gap between science fiction and sci-fact, Josh knows where the fast money is going as he outlines the incredible speed of development taking place right at the edge of the cutting edge.
(And excellent second episode. Available on YouTube here.)
JIM ROGERS – MASTERCLASS PART I
In Part One of this momentous interview, investment legend Jim Rogers sits with Real Vision for a visionary Master Class, taking us back in time to the beginning of his career and walking us through a series of lessons learned as the world of investing slowly embraced the age of global connectivity. Weaving a series of anecdotes into a compelling picture of the evolution of Wall Street over the course of several decades, along the way Jim highlights long-term investing opportunities in the world today, and lays out his concerns over the domination of today’s markets by central banks.
JIM ROGERS – MASTERCLASS PART II
In Part Two of this extraordinary Master Class, Jim Rogers discusses how he created an investment framework from motorbiking across the world, why the current investment landscape in Asia may be more promising than it seems, where he is focusing his investments, and the knock-on consequences of central bank mechanisms to artificially stabilize the economy.
In our Masterclass series, Corriente Advisors Principal, Mark Hart explains how he became one of the world’s most successful hedge fund managers. Mark talks about his big home runs in subprime and European sovereign debt and explains his strategy towards the potential hard landing in China. Frank, open and full of insight – this Masterclass takes you inside one of the most brilliant minds in finance.
BEYOND FRONTIER MARKETS – EXTREME INVESTING WITH JIM ROGERS
Investing legend, Jim Rogers, sets out to identify unique opportunities, while seemingly breaking every rule in the book, as he predicts a bear market & bankruptcy for the US.
[ZH summary]
TIM FERRISS – MARK HART – RAOUL PAL – INTERVIEW
In his Master Class, Mark Hart mentions Tim Ferriss as a friend and lifestyle design advisor. In this three-way conversation, Raoul speaks with Mark and Tim on the currency that we should prioritize higher – time. A master of meta-learning, Tim discusses easy ways to optimize your productivity, why we confuse the goal of ‘having money’ with ‘quality of life’, and explains what happens when we re-examine our self-defined boundaries.
[Tim Ferriss Show Podcast version]
KYLE BASS – TIPPING POINT FOR CHINA
In what is sure to become a Real Vision favourite, Kyle Bass, founder and CIO of Hayman Capital Management LP, shares his opinions on the importance of position-sizing and explains why it’s so crucial to have conviction behind an investment thesis. Kyle discusses the explosive credit growth in China and draws comparisons between the NPL crisis and the events of September 2008. He also shares his thoughts on gold and Japan, and outlines why he believes US rates are going lower regardless of any inflationary pressures.
KEVIN MUIR – PREPPING FOR A MARKET MELT-UP
Veteran trader Kevin Muir quit Bay Street, Canada’s version of Wall Street, and set up his own shop. Until he joined, East West Investment Management. In this wide-ranging interview with Tony Greer, Muir explains what led him to make that major career change, and also speaks to the genesis of his Macro Tourist newsletter. Equally fascinating are Muir’s deep dives into Fed policy under Jerome Powell, Modern Monetary Theory, and the signals from the Canadian housing market that make him bullish on equities.
DIEGO PARILLA – BUBBLES AND ANTI-BUBBLES
How can investors position themselves to profit from irrational markets? Diego Parrilla of Quadriga Asset Management explores the opportunities behind bubbles — and their funhouse mirror opposite, anti-bubbles — which result from artificially suppressed prices.
[Also available off paywall here]
FED INSIDER OUTLINES US DILEMMA AS PENSION CRISIS LOOMS
Former Federal Reserve insider Danielle DiMartino Booth has a unique perspective on the internal machinations for the Fed Board, with the first opportunity to change rates since Trump’s victory. Danielle pulls no punches as she connects the dots between the fallout from the election, the Italian referendum, the next moves in the bond market and the impending pensions crisis facing the United States.
[ZH summary]
Josh Crumb of Goldmoney provides a unique take on the monetary attributes of gold, making the argument for investing in the precious metal, rather than saving. Getting beyond the true religion of gold ownership, Josh looks to the future of money and the intersection between gold and cryptocurrencies.
[C.f. my Twitter thread]
Revered investment visionary Kiril Sokoloff, founder of 13D Global Strategy & Research, encapsulates the big picture trends better than anyone and Raoul Pal gets the chance to sit down with the legendary thinker to peer into the future of technology, including China’s quantum computer advantage, which has the potential to be the ultimate disruption, with an unhackable new form of internet, as well as long term challenges facing the US like health and demographics.
[RV YouTube link]
THE JIM GRANT SERIES: JAMES AITKEN
The esteemed Australian hedge fund advisor James Aitken sits down with legendary financial writer Jim Grant for an insightful conversation about central bank stimulus, the European financial system, China’s future, short selling, and more. Aitken, the founder of Aitken Advisors, compares recent European crises to the current state of the European economy and markets. He also shares his philosophy about how to properly navigate fully valued markets.
THE JIM GRANT SERIES: MERVYN KING
Former Bank of England Governor Mervyn King takes a seat with Jim Grant as the legendary financial writer brings the biggest names to Real Vision, with the candor to elicit the insights that you won’t see anywhere else. Mervyn King, Baron King of Lothbury, navigated the financial crisis during his decade at the helm of the UK central bank. Now he reflects on the absurdity of market models and widespread blindness as to what created the financial crisis, which impedes both the recovery and efforts to prevent another crisis in the future.
BUILDING MODELS TO FIX MISTAKES OF THE PAST
Emanuel Derman is one of the true innovators of quantitative finance and the author of My Life as a Quant and Models Behaving Badly, meets with Michael Green to discuss a model driven world and the future of equity derivatives. In an intense discussion on the ability to price volatility it is argued that unlike in science, models can never provide the ultimate truth because they are always tackling the problems that the previous set of models created.
Last week my interview with Alan Boyce was released. Alan was instrumental in one of the greatest investments I have ever seen in my career. Alan noticed that the Argentinean crisis in 2001 was causing a fire sale of the world’s best grazing lands and farm lands whilst he was working as a portfolio manager at Soros Fund management. George Soros and his son Robert leapt at the opportunity and bought huge swathes of farm land which they then turned into one of the biggest farming businesses in South America.
Alan has an enormous breadth of experience but his focus these days is mainly in renewable energy and farming. He is getting very bullish on next year’s crop cycle, where some big opportunities may lie. If you haven’t watched it yet, I urge you too. It’s an instant classic and the feedback many of you have given is outstanding.
Hugh Hendry, Founder & CIO of Eclectica Asset Management, joins us this week to take his place in the hallowed halls of Masterclass. In this exceptional hour-long interview covering a wide range of topics from the macro implications behind U.S. interest rates and their effect on treasuries, to the change in China’s economic model from production to consumption, to the global opportunities and vulnerabilities he sees, this is an interview you’ll be re-watching for months.
THE PERILS OF PASSIVE INDEXATION
In a long awaited interview, legendary investor Mike Green joins Real Vision CEO, Raoul Pal, to discuss the corporate credit cycle, the rise of passive indexing, and the consequences of mass baby-boomer retirement. Green argues that the simple algorithmic logic of passive vehicles causes irrational capital allocation. He asserts that these passive strategies only make money in a liquidity-enhanced environment, and he explains that stresses to the indices’ lack of cash reserves could create market volatility. Green and Pal examine the shift to passive vehicles and how that shift is molding the fate of both baby-boomer pensioners and millennials.
LORD TURNER ADVOCATES DEBT MONETIZATION
Lord Adair Turner was the Chairman of the Financial Services Authority in the UK, starting his tenure just five days after the failure of Lehman Brothers, with the global financial system on the brink of collapse. In a special interview with Real Vision, Lord Turner explains how he would approach the monetization of the vast global debt pile, with the world gripped in a deep deflationary trap, and no clear way out.
FINDING THE OPPORTUNITY IN SILICON VALLEY
Silicon Valley growth investor – and an authority at identifying rising stars in the hotbed of technology innovation, Michael Moe has the vision and expertise to help investors match valuation with opportunity. Offering a rare glimpse into the mindset of Silicon Valley’s leaders, Michael takes Real Vision on a grand global excursion to uncover the next new technologies set to change the world.
DIEGO PARRILLA – ENERGY PRICES CONVERGE IN FLAT WORLD
Diego Parrilla, co-author of The Energy World is Flat, speaks with Real Vision on the future convergence of energy prices, the BTU that broke OPEC’s back, and our shared quest for abundant, cheap and clean energy.
We sit down with one of the co-founders of Paypal, Jack Selby, who described to us the laborious and disruptive processes involved in setting up one of the biggest online payment systems in the world. Jack also shares lessons learned at Clarium Capital and the challenges of managing a macro fund when you have the Fed on the other side of the trade as well as his latest venture into the independent film industry. A fascinating journey through a wonderfully diverse career.
INTERVIEW WITH JAWAD MIAN – PART ONE
Jawad Mian, Founder of Stray Reflections, lays out the bull case in Part One of this extraordinary interview, explaining why he sees growth conditions as having improved dramatically since the ’08 crisis and why data which may seem poor at first blush may mask better long-term cyclical market dynamics. From there, Jawad touches on a wide variety of topics from Fed policy to U.S. dollar trends to bond and equity cycles. The perspective offered by this brilliant mind will broaden your worldview and give you a range of original insight to blend with your investing framework.
INTERVIEW WITH JAWAD MIAN – PART TWO
Jawad Mian, founder of Stray Reflections, continues his discussion with Grant Williams in Part Two, segueing to the Middle East where he discusses the geopolitical structures and tensions between nations, his short and long term outlook for crude oil, the current role of ISIS and the risk spectrum they pose globally, and gives a number of specific trade recommendations in the current market environment.
WILLIAM WHITE – THE FUTILITY OF FED MODELS
William White, Chairman of the Economic & Development Review Committee at OECD, sits down for an enlightening discussion on the model-based forecasts of central banks, the potential for a global ‘debt holiday’, and why ‘4’ may not always come after 1, 2, 3.
GRANT WILLIAMS IN CONVERSATION WITH WILLIAM WHITE
Grant travels to Toronto to meet Bill White, whose experience at the Bank of England, Bank of Canada, BIS and OECD spans five decades.
The two talk about the changes in central banking that Bill has witnessed over his career, the potential for an unruly outcome, the dangers unleashed when unfairness erodes trust, and how central banks really think about gold.
DECENTRALIZED APPLICATIONS ARE MARKET SERIAL KILLER
Dan Morehead from Pantera Capital was one of the first major investors in Bitcoin and the early cryptocurrency technology. With the advent of tokenization, Dan assesses the impact that the next wave of decentralized applications will have on the world’s most valuable data monopolies and where the winners will emerge, as the Blockchain disintermediates venture capital in a post-capitalist era.
THE COST OF ACTIVISM IN PUTIN’S RUSSIA
The inspiring, emotional and tragic story of Bill Browder’s Hermitage Capital in Russia is perhaps the most powerful piece of film we’ve ever featured on Real Vision. After his world beating Hermitage fund was devastated by the Russian default, Bill Browder took on the oligarchs and won, in an epic tale straight from the pages of a spy novel. But as the Russian government turned on him, the story turned from corruption to tragedy.
[RV YouTube link, though there may be another side to the story, e.g. this ZH article and this documentary]
MICHAEL NICOLETOS – THINK PIECE
Michael Nicoletos, CIO and co-founder of AppleTree Capital explores the political, behavioral, societal, macro and fiscal situation in Greece, giving objective analysis on debt burden and possible outcomes. Nicoletos shares his take on the importance of timing and liquidity, and looks at Russia and Turkey in terms of their macro and geopolitical positioning.
OPTIONS FOR EXTREME VOLATILITY MISPRICING
Nancy Davis of Quadratic Asset Management is a master of option portfolio construction, implementing Quadratic’s entire portfolio with options and swaptions. With volatility at 23 year lows and risk assets at all time highs, Nancy is exploiting some wild mispricings and in conversation with Michael Green, she explains her unique strategies, blending quantitative tools and discretionary judgment, in a market dynamic that is both exciting and incredibly challenging.
GRANT WILLIAMS IN CONVERSATION WITH ROSS BEATY
Grant travels to western Canada for a conversation with Pan American Silver Chairman, Canadian Mining Hall of Fame inductee, and Order of Canada recipient Ross Beaty. The two discuss Ross’s extraordinary career as a serial entrepreneur across multiple different resources, and pick apart the successes and failures that have shaped one of the most successful mining executives of the last half century. Ross describes his successful ventures in silver, gold, copper, and alternative energy, and explains his deep philanthropic commitment to the environment, in a fascinating and engaging conversation.
GRANT WILLIAMS: IN CONVERSATION WITH MARC COHODES
Real Vision’s new flagship interview series premieres, as famed short seller Marc Cohodes joins Grant Williams for a candid and emotionally raw interview. In the first in a series of extended discussions with successful investors, Grant asks Marc about his short selection process, the difficulty of managing emotions when embroiled in a fight and his current battles with a series of companies he believes to be fraudulent. Marc offers a vicious takedown of biotech company MiMedx, and shares a gut-wrenching story of losing money during 2008, despite being perfectly positioned
CARSON BLOCK’S APPROACH TO SPOTTING FRAUD, COCKROACHES AND BULLSHIT
Famed activist short seller Carson Block pulls no punches as he takes aim at Canada, Jack Ma and the U.S. pharmaceutical industry in this interview with Brian Price. Block, who serves as CIO of Muddy Waters Research, discusses the red flags he looks for when hunting for fraud, and reveals which companies are currently on his radar. Carson also touches on how his line of work has led to both tremendous success and death threats.
MADOFF WHISTLEBLOWER FLAGS NEXT BIG FINANCIAL SCANDALS
Harry Markopolos is the former derivatives professional turned independent financial fraud investigator who uncovered the $65 billion Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme, only to be ignored by the SEC for over nine years. A vocal critic of the US regulator, Harry now has the audit world and insurance industry in his sights as the next big financial frauds yet to come to light.
Kathryn Derbes, CEO of KDPM LLG., walks us through the recent movements in the precious metals markets and explains how an apparent transition in the way many people think about gold is affecting both the price movement and the degree of leverage in the paper gold market.
GOLD’S EVOLVING ROLE IN PORTFOLIOS
Simon Mikhailovich, Co-Founder of the Tocqueville Bullion Reserve, returns to Real Vision to discuss the events that propelled him to become a gold investor. In this in-depth interview, Mikhailovich speaks with Real Vision’s Grant Williams about gold’s role in a portfolio and how it can be used to hedge against risk.
James Crawford, Founder and CEO of Orbital Insight, speaks to Real Vision on a revolutionary new way to collect hard economic data – from the sky. By processing satellite and drone imagery, Crawford explains how market practitioners can have the latest information on the activity of resource industries, crop production, and even particular retail stores.
[Review of the interview in this RV podcast, similar to this Ted Talk]
STEPHEN B. STREATER – THINK PIECE
Stephen B. Streater, HNW Investor, leads us on a tour de force Think Piece across a wide range of topics, from the effects of AI on the labour market and the hoarding of wealth, to the preference for holding platinum over gold, to the knock-on effects of climate change that have been obscured by denial.
BUBBLE SPOTTER SEES FED BALANCE SHEET AT $10T IN DANGEROUS MARKETS
Doug Noland has a long history in hedge funds, as a noted short seller, but is best known for his ability to spot bubbles. He wrote about the mortgage finance bubble in 2002 and called the government finance bubble in April 2009. In this Master Class, Doug outlines where the cracks will appear in the current excess, running right to the heart of the monetary system.
[ZH summary]
REWIND – LOUIS GAVE REVIEWS MARKET FORECASTS
Louis Gave is back in the chair as Rewind takes a look back at some of his predictions from prior appearances on Real Vision. Gain a new perspective on one of the sharpest and smartest minds in finance as Louis re-examines and updates his view on China’s economic prospects and how his thinking has changed on Europe, while casting an eye on the potential outcome in the forthcoming French elections
FRASER HOWIE – THE REAL STATE OF PLAY IN CHINA
Author and independent analyst on China, Fraser Howie has spent 25 years working in the financial sector in Asia, examining how financial markets work and how the Chinese government approaches imbalances in the system. Fraser sees the future risks for China skewed to the political side, rather than economics, with an eye on Trump’s rhetoric and discusses the real meaning of reform for the Communist Party government.
Gordon Schücker 