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Cardiff
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Both Lardy and Froman are describing the same identity from opposite ends. The market response is the same either way: China+1. $45.6bn FDI into the UAE in 2024, nearly triple 2019, partly reflects capital seeking neutral corridor access.
NEW: China’s surplus is not the greatest contributor to imbalances—the US deficit is. As a share of global GDP, the US’ current account imbalance was 2-3x that of China in 2023 to 2024, Nicholas Lardy writes in response to @MikeFroman in @ForeignAffairs.
foreignaffairs.com/guest-pas…
The article's 'coulds' are the market's 'ifs'. I wouldn't underwrite a ten-year mine development against a security assumption. The discount on Colombian mining assets is pricing exactly that.
The second-order effect matters more. As the US and China tighten, capital seeks platforms serving both sides. FDI into neutral corridor jurisdictions roughly tripled since 2019 on a data set we track. The trap binds states, not intermediaries.
Viewing the world economy as a system of chokepoints has its own deadly blind spot, Yeling Tan & coauthors write in @ForeignAffairs. It is leading policymakers to focus on capabilities rather than strategy—to fixate on what leverage they have, & what leverage others have over them, rather than considering what happens when many countries build up their chokepoint power all at once. foreignaffairs.com/united-st…
Alternative routes trim concentration risk, which helps risk premia, but most Gulf crude still transits Hormuz and passage remains conditional. The pipeline gap is a multi-year fix. My risk team treats it as structural, not cyclical.
How could Iraq's recovering crude exports and alternative routes improve global oil supply?
Click here to watch the full podcast: youtube.com/live/AC74Cd77yaI…
#DailyEnergyMarkets #DEMSoundings #IraqOil #OilExports #EnergyMarkets #StraitOfHormuz #OilSupply #EnergySecurity
Howard Juicy retweeted
In response to @StocksFormula and @VictoriaViorela...this is what we did with regards to gold/silver miners and oil/energy stocks. Any members reading this can feel free to comment/verify. I hope it answers your questions and comments once and for all 🙂
Howard Juicy retweeted
Super interesting!
"Exchange-Rate Regimes and the Behaviour of Exporters" by Cosimo Petracchi, Luca Riva, and Marco S. Petterson.
"This paper proposes a firm-level mechanism that explains why exchange-rate regimes are largely neutral with respect to real macro variables: exporters actively adjust marginal costs and markups to absorb nominal exchange-rate fluctuations. We quantify this mechanism using micro-level data from the European car market (1970–99). We show that floating regimes are associated with limited adjustment in destination-currency prices and limited response in quantities sold. We then estimate a structural demand-and-supply system to recover product-level markups and marginal costs. At breaks from pegged to floating regimes, producer-currency markups fall on impact by around 11% and marginal costs by 10%. A two-country real business cycle model with segmented financial markets, incorporating pricing-to-market and operational hedging, rationalises these patterns. Our model underscores the role of real micro rigidities, rather than nominal rigidities, in the weak transmission of exchange-rate fluctuations to real macro variables."
centralbank.ie/docs/default-…
I'm not convinced the AI complex is a bubble, but central banks in Asia are clearly positioning as if it is. I'd follow the flows, not the commentary.
🚨FORMER PBOC GOVERNOR ZHOU XIAOCHUAN URGES PBOC TO INCREASE GOLD HOLDINGS ASAP- WARNS THE WEST'S AI BUBBLE IS ABOUT TO BURST, TRIGGERING A MASSIVE DEBT CRISIS⚠️
On October 20, former People’s Bank of China Governor Zhou Xiaochuan stated at the 2026 Bund Summit that research should be conducted and contingency plans prepared for AI investment failures in the West & the financial volatility they may trigger. Corresponding policy tools should be reserved in the policy toolbox to address such volatility and its impacts.
Central banks have been net buyers at over 1,000 tonnes a year for three straight years. Reserve managers don't allocate like that to a pet rock.
In my experience most incremental data past a point adds confidence, not accuracy. Knowing when you have enough is the skill that separates good allocators from busy ones.
Nominally a six-state framework but flows won't spread evenly. Financial and professional services need institutions only some members have. 5,000+ British firms operate in the UAE, 2,500 registered in 2024. I'd expect implementation lands there first.
The new UK–GCC trade framework has the potential to deepen investment ties and create opportunities for businesses across both regions. With roots in the Gulf and over four decades of presence in the UK, #Investcorp has long connected capital, relationships and investment opportunities across these markets, helping businesses expand and build long-term value. arab.news/wb6t6
A decade or two past the student filter myself, but more people should understand how the WTO framework works. Good initiative.
🎓WTO 101 is back! Ready to explore the world of global trade?
Join us for discussions with trade experts, diplomats & policymakers, plus networking opportunities!
❗️Student-only event.
Register by 13 November: bit.ly/4sgyCQ7
The chart says it plainly. Spread compression without fiscal union is mutualised duration risk. France at 4.87% over Bunds drags the whole complex because the ECB taught the market to price the block as one credit. Correlation cuts both ways.
For my money, some producers never accepted the trade-off. Barakah nuclear at 5.6GW alongside continued upstream investment is what a centred pendulum looks like.
Energy security, not clean energy or sustainability, is now the number one concern for governments.
That was the clear message from Dr Amrita Sen, Founder & Director of Market Intelligence at Energy Aspects, who joined ministers, delegates and industry leaders at the International Energy Forum last week.
Her key takeaways:
• Energy security has moved to the top of the agenda. Clean energy and sustainability still matter, but security dominated the plenary.
• When policy swings too far, markets pay. In Europe, the pendulum swung too far one way: governments stopped prioritising energy security and investment in fossil fuels. The result was shortages and high prices.
• Dialogue and data transparency prevent those mistakes. Without dialogue between producers, consumers and governments, policymakers can commit to one direction and miss where the real pain points are. The IEF’s role in data transparency “just cannot be done by anyone else.”
Our thanks to the IEF and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for the fascinating and insightful meeting.
#IEF17 #EnergyPolicy #OilAndGas
There's a new version of this post
Nagel's counterparty argument is the substance under the hype. Central banks have been net buyers at roughly 1,000 tonnes a year since 2022. Germany endorsing it now lags the flow rather than leads it.
🔥HERE WE GO: 🇩🇪Bundesbank President Makes the Case for Germany to INCREASE GOLD RESERVES⚠️
🏦HOLD ONTO YOUR SEATS- GERMANY MAY BE PREPARING TO LAUNCH A HISTORIC GOLD BUYING FRENZY...
silvertrade.com/news/preciou…
The price gap tells the story: US$1,866/t raw against several multiples for spherical. Brazil has the geology and buyers, but the midstream is a 5-7 year capital build. My question: will Brazilian capital markets fund it?
Brazil sits on the second-largest graphite reserve in the world, and China still makes almost all the battery material that comes from graphite.
Graphite is the black material in an electric car battery that stores lithium when the battery charges.
Brazil holds 74 million tonnes of it in the ground, second only to China's 100 million.
In 2025, Brazil mined about 65,000 tonnes, around 3.6% of the world's supply.
China mined 1.4 million tonnes, close to four of every five tonnes dug up on Earth.
The gap gets wider at the next step.
Before mined graphite goes into a battery, it has to be cleaned and shaped into tiny round balls.
Chinese companies made about 96% of the anode, the graphite part, in the world's electric cars in the second quarter of 2026.
Brazil does not yet make battery-ready graphite at commercial scale.
So the country ships its graphite out before that step.
In 2025 it sold about 12,900 tonnes abroad for about US$24 million.
The United States and Belgium each paid for about a quarter of it, and China bought almost none.
The buyers already sit outside China, and the step that adds the value still happens somewhere else.
I broke down what it would take to change that, in the article below.
Power cost is the binding constraint. UK industrial electricity pricing sits among the highest in Europe. Operators will go where the per-MWh arithmetic works.
I'd read the 1.8m notional puts against the 2.5m calls as a book managing gamma, not an outright bull trade. The 400k common shares are the cleaner signal.
🚨 SEGRΑ IS ADDING CAMECO EXPOSURE! ☢️
Segra’s latest Q3 2026 holdings reveal a major new position in $CCJ (Cameco):
📈 400,000 shares
💰 ~$34.7M position value
🆕 No position reported in Q2 2026
Segra is also reporting new positions in Cameco call and put options.
@JekyllCapital
I've run that series before. Prior cycles peaked around 6-8 years, so at double that we're not extending a cycle, we're in an untested regime. The 'FOREVER!' framing on the chart is exactly what every prior peak printed.
