Odd Lots
Episodes
Apple Is at the Cutting Edge of a Revolution in Chips
17 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
On a recent episode of Odd Lots, we talked about Intel, and how the former dominant American semiconductor company was stumbling. But big things are h...
This Is the Macro Picture Going Into 2021
14 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
It's obviously been an extraordinary year for markets and the economy for reasons that don't need stating at this point. But what does 2021 have in st...
Why Africa Borrowed Billions of Dollars From China
10 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
It's no secret that some African nations went on a borrowing spree in recent years, tapping both international markets and sovereign lenders such as C...
Why the IMF Changed Its Views on Capital Controls
07 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
For years, the IMF was generally of the view that free trade was good, and that open capital flows were also good. But in recent years, the latter vie...
Former ECB Chief Economist Peter Praet on What's Next For Central Banks
03 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
With developed economies still operating well below pre-crisis levels, central banks face substantial pressure to pursue stimulative policies on an on...
How the Number One U.S. Semiconductor Company Stumbled
30 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
For years, Intel has been the pre-eminent U.S. semiconductor company. But lately, the company has stumbled. This past summer, shares in the company pl...
How Money Became A Form Of Social Media
26 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
There are many similarities between cryptocurrencies and social networks. And the rise of payment apps like Venmo make the link between payments and s...
Inigo Fraser-Jenkins and Aaron Brown Debate The Future Of Quant Investing
23 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Traditional quant strategies that try to screen for stocks that are "cheap" have had an extremely rough period. So is this just a temporary setback th...
The Episode That Turned Tracy Into A Bitcoin Bull
19 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Bitcoin has been on a tear lately, but it's been a bit unclear as to what's driving it. But whatever's driving it, co-host Tracy Alloway has given up ...
This Is How People Really Feel About Paying Taxes
16 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The politics of taxes are always fraught. In theory, everyone wants to pay less of them and bristle at the prospect of paying more. But it turns out t...
A Political Reporter Argues That Wall Street Doesn't Get DC
12 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Investors have always had to pay attention to what's going on in Washington DC, but this year it's been on a whole new level. Between virus response p...
This Is The NYSE's Plan To Win More Direct Listings
09 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
This year's stock market boom has coincided with a boom in new listings. There have been plenty of IPOs, numerous SPACs, and an uptick in companies do...
Michael Mauboussin On Valuing Intangible Assets
05 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Measuring a company's book value is a classic practice among investors seeking to understand how much a firm's actual assets are worth. But what happe...
A Forensic Accountant On Why Chinese Internet Companies Are So Tough To Analyze
02 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The IPO of Ant Financial will go down as one of the most extraordinary deals of all time. And in general, Chinese internet companies have been huge wi...
Lessons From Ruth Krivoy, the Former Head of Venezuela's Central Bank
29 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The COVID-19 crisis has pushed central banks around the world into uncharted territory. Typically when we talk about this, it's from the perspective o...
JPMorgan's Josh Younger on Rate Derivatives and Volatility Ahead of the Election
26 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
For months now, traders have been positioning for a major volatility spike around the November election. But what are markets really expecting, and ho...
Benoît Cœuré On Central Bank Digital Currencies And The Future Of Monetary Policy
22 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Central banks around the world are increasingly launching pilot projects to explore the possibility of issuing digital currencies. But how would they ...
Rep. Ro Khanna On Why Democrats Should Cut A Stimulus Deal With The White House
20 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
With just two weeks until the election, talks over a stimulus deal remain ongoing, with negotiations having picked up between House Speaker Nancy Pelo...
A Volatility Arbitrage Trader On What Markets Are Saying Right Now
19 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
It's been an extraordinary year for traders of volatility. We had the crisis, we had this incredible surge in retail call options buying, and we have ...
How Tobacco Became One Of The Greatest Investments In History
15 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
For over a century, tobacco stocks have been among the greatest investments in history, consistently outperforming other sectors decade after decade. ...
Michael Hudson On Why The US Risks Becoming The Next Greece
12 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In the wake of the Great Financial Crisis, you heard a lot of talk about the US becoming like Greece unless the budget deficit were brought under cont...
What It Takes To Win At Quant Investing
08 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Interest in quantitative investing strategies continues to grow; however, as the space gets more competitive, making money and winning gets harder and...
An IMF Economist On The Challenge Of Finding The Neutral Rate Of Interest
05 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
One of the guiding lights of Fed policy over the years has been the so-called Neutral Rate of Interest or R*. It's at this rate, theoretically, where ...
Volatility Suppression Turned The Entire Economy Into One Big Carry Trade
01 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In a carry trade, an investor borrows money cheaply to buy an asset that yields more. As long as nothing changes overall, the investors get to pocket ...
How All Financial Markets Turned Into The Same Big Trade
28 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
These days it seems like all financial markets are the same big trade. A gold chart looks like a Tesla chart, which looks like an Ethereum chart, whic...
This Is What Happened When They Tried To Fix Journalism Using Blockchain
24 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Back in 2017, during the Bitcoin boom, there were a number of different attempts to use blockchain technology to improve a host of businesses and indu...
A Top Crypto Exchange CEO Explains Why The 2020 Boom Is Different
21 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Crypto is hot this year again. In 2020, we've not only seen a substantial rally across a lot of different coins, there's been an emergency of new expe...
How Traders Used Google Searches To See The Economic Recovery In Real Time
17 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The use of so-called "alternative data" has been gathering attention for some time. Investors have been looking at things like credit cards or satelli...
How SoftBank And Robinhooders Added Fuel To The Stock Market Boom
14 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
One of the most intriguing subplots to the 2020 stock market boom has been the speculative fervor with which investors have dived into this market. An...
Why Blank Check Companies Are The Hottest Thing This Year
10 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
SPACs have been around a long time. The basic premise is that a group of people raise a bunch of money from public market investors, with the premise ...
How A New Type Of Money Helped Cause The Great Financial Crisis
07 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
It's fun to talk about what money is, but often it's hard to connect the dots and make it actually relevant to the discussion of the economy and marke...
Paul McCulley: We Are "Unambiguously" On The Verge Of A Profound Change In The Economy
03 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Paul McCulley is a former Managing Director at PIMCO and a legend of the industry, having helped coin phrases such as "shadow banking" and the "Minsky...
Minneapolis Fed President Neel Kashkari On The Historic Challenges For Monetary Policy
31 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The Fed is facing historic challenges for two reasons. The first is the coronavirus and the task of facilitating the economic recovery. The second cha...
The Father Of CMBS Says We’re In ‘Uncharted Territory’ When It Comes To Valuing Real Estate
27 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
There are some sectors of the real estate market, such as suburban residential housing, that are doing just fine throughout this crisis. However, othe...
The CEO of a $1.4 Billion REIT Explains The Surprising Year In Housing
24 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
When COVID hit, people had visions of a plunge in home prices and a massive wave of evictions. So far, that largely hasn’t played out. On this episo...
Rep. Ayanna Pressley On How The Fed Can Fight Racial Inequality
20 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In the United States, Black Americans have experienced persistently higher levels of unemployment than their White counterparts. While the Fed has foc...
How To Run A Bowling Alley-Arcade-Restaurant-Bar In The Middle Of A Pandemic
17 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The pandemic has been brutal for restaurants and other indoor entertainment venues. So imagine running a space that's a restaurant, a bowling alley, a...
The ECB’s Former Vice-President Explains The Historic Step That Europe Just Took
10 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
For years, people have identified the lack of fiscal transfers and fiscal burden sharing as one of the glaring architectural flaws of the European eco...
Viktor Shvets On Why There’s No Going Back To Pre-COVID Capitalism
06 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In light of the massive disruption to the economy, there’s a widespread view that things have been permanently altered, that fiscal policy must take...
Why Investors Keep Losing Money Betting Against The Hong Kong Dollar Peg
03 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
For years, macro hedge fund managers have been stalking the Hong Kong Dollar. Since 1983, the currency has been pegged at around 7.75 per US dollar, a...
How They’re Really Making Money On Your Free Robinhood Trades
30 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
With so many people working at home, bored, and with no sports to bet on, there’s been an incredible explosion of retail stock market trading. One s...
Introducing: Blood River
28 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The killers of Berta Caceres had every reason to believe they’d get away with murder. More than 100 other environmental activists in Honduras had be...
How A Professional Writer Turned Herself Into A World Class Poker Player
27 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Switching careers is always difficult. But former New Yorker staff writer Maria Konnikova did it in dramatic fashion. Konnikova decided that the best ...
Meet The Mayor Who Printed His Own Currency To Fight The Virus
20 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
With the virus crushing economic activity, local governments have had to cut spending and rely on Federal support in order to maintain basic services....
Why Studying Keynes Is More Important Than Ever
13 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In response to the economic crisis, governments around the world have engaged in stimulative policies that might be characterized as “Keynesian” i...
How The Government Can Guarantee Everyone A Job And Fix The Unemployment Crisis Immediately
09 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Officially, the US unemployment rate stands at 11%. This is higher than the worst levels of the financial crisis. And there are reasons to think that ...
Why The World Is Getting Angrier, And What Says About The Economy
06 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The world has gotten angrier in recent years, and the coronavirus crisis seems likely to have accelerated the trend. So what does this say about the e...
Hyun Song Shin On What Central Banks Have Learned From The Crisis
02 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Central banks and fiscal authorities around the world have taken extraordinary measures to stem the economic fallout from the coronavirus crisis. But ...
This Is Why The China Bubble Never Seems To Pop
29 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
For years and years, the Chinese economy has been characterized as a bubble, with too much debt, and a history of badly thought out, state-directed in...
Introducing Foundering
25 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Adam Neumann had a vision: to make his startup WeWork a wildly successful company that would change the world. He convinced thousands of other people ...
What The Black Death And Spanish Flu Can Tell Us About What Comes Next
22 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Nobody knows what the post-COVID future looks like. But there are some lessons to be learned from previous pandemics. On today’s episode we speak wi...
Chamath Palihapitiya Says A Reckoning Is Coming For Big Tech
18 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Chamath Palihapitiya is the CEO of Social Capital, the Chairman of Virgin Galactic and a partial owner of the Golden State Warriors basketball team. H...
Domino’s: This Is How A Pizza Chain Stock Did Just As Well As Google
15 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In the summer of 2004, Google went public and, as everyone knows, it’s done phenomenally well. What’s less known is that a few weeks later, Domino...
Why You Can’t Blame The Fed For Ultra-Low Interest Rates And Soaring Asset Prices
11 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
One of the characteristics of the pre-crisis (and perhaps also the post-crisis) economy is the presence of very low interest rates, and financial asse...
Two Investors Did A Tour Of The Globe To Find The Best Place To Put Their Money
08 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
As many active fund managers have discovered in recent years, it’s extremely hard to find a sustainable edge in investing. But for people who put in...
This Is What Happened To LIBOR During The COVID Crisis
05 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Welcome to Part V of the Odd Lots LIBOR series, in which Tracy Alloway and Joe Weisenthal take a look at life after LIBOR, the interest rate tied to m...
How The Transition Away From LIBOR Is Actually Going
04 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Welcome to Part IV of the Odd Lots LIBOR series, in which Tracy Alloway and Joe Weisenthal take a look at life after LIBOR, the interest rate tied to ...
The Case for AMERIBOR As The Replacement for LIBOR
03 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Welcome to Part III of the Odd Lots LIBOR series, in which Tracy Alloway and Joe Weisenthal take a look at life after LIBOR, the interest rate tied to...
This Is The Index That's Supposed To Replace LIBOR
02 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Welcome to Part II of the Odd Lots LIBOR series, in which Tracy Alloway and Joe Weisenthal take a look at life after LIBOR, the interest rate tied to ...
Meet the Man Who Blew the Whistle on LIBOR
01 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Welcome to the Odd Lots LIBOR series, in which Tracy Alloway and Joe Weisenthal take a look at life after LIBOR, the interest rate tied to more than $...
Here’s Who Really Benefits From The Dominance Of The U.S. Dollar
28 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
When people talk about the dominance of the U.S. dollar in global commerce, they often refer to it as a unique privilege of the United States that its...
Three Sovereign Debt Experts Explain How The World Can Instantly Bring Aid To Emerging Markets
25 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The economic crisis will result in an extraordinary amount of pain for emerging markets. In addition to the health disruption, the global economic col...
What The Weak Recovery In Japan Can Teach Us About Re-Igniting The U.S. Economy
21 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Even with the recent stock market rally, expectations are poor for a robust recovery in the U.S. So what does history teach us about what works and wh...
Mark Cuban On Why The Government Should Directly Hire Millions Of People
18 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
How should the government address the economic crisis? On this episode, we talk with Mark Cuban, the Shark Tank co-host and billionaire owner of the D...
The Coronavirus Crisis Could Lead To The Mother Of All Trade Imbalances
14 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
With the acute phase of the health crisis having faded in China, factory activity has ramped up again. One big problem though: With the economy so dep...
Richard Koo Explains Why The Recovery Will Be So Difficult
11 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Countries around the world are undergoing an unprecedented, simultaneous real economic shock. So how should policymakers respond? Richard Koo is the C...
What the Market Crash Says About How Investing Works
07 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
We’ve seen a huge market crash this year and a number of firms reporting portfolio losses. So why were so many big investors crowded into the same t...
Nouriel Roubini Sees A Bad Recovery, Then Inflation, Then A Depression
04 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
During the last crisis, the economist Nouriel Roubini earned the nickname “Dr. Doom” for his ominous prognostications about the economy and financ...
How To Fund The Search For A COVID-19 Vaccine And Boost The Recovery
30 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The hunt is on for a clinical therapy to prevent or treat COVID-19. But what’s the best way to go about this? How can governments accelerate this pr...
Adam Tooze On How This Crisis Is Different Than The Last
27 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In 2018, Columbia history professor Adam Tooze published his magisterial work “Crashed”, which framed the Great Financial Crisis as essentially a ...
How The Coronavirus Crisis Pushed The Fed Into Truly Uncharted Territory
23 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The fate of the economy remains extremely unclear. However there is little doubt that the Fed has taken dramatic steps to arrest the crisis. Not only ...
Emerging Markets Have Never Experienced A Crisis Like This Before
20 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
With major economies around the world coming to a screeching halt, emerging markets are in a squeeze of historic proportions. Not only are they being ...
Why The War On Physical Cash Is A War On Freedom
17 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Commerce and payments are increasingly digital. This shift from physical to electronic is one that governments and businesses are eager to accelerate ...
Marco Rubio On The Effort To Save Jobs And Get People Working Again
15 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
At the end of March, Congress passed the CARES Act in an attempt to mitigate some of the massive economic devastation being caused by the coronavirus ...
How To Stop The Fiscal Emergency Facing U.S. Cities And States
13 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
With the U.S. economy going into a deep slump, the Federal government has attempted to counteract the pain by increasing spending. But for cities and ...
Here’s What’s Happening With Those Korean Structured Notes That Bet Against Market Volatility
09 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Earlier this year on Odd Lots, we did an episode about Korean structured investment products that were sold to retail investors, whose performance was...
Tom Barrack On The Crisis In The Commercial Real Estate Market
06 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The commercial real estate market has been clobbered in this crisis, as restaurants and stores virtually shut down entirely throughout the month of Ma...
Zoltan Pozsar and Perry Mehrling On The Historic Crisis Of Financial Market Plumbing
30 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The plumbing of the financial system is coming under strain like never before. On this week’s podcast, we speak with two legendary experts on how th...
How The Crisis Nearly Blew Up One Of The World’s Safest Trades
26 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In normal times, U.S. Treasuries are the ultimate safe haven. They are highly liquid and guaranteed to pay out. So when people want to hide out during...
A Longstanding Fear About The Corporate Debt Market May Finally Be Coming True
23 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
For a long time, people have been warning that corporate debt could be the major source of vulnerability in today's economy. And the market meltdown t...
How A Macro Manager Is Trading On One Of The Wildest Markets In History
19 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Markets around the world are so extremely volatile that nobody can think of any perfect precedent. There are shades of the Great Recession, 1987, the ...
How Saudi Arabia Delivered A Blow To U.S. Shale Companies At The Worst Possible Moment
16 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Saudi Arabia recently announced that it was engaging in a full-on price war by pumping oil like crazy. At one point, after the move, the price of Bren...
How To Stop The Recession From Happening Right Now
12 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The U.S. is on the verge of an economic crisis due to the coronavirus, as people and businesses aggressively pull back on spending. On this week's Odd...
Did Passive Investing Fuel A Bubble In Ultra-Large Tech Stocks?
09 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Questions continue to arise over the effect of passive investing, and whether or not it's somehow distorting the market. On this week's episode, we sp...
How A Profane Subreddit Moved The Market
05 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In recent weeks, before the stock market plunged, a page on reddit called r/WallStreetBets suddenly started exhibiting enormous influence on a handful...
How Iraq Pulled Off One Of The Biggest Sovereign Debt Restructurings Of All Time
02 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
There are lots of famous debt crises in history, but the story of Iraq's government debt build-up in the 1980s and subsequent restructuring in the ear...
This Is What The Coronavirus Means For The Chinese Supply Chain
26 Feb 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Apple's recent revenue warning reminded the world of how exposed the company is to China, and in particular its factories. As the coronavirus continue...
The Jeweler From Uncut Gems Explains Why People Go Crazy For Gold And Diamonds
24 Feb 2020
Contributed by Lukas
One of the best recent movies was Uncut Gems, in which Adam Sandler plays a Diamond District jeweler with an addiction to gambling and risk. It turns ...
What the Coronavirus Means for Pandemic Bonds
17 Feb 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Back in 2017, the World Bank issued the world's first pandemic bonds. The bonds are meant to shift some of the financial risk of a global pandemic on ...
Why The Rise of Passive Investing Might Be Distorting The Market
10 Feb 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Over the last decade or so, we've seen an incredible rise in so-called passive investing. While definitions differ over what this means, we've seen mo...
How To Use Fiscal Stimulus To Stave Off The Next Recession
03 Feb 2020
Contributed by Lukas
There's a growing consensus that governments need to act more aggressively in using fiscal policy to stave off the next recession, and that monetary p...
Perry Mehrling Explains Why "The Money View" Is Key To Understanding Financial Markets
27 Jan 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Even to this day, there are economists who don't understand money or don't think that money is an important aspect of the economy. They see the world ...
Why The Transition To Clean Energy Is Happening A Lot Faster Than People Realize
24 Jan 2020
Contributed by Lukas
At the recent World Economic Forum in Davos, there was a lot of talk about the need to change the world's energy usage in order to address climate cha...
How An Exotic Investment Product Sold In Korea Could Create Havoc In The U.S. Options Market
20 Jan 2020
Contributed by Lukas
What's the connection between low global interest rates, Korean retail investors, and the U.S. options market? On this week's Odd Lots podcast, we dis...
What It's Like To Be An Investor In Iran's Market Right Now
13 Jan 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Iran's stock market is one of the most unfamiliar equity markets in the world. With Iran under stringent U.S. sanctions, it's hard to even find data o...
Introducing Prognosis Season 4: America's Broken Health-Care Costs
09 Jan 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Americans are paying more and getting less for their health care than ever before. On the new season of Prognosis, reporter John Tozzi explores what w...
Why So Many Emerging Markets Are Blowing Up Right Now
06 Jan 2020
Contributed by Lukas
From Argentina to Chile to Lebanon, we're seeing a high degree of political and economic uncertainty among emerging market economies. On this week's O...
Why It's A Big Problem That Economists Still Don't Understand Money
30 Dec 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The severity of the Great Financial Crisis took economists by surprise, particularly the ones who believed that markets were largely stable and self-r...
A Human Rights Activist Explains Why Bitcoin Is So Important to His Work
23 Dec 2019
Contributed by Lukas
When people think about Bitcoin, they often think about neo-goldbugs who hate inflation and the Federal Reserve. But beyond the financial case for it,...
How Online Dating Is Reshaping the Entire Economy
16 Dec 2019
Contributed by Lukas
By this point, everybody knows that online dating is a massive phenomenon, reshaping the social habits of the young and the single. But perhaps people...