Global Macro Update

Bleakley Advisory Group CIO Peter Boockvar talks interest rates, why new housing construction is set to plummet, and what dog food says about the economy. You'll also hear why chatter about China's economic Armageddon is overblown and why that's good for everyone.

Mauldin Economics COO Ed D'Agostino talks to Louis Gave, CEO of Gavekal Research, about China's so-called economic crisis, the Fed's unspoken third mandate, and "the real story of the summer."

Jan Stuart has one of the most fascinating jobs in finance. As an energy analyst at investment bank Piper Sandler, he not only monitors trends in the energy markets, but also the spiderweb of geopolitical forces that affect how (and if) 8 billion people across the globe keep the lights on. In the latest Global Macro Update interview, Jan and Ed D'Agostino discuss nuclear energy's "green" makeover, the private support Bill Gates is pouring into nuclear development, and whether uranium bulls are too early to the party.

The state of modern warfare has changed. It has moved into space for control of what's orbiting the planet. This poses new threats, including attacks on satellites that control global GPS, and sabotage that renders critical orbits unusable. And a new race to the moon is underway to capture the ultimate commanding heights. We also look at political angst in America, the growing belief that it is us against the political elites, and the upcoming presidential election. I cover that and a whole lot more with guest Dr. Pippa Malmgren, author, economist, and advisor to policymakers and presidents around the world.

US trade with China is way down with one disturbing exception: fentanyl. Thousands of Chinese companies are capable of manufacturing ingredients needed to produce the drug and exporting them to the West, along with instructions on how to create fentanyl powder. Many of these companies are state-owned enterprises, according to Allison Fedirka, my guest this week. She says there is no denying that China's government is involved with the fentanyl drug trade to the US. Allison Fedirka is the director of analysis at Geopolitical Futures (GPF). My subscribers are familiar with the in-depth work of George Friedman and his team at GPF.

Zombie companies need cheap money to survive. Cheap money is a thing of the past, and casualties are piling up. It's a familiar script: borrow money to fund growth, and compete on price. That business model fails when interest rates rise quickly. As debt-burdened, low-cost providers get squeezed by higher rates, more will fail. My guest is Barry Habib of Highway.ai. Barry fears the Fed is looking for clues in the rear-view mirror. Looking ahead and extrapolating trends would give the Fed a better perspective and less incentive to raise rates. We also cover interest rates, housing, and inflation.

My guest this episode sees several things simmering beneath the surface that suggest the economy may not be as weak as many believe. When inflation spiked last year, companies responded by raising their prices. As price pressures started to ease, companies opted to prioritize pricing over volume. The move made perfect sense, says Samuel Rines, Managing Director at Corbu, LLC, as pricing helped maintain margins. It's a strategy he has dubbed "price and margin" (PAM). And as input costs retreated and prices stayed steady, the money fell to the bottom line. It's one of the things that kept him bullish in the face of widespread bearishness early this year.

Trust in elected officials has been in steady decline for decades. It's hard to decide if members of Congress and other elected officials are self-serving or civil servants. One thing is certain—many are getting richer while in office. They are investing based on insider knowledge. If you or I did that, we'd go to jail. If you are in Congress, it's perfectly legal. Matt K. Lewis just released a book on this topic, and he pulls no punches. Filthy Rich Politicians explains just how badly our system is broken and which politicians are the most egregious when it comes to lining their pockets.

Socially responsible investing hasn't changed anything while handing investors subpar returns. The envisioned benefits of ESG investing—owning companies that follow responsible environmental, social, and governance policies—have failed to materialize. Instead, the blind acceptance of ESG precepts has resulted in trillions of dollars being misallocated and zero progress toward its principle target: climate change. Terrence Keeley, author of Sustainable: Moving Beyond ESG to Impact Investing, shows how ESG got the ideology right and the methodology wrong.

If you listen to the financial media, you'd think seven stocks are responsible for "the market's" gain this year. But the charts are telling us otherwise. Almost every sector is up double digits since last June. To understand what's happening in the markets, this week we connect with market technician JC Parets. JC is the founder and chief analyst at All Star Charts. The company offers daily market commentary and a technical analysis platform for research and options trading. He is seeing the continuation of a healthy sector rotation that started last year when value rallied. He has charts and comments on several stocks, commodities, and sectors.