1hr interview Chamath Palihapitiya - How to Invest in This Crisis

[Adeptus]

Video released April 2, 2020 - 290,000 views so far.

1 hour 20 min interview with Chamath Palihapitiya - Legendary billionaire venture capitalist guy, previously Facebook Exec and owned 5% of all Bitcoin back in 2013. I consider this guy super smart, so I always try to listen to his latest interviews.

"How to Invest in this Crisis" - He covers a lot of ground, including various issues of the US economy during this crisis not covered in the MSM, and how we can get out of it during this period of pandemic. He also discloses his investment strategies in the current crisis environment.

I got a lot out of it, hope you guys enjoy it.

[Woodsman]

Re: 1hr interview Chamath Palihapitiya - How to Invest in This Crisis

Video released April 2, 2020 - 290,000 views so far....

Excellent stuff. Really worth watching. Kept me interested until the end. Never heard of this fellow before. I think now I'll look for his take more often. Much appreciated!

[Mega]

Re: 1hr interview Chamath Palihapitiya - How to Invest in This Crisis

I quite liked him, but well...............did he say anything that we have not discussed here for the last 10-15 years?
Default or inflation..........they tried to get inflation for years & failed, he hedged both to which method & time line.

Bitcoin ?..............who has not be ripped off?............a electronic system "They" can kill at a flick of a switch.

Every business will want to massively cut costs.........Gee, who of thought!
"People can't won't want to buy stuff they don't need".......A blinder!

Having been though the 1979/83 recession & the 89/93 one I think I know what's next.

The Central banks baled out the banks in 08, this time the IMF will have to bale the "CB's" out.....with SDR's.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...more-economies

Mike
Ps, just back from Walmart & two guys where shouting to each other.
Both builders, they were discussing their staff & how they had to take on ANYONE who washed up at their door.
No matter how crap they where, they no choice but to employ them..............not any more!

Both guy were rubbing their hands with delight, now they get to pick smart reliable people, no piss takers .....I see a "Cull of incompetent" coming

[Woodsman]

Re: 1hr interview Chamath Palihapitiya - How to Invest in This Crisis

...I see a "Cull of incompetent" coming

Yeah, Mike. Fundamentally, the United States of America and the Republic that we've known (pretty much the same for Britain) is effectively over. It has been foreclosed, placed in Chapter 13 bankruptcy, and is being restructured.

Everything we have known and taken for granted is in the process of being swept away. Corona, while a real event with real consequences for health, is simply the excuse/cover to implement long-sought after plans. It's the justification for bursting the bubble and the global reset. Nothing will ever be the same again.

Just off the top of my head, over the next couple of years we'll have things like

Socialism/state capitalism
Federal Reserve issued cryptocurrency
Universal social credit system
Universal basic income
Universal healthcare
Internal passports
Digital blockchain-based identification
Internet licensing
Gun licensing, bans

In short, we're going to become China with American characteristics.

Barring a miracle, we are entering a totalitarian age with authoritarian structures embedded in every aspect of our daily lives. In a sense, we'll be locked down for the remainder of our days.

Free humanity, rest in peace.

[Mega]

Re: 1hr interview Chamath Palihapitiya - How to Invest in This Crisis

Well
I suspect "They" going to have a lot of VERY pissed people on their hands.
What you list is their "Wet dream list".........they get very little.

The Domino's are starting to fall already:-

Very Smart guy, dead right & its about to happen:-

[lakedaemonian]

Re: 1hr interview Chamath Palihapitiya - How to Invest in This Crisis

Chamath is an exceptionally sharp guy.

But for those inclined it’s worth noting he was the VP of User Growth at Facebook.

He’s the guy responsible for leading the team that developed the worlds biggest and most addictive digital nicotine product.

It could also be argued that the free product his team created requires collection in a digital concentration camp.

So there is that.

But we did learn about hypothermia from Nazi concentration camp doctors.

I like him, he is a very sharp guy, but we can’t forget he is a Big Digital Tobacco executive, former or not.

[bpr]

Re: 1hr interview Chamath Palihapitiya - How to Invest in This Crisis

I like him, he is a very sharp guy, but we can’t forget he is a Big Digital Tobacco executive, former or not.

Very interesting interview, thanks for sharing. He does seem to have reformed a bit. More interesting is his personal history and take on capital as a tool for positive reform (he discusses it toward the end of the video), which is rarely heard in the polarized circles who either a.) blame "capitalism" for all of our society's evils or b.) worship at the altar of "capitalism" and neglect the iniquities which are exacerbated by our current system. (Wikipedia)

[lakedaemonian]

Re: 1hr interview Chamath Palihapitiya - How to Invest in This Crisis

Very interesting interview, thanks for sharing. He does seem to have reformed a bit. More interesting is his personal history and take on capital as a tool for positive reform (he discusses it toward the end of the video), which is rarely heard in the polarized circles who either a.) blame "capitalism" for all of our society's evils or b.) worship at the altar of "capitalism" and neglect the iniquities which are exacerbated by our current system. (Wikipedia)

Agreed.

I’ve been following for a few years after attending a talk he did in person a few years ago.

I think he has a good mix of intelligence, experience, passion, and candor.

The last two means he shows his cards more than most when he gets worked up about something.

Like Warren Buffett a decade plus ago, I’ve learned to follow not just what people say, but what they actually do.

[Techdread]

Re: 1hr interview Chamath Palihapitiya - How to Invest in This Crisis

Yeah, Mike. Fundamentally, the United States of America and the Republic that we've known (pretty much the same for Britain) is effectively over. It has been foreclosed, placed in Chapter 13 bankruptcy, and is being restructured.

Just off the top of my head, over the next couple of years we'll have things like

Socialism/state capitalism
Federal Reserve issued cryptocurrency
Universal social credit system
Universal basic income
Universal healthcare
Internal passports
Digital blockchain-based identification
Internet licensing
Gun licensing, bans

In short, we're going to become China with American characteristics.

Barring a miracle, we are entering a totalitarian age with authoritarian structures embedded in every aspect of our daily lives. In a sense, we'll be locked down for the remainder of our days.

Free humanity, rest in peace.

That is actually my idea of Utopia, maybe because I grew up reading Asimov and Iain Banks.

The freedom most think they have in the West is an illusion.

[Woodsman]

Re: 1hr interview Chamath Palihapitiya - How to Invest in This Crisis

That is actually my idea of Utopia, maybe because I grew up reading Asimov and Iain Banks.

The freedom most think they have in the West is an illusion.

Well I'm pleased to know the chains will rest easy on some. The future is all yours!

Don't know about Banks, but Asimov was known as a real son of a bitch. And his son was discovered with a massive cache of illegal images of children. From the sounds of it, he's a real prize, don't you think? A chip off the old block, considering this is a disturbingly common pattern among that generation of SciFi authors:

...a childless bachelor, "[Asimov] is a 47-year-old nerd," he said. "He's not a predator. He stays home a lot, and he's a pretty reclusive introvert."

Andrian said Asimov "strikes me as an acutely intelligent guy who wouldn't hurt a flea. . . . He hasn't got the social grace or skills of one who would try subtly to lure a kid into his house."

Curious synchronicity there with UBI, I'd say. A spergy, fat, lazy, pedophile, with no job, no prospects, and no social skills, living off a monthly $3K stipend.

Utopia at last!

Only before you pop the bubbly in celebration, you might want to get your affairs in order or that of your children because you may never have the chance to enjoy this Brave New World. When facing economic ruin of the sort we are, states usually respond by waging war. The last time America and the world faced this level of economic collapse, it tool 85 million dead world-wide and a world war to pull us out of it.

[Mega]

Re: 1hr interview Chamath Palihapitiya - How to Invest in This Crisis

I also add that the wealth of the British empire became Amercan wealth after the war....

[Techdread]

Re: 1hr interview Chamath Palihapitiya - How to Invest in This Crisis

Well I'm pleased to know the chains will rest easy on some. The future is all yours!



Only before you pop the bubbly in celebration, you might want to get your affairs in order or that of your children because you may never have the chance to enjoy this Brave New World. When facing economic ruin of the sort we are, states usually respond by waging war. The last time America and the world faced this level of economic collapse, it tool 85 million dead world-wide and a world war to pull us out of it.

The last time America and the world faced this level of economic collapse, it tool 85 million dead world-wide and a world war to pull us out of it.

Such a bullshit statement, it took an existential crisis, going by some people's reckoning we are going through one now.
Maybe we get lucky and taxes get pushed up to eye watering percentages for the top 1% like the 94% during the war.
If a lot money gets spent on global warming then the science created on that endeavour could give us the productivity boosts needed to eventually accelerate GDP.


Socialism/state capitalism. Socialism is the natural state of humans. Sweden's type of socialism not the anti science state religion type which I call totalitarianism that China and the Soviet Union practise.
Universal social credit system - You have that already in the financial sphere, in the social sphere I don't have enough info for a view.
Universal basic income - This can be a right wing tool as practiced by the British if set two low, ideally it should be set to at least to half of GDP but I concede we are not ready for this yet, a few more inventions need to be made Strong A.I, Driver less cars, completely automated agriculture etc.
Universal healthcare - That's just a basic requirement a country like the US can not be called developed until all its members get a basic level of health care, it would be cheaper too compare European outcomes versus American outcomes and a lot cheaper.
Internal passports - last time i was in the states I had to show my passport to get a drink so..
Digital blockchain-based identification - I would go further and go for a system where everybody is treated as a data stream? and companies paid access to use the data. it would have the odd effect those with odd diseases would be more valuable. Anonymity is the key here, and laws that you don't get discriminated for say having mental illness etc..
Internet licensing - don't really get what you mean here, but if you mean internet censoring, we do need some monitoring its just were do you draw the line as in most things.
Gun licensing, bans - well i can quite understand the US, as if the right to bear arms is a safety net. It just means the US has a much higher homicide rate than comparable countries.

[Woodsman]

Re: 1hr interview Chamath Palihapitiya - How to Invest in This Crisis

Such a bullshit statement...

Regrettably, historical actualities don't care much for your ideal society and Utopian hopes. The existential crisis of which you speak was the Great Depression and the cratering of aggregate demand, the ultimate resolution of which was the resumption of growth due to rising industrial production in the preparation for the United States’ entry into World War II through to its final resolution. This is indisputable, despite ceaseless attempts ever since by some of those on the left to credit FDR's New Deal policies as the ultimate agent of recovery.

No less than several Nobel Prize winning economists, Paul Krugman among them, consider this axiomatic:

What saved the economy, and the New Deal, was the enormous public works project known as World War II, which finally provided a fiscal stimulus adequate to the economy’s needs.

"Franklin Delano Obama?" New York Times. November 10, 2008

Fortunately, there are principled people on the left who value reality (never mind, the value of productive work) more than they do politics.

Here for instance, in the Marxist Monthly Review, editor Harry Magdoff - a prominent American socialist commentator who held several administrative positions in government during the presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt - concurred with the neoliberal Krugman:

The onset of a marked recession [in 1937-38] after years of pump-priming startled Washington. Questions began to be raised about the possibility of stagnation in a mature capitalism, the retarding effect of monopolistic corporations, and other possible drags on business. These concerns faded as war orders flowed in from Europe, and eventually they disappeared when the United States went to war. The notion of the “Keynesian Welfare State” has tended to disguise the fact that what really turned the tide was not social welfare, Keynesian or otherwise, but war.

"The Same Old State." Monthly Review. January 1, 1998

Marxist economist Michael Roberts and author of "The Long Depression: Marxism and the Global Crisis of Capitalism," writes that it was necessary for America to go to war in order to establish a sustained recovery because the New Deal and Keynesian-type policies of low interest rates and fiscal stimulus via tax cuts and government spending proved unable to restore growth.

There is no evidence of recovery before the war "kicked in." Investment took off from 1941 onwards to reach, as a share of GDP, way more than double the level that investment stood at in 1940. Why was that? Well, it was hardly the result of renewed private sector investment. In 1940, private sector investment was still below the level of 1929 and actually fell further during the war. The state sector took over nearly all investment, as resources (value) were diverted to the production of arms and other security measures in a war economy.

Michael Roberts. "The Great Depression and the War."

It's understandable why some on the Utopian left would be troubled by any attempts to connect WWII with the end of the Great Depression since it leads to a conclusion that condemns their core beliefs. If it takes millions of dead soldiers and civilians to produce a recovery, that's hardly a ringing endorsement of their ideas. It speaks volumes about the efficacy of Military Keynesianism and the abundance of ... ahem ... "creative destruction" found in war.

Nevertheless, the facts speak for themselves. Even after seven years of "bold, persistent experimentation" by FDR's New Dealers, only 46 percent of the recovery had been accomplished by the fourth quarter of 1940. More than half of the recovery took place between 1941 and 1942—in other words when war spending had fully geared up. Government purchase of goods and services ticked up by 54.7 percent in this one-year period and continued to increase as the actual war began (see Vernon. "World War II Fiscal Policies and the End of the Great Depression." The Journal of Economic History. December 1994). The federal government spent about $350 billion (not adjusted for inflation) during World War II — or twice as much as it had spent in total for the entire history of the U.S. government up to that point.

Why no less a figure than John Maynard Keynes himself thinks your assertion is the bovine scatology:

It is, it seems, politically impossible for a capitalistic democracy to organize expenditure on the scale necessary to make the grand experiments which would prove my case — except in war conditions.

As quoted in "Was there a Keynesian Economy in the USA between 1933 and 1945?" Journal of Contemporary History. 1999 vol. 34.

So there it is.

Word of advice? If you're a young man under age 45, it might be prudent to steel yourself. For the path to your Utopian welfare state leads straight through Hell.

[Techdread]

Re: 1hr interview Chamath Palihapitiya - How to Invest in This Crisis

Regrettably, historical actualities don't care much for your ideal society and Utopian hopes. The existential crisis of which you speak was the Great Depression and the cratering of aggregate demand, the ultimate resolution of which was the resumption of growth due to rising industrial production in the preparation for the United States’ entry into World War II through to its final resolution. This is indisputable, despite ceaseless attempts ever since by some of those on the left to credit FDR's New Deal policies as the ultimate agent of recovery.

No less than several Nobel Prize winning economists, Paul Krugman among them, consider this axiomatic:



Fortunately, there are principled people on the left who value reality (never mind, the value of productive work) more than they do politics.

Here for instance, in the Marxist Monthly Review, editor Harry Magdoff - a prominent American socialist commentator who held several administrative positions in government during the presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt - concurred with the neoliberal Krugman:



Marxist economist Michael Roberts and author of "The Long Depression: Marxism and the Global Crisis of Capitalism," writes that it was necessary for America to go to war in order to establish a sustained recovery because the New Deal and Keynesian-type policies of low interest rates and fiscal stimulus via tax cuts and government spending proved unable to restore growth.

It's understandable why some on the Utopian left would be troubled by any attempts to connect WWII with the end of the Great Depression since it leads to a conclusion that condemns their core beliefs. If it takes millions of dead soldiers and civilians to produce a recovery, that's hardly a ringing endorsement of their ideas. It speaks volumes about the efficacy of Military Keynesianism and the abundance of ... ahem ... "creative destruction" found in war.

Nevertheless, the facts speak for themselves. Even after seven years of "bold, persistent experimentation" by FDR's New Dealers, only 46 percent of the recovery had been accomplished by the fourth quarter of 1940. More than half of the recovery took place between 1941 and 1942—in other words when war spending had fully geared up. Government purchase of goods and services ticked up by 54.7 percent in this one-year period and continued to increase as the actual war began (see Vernon. "World War II Fiscal Policies and the End of the Great Depression." The Journal of Economic History. December 1994). The federal government spent about $350 billion (not adjusted for inflation) during World War II — or twice as much as it had spent in total for the entire history of the U.S. government up to that point.

Why no less a figure than John Maynard Keynes himself thinks your assertion is the bovine scatology:

So there it is.

Word of advice? If you're a young man under age 45, it might be prudent to steel yourself. For the path to your Utopian welfare state leads straight through Hell.

Way to learn the wrong lesson from history!
It took higher government spending, higher taxes and debt to pull the US out of the malasie. I have no doubt that the second world war helped the US initiate those policies,
I find it a bit of a stretch to say we need a war with millions to die to achieve growth.

The right have a lesson here, lower taxes are not always a panacea for economic growth, Government spending by raising debt will do the trick.

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Some have called for a return to the gold standard. How would it affect the economy?
What is the gold standard?

It’s a monetary system that directly links a currency’s value to that of gold. A country on the gold standard cannot increase the amount of money in circulation without also increasing its gold reserves. Because the global gold supply grows only slowly, being on the gold standard would theoretically hold government overspending and inflation in check. No country currently backs its currency with gold, but many have in the past, including the U.S.; for half a century beginning in 1879, Americans could trade in $20.67 for an ounce of gold. The country effectively abandoned the gold standard in 1933, and completely severed the link between the dollar and gold in 1971. The U.S. now has a fiat money system, meaning the dollar’s value is not linked to any specific asset.
Why did the U.S. abandon the gold standard?


To help combat the Great Depression. Faced with mounting unemployment and spiraling deflation in the early 1930s, the U.S. government found it could do little to stimulate the economy. To deter people from cashing in deposits and depleting the gold supply, the U.S. and other governments had to keep interest rates high, but that made it too expensive for people and businesses to borrow. So in 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt cut the dollar’s ties with gold, allowing the government to pump money into the economy and lower interest rates. “Most economists now agree 90 percent of the reason why the U.S. got out of the Great Depression was the break with gold,” said Liaquat Ahamed, author of the book Lords of Finance. The U.S. continued to allow foreign governments to exchange dollars for gold until 1971, when President Richard Nixon abruptly ended the practice to stop dollar-flush foreigners from sapping U.S. gold reserves.

[Woodsman]

Re: 1hr interview Chamath Palihapitiya - How to Invest in This Crisis

Way to learn the wrong lesson from history!...

You're okay, Dread. I appreciate you for giving me the opportunity to remind myself that some people can't be taught and that in any case it's not my job to do it. A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still. That was true when my great-grandfather first taught me that ancient rhyme, true when his father taught it to him, and true today.

I expect it won't matter much in the coming months. At some point, we'll both have the displeasure of being right. We'll see government spending the likes unseen in human history at levels that will make the New Deal, the Great Society, and the run-up to WWII combined look positively bush league. And then war will come.

First at home, brother against brother. For a country so divided as mine, whose people seem so willing and eager to be manipulated, deceived, and distracted by a feckless and mendacious ruling class itself defined by the extremes of ethical solipsism and ethical egoism, will find it almost impossible to come together in common cause once the cupboard is bare and the blessed Internet is cut off. It will be all against all until the logic of all for one and one for all reasserts itself. With luck, that will come before the war abroad. But come it will, either initiated by that same sclerotic leadership for all the reasons compiled by history that states under domestic economic and political pressure use as their casus belli, or in response to some external threat or affront.

For all their intellect and impressive credentials, the myopic technocrats and scientists like Fauci whose decisions and counsel have brought us to the brink of ruin, failed to appreciate that our best deterrent against novel disease and the disasters of war was not our science or our weapons, but our prosperity arising from the strength of our economy and the productive capacity of our people. What good is the United States to the rest of the world without its consumers to buy their surplus? What use does Eurasia and the rest of the world have for a hegemonic United States of America when they can no longer be sustained by selling to American consumers and corporations? What but the productive capacity of Americans will back up the trillions upon trillions of dollars we are told will be issued? And in lieu of that capacity, what is to forestall the mother of all monetary crises that looms? Who will buy the government's bonds - any government's - when a critical mass of the world at last comes to understand the folly of their response and confidence in their ability to manage anything at last collapses?

Nobody, no authority, not Fauci, not Gates, not anyone, who today has gravitas and tomorrow will be universally reviled, took even a moment to ponder those questions before committing the world to this disastrous and ruinous response. In reaction to a simple virus and a putative effort to "save lives," they in time will take more lives and wreak more havoc than the worst outcomes their modelers could have predicted. To save lives, they destroyed life.

In a way, I'm grateful. I had this nagging, back of my mind dread that for this last part of my life I'd be made to pay for my sins by slipping away in meaningless splendor and comfort, each day blending into the next almost imperceptibly and surrounded by the artifacts and grave goods collected over a lifetime like some pharaoh or Celtic prince until accident or illness and old age cut me down at last.

Now life has purpose again and a meaning so clear and simple to reckon that my walls full of books on history, philosophy, and religion have no greater purpose than to feed my fireplace come winter and to wipe my ass in the meantime. We all get to start over again, to be pioneers and farmers and warriors and inventors and entrepreneurs, each rebuilding our world by hand. I won't have much time to participate, but the time I have I'll use to the fullest and I haven't been this thrilled and on edge about anything in so very long, Dread.

I apologize to whatever part of you that you've chosen to share with me here, and to lake and jk and thrify and dc and all the others come and gone, too. I've let boredom and ego and pride be a plaything for too long. I forgive myself for that too and so there's no need or expectation of reciprocity from anyone. And besides, there's no more time left for regrets and recriminations. There's too much work ahead of us and its important that we do it, even if we're destined to work at cross purposes and against our common interests for some time to come. It's the work that matters, at least until that day for me when it doesn't.

On this Good Friday, when once the greatest worldly power dimmed the Light of the World at Golgotha, I take solace that the darkness lasted but three days before the Light shone brightest, illuminating forever the Way and the Truth with such brilliant clarity that even the worldly powers bowed under His glare.

Good luck, good health, and peace to you and all of you.