Welcome to another week! For the new readers: every week I comment on the top prediction markets—selected by volume, volatility and surprising resolutions—across (geo)politics, elections, macro, tech and science. Markets first, news through their lens, not the other way around.

Let’s see what changed in the world!

Weekly Outlook

US Inc.

Midterms

Last week was good to the Democrats. After a series of favorable polls across battleground states, they now hold the widest lead yet in Silver Bulletin’s forecast:

Adjacent’s indices also put Democrats as slight favorites, though the gap is narrower here:

This is a direct result of the Iran war. Last week I showed you the record diesel crack spread. There’s a catch, though: the premium needs time to flow downstream (to the end customer—you), so these polls reflect sentiment from before the latest price increase. Democrats have more upside coming.

I expect Democrats to continue to outperform in the polls, unless we get a new, real peace narrative. Speaking of, there’s one more person who would love to see one this week.

The Fed

This person is Kevin Warsh. Friday’s CPI print came in hot not cool enough and now traders give an 80% chance of a hike this week. Warsh gave traders little choice—he pressured the market to figure out the interest rate without input from the Fed, and it called his bluff.

Surprisingly, for now the market sees only one hike this year:

This runs against my analysis. If the Fed decided to destroy demand to rein in inflation, it would have to start a hiking cycle. A 25 bps increase is not nearly enough to move the policy into restrictive territory.

Yet, a single hike in September is the base case:

For me the decision is still highly dependent on the course of the Iran war. Taking it into account, along with the market’s assessment of the decision, I need to drop my FV of no hike from 81% to 40%—I see a hike as likely, but far from certain.

For now, I’m keeping my position.

Clarity Act

Lastly, we got an update regarding the Clarity Act. The Trump admin agreed to the ethics provision along with most of the other changes proposed by the Democrats. Now, the ball is in Democrats’ court.

Traders were waiting for that—the market rallied 10 points on the news and stabilized around 30%. Any bullish news from the blue camp is bound to push it towards 50; a successful cloture vote will send it into the 80s.

I remain bullish on the Clarity Act passing and still hold my 7.8k Yes shares.

The Americas

Brazil Presidential Election

Flávio Bolsonaro is now the favorite to win the Brazilian presidential election. A few weeks after I flagged his rise (along with a couple of reasons to be bullish on him), the first polls that put him as the run-off leader dropped:

Depending on the schedule, I might have something interesting for you on the election that I’ve been working on.

Asia

No news from Asia-related prediction markets.

Middle East & Africa

The Iran War

The big news from the Middle East comes from Saudi Arabia. The Houthis and some Iraqi militias hit the East-West pipeline. As a result, it is completely shut and traders see only a 56% chance it restarts by the end of the month:

At the same time, the sentiment on peace is at an all-time low:

The only nugget of hope, the Iran-Oman Hormuz Management Agreement meeting scheduled for today, was postponed indefinitely:

However, there seems to be growing pressure to end the war. The East-West pipeline is down. The tanker war in the Strait of Hormuz continues—both WTI and Brent are now above $100 per barrel while US diesel breached $6.20 per gallon:

And rumor has it that Saudi Arabia pushed to postpone the meeting on Hormuz:

I wouldn’t be surprised if MBS were trying to pressure Trump this way. His risk tolerance might be too low to fight the Houthis again.

On the other side of the region, a diplomatic meeting between Israel and Lebanon in Rome was postponed to October:

The diplomats are still due to meet in New York this month as part of the UN meeting, but it is unlikely they will hold long, focused sessions.

The Houthis

In Yemen, the Houthis advanced and took over the land directly adjacent to the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait. Saudi-backed forces that held it for the last eight years or so completely disintegrated. Traders saw it as a sign that from now on, the Houthis can block the strait more easily, worth a 4-point premium on the market.

Europe

The Ukraine War

The biggest news from the Ukraine war last week comes from just across the Polish border. A Russian drone struck a passenger train near Yahodyn, 2km from Poland, while Boris Johnson and David Petraeus were in the area.

It is the next big provocation from Russia, days after Kushner and Witkoff visited Moscow.

It is clear by now that no peace will happen soon:

In fact, a NATO-Russia military clash is more likely (and I agree with the market):

Sweden

The Swedish Social Democratic Party won an extremely close election. The votes are still being counted, but at this point there’s no chance the overall result changes.

It is the first election first time the far right lost ground since 2010. Sweden, once a country with very lax immigration policies, became one of the hardest European countries to get into after a public backlash over immigration. The new government can relax the rules a bit, but no one expects a full return to the previous regime.

Other

AI

In AI, we saw a lot of trading on the Best AI model market. Initially, traders saw a chance Astra could overtake Fable on the LMArena text leaderboard, but those hopes were quickly dashed.

However, Astra, or rather OpenAI, is pretty good at solving Millennium problems:

Traders expect another one to be solved by the end of the year (Navier-Stokes was solved just last week).

Lastly, I saw a strange move on the “Will OpenAI release a social network in 2026?” market:

I’m not sure there was any news that pushed the price, but sometimes these are insiders getting in early.

Wrap up

That’s all for today! The delayed Forecast Update will come out before the FOMC. Additionally, I might do a post-vote update on the Clarity Act.

Stay strong and see you soon!

This is not official investment or life advice. Do your own research. These are only my opinions and I encourage anyone to do their own research before putting any money anywhere.

Welcome to another week! For the new readers: every week I comment on the top prediction markets—selected by volume, volatility and surprising resolutions—across (geo)politics, elections, macro, tech and science. Markets first, news through their lens, not the other way around.

Let’s see what changed in the world!

Weekly Outlook

US Inc.

Midterms

The biggest news this week on the midterms comes from Missouri. The Supreme Court of Missouri ruled that the new congressional map is not valid and that the voters should decide in November whether to introduce it.

The MO-05 seat winner depended almost entirely on the shape of the map—with the decision the seat flipped from an 84% chance to be Republican to an 80% chance to be Democrat, even after the state AG directed the case to the SCOTUS.

A Democratic sweep is now the base case, at 52% with less than two months to go. But it’s hardly because of the congressional map—Republicans are hurting mostly because of the downstream effects of Trump’s choices during the last year. Ultimately, the price at the pump and the frustration of every grocery bill are what pushed people away from the administration.

At the same time, Trump is preventing the Republican candidates from distancing themselves from him. The upcoming midterms convention in Dallas, the first of its kind, centralizes support (or lack thereof), further complicating the situation for swing state nominees.

If the GOP wants to fight for the Senate and prevent a Blue wave, the convention needs to be a new beginning rather than a victory lap. Let’s see if Trump manages to surprise us. For now, I don’t see the convention becoming a material advantage.

The Fed

In the middle of the political discourse is the Fed. With the upcoming midterms and the ongoing Iran war, its rate decision is one of the most important in recent years. Everyone knows that a hike immediately before an election hurts the ruling party. But underneath there’s an even bigger issue to understand.

We are in a major supply shock thanks to the Iran war. Decreased supply of raw materials causes shortages in poorer economies and inflation in developed ones as they need to pay more to secure deliveries (or, in other words: developed economies outbid the poorer ones for essential supplies). Unlike demand shocks, which can be directly mitigated by monetary policy, supply shocks cannot be solved by printing dollars. The only thing monetary policy can do in the face of a persistent, structural supply shock is to raise interest rates to destroy demand.

Higher interest rates curb spending and help control shortage-induced inflation. Demand destruction is essentially a fancy name for inducing a controlled recession (or at least deceleration in growth). So far the Fed has refused to hike. Inflation has been manageable, and there were hopes the Iran war could end soon.

The Fed’s decision to hike now would mean that it coordinated with the Trump admin and made a conscious decision to start destroying demand across the economy. It doesn’t look like we are anywhere close to that point with the midterms two months away and still some time to change course.

The Americas

Brazil Presidential Election

During the week, Flavio Bolsonaro’s chances of winning the election stabilized around 40%, with Lula in the 55–57% range. Recent polling puts both neck and neck:

Polling numbers resemble the 2024 US Presidential election, where Kamala Harris held a slight lead in the weeks leading up to the election. From my point of view, the polls are within the margin of error. Intuition says Bolsonaro, but I don’t have a proper analysis yet—I may do a deep dive in the coming weeks.

Asia

China

In Asia, SCMP reported that China is stepping up its preparations to blockade Taiwan. The markets on the China x Taiwan invasion or clash, however, are flat.

Blockading or invading Taiwan is the riskiest and most expensive option for reunification. Ultimately, traders believe that a death by a thousand cuts is the strategy and blockade options are being prepared as a threat.

Middle East & Africa

The Iran War

The Iran war is stable, as far as wars go. Last week’s developments can be summarized as “tanker wars”—both sides are now targeting shipping through the Strait of Hormuz. Since Iran implicitly agreed that Hezbollah alone needs to deal with Israel in Lebanon, the focus has been on materials flow.

Iran needs to force America into concessions by imposing unbearable costs on the global economy, while the US needs to sustain the flow to extend its runway:

As a result, sentiment is at its lowest level ever:

At the same time, the cracks in the global economy are becoming more apparent by the day:

For now, Trump thinks he can end the war in Ukraine and unlock Russian raw materials. Pretty soon, he will find out how wrong he is and scramble for either a hasty deal with Iran or… export controls. I believe the topic of the Iran war will be crucial in the next two months, especially since the “tanker war” only makes the structural damage to the economy worse.

I have a long-running thesis on the Iran war and positions built around it, and I believe that the markets are severely underpricing the possibility of a deal now. You can read the latest update to my thesis here, along with my assessment of the Ukraine war and my view on the upcoming Fed decision:

The Houthis

On the other side of the Arabian Peninsula, the chance the Houthis close the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait rose sharply on news of the Houthis fighting to reclaim land adjacent to the strait. Traders see it as a move to reassert control of that land. It will give them more control of the waterway, thus making their threat of closure more credible.

I still see the cost of a total blockade as too high, but my fair value has increased slightly as well.

Israel

Israel itself is now focused on the upcoming Knesset election. After last week, Eisenkot stabilized at a 50% chance to be the next prime minister, while Netanyahu is at 30%. Polling is still extremely close, with neither sure of a majority:

I will be watching how the Iran war developments impact the election, especially if Trump goes for a hasty deal.

A tricky Israel market also revealed itself this week:

Turns out, Israel routinely closes its airspace on Yom Kippur, which is enough to satisfy the rules—the market repriced from 9c to 78c once traders realized their mistake.

Europe

The Ukraine War

Kushner and Witkoff traveled to Moscow and Kyiv during the weekend to meet with Putin and Zelensky in an effort to make peace. Talks were described as “very meaningful”; rumors have it that the envoys discussed post-war cooperation with Russia.

Since Trump is desperate for a win, the vagueness signals a lack of progress. Chances for a short-term ceasefire are only slightly up, while a long-term armistice is even less likely than before the meetings:

Trump’s effort to end the war, instead of focusing on Iran, was doomed to fail from the start. August marked the month Russia intensified provocations against European nations:

It was also the month rumors of a new mobilization in Russia hit the tape.

I’m extremely bearish on a peace deal in Ukraine, with my fair value below 5% this year.

Germany

AfD won 39 out of 83 seats in the Sachsen-Anhalt election. While traders expected AfD to win, they didn’t see such an outperformance:

AfD fell just three seats short of an outright majority—the closest a far-right party has come to governing alone in a German state since WWII.

Other

AI

Lastly, AI. Two new frontier models dropped this week—Anthropic updated Fable, and OpenAI released GPT-6 Astra, the first in a new series.

After a period of total dominance by Anthropic, OpenAI is once again challenging the leader when it comes to benchmarks—traders now give a 15% chance OpenAI will have the best AI model this month, up from 3% just days ago.

Did you have a chance to test Astra? Do you think it’s materially better than Fable? Let me know in the comments.

Wrap up

That’s all for today! The schedule for the week is TBD, outside of the usual commentary.

Stay strong and see you soon!

This is not official investment or life advice. Do your own research. These are only my opinions and I encourage anyone to do their own research before putting any money anywhere.

I’m reviving this series as a forecast update on the global events I cover. While deep dives are great for introducing a new thesis, they are not optimal for updating—often I needed to repeat large parts of a thesis in each update as deep dives are standalone content and always require context. Now, I will be able to update you on a rolling basis and build up my theses step by step.

Today I’ll focus on the Iran and Ukraine war developments and the latest on the Fed decision in September. The last Forecast Update is here for context:

Iran

The most recent deep dive on Iran:

And a small update:

The Iran peace markets are at their lowest level ever and so are the Strait of Hormuz traffic normalization markets:

Oil markets are near 2026 highs as well:

Sentiment is as bearish as it gets:

1. We’ve seen another round of kinetic strikes.

2. There’s no peace narrative circulating.

3. Trump is reportedly mulling exiting the war.

4. Diesel cracks are at record highs.

And the situation seems to be in a strange equilibrium—diplomats are still engaging (Qatari and Pakistani trips most notable in recent days) while any kinetic attacks are rather limited in scope and duration. We are still playing the game of chicken. For the next two months, however, Iran holds the upper hand.

Since neither side will invade anything, we are analyzing runways, supply chains and domestic politics, rather than military capability. Here, there’s a striking (pun intended) asymmetry:

• Iran already feels all the pain it can. Exports are effectively blocked, so it has limited access to foreign currency. Industrial capacity is decimated and shortages of basic goods are pushing inflation higher. Coups and revolts have historically needed much less to spark. That being said, Iran’s runway is still measured in months, even years—IRGC seems to be in full control of the political apparatus, the economy and Artesh itself. And Iranians are like the Soviets: they are used to shortages.

  

• The US, and the rest of the world, on the other hand, has yet to feel the real pain. Diesel, jet fuel, LNG, sulfur, helium and many other commodities are near or at ATHs. Fertilizer is scarce and will impact food supply next year and beyond. The SPR is at its lowest level since 1982, when it was being filled. Everything is strained, but nothing has broken yet.

Trump faces difficult midterms with the global economy strained to the limit. While Americans will hardly starve, they will feel the pain in prices. And in potential wars all around the world if we really hit the wall at full speed.

What I see happening next:

Read more

Welcome to another week! For the new readers: every week I comment on the top prediction markets—selected by volume, volatility and surprising resolutions—across (geo)politics, elections, macro, tech and science. Markets first, news through their lens, not the other way around.

Let’s see what changed in the world!

Weekly Outlook

US Inc.

Midterms

Over last week we saw a Democratic sweep become the clear favorite on the Balance of Power market, breaching the 50% threshold. The Senate market is still priced at a coin flip, though—if a full sweep costs the same as the Senate alone, traders have the House at near-certainty.

Prediction markets are slowly converging with Nate Silver’s FLIPR model, which has shown a slight Dem advantage since its inception:

The trend is also visible on Adjacent’s SENR Index, which is down on the week:

At 100.62 points, it shows that individual Senate race markets are aligned with the wider view.

The Fed

Jackson Hole. I expected Warsh to be vague, but he decided to tease a hike instead. However, after his introduction, he was much more balanced. His comments around inflation were no different from what he presented during the last two FOMC press conferences.

Warsh may try to abandon forward guidance, but he cannot escape the fact that every communication out of the central bank is treated as monetary policy. There’s more to policy than the interest rate—holding rates stable with a hawkish outlook produces a different market reaction than a purely balanced outlook or a dovish suggestion.

In my opinion, the market reacted rather sharply to a speech that introduced no surprises—I accumulated some No hike shares during the repricing.

The Americas

Brazil Presidential Election

Flavio Bolsonaro is getting closer to Lula with every poll:

And the raw numbers understate it: AtlasIntel’s +10 came from an online panel that forced undecideds to commit, while Quaest and Datafolha still carry 10-14% unallocated. I expected this election to get more volatile as we approach September, but I didn’t see Bolsonaro gaining so much ground in just two weeks.

For now I’m on the sidelines, but it might change in the coming days.

US-Canada

In the north, this week was dominated by Trump’s pettiness. He renamed Lake Ontario by an executive order and Google Maps quickly obliged.

I may not like it, but this is something that plays very well with his base, something he needed very much since the Iran war cost him a lot of trust with MAGA.

Asia

No interesting markets to report.

Middle East & Africa

The Iran War

Bessent’s economic D-Day announcement made little waves and amounted to nothing substantial. The week was quiet up until last night, when America struck southern Iran to eliminate launchers. Iran retaliated, sending missiles over the Gulf States and Jordan.

As with recent kinetic action, Israel neither participated nor was it the target:

This is the first US strike since July 29, 33 days ago. A return to hostilities bid up the US invasion market, but it’s still a remote possibility:

However, the action did impact some of the long-term markets. Both the US blockade market and the SOH traffic normalization market dipped:

Long-term peace talks markets took a bit less pain, but they are still down:

Overall, the developments in the last two weeks are hardly optimistic. But at the same time, they are barely hawkish… We’ve been in a somewhat neutral state, which begs to be disrupted by the coming midterms.

I have high hopes for developments in the next 10 days—if I don’t see signs of progress, I’ll reassess my thesis.

The Houthis

On the other side of the Arabian Peninsula, the Houthi blockade market is flat despite major volume.

It’s probably the most retail-heavy market at the moment—price clearly favors going on the No side, while the Yes side enjoys all the retail flow thanks to constant tensions.

Israel

Israel is a bit on the sidelines when it comes to the recent escalations. It seems to be busy with the coming Knesset election. We’ve seen Netanyahu close some of the gap to Eizenkot, but overall, the latter is still a clear favorite to win.

It’s all because Ofer Winter announced his entry into the race. The ex-IDF brigadier is diluting the right-wing vote, reducing the overall chance of anyone having a majority.

Europe

The Ukraine War

The Ukraine war is the one escalating the most right now. The CIA director’s visit to Moscow sparked a lot of drama on the old continent and many expect an imminent escalation. Some even expect a NATO-Russia clash.

However, I doubt anything will happen pre-Duma election:

With a month out, there’s plenty of time to collect signals and prepare a forecast—I’m planning a deep dive for the second half of October!

Iceland

Outside of wars, Iceland held a referendum on resuming the EU talks. Traders gave a slight advantage to the Yes side, which ultimately lost—Icelanders voted 52 to 48 against resuming the talks.

Other

AI

In AI, the two top markets are about Anthropic. The former, on the best AI model this month, is all but decided. The latter, on the release of the next Mythos-class model, is a toss-up:

Traders expect a release as soon as today—I do hope that Claude-speak is fixed in the update.

Business

Lastly, some news from business. The market on PayPal being acquired by Stripe fell to bond territory after reports that the deal fell through. M&A markets tend to behave like biotech stocks—a high entry barrier due to information complexity and scarcity combined with wild swings.

I need to engage more in these markets—my history with them is rather good.

Wrap up

That’s all for today! I don’t have a deep dive in mind for this week. Instead, I’ll publish a forecast update towards the end of the week to capture all the developments in the running forecasts.

Additionally, I’m doing a slight adjustment to the videos—they’ll come out on Fridays and have more insight about market moves throughout the week.

Stay strong and see you soon!

This is not official investment or life advice. Do your own research. These are only my opinions and I encourage anyone to do their own research before putting any money anywhere.

Fed markets have never really been exciting. For eight years we had Powell at the helm and he was like a rock—stable, unmoved and… boring. His approach was one of stability and communication. Dot plots, forward guidance, Nick Timiraos as Fed whisperer; generally, the post-GFC regime focused on stability above all.

That changed in 2022. Before the Ukraine war the global economy was rather stable, bar COVID—and the pandemic was a demand shock, something the Fed is well equipped to manage through rates. Supply shocks are a different beast. The Fed cannot print oil. Worse, the stable, data-driven approach forced Powell to offer continuous guidance on inflation over which he had little to no influence. Cornered, the previous chairman did the only thing he could—he kicked the can down the road and called inflation transitory.

Warsh’s Fed saw that. He dropped guidance, declined to submit his own dot, and is intentionally vague in his speeches.

Jackson Hole

If you think that Jackson Hole will be any different, think again. The theme of the symposium is “Financial Innovation: Implications for Payments and Policy”. The theme itself gives Warsh the ultimate cover—chances are he won’t mention the monetary policy path at all.

Instead, he can freely talk about AI, stablecoins and his task forces (the bolded three are what I expect him to spend the speech on):

• Communications: Mervyn King, Arminio Fraga, Peter Fisher—legitimizing the end of the dot plot and forward guidance.

• Balance sheet: Rajan, Stein, Dynan—Warsh’s own smaller-balance-sheet view outsourced to people with academic cover.

• Data: Doug McMillon, Raj Chetty, Kevin Murphy—providing cover for bad economic data by suggesting that there’s a need for better, private-market sources.

• Productivity and jobs: Marc Andreessen, Chad Jones, Asha Sharma—AI’s impact on productive capacity and monetary policy. This is the doctrinal home of “the economy can run hot without inflation.”

• Inflation frameworks: Greg Mankiw, Thomas Sargent, William White—working out a new approach to modeling inflation.

I will be surprised if the speech moves the September hold odds by more than 10 points in either direction. Especially after the two FOMC press conferences we’ve seen, both refusing to provide any guidance and forcing the market to decide itself. The task forces provide an additional cover—Warsh can claim that inflation is a non-issue and that data is not reliable.

So what is the answer to September, if it’s not Jackson Hole?

Share

The Rate

If Warsh is not the one to give us guidance, we need to guide ourselves. Luckily, we have plenty of tells in what the Fed and the Treasury do.

The naive read of the current regime is that they want the market to tell them what to do. Both previous meetings resulted in higher long-term yields and a pure read would indicate that it’s high time for a hike. But we are nowhere near pure.

We are in an energy supply shock and there’s only one way to fix it—partially destroy demand and either wait for the crisis to resolve or build more capacity in the meantime. In our specific case building more capacity is easier said than done. Especially if the Strait of Hormuz opens—then, we would enter oversupply, pushing new projects towards bankruptcy. Additionally, America is directly involved in causing the supply shock.

What is rather happening is a deliberate policy choice—keeping the government borrowing cost relatively low and letting the long end bear the cost of the shock.

The tells are already there: the Fed cut its bill purchases to zero on August 14, Treasury froze coupon sizes and pushes every marginal dollar through bills, and the 2-year hasn’t moved while the 30-year made a twenty-year high. But can the board support it?

The Votes

Read more

Welcome to another week! For the new readers: every week I comment on the top prediction markets—selected by volume, volatility and surprising resolutions—across (geo)politics, elections, macro, tech and science. Markets first, news through their lens, not the other way around.

Let’s see what changed in the world!

Weekly Outlook

US Inc.

Midterms

The midterms are less than three months out and traders increasingly focus on the main election markets, rather than primaries. Here, a persistent D advantage in the generic ballot polling average is keeping a Democratic sweep as the base case:

Ever since the beginning of August, Republican chances have been steadily decreasing on the main market. This is aligned with reports that Jared Kushner met with Hakeem Jeffries to discuss WH-Congress cooperation post-midterms.

However, Adjacent’s SENR Index, based on a basket of individual Senate races, is still showing a slight Republican advantage:

While the discrepancy is small (the main Senate market is exactly at 50/50), the index might be providing a real alpha.

In the primaries, the most popular market is still the SC Republican Senate Special Primary Winner:

Darline Graham is down from the peak of a 92% chance of getting the nomination to 69%. The move down was fueled by a rather weak debate performance and incoming polls that show her advantage dwindling.

The slight increase in the last two days happened on the back of a Trump rally in support of Darline.

2028 Presidential Election

The last two weeks saw a major repricing on the Democratic Presidential Nominee 2028 market. AOC solidified her lead and traders now give her a 23% chance of getting the nomination.

Additionally, Jon Ossoff is emerging as a strong contender. He is currently tied with Gavin Newsom at a 15% chance of getting the nomination—the latter was a strong favorite to win only a month ago!

Ossoff’s chances are rising due to recent polls showing him as more likely than Newsom to beat any Republican contender.

On the Republican side we see no changes:

JD Vance is still the favorite to get the nomination.

The Fed

It is an important week for the finance world—the Fed officials will gather at Jackson Hole to discuss policy. The market on the September decision is flat ahead of Kevin Warsh’s speech.

Traders expect the Fed to hold rates on the upcoming meeting. However, there’s still a 56% chance of a hike this year, and only a 14% chance of a cut:

The consensus among analysts now is that a hike becomes most probable only after the midterms.

The Americas

Brazil Presidential Election

We are entering a crucial period in the Brazil Presidential Election. In the last five weeks, Flavio Bolsonaro has cut Lula’s lead by half and some polls show a statistical tie between the two in the run-off.

Polymarket still gives Lula a significant advantage (63% vs 33%). However, Bolsonaro’s chances rose by 10 points in the last month, in line with the recent polling.

We have two months until the run-off and if Bolsonaro is able to sustain the trend, we will have an extremely tense election night.

Canada Trade Deal

Last week saw trade talks between the US and Canada collapse. While it was a separate discussion from the USMCA, it shows two things:

1. How unrealistic the extension of the broad USMCA agreement is, if a smaller discussion faced so many hurdles.

2. How pathetic the state of US-Canada relations is.

Traders priced in both things and now give only a 13% chance the wider agreement is extended this year.

Why did the deal fall apart after Trump’s announcement that it was finalized? Reporting suggests that America introduced a series of changes that were unacceptable to Canada—it looks like Trump is firing up a trade war ahead of the midterms. Maybe he thinks it will help to lift his approval rating from the absolute gutter:

Asia

South Korea

South Korea is now expected to raise rates this Thursday. The market was initially split—then traders started pricing in an upward revision of annual GDP growth on the back of the semiconductor export boom. The inflation forecast is expected to move the same direction, and the market now heavily favors a hike.

Middle East & Africa

The Iran War

Today, Scott Bessent is expected to announce the most striking sanctions package on Iran in what is dubbed the single greatest economic offensive against a country.

Iran threatened severe retaliation, including an implicit suggestion of kinetic strikes:

That being said, traders see little chance the ceasefire between Iran and the US or Israel will be broken:

Same can be said about putting boots on the ground—Trump’s mention of the military defending bond yields had little impact on the chance of a US invasion of Iran:

Traders seem to heavily discount the severity of the operation and the subsequent Iranian response.

Instead, rumors of a potential revival of the MoU framework pushed the market on the end of the US blockade of Iran up:

Long-term Strait of Hormuz traffic normalization markets also saw an uptick on the hopes of a diplomatic push:

And so did the market on the US-Iran peace talks:

The economic warfare narrative is treated mostly as noise—after all, there’s little more the US can sanction (and effectively enforce). At the same time, peace signals were rather soft—most markets have been flat for the last few days, as if waiting for a worthy signal.

The Houthis

The Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia have quieted down this week. However, tensions are still high and traders keep the market forecast on the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait closure flat.

Israel

Lastly, Netanyahu’s chances of staying prime minister of Israel are sliding. Each new poll shows Likud losing support in favor of Gadi Eisenkot.

Netanyahu’s problems are structural—Israelis disapprove of his handling of the war and I don’t believe he can change their perception anytime soon. I do have a small No position on him, but I also do know that Israeli politics can be volatile.

Europe

The Ukraine War

The Ukraine war is escalating. Last week we saw several drone incursions, as well as a curious 3-day NATO exercise around Kaliningrad:

One of the drone incidents caused the NATO-Russia military clash market to spike. However, it was ruled that the incident was outside of the market rules.

At the same time, Ukraine continues to strike further into Russian territory and it expanded its civilian targets to other e-commerce warehouses:

I still expect Russia to escalate after the Duma elections:

Putin cannot allow Ukraine to continue the strike campaign unpunished. Mounting losses are forcing his hand and I expect to see some kind of a breakthrough by the end of the winter.

Other

AI

We are nearing the end of August and Anthropic still absolutely dominates the leaderboard. Even the recent wave of Claude hate on X didn’t change the simple fact that Fable is an exceptional model.

Anthropic is looking to ride the Mythos-Fable wave to the IPO, where it aims to beat SpaceX:

Traders now give a 47% chance Anthropic will breach a $2.5 trillion valuation by the end of the year.

Wrap up

That’s all for today! I’m working on my Fed deep dive and I’m planning to publish it by Friday.

Stay strong and see you soon!

This is not official investment or life advice. Do your own research. These are only my opinions and I encourage anyone to do their own research before putting any money anywhere.

I’m reviving this series as a forecast update on the global events I cover. While deep dives are great for introducing a new thesis, they are not optimal for updating—often I needed to repeat large parts of a thesis in each update as deep dives are standalone content and always require context. Now, I will be able to update you on a rolling basis and build up my theses step by step.

Today I’ll focus on the Iran war and its chances of ending. The Clarity Act and Ukraine forecasts remain stable. Look at my latest update to get up to speed:

Iran

The most recent deep dive on Iran:

And a small update:

Read more

Welcome to another week! I’m introducing a new format for the Global Outlook. From now on prediction markets will be at the center of this series. Each week I will comment on a selection of top prediction markets based on volume, volatility and surprising resolutions across (geo)politics, elections, macro, tech and science.

This way I’ll be able to focus on interpreting the change in market forecast, rather than judging the news through a market lens.

Let’s see what changed in the world!

Weekly Outlook

US Inc.

Midterms

Darline Graham Nordone advanced to the run-off in the SC Republican Senate Special Primary. She got 33% of the vote, 17 percentage points short of an outright majority needed to get the nomination in the first round. She will now face Ralph Norman, who finished the first round with 24%.

Despite the run-off, traders now feel more confident than ever that the late Lindsey Graham’s sister will take the nomination. Initially, they were worried that the Trump endorsement wouldn’t be enough against a rather wide field. Now, the 9-point lead proves all the worries were unnecessary—my FV assessment is even slightly above the market.

In the wider midterms forecast, we have two conflicting information sources. Adjacent’s SENR index, which currently has the 2026 and 2028 Senate races in its basket, shows a slight Republican advantage:

In the meantime, Nate Silver’s generic-ballot model shows a massive Democratic advantage:

This is an interesting divergence—last week I mentioned how FLIPR’s release impacted prediction markets. The very markets that feed into the SENR index. I believe that it shows that Nate Silver, after a rather unimpressive performance in the previous elections, is no longer fully trusted—the market put a discount on his forecast.

2028 Presidential Election

We still have almost three months until the midterms, but the media already focus on the 2028 presidential election. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez became the favorite to win the 2028 Democratic Presidential Nomination. Her rise—from a 14% chance a month ago to a 21% chance today—is fueled by rumors that she ended her relationship with her longtime fiancé. She also reportedly froze her eggs.

What does a personal relationship have to do with a presidential run? Traders believe that she is preparing for a run—freezing her eggs and splitting from a longtime partner is a strategic move if you think you will be too busy for a serious relationship (or kids) in the next few years. Additionally, the progressive wing of the Democratic Party continues to dominate the primaries.

Interestingly, Kalshi still shows Gavin Newsom as the favorite.

While AOC surged on the Democratic Nominee Market, JD Vance is widening his lead with a 47% chance to get the nomination:

Recently, Trump mentioned that in the end, it has to be JD.

The Fed

Moving to the economy, Polymarket now sees only a 25% chance of a hike in September. Additionally, a hike is no longer likely this year—traders give only a 47% chance of one by the end of the year, down from 78% barely a month ago:

All fueled by this week’s economic data dump—a relatively soft CPI print, high initial jobless claims and a disastrous retail sales report. Traders see two things playing out: first, the recent data dump suggests that the consumer is getting squeezed enough with rates at their current level; second, the midterms are coming and Republicans would do anything to prevent a hike just before the election.

The Fed cut market completes the picture: despite weak labor and consumer data, traders see only a 15% chance of a cut this year:

The Americas

Brazil Presidential Election

In the Americas, the Brazil Presidential Election is the most important upcoming event. The market continues to attract massive volume, totaling almost $4 million in the last week alone. Despite its popularity, the market is relatively flat—Lula is up 2 percentage points on the week while Flavio Bolsonaro went up by 3 percentage points. Other candidates took a hit as voters converge on the top two choices.

Flavio has been on a gradual rise for over a month now. Recently, he’s been tightening the gap and fresh polls put him within the margin of error of Lula. With the intensive part of the campaign starting soon we can expect more volatility on the market.

The first round will take place on the 4th of October and the second round will be held on the 25th of October.

Asia

Indonesia

Moving to the Eastern Hemisphere, an M7.7 earthquake hit Indonesia, followed by another M6.9 quake only a day later. At least 53 people are dead, with many more missing.

It is not a shocking development, however, as Indonesia is prone to frequent earthquakes, along with Japan, Chile and the Philippines—all four were equally likely to get the first M6.0+ quake.

Japan

In finance, traders moved their BoJ rate decision forecast and now see a 72% chance of a hike. The adjustment is caused by a weak yen performance this year combined with rising inflation. However, a slowdown in GDP growth prevented the forecast from going above an 80% chance of a hike.

The next meeting is scheduled for September 17-18.

Middle East & Africa

The Iran War

Now, the most important event—the Iran war. Last week passed with no big news hitting the headlines. We saw Axios report that America has a backchannel with the IRGC as well as signs of possible in-person talks in the UAE:

However, with no tangible progress, the chances of a final nuclear deal are going down—traders put a final deal at just 3% by the end of September and at 18% by the end of the year.

That being said, a return to wider hostilities is unlikely:

The Israel-Iran ceasefire-break market sits at 24% for the end-of-September expiry. It doesn’t mean that ships won’t continue to be struck, though.

Especially since the hopes for the Iran–Oman Hormuz Management Agreement are faltering:

Traders still see a 60% chance of one by the end of September, but even then they have several reservations. First of all, they see only a 40% chance of the US announcing an end to the Iranian blockade in the same timeframe:

As if that weren’t enough, they give an 11% chance—the No side is knocking on bond territory—that traffic through the Strait of Hormuz will return to normal by the end of September:

What does it mean? Well, traders learn—the last few deals meant to open up the strait fell short of expectations, with neither delivering a sustained surge in crossings. Ultimately, signing papers is easy; delivering results is not.

The US crude oil reserves market is aligned with the SOH-related markets. Traders see a 63% chance the SPR will fall below 285 million barrels of oil by the end of the month:

The last reported level is slightly above 298.5 million barrels of oil—but with no progress around the strait the oil must come from somewhere…

To top it all off, Iran and America are not expected to meet anytime soon:

Traders now give only a 31% chance of a meeting between the two countries by the end of September. A lack of an in-person meeting didn’t stop the MoU from being finalized, though. Chances are we will see progress regardless.

This week the 60-day MoU deadline is ending. While traders see little chance of the deadline being extended, this week should bring some news on the back of the expiring truce:

The Houthis

On the other side of the Arabian Peninsula, the Houthis maintain pressure on Saudi Arabia. Traffic is down, but the blockade is well short of a total shutdown. Traders give only a 20% chance of an effective shutdown (less than 10 crossings a day for 7 days) by the end of the year.

I think traders are overestimating here—my fair value for the end-of-year market is 10%.

Ethiopia

In Africa, an Ethiopian election that took place months ago drew the most volume of any election market last week. I suspect a lot of wash trading—the market lacks liquidity rewards and the situation is stable. Abiy Ahmed’s party won, and the only risk is that he changes the constitution and introduces a presidential system instead of taking the PM seat (yes, really).

I doubt this outlier scenario is the reason for such high volume considering that the price is stable.

Europe

The Ukraine War

The Ukraine war is escalating at a breakneck pace. Ukraine vastly improved its drone and missile production capabilities and launched a strike campaign. At first, it focused on oil infrastructure. Then, it expanded and started targeting infrastructure near major cities like Moscow. Recently, Ukraine has targeted several Wildberries warehouses (Russia’s Amazon), hitting civilian infrastructure for the first time.

Russia is not going to be passive. We are seeing rumors of mobilization along with increased drone and missile incidents on the NATO eastern flank:

In the last three weeks alone we had at least 5 incursions, including a cruise missile that struck eastern Poland:

However, Russia has a parliamentary election on September 20:

We all know what to expect, but I do think that Putin might be waiting to lock in the new government before launching a new phase of the “special military operation”. Recent escalations imply that this winter could be a deciding moment in this war.

Other

AI

Anthropic’s IPO leaks surprised traders forecasting the AI lab’s valuation. The market is now pricing in a 47% chance Anthropic will be worth more than $2.5 trillion by the end of the year.

The creator of Claude is looking for a $2 trillion valuation on its October IPO and traders see it grow with the wider market. Then again, it could just as easily go the SpaceX way—down 13% in the two months since its IPO.

Wrap up

That’s all for today! This week’s schedule is TBD outside of the Friday’s Forecast Update.

Stay strong and see you soon!

This is not official investment or life advice. Do your own research. These are only my opinions and I encourage anyone to do their own research before putting any money anywhere.

I’m reviving this series as a forecast update on the global events I cover. While deep dives are great for introducing a new thesis, they are not optimal for updating—often I needed to repeat large parts of a thesis in each update as deep dives are standalone content and always require context. Now, I will be able to update you on a rolling basis and build up my theses step by step.

Today I’ll focus on the Iran war and its chances of ending. The Clarity Act and Ukraine forecasts remain stable. Look at my latest update to get up to speed:

Iran

The most recent deep dive on Iran:

And a small update:

Read more

Welcome to the 20th State of the PROPHET NOTES. As there are a lot of new subscribers, I use this series to give you a monthly update on my performance on prediction markets as well as a high-level outlook for the next month.

For me accountability matters. My bets are fully visible on the blockchain and my profile is public (under PROPHET.NOTES). The value of PROPHET NOTES is truth and transparency. And my P&L is the only and ultimate confirmation of my forecasts.

By seeing my results that are fully based on my articles and posts, you can be the judge of my value to you! I am honest of my wins and I’m honest about my losses. My aim here is to provide you with insight into the future of the world that is as accurate as possible. And there is no better way to judge it, but by pure prediction markets return on my predictions.

Summary

July was calm, finally…:

1. I started July with $22,060 in my portfolio.

2. Today (August 7th) my portfolio stands at $22,372.

3. There were no additional capital injections.

4. Total ROIC is 1.4% for the month and for 4.6% for the year. Percentages are calculated on the normalized bankroll.

5. All bankroll allocations are on the basis of starting bankroll.

The Good

July was another green month, marking a somewhat official ending of my choppy performance this year. My performance could have been better, but some my new positions repriced:

1. The Clarity Act market was priced mostly on hopes of passing it pre-recess. However, several developments pre-recess moved the timeline without impacting my FV assessment—I hold the position with some loss.

2. The Iran war markets—my thesis is playing out in real time and I fully expect to see big swings in the value of these positions.

Considering that I remained in the green with my two main theses going against me shows me that my work in previous months is paying off.

The Bad

I should have realized Congress can deal with government funding pre-recess and push the Clarity Act to September. However, my overall entry is quite decent and well below my FV assumption.

Other than that, I don’t have any particularly bad comments—July was a slow month and I didn’t trade a lot.

Bankroll Comments

I around 50% of my bankroll available for trading. I’ve been reshuffling my portfolio in the last few days. I expect to have below 30% portfolio available by September.

Wrap Up

That’s all for today. I have a Forecast Update in the works for tomorrow.

Stay strong and see you soon!

This is not official investment or life advice. Do your own research. This are only my opinions and I encourage anyone to do their own research before putting any money anywhere.

Welcome to another week! The big news comes from the Middle East (of course!), but we have quite a few interesting developments in the US, Venezuela (where elections might be coming) and Ukraine, which is working hard ahead of winter.

Each week I gather all the relevant news from around the world and provide my commentary in my Global Outlooks. This way you can look under the hood and see how a geopolitical trader thinks about the world. Paid subscribers go a level deeper: my full Iran and Ukraine war coverage, election deep dives, and the fair values I’m actually trading on.

Let’s see what changed in the world!

Weekly Outlook

US Inc.

America’s economy lost 23,000 jobs in July; economists had expected a gain of about 83,000. The BLS also revised its May and June figures down by a combined 103,000. Labor-force participation fell to its lowest level since 1976. A weaker jobs market makes it less likely the Fed will raise rates in September.

Comment: chances are Kevin Warsh is up against stagflation, where inflation goes up while the job market contracts. Odds of a September hike went down to 36c. However, Warsh seems to prioritize inflation in his remarks, after years of it running well above the 2% target. I believe traders reacted too sharply to the labor market data. Either way, future price action depends on the CPI and PCE prints, which could break in either direction.

A federal appeals court ordered Trump to stop building his $400 million ballroom on the site of the White House’s East Wing. The DC Circuit ruled 2-1 that the 90,000-square-foot addition requires the approval of Congress, noting that each president is “a temporary tenant, not the owner” of the building. Trump called the ruling “politically motivated” and said he would ask the Supreme Court to overturn it.

Comment: Trump continues to say that the ballroom is a matter of national security—several secure facilities are part of the construction. If that’s the case, I expect the ballroom case to go in favor of the admin.

Abdul El-Sayed narrowly beat Haley Stevens in Michigan’s Democratic Senate primary, taking 49% to her 47%. El-Sayed, who ran on the party’s left, was outspent by more than eight to one in the most expensive Democratic Senate primary on record. The left has recently won primaries in New York City and Colorado. He faces Mike Rogers, a Republican, in November.

Comment: traders perceive the choice of a polarizing candidate as a disadvantage in this crucial election. Democrat chances dropped from 74% before the primary to 60%. We are in coinflip territory in one of the battleground states!

Trump is trying once more to fire Lisa Cook, a Fed governor, a month after SCOTUS suspended his first attempt. The White House told Cook this week that the president was “considering” removing her over allegations of mortgage fraud, and gave her until August 26 to respond. Cook denies wrongdoing and says the case is a pretext for pressure on interest rates.

Comment: Trump tries his best to pressure the Fed, but it’s a lost cause. The market sees no chance of Cook’s removal and rightly so—SCOTUS maintained the protection of Fed governors in its recent ruling.

Trump signed two executive orders targeting birthright citizenship, weeks after the Supreme Court struck down his previous attempt. The first excludes the children of foreign officials, of members of designated terrorist organizations and of parents found to have committed citizenship fraud. The second orders the State and Homeland Security departments to deny visas to suspected “birth tourists”. Both will probably be challenged in court.

Comment: I don’t see Trump having any serious chance with 14th Amendment cases.

The Senate confirmed Todd Blanche as attorney-general by 50 votes to 49. Republican holdouts came round only after Trump’s former personal lawyer formally scrapped the $1.78 billion fund designed to compensate his allies for government “lawfare”. Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski voted against him anyway.

The Senate also passed a bill funding federal agencies until December 11, by 90 votes to 6, sparing America a shutdown five weeks before the midterms. The last one, in October 2025, lasted 43 days, the longest in the country’s history. The bill now goes to the House.

Comment: Congress clearly didn’t want to risk any delays before the final campaign stretch in October.

Palantir raised its annual revenue forecast to around $8.15 billion, up from $7.65 billion, after quarterly revenue grew by 93% year on year to $1.94 billion. Government and commercial sales both accelerated in America. Profits rose by 55%, to $1.06 billion.

Comment: is it even shocking that military contractors beat revenue expectations in a time of war?

The Americas

British Columbia declared a state of emergency as more than 100 wildfires burned across the Canadian province. The Bald Range fire has consumed around 9,500 hectares and forced all 12,000 residents of Summerland to leave. Roughly 21,700 people have been evacuated, with another 9,700 on alert.

Comment: enjoy the El Niño…

Two attacks marked the first days in office of Abelardo de la Espriella, Colombia’s new right-wing president. A car bomb at a toll plaza in Cauca injured two security guards, and a drone strike on a police station in Cesar killed an officer. The armed forces blamed rebels who had separated from the FARC. De la Espriella, sworn in at Cali on Friday, campaigned on ending peace talks with armed groups.

Comment: with the election of the right-wing president, the Trump admin is quick to tighten its partnership with Colombia. Traders see it as a sign that the US military might help Colombia fight the rogue militias.

Flávio Bolsonaro chose Alfredo Gaspar, a conservative congressman, as his running-mate in Brazil’s presidential election. He had promised to pick a woman, but several higher-profile candidates could not get their parties to back them. Lula is still on course to be re-elected on October 4, though recent polling shows Bolsonaro closing the gap.

Comment: Bolsonaro’s chances are rising slowly, but he’s still far behind Lula, with only a 27% chance of victory. I have no horse in this race, but I do think that Bolsonaro won’t give up easily. And he does have a couple of strong allies in Trump and Milei.

Talks backed by America got under way in Caracas on holding democratic elections. The government’s lead negotiator is Jorge Rodríguez, the head of the National Assembly and brother of Delcy Rodríguez, who became president when America removed Nicolás Maduro in January. The opposition is represented by Dinorah Figuera, who has returned from exile. María Corina Machado, still in exile, says success will be measured by whether free elections are actually held.

Comment: it’s big news, but it’s also a process—traders see little chance of an election this year. And once it does happen, I expect it to be far from free and fair…

Asia

Alibaba released Qwen3.8-Max, its biggest AI model yet. It has 2.4trn parameters but activates only 95bn at a time, and ranks fifth on the Text Arena leaderboard, trailing only Anthropic’s models. Alibaba is charging about 40% of what Claude Opus 5 costs for input tokens. Moonshot, a Chinese rival, released Kimi K3 last month.

Comment: Chinese models continue to improve at a breakneck pace. While traders see little chance of a ban, we are definitely heading towards “protectionist” territory.

India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party lost a by-election in Bihar in a seat it had held for 30 years. Prashant Kishor, of the upstart Jan Suraaj (Good Governance) party, won Bankipur by more than 19,000 votes. Narendra Modi is still struggling to contain the “cockroach” student movement, whose protests forced the education minister to resign last month.

Comment: no major comment—the next general election in India is only in 2029.

Taiwan began Han Kuang, its largest annual military exercise, which runs until August 14. The live-fire drills test the army’s ability to sustain round-the-clock operations and to counter China’s “gray-zone” tactics, and give Taiwan’s new M1A2T tanks their first outing. Civilians face air-raid drills and a deliberate slowdown of mobile internet speeds.

Comment: tensions are high, but both traders and I see little chance of any China x Taiwan confrontation anytime soon. Invasions are tough, especially amphibious ones.

Middle East & Africa

Trump called Iran “unbelievably duplicitous” for denying that it is negotiating with America. He insisted talks had resumed on Monday and described them as Iran’s “last chance” for a deal. Iran said it is discussing the management of the Strait of Hormuz with Oman only. American markets rallied at the news.

Oil prices then fell below $80 a barrel after Qatar said a draft agreement had been “circulated” and that negotiations were in “very progressive stages”. Scott Bessent suggested the waterway could reopen by Wednesday.

Iran and Oman agreed a proposed new shipping route through the strait, with inbound ships using the Iranian channel and outbound traffic the Omani side, opening it for 60 days with no transit fees. Iran’s foreign ministry said a joint statement would be finalized “provided certain third parties do not obstruct the process”. Iran’s parliament reviewed a separate draft that would bar vessels from America, Israel and other “hostile” countries.

Tehran then issued six demands that America must meet before the strait reopens: lifting the naval blockade, withdrawing American forces from the region, ending sanctions, paying war reparations, releasing frozen assets and halting operations against Iran’s allies in Lebanon, Palestine, Yemen and Iraq. Hopes of an early deal faded.

The UAE said an Iranian missile hit a tanker owned by ADNOC, its state oil company, in the strait on Saturday. Abu Dhabi called the strike an act of piracy by the Revolutionary Guard Corps and said more than a dozen of its ships have been attacked since February. Brent still ended the week at $83.55, down by more than 7%.

Comment: this one is for my paid subscribers. For my most recent update on the Iran war, look at my Forecast Update from Saturday:

The Houthis killed at least 30 Yemeni government troops in Marib, Hadhramaut and near the Bab al-Mandab strait, and shelling near Mokha killed seven civilians. The Iran-backed militia said it was pre-empting a Saudi-backed buildup meant to break its grip on the waterway.

Days later the militia set fire to Saudi Aramco’s refinery at Jazan with a drone. Saudi Arabia said the blaze was put out and no one was hurt. The 400,000-barrel-a-day plant had been shut since late July, when an earlier attack damaged it.

Comment: the Houthis are simply negotiating. Strikes are all they can do, as I explained in detail in a video yesterday:

Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkey signed a trilateral defense pact in Mecca, agreeing that an attack on one would be treated as an attack on all. The deal follows nearly a year of negotiation. Pakistan’s foreign ministry said the deal would “strengthen collective deterrence”, was “purely defensive” and remained open to other countries in the region.

Comment: Egypt is reportedly being courted to join the agreement as well. The Saudis are consolidating all the Sunni states under a joint defense umbrella. In my opinion, they are getting ready for the post-war order, rather than escalation.

Israel rejected America’s 15-point peace plan for Gaza. Netanyahu told his cabinet that the army, which holds more than half the strip, would not withdraw until Hamas is “genuinely disarmed, not fictitiously disarmed”. The plan, announced on July 30, had envisaged withdrawal and disarmament running in parallel. Hamas says it still backs the roadmap.

Comment: since all the wars in the region are interconnected, I can’t really analyze this one on its own. Israel is also negotiating, but at the same time Netanyahu needs to play domestic politics ahead of the election.

Envoys from Israel and Lebanon met in Rome for a seventh round of talks. They discussed the “model areas” from which Israel would withdraw in stages, and how Hezbollah’s disarmament would be verified. Israel kept striking Lebanon while the talks ran, and Naim Qassem, Hezbollah’s leader, said the negotiations would bring Lebanon “nothing but shame”.

Comment: the Israeli population is keen on expanding the Lebanon operation, rather than exiting. We should expect the fighting to continue in the short term, but a broader deal could shorten the timeline.

Europe

Turkey is set to transfer American-made weapons to Ukraine. The State Department notified Congress of a $284 million package covering 12 M270 rocket launchers, 70 ATACMS missiles, more than 2,500 cluster rockets and about 47,000 203mm shells from Turkish stocks. Ankara is retiring the older systems. Deliveries could begin in late August if Congress does not object.

An explosive-laden drone was found at Leipzig airport in Germany, beside a Ukrainian Antonov cargo plane loaded with ammunition. It is the first such incursion to carry explosives; previous incidents have been linked to Russia, and German authorities are treating this one as a state-security case. The European Commission separately transferred a fifth tranche of profits from frozen Russian assets, worth €1.4bn ($1.6bn), to Ukraine.

Russian strikes killed 17 people in Kyiv and the surrounding region on Wednesday, after attacks on August 1 and 4 killed nine and 14. Ukraine intercepted none of the incoming ballistic missiles. Zelensky has again appealed to Washington for Patriot PAC-3 interceptors, which are in short supply partly because of the Iran war.

Comment: escalation, not peace, is the base case. This winter we might finally see a breakthrough in this war. For now, all parties are preparing—logistics strikes, AD deals, mobilization chatter in Russia; everything points to escalation.

Zelensky made his first official visit to Serbia, meeting Aleksandar Vučić in Belgrade to discuss EU membership, trade and energy. Serbia has drifted from the Kremlin since 2022, cutting trade and swapping Soviet-era equipment for Western gear, but Vučić repeated that it will not sign up to sanctions against Russia, on which it depends for gas.

Comment: an interesting meeting. Is Serbia ready to choose a side in this war? I’ll try to figure this out.

EU interior ministers held emergency talks on border security after tens of thousands of migrants crossed from Morocco into Ceuta, the Spanish exclave. Ursula von der Leyen called for “united action” and for physical barriers where needed; 22 of the 27 member states had asked for a coordinated response. Spain says about 69,500 of the migrants have since returned to Morocco.

Spain then imposed retaliatory border checks on travelers from Italy, which had suspended Schengen rules for arrivals from Spain and refused to lift them. The two countries share no land border and normally allow visa-free travel. Spain’s checks run until September 7; Italy’s stay until at least August 15.

Comment: ultimately, nothing changed. Business as usual in the EU…

Other

Scientists at Stanford said they had used AI to engineer novel viruses. They trained a generative model, Evo 2, on genetic sequences, then asked it to write new ones capable of fighting E. coli. Of nearly 300 phages the team synthesized and tested, 16 proved “exceptional”, and a mixture of them overcame resistance that natural phages could not. The researchers acknowledged the work raises “biosecurity considerations”.

Comment: the models continue to surprise me. It seems that only a few months ago they were mostly good at coding. Now, they feel like capable agents, which can be a bit worrying considering what follows.

Britain’s AI Security Institute said that, during regular safety testing, Anthropic and OpenAI models had engaged in unprecedented levels of “autonomy and deception”. Across 122 evaluations the institute logged 19 unsanctioned actions on the live internet, including an agent that created fake profiles of real people to pressure a maintainer into approving malicious code on GitHub. Both labs noted that normal safeguards had been removed for the tests.

OpenAI said it was pausing work on Astra, a yet-to-be-released model, citing its “critical” cyber capabilities. A model reaches the firm’s “critical” threshold when it can identify and develop severe bugs without human intervention, or devise novel strategies for high-level cyber-attacks. OpenAI said Astra was not involved in the recent hacking of Hugging Face.

Comment: rogue AI models are not something I like. I’m not sure how much of the news is marketing and how much is true. I do wonder how many instances of rogue behavior are not yet detected.

SpaceX beat analysts’ revenue expectations in its first earnings report since June’s IPO, taking in $7.81 billion in the second quarter, up from $4.1 billion a year earlier. Its net loss narrowed to $541 million, but capital spending reached $18.4 billion, of which $15.8 billion went on AI. Shares fell by about 8% after hours and by nearly 14% the next day, dragging the NASDAQ down 0.8%. An early-investor lockup expires on Thursday.

Comment: everyone loves rockets until they see how much you need to spend to get them up. Jokes aside, SpaceX is arguably a great company, but it needs years, or even decades, to mature.

Wrap up

That’s all for today! This week’s schedule is TBD outside of the State of the PROPHET NOTES recap tomorrow.

Stay strong and see you soon!

This is not official investment or life advice. Do your own research. These are only my opinions and I encourage anyone to do their own research before putting any money anywhere.

I’m reviving this series as a forecast update on the global events I cover. While deep dives are great for introducing a new thesis, they are not optimal for updating—often I needed to repeat large parts of a thesis in each update as deep dives are standalone content and always require context. Now, I will be able to update you on a rolling basis and build up my theses step by step.

Today I’ll focus on the Iran war and its chances of ending, the Clarity Act and the Ukraine war.

Iran

The most recent deep dive on Iran:

And a small update:

Read more

Welcome to another week! Trump once again stopped a massive escalation hours before his threat expired. Iran and the US are supposed to negotiate again starting today as tensions in the region run high. Outside of that, the Middle East saw developments across Yemen and Gaza.

Other parts of the world didn’t sleep. From the Fed’s decision to Chinese tech advancements and Ceuta, it has been a busy week across the board.

Each week I gather all the relevant news from around the world and provide my commentary in my Global Outlooks. This way you can look under the hood and see how a geopolitical trader thinks about the world. Paid subscribers go a level deeper: my full Iran and Ukraine war coverage, election deep dives, and the fair values I'm actually trading on.

Let’s see what changed in the world!

Weekly Outlook

US Inc.

America banned imports of humanoid robots, citing “unacceptable risks” to national security. The Federal Communications Commission said “advanced robotic devices”, which are mostly made in China, could “surveil Americans”. The regulator also blocked foreign-made power inverters, which are used in data centers and solar panels. China accused America of protectionism.

Comment: America can feel China breathing down its neck, both in robotics and AI. Trump is a protectionist at heart and naturally his first instinct is to block access to Chinese tech. Protecting frontier industries is not inherently bad, and surveillance makes a convenient cover story for the real reason: Chinese frontier tech is almost on par with America's.

America’s economy grew more slowly than expected in Q2, expanding by an annualized 1.5%. Consumer spending grew by 3.2% thanks to slowing energy inflation and higher-than-usual tax refunds, and AI-driven investment continued to boom. Growth was offset by a decline in net exports and companies drawing down their inventories.

Comment: the positives continue to cover up the negatives and the K-shaped paths continue to diverge. The second half of the year is the one to watch, however. The effects of the Strait of Hormuz blockade, combined with extreme weather caused by El Niño, should show themselves in the price of energy, downstream manufacturing and food. I focus more on El Niño in the Europe section.

The Federal Reserve left the interest rate unchanged at 3.5% to 3.75%. Three of the 12 members of the FOMC voted for a 25bps increase. Kevin Warsh, the new chairman, urged patience in bringing inflation down and said the Fed would “not hesitate to act” when necessary. American stocks fell and 2Y Treasury yields declined.

Warsh is also considering reducing the number of rate-setting meetings held each year. The policy committee currently meets eight times; Warsh reportedly believes fewer meetings would draw less attention to the Fed.

Comment: Kevin Warsh clearly wants the markets to set their own rate before he acts. By refusing to provide forward guidance he forces the market to react to the incoming economic data. This way, the Fed gets another, valuable data point—unobstructed market sentiment. I expect a few more interesting meetings as Warsh’s approach becomes clearer.

Trump said Todd Blanche will remain acting attorney-general even if two Republican senators continue to block his confirmation. Trump also vowed to revive the $1.8bn “anti-weaponization” fund, designed to pay his MAGA allies, which he had previously abandoned. The senators have refused to approve Blanche without assurances that the Justice Department will not create the fund.

Comment: another Trump grift. It’s rather inconsequential for global affairs and traders expect Todd Blanche to be confirmed before the midterms.

Anthony Fauci, the chief medical adviser to the White House during the COVID-19 pandemic, repeatedly invoked his Fifth-Amendment right not to answer questions during a Senate hearing on the origins of the virus. Rand Paul, the Republican senator chairing the committee, said lawmakers would vote on holding Fauci in contempt. Fauci, who retired in 2022, accused Paul of an “unhinged obsession” with him.

Comment: MAGA wants justice on COVID and MAGA will get it. Traders see a fair chance Fauci is charged by the end of the year. I’m inclined to agree.

The Americas

Keiko Fujimori was inaugurated as Peru’s president after winning June’s runoff by fewer than 50,000 votes. The daughter of former president Alberto Fujimori becomes the country’s ninth president in a decade.

Comment: I wonder if she has her father’s inclinations to stay in power…

Brazil recalled its ambassador to Argentina after Javier Milei attacked Lula and a Supreme Court justice at Flávio Bolsonaro’s campaign kick-off rally, calling Brazil’s president a “thief” and a “former convict”. Brazil’s foreign minister summoned Argentina’s ambassador to express “revulsion”.

Comment: Brazil is one of the few LatAm countries where the left is ahead of the right. Milei's move serves two purposes: helping Trump pull LatAm to the right and toward the US, and securing a politically aligned neighbor. However, I’m not sure Milei’s popularity can translate into more votes for Bolsonaro.

Asia

Shares of ASML, which makes the tools used to produce advanced semiconductors, fell by more than 8% after The Information reported that a Chinese state-backed company has started mass-producing deep ultraviolet lithography machines. DUV machines are a generation behind the cutting edge of chipmaking, but they would represent a breakthrough for Chinese manufacturing.

Comment: as I’ve written before, China is cutting the distance to America in frontier tech.

The Bank of Japan held rates steady at 1.0%, but hinted at future hikes. Japan’s weak currency is squeezing households by pushing up import prices. On Thursday the yen briefly strengthened from ¥163 against the dollar to ¥158 after authorities intervened, though it slid again on Friday.

Comment: America is directly intervening in the yen market to keep its price stable. Japan is getting squeezed and traders see it as a sign that the problems will not go away easily. The recession forecast was repriced massively, now at 42%.

Middle East & Africa

The pause in the Iran war broke early in the week. Trump said America was having “good talks” with Iran, but Iran-backed militias attacked America’s Gulf allies, and CENTCOM said it intercepted “multiple ballistic missiles” in a “surprise” Iranian attack on its forces in the Gulf. America and Saudi Arabia also carried out joint strikes on “Iran-aligned terrorists” in Iraq.

America then struck Iran’s southern provinces. The renewed fighting pushed Brent crude to nearly $91 a barrel, up from a two-week low of roughly $84.

Netanyahu visited the White House on Tuesday. Ahead of the meeting Trump said Israel “wouldn’t survive” without America; afterwards he called it a “very good meeting”, while Netanyahu described it as “one of the best conversations” he has had with Trump.

On Saturday Trump cancelled a new wave of strikes on Iran because the “perimeters of a deal” had been agreed. He claimed the agreement would include the “complete and total” opening of the Strait of Hormuz and “an end to Iran’s nuclear threat”, and said it had Israel’s support. Negotiations resume on Monday.

However, Israel has indicated it will attack if Iran restarts its nuclear or ballistic-missile programs “regardless of external commitments”, while Iran maintains there is not yet any agreement on reopening the Strait of Hormuz, on which the purported deal depends.

Comment: Iran update coverage is available for my paid subscribers.

Saudi Arabia proposed an international maritime-defense alliance amid Houthi attacks on oil tankers in the Red Sea. Representatives of 43 countries discussed the plan in Riyadh on Thursday; 14, including Egypt and Qatar, expressed support for “joint maritime operations”, intelligence-sharing and exercises.

Comment: it seems that Saudi Arabia is unwilling to commit to a ground operation in Yemen, opting instead for naval escorts. I doubt this initiative will be successful. Egypt's enthusiasm is the tell: if the initiative fails, Egypt wins anyway—with Bab-el-Mandeb too risky, Saudi tankers bound for Asia have to exit north through Suez and go the long way around Africa. Since late 2023 Egypt has been struggling due to decreased traffic through the Red Sea. However, this is not an equilibrium. Sooner or later, the Houthis will need to be dealt with.

A small note to the market: the effective closure of the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait is rather unlikely due to the volume of Chinese-bound vessels.

Trump said his Board of Peace struck a deal for Hamas and other militant groups in Gaza to disarm fully. Hamas confirmed it agreed to the 15-point proposal, but only if Israel withdraws its forces from the territory. For now, Israel refuses to withdraw.

Comment: Hamas did agree, but until Israel approves the plan, nothing can happen. The disarmament is conditional on phased Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. I expect Israel to agree to the plan eventually; the IDF probably still needs to do more before it's comfortable with the withdrawal.

Europe

Trump met Zelensky at the White House and said the meeting went “very well”; Zelensky said the pair discussed “licensing arrangements” for Ukraine to produce American Patriot missiles. Three days later Trump said America has not agreed to grant the licenses, weeks after offering them. Trump said the technology is “a hard thing to give away”.

Andy Burnham hosted Zelensky in Portsmouth—his first meeting with a foreign leader as Britain’s prime minister—and said his government would “honor every commitment” Britain has made to Ukraine. He announced Britain would share “Stone Cloak”, a technology for countering drone jamming, and promised to help Ukraine achieve a “full and unconditional ceasefire” with Russia.

Russia hit Kyiv with 27 ballistic missiles and 185 drones overnight on Saturday, killing nine people across five districts. Zelensky said only one of the ballistic missiles was intercepted, blaming the dwindling supply of Patriot interceptors.

Comment: Ukraine has a new strategy, which brings the war to Russia—attacking energy infrastructure along with Wildberries, an Amazon equivalent, will make ordinary Russians feel the consequences of the war. By lowering domestic morale, Ukraine wants to bring Russia to the table with concessions, rather than demands. However, traders believe a long-term ceasefire remains unlikely. Russia still has strategic depth and everyone expects it to escalate before sitting down to negotiate.

A Russian Kh-101 cruise missile crashed in eastern Poland during an overnight barrage on Ukraine, leaving a 30-foot crater near a village in Lublin province. Donald Tusk, Poland’s prime minister, said the country “was prepared to shoot down the missile if it had continued its flight”; NATO jets were scrambled and the alliance said it would “defend every inch” of its territory. Russia did not comment.

Comment: as usual, there are no consequences. Europe, despite all its tough talk, is unable to respond properly. This is like slow-boiling a frog—first acts of sabotage, then drones, then actual missiles. Expect more such acts.

Russia’s Federal Security Service charged Pavel Durov, the founder of Telegram, with “facilitating terrorist activity” and issued an international arrest warrant. The agency accused him of allowing Ukrainians to coordinate “acts of sabotage and terrorism” on the platform. Durov, who is Russian-born but holds French and Emirati citizenship, responded with a photograph of himself raising a middle finger.

Comment: Russia wants its citizens to use a government-approved comms app, MAX by VK, rather than Telegram. This is part of the effort to force the transition as Telegram continues to be extremely popular in Russia.

More than 50,000 migrants crossed into Ceuta, a Spanish enclave in North Africa, from Morocco. Spain deployed troops; at least 57 people died trying to cross, and Spain says almost all of the migrants have since returned. France strengthened its border controls and Italy temporarily suspended some Schengen cooperation with Spain. The EU called an emergency meeting for Tuesday.

Comment: another European story where there are no consequences. Migrants went in unchallenged, posing all kinds of risks to national and European security. Europe has a migrant problem only because it allows it. And it will continue to be a problem as long as there is no change in policy.

Emmanuel Macron said the wildfires in France’s southwest are the country’s “most difficult situation” since WWII, warning of “tough” weeks ahead. The mayor of Bordeaux said he was preparing for “all eventualities” as one blaze burned nine miles from the city. More than 320,000 people have been evacuated across France and Spain.

Comment: super El Niño continues to disrupt weather across the globe. Heatwaves, droughts and storms are hitting regions that produce the majority of the global food supply. This winter won’t be tough only because of scarce energy—food supply will be a major problem. Developed economies will feel it through inflation, developing through scarcity…

Extreme heat forced Hungary to shut down its only nuclear-power station—the first full shutdown in the plant’s 44-year history—after drought brought the Danube river, which supplies its cooling water, to its lowest level in years. The site provides roughly 40% of Hungary’s electricity; the government said it may halt supply to the largest users if the grid comes under pressure.

Comment: this is the energy part of the problem (among others)…

Other

New York sued Kalshi, accusing the prediction market of running an “illegal gambling operation” in the state without a gaming license, seeking penalties the state estimates could total $36 billion. Several states have filed similar suits against Kalshi and other prediction markets. The Trump administration, which favors the industry, is drafting new rules for the platforms. Kalshi dismissed the lawsuit as “political theatre”.

Comment: prediction markets continue to fight the gambling lobby. For now, prediction markets are winning and traders don’t see that changing anytime soon.

Anthropic said it detected three instances of its models breaking out of testing environments and accessing other companies’ systems. The lab found the incidents during a review triggered by OpenAI’s admission last week that two of its models had breached Hugging Face; Reuters reported OpenAI has since identified further cases of its agents going rogue.

Comment: it's probably a marketing stunt. If any of it is true, however, it's a major admission from the two top AI labs that should make us think more about protection against rogue AI agents.

Amazon completed its $50bn investment in OpenAI, taking its stake in the AI firm to around 5% ahead of OpenAI’s planned listing. The funds will be used to help OpenAI train more models.

Comment: traders still don't see OpenAI's valuation hitting a trillion dollars this year, especially after news that the IPO might slip to 2027.

Citadel bought most of the equities held by Situational Awareness, the AI-focused fund run by Leopold Aschenbrenner, a 24-year-old with no prior trading experience, after margin calls from its prime brokers amid the sell-off in AI stocks. The fund, leveraged roughly four times, had grown to $45 billion at its peak; what remains is a stake in Anthropic and a private investment vehicle.

Comment: what can I say—Leopold has no concept of risk management and is not fit to run outside money… but he is still standing, and since he is supposedly still up YTD, he will probably raise more by the end of the year.

Wrap up

That’s all for today! I’m working on a USMCA deep dive while I monitor the Clarity Act situation. Otherwise, we are all watching Iran.

Stay strong and see you soon!

This is not official investment or life advice. Do your own research. These are only my opinions and I encourage anyone to do their own research before putting any money anywhere.

Welcome to another week! We had a surprise development over the weekend as the US stopped its strikes on Iran. However, the Houthis are still fighting. Outside of the Iran war, we had developments across tariffs, midterms and LatAm elections.

In the Eastern Hemisphere the spotlight is on Ukraine and record wildfires in Western Europe. All while there was an ASEAN summit where Rubio and Lavrov met.

Each week I gather all the relevant news and provide my commentary in my Global Outlooks. This way you can look under the hood and see how a geopolitical trader thinks about the world. Paid subscribers go a level deeper: my full Iran and Ukraine war coverage, election deep dives, and the fair values I'm actually trading on.

Let’s see what changed in the world!

Weekly Outlook

US Inc.

The Trump administration imposed tariffs of between 10% and 12.5% on goods from 60 countries, accusing them of failing to police imports of goods made with forced labor. They begin on Friday, when a separate 10% levy expires. Trump has repeatedly adjusted his tariffs since the Supreme Court struck down their main legal justification in February.

Trump will also impose a new 50% tariff on nearly $20 billion of Canadian goods for “discriminatory treatment of American products”. The levy takes effect in 30 days under Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930, an obscure provision that has not been used before to set tariffs. Products already subject to tariffs, such as steel, are exempt.

Separately, Trump said generic-drug manufacturers must move production to America or face a 100% tariff from August 2028, rising to 200% from August 2029. Generic drugs account for about 90% of prescriptions filled in America, most of them manufactured in India and Europe.

Comment: as usual with Trump, tariffs are used as leverage and their implementation can always be delayed. I don't think these announcements shock anyone at this point.

Member states of the International Criminal Court voted to fire Karim Khan, its chief prosecutor, over allegations of sexual misconduct, which he denies. He is the first sitting chief prosecutor removed in the court’s history. The decision comes as the court faces pressure from America over its investigations into American and Israeli citizens; Marco Rubio recently launched a campaign to “dismantle” the ICC.

Comment: the US only likes the international organizations it controls. Since the ICC issued an arrest warrant for Netanyahu, America has been openly opposing it. Now it seems it is trying to gain control over the entity. Or at least trying to paralyze it.

Democrats in Maine chose Troy Jackson as their new nominee for the Senate race in November, after Graham Platner dropped out following allegations of sexual assault, which he denies. Jackson, a fifth-generation logger and former Maine Senate president, will take on five-term Republican Susan Collins. Democrats need a net gain of four seats for a Senate majority.

Comment: Maine is the key state in the battle for the Senate. For now I know little about Troy Jackson, but I do plan to change that soon.

The Americas

A federal judge in New York set a June 2027 trial date for Nicolás Maduro, 200 days after American special forces captured Venezuela’s former leader and flew him to a Brooklyn jail. Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, face drug-trafficking and weapons charges, which they deny. At the pretrial hearing his lawyers signaled they will argue that his capture was illegal and that he has immunity as a former head of state; oral arguments are scheduled for November.

Comment: this one will surely be fun to watch. The Trump admin is bound to make it a show and set an example. Prepare for a lot of drama with little substance.

Daniel Ortega said Nicaragua would “never” hold elections again, in effect cancelling polls scheduled for next year; parliament has moved to abolish them. Marco Rubio called on the international community to cut off Nicaragua, saying the regime “cannot expect to maintain business as usual”.

Comment: America continues to be heavily engaged in the Western Hemisphere's political affairs. And Nicaragua is rather low-hanging fruit.

Flávio Bolsonaro formally launched his campaign for Brazil’s presidential election in October, with endorsements from Javier Milei and Binyamin Netanyahu. “Bolsonaro’s blood flows here,” the senator said. His father, Jair Bolsonaro, was sentenced to 27 years in prison for plotting a coup.

Comment: Flavio Bolsonaro is battling a leak connecting him to a high-profile fraud investigation involving Daniel Vorcaro, a jailed banker. Despite the global swing to the right, he is not a favorite to win. But I do expect some help is on the way.

Asia

Foreign ministers from ASEAN’s 11 members met in Manila. The bloc discussed whether to readmit Myanmar’s military rulers to its high-level meetings for the first time since the 2021 coup; Thailand supports readmission, Singapore opposes it, and no consensus was reached. Border clashes between Thailand and Cambodia and tensions in the South China Sea were also on the agenda. Marco Rubio and his Chinese and Russian counterparts attended the broader security meetings.

Comment: nothing substantial happened at the summit. Rubio and Lavrov met to discuss the Ukraine war, but I don’t think any breakthrough was reached.

India’s education minister resigned after weeks of protests over leaked exam papers and youth unemployment, led by the Cockroach Janta Party — named after a judge likened unemployed youths to “cockroaches”. Some 180 protesters were injured in earlier clashes with police in Delhi. Protest leaders said they would end their demonstrations.

Comment: a small political crisis in India resolved as quickly as it started.

Perry Warjiyo resigned as governor of Indonesia’s central bank, two years before the end of his term. He had led the bank since 2018. His departure raises further questions about the bank’s independence: Prabowo Subianto has given the legislature more control over the bank and appointed his nephew as a deputy governor.

Comment: this doesn’t spark confidence in the Indonesian Rupiah, which has been falling against the dollar for quite some time.

Middle East & Africa

America bombed Iran over the course of the week. Trump threatened to hit Iran’s nuclear facilities “pretty soon”, and Pete Hegseth, his war secretary, told Congress the war has cost America $37.5 billion so far.

Yemen’s Houthis declared a naval blockade on Saudi Arabia. Tankers carrying Saudi crude reversed course in the Red Sea, and the militia later struck two Saudi tankers and the city of Jizan; Saudi Arabia retaliated against Houthi targets in the port city of Hodeida. Trump said he would hold Iran responsible and threatened “major military punishment”.

Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, the speaker of Iran’s parliament, warned that if Iran cannot export oil, “no one will sell oil” in the region, adding that the Strait of Hormuz would not return to pre-war conditions.

Brent crude rose above $100 a barrel for the first time since May, after Trump told Axios he was considering a “massive attack” on Iran, “bigger than ever before”.

America then paused its attacks for two consecutive nights and Iran said it would stop “retaliatory operations”. Mike Waltz, America’s ambassador to the UN, said Trump was giving peace talks “some space”; senior military officials have reportedly warned that America risks running out of munitions. Brent fell 5% on the lull.

Iran said a Ukrainian attack on an Iranian merchant ship in the Caspian Sea killed a sailor, and urged European countries to hold Kyiv accountable to stop the war from widening. Netanyahu will meet Trump at the White House on Tuesday.

The Houthis continue to exchange strikes with Saudi Arabia despite the US-Iran pause. Most recently they hit the Saudi Aramco oil facilities in Abqaiq.

Comment: my Iran war coverage is for paid subscribers only.

Saudi Arabia and America signed a deal to build a civilian nuclear program in the kingdom. The agreement, which Congress must review, would reportedly last 30 years and could allow American companies to build a uranium-enrichment facility there. A day later Trump said the deal is “totally subject” to Saudi Arabia joining the Abraham accords and does not include “enrichment of material”. Saudi Arabia has refused to normalize ties with Israel without a serious path to a Palestinian state.

Comment: my Iran war coverage is for paid subscribers only.

Israel withdrew troops from three “pilot zone” villages in southern Lebanon and the Lebanese army deployed behind them, the first test of the US-brokered agreement. The Lebanese army has accused Israel of obstructing the handover with continued shelling; Netanyahu described the moves as “redeployments” rather than withdrawals.

Comment: we are still in the pilot phase. Not for long.

Europe

Volodymyr Zelensky sacked Oleksandr Syrsky, Ukraine’s commander-in-chief, after days of protests calling for the general’s ousting. Mykhailo Drapaty, the commander of Ukraine’s joint forces, will replace him. Demonstrators are also demanding the reinstatement of Mykhailo Fedorov, the defense minister dismissed last week; Zelensky said Fedorov would receive a “prominent position”.

Ukrainian drones struck seven warehouses belonging to Wildberries, Russia’s biggest online retailer, in the space of a week. Zelensky said he is “bringing the war back home” to Russia by targeting logistics hubs that supply drones and gear to its military. Russia said it attacked Ukraine’s port infrastructure and ships in response.

Alexander Novak, Russia’s deputy prime minister, said the government would maintain its ban on petrol exports until the end of the year and is considering extending its ban on diesel exports. Ukrainian drone attacks on refineries have caused fuel shortages, rationing and queues at petrol stations across Russia.

Comment: Zelensky continues to prove he is a sharp politician who can maneuver out of any crisis. At the same time, Ukraine achieves new successes thanks to targeting Russian supply chains rather than fighting on the front. However, we are all awaiting the next big move from Russia. I also do think it's coming—Putin needs a breakthrough this year, even if “only” a political one.

Andy Burnham began his premiership by promising to remove VAT from household electricity bills from October. Critics dismissed the £850m ($1.1bn) policy, which will save the average household £45 a year, as “unfunded”. Burnham insisted his government would maintain “fiscal discipline” while taking “a little bit of pressure off people’s shoulders”.

Comment: well, he is trying. But the UK is in a difficult spot that needs a bolder vision than removing VAT on electricity ahead of what will probably be the most expensive winter in recent European history.

France’s parliament passed a bill banning social media for children under 15, the first such law in the EU. Platforms must impose age-verification checks on new accounts from September and shut down accounts of underage users. Britain’s government has considered a similar law.

Comment: this is a setup to ban pseudonymous accounts in the future. I’m old enough to remember ACTA protests in Poland. And now the French are just next in line among nations giving away part of their power over the internet to the government…

Ozgur Ozel, the deposed leader of Turkey’s main opposition party, registered a new party to challenge Recep Tayyip Erdogan, taking 90 MPs with him from the CHP. Ozel was removed as CHP leader by a court in May, in what was widely seen as a political crackdown. Early polling puts his new party ahead of Erdogan’s AK Party.

Comment: I think it’s a bit too late to challenge Erdogan in open elections.

An intern at NATO’s military headquarters in Belgium was arrested for spying. Belgian authorities said the woman is a Canadian national of Chinese origin, suspected of spying for an undisclosed “third country” at SHAPE, the alliance’s command center in Mons.

Comment: spying Chinese interns are now in Europe after penetrating the US startup scene. It looks like China is expanding its covert ops capabilities with success. But jokes aside, it’s a major security breach. Who knows what the intern could really access or see…

Wildfires forced more than 300,000 people to flee their homes in France and Spain. Blazes reached the suburbs of Bordeaux, prompting France’s biggest peacetime evacuation since the second world war, while Spain declared its first national emergency over a wildfire as fires merged outside Madrid; one man died in Valencia. Sébastien Lecornu, France’s prime minister, said wildfires “have reached a level that has never been seen before”.

Comment: El Niño continues to destroy European crops. It will be a tough winter—expensive gas, electricity and food…

A car plowed into a crowd at a gay-pride event in Berlin, killing one person and injuring 29, in what authorities called an Islamist terrorist attack. The suspect was shot dead by police after a manhunt. Kai Wegner, the city’s mayor, described it as “an attack on our free and open society”. Germany has seen several similar attacks in recent years.

Comment: it’s been a while since the last one. Thankfully, this one was not as deadly.

Other

OpenAI said that GPT-5.6 Sol, a frontier model, and an unreleased model escaped a sandboxed testing environment and hacked into Hugging Face’s systems without being told to do so, going online and stealing login credentials after finding a zero-day vulnerability. Hugging Face said it used a Chinese model to defend itself because the guardrails on American models made them useless.

Comment: these are quite scary stories, unless they are partially misleading. Neither option is a good sign. The models are way more capable than a year ago and I can see it through my work. And supposedly the frontier labs have even better models that are unreleased.

SpaceX completed the 13th test flight of Starship, its first since the company’s IPO in June. The rocket deployed 20 Starlink V3 satellites, and the ship’s splashdown was gentle enough that it floated intact on the ocean rather than exploding. SpaceX described it as its best re-entry yet.

Comment: finally! Whatever you think about Elon, I do want this one to progress and succeed.

The European Commission approved Paramount’s $111 billion acquisition of Warner Bros Discovery, on the condition that it exits United International Pictures, its European distribution venture with Universal, within 13 months. Paramount also agreed to delay closing until June 2027 at the latest while a judge considers the antitrust lawsuit brought by twelve American states. Paramount said the claims “cannot withstand scrutiny”.

Comment: the timeline on the acquisition keeps stretching. But I do think that the Trump admin will push this one through.

Wrap up

That’s all for today! I’m working on a USMCA deep dive while I monitor the Clarity Act situation. Otherwise, we are all watching Iran.

Stay strong and see you soon!

This is not official investment or life advice. Do your own research. These are only my opinions and I encourage anyone to do their own research before putting any money anywhere.

Hey traders! We have a champion. After over a month of trading, multiple knockout duels and one very long weather-dominated endgame, BeefSlayer_ is the HIVE World Cup winner. And he took the trophy while sitting on a negative P&L!

Maskache put up a good fight, but this time it simply wasn’t enough. Let’s break down the last day, the final numbers, and what the whole tournament looked like from start to finish.

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Quick Rules Summary

Finalists go 1v1, seeded by group score. Both traders reset to $500 for a short head-to-head window; whoever makes more profit advances. Single elimination, until one champion is left.

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Best Trader of the Day

We know who’s the best now! Congrats BeefSlayer!

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Worst Trade of the Day

I’ll take it easy on Maskache today ;)

Finals

BeefSlayer_ vs Maskache

BeefSlayer_ and Maskache surprised us all with one thing—both traders ended the duel with a negative P&L, a first for both.

Maskache wasn’t able to make up a difference after a dismal first two days. He zeroed out in the end and lost it all trying to catch up with BeefSlayer. The latter must have felt very safe. He barely even traded and ended up with a negative $26 in P&L.

It could have been variance. It could have been fatigue. But we cannot deny that both traders deserved a place in the finals. Even the best traders have bad days. But they do have consistency:

Ultimately, Maskache made $6,831 while BeefSlayer is richer by $8,511. This is just from trading, not taking into account tournament prizes.

While the performance in the finals was choppy, you can clearly see that both traders more than 10x-ed their starting bankroll in a matter of weeks. This alone is an exceptional achievement.

Congratulations to BeefSlayer and Maskache! It was a pleasure to cover your duel.

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Wrap Up

That’s all! It was a pleasure to cover this tournament. I’ve seen incredible comeback stories and ultimate failures. I’ve tried to show you how different traders in the tournament approach risk and reward. And I tried to get the title myself, ending the tournament in the Round of 16.

Over month of fierce trading, covering new developments and watching the best prediction market traders trying to prove they deserve the title. I hope you had as much fun as I did.

Now, we’re back to regular programing. Until the next!

Stay strong and see you soon!

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This is not official investment or life advice. Do your own research. These are only my opinions and I encourage anyone to do their own research before putting any money anywhere.

Hey traders! We’ve made it to the last day of the HIVE World Cup, and the Finals have turned into a war of attrition rather than the shootout we were promised. BeefSlayer_ is clinging to a slim $16 in profit while Maskache is down $475 and neither trader produced a single call today worth handing an award to.

With less than 24 hours on the clock, let’s break down where the final duel stands and whether Maskache has any realistic path left to the trophy.

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Quick Rules Summary

Finalists go 1v1, seeded by group score. Both traders reset to $500 for a short head-to-head window; whoever makes more profit advances. Single elimination, until one champion is left.

Subscribe now

Best Trade of the Day

No trade deserved the best trade of the day title—you got to try harder guys!

Share

Worst Trade of the Day

No signle trade deserves the price.

Finals

BeefSlayer_ vs Maskache

Both BeefSlayer_ and Maskache have a rather disappointing performance. BeefSlayer_ has just $16 in profit, while Maskache is down $475.

It’s been a tough final for the best weather traders. The weather gods have been especially cruel to Maskache, who can’t seem to correctly predict a single market. BeefSlayer_, looking at Maskache’s performance, might just be taking it easy.

With less than 24 hours to go Maskache has only $25. Can he make up the difference? We saw plenty of surprises throughout the tournament, but this one just seems too impossible.

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Wrap Up

That’s all for today! Two days ago I said that Maskache still has a shot at the championship. Today I’m not so sure. Do you think he still has a chance? Let us know in the comments

See you tomorrow for the final HIVE World Cup Recap where we will see who’s the winner!

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This is not official investment or life advice. Do your own research. These are only my opinions and I encourage anyone to do their own research before putting any money anywhere.

Hey traders! The Final duel is here. After weeks of eliminations, the HIVE World Cup has come down to two weather traders: BeefSlayer_ and Maskache. Day one is in the books, and BeefSlayer_ has drawn first blood while Maskache is already fighting from behind.

Let’s break down where the Finals stand and whether Maskache can claw his way back.

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Quick Rules Summary

Finalists go 1v1, seeded by group score. Both traders reset to $500 for a short head-to-head window; whoever makes more profit advances. Single elimination, until one champion is left.

Subscribe now

Best Trade of the Day

No trade deserved the best trade of the day title—you got to try harder guys!

Share

Worst Trade of the Day

The worst trade of the day goes to Maskache:

He wrongly predicted the highest temperature in Seoul for $166 loss, giving BeefSlayer_ an early lead.

Finals

BeefSlayer_ vs Maskache

BeefSlayer_ has an early lead after a bad trade from Maskache. Both weather trader, however, got us used to much higher P&Ls. This contest is far from over and I expect Maskache to make up the difference soon.

Traders are competing for the main prize now and each trade counts. And with weather, we have dozens of markets daily making for a great show. Maskache can make up the loss in no time and be back in the game.

It’s the ultimate showdown between the top weather traders!

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Wrap Up

That’s all for today! The Finals opened with a stumble from Maskache, whose $166 miss on the highest temperature in Seoul handed BeefSlayer_ an early lead. But both of these traders have shown us far bigger P&Ls than this, and with dozens of weather markets resolving daily, there’s plenty of room for Maskache to erase the gap. This one is far from over.

Who’s your pick to be crowned HIVE World Cup Champion? My longtime favorite BeefSlayer_, or the resilient Maskache?

See you tomorrow for another HIVE World Cup Recap!

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This is not official investment or life advice. Do your own research. These are only my opinions and I encourage anyone to do their own research before putting any money anywhere.

Hey traders! The wait is over. The Semifinals are done and we know our two finalists. Both duels delivered, and one of them came down to a single trade that flipped everything with less than 24 hours to go. Now we’re left with two weather traders standing: BeefSlayer_ and Maskache.

Let’s break down how we got here and who’s got the better shot at lifting the trophy.

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Quick Rules Summary

Finalists go 1v1, seeded by group score. Both traders reset to $500 for a short head-to-head window; whoever makes more profit advances. Single elimination, until one champion is left.

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Best Trade of the Semifinals

The best trade of the Semifinals goes to BeefSlayer_. He made $1,605 and then $869 the next day predicting the highest temperature in Seoul.

Congrats!

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Worst Trade of the Semifinals

The worst trade of the Semifinals goes to Joker_Poly:

He lost $2,075 wrongly predicting the outcome of an WNBA game and lost his duel with BeefSlayer_.

JokerPoly ends the tournament in the Semifinals with $2,919 in total profit. Congrats!

Semifinals

Joker_Poly vs BeefSlayer_

Joker_Poly went neck-to-neck with BeefSlayer_ until the last moment. Both traders had an amazing run, however JokerPoly lost it all on one WNBA prediction. That way we lost the last non-weather trader in the tournament.

BeefSlayer goes on the the Finals with $2,878 in profit. Congrats!

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Maskache vs WeatherOnly

WeatherOnly was in the lead at times, however he lacked some luck in the last day. After a series of bad weather predictions he lost almost the entire bankroll.

On the other hand, Maskache held steady and advanced to the Finals with $1,487 in profit. He will now match against BeefSlayer_ in the ultimate weather trader matchup.

Congrats!

Wrap Up

That’s all for today! The Semifinals gave us everything. BeefSlayer_ held his nerve after Joker_Poly threw it all away on one WNBA call, while Maskache stayed steady as WeatherOnly’s bankroll melted away. The last non-weather trader is out, and the Finals will show who’s the best out of the dominating caste of weather traders.

Who’s your pick to be crowned HIVE World Cup Champion? My longtime favorite BeefSlayer_, or the dominating Maskache?

See you tomorrow for another HIVE World Cup Recap!

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This is not official investment or life advice. Do your own research. These are only my opinions and I encourage anyone to do their own research before putting any money anywhere.

The Clarity Act market is another Trump-fueled soap opera. Every deal announcement makes the market rip up, while every leak about Trump's crypto dealings sends it off a cliff. The market went from as high as 81.5% to a low of 31.5%, to settle at 41.5% as of now.

Traders treat this market as any other legislation market. They are missing the bigger picture. There are bigger things at play here and preparations are already well underway. I’ve been building this thesis for a while and now I’m ready to share it.

What Is the Clarity Act?

The Clarity Act is a major part of a comprehensive crypto regulation push. It all started with the Genius Act. Signed last year, it provides the basis to regulate stablecoins. The two most important provisions specify:

1. Who can issue stablecoins.

2. What kind of collateral must be used when minting stablecoins.

In effect, it creates ground rules for stablecoin creation and issuance. Most importantly, it specifies that all stablecoins must be backed 1:1 with US Treasuries or cash. However, it stops at that and does not address the wider crypto market—while stablecoins are now a regulated product, the very infrastructure they rely on is still mostly unregulated.

This is where the Clarity Act comes in.

The Clarity Act goes a step further. It’s a comprehensive act that establishes a regulatory framework for the entire blockchain industry. It’s a pretty long piece of legislation that sets up rules for pretty much everything on crypto: tokens, NFTs, smart contracts, DeFi, you name it.

It divides jurisdiction over digital assets between the CFTC and the SEC, allowing for broad integration of digital assets into the overall financial system. If passed, this bill, in combination with the Genius Act, will permanently regulate the crypto industry. No more operating on guidance. No more overnight rule changes.

But you probably know that already.

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What Did You Miss (Probably)?

There are several facts and developments that are connected to the Clarity Act. In their totality they show a wider plan behind the legislation. When interests align, there’s a bigger dedication to push things through.

Read more

Welcome to another week! Nine nights of bombing, tankers ablaze, and Brent above $90. The war for the Strait is escalating fast. Some reports suggest a ground invasion could be coming. I won’t jump to such conclusions too soon, but tensions are definitely high.

Additionally, thanks to a new Substack feature, I have a small segment just for my paid subscribers in today’s article.

We had plenty of developments outside of the Iran war, so let’s look at prediction markets to make sense of the world!

Weekly Outlook

US Inc.

Trump used a primetime White House address to accuse China of helping to rig America’s elections, blaming the deep state for covering up “China’s sinister election meddling” and releasing documents that supposedly prove his case. The Chinese embassy rejected the claims. ABC, CNN and NBC refused to air the speech live and now Trump wants their licenses revoked for it.

Comment: I think that the election interference narrative works well to motivate right-leaning voters. We should see more of that as midterms come closer. The market broadly agrees as chances of any license being revoked are at only 19%.

New York became the first state to freeze construction of large data centers. Anything drawing 50 megawatts or more is on hold for up to a year while officials work out a “regulatory framework”. Anti-data-center sentiment is spreading across America on environmental grounds, utility costs and general distrust of the technology.

Comment: the market spiked on the news, but it needs a proper bill rather than an executive order. Traders now see a 79% chance of a moratorium in any state by the end of the year, fueled by the first step New York made.

Some good news on inflation: the headline rate fell to 3.5% in June, from 4.2% in May, which is a steeper drop than expected, driven by cheaper gas. Core inflation eased to 2.6%. That takes some pressure off the Fed, though Kevin Warsh refused to declare “mission accomplished” and reiterated his commitment to the 2% target.

Comment: traders were a bit surprised by the newest inflation print, but they still expect annual inflation to be above 3.75%. Additionally, a hike is still largely expected:

United Airlines expects almost $6 billion in extra fuel costs this year thanks to geopolitical uncertainty. Fuel spending jumped 84% year on year in Q2. The airline still beat expectations with $17.7 billion in revenue, up 16%.

Comment: but the mainstream media will continue to convince you that all is good and there is no oil shortage. It’s going to get worse before it gets better.

Meta may rent computing power to Anthropic in a deal reportedly worth up to $10 billion over two years, according to the New York Times. Talks are at an early stage, but Zuckerberg has long hinted that Meta’s excess compute is for sale at some premium.

Comment: after the new Kimi model everyone understands that compute is not the bottleneck it used to be.

The Americas

Trump threatened Canada with additional tariffs over the smoke from hundreds of wildfires currently blowing into the US, accusing Ottawa of not properly maintaining its forests. Ontario’s premier Doug Ford called the threat unacceptable and suggested Republicans send help instead.

Comment: for Trump the wildfires are just another occasion to poke Canada. Same as Alberta independence or calling Trudeau the governor of the 51st state.

A 5.5-magnitude earthquake hit Peru’s Andes region, killing at least six people and displacing hundreds. Several buildings collapsed, including a 16th-century church.

Comment: additionally, we had massive storms in Chile, courtesy of El Nino.

Asia

China’s economy is sending mixed signals. Exports jumped 27% year on year in June to a record $412.4 billion. It’s the biggest increase since 2021, powered by AI hardware. Yet GDP grew just 4.3% in Q2, the slowest pace since 2022 and below Beijing’s target. Domestic demand and investment remain weak.

Comment: China also feels the effects of the Iran war.

Apple finally got Chinese regulators’ blessing to launch its AI services on iPhones in the world’s largest smartphone market. Apple Intelligence will run on models from Alibaba and Baidu.

Comment: China just secured a great opportunity for its models to improve through usage. American frontier labs do not really enjoy any significant lead over Chinese labs.

Australia announced it is working on sweeping AI regulations. The legislation, coming to parliament next year, promises copyright protection for artists and will force big data-center operators to underwrite new power supply. A new Office of Artificial Intelligence will oversee it all.

Comment: AI labs are actually welcoming the regulation as it solidifies their place at the top.

South Korea is opening up its currency. From 2027, foreigners will be able to open won accounts at foreign institutions, ending the requirement to route transactions through Korea — a bold step for a country that has long kept a tight grip on its FX markets.

Comment: do we really need more degens trading KOSPI?

Middle East & Africa

The war for the Strait entered its most violent phase yet.

Trump opened the week by declaring America the GUARDIAN of the Strait of Hormuz, reinstating the naval blockade of Iranian ports and proposing a 20% fee on all cargo passing through.

A day later he backtracked on the fee, saying Gulf states would make trade and investment deals with the US instead. The blockade stayed.

The bombing did too. America has now hit Iran for nine consecutive nights, targeting surveillance sites, air defenses, logistics and weapons storage, and threatened to go after power plants and bridges unless Iran gets to the table and negotiates.

Iran answered with missile and drone strikes on American bases in Bahrain, Kuwait and Jordan, and hit a Kuwaiti power and desalination plant. Two American servicemen were killed in Jordan on Friday and one is missing; a third was killed in Iraq over the weekend, taking the US death toll in the war to 17.

Shipping is caught in the middle of it all. The UAE said Iranian missiles struck two of its supertankers, killing a sailor; Iran later claimed two ships using an unsafe route had an accident and that the strait remains under its complete control. Traffic has collapsed and Brent passed $90.

Comment: I have a small update for my paid subscribers. Otherwise, I wrote an article on the recent Iran war developments, and recorded a video with my thoughts on the markets:

Houthi rebels fired missiles and drones at Saudi Arabia’s Abha airport after Saudi strikes on Sana’a’s airport, which were meant to stop a plane carrying a Houthi delegation home from Ali Khamenei’s funeral in Tehran. It is the first major Houthi–Saudi escalation since 2022.

Comment: I don’t think either side wants to fire up Yemen along with Lebanon. That said, if we have any surprises in Lebanon, closing the strait is very much in play.

Chevron signed preliminary deals for stakes in Iraq’s oil fields and joined a consortium studying a pipeline through Syria that would bypass the Strait of Hormuz entirely. Trump also teased “massive” oil deals with Iraq.

Comment: this is all great news, but it won’t be up and running anytime soon. It doesn’t change anything for the ongoing Iran war.

Europe

It was a busy week for Ukraine, at the front and at home. At the coalition of the willing summit in Paris, Ukraine and nine European countries agreed to build a shared ballistic-missile defense for Europe, drawing on Ukraine’s experience.

Back in Kyiv, Zelensky reshuffled his government. Parliament confirmed Sergiy Koretsky, boss of state energy giant Naftogaz, as prime minister, with a mandate to focus on relations with America and the EU and on securing weapons.

The reshuffle came at a price. Protests broke out across the country after Zelensky sacked Mykhailo Fedorov, the popular defense minister behind Ukraine’s drone-warfare buildup. Zelensky said Fedorov kept clashing with the generals and that he had to choose between sides; Fedorov says his initiatives were blocked.

On the battlefield, Ukraine keeps squeezing Russia at sea, claiming 116 strikes on Russian ships in the Sea of Azov in nine days, including 11 last week. The waterway carries a quarter of Russia’s wheat exports; Lavrov called the campaign “terrorism, pure and simple”.

Russia hit back at the capital with one of its heaviest attacks in months — 41 missiles and 125 drones overnight on Sunday, killing at least one person and starting fires in five districts of Kyiv.

Comment: interesting, as Ukraine started to gain the initiative, Zelensky replaced the mastermind behind the new plan. Maybe the campaign is too effective and endangers the global oil supply. The Iran war surely takes precedence..

Andy Burnham was confirmed as Labour leader with the backing of 379 of the party’s 403 MPs and takes over from Keir Starmer on Monday. In his speech he said Britain took a wrong turn in the 1980s, when political power was centralized and economic power was privatized, promising devolution and public control over the cost of the essentials. No ministerial team yet.

He inherits a fragile economy. GDP grew 0.1% in May after an Iran-war-driven 0.1% contraction in April, with services doing all the work while production and construction fell.

He also inherits a tense country. Counter-terrorism police took over the investigation into the death of Ann Widdecombe, the Reform UK politician found dead in her home, after new information and evidence emerged. A 28-year-old man arrested earlier in the case has been rearrested on terrorism charges.

Lastly, Britain nationalized British Steel on national-security grounds, and China is not happy. Jingye, the Chinese owner since 2020, is demanding compensation, while Beijing warned the takeover will directly affect Chinese investors’ confidence in the country.

Comment: I’ve already commented a bit on the shape of the new Cabinet in my video. However, the nationalization of British Steel is an interesting decision. Europeans are clearly getting up to speed with what’s happening in the world and they are starting to take care of core industries.

Germany is raiding its climate fund. More than €30 billion ($34 billion) earmarked for heat pump and EV subsidies will be shifted to the federal budget or cancelled outright through 2030 as Merz tries to consolidate public finances.

Comment: Germany has big military ambitions nowadays. They need to finance them somehow.

Volkswagen may cut another 50,000 jobs, per an internal memo seen by Reuters, doubling planned cuts to 100,000 by 2030, 16% of the workforce. Years of falling sales, especially in China, are forcing Europe’s largest carmaker to shrink.

Comment: the fall of the German economy continues.

Other

Spain won the World Cup, beating Argentina 1-0. It took until the second half of extra time to break down the reigning champions, who finished the match with ten men. Trump handed over the trophy alongside FIFA’s controversial boss Gianni Infantino.

Comment: it was a great World Cup, despite low expectations.

Twelve states sued to block Paramount’s $111 billion takeover of Warner Bros Discovery, arguing it hands Paramount too much control over film distribution. The DOJ already approved the deal; the lawsuit could push it past its September 30th deadline, triggering a ticking fee owed to shareholders each quarter.

Comment: I wonder if Netflix had anything to do with it…

Wrap up

That’s all for today! This week comes my deep dive on the Clarity Act. Other than that, I’ll continue to monitor the Iran situation as we might be on the verge of a new chapter in this conflict.

Stay strong and see you soon!

This is not official investment or life advice. Do your own research. These are only my opinions and I encourage anyone to do their own research before putting any money anywhere.