The daily view 5/29/2023: Ark, Bitcoin Keeps Lagging Tech, DeSantis vs. Trump

Right again: Ark’s Cathie Wood sells Nvidia stock at the bottom, missing out on huge rally. Ark has significantly lagged the QQQ/Nasdaq index, as I predicted in 2022 and early 2023 it would:

Ark is down 11% over the past year compared to 13% gains for QQQ. No matter which timeframe I choose, Ark is worse.

The left has a point when they talk about overpaid rich people who do not produce value commensurate with their incomes/wealth. She is a prime example. Related posts: “Professional Morons” and “Fixing The Expertise Misallocation Problem“. How much GDP and other metrics of societal well-being is stunted by having incompetent people in the highest positions of power, or in business? Over many decades, compounded, it adds up to a lot. It’s not just a DEI/woke problem either, as we see with Cathie Wood, Chamath, and others. Both sides are guilty of promoting incompetent people.

There is a niche for liberals who reject identity politics in favor of economic populism, even in mainstream politics. The sudden success of RFK is one such example. Although similar to Sanders in 2015/2016, who also had a lot of momentum, they tend to flame out fast come primaries.

Right again x2: Bitcoin lags ‘big tech’, just like I said would happen. Now such underperformance is being picked up by major media sources now like Bloomberg, as further evidence of how I am always ahead of the curve. Nvidia, Marvel, and AMD surged 20% or more last week. QQQ up 5%. TECL, TQQQ, and FNGU up 10% or more. Meta stock at $260. But Bitcoin still below $28k.

The difference is striking (Bitcoin in black, compared to TQQQ and TECL in gold and blue):

Bitcoin does not hedge inflation, does not benefit from ‘AI boom’, does not generate shareholder value. It’s just overpriced crud.

Right again x3: Germany falls into recession due to high inflation.

This confirms that whatever problems the US has, are worse overseas even in Western countries. Higher inflation, more unrest, higher unemployment, weaker growth, worse stock market returns, etc.

From Unz: Meatball Ron Officially Throws His Hat in the Wind!

Elon has no animosity towards Trump, nor does he particularly favor DeSantis. Given that Trump is no longer active on Twitter and only DeSantis remains, who is also hugely popular on Twitter, why would Elon help a candidate who is on a competing platform? On Twitter, there is considerable overlap between supporting Trump and supporting DeSantis.

Frankly, as long as he is remaining in that exclusive “Truth Social” contract, I can’t really even take his candidacy seriously. If he’s not going to use Twitter, the platform that won him the 2016 election, because of a contract with a fake social media company, then the campaign looks suspiciously like a callous money-grab.

It’s called integrity, upholding a contract.

In terms of being the nominee or winning the general election, their odds are about the same. DeSantis is not a weak candidate by any stretch despite his poor Twitter debut or sometimes coming off as socially awkward. As I said before, short of a catastrophic gaffe or major scandal, it’s anyone’s game until 2024, when the primaries begin.

Despite being Catholic, DeSantis has the advantage of securing more evangelical and undecided voters compared to Trump, and winning his home state (winning Florida typically means winning the general election). They cover different ground, and each have different strengths and weaknesses: DeSantis is more of a culture warrior whereas Trump is more of a nationalist. But DeSantis will be more effective as President in terms of implementing policy in a divided House and Senate. Being an outsider dooms Trump to being on the sidelines, not a key or team player.

But Trump is more imaginative, and is better at reading trends. His proposal to ban TikTok in 2020, even though as I predicted it would fail, was prescient given that the mainstream, including the left now, acknowledges that TikTok is spying on Americans (even though all big tech companies like Facebook and Google also gather tons of information on Americans, it’s worse when China does it, I guess).

And finally, Google quietly removes its Covid tracker:

1 comment

  1. Best description of the difference between Trump and Desantis. Both have strengths and weaknesses.

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