1. Oil prices surge, and stocks make new highs nevertheless. It looks like I was right (so far) on all counts:
(a) The strait remaining in some Schrodinger-like state of being blockaded or opened, possibly until 2028, as I wrote here. At this point the stock market has stopped caring, as I also correctly predicted.
(b) Surging oil prices not hurting stocks.
(c) CPI remains puzzlingly low despite >$100/barrel oil.
(d) Bitcoin lagging stocks as QQQ keeps going up. The divergence between Bitcoin vs QQQ will keep widening, similar to 2025. I will profit by remaining “short” Bitcoin and “long” QQQ, as I did in 2025 and earlier this year.
2. It’s been 3 years since GLP-1 drugs saw mainstream use. There was/is a popular narrative, from October 2023, that these drugs will hurt consumer spending due to people eating less. With Walmart stock at record highs, I was right again.
This is because:
-Restaurants and retailers can respond by raising prices and offering smaller portions, boosting profit margins. Thus is what shrinkflation is about.
-Despite the popularity of these drugs, penetration is still low relative to U.S. population.
-Retailers are diversified beyond food.
-A sizable percentage of people on these drugs later discontinue them and resume old eating habits.
-These drugs have variable efficacy and only 30-50% of users see a dramatic reduction of appetite.
3. Funny tweet
Trump is already a lame duck. He is an extremely unpopular President that has alienated most of his base. He has no path to govern effectively for the next 2 years. If Trump cared about the country, he would follow Nixon's example and resign. But Trump has too big of an ego to… https://t.co/CdbpRYzhON
— RAMZPAUL (@ramzpaul) April 29, 2026
and
Food and fuel are becoming unaffordable. America is in a crisis. The World stands at the precipice of a global depression.
This is why we need a new ballroom.
— RAMZPAUL (@ramzpaul) April 30, 2026
Bill “Gates” Paul is blackpilling again. He’s right in the sense that it does not matter what Trump does at this point, aside from judicial appointments or endorsing candidates. You don’t vote for Trump because you expect to get anything out of him , unless you initially campaigned against him or never supported him in the first place (e.g. AI and semiconductors companies getting taxpayer-funded initiatives, such as stakes in Intel, but no BTC reserve by the people who actually campaigned for him).
You’re not going to get affordability or anything like that. I look at it like, “With Trump in power, he limits the harm the left can do.” DOGE was a success in so far as defunding the Left, not saving money as many erroneously assumed. It’s more like a stopgap measure until the AI singularity…or something.
I don’t see any scenario in which his approval ratings increase either. The tariffs and Iran war are unpopular outside of his base. Those who supported him from the start will continue to do so. Those who are ambivalent will remain undecided. And those who despise him will continue to oppose him.
As I wrote earlier, in trying to create a legacy as a “great man of history,” Trump has made geopolitics and tariffs the defining issues of his presidency, and has pushed affordability and other domestic concerns to the backburner. He seeks the approval of “important people” and institutions (e.g. as symbolized by the Nobel Prize), and less so about issues that affect “ordinary people” as those issues are of less historic importance or involve lower status people.