Jamie Dimon Warns About America’s Coming Debt Crisis

Notes From the Field By James Hickman (Simon Black)  June 2, 2025

Jamie Dimon is one of America’s most prominent and successful CEOs; he built JP Morgan Chase into a $4 trillion juggernaut, so it’s fair to say that he understands global finance in a way that most people-- and most politicians-- do not.

 On Friday, Dimon sat down for a 30+ minute live interview at the Reagan National Economic Forum-- named after the 40th President who constantly preached cost-cuts and responsible spending.

This Will Either Make You Hopeful… Or Extremely Irritated

Notes From the Field By James Hickman (Simon Black)  May 29, 2025

Germany’s “Iron Chancellor” Otto von Bismark didn’t pass the world’s first modern Social Security system out of the kindness of his heart.

 The year was 1889, and Bismark was fighting hard against the rising tide of socialism; the second volume of Karl Marx’s Das Kapital had been published just a few years earlier in 1885, prompting growing calls for strikes, protests, and wealth redistribution.

 For Bismark, his social security program was intended to appease socialists while preserving the conservative political order that he had spent decades building. And on May 24, 1889, his new “Old Age and Disability Insurance Law” was passed by the Reichstag and signed by Kaiser Wilhelm II.

Investors Have Finally Had Enough With $2+ Trillion Deficits

Notes From the Field By James Hickman (Simon Black)  May 22, 2025

Well, that was fast.

It only took five days after Moody’s downgrade of the US government’s sovereign credit rating for investors to throw a fit. The result was yesterday’s meltdown trifecta in which ALL three major markets-- US stocks, US bonds, and the US dollar-- lost significant value.  I wrote about this extensively last month because we saw the same phenomenon after the “Liberation Day” announcement.

Typically, if there’s bad news in a major developed country, investors will simply shift their money into a different asset class within that same country.

So... Now What?

Notes From the Field By Simon Black (Simon Black)  May 13, 2025

One of the most mysterious villains in the history of cinema was the fictitious character ‘Keyser Söze’ from the movie The Usual Suspects.

 No spoilers here, but there’s a scene where they describe his rise in the criminal underworld. According to the story, Keyser Söze realized that “to be in power, you didn’t need guns or money or even numbers. You just needed the will to do what the other guy wouldn’t.”

Yikes. The “ONE BIG BEAUTIFUL” Tax Bill Is The Opposite Of What America Needs

Notes From the Field By James Hickman (Simon Black)  May 14, 2025

In the year 428 BC, ancient Athenians imposed a special tax called the eisphora that targeted local business investments in the city-state.

 It was expensive and highly unpopular among investors. And wealthy Athenians simply stopped investing in local businesses to avoid the tax.

 This is almost an iron-clad lesson of history: whenever governments tax something, they end up with less of it. And the inverse is also true: whenever governments subsidize or cut taxes on something, they end up with more of it.

Why We Can Forget About “Drill Baby Drill” (Podcast)

Notes From the Field By James Hickman (Simon Black)  May 7, 2025

Travis Stice is not one of those rare corporate CEOs who is a household name around the world... like Warren Buffett. But the two share a similar ethos. 

Buffett famously quipped, “Be fearful when others are greedy, and greedy when others are fearful,” which was ultimately a nod to the cyclical nature of markets and the economy. 

As surely as night follows day, and autumn/winter follow summer, bad times follow good... and then good times follow bad. 

This Trifecta of Market Declines is Rare… And Not Good

Notes From the Field By James Hickman (Simon Black)  April 30, 2025

 In today’s podcast, we explore the rare phenomenon of simultaneous declines in the stock market, bond market, and currency market—a powerful signal of capital flight out of the US.

 We talk about when and where this has happened before, and why the Federal Reserve’s diminishing control over interest rates won’t fix it.

America’s “Suez Moment” Has Arrived

Notes From the Field By James Hickman (Simon Black)   April 25, 2025

Don Edgar considered himself extremely lucky.

It was early in the morning on November 6, 1956, and the World War II veteran turned journalist for Britain’s Daily Express was one of just two reporters invited to witness Britain’s invasion of Egypt.

Standing on the bridge of a British warship, Edgar wrote that it was “the most impressive military operation the British had put on for many a year, with parachutists, marine commandos, tanks, aircraft, and a naval bombardment.”

So… Is It Over? And The Surprising Player That Is Holding The Cards

Notes From the Field By James Hickman (Simon Black)  April 23, 2025

Franklin Roosevelt pressed the red emergency button to stop the elevator on the way down to his private dining room. The King of Saudi Arabia was waiting for him, but the President wanted to smoke a couple of cigarettes first.

 It was 11:30 in the morning on Valentine’s Day, 1945. World War II was nearing its end, and Roosevelt had just come from the famous Yalta Conference with Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin to discuss what post-war Europe would look like.