Investing & Markets
Chips, the AI supply chain, macro and money flows: slowly making sense of markets. 212 posts.
Keep the Tool, Raise the Bar: Sweden's Governor on QE, Independence, and Cash
Notes on the 2026-09-28 Macro Musings episode with Riksbank Governor Erik Thedéen: why a central bank founded in 1668 decided to raise the bar for large-scale asset purchases, the three layers of that argument, where each one stops holding, and what breaks if you transplant it. Educational, not investment advice.
Getting a Crosswalk Painted in LA Takes a Few Years or More
Notes on the Odd Lots live episode from Hollywood, 2026-09-28: developer Zach Lasry and Calculated Risk's Bill McBride on LA zoning, permit queues, and the scramble for transformers. I used to blame interest rates for everything that doesn't get built. This one changed my mind. Educational notes only, no investment advice, no stock recommendations.
Laying Out One Week of Public Posts: The AI Buildout's Bottleneck Has Moved
An independent researcher covering the AI infrastructure upstream posted seventeen times on X between 2026-09-21 and 09-25. Lined up together, they show the bottleneck shifting away from GPUs toward CPUs, memory, and the optical upstream.
Podcast Notes Weekly: Sep 21–Sep 27, 2026
The takeaways from 28 podcast notes I wrote this week (Asianometry, Caibaogou (財報狗), Macro Musings with David Beckworth, Bloomberg Odd Lots, Serenity Weekly, The Circuit and more). Two to four sentences per episode, with a link to each full post.
When Kindness Becomes the Ceiling: Masako Aragane on DEI Practice in Japanese Companies and Impostor Syndrome
On 27 September 2026, InterFM's Investor's Sunday hosted DEI consultant Masako Aragane on what Japanese companies actually do: Hitachi embedding diversity in its sustainability strategy with quantified causal links, Kirin sending male managers to pick up colleagues' children for five straight days, Mercari narrowing its unexplained gender pay gap to 1.4%. Educational content, not investment advice, no view on individual stocks.
Taiwan's ETF Mania: Following the Crowd, or Actually Understanding It? — Notes on MacroMicro After Meeting EP 215
Fee ratios behind 0050 versus 006208, why Nikkei and TOPIX diverge, how to attribute an active ETF's good year, and the currency-and-price gap inside bond ETFs. Listening notes on one podcast episode. Educational content, not investment advice, no tickers recommended and no price targets.
When Every Headline Leads Back to One Trunk: Michael Every on the Geopolitical Puzzle (MacroVoices #551, Part 2)
Notes after listening to the MacroVoices #551 bonus episode: Iran's one-week deadline, the rumored diesel export ban, Canada's war game, and how Michael Every routes all of it back to the US-China contest. Educational listening notes, not investment advice; no tickers, no price targets.
High Bandwidth Flash Is Coming: 16x the Capacity, and What It Costs
Notes after watching Asianometry's 2026-09-24 episode 'High Bandwidth Flash Is Coming': HBF lifts per-stack memory from about 36GB to 512GB, but runs two orders of magnitude slower and survives only a few thousand writes. The opportunity, the costs, and what Optane taught us. Educational, not investment advice — no tickers, no price targets.
"My Wife Flatters Me Because She Is Partial to Me": Statementdog on Whether Memory Is Really Tight
Statementdog Podcast EP567's news roundup: how to read Acer's Chen Jun-sheng saying memory is 'not as short as people think,' the power-semiconductor price-hike timeline running from last year's TI to next year's Renesas, and the new outlets opening up for silicon carbide after Chinese price wars flattened it. Listening notes on judgment method — no stock picks, no price targets.
Stocks Everyone Hates: Jonathan Boyar on Buying What the Baskets Dumped
Notes from the 2026-09-25 episode of The Compound and Friends. Value investor Jonathan Boyar on why only 23.2% of large caps beat the index over ten years, how AI-driven basket selling creates dislocations, and the line between a broken stock and a broken business. Educational, not investment advice; individual stocks carry risk.
MacroVoices #551 with Michael Every: Oil Came Back Down, the Risk Didn't Leave
Notes from MacroVoices episode 551 (September 24, 2026), where Rabobank strategist Michael Every discusses Iran, Russia-Ukraine, diesel, Greenland, China and stablecoins. These are listening notes about telling apart 'the conditions changed' from 'people stopped looking'; educational only, not investment advice, with no tickers, price targets or entry points.
Hollywood Was Sinking Before AI Arrived — Notes on Odd Lots Live in LA
Bloomberg Odd Lots, 2026-09-25, live in Los Angeles: writer Hayes Davenport tells the last decade through shoot days — from 40,000 to under 20,000. Educational notes, not investment advice, no stock recommendations.
No Gas Stations at Sea: Catalyst on Anduril's Maritime Energy Problem
Notes on the 2026-09-24 episode of Catalyst with Shayle Kann, featuring Anduril's Andrew Nus on energy density, certification timelines, and nuclear-powered shipping. Personal commentary for educational purposes; not investment advice, no stock picks or price targets.
Gooaye EP699: The Thing Everyone Says Is Dying Usually Outlives the Forecast
Notes on Gooaye EP699 (23 Sep 2026): a rumored 40-to-1 CPU-to-GPU ratio with no traceable source, a 15–20% DSP price hike, and how to take apart a number before you trust it. Educational commentary, not investment advice — no tickers recommended, no price targets.
When Content Becomes Free: Odd Lots on How AI Is Upending Social Media Work
From the September 24, 2026 Odd Lots live show in Los Angeles: Taylor Lorenz and Rachel Karten on what AI actually did to social and marketing work — bosses outsourcing judgment to models, audiences who say they hate AI content but watch it anyway, and how-to creators losing ground. Listening notes and reflections; educational, not investment advice.
China's Oil Shock That Wasn't: Three Shifts From Columbia Energy Exchange
On 22 September 2026, Columbia Energy Exchange hosted Erica Downs and Michal Meidan on why China cut crude imports after the Hormuz disruption instead of scrambling for barrels. Listener notes on buffers, state pricing, and energy security moving from resources to technology. Educational, not investment advice.
The Story Flips Faster Than You Do: Meta's 28% Three Weeks and Admitting I Was Wrong on Netflix
Notes from the September 22, 2026 episode of The Compound and Friends: Meta added roughly $450 billion in three weeks after launching Muse, why weak market breadth today isn't 1999, why only 23% of large-cap stocks beat the index over ten years, and how to think about the 10-year Treasury back at 5%. Educational, not investment advice.
Cleared, But Not Adopted: SpectraWAVE's Former CEO on Why Proof Looks Different at Every Stage
Notes on the 2026-09-21 Medsider interview with former SpectraWAVE CEO Eman Namati: what scientists unlearn as CEOs, how to define an MVP for the stage you're in, why clearance evidence and adoption evidence are different animals, and lessons on fundraising and acquisition. Educational, not investment advice.
Where Copper Runs Out: Notes on Ayar Labs CEO Mark Wade and Co-Packaged Optics
Listening notes on The Circuit's 2026-09-21 interview with Ayar Labs CEO Mark Wade: why AI data centers are gated by chip-to-chip links, which step of optical interconnect is hardest, and how to check the adoption timeline against reality. Personal educational notes; not investment advice and not a recommendation of any stock.
The Red Queen's Treadmill: Gabe Stengel on Investing Superintelligence and Where It Gets Stuck
Notes on Invest Like the Best EP.492 with Rogo co-founder Gabe Stengel: the first-mover disadvantage of years with a bad product, a managing director marking up decks on an iPad, the penny the AI labs won't stop to pick up, why auditability beats accuracy, and what edge humans keep. Personal listening notes for education only, not investment advice, and no stock recommendations.
The Machine Works, So Why Did TSMC Wait? Notes on Supply Chained's Episode About High NA EUV and 12-Inch Masks
Supply Chained's 2026-09-21 episode covers ASML and TSMC's push toward 12-inch EUV photomasks: why High NA halved throughput, why TSMC waited until 2030, and who will make the mask blanks. Personal listening notes for educational purposes only; not investment advice and not a recommendation of any stock.
Why Is Jev, a Model That Only Answers Multiple Choice, Everywhere? Three Questions from TechWave EP155
Listening notes on TechWave EP155 (2026-09-21): Jev is a classification model that outputs only probabilities over the options you give it. It is 200x faster and 400x cheaper, but what did it give up to get there, and what does it mean for AI agents and model routing? Educational content only, not investment advice or a recommendation to buy or sell anything.
Why Intel's Optane Ended: A Memory Caught Between DRAM and NAND | Asianometry Listening Notes
Notes after listening to Asianometry's 2026-09-20 episode on Intel and Micron's 3D XPoint / Optane, from phase change memory's origins to its 2022 wind-down. Educational content only, not investment advice and not a recommendation of any stock; technology products and the companies behind them carry high uncertainty.
Silicon Photonics Is Still Waiting for a Common Track Width: A Materials Insider Turned Analyst on Advanced Packaging's Bottlenecks
Notes from CMoney's Caibaogou podcast, episode 566. SemiVision founder Jett moved from the semiconductor materials business into industry research. He talks about the qualification barrier for permanent materials, hedged bets while silicon photonics lacks a standard, optical testing as a bottleneck, full capacity crowding out startups, and why the people who know the most have the least reason to speak. Educational industry observation only; not investment advice, and industry judgments can be wrong.