“You wake up in Chicago, pull back the curtain, and you KNOW where you are. You could be nowhere else. You are in a big, brash, muscular, broad shouldered motherfuckin’ city. A metropolis, completely non-neurotic, ever-moving, big hearted but cold blooded machine with millions of moving parts — a beast that will, if disrespected or not taken seriously, roll over you without remorse. It is, also, as I like to point out frequently, one of America’s last great NO BULLSHIT zones. Pomposity, pretentiousness, putting on airs of any kind, douchery and lack of a sense of humor will not get you far in Chicago. It is a trait shared with Glasgow — another city I love with a similar working class ethos and history.Chicago is a town, a city that doesn’t ever have to measure itself against any other city. Other places have to measure themselves against it. It’s big, it’s outgoing, it’s tough, it’s opinionated, and everybody’s got a story." - Anthony Bourdain.
#ChicagoHistory 🌹
An interesting comment from a Former $META employee. ENERGY is the biggest bottleneck right now.
Even if $META wants to spend $100-$150B on CapEx for AI infrastructure, they can't. It is not just $NVDA.
Transformers, power equipment, cooling equipment, and the availability of power it is all limited right now. Schneider Electric is completely booked until 2030.
Even if you have the money, you can't spend it.
We won’t comment too much until the official details are released, but Armenia, Turkey, and Azerbaijan have reached an agreement on the Zangezur corridor during Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s recent visit to Turkey. Under this deal, Russia will have zero control over the corridor effectively being cut out entirely.
In response, Moscow attempted a failed coup against Pashinyan through clerical channels last week to disrupt the ongoing negotiations. Now, it’s trying to pressure Azerbaijan, but those efforts are also falling flat. In essence, Turkey, Armenia, and Azerbaijan are forming a new regional axis that openly challenges Russian influence.
The country is 100% behind the president on fixing a global system of tariffs that has disadvantaged the country. But, business is a confidence game and confidence depends on trust.
President @realDonaldTrump has elevated the tariff issue to the most important geopolitical issue in the world, and he has gotten everyone’s attention. So far, so good.
And yes, other nations have taken advantage of the U.S. by protecting their home industries at the expense of millions of our jobs and economic growth in our country.
But, by placing massive and disproportionate tariffs on our friends and our enemies alike and thereby launching a global economic war against the whole world at once, we are in the process of destroying confidence in our country as a trading partner, as a place to do business, and as a market to invest capital.
The president has an opportunity to call a 90-day time out, negotiate and resolve unfair asymmetric tariff deals, and induce trillions of dollars of new investment in our country.
If, on the other hand, on April 9th we launch economic nuclear war on every country in the world, business investment will grind to a halt, consumers will close their wallets and pocket books, and we will severely damage our reputation with the rest of the world that will take years and potentially decades to rehabilitate.
What CEO and what board of directors will be comfortable making large,
long-term, economic commitments in our country in the middle of an economic nuclear war?
I don’t know of one who will do so.
When markets crash, new investment stops, consumers stop spending money, and businesses have no choice but to curtail investment and fire workers.
And it is not just the big companies that will suffer. Small and medium size businesses and entrepreneurs will experience much greater pain. Almost no business can pass through an overnight massive increase in costs to their customers. And that’s true even if they have no debt, and, unfortunately, there is a massive amount of leverage in the system.
Business is a confidence game. The president is losing the confidence of business leaders around the globe. The consequences for our country and the millions of our citizens who have supported the president — in particular low-income consumers who are already under a huge amount of economic stress — are going to be severely negative. This is not what we voted for.
The President has an opportunity on Monday to call a time out and have the time to execute on fixing an unfair tariff system.
Alternatively, we are heading for a self-induced, economic nuclear winter, and we should start hunkering down.
May cooler heads prevail.
Here’s the chart on the global imbalance that the Trump administration is trying to adjust: US makes up 29% of global consumption but only 15% of global manufacturing. China makes up 12% of global consumer spending and 32% of global manufacturing.
we have lost a lot of manufacturing share to China