Union Square Research Group

Our job is to find a few intelligent things to do, not keep up with every damn thing in the world. -Munger

[Atlas Press @realAtlasPress]

Otto von Bismarck, what a line

[Javier Blas @JavierBlas]

Energy factoid of the day:

The entire annual global LNG market equals to about six weeks of coal demand in China and India.

[Basil🧡 @LinkofSunshine]

What's the most dangerous job in America?

You might think it's being in the army, or a police officer, or a construction worker

But one job has double the amount of people getting disability checks. 75% of LIRR employees are receiving disability checks from the NY Gov.

[Max Marchione @maxmarchione]

In some very real sense, Ozempic was invented in 1990. Pfizer ran the human trials and just never published them.

They showed it lowered blood glucose in diabetics, slowed gastric emptying, and killed hunger; the same 3 things that make Ozempic work today.

The joint venture agreement said internal data stayed internal, and that was that. Pfizer killed the program in 1991. The reasoning, as far as I can tell, was that nobody would ever want an injectable diabetes drug besides insulin.

So, the license went back to the hospital in Boston that held the patents.

Novo picked it up in 1992 and spent the next two decades building liraglutide, then semaglutide.

It's insane that data sat in a filing cabinet for 30+ years.

I only know this because Jeffrey Flier, one of the Harvard scientists in the room, finally wrote it up. He's in his late 70s and didn't want the history to die with him.

This makes you wonder what else is in those filing cabinets.

Ozempic could've existed 27 years ago.

[Dimko Zhluktenko 🇺🇦⚔️ @dim0kq]

Fiber optics is still happening at the battlefield, although not as much as it used to be.

It's extremely pricey now. We used to buy 50km spool for $300, now it's easily $2500. Just so you know

[constans @constans]

For example, I’m sure all the civilian leaders of Leningrad who defended the city during the siege were hailed as national heroes and received great honors from Stalin and for a generation afterwards.

[Dirt Cheap Banks @dirtcheapbanks]

Community banks are the last place in America where a man in a short-sleeve dress shirt can approve a $400,000 loan based on the fact that he went to high school with your dad. There are 4,100 of them left. There were 14,000 in 1984. Every time one gets acquired, a teller named Brenda learns a new software system and a small town loses the only institution that would lend against a combine. The acquirer always says nothing will change. Brenda is gone in eighteen months. The lobby cookies go next. Then the branch closes. Then the building becomes a vape shop. This is not a financial trend. This is the slow administrative murder of the only version of capitalism that ever knew your name.

[SMB Attorney @SMB_Attorney]

POV: You just paid S&C, one of the three most expensive and high-powered law firms in the world, $3000 per hour to submit AI slop to the court on your behalf.

No one is safe.

[Lawrence Hamtil @lhamtil]

The uses of helium in the US via Construction Physics

https://t.co/t8nu8NPoDG

[The Market Ear @themarketear]

The final two LNG Qatari cargos will arrive in Europe by April 13th. After that, physical tightness in European gas markets will begin to intensify. No fresh Qatari cargos likely on the way for at least 2-3 months.
https://t.co/8jcLBtU6GU

[gasworld @gasworld]

Executives across the technology sector have begun flagging supply chain disruptions tied to helium scarcity during the Middle East conflict, a development that coincides with the accelerating commercial scale of AI platforms and… https://t.co/HHJ193sBIX #gasworld #industrialgas

[🌿 lithos @lithos_graphein]

Not a semi problem. The spice will flow regardless.

Ukraine War - Neon shortage.
Iran War - Helium shortage.

>>semiconductor companies tend to outbid every other industry for available supply, Brook told the New York Times, because the cost of idling a fab dwarfs any premium on the gas itself. “They’ll outbid anybody,” he said, leaving other sectors like pharma and medical imaging short of supply.<<

[North American Helium @NAHelium]

North American Helium CEO, Nicholas Snyder, speaks about the current helium crisis with @TheStalwart and @tracyalloway on the Odd Lots podcast

[Union Square Research Group @UnionSquareGrp]

@KarstResearch This guy: https://t.co/2x3l1f4LQC

[North American Helium @NAHelium]

North American Helium CEO, Nicholas Snyder, speaks about the current helium crisis with @TheStalwart and @tracyalloway on the Odd Lots podcast

[Scott Lincicome @scottlincicome]

"Helium shortage has started impacting tech supply chains, execs say" https://t.co/JJWBmBw6ua

[Joe Weisenthal @TheStalwart]

Helium episode out tomorrow

[Joe Weisenthal @TheStalwart]

NEW ODD LOTSL

The helium shortage

@tracyalloway and I talk to Nicholas Snyder, CEO of North Americah Helium about a commodity with a surprising number of industrial applications, including and especially the semiconductor industry https://t.co/QjwqFhMsdO

[John W. 🇺🇸 @jawagner92]

Ed Thorp seeding Citadel’s first fund and handing teenage Ken Griffin boxes full of obscure prospectuses in the 1990s.

[Ed Conway @EdConwaySky]

Very, very bad news.
As I wrote in Material World, Ras Laffan is one of the most important industrial sites not just in the Gulf but in the world. LNG, helium, other products. Massive.
Whatever happens next, serious damage to this site could reverberate for months, maybe years.

[Union Square Research Group @UnionSquareGrp]

@johnarnold @AudeIdScire Building a large "for profit" business that would hire and train a lot of people and change the trajectory of their lives even if the profit margin was meagre might be a tremendous good (construction trades?), but I'm not sure that's what Thiel is talking about...

[Union Square Research Group @UnionSquareGrp]

@johnarnold @AudeIdScire I'm sympathetic to Charlie Munger's point that employee training programs at McDonalds and Costco have probably helped more people in this country than any number of massive donations towards public education.