smolalpha

🦊 Buy Side PE/VC. No Crying in the Casino.

[smolalpha @smolalphas]

@AravSrinivas Data not gud.
2 cases quarantined in SG

https://t.co/EUmBciUXyn

[Patrick OShaughnessy @patrick_oshag]

My guest today is Paul Tudor Jones (@ptj_official), one of the greatest macro traders of all time.

He correctly predicted the 1987 stock market crash and shorted the Japanese bubble in 1990. For over 40 years, his flagship fund has had a negative correlation to the S&P 500. 100% of his returns are alpha.

He says today's market has so many similarities to 2000, "the easiest bear market I've ever seen in my whole life."

He makes the case for going long dollar-yen, why Bitcoin beats gold as an inflation hedge, and why he was wrong about Warren Buffett.

But what I'll remember most from this conversation is Paul's zest for life. He's 71 and still wakes at 2:30 every morning to trade the London open. He works out for two hours a day. He walks with his wife every evening. He travels the country chasing peak spring and peak fall. He's so excited about the songs picked for his funeral that he wishes he could be there to hear them.

Paul has lived five lifetimes in one. He's one of the most entertaining and interesting people I've met, and the conversation will leave you searching to be as passionate about what you do as he is about what he does.

Enjoy!

Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
1:00 The Kindest Thing
13:19 Trading vs. Investing
17:33 Lessons from Warren Buffet
22:24 The Existential Risks of AI
29:54 The Nature of Trading
31:46 Bitcoin
35:55 Bubbles
42:08 A Day in the Life of PTJ
46:00 Information Overload
47:07 Passion for Markets
50:49 The Robin Hood Foundation
54:18 The Workless World
56:03 Journalism
1:00:00 Principal Components of a Great Life
1:05:06 Kill Them With Kindness

[@aaronjmars @aaronjmars]

holy fuck, a hair dryer at a Paris airport broke Polymarket weather markets & made someone $34,000 richer

- polymarket was settling Paris temperature bets on a single Météo France sensor sitting near the Charles de Gaulle runway perimeter - basically unguarded

- the guy bought the long-shot outcome (like "22°C" when everyone expected 18°C) for pennies, since nobody thought it'd hit

- then he walked up to the probe and briefly heated the air around it with a portable heat source, spiking the reading just long enough to register as the daily max

- temperature snapped back to normal in minutes, the market resolved in his favor, and he cashed out - twice, on April 6 and April 15, before Météo France caught on and filed charges

hyperstitions.

[smolalpha @smolalphas]

@wassielawyer @pept_aura

[smolalpha @smolalphas]

Good take 🤣

[wassieloyer @wassielawyer]

Yep this is the correct take.

Running a startup in Singapore is so negative EV that you select for retards who failed out of system, high functioning autists that refuse their place in the system and wealthy heirs trying to make their name outside the system.

The retard class is almost uninvestable, except for those who pivoted into the shadow economy (nightclubs, ktvs, gambling etc) in their teens and still maintain a code of brotherhood but good luck getting access to these people or convincing them to let you ape their KTV / Johor Vape Run. Avoid the system dropouts that pivoted to insurance sales like the plague (they basically sell financial scams to the elderly) and they will rug in the blink of an eye too. You might find a diamond in the rough that previously worked at a local tech company like Grab, Shoppee etc but it’s like finding a needle in a haystack bc it’s hard to tell them apart from a retard that got fired and will be pivoting into insurance if the startup LARP fails.

The high functioning autists are more investable but there are two main problems. To clarify - these are kids preordained by the Singapore system for high finance, bigtech, biglaw, medicine and other “high value” professions alongside a 2 million dollar mortgage but have somehow rejected their destiny.

The first problem is discoverability. The first class of autists fuck off to the West Coast, London or godforbid Berlin for college where they embrace and explore all their quirks that made them feel out of place in Singapore. The ones who went to Berlin are lost forever. The ones that went to California / London might, after a few years of self-discovery often involving sex, drugs and rock and roll financed by autistic superpowers or their parents, return to Singapore after either a family tragedy, the false promise of a good Asian wife / husband or their Western tax bill. You might be able to invest in them then as they seek funding for some grand moral mission to embrace or reject capitalism in their autistic niche area.

But the second class of autists that are investable don’t leave Singapore at all. You will find them in STEM, geeking out in the laboratories and computer science departments of universities, possibly in A Star. They speak a maximum of five sentences a day and are largely incapable of maintaining extended eye contact. But behind those bespectacled eyes in the acne scarred face is the potential engine of a billion dollar empire. Or a Chinese spy. Too bad you don’t speak autist.

The second problem is economic alignment. The autist does not understand money the way you do, if they did, they would be on half a mil+ comp packages within the system. You think just because you found them and funded them they work for your bags? No sir - they work for the mission. And you better pray that mission has the side effect of increased enterprise value or a path to liquidity. If not - thank you for your donation we will be applying our next gen quantum computing capabilities to solve poverty in sub-Saharan Africa.

Finally, the wealthy heirs. Success in the system means nothing because they will never emerge out of their parents’ shadow. Their grandfathers name is on your university lecture theatre.

Desperate to make a name for themselves, they will reject the family mandate to manage the real estate portfolio in order to found a startup. They might even take your venture cheque even though your fund is smaller than his inheritance bc an external fund provides “validation”. You will vie for allocation alongside people who want an intro to their dad.

Pros - they have near infinite funding and networks.

Downside - they don’t care about money and might be retarded. Good luck getting an exit.

[smolalpha @smolalphas]

@denistratos Interested

[smolalpha @smolalphas]

@labubu_trader @Manisnoobs Insane foresight bro

[EternaLEnVy @EternaLEnVy1991]

Some of the most retarded things I've seen in trading:

1. I streamed all my trades from Jan 2024 till ~Aug 2025 my entire run from 30K to multi 8 figs on my mentor's discord, an unprofitable trader who watched everyday stayed unprofitable trading their own style for majority of it.

2. A trader spent a decade trading everyday for multiple tens of thousands of hours and still remains unprofitable. I found him interesting and we were on dms for awhile. I was honestly trying to learn from him. Later on I suceed heavily and hes never once asked me for help even tho I got him sponsored by my rich friend to trade with more funds.

3. I recently tutored my good friend's friend for two sessions as a favor as they were interested in starting trading. That person had a bunch of things they wanted to explore but I tried to help them focus on a few ideas. It was clear they wanted to explore their own style and I was left on read (thank god).

4. At the beginning I was in dms of 3 ex pro players daily about trading. I reached out to all of them about trading with me more closely. They all rejected or wasn't too interested at the time even though I was starting to find sucess. Most haven't reached out to me since or took like 1.5 years to do so when its too late.

And many more...

All these retards wanted to "be themselves" and "find their own way." They don't want to admit they are heading the wrong path and they don't want to ask for help untill its giga undeniable (too late).

Honestly this is probably just normal human (retard) behaviour.

And they think I am eGomAXxing because of how I speak.

Realistically more real and humble than any negative trader.

The first real hope I found in trading when I first started was from going through a paid discord looking at how people talk and msging the people I considered the smartest to teach me something. Most rejected and didn't offer much but @gabriel__daher who was profitable at the time helped me and taught me some shit.

Reached out eventually and turned out he was no longer profitable. I taught him some shit for a few hours and dropped him off in another discord with some profitable traders as repayment for his kindness. Though basically I just left him a new starting point. He msged every fucking profitable trader there endlessly till he found a mentor. And now hes BALLIng.

Honestly almost every 8 fig trader I know has found their initial sucess through some mentorship or from working together with other traders and developing together.

I've personally learnt a lot from a lot of different traders throughout. But how do you get help from other traders?

At the end of the day its all about give and take.

Surprisingly people nowadays don't quite understand that.

Instead they are entitled and demand help. They annoy you and threaten you instead. Their idea is if they are terrible to someone they will get help from them eventually.

Bitch I rather burn all my fucking money than help you.

It's honestly just a sense of pride and honor as well. As a taker you need to know your place and to at least try to give back or at least feel in debted to try to help them out later.

Some people don't mind teaching a good guy who has potential and willing to work hard. Maybe try to be funny? Make them feel good for helping you.

The people who leech more than they give will be cut out eventually or just receive less.

For me how I got to learn from traders was by sharing to them than they did to me. Or if anyone ever shared something with me thats +ev first I would tax myself to give something back of value. But if those people take it for granted then thats that.

As an example some people taught me some shit first like @irigstocks or Zero and I was too bad to help them back but now I have returned the favor to help them out of being WASHED AND TRASH AS FUCK.

And of course my mentor who I have no idea where I would be now without him. But also without me I think he would be at 1/3 as well.

Give and pay your debts. I still have some left to pay.

(was gonna write something but im hungry peace)

[smolalpha @smolalphas]

@KatanTrades Dormy Inn. I like Premium Kanda one.

Onsen, Sauna, Cold Baths..

[smolalpha @smolalphas]

Too bad they committed fraud and got liquidated. If only they kept clean they'd be legends.

[Loshmi @loshmi]

maturing is realizing that FTX was one of the best investors in crypto industry:

> $500M in Anthropic would now be worth roughly $30.4B
> $1B in Solana would now be worth roughly $5.1B
> $648M in Robinhood would be $5.7B
> $100M in Sui would be $1.2B
> $1.15B in Genesis Digital Assets would be $3.5B
> $700M in SpaceX via K5 would be $3B

did some estimates and their total portfolio would be up from $4.7B to $52.5B which is a $47.8B in rise

absolutely nuts

[smolalpha @smolalphas]

Damn good business

[🇨🇳XuZhenqing徐祯卿 @XueJia24682]

✨🇨🇳A Chinese enterprise has shared its military inflatable models — they not only look authentic but are also mobile.

[smolalpha @smolalphas]

@based16z Bro the chop has been insane. I fucking hate it but great opportunity for those who traded the chop and positioned accordingly (short dated calls, long dated puts)

[smolalpha @smolalphas]

@edwardmorra_btc Try cutting all coffee and tea for a few days. See if it normalises.

Vitamin D from sun is OK but it your normally taking pills then best not to overdo it - I find 5000 IUs, particularly taken later in the day can affect my own sleep.

[smolalpha @smolalphas]

@edwardmorra_btc Magnesium glycinate. 1st gen (sedating) antihistamines are also great and will boost HRV temporarily.

No foods 4hrs before bed. No blue light.

Finally if you wanna throw money at the problem you can also pick up an @eightsleep

[smolalpha @smolalphas]

This is the top.

[Kalshi @Kalshi]

Kalshi x Bezel

Rolex. Omega. Cartier. Tudor.

Trade price movements of iconic watches.

Only on Kalshi.

[smolalpha @smolalphas]

@AIslop_ @CL207

[smolalpha @smolalphas]

@SingularityRes What happened to Gitlab which was called and related to Gavin Baker as well?

[Theo - t3.gg @theo]

Heads up: Anthropic is giving out $50 of free credit to many Claude Code users if you go to the usage dashboard and click "claim"

[smolalpha @smolalphas]

@nearcyan Good article - quite surprising that @eightsleep didn't perform well. Its known they are not limited by power constraints unlike wearables like Whoop or Oura.
Technically their sensors should have much more data but perhaps its a noise or data processing problem.