We Live on a Planet of Innovative Sheep Who Wish to Graze in Peace

I am going off-topic this week because global events should not be ignored.

 

As investors and speculators, we are all capitalists. Some may deny this when sipping cocktails with their progressive friends in the trendy bars of London or Silicon Valley, but if you risk your money to make more money, you are a capitalist.

 

Some capitalists go on to build empires because they want power, but most capitalists simply want to build a better and more secure life for themselves and their families. When a capitalist risks his capital, he knows that he might lose what he has risked, and most speculators will do what they can to limit the amount of wealth that they might lose if things go wrong.

 

In financial markets, an environment where risk and reward are incredibly high, we are advised to set limits on how much of our wealth we should put at risk. In other words, “Don’t invest more than you can afford to lose” or “Do not speculate with money you need for paying your mortgage and other bills.” This advice is indeed very sound.

 

If we take our speculative activity seriously, and we should all approach the assumption of risk seriously, then we need to diversify our risk and not put all our eggs in one basket.

 

I know we all hear about and admire those who went against this idea, people who gambled on one company or product and made a killing. But in my experience, vastly more people were killed by not managing their risk than those who made a killing!

 

To manage our risk when playing in financial markets, we want two things: One is to play on a level playing field. Of course, there is no such thing as a level playing field in our business. Indeed, it is from the unevenness of prices that successful speculators derive their profits. The other thing we want is to play a game where the rules are not always changing, and especially, a game where the rules are not always changing to benefit our opponents.

 

This is where we come back to the empire builders.

 

Building a financial empire is the goal of all capitalists, investors, and speculators. Of course, the building of a financial empire involves a lot more than simply taking a risk, but I am not going to go into a diatribe about hard work, dedication, or luck, the lack of which causes most of us to fall short of this goal.

 

There is nothing wrong with being a capitalist and building a financial empire; it’s a great objective. However, when that financial power is used to influence politicians and political events, then we, and the rest of society, have a problem.

 

This is the situation we are now in.

 

We as individual capitalists are all about free markets, financial growth, and personal success, but ours is not the only ideology on this planet. We also have Marxists, the ideology of the unsuccessful and unambitious, and religious extremists whose idea of power and success involves forcing everyone to adopt their religious teachings.

 

I will take the idea of free-market capitalism and growth of the individual over the groupthink of Marxists and religious fanatics every day of the week.

As much as we get criticized for being greedy and self-indulgent, I would much rather that than demanding other people pay for my way of life or demanding that other people think the same way as I do. There is no moral high ground or righteous claim to be had if you do not respect the freedom of the individual.

 

Currently, our political and financial elites are using our money to impose their doctrines on us, and as they change the rules to cement their positions, the rest of us are suffering. Because we are suffering, other ideologies are seeing an opportunity to expand their influence and power.

 

This expansion inevitably leads to wars and deaths, and the number of deaths represents a number of individuals losing their lives.

 

More importantly for us, it is capitalists who fund these wars, and innovators who create not only the tools of war but also the tools to fund these wars. I am not talking about the small speculator like you or me or the smaller investment funds that help individuals grow their wealth. Nor am I talking about innovators such as Satoshi Nakamoto, who created a product that gave an opportunity to individuals to increase their financial freedom and independence.

 

I am talking about the financial empires that need wars to make money from their investments in the industrial military complex. Those financial empires that invest in China and the Middle East for financial gain, strengthening the position of competitive ideologies. I am talking about those active in the cryptocurrency industry who are helping our governments develop CBDC and bending over backward to solve the problem of making us all adopt digital identities, which ultimately will benefit future Marxist governments.

 

And these things bring me back to financial markets and the future of speculation.

 

What is the future of speculative markets when the government can control our money?

 

 

Much is said about the problem of CBDC and how it will damage our freedom to spend our own money. But what would happen if the government decided that we could not speculate or refused to allow us to pay our margins? What would happen if they decided that we could invest in one innovative company of their choosing but not one of our choosing? When this happens, financial markets will all but disappear, and with it will go our wealth.

 

In a nutshell, our enemies are not individuals or groups of peaceful individuals. Our enemies are those seeking power and influence, be they foreign or in our own over-powerful government.

 

I was born at the height of the Cold War, and I was a child during the Cuban Missile crisis; yes, I am that old. But I do not remember a time when we were closer to a world war than we are today. And I definitely cannot remember a time when our personal or financial freedoms were so limited, and these already limited freedoms were under increasing threats.

Perhaps if we want to be super innovative, we need to focus on what we can create to ensure a peaceful existence and protect the rights of the individual. Perhaps instead of building empires, we should do more to protect the Empire we live in and leave other people to live how they want in theirs.

 

I am sure that if everyone was allowed to live their own life in peace and away from the influence of big money and big government, who are constantly changing the rules of how we live, the world would be a much nicer and more prosperous place.

 

I feel like I should apologize for going off topic this week, but current events in the Ukraine and the Middle East are a real concern. The corruption by the Biden family and by the Sunaks in the UK cannot continually be dismissed. The power being assumed by the UN, the WEF, and the EU, has to be addressed, and things need saying before they completely control what is said on social media.

We need to challenge the power that the likes of BlackRock and Vanguard have over our societies, who use the money we invest with them to further Marxism through the promotion of ESG and DEI.

 

All these things are affecting our economies and markets and will have a detrimental effects on the future of our industry if things do not change.

More importantly, more important than money, they are leading us into wars and causing an increase in evil, terrorist activity. Something none of us want.