John, Keep connecting the dots! Rabbit Holes can be a good thing..
Your instincts along with your knowledge of history observations of current facts always lead you in the right direction. Have a great, but short fabulous vacation. Best as always
Thanks so much Dianne! Just back from a fabulous (if far too short) vacation of 2 days in Tuscany. We sat in the Roman thermal baths there, eat well (and drank even better wine) slept a bit; I feel quite human! Thanks about the rabbit holes. sometimes I think our community is like Holmes and Watson at 221B Baker Street, waiting for the next analytical adventure. My they long come!
Another question is the ultimate dynamics between the USA and Canada.
Thinking freely (unburdened by what has been - I would venture to say), the three middle states Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta have all the minerals and oil and gas that Russia (or China) has, with the USA as the immediate customers. Alberta wants out of the Ottawa claws long since. No love lost whatsoever with the capital and with Québec/Ontario elites.
Rare earths? Just prospect, and you will find. Minerals for the 21st (and even for the 22nd) century - problem solved. Take them in and you become unsinkable. Rest Canada would collapse, the same way Ukraine will collapse, or Spain collapsed in the New World.
Better still, Trudeau can only hang on for another year; then (he’s up by 20) we get Pierre Poillevre, conservative firebrand, who is very much on Trump’s wavelength; here’s to regionalisation!
The situation between China and Taiwan is no different, if anything even closer, more intimate, more friendly (at the family level) and less adversarial (yes!) than that between the USA and Mexico. The Taiwanese script is unreformed old Chinese script (untouched by Mao's simplifications). The biggest investors and the biggest trading partners both ways (by far).
ASML is their only problem (the machines that make the machines that make chips). CSMC (China Semi) can long since make any chips as long as they get the masks from ASML, no different from TSMC. The CVD (photochemistry) is entirely within their competency. If you can manufacture fentanyl, you can manufacture photochemicals. COMAC now makes entirely competitive jet airliners, China Eastern strategically buys from them instead of from Airbus now. They are short oil and gas but Russia can supply, from Sakhalin around the door. They are autarkic in coal and manufacture fertiliser from coal (urea, where coal is not a competitive disadvantage). They manufacture more than half the world's steel and alloys (essential for wars).
The nearshoring works against Taiwan continuing its alliance with the USA as Taiwan's US customer base is now at risk.
So really it comes down to politics, not resources or means - on either side of the Pacific.
..But yes, Erik, its not (to put it mildly) friendly at the political level. Its not the same and we are simply not (based on last week’s discussions) lose our credibility over Taiwan in the Indo-Pacific. The danger zone is about 3-4 years off, but it is coming.
The way to bet 2:1 Harris (0.67:0.33) odds in Europe is to do a massive bet on Trump against the "European quote" and take out all risk by doing the opposite Harris bet in the USA where the odds were 0.47:0.53 favouring Trump. You lose on the USA quote but win far more on the European quote. Basically you have only counterparty risk on the two brokers (or really the European broker (because the USA Harris bet is lost anyway). The spread between the 2 quotes is yours irrespective of the outcome.
Erik you know your stuff! However, the point i’m making is how absolutely analytically clueless the Europeans were about 2024; wish-casting par excellence!
John, Keep connecting the dots! Rabbit Holes can be a good thing..
Your instincts along with your knowledge of history observations of current facts always lead you in the right direction. Have a great, but short fabulous vacation. Best as always
Thanks so much Dianne! Just back from a fabulous (if far too short) vacation of 2 days in Tuscany. We sat in the Roman thermal baths there, eat well (and drank even better wine) slept a bit; I feel quite human! Thanks about the rabbit holes. sometimes I think our community is like Holmes and Watson at 221B Baker Street, waiting for the next analytical adventure. My they long come!
Another question is the ultimate dynamics between the USA and Canada.
Thinking freely (unburdened by what has been - I would venture to say), the three middle states Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta have all the minerals and oil and gas that Russia (or China) has, with the USA as the immediate customers. Alberta wants out of the Ottawa claws long since. No love lost whatsoever with the capital and with Québec/Ontario elites.
Rare earths? Just prospect, and you will find. Minerals for the 21st (and even for the 22nd) century - problem solved. Take them in and you become unsinkable. Rest Canada would collapse, the same way Ukraine will collapse, or Spain collapsed in the New World.
Better still, Trudeau can only hang on for another year; then (he’s up by 20) we get Pierre Poillevre, conservative firebrand, who is very much on Trump’s wavelength; here’s to regionalisation!
The situation between China and Taiwan is no different, if anything even closer, more intimate, more friendly (at the family level) and less adversarial (yes!) than that between the USA and Mexico. The Taiwanese script is unreformed old Chinese script (untouched by Mao's simplifications). The biggest investors and the biggest trading partners both ways (by far).
ASML is their only problem (the machines that make the machines that make chips). CSMC (China Semi) can long since make any chips as long as they get the masks from ASML, no different from TSMC. The CVD (photochemistry) is entirely within their competency. If you can manufacture fentanyl, you can manufacture photochemicals. COMAC now makes entirely competitive jet airliners, China Eastern strategically buys from them instead of from Airbus now. They are short oil and gas but Russia can supply, from Sakhalin around the door. They are autarkic in coal and manufacture fertiliser from coal (urea, where coal is not a competitive disadvantage). They manufacture more than half the world's steel and alloys (essential for wars).
The nearshoring works against Taiwan continuing its alliance with the USA as Taiwan's US customer base is now at risk.
So really it comes down to politics, not resources or means - on either side of the Pacific.
..But yes, Erik, its not (to put it mildly) friendly at the political level. Its not the same and we are simply not (based on last week’s discussions) lose our credibility over Taiwan in the Indo-Pacific. The danger zone is about 3-4 years off, but it is coming.
The way to bet 2:1 Harris (0.67:0.33) odds in Europe is to do a massive bet on Trump against the "European quote" and take out all risk by doing the opposite Harris bet in the USA where the odds were 0.47:0.53 favouring Trump. You lose on the USA quote but win far more on the European quote. Basically you have only counterparty risk on the two brokers (or really the European broker (because the USA Harris bet is lost anyway). The spread between the 2 quotes is yours irrespective of the outcome.
Erik you know your stuff! However, the point i’m making is how absolutely analytically clueless the Europeans were about 2024; wish-casting par excellence!