If you’re like me, you’ve been put off from digging deeper into DeFi by the terrible signal-to-noise ratio of anything crypto-related on the interwebs. That’s why I found this DeFi primer (using Maker DAO as a specific example) by ET contributor and banking analyst Marc Rubinstein to be so fantastic.

Recent major media stories that feel to us like they’re part of a larger narrative campaign.
Recent major media stories that feel to us like they’re part of a larger narrative campaign.

Modeling common knowledge by analyzing missionary statements and their reverberations works. Except when it doesn’t.
What do you get when you give a raccoon billions of dollars AND invisibility from regulators? Collusion and insider trading.
Most of us are under the impression that a protracted conflict within China will increase national unity. Not this time.
Recent Notes
Office Hours Recap 7/29/2022
These are the major topics and ideas we discussed during the 07/29/2022 Office Hours as well as some of the biggest takeaways. If you have something you want to add to the conversation, let us know in the comments and join us next time.
The Fifteen Faces of Fiat News
We’re building a Narrative Early Warning System (NEWS) as our first major research project in a larger effort to inoculate ourselves against the weaponized narratives of Big Tech, Big Media and Big Politics.
Cursed Knowledge #11: Locks of Love
Locks of Love is one of the most well known and well regarded charities in America. But things aren’t always what they seem. Sometimes the smokescreen of common knowledge can obscure what’s really going on. So join me in a look behind the curtain at America’s most beloved charity.
Office Hours Recap 7/22/2022
These are the major topics and ideas we discussed during the 07/22/2022 Office Hours as well as some of the biggest takeaways. If you have something you want to add to the conversation, let us know in the comments and join us next time.
Mailbag! Hollow Men Edition
The Epsilon Theory commentariat is the best thing on the Internet today. Watch from a distance if you like, but when you’re ready … join us!
Office Hours Recap: 07/15/2022
These are the major topics and ideas we discussed during the 07/15/2022 Office Hours as well as some of the biggest takeaways. If you have something you want to add to the conversation, let us know in the comments and join us next time.
Office Hours Recap: 07/08/2022
These are the major topics and ideas we discussed during the 07/08/2022 Office Hours as well as some of the biggest takeaways. If you have something you want to add to the conversation, let us know in the comments and join us next time.
Hollow Men, Hollow Markets, Hollow World
Over the past 25 years, our leaders have intentionally constructed an Apocalypse Now world of proclamation and fiat, where our wealth has grown much faster than our economy.
The bill is due for their hubris, and inflation is here to collect it.
How to Succeed as a Sell Side Trader
ET contributor Brent Donnelly has some advice that’s ostensibly for sell-side traders, but is actually for everyone in markets. And everyone who isn’t.
Office Hours Recap: 06/24/2022
These are the major topics and ideas we discussed during the 06/24/2022 Office Hours as well as some of the biggest takeaways. If you have something you want to add to the conversation, let us know in the comments and join us next time.
Office Hours Recap: 06/10/2022
These are the major topics and ideas we discussed during the 06/10/2022 Office Hours as well as some of the biggest takeaways. If you have something you want to add to the conversation, let us know in the comments and join us next time.
Being Human in a LARPing World
The cure for the cancer of gun culture and police culture is not to be found in reform laws around guns and police, but in reform ideas around culture, ideas that create a new dimension of American society that rejects LARPing and LARPers alike.
The MacGuffin, Part 1: The Corrupt Crypto ‘Revolution’
If you don’t see that the crypto “industry” has become just as blindingly corrupt, just as oozingly fatuous, just as profoundly captured by the Nudging Oligarchy as the traditional financial services industry it was supposed to replace … well, you’re just not paying attention.
The Most Important Trading Decision
Trading is hard. Your odds of success are heavily influenced by the seat you choose. Retail trader or bank trader or PM, here are metrics to evaluate that seat.
Cursed Knowledge #10: This Podcast Never Happened
We’ve all fallen victim to a bad retcon at some point in our lives. It’s Sherlock Holmes coming back from the dead. It’s the reveal that an entire season of Dallas was only a dream. It’s the author changing their mind and trying to convince you that it’s all part of the plan. I don’t buy it. And neither should you.
NGMI
The Fed’s rate hikes to curb inflation?
Not gonna make it.
Money Can Buy Happiness (in variable and diminishing quantities)
What does your money/happiness curve look like? Is it curved or linear? Does it flatline somewhere? If so, where?
There’s the game of trading and the metagame of life. To win the latter, you have to Know Thyself.
Winner’s Tilt
The most damaging stories and narratives are not those that others tell us, but those that we tell ourselves.
Waiting for the Dog to Bark
In the days leading up to their invasion of Ukraine, Russia successfully mounted a largescale cyberattack on Ukrainian banks, utilities and government agencies. Since then … crickets.
What are the vulnerabilities of Western financial systems to a new and wider attack?