MacroTrader

Portfolio Update

@Fongern_FX Nobody builds a CDS index on vibes. Somebody upstairs with a real book on the long side asked for it.

⚠️ Big, really big bombshell: The same banks publicly calling private credit "manageable" just launched a CDS index to short it. In short: When banks build the instrument to bet against a market, the diagnosis is already made.

@Fongern_FX The first buyers of any new CDS index are the desks that built it. Outside money always shows up late and ends up holding the long leg.

@GlobalMktObserv Going from +730 to -80 in a single revision is IEA quietly admitting the demand side broke. Matters more than anything the supply side does from here.

‼️The Gulf energy shock is now destroying global oil demand at a scale not seen since 2020: The IEA now expects global oil demand to contract by -80,000 barrels per day in 2026, a reversal of -810,000 bpd from its prior forecast of +730,000 bpd👇 globalmarketsinvestor.beehiiv.com/p/physical-rea…

🚨Asia and Europe are running out of jet fuel: Jet fuel prices rose +70% since the US and Israel launched airstrikes on Iran six weeks ago, to $4.24 a gallon, according to the Argus US Jet Fuel Index. Europe has ~6 weeks of jet fuel remaining, though the situation varies significantly across the continent, with Britain, Iceland, and the Netherlands most at risk, while Austria, Bulgaria, and Poland hold more comfortable stocks, according to IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol. This comes as only ~10% of a barrel of oil goes to jet fuel, making it the most vulnerable refined fuel to supply disruptions, according to GasBuddy. After China and Thailand stopped exporting jet fuel to meet domestic needs, import-dependent markets including Vietnam, Myanmar, and Pakistan began running out of supply. Major European airlines including Lufthansa, Air France-KLM, and Ryanair have begun cutting flights and rationing fuel, with some Italian airports already restricting supply. Tokyo-London round-trip airfares on ANA's nonstop service surged +90% over the 50 days surrounding the start of the Iran war, to ~$3,010, according to Nikkei. Fuel surcharges on Japan-Europe routes are expected to exceed ~$503, per ticket if current kerosene prices persist, with JAL and ANA both considering raising surcharge caps. This is a crisis.

@DannyDayan5 Overheat was always there. The war just gave everyone an excuse to look past it for a few months.

Overheat is back as the key macro risk if the war is over.

@CryptoJelleNL Weekend sweeps are the ones that reclaim. Monday tape usually settles it.

$BTC testing the 100-day EMA, and potentially putting in a major sweep of the local highs - while also tagging the highs of a flag-like structure. Confirm the sweep over the weekend and it's an easy trade back down - with clear invalidation just above as well. Simple.

Iran just put a tollbooth on 20% of the world's oil supply. The price is $1 a barrel. And they want it in Bitcoin. On March 30, Iran's parliament passed a law called the Strait of Hormuz Management Plan. If you're a supertanker hauling 2 million barrels through that 21-mile stretch of water between Iran and Oman, you now owe Iran about $2 million to pass. In crypto. The IRGC (Iran's military, basically their Pentagon fused with a mafia) has reportedly been running this toll since mid-March. Accepted currencies: Chinese yuan, Bitcoin, and possibly USDT (a dollar-pegged crypto token). Public estimates put revenue at up to $20 million a day from oil tankers, and $600 to $800 million a month if you add in the LNG (liquefied natural gas) ships. The Strait of Hormuz is where one fifth of the world's oil flows. 138 ships a day, normally. After the US and Israel struck Iran on February 28, traffic collapsed to ONE vessel on March 7. Brent crude jumped from $71 to $128 in five weeks. The Bitcoin part is what I can't stop thinking about. Iran ran sanctions evasion through stablecoins for years. Their central bank alone held at least $507 million in USDT. Then Tether flipped the kill switch. Froze $37 million of Iran's central bank wallets in June 2025. Froze 42 more Iranian addresses in July. Since 2023, Tether has frozen $3.3 billion across 7,000 wallets. A stablecoin is basically a dollar with a compliance department attached. The company that issues it can freeze your money from a conference room in the British Virgin Islands. Bitcoin has no company, no office, no compliance department. Once a Bitcoin payment confirms, it is finished. Nobody on earth can reverse it. From a spokesperson at Iran's oil exporters union: tankers get "a few seconds to pay in Bitcoin, ensuring they can't be traced or confiscated due to sanctions." Picture a supertanker captain off the coast of Oman, engine idling, email open, scanning a QR code to send $2 million in Bitcoin before Iran waves him through. That is the scene actually playing out right now on the jugular vein of global energy. For years the Bitcoin debate was about price. Will it hit $100K, $500K, a million. A sovereign nation just made the real question obvious: what happens when the PROPERTIES of the money matter more than its price. For scale, Bitcoin's market cap is $1.33 trillion. The US Treasury market is over $35 trillion. Bitcoin cannot replace the dollar in global trade yet. But a $2 million toll doesn't need that kind of depth. It needs to not be freezable. Bitcoin clears that bar. Iran isn't the only one reaching. Trump signed an executive order in March 2025 setting up a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve of roughly 200,000 coins. El Salvador is up to 7,565. A CCP-backed (Chinese Communist Party) think tank at Renmin University published a paper calling Bitcoin a strategic reserve asset. Taiwan is reportedly evaluating it as insurance against a potential Chinese blockade. The world's most sanctioned regime, the world's most powerful government, a tiny Latin American country, a Chinese academic institution, and an island nation staring down a blockade are all reaching for the same asset for the same reason. Bitcoin's mid-March rebound rolled over at $76,000. A clean break above and this story stops being academic.

@NYoungfarmer @zerohedge Damn good point

@MoMoMacro @zerohedge Rbi offer gold as payment Dollar will get Delhi belly.

India's Central Bank Tells Oil Refiners To Stop Buying Dollars On Spot Market zerohedge.com/commodities/in…

@SuperBitcoinBro Once a flag outlasts the pole it stops being continuation and turns into its own chop zone. The double bottom at prior ATH is a much more honest test of who actually wants to be long.

@firstadopter Happens with every model swap. The rough edges get patched way before the vibes recover.

Bad social news cycle

Anthropic running out of compute is hurting their brand among customers. Honestly? We're paying customers. We deserve the service (and reliability uptime!) we paid for.

@yieldsearcher Severance cohorts also sit in IJC way longer than they used to. By the time the series confirms anything the labor market has already moved.

While I maintain that IJC is a less relevant labor metric in the age of the gig economy and severance packages, I would note that few people extend the logic of a lower breakeven payroll threshold (due to pop decline) to a lower breakeven IJC.

@AlphaWizarDD The snack cart compounds in rupees that actually circulate. SIPs compound in screenshots.

@GlobalMktObserv The adjusted 250 is the real print. The headline number is just Treasury calendar optics.

🚨The US government spending is out of control: The US government budget deficit increased +2% YoY in March, to $164 billion. However, adjusted for the timing of certain benefit payments, the March deficit would have been $250 billion 👇 globalmarketsinvestor.beehiiv.com/p/calendar-rel…

@blondesnmoney Means liquidity is running hotter than any of those headlines.

@orrdavid The edge is real but hardly anyone can actually take it. Most long-only books are locked up at the exact drawdown point where stepping in would pay.

Old school long/shorts will say this is clear evidence that markets are broken. But it's really a sign of markets becoming more competive, and no longer having this free lunch. Some long only guys could learn to step in at these extremes and collect a new free lunch.

@DeItaone Every AI chip deal comes with an equity swap now. Cash is barely the point.

OPENAI TO SPEND MORE THAN $20 BILLION ON CEREBRAS CHIPS, RECEIVE EQUITY STAKE - THE INFORMATION

@zerohedge Grain tape hasn't moved on any of this. Food shocks never announce themselves in advance.

Drought Engulfs 60% Of U.S. As Farmers Begin Spring Planting zerohedge.com/weather/drough…

@TankerTrackers Catch and release tells you nobody actually wants those barrels off the market right now.

Speaking of which: Another successful Catch & Release by France today. After holding her for nearly a month for flying a false flag, French authorities have release the Dark Fleet tanker DEYNA (9299903) along with her estimated 722,408 barrels of Russian crude oil.

How long before the EU starts buying Russian jet fuel?

@Bowtiedplayer Not Interested is the one button the algo treats as engagement.

Trying out the Not Interested feature. Somehow a bunch of hardline feminist dating advice keeps popping up in my algo lol

@dlacalle_IA Swimmingly and locked-and-loaded hit the same news cycle. Pick one.

Trump says war in Iran is going 'swimmingly' and 'should be ending pretty soon' cnb.cx/42eyioE