Authored by Stephen Soukup via American Greatness,

Years ago, when my oldest son was a Boy Scout, he was asked to write a report/make a presentation on a modern American “hero.” He chose Elon Musk, and I, of course, rolled my eyes so hard they nearly popped out of my head.

I knew Musk was a successful businessman, but I also knew that he was both an advocate for and a seasoned manipulator of Big Government. Tesla, for example, received a $465 million Department of Energy loan in 2010 under the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing program, a Big Government scheme to encourage private companies to advance Big Government priorities (namely, fighting Climate Change by reducing carbon emissions). Likewise, Tesla was, at least at the time, commercially viable only because of the more than $1 billion ($7,500/vehicle) in federal EV tax credits claimed by its buyers. Without government greasing the proverbial wheels a bit, Tesla would have struggled to get the literal wheels rolling out the sales floor doors.

Moreover, Musk publicly acknowledged that he voted for Obama and presented himself as part of the “green” business revolution, men and women who could and would “do well by doing good.”

My, how things change.

Just a short decade later, Elon Musk is, indeed, regarded as a genuine hero by most on the American political Right—and by anyone who favors free enterprise—while he is loathed and actively derided by his former friends and allies on the Left. Especially this past week, after the SpaceX IPO made him the world’s first trillionaire, the Democrats and other leftists who once loved him, partnered with him, and sang his praises loudly have shown nothing but contempt for him and hatred for his inarguable business success. As the controversial Democratic Senate nominee from Maine, Graham Platner, ominously put it, “Elon Musk just became the world’s first trillionaire. Let’s make sure he’s also the last.”

How, exactly, did we get here?

The biggest part of the story is Musk’s own political evolution, which proceeded slowly, in stages, but was accelerated at a handful of inflection points.

Of these inflection points, two stand out among the others.

The first of these took place during President Biden’s first year in office.

Biden and his administration were knee-deep in pushing a new, far more aggressive climate agenda. On his first day in office, Biden issued 17 executive orders, several of which addressed climate change and other environmental matters. Most notably, he signed an order to reinstate the nation’s participation in the Paris Accords, thereby placing a policy-making emphasis on electrification and decarbonization. A big part of that effort—as would be evinced in the “Inflation Reduction Act” passed the following year—was pushing the purchase of electric vehicles. To that end, on August 4, 2021, Biden hosted an EV “summit” at the White House. He invited three EV makers—General Motors, Ford, and Stellantis—to watch him sign another executive order, this one mandating that half of all new vehicles sold in the United States by 2030 be EVs. Of the three, GM had the largest percentage of its sales derived from fully electric vehicles—1.5 percent. Ford sat at 1.3 percent, and Stellantis didn’t even have an electric vehicle for sale in the American market. Meanwhile, Tesla was the nation’s largest EV auto seller at the time, and 100 percent of its vehicles were fully electric. Yet Musk and his company were left off the Biden team’s guest list.

What GM, Ford, and Stellantis did have, of course, was the support of the United Auto Workers Union. In fact, the three also just happened to be the largest UAW employers. Tesla, by contrast, had long fought the unionization of its factories and had been embroiled in a rather ugly dispute with the UAW. In response to the snub, Musk vented a bit, tweeting:

Biden held this EV summit. Didn’t invite Tesla.

Invited GM, Ford, Chrysler, and UAW. EV summit at the White House, didn’t mention Tesla once and praised GM and Ford for leading the EV revolution.

Doesn’t it sound a little bias? It’s not the friendliest of administrations.

Seems to be controlled by the unions.

Just under a year later, Musk reached the second inflection point, which also turned out to be his breaking point.

In May 2022, the S&P 500 ESG Index conducted its annual rebalancing. And when it did, it removed Tesla.

ESG stands for “environmental, social, and governance” investing, a strategy that purports to push corporations to address issues beyond traditional profits and losses, focusing on the broader societal impacts of their operations. I wrote a whole book about ESG (The Dictatorship of Woke Capital) in which I made the case that its flaws are numerous and disqualifying. One of the most significant of these is that ESG has no set definition. It means whatever its practitioners decide it means in the moment, based on little more than preference and convenience. And this is precisely where the S&P’s index ran into problems with Tesla.

By any objective measure, Tesla should have been a mainstay of any investment strategy focused on environmental benefits. It was and is a pioneer in carbon reduction strategies in the personal transportation market. What could be more environmentally friendly than that? The S&P, however, objected to Tesla’s procedural strategies, or lack thereof. It argued that Tesla didn’t have a published “low-carbon strategy,” or verifiable “codes of conduct.” It noted that the automaker had been accused of racial discrimination and didn’t do a great job of handling a National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) investigation. In short, the ESG index tossed the innovator in “E” technology off its list of acceptable companies because it valued the process of the ESG strategy more than it did the outcomes.

Needless to say, this incensed Musk. On May 18, he (once again) tweeted his frustration:

Exxon is rated top ten best in world for environment, social & governance (ESG) by S&P 500, while Tesla didn’t make the list! ESG is a scam. It has been weaponized by phony social justice warriors.

Not coincidentally, two and a half hours later, Musk returned to Twitter to make an announcement about his partisan political future:

In the past I voted Democrat, because they were (mostly) the kindness party. But they have become the party of division & hate, so I can no longer support them and will vote Republican. Now, watch their dirty tricks campaign against me unfold . . .

It is worth noting here that Musk didn’t just switch parties. He radicalized. His change in partisan affiliation and political involvement was night and day.

He went from a quiet, nominally aligned center-leftist to a full-blown, aggressive libertarian-conservative. Instead of giving $1,000 here and $1,000 there to Democratic candidates, he started throwing money into politics as if he’d never miss it (in part because he never would). He backed Donald Trump with millions of dollars and then joined his administration (for free) as the leader and organizer of DOGE. The combination of the union-driven and the ESG-driven snubs sent him over the edge. Not only would he no longer support Democrats, but he would support their opponents loudly and generously.

Although it would be easy (and not entirely wrong) to say that Elon Musk’s political evolution was a self-inflicted wound by the Democrats, who enthusiastically chased him out of their party, it’s more accurate to say that the break between the two was a structural inevitability. That inevitability was inarguably exacerbated and hastened by Democratic overconfidence and miscalculation, but that’s the difference between Musk simply leaving the party and becoming radicalized for the other side. Musk’s shift away from Democratic politics was likely always going to happen and is emblematic of the long-standing tension between so-called “progressives” and actual progress. The ideology that once sought explicitly to “better” the nation and its people has become little more than a machine for creating rules, often at the expense of that improvement. Musk’s fervent embrace of the Democrats’ opponents was driven by personalities—theirs, his, and probably Trump’s.

Think about it this way…

 The Progressive coalition traditionally has very much resembled the S&P ESG index noted above. It has always been carefully managed, regulated, labor-friendly, bureaucratic, and procedure-driven. It has always been more about process than outcome. Musk, for his part, is the opposite. He is disruptive, as capitalist entrepreneurs tend to be. He favors that which moves fast, eschews established rubrics, and achieves results. He is outcome-driven and cares very little (sometimes, maybe, too little) about process. The idea that he and today’s Democrats could have remained strongly aligned is, in retrospect, incongruous.

That’s not to say that he and the GOP are perfectly aligned, but certainly his ethos fits better there, at least for the moment.

The bottom line here is that while process values have their place, they can be self-defeating, particularly when they are allowed to serve as a substitute for experience and reality.

The Democrats don’t hate Elon Musk because he’s a trillionaire. They hate him because he became a trillionaire by breaking all their dearly held and largely outmoded rules.

There’s a profound lesson in that, if anyone is willing to learn it.

America remains one of the world’s most influential countries, but public opinion of the U.S. varies widely across the globe.

Some of its strongest support now comes from emerging economies such as Vietnam, India, and the Philippines, while favorability has weakened across several longtime Western allies.

This graphic, via Visual Capitalist’s Dorothy Neufeld, ranks how people in 45 countries view the U.S. using January 2026 survey data from Morning Consult’s America Reputation Tracker.

Where Positive Views Are the Highest

Israel and Nigeria rank first in the survey, with 83% of respondents holding favorable views of America.

Morocco, Vietnam, and Peru round out the top five, highlighting how some of the strongest support for the U.S. now comes from outside its traditional circle of Western allies.

India has the highest favorability rating of any major economy at 62%, ranking ahead of countries such as Canada, Germany, and France.

Argentina also places in the top 10, underscoring how perceptions of America are often strongest in countries that view the U.S. as an important economic, security, or strategic partner.

The Countries Souring on America

Trade disputes and rising political tensions have weighed heavily on America’s image among many of its traditional allies.

Tariffs on Canada and Europe, criticism of NATO, suggestions that Canada could become the 51st state, and President Trump’s interest in acquiring Greenland have all strained relations across the Western alliance. As a result, nine of the 10 lowest favorability ratings in the survey come from Western countries, including Canada, France, Germany, and Sweden.

In response to growing uncertainty around U.S. policy, Canada has expanded economic cooperation with Europe and sought closer engagement with China.

One of the survey’s most surprising findings is that China ranks ahead of several longstanding U.S. allies. Despite ongoing geopolitical rivalry between Washington and Beijing, America’s favorability rating in China exceeds that of countries including Canada, Belgium, and Sweden.

In other words, countries that have been America’s closest partners for decades now view it less favorably than its chief geopolitical rival.

To learn more about this topic, check out this graphic on how much U.S. states rely on imports from Canada, Mexico, and China.

Authored by Glenn Cameron via BitcoinMagazine.com,

There is now $15 billion sitting in three securities being marketed to bitcoin holders as the safer, smarter way to access bitcoin exposure: Strategy’s preferred stack, STRC, and SATA.

The pitch is identical across all three.

Tax-favored. 11.5% income. Backed by bitcoin. Money-market risk. 82.7% of the buyer base is retail.

Every word of that pitch is wrong, and the security those buyers actually own is built to fail in exactly the bitcoin environment it claims to harness.

The Pitch Is a Story. The Capital Structure Is the Truth

STRC is an unsecured, subordinated, perpetual preferred equity. No maturity date. No lien on a single satoshi of Strategy’s bitcoin treasury. The dividend is discretionary, which means the board can cut it at any monthly meeting with no notice, no remedy, and no vote. S&P rates the issuer B-, four notches into junk territory. None of that information appears in the marketing.

Stack those features against the words in the pitch. “Backed by bitcoin” describes a security with no claim on a single coin. “Money-market-like” describes an instrument rated four notches below investment grade with no maturity and a discretionary coupon. “Safe income” describes a payment the board controls and the funding source for which is the security itself. Each phrase in the marketing is contradicted by the indenture.

That is not a money market fund. It is speculative-grade credit-like product dressed in safe-income marketing, and 82.7% of it sits on retail balance sheets. Of the $10.7 billion notional outstanding for STRC, roughly $8.8 billion belongs to retail bitcoin holders concentrated in a single junk credit. There is no polite phrase for that exposure. It is a bag, and retail is holding it.

The Funding Mechanism Eats Itself

The structural risk in STRC is not that the dividend is high. It is that the dividend cannot be funded out of the business. Strategy’s underlying software business produces roughly $477 million in annual revenue. Total preferred dividend obligations now exceed $1.2 billion, a ratio of 3.5 to 1. The gap is not closed by earnings. It is closed by issuing new STRC shares at or above par, or diluting common shareholders of MSTR, with the proceeds recycled to pay the existing holders.

That is a reflexive funding loop. It works when STRC trades above par and breaks the moment it doesn’t. Anything that pressures the price, a credit downgrade, a missed dividend, a bitcoin drawdown, a capital markets shutdown, removes the very mechanism the dividend depends on. There is no plan B in the indenture. There is no lien on bitcoin to seize. There is no operating cash flow to redirect. There is only the next share issuance, and the next, until either bitcoin compounds the company out of the problem or the structure jams.

Then there is the dividend ratchet. The coupon has moved monthly from 9% to 11.5%, embedding $268 million in permanent annual obligations into the structure. The rate has only ever moved in one direction. Each monthly increase makes the funding gap wider, the share issuance more dilutive, and the price floor harder to hold. The mechanism designed to keep STRC attractive to new buyers is the same mechanism that compounds the burden on the issuer and accelerates the run on the funding loop when stress arrives.

The Mythical Institutional Buyer and the Math That Buries Him

The standard defense of the Digital Credit category goes like this: surely informed institutional capital is on the other side. Insurance companies need yield. Pension funds need duration. Fixed-income desks need product. Digital Credit is the institutional bridge to bitcoin.

That defense collapses on its own logic. Any institution that allocates to an unsecured, subordinated, perpetual preferred layered on a bitcoin treasury must first underwrite the underlying asset. Any institution that does the work to underwrite bitcoin allocates directly to spot bitcoin, where the credit risk vanishes and the path-dependent fragility goes with it. The institutional buyer who is both informed and rational does not exist in this product. The buyer who does exist, at 82.7% concentration, is retail.

The path-dependency math finishes the argument. Across 5,000 simulated bitcoin paths at a 10% compounding rate, the credit model produces a 12.3% probability of formal default, a 21.9% probability of dividend deferral, and a 50.7% probability of at least one forced bitcoin sale by the issuer during the eight-year cycle. At a 15% compounding rate, STRC has a 44.6% probability of ending below $85 even on paths where bitcoin recovers to new highs.

A bitcoin holder’s terminal wealth depends only on where bitcoin ends. An STRC holder’s outcome depends on every drawdown in between, because the same mechanisms that pretend to protect the dividend in calm conditions become the mechanisms that consume the holder’s principal in stress. The product is most fragile in exactly the bitcoin scenarios the underlying asset absorbs without consequence.

Bitcoin Was Built to Kill This Exact Trade

Bitcoin’s entire reason for existing is the removal of counterparty risk, custody risk, and opacity from monetary holdings. STRC, Strategy’s preferred stack, and similar instruments reintroduce all three under a marketing layer the underlying instrument cannot support. The alternative does not require any of that machinery: bitcoin in self-custody alongside a U.S. Treasury income ladder produces the same cash profile, with more terminal wealth and no corporate issuer in between.

The market will eventually clear the difference between the security retail thinks it bought and the security it actually owns. Anyone reading the cap table and allocating anyway is willingly underwriting Saylor’s funding plan with capital that thinks it bought a money market fund.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ZeroHedge.

 Submitted by QTR’s Fringe Finance

GLJ Research’s Gordon Johnson is one of my favorite analysts on the street to read and gets a rare endorsement from me (I hate basically everyone selling sell-side style research) because, like my friend Mark Spiegel, he is one of the last few analysts out there that seems committed to the truth….no matter how ridiculous it makes him look in the short term while he’s waiting for his theses to play out.

Johnson came away from this week’s Fed meeting with a conclusion that would have sounded almost absurd just a few months ago: the Fed may finally be breaking with the post-2008 playbook. And the timing couldn’t be better for the Fed to do this to make a total fool out of me. After all, I literally just predicted a month ago there’s no way they would ever stop the neverending cycle of QE they started two decades ago. Days ago, I satirically wrote that the only bear case left for markets is total human extinction.

Enter Kevin Warsh’s first press conference as Fed Chair with inflation running completely out of control. My friend GoJo makes the…err…bold claim that the Fed is not tweaking it’s post-2008 playbook…not adjusting it around the margins…breaking with it.

Johnson’s central argument is that Kevin Warsh’s first meeting as Fed Chair represented a repudiation of the Bernanke-Powell era and a return to a much older conception of central banking…one where the Fed’s primary job is delivering price stability, not reassuring investors, supporting asset prices, or providing a detailed roadmap for every future policy move.

The actual rate decision this past week was almost beside the point. The Fed held rates steady at 3.50%-3.75% for a fourth consecutive meeting. What mattered was everything around it. Warsh stripped forward guidance from the statement, calling it ill-suited to the current environment. He refused to submit his own dot-plot projection. The statement itself was shortened and reduced largely to facts. Nine of twelve participants now expect at least one hike by year-end.

Meanwhile, Warsh launched multiple task forces to reevaluate the Fed’s framework and openly emphasized the institution’s obligation to restore credibility on inflation.

Markets did not exactly celebrate at first (before, of course, turning higher on Thursday). On Wednesday, stocks sold off, gold weakened, two-year Treasury yields surged, and September hike odds nearly doubled. Investors who showed up hoping to hear some variation of “cuts are coming” instead got a lecture on inflation credibility and a reminder that the Fed’s mandate is not maximizing the S&P 500.

To Johnson, this wasn’t simply a hawkish meeting. It was the opening shot of a regime change. His view is that the modern Fed became two things after 2008. First, it became obsessed with transparency. Every possible future policy path was telegraphed through dots, forecasts, projections, speeches, press conferences, and carefully managed expectations.

Second, and more importantly what I argue all the time, is that it it became a de facto backstop for risk assets. Investors learned that serious market weakness would eventually trigger accommodation. Bad economic news became good market news because it increased the probability of Fed support.

Johnson believes Warsh is deliberately dismantling that framework. No dot. Less guidance. Fewer promises. More uncertainty. More emphasis on inflation. More willingness to surprise markets. In Gordon’s telling, the “Fed put” is not merely being questioned; it is being retired. That is a massive claim. It’s also why Johnson reaches for perhaps the biggest comparison available: Paul Volcker.

In a note out to clients this week, Johnson argues that Warsh’s intellectual instincts are fundamentally different from Bernanke’s. Bernanke’s worldview was shaped by the Great Depression and the dangers of deflation. Warsh’s appears much more shaped by the inflationary experience of the 1970s.

Johnson points to Warsh’s long-running criticism of quantitative easing, his concerns about balance-sheet expansion, and his warnings about inflation risk dating back more than a decade. He also highlights Warsh’s role during the QE2 debates, when Warsh publicly expressed skepticism about the very policies his institution was pursuing and eventually left the Board before his term expired.

In Johnson’s interpretation, today’s Warsh is the same man who spent years warning that emergency monetary policy was becoming permanent monetary policy. That’s why he sees continuity rather than reinvention. To Gordon, this isn’t a politician adopting hawkish language because it’s fashionable. It’s someone who has been making versions of the same argument for fifteen years and now finally has the votes.

This all sounds great. I hope Gordon is right. I have a sneaking suspicion that he isn’t. And before we start engraving “Volcker 2.0” onto commemorative plaques, it’s worth remembering a few things.

The first is that the easiest thing in the world for a central banker to do is talk tough. The hardest thing in the world for a central banker to do is stay tough.

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Volcker’s legacy wasn’t built on speeches, communications strategy, or symbolic changes to Fed procedures. It was built on tightening until inflation broke despite overwhelming political pressure, market turmoil, and public outrage. The real Volcker test begins when unemployment rises. The real Volcker test begins when stocks are down 25%. The real Volcker test begins when Congress starts screaming and the White House decides inflation is suddenly less important than growth.

And that has been the time where the chickenshit cowards who advocate for today’s monetary policy go into full panic mode and capitulate, sometimes on national television.

If we’re being honest, the Fed’s institutional history doesn’t exactly inspire confidence. Every cycle begins with stern declarations about price stability. Every cycle begins with promises that inflation will be defeated and that credibility is paramount. Then something breaks…a bank, a market, a major employer, a politically important sector, or the broader economy itself, and suddenly the framework gets rewritten, CNBC anchors shit themselves and act like 2 year olds throwing temper tantrums, and the Fed and Treasury come to the rescue. Then, the Fed chair at the time is praised for having “courage” and wins the Nobel Prize.

The emergency becomes permanent. The temporary facility becomes structural. The exception becomes the rule. The Fed’s modern history is not one of relentless discipline. More often than not, it’s a story of capitulation followed by a very sophisticated explanation for why capitulation was actually prudent policy all along. As Peter Schiff often says, “there’s nothing more permanent than a temporary government program”.

And that’s the part of Gordon’s thesis I’m not yet willing to underwrite.

To be clear, I’m not dismissing it. In fact, I think Johnson is right to focus on the reaction function rather than the rate decision itself. A central bank’s communication framework often tells you more than a 25-basis-point move ever could. If Warsh is truly trying to reintroduce uncertainty into markets, force investors to price risk without a guaranteed backstop, and reorient the institution around inflation rather than asset prices, that would represent a profound shift.

The problem is that every Fed chair looks tough before something important breaks.

Personally, I’m not ready to declare that Warsh is picking up where Volcker left off. I am willing to wait and see. If he continues prioritizing inflation over asset prices, if he accepts market pain as a necessary consequence of restoring credibility, and if he proves willing to keep tightening in the face of inevitable pressure, then perhaps Gordon’s thesis will prove correct.

What I do think Gordon gets right is the underlying inflation question.

As I have written repeatedly, if inflation is genuinely persistent, rate hikes are ultimately necessary. There is no magic workaround. There is no AI-powered escape hatch. There is no press-conference solution. Inflation is not defeated through clever narratives or optimistic forecasts. It is defeated through tighter monetary conditions that reduce demand, re-anchor expectations, and restore confidence in the currency.

History is fairly clear on that point, which is why so many people celebrate Volcker today while simultaneously advocating policies that would make a genuine Volcker-style campaign impossible. Everyone loves inflation fighters in retrospect. Very few people are willing to tolerate the economic pain required to actually defeat inflation in real time.

That’s why I remain skeptical. Because the Fed has spent the better part of two decades teaching markets that pain will eventually be relieved. Breaking inflation is hard. Breaking expectations and psychology that has become laden with hubris and euphoria is harder, as I wrote back in early 2025. Breaking the institution’s own reflex to intervene may be hardest of all.

So yes, Gordon may be right that the Fed put is dying. He may even be right that Warsh intends to kill it. But intentions are cheap. Every Fed chair sounds independent until the pressure arrives. Every Fed chair talks about credibility until credibility becomes expensive. As Mike Tyson said famously, “everybody’s got a plan until they get punched in the mouth.”

I love reading Gordon’s take and will continue to do so. But I’ll only believe the Fed put is dead when the next crisis arrives and the Fed refuses to revive it.

I’d love to hear your take on what you think Warsh’s tenure will look like in our ongoing discussion here. Who’s stance do you agree with more?

—

QTR’s Disclaimer: Please read my full legal disclaimer on my About page here. This post represents my opinions only. In addition, please understand I am an idiot and often get things wrong and lose money. I may own or transact in any names mentioned in this piece at any time without warning. Contributor posts and aggregated posts have been hand selected by me, have not been fact checked and are the opinions of their authors. They are either submitted to QTR by their author, reprinted under a Creative Commons license with my best effort to uphold what the license asks, or with the permission of the author.

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As of May 20, 2026 I personally no longer actively trade (read my story here). My investing/saving is done by recurring contributions mostly to sector ETFs and a few select equities, trusted third parties who oversee my accounts, and advisors. Such advisors or funds, through individual equities, options, index funds, mutual funds, ETFs, or other securities, may have positions in, exposure to, or holdings of names mentioned herein that I know nothing about. Basically, via index funds, ETFs and individual equities it is possible I could own, have exposure to, or not own anything at any point. As of the same date, May 20, 2026, in an attempt to lead a healthier lifestyle, I’ve also excluded myself from fantasy sports, sports betting, online and in-person casinos and prediction markets.

And all positions can change immediately as soon as I publish this, with or without notice and at any point I can be long, short or neutral on any position. You are on your own. Do not make decisions based on my blog. I exist on the fringe. If you see numbers and calculations of any sort, assume they are wrong and double check them. I failed Algebra in 8th grade and topped off my high school math accolades by getting a D- in remedial Calculus my senior year, before becoming an English major in college so I could bullshit my way through things easier.

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As we have detailed extensively, most recently here: “Blackrock’s Private Credit Fund Gates Investors Again After Redemption Requests Surge “, private credit firms continue to face a flood of redemption requests…

And after this week’s report from Fitch Ratings, it appears any light at the end of the tunnel is an oncoming train.

As Andrew Moran reports for The Epoch Times, the U.S. private credit default rate remained at a record high in May, according to the latest update from Fitch Ratings.

Private credit woes this year have taken a backseat to various headwinds and tailwinds, whether the war in Iran or SpaceX’s blockbuster debut on Wall Street.

But data suggest that pressures are still mounting for the industry.

Fitch Ratings said its Private Credit Default Rate remained at a record 6 percent in May, unchanged from the previous month.

Monitoring approximately 1,500 private credit issuers, Fitch logged 14 default events last month. Healthcare providers, business services, and industrial manufacturing each registered three events.

Six serial defaulters—issuers that have defaulted multiple times—were discovered by Fitch. Additionally, half of the default events consisted of maturity extensions under stress.

“This continued the prior month trend of maturity extensions under stress outpacing all other default scenarios,” Fitch reported.

“Five of the seven maturity extensions pushed loan maturities out by one to two years from their original maturity dates, while one extended the maturity by seven months and another extended it by one month.”

It is unclear whether the worst is over for the $2 trillion private credit sector, as more investment firms continue to see client exodus or impose capital redemption limits.

Turmoil Persists

In a recent letter to shareholders, BlackRock Private Credit Fund stated that shareholder repurchase requests reached more than 13 percent of outstanding shares in the second quarter, pushing past the investment vehicle’s 5 percent quarterly limit for the first time since it launched in June 2022.

Blackstone, the world’s largest alternative asset manager, said earlier this month that it is capping withdrawals at its flagship private credit fund as redemption requests surged in the April–June period. It reassured investors that limiting drawdowns would boost long-term gains.

Partners Group, the Swiss-listed fund manager, halted redemptions from its Global Value SICAV fund at 5 percent after withdrawal requests reached almost 10 percent.

David Layton, CEO of Partners Group, said the majority of withdrawals are coming from the retail side, which accounts for about 20 percent of overall investments.

“What you’re doing is you’re balancing the needs of certain investors—a small percentage of the fund that would like to get liquid—with the needs of the remaining segment of the investor population that would like to see that fund continue to invest and continue to compound,” Layton said in a June 3 interview with Bloomberg TV.

The Swiss private markets juggernaut later shot down reports that it would cap more fund withdrawals following a spike in drawdown requests.

“Partners Group has no intention of altering any documented liquidity mechanisms and has no plans to freeze any of its evergreen vehicles, given their portfolios are healthy and they have sufficient liquidity in line with the target allocations,” it said in a June 12 statement.

Systemic Risk ‘Less Pronounced’

Concerns that private credit could be the next subprime meltdown after 2008 and 2009 have been widespread, fueled by growing retail participation and the “SaaSpocalypse.”

Private credit is widely exposed to the software sector, accounting for up to 20 percent of its loans. When software stocks were hammered earlier in the year due to worries that artificial intelligence would upend business models, the private credit industry also took a beating.

But a chorus of market watchers argues that systemic risks are minuscule.

“Systemic risk appears far less pronounced than between sub-prime and the financial system in 2008,” LSEG analysts said in a June 15 analysis.

“We note that [private credit] largely withstood the Covid and Ukraine shocks in 2020-22 and that both lenders and borrowers are well aware of the risks involved in these loans, whence the covenant-protection is generally greater.”

Investors seem to agree, as private credit stocks joined the broader market rally over the last few days.

Still the bounce remains modest amid YTD declines…

Authored by Daniel Nuccio via The Brownstone Institute,

AI is everywhere. It’s getting incorporated into everything. That’s simply progress, we’re told. And therefore we need to embrace it, lest we look like a Luddite and let China win (whatever that means).

Yet, simultaneously, a lot of people also are afraid because of AI. Very afraid. And sometimes, we’re told that we should be afraid too.

However, in public discourse surrounding AI, there often can be a lack of detail regarding what specifically we’re supposed to be afraid of. Sometimes it is not even clear what is meant by the term “AI.”

Technically speaking, as I have touched on previously, one could argue (as some older computer scientists do) that AI is an umbrella term for a family of algorithms based in math that sometimes dates back more than a half-century. 

Practically speaking, numerous programs we’ve been living with for years like Google Maps and Amazon’s recommender system can be thought of as AI despite their lack of novelty. Yet, in public discourse, the term AI tends to refer to generative AI (e.g, ChatGPT), as well as any number of hypothetical future programs that will do everything humans can do but better, will therefore both solve all our problems while also putting most of us out of work, and also eventually just might decide to go full Skynet on us unless they decide that we’re not worth the trouble.

(Sounds pretty sexy. Perhaps someone should make a series of movies about it. Perhaps people will even like two out of five of them.)

Unfortunately, though, these more hyperbolic, sci-fi depictions of the threat(s) posed by AI tend to get more attention than, and consequently distract from, more realistic and more imminent threats pertaining to privacy, freedom, autonomy, and even just a way of life many of us have come to enjoy. 

Automatic license plate readers, facial recognition, digital grandmothers, mandatory drunk and distracted driving detection programs, any of the technologies “grandson” was shouting about in “Autonomous Delivery Robot,” and wearable recording devices that transcribe and process in-person conversations for the anti-social and easily distracted are just of a few of the more realistic threats that come to mind. (And this by no means is a complete list).

Therefore, I tend to appreciate when members of our ruling class can take a morning to have a measured conversation about fairly well-defined threats posed by this technology (or suite of technologies), as was done at the US House of Representatives’ Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection Subcommittee’s June 4 meeting on the “AI Security Landscape.”  

Superficially, the meeting’s discussion could probably be framed in terms of “Is the greatest threat posed by AI an external one in the form of foreign hackers looking to exploit vulnerabilities in the software controlling the United States’ critical infrastructure or an internal one born from the lack of regulation and accountability for AI’s use at home?”

From watching the discussion, however, it seemed less like a matter of “either or” and more like an uncontested response of “Yes and…”

Sandra Joyce of Google, Frontier Model Forum executive director Chris Meserole, and Corridor Security Inc. CEO and co-founder Jack Cable provided testimony regarding how AI is transforming the cybersecurity landscape as digital weapons fall into the hands of the cyber-barbarians at the gates who will use those weapons to find vulnerabilities in our critical infrastructure and/or deploy ransomware attacks.

“This technology has impacted cybersecurity in profound ways for both the defender and the attacker,” stated Joyce.

“[H]ackers have more powerful tools than ever,” Cable noted, naming Mythos and GPT-5.5 specifically.

“These models aren’t just hype,” he warned.

“They are truly starting to rival or exceed humans on security tasks and do so at an unprecedented scale.”

Joyce suggested “threat actors” don’t even need something like Mythos and can be quite capable of doing a lot of damage with an older program.

Emphasizing the threats from within, Electronic Frontier Foundation senior policy analyst Matthew Guariglia stated, “The question is not how do we reign in AI, it’s how do we reign in the agencies that would unleash AI on the American public?”

In his testimony, Guariglia highlighted how the US national security state already uses a variety of tools that collect data on people without probable cause and that can make “inferences about a person’s politics, personal life, religion, and geolocation, sometimes inaccurately with major consequences.” 

Furthermore, Guariglia said, “AI also has a track record of getting things wrong, from false citations on legal briefs to a major AI mistake that sent DHS recruits to the field without proper training.” 

“There are likely more consequential examples that we don’t even know about because of classification that would prevent a more thorough accounting,” he added.

Similarly, Rep. Delia Ramirez (D-IL) observed, “We’re watching AI-powered monitoring systems spread to schools, to public housing, to hospitals with no transparency about how they work, no ability to challenge them, and no recourse when they’re wrong.”

In a later exchange concerning a possible scenario in which an AI program designates a city’s water supply as compromised when it is in fact fine and subsequently restricts the ability of the city’s residents to access water, Guariglia and Ramirez suggested that within the confines of current US law, transparency about how the problem occurred would likely be left up to the discretion of the city implementing the system while the question of who can be held accountable is a rather nebulous one.

Despite not quite being as sexy as battling T-800s in the streets for our lives and our livelihoods, more ransomware attacks, a further erosion of our privacy, and a lack of required transparency and accountability when HAL makes an oopsy and shuts off everyone’s water all sound pretty serious even if these things don’t quite warrant mass hysteria or a movie franchise. Perhaps they are even sufficient for reasonable concerns over the current zeitgeist to incorporate AI into everything. And maybe, just maybe, they provide reason to make us rethink our decision to connect everything in modern life to the internet.

Authored by Noel Williams via AmericanThinker.com,

So far, the World Cup is living up to Gianni Infantino’s (FIFA President) clarion call to “unite the world” (or at least the participating nations therein).

Of course, that could quickly change when we get to the knockout stages of the tournament when they’re more overwrought emotions and rivalries are more intense.

In the meantime, soccer fans from far-flung places are reveling in America’s beauty and bounty.

They appreciate America more than Dems, which is not surprising since most Dems are anti-American.

There are three glorious American attributes that are drawing particular praise from our World Cup visitors: the warmth and friendliness of the people (they must not be commingling with Dems), the natural beauty of the country, and the food.

But what about the beer?!

Scotland fans drank the pubs in Boston dry. At the Adams Taproom, they drank four times as much Boston Lager as the bar usually sells.

They better call for emergency deliveries because guess who’s in town next? England!

The English, like the Scots and other fans, are also loving America.

It must be a relief to breathe deep the fresh American air, and evade the P.C. Police in blighted Old Blighty.

The Three Lions (nickname for their teams) will play Ghana at Gillette Stadium (aka, Boston Stadium during the World Cup) next Tuesday — and they are not known to be teetotalers. 

This exuberant fan is not atypical as he endeavored to get drunk before, during, and after the game against Croatia in Dallas.

“We’re going to get drunk before the game. We’re going to get drunk during the game. And then we’re going to get drunk after the game.”

The match doesn’t start for another few hours, but England fans have a plan. pic.twitter.com/RSBYt2oguh

— FOX 4 NEWS (@FOX4) June 17, 2026

To the birthplace of the American Revolution: The English are coming, the English are coming. Let’s have a proper Boston Beer Party. Should they turn into unruly hooligans, there’s always Boston Harbor to sober them up.

Even if the ale and lager procurers underestimate the fans’ drinking prowess, America’s munificence is unparalleled.

It’s so refreshing to hear the objective opinions of our gracious visitors (mostly unaffected and uninfected by TDS), contrasted to the damning Dems.

For example, imagine the leftist angst incurred when a fan admired a scantily-clad cheerleader; the Scot in this sincere scene was simply agog (I doubt the Scottish ladies tartan tans compare).

Tartan Army are not used to cheerleaders! 😂@WeAreSTVRadio pic.twitter.com/sY00udItqX

— Cat Harvey (@MissCatHarvey) June 14, 2026

No longer dependent on the leftist press, our World Cup visitors can believe their “lying eyes”: we are still the last great hope of Earth.

Therefore, when the U.N. or other pretentious “dumb-gentsia” group ranks the most “livable countries,” they should consider their ability to host such a spectacular spectacle.

Go USA!

Short of abolishing the Fed (much preferred), would automating the Fed make more sense than the current system? Should we trust Kevin Warsh, Jerome Powell, and Lisa Cook to read the tea leaves each month and decree rate changes for us commoners? 

That was Fundstrat’s Mark Newton’s suggestion during last night’s ZeroHedge debate on his H2 market outlook. He pointed out the new chair’s plan to eliminate “forward guidance”, a term invented under the previous chair Powell in which the Fed strategically signals its plans on rate changes so that those signals themselves might change rates organically by market forces.

It’s all a big mess… but Newton and BTIG’s Jonathan Krinsky also debated whether the AI trade is in a bubble and which sectors look like attractive investment opportunities. Here were Newton’s remarks on the Fed and other highlights, though we recommend watching the full debate at the end:

Automate The Fed

Fundstrat’s Mark Newton believes incoming Fed Chair Kevin Warsh could face a difficult balancing act from day one.

“I think he’s got his work cut out for him,” Newton said, noting that Warsh will be speaking for a Federal Reserve committee that has “turned clearly hawkish” while simultaneously facing pressure from an administration that “almost always wants to cut rates to juice the economy.”

Rather than focusing on rate cuts themselves, Newton argued the biggest change under Warsh may be how the Fed communicates. “My take is that there’s gonna be far less forward guidance or even a dot plot under Warsh, less communication,” he said. Markets have become accustomed to a steady stream of comments from Fed officials, and Newton warned that the transition could create volatility as investors try to recalibrate.

WARSH: I THINK THAT MARKETS PERFORM BEST WHEN REACTING TO INCOMING DATA, THEY WORK LESS EFFICIENTLY WHEN THEY ASK HOW WILL THE FED REACT TO THAT INCOMING INFORMATION

Finally, the 4th wall falls

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) June 17, 2026

Newton also mused about automating the entire FOMC, questioning the dated practice of a council of economists working with clunky tools to periodically tinker with the entire nation’s (and world’s) economy.

“If there’s one area that’s ripe for regime change by AI completely, it’s the Federal Reserve,” he said. “They’re looking at data going back over the last few years to try to make decisions on whether to cut interest rates, which will take twelve to eighteen months to materialize in the economy. That does not make any sense in 2026.”

pic.twitter.com/qLXBEgdTQs

— ZeroHedge Debates (@zerohedgeDebate) June 19, 2026

“The AI trade will continue into 2028”

Where many see a bubble, Fundstrat’s Mark Newton sees an opportunity.

“I do not see a bear market in technology,” he said, arguing that the sector is likely headed for a period of consolidation rather than a major decline. Semiconductors may need to “back and fill” after their recent run, according to Newton.

He remains bullish on the longer-term AI story but did say there are signs that it’s overbought near-term. Newton highlighted the Relative Strength Index (RSI) on the highly-watched Invesco Equal Weight Tech ETF.

“That’s all a good thing for tech. It’s just that when an RSI level of 78 on equal-weighted technology, it’s not the best risk reward for me over the next three to six months.”

On banks, REITs, travel, consumer discretionary, and healthcare sectors, Newton sees improving momentum, noting that “most European and also U.S. commercial banks have been showing very good strength” while REIT ETFs are “breaking out to multi-year highs.”

“Consumers snapping back over the next couple months” following a ceasefire success, he said, would benefit airlines, hotels, and beaten-down discretionary names. Newton specifically likes Delta, Marriott, booking companies, and apparel Ralph Lauren. 

pic.twitter.com/pnOF5LInOu

— ZeroHedge Debates (@zerohedgeDebate) June 19, 2026

Watch the full debate below, watch on Adam Taggart’s Thoughtful Money channel, or listen on Spotify.

https://t.co/jxITOFkt3p

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) June 18, 2026

Authored by Steve Watson via Modernity,

The insane attack at a family-run zoo in Cambridgeshire, UK has now produced a fresh outrage.

A three-year-old boy from the area remains in critical but stable condition at Addenbrooke’s Hospital after being thrown into a crocodile enclosure.

Yet, the 30-year-old man from Norfolk arrested on suspicion of attempted murder has already been released on bail until 18 September. Police assessed him as “unfit for interview” and continue to withhold his identity from the public.

Man arrested after child, 3, ‘thrown into crocodile enclosure’ released as suspect ‘unfit for interview’ https://t.co/NRmW0yzmkL

– GB News (@GBNEWS) June 19, 2026

This follows the initial reporting of the incident at Johnson’s of Old Hurst zoo near Huntingdon. As covered in our earlier piece on the initial incident and rampant online speculation about the identity of the man who was arrested.

The boy and the suspect were not known to each other, and detectives from the Major Crime Unit treated the case as a serious criminal investigation from the outset.

Cambridgeshire Police confirmed the release after the assessment. Detective Inspector Verity McCann stated: “Our enquiries are ongoing as we continue to understand the circumstances surrounding this distressing incident. Our thoughts remain with the boy and his family, and specialist officers continue to support them through this difficult time.”

Witnesses described a heroic intervention that prevented an even worse outcome. The zoo owner’s wife reportedly jumped 15 feet into the crocodile enclosure to pull the injured toddler to safety.

Staff administered immediate medical treatment at the scene before emergency services arrived. The boy suffered serious wounds from at least one crocodile attack inside the enclosure.

Reports indicate he suffered a broken arm, a broken pelvis, likely stemming from the impact after being thrown, as well as multiple crocodile bites during the incident on Thursday afternoon.

Public anger has erupted over the decision to release the suspect.

Many see the move as further evidence of a justice system that fails to prioritise the protection of children and the public when confronted with extreme violence.

? #BREAKING: It has been confirmed that the man who threw a 3-year-old toddler into a crocodile enclosure in the UK…

…HAS ALREADY BEEN LET OUT ON BOND!!!!

The man is being described as ‘mentally disabled’ and police are STILL refusing to name him.

Witnesses say the zoo… pic.twitter.com/uBhxXhJkWY

– Matt Van Swol (@mattvanswol) June 19, 2026

Imagine living in a country where you go straight to jail for a tweet, but get bail after being arrested for ‘allegedly’ throwing a 3 year old baby into a crocodile enclosure! The world is watching is disbelief! pic.twitter.com/Do1ljHSofF

– Liam Tuffs (@liamtuffs1) June 19, 2026

Lunatics who throw toddlers to crocodiles probably ought not to be on the streets. https://t.co/lIijFzPlIh

– Carl Benjamin ??????? (@Sargon_of_Akkad) June 19, 2026

The pattern of releasing individuals deemed too unwell for interview while leaving the public uninformed about their identity has fuelled widespread demands for transparency and stronger safeguards.

Critics argue that mental health assessments should not automatically translate into freedom to roam when the alleged act demonstrates clear and present danger to others.

Meanwhile, Sky News headlines have drawn sharp criticism for their choice of language. The outlet repeatedly described the boy as having “ended up in crocodile enclosure” rather than stating he was thrown there.

BREAKING: Man arrested after toddler ended up in crocodile enclosure ‘not fit for interview’ and released https://t.co/eBomHyjDvC

– Sky News (@SkyNews) June 19, 2026

One report opened with: “A three-year-old boy who was seriously injured after ending up in the crocodile enclosure at a Cambridgeshire zoo was attacked by at least one of the reptiles, Sky News understands.”

An earlier Sky News post had used similar passive phrasing: “a boy has been taken to hospital with serious injuries and a man arrested on suspicion of attempted murder after a toddler ended up in a crocodile enclosure in Huntingdonshire.”

“Ended up”. The toddler just ended up in the crocodile pit. Funny how all these kind of things end up isn’t it. https://t.co/GeLLNAFhVX

– m o d e r n i t y (@ModernityNews) June 19, 2026

This wording stands in contrast to more direct reporting elsewhere that used “thrown into” in the headline. Passive constructions like “ended up” minimise the deliberate nature of the assault and shift focus away from the perpetrator’s actions toward vague circumstance.

In high-profile cases involving violence against children, precise language matters. Euphemisms erode public trust and fuel the very speculation authorities claim to want to avoid.

The decision to withhold the suspect’s identity while confirming his release on bail until mid-September compounds the problem. A man arrested for allegedly hurling a defenceless three-year-old into a pit of crocodiles is back in the community.

Britain’s justice system increasingly appears calibrated to protect processes and sensitivities over basic public safety. When posting opinions online can trigger swift arrest and denial of bail, yet an alleged attempt to feed a toddler to crocodiles results in prompt release, the imbalance is impossible to ignore.

The heroic actions of zoo staff saved a life that day. The authorities’ response since has done little to reassure anyone that similar threats will be met with the seriousness they demand.

Not long after Shenzhen-based Huawei unveiled what it described as a breakthrough pathway for advanced semiconductor production at the recent IEEE ISCAS conference, the Trump administration raised concerns that one of Dutch chip-equipment giant ASML’s extreme ultraviolet lithography, or EUV, machines may have fallen into Chinese hands.

Bloomberg reports that Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has raised concerns that one of ASML’s EUV machines may have reached China despite US-led export controls.

ASML has pushed back on Lutnick’s suggestion, explaining that none of its EUV machines, used to print the tiniest circuit patterns onto advanced computer chips, have ended up in the hands of the Chinese. This report is based on sources from the outlet who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe private conversations.

ASML says all 314 of its operating EUV machines are accounted for globally.

More color from the outlet:

Multiple senior administration officials, speaking on condition of anonymity to describe a sensitive matter, said they have evidence indicating ASML is not acting in good faith — such as exports to China of gear specifically related to EUV tools, which ASML denied to Bloomberg. These US officials, who didn’t comment on Lutnick’s meetings with ASML, declined multiple requests from Bloomberg for proof of the shipments, citing the sensitivity of the information and sources. They also declined to say whether they have seen evidence of an actual EUV system in the Asian country.

The dispute adds pressure on ASML, with shares in Amsterdam trading down as much as 2% on Friday. Shares have advanced as much as 81% this year due to the AI and data center buildout narrative.

Here is Citi analyst Andrew Gardiner’s first take on the US Government-ASML dispute:

According to Bloomberg (6/19), US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has told ASML of concerns that an EUV machine is in China, in contravention of regulations that prevent ASML from shipping EUV to China. No evidence for the claims was provided to journalists. ASML have reiterated publicly they have never shipped a machine or EUV parts to China. ASML can “see” each of the EUV tools running at customer fabs, as the machines send back data to ASML on their operations. ASML are now in the difficult position of trying to prove a negative, when no evidence is being furnished against their position. Given our time spent with ASML over the last two decades, including with current management in recent years, we find it very hard to believe that they would jeopardise their position in the industry, their reputation, or their technological leadership just to deliver an EUV tool to China.

Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Masahiro Wakasugi comments:

US concerns about Chinese chipmakers using advanced tools made by ASML might have little impact on its sales. Bloomberg News reports that in recent meetings, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick expressed the concerns to ASML’s leaders, saying one of its top machines might have made its way into China, violating US-led restrictions. But ASML says it has never shipped extreme ultraviolet lithography systems to China and has complied with tightening restrictions on deep ultraviolet tools. Also, using ASML machines to make advanced chips would probably require sophisticated tools from other foreign firms that also face restrictions. China is increasingly able to make more-advanced chips with legacy tools, so the US concerns may reflect Chinese engineering progress rather than any lapse in ASML’s compliance with export controls.

Related:

• Inside The Chip Chokepoint: Goldman’s Five Key Takeaways From ASML Visit

US concerns may reflect China’s progress in developing advanced chips, especially after Huawei’s announcement last month of a potential breakthrough in semiconductor production.