WTFinance

Interview recorded - 27th of April, 2026On this episode of the WTFinance podcast I had the pleasure of welcoming back Edward Dowd. Edward Dowd is a former BlackRock portfolio manager and founder of Phinance Technologies. He has been early on several of the most important macro calls of recent years and his January 2026 recession warning was published before a single shot was fired in Iran.0:00 - Introduction1:00 - Recession in 2026?4:10 - Weak employment7:20 - Inflation9:55 - FED actions12:33 - Inflation at 11%13:20 - AI investment20:19 - Lending stagnation?23:08 - Chinese weakness26:17 - Assets to perform?30:07 - One message to takeaway?Edward Dowd is currently a founding partner with Phinance Technologies. He has worked on Wall Street the majority of his career, most notably at Blackrock as a portfolio manager where he managed a $14 billion Growth equity portfolio for ten years. Edward's book Cause Unknown: The Epidemic of Sudden death in 2021 & 2022 propelled him as an alternative voice during the pandemic and the economic implications that continue to plague us today. Phinance's unique alternative macroeconomic analysis of the global debt crisis and what may unfold has given many a deeper understanding of the global nature of our problems today.Edward Dowd:Website - https://www.eddowd.com/Phinance - https://phinancetechnologies.com/Home.aspX - https://x.com/DowdEdwardWTFinance -Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/wtfinancee/Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/67rpmjG92PNBW0doLyPvfniTunes - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wtfinance/id1554934665?uo=4Twitter - https://twitter.com/AnthonyFatseas

Interview recorded - 24th of April, 2026On this episode of the WTFinance podcast I have the pleasure of welcoming back Josh Young. Josh Young is the Chief Investment Officer of Bison Interests, an investment firm focused on publicly traded oil and gas companies. He has achieved consistent benchmark outperformance across nearly two decades of professional investing in oil and gas securities, with deep expertise in the E&P business model, operating environments, and capital allocation. A contrarian by nature, Josh has built a reputation for identifying value in energy equities long before the mainstream catches up — and for being right about the structural forces driving the sector when consensus gets it badly wrong.During our conversation we spoke about his overview of the geopolitical situation, closure of the Strait, global storage, physical vs paper prices, oil higher for longer, who is the winner of the conflict, US natural gas and more. I hope you enjoy!0:00 - Introduction2:04 - Overview of geopolitical situation5:46 - Surprised about closure of strait?8:20 - Global storage10:17 - Physical vs paper prices14:34 - Iran continue to control strait17:31 - Oil higher for longer27:56 - Winner of the Iran conflict?31:28 - Any other regions?34:09 - US natural gas38:19 - Companies Josh is watching43:09 - One message to takeaway?Josh Young has been professionally investing in publicly traded oil and gas securities for nearly two decades, highlighted in Barron's and elsewhere for exceptional performance as Bison’s CIO. Josh possesses a deep understanding of the E&P business model and operating environment, with notable experience as Chairman of Canadian E&P company RMP Energy (rebranded as Ironbridge Resources). Under Josh’s leadership, the company achieved a successful turnaround, outperforming peers and ultimately being acquired at a 78% premium. Josh is the author of numerous articles on oil & gas investments and is a frequent guest speaker at various energy industry conferences. Josh began his career as a management consultant to Fortune 500 companies and private equity firms. He later worked as an investment analyst for a private equity fund and served as an energy investment analyst at a multi-billion-dollar single-family office, which was nominated as Institutional Investor’s Single-Family Office of the Year in 2008. Josh holds a B.S. in Economics with honors from the University of Chicago.Josh Young - X - https://x.com/JoshYoungWebsite - https://bisoninterests.com/Substack - https://www.bisoninsights.info/WTFinance -Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/wtfinancee/Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/67rpmjG92PNBW0doLyPvfniTunes - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wtfinance/id1554934665?uo=4Twitter - https://twitter.com/AnthonyFatseas

Interview recorded - 16th of April, 2026On this episode of the WTFinance podcast I had the pleasure of welcoming back Michael Pento. Michael Pento is President and Founder of Pento Portfolio Strategies, a registered investment advisory firm managing money across the full inflation and deflation cycle spectrum. His proprietary 20-component model is designed to determine the two most important factors in successful investing — the second derivatives of growth and inflation. [Pentoport](https://pentoport.com/) He is a specialist in Austrian economics, a regular contributor to CNBC, Bloomberg and Fox Business, and the author of The Coming Bond Market CollapseDuring our conversation we touched on the current economy, why things are looking bad, Unemployment rising, the FED creating massive wealth divides, the triumvirate bubble and what this means for your portfolio. I hope you enjoy!0:00 - Introduction3:08 - Current Overview5:40 - Higher oil prices for longer9:34 - Unemployment10:58 - FED Jerome Powell18:14 - Issue with deficit21:28 - Bad for economy, good for markets?23:48 - Debt bubble27:28 - Close to the door28:38 - One message to takeaway?Michael Pento serves as the President and Founder of Pento Portfolio Strategies (PPS). PPS is a Registered Investment Advisory Firm (RIA) that operates like an actively managed fund without all the expenses. The Model Portfolio uses a proprietary macroeconomic model to determine when and how to invest across an inflation/deflation and economic cycle spectrum. The 20-component model is used to determine the two most important factors when it comes to successful investing: the second derivatives of growth and inflation.Michael Pento - Website - https://pentoport.com/Twitter - https://twitter.com/michaelpento?lang=enLinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-pento-a1882917b/WTFinance Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/wtfinancee/Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/67rpmjG92PNBW0doLyPvfniTunes - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wtfinance/id1554934665?uo=4Twitter - https://twitter.com/AnthonyFatseas

Interview recorded - 16th of April 2026On this episode of the WTFinance podcast I had the pleasure of welcoming back Glenn Diesen. Professor Glenn Diesen is a political scientist at the University of South-Eastern Norway, associate editor at Russia in Global Affairs, and one of the most cited scholars on Russian foreign policy and Eurasian integration. His book, The Ukraine War and the Eurasian World Order, has been described by John Mearsheimer as a must-read for anyone trying to understand the great shift in global power taking place before our eyes.During our conversation we spoke about the overview of geopolitical situation, extended proxy wars, global economic fallout, conflict off ramp, potential for another Suez crisis and more. 0:00 - Introduction2:56 - Overview of geopolitical situation5:36 - Extended proxy war8:22 - Iran leverage12:01 - Attacking GCC neighbours15:08 - China & Russia supporting Iran17:45 - Global economic fallout19:51 - Conflict off ramp?22:54 - Trump destroying uni hegimony?25:48 - Another Suez crisis?28:14 - Middle powers33:22 - Re-militarisation of the world36:01 - Future world38:57 - One message to takeaway?Professor Diesen is an academic, author, editor, and political commentator. His research focus is primarily on Russian foreign policy and the geoeconomics of Greater Eurasia and the emerging strategic partnership between Russia and China. Diesen’s latest books are The Ukraine War & the Eurasian World Order (2024); Russophobia: Propaganda in International Politics (2022), Europe as the Western Peninsula of Greater Eurasia: Geoeconomic Regions in a Multipolar World (2021); Russian Conservatism: Managing Change under Permanent Revolution (2021); Great Power Politics in the Fourth Industrial Rivalry: The Geoeconomics of Technological Sovereignty (2021); The Return of Eurasia (2021); Russia in a Changing World (2020); The Decay of Western Civilisation and Resurgence of Russia: Between Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft (2018); Russia’s Geoeconomic Strategy for a Greater Eurasia (2017); and EU and NATO relations with Russia: After the collapse of the Soviet Union (2015).Glenn Diesen: X: https://twitter.com/Glenn_DiesenSubstack: https://glenndiesen.substack.com/YouTube: @GDiesen1 WTFinance -Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/wtfinancee/Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/67rpmjG92PNBW0doLyPvfniTunes - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wtfinance/id1554934665?uo=4Twitter - https://twitter.com/AnthonyFatseas

Interview recorded - 13th of April, 2026On this episode of the WTFinance podcast I had the pleasure of welcoming back Matthew Piepenburg. Matthew Piepenburg is Partner at Von Greyerz, author of Rigged to Fail, and co-author of Gold Matters — a comprehensive examination of gold as a historically confirmed wealth preservation asset. He began his career as a transactional attorney, launched a hedge fund during the NASDAQ bubble, and has worked across family offices and Morgan Stanley's hedge fund platform before dedicating his work to precious metals and monetary risk.During our conversation we spoke about the current geopolitical situation, the dollar system fracturing, central banks losing control, golds continuous rise and more. I hope you enjoy!0:00 - Introduction3:18 - Geopolitical overview8:40 - Dollar system fracturing?20:34 - Central banks losing control?24:07 - Gold rise to continue32:43 - Central Bankers selling gold38:34 - Cash settlement of gold41:18 - Paper vs physical49:09 - One message to takeaway?Matt began his finance career as a transactional attorney before launching his first hedge fund during the NASDAQ bubble of 1999-2001Thereafter, he began investing his own and other HNW family funds into alternative investment vehicles while operating as a General Counsel, CIO and later Managing Director of a single and multi-family office. Matthew worked closely as well with Morgan Stanley’s hedge fund platform in building a multi-strat/multi-manager fund to better manage risk in a market backdrop of extreme central bank intervention/support. The conviction that precious metals provides the most reliable and longer-term protection against potential systemic risk led Matt to join VON GREYERZ.The author of the Amazon No#1 Release, Rigged to Fail, Matt is fluent in French, German and English; he is a graduate of Brown (BA), Harvard (MA) and the University of Michigan (JD). Along with Egon von Greyerz, Matthew is the co-author of Gold Matters, which offers an extensive examination of gold as an historically-confirmed wealth-preservation asset.Matthew Piepenburg - LinkedIn - https://linkedin.com/in/matthewpiepenburgWebsite - https://vongreyerz.gold/WTFinance -Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/wtfinancee/Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/67rpmjG92PNBW0doLyPvfniTunes - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wtfinance/id1554934665?uo=4Twitter - https://twitter.com/AnthonyFatseas