The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 26 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 1 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Bessent: Marine Le Pen will become president of France in 18-24 months
“I would predict that in the next 18 or 24 months, Marine Le Pen
The bête noire of European politics is going to be president of France, and she's going to be president of France because the alternative on the left is worse than she is.”
Bessent: 2024 election is last chance to outgrow US debt burden
“And I think we can through deregulation, energy, independence, and dominance in the U.S., and a growth mindset. We can get back to growth. I feel very strongly that this is the last chance to grow our way out of this.”
Bessent: Microeconomic company data drives macro decisions better than aggregate models
“My style, still the Duquesne style, is that the micro drives the macro. We can get a huge amount of information from what companies are telling us. We can't predict the PCE deflator better than anybody. We can't have a better model for LEI, but if trucking com…”
Bessent: Xi Jinping won't allow market clearing needed for a sustainable economy
“He's a Leninist, so he's not going to allow a clearing function in the market
that would
Allow for a sustainable Chinese economy.”
Bessent: A Bretton Woods-scale realignment is coming to global trade
“I also felt very strongly that we're in the midst of a great realignment and of a Bretton Woods realignments coming in terms of global policy, global trade.”
Bessent: Why defending the British pound in 1992 was politically impossible
“My contribution was just an observation that the British housing market, that mortgages there, floated with the base rate, which is their overnight rate. And if the Bank of England raised rates on Wednesday, mortgages went up on Friday. If they were trying to …”
Bessent: 1992 pound short risked only 2.5% against massive asymmetric upside
“Because of the exchange rate mechanism, the Bank of England or the British government had to buy an unlimited number of pounds to keep the pound in a quarter. So it was an asymmetric bet. We could push them up against the wall And the most they could push us b…”
Bessent: Allocators Get Best Results Adding to Good Managers in Slumps
“There was a very good study from the Common Fund that said one of the most successful strategies for allocators that when you believe in the manager, and I always tried to do this when I was at Soros or any investment committee that I'm on, When a manager has …”
Bessent: Gold is my largest position in a long-term bull market
“Then I think we are in a long-term bull market in gold.
I think we're seeing reserve accumulation by central banks.
I follow it closely.
It's my biggest position.”
Bessent: In money management, objective P&L protects you from social networking biases
“I think maybe subconsciously one of the reasons I was attracted to money management, the numbers are the numbers. It's not a sales job. You don't live next to clients in Greenwich, and they're going to give you commissions because you're at the country club to…”
Bessent: Mortgage book author's fund lost 100% during the subprime crisis
“We had a very distinguished mortgage manager come into the office. I think he'd actually written the Wiley book on mortgages and tell us what a great buy mortgages were halfway through the crisis, and I think his fund went down a hundred percent.”
Bessent: Bad government regulatory policy creates highly profitable investment opportunities
“That was really my first go with seeing how bad policy creates good investment opportunities.”
Bessent: George Soros's Greatest Investment Was Hiring Stanley Druckenmiller
“I think the greatest investment he ever made was finding Stan, because in He turned over the portfolio, but was still kind of actively involved from the sidelines. Then the following year when the Berlin Wall came down, he was able to spend more of his time on…”
Bessent: Soros used 300% leverage to gain 140% trading 1980s currency accords
“He kept a trading journal in a year when he was up over a 140%, and these currency, the realignments, the plaza cord, the lube cord happened. The things move six percent in a night, and He would add a 300% position because things really used to trend a lot mor…”
Bessent: Great external managers provide big thematic trade ideas and SPVs
“A very good manager is someone you're proud to be invested with. They have good returns and you never have to worry about the phone call that things have gone pear-shaped. So that's a very good manager for an outside manager. A great manager would be someone w…”
Bessent: LTCM's 1998 collapse was relative value gone amok, not macro
“Long-term capital had blown up in 1998, And that wasn't really macro, it was more RV gone amok.”
Bessent: Soros bought Jon Corzine's $3.5B Italian bond liquidation in 2011
“I think five days in, the biggest trade I'd ever done was John Corzine's firm got liquidated out of their Italian bond position, and it was a three and a half billion dollar trade. I still had the index card that I worked it out on. JP Morgan called us, and I …”
Bessent: Liquid markets are like cards and backgammon, not chess
“The liquid markets game are cards and backgammon. It is luck and how are you going to manage the hand you're dealt?”
Bessent: Failed economic policies still generate massive, lucrative market price gyrations
“The policy decision doesn't have to work. But it can cause a lot of price gyration.”
Bessent: Cutting risk in December is almost always right
“When I look back, almost every time that I've taken it down, it's been the right thing to do, because there's always a counter trend.”
Bessent: Portfolios cannot survive being concentrated, illiquid, and leveraged all at once
“One of my risk management techniques have been, you can be one thing, but not many. You can't be concentrated, illiquid, and leveraged. I prefer to be liquid and then to use leverage.”
Bessent: Macro investing requires episodic home runs rather than steady win rates
“A lot of macro tends to be more Babe Ruth than Ted Williams, and the investors grow impatient, they pull out, you have a big year, big two years, the money comes back in, rents and repeat.”
Bessent: Japan could be in a secular bull market
“Japan.
I believe that this could be a secular bull market.
One of the few in the world.”
Bessent: Ray Dalio pitched his research newsletters door-to-door in the 1980s
“All these CEOs and getting all this great exposure, and also getting great exposure, people like Leon Cooperman, Byron Wayne, Ray Dalio used to come in and sell us this newsletter.”
Bessent: Kynikos gained ~50% in 1990 while the S&P dropped
“Maybe in 1990, the S&P was down, high teens, 20, and we were up 50.”
Bessent: Duquesne Contract Is One Page Leaving Compensation to Druckenmiller's Discretion
“The Duquesne employment contract is one page, and it's a, all compensation is at the discretion of Stanley Updruckenmower, and I only know one person in four years who's ever complained about being underpaid.”