Finance & Startups

US consumers are sending a loud warning sign. Sentiment around current economic conditions just hit the lowest level ever recorded worse than 2008, worse than 2022, even worse than the high-inflation shock of the 1980s. That’s not just “weak confidence,” that’s something structurally different. What’s driving it isn’t fear of the future it’s the present. Buying conditions for big-ticket items have collapsed to record lows, showing how broken affordability feels right now. Prices are still high, borrowing costs are expensive, and household budgets are stretched to the point where even normal purchases feel out of reach. This explains why confidence is deteriorating even as inflation has cooled on paper. The damage from years of price increases is still locked into rent, insurance, food, utilities, and financing costs. At the same time, the labor market is quietly softening, with slower hiring and growing job insecurity eating away at confidence. For the Fed, this is a problem. Consumer spending is the backbone of the economy, and sentiment like this usually shows up in weaker demand next. Policy may be doing what it’s supposed to by tightening financial conditions, but record-low confidence raises the risk the Fed has gone too far. The message isn’t that a recession is inevitable it’s that the room for error is shrinking fast. Consumers feel worse off than at almost any point in modern history, and that kind of pessimism rarely lies. Demand may already be bending, even if the data hasn’t fully caught up yet.👀

Your knowledge is so welcome in my little world John, thank you for your insight!

I think their best days are behind them and their business model is getting more and more comodotized. Everyone’s jumping into predictions markets while trading volumes are going down.. expected to fall further as the high risk appetite of Robinhood traders cannibalizes their own business as they add betting on predictions markets. I had an order for put options in-the-money below $130 a share and chickened out and canceled it, but would have had a nice gain on that trade. I’m not going to bet against it but I think they’re vulnerable to the deleveraging on the horizon. Some crazy stat I saw.. like 98% of the investments made on their platform are short-term.. almost zero long term investors use Robinhood. That’s dangerous if a bear market ever hits. On a side note I predict a melt up of stocks and crypto the rest of the month or at least next week. Over $7T of trading today due to triple-witching options expiring today (potentially the highest trading day in the history of the markets) will create a lot of liquidity for next week and probably a lot of people will find bargains to add positions and push prices up

Anybody in or looking into Robinhood stock?

Pretty solid day today.. climbing the ladder. I wouldn’t be surprised to give some back tomorrow tho. My portfolio is skewed a lot right now with my OKLO put options. I’m up $24K on them including about $5K today. I sold a few today but they don’t expire until March so I’m only trading around the position. I’m letting it ride a while. Their stock was up 1000 percent this year at one point! They won’t have a working nuclear reactor or revenue of any kind for yearssss. Stocks like that are an easy short. Even tho I’m rooting for them to succeed and really hope they can bring their technology to fruition.. their stock just got way too far ahead of itself. It reminds me of when 3D printing first hit the scene. All those stocks shot up but then came crashing down

Maybe I should take profits to put into Sircles next week 👀

It’s funny you mention it I actually looked into it after you dropped that in the chat needed up getting some $36.76

Hut 8 signed a 15 year lease, $7B deal with Google for a data center build.. up big today. I loaded up a few days ago when I dropped that recommendation in here

Lowering interest rates = increased inflation. It’ll be valuable to own assets

Big IPO’s coming next year. Perhaps approaching $2T in equity hitting the public markets. When this happens in the past it usually leads to a down or flat market because investor dollars are now competing for a glut of new issuance. Whoever the next fed chair is, they’ll be lowering interest rates. I think everyone pretty much accepts that’s the president’s selection criteria.. so expect lower rates (for better or for worse)

Who does everyone like for the new fed chair position?

SpaceX ipo would be huge data centers in space is a great idea lots of hurtles to combat tho like cooling for example there’s no airflow in space sure it’s cold unless it’s in direct path of the sun then it’s not so cold I think a lot of people are jumping into Tesla currently as a way to kinda get a head start. I think spaceX going public is a great way to raise the money they need to expand there already massive dominance of space. SpaceX already owns like 75% of satellites orbiting earth. Tesla technology will most likely play a good size role of spaceX’s ventures in space. Think of the battery tech, the autonomous robots etc… most of teslas tech can be utilized in space! Full disclosure I am a big fan of the muskosphere in general so I may be a little biased

Not to change the subject but just read that musk plans to IPO spacex sometime next year. Could it have similar success as Tesla? I kick myself for not buying in when Tesla IPO’d and spacex being connected with star link could have the same results.

I’m not all doom and gloom against the entire crypto universe.. just the Pets.com bullshit I saw in the late 90’s. As a counter balance to my strategy I’ve been going long companies like Hut 8 because they were a Bitcoin miner who acquired power plants for penny’s on the dollar back when you couldn’t give away a power plant. Now with AI and the need for massive data centers (which they also have) and the need for 10X more power than our country produces today.. Hut 8 has real earnings, real property and strong management. Today is a great day to start a small position with them.. down like 10% today in sympathy with Bitcoin but that’s not even their business anymore

I was also in a 2X short on Microstrategy which I sold this morning but kind of regret. And I have put options against ASST which is a Microstrategy wannabe and totally going to zero eventually

IBIT and long SBIT which is a 2X short ETF

Who did you short ABTC?

Little more than 30 minutes to go and I’m up about $3K but need to make a decision regarding some options expiring Friday. They can go to zero or if Bitcoin keeps dropping be a $20K gain

Yeah the market has been on a tear for years now and an entire generation has yet to experience a severe Bear Market. Commodities like silver are up over 100% this year… that kind of tells you something. Markets are highly leveraged and people are chasing momentum. It’s a great strategy when it works but it’s crushing when it reverses. There’s an old saying on Wall Street.. stocks take the stairs up but they take the elevator down. I ended up with a $5K gain today.. mostly betting against (using put options) OKLO and MSTR… two poster child stocks of the speculative frenzy going on. I have long positions in more reliable dividend paying stocks as well. I’ll share some of those ideas here too. I think they’ll hold up well in a bad market correction

Yeah that’s a lot. Something I want no part in.

I’m loving this this is the kind of convo I WANT in the wealth chat the amount of people on margin rn is insane!

I think fear is creeping in for sure. I’ve been watching CNBC every morning for 30 years and can usually get a good read on people. There was zero fear back in September and that’s when I started betting against some extremely high flying companies. There was a snap decline not much after that which kind of woke everyone up.. and these are highly intelligent and highly informed men and women on Wall St.. these aren’t just reporters. All of a sudden their comfort zone was shaken and ever since then the market has been susceptible to panic selling. Panic is too strong of a word but something less than panic but strong fear. When that happens at this high of margin debt levels it forces selling by brokers (margin calls). The market is in danger of a cascading effect at any moment. Today is a good example. I have to couch that by saying.. a major wave of selling is absolutely not guaranteed and this is historically a strong period for the stock market.

Do you think the stock market will follow the same path?

I also expect a major decline in Bitcoin. I have a lot to say about that but for now I’ll just say.. I would not be a buyer here even though it’s come down a lot already from its all-time highs.

I’m expecting continued pressure on markets for a little while. Brokers are reporting the highest margin balances in history. Over $1.2 Trillion in margin debt currently held. That leaves zero wiggle room for a downturn

That is awesome. I’m so happy for you. I should just give you my portfolio and let you run it. lol.

Markets are down bad today but my portfolio is up another $3K…

Around this time a year ago I realized the crypto market was topping out. Everyone thought I was nuts. Since then Bitcoin is down for the year. I’ve been investing since college and turned a $3,500 financial aid check into over $350K in just a couple years. I showed my grandmother (who lived through the Great Depression) my E*trade account and she almost fainted. I got into Real Estate, bought some properties and funded my retirement account with $75K… all invested in a single company very few had ever heard of called Nvidia. In around 2005ish I needed the money for a small business I started (Tech2U) with my friend Todd so I sold it all at almost no gain or maybe even a loss back then. If I left the money alone it would be worth over $50M today.. and tax deferred! The company we started has done well so it’s all good.. but not that well haha. I also had 2000 shares of GameStop which I sold out of a few days before the short squeeze began. You win some you lose some. But back to the point. I’m a decent investor with a good record.. especially when I focus. I spent the last few weeks diving back into the market. I’ve made over $100K over that time (including about $6K just today) and I’ll share some thoughts here going forward..

Calculated? 🤔

The House of Representatives passed the Invest Act today with bipartisan support (303-123). The bill is aimed at broadening access for investors to private markets (like startups) and ease capital raising rules for small businesses. The bill now moves to the Senate for consideration.

We’re running a Be Thankful Giveaway in the Meet the World chat. All you have to do is write what you’re thankful for and drop an emoji on your message. The Top 5 messages with the most reactions each win a $100 Visa gift card for the holidays. 💸✨ Jump in and share your thankful message! https://getapp.sircles.com/campaignGroup.php?q=MjY3MTc=&g=NCHoFC

I heard about it Danny, I imagine that he’s been contacted by the powers that be? It made national news 😬

Did you all see some guy vibe coded a hack that brought the cardano network down this week

@anthony grace Nope! I sure am as well! Bring it on!

Am I the only one buying more bitcoin as it falls??

Good god I hope so! I’ve been doubling down 😅

It’s different this time, right?

Glad to hear it I see a lot of hate online! So your basically maxing out the allowed reward for the month

I love my Gemini Credit card! I had tried changing which Crypto it gives as rewards, but now I leave it on $ATOM—which I then Stake and continue to earn a percentage on. In 7 months the only downside I have discovered with my Gemini credit card is that even if I pay off my balance early I don’t earn more rewards until the new period begins.

I just got it a few days ago haven’t revived my physical card yet used it once so far with Apple Pay I choose bitcoin as my crypto of choice kinda cool to see the cash back come in the form of crypto so far only good things to say

I didn't know there was one, I'll check it out. Have you used it

Has anyone used the Gemini credit card in here?