Every Saturday · The Week in Podcasts

The Week in Podcasts · Oct 24 to Oct 30

Anthropic S1 Tests the AI Financing Trade

Sequential revenue growth fell from 147% to 45% against $800 billion of compute commitments; the variable that decides is compute intensity per token.

59 episodes from 37 shows · the top 10 · every episode at the end

So what's happening in AI to me is evidence of like almost a denial of a reality that's already here.Alexander 'Alty' Altmann▶ hear it at 8:24

#1 Odd Lots

What Wall Street Really Thinks About the AI Trade Now

Alexander 'Alty' Altmann (Barclays) · Oct 29 · 48 min

Altmann's read: consensus is still long AI, but the market sits in the denial phase of a financing squeeze that is showing first at the periphery, the neoclouds. Barclays' survey finds only 60% of investors expect AI financing to be a problem; the Cipher convert and widening data-center bonds say the answer should already be 100%. The variable that decides is revenue, and S&P net profit is roughly $5 to $5.5 trillion against trillion-dollar TAM claims.

Why listen: A sell-side strategist maps where AI stress appears first, why index volatility stays low, and the one signal that would break consensus.

▶ 4:51 Neoclouds as periphery, Cipher spillover, financing survey, 2026 issuance anomaly▶ 13:07 Revenue gap: S&P profit vs TAM claims, open-weight and local models▶ 27:25 Why index vol stays low, unmappable AI factor, capex at 12% of GDP

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Being in a business where you are committed to spend $800 billion, where your entire franchise is just simply based on price, is dangerous.Steve Eisman▶ hear it at 9:48

#2 Prof G Markets

Why Steve Eisman Isn't Buying Anthropic's IPO

Steve Eisman (The Real Eisman Playbook), Dan Shalon (Prof G Media) · Oct 28 · 37 min

Eisman's answer to whether to buy Anthropic's IPO is no. The S1 stops at Q2, the peak of token maxing; third-quarter reports show sequential revenue growth falling from 147% to 45% and revenue-to-compute dropping from 2.08x to 1.7x, against $800 to $900 billion in compute commitments. A franchise competing only on price, with no moat, is the core objection.

Why listen: The clearest data-driven bear case on the largest IPO in history, against an expected valuation of $2 trillion.

▶ 1:34 Quarter-by-quarter revenue growth and revenue-to-compute ratios through the token-maxing cycle▶ 7:27 No moats, the 50% price cut, zero shareholder rights, and the flat no▶ 12:17 CoreWeave debt at 15% as the AI build-out's financing tell

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And instead, we have even seen some indications of appetite to start fresh longs at current levels. Carry is likely behind much of this behavior and serving as a very big cushion for the currency.Tanya Jacob▶ hear it at 10:26

#3 At Any Rate (JPM)

EM Fixed Income: A busy calendar of elections and CBs

Ben Ramsey (JPMorgan), Tanya Jacob (JPMorgan) · Oct 29 · 21 min

JPMorgan's EM team reads Lula's upset as a technical shock absorbed by carry: USD/BRL gapped 12% to 560 on Monday, then consolidated near 540 with fresh longs appearing. Positioning was the vulnerability, BRL exposure at the 99th percentile since 2003. Credit stays cautious; Brazil should now trade like a run-of-the-mill double B.

Why listen: Clearest sell-side read on whether Brazil's election shock stays contained or slips back into the December 2024 FX-rates-credit loop.

▶ 6:15 Central banks concede tighter financial conditions; EM terminal rate pricing likely peaked▶ 9:04 Brazil post-election: positioning, FX levels, DI curve, SELIC path, fiscal catalysts▶ 13:50 Brazil credit repricing, balance sheet offsets, negative-equilibrium risk, spillover to Mexico

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Hey, we cut 75 basis points last year to support the labor market. We should probably reverse those. That's what we should be thinking.Michael Gapen▶ hear it at 2:31

#4 Morgan Stanley

To Hike or Not to Hike

Michael Gapen · Oct 28 · 11 min

Gapen's call: the Fed skips a hike at this meeting, delivers one more in March 2027, then stops as disinflation reappears. The cycle is a recalibration that reverses last year's 75 basis points of cuts, not a return to 2023 highs. Payrolls near 50,000 a month and decelerating wages argue against a broad overheating. Hornbach reads the 10-year's retreat from above 5.25% to 5% as technical.

Why listen: A clean statement of the Morgan Stanley house path for Fed hikes and 10-year yields into 2027, with the falsifier named.

▶ 2:31 Labor data, recalibration versus aggressive cycle, what flips the Fed to hiking every meeting▶ 5:42 Residual seasonality and the one-more-hike-in-March call▶ 6:49 Treasury repricing, technical flows to 5.25%, 2027 path for 10-year yields

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the bond market never believed even once that AI was going to actually produce, you know, miraculous productivity, right? You know, the bond market was never AI-pilled, much less AGI-pilled.Steve Hou▶ hear it at 22:17

#5 Monetary Matters (Jack Farley)

Why Compute Prices Are Still Rising | Steve Hou of Silicon Data on GPU Rental Indices, Fed Meeting, and Anthropic S-1 (LIVE)

Steve Hou (Silicon Data) · Oct 28 · 64 min

Silicon Data's GPU rental indices show on-demand rates rising across H100, B200 and B300 while the token price index has fallen since the end of May. The H100 forward curve has lifted at every tenor out to 36 months since October 2025 and now slopes upward at the long end, signaling expected rent inflation rather than the backwardation that financed neocloud build-outs.

Why listen: Hard pricing data on compute, forward curves and residual values, set against a bond market that was never AI-pilled.

▶ 3:37 Token price index versus surging H100, B200, B300 rental rates▶ 19:47 Fed, credit spreads, neocloud selloff and compute futures as a hedge▶ 27:04 Forward curve shape, contango debate, chip residual values versus depreciation

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so I'm not calling for a crash but the the euphoria is brokenRobert Armstrong▶ hear it at 22:27

#6 Prof G Markets

The $800 Billion Catch Behind Anthropic's IPO

Paul Kedrosky (SK Ventures), Robert Armstrong (Financial Times) · Oct 27 · 37 min

Kedrosky reads Anthropic's S1 as a snapshot taken at the peak of a distributor-dependent model. H1 revenue of $16.3bn and a $693m operating loss look clean; $800bn-plus of non-cancellable compute commitments sit outside the income statement, and the filing signals a pivot to owned capex. The decider is compute intensity per token and whether growth reaccelerates from roughly 50%.

Why listen: Two regime tells in one episode: the AI IPO cycle's accounting seams, and Armstrong on Treasuries re-earning haven status below 5%.

▶ 6:35 The $800bn compute footnote, distribution through competitors, and the capex inflection▶ 15:16 What a working model requires: compute intensity, growth reacceleration, valuation▶ 19:37 Armstrong on the Treasury rally, cracks beneath the indices, 10-year as signal

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If the index does move lower, I believe 7,100 to 7,200 on the S&P 500 is where the corrections should find material support.Mike Wilson▶ hear it at 1:21

#7 Thoughts on the Market (Morgan Stanley)

The Next Stage of the Market Correction

Mike Wilson (Morgan Stanley) · Oct 26 · 5 min

Morgan Stanley's Wilson calls the correction that began in June late-stage but unfinished at the index level, with 7,100 to 7,200 on the S&P 500 as material support. The case for a positive resolution: 60% of Russell 3000 stocks have already fallen more than 20%. Three clearing events, AI credit supply, the midterms and liquidity, decide the timing of the low.

Why listen: A dated roadmap for the last leg: index support level, semis as the benchmark, and the trigger for a Fed pivot.

▶ 0:02 Mid-cycle transition framing, breadth damage, S&P 500 support level▶ 1:44 Three clearing events: AI supply, midterms, liquidity▶ 3:23 Fed pivot trigger, positioning in corrected quality, buying the downdraft

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There is no shortage of capital, and there is no shortage of demand. The bottleneck is who can actually pull these projects out of the ground, who has the capabilities to complete the land development, secure the grid connection,Connor Teskey▶ hear it at 5:10

#8 Goldman Sachs Exchanges

Brookfield’s Connor Teskey on the Real Bottleneck in the AI Buildout

Connor Teskey (Brookfield Asset Management) · Oct 30 · 35 min

Teskey, who runs Brookfield Asset Management's roughly $1.3 trillion book, argues the AI buildout is constrained by execution, not capital or demand. Power supply sits at a small fraction of demand, so a slowdown or even a decline in AI demand growth leaves the imbalance intact. The scarce asset is the operator that can deliver grid connection, generation and a gigafactory on time.

Why listen: A scaled infrastructure allocator reframes the AI-fragility debate around power delivery capacity, with sovereign offtake in Europe as the underappreciated demand leg.

▶ 3:08 AI demand fragility rebutted; execution capacity named as the real bottleneck▶ 8:22 Power market mechanics: storage growth, buyers paying for delivery certainty▶ 26:45 Alternatives growth: institutional versus individual penetration, private capital for infrastructure

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if the decision comes down to owning stocks or Treasuries over the next six months, I don't think there's a question. It has to be long-term Treasuries.Vincent Deluard▶ hear it at 2:37

#9 Monetary Matters (Jack Farley)

The Fed Put Is Dead: Why Stagflation & a Bear Market Are Next | Vincent Deluard | StoneX

Vincent Deluard (StoneX) · Oct 27 · 68 min

After six years arguing nominal growth was underestimated, Deluard flips: a US equity bear market has begun, with two-thirds of stocks below the 200-day moving average, and stagflation follows as the Fed put and fiscal put expire together. Long-term Treasuries beat stocks over the next six months on liquidity, not value. Secular inflation of 3.5-4% still points to 6-7% long yields later.

Why listen: A long-standing nominal-growth bull reverses on both stocks and Treasuries, with the fiscal-margin arithmetic that decides whether Q3 earnings hold.

▶ 1:50 Liquidity case for long Treasuries: pensions, QRA, TGA drawdown, debt ceiling▶ 10:32 Three fiscal policies that juiced margins and why they end after midterms▶ 1:02:29 Equities lower in 6-12 months; euro depreciation trade via yen and won

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I would fade the bond rally all day long because one way or another someone's going to borrow that money and the market's been demanding a higher rate.Luke Gromen▶ hear it at 29:18

#10 MacroVoices

MacroVoices #556 Luke Gromen: US Midterms & Beyond

Luke Gromen (Forest for the Trees) · Oct 29 · 55 min

Gromen's call: AI white-collar layoffs convert into a consumer credit shock and a Treasury supply problem, not a bond rally. $19 trillion of consumer debt at a 5% default rate is roughly $1 trillion, 40% of the $2.6 trillion US bank equity base. Add a recession and the deficit doubles from $2 trillion to $4 trillion, leaving the Fed as the only buyer.

Why listen: Links Iran attrition, AI layoffs and bank balance sheets into one Treasury supply calculation that cuts against the consensus long-duration hedge.

▶ 7:18 Iran's air defense attrition math and why the bond market is the target▶ 19:39 AI layoffs, $19 trillion consumer debt, 40% of bank equity at risk▶ 27:54 Recession deficit math, $5 trillion Treasury supply, Fed as sole buyer

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