The real message in the yen intervention

The dollar’s status as a reserve currency is not what it used to be

giftarticle.ft.com

FCM Weekly Market Notes

The Fed as a Volatility Multiplier Most of the time, you need not really care what the Fed is doing as an average investor. But at rate cycle inflections—where the interest rate cycle turns up, down, or flat from recent trends—uncertainty rises and the Fed can provide a roadmap to limit market volatility. This enhances investor confidence and ultimately the probability of a smooth path of investment returns. Then there are the “tails”—events like the Great Financial Crisis or Covid— where the Fed MUST lead. A Fed that raises the odds that it will not quickly communicate that it recognizes such an event in real time or respond appropriately raises the risks of investing in general. That is the Fed framework that follows from less communication, and the new Fed chair is all in on this approach. What we saw this week is the bond market pricing this in. Just another reason we believe bonds are a very poor investment choice in this era. New Fed chair Warsh said at this week’s meeting that there was a new sheriff in town for inflation fighting, the target was really 2%--never mind the 63 straight months above 2%--and that target would be achieved. Except the Fed did nothing. And Warsh continues to muse about altering how we measure inflation, which completely derails the “tough on inflation” theme if you are potentially moving the goalposts. On Friday, a trial balloon was released that suggested Warsh was considering having Fed meetings less often than the decades long practice of eight times a year—doubling down on the view that less is more in Fed communication. All of this combines to make investing in fixed income more fraught. The ascension of the uber-confident Warsh comes as a host of structural inflation issues continue to stir in the background for both investors and the economy. The return of tariffs as a blunt tool will increase the odds of at least temporarily higher inflation. The ongoing Middle East conflict will guarantee higher oil prices for longer. Getting to a 2% inflation rate under these conditions would clearly require some pain be felt on the growth front and likely in markets as well. And the growth story is also shaky. This week’s preliminary report of 1.5% growth in Q2 is the latest in a string of average to uninspiring numbers. The massive tsunami of AI spending by big tech is showing signs of nearing a peak as the market continually reasserts its anxiety about spending at that level without signs of an appropriate return. And the last issue looming is the massive US pile of debt. No one can know when this issue becomes front and center, but it at least appears to be one factor behind fewer international holdings of US debt. That debt load will likely begin to influence Fed policy before the term of the new chair is over. This chart shows why: How high can interest rates go as we approach a staggering quarter of tax revenue being spent simply to service existing debt? And of course, the $40 trillion-ish debt level question will be what happens when yields must be suppressed to continue financing the debt, and ultimately, when inflation has to be allowed to reduce the real stock of debt to levels financial markets can live with? The odds are high that Kevin Warsh is going to be the guy to answer those questions. Just don’t count on him communicating his answer to you, at least until markets have forced him to do so at great cost to investors. James Barrineau, Chief Investment Officer Fiduciary Capital Management LLC 1621 Central Ave Cheyenne, WY 82001 Website: www.FiduciaryCM.com Direct: (914) 588-1978 https://calendly.com/jbarrineau-fiduciarycm/30min Fiduciary CM Firm Brochures https://fiduciarycm.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/James-Barrineau-ADV2b-3- 212026.pdf Fiduciary CM Form CRS (ADV3) Privacy Policy Email Disclaimer Advisory and Consulting Services offered through FIDUCIARY CM® (Fiduciary Capital Management LLC). FIDUCIARY CM® is an SEC Registered Investment Adviser. Information presented is for educational purposes only for a broad audience. The information does not intend to make an offer or solicitation for the sale or purchase of any specific securities, investments, or investment strategies. Investments involve risk and are not guaranteed. FIDUCIARY CM® has reasonable belief that this marketing does not include any false or material misleading statements or omissions of facts regarding services, investment, or client experience. Please refer to our Firm Brochure (ADV2) for material risks disclosures. The opinions referenced are as of the date of publication and are subject to change due to changes in the market or economic conditions and may not necessarily come to pass. FIDUCIARY CM® may discuss and display, charts, graphs, formulas, and stock picks which are not intended to be used by themselves to determine which securities to buy or sell, or when to buy or sell them. Consultation with a licensed financial professional is strongly suggested. Please remember that securities cannot be purchased, sold, or traded via e-mail or voice message system. For more information, please visit www.Fiduciary CM.com.

dlvr.it

The hidden financial costs of chasing AI supremacy and who is unwillingly footing the bill

Meta and Microsoft report earnings today. Will they keep overstating their profitability?

open.substack.com

How Leopold Aschenbrenner, the ‘golden child’ of the AI trade, was laid low

The $20bn hedge fund manager’s wild ride ended with a call to Ken Griffin

giftarticle.ft.com

Market Commentaries

FCM Weekly Market Notes Bonds Are Not a Haven from Wobbly Markets Traditional bonds may not provide the protection investors expect from unsettled equity markets. This week’s commentary reviews int…

dlvr.it

The US has collected about $13bn of Venezuela’s oil money. Where is it?

Washington has given diverging accounts of where the earthquake-shattered country’s funds are going

giftarticle.ft.com

Eventually, the rate of the change of the change in that technology’s advancement slows and that is where the danger starts. We are there now.

FCM Weekly Market Notes The Certainty of a Burst Bubble Deliberating over whether there is an AI-related bubble is a complete waste of time. Developing a behavioral-based strategy to navigate it’s bursting is not. When you combine a transformational technology with human nature, you get money set on fire. It cannot be otherwise; in fact it is a key ingredient to that technology moving forward. In the AI story we will almost certainly see hundreds of billions of dollars set alight. Mega-cap tech started spending out of its vast cashflow coffers and has now moved to debt and equity issuance. The arms race eventually begins to lack a logic and devolves into more must be spent because more is being spent by the other guy. And this week reminded us of the relatively new twist on this bubble: credible competition from outside the US. Low-cost Chinese AI models with comparable performance that are customizable continue to be developed and released to market. Previously DeepSeek, this week it was Moonshot. Cheaper, open source, more cost efficient, and only slightly inferior to US models according to experts. “There goes a big chunk of potential market share” seems like a logical conclusion. With a classic bubble story unfolding plus, extended valuations, and about a doubling of the market indices over the past 2.5 years, what is an investor to do? The first rule is to seek price validation for your thesis. A sound investment process should keep you out of trouble—even through important market shifts. We have a simple rule: a break below a 30-day moving average requires a risk reduction. Note that the decision is pre-made, removing any emotional biases. This week we saw a classic case in tech: Do we know with certainty that this is the AI bubble bursting? No. But we have eliminated the necessity to endlessly deliberate around that question. And if the thesis turns out to be true—and history says eventually it will be— we will have avoided significant downside. Lots of things follow from this. Overly complicated portfolios must be reviewed for places where the fallout might not be immediately obvious. If you own passive indices as a core that won’t be touched, you can shift from tech-heavy to tech-lighter. This is the ratio of the price of the Nasdaq 100 versus the S&P. If you invest in “factor” funds, avoid or (better) eliminate momentum. This is not the market regime where that factor shines. Factors closely adjacent to tech are under-performing and factors related to value are out-performing. This chart shows performance relative to the S&P. A great place to start understanding what you own, and where your vulnerabilities might be, is to ask which bucket each of your holdings might be most correlated to. A sound portfolio will both be diversified but also easily understood in terms of what you own, its correlation to other holdings, and its vulnerability to large market events. If you can’t look at each of your holdings and answer those questions your portfolio is likely to be overly complex. You don’t need to know whether this is the start of “the big one”. You will, with 100% certainty, discover it in hindsight and then you can read all the pundits explaining why it was obvious from the start. An investment process based on objective indicators that is simple, consistent, and appropriate for any market weather is the only necessity for surviving and thriving when the bubble goes. Let the rest of the market argue about its characteristics. James Barrineau, Chief Investment Officer Fiduciary Capital Management LLC 1621 Central Ave Cheyenne, WY 82001 Website: www.FiduciaryCM.com Direct: (914) 588-1978 https://calendly.com/jbarrineau-fiduciarycm/30min Fiduciary CM Firm Brochures https://fiduciarycm.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/James-Barrineau-ADV2b-3- 212026.pdf Fiduciary CM Form CRS (ADV3) Privacy Policy Email Disclaimer Advisory and Consulting Services offered through FIDUCIARY CM® (Fiduciary Capital Management LLC). FIDUCIARY CM® is an SEC Registered Investment Adviser. Information presented is for educational purposes only for a broad audience. The information does not intend to make an offer or solicitation for the sale or purchase of any specific securities, investments, or investment strategies. Investments involve risk and are not guaranteed. FIDUCIARY CM® has reasonable belief that this marketing does not include any false or material misleading statements or omissions of facts regarding services, investment, or client experience. Please refer to our Firm Brochure (ADV2) for material risks disclosures. The opinions referenced are as of the date of publication and are subject to change due to changes in the market or economic conditions and may not necessarily come to pass. FIDUCIARY CM® may discuss and display, charts, graphs, formulas, and stock picks which are not intended to be used by themselves to determine which securities to buy or sell, or when to buy or sell them. Consultation with a licensed financial professional is strongly suggested. Please remember that securities cannot be purchased, sold, or traded via e-mail or voice message system. For more information, please visit www.Fiduciary CM.com.

dlvr.it

Opinion | Trump and His Critics Whistle Past the Truth of 2020

Our elections are messy, there’s foreign influence—but the 51 laptop liars were unique in U.S. history.

wsj.com

Trump Media to sell high-speed access to president’s social media posts

Family company hopes large trading firms will pay for market-moving social media posts milliseconds early

giftarticle.ft.com