Jon-in-NYC

Biggest one outside oil is Agriculture/ Fertilizer. As a % of global exports it’s more exposed to Strait than even oil is. Also big time component as you need to apply Nitrogen before plating by end of April. US is net short Nitrogen. Prices are up huge already, but below 2022 spikes (so far)

Wow “females” is such a tell with these guys.

When your whole long-only investing business starts blowing up with the S&P up for the year and HY spreads at like 350, you have managed to attain a special kind of stupid.

Another reminder of the negative externalities of automobiles that we totally neglect to tax and price appropriately.

Honest question, but does anybody still consider Axios a trustworthy news source or just a place the Trump admin launders stories they want to get out? I’ve always thought the latter but maybe that’s just me?

Giving away like 1/3 to 1/2 of our public street space to free private car storage is one of the most insane things ever. If it didn’t already exist and somebody proposed demolishing outdoor dining space, pedestrian plazas, outdoor cafe space, etc for free private car storage- you’d laugh at them.

Everybody is trying to predict the future with the available information, their priors, and their assessment of how everyone else will react. Lots of people have different opinions and the marginal buyer and seller agreeing can occur at vastly different points where there is a lot of uncertainty.

Even if you found a crew stupid enough, no ship owner would let you. There is no insurance for sailings through Hormuz now.

We know the US government is holding Top secret chats on Signal. It seems to be the default communication method for the Trump administration (to avoid legal record keeping requirements, jail, etc.). Every global intelligence agency NOT working on this is failing to do their job. It’s a goldmine.

This is a tough balance to strike. As someone going through some really complex and difficult medical issues, AI can be a very useful tool in translating medical jargon from clinical notes & preparing good question lists to ask your doctors. But yeah, fancy autocomplete is not your doc!

If I were doing what this administration is currently doing abroad, I would REALLY not want to argue that other nations can violate a country’s sovereignty and put its leaders in jail for crimes. John Roberts can’t help you if the world goes there, amigos.

But they are also totally fine ignoring the impact of their actions on other people, including people with health issues that prevent they themselves from being vaccinated.

I have a much tougher time letting that part go. I wish the (old) HHS/CDC spent more time educating people on this.

Energy markets to equity traders:

I was unsuccessfully trying to be silly. I’m a hedge fund manager who has known many of these management teams for 3 decades or so. I fully understand their naïveté :-)

But not Costco, the are actually very very smart. Ron started driving a forklift, not sitting in HBS lecture halls.

Yup US is a net importer of nitrogen fertilizers and the price we pay for that global commodity is the marginal cost of the highest cost needed to clear the market. Urea prices in New Orleans are up ~ 30% over last week’s already very high prices.

In so many ways across the retail industry, Costco shows best practices. You’d think by now these guys would all just wait and do whatever COST does.

Well if taking out a leader is legal (we just did it after all) then I guess he argues he’s a prisoner of war and we have to just let him go when the hostilities with Iran end, right?

Leaving is always an option.

For Nitrogen fertilizer it’s 35-45% of global exports. And planting season is about to kick off as weather warms in northern hemisphere.

Ammonia is just one source of N. It’s upgraded to other products to ship. What matters is N (as NH3, urea, UAN, AN) to the soil. One must look at global N supply and demand. This is a HUGE adverse supply shock to global N markets.

If you are net importer, that supply shock means big price pain.

Also to put that in perspective, CF industries in the US makes around 10 million tons of Ammonia a year. The issue is the US net imports Nitrogen, so the price farmers pay in the US is the cost of the highest cost ton needed to balance the market. Taking out ME exports shifts that cost up.

MidEast is exporting as urea globally as it’s cheaper to ship nitrogen as a solid than as a toxic, cryogenic
liquified gas. The point is really just that it’s a global commodity market, so the cost of nitrogen in the US is based on the marginal high cost produced required to balance the market.

That would be Potash. For Nitrogen the Us is a big, low cost producer, but we still are net importers. What we are short is mainly coming from the Middle East

If you like eating food it’s also worth checking out the fact that 35-45% of all globally traded nitrogen fertilizer goes through that strait. And pre-plant ammonia application season is about to kick off pretty soon.

No “under construction” GIF? Wow Meg gets it DONE!

If it’s something like Fluorouracil for basal cell carcinoma I could totally see them hiding it because he wouldn’t want them to admit he has any type of cancer.

Accessories to murder after the fact.

How about fertilizer? Around 30% of global nitrogen fertilizer transits the Strait of Hormuz, and planting is RAPIDLY approaching. If you are going to get nitrogen in the soil before corn planting, you are gonna need ships to sail in the next few weeks. Farmers, buckle up on pricing.

The US and Israel clearly have very different goals here. If you can even say the US has a goal in mind beyond “make lots of booms”.

If they think oil prices are a problem wait till they realize what this does to fertilizer and therefore food prices. Taking out a huge portion of fertilizer trade (Iran exports plus all the urea and ammonia that transits thru Hormuz) — right as we approach spring planting season.