Episode 88 - China and Russia, LNG buddies | Booze hurdles for India | Gene Epstein (Soho Forum) - a podcast by Ryan Ray & Ellen Wald

China and Russia Are Partners—and Now Have a $55 Billion Pipeline to Prove It
https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-and-russia-are-partnersand-now-have-a-55-billion-pipeline-to-prove-it-11575225030?
- 1800 mile pipeline through Siberia
- Does this signify a new era of Russia influence over China? Hard to imagine given Russia’s GDP is lower than each of California’s, New York’s And Texas’s. Russia’s GDP per capital is a little higher than Mississippi’s.
- Does Russia’s deal with Huawei negate Russia’s potential influence over China in natural gas.
- Geopolitical partnerships are not 1+1=2 anymore. Tend flatten out these issues into relationships that are much more basic than we assume

Saudis Push for Longer-Lasting OPEC Cuts as Aramco IPO Approaches
https://www.wsj.com/articles/saudis-push-for-longer-lasting-opec-cuts-as-aramco-ipo-approaches-11575214071
- potential impacts are for post-IPO trading. Will Saudi Arabia try to push oil prices up before (or after the Aramco IPO) and can they even make an impact on oil prices through OPEC?

Booze May Be Hurdle to India’s Energy Independence
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-12-01/booze-may-be-hurdle-to-giant-oil-buyer-s-energy-independence
- Learn from the U.S. and don’t put food into your cars.
- building out infrastructure for EVs would be a better use of energy investment dollars.

Interview with Gene Epstein - TheSohoForum.org

- Yield curve was inverted a couple months ago but not anymore at this point
- Inverted yield curve is when short term interest rates (3 months) are higher than long term (10 months) interest rates. This is the opposite of what you would expect.
- Signals something disturbing that investment is not good for long term. Typically get a recessions later on. This is fairly good indicator of recessions.
- But now the 10 year is above the 3 year again but we should consider the possibility that there could be a recession in the next 12 months.
- Will have political impacts if it happens.
- Currently in the longest slow but steady expansion period. Better to grow for 10.5 years at slow pace than to grow quickly for 6 years.
- Prediction: pace of growth will continue into 2021
- Tariff/trade war influence - manufacturing in US has definitely felt this

- China/Russia relationship. One pipeline is not going to create an uber-polity that will take over the world.
- Russia is a non-entity in the world. Threat to their own backyard but not global influence.
- Russia’s GDP is on par with Italy. China’s GDP is on par with US but population is many times US so China will have to grow much more in order to really be on par with the U.S.
- Great relationship between the U.S. and China via Walmart in which Walmart imports Chinese made products and sells them to poor Americans.
- No worry about Russia being a threat, even to Western Europe.

Oil market outlook on TDAmeritrade Network
https://tdameritradenetwork.com/video/rB4AoW65HjqBbsc9-rAAxQ

Further episodes of 301 Moved Permanently

Further podcasts by Ryan Ray & Ellen Wald

Website of Ryan Ray & Ellen Wald