The greatest gift a parent can make to his kids is to teach them to be critical thinkers and spot logical fallacies. This has never been easier.

Probably the most important post I'll ever write on here. Why I think that the "Great Taking" type scenario was written into law as a Strategic fallback, and not as a Primary Base-Case. If you are unfamiliar with the book "The Great Taking": - The book describes what David Rogers Webb calls "The Great Taking" - a systematic, global seizure of all collateralized assets through legal, technological, and financial mechanisms. In other words, you don't own the stuff in your brokerage account. - All assets "in the system" (brokerage accounts, bank deposits, bond custodianship, mortgages, even most "gold ETFs") are structurally vulnerable to seizure via rehypothecation chain. - This is enabled by the laws in EVERY country in the World (they were changed recently to allow for this global seizure type scenario). - Only assets outside custody chains (physical, bearer-form, or strong self-custody digital like Bitcoin, Monero, physical gold in personal possession) are immune. Of course, if a Great Taking type scenario takes place, assets like Bitcoin and Gold get revalued exponentially (10x–100x relative to collapsing seized assets). Everything else = frozen, haircut, or outright transfer. So why do I say "The Great Taking" is not the base case? - Based on my research, I'd give it ~25–35% over the next 10-20 years. It's still far too high to dismiss. - Mechanisms (UCC laws, rehypothecation structures, bail-in clauses, digital rails) already exist. - Only trigger required: systemic crisis + narrative cover ("protect system stability / prevent contagion"). - However, if fiat sovereign debt spiral accelerates, I'd move my odds up to ~60-70% over the next 10-20 years. - If global debt pyramids become visibly unserviceable, asset seizure (via collateral sweep) becomes the only way to reset without open default. - Still, it is not the Primary Base-Case - The Controllers prefer gradual controlled capture (CBDCs + behavioral shaping + perpetual claims on labor/energy). - It is the Strategic Fallback - If systemic control frays (currency collapse, capital flight, delegitimized political system), then seizure protocol is triggered as the emergency override. - The fact it is legally embedded across all jurisdictions signals it was always intended as the last resort fail-safe - not daily operating mode. - Bitcoin, Gold, land without liens (physical, bearer-form, or strong self-custody digital) are the true anti-fragile hedge here. - Avoid: Leveraged assets, rehypothecated claims, pooled accounts (even "segregated" ones collapse in stress). - Psychological edge: Most can't accept that "ownership" has already been redefined legally. They'll rationalize seizures as "temporary stabilizations". - The Great Taking isn't a fringe hypothesis. It's already structurally embedded. The only question is trigger conditions. - Everything in custody might get swept overnight. With narratives: "protect system", "fair distribution", "prevent collapse". - Still my base case is: No outright seizure, but effective confiscation via inflation, negative rates, and behavioral CBDC restrictions. Things get nuanced once you get into state-embedded equities (e.g. Palantir, Microsoft) in a Great Taking type scenario. Technically, all stocks held through custodians, brokerages, and CSDs (DTCC, Euroclear, Clearstream, etc.) are legally collateralized and can be swept. However, the Controllers usually do not "punish" their own instruments. State-embedded companies are not "capital assets" in the same way as random ETFs. They are extensions of the state-control lattice. Seizing their equity en masse would destabilize their role. Why would the Controllers burn the infrastructure they rely on? Instead, these equities are more likely to be: - Ring-fenced: carved out from seizure frameworks. - Converted: forcibly shifted to "CBDC-denominated ledger shares". You still "own" them, but only inside the CBDC matrix. - Protected selectively: insiders, elites, and aligned funds retain ownership; retail may be converted or frozen. So - yes, they are technically seizable, but practically unlikely to be targeted, because they are the command system itself. In summary, the full Great Taking type scenario is technically possible, legally enabled, but extremely risky. Requires near-perfect control of narratives + timing (crisis trigger + CBDC rollout + global harmonization). If mismanaged, triggers chaos -> loss of trust in state. Hence, fallback scenario if debt pyramid collapse outruns managed transition. If you are very concerned about this type of scenario, you can explore Direct registration (if possible), transfer to Custodians Outside Seizure Jurisdictions, or long-term call options (which can be cash-settled in "new CBDC terms" instead of seizure). But, in general, random S&P companies have higher seizure odds than State-embedded firms (which have the lowest odds of getting seized), in a Great Taking type scenario. This doesn't make holders of State-embedded firms immune to seizure. Let's look at Palantir as an example - arguably the most state-embedded company. Immune archetypally -> Palantir itself will not be destroyed. Its contracts, revenues, and integration with the state guarantee survival. Not immune retail-wise -> your access to PLTR shares can still be taken, frozen, converted. In other words: - The entity is immortal. - Your claim on the entity is not. (Its only as safe as your custody arrangement). So in the worst possible case scenario, the "Great Taking" doesn't eliminate Palantir - it just eliminates weakly-held claims to Palantir. Alpha comes from mastering custody layers - not just asset selection. The Controllers designed the game so that they keep the immortal entities while you keep the disposable claims. The alpha is to invert that game as much as possible.

Portfolio managers have hard/soft rules that not very many investors understand. If you understand them, you can exploit them. The hard rules are good to know, but I'm not going to focus on them right now because I find the soft rules more interesting. Soft rules aren't in law (as opposed to hard rules), but they run the show. - Career risk & closet indexing: stray too far from benchmark -> firing risk. - Draw-down limits: internal (e.g., −8% month / −15% quarter trigger size cuts). - Quarter/half "optics": window dressing (dump losers, own benchmark mega-caps into print). - Model/committee discipline: committees won't approve "weird" theses (e.g., my thesis - "technocracy substrate"); position sizes muted even when edge is real. - Capacity & liquidity: if daily turnover can't absorb a 3–5x Average Daily Volume exit, Portfolio Manager sizes down. - Reputational veto: "Surveillance/governance winners" may be under-owned because investor relations can't say the quiet part. Big platforms prefer scale and low headline risk - true alpha gets under-allocated. - Incentive comp geometry: annual bonus is tied to relative performance so it hurts to be early/contrarian. - Organizational inertia: new ideas need risk sign-offs; slow ≈ "no". Then, there's also the reality around what turns Portfolio Managers into forced-sellers. - Volatility & Value at Risk gating (When Value at Risk spikes, risk parity / levered macro funds de-risk mechanically. - When realized/implied volatility jumps, Value at Risk rockets even with flat prices. - Value at Risk (VaR) is a financial metric that estimates the potential loss in value of a portfolio over a specified time period, given normal market conditions. - Due to Value at Risk gating, mispricings widen precisely when upside improves. - Use Value at Risk events (policy panics, hearings, short bans, fee spikes) to buy state-embedded compounders. - Value at Risk events push Portfolio Managers to sell what they actually like (liquid compounders) to fund outflows - precisely when the expected value is best. - Use forced-seller windows to scale in. - After the facility/standard arrives, policy synchronization lifts the same names - then the Portfolio Managers come in, the indexers (S&P, QQQ, etc.) add, and the entry looks "obvious". - Policy Synchronization is when the same rules start to appear across allied countries which usually means to front-run spend on identity/compliance. In other words, front-run standards harmonization. Do not think that markets are free. Markets are efficient to constraints. Learn the constraints (hard + soft), anticipate the forced flows, and be the one entity in the stack that doesn't have to sell. Mispricings persist because Portfolio Managers optimize career/mandate constraints, not truth. This point: - "Reputational veto: "Surveillance/governance winners" may be under-owned because investor relations can't say the quiet part." is very significant and needs to be explored further. It basically means that Conspiracy = asymmetry.