I am so appreciative of your and Scott's "mission" of enlightenment. When the world we live in IS a casino, it's 'dear leader' being the central casting MC, there is a devotion to get-rich-quick, and why not, when young people see the Kardashians' glory and Trump's meteoric rise from a Reality Show Bimbo to the president of the United States.... We are a country addicted to schemes because traditional opportunities and values have grown thin - or the patience of the striver has.
I am sharing your and Scott's pages to my son, an ambitious, hardworking young man, who sees with both eyes. I want the right example of advisors to be within his grasp and attention.
Like your link at the top with a funeral arrangement, Ed, because financial crises are a bit like deaths, aren’t they? We know they happen but we somehow convince ourselves that they don’t happen to us! As if it’s a tragedy that only happens elsewhere. The attitude - understandable, to a degree - makes it all the more shocking when the crisis arrives.
Ed, thanks for a well researched article and a timely warning. This gambling culture has metastasized beyond anything I could ever have imagined. SK just received a huge wake up call. Sooner or later it's coming to the USA. And when it blows it'll hurt gamblers and non gamblers alike.
Ed, I agree with your premise entirely, and the part that worries me most isn't even in your piece directly: it's the backdrop you're describing this crisis against. South Korea's crash came from concentration and leverage layered on top of loneliness and inequality. America has all of that, plus a government actively making the underlying inequality worse while pretending the market's rise is proof everything's fine.
That's the disconnect that keeps me up at night. The gap between the ultra-rich and the desperately poor in this country isn't narrowing; it's widening by the month, and yet the market keeps climbing as if none of that matters. As if a shrinking middle class, a gutted regulatory apparatus, and an administration that's told its own citizens outright that the way to get rich is to cheat, are somehow bullish signals rather than exactly the kind of rot that precedes a collapse. Markets are supposed to price in risk. Right now America’s are pricing in impunity instead, and treating the two as if they're the same thing.
South Korea's crash happened because leverage let a concentrated bet amplify itself past the point of survival. America is set up to do the same thing at a national scale—a hollowed-out SEC, insider trading normalized from the top down, a president openly cheering the casino instead of regulating it. When the correction comes, and it will, it won't just be retail traders in their twenties losing their shirts on single-stock ETFs. It'll be a country that spent years pretending the chart going up and the country falling apart underneath it were two unrelated stories. They were never unrelated. They're the same story, and South Korea just showed us how it ends.
Alternative perspective: these lessons were obvious in 1930, and formed the core of financial market regulations in the US. By the 1980s, investment professionals learned these precepts in MBA courses and professional investment programs. Heo Kyung-wook became the first Korean civil servant to obtain the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation in 1999. In 2000 the CFA Society Korea was officially recognized.
Korea’s current trouble was the result of corruption. No learning of abstract lessons will prevent reoccurrence. The people responsible for financial regulation should be punished. The financial industry leaders involved should be fired. The current focus on “lessons” is a smoke screen.
I'm sure we'll be reassured when the Donald tells us the crash is a "hoax", and "fake news". The guy can't even own up to a rushed, botched, paint job. Hell, he might even try to indict somebody, like,well,you. Maybe after Ed Zitron.
I’ve been reading your stuff for a while. I think I could help you write faster without losing your voice. Even I can help you with repurposing your long form into notes.
More than 1.1 trillion won in forced selling during June is hard to ignore. Once brokers close positions, investors lose the option to wait. That can make a bad drop worse.
Let's not forget that it was Biden's SEC who made leveraged single-stock ETFs available to non-accredited retail investors in 2022, so the fact that people are now trading in this financial dynamite has nothing to do with Trump gutting the SEC.
Can you chart an overlay of the KOSPI with the S&P500 comparing the leveraged concentration of wealth? I think that would hit the point you’re making. You’ve been very vocal about how the market has been top heavy and leveraged for a massive correction for as long as I’ve been listening to you (a long time). I believe you’re right. It’s not if the bubble will burst, but when. At 67 years old it makes this all the more terrifying.
I am so appreciative of your and Scott's "mission" of enlightenment. When the world we live in IS a casino, it's 'dear leader' being the central casting MC, there is a devotion to get-rich-quick, and why not, when young people see the Kardashians' glory and Trump's meteoric rise from a Reality Show Bimbo to the president of the United States.... We are a country addicted to schemes because traditional opportunities and values have grown thin - or the patience of the striver has.
I am sharing your and Scott's pages to my son, an ambitious, hardworking young man, who sees with both eyes. I want the right example of advisors to be within his grasp and attention.
Thanks, Ed, and thanks, Scott.
Like your link at the top with a funeral arrangement, Ed, because financial crises are a bit like deaths, aren’t they? We know they happen but we somehow convince ourselves that they don’t happen to us! As if it’s a tragedy that only happens elsewhere. The attitude - understandable, to a degree - makes it all the more shocking when the crisis arrives.
Ed, thanks for a well researched article and a timely warning. This gambling culture has metastasized beyond anything I could ever have imagined. SK just received a huge wake up call. Sooner or later it's coming to the USA. And when it blows it'll hurt gamblers and non gamblers alike.
Brilliantly summarised. You write really well and simply.
Ed, I agree with your premise entirely, and the part that worries me most isn't even in your piece directly: it's the backdrop you're describing this crisis against. South Korea's crash came from concentration and leverage layered on top of loneliness and inequality. America has all of that, plus a government actively making the underlying inequality worse while pretending the market's rise is proof everything's fine.
That's the disconnect that keeps me up at night. The gap between the ultra-rich and the desperately poor in this country isn't narrowing; it's widening by the month, and yet the market keeps climbing as if none of that matters. As if a shrinking middle class, a gutted regulatory apparatus, and an administration that's told its own citizens outright that the way to get rich is to cheat, are somehow bullish signals rather than exactly the kind of rot that precedes a collapse. Markets are supposed to price in risk. Right now America’s are pricing in impunity instead, and treating the two as if they're the same thing.
South Korea's crash happened because leverage let a concentrated bet amplify itself past the point of survival. America is set up to do the same thing at a national scale—a hollowed-out SEC, insider trading normalized from the top down, a president openly cheering the casino instead of regulating it. When the correction comes, and it will, it won't just be retail traders in their twenties losing their shirts on single-stock ETFs. It'll be a country that spent years pretending the chart going up and the country falling apart underneath it were two unrelated stories. They were never unrelated. They're the same story, and South Korea just showed us how it ends.
Alternative perspective: these lessons were obvious in 1930, and formed the core of financial market regulations in the US. By the 1980s, investment professionals learned these precepts in MBA courses and professional investment programs. Heo Kyung-wook became the first Korean civil servant to obtain the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation in 1999. In 2000 the CFA Society Korea was officially recognized.
Korea’s current trouble was the result of corruption. No learning of abstract lessons will prevent reoccurrence. The people responsible for financial regulation should be punished. The financial industry leaders involved should be fired. The current focus on “lessons” is a smoke screen.
I'm sure we'll be reassured when the Donald tells us the crash is a "hoax", and "fake news". The guy can't even own up to a rushed, botched, paint job. Hell, he might even try to indict somebody, like,well,you. Maybe after Ed Zitron.
I love you articles Ed.
I’ve been reading your stuff for a while. I think I could help you write faster without losing your voice. Even I can help you with repurposing your long form into notes.
You missing the impact a note can create.
Want to see a sample?”
Good work, Ed. You are so much better at this than Scott.
More than 1.1 trillion won in forced selling during June is hard to ignore. Once brokers close positions, investors lose the option to wait. That can make a bad drop worse.
Let's not forget that it was Biden's SEC who made leveraged single-stock ETFs available to non-accredited retail investors in 2022, so the fact that people are now trading in this financial dynamite has nothing to do with Trump gutting the SEC.
Can you chart an overlay of the KOSPI with the S&P500 comparing the leveraged concentration of wealth? I think that would hit the point you’re making. You’ve been very vocal about how the market has been top heavy and leveraged for a massive correction for as long as I’ve been listening to you (a long time). I believe you’re right. It’s not if the bubble will burst, but when. At 67 years old it makes this all the more terrifying.