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Speaker 1: You're listening to the Buck Sexton Show podcast, make sure

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Speaker 1: you subscribe to the podcast on the iHeartRadio app or

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Speaker 1: wherever you get your podcasts.

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Speaker 2: Hey guys, welcome to Buck Brief. First time on the show.

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Speaker 2: John lefev is with us now. He is a best

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Speaker 2: selling author of Straight to Hell. He's a former Wall

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Speaker 2: Street insider. I think anybody who works on Wall Street

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Speaker 2: when they go into media, John is considered an insider.

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Speaker 2: So there you go. And the man behind the Goldman

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Speaker 2: Sachs Elevator Twitter account, which I'm gonna tell you John,

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Speaker 2: I started in media out of the CIA in twenty eleven,

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Speaker 2: Goldman Sachs elevat and I was a New York City kid.

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Speaker 2: I grew up in the city. All my friends worked

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Speaker 2: in finance. My dad worked on Wall Street. So Goldman

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Speaker 2: Sachs Elevator original account was I think one of the

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Speaker 2: first like five Twitter accounts that I actually followed. So

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Speaker 2: here we are, many years later. How did you come

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Speaker 2: up with it?

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Speaker 1: Yeah? So the short version is I was in Hong

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Speaker 1: Kong working in banking, and we post crisis, we'd set

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Speaker 1: up a capital markets advisory firm, kind of a hybrid

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Speaker 1: between advisory trading, private equity and traditional capital markets, you know, fundraising,

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Speaker 1: whether it's bonds or loans or anything between. So it

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Speaker 1: was a nimble, flexible boutique that operated across Asia and Europe.

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Speaker 1: And I left in two thousand and ten to join

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Speaker 1: Golden Sachs. They gave me an offer I effectively couldn't

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Speaker 1: refuse to run their Asia syndicate business. And a month

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Speaker 1: into my gardening leave, which is the period that you

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Speaker 1: have to sit out of markets if you possess material

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Speaker 1: market sensitive non public information. You're not allowed to work

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Speaker 1: if you go from one bank to another. So I

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Speaker 1: was in the middle of my three month gardening leave

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Speaker 1: when the firm that I left sued me for breach

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Speaker 1: of contract, citing the non compete clause that we had,

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Speaker 1: so that effectively prevents hid me from joining Golden and

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Speaker 1: so I spent the next year traveling around Asia and

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Speaker 1: just drinking and having fun. And this was peak occupied

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Speaker 1: Wall Street. So I one day I was just sitting

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Speaker 1: in a bar with some friends and I said, Man,

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Speaker 1: these people hate us, and they have no idea if

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Speaker 1: they really knew in terms of the racism and the

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Speaker 1: classism and the sexism and the corruption and the deviance

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Speaker 1: they would they have no clue, And so it started

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Speaker 1: as a joke and it just kind of took off,

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Speaker 1: and I kept with it because at the time I

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Speaker 1: was looking to leave the industry was this. You know,

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Speaker 1: I'd worked in New York and London and Hong Kong

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Speaker 1: and Singapore and was kind of sick of it. And

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Speaker 1: when I got into the business, I got in because

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Speaker 1: of the book Liar's Poker. And when I started, I

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Speaker 1: looked around. I said, Man, this work isn't that hard.

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Speaker 1: These people aren't that smart, but yet they define themselves

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Speaker 1: as human being by the fact that they worked for

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Speaker 1: Morgan Stanley or Goldman Sachs or Deutsche Ank or JP

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Speaker 1: Morgan or whatever. It's kind of pathetic. And so I'd

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Speaker 1: always wanted to write a book, so cynically I had

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Speaker 1: had kept track of my stories throughout my career. And

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Speaker 1: then once the Twitter account took off, I thought, well,

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Speaker 1: I'm not a writer, but I can use this platform

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Speaker 1: and this following to get exposure, you know, with the

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Speaker 1: ultimate goal of publishing a book, which is why effectively

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Speaker 1: I grew the account up until you know, publishing my

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Speaker 1: book and then gradually let it die. Over the subsequent

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Speaker 1: years that followed, just because you know, I figured there's

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Speaker 1: only so much you can say about it, so I

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Speaker 1: just kind of hung you know, retired the account a

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Speaker 1: couple of years ago.

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Speaker 2: What was the ethos or the you know, what were

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Speaker 2: the organizing principles of Goldman Sachs GS elevator Twitter account?

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Speaker 1: Well, effectively, the basic premise, right was just things overheard

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Speaker 1: in the elevator at Goldman Sacks. But it was never

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Speaker 1: meant to be taken literally, So it was just a

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Speaker 1: It was a fictional character that I think people could

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Speaker 1: relate to, and it illuminated a culture. So it didn't

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Speaker 1: just represent Goldman Sacks. It represented, you know, everybody in

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Speaker 1: that sphere, everyone that people hated.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I can nind of jump in really quickly because

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Speaker 2: I covered Occupy Wall Street for the Blaze. People forget

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Speaker 2: that the banksters. There was this period of time for

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Speaker 2: a couple of years where the banksters were like this

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Speaker 2: public enemy number one. I mean, you know, like the

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Speaker 2: big investment banks and all this stuff, which is actually

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Speaker 2: kind of insane, but anyway, that was what happened.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, you know, we had family members getting

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Speaker 1: chased out of dentist's offices because they were overheard saying

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Speaker 1: that they were, you know, using the Goldman Sachs company

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Speaker 1: insurance to pay for their kids' dental care. I mean,

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Speaker 1: that's how much Animal was towards towards bankers at the time.

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Speaker 1: It was. It was a wild time.

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Speaker 2: And then I want to get into your book and

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Speaker 2: all that, but actually I'm going to bring us into

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Speaker 2: the current moment here in a second with as somebody

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Speaker 2: who knows how the markets work, how the street works,

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Speaker 2: I want you to tell me what you expect. Here

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Speaker 2: we are. It's November twenty twenty four. Trump's going to

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Speaker 2: be president, He's got the House, he's got the Senate.

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Speaker 2: What do you think happens in the markets? But hold

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Speaker 2: Radio dot com or call eight four four eight two

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Speaker 2: four safe today. All right, John, the Trump economy starting

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Speaker 2: starting in January. What does it look like in the

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Speaker 2: markets and why why do you think things are gonna

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Speaker 2: head in one direction or another?

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Speaker 1: I think that is such a difficult question because you know,

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Speaker 1: if you look at what we are being handed with

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Speaker 1: the property market, with rates, with inflation, that's not going away.

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Speaker 1: I mean, an alternative outcome would have been a generational disaster.

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Speaker 1: So it's it's hard to then kind of recalibrate to

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Speaker 1: look at where we are are now. But having said that, obviously,

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Speaker 1: you know, optimism is up, Crypto is up, equities are up,

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Speaker 1: even though a lot of that that growth is kind

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Speaker 1: of concentrated in you know, a handful of stocks. So

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Speaker 1: it's hard to be bearish. But at the same time,

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Speaker 1: I think a lot of that sentiment is priced in,

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Speaker 1: and I think the underlying fundamentals in other areas are

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Speaker 1: perhaps going to present some some headwinds that will be

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Speaker 1: pretty difficult, right especially on the real estate side, where

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Speaker 1: you know, morg rates aren't aren't going to come down.

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Speaker 1: Housing is dysfunctional, the commercial lending space is dysfunctional. So

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Speaker 1: the question is how do you balance those headwinds with

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Speaker 1: the tailwinds we're going to get, particularly from Dose, which

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Speaker 1: is going to be so radically transformational as probably the

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Speaker 1: most impactful, profound initiative any of us have ever seen

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Speaker 1: or will ever see in our lifetime, that is so

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Speaker 1: far beyond comprehension that you know, I guess when I

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Speaker 1: balance all of those forces, you can't help but be

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Speaker 1: bullish because you have to go long, you have to

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Speaker 1: go along elon. But there's gonna be a lot of pain, right,

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Speaker 1: you know, when you take when you look at how

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Speaker 1: reliant Kamala's administration in terms of GDP growth, in terms

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Speaker 1: of employment growth has been on the government sector, on

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Speaker 1: people having multiple jobs, on illegal right. If you take

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Speaker 1: those components out of the GDP component and out of

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Speaker 1: the employment sector, there is obviously room for a lot

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Speaker 1: of pain. So I think it's very challenging. I think

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Speaker 1: it's very difficult to have a view. But by and large,

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Speaker 1: I think the best advice anybody can take at this

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Speaker 1: point is do not bet against Elon.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I feel that way in general. I mean, I'm

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Speaker 2: I'm somebody who always says, you know, don't meet your

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Speaker 2: heroes and don't be a fan of anyone. I can't

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Speaker 2: help but kind of be a fan of Elon. I

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Speaker 2: find what he's doing in the space realm in Tesla

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Speaker 2: buying X, which I don't know if you had this

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Speaker 2: experience at all, John, I mean during COVID, I was

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Speaker 2: very very vocal early on, I mean among the earliest

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Speaker 2: about how stupid lockdowns were and how masks are preposterous,

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Speaker 2: and I was getting I got throttled, I got suspended,

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Speaker 2: I got demonetized on YouTube, I got shut down on

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Speaker 2: you I mean, it's just like a constant now that

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Speaker 2: Elon has just created one big public square where people

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Speaker 2: get exchange ideas. I mean, I feel like I'm forever grateful,

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Speaker 2: but I feel like the Elon effect the economy will

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Speaker 2: be strong. That all said, what you're identifying is, as

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Speaker 2: far as I can see, it are structural long term risks, right,

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Speaker 2: long term problems. Thirty six trillion in debt is thirty

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Speaker 2: six trillion in debt. It doesn't matter who the president is.

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Speaker 2: That starts to be a scary number. And I'm wondering,

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Speaker 2: is there anything that you're looking for? No matter there

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Speaker 2: are some things that no matter what Trump does. I

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Speaker 2: think they are the concerns that something bad could happen.

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Speaker 2: There could be kind of a reset. There's the intentional

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Speaker 2: pain to get us where we need to be in

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Speaker 2: the economy. But then there's also the wheels start to

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Speaker 2: come off the bus just because they've been coming off

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Speaker 2: for the last you know, fifteen years. What do you

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Speaker 2: think what would worry you in the markets? Like what

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Speaker 2: would be the warning signs that you'd see You'd go,

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Speaker 2: oh god, this is about to get ugly.

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Speaker 1: That's very I think the trigger would be a major

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Speaker 1: correction in inequity markets, because if you think about the

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Speaker 1: fact that you know the average baby boomer and from

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Speaker 1: a technical perspective, you know, the housing market has been

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Speaker 1: relatively resilient because of where people have in terms of

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Speaker 1: mortgages paid off or locked in low mortgages, so there

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Speaker 1: hasn't been a need for somebody to necessarily sell their house.

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Speaker 1: But if you know baby boomers who have eighty percent

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Speaker 1: of their net worth in the value of their primary residence,

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Speaker 1: you know, if you see cracks emerging the equity markets,

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Speaker 1: then it could compel us to finally test the housing

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Speaker 1: market in a way that we haven't been able to

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Speaker 1: do in the last couple of years because of that

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Speaker 1: market dislocation of where rates have been and the inability

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Speaker 1: for a new body, so you really haven't a had

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Speaker 1: you've had kind of market dislocation, right, So if you

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Speaker 1: see a correction in equity markets, it could force selling

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Speaker 1: in the housing market, which would cause I think a

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Speaker 1: catastrophic snowball effect across the entire system, which would impact

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Speaker 1: you know, rates move down a little bit, housing crashes,

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Speaker 1: the economy stumbles, employment stalls, and then at that point,

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Speaker 1: you know, inflation will remain persistent, so you know they're

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Speaker 1: not going to keep cutting rates, and even if they do,

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Speaker 1: it hasn't really necessarily made a difference. So they did

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Speaker 1: a fifty basis point great cut six weeks ago, and

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Speaker 1: mortgage rates are up a basis point, So you know

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Speaker 1: the toolbox at the Federal Reserve will have, especially in

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Speaker 1: a Trump economy, I think, are going to be quite challenging.

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Speaker 1: So I think, in simple terms, what would scare me

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Speaker 1: the most would be a significant equity market sellof. And

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Speaker 1: again that's also a reflection of optimism, right, because what

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Speaker 1: do I mean? There's no better prop or investor sentiment

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Speaker 1: perhaps than equity markets. Right, And if you look at

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Speaker 1: on a forward looking basis the valuations, people are increasingly optimistic.

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Speaker 1: So when that changes, I think it's a reflection of

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Speaker 1: both the risks we have from a technical perspective, but

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Speaker 1: also with respect to a shift in terms of people's optimism.

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Speaker 2: We're going to come back here with John Lefev, the

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Speaker 2: author of Straight to Hell and the founder of the

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Speaker 2: Goldman Sachs Goldman Sachs Elevator Twitter account, which was one

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Speaker 2: of my early It was like I set up my

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Speaker 2: Twitter account, I followed like you and Colter. I still

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Speaker 2: remember it was like the first ten follows. I didn't

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Speaker 2: eve know what Twitter was. I came out of the CIA,

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Speaker 2: couldn't I need even have social media? And I get

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Speaker 2: this job working at the Blaze. They're like, you need

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Speaker 2: a Twitter account. I'm like what and no idea anyway,

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Speaker 2: but I liked I saw some of the things. I

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Speaker 2: like some people I followed. Anyway, here we are now.

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Speaker 2: That was Oh my god, dude, I'm getting old. That

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Speaker 2: was almost fifteen years ago. So it's been a while. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: we're talking about the economy. We're talking about structural issues. Look,

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Speaker 2: President Trump is already busy these days and he's announcing

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Speaker 2: all these positions and he's got some great ideas for

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Speaker 2: the economy. But our sponsor, Birch Gold, wants you to

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Speaker 2: All right, John, what do you think we learned from

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Speaker 2: this election, the Trump Kamala showdown, and how do you

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Speaker 2: think it affects the country going forward? You know, big,

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Speaker 2: big stuff, But I want to know what you think.

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Speaker 1: I mean. I think that the key thing for me

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Speaker 1: is just kind of almost socially. I have found that, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's almost hard to articulate. But anybody I think who

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Speaker 1: is now not a Trump supporter is either dumb or duped.

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Speaker 1: So if you look at like the evolution of Elon

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Speaker 1: saying he was going to be a political or even

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Speaker 1: left leaning, and then look at say Bill Ackman or

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Speaker 1: David Stack, Bill Perkins, any of these guys that have

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Speaker 1: kind of moved over. You know, if you spend an

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Speaker 1: hour with somebody talking about Charlottesville, talking about Russia, date

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Speaker 1: talking about the fact that our own intelligence agencies tried

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Speaker 1: to frame the sitting president of the United States, Fortreese,

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Speaker 1: it and it's all provable, and they come out of

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Speaker 1: that not realizing that they were duped or at least

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Speaker 1: the last eight years and obviously longer, and they can't

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Speaker 1: comprehend this. Then again, we live in separate world, and

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Speaker 1: so I think the takeaway from me that gives me

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Speaker 1: hope is that there are so many Elons out there.

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Speaker 1: There's so many Blackman's out there, There's so many people.

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Speaker 1: You know, basically, anybody with an IQ above one oh

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Speaker 1: five has and should have woken up to the realities. So,

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Speaker 1: you know, you alluded to your COVID experience a few

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Speaker 1: minutes ago. You know, if that happened again, we wouldn't

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Speaker 1: go through what we went through because people have really

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Speaker 1: really woken up. And so I think culturally that has

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Speaker 1: been the fundamental shift, and we are effectively a different culture.

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Speaker 1: I mean, you know, just a year and a half

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Speaker 1: ago we were talking about clotting gay at Harvard. Now

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Speaker 1: that seems completely absurd. And you know, Scientific American obviously

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Speaker 1: the the editor in chief resigned today. You know, these

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Speaker 1: are cultural changes that wouldn't happen, right. And they did

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Speaker 1: a survey about a month ago and they asked if

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Speaker 1: people It's a very simple question. It was like, do

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Speaker 1: you believe Donald Trump endorsed white supremacists in Charlottesville? And

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Speaker 1: you know, of conservatives, they it was fifteen percent said yes.

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Speaker 1: Of independence it was kind of thirty five percent yes,

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Speaker 1: and anybody to the left it was seventy five to

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Speaker 1: eighty percent still said yes one month ago. And this

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Speaker 1: is a hoax that had been disproven for years. And

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Speaker 1: that's just kind of a singular example, and that is

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Speaker 1: the progression we're seeing. And if you had taken that

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Speaker 1: poll a year ago or two years ago, the numbers

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Speaker 1: would have been even more significant. So if you've kind

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Speaker 1: of fast forward to where we're going to be in

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Speaker 1: January of next year, year, I've even found just in

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Speaker 1: terms of what I've seen in the last week. There

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Speaker 1: are people that I know who voted for Kamala Harris

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Speaker 1: and you can look at like Pete Hegseth or Matt

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Speaker 1: Gates and and that's obviously kind of going to stir

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Speaker 1: things up. But putting that aside, I've seen people that

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Speaker 1: voted proudly for Kamala come out and say, you know what,

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Speaker 1: I was wrong. I still didn't get it, and now

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Speaker 1: I get it. So for me, it's that cultural shift

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Speaker 1: that is really going to keep trending in the right

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Speaker 1: direction for us.

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Speaker 2: Do you feel like there's been a big change in

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Speaker 2: terms of going back to your your Wall Street roots

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Speaker 2: here for a second? Do you feel like the era

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Speaker 2: of Wall Street is the place where all the Ivy

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Speaker 2: League kids are just shoving each other out of the

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Speaker 2: way to try to break down the door? Is that over?

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Speaker 2: Is that really going on still? I mean, I'm kind

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Speaker 2: of an old man now and I don't have any

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Speaker 2: kids who are college age, but it seems to me

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Speaker 2: that everybody wants to either you know, start the next

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Speaker 2: big tech thing or be an Instagram influencer.

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Speaker 1: Well, sadly it's probably influencer, right, but the allure of

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Speaker 1: going to Wall Street, I think died I don't know,

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Speaker 1: probably ten fifteen years ago, and I'm probably the wrong

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Speaker 1: person to ask, because cynically, I think it's really a

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Speaker 1: profession that people get into because they're obviously smart, but

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Speaker 1: they're not quite sure what they want to do, or

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Speaker 1: they don't have the balls to go out and take

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Speaker 1: a risk. So it's a good place to go. Sit somewhere,

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Speaker 1: get paid relatively well, get well trained, get that stamp

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Speaker 1: of approval, and then down the line, reconsider what it

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Speaker 1: is that you really want to do. And it's prestigious

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Speaker 1: and so you you know, worst case scenario, if you

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Speaker 1: stick it out for twenty years, you can retire at

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Speaker 1: the age of forty five and be well respected in society.

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Speaker 1: That has changed over the last fifteen years, and I

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Speaker 1: think it's going to continue to change, and in fact,

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Speaker 1: I think it was yesterday there was a conversation with

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Speaker 1: Elon and Vivek basically saying they want Doze to be

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Speaker 1: the place where the young smart graduates want to work,

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Speaker 1: where they want to spend eighty one hundred hours a week,

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Speaker 1: probably not getting paid Wall Street money, but they will

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Speaker 1: get the experience and they will have the cachet and

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Speaker 1: prestige and the network effect whereby after that time they

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Speaker 1: can do everything. So I think you're right. So it's

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Speaker 1: going to be tech and it's going to be dozed.

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Speaker 2: Now is a time when Israel's allies have to stand

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Speaker 2: with the state of Israel. That's why I'm proud to

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Speaker 2: partner with the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews. They've

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Speaker 2: been building bridges between Christians and Jews for over forty years,

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Speaker 2: and since that time they've been on the ground helping

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Speaker 2: the vulnerable and providing security for Jews in both Israel

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Speaker 2: and Ukraine. Thank you for your support during this critical time.

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Speaker 2: Your gift helps the Fellowship provide food, necessities and security

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00:20:59,977 --> 00:21:02,417
Speaker 2: to those most Indeed, standing with Israel and the Jewish

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00:21:02,457 --> 00:21:05,337
Speaker 2: people has never meant so much. Go to support IFCJ

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Speaker 2: dot org to learn more and make a gift now

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00:21:07,737 --> 00:21:11,097
Speaker 2: that support IFCJ dot org or call eight eight eight

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Speaker 2: four eight eight IFCJ eight eight eight four eight eight

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Speaker 2: IFCJ with With Doge on my mind here, I think

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Speaker 2: one of the big stories of the twenty twenty four

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Speaker 2: election that will get more attention going forward as people

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Speaker 2: think about this stuff. I'm not saying no one's noticed.

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Speaker 2: A lot of people have noticed it, but you know,

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Speaker 2: Trump is just such a force of nature that all

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Speaker 2: eyes and attention go to him. The change of X

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Speaker 2: as a free speech platform, I think has dramatically affected

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Speaker 2: the entire media landscape because they can't get away with

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Speaker 2: the same crap they could before because they can't count.

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Speaker 2: And people say, oh, well, Facebook and YouTube there's still

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Speaker 2: you know, communists, and they are like, they're very left

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Speaker 2: wing and absolute as so the Facebook has actually been

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Speaker 2: getting a little bit better. YouTube is horrible. Google is

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Speaker 2: a bigger threat to your freedom than TikTok. I tell

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Speaker 2: people this all the time, but they've had to at

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Speaker 2: least take account of there's one place you can get free.

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Speaker 2: You can actually see the original video, you know, like,

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Speaker 2: are they cheap fakes or is Biden actually a dementia

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Speaker 2: riddled old man. We all know the answer to that now,

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Speaker 2: but that I think X played a large role in that.

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Speaker 2: And you mentioned the Silicon Valley guys, some of these

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Speaker 2: big guys. It's really hard to say that Trump is

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Speaker 2: like the representative of like white nationalist hillbilly's or something,

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Speaker 2: which was very much the twenty sixteen media narrative about it.

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Speaker 2: When the richest guy in the world and a bunch

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Speaker 2: of the richest guys in the world who do stuff

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Speaker 2: that requires a tremendous amount of brain power and entrepreneurialism

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Speaker 2: are like, this guy is obviously the choice. So I

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Speaker 2: feel like that was actually a big part of the

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Speaker 2: Trump move in twenty twenty four.

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Speaker 1: It wasn't a big part, it was the only part.

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Speaker 1: Without Questions, Without Elon buying Twitter, we wouldn't have any

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Speaker 1: of this full stop end of store.

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Speaker 2: There we go, John, What are you up to next?

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Speaker 1: Ah? Well, I am a kind of project based right

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Speaker 1: so I look at from a private ectory perspective different projects,

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Speaker 1: and so I've got a few projects right now. Something

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Speaker 1: in the in the media landscape, which is almost like

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Speaker 1: a post election to your point, a response or adjustment

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Speaker 1: to the fact that you will see the complete and

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Speaker 1: utter annihilation of the traditional media landscape. And in a

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Speaker 1: world where there are already too many substacks and too

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Speaker 1: many podcasts and too many newsletters. I think there is

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Speaker 1: an AI curation solution to that, so effectively, it's a

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Speaker 1: it's a curation media tech play, which would take me

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Speaker 1: a long time to explain. I think My other main

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Speaker 1: project is a solid state battery company that is looking

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Speaker 1: We're looking to reduce everyone's exposure and reliance on China,

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Speaker 1: so we manufacture solid state batteries and we are looking

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Speaker 1: very soon to announce the manufacturing facility being built in

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Speaker 1: the United States, which will be a massive, massive project.

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Speaker 1: And so you know, think of a drone battery, or

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Speaker 1: a phone battery or even currently a car battery. You know,

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Speaker 1: they're they're lithium ion. So this is solid state, which

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Speaker 1: is more stable, it doesn't degrade, it lasts longer, and

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Speaker 1: it's it's fully recyclable. So it's it's the next evolution

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Speaker 1: in battery technology, which I think there are a few

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Speaker 1: companies that have been have been working on it. We're

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Speaker 1: confident now that we're moving into the manufacturing phase there

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Speaker 1: and our main focus is reducing the reliance on China,

430
00:24:56,217 --> 00:24:59,097
Speaker 1: which up until now, you know, forget everything that Elon

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00:24:59,217 --> 00:25:01,937
Speaker 1: is doing, because obviously they're doing a tremendous amount, but

432
00:25:01,937 --> 00:25:05,337
Speaker 1: they're not in the solid state battery space. But we

433
00:25:05,377 --> 00:25:08,657
Speaker 1: will be looking to build a facility in uh somewhere

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Speaker 1: in the United States, which we cannot announ up at

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00:25:10,337 --> 00:25:10,897
Speaker 1: this point.

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00:25:11,377 --> 00:25:15,377
Speaker 2: Very cool, Uno it'll be a deal, very cool looked

437
00:25:15,377 --> 00:25:16,737
Speaker 2: at it. Look forward to hear more about it, and

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00:25:16,737 --> 00:25:19,737
Speaker 2: hopefully we get a drink down in South Florida sometime John,

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00:25:19,737 --> 00:25:21,017
Speaker 2: thanks for hanging out. Good to see you.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely