Episode Summary
Executive Summary: Macro Voices’ 10th anniversary episode featured Alex Gorevich arguing that the fixed-income cycle is still following a normal easing playbook, while AI is likely to drive a long-term energy bottleneck and an arms race in power generation. He sees Japan as a potential macro inflection, precious metals as cooling into consolidation, and uranium as structurally bullish, with Patrick expressing a tactical bullish yen trade.
Main Topics: Fixed income and the bond-cycle playbook (Priority: 5/5): Alex argues the current bond market is not unusual: easing cycles often see short rates fall first while long rates stay sticky, then rally later. He sees current data as ambiguous, with inflation softening and employment weakening but not yet decisively. AI, employment, and the energy bottleneck (Priority: 5/5): Both speakers agree AI is likely to reshape labor markets and dramatically increase electricity demand. Alex believes compute growth will overwhelm all energy supply additions, making energy the key bottleneck for civilization and growth. Energy investment implications (Priority: 5/5): They debate whether nuclear, natural gas, and other sources can scale fast enough to meet AI-driven demand. Alex sees energy infrastructure broadly as attractive, while Eric emphasizes gas turbines as a practical interim bottleneck and investment theme. Precious metals correction and cycle status (Priority: 4/5): Gold, silver, platinum, and palladium are discussed as being in different phases of their cycles. Alex thinks silver may have completed much of its run, gold is consolidating, and platinum may still be early; Eric frames the selloff as a likely consolidation rather than cycle end. Japan and the yen as a potential inflection point (Priority: 5/5): Alex sees Japan as one of the most interesting macro setups: higher yields, a steeper curve, persistent inflation, and an extremely weak yen may be nearing a turning point. Patrick turns this into a tactical bullish yen options trade. Market posture: equities, dollar, commodities, and rates (Priority: 4/5): In the post-game, Eric and Patrick review a market in transition: U.S. equities are still fragile beneath the surface, the dollar remains weak but at support, crude is constructive, copper and uranium are consolidating, and 10-year Treasury yields are beginning to move again. Alex Gorevich’s new book and trading framework (Priority: 3/5): Alex explains that the new edition of The Next Perfect Trade is designed to let readers judge his original strategy against hindsight, including mistakes, successes, and the discipline problems traders face.
Key Arguments: The beginning of an easing cycle usually produces a steeper yield curve, with short rates falling first and long rates staying sticky; a later long-end rally is often overdone and comes much later. Differences between a hawkish and dovish Fed are usually only around 50 bps for a couple of meetings because economic data ultimately forces policy convergence. Real interest rates staying higher should eventually weaken employment because more expensive money constrains balance sheets, expansion, and hiring. AI is likely to be a major long-term force in job displacement and GDP structure, but not necessarily an immediate source of explosive growth in the short run. AI will become a military and geopolitical arms-race issue, likely increasing defense budgets while reducing the need for human ground troops. Compute demand is growing so fast that it will likely overwhelm energy supply growth, making energy the bottleneck for future growth regardless of whether the source is nuclear, gas, renewables, or fusion. Nuclear is the long-term strategic answer to energy demand, but it may be too slow and expensive to solve near-term hyperscaler needs. Natural gas-fired power plants may be the fastest scalable interim solution, with gas turbines likely becoming a major bottleneck due to long lead times. Precious metals appear to be undergoing a correction/consolidation after an extended rally; silver may have already run far beyond conservative price targets, while platinum may still have room to catch up. Japan may be approaching a regime shift because rising yields and a still-cheap yen can eventually pull capital back in, making yen longs attractive. The new edition of The Next Perfect Trade is intended to test trading principles against real-world outcomes and openly document where Alex was wrong or failed to follow his own rules.
Data Points: Macro Voices episode: 519 - Episode number for this interview Production date: February 12, 2026 - Episode release date Macro Voices age: 10 years old - Host opening remarks S&P 500 weekly change: up 86 bps - Week-over-week scoreboard as of Feb. 11, 2026 S&P 500 level: 69.41 - As read in the transcript scoreboard U.S. Dollar Index weekly change: down 87 bps - Week-over-week scoreboard U.S. Dollar Index level: 96.79 - As of Feb. 11, 2026 close WTI crude weekly change: down 78 bps - March WTI contract WTI crude level: 64.63 - March WTI contract close RBOB gasoline weekly change: up 46 bps - April RBOB contract RBOB gasoline level: 220 - April RBOB contract close Gold weekly change: up 299 bps - April gold contract Gold level: 5,098 - April gold contract close Copper weekly change: up 188 bps - March copper contract Copper level: 596 - March copper contract close Uranium weekly change: up 350 bps - February uranium contract Uranium level: 88.70 - February uranium contract close U.S. 10-year Treasury yield weekly change: down 10 bps - Market scoreboard U.S. 10-year Treasury yield level: 4.17% - As of Feb. 11, 2026 close Yen future cited by Patrick: September 2026 yen future at 62.20 - Trade-of-the-week setup Call option strike/expiry: August 7, six-month 63 call - Patrick’s yen options trade Option premium: 37 pips - Yen call used for convex bullish exposure Intrinsic value in option: 32 pips - Patrick notes most of the premium is intrinsic Option delta: ~0.77 - High-delta participation in yen upside Notional per contract: ~$80,000 - Patrick’s yen trade structure Premium outlay per contract: $4,625 - Cost of convexity and capped risk Gold retracement levels discussed: 50% at 5,024; 61.8% at 5,166; 38.2% at 4,882 - Patrick’s technical framework for gold Dollar support level discussed: ~95 - Patrick identifies a key multi-year support zone Natural gas plant build time: ~1.5 years - Eric’s estimate once turbines are secured Gas turbine lead time: ~6 years - Eric says turbine shortages are a key bottleneck Nuclear prototype permit threshold: 30 MW thermal - Eric discusses DOE permitting path bypassing NRC approval
Pivotal Quotes: "The fixed income market lies at the heart of everything." — Alex Gorevich: Alex opens the bond discussion, framing fixed income as the core macro signal "I think that energy will unavoidably become a bottleneck for civilization, for the growth, for growth." — Alex Gorevich: Alex’s core thesis on AI-driven compute demand and energy scarcity "It ain’t over till it’s over." — Eric Townsend: Eric’s caution that gold’s correction may not yet be complete
Implications: Listeners should expect continued volatility in rates, energy, and Japan, with AI turning electricity and infrastructure into strategic assets. Near term, consolidation may dominate; longer term, yen strength, uranium, gas infrastructure, and selective precious metals exposure stand out.
From the Transcript
Going out. Trump is going to get his way. We're headed toward much lower interest rates. At the same time, there's other people saying, no, it's the opposite. Too low of a policy rate is going to ignite inflation fears. We could see a crash in the back end of the bond market. What's your take? How should we understand the fixed income market and the outlook for bonds? Eric, thank you for having me here. It's good to be back. And yes, let's start with the fixed income market because ITQS fixed income market lies at the heart of everything. And it responds to probably the most robust set of economic data, which is U.S. economic data. Though, admittedly, economic data in the U.S. over the last few months has been quite confusing. Even like to think of the government shutdown, which disrupted various economic statistics reports and made them very distorted, and a lot of conflicting data. We could dig in this a little more, but just to look at the big picture, the data has been inconclusive. As for
On the other guy, I think AI is going to be that important, and I think that whether you like the fact that it's going to create an energy crisis, and I think it will, or not, it's going to happen because it's going to be a matter of national security. Am I just being a conspiracy theorist to say things like that, or do you think it's going to be that important? I would say I wholeheartedly agree with you. I think it's almost mathematically impossible to be otherwise. I think that already we're already at the stage when being Skeptic about AI role in the military developments is a thing of the past. There is really almost no room left for skepticism about what you're saying. It will almost inevitably be an arms race in terms of AI. What is interesting, I was even thinking, which is completely independently of what you just said, specifically this morning, I was thinking about the impact of AI and military, and I was thinking that paradox.
Patrick, the main thought on my mind this week is: well, it ain't over till it's over. We're back above the 50% FibRetrace level at 5024 on the April contract. That's definitely positive. But this rally has stalled here right around 5100 a few times now. Seems like we're fighting some pretty strong resistance there, and that's still well below the 61.8 FibRetrace level, which is at 5166. And to be sure, after a panic of the magnitude That we saw last week, a dead cat bounce trading up to the 61.8% Fibonacci retracement level. That's 5166, 5166 on the April contract. If we were to hit that level, then roll over in order to retest, let's say, first the 50% level, that's 5024, and then going down to 4882, which is the 38.2% level, that would be a perfectly textbook, you know, failed dead cat bounce type of thing.
About Macro Voices
Weekly market commentary by Hedge Fund Manager Erik Townsend and interviews with the brightest minds in the world of finance and macroeconomics. Made possible by funding from Fourth Turning Capital Management, LLC