GameStop: Future '30 For 30' Episode or Future Civil War Movie? Special Guest Kyle Bass

Betting On Zero

Burke Koonce and John Fichthorn discuss the latest topics of interest in politics, financial markets, and the cultural forces that shape the world around us, which today starts with GameStop and the battle between retail investors and short-sellers..

John, who is executive chairman of Maven, owner of TheStreet.com and other media properties, and Burke, who runs the Capitalism Maven site for TheStreet.com, have a long history together discussing markets, politics and contemporary subjects. These discussions sometimes get made into films such as Betting On Zero, which of course is about a short-seller.

In this episode, we are joined by Kyle Bass, chief investment officer of Hayman Capital, who has been an observer of capital markets and geopolitical machinations for decades. He is an experienced short-seller, and with this week’s madness over Gamestop, Kyle’s take is especially fascinating.

This is a fun and far-reaching episode. We’ll have to have Kyle back soon, because while we could have talked about GameStop all day, there were too many other topics to touch on. Of course, that’s how capital markets work--one topic leads to another and everything is connected.

Precisely because of that, Kyle thinks the GameStop folly could have a meaningful impact on the markets. If suddenly every risk-management model has to incorporate a probability of a social media mob running over each position, markets will behave differently.

Social media is changing the balance of power all over the world, capital markets included. Of course, any discussion of balance of global power leads to a discussion about China, and Kyle is one of the world’s closest watchers of the Middle Kingdom. And any discussion of global politics includes a discussion of global markets and, well, you get the picture. Kyle Bass is a fantastic guest.

We hope you enjoy this action-packed episode.