Investor in emerging market real estate, equities & bonds. In Eastern Europe since 2015. I also work with clients to access superior opportunities abroad.
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Joined March 2012
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Jason - macro & investing retweeted
I would give up everything to be teleported back to 1999 Moldova as a junk bond trader. Chisnau was a great place before Maia Sandu ruined everything.
POV: you're an expat in Chisinau in 2001 and invested in Moldova's 10 year government bonds when yields were at 21% (Russian banking crisis).
By 2003 (when Dragostea Din Tei was released) yield normalized to 10.5%. You doubled your money within two years.
Now you rotate to Romanian real estate, which went on to doing a 4x between 2003 to 2008 (one of the most incredible real estate bubbles across CEE region). You exited at the peak and EURUSD was 1.58. Life is good.
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
I entered $PBR at around $11.5 in January and even back then - I struggled to find any Brazilian local investors who were bullish PBR. Whilst many global value investors (including quite experienced and successful ones) considered PBR solidly undervalued.
There was a good Goldman Sachs memo (around April - May) on Brazil, highlighting how much of the $EWZ and $EWZS gains until then were captured by foreign investors as locals over-estimated the internal political risk.
I saw similar with Polish equities - $EPOL equity index went up 250% in last 4 years. Majority of those gains were captured by foreign investors and funds, as locals were too skeptical of their own stock market.
So in summary - I think there's a lot of value in monitoring both what local and foreign investors are thinking. One benefit foreign investors have is they are less politically emotional and have a comparatively lens (i.e. a Brazilian investor might look mainly at the internal situation in Brazil and think it's bad - a foreign investor compares globally and realized Brazil's problems are not that unique).
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
My view is that an EM fixed income portfolio (with some skills) can yield you similar to the headline rate of SPX over the long run (7-10%). But with less drawdowns and predictable cashflow - offering you optionality, which is super valuable and what proponents of equity index DCA do not consider often enough.
E.g. many would have been unable to sell (without taking a realized loss) during that 10+ years, even if an exceptional opportunity presented itself. And many such opportunities did appear in the 2000s.
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
#Chine 🇨🇳 : Aéroport de Pékin des voyageurs dénoncent l'usage massif des fauteuils roulants gratuits par des passagers valides pour doubler les files d'attente.
Les compagnies sont légalement obligées de fournir cette assistance sans justificatif
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
Lula convidou Erdogan para visitar o Brasil em sua primeira bilateral na COP31. O presidente turco, anfitrião da COP31, aceitou imediatamente e ainda se comprometeu a estar acompanhando de uma ampla delegação de empresários turcos em sua visita de Estado ao Brasil. Lula 4 já começou. A parceria estratégica com a Turquia é um capítulo importante de toda política externa dos governos petistas. Assim como o Brasil, historicamente, a Turquia adota uma posição de "ambiguidade estratégica", fronteira entre o ocidente e oriente, meio lá, meio cá. Esta também é a posição histórica estrategicamente mais vantajosa ao Brasil. Como países emergentes não podem estar sujeitos à hegemonia do imperialismo e nem têm qualquer interesse em se submeterem a outras hegemonias - ainda que benignas - como forma de "proteção". Seria o mesmo que crescer e não ter pernas para ficar de pé. Um alinhamento excessivo, mesmo com parcerias benignas, ganha-ganha, como por exemplo com a China, retira desses países uma vantagem política importante.
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
Why waste money on Ukrainian energy infrastructure that will be destroyed by Russian missiles when you can spend that money on looksmaxxing, live crocodiles, and Rolls-Royces?
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
Banning online betting in the context of Brazil is actually a good policy. Normally okay with legal gambling in a country with a tradition of it like Britain and eating the negative externalities, but in Brazil with its large O Algo community with addictive personalities and not much money the social externalities can be ruinous in a way they aren’t elsewhere
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
My daughter is under 6 months old and just got residency in Croatia. That makes three countries so far. She’s getting her fourth in April.
A lot of people ask why you’d bother getting residence in another Schengen country when she’s already a Schengen passport holder.
There are a few reasons.
During COVID I was a resident, so I could still come and stay here, which had some of the most relaxed rules in Europe back then.
Foreign neighbours without any paperwork confirming the right to be there got stuck. Countries like Austria and Germany wouldn’t let them drive through, and Croatia wouldn’t let them in either. Yes, even Schengen “citizens.”
I’m also starting her clock towards citizenship. I’ll be eligible for Croatian citizenship in about 2.5 years.
It should be easier to get hers along with mine. If that doesn’t work, at 18 she can claim it on the basis of 8+ years of residency. A very strong path.
Total cost was €7 for ID pictures, €5 for birth certificate, €13 application fee and my time filling out a 4 page form.
Time will pass anyway, so use it to your advantage.
Rules may change for the worse or for the better, but she’ll have a very good shot at citizenship with 18 years of residency and fluent Croatian since we spend time here.
The biggest gift you can give your children is options.
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
With monetary policy less likely to come to the rescue for now, BRL’s – and local duration’s - best domestic hope is a better fiscal anchor. That makes the new cabinet - esp. Minister of Finance - the key domestic catalyst/signal of how seriously Lula takes fiscal discipline
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
🇷🇴 The go to guy to buy real estate in Romania is @MacroJason
Check out his X account. Always good stuff.
Homes in Romania became 43% more affordable relative to local incomes in the last 10 years. Exact opposite in Portugal, where it became 61% less affordable.
Real estate investors in both countries did very well in recent years. What's special about Romania vs Portugal's market is that investors achieved identical upside with much more downside protection (significantly less leverage in the system and strong fundamental value relative to local income and demand).
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
At this point in trading, or investing, both, I won't push the button if risk-to-reward is not at least 1:4. I would rather take a walk in the forest.
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
Not only Georgia - China also signed the final boarder settlement deal with Russia in 2008 ending all historical disputes (in total around 20% of Chinese territory given to RF vs historical peak)
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
4 days ago, Ueno closed with $2k of my money in it.
I was busy at IMI Connect in Buenos Aires, so I did nothing.
Today, I got an email from Zeta: My new account is ready, all my money is available.
Didn't lift a finger. No annoying KYC. Gracias Paraguay🇵🇾
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
99% of twitter traders underperformed grannies in
@MacroJason's favorite emerging markets - who simply deposit money into a bank savings account (or buy government bonds) and do absolutely nothing.
Long EM grannies. Long babushkas and vovó. Short FinX traders and substack writers. $EMLC $SEML $BLTN $HSBK $KSPI $UZNF $EEM
Tech Stocks in Bear Market Territory:
1. SanDisk, $SNDK: -66%
2. Arm Holdings, $ARM: -64%
3. Coinbase, $COIN: -63%
4. Nebius, $NBIS: -62%
5. Seagate, $STX: -60%
6. Marvell Technology, $MRVL: -59%
7. ServiceNow, $NOW: -57%
8. Oracle, $ORCL: -56%
9. AppLovin, $APP: -54%
10. Circle, $CRCL: -54%
11. Super Micro Computer, $SMCI: -51%
12. Micron, $MU: -48%
13. Dell, $DELL: -47%
14. SpaceX, $SPCX: -47%
15. Qualcomm, $QCOM: -43%
16. Broadcom, $AVGO: -41%
17. AMD, $AMD: -39%
18. Robinhood, $HOOD: -38%
19. Alphabet, $GOOGL: -32%
20. Tesla, $TSLA: -32%
21. Palantir, $PLTR: -28%
22. TSMC, $TSM: -28%
23. Meta, $META: -26%
24. CrowdStrike, $CRWD: -26%
25. Nvidia, $NVDA: -25%
The S&P 500 has now erased -$4 trillion in market cap since October 6th.
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
Romania is gifted. It has tripled productivity over the past two decades and has some remarkable strengths: technical talent, energy resources & more.
If Europe were a family, Romania and Poland would be two of its most dynamic members. These countries deserve more attention, says @Mariekeconomie.
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
I find the perceptions about Argentina in comparison in Brazil quite intriguing given stories like this: xitter.twitterapi.xyz/em_martinez/status/211…
Una reflexión cultural olvidable en 5 minutos como muchas que hago.
Brasil tiene una población con aprox. 5 a 7 años menos de escolaridad promedio, mucho más analfabetismo y pobreza que nosotros.
Sin embargo, cuando le pregunto al verdulero experto de mi barrio por qué compra cebolla brasileña, no me dice porque es más barata. Dice: "porque el peso que dice la etiqueta en la bolsa es el verdadero". Para la nacional, lo tengo que verificar bolsa por bolsa.
Eso también es batalla cultural.
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
If you are holding over €500K in cash, you may wish to consider a structure like this. Holding large amounts of cash in a bank account instead of government bonds is poor risk management.
I’m surprised this isn’t talked about more. I believe it’s because the US government has (so far) always rescued bank depositors who made bad judgements (e.g. Silicon Valley Bank, Signature, First Republic). Thus, there’s little incentive to learn from the mistake.
Ideally, your bond brokerage account is held at the same private bank as your current account. This prevents having to move funds from a third-party broker (e.g. IBKR), which introduces additional time and risks.
If you want to be cautious, then Revolut and Wise should be used purely for internal FX conversion and not third-party transfers.
In Paraguay, a large bank has just been shut down for 'irregularities and lack of solvency'. Those who deposited above $35K lose their money.
You will notice I rarely talk about 'high yield bank deposits', often promoted by passport bros (Paraguay, Georgia etc). I favor government bonds instead.
Here's why: EM bank deposit interest rates often poorly compensate you for taking on banking sector risk in countries with low levels of transparency.
E.g. Paraguay banks may pay 10% on local currency bank deposits (subject to 15% WHT for non residents). But government bonds pay ~8% tax free anyway. You collect 200 bps premium but have unlimited downside vs risk free PYG yield.
The real winner when you deposit money into an EM bank is often the bank's equity holders. They get the upside and you get the (unlimited) downside.
Jason - macro & investing retweeted
When buying off plan real estate in emerging markets - the protection you get is very different depending on the country. Your main risk is the developer but a more exotic risk is the developer’s bank.
Many Eastern European countries are surprisingly OK. Romania is perhaps the worse but you are compensated through 15/85 payment structures. I.e. only 15% down payment and remaining 85% payable only on completion - thus your downside is relatively capped.
