Ep.466: The Iran War and the Limits of American Power | Joshua Landis

Bullish:

• $OIL - Oil prices rising due to Strait of Hormuz closure and Middle East conflict, with 20% of world's exported oil at risk. Inflation concerns mounting as gas prices already up 50 cents per gallon.

  • “here in Oklahoma, gas prices are already up by 50¢ a gallon. I was noticing on my way to work this morning as I had to fill up, and that means that I paid $5 more for my tank of gas than I normally pay.”

    Joshua·8:11

  • “inflation is going to tick way up. And part of the reason that Trump was able to get inflation down is because he flooded the market with oil as much as he could and made it easy for oil.”

    Joshua·8:44

  • “oil tankers coming through the Straits Of Hormuz where 20% of all the world oil comes, you know, comes through there, the exported oil. That's been closed because Lloyd's of London and the big reinsurance companies said we are not gonna insure any tankers going through the Straits Of Hormone. So everything stopped, and oil prices jumped up.”

    Joshua·9:12
• $DEFENSE - Massive military spending underway with aircraft carrier deployments costing $7M/day each, replacement jets costing nearly $500M, and hundreds of jets deployed to Middle East.

  • “this war is gonna be very expensive. You know, having two aircraft carrier groups over there is each one is $7,000,000 a day, but the three airplanes that were shot down are almost half $1,000,000,000 in their replacement costs.”

    Joshua·9:40

  • “we've sent hundreds of jets, tankers that refueling tankers, you name it, to The Middle East. It's expensive. And that that price is gonna begin to mount up.”

    Joshua·9:55

Bearish:

• $IRAN - US and Israel conducting massive bombing campaign to destroy Iran's nuclear and missile capabilities, with regime change as potential objective. Infrastructure and military being systematically degraded.

  • “The US and Israel have been bombing Iran mercilessly from the air.”

    Demetri·3:06

  • “for Israel, the objectives are regime change. For The United States, it's unclear what the objectives exactly are. On the one hand, we've had, you know, secretary of war say that it's about attritting both the nuclear and the missile capabilities of Iran.”

    Joshua·4:34

  • “president Trump said that he had obliterated the nuclear capabilities. So this is obliterating the missile capabilities.”

    Joshua·5:23

  • “We've destroyed largely destroyed Hezbollah, overturned the Assad regime. We've got the Houthis on their heels, and we've bombed Iran and and and largely hurt their nuclear capacity.”

    Joshua·15:17
• $EQUITIES - Rising inflation from oil price spike and massive war spending will hurt markets and force policy changes, impacting midterm elections and economic growth.

  • “inflation is gonna hit you know, here in Oklahoma, gas prices are already up by 50¢ a gallon... if that extends, that's going to hit inflation in a big way because it's not just my gas tank, it's my heating oil, it's all the transportation for Walmart and Amazon and so forth.”

    Joshua·8:09

  • “So inflation is going to tick way up... that's going to hurt him in the midterms.”

    Joshua·8:43

  • “I would argue that this war is going to undermine American security more than it's going to advance American security, and it's going to undermine regional security.”

    Joshua·20:34
• $INSURANCE - Major reinsurance companies refusing to cover tankers through Strait of Hormuz, forcing US government to backstop all insurance costs for oil shipments.

  • “Lloyd's of London and the big reinsurance companies said we are not gonna insure any tankers going through the Straits Of Hormone. So everything stopped, and oil prices jumped up.”

    Joshua·9:22

  • “Trump is now saying America will pay for all that insurance and any damaged tanker that goes through there. And, that's another big expense.”

    Joshua·9:32