Learn from market history. Join us as we study the insights from the past to navigate the present—and prepare for the future w/ co-hosts @dnlgmb & @mgharris34
New York, NY
Joined August 2025
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backtestpodcast retweeted
The tale of the Cornish Giant was one my favorite parts of @backtestpodcast's Revolution series.
Richard Trevithick invented the steam locomotive, but the rails cracked underneath it. His steam locomotive couldn't break into the market until iron caught up. It was a classic Total Product problem from the book Crossing the Chasm.
As a life update, like Gretchen Weiners trying to make fetch work, I am still trying my best to make Trevithick work. It means someone who is huge, smart, and a little crazy. Use it at the polls today!
backtestpodcast retweeted
It’s 1850. The Gold Rush is on. Cornelius Vanderbilt thinks he’s found a faster, cheaper route to California through Nicaragua, but his engineers tell him it's impossible: too shallow, too many rapids.
So he goes himself. He shoves the pilot aside, runs the boiler at full steam. Then he winches the boat over the rocks!
He opens his route and undercuts his competition so badly, they pay him to stop.
backtestpodcast retweeted
@backtestpodcast being honored in Bend Quarterly (an oldschool IRL newspaper) is a fun and unexpected way to put a bow on our Rail Revolution series.
backtestpodcast retweeted
We are in a new investment era defined by uncertainty. We partnered with More Than Capital to ask global leaders three questions: What is so uncertain? What can history teach us? And how should we lead our businesses in the face of uncertainty? Link below.
backtestpodcast.com/p/high-s…
backtestpodcast retweeted
During the Civil War, Lincoln spent hours at the telegraph office reading dispatches
One of these led to a great story that opens our latest @backtestpodcast episode... all about leading through uncertainty with lots of lessons from history and markets
backtestpodcast retweeted
The cease-fire in Iran failed. It’s worth taking a step back to review the three paths to resolution in oil markets.
Path 1 seems to have failed and we’re giving Path 2 a try, which will take time to play out.
That means we’re back to thinking about Path 3, price levels. Can the oil market remain optimistic while the US military forces open Hormuz? Will these military efforts succeed? If not, we may see some dramatic price spikes to trigger demand cutbacks.
@Bob_McNally is an excellent teacher to understand the history and the mechanics of all this. Full interview in the comments.
backtestpodcast retweeted
In case you need some cool stories for your 4th of July party!
nitter.gq/backtestpodcast/status…
backtestpodcast retweeted
Saturday is America’s 250th. Did you ever think about who called the shots for financing the war while Goerge Washington called the shots on the battlefield? @backtestpodcast just dropped a one episode special telling the story of how the American Revolution was financed. Link below. HBD, America!
open.spotify.com/episode/5OW…
backtestpodcast retweeted
“Everybody could see that the railroads were going to change the world... Everybody wanted to have a piece of it and they could. Everybody put their money in it and you had the biggest bust on both sides of the Atlantic that you could imagine
And out of the ashes, the tracks were still there, the locomotives were still there, the demand was still there, and it changed the world
[AI] is as big as anything but the railroads”
NEW ODD LOTS - JEREMY GRANTHAM ON HOW TO SPOT IF A BUBBLE'S ABOUT TO BURST
@TheStalwart and I talk to the legendary @GMOInsights investor about AI, big changes in the Big Tech stocks, famous bubbles from history and much more.
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcas…
backtestpodcast retweeted
fantastic series on the birth of railways and its parallels to the current moment open.spotify.com/episode/28I…
backtestpodcast retweeted
Last week I said the capital required for the AI build out is massive. I also said the only historical analogue is the Railway build out in the 1800s.
Some of you didn’t believe it. Here’s a little Friday @backtestpodcast post with the data and a great economic history chart for my fellow economic history chart nerds.
substack.com/home/post/p-200…
backtestpodcast retweeted
From @mgharris34 on @backtestpodcast: "...customers don't buy your core technology all by itself. They buy the complete solution. They buy the outcome that they actually want. And Richard Trevithick is a great example of this. You know, he built a great locomotive prototype, but didn't have the rails that could support it. Iron technology hadn't caught up. So he just, didn't have the total product and George Stephenson did just about 20 years later. And you see this over and over again with major technological revolutions."
As true today as it was in the early 1800s...
nitter.gq/johnarnold/status/2056…
'@TimMLatimer had a vision for enhanced geothermal back in 2012 as a junior drilling engineer at an oil company. Getting no internal traction, he decided to pursue it as a startup. He and the team at Fervo Energy not only had to overcome major technical challenges, but also convince the deeply skeptical worlds of energy services and finance.
Last week’s blockbuster IPO was an extraordinary validation of that vision. Tim’s essay to Stanford GSB shows just how prescient his thinking was long before the rest of the industry came around. It's an incredible story of equal parts conviction and execution. Congrats to the whole team.
backtestpodcast retweeted
The AI buildout has one historical analog. Not the internet. Not electricity. Rail. @backtestpodcast just launched a series on it. Episode 1: how rail technology broke through.
podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcas…
backtestpodcast retweeted
Hard to overstate and I stand by what @mgharris34 and I said in our @backtestpodcast shale revolution series
Probably the most underappreciated technological revolution in history
nitter.gq/Bob_McNally/status/204…
The shale revolution turned the United States into an Arsenal of Energy™️ and never has one been needed more than now.
Let’s keep it that way.
wsj.com/business/energy-oil/…
backtestpodcast retweeted
Great listen w Bob McNally highly recommended watch thanks @Bob_McNally brilliant. Load bearing assumptions and the history was fantastic.
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcas…
backtestpodcast retweeted
At @backtestpodcast we go deep studying market history before distilling everything into character driven stories. 80s on Wall Street book club below.
backtestpodcast retweeted
This was so fun to read alongside @backtestpodcast's episode on how Marks and Karsh navigated the '89 - '91 credit crisis. Great work @GregObenshain of @verdadcap - keep 'em coming!
mailchi.mp/verdadcap/echoes-…
backtestpodcast retweeted
Another must read memo from @HowardMarksBook
Read that, then go listen to the 80s on Wall Street series on @backtestpodcast
nitter.gq/Oaktree/status/2042298…
In his latest memo, @HowardMarksBook examines the evolution of sub-investment grade credit, focusing on the rise of direct lending and recent issues in the market. #OaktreeInsights
Read: oaktreecapital.com/insights/…
backtestpodcast retweeted
Backtest episode drop alert! Listen in to hear the story of how the legend of Howard Marks and Bruce Karsh was forged in the refining fire of the third greatest credit crisis in modern history. Link below. 👇
backtestpodcast.com/p/the-80…
