Valuetainment - January 08, 2026


＂This Is Cold War 2.0＂ - Michael Burry PREDICTS China–U.S. Escalation After Venezuela Clampdown


Episode Stats

Length

15 minutes

Words per Minute

201.8227

Word Count

3,093

Sentence Count

9

Misogynist Sentences

3

Hate Speech Sentences

9


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 so big short michael burry says markets are missing a trick as the venezuelan raid just
00:00:05.000 changed the game okay and to me it's not even the venezuelan game well it's kind of geopolitics
00:00:11.220 yeah that makes sense so michael burry says u.s and already venezuela is much bigger than the
00:00:15.360 markets here the big short investor said who recently pivoted from running a hedge fund to
00:00:20.100 writing on substack publishing a post nearly early monday saying the game just changed in the mid to
00:00:26.420 long term and markets are not pricing in all that they may of this weekend's events this is a
00:00:32.620 paradigm shift despite the markets yawning he later wrote on x benchmark oil prices climbed less than
00:00:37.520 one percent on monday and u.s took futures opened higher after the u.s captured the president
00:00:43.420 nicholas maduro over the weekend and president trump america run the oil rich country being
00:00:47.860 the seizure was a shot across china's bow uh burry wrote pointing to billions of dollars on loans
00:00:55.100 that china has made to venezuela under its belt and wrote initiative which were collateralized
00:00:59.820 using future oil output that is now in the u.s sense the investor who shot the fame after the
00:01:06.440 president bet in 2000 housing bubble was featured in a book the big short wrote that china may now have
00:01:12.500 a blueprint for how to take control of taiwan but must be in awe of trumpian america's infuriating
00:01:18.300 gull and decisive power burry said that china stock uh strike him as somewhat riskier now in
00:01:24.940 terms of running afoul of sanctions he wrote that alibaba baidu and other potential sanction targets
00:01:30.400 could be in for some volatility of china escalates yeah i think i think something's going to happen
00:01:35.700 i think one of these big things could potentially happen because you are literally suffocating these
00:01:41.500 people right now yeah go ahead brandon yeah i mean when it comes to what's more strategically
00:01:45.520 important between um venezuela for us or taiwan for china and i mean it's probably taiwan that's more
00:01:52.360 strategically important like it'd be a bigger blow to the u.s if china successfully took taiwan
00:01:56.960 than um the fact that we took venezuela right what i wasn't 75 percent of our semi-conductors come
00:02:02.860 from there oh yeah yeah so that i said i think that's a bigger asset if they were able to take
00:02:07.740 it i don't think they would be able to take it even if they used the full force their military like
00:02:11.700 they're not capable of doing what we did just because of the way the um taiwan is set up you know
00:02:16.200 we've done videos before in the past of like how harsh the conditions actually are for the navy to go
00:02:20.200 cross and take it over it's like a mountain in the middle of the ocean so i i don't think they'd be
00:02:24.440 capable of that and if they did try to do it i think we would try to get close with russia really
00:02:29.360 quick and and stop selling china like china's extremely dependent on oil from other countries
00:02:33.220 so for that reason i don't think they're just i think they want to i don't think they're capable
00:02:37.240 of doing it though i think you know what burry said he's it's not about oil here or at least in
00:02:42.880 this one respect what he said was that you know through the belt and road initiative china has lent
00:02:46.860 billions of dollars all over the world and with venezuela that was collateralized by venezuelan
00:02:52.340 oil trump just took their collateral which means those loans are worthless because let's face it
00:02:57.680 venezuela is not going to pay them back and china knew that when they extended the loans that's what
00:03:01.080 china does it extends loans to these countries that they know that they can't pay back intending to
00:03:06.020 either take the oil as the collateral or some other form of collateral usually it's facilities like you
00:03:10.340 know a railroad or a dam or some kind of mine so what trump said is okay i see your belt and road
00:03:15.720 initiative and i'm going to take the initiative and take the collateral right off the board which
00:03:19.220 makes that loan and your entire effort in venezuela worthless again it's it's a piece on the chess
00:03:24.840 board that it's it's a pretty damn big one yeah yeah the economic hitman principle they took that away
00:03:29.700 from like they took away the resource what does he want though he has to want something trump or xi
00:03:34.200 trump what does trump want what does trump want i think he realizes that this is cold war ii let's be honest
00:03:41.140 about this um china is not a what does they call it strategic um partner rival or whatever they call
00:03:48.380 it no this is cold war ii and it has been um you know why did they leak that story from what was it
00:03:54.520 new york a couple of months back where they had all of those um sim cards in a room that could just
00:03:59.500 basically fry the communication grid in new york why did they leak that to say that look we are kind
00:04:05.300 of at war which why have the chinese been buying farmland next to um air bases yeah to do what the
00:04:10.960 ukrainians did in a first strike to launch a drone attack to take out the u.s uh air power is this one
00:04:16.420 you're talking about so what i'm saying is that the trump administration at least realizes even though
00:04:20.060 they don't want to say it explicitly this is cold war ii and so we need to think cold war ii where's
00:04:25.480 the dun rogue doctrine is coming from it's the execution of that strategic realization we are in a cold
00:04:31.200 war with the chinese and the worse it gets for the chinese system the more likely it turns into
00:04:36.300 something that gets really bad yeah what i think what people need to look at is what you're talking
00:04:43.620 about is this is really 3d chess venezuela is not about venezuela right it's not about marxism in the
00:04:51.720 western hemisphere although they want sort of like a benefit right right they they love you know i think
00:04:57.540 that there's a part of marco rubio and marco rubio is the guy whose desk this whole thing really sits
00:05:03.800 on this isn't the department of energy this this is sitting on marco rubio's desk on 3d chess because
00:05:12.340 it is it is the blow against russia it is the blow against china and their collateral it is taking back
00:05:18.940 the hemisphere it is a blow for against marxism um and the the u.s mainstream media wants to talk about
00:05:27.040 oh it was illegal to go in there and now the greedy you know all the greedy energy companies
00:05:33.440 are going to get the oil wait a minute only chevron's in there materially benefiting right now
00:05:38.340 and trump's inviting everybody else would you like to invest in venezuela would you like to yeah would
00:05:42.960 you like to spend billions of dollars with your money not my money with your money and then pull
00:05:47.640 the oil out and then pay the venezuelans for the oil out of their country so when he stabilizes
00:05:53.540 venezuela the phrase that we all want to look at here is very simple on our terms and this is all
00:06:00.700 related to the cold war he wants china to be a trading partner on our terms and not manipulating
00:06:07.480 venezuela he wants iran to be not in this hemisphere on our terms is there something for them to trade on
00:06:15.220 oil there's a deal to be made if they'll do it on our terms and only go over here and not over here
00:06:19.240 and now he also has an impact on russia who is basically like the credit card in the middle of
00:06:27.980 this they're the transaction guy in the middle of this and now he's like saying no no no transactions
00:06:32.120 don't go through you and he's away how am i going to make any money what's kind of the point you got
00:06:35.280 to ask me for permission and by the way how important was it they sent one of their own subs
00:06:40.200 to shadow one tanker we're not talking about a pipeline we're not talking about that was a tanker
00:06:45.720 loosely yeah yeah yeah an old jalopy tanker so this is all about the 3d chess game on our terms and i
00:06:55.600 think history is going to look back on this and see just how big of a deal it was and i you know and
00:07:02.940 i'm gonna i'm out and saying that this is trump and rubio and we're gonna look back on this on one
00:07:10.300 of the most amazing times not just getting maduro but all the six months that are going to go around
00:07:14.900 this that it is going to be tremendous yeah for the folks that are watching out there um this place
00:07:22.600 is 22 degrees the podcast room and i think they do this on purpose for we could use some oil in a heater
00:07:28.540 right over here it's it's you have to be here to see what it feels like uh uh but it's it's i agree
00:07:37.080 with what you're saying on how um unique of a time we're living for this many things to be moving
00:07:42.500 we're gonna look back on it yeah you think about oh oh oh the big if is if they can pull it off i think
00:07:49.060 they could pull it off because they have so much leverage right now jeff the amount of we have we have
00:07:54.820 not yet seen the chinese and russian retaliation not retaliation but them realizing it's sort of
00:08:01.100 like do they know what trump knows that they know that the trump knows do you think they're not
00:08:06.040 paranoid do you think uh do you think well i think that's why trump has had to establish these
00:08:10.460 precedents let me ask you a question by nature by dna in nature who do you think is naturally more
00:08:16.400 paranoid american leaders politically russian or chinese chinese chinese and then second is who
00:08:22.700 by other chinese that's right so so you don't think they're sitting there wondering knowing what
00:08:30.380 he's doing i don't think they're delusional i do i think they are i think that the chinese have been
00:08:35.140 following the caricature that has been printed about trump and i think that's you know a lot of
00:08:39.120 intelligence is really just regurgitating all these mainstream ideas and i think what's what's
00:08:44.180 happened is they have vastly underestimated first first of all his resolve but also his strategic
00:08:49.460 planning as well as the ability to execute on that strategic planning so i think the chinese have
00:08:54.400 yet to fully respond to fully comprehend what's taking place there's no way they are who they are
00:08:59.200 without sitting there mapping out and saying these are the 22 things he could do you gotta remember
00:09:03.520 this is a communist regime they're not exactly i mean the image of the chinese as you know there's
00:09:07.360 these long planners who are thinking a thousand years ahead no that these are communist bureaucrats
00:09:12.900 they are thinking about tomorrow they're not thinking about a thousand years ahead i don't know about
00:09:16.980 i don't know if they're a little bit more longer maybe not a thousand by the way they think 10 when
00:09:20.940 other people think 10 minutes yeah i i don't i don't know if they you know when they said the
00:09:25.560 whole made in china 2025 remember how by 2025 they wanted to be able to take over the world and they're
00:09:30.220 going to be the the the biggest thing and when they announced it you know and then covet happened so
00:09:35.180 to me yeah but those are just five-year plans if china is sitting there behind closed doors seeing
00:09:42.520 what's going on my concern is with the amount of suffocation where you cause people to see
00:09:50.220 how much control they've lost they make desperate moves like covet like covet and desperate moves
00:09:57.280 could be massively retaliatory and all of a sudden you're like wait a minute what just happened or if
00:10:02.980 you want to be positive that's exactly what the trump administration is counting on why because then
00:10:07.740 they could use a desperate move on the part of china or russia whoever it is they think as their
00:10:12.140 next step now we're justified in taking it up a notch because the chinese did this and they
00:10:17.640 perfect so question for you what's up a notch i don't know i mean that's rubio rubio in terms of
00:10:22.680 pressure yeah what's next um sorry so putting enough pressure on russia they're distracted with
00:10:29.060 venezuela let's get taiwan now let's make a desperate move let's do a naval blockade let's do an
00:10:33.560 economic super sanction i mean you see what i mean would china now do i think they put boots on the
00:10:39.180 ground and go on taiwan no but would they maybe move three chess moves ahead thinking that the rest
00:10:44.760 of the world is distracted by iran fall or not fall and venezuela and what we're doing and putin what
00:10:51.460 he's doing would china take advantage of that and and make like three big chess moves on taiwan i think
00:10:58.820 so what is it the leverage the chinese have what is it they have that they could use as leverage there's
00:11:03.040 really i mean manpower man but i think you know more of an economic thing like rare earth yeah
00:11:08.240 so okay you need for basically anything that has to do with modern electronics so maybe they start
00:11:13.340 restricting rare earth it's just the refinements of rare so like we just don't have the refining
00:11:16.540 capacity we have rare it's just not refinement it's not easily easy to get right so i mean
00:11:20.260 so trump is already sort of like ahead on that part saying okay we're going to start building our
00:11:24.600 capacity so we're going to take away the chinese leverage before they can even use it and their
00:11:28.720 biggest asset is getting the discounted oil from russia and iran so you know if iran suddenly
00:11:32.880 falls and russia has enough pressure on them to stop being so friendly with the oil they give to
00:11:36.760 china then china's really in a stranglehold where they stop getting the cheap russian and iranian oil
00:11:41.460 because that's like chinese china's nucleus is the ability to get cheap oil from iran and russia
00:11:46.100 yeah i mean you know the the this is the other question as well we talked about on the podcast on
00:11:54.540 monday it's very obvious that trump is relying on marco a lot more than he's relying on jd to get
00:12:01.840 things done it it seems as if the second most powerful person on his team is not vance it's
00:12:12.160 rubio and by the way if rubio is in more of these meetings doing the deals world leaders are now
00:12:21.180 accustomed to who rubio rubio to be doing that which means they're kind of sitting there saying
00:12:26.660 we either want this guy in 2028 or we don't but if vance is not in those rooms building those
00:12:32.000 relationships and rubio is and maybe rubio's turn in 2028 and then vance's turn maybe in 2036
00:12:38.280 you know you bring something interesting up i was watching the weekend news shows and rubio wasn't out
00:12:44.060 there like a proxy just giving the administration's talking point he was processing points and responding
00:12:50.980 to report report you know what i mean yeah for sure very different from the the senator from
00:12:55.720 michigan i support what the administration has said about this this and this and and i think he's
00:13:00.000 doing a fine job and i think you're full of crap you know that's that's a proxy out doing the talking
00:13:04.840 point rubio was going no no no you don't understand a b c this is how we're going to be you know and he
00:13:11.400 was really there putting the processing down that that impressed me having said that folks since
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