#1511 Jordi Visser | Is A Recession Coming Soon?!

— Fed held interest rates steady this week; Jordi argues they made the right call given policy uncertainty, though Powell's use of "transitory" to describe tariff inflation reignited concerns despite its technical accuracy.

— Stock market sentiment is frozen ahead of April 2nd tariff decisions; the S&P 500 is only down 3% year-to-date, but rotation away from the Mag-7 into global equities and broad dispersion in breadth suggests restructuring rather than recession.

— Tesla faces dual pressures from tariff concerns and political polarization, but the real opportunity lies in its robotics division, which Musk has called the most important industry over the next decade.

— AI hardware adoption is accelerating faster than most investors expect; companies like NVIDIA forecast $1 trillion in data center CapEx by 2028, and the collision of AI with physical robotics, autonomous vehicles, and phones is creating a new boom in traditionally "dead" hardware sectors.

— April 2nd tariff implementation is priced as catastrophic by market sentiment, but Jordi expects negotiations with 15 key countries and a shift from trade war to tariff negotiation, with long-term deficit reduction and productivity gains offsetting near-term disruption.

— S&P 500 down ~3% year-to-date; all major indices remain below the 200-day moving average, which historically signals caution.

— Mag-7 down significantly while the other 493 S&P companies up ~1%, reflecting a broad rotation out of US mega-caps into global markets and higher valuations elsewhere.

— Copper hit all-time highs despite recession fears, signaling strong demand for physical materials supporting AI infrastructure buildout.

— NVIDIA traded "like Bitcoin"—bought on rumor of event, sold on news—despite Jensen Huang raising guidance and forecasting record CapEx cycles; stock remains valued at 25–29x forward earnings.

— Treasury Secretary Bessent stated he does not believe current economic data (GDP, inflation, jobs figures) is accurate, raising questions about data reliability in a high-speed digital economy.

— Position for April 2nd as a tariff negotiation milestone rather than a trade war cliff; if the administration can demonstrate job preservation and phased implementation, markets should move from fear to growth investing in H2 2025.

— Rotate exposure toward hardware and infrastructure plays (copper, semiconductors, power companies, oil) over software and cloud services; the AI-robotics boom requires physical buildout that traditional commodity suppliers and chip manufacturers are best positioned to capture.

— Watch Tesla and robotics stocks as leading indicators of sentiment recovery; panic has erased valuation for robotics potential, creating asymmetric upside if execution continues and the political narrative stabilizes.