Transcription
There are two ways this can go. We're going to sack all you rich guys, or you guys are going to actually start sharing the wealth. And I think that's going to be a political mantra. There's a philosophical basis that's being developed and growing, and that makes sense to everybody who hears it to say, "Yeah, we got to share this." And so now, is it going to be, you know, taxes on data centers? Is it going to be taxes on AI profits? Is it going to be sharing equity like Bernie Sanders said? It's going to be something. And we got to figure out what's the smartest way without stifling innovation. But I think it's becoming almost a bipartisan talking point that some of this wealth has to be shared.
I'm worried about it. I'm surprised that other very wealthy people are not worried about it because if you study history, when it goes haywire like this, people show up with pitchforks and tiki torches. I'm almost like saying, "Hey, super rich people, calm down. Let's figure out a way to use market forces to spread the wealth as opposed to having somebody come in that's socialist that will decapitate the incentive structure in the system." Welcome to All Things Markets. I am Anthony Scaramucci.
And I'm Mike. No regrets.
Okay, Mike. I was just getting, I'm really only like half of Anthony Scaramucci. Okay. Whoa. I'm looking for my Bitcoin, Michael. I don't, I don't know where it is, Mike. Where, where is my Bitcoin, Michael?
There's a saying in the Wizard of Oz when the Munchkins say, "We don't like it here no more." Um, listen, this is a, this is a MicroStrategy-led breakdown in confidence around that complex, which is creating a crisis of confidence in Bitcoin. You know, at a time when crypto in general is underloved, right? People are more and more skeptical about market structure. Um, there's energy elsewhere. The Fed chair, Kevin Warsh, came out hawkish in his first meeting, and then Scott Bessant, surprisingly out of nowhere, came and piled on and was a strong dollar guy. You know, strong dollar is, is, is, is weak Bitcoin. And that's the first time we've really heard Bessant two days, yesterday or the day before, you know, come out and make the case for why the strong dollar is good for the US economy. He had it until then, right? They kind of wanted a weaker dollar. And so I think you put all those things together, and Bitcoin has been in a world of hurt.
So interesting because I want to just explain this to the young viewers. There's some feeling of vulnerability given a $14 billion unrealized loss at Sailor's strategy. And so what tends to happen is markets go to sources of pain and see if they can break the guy, right? So if they jam Bitcoin super down and explode him, then they can make massive profits on the short side. So in this episode, though, we're going to discuss the widening US wealth gap. We're going to discuss the tech selloff that took place earlier this week. So, it's not just Bitcoin. And then we're going to talk a little bit about the political backlash against AI and its lasting impact. And you know, Michael is very AI. I think, I think there's a correlation, Michael, between Zoran's popularity, Zoran Mandani's popularity with younger people, and the lack of popularity or the hatred of AI. It seems like that they are, you know, in a negative correlation. So, but, but let's go to the AI trade for a second. The stock market is, uh, I don't know, Mike, it feels like we've had a blowoff top here. Am I right in saying that? Or you think that we're, we're still in this AI boom?
Yeah, it's, you know, it's the hardest thing to do is call the top of a bubble. If this was the top, right, and we break this trend line up and stocks go down 15, 20% from here, we'll all look back and say, "Or more." We'll say, "Wow, yeah, of course it was. It was the SpaceX IPO that was all that supply. That's what created this, you know, that's, that was the end of it, and markets will head lower." The only problem with that is when you look at that chart formation, it's not what a top normally looks like, and a top normally looks like a huge, you know, candle where the last day is a blowoff top and then a big correction down and then a real dramatic, right? This is like hyper volatility within a 3 to 4 percent range. Still, you know, four to five percent from the high.
Um, and so listen, short term, the market, the NASDAQ especially, trades heavy. Um, and it trades like it wants to shake people out. My gut feeling is, while I've been bearish, uh, it still doesn't feel like what, what a high, a final high will be, will feel like. And so we'll watch this really carefully. Um, in the short run, I'm, I'm, I'm nervous. Uh, you got a lot of supply that wants to come into the market. We're digesting supply. It's not even, it's not even just equity supply. It's, it's, it's interest rate. It's, it's credit supply that just keeps coming to the market, and so you're sucking up a lot of the liquidity.
Yeah, and, and, and by the way, Mike, some speculation now that ChatGPT or OpenAI may not go public at this moment. Obviously, Claude is under some stress, is under some stress from the federal government. Uh, and with the SpaceX sort of peak in the low 200s and now back into the 150s, uh, you think those two deals are still going to come?
I, I think Anthropic will come this year. Um, I mean, you, you, you read the same thing I did on, uh, on ChatGPT, on, on Sam Altman's company. Um, you, they're thinking of delaying it. Uh, I do think in time they're both public companies. They are, you know, they are massive, massive, uh, capital users. Uh, the whole world's invested in them. Uh, and this AI thing is not going away.
The other reality check, I think, was we've gotten through another series of primaries, and it's just highlighting two things. One is, oh wow, we're now only, you know, four and a half months to the, to the midterms, and it's just really hard to, to see a Republican, you know, win there. The Democrats are going to win the House, and, and I actually think they're going to win the Senate. What has changed the tables a little bit is while most of the Democrats that got elected in these primaries or won their primaries, I'd say are, you know, center-left Democrats who kind of would tow the Democratic line. A lot of people that had been recruited were ex-military who have a, you know, a leadership and a service focus. And so I think there's a lot of good candidates that the Dems have, have brought out.
The big races that got all the press were these three New York House seats where, you know, I'd say Mandani Democrats or AOC Democrats, you know, Socialist Party Democrats. They won, and they beat, they beat incumbents in two of those three races. And that, that's a big deal because all of a sudden we go from having a Congress with five, you know, AOCs, right, Rashida Tlaib, you know, they call themselves the squad, to eight. And when you think what that means, it's like the Tea Party who had whatever 20 odd congressmen in control of the Republican party. If you're a big enough minority party, you are the fulcrum. You see it in Israel all the time in their politics. You have these tiny little far-right religious parties that say, "Well, we have one issue we care about, and we'll, we'll go to whoever gives us seats, whoever does what we want."
And so unless the Democrats really run the table, right, there's going to be a big fight over Hakeem Jeffries' speakership. "We don't want him. He's not, he's not, he's not left enough." Again, I, I'd say this really, really loudly. The center point of the Democratic Party is kind of where I think most Americans want the country. I don't think, you know, most Americans want a Democratic socialist. I don't think it plays in Wisconsin or, or anywhere else. And so this is the big loser of this primary is really were the Democrats, uh, in that it's going to make this party a lot harder to, to hold together.
You know, you know, while all this is happening, an age of American finance has really transitioned, and I, I'm going to mark the death of Alan Greenspan, who got to age 100, and the early part of your career, which tracks the early part of my career, was an Alan Greenspan-centric financial services community in my mind. And so I just want to talk a little bit about him for a second. He, he ran the Fed for 18 and a half years with a lot less drama, obviously. I mean, you know, and people forget this, Michael. George Herbert Walker Bush was the first Donald Trump on the Fed. Okay, people do not remember George Herbert Walker Bush calling Alan Greenspan and say, "Jam those rates down. I'm trying to get reelected." And remembering how pissed he was at him. I mean, people don't remember it, but he was that.
And so anyway, talk a little bit about, if you don't mind, the Fed. Uh, take us back 32 years ago to 1994. You and I were both at Goldman Sachs when an avalanche was happening and Greenspan trying to orchestrate a soft landing. And then just address for, for me, if you don't mind, what we learned from Greenspan, what's still with us, and what, what we've lost.
I think it's a great thing to talk about. Uh, listen, I was lucky enough the day he left the Fed, literally the night he left, he flew to, to New York, Lehman Brothers office, and there were 12 big hedge fund managers. Uh, I was running a macro fund at the time, and we had this at that point famous $250,000 dinner, i.e., limited, paid him a quarter million dollars to have dinner. Uh, and he is, when I say fresh off the presses, he was like six hours from having, you know, had his last day. And I remember that the dinner ended. I actually was sick. So I'm sitting there sweating, and I think Stan Druckenmiller had sent a couple of us a text, or, uh, and he said, "Well, what was the most impressive thing about that dinner?" And all of us had the same feeling that at 84 he was sharp as a tack. He knew every price that day. What had happened to oil? What had happened to?
And what I realized was at that point, the Fed chair is a macro trader who has a data set that comes in, who processes it and makes predictions about the US economy, and that guy was as good as any of the, any of the guys sitting around that table in terms of being able to analyze, think about, and talk through the markets.
Um, he had a time when, you know, he was teamed up with Bob Rubin as the Secretary of Treasury. And of course, the Fed had its independence. But Greenspan knew and Rubin knew very well that the Fed and the Treasury have to be a yin and a yang, right? If you've got a government that just keeps spending money, there's not a whole lot the Fed can do if they say monetize us. And so, where's that voice? Uh, where's the collaboration, and where's the, the independence? And while we talk about an independent Fed, it has to be an independent Fed that is collaborating at times with a broader picture. And I think Greenspan really understood that.
Um, he also was at a time where integrity was more, more in the DNA of all our politics, right? We didn't have this WWE politics that we seem to have today. WATCH OUT. WATCH OUT. WATCH OUT. WATCH OUT. Um, with the, the, you know, walking out of bill signings, with all the hysterics that have come around, uh, both sides of the aisle, right? It was a much more serious approach to, to policy.
And so, uh, yeah, he was a giant, and, and, and my, my, my takeaway from that dinner was, man, stay engaged until you're 84 because it keeps you young.
Yeah. I, I, I, I'm with you. You got to stay young, Mike. You got to think young. I want to, I want to, I want to keep going here on this, though, because I, I, I feel like we are now in an age of Fed interdependence. Um, I, I would mark the Greenspan period, even the periods in the 70s, the Volcker period, uh, pretty much Fed independence, but I feel like we're now, we're now flexing a little bit on the Fed. You know, there's some great memes where, uh, you know, Biden is like, you know, like, you know, like putting his finger in Warsh's face. "Hey, don't, don't be raising rates here." You know, you think we, we think we've lost something, Mike, in terms of that independence?
I think there's a very good chance that Kevin Warsh becomes an Alan Greenspan-like figure that, like his first press conference, I thought he was tough as a freaking, you know, street fighter and smart. Um, and so he's going to work really hard to bring integrity back, the perception of integrity. And I wouldn't say back. I actually think Jay Powell, I mean, he stood up to Trump. He said, "You want to fight? I'll fight you publicly." I think Jay Powell deserves a lot of credit for his, his unwillingness to bend, to bend the knee.
Like Fed governors in the long run are looked back on as, did they make the right call at the right time? They're like macro traders, right? Uh, I remember I was sitting with Jean-Claude Trichet, who famously raised rates in 2008 right before the world collapsed, uh, because he wanted to anchor inflation expectations. Like, that was the wrong call. And, you know, he might still argue, "Oh, it was the right call." It was absolutely the wrong call.
And so Fed governors have a track record that's auditable. You know, you look back and say, did they make the right move at the right time? And I think, you know, Warsh has a really good shot at being one of those, one of those great Fed governors. And his relationship with Bessant is a plus, not a negative. Um, Bessant has a harder job, right? He's got the hardest boss in the world, and he's got a dysfunctional Congress, and even when they want to function, right, the president can say, "Stop functioning," which, which we just saw in this housing bill.
Well, I mean, look, the housing bill is going to pass. You know, it has the veto-resistant majority. So, you know, Trump can delay it, but the housing bill will, will pass. So, but, but I'm, but I'm with you. I just think, I think it's, we're just at a weird time. It makes me worry because the next topic I want to talk about with you is the US wealth divide. Never been bigger, Mike. Uh, top 20% of the earners now account for 58% of all the personal spending. Highest proportion on record. Uh, bottom 80% account for just 42%. That's the lowest on record, Michael. And let me tell you something, I'm worried about it. I'm surprised that other very wealthy people are not worried about it because if you study history, when it goes haywire like this, people show up with pitchforks and tiki torches, and, and I think the Mandani movement is an example of that. I'm almost like saying, "Hey, super rich people, calm down. Let's figure out a way to use market forces to spread the wealth as opposed to having somebody come in that's socialist that will decapitate the incentive structure in the system." So, you know, what is your reaction to that, Michael? Because, you know, last time this really happened, Teddy Roosevelt was kicking people's asses.
I read that story, the story that that same paragraph that you just gave. I read that in, in a newspaper yesterday. Someone else, you know, uh, saying it. I forgot who it was. I think we're going to hear that story over and over. Uh, like, listen, there are two ways this can go. We're going to sack all you rich guys, or you guys are going to actually start sharing the wealth. Uh, and, and I think that's going to be a political mantra.
Um, you know, I asked a senatorial candidate who, who is on the rise, uh, about AI, and he had a great answer. He said, "Listen, you know, just like in Alaska where they had oil and that we share that oil amongst everybody, uh, we have to look at AI. If the, if the feedstock to AI is all our collective knowledge, right? You're, you're feeding AI with our data, but our knowledge, and it's becoming this knowledge machine that processes data, processes the, the knowledge that's come before it and makes decisions, uh, well, we all own some of that knowledge, don't we? So, some of that needs to be shared."
And so, his, his link to getting into, uh, how do we share? He had, he didn't have the answer for how do we share yet, but there's a, there's a philosophical basis that's being developed and growing, and that makes sense to everybody who hears it to say, "Yeah, we got to share this." And so, now, is it going to be, you know, taxes on data centers? Is it going to be taxes on, on AI profits? Is it going to be taxes on, is it going to be sharing equity like Bernie Sanders said? It's going to be something, and we got to figure out what's the smartest way without stifling innovation. Uh, but I think it's becoming almost a bipartisan talking point that some of this wealth has to be shared.
So we'll have to see if we can get it right, Mike, because I'm just telling you, you know, the, uh, the rent board yesterday,
We normally don't get it right.
Yeah. Well, I mean, but we also got a lot of indifferent people. I, I had some super wealthy guy tell me, you know, "Well, there's video games out there and other things like that, or like opiates of the masses." I'm like looking at the guy going, "Okay, but, you know, the, the thing, the thing I'm just going to say here before I go to the next topic, the rent board, New York City, rent control apartments, the vote, 0% rent increase." So listen, I get it, but you're now putting stress and pressure in the market because, you know, we have a supply-demand imbalance in these markets. We need more housing. And if you're not going to allow the rent increase for the landlord, he's going to cut costs. You're going to see things go into under repair in terms of maintenance. Uh, and we're just setting off a non-market-based nightmare in the system. So anyway, that's my two cents, but I want to, I want to go to this back where,
I was going to say this wealth thing shows up, and the inflation in, in parts of our economy show up to me every day. You know, I'm out sitting here in Amagansett in the Hamptons, uh, one of the richest parts of America. And I'm telling you, to rent a house for the weekend, I'm having a party, a bunch of friends coming in from, you know, around the country. A lot of people go to the Airbnb and just rent a place for the weekend. It's shocking what it costs to rent a, just a, just a small, modest place. You can't find a place out here for less than $10,000 a weekend. Uh, and that's a tiny place. Most are 20,000. People are like, "Hey, I'd love to come to the party, but 20,000, like, that's not in the, that's not in the, in the cards for a weekend or for a week, whatever." Uh, and so,
I'm telling you that has tripled in the last five years.
You feel it. You feel it so many places, and it's, it's a painful process.
It's painful for me to watch too because, you know, you and I have been blessed, Michael, but I'm telling you, there's a lot of people that, I'm a lot of my family members are feeling the struggle, which of course, certainly trying to help out with. But let, let's go to this backlash, Michael, because I think it's related. So, we have this wealth disparity, and now we have this backlash on AI. I think they're connected. I think they're blending to each other. Here's the message, Mike. "Wait a minute. I can't afford anything. You've inflated the money away, and oh, now you're going to have a supercomputer come in and steal my job." Okay. So, I'm coming for you with the jugular politically. Investors are nervous about this. AI valuations are super high. But talk to me about the public anger. And you know this, Mike, if you were giving a commencement speech a few weeks ago and you mentioned the word AI, I mean, you got blasted, man.
Architects of artificial intelligence. Interesting.
Yeah. Listen, and you're seeing it with data center, you know, there was a guy who ran, uh, in the primary in Utah, and he literally, you know, Utah was building a giant data center. There was data center protest. It became the issue of the election, and he lost. Uh, you know, that was loud and clear, one issue that, you know, cost a politician the seat. Uh, there's an anti-data center, and, and it's, it's really not anti-the data center, it's anti-AI, and data center is an easy symbolic way of, of picking it. And so, you know, the politics are going to get worse, not better, around the building of the infrastructure of AI, which is kind of crazy because we need AI for the good stuff too, right? For the medical innovation, for, and, and we need it to compete in the world. Like, while I'm not a, "China is the ultimate enemy," China's building AI pretty fast and cheap. And so we're in this tension between how do we do it right, and, oh God, we do it, we have to do it fast. And I don't, I don't know if we're going to be able to, to ride that wave perfectly, right, that balance, but it's a real tension.
Um, and so listen, I think the, the election is a big deal for the markets, and we're going to get closer and closer to it, uh, in, you know, to, to, to November. Uh, and I think maybe the market selling off a little bit here is thinking about that. Um, but you are going to have, you saw Micron earnings where, like, you're going to have the AI guys continue to show, "Hey, these are cash producing machines."
I, I got a call from one of the, maybe the single best investor of the last 25 years yesterday, uh, and we don't speak often, once every six months, and he always calls him when something's happening in crypto. And he was looking at the Bitcoin MicroStrategy thing, and he says, "I'm just, I'm looking at the Apple stock chart breakdown." Uh, you saw Apple had to say, "Hey, we got to raise all our prices because we just can't afford this memory." Uh, and, and so margins going down. So Apple's chart looks bad. Apple's one of the great darlings of the market for the last 25 years, right? His Berkshire's biggest holding it had been, had been, uh, and he says, "I'm wondering." He said, "It's just weird, like there's so many things that are making this harder to play."
Uh, but he said, "And then you look at the earnings." He was like, "These stocks are, if you look at '27 earnings, are pretty reasonable. If you look at '20, '30 earnings, they're like dead sheep." Uh, you know, the, the, the profitability power or possibility of, uh, of these hyperscalers, of so many things within that chain. And so it's hard to, to say, "Ah, you know, that Google's expensive," right? It just isn't.
Um, and so the markets are at a much more challenging, I mean, even again, this, this guy normally has got such a clear thesis, and he was asking a ton of questions. And, uh, and it was interesting because I was complaining about Alibaba. Uh, I was like, "Man, I've gotten whacked in Alibaba, and I broke one of my, one of my key rules, which is, charts don't lie, people do. Pick a point on the chart, if it breaks, you're out." And I was like, "Well, this is such a cheap stock," and I got caught in the value trap of holding Alibaba. And it goes down every day. You know, probably at levels now that, you know, it's under $250 billion. Is an amazing company. But he said he used to look at Alibaba, and you got to look at Amazon. And he said, "Well, yeah, Alibaba was cheap, but was, was, was way cheap to Amazon. Now Alibaba is cheap, but Amazon's almost just as cheap, and I'd rather buy Amazon than Alibaba. Uh, because it's here, it's got, doesn't have the China risk." And like our big companies aren't expensive. And that's what's crazy when you see an overall market that looks wildly expensive. And so I think it's going to be a really challenging time to trade and invest.
Such a great lesson because we have to teach people that too, right? I mean, not, not saying that pedantically, but I mean, we have to explain to people through our experience. It's a great lesson to see through the market cycles. A 25, 30-year-old version of me, I used to ride these cycles with all the adrenaline that you could possibly imagine. You know, now I feel like maybe my nerve endings are a little numb. All right, we're going to switch to bulls and bears. Mike, uh, we have another massive tech selloff in 2026. Is that possible? Is that a yes or a no from you, bull or bear?
Yeah. Yes, I think we could be in it right now. Like, you know, but you watch how the NASDAQ closes today, but, you know, we closed down, which it looks like, you know, we're opening down, uh, and there's a little flag pattern, you know, that's going. So it's been very frustrating if you own puts because you're like, "Maybe I should take some profit," and you don't, and then it goes right back up, and then right back down, and right back up. And, and so if you really step back and look at the market, it hasn't really moved yet. You know, if this flag pattern resolves up, then you're going to have another searing, uh, rally into, into, into, into the fall. And if it resolves down, you're going to have a significant, uh, correction. And, uh, I think in the short run, down feels more likely, but it hasn't broken yet. And it's dangerous to, you know, it's cost me a lot of money. I keep selling the lows and buying the highs.
I joined the club. More, more political candidates run on an anti-AI platform. I'll go first on that. I think that's pretty obvious. I think, I think, I think they're coming for AI because they sense that that is an emotional thing for voters. So, I'm going to say yes on that. Bullish on that.
I, I was with Mickey Sherrill, the governor of New Jersey, who got elected last November, reelected—no, got elected, I'm sorry, as governor last November, uh, in a tight, you know, what looked like it was going to be a tough race, and she, it turned out to be a blowout. And she mentioned to me that AI did not get asked once on the campaign trail. Now, one question about it, data centers are AI. It wasn't an issue as recent as last November. And now it's going to be an issue, not the issue, but at least a top three issue in every race. And so every candidate is going to have to have some version of, is AI good for us or not? Uh, and how should we regulate it?
Now, what's complicated about that is me and you, who are in this market every day, are only now getting to our opinions, and I mean, it's a really complicated calculus. And so I think there's going to be like talking points. "Hey, you're a right-wing guy. This is your talking point. You're a center-left guy. This is your talking point." Like, these campaigns are under such stress, and they're so nervous, they don't really often give as thoughtful answers as the one that I gave you earlier, you know, that I got from a, a meeting with a guy running for Senate. And you're going to see that, but it's going to be an issue on every single campaign. And at least shading that, "Well, we've got to do something," is going to be the, the status quo. All right, Bitcoin, Michael. Does gold outperform Bitcoin in 2026?
You know, I think it's a little too random to figure out which. They're both in bare markets, right? They're both down a bunch from their highs, right? Let's say Bitcoin's trading at 60, it was 100. Call Bitcoin 50% from the high and gold 45% from the high. Um, I think they'll be correlated at one point. I don't think we have a, we don't think we have a rate cut cycle close.
But what is interesting is you're not going to see as many rate hikes as we would have thought even a month ago because the war's ending, oil's coming down. That's going to give a respite. You'll, you'll have some high inflation numbers come through the pipe, but they're not going to be sustainable. And you could see talk of rate cuts, uh, by the end of the year, you know, for early next year, not rate hikes. It's, that's, you don't have that talk yet.
But I mean, Madame Lagarde already kind of toned down the, the tension a lot in Europe, right? Where people thought, "Oh, she was going to have to hike 50." And, and so, uh, we could see in the fall, like the hope for Bitcoin is you get an easier monetary policy, the Chinese come back and start buying. There's a big correlation between Bitcoin and Alibaba. I wish I'd looked at this before I owned Alibaba, but you put those charts next to each other, and you know, the Chinese, the Chinese consumer, the Chinese investor isn't buying crypto right now, and they're not buying their own stocks. And I think if you see Alibaba turn, that'll be a nice at least one thing to check for Bitcoin turning.
This 60, 59 area is stunningly important. If this holds, we're all going to breathe a sigh of relief. If this does it, it opens up 45. And, you know, the cycle guys would say that's my,
You think we hit 45 before we hit 85?
I think it's a 50/50. I like, I, I'm really, I think if, if we're talking next week and Bitcoin's 55,000, it's going lower. And if we're talking next week and it's 62,000, it probably held. And I, I, you know, I, I, I have less oomph on my prediction than I normally do because I think we have such a complicated setup. The Sailor thing is real. Uh, you know, MicroStrategy has lost confidence. His, his perpetuals are trading horribly, and what the market doesn't understand is he can sit and do nothing, um, and, and be fine. He doesn't, he's not a forced seller of Bitcoin anytime soon. He's not a forced seller of his own stock.
He has plenty of cash to pay his dividends for a while. Uh, and wait, the market wants to challenge him and, and, and, and put him in pain. And,
I'm riding with Sailor. I think, I think he'll figure this out. I'm, I'm riding with Sailor. But I,
I, I question for you, brother.
What's that?
I said, "Man, oh man, there is a lot on the line there because that's the story right now." And so if you're him, you're like, "I don't want to be the story anymore. I want the story to go elsewhere." And so he's got to figure out how he does something to regain confidence. And it's hard to do right now when, like, there's a tsunami coming at you.
All right. You're out in the Hamptons, so you got to have some smiling going on. What made you smile this week?
Today is my 33rd, uh, wedding anniversary. And so for anyone who's been married, uh, you know, it's not all a walk in the park. There's great highs and, and tough times. And surviving 33 years should make anybody smile.
I, I've been married a combined 34 years, but notice I said combined. Okay? So, I've, I've been walked over the head a few times here on Michael. But, but what's made me smile, uh, which I think is the most important thing, is I was able to take my kids to Disney World over the, uh, Father's Day weekend, and, uh, I got some quality time with my four banana head sons. So, that was a, that was a lot of fun for me.
Let me ask you, all right, guys. Let me ask you a one macro question on Disneyland. Sometimes you, you go to an event and you pick something up. Like, while it's been so hard, if you're in New York City, you got to think you're in a recession. You go out every night, and the place is booming, and, you know, people said, "It's the end of New York." I was like, "What are you talking about? New York's never been better. Restaurants are on fire. Uh, hotels are hard to get into." Like, New York has such a vibe to it. When you go to Disney, what did Disneyland feel like?
Packed. Disneyland's packed. Again, it's part of the K, though. We have to remind everybody, you know, there's a good 35% of the country doing super well. You know, the New York Post is reporting that a member of Zero Bond, to ask Michael Rubin to go to his white party, willing to spend $2 million to do that. I mean, I don't know. You know, you, you see these ticket prices at the World Cup. Uh, you know, the, the,
I've been to that party. It's a lot of fun, but it ain't worth two million.
All right. All right. Well, I've never been to the party, but I wouldn't pay 2 million for the party. But I love the fact that Michael Rubin said, "Hey, even though you can pay 2 million, I'm not taking your 2 million." I mean, this is a crazy society we're living in. Dude, let me tell you something, okay? If I'm having a party at my house, you call me and you say, "Hey, I'll give you two million to come. Okay, you can show up with 10 people." I don't, you know, my, my, my point is we're in this weird environment. So, anything at the top end doing very good, doing very well, I should say, but everything in the, in the middle to the bottom end, unfortunately, I can, I can see the struggle, Mike.
Let me say one last thing, and I know we're running out of time because you said something that I don't think we gave enough airtime to. There are 350 million Americans. So, the top third is 115, or yeah, 116 million Americans. So, let's even go to the top 20%, right? 75 million Americans. Uh, that's a lot of wealthy people. It's bigger than any other country's wealth. Just our 75.
And so, if it's a Taylor Swift concert, there are not enough tickets to go around even in that 75 million. Seats at Disney, seats at good restaurants in New York. And so while it always feels okay at that real top, very few of us talk to people, if you're of Wall Street, or that are in that bottom third regularly. And so, like Disneyland, "What are you talking about Disneyland?" It's, and, and that's, I think, why America keeps lurching for some solution.
You know, populist left, populist right, is that American dream of, "Of course, I get to take my kids to..." Every parent wants to take their kids to Disneyland for a weekend. Every parent in America. I mean, maybe after they do it, they won't say that they wanted to, but, and so we've got to get back to a place where part of the American package is, you know, you get a good two-week, you know, you got to go two different one-week vacations, you got to go to take your kids to dinner every once in a while, you got to get your, send your kids to a decent school. Like that, what's available to the bulk, that other 65%.
And I think partly because we have so many people doing okay and so many people doing super well, it could easily always feel okay, right? Disneyland felt great. Wrong barometer. I guess my, my lesson I learned is it's the wrong barometer.
Yeah. I would just say, yeah, exactly. And I would just say we got to watch our confirmed biases as we, uh, as we invest and as we think about our society. All right. Well, that's it for this week of All Things Markets. We'll see you next week. Mike, have a great time in the Hamptons. Have a good weekend, everybody. Uh, and just so everybody knows, we are, uh, we are live here June 26th at about 7:50.