Last Post of 2022
149: Arbitrage Andy and Arb Letter in 2023
2022 has been an insane year.
For starters we received confirmation on pretty much every single “conspiracy” theory we held and were ridiculed for over the last two years including:
Covid - it’s origin, nature, and treatments
Vaccines - their efficacy, potential side effects, and the lies spread about them from the get go
Ukraine, Hunter Biden, and the 2020 election
The scams of centralized institutions (FTX, Celsius, Gamestop debacle, etc.)
The corruption of our politicians on both sides
There’s endless examples but needless to say we are more vindicated than ever.
Coming off the tails of the Covid 19 world lockdowns, a highly contested 2020 election, the finale of the greatest streak of money printing every achieved (maybe in the universe), the aggressive market corrections since, a war in Ukraine, and much more — we end up here, with only hours left before 2023.
How are you feeling?
Did you accomplish all you wanted to during the last year?
Did you get ahead?
Did you have a revelation on the nature of the world?
We finally got to launching Arb Letter, the first official branch off of our Arbitrage Andy brand on instagram.
Almost 6 years ago I started the Arbitrage Andy instagram in the bathroom at lunch on a slow Tuesday.
Over the years I grew an instagram to 249,000 followers (it seems permanently stuck at that number, but more on that later), a Twitter to 17,000 which got nuked by the former corrupt administration at Twitter, we built a new Twitter to 6,000 followers, and a news letter to 18,000 subs in less than 8 months.
Initially the instagram brand and meme page fueled much of the growth. Being a key player in the golden age of finance memes was an experience I will never forget. But the world has changed since those days.
It was epic. Met some amazing people online, interacted with companies and people I never thought I would, made some money, took some trips, learned a lot about business, became proficient in OTC meme origination, and got the privilege of having my own community and following to interact with and make content for.
I mean it when I say that I am grateful to have an outlet for my interests and a following who enjoys the same content/focuses.
Our focus or “brand” will probably always change and iterate to stay relevant, ensure we are working on the most impactful/recent pieces of news and content, and set us up for longevity.
In the golden era of finance memes, it was Rolexes and Deal Sleds, office pics, hermes ties, NYC night club videos, Murray Hill pregames, summers in the Hamptons, bonus check screenshots, and the gluttony of the years of uncapped excess in finance and more specifically “wealth/Wall Street culture in the Northeastern United States.
Some great post college years of my life running around in NYC with a viral following on social media, an anonymous finance meme account, and an absurd micro celebrity attitude that paid off in more than one realm.
But now I am 30 and have a family.
I took what I needed from my experience in finance, the bachelor life in NYC, and 7 years running amok in Gotham. Business sense, a bit of a chip on my shoulder, my understanding and respect for what money is and can do for your life, and some hair loss were what I ended up taking away.
Truth is over the last several years my life priorities, interests, and values don’t align much with the fringe aspects of corporate culture or “fitting the mold” anymore.
A large part of my lack of interest in going the “traditional route” and working endlessly for a promotion or to be the company man, was fueled by the success and passion I had in my Arbitrage Andy endeavors — every ounce of spare time I had went into digging my Andy Dufresne escape the 9-5 tunnel so to speak. (Shawnshank).
After all, it’s pretty difficult to care about the next client call you have for your day job when you have influencer ad offers or business lines that can make your monthly paycheck in a day or two.
Sure I love “finance culture”, large sums of money, and nice things but what I found more often than not was a large contingency of vapid, unhappy, psychopathic, and shallow humans.
These groups exist in other industries but it was particularly widespread in trading/finance etc.
So I came to the realization that I ultimately wanted to do my own thing and run my own show — if I could run my own business or work for myself that was the ultimate goal.
I was tired of working for incompetent middle managers and idiots and at the same time, throughout lockdowns, senseless political decisions, and endless woke agendas, I leaned heavily into Arb Letter to hedge our presence on Instagram but also to be able to speak about things that didn’t fit the mainstream narrative. I witnessed the world change in real time, watched masses and masses of people brainlessly follow orders and senseless mandates, understood the way things are likely trending, and took time to contemplate what it all meant for the future.
After being in the e commerce and social media world for 7 years we identified efforts and measures that were taken against our presence online, much like the measures taken by Twitter and other social media companies to shadowban and suppress accounts and ideals that they didn’t want spreading.
It included some clear efforts to stymie our growth and reach — probably because of the nuanced topics we cover and the tone we have — centered around critical thought, freedom, self sufficiency, sovereignty, and some of our crass humor for dealing with this life journey all of us find ourselves on.
So I more aggressively worked on the different business aspects of my brand. I launched Arb Letter and we quickly amassed almost 18,000 subscribers, among them, thousands of paid who subscribe for our deep dives, interviews, and commentary on markets, global news, politics, and life.
I will continue to fight the good fight.
We hope to launch our podcast in 2023 and will continue to grow our coverage of the intersection of markets, politics, life, and personal devlopment.
My aim or “brand” is strictly to provide the truth in the new age of true noise and misinformation. We want to be bold outliers that aren’t afraid to challenge official narratives and get to the root of issues globally.
True misinformation of course, comes from those who so strongly claim to be able to identify it.
Nowadays speaking the obvious truth seems to be the biggest crime around. Corporations, institutions, and society seem more interested in woke virtue and political correctness than logic or efficiency.
We live in an age where Elon, the richest man in the world, ends up being the only person willing or able to uncover verifiable proof of what many of us already suspected — mass shadow bans, censorship, government collusion, corruption, and tyranny freely at work by the radicalized tech elite.Regardless of if you like him or not — look further to see what he uncovered.
Had he not, who knows what else would’ve been suppressed, removed, and shadow-banned by the government agencies and Twitter officials who took it upon themselves to essentially regulate and decide what people saw and what was fact.
To be clear there is no doubt now that the tech elite and their behemoth companies have all sold out to the three letter agencies, foreign entities, and actors — but the corruption and rot of our institutions and government goes much much deeper. People are beginning to see this through the release of the Twitter files, market developments, and more.
We will always stand for critical thinking, grit, healthy skepticism of the government/institutions, a bit of irreverence, and a strong sense of independence and sovereignty.
In this world now — everything you consume is meant to influence your thinking.
Which is why Arb Letter is so important. We want to cut through the noise and distractions you are constantly being fed by legacy media, pundits, and organizations.
So why do I recount our short history at Arbitrage Andy and Arb Letter?
One thing I would leave you with is this.
We’ve got some major plans for 2023 we hope to execute on. We won’t ever lose the spirit of the original Arbitrage Andy brand but this new world requires us to be more nimble, adaptive, and cunning to get our message across and get you the content you want in an unfiltered and untampered way.
I will always strive to bring you the truth — in a real/blunt way, while touching on the intelligence, updates, and data that I think should impact, or at the very least stimulate the way you view the world.
Of course humor and our roots in finance will always be a key piece of Arbitrage Andy.
If you’ve followed us or subscribed over the last 6 years I want to personally thank you for coming on this journey with us. It’s been one of the most impactful and fulfilling endeavors in my life so far.
If you subscribe to our free stuff thank for taking part! If you’ve decided to go with paid to get our best work, opinions, and content I’m excited to continue expanding our coverage in 2023.
Onward!
Markets
It’s been a rough descent from the glorious bull market and fed policy - fueled bull market that gripped the entire world and spawned masses of irresponsible retail traders. The gamestop debacle, AMC scene, crypto mania, NFTs, ARKK, Chamath’s SPACs, etc. etc.
The market environment was ludicrous.
People were selling rock NFT for $500,000+.
I was checking my portfolio everyday laughing at how rich I was on paper.
In hindsight when Aunts and Uncles start shilling Cardano at Thanksgiving and 15 year olds became hedge fund managers on Robinhood we probably should’ve begun to wean down positions.
Nearly every irresponsible, leveraged, abused, and gluttonous financial scheme was born and run during this bull market and when the Fed eventually had to take a stance against soaring inflation, it all came crumbling down shattering the visions people had of up only markets.
Now we see widespread tech layoffs,, valuations are crushed, retail and institutional investors are REKT from bad bets, inflation still lingers, and it looks like we could have some more selling coming our way in the coming weeks of January.
Bleak to say the least.
Hopefully there are sunnier days for all of us on the horizon.
Everyone got a first class understanding of market cycles, fed policy, and asset bubbles.
We’re ignoring the haters that are chirping crypto because they don’t realize the paradigm shift that’s playing out.
We fully expect down the line for crypto/digital assets/defi to eat the world of finance. Unfortunately the Federal Reserve continues to play games and the government isn’t giving out free money anymore to fuel reckless retail buys.
Institutions have slowly been getting infrastructure and trading desks ready for the next crypto bull run. 2023 will be a great year to see which crypto assets stand the test of time and which protocols and projects disappear forever.
We won’t stop accumulating cheap tech, growth, and AI stocks but for the time being we are focused primarily on building our online business and brand.
Crypto
Unfortunately in the wake of FTX crypto and defi sentiment seems to be close to an all time low.
We haven’t done much besides sit on our hands and lick some wounds on some of our riskier crypto bets and tech stocks we didn’t sell at the top.
Crypto obviously has disappointed us a bit in the short term with the abundance of scams, ponzis, and shit coins/companies.
Our take on crypto hasn’t changed and outside riskier gets like $MATIC and $LINK we are sitting comfy looking for more changes to bring down our BTC and ETH averages. We’ve always had a long term view ok crypto and defi adoption/true price appreciation and so this down period; while it does blow, we view as more than necessary on the longer time frame.
Sam Bankman Fried is still tweeting after posting record bail and hiding out in the Bahamas.
We truly live in a clown world of no justice and stories you can’t make up if you tried.
The good news?
Much excess, scam protocols, and leverage has been wiped from the system which purged non believers, posers, and influencers who used referral codes and shilled shitcoins endlessly.
While we made it clear which assets we are long term bullish on (BTC/ETH/MATIC/LINK) we will always maintain our long term view. Would we love to go back in time and sell 100% of course: but that’s hindsight trading and does little for us now.
If you invest long term, price fluctuations, even dramatic sell offs like the one we saw, don’t matter much in the grand scheme of things.
Our stance has not changed - we are still accumulating, long term bullish, and have recommended a very straight forward strategy for folks repeatedly.
DCA, hold long term, and use cold storage/security.
Some important lessons for everyone that participated in crypto this year.
Make sure to take profit when people are selling NFT rocks and cumcoins
Notice when the fed reserve officials sell to avoid a conflict of interest, that’s normally a good time to exit risk on assets
Avoid storing large amounts of crypto on exchanges and insecure wallets. USE COLD STORAGE.
Everything is not always what it seems even when endorsed by countless celebrities, business people, and legit institutions ( FTX)
The time horizon for true crypto maturity and true adoption is longer now
Regulation will likely come eventually
Institutions are in fact getting busy during this bear market
If you’ve been reading arb letter you know the broad themes in society, markets, and the USA that we expect to see play out, including:
A more sustained economic recession with potential real estate contagion soon
Russia will continue its war in Ukraine into the warmer months of spring, taking full advantage of the energy landscape to freeze out Europe and further disrupt nato efforts to consolidate and deter more movement
Crypto markets will continue to feel the impacts of scams, ponzis, and fed policy’s impact on risk assets. Recovery time uncertain.
Equity markets likely continue to chop through January, more pain ahead for lower middle class
We expect crime to continue to increase fueled by desperation, mental health risks, lockdown/pandemic anxiety, and wealth disparities
Layoffs will ramp up further and bonuses will continue to plummet (Wall Street already seeing impact of this)
Dividends/Growth Segment
One of the new pieces of my overall portfolio I set out to create and get going is my growth/dividend holdings.
I threw some coin at the following names to build up a portfolio segment that has impressive dividend yields.
Not trying to think about entry so much on these as they will all be long term holds. Some of the names are near 52 week lows and some towards the higher end with some inflation induced pumps.
I plan to add to this fund monthly and build it alongside traditional retirement accounts. Let me know if there are others your reccomend if you have experience investing in growth/dividend stocks.
We’ve covered the concepts before this year but in 2023 we will be focused on 3 core pieces of our financial strategy.
Increasing MRR/ARR for our businesses
Accumulating assets in crypto/equities/real estate
Focusing on building a gold/physicals fund
If we happen to see a reversal in 2023 many people who lost their capital or have sat on the sidelines could miss out.
If the current market conditions persist and we continue to see more selling into the spring, we will start to get more capitulation, anger, and disbelief. We lean towards one larger capitulation period that bleeds into real estate.
Fed policy will likely shift a bit if we see continued success against inflation and escalated layoffs/unemployment.
Global News
2023 will likely bring a whole swath of new challenges and unforeseen macro events that rattle markets and confidence in governments.
In 2023, India, Brazil, Turkey and Saudi Arabia will be among the most influential geopolitical swing states, with outsized impact on dynamics relating to the war in Ukraine and other global issues. India's neutral position toward the war in Ukraine will likely come under growing pressure (EY).
World powers will continue to compete for commodity monopolies and the world will likely be monitoring China to get a read on if the zero covid policy ends up causing a second wave and consequent shutdown of Chinese manufacturing capability.
We anticipate more conflicts to develop in the world in 2023.
Always eyes watching you and the voice enveloping you. Asleep or awake, indoors or out of doors, in the bath or bed—no escape. Nothing was your own except the few cubic centimeters in your skull.
—1984
Institutions & Deep State
If you’ve been following Arb Letter this year, you know we try to be completely transparent and upfront about our opinions on who is really pulling the strings in markets, global politics, and shadowy schemes.
In 2023 we expect the “agenda” to speed up from certain actors we consider to be shady and likely participants in more insidious initiatives aimed at control, influence, and profit.
The CCP, WEF (World Economic Forum, US Government, FBI, DHS, CIA, and more are working overtime.
With a resurgence of Covid in China we wouldn’t rule out a push for more lockdowns in the US eventually if it serves the right purposes or end goals for big pharma, politicians, and certain NGOs.
We’ll be certain to cover our views in more depth in the coming months but know this — the fight between dependence on governments/institutions and the sovereign and free individual is ramping up — the digital aspect of our lives makes this that much more expansive.
There is a constant fight for your attention and the chance to influence what you think and how you live.
To us these are the concepts you’ve either picked up on during the last two years OR you are still living in ignorance.
Other deep state/institutional pushes we expect to ramp up are:
CBDCs (Central Bank Digital Currencies) (105 countries, representing over 95% of global GDP, are exploring a CBDC per CrowdSourcingWeek).
Lockdowns/Vaccine shilling will continue
More propoganda and actual misinformation on vaccines and side effects
Continued ambivalence to what is objectively a massive crisis at the US border
Potential large black swan or false flag type events - terror attacks, power grid failures, climate change emergency acts, etc. (these aim to distract the public from worsening domestic conditions)
We talk a lot about escaping the matrix and the 9-5 lifestyle/system and will be turbocharging our efforts and content on this in 2023.
One other nuanced theme you can pick up on if you’re paying attention is the psychological operations being run on the populace. Corporations, interest groups, and governments want you dumb, feeble, sick, impressionable, and depressed.
You’re easier to control, sell to, and predict.
Couple potential psy ops we’ve picked up on this year include:
Tik Tok fake celebrity death game (normalizes the jest/fakeness of celebrity deaths. In reality actors, celebrities, athletes, and others have been dying suddenly worldwide with few explanations. This potential Psy Op aims to “normalize” that discussions on this topic are fake or jokes. Similar to when the CIA invented the word “conspiracy” to negate and belittle those who questioned JFKs death circumstances and make them seem crazy.
Covid and vaccine psy ops have been in full effect for 2 years. We will likely do a dedicated post on it in the new year but the newest psy op is a plethora of articles and posts claiming “Video games raise rate of heart attacks” “Hard exercise leading to blood clots” “Climate change leading to cancer” and so on. It’s fairly obvious to us what’s going to on but unfortunately most can’t see through the lies and deceit. Surprisingly we’ve received the first “official” acknowledgements of side effects of the vax and boosters from the FDA and other various sources that managed to avoid big tech censorship. More of this likely to drop through Twitter Files and uncensored experts like Dr. Robert Malone, the co inventor of MRNA tech.
The Ukraine/Afghanistan conflicts were both likely events where digital psy ops were run to tailor favor or support for the events domestically in the US. The idea being, don’t let widespread dissent or anti war/anti pullout rhetoric to spread. This was in part proven by recent releases in the Twitter Files.
We got confirmation that these types of strategies are used earlier this month if you don’t remember.
Some of these more vanilla types of psy ops that we see harming young people focus on breaking down family unit dynamics, healthy masculinity/femininity, and the fabric that holds the US together.
Manoshpere and masculinity influencers are under particular fire and attack by legacy media institutions.
We saw the left try to cancel Joe Rogan, Elon Musk, and many others over the last several years.
Most recently Tik Tok/Social Media sensation and manoshpere star Andrew Tate was arrested alongside his brother Tristan Tate yesterday in Romania under alleged human trafficking charges.
This comes on the heels of a Twitter interaction between the two that happened on the 28th. Tate chirped Greta about all the dinosaur fuel his cars eat up. Romanian authorities arrested Tate and his brother at
They have since been released.
We will wait for all available info to come out on this, but our inclination and first guess is that the powers that be wanted this guy to shut up and threw what they thought could stick to get rid of him. If the Tates are guilty of trafficking of course it’s horrific and they should be punished accordingly. But given the previous attempt to cancel them for their message on masculinity, hard work, and the layout of the “matrix” we aren’t surprised if this was an elite sponsored hit job.
Again, not that we support Kanye’s bender he went on but you can see how quickly the “system” shut him out completely for saying the wrong thing.
Banks halted withdrawals, he lost endorsements, AND certain accounts were locked. Same shit happened with crypto ponzis and exchanges that halted withdrawals or gambled customer money.
DECENTRALIZATION is the hedge against the corrupt elite and institutions.
Tate has since tweeted “The matrix has sent their agents” in response to the apprehension.
As mentioned we will strive to become more financially independent, and less reliant on the government and large institutions in 2023.
There is a massive push to get people to fall into the big government reliance trap — either through manufactured crises, supply chain shortages, climate change virtue signaling, vax passports, CBDCs, etc.
We will do everything in our power to avoid those traps.
Our largest geo political risks and predictions for 2023 are:
An escalation in Ukraine or Eastern Europe - potentially nuclear if Russia loses the initiative and Putin gets desperate
China decides it’s time to move on Taiwan
Terrorism and extremism growth in North Africa and middle east regions
Global Fed policy leads to a prolonged and sustained economic Recession
China lockdowns 2.0 shock global supply chains and businesses
Political unrest in the United States
Blackouts and power grid “failures”
Severe food shortages and supply chain woes
There’s a massive dance happening on the global stage for influence and power. China is watching how we work in Ukraine to see what our response could be to their push for Taiwan and south Pacific objectives.
The fight to become global hegemon will escalate.
As they say believe nothing of what you hear, and only half of what you see.
Tonight I am going to have a chill New Years. I am staying in cooking a super nice steak dinner, having some red wine and bourbon, and spending time with my wife and family.
Thank you to all of you again for choosing to read Arb Letter and follow us on Arbitrage Andy.
We are committed to bringing you some of the realest, unfiltered, and critical info/content we can while providing the entertaining commentary so many want in a world of boring business newsletters, boomer legacy media channels, and celebrities/influencers that are completely removed from reality.
Pumped for next year - cheers and happy new year kings and queens, lords and maidens.
Andy
Disclaimer - I am a 30 year online business owner, former trader and salesmen, and financial meme account brand. None of this should be considered formal financial advice — all views are my own opinion. You should thoroughly research financial decisions you make and know the risks involved.
We strive to synthesize and distill the best information on various topics out there combined with our no nonsense commentary on markets, politics, and life.
We’re still learning as well so make sure to drop a comment, add some feedback, or share our two cents so the community can become that much better.
Balance and discipline is really all it is. Thanks for the update and content heading into the new year. A fulfilling life is one that is fully lived and the more we are put in bubbles the less people tap into that fulfillment. Moving into 2023 let’s keep the momentum moving toward a more enjoyable and enlightened future. The future now falls into the hands of my own generation and your non biased insights are exactly what we need to make actual change. Thanks for grinding and Happy New Year!
Thank you for the amazing content, Andy! Extremely glad to see a well executed idea and effort being rewarded through a successful business. Keep it up, and happy new years! Excited to see what 2023 holds for us all.