Everybody knows by now that a handful of hedge funders made a fortune by betting against housing before the market crashed back in 2008. But, people who bought at the bottom, when everyone else was panicking, also did extremely well. In the latest episode of Odd Lots we speak with Bloomberg Alastair Marsh, who discovered two traders who won big time by buying the most toxic assets in the world during the depths of the panic in early 2009.

Everybody knows by now that a handful of hedge funders made a fortune by betting against housing before the market crashed back in 2008. But, people who bought at the bottom, when everyone else was panicking, also did extremely well. In the latest episode of Odd Lots we speak with Bloomberg Alastair Marsh, who discovered two traders who won big time by buying the most toxic assets in the world during the depths of the panic in early 2009.

Bloomberg's Joe Weisenthal and Tracy Alloway explore the most interesting topics in finance, markets and economics. Join the conversation every Monday, Thursday, and Friday

Bloomberg's Joe Weisenthal and Tracy Alloway explore the most interesting topics in finance, markets and economics. Join the conversation every Monday, Thursday, and Friday

Bloomberg's Joe Weisenthal and Tracy Alloway analyze the weird patterns, the complex issues and the newest market crazes. Join the conversation for interviews with the most interesting minds in finance, economics and markets.

Odd Lots

On Bloomberg’s Odd Lots podcast Joe Weisenthal and Tracy Alloway explore the most interesting topics in finance, markets, and economics. Join the conversation every Monday, Thursday, and Friday.

On Bloomberg&rsquo;s Odd Lots podcast Joe Weisenthal and Tracy Alloway explore the most interesting topics in finance, markets, and economics. Join the conversation every Monday, Thursday, and Friday.

Episode 16: Making Money When Everyone Else is Losing Theirs

https://api.omny.fm/orgs/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/clips/37576baa-cc04-4a1b-9093-ae27006100ce/transcript

We closed out our New York live show on May 28 with a panel that featured three of our favorite Substackers: James van Geelen of Citrini Research, Sam Ro, founder of The TKer, and journalist Jasmine Sun. They've all been Odd Lots guests before, and we wanted to get them together to discuss how journalists and analysts are supposed to cover this incredibly strange and highly pressurized moment in markets. Not only has AI basically infected every corner of the world, the media included, but there's just so much news that it's sometimes hard to figure out what the focus should be. But James, Sam, and Jasmine have all found their own niches, and cover AI in a really unique way. This panel discussion debates how the media has covered fears over the AI bubble and the possibility of mass job loss, if people in Silicon Valley are scared about the future of society, if AI can really mimic a writer's voice and personality, and (if they can) how writers can hedge against that future.

Read more:
Amazon in Talks to Sell Custom AI Chips in Bid to Undercut Nvidia
AI Company Dream Triples Value to $3 Billion in Funding Round

Only http://Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox each week, plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at  bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots

Subscribe to the Odd Lots Newsletter
Join the conversation:discord.gg/oddlots

We closed out our New York live show on May 28 with a panel that featured three of our favorite Substackers: James van Geelen of Citrini Research, Sam Ro, founder of The TKer, and journalist Jasmine Sun. They've all been Odd Lots guests before, and we wanted to get them together to discuss how journalists and analysts are supposed to cover this incredibly strange and highly pressurized moment in markets. Not only has AI basically infected every corner of the world, the media included, but there's just so much news that it's sometimes hard to figure out what the focus should be. But James, Sam, and Jasmine have all found their own niches, and cover AI in a really unique way. This panel discussion debates how the media has covered fears over the AI bubble and the possibility of mass job loss, if people in Silicon Valley are scared about the future of society, if AI can really mimic a writer's voice and personality, and (if they can) how writers can hedge against that future.
Read more: <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-06-18/amazon-is-in-talks-to-sell-nvidia-rival-chips-to-other-companies?utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=podcast&amp;utm_campaign=odd_lots&amp;utm_content=article" data-prosemirror-content-type="mark" data-prosemirror-mark-name="link">Amazon in Talks to Sell Custom AI Chips in Bid to Undercut Nvidia</a> <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-06-18/ai-company-dream-triples-value-to-3-billion-in-funding-round?utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=podcast&amp;utm_campaign=odd_lots&amp;utm_content=article" data-prosemirror-content-type="mark" data-prosemirror-mark-name="link">AI Company Dream Triples Value to $3 Billion in Funding Round</a>
Only <a href="http://Bloomberg.com" data-inline-card="" data-card-data="">http://Bloomberg.com</a> subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox each week, plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at&nbsp; <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots?in_source=oddlotspodcast" data-prosemirror-content-type="mark" data-prosemirror-mark-name="link">bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots</a>
<a href="http://bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots" data-prosemirror-content-type="mark" data-prosemirror-mark-name="link">Subscribe to the Odd Lots Newsletter</a> Join the conversation: <a href="https://discord.gg/oddlots" data-prosemirror-content-type="mark" data-prosemirror-mark-name="link">discord.gg/oddlots</a>

How Substack Creators Are Covering This Strange Markets Era

https://api.omny.fm/orgs/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/clips/af2e1113-d234-4b94-89ce-b46d0139fa3f/transcript

There’s a lot to unpack with AI right now — everything from its potential impacts on the labor market and society to more extreme questions about existential risk. Anthropic, which builds frontier models like Mythos, Fable, and Claude, is actively grappling with these issues, including whether governments should limit AI development. Just last week, the Trump administration forced Anthropic to block foreign access to its two leading models. In this episode, we speak with Jack Clark (co-founder and head of public benefit) and Peter McCrory (head economist) about how Anthropic approaches safety and economic risks. We talk about its preparations for recursive self-improvement, the engineers it's hiring now, and why Jack left Bloomberg to enter the early AI industry.

Read more:
Anthropic Lays Out Vision for How to Bolster AI Models’ Safety
Microsoft Makes Big AI Inroads in China by Selling OpenAI Models

Only Bloomberg - Business News, Stock Markets, Finance, Breaking & World News subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox each week, plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at  bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots

Subscribe to the Odd Lots Newsletter
Join the conversation:discord.gg/oddlots

There&rsquo;s a lot to unpack with AI right now &mdash; everything from its potential impacts on the labor market and society to more extreme questions about existential risk. Anthropic, which builds frontier models like Mythos, Fable, and Claude, is actively grappling with these issues, including whether governments should limit AI development. Just last week, the Trump administration forced Anthropic to block foreign access to its two leading models. In this episode, we speak with Jack Clark (co-founder and head of public benefit) and Peter McCrory (head economist) about how Anthropic approaches safety and economic risks. We talk about its preparations for recursive self-improvement, the engineers it's hiring now, and why Jack left Bloomberg to enter the early AI industry.
Read more: <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-06-18/anthropic-lays-out-vision-for-how-to-bolster-ai-models-safety?utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=podcast&amp;utm_campaign=odd_lots&amp;utm_content=article" data-renderer-mark="true" data-is-router-link="false" data-testid="link-with-safety">Anthropic Lays Out Vision for How to Bolster AI Models&rsquo; Safety</a> <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-06-17/microsoft-s-china-ai-business-grows-on-openai-model-sales?utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=podcast&amp;utm_campaign=odd_lots&amp;utm_content=article" data-renderer-mark="true" data-is-router-link="false" data-testid="link-with-safety">Microsoft Makes Big AI Inroads in China by Selling OpenAI Models</a>
Only <a href="http://bloomberg.com/" data-testid="inline-card-resolved-view">Bloomberg - Business News, Stock Markets, Finance, Breaking &amp; World News</a> subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox each week, plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at&nbsp; <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots?in_source=oddlotspodcast" data-renderer-mark="true" data-is-router-link="false" data-testid="link-with-safety">bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots</a>
<a href="http://bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots" data-renderer-mark="true" data-is-router-link="false" data-testid="link-with-safety">Subscribe to the Odd Lots Newsletter</a> Join the conversation: <a href="https://discord.gg/oddlots" data-renderer-mark="true" data-is-router-link="false" data-testid="link-with-safety">discord.gg/oddlots</a>

Anthropic's Co-Founder and Top Economist on Doing Research at the AI Frontier

https://api.omny.fm/orgs/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/clips/3b7f6933-fbbc-4e6e-a0de-b46d00ff8723/transcript

Jeremy Grantham, co-founder and long-term strategist of GMO, has a long history of calling bubbles. As he recounts in his new memoir, The Making of a Permabear: The Perils of Long-Term Investing in a Short-Term World, that includes spotting the dot-com bubble of the early 2000s, which some people see as analogous to the current excitement over AI. And when it comes to today's market, there are a lot of signs of frothiness you could point to. In this episode, we speak to Grantham about how he sees markets right now, including a watershed change for Big Tech stocks, the signs he watches out for to spot when a bubble might burst, and what really keeps him up at night.

Only Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox — plus unlimited access to the site and app. Sign up at bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots

Jeremy Grantham, co-founder and long-term strategist of GMO, has a long history of calling bubbles. As he recounts in his new memoir, The Making of a Permabear: The Perils of Long-Term Investing in a Short-Term World, that includes spotting the dot-com bubble of the early 2000s, which some people see as analogous to the current excitement over AI. And when it comes to today's market, there are a lot of signs of frothiness you could point to. In this episode, we speak to Grantham about how he sees markets right now, including a watershed change for Big Tech stocks, the signs he watches out for to spot when a bubble might burst, and what really keeps him up at night.
Only Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox &mdash; plus unlimited access to the site and app. Sign up at&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots?in_source=oddlotspodcast" data-link-cookie="1" data-destination="https://www.bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots?in_source=oddlotspodcast">bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots</a>

Jeremy Grantham on How to Tell If a Bubble Is About to Burst

https://api.omny.fm/orgs/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/clips/60f6b6ac-8fe5-49e8-80a2-b46c01750478/transcript

Episode 16: Making Money When Everyone Else is Losing Theirs

In 1 playlist(s)

Odd Lots

Social links

Follow podcast

Recent clips