commodity trading

Oops! How did nearly $2 million worth of nickel owned by JPMorgan Chase turn out to be just bags of rocks? We’ll give you the TL;DR on commodity trading and tell JPMorgan’s tale of woe. And, the House passed a piece of GOP-backed legislation that’s in line with many conservative politicians’ push to limit what can be taught and read in schools. While the bill won’t make it through a Democratic Senate, it could still be used as a political tool. Plus, a round of Half Full/Half Empty with a surprise guest host!

Here’s everything we talked about today:

• • “JPMorgan’s Mystery ‘Nickel’ Rocks: The Hunt for Clues Begins With a Kick” from Bloomberg

• • “JPMorgan Had Some Fake Nickel” from Bloomberg

• • “Parents Bill of Rights: 5 things to know about the House GOP’s legislation” from The Hill

• • “House passes the GOP’s Parents Bill of Rights measure opposed by Biden” from NBC News

• • “Twitter claims ‘legacy’ blue checkmarks will start to disappear on April Fools’ Day” The Verge

• • Moderna will charge around $130 for its COVID vaccine — and Congress isn’t too happy

• • “Subway’s Footlong Pass is back as more restaurants test subscriptions” from Axios

• • “These New Yorkers Hate the New ‘We ❤️ NYC’ Logo” from The New York Times

• • “WGA Would Allow Artificial Intelligence in Scriptwriting, as Long as Writers Maintain Credit” from Variety

• • “Our Film Critic on Why He’s Done With the Movies” from The Daily

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One of the big themes these days is the return of the 'real' economy. You can't solve problems these days with just money. Not everything can be done by sitting behind a screen. And so some of the most important players in this new environment are the commodity trading shops, which help arrange financing and delivery of oil, coal, natural gas, nickel and everything else you can think of across the far-flung corners of the globe. It's a very different type of business than most trading, which is mostly just about charts on a screen. On this episode we speak with long-time commodities journalist turned Bloomberg Opinion columnist Javier Blas -- the co-author of 'The World For Sale: Money, Power, and the Traders Who Barter the Earth's Resources' -- to get a deeper understanding of how these firms operate, and how they're dealing with this environment of surging commodity prices and extreme volatility. 

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