Top Traders Unplugged With Niels Kaastrup-larsen | Engaging Conversations With The Top Traders & Investors

In this episode, Alan Dunne and Cem Karsan explore a market that appears calm on the surface yet increasingly unstable underneath. As indices move sideways, they discuss how options flows and structured products are reshaping market behavior, driving rotation rather than direction. From the weakening of former leaders to the rise of defensives, the conversation turns to what these shifts may signal about a broader topping process. They also examine the growing influence of AI narratives, political incentives, and global tensions, not as isolated shocks but as forces building pressure within the system. The result is a discussion about how markets evolve when structure, policy, and sentiment begin to move out of sync.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Investment Books ev

In today’s episode we talk to Mark Roberts, founder of Off Wall Street, a legendary provider of short selling research to hedge funds. Seven months before Enron became the biggest bankruptcy in US corporate history, Off Wall Street published a report recommending the shares be sold. The success of this call made Mark and Off Wall Street synonymous with original and rigorous research. We talk to Mark about his unusual personal background, how being a hippie in Berkeley in the 1960s prepared him for identifying overvalued companies two decades later. He explains why questionable accounting and high valuations are the “symptoms, not the disease” and compares today’s markets with those of the Dotcom era. His new book, Off Wall Street How To Win At Short Selling By Betting Against The Crowd was just released in February 2026.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most

Today Alan and Mark step back from the noise to examine a market environment that feels subtly but meaningfully different. From AI euphoria giving way to harder questions, to gold’s steady rise and a surprising divergence between US and emerging market inflation, the conversation centers on rotation, uncertainty, and shifting assumptions about safety. They explore whether Treasuries still anchor portfolios the way they once did, how fiscal pressures could reshape monetary policy, and why regime thinking matters for systematic investors. Beneath it all is a reminder that correlations change, narratives evolve, and adaptability remains the most durable edge in uncertain markets.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Investment Books ever written here.And you can get a fr

The global order is shifting in plain sight. In this Global Macro conversation, Steen Jakobsen, inventor of the Outrages Predictions, joins Niels Kaastrup-Larsen and Alan Dunne to examine the slow grind reshaping productivity, debt, currencies, and political stability. From dollar regime risk to state capitalism, from market concentration to commodity repricing, the discussion moves beyond headlines to structural fault lines. Is gold signaling debasement? Can the U.S. sustain its debt path? Does AI lift productivity or hollow it out? Rather than predict collapse, Jakobsen outlines a drawn-out transition where capital reallocates, volatility hides beneath the surface, and political systems are tested long before markets finally react.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best In

Today, we examine a year that looked chaotic but felt familiar to trend followers. Gold surged, equities rotated globally, and non-US markets quietly gained momentum. Yet beneath strong returns lies a deeper debate about model design, short versus long horizon signals, and whether innovation in liquid alternatives serves investors or sales desks. From AI disruption to product engineering and allocator behavior, this episode explores where systematic strategies truly create value and where structural incentives distort outcomes. In a changing macro regime, clarity of purpose may matter more than ever.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Investment Books ever written here.And you can get a free copy of my latest book “Ten Reasons to Add Trend Following to Your Portfoli

A familiar portfolio map is being redrawn. Ian Harnett traces the regime shift from disinflation and reliable bond hedges to a world where inflation pressures linger, supply chains shorten, and capital becomes a policy tool. The conversation moves from China’s exported deflation to Europe’s structural constraints, then into America’s strategy of attracting investment with tariff leverage. Beneath it all sits a political question: what happens if the governing coalition fractures ahead of the midterms. Harnett argues that is the moment the dollar turns from anchor to risk.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Investment Books ever written here.And you can get a free copy of my latest book “Ten Reasons to Add Trend Following to Your Portfolio” here.Learn more about the

Today, we are joined by Rob Carver to unpack one of the most volatile weeks seen in commodity markets in years. The conversation centers on silver’s sharp rise and sudden collapse, using it as a case study in volatility targeting, liquidity risk, and disciplined position sizing. From Freaky Friday to broader dislocations across assets, they examine why systematic risk management matters when markets move faster than narratives. The discussion expands into diversification, correlation assumptions, alternative markets, and new research on trend portfolio construction, offering a grounded reminder that survival often matters more than precision.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Investment Books ever written here.And you can get a free copy of my latest book “Ten Reas

Cem Karsan sits down with Ben Hunt, founder of Epsilon Theory, to explore how narratives shape markets, politics, and decision making itself. Drawing on decades of experience across academia, hedge funds, and applied AI, Ben explains why stories, not data, increasingly drive outcomes in modern markets. The conversation spans unstructured data, inference, common knowledge, and the mechanics of narrative momentum. Together, they examine consumer expectations, inflation silence, geopolitical signaling, and the slow shift away from US dominance. What emerges is a framework for understanding markets as reflexive systems, where perception often matters more than reality.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Investment Books ever written here.And you can get a free copy of m

Katy Kaminski joins us to assess the early signals shaping markets in 2026. The conversation explores the resurgence of commodity trends, the role of volatility estimation, and why diversification across markets and speeds matters more than ever. Drawing on new research, they examine dispersion within the CTA universe, the limits of replication, and how volatility targeting quietly determines outcomes. From precious metals to currencies, from crisis alpha to geopolitical risk, this episode offers a grounded look at why trend following thrives during disruption and why regime change remains its natural habitat.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Investment Books ever written here.And you can get a free copy of my latest book “Ten Reasons to Add Trend Following to You

In this episode, Alan Dunne is joined by Dario Perkins to examine why the global macro consensus may be fundamentally misreading the current cycle. The conversation moves from US fiscal stimulus and Federal Reserve credibility to the limits of the K-shaped economy narrative. Perkins challenges prevailing assumptions around AI-driven productivity, labor market weakness, and falling inflation, arguing that policy choices are pushing economies toward overheating rather than stagnation. The discussion extends to bond markets, term premia, Japan’s normalization, Europe’s fiscal pivot, and China’s rebalancing dilemma. What emerges is a picture of renewed growth, rising risks, and a cycle whose ending is now becoming visible.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Investment Books

In this episode, Niels hosts Yoav Git to explore inflation risk, bond fragility, and the changing role of trend following in a world defined by supply shocks and declining trust. Drawing on recent research and market behavior, the conversation examines why traditional bond allocations struggle during inflationary regimes and how commodity trend strategies may offer structural resilience. The discussion spans geopolitics, deglobalization, energy markets, fixed income autocorrelation, and the limits of forecasting macro outcomes. Rather than predicting inflation’s path, the episode focuses on portfolio construction that can endure multiple regimes. What emerges is a disciplined argument for robustness over precision in an increasingly unstable global system.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultima

Today we discuss one of the most popular and influential economic books of the last few decades - The Winner’s Curse. Originally published in 1994, a new version has just been released and we are joined by co-author Alex Imas who wrote the new edition alongside Nobel Prize winner Richard Thaler. When are we likely to spend a windfall and when are we likely to save it? When is it most dangerous to bid for business against competitors? And are ‘arbitrage’ opportunities in markets really a free lunch?-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Investment Books ever written here.And you can get a free copy of my latest book “Ten Reasons to Add Trend Following to Your Portfolio” here.Learn more about the Trend Barometer here.Send your questions to info@toptradersunplugged.c

Today, we are joined by Nick Baltas to examine how narratives, signals, and structural design are reshaping trend following at the start of 2026. The conversation moves from investor storytelling and information digestion to a sober review of what truly drove dispersion in 2025. We explore why speed and universe choice mattered more than expected, why recent outcomes may be misleading, and why reacting to performance is often a mistake. The discussion then turns technical, unpacking new academic research on nonlinear momentum, signal construction, and the deeper mechanics behind trend following’s defensive behavior during stress. The episode closes with a reminder that discipline, not prediction, remains the strategy’s core advantage.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best I

As the long era of neoliberal certainty frays, Mark Blyth argues that we are drifting back toward a 19th century world of rival blocs, imperial habits and dangerous illusions. In this conversation, he traces how repeated “software crashes” of capitalism produced inflation, austerity, populism and now a return to industrial policy and great power confrontation. He connects deficits, demographics, migration, and housing with the lived reality of stagnant wages and rising prices. Along the way, he questions central bank mythology, challenges deficit obsession, and asks whether politics can adapt before events force a far harsher reset.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Investment Books ever written here.And you can get a free copy of my latest book “Ten Reasons to Add

The new year opens with a shift hiding in plain sight. As globalization recedes and the world fractures into spheres of influence, Rich argues this isn’t just a political story - it’s a structural shift that favors trend following. In this episode, he challenges the illusion of control baked into most trading systems: why backtests offer comfort, not readiness; why precision breeds fragility; and why the future isn’t something to predict, but something being built in real time. This is a conversation about trading with humility, designing for persistence, and letting go of the need to know. The signal is now.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Investment Books ever written here.And you can get a free copy of my latest book “Ten Reasons to Add Trend Following to Your

William White returns to assess a world edging closer to systemic stress. Drawing on decades advising central banks, he describes a macro regime defined not by temporary shocks, but by a deep reversal of the forces that once kept inflation low and debt manageable. From de-globalization and demographic decline to energy constraints and fragile supply chains, the conversation traces how rising costs collide with record public and private leverage. White warns that policy makers are trapped between inflationary pressures and debt sustainability, with no clean exit in sight. The discussion closes on AI, currency fragmentation, and the uncomfortable possibility that today’s stability masks a far more dangerous future.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Investment Books ever w

In part two of our year-end roundtable, the Systematic Investor team goes beyond performance to ask harder questions about the path forward. Are today’s drawdowns a signal of structural change? - or just the cost of staying disciplined in a low-volatility regime? As allocators repackage old ideas under new acronyms and model drift tempts even seasoned managers, the conversation turns to what still holds. From AI and capital efficiency to the quiet value of doing less, this is about defending process when the payoff isn’t obvious - and knowing what not to change when pressure mounts. We close off with our 2026 Outrages Predictions... don't miss them!-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Investment Books ever written here.And you can get a free copy of my latest book “T

In this Ideas Lab episode, Kevin Coldiron speaks with venture capitalist and former founder Aubrie Pagano about what stands between today’s AI hype and a truly transformative AGI economy. Rather than treating AI as destiny, Aubrie maps the frictions that hold it back: hard power limits, fragile industrial data, and agents that still cannot coordinate with humans or each other. She explains why we may be a full capital cycle or two away from real AGI and why that delay is precisely where the best opportunities lie. The conversation then widens into the “Aquarius Economy,” a possible future in which human agency, not algorithms, becomes the scarcest and most valuable asset.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Investment Books ever written here.And you can get a free

Niels is joined by all 9 amazing co-hosts, to discuss a year that refused to behave. In part one of the annual "roundtable", Niels and the group map why 2025 produced such striking dispersion across trend followers. They revisit the Liberation Day shock and the uncomfortable truth it exposed: results often came down to unglamorous choices like market selection, time horizon, and how quickly risk is resized after clustered volatility and sharp reversals. The conversation then widens to a structural theme: the rapid growth of strategies investors hope will sit outside stocks and bonds, from managed futures and multi strats to structured products, gold, and crypto, plus the liquidity, reflexivity, and selection challenges that follow when everyone reaches for the same diversifier.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your F

Moritz Siebert speaks with Doug King about what it really means to trade commodities through cycles, distortions, and stress. Drawing on decades at Cargill and more than twenty years running a commodities hedge fund, Doug explains why innovation keeps scarcity narratives in check, why commodities resist buy and hold logic, and how real edge comes from cash markets rather than futures screens. He reflects on defining trades in oil, nickel, and agriculture, the limits of volatility targeting, and the discipline required to survive violent squeezes. The result is a grounded account of conviction, risk control, and why commodities reward patience more than prediction.-----50 YEARS OF TREND FOLLOWING BOOK AND BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO FOR ACCREDITED INVESTORS - CLICK HERE-----Follow Niels on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or via the TTU website.IT’s TRUE ? – most CIO’s read 50+ books each year – get your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Investment Books ever written here.And you can get a free copy of my