January 9, 2025 • 40 mins
Nate and Maria share their predictions for the year to come, covering everything from the price of Bitcoin, to the fate of President Trump’s cabinet picks, to whether Nate will wear skinny jeans.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:15):
Pushkin. Welcome back to Risky Business, a show about making
better decisions. I'm Maria Kanikova.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
And I'm Nate Silver.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Nate Today is going to be a fun show. You're
taping from Tokyo, I'm taping from New York, so from
opposite sides of the world. We'll be talking about our
predictions for twenty twenty five on a whole number of things,
a whole bunch of topics, from you know, economics and
politics to pop culture and lots of things in between, sports,
(00:53):
fashion choices. I think you'll enjoy this one. Let's get
into it.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
Nate, Happy twenty twenty five.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
Everybody Happy twenty twenty five. It's a quarter thing century.
It's a good boy, all right. Yeah, that's insane. God,
what were you doing on New Year's two thousand? On
New Year's two thousand, Oh my god, I was still
in high school, I was God, yeah, I was in
(01:27):
high school. So I was with my family. Where were
you twenty five years ago?
Speaker 2 (01:32):
I was in on a beach in Key West, Florida, nice,
doing various substances that may or may not have been
legal in the state of Florida. And we'll leave it
at that.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
Sounds good. I think there's I think you're good on
the statute of limitations. Okay, okay, all right, so let's
get into it. So we have a bunch of different
topics ranging from you know, crypto to pop culture. Do
you want to start it off with kind of one
of the big topics that we've talked about on the
(02:06):
show multiple times, which is bitcoin. What do you think
nate will be the highest price that bitcoin will reach
this year? And what do you think will be the
lowest price bitcoin will reach? If you want, I can
start a soft way. So we're looking at polymarket, where
I'm an advisor says that the over.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
Under mark is roughly one twenty k by market thirty first.
Speaker 1 (02:33):
That's not the end of the year, yeah, and any.
Speaker 2 (02:35):
K on the lowest and by March thirty first. You know, look,
I mean, if you had to like, this is a
really hard question, it is a really hard question.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Yeah, let me say the high is the high is
one forty is my over under, and the low is
sixty right, Okay, all right, that's I'm just doubling. I'm
just doubling polymarket. I trust that people in poly market
a lot of crypto friendly types there. I trust that
(03:07):
the market is smarter than I am, and I'm just
doubling the range. Sure, So yeah, March thirty first through
the end of the year.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
Okay, that's pretty smart. I am going to go higher
than you. I am going to say one eighty high
for twenty twenty five. So I think that there are
a lot of people, a lot of smart crypto people
who think it will hit two hundred and might even
go over two hundred. I don't think it will go
that high, but I'm going to be bullish and I'm
going to say one eighty. And on the low side,
(03:37):
I'm not sure. I will say seventy. I will say
seventy as the low.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
So are you buying I mean that sounds pretty asymmetric
where you should be buying bio. Are you buying bitcoin?
Speaker 1 (03:47):
I am not currently buying bitcoin, but I think that
bitcoin is actually something that potentially I should start buying.
Especially as Donald Trump comes into office. We know that
he hasn't necessarily delivered on, you know, things that he's
promised in the past, but so far there are positive
signs that he is going to be pretty pro crypto,
(04:11):
and if all of those things come to pass. You know, normally,
the way that you look at markets is, oh, you know,
smart people have already priced this in, right, So the
price of bitcoin already reflects people being optimistic about Donald
Trump and what he's going to do and his policies.
But I think that with crypto it doesn't necessarily work
that way, and the market doesn't price things in quite
(04:31):
the same way as the stock market. I would say
that it's less efficient in some ways and much more volatile, right.
We see, you can see in the cryptocurrency world, you
can see something go up five hundred percent, right, That
just does not happen on the regular stock market. So
so I would say that there's the upside is asymmetric,
right now.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
See, I might argue that crypto is almost my definition
ary vibe spased, right, Yeah, and it may over anticipate,
it may overly be pricing it in, you know what
I mean.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Yeah, that's also very possible.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
And in general I'm wonder if there's like a little
bit of irrational zoo Brenth. I mean, President's is hard, right,
He's inheriting a pretty unhappy electorate. He will be surrounded
by a mix of people, some of them are confident
in many of whom aren't. He has very narrow majority
in the House, right, Yeah, he's old. He and Eli
(05:27):
will probably have a falling out at some point. B
A BFFs. I don't know. I think there's kind of
a I think the average Trump new convert enthusiast crypto
enthusiast is a little high on fumes right now. And
I remember, you know, kind of when uh, whenever there's
(05:50):
new president, when there's a switch of parties, right, like
people people don't understand how difficult it starts to look
three to six months in right, you're doing your one
hundred days stuff, although it's harder now than it used
to be. But Trump will do some executive orders. We'll
talk about that in a bit, and then I know,
I think there's a short term bare case on Trump
(06:12):
I think is probably worthwhile. And how that turns it
to the crypto is not linear entirely. But like, it's
hard to be president, that's all I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
I totally agree with that. But because we're looking at
by the you know, this year in total, right, we're
not actually doing a prediction of where it's going to
be next month or where it's going to end up.
We're just saying, like, what is the high for twenty
twenty five? And I actually think that the irrational exuberance
will get us to that high at some point, and
(06:40):
then it might crash right precipitously. And the reason I'm
not buying bitcoin, by the way, is that I'm not
confident enough in my ability to predict, you know, when
those crashes will come and when those changes and sentiment
will come. But I do think we're going to see
something like that. So I think that there's a lot
of a lot of things to be said for pre caution,
(07:00):
but also for you know, let's put some of those
irrationally exuberant predictions in there. Let's switch gears a little bit,
sort of sort of because this is related to Trump.
So how about a prediction about Trump's We've talked about
the cabinet right and about his nominees. Do you have
a prediction for how many cabinet nominees and this is
(07:20):
starting now, so Gates does not count, will either be
rejected or withdraw No Gates. Yeah, let's so gate Gates
does not count because that has already happened. So starting now,
let's bench tracker with poly Market.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
Poly Market says Pete haig Seth is an eighty six
percent chance of being confirmed, Tulsa Gabbard seventy five percent,
Cash Hotel eighty nine percent, RFK Junior eighty five percent,
and then there are some other people that probably nobody
cares about. Right, So let me do math fifteen twenty five,
fifty sixty and then a little pocket change we get.
(07:55):
So poly Market says that the best bet is probably
one or zero. I'll go with zero. I think that
like we saw the scalp with Mac, I think if
you're going to have somebody else that it would have
happened sooner in this kind of pre because the further
(08:16):
you go, the more embarrassing to Trump, and most Republicans
in the Senate actually don't want to embarrass Trump. And so,
I mean, you know, the market says that Gabbard is
the most likely wild card, and but but I think
they've mostly survived. I mean out they'll survive the vetting
making them look good, right, But there's no objective standard here, right,
(08:36):
it's do you have fifty votes in the Senate? And
I think I think they've probably survived it in a way.
Mack age students. So I'll go with zero. I'll go
he'll bet one thousand.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
The rest of the way, I actually agree with you,
I was going to say zero. I don't think that
anyone's going to withdraw, and I don't think anyone is
going to be rejected. I think we're going to see
the falls light confirmed. I think that people will tow
party lines, and I think that we're going to see that.
We're going to see everyone sail through. I don't even
think it's going to be particularly close.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
Next question, you are eluding this, Maria, number of press
secretaries in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 1 (09:12):
I am going to say that in twenty twenty five
he is going to have two. That's going to be
my prediction.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
Maria, we're agreeing too much here. I'm two seems like
the rational modal number. It's a fucking hard job, it is.
I mean, I kind of feel like press secretaries of
the one people should be allowed to lie, you know
what I mean, because you can't really do the job
without lying.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
Well, I don't think. I mean, I think there's a
difference and between lying and spinning, and there is, so
I do. I'm not trying to play semantics here, right,
So there's lying where like you're just like flat out
saying something that you know is not true. And then
there are like misrepresentations, which in some ways is worse
(09:58):
right because it's harder to be like you lied. You
can be like, well, no, like if you parse the
sentence semantically, I didn't. Technically, I did not lie. And
I think that that's more what press secretaries do. They're
more spin doctory than they are.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
It's like a poker player, you know. Some poppe plays
will not like actually lie about the contents of their hand. Right.
You'll be like, do you have a pucket kings? And
they'll be like, well, it's a big pair or something,
you know what I mean. Yeah, I just lie about
the kindents of my hand all the fucking time. In poker,
it's like allowed.
Speaker 1 (10:31):
It is allowed, It is allowed. I don't do it there, No,
I don't do it, but but it is absolutely allowed,
and I totally don't blame you for doing it. The
funniest thing, by the way, can we just do like
a poker aside is when people lie about their hand
on stream, on televised stream when their cards are shown,
and it will become very very clear that they're lying.
(10:54):
Scott sever does this all the time, and he'll just
like with a straight face like be like fold you
know I've got it, or like he'll he'll or just
like completely lie what hand he has and like you
can see he's lying and he just doesn't care. So
I think that I think that that is definitely very accepted.
I am more of the I don't like telling people,
(11:15):
you know, what I had and they if they don't
take that for an answer, I'll just say yes, right, Sullivan,
did you have Kings?
Speaker 2 (11:22):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (11:22):
Did you have Queen's Yes? Did you have JACKX Yes?
Did you have Ace King?
Speaker 2 (11:26):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (11:26):
Like I will, and if you start asking me more
than one hand, you will realize that I'm just saying
yes to everything. So I'll just do something like that,
which you know will will normally shut people up. But
I don't like to tell people what I have, as
we've talked about before on the show, and I think
this is an important point outside of poker. Information equals power.
Do not give people information when you don't have to, right,
(11:50):
have them know as little as possible about your intentions,
how you play everything else. So yeah, two press secretaries.
First ones never hold on. I mean, Trump just goes
through press secretaries like none other. I wouldn't even be
surprised to see three. But I think two is the
right prediction. All right, we've got one more Trumps? What
we have more than one? Trump has said he will
(12:11):
declare a national emergency on his first day in office
to begin mass deportations. Do you think he will do
this on January twentieth? Is there going to be a
national emergency declaration?
Speaker 2 (12:24):
Again? There is a market to calibrate to polymarket says
eighty percent chance on day one he does issue at action.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
I have that seems high.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
Yeah. Well, look, I mean one of the things you
can say Trump had a mandate to be elected on
was immigration, right, and he clearly cares a lot about that.
I mean, it's kind of core to his brand. I
think it's within the purview of the one House issue
executive action. So I'm going to say, yes, right, I
(12:54):
have no reason to like, like, this is kind of
what you promised. This is what he promised to do
if you voted for Trump. This is what you were
supposed to get, and I think he's going to do it.
Speaker 1 (13:04):
I mean, I think you're probably right, but I'm just
gonna get of a completely. So this is the opposite
of what we do here on Risky Business, which has
use our rational minds to do predictions. I'm just gonna
say he won't do it because I don't want him to.
That is not how you make decisions. So the rational answers, yes,
I think there will be a national emergency. My emotional
(13:26):
answer is I hope there isn't and I hope that
there are no mass deportations. But you're absolutely right that
this is something that people that people you know did
vote for.
Speaker 2 (13:38):
And so I mean if the reason why I think
you want to take the yes and bet is like
ify for whatever reason, is influenced by uh, I mean,
Silicon Valley doesn't care as much about the illegal immigration,
but if he's influenced to like take a softer line,
I think he would still issue an executive order of
some kind. It would and it would have fewer teeth
(13:59):
or they wouldn't fight for it as much in the
courts or right. I think he kind of has to
like do this to kind of maintain face. What if
he gets in and he's like, it's all long con
it's all long coin of been a Democratic all time,
including the first term. I know what place that.
Speaker 1 (14:16):
Was that was not Trump, I'm not sure who that was.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
Adam Sandler never, that was embarrassing, most embarrassing when williams. Hey,
let's move on the next question. Will Elon Musk become
the world's first trillionaire in twenty twenty five. His current
net worth, according to Bloomberg, is four hundred and twenty
six billion with a B dollars.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
I say no, I say he will not become a
trillionaire in twenty twenty five. And I say this because
Tesla has had disappointing sales this year. I realized that
that's only one small part of his net worth, but
you know it's it's an important one. And I also
think that there's going to be some fallout with his
(15:03):
association with Trump, including a fallout with Trump at some point,
because I don't don't know of anyone, like any high
profile marriage that Trump has had that has lasted, obviously
including his actual marriages, but what I mean right now,
you know, marriage with any kind of close political confidant. Right,
he's broken up with all of them. He elevates advisors,
(15:26):
He's like, you know, they're BFFs. They're really close, and
then always there's you know, I don't know if it's
ego clashing or what it is, but there's always a
falling out. And I think that that's going to hurt Elon,
and I think that's going to happen in twenty twenty five.
So I don't think he's going to become poor, but
I definitely do not see him becoming a trillionaire. There's
(15:47):
also the AI component, and you know, I think it
does matter whether you're bullish or bearish on the financial
prospects of AI, and I don't think they're going to
figure out their cash flow finances, you know, how to
actually make money in the coming year.
Speaker 2 (16:03):
What do you think, Nate, So if someone else becomes
a billionaire a trillionaire before, you also lose this bet.
Is that correct?
Speaker 1 (16:12):
Yes, because he's the first trillionaire.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Okay, oh yeah. For Look, the long term average for
super rich guys that they increase in net worth by
probably around twenty percent per year, which is very very
good relative to how most Americans do. But take take
four to fifty whatever is now and add twenty percent,
and you're not that close. There's a little bit of
a thing before about like to the extent that like
(16:37):
assets that Elon owns have been priced up, that's kind
of priced in to some extent already. I tend to
agree that, Like, I mean, you see these periodic reports
that Trump was like Elon's getting a little carried away here,
and yeah, I think this is a a It's not
impossible to imagine, but I'd say, like, I think there's
(16:58):
maybe a one in five chants and then tweet that
twenty percent down to like eighteen because now and then
someone else gets there first, like in the AI scenario
where this is the year where you have like a
big AI boom, then like the Nvidia people and other
people that are a bit more like directly tied to
(17:19):
AI might benefit first. Right.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
But yeah, okay, so we agree on this one as.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
Well, and we'll be right back after this break.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
What's up next? Let's do some poker.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
Poker over under on Nate and Maria's net tournament winnings
for the year, i e. Winnings minus buy in. Let's
assume this is all live tournaments, right, so we'll ignore
any any sketchy uh online stuff that we might or
might not do. So it's trackable in theory.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
It's hard. You know, tournaments are so incredibly it's such
a volatile thing, right, and there's so much variance there
that it's really really difficult to have predictions. I mean,
I've had years where I've been down a lot, and
I've had years where I've been up a lot, And
you know, I would like to have a nice optimistic
(18:26):
prediction that but and I think you have to. If
you're a tournament player, you have to be optimistic. It's
kind of like an entrepreneur. You realize that, you know,
most people lose money, but in order to do it,
you have to believe that you're one of the few
that's going to succeed. So I think you kind of
have to have that mindset I'm in.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
Look in the book, I did some simulations for a
assuming a very good tournament player, maybe if we're being honest,
probably not too far from where you and I, Maria,
but maybe a little bit better in that book then,
you know, but in that vicinity, right, and if this
player PENELOPEA I named her, if she plays two hundred bullets,
(19:11):
two hundred entries, that is bullets. We don't want to
use violent imagery, but that's what pokers say. When you
buy into a tournament, you fire a bullet. She buys
into two hundred bullets per year in live poker tournaments
with a schedule that probably looks a lot like what
you are. I might play Maria the mix of tournaments,
and she loses money about forty to forty five percent
(19:34):
of the time out of two hundred entries. I might
play fifty entries this year. You might play more. You
might be I don't know where are you seventy five,
one hundred or something like. Well, probably the brutal truth
is that the odds are that we will have a
losing year, or at least I will with fifty entries.
It's hard to win money with fifty entries. Sometimes you
win a lot of money, but like probably sixty percent
(19:56):
of the time, you wind up with a losing year
with that, with that volume, even with with with an edge,
I assume poker tournaments, we remain pretty soft. But like, so, yeah,
probably my over under is like negative ten thousands. Okay,
I won't speak for you.
Speaker 1 (20:08):
All right, I'm gonna I'm gonna be optimistic, but I'll
be I'll be cautiously optimistic. We'll stay in the five
figures instead of six figures. So so I'll say that, uh,
I predict my net tournament winnings this year to be
forty five thousand, twenty twenty five. I don't know where
(20:31):
that number is coming from. It's it's trying, it's tempering expectations,
but trying to hope for the best. The thing is,
it's it's.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
Actually kind of hard to have the forty five thousand plus.
It's like like you kind of have like you almost
want to say like negative fifty thousand, or like I
think something in three hundred k right or five, you
know what I mean, because that's kind of where the distribution.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
It's true, it's true, but you know, like thinking of
this past year, you know, I had a horrific World series,
but I had a really good year at the end.
But I had you know, I had some really big scores,
but because my world series was so bad, I was,
you know, down over one hundred thousand dollars. Like that
really detracted from from the big scores. So so at
(21:16):
the end I was positive, but it could have, you know,
it could have very easily. It took a number of
big scores to get me to the positive part, right, So.
Speaker 2 (21:25):
So what's on the what's on the schedule, even what's
on this because fucking France I was gonna go.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
To I know, I know, it's very sad. It's very sad.
EPT Paris, which was supposed to be the first European
Poker Tour stop. Poker Stars my sponsor, I'm an ambassador.
You know, we've got We've got lots of descibers this show. Unfortunately,
because of French regulations that got that got canceled. They're
trying to reschedule it. I'm really hoping that it will
(21:51):
be rescheduled. But right now, the first EPT stop is
going to be Monte Carlo. That's going to be in April.
I will be there and you should com nate. Monte
Carlo's gorgeous. It's right on the water, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
Beautiful, Robbie. You look at Monta Carlo.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
Yes, it's a beautiful probably a pretty easy, beautiful hotel, probably.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
Pretty easy to persuade, beautiful.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
Location, great fields. It's a really wonderful event. I think
you should come and we can do we can do
some bets for the show and for our listeners, and
we can do a podcast episode from Monte Carlo. So
let's then move on to AI. Oh I hate this question.
It's so sad. Will a consumer AI model be able
(22:34):
to host risky business by the end of twenty twenty
five that will be indistinguishable from meat space, you and me?
Or and if not, then in what year will that
be possible? So what's our pe doom for podcast hosts?
Speaker 2 (22:54):
No, I agree, and I think it will be a while,
if ever. I mean, like, I think personality is a
very high fidelity problem that like I don't think there's
like enough. I don't know. Yeah, it's it's hard to Yeah,
it's pretty hard. I mean like it can kind of
(23:15):
like make inferences about people that are very smart, right,
but like because it kind of sees what the essential
features are I think, but like the nuances are very
are very tricky. Like AI is not a very good
stylist at writing. I mean, I don't think it's very
good at like art. I think people misunderstand art. This
is a band, but like it is for another time.
But like I'm not worried about this in the short thing.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
I totally agree with you. I don't think it's good
at creative things in general, because it's good at regurgitation
and at making things formally look like they're like on
the surface good formalistically, but I don't think it's able
to have creative insight. It's not able to connect ideas
or answer questions in ways that haven't been done before
(23:59):
because it doesn't actually think right. It doesn't actually have
a brain. All it's doing is kind of connecting information.
And there's also that there's also the garbage in garbage out.
As more and more people are saying, you know, don't
train AI on our ship, then you see that the
AI output actually degenerates pretty quickly. So so I don't
(24:22):
I don't think they're coming for our jobs yet.
Speaker 2 (24:26):
And I'm not sure I agree that it doesn't think.
Speaker 1 (24:29):
Well thinking, So I guess. I guess this is a
much deeper philosophical discussion, which we can have on another
episode of the show because it will take too long.
But I think this is a very interesting question about
what thinking actually is and how we should define that.
But yeah, let's let's table that and let's have an
episode about that, because I actually think it's really interesting. Nate,
(24:52):
there's a question that's specific to you. You have ten
thousand dollars and you can bet it on any line
in sports this year, but you have to bet right now.
Speaker 2 (25:03):
I mean, I think the Oklahoma city is shay. You'll
just Alexander is a good bet. When the MVP A
were and he was at something like minus one twenty before,
which implies what is that like if you know fifty
five to sixty percent chance. I think he's more lucky
than that to win the award. He is averaging let
me look up his stats, so he's on the best
(25:23):
team in the league. He's averaging thirty one point three
points per game, five and a half rebounds, six assists,
almost two steals per game on the best defense in
the league, on the best team in the league. Nicola
Jokich is an incompetition great player, but the Nuggets kind
of suck. I think I think he is more lucky
than Vegas assumes to win the MVP. And when I
(25:44):
get back in any country we're betting is legal, I
will be betting, probably not ten K, but betting some
money on that.
Speaker 1 (25:50):
All right, Well you heard it here first, Nate. Does
this mean that I should quickly open a sportsbook account
and bet that I don't have? It's probably I've never
done any sports betting. By the way, ever, in my.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
Minus war twenty is fifty five percent animals at sixty,
So the answer is probably probably not okay, right, I
mean because like, well, if you get like all the
bonuses from the sports betting account, then sure, right, like
a reason why I like you don't want to make
Like in theory, these long term future's bets are fairly profitable, right,
(26:27):
but in principle, if I am betting now on January,
that ties up my capital for for several months, right,
And then theory that like takes like a little tax
on it, where like in theory, if that's in the
s and P. Five hundred over four months, then you
make whatever two and a half percent or something like that,
And so like that's a little bit of a tax.
(26:48):
It's meaningful. But then look, I don't know, I think
it's a good bet. I'm gonna make that bet when
I can.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
All right, sounds good.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
And we have a question for Maria what cognitive bias.
They're all excited they went to the cognitive bias New
Year's party, And can you imagine and like different cognitive
biases at a.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
Post that would be a hilarious skit.
Speaker 2 (27:14):
Well, what kind oftive bias will win the second annual
Daniel kind of a Memorial Cognitive Bias of the Year
Award for twenty twenty five.
Speaker 1 (27:21):
Right, So we just had the Golden Globe Awards, and
now cognitive biases are looking to see which one of
them is going to win. I am going to vote
for the recency effect as the bias of twenty twenty five.
And what the recency effect also known as the availability bias?
It means that basically, we overvalue what's happening, what just happened,
(27:44):
things that are easily available to memory, and kind of
forget the rest, right, Like it's a kind of amnesia
where you forget selectively forget history and what's come before,
and you overwet your decisions based on the information and
the events that have just happened and that are most
easily accessible in your mind. And I think we already
started to see that. You know, it's funny, I just
(28:06):
made the joke about the Golden Globes, but you already
saw that in the goal in globes where basically no
one talked politics, right, it was like, if you remember
what happened after Donald Trump's first election, everyone had it
in their speech and there was all this stuff, and
this time it was just like, h okay, right, like
moving moving on, We're not gonna we're not going to
talk about it. We don't we don't really care. And
(28:28):
so it just goes to show that, you know, our
memories are short, and we accept kind of new normals
very very quickly. And I think we'll we'll see a
lot of collective forgetting happening in the year twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
I was host. I don't know if it's the same
or the opposite. I was going to kind of go
with the with the hot hand bias, right. I think
Trump and Republicans are likely to overreach and overestimate their popularity,
and like we talked about before, being president is hard.
But we'll see.
Speaker 1 (29:00):
I think I think that's also quite likely that's they're
not they're not mutually exclusive. I think both of these
things could absolutely be true. Yeah, and we'll be back
right after this. Let's move on to a multiple choice
(29:28):
around about TikTok Okay, what's going to happen to TikTok
a banned in the US? So Alpha Jen Alpha Riots
b sold to a non Chinese company, C, nothing remains
under Chinese corporate control or D none of the above.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
So Trump has asked the Supreme Court to pause the
law that could ban TikTok. I'm gonna, I'm gonna, Marie,
why aren't you in foremost, will I cheat by looking
at polymarket?
Speaker 1 (29:54):
I think it is going to be sold to a
non Chinese company, because so that's that's option B. I
don't think it's going to be banned. I think that's
too politically kind of risky. And Donald Trump does not
like to do something that's going to hurt his popularity
that much. But he you know, with tariffs, et cetera,
(30:16):
it's not like he cares that much about alienating China
on some level. So I think that that might be
the compromise that that ends up that ends up winning out.
So sold to a non Chinese holiday market, all right, tell.
Speaker 2 (30:30):
Me it's a forty three percent chance that TikTok has
banned in the US before May twenty five, and so
like if you exchect it out to anytime, that's surprisingly high.
But like, so we do this law in place right
that required it to be sold, So Trump will kind
of have to go out of his way to prevent that, right,
(30:50):
And I guess you're right, right because like, I think
Trump concluded that like TikTok was probably helpful to him
in the general election, right, Like it seemed to be
boosting a lot of the campus protest type of stuff. Right,
But Trump is also hawkish on China. I'm going to
(31:13):
follow the polymarket logic. I'm gonna go that like TikTok
will be banned in the US with above fifty percent
probability by the end of the year, not by May.
I'm going n trusting the market here by May. And
then yeah.
Speaker 1 (31:27):
All right, so we'll see what happens. Does it get
banned or does it get sold to a non Chinese company.
Apparently the loser of this has to post to TikTok.
We'll see about that. I'm not committing, not committing.
Speaker 2 (31:37):
I haven't thought it. So if I'm wrong, So if
you're wrong, TikTok is banned, so you don't have to post.
That seems unfair.
Speaker 1 (31:45):
That is unfair. Yeah, it's true. Well, we'll we'll figure out.
We'll figure out another That is funny. That is very funny.
All right, let's do a lightning round for pop culture.
I don't know if you care about this, but I've
been following Will the Oasis brothers have a fight on
stage during their twenty twenty five world tour? Absolutely they will.
(32:07):
Those people, those two guys cannot coexist. I think they've
thrown shit at each other every single time they've been
on stage, or one of them has stormed off every
single time that they've tried to do a reunion tour.
If they care about their bottom line, I think the
only reason they're having a reunion tour is because one
or both of them wants money. They'll probably try not
to do it at the very beginning.
Speaker 2 (32:27):
Yeah, it might be a fake fight, but like they'll
have it. I mean that's a pretty logical bet.
Speaker 1 (32:32):
I agree. All right. Kim Kardashian visiting mar A Lago.
Speaker 2 (32:36):
Is she taking a stance on Trump?
Speaker 1 (32:37):
No, but I think she will because I think she
you know, she was married to Kanye for so long
or whatever he's calling himself now. Yeah, yeah, so I
think I think there's a good chance that she that
she goes there, and she's also very business savvy, so
I think she will do whatever's better for her bottom line.
And I think that she'll she'll probably uh that that
(32:58):
means coosing up to Trump, So I would I would
say there's a good chance she doesn't.
Speaker 2 (33:02):
I have no opinion. I'm proud to have no opinion.
Speaker 1 (33:04):
Sounds good. Best Picture winner? Do you have an opinion?
Speaker 2 (33:09):
Uh, I know it's about dyla movie good.
Speaker 1 (33:15):
I have not seen it yet, so so I don't know.
I'll put uh, let's put the Brutalists there. Seems like
it seems like a good one. Oh, this is interesting.
I'm gonna I'm gonna have to speculate on this chance
that Nate wears skinny jeans, which are supposedly back. So
(33:36):
so you know with one hundred percent certainty whether it's
yes or no.
Speaker 2 (33:40):
And I don't. I don't know where's it. Where's a
threshold for seini jeans?
Speaker 1 (33:45):
I don't. I don't know. This is very interesting, and
I think it's probably different for men and women because
straight leg jeans for women are not skinny jeans. For women,
they really have to be like skin tight. But I
feel like for men there's more of a there's like
more of a window for them to be like a
little bit less than skin tight. I'm gonna I can't
even speculate on this. Well, no, okay, I'm.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
Turning forty seven years old in a week, Marie, I'm
not going to be wearing skinny jeans. I don't think.
Speaker 1 (34:16):
All right, well, I'll talk to your partner about this
and see. I think it depends on it depends on
how the styles go.
Speaker 2 (34:23):
If I win, if I win an event at Monte Carlo,
then I'll celebrate by buying some All right, let's do
skinny jeans in Europe. Let's do it.
Speaker 1 (34:31):
And finally, do you have a long shot bet for
twenty twenty five, the thing that probably isn't going to happen,
but you look like a genius if it does.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
Yeah, I actually do have one.
Speaker 1 (34:41):
What is it?
Speaker 2 (34:43):
Remember the drone thing?
Speaker 1 (34:47):
Yeah, the New Jersey dress.
Speaker 2 (34:48):
There are efforts of all these like drones over New
Jersey and then it kind of went haywire and then
it died out yep, and you know, people forgot about it.
I think there's like a one in three chance that
later reporting reveals that the initial spark of something was
something real.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
Okay, that's I think that's a really interesting prediction.
Speaker 2 (35:15):
Yeah, because the issue is like, once it became this
big viral thing. Then like the signal to noise ratio
went way down and people were like just seeing like playings,
learning at new work and every old you know, the
moon and shit like that, right, But like you did
have like the initial reports seemed more credible and like
also like if you were like and there are a
lot of military bases around there, if you were like,
(35:38):
I don't think it's anything like super exciting, right, but
like let's say you were testing out some new type
of surveillance drone, right and you're running them back and
forth between different military bases, and the US military, by
the way, like has lots of drone technology, doesn't deny
that it's an important part of a defense arsenal these days, right,
I think it's like reasonably likely that like they were
(36:01):
doing this a little too much, and like some people
who were noticing carefully detected a change and the number
of drones relative to baseline, and then kind of people
that carried away and they were like and their denials
weren't very They were like, well, there are lots of
things in are drones in the sky, which is true, right,
and became more and more true. Was more reports surfaced
(36:22):
but if you were doing that shit, like let's say
you have like a little pilot project or no puninitendies
unpiloted project, you probably cut the fuck out of that
once you once you get scrutiny on it, right, So
I think there might have been something real there. I
think the media was like not very basying in how
I thought about the story, right, And like the military
(36:44):
has drones, and like there ever reports about activity over
over air force bases for years that are fairly credible
and reported batlets like the Wall Street Journal, and I
thought people were much too smug about that. And in
the in the Trump era, there's a certain type of
story where like where greater skepticism of the establishment I
think might be might be helpful. Yeah, so that's my
(37:08):
weird I wouldn't take it even money, But like I'd
say one in three that some credible news outlet publishes
a story probably opaquely sourcing, like yeah, there was a
little something there, It was no big deal, but like
people weren't totally making this up, and there was like
a discrete increase for a couple of weeks Stare in
New Jersey.
Speaker 1 (37:25):
Yeah, I mean that sounds very plausible. To me, you
know when I you know, living in Vegas near a
lot of a lot of military bases, you actually see
weird shit in the sky all the time, including drone displays,
and so I think that you know, there, you're just
kind of used to it. You're like, there's Nellus, you know,
there's all this stuff, and I think that there, I'm
(37:48):
actually I think your prediction is a pretty solid one.
Mine was not nearly as fun or as interesting or
as technology well sort of technology oriented. But I'm predicting
that twenty twenty five is going to be the year
that we see a nuclear power resurgence, That all of
(38:09):
the countries that have brought their power plants offline are
going to bring them back online, and we're going to
see the first new nuclear power plants open for a
long time. That what makes you say that AI energy
needs our power, We need power. Yeah, energy needs are
are rising and companies don't know how to meet them
and nuclear This will make them much friendlier to nuclear
(38:31):
power than they ever have been before. And I'm actually
very pro nuclear power. I think this is a good thing.
I think that could be one of the good consequences
of AI because I think it's a really nice, clean
energy source. So that's my prediction on that note, Nate,
I think you have to get to an airport right
You're you're in Tokyo, You're about to fly, and I
need to get to a comedy show. I am seeing
(38:52):
Alex Adelman and I'm very, very excited about that. So
yes we will. We're both having two exciting destinations. Mine
a little bit more exciting than yours.
Speaker 2 (39:02):
I mean, I'm going to the airport. I'm not even
the nice airport in Tokyo, go to Henata.
Speaker 1 (39:06):
All right, there we have it. Safe travels and we'll
see you next week. Happy twenty twenty five.
Speaker 3 (39:11):
Everyone.
Speaker 1 (39:34):
Let us know what you think of the show. Reach
out to us at Risky Business at Pushkin dot FM.
Risky Business is hosted by me Maria Konnikova.
Speaker 2 (39:44):
And byb Nate Silver.
Speaker 1 (39:47):
The show is a co production of Pushkin Industries and iHeartMedia.
This episode was produced by Isabelle Carter. Our associate producer
is Gabriel Hunter Chang. Our executive producer is Jacob Goldstein.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
If you like the show, please rate and review us
so other people can find us too, And if you
want to listen to an ad free version. Sign up
for Quskin Plus. For six, ten and nine a month,
you had access to ad free list. Thanks for tuning in.
Pushkin. Welcome back to Risky Business, a show about making
better decisions. I'm Maria Kanikova.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
And I'm Nate Silver.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Nate Today is going to be a fun show. You're
taping from Tokyo, I'm taping from New York, so from
opposite sides of the world. We'll be talking about our
predictions for twenty twenty five on a whole number of things,
a whole bunch of topics, from you know, economics and
politics to pop culture and lots of things in between, sports,
(00:53):
fashion choices. I think you'll enjoy this one. Let's get
into it.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
Nate, Happy twenty twenty five.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
Everybody Happy twenty twenty five. It's a quarter thing century.
It's a good boy, all right. Yeah, that's insane. God,
what were you doing on New Year's two thousand? On
New Year's two thousand, Oh my god, I was still
in high school, I was God, yeah, I was in
(01:27):
high school. So I was with my family. Where were
you twenty five years ago?
Speaker 2 (01:32):
I was in on a beach in Key West, Florida, nice,
doing various substances that may or may not have been
legal in the state of Florida. And we'll leave it
at that.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
Sounds good. I think there's I think you're good on
the statute of limitations. Okay, okay, all right, so let's
get into it. So we have a bunch of different
topics ranging from you know, crypto to pop culture. Do
you want to start it off with kind of one
of the big topics that we've talked about on the
(02:06):
show multiple times, which is bitcoin. What do you think
nate will be the highest price that bitcoin will reach
this year? And what do you think will be the
lowest price bitcoin will reach? If you want, I can
start a soft way. So we're looking at polymarket, where
I'm an advisor says that the over.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
Under mark is roughly one twenty k by market thirty first.
Speaker 1 (02:33):
That's not the end of the year, yeah, and any.
Speaker 2 (02:35):
K on the lowest and by March thirty first. You know, look,
I mean, if you had to like, this is a
really hard question, it is a really hard question.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Yeah, let me say the high is the high is
one forty is my over under, and the low is
sixty right, Okay, all right, that's I'm just doubling. I'm
just doubling polymarket. I trust that people in poly market
a lot of crypto friendly types there. I trust that
(03:07):
the market is smarter than I am, and I'm just
doubling the range. Sure, So yeah, March thirty first through
the end of the year.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
Okay, that's pretty smart. I am going to go higher
than you. I am going to say one eighty high
for twenty twenty five. So I think that there are
a lot of people, a lot of smart crypto people
who think it will hit two hundred and might even
go over two hundred. I don't think it will go
that high, but I'm going to be bullish and I'm
going to say one eighty. And on the low side,
(03:37):
I'm not sure. I will say seventy. I will say
seventy as the low.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
So are you buying I mean that sounds pretty asymmetric
where you should be buying bio. Are you buying bitcoin?
Speaker 1 (03:47):
I am not currently buying bitcoin, but I think that
bitcoin is actually something that potentially I should start buying.
Especially as Donald Trump comes into office. We know that
he hasn't necessarily delivered on, you know, things that he's
promised in the past, but so far there are positive
signs that he is going to be pretty pro crypto,
(04:11):
and if all of those things come to pass. You know, normally,
the way that you look at markets is, oh, you know,
smart people have already priced this in, right, So the
price of bitcoin already reflects people being optimistic about Donald
Trump and what he's going to do and his policies.
But I think that with crypto it doesn't necessarily work
that way, and the market doesn't price things in quite
(04:31):
the same way as the stock market. I would say
that it's less efficient in some ways and much more volatile, right.
We see, you can see in the cryptocurrency world, you
can see something go up five hundred percent, right, That
just does not happen on the regular stock market. So
so I would say that there's the upside is asymmetric,
right now.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
See, I might argue that crypto is almost my definition
ary vibe spased, right, Yeah, and it may over anticipate,
it may overly be pricing it in, you know what
I mean.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Yeah, that's also very possible.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
And in general I'm wonder if there's like a little
bit of irrational zoo Brenth. I mean, President's is hard, right,
He's inheriting a pretty unhappy electorate. He will be surrounded
by a mix of people, some of them are confident
in many of whom aren't. He has very narrow majority
in the House, right, Yeah, he's old. He and Eli
(05:27):
will probably have a falling out at some point. B
A BFFs. I don't know. I think there's kind of
a I think the average Trump new convert enthusiast crypto
enthusiast is a little high on fumes right now. And
I remember, you know, kind of when uh, whenever there's
(05:50):
new president, when there's a switch of parties, right, like
people people don't understand how difficult it starts to look
three to six months in right, you're doing your one
hundred days stuff, although it's harder now than it used
to be. But Trump will do some executive orders. We'll
talk about that in a bit, and then I know,
I think there's a short term bare case on Trump
(06:12):
I think is probably worthwhile. And how that turns it
to the crypto is not linear entirely. But like, it's
hard to be president, that's all I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
I totally agree with that. But because we're looking at
by the you know, this year in total, right, we're
not actually doing a prediction of where it's going to
be next month or where it's going to end up.
We're just saying, like, what is the high for twenty
twenty five? And I actually think that the irrational exuberance
will get us to that high at some point, and
(06:40):
then it might crash right precipitously. And the reason I'm
not buying bitcoin, by the way, is that I'm not
confident enough in my ability to predict, you know, when
those crashes will come and when those changes and sentiment
will come. But I do think we're going to see
something like that. So I think that there's a lot
of a lot of things to be said for pre caution,
(07:00):
but also for you know, let's put some of those
irrationally exuberant predictions in there. Let's switch gears a little bit,
sort of sort of because this is related to Trump.
So how about a prediction about Trump's We've talked about
the cabinet right and about his nominees. Do you have
a prediction for how many cabinet nominees and this is
(07:20):
starting now, so Gates does not count, will either be
rejected or withdraw No Gates. Yeah, let's so gate Gates
does not count because that has already happened. So starting now,
let's bench tracker with poly Market.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
Poly Market says Pete haig Seth is an eighty six
percent chance of being confirmed, Tulsa Gabbard seventy five percent,
Cash Hotel eighty nine percent, RFK Junior eighty five percent,
and then there are some other people that probably nobody
cares about. Right, So let me do math fifteen twenty five,
fifty sixty and then a little pocket change we get.
(07:55):
So poly Market says that the best bet is probably
one or zero. I'll go with zero. I think that
like we saw the scalp with Mac, I think if
you're going to have somebody else that it would have
happened sooner in this kind of pre because the further
(08:16):
you go, the more embarrassing to Trump, and most Republicans
in the Senate actually don't want to embarrass Trump. And so,
I mean, you know, the market says that Gabbard is
the most likely wild card, and but but I think
they've mostly survived. I mean out they'll survive the vetting
making them look good, right, But there's no objective standard here, right,
(08:36):
it's do you have fifty votes in the Senate? And
I think I think they've probably survived it in a way.
Mack age students. So I'll go with zero. I'll go
he'll bet one thousand.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
The rest of the way, I actually agree with you,
I was going to say zero. I don't think that
anyone's going to withdraw, and I don't think anyone is
going to be rejected. I think we're going to see
the falls light confirmed. I think that people will tow
party lines, and I think that we're going to see that.
We're going to see everyone sail through. I don't even
think it's going to be particularly close.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
Next question, you are eluding this, Maria, number of press
secretaries in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 1 (09:12):
I am going to say that in twenty twenty five
he is going to have two. That's going to be
my prediction.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
Maria, we're agreeing too much here. I'm two seems like
the rational modal number. It's a fucking hard job, it is.
I mean, I kind of feel like press secretaries of
the one people should be allowed to lie, you know
what I mean, because you can't really do the job
without lying.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
Well, I don't think. I mean, I think there's a
difference and between lying and spinning, and there is, so
I do. I'm not trying to play semantics here, right,
So there's lying where like you're just like flat out
saying something that you know is not true. And then
there are like misrepresentations, which in some ways is worse
(09:58):
right because it's harder to be like you lied. You
can be like, well, no, like if you parse the
sentence semantically, I didn't. Technically, I did not lie. And
I think that that's more what press secretaries do. They're
more spin doctory than they are.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
It's like a poker player, you know. Some poppe plays
will not like actually lie about the contents of their hand. Right.
You'll be like, do you have a pucket kings? And
they'll be like, well, it's a big pair or something,
you know what I mean. Yeah, I just lie about
the kindents of my hand all the fucking time. In poker,
it's like allowed.
Speaker 1 (10:31):
It is allowed, It is allowed. I don't do it there, No,
I don't do it, but but it is absolutely allowed,
and I totally don't blame you for doing it. The
funniest thing, by the way, can we just do like
a poker aside is when people lie about their hand
on stream, on televised stream when their cards are shown,
and it will become very very clear that they're lying.
(10:54):
Scott sever does this all the time, and he'll just
like with a straight face like be like fold you
know I've got it, or like he'll he'll or just
like completely lie what hand he has and like you
can see he's lying and he just doesn't care. So
I think that I think that that is definitely very accepted.
I am more of the I don't like telling people,
(11:15):
you know, what I had and they if they don't
take that for an answer, I'll just say yes, right, Sullivan,
did you have Kings?
Speaker 2 (11:22):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (11:22):
Did you have Queen's Yes? Did you have JACKX Yes?
Did you have Ace King?
Speaker 2 (11:26):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (11:26):
Like I will, and if you start asking me more
than one hand, you will realize that I'm just saying
yes to everything. So I'll just do something like that,
which you know will will normally shut people up. But
I don't like to tell people what I have, as
we've talked about before on the show, and I think
this is an important point outside of poker. Information equals power.
Do not give people information when you don't have to, right,
(11:50):
have them know as little as possible about your intentions,
how you play everything else. So yeah, two press secretaries.
First ones never hold on. I mean, Trump just goes
through press secretaries like none other. I wouldn't even be
surprised to see three. But I think two is the
right prediction. All right, we've got one more Trumps? What
we have more than one? Trump has said he will
(12:11):
declare a national emergency on his first day in office
to begin mass deportations. Do you think he will do
this on January twentieth? Is there going to be a
national emergency declaration?
Speaker 2 (12:24):
Again? There is a market to calibrate to polymarket says
eighty percent chance on day one he does issue at action.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
I have that seems high.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
Yeah. Well, look, I mean one of the things you
can say Trump had a mandate to be elected on
was immigration, right, and he clearly cares a lot about that.
I mean, it's kind of core to his brand. I
think it's within the purview of the one House issue
executive action. So I'm going to say, yes, right, I
(12:54):
have no reason to like, like, this is kind of
what you promised. This is what he promised to do
if you voted for Trump. This is what you were
supposed to get, and I think he's going to do it.
Speaker 1 (13:04):
I mean, I think you're probably right, but I'm just
gonna get of a completely. So this is the opposite
of what we do here on Risky Business, which has
use our rational minds to do predictions. I'm just gonna
say he won't do it because I don't want him to.
That is not how you make decisions. So the rational answers, yes,
I think there will be a national emergency. My emotional
(13:26):
answer is I hope there isn't and I hope that
there are no mass deportations. But you're absolutely right that
this is something that people that people you know did
vote for.
Speaker 2 (13:38):
And so I mean if the reason why I think
you want to take the yes and bet is like
ify for whatever reason, is influenced by uh, I mean,
Silicon Valley doesn't care as much about the illegal immigration,
but if he's influenced to like take a softer line,
I think he would still issue an executive order of
some kind. It would and it would have fewer teeth
(13:59):
or they wouldn't fight for it as much in the
courts or right. I think he kind of has to
like do this to kind of maintain face. What if
he gets in and he's like, it's all long con
it's all long coin of been a Democratic all time,
including the first term. I know what place that.
Speaker 1 (14:16):
Was that was not Trump, I'm not sure who that was.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
Adam Sandler never, that was embarrassing, most embarrassing when williams. Hey,
let's move on the next question. Will Elon Musk become
the world's first trillionaire in twenty twenty five. His current
net worth, according to Bloomberg, is four hundred and twenty
six billion with a B dollars.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
I say no, I say he will not become a
trillionaire in twenty twenty five. And I say this because
Tesla has had disappointing sales this year. I realized that
that's only one small part of his net worth, but
you know it's it's an important one. And I also
think that there's going to be some fallout with his
(15:03):
association with Trump, including a fallout with Trump at some point,
because I don't don't know of anyone, like any high
profile marriage that Trump has had that has lasted, obviously
including his actual marriages, but what I mean right now,
you know, marriage with any kind of close political confidant. Right,
he's broken up with all of them. He elevates advisors,
(15:26):
He's like, you know, they're BFFs. They're really close, and
then always there's you know, I don't know if it's
ego clashing or what it is, but there's always a
falling out. And I think that that's going to hurt Elon,
and I think that's going to happen in twenty twenty five.
So I don't think he's going to become poor, but
I definitely do not see him becoming a trillionaire. There's
(15:47):
also the AI component, and you know, I think it
does matter whether you're bullish or bearish on the financial
prospects of AI, and I don't think they're going to
figure out their cash flow finances, you know, how to
actually make money in the coming year.
Speaker 2 (16:03):
What do you think, Nate, So if someone else becomes
a billionaire a trillionaire before, you also lose this bet.
Is that correct?
Speaker 1 (16:12):
Yes, because he's the first trillionaire.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Okay, oh yeah. For Look, the long term average for
super rich guys that they increase in net worth by
probably around twenty percent per year, which is very very
good relative to how most Americans do. But take take
four to fifty whatever is now and add twenty percent,
and you're not that close. There's a little bit of
a thing before about like to the extent that like
(16:37):
assets that Elon owns have been priced up, that's kind
of priced in to some extent already. I tend to
agree that, Like, I mean, you see these periodic reports
that Trump was like Elon's getting a little carried away here,
and yeah, I think this is a a It's not
impossible to imagine, but I'd say, like, I think there's
(16:58):
maybe a one in five chants and then tweet that
twenty percent down to like eighteen because now and then
someone else gets there first, like in the AI scenario
where this is the year where you have like a
big AI boom, then like the Nvidia people and other
people that are a bit more like directly tied to
(17:19):
AI might benefit first. Right.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
But yeah, okay, so we agree on this one as.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
Well, and we'll be right back after this break.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
What's up next? Let's do some poker.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
Poker over under on Nate and Maria's net tournament winnings
for the year, i e. Winnings minus buy in. Let's
assume this is all live tournaments, right, so we'll ignore
any any sketchy uh online stuff that we might or
might not do. So it's trackable in theory.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
It's hard. You know, tournaments are so incredibly it's such
a volatile thing, right, and there's so much variance there
that it's really really difficult to have predictions. I mean,
I've had years where I've been down a lot, and
I've had years where I've been up a lot, And
you know, I would like to have a nice optimistic
(18:26):
prediction that but and I think you have to. If
you're a tournament player, you have to be optimistic. It's
kind of like an entrepreneur. You realize that, you know,
most people lose money, but in order to do it,
you have to believe that you're one of the few
that's going to succeed. So I think you kind of
have to have that mindset I'm in.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
Look in the book, I did some simulations for a
assuming a very good tournament player, maybe if we're being honest,
probably not too far from where you and I, Maria,
but maybe a little bit better in that book then,
you know, but in that vicinity, right, and if this
player PENELOPEA I named her, if she plays two hundred bullets,
(19:11):
two hundred entries, that is bullets. We don't want to
use violent imagery, but that's what pokers say. When you
buy into a tournament, you fire a bullet. She buys
into two hundred bullets per year in live poker tournaments
with a schedule that probably looks a lot like what
you are. I might play Maria the mix of tournaments,
and she loses money about forty to forty five percent
(19:34):
of the time out of two hundred entries. I might
play fifty entries this year. You might play more. You
might be I don't know where are you seventy five,
one hundred or something like. Well, probably the brutal truth
is that the odds are that we will have a
losing year, or at least I will with fifty entries.
It's hard to win money with fifty entries. Sometimes you
win a lot of money, but like probably sixty percent
(19:56):
of the time, you wind up with a losing year
with that, with that volume, even with with with an edge,
I assume poker tournaments, we remain pretty soft. But like, so, yeah,
probably my over under is like negative ten thousands. Okay,
I won't speak for you.
Speaker 1 (20:08):
All right, I'm gonna I'm gonna be optimistic, but I'll
be I'll be cautiously optimistic. We'll stay in the five
figures instead of six figures. So so I'll say that, uh,
I predict my net tournament winnings this year to be
forty five thousand, twenty twenty five. I don't know where
(20:31):
that number is coming from. It's it's trying, it's tempering expectations,
but trying to hope for the best. The thing is,
it's it's.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
Actually kind of hard to have the forty five thousand plus.
It's like like you kind of have like you almost
want to say like negative fifty thousand, or like I
think something in three hundred k right or five, you
know what I mean, because that's kind of where the distribution.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
It's true, it's true, but you know, like thinking of
this past year, you know, I had a horrific World series,
but I had a really good year at the end.
But I had you know, I had some really big scores,
but because my world series was so bad, I was,
you know, down over one hundred thousand dollars. Like that
really detracted from from the big scores. So so at
(21:16):
the end I was positive, but it could have, you know,
it could have very easily. It took a number of
big scores to get me to the positive part, right, So.
Speaker 2 (21:25):
So what's on the what's on the schedule, even what's
on this because fucking France I was gonna go.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
To I know, I know, it's very sad. It's very sad.
EPT Paris, which was supposed to be the first European
Poker Tour stop. Poker Stars my sponsor, I'm an ambassador.
You know, we've got We've got lots of descibers this show. Unfortunately,
because of French regulations that got that got canceled. They're
trying to reschedule it. I'm really hoping that it will
(21:51):
be rescheduled. But right now, the first EPT stop is
going to be Monte Carlo. That's going to be in April.
I will be there and you should com nate. Monte
Carlo's gorgeous. It's right on the water, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
Beautiful, Robbie. You look at Monta Carlo.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
Yes, it's a beautiful probably a pretty easy, beautiful hotel, probably.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
Pretty easy to persuade, beautiful.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
Location, great fields. It's a really wonderful event. I think
you should come and we can do we can do
some bets for the show and for our listeners, and
we can do a podcast episode from Monte Carlo. So
let's then move on to AI. Oh I hate this question.
It's so sad. Will a consumer AI model be able
(22:34):
to host risky business by the end of twenty twenty
five that will be indistinguishable from meat space, you and me?
Or and if not, then in what year will that
be possible? So what's our pe doom for podcast hosts?
Speaker 2 (22:54):
No, I agree, and I think it will be a while,
if ever. I mean, like, I think personality is a
very high fidelity problem that like I don't think there's
like enough. I don't know. Yeah, it's it's hard to Yeah,
it's pretty hard. I mean like it can kind of
(23:15):
like make inferences about people that are very smart, right,
but like because it kind of sees what the essential
features are I think, but like the nuances are very
are very tricky. Like AI is not a very good
stylist at writing. I mean, I don't think it's very
good at like art. I think people misunderstand art. This
is a band, but like it is for another time.
But like I'm not worried about this in the short thing.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
I totally agree with you. I don't think it's good
at creative things in general, because it's good at regurgitation
and at making things formally look like they're like on
the surface good formalistically, but I don't think it's able
to have creative insight. It's not able to connect ideas
or answer questions in ways that haven't been done before
(23:59):
because it doesn't actually think right. It doesn't actually have
a brain. All it's doing is kind of connecting information.
And there's also that there's also the garbage in garbage out.
As more and more people are saying, you know, don't
train AI on our ship, then you see that the
AI output actually degenerates pretty quickly. So so I don't
(24:22):
I don't think they're coming for our jobs yet.
Speaker 2 (24:26):
And I'm not sure I agree that it doesn't think.
Speaker 1 (24:29):
Well thinking, So I guess. I guess this is a
much deeper philosophical discussion, which we can have on another
episode of the show because it will take too long.
But I think this is a very interesting question about
what thinking actually is and how we should define that.
But yeah, let's let's table that and let's have an
episode about that, because I actually think it's really interesting. Nate,
(24:52):
there's a question that's specific to you. You have ten
thousand dollars and you can bet it on any line
in sports this year, but you have to bet right now.
Speaker 2 (25:03):
I mean, I think the Oklahoma city is shay. You'll
just Alexander is a good bet. When the MVP A
were and he was at something like minus one twenty before,
which implies what is that like if you know fifty
five to sixty percent chance. I think he's more lucky
than that to win the award. He is averaging let
me look up his stats, so he's on the best
(25:23):
team in the league. He's averaging thirty one point three
points per game, five and a half rebounds, six assists,
almost two steals per game on the best defense in
the league, on the best team in the league. Nicola
Jokich is an incompetition great player, but the Nuggets kind
of suck. I think I think he is more lucky
than Vegas assumes to win the MVP. And when I
(25:44):
get back in any country we're betting is legal, I
will be betting, probably not ten K, but betting some
money on that.
Speaker 1 (25:50):
All right, Well you heard it here first, Nate. Does
this mean that I should quickly open a sportsbook account
and bet that I don't have? It's probably I've never
done any sports betting. By the way, ever, in my.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
Minus war twenty is fifty five percent animals at sixty,
So the answer is probably probably not okay, right, I
mean because like, well, if you get like all the
bonuses from the sports betting account, then sure, right, like
a reason why I like you don't want to make
Like in theory, these long term future's bets are fairly profitable, right,
(26:27):
but in principle, if I am betting now on January,
that ties up my capital for for several months, right,
And then theory that like takes like a little tax
on it, where like in theory, if that's in the
s and P. Five hundred over four months, then you
make whatever two and a half percent or something like that,
And so like that's a little bit of a tax.
(26:48):
It's meaningful. But then look, I don't know, I think
it's a good bet. I'm gonna make that bet when
I can.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
All right, sounds good.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
And we have a question for Maria what cognitive bias.
They're all excited they went to the cognitive bias New
Year's party, And can you imagine and like different cognitive
biases at a.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
Post that would be a hilarious skit.
Speaker 2 (27:14):
Well, what kind oftive bias will win the second annual
Daniel kind of a Memorial Cognitive Bias of the Year
Award for twenty twenty five.
Speaker 1 (27:21):
Right, So we just had the Golden Globe Awards, and
now cognitive biases are looking to see which one of
them is going to win. I am going to vote
for the recency effect as the bias of twenty twenty five.
And what the recency effect also known as the availability bias?
It means that basically, we overvalue what's happening, what just happened,
(27:44):
things that are easily available to memory, and kind of
forget the rest, right, Like it's a kind of amnesia
where you forget selectively forget history and what's come before,
and you overwet your decisions based on the information and
the events that have just happened and that are most
easily accessible in your mind. And I think we already
started to see that. You know, it's funny, I just
(28:06):
made the joke about the Golden Globes, but you already
saw that in the goal in globes where basically no
one talked politics, right, it was like, if you remember
what happened after Donald Trump's first election, everyone had it
in their speech and there was all this stuff, and
this time it was just like, h okay, right, like
moving moving on, We're not gonna we're not going to
talk about it. We don't we don't really care. And
(28:28):
so it just goes to show that, you know, our
memories are short, and we accept kind of new normals
very very quickly. And I think we'll we'll see a
lot of collective forgetting happening in the year twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
I was host. I don't know if it's the same
or the opposite. I was going to kind of go
with the with the hot hand bias, right. I think
Trump and Republicans are likely to overreach and overestimate their popularity,
and like we talked about before, being president is hard.
But we'll see.
Speaker 1 (29:00):
I think I think that's also quite likely that's they're
not they're not mutually exclusive. I think both of these
things could absolutely be true. Yeah, and we'll be back
right after this. Let's move on to a multiple choice
(29:28):
around about TikTok Okay, what's going to happen to TikTok
a banned in the US? So Alpha Jen Alpha Riots
b sold to a non Chinese company, C, nothing remains
under Chinese corporate control or D none of the above.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
So Trump has asked the Supreme Court to pause the
law that could ban TikTok. I'm gonna, I'm gonna, Marie,
why aren't you in foremost, will I cheat by looking
at polymarket?
Speaker 1 (29:54):
I think it is going to be sold to a
non Chinese company, because so that's that's option B. I
don't think it's going to be banned. I think that's
too politically kind of risky. And Donald Trump does not
like to do something that's going to hurt his popularity
that much. But he you know, with tariffs, et cetera,
(30:16):
it's not like he cares that much about alienating China
on some level. So I think that that might be
the compromise that that ends up that ends up winning out.
So sold to a non Chinese holiday market, all right, tell.
Speaker 2 (30:30):
Me it's a forty three percent chance that TikTok has
banned in the US before May twenty five, and so
like if you exchect it out to anytime, that's surprisingly high.
But like, so we do this law in place right
that required it to be sold, So Trump will kind
of have to go out of his way to prevent that, right,
(30:50):
And I guess you're right, right because like, I think
Trump concluded that like TikTok was probably helpful to him
in the general election, right, Like it seemed to be
boosting a lot of the campus protest type of stuff. Right,
But Trump is also hawkish on China. I'm going to
(31:13):
follow the polymarket logic. I'm gonna go that like TikTok
will be banned in the US with above fifty percent
probability by the end of the year, not by May.
I'm going n trusting the market here by May. And
then yeah.
Speaker 1 (31:27):
All right, so we'll see what happens. Does it get
banned or does it get sold to a non Chinese company.
Apparently the loser of this has to post to TikTok.
We'll see about that. I'm not committing, not committing.
Speaker 2 (31:37):
I haven't thought it. So if I'm wrong, So if
you're wrong, TikTok is banned, so you don't have to post.
That seems unfair.
Speaker 1 (31:45):
That is unfair. Yeah, it's true. Well, we'll we'll figure out.
We'll figure out another That is funny. That is very funny.
All right, let's do a lightning round for pop culture.
I don't know if you care about this, but I've
been following Will the Oasis brothers have a fight on
stage during their twenty twenty five world tour? Absolutely they will.
(32:07):
Those people, those two guys cannot coexist. I think they've
thrown shit at each other every single time they've been
on stage, or one of them has stormed off every
single time that they've tried to do a reunion tour.
If they care about their bottom line, I think the
only reason they're having a reunion tour is because one
or both of them wants money. They'll probably try not
to do it at the very beginning.
Speaker 2 (32:27):
Yeah, it might be a fake fight, but like they'll
have it. I mean that's a pretty logical bet.
Speaker 1 (32:32):
I agree. All right. Kim Kardashian visiting mar A Lago.
Speaker 2 (32:36):
Is she taking a stance on Trump?
Speaker 1 (32:37):
No, but I think she will because I think she
you know, she was married to Kanye for so long
or whatever he's calling himself now. Yeah, yeah, so I
think I think there's a good chance that she that
she goes there, and she's also very business savvy, so
I think she will do whatever's better for her bottom line.
And I think that she'll she'll probably uh that that
(32:58):
means coosing up to Trump, So I would I would
say there's a good chance she doesn't.
Speaker 2 (33:02):
I have no opinion. I'm proud to have no opinion.
Speaker 1 (33:04):
Sounds good. Best Picture winner? Do you have an opinion?
Speaker 2 (33:09):
Uh, I know it's about dyla movie good.
Speaker 1 (33:15):
I have not seen it yet, so so I don't know.
I'll put uh, let's put the Brutalists there. Seems like
it seems like a good one. Oh, this is interesting.
I'm gonna I'm gonna have to speculate on this chance
that Nate wears skinny jeans, which are supposedly back. So
(33:36):
so you know with one hundred percent certainty whether it's
yes or no.
Speaker 2 (33:40):
And I don't. I don't know where's it. Where's a
threshold for seini jeans?
Speaker 1 (33:45):
I don't. I don't know. This is very interesting, and
I think it's probably different for men and women because
straight leg jeans for women are not skinny jeans. For women,
they really have to be like skin tight. But I
feel like for men there's more of a there's like
more of a window for them to be like a
little bit less than skin tight. I'm gonna I can't
even speculate on this. Well, no, okay, I'm.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
Turning forty seven years old in a week, Marie, I'm
not going to be wearing skinny jeans. I don't think.
Speaker 1 (34:16):
All right, well, I'll talk to your partner about this
and see. I think it depends on it depends on
how the styles go.
Speaker 2 (34:23):
If I win, if I win an event at Monte Carlo,
then I'll celebrate by buying some All right, let's do
skinny jeans in Europe. Let's do it.
Speaker 1 (34:31):
And finally, do you have a long shot bet for
twenty twenty five, the thing that probably isn't going to happen,
but you look like a genius if it does.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
Yeah, I actually do have one.
Speaker 1 (34:41):
What is it?
Speaker 2 (34:43):
Remember the drone thing?
Speaker 1 (34:47):
Yeah, the New Jersey dress.
Speaker 2 (34:48):
There are efforts of all these like drones over New
Jersey and then it kind of went haywire and then
it died out yep, and you know, people forgot about it.
I think there's like a one in three chance that
later reporting reveals that the initial spark of something was
something real.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
Okay, that's I think that's a really interesting prediction.
Speaker 2 (35:15):
Yeah, because the issue is like, once it became this
big viral thing. Then like the signal to noise ratio
went way down and people were like just seeing like playings,
learning at new work and every old you know, the
moon and shit like that, right, But like you did
have like the initial reports seemed more credible and like
also like if you were like and there are a
lot of military bases around there, if you were like,
(35:38):
I don't think it's anything like super exciting, right, but
like let's say you were testing out some new type
of surveillance drone, right and you're running them back and
forth between different military bases, and the US military, by
the way, like has lots of drone technology, doesn't deny
that it's an important part of a defense arsenal these days, right,
I think it's like reasonably likely that like they were
(36:01):
doing this a little too much, and like some people
who were noticing carefully detected a change and the number
of drones relative to baseline, and then kind of people
that carried away and they were like and their denials
weren't very They were like, well, there are lots of
things in are drones in the sky, which is true, right,
and became more and more true. Was more reports surfaced
(36:22):
but if you were doing that shit, like let's say
you have like a little pilot project or no puninitendies
unpiloted project, you probably cut the fuck out of that
once you once you get scrutiny on it, right, So
I think there might have been something real there. I
think the media was like not very basying in how
I thought about the story, right, And like the military
(36:44):
has drones, and like there ever reports about activity over
over air force bases for years that are fairly credible
and reported batlets like the Wall Street Journal, and I
thought people were much too smug about that. And in
the in the Trump era, there's a certain type of
story where like where greater skepticism of the establishment I
think might be might be helpful. Yeah, so that's my
(37:08):
weird I wouldn't take it even money, But like I'd
say one in three that some credible news outlet publishes
a story probably opaquely sourcing, like yeah, there was a
little something there, It was no big deal, but like
people weren't totally making this up, and there was like
a discrete increase for a couple of weeks Stare in
New Jersey.
Speaker 1 (37:25):
Yeah, I mean that sounds very plausible. To me, you
know when I you know, living in Vegas near a
lot of a lot of military bases, you actually see
weird shit in the sky all the time, including drone displays,
and so I think that you know, there, you're just
kind of used to it. You're like, there's Nellus, you know,
there's all this stuff, and I think that there, I'm
(37:48):
actually I think your prediction is a pretty solid one.
Mine was not nearly as fun or as interesting or
as technology well sort of technology oriented. But I'm predicting
that twenty twenty five is going to be the year
that we see a nuclear power resurgence, That all of
(38:09):
the countries that have brought their power plants offline are
going to bring them back online, and we're going to
see the first new nuclear power plants open for a
long time. That what makes you say that AI energy
needs our power, We need power. Yeah, energy needs are
are rising and companies don't know how to meet them
and nuclear This will make them much friendlier to nuclear
(38:31):
power than they ever have been before. And I'm actually
very pro nuclear power. I think this is a good thing.
I think that could be one of the good consequences
of AI because I think it's a really nice, clean
energy source. So that's my prediction on that note, Nate,
I think you have to get to an airport right
You're you're in Tokyo, You're about to fly, and I
need to get to a comedy show. I am seeing
(38:52):
Alex Adelman and I'm very, very excited about that. So
yes we will. We're both having two exciting destinations. Mine
a little bit more exciting than yours.
Speaker 2 (39:02):
I mean, I'm going to the airport. I'm not even
the nice airport in Tokyo, go to Henata.
Speaker 1 (39:06):
All right, there we have it. Safe travels and we'll
see you next week. Happy twenty twenty five.
Speaker 3 (39:11):
Everyone.
Speaker 1 (39:34):
Let us know what you think of the show. Reach
out to us at Risky Business at Pushkin dot FM.
Risky Business is hosted by me Maria Konnikova.
Speaker 2 (39:44):
And byb Nate Silver.
Speaker 1 (39:47):
The show is a co production of Pushkin Industries and iHeartMedia.
This episode was produced by Isabelle Carter. Our associate producer
is Gabriel Hunter Chang. Our executive producer is Jacob Goldstein.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
If you like the show, please rate and review us
so other people can find us too, And if you
want to listen to an ad free version. Sign up
for Quskin Plus. For six, ten and nine a month,
you had access to ad free list. Thanks for tuning in.
Hosts And Creators
Maria Konnikova
Nate Silver
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