medium convictionactive · updated 2026-08-15T00:00:00.000Z
Tech disinflation backdrop → policy-created inflation spikes → gold/USD as competing safe havens
Shvets: the long-run backdrop is technologically driven disinflation (zero marginal cost); inflation is a series of policy/war spikes. Gold failed as an Iran-war hedge because liquidity fled to USD/Treasuries — the insurance premium only pays in a monetary-system reset.
The chain
1
The dominant longer-term trend is technologically driven disinflation (everything toward zero marginal cost); Warsh and Bessent are correct on that backdrop.
viktor-shvets in 2026-08-15-macro-voices-macrovoices-544-viktor-shvets-how-markets: "we're living in a disinflationary world. I think Kevin Warshaw and I think Scott Besant are absolutely correct that disinflation is a dominant longer term trend. ... Every product will find a zero marginal cost curve."
2
Inflation we observe is a stack of policy-created spikes (COVID, Russia/Ukraine, Iran, chaotic trade/immigration) sitting on that backdrop; stop creating spikes and disinflation reasserts. Transient stacked on transient can become 'permanent' in business minds.
viktor-shvets in 2026-08-15-macro-voices-macrovoices-544-viktor-shvets-how-markets: "the backdrop is disinflationary, but we're creating spikes. Where do they come from? They come from our reaction to whatever happens to us. Things like Covid, things like Russia Ukraine war, Iran war, things like chaotic trade or immigration policies."
3
Gold is the insurance premium on expected monetary-system destruction, but it corrected >25% during this Iran war because investors chose USD/Treasuries for liquidity; Shvets still prefers gold over bitcoin for a true reset.
viktor-shvets in 2026-08-15-macro-voices-macrovoices-544-viktor-shvets-how-markets: "they've decided that even though the war was started by the United States ... it's still USD and Treasuries are the pools with the greatest degree of liquidity as a protective device. But I think it's temporary because at the end of the day, to me, gold remains the ultimate safety assets in a case of an absolute destruction."
What would falsify this
- Step 1: Core inflation unanchors in surveys AND 5y5y / 10y swaps simultaneously and stays there after policy spikes stop.
- Step 3: Gold outperforms USD/Treasuries in the next geopolitical spike the way the simple war-hedge rule predicted.
Contradictions / tensions
- Shvets also made a 2026 stagflation call that he insists is consistent (spikes on a disinflation backdrop) — easy to misread as a regime change.
- Gold-as-reset-hedge is unfalsifiable until a reset; the war-hedge failure is the only dated observation.
Implications
- If policy spikes stop, the Warsh/Bessent disinflation call is the base case — rates can come down without a growth collapse.
- Gold is a reset hedge, not a war hedge; this Iran episode is a live falsifier of the simple gold-during-war rule.
- Iran = Vietnam (no exit, shifting US objectives); Ukraine = Korea (brutal, finite, DMZ). Hormuz will hiccup for a long time — not a clean open/close binary.
Companies
Concepts
US recession-resistance regime (and the Fed-rate-shock kill-switch)Why the 2026 energy shock is different from 2022
Open questions
none