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The Derivative: Daily Summaries Delivered
by RCM Alternatives
Welcome to The Derivative, where we dive into what makes alternative investments go, analyze the strategies of unique hedge fund managers, and chat with interesting guests from across the investment world. Hosted by RCM Managing Partner, Jeff Malec, join us to take a ride through the world of alternative investments.
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- 2 weeks ago1h 8m
How an Discretionary Ag Trader "Reads the Soybean Leaves" with Stephen Davis
In this episode, Jeff talks with Stephen Davis of Davis Commodities about Memphis’s long-standing role as a center for commodity trading and Stephen’s path into the business, from his first days on the Chicago Board of Trade grain floor to building his own trading firm. Stephen dives into how agricultural markets are shaped by global supply and demand, crop conditions, weather, trade flows, and government policy, including the many uses of corn and soybeans in food, animal feed, and fuel. He also explains how he turns research into trades, why he favors longer-term themes over short-term market moves, and how experience, including costly mistakes, helped him develop firm risk-management rules. The conversation covers his Plutus agricultural strategy, Global Macro and Atlas programs, and how commodities can diversify portfolios concentrated in stocks and bonds. - SEND IT!Chapters:00:00-01:17= Intro01:18-12:56= From Memphis Commodity Roots to the Trading Floor 12:57-18:20= Brokerage to CTA Trading: Learning Risk Management 18:21-28:02=Agricultural Research, Trading Lessons, and Risk Management28:03-38:54 = Plutus: Agricultural Trading Strategy, Corn Outlook, and Risk Management 38:55-51:38 = Soybean Markets, Biofuels, and Weather’s Role in Agricultural Trading51:39-59:26 = Weather Forecasting, Crop Yields, and Global Crop Tours59:27-1:05:49 = Macro and Atlas Strategies, Portfolio Diversification, and Family1:05:50-1:07:56 = Memphis MoviesFollow along with Stephen on LinkedIn, and be sure to check out daviscomllc.com to learn more about what they are up to.Don't forget to subscribe toThe Derivative, follow us on Twitter at@rcmAlts andsign-up for our blog digest.Disclaimer: This podcast is provided for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as legal, business, or tax advice. All opinions expressed by podcast participants are solely their own opinions and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of RCM Alternatives, their affiliates, or companies featured. Due to industry regulations, participants on this podcast are instructed not to make specific trade recommendations, nor reference past or potential profits. And listeners are reminded that managed futures, commodity trading, and other alternative investments are complex and carry a risk of substantial losses. As such, they are not suitable for all investors. For more information, visitwww.rcmalternatives.com/disclaimer
- 3 weeks ago1h 10m
Running an "Old Fashioned" Hedge Fund with Adrian Keevil of Plustick Partners
In this episode, Jeff Malec talks with Adrian Keevil of Plustick Partners about his path from corporate finance and academic research to investing, and how his work on stakeholder relationships informs the firm’s approach. Keevil explains Plustick’s old-fashioned partnership philosophy and its focus on distressed, event-driven, and special-situations investing, from overlooked assets and misunderstood businesses to shorting unsecured bonds. He also shares the personal and professional experiences behind his perspective, including his family’s history in market trading and lessons from studying how real businesses operate. The conversation explores portfolio construction, credit markets and private credit, the potential economic effects of AI, and the ethical questions AI raises in business and education. It wraps up with Keevil’s Charlottesville restaurant recommendations. - SEND IT!Chapters:00:00-01:23= Intro01:24-11:54= Plustick Partners and the Old-School Hedge Fund Model 11:55-30:29=Distressed Investing, Hidden Assets, and Building a Resilient Portfolio 30:30-48:00=Unsecured Bond Shorts, Credit Markets, and Finding the Story Behind a Business 48:01–58:37 = Private Equity, FanDuel, and Plustick’s Idea-Driven Research Process 58:38–1:10:55 = AI, the Future of Work, and Business Ethics + Top restaurants in Charlottesville From the Episode:NEW WHITEPAPER: Beat the Market with Less VolatilityPODCAST: Zigs, Zags, and Finding Micro Cap Winners with Ian CasselFollow along with Adrian and Plustick on LinkedIn, and be sure to check out plustickpartners.com to learn more about what they are up to.Don't forget to subscribe toThe Derivative, follow us on Twitter at@rcmAlts andsign-up for our blog digest.Disclaimer: This podcast is provided for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as legal, business, or tax advice. All opinions expressed by podcast participants are solely their own opinions and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of RCM Alternatives, their affiliates, or companies featured. Due to industry regulations, participants on this podcast are instructed not to make specific trade recommendations, nor reference past or potential profits. And listeners are reminded that managed futures, commodity trading, and other alternative investments are complex and carry a risk of substantial losses. As such, they are not suitable for all investors. For more information, visitwww.rcmalternatives.com/disclaimer
- Oct 8, 202625 min
The Fall Solo Six-Pack: Sports Games, the Return of Discretionary Macro, & AI Coming for Your Job
In this solo six-pack episode of The Derivative, Jeff Malec makes the case for showing up to your kids’ games, especially when the final round of high school golf ends one stroke short of state. Then it’s off to the CTA Expo, where systematic strategies may be yesterday’s novelty and discretionary macro is having a moment. Jeff also digs into the Lakers sale, insurance float, and the tax perks that can come with owning a sports franchise, before wondering whether ultra-luxury resort communities are becoming self-contained mini-cities, and whether their plumbers and caddies could be among the workers least threatened by AI. Jeff checks the early evidence on AI and jobs: entry-level knowledge workers are showing some warning signs, even as the broader employment picture remains unsettled. He wraps up with listener mail on getting more RCM voices on the podcast, making managed-futures strategies easier to compare, and bringing tail hedging back into the conversation. Expect sports, markets, tax quirks, big questions about the future of work, and a few strong opinions along the way. - SEND IT!Chapters:00:00-00:52= Intro00:53-04:03=Why Showing Up for Your Kids’ Games Matters04:04-07:23=CTA Expo Takeaways: Discretionary Macro’s Return07:24–10:51 = The Lakers Sale, Tax Benefits, and a Utah Real Estate Deal10:52–14:30 = Luxury Enclaves and the AI-Proof Jobs That Serve Them14:31–21:11 = Tracking AI’s Impact on Jobs: Early Signals and Open Questions21:12-25:59 = Listener Mailbag: Managed Futures, Tail Hedging, and Podcast GuestsFrom the Episode:BLOG POST: When Skynet Writes a Substack: The AI Doom Piece That Moved MarketsPODCAST: AI, Markets, and the Profits of Doom with Adam ButlerPODCAST: Painting Corners to Protecting Portfolios: Former MLB pitcher Scott Karl on How Athletes Blow the Money, Alts, the Mental Side of Performance, and the NIL EraPODCAST: This City Trades Different: Yogi, the Floor, and Building RCMQuestions and comments about this episode or The Derivative podcast? Contact us! Mailbag@rcmam.comDon't forget to subscribe toThe Derivative, follow us on Twitter at@rcmAlts andsign-up for our blog digest.Disclaimer: This podcast is provided for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as legal, business, or tax advice. All opinions expressed by podcast participants are solely their own opinions and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of RCM Alternatives, their affiliates, or companies featured. Due to industry regulations, participants on this podcast are instructed not to make specific trade recommendations, nor reference past or potential profits. And listeners are reminded that managed futures, commodity trading, and other alternative investments are complex and carry a risk of substantial losses. As such, they are not suitable for all investors. For more information, visitwww.rcmalternatives.com/disclaimer
- Sep 24, 20261h 23m
AI, Markets, and the Profits of Doom with Adam Butler
Jeff Malec sits down with Adam Butler of Return Stacked ETFs, back for the first time since their May 2023 AI episode, when GPT-4 had just come out. Since then Return Stacked has grown past $1.6 billion. Adam explains why AI is spreading faster than any technology before it and describes his own workday, with Claude Code and Codex agents running in parallel and working overnight until the human's attention is the real limit. He then pushes back on the doomsday headlines. He argues that p-doom stories help frontier labs chasing trillion-dollar IPOs and favorable regulation, and points to the risks he thinks are real, like "obliterated" models with their safeguards stripped out and cyberattacks on critical infrastructure.Along the way, they dig into the paperclip maximizer and the recent case where sandboxed AI agents secretly coordinated to gain admin access to Hugging Face. They also cover AGI, ASI, and recursive self-improvement, and why Adam sees markets as the original paperclip maximizer. From there they turn to the AI funding loop with Nvidia at its center and no real moat for the labs, why Adam expects negative stock returns and prefers trend following, and his argument that mass job loss is a failure of imagination, not an inevitability. - SEND IT!Chapters:00:00-01:51= Intro01:52-10:23=Compute Deflation and the Multi-Agent Workday10:24-19:46=Managing the Agent Swarm, and Doubting the Doomsayers19:47–35:51 = Fear, Incentives, and Obliterated Models: Which AI Risks Are Real?35:52–53:57 = Paperclip Maximizers and Escaping Agents: How AIs Learned to Coordinate53:58–01:05:39 = RSI, Regulatory Capture, and Winner-Take-All01:05:40–01:20:13 = No Moat, No Mission: The AI Funding Loop, Trend Following, and America's Failure of Imagination01:20:14–01:23:34 = Rooting for Whatever Went UpFrom the Episode:PODCAST: AI isn’t coming…it’s already here, with Adam Butler and Taylor PearsonBOOK: Neal Stephenson - Snow CrashFollow along with Adam and Return Stacked on LinkedIn, and be sure to check out returnstacked.com to learn more about what they are up to.Don't forget to subscribe toThe Derivative, follow us on Twitter at@rcmAlts andsign-up for our blog digest.Disclaimer: This podcast is provided for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as legal, business, or tax advice. All opinions expressed by podcast participants are solely their own opinions and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of RCM Alternatives, their affiliates, or companies featured. Due to industry regulations, participants on this podcast are instructed not to make specific trade recommendations, nor reference past or potential profits. And listeners are reminded that managed futures, commodity trading, and other alternative investments
- Sep 17, 20261h 20m
RE-RELEASE: Texas Trend Following with Salem Abraham
Some episodes are worth bringing back. This is one of them. Salem Abraham is a bit of a legend in the trend following and managed futures world. With 30+ years in the business, he’s got the experience, the war stories, and, thankfully, the willingness to tell them. We originally sat down with Salem a few years ago, and the conversation was too good to leave in the archives. In this re-release, we cover tiny Canadian, Texas; why you need noodles and red sauce if you’re competing to make the best spaghetti; the Turtle Traders; a tourist boat capsizing in front of the nude beach; just how low oil can go; hanging out with Boone Pickens; honeybees; sending the first computer-generated orders electronically to the CME; trend following, naturally; why an apple salad is not a fruit salad; bonds at zero; and pecan and apple orchards. You know, the usual. Salem is the founder of Abraham Trading Company, a research-driven investment management firm that has managed alternative asset portfolios since 1988 for families, individuals, foundations, endowments, and institutions. Today, the firm runs the Fortress Fund for endowments and institutional investors.So whether you caught this one the first time around or somehow missed it, we're digging it back out of the archives. - SEND IT!Chapters:00:00-01:20= Intro02:20-13:14=Canadian, Texas: Orchards, Eight Kids, and Community Capital13:15-34:45=From 1987 Crash Kid to Panhandle Prop Trader: Lessons, Oil Busts, and Early HFT34:46–38:45 = When Everyone’s on One Side of the Boat: Crowded Trades, Crashes, and Naked Risk38:46–58:38 = Building a Hurricane‑Proof Portfolio: Bonds Are Broken, Alternatives Step In58:39–1:09:59 = From Crashes to Coronavirus: Rethinking 60/40 and Birth of the Fortress Fund1:10:00–1:19:49 = Salem’s Lightning Round: Favorite Things, Real Assets, and Star WarsFrom the Episode:T. Boone Book: The First Billion Is The HardestCheck out our Trend Following Guide!Follow along with Salem and Abraham Trading Co. on LinkedIn, and be sure to check out abrahamtrading.com to learn more about what they are up to.Don't forget to subscribe toThe Derivative, follow us on Twitter at@rcmAlts andsign-up for our blog digest.Disclaimer: This podcast is provided for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as legal, business, or tax advice. All opinions expressed by podcast participants are solely their own opinions and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of RCM Alternatives, their affiliates, or companies featured. Due to industry regulations, participants on this podcast are instructed not to make specific trade recommendations, nor reference past or potential profits. And listeners are reminded that managed futures, commodity trading, and other alternative investments are complex and carry a risk of substantial losses. As such, they are not suitable for all investors. For more information, visitwww.rcmalternatives.com/disclaimer<
- Sep 10, 20261h 5m
Zigs, Zags, and Finding Micro Cap Winners with Ian Cassel
Ian Cassel, founder of MicroCapClub and author of Stock Picker, joins Jeff Malec to walk through the underfollowed world of micro cap stocks, tiny, illiquid public companies where most 10x winners are born. He shares his journey from blowing up a dot‑com era portfolio to rebuilding it with XM Satellite Radio, explains why structural inefficiencies and lack of institutional capital create opportunity, and breaks down how he evaluates management, survives volatility, and finds small, profitable businesses that can self-fund growth. Along the way, they compare micro caps to private equity and venture, discuss global markets from Canada to Australia, and explore why serious stock pickers and small business owners are increasingly drawn to this overlooked corner of public markets. SEND IT!Chapters:00:00-01:06= Intro01:07-04:22= Hometown Roots and Micro Cap 10104:23-19:14= From Penny Stock Stigma to Informational Edge: Ian’s Micro Cap Origin Story19:15-38:15= Illiquidity Edge: Why Owning Every Micro Cap Fails (and Stock Picking Wins)38:16–50:49 = Betting on People: Management Upgrades, Tailwinds, and 10x Setups50:50–1:01:33 = Living Off Your Portfolio: The Psychology, Pain, and Payoff of Being a Stock Picker01:01:34-01:05:02 = Philly Sports, Risk, and Wrapping Up with ‘Stock Picker’From the Episode:Stock Picker (Book): Amazon | MicroCapClubRoadrunner Podcast episode Follow along with Ian and MicroCapClub on LinkedIn, and be sure to check out microcapclub.com to learn more about what they are up to.Don't forget to subscribe toThe Derivative, follow us on Twitter at@rcmAlts andsign-up for our blog digest.Disclaimer: This podcast is provided for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as legal, business, or tax advice. All opinions expressed by podcast participants are solely their own opinions and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of RCM Alternatives, their affiliates, or companies featured. Due to industry regulations, participants on this podcast are instructed not to make specific trade recommendations, nor reference past or potential profits. And listeners are reminded that managed futures, commodity trading, and other alternative investments are complex and carry a risk of substantial losses. As such, they are not suitable for all investors. For more information, visitwww.rcmalternatives.com/disclaimer
- Sep 3, 202654 min
From Quarterback to CIO: John McArthur on Alts, AI, and the Future of Wealth at Krilogy
In this episode, Jeff Malec sits down with John McArthur of Krilogy to trace his path from backup quarterback at Mizzou and Northwestern to CIO of a nearly $6 billion independent wealth management firm. John talks about how college football shaped his views on timing, opportunity, and accountability, then connects those lessons to building a planning-first advisory culture outside the wirehouse world of AG Edwards and Morgan Stanley. The conversation dives into how Krilogy builds portfolios using a mix of active and passive tools, daily-liquid alts, private markets, and fixed income, with a particular focus on left-tail risk, crisis alpha, and why diversification still matters in a market dominated by mega-cap tech and AI narratives. John explains how the firm thinks about private equity, private credit, secondaries, and interval funds, emphasizing liquidity trade-offs, client education, and realistic expectations around distributions in a higher-rate world. Jeff and John also tackle the economic and market implications of AI, both as a powerful productivity engine and a potential source of labor disruption and how that overlays with client fears about geopolitics, inflation, interest rates, and elections. They wrap by getting practical on college savings strategy when markets are at all-time highs, the behavioral side of advising (part therapist, part portfolio architect), and close on a lighter note with John’s football roots and his personal Mount Rushmore of gridiron stories, including a nod to Bo Jackson’s legendary 30 for 30. SEND IT!Chapters:00:00-01:20= Intro01:21-05:25= NIL Millions, Teenagers, and the Trouble With “New Money”05:26-14:26= From Backup Quarterback to CIO: Building Krilogy and Planning for the Next Left-Tail Shock14:27–24:47 = Beyond “Alts”: Private Markets, Secondaries, and Whether AI Fuels Boom or Bust24:48–33:08 = Buffered Notes, Interval Funds, and De-Risking College at Market Highs33:09–43:17 = Fear, Euphoria, and the CIO as Therapist: Coaching Clients Through the Next Shock43:18–51:45 = Bo, Ball, and Balancing Risk: From Two-Sport Legends to Two-Sided Portfolios51:46–54:32 = Bo, Bars, and Bill Simmons: McArthur’s Mount Rushmore of Football FlicksFrom the Episode:PODCAST: Scott Karl episode: Painting Corners to Protecting PortfoliosRCM Golf Clinic Sept 25th Sign-upFollow along with John and Krilogy on LinkedIn, and be sure to check out krilogy.com to learn more about what they are up to.Don't forget to subscribe toThe Derivative, follow us on Twitter at@rcmAlts andsign-up for our blog digest.Disclaimer: This
- Aug 20, 20261h 9m
Why Oil Didn't Go to $300, plus Chinese gold bugs, Copper Squeezes & Uranium Alpha with Josh Blanchfield (Avos Capital)
Jeff Malec sits down with Josh Blanchfield of Avos to trace his path from physics at Harvard, poker pro, and 11 years at Bridgewater (including co-heading the trading desk during Lehman) to running a concentrated, risk-aware commodities and macro shop. Josh explains why China is “ground zero” for global commodities, detailing how its import cuts, stockpiling, and scrap policies have shaped oil, copper, gold, and uranium, and why understanding flows and participant behavior matters more than neat top-down supply-demand models. He breaks down how Avos blends macro with very granular micro, like Chinese spec flows around Lunar New Year, refinery outages, crack spreads, and uranium’s inelastic buyers, to build convex, options-heavy trades that aim to capture upside tails while avoiding the classic commodity-fund blowup. Along the way, they dig into the realities of radical transparency at Bridgewater, the limits and promise of AI as a “research team we never hired,” the risks of an AI-driven labor shock, the true drivers of the dollar’s dominance and petrodollar fears, why he’s skeptical on small modular reactors but bullish nuclear, and how his Substack and broader investment philosophy challenge received wisdom on everything from munis to equity valuations. - SEND IT!Chapters:00:00-01:19= Intro01:20-09:01= From Boulder Trails to China’s Oil Trap: Josh’s Origin Story and DB Cooper Commodities09:02-19:27=China’s Dollar Dilemma, Gold Grab, and the Real Story Behind Commodity Power19:28–30:36 = From Poker Tables to Lehman’s Collapse: Josh’s Bridgewater Baptism by Fire30:37–37:57 = AI, Jobs, and Impossible Growth: Rethinking the Macro Behind the Magnificent Seven38:38–49:04 = Gold Flows, Burning Refineries, and the Uranium Edge49:05–56:26 = Capacity, Convexity, and Why Small Nuclear Isn’t So Small56:27–01:09:15 = Munis, Myths, and Moneyball: Josh’s Skeptical Playbook and Pop-Culture LensFrom the Episode:PODCAST:“Dr. Copper”: From Chilean Mines to Chinese Smelters to AI Data Centers in the US – with Kurt Nelson & Natalie Scott-GrayPODCAST:Going Nuclear: How Uranium is Powering Portfolios with Trevor Hall & Justin HuhnPODCAST:OpenSnow’s Joel Gratz built a Pod Shop for Powder Days: the PMs are Meteorologists and the Returns are FaceshotsBLOG:The Definitive List of the Best Investing MoviesFollow along with Josh and Avos on LinkedIn and Substack, and be sure to check out avos.co to learn more about what they are up to.Don't forget to subscribe toThe Derivative, follow us on Twitter at@rcmAlts andsign-up for our blog digest.<
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About The Derivative
Welcome to The Derivative, where we dive into what makes alternative investments go, analyze the strategies of unique hedge fund managers, and chat with interesting guests from across the investment world. Hosted by RCM Managing Partner, Jeff Malec, join us to take a ride through the world of alternative investments.
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