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Jim Kane

@kanejim.bsky.social
1.1K followers 465 following 1K posts

Please send me evenings and weekends. @thisisfincap.bsky.social

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Reposted by Jim Kane
Toby Nangle @tobyn.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
🚨It was only a matter of time before the good people of the BIS got around to looking at AI circular financing www.ft.com/content/8787...
ft.com
Is circular financing in AI a problem?
Only if the wheel stops spinning
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 4h
"Everyone has a job, no immigration."
Snippet from the transcript of "Apollo Global Management, Inc. Presents at Bank of America 31st Annual Financials CEO Conference, Sep-23-2026 03:00 PM"

Craig Siegenthaler

We'll get started with the macro. The macro backdrop has definitely been more resilient than many expected, yet uncertainty remains geopolitically, fiscally and also in the rate trajectory. Marc, how are you reading the environment right now? And what does it mean for Apollo's outlook and portfolio position?

Marc Rowan

So the fundamentals are actually quite positive. Everyone has a job. There is no immigration. Let's talk U.S. first, which is the largest market. Everyone has a job, no immigration. You have a massively accretive CapEx cycle, which is creating demand across lots of different sectors. You have the government policy incredibly accommodative. Capital markets are wide open. And so valuation aside, I think it will be difficult to cause a U.S. recession over the near term. The companies have been shocking resilient. Earnings are up. And generally, credit performs well if the economy is good, absent specific risks or stupidity.
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 8h
Only UK water utilities require this level of ownership complexity!
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susannah glickman @susglickman.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
newt taking his window of opportunity to make defense $, will we ever leave the 80s/90s
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Mike McCarthy @itsmccarthy.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Out of hibernation to share a polemic I published today at Salvage titled “On Theoretical Degeneration.” It takes aim at the unusual suspects currently reconstructing right theory (Yarvin, Land, etc.) and some on the left and center as well. You can find the article online below.
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
It's definitely not a giant fee grab 🙄 www.pionline.com/rules-regula...
One proposal would permit investment advisers to regulated funds to receive performance-based compensation calculated based on capital gains in or capital appreciation of a regulated fund’s account. Performance-based compensation frameworks are common with private funds, such as private equity and venture capital strategies and hedge funds.

The move could attract private market managers to launch and allocate private market strategies to regulated funds, according to John Fitzgerald, a partner at law firm McDermott Will & Schulte.

“There have been private market managers who’ve been hesitant to enter registered funds because of the fee construct,” Fitzgerald said. If this proposal were to be finalized, “I would expect there to be some private market advisers, who will relook at this market to see whether or not they can offer their strategy there,” he added.
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Financial Times @financialtimes.com · 01/10/2026
An AI sovereign wealth fund isn’t progressive — it’s techno-imperialism ft.trib.al/7xf1b1F
ft.trib.al
An AI sovereign wealth fund isn’t progressive — it’s techno-imperialism
Accruing income at home from land and power abroad has an old name: empire
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Political campaign language finally catches up with the rise of the new finance capital. giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...
Graphic show that between 2016 and 2026 candidate shifted away from using the term "big banks" -- there is a sharp drop off after 2020. In 2026, there is a sharp increase in the usage of "private equity," "hedge fund," and "corporate landlord."
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Good timing…
WASHINGTON, Sept 30 (Reuters) - The US securities ​regulator is set to propose rules on Wednesday aimed at expanding retail investors' access to private assets that have ‌traditionally been reserved for professionals, potentially offering higher returns but also exposing everyday Americans to more risk.
The Securities and Exchange Commission's proposals are part of a broader push by US President Donald Trump's administration to "democratize" private assets, such as private equity, private credit, real estate and venture capital, that can potentially result ​in higher returns than traditional stock and bond portfolios.
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Perfect spokesghoul for the Clarity Act.
Image of Andrew Cuomo speaking on Bloomberg TV
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
"...hybrid 401k product that includes privates and insurance wrappers" Sounds fun!
Snapshot of a Bank of America research note discussing BlackRock. Text says:

BLK live with private-public target date fund  BLK already is live with a hybrid public-private target date product with Great Gray (June 2025 launch) and able to leverage its proprietary data with Aladdin but it is now launching a new hybrid 401k product that includes privates and insurance wrappers. The insurance wrapper would be a fixed annuity-like wrapper that can provide retirees defined benefit-like solutions. KKR-Capital Group, BX-Wellington-Vanguard and GSTROW could be working on similar offerings while BLK’s product is 100% proprietary as BLK doesn’t need a 3rd party following its recent acquisitions of GIP and HPS.
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Nessa Ní Chasaide @nessanichasaide.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Great selection of papers on technofinance just out in @finandsoc.bsky.social
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Ewan McGaughey @ewanmg.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
My report on fixing the water system is out with @cmmonwealth.bsky.social: 💦transfer the leakiest, polluting companies to public hands for £0 🌊audit the rest to gauge repair costs, and public ownership is likely to cost £12bn, saving up to £1.4bn in 3 years www.common-wealth.org/publications...
common-wealth.org
Crystal Clear: the Solutions for Clean, Running Water
The clearest and most cost-effective route to genuine public control of England's water is through public ownership.
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
"...most Democrats in Pennsylvania have a positive view of socialism — and nearly 40% consider themselves to be a democratic socialist, a new poll found."
inquirer.com
Pa. Democrats have mostly positive view of socialism as progressive candidates secure wins
With Philadelphians set to elect their first democratic socialist to Congress, most Pennsylvania Democrats have favorable views of socialism. Still, it remains broadly unpopular.
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
"An Israeli social media post from inside the stadium in Debrecen shows their fans chanting: 'IDF, IDF, IDF.'"
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Inevitably, we’ll get PE funds with NAV loans backed by portfolio holdings and then wealthy individuals taking out NAV loans on their stakes in the same fund, right?
The bank will generally lend between 25 and 35 per cent of the assets’ value for NAV loans, Williams said — well below the 40 to 60 per cent loan-to-value that banks typically offer for art loans, another class of illiquid assets the rich borrow against. Loan terms tend to be two to three years and are commonly renewed.
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LPE Blog @lpeblog.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
In the @bostonreview.bsky.social, Noura Erakat discusses the Board of Peace as a template for a new world order.
bostonreview.net
Exit and Exception
The Board of Peace’s model for governing Palestine reflects designs for a new world order.
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The Washington Post @washingtonpost.com · 25/09/2026
President Trump’s war on Iran, now in its seventh month, has led to a plunge in the consumption of oil and gas around the world as fighting disrupts production and transportation. wapo.st/4ycPvNA
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
"Florida's state-run public pension fund and a conservative think tank sued the New York ‌Times on Wednesday... Both petitioners are Times shareholders" 👀
reuters.com
Florida fund sues New York Times over alleged anti-Israel bias, demands records
Florida's state-run public pension fund and a conservative think tank sued the New York ‌Times on Wednesday, seeking materials to determine whether the company's board is letting the newspaper promote...
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
"The notice also stands to raise questions yet again about the resilience of data center leases."
bloomberg.com
Oracle Cites ‘Force Majeure’ to Shield Itself on Controversial Data Center
Oracle Corp. is moving to shield itself from racking up expenses on a massive data center being built in New Mexico, adding a fresh wrinkle to a project beset by opposition and regulatory setbacks.
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Megan Wachspress @meganwachspress.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
For @lpeblog.bsky.social I wrote about why "bring your own power" is a false solution to the problem of datacenter energy demand and why municipalization (public ownership and control) of regional transmission organizations is necessary to protect ratepayers and accelerate decarbonization.
lpeproject.org
The Neoliberal Grid is in Crisis
To protect customers from rising electricity prices, public officials are urging data center developers to supply their own power. But this approach risks privatizing the power grid…
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Monique Morrissey @moniquemorrissey.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
My @epi.org colleagues @elisegould.bsky.social & Hilary Wething put together a banger of a chartbook on wage suppression--the single biggest cause of the affordability crisis. Some of the charts are among EPI's greatest hits & some are new (at least to me). www.epi.org/publication/...
epi.org
Wage suppression in 10 charts
Wages for typical workers lag far behind productivity growth. It hasn't always been this way and does not have to be this way. These 10 charts outline the historical context of workers’ wage trajector...
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Benjamin Braun @benbraun.social · 23/09/2026
Timely, given the strong Minsky moment vibes these days. Just out in Politics & Society. "The more Minsky rose to the challenge of explaining the economics of his [wage-led growth] proposal ... the more Democrats grew concerned about its politics." journals.sagepub.com/doi/epub/10....
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
This is a doozy of a story.
Sheikh Tahnoon’s International Holding Company is expected to lead the consortium with Allied Investment Partners of the UAE, according to a person familiar with the discussions.

The Khayyat family would take a smaller stake, while Boehly and the DFC would control a majority of the board, the person said.

The Khayyat brothers have emerged as increasingly prominent partners in projects involving figures close to the Trump administration. 

The family has a stake in an Albanian property development involving Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner. It is also pursuing a potential reconstruction of Syria’s pipeline network as part of a project involving Tom Barrack, the US special envoy to Syria and a longtime associate of President Donald Trump.

UCC, a company controlled by the Khayyat family, has also recently secured an oilfield concession in Libya that was not awarded through an open tender and is taking a minority stake in a Venezuelan gasfield operated by BP.
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
"As for the curriculum, many details are still being sorted out.
wsj.com
Exclusive | The Tech Elite Is Funding an Alternative to College
The venture-capital firm is spending $35 million to back the two-year academy, with other Bay Area tech giants on board.
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
TIL private credit has spawned a new type of fund vehicle, a hybrid of CLOs and collateralized fund obligations (CFOs), which Moody's is calling multicredit fund vehicles (MCFVs). www.moodys.com/research/Pri...
MCFVs hold – both directly and indirectly – a hybrid pool of investments that can include asset-backed whole loan assets, corporate loans and bonds, and real assets. Meanwhile, CLOs directly own corporate loans, and CFOs hold primarily pools of fund interests with exposure to private equity investments.
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Jo Michell @jomichell.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
Not sure there are many Kalecki heads on this website but I'm going to give this a try anyway. If this isn't your cup of tea, you might want to hit mute now...
A journal cover page for "An analytical heterogeneous agent macro model of concentration, markups, and falling labour shares" by Karsten Kohler, Jo Michell and Ayoze Alfageme, published in the Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control.

The abstract text is: This paper presents an analytical heterogeneous agent model (HAM) to explore micro-level concentration dynamics and their effects on macro-level distribution and growth. It contributes to recent work on macroeconomic agent-based models (ABMs) by comparing a small-scale ABM with bilateral firm-customer matching to a simplified HAM without direct agent interactions. The HAM replicates key ABM results while allowing for analytical solutions. In the model, larger firms benefit from lower unit costs due to economies of scale, gain larger market shares, and set higher markups. More profitable firms temporarily grow faster, leading to endogenous changes in the firm size distribution. The resulting right-skewed distributions create a divergence between the average profit share across firms and the aggregate profit share, which is driven by the largest firms. The decline in the labour share reduces aggregate consumption and slows growth. Despite its simplicity, the model captures key empirical patterns related to superstar firms and declining labour shares.
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
Another day, another exposé of one of the endless tax avoidance maneuvers used by the wealthy. www.wsj.com/personal-fin...
Anatomy of a Grantor-Retained Annuity Trust

The grantor transfers assets like stock shares into a GRAT.

Annuity payments are made to the grantor over the GRAT’s term, gradually returning the initial value of the assets plus interest.

Gains in the value of the assets above a certain interest rate are transferred to a trust for beneficiaries like a spouse or children, free of gift and estate taxes.

People set up GRATs for a set number of years, typically ranging from two to 10, to hold assets they expect to notably appreciate in value. Generally, if the assets appreciate faster than a special federal interest rate in the month the GRAT is formed—5.4% for September—the gains escape transfer taxes.

The grantor sets annuity payments to get back amounts that mirror the original contribution, plus interest at the special federal rate, to avoid gift taxes on the contribution. Payments must be made at least once a year.

If the assets don’t clear the hurdle rate, the grantor simply gets their money back through the annuity payments, leaving a balance of zero. Many simply roll over the annuity payments into another GRAT.
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Quinn Slobodian @quinnslobodian.com · 21/09/2026
oh www.ft.com/content/64f9...
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Daniela Gabor @danielagabor.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
We were a bit early in our predictions but unfortunately quite accurate - we're heading for a world of shortages and we can't manage them with neoliberal state institutions.
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Dutch pension funds got jokes? Who knew? “BpfBouw… said BlackRock was chosen due to its international footprint, execution capacity and ‘alignment in the field of socially responsible investing.’”
bloomberg.com
BlackRock Poised to Win Pension Fund Mandate for Dutch Builders
BlackRock Inc. has emerged as the preferred manager for a portfolio of Dutch pension assets worth just under €70 billion ($80 billion).
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
“Behind the scenes, the unit at the centre of the creditor firestorm was waiting on four clients to pay more than $200m it had booked in revenue the previous year… The clients all had links to Walter — and to life insurance companies connected to the billionaire.” giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...
Money has moved from insurers linked to Walter to intermediaries which paid his asset management giant Guggenheim
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Nicola Rennie @nrennie.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
My list of data-related resources had a bit of a re-fresh recently! They're now all in the one site. You can still browse by topic or see them all at once! 📊 Link: nrennie.rbind.io/resources/ #RStats #DataViz #StatsEd
Screenshot of resources page.
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Philadelphia Inquirer @inquirer.com · 18/09/2026
A bid for the mayor’s office would pit Brooks, the leader of the city’s Working Families Party, against Parker, a centrist aligned with the Democratic Party establishment.
inquirer.com
Philly City Councilmember Kendra Brooks is considering running for mayor, sources say
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Lenore Palladino @lenorepalladino.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
mapping the wild financial interrelationships within AI tech & finance is fascinating & also changing every day: great set of visuals ⬇️⬇️ their risk is our risk: not pictured is the next layers out, workers' money-pension funds, retirement accts, anyone w/ an index fund 💰 www.ft.com/content/8475...
ft.com
Joining the dots between big AI
In the loop?
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Starbucks Workers United @sbworkersunited.org · 17/09/2026
ed sheeran 🤝 starbucks and their union-busters
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Mike Konczal @mtkonczal.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
The Tax Foundation argued recently that we should think of the falling labor share as making a 'round trip' back to 'historically precedented' values. I disagree and walk through how the argument is weaker than it seems. Plus we dig into NIPA flat files! newsletter.mikekonczal.com/p/i-disagree...
newsletter.mikekonczal.com
I Disagree With The Tax Foundation, Labor Share is Collapsing
Getting into the guts of NIPA and what prop income really does when you include it.
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
www.pionline.com/institutiona...
The Lockheed Martin lawsuit, like similar lawsuits alleging ERISA violations by purchasing annuity contracts from Athene, claim that the insurer is riskier in part because of its ties to Apollo. The original court filing cites Athene as a “private-equity controlled insurance company with a highly risky offshore structure.”
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Benjamin McKean @blmckean.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
On the one hand, lol - on the other hand, lmao
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Alex Press @alexnpress.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
New one on how Amazon maps union risk across its warehouses.
thealexpress.substack.com
Amazon’s Organizing Map
The company knows which warehouses it’s worried about. Unions might want to take a look.
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
Artificial intelligence will wipe out all life on earth, end ESG wars.
Reuter article subheading says "Oxford professor Eccles says AI can help end the ESG wars"
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Jens van 't Klooster 💸💸💸 @jvtk.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
Couldnt be more timely! In @jeppjournal.bsky.social (open access), a detailed post mortem of the 2022 inflation shock, and suggestions how to do better this time.
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
“package includes as many as 20,000 MK-84s and 20,000 BLU-117s, as well as up to 20,000 I-2000 Penetrator warheads. The weapons are extremely lethal. The MK-84, for example, sends metal fragments in every direction for thousands of feet, causing huge craters and ripping through metal and concrete.”
bloomberg.com
US Plans to Provide Thousands of Massive Weapons to Israel
The US is preparing to provide Israel thousands of bombs that are among the most destructive in its arsenal, the largest single transfer of such weapons in years.
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

	Please use the sharing tools found via the share button at the top or side of articles. Copying articles to share with others is a breach of FT.com T&Cs and Copyright Policy. Email licensing@ft.com to buy additional rights. Subscribers may share up to 10 or 20 articles per month using the gift article service. More information can be found at https://help.ft.com/faq/gifting-and-sharing-an-article/what-is-a-gift-article/.
	https://www.ft.com/content/2285c111-b103-4b04-96c7-fe26a3c04c3e?syn-25a6b1a6=1

	The concentration of wealthy donors’ money is stark in primaries in safely Democratic or Republican districts, where the party contest can in effect decide who goes to Congress.

Donors might have realised that early spending in those primaries could be more efficient than during a general election, said Stanford’s Bonica.

“In primaries, you can have a pretty sizeable effect,” he said.
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
the part that looks like a pension will be the fees the asset manager collects.
wsj.com
Exclusive | How BlackRock Plans to Make the Corporate 401(k) Look More Like a Pension
The investment manager aims to overhaul target-date funds with more options for employers.
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
Oops! www.bloomberg.com/opinion/news...
This is how the arbitrage play worked: Erebor promised customers it would convert Tether’s and Circle’s stablecoins to U.S. dollars at face value without charging a fee, people familiar with the offer said. And yet stablecoins often trade at a slight discount to their $1 face value in the open market, thanks in part to the fees major stablecoin issuers like Tether and Circle charge to convert tokens into cash.

The disconnect meant traders could profit by buying large numbers of stablecoins in the open market and redeeming them with Erebor at full face value, with the bank eating the difference in costs.

One firm that quickly took advantage of Erebor’s offer was Wintermute, a crypto-focused high-frequency trading firm backed by investors such as Lightspeed Venture Partners. It made money swapping millions of dollars’ worth of tether stablecoins it had purchased at a discount for their full face value of $1 each with Erebor, the bank discovered earlier this year, according to people briefed on the matter. …
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
“My ‘I have no involvement in a crypto-adjacent financial exchange that my son is launching’ t-shirt is raising questions already answered by the t-shirt.” www.politico.com/newsletters/...
Demand Progress Executive Director Sean Vitka took aim at Gillibrand in a statement to MM, writing that the New York Democrat “is supposed to be helping lead opposition to rampant corruption in the Trump administration, yet she’s instead using her position of power as [Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee] Chair to push other Senate Democrats into supporting bad crypto industry policy that will enrich Trump's family — and her own.” A Gillibrand aide responded that, rather “than surrender to that status quo, Senator Gillibrand would relish the chance to debate real ethics reforms on the floor — in full view of the public, seven weeks out from the midterms.” (Gillibrand has also previously said she has no involvement in a crypto-adjacent financial exchange that her son is launching.)
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Jim Kane @kanejim.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
the Philly marathon better not turn into a triathlon this year.
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Mike McCarthy @itsmccarthy.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
Something I wrote on the class politics of AI discourse theorydecay.substack.com/p/x-risk-acc...
theorydecay.substack.com
X-risk Accelerationism
Are the one’s issuing existential warnings about AI paradoxically deepening the risk?
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