#354 Larry McDonald: Private Credit Is This Cycle's Subprime — And Retail Investors Are Holding the Bag

About this episode

Larry McDonald discusses the risks of private credit and its implications for retail investors in the current market cycle.

New York Times’ bestselling author Larry McDonald, founder of The Bear Traps Report, returns to The Julia La Roche Show for an in-person episode discussing the risks in the markets today. McDonald makes the case that private credit is this cycle's subprime — opaque, over-leveraged, and already cracking — and warns that the retail investors who were sold quarterly liquidity on an inherently illiquid asset class are about to find out the hard way. He also breaks down why stagflation is the defining macro theme of 2026, why the 60/40 portfolio is broken, and why the great migration out of financial assets and into hard assets — energy, copper, gold, and commodities — is only in the second or third inning. Plus: a surprising first-ever Bitcoin buy, why natural gas is his top multi-year trade, and the under-the-radar risk nobody is talking about. Links: How To Listen When Markets Speak: https://www.amazon.com/Listen-When-Markets-Speak-Opportunities-ebook/dp/B0C4DFVFNR Colossal Failure of Common Sense: https://www.amazon.com/Colossal-Failure-Common-Sense-Collapse/dp/B002IFLWMK Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/Convertbond Bear Traps Report: https://www.thebeartrapsreport.com/ 0:00 Intro…

People in this episode

Host: Julia La Roche

Guest: Larry McDonald

Topics covered

• private credit
• subprime
• stagflation
• financial assets
• hard assets
• market risks

Keywords

• private credit
• subprime
• stagflation
• financial assets
• hard assets
• market risks
• Larry McDonald

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: The Bear Traps Report

Books & works: How to Listen When Markets Speak, Colossal Failure of Common Sense

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