203 - Is this the year crypto crashes?

We all love a boom story, until it turns into a 40‑year hangover. In 1995, Japan’s nominal GDP hit its high‑water mark. It took until the 2020s to get back there. Debt has exploded to 250% of GDP. The population is shrinking so fast that by 2070, one in three Japanese will have vanished, down from 128 million in 2010 to just 87 million. What went wrong? A bursting property bubble, a banking system in denial, and a culture where shame trumps change. For four decades, Japan has been the economic equivalent of a superstar striker refusing to retire; still wearing the jersey, but stuck on the bench.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week marks 80 years since the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and we’re taking a deep dive into Japan’s extraordinary economic story. In part one of our two-part series, we explore how Japan went from a feudal, isolated society to one of the most powerful economies in the world. With our guest Russell Jones, a brilliant economist and my old boss, we look at the Meiji Restoration, post-war reconstruction under America’s wing, and the wild property and stock market bubble of the 1980s. Along the way, we chat about Trump’s war on economic statistics, a touch of Cold War nuclear tension, and even a special Electric Picnic-related announcement! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week we talk to Matthew Ruddy, a young Dublin entrepreneur who did everything right - built his first business at 17, worked alongside the lads at Dogpatch Labs. Except he's now living in Brisbane, not Dublin. Matthew's story captures what's happening to an entire generation. These aren't traditional emigrants heading to London building sites, they're highly educated risk-takers who desperately want to stay home but can't afford to take entrepreneurial risks when rent costs two grand a month. The statistics are staggering: home ownership among 25-34 year olds has fallen by 48% since the mid-90s; the highest decline in the world. This housing catastrophe is causing a mental health crisis among young adults in English-speaking countries, with Ireland leading the pack. It's creating a vicious cycle where young talent either takes safe multinational jobs or emigrates entirely, starving Irish startups of the people they need. Meanwhile, we're left wondering where all the young entrepreneurs have gone. They're everywhere but home. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Not so fast! We unpack the surprise EU-US trade deal that has everyone shouting sellout but we see it differently. In this episode, we take a deeper look at what really went down in the Trump-triggered tariff negotiations. The headlines scream defeat: Europe folds, Trump wins, 15% tariffs slapped on all EU goods while the US gets full access to the European market. But is that the full story? We break it down, the EU runs a $200 billion trade surplus with the US. So why would they agree to this? Because sometimes in poker, the smartest move is folding a bad hand to fight another day. We also lift the lid on the civil war brewing within Europe: the Commission vs. the member states, nationalism vs. federalism, free trade idealism vs. geopolitical realism. Germany wants to protect its cars. France its booze. Ireland? Our pharma sector’s now hanging in the balance. We talk street-fighting Trump vs. rulebook Europe, why this deal might actually be good news for investment in Ireland. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, we take you back to the final years of Yugoslavia, a country that exploded into one of the bloodiest wars Europe has seen since WWII. We trace how ethnic tensions, decades of suppressed rivalries, and opportunistic leaders tore the region apart, while Europe watched on, paralysed. We explore how the Serb army launched brutal assaults across Croatia and Bosnia, committing acts of ethnic cleansing that left over 100,000 Bosnians dead, often at the hands of their own neighbours. For years, the West hesitated. But after a dramatic shift in Washington, the U.S. stepped in, arming the Croats, launching air strikes, and ultimately brokering the Dayton Accords to end the war. In this episode, we follow the story from Vukovar to Sarajevo, from Belgrade backroom deals to Clinton’s White House. We explain how Croatia won the war but lost nearly a million people to emigration, how Serbia suffered the worst hyperinflation ever recorded, and how Slovenia quietly became the EU’s success story, set to overtake the UK in GDP per capita within five years. We also reflect on the strange persistence of empire: Russia still backs Serbia, Turkey stands with Bosnia, and the West never really forgot its favourites. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.