Home Diary of a CEO Notes
Diary of a CEO · 2026-04-06 · 1h 33m

Financial Crash Expert: The 90-Day Collapse Timeline They Are Desperately Hiding.

Economist Steve Keen lays out five ways the Iran war could end, warns of global famine, and predicts an imminent AI crash.

Financial Crash Expert: The 90-Day Collapse Timeline They Are Desperately Hiding.
The guest

Steve Keen — A heterodox economist known for predicting the 2008 financial crisis and for critiquing mainstream economics for ignoring money, debt, and energy. He develops modelling software (Ravel) and runs a YouTube channel on economic and geopolitical issues.

The gist

Keen and Bartlett dissect an escalating Israel-Iran war and its threat to the global economy, focusing on the Strait of Hormuz as a chokepoint for oil, fertilizer, and helium. Keen argues a prolonged conflict could trigger a global famine and semiconductor shortage, and walks through five scenarios for how the war might end, from nuclear catastrophe to Iran disabling Israel's nukes. He frames Trump's behavior as narcissistic market manipulation (a 'pump and dump' on oil) and argues inequality causes wars. The conversation then pivots to an AI investment bubble Keen expects to burst within 24 months, mass job displacement, universal basic income, and the fragility and unsustainability of the current economic and energy system. He closes advocating self-sufficiency, solar power, and a more cooperative, China-leaning economic model.

Big reveals

  • Keen claims Trump is running a 'pump and dump' scheme on oil prices for his own and his friends' wealth.
  • Argues a sustained conflict could cut 20-30% of world fertilizer and trigger a global famine, with India running out within 2-3 months.
  • Lays out five war-ending scenarios and puts the 'destroy Iran with nukes' outcome at under 10% but 'scary'.
  • Says the idea Iran could disable Israel's nuclear weapons is his most-hoped-for and most-likely outcome.
  • Predicts Trump will send 2,000-10,000 ground troops in (over 50% likely), calling it a suicide mission.
  • Predicts a severe economic contraction from the AI bubble within roughly 24 months.
  • Declares Bitcoin is going to zero because of its unsustainable energy demands.
  • States communism / a China-style cooperative model is a better direction than Western capitalism.

Things worth remembering

  • Roughly 30% of the world's helium comes from a single gas field spanning Saudi Arabia and Iran, and helium can't be stockpiled because it leaks through containers.
  • Without synthetic fertilizer (the Haber-Bosch process), Earth could only support between one and two billion people.
  • Hitler came to power amid -10% deflation and 25% unemployment, not the Weimar hyperinflation people assume.
  • Modern nuclear weapons can be ~1,000x Hiroshima's yield; destroying Iran would take hundreds of them.
  • An emergency airport shutdown costs Dubai an estimated $1 million per minute, about $1.4 billion a day.
  • The US president has sole authority to launch nuclear weapons without consulting Congress or the Joint Chiefs.
  • Big tech is on track to spend $720 billion on AI infrastructure in 2026, a roughly 5:1 spend-to-revenue ratio.
  • The failure rate of AI-specific startups reportedly hit 90% in 2026, with ~95% of enterprise AI pilots failing.
  • Spotify says it hasn't written a human line of code since December, which Keen says he personally verified with its CEO.
  • Athenian democracy selected officials by lottery rather than elections, which Keen prefers to electing 'narcissists'.

Recommended in this episode

Books, products and media the guest or host genuinely endorsed here — with the buy link.

Affiliate link — we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.

Guest’s ownProduct

Ravel

Steve Keen

“I've developed a software package called Ravvel uh which I've got one programmer for and I I teach an online course as well” — Steve Keen 01:17:15
Find it on Amazon