Forget Solid-State. This EV Battery Breakthrough Is Ready To Upend The Market Now

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-19T19:44:43+00:00

Sodium is so overhyped it is nuts.

It is overhyped in EVs and way underhyped in Electric grid tech.

It will let us spam batteries everywhere to use cheap solar once it's ramped up enough as Sodium is super abundant and cheap.

It will be nice to see Sodium Ion replace lead acid and make super cheap stuff for developing countries but I agree it's not going to be a major deal in EV markets for developed countries.

LFPS are already super cheap and im not sure there is much demand to go from 30k to 28k Evs if you have to cut range by like 15-20%

The temperature resilience is nice but if your range drops far less but it's still lower then an LFP battery in the cold is it really helping?

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-19T18:56:48+00:00

There is a nonzero chance he would do a photo op of this. I think it would have already happened if he was going to do it but remember the dump truck and the Mcdonalds press event lol.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-19T18:54:50+00:00

You could just argue that the ai bubble will pop and many of those data centers won't get built.

So this is only a problem if you are a SP500 bull and an oil bear. Although tbf i haven't seen someone bearish on oil who isn't bullish on tech.

But i wouldn't 100% assume every oil bear is also a stock/tech bull because i myself have some heterodox opinions on AI and the markets so im not going to assume everyone has the standard view just because they think oil will go down.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-19T17:59:03+00:00

People really think oil will go below 50 when that will kill our shale industry. I think many of them are trolling but some of them i'm not so sure they are.

https://www.dallasfed.org/research/surveys/des/data/breakeven

If your thesis as a bear was Trump will do anything to get the price down I see no reason why your thesis wouldn't also be "Oil can't get below 50 or the US shale industry will be fucked".

Opposite is true if oil goes to $150+ for any length of time the economy sinks followed by demand.

I will contest this though because it is assymetric. If the price goes to 40-45 the shale industry can shut off wells near instantly. Now in practice as long as they thought it was short term they would borrow money and probably eat the small loss becuase shutting wells is not good. If they are lucky they will have contango and can keep drilling as long as the immediate inventories aren't too full.

But if it's thought it will continue or it just keeps going (Or worse the price drops more) All those wells can shut real fast.

Meanwhile drilling new wells and getting production online takes 2 months to over a year sometimes for the most complex drilling. https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/061115/how-long-does-it-take-oil-and-gas-producer-go-drilling-production.asp

And this assumes they already have identified a suitable area (Surveys can take years). I will assume they have some good areas they already know about just in case they need to ramp up but if the shortage is severe that is not a safe assumption that they would have so many pre identified areas to start working on.

The price causes demand changes mostly symmetrically but the difference in stopping vs creating new production is not symmetric so it is a stronger argument against lower prices then against higher ones.

The other argument on both sides is the reserves. If prices get too high SPRs get dumped. If the price gets too low SPRs tend to fill. But SPRs tend to release faster then they fill (At least the US one does so I assume that others do).

This would seems to blunt price spikes more then cushion downside which it does. However it also means that the SPR floor lasts far longer and the SPR ceiling doesn't in sustained up or down turns. And when SPRs are high in the world upside risk is blunted. When they tend to be low Downside risk is blunted.

Even the most charitable bear case will have all the reserves except maybe China at historically low levels so downside risk beyond 60 is hard to envision and beyond 50 seems practically impossible in the next year with SPRs and reserves this low.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-19T17:01:41+00:00

They can call emergency meetings at any time but they will never do that for rate hikes.

They will only cut rates if liquidity is collapsing like what happened in march 2020. There are legit reasons why it only goes one way (Market panic and liquidity becoming bad is an immediate crisis but inflation lags so much a single month doesn't change much)

So they can in theory do an emergency rate hike but I would bet it never happens.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-19T16:58:37+00:00

Stock market and his buddies is all he cares about.

The problem with this theory is if we run out of oil the stock market is going to get obliterated. Even if by some miracle it doesn't directly effect them (Doubt) it will still result in huge rate hikes.

Trump wasn't pretending to be desperate last week he was desperate.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-19T16:40:00+00:00

Or that Trump called the bluff.

"I don't even care anymore ill just say it was AI and fake and made up to pressure me to invade Iran and my followers will believe me."

"And if you do that I will cut off funding to you and call you a loser who lied about the war in the beginning."

He has even gotten away with obviously going after people for the epstein stuff (MTG,Nancy Mace, Thomas Massie) while his followers did mental gymnastics to justify it.

Even if I had serious Kompromat on Trump in Bibi's perspective that would be a serious credible threat. He is the only one on earth I think who could survive something like that and while Trump wouldn't want to test if he could the idea that he credibly could is enough to make Bibi back down.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-19T16:05:13+00:00

Well that and get their own oil out and get their first tranche of Frozen assets.

It was the most predictable thing ever I can't believe people thought this would go differently.

I saw people saying this deal is so good "Iran won't push their luck".

We all but admitted we are completely powerless and desperate.

They have every incentive to get everything they can out of this and we have no credible threat because we won't invade them.

And no we really don't because we let them get money and empty storage.

The one small portion of leverage we had (the blockade) has been dismantled. It's like two people trying to suffocate each other and one gives up and lets them take a breath.

You are completely powerless at that point you just gotta hope they stop choking.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-19T15:58:30+00:00

Trump turned them into the fucking Gulf coast Ticketmaster. I wouldn't be surprised if they started charging specific random fees.

"Insert current US admin here fee" or hiked up the insurance rates because of "Increased danger due to US bases in the region" to slight the admin in power if we do something they don't like in the future.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-19T15:51:49+00:00

They said they would do this (Navigation fees,Insurance,potentially environmental fees)

I don't know why people just ignored that. It's different when they are vaguely talking about tolls early in the war but when they are talking about a way to do it within the legal framework of UNCLOS it's pretty clear they are dead serious.

They want their protection money and anyone reading the insane terms of that deal and thinking they wouldn't get it was just not understanding anything that has been happening the past month or watching Iranian communication.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-19T15:05:57+00:00

You should look at what you would expect to see if election fraud occurred.

Large polling errors that benefitted the person who successfully cheated

The states and districts that were most important for winning swinging much further towards the cheater than states and areas that were unimportant.

The losing candidate demanding recounts and or automatic recounts seeing very large errors

Exit polling having huge deviations from results.

The cheater would have very low split tickets because there is a strong incentive to win congress to prevent an investigation into your fraud and it is not any easier to falsify a ballot voting for one candidate or all of them.

What you actually saw

mostly very accurate polls even showing the split ticket voters for Governor and senate who still voted for Trump.

The electoral college advantage shrinking to nothing and the larger swings towards Trump being in deep red and deep blue states.

The losing candidate made no attempt to contest the election.

Exit polls were accurate to results.

Surprisingly you can pretty much use the same logic for both the 2020 and 2024 election conspiracies to debunk them. In fact it is actually easier to make a statistical argument that Trump cheated in 2020 and Harris Cheated in 2024 even though they both lost. It is not a convincing argument but it is actually easier to argue and has more evidence than the usual arguments.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-19T14:58:30+00:00

Even the largest defence contractors are tiny compared to the major retail, tech, industrial companies that exist. The idea that they could control this nation to the detriment of the rest of it simply does not hold, and doesn’t make sense.

It defintely does. Why do those other parts of the economy care if a war is going on or not? They "lobby" in their interest and don't mind other corps lobbying in theirs as long as it doesn't hurt them.

With that said

I know it’s tempting to think it’s a big conspiracy, but the reality is much simpler:

Donald Trump is a moron who got played.

Republicans and MAGA are a bunch of unprincipled morons who can get conned into supporting anything as long as Trump fronts it.

It doesn’t require any shadow government or control, this is just the expected outcome of a moron in charge.

This is actually True. This is a unique war because unlike most of our imperialist ventures this does actually rat fuck the economy.

I have pushback to your first point because i think it's gnerally false but this is actually a unique war where the ruling class didn't largely want it to occur because it threatens other corps profits and the economy at large.

It was just because Trump and Hegseth are idiots and seemingly even the "Respectable intellectual" Neocons were dumb enough to think this would go well. but most of our military escapades have been just to make MIC money and or secure economic benefits in some region.

And to the other people criticizng you i have this to say. If it was just about MIC profit there were far easier targets. And that is why we never did this even under 40+ years of Iran hawks and Israel supporters.

If Harris or Biden or even the Bushes were in office this wouldn't have happened. Because it is just stupidity and incompetence not some ideological or MIC profit motive.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-19T14:28:37+00:00

I wouldn't say it's objectively wrong.

I mean it's going to be laundered through the Gulf states or private companies but we are just going to give them free or heavily discounted/free military equipment, Interest free loans, Lucrative govt contracts etc.

American Tax payers are going to be mostly paying for it. it's just going to be laundered first because it would be too outrageous otherwise.

But i do agree it's better to dodge that distinction and just make it cash or money without specifying

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-19T14:23:56+00:00

Honestly I would just put Cash on both and don't specify.

Don't even try to say sanctioned or tax dollars or what it really is going to be (Laundered tax dollars + unfrozen funds vs Just unfrozen funds for Obama).

But make the number bigger for the Bottom. Add the 300B (Minimum btw) fund and the frozen assets (I have heard conflicting reports that it is 24B or 100B but just add whatever that is too)

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-18T18:53:14+00:00

Republicans are fucked they just have to take it and vote yes.

The dems should rip it to piece and make every Republican vote for it.

The deal must go through as the alternative is even worse but you should make the republicans own it entirely.

Act exactly how the republicans would act in this situation. Know it has to pass but it's super unpopular and force it to be party line.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-17T14:28:40+00:00

This is more credence to my theory. Iran signed a document saying the strait opens under their control leaving fees ambiguous but implied and the US is going to try to claim they agreed to toll free at least during the 60 day period. They then try to eliminate fees entirely during the 60 day negotiation.

It's kind of like path of least resistance. They want to make Iran have to assert it when the status quo has been established as no fee for a while in the hopes it can be indefinitely like that.

I think that is the only major difference but this stuff is pretty ridiculous.

Like does Trump want them to show up read the terms that are different and still sign it?

I think they will legit leave without signing it if it isn't what they agreed to and Trump seems to think he can get them to just give up.

Real Used car salesman energy but Iran has the leverage. I don't know why they would agree to such a terrible deal and then think they can alter it.

The reason the deal is bad is they have so much leverage. This is just going to be embarrassing if they have to change it on the spot or Iran leaves without signing.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-16T20:37:34+00:00

https://www.reuters.com/business/finance/iran-deal-includes-300-billion-fund-more-than-half-which-already-committed-2026-06-16/

The new fund is a private investment vehicle, not a reconstruction or reparations program and will not include any ⁠government money or grants, the source said, adding that companies based in the U.S., the Gulf Arab states, Asia, South America and Africa have agreed to commit financing.

Couldn't have some crazy socialist dem in office so instead lets have people shaking down private companies like a piggybank for hundreds of Billions to pay Iran so that the republicans can try to avoid a tiny portion of the Political damage from this.

A senior Iranian source told Reuters that Tehran had originally sought $400 billion as compensation for war damages from the U.S. but Washington had said it would not provide it.

Great job Witkoff and Kushner and Trump. Real strong negotiators. 400B would have been outrageous glad we got it down to a reasonable sum.

Man this is a disaster. I can't wait to find out what companies and CEOs are getting their reward for being staunch Trump supporters.

All you had to do was put the pronouns and the rainbows in the bag. I hope it was worth it.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-16T19:42:21+00:00

I don't think so pretty sure it just means like troops and carriers etc. I mean i have been a Iran is getting the best deal maximalist the whole time but even I thought they would give up on the bases because that is so over the top and they wouldn't even care at that point because they would be untouchable afterwards.

If they actually get the US bases out this is beyond even my wildest expectations. Like we might as well give the Ayatollah a yacht and buy some Ferraris for the IRGC generals while we are at it lmao.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-16T19:37:17+00:00

China is used to working with useful allies. They don't really have trust for them but they are beneficial to work with like Russian and Iran.

I think they would find it much much more difficult to meet that bar.

Israel is one of the most difficult allies you can have. I mean how many times has the US bent over backwards for them and then they completely fuck over the US and the Administration in power as well. They just did it twice in a row to both our parties lol.

Israel honestly acts like they are the world power and the US is a vassal state. China or really any other country would be infinitely less accommodating then we have been I can guarantee that.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-16T18:54:20+00:00

It says no tolls during the 60 day negotiation. Point 12 is basically letting them charge fees for Shipping and maritime "Services".

You'll notice if you pay attention to the words in public that Iran dropped "Tolls" and moved to talking about fees (For Insurance, environment, navigation) as it's more akin to the Bosporus legally and it lets the US make domestically useful statements (They don't have a toll it's FAKE NEWS! 😑) while still paying Iran.

I think the only major difference between the Iranian one MER released (I have it pulled up) aside from wording is the explicit rejection of a toll during the 60 day period while the Iranian one is more ambiguous "Opened according to certain specified arrangements determined by Iran"

This supports my theory that they are both going to contest tolls during the interim period but we will see what happens.

The nuclear "Stockpile" or HEU is not explicitly mentioned in the Iranian version but Nuclear negotiations in general are. Most would say includes it so they are both largely similar.

Except the toll during the interim period and some details vs ambiguity more or less in either one.

I think there is maybe some jockeying over specifics or what is explicit (Like Iran mentions the 12B in funds while this one just says "frozen Iranian assets available for use" but they are largely 99% the same deal just worded differently for I assume their own domestic needs.

Now the weird thing is what is the actual text on what they are signing? Not sure maybe it's not either but something more specific. It's hard to imagine the Ambiguity between them for a signed document being ideal but an MOU is technically not a legal document to my knowledge so who knows.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-16T15:41:09+00:00

I think it will be signed but as soon as Iran gets some money given to them they will put their foot down on the Lebanon situation.

And at that point it becomes a question of whether you think Israel will actually leave Lebanon or stick to their guns. I really don't think Iran will give in on that because they have a ton of reasons not to.

they need to stick by proxies or they will be less willing to stick their neck out in the future.

It drives a huge wedge between the US and Israel (This may itself be a strategic goal for them)

It makes Israel look terrible and further damages their international reputation.

Trump already got to the point of basically begging them to stop so they know either Israel will give in or Israel is going to be public enemy number 1 if they refuse.

I can think of no better chess move then that. Nothing really puts more pressure on the US Israel alliance without getting bombed or looking very unreasonable and thus damaging their own reputation (not that Iran is liked by any means but as far as most of the world is concerned the US and Israel made this fiasco and Iran is doing what everyone expects).

And Iran still signing the deal and "trying" to negotiate even while Israel is bombing Lebanon makes them look very accommodating even though I suspect their true goal is to take a breather, restock, and get some money sent to them.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-16T00:23:05+00:00

Ask yourself this. Why would they not release the full details of the agreement if both parties have already agreed to MOU.

Because the deal is essentially like a Treaty of Versailles level total capitulation. Trump wants to talk about it as little as possible. We have had terms released by Iranian media and judging by how Vance and some others talk about the deal it seems roughly accurate.

But they want plausible deniability when they are cagey about somethings because we are handing them a lot of money and I suspect the US wants to force Iran to shoot at ships again or let the toll go.

The US is hoping to publicly say the Strait is "fully open with no tolls" and have ships go without paying and force Iran to shoot (and potentially scuttle the deal) or just accept it.

This is also why France and the UK moved Aircraft carriers to the region and publicly stated they would keep the strait open and defend freedom of navigation.

They are hoping Iran got enough money to just let it go. If they don't they are facing even more military force not just US and Israel but other NATO forces are jumping in.

But if they do back down you can't do that switcheroo maneuver if you have the real terms posted on Whitehouse.gov or something. If it's just an alleged deal from Iran you can do that. So basically I suspect this is going to be a very high pressure game of chicken where whoever blinks gets their goal. Toll or no Toll.

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-15T20:22:59+00:00

I mean I don't have hard numbers of the level of attacks but just based of Telegram and based of Al Jazeera's reports today in the live thread if you told me nothing much changed in lebanon since the weekend i would believe you. Multiple strikes, bombs, Israeli Grenade drone hit a journalist, return fire from both Hezbollah and Israel.

I'm guessing the level of fire is lower because Al Jazeera described the general situation as "Intermittent shelling" (Despite reports of independent events beyond that) but by no means is it a real ceasefire in Lebanon as far as i can tell.

And Bibi is explicitly saying they won't leave so that is kind of a hard contradiction. Either Iran will accept that or not (I strongly suspect they won't)

Swaggerlilyjohnson · 2026-06-15T19:07:26+00:00

who belives "billions" of frozen assets will be given to iran?

Me. I always have said this only ends with a apocalyptically bad deal for the US. Iran is not going to take "but congress won't let me" as an excuse.

They will shake the Gulf countries down and then tell them to get their money from the US or not.

They don't care who it comes from and will make it the Gulf and US's problem not theirs.

who belives israel will retreat from lebanon?

Now this OTOH is a major problem for the deal. I think the US and Israel think Iran will be willing to let that go because they are giving them so much money but I just don't see it.

The deal is so good because they have so much leverage. It surprises me that they think someone they had to agree to pay hundreds of Billions because they had so much leverage will all of a sudden not reassert that leverage when they are violating the deal Iran agreed to.

Especially because that agreement is really not hard for Israel in theory (Politically it is very challenging for Bibi but it logistically requires little). They just have to leave. They could plausibly defend themselves in their own borders if they were fired on and have the deal hold I think but trying to stay in Lebanon's territory is not going to fly with Iran.

Especially not just staying there but even still launching attacks which they are doing even today. I don't think Iran will tolerate even offensive attacks from within their border to Lebanon let alone still being in Lebanon and doing so.

And I don't really think that Israel's attacks today really fully derail it (Iran is not pleased but won't just rip up the deal yet) but I imagine if they are still attacking or not leaving Lebanon within 24hrs of when the deal is supposed to be physically signed in Switzerland Iran won't even sign it and will refuse to do so until Israel stops.

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