Title: John Polomny Says Copper Could Hit $12 as the AI Bubble Bursts Show: In It to Win It (Steve Barten) — guest interview Guest: John Polomny, Actionable Intelligence Alert (AIA) Date: 2026-08-13 URL: https://youtu.be/UfQ2F8SAtjc Length: 30:56 Note: Fillers (um/uh/you know) removed and stutters/false starts collapsed; wording otherwise verbatim, timestamps unchanged. Public portion only; the conversation continues for the host's premium subscribers (oil & gas royalties, oil services, his "number one focus") — not captured here. =====
00:02 Welcome to In It to Win It. This is Steve Barten and thank you for tuning in. We are back with John Polomny of Actionable Intelligence. John, thank you for coming back on the show. >> Glad to be here, Steve. Thanks. >> Yeah, you're welcome. Glad to have you. Okay, let's start out with the Strait of Hormuz. We got a question from SB.
00:20 So, about 20% of the world's oil used to move through the Strait of Hormuz up until Trump's war with Iran. He's asking, "Do you think a very high proportion of that 20% of world oil supply can have been bypassing Hormuz via maybe the Caspian Sea, pipelines, ports on the south side of Oman, and overland routes?" I never hear anyone talk about that.
00:46 What are your thoughts? >> Yeah, that's definitely happening. You have a east-west Saudi pipeline. You have the one that was just discussed from Oman. You don't have to go into the Gulf. You have stuff from Iraq going into Syria with hundreds of truck. I'm sure there's something happening slightly in the Caspian.
01:10 But maybe you're bypassing half of it. It depends on who you want to listen to. No one's going to know the exact number. But I think all the big analyst houses have got their opinion on it. But yeah, it's not 100% closed.
01:32 Ships do make pick and runs through and get through, but it's not sufficient to restore trade there. And the thing I would remind people is a lot of people are still forgetting, I think, or they have forgotten. It's not just oil, right? It's LNG. It's 6 or 7% of your aluminum smelting capacity is in the Gulf.
01:55 Fertilizer production, nitrogen fertilizer — all these things that were being utilized due to the petrochemical complex that's there or fairly cheap energy. That's still a problem, too. And I think a lot of people have forgotten that, but yes, of course, people are going to try to find economic means to bypassing and bring the stuff to market, but it's not going to be sufficient to cover the full 20 million barrels or whatever. Maybe it's half or maybe a
02:31 little bit more than half. I don't know. It depends who you want to listen to. >> So, basically countries have been drawing down on their piggy banks of oil and that's what has allowed to make up for that loss? >> Well, yeah, you've had coordinated withdrawals. It's come out now.
02:53 This is pretty standard acknowledgement that the Chinese restricted their imports significantly and were drawing down their stocks. But again, this is all finite. It cannot just go on forever. This is why the Trump administration is desperate for a deal, obviously 3 months out from a congressional election.
03:15 And so they don't want oil prices spiking over 100 and gasoline five dollars plus a gallon and diesel six or seven dollars a gallon, that would be not good, because that's what blue bits Americanus looks at, stuff like that. They don't really know what's going on.
03:35 All they care about is the price of gasoline is high, somebody needs to do something. And so yeah, I think there's a lot of games being played. I don't know. I heard an interesting theory. I think it's plausible. It's impossible for us to know at our level, A grade here, but somebody made the argument.
03:56 I think there was meetings that the Trump administration had had with the Chinese. And it would be like why what motivates the Chinese to stop importing four, five, six million barrels a day, whatever it was. And basically going to their own stocks which are well over a billion barrels.
04:17 What are they getting for it? And I think they're going to get Taiwan. I think we're going to back away from Taiwan and there's not going to be a military invasion. This is all fantasy. These things are already melding economically and politically. If you look at the party that's out of power there, the woman that runs it, I forget her name.
04:33 She was already in China. This is going to happen just because of economic and the US is just not going to get involved in it. They don't have the ability to. I think some of your other questions you submitted to me we can get into that, but I remember the chief of naval operations under the Biden administration stated that the Navy needs to prepare for a war with China in 2027.
05:00 Well, I think that's a ridiculous statement now in retrospect and that's just not going to be possible. I've stated before that I have a thesis that the world's breaking down into hemispheric control points and the US is going to fall back onto its western hemisphere.
05:20 And we don't have the ability, the money, the will to be able to project this power anymore. And we're living in a post World War II military mindset that asymmetric warfare has nullified. So yeah, I think all of that kind of ties in and I don't know if that's the case what happened, but something's happened.
05:44 Why would the Chinese, if we're always accusing them, always threatening wars — why would they not let the price of oil go? Why would they dip into their stocks and take the pressure off? Again, these are all finite things. Eventually you have to restore production, and demand continues to go up.
06:06 So, you're drawing down stocks. And then you just had the fake gaslighting and jawboning. I was trying to track it. I gave up trying to track how many times we got it: we're working on a deal. A deal is imminent. Last time I looked, 38 times this has been said.
06:28 This is just trying to kick the can down the road. Politics drives what happens in the US. And so the last thing they want is oil over $100 a barrel and people saying that's it. You see the cost of living. Polling is the major thing that people are squawking about.
06:53 So, anyways, that's kind of a long-winded answer. That's kind of where I'm at on this. >> Okay. What would undo your thesis of the Western hegemon breaking down? What would you have to see for you to rethink that? >> This is nothing new under the sun, as Solomon said. Look at history. You're living history.
07:22 Theater continues throughout human history because the same thing happens to all empires. They basically go into decline because of military overreach and because they spend too much money, go into debt. There's secondary things involved which we don't have time to get into, but that's the primary thing. We just can't afford it.
07:42 and can't do this anymore. And so you say what would reverse it? I don't know. Name one congressman or senator or major politician that's talking about not just not even cutting spending, holding spending. You're running 2 billion dollar deficits. People don't even acknowledge this.
08:06 You're going to crack 40 trillion in debt. It's not going to stop. It's going to continue until it can't continue. And then eventually, okay, cut spending. Decrease the defense budget by 90%. Reform all of these entitlements. Do all the things that reinstate those. Go through and just do like Milei did in Argentina.
08:31 This is not politically possible. It's not going to happen. Both parties, you're asking the establishment to correct the establishment. They're not going to do that. And so a crisis will eventually happen. I don't know. It won't happen next week. Maybe happen in a month. It will happen eventually, as I've said before, and that's all that will matter then.
08:53 And then, after the wheels fall off the cart completely, when you have no other choice like in Argentina or many other examples throughout history, then the people finally say, "Okay, we have to deal with this." But by that time — I've said this. I make provocative statements and people, it depends who's in power because I'm against all of these politicians.
09:14 It's not going to be saved. You're in a slow decline. The average Roman that was living in Rome during its decline didn't know Rome was in decline. The average American doesn't know this, okay? And I find it amusing to go to my comments. You have Trump derangement syndrome.
09:34 Well, did I have Biden derangement syndrome when I was — It's not going to be fixed politically. It's going to continue until it can't continue anymore. And as I've said before, I think 2028, 2032, the last presidential — The United States will not exist as a political entity intact as it is now in a generation. It's impossible.
09:57 Okay? And so invest accordingly. Is that actionable tomorrow morning when the market opens? No, but this is something that should be in the back of your mind. And the younger you are, you're going to have to go through this, and it won't be pleasant. Look at the decline of the Soviet Union after perestroika.
10:18 It was horrible living there. People suffered. It's going to be horrible here. Massive inflation, massive taxation, political, economic, and social upheaval. We're in a cold civil war now, and people refuse to acknowledge. You have states — it was the same thing during the Biden administration. You have blue states refusing to comply with federal law.
10:37 Federal government's not doing anything because they don't want to have people in the streets, and they have to deal with it then. The same thing when Biden was in power. There were many sheriffs and people around who refused to comply with gun laws, okay? So, this is already the breakdown of federalism.
10:56 It's slowly but It's insidious, okay? And so, it will just continue, and then that'll be it. So, like I said, it's not actionable, but it's not going to change. Who's going to cut the debts? Who's going to pay the debt back? You cannot get elected in this country if you're going to say, "Well, we need to reform all of these programs.
11:13 " We need — how long did Dodge last? There was no appetite for it, okay? And so you're seeing in some experiments like they ran a Dodge program in Florida, but these are unique situations. And personally, I think it would be better if we had 50 countries on this continent, not one big federal government, but that's my own opinion.
11:32 And so, no, I don't think it's going to be reversed. All the things that — I repudiate the debt tomorrow and start over. They're not going to do that, okay? Because that's the end of the empire. So, this is how it worked. It'll trundle and creak along until the wheels fall off. And then something else will emerge.
11:50 When the UK had its Suez moment, 1953, or I argue World War I is probably the end of their empire. It didn't dry up and blow away. The UK is still there. They're just not big deal on the world stage anymore, even though they like to act as they are. But this is how it is. And so yeah. I think I follow what Doug Casey said in his book, International Man.
12:13 You should invest in one country, bank in a second, and live in a third. And the idea is don't have all your eggs in one political basket, okay? You can see what the trends are here. It's going to be a younger generation, a bunch of people that feel like they have not benefited are going to — there's going to be a big movement towards we're all in this together and everybody needs to pull their load.
12:42 You can call it socialism, you can call it whatever you want to call it, but you're seeing that. So, you need to prepare accordingly. The center is not going to hold. And so, that's it. And people think 3% or 4% inflation, wait till you have double-digit inflation, wait till you have yield curve control, capital controls come after that.
13:02 And Russell Napier and other people, lots more than me, have talked about this. And people say, "Well, that will never happen here." Well, it's happened in many, many countries around the world, and this idea that the United States is somehow exempt from economic laws and these political laws that go throughout history, it's not.
13:19 And so, that's what I think about it. It's not going to be reversed. The things that are necessary to reverse it are not politically possible. >> Okay, I'm going to share my screen here real quick and this is >> [clears throat and cough] >> the M2 money supply. >> [laughter] >> So, chart goes up, inflation goes up. Just here since COVID right around there.
13:44 They've increased the money supply almost 50%. So, that I think is essentially what you're talking about is we have to outperform that and use hard assets to do it. >> Yes, that's your goal. It's interesting, Mr. Warsh tried to portray himself as the new Volcker, which I think was a mistake.
14:04 It's stupid. The people are all clowns. You don't get into those positions unless you're going to do what's required. Bottom line is these debts can't be paid. They got to roll 9 trillion this year, plus sell another 2 trillion in debt for the deficit. Why do people look — if you want to bring the charts up, bring up the 30-year rate.
14:25 Multi-year going back to like the '80s. Bring up the 10-year. You can obviously see that the bond bull market was over a few years ago and we're going to be into many years of rates going up. And the US economy can't take the 7 8% long bond yields. The thing will break. Okay, there you go. >> Yeah, here's the 10-year yield.
14:46 I'm sorry, the 30-year yield. So, we were in a downtrend. We've recently broken that around 2022 and it looks like we're kind of breaking out right here in the last couple of weeks. So, >> Yeah, so eventually what are they going to have to do to arrest this? Because what did Bill Clinton say when somebody quipped, "Well, if he died, he'd want to come back and be reincarnated as the bond market.
15:12 " The United States, what are you going to do? You think these Russian serfs, these generation Z people that are all, "Gee, I don't understand what my standard of living" — because the Federal Reserve and the deficits, no one person in 10,000 understands this. And so what happens to a US economy at 7 8% on a 30 year? Everything break.
15:33 Okay? So what did Japan do? What do all these countries do? They do yield curve control. The United States did yield curve control. Lyn Alden wrote about this. She went through all this after World War II — we had debt to GDP that exceeded what we did here. They had yield curve control. And then what they will do after that, you'll be like, well, I'm not going to buy those certificates of confiscation.
15:56 Yes, you will. Because who makes the laws that regulate insurance companies, banks, pension funds? Congress. They'll mandate it. You have a Fidelity 401K, you'll buy 30% — 30% of your assets need to be in bonds. Well, I'm not going to comply. You don't have a choice. And I'll make insurance companies — so they'll hold the rates low, inflation will be above that.
16:18 That's yield curve control. And you slowly inflate the debt away over time. They steal your wealth. And you have to understand this is where we're heading. We're already in this. There's no way out of this, okay? And so you have to invest accordingly. Because you run inflation at even 3% in 20 years, you lose half your standard of living.
16:39 You lose half your purchasing power. People don't understand these concepts, okay? And that's why inflation, which is created by the state — you have to understand the Cantillon effect. He who is closest to the money printer wins. He who gets his hands on the money first and can put it into assets wins, okay?
17:01 People say, well, what would fix this? I don't know. Stop living beyond your means. You can't do it in your personal life, you can't do it in your business, but everybody just says, well, this is fine. We'll just keep running two trillion. You're running deficits as a percentage of GDP that are the same that you ran during World War II when you were fighting on two fronts against the Japanese and the Germans.
17:24 Where's the war? It's supposedly the best economy ever. You pull that two trillion out, you would have a collapse. This is another reason why you're not seeing the mass deportations. The country would collapse. Okay? They're not going to allow it. They're going to kick the can and try to work it and you have to understand this and people don't like this, okay? Because they're still being gaslighted and they buy into the whole thing, but this is reality. This is not unique to our
17:53 situation. This is a historical thing that has happened many times throughout history. And so this is one of the main themes that I have. You need to understand this and accept it and you just deal with it and you look for ways to — this is the sandbox you have to play in, so invest and live accordingly.
18:14 >> One of the hard assets that you like is copper. We're within spitting distance now of all-time highs here on copper. We got a question from Only Entertainment. He says, do you still stand by your copper call as data centers turn to photonics, optics to move data rather than copper? Also, public sentiment grows against data centers.
18:42 Do you see the US scaling down or just keeping at it and let whatever happens happen? >> Well, this question seems to be tied to the AI buildout. This is the biggest bubble. Paul and some other people came out. I had it on my charts on my last weekly call or video. As a percentage of GDP, this AI buildout exceeds what happened in 1999 and 2000 when that fiber and telecommunications and internet build-out.
19:16 And it also exceeds housing. So, this is a bubble. The amount of capital that they're investing, they cannot get a return on, okay? At some point, you have to have enough cash flow to justify the expense that you've made. They have not done this. And so, we're in this circle jerk of building these things out.
19:40 And so, it's consuming a lot of resources, okay? Copper is one of them. I think when this thing blows up, copper might pull back. We'll probably have a deep recession. But then again, what will the Federal Reserve do if we have a deep recession? What do they do after every bubble pops? There's an initial reaction in the market.
19:58 It collapses. During the internet bubble, the Nasdaq went down like 80 or 90%. Can that happen again? Yes, but what happened to value stocks and commodities after the initial pullback, because everything goes down in a panic? Then the Federal Reserve comes in and does what? Prints a lot of money because there's going to be a lot of problems, okay? All these companies, high-margin businesses that are these hyperscalers, they were initially when they were building out, they were doing it out of
20:30 cash flow, okay? Then when they exhausted their cash flow to do this, then some of them started issuing stock. Now, they're issuing debt, okay? So, if you can't pay your debts, what's going to happen to these things? This is like an arms race. That's how Zuckerberg described it.
20:47 You have to keep doing this. And remember, it's not like I build this thing and it's a 20-year factory and I just have to maintenance capital. It's a continuous arms race as the electronics or the technology speeds up and Nvidia comes out with a new whatever, then you have to go buy that.
21:08 Every two or three years you're having to reinvest hundreds — how do you get a return on this? At some point you have to get a return. Okay? And this is going to be a problem. So, yes, if you have 3 and 1/2% of GDP reflective of this build-out and it crumbles, then copper will probably suffer, okay? But, the problem is who knows if it's when it's going to pop.
21:35 Who knows if it will pop? This is all in the future. And so, copper — there's not enough copper. All you have to do is look up Robert Friedland, listen to him. He knows more about copper than anybody, okay? We don't have enough copper mines. Chile's in terminal decline. Peru's having problems — all these problems and the demand for copper is not just for AI, it's for electrification and development in the global south and east.
22:00 And so, it's going to be volatile, but by the end of the decade, where's copper going to be? $10 or $12 a pound? Who knows? Okay? It's in the future, but the supply — you have to look at both sides of it. Could you have a temporary pullback? Because this AI build-up blows up? Yes, absolutely.
22:20 Will that be permanent? No, because the supply is just not there. The resources are getting harder to get to, deeper, harder, more complex, and more politically volatile places. Do you want to spend $8 billion on a copper mine in the DRC, in the eastern DRC? Well, they've been able to navigate that because they have Chinese partners and the DRC, they're not going to screw around with them.
22:44 But, if you're Rio or BHP, do you want to go into these places? Selling that to your board is difficult. So, where is all the money going to come from for the new copper? We have to mine as much copper as we've mined in the history of the world in the next 20 years.
22:59 Is that going to happen? I don't know. I don't see the investment. So, these things are cyclical. You need to pay attention to them and you don't just buy and hold and forget about it like it's buying Monster or buying some growth stock and you just sit back for 20 years and it goes up 10.
23:17 That's not how you play resources. So, I don't know where copper's at today, 650, something like that, but there's ways to play it and you have to be cognizant of the cycles it goes through and it is based on economics. Right now there's a lot of demand, supply is constrained, so the price is up.
23:37 I don't know what else to say about it. I don't try to predict where these prices are going to go in the short, or medium term, it's impossible. >> Okay. So, it sounds like you're not worried about if the data center doesn't go through, if the hyperscalers don't consume that, the copper bet is still on.
23:56 >> Well, you could say the photonics or whatever, but that doesn't — what goes into the transformers and all the wiring for the power. That's where a lot of the copper's consumed. And so the bottom line is when this bubble blows up, which it will, we're going to have a deep recession.
24:12 I don't know how bad it will be, but copper go down to four or 350, that's kind of median price of production. Probably, who knows? I don't know. That'll be a buy, you should back the truck up because what's the Federal Reserve going to do? They're going to come in and print more money than any — they're just going to — that's what they always do and then what happens to all these hard assets? Just look at history.
24:32 They rally. So, you have to understand it. If you see, you'll kind of understand if the bubble's popping, then you might just want to say, well, I have some copper stocks that are up several hundred percent, maybe I sell them then and buy them back later. That's what you have to do in this sector.
24:49 You can't just — everybody says you're just going to ride through. You're not going to ride through a 50 or 60% decline. Most 999 out of a thousand people will sell. And they'll sell at the bottom. So, if you have profits in the hundreds of percent in a couple years, you might want to think about taking some off the table.
25:08 And so, you have to manage these positions and understand it's cyclical. >> Okay. We have a question on exactly that, and then we're going to go a little bit deeper with premium subscribers. Golden Moon Chuck, love the screen name, is asking, "How and when do you take profits? I often take them off the table too early, but when a stock is up 30% is the old-school rule still a thing? Centered on a mining stock portfolio, what is your magic formula for locking in gains?" >> I don't have magic formulas. There's no
25:39 magic. What I do is not going to be appropriate for what other people do. I don't know this person. How can I tell them what to do? Okay? If you're laying awake at night staring at your ceiling fan, rubbing your hands together, and drinking Maalox because the stock is down, what do I tell people to do? When you buy these things, first of all, let me preface this, and people don't like it.
26:00 I don't care if you don't like it. I don't give a damn. Most of you people should not be putting your money into these things. You don't have the background, you don't have the knowledge, you don't have the constitution. Now, you're going to disregard that. I know that, people. But you're going to buy these things, okay? You need to understand that they're very volatile.
26:22 Look at the high and low. Go back all the stats available. Go back each year and look at the difference in the high and low. These things can move 50 or 60% up and down each year in the middle of a bull market. If you don't understand this and can't make — let's go back to what Uncle Rick says. You have to understand this, and then you have to make that volatility your friend.
26:48 If I buy XYZ copper company, for example, have you written it down in a book, in your logbook, why you've — what's your thesis behind it? Is it a developmental company? Is it run by people that have serially been successful before? Like a Ross Beaty or the Lundin family or people that actually know what they're doing. And so if it drops 60% and nothing's changed with the thesis just because the market took a short-term blip you should be buying more.
27:16 But what do most people do? So if you're in resource stocks and you're selling after 30% gains, you need to get out of resource stocks. This is not what they're — I could say yes, some people say it goes up 100%. Maybe you could take down half your money. Now you've recovered your initial capital and you can let it ride.
27:35 My always view is if your stomach is hurting and you can't sleep and you're worried all the time, then your position is too big. You should sell it down. But this is a very emotional sector and people start going on Twitter and they go on social media and they get riled up. I talk to people all the time.
27:56 First thing I ask them is why did you buy this? And there's a long pause. And then it finally comes out, well, I saw something on Twitter. Somebody said — so you didn't do any research. You can't tell me why you bought this. And now it's down 50% and you're upset.
28:11 I don't know what to tell you. Go play in traffic. You shouldn't be in this sector. You're playing in traffic. You don't know what you're doing. So with all your — get knowledge, as Malcolm Forbes used to say. This is a knowledge-based business. It's very volatile and you have to tame that volatility and master it and use it for your advantage.
28:34 When the masses are selling and there's nothing fundamentally wrong with the company and your thesis is intact then you could buy more. You should be glad. If you like canned peaches in heavy syrup and they cost a dollar a can at Kroger and your wife calls you and says, "Hey, peaches in heavy syrup are selling for 40 cents.
28:54 You should buy a couple cases, right?" Well, this is the exact opposite of what people do in these markets. So, I know this offends people. You're going to — who is this guy? And that's the guy that if you look in the mirror, that's who I'm talking to. That's the guy that hasn't got it yet, and people don't consistently make money in resource stocks.
29:13 It's the only way to do it. >> John, I love your weekend recap every Saturday. Keep up the great work. If viewers want to follow you and your work, how can they do so? >> YouTube and the weekly market update. We talk about these things just in a general sense. Then we have the Substack Actionable Intelligence.
29:39 There's a paid subscription. This is where we get into what I'm buying and what I'm doing in my personal portfolio to take advantage of the exact things we're talking about. And so far that's been fairly successful. If people are interested, they can check that out on Substack. >> Okay, we'll put your links down below and in our Substack article.
30:00 We're going to go a little bit deeper with premium subscribers. John, thank you for your time. >> Sure. >> Thank you for watching. John and I continue the conversation for premium subscribers and we go much deeper. We talk about where he sees opportunity in oil and gas royalty companies. How he thinks about oil services.
30:18 And we also get into his number one focus right now for what he thinks could be the biggest opportunity ahead. Where is capital starting to flow? What markets are still being ignored? And where could the next major setup be forming? Check out the link below to get full access to the premium interview.
30:34 And as a premium member, you'll also get my weekly personal portfolio recap, real-time buy and sell alerts, and access to our premium member chat group. Thank you for being here. You have a wonderful rest of your day and happy trading. For more content like this, check out these videos right here.