You’re formally invited to…
Dear Fellow Expat:
Welcome back.
And welcome to something I should have started writing long ago.
A real letter about the consequences of the economy and the financial system…
Something… called Extraction.
Extraction is what happens when a system… corporate, financial, political, personal…stops serving people and starts feeding on them.
Not necessarily through malice, but through structure. Through priorities.
Through incentives that reward taking more than they reward building.
You’ve probably felt it too.
That creeping sense that something is always being taken… your time, your money, your attention, your ambition. False promises. Broken social contracts.
It’s a pattern.
A system built on draining value from individuals while insisting it’s doing them a favor. That place where there’s no accountability… just people saying “That’s the way it is… deal with it…”
The place where permission is not just expected… It’s demanded.
If you’ve ever felt drained by a system designed to extract from you…
You’re in the right place.
That’s what this letter is about…
But, before we begin, a toast to all of you out there on the edge, too.
Looking for answers. Longing for ideas. Trying to protect your health, your wealth, and yourself in a world of inflation, debasement, volatility… and unknowns.
You’ve come to the right place… far from the noise… for an honest conversation.
And for a strategy to give you back your time and money… with little effort required.
At the Edge
I’ve walked many miles over the last three months… as I reestablish my purpose.
I defined that purpose on Thursday.
To uncover how markets and economic systems truly work and translate and simplify that knowledge so people can protect themselves, seize opportunities, and think independently in a system that rewards confusion.
Why that purpose?
I’ve been reflecting on that thing so many people feel is wrong… but can’t place it.
It hangs on the tongue like battery acid…
Because deep down, people can feel when something is draining them, even if they can’t name the source.
What’s wrong with this economy? What’s wrong with this market? With this system?
What’s wrong with the people who extract from others…
These questions itch and scratch… and won’t stop nagging over sleepless nights.
I know the answer… because I’ve lived it, felt it, and studied it rigorously.
The answer is obvious once you see it…
Today’s system wasn’t built to help the average person…
It was built to extract… people and institutions pulling at your money, time, labor, and attention.
Always taking. Never creating.
I’ve long quoted Frank Sebotka from Season 2 of The Wire on this phenomenon.
“We used to make shit in this country, build shit. Now all we do is put our hand in the next guy’s pocket.”
That’s extraction…
Extraction hits you in ways you first barely notice: the higher fees, the smaller paychecks, the shrinking benefits, the subscriptions you never wanted, the inflation nobody can explain, the false promises from authority, the debt that never goes down.
It’s death by a thousand transactions.
You work more, earn less, and watch everyone in charge tell you everything is fine.
This is the part where most people give up… because they don’t realize the system is designed to exhaust them first.
This issue isn’t a recent phenomenon. It is the essence of the system we’ve operated under since at least 2008. And it only accelerated after the COVID-19 crisis.
But here’s a truth most people miss…
The extraction system only works on people who don’t understand it.
Once you see the incentives, once you know the patterns, once you know where the traps are, you stop being prey.
You get your time back. Your money back. And you get your agency back.
This publication exists for one reason: to give you back your leverage.
Welcome to Postcards from the Edge of the World…
Here, the Edge is not the end…
It is the vantage point from which we can see the world for what it is…
It is a place where you will properly empower yourself...
Where we will have a different conversation… sometimes fun, sometimes sober…
But one with one mission that sets us apart from the financial publishing world…
You will always leave here informed, aware, and the author of important decisions…
Here you can lead yourself and your finances through one of the most turbulent periods in American and global economic history.
Here you will learn - historically - how people before you have invested and avoided the pitfalls of a similar system that has reached its limits…
Here is a new day…
The Difference
It’s a joy to bring Postcards back into my editorial fold.
Yes, I have enjoyed writing Me and the Money Printer because it allows me to cover modern finance with the reverence and honor it deserves… which is None.
But Postcards offers a different mission.
What separates these two letters?
That’s simple…
Money Printer explains the system… how it moves, how to trade it, and how to thrive financially in it.
Postcards explain the world the system creates… and how to live in it while still building and protecting wealth...
Money Printer is the mechanics.
Postcards are the consequences.
Money Printer is in the middle of the market madness… on the trading floor…
Postcards are the flag in a corner of the intellectual wilderness…
There’s a lot more to life than stocks, bonds… and crypto.
You have to live in this world… prepare and move accordingly.
It Isn’t Personal… But You Should Make It So
Here at the Edge of the World, you have to look down into the abyss and see what others saw long before you, with an open mind, even when it’s uncomfortable.
It took millennia of wars, failures, accidents, and statistical miracles for you to exist at all. You are here, in this moment, reading these words.
That in itself is a miracle.
And when you look back over the course of history that brought you here, you’ll see the same patterns repeating in economics, in politics, in markets, and in human behavior. The technology changes. The incentives do not.
It’s a humbling and almost spiritual realization.
And it only happens out here on the edge, where the wind hits your face, where your breath rises in the cold, and where you finally feel free enough to speak honestly.
Because once you strip away the noise, you see the deeper truth that most people never catch.
Extraction is… not personal.
It’s structural. It’s the product of incentives.
Everyone in power, from corporations to politicians to bureaucrats to bankers to executives to influencers, is simply following the trail that rewards them most.
If you understand the incentives, you understand the behavior.
And once you understand the behavior, the world stops feeling chaotic and starts feeling predictable.
My message: Predictability is leverage.
It is the hidden door you always sensed was there but never opened.
And it is the last place they would ever think to look for us.
Now that you know where we’re headed, here’s how each week will work.
What to expect
Let me make this simple.
Every week, you’ll receive a new edition of Postcards from the Edge of the World.
It will arrive with one purpose.
To help you see the system for what it is, understand how it operates, and position yourself so the extraction machine cannot hollow you out.
Each issue follows the same structure.
Seven brief sections… and one recommendation at the end.
Each section has a job to do.
Each one pulls back a layer of the world you are trying to survive and profit from.
Here is the map.
The Ways They Take
We start with one mechanism of the week. A real example. A fresh wound.
A clear look at who is taking what, how they do it, and why it matters.
What’s Beneath the Noise
You get the overlooked signal.
The thing hiding inside the headlines.
The data point, legal change, market shift, or political tell that reveals the next extraction point before everyone else sees it.
How Power Really Works
This is the incentive layer.
The politics. The business motives. The networks.
The real reason behind the decision makers and why they always seem to win. This is where the veil gets pulled back.
The Everyday Hustle
This is where the challenge hits real life.
The grocery store. The credit card bill. The rent. The energy bill. The shrinking paycheck. This connects the macro system to your kitchen table.
The Real Economy
Here, you get the practical side.
What does all of this mean for households, for the middle class, for savers, for borrowers, for workers, and for investors?
Most importantly, this is where I show you the leverage point. The angle.
The place where the extraction machine slips.
The Back Page
This is the human space.
The rant. The story. The humor.
The part where I put the charts down and say the thing everyone else is too polite to say.
The Sovereign Move
This section is the point of the entire publication.
Every week, you will receive one actionable recommendation that strengthens your position inside a system designed to weaken you. Not hype. Not clickbait. Not the usual “buy this stock because it looks cheap” nonsense that fills financial inboxes.
The Sovereign Move is the opposite of that.
It is a weekly step toward reclaiming agency in a world that tries to strip it away.
Each recommendation directly connects to the week's theme.
If the system is taking through inflation, you get the asset that resists inflation.
If the system is taking through debt, you end up with the position that wins, as borrowers lose.
If the system is tightening liquidity, you get the trade that benefits from scarcity.
There is a method behind this.
The goal is to help you build the personal equivalent of a sovereign wealth strategy.
Institutions with real power do not gamble. They position themselves so that crises become opportunities and instability becomes a harvest.
You will learn how to do the same.
Some weeks, the Sovereign Move will be a stock.
The kind of company that sits quietly inside the global plumbing and gets paid every time someone else must pass through a toll. Other weeks, the move may be a currency, a commodity, a bond, a spread, or a shift in portfolio structure.
Sometimes the move will not be a trade at all.
Sometimes it will be a defensive action. A structural change. A way to shield capital from extraction, such as reducing exposure to a particular sector, changing liquidity levels, or building protection through global diversification.
Each move has one purpose.
To help you build wealth that is resilient under pressure. Wealth that grows even when the system breaks. Wealth that survives shocks, changes, and political cycles.
If you follow this section consistently over time, you will create something most people never experience.
A method and mentality that does not depend on hope or headlines.
A portfolio that behaves more like a sovereign wealth fund than a retail brokerage account.
That is the point.
The extraction machine works because most people react.
The sovereign move works because you do not.
This is where the power is.
This is where your leverage begins.
And once you see how the system works… I assure you, you’ll never unsee it again…
Welcome to Postcards from the Edge of the World…
Look for exclusive content, subscriber-only, in the coming weeks… on how we identify investment opportunities and properly screen and dedicate capital to our top ideas.
Stay positive,
Garrett Baldwin
Excellent. He's back!
GB, thnx for the insight. After reading it I am feeling akward, as a protagonist of Carpenter's 'They Live' (we sleep) John Nada (played by Roddy Piper), who puts on a pair of special sunglasses and discovers that the world around him is not as it seems