International Man: Palentir’s Peter Thiel recently moved his family to Argentina, bought a $12M house in Buenos Aires, and some farmland in Uruguay. Thiel also has New Zealand citizenship and reportedly has a Maltese passport. So this isn’t his first attempt at international diversification.

What do you think he’s positioning for?

Doug Casey: It’s obvious he sees that the US is in trouble. In 2024, it came within a hair’s breadth of electing a low-IQ communist for President, and NYC actually did elect one for Mayor. He sees that the greatest risk to his freedom and wealth is political, so he’s diversifying politically.

I’ve never met him, but we appear to have similar tastes in offshore locations. I lived in New Zealand for years. His house in BA (I’m shocked he was able to find one that expensive) isn’t far from my place. Nor is his place near Punta far from mine.

He appears to be well-positioned in three of the most desirable places in the Southern Hemisphere, relatively isolated from World War 3.

I don’t doubt he keeps a well-stocked pantry. Perhaps I’ll pop over and borrow a cup of sugar or a garden tool someday, as neighbors often do…

International Man: With JD Vance as Vice President of the US, Thiel’s network is closer to Washington, D.C. power than ever before. What do you think he is hedging against?

Doug Casey: Having friends in high places is a time-tested way of protecting yourself from enemies.

That’s why the rich give lots of money to both parties in the US, to have a “roof” no matter which side is in office. But Thiel is a sound enough libertarian that I doubt he’d consider giving succor to the bad guys. He seems interested in using some of his wealth, estimated to be around $25 billion, to try to change things for the better. Vance seems like a decent enough person, looking uncomfortable when he has to promote or defend Trump’s goofier policies.

I have no idea what Vance’s character really is. But I’d like to believe Theil selected and mentored him because he was basically decent, and might survive swimming in the Washington cesspool. Maybe Thiel thinks that, if he can be installed as President, Vance might throw some sand on the country’s slippery slope to perdition.

If so, it’s an admirable effort on Thiel’s part. It helps offset the deleterious influence of people like Soros and Bill Gates. Most of the billionaire class seems to be amoral leftists who overwhelmingly support the bad guys. Why do they do it? Like Trump, they’re opportunists who lack a moral core. They don’t know or care what’s right or wrong, but they definitely know that a dollar given to a corrupt politician will likely be repaid ten, a hundred, or a thousand times over from the public treasury.

I’d like to think Theil is more philosophically inclined than the average billionaire. But, on the other hand, he’s made billions as a founder of Palantir, an Orwellian nightmare, which acts as a panopticon, a veritable Eye of Sauron, monitoring everything about everybody.

So, is Thiel a good guy? I don’t know. He’s clearly interested in questions about Good and Evil, having delivered talks on the Antichrist. Or maybe he’s like my erstwhile friend from Brooklyn, Jeffrey B., whose motto was “Anything you want, mistah, just gimme the money!”

International Man: What impact do you think Javier Milei’s presidency has had on powerful foreigners like Thiel?

Doug Casey: It’s well known that both Milei and Theil are outspoken advocates of anarcho-capitalism. Milei’s election in Argentina was something of world historic importance. Decades of kleptocratic Peronism had run Argentina until the wheels fell off. Milei was—against all odds—elected on a platform of abolishing the State. I’m a huge supporter, of course. Although I feel Milei is now talking the talk more than walking the walk (link).

That said, Argentina is still the only country in the world that’s at least talking the talk and taking steps in the right direction. Argentina may yet, therefore, get some serious investment. But the country has been so corrupted by decades of Peronism that I suspect the really big money will wait to see if Milei’s changes will stick. The issue is in doubt.

International Man: Doug, you’re no stranger to Argentina or the Southern Cone. What’s your take on Argentina as a viable plan B to insulate from the instability everywhere else?

Doug Casey: Everywhere in the world, the State, as an institution, is in the ascendant. Before WW1, no government took more than 5% of a country’s GDP. Now, 30% is considered low, and some governments, like France, take around 60%. Worse, these increased revenues are used for military budgets, welfare spending, regulation, and things like suppressing free speech.

That makes Argentina a top choice—even ahead of the US. Assuming Milei is reelected in a couple of years, I’d like to believe we’ll see many thousands of wealthy, right-thinking Europeans making what Rhodesians used to call “the chicken run,” immigrating to Argentina. Europe is a sinking ship.

Uruguay will also benefit. True, it’s a welfare state. But it’s small, stable, agrarian, and has lots of other advantages we’ve discussed in the past. I’m also a fan of Paraguay and Brazil, for different reasons.

I’ve been to well over 150 countries, and lived in ten. The way I see it, Argentina and Uruguay are the best bets for international diversification.

International Man: How important is diversifying yourself today? Immigration rules and borders are increasingly strict.

Doug Casey: It’s critical. I don’t doubt that the US could impose foreign exchange controls as the dollar gets weaker. The country is becoming socially, financially, economically, and politically unstable. The Red people and the Blue people can’t even have a polite conversation anymore. The stock market is in a historic bubble. When it melts down, the consequences for what’s left of the middle class will be ugly. Especially with the gigantic levels of debt everywhere. The situation is compounded by the fact that the real estate market is floating on a sea of debt. We’re looking at widespread unemployment and social unrest at home, and war abroad. Canada and Europe are in even worse shape.

We’re going into what I’ve termed The Greater Depression. It will be much deeper, longer-lasting, and much different from the unpleasantness of 1929-1946.

Things are still pretty mellow at the moment. I hope I’m wrong, and they stay that way. But don’t plan your life around it. It seems to me that everything that can go wrong is on the edge of doing so.

On the bright side, most of the real wealth in the world will still exist. Lots of it will just change ownership. There are no guarantees, but you don’t have to be hurt by these things. I believe you’ll find the advice we offer in my letter with David Stockman, Contrarian Insider and at Crisis Investing most helpful.

Editor’s Note: Unfortunately, there’s little any individual can practically do to change the course of these trends in motion.

The coming economic and political crisis is going to be much worse, much longer, and very different than what we’ve seen in the past.

That’s exactly why New York Times best-selling author Doug Casey and his team just released an urgent new video The Most Dangerous Event of the 21st Century. It explains what’s to come and exactly what you should do to protect yourself. Click here to watch it now.