EU

SarcasmReigns

True. We’ve rented the BYD SUV in Germany a few times and looked up prices there - the base model is about 30k EU, the ones we rented had all the bells and whistles and they were like $50k EU. I believe even in Mexico where they were originally sold for $10k, they’re much higher now.

Speedy_Greyhound

And China, India, The EU, Great Brittan, Australia, Ukraine..... This is why Canada is in no rush to capitulate to the orange turd-goblin.

Winnipeg-Bear

It’s all good, pretty sure Canada is gonna be throwing in with the EU soon. Good luck Mexico, I’m sure Trump is going to sign in invisible ink

Maryjanegangafever

Good for Mexico!! Canada striking negotiations with the EU. Sort of big thing….

RoaringPity

this is the response bc Canada and EU apparently have something being announced next week

Harbinger2001

Canada is announcing their pivot to the EU next week. It's over.

Slaaneshdog

Yes, they do so by choice because they have the money for it, their cities allow for it, and because gas is so incredibly cheap in the US You think EU we wouldn't see a meaningful uptick in big cars if our gas priced was half the prices they normally are, our purchasing power shot up meaningfully, and our cities got redesigned to make it a lot easier to drive big cars around in them?

Ok_Upstairs6472

Dogs can vote in EU. Look, they have way better elected officials than us here in the US.

TheirSam

Sure they do. I get foreign tax withholding on every single one of my EU pharma dividends.

Alternative-Disk404

Hey don't blame everyone, Scotland voted overwhelmingly to stay in the EU, along with London. I don't think you can just blame it on the algorithms when a whole country voted against it.

Adventurous_Ant_4233

Nah, not all countries levy capital gains taxes on foreign investors. Most EU countries don't, for example.

Significant_Cover_48

In 2020, when the UK left the Union for brief moment my country, Denmark, was the largest exporter and producer of oil and natural gas in the EU after having been number two since 1993. Today we have closed down most drilling sites and are phasing out fossil fuels,, and by 2050 the nation is projected to produce 0% oil and natural gas. Zero.

-mini-kuma

Why Americans in so much debt? They're making trillions in tariffs ∘ ∘ ∘ ( °ヮ° ) ? Anyways, UK/EU bumped the NIKKEI+KOSPI on close, so hopefully a decent Monday in Asia.

Sick0h

Very interested to see where EU decides our market will be next week. US trading hours should probably just be closed tbh.

Copenhagen8ull

Depends on what breaks the AI bull case, it could be: High energy prices = Own oil/Energy Overcapacity in infrastructure = Own the applications Higher bonds but safe economy = Own banks Distrust in USA = Own EU value, have a company at 4 times EBIT guidance growing double digit where money could rotate. \+ A healthy long term mindset.

ryzetard

stable core inflation meaning oil is still not affecting broad economy. id like to remind you EU has hiked but from 2.25 to 2.5, same fucking core inflation, whereas US is at 3.5% go on, hike on a stable cpi reading while us bond yields are through the roof and cuck hard your AI race and regular consumers to bring down the core cpi by like 0.2 while its still fucking stable xd sometimes im leaning ber but this time bers are literally acting retarded as fuck

Aeplwulf

Don't overbuy into Chinese narratives to compensate for American narratives. They built the biggest bridge in human history, but also most of china doesn't have proper plumbing outside the big cities and people make 800$ a month selling stuff to EU, US and ASEAN, and all three of those markets are raising barriers. TBH, if any one of these ships starts going down, they drag everyone else with them, just look at 2008.

EnvironmentalScar675

mb, EU times 💀 I meant 4PM GMT-4

makeaccidents

Average commute distance across US and EU are in a similar range (10-15 miles each way) Source US census, German federal statistics office, UK gov.

FrankRuben27

To assume that the EU/ECB (as it acts now, not as it was once meant to act) needs Trump to kill its economy and businesses is either uneducation or malevolence. Same for assuming that rational acting sits on the other side of that ocean. Out of the many examples, just educate yourself on the newly active PPWR (Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation), its history and its current status (just google Jessika Roswall ppwr). Having lived as European over many decades and seeing these people act is utterly depressing. But please go ahead and clap yourself on your shoulder for buying EU ETFs...

montblanc2020

Valid thesis, but probably way too early. Remember, the EU is slower than a turtle. Until there will be meaningful developments, V and MA will not drop significantly.

Harbinger2001

Canada already has a free trade agreement with the EU and the regulatory requirements are very light for exporters. Far simpler than USMCA paperwork.

Harbinger2001

There is something very big being prepped to announce with the EU.

Aktie_Anders

I don't even have access to that specific ETF, non-EU listen ETFs aren't available on my Scandinavian brokerage.

Chance-Albatross7809

natgas is more important for that, which is actually relatively cheap if ur in the US if ur in the EU though ur cooked natgas is fucked

el_dude_brother2

China plan os working really really well. Play long game, let other countries fuck themselves. Trump and Putin are like heaven sent for China. They slowly become everyones go to super power. US isolating the EU, Canada, Mexoco is stupid af

Lumpy_Conference6640

Oh, hello coup d'etat... Funny, I thought the US was worth more than 1.4T. Do we have any other bidders... China, EU, Greenland anyone, anyone... Bueller? 

Spiritual-Matters

ELI5: OP doesn’t understand payment processors. They do more than just transfer numbers. They handle CC fraud investigations and disputes. Their rewards programs are mostly funded by companies accepting the CC payments, so consumers won’t want to switch anyhow. The sovereignty issue is real and the EU is looking for alternatives, however.

Sick0h

Look at the charts. EU tells us what our market is worth during our premarket hours and we just dick around all day.

Kaastu

Don’t think the euromarket is comparable. EU bonds is a very small amount of total EU country bonds. You should probably look at Germany, France, Italy, Spain and UK to get a good picture

The_Albertino

Germany and EU regulations , they are fucked. They had to secretly buy Russian Nat Gas last winter

Spy300

>Breaking News: The European Central Bank raised interest rates in an attempt to quell rising inflation driven by the war in the Middle East. No, this is a symbolic 25bps hike that does nothing to fight 150 oil. In reality, negative real rates are sky rocketing and EU is devaluing their debt. As it was called. >u/Spy300 5 points 1 year ago >They're going to need coordinated hyperinflation globally as the entire G7 has run their debt up to unsustainable. >Iran attack for an oil double is the easiest way for them [[1]](https://www.reddit.com/r/wallstreetbets/comments/1l70sah/daily_discussion_thread_for_june_09_2025/mwv83rk/) ✅️

Some-Stranger-7852

Maybe? Maybe not? EU can’t offer the same financial packages US labs can. China can match them, but then you have to live in China (has some advantages, but currently still more disadvantages), so I’d expect most of top tier talent who would want to move to China have already done it.

toggaf69

Most of the EU countries are starting to hit some uncomfortable levels of spending to keep up with their Luxury Boomer Communism, but they’re still better off than the US is under these clowns

Zaigard

> they've already completely deindustrialized United States: Holds an estimated 11% to 16% share of global manufacturing value-added (MVA). European Union: Holds an estimated 15% to 17% share of global manufacturing value-added. > and become a welfare refugee state United States: Recent OECD data estimates the public cost of hosting and supporting refugees and asylum seekers at roughly $7,500 per head. European Union: EU member states vary widely, but average public expenditure per refugee ranges significantly. For example, countries like Germany and France record around $6,100 to $6,400, but most countries pay less than $4,000.

ClubSoda

Canada: It’s all good. We have buyers in EU and Asia now.

Koki4kok

Im from the depths of the EU, no lie I also like mayo 🤣, but not fat tho. Would never put it on sushi.

AMadWalrus

I’m from the US and live in the EU and I feel like Europeans like to slater random shit like sushi with mayo. In my experience, not that many things with random mayo in the US

ankokudaishogun

> You think EU Digital wallet is the same as UnionPay? No. The ECB Wallet(the EU Wallet is unrelated) is an app which is meant to connect and manage an ECB-backed account. UnionPay is a digital payment services provider, basically managing the transfer of credits used in purchases from a bank to another(to simplify a bit).

LocusHammer

You think EU Digital wallet is the same as UnionPay? Ok. There isnt really more to be discussed. It would not be productive.

Were_all_dead_anyhow

The West is slaved by its creditors. We (US, EU, UK, etc.) are intentionally mired in debt, and when a state is reliant on creditors to buy its debt and avoid economic collapse, the state’s foreign and domestic policies conform to the interests of international finance and geopolitics rather than the moral will of its citizenry or even the economic stability of the country. People get hung up on the image of physical ownership of the chattel slave, when the end goal is what people should focus on; the fundamental logic of slavery is the elite extraction of labor and resources from a lower class. When you own sovereign debt, structural coercion is the new modern debt bondage. Under chattel slavery, masters bore the cost of feeding and housing captives, whereas debt bondage functions as a highly efficient upgrade where workers are financialized through student loans, housing, medical debt, etc., forcing them to police themselves and work indefinitely just to service the interest. When the people want services to improve in a democratic state, the politicians shrug and say "we can't afford it". You are left with a democracy that strictly prioritizes system preservation by funding debt servicing, police, and surveillance, over public welfare because state stability is tied to financial markets and social control. Interest payments to private creditors are treated as legally non-negotiable to prevent economic collapse, ensuring the financial class is paid first. The resulting inequality and declining public services, popular unrest naturally rises, prompting politicians to aggressively fund security and surveillance apparatuses to suppress people and guarantee order. This is why the Epstein people aren't punished outside of a token few. Whenever the people of a country have had enough, the creditor-class resorts to scapegoats: The domestic "Other", usually immigrants and minorities, the "Leach" like welfare and unions, and/or the external threat as a means to gin up a war to purge your angry and poor men abroad before they stand against you at home. Neat huh?

LocusHammer

I think you saying terminal management is a non-issue is clear evidence that you arent grasping the full impact. But hey, if you agree with the thesis, buy shorts on the networks. Go make some money. If my pov is laughably offbase, it should be easy return for you. I am a payments consultant and have managed payment contracts globally, and implementation, for over 10 years at both Uber and NCLH. I oversaw North America, EU, and APAC market expansions. So if my perspective is laughable, and you know better, go get your money and apply for a SVP level role in payments. Make 300k+ base. Uplift your family. Two of our clients race track and bucees had over 10,000 merchant accounts alone. 10-15 terminals per location + fuel terminals. Imagine telling a merchant like that this is a non issue. Especially since those are the ones with firepower to lobby.

ankokudaishogun

> At least 3-5 different integrations need to talk to one another. https://www.ecb.europa.eu/euro/digital_euro/progress/html/ecb.deprp202510.en.html#toc4 > A dedicated payment terminal is just as annoying and it introduces consumer friction Yes, thus the update of existing terminals being more likely. Terminals, after all, are just that: the last part in the communication chain, as long as a D€-enabled phone\card uses the same hardware systems as any current card\phone(and that's the current plan), there is no reason to change the physical terminal. But dealing with multiple terminals has never been a real issue. > A new terminal is also 1500 dollars. EU is forcing merchants to pay for terminals for one payment method? Aside the expense being deducible from taxes, most terminals aren't bought but are rented. The cheap ones(you can easily buy one for 100€ tax excluded and fully deducible) usually come with a regular fee for the software. Heck, you can use *your own phone* as a terminal, only paying for the software. It's very much a non-issue. > Please link the legislation because I've been following this and the first iteration of the EU wallet is peer to peer only. Like Zelle. So the legislation forces adoption of a feature that does not exist? EU wallet 0.1 is p2p, yes. But it's also far from the final version. EU Wallet *is planned* to being able to manage payments(see [footnote 35](https://www.ecb.europa.eu/euro/digital_euro/progress/html/ecb.deprp202510.en.html#footnote.35))

Diddly_eyed_Dipshite

I primarily agree with you. But on the nuclear arms, I would much rather no country had them, and I would very enthusiastically support complete NPT. However the US has them, is a sworn enemy of Iran, has threatened to wipe out their civilisation, and has committed heinous crimes against civilians, knowing this, and that theres nothing stopping the US from doing this again and again in the future, then I cant consciously reject the right of Iran to have deterrent nukes, the US treatment of NK compared to Iran has shown us that Iran needs them. I come from a completely neutral company, I'm the EU which was entirely built on peace, yet I hope we build out our nuke infrastructure or come under Frances deterrent umbrella, just because the US could easily start a war with us in the future too.

DiscoStuTalkin2You

EU confirmed rate hike as expected no doubt it’s gonna happen here too

LocusHammer

You do not understand how payment orchestration works. A payment method isn't just a oush to a terminal. At least 3-5 different integrations need to talk to one another. And then there is accounting ledger and system changes on the merchant side. But let's see. Remind me in however long you'd like and I'll gladly eat my words. A dedicated payment terminal is just as annoying and it introduces consumer friction. Which terminals will accept it? Please link the legislation because I've been following this and the first iteration of the EU wallet is peer to peer only. Like Zelle.

ankokudaishogun

> Seems they will palce some mechanism that will, at start, limit an impact on Visa, Mastercard and etc. Nobody *keeps* money on VISA\Mastercard accounts. This is to limit impact con *commercial banks* who, having spent the last few decades lowering account interests, fear people would prefer a zero-cost EU D€ account than letting themselves being sucked like by leeches.

ankokudaishogun

> And then you mean to tell me the EU will develop payment architecture that will make merchants want to adopt it as a payment method? Are you joking, right? This is EU. They already developed LEGISLATION forcing merchant to adopt it. It will be either a dedicated POS terminal or, most likely, a software update for the already present terminals.

ankokudaishogun

Both: Russia made EU going "let's start planning a contingence for a nightmare scenario, as unlikely it will b.." "TRUMP: SNACTION ICC!!""!" EU:"fuck, we actually need something"

ankokudaishogun

To start because in most cases you *pay* for credit cards in EU. You *also* often pay for debit cards, but it's usually half as much or less.

Interesting-Tough640

If the US paused progress then I expect both EU snd china would acquire some additional talent pretty quickly

gotcree

Cannara just loaded up more to their credit facility. They're going all in on expanding cultivation capacity in preparation for applying and obtaining their EU-GMP certification. With Germany cracking down on EU-GMP washing, compliant EU-GMP flower will be hard to come by and will become that more scarce.

CurbsEnthusiasm

Literally received a $12k tariff refund two weeks ago, only to lose it again on a new order of product from the EU. It’s not like these companies got a refund and just stopped buying the same tariffed products again. The new tariffs are under a different classification now, and the chances of receiving another refund are much lower this time. 

BeyondGITSandBots

Hmm, I didn't look into it in detail, so take it with a grain of salt. Some assumptions of possible future events or risks that I would consider and their likelihood: - US dollar will almost certainly (continue to) devalue because the government sits on a huge pile of debt and the interest (bond yield) they have to pay on it increases for 30 and 10 year bonds despite the fact that the treasury is buying them back which is supposed to stabilize ir lower the yields. This means people don't trust the us as debtor anymore (especially US allies sell bonds, and Japan structurally has to, to support the yen value against the US dollar, see carry trade). The main cause is rising inflation that foreseeably stays high (Iran war, Ru-Ukr war, increasing fuel and gas prices for years to come). The only thing the US can do to address these structural inflation/debt/interest problems is: stabilize household (reduce spending, increase taxes, especially for the wealthy) but let's be honest, they have not a history of doing that. So money printer goes brrr, QE, US dollar devalues (also because it's on its way of not being the global curency standard anymore). - AI speculation may or may not work out. It cannot be reliably predicted yet because efficiency gains might seriously push prices lower and disruptive technologies are being developed. I'll not go into the details here, although I am very well informed, following it daily and heavy AI user for coding myself. What we can say: a lot (hundreds of billioln, possibly trillions) are in there, mag7 values are blown up horribly due to mainly future expectations and general US stock market is still at the upper limit of PE/Shiller (both not perfect but give an idea) valuation. So, the risk of a bubble, a pop and a major course correction is very real. What we can say: at least valuations are so high, most stocks are not are not worth investing, given the risk. So, what would I invest in? Difficult. Probably a good old diversified mix (for long term) or pick out specific stocks (short term, if you have the time to invest): - No US stuff - No bonds (dollar devaluation) - No US stocks, except single picks (not affected by USD devaluation but prices are high already and AI circle jerk outcome highly uncertain) So that leaves us with: - Global developed conuntry stocks (I have not informed myself here about global macros, industries, valuations, etc., so I cannot tell you which countries/industries). Random guess I would at least look into: EU (prices possibly more moderate than US), China (I know nothing about it, but the market has established itself and the government has proven to stable and working (so far) long term plans which - see AI, robotics, renewables, electric cars, electrinics). My best bet would be ETFs (for old-school boring global diversification long term, but global market ETFs will also go down if US stock market drops, so use it at your own risk or stay informed to be ready to jump the boat at the right moment, just in case) or get informed about Chinese stocks (heck, I think the memory company that recently IPOed launched with a 6x increase! If I would have the time to day trade, this would have been a huge win, as well as some other possible candidates, like the robot companies. The Cgov openly announces ehich industries they will pump money into, so that's free money for investors. Not a China fanboy, certainly not of the C-gov, but look at Singapore. A kind of dictatorship with a long term plan - it worked before - and it seems to work in China too). - Emerging markets I have no clue about. Never followed. India as well, no idea. I guess if you have time to spend, there might be some opportunities in emerging countries for specific picks but also risky. See quite a few examples of Indian fraud scandals. Ain't nobody got time for that. - Then some boring diversification mix. At least exchange your USD to any other currency (again, I have not done research on which would be best and what ratio). Maybe CHF, EUR, and some other "western democracy" currencies, maybe even chinese CNY (if they don't manipulate the shit out if it anymore, which they probably still do, would need to check. At least the gov will keep it relatively stable but gov might also lower it if possible but currently too much upwards pressure). No JPY, obviously! Maybe some gold. I don't have time for active trading currenlty. So, if you really want to avoid holding USD, which I would highly recommend (I would def not hold USD as it will continue to devalue): tld;dr: everything not USD, prob no US stocks (except specific picks) - global ETFs, look into China stock picks, EU/western/China currencies.

Some-Stranger-7852

Russia is so far behind it’s not worth mentioning. Same for India. EU are realistically like a couple of year behind: they don’t have the compute or talent to actually compete. China is the only real threat and they are still roughly 6-9 months behind. I also don’t think they have the capability to build the most frontier model anyway: they can match Sol performance just cheaper, but can’t match Astra or Fable. You underestimate the lead US labs have in general.

inforcrypto

When will the EU sanction undemocratic USA, the way they sanction every poor country for being undemocratic?

toucanflu

Canada, the EU, China do not give a F about the US now

crisco000

Bc it’s pointless. Let’s pretend Bernie got Congress to pause the advancement of AI. Ok, now what? You think China is going to pause? How about Russia? Or india? Or the EU? Pandoras box has been open and it can’t be closed. Good or bad we’re all in

FlatEvent2597

Yes. Apparently Canada is joining the EU. And China has announced that it wants to do military training with Canada - do that was a surprise to near everyone. So happy! Someone likes us!! ❤️

HelloYesThisIsFemale

I hit that. It's why my brokerage now has so many different versions of S&P and other funds, because the EU has incompatible regulations as to how to provide/format the information documents which I don't give a shit about. Genuinely just avoiding that is adding value.

ConspicuousPineapple

It's substantially lower than that on average in Europe. There are plenty of payment processors available for small businesses where fees are barely over 1% for EU-issued cards (for non-EU cards you see the standard US rates). Huge corporations are able to negotiate even lower fees.

FlyingBishop

You claimed that there's no money to be made in the EU. The GDP of the EU is $34T compared to $32T in the US. There's plenty of money to be made in the EU, you're the one trying to dismiss a market and I don't understand your rationale for saying the market is not important.

FlyingBishop

Yes, and unlike those dumbos in the EU, we know that money only counts if it all comes from one country. Getting the same amount of money from many countries is actually worth less money.

dc2b18b

Exactly! You’d need to count the entire continent, including non member countries, in order to get a number that big. Glad we’re on the same page. So many dumbos in the EU, I’m glad you’re not one of them.

VirtualPercentage737

I am saying if you are objectively sitting on a pile of money and want to retire, where would you put it? Let's just buy bonds to make it easy. China doesn't have a history long enough and has a totalitarian government. Japan is off a debt cliff. The EU as a whole is off a debt cliff. MAYBE Switzerland or Norway. Russia no. India is a gamble. Canada is with the US.

Dom1252

What are the other advantages? I have free multi currency account with 2 cards from my bank, with free ATM withdrawals in EU and some amount outside (I don't remember how many, maybe 3 per month?) To get revolut card I had to pay one time fee of like 5 euro, which isn't that bad but it's 5 euro more than nothing

dagelijksestijl

The EU capped the interchange fees at 0.2% (with some member states apparently going even further). Doesn’t preclude the EU from cutting two American corporations out of the equation that are known to impose their morality on legally operating private businesses (=porn) and have previously been used as an instrument of coercion.

Sick0h

The EU is our fucking daddy now. Our market does what they want overnight and we have no say. Wall Street has been cucked back to the stone ages.

toucanflu

Simply just don’t do business with the US, which is what is happening. Let’s not forget that Canada’s PM (outside of education) has been the head of two federal banks. With one having to navigate brexit. He didn’t even want to be PM but was dragged into it and felt a sense of duty. The 80% geography has diminished to maybe 50% now due to more efficient trade routes and they could very possibly become part of the EU. The damage done by trumps admin will go down in history as one of the biggest blunders outside of the collapse of the Roman Empire. In fact, it might just be the modern day collapse of an empire because outside of the US, NK and Russia (who is playing you) there literally is no country that wants anything to do with you. Thats pretty bad economics to me lol It might take a year or two to establish different and better trade routes but it will happen due to Trump and that won’t be repaired

BeyondGITSandBots

Who do you compare 🥭 to? Putin? Kim Yong Un? China? At least China has a 5-year plan... Donnie has not even a concept of a plan, except ripping everyone else off, especially the tax payers and his voter base, and so seems also a big part of CEOs and other politicians. Cleptocracy and no one does anything against it. He's openly insider trading...and even selling it. I think outside if the US, certainly not in the EU, is comparing the US government to anyone else. The Don and his clan of buffoons are kind of "special", and unfortunatley not the good kind of special. Edit: I noticed this turned out to sound like it could be misinterpreted as an insult. But it was not meant to be. The US government is openly ripping of its population and T voters especially and they don't notice it and no one seems to do anything against it. It's really a pitty for what the US people previously had built up just to be torn down within a few years by an utterly corrupt and incompetent government (I mean even more blattently and openly corrupt than most other countries)

I_am_Foley666

Everybody is critical of his post, but it's really happening. Here in Luxembourg we're switching to Wero already. The EU is done with being scalped on every transaction by US concerns. Thanks Donny, you pushed us over the edgge and it's only going to help.

dc2b18b

EU is always making big steps for the future. The future is always 30 years away. By the time any of this is actually implemented, 2 dozen US startups will already have built solutions and dominated each niche of the market.

Rnee45

I agree with the thesis, but you have to get the timing right too to short. And if there's anything in this life I'd bet on, is for EU bureaucrats to fumble digital EURO implementation.

mattmentecky

>They're doing it because every time a European buys a coffee, 2.5% of that transaction takes a vacation to San Francisco. This is simply 100% factually not true. Fees are already capped at 0.3% for credit cards in the EU: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/EN/legal-content/summary/fees-for-card-based-payments.html So Visa and Mastercard has already absorbed (and done so for a decade) a EU market that doesn't net them those big transaction fees. Second, there is simply no way that any digital Euro will not have caps. If there werent, commercial banks in the EU would suffer a lot more than CC companies. It also ignores that V/MA POS infrastructure will simply not go away for the sole purpose of foreigners and hospitality travel, unless the EU is going to offer free transactions and credit extensions for payment beyond its borders. In essence your thesis is: V/MA will cease to exist because the government will handle credit extension, dispute resolution, fraud, KYC/AML and for unlimited funds, all for the sweet payoff of saving citizens 0.3%.

Ryanthetemp43

Well I counter argue your claude prompt with my very own claude prompt: This is well-written and almost entirely wrong about the mechanism it's shorting. Here's the breakdown. The load-bearing factual errors 1. The 2.5% number — this is the fatal one. He says every European coffee sends 2.5% to San Francisco. European interchange has been capped by EU regulation since 2015 at 0.2% on debit and 0.3% on credit. More importantly, Visa and Mastercard don't receive interchange at all — that goes to the issuing bank. V/MA earn network and scheme fees measured in single-digit basis points. His headline grievance is off by roughly two orders of magnitude for the companies he's short. He's shorting the tollbooth operator while describing the toll that goes to somebody else. (Also, Mastercard is headquartered in Purchase, New York.) 2. The catalyst is 2029 at the earliest. The ECB's actual timeline: the digital euro Regulation still has to be adopted by co-legislators during 2026; a 12-month pilot begins in H2 2027; the Eurosystem aims to be ready for potential first issuance during 2029, and the ECB will only decide whether to issue once the Regulation passes. The pilot cohort is 10–30 PSPs selected by mid-2026. And the design includes holding limits specifically to prevent deposit flight — Cipollone has framed it as preserving banks' central position in payments, not disintermediating them. He's short shares against a catalyst that is three-plus years from existing and contingent on EU legislative politics. 3. The financials are actively contradicting him right now. Visa's fiscal Q3 2026: revenue $11.63B, up 14%, adjusted EPS $3.32, up 11%, cross-border volume +13% constant-dollar. Mastercard's Q2 2026: revenue $9.28B, up 14%, adjusted EPS $5.04, up 21%, operating margin 60%, cross-border +12%. Intra-Europe cross-border specifically grew 12%. Whatever structural decline looks like, it does not look like mid-teens revenue growth at 60% margins in the exact geography he says is the epicenter. 4. His China evidence cuts against him. The 260 million e-CNY wallets figure is years stale. Actual cumulative usage: about 3.48 billion transactions worth ¥16.7 trillion (~$2.37T) since the 2019 pilot began — versus WeChat Pay alone processing roughly $15.4 trillion in 2024 alone. Adoption has been weak enough that from January 1, 2026 the PBOC had to start letting banks pay interest on e-CNY balances and extend deposit insurance to them, explicitly to compete with Alipay and WeChat Pay. A state-backed CBDC losing to private wallets inside an authoritarian system that can mandate adoption is the single strongest available counterexample to "CBDCs steamroll incumbents." He cited it as his proof. 5. The UnionPay claim is metric-gaming. UnionPay leads on cards issued and total transaction value, overwhelmingly from a domestic near-monopoly in China where foreign networks were effectively excluded. That's not evidence of global displacement; it's evidence that China closed its home market, which happened years ago and is already in V/MA's numbers. 6. Sanctions run through the wrong node. Financial coercion operates through dollar clearing, correspondent banking, and SWIFT messaging — not card networks. Cutting off Russian card acceptance was a visible retail symptom, not the mechanism. If Brussels is building "revenge architecture," V/MA are a side casualty, not the target. 7. Category confusion throughout. He repeatedly treats merchant anger about interchange as a threat to network revenue. Merchants dumping cards over fees hurts issuers first. Meanwhile a growing share of V/MA revenue is value-added services — fraud scoring, tokenization, dispute infrastructure, consulting, data — which is rail-agnostic and in some cases sells into the new rails. What's genuinely true The bear case isn't empty, it's just misassembled: India is a real, materialized version of his thesis. RuPay has exclusive rights to link credit cards to UPI, and now handles roughly 38% of Indian credit card transactions by volume, up sharply. The RBI has mandated network choice at issuance. That is precisely "state mandates the domestic network and the Americans lose share." His UPI number is also stale in the wrong direction — it's about 23.2 billion transactions monthly as of May 2026, not 10 billion. Brazil's Pix is the best empirical evidence he didn't lean on. Pix demonstrably took share from debit at point of sale. It's the cleanest existing proof that a free A2A rail can displace card volume in a large economy. The sovereignty motive is real. The European Payments Initiative and Wero exist precisely because European policymakers view dependence on two American networks as a strategic exposure. That's not paranoia. Regulatory interchange pressure is a genuine multi-decade headwind — EU caps, Durbin, Reg II debit routing, ongoing litigation. The 15-to-20-year terminal-value question is legitimate. If A2A, wallets, stablecoins, and CBDCs all normalize globally, network take rates compress and the terminal multiple has to come down. That's a real valuation argument. Notably, the more credible near-term threat to cross-border economics is stablecoins, not CBDCs — and both V and MA are building into that themselves rather than being bypassed by it. The structural problem with the trade, separate from the argument Even if every word were correct, the expression doesn't match the thesis. A 2029-plus structural repricing held via short common stock means unlimited upside exposure, borrow cost, and no defined invalidation — while both companies run large buybacks that structurally bid their own shares and are currently compounding EPS in the teens-to-twenties. The two positions are also not diversification; V and MA are near-identical exposures, so ~$122k is one bet, not two. A thesis can be completely right about 2035 and still get closed out in 2027. Legitimacy score 34 / 100 Component Score Note Understands the revenue mechanic 15 Confuses interchange with network fees Accuracy of cited evidence 35 Stale e-CNY, gamed UnionPay, stale UPI Identifies real structural forces 70 Sovereign rails and regulation are genuine Catalyst timing 10 2029, legislation-contingent Falsifiability / defined thesis 10 No target, no timeline, no invalidation Trade construction vs horizon 15 Spot short against a decade-long thesis Split another way: as a 15-year essay on the fragmentation of global payment rails it scores maybe 65. As a 2026 short thesis it scores about 15. The gap between those two numbers is the entire problem — he's identified a real long-run erosion and expressed it as a near-term trade, against companies currently growing revenue 14% with 60% margins. I'm not a financial advisor and I'm not telling you what to do with a position. If it's useful, I can pull the actual geographic revenue split from V and MA's latest 10-Q/10-K to size how much of the profit pool is genuinely exposed to euro-area domestic volume — that's the number that would either validate or kill this thesis quantitatively, and neither he nor the bulls seem to have looked it up.

a_simple_spectre

The EU directly caused this amd pushed for it, that's not it

anelectricmind

Apparently, it's coming soon. Prime Minister Carney should be announcing something with the EU next week or so.

RonyElZaib

So the vast majority of cards issued and used in the EU have an interchange cap of no higher than 0.3%. Where is the problem exactly? No one forces the merchant to accept card payments.

Shajirr

Anything country-dependant is just that, usable only in a small territory. The real solution needs to work across all EU at the very least.

Both_Extension131

EU legislation literally caps it at 0.2-0.3% for debit-credit cards bud.

LocusHammer

Its a little more nuanced, but yes, I should have been clearer. EAA issued consumer cards have a 0.30% interchange rate. With other network fees, those costs are usually around 1-1.50%. Transactions on cards not issued by the EU, interregional cards for ecommerce, corporate, etc are uncapped. Yes, you are right though. EAA issued consumer cards have an interchange cap of 0.3% before other fees apply.

LocusHammer

A correction on the correction (lol): On EAA (EU) issued consumer credit cards, sure. That is one category of card products. And with the ancillary extra network fees in the EU, the pricing on those can be 1.50%. Interregional e-commerce is not capped for instance. Business cards are uncapped. Prepaid cards. Merchants are not paying 0.30% to accept credit cards. They are paying more.

Few-Masterpiece3910

because the country your in prohibits charging customers differently depending on payment method. (Most countries). If you had to pay 4% more to pay wit CC instead of a debit card, I would guess you would rather pay 4% less. And in the EU where MC & V only take 0.3% they don't have the money to pay out rewards. But a lot of CC cost 20-50€ per year. So yes I don't even have a "real" CC.

hamstercrisis

the EU has sanctions on Russia too, what are you nuts going on about

hamstercrisis

Your points on sanctions against Russia are bizarre. You do know that the EU has sanctions against Russia too right? As they are attacking the EU's neighbour?

G8racingfool

The only thing the EU will coordinate is somehow making it *more* expensive and a PITA to transact with their CBDC than it will to maintain the skimmer grift. MC/V may shift strategies, but I doubt they're going anywhere. And they are *far* to big to be blindsided by a development like this.

michahell

Fuck yeah for revenge architecture! all-in on the EU sovereignty bandwagon. …Also taking small positions in Visa and MasterCard now as I know federation is hard and EU govs are good at fucking things up

GetRektByMeh

Wero has launched in Germany, France and another country (I think Austria) + is consolidating iDEAL in the Netherlands. On top of this they’ve signed a deal with Bizum (Spain’s QR system) and I believe (but am not 100% sure of) Blik, Poland’s one. It’s looking like a lot of the EU will end up being able to pay via QR with rails based in EU. I still think people will use cards, but it is changing the conversation a bit.

dc2b18b

Optimistic to think the EU can coordinate anything in only 20 years

LocusHammer

It's based on a misunderstanding of the EU digital wallet and a misunderstanding of the payments industry. It is not sound. Unless the short position is 25 years. No one even remembers how ass 3D Secure 1.0 was, and that is even simpler than this. EU digital wallet is US Zelle. Its first iteration is peer to peer only.

LocusHammer

A correction: EU debit is regulated at 0.2%. Credit is not regulated like that and averages around 2.5% with lower bounds on standard cards and upper bounds on premium plus. Acquiring banks generally apply a discount of 3.5bps to 5bps if you are on interchange ++. You get into the 3-5% total discount if you do blended pricing which is what smaller merchants usually do because they don't have time to deal with fee maintenance. Now, EU payment preferences are more debit than credit, unlike the US, but credit is still very meaningful.

Snotspat

Uh yes, Europeans are known for their work ethic. That's how they're twice as productive as Americans for instance. Wtf. is a "Europoor"? The median EU citizen is like 3 times as wealthy as the median American. USA is shit poor compared.

kim82352

... unless EU sues them for $2T

Snotspat

Take Denmark, they attempted to ditch Mastercard/VISA in 1985: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dankort](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dankort) And the network is still running btw. But consumers use Google/Applepay for convienience, or want the cashback from VISA/Mastercard. The cashback scheme is btw. the lever VISA/Mastercard always pulls whenever competition arrives, and it will honestly require legislation in a national level to kill. Maybe that's what the EU will finally do. In Denmark shops have signs urging the use of Dankort or Mobilepay, which kinda started when Denmark narrowly avoided a war with USA. So, I guess Trump isn't on VISA/Mastercards gift list.

Radiant-Scene-5171

German AfD Leader Alice Weidel: We need to significantly limit our payments to the EU. Every week, almost one billion euros flows to Brussels, but only a fraction of it comes back. We want our money back

ankokudaishogun

Only for people who actually move around internationally. Which are quite the minority. Most non-physical payments are done either to entities inside the country or, for EU, entities inside the EU.

sabautil

The 1040 ez is a couple of pages. Takes like 15 mins to do! I've never had to file more that 2 pages for personal taxes. And it's free to file. My business on the other hand has employees. State and federal taxes. Also keep in mind, Germany in this context to me is like an American state. America is huge, a union of states, just like the European Union is a union of countries. Do you have to file an EU tax return or does the state pay your taxes to your union? If so then there's a big difference there.

Pantalyon1

In the EU there are strict caps on how much credit card companies can take in fees. Since the fees are capped much lower than in the US credit cards don't really offer rewards generally in the EU (there are some exceptions, for instance american express still has decent rewards)

gamma55

What ECB doesn’t get is that while eurozone payment rails are great and all, just about every European that ever travels needs V or MC on top of their ECB card because no one thinks EU can become a global salesman for payment processing. And since you’re already forced to have V or MC, why bother with the ECB card that has limited acceptance, and offers zero retail protection compared to credit cards (due to how contracts work by nature). So very high probability it will just become another wildly convoluted byrocratic bullshit from EU.

a_simple_spectre

Revolut is a bank, not a payment processor Credit card usage in EU is generally very low because regulations around "benefits"