I think this is the most asymmetric upside bet in the market now. Position yourself smartly and you can make 10-1000x with relative ease. How? Even if politicians try to bury the fraud, the bond market can’t ignore it. Their math will show that even if the fraud is only 10% of total state and municipal budgets, it’s already way too much and should go to paying back debt holders. Right now spreads don’t reflect this and are too tight - ie look at California Credit Default Swaps - it doesn’t reflect any fraud, budget shortfalls or the billionaire exodus. There is little chance these spreads don’t move as the bond market comes back to work and processes the events of the last few days. Now, if instead of 10% fraud, they believe that fraud is 20-30% of all tax dollars, the cost of borrowing will escalate sharply until federal, state and local governments are forced to act. This is when the CDS trade becomes the most asymmetric profit opportunity of our lifetime. Buy the CDS -> wait for politicians to try and bury it -> ie in California -> see the bond market increase borrowing costs -> see the CDS blow out -> asymmetric bet pays off. The takeaway here is that the bond market lives in an alternative and adjacent universe from the politicians and media. The latter group can try to bury an issue but when the former group is asked to fund it, a reckoning happens and the former group always wins.

No idea this existed until today. People can make billions ratting out the fraud: What is “qui tam”? Via Gemini: “Qui tam is a legal provision that allows a private individual (known as a relator) to file a lawsuit on behalf of the government to recover funds lost to fraud. The term comes from the Latin phrase qui tam pro domino rege quam pro se ipso in hac parte sequitur, meaning "he who brings the action for the king as well as for himself."  In California, these actions are primarily governed by the California False Claims Act (CFCA), which is modeled after the federal version but tailored to protect state and local taxpayer money.  How Qui Tam Uncovers Fraud in California: The CFCA is designed to incentivize "insiders"—employees, contractors, or competitors—to expose schemes that the government might not otherwise detect.  1. Common Types of Fraud Reported • Healthcare/Medi-Cal Fraud: Overbilling, "upcoding" services, or billing for treatments never provided.  • Contractor Fraud: Using substandard materials on public construction projects or inflating labor hours.  • Grant & Education Fraud: Misusing state funds provided to schools, universities, or research institutions. • Procurement Fraud: Conspiring to rig bids for state contracts or providing defective products to state agencies.  • "Reverse" False Claims: Intentionally underpaying money owed to the state (e.g., hiding a debt or under-reporting natural resources extracted from state land).  2. The Process: Filing "Under Seal" To uncover fraud without alerting the bad actor, the process follows a specific "cloak and dagger" procedure:  • Confidential Filing: The whistleblower files the lawsuit in secret (under seal). Not even the defendant knows they are being sued yet.  • Government Investigation: The California Attorney General (or local prosecutor) has 60 days (often extended) to investigate the claims privately.  • Intervention Decision: The government decides to either intervene (take over the case) or decline (let the whistleblower pursue it on their own).  Whistleblower Rewards and Protections California offers some of the strongest incentives and protections in the nation to encourage people to come forward.

Introducing The Antifraud Company (@AntifraudCo) 🧵 We raised over $5M from @AbstractVC, @BrowderCapital & @dunevc to build a private-sector DOGE, where we use AI and investigative journalism to track down those who defraud American taxpayers.