---
title: "A Wild Year in the Business Desk | Alex af Heurlin | Negotiator 92"
titleOriginal: "Taloustoimituksen hullu vuosi | Alex af Heurlin | Neuvottelija 92"
episodeNumber: "92"
guest: "Alex af Heurlin"
datePublished: 2021-07-30
duration: "48:55"
youtube: "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY"
originalLanguage: "fi"
topics: ["investing_markets","finnish_economy_policy"]
subtitleMethod: "none"
provenance: "Owner page assembled from YouTube metadata, the neuvottelija.fi episode record and the publisher's own chapter marks, translated one for one. The marks are genuine: twenty-four of them, with gaps from 60 to over 200 seconds, tracking the recording rather than a grid. No transcript is published here — the channel has no English caption track for this episode and the Finnish one is YouTube's automatic track. The guest is a working business journalist discussing companies and instruments he covers, and he discloses his own portfolio in the episode; the host works in corporate finance. Nothing here is investment advice, and the SPAC, IPO and valuation discussion is that of July 2021, before the market turned. Ernst Grönblom, discussed in one chapter, appears as a guest in EP97 of this programme."
fiCanonical: "https://www.neuvottelija.fi/fi/episodes/104-taloustoimituksen-hullu-vuosi-alex-af-heurlin-neuvottelija-9"
canonical: https://www.neuvottelija.com/podcast/episodes/ep92-taloustoimituksen-hullu-vuosi-alex-af-heurlin/
---
# A Wild Year in the Business Desk | Alex af Heurlin | Negotiator 92

English subtitles are not available on this page. This is an episode summary, not a curated transcript.

## Chapters

- [00:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=0s) The highlights of the episode
- [01:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=60s) The guest is Alex af Heurlin, a journalist at HS Visio
- [03:36](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=216s) HS Visio's salmon-pink model, the Financial Times
- [05:01](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=301s) The interesting content comes from outside the mainstream media
- [07:42](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=462s) The IPO boom, and Finland's first SPAC
- [09:53](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=593s) Hundreds of American SPACs, and the flood of private equity money
- [11:16](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=676s) Lauri Holappa and modern monetary theory
- [13:47](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=827s) Central bank socialism, and MMT's branding from the left
- [15:35](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=935s) MMT works only in your own currency, not in the euro
- [17:01](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=1021s) The EU's pandemic recovery package as a federal precedent
- [19:13](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=1153s) Can the ECB monetise 750 billion of joint debt
- [21:39](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=1299s) Game theory: everyone borrows, and someone is left holding the card
- [23:03](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=1383s) Why federal development is not debated
- [24:21](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=1461s) Tax populism: the Finns Party as supporters of federalism
- [25:31](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=1531s) Finland's tax rate near the OECD top, its wealth near Eastern Europe's
- [27:52](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=1672s) Juha Hurme's Niemi, and the zero-sum culture
- [29:49](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=1789s) Equity savings accounts, and social security in account form
- [32:46](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=1966s) Roger Wessman's criticism: can everyone grow wealthy
- [35:45](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=2145s) Ernst Grönblom, and the few winning stocks
- [37:52](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=2272s) Index or stock picking, and Alex's own portfolio
- [39:18](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=2358s) Technology as a compulsory part of a long-term portfolio
- [42:35](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=2555s) The power of the tech giants: Apple in semiconductors
- [44:49](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=2689s) Apple's car, or virtual glasses next
- [48:26](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY&t=2906s) Thanks and closing words

## Summary

Alex af Heurlin, a journalist at Helsingin Sanomat's HS Visio, describes what it is like to write about investing in a year when SPACs, the IPO boom, modern monetary theory and the EU's pandemic stimulus were all in the headlines at once. The episode is a conversation between two market watchers in which the journalist criticises Finland's first SPAC bluntly — why would you want to buy a pig in a poke — and in which two readings of MMT are set against each other: for af Heurlin a creditable description of what is already happening, for the host an accurate description of the system but branded from the left, with the addition that MMT does not work in the euro area at all because its mechanisms require your own currency and your own taxation. The discussion turns to Finns' weak financial wealth, a tax rate near the OECD top, and the zero-sum culture described by Juha Hurme.

## The premise that does not hold here

The most useful correction in the episode is narrow. Modern monetary theory's mechanisms assume a state that issues its own currency and levies its own taxes. A euro area member has neither, so the Finnish argument about MMT is being conducted about a country that does not exist — whatever one thinks of the theory itself.

## A pig in a poke

A SPAC raises money first and identifies the acquisition afterwards. The journalist's blunt objection is not unsophisticated; it is the structure stated plainly, and the burden is on the sponsor to explain why that is a good trade for the investor.

## Top of one table, bottom of another

Near the OECD top in tax rate and near Eastern Europe in household financial wealth. The two facts are not the same claim and putting them side by side is what makes the pairing awkward — the episode raises it and does not resolve it.


## Watch

The recording lives on the Neuvottelija channel: [Taloustoimituksen hullu vuosi | Alex af Heurlin | Neuvottelija 92](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXnDrogoAQY).
A Finnish edition of this episode is published at [www.neuvottelija.fi](https://www.neuvottelija.fi/fi/episodes/104-taloustoimituksen-hullu-vuosi-alex-af-heurlin-neuvottelija-9).

## In depth

The Neuvottelija AI editions carry a long-form write-up of this episode:
[English](https://www.neuvottelija.com/ai/ep92-taloustoimituksen-hullu-vuosi-alex-af-heurlin/) · [suomeksi](https://www.neuvottelija.fi/economy/ep92-taloustoimituksen-hullu-vuosi-alex-af-heurlin/).

---

Cite as: Sami Miettinen, Neuvottelija — A Wild Year in the Business Desk | Alex af Heurlin | Negotiator 92, https://www.neuvottelija.com/podcast/episodes/ep92-taloustoimituksen-hullu-vuosi-alex-af-heurlin/, 2021-07-30. For quotes include episode 92 and timestamp.