Rick Rule Reveals Top Trades To Beat Trade Wars, Inflation In 2025
Speakers
Rick Rule
— Founder, Rule Investment Media
Summary
Rick Rule joins David Lin to outline his top 2025 themes: Canadian oil and gas, natural gas over oil, oil supply constraints, gold, and banking. He argues that political constraints on Canadian energy exports are easing, US shale production growth will be harder than politicians expect, and unsustainable US fiscal policy will force money printing that benefits gold. He also discusses tariffs, inflation, and why banking is an excellent but analytically demanding business.
- Rick Rule names Canadian oil and gas as his top 2025 theme.
- He expects natural gas to outperform oil as export bottlenecks ease.
- He doubts Trump can add 3 million barrels per day of US oil production.
- He sees gold benefiting from fiat debasement and unsustainable US debt.
- He dismisses broad Canadian tariffs as unlikely, though targeted tariffs are possible.
- He calls banking a great business if investors analyze individual banks and avoid lending mistakes.
- Battle Bank hopes to launch in Q2 2025 and offer gold/silver-backed credit.
- Rick says he lacks expertise in Bitcoin/crypto and gives no directional call.
Ideas
Canadian oil and gas policy tailwind.
Rick Rule's top 2025 theme is Canadian oil and gas. Canada has strong geology and oil-and-gas human capital, but production and exports were constrained by the Trudeau government's opposition to carbon-based energy, refusal to approve coastal transmission/LNG projects, and US/Canada blocks to Keystone and Canadian heavy crude reaching US Gulf Coast refiners. With Trudeau leaving and a more favorable US regulatory regime under Trump, those political and infrastructure bottlenecks should ease, letting Canadian heavy oil and LNG reach premium US and global markets. He expects gas to outperform oil and Canadian producers to outperform most because their policy constraints are changing most dramatically.
Natural gas will outperform oil.
Rick expects natural gas to do better than oil. The removal of Canadian and US political and transmission constraints should allow Canadian natural gas to be liquefied and exported through British Columbia, the Atlantic, or the US transmission/LNG system to Europe and premium Asian markets, closing the huge gap between cheap Alberta gas and much higher global prices.
Oil supported by constrained supply growth.
Rick says oil will do well, and he is skeptical that US production can rise by the 3 million barrels per day Trump wants. Shale producers have already drilled about 75% of their A-quality locations, Permian water disposal capacity is constrained, and higher output would require improved technology and lower cost of capital as well as supportive oil/gas prices. Challenged supply growth supports oil.
Fiat debasement makes gold outperform.
Rick expects gold to do very well over Trump's four-year term. The US fiscal position is unsustainable, with $36T on-balance-sheet debt plus roughly $100T net present value of unfunded liabilities, and the only political escape is printing money and raising the debt ceiling. That devalues fiat currencies' purchasing power, historically a powerful tailwind for gold; in the 1970s the dollar lost about 75% of purchasing power while gold rose from $35 to $850. Distrust of central banks and large commercial banks reinforces the case, but the main driver is fiat debasement.
Excellent banks with disciplined lending.
Rick views banking as a wonderful business, possibly the best except for property-and-casualty insurance, if investors analyze individual banks rather than blindly buying the sector. Banks can pay roughly 4-5% on deposits, lend at 8.5-9%, and lever 9-10x, producing very high ROE. The keys are keeping non-interest expenses low and avoiding lending mistakes, especially by lending only in industries the bank understands. He warns that buying banks as a class without banking knowledge can lead to losses.
