Politics & Power Quote by Jim Rogers

Rogers is puncturing the fairy tale that proximity to power equals profit. He sets up a neat escalation - president to chairman - and then flips the expected hierarchy: the closer you are to the people who supposedly know the most, the worse your outcome. It lands because it’s not really about “insider tips” as a naughty advantage; it’s about the psychology of authority and the ways information gets weaponized.

The president, in Rogers’s framing, is a macro storyteller. He’s incentivized to project strength, calm markets, and sell the national narrative. If you trade on that “inside information,” you’re trading on messaging. You’ll lose half because you’re still dealing with reality at some point - earnings, rates, war, recession - but at least the president isn’t usually timing your entry for his personal liquidity event.

The chairman of the board is different: micro power, direct incentives, and the ability to curate what you hear. That “inside information” can be less a tip than a trap - selective optimism, strategic omission, or plain old self-deception from someone surrounded by yes-men. Even when it’s sincere, it’s contaminated by a bias toward the company’s survival and their own legacy. The subtext is almost cynical-efficient: the market’s most expensive information often comes from the mouths closest to the deal.

Contextually, it’s a veteran investor’s warning against confusing access with edge. Rogers is telling you to distrust “smart money” theater and to remember that the only truly valuable information is the kind that isn’t trying to sell you something.