Former global macro fund manager Raoul Pal doesn't think financial television channels are providing real value for viewers.
That's why Pal has decided to take matters into his own hands by launching Real Vision Television —an on-demand, subscription video service providing a library of content on economics and investing.
"It's a real mix of things; it's somewhere between TED and Netflix and The Economist," Pal told Business Insider in a telephone interview.
For the project, he teamed up with Grant Williams, the author of the newsletter Things That Make You go Hmmm; U.K.-based advertising executive Damian Horner; and his own colleague Remi Tétot.
They felt that financial TV wasn't offering content that they wanted. For example, they didn't care about watching a company CEO go on about how great his or her firm was doing despite the economy.
"At its very core, I think we felt that people — general investors and the general public — were not getting access to open and honest discussion about economic and investment state-of-affairs. We think the world is kind of incredibly complicated right now, and people need to see a broader range of discussions to make their own decisions."
The launch of Real Vision Television also comes at a time where CNBC has just hit a 21-year low for viewership.
Pal is well-known in the global macro space. He's a Goldman Sachs alumnus, and he co-managed GLG's global macro fund — one of the largest in the world. In 2004, he retired from managing money at age 36. Even out of the game, he has remained on the radar of some of the most brilliant global macro investors in the world.
And even if you may not have heard of Pal, you may recall an epic presentation he published back in 2012.
The grim deck was called "The End Game," and in it he predicted a series of sovereign debt defaults and "the biggest bank crisis in history." While that didn't happen, Pal told us that the debt dynamics were still there and that "nothing" had been resolved.
Pal, who lives in Spain, is the author of the highly regarded research publication The Global Macro Investor, which is read by the hedge fund elite (Hayman Capital's Kyle Bass once mentioned it in one of his fund's letters). A subscription to Pal's publication costs tens of thousands of dollars. Only a handful of people have access to the publication, and it never leaks to the public or the media.
Pal's Real Vision Television will give more people access to his insights. It will include discussions with research analysts, hedge fund managers, newsletter writers, traders, etc.
Many of the well-known fund managers and analysts don't appear on people's radar screens because they don't tend to seek publicity or make media appearances. Pal nevertheless knows a lot big names that would contribute.
"The good thing is because we know so many of these people because we've been around so long that they were willing to get on board with us and help us with our mission."
A subscription for Real Vision Television will cost $400 per year. Right now, you can subscribe for $200.
"We want to make it affordable. That's the very idea — the idea is not to be an exclusive service. It's a way of educating a whole load of people in the way that they should be."
