Bill Ackman just explained the two trades that made him $5.2 billion in three years. Both started the same way. He saw a storm coming that everyone else was ignoring. Trade one: COVID, January 2020. Ackman read the early data and concluded the world might have to shut down its entire economy to stop the spread. Equity and credit markets were priced as if everything was fine. Over 10 days, he bought $74 billion of notional credit insurance. The premium cost him $27 million. Ten days later it was worth $2.6 billion. He took every dollar of that and bought stocks with the market down 30%. Trade two: inflation, late 2020. He saw the setup clearly. Trillions in government spending. Rates at zero. A vaccine coming that would unleash pent-up demand. Supply chains already disrupted. He concluded a massive demand shock was coming into a constrained supply environment and that inflation was inevitable. He bought interest rate options when the 2-year treasury was at 12 basis points. The strike was at 94 basis points, 0.94%, which at the time looked impossibly out of the money. It still looked like a low rate. Those options turned into another $2.6 billion in profit. He bought stocks again. His framework hasn't changed across either trade. Two storms. $27 million in. $5.2 billion out. Stocks bought both times at the bottom.