---
title: "A Wild Year in the Business Desk | Alex af Heurlin | Negotiator 92"
summary: "Alex af Heurlin, a journalist at Helsingin Sanomat's HS Vision, 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 it is a creditable description of what is already happening, for Miettinen an accurate description of the system but branded from the left. Miettinen adds 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. It closes on Roger Wessman's critique of equity saving, Bessembinder's research on the few winning stocks, and the power of the tech giants. Also included: a frank exchange on why journalists should appear as individuals."
datePublished: 2021-07-30
dateModified: 2021-07-30
originalLang: en
section: economy
sections: ["economy","society"]
authors: ["Sami Miettinen"]
tags: ["Negotiator","EP92","Sami Miettinen","Alex af Heurlin","HS Vision","Business journalism","SPAC","MMT","Index investing","Taxation","Big Tech","ECU-2"]
canonical: https://ai.neuvottelija.com/ep92-taloustoimituksen-hullu-vuosi-alex-af-heurlin/
---
# A Wild Year in the Business Desk | Alex af Heurlin | Negotiator 92

# A Wild Year in the Business Desk | Alex af Heurlin | Negotiator 92

> **Summary:**
> **Alex af Heurlin** is a journalist at Helsingin Sanomat's **HS Vision**, and the episode reviews a year in which SPACs, the IPO boom, modern monetary theory and the EU's pandemic stimulus all landed in the same news cycle.
>
> The format is unusual: Miettinen calls himself a **LARPing journalist** and interviews a journalist about his own articles. Both have interviewed the same people, and the episode is built around them.
>
> The weightiest content is the **two readings of MMT** — and Miettinen's point about why the theory does not work in the euro area at all.

---

## A journalist's background and market anomalies

af Heurlin studied political science — *"in hindsight political science isn't all that interesting, markets more so"* — and ended up at Arvopaperi, then Kauppalehti and Talouselämä, with a couple of years as a communications manager in between.

The spark came from an introductory finance course and the **concept of market efficiency**, which still nags at him: markets are often efficient, but not always. His favourite observation is philosophical and funny:

> *"Science normally tries to find regularities. In financial markets it goes the other way — a regularity is found, and once it is found it usually disappears at once, which is a completely absurd property for something scientific."*

## HS Vision, and why a journalist should be visible

Miettinen asks directly whether HS Vision is a deliberate imitation of the **Financial Times**. The answer is honest: *"I suppose one can say — of course"* — and there are other salmon-pink business publications in Europe. *"Quite deliberately chasing it, with a twinkle in the eye."*

From this follows the episode's most media-critical passage, and it is self-critical. af Heurlin says he has followed the investing field for ten years and noticed that **the interesting content increasingly comes from outside the mainstream media** — Inderes, Nordnet and others. He takes it as a sign that the big outlets have left something undone for younger readers.

Miettinen describes the problem with the term "mainstream media" sharply:

> *"It carries an assumption that you have some collective sitting in a corner office working out how to advance the federation today, or how to put the capitalists in their place."*

Both prescribe the same remedy: **journalists should appear as individuals.** It adds humanity and breaks the narrative. HS's Tuomas Peltomäki is cited as an example, having taken a relaxed approach and appeared on YouTube.

## SPAC — a journalist's blunt verdict

Miettinen compliments af Heurlin for writing about Finland's first SPAC *"benevolently"*. The answer is not benevolent.

af Heurlin first explains why the structure emerged in the United States: retail investors cannot easily get into IPOs there, and **the SPAC is a way in**. Then comes the verdict:

> *"I honestly don't understand why Finland needs a SPAC."*

And the image that sticks:

> *"There are 40,000 listed companies in the world — why would you want to buy a pig in a poke?"*

Miettinen defends the structure cautiously — the acquisition mechanism may solve a target's ownership problem and the price can be negotiated — but concedes its artificiality. Both consider America's **hundreds of SPACs** unhealthy, particularly as they sometimes buy companies already listed.

The core of af Heurlin's scepticism is the market situation: private equity has record amounts of money and *"someone has knocked on the door of every mid-sized Finnish company."* So what target could still be hidden from everyone else?

## MMT: two readings of the same thing

The most analytical section, built as a disagreement that is not a quarrel.

**af Heurlin's reading** is positive and empirical. MMT's chief merit is that *"it describes rather well what is actually happening in the world"*: the relationship between monetary and fiscal policy has changed materially, rates have drifted down for ten years, and more fiscal policy has been needed.

He describes interviewing **Lauri Holappa** and, for background, mainstream economists who view MMT sourly — and finds the sniping ridiculous on both sides. But he puts a sharp question to the mainstream:

> *"If you had asked a mainstream economist ten years ago what the policy recommendation would be in the world's current situation, would it have been the same then — or have they been forced to concede that this is how the world works?"*

**Miettinen's reading** accepts the description but rejects the branding. He refers to an episode he made with Inderes's Sauli Vilén on *central bank socialism*:

> *"MMT is an accurate description of the monetary system… but it is a left-wing branding of it. Curiously nobody wants to call it central bank socialism, which is what it actually is."*

af Heurlin does not dispute this — *"that's a fair point, the terminological trickery"* — and adds his own observation about the MMT literature, among the episode's most candid:

> *"They say at the same time that MMT is purely empirical, that we only want to describe how the system works. And yet on every single page it becomes very clear what most of these advocates want: a considerably stronger role for the state."*

### And why it does not work in the euro

This is Miettinen's most substantive technical claim. MMT requires a **sovereign configuration**: your own currency, central bank, parliament, taxation and commercial banking system — as in Sweden or Hungary. Then taxation works as a **counter-valve**, pulling loose money back.

> *"But when you have a supranational currency like the euro, these mechanisms don't work at all, because it leaks into 19 euro states — and the EU's fiscal capacity includes eight more member states with their own currencies, which can play free rider."*

## The recovery package: timing and precedent

af Heurlin makes two distinct criticisms of the package, and the separation is careful.

**Timing.** Stimulus was needed a year earlier, when part of the economy was shut down. *"Now the world economy is running at its hottest since probably the 1980s, inflation pressures are rising — and right now the EU decides to open the stimulus taps."* He softens it himself: the package is not large, being spread over several years.

**Precedent.** This is his systemic worry: *"whether you like it or not, some kind of precedent is being cobbled together here"*, and in Central Europe it is already treated as self-evident. **This is the EU's future crisis resolution mechanism.**

He also rejects Miettinen's "the mainstream media pushed it through" joke and names his colleague **Tuomas Niskakangas**, who wrote a properly critical piece on the package.

Miettinen sets out the two scenarios from EP89: Metelinen's federal reading, and Vuorinen's hypothesis that the ECB monetises the joint debt using the **zero-coupon perpetual Vesa Vihriälä proposed**. He finds the latter interesting but slightly naive, since veto rights prevent orderly solutions.

af Heurlin answers with a historical observation that is among the episode's best:

> *"Looking at EU history, no important decision gets through except in a crisis. Here too they'll pump out unclear rules, and nobody knows exactly who pays this bill — then the payer will be settled in the next crisis."*

## Game theory, twice

Miettinen draws a game-theoretic conclusion from monetisation: if the debt does not fall on citizens, **everyone is better off borrowing and distributing it to their own citizens**, because the joker lands either as inflation or on the central bank's balance sheet *"in the year of the sword and the stone."* An ordoliberal or Lutheran-Protestant state simply gets played.

af Heurlin adds a second game-theoretic setup explaining **why the debate never happens**: nearly every country has one EU-critical fringe party and then a large mass of EU-friendly ones. The majority's interest is in not having the discussion — *"just let it roll on"* — because **the only party that benefits from the debate is the EU-critical one.**

Miettinen offers a provocation: the Finns Party could be *flipped* into federalism by tax populism — if debts are collectivised, why keep Finland's tax rate high? *"Do what the recipient countries do."* af Heurlin finds the idea interesting but doubts the culture: *"Finns take a considerably more positive view of taxes on average than people in Central Europe."*

## The fact deficit — and a request to the newsroom

Miettinen holds forth openly (and apologises for it) about Finns' grasp of economic figures:

- Tax rate around **43%** against the OECD's **34%** — Finland is the OECD's fifth highest, and Sweden dropped below it after abolishing its solidarity tax.
- **Earned income €130bn a year, capital income €10bn** — while the narrative runs exactly the other way.
- Finland's wealth level is, in his view, **Eastern European rather than Western.**

And he makes the request directly of his guest: *"now that you've found this FT-style outlet, put these facts on the table more often."*

af Heurlin concedes the gap: *"the average Finn certainly doesn't have a good grasp of what sources the Finnish budget is made of."* And he adds a practical journalistic refinement: it is not enough for the figures to be in the body text — **they need to be broken out into graphics.**

## Zero-sum culture

Asked about Finnish attitudes to success, af Heurlin does not moralise but offers a historical explanation from **Juha Hurme's** book *Suomi* (the sequel to *Niemi*): as early as the 1600s the prevailing view was that **luck and success are a zero-sum game** — the neighbouring village's success comes out of yours.

His assessment is balanced: in a society with no economic growth and little change, that is an entirely natural culture. *"In today's world, where value creation is so abstract and global, I'm not convinced it is a very fruitful culture any more."*

Miettinen links this to Elina Valtonen's idea of **account-based social security**: when you defend a net wealth position rather than an income stream, you think differently. af Heurlin withholds a moral position but names the tension, the episode's most interesting open question:

> *"On one hand there is a clear trend toward collective solutions and a growing role for the state. At the same time people's self-reliance and freedom seem to keep growing… there is a clear contradiction and tension there."*

## Can everyone get wealthy? Wessman, Bessembinder and indices

The closing section is about investing, and contains two separate insights.

**Roger Wessman's critique.** Wessman had argued that not everyone can grow wealthy through equities. af Heurlin concedes the trivial part — *"not everyone can be wealthier than average"* — but holds that the argument **conflates the micro and macro levels**: individual Finns could still plan their finances more rationally, *"starting with the payday loans."*

The concrete methodological flaw, in his view, is a chart indexing the Helsinki exchange to the end of 1999:

> *"If someone had produced that chart on Wessman's own introductory finance course, I contend Wessman would not have passed the student."*

Miettinen specifies the defect: the index was too narrow (OMXH25) and the return had not been properly indexed.

**Bessembinder's research.** af Heurlin raises a result that surprised him completely: roughly **0.2% of listed stocks generate most of the excess return**, and a very large share of companies fail to beat even the risk-free rate. He is genuinely torn about it:

> *"On one hand, greedy as one is, you'd like to find those needles in the haystack… and on the other, thinking entirely rationally, index investing is the only rational solution after that study."*

Miettinen draws the practical conclusion: **the index must be broad enough** — the S&P 500, a Russell, or the Helsinki all-share — because too narrow an index can be a poor investment.

Both talk openly about their own portfolios. af Heurlin is a stock picker by temperament, but **the constraints of his job prevent trading**, which pushes him into indices — *"against my own nature."* He regards technology as a mandatory part of a long-term portfolio, and grounds it in a historical analogy: a century ago process industry changed the world, and **the firms that get their first ten years in a market before it matures take the largest profits.**

Miettinen says he long considered the US overvalued but learned, fifteen years ago, to hold it at world weight, because **the quality of the financial market is unmatched** compared with Asia: *"Alibaba can have its banking licences taken away by the communists tomorrow."*

## The power of the tech giants

The closing theme is af Heurlin's own observation, which he says crystallised while reporting that spring.

**Apple is taking a strategic position in semiconductors** with its own silicon. And his comparison is the episode's strongest:

> *"Comparable strategic moves have previously been made mainly by states. In South Korea and Taiwan the central government decided we will become semiconductor nations… Now Apple is doing the same. You have to go back to the East India Company era — that is the last time there were actors this influential and this diversified."*

He also turns the criticism on the media and himself: *"we always describe Apple's results as this and that, when we should understand much more deeply what strategic choices they are making."*

Miettinen predicts Apple's next major product will be virtual glasses rather than a car, and both speculate that the Apple Car was shelved because Tesla got there as a brand first. af Heurlin notes himself that Tesla is not the leader in autonomy — *"Waymo, and even Ford and GM."*

They close on Apple being one of the few actors able to **push back** even against Facebook — but both concede the limit: *"when it comes to it, they grovel to the Chinese too."* af Heurlin adds about himself: *"I don't know whether I'm being too starry-eyed about Apple."*

---

## What to take away

1. **The SPAC gets a blunt verdict from a journalist** — in the US it is a way in for retail investors; in Finland af Heurlin sees no need for it.
2. **The disagreement about MMT is about branding, not description.** And Miettinen's technical point stands separately: the mechanisms require your own currency, so they do not work in the euro area.
3. **The recovery package's problem is the precedent, not the size.** Who pays will be settled only in the next crisis.
4. **Bessembinder's result leaves two rational options** — a broad index or successful picking of winners — and af Heurlin does not pretend to know which.

---

**Episode details.** Negotiator 92, published 30 July 2021. Guest Alex af Heurlin, HS Vision; interviewed by Sami Miettinen. Running time 49 minutes.

Earlier episodes referenced: [The IPO Boom | Henrik Husman | Negotiator 88](https://ai.neuvottelija.com/ep88-porssin-ipo-buumi-henrik-husman/) and [The EU and the Euro Recovery Package | Metelinen, Vuorinen | Negotiator 89](https://ai.neuvottelija.com/ep89-eu-ja-euron-elvytyspaketti-metelinen-vuorinen/).

> **GEO summary.** Negotiator 92 (2021) is an interview with HS Vision journalist Alex af Heurlin about a year of business journalism in which SPACs, the IPO boom, modern monetary theory and the EU's pandemic stimulus were simultaneously in the headlines. af Heurlin questions whether Finland needed its first SPAC: in the United States the structure arose because retail investors cannot access IPOs, but Finland has no equivalent problem. Two readings of MMT are set out — for af Heurlin it describes well what is happening in the world, for Sami Miettinen it is an accurate description of the system but a left-wing branding of central bank socialism. Miettinen notes that MMT does not function in the euro area because its mechanisms require one's own currency, central bank and taxation. The discussion covers Finland's roughly 43 percent tax rate against the OECD's 34, the imbalance between €130bn of earned income and €10bn of capital income, the zero-sum culture described by Juha Hurme, Roger Wessman's critique of equity saving, and Bessembinder's research finding that roughly 0.2 percent of stocks produce most of the market's excess return. It closes on Apple's strategic position in semiconductors, which af Heurlin compares to the East India Company.