SIGNAL MACRO Request access

Independent geopolitical & global macro strategy

Signal Macro is an independent research and advisory firm. We give institutional investors, C-suite executives and boards a structural read on how politics and policy move markets, and the decisions that depend on them.

Request access How we work
Coverage frameEvery signal is mapped to it
Framework
PPC · UMB · Quadrangle
Regime
M1 · Multipolar, stage one
Anchor assets
UST 10Y · USD · S&P 500
Anchor players
The Fed · Washington · Beijing
Horizons
Tactical 0–6m · Cyclical 6–24m · Structural 24m+

The method

Power first. Then preferences and constraints.

Most geopolitical research starts with headlines. We start with who holds power, because that is what produces policy, and policy is what moves markets.

Method

The PPC Method

Power, Preferences, Constraints. Map the distribution of power, then read how the stated and revealed preferences of those who hold it interact with the constraints they face. That interaction is the analytical engine. Between states, interests replace preferences and the analysis is explicitly realist.

Regime

The UMB regime framework

Six stages from unipolar to multipolar, U1 through M2, each with its own distribution of asset returns. Russia's invasion of Ukraine marked the threshold into M1. Placing the world on this map tells you which investment regime you are in before you read the next headline.

Structure

Quadrangle Theory

The world as a four-level game: domestic politics, the domestic economy, international politics and the international economy. Stability holds while the four sit in cooperative equilibrium; shocks propagate when one level breaks. It is the lens that shows how a vote in Washington becomes a move in the dollar.

Review

Macro After-Action Review

Every major call is frozen before the outcome is known: the call, its horizon, its confidence, its causal chain and the conditions that would kill it. Afterwards each one is reviewed the same way, with outcome separated from process. Over time that builds something rarer than a forecast record: a record of reasoning.

Why Signal

Few observations. Structural answers.

Macro and geopolitical forecasting rests on a small number of observations that are not independent of one another. Under regime change, matching today to historical analogues overfits the past, and the more dimensions you match on, the worse it gets. Machines have made that error cheaper and more convincing.

Signal Macro's answer is structural. We ask what forces are producing today's world, map the distribution of power behind them, and work forward to what policymakers can and will do. The scarce asset in this environment is demonstrated causal judgment, not another forecast.

Value of expert judgment

1/N

Inversely proportional to the number of observations.
The fewer the precedents, the more the reasoning matters.

What clients receive

Monthly12 × year

GeoMacro Briefing

The month's most important macro and geopolitical developments and what they mean for the three anchor assets, across all three horizons.

Quarterly4 × year

Strategy Call

A live discussion of key developments and the risk-asset outlook, including the signals gathered across the Signal network over the quarter.

Ad hocAs the question arises

Special Reports

Investigations into the most important questions facing investors, published when the question is live rather than on a calendar.

Every piece carries a clear call, a horizon and the conditions that would prove it wrong. Research is confidential to subscribing institutions and not for redistribution.

Institutional investors

The research programme

For CIOs, macro portfolio managers, allocators and the teams around them: the briefing, the call and the special reports, mapped to the three anchor assets and three investment horizons.

C-suite & boards

Executive and board advisory

For leadership teams whose strategy, supply chains and capital are exposed to a changing world order: executive briefings, board sessions and bespoke work on the geopolitical questions that shape the next decision.

Founder

Jim Mylonas

CEO & Global Strategist

Signal Macro
Founder, CEO & Global Strategist (2026–present)
BCA Research
Chief Strategist, Client Advisory & Daily Insights (2011–2019)
BCA Academy
Conceived and led the firm's investor-education arm
Education
Honours BA, Economics & Political Science, University of Toronto
MA, International Affairs, Carleton University (NPSIA)

Jim Mylonas has advised institutional investors on geopolitics and macro since 2011. He founded Signal Macro to bring the frameworks he developed over that time, the PPC Method, Quadrangle Theory and the UMB regime map, directly to the investors, executives and boards who have to act on them.

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Start the conversation.

Signal Macro serves institutional investors, C-suite executives and boards. Tell us about your mandate and we will follow up with a sample GeoMacro Briefing, subscription details or a proposal for advisory work.

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