Throughout history, people’s perceptions of reality, understanding, and their role in the world have been suddenly altered by events, disclosures, or revelations. The instant collapse or reconfiguration of solid belief structures, rather than the details of what was disclosed, is the defining feature of such events, as would be the case with a hypothetical revelation of non-human intelligent life.
The Discovery of the Americas occurred in the 15th century, marking the beginning of sustained and uninterrupted European contact, which forced the rewriting of theology, history, and anthropology because an entire continent and its civilizations were unknown. At that time, human history was considered partial.
Nicolaus Copernicus, who in the 16th century proposed that the Earth revolves around the Sun, and that the Earth is not the center of the universe, is considered one of the first documented instances of a mankind paradigm change in human history. It hit the centralized spiritual authority hard because it was an existential downgrade.
Atomic bombs over two Japanese cities in 1945 introduced a sudden, unprecedented military power and destructive capability, changing ethics, politics, and fear to an extinction level.
However, the world was shocked by the 9/11 attacks in real time, defining the unthinkable, and the high impact on all of us of not knowing who could have done it, how, or why. The world changed that day, and confidence was lost.
Recently, the Sunday Times reported that Helen McCaw, a former analyst who created strategies for hypothetical economic disasters at the Central Bank of England, wrote to Andrew Bailey, the bank’s governor, about the necessity of getting ready for what appears to be the Trump administration’s decision to disclose information about the persistence of technologically advanced non-human intelligence that is responsible for unknown anomalies and phenomena in the United States.
Do not forget when Donald Trump spoke with Joe Rogan about aliens and UFOs during his October 2024 interview. According to Trump, he spoke with “solid pilots” who reported seeing “things you would not believe,” such as objects that were “round in form” and moving “four times faster” than a supersonic jet fighter plane.
If there is an official announcement and its showed clear evidence that nobody is going to dispute, in a matter of hours, we will see total financial instability, there may be high price volatility in stock markets, due to catastrophizing or euphoria, and a collapse in confidence if market participants feel uncertain on how to price assets, McCaw reportedly wrote in her letter.
9/11, Central Banks and Alien Revelation
There is no exact precedent for a revelation of this kind, but we can learn from 9/11 and formulate possible actions to consider.
1. Market reacts with fear. NYSE closed for four trading days, starting with immediate market closure, and when reopened, the Dow Jones fell ~7 % in a week. Airlines, insurers, and travel stocks collapsed.
Lesson: The first crisis is informational. The disclosure would generate uncertainty and a highly volatile scenario, possible temporary market stoppages to manage panic, fear of attacks, and geopolitical instability. Central banks must be prepared to manage and provide information, to instill trust on the one hand and on the other, provide a huge amount of liquidity quickly to flood the entire system, and if needed, emergency rate cuts. Most importantly, it must react quickly with coordinated action internationally for high-ambiguity events.
2. Systems Fail. Wall Street was not saved at first by the Fed. Payment systems, settlement networks, and clearinghouses were all stabilized.
Lesson: Stress-test operational systems. The revelation will cause communication disruption, cyber phobia, and payment delays in operational systems. The main systems should be stress-tested for an unexpected increase in balance inquiries, transfers, withdrawals, currency exchanges, and for cyberattacks, given the opportunity, to avoid loss of control.
3. Sector economic shocks. Winners versus losers in the short term: Defense, security, oil versus airlines, travel, hospitality, insurance.
Lesson: Shocks redistribute economic winners and losers. Financials, consumer discretionary spending, luxury, and tourism will likely be affected versus defense, aerospace, cybersecurity, and advanced materials. The government and companies must anticipate sectoral impacts and support critical industries to maintain stability, while investors anticipate opportunities.
4. Fed reacts rapidly. The Fed took initial action only 41 mins after the event, confirming it was “fully operational” and stood ready to provide liquidity. The Fed injected US$100 billion-plus in liquidity over the next three days.
Lesson: Move extremely fast. Risk managers are captivated by low-probability, high-impact risks, including the possibility of high US dollar volatility, with gold, silver, and likely crypto as stores of assets. There will be a need to not only focus on keeping the market operational, but people will also ask new questions and react with hyper-information on social media.
5. Global political and economic influence. Before the attack, the internet bubble marked the beginning of a long recession in the United States and other countries, and the 2003 Iraq War triggered oil market volatility and high prices, accompanied by instability in the region.
Lesson: Look at a disruptive global shock. The new US military operation against Iran, launched a few weeks ago, is introducing a high level of instability to the world, resulting in pressure that drives up inflation. At the same time, it is difficult to cut interest rates. There is also a high impact on gasoline prices because of the historic oil supply shock, with approximately 20 million barrels per day, almost equivalent to the daily production of the United States and Saudi Arabia. The impact also threatens to trigger a global recession. The situation is pressuring central banks to act early in a scenario where the economy could fall into a combination of high inflation, low growth, and rising unemployment.
Alien Disclosure and the Benefits for the US
I strongly believe that the strategy was already deployed. A weak dollar benefits the United States because US exports become cheaper globally, manufacturing comes back because of competitive pricing, China’s competitive advantage will be deluded, and the US$38.8 trillion debt will be inflated away. Alien disclosure is a monetary event, and Wall Street monetizes this kind of uncertainty very quickly. Its capability to recover from lows to highs is amazing. Remember when the S&P 500 dropped more than 30% in only 23 days in 2020 due to COVID-19? At the end of the same year, it had recovered its initial level.
Controlling the narrative and having first-mover advantage, the ability to dominate global media, finance, and agenda-setting institutions will help the United States at the revelation event, but central banks need to be ready when nobody is thinking the unthinkable.