Michael Burry is back in the news: "The only way to win is not to play"

*Michael Burry is an American investor with an unconventional background.*

A doctor by training and a graduate of Vanderbilt University, he abandoned medicine in the early 2000s to devote himself to finance. Passionate about fundamental analysis, he founded his own fund, Scion Capital, in 2000, with a simple yet formidable approach: seek out undervalued companies, bet against market excesses and, above all, never follow the crowd. *This contrarian philosophy would enable him to make one of the most famous bets in the history of modern finance.*

In 2005, Burry uncovered a flaw in the system: banks were granting mortgage loans on a massive scale to insolvent households.

These loans, known as subprimes, were then turned into complex financial products resold on the markets as if they were risk-free. By meticulously studying the data, he realised before anyone else that these products were a ticking time bomb.

Against consensus, he decided to bet against the US housing market by purchasing insurance contracts on these bonds (the famous CDS, or Credit Default Swaps). For two years, he endured Wall Street's mockery and pressure from his own investors, who were convinced he was losing his mind.

But in 2007, it all collapsed. The US housing market imploded, banks fell, and Burry became one of the few to have not only anticipated the crisis, but also profited from it. His fund posted an extraordinary performance: gains of over 480% at a time when most investment funds were losing billions. This feat was recounted in Michael Lewis's book The Big Short, which was adapted into a film in 2015 starring Christian Bale as Burry.

The film highlights a solitary, rational man obsessed with figures, ready to defy the entire system in the name of economic truth.

On 31 October 2025, Burry posted a terse but poignant message on his X account:

This quote, inspired by the film WarGames (1983), in which an artificial intelligence discovers that the only winning move in a nuclear war is not to play, perfectly encapsulates Burry's vision.

The latter suggests that financial markets are entering another bubble phase, similar to the one he witnessed prior to 2008. Without pointing to a specific asset, he appears to target the frenzy surrounding artificial intelligence and tech stocks, whose valuations are reaching record highs.

Companies such as Nvidia, Microsoft and AMD have seen their market capitalisations skyrocket since 2023, fuelled by the euphoria surrounding generative AI.

According to Burry, the global economy is once again *dominated by speculative logic*, where investors bet more on promises than on actual profits.

AI projects are proliferating, start-ups are raising billions, and markets are betting on endless growth. Yet behind the euphoria, economic fundamentals remain fragile: inflation persists, interest rates remain high, and the profitability of many AI players remains hypothetical.

In this context, Burry's message can be read as a call for caution.

He is not saying that everything should be sold, but rather that it is sometimes better to refrain from investing in the collective madness.

As in 2007, he observes troubling signals: excessive valuations, overconfidence, and a market that seems to *ignore risks. His warning serves as a reminder that euphoria is often the final stage before a reversal*.

This is not the first time Michael Burry has tried to warn investors.

On 31 January 2023, he simply tweeted one word:

Viewed more than 2.3 million times, this post immediately went viral across the financial world. Many saw it as a major warning, and some investors reduced their stock market positions. Yet the facts proved him wrong.

Since that tweet, the market has continued to rise. The tech ETF ProShares UltraPro QQQ (TQQQ), for example, rose from *23 dollars in January 2023 to more than 115 dollars at the end of October 2025*, representing an increase of almost +400%.

Today, many investors mock this failed prediction. Burry himself admitted a few weeks later: *"I was wrong to say sell."*

This precedent serves as a reminder that even the greatest visionaries can be wrong, particularly when it comes to timing. Spotting a bubble does not mean knowing when it will burst.

*The question divides the financial community.*

On the one hand, some believe his warnings still deserve to be heard. Burry has proven he can spot systemic flaws long before others. When he speaks of a "bubble", he does not do so lightly: he bases it on real data, valuation ratios and macroeconomic trends.

On the other hand, his recent forecasting errors are a reminder that finance is a game of uncertainties. Markets can remain irrational longer than an investor can remain patient, as the economist John Maynard Keynes put it.

In reality, Burry's message may not be to sell right away, but rather to remain clear-headed.

His tweet calls for *discipline and prudence, urging people not to give in to the fear of missing out (FOMO*). It reminds us that bubbles are only clearly visible after they burst, and that long-term success relies on patience and reflection, not on momentary emotions.

So, should we believe Michael Burry? Perhaps not blindly. But it would be just as unwise to ignore him. After all, *he was the man all of Wall Street took for a madman…* until the day he was proved right.