Former CIA Spymaster Brings Geopolitical Intelligence to the Business


The Arkin Group, a world danger consulting and intelligence agency, has launched TAG Intel, which can present non-partisan geopolitical intelligence to the wealth administration group. TAG Intel is led by Jack Devine, a 32-year veteran of the Central Intelligence Company, who goals to democratize the data he’s been bringing to international company purchasers since 2000.

Devine created The Arkin Group in Could 2000, together with New York lawyer Stanley Arkin, who handed away in 2023. The agency makes a speciality of worldwide disaster administration, strategic intelligence, investigative analysis and enterprise problem-solving.

Devine has fairly a fame within the intelligence group; he led the CIA’s Counternarcotics Heart when drug kingpin Pablo Escobar was taken down. He was in control of this system that drove the Soviets out of Afghanistan within the late Nineteen Eighties. He was in Chile when Salvador Allende was overthrown in 1973. He was head of Iranian operations in the midst of the Iran-Contra affair, which he’s been outspoken about saying was not a good suggestion.   

He mentioned the human sources and community he’s constructed through the years differentiate his intelligence.

“All over the world, I’ve folks which can be indigenous and are very educated about their nations,” he mentioned. “And so they construct up a really spectacular, in my opinion, community.”

A 12 months and a half in the past, Devine began to fulfill with wealth and asset managers.

“Most of the asset managers particularly mentioned, ‘We have at all times checked out geopolitical issues around the globe. And we had fashions. However now these fashions aren’t working for us. It’s a rather more complicated world. And though AI supplies a whole lot of info that’s typical knowledge, it’s stuffed with what everyone else thinks,'” he mentioned.

There’s additionally a whole lot of disinformation round geopolitical occasions, so these firms have been in search of a supply of intelligence they might belief. Devine mentioned his content material doesn’t lean towards one get together or one other, and it’s primarily based on info he’s receiving from sources on the bottom in these nations.

TAG Intel will present this similar intelligence in a shortened model for wealth managers to cut back uncertainty round international crises and different occasions purchasers might ask about.  

It will embody a turnkey subscription-based content material service, The Intel Director’s Temporary, which begins at $10,000 a 12 months. That subscription features a weekly evaluation of geopolitical points and their impacts, a disaster report on fast-breaking international occasions and potential market affect, a quarterly report that gives deeper intelligence into industries and sectors, month-to-month dwell Q&A periods with analysts, entry to Devine’s podcast, and in-person occasions with Devine for choose purchasers. For $299 a 12 months, advisors can get entry to the weekly experiences, and for $500 a 12 months, they’ll get the disaster experiences, in accordance with TAG Intel’s web site. 

“What I hear from asset managers or wealth is, ‘the world is complicated, and it is unsure, and we do not know the place to go to seek out the reply,’” Devine mentioned.

“They’ll cross it on to their purchasers; they are often sensible. And it relieves a whole lot of that pressure about, ‘I’ve this particular person’s cash, however is there going to be a conflict subsequent week?’ Or, ‘Is Putin going to really use a nuclear weapon?’ And I’ve solutions primarily based on a reasonably arduous assortment on all these points,” he mentioned.

For instance, his content material may discover the danger of a full-blown conflict between Hezbollah and Israel, given current developments. He’ll discuss the place the conflict in Russia goes and the way that conflict could be advantageous. He’ll have a look at how secure issues are in Brazil and Argentina.

“Every thing on the planet is interlocked in the present day,” he mentioned. “In the event you’re Russia, they have their hand within the Center East. In the event you’re Iran, they have their palms in Russia and the North Koreans. In different phrases, every little thing’s interconnected. The cash’s interconnected.”

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *