Search Captions & Ask AI

E62: Elizabeth Holmes verdict, fraud origins & takeaways, navigating "The Great Markdown" & more

January 08, 2022 / 01:06:39

This episode covers the recent conviction of Elizabeth Holmes, poker night experiences during COVID-19, and insights into the current tech market corrections. The hosts discuss the implications of Holmes' fraud case, the psychological shifts during poker night, and the state of venture capital and tech valuations.

Elizabeth Holmes was found guilty on four counts of fraud, facing potential prison time. The hosts analyze the jury's decision, noting that while she misled investors about Theranos' capabilities, the case reflects broader issues in Silicon Valley's relationship with the media.

The conversation shifts to a poker night where the hosts recount a COVID-19 scare involving a dealer testing positive. They humorously detail the group's initial panic and eventual acceptance of the situation, illustrating the emotional cycle experienced during the pandemic.

Finally, the hosts discuss the current state of tech valuations, highlighting a significant correction in the market. They emphasize the importance of being 'default alive' for startups and share advice for founders navigating these challenging economic conditions.

TL;DR

Elizabeth Holmes is convicted of fraud; poker night reflects COVID-19 psychology; tech market faces significant corrections.

Video

00:00:00
happy new year happy new year happy new
00:00:02
year
00:00:04
guys listen
00:00:05
it's now it's candle season
00:00:08
oh god look at the equanimity this look
00:00:11
at his equanimity this candle costs 24
00:00:14
000 it is an extremely rare
00:00:17
brazilian sandalwood
00:00:19
you literally have to go into the amazon
00:00:22
and like
00:00:23
you know you you basically have to like
00:00:25
i mean try to extinct trees no bro you
00:00:28
gotta you gotta tear out like two acres
00:00:30
of rain forest and then you find this
00:00:31
one tree completely
00:00:34
you know sacred
00:00:35
uh and then you chop it down
00:00:38
you make this thing reduce it and it
00:00:40
lasts for a full 45 minutes how do you
00:00:42
like that sweater karen
00:00:44
candle carrots are going to be karen
00:00:46
candle carrots are calling it right now
00:00:48
the dms are coming you guys want to hear
00:00:50
about poker last night oh did you go so
00:00:53
i go down i take my eight hour drive
00:00:56
down south to jamaat's house and i pull
00:00:58
in and uh you know the security guard
00:01:01
greets me nicely as always i walk in and
00:01:04
i walk towards the poker room and
00:01:06
everyone's in there with the door open
00:01:08
like someone just got shot
00:01:10
masks on freaking out and champ is
00:01:12
inside the house and i wave and he's
00:01:14
like
00:01:15
get in here
00:01:16
and then i go in he's like oh who is
00:01:18
positive
00:01:19
max the dealer
00:01:21
tested positive and everyone's been
00:01:22
hanging out in the poker room with no
00:01:24
masks oh
00:01:28
the only two people that were exposed to
00:01:30
max we sent home yeah so everyone starts
00:01:32
freaking out he shuts the uh shuts the
00:01:34
poker game down chamf kicks everyone out
00:01:37
sends everyone home
00:01:38
and then he's like all right let's go
00:01:39
have dinner inside you know we're not
00:01:41
we're going to we open up all the doors
00:01:43
we're going to kind of lysol the room
00:01:44
tomorrow we all go in have dinner or you
00:01:47
know chamath and i go in and have dinner
00:01:48
with matt and the kids and then chemoth
00:01:51
starts thinking you know what it's okay
00:01:52
they were only exposed for a few seconds
00:01:54
let's call phil back okay let's call
00:01:56
shuffle back let's call keating back and
00:01:58
then they all come back for dinner and
00:02:00
at this point it's become like a dinner
00:02:01
party and then a couple of glasses of
00:02:03
wine in and then it's like you know what
00:02:05
the room's probably safe we should go
00:02:08
i mean the whole poker night went
00:02:10
through the entire cycle of psychology
00:02:12
of covid the whole pandemic it's like oh
00:02:14
my god get everyone out lock up and then
00:02:17
by the end of the night it was like you
00:02:18
know what let's go in the room and just
00:02:19
play poker and give each other coven
00:02:21
they got to acceptance they got to
00:02:22
accept this they went through the whole
00:02:23
emotional cycle of the pandemic in one
00:02:25
hour does anyone know anyone who's a
00:02:27
serious case of macron no i mean i know
00:02:29
dozens of people at this point and they
00:02:31
all say it was a cold yeah dozens of
00:02:32
people and that's just except for jake i
00:02:34
was on
00:02:38
was on social media giving everyone the
00:02:40
update like oh i sneezed today
00:02:43
oh i still test the positive he's like
00:02:45
showing his positive tests
00:02:51
we're concerned it's the only good test
00:02:53
result jkl's ever had yeah exactly
00:02:56
it's the only positive that's true
00:03:00
[Music]
00:03:10
[Music]
00:03:14
elizabeth holmes has been found guilty
00:03:16
on four counts of fraud
00:03:18
faces 20 years in prison for each guilty
00:03:21
account they would be i understand
00:03:23
served concurrently
00:03:25
most people are here speculating four to
00:03:27
10 years
00:03:28
and then i think you can get 15 off for
00:03:30
good behavior again i'm no expert on
00:03:32
that but that's what i read
00:03:34
uh guilty counts were two counts of wire
00:03:36
fraud and two counts of conspiracy to
00:03:37
commit fraud she was originally charged
00:03:38
with a total of 11 counts of fraud
00:03:40
uh four were guilty four were not guilty
00:03:43
three were a split verdict the jury said
00:03:45
they were unable to come to a unanimous
00:03:47
anonymous
00:03:48
verdict on three of the counts after
00:03:50
more than 45 hours of deliberation quote
00:03:52
from the wall street journal article
00:03:54
juries were persuaded that ms holmes
00:03:55
conspired to defraud investors this
00:03:57
outcome could be significant because it
00:03:59
means hundreds of millions of dollars of
00:04:00
thera knows investors
00:04:02
that there are the most investors lost
00:04:04
could be taken into consideration during
00:04:05
her sentencing his big numbers the jury
00:04:08
was split however on which of the six
00:04:10
investors who testified were defrauded
00:04:12
the jurors convicted his homes on three
00:04:14
counts
00:04:15
these included a hundred million dollars
00:04:16
from the family office of former
00:04:18
educator ed education we know the
00:04:20
details jake saw he was like doing it
00:04:22
for the audience
00:04:24
so anyway um thoughts on uh the legal
00:04:29
uh technicalities of the case counselor
00:04:32
sex well we've talked about this before
00:04:34
i mean i think so at the end of the day
00:04:35
she was convicted on the counts related
00:04:37
to deceiving investors she was not on
00:04:40
the accounts related to patients i think
00:04:42
that makes sense in that her obligations
00:04:45
to
00:04:46
investors are very clear whereas i think
00:04:48
that the patient related duties are i
00:04:50
mean she had them but it's a little bit
00:04:52
less clear so i mean look it's it's what
00:04:54
we've always said here
00:04:56
as a founder you can be
00:04:58
as messianic as you want to be you can
00:05:01
promise
00:05:02
you know anything about your vision and
00:05:04
what you intend into the future but what
00:05:06
you must do is be accurate about the
00:05:09
current state of your business you
00:05:11
cannot lie
00:05:13
about the deals that you've made about
00:05:15
the current capabilities of your product
00:05:19
and she was putting you know logos of
00:05:21
customers she didn't have in her deck
00:05:23
she was lying about the military being a
00:05:26
customer so she simply exactly
00:05:28
misrepresented where she was at that
00:05:31
time at the at when
00:05:33
these investors invested and that was
00:05:35
the red line she should not have crossed
00:05:37
and i think in that sense it's a pretty
00:05:39
simple case i think you know the the the
00:05:41
part of this again you know the the the
00:05:44
piece of this that's interesting
00:05:46
is not the case itself but really the
00:05:48
media coverage because the media wants
00:05:50
to portray this case as an indictment
00:05:54
of silicon valley and the thing you keep
00:05:56
hearing over and over again none of us
00:05:58
were involved
00:06:00
well it just factually yes exactly we
00:06:02
weren't involved but
00:06:03
like there's not a single person in
00:06:05
silicon valley i think who put in a
00:06:07
single shekel into this thing who
00:06:09
actually does this as a real job tim
00:06:11
draper
00:06:12
well she he doesn't know
00:06:13
put in a little bit of money as an angel
00:06:15
and then he he didn't put a single
00:06:16
dollar in after that i'm saying you know
00:06:18
you didn't come to social capital or
00:06:19
craft ventures or to sequoia or to tpb
00:06:22
or to google to raise money for this
00:06:24
thing none of that happened
00:06:26
you know saks is right like the the
00:06:27
summary of uh the wall street journal
00:06:30
nick you can post it because i put it in
00:06:31
the group chat basically summarized the
00:06:34
fraud and is exactly what sack says she
00:06:35
had fixed the logo of specifically i
00:06:37
think it was pfizer that had not
00:06:39
validated theranos's technology in
00:06:41
materials she presented to investors so
00:06:43
she's basically like pfizer said this is
00:06:45
a go
00:06:46
and apparently that wasn't true she gave
00:06:48
the false impression that the devices
00:06:49
were used by the us military that's what
00:06:51
got all these military folks to sign on
00:06:53
board and support it that wasn't true
00:06:55
and then uh
00:06:57
and then she the biggest coup was that
00:06:58
she signed a deal with walgreens and
00:07:00
safeway to include its devices in
00:07:02
hundreds of stores
00:07:03
and then many investors saw these
00:07:05
contracts as an endorsement of the
00:07:06
technology and growth potential
00:07:09
but basically those folks did no
00:07:10
diligence and bought the hype and so it
00:07:12
was just a whole cycle of this thing
00:07:14
that basically fell apart because the
00:07:16
tests didn't work freeberg
00:07:19
what are your thoughts as our life
00:07:20
science guru what's most interesting to
00:07:22
me is how does this get to this point
00:07:25
if you're elizabeth holmes you're 19
00:07:28
years old
00:07:29
and you start telling your story
00:07:31
and the more
00:07:33
grandiose the story you tell is the
00:07:35
better the reaction you get is it
00:07:37
becomes reinforcing and the behavior
00:07:39
extends a little bit further and a
00:07:41
little bit further every time she told a
00:07:43
story about how incredible this tech was
00:07:45
it's just one drop you take one drop it
00:07:47
can measure everything when she
00:07:49
simplified it and reduced it to that and
00:07:51
it was such an incredible statement and
00:07:53
she saw the reaction from people she's
00:07:55
like wow that works let me repeat it
00:07:56
it's like any good sales person they
00:07:58
figure out what sells and then they sell
00:08:00
it and then they repeat
00:08:01
and what's interesting to me that you
00:08:04
know you talk about the media
00:08:06
but when she went out and told her story
00:08:09
and got
00:08:10
incredible press coverage because she
00:08:12
was a young female doing something that
00:08:15
was going to save lives
00:08:17
there was this altruistic steve
00:08:18
jobs-esque
00:08:20
kind of combination here
00:08:22
the media wrote a glowing review of her
00:08:24
and then she said wow look they said
00:08:26
something great let me go do that again
00:08:27
and she got a bigger media piece written
00:08:28
and a bigger media piece and the more
00:08:30
she said the bigger she said it the more
00:08:32
she claimed she could do the bigger the
00:08:33
story got the more coverage she got and
00:08:36
the whole thing became this kind of
00:08:37
reinforcing cycle and i do think that
00:08:40
the press coverage that she got as she
00:08:42
was building this business which helped
00:08:44
her raise capital helped her attract
00:08:45
employees helped her get walgreens and
00:08:48
safeway to the table
00:08:49
allowed to fall
00:08:51
it allowed her to build the business but
00:08:53
it's exactly what created the narrative
00:08:55
that wasn't true
00:08:57
and so the coverage that the press gave
00:09:00
her and we see this every day you guys
00:09:02
all see these top 50 companies and we
00:09:04
all know having met a lot of these
00:09:06
companies as you go down that list this
00:09:08
this 20 companies are total scam
00:09:10
companies they're fraud they're not
00:09:11
going to work they're grifters all the
00:09:13
stuff that you guys might say about the
00:09:14
quality of those businesses but the
00:09:16
press reporter isn't doing diligence
00:09:18
they're not a no you know it turns out
00:09:20
all the diligence was done
00:09:21
after the fact and then it's like well
00:09:23
maybe we should go do some diligence oh
00:09:25
wait a second because this the press
00:09:27
coverage has now created this hyped
00:09:28
story about who and what she is
00:09:31
the the diligence actually pays off
00:09:33
because you have something to take apart
00:09:35
if she was just a nobody startup that
00:09:37
raised 30 million dollars and they're
00:09:38
still trying to figure out their way
00:09:39
there would be no value in any reporter
00:09:41
doing diligence on her and trying to
00:09:42
figure out what was actually there it
00:09:44
was because the story got big that it
00:09:46
gave everyone including john kerry who
00:09:48
an incentive he's the wall street
00:09:49
journal reporter who broke all this an
00:09:51
incentive to go in and take this thing
00:09:52
apart
00:09:53
and so i mean it's really unfortunate
00:09:55
and it's really self-reinforcing that
00:09:57
the press coverage that created the
00:09:59
circumstance here
00:10:01
ultimately also enabled them the press
00:10:03
to take the thing apart and you know
00:10:05
land this woman in jail and i'm not
00:10:07
saying she did nothing wrong but i'm
00:10:09
just saying that there's a system here
00:10:11
and the system is set up but she
00:10:12
manipulated the press yeah
00:10:14
let me ask one question
00:10:16
then i got a question for
00:10:17
saxon champ her basic premise
00:10:20
that one drop of blood could get you
00:10:22
hundreds of results let me just ask you
00:10:24
a question free break at what point
00:10:25
would one drop of blood
00:10:27
or so a nano tube uh be able to at our
00:10:30
current technological
00:10:32
you know ramp
00:10:33
be able to give us a hundred different
00:10:35
data points on a person every time
00:10:37
you're generating a data point you're
00:10:39
running what's called an assay which is
00:10:41
a measurement of something
00:10:43
the question is how much of a molecule
00:10:45
are you measuring against what volume is
00:10:48
there enough of that molecule in that
00:10:50
volume to give you a statistically good
00:10:52
reading and that is a function of how
00:10:54
precisely you can measure that thing so
00:10:57
there are there are great advances
00:10:58
happening right now in a domain and life
00:11:01
sciences of hardware technology called
00:11:03
microfluidics this is the manipulation
00:11:06
of pico leader you know very very small
00:11:09
volumes of liquid and then being able to
00:11:11
run chemical assays using biochemical
00:11:14
techniques which we now have all these
00:11:15
amazing new
00:11:16
kind of tools like crispr and other
00:11:18
things that would allow us to get a much
00:11:20
more precise measurement with a much
00:11:22
smaller volume than has ever been
00:11:24
possible so we can manipulate small
00:11:25
fluids we can measure them so there's
00:11:27
nothing today that would physically say
00:11:30
we cannot do many of the things that she
00:11:32
claims to have been able to do but there
00:11:34
are there's a stacking of technology
00:11:36
assets that need to be done to make that
00:11:38
happen in reality
00:11:40
and each of those assets are very
00:11:41
different so look you could do it with
00:11:43
cholesterol right now you could do it
00:11:44
with blood sugar right now but you
00:11:46
couldn't do both you could theoretically
00:11:48
you could put them into a device and do
00:11:50
that no the reason the reason why lipids
00:11:52
work can you do four hundred things
00:11:54
you cannot i've actually funded three of
00:11:56
these businesses and i've poured almost
00:11:57
100 million dollars of money into it and
00:12:00
they've all failed and the reason is
00:12:01
exactly what he said you can do
00:12:03
cholesterol because lipids are big
00:12:04
enough you know and so you can basically
00:12:06
build an assay that can pick that off
00:12:08
with a drop of blood you can do a
00:12:10
reasonably good job with pretty large
00:12:12
error bars on sugar but all of this
00:12:14
other stuff where you're going to
00:12:15
replace like a you know a cbc or these
00:12:18
broad you know profile panels that we
00:12:20
all get once a year to assess our health
00:12:23
today i don't think that that's
00:12:25
necessarily within reach it's not within
00:12:26
technological region it's not because
00:12:28
people aren't you know smart enough it's
00:12:31
just that not enough of this investment
00:12:32
is happening because then you go back to
00:12:34
this whole idea where the funding cycle
00:12:36
needs to see a big payoff for the
00:12:38
capitalists to want to get involved in
00:12:40
this thing and there really isn't you
00:12:42
know it's not as if like quest and
00:12:44
labcorp
00:12:45
are printing 400 billion dollars of
00:12:47
revenue and profits and so it's not like
00:12:50
there's a massive economic incentive to
00:12:52
run in
00:12:52
and so even when you know we have tried
00:12:55
in multiple occasions with completely
00:12:57
different teams of incredible people
00:13:00
every single time we have failed so
00:13:02
there's a physics
00:13:04
law here that's just not physically
00:13:05
possible she made this claim uh
00:13:07
saxophone remember and don't don't make
00:13:09
it broad there are things there are
00:13:11
molecules there are pathogens there are
00:13:13
things you can absolutely detect small
00:13:15
molecules
00:13:17
you can you can detect with a drop of
00:13:18
blood
00:13:19
you know measure counting how many blood
00:13:21
cells you have in your whole body you
00:13:24
know using an estimate from a single
00:13:26
droplet of blood because you know we
00:13:27
have these machines called flow
00:13:29
cytometry machines where we sort blood
00:13:30
cells and then it'll tell you how many
00:13:32
red blood cells you have and how many
00:13:33
different kinds of white blood cells
00:13:34
that's a big part of your annual checkup
00:13:36
that you'll typically get you know you
00:13:38
need a good amount of blood to get an
00:13:39
accurate reading on how many blood cells
00:13:41
there are using even just using lasers
00:13:43
and and you know these sophisticated
00:13:45
machines can you reduce that down to a
00:13:47
droplet physically probably not right
00:13:49
and so there's some it's not universal
00:13:51
to say this is possible it's not
00:13:52
possible there are elements that are
00:13:53
absolutely possible some of which are
00:13:55
being done today and there are some
00:13:56
things that are going to be very hard to
00:13:57
pull off got it and she was making these
00:13:59
claims as early as 2003 when it was
00:14:02
founded so we're talking about 19 years
00:14:04
ago and we're saying here it's not going
00:14:05
to be possible to do hundreds of these
00:14:07
things maybe in our lifetime we're
00:14:09
talking about decades from there we need
00:14:10
to be some significant breakthrough
00:14:12
sacks let me ask you a legal question
00:14:15
i was on a podcast and i
00:14:17
said to them why haven't the prosecutors
00:14:20
had bill maris who is a friend of
00:14:23
freeburgs who helped me get him on the
00:14:24
podcast he was great thank you for that
00:14:26
uh david um this week in startups very
00:14:28
smart guy very smart guy and he came out
00:14:31
publicly when he was running google
00:14:34
ventures and he said we looked at it a
00:14:35
couple of times he's referring to their
00:14:37
nose but there was so much hand waving
00:14:39
like look over here that we couldn't
00:14:41
figure it out
00:14:42
so we just had someone from our life
00:14:44
science investment team go into
00:14:46
walgreens and take the test and it
00:14:47
wasn't that difficult for anyone to
00:14:49
determine that things may not have been
00:14:51
not be what they seem here now saks i
00:14:55
was on this podcast to drop out which i
00:14:57
think is an abc news one and i said why
00:14:58
didn't the prosecution bring up
00:15:01
you know gv let's assume sequoia
00:15:02
andreessen and you know the 20 top firms
00:15:05
in the valley uh who said no and they
00:15:07
all said no because she wouldn't show
00:15:08
them due diligence and i asked them why
00:15:11
didn't the prosecutors bring up those 20
00:15:14
firms and compel them to testify about
00:15:16
why they didn't invest to give the
00:15:17
counter example and she said i don't
00:15:19
know
00:15:21
wouldn't that have been a much better
00:15:22
strategy to say
00:15:23
here are the credible people who didn't
00:15:25
invest i'm not sure i see the relevance
00:15:27
of that because
00:15:29
elizabeth holmes crime was not
00:15:31
promising something that she couldn't
00:15:33
ultimately deliver on
00:15:35
it's okay to fail in silicon valley one
00:15:37
of the best things about silicon valley
00:15:39
is that we don't punish failure
00:15:42
her mistake wasn't making
00:15:44
misrepresentations to the people who did
00:15:45
invest
00:15:46
right
00:15:47
if and what i'm saying is if anything
00:15:49
actually what elizabeth holmes maybe
00:15:51
should have done was call up some of
00:15:52
those firms and they could have said how
00:15:55
easy it was for them to figure out
00:15:57
that they shouldn't have invested maybe
00:15:58
that would have been a way to kind of
00:15:59
muddy the waters on her side so i was
00:16:02
thinking that they would have said hey
00:16:04
she wouldn't show us the technology and
00:16:06
when we did our independent diligence
00:16:08
she wouldn't let us diligence we did
00:16:09
outside backdoor diligence
00:16:11
it failed there were red flags all over
00:16:14
this thing we we had talked about in our
00:16:16
poker games way before this thing went
00:16:18
off the rails um the fact that there
00:16:20
were no major vc firms involved who
00:16:22
could who had expertise in biotech who
00:16:24
could do the diligence it was all
00:16:27
sort of
00:16:28
it was basically
00:16:29
family office money of people who
00:16:31
weren't in silicon valley you know
00:16:33
writing big checks whether it was rupert
00:16:34
murdoch or the devos family or what have
00:16:37
you
00:16:38
there were there were just red flags
00:16:40
coming off this thing which is why
00:16:41
silicon valley was not
00:16:43
by and large due by it the people who
00:16:45
were duped by it were the people
00:16:47
that elizabeth holmes was able to sell
00:16:50
the patina of silicon valley to
00:16:52
and the media
00:16:54
because the media
00:16:56
what we've seen over and over again is
00:16:58
they don't fact-check stories when they
00:17:00
fit their priors
00:17:01
the prior here is that you know what the
00:17:04
media want to believe is that the next
00:17:06
steve jobs was going to be a woman
00:17:09
and so when elizabeth holmes served that
00:17:11
up to them wearing the black turtleneck
00:17:13
it was too good a story for them to fact
00:17:15
check too heavily and so they ran with
00:17:17
it in the same way in the same way that
00:17:20
you know the ivermectin hoax that
00:17:22
rolling stone ran with was too good a
00:17:24
story to be fact checked because they
00:17:26
want to believe that the maga people in
00:17:27
oklahoma were eating horse paste i mean
00:17:30
no there's a hundred better examples of
00:17:32
just i mean just to be generic sacks of
00:17:34
other startups that we all know are
00:17:36
total nonsense and
00:17:38
total nonsense and the report
00:17:41
there's a he there's a fraud in biotech
00:17:43
going on right now that hey
00:17:45
david and i david and i saw upfront i
00:17:48
mean it's like this stuff is crazy
00:17:50
it's really really crazy look i mean i
00:17:52
think the moral of the story for
00:17:53
entrepreneurs i mean i think there's a
00:17:55
couple of takeaways here number one you
00:17:57
got to be really clear with the present
00:17:58
state of your business it's okay
00:18:01
to talk about your grand vision and what
00:18:03
you're going to do in the future but you
00:18:04
cannot be inaccurate in any way with
00:18:06
respect to your current numbers and
00:18:09
partnerships and deals and current
00:18:11
capabilities i think number two i think
00:18:14
when you start working with the media in
00:18:16
this way to promote your company you're
00:18:18
playing with fire because the media
00:18:20
really has two kinds of stories they
00:18:21
build up and they tear down and when
00:18:23
they're done building you up they're
00:18:25
gonna tear you down because that's the
00:18:26
only story left to right so
00:18:28
if you're gonna go court the media in
00:18:30
that way to try and get publicity you
00:18:32
better be really careful how you do it
00:18:34
you better be really accurate and you
00:18:36
better not give them cause to later
00:18:39
regret pumping you up because they will
00:18:41
tear you down even harder if you do that
00:18:43
i think i think the more important
00:18:44
danger that i just like to speak
00:18:46
generally to for a second is to not let
00:18:48
other people do your thinking for you
00:18:50
the investors that came into this
00:18:51
business came in under the assumption
00:18:53
that this was a real business because
00:18:56
the press had written about it and the
00:18:57
press wrote about it because the general
00:18:58
had joined the board and the general
00:19:00
joined the board because his buddy
00:19:02
george schultz said hey you should meet
00:19:04
this lady and the whole thing ended up
00:19:06
becoming this roundabout where no one
00:19:09
actually did any original thinking and
00:19:11
no one did any actual diligence stop and
00:19:13
the whole thing ended up being this i'm
00:19:14
sorry yeah now you're talking about
00:19:16
actually how silicon valley works so
00:19:17
that's [ __ ] [ __ ] yeah okay you
00:19:19
don't think
00:19:20
these dopes run around thinking of
00:19:22
sequoia benchmark social capital craft
00:19:24
invest i'm just plowing the money in of
00:19:26
course they do they don't even think
00:19:28
social proof they assume that we've done
00:19:30
our jealousy
00:19:31
you think they're doing principal
00:19:32
diligence these like the silicon by the
00:19:34
way
00:19:35
this is also how the bernie madoff
00:19:37
scandal you know um got so far ahead of
00:19:39
itself no one actually went in and did
00:19:41
the audits of those financials everyone
00:19:43
assumed that because someone else has is
00:19:45
in this thing and because someone else
00:19:47
is involved or someone else something
00:19:48
nice has been written about it or said
00:19:50
about it it's worth backing and like the
00:19:52
lack of original thinking in business
00:19:54
and life in general i think is you know
00:19:56
one of the biggest you know risks that
00:19:58
each of us takes and it's why it's
00:19:59
really important to learn how to take
00:20:00
your for yourself i i have a deep
00:20:02
respect
00:20:03
for early stage investors because they
00:20:05
have to get in and make some critical
00:20:07
decisions
00:20:09
some people make those decisions about
00:20:10
the team
00:20:11
right the psychology of the co-founders
00:20:14
sometimes it's about the end market and
00:20:16
sometimes it's about a deep analysis of
00:20:19
the traction
00:20:21
but you have to honestly let's be honest
00:20:23
there is a valley of funding between the
00:20:25
series a and maybe the d or the e
00:20:29
where
00:20:30
i really think a lot of folks just look
00:20:32
for signaling value based on who the
00:20:34
series investors were they're saying
00:20:36
i'm not sure they're making black i'm
00:20:37
not sure that those family offices were
00:20:39
any worse or any better like maybe the
00:20:41
devos family looked at rupert murdoch
00:20:43
and said he's smart so i'm in yeah
00:20:45
that's exactly what happened that's so
00:20:46
different than all these series b and c
00:20:48
firms that say uh benchmarks in i'm in
00:20:50
totally it's the exact same thing
00:20:52
totally i literally had a situation and
00:20:54
i think i brought it up in a previous
00:20:55
episode where i was working on a deal it
00:20:57
wasn't like a major check for us it was
00:20:59
you know a six-figure check
00:21:01
and they said uh none of the other firms
00:21:03
are asking for diligence uh why should
00:21:05
we give it to you and i was like
00:21:07
how much are they crazy and they were
00:21:08
putting in more money than i was they
00:21:10
were putting seven figures in crazy and
00:21:11
i said because i have no idea diligence
00:21:13
when you ask for diligence now some of
00:21:14
these founders look at you like how dare
00:21:16
you yeah exactly they no in this case
00:21:18
they were insulted and they said we're
00:21:20
not giving you diligence and they and we
00:21:22
walked away
00:21:24
without visiting the house
00:21:25
yeah they're like buy it without
00:21:27
this company that dave and i call called
00:21:29
you know well david was calling it
00:21:30
theron was 2.0 but
00:21:32
this company couldn't even explain gross
00:21:35
revenue they couldn't they didn't it was
00:21:37
like gross revenue asterix and it's like
00:21:40
if there's one metric on a pdl that can
00:21:42
never have an asterisk ever the top line
00:21:45
the top gross revenue the money that
00:21:48
came into your right
00:21:49
customers
00:21:55
i get it okay
00:21:56
but
00:21:57
gross revenue asterisks how much money
00:22:00
is in the right
00:22:01
open the register count the money and so
00:22:03
i just remember asking the simple
00:22:05
question like
00:22:06
um
00:22:07
can you just take the asterisks away and
00:22:09
just tell me
00:22:10
this is a company the two of you were
00:22:11
looking at together
00:22:14
you and i have talked about many times
00:22:15
oh really you're a theradose 2.0 sir
00:22:18
that's what this guy is and i and i've
00:22:20
learned a lot about delaware law i don't
00:22:22
know if you guys have i've talked about
00:22:23
this company
00:22:25
yeah yeah well bro you in the text you
00:22:26
were like i'm shorting again i'll tell
00:22:28
you in a minute oh right um yeah you
00:22:30
know what it is but anyway i've been
00:22:31
getting a big um a lesson here about
00:22:33
delaware law there's something called a
00:22:35
section 220. have any of you ever had to
00:22:38
file one of these by the way
00:22:40
it worked out really well sorry go ahead
00:22:42
do any are any of you aware of whatever
00:22:44
oh you're sure
00:22:45
any of you aware of what a section 220
00:22:47
is or heard of this before
00:22:50
basically in a delaware corporation if
00:22:52
you're a shareholder of any size not
00:22:53
just like a board member with 10 or
00:22:55
whatever
00:22:56
if you feel there's malfeasance going on
00:22:58
you can file this 220 in delaware and uh
00:23:01
according to there's a great scandanarps
00:23:03
uh article on this
00:23:05
the the delaware courts are taking very
00:23:06
seriously that if there's any accusation
00:23:08
of any kind of malfeasance especially
00:23:10
financial
00:23:11
any shareholder
00:23:13
even tiny can get all of the books
00:23:16
and in detail not board minutes not top
00:23:18
level p l like detailed financials uh
00:23:21
and so for people who are running
00:23:23
companies
00:23:24
this is private companies too or this is
00:23:26
in private companies look up section 220
00:23:28
of the delaware general corporate law i
00:23:30
remember at facebook is because we had
00:23:32
these vagaries of having to control
00:23:34
shareholder account or stuff like that
00:23:36
and information rights yes we actually
00:23:38
kept the financials on a physical
00:23:41
computer that was not connected to the
00:23:42
internet so the people that wanted it
00:23:45
to come to our office and then we
00:23:46
remember them in like a windowless room
00:23:48
without their phone or something is that
00:23:50
i think that's that's that's how they
00:23:52
avoided people filing 220 requests
00:23:55
and so just something for people to be
00:23:56
aware aware of on both sides of the
00:23:58
table that if they're shenanigans going
00:24:00
on a company founders think well i don't
00:24:02
have to give any information to my
00:24:03
shareholders that's not true and it's
00:24:05
not true whatever you have in
00:24:06
information rights whatever your lawyers
00:24:08
wrote is not
00:24:10
above section 220 in delaware so just
00:24:13
keep that in mind i got a case like that
00:24:15
right now going on
00:24:17
where our founder won't give you
00:24:18
information well
00:24:19
it's not the founder but there's a
00:24:22
company that just sold and they won't
00:24:25
tell the shareholders like the terms of
00:24:28
the deal
00:24:29
what
00:24:30
yeah even possible good question but
00:24:34
it's it just reeks of a fraud i'm not
00:24:37
going to say the name yet because i'm
00:24:38
hoping that they're going to start
00:24:40
acting in a more kosher way but it's the
00:24:42
most egregious thing i've ever seen all
00:24:44
you have to do is talk to your attorney
00:24:46
at wilson fenwick or whatever one of the
00:24:49
cohort of silicon you literally have the
00:24:51
management of the company
00:24:53
they've engaged in a sale the sale has
00:24:54
been publicly announced we have reason
00:24:56
to believe it's in the hundreds of
00:24:57
millions and they won't tell anybody the
00:24:59
terms
00:25:00
yeah file a 220 follow 220 and you know
00:25:03
what they're public so then the crazy
00:25:05
thing about these 220s is it used to be
00:25:07
that all of the information had to be
00:25:09
private yet to sign like non-disclosures
00:25:10
whatever and now in certain
00:25:11
circumstances i think it's in the best
00:25:13
interest of all shareholders the 220
00:25:14
information can be public and so that is
00:25:17
just like
00:25:18
a sniper shot to anybody who is
00:25:21
doing any kind of shenanigans we had a
00:25:23
company in the same situation who
00:25:25
wouldn't tell us about a sale
00:25:27
and then i have a call with the board
00:25:29
because i own seven percent of the
00:25:30
company this is years ago and i said can
00:25:31
you explain to me what happened here and
00:25:33
they're they're like yeah well we're
00:25:34
doing the sale and blah blah and it
00:25:36
turned out the bankers were taking 40 of
00:25:38
the sale whatever and i was like okay
00:25:39
well i'm not going to approve this and
00:25:40
it you need my approval
00:25:43
let's talk about how we can make this
00:25:44
work because we have outside funding
00:25:46
that the company's turning down to do a
00:25:47
sale that everybody's losing their money
00:25:49
on doesn't make any sense
00:25:50
and um they said well we can't really do
00:25:52
that because we've already sent the
00:25:53
eight employees over to the new company
00:25:55
that's buying it i was like what do you
00:25:57
mean like we ran out of money to pay
00:25:58
them so
00:26:00
they all moved over to the payroll of
00:26:01
the new company i'm like you haven't
00:26:02
closed the transaction yet wow
00:26:05
it was crazy like there's some weird
00:26:06
stuff that happens to private companies
00:26:08
yeah
00:26:09
this stuff is always at the peak of when
00:26:11
there's a correction right i mean this
00:26:12
may be a good way to talk about what's
00:26:14
going on it's a great segue but it's
00:26:16
like that level of grift happens right
00:26:18
before
00:26:20
you know basically we have to re-rate
00:26:22
valuations you know people because
00:26:24
entrepreneurs entrepreneurs just take so
00:26:26
much
00:26:27
well there's just a small small
00:26:29
percentage of them but they just take so
00:26:30
much leeway in pushing the boundary
00:26:33
and and sometimes it's other board
00:26:34
members who are acting their own
00:26:35
interests but i solved this problem
00:26:36
really easy i called the ceo of the
00:26:39
public company that was buying them and
00:26:40
explained the situation he's like talk
00:26:42
to my cfo a friend of the pod whatever
00:26:44
and i they said how do we solve this
00:26:45
with you i said well this is how much
00:26:46
money i have in this is the value of
00:26:48
your company how would you like me to be
00:26:49
an advisor to your company for the same
00:26:51
amount of that value in shares also you
00:26:53
grifted so no that's great so basically
00:26:56
you got bamboozled and so you bamboozled
00:26:59
everybody else by the way
00:27:01
and then they said okay we'll make you
00:27:03
an advisor then i took the advisor
00:27:04
shares and i wrote a letter and pledged
00:27:06
them to my investors
00:27:09
and my investors are now 3x their
00:27:11
original investment
00:27:12
and i said i'm not letting it go i'm not
00:27:14
signing the paper until i get the 250k
00:27:16
that my investors put in period and then
00:27:18
they didn't now i'm up all right let's
00:27:19
segue
00:27:22
crazy market pullback the great write
00:27:23
down has occurred charts from altimeter
00:27:26
uh our friend brad gerson i assume uh
00:27:28
show a major regression to the mean for
00:27:30
tech stock sas index median enterprise
00:27:32
value next 12 months expected revenue
00:27:34
yadda yadda this includes people like
00:27:36
adobe datadog
00:27:38
shopify twilio workday and as you can
00:27:40
see here on the chart which will pull up
00:27:42
saks explain to us what's happening here
00:27:44
well it's a major regression to the mean
00:27:46
on value on public company valuations in
00:27:49
both sas but also more generally the the
00:27:51
high growth
00:27:53
stocks have corrected more than the
00:27:55
indices so that would imply that there
00:27:58
might be more correction to come
00:28:00
against the indexes i think the growth
00:28:02
stock's already taken the bulk of the
00:28:04
hit but what triggered it this week is
00:28:06
you know i predicted and you guys had
00:28:08
similar predictions on the just a few
00:28:10
weeks ago
00:28:11
that this would be the 2022 be the year
00:28:13
of the correction it really began in
00:28:14
november you had the the fed
00:28:17
you had fed governors make some hawkish
00:28:19
statements about the about inflation not
00:28:21
being transitory about the need to raise
00:28:23
rates
00:28:24
then we had the um the fed open market
00:28:26
committee meeting this is in i think
00:28:28
around december 15th and they announced
00:28:30
what they were going to do on rates
00:28:32
and now this week the minutes of that
00:28:34
meeting were released
00:28:36
and it basically
00:28:38
it said something that was completely
00:28:39
different than what they announced to us
00:28:41
just three weeks ago
00:28:43
and so the market basically just seized
00:28:46
up and went into convulsions and
00:28:48
specifically
00:28:49
what they said you know in in
00:28:51
mid-december was that
00:28:53
they were going to taper faster they
00:28:55
were going to end q1 sorry they're end
00:28:57
qe
00:28:58
at the end of q1 instead of q2 and then
00:29:00
we're gonna have quarter point rate
00:29:02
hikes in q2 q3 q4 that was the plan for
00:29:05
2022 and then there was additional
00:29:07
guidance that they were expecting three
00:29:09
more quarter point rate hikes in 2023
00:29:12
and two in 2024 so that was sort of the
00:29:14
three-year plan that was laid out then
00:29:16
we find out from these minutes and i
00:29:18
guess these minutes weren't leaked or
00:29:20
anything they they published them after
00:29:22
a like a three week revise and extend
00:29:24
remarks type period but what we find out
00:29:27
is there what they were talking about
00:29:28
was having a rate hike as soon as q1 and
00:29:32
not just ending qe but actually shedding
00:29:34
assets which is like the opposite
00:29:36
of qe so instead of basically going out
00:29:38
there
00:29:39
and creating money shrinking the balance
00:29:41
yeah yeah shrinking their balance sheet
00:29:43
so instead of going out and buying bonds
00:29:45
they're going to sell their bonds which
00:29:46
will reduce the money supply
00:29:48
so look if that was their view three
00:29:50
weeks ago why didn't they announce it i
00:29:52
mean my problem with this is it makes
00:29:55
the fed look like they don't know what
00:29:57
they're doing because they announced
00:29:59
something just three three and a half
00:30:00
weeks ago that's completely at odds with
00:30:02
the statement they just put out
00:30:04
so either something changed in the last
00:30:06
three weeks and there's been no data or
00:30:08
they don't know what they're doing just
00:30:09
so you know they they they have a little
00:30:11
bit of a track record of this so in 2018
00:30:14
it looked like there was going to be
00:30:16
inflation
00:30:17
and powell tried to get ahead of it and
00:30:20
he raised rates and the the market
00:30:23
completely collapsed and they were
00:30:24
looking i think a chinese data at the
00:30:26
time and it looked like you know china
00:30:28
was turning you know going crazy then
00:30:30
china completely turned over it was a
00:30:32
complete head fake the economy wasn't
00:30:34
rip roaring inflation didn't exist
00:30:36
and
00:30:38
they basically just curtailed a lot of
00:30:40
investment and destroyed a bunch of
00:30:42
value
00:30:43
so this time around i think they're very
00:30:44
sensitive to not correcting too quickly
00:30:47
but then the opposite thing happened
00:30:48
which is they probably waited a little
00:30:50
too long and now you know we're
00:30:52
correcting too slowly too late into the
00:30:54
cycle
00:30:55
and
00:30:56
we're just sort of digesting that
00:30:58
reality and so i think that you know
00:31:01
we're probably to be honest with you
00:31:03
like actually like we've puked it all
00:31:05
out for the most part in my opinion you
00:31:08
have to remember right like the big
00:31:09
difference between now and even 10 and
00:31:12
frankly more importantly 20 30 40 50
00:31:14
years ago is how many computers are
00:31:17
involved that trade
00:31:18
how much passive money is involved that
00:31:21
owns assets and how much of this stuff
00:31:24
is sitting on the sidelines still in
00:31:26
money market accounts and munis so if
00:31:29
you look at those markets there is a ton
00:31:32
trillions of dollars
00:31:34
waiting to find a home
00:31:36
and what we've now done and brad's
00:31:38
charts show this is we've basically
00:31:41
chopped the head off of all of these
00:31:44
fast growing growth multiple the
00:31:45
underlying companies have not changed
00:31:47
once until it right these companies are
00:31:49
still growing by crazy amounts like
00:31:51
snowflake is still an incredible
00:31:52
business unbelievable but the multiple
00:31:54
that one was willing to pay has been
00:31:56
has been very much re-rated as is a
00:31:58
bunch of other so let me ask you a
00:32:00
question
00:32:00
if we've gone from these 50 60 70
00:32:03
multiples time sales and now it goes
00:32:05
back down to 20.
00:32:07
is that dare i say a buy signal
00:32:10
well those trillions of dollars start
00:32:11
moving back in because who wants to be
00:32:13
in a money market i don't i don't know
00:32:14
and i i can't really call these things
00:32:16
but one a really smart person that i
00:32:18
talked to this week
00:32:20
you know he actually liquidated
00:32:22
everything
00:32:23
in october and november
00:32:25
[Music]
00:32:27
and you know and i i don't know we
00:32:30
talked about this on the pod but you
00:32:31
know i
00:32:32
was feeling so much tension at the end
00:32:34
of last year i actually had when i look
00:32:36
back on q4
00:32:38
it was probably the most difficult
00:32:39
quarter of my professional life
00:32:42
and just trying to manage risk and i
00:32:44
exited a ton of positions all my pipes
00:32:47
you know my third party pipes i
00:32:49
basically sold off except for one you
00:32:51
know i generated some liquidity in other
00:32:53
places as
00:32:54
well and
00:32:56
i was glad that i did that
00:32:59
in part because i saw you know what he
00:33:01
was doing and in part because you know
00:33:02
jeff and elon were selling and i thought
00:33:04
i mean this is just this is crazy to sit
00:33:06
on the sidelines and you know be the bag
00:33:08
holder here
00:33:10
going into q1
00:33:12
i talked to the same guys and what he
00:33:14
said to me which i think is very smart
00:33:16
is
00:33:17
you have to really look at
00:33:19
the first and second derivative of the
00:33:21
10-year bond
00:33:22
because when that stops moving like the
00:33:25
10-year bond is this beautiful barometer
00:33:27
of the collective wisdom of every single
00:33:30
investor in the world
00:33:31
about what they think about long-term
00:33:33
growth and inflation and it's a really
00:33:36
important market you know we've talked
00:33:37
many times look at the 10-year break
00:33:39
even if you want to understand where
00:33:40
inflation is going we started to talk
00:33:41
about that seven months ago
00:33:43
and if you look at that the rate of
00:33:45
change so the volatility in the 10-year
00:33:48
yield is slowing way down
00:33:51
and if that continues to hold
00:33:54
that means that people are really saying
00:33:56
there's a small amount of real inflation
00:33:59
a reasonable amount of transitory
00:34:01
inflation and we're about to kind of
00:34:02
wash most of it through the system with
00:34:05
you know 100 basis points of rate hikes
00:34:07
and if that's the case then
00:34:09
you may see a quick pullback you know in
00:34:12
q1 and we're back to the races again
00:34:14
because of all this other money that's
00:34:16
going to say i got to get back in and if
00:34:17
you look at all these corrections in the
00:34:20
world of computer traded algorithms and
00:34:22
etfs and passive money and
00:34:24
it's all the snapbacks are so fast you
00:34:27
correct 20 and then whoop
00:34:29
you whip it back and you go
00:34:31
so i don't know i mean that's one view
00:34:33
based on the past but when you have
00:34:36
these big swings remember it's not that
00:34:38
every
00:34:41
issue moves perfectly in sync with every
00:34:44
other issue
00:34:45
so there are these
00:34:46
call it over adjustments that happen
00:34:49
within a cohort so within a group of
00:34:51
companies some of them will trade down
00:34:53
much farther than others the multiple
00:34:55
will compress much further than others
00:34:57
and there's certainly opportunities
00:34:59
within as there is in any market that's
00:35:01
moving quickly
00:35:02
uh to find businesses that now are
00:35:04
prices mature
00:35:06
non-growth value businesses and they're
00:35:08
profitable and growing and there's a
00:35:10
bunch of those out there now
00:35:11
and that wasn't the case a month ago i
00:35:13
don't think a single thing in the last
00:35:15
quarter has changed in the underlying
00:35:17
fundamentals of the majority of
00:35:19
businesses that are public
00:35:21
and i actually think for the most part
00:35:23
nothing has really materially changed
00:35:25
for the majority of private companies
00:35:27
all that's changed is what you're
00:35:29
willing to pay in the future for it
00:35:31
and the one thing that hasn't changed is
00:35:33
what you're willing to pay in the future
00:35:35
for the private businesses so the real
00:35:36
question you know for saxon you know for
00:35:38
the active investors in the private
00:35:40
markets which i
00:35:42
don't know what to think about is
00:35:44
will the haircut that we've all taken in
00:35:47
the public markets
00:35:49
spill into the privates and it's
00:35:50
starting it's starting but it feels to
00:35:52
me it's not just about what's going to
00:35:54
happen with new emerging growth
00:35:56
companies but i mean you guys correct me
00:35:58
if i'm wrong but there are hundreds of
00:36:00
companies
00:36:02
that have raised billions of dollars at
00:36:05
valuations that if they look in the
00:36:07
public markets now they are never
00:36:09
actually going to achieve if they were
00:36:10
to go public in the next three four or
00:36:12
five years based on their projections so
00:36:14
to your point so what are nine yeah
00:36:17
there are 900 unicorns right now 900 and
00:36:20
so
00:36:21
once you get to look it's one thing to
00:36:23
be a 200 million dollar company and sell
00:36:24
to microsoft or whatever but when you're
00:36:26
a billion dollar company there are very
00:36:28
few buyers i just want to point out
00:36:30
there's a huge disincentive
00:36:33
for an investor or a shareholder of vc
00:36:36
or a private equity firm to take a big
00:36:38
write down on a company like that
00:36:40
and so there there is always this push
00:36:42
to what do we do next and it creates
00:36:44
this certain certainly i can tell you
00:36:46
i'd love your point of view but you're
00:36:47
this really like unhealthy tension
00:36:50
because to take a write down
00:36:52
on 900 unicorns is gonna cause a
00:36:55
write-down of
00:36:57
hundreds of billions of dollars and not
00:36:59
gonna cross all vc portfolios in
00:37:01
aggregate because they're not going to
00:37:03
end up going public well i'm sorry just
00:37:05
to finish your thought
00:37:06
because the end market is only to go
00:37:08
public there are very few kinds of exits
00:37:10
yeah there are no and not in the
00:37:12
billions of dollars because you have to
00:37:13
think one or two people
00:37:14
yeah big tech is off the sidelines okay
00:37:17
you know even if you look at like visa
00:37:18
members
00:37:20
nobody's
00:37:25
but my point is when you have 900
00:37:27
companies with a billion dollars in plus
00:37:28
they have to go public they have to go
00:37:30
public and so correct you can't go
00:37:32
public into a valuation framework that
00:37:34
values you at 30 to 40 percent less of
00:37:36
your last private mark right yeah it
00:37:39
said as well you did have do use
00:37:41
tomorrow
00:37:42
so this is an important question because
00:37:44
isn't that going to be the case that all
00:37:45
these vc's with the
00:37:47
2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 vintage are
00:37:52
gonna end up having they've all got
00:37:54
these great marked books right now you
00:37:55
know the books are all marked to 3x uh
00:37:58
you know multiple on invested capital
00:38:00
and now they're going to end up having
00:38:01
these liquidity events that are going to
00:38:03
come in at shockingly low valuations and
00:38:05
there's going to be this great re write
00:38:07
down and retrenchment
00:38:09
i can tell you there's a couple of
00:38:10
examples one is the athletic yesterday
00:38:12
which had raised money at 500 million
00:38:14
just two years ago just sold for about
00:38:16
500 million to the new york times
00:38:18
and
00:38:19
those investors basically put money in
00:38:21
and they got their money back it's a
00:38:22
push so i think you're going to see a
00:38:24
lot of these questions no i agree with
00:38:26
you yes i'm going to give you the
00:38:26
examples and there's also your
00:38:28
acquisition by a mid-tier comp acquirer
00:38:30
and so there'll be plenty of those that
00:38:32
occur so there'll be a lot of pushes i
00:38:33
think is my prediction of those 900
00:38:35
unicorns and then for a lot of these sas
00:38:37
companies so you're saying you think
00:38:38
that a bunch of them are going to sell
00:38:39
for under a billion dollars and the vcs
00:38:42
because they have preference they're
00:38:43
going to get their money correct correct
00:38:45
i think it's going to be a lot of these
00:38:46
pushes where i don't know what is it in
00:38:48
blackjack david when you're playing
00:38:49
those three hands and you get a push
00:38:50
like and it's like okay i'm going to
00:38:51
live to to fight another hand now which
00:38:53
we've seen sax do a number of times and
00:38:55
then for the sas is where sax i'm
00:38:57
interested in your position because we
00:38:59
saw in sas all of a sudden the private
00:39:01
market 30 40 50 60 70 times top line
00:39:05
and now it's gone back down to 20 30 40.
00:39:08
so those companies now basically have
00:39:10
three the public markets have but i
00:39:11
don't think that the private market has
00:39:13
happened already everybody's pausing and
00:39:15
so for the people who raised that 50x
00:39:17
congratulations you did the right thing
00:39:19
if you have enough money to fill in that
00:39:20
valuation is it a congratulations though
00:39:22
i mean it seems like there are people
00:39:24
say it is pretty tough position now
00:39:26
hey
00:39:28
you just raise money at a billion dollar
00:39:29
valuation with 10 million of revenue
00:39:31
you're like 20. let's say let's say yeah
00:39:34
okay i mean like what are you gonna do
00:39:35
what are you gonna do in your next round
00:39:36
because you're burning 100 million a
00:39:38
year now or 40 million or whatever it is
00:39:39
you're burning almost all the companies
00:39:41
i've seen in this exact situation you're
00:39:43
talking about have that 20 million they
00:39:44
got a billion they raised 100 million or
00:39:47
200 million and they're basically now
00:39:49
saying okay we got to make this last
00:39:51
until we can catch up to that valuation
00:39:52
and get to 50 to 75 million so i think
00:39:55
you would i would take that deal as a
00:39:56
founder and as an investor because it
00:39:59
takes out the downside and now you just
00:40:00
have to worry about catching up to the
00:40:02
valuation and you have four years of
00:40:03
runway
00:40:04
if they're not gonna they're gonna right
00:40:06
now no no no no no no those companies do
00:40:08
not those those companies absolutely do
00:40:10
not have four years of runway i will bet
00:40:12
dollars to donuts they have two years or
00:40:14
less
00:40:15
and most of these companies have 18
00:40:16
months which means they got to be
00:40:17
raising in six to nine no correct
00:40:19
they're changing they're changing their
00:40:21
spend and they're
00:40:22
changing their spend they're not firing
00:40:24
anybody you're not hearing about layoffs
00:40:26
at startups okay all right
00:40:28
you're not hearing about it but maybe
00:40:30
they're changing their forward-looking
00:40:31
growth plans what are you seeing sex
00:40:34
i'm telling you what i'm seeing what are
00:40:35
you seeing i think that
00:40:37
the trickle-down effect is inevitable
00:40:40
but i'm not sure it's fully kicked in
00:40:42
yet um it's going to take
00:40:45
a few high-profile deals to land at say
00:40:49
50 times arr instead of 100 times ar in
00:40:52
order for everybody to know that there's
00:40:54
a new
00:40:56
valuation level
00:40:58
so if you look at the altimeter chart on
00:41:00
set public sas multiples let's see i
00:41:02
mean they can pull it up it basically
00:41:04
it's the sas index that shows median
00:41:06
median expected value to
00:41:09
next 12 months revenue
00:41:11
and during this sort of
00:41:14
late 2020 early 21 period it got as high
00:41:17
as about 15 times the historical average
00:41:22
yeah for well for next 12 months or uh
00:41:24
revenue
00:41:26
the
00:41:27
which is sort of that kind of makes
00:41:29
sense um so so historically it's around
00:41:32
eight right so so basically all the
00:41:34
valuation levels doubled
00:41:36
and now they've come down to about ten
00:41:38
times so you could say that if it fully
00:41:41
reverts to the mean we still got like
00:41:42
another negative twenty percent to go i
00:41:46
don't know if that's going to happen i
00:41:48
mean i think there has been a greater
00:41:50
recognition that sas businesses are some
00:41:52
of the best businesses to own right it's
00:41:55
they are
00:41:56
subscriptions software businesses great
00:41:57
gross margins they just keep compounding
00:42:00
so maybe it will stabilize it 10 times
00:42:03
but i think what we can say with 2020
00:42:05
hindsight is that the record price
00:42:07
levels we got to in the public markets
00:42:09
in 20 and 21
00:42:11
were
00:42:12
sort of unusual and unique and probably
00:42:14
the result of this incredibly
00:42:17
expansionary fiscal and monetary policy
00:42:19
that was coming out of washington
00:42:22
now has it trickled down to the again vc
00:42:24
markets yet i mean the way that that has
00:42:26
to happen is that the latest stage
00:42:28
investors the crossover investors who
00:42:30
invest in both public markets and
00:42:32
private markets they have to to pay they
00:42:35
have to start paying less for the latest
00:42:37
stage growth companies and then you know
00:42:39
all the downstream vcs are going to
00:42:41
start paying less as well because you
00:42:43
know if you know the markups are lower
00:42:45
you have to take that into account so
00:42:47
look all of this is underway right now i
00:42:49
mean i gave a bloomberg interview in
00:42:52
december and um
00:42:54
i think i went on maria barromo show
00:42:57
around that time as well and i kind of
00:42:58
warned that all this was coming
00:43:01
and um yeah we were in the midst of it
00:43:03
of a giant re-rating because we're
00:43:05
realizing that so much
00:43:08
of the peak values we were seeing
00:43:10
in 2020 and 21 were the result of
00:43:13
artificial liquidity
00:43:15
and as what you guys predicted you know
00:43:17
it's one of our big you know
00:43:19
i guess my big prediction for uh
00:43:21
business losers
00:43:22
this year were asset classes that were
00:43:24
highly dependent on liquidity you guys
00:43:26
predicted crypto would be one of those
00:43:28
clearly it's taken a massive hit
00:43:30
um have you seen how much the crypto
00:43:32
markets are off just in the last week
00:43:34
so it's um
00:43:36
so much for them being uh uncorrelated
00:43:39
no it's because
00:43:40
look the customer says bitcoin is going
00:43:42
to be uncorrelated so the market the
00:43:43
crypto markets are like a sponge for
00:43:45
liquidity and the more liquidity there
00:43:46
is out there the more money can flow
00:43:48
into a more speculative asset class
00:43:51
but look my my objection to this i mean
00:43:54
is that if you look at the fed's actions
00:43:57
i mean i think chamath is right that
00:43:58
they waited way too long to react and
00:44:01
during the crisis they overreacted i
00:44:04
mean they pumped i mean we on a previous
00:44:06
pod we showed the assets
00:44:09
between under reaction and overreach yes
00:44:11
exactly and and now they're i think
00:44:13
they're in they're going into
00:44:14
overreacting again
00:44:15
i actually think they nailed it in in
00:44:17
mid-december they nailed it by giving us
00:44:19
business certainty around what the new
00:44:22
raid environment was going to be and
00:44:23
just three weeks later in the minutes to
00:44:25
that very meeting they completely
00:44:27
undermined the certainty or the
00:44:30
the greater level of certainty and
00:44:31
predict the predictability that they had
00:44:33
provided markets they've now introduced
00:44:35
massive uncertainty
00:44:37
so it's just it's unbelievable
00:44:39
it's like they're pilots and like they
00:44:42
stalled the plane and then they're like
00:44:43
oh let's pull back well no it's more
00:44:46
they're kind of pulling out the manual
00:44:47
and learning in real time yeah and it's
00:44:49
like you need to just point the nose
00:44:51
down a bit and add a little bit of speed
00:44:53
so you get some lift like it really is
00:44:55
tragic the performance of our government
00:44:57
at every level over since covet at the
00:44:59
last you know since 2020 i mean it's
00:45:02
been abysmal i mean first you have the
00:45:04
self-inflicted wound of lockdowns i mean
00:45:07
the economy is going to take a hit no
00:45:08
matter what because highly at-risk
00:45:09
people would have stayed home and
00:45:12
reduced their economic activity but
00:45:13
instead of just protecting the at-risk
00:45:15
people we had to lock down the entire
00:45:17
economy we padlocked elon's factories
00:45:20
and on and on so we basically shut down
00:45:22
the whole economy for no reason and
00:45:24
states like california kept it going way
00:45:26
longer than they had to so then the
00:45:28
government just prints
00:45:30
like five six trillion and the fed
00:45:32
doubles the size of its balance sheet
00:45:35
and then now they're abruptly getting
00:45:37
off drugs i mean look they put us on
00:45:38
drugs and now they're going cold turkey
00:45:41
and so i think there's actually like a
00:45:43
much greater risk now of the economy
00:45:45
going to recession this year because of
00:45:46
the fed's overreaction this week
00:45:49
i mean they had they had the goldilocks
00:45:51
scenario down about three weeks ago and
00:45:52
i think they're going to tank the thing
00:45:53
now or there's a much greater risk of
00:45:55
that best advice for founders private
00:45:58
companies
00:45:59
in this turmoil
00:46:01
what's your best advice fam
00:46:03
you're a founder you got i don't know 18
00:46:05
months of runway right now you're going
00:46:07
into this
00:46:08
you know slush and you want to know what
00:46:10
should i do
00:46:12
what should i do i think paul graham's
00:46:13
advice it makes the most sense here you
00:46:15
need to focus on being default alive um
00:46:18
define what that is just for people yeah
00:46:20
so you know paul graham wrote this great
00:46:22
essay uh as part where he's the founder
00:46:24
of y combinator and you know he has this
00:46:26
very simple you know framework of
00:46:28
looking at companies which is your
00:46:29
default debt or your default alive and
00:46:31
when you're losing money
00:46:34
as a company and you're burning enormous
00:46:35
amounts of cash your default debt now if
00:46:37
you're growing fast enough
00:46:39
default debt is a great strategy for
00:46:41
value creation
00:46:42
but at some point
00:46:44
everybody around you will expect you to
00:46:47
be default alive and what that means is
00:46:49
that the cost of what you do
00:46:51
are less than the revenues you bring in
00:46:53
when the result or profits
00:46:55
and even then that's not good enough i
00:46:57
don't know if you guys saw but you know
00:46:59
if you look inside of big tech
00:47:01
i was shocked to find out that you know
00:47:03
for example you know companies like
00:47:05
microsoft specifically and apple you
00:47:07
know these guys trade at huge forward
00:47:09
multiples right for enormous
00:47:11
profitability but companies like
00:47:13
facebook and google for the same level
00:47:15
of profitability you know trade almost a
00:47:17
third less in terms of multiple
00:47:20
so even when you're that good it's not
00:47:22
good enough to be default alive that's
00:47:24
how hard this game is over very long
00:47:27
periods of time
00:47:28
and so when you have a moment to really
00:47:30
understand how to be default alive
00:47:33
and you don't take it i think it's a
00:47:36
huge disservice because we don't do
00:47:38
enough of that kind of coaching that
00:47:40
really
00:47:41
inflicts that kind of discipline and
00:47:43
expectation setting i remember i have a
00:47:46
large climate investment it's actually
00:47:48
the single largest investment i've ever
00:47:49
done
00:47:50
[Music]
00:47:51
and so i sweat the details pretty
00:47:53
significantly and you know i was with
00:47:55
the team
00:47:56
in
00:47:57
uh
00:47:58
uh in november december
00:48:00
for board meeting and setting up 2022
00:48:03
and my whole thing was guys you have to
00:48:05
get default alive you have to get
00:48:07
contribution margins to be in a certain
00:48:08
band you were we are going to target
00:48:10
this level of free cash flow generation
00:48:12
this year and there's no if ands or buts
00:48:14
about it and what's great is the entire
00:48:16
team embraced it and we're marching
00:48:18
towards that but if they didn't and
00:48:21
they're like no we're just going to grow
00:48:22
at all costs again
00:48:24
oh my god i would be freaking out right
00:48:26
now freeberry what do you have to add to
00:48:27
that as advice to founders who have not
00:48:29
been through this before i built my
00:48:31
business my
00:48:32
climate corp uh we raised a round in
00:48:35
november of 2007 we raised 12 and a half
00:48:38
million dollars and then the financial
00:48:39
crisis hit in 2008.
00:48:41
and um i'd say two things
00:48:44
were really important uh number one was
00:48:47
just
00:48:48
keep building so if you're building a
00:48:50
great business
00:48:53
it doesn't matter what the market
00:48:55
perturbations are uh you know the the
00:48:57
market will value you what they're going
00:48:59
to value you add and if you're a good
00:49:00
business there's going to be money
00:49:01
available
00:49:02
to you
00:49:03
the second piece of advice is one that i
00:49:06
know has been said over and over again
00:49:08
but you know never raise an evaluation
00:49:10
beyond you know what you're reasonably
00:49:12
going to be able to kind of deliver
00:49:13
returns on at some point in the future
00:49:15
because otherwise those nasty dynamics
00:49:17
emerge
00:49:18
you know you could raise money at some
00:49:20
crazy high valuation that's not always
00:49:22
the best thing to do because then the
00:49:23
expectation of the investors coming in
00:49:25
at that valuation or they want to make
00:49:27
three times that money or four times
00:49:29
that money and it pushes you to do
00:49:30
something unhealthy like spend more than
00:49:32
you otherwise would
00:49:34
stretch for a bigger outcome and put
00:49:36
your entire company at risk so you know
00:49:38
two things to me have always been just
00:49:40
stay focused on building your business
00:49:42
don't let you know kind of market
00:49:43
conditions drive your decision-making
00:49:46
and second define what for you is the
00:49:48
best practice of staying focused on your
00:49:50
business because that is a very general
00:49:52
term what is freeberg if you're going to
00:49:54
say the top three things of focused on
00:49:56
your business tactically means i have a
00:49:58
simple rubric for value creation in a
00:50:00
business you know number one is can you
00:50:02
make a product number two is do people
00:50:04
want to buy your product number three is
00:50:06
can you make a positive gross margin
00:50:08
selling that product to those people
00:50:10
number four is can you make a return on
00:50:13
the marketing dollars you have to spend
00:50:14
to generate that gross profit meaning
00:50:16
you know can ltv exceed cac and number
00:50:19
five is can you scale the amount of
00:50:20
money you deploy to grow your business
00:50:23
such that as you grow the return goes up
00:50:25
not down if those are the five kind of
00:50:28
things you can accomplish in that order
00:50:30
you can build the next google and so and
00:50:32
then the sixth thing is can you be a
00:50:34
platform which is meaning can you
00:50:35
transition to being a multi-product
00:50:36
company that gets leverage out of the
00:50:38
the user base or the technology that
00:50:40
you've built got it and so you know if
00:50:42
you think about revenue streams more
00:50:44
multiple revenue streams using the same
00:50:45
customer base or multiple products or
00:50:47
you know whatever
00:50:48
um and so if you can achieve those six
00:50:50
things
00:50:51
um in that order
00:50:53
every step of the way every increment
00:50:54
you can make across that spectrum drives
00:50:56
significant value as a business
00:50:58
ultimately what the multiple on your
00:51:01
business will be is purely going to be a
00:51:03
function of what else is going on in the
00:51:05
world things that you cannot control
00:51:07
and so if you're driving your decisions
00:51:09
about building your business using that
00:51:10
first rubric good for you you're going
00:51:12
to succeed you're going to have money
00:51:13
available to you awesome if you're
00:51:15
driving your decisions based on what the
00:51:17
market is telling you to do and what the
00:51:18
market is saying is available to you and
00:51:20
money and all that sort of stuff you
00:51:22
know you're setting yourself up to
00:51:23
basically be you know blowing up are you
00:51:25
also saying to be independent of
00:51:27
valuation
00:51:29
yeah i i'm always of the opinion that
00:51:30
you shouldn't raise money beyond your um
00:51:33
into evaluation that you're not
00:51:35
comfortable saying in different market
00:51:38
conditions or what have you i can return
00:51:39
multiple ways i don't think any founder
00:51:41
has ever you know
00:51:42
most of these founders were not around
00:51:44
in 2000 and they were 2008 or two but
00:51:47
even 2008 was less important in my mind
00:51:50
because it was it was it was fast and
00:51:52
again we had government stimulus so you
00:51:54
know like i think 2008 was an
00:51:56
aberrational moment i was i was in the
00:51:58
middle you know inside of facebook and i
00:52:00
was like what the hell is going on here
00:52:02
the government's going to step in and
00:52:04
you know with tarp printing a trillion
00:52:06
dollars whatever it was it didn't affect
00:52:08
you guys
00:52:09
it didn't affect us at all yeah but you
00:52:11
were the most powerful company or not at
00:52:13
that time 2008
00:52:15
wow
00:52:21
here's the thing that people don't
00:52:22
realize with facebook google was
00:52:23
profitable from day one too yep we we
00:52:25
were always default alive i want every
00:52:28
single person listening to this to
00:52:29
understand this okay we sold poker ads
00:52:32
for party poker in big banner ads on
00:52:35
facebook and we made money you got the
00:52:37
bag you got yourself independent we're
00:52:39
profitable okay so i don't buy this
00:52:41
argument that argument of unprofitable
00:52:43
growth is a vestige of fund dynamics and
00:52:47
vcs who want to raise larger and larger
00:52:49
funds to blind their pockets with fees
00:52:52
it's a function of what i mentioned
00:52:54
before which is if you can
00:52:56
think about the context of a portfolio
00:52:58
of those bets it makes sense but if you
00:53:00
think about your business it doesn't
00:53:01
make sense in 2000 that didn't make
00:53:03
sense you could not run an unprofitable
00:53:05
growth business the money would not have
00:53:06
been there right and the real reason is
00:53:08
that was a a market check meaning you
00:53:11
had people reallocating capital because
00:53:14
risk rates were different you know you
00:53:15
could put money at six percent in the in
00:53:17
u.s 10-year bonds now obviously you
00:53:20
can't do that today so maybe this cycle
00:53:22
is just the new normal and so you know
00:53:24
maybe you can always be default debt and
00:53:26
be able to raise money because
00:53:28
the incentives exist but i wonder when
00:53:31
that stops and so i don't know google
00:53:33
was an incredibly cash efficient
00:53:35
business i think they raised under 50
00:53:37
million as a private company they never
00:53:38
used any of it because google the first
00:53:40
the first thing google did is they did a
00:53:41
massive search syndication deal with aol
00:53:43
that paid them hundreds of millions of
00:53:44
dollars and that funded the business if
00:53:46
you can sell ahead of your customers in
00:53:49
terms of delivering the service or the
00:53:50
product to them you've got the most
00:53:52
beautiful business in the world that's
00:53:53
the definition of bootstrapping google
00:53:55
even though they raise venture capital
00:53:56
effectively bootstrap the business by
00:53:58
getting customers to pre-pay like elon
00:54:00
getting people to prepay for cars i
00:54:02
wrote this in my annual letter like two
00:54:04
years ago but facebook google apple
00:54:06
microsoft and amazon raised collectively
00:54:07
less than 250 million dollars yeah i
00:54:10
mean what yeah so i mean i i agree with
00:54:12
what a a lot of what you guys have said
00:54:15
um
00:54:16
i mean so i agree with freeburg that
00:54:18
recessions or downturns are actually
00:54:19
great times to build startups because
00:54:21
innovation doesn't stop and you know so
00:54:23
paypal was predominantly built after the
00:54:24
dotcom crash
00:54:26
uh yammer was probably built after the
00:54:28
2008 sort of great recession so it's
00:54:30
absolutely doable and some things
00:54:32
actually get easier in a downturn
00:54:33
there's like way fewer startups getting
00:54:35
funded and so like talent gets easier to
00:54:37
recruit so
00:54:39
you know things loosen up in you know in
00:54:41
terms of the company building side the
00:54:43
only thing that really gets harder in a
00:54:44
downturn is fundraising right this is
00:54:47
and by the way i think it's a good
00:54:49
practice for
00:54:50
founders not to care what happens
00:54:52
in the public markets than as to early
00:54:54
stage founders right because
00:54:56
the only time that really touches you is
00:54:58
when you need to access the capital
00:54:59
markets right and then you will be
00:55:02
subject to the downstream impact on vcs
00:55:04
of what's happening in the market so
00:55:06
so the only thing that really gets
00:55:08
harder is fundraising and this is where
00:55:10
i think
00:55:10
chamas
00:55:11
advice comes in i i personally think
00:55:14
that trying to achieve default alive
00:55:16
status is too high a bar i mean it's a
00:55:19
wonderful thing if you can do it i mean
00:55:21
facebook did it google did it the very
00:55:22
best companies did it but i know very
00:55:25
few sas companies that could continue to
00:55:26
grow if they had to be castral positive
00:55:29
i mean at an early stage so
00:55:31
the metric i use is bird multiple i
00:55:33
wrote a blog about this once um
00:55:35
it's basically just how much are you
00:55:37
burning for every dollar of net new arr
00:55:40
you're adding so in other words like if
00:55:43
you're burning a million dollars you
00:55:45
know over whatever period of time a
00:55:47
month quarter year to add a million
00:55:49
dollars of net uar that's actually
00:55:51
pretty good so a bundle
00:55:53
of like one or less is amazing i'd say
00:55:55
even up to two
00:55:57
is good so in other words like if a sas
00:55:59
company can
00:56:01
say add 10 million of net new arr in a
00:56:03
year and burn 20. i think vcs will fund
00:56:05
that all day long even in a recession
00:56:08
two year payback yes but when you start
00:56:10
getting to burn multiples of three four
00:56:11
five six and up that's when like vc's
00:56:14
are going to go wait a second yeah
00:56:16
you're that gross that's efficient right
00:56:18
you're not efficient it's not just
00:56:19
efficient but it starts to raise
00:56:20
questions about your product market fit
00:56:22
because you're effectively spending too
00:56:23
much money to grow so like why is a
00:56:25
growth
00:56:26
that hard right no market yeah no market
00:56:29
yeah exactly no marketable i think it's
00:56:30
a good way of putting it so i do think
00:56:32
you have to start like in a downturn or
00:56:33
in choppy waters you have to sharpen the
00:56:35
pencil get more efficient about your
00:56:37
burn look at your burn multiple
00:56:39
and then i think you know if you have
00:56:40
the opportunity to top off your war
00:56:42
chest like that's smart you know and
00:56:44
don't wait too long and be frugal i mean
00:56:46
god the amount of like
00:56:49
crazy spending i'm seeing in some
00:56:50
startups and unnecessary spending if
00:56:52
you're spending something it's not going
00:56:53
into product it's not going into
00:56:55
marketing
00:56:56
you know it's not going into sales and
00:56:58
it's not you know just you really have
00:56:59
to ask yourself why am i spending money
00:57:01
on going to this conference going to
00:57:02
that conference on this office space
00:57:04
like really be frugal i know that it's
00:57:06
when you have all this money sloshing
00:57:08
around you're looking for things to
00:57:08
spend it on but stay focused
00:57:12
yeah i mean yeah don't don't spend 7 500
00:57:15
on that unless you've got tons of cash
00:57:16
laying around
00:57:18
and we will be getting back to the
00:57:19
people who applied we're going to go
00:57:21
through and
00:57:22
somebody's going to approve you
00:57:24
let's add one other thing to this which
00:57:26
is you're right that like most founders
00:57:28
have never even seen a downturn because
00:57:29
the last big one was a great recession
00:57:31
of 2008 2009. so many founders were even
00:57:33
around back then the most the most the
00:57:35
real one was 2 000. that's right that
00:57:37
was the big crash it froze i would say
00:57:40
it froze to that 2008
00:57:42
was what like 12 to 18 months of
00:57:44
choppiness and i would say a lot of
00:57:46
companies couldn't raise money had to do
00:57:47
down rounds had to do multiple
00:57:48
liquidation preferences it was gnarly on
00:57:51
some cap tables during that period
00:57:52
and if you don't know what multiple
00:57:54
liquidation preferences are ask your
00:57:56
attorney i understand but there was no
00:57:57
real market check the market check was
00:57:59
really in 2000. and you saw it was a
00:58:02
multi-year slog
00:58:04
it was a bloodbath you had to be deep
00:58:05
well it's not vaporized yes people or
00:58:07
you had to be default alive absolutely
00:58:09
absolutely yeah but i would say a third
00:58:11
of the startups went away in 2008. i
00:58:13
don't think we're running into that
00:58:14
again so you know let's not create a
00:58:16
sequoia graveyard
00:58:19
but you could
00:58:20
nobody knows just a point look it's a pr
00:58:22
it's a probability of getting your
00:58:23
business funded right and and that's
00:58:25
kind of
00:58:26
lower it's it's not like but here's the
00:58:28
thing what i but what's shocking to me
00:58:30
it's like
00:58:31
i don't understand why people think you
00:58:33
can grow infinitely forever it's just
00:58:36
not true
00:58:37
even the best businesses in the world
00:58:39
after 15 or 20 years are barely growing
00:58:41
at 20 percent people forecast facebook
00:58:44
and google
00:58:45
those are the two best businesses in the
00:58:47
world
00:58:48
but isn't the question what kind of
00:58:49
growth vcs are willing to finance no
00:58:52
what i'm saying is if you know that your
00:58:54
terminal growth rate if you are one of
00:58:56
the best companies ever created ever is
00:58:58
20 in 20 years it doesn't take a genius
00:59:01
to do a line of best fit between now
00:59:03
where you're at 100 and 20 and realize
00:59:06
that at some point if you don't figure
00:59:08
out how to make money by selling what
00:59:10
you're selling there's a lot of people
00:59:12
who will be smart enough after enough
00:59:14
historical data has come through the
00:59:15
transom or come over the past to realize
00:59:18
that these things are not that fundable
00:59:20
and this is what's shocking to me it's
00:59:21
like that data is hiding in plain sight
00:59:23
for anybody to look at
00:59:24
it doesn't make sense unless you believe
00:59:26
that those those growth rates of 40 50
00:59:29
60 are sustainable for 30 years or 40
00:59:33
years we've seen zero examples and you
00:59:35
have to look at these canaries in the
00:59:37
coal mine because if if the best
00:59:38
companies in the world can't do it
00:59:41
you're you have to really scratch your
00:59:43
head here or ignore it
00:59:44
whatever that's fine
00:59:47
just wing it yeah it'll work out don't
00:59:50
worry about it don't worry about it
00:59:51
don't worry just add like teachers
00:59:53
around it's fine one of those features
00:59:55
will work and save the day there's some
00:59:57
magical future though did you see
00:59:59
andreessen announced that they raised
01:00:00
nine billion dollars or something today
01:00:02
across the united states congratulations
01:00:05
they're building a colossus yeah i mean
01:00:09
silicon valley in terms of capital is um
01:00:12
you know seeing kind of power returns
01:00:14
itself right there's going to be a few
01:00:16
firms that are going to you know control
01:00:18
eighty percent of the and reason should
01:00:19
go public and drinking
01:00:22
tiger global
01:00:23
you know whatever happens i don't know
01:00:25
if something is i mean there's
01:00:29
if you look at the aggregate capital
01:00:30
that's being deployed into private
01:00:32
markets right now
01:00:33
in in probably two years eighty percent
01:00:35
of it's going to come from three firms
01:00:36
or four firms the problem is if you're
01:00:38
running that much money
01:00:40
you're insane to not take your gp public
01:00:42
because it's the only way like you're
01:00:44
not really generating carry at that
01:00:46
point because you're generating a market
01:00:48
beta return so you'll do okay but when
01:00:51
you're sitting on 20 30 40 billion of
01:00:53
imputed wealth by being the owner of the
01:00:55
gp of tiger or andreessen you'd be
01:00:58
insane to not go public i think the odds
01:01:00
are going to be pretty high that
01:01:01
andreessen will go public right i mean
01:01:03
they're certainly setting themselves up
01:01:04
to be a lot more than just a capital
01:01:05
allocation though right it's never
01:01:07
happened well
01:01:14
no but i mean like venture's never
01:01:16
scaled up to the point that private
01:01:17
equity has until now and now that they
01:01:19
have it's very likely it's very likely
01:01:21
that you'll see andreessen be the first
01:01:23
i don't know them you know very well but
01:01:25
sacks you were gonna say something yeah
01:01:26
well i think it's a super interesting
01:01:28
point because if you talk to the
01:01:28
previous generation of vcs what they
01:01:30
will tell you is who retired right is
01:01:33
when you ask them well did you get
01:01:35
anything for your
01:01:36
partnership share in the firm not just
01:01:38
in a fund but in the firm they'll tell
01:01:40
you no they basically just gave it away
01:01:42
to the next generation of partners even
01:01:43
though they they built the firm and it's
01:01:45
because historically the belief on the
01:01:48
part of vcs was that there was there was
01:01:49
no value to vc firms other than just
01:01:53
their interest in each particular fund
01:01:56
but you're right like if they do achieve
01:01:57
a much greater level of scale and they
01:01:59
can go public then there is
01:02:02
actually value in the firm itself
01:02:04
and if you look at the terminal
01:02:06
valuation of blackstone as indexed to
01:02:07
aum you know uh once you pass a couple
01:02:10
hundred billion of aum you can trade
01:02:13
point two towards 0.1.2 times and so you
01:02:16
know if you have 50 billion of aum
01:02:18
there's 10 billion dollar market cap
01:02:20
there and if you you know if you're
01:02:21
calling jason or
01:02:23
andreessen or horowitz i mean
01:02:25
that's five billion dollars that just
01:02:27
appeared out of nowhere why would you
01:02:29
not do it right right it's a little bit
01:02:30
like goldman sachs they always said that
01:02:32
we're a partnership we're never going to
01:02:33
ipo because and then they did and then
01:02:35
they did and the and same thing did caa
01:02:38
do it too no i guess there are no what
01:02:40
happened with cna was ovitz
01:02:42
uh sold this position to go to disney so
01:02:44
there wouldn't be a conflict but he
01:02:45
could have kept it and the like
01:02:46
residuals they were getting from
01:02:48
projects they packaged were incredible
01:02:50
didn't the aria emanuel one
01:02:53
it did endeavor did endeavor
01:02:55
how are they trading i haven't even
01:02:56
looked at
01:02:57
endeavor i'm not sure but let me tell
01:02:59
you like it's actually but think about
01:03:01
if you're not like the current
01:03:03
like partner owners of the firm but
01:03:05
you're like on a partnership track there
01:03:06
and you're working your way up to
01:03:07
partner
01:03:08
like by time you get to partner it's
01:03:10
gonna be a very different economic
01:03:12
equation because instead of getting your
01:03:14
one over n share of the pie when you
01:03:16
eventually become
01:03:17
partner with n being the number of
01:03:19
partners or some version of that
01:03:21
now the company is owned by the public
01:03:23
and the public or the board of directors
01:03:25
is determining your salary and maybe you
01:03:28
get a salary and bonus and some you know
01:03:30
essentially
01:03:31
options or equity participation but
01:03:33
you're not going to be a true owner
01:03:34
anymore because you the firm is going to
01:03:36
be owned by the public wait a second
01:03:38
what if we take each of our businesses
01:03:40
put them together and then take them
01:03:42
public as all in capital
01:03:45
and then we get the best i'm good i'm
01:03:46
good i'm good
01:03:47
we got the startup studio
01:03:51
on a conference so i don't know
01:03:54
we can't agree on the decor and food
01:03:56
for our one day event in miami that's
01:03:58
because the amount of work you guys want
01:04:00
to do is slagging me in a slat in a chat
01:04:02
no what we want is someone to do the
01:04:04
work we want to hire a professional
01:04:06
i have been doing conferences for 25
01:04:09
years stop starting my no and you know
01:04:10
what's going on for tuning it you know
01:04:12
what's gonna happen you launched yammer
01:04:13
at my conference and i put the fix in
01:04:16
for you to win
01:04:17
thank you tech crunch was a beautiful
01:04:18
conference
01:04:19
but for all in summit is it just the
01:04:22
case we want people to show up and
01:04:23
there's gonna be a stage and people
01:04:25
talking on stage in this whole
01:04:26
conference or we want to create a more
01:04:27
magical experience
01:04:30
a davos or a sun valley or something
01:04:32
like we're in an agreement all right
01:04:33
everybody thanks for tuning in to
01:04:35
episode 62 of the all-in podcast we'll
01:04:38
see at the all-in summit and if you want
01:04:39
to do us a favor please go ahead and
01:04:42
subscribe and rate us on
01:04:44
apple we could really use that
01:04:47
uh and uh thanks to spotify for
01:04:50
including uh daniel shout out to thanks
01:04:52
dad
01:04:53
he included us in their video so now if
01:04:55
you're on spotify and you're listening
01:04:56
to the pod you can click a button as of
01:04:58
this week and watch the video or you can
01:04:59
watch the video on youtube yeah it was
01:05:01
nice he emailed us and uh his team and
01:05:03
then i cc'ed him on the email he's the
01:05:05
best yes i think would he be good for uh
01:05:08
what do you think about having him and
01:05:09
mr beast he's super super super here's
01:05:11
my idea for a trio him mr beast
01:05:15
and then one other person to do a media
01:05:17
trio future of media what is your what
01:05:19
is your own
01:05:20
what is your idea you don't even know
01:05:21
the third person i mean well i'm putting
01:05:23
it out there asking for a suggestion for
01:05:24
their relationship
01:05:26
you just throw this [ __ ] this is our
01:05:27
conference in presario oh my gosh well
01:05:30
those are two great guests on the stage
01:05:31
at the same time let's figure out who
01:05:33
besides j kell's gonna produce the
01:05:34
conference
01:05:45
david
01:05:48
it said we open sacks it to the fans and
01:05:51
they've just gone crazy
01:05:55
[Music]
01:06:16
it's like this like sexual tension that
01:06:17
they just need to release
01:06:23
your feet
01:06:34
oh
01:06:36
[Music]

Badges

This episode stands out for the following:

  • 70
    Most shocking
  • 60
    Funniest
  • 60
    Best concept / idea

Episode Highlights

  • The Cycle of COVID Psychology
    A poker night turns into a reflection of the emotional stages of the pandemic.
    “The whole poker night went through the entire cycle of psychology of COVID.”
    @ 02m 10s
    January 08, 2022
  • Elizabeth Holmes Found Guilty
    Elizabeth Holmes has been convicted on four counts of fraud, facing significant prison time.
    “This outcome could be significant because it means hundreds of millions of dollars of Theranos investors lost.”
    @ 03m 59s
    January 08, 2022
  • Media's Double-Edged Sword
    The media can elevate your company but is quick to tear it down.
    “The media builds you up, then tears you down.”
    @ 18m 20s
    January 08, 2022
  • Independent Thinking is Key
    Don't let others dictate your decisions; think for yourself.
    “Don't let other people do your thinking for you.”
    @ 18m 43s
    January 08, 2022
  • Understanding Shareholder Rights
    Shareholders can file a 220 in Delaware for financial transparency.
    “You can file a 220 in Delaware if you suspect malfeasance.”
    @ 22m 52s
    January 08, 2022
  • Fed's Confusing Signals
    Recent Fed statements raise questions about their understanding of the market.
    “The Fed's recent statements make them look like they don't know what they're doing.”
    @ 29m 59s
    January 08, 2022
  • Market Liquidity Insights
    Trillions of dollars are waiting to be invested as market corrections occur.
    “There are trillions of dollars waiting to find a home.”
    @ 31m 34s
    January 08, 2022
  • The Unicorn Dilemma
    There are currently 900 unicorns, but many may never achieve their projected valuations.
    “There are 900 unicorns right now.”
    @ 36m 17s
    January 08, 2022
  • Market Dynamics
    The trickle-down effect from public to private markets is inevitable, affecting valuations.
    “The trickle-down effect is inevitable.”
    @ 40m 37s
    January 08, 2022
  • Advice for Founders
    In turbulent times, focus on being 'default alive' and keep building your business.
    “You need to focus on being default alive.”
    @ 46m 15s
    January 08, 2022
  • Building in Downturns
    Recessions can be prime opportunities for startups to innovate and recruit talent.
    “Recessions are actually great times to build startups.”
    @ 54m 18s
    January 08, 2022
  • The Importance of Efficiency
    In tough economic times, startups must focus on efficiency and managing their burn rate.
    “You have to sharpen the pencil and get more efficient about your burn.”
    @ 56m 32s
    January 08, 2022

Episode Quotes

Key Moments

  • Holmes Verdict03:16
  • Independent Thinking18:43
  • Fed Critique29:59
  • Default Alive46:15
  • Startup Resilience54:18
  • Downturn Opportunities54:21
  • Frugality in Spending56:46
  • Market Realities58:30

Words per Minute Over Time

Vibes Breakdown

Related Episodes

Podcast thumbnail
E47: Facebook's week from hell, Ellen Pao on sexism in Elizabeth Holmes coverage, Newsom wins & more
Podcast thumbnail
E45: Theranos & VC fraud risks, China bans video games, Texas SB8, Apple app store, CA fires, Rogan
Podcast thumbnail
E43: Innovative venture strategies, Zymergen's implosion, Square acquires Afterpay & more
Podcast thumbnail
E89: GDP growth negative in Q2, $SHOP layoffs, Alzheimer's fraud, Ginkgo acquires Zymergen & more
Podcast thumbnail
E107: The Twitter Files Parts 1-2: shadow banning, story suppression, interference & more
Podcast thumbnail
Why AI will dwarf every tech revolution before it: robots, manufacturing, AR glasses from CES 2026
Podcast thumbnail
E140: LK-99, Sclerotic establishments, Fitch downgrades US debt, Trump indicted... again
Podcast thumbnail
E125: SpaceX launch, Fox News settlement, "Zombie-corn" exodus to AI, late-stage implosion
Podcast thumbnail
E74: Market update, inverted yield curve, immigration, new SPAC rules, $FB smears TikTok and more
Podcast thumbnail
E65: VC markup dynamics, Russia/US tensions over Ukraine, Altos Labs raises $3B, Stripe mafia & more
Podcast thumbnail
E46: False Ivermectin narratives, regulatory grift, wartime mentality in solving issues & more