All In Podcast Episode 100 Notes October 14 2022

 

October 14 2022

• Killer intros by JCal
  • Sacks got a big care package from MonCler
    • Got ratted out at his Blue Angels party
  • Chamath pays for his Laura Piana
  • 100 more!
• Reflecting on the first 100 episodes and what makes the show special
  • Friendships are relatable
  • Everyone has a unique point of view
  • Their success is important because it gives them credibility
  • The pod is educating people of import and influence
  • Internet has caused news cycle to resolve very quickly - so everyone comes to consensus and same point of view very quickly - people coalesce around unipolar point of view or how it contrasts with the other side - US vs China, us vs them, blue vs red, etc - this is what is fundamentally wrong about how the system is working today - so now this pod shows people how to have a real rational out of sync point of view that can change your mind in a meaningful way - so try to stay away from dualistic thinking - there are shades of gray
  • Journalism as it was is dead - with internet facts are free and come to you super fast, now journalist has to provide narrative
  • These people are compensated based on follower counts
  • Nuance is lost
  • Mainstream media is very biased (how they are not saying GDP -ve growth of 2% is nothing to worry about - favoring Biden, Ukraine war, how we got here)
  • Media’s biggest power is ability to define when time begins on an issue
    • Come in in the last 15 minutes of the game and act like the whole thing didn’t happen - like how Ukraine situation with Russia has been building up since 90s, etc
  • Chamath loves the cold opens
  • Sacks likes JCal’s Joe Pesci voice
  • Friedberg doesn’t like when JCal and Sacks fight
  • Summit was fun - people had a good time
• Fan Questions
  • Sacks not able to finish his SaaS book because of pod
  • Sacks is more open to attacks from nitwits because his views are the most different
  • People don’t believe in themselves and attack people who do
  • Great time to build a company - separate the wheat from the chaff, get rid of weak people, get rid of people who don’t respect capital
  • Big tech put is gone, those are the generals who are about to get shot in the public markets
  • Bill Gurley is right - way better at helping you build your company than these useless young kids
  • TVPI = Total Value / Paid Investment
  • If you are smart, hard working, don’t have self sabotaging behaviors and make some good risk bets you will be fine - technology is a huge wind on your back
  • Exact amount of how well you do will depend on stochastic factors and luck
  • Make sure you’re building equity in yourself instead of being in the services business
  • Every year you’re building income but not building equity is a year of lost growth
  • You need compounding growth - you need more options every year
  • If you want to have outsized success you need to have equity in some thing, even if you have amazing hourly rate your success will not be uncapped
  • Not just shares in something - can create equity in yourself more than any era - can create website that prints cash for you, service, etc
  • What are you getting leverage off of - used to be labour - run factory
  • Or you can get leverage off of capital - fund manager
  • Or software and technology
  • Sacks is doing Yammer 2.0
    • Have to take out Slack
  • Chamath left Facebook and stopped using it, distributed Slack and stopped using it
  • With $100
    • Chamath would do energy or life sciences
    • Sacks wud start B2B software company
    • JCal would do a fund
    • Friedberg would build something - life sciences and software, AI/ML meets life sciences
• Ukraine/Russia
  • Biden said we’re facing risk of armageddon
  • Probability of nuclear weapon use has gone from 1-5% to 20-25% by Leon Pannetta - respected figure in Washington
  • No one is saying what we should do to avoid this
  • Panetta and Petraeus said we should attack Russia directly if they nuke Ukraine - so they want WW3, its mission creep, US is more involved in the war and more committed
  • When people clamor for war check if they are getting paid to shill for military industrial complex
  • Washington think tanks are funded by Defense industry
  • There is no lobby for peace
  • If Fed raises rates to 4-5% it will become economically infeasible to finance wars abroad
  • World is saying we can’t afford this war and focus on our country - another side wants to focus on going to war because they are economically incentivized - 2 groups are vying for the budget of the world
  • Central banks vs M.I.C
  • Next $0.5T - $1T spent in western countries will be spent on internal stuff instead of external war - like UK pension system
  • Biden budget: > 1/3rd budget will go for debt service - so debt service will eat up whole federal budget in a decade or so
  • Why are we paying $80B to Ukraine instead of fixing internal stuff
  • Rubber meets the road for Ukraine in Crimea - Sevastopol naval base - 80% of crimea is russian, gallup polls say 3-4th want to go to Russia but Ukraine nationalism says Crimea is not Russian
  • So either tell Zelenskyy to give up Crimea or go for WW3
  • Elon tweet was interesting - Crimea has been part of Russia since 1783 until Krushchev’s mistake
  • He who pays the piper calls the tune
  • Blank check caused WW1 - German Kaiser gave money to Austrians
  • US should not keep funding Ukraine to taking Crimea
  • US needs to have a point of view on what is important for American interests
  • Ukraine is a client state of the US - they don’t get to call the shots
  • Accomplished something by not getting Kyiv taken over - so support self rule but similarly support that for people in Crimea
  • UK treasurer is allowed to call investment bank for pension fund and lever
• Amazon Andy Jassy
  • Cost cutting
  • We are near the end of market bottom
    • Only 1 cohort of company has not been whacked - Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, Google
      • Even these companies are making more money than is appropriate
  • Tim Cook did this in 2017-2018 - moved into a different bucket in people’s minds - that’s when Buffet came in
  • Amazon will become a GARP stock - growth at a reasonable price
  • Haven’t seen this from MSFT yet - have seen hints of this from Google
  • These companies will do the same thing soon - so that will hit market bottom because they will say “Do not sell this stock”
  • Amazon is slightly different because they are physical economy - much more than Google, Microsoft
  • These are the ones who take the index to 3200 - everything else is 50-90% down, last year a quarter of SP500 is in them
  • Organized capital is now finding a bottom
  • VC firms are buying public equities
  • NY Times has so many -ve headlines
  • So Fed will raise rates more - so smart money - invest in market now-ish
  • Tom Friedman, a hawk traditionally is saying we are fighting China and Russia at the same time
• Besties looking forward to next 100