SpaceX IPO, Iran War Fallout, Quantum Bitcoin Hack, The Space Opportunity

All right, everybody. Welcome back to. the number one podcast in the world, to. you all-in podcast. David Sacks couldn't make it this week, but we have the trio. David Friedberg is. here, your Sultan of Science, Chamath. Palihapitiya, SpaceX filed. confidentially to go public on April 1st. targeting a 1.7. 5 trillion with a T valuation. When. SpaceX goes public, if it's at that 1.75. trillion dollar valuation, so weird to.

say trillion dollar valuation for an. IPO. They would be the eighth largest company. in the world right behind TSMC and Saudi. Aramco. They're both worth 1.7 X at the. taping of this podcast. Tesla is number. 10 with 1.37 trillion dollar valuation. Hey, if you were to combine those two as. many people are speculating will happen. at some point and you can buy the stock. ticker E L O N, that would be a 3.1. trillion dollar company and that would. make them the fourth largest company. ahead of Microsoft. They're aiming to.

raise Chamath 75 billion, which would be. the by far the biggest raise ever in an. IPO. Expected to go out in June. I think they were trying to hit the 420. date cuz that would have been even more. hilarious, but. they're not going to be able to do that. SpaceX recently acquired X.AI for 250. billion. That includes X and Twitter and. the XAI large language model AI company. Starlink generating between 50 and 80%. of SpaceX's revenue. We'll have all.

those details shortly. And it'll be. close to 20 billion dollars a year. according to reports. Launch of rockets is the other 40% of. the business, 5 billion in 2024. according to reports. Total revenue. 2025, 15 to 16 billion with 8 billion in. profit according to Reuters. So, let's. stop there and we're going to talk about. all the other IPOs that could be coming. Chamath. I think people really want to know and. you may have mentioned this on an. earlier episode, what are the chances.

that Tesla, after if this IPO goes well, that Tesla and SpaceX could wind up. being the same company. We saw they're. collaborating on a fab. 100% is what. you're putting it on? Okay. Okay, sorry. Let me Let me be clear. 99.999%. Okay. What will that [laughter] mean. when if those two companies or when. those two companies merge? One of the. great. things that happened in my career was. there was a point where, you know how. like you grind at a level and then, you.

know, you just get exposed to things at. a different level. And then you grind. for years and you get exposed to things. at a yet another level. In one of those steps, I was very fortunate to be introduced. by Thomas Laffont, actually, to the head. of Wachtell Lipton. Is it a law firm? Law firm. And his name. is Ed Herlihy. And he said, "This is the most. important, well-known, well-run, powerful law firm in America." Then I.

looked at the transactions and they're. just in the middle of everything. And. now, you know, my lawyer, Raj Narayanan, who. does everything for me, one of the. senior partners at Wachtell, I can attest are incredible. And they. said to me, in the middle of all of this. stuff when I was doing a bunch of deals, they said, "Chamath, just get ready. to pay a tax." And I said, "What does. that mean?" They said, "The way that the American capital. markets are set up is both that you can. be incredibly creative and do incredible. things. But, and we talked about this a little.

bit last week, there's a bunch of tort. that allows folks to hang around the. hoop and get paid no matter what. You. see this in all IPOs, shareholder. lawsuits abound. And they try to create a class out of. it. And the reason they do that is that. there's D&O insurance that then will pay. out some number of millions of dollars. The attorneys take 40 or 50% and then. these plaintiffs get a few bucks. You. saw how egregious this court. manipulation was when. this guy with 10 shares sued Elon's comp. package at Tesla and won. And what was.

that really? That was the trial lawyers. trying to get paid hundreds of millions. of dollars by exploiting a seam. It was. a shakedown. Call it what It was a. shakedown. Why am I bringing this up? If. you take the the Raj and Ed example of. this, this SpaceX IPO is going to set up a. couple of things. The first is there's just going to be. the natural noise in the market. and Elon will have to sort through all. of the little ticky-tacky things. But the most important positive thing. that will happen from the IPO.

is a validated external mark-to-market. valuation. of SpaceX. And the market every day in real time. gives you a valid mark-to-market. assessment of the value of Tesla. And this allows you to put these two. things together to minimize. these losses. And I think that that's what Elon really. needs. It'll make his life tremendously. simpler from a governance perspective. It'll make the companies and this.

quibbling about his time a non-issue. because again, nobody talks about Zuck. or Satya or Sundar. or Jensen. allocating time across various projects. inside of. Meta or Google or Microsoft or Nvidia. Nor should they really. make this claim from Elon because as. you're seeing, there's actually an enormous overlap and. commonality to the various things that.

he is doing. He's building the robots, but they're used inside of SpaceX. He's. building a Terafab, they're used inside. of Tesla. He's building xAI, they're. used across both. So I think we need to do this. It'll. minimize the shareholder noise because. it'll give less room to somebody that. says, "Hey, he set a valuation out of. thin air." Well, and But, dollars to. donuts, these things are going to merge. And it speaks to the singularity that's. going on right now. You know, you had a car company, you had. a space company. Okay, that was a pretty. How do those two things overlap? And.

it's like AI, data centers in space, where do you get chips from? And then. actually going to raw materials inside. of one factory, going out the other, and having. discussed with Elon many times, what he. learned, you know, at Tesla or SpaceX. about advanced materials informed. different products at the different. companies. And now you just You'll have. all of that in one place. And then you. think about the brain trust that he. built at those two companies, plus. Boring Company, plus Neuralink. If. they're all in there, all this.

cross-disciplinary learning is going to. compound and compound and compound. Elon. knows more about factories than probably. anybody. Like there's people in China. who have, you know, Foxconn knows a lot about factories. You. know, so there are some people who know. as much or or probably even a little bit. more about some aspects of it, but. that's a a true advantage of bringing. those two teams together. And you saw. it, people would go from one company to. the other. Freeberg, my question for. you, very acutely with your NASA hat and.

uh you know, your your background today, is. 20 years ago, he he started trying to. get to space with SpaceX, and here we. go, there's more rockets going off in a. month now than there are days in the. month for the for the entire country, and he's got rockets going up every two. or three days. You can just basically. hop on a SpaceX flight and get to space. Maybe you could just use. your vision there to tell the audience. what could things look like in another. 20 years if SpaceX continues at this. cadence or even, you know, goes faster.

because of AI. Well, this week's a pretty important. milestone. for that point because we just launched. Artemis 2 yesterday, which is man's returning to the moon. So, the United States. shipped. this rocket with four astronauts on. board. They're going to do an orbit. around the Earth, head to the moon, come back around, and come back to Earth. in anticipation of landing on the moon. in about 2 years. And getting to the moon, I think, is.

going to be very important, not just. because there's this important social. milestone and race happening on right. now with China, but I think the moon could end up being. kind of the next industrial frontier for. humanity. And the reason is if you can get to the. moon, the moon has an extraordinary. abundance of material that we can mine, process, and manufacture into goods, and. ultimately the cost to ship those goods. back to the Earth is zero. It will cost less to move goods,

manufactured goods, processed or. uh precious metals from the moon to a. specific point on Earth. It will cost. less to do that than to ship it using. any other terrestrial conventional. method, whether that's a boat, an. airplane, or a railroad. And the reason. is that on the moon, you can take. advantage of the low gravity. It's about. 1/6 the gravity and the complete lack of. an atmosphere, meaning that it's. frictionless to move material off of the. moon, and very low energy to move it off.

of the moon. You do not need to use a. rocket propellant with high energy like. we have to do to move things off of the. Earth. In fact, the design for moving. material off of the moon is to use. what's called a mass driver, which is. like a a train track, like a rail, like. an electric rail. You kind of see these. in, you know, high-speed trains that work on. kind of magnetic levitation, and you. could put a package on that rail and use. electricity to accelerate that package. to a 100 G-force, shoot it back to the.

Earth, or theoretically shoot it to. Mars, and it will go to the exact point. on the Earth you want it to go to, reenters the atmosphere and lands with a. a simple parachute where you wanted to. go. So, we could run continuous mining, continuous manufacturing processes on. the moon at a fraction of the cost of. what it would take to do it here on. earth. The biggest limiting factor, getting people to the moon. And that is. largely solved or will be solved in the. next few years by robotics. So, I think. that there's this pretty profound. intersection with what's going on in. robotics with this moment for space.

industrialization and moving to the. moon. So, you know, Tesla, I think 20. years from now is actually a more. interesting story whether they're the. same independent company or the same. company. I think we're going to look. back one day and have this kind of. laughing observation that Tesla started. out as an electric car company. 100%. >> Ended up ended up becoming an autonomous. car company and the autonomous. competency is what led to the robotics. revolution. And the robotics revolution, even if the socialists ban robotics on.

earth and tell us no robots allowed, they're taking all the jobs, [laughter]. you could ship all those robots to the. moon and they could get to work and. create an entirely new manufacturing. frontier for our civilization, for. humanity. That frontier can manufacture. precious metals and other goods and ship. them back. You could manufacture. semiconductors on the moon. All that's. missing is the robots. So, moving the. robots to the moon or setting up the. materials for robots to build themselves. on the moon is kind of the first phase. of this transition. You know, asking. about 20 years from now and then the. next phase is building stuff up. So,

look, I mean, I think that this may not. be and it certainly won't be limited to. just SpaceX, but SpaceX is demonstrating. its capacity at being effectively the. railroads. You know, what the railroads. were to the west and to the frontier in. the west, you know, in the last. generation, SpaceX will be to the moon. and ultimately to Mars. And there's going to be an extraordinary. abundance of production that's going to. come out of the moon. The moon has. everything, by the way, and I'll say one. more thing about SpaceX. SpaceX has also. created, and this is going to be a big. part of the valuation analysis that many. are doing, they've created a backup to.

the internet. You know, the internet is. fundamentally limited by all of the. nodes on the network and the. connectivity amongst all those nodes. And that connectivity is largely driven. by copper and fiber optic cable. So, in. space, with the number of satellites. going up with Starlink, and to actually. deploy data centers that can output data. on those nodes on that network, SpaceX. has largely built a backup internet. And. that backup internet can coincide with. the Earth's internet, but it creates. this extraterrestrial communication. network that gives us theoretically the.

ability to think about, "Hey, if. governments collapse, if there's. civilizational upheaval, etc., etc., etc." This becomes, I think, a. fundamentally kind of important. technology infrastructure that's going. to exist in parallel. So, I'm pretty. excited about like these two separate. paths for SpaceX and where they. intersect with Tesla, I think it's pretty profound at the. moment. Yeah, and it can't be. understated what. lowering the cost per kilogram to get to. space has done to entrepreneurs around. the company. There's multiple.

entrepreneurs who are now doing asteroid. mining or Varda doing experimentation in. space, and I have a. I've been doing some late-stage stuff. Chamath with my syndicate, and one of. the interesting companies we syndicated. We we did Zipline, which is a great. company, but we also did this company. called Vast, Vast Space. Uh Jed is the. founder. He He created uh Ripple and uh. and and some other crypto projects, and. he put a lot of his money, hundreds of. millions of dollars, into this company. Vast Space. And they're designing a.

space station. How did they do it? Well, they just bought carriage on. SpaceX rockets, and they paid in. advance, they have their slot, and now. they're doing this massive innovation to. make modular space station components. Here's what I'll And the thesis is, "Hey, what if Google or Amazon want to. have a space station in space?" You. know, completely possible they may want that. Here's what I'll say. I think. sometimes it's better to be lucky than. good. There are all of these ways that.

so many people will end up with. participation into SpaceX. I think we. all owe. Elon an enormous thanks. I think that. this is going to unleash. just an unbelievably large economy of. things. that we have no idea about. And when I see. this thing, that video that you just. showed, what it reminds me is that we. have a very rudimentary capability in. space. What does that mean?

If you take if you catch a ride on. Falcon 9 or Falcon Heavy, basically it's. dropping you off at 550 km, I think. You. have a different sort of problem if. you're trying to get to GEO. But even if you get dropped off at 500. or 550, how do you get to your actual orbital. plane? Right? So, meaning if you think of Elon. as like the big container ships that go. from China to America, once it gets to. Long Beach, you need FedEx. There's an entire. infrastructure there that's going to get. all of this logistics built last mile.

There's a huge garbage collection. problem that's getting built up. We. still haven't technically solved how to. do garbage collection in space. There's nets, there's magnetic plates. All of that is getting fixed. Then there's going to be an explosion in. actual power generation. The cell. composition of solar cells up in space. are materially different. It's a really. incredible thing. You look at these thin. sheets, they are like 1 mm thick. You. could if you carried it on your hand, the glass breaks. Yet you can smash a. meteor into it when it's laid and.

laminated and nothing happens. It's like. the It's like. So, my point is in every single. dimension of what the. earthly economy looks like, it's now going to go and get rebuilt in. space. There'll be a FedEx of space. There'll. be a Maersk of space. There'll be a I. don't know what the garbage collection. companies are, Allied waste of space. There's going to be everything of space. that exists in the United States. Freeburg just talked about the Freeport. Macaran of space. Like everything.

And that we owe to him. Yeah. And I hope he gets that credit because. the amount of businesses I think that. can get created and the amount of value. that will be created on top of SpaceX's. shoulders. is vast. It's the beginning of the. beginning of the beginning. And it's. going to create enormous opportunities. for people who are smart and. resourceful. And Freeburg, maybe you. could comment on the PGMs, the palladium.

that's on asteroids, and just they're. rare here on Earth. If we had an. unlimited supply or a continuous supply. of those minerals, you know, what what. could the downstream effect of that be? And then what if we find things in space. that we are unaware of? There are. unknown unknowns, correct, Freeburg, when you start to conceptualize this? I. do think like the asteroid mining is an. interesting concept, but I do think it's. going to be more likely that we'll have. the need for infrastructure so we can. produce ores and refine and so on.

versus, you know, bringing chunky rock. back. I think that you could do this. very effectively on the moon. The. primary elements that are missing from. the moon that we have on the Earth are, you know, carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen, and oxygen. Basically, these things that make life. on Earth. But that's because they. primarily exist in a gaseous form, and. the Earth has enough gravity to retain. those gases and have an atmosphere. The. moon is too small to maintain an. atmosphere. The gravity's too little, so.

those gases all kind of went away. They. evaporated away in the early formation. of the Earth and the moon. But on the. moon, there's everything else. There's. aluminum, there's silicon, there's. palladium, there's platinum, there's. gold. There's everything you possibly. need. So I think as we do the calculus. and all of this, we'll end up realizing. that the moon is probably the best. frontier. One of the biggest issues is. dissipating heat because you don't have. an atmosphere, but theoretically you. could recapture that heat and use like. helium gas or something to turn a.

turbine and actually run production of. even more electricity. You just put a. couple solar panels out. I did the math. on this. It's like 500 square meters of. solar panels will let you run a 4 km. mass driver to ship material back to the. Earth every 10 to 15 minutes. One kind. of material every 10 to 15 minutes. >> sled you described earlier that Elon's. been talking about as well, yeah. >> So you could think about having. autonomous mining vehicles deployed on. the moon, processing the ore, and then. sending completely processed material. back. And then for a heat shield for. re-entry to the Earth, you just use moon.

rock. You only need about 15 cm of moon. rock at the front of the package. And. then that'll burn up when it re-enters. the atmosphere and the package, you. know, kind of parachutes down and lands. where you want it to land in your. industrial shipyard or whatever. So. there's just like you know, I think. we'll we'll continue to kind of iterate. on this. I'm speculating in a bunch of. different ways. >> the beginning of the beginning. Gosh, I. mean, can you imagine having a moon base. in America is just wow. Well, imagine. permanently present on the moon is just. and factories on the moon is just wild.

to consider. >> Wild. Can you guys just imagine like the. middle or the early 19th century, like. the late 1700s, early 1800s in America, and there's like all this land out on. the west, and like whatever people were. contemplating in that moment about what. they were going to go do with that land. on the west, and they started to travel. west, their minds would have been blown to see. what happened 100 years later, or now. 150 years later. You know, like it's. just That's the moment that we're at. right now, and the railroads are being. built to get us to this next great.

frontier. They're being laid out before. us, and the opportunity is really. limited only by our imagination. And. before we would have never been able to. tackle these great frontiers, but this. magical new technology came about called. robots. And these robots are are going. to allow us to actually make use of. these frontiers. >> [clears throat]. >> and explore them and develop them. And. that's why this is such an incredible. moment where this intersection of. autonomy and robotics and space. traversal kind of drive forward humanity. into this new era. And it's Again, this.

is not a zero-sum game. This is. expanding humanity's potential, expanding production, which is so. different than the way the socialists on. Earth are talking about it where. everyone's fighting against progress. because they think that progress. And the truth is it's about everyone. building stuff. that's new and everyone benefiting from. this. I'm going to open a hotel casino. in the space. That'll be good. That'll be so good. >> No, I'm serious. Absolutely. You think. it's funny, but I am. >> I would love that. Yeah, and then no.

rake, no rake, no gravity. No rake, no. gravity. No tax, no tax or poker winnings. I love. it. Whoever implements the red-light. district in space is going to become a. trillionaire. Oh, wow. That's Yeah, with. the robotics and the pleasure droids, replicants. Oh man, it could get crazy. All right. Well, let's just hope you're. we're not the Donner Party on the way. there. Um. 2026 Don't worry, you'll be you'll be. safely on the ground.

Schlepping syndicates. I'll tell you something. Thank you. Shout out the syndicate.com. and flying [laughter] to join me in. great companies. Do you own any rockets? You guys might. be retired, but I'm in the game. I'm in. the arena trying things. I'm selling I'm. selling enterprise software every day. That's what I do. >> Chamath said, "Hey J Cal, can we get. wrapped this up real quick cuz I got to. get on a sales call. I got to get on a. discovery call.". Listen, I like the fact that we're all. working. We're working into our 50s. I.

love it. Hey, 2026 could be an all-time. record for IPOs. Looks like it will be. And PropTech, OpenAI, Databricks. I mean, these are. all. nine and possibly 10-figure IPOs in. terms of the valuations. Long tail of. other companies, Stripe, Cerebras, Canva, Discord. Lots of people waiting. Here's. your Polymarket. SpaceX 94%, obviously. That looks like it's We just talked. about that for 20 minutes. Anthropic.

41%. People were saying 70% in February. OpenAI 38%, Databricks 32%. People are wondering what could derail. this. Obviously, we we we have a very. pro-business. group of people in Washington, D.C., but. you have potentially this Iran war. We'll talk about that later in the. program. Could potentially push us back if God. forbid it was to spiral or there was a. recession. Maybe the Democrats,

you know, taking control of Congress, Senate, etc. What are your thoughts here. on the flurry of potential IPOs? We're. talking about trillions of dollars of. companies, Chamath. And if that does. happen, let's start talking second and. third-order impact of of that kind of. distribution chain that could happen for. LPs. And then just also all these. employees, you know, and then a a currency for. these companies. We'll go from a Mag 7. to a Mag 17, it looks like. >> I think that we have a bit of a risk. problem.

And I think this is why it makes so much. sense for Elon to get out first. If you think about appetite as. equivalent to like a person at a. Thanksgiving dinner, when you first come. in and you see all of this stuff, it's. so plentiful. Your eyes are bigger than. your stomach. And I think in a moment like that, you. want to be the one that is consumed. first. Mhm. And I think the risk. increases when you are at the tail end. because the risk is that the diners will. run out of space.

And if you use that analogy, >> And if you use that analogy, I think the. reason why people's plates will get full. are. probably twofold and maybe threefold. The first and most important thing is. there's. enough tactical event risk. that people generally want to be risk. off and have more margin of safety. I think the Iran thing is kind of in. there, but I think the big tactical.

event risk is that. we have a lot of these really important. financial moments tied to this concept. of. AGI, ASI. I don't know if you saw the. OpenAI. announcement on their final terms, but. you know, a huge slug of Amazon's. capital is tied to a 2028 IPO or a. moment that calls for this. Then there was a bunch of leaks, text messages or whatever that said that. there's a version of some AGI running. inside of Anthropic. Then there was the.

fact that, you know, the leak of Claude. code basically demonstrated that they. had feature flagged away a bunch of. improvements. So, if you stack up all. these improvements, they're actually much further ahead than. the models realize. If you take all of. that as a basket, it goes back to what I. said last week, which is. we have a real pricing problem. If AGI is real, the durability of most companies is slim. to none. If AGI is not real, then the fundraising capacity of these. companies that are now raising of.

billions of dollars needs to get. questioned and inspected thoroughly. History will sort out which one is. right, but both cannot be right. So, in. that vein, I actually think J Cal, I. don't think we're going to have like. these quote-unquote blockbuster stream. of IPOs. I think what happens is SpaceX. is going to get out. They're going to do. great. And then maybe the next one does good to. great. Then the next one will do good. And then the appetite runs out because. you just can't absorb incrementally.

trillions of dollars of new demand. And if you think about it, where is it. going to come from? Is it going to come. from the sidelines? I don't know. I. think it's more of a reallocation. exercise. But if you look at the S&P, well, most people are now defensively. moving away from these kinds of things. towards the things that are more. protected, what the industry calls halo, right? High asset, low obsolescence kind of. businesses. Those things trade for zero today, Jason. You could buy hundreds of. millions of dollars of year of cash flow.

for two to five times right now in the. stock market. And so, why are you going. to go way out on the risk curve and buy. something at 200 times. revs, let alone earnings. Yeah, the the. So, I don't know. I'm I'm more in the. camp of. I think it's good to be first. It's pretty decent to be second. But if. I were you, I would get the heck out and. get public and get your money and. fortify your balance sheet ASAP because. I think the risk builds. the further down the IPO chain you're.

in. Yeah, there's going to be a. competition. for investor dollars, whether it's. retail or it's institutional or. sovereign wealth funds. They're going to. have a lot of choices here. Do you want. to be in Nvidia? Do you want to be in. SpaceX? Maybe you have to rotate out of. Amazon or Google or Disney in order to. take on those opportunities. And that's. going to be a a great competition. probably. We could see a lot of these IPOs, Friedberg, trade below their IPO price. in the year or two after they come out.

and get repriced, yeah? Like we've seen before. I think the. market's going to need to find a price. Remember that the shareholders in a lot. of these companies have held on to these. shares for a long period of time. And. the valuations are extraordinary. I. mean, hundreds of billions of dollars in. market value coming to market liquid for. the first time. Some of these investors, regardless of whatever their entry price. was, are going to be looking for. liquidity. So, there's. only so much capital to absorb those.

shares on the buy side. Meaning, if the buyers and the bid is. not there to fulfill all of the selling, then you're going to see the share price. decline. And the market's going to find. a price. And so, I I think this idea. that like an IPO. is, you know, just a step in driving the. price or value of a company up is a. pretty false sense. And and I think. we'll realize it's pretty false as some. of these IPOs take place because there. is so much pent-up selling demand. There. is so much value that's been created. There's going to be so much selling.

pressure. And then there's going to be. very little buying activity on some of. these because anyone that could have. bought at scale. on the buy side post public were already. in a lot of these companies pre-public. as private companies. And so, I don't. know who the big buyers are that. everyone's expecting are going to show. up. They're probably thinking it's going. to be retail. Retail, yeah. Yeah, but how much money does retail. have left? I mean, you if you look at. retail investors, they have a certain. amount of powder and it's probably. deployed. It's not like they have. unlimited places to look for that. And,

you know, there's some evidence of this. Blue Bloomberg ran an article on. Wednesday. We tip on Thursday, folks. And you get to listen to the pod on. Fridays. OpenAI is falling out of favor. with secondary buyers. According to a. report, OpenAI investors can't find. buyers at the new $850 billion valuation. that Chamath referenced earlier. Investors Bloomberg spoke to are looking. to sell. $600 million worth of shares. People are. looking for liquidity. and said they were institutional.

investors. Anthropic, currently valued. at $300 billion, is seeing major. secondary bids at a $600 billion. valuation. So, I think Chamath, what. this shows us is you're correct. They're, you know, OpenAI and Anthropic. are the two next cards. That's your turn. and river, folks. If SpaceX is the flop. and maybe they're massively overvalued. right now. Maybe they're three, four, 500 million billion dollar companies, not trillion dollar companies. And if you look at the amount of revenue. 24 billion for OpenAI at 852 billion,

that's 35 times price to sales ratio and. that is a. absurd price to sales ratio depending on. if the growth keeps happening. And as. you reference Chamath, what if we are at. artificial general intelligence, AGI? And the moats on these things is de. minimus or or there is no moat. Anthropic just got hacked. All their secrets are out. Somebody. trans muted the code into another. language, posted it on GitHub.

Can't be stopped. I don't know if you. saw that story, Freeberg, but this is. kind of mind-blowing. Somebody took the. Anthropic code, I don't know what it was. written in, and then basically just put. it into another language, reposted it. If Anthropic comes and says, "Hey, you. can't do that." Well, that negates their. argument, Chamath, that they're allowed. to train on other people's data and then. spit out a different output. So, this is. a very weird moment in time, right? It. is. I think you're you're bringing up a. bunch of different points, so let me. just sort them out in the order that I.

think is important. Is there a market. for OpenAI at 800 billion? Yes, and. there should be. When I read that press. release. my mind was blown. This is a. I've never seen a business like this. And I'd say the same thing about. Anthropic. What an incredible thing that both of. these two companies have been able to. create. Nobody in the history of the. world. has ever seen two businesses like this. at this scale. Okay? It's unbelievable. These are trillion.

dollar companies. They both are. And they both deserve to. be. How profitable they are. I don't know. What their terminal. valuation is I don't know. What will. people pay for an IPO? I don't know. But Nick, I just shared. something with you. These two companies need to get out as. quickly as possible. And the reason is every single company. that comes after it, all those companies. that you just named Jason, are not. nearly as important and do not need the. money nearly as badly as these guys do.

And where will it come from? The. specific answer to your question when. you look at this chart is. the tech sector PE is going to shrink. faster, in my opinion, than the non-tech. PE. And the reason is because as these. companies come out, the combination of SpaceX, OpenAI, and. Anthropic, all three are baking. an AI technology that first and foremost. will go after the tech sector. It will eliminate and it will. cannibalize and it will erode.

most of the moats. that support this differential trading. So if I were a betting man, my first bet. is as those three companies come out, these software businesses are going to. approach the rest of the non-tech PE. Okay, that's the first step that has to. happen. So the rate of change of of the. multiple erosion. will basically say to the world, "Hey, these tech companies are. I don't know. I'll buy the first five or. six years of this story, but I'm not.

buying year 15 of this anymore because. these three guys are going to build. something.". So that's where the money comes from. That's why I think. after SpaceX, these two guys need to get. their act together, file quickly, get. out, and just get the money, fortify. their balance sheets, and be in a. position. Everything Everything that. happens after that is a total coin toss. because once these three companies are. public, I think the blue line will converge to. the orange line and it's going to be. nasty. Yeah, Freeberg, just looking at. this, do you believe that secondary.

market is a canary in the coal mine here. with OpenAI? Because if we we've and. we've gone through this year after year. here. These are exceptional businesses. They've grown incredible. Customers love. their products, but the burn is brutal. The circle of financing problem is still. out there. Like, what's reality here? The And that's going to all come out. when these S-1s get filed and they're. publicly traded companies and they have. quarterly earnings reports. Market share. for these could be flipping. Anthropic. and and Gemini, other players coming.

into the market. What are your thoughts here on. uh Anthropic and OpenAI post the SpaceX. IPO? Like I said, there's only so much. capital in the world. So, I do think one of the things that's. probably being underestimated at the. moment is the liquidity crunch that's. ahead for capital intensive technology. businesses given the conflict in the. Middle East. I don't think that Qatar. and certain Saudi offices and certain.

offices in UAE and Oman are as eager as. they were or, you know, have been to. provide large slugs of capital to. support these initiatives. And remember, that capital moves its way through the. markets, whether it's through JP Morgan. and a loan to SoftBank, which then gets. paid to OpenAI. At the end of the day, there has to be unencumbered debt-free. capital that's being provided to these. systems from somewhere in the world. And. the If you trace all of it back, like a. large chunk of it has historically in.

the last couple of years come from. Middle East sovereigns and family. offices. And I think that those are. likely going to tighten up in the near. term. That being the case, there's. probably less demand. I do think that. there's a lot of secondary demand coming. from family offices in Europe and. Singapore, places like that that that. generally have not had great access or. early-stage access to private companies. But at some point, there's only so much. demand there. So, I don't know like how. far this is going to go or when this. capital crunch that's going to emerge, I. think from the Middle East. I don't. think we've really felt the shockwave.

yet on what's happening because remember. a lot of these Middle East capital. commitments were made in the last cycle. as LP commitments or whatever. And you know, if they stop if they. downscale LP commitments or they stop. doing primary and secondary. transactions, you know, it takes a. little bit of time before the market. feels that and then it's like, "Oh, the. reliable go-to are gone." And a lot of. the big funds the the mega funds that. are out there totally that have Middle. East LPs are gone and suddenly. everyone's going to be like, "Whoa." And. the shockwave will hit.

So, let's see. It is a risk for the. United States because China I don't. think it's going to be as challenged. We're so dependent on Middle East. capital but maybe that. China has an a capital advantage. actually going into this mess. >> I mean and we talked about force majeure. to come into [clears throat] play here. if this Iran thing spirals God forbid. out of control. or gets worse. People could say, "You. know what? We're we're going to. downscale our commitments and hey, there's a war so we don't have to fund. this.". >> I think the markets will shake that off,

Jason. I don't think that they they view. this Iran thing as a big thing. I think. the big event risk in the market is is. AI real or not real? And if it's real, what are all of these companies worth? That is the big sword of Damocles over. the stock market. Yeah. All right. Well, that's a good segue I. think into talking a bit about Iran. We. took the week off from it last week. And we're going to catch up here. >> way, not because we just to be clear not. because we intended to which all the. comments railed us on but we literally. Jason did a terrible job moderating. It.

was on the freaking docket. We were. supposed to talk about it. We didn't get. to it and we went right up. That's it. It's it's clearly my fault. Um. >> [laughter]. >> He DM'd it. He you know, it's like. >> Yeah, I know. I'm just protecting Trump. I'm out here getting cover for Trump's. mistakes. >> Yeah. Yeah. Everybody knows I'm IN THE POCKET OF. PRESIDENT TRUMP. >> a ticket. Take a ticket. Oh, you have an. issue? Okay. Well, you're issue number. 17. Trump DM'd me and said, "Can you. please take this off the docket?" I was. like, "You got a bus." And then you're.

like, "Oh, sorry, office is closed. Come. back tomorrow." Today is day 34 of the. Iran war {slash} military operation. Trump addressed the nation Wednesday. night for a brisk 18 minutes. Here's a. 40-second clip. >> We're now totally independent of the. Middle East, and yet we are there to help. We don't. have to be there. We don't need their. oil. We don't need anything they have, but we're there to help our allies. For. years everyone has said that Iran cannot. have nuclear weapons, but in the end.

those are just words if you're not. willing to take action when the time. comes. Our objectives are very simple. and clear. We are systematically. dismantling the regime's ability to. threaten America or project power. outside of their borders. And then. tonight I'm pleased to say that. these core strategic objectives are. nearing completion. All right, the costs. here are mounting. A war is a very. serious business. 13 American service.

members have tragically died. Over 200. have been injured. On the other side of. the ledger, 3,500 Iranians have died, including 1,600 civilians and over 200. children. 1,200 people in Lebanon have. died from Israeli strikes. And we now have 50,000 troops deployed. to the Middle East. Chances of a. ground invasion are increasing. War has. cost $70 billion so far. That's assuming. $2 billion a day, which there seems to.

be consensus on via the Department of. War. Pentagon has asked Congress for another. $200 billion. To put that in context, the. war in Ukraine was $113 billion in the. first year. This could quickly exceed it. when we hit. 50 days. This isn't cheap. There are a. lot of costs. Here's uh your polymarket. on a ceasefire, 25% chance of a. ceasefire by the end of April, 47 chance.

by the end of May. The sharps are. thinking this could wrap up, but ground. invasion. which would be just really. impactful, I think. 63% chance by the. end of April, 71% chance by the end of. December. We're going to get into the. second-order effects, but what do you. think, Chamath? Uh. this obviously is super unpopular war. I think two things, and. the president kind of alluded to one. that I think is very important, which is.

if you are not energy independent, you. are at risk. And I don't know how many. more examples now that world leaders. need to be shown to get their acts. together. So, if the Ukraine-Russian. conflict didn't show Europe, then this. should show not just Europe, but the. rest of the world. You need to be in. control of your own energy. infrastructure and energy independence. Because stuff happens in the world, and. you're not always in control or can. shape how that stuff. can indirectly or directly.

affect you. The United States has energy. independence. It's an incredible. situation. What was interesting to me is. if you look at Europe, you know, they gutted. a couple of their energy markets, and they essentially ceded control to a. combination of very expensive imports. and China. They did that in. markets like nuclear, where they just. went out of it. They did that in things. like nat gas, where again, we can. debate, but where where did Nord Stream.

2 go? We don't know. And they did that. in things like solar, where they just. gutted all of the credits. But what's interesting is they're. starting to turn that around. I think Italy just reintroduced. effectively what's called investment tax. credits. Spain just did as well. Germany is restarting nuclear. So, if. you just look at the the last few. months, just that change is incredibly important. because our largest ally, Europe, should. be fundamentally energy independent so.

that they preserve complete and total. optionality like we do. in how we respond to these situations. That I think I think is a is a critical. thing that is a positive outcome of. what's happening. And then Second, Jason, which I think is a huge question. mark and it builds on what Friedberg. said before, the Middle Eastern states, specifically. the UAE and Saudi, Qatar, Kuwait, they are our most important financing.

and banking partner in the future. And I think we need to see a conclusive. end to this war. because they need to be in a position to. monetize these critical assets. Because. at the same time, if you see these big. pools of demand. start to become energy independent by. either accelerating nuclear, but I. again, that's just problematic and slow. But frankly, they're just going to ramp. up solar. That's the only way that you. can dispatch energy quickly. I think what that does is it decreases. hydrocarbon demand over the long run.

That then decreases the monetization. capacity for these countries. So, if you put these two things. together, all of these folks in the region want. safety, security, and they need a quick. end to this thing now. Okay. And I think that they're more. incentivized to put boots on the ground, Jason, than America is. That's the point. I was trying to make. Friedberg, let's talk a little bit about. fertilizer. You had brought up. when we had the start of. the Ukraine war, hey, this is the. breadbasket, we could have a massive.

famine. Thankfully, that was avoided. There were carve-outs for getting wheat. and and other. crops out of Ukraine, but here we are. again. with a significant amount of fertilizer. comes out of that region and it's not. flowing right now. Do you have concerns. this time around that we could see. something similar? Fertilizer is made up. of three elements. There's different. fertilizers. The one element is N for. nitrogen, P for phosphorus, and K for.

potassium. Ukraine is the largest producer of the. K, the potassium, the potash. But the N. in fertilizer is nitrogen. And that is. about 60% of what goes into the ground. That's 60 to 65% of global fertilizer is. the nitrogen. That's what really drives. agricultural productivity. And we need nitrogen fertilizer to grow. crops everywhere on Earth that we're. growing crops to feed people at scale.

That nitrogen is primarily made where. natural gas is produced and processed. And the reason is that they use the. natural gas as an input to the. production process. They get the the. carbon, the hydrogen, the oxygen. And. then they compress, remember 70% of our. atmosphere is made up of nitrogen gas. So, they compress the nitrogen in the. air to 200 times atmospheric pressure, run it over a electrical current with a. metal catalyst and you break apart the. N2s, so you have just single nitrogen. atoms, and then you combine it back and.

you end up getting ammonia out of the. other end. That's why nitrogen. fertilizers are produced where natural. gas is processed. So, the Middle East obviously is a. massive producer, particularly in Qatar, of natural gas. And that's why so much. of the world's nitrogen fertilizer is. made in the Middle East. In fact, about. 35% of the world's nitrogen fertilizer. goes through the Strait of Hormuz. And. it is then shipped to countries around. the world that farm and that need it to.

grow their crops. The swing producer in the world is. China. China historically makes about. 15% of the world's nitrogen fertilizer. And when the war started, a few days. after it began, China shut down exports. of their nitrogen fertilizer. And so. they basically choked out the rest of. the world. And so when the Strait of. Hormuz shut, the nitrogen stopped. flowing. Here you can see the price. spike that happened. So as the the war. began, this is urea. Urea is the solid. form of nitrogen fertilizer. So urea was trading at about 350 bucks a.

ton before the the conflict kind of took. off. And it continues to spike up. Uh it. reached over $700 a ton in the last 2. days. And this is really, really, really. impactful. It's not just like, "Oh, the. price is double." Number one, there's a. supply deficiency. So farmers in places. like Africa and South Asia are not. getting the urea that they need to farm. That is going to have a massive. follow-on problem. And in markets where they have access, because the price has spiked, like in.

the United States, our biggest crop is. corn. You need about 200 lb of that urea. per acre for corn. And that cost basically makes you. unprofitable. There is no way you can. make a profitable crop of corn. The. other thing that China did at the same. time is they stopped buying corn. So corn prices would normally spike up, and corn prices have remained low while. the input prices have spiked for. American farmers. So American farmers. are in a real pickle. Fortunately for this spring planting, which is happening right now, about 2/3.

of American farmers had already secured. their fertilizer before the this began. But a third did not. And they're. switching crops, typically to soybeans. But we have a fall planting coming up in. a couple of months here. And the choke. points on production is going to keep. prices very high. In the United States, we make a lot of our own ammonia at our. natural gas facilities in places like. Oklahoma and Texas and Wyoming and other. places. And then it ships directly to. the farms. But the cost is so high. because of the global market that it's. going to become very hard for farmers to.

make a profit. And around the world, there are many farmers, millions and. millions of farmers that can't access. this fertilizer now. So, the choke point. in the Strait of Hormuz is turning out. to be a real critical global food supply. crisis yet again, similar to Ukraine. And remember, there was about 400. million people. following the Ukraine war globally that. we saw enter into a state of. malnutrition. This means more than 1. year. of 1,200 calories or less per day for a. year, 400 million people after Ukraine. So, coming out of this crisis, it could.

be even more severe given the. criticality of nitrogen-based. fertilizers and the shutdown of the. strait. Let me make two more points on. this. You would think, "Okay, we'll make. more nitrogen fertilizer." The. facilities take at least 3 to 5 years to. fix when they break, which is what just. happened in Qatar. That facility got. damaged, the the main facility that's. being used to make fertilizer. So, that. is the largest producer of urea in the. world that's now going to be. incapacitated for 3 to 5 years. And if. you want to build a new facility, it. takes about 7 years.

All the facilities around the world that. make urea and ammonia, these nitrogen. fertilizers, typically run 24/7 365 at. full capacity. There is no downtime. where you can just turn on excess. production in the world. So, you know, the world is very delicate in its. balance of inputs and food production. and outputs. The whole world has like. less than 30 days of food, of calories. stored up. So, as these kind of supply. chain problems start to percolate, there's shockwaves that start to get. felt around the world. So, it's a pretty. serious crisis ahead. And it'll take a few months before it'll.

be fully realized. In the meantime, US. farmers are getting their asses handed. to them. They can't make money, and. China is using this as a moment for. extraordinary leverage over America and. taking advantage of the situation by. shutting down exports of their. fertilizer and at the same time not. buying American production of corn. We. probably need Friedberg to have some. sort of resiliency here and address this. like we did. with pharmaceuticals, PPE, all these. other things. Yeah, we should have some. sort of stock pile of fertilizer. Chamath's point is absolutely correct.

Natural gas reservoirs exist around the. world. And we've been loath to exploit. them or develop them because of the. climate change carbon risk and issues. But I think what we're realizing is that. those are luxury beliefs to an extent. You can only say let's not exploit. carbon resources until you hit a. shockwave like this and then people are. like, wait a second. We really do need. to have these systems up and running and. we need to have excess capacity and. local capacity in the system because.

single points of failure for the whole. world's food supply is not going to cut. it anymore. Particularly as the world is. becoming more fragmented and multipolar. and there's less US policing of the. world that's going to happen and so on. It's going to be very critical that. everyone starts to think about doubling. down not just on energy production but. some of these other critical inputs like. fertilizer. And another output just as a. quick side story. on nat gas production is when you pull. nat gas out of the ground, that's the. primary place we find helium. And helium. we're all waking up to the fact, you. know, we never really think about.

helium. We think about kids balloons at. birthday parties. But helium goes into. MRI machines. Helium goes into. semiconductor manufacturing. Helium goes. into mass spec machines that are used in. chemical analysis with a lot of. applications around the world. Helium is. a critical input to medical equipment, to manufacturing equipment and all of a. sudden a third of the world's helium. coming out of Qatar is not making it. out. And so we're going to now going to. have a helium supply shock that's going. to affect the world. So we're starting. to wake up to the fact that perhaps.

these nat gas fields that we've allowed. to kind of turn a blind eye and say let. one country exploit them and let them. make all the nat gas. The US is actively. developing, you know, I went down and. visited that Cheniere facility in. Louisiana with Doug Burgum a couple. months ago which was an amazing site to. see. where we do all the LNG exporting. But the US has extraordinary nat gas. reserves. So do many other places in the. world that have failed to take advantage. of developing them. And I think we're. realizing the criticality of doing so at. this moment. Looking at this, I think. we'll have.

Trump pivot extremely soon. I brought. this chart up now. This will be the. fourth time you've brought this up. >> J. Cal? You think he's going to wrap. this up? I mean He's 100% going to wrap. this up and I and I can show why. I. mean, this just basically look at the. history of this. You guys remember I brought up this. chart. with. Trump's net approval rating and you you. look at how this has changed over the. three times I brought it up. First time. in June last year, then October, and. again, I'm going to bring it up here.

The stuff with ICE, then you know, the. Epstein files, and just going right down. the line of unpopular decisions, Trump's. net approval rating now has just. plummeted to -17. This is the least. popular he's ever been. And he's had to. pivot here. Pam Bondi at the time we are. recording this, as I predicted on a. previous episode that. Kristi Noem and Pam Bondi would be.

fired, or and I guess in Trump's terms, he likes to get them a new job and give. them a window seat. This is absolutely going to result in a. quick pivot. Who knows what the. downstream effects are, but the. inflation three handle is coming back. according to Polymarket. Gas is over $4. a gallon. And then, you know, you can. easily to mock like we did earlier these. like no kings protests, but 8 million. people came out for that. That's a large. number. And if you look at the.

Polymarket for what's going to happen in. the midterms, 51% chance now that the. Dems take the Senate, 86% that they take. the house. And you know, what you're. going to take from that is. >> Wait, sorry. Polymarket is now showing. the Democrats winning both houses? >> Yeah, pull it up, Nick. Significant. chance of that. And you know, when this. happens, how much money is being bet on. that? Let's just see. 51% they take the. Senate, 86% they take the House, and 4. and 1/2 million dollars on this. >> 4 and 1/2 million dollars on this? Oh, gosh. Yeah, it's I tend to I tend to.

filter how seriously I take Polymarket. just based on the total quantum, but. this is a big number. Yeah, and and I. you know, listen, I this is not me. trying to dunk on Trump and my personal. beliefs. I think when you lose Tucker, when you lose Megyn Kelly, when you lose. Joe Rogan, you know, and. people are looking at who Trump. surrounded him with, there's really just. two groups. You have these super highly. qualified people, Bessant, Lutnick, obviously David Sacks. You got You got.

really highly qualified people, J.D., you know, who who I think the world of. I think these people are great. But then. he puts some people in positions that I. think weren't up to the task, Pam Bondi, Christie. I'll put Stephen Miller and. Kash in that as well, my personal belief. in that case. And those people have not. served him well. And they need to get. this presidency back on track because. what's going to happen is we're going to. have two more years of impeachments and. investigations, and the whole thing's going to be. derided. And we really need to start.

thinking about what who's making these. decisions? Who Who made this decision to. go into Iran and why? Who made these. decisions to have ICE go into Minnesota. and why? And I think a lot of it goes. back to Stephen Miller. I got mocked a. bit. here on the pod for like blaming him, but you can correlate Stephen Miller, Kristi Noem, Kash Patel, and Pam Bondi. with all of the downside of this. presidency and the plummeting ratings. Trump's going to need to clear house. He's cleared out two of four. I predict.

he'll clear out the other two and get. great leadership in there and turn this. presidency around because listen, this. is going to be socialism now and AOC's. going to win. This is going to cause. massive chaos if he doesn't get out of. Iran and do it soon. Just my. handicapping of the situation. Uh. Hegseth, I'm not so sure. I'm not sure. if I you know what I think of him yet, but. you know, we don't have information on. why Trump did this. That's going to be. the next shoe to drop. On why why he did. it? Freeberg, I think you know, this is.

the point I made the second this war. happened. or military operation. I mean, let's. let's call it what it is. This is a war. When you kill the top 100 people, it's a. war. I said, I don't have the. information of why he did this. Like he. might have information Freeberg that we. don't have that made this an absolute. must for us to do. But we haven't revealed that. information. He hasn't explained it well. to the American people. I think that's. why the ratings are, you know, and I. don't want to make the ratings like a TV. ratings. His popularity is getting crushed here.

The way this was explained to Americans, and again, I'm not inserting my position. here. I'm just talking about the. disconnect right now is that Operation. Midnight Hammer was supposed to have. just decimated this. So, why did we do. this again? And. we don't have the information. This is. why I try to stay humble in this and say. like what information does Trump have of. that we don't have. Some people seem to. think, Chamath, this was overconfidence. Uh there's obviously this debate, did we. get baited into this by Israel and get.

pushed into it and is he a Manchurian. candidate, etc. I that's above my pay grade, too. I. don't have any information on that. I'm. not in the CIA. It's hard to be a. an armchair critic on this stuff in both. senses. Like I think it's hard to say. hey, this guy got talked into doing. this. Israel manipulated him into it. You know, sorry, it's easy to say that. It's also easy to say, hey, we should go. get rid of the country that's made all. the nuclear weapons. Both of those are. easy to say without all of the texture. of the relationships and the details and.

what really went on. None of us know. is the truth. That's literally the point. I you know, I've been trying to make. here It's like, how do the same thing with Venezuela? Like, how do we know we don't have any. intelligence to map We we're not in the. CIA. We don't have. any of these insights that Mossad or the. Israeli intelligence services have. How do we know how this was going to go. down? And you know, that's all going to. come out, I think, when this all gets. investigated, yeah. I think Trump is and. has been the most consistent anti-war.

president of modern history. Yes. And I. think that it's fair to say. that he has and has had. and has demonstrated enormous restraint. and has the highest bar thus far. of folks for actually getting into. conflict. So, I do think that what. Freeburg says is very important. There's. just so much we don't know. And I think that he doesn't want to. stain his legacy. with a typical American,

you know, Forever war. Yeah. He doesn't. want that. I don't think he doesn't need. to be anywhere near that. So, there is. obviously stuff that we don't know. I. still think that there's. a short-term problem, which is not just the threat that Iran. poses. to Israel, but there's a threat that. Iran poses to the rest of the Middle. Eastern community. Yeah. >> That neighborhood is a complicated. place. There was an interview that MBS. did on Saudi television. Nick, maybe.

maybe you can find it. It's in Arabic, but there's a good. version of it that I saw with subtitles. And if you hear the MBS's telling. of what the Iranian threat is, it's not. dissimilar. to how the Israelis would characterize. the threat. And so, I think it's important to. understand that unpredictable actors. should not be given an opportunity to. have a cataclysmic weapon.

that can just completely destroy the. Earth as we know it. That just doesn't. make sense. And I think if you can. intervene to prevent that, we're now. aware of the damages of what this can do. to enough of a degree. where. there should be enough of nuclear. disarmament from here on out. The six, seven, eight, nine countries. that have it, okay. There's all kinds of. reasons why maybe we could have remade. those decisions over the intervening 70. years. Maybe there's some that we never should. have let have it. The Pakistan-India. thing is a good example of one.

But we are where we are. And I think we can all agree no more. countries should incrementally get. access to this thing. Absolutely not. And this regime specifically believes. that anybody who is not part of this. specific religion needs to die and the. whole. >> Well, that Islam needs to be reunited in. order to take on anybody who's not part. of. >> Well, I and I would their version of. radical Islam. Like it's a it's a if. this is a religious. lunacy in that country, I think.

everybody else should be murdered if. they don't convert. I think it's. important to say that the overwhelming. majority of Sunnis and the overwhelming. majority of Shias. are peaceful, observant people. There. are fringes in every religion. And in specifically this, I think the. most important thing is to not take your. word or anybody else's word. I do think it's important to listen to. somebody like MBS because I think it's. the lived experience of, you know, having to run a country in that. neighborhood and what it means. And I. think what you see is as you as you're.

articulating, many layers of complexity that again I. think that most of us in the West have. zero appreciation for. All of this goes to. in the short term, I think that they forced themselves into. a corner. I think we can go back and relitigate. why did Obama let him out? That was a really, really stupid idea. We probably should have kept our thumb. on the scale. and had them close to teetering on. economic insolvency. That's the only.

thing that has kept them in check. They. veered wildly away the minute we let. them out of the. disarmament agreements that we had. But we are where we are. We got to put. the genie back in the bottle and we. cannot look to other countries and. tolerate this idea that they also want. to build the kinds of weapons that can. literally destroy the face of the planet. as we know it. It's a non-starter. And. then the second order effect is. how do we make sure.

that folks that are participating in all. of this broader seeds of sowing chaos, how do we hem them in? And how do we create a more reasonable. world order? And I think that the second. order effects, and I've said this. before, kind of bring this back to China. And I. think a world where it's bipolar, where. it's the United States and China roughly. as the two leading. statesmen of the world. is probably the Nash equilibrium here.

And so I think getting China in a. position where they need to do a deal, and remember I said this, the worst thing that could happen for. China was the president delaying the. summit. And here we are, we're now it's. delayed for 6 weeks, it's going to go. into mid-May. If you think the Strait of. Hormuz numbers. as it relates to energy prices in Europe. or anywhere else are crazy, look at. what's happening inside of China right. now. It is a no bueno situation.

And so in May, if we can reestablish a. set of operating criteria that keeps. normalcy in check, no more of this rapid random expansion. everywhere where the Chinese are trying. to build bases in near us and, you know, now we have to have a point of view near. them. We don't need any of that. So I think if we can use this as an. opportunity to de-escalate, I think we. should. Yeah. We we seem to have moved from I. mean, I think this is the question. There's a a doctrine, I don't know if.

you guys heard this one before, of. mowing the lawn, which is. the Israeli's view of Hezbollah, Hamas, and even Iran, which is just, "Hey, we. have to take away. their progress, the last 30 or 40% of. their progress towards nuclear bombs, and we just do that consistently, and we. contain them." This has tipped over into. regime change, and so I think that's the. wild card that none of us can predict. what happens from this point forward. And I I don't know how you leave Iran in. this state if they're going to take over. the the strait uh and charge everybody a.

dollar a barrel. Is that going to be. tenable? Are they going to keep blowing. stuff up? This is uncharted territory um. and yeah. And very high stakes. President Trump. also reiterated the US doesn't need. Middle East oil, and that Europeans. should go straight to the strait and. just take it. He said that the strait. will open naturally because, quote, Why. do we always want to be able Why are you. always focusing on the Straits of. Hormuz, Jason? Why am I? I mean, you're overlooking I.

think cuz I'm your You're always. overlooking the gays of Hormuz as an. example. That's true. That and the. non-binaries of Hormuz. They all count. >> Well, why is it all about the Straits of. Hormuz all the time? >> it's I don't want to get canceled here. because I'm talking about I don't know. the pronouns to use for these straits of. Hormuz, but yes, the straits in Hormuz I don't think. you're allowed to be gay in Hormuz. I. think you have to keep that pretty quiet. there, don't you? That was the greatest. clip ever. If you don't know what we're. referring to, it's about. >> [laughter]. >> clip of It's incredible. of. purple-haired people No, not.

purple-haired. This was a young Indian. lady. Uh and she We all thought the same. thing. Indians are so smart. How what. happened to her? Well, what happened? She's the. They found an Indian who didn't. understand [laughter] I think that was. the one. They found dumb Indian. They. found Yes, exactly. Oh god. They found her. They found [laughter] her. This is She's. been absolutely I mean this. >> Isn't it a little bit homophobic that. we're so focused on the straights of.

homos and not the gays of homos? [music]. I agree. Yes, for sure. So why do you. think we're running to leave the gays of. homos behind? I think it's just. history. Which Ivy League do you think. she went to? Brown. >> Yeah. 100% Brown or Columbia. Okay. Oh yeah, that's that's a good call. I. would say Columbia. She Yeah, she might. have gone to Vassar actually. I think. that would might have been her safety. school. It That's the best. not Borat not Borat um Bruno. impersonation I've heard in a long time.

Sacha Freeburg, why are you so gay? You. think the straights [laughter] of homos. Are you Are you making your potatoes. non-binary? >> [laughter]. >> It's like literally. the Bruno. You you got to do 10 minutes to Matthew. You want to do your Bitcoin thing or you. want to just break? The Bitcoin thing. was interesting because I think in the. last couple of. months, what we've started to see is an. increasing amount of. research that says that.

the. scheduled eventuality. of a quantum chip. a functional chip. is probably not. 25 or 30 years away. It's probably now in the next 5 to 7. years if I had to guess. And I think that because that event. horizon has moved in. in these next 5 to 7 years. for those that follow Bitcoin and care. about it.

my only advice on this topic is that the. leaders of the Bitcoin ecosystem. need to organize themselves. and need to make sure that they have an. answer to the question. of is this stuff quantum resistant? Because if the answer is no, they are a. very visible and obvious honeypot. Now, there is the answer that then a lot. of the Bitcoin community gives, which is. well, everything is screwed. And my only advice is. possibly, but if a non-state actor gets.

a hold of quantum technology that can. defeat crypto as we know it today. SHA-256, you know, ECDSA, like the. elliptical curve stuff, the. run-of-the-mill stuff that we all rely. on. A non-state actor's incentive. will first be to drain the obvious. honeypots, and then tell everybody that. it's broken, so that then everything. goes to all the prices go to zero, and then they have all the money, and. then they can buy stuff. That would be. the sequence of events if you were a. non-state actor. So, yes, you're right,

the banks get hacked. Yes, you're right, all this other stuff. goes kaput. But, I think you first go and you. exploit the obvious places, and I think. crypto is the most obvious honeypot in a. world where you can defeat encryption. Now, in fairness. the crypto community, this was much, much earlier, had to deal with this. They had to migrate from different. encryption schemes in the early parts of. Bitcoin. And they were able to. self-organize. The difficulty here is you're talking. about a big technological lift. You're.

talking about all the wallets being. re-architected. You're talking about all. the transactional flows, all the. processing nodes. These are complicated. things that need to happen. And I would just tell the crypto. community, you have 5 to 7 years to get. your in order. That's it. Freeberg. Quantum computing, just generally. speaking, you feel it's going to have a. major impact in the short term? Do you. think it's actually going to become. viable in the mid term? Where where Where do you think about it? Cuz it's always been 10 years out, but.

it feels like we're making some. progress. Yeah, there's a lot that's. changed. I mean, so the. the primary mechanism of modern. encryption standards relates to. factoring primes of a an integer. Discovering the prime factors of an. integer would give you the ability to. theoretically crack. encryption. There was an algorithm that. was theorized by a guy named Peter Shor. I think I talked about this in a prior. episode back in 1994 called Shor's. algorithm. Today, it's kind of the.

commonly well-known model for how you. could do this. And it's a You could. watch a YouTube video on it. There's. some YouTube videos that explain it. pretty clearly. Takes a bit of time to understand it. And then, a couple years ago, I think in. 2023, there was another computer. scientist. named Oded Regev. from NYU who published another paper. that showed a faster, different approach. to Shor's algorithm. It was an. improvement on Shor's algorithm that. basically reduced the number of quantum.

operations required to factor a large. integer significantly. So, there's kind. of Yeah, we. >> Sorry, we went from 28 million of those. operations down to 500,000. Yeah, and so, there's this a lot of work. going on right now, even before we have. industrial. scale quantum computers, a lot of work. going on in quantum computing theory and. building models and algorithms. And a. lot of this is rooted in in pure. mathematics and statistics and whatnot. That work is making progress in building.

better algorithms even before the. compute comes online. And then, there's. the separate set of things that you can. track, but you know, the market, if you. want to. trust the market, is betting that we are. within spitting distance of quantum. computers reaching the industrial scale. at this moment. So, those two things. intersect at some moment in the near. term where you have algorithms that are. low demand, low latency, that can crack. modern encryption standards, and then, the computing comes online, and someone.

is going to execute. The The real thing. is what do you do about it? There's a. whole bunch of research that's been. going on for 20 plus years on quantum. algorithms quantum encryption standards. And so the to Chamath's point, these. things exist. It's just a heavy lift. And so there's. going to be this heavy lift. Probably, you know, pretty good business to be. made in the next couple of years in. uh all of the changes are going to need. to happen across all encryption. standards across the whole internet. across how we do communications and so. on. In a crazy way freeburg crypto's in.

the same place as all these software. socks. Meaning if AGI and ASI are real, these software companies are not what we. thought they were. Yeah. If quantum is. real, a bunch of these crypto projects. are not what we thought they were. And. so you can't have both guys. You got to. choose. Mhm. >> [clears throat]. >> Pick one. Yeah. All right everybody. This has been Oh. hey we listen um you know I have an. incredible EA. Executive assistant.

It's a really been like, you know, everybody talks about like agents agents. agents agents. And this was the. pre-agent agent. Mhm. You know, my my. EAs averaged around. 188 to 200k a year. And then. >> People are right now their heads are. exploding in middle America. Let's tell. the truth. I was paying 188 to 200,000. dollars a year. They were wonderful, okay? Right. And then I Jason was like try this try. this thing called Athena. Athena Athena. I'm like what is it? So I called the. guys and they're like yeah we have these.

really well-trained folks. They're like. geniuses that work in the Philippines. It's 3,000 a month and we're building. all this tooling. And so as all these. agents get better and all these AIs get. better, they'll get the advantage of. that. I said, "Okay, I'll give it a. try.". This is the first time I've had a male. assistant. His name is Lei. Lei's fabulous. He's a math grad math. and computer science in the Philippines, okay? And he's excellent. I love Lei too. Uh somebody just put it in the chat. I.

love Lei. From Nick. Oh, yeah, Nick. Nick, you love Lei. Coming to NBC this. fall. These guys are incredible. They do. everything for me. It's like the most incredible hack and. arbitrage I've ever seen. Then now then. I can direct a bonus to Lei at the end. of the year, which is great because then. it allows me to feel like I'm giving him. really, you know, good support. He works. my hours from the Philippines. Have not looked back. Go, Athena. Yeah, that's great. I I I. use it as well. I was the first investor.

in it. >> You're the first You're the first How. many Athenas you have? One or two? I. have one. >> two for a long time. >> second one. And uh then that person moved on. You. split it between like work and personal. or no? >> Yeah, it's work and personal. As an. example, like there's an incredible bakery where. I live, uh like out in Dripping Springs, uh called Abby Jane Bakery. They don't. take orders. But every Thursday, uh my. Athena assistant calls at 8:00 a.m., asks them what's on the menu cuz they. change the menu every week. [laughter].

And then they send me the menu, I order. the bakeries, and then he calls an Uber courier to. pick it up and drop it off cuz they're. not on DoorDash or UberEats. Just a. stupid example of something that made. our lives incredible to have the best. bakery in all of Austin. in the house every weekend for the girls. and everything. And um. Everyday problems. Yeah. Everyday. problems. Anyway, it's it's a silly example, but I was. having to go make that run and I did it. every like fourth or fifth week as a. treat. Now it's every week. So you just. look at what you're doing.

The other thing we're doing is they've. been able to. We we had Americans who were researchers. sorting through the inbound applications. from founders. We were able to put an. Athena assistant on that and then define. it and then we they're learning how to. use Open Law. So the Athena Open Law. merger is kind of happening in real. time. >> Yeah, no, I have I have doing a bunch of. advanced tasks that I typically wouldn't. give to my EA. And then he also deals. with sort of this the more practical. day-to-day tasks, scheduling, all that.

stuff. Anyways, it's been it's been an. incredible eye-opening thing because it. sets a very good example where, you. know, you can be cost-effective and. still get your work done. Um. and it was really bothering me actually. because like the the amount of cost. inflation for that role because I don't. think I've ever needed an EA. I'll just. be honest, I'm going to put it out. there. I think I've always needed an AA. And I would title them differently and. sometimes I would call you know, the I I. mean I've said this before but like you. know, even like roles like chief of. staff, they just don't make sense. Like.

the chief of staff should be the second. most powerful person in the world. because they work for the president of. the United States. Yeah. >> Everybody else should not have a chief. of staff, in my opinion, okay? It's um it's a major unlock and the. problem is we have the lowest. unemployment of our lifetimes and it's. just people don't want to take the EA or. the administrative assistant position in. America. They just don't. There's they. want to do something higher up the stack. but the people in the Philippines, you. know, they do want that job. >> Lay's crushing. I love Lay. Uh RJ's my. guy and uh yeah, first time.

>> got a guy, too? I got a guy, too, and he. is also very technical. Uh so anyway, shout out to Athena. Uh shout out to. Athena. Thank you, guys. >> Thank you. Thank you, Athena. Awesome. Yeah. Friedberg, yeah, I know you're. making great progress. You showed me. some pictures of potatoes. from Ohalo. Um how's that going? Shipping seed this week to farmers all. over North America. So, we're getting. going. Are you sending seed to our. friend Roger the Dirt Farmer? He is. His. son, yeah. He's going to. >> Oh, that's so great. And [snorts] Roger? Mhm. Yeah, I love it. Roger the Dirt.

Farmer is a phenomenal poker player. He. and Keating often play in the game. together. >> Uh-huh. How'd they do a couple weeks. ago? They came up. They came and visited. me the next day. Both of those two. goofballs ran over the game. It's so. frustrating. It's frustrating playing. with Keating. Roger is much more. of a tag, you know, a tight aggressive. player. So, it's no picnic. There's no. free lunch when both of those two guys. are in the game. And then on top of. that, you know, Helmuth Koon, Robo it's like it's not a. winning game. It's murder's row. I got I. made a late trip to the valley. I'm.

like, "Hey Chamath, Oh, Jesus. >> town. I get to play." Chamath's like, "Uh I got some bad news for you. You're no longer. >> [laughter]. >> on the list and I filled the game up. plus two. So, I squeak into the game. I run up a quick 20 25 times skis and. then Helmuth. passive aggressive Helmuth. who who cannot handle the fact that I'm. more famous than him now. It's just. totally tweaked him that Chamath and I. and you Reeboks are so much more famous. than him. It's broken his brain. He's like,

"Uh okay, a car dealer? Car dealer, you're supposed to have a seat and Jake. out doesn't." And I've literally just. doubled up at that point. Chamath's. like, "Okay, I guess you can book the win, Jake out, cuz you know, it's like poor. taste to double up and then leave." How. much you doing? 40 50k? It was only like. 25 times. It was It's like a used Model. Y. Yeah, yeah. Hey Chamath, uh we're. here at the end of the show. I just. wanted to make sure people know that the. liquidity event that we're hosting, uh. you can go to allin.com/events has sold.

out and we've started a wait list. So, this is the quickest we've ever sold. out. I asked Kimbra and Lisa to try to. find another 100 seats. I think there's. like 7.7 trillion dollars of. money that want to attend. We can't get. everybody in, so we're trying to get. everybody together. We announced Bill. Ackman and Andre Carpathy last week. Incredible. We're going to do an I. Russell like pitch competition. There's. like. four whiz-bang hot. fund managers.

>> is for folks who don't know, yeah? I. know a bunch of these guys, but four of. them in particular are running super hot. right now. Like. taken 50 million, run it up to a billion. to three billion. They're just ripping. And, uh uh they're going to go on stage. and they're going to give us their best. ideas pitch. And, the three of us plus I. think as many of the guests that can do. it. will vote. And then, maybe we can even. publish these ideas so that folks can. can try to. follow them. They can vet them, right? It's like a really brave thing to do to.

get on stage and say, "Hey, I'm making. this bet." Like, that's like. >> I did it four times. Yeah. I mean, I. just spanked it, but hopefully these. guys can do the same thing. But, listen. We have a natural resources pitch. We. have something in health care. We have. something in tech. We have something in. genius. It's great. It's like all the. big categories, right? Something in. crypto. So, it's you're going to get. every shade of every whippy. big. alpha market. By the way, you created a. bit of a storm on the interwebs with. your Tao mention in the.

uh Jensen interview. I just asked Jensen. a question. I'm not long Tao. He. redirected it to something, which is. folding at home, which is I think if you. don't know it, you should look it up, but it's how you can allocate compute to. helping solve health problems. The point. is these open source projects or these. distributed compute projects. are the future. The real question is. what is the architecture and the. incentives? None of us knows that. Yeah. But, man, I think it's so important. And. then, all these goons went crazy. went. crazy. Well, I mean, the reason is. because I did place a bet on Tao uh like.

a couple of weeks ago I went public. with, "Hey, yeah, I've got a small bet. here because I think these subnets are. fascinating in distributed computing.". >> Your Tao maxing. >> I mean, it's like I'm I might be five or. six hundred thousand dollars. A tiny. bet. Your syndicate maxing. >> No, I did it myself. I did it myself. I. made a small bet on Tao because I. watched exactly This is syndicate. maxing. >> I'm it's not I'm not. [clears throat] maxing here. But, I am. certainly not doing any introspection. I. am just doing deals on great founders.

and companies. >> Andreesen has been rage tweeting about. this guy that he watches A genius. who. posts these videos about maxing? Yes. I watched the videos. It's. incredible. This guy is. >> Fantastic. What is the guy's name? I. don't know what the guy's name is. >> but he goes on his back deck. He's got a. Weber grill. >> Smoking a cigar, smoking a cigar, and he. says, "Listen, it doesn't matter." That. may be the most incredible contribution. of your life. That's the most incredible. contribution and reason may be making to. culture and society in America, not the. browser. That he found this guy. I.

encourage you, Nick, find the video post. the links. This guy is incredible. Because you're overthinking it, folks. Just enjoy your life and work hard and. don't think it through because look what. happened to Freeberg. He started. ruminating. Love you, boys. Don't. ruminate. Just go sell software and go. make better potatoes Freeberg. No more. ruminating and therapy for you, Freeberg. Come on the program anytime, Mark and Jason. They'll max with us here on the. All-In pod. Love you, boys. Bye-bye.

>> [music]. >> Rain Man, David Sacks. And [music] I said, "We open sourced. this to the fans and they've just gone. crazy with it." Love you, guys. I swing. a king kong. >> [music]. >> Besties are back. That is my dog taking a dump in your. driveway, Sacks.

We should all [music] just get a room. and just have one big huge orgy cuz. they're all just useless. It's like this. like sexual tension that they just need. to release somehow. >> [music]. [laughter]. >> We need to get merch. Besties are back. >> [music]. [music].