Apostoli Evreniadis

Many big parts of my 2025 in one picture: 1. Long-awaited arrival of baby #2 2. traveling very often from SF to Milwaukee to GC construction of a new Mimosa (my brunch restaurant brand), for the first time at my own property 3. Building Ality into a full-fledged reservation system used at my restaurants that is now evolving to be the best (and only?) personal social network for a restaurant’s guests, team, and management. 2026 will very likely be a milestone year and there are some big goals that I have set, but I remind myself (and anyone else who struggles with direction): - Put one foot in front of the other. Small-steps-but-consistently will get you farther than a bunch of all-nighters. - Focus. Simplify your life; you don’t need to know everything that is happening in the world. It’s 10x better to follow 5 people you highly admire on Twitter than follow 500 of the most influential accounts. Similarly, knowing about and trying out every single AI tool that is announced is far worse than finding one tool and becoming proficient in it. - Be kind (and be the first one to be kind). It’s very popular these days to be “tough”. While that has its place in world-stage politics, in most of our lives leading with kindness (but firmness) is the route to success and meaning in your life. - Lastly, but most importantly: stick to your f****** guns. If you believe in something, you must actively find ways to reinforce that belief in you. If you don’t then the world will surely try to “normalize” you and bring you down with the rest of them. Especially true in the SF tech sphere: If you have a startup idea, chances are you will be steered in different directions based on feedback from peers and investors. In those moments, it is highly important that you remind yourself: “NO ONE KNOWS WHAT THE FUTURE HOLDS.” For every 10 people that you share your idea with, there will be 9 that try to steer you in a different direction (some out of care and some out of disbelief in you). It takes listening to a handful of episodes of the “Founders Podcast” to realize that most of history’s greatest entrepreneurs saw the world from a different lens and most people around them tried to prove them wrong (I’d start with episodes on James Dyson or Todd Graves). However, it is important not to focus on the negativity here. Instead of trying to prove the doubters wrong, PROVE THE BELIEVERS RIGHT. That 1 in 10 people that supports and believes in you? Handwrite their name on a list, post it somewhere you’ll see every day, and keep adding to it. When we wire our brain with positive signals, we can move mountains. I don’t consider myself successful yet, not when I think of where I’d like to be. But the 3 bullets shared in the beginning of this post I do see as huge wins. Thinking back, they were all achieved by following the above playbook. Happy New Year to all. Wishing you all good health and may all your dreams and goals come true this year.

@hthieblot 13/16 ✅

Major green flags in a founder: 1/ crazy grit, won’t give up 2/ started building before pitching investors 3/ constantly moving, constantly generating new information 4/ very technical 5/ not addicted to founder cosplay 6/ goes out and talks to users 7/ finds creative, experimental marketing channels 8/ genuinely cares about what they’re building 9/ never blames others or external factors 10/ tinkered with projects obsessively at a young age 11/ constantly comes up with interesting ideas 12/ knows their metrics cold 13/ doesn’t chase hype, chases truth 14/ excellent storyteller. Can sell the vision to hires, investors, and customers 15/ can clearly explain what they are building in one sentence 16/ can’t stop talking to customers If you hit a good chunk of these, tell me what you are building

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@joshishantanu4 Likewise, my friend!

@apostoliev You're going to crush it in 2026!

Many big parts of my 2025 in one picture: 1. Long-awaited arrival of baby #2 2. traveling very often from SF to Milwaukee to GC construction of a new Mimosa (my brunch restaurant brand), for the first time at my own property 3. Building Ality into a full-fledged reservation system used at my restaurants that is now evolving to be the best (and only?) personal social network for a restaurant’s guests, team, and management. 2026 will very likely be a milestone year and there are some big goals that I have set, but I remind myself (and anyone else who struggles with direction): - Put one foot in front of the other. Small-steps-but-consistently will get you farther than a bunch of all-nighters. - Focus. Simplify your life; you don’t need to know everything that is happening in the world. It’s 10x better to follow 5 people you highly admire on Twitter than follow 500 of the most influential accounts. Similarly, knowing about and trying out every single AI tool that is announced is far worse than finding one tool and becoming proficient in it. - Be kind (and be the first one to be kind). It’s very popular these days to be “tough”. While that has its place in world-stage politics, in most of our lives leading with kindness (but firmness) is the route to success and meaning in your life. - Lastly, but most importantly: stick to your f****** guns. If you believe in something, you must actively find ways to reinforce that belief in you. If you don’t then the world will surely try to “normalize” you and bring you down with the rest of them. Especially true in the SF tech sphere: If you have a startup idea, chances are you will be steered in different directions based on feedback from peers and investors. In those moments, it is highly important that you remind yourself: “NO ONE KNOWS WHAT THE FUTURE HOLDS.” For every 10 people that you share your idea with, there will be 9 that try to steer you in a different direction (some out of care and some out of disbelief in you). It takes listening to a handful of episodes of the “Founders Podcast” to realize that most of history’s greatest entrepreneurs saw the world from a different lens and most people around them tried to prove them wrong (I’d start with episodes on James Dyson or Todd Graves). However, it is important not to focus on the negativity here. Instead of trying to prove the doubters wrong, PROVE THE BELIEVERS RIGHT. That 1 in 10 people that supports and believes in you? Handwrite their name on a list, post it somewhere you’ll see every day, and keep adding to it. When we wire our brain with positive signals, we can move mountains. I don’t consider myself successful yet, not when I think of where I’d like to be. But the 3 bullets shared in the beginning of this post I do see as huge wins. Thinking back, they were all achieved by following the above playbook. Happy New Year to all. Wishing you all good health and may all your dreams and goals come true this year.

@tomoima525 Thank you, Tomo! I know firsthand that you possess all three!

@apostoliev Awesome 2026 statement and thanks for sharing! All of them are also important for me. Focus, be kind, and have grit!

ugly action beats unfinished perfection 🤘

@chesterzelaya Incredible. Bravo, brother.

presenting our sub 40ms autonomy stack that turns almost any FPV quad into a self-driving agent > up to 10km range (with the right quad) > drone agnostic > fully programmable and customizable

RE: Fraud in Minnesota I’m not sure that most Americans understand that in large swathes of humanity, there is no actual concept of “fraud,” particularly fraud against the government. Instead, there is a belief in the virtue of getting away with what you can to help yourself and your tribe. I spent a lot of my life in the Middle East and Central Asia, working closely with foreign contractors and foreign governments to provide support to American military operations. As a US Army officer with a big checkbook courtesy of Uncle Sam, I can’t really count the sheer number of times I was offered bribes to award a contract, or falsify records to do things like create larger (fake) headcounts at places like dining facilities, or to just simply be on the take for future illegal requests. Of course I had enough sense to never comply with such requests. Moreover, they were never explicitly structured as “bribes”; instead it was usually along the lines of “Here I have these Rolexes as gifts for you and your wife to show our friendship.” (Unfortunately, too many US officers and NCOs succumbed to this siren song and ended up breaking rocks in Leavenworth.) The weird thing about this to me was that whenever I turned down such an offering, it was treated as a grave insult. I was the one in the wrong, and not the fraudster trying to bribe me. They considered it rude that I was in their country and refused to accept how things got done. After all, why did I not want to help my tribe by helping their tribe? Let me repeat: in these cultures, FRAUD IS NOT EVEN A CONCEPT. There is only what helps your tribe. Such thought processes are so alien to Americans and much of the West. We are raised on the presumption that our institutions are valid, that the rule of law always prevails, and that integrity is universal. We need these presumptions to have working governments and economies, and without those presumptions—without the mental barrier that causes us not to accept outright fraud—our nation would quickly descend into the economic and social hellscape of countries like…. ummm… you know…. SOMALIA! So when we import people en masse from cultures that accept bribery and fraud as routine, acceptable ways to advance one’s tribe, we should not be surprised that things like the $8 BILLION fraud schemes of the Somali population in Minnesota happen so easily. Introducing a fraud-based culture based on tribalism into America is like introducing some sort of lethal virus into a population that has no natural immunity. The virus will spread and grow, unchecked, because it is so alien to the host. Similarly, a culture of fraud is anathema to American thinking, and it must be cut out before it consumes the host. So when you see and hear patriotic Americans decrying what is happening in Minnesota or elsewhere, and when they seek deportation of the offenders, it is not “racism,” it is not “bigotry,” it is not “xenophobia”; instead, it is preserving the American tradition of responsible institutions and national integrity.

It’s not 1% a year for 5 years. It’s a one time 5% tax on all assets and it will kill entrepreneurship in California. Here is an example: John Doe starts a company. He takes a nominal salary - say $150k for this example - and the rest in equity in the company. Let’s say he owns 20%. He raises VC capital in 2026 from someone that invests $100M into the company and values the company at $6B. This means his 20% is “worth” $1.2B. I put it in quotes because he can’t actually sell. He has a paper value that putatively says he’s a billionaire. But he actually lives on $150k because that is what his income is. Just because someone decides to make a bet on the business does not mean some bank account in your name magically gets created with $1.2B in it. Under the proposed tax, however, John Doe would now owe $60M in cash to California in 2027. How will he pay it? Is there some buyer you know of, that the rest of the market doesn’t, that will do a deal at the max value when there is a distressed seller like John Doe who needs money he doesn’t have to pay taxes on value he also doesn’t have! Now imagine that after the tax is assessed, in early 2027, the company takes a write down to $200M. Now his share is $40M. But he still owes $60M. Again, there are no buyers for his shares per se. He still only makes $150k/yr. What is this person supposed to do? He now has a “worth” of $40M but owes California $60M. Should he declare bankruptcy now because he tried to start a business but was retarded enough to do it in California? So did you really get the billionaires?? No. Because the mega billionaires have already left or are tax structured to minimize the tax or will fight it. You will, however, drag a bunch of young, energetic folks who want to make things and hire people into bankruptcy court. Awesome work, Ro. You should be proud.

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We just raised a $20M seed round to build the largest bank in the world. Kontigo crossed $30M in annual revenue, $1B in payment volume, and 1M users in under 12 months, with a team of six engineers and one designer. We are the fastest-growing stablecoin neobank in the world. Any individual or business on earth can: - Earn 10% yield on their digital dollars. - Get a stablecoin card with bitcoin cashback. - Activate a USDT credit line. - Invest in tokenized U.S. stocks. - Open an international account for free. This is a real-world use case of crypto. No casinos, no jargon, just normal people who don’t even know what USDC or USDT is. We’re, once and for all, democratizing access to basic finance and giving 4.8 billion people the ability to hold a stable currency (USDC) alongside a wealth creator (BTC). The equation is simple: they invest in BTC, they hold USDC, and they spend in local stablecoins. More than a thousand businesses and a million users are already doing this. They connect their local bank, card, or payment method and start moving funds globally, instantly, and without limits. No matter the corridor. U.S. ↔ LatAm, LatAm ↔ Asia, Asia ↔ Europe, U.S. ↔ Africa, Europe ↔ LatAm. We’ve them all. Just imagine how much faster Revolut would’ve grown if they didn’t have to get individual banking licenses in each of the 50 countries they’ve launched in. That’s @kontigo_app You simply can’t outcompete the fact that our backend, database, and infrastructure run on the freaking blockchain: 24/7, at a fraction of the cost, open, permissionless. It’s a whole new game, different incentives, and a new technological paradigm. Thanks to all the early supporters! We’re proud to partner with the best: @t_blom & @harjtaggar from @ycombinator ; @hthieblot & @FurqanR from @fdotinc ; @davefontenot from @hf0 ; @HoolieG from @cbventures & @jessepollak from @base ; Saurabh and Grace from DST ; also @GoodwaterCap @Soma_Capital @pioneer_fund @transposevc @alumniventures @m_franceschetti @EvanWeb3 @metavarce @davecyen Tom Brown, Oliver Jung, Ricardo Schäfer, Andrej Henkler, Yi Shi, Philippe Teixeira. Some people said the fintech era was over…

@hthieblot Hope you get through it as smoothly as possible!

Back in the Emergency room again, Flu type A hit me hard. I haven’t been this sick in 15 years. Now it’s turning into some kind of pneumonia. See y’all in a few days

@GringleTV @NextBestPicture The best actress of her generation

@NextBestPicture Rachel kemp? Who is that ?

A soul-snatching moment

@petpinai Unstoppable! Bravo!

Top-tier backers believe in the Petpin mission. Take a quick look at our 2025 wins.

@Shubh_Mit Woah woah woah! That’s amazing man! Bravo!

Sunday: At XAI hackathon Monday 10pm: Got offer at XAI This company moves crazy fast

@zachdive Ya it was a good one today!

best sunset in the world, there is no debate

@BrianRoemmele That's a C5 Corvette; they average about $20k. Try again.

There will be signs, especially how one gets into the rented automobile.

@spirosx @reidhoffman Amazing! Bravo!

One of the most creative gifts I have ever received. A personalized version of Reid’s Superagency book. Thanks @reidhoffman

@kodjima33 @omidotme Love the consistent "doubling down"! 👏

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