Patrick OShaughnessy (@patrick_oshag) - Twitter Profili

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Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag·4 Mar

My conversation with John Arnold (@johnarnold). Few people I've spoken with have as wide a view of the global system as John. He was one of the most successful energy traders of all time, and after stepping away from markets he built a foundation devoted to solving America's most critical systemic problems in a principled way. John's recent trip to China was the catalyst for this conversation, and I feel lucky we all get to learn from him. We discuss: - His trip to China and what it taught him about robotics, AI, and EVs - What it takes to be the best (and what it costs) - Building the best seat in the market - The state of energy markets today - NIMBYism as the impediment to progress - What he thinks about the wave of nuclear startups - Fixing America's broken systems: healthcare, criminal justice, education, and journalism Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 intro 0:45 China’s Rapid Transformation 3:53 Lessons from the Chinese EV Market 6:12 Robotics 11:22 The Discipline of an Elite Trader 15:42 Leveraging Scale and Proprietary Data 17:36 Lessons from the Baseball Cards 21:15 Trading Natural Gas and Market Dynamics 25:34 Innovation in the Modern Energy Sector 27:02 High-Level Goals of the U.S. Energy System 32:59 Overcoming NIMBYism 36:10 The Challenges of U.S. Transmission Lines 37:55 The Future of Nuclear, Fusion, and SMRs 44:00 The Economics of Solar and Battery Storage 48:28 Data Center Demand 50:28 Housing Reform 53:32 Rethinking the Role of Philanthropic Foundations 57:05 Improving the Criminal Justice System 1:01:58 Privacy and Security 1:05:03 Education and Life Outcomes 1:06:41 The Promise and Pitfalls of EdTech and AI 1:09:12 Identifying Market Failures in Healthcare 1:12:10 The Role of Regulation Across Different Systems 1:14:06 Journalism as the Fourth Estate 1:16:41 The Kindness of Hard Truths

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Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag·7h

Jerry’s @ganeumann latest in Colossus. Wish I could read an article by him everyday. He’s the person that first taught me about startups. There’s plenty to learn and borrow from others, but there’s no playbook for making something great.

Colossus@colossusmag

Despite the proliferation of startup pundits over the last 25 years, no one knows how to make startups more successful. The New Pundits have sold millions of books, and their entrepreneurship “science” is taught in universities and accelerators all over the world. But none of it has made a difference. Startups are no more likely to survive today than they were in 1995. By some measures, they are even less likely to work. In his latest essay, legendary venture investor @ganeumann presents the data, diagnoses the problem, and proposes something that might actually work. It involves Robert Boyle, Peter Thiel, Paul Feyerabend, and Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking-Glass. colossus.com/article/we-hav…

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Nathan Baschez@nbaschez·1d

This is the most interesting thing I've read in like 3 years colossus.com/article/we-hav…

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Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag·1d

William is a great reminder that the people who win become obsessed with something very small and stick with it far longer than anyone else. Enjoy three minutes of him explaining how to become the very best at one thing: "I'm probably the best in the world at a couple small, boring stuff. I do think the world for builders is the world of specialists. And you have to go extremely, extremely deep into your area and that's where you find value. One of the best determiners for success of founders is can they find the most boring thing humanly possible, interesting, over a multi-decade period. How AI is going to disrupt software...These are generalist topics that I can probably find a thousand people that have interesting, compelling ideas and can go pretty deep on that. But you can't create value there. You can create value if you're the number one person in the entire world at this little niche thing. And I think this niche thing can generate billions of dollars over time. The problem is those places are really boring and requires you to read hundreds of thousands of pages that you cannot Gemini Deep Research your way through."

Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag

.@williamhockey is one of the least visible founders in tech relative to what he has created. He co-founded Plaid and is now building Column, a software company that owns a bank, and powers Ramp, Wise, Bilt, Mercury, and others. He funded it himself by borrowing against nearly everything he had in Plaid shares, and has never raised any outside capital. His story matters because so much of the value in our industry gets created through exactly this kind of extreme personal risk. He is maniacal about being the best in the world at his thing, and has spent his entire career betting on himself and doing whatever it takes to win. He also spends a lot of time outside the US (in places like Kinshasa) which has given him a rare perch on the power of the US dollar. We discuss: - Why emerging markets are often the most financially innovative - What owning 100% of his company allows him to do that VC-backed founders cannot - Getting margin called and nearly going bankrupt - Why the best founders are specialists - What it takes to be the best in the world at your thing - How Silicon Valley's consensus culture produces consensus founders - How the US dollar functions as an instrument of national security Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 Intro 9:19 Emerging Markets 14:03 Silicon Valley's Elite Consensus Problem 16:03 Rejecting the VC Hamster Wheel 21:45 Equity and Liquidity 26:03 Funding a Bank 29:45 The Necessity of Extreme Founder Risk 37:18 Finding Leverage 45:20 Longevity and Profitability in Banking 48:46 Matching Your Capital Structure to Your Business 51:44 The Unseen Power of the US Dollar 1:02:30 How AI Will Transform Legacy Banks 1:09:23 The Kindest Thing

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Colossus@colossusmag·1d

Despite the proliferation of startup pundits over the last 25 years, no one knows how to make startups more successful. The New Pundits have sold millions of books, and their entrepreneurship “science” is taught in universities and accelerators all over the world. But none of it has made a difference. Startups are no more likely to survive today than they were in 1995. By some measures, they are even less likely to work. In his latest essay, legendary venture investor @ganeumann presents the data, diagnoses the problem, and proposes something that might actually work. It involves Robert Boyle, Peter Thiel, Paul Feyerabend, and Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking-Glass. colossus.com/article/we-hav…

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Invest Like the Best@InvestLikeBest·2d

Patrick Collison tells people in their 20s to not move to San Francisco. William largely agrees with him. He thinks SF has a consensus problem and has removed the risk from becoming a founder: "I'm a product of Silicon Valley. I started Plaid back in 2012. I've been there since I was 21, and it's very easy to stay in Silicon Valley. But you can start to get isolated and get very consensus focused. San Francisco is probably the most consensus place I've ever been to. That is both a huge crutch for us, but it's also probably the most valuable asset. As a founder, if you're building in something that SF believes is very consensus, but the world does not believe yet, that's actually a great operating environment. That's why Silicon Valley and SF are so dynamic and we're so in front of the curve. But we also have completely lost touch with how the rest of the world operates. Even how the everyday American operates. So I think it's very important to go to places that don't have that same bias. If you think about emerging markets specifically – the founders who build there, they're the everyday people, they live in this constrained society. They're constrained in a way that San Francisco and New York isn't. And that breeds a different type of creativity, it breeds a different type of innovation that you really can't get anywhere else. If you go to talk to people in London or Vienna or San Francisco, people are living in a world of abundance. And that causes a very specific creation cycle. SF and Silicon Valley are probably more akin to Wall Street in the 1990s than they are like a research lab in Cambridge in like the 1950s. Maybe that was Silicon Valley in the 90s, but it's not anymore. You talk to a 23-year-old and assuming you're like moderately competent and went to the right high school and college, you're going to get a $3 million seed round. And worst case scenario, you can go work at like a great company as an engineer and you'll have "founder" on your resume. There is no risk in that proposition. If you go back to pre-2008, you're on the edge of the knife, and I think that creates just so much intensity in creativity and fear that is such a critical part of the founder journey. Starting companies is just too f**king safe, and it's caused a lot of companies to be super safe companies -- like we're going to pivot to AI and wrap OpenAI/Anthropic. That's not bold, that's not ambitious. And it's because we are attracting founders that actually want to be employees. They don't think and say "if I don't pull this off, I'm going to become bankrupt. My life is over." I think that's pretty healthy. That's when you bring out the rawness of humanity. And I don't see that very much anymore."

Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag

.@williamhockey is one of the least visible founders in tech relative to what he has created. He co-founded Plaid and is now building Column, a software company that owns a bank, and powers Ramp, Wise, Bilt, Mercury, and others. He funded it himself by borrowing against nearly everything he had in Plaid shares, and has never raised any outside capital. His story matters because so much of the value in our industry gets created through exactly this kind of extreme personal risk. He is maniacal about being the best in the world at his thing, and has spent his entire career betting on himself and doing whatever it takes to win. He also spends a lot of time outside the US (in places like Kinshasa) which has given him a rare perch on the power of the US dollar. We discuss: - Why emerging markets are often the most financially innovative - What owning 100% of his company allows him to do that VC-backed founders cannot - Getting margin called and nearly going bankrupt - Why the best founders are specialists - What it takes to be the best in the world at your thing - How Silicon Valley's consensus culture produces consensus founders - How the US dollar functions as an instrument of national security Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 Intro 9:19 Emerging Markets 14:03 Silicon Valley's Elite Consensus Problem 16:03 Rejecting the VC Hamster Wheel 21:45 Equity and Liquidity 26:03 Funding a Bank 29:45 The Necessity of Extreme Founder Risk 37:18 Finding Leverage 45:20 Longevity and Profitability in Banking 48:46 Matching Your Capital Structure to Your Business 51:44 The Unseen Power of the US Dollar 1:02:30 How AI Will Transform Legacy Banks 1:09:23 The Kindest Thing

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Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag·2d

William got margin called and pledged over $1B of his own stock to fund Column. He explains why extreme personal risk is what makes great founders, and why we see less of it today: "I think that the good founders bet on themselves and take an extreme amount of risk to do that. The extreme amount of risk part is something that we no longer have. But when there's literally only one door in front of you. You don't have a choice, and that fear and innate desire creates another part of you. It creates creativity, it creates inspiration. It's extremely valuable part of the founder journey. And in many ways, Silicon Valley we've actually removed that. I don't know why we don't talk about it more. If you go back to pre 2008, you're on the edge of the knife. We don't create environments where a founder has to bet themselves. I think starting companies are just too f**king safe. It's caused a lot of companies to be super safe companies like, we're gonna pivot to AI...that's not bold, that's not ambitious. It's because we are attracting founders that actually want to be employees. They don't think if I don't pull this off, I'm going to become bankrupt. My life is over and I think that's pretty healthy. That's when you bring out the rawness of humanity and I don't see that very much anymore. The weird thing is an early stage employee takes way more risk than an early stage founder. And I don't think we should actually de-risk the early stage employee. I just think we need to increase the risk for founders. I think we need to make failure much more expensive."

Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag

.@williamhockey is one of the least visible founders in tech relative to what he has created. He co-founded Plaid and is now building Column, a software company that owns a bank, and powers Ramp, Wise, Bilt, Mercury, and others. He funded it himself by borrowing against nearly everything he had in Plaid shares, and has never raised any outside capital. His story matters because so much of the value in our industry gets created through exactly this kind of extreme personal risk. He is maniacal about being the best in the world at his thing, and has spent his entire career betting on himself and doing whatever it takes to win. He also spends a lot of time outside the US (in places like Kinshasa) which has given him a rare perch on the power of the US dollar. We discuss: - Why emerging markets are often the most financially innovative - What owning 100% of his company allows him to do that VC-backed founders cannot - Getting margin called and nearly going bankrupt - Why the best founders are specialists - What it takes to be the best in the world at your thing - How Silicon Valley's consensus culture produces consensus founders - How the US dollar functions as an instrument of national security Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 Intro 9:19 Emerging Markets 14:03 Silicon Valley's Elite Consensus Problem 16:03 Rejecting the VC Hamster Wheel 21:45 Equity and Liquidity 26:03 Funding a Bank 29:45 The Necessity of Extreme Founder Risk 37:18 Finding Leverage 45:20 Longevity and Profitability in Banking 48:46 Matching Your Capital Structure to Your Business 51:44 The Unseen Power of the US Dollar 1:02:30 How AI Will Transform Legacy Banks 1:09:23 The Kindest Thing

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Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag·2d

.@williamhockey is one of the least visible founders in tech relative to what he has created. He co-founded Plaid and is now building Column, a software company that owns a bank, and powers Ramp, Wise, Bilt, Mercury, and others. He funded it himself by borrowing against nearly everything he had in Plaid shares, and has never raised any outside capital. His story matters because so much of the value in our industry gets created through exactly this kind of extreme personal risk. He is maniacal about being the best in the world at his thing, and has spent his entire career betting on himself and doing whatever it takes to win. He also spends a lot of time outside the US (in places like Kinshasa) which has given him a rare perch on the power of the US dollar. We discuss: - Why emerging markets are often the most financially innovative - What owning 100% of his company allows him to do that VC-backed founders cannot - Getting margin called and nearly going bankrupt - Why the best founders are specialists - What it takes to be the best in the world at your thing - How Silicon Valley's consensus culture produces consensus founders - How the US dollar functions as an instrument of national security Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 Intro 9:19 Emerging Markets 14:03 Silicon Valley's Elite Consensus Problem 16:03 Rejecting the VC Hamster Wheel 21:45 Equity and Liquidity 26:03 Funding a Bank 29:45 The Necessity of Extreme Founder Risk 37:18 Finding Leverage 45:20 Longevity and Profitability in Banking 48:46 Matching Your Capital Structure to Your Business 51:44 The Unseen Power of the US Dollar 1:02:30 How AI Will Transform Legacy Banks 1:09:23 The Kindest Thing

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Invest Like the Best@InvestLikeBest·12 Mar

"All of your contributions to the world are going to come from your superpower." @ssankar on what Alex Karp taught him about finding people's superpowers: "Really talented people are highly uneven. They're very good at some things and really bad at some other things. Particularly for high achieving people, when they're young, they misattribute what their superpower is. They think there's this thing they do that requires effort and therefore they get a dopamine hit when they succeed. It's probably something they're not even bad at, they're just okay at. Superpowers are effortless. My analogy for this is Superman - he could fly, he could see through walls. It's just something he could do. That's usually something you learn comparatively. This thing that's effortless for me other people who are really smart can't seem to do. And embracing that is the first step. The other part of this is kryptonite. There are some set of weaknesses you have where you aren't just average, you're six deviations below average. It's not something you can work on. The only strategy for Superman around kryptonite was to avoid it. You have to create an environment that supports them through that because the discovery of kryptonite usually involves you being exposed to it. You're going to make some really bad mistake that will have real consequences. Hopefully you learn from that mistake, but you don't want to create a culture which is like "I have to fire you."

Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag

My conversation with Shyam Sankar (@ssankar). Shyam has spent nearly 20 years as the most important person at Palantir that most people have never heard of. We spend a lot of time understanding his worldview, which helps explain why he has devoted his life to this work. At the center of it is a belief in the primacy of people -- all meaningful change comes from a small number of builders willing to be heretics first. You will find few people who think as deeply about the relationship between technology and national power. In many ways, he is becoming the modern version of the heretics he most admires. We discuss: - What Alex Karp taught him about identifying superpowers and unlocking talent - Heretics + the components of American greatness - The origins of the FDE model - Ontology and chips – where value will accrue in AI - Why dual-use companies are the future of American industry - China and what it would take for the US to reindustrialize - His journey from Nigeria to Orlando and what his dad taught him about gratitude Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 Intro 2:23 Defining Heretics in US Military History 8:36 Shyam’s Personal Disagreeableness 9:49 Formative Experiences & Worldview 12:52 What Makes America Exceptional 14:48 What Does Greatness Mean? 15:33 Alex Karp 16:46 How to Unlock Talent 19:21 Identifying Superpowers and Kryptonite 22:54 The Gamma Ray Moment 25:00 Palantir's Next 10 Years 27:03 Forward Deployed Engineering 33:40 Explaining What Palantir Is 37:50 Military vs. Commercial Customers 39:00 The State of the US Military Today 47:01 How to Re-Industrialize America 51:06 Perspective on China as an Adversary 56:17 How to Get More Heretics in Government 1:03:53 Managing Rapid Pivots & Momentum 1:08:48 Where Will AI Value Accrue? 1:13:33 Reasserting the Legitimacy of Institutions 1:15:54 To Do or To Be? 1:16:31 Reflecting on Fatherhood 1:17:34 Kindest Thing

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Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag·12 Mar

I suspect this is happening at many companies, but it does seem like younger people will have an asymmetric advantage with AI.

Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag

My conversation with Shyam Sankar (@ssankar). Shyam has spent nearly 20 years as the most important person at Palantir that most people have never heard of. We spend a lot of time understanding his worldview, which helps explain why he has devoted his life to this work. At the center of it is a belief in the primacy of people -- all meaningful change comes from a small number of builders willing to be heretics first. You will find few people who think as deeply about the relationship between technology and national power. In many ways, he is becoming the modern version of the heretics he most admires. We discuss: - What Alex Karp taught him about identifying superpowers and unlocking talent - Heretics + the components of American greatness - The origins of the FDE model - Ontology and chips – where value will accrue in AI - Why dual-use companies are the future of American industry - China and what it would take for the US to reindustrialize - His journey from Nigeria to Orlando and what his dad taught him about gratitude Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 Intro 2:23 Defining Heretics in US Military History 8:36 Shyam’s Personal Disagreeableness 9:49 Formative Experiences & Worldview 12:52 What Makes America Exceptional 14:48 What Does Greatness Mean? 15:33 Alex Karp 16:46 How to Unlock Talent 19:21 Identifying Superpowers and Kryptonite 22:54 The Gamma Ray Moment 25:00 Palantir's Next 10 Years 27:03 Forward Deployed Engineering 33:40 Explaining What Palantir Is 37:50 Military vs. Commercial Customers 39:00 The State of the US Military Today 47:01 How to Re-Industrialize America 51:06 Perspective on China as an Adversary 56:17 How to Get More Heretics in Government 1:03:53 Managing Rapid Pivots & Momentum 1:08:48 Where Will AI Value Accrue? 1:13:33 Reasserting the Legitimacy of Institutions 1:15:54 To Do or To Be? 1:16:31 Reflecting on Fatherhood 1:17:34 Kindest Thing

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Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag·11 Mar

Shyam explains how America's defense industry went from founder-led to a consolidated and conformist system: "In 1993, there was a very famous dinner at the Pentagon called The Last Supper. The Secretary of Defense told a subset -- 15 of the 51 primes -- the budget's getting cut, we give you permission to consolidate. This just set off a merger frenzy that led from the consolidation from 51 down to 5. The consequence is this is the moment of profound financialization and conformity in the industrial base. You lost the crazy people. They went to tech. What we would recognize in the Valley today, that's where this talent was. It was in the industrial companies of America. We think about it as Northrop Grumman. Much more accurately, it was Jack Northrop. It was Leroy Grumman. You had founder figures. The defense industry used to not just be about dividends, buyback ratios and financial engineering. It was about real engineering. We need a little more crazy back."

Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag

My conversation with Shyam Sankar (@ssankar). Shyam has spent nearly 20 years as the most important person at Palantir that most people have never heard of. We spend a lot of time understanding his worldview, which helps explain why he has devoted his life to this work. At the center of it is a belief in the primacy of people -- all meaningful change comes from a small number of builders willing to be heretics first. You will find few people who think as deeply about the relationship between technology and national power. In many ways, he is becoming the modern version of the heretics he most admires. We discuss: - What Alex Karp taught him about identifying superpowers and unlocking talent - Heretics + the components of American greatness - The origins of the FDE model - Ontology and chips – where value will accrue in AI - Why dual-use companies are the future of American industry - China and what it would take for the US to reindustrialize - His journey from Nigeria to Orlando and what his dad taught him about gratitude Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 Intro 2:23 Defining Heretics in US Military History 8:36 Shyam’s Personal Disagreeableness 9:49 Formative Experiences & Worldview 12:52 What Makes America Exceptional 14:48 What Does Greatness Mean? 15:33 Alex Karp 16:46 How to Unlock Talent 19:21 Identifying Superpowers and Kryptonite 22:54 The Gamma Ray Moment 25:00 Palantir's Next 10 Years 27:03 Forward Deployed Engineering 33:40 Explaining What Palantir Is 37:50 Military vs. Commercial Customers 39:00 The State of the US Military Today 47:01 How to Re-Industrialize America 51:06 Perspective on China as an Adversary 56:17 How to Get More Heretics in Government 1:03:53 Managing Rapid Pivots & Momentum 1:08:48 Where Will AI Value Accrue? 1:13:33 Reasserting the Legitimacy of Institutions 1:15:54 To Do or To Be? 1:16:31 Reflecting on Fatherhood 1:17:34 Kindest Thing

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Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag·10 Mar

Shyam on why the US needs to become reindustrialization maximalists: "The biggest lie of globalization was that the US would do the innovation while China did the production. The breakthrough behind the Attention Is All You Need paper came from Google trying to improve Translate by 3%. Innovation is a consequence of production. WuXi went from being a cheap pair of hands for pipetting contract research to now 50% of all clinical trials are drugs that are created in China. We ceded the innovation. It wasn't taken from us. We ceded it because we had a completely incorrect preset. I don't think it's true that we're not great at building things in this country. Look at Elon and the progeny of Elon. Apple has spent the equivalent on an inflation adjusted basis in the last five years of two and a half Marshall plans (~$350B+) building talent and capacity in China. How about we try to spend one Marshall plan here?"

Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag

My conversation with Shyam Sankar (@ssankar). Shyam has spent nearly 20 years as the most important person at Palantir that most people have never heard of. We spend a lot of time understanding his worldview, which helps explain why he has devoted his life to this work. At the center of it is a belief in the primacy of people -- all meaningful change comes from a small number of builders willing to be heretics first. You will find few people who think as deeply about the relationship between technology and national power. In many ways, he is becoming the modern version of the heretics he most admires. We discuss: - What Alex Karp taught him about identifying superpowers and unlocking talent - Heretics + the components of American greatness - The origins of the FDE model - Ontology and chips – where value will accrue in AI - Why dual-use companies are the future of American industry - China and what it would take for the US to reindustrialize - His journey from Nigeria to Orlando and what his dad taught him about gratitude Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 Intro 2:23 Defining Heretics in US Military History 8:36 Shyam’s Personal Disagreeableness 9:49 Formative Experiences & Worldview 12:52 What Makes America Exceptional 14:48 What Does Greatness Mean? 15:33 Alex Karp 16:46 How to Unlock Talent 19:21 Identifying Superpowers and Kryptonite 22:54 The Gamma Ray Moment 25:00 Palantir's Next 10 Years 27:03 Forward Deployed Engineering 33:40 Explaining What Palantir Is 37:50 Military vs. Commercial Customers 39:00 The State of the US Military Today 47:01 How to Re-Industrialize America 51:06 Perspective on China as an Adversary 56:17 How to Get More Heretics in Government 1:03:53 Managing Rapid Pivots & Momentum 1:08:48 Where Will AI Value Accrue? 1:13:33 Reasserting the Legitimacy of Institutions 1:15:54 To Do or To Be? 1:16:31 Reflecting on Fatherhood 1:17:34 Kindest Thing

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Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag·10 Mar

My conversation with Shyam Sankar (@ssankar). Shyam has spent nearly 20 years as the most important person at Palantir that most people have never heard of. We spend a lot of time understanding his worldview, which helps explain why he has devoted his life to this work. At the center of it is a belief in the primacy of people -- all meaningful change comes from a small number of builders willing to be heretics first. You will find few people who think as deeply about the relationship between technology and national power. In many ways, he is becoming the modern version of the heretics he most admires. We discuss: - What Alex Karp taught him about identifying superpowers and unlocking talent - Heretics + the components of American greatness - The origins of the FDE model - Ontology and chips – where value will accrue in AI - Why dual-use companies are the future of American industry - China and what it would take for the US to reindustrialize - His journey from Nigeria to Orlando and what his dad taught him about gratitude Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 Intro 2:23 Defining Heretics in US Military History 8:36 Shyam’s Personal Disagreeableness 9:49 Formative Experiences & Worldview 12:52 What Makes America Exceptional 14:48 What Does Greatness Mean? 15:33 Alex Karp 16:46 How to Unlock Talent 19:21 Identifying Superpowers and Kryptonite 22:54 The Gamma Ray Moment 25:00 Palantir's Next 10 Years 27:03 Forward Deployed Engineering 33:40 Explaining What Palantir Is 37:50 Military vs. Commercial Customers 39:00 The State of the US Military Today 47:01 How to Re-Industrialize America 51:06 Perspective on China as an Adversary 56:17 How to Get More Heretics in Government 1:03:53 Managing Rapid Pivots & Momentum 1:08:48 Where Will AI Value Accrue? 1:13:33 Reasserting the Legitimacy of Institutions 1:15:54 To Do or To Be? 1:16:31 Reflecting on Fatherhood 1:17:34 Kindest Thing

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Patrick OShaughnessy retweetledi

Alix Pasquet@alixpasquet·6 Mar

Years ago, as a youngin, a mentor of mine told me that Goldman Sachs had a concept called "the person vs the seat". He explained it: if you look at a person and you put him on a seat at your firm, is it the seat making the money or is it the individual? Think about one aspect of the seat, which is the deal flow. Is the flow coming to the seat because it is Goldman, or is it coming to the person? As human chimpanzees, we have a tendency to think we are the ones who are doing all the work and getting the job done (self attribution bias and other highly comical biases), but very often, we are just sitting in a really good seat. What if we leave? Will we still have all that flow? Could we even replicate the flow? How about the other benefits of the seat? I think there are several lessons to this. a) make the seat very powerful, as @johnarnold explains in a part of the pod below. What are the conditions you can create at the seat level to make it powerful? b) the persons who are valuable are the ones who augment and preferably multiply the value of the seat. Those are the ones that you make a partner. c) The "seat" is the reason why if a person leaves a firm, bc he has done well there and then goes to the next shop and does not have the same performance. Very common. By the way, on John Arnold. a) John just went to China, and he shared on X a recap of his trip. Must read. It complements very well the pod that @bgurley did with @altcap on China. (Go read Gurley's book!) John is on the board of META now and check out how good the board is. Would love to be a fly on the wall on this one. Must be business learning on steroids. b) An interesting event in market history is Centaurus' run-in with Amaranth. Worth taking a look at that. c) his other pods are also worth a listen. Im consistently amazed at the quality of @patrick_oshag pods and also his questions. Crazy that we have access to these now. When I was starting out, Id have paid a small fortune to listen to this.

Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag

My conversation with John Arnold (@johnarnold). Few people I've spoken with have as wide a view of the global system as John. He was one of the most successful energy traders of all time, and after stepping away from markets he built a foundation devoted to solving America's most critical systemic problems in a principled way. John's recent trip to China was the catalyst for this conversation, and I feel lucky we all get to learn from him. We discuss: - His trip to China and what it taught him about robotics, AI, and EVs - What it takes to be the best (and what it costs) - Building the best seat in the market - The state of energy markets today - NIMBYism as the impediment to progress - What he thinks about the wave of nuclear startups - Fixing America's broken systems: healthcare, criminal justice, education, and journalism Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 intro 0:45 China’s Rapid Transformation 3:53 Lessons from the Chinese EV Market 6:12 Robotics 11:22 The Discipline of an Elite Trader 15:42 Leveraging Scale and Proprietary Data 17:36 Lessons from the Baseball Cards 21:15 Trading Natural Gas and Market Dynamics 25:34 Innovation in the Modern Energy Sector 27:02 High-Level Goals of the U.S. Energy System 32:59 Overcoming NIMBYism 36:10 The Challenges of U.S. Transmission Lines 37:55 The Future of Nuclear, Fusion, and SMRs 44:00 The Economics of Solar and Battery Storage 48:28 Data Center Demand 50:28 Housing Reform 53:32 Rethinking the Role of Philanthropic Foundations 57:05 Improving the Criminal Justice System 1:01:58 Privacy and Security 1:05:03 Education and Life Outcomes 1:06:41 The Promise and Pitfalls of EdTech and AI 1:09:12 Identifying Market Failures in Healthcare 1:12:10 The Role of Regulation Across Different Systems 1:14:06 Journalism as the Fourth Estate 1:16:41 The Kindness of Hard Truths

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Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag·7 Mar

The swag that Shyam brought for us at the recording came in an ammo box

Colossus@colossusmag

“You lost the crazy people. They went to tech.” @ssankar explains how the American defense industry was once built by founder figures and attracted obsessive engineers like Kelly Johnson, who built 41 aircraft in his lifetime and treated engineering like an artistic pursuit. After the Cold War, the industry consolidated from 51 major defense primes to 5 and shifted toward conformity and financial engineering instead of real engineering. As bureaucracy crept in, the system calcified. Colossus Members have early access to Shyam’s new conversation with @patrick_oshag on @InvestLikeBest, where he explains how that shift reshaped the defense industrial base and why he believes America needs to “get a little crazy back” to rebuild its industrial strength. Members can listen now in their Private Audio Feed. Subscribe here: colossus.com/subscribe

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Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag·5 Mar

The US and China have separated far more than most people realize since 2019. Flights between the two countries are down ~70%. Western expats in China are down 50-75%, and American students studying there are down ~90%. For years China brought in Western talent to learn how to build businesses. Those skills are now largely domesticated. "There's this confidence building. We used to just copy the West. Now we're world leaders in many of these things. We don't need the West coming to teach us things, we're going to teach the West."

Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag

My conversation with John Arnold (@johnarnold). Few people I've spoken with have as wide a view of the global system as John. He was one of the most successful energy traders of all time, and after stepping away from markets he built a foundation devoted to solving America's most critical systemic problems in a principled way. John's recent trip to China was the catalyst for this conversation, and I feel lucky we all get to learn from him. We discuss: - His trip to China and what it taught him about robotics, AI, and EVs - What it takes to be the best (and what it costs) - Building the best seat in the market - The state of energy markets today - NIMBYism as the impediment to progress - What he thinks about the wave of nuclear startups - Fixing America's broken systems: healthcare, criminal justice, education, and journalism Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 intro 0:45 China’s Rapid Transformation 3:53 Lessons from the Chinese EV Market 6:12 Robotics 11:22 The Discipline of an Elite Trader 15:42 Leveraging Scale and Proprietary Data 17:36 Lessons from the Baseball Cards 21:15 Trading Natural Gas and Market Dynamics 25:34 Innovation in the Modern Energy Sector 27:02 High-Level Goals of the U.S. Energy System 32:59 Overcoming NIMBYism 36:10 The Challenges of U.S. Transmission Lines 37:55 The Future of Nuclear, Fusion, and SMRs 44:00 The Economics of Solar and Battery Storage 48:28 Data Center Demand 50:28 Housing Reform 53:32 Rethinking the Role of Philanthropic Foundations 57:05 Improving the Criminal Justice System 1:01:58 Privacy and Security 1:05:03 Education and Life Outcomes 1:06:41 The Promise and Pitfalls of EdTech and AI 1:09:12 Identifying Market Failures in Healthcare 1:12:10 The Role of Regulation Across Different Systems 1:14:06 Journalism as the Fourth Estate 1:16:41 The Kindness of Hard Truths

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Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag·5 Mar

@tferriss @EconTalker Great stuff

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Tim Ferriss@tferriss·4 Mar

tim.blog/2026/03/04/the…

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Tim Ferriss@tferriss·4 Mar

NEW blog post is up! The Self-Help Trap: What 20+ Years of “Optimizing” Has Taught Me The older I get, the more I think that self-help can be a trap. Sometimes the cure is worse than the disease. I say this after ~20 years of writing self-help and a lifetime of consuming it. Spend enough time in the world of “improvement,” and you’ll notice something strange: The people most obsessed with self-help are often the least helped by it. Behind the smiles and motivational quotes, behind closed doors and after a drink or two, the truth is that they’re not able to outsmart their worries. On one hand, perhaps this unhappiness is precisely what lands one in self-development in the first place, right? I long assumed this about myself, and it’s partially true. On the other hand, what if self-help itself is actually creating or amplifying unhappiness? Modern self-help contains an in-built flaw: To continually improve yourself, you must continually locate the ways you are broken. Fortunately, there are a few perspective shifts that make all the difference. It took me embarrassingly long to figure them out. To get started, let’s take a fresh look at an old concept. See the link below to the full blog post 👇

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Jesse Livermore@Jesse_Livermore·5 Mar

This was an absolutely PHENOMENAL episode. Would have gladly paid to listen to another 5 hours of it. Huge thanks to Patrick and John for making it happen.

Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag

My conversation with John Arnold (@johnarnold). Few people I've spoken with have as wide a view of the global system as John. He was one of the most successful energy traders of all time, and after stepping away from markets he built a foundation devoted to solving America's most critical systemic problems in a principled way. John's recent trip to China was the catalyst for this conversation, and I feel lucky we all get to learn from him. We discuss: - His trip to China and what it taught him about robotics, AI, and EVs - What it takes to be the best (and what it costs) - Building the best seat in the market - The state of energy markets today - NIMBYism as the impediment to progress - What he thinks about the wave of nuclear startups - Fixing America's broken systems: healthcare, criminal justice, education, and journalism Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 intro 0:45 China’s Rapid Transformation 3:53 Lessons from the Chinese EV Market 6:12 Robotics 11:22 The Discipline of an Elite Trader 15:42 Leveraging Scale and Proprietary Data 17:36 Lessons from the Baseball Cards 21:15 Trading Natural Gas and Market Dynamics 25:34 Innovation in the Modern Energy Sector 27:02 High-Level Goals of the U.S. Energy System 32:59 Overcoming NIMBYism 36:10 The Challenges of U.S. Transmission Lines 37:55 The Future of Nuclear, Fusion, and SMRs 44:00 The Economics of Solar and Battery Storage 48:28 Data Center Demand 50:28 Housing Reform 53:32 Rethinking the Role of Philanthropic Foundations 57:05 Improving the Criminal Justice System 1:01:58 Privacy and Security 1:05:03 Education and Life Outcomes 1:06:41 The Promise and Pitfalls of EdTech and AI 1:09:12 Identifying Market Failures in Healthcare 1:12:10 The Role of Regulation Across Different Systems 1:14:06 Journalism as the Fourth Estate 1:16:41 The Kindness of Hard Truths

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Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag·4 Mar

Solar power today costs 50% more than it did around 2020, even though solar panels themselves keep getting cheaper. John points out that people often confuse the cost of panels with the cost of power. "A solar panel doesn't get you what you want. You want electrons at the location that load is at." But delivering electricity requires land, labor, transmission, and capital, all of which are inflationary.

Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag

My conversation with John Arnold (@johnarnold). Few people I've spoken with have as wide a view of the global system as John. He was one of the most successful energy traders of all time, and after stepping away from markets he built a foundation devoted to solving America's most critical systemic problems in a principled way. John's recent trip to China was the catalyst for this conversation, and I feel lucky we all get to learn from him. We discuss: - His trip to China and what it taught him about robotics, AI, and EVs - What it takes to be the best (and what it costs) - Building the best seat in the market - The state of energy markets today - NIMBYism as the impediment to progress - What he thinks about the wave of nuclear startups - Fixing America's broken systems: healthcare, criminal justice, education, and journalism Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 intro 0:45 China’s Rapid Transformation 3:53 Lessons from the Chinese EV Market 6:12 Robotics 11:22 The Discipline of an Elite Trader 15:42 Leveraging Scale and Proprietary Data 17:36 Lessons from the Baseball Cards 21:15 Trading Natural Gas and Market Dynamics 25:34 Innovation in the Modern Energy Sector 27:02 High-Level Goals of the U.S. Energy System 32:59 Overcoming NIMBYism 36:10 The Challenges of U.S. Transmission Lines 37:55 The Future of Nuclear, Fusion, and SMRs 44:00 The Economics of Solar and Battery Storage 48:28 Data Center Demand 50:28 Housing Reform 53:32 Rethinking the Role of Philanthropic Foundations 57:05 Improving the Criminal Justice System 1:01:58 Privacy and Security 1:05:03 Education and Life Outcomes 1:06:41 The Promise and Pitfalls of EdTech and AI 1:09:12 Identifying Market Failures in Healthcare 1:12:10 The Role of Regulation Across Different Systems 1:14:06 Journalism as the Fourth Estate 1:16:41 The Kindness of Hard Truths

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Alana Levin@AlanaDLevin·4 Mar

Probably one of the best ways to spend the next 80 minutes. John Arnold is a Druckenmiller-level GOAT

Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag

My conversation with John Arnold (@johnarnold). Few people I've spoken with have as wide a view of the global system as John. He was one of the most successful energy traders of all time, and after stepping away from markets he built a foundation devoted to solving America's most critical systemic problems in a principled way. John's recent trip to China was the catalyst for this conversation, and I feel lucky we all get to learn from him. We discuss: - His trip to China and what it taught him about robotics, AI, and EVs - What it takes to be the best (and what it costs) - Building the best seat in the market - The state of energy markets today - NIMBYism as the impediment to progress - What he thinks about the wave of nuclear startups - Fixing America's broken systems: healthcare, criminal justice, education, and journalism Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 intro 0:45 China’s Rapid Transformation 3:53 Lessons from the Chinese EV Market 6:12 Robotics 11:22 The Discipline of an Elite Trader 15:42 Leveraging Scale and Proprietary Data 17:36 Lessons from the Baseball Cards 21:15 Trading Natural Gas and Market Dynamics 25:34 Innovation in the Modern Energy Sector 27:02 High-Level Goals of the U.S. Energy System 32:59 Overcoming NIMBYism 36:10 The Challenges of U.S. Transmission Lines 37:55 The Future of Nuclear, Fusion, and SMRs 44:00 The Economics of Solar and Battery Storage 48:28 Data Center Demand 50:28 Housing Reform 53:32 Rethinking the Role of Philanthropic Foundations 57:05 Improving the Criminal Justice System 1:01:58 Privacy and Security 1:05:03 Education and Life Outcomes 1:06:41 The Promise and Pitfalls of EdTech and AI 1:09:12 Identifying Market Failures in Healthcare 1:12:10 The Role of Regulation Across Different Systems 1:14:06 Journalism as the Fourth Estate 1:16:41 The Kindness of Hard Truths

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Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag·4 Mar

John toured NIO's factory in China. They built an upscale EV for under $10k and went from the first shovel in the ground to the first car off the line in just 17 months. He said China knew it would always be behind in ICE cars, so it pushed aggressively into EVs to leapfrog to the next technology and gain an advantage over the rest of the world. "Going to their factory and seeing, number one, how quickly that factory is built. And second, the factory automation -- much of the process was done via robotics. Looking at the auto plants we have in the US, we still have a plant that was originally built a 100 years ago, operating outside of Chicago. The average age of a US plant is roughly 40 years now. They've been upgraded over time but I don't think they replicate what's happening with robotics in China. This combination of being able to do things really quickly with a skilled but low-cost labor force and robotics has just allowed China to create a quality product at a price that nobody in the rest of the world's really been able to figure out yet."

Patrick OShaughnessy@patrick_oshag

My conversation with John Arnold (@johnarnold). Few people I've spoken with have as wide a view of the global system as John. He was one of the most successful energy traders of all time, and after stepping away from markets he built a foundation devoted to solving America's most critical systemic problems in a principled way. John's recent trip to China was the catalyst for this conversation, and I feel lucky we all get to learn from him. We discuss: - His trip to China and what it taught him about robotics, AI, and EVs - What it takes to be the best (and what it costs) - Building the best seat in the market - The state of energy markets today - NIMBYism as the impediment to progress - What he thinks about the wave of nuclear startups - Fixing America's broken systems: healthcare, criminal justice, education, and journalism Enjoy! Timestamps: 0:00 intro 0:45 China’s Rapid Transformation 3:53 Lessons from the Chinese EV Market 6:12 Robotics 11:22 The Discipline of an Elite Trader 15:42 Leveraging Scale and Proprietary Data 17:36 Lessons from the Baseball Cards 21:15 Trading Natural Gas and Market Dynamics 25:34 Innovation in the Modern Energy Sector 27:02 High-Level Goals of the U.S. Energy System 32:59 Overcoming NIMBYism 36:10 The Challenges of U.S. Transmission Lines 37:55 The Future of Nuclear, Fusion, and SMRs 44:00 The Economics of Solar and Battery Storage 48:28 Data Center Demand 50:28 Housing Reform 53:32 Rethinking the Role of Philanthropic Foundations 57:05 Improving the Criminal Justice System 1:01:58 Privacy and Security 1:05:03 Education and Life Outcomes 1:06:41 The Promise and Pitfalls of EdTech and AI 1:09:12 Identifying Market Failures in Healthcare 1:12:10 The Role of Regulation Across Different Systems 1:14:06 Journalism as the Fourth Estate 1:16:41 The Kindness of Hard Truths

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