Pietro Conte

@tugot17 @BoringBiz_ Pre WW2, Europe led the world in science, industry, and global politics. Post WW2 has been a slow, steady decline of international influence. The 70s were better than the 90s which were better than today.

@pietro__conte @BoringBiz_ this is just plainly wrong, 1990s Europe was richer, had roughly same number of global champions, still had globally competitive academia, etc.

If it wasn’t clear already, I think this AI race has fully revealed the stagnation that taken place in Europe over the last couple of decades The world is going through a massive technological revolution, and not a single consequential company in the space is based out of Europe Truly boggles my mind how one generation of leaders just stripped the entire continent’s ability to compete

Corporate speak is the number one giveaway that someone doesn’t know what they’re saying.

Better to be honest than nice.

You build trust by telling the truth.

You can't sell something to anyone until you've built enough trust. Man's greatest fear is getting ripped off.

@thedankoe The challenge is choosing a goal meaningful enough to justify dedicating your life to it.

If you don't have a goal so meaningful it makes other people's opinions irrelevant, you will lose control of your life. You will adopt the goals assigned to you by your parents, peers, or society.

Courage is testing your beliefs in public.

@signulll If you knew how hard it actually is, it would be unreasonable to pursue. Entrepreneurs are inherently unreasonable which is what makes the path possible.

i always operate under the assumption that things are easy until proven otherwise. mostly cuz the people loudly insisting things are hard are usually selling difficulty (consultants, gatekeepers, or incumbents who benefit from the moat narrative). also starting from easy means you actually attempt things. the cost of a false easy is often an afternoon now esp with ai whereas the cost of a false hard you never try at all. e.g. this is how i got into woodworking & hard edge painting, among many other things.

Entrepreneurship and labor are mindsets not jobs.

@EdwardPuen50245 @TFTC21 Yes exactly. A traders skill used to be finding patterns others didn’t see. AI finds patterns 1000x faster than any human possibly could

@pietro__conte @TFTC21 Even if you have a trading system, AI probably learns it an instant and uses it against you on behalf of some hedge fund.

Ken Griffin went home on a Friday "fairly depressed" after watching AI agents at Citadel do work that used to take teams of PhDs in finance months to complete. Done in days. His words: "These are not mid-tier white collar jobs. These are extraordinarily high skilled jobs being automated by agentic AI." This is the head of one of the most successful hedge funds in history saying the people he pays seven figures to analyze markets and structure deals are being replaced by software that works in hours instead of months. Not theoretically. In his own office. Right now. The Coatue deck we covered earlier this week called agents "the biggest unlock" in AI. Griffin just confirmed it from the buy side. The shift from copilots to agents is not a future event. It is already happening at the highest levels of finance.

@Budgetdog_ College is a bundle beyond what you learn in the classroom. The experience is how to socialize with people from other backgrounds than what you grew up with. It’s the university’s responsibility to support finding a job into the workforce.

I’m having a hard time thinking college, as we know it today, will be relevant by the time my girls are of age. I really don’t think it will be. And I do wonder if/how the 529 rules will change. Almost makes me want to shift it to the parent taxable brokerage.

Where’s a guy gotta go to become a better writer? Essays / non fiction.

You are what you repeatedly do. Success is a habit.

@Jayyanginspires NY is also 10x the size of SF. Finance is what drives NYC with a bit of tech and other industries you’d expect of a mega economy.

SF feels like everyone is playing against one scoreboard: how much money do you raise / how big is your startup? NY feels more diverse in ideas and ambitions. There are startup founders, yes. But also artists, athletes, finance, service businesses, consumer apps, etc SF the city feels so boring there’s nothing to do but lock in and work. NY there’s always something happening. There’s an invisible momentum that pulls you forward.

@WestsideLAGuy Business administration is managing somebody else’s asset. Entrepreneurship is breathing life into an asset. Value in both, unlimited upside in one.

Elite MBA students are behind the curve because companies hire them once they’re mature businesses. Elite undergrads are ahead of the curve & know about hot companies before they go parabolic. Jane Street for instance was well known in mid-2000s at the top 10 colleges.

If you can’t do it every day for 10 years, you won’t be successful at it.

@signulll It pains me to see the spurs land another big 3 that will dominate next 10 years.

the san antonio spurs are the model organization of the nba, & potentially in business altogether. there is loyalty, leadership, the old school veterans always show up in support of the team, they draft well, they coach well, & they just play the game the right way. oh & they have had such an insane amount of success for a small market franchise (although this matters less in a salary cap environment).