✔️ @venture

📱 A $27 Instagram post turned into an 8-figure startup
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Kale started with a simple idea: instead of paying major influencers huge fees, brands could pay everyday users for posting about products they already use. The first proof was just $27 paid for an Instagram post about dog bandanas.
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Five years later, Kale has crossed 8 figures in annual revenue, grown roughly 9,000% in 3 years, and adds a new user every 90 seconds. Its clients include Unilever, P&G, Nordstrom and DoorDash.
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Creators choose brand challenges inside the app and earn from a few dollars to several hundred per post depending on engagement. Kale says this content generates 20x the engagement of traditional influencer posts.
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Kale's bet is that the next layer of influencer marketing belongs to thousands of small creators who look more like customers than celebrities.

✔️ @venture

S&P 500 is up more than 90% ever since Michael Burry told investors to “Sell.”

✔️ @venture

📈 11 stocks with some of the biggest upside
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Even after huge runs across AI and tech, several major stocks still trade well below consensus price targets. Nvidia, for example, has around 35% implied upside after quarterly revenue surged from $3B to $82B.
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The biggest gaps:
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🖱 Wingstop $WING: +85%
🖱 SpaceX $SPCX: +67%
🖱 Micron $MU: +62%
🖱 FICO $FICO: +44%
🖱 Reddit $RDDT: +41%
🖱 Nvidia $NVDA: +35%
🖱 Uber $UBER: +33%
🖱 Meta $META: +29%
🖱 Netflix $NFLX: +28%
🖱 Robinhood $HOOD: +27%
🖱 AMD $AMD: +25%
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Some of the fundamentals behind those targets are just as extreme. Micron's gross margin has gone from -33% in 2023 to 85%, Uber has swung from burning nearly $5B in free cash flow to generating more than $10B, while Reddit's FCF margin has improved from -20% to 37%.
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Price targets aren't predictions, but this is a useful watchlist of stocks where current prices still sit far below analyst expectations.

✔️ @venture

Time vs Money

✔️ @venture

🚀 SpaceX could create the next PayPal Mafia
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SpaceX's IPO raised $75B and turned an estimated 4,400 current and former employees into millionaires. For comparison, Google and Facebook each created around 1,000 employee millionaires when they went public.
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That money is already spilling back into startups. At least 147 companies have been founded by former SpaceX employees, and thousands more now have the capital to start companies or write angel checks.
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There is a familiar precedent. Elon Musk launched SpaceX after PayPal sold to eBay for $1.5B. The group that emerged from PayPal later built companies including LinkedIn and Palantir, while also creating Founders Fund.
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SpaceX generated $18.7B in 2025 revenue, up 305% in 3 years. Its IPO may end up doing more than creating liquidity for shareholders. It could seed a new generation of founders and early-stage investors across Silicon Valley.

✔️ @venture

💰 Trump is selling faster access to his market-moving posts for up to $100K a month
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Trump Media's Truth API gives paying customers access to machine-readable Truth Social posts within milliseconds. Contracts reportedly cost $60,000 to $100,000 per month, and more than 10 customers have already signed up.
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The customers reportedly include financial news outlets and high-frequency trading firms. The appeal is obvious: Trump regularly uses Truth Social for announcements on tariffs and government policy that can move markets.
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Now The Intercept and Freedom of the Press Foundation are suing, arguing that the service gives paying subscribers preferential access to public government information while Trump remains the largest shareholder of Trump Media.
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When milliseconds can matter to a trading algorithm, early access to a presidential post becomes a product worth $100K a month.

✔️ @venture

🤖 Anthropic’s Shadow Power: Who Is Kemi Clark?

The WSJ reveals Kemi Clark as a behind-the-scenes influencer at Anthropic, negotiating with investors and shaping decisions without a formal role.

Little is known about Clark. Even Google and Claude can’t clarify her position. Information about her appears deliberately erased.

About a decade ago, she sought investment from convicted Jeffrey Epstein for her startup and met Google CEO Eric Schmidt, who later invested early in Anthropic. She reportedly introduced Schmidt to Dario Amodei.

Clark tried to start an internal fund called Mother of AGI Fund at Anthropic, but it never launched. The article comes as the company nears its IPO.

✔️ @venture

The world’s best investors just revealed what they were buying.

And some of the moves are wild:

🖱 Berkshire added ~$17 BILLION of Alphabet
🖱 Ackman sold Alphabet completely
🖱 4 different investors bought Uber
🖱 2 bought a stock down 53%
🖱 11 bought Amazon

✔️ @venture

If you invested $10,000 in $BYND 7 years ago you'd have $20 left today.

Beyond Meat is now down 99.8% from its All time high.

✔️ @venture

🤖 AI pricing meets capex math

OpenAI cut GPT-5.6 Luna by 80%, from $1 to $0.20 per 1 million input tokens. Anthropic launched Claude Opus 5 at half the price of its top model.

Across leading US models, prices are down almost 25% since mid-July. Chinese open models are forcing the move, with DeepSeek V4 Flash matching OpenAI's Luna on performance at half the cost per task.

Customers are already acting on it. DoorDash and Airbnb have switched to cut their AI bills.

The valuation issue is simple. AI companies are expected to eventually charge enough to cover what they are spending. Nvidia alone just arranged $500 billion in financing for AI infrastructure.

Prices falling 80% in a month do not support that math. OpenAI and Anthropic are planning IPOs at trillion-dollar valuations while cutting prices.

✔️ @venture

🔍 Investor filings split on Alphabet

Recent filings show split positioning among large investors: Berkshire added about $17 billion of Alphabet, while Ackman exited Alphabet completely.

Uber drew buys from 4 investors, Amazon from 11, and 2 investors bought a stock down 53%.

✔️ @venture

The 5 deadly sins of an investor

🖱️ Waiting for the next crash to invest
🖱️ Emotional-based decision making
🖱️ Trading too much
🖱️ Trimming winners to buy more losers
🖱️ Chasing the next big thing

✔️ @venture

🔠 AI capex turns contracted

The AI buildout already has about $3.2T of commitments locked in, making it look less discretionary than a normal capex cycle.

🖱️ $GOOGL, $946B, up 116% QoQ.
🖱️ $META, $731B, up 59% QoQ.
🖱️ $MSFT, $672B, up 50% QoQ.
🖱️ $AMZN, $453B, up 13% QoQ.
🖱️ $ORCL, $349B, up 16% QoQ.

Hyperscalers are securing compute, power and infrastructure years in advance.

The supply chain is starting to look like a multi-year contracted buildout.

✔️ @venture

⚖️SEC Proposes First Crypto Rulebook

🖱️ Projects can raise up to $75 million a year without registering as securities.

🖱️ A separate one-time exemption allows up to $5 million over four years.

🖱️ A token stops being a security once the team completes what it promised to build.

🖱️ State securities rules are overridden for these offerings.

🖱️ Projects still have to disclose key information to investors.

🖱️ The public comment period runs for 60 days.

✔️ @venture

📺 YouTube Eyes $1B NBA Deal

YouTube is in advanced talks on an NBA streaming deal worth more than $1B from the 2027-28 season.

It could combine local broadcasts for at least 25 teams in one hub. The NBA reportedly seeks up to $1.2B.

✔️ @venture

Google went public 22 years ago today at a $23B valuation.

It is up 18,161% since.

✔️ @venture

🧬 Moderna’s Personalized Cancer Vaccine

In a Phase 3 trial, Moderna’s personalized mRNA vaccine intismeran, combined with Merck’s Keytruda, extended recurrence-free and distant metastasis-free survival in high-risk melanoma patients after surgery. Moderna shares surged.

The vaccine targets each tumor’s neoantigens. It is the first successful late-stage trial for an individualized mRNA cancer therapy.

✔️ @venture

“We all sit in the shade of trees that were planted by others. So it’s obligatory, I think, to plant a few trees ourselves, if we’ve had good luck.”

Warren Buffett

✔️ @venture

“Intelligent people make decisions based on opportunity costs.”

Charlie Munger

✔️ @venture