E132: SEC goes after crypto giants, Sequoia splits, LIV/PGA, Messi's deal + LIVE Q&A!

1. 0:00 – 1:48

   Bestie intros!

   1. DFDavid Friedberg0:00

      Hey, everybody. Welcome to the All-In Podcast. I'm your moderator for the week, Dave Friedberg, not the world's greatest moderator. This show is going to be a bit of a shortened version. At the backend of the pod today, we actually are gonna show some Q&A from Jason's launch summit, which he held in Napa Valley this week. Great event. Thanks for having us up there, J-Cal.

   2. JCJason Calacanis0:22

      Thanks for coming.

   3. DFDavid Friedberg0:23

      Great speakers, great content, and we did a live Q&A for the All-In pod with the audience there, which we'll transition to about halfway through- through the show today. J-Cal, thanks for your hospitality.

   4. JCJason Calacanis0:36

      Oh. Yeah.

   5. DFDavid Friedberg0:37

      Thanks for throwing the-

   6. JCJason Calacanis0:38

      Thanks for coming.

   7. DFDavid Friedberg0:38

      ... the fun birthday party, the poker night. We had a great time.

   8. DSDavid Sacks0:42

      I still don't know what I was doing there.

   9. CPChamath Palihapitiya0:43

      You were meeting some of your LPs- (laughs)

   10. JCJason Calacanis0:45

       (laughs)

   11. CPChamath Palihapitiya0:45

       ... who you'd never met before. (laughs)

   12. DSDavid Sacks0:46

       It was like a dog and pony show. J-Cal was using us as some sort of-

   13. CPChamath Palihapitiya0:50

       (laughs)

   14. DSDavid Sacks0:50

       ... dog and pony show to raise money.

   15. DFDavid Friedberg0:51

       Sacks, did you really have LPs there that you had never met?

   16. DSDavid Sacks0:54

       No.

   17. CPChamath Palihapitiya0:55

       Yes. (laughs)

   18. DSDavid Sacks0:56

       Hold on a second. I had one LP there who I have definitely met many times before.

   19. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:00

       Okay. She told us she'd never met you. She wanted an introduction.

   20. DFDavid Friedberg1:02

       (laughs)

   21. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:03

       So, maybe she's getting into the spirit of All-In and joking with you, but you had a three-hour meeting with one of your LPs. At least I heard. She talked about it the next day.

   22. DSDavid Sacks1:09

       I did, for a while, yeah. Yeah.

   23. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:10

       Yeah, she said she had, like, two or three hours with you.

   24. DFDavid Friedberg1:11

       Chamath, are you with us today? What's going on?

   25. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:12

       You there, buddy? Chamath was very drunk, by the way. He brought up his own wine. He started margaritas at two o'clock.

   26. DFDavid Friedberg1:17

       He showed up dr-... Well, he was drunk by the time we got there.

   27. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:19

       What?

   28. DFDavid Friedberg1:19

       He- he showed up at, like,-

   29. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:20

       Day drinking Chamath?

   30. DFDavid Friedberg1:21

       ... 2:00 in the afternoon. He was day drinking margaritas in the sun.
2. 1:48 – 7:52

   Why RFK Jr. is resonating

   1. NANarrator1:48

   2. JCJason Calacanis1:48

      You know, by the way, politics is one of these incredible things where you see the meanest people come out of the woodwork when you even feign support for somebody that they don't support.

   3. CPChamath Palihapitiya2:01

      Mm.

   4. JCJason Calacanis2:01

      Now that it's out there that Sacks and I are doing this fundraiser for RFK.

   5. CPChamath Palihapitiya2:06

      Oh, yeah?

   6. JCJason Calacanis2:06

      If you look at Twitter, some of, like, the- the Democratic surrogates are out just smacking me and Sacks around, and-

   7. CPChamath Palihapitiya2:17

      Ah.

   8. JCJason Calacanis2:17

      ... it's incredible because-

   9. DSDavid Sacks2:19

      Welcome to my world.

   10. JCJason Calacanis2:19

       ... these people are, like, the biggest-

   11. CPChamath Palihapitiya2:21

       (laughs)

   12. JCJason Calacanis2:21

       ... imposter loser clowns.

   13. DSDavid Sacks2:24

       (laughs)

   14. DFDavid Friedberg2:24

       Ooh.

   15. JCJason Calacanis2:24

       They've never literally done anything in their whole life, and then they show up and then they just, like, "How dare you work and help build a company? How dare you help build another company?"

   16. CPChamath Palihapitiya2:34

       (laughs)

   17. DFDavid Friedberg2:35

       (laughs)

   18. JCJason Calacanis2:35

       (laughs) "How dare you help now fund other companies? I am a talking mouthpiece who's never done anything except work in one administration as a speech writer. And now I think you guys suck balls." It's like, give me a break.

   19. DFDavid Friedberg2:47

       So, you- are you a little, kind of, emotional about that today, Chamath?

   20. JCJason Calacanis2:50

       I lo- I actually... I love critiques actually, because I think, like, you can learn a lot from critiques, but then when mids just spew, I just get annoyed. I think mids should not be allowed to talk.

   21. CPChamath Palihapitiya3:02

       Yeah. Well-

   22. JCJason Calacanis3:04

       That's just my thought.

   23. CPChamath Palihapitiya3:04

       There goes half the internet.

   24. DFDavid Friedberg3:06

       Sacks, are your Republican cohort friends upset about you hosting a fundraiser for RFK?

   25. DSDavid Sacks3:13

       I've gotten none of that.

   26. DFDavid Friedberg3:14

       None of that.

   27. CPChamath Palihapitiya3:15

       That's interesting. What's your take on that?

   28. DFDavid Friedberg3:17

       Dude, yeah, do Republicans generally think that it's a good thing if RFK Jr. Gets the Democratic nomination because he will be easily beatable?

   29. DSDavid Sacks3:24

       I don't think they're thinking that way. I think that there's a respect for RFK Jr. among many Republicans because he's speaking out on issues that they care about, like I've talked about.

   30. CPChamath Palihapitiya3:35

       Mm.
3. 7:52 – 26:08

   US crypto crackdown: action against Binance & Coinbase

   1. DFDavid Friedberg7:52

      So this week-

   2. Mm-hmm.

   3. ... the SEC took-

   4. Here we go.

   5. ... serious action against, uh, Binance and Coinbase. You know, pretty significant, pretty loud. SEC filed 13 charges against Binance entities and the founder, CZ. Charges include operating unregistered, uh, securities exchanges, broker-dealers, and clearing agencies, mis- misrepresenting their trading controls and their oversight on the Binance US platform, and the unregistered offer and sale of securities. The next day, they sought a temporary restraining order to freeze Binance's US assets. And then, on Tuesday, the SEC sued Coinbase over their exchange and their staking programs. Stock dropped 12%. The SEC said that the company was operating an unregistered exchange and broker and that 13 of their assets listed on their platform were considered crypto asset securities. Brian Armstrong, obviously has been on the pod several times, said he's not shutting down his staking service and said, "Regarding the SEC complaint against us today, we're proud to represent the industry in court to finally get some clarity around crypto rules." He's generally made the statement that he has tried multiple times to register with- with the SEC. They have not had a mechanism for him to register. They have tried to do everything by the book, and that the SEC approved their IPO filing knowing full well the details of their business and their operating model, and still allowed them to go public on a US securities exchange, despite full knowledge about their business. Chamath, does anything change this week based on the SEC's action or is this just a continuation of, you know, crypto has been rolled back and will continue to roll back here in the US? Or is this something new and a new action and opens up a new front on the, uh, the government versus crypto?

   6. JCJason Calacanis9:43

      It's a good question. I think there's two ways to look at this. One is the conspiracy theorist way, which you see a lot of on Twitter, which is this idea that crypto is making all of these in-roads as a replacement mechanism for fiat currency, and so governments are really now invested in trying to shut it down. I think that's largely untrue. And then there's the more simple basic reality, which is that there was one part of the SEC that frankly didn't do the job that they were supposed to by either allowing a few of these crypto companies or crypto businesses to go public, either as standalone businesses or as part of other businesses, so Coinbase, Robinhood, et cetera. And then there's this part of the enforcement action after this FTX fiasco, which is a lot of CYA, covering your ass by the SEC, especially because it looked like they had some cozy relationships with them. And so they're coming down hard and they're going to go and systematically dismantle the largest actors, and they're going to go through the value chain. So, I think the obvious place that they're looking now are the exchanges. They'll look at the custodial services. They will not approve any ETFs. And then eventually, I do think it trickles into all of the staking services. And eventually, I think it'll touch the venture community and all of those firms and funds that had a huge robust business in staking these crypto projects in order to get coins, like founding coins, and then being able to sell them.

   7. DFDavid Friedberg11:30

      J Cal?

   8. I mean, I've been talking about this since the beginning, 'cause I- I bought Bitcoin and wrote about Bitcoin when it was maybe 25 cents, and, uh, then again when it was a hundred. So I've been following this for a long time, and I think, thinking from first principles, just stepping back for a moment, you know, what we do in technology is fundamentally disruptive if it's at its best, if it's truly gonna be important in the world. And when you hear that word disruption, y- you kind of file it as a buzzword, but what it really means at its core is, like, competition. And it's not just competition disruption. When you say disruption, you're talking about existential competition. Two people go in the ring, one person comes out. Like, somebody's gonna get really fucked up.And if you... People keep bringing up, "Oh, you're an investor at Uber. They broke the rules, they bent the rules." Uber was going against cabs. Airbnb was going against, like, hotels. WeWork was going against, like, long-term real estate leases. When you look at all those disruptive technologies and what they did at their core, they disrupted on behalf of consumers and lowered prices, increased choice, et cetera. When you get crypto, it- the crypto crowd literally said, "We are going to replace fiat currency." Fiat currency is the government. And so my thesis from the beginning was, if the government has a way to stop this, they do not want to be disrupted. Uh, what, what is a government at its core? It's a military, it's a bunch of rules, laws, and it's money. That's the kind of pillars of, of any government's power. We knew the government wasn't gonna give this up. And, you know, they, they effed around and found out. But the truth is the... And, and this is where I have some sympathy for the crypto people, not the people who are just committing crime with the whole way and just dumping these bags on retail, et cetera. But we do wanna have this innovation here. There are some innovative aspects to it. But Gary Gensler said, "Listen, you already have electronic money. It's called money in the United States. We already have these services. You don't need this. Consumers don't need it." And you have to understand the SEC's function in the world to understand why they're taking this action. Their function is to protect investors. Investors lost a bunch of money, therefore they are going to retroactively inflict pain and hold people accountable for their mandate, which is to protect investors. You could have easily resolved this, the SEC, and the companies could have resolved this. The companies could have filed these things as securities and only allowed accredited investors, top 5% of the country of people who make over 200K a year. They didn't do that. They said, "Anybody can buy these." Well, it- that's just not how it works in America, and it should change. I think everybody should be able to buy any security they want in America, just like anybody can go play blackjack. And the easiest solution for this just passed in Congress this week, and it will go to the Senate and, and be a law soon, I think, allowing every American, the other 94%, to take a test and become accredited. If that happens, you take a test just like you take a driver's license test. I know what diversification is. I know how risky these are. Once you take that 50-question test, you become accredited, and then you can buy these coins if you want to. Uh, and that's really the easiest path to resolution here so we don't have Brian Armstrong move his company to the Middle East or, uh, you know, an island in the Caribbean, which is what he's gonna do, I predict. So...

   9. Okay. Well, look, we've seen this bill make its way, I think, through... Is it going to the Senate next or is it...

   10. Going to the Senate, yeah.

   11. Going to the Senate next.

   12. Going to the Senate.

   13. So let's see if it gets done. I think it's a- it's a good point. One thing I'll point out, when individual investors were making money because all of these asset values were inflating, all of the coins were growing and were, were climbing in value, everyone felt good, there was an emergent cry that we all wanna have access to these new instruments, we all have a right to make these investments and to own these assets. And then as the asset values declined and individual investors began losing money, the emergent cry is, where was the government to help save and protect us? And so the SEC, I would argue, was probably a little bit hindered when the market was inflating in being able to step in and take action, because that would have been counter to the cries of the retail market. But as the retail market took their, their hits, the SEC has to step in, and Congress steps in, and everyone starts to say, "It's time to act. We should have acted sooner." And this was, you know, fairly predictable.

   14. DSDavid Sacks15:53

       I think what's happening is more nefarious than that. So the SEC is doing two different things. They're, they're alleging two different kinds of crimes. One set has to do with protecting investors from having their funds stolen on these exchanges, or at least commingled. FTX did that, right? Where they basically took customer deposits and stole them. What Binance is accused of is taking customer deposits, maybe not stealing them, but commingling them with company funds. That should be looked at, and, and I think crypto customers should be protected against that. However, the case against Coinbase, they're alleging a completely different set of facts, which is effectively what Gensler and the SEC are saying is that it is not legal to operate a crypto exchange in the United States. That is what the SEC is saying, because Coinbase has basically done everything right. And I believe that Gensler is far exceeding his authority in stating something like that. It is not up to the chairman of the SEC to say that Americans should not be holding crypto. Why, as a free people, should we not be able to buy crypto if we want to? You know, why shouldn't we be able to buy Bitcoin? Now, maybe you apply rules around accredited investor status, there should be protections against unsophisticated investors buying stuff or getting defrauded. That's fine. That's the framework that Brian Armstrong is asking for. But w- everyone should understand what the SEC is doing right now is basically usurping congressional authority. It should be Congress that makes the law. If Congress wants to ban crypto exchanges in the United States and prevent the citizens of the United States from owning crypto, let Congress do it. It should not be up to Gensler to do that. And the question is, why is Gensler going this far when previously he had relationships in the industry? Apparently, he was a consultant to Binance. And even worse, he was talking to FTX about giving them some special status. And I think the reason is, the, the scuttlebutt is that he has an alliance with Elizabeth Warren. And the rumor is that, you know, she will make him Treasury Secretary if he basically destroys crypto in the US.

   15. DFDavid Friedberg18:00

       Sorry, where is the evidence for that? That's just someone's rumor and speculation?

   16. DSDavid Sacks18:04

       Just the scuttlebutt in the industry.

   17. DFDavid Friedberg18:06

       But, okay, so it's, it's someone-

   18. It's the back channel.

   19. DSDavid Sacks18:09

       The back channel.

   20. DFDavid Friedberg18:09

       So-

   21. This is, in fact, the back channel, but-

   22. DSDavid Sacks18:10

       So, so just to be clear, rumor and innuendo is what you're-

   23. DFDavid Friedberg18:13

       ... say.

   24. DSDavid Sacks18:13

       No, look. What I would say is clear is that Gensler and Elizabeth Warren have an alliance, uh, to destroy crypto in the US. This was speculated about before with Operation Choke Point but now, it's clear. They're trying to shut down-

   25. DFDavid Friedberg18:24

       What is Operation Chokepoint?

   26. Mm.

   27. DSDavid Sacks18:25

       We've talked about it on the show before. It was a series of actions taken-

   28. JCJason Calacanis18:28

       It's what you do when you're in a hotel at night. (laughs)

   29. DFDavid Friedberg18:30

       Oh.

   30. DSDavid Sacks18:32

       (laughs)
4. 26:08 – 41:55

   Sequoia splits into three

   1. DFDavid Friedberg26:08

      I'm gonna move forward to the next topic, which I think is really interesting in the vein of both de-globalization, but also, you know, the scale at, at which venture firms have gotten to. Sequoia decided this week and announced publicly that they're splitting off their China and India/Southeast Asia funds. As you guys obviously know, Sequoia Capital is a venture capital firm. And within that firm, they manage multiple funds. Some of the funds that they've raised and managed have been specifically targeted in China, where they have $56 billion. I don't know if this number is accurate, but that's an incredible number. $56 billion of assets under management focused just in Sequoia China. And then they have a Sequoia India fund, which has, uh, about $4 billion of capital raised in just the last three years. And now they are separating the management company and the oversight of those funds into separate management companies. So Se- Sequoia Capital will no longer oversee those China funds. A new firm has been formed called Sequoia China, that is now owned and run by a separate management team based in China. And Sequoia India is now called Peak 15 Partners, which is owned and operated by a separate team of managers out of India. Roelof Botha will manage the US and European Sequoia Capital. Neil Chen will oversee Sequoia China and-

   2. JCJason Calacanis27:35

      Shen.

   3. DFDavid Friedberg27:36

      ... Shailendra Singh-

   4. JCJason Calacanis27:36

      Shen, Neil Shen.

   5. DFDavid Friedberg27:37

      ... Shen, I'm sorry, Neil Shen and Shailendra Singh will oversee Sequoia India. I guess this is a question of did Sequoia get too big or are they caving to pressure of the political issues arising with having deep relationships and ties with China, or as they have said, a lot of competition between these different portfolios and companies within these portfolios amongst each other? Chamath, what's your read on the action? Is there anything to read into this and anything to extrapolate from it?

   6. JCJason Calacanis28:03

      Well, it's been a parade of missteps for Sequoia in the last couple of years, and I'll let Sequoia figure out who to blame for this. But the reality is, they, I think, felt a lot of FOMO post SoftBank. They raised this large mega fund that kind of straddled all of the sub funds and straddled all of the regions, and so they dangled the carrot of trying to get into the early stage US fund by investing in this big mega fund that also had China and India exposure and growth exposure. Then they tried this like very convoluted evergreen structure right before the market fell apart, where you could basically become a permanent capital vehicle. And as far as I can tell from the outside looking in, it just seems like a tax di- tax play for the GPs to not have to sell and realize capital gains. But that only works when the stock market keeps going up, which it didn't and then it summarily crushed tech stocks 80 or 90%. So that was a misstep. And then when you put all these things together, now that China is contracting, and we've said this before, I think China is largely uninvestable for the next 30 or 40 years. It just makes sense to jettison it. Now, I will say though that Neil Shen is elite if you consider in investing, I would say I have a simple rubric. Anybody who's made more than a billion dollars for themselves as an investor, I consider elite. Neil Shen is elite. And so he'll do just fine running that Sequoia China business. I was surprised about why they would allow India to leave. There's nobody that elite at Sequoia India by that rubric. But India is a country growing at 6% a year. It literally looks like China in 2008 and '09. And so I'm not sure why you would let them leave. I think that you would want to attach them to yourself, because it makes the US business look better, you probably gets differentiated and smoothed out returns. But I think this is a little bit of taking-

   7. DFDavid Friedberg30:15

      What about the point of view of, of competition, Chamath, that there was competition between the, the different portfolio companies?... and it was leading to conflict.

   8. JCJason Calacanis30:23

      No, that's stupid. Th- I mean, that's dumb. That happens in the United States. (laughs) Sequoia has always been known to fund everybody that they think will make money, no matter how much they compete, no matter where they are, so-

   9. DFDavid Friedberg30:33

      It was controversial when they backed y- when they backed YouTube and Moritz was sitting on the board at Google and-

   10. JCJason Calacanis30:38

       Sure. Look, Sequoia, Sequoia as an organization is elite. They're there to make money for their LPs, period, end of story. And so all of the other words that can go in any press release basically, I think, try to hide the fact that this is an organization that's had some missteps. They're not on solid ground. They've lost a lot of money and they're trying to figure out what to do next. I, however, if I was running that organization, would have probably done nothing and just let the dust settle. And I think that all of these actions are too close together and it's a little bit, to me, a flailing in the water. And so I don't think it was a good idea to let India leave. I think it made a ton of sense to cut China, but I think all of this stuff happened, started happening a few years ago, starting with that $8 or $9 billion mega fund that they raised to try to compete with SoftBank.

   11. DFDavid Friedberg31:33

       Sacks, any read on this?

   12. DSDavid Sacks31:35

       Yeah, I mean, I think it's a example, prominent example of decoupling and de- globalization going on. So I agree, we have to treat India and China separately. With respect to China, I just think it's become harder and harder for Americans to do business in China, both because we don't really have the visibility into that system and, uh, there's too much political uncertainty, so kind of to Chamath's point about it being increasingly uninvestable, but I also think that geopolitical concerns. It's just very hard to straddle those concerns now because the geopolitical competition is heating up so much. I think it's investable for people like Neil Shen, who are insiders in that system. So I think, you know, elite Chinese investors can, I'm sure, make money in China over the next few decades, but I think it's just too hard for Americans to figure that out. So I think them parting ways makes a lot of sense. I think it's going to simplify Sequoia's life a lot. India, I, I agree with Chamath that that's sort of a different question because India is going to be a huge growth economy over the next few decades and they are a US ally, so it doesn't pose the same geopolitical risks. But my guess is that it was just kind of unwieldy, that it's too unwieldy to kind of merge funding sources and firm management across two firms that are really pretty different, right? The US Sequoia firm-

   13. DFDavid Friedberg33:01

       Yeah.

   14. DSDavid Sacks33:01

       ... and then this Indian firm. So my, my guess is they just decoupled because it was just getting too hard to manage. And, and if you're an LP, don't you just want the ability to say, "Okay, I'm going to allocate this much money to India and I'm going to allocate this much money to the US"? I think LPs probably like it too.

   15. JCJason Calacanis33:17

       Sequoia China is frankly, over the last 15 or 20 years, as good and probably is numerically better than Sequoia US. So that was an elite organization just by itself. Sequoia India, I don't think has much to talk about. And so maybe what Roelof decided is, "This team is just not very good so we might as well just cut it and we can revisit it later." They probably have some number of years of a non-compete and then they could come back into the market five years with a totally new team, and that may be easier. So it may be easier just to, just-

   16. DSDavid Sacks33:49

       Maybe the team there-

   17. JCJason Calacanis33:49

       I can give you the actual information. (laughs)

   18. DSDavid Sacks33:50

       ... actually wanted to be separate.

   19. DFDavid Friedberg33:51

       (laughs)

   20. DSDavid Sacks33:51

       Look, it's hard to cross returns from two totally different funds, right?

   21. JCJason Calacanis33:56

       Yeah.

   22. DSDavid Sacks33:57

       Because one side, one side's-

   23. JCJason Calacanis33:58

       You're right.

   24. DSDavid Sacks33:58

       ... going to be unhappy with the trade, right?

   25. DFDavid Friedberg34:00

       Yeah, you're right.

   26. JCJason Calacanis34:01

       I can, I, I can give you the-

   27. DFDavid Friedberg34:02

       Jay Kal's got actual information to share?

   28. JCJason Calacanis34:04

       Well, no, I mean, I'm-

   29. DFDavid Friedberg34:05

       Rather than-

   30. JCJason Calacanis34:05

       I have the closest-
5. 41:55 – 56:16

   PGA merges with LIV, Lionel Messi's revolutionary deal with the MLS, Apple, and Adidas

   1. DFDavid Friedberg41:55

      just move on.

   2. JCJason Calacanis41:55

      Well, we agree to disagree sometimes here on The All-In Podcast.

   3. DFDavid Friedberg41:58

      Sure, yeah. (laughs)

   4. DSDavid Sacks41:58

      Exactly.

   5. JCJason Calacanis41:58

      We're gonna move on for our last topic of the day with the, uh, announcement-

   6. DFDavid Friedberg42:02

      Can we talk Messi? Can we talk Messi?

   7. JCJason Calacanis42:04

      No, no, no. We're not g- 'cause we're g- 'cause we're gonna do one last topic, which I think is-

   8. DFDavid Friedberg42:07

      But PGA and Messi go together.

   9. JCJason Calacanis42:08

      Yeah, so let's just talk about the PGA. So-

   10. DFDavid Friedberg42:09

       Let's do Messi and the PGA.

   11. JCJason Calacanis42:11

       No, we don't have time.

   12. DFDavid Friedberg42:12

       Let's do both.

   13. JCJason Calacanis42:12

       Guys, I appreciate the Messi interest, but we're gonna talk about something less messy-

   14. DFDavid Friedberg42:15

       Who the fuck cares about the PGA?

   15. JCJason Calacanis42:15

       ... or even more messy.

   16. DFDavid Friedberg42:17

       Who cares about the PGA? It's golf.

   17. JCJason Calacanis42:17

       So I, I actually think it's pretty interesting for a couple of reasons. So as you guys know, the PGA Tour has been around since 1930. I think the PGA Tour makes $1.6 billion a year, if reports are correct.

   18. DFDavid Friedberg42:30

       I make 1.6 billion a year. Boring.

   19. JCJason Calacanis42:32

       Nice! (laughs) I mean, it depends on the year.

   20. DFDavid Friedberg42:34

       All of the players on the PGA Tour are independent contractors, so Saudi Arabia's public investment fund, a- and this is what I think is one of the more interesting aspects of this story, and maybe speaks to a, a broader kind of set of, uh, geopolitical transitions that are underway, the Saudi Arabian public invention f- uh, uh, Public Investment Fund started LIV Golf as an alternative to the PGA Tour.

   21. JCJason Calacanis43:01

       LIV Golf.

   22. DFDavid Friedberg43:02

       LIV Golf. They invested, uh, $2 billion of, of capital and offered guarantees to golfers to come and get on their tour. They ended up, um, offering, at one point, Tiger Woods reportedly got a $800 million guarantee to join their tour, which he, uh, turned down. Phil Mickelson got a reported $200 million guarantee, which he took to join the tour.

   23. JCJason Calacanis43:25

       Hideki Matsuyama got offered 750K, 750 million-

   24. DFDavid Friedberg43:29

       Yeah.

   25. JCJason Calacanis43:29

       ... which he turned down.

   26. DFDavid Friedberg43:29

       Yeah. 750 million. So seven of the top ten golfers in the world actually signed up and, um, it caused obviously significant disruption to what has effectively been a monopoly, which is the PGA Tour in golf, in professional golf. And, uh, here we are, two years later, and it was announced this week that LIV and PGA are merging. And the current PGA Tour commissioner, Jay Monahan, will serve as CEO of the new entity. Just by way of reference, Jay Monahan makes a reported $14 to $15 million a year in salary as CEO of the PGA Tour. He will now be CEO of this combined organization. One big question mark is how much is he getting paid and did that help secure and solidify this deal getting done? But I think another big question is do we think this will actually close? Will this face regulatory and anti-trust scrutiny? Will this face CFIUS because it is the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund that is effectively taking a large stake in the PGA Tour. Um, let's go to our resident, um, professional sports team owner or former minority owner, Chamath. Any takes on, uh, on this announced merger? What does it say about the PGA's ability to hold action?

   27. JCJason Calacanis44:41

       This is what's so crazy about your topic selection. Messi was offered $1.6 billion personally by the Saudis and you don't wanna talk about that 'cause you wanna talk about a whole organization playing an antiquated sport that itself generates $1.6 billion.

   28. CPChamath Palihapitiya44:56

       (laughs) Welcome to being the moderator. (laughs) Tech moderator topic.

   29. DFDavid Friedberg45:02

       So, so, so what's your point?

   30. CPChamath Palihapitiya45:03

       Welcome to my world. (laughs)
6. 56:16 – 1:02:20

   Ukraine update, Tucker on Twitter

   1. JCJason Calacanis56:16

      All right. Give ... Let's give Sax some red meat here. You, Sax, I'll give you a little red meat. You want Tucker on Twitter. Here's your red meat choices as we wrap. You want Tucker on Twitter, you want a Russian-controlled dam being destroyed for a major flood, or do you want Chris Christie joining the race? Which red meat would you like?

   2. DFDavid Friedberg56:36

      (laughs)

   3. JCJason Calacanis56:36

      Which red meat we put in front of crazy hair?

   4. DSDavid Sacks56:39

      Well, I mean, what's happening in Ukraine is really the big news this week.

   5. DFDavid Friedberg56:42

      Okay. We'll give you a little red meat.

   6. DSDavid Sacks56:43

      I mean, the Ukrainian counteroffensive has-

   7. DFDavid Friedberg56:44

      Tell us.

   8. DSDavid Sacks56:45

      Well, the Ukrainian counteroffensive has started in earnest. And yes, in conjunction with that, you had the destruction of that major dam, which it's not clear who did it. I mean, both sides are pointing the finger at each other. So and there are reasonable arguments for why either side may have done it. In terms of who benefits, it seems to benefit the Ukrainians more because the destruction of the dam washed out a bunch of Russian defensive fortifications and villages of Russian speakers. On the other hand, the Russians were in control of the dam, so it would have been easier for them to carry it out if they had wanted to. We just don't know. But I think, you know, events have now moved beyond that and we are now probably in the third or fourth day of, of the Ukrainian counteroffensive. Of course, it has not been officially declared, but there is major, major fighting happening now where Ukrainian armored divisions are seeking to, you know, penetrate Russian defensive lines around Zaporizhia. And, uh, so the long-awaited, uh, Ukrainian counteroffensive has certainly begun.

   9. DFDavid Friedberg57:51

      Uh, how does the, the dam relate to the Nord Stream pipeline? Because these are both situations where people are like, "Who actually did it? What's their motivation?" And let's face it, these are chaotic actors at times and figuring out who has the motivation to do these things seems like a leveling up kind of game because you can't put it past either party in some cases. But in the case of Nord Stream people saying, "Hey, it was the Ukraine," but then there's this argument that the Ukraine is not capable of doing it or maybe it was sanctioned by the US or the West and then executed by Ukraine. What, w- where do you wind up with all these?

   10. DSDavid Sacks58:27

       So on, on Nord Stream, we're now on our third cover story. The CIA sourcing their stenographers at the Washington Post have now claimed that-

   11. DFDavid Friedberg58:35

       (laughs)

   12. DSDavid Sacks58:35

       ... it was six Ukrainian dudes in a yacht who blew up Nord Stream.

   13. DFDavid Friedberg58:39

       (laughs)

   14. DSDavid Sacks58:41

       No, seriously, and if you look at this boat, I'll, I'll put a photo of the boat on the screen. It's, it's pretty silly.

   15. DFDavid Friedberg58:45

       It's a tender.

   16. DSDavid Sacks58:46

       The, ten cr- Yeah.

   17. DFDavid Friedberg58:47

       It's a tender.

   18. DSDavid Sacks58:47

       The Ukrainians do not have a navy and they certainly don't have Navy SEALs. I don't believe they have the capability to i- it... By the way, the, this destruction of Nord Stream, Nord Stream was this huge underwater steel and concrete structure. It's so-

   19. DFDavid Friedberg59:01

       It's not that deep though, 'cause it's only 150 or 200 feet deep at the lower points and-

   20. DSDavid Sacks59:07

       It's deep enough and it took a lot of explosives, so they had to know-

   21. DFDavid Friedberg59:09

       Yeah.

   22. DSDavid Sacks59:09

       ... what they were doing. So I-

   23. DFDavid Friedberg59:11

       I've d- I dove 120 feet once, so it's, it's not that deep.

   24. DSDavid Sacks59:13

       But the point is that when, when Nord Stream was first destroyed, the media rushed out to say, well, the Russians did it, even though the Russians had no motive to do it. It was their own-

   25. DFDavid Friedberg59:23

       It's their pipeline.

   26. DSDavid Sacks59:24

       It's their pipeline. They could just turn it off if they wanted to. But this is what we hear is that every time something destructive happens, it's the Russians did it. Why would they attack themselves? Because they're so crazy. We heard this with Nord Stream. When Belgorod, which is a Russian district just across the border from Ukraine, was attacked, it was claimed that the Russians did it, these were Russian insurgents. No, that's pretty silly. It was Ukrainians dressed in Russian uniforms. And just recently when there were drone attacks on Moscow, we were also told that, "Oh, it wasn't the Ukrainians who did it, it was Russian dissidents or something," which again, makes no sense. So this is not to say that the Russians didn't blow up that dam, it's just to say that whenever the story is rushed out that the Russians did something highly destructive, you have to ... We, we need to see some evidence here and we just don't know.

   27. DFDavid Friedberg1:00:09

       It's just hard to know. The fog of war is thick.

   28. JCJason Calacanis1:00:13

       All right. What'd you think of Tucker's first show?

   29. DFDavid Friedberg1:00:17

       Oh, it was incredible.

   30. JCJason Calacanis1:00:17

       And he's getting sued but he got ... The tweet got at least like 90 million views, which means the video probably got 10% of that or something. So probably 10 million views.
7. 1:02:20 – 1:15:18

   LIVE Q&A from Angel Summit in Napa!

   1. DFDavid Friedberg1:02:20

      (graphics whooshing)

   2. JCJason Calacanis1:02:21

      All right. Welcome to a baptism.

   3. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:02:25

      (laughing)

   4. JCJason Calacanis1:02:25

      John the Baptist.

   5. DFDavid Friedberg1:02:27

      Are you ready to accept Christ, Freiberg, into your soul?

   6. DSDavid Sacks1:02:32

      I honestly have no idea what I'm doing here.

   7. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:02:34

      (laughing)

   8. DSDavid Sacks1:02:36

      I've... I have no idea who these people are or what this is or why you're all wearing white.

   9. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:02:43

      (laughing)

   10. DSDavid Sacks1:02:43

       I mean, seriously, I'm sure you're very nice people, but I have no idea what this is.

   11. DFDavid Friedberg1:02:48

       Have you seen the Wicker Man?

   12. DSDavid Sacks1:02:49

       J Cal was like, "We're taping an episode in Napa," and I'm like, "What? On a, you know, off day?" Wait, wait, what is this?

   13. JCJason Calacanis1:02:55

       It's Monday.

   14. DFDavid Friedberg1:02:56

       Today's Monday, yeah.

   15. JCJason Calacanis1:02:56

       It's Monday.

   16. DFDavid Friedberg1:02:57

       Are you okay, buddy?

   17. JCJason Calacanis1:02:58

       Yeah.

   18. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:02:59

       (laughing)

   19. DFDavid Friedberg1:02:59

       You low blood sugar?

   20. DSDavid Sacks1:03:00

       Yeah, actually I do... Bring us, like, a cheese plate or something.

   21. DFDavid Friedberg1:03:03

       Can we get a cheese plate?

   22. JCJason Calacanis1:03:03

       Can we get a cheese plate for Sax please?

   23. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:03:04

       (laughing)

   24. DSDavid Sacks1:03:04

       We don't need all this.

   25. JCJason Calacanis1:03:05

       And guacamole and chips.

   26. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:03:07

       (laughing)

   27. JCJason Calacanis1:03:08

       Please.

   28. DSDavid Sacks1:03:08

       But honestly, like, I didn't sign up for this. I thought we-

   29. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:03:12

       (laughing)

   30. DSDavid Sacks1:03:13

       I thought we just agreed to do a podcast and somehow we've been roped into doing some dog and pony show for J Cal's LPs.

Episode duration: 1:42:50