[trading places]

xAI SpaceX merger, LatAm 2026 IPOs, Anurag Chandra wisdom from managing pension funds & FOs | Ep22

February 4, 2026

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  • Rumors suggest Elon Musk is exploring a merger of SpaceX, Tesla, and xAI into "Elon Inc" as a potential path to an IPO, despite potential shareholder dilution concerns. 
  • SaaS company valuation multiples have dropped to a 10-year low (around 4.1x), emphasizing that demonstrable growth (above 15-22% YoY) is now critical for maintaining premium valuations. 
  • Investor Anurag Chandra emphasizes that understanding an entity's risk budget and time horizon is the fundamental starting point for any capital allocation decision, regardless of fund size. 
  • International allocators are increasingly looking to invest capital away from the United States due to concerns over U.S. trade policy and macroeconomic stewardship. 
  • Latin American venture capital exits are a proven market, with the next wave of potential US IPOs expected to include companies like Agibank, WellHub, and RAPI, primarily originating from Brazil. 
  • LATAM company valuations show a convergence toward US multiples as companies mature, though early-stage investments capture a larger discount, and sectors like e-commerce (Mercado Libre) can trade better than US peers, while digital banks start with lower multiples. 

Segments

Elon Inc Merger Rumors
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(00:01:03)
  • Key Takeaway: SpaceX merger with Tesla and/or xAI is rumored as a path to public listing for SpaceX.
  • Summary: The rumor suggests a merger of SpaceX, Tesla, and xAI into a single entity, dubbed ‘Elon Inc.’ This follows Elon Musk’s history of merging companies, such as Tesla acquiring Solar City. The rationale may involve consolidating revenue streams from SpaceX/Tesla with AI capabilities from xAI.
Anthropic’s Massive Private Raise
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(00:06:12)
  • Key Takeaway: Anthropic doubled its private fundraising target to $20 billion at a $350 billion valuation, indicating strong investor demand.
  • Summary: Anthropic’s private raise is reportedly six times oversubscribed, attracting A-plus investors like GIC, CO2, and Sequoia. The company is parallel tracking a private raise and an IPO, likely aiming to beat OpenAI to the public markets for better capital access. Anthropic’s story appears less of a stretch than OpenAI’s valuation, given its improving revenue and financials.
OpenAI IPO Timing and Valuation
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(00:08:16)
  • Key Takeaway: OpenAI is signaling a Q4 IPO while simultaneously raising private capital at an $800 billion valuation, potentially anchoring future public pricing.
  • Summary: OpenAI is reportedly targeting a Q4 IPO but may opt to stay private if favorable private terms are available, potentially raising more than Alibaba’s IPO amount privately. The strategy involves announcing an exorbitant IPO valuation ($750B-$800B) while raising private rounds at half that price, effectively anchoring the valuation floor. NVIDIA, Microsoft, and Amazon are involved in discussions for a potential $60 billion private investment.
Ethos Technologies Underwhelming IPO
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(00:12:25)
  • Key Takeaway: Ethos Technologies’ $1.2 billion IPO traded down 11% on its first day, reflecting a sub-scale offering for major institutional investors.
  • Summary: Ethos Technologies, an insurance marketplace platform, raised $200 million at a $1.2 billion valuation but traded down, ending near a $1 billion market cap. The company generated $344 million in LTM revenue but the offering size was too small for large IPO investors to meaningfully participate. The performance suggests that even modestly profitable companies need significant scale to command strong public market debuts.
SaaS Multiples Hit Decade Low
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(00:13:55)
  • Key Takeaway: The median SaaS multiple has fallen to 4.1x revenue, a level last seen during the 2016 crash, punishing slow growth.
  • Summary: SaaS valuations have dropped 70-80% from their 2021 peak, with the median multiple hitting 4.1x. Companies growing over 22% YoY maintain a 12x multiple, while those growing 15-22% see a 7x multiple. If growth falls below 15%, the market is extremely punitive, especially as AI sucks capital away from the sector.
Kevin Warsh as Potential Fed Chair
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(00:16:03)
  • Key Takeaway: Kevin Warsh, a former Fed governor and critic of easy money, is a favored pick for a potential Trump-appointed Fed Chair.
  • Summary: Warsh is viewed as an inflation hawk and a rules-based figure, contrasting with Ben Bernanke’s quantitative easing approach, which Warsh dissented against in 2010. His center-right policy alignment on deregulation and taxes appeals to Trump, but his market credibility suggests he won’t solely follow presidential directives. The market reacted favorably to his potential nomination.
Waymo’s High Valuation and ARR
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(00:19:04)
  • Key Takeaway: Waymo raised $16 billion at a $110 billion valuation, supported by $350 million in ARR, translating to a revenue multiple near 300x.
  • Summary: Waymo’s valuation is supported by its $350 million ARR run rate and increased deployment across major cities, suggesting they are ahead of prior monetization plans. Despite the high multiple, the expectation is that rapid scaling will drive revenue into the billions, justifying the current premium. The funding round included significant participation from its owner, Alphabet, alongside new investors.
Social Media Addiction Lawsuit Implications
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(00:21:37)
  • Key Takeaway: The ongoing social media addiction lawsuits set a precedent that could impose significant liability on product managers for intentionally addictive features.
  • Summary: Hundreds of parents are suing social media companies, claiming products are intentionally addictive and harmful, requiring proof of duty of care breach causing harm. If juries find features like infinite scroll or autoplay harmful, it puts every app developer on notice regarding potential liability. TikTok and Snapchat have settled, but Instagram, Google, and Facebook are proceeding to trial.
Maltbook and Swarm AI Emergence
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(00:24:11)
  • Key Takeaway: Maltbook, a social network for AI agents, is experiencing viral growth, signaling a shift toward agent-to-agent interaction and ‘swarm AI’ intelligence.
  • Summary: Maltbook was reportedly developed entirely by an AI agent in one week, attracting hundreds of thousands of agents and tens of thousands of human observers. This platform highlights the transition from LLMs (chatbots) to powerful AI agents capable of performing tasks on users’ behalf. The rapid interaction and mutation among agents suggest a new, potentially unpredictable, phase of AI evolution.
2026: The Year of the AI Agent
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(00:29:25)
  • Key Takeaway: The speaker predicts 2026 will be the year of the AI agent, leading to massive productivity gains as these ‘super workers’ become mainstream.
  • Summary: Following the year of the LLM (2025), 2026 is forecasted to feature major players creating AI agents that work autonomously for users. Tesla’s pivot to focus on Optimus robotics aligns with this trend, suggesting a future where AI agency is embodied or deeply integrated into workflows. This shift is expected to drive significant productivity improvements, assuming security concerns are managed.
Allocator Mindset: Risk and Horizon
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(00:33:42)
  • Key Takeaway: Capital allocators must define their risk budget and time horizon first, which dictates the investment palette available, from basic ETFs to direct company acquisition.
  • Summary: The framework for allocation is consistent whether managing a small portfolio or a $100 billion sovereign wealth fund: define horizon and risk profile. Pensions, often underfunded, must balance the need for aggressive returns to close funding gaps against the fiduciary commitment to making scheduled payments. This requires rigorous stochastic modeling to justify taking on higher volatility in growth assets.
San Jose Pension Strategy
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(00:39:03)
  • Key Takeaway: The San Jose pension system prioritizes small, niche managers in alternatives (4-5% VC, 10% Buyout) to generate alpha, leveraging its ‘small but mighty’ AUM advantage.
  • Summary: The $10 billion system avoids the large check sizes required by mega-funds, preferring niche PE/VC managers under $300 million for outsized returns. They actively re-risked the portfolio post-2019, capitalizing on the March 2020 market crash, which resulted in top national performance that year. Governance and institutionalizing practices are seen as more critical to long-term success than individual manager genius.
Incentives and Governance Endurance
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(00:44:36)
  • Key Takeaway: Institutionalizing practices and aligning incentives for long-term value creation is extremely difficult in public pension systems due to short-term job preservation pressures.
  • Summary: The speaker, retiring in 2026, notes that pension investment officers often focus on job preservation rather than maximizing long-term venture returns (e.g., aiming for 5X). Unlike private funds incentivized by carry, public fiduciaries lack strong incentive structures to take calculated risks during market downturns. Enduring positive practices relies heavily on culture and personal obligation rather than hard compensation structures.
Secondary Market Dynamics
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(00:52:06)
  • Key Takeaway: The secondary market offers opportunities to acquire fundamentally sound assets from LPs needing liquidity, allowing buyers to achieve growth-like returns in a compressed timeframe.
  • Summary: Secondaries are attractive when good assets have owners needing liquidity due to time horizon constraints or LP cash flow needs. Diligence on underlying assets is paramount, as the market currently has more supply than capital, making deal flow and asset understanding crucial for buyers. For smaller managers, locking in 10X DPI early is beneficial for future fundraising success.
Long-Term Outlook and Macro Concerns
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(00:57:37)
  • Key Takeaway: The speaker remains bullish on innovation (AI, robotics) but is deeply concerned about US macroeconomic stewardship potentially slowing crucial international capital inflows.
  • Summary: The speaker is energized by advising AI companies and believes the current innovation cycle will generate Internet 1.0 level wealth over 10-15 years. However, he worries that current US trade and macroeconomic policies risk eroding the nation’s reserve currency status. This concern is shared by international allocators who are actively looking to diversify investment away from the United States.
Macro Concerns and Capital Flows
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(00:58:47)
  • Key Takeaway: U.S. macroeconomic stewardship is causing international allocators to actively seek investment opportunities outside the United States.
  • Summary: Concerns exist regarding the U.S. administration’s trade policy and macroeconomic stewardship, leading international allocators representing trillions of dollars to desire moving capital away from the U.S. The speaker worries that capital inflows supporting the trade balance may slow or stop due to the exploitation of reserve currency status. The persistence of Silicon Valley’s warp-speed innovation rate versus global ecosystems remains an open question.
LATAM Exit Market Provenance
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(01:01:38)
  • Key Takeaway: Latin America is a proven exit market demonstrated by major IPOs and strategic M&A activity over the last decade.
  • Summary: The Latin American exit market is proven, evidenced by billion-dollar IPOs like Mercado Libre and Nubank, alongside strategic acquisitions by global players such as Visa, Uber, and Okta. The focus has shifted from whether LATAM can produce big outcomes to identifying the next successful companies and the required conditions for their success. PicPay’s recent IPO is expected to open the window for other Brazilian companies like Agibank and AffinTech.
LATAM Unicorn Quality and Opportunities
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(01:03:43)
  • Key Takeaway: Of the approximately 40 LATAM unicorns, only one-third are performing extremely well, creating buying opportunities in tier-two companies trading below global benchmarks.
  • Summary: LATAM unicorns are unevenly distributed in quality, with roughly one-third struggling, one-third surviving, and one-third performing very well. The next wave of potential IPOs includes Agibank, WellHub, and RAPI, with a prediction of at least five US IPOs and five M&A exits over $1 billion in the next three years. The opportunity lies in tier-two companies that are consolidated and near-profitable but still priced below global peers.
Valuation Convergence and Sector Focus
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(01:07:10)
  • Key Takeaway: LATAM valuations converge with US levels closer to IPO, and while FinTech remains dominant, B2B SaaS and logistics offer strong emerging opportunities.
  • Summary: Early-stage LATAM companies trade at significant discounts (up to 3x lower) compared to the US, but multiples converge with US levels in growth stages as quality and regional uncertainty diminish. E-commerce multiples can exceed US peers, while digital banks start with lower multiples. Beyond FinTech, B2B SaaS (like the acquired Alf0) and logistics companies addressing ’tropical problems’ are highlighted as high-potential sectors.
PicPay IPO and PIX Impact
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(01:11:44)
  • Key Takeaway: PicPay’s successful IPO, despite past ownership scandals, was heavily enabled by the rapid, government-backed adoption of the PIX payment system in Brazil.
  • Summary: PicPay, which finally IPO’d after four years of trying, has 42 million active users and is expanding into a full digital banking ecosystem. The adoption of PIX, a central bank development, was the main factor enabling the scale and growth of fintechs like PicPay. The resilience shown by the company proceeding despite past corruption issues involving its controlling family signals institutional strength in Brazil’s financial policy.