Nov 6, 2021 · 1h 30m · allin
E54: Spread trading big tech, capital allocation, Zillow's misfire, Progressives suffer losses
Chamath Palihapitiya · 27m spoken David Sacks · 20m spoken David Friedberg · 17m spoken Jason Calacanis · 14m spoken
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
In Episode 54 of the All-In Podcast, the hosts discuss mega-cap tech spread trading, venture capital structures, Zillow's iBuyer collapse, 2021 election outcomes, educational reform debates, and scientific breakthroughs in carbon capture.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. The hosts hold 99.4% of the talking time here. How this is scored →
The hosts as informed peer 6.8 Guest teaching 2.2 Guest disagreement 3.6 The hosts pushing back 3.4
speaking balance: gold is the hosts, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 44:36 Sacks berates JCal over episode topics
Sacks forcefully snaps at JCal for wasting an hour on DAOs and corporate stories rather than key political news affecting ordinary Americans.
Hardest push from the hosts ▶ 15:39 Chamath rejects JCal's Airbnb trade suggestionChamath flatly refuses JCal's proposed spread trade comparing Airbnb to airlines, calling it a stupid idea between uncorrelated companies.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 1:16:45 Friedberg details CO2-to-starch bioengineering mathFriedberg educates the panel on artificial enzyme CO2 synthesis, calculating that a 25-by-25 mile tank array could offset global emissions and replace US corn yields.
The host holds their own ▶ 8:23 Chamath explains risk parity and big tech spread tradingChamath demonstrates deep market knowledge detailing long Google/Microsoft and short Meta/Apple spread trading strategies to neutralize market volatility.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | The hosts as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | The hosts pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| All-In Podcast Title Sequence | 2 | 1 | 2 | 2 | The hosts joke about pronouns, physical descriptions, and Microsoft's woke corporate presentation style. The discussion is purely comedic banter with minimal technical depth. | |
| Spread Trading Big Tech and Risk Parity Market Strategies | 8 | 3 | 4 | 5 | Chamath demonstrates high expertise outlining big tech spread trades and risk parity strategies. When JCal proposes a spread trade between Airbnb and airlines, Chamath sharply rejects it as a bad, non-correlated idea. | |
| Bird Goes Public on NYSE and Early VC Investment Insights | 7 | 1 | 1 | 1 | Sacks details Bird going public via SPAC on the NYSE and explains their financial recovery post-COVID using the fleet manager model. The conversation is collaborative and informative with no friction. | |
| VC Fund Structures, Sequoia Fund, and Permanent Capital Models | 8 | 2 | 3 | 3 | Chamath and Friedberg analyze venture fund dynamics, Sequoia's evergreen model, and permanent capital structures. The exchange is constructive with participants sharing nuanced VC investment philosophy. | |
| Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs) and Web3 Infrastructure | 7 | 2 | 3 | 3 | JCal raises DAOs as a new capital model, but Sacks dismisses their current real-world applicability for VC investing. Chamath provides detailed tech insight comparing Web3 plumbing to early Web1/Web2 OSI layers. | |
| Zillow's iBuyer Collapse vs. Opendoor's Algorithmic Model | 8 | 3 | 9 | 6 | Chamath and Friedberg unpack why Zillow's iBuyer model failed due to faulty Zestimate pricing and poor margins compared to Opendoor. Sacks then explodes in intense frustration, cursing at JCal for wasting an hour on esoteric business topics instead of major political news. | |
| Analysis of 2021 Election Results and Progressive Losses | 7 | 2 | 4 | 3 | Sacks outlines the 2021 election wave against progressive policies, citing Glenn Youngkin's victory in Virginia and moderate wins in Seattle and Minneapolis. Chamath agrees, emphasizing that voters rejected policy extremism in favor of moderation and safety. | |
| California Math Framework, Detracking, and Education Reforms | 7 | 3 | 6 | 6 | The group debates California's proposed math curriculum changes and detracking. Friedberg argues that removing tracking harms exceptionalism, while Sacks and JCal clash on how to handle educational disparities without removing advanced programs. | |
| Polarization Chart Analysis and Democratic Party Realignment | 7 | 2 | 3 | 3 | Sacks presents a political chart tracking party shifts away from the median voter since 1994, arguing the Democrats moved further left than Republicans moved right. Chamath and JCal agree on the strategic need for Democrats to appeal to center voters. | |
| Chinese Breakthrough in Converting CO2 into Starch | 9 | 4 | 2 | 2 | Friedberg presents a detailed scientific breakdown of a Chinese study converting CO2 into starch via cell-free enzyme systems. He performs back-of-the-envelope calculations showing how a 25x25 mile facility could theoretically capture global CO2 emissions and replace corn production. | |
| Elon Musk Challenges UN World Food Program on Twitter | 5 | 1 | 3 | 3 | Chamath retells Elon Musk's viral Twitter interaction challenging the UN World Food Program to provide a detailed open-source plan to end world hunger. The group laughs at the UN official's inability to deliver a real plan. |
Statements from this episode (23)
Sacks: Microsoft's presenter introductions reflect woke capitalism out of control
“So, look, this is just woke capitalism. This is wokeism out of control.”
Palihapitiya is long Microsoft and Google, short rest of big tech
“I'm still long Microsoft and Google and short the rest of big tech, so I'm fine with it.”
Palihapitiya: Distribution and bundling overpower superior software features
“When you have a massive distribution advantage, feature parity is enough, and you can actually be slightly less than good enough on the features because distribution and bundling and packaging overpower a customer's desire to adopt a product.”
Palihapitiya: Microsoft entering Notion's market will succeed with 80% feature parity
“This past week, Microsoft decided to go after Notion, and it's going to be, I think, a very similar story where, you know, once they decide to sort of go after this product experience, they only need to be 80% as good. And then the distribution and bundling an…”
Sacks: Bird hit $60M revenue in Q2 2021 near profitability
“In Q two, they just did sixty million in revenue in the last quarter. And I think it was a gross profit of something like 27%. And it was, had a loss of like twelve million. So they're very, very close to getting to profitability.”
Chamath: VC investors struggle to context switch to managing public equity
“The hardest thing I think that Sequoia is going to find in this new iteration is at some point, somebody's reputation will be on the line for judging public equities. And it's still not clear to me that people who live and breathe venture can context switch we…”
Friedberg: Sequoia Heritage Fund was funded exclusively by GP capital
“They set up the Heritage Fund, and they set it up with only GP's money. It's got billions under management, and it's been making late stage private, but mostly public equity investing.”
Chamath: LPs should pull capital rather than let Sequoia hold public stock
“If I was an LP of Sequoia, I would want the money back. And the reason is I'm not sure that Sequoia can compound money in the public markets anywhere near what I could.”
Chamath: John Doerr never sold distributed Amazon shares
“He had never sold a single share of Amazon that was distributed to him, and he had only sold a handful of shares of Google only to fund future capital requirements at Kleiner at the time.”
Sacks: DAOs have not yet proven effective as venture fund managers
“We talked about these things as if they already are here, and they're not quite here. I mean, technically, I know they exist, but people haven't really figured out how to Use them to, you know, to be a fund manager, for example.”
Chamath: Web3 will alternate between consumer apps and tech infrastructure
“So we're in that world where it's going to be a little back and forth where the pendulum will swing back and forth between consumer experiences that capture imagination, get to some level of scale, but then create incentives for the developer ecosystem and the…”
Chamath Palihapitiya owns 3% to 4% of Opendoor
“I am one of the largest individual shareholders of that company. I think somewhere between three and four percent of the business I own.”
Chamath: Policy extremism cannot sustain long-term electoral success
“Now what we're realizing is the different form of extremism, which is policy extremism will also be met with the same response, which is that you can't sustain election results and wins, right?”
Friedberg: Limiting performance outcomes moves the whole distribution curve downward
“As soon as we try and limit the difference in that distribution we move the entire curve to the left.”
Sacks: The public school system is the primary cause of structural racism
“Look, I mean, if you're going to define structural racism as conditions that, that trap people of color in poverty across generations, which seems like a pretty fair definition, then you have to say the number one cause of structural racism is the school syste…”
Sacks: 55% of Hispanic voters in Virginia voted for Glenn Youngkin
“By the way, 55% of Hispanics in Virginia voted for Youngkin.”
Sacks: Minority voters are shifting toward supporting charters and school choice
“So minorities are shifting on this issue of charters and school choice.”
Sacks: The 2020s could be a Republican decade politically
“I think this could be a Republican decade.”
Sacks: Federal infrastructure bill will sail through post-2021 elections
“I think what's going to happen in the wake of this election is that this infrastructure bill is going to sail through because one of the crazier things that the progressives were doing was holding that bill hostage.”
Sacks: Democrats will lose 40 to 50 seats in 2022 midterms
“You're going to see. 40 to 50 seat losses by the Democrats in 2022.”
Friedberg: Chinese enzymatic CO2-to-starch process is 10x faster than corn
“And the system basically converts that carbon dioxide into starch, which is being done at a rate that's almost 10 times higher than what we see with corn plants.”