And I said, "Dennis, it's a bubble. How

does it feel to be in a bubble?" Grabbed

my hand and said, "Martin, it feels

better than being outside the bubble."

And I was like, "He's absolutely right.

I have to go into this bubble. I'm in

the wrong side of the table."

>> So, I met Martine through Alex Bearing

at 3G. I try to ask everybody that I

interview, "Who should I do next?" Alex

said, "Martin." I asked why. He said

he's just the most lovable investor that

he's come across.

>> Sometimes we're accused of being

dolphins in a sea of sharks. And I love

to be a dolphin. Who wants to be a

shark? Dolphins have much better life.

>> I think in this conversation you'll see

that Alex is right. Martine has a

refreshingly light, funny attitude and

way about him. He clearly does not take

himself or almost anything too

seriously. and yet has become one of the

most successful private markets

investors now helping run General

Atlantic, one of the story private

equity and growth equity franchises in

the world.

>> Drop down with no equipment other than

the spear. You let little fish go by

because you you're not there to hunt

little fish. You're waiting for the big

fish. I think his life is an adventure

where you can feel him not only getting

better, but at every single moment,

making fun of it and laughing. You'll

hear him and me laugh a lot in this

episode. I wish there was way more of

that in the investing field where so

often it's so serious and so intense.

You can have excellence and laughter at

the same time. And I think Martin and

this conversation is a testament to that

truth.

Alex, who introduced us from 3G, told me

this incredible story about you getting

a job after him telling you no and what

you did to get it. Can you tell that?

Can you tell story?

That's one of the one of one of the good

stories.

>> Coming out of business school,

I need to decide where to live because

I'm from Bolivia. Bolivia is too small.

I was finishing eight years in the US.

US felt too competitive. So I had to

think of somewhere else that had to be

big, not too competitive and have

beautiful people because I was single at

the time. So that was the criteria.

>> So Brazil

>> Brazil end of one Brazil. Uh so I look

at the most exciting jobs in Brazil and

at the time the 3G founders had a

private equity shop which at the time

was the largest private equity shop in

the emerging markets. This is 1997

and one of the partners has recently

graduated from the same school was

coming to town to interview Brazilians

to hire one person. So I was like this

is destiny. This this is for me. So I

reached out to Alex Bing who you know is

now running 3G and it's become a great

friend and I introduced myself. This

Bolivian super smart I really want to

make it in Brazil and I hear you're

doing a dinner. I'd love to come by if

you if you'll have me. And Alex, who's

super smart and tough. He's like,

Martin, we're only hiring one person and

it's not going to be a guy from Bolivia

that doesn't speak Portuguese,

so no, you can't come to my dinner. I

was like, bummer. So that night, I show

up to the dinner, introduce myself as

Martin, and I said, don't worry, I'm not

even going to eat. I just want to listen

to you because I find you interesting.

And I think he was taken back by my

boldness that he did they did interview

me. And um they did hire me, but they

made one condition. I had to take some

Portuguese lessons before I showed up,

you know, 3 months later. And I said,

"I'm happy to do it as long as you pay

for them."

>> Yeah.

>> And that's how I met my wife.

>> She was your teacher.

>> She was my teacher. She was technically

a teacher. The way it really worked is I

called my Brazilian friends and I said,

"Can you find a very smart, very

attractive Brazilian PhD master

somewhere in the Boston area and I have

someone that will pay her to talk to me

and that's I'm still married 25 years

later.

>> What What have you learned from Alex and

from his team?" The founders of 3G, the

original three founders are incredible

people whom I worked with in the

beginning of my career and um I once

wrote a book. This is 2003. The company

I had co-founded uh was was going

through trouble. I took some time off

and I wanted to answer the question of

how does one make money in countries

with so much turbulence. I mean Brazil

Brazil in the 90s and in the first

decade of the of the century was

incredibly turbulent. I mean crisis

after crisis after crisis very hard to

make to create wealth to build companies

with so little. It's like navigating

through the fog.

>> Yeah.

>> You can move very slowly and there's

things that can come at you from

different ways. I partnered with uh this

professor, this mentor of mine from

Harvard College. He was teaching at

Harvard Business School, Don Soul. And

what we did was paired company analysis.

Look at 10 very successful companies in

um in Brazil that had made tremendous

wealth creation in the crazy '90s. But

look at their actions in contrast to 10

much less successful companies during

the same period of time. uh and the test

was these were pairs of companies that

looked similar in size and value at the

beginning of the '90s but by the end of

the '90s one was at least 5x more

valuable than the other. So that was the

control group and that's how we studied

and when one of the companies is the

beer company Brahma that the Georgia Po

Lemon and Marcel Telles and Betto had

bought in 1989

that was competing against the other

bean company called Antarctica that was

owned by the Germans and at a foundation

who in 1989 was a better more profitable

more valuable company. But by a decade

later when these two merged

uh the Brahma shareholders kept 95% of

the equity value.

>> So it was 10x

>> value creation relative to the

comparison twin.

>> How did they do it? They're great spear

fishermen.

You don't chase the fish.

>> You wait.

>> Wait. You well you decide where you're

going to anchor. You drop down with no

equipment other than the spear and you

hold your breath for one minute, for two

minute. You let little fish go by

because you you're not there to hunt

little fish. You're waiting for the big

fish. And then when you're almost

running out of oxygen, you got two or

three seconds to get the big fish and

then go up as you're both feeling the

sort of lack of oxygen, he feeling a

spear through his chest. But it's an

exercise of waiting. Why do they say

these are great spear fishermen? The

step number one of spear fishing is

deciding where you're going to anchor in

looking to buy their beer company. They

started to think about it 5 years before

they were owners of the number one

investment bank in Brazil, Bank of

Guarantia. They were making tons of

money out of volatility and inflation

because you in high inflation periods

you can make a lot of money if you are

smart with math and finance. uh but they

knew inflation would end one day and

they said we want to buy a company that

will benefit from a low inflation rising

consumption.

Beer is one such company. But they

waited five years for this company to

come for sale. And it came for sale

two weeks before an election when the

Swiss owners got scared that a socialist

was going to become president

Lula first time government and he was

from the workers party and they called

them and it says can you do a deal in a

week? We'd like to get out of town. We

don't want to take the risk of a

socialist president. And Georgia have

been waiting for that big fish,

>> for five years, closed the deal in a

week.

>> And then he waited 10 years

till Antarctica was in trouble when a

big devaluation

and closed the deal in three months. And

then he waited another seven years to do

a deal with Interbru. And then the

biggest of all deals waited a following

decade to do a deal with anouser Bush

>> and and basically over this period $80

million initial investment in Brahma

became a $60 billion plus excluding

dividends but they're great fisherman

>> and they wait for the big fish and as a

concept

that is something uh I've learned from

them which is uh every four or five

years there's a once in a generation

opportunity that you have to be ready

and be willing to move quickly to

capture and if you do you can create

disproportionate value for your company

for your investors for your employees

>> do you have a a a story of your own that

is the closest to a great spear fishing

outing

>> I wasn't an entrepreneur I was set out

by these three guys to go and find great

entrepreneurial companies and invest

$500 million in 20 companies. You got 18

months. Go. In month three, I

>> That was your mission. That was

>> That was my mission. That mission number

one out of business school. Now that I

was speaking Portuguese, I could I could

go.

>> And by month three,

>> I remember talking to a buddy of mine

because we were benchmarking different

models and buddy of mine had taken a job

in the US company that went public in

the do era. clearly a bubble being

valued at 20 times revenue which sounds

quaint by today's standards by by 1998

standards

and I said Dennis

it's a bubble how does it feel to be in

a bubble and he said to me grabbed my

hand and said Martin it feels better

than being outside the bubble and I was

like he's absolutely right I have to go

into this bubble I'm in the wrong side

of the

So very quickly left the fund and within

I think three months we had raised $80

million to launch subarino.com

>> uh which was the e-commerce Amazon.com

merged with Alibaba

uh to take on Brazil and that happened

very very quickly. A second time after

we sold my business during the GFC, I I

was working for another fund briefly

and

looking to buy sort of a fixed income

exchange in Brazil which a dominant

platform 80% margin business

a lot of competition and then all of a

sudden the GFC happened and everyone

dropped out everyone and I was like no

you double down and we were able to buy

a market dominant high margin business

that's six times

>> and we did it in two months

>> and people are like what do you mean

you're doing something with the GFC and

I said if we're not willing to buy a

dominant platform a six times ITA

>> we should shut down

>> the world it means the world is ending

and we should the world is not ending a

dominant platform will always be worth

more than six times IA and there's been

you know every every three or four years

there's one such

unique distortion that you have to move

very quickly. That's perhaps one of the

learnings of being an entrepreneur in

the dotcom. Like I'm a rare investor

that has been an operator, but I it's

not just that I was I had been an

operator.

>> What the do taught me and I just

realized this recently. You can do seven

years of work in one year.

>> Say Marvel. What do you mean?

>> Like when you when Elon Musk says, you

know, do your 10ear plan and try to get

it done in one year. Yeah. You're like,

he's like crazy. Yeah.

>> Look what he's built.

>> Yeah.

>> In in the dot, it felt like the world

was on steroids.

>> Like in Sumarino, not only had we raised

$80 million within the first three

months. Within one year, I was in charge

of uh international, we opened Sumarino

in six countries with warehouses and

customers and registrations and teams.

It was done in one year. If you had told

me how long it would take a normal

person to do that, I would say 3 to four

years. going fast and we were like no we

we have to do it like this is a first

first mover will be incredibly valuable

we did it in one year so it's this this

ability to move very very fast to

capture opportunities which are fleeting

which seem humanly impossible are

actually not

>> this seems like a moment of that is

happening maybe on mega steroids you

know I think of a company like cognition

as a recent example that I know well

where the pace of growth of the business

is it's just sort of hard to believe

that it's possible. You know, it's

serving developers. Maybe previously a

company like Stripe, which is one of the

great companies in the US in the

technology world, is a certain size.

It's grown that size over 15 years. And

these things are growing at a pace that

is it's sort of hard to wrap one's head

around. And so I'm curious how you think

about that in the current moment right

now, but also what lessons you learned

about what it takes to go to put a

10-year plan into one year. like what

what is different about the behavior in

that compressed one-year period that

makes that possible?

>> So, this is like my fourth or fifth

bubble and all bubbles are born out of a

a truly transformative

>> technology

>> technology. Yeah.

>> And in all the previous bubbles,

the promise was spectacular. The short

term was disappointing and the long term

delivered more than expected.

>> Yeah. But in that process, a lot of

fortunes were made and destroyed.

>> Yeah.

>> So, um I think as a firm, John Athletic

has been around for 45 years. We try to

make different mistakes

>> in each bubble.

>> And I'm sure we're making

our approach this time,

different from the internet, has been to

be incredibly aggressive at deploying AI

in the portfolio.

>> Yeah.

>> The promise of AI is clear to everyone.

Let's see what's working in the real

world and let's share Brex practices.

And we got incredible scale with over

200 portfolio companies. We have a 100

people in our portfolio support

portfolio operations team. This year

we'll do 500 projects with the

portfolio. A third of them are AI

projects. So we're seeing what works in

the front lines. And as soon as we see a

use case with real ROI and real revenue

to the provider of the service and you

can sort of model what the economics and

the cost to serve and what the long-term

profitability maybe is of this exciting

new market,

>> then we pounce.

>> The first one where we felt that has

happened is code generation.

>> Yeah. Cognition and cursor and

>> and it's just happened right now in the

last 12 months.

>> It's crazy. I mean based on public

information anthropic revenues and

coaching went from 200 million to over 4

billion in 12 months in B2B that kind of

growth has not happened ever ever and

it's so exciting and it's working in

real life and programmers are happy and

then all of a sudden you've got this new

reality where human programmers are

hyperproductive and they're working

alongside agentic programmers who have

no moral northstar and do not sleep. and

how you get them to work together to a

common output which is super sensitive

to you the client who's running on the

software.

>> Yeah,

>> super exciting. That's one area

marketing optimization. Uh obviously

it's it's machine learning on steroids.

Uh we we we we're investors in Liftoff

which is very much on this. We're

investors in a software company called

Insider that does enterprise marketing

optimization. Uh data companies

turbocharged with AI. We're investors in

a Israeli company called VI. There's so

much. It's super exciting. It's super

risky. We're probably going to go look

back and say we weren't bold enough in

going for the killer app soon enough,

but we've been bold enough before and it

didn't pay to go very early. And I think

what's really interesting about GA and

we've been around for 45 years through

all these technological cycles and we've

been international for 30 years. We've

been in the in emerging markets for 25

years. We take on a lot of risk, micro

risk. We take on a lot of technology

risk because we are investing across

what we call 18 power alleys that cut

across five sectors.

Guess what our loss ratio is?

>> Tell me

>> 4%.

>> On capital or on capital

>> on capital on capital. Okay.

um

for this kind of like when in venture

and growth equity loss ratios of 20 to

40% are common but there's something

about the way we deal with risk that

allows us to capture what we think are

reasonably good returns but that's

surprisingly

low risk ratio and it has to do I think

with an appetite for risk uh we don't

take binary risk for us in when we do

the sort of the scenario planning of

three to 1,000 scenarios on one dozen in

mind in one mind like you do when you

think of an investment for us a worst

case scenario a company grows into the

valuation we paid for it

and that limits what you do it limits

the timing of where you go into a new

industry you probably leave some money

on the table but you also leave a lot of

risk on the table and that product of

you know reasonable returns with low

risk

is a great product.

>> I have 95% of my net worth in that

product and I sleep well at night.

>> Yeah.

>> I have a vastly undiversified portfolio

of you know two assets GA. Yeah. And

treasuries.

>> The the the 45 years ago the sort of

origin story of GA itself is so

interesting. Chuck Feny such an

interesting character. How does his

spirit loom in the business and in your

personal consciousness?

>> He's the accidental billionaire. got the

idea of duty-free by looking at naval

bases where commerce was free in the

Pacific during the Korea war. Starts

building these duty-free shops, becomes

a billionaire, sells to Louis Vuitton,

and he's confronted with the question,

what is the purpose of wealth? What do I

do with this wealth? And his answer

resonated really well with me. The

purpose of wealth is to improve the

human condition now, not tomorrow, now.

because the present value of happier

life for more people now is very

valuable. Uh so he wants to give it all

away. Forget giving half away.

>> He's I'm he's like my v my dream is my

last check will bounce. I want to die a

poor man and I want to give it all. Uh

but before I give it all, I believe uh

you can create additional wealth by

investing in innovation, by backing

great entrepreneurs globally. And he

said, you at GA to the original founding

team at GA, go back the world's best

entrepreneurs, be a good partner, and

know that all the proceeds of our work

will go to great causes. And we've been

doing that for 45 years, backing great

innovators

everywhere. We've invested in over 500

companies over the last 45 years. Half

of our investments have been in the

United outside of the United States. And

we've seen the power of innovation to

create wealth uh globally. This is not a

privilege just to US. It's not a

privilege just to European. And this

concept of what is the purpose of wealth

is also meaningful personally. Like I I

I think when I think of the wealth I'm

creating and the people that I work with

are creating, we're all incredibly

thoughtful

of how we allocate our time and wealth

to make the world better and in the ways

that are meaningful to us. And there's

no right and wrong. Uh but I find that

accumulating wealth is a is is makes you

gloated and slow using your body and

your life as a a channel of you know

wealth that comes but goes to places

that can be made better. But it's a

beautiful way to approach life and

particularly if you're in the profession

of allocating other people's wealth into

great innovators. It it all makes sense.

It all fits in internally consistent and

that's why we've been around for 45

years. They're not that many. You can

count them in in both hands. The number

of firms that are investors in tech and

innovation that have been around and

been successful this long. And I think

it has to do with the internally

consistent vision, mission, and plan

that Chuck had for GA.

>> That's not a normal origin story for a

firm like this. Usually, it's a really

just purely commercial enterprise. Some

young investors set off and and build a

firm. Um, this was different. What else

about that founding DNA makes the setup

of the firm unique? How does his

original vision and setup allow you to

act differently than others do today?

>> There's this phrase written into our

founding documents which is we're good

partners to each other

to our founders and to our clients. The

partnership ethos is fundamental. And

when you look at 45 years of references

of 500 people we've 500 companies,

thousands of people we've partnered with

and you say, "What do you think of GA?"

They're good partners. They're good

guys. They're good people. They they say

they do what they say they're going to

do. They put the company's interests

first. Sometimes we're accused of being

dolphins in a sea of sharks. And I love

to be a dolphin. Who wants to be a

shark? Dolphins have much better life.

Uh so I think that's a big part of the

firm's DNA. So I'll give you an example.

I uh I ran our general Atlantics uh

Latin America program for the first

seven eight years of my career at

General Atlantic and in all the due

diligence uh sessions they asked me

what's how did you do it? Yeah. How did

you make money in the one neighborhood

that no one makes money because

no I just I don't go that's part of the

reason but the other reason

is I say the reason we do well in Latin

America is we don't have a Latin America

fund.

>> Ah

>> because if we had a Latin America fund

>> we're going to put money in Latin

America.

>> We're going to buy at the top but sell

at the bottom. H and you know what? If

you want to make money you do the

opposite. You buy at the bottom you say

at the top and they're like oh

interesting. Why doesn't why don't other

people do it? It turns out it's really

hard to do to um

have a team in Latin America or in China

or in India or in Southeast Asia

compete for attention and money through

a Guang Global IC.

It's so hard to do unless your culture

is about partnership. The culture

demands good partnership.

>> Yeah. and the culture expels behavior

that's not consistent with being a good

partner. We're structured in in a way

that first we are the largest investor

in our own product by design. Right now

we have about the employees of General

Athletic have about 8% of the funds we

administer over $5 billion of our own

capital. This does not feel like

managing other people's money. this

feels my day-to-day I'm managing my

family wealth first and foremost and I'm

doing it with care and with intention

and purpose the way we um

fund raise is different also one one of

the problems with the industry is the

fund the five-year fundraising cycle to

to be able to raise your next fund you

have to deploy at a certain speed and

you need to return capital a certain

cadence otherwise you don't get to do

the next fund and if there is that

winter of risk like we've had for the

last three years. Uh you're out of dry

powder exactly at the time that things

are on sale. So the traditional

fundraising cycle fiveyear cycle creates

lots of distortions and pain for our

industry. Uh we have an evergreen a

hybrid evergreen fundraising cycle

meaning yes every two to three years we

have a normal fund. So if you want a

normal fund come to GA every two or

three years perfect but if you're a

large institution and are willing to do

a standard managed account

you can come in anytime and the two

structures invest at same portfolio from

here forward there's never conflict of

mind the legacy but the advantage of

that is there's no fundraising cliffs

we're always fundraising it's always

steady there's no big jumps there's no

pressure to liquidate something to meet

some artificial target that makes our

lives so much easier. And then the the

sort of third component that I think is

distinctive which I hated initially

because uh we have a communist system of

compensation which is you all get a

percent of the total performance not

your individual performance. I was you

kidding me? I'm a spear fisherman.

>> I'm a spear fisherman. I I I got some

big fish left in me. I mean this

communism didn't work in the Soviet

Union. Why is that going? And then I saw

how it changed everything.

in that the level of collaboration is

fantastic. And the way you prevent the

Soviet Union from happening is if you're

not pulling your weight, you're not on

the boat. So, it's a meritocracy in that

you to be in this community where we all

win together and lose together. We all

have to be effective and bringing as

much into the partnership that we're

taking away from it. And that's what

keeps the health and meritocracy of the

system. But there isn't a hyper

incentive to be hyperproductive because

if I'm hyperproductive, I'll make more

wins in that game. No, it's it's it's

much more about winning as a team as

opposed to winning as an individual.

>> The the that dual structure, which is

unusual, you know, not not common. What

are the negatives or tradeoffs

associated with that? Like do the fund

investors get upset that they don't

really know like what percent of the

total they're going to get? There's two

two two very serious trade-offs. First

of all, it takes forever to explain.

>> We'll do it at scale right here. They'll

never have to do anything.

>> And they're like, why do you have two

series and why which one is better?

Which one is worse? I can get it why

this is good for you, but how is it good

for me? So, sort of the on boarding

experience is a painful experience. The

other uh downside is fundraising is a

perpetual activity. Whereas for uh a lot

of my competitors every five years it's

a six-month sprint that all they do is

fund raise and then they can not fund

raise for another four and a half years.

>> It's kind of like binge dieting. You do

it you only do it once every six years.

And for us it's a no-brainer. That's a

structure that leads to more productive

deployment of C. My my friend John Kim

who is a we're very well-known

fundraiser at General Catalyst has this

simple equation which is that persuasion

equals desire minus fear. What have you

learned about fundraising given that

you've had to do it as a firm on a

constant basis?

>> I think most humans go from FOMO to fear

and one of the traps of our industry is

you can only fund raise when things are

very expensive

>> because that's when everyone's on FOMO.

Have you been able to invert that fear

to FOMO problem so that you can if you

have been able to raise some money in

the harder times? What is the key to

doing that? Well,

>> there's always someone in the world that

has excess capital even in a time of

fear

and you go there. I I do this like in

Brazil, you know, one other of our

tricks or tricks, our strategies to

navigate global complexity

is in every geography we're in,

we have the best families, the most

entrepreneurial families become

investors and we cultivate them not

necessarily for their money, but for

their insights

>> around the country and around the

entrepreneurs with which we partner. It

takes a really long time and and a lot

of those families are typically

entrepreneurial. They're like, "No, no,

I don't invest in funds. I invest

directly because I created a business

and I'm so good and I'm good at getting

the big fish. And I'm like I asked him

very simple question. I say hey um what

percent of your net worth you have in

Brazil?

>> And they're like h like liquid net

worth. No, no, no, no, total net worth.

And they're like the number is typically

between 90 and 95%. I said that's very

interesting. And I said close your eyes.

Imagine you're not Brazilian. you're a

citizen of the world, what percent of

your wealth would you put in Brazil? And

they're like, oh, 3%. Yeah, how about I

help you get a little closer to three

than the 95 you're in. So, I find that

argument to be genuinely effective

because it's genuinely in their best

interest.

>> And I think people have a natural

tendency to overinvest in that in which

they understand. And of course, those

families understand what it is to invest

in Brazil. But in doing that they're

massively underdiversified and the world

has become really really risky and

there's only one free lunch in finance.

Do you remember that from

>> diversification is the only free lunch.

H so thinking strategically about you

know how to diversify with whom to

diversify is is hard but super valuable

if you want that free lunch. Speaking of

diversification, maybe the most

interesting dimension of that today is

geographic. We were talking before we

hit record about the incredibly wide

gulf between the pristine US, you know,

equity assets and basically everywhere

else in the world. There was a time when

you saw this chart between like the S&P

500 and the Aquorld XUS or something and

it was kind of back and forth and back

and forth and then the line has just

gone like this for 20 years where the US

has just so completely dominated

everybody else in enterprise value

creation or or some measure like that.

How do you interpret that shift? Is it

secular? Is it is it going to be

cyclical and go back towards the

international markets? What do you think

about that crazy bifurcation?

The premium for ex US exceptionalism has

never been higher. US public equities

are trading at 26 times earnings for a

4%

forecasted growth which is at the 97th

percentile of the last 25 years. And the

US dollar despite a 10% depreciation

this year is pretty much uh two standard

deviations far away from the uh the

neutral state.

So the US has never been

this expensive. I love the US. It's

still the number one economy. I still

want have half my assets in the US, but

not 90% of my assets in the US. Not only

is it very expensive, total debt to GDP

is 125% of GDP. That is the highest of

the OECD. It's higher than it was after

World War II when America levered to

defeat the axis of evil. current plans

in place, within five years, we're going

to be at 145% of GDP, which is higher

than Greece and Italy. And the US has

not had a recession since 2009. Are you

sure you want to have 95% of your assets

in the United States of America? I I

don't. Um, if you look at the rest of

the world, uh, you can buy Europe at 14

times earnings, you can buy Brazil at

nine times earnings, you can buy Mexico

at 10 times earnings. uh we're we're

finding 40 50% growers at 12 times I

zipa 14 times IDIA many of them serving

dollarized clients uh so

the case for global diversification the

price for global earnings the case has

never been strongest the price has never

been lower on a relative basis so I do

think that in the next 10 years those

who achieve some level of a

diversification will be rewarded because

I do think uh there's a little bit of

froth in the US market and the opposite

in a lot of the emerging markets.

>> What have you learned on any recent

trips to China?

>> China is fascinating and I've been going

to China for 25 years and I've seen the

development. It's the fastest change in

terms of per capita GDP in modern

history or any country at at scale. It's

an incredibly complex society.

um tremendous amount of innovation and

we were lucky in having been early in

China as G. We've been investing there

from 25 years. I am highly optimistic

that tensions have stabilized and that

market conditions are are are are

improving and we've been underweight

China for the last 5 years where we're

we just we just did two deals. We're

going to pick it up a little bit.

There's always binary risk on the around

the geopolitics, but there's just so

much innovation. There's much so much

entrepreneurial zeal. Um the one thing I

learned I actually learned over drinks

with a Chinese entrepreneur. So I I've

done business in 19 countries and I love

to connect on a human level with the

entrepreneur. So much so much even at

growth stage so much of the assessment

of the company and of the partnership is

about chemistry and uh it was very hard

for me to build chemistry with the

Chinese entrepreneurs. One night I'm

having a long dinner with lots of um you

know good food and and alcohol with an

entrepreneur who was an anthropology PhD

of University of Arkansas. And I said if

someone can explain me the Chinese

mentality it's this man. He said to me

and like any oversimplification it's

unfair but there's a grain of truth. And

he said um what you have to understand

about the entrepreneurs you're dealing

with. He said, "This generation of

entrepreneurs,

people who are in their 30s and 40s,

they're all children of the cultural

revolution.

Everything was taken away

from these families, everything. And

they are scarred and they have something

to prove because they think something

was stolen and they will get it back."

So there's a level of drive and ethic,

work ethic that probably matches the

refugees of World War II that came to

the states and did these great

businesses after World War II or other

people that have, you know, had hardship

in in their life. But this applies to

98% of the entrepreneurs.

They saw it with their parents.

>> So that's the other condition you should

take into account. How do your ancestors

show up in your life and values?

>> We're all products of our traumas and

our adventures and our dreams is my

worldview. So what are my traumas? Some

are personal and some are generational.

The generational traumas

on my mother's side

Jewish family had to flee the Russian

Empire through Romania, then Argentina,

then Bolivia. So fleeing leaving

everything behind from my father's side

very wealthy uh landed oligarchy of

Bolivia h in 1952 there's a revolution

they lose everything and their house and

farms get burned down and they almost

die

>> when my father was a teenager. So on

both sides there's a sense of loss and

uh escape that is very present and they

uh decide to become communists and

doctors. They're both doctors in public

hospitals in a little town in Bolivia.

So that's their their trauma which I

relate to the cultural revolution.

They are religious so not not atheist.

Um in in my personal life the trauma

trauma comes from two places for me. Uh

one is I grew up in Bolivia in the 80s

and that was chaos. Bolivia in the 80s

seven presidents in 10 years including

four coup detas. We had inflation now

you got 5% inflation. We had 35,000%

inflation. So time

>> 35 35,000 time value of money. I

understand. Okay. Like like the only

time my mom ever punished me was one

time she sent me to exchange her salary

for dollars when she got it. And I took

a 1-hour break to visit a friend and it

lost half its value in that hour. So I I

I was grounded for a year because of

that one hour break on the exchange. So

anyways, uh so so so and there was also

a lot of violence because of ethnic

violence in Bolivia. So it was it was

rough. It was it felt unsafe. It felt

turbulent. And then I I have a genetic

disorder. I I I bruise very easily like

very very easily. So getting out of bed,

deciding what activity to do is a

riskreward tradeoff since the age of

five.

>> And that is a way of seeing the world

that most people

>> risk. Like I know how to price risk. I'm

like ah not worth it. My my friends are

like why are you always thinking of the

downside? Well, quit. I have my reasons.

So anyway, so that's I I find when

trying to understand a person, I do it

with entrepreneurs, seeing what their

trauma was is super useful because I

find a lot of the most driven people are

driven because of foundational traumas.

And if you understand them and you're

traumatized yourself, you can relate and

empathize, but you also understand the

intensity

that drives them. and and whether they

can manage it and channel it

productively. But but if you can, it is

such a wonderful engine of

transformation

and it's cur curative. It's it's healing

to channel it in a positive way.

>> Have you ever worked with somebody that

did extremely well with none of that

traumabased drive who was just well

adjusted and happy and kicked ass?

>> No. Still looking for her or him. zero.

And

>> and again, it doesn't need to be rack to

riches. It doesn't need to be a big

disease. It could be like I heard one of

one of our one of my fiercest

competitors. He was cleaning. He was

mowing the lawns of his buddies who were

with the cute girls and his entire life

he wanted to show them. I don't judge.

That's a real trauma. Pain is pain.

>> Yeah.

>> So, how did you learn to harness it?

because the the other end of the

spectrum could be unharnessed and just

chaos. How do you learn to harness or

channel it to something productive?

>> Managing one's emotions productive

requires either therapy, writing a

journal, or meditating. You should do

two of the three.

I do two of the three.

>> Try to do the third one, but it's really

hard.

>> Meditation.

>> Yes.

>> Yeah. We're on the same page. If if I

asked a bunch of people that knew you

and the investments that you've made

across your career, what is a U

investment? Like what are the

characteristics where they see that

company like, oh, you know, how would

they describe it?

>> This is a funny story. I'll answer the

question, but I'll answer. Yeah.

>> Uh, so when I got promoted to chairman

of the investment committee, so elevated

from a Latin America role my life to uh

head of the investment committee of

General Atlantic, this iconic global, I

was lost. So I go to the the the

founding two founders. Steve Denning was

a CEO for the first 20 years.

>> Army man, Mckenzie man, Stanford MBA

structured. I say, Steve,

how do I

make decisions across so many

geographies and business models? What's

the framework you think I should apply

to add value to my partners? and he

said, "You should develop a checklist

that captures the characteristics of a

winning GA deal." So, go back and look

at our 25 years of history, our best

deals. I'll share a couple

characteristics. I I give you the three

M's, but they're probably five Ps as

well. Create a checklist. And I was

like, "Yeah, checklist." Same day, I go

to the co-founder, uh, Dave Hodgson.

He's he's just super glued but just the

smartest guy in the room always.

>> Yeah.

>> And I asked him the same question and

the first thing he says

refuse avoid the temptation to use a

checklist. If it was as simple as a

checklist, we wouldn't get paid millions

of dollars to do what we do. And I was

checklist. No checklist. Okay. So

whenever there is a paradox, there's an

elegant

unparadoxing of the paradox.

>> Yeah. So Danny Kaliman, thinking fast,

think slow checklist manifesto built on

work he did for the Israeli Defense

Forces to create the checklist for the

elite agents. Turns out uh the checklist

work, but in applying the idea of

checklist, there were these super

interviewers

that got even better results

consistently than just the average

interviewer. So, well, there was

something beyond the checklist that that

was statistically significant. And

there's one interview of the super

interviewer where she says, "I do the

checklist because I have to, but after I

do the appraisal, I close it and I close

my eyes and see how I feel and I go with

my gut and she has perfect scores."

So the uh framework I use for what's the

perfect martin or g ide deal is the

combination of a checklist with my gut

which I call the educated intuition.

What's in the checklist of things we

like? Huge TAMs, business models that

create economic value and have mode

teams with the right go forward

capabilities. Uh situations where

there's inorganic growth to get and

there's tremendous amount of strategic

value meaning someone will overpay to

have this capability if we are

successful. Uh so those are the things

that uh the checklist aspires. Me

personally, in the deals I've led, um,

they have to make the world better. I am

so proud that I invested in the number

one investing platform in Brazil when

there were only 80,000 people that own

stocks in Brazil. And now 10 million

people

>> own stocks.

>> What's it called?

>> XP. It's publicly traded, $10 billion

market cap. I invested when they were

nothing. I am so proud that I went

against every convention and invested on

an edtech company. ETH was a dark alley.

We have power alleys. There are some

places we don't touch. And I was like,

"No, no, no. This is different. This is

different." This little company in the

northeast of Brazil which was creating K

through2 learning systems which is sort

of a instead of using textbooks, you

package everything in a sort of hybrid

notebook with digital

went from 80,000 students to 8 million

students. 8 million kids every day today

uh use this platform and it's world

class. is really good content and it's

an amazing entrepreneur, son of a

teacher and we made money. Uh we have a

platform that uh 97% of financial

institutions use for digital on

boarding. Turns out Brazil is the world

capital of online fraud and this is the

one company that catches it. And I am so

proud that I started mentoring this kid

when his company was nothing and I did

it through Endeavor and it took me eight

years before I had like became

investable for J and then we invested

and now they're dominant and so it's if

they makes the world better I you see

it's beyond money. It's energy. If the

checklist is mind and the instinct is

gut, have you met a great investor who's

mostly heart?

Uh, no. I think

heart is super important if you want to

be a leader of a large organization

because you have to move the hearts of

hundreds, thousands of people to row in

the same direction with purpose and and

with effectiveness. Uh and that is

crucial and the heart is so powerful. It

overrides gut and brain. It and to do it

at scale. You you see these people that

are super good leaders. The energy is

captivating and they are wizards of the

trade. It's really hard to do all three.

A and part of being a good investor

is to not fall in love

because at the end of the day you have a

fiduciary duty to produce returns and

you have to make some tough calls and

love is a treacherous thing. So funny

story. So the one time that I didn't

follow the checklist was uh for love. So

obviously I had a checklist for the

woman I'm going to marry. And when I met

Daniela, my Portuguese teacher, she

didn't score very high on the checklist.

>> Where was she deficient?

>> I will say, but things that are

absolutely irrelevant to the task at

hand. I had the wrong framework.

And she was perfect in every way. And

she's been perfect in every way. So, in

matters of the heart,

forget the checklist.

>> Yeah.

>> But I don't think the three of them come

together in the investment profession.

>> You uh you mentioned the two founders.

What about Bill Ford? What have you

learned from him?

>> Oh, Bill.

so much. Uh, so I think I I've worked

with Bill for 15 years. I actually

pitched Bill my startup and this is 1998

came in through through New York and I

had heard a lot about General Atlantic

and how they're different and they think

long term and they're good partners and

Chuck Feny really hard to get the

meeting. We give them the meeting. Bill

and I really hit it off. I made the

pitch and he's like, "Uh,

we're not ready for Brazil.

>> I'm really sorry." And I was heartbroken

because I really wanted G. And Bill was

an amazing guy. 10 years later after I

sold my business, was working at another

fund. He called me and was like,

"Remember me?" I was like, "Yeah, I

remember you." He's like, "Can we try

this again?" I said, "Yeah, we can try

this again, but just for you know, you

would have made 18 times your money if

you had said yes." So, yeah, yeah, I

know. I know. I know. So, come. Bill um

has an incredible ability to see around

corners and and and be visionary in

making bets before they're obvious.

>> So going into Europe, going to the

emerging markets, going into consumer,

going into life sciences, pushing me now

to go into robotics and humanoids, I'm

like, Bill, too early. No, we need to go

to So he's he's he's an incredible

ability to to look around corners. He uh

also in managing the partnership

and us has heart not for investment

decision- making but in keeping our

culture the meritocracy of the firm also

with heart has helped me develop as a

leader of of GA and letting from the

heart and is an incredible money maker

so his mind

>> that helps too

>> that helps that tip detail

>> as you've progressed in your investing

specific career.

>> What changes the most as you become more

senior? How does it feel the most

different doing it today versus doing it

when you're a, you know, lots to prove

young analyst?

>> Yeah. The hardest thing when you're

young is developing patience and the

conviction that you can wait a little

longer for the big fish. You're young,

it's up or out. You want to get going.

>> You want to get going. You want to get

deal experience. You want to get notches

on your belt. And that's completely

wrong instinct. And when you're older,

you have a lot more range. You've seen a

lot more and you got patience. You're

like,

>> "Nothing scares me and I know a big fish

will come. Calm down. No pressure."

>> Um,

you are less in the front lines and more

as a coach player helping you, training

young partners to do what you used to

do. Uh, and initially that can be very

demotivating because Tom Brady likes to

be on the field, not coaching or opining

on Fox. Yeah, maybe not not so fun. Uh

until you re re-imagine the game and you

live vicariously through the people

you're training and you enjoy their wins

almost as much as you enjoyed your wins.

So that's been the the the the me the

mental flip that I had to do to enjoy

this phase because of course scoring

goals is better than coaching of unless

you make the mental shift that live

vicariously through them. The hard thing

and that's why there's not that many

venture and growth equity investors over

over the age of 50. It's not just that

we call in rich or we get tired or we

develop new interest. I I think our

brain ages and stops being plastic. So

one one one of the uh great learnings

from beautiful mind Dave Hodson who's

aged beautifully. He's in his late 60s

and is very sharp and very much on top

of the new trends and he defies the

convention and I said what what what is

the secret to forget Peter Ata I want to

hear from you

I just want the brain I don't I don't

care about my V8 and the max I want I

want the young brain and he said three

things the most important one is I

refuse to think like an old man

still plays I still wonder I'm still in

awe and I don't fall into the trap of

thinking I have the answer to

everything. I'm always learning,

experimenting, and playing. And that's

the hardest part because uh we have this

illusion as we get older that there's no

room for play. There's no room for play.

There's always room for play.

>> How do you inject that into your life?

>> You just don't take yourself too

seriously. I'm always laughing about

everything. making fun of every even

even when confronted with the worst

perfect storm where something happens I

start laughing and I say what are the

odds so many bad things could happen all

at once this HAS NEVER HAPPENED BEFORE

SEVEN THINGS AT THE SAME time let's work

through it

that attitude I think is makes life a

lot more fun

>> so so what do you make of this current

bubble that we're inside outside you

know depending on the

You mentioned humanoids, you mentioned

bio a little bit. Like there's there's

all this exciting stuff happening

probably all of which in the long run

will be amazing for people be a lot of

consumer surplus and all this. Um you

want to make money you know through this

process for your for yourself and your

partners. How does it feel to you to

>> this is more meaningful because it will

touch a higher percentage of GDP

>> right? The internet was the other very

meaningful one but it changes how we

interact with each other. This will

change much more than that. Unambiguous

recommendation. If you're in your 20s or

early 30s, go work at AI because you're

going to live through dog years.

Meaning, what we're talking about.com,

seven years of activity in one year. And

regardless of whether that company does

well or you make money, you're going to

have compressed learning

that only happens once every 20 years.

So, don't miss that opportunity. And

when I say that age group, I mean that

mental age group. You could be in your

50s and be in that mental after when

you're ready to take risk. Just go do

it. If you have a young mind today, go

work in AI because it's going to be so

much fun and the learning or I think

investing uh is risky. Our approach

which may prove to be too conservative

was to take it slow because it's not

clear yet where the value is going to be

created. It's not clear yet how much

more powerful the large language models

are versus others that are more

efficient um or how much of the value

will be captured by the by the models

versus the applications. So it's

exciting to watch. I know we're going to

have a moment where we're all going to

wake up and say we've invested too much.

I don't know if it's three years away or

18 months. I don't think it's No, for

sure it hasn't happened yet.

>> You don't think so? You don't think

there's a chance that we're like kind of

at we're in that moment already?

>> No.

>> Why? Why not?

>> It's not crazy enough. Well, I was

looking at some stats at comparing the

AI wave, let's not call it a bubble

wave,

to the com and to the railroads. And

it's looking at the ratio of capex to

revenue and and what percent of GDP was

involved in this and how was this capex

funded?

and uh capex to revenue still not crazy

and revenues new revenue streams are are

managing and the biggest difference

relative to railroads and.com

is the funds are coming from really rich

companies the magnificent six who are

printing money out of their dominant

positions are reinvesting a lot of this

money into the capex that's powering all

this innovation so it's very healthy

it's it's not junk bond speculators or

thin margin telecom companies that are

levering up the wazoo with retail money

to fund

this wave of innovation. It's really

profitable companies. So, I think it's

got more legs. Will it be bumpy? Yes. Uh

but the thing about predicting the

future is it's really hard. Explaining

the past is a lot easier. I'm always

interested in this difference between

risk, which I think of as sometimes

quantifiable or imaginable, and pure

uncertainty, like we literally just

don't know what's going to happen or and

if you think about where you've made

money, how much do you think came from

the un willingness to like embrace

uncertainty versus taking really

calculated risks? Listen, uh you never

invest

a lot of money without visibility to

what you're doing.

Uh there is fog and different layers of

fog. And what the fog does is it slows

you down, but if you look pierce

through, you see clarity. You see a

monopolist at six times. You see an

opportunity to take it's not a shot in

the dark and hope for the best. And what

you can't do is just shut down and say

this is too rust, too

>> like too unpredictable.

>> Yeah.

>> You just have to engage with the

unpredictability until you see something

before others and you strike for the

fish.

>> In an era like this when it's all

changing so fast and understanding the

core technologies is important. How do

you how do you personally learn like

what is your preferred method to stay a

breast of what is going on and like stay

in touch with reality?

>> Talk to young people.

>> Yeah.

>> Surf Tik Tok.

Try different apps. Try crazy things. Go

to places where there are no old people

>> and you don't care. I don't care someone

calls me old. I'm just playing.

>> Uh so it's it's just keep it fresh.

>> Value is in the new. M

>> being in the new always

>> uh even if it turns out to be a dead

end. Most of what we do is dead ends

>> but it doesn't mean it wasn't valuable

to try it.

>> Uh so that's the hardest thing.

>> There's been this wild transformation of

our industry in the time that you've

been a professional in it. Um what does

the competitive dynamic feel like to you

today? There's so many smart

>> the universe of amazing companies has

expanded. uh the number of hundred

million dollar revenue business growing

40 50% has grown 10x uh because more

technology more people taking risk in

more places unfortunately we compete

against 19,000 GPS like one of our it

was it was not very nice thing to say

but one of my competitors said there's

more GPS than McDonald's in in the

United States which you know it's one of

those GPS that are smaller they don't

feel nice when you compare McDonald it's

really too many GPS and and the industry

is consolidating

It's become incredibly competitive. You

have to have more clarity. What is your

competitive edge? How have we thought

about our edge brand? We've built this

brand about being good partners. This

brand means something and people get

value from GA inside. Attracts helps

them recruit talent, get clients, go

public

scale to have muscles that small shops

don't have. We have 100 people in

operations. They can help you with

pricing, Salesforce effectiveness, AI

for what customer service, whatever you

need. We got a team. It's there for

free. Go for scale. We got an in-house

human talent team that has taps into a

database of 15,000 vetted executives

that you need a CTO. We'll send you a

list tomorrow of eight guys in the area

who we've worked with and I think fit.

That's that's that's an area. And then

you have to be a specialist. Can't be a

generalist anymore. So, we've chosen

what we call the GA power alleys. There

are 16 parallies, things like AI

applications, value based care, digital

payments, 16 paralysis. Check the

website. In those paralities, we think

we're among the best in the world and we

show up with 32 case studies of we've

done this 32 times. And yes, you can

copy things that work, but guess what?

You don't know the things that didn't

work that we tried that we're going to

prevent you from trying.

So it it's made it harder to compete.

But I do think scale and experience

helps

provided you are deliberate at learning

from the experience and focused on how

you build capabilities with scale in

areas that really matter not just look

good on a website. If you're teaching a

seminar about or for young investors who

are only allowed to go invest in non US

companies, so everything but the US,

what are the most important things for

that crew to know

>> about doing that well that's distinct

from what it would take to do well in

the US?

>> There's a lot more volatility.

So there the frequency of surprises is

much higher. So agility is is is super

important.

Um we're also low trust cultures. They

um even though most of them are

religious doesn't mean you can trust.

So a higher percentage of the time you

may find yourself with a crook uh across

the table. So the value of referencing

is is is much more important. And how to

do a good reference is super important

because people don't say bad things

about other people easily. So that's

another one. H the third one which is a

positive one which is the one great

advantage of being outside the US is

there's so many things that don't work

well

>> lower hanging fruit

>> humongous lowerhanging fruit and if you

provide a great service you capture a

lot of value for a really long time.

>> How do you do a good reference

>> for an investment? You do it with a

family that has given you money to make

investments and you say, "Jang, we're

about to invest $200 million in this

entrepreneur.

Uh, you know, you know his grandfather.

Do you think we should take this risk?"

>> And he's like, "Oh, no way.

He's a crook. Son of a crook." Because

he has money with you. He tells you the

truth. If you didn't have money with

you, he'd say at worst he'd say, "I

don't know. There's some noise. I would

do my homework or they're fine." Like,

now for hiring,

there's another hack which I learned

which is so important. So much of life

is getting the right people on the bus.

And when you're going to do a reference

on a hire, you call the person and you

say, "Hey, I'm about to we're

considering David for this role. This

role involves the following five

challenges. Ba ba ba.

This is a very important decision for my

company because we can't get this wrong.

It's also a very big decision for David

because he's happy at his job and if he

gets this wrong, if we get this wrong,

we've wasted time and he's out of a job.

Help me assess if this is a good risk

for me and Dave. And if you can have an

honest discussion, if you don't feel

comfortable engaging like this, let's

not talk about it. But that's what I

need the reference for. You'd be

surprised. People are like, "Well, for

that risk, David, leave him there. He's

fine." But but that is a genuine way to

answer it because what I described is

actually true. If this is a bad fit,

David should not be taking this job.

Reference calls are like are not tell me

about David. Is he a good guy? That's a

waste of time because Dave People say,

"Yeah, he's a great guy. He's a great

guy, very competent.

>> What have you learned about

managing help manage the career success

of investors, which is a very

distinctive job from a career ladder in

a company or something? Um, incentives

matter a lot, I'm sure. I'm curious what

you've learned about incentives. Um,

what mistakes have you made? You know,

if you think about you being responsible

for other investors and you wanting them

to thrive, what what's the good, the

bad, and the ugly that that you've

>> It's an apprenticeship business. So,

pairing them up with different people

with different skills, different styles

is super important. Helping them from a

very young age to make recommendations.

Don't just do the task.

Answer the so what and ultimately say

what's my level of conviction in doing

this investment? don't rely just on this

more senior people. Actually, one of the

tricks I used to do because I've been in

three investment committees in my

career, you know, the 3G advent and uh I

would try to understand the mind of each

investment committee member and predict

what they're going to ask. So, I would

read the memo and say George Apollo is

going to ask this, Bill Ford is going to

ask this, Jan Carlos Toro is going to

ask this. And also predict their vote.

By the end of a year of doing this, I

had I was up to 80 90%. And what was

really interesting, it was forced me not

only to have my own opinion about a deal

because I would read the materials, but

look at it from the perspective of

someone who's really good at making

these kind of decisions. And my ambition

was to one day be completely

unpredictable when someone tried to do

this with me in when I became a senior

person because I was capturing learnings

from 30 perspective. It's not true. I'm

I'm actually pretty predictable by now.

But uh it's it's it's learning

vicariously by forcing yourself to have

opinions and also putting yourselves in

the minds of people who are proven

investors is a way of the apprenticeship

on steroids. And one of the things that

that we do at GA, which I'm really proud

of because it was culturally very hard

to do, our investment committees are

open to everyone.

>> The whole firm,

>> the whole firm, investment

professionals. So every Tuesday 190

people sign up and there's no

presenting.

>> We we come in directly to Shark Tag just

questions

>> and it's beautiful.

>> So So talk me through how that meeting

works. So one person like a sponsor is

proposing a deal.

>> So there's a deal team. The deal team is

typically a combination of a sector and

a geo put together. There's standardized

materials with the checklist. Uh it gets

distributed by Friday we yeah Tuesday we

come in. There's no presenting the deal

lead. is always a deal lead. The main

sponsor is there to answer questions

>> and we have five investment committee

members and the IC robot which also

opines and we just ask you questions.

>> What's the IC robot?

>> We so we've we've been training this

sixth member of the IC based on 45 years

of data.

So she votes on all our deals and and

we've we've been having her do this for

the last three years and we called her

>> is she any good?

>> So we've back tested her. Yeah.

>> And she's much better than humans.

>> But it turns out someone who's been

trained in the past is very good at the

past.

>> Yeah.

>> We only have three years of concurrent.

So we need to wait another four or five

years. I'm hoping that by the time we

retire, I retire about 10 years, she'll

be better than

>> if I was doing that, if I could somehow

do that exercise with you where I I

could predict the sorts of questions

that you tend to ask about companies,

what what are they like? What are the

big ones that you find yourself

constantly asking sponsors who are are

promoting a deal?

>> Yeah. Uh

getting in the mind of the founder,

>> his his or her motivations, why this is

so special and the trajectory that got

to this. I try to meet the founders

outside the investor community process

as a sponsor basis of competition sort

of true distinct

uh competitive advantage and durability

of o of the competitive uh advantage.

And then I I think and then I try to

push people on the tales

uh both positive and negative like like

if these six bad things happen what's

how bad is it and how likely is it or if

this amazing development happens which

could be amazing how how unlikely is and

who else would benefit from so I I

always find the tales to be the most

interesting because if you look at the

distribution of our returns 10% of our

best deals and we get lucky and they

produce 50% return. So we lose money

very little and then 10% we get 5x plus

and these are really important and these

all of them are better than the upside

case in our memos

>> because good things happen that we did

not see coming but God bless and thank

God. So I always find like we where are

the lottery tickets?

>> How do you assess h it seems like first

of all incredibly important like all the

data we know how important the right

tail is for investing outcomes. Uh it's

like, you know, well well wororn truth

at this point. How how do you how does

one get better at assessing the option

value embedded in a given business? Like

that that just seems so crucial, but

I've never there's no book about that.

There's no podcast about that. You've

got 10 investments. How do you know

which of the 10 has more embedded like

right? So the

pattern recognition from having seen

winning lottery tickets gives you some

help, right? If you've seen more of

these, you begin to see where you get

how how you can get lucky. Uh as

important

in all those lucky scenarios,

there was a spear fisherman at the top

to capture an opportunity that was

available to many, but they seized it.

So it's a lot more about

>> the capital allocator at the top

>> the the CEO is he someone that can spear

fish

>> and some people you it takes one to no

one some people are really good at it

some people are not spear fisherman

>> what is your unfinished business

professionally

>> so listen I I I could not think of a

better

activity than working in growth equity

at general athletic for the next 10

global growth equity in the middle of

the AI revolution with the seniority

that I have and the dry powder

>> pinch me pinch me because I hope I don't

die on a plane crash because it's going

to be great. Uh so now after that and I

think you have to start thinking I've

been active mentoring entrepreneurs

through Endeavor which is a

nonforprofit. I'm in the board and I've

been doing this for 25 years. I actually

started mentoring which is an

interesting tidbit when my business was

running out of cash

and after com sounds exciting but there

was a death you know the dark valley of

death and Linda Rottenberg the founder

of endeavor she's like it is precisely

at your darkest moment that you mentor

because it's a sign of you have

something to give

>> in the darkest moment of the night which

is interesting the whole AA like I have

friends who are in AA the body system is

so valuable because even at your darkest

moment you have enough light to help

someone and that gives you the strength

to make it through. So I huge believer

in mentoring that's something I will do

for the rest of my life. And then I uh

the unfinished business I think uh as I

get older I I want to help in this

higher education in the US. I think

we've lost our way. And I saw the impact

scholarship to Harvard did to a young

kid from Bolivia and I I love that

institution. I I love education and I

think it's in a moment that it's uh lost

his way and and we can find it back. C

>> can you teach me mentoring? How how does

one mentor? Well,

>> my my strategy there's many ways to do

it. um I don't have time to be someone's

mentor for six years or to see them

maybe as part of endeavor I'll see them

twice. So I have to hurt them

for the mentoring to be impactful I have

to make it so obvious that it's so

stupid they haven't yet focused on this

that they're like show him and then they

act on it. Uh so uh my mentoring

sessions are very uncomfortable. I mean

I do it I do it in with a smile on my

face of

>> course but it works. It it it's like

crash therapy like three years of

therapy in one hour. You got you no time

for both. We're going directly for the

for the sensitive points. And I learned

to do it in a way that's not damaging or

disrespectful in any way. But it is

very scathing and saying you can't this

is clearly an opportunity. Come on wake

up. smelled the coffee and sure enough

now I have a couple of billionaire

friends who are like you really hurt me

but thank you

>> and and I'm so I'm always curious about

like literal process like if you're

meeting someone for the first time it is

the format you ask them a bunch of

questions and then you quickly do the

you know the aggressive like why aren't

you doing this thing

>> so I I'm married to a shrink

psychoanalyst so as a condition to our

marriage I have to do psycho analysis

and and it's a wonderful thing I wrote

it's one of the three things I wrote

therapy and meditation and

um one one of my favorite he's now

diseased but he was a philosopher writer

an incredible Italian Brazilian guy very

famous in Brazil and uh you would go to

this one hour weekly session and he

would look at you in silence and if

didn't say anything after a while you

just say in town and town is translating

so

I let you take it the most powerful way

to Start a conversation with someone

you're trying to get to know. Silence.

You tell me.

>> What do you want to talk about?

>> What do you want to talk?

>> Simple.

>> Simple. I'll give you another one. I

asked, what's the most important

question you need the answer to from the

universe?

The answer to that question is so

powerful because vocalizing that which

you most want the answer to is

liberating.

My traditional closing question for

everyone is the same. What is the

kindest thing that anyone's ever done

for you?

>> Daniela,

taught me how to love.

As I, as we established, my heart's not

very developed and my gut and my brain

are very developed. And uh she's such a

loving, wonderful woman.

and uh she's being loved by her and

learning from her how to love back and

then learning from her how to love our

daughters and the way that they need to

be loved.

And she's so smart and loving me can

sometimes be very hard.

>> A beautiful place to close and thank you

for the reminder to laugh a lot in these

conversations. Thanks for your time.

>> Thank you for having