Marvin’s Best Weekly Reads April 12th, 2026
"April showers bring May flowers." —Thomas Tusser
This was enlightening. All about SpaceX and lessons from Elon.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPXYqPXo_R0
2. Enjoying this series of interviews with VC iconoclasts from Slow VC.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRhe6JxJruI
3."The point is what we’re teaching. Every employee who got that Slack learns that “mission” is a recruiting pitch. Every founder who watches their VC fund a competitor learns they were a bet, not a partner.
I still back founders. I still believe there’s never been a better time to build. But I try to find people who still believe the oath matters. The ones who would rather go slower than abandon the people who believed in them. Even when faster often means richer.
So pick carefully. Ask your VC who else they have backed in your category. Ask what happened to employees at the founder’s last company. Understand what the numbers actually mean before you sign anything."
https://writing.nikunjk.com/p/loyalty-is-dead-in-tech
4. "Entrepreneurs, my recommendation is this: choose a North Star metric that truly represents the value you deliver, track it rigorously, and ensure your entire team rallies around it. A startup is more than a single metric, but there is nothing more powerful than clarity about what you are working toward and why."
https://davidcummings.org/2026/01/31/pick-a-north-star-metric-not-revenue/
5."This is the “Your King Sucks” theory of software investing. For the last decade or so, public market investors treated annual recurring revenue (ARR) as the ultimate form of material. If a company had $500M in ARR growing at 30% with 80% gross margins, it was a winning business with a material advantage. You could argue about the valuation—is it worth 10 times revenue or 15?—but there was never a doubt that the revenue was real. You also assumed that because the product was “sticky” (a word VCs love because it sounds like a moat but often just means “too annoying to uninstall”), the material advantage would eventually translate into a win.
But AI has effectively turned every software value-prop chessboard (I’m stretching the analogy here) into a tactical mess where every almost every “safe king” is suddenly exposed. If you are an enterprise software company whose primary value proposition is “we provide a slightly better UI for a database” or “we help your HR department fill out forms,” your material doesn’t matter anymore. You might have $1 billion in revenue, but if a generative AI agent can do that same task for the cost of a few API calls, your product sucks. Your king is standing in the middle of an open file, and the half-trillion-dollar-backed-AI is the opposing queen coming down the board for your margin."
https://oldroperesearch.substack.com/p/your-king-sucks
6."It’s a cold, grey, and sludgy early afternoon in Kyiv. Today, the brightest minds of the defense industry are meeting with military experts and international funding providers to discuss on how to best win the war being waged against Ukraine by Russia, almost four years after it started.
This event is unique in that it is sponsored by an American investor, Perry Boyle, CEO of MITS Capital, in conjunction with Ukraine’s elite Azov Brigade."
https://underfirenews.substack.com/p/soldiers-and-startups-inside-the
7. "Modern culture often encourages men to be self-serving and concerned with themselves. If we look closely, history offers us a more enduring standard. The men who shaped our world were often those who accepted responsibility willingly and served others before themselves.
Character is not a relic of the past. It is the foundation of anything worth building and preserving. We must continuously guard against the erosion of character in our lives and society. By studying great men in history, we can learn how to do that through their example."
https://thewaysofagentleman.substack.com/p/five-men-of-character-who-shaped
8. Job loss versus Task loss in AI. Educating your kid in the age of AI. One of the better interviews with Marc Andreessen in recent months.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87Pm0SGTtN8
9. "This is what capital wars might actually look like — not slogans or secret meetings, but states reclaiming control over funding, liquidity, and strategic inputs.
For Japan, this was a reclaiming of agency. Higher yields allow domestic capital to fund defense, semiconductors, and technology instead of subsidizing global speculation. Grandma finally gets to spend on herself.
For the United States, the outcome is complex but strategic. Cheap foreign funding is fading, but a stronger dollar and falling commodity prices cool inflation without forcing a recession.
For the global system, the implication is stark.
The old assumptions — that cheap funding would return, that central banks would cushion disorder, that markets could externalize sovereign costs — are no longer safe.
New norms are emerging:
Funding is political.
Leverage tolerance is lower.
Volatility is not a bug — it’s enforcement.
Even “safe” assets depend on funding regimes.
A thirty-year family arrangement built on indulgence is ending. Returns will increasingly come from productivity, not leverage. Borrowed patience has limits."
https://tanviratna.substack.com/p/gold-silver-the-dollar-the-week-that
10. "This probably tells us something about how investors think about gold versus Bitcoin. They probably think of Bitcoin as something that benefits from the success of the American economy — probably because when the U.S. economy does well and Americans are feeling rich, they put some of their money into Bitcoin. Whereas they still think of gold as something that you need when nations as a whole do poorly.
Ultimately, safe-haven assets are a coordination game — people just sort of collectively decide which assets to buy in order to protect themselves from international financial anarchy. So far, they’re still coordinating on gold, not on Bitcoin."
https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/international-financial-anarchy
11. "So what’s going to happen here is the physical world is going to compete with the bullshit financial world, some of these crazy hyper dreams. And then we’re going to end up with much higher prices for these metals in real terms against a depreciating currency.”
https://robertsinn.substack.com/p/robert-friedland-the-physical-world
12."Friedland on the more obscure strategic metals that are absolutely vital for defense & aerospace industries:
“….we really need to talk about metals like scandium, rhenium, niobium, or tantalum, you absolutely have to have for national security requirements. These are metals that are more thinly traded, less transparent, and these metals can go up 10x, 20x, 50x in price. And this is really going to open at a theater near you because we’re in touch with the demands of the United States military, and we know that these metals are very hard to find and they absolutely have to be had. So, it’s some of these more interesting metals that we should talk about at some point in the near future…”
Tantalum is used in jet engines, scandium is added to aluminum for high-strength, lightweight components in aerospace. Meanwhile, niobium and rhenium are superalloys that are used in jet engines and rocket components due to heat resistance."
https://robertsinn.substack.com/p/robert-friedland-i-would-not-be-surprised
13."Three indicators would signal the bubble is bursting: hyperscaler capex decelerating more than 20% year-over-year as spending reverts toward historical norms; enterprise AI production deployment rates stalling below 15%; and Nvidia’s revenue concentration from its top four customers exceeding 70%, indicating the loop is tightening rather than expanding.
Conversely, three indicators would confirm the floor is solidifying: healthcare and manufacturing AI spending exceeding $20 billion annually; enterprise AI deal conversion rates sustaining above 45%; and Fortune 2000 AI budgets growing 30% or more with documented productivity gains.
The 2026 AI market isn’t a bubble in the 1999 sense—the companies are real, the profits are real, the technology works. The question is whether the customers become real. Until AI revenue flows beyond the circular loop of hyperscalers and their subsidiaries into the productive economy of the Fortune 2000 and below, the trillion-dollar infrastructure bet remains exactly that: a bet on diffusion that hasn’t yet occurred."
https://investinginai.substack.com/p/what-to-watch-in-2026-to-evaluate
14."Most people are Emotionally Over-Invested. They need the deal, they need the approval, they need the “Yes.” This need creates a Desperation Scent that high-level players can smell from a mile away. When you need something, you lose the ability to walk away. And if you can’t walk away, you have zero leverage. You are not a negotiator; you are a beggar with a pitch deck."
https://luxlifestylelab.substack.com/p/the-indifference-edge
15."Founders who started 2-3 years later (2020-2021) are now facing a much harder path: higher customer acquisition costs, more skeptical investors, mature competitors, and a tighter funding environment. Building a comparable war chest at an early stage would be comparatively rare today.
Yes, Brex is selling past the fintech peak. But they benefited from it too. Ultimately, being early to a good wave can be just as valuable as riding the peak."
https://99tech.alexlazarow.com/p/second-order-lessons-from-brexs-acquisition
16."One of the most surprising things for me is that many of the folks who provided me guidance and mentorship early in my career have become less active in the venture business or have less to offer about this phase of the journey. This isn’t a criticism, but more of an observation. By the time you get to the second desert, many of the folks who helped and advised you in the beginning will be less involved in the business or doing it in a different way that suits them better, but is potentially less aligned with the questions you have and the advice you seek. I find myself searching for a new set of advisors who know how to navigate this phase of firm building and who are still actively engaged in it.
Finally, most of the questions are about the firm and not the next fund. There will always be questions about what it takes to raise the next fund, which LPs will come back, which companies will deliver the core returns, etc. But in the second desert, many more of the questions are about firm longevity, succession, and other longer-term issues that feel very far off when you are first getting started."
https://chudson.substack.com/p/the-second-desert-in-venture-capital
17.Oren is an OG in Silicon Valley. Oren Zeev and Elad Gil are literally taking Solo GP-ing to another level.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KuurCxYog5k
18."What most people do is they wait until it is “time to show up” or they overstay thinking that people are suddenly going to show up the last hour. Unlikely.
In market terms it would be: 1) buying when it is consensus = no returns left, 2) selling when there is low interest = party/venue is empty = unless going to zero likely fills up later and 3) repeating this over and over thinking that investing is about following herds… It is the exact opposite.
The Cheat Code? Your nervous system is giving you the answer every single time. If you find yourself feeling FOMO you should write that down in your one day journal. If you back track the info, you’ll find that your emotions are the exact reverse of what ends up happening. If you’re excited? Usually the peak. If you’re depressed? Usually the bottom. So on and so forth.
Instead of trying to outsmart billionaires and quants, the easier move is to monitor your own feelings and emotions. Get control of your dopamine receptors and you’ll perform much better making a handful of moves per year. This also frees you up to build up that WiFi money = absurd financial gains every 4 years."
https://bowtiedbull.io/p/how-to-be-a-better-investor-without
19.How to be the best. Ovitz is intense but brilliant. How to stay current. No better friend, no worse enemy. This is an instructive interview.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wp1Wn6QkkKU&t=2212s
20.Building a massive VC brand and platform. Lots of great insights on the history venture market and how A16Z is dominating.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ID27juNvAfc
21. Sam Lessin is one of the few original thinking investors in Silicon Valley. This is worth listening to.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ir7yLNgZ3gM
22. "If you want to make real money online stop thinking like an employee.
Start thinking like a modern philosopher with a business system.
Your new daily routine should look like this:
1 hour of input: learn something that upgrades your skill or perspective.
2 hours of creation: build one digital asset per day (post, guide, offer).
30 minutes of leverage: automate, schedule, or repurpose your best work.
10 minutes of reflection: ask yourself, “Does this earn or distract?”
https://luxlifestylelab.substack.com/p/the-modern-art-of-earning-elegantly
23."Leveraged software companies running on leveraged infrastructure. When AI compresses software revenue, the stress doesn’t stop at equity. It cascades into debt."
https://tomtunguz.com/the-other-leverage-in-software-and-ai/
24."Look at the three most difficult decisions you’ve been avoiding. Ask yourself: “Am I avoiding this because it’s the wrong move, or because I’m afraid of how it will make someone feel?” If it’s the latter, execute the decision before sunset today. Every hour you wait is a tax on your authority."
https://luxlifestylelab.substack.com/p/the-empathy-trap
25."The takeaway is this: the Pentagon’s needs determine what gets funded and what doesn’t. So if you want to get paid, your product must address a priority need."
https://stanfordh4d.substack.com/p/selling-to-defense-explaining-the
26.A great discussion this week on NIA: the Elon X empire, Silver/Gold boom & bust + Moltbook aka OpenClaw.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuQwe3fxAsY
27."The other was the understanding that when there’s a war, you have to be ruthless. There were ruthless actions taken that were effective. Afterwards, my parents never, ever mentioned it. I never heard a word about it, nor did they ever talk about what they left behind.
It was my parents who brought me to Sicily, and therefore I learned Sicilian, and therefore I learned many, many things, including the art of violence, controlled violence. Even as very young children in Sicily, you could never escalate fights, because if you won the fight over the other 8-year-old, the 10-year-old would come, the brother. Then, another brother, and then the parents would come out, then guns would come out.
You learned, actually, the coherent use of force, which is very typical of the culture, which is the mafia culture, really, is that you don’t waste force. If you go around punching people for no reason, this is really terrible. All these other stuff were all giving to me without any credit on my own, any merit on my own. It was what you might call an extraordinarily fortunate childhood for somebody whose final destination was not to paint, or make films, or build houses, but to do what I have done, which is to study war and all these other things. I was given all this right at the start."
Technology intervenes in war, incrementally and invisibly, changing nothing.
Then, suddenly, technology intervenes and changes everything. It ended the possibility of the cavalry charge. Cavalry gets swept off the battlefield."
https://www.chinatalk.media/p/ed-luttwak-on-military-revolutions
28."In 2010, during a diplomatic dispute with Japan, Chinese rare-earth exports suddenly slowed. Prices spiked. Panic followed. Although China denied imposing a formal embargo, the message was unmistakable.
A decade later, amid rising trade tensions with the United States, Beijing made its intentions clearer. Export controls were tightened. Licensing requirements expanded. Restrictions on rare-earth processing technologies were imposed.
By 2025, China was openly treating rare earths as a strategic asset, one that could be weaponized in response to tariffs, sanctions, or military pressure. The risks could no longer be ignored. Modern defense systems depend heavily on rare earths. An F-35 fighter jet contains hundreds of pounds of rare-earth materials. Missiles, radar, satellites, and secure communications systems all rely on specialized magnets and alloys for which there are no easy substitutes.
And 2026 continues the uncomfortable dilemma. The United States has the resources, capital, and technical expertise to rebuild domestic capacity—but not quickly. Processing facilities take years to permit and construct. Skilled labor must be trained. Supply chains must be reassembled. In the short run, dependence remained. Trump’s sudden tariff war, framed by Beijing as yet another affront to China’s long-promised redemption from its “century of humiliation,” sharpened the confrontation between what the Chinese Communist Party perceives as a resurgent Middle Kingdom and a declining hegemon.
All of this helps explain the White House’s eagerness to secure Chinese assurances. The deal bought time. It did not solve the problem."
https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/chinas-rare-earth-monopoly-and-why-markets-will-break-it
29."While I remain steadfast in my believe that the founders who focus will win, this very much feels like a moment-in-time when it’s important for founders to take stock of what’s going on around them.
That doesn’t mean diving down the rabbit hole of agent social networks, but it does mean checking out the latest tools. And it’s always better to do that with friends.
I’m setting aside time in the next few weeks to stop, collaborate and listen. I suggest you do too."
https://chrisneumann.com/archives/stop-collaborate-and-listen
30."When institutions start to lose their soul, the people inside them start to care about different things. Aesthetic warmth, values coherence, institutional vibe. These are now functioning as primary signals for where elite talent goes (and more importantly, stays), and by extension, which companies breakaway and which don’t.
The Tipping Points:
So how does this actually progress?
First, people will fleece investors for all they can. Secondary sales, SPACs, HALOs, whatever structures exist. If you are going to do the thing that is losing status you might as well gun for the kind of money that gives you options later, because you may need those options.
Second, there are early cohorts of founders who will aim to find vibe-alignment with their capital. This is the bull case for more opinionated or smaller firms at the early-stage. I’m talking my own book here, but as the mission actually starts to matter again (not in the “wink-wink” sense), if a core value-add of VCs has been “brand halos”, then founders will align with investors that show an aesthetic they want to feed into their startup’s status signaling. The capital you take becomes a statement about who you are, and people will start to treat it that way.
Third, what people care about when they join a company will start to shift. Despite the desire to say that we can all be solopreneurs, I don’t think human beings actually want this. We are starting to see the full rejection of the illusion of freedom that remote work offered us, driven by the complexities of how it has changed us. What matters now is identity, community, belonging, and being out in the world, experiencing life in various ways. This means the intersection of who you work with, why you’re building, and what you’re building really matters and will directly reflect your values and your ability to be in communities. The vibes must be good at your company to have it be viewed as high status to work there, and this becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy once the flywheel begins.
Fourth, people will stop building venture-backed businesses."
https://mhdempsey.substack.com/p/vc-backed-startups-are-low-status
31."If we return to this earlier point, what exactly is the short leg? I’m being a bit cagey because there are many answers to this question, most of which I’d probably agree with...
Short USD
Short traditional employment & the career ladder (wage cuck)
Short social mobility
There are valid arguments for each of these, and the real answer is that it’s complicated. But as I said earlier, I think a lot of the core message10 is inadvertently warped in a way that leads people down the doomer rabbit hole. And my sense is that the majority of people who have begun this descent are effectively short agency.
It is an intellectual short position on human adaptability, creativity and ambition. And to me it’s one of the most alluring yet dangerous ways to frame the world, especially to young people. It suggests the genie is out of the bottle for some inevitable future where humans are sorted into either an elite utopian status or the permanent underclass living like the Tailies in Snowpiercer. But that line of thinking presupposes we have no discretion over how the future unfolds. It is a defeatist view."
https://0xsmac.substack.com/p/the-children-yearn-for-the-fiat-mines
32.A sober geopolitical take on Ukraine-Russia peace talks from one of the few credible experts out there.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LqP8CUh3TI
33.Learning from leaders at some of the top financial institutions. Goldman and A16Z. Well worth watching for the global macro takes and tech.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jLVgGGz5bvk
34. Electronic warfare innovation from Ukraine and Russia coming to the rest of the world.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdofxOjKmd4
35.Good takes on Elon and SpaceX acquisitions and what's up in AI.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9NekS6PCM0
36.Instructive discussion with the Benchmark team, the craftsmen of venture capital. A true partnership. One of the most unique firms in Silicon Valley.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPxB1oeAIIc&t=58s
37. Some good global macro: invest in stuff that is scarce. Hard assets: silver, copper, BTC. Uranium & microchips too.
The return of basic economics: supply and demand. Invest in scarce things (manufacturing, hard assets) & avoid abundant things like software & tech.