The weekend is here! Pour yourself a mug of Colombia Tolima Los Brasiles Peaberry Organic coffee, grab a seat outside, and get ready for our longer-form weekend reads:
• The CEO Who Says an Asteroid Is Coming to Destroy America’s Businesses: He’s a supply-chain logistics geek with a huge following—and a dire warning about tariffs. (Wall Street Journal)
• North Korea Stole Your Job: For years, North Korea has been secretly placing young IT workers inside Western companies. With AI, their schemes are now more devious—and effective—than ever. (Wired)
• Global BYD: The international expansion of Chinese electric vehicles. (Phenomenal World) see also Inside the rural Texas town where Elon Musk is basing his business empire: After fleeing Silicon Valley for political and business reasons, Elon Musk is building a corporate campus in rural Texas – but his new neighbours have mixed views. (BBC)
• How Scheels conquered Middle America: It’s an outdoor retailer. It’s a department store. It’s an amusement park. It’s taking over. (Washington Post)
• Israel’s A.I. Experiments in Gaza War Raise Ethical Concerns: Israel developed new artificial intelligence tools to gain an advantage in the war. The technologies have sometimes led to fatal consequences. (New York Times)
• The group chats that changed America: But their influence flows through X, Substack, and podcasts, and constitutes a kind of dark matter of American politics and media. The group chats aren’t always primarily a political space, but they are the single most important place in which a stunning realignment toward Donald Trump was shaped and negotiated, and an alliance between Silicon Valley and the new right formed. The group chats are “the memetic upstream of mainstream opinion,” wrote one of their key organizers, Sriram Krishnan, a former partner in the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz (typically styled a16z) who is now the White House senior policy adviser for AI. (Semafor)
• This Pill Promises to Give Your Dog More Years. You Might Not Like What Comes With Them. The drug could keep your pet around for longer—but some vets and ethicists worry that we might be barking up the wrong tree. (Slate)
• What Is Semafor? The Smiths’ newsletter-and-events business is both a modern media mash-up and a throwback to a pre-Trump era. (New York Magazine)
• The philosopher’s machine: my conversation with Peter Singer’s AI chatbot: The world’s most famous living philosopher has launched a chatbot to deal with ethical dilemmas. One former philosophy student-turned-journalist tests it out. (The Guardian)
• The Straight-Laced Control Freak Who Conquered the World’s Most Glamorous Sport: Under Ron Dennis, the McLaren team built a Formula One dynasty by running a racing outfit like a business. Here’s how they did it. (Wall Street Journal)
Be sure to check out our Masters in Business next week with Sander Gerber, the CEO/CIO of Hudson Bay Capital. The firm is a global multi-strategy investment firm based in Greenwich, with offices in NY, Miami, London, Hong Kong, and Dubai. Founded in June 2005 (with Yoav Roth) they manage $20B in client assets.
The U.S. Dollar vs. Your Portfolio
Source: A Wealth of Common Sense
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