Exits Are Back, QSB Stock & The New America Party? | E2148
This Week in Startups
Jason Calacanis
4.4 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 7 July 2025
⏱️ 67 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Today’s show:
Startup exits are heating up with $67.7B in Q2 activity, QSBS just got a major expansion, and Robinhood is pushing boundaries with tokenized SPVs. In this episode, @Jason and @alex break down what it all means for founders and investors, plus the rise of Elon’s “America Party,” TikTok’s potential reboot, and why SaaS startups must rebrand around AI to stay competitive. A must-watch for anyone building, investing, or navigating tech in 2025.
Timestamps:
(04:29) Jason’s thoughts on Elon Musk’s America Party
(10:05) Oracle - Try OCI and save up to 50% on your cloud bill at https://www.oracle.com/twist
(15:02) M&A keeps heating up and why a big fintech IPO could be on the way!
(20:00) OpenPhone - Streamline and scale your customer communications with OpenPhone. Get 20% off your first 6 months at https://www.openphone.com/twist
(26:32) Unpacking liquidation preferences for non-experts
(29:11) AI companies are soaking up the majority of investment dollars but what does that really MEAN?
(30:02) MonarchMoney - Get 50% off your first year by going to MonarchMoney.com and using the offer code TWiST
(36:26) Why Jason’s group chat will love the QSBS expansion but it’s not really that big of a deal…
(46:27) TikTok seems poised to make a deal… Why Jason thinks they do pose a national security threat.
(59:22) Why is CoreWeave picking up Core Scientific, and is now a good time to sell your shares?
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | If people who are already making a lot of money, if you give them the ability to invest more |
| 0:05.8 | and you make it easier for them to invest more, it's actually better for everybody. |
| 0:09.2 | That's hard for people to get their heads around because they're like, wait, that person's |
| 0:13.1 | already rich. |
| 0:13.7 | Bezos is already rich. |
| 0:14.8 | Why should Amazon and Andy Jassy's already rich? |
| 0:18.1 | You know, the people who work at Facebook, Zuckerberg's already rich. |
| 0:20.9 | Why should they be able to buy more companies and make their company bigger? |
| 0:24.3 | Well, if you look at it as, hey, we're all Americans and that company is a global company |
| 0:30.1 | that's making money around the world. |
| 0:31.8 | It's giving an advantage to our country. |
| 0:34.2 | That's why we have the lowest unemployment of our lifetimes. |
| 0:37.3 | That's why the country is done so well. |
| 0:40.3 | Yeah, it's just hard for, I think, people on the bottom sometimes or really highly educated people, |
| 0:46.0 | as I wrote in my piece on my substack the other week with Generation She. For that socialist bent, |
| 0:52.0 | I think it's really hard when you have $200, $300,000 in student loans and no job prospects because your degree means nothing to employers. |
| 1:00.7 | It's pretty hard to buy into capitalism, right? |
| 1:04.1 | This Week in Startups is brought to you by Oracle. Oracle Cloud Infrastructure, or OCI, is a single platform for your infrastructure, database, application development, and AI needs. |
| 1:16.4 | Save up to 50% on your cloud bill at Oracle.com slash twist. Open phone. Create business phone numbers for you and your team that work through an app on your smartphone or desktop. |
| 1:28.4 | Twist listeners can get an extra 20% off any plan for your first six months at openphone.com slash twist. |
| 1:34.8 | And Monarch Money. Get control of your overall finances with Monarch Money. Use the code |
| 1:40.4 | twist at MonarchMoney.com in your browser for half off on your first year. |
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