Naval’s $500 VC fund, the Maduro Polymarket scandal, and NYT defends theft and murder | E2280
This Week in Startups
Jason Calacanis
4.2 • 1.4K Ratings
🗓️ 25 April 2026
⏱️ 50 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
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Today’s show:
It’s a News and Off-Duty weekend roundup!
AngelList’s USVC fund is open to anyone with $500, but it’s getting pushback on social media. Do the critics have a point?
A Special Forces soldier made $409K betting on the military’s capture of Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro. Is the world just a big casino now?
And a NYT podcast defends shoplifting and explores “social murder.” Find out why Jason says they crossed the line.
Plus: Why you should teach your kids about investment and more, Off-Duty streaming and book recommendations.
Related Links
USVC: https://usvc.com/
AngelList: https://www.angellist.com/
Naval Ravikant on X: https://x.com/naval
“Don’t Listen to the Peanut Gallery; USVC is a Watershed Moment” by Hari Raghavan: https://x.com/haridigresses/status/2047503944839016681
@Covered_Call USVC tweet: https://x.com/covered_call/status/2047020060900733306
Forge Global: https://forgeglobal.com/
Calm: https://www.calm.com/
Full DOJ indictment of Gannon Ken Van Dyke: https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/us-soldier-charged-using-classified-information-profit-prediction-market-bets
NYT “The Opinions” podcast: “The Rich Don’t Play by the Rules. So Why Should I?” https://www.nytimes.com/video/opinion/100000010849055/the-rich-dont-play-by-the-rules-so-why-should-i.html
Hasn Piker on Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/hasanabi
New Yorker: Jia Tolentino: https://www.newyorker.com/contributors/jia-tolentino
NYT: Nadja Spiegelman: https://www.nytimes.com/by/nadja-spiegelman
Jia Tolentino on X: https://x.com/jiatolentino
Garry Kasparov on X: https://x.com/kasparov63
Prof G Media: https://www.profgmedia.com/
Kids Investment Club: https://www.kidsinvestmentclub.com/
Time stamps:0:00 Intro
1:18 Naval's $500 VC Fund Explained
5:54 Should You Trust Critics With 2K Followers?
7:21 Learn By Betting — Jason's Philosophy
10:10 Northwest Registered Agent - Get more when you start your business with Northwest. In 10 clicks and 10 minutes, you can form your company and walk away with a real business identity — Learn more at https://www.northwestregisteredagent.com/twist
12:30 The Maduro Polymarket Scandal
13:28 Should the Military Bet on Missions?
19:55 LinkedIn Jobs - Hire right, the first time. Post your first job and get $100 off towards your job post at https://LinkedIn.com/twist
29:32 NYT Defends Theft & "Social Murder"
30:28 There Is No Moral Equivalence
33:41 The Nepo Baby Behind the Article
35:42 Prof G's "Resist & Unsubscribe" Movement
37:54 Walk The Walk — Hasan, Bernie & Performative Outrage
44:49 Teaching Kids About Money
48:21 The Rich Get Richer & The Poor Stay Poor
Off Duty Recommendations
“The Complete Maus” by Art Spiegelman: https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Maus-Art-Spiegelman/dp/0679406417
“Thinking in Bets” by Annie Duke: https://www.amazon.com/Thinking-Bets-Making-Smarter-Decisions/dp/0735216355
“Queen of Chess” trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pmJgtLKBXg
Greenlight app: https://greenlight.com/
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Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | This is disgraceful. |
| 0:01.3 | You have an obligation to think through what you say. Crazy and deranged behavior that's all being bundled together and violence towards individuals who disagree with. We live in a democracy. All violence is immoral, as Martin Luther King said, as Jesus said, this is an incredible fail by the New York Times. So are we going off duty or you have a news story or two you on my comment on. I got one news story. I feel like people are going to want to hear your thoughts about this. |
| 0:22.9 | Is this Hassan on New York Times? |
| 0:25.0 | Oh, we're doing that in off duty? |
| 0:25.9 | We can talk about that again. We can talk about that some more if you want to. Sure. Lute maxing. I know you're a big fan of Lute maxing. Angelist has a new product out called USVC. |
| 0:37.0 | They're offering exposure to venture investments with a $500 minimum. No accreditation required. The goal is long-term capital appreciation, not traditional liquidity. It's a little bit like venture for normies, venture for kiddos. That's sort of how people are describing it. |
| 0:54.8 | There's been a lot, Jason, a lot of discussion over the last 2448 on X about this. |
| 1:01.0 | Criticism has been really sharp. |
| 1:03.1 | There's a viral thread from a guy named Mario at Covered underscore call. |
| 1:07.5 | He's calling this yet another grift in the world of retail accessible VC. |
| 1:12.1 | And he says, retail doesn't need access to private markets this badly. |
| 1:15.8 | A whole laundry list here. |
| 1:17.6 | I'll pull up the tweet so you can see. |
| 1:19.2 | So this is AngelList's new USVC, U.S. Venture Capital. |
| 1:24.2 | This is an SEC registered fund that allows non-accredited retail investors to invest |
| 1:29.7 | in private pre-IPO companies. Correct. And my friend Naval is doing it, Ravacant, who's been on the |
| 1:35.9 | program. And so they've got a bunch of portfolio companies in there that people want. The way this |
| 1:43.7 | works is these are, I believe they're called closed-end funds. |
| 1:48.3 | What they allow you to do is you, instead of paying carry, the two and 20 you hear about venture capital, 20% carry, 2% fees a year. |
| 2:00.2 | So if you had a $100 million fund and you turn it into a |
| 2:05.5 | $300 million fund in returns, that means you had 200 in profits. The VC would get 20% of the 200, |
| 2:13.7 | not the 300, but of the gain. 20% of the 200 is 40 million. So that's what VCs are hoping for. They're hoping to triple your money. You're hoping they triple your money because you would double your money in the stock market. Is the theoretical concept here. Once in a while you get an outlier that pays 5x. Once in a while you get a dud that pays 0.5x. You lose half your money sometimes. You go 10x sometimes, but you're |
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