E159: The Bestie Awards! Recapping the best and worst of 2023

2023 Bestie Awards: Political Landscape & Winners

• Donald Trump is identified as the biggest political winner of 2023, with Chamath Palihapitiya citing the "documents case" and the Colorado Supreme Court ruling as catalysts that galvanized his Republican nomination and increased his path to the White House.
• Saudi Arabia is awarded the title of biggest political winner for achieving unprecedented global leverage, maintaining productive relations with the US, China, Iran, Israel, and Russia while modernizing its domestic economy.
• Abortion rights are deemed the third biggest political winner by David Sacks, as post-Dobbs state-level referendums in red states (e.g., Kansas, Ohio) and battleground states (e.g., Michigan, Pennsylvania) have consistently preserved these rights and swung legislative control to Democrats.
• DeSantis and the DEI/ESG movements are identified as the biggest political losers, with Chamath Palihapitiya noting a 15% shrink in sustainable asset ownership ($5 trillion) and David Sachs highlighting the negative impact of the Hamas attacks on the DEI narrative within universities.
• Vladimir Zelenskyy is named the biggest political loser for declining the April 2022 peace deal based on advice from Boris Johnson and Joe Biden, a decision Sachs characterizes as leading to his "messianic" decline and alienation from European allies.
• The American People are collectively named the biggest political losers by Chamath Palihapitiya, due to facing an 80+ year-old rematch between Biden and Trump despite approximately 70-80% of the electorate opposing it.
• Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (RFK Jr.) is cited as the biggest political surprise for dropping out of the Democratic primary to run as an independent and achieving leading poll favorability.
• Hamas is identified as the biggest political surprise by David Sacks and Jacob Freedberg for its unexpected rise from a peripheral group to a central geopolitical actor following the October 7 attacks.
• Third-party candidates (Vivek Ramaswamy, Dean Phillips, RFK Jr.) are noted as a trend that could capture over 19% of the popular vote, potentially benefiting or hurting Biden and Trump depending on the specific demographics of the protest vote.
• Anti-semitism, the rehabilitation of Donald Trump, and the misuse of free speech by figures like Alex Jones are identified as the worst political trends of 2023.

Business Performance: Winners, Losers, and Surprises

• Elon Musk is named the biggest business winner for simultaneously rebasing Twitter, scaling Starlink, and consolidating Tesla's leadership in EVs and battery technology.
• The "Magnificent Seven" (led by Microsoft, NVIDIA, and Meta) are recognized as the biggest business winners, accounting for nearly all S&P 500 gains with the top seven companies growing ~80% compared to 12% for the remaining 493 stocks.
• Microsoft is specifically highlighted for adding over $1 trillion in market cap, successfully closing the Activision acquisition, and demonstrating strategic agility during the OpenAI leadership changes.
• Uber, under Dara Khosrowshahi, is recognized for transforming from a potential failure to an S&P 500 profitable entity with a market cap growth from $50B to $126B.
• Venture Capitalists (2021 Vintages) are named the biggest business losers, with LPs indicating that 50% of firms managing this capital could fail due to the poor performance of 2021 deployments.
• Disney and Warner Bros. Discovery are identified as the biggest business losers due to box office flops, the collapse of their comic book franchises, the decline of Disney+, and backlash against "woke" content.
• The "Woke" Community is named the biggest business loser for attempting to drive revenue through social movements, a strategy that Chamath Palihapitiya states backfired with consumers demanding product quality over political alignment.
• The Federal Reserve (BTFP & Rate Guidance) is cited as a major business surprise for preventing a recession via the Bank Term Funding Program and surprising the market with dovish rate cut guidance in December 2023.
• Sam Altman is recognized as a business surprise for his ouster and immediate return to OpenAI following a boardroom coup, demonstrating significant influence over his employee base.
• The "Woke" Business Strategy is criticized as a trend where companies like Bud Light and Target faced financial consequences for social activism, leading to a consumer shift toward "staying in their lane."

Science, Technology, and Cultural Trends

• CRISPR Therapy is named the best science breakthrough by Chamath Palihapitiya for its FDA approval treating sickle cell anemia, a significant medical advancement for the African American community.
• Brain Decoders are highlighted as a major science breakthrough by Jacob Freedberg, utilizing fMRI and AI (GPT) to translate brain activity into text, aiding those unable to speak.
• Open Source LLMs are identified as the best new tech by Jacob Freedberg, enabling offline, local running of language models to bypass government regulation and surveillance.
• LK99 is named the biggest "flash in the pan" for the brief, unreplicable hype surrounding room-temperature superconductivity.
• Geoffrey Hinton's Effective Altruism (EA) movement is named a "flash in the pan" following the Sam Altman ouster, which was partly driven by EA-affiliated board members.
• George Santos is identified as a "flash in the pan" politician who briefly held office before being impeached for using campaign funds for personal luxury.
• The National Debt is cited as the worst trend by Chamath Palihapitiya, described as an "upside-down hockey stick" trajectory that has accelerated from $1 trillion/year under Obama to $2 trillion/year under Trump and Biden.
• Mental Health Decline in Youth is highlighted as a worst trend, with Chamath noting a 35-44 age group death rate increase of 26% and a 20% increase for 25-34 year olds above pre-pandemic levels, alongside a 36% rise in Western suicide rates over two decades.
• Normalization of Government Spending is identified by Jacob Freedberg as a worst trend, where the political cost of fiscal discipline has vanished, leading to a normalization of trillion-dollar spending.
• Colorblind Meritocracy is named the best trend by David Sacks, citing the Supreme Court banning race-based affirmative action and red-state governors shutting down DEI programs in universities.

Leadership, Media, and "Bestie" Awards

• Satya Nadella (Microsoft) and Jensen Huang (NVIDIA) are named Best CEOs, with Sacks awarding Jensen Huang for NVIDIA's 235% stock rise and Chamath praising Satya Nadella's capital allocation.
• Bill Ackman is named Best Investor for perfectly timing the bond market short and covering at the peak in October 2023 to generate hundreds of millions.
• Novo Nordisk is named Best Turnaround for the success of GLP-1 drugs (Ozempic/Wegovy), driving a 4-5x stock increase over the last four years.
• Muyuan Foods is named the Worst Company of 2023 by Jacob Freedberg for its industrial-scale pig factory farming, criticized for inhumane living conditions.
• Fox News is named the Worst Company by Chamath Palihapitiya for deceiving voters, firing Tucker Carlson, and facing a $2.7 billion lawsuit over election misinformation.
• Liz Magill (Former UPenn President) receives the "Self-Immolation Award" for her tone-deaf congressional testimony regarding free speech and genocide advocacy.
• Rudy Giuliani receives the "Self-Immolation Award" as the namesake of the award, following a $150 million defamation judgment and the exposure of the fake elector scheme.
• Taylor Swift is named a wildcard Best CEO for generating $4B in revenue from her tour, merchandise, and concert film, and boosting local economies by $90M per stop.
• "GFP" (Good Fing Profit)* is named Best Meme for Elon Musk's retort to Bob Iger, while the "Boston Cop on a Slide" meme is cited as a viral reaction to market chaos.
• The "Bear" Season 2 and Succession Finale are named the best media releases, with Jacob Freedberg specifically praising "The Bear" episode "Forks."
• "The Idea Factory" (history of Bell Labs) is recommended as the best book, arguing that institutional monopolies can foster long-term innovation rather than stifle it.

Forward-Looking Statements & Predictions

• 2024 Recession Avoidance: David Sacks predicts a "soft landing" for the US economy in 2024, a rare occurrence he previously noted almost never happens, though the B2B software sector has already experienced a recession.
• Third-Party Viability: Chamath predicts a significant fragmentation in the 2024 election, suggesting a third-party candidate could capture over 19% of the vote, potentially altering the winner of the presidency.
• Ivy League Decline: Jacob Freedberg predicts a continued drop in applications and funding for Ivy League schools due to their perceived lack of free speech and first-principles thinking.
• AI Democratization: Jacob Freedberg anticipates the continued growth of local, open-source AI models as a defense against increasing government regulation, framing this as a battle between a "new enlightenment" and "new dark ages."
• Fiscal Consolidation: David Sacks notes that while the US avoided a national recession, the B2B software industry has bottomed out and is showing "green shoots" of recovery.
• Global Instability: David Sacks warns of the risk of the US being drawn into a broader Middle East conflict or a proxy war in Ukraine in 2024.
• Market "Meltdown": Chamath Palihapitiya predicts the stock market will "melt up" until the first Federal Reserve rate cut in 2024, followed by potential real selling pressure.
• DeFi/Banking: David Sacks remains ambivalent about the long-term consequences of the Fed's Bank Term Funding Program (BTFP), acknowledging it prevented a 2023 recession but hiding unknown systemic risks.