Josh Wolfe Profile picture
Co-Founder @Lux_Capital | Trustee @SfiScience Santa Fe Inst | Chair @CiPrep Coney Island Prep (Brooklyn) | Co-Founder of Carson, Quinn & Bodhi w/ @ltwolfe

Feb 18, 2022, 11 tweets

1/ Releasing year-end redacted Lux quarterly letter to LPs

Our theme is: the power of ‘AND’

-raising fortress balance sheet cash + husbanding it wisely
-a coming wave of consolidation + M&A
-the macro, margin debt + market structure
-Magritte’s “Perspicacity”
-and much more…

2/ We are transitioning from CONJUNCTION…
to a period of DISJUNCTION

From “and” as neutral combination…
to “and yet” as expression of contrast

Comfort and complacency create conditions
for risk, instability + vulnerability

To FORESEE a risk is to help PREVENT its occurence

3/ We told Lux cos in 2021:

expect good AND bad market conditions AND be so well-capitalized to be unfettered by fear AND prepared to pounce

~90% of our holdings are funded into 2023

We made 136 distinct investments AND our co’s raised over $12.6B with 21 each raising >$100M

4/ In 2022 we advise

husband your cash AND consolidate your position
DO it as quietly as you can
DO it as loudly as you can—just DO it

Consolidation is the ultimate corporate “AND”
(customers, tech, market position)
so you can emerge stronger, fitter + get ready to stand out

5/ Magritte's "Perspicacity" aptly captures Lux’s unusual approach

a painter stares studiously at an egg—THAT WHICH IS
as he paints a bird on the canvas—THAT WHICH MAY BE

It's an egg—AND YET—it will be a bird
Through combination, transformation…

6/TIME ARBITRAGE—is the main advantage available to all
seized by few

Like the coupling of butterflies fluttering above AND below aware of eachother—OPAQUE to PROBABILITY—valuations fluctuate above + below volatiley

Any investment is
the pairing of an ALLOCATION + an ASSUMPTION

7/ Margin debt at $910B = highest level ever

wild swings are symptomatic of high-startle response from high uncertainty that some may know something that others don’t—when mostly NOBODY knows NOTHING

market reversion to the MEAN
MEANS a reversion to lower exit values

8/ All US recessions have been preceded by an INVERTED YIELD CURVE—though not every inverted curve was followed by a recession

We see potential for “BIFLATION”

AND
environmentalists have TOO QUICKLY overlooked the severe economic pain of switching TOO QUICKLY from coal + natgas

9/“Occupy Fed” movement is possible

Govt’s can lose control AND govts can take it

Global TECH challenges + opportunities
-US vs China vs Russia
-African continent
-Capital vs Labor
-Space Race 2.0

On “Consilience”—the unity of knowledge from different disciplines…

10/
INVENTIONS
everything NEW comes from synthetic combinations
of everything OLD

PEOPLE
all of us contain MULTITUDES
Founders can be:
brilliant AND irascible
polarizing AND genius
compassionate AND careless
wordsmiths AND inumerates
great storytellers AND terrible operators

11/
invention of new tech can solve PAST problems AND create future problems to be solved by FUTURE tech

—“Yes AND”

An overlooked science AND an unknown but hungry founding tech team AND a terrifyingly ambitious dream––its crazy!..

AND YET…that’s what we search for every day

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