The first half of the year was a wake up call to the VC industry. Both in the shift in perception of the investability of SaaS and that investing in companies building for the world of atoms can produce extreme power law outcomes. We hear of strong pressure both internally amongst GPs and externally from LPs across a swath of investment firms to seriously reorient their allocation strategies. 2026 is the first year that robotics has really registered on the map for VC investment and we expect growth to accelerate. I would not be surprised to see annual investment in private robotics companies to exceed $100b by next year.

The loud, wheezy hoot of the pit horn used to signal the end of the shift. Blaring across the town, it blew the changes. We'd all hear it. My father, as his father before him, was a GP in Ashington, a large mining town in Northumberland. Ashington was the hub of a network of subsidiary collieries including Woodhorn (now a museum), Ellington and Lynemouth, which both appropriately featured as film locations for Billy Elliot. Mining was in the local blood. To work 'doon the pit' was a proud profession and a natural family succession. ✍️ Alastair Irvine Article |

The Bank of Japan has raised interest rates once again, ramping up the pace of hikes to the fastest in 36 years. On today’s Big Take: What the shift means for Japan and global markets.

The U.S. military is expected to move most of its MQ-9 "Reaper" drones out of Africa and into U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM), which oversees Latin America, according to six sources who spoke with CNN. The Pentagon declined to comment. The shift comes as the Trump administration ramps up counternarcotics and counterterrorism plans in South America, including potential operations in Ecuador. One source said discussions are still underway about sending some drones to the Middle East instead, where the US has lost MQ-9s in strikes against Iran. Some sources voiced concern that pulling drones from Africa could hurt ongoing operations against ISIS and al Shabaab there. The move follows a classified DOJ legal opinion, previously reported by CNN, authorizing lethal strikes against a secret list of cartels. Colombia has separately arranged to borrow three MQ-9A drones from the US, and Panama just received over six million dollars in drone systems for border surveillance. Source:

The latest edition of The Signal newsletter is here. Explore why private markets are becoming a mainstream allocation, what’s driving the shift and what it could mean for investors and companies. Read more from the Morgan Stanley Institute:

“The old flywheel-driven growth approach is probably a lot harder to replicate going forward... We want to see applications where, despite market conditions, users still want to pay to use them.” — @arthur0x, CEO & CIO of @DeFianceCapital When crypto application revenue is overly dependent on market activity, it becomes difficult to separate durable demand from market beta. Arthur’s thesis is that the next generation of applications needs a demand floor — users who keep paying even when the cycle turns. The shift from cycle-driven activity to more persistent demand makes crypto applications easier to forecast and underwrite — ultimately broadening the investable market for them.

The shitcoin casino has been something I mocked and looked down on since 2020 I was holier than thou meanwhile my "real" curve coins went to zero all the same Now on cycle 3 i can accept the shitcoin casino as a subculture of the internet But the shift this time changes things They will still go to zero in time, but the PROCESS creates real yield and impacts REAL ASSETS I think we're in the early innings of crypto degeneracy becomingn the tail that wags the entirety of tradfi Hard to imagine now but financial nihlism is only growing and this is a prediction I am starting to feel comfortable with Meanhwile you can own the casinos Crypto proving it can continuously create black holes for capital in unexpected ways Not proud of it, man enough to say it. Kinda like the herpes you got in Vegas, I think this stuff is not going away.

The shift we are seeing right now is extraordinary. Markets now see a BASE case of 4 interest rate hikes by July 2027. To put this into perspective, at the start of 2026, markets saw 4 interest rate CUTS during this time period. That's a difference of +200 basis points between interest rate expectations now and 9 months ago. These are, by far, the most hawkish Fed policy expectations since the Fed began raising interest rates in March 2022. It's clear: the market believes "higher for longer" is back and inflation is here to stay. Wednesday is going to be an eventful day.

The National Sheriffs’ Association was the last of the major police organizations opposing the Clarity Act to change its position, moving from opposition to neutral. But that shift is notable. Compare the language in this letter with the one the group sent July 31, when it described the bill as “harmful,” warned of “significant law enforcement and public safety risks” and characterized the BRCA language as “terrible policy.” While not an endorsement, the shift likely reflects significant behind-the-scenes work between White House officials and the group this summer to move it from its earlier highly critical stance to neutral. Not expected to change their positions, I’m told, are the prosecutors: the National District Attorneys Association and the National Association of Assistant U.S. Attorneys. Both groups have conditioned their support on significantly narrowing the BRCA’s protections for noncustodial software developers, including making it easier to prosecute them as unlicensed money transmitters for knowingly moving illicit funds. The White House, Treasury, Members of Congress and the crypto industry have made clear they are unwilling to make those changes. Democratic Senator @SenCortezMasto aligned herself with the prosecutors’ groups in a July letter backing the proposed changes and has not publicly shifted her position since. But the NSA’s move to neutral is generally being viewed as removing another obstacle on the path to the September 15 vote.

The consumer app absorbs the product layer. Asset management becomes code. Whoever owns the front end owns the customer. That is the shift, and we are the layer underneath it. Ready to build? #onchainfinance#