June 29, 2025
Happy Sunday from one of the many cities experiencing record heat waves this week, where the sidewalk essentially feels like lava.
If you are stretched out in a hammock, congratulations on mastering WiFi vacationing. If you are hiding indoors with the AC cranked, consider this your mental getaway for the next 10-15 minutes.
Grab a cold drink, settle in, and let us see what the economic carnival has cooked up this week.
- Alex Blackwood
💸 Global Wealth Exodus: A record 142,000 millionaires are projected to relocate globally this year, with the UK facing an unprecedented exodus of 16,500 high-net-worth individuals. This massive wealth migration, driven by tax changes and a search for stability, is redirecting capital to global hubs like the UAE.
👟 From 'Dad Shoe' to Dunk Contest: New Balance, once known for its unglamorous footwear, has strategically transformed its brand image by signing top-tier athletes like NBA prospect Cooper Flagg. This shift from "Endorsed By No One" to a star-studded roster has fueled significant revenue growth and cultural relevance, proving a personal connection can outmaneuver bigger rivals.
🤖 AI Sparks Office Leasing Comeback: Turns out AI isn't just gobbling code, it's inhaling office space. Tech leasing spiked 21% year over year in Q1 as every "GPT" startup sprinted back to desks. Markets like San Francisco, New York, Seattle, and Boston are benefiting as AI-driven demand reshapes where and how tech firms work, signaling a strong recovery for office real estate.
QuantumScape just dropped a game-changing announcement that sent its stock soaring earlier this week. The company integrated its advanced “Cobra” ceramic separator process into baseline production, slashing manufacturing time and equipment footprint like never before.
What Happened?
QuantumScape successfully deployed its Cobra separator process across its solid-state lithium-metal battery production lines. This innovation boosts heat treatment speed by roughly 25 times compared to their previous “Raptor” method while using a fraction of the physical space. This breakthrough marks a critical step toward scalable, cost-effective mass production of next-generation solid-state batteries. These are widely regarded as the “holy grail” for electric vehicles due to their potential for longer range, faster charging, and improved safety.
CEO Dr. Siva Sivaram called Cobra “a powerful path forward for commercializing our next-generation battery technology,” emphasizing how it significantly improves throughput and shrinks the equipment footprint.
How Did We Get Here?
QuantumScape has been pioneering solid-state battery tech for years, aiming to overcome the limitations of conventional lithium-ion batteries. The Raptor process, introduced in 2023, was their first major leap in continuous-flow separator production.
Cobra builds on that foundation, accelerating production speed and efficiency to a level that makes gigawatt-scale manufacturing feasible. This progress is crucial for meeting growing EV demand and supporting partnerships like the licensing deal with Volkswagen Group.
So What's the Big Deal?
This isn't just an EV story; it's a foundational technology shift with massive implications:
The New Battery Arms Race
QuantumScape’s breakthrough isn’t happening in a vacuum; it’s a major move in a global arms race to redefine energy storage. The year 2025 is widely seen as a "watershed year" for solid-state technology, marking its transition from the lab toward real-world applications. The competition is fierce.
Toyota is promising batteries with over 600 miles of range, while automakers like Hyundai, Stellantis, and Mercedes-Benz are all racing to get their own versions into prototype vehicles by 2025 or 2026. The universal goal is to crack the code on the core limitations of today's lithium-ion batteries: range anxiety, slow charging, high cost, and safety concerns.
While major hurdles like production costs and manufacturing scale remain for the entire industry, the pace of innovation has never been faster. This global push could accelerate mass EV adoption by three to five years, fundamentally reshaping the future of transportation.
Bottom Line
QuantumScape’s Cobra breakthrough is more than just a corporate milestone; it's a signal that the next wave of technological disruption is gaining speed. By solving a critical piece of the manufacturing puzzle, the company has brought the promise of a safer, more powerful, all-electric future one giant step closer to reality.
Our biggest PadSplit to date, The Gaitok, is approaching a sellout. With almost $370k already invested in it and its anticipated first dividends around the corner, this PadSplit is generating quite a buzz.
It's got the same high-occupancy model, same essential-worker tenant base people have come to love, with projected double-digit yields that echo our other PadSplits.
This fully-operating, co-living asset features 100% occupancy, generating $110k+ in post-fee revenue over the last 12 months, and featuring jaw-dropping yields.
Here is an overview on some key numbers:
Invest today; the clock is ticking to own a piece of The Gaitok.
Some books whisper cautionary tales, Brave New World straps you into a feelies chair and cranks the soma drip until you cannot tell if you are chilled or chilled to the bone. Huxley skips the flying cars and goes straight for your dopamine receptors, building a society where happiness is mandatory and individuality is a software bug.
Meet Bernard, the brooding misfit with a gym membership for the mind, and Lenina, corporate approved perfection in a red jumpsuit. Their weekend getaway to the Savage Reservation plays like a glitch in the Matrix, proving paradise is just a factory preset.
The world is neon hatcheries, baby bottles on conveyor belts, and slogans that cling to your brain like pop up ads. You will smell the antiseptic labs, feel the synthetic silk of hypnopædic sheets, and hear the white noise of state sponsored content lulling citizens to sleep.
If you have ever scrolled social media and wondered who is really pulling the strings, this book is your red pill. Read it with your phone on airplane mode, skip the energy drink, and prepare to side eye every wellness campaign you see for a week.
⭐ 4.8 / 5.0 in my book (no pun intended)
A. "Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."
B. "Money, it's a gas. Grab that cash with both hands and make a stash."
C. “Roads? Where we’re going, we don’t need roads.”
Blend every photon in the observable universe into one paint swatch and you get a beige color scientists nicknamed Cosmic Latte. Translation: the grand cosmos is basically the same shade as the foam on your morning latte.
Written by Alex Blackwood & Thomas Horcel
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