More iteration on BoA docs for Mahlstedt business accounts.
Shopped at Chase for business banking alternatives.
No generic rewards programs for banking balances, just cc.
Need 2k to waive $15/mo checking account fee.
Credit cards are basically: (full list https://creditcards.chase.com/business-credit-cards)
Business Unlimited, 1.5% cash back on everything, no fee, $750 back on $7.5k/3mo
Business Preferred, 3%points back on shipping/advertising/internet/travel, 1%points back on everything else, $95/yr, 100k points on $15k/3mo
I like this one a lot, since it keeps your rewards points in the same world as personal.
And remember you can redeem points back on travel for 1.25x (personal ultimate rewards is 1.5x) so you basically get 1.25% cash back on everything and 3.75% cash back on the special categories.
Trust.
Notarized the trust, was a process.
Looks like Chase and BoA have both suspended notary services (informally/temporarily?). Chase doesn’t do wills, but the trust is all I need urgently.
Convinced, called their notary hotline for some quick advice, then got the stamp.
2 docs: the actual trust, and the certificate. The latter is a truncated documentation that provides the proof without exposing any private details of the trust.
Will/healthcare.
Will leave these unsigned/notarized/witnessed for now. Adding note for future.
Living will, HIPAA, PoA, etc.
Notary Public.
Less than $100 for application and exam fees. Takes a month or two to schedule, prep, test, commission.
Lasts 4 years in new york.
Prep material: Notary Law (https://dos.ny.gov/system/files/documents/2022/04/notary.pdf). There are other books too. Imagine could get prepared in 2 fulltime days?
Test is 1hr. Must get 28/40 multiple choice questions.
Will do this later, added note.
There are some pretty great iphone scanner apps.
Reinforcement learning and other methods for the netflix recommendation engine: https://netflixtechblog.medium.com/reinforcement-learning-for-budget-constrained-recommendations-6cbc5263a32a
Uber is ending its rewards program (!) and focusing on the Uber One membership. Discounts and fee reductions and stuff, but no more $5 every 5k pts.
Dissembled the s9 roomba and cleaned the edge brush, bin, filter, main brushes. Then replaced the edge brush and the base bag.
Remember I have extra replacement parts from when the first s9 was shipped with faulty firmware.
And remember the base turns red when the bag is missing or full.
a16z invested 350m into Adam Neumann’s residential real estate startup Flow.
Remember too that a16z invested 70m just a few months ago into Neumann’s blockchain carbon token startup Flowcarbon.
Lots of reachouts to various folks from various disciplines for the startup.
Started the BoA business account + credit card, will be $300 bonus if I deposit 3k.
SS-4 for EIN.
ZenBusiness has a lot of templates for various agreements/contracts/waivers/terms, including the operating agreement.
Created the operating agreement. Tax reporting, audits, members, arbitrary conditions, how to handle voting (>$10k transactions), membership changes. Very very similar to DAO governance.
Mahlstedt Trust.
Well, full estate plan. Trust, will, healthcare, everything.
I’m trustee, successor Eric. Revocable. Can lend, pledge, sell, etc against assets.
Have to sign+witness and notarize before official.
And, of course, you have to fund the trust. Without assets in the trust, there’s nothing to move.
Will has wishes, memorial, body, statements, etc.
Looks like jane street median is a little higher than citadel.
Thread on p2p lending: https://twitter.com/ValKatayev/status/1555233235801481216 (Val Katayev)
Prosper. 2006. Decentralized pooling of capital, others can borrow against it.
Survived the crash because it was personal debt.
“Credit card default rates have never surpassed the actual interest rate they charge.”
Your identity, your score, your borrowability is on the line. May default some, but with proper diversification (p2p, decentralized lending), won’t wreck you.
Consistent returns (variable, but avg 10%), exit opportunities.
High net worth individuals love investments like these. Target first. You have the funding side (easily, important). Creation of the fund is rapid. Rich folks tell their network, spread is not hard (esp in tech circles). Can then bring in institutional money, banks, VCs. Then spread internationally.
Some research into secfi, slide, caplinx.
US sanctions on Tornado! Very curious how this plays out. Smart contracts are currently running on thousands of computers globally, mixing transactions to obfuscate details. That can’t be stopped. Ingress/egress can…maybe?
The lend side is called earn, since technically you’re funding the pool that borrowers borrow against, earning your portion of that interest. They have curated pools: maven, orthogonal, alameda, celsius. Different APYs for each, maple does risk assessments.
Applied (as Mahlstedt LLC) for borrow as well. This is not open to retail; you can’t login with your wallet and borrow against the pools. This is for curated crypto institutions, typically protocols both new and established that are seeking growth. There are term agreements, full process. Basically a crypto VC, using the capital from the decentralized lenders (investors).
Token is MPL.
xchain on eth and sol.
Cut/copy/paste from the context menus in gdocs (from the other day’s post about removing formatting when shifting text between public wp blog and private gdoc blog) requires a chrome extension: Google Docs Offline (from google). https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/google-docs-offline/ghbmnnjooekpmoecnnnilnnbdlolhkhi/related
Jeff reached out about interview prep and shifting a bit away from hw+embedded and toward pure sw, as well as a friend who is turning a successful art gallery into an NFT collection (will talk to him, pier59studios). 3 helpful docs: process (https://bmahlstedt.com/2020/02/15), DS&A (private gdoc), Design (private gdoc), Factor+Score Matrix (private gdoc).
Excellent video on Wim Hof: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TM6WKeZ43s4
Started the PE-backed loan conversations with a few banks.
Applied for developer tickets for breakpoint (solana lisbon).
Compound (https://app.withcompound.com/accounts) is a mint alternative, optimized for tech folks (PE, crypto, etc).
fuse.js is the fuzzy search lib.
QC spa on governer’s island: https://www.qcny.com/en
Assure is probably the most popular SPV platform. Sydecar is another. Easy to get funding as a founder, easy to invest as an investor, helps with fund administration, more.
GDP report showed economy shrank by 0.2% in Q2 (Q1 was 0.4%).
Securitization: merging various assets into a group and then issuing an instrument for it.
Standard: securitizing companies. That’s what equity is.
Relevant: securitizing debt. Like a loan ETF. These are called CDOs: collateralized debt obligations.
Example: I’m a bank and I manage a ton of mortgages and personal loans and credit lines. I create a diversified portfolio of all this debt and then create a Brian token which represents a stake in the pool. Then I sell the debt to various investors. They’re basically funding the loans, and then they’re getting a guaranteed return from the interest (diversified, customized, etc). I’m the aggregator, the pool, the originator; I’m not the lender. I charge origination fees, not interest. The investor basically takes the role of the lender. And I can take the assets off my balance sheet, which means I have more cap space (under liability threshold) to underwrite additional loans and bring more TAM in.
This is exactly how mortgage-backed securities work. Banks group all mortgages into buckets by risk level (tranches) and then sell them as bonds to investors. (of course – veiling the assets backing the security, as in 07-09, can lead to large problems).
Exposes opportunities to investors in ways that might not be available otherwise. In a fractional way, with lower barrier to entry. While being beneficial to the originator to reduce books.
Watched the AWS+Datadog webinar on how to observe k8s envs.
Specifically EKS Blueprints. Basically IaC specs for full deployments. Interfaces with terraform and aws cdk.
Stripe sitting just below the 3 hectacorns (140b, 127b, 100b respectively) at 95b.
Paste with no formatting when copying between the wordpress and gdoc editors. Otherwise the indentation is trashed.
Continued motorcycle storage pursuit.
The garages are great for access (security, maintenance areas, etc) but are basically full.
Did some research on storage lockers. Some do allow motorcycles.
Local Locker does not allow gas. Manhattan Mini Storage doesn’t either.
Talked to Public Storage and Local Locker.
Got quotes from a few others. $300-400/mo. Same (if not more) as a regular garage. Plus you can’t access it, and you have to drain the gas and oil. Not worth it.
Overall extremely annoyed; I don’t have hours to waste on finding alternate parking like this. Motorcycles should be easy, but NY is much worse than CA for this.
Remember I applied to cyclegarage and risingwolf a couple weeks ago. No reply.
Reached out to rydersalley, VAX moto, machina cycles. All via both phone and email. Some bounced. The ones that went through didn’t get replies.
Icon parking continues to be unhelpful – website shows tons of facilities with motorcycle availability, but I called ~5 and pissed off attendants just said they’re full.
Finally met someone helpful! Motorgrrl. <$200/mo, comparable to current. They have space (albeit may be tight). I’ll bring it in fri or sat. They say climate-controlled and safe, so assume covered and secure. A little worried about driving over the bridge before maintenance, but will take it easy.
Revisited IRS section 83(i). Defer income from the exercise of an RSU or ISO for up to 5 years, namely deferring AMT. This was to accommodate employees at companies without/infrequent tender offers, since they don’t have liquidity to pay the taxes on the exercise.
MSFT +5%.
Choco taco is being discontinued??
Russia withdrawing from the ISS in 2024, leaving US / Japan / Europe / Canada.
Remember figure. Crypto-backed loans. APRs 6-8%. Up to 3M. Can also do mortgages, helocs, refinances, and personal loans (smaller maximums, but faster process).
