Welcome back to your daily memorandum talking tech, business, AI, markets, and more. 🗞️

In today’s edition, we are tackling the following:

🚪 All 11 of Elon Musk's xAI co-founders have now reportedly departed.
🤝 Mark Zuckerberg texted Elon Musk offering support for DOGE efforts.
🚔 74 arrested in Los Angeles after 'No Kings' rally turns violent.
🏦 U.S. Treasury to meet with insurance regulators over private credit concerns.
🕊️ Pakistan offers to host U.S.-Iran peace talks amid ground assault fears.

TECHNOLOGY

• All 11 of Elon Musk's xAI co-founders have now reportedly departed (TechCrunch)
  ^{_{More: MSN, Yahoo!, Seeking Alpha}}

  • Manuel Kroiss & Ross Nordeen, the last two xAI co-founders, have both reportedly left the company.

  • Musk recently acknowledged that xAI "was not built right," saying the company is being rebuilt from scratch.

  • xAI was recently acquired by SpaceX, consolidating SpaceX, xAI, & X under one corporate umbrella.

• DeepSeek suffered its longest outage ever, lasting over seven hours (Bloomberg)
  ^{_{More: Straits Times, Business Standard}}

  • Users began reporting faults on the evening of March 29, and DeepSeek issued multiple updates to resolve them.

  • The cause of the outage remains unclear, & DeepSeek did not respond to requests for comment.

  • The disruption is unusual for DeepSeek, which has maintained near-99% uptime since launch.

• Mark Zuckerberg texted Elon Musk offering support for DOGE efforts (TechCrunch)
  ^{_{More: Engadget, NewsBytes, Yahoo!}}

  • Court documents reveal Zuckerberg texted Musk in February 2025, offering help protecting DOGE team members.

  • Musk responded with a heart emoji, then asked if Zuckerberg would join his bid for OpenAI.

  • Zuckerberg suggested a call to discuss the OpenAI bid, but never actually signed on.

BUSINESS

• 74 arrested in Los Angeles after 'No Kings' rally turns violent (Washington Post)
  ^{_{More: AP, NBC, CBS.}}

  • L.A. police arrested 74 people Saturday after protesters refused a dispersal order near a federal complex.

  • Some demonstrators threw rocks, bottles, & concrete at officers, injuring two with concrete blocks.

  • The L.A. clashes stood out amid otherwise peaceful 'No Kings' protests across all 50 U.S. states.

• U.S. Treasury to meet with insurance regulators over private credit concerns (Reuters)
  ^{_{More: Straits Times, Yahoo!}}

  • Treasury plans a series of meetings with insurance regulators to discuss the $2T private credit market.

  • Concerns over liquidity, transparency, & lending discipline have rattled investor sentiment in recent weeks.

  • Treasury Secretary Bessent wants to improve oversight of private credit lenders without direct regulatory authority.

• Volkswagen unlocks $1B more for Rivian after winter testing milestone (TechCrunch)
  ^{_{More: CryptoRank, Yahoo!, Electrek}}

  • VW ID.EVERY1 completed winter testing, triggering a $1B investment from Volkswagen Group into Rivian.

  • The $1B breaks down as $750M equity & up to $250M in equity or convertible debt.

  • Total deal value could reach $5.8B, including a $460M equity payment after the first joint venture vehicle launches.

MARKETS

WORLD

• Global stocks drop & oil surges amid fears of widening Iran conflict (Bloomberg)
  ^{_{More: Morningstar, Financial Post, Reuters}}

  • Asian stocks fell sharply, with South Korea dropping 5.3% & Japan's Nikkei declining 4.6%.

  • Brent crude rose 3.3% to above $116 a barrel, bringing year-to-date gains to roughly 90%.

  • Additional U.S. troops arriving in the Middle East fueled fears of a broader ground conflict with Iran.

• Pakistan offers to host U.S.-Iran peace talks amid ground assault fears (Reuters)
  ^{_{More: CNA, Japan Times, Yahoo!}}

  • Pakistan's foreign minister announced plans to host "meaningful talks" for a lasting resolution to the conflict.

  • Iran's parliament speaker accused the U.S. of planning a ground assault while signaling openness to negotiations.

  • Complicating peace efforts are the hardline positions held by the U.S., Israel, & Iran on ending the conflict.

• Trump reverses Cuba oil blockade, allowing a Russian tanker through (CNA)
  ^{_{More: Reuters, Straits Times, CNBC}}

  • Trump said he has "no problem" with any country supplying Cuba with oil, reversing his earlier blockade stance.

  • A sanctioned Russian shadow fleet vessel was nearing a Cuban port Sunday, expected to dock Monday.

  • Cuba has gone three months without an oil tanker, triggering fuel rationing, blackouts, & a health crisis.

FUTURISM

• Yahoo launches AI answer engine Scout to reclaim its search roots (AP)
  ^{_{More: Seattle Times}}

  • Yahoo is rolling out Scout, an AI-powered answer engine designed to simplify search by generating direct responses with supporting hyperlinks.

  • Scout is launching to roughly 250M U.S. users and is meant to personalize results while acting as a “flywheel” that drives traffic back into Yahoo’s core products (finance, sports, news, fantasy, and mail).

  • Yahoo is licensing Anthropic’s AI to run Scout and is positioning it as a new way back into search, while competing against Google’s Gemini-powered search, chatbots like ChatGPT and Claude, and answer engines like Perplexity.

• Eli Lilly expands Insilico Medicine partnership for AI-driven drug discovery (Reuters)
  ^{_{More: MSN, Seeking Alpha}}

  • Eli Lilly & Insilico Medicine struck a deal worth up to $2.75B to expand their AI drug discovery collaboration.

  • Insilico receives $115M upfront, with the rest tied to development, regulatory, & commercial milestones plus royalties.

  • Lilly gains exclusive worldwide rights to develop & commercialize certain oral treatments currently in preclinical development.

• Retiring CEOs cite AI disruption as a key reason for stepping down (CNBC)
  ^{_{More: MSN, Yahoo!}}

  • Coca-Cola's James Quincey & former Walmart CEO Doug McMillon both cited AI as a factor in their departures.

  • Both said their companies need leaders with fresh energy & a stronger grasp of AI's potential.

  • The trend reflects how corporate America's top executives are reckoning with the scale of the AI transition.

• Explore the essential startup reading database*

  • Learning from the best is how you become the best. We've curated a list of top-notch articles, blogs, and readings essential for startup founders.

  • And here's the kicker: we've organized it all in a user-friendly Notion database for easy access and tracking. Double win!

  • As aspiring leaders and innovators, this list serves as a bridge to absorbing the knowledge that has propelled others to success.

CONTENT

• A former skeptic explains why OpenClaw's AI agents are worth trying (Lenny's Podcast)

  • Claire Vo went from accidentally deleting a calendar entry to running 9 OpenClaw agents across multiple personal devices.

  • She shares step-by-step setup tips, common mistakes to avoid, & real-life use cases that changed her workflow.

  • Vo also covers security risks, browser limitations, memory issues, & why specialized agents outperform general-purpose ones.

• Cyberstarts founder Gili Raanan explains why early-stage margins don't matter (20VC)

  • Raanan, a seed investor in Wiz, Island, & Cyera, argues gross margins matter less in the AI era.

  • He discusses how to distinguish real startup growth from engineered metrics & what fast growth actually looks like.

  • The conversation covers GP/LP misalignment, mega fund economics, & why public markets are crushing software multiples.

• Tesla & SpaceX alumni share lessons on building hard tech startups (a16z)

  • Founders from Galadyne & Mariana Minerals discuss what they learned building Starship & Tesla's lithium refinery.

  • Key topics include decision velocity, critical path management, vertical integration, & hiring for high-talent-density teams.

  • They also cover setting aggressive milestones, flat org structures, & sustaining intense work cultures without burnout.

EXTRAS

• Logan Paul's Pokémon card sold for a record-breaking $16M (CNBC)
  ^{_{More: MSN, Forex Factory}}

  • A rare Pikachu Illustrator card owned by Logan Paul sold at auction for over $16M in February.

  • The sale set a new record for the most expensive trading card ever sold at auction.

  • Pokémon card indexes posted gains far exceeding the S&P 500's average annual return of 10–12%.

• Parents urged to set clear social media rules after landmark court ruling (AP)
  ^{_{More: MSN, ABC}}

  • A California jury found Meta & YouTube liable for mental health harms caused to children on their platforms.

  • Doctors & advocates welcomed the verdict, hoping it could trigger broader regulation of the social media industry.

  • Experts say the ruling is a timely reminder for families to rethink how children use social media.

• Target faces a fresh boycott over its response to ICE enforcement (CNBC)
  ^{_{More: MSN, Seeking Alpha}}

  • The AFT union is urging its 1.8M members to boycott Target over its response to Minneapolis ICE raids.

  • The new boycott comes as Target is already working to rebuild trust & return to sales growth.

  • An earlier boycott over Target's DEI rollback had just ended before this new one was called.

AND MORE

• Testing whether a classic Game Boy gadget can detect counterfeit cartridges.

• Stanford study warns of real dangers in seeking personal AI chatbot advice.

• Roko’s Basilisk skips the buzz words and cuts straight to what moves markets, products, and careers.

• The race to power the U.S. grid by 2035 is wide open.

• Watching HBO's Harry Potter series means supporting J.K. Rowling's anti-trans activism.

• Let’s take a look at the retro tech making a comeback.

• Apple is fighting antitrust battles over the App Store worldwide.