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Discover tariff proof investment strategies with PIPE’s private equity model that shields your capital from global trade chaos.
23 Plays11 days ago
Dive into the latest episode of the PIPE gDAO Podcast for impact finance, recorded at 10:03 AM BST on Sunday, April 13, 2025 Episode 19 of our podcast series, Tariffs Can’t Touch This: The Hidden Power of Private Equity in DeSci, where we unveil tariff proof investment strategies that shield your capital from global trade turmoil. Explore private equity fundamentals and discover how PIPE private equity tokenization blends the stability of private equity DeSci investing with the innovation of DeSci investing. Learn why biotech investing tariff immunity matters and how PIPE leverages investing in DeSci with USDC to offer liquidity and resilience, unlike volatile markets or stagnant assets like gold. With over 500% CAGR potential and tariff impact immunity, PIPE’s model redefines biotech investing by tapping into university R&D and government tailwinds. Join us for a fun, accessible breakdown of tokenization and why PIPE’s approach keeps your portfolio steady in any storm—because tariffs? They can’t touch this. Available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and X—tune in to unlock the future of tariff proof investment strategies today!
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Transcript
Challenges in Retaining Talent and Hiring in Web3
00:00:00
Speaker
But first, did you know that even top companies like Coinbase struggle with talent retention, averaging just about 0.8 years, so under one year? Web3 faces big problem with unqualified applicants, some scammers, overall CV spammers, leading to short-term hires.
00:00:17
Speaker
Applications like passion, they are misaligned with the project ethos. This disconnect reduces long-term commitment to missions and goals. Well, Arbaito fixes this.
Introducing Arbaito: AI-Driven Web3 Job Platform
00:00:27
Speaker
Arbaito is a limited membership web3 jobs platform that combines AI tools, vetting and job management tools as well as third-party ad boosts.
00:00:36
Speaker
We are maximizing the number of eyeballs on your job post. Join today by going to our link tree in the description and look for arbaito.io.
Podcast Introduction and Personal Tidbits
00:00:45
Speaker
Hello, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome back to episode 19 of the Pipe G Dowd podcast.
00:00:52
Speaker
As usual, I'm your host, Noodle, and I'm in quite high spirits because this weekend, um I don't know if any of you are long-time listeners, but Stoke City, my favourite football club, my hometown football club, have just gotten out of the relegation zone. Now, those of you that know ball, know football,
00:01:12
Speaker
ah You will know how big that means. We're in the Championship, England's second division. Soon go in first, I promise, I promise. But enough about Stoke. All right,
Impact of Tariffs on Markets
00:01:23
Speaker
let's talk. Now, a lot has been going on in the world recently, especially...
00:01:28
Speaker
with keywords that we're going to be using today, such as tariffs. Now, if you don't know what a tariff is, then you are just like the majority of Republicans because tariffs have been thrown around a lot. And a lot of people don't really, i think, understand what a tariff could mean um what tariff is. And basically a tariff is a tax where the government will tax incoming goods from a usually a country so let's use it as let's use a modern day example which could be america are taxing everybody um but let's say china american are putting i'm not too sure what the rate is right now but they i know they put like 50 percent
00:02:15
Speaker
Tariff, which means that people that are buying from the Chinese market are going to be not only paying for how much the project product costs in China, but they're also going to have to pay the tariff to the U.S. government so that they can, I guess, import that specific item.
00:02:35
Speaker
But obviously, the this has had a massive effect on the global stock market.
Private Equity vs. Public Markets During Crashes
00:02:41
Speaker
And basically, that's what we're going to be talking about today. And also talking about is private equity safer and better than public markets, specifically during a tariff induced stock market crash.
00:02:56
Speaker
So yeah, let's rewind a little. On April 3rd of this year, which is 2025, the S&P 500, it dropped 4.8%, which is the worst single day plunge since 2020. And I don't think I need to remind you what happened in 2020, but just in case you don't remember...
00:03:16
Speaker
ah that's when we had a global pandemic, which basically meant that no one could go outside and people couldn't work because everyone was getting ill and quite a few people were dying.
00:03:29
Speaker
um Not a fun time to be alive, that's for sure. I still remember here in the UK, we were doing online pub quizzes and people were drinking pints with their mates, but they'd be sat two metres apart from each other.
00:03:45
Speaker
um I spent most of that lockdown studying and playing football in my garden ah with my mates. What we used to do is we used to go to a field and we'd...
00:03:58
Speaker
just kick a ball to each other, but we'd be on like opposite ends of the field. we just hoof it over the field to each other. We do that for hours. But anyway, that's enough about what we all got up to in lockdown.
00:04:08
Speaker
If any of you have any interesting lockdown stories, then please do send them in. Maybe even tweet at us what you guys got up to in lockdown, if you made any specific trades when the market was low.
00:04:19
Speaker
But yeah, yeah. Going back on April 3rd, obviously S&P dropped by 4.8%. And that's not just sort of a red day on the charts. That is a $4 trillion in market value, which was gone.
00:04:32
Speaker
But why did this happen? And it happened because of global tariffs, which disrupted supply chains, rising costs, and it caused investor panic. The full macro economic cocktail of chaos.
00:04:47
Speaker
But while public equities took the hit and took it fast, it was sort of a very different story that was playing quietly in the background. So that's the world of private equity we're talking about when we're talking about the background here.
00:05:02
Speaker
And more specifically, vehicles like the PGF launchpad, which is obviously us, was part of a broader ecosystem known as Pipe, which have quietly been weathering the storm, the whole sort of different rhythm. So we're going to be breaking down the key layers of what happened during in the private equity market, basically.
00:05:23
Speaker
So yeah, here's the deal. Private equity isn't exposed to the daily chaos of Wall Street. When public stocks tank, private investments don't instantly follow.
00:05:34
Speaker
And why is this? Well, it's because of two core reasons. Liquidity is a shield. So private equity investments aren't traded daily. That means there's no panic selling, no irrational swings, and they're designed to be held long term.
00:05:50
Speaker
So they don't react to every tweet or trade war. And then there's also point two, which is delayed valuations. So unlike the S&P 500, which is marked to market every second,
00:06:03
Speaker
Private equity funds on reassessors, so their values quarterly. They reassess their values quarterly, maybe even sometimes annually. So when the S&P fell nearly 5% in a day, private portfolios just didn't really budge, or at least not on paper.
00:06:22
Speaker
And that is huge, not just for your net worth, but internally but also for your psychology so investors in private equity vehicles like the pgf or lodge pad didn't see their dashboards flash red and when you don't see red you're not tempted to sell at a loss and then also the long-term performance and is like what happens over time and then is private equity actually better and honestly this really does depend you
00:06:52
Speaker
because private equity isn't immune to tariffs. If supply chains stay broken or inflation sticks around or we tumble into a recession, and right now there's a 40 to 60% chance, according to leading economists, that even the nimblest growth stage companies in a private equity portfolio will definitely be feeling the pressure.
00:07:17
Speaker
But there's a flip side. So private equity firms often hold what is called dry powder, which is uncommitted capital they can use to buy undervalued companies during downturns.
00:07:30
Speaker
So, for example, after 2008, the private equity funds that were launched in the aftermath saw some of the best returns that decade. And again, 2008 was the I think it was the housing crisis, the market crash caused a massive housing crisis.
00:07:47
Speaker
um And so the PGF launchpad operates in exactly this way. So it's stepping into the gap when public market valuations are low and the competition for early stage assets thin out.
00:08:00
Speaker
And that's when the big gains are made. So yes, private equity avoids the panic and potentially profits from it too. And then there's also risks and trade-offs.
00:08:12
Speaker
So it's not all an upside. So of course,
Exploring the Pipe General Fund and Decentralized Science
00:08:16
Speaker
there's liquidity, public market wins. If you need cash fast, good luck liquidating a private equity position.
00:08:24
Speaker
Public stocks, stocks, stocks, you can sell in seconds. Whereas private equity, you're definitely going to be looking to be in it for like five to 10 years.
00:08:37
Speaker
So private equity is not a quick cashback. As we say, it's a investment, a long term investment into the future of that company or that that portfolio that you've invested in.
00:08:50
Speaker
It's not where you're buying, for example, Web3 crypto coins that valuate and then pro their properties. Values fluctuate all the time. ah So you can just sell on a high or a low. It's not like that with private equity.
00:09:05
Speaker
And then also there's diversification. So it's easier ah with ETFs or mutual funds. ah Private equity portfolios, including the Pipe General Fund, are more concentrated, although the Pipe ecosystem does work to counter this by tokenizing across many different assets.
00:09:28
Speaker
And then there's also transparency. So private equity or PE plays the long game and doesn't report daily. That's good for sanity, but definitely harder for data hungry investors who want minute by minute updates.
00:09:43
Speaker
Still, the structural strength is real. So historically, over the past 25 years, private equity has outperformed public markets by 5% per year average.
00:09:56
Speaker
on average So now we're going to be sort of zooming in on the Pipe General Fund. So unlike most private equity funds, the Pipe General Fund Launchpad focuses on DeSci, which is decentralized science.
00:10:12
Speaker
It's early stage biotech, but tokenized. It funds research born in universities and takes it from lab to market. These are companies that aren't exposed to global tariffs the same way a Nike or Tesla might be.
00:10:28
Speaker
They're funded in USDC. They're backed by university R&D and they often benefit from increased government funding downturns. Think about that.
00:10:39
Speaker
While retail collapses and tech reels from tariffs, PGF-backed companies are receiving new grants and stimuluses to fuel innovation. That's real insulation.
00:10:52
Speaker
And the pipe ecosystem wraps this in a neat burp. So QED due diligence reduces losses by 600 times. And there's 95% survivability of these early stage projects compared to 10% in traditional startups.
00:11:10
Speaker
And then there's also tokenized exposure, which allows for liquidity. You can trade the token linked to the fund's assets. And because it's backed by stablecoins, your entry value doesn't evaporate while you wait to deploy capital.
00:11:25
Speaker
So in short, the Pipe General Fund gives you the upside of early stage growth, the downside protection of private equity structure and the flexibility of Web Free liquidity.
00:11:37
Speaker
And then we're going to be also talking, so when the public market panics and like, let's be honest, when tariffs hit, most investors lose twice. One, when their public portfolio tanks and two, their private equity or VC commitments dry up because either they're out of cash or too scared to deploy it.
00:11:59
Speaker
The pipe model flips that and it gives you access to a pool of pre-vetted, de-risked early stage biotech opportunities, liquidity via tokenization and capital stability through USDC.
00:12:15
Speaker
And most importantly, insulation from geopolitical chaos.
The Stability of Private Equity in Biotech
00:12:20
Speaker
It's the perfect hedge for macro madness. So is it safer now and then smarter later?
00:12:28
Speaker
As a sum up in the short term, private equity, especially in forms like PGF, have been safer. It's not exposed to to daily volatility.
00:12:40
Speaker
It avoids panic, it holds its value on paper when the S&P is melting down. In the long run, it may very well be better to, assuming it uses this downturn as an entry point and continues to back adaptive government-supported science.
00:12:58
Speaker
And PGF Launchpad is a case study in how to do that. Combining the rigor of private capital with the innovation of Web3 and the mission of decentralized science.
00:13:10
Speaker
So next time the market screams tariffs, remember, not all capital runs for the hills. Some of it steps into the lab, holds steady in stable coins and quietly builds the next generation in biotech.
How to Reach Out for More Information
00:13:29
Speaker
Now, remember, if you want to access this information or more information on the PGF Launchpad or the Pipe General Fund or even the PAN, then please use the link tree in the description where it will take you to our social media, our YouTube, even our webpage where you can go and explore the Launchpad and view all the projects that we've got going on over there.
00:13:55
Speaker
Even our prior podcasts, we were covering the projects. um so yeah please go into the script the description and if you liked this format of the script of the podcast then please let us know in reviews or even join our telegram and talk about it because we're very excited i'm really enjoy doing this and i'm excited to do more so yes we will be seeing you all later But before that, hey, listeners, we get it.
00:14:25
Speaker
Sometimes you've got questions and browsing through endless FAQs just isn't cutting it. I mean, we do have Discord and Telegram where you could ask us questions directly. We're very responsive there.
00:14:37
Speaker
ah But maybe you want to hear a human interaction for something important. lot people value that, especially those who are... ah you know, on the elder side. We get it in the universities. There are elder professors.
00:14:49
Speaker
So why not make it easy on yourself and give us a call? Yes, just pick up the phone and dial plus 44 0161 399 4283. From to 8pm UK time. three nine nine four to eight free from nine am m to eight p m u k time Monday to Friday.
00:15:06
Speaker
Whether it's a quick question, a bit of help you need, or you just want to chat with a real person, we're here for you. No robot robots, no runaround, just friendly folks ready to give you the answers you need and fast.
00:15:18
Speaker
So next time you're stuck, remember this number. Plus 44 0161 399 4283. Available to 8pm UK time, Monday to Friday. We're ready when you are. available nine am m to eight p m u k time monday to friday ready when you are