Other People's Money with Max Wiethe

Maredith Hannon, Head of Business Development at Wisdom Tree Digital, joins Other People’s Money to discuss how tokenized real-world assets are taking off at a pace eerily similar to the early growth of ETFs. Crypto enthusiasts have long touted the potential for fund vehicles to be tokenized and put on chain. That story is quickly becoming a reality with rapid AUM growth and established players like WisdomTree with over $100B in AUM quickly launching funds from money market and equity to alternatives like private credit. Hannon also discuss the additional utility that on chain funds provide and how they are giving access to retail and institutional clients alike with platforms like WisdomTree Prime and WisdomTree Connect.

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Timestamps:

00:00 Introduction

00:54 The Rise of Tokenization

02:20 WisdomTree's Tokenized Funds

04:35 Comparing ETFs and Tokenized Funds

10:35 User Experience in Tokenized Assets

20:29 Regulation and Future of Tokenized Funds

25:12 Tokenized Private Credit

26:01 Liquidity and Redemption in Private Credit Funds

28:08 Secondary Market and Peer-to-Peer Transfers

29:34 Transparency and Daily Updates

37:10 Future of KYC and Identity Verification

43:12 Global Expansion and New Use Cases

46:10 Getting Started with WisdomTree Prime

This episode is brought to you by CAIA.nxt. Learn more about their alternatives education courses for investment advisors and get 10% off with code MMTEN: https://caia.org/content/welcome-monetary-matters-and-other-peoples-money-listeners

Steven Novakovic, Managing Director of Educational Programs at CAIA, discusses the monumental shift from strategic asset allocation to the Total Portfolio Approach (TPA), a change recently highlighted by major moves at CalPERS. The conversation explores the evolving landscape of private markets, specifically how secondary markets are providing crucial liquidity and entry points for investors dealing with slowed distributions and the "denominator effect". Novakovic also provides a candid look at the friction between hedge fund fees and beta-heavy returns, arguing that sophisticated limited partners will not pay for beta. As alternative investments become more accessible to retail wealth, he emphasizes the critical need for education regarding evergreen funds and the unique risks of private market liquidity. Finally, the episode looks forward to 2026 educational initiatives at CAIA.

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Timestamps:

00:00 Introduction to Governance Changes in Pension Plans

00:45 Strategic Asset Allocation vs. Total Portfolio Approach

03:24 Early Adopters and Global Trends in TPA

05:06 Benchmarking and Decision-Making Shifts

09:58 CalPERS Case Study: Governance and Tactical Opportunities

17:32 Impact on Managers and Investment Strategies

22:08 Current Market Trends and Private Credit

25:54 Private Equity Distributions and Secondary Markets

35:32 Reinvesting Portfolio Proceeds

36:39 Understanding Secondary Market Buyers

37:09 Benefits of Secondary Allocations

39:14 Challenges and Strategies in Secondary Markets

45:03 Hedge Funds vs. Equity Markets

46:35 Evaluating Hedge Fund Performance

49:02 Active Management and Fee Structures

56:53 Educating Investors on Alternatives

01:03:00 CAIA's Educational Resources

01:05:44 Upcoming CAIA Programs

In this episode of Other People’s Money, Matt Ober, General Partner at Social Leverage, discusses how the data economy is evolving for providers, vendors, and investors. He explains how AI is reshaping data business models, highlights emerging data sources in what he calls the “degenerate economy,” and argues that many alternative data sets once considered sources of alpha are rapidly becoming commoditized beta.

Matt also shares how Social Leverage uses data to make seed stage venture investments, how its approach differs from that of mega VC firms, and where the firm is currently focused. He reflects on his career path from quantitative hedge funds to venture capital and how the expanding role of data shaped his trajectory in the investment business.

Before joining Social Leverage, Matt was Chief Data Scientist at Third Point, where he built the firm’s data analytics and technology platform supporting investments across equities, structured credit, venture capital, and cryptocurrency. Earlier, he was Head of Data Strategy at WorldQuant and a founding member of WorldQuant Ventures, focused on private investments in fintech, data, and technology.

Sign up for Matt’s newsletter The Rollup: https://www.mattober.co/

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Timestamps:

00:00 Introduction

01:21 The Business of Data

03:28 Data Pricing and AI Impact

04:36 Challenges for Data Companies

07:31 Emerging Data Sets and Buyers

14:25 Social Leverage's Investment Strategy

17:07 Venture Capital Market Dynamics

21:22 Fund of Funds and Network Value

22:40 Insights on Software and AI

25:54 Beehive vs. Substack

29:46 Hedge Fund Journey and Data Evolution

31:41 The Data-Driven Investment Strategy

32:05 Scaling Up: From Millions to Billions

32:24 Global Data Acquisition

32:49 Building a Data-Driven Ecosystem

33:06 Transition to Third Point

33:43 Integrating Data with Investment Processes

34:34 Challenges and Politics in Hedge Funds

35:49 Evaluating Data Sets and Their Impact

37:43 The Evolution of Data in Investment

38:49 The Role of Data in Hedge Fund Success

43:10 From Hedge Funds to Venture Capital

52:08 The Future of Wealth Management

55:00 The Rise of Prediction Markets

59:35 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

This episode is brought to you by Fiscal.ai. Sign up for a 2-week free trial and get 15% off any paid tier at: http://fiscal.ai/mm

Over the last 8 years, Yaron Naymark, founder and managing partner of 1 Main Capital, has patiently grown his concentrated long-biased hedge fund by outperforming major equity benchmarks like the S&P 500. Any manager who has been in his shoes though will tell you that outperforming the market isn’t enough to attract the institutional capital necessary to seriously scale a fund. Here he discusses the importance of consistency of communication with investors, how his portfolio management has evolved, and the other operational improvements he has made that have helped spur growth. He also discusses a $20m strategic investment from Cannell Capital he took in 2025 and how he thinks about these types of “seed” deals.

Sign up for 1 Main Capital’s distribution list: https://www.1maincapital.com

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Timestamps

00:00 Introduction and Personal Insights on Investing

00:43 Guest Introduction and Fund Background

00:55 Fund Growth and Milestones

02:41 Challenges and Turning Points

03:20 Marketing and Investor Relations

07:41 Economic Considerations and Fund Management

10:51 Investment Philosophy and Strategy

27:08 Podcasting and Public Engagement

28:55 Transparency in Investment Strategies

29:41 Audience Growth and Distribution

31:03 Pitching Ideas and Raising Capital

32:20 Investment Minimums and Investor Relations

33:37 Marketing and Outreach Strategies

36:57 Switching to Jefferies and Other Service Providers

42:57 Strategic Investment from Cannell Capital

51:54 Hiring an Analyst and Future Plans

55:19 Managing Fund Capacity and Performance

58:40 Conclusion and Contact Information

This episode is brought to you by VanEck. Learn more about the VanEck Rare Earth and Strategic Metals ETF: http://vaneck.com/REMXMax

Sam Gaer, CIO of Directional Strategies at Monarq Asset Management, joins Other People’s Money to discuss how he uses quantitative directional strategies to trade crypto assets and produce an institutional quality return stream that has outperformed bitcoin at scale. He explains how his experience as a market maker, executive, and self-taught electronic exchange technologist driving some of the most important technological advances in finance led him to “burn the boats,” leave tradfi, and go all in on building institutional crypto strategies with Monarq. He also discusses how institutional appetite for crypto hedge fund strategies is growing with increased regulatory clarity, greater availability of institutional level funds, and evolving market opportunities in crypto-native and crypto-linked tradfi assets.

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Timestamps

00:00 Intro

01:43 Q4 Crypto Volatility

06:21 A Disappointing Year for Crypto Bulls

10:29 Taking Advantage of Extreme Volatility

12:50 Triple Barrier Risk Management

15:43 $REMX

16:26 Responsible Leverage

17:17 Is the 4-Year Cycle Over

21:55 Early Days Pit Trading

24:16 Building Electronic Exchange Technology

26:38 CEO of NYMEX Europe and NYMEX IPO

27:24 Move to FINRA

28:43 Building and Selling a Volatility Hedge Fund

29:15 Burn the Boats

32:14 Joining Monarq

37:14 Differences Between Crypto Fund Managers and TradFi

39:17 Institutional Adoption of Crypto Hedge Funds

44:27 Can Crypto Strategies Scale to Meet the Demand?

47:19 The Crypto TradFi Collision

49:57 The Difference Between Institutional and Non-institutional Quality Crypto Funds

54:13 Hyper Liquid and Other Market Improvements in Crypto

59:26 Will TradFi Take Over Crypto?

01:01:31 Digital Asset Treasuries

01:08:46 The Next Stage for Monarq