Top 20 Private Companies in 2026, The Billionaire Tax, Mistral AI Valuation | Augment + Sacra | Ep20

In this episode of Trading Places, Dave McClure and Aman Verjee dive deep into the rapidly evolving world of private tech markets.They’re joined by: • Noel Moldvai (Founder & CEO, Augment Markets) • Adam Crawley (Co-Founder, Augment Markets) • Marcelo Ballvé (Founder, Sacra)Together, they unpack what’s actually happening beneath the surface of AI, secondaries, and late-stage private companies: • Why the bar for IPOs keeps moving higher • How secondary markets have become a primary source of liquidity • What SPVs, tender offers, and structured secondaries really solve • Whether today’s AI valuations reflect fundamentals—or momentum • Why many “private” companies now behave like public companies without public rulesIf you’re tracking AI, private markets, or venture liquidity in 2026, this episode explains where price discovery is really happening—and who benefits from it.Timestamps00:00 – cold open00:59 – [ tech & vc news ]01:15 – California billionaire tax 🤌09:06 – China IPOs in 2026 🇨🇳13:10 – JP Morgan & secondary market 📈15:49 – BlackRock–Microsoft $12.5B partnership 🤝 17:47 – Cerebras AI new $22B valuation 💰22:04 – [ roundtable: Marcelo Ballvé / Adam Crawley ]22:47 – Adam Crawley, co-founder of Augment 👨‍💼23:31 – Marcelo Ballvé: CB Insights → Sacra 🚀24:19 – Augment Power 20 🔍31:39 – How Sacra gets data 📊34:42 – Up-and-coming private companies 🐎39:51 – Going public vs staying private 🆚[ val corner: Mistral AI ]56:13 – Top 10 French unicorns 🇫🇷58:03 – $2B → $13B 👍59:00 – 100x on “maybe” revenue 👎1:02:53 – Valuation prediction 🔮[ intvw: Noel Moldvai / Augment CEO ]1:04:02 – Value proposition of Augment 💰1:06:40 – The rise of SPVs 💸1:11:17 – Tokenization of private companies 🟡1:15:38 – Future of secondary markets 🤔[ links ] [ invest = https://practicalvc.com ] [ trading places socials = www.linktr.ee/tradingplacespod ] [ noel moldvai = https://www.linkedin.com/in/noelmoldvai/ | https://x.com/noelregrets ] [ adam crawley = https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-crawley-b2146753/ | https://x.com/adamcrawley1 ] [ augment = https://augment.market/ ] [ marcelo ballvé = https://www.linkedin.com/in/marceloballve/ | https://x.com/ballve ][ sacra = http://sacra.com/ ] [ aman verjee = https://www.linkedin.com/in/aman-verjee | https://x.com/amanverjee ] [ dave mcclure = https://www.linkedin.com/in/davemcclure | https://x.com/davemcclure ]Thank you for watching#VentureCapital #StartupInvesting #secondaries #VCSecondaries #mistralai #augmentmarket