I'm a serial entrepreneur who has raised $145M+ and has had multiple exits. I'm now on a mission to support founders with their capital strategy and acquire the capital they need to grow their businesses. Thunder.vc is a tech-enabled investment bank for founders, by founders. 

When it comes to supporting the founders in our Thunder.vc community, here are some free resources that can help you with your capital-raising efforts. 
- $100M Exits newsletter & Podcast 
- Sign up at http://blog.thunder.vc 
- Free list of AI-recommended VCs specific to your business - https://web.thunder.vc/list-of-investors-vcs-for-founders  
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Securities are offered through Finalis Securities LLC Member FINRA / SIPC. Thunder X Capital, LLC is not a registered broker-dealer, and Finalis Securities LLC and Thunder X Capital, LLC are separate, unaffiliated entities.

Jason Kirby

This is the story most founders never post on LinkedIn. Most founders only focus on the upside.
 
Very few imagine the moment they stop being CEO.

James Rose scaled his first business to millions in revenue rapidly. Everything was going up and to the right...until it wasn't anymore.

Then the market turned.
The business collapsed.

And suddenly, he had to do the unthinkable: become an employee again.
Not because he wanted to. Because he had to. Family to support, lifestyle to maintain, and unsure of what the next big idea would be. 

That transition of losing the company and the identity was harder than the failure itself.

I chose to have James on because he had some amazing insights around this transition. It took him over a decade to get back in the saddle as a founder again, but he's managed just fine. His life wasn't over. 

But he was practically unemployable outside of sales. He was "over qualified"

So he dropped his ego and aspiration for a VP role and took a mid level sales job and grinded. It was tough, but it worked for him.

In this episode of $100M Exits, James breaks down:

- The emotional toll founders don’t talk about
- Why identity gets dangerously tied to the title
- How this moment reshaped how he builds today

I felt this was an important story to share as most founder don't know what's next after a failure. James's story is a ray of hope for the hopeless founder wondering what to do next. 

See the full episode in the article.

4x Exits, $100M+ Raised. Helping founders raise/exit with clarity, control, and conviction.

Watch the full video here This is not a story we discuss often on this podcast, but I felt Jame's story of having to "get a job" after scaling a multi

Open article: From CEO to employee, the pivot no one prepares for by Jason Kirby • 2 min read

From CEO to employee, the pivot no one prepares for

Yesterday I spoke my partner Oliver Low about a founder who just lost 2/3rds of their revenue right before making an acquisition. 

It was a total death to the founder. In their mind, how could they, in good faith (and legally) acquire a company with their stock if they just had a massive hit like that. 

This roll up acquisition strategy was designed by my partner and I to help them clear their pref stack and ensure the founders had a solid paid day for their efforts.

No one expected their anchor client to change management and drop the contract 🤯 

We empathized with the founder, and they ultimately just want to throw in the towel, wind down the company and return the $0.25 on the dollar back to their investors. 

I honestly respected them for that. They've had it hard enough on their journey, to reboot after a hit like that and all their plans crumble before their eyes...could they really put in another 5+ years to turn it around and clear their pref stack...is it even worth it?

Sometimes it's just better to quit...yes...the nasty Q word. We're often don't as founders "never give up" "never quit"

But sometimes, it's economically illogical to keep going from their perspective. 

The company needs a recap to ditch their toxic cap table that's holding them back, raise more cash or sell to someone who has cash to perform the AI roll up strategy. But the founders don't the energy or the desire to put up that fight.

It's a great business otherwise, just the prefstack makes it not worth it. 

It's a reality that more and more founders are running into when they can't grow fast enough to exceed their past valuations or pref stacks. 

If you know founders facing these issues, tag them in the comments and let them know they're not alone. 

I spend my days helping founders navigate these situations. 

For this particular founder, I might acquire the business myself and put in a CEO to execute the roll up strategy. There's always a creative way to solve every problem, but the incentive has to be there to make the juice worth the squeeze...never forget that part.

If your CAC is rising, your only defense is LTV.
Brian Ree built one of the highest-LTV businesses in fashion & sold for $700M

Here’s the playbook that led to a ~$700M outcome:

- Make LTV your North Star (not revenue).
- Improve gross profit per order before scaling traffic.
- Control supply chain via private label.
- Track 52-week cohort spend religiously.
- Use AI to predict product-level expected value.
- Optimize retention before increasing paid spend.

My takeaway from Brian, especially in the world of DTC today, growth doesn’t fix broken unit economics. It magnifies them.

While competitors chased top-line revenue, DailyLook engineered durability.
The result? Stronger margins, better retention, strategic leverage in M&A.

Watch the full episode below.

Watch the full video here Brian Ree’s journey with DailyLook is a reminder that survival precedes scale. When growth stalled and capital dried up, he 

Open article: How Brian Ree Turned a DTC Crisis Into a $700M Exit to Victoria's Secret by Jason Kirby • 2 min read

How Brian Ree Turned a DTC Crisis Into a $700M Exit to Victoria's Secret

When Kris Rudeegraap raised $100M from SoftBank for Sendoso, it didn’t start with a term sheet.

It started with a coffee.

SoftBank came inbound in late 2021.

Within days, that coffee turned into partner pitches.

Two weeks later, he was told:

“Block your entire calendar. We’ll tell you the day before Masa is ready.”
No private jet to Japan, like he was told, just a Zoom grid with a dozen SoftBank partners and Masa Son at the center.

Masa wasn’t casual.

He knew the numbers.

He asked pointed questions about growth velocity.
He grilled the US partners about how big this could get.

Then: silence.

A couple weeks later, Kris got the term sheet.

But the wire? Delayed for months...MONTHS because of international transfer reviews.

But once that $100M was real, expectations changed overnight.

Not subtly. Overnight.
At the time, Sendoso was around ~$50M ARR.

They had already raised roughly $65M prior.

With $165M+ in preferred capital stacked, the thinking wasn’t defensive.
It was:

“How fast can we double again?”

So what did they do?
They hired. Aggressively.

Kris said they ramped up to roughly 30 recruiters just to fuel hiring across go-to-market.
SDRs. AEs. Marketing. Post-sales support.

Because in 2021, the math felt simple:
More heads = more revenue.

Top-down target said “double.” Bottoms-up math didn’t get them there. So they changed the inputs. Turn on the hiring flywheel.

In hindsight, that wasn’t irrational, but tt was consistent with the rest of the market raising stacks of cash.

But then 2022 hit.

And the same company, with the same strategy, suddenly had to pivot. Growth at all costs pivoted to conserve and generate profit. He hired all those people and before they could generate a dollar of revenue, he had to lay them all off 😬 

The board conversations change when capital isn’t cheap anymore.
Which leads to two uncomfortable truths:

1️⃣ Mega-rounds distort decision-making
When you have $100M in the bank, the pressure to justify it shapes behavior. You optimize for scale, not resilience.

2️⃣ Capital amplifies strategy, it doesn’t fix it. If your go-to-market motion works, capital accelerates it. If it’s fragile, capital magnifies the fragility.

I talk to founders everyday wanting to raise capital, but they often don't realize the burden that comes with it. 

But kudos to Kris, he took the medicine, built an advisory board of over 100 experts, and navigated the storm to acheive amazing results being a leader in his category. 

If you want to hear the full story, check out my latest podcast on $100M Exits.

Watch the full video here Raising $100M doesn’t solve your problems; it magnifies them. Kris shares what founders rarely talk about: the operational w

Open article: How Sendoso Raised $100M From SoftBank by Jason Kirby • 2 min read

What color box are you in? 

If you're not in the green at the very least...I don't think we can be friends. 

I'm in the redbox  🦞 

This also explains the mega valuations we're seeing in AI. Real revenue is being generated at a scale and speed never seen before, and we're barely scratching the surface.

With over 17 years in capital markets and public‑company leadership, I help small‑cap companies stand out through strategic branding, marketing and clear communication. 

Through my personal brand, I share educational content on marketing best practices for small‑caps, demonstrate how to turn complex market and mining concepts into digestible stories, and show how storytelling differentiates our industry. 

My mission is to elevate small‑cap visibility and credibility, teach peers about the importance of branding and scalable AI tools, and show the broader public why responsible mining matters in everyday life. If you’re ready to transform your brand narrative, let’s connect.

I specialize in:

→ Investor storytelling: turning complex results into simple, investable narratives
→ AI-powered branding: strategies that build trust, credibility, and visibility
→ CEO & corporate LinkedIn optimization: profiles and pages investors follow
→ Executive LinkedIn thought leadership: aligning personal + company voices for authority
→ Digital asset creation: articles, eBooks, decks, videos, and more
→ Digital footprint audits: exposing gaps that limit visibility and credibility
→ Content repurposing: transforming one milestone into multi-platform investor touchpoints

👉 At Bullvision Consulting, we believe attention is the new currency and visibility is credibility.
📩 Ready to sharpen your digital footprint? Book a call here https://shorturl.at/K6I9T or DM me.


📲 Why digital visibility matters. The facts:

🔹 91% of institutional investors have made recommendations or decisions based on digital or social media; 88% say equities they cover should maintain a digital/social presence. (Brunswick Group)

🔹 After IR sites, investors look you up: LinkedIn (7.83/10) and Google (7.81). (Brunswick Group)

🔹 LinkedIn now has 1B+ members and 65M+ decision-makers. (LinkedIn Business Solutions)

🔹 48% of institutional investors expect customized content tailored to their interests. (Social Media Today)

Anna Dalaire

PDAC doesn’t create momentum.
It exposes it.
Every year, 30,000 people land in Toronto.

Booths go up.
Calendars fill.
Panels run.

But here’s the part no one says out loud:
Most companies arrive hoping #PDAC will generate interest.

The serious ones arrive with interest already structured.

The difference?

→ Investor targets mapped months in advance
→ A defined capital objective
→ A clear 12-month catalyst path
→ One consistent story across booth, deck, and meetings
→ Follow-up planned before the first handshake

PDAC doesn’t create your story.
It tests it. ⚖️

With 1,300+ booths, it becomes a live audit of narrative clarity and capital discipline. From ten feet away, most booths blur together.

Investors aren’t just remembering your logo.

They’re remembering:

→ Whether the capital ask made sense
→ Whether your timeline felt credible
→ Whether your team sounded aligned
→ Whether the narrative held up under pressure
→ Whether the story worked for generalists, not just geologists

Momentum isn’t built at PDAC.
It’s revealed there.

The companies that leave with traction built it months before arrival.
The rest leave with visibility, not velocity.

I’ll be spending some of my time at the Forte Minerals Corp. booth, #2736.
Come by and say hi. 👋

Small‑Cap Branding & AI‑Powered Marketing Strategist | Amplifying Visibility & Credibility | 17+ Years Capital‑Markets Leadership | Educator, Storyteller & Brand Builder

Everyone is talking about gold. 🟡
It’s showing up in places it hasn’t for years.
With friends who don’t follow markets.

At dinners.
On the weekend, over drinks.

When an asset moves from research desks into casual conversation, something has shifted.

For years, gold did very little.

From 2016 through 2019, it traded roughly between $1,050 and $1,350 per ounce. Range-bound. Frustrating. Easy to dismiss.

That’s what long bottoms look like.
Then the backdrop changed.

Trade wars.
Falling interest rates.
A pandemic.
Expanding central bank balance sheets.
Persistent inflation.
Rising sovereign debt.
Geopolitical tension.

Gold broke $2,000 in 2020, then consolidated again.
But 2025 was different.

That’s when it began making new highs consistently.

→ Inflation stayed sticky
→ Rate cuts came into view
→ Debt concerns intensified
→ Central banks kept buying at record levels

The market stopped treating gold as a trade.
It started treating it as insurance.

By January 2026, gold pushed through $5,000.

Not as a spike.
As a repricing.

After a parabolic move near $5,600, a sharp sell-off followed in late January and early February.

Leverage unwound. Crowded positioning cleared.

Since then, gold has rebounded, trading back over $5,200 on Monday.

Big repricings don’t move in straight lines.

They surge.
They correct.
They consolidate.
They test conviction.

The pullback didn’t invalidate the story.
It revealed how crowded the trade had become.

The real debate into 2026–2027 isn’t whether gold “gives it back.”
It’s whether the forces behind it are embedded in the system.

When a market narrative moves beyond analysts, it’s a signal.

If new investors are paying attention, are you inviting them in or filtering them out with complexity?

-----

Anna Dalaire
Strategic Advisor to Small-Cap Public Company Leaders. Writing about capital markets, investor interpretation, and applied AI.

Most investor content fails because
it’s written to be correct, not understood.

I’ve sat inside public companies where teams spent weeks perfecting technical accuracy.

Every metric precise.
Every disclosure defensible.
And for good reason.

Regulators matter.
Compliance is non-negotiable.

But defensibility isn’t the same as communication.
Investors didn’t miss the message.

They didn’t absorb it.

Most investor content assumes the audience reads like insiders.
But, they don’t.

They’re pattern-matching.
They’re scanning for signal.
They’re asking a handful of quiet questions, and your content should be answering them:

→ Do I trust these people with my money?
→ Have they done this before?
→ Are they meaningfully invested or just holding free stock?
→ Is the company's story, goals, and roadmap easy to understand?
→ If I buy today, where is the real upside?
→ What is the next catalyst?

If your communication doesn’t answer these clearly, technical accuracy won’t save you.

Complexity works in a closed room.
Markets don’t stay closed.

When new capital shows up, generalists and retail.
Insider language stops working.
And when that happens, distance shows.

Complexity doesn’t signal intelligence.
It signals distance.

And distance is expensive in public markets.

This isn’t a marketing problem.
It’s a leadership decision.

What you explain.
What you simplify.
What you assume investors already know.

Great investor communication respects rigor and translates it.

If investors can’t repeat your story after one read, the issue isn’t sophistication. It’s clarity.

So the real question isn’t whether your content is technically accurate.

It’s whether it was written for insiders who already agree with you or for a market that’s just starting to pay attention.

🔖Save this as a reminder to review your investor content through the eyes of the market.
—

Anna Dalaire
Strategic Advisor to Small-Cap Public Company Leaders. Writing about capital markets, investor interpretation, and applied AI.

Punch was abandoned.
Then bullied.
So he holds onto the one thing that feels safe. 🧸

Investors aren’t that different.

Most have lived through dilution.
Missed guidance.
Over-promising.

Of course they want upside.

But what they also need is stability.
Consistency.
Something they can trust.

Psychological safety attracts capital.

In markets, that looks like:

→ Consistent messaging
→ Clear downside discussion
→ A visible capital plan
→ A management team investors trust
→ Milestones they can track

Without that, capital behaves differently.

It trades.
It hits the bid.
It rotates out.

Transient capital creates volatility.
Durable capital supports valuation.

Clarity isn’t just good branding.
It’s the investor’s teddy bear.
It’s safety.

PS - People don’t hold what makes them anxious.

—

Anna Dalaire
Educator. Storyteller. Brand builder for capital markets.

I broke one of my own rules during PDAC
I did not post.

No hot takes.
No booth selfies.
No “what we learned” recap carousel.

Because sometimes the smartest thing to do in a noisy room is wait until you can actually hear the signal.

And #PDAC2026 had one.

This year felt different, not just bigger.
Yes, the conference was packed.
More than 32,000 people attended.

But the real shift was not volume.
It was attention.

There were plenty of familiar faces:
industry veterans, mining investors, geologists, operators, and executives.

But there were also more people from outside the sector.

Newcomers are trying to understand mining, critical minerals, and where this space may be heading next.

That is usually what happens when an industry starts to regain broader relevance.

The same themes kept surfacing:
→ critical minerals
→ supply-chain security
→ refining and processing bottlenecks
→ Indigenous participation
→ AI and digital tools
→ exploration capital coming back

Here is the part I think matters, but most forget:
As mining pulls in new audiences, insider language becomes less effective.

The companies that stand out will not be just those with the best assets.

They will be the ones who can explain their story clearly to people who are just starting to pay attention.

That is the shift I saw through the lens of marketing, branding, and communication.

What stood out through your lens?

🔖 Save this as a reminder that, as new audiences enter the market, clear communication becomes a real advantage.

—

Anna Dalaire
Strategic Advisor to Small-Cap Public Company Leaders. Writing about capital markets, investor interpretation, and applied AI.

56% wage premium isn’t for AI engineers anymore.
It’s going to leaders who know how to direct AI and extract decision-grade output from it.

This is not a trend.
It’s market repricing. 📈

For years, AI compensation bumps were reserved for technical specialists.

Now Finance, Legal, Marketing, and executive teams who understand AI workflow integration are seeing salary increases of 35 to 56 percent.

Not because they casually use AI.
Because they know how to direct it, challenge it, and extract decision-grade output.

In mining and exploration, this matters more than most people want to admit.

We operate in a world of 400-page technical reports, endless data rooms, tight budgets, and capital markets scrutiny.

If you’re still operating with a 2006, 2016, or even 2020 mindset in a 2026 market, you’re misallocating time and capital.

In my article, I break down the five AI skills I use every day. 🤖

→ The Golden Prompt
→ Your Master Prompt
→ AI as a Critic, not a cheerleader
→ Context Compression for executive clarity
→ Choosing the right AI machinery

AI doesn’t replace expertise.
It sharpens and scales the operator behind it.

The assay lab changed exploration economics.
AI is changing leadership economics.

If no one on your team has upgraded their AI skill stack, you are structurally less efficient than your competitors.

Are you using AI like a search bar or like a competitive lever? 🤔

Read the full breakdown here ⬇️

—

Anna Dalaire
Strategic Advisor to Small-Cap Public Company Leaders. Writing about capital markets, investor interpretation, and applied AI.

The 56% Wage Premium: Why AI is the New "Assay Lab" In the exploration and mining world, we’re used to looking for value where others see dirt. We rel

Open article: Five AI Skills for Mining and Exploration Leaders by Anna Dalaire • 10 min read

Five AI Skills for Mining and Exploration Leaders

It’s not the asset.
It’s that you’re not answering the questions investors are actually asking.

Investors are running a model:

→ Can I trust this team?
→ Is the business clear?
→ Does capital create value?
→ What breaks?
→ When do I get paid?

If your communications don’t answer those consistently, the market writes its own version. And markets don’t assume upside.

Compliance is not an excuse for being unclear.

You can stay compliant and still explain:

→ The capital map
→ The downside
→ The valuation logic

Small-cap, exploration and junior mining companies feel this most.

Less coverage.
More volatility.
Tighter windows.

Which means communication isn’t promotion.
It’s infrastructure.

Durable investor bases aren’t built on noise.
They’re built on clarity.

Clarity compounds.

-----

Anna Dalaire
Educator. Storyteller. Brand builder for capital markets.
Follow for more on small-cap branding and AI-powered marketing strategy.

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