Nora: [dry] A hundred billion dollars. For a company worth thirty billion about a year ago. Same tunnels, same drones, triple the sticker.
Dex: [excited] That's Anduril — and yeah, that number's very real. This is Dex.
Nora: And this is Nora. It's Monday, July 27th, 2026, and the money printer is warm.
Dex: Three stories today, and honestly all three are just valuations doing gymnastics. Let's run it.
Nora: First — Anduril, reportedly raising at around a hundred billion, more than triple last year's mark.
Dex: Then Elon's Boring Company — the tunnel guys — chasing four billion at a twenty billion valuation.
Nora: And an AI insurance startup called Corgi hitting four billion... on its third round in eight weeks.
Dex: [laughs] Eight weeks, three rounds. We're gonna have feelings about that one.
Dex: Let's start with Anduril. Per Reuters, they're talking a two-stage raise that pushes them up about forty billion, to roughly a hundred.
Nora: Let me get the ladder straight. June 2025 they're at thirty and a half billion. May this year they raise five billion at sixty-one—
Dex: —and now a hundred. In fourteen months.
Nora: [dry] That's not a valuation, that's a heart-rate monitor during a panic attack.
Dex: But this one I actually buy, Nora. Defense budgets are exploding, they've got real contracts, real hardware in the field.
Nora: Real hardware, sure. Tripling in a year isn't hardware, it's narrative. Somebody decided Anduril is the defense platform and priced in the whole future.
Dex: Is that wrong, though? Palmer Luckey basically built the anti-Lockheed. It's a software company that happens to shoot things down.
Nora: The vibe. [beat] At a hundred billion, the vibe needs to start closing contracts the size of small nations.
Dex: The two-stage raise is the tell — they're testing appetite in tranches instead of one giant gulp.
Nora: Which means even they aren't sure the hundred sticks. You stage it so you can bail if demand wobbles.
Dex: Or you stage it because everyone and their sovereign wealth fund wants in and you're managing the line.
Nora: [sarcastic] Ah yes, the classic problem of too much money. My heart bleeds.
Dex: Here's the takeaway — if you're building defense-adjacent anything, the capital is there right now. Investors want the next Anduril.
Nora: And if you're an employee holding options at that hundred-billion mark? Just know you bought in at the top of the ladder, not the bottom.
Dex: Story two — the Boring Company. Elon's tunneling outfit is reportedly in talks for four billion at a twenty billion valuation, per the Journal.
Nora: Twenty billion. For digging holes.
Dex: [laughs] Loop tunnels! The Vegas Loop! You've ridden in a Tesla through a tunnel, it's very—
Nora: —it's a very expensive way to sit in traffic underground, Dex.
Dex: Okay, but here's the jump — they were at five point seven billion back in 2022. This is more than triple.
Nora: On what revenue? Name me the Boring Company's actual business. The Vegas convention loop and a promise?
Dex: [beat] There's the Vegas expansion, there are city talks, and there's... the Elon premium.
Nora: The Elon premium. That's the whole thesis. You're not buying tunnels, you're buying proximity to the guy.
Dex: Which historically prints money! SpaceX, xAI — everything he touches gets re-rated.
Nora: And the flying-cars-underground pitch from 2018? We were promised a network under LA. We got one loop by a casino.
Dex: Fair. And to be clear — deal's not closed, terms could still move. WSJ's careful about that.
Nora: [dry] 'Terms could change' is doing heroic work in every one of these stories today.
Dex: Takeaway for founders — if you're pitching infrastructure, the market's paying up for physical, hard-to-copy moats again. Atoms are back.
Nora: What it means for you is: a twenty-billion tunnel company exists, and your Series A got told the numbers were 'aggressive.' Sit with that.
Dex: Last one — Corgi. AI insurance startup, YC summer '24, just closed a second Series B extension at four billion.
Nora: A second extension. So the Series B needed... two encores.
Dex: And get this — third raise in about eight weeks. They were at two point six billion in late May.
Nora: [beat] Eight weeks. That's less time than it takes most people to get an expense report approved.
Dex: [excited] This is the AI back-to-back-round frenzy in its purest form. Investors are re-upping before the ink dries.
Nora: Or they're terrified of missing the round, so they keep stapling new money onto the last one. That's not conviction, that's FOMO with a term sheet.
Dex: Insurance is genuinely a great AI target, though — pricing risk, underwriting, claims. Tons of unautomated grind.
Nora: I don't disagree on the product. I'm side-eyeing a valuation that doubled in the time it takes milk to expire.
Dex: Hot take — the three-rounds-in-eight-weeks thing becomes normal. Rolling raises, no more discrete 'we're raising' moments.
Nora: [sarcastic] Great, so fundraising becomes a subscription. Congratulations, we've invented a company that's always begging.
Dex: Or always winning. Depends which side of the cap table you're on.
Nora: Here's the takeaway, founders — when the market moves this fast, so does the down round. What triples in eight weeks can halve in ten.
Dex: And if you're an early Corgi employee — congrats, your equity got repriced three times before your first performance review.
Nora: So today: Anduril chasing a hundred billion, triple last year, staged in tranches so they can flinch.
Dex: Boring Company eyeing four billion at twenty, up from five-seven in 2022 — the Elon premium, underground.
Nora: And Corgi at four billion, third round in eight weeks — the poster child for AI raise-until-you're-dizzy.
Dex: Before we go — one fun stat. Add today's three valuations and you clear a hundred and twenty-four billion in headlines from a single Monday.
Nora: [dry] And not one of them is actually closed. Every single one said 'reportedly' or 'terms could change.'
Dex: [laughs] So a hundred and twenty-four billion in vibes. That's the market, baby.
Nora: That's the show. Three companies, three ladders, and 'terms could change' as the phrase of the day.
Dex: Come back tomorrow — we'll see whose valuation tripled overnight while you slept. See you then!
This show is made with AI: the hosts’ voices are synthetic and the scripts are AI-assisted. Every story links to its original source.