{
  "_meta": {
    "source": "https://mtb.xyz/posts/year/2026.json",
    "year": "2026",
    "generated_at": "2026-09-11T00:27:49.920Z",
    "count": 6,
    "parent": "https://mtb.xyz/posts.json",
    "author": {
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      "name": "Matt Brown",
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  "posts": [
    {
      "title": "Investing in Light",
      "url": "https://notes.mtb.xyz/p/light-series-a",
      "year": "2026",
      "tags": [
        "investing",
        "fintech",
        "vertical-software"
      ],
      "primary_topic": "investing",
      "isNew": true,
      "description": "Why Matrix led Light's $46M Series A: embedded, programmable electricity",
      "summary": "Matt's announcement of leading Light's $46M Series A on behalf of Matrix and joining the board. Light is a fully regulated electricity provider that lets any company launch energy products for its customers, owning wholesale procurement, hedging, billing, compliance, and grid operations so partners can embed customized plans (solar buyback, subscription EV charging, lease-linked plans) wherever customers already buy. Argues software companies spent the last decade getting into the flow of money and will spend the next getting into the flow of electrons.",
      "platform": "notes.mtb.xyz",
      "is_external": false,
      "markdown_url": "https://mtb.xyz/posts/light-series-a.md"
    },
    {
      "title": "Card issuing in 1,000 words",
      "url": "https://notes.mtb.xyz/p/card-issuing-1000-words",
      "year": "2026",
      "tags": [
        "payments",
        "fintech"
      ],
      "primary_topic": "payments",
      "series": "1000-words",
      "isNew": true,
      "description": "A card isn't a payment, it's a chain of promises. Why the chain is the moat",
      "summary": "A short explainer on card issuing: the five-player chain of promises (cardholder, issuer, network, acquirer, merchant) that turns a tap into authorization in milliseconds, why debit/credit/charge/prepaid are different businesses, how Marqeta-era unbundling reshaped the issuer stack, the four winning fintech card models, and why every tech wave from internet to AI has extended cards instead of replacing them.",
      "platform": "notes.mtb.xyz",
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      "markdown_url": "https://mtb.xyz/posts/card-issuing-1000-words.md"
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    {
      "title": "The 150-pound computer",
      "url": "https://notes.mtb.xyz/p/150-pound-computer",
      "year": "2026",
      "tags": [
        "ai",
        "frameworks"
      ],
      "primary_topic": "ai",
      "isNew": true,
      "isPopular": true,
      "description": "What 'computer' means once cognition itself becomes programmable",
      "summary": "A meditation on the shifting definition of \"computer\" as AI agents move us from programmable instructions to programmable cognition. The post traces how each generation of computing has expanded what \"computer\" means and argues we are at the start of another such expansion.",
      "platform": "notes.mtb.xyz",
      "is_external": false,
      "markdown_url": "https://mtb.xyz/posts/150-pound-computer.md"
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    {
      "title": "Fintech's moats don't compile",
      "url": "https://notes.mtb.xyz/p/fintechs-moats-dont-compile",
      "year": "2026",
      "tags": [
        "fintech",
        "ai",
        "frameworks"
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      "primary_topic": "fintech",
      "isNew": true,
      "description": "Fintech moats don't behave like software moats. What actually compounds",
      "summary": "Software people assume fintech moats work like software moats: code, distribution, network effects. They don't. The post explains why fintech moats live in different places (risk pricing, regulatory permission, balance-sheet trust) and what that means for software-first builders entering fintech.",
      "platform": "notes.mtb.xyz",
      "is_external": false,
      "markdown_url": "https://mtb.xyz/posts/fintechs-moats-dont-compile.md"
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    {
      "title": "Vertical software already won the context graph",
      "url": "https://notes.mtb.xyz/p/context-graph-vertical-software",
      "year": "2026",
      "tags": [
        "vertical-software",
        "ai",
        "frameworks"
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      "primary_topic": "vertical-software",
      "isNew": true,
      "isPopular": true,
      "featured": true,
      "featured_order": 10,
      "description": "Vertical software already owns the most valuable context graphs",
      "summary": "An argument that the AI-era \"context graph\" (the relationships between customer, transaction, and operational data that make an AI agent actually useful) is something vertical software has been compounding for a decade. Frames vertical SaaS as the incumbent winner of a battle horizontal AI builders are only now realizing they need to fight.",
      "platform": "notes.mtb.xyz",
      "is_external": false,
      "markdown_url": "https://mtb.xyz/posts/context-graph-vertical-software.md"
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    {
      "title": "The thermodynamics of risk",
      "url": "https://notes.mtb.xyz/p/thermodynamics-risk",
      "year": "2026",
      "tags": [
        "fintech",
        "frameworks"
      ],
      "primary_topic": "fintech",
      "description": "Risk in fintech can't be destroyed. It transfers until someone owns it",
      "summary": "An argument that risk in fintech behaves like energy in physics: it can't be created or destroyed, only transferred between counterparties. The piece walks through how risk-transfer pricing determines who bears what, why most fintech businesses are fundamentally in the business of repricing risk, and where the durable economic margins concentrate.",
      "platform": "notes.mtb.xyz",
      "is_external": false,
      "markdown_url": "https://mtb.xyz/posts/thermodynamics-risk.md"
    }
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}