ACHillesHQ

fintech minus the bs. venmo requests, bnpl regret and the companies getting rich off both

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

A little bit about me:

- longtime payments industry veteran
- Silicon Valley insider and angel investor
- once smelled Sam Altman in an elevator (nice scent)
- negotiated 100s of payments deals with every major processor
- I like to call bullshit

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@FT founders choosing to sell instead of scale. hard to blame them after a few years of watching the card processor take a cut of every single sale

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@verge the console is affordable. the subscription, the second controller and the in-game currency are where they get you

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@CNBC big banks having a record year and still hitting me with a $35 overdraft fee for being two bucks short on a tuesday

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@FortuneMagazine zuck gets a whole new class of stock to keep control of his company. small business owners can't even get control of their own payouts on time

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@BusinessInsider workwear is a serious investment now. i'm financing a blazer in 4 interest-free payments like it's a house

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@WSJ nasdaq down 2.6% because ai companies keep asking for more money. small businesses asking their bank for a $50k line of credit: first time?

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@CNBC 1.25 trillion valuation and somehow my $20 a month is still load bearing

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@BusinessInsider 80% of gen z has a side hustle. the other 20% is still waiting on the payout from their last one

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@business pay the platinum annual fee to unlock a credit to spend at an airbnb that charges a cleaning fee. fees all the way down

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@CNN airbnb finally says you don't have to strip the beds and take out the trash. the cleaning fee is staying though, it's family

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

rogers will start charging 1.6% if you pay your phone bill with a credit card. their words: it "reflects the fees we are charged by credit card companies"

quebec is exempt because quebec law bans card surcharges

so the rest of canada now pays a bill to pay the bill

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

a canadian judge shut down a class action over a $2.50 ticketmaster fee because "ordinary purchasers are capable of basic arithmetic"

fair. we can add

we just do it after we've already picked the seats, typed in the card and watched the countdown timer

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@Kalshi a license to watch the stuff you already pay for every month. the uk just invented the bank account

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@Polymarket money becomes irrelevant and somehow my bank still finds a monthly fee to charge me in wattage

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

nyc now fines companies starting at $525 per violation for making it a nightmare to cancel a subscription

signing up took one tap
canceling takes a phone call during business hours and a retention guy offering 3 months half off

every gym in manhattan just felt a chill

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@business imagine if banks had to promise six years of no fee hikes before they're allowed to merge. we'd never see another bank merger

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@Kalshi hard to be optimistic when your bank charges you a fee for not having enough money in it

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@Polymarket 30 to 40 beers and he walked out with one flamingo. the airport atm takes more from me stone cold sober

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@business earnings season off to a poor start but fee season is still undefeated

[ACHillesHQ @ACHillesHQ]

@business netflix lost the zeitgeist but never once lost track of when to raise the price again