The Booming Business of Chinese Peptides

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Here you go. Let me see what is this. Okay, quality, it's quality sprays.com and it's a, wait, that seems like an illegal drug. It says oxytocin. It's not illegal. It's not illegal. I got it off Amazon for like six deeper. Oxytocin. That sounds illegal. It's not. Okay. Do you know what oxytocin actually is? I'm sure it's really bad. It's a peptide. Okay. I didn't know that. Yeah. I actually don't even know what a peptide is. I've been hearing this word peptide. I don't know what classification of chemical or molecule chain or anything of peptide is. So hearing about this word peptide more and more. Thank you. Thank you. You're actually going to give this to me or is this just a prop that I have to give it? It's just a prop. Okay. And I just said that. That it's yours, but it's actually mine. Okay. Peptides. Peptides are the P in GLP ones that are so popular. Okay. I think I do. Yeah. I think I knew GLP ones as a peptide. But I still don't know. What is it? Anyway. So hearing about it a lot is because a lot of people seem to be using them in various ways. And there are all these different types of peptides that supposedly do different things for the body. This one apparently makes you better at eye contact and more sociable. You know, it's really funny back when I was in, I could have used this like 25 years ago. When I was younger, like in college, it didn't happen very often, but I occasionally went on a few dates. And it was very rare, very rare. I'm not going to say anything. Very rare occurrence. But one of the things I would notice is if I was out on a date and like the girl would start like messing with like her hair. I mean, she likes you. No. And she's like, is there something wrong with my hair? Because you keep looking like three inches above my eyes. Oh. And I'm like, no, I'm just very awkward. It's very difficult for me. And she's like, oh, I was like, it's very awkward for me. I'm not very good at eye contact and so forth. And so I just assumed it was something in my hair that I was like trying to get out. And I was like, no, I'm sorry, I'm just like this. This happened to you more than once? Yes. So I could have really used a chemical that would solve the eye contact problem. Now I've grown up. I've grown out of it. I can look someone in the eye now. I will say I have tested it. I'm not entirely convinced of its effects. But, you know, in the name of science for all thoughts, I have been a guinea pig. So we know GLP ones, whatever they're called, we go over you and all those, those are good for weight loss. And we know it's almost a miracle drug, right? Every single criminal. But in theory, there are other peptides out there that could be equivalently miraculous. We just don't really know about them. And maybe they're not sort of medicinalized the way that the weight loss ones are. Yeah. And also not distributed the same way as GLP ones in America. And we're going to get all into that because it's actually a really interesting topic, both culturally and from a supply chain perspective. And we love supply chains. So we love supply chains. All right. So for this particular topic, we're actually going to have two guests. Great. Because it's so interesting. And I got so into the peptide world. Our first guest is Jasmine's son. She has an independent writer covering AI and San Francisco culture. And this is definitely a San Francisco cultural thing. So Jasmine, you are truly the perfect guest. Thank you so much for coming on all thoughts. I am so excited to be here. So first of all, why don't you just tell us a little bit more about what peptides actually are and how they first came on to your radar screen. Right. So peptides are basically short chains of amino acids. They are the building blocks proteins. They're peptides that are naturally occurring in the human body. So for example, oxytocin, like you have right there, we produce it during pregnancy when you hug somebody, hug your partner, hug your family member. But there are also synthetic peptides that are manufactured in labs or people can take these peptides that already exist in the human body and inject extra of it if your body say doesn't produce enough. So insulin, for example, is an example of a peptide that's been used obviously for to treat diabetics for a very long time. So peptides are actually a very broad class of drugs, but I think the interest in more experimental peptides and within biohacking communities and things like that has really exploded in recent years. I would trace it to basically the boom in GLP one use, a lot of folks who I spoke to over the past few weeks who have been experimenting with peptides and injecting them themselves first started getting comfortable with even the idea of injections, which we're previously seeing as a bit intense for people. Yeah, you're injecting yourself with drugs that has a lot of connotations. Right, but I think that GLP ones in a zempic and wagovie were what really popularized it and made people comfortable. So it first came on my radar aside from the GLP story, because I started seeing tweets that I'm sure you guys have seen too, all over Asaf Tech Twitter about how everybody has a Chinese peptide dealer now. I thought this was kind of a joke until I started mentioning it in conversations and I realized that my friends were on Chinese peptides. They were like, wait, Jasmine, are you not on these? They're amazing. I got to get you on these peptides. I got a dealer. I got my guy and I'm like, what are you on about? And I think the first one that I heard about people using, which is the most popular that I have since heard, is read a true tide, which is what some people call a GLP three. So basically GLP ones are through the FDA process people are like something like 12% of Americans depending on what survey you look at are using them. But there are now next generation weight loss drugs that work on not just the GLP one receptors, but also the GIP receptors and the glue gone receptors to encourage even faster weight loss. And these GLP threes like read a true tide are still in phase two clinical trials. But because people have been watching this space, they're seeing really good results in those clinical trials. Some folks have thought, okay, let me go straight to the source. I'm going to find a Chinese manufacturer that makes read a true tide for cheap. And I will import them at a low cost of maybe a hundred bucks, 200 bucks a month from one of these gray market suppliers. And using myself for weight loss for one-fifth of the cost that I was getting my prescription ozempica or something like that, I promised you this was a supply chain. Yeah, no, that's great. Obviously want to talk more about peptides. That's what we're here talking about. But I actually just want to back up one second because your San Francisco culture reporter among other things and you write great stuff about AI and communication and all that stuff. One thing I think about a lot these days is that we all know that people in San Francisco really have a very big influence on all of our lives right because they designed the digital products that essentially constitute what makes modern living distinct. One thing I feel like and I struggle around my articulate this all of these other things that are part of the contemporary San Francisco lifestyle, whether it's sort of like believing in AI doom scenarios, et cetera. It's like weird cults that they form like to some extent this is such an important beat that you're on because we are all living in the shadows of what has going on in these people's brains, right? Like these ideas that they think about body hacking and so forth, they become the sort of like consumer products and so forth that everyone is sort of used with uses without ever thinking about like some of the philosophical Gestalt behind it all. Totally, I mean, I think that's totally right that's why I love the San Francisco B I sort of collapse it to like honestly, I just report on San Francisco, whether that is, you know, in the beginning of 2025, a lot of it was about the young tech right and what did that happen? It's about AI all the weird sub ideologies from AI doom to the successionist who actually think that AI has a moral duty to replace the human species because they're superior to us. There are all these weird strains of thought and I think SF, especially this year, increasingly prides itself on sort of being the place where the future comes first, they've sort of re-embrace that identity of like we're going to have funerals for AI models that we miss. We are embracing Robotaxi abundance with Tesla, Robotaxi's and Zoops's and Waymos and we're going to be the ones to trial the stuff first. I'm going to a peptide rave this Saturday with a cyberpunk dress code. There's a lot, it's very San Francisco, there are underground Robotbites that I'm sure you guys have seen videos of, but I think San Francisco is really leaning into its identity these days of we're kind of going to be the place that is not sort of suffering under the regulatory decelerationist burden that's plaguing the rest of the Western world and we're going to embrace the frontier and I think peptides are part of that. It's a signaling thing as much as a health thing. Well, okay, speaking of the tech community, is it true that something like oxytocin, it actually improves your eye contact and the way I heard it was, this could be helpful for people who are in tech and maybe aren't that sociable. Oh, my god, yeah, so the oxytocin is the only peptide that I've personally tried. I think I first heard about it because will it appear who's like a young AI researcher open AI tweeted about it as I think nasal oxytocin is going to be ozemic for autism. It's an incredible line, like what the hell is this and it's been tested on people with aspergers to help improve again those feelings of social connection empathy warm that comes as a nasal spray you can get for 50 bucks, 60 bucks off Amazon or something. So I also like you Tracy when I tried it, I didn't think it worked, but my friends did insist that I was a little bit friendly and I normally am. And I wasn't back to making more eye contact. So we didn't have to do some experiments here at all thoughts and just have a bunch of conversations where we're on and off the oxytocin to happen. Yeah, we got you. I really, I really could have used that in college for sure. So there's all kinds of ones. Right. So okay, GOP ones weight loss. This one supposedly helps you with eye contact and connection. What are some of the other things that people are using peptides for? So aside from the GOP ones and the GLP3s, which are the most popular, there are ulcers of peptides. They are a really, really broad class of chemical. So the most popular other than that is BPC 157, which supposedly helps with muscle healing and regeneration. So after a really hard workout, that one has been experimented with in bodybuilding communities for many years. So there's all these crazy bodybuilding forums where people are playing with this stuff and human growth hormone and things like that. There is melanotan, which supposedly increases melanin production in the skin. So I talked to a founder, a CEO of a unicorn logistics company who told me that his first peptide was melanotan because he hated being a ginger. He had always wanted to stop being a ginger. So he cured it by taking this thing that increases your melanin production and makes you tanner. Another person described it to me as the hot horny and tan peptide. So that one for the those who aren't getting enough sunlight, shut in an office. Maybe that's your pick. There is a battalion, which folks have credited with increasing improving their sleep, their cmax, which people believe helps with their anxiety to be clear most of the peptides aside from the GLPs have not been in any human trials whatsoever. So a lot of this sort of comes from anecdotal evidence and people experimenting rather than from like FDA approved or like RCTs and some of these, you know, only have animal trials or cell culture in vitro tests. Yeah, I wanted to ask you about this actually because my impression is peptides like there's not much profit to be made from them for the pharma companies. And so it's just not worth it to them to actually test on humans. And yet they're still commercially available. That is one of the stories I heard because you know, I asked well GLP ones have been so profitable. So like why aren't people trying to push through FDA trials. Yeah, these other peptides that people have been crediting with like transformative health improvements or whatever. And the story I heard is that because peptides are these very small, very basic chains, they're too commoditized basically like at the point where these Chinese factories are able to without a ton of like extremely advanced scientific knowledge. Be able to manufacture them on mass. No company is going to want to invest like 100 million a billion dollars in getting it through the like excruciating FDA trial process. And so that's sort of left peptides in this great market environment where people are saying like, okay, like I might as well go import the stuff from China, maybe get a purity tested myself. It's going to cost a few hundred dollars in total. And let's just see. Yeah, let's talk about that because I don't love the idea of sticking myself with needles. But then also I don't love the idea of like sticking myself with needles for some random thing that came from a factory or having a dealer right. I want to get into the legal aspects of all this as well. But yeah, talk to us about the I guess just the comfort that people have with frankly injecting themselves with chemicals that they probably have no idea what's in there can't verify it or have no idea how the quality of the lab in China that they're getting them from. Yeah, I mean, so I've interviewed probably a dozen plus people peptide users in and around the tech community over the past few weeks and I will say that almost everyone I spoke to I asked like, hey, are you scared? Are you worried? Did you have to like get over a mental hump with a stuff? And most of them would tell me, you know what, like I have a higher risk tolerance than most people. I think this is something that say startup founders in particular really pride themselves on and a lot of these people were startup founders right there. They think I'm the kind of person who is willing to take risks. I'm the kind of person who doesn't really need to wait until I'm given permission to do something whether that's by a regulator by some boss. I can sort of study up in my own way and that's good enough. So like I think people were surprisingly they were very comfortable telling me there is some risk. I know that there have been some negative side effects, but you know what I keep a journal every day I have friends who have used it. I'm going to suppliers that are showing their testing certifications from top peptide testing firms and that's good enough for me, even though I wouldn't recommend that everybody do this. But you're right Joe, this is a legal gray area. Some people would even say black market. So use of the vast majority of these peptides, particularly the non GLPs, no human trials, no FDA approval, whether for pharmaceutical use or for use in compounding pharmacies, which GLPs have been somewhat approved for. What that means is that it is an illegal gray area because they're not also not on DEA list, so they're also not in the sort of illicit drug list. It's sort of a we don't know. And so one funny thing that people joke about is all of the vials for these peptides will say for research use only because everyone is watching peptide research apparently. Exactly. So these Chinese manufacturers, what they are allowed to do is the ship peptides are on the world for research use for scientists, for medical researchers, for bio researchers. And so as long as you're not saying it's for human use, you don't have to prove a certain level of purity standard, you don't need necessarily a factory that follows CGMP protocols, which are an FDA approval to know that a factory meets certain quality standards. But again, research use has a lower bar, so people are basically importing the peptides for research use. And then what they'll sometimes do is then ship it separately to purity testing firm. So there are different ones that people trust and don't located in the US, located in Europe, but they'll basically take their batch of peptides that they got from the Chinese manufacturer, take a few samples, ship them off to a testing site, get a certification that it's pure, it's impure, and then they will go mix them themselves. Certain suppliers will basically serve as the American middlemen, they will be US based companies that will negotiate with the Chinese factories themselves sort of figure out which ones are trusted by running purity tests on like 10 different Chinese factories they find, pick the one that they trust the most, and then sort of offer their brands guarantee of running the purity testing process for the US buyers. And so like it really depends on people's risk tolerance. I've spoken with people who are going direct and literally just being in contact with the manufacturers themselves. I've also spoken to people who have said I'm willing to use this US middlemen supplier that my friends are all using and say is legit and is providing these tests and certifications, but I'm not going to go straight to the factory. Talk to us about the info sharing a little bit more because this is one aspect of the peptide community. I guess you would call it is everyone is sort of sharing maybe their personal dealer personal supplier and also info on their personal experience with efficacy. Totally, I think the sort of epistemology of the space is super interesting because it's very word of mouth base very anecdotal and I think it is rooted in a growing distrust of the medical establishment and established sources so people are sort of embracing this do your own research. I would say that quote unquote row wellness influencers like Joe Rogan or Andrew Huberman have both talked extensively about these peptides so there are very wide audiences so followers in those communities are learning about them. There's a lot of word of mouth, for example, at certain gyms trainers and people who trained together will be sharing their peptide stacks. One of the folks who I spoke to learned about the peptides at less online, which is a rationalist conference happens every spring. There is a GLP one session that she went to she then discovered this person that everybody else was on red a true tide and said and they all decided to tell her hey we're also alive so like you should get on this. There's less wrong post on the rationalist forum describing people's day by day experiences with peptides or amateur sub-sec blogs or very shady telegram and discord groups where people are advertising their suppliers though honestly I think I would not choose a supplier off like a telegram or discord group personally but it is kind of the wild west out there in terms of information and most people are really just going off social proof and the people that they personally know. You know we did an episode a while back about Adderall and of course a lot of people who are you know work in front of a computer or feel that they can get some edge on Adderall is there like a level of competitiveness though in the culture such that you feel like look all their people are maybe they're more locked in maybe they're better at office politics or maybe better pitching a V.C. because they got there where people feel like they have to be on these or they feel like they have to optimize. They're peptides stack so that they can compete and sort of be at their best. Oh yeah absolutely I mean one of the YC founders I talked to she literally said it's another thing I can optimize just like my SEO she runs a SaaS business as her day job or another thing that somebody in these communities told me is these people sometimes they're not overweight in fact a lot of the time these folks are not actually overweight and the reason they're taking say bread a true tide or weight loss peptide is because they want to eliminate the food noise so they don't have to take a break for lunch. They can just be locked in for 16 hours straight like why do you have to go to the gym which is going to you know drain your ability to run a few more experiments or whatever when you could just be taking one of these. And so I think there is a lot of this optimization ethic that is driving people's desire another piece that I'm sort of thinking about is whether that looks maxing trends you know have impacted Silicon Valley as well. So one of the founders who I spoke to who is using a weight loss peptide mentioned that she watches YC launch videos and she realizes none of the founders are overweight anymore and I'm going to have to be on video if I'm a founder I'm going to have to go on podcasts and I want to make sure that I look my best. So I do think that these sort of optimization trends are impacting peptide use as well. Yeah this is something we've discussed on the show before but this idea that looks maxing is going to become more important as information gets commoditized or the knowledge economy gets commoditized via AI then your only edge is going to be basically what you look like and how you interact with people. By the way I'm a big fan of no lunch in the office Joe knows I refuse to eat like the sad salads that cost $20 over here in New York I find it's better just to save my calories for like a really nice dinner. Talk to us about how you see the future of peptides kind of unrolling because it does seem to be it's kind of a weird thing where these are becoming more popular and presumably we're just at the beginning stages of people hearing about this and more people consuming them. But there's little to no sign of FDA approval or these becoming sort of I don't want to say legalized because they're in this gray market area but made official in some way. Right it's hard to say everyone I spoke to whether suppliers or doctors in California definitely said that they saw peptide use booming this year I've been seeing more news in mainstream journal mainstream newspaper outlets about personal peptide use. I think that peptide use is going to explode I mean as soon as people realize that I can be paying $200 for the same maglutide that I'm currently getting for 1200 I find it very hard to imagine that that is not going to explode their TikTok influencer niches telling you how to mix the bacteria static water with the powdered stuff in the vials and how to inject it if you've never done it before. So the policy environment I think it's hard to predict last year RFK junior the secretary of health and human services said that he would end the Biden administrations war on peptides he sort of has embraced these take your health into your own hands like experimental therapeutics at the same time there hasn't actually been actions so far this year by the health and human services administration to bring peptides into a more legal zone. While RFK has signaled that he will there hasn't been policy action yet I did reach out to the HHS and FDA for comment and they said that they cannot predict future regulation but that they are actively revising the list of book peptides that are allowed for compounding and compounding pharmacies so sort of classic we don't know maybe looking at it language but folks in the peptide community are really hoping to see a more at least less a fair regulatory stance where they're not going to be shutting down these peptide suppliers. Jasmine Sun that was absolutely amazing you were truly the perfect guest to talk about the intersection of peptides and San Francisco culture so thank you so much for coming on all thoughts. Thanks so much for having me better get ready for my peptide rave that's right. Today's markets move fast get the insights you need in 10 minutes with the Barclays brief a new podcast from Barclays investment bank. Through sharp dialogue and scenario based analysis our leading experts analyze key market themes each week so whether you're managing portfolio or leading a business the Barclays brief podcast can help you make smarter decisions today stay sharp state brief find Barclays brief wherever you get your podcasts. Hey there odd lot listeners as we come into 2026 we are realizing that one thing we're constantly thinking about on the show is how companies actually get built not just like the headline version of that story but the messy operational reality of it. We love messy operational reality of things the never ending question dive deeper how companies make it big what causes one company to succeed why others fail. I have good news that is exactly what the acquired podcast does Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal pick a company and then explore all the ins and outs of its trajectory lots of detail there how it scaled the ups and downs and so much more. Yeah and we actually we had them on odd lots back in February last year we talked to them about everything from TSMC Nvidia Mars Hermes scale capital structure the importance of incentives all of the different I guess ingredients that go into some of the success of these names that we talk about every day. Also their show actually turned 10 years old in 2025 just like us so we're I guess the same age in podcast years. Anyway if you like odd logical we get into various market dynamics how the economy actually works under the hood you'll obviously appreciate and enjoy the acquired podcast to do similar work similar ideas all focused on the context of individual company. So go check out the acquired podcast you can find them wherever you get your podcasts. So Joe Jasmine did a great job of introducing us to the peptide space about which we don't really know anything but I think we need to talk to someone who's actually in the business. Yeah this is one of those stories where it's obviously a cultural story but it's also a supply chain regulation marketing standpoint where they're coming from how are they getting them out and for me it's like how do people have any confidence like what they're literally injecting into their bodies where is this coming from. So I have the perfect second guest we're going to be speaking with Zach David he is the managing partner of Persec technologies which runs peptide partners which is a supplier of peptides so Zach how did you get into the space because you've had an interesting career path. Right I got into this space basically solving the problem for myself a few years ago my health was very poor and I started working with a specialist in the wellness and longevity community and functional medicine and I noticed the peptide therapies that she was prescribing were highly effective but also extremely expensive. So then I started doing a little supply chain slew thing of my own and found a much better solution to that and the question that she asked was do you think it would be legal for me to do that for my patients and the answer is of course no but that set off a 14 month investigation on how to bring that into the legal market which is what we're eventually working on. What do you tell us just sort of the basics of what you do what is the service your business provides. So very similar to what I went through a lot of these peptide therapies are either met multi year or lifelong and they exist and people are going to Chinese peptides to find cheaper solutions. And so we started pushing for independent testing for endotoxins screening for heavy metal testing which the incumbents in the industry were not doing at all at the time and now pretty much everybody is. So I have so many questions already but how do you actually go about finding a supplier for a particular peptide because I imagine you know you're dealing with people who are all the way over in China. There's probably a lot of different companies to choose from and not that much information out there about them. How do you even begin to go about doing this? There's a good mix of how to find them a lot advertised on say TikTok or they'll find you on WhatsApp. They will hunt down your website and then introduce themselves as suppliers. And so we go through a long vetting process by some estimates there are 10 major manufacturers there and they're handful that manufacture in house. And then there's something called liofilization which is kind of like the finishing step that puts it in the bottles. We basically were just constantly talking to new potential suppliers and we'll give them a try will send everything out for testing in the labs that we use are based in the US that follow us standards and FDA guidelines. Which is a little bit different than some some of the more popular testing labs that are overseas. Okay, talk this through the step by step. Okay, you find a supplier based in China, you like them, whatever, etc. Where does it arrive when it gets to the US? Does it go to the lab first? Does it go to you? If it goes to you, what percentage of vials or what percentage of whatever is actually checked such that you can say, okay, this is a good batch. Right, so we randomly sample from say we order a thousand vials will randomly sample between three and five. And if the variance in the quality is very tight and we consider that a good batch, we famously throw out batches. We don't consider up to our standards and sometimes we'll post pictures of us dumping in the trash on Twitter, which gets us a little cache, but it's not fun to dump money in the garbage, but sometimes you have to do it. Can I just ask about the sequence of the chain in particular because it is a peptide, what is the type of storage that it has to be involved in from the container on the ship to the dock. Is it a temperature type thing? How do you ensure that sort of quality doesn't degrade during the shipping process? Yeah, it's a great question. If you were shipping very large amounts, you would want a cold chain supply the entire route. However, the liofilization process keeps things shelf stable for quite a long time and recent studies have shown that it doesn't degrade as fast as people initially thought. So when we use commercial grade freezers, as soon as we get it in and then we'll label the vials and then we'll randomly sample. Tell us more about the manufacturers in China because I'm having a sort of hard time wrapping my head around who they actually are. So I take it. Most of them are not big pharma offshoots. They're sort of independent manufacturers, but how are these companies actually I think is coming into being. Yeah, so there's an interesting mix of where the gray market manufacturers and well, let's call it the lit market manufacturers. There are a handful of 10 to 15 billion dollar publicly traded companies in China that do contract manufacturing, but they only sell to FDA supply like FDA registered companies with supply chains. The major gray market labs, they only sell to other companies within China who then finish it with the liofilization and then sell directly to the consumers. And what's the actual material that makes up a peptide when we're talking about peptides, like what are the building blocks of a particular, you know, I get a vial in the mail. What is it exactly? So the FDA definition is that is is an amino acid chain of 40 or less that definition was added to the federal register in 2020. And it is no surprise that things like semi glutite otherwise known as ozempic, Mujaro, otherwise known as tersepetite. And the next generation that everyone is currently using called retitrutite all happened to be exactly 39 in late. So I think there was some clever lobbying, but also things less than 50 tend to be very stable, unlike larger proteins, which tend to fold it on themselves. And the manufacturing process called solid phase peptides synthesis is almost a solved problem. But how do we actually make amino acids? That is a good question. It has to follow up with you on that somewhere naturally derived and some are synthetic. The resurgence in peptides from its original heyday is partially due to synthetic amino acids. Just talk to us about law and regulation. What is the stance of these things? I actually still don't totally understand of a legal to be sold or I don't know what this term gray market means, etc. Just walk to us about how the government, whether we're talking criminal authorities or just FDA type authorities think about these things right now. So the guidance is very, it is very careful. There has to be a lot of disclaimers about not for human use on anything sold for research purposes. Doctors can prescribe them. For example, there's one called Cermoralin, where it was abandoned by the manufacturer for economic reasons, not for safety reasons in around 2008. But you can get it from compounding pharmacies in the United States. And so doctors will formally FDA approve. However, thanks from compounding pharmacies do not undergo the same safety standards, but what doctors will still prescribe stuff like that. The FDA, I think, I would say we put this, when it's for research use only, then you're legitimately selling for research use. It does not fall under there, you just. So a lot of people are conducting peptide research in the comfort of their own homes. Yes, as I'm sure, you know, most last listeners are aware the market for micro pipettes is growing 8% year over year projected to 3030. So I do believe that a lot of people have the home labs. Yeah. We micro pipettes. What are we? Yes, this is what is that? Oh, that's like a little thing to extract some liquid. Is that what we're talking about? Yeah. So this is our proxy for peptide consumption is the booming market for micro pipettes. Is the booming market for micro pipettes? I'll take it. So that's a little it's a little tongue in cheek, but no, no, but this is useful. It's like, okay, like if we see this thing rising, then intuitively, this is what they're using for. So in your marketing, what do you have to say such as that you don't run a foul of people in DC or whatever? We have strict terms and conditions for research use only labeled on the boxes labeled on the vials, labeled on the website. We don't even use the term dosing. We only talk about sample sizes and just we are very, very, very per research. But there is a big movement of people who self-organize in telegram and discord communities who are experimenting on themselves. Long time internet friend of the podcast, Burb, Sherman, Burb. I saw she had a Chinese peptide rave in San Francisco this week. Yes, she, yes, we sponsored it. It was nice. We had a great time. She's a very, very, very good friend of mine. I'm guessing that's the same one. Jasmine went to, probably. I assume. Unless they're, I don't know if San Francisco could there be two Chinese peptides raves and we get not surprised. We have the slightest. So, Zach, how do you actually decide which peptides to stock? Is it whichever ones are getting the most buzz? On TikTok, do the manufacturers approach you with new things that they're making and then you test them out? That's a, yeah, that's a very good question because the formularies change a lot. Although between the manufacturers and the suppliers, they do have very, very similar formularies. The ones who deal with the controlled substances and antibiotics, we tend to stay away from. But the ones that we stock, we look for good safety profiles in humans. Unfortunately for almost all of these, there are not a lot of good randomized control trials, but a lot of them have good safety studies in humans. So, certain things like, there's a popular one called AOD9604, which has not had a successful human trial ever. And so, we just decided not to stock that for ethical reasons. Okay, so we know that in theory, well, we know more than in theory that the most famous peptides can curb your appetite and therefore facilitate weight loss. Tracy had a little thing of a spray that ostensibly helped artists make better eye contact, which is of course a valuable skill if you want to live in. Human civilization, what are some of the other, what are some of the other popular, what are the other things that people are consuming peptides? What other any that might surprise us? So, there is a class called growth hormone releasing peptides or growth hormone stimulating peptides. They have very short half lives rather than like HGH replacement therapy, like human growth hormone replacement therapy, which will eventually cause your body to naturally stop producing its own. This class works with your pituitary to make like an impulse and release some growth hormone rather than replace it. So, that would be good for like weight ulcers or bodybuilders or anyone who just wants more strength or that we're talking about. And yeah, and it's also been increasingly prescribed by physicians for improved sleep as well. Why don't we manufacture peptides in the US? How is it that China seems to dominate this particular market? That is a great question as well. I believe it's the input and put materials and the labor and expertise required to engineer it. What happens is a lot of the raw materials are produced in China and then over here they're finished in facilities like doing the lyophilization and purification process by compounding pharmacies. Okay, everyone who uses these, they have to inject them. Is this, is it all needles and vials? Mostly at this time, however, we've seen an increasing amount of oral formulations. The problem is because of these are small molecules, the digestive system breaks them down very quickly. So creating reliable oral formulations for peptide therapies has been historically very difficult. Hey, there are a lot of listeners as we come into 2026. We are realizing that one thing we're constantly thinking about on the show is how companies actually get built. Not just like the headline version of that story, but the messy operational reality of it. We love messy operational reality of things. The never ending question, dive deeper, how companies make it big, what causes one company to succeed, why others fail? Well, I have good news. That is exactly what the acquired podcast does. Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal pick a company and then explore all the ins and outs of its trajectory, lots of detail there, how it scaled the ups and downs and so much more. Yeah, and we actually, we had them on AdLots back in February last year. We talked to them about everything from TSMC, Nvidia, Mars, Hermes, scale, capital structure, the importance of incentives, all of the different, I guess, ingredients that go into some of the success of these names that we talk about every day. Also, their show actually turned 10 years old in 2025, just like us. So we're, I guess the same age in podcast years. Anyway, if you like AdLots, believe we get into various market dynamics, how the economy actually works under the hood, you'll obviously appreciate and enjoy the acquired podcast, do similar works, similar ideas, all focused on the context of individual company. So go check out the acquired podcast. You can find them wherever you get your podcasts. How do you reduce costs in the space? Is it buying in bulk from a particular supplier or, I don't know, finding cheaper manufacturers of vials and the lionization process, ionization process? Lyofilization. Lyofilization, it's just a fancy word for free's drink. Okay, all right. The free's drying process then. That's easier. Yeah, so it is, it is buying in larger and larger quantities. The one of our manufacturing partners over there, they created a novel method of being able to produce large quantities of raw materials. And the next step in our company's evolution is going to be buying a manufacturing facility and starting to do that finishing step here and slowly over time, bring this above board and fully FDA compliant. Am I stupid for not using peptides? I work in a very competitive industry. I have a very demanding schedule. I have two children. I'm 45 and so I'm at the second half of the curve. My body is getting a little deteriorating and getting a little bit closer to death each day. Like am I stupid for like not tasting the fruits of advanced science? That is a question between you and your physician. Okay, that is a very smart answer. Do you feel that it is an important element of your ability to thrive and compete your research into peptides? I do. I like them a lot. I've noticed a lot of good changes, especially my health, my energy over the years, but I also do work closely with a physician and not in the care of one. Can I ask you a little bit about marketing? How do people discover your company? How do people server? Let's see. Word of mouth has been great. Several influencers have written about the cost effectiveness of our product. And then there's a website called Finric, which has started to offer this wonderful service where people can send in files from anyone that they buy from off any of these research years on my sites. They've covered over 140 companies now. And we've started to take number one slots on their site just left and right. So I think we're doing something we're doing something a little bit better than ever. People crowdsourcing a lot of the research and reviews. And also I guess you hold peptide raves, right? That's a marketing thing. That was that was once it might happen again. You know, I'm not much of a I'm not much of a dancer, but I did I did feel some questions. Something that sort of works a little bit like human growth hormone. I get very appealing weight loss again. Concentrate. Are there any surprising peptides? What's the most unexpected thing that a peptide might in research suggest could benefit someone? I don't know if I should say this out loud. Let me do a definition. Yeah, okay. Well, there is one peptide that goes under the name PT 141. It's brand name. It's actually an FDA approved one. It's called Viley C and it is meant for low sex drive. It's very completely legitimate. Nothing wrong with saying that out loud for men and women. It's meant for it's meant for women. But according to people that I have who have told me it works for men as well. Many people are saying, what's the cost? What's the customs process actually like for this? Cause I imagine I mean customs is a pain at the best of times. And I imagine something like this. It's potentially even more complicated. And then also have you been impacted by tariffs at all? Yeah, it was really fun to see the first time a UPS driver asked for cash on deliveries since like 1998. Remember cash on delivery? That was when they went to first came back and no one really knew. No one had had the infrastructure to charge in advance. Now they'll now they'll let you know, hey, you're going to owe $30 here, $60 here. It's like an online payment portal too, right? Yeah, it's not. But originally there was originally there wasn't a driver showed up and wanted to check. Yeah, it was crazy. I'm ready about this PC 141 to unlike Viagra, which famously opens up blood flow pathways. This one, it's method of action is actually to increase the underlying sexual excitement itself, which is sort of different. I have heard that it works. I don't have any experience with it, but I have heard that it works. Wait, so what does the customs documentation actually look like? When the stuff arrives at a port, what forms are you filling out? They're fun. They're half a mandarin, so it's a little awful. Look, no, a scan of chat you'd be doing. Language doesn't matter these days. How long do you think it's going to take if it happens at all for these sorts of peptides to become as you put it above board in the US? So there's an interesting history there. So the most popular ones, basically in September 2023, we call the peptide arm again, about 17, 20 of the most popular ones that were prescribed by doctors in the wellness and longevity community were put on this. What's called the 503A band list, and they banned the prescribing of or the compounding of certain peptides. And according to my physician, it was not for particularly good scientific reasons, but but the explanation that they give is that it can trigger immune responses that adverse immune responses. Last question for me, has there been any change in DC since the changing of the administration in terms of either the FDA or otherwise? So I go through all of the enforcement letters that the F so you can go on the website and you can see every enforcement letter and every warning letter that they send to every single website. And I believe the last one ever sent was December 2024. So there has not been a lot of enforcement. Yeah, that's a pretty big hint. All right, Zach, we're going to leave it there, but thank you so much for coming on all plots. That was super interesting. I'm such a huge fan. Oh, thank you. We're going to use that and this is a real thank you so much. So Joe, that was really interesting, fun episode. Obviously it intersects with a bunch of op-lots themes, primarily competition with China in the biotech space and also supply chain issues and medical regulation. Are we going to see the White House adopt a industrial policies to wean us off of our dependence on China for experimental peptides? When talking about that, what I was about to say is actually we've talked about this before, but you could envision a world where knowledge becomes very commodified because of AI. And so everyone's competitive edge is basically what you look like, how you present yourself and interact with others. So maybe in that economy peptides have a lot of value. Absolutely. I could totally say it. I mean, I think the way I think about that question is we don't even need to talk about AI in the sense that we are already on this path, right? People have been looks maxing prior to the invention of chatbots. People have felt ever since the maybe since the iPhone or maybe since Instagram. It looks have always mattered, but I think we're at an acceleration point. So what I'm saying is like this already feels like it's accelerating. Some of these Trent absolutely looks have always mattered. People have always been anxious about their weight, et cetera. But it does feel like this pressure is just building where everyone is thinking about these things. Everyone feels very competitive all of these things. And everyone is open about how competitive. Very open. It's kind of surprising. There was a time when people didn't talk about things like their plastic surgery. But now it seems very or more transparent than it used to be. The other thing I was thinking about just in terms of regulation. I mean, it's notable that it's a gray market, right? As we described and ostensibly everyone is doing peptide research in their basements. And that's kind of a joke, right? But on the other hand, it's not really a joke because what we're doing is kind of outsourcing human trials. I guess to like citizens who are opting in. They're the ones opting in to test these new treatments. You know, it's interesting. We did that. We did that episode with DA Wallack and he talked about how we could have a model of sort of market for pharmaceuticals and therapies in which the only thing required to sell something is the safety trial. Right now for any therapy, we do safety and then efficacy. But it is very, you could argue that really the only thing that should be required is a safety trial. And then it's up to the consumer or whatever. You know, I think you could make that argument that then it's up to the doctor and the consumer together to decide is this worthwhile given the price of what we know about et cetera. But what it feels like to me is we're sort of entering this era in which regardless of what the formal law states or what regulation state. There is a cultural move towards letting people experiment as they want with things that by and large, it doesn't sound like there's much evidence of particularly harmful dangerous with a lot of this stuff. No one has died from peptides that I know. As far as I know, I haven't seen that et cetera. And so it feels like we're sort of, you know, this is part of the hacker culture. It's like, okay, there's probably not much danger, I suppose, but what it does for you. That's on you to figure out. All right. Thank you. Everyone who is experimenting with peptides. You're doing it for the greater good. I'm sure. Shall we leave it there? Let's leave it there. This has been another episode of the All Thoughts podcast. I'm Tracy Alloway. You can follow me at Tracy Alloway. And I'm Joe. Why isn't that you can follow me at the stalwart fellow. I guess Jasmine's son. She's at Jasmine new son and Zach David. He's at Zach David. Follow our producers, Carmen Rodriguez at Carmen Arman, Dashobinit, a Dashbot, and Kilbrooks at Kilbrooks. From our AdLots content, go to Bloomberg.com/AdLots with a daily newsletter and all of our episodes. And you can share about all of these topics 24/7 in our discord discord GG/AdLots. And if you enjoy AdLots, if you like it, when we talk about the peptides supply chain, then please leave us a positive review on your favorite podcast platform. And remember, if you are a Bloomberg subscriber, you can listen to all of our episodes absolutely add free. All you need to do is find the Bloomberg channel on Apple Podcasts and follow the instructions there. Thanks for listening. I'm Barry Rittalts inviting you to join me for the Masters in Business podcast. Every week we bring you fascinating conversations with the people who shape markets, investing, and business. CEOs, fund managers, billionaires, Nobel laureates, traders, analysts, economists, everybody that affects what's going on in the market, whether you own stocks, bonds, real estate, commodities, crypto, you really need to hear these conversations. 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