Twilight of the Quick Delivery Startups

July 18, 2022

Another quick delivery startup is struggling to keep its doors open. Beijing-based Missfresh is fighting huge losses and accounting irregularities.

From a report that broke this weekend in the Financial Times:

Tiger Global-backed grocery delivery start-up Missfresh is fighting to survive as it shuts operations across China, wallows in an accounting scandal and searches for capital to sustain its business.
The upheaval marks a stark turn of fortunes for Missfresh, which pulled in more than $1bn in financing from investors such as Tiger Global and Goldman Sachs and gained a $3bn valuation in New York one year ago. Its market value has now sunk to $88mn.

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

Like Gopuff, Gorillas and others, Missfresh opened warehouses of goods across cities. It promised deliveries in 30 minutes or less.

But it’s losing massive sums of money. In fact, management isn’t even sure how bad the losses are:

While Missfresh has been unable to issue audited financials or its annual report for the year to December 31, the company estimated losses last year hit Rmb3.7bn.

Missfresh isn’t the only quick delivery startup getting hammered.

Fridge No More and Buyk both shut down this spring. JOKR exited the US market and Gorillas has done huge layoffs.

Quick delivery is a notoriously difficult business. The costs of opening dark stores, acquiring customers, and paying delivery staff are staggering.

Meanwhile, the competitive market pushes companies to slash prices. The result: terrible margins.

When a startup like Missfresh charges ahead with growth at all costs, the results aren’t pretty. Even massive revenue growth doesn’t matter if the business can never make money.

Remember the old joke:

“We lose money on every sale, but we make it up in volume.”

As an angel investor, I avoid businesses like this.

Quick delivery startups are messy and hard to scale. Meanwhile, high costs and stiff competition mean razor thin margins.

I prefer a pure software business. They’re easier to scale and far more profitable.

For a quick delivery business to succeed, it must have a laser focus on unit economics. Each additional delivery must be profitable.

Otherwise, the company can never make money no matter how many deliveries it does.

Gopuff, the most successful quick delivery company in the US, is laser focused on margins.

Its gross margins, or profit on each additional delivery, are estimated at nearly 50%. That’s significantly higher than Uber’s.

The death of one quick delivery startup after another is great for Gopuff. It removes their competitors!

The carnage in this sector makes me even more attentive to unit economics in my investments. There’s no sense throwing money at business models that just don’t work.

What do you think is the future for quick delivery? Leave a comment at the bottom and let me know!

More on tech:

Did LinkedIn Just Build the Future of Work?

Are You a Venture Scale Business?

How to Write Investor Updates

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

If you found this post interesting, please share it on Twitter/Reddit/etc. This helps more people find the blog!

Save Money on Stuff I Use:

Fundrise

This platform lets me diversify my real estate investments so I’m not too exposed to any one market. I’ve invested since 2018 with great returns.

More on Fundrise in this post.

If you decide to invest in Fundrise, you can use this link to get $100 in free bonus shares!

Misfits Market

I’ve used Misfits for years, and it never disappoints! Every fruit and vegetable is organic, super fresh, and packed with flavor.

I wrote a detailed review of Misfits here.

Use this link to sign up and you’ll save $15 on your first order.

AMC Fails to Deliver Hit 9.7 Million

July 15, 2022

In over a year reporting on this, I’ve never seen a number this big.

Fails to deliver in shares of AMC Entertainment Holdings Inc. hit nearly 9.7 million in June. The report, released today by the SEC, covers the second half of the month.

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

The peak came on June 28, with 9,697,393 shares failing to clear. Fails to deliver settled at a still massive 1,907,897 at the end of the month.

So what are fails to deliver, anyway? A fail to deliver occurs when a trade is made but never completed.

Let’s say I agree to sell you 100 shares of AMC for $15.07 each. You want the shares and you’re happy with the price, so you agree.

Done deal right? Wrong.

I have to actually deliver the shares to you. When I fail to do that, that’s called a fail to deliver.

Fails to deliver often occur when traders engage in naked short selling. This generally illegal practice involves selling short shares without borrowing them first.

It’s a powerful way to push down a share’s price. If you can sell stock short without borrowing any, you can short any amount!

The market is flooded with sell orders and the share price dives. But the trades never get completed.

Instead, they show up on this report.

This is a truly incredible number of failed trades. Let’s zoom in on June 28th, the peak for fails to deliver.

Here’s how many fails to deliver some of the biggest stocks in the market had that day. This can give us an idea of what’s normal, even for far larger companies:

Alphabet Inc. (Google): 814

Apple Inc.: 28,223

Microsoft Corp.: 12,400

The biggest companies on earth have just a few trades not clearing. Meanwhile little old AMC has nearly 10 million.

Keep in mind, just because those fails to deliver dropped near the end of the month doesn’t mean the trades ever settled. The DTCC often puts trades that failed some time ago into an “obligation warehouse.”

After that, these failed trades disappear.

How can we have robust financial markets when the public doesn’t trust them? And how can the public trust markets when trades that affect share prices never actually happen?

It’s time for the SEC to investigate this issue vigorously.

Until then, we’ll just see more bogus trades pile up.

What do you think is causing these failed trades? Leave a comment at the bottom and let me know.

Have a great weekend everyone! 👋

More on Fundrise in this post.

If you decide to invest in Fundrise, you can use this link to get $100 in free bonus shares!

Misfits Market

I’ve used Misfits for years, and it never disappoints! Every fruit and vegetable is organic, super fresh, and packed with flavor!

I wrote a detailed review of Misfits here.

Use this link to sign up and you’ll save $15 on your first order.

Did LinkedIn Just Build the Future of Work?

July 14, 2022

I think I just saw the future of work. And it is good.

In an amazing new video from The Wall Street Journal, reporter Adam Falk tours LinkedIn’s completely redesigned headquarters. He finds every sort of office space a human could want…plus free lattes.

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

LinkedIn’s headquarters in Silicon Valley used to look like any other office. Rows of identical desks and the occasional uninspired conference room.

But after the pandemic, LinkedIn knew it couldn’t bring everyone back into an old-school cubicle farm.

So it completely redesigned its headquarters for a combination of in-person and remote work. (Hint: it looks a lot like WeWork.)

The result: essentially every kind of workspace imaginable, grouped into little pods. Soft chairs, high-backed booths, outdoor seating and, of course, private offices.

I like this variety. The idea is to help people work in different postures throughout their day.

This avoids aches and pains.

I’m experimenting with it myself right now! Instead of the table where I usually sit hunched for hour after hour, I’m in a comfy easy chair for a bit.

I don’t know about you, but my neck is sore just about every day! I’m hoping this helps.

The variety of seating also helps deaden noise. Those high-backed booths block sound a lot better than an open floor full of desks.

When I was working in an office, noise was my nemesis. Co-worker conversations could make it very hard to focus.

And best of all, LinkedIn doesn’t even make employees to come to this beautiful office! Everyone can be remote or in-office for whatever amount of time they like.

I love working from home. Cutting out a commute and avoiding noise make me a lot happier.

But it doesn’t work for everyone. My friend Tim*, who is in sales, hates remote work.

He explained that it’s very hard to get fired up about cold calling when you’re lounging in your living room. And there are lots of Tims, productive workers that love being in an office.

Then there are other people like my friend Jason*. He might enjoy remote work if he were single, but with a small child and a wife who also works remote, peace and quiet are hard to come by.

So any larger company like LinkedIn is wise to have at least some office space to accommodate workers like these.

The one problem I see with LinkedIn’s campus is too few private offices. Sometimes people need a room with a door so they can blot out the world and focus.

I’d also add an optional, free WeWork membership for every employee. This would be great for staffers that don’t live close to headquarters but still need to get out of the house.

And at $299 a month, the cost is nothing for a giant like LinkedIn.

In all, I think LinkedIn did an awesome job! Less pampered workers would be in awe of the glass atria and cozy couches.

I spent many years in grey cubicle farms and never liked it much. I hope this beautiful office serves as a model and we all work better in the future!

What do you think the future of work is? Leave a comment at the bottom and let me know!

More on tech:

Apple Tackles the Most Aggressive Spyware with New Lockdown Mode

Managing a Crisis the Sequoia Way

Why Tech Stocks Are Oversold

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

If you found this post interesting, please share it on Twitter/Reddit/etc. This helps more people find the blog!

Save Money on Stuff I Use:

Fundrise

This platform lets me diversify my real estate investments so I’m not too exposed to any one market. I’ve invested since 2018 with great returns.

More on Fundrise in this post.

If you decide to invest in Fundrise, you can use this link to get $100 in free bonus shares!

Misfits Market

I’ve used Misfits for years, and it never disappoints! Every fruit and vegetable is organic, super fresh, and packed with flavor!

I wrote a detailed review of Misfits here.

Use this link to sign up and you’ll save $15 on your first order.

*Not their real names

Wall Street Banks Turn on Each Other as Federal Probe Looms

July 13, 2022

Morgan Stanley has been under federal investigation since February. Now, banks are turning on each other and unidentified sources are leaking information.

From a report that broke overnight in the Financial Times:

…according to reports, two of Morgan Stanley’s competitors, Credit Suisse and Goldman Sachs, have gone so far as to alert the US Attorney’s office and the Hong Kong regulator SFC, respectively, about “potential issues” around block trades executed by Morgan Stanley.

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

The SEC and DOJ are investigating Morgan Stanley’s stock trading business.

Morgan frequently handles large “block trades” for institutional investors. There are allegations that it may have tipped off hedge funds to big sales that could move markets.

This would allow hedge funds to short the stock before the big block of shares is sold. Such a trade could offer quick, easy profits.

Why would Morgan do this? Because hedge funds are among the bank’s best clients.

Hedge funds have “prime brokerage” arrangements with big Wall Street banks like Morgan. Those trading accounts mean lots of juicy fees for the bank.

Let’s say you want to get or keep a lucrative customer. You might be tempted to give them valuable information, even if it’s illegal.

Nothing has been proven against Morgan yet. It’s possible that they were just conducting big trades in a straightforward and honest way.

But watching these big banks turn on each other gives me pause. I have rarely seen major banks reporting each other to regulators, as Goldman and Credit Suisse did with Morgan.

What’s more, Morgan has suspended some of its block trading staff. Why would they do that if they had done nothing wrong?

But it’s not just the big banks that are talking. Unidentified whistleblowers are also offering up information on possible wrongdoing at Morgan:

This noise goes well beyond the normal thrust-and-parry of a hyper-competitive business. Visceral grudges and grievances underlie these complaints; the Feds are on the case; unidentified people “close to the investigation” are briefing the media and naming names; and careers, livelihoods and reputations hang in the balance.

Perhaps it’s all a big misunderstanding. But my gut tells me where there’s smoke, there’s fire.

Do you think Morgan and other big banks help hedge funds front run trades? Leave a comment at the bottom and let me know.

More on Fundrise in this post.

If you decide to invest in Fundrise, you can use this link to get $100 in free bonus shares!

Misfits Market

I’ve used Misfits for years, and it never disappoints! Every fruit and vegetable is organic, super fresh, and packed with flavor!

I wrote a detailed review of Misfits here.

Use this link to sign up and you’ll save $15 on your first order.

Photo: “Morgan Stanley Headquarters” by Alex E. Proimos is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0.

Mass Protests in China as Bank Runs Continue

July 12, 2022

Major news out of China as over 1,000 protestors in Zhengzhou demanded their savings back:

This is huge. Don't know how this will end. Henan bank is NOT the only one that is having problems with liquidity. All four Chinese banks are having the same issue. Some depositors found they can save and can NOT withdraw money with their bank cards. #bankrun #China #CCP pic.twitter.com/5WYYgpmIWP
— Inconvenient Truths by Jennifer Zeng 曾錚真言 (@jenniferzeng97) July 10, 2022

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

There are runs on several Chinese banks. The depositors, desperate not to lose their life’s savings, are taking great risk to speak out.

From the Indian Express:

In a rare large protest in China, over one thousand angry bank depositors, who have been protesting for access to their frozen funds, faced off with the police in Henan province leading to a violent clampdown Sunday.
Depositors of four rural banks in this central province have not been able to withdraw their funds since April. Sporadic protests have been going on since May.

Many smaller Chinese banks promised high interest rates to attract deposits. They advertised those rates on platforms run by Chinese tech giants like Baidu and JD.

Now, these small banks are finding themselves unable to pay those high rates. Worse yet, some banks have been infiltrated by criminals who are siphoning money out:

In the present case it is being alleged that these banks attracted deposits by offering attractive terms and high interest rates. A report in the South China Morning Post in May said that while Bank of China offers 2.75% a year interest on five-year deposits, the found banks in question were giving around 4.5% a year on their deposit products through third-party platforms.
Also, a statement by the Henan police on July 10 said that a criminal group had gradually taken control of several rural banks and was moving out funds.

Behind the peril facing Chinese banks is a weak economy. Intense COVID lockdowns this year have hammered economic activity.

An overheated property market is also crumbling. This has triggered defaults at major property developers, including Evergrande.

Something interesting happens when people see depositors struggling to get their money out. They start wondering about their own bank.

This is how a contagion could spread through the Chinese banking system. Cue It’s a Wonderful Life, without the happy ending.

The Chinese government’s violent repression of small savers in Zhengzhou may be just the beginning.

China is in a sensitive period. The 20th Party Congress, enormously important to the Communist elite, happens in November.

At that meeting, Xi hopes to secure a third term in office and effectively become leader for life. He and his underlings are likely to repress any “disturbance” during this time.

Already, China’s massive surveillance apparatus is being turned on these small savers.

Zhengzhou protesters have had their “health codes” turned off. Without the green QR code on their phones, they can go nowhere and do nothing.

The health code system was created to stem COVID. Predictably, it’s now being turned against dissidents.

I’m not a particularly religious man, but this Orwellian act reminded me of a passage from the Bible:

It forced all the people, small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to be given a stamped image on their right hands or their foreheads,
so that no one could buy or sell except one who had the stamped image of the beast’s name or the number that stood for its name.
Revelation 13:16-17

I hope these decent, hardworking people will get their life’s savings back. I also hope we always resist this type of tyranny here at home.

What do you think is next in China? Leave a comment at the bottom and let me know.

More on Fundrise in this post.

If you decide to invest in Fundrise, you can use this link to get $100 in free bonus shares!

Misfits Market

I’ve used Misfits for years, and it never disappoints! Every fruit and vegetable is organic, super fresh, and packed with flavor!

I wrote a detailed review of Misfits here.

Use this link to sign up and you’ll save $15 on your first order.

How to Write Investor Updates

July 11, 2022

You did it!

You closed a big funding round! Time to pop the champagne!

But you still have one little problem: what are these pesky investor updates?

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

If there’s one thing that really confuses founders I meet, it’s investor updates. Many big investors require regular updates as part of a funding round.

Meanwhile, founder after founder has no idea what’s expected of them.

When startups are doing well, their investor updates are short and full of numbers. When they're not, their updates are long and mostly words.
— Paul Graham (@paulg) March 2, 2021

Updates can and should be simple. This is what I want to see:

Revenue
Burn
Cash in Bank
Runway
Highlights
Lowlights
Next month’s plan
Asks for investors

Here’s an example update I wrote. It’s for my favorite startup, Uber (yes, even now).

The information is completely fictional, but here’s how it should look:

Uber – June 2022 Investor Update

Hello,

June was a great month for Uber! We saw significant growth across markets:

Burn: $75,000/month
Cash in Bank: $1,082,453
Runway: 14 months

Highlights:

Major growth in new New York City market brought us our highest monthly revenue ever
Hired 2 new engineers to build out user profile function
Reduced CAC from $45 to $35

Lowlights:

Cease and desist order in Austin, Texas. We are appealing.
Departure of a strong front-end engineer

Next month’s plan:

Expand to New Jersey
Hire 2 more front-end engineers

Asks:

Intros to strong front-end engineers with experience in Python
Lobbyists with connections to taxi boards in major cities

Thank you,

Travis Kalanick

Many founders update their investors only rarely, if at all. And when they do, there’s way too much information!

This update gives investors all the key data points about your startup. But it doesn’t take tons of time to write or to read.

So what can updates do for you, as a founder?

Updates get your existing investors excited about your progress. This makes us eager to invest more even before you ask! 💰

You also get to put those moneybags to work for you! Your investors have tons of connections and expertise just waiting to be harvested.

Go with monthly updates, or at least quarterly. If we only hear from you quarterly or even less, that’s fewer opportunities for us to help in a timely fashion.

Even if the terms of your financing don’t require any updates, send them anyway! You want your investors engaged, excited, and helping you.

Finally, investor updates are a good idea even for companies with no investors! Call it a “Company Update” and make sure every potential investor you meet gets it in their inbox like clockwork.

Once they see your diligence and your company’s progress, they’ll be breaking down your door to invest.

What questions do you have about investor updates? Leave a comment at the bottom and let me know!

More on tech:

Talking Startups and Today’s Fundraising Pullback

Are You a Venture Scale Business?

Talking About Today’s Startup Market on The Accelerator Podcast

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

If you found this post interesting, please share it on Twitter/Reddit/etc. This helps more people find the blog!

Save Money on Stuff I Use:

Fundrise

This platform lets me diversify my real estate investments so I’m not too exposed to any one market. I’ve invested since 2018 with great returns.

More on Fundrise in this post.

If you decide to invest in Fundrise, you can use this link to get $100 in free bonus shares!

Misfits Market

I’ve used Misfits for years, and it never disappoints! Every fruit and vegetable is organic, super fresh, and packed with flavor!

I wrote a detailed review of Misfits here.

Use this link to sign up and you’ll save $15 on your first order.

Photo: “Confused PC” by Luigi Rosa is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

Are You a Venture Scale Business?

July 8, 2022

A nice young man contacted me recently with an investment opportunity: a nude resort in Mexico.

I declined. But not for the reason you might think.

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

Are You a Venture Scale Business?

My decision wasn’t a moral one. I passed because this is not a venture scale business.

Venture scale businesses are companies that can grow at massive rates. They also have very high profit margins.

Why isn’t the nude resort a venture scale business?

Because you would have to build hotels, pools, restaurants (ew) and whatever else a nude resort has. And you’d have to do it at impossible rates.

Because it involves physical items, it cannot grow at the same rate as a software business.

A Typical Venture Scale Business

Venture scale businesses are almost always software companies.

What’s our obsession with software? You can build a software product and then make it available to as many people as you want.

Building the product costs a lot. But making it available to one more person costs very little.

Of course, it usually takes some sales and marketing dollars to land a new customer. And customer support also costs money.

But a good Software as a Service (SaaS) business generally has a gross margin of 80% or more. This means that for every new customer they get, 80% of what that customer pays them falls to the bottom line as profit.

Yum yum! 😋

But Not All Software Companies Qualify

You can have a software startup with a killer product and great margins…and still not be a venture scale business.

Why? Because in order to interest VC’s and angels, you have to do more than grow fast with high margins. You have to grow big.

Really big.

Venture investors are looking for billion dollar companies. To get there, you have to generate massive revenue.

The current valuation multiple for high-growth SaaS businesses in the public markets is about 8. This means that for every dollar you make in revenue, the markets give you 8 dollars in valuation.

So, to be a $1 billion business, you need to hit $125 million in revenue.

Let’s say you’re making software for wedding planners. No matter how good your software is, it’s unlikely to ever be a venture scale business.

Assume the most you can charge the wedding planners is $50/month. There are about 23,000 wedding planners in the US.

So even if you got every wedding planner in the entire country as your customer (impossible), your revenue would be only $13.8 million. Your valuation would be about $110 million in the public market.

Realistically, you’d probably top out around $40 million at best.

Why Do Venture Investors Need $1 Billion Companies?

I can imagine what you might be thinking.

“Why are venture capitalists so greedy? What’s wrong with a $40 million business? That’s a lot of money!”

It is! To understand why VC’s are so insistent on getting big, you have to understand how they make returns.

Most of the investments they make will go to 0. Meanwhile, the few survivors have to become Godzillas in order to make up for all the losers.

This is the only way they could avoid losing all their money. And if they lose everything, there will be no venture capital for anybody.

Becoming Godzilla

Since I usually invest at seed stage, let’s take that as an example. At seed stage, you’re usually 7-10 years from an exit by acquisition or IPO.

Let’s say the seed stage company has $250,000 of revenue a year. To reach that $125 million of revenue in 10 years, the startup has to grow at about 5.3% monthly.

That means you nearly double every single year for a decade, on average. In reality, you probably grow even faster than that early on, then taper off.

Can you imagine the nude resort doubling its business every year? First year 1 resort, next year 2, and 1,024 resorts by 2032?

Not really.

Wrap-Up

I hope this helps explain some of the reasons you get a no from investors.

It may be frustrating. But they have their own people to answer to: their investors!

Venture capitalists won’t be able to keep raising funds if their returns are bad. So they have to make sure they pick only the best bets.

For more on this subject, check out this excellent segment of the This Week in Startups podcast with Jason Calacanis and Molly Wood:

What questions do you have about venture scale businesses and what venture investors look for? Leave a comment at the bottom and I’ll try to answer!

Have a wonderful weekend everyone! 👋

More on tech:

Talking About Today’s Startup Market on The Accelerator Podcast

The Power Law (Part One)

Managing a Crisis the Sequoia Way

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

If you found this post interesting, please share it on Twitter/Reddit/etc. This helps more people find the blog!

Save Money on Stuff I Use:

Fundrise

This platform lets me diversify my real estate investments so I’m not too exposed to any one market. I’ve invested since 2018 with great returns.

More on Fundrise in this post.

If you decide to invest in Fundrise, you can use this link to get $100 in free bonus shares!

Misfits Market

I’ve used Misfits for years, and it never disappoints! Every fruit and vegetable is organic, super fresh, and packed with flavor!

I wrote a detailed review of Misfits here.

Use this link to sign up and you’ll save $15 on your first order.

Photo: “Godzilla ゴジラ” by kirainet is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.

Apple Tackles the Most Aggressive Spyware with New Lockdown Mode

July 7, 2022

Apple Inc. landed a major blow for privacy yesterday. It announced a new Lockdown Mode, designed to stop even the most sophisticated spyware attacks:

Apple today detailed two initiatives to help protect users who may be personally targeted by some of the most sophisticated digital threats, such as those from private companies developing state-sponsored mercenary spyware. Lockdown Mode — the first major capability of its kind, coming this fall with iOS 16, iPadOS 16, and macOS Ventura — is an extreme, optional protection for the very small number of users who face grave, targeted threats to their digital security.

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

The new feature will be released this summer to developers and fully available this fall. It blocks numerous exploits that spyware uses:

At launch, Lockdown Mode includes the following protections:

• Messages: Most message attachment types other than images are blocked. Some features, like link previews, are disabled.

• Web browsing: Certain complex web technologies, like just-in-time (JIT) JavaScript compilation, are disabled unless the user excludes a trusted site from Lockdown Mode.

• Apple services: Incoming invitations and service requests, including FaceTime calls, are blocked if the user has not previously sent the initiator a call or request.

• Wired connections with a computer or accessory are blocked when iPhone is locked.

• Configuration profiles cannot be installed, and the device cannot enroll into mobile device management (MDM), while Lockdown Mode is turned on.

In all, this still sounds like a pretty usable phone to me.

Most websites should work and phone calls are unaffected. You can even send pictures to your friends!

Apple appears to have done a great job in balancing usability and security. After all, if Lockdown Mode bricks your phone, no one will use it.

Apple is even offering up to $2 million to anyone who can break Lockdown Mode. So start coding, folks!

Most of us probably don’t need this type of protection. But for dissidents or persecuted minorities, it could be critical:

“The global spyware trade targets human rights defenders, journalists, and dissidents; it facilitates violence, reinforces authoritarianism, and supports political repression,” said Lori McGlinchey, the Ford Foundation’s director of its Technology and Society program.

Lockdown Mode could also protect heads of state. Angela Merkel had her phone hacked while serving as Chancellor of Germany.

Other world leaders probably have spyware on their phones right now, even if they don’t know it.

Apple is not alone in addressing aggressive spyware. Google has a feature called Advanced Account Protection that adds security to logins and downloads.

It’s unclear which company offers the better package for high risk users. But I’m glad both are taking the issue seriously.

The main enemy for Apple and Google in the security fight is an obscure Israeli company.

NSO Group produces spyware called Pegasus. It can infiltrate phones without any user action.

From Scientific American:

Since 2019, Pegasus users have been able to install the software on smartphones with a missed call on WhatsApp, and can even delete the record of the missed call, making it impossible for the phone’s owner to know anything is amiss. Another way is by simply sending a message to a user’s phone that produces no notification.
Once installed, Pegasus can theoretically harvest any data from the device and transmit it back to the attacker. It can steal photos and videos, recordings, location records, communications, web searches, passwords, call logs and social media posts. It also has the capability to activate cameras and microphones for real-time surveillance without the permission or knowledge of the user.

It’s striking that no matter how careful you are about passwords or clicking links, you’re not safe from Pegasus.

The software has been used by authoritarian regimes for surveillance. Some evidence suggests it was used by the Saudis to locate and kill journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Even as it threatens others, NSO Group itself is threatened with extinction.

US sanctions has wreaked havoc on its business. An acquisition by a US defense contractor could save it, but it faces government opposition.

Without a white knight coming to the rescue, NSO may not survive.

And I say good riddance. An unscrupulous company that sells tools to dictators to track and kill dissidents needs to die.

What do you think of Apple’s Lockdown Mode and digital surveillance? Leave a comment at the bottom and let me know!

More on tech:

The Autonomous Weapons of the Future…and Present

Talking Startups and Today’s Fundraising Pullback

Managing a Crisis the Sequoia Way

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

If you found this post interesting, please share it on Twitter/Reddit/etc. This helps more people find the blog!

Save Money on Stuff I Use:

Fundrise

This platform lets me diversify my real estate investments so I’m not too exposed to any one market. I’ve invested since 2018 with great returns.

More on Fundrise in this post.

If you decide to invest in Fundrise, you can use this link to get $100 in free bonus shares!

Misfits Market

I’ve used Misfits for years, and it never disappoints! Every fruit and vegetable is organic, super fresh, and packed with flavor!

I wrote a detailed review of Misfits here.

Use this link to sign up and you’ll save $15 on your first order.

Photo: Apple CEO Tim Cook

Bill Ackman Loses $4.8 Billion

July 6, 2022

Hedge fund manager Bill Ackman has taken major losses this year. From a new report by Institutional Investor:

Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square Holdings fell 9.5 percent in June and is now down 26 percent for the year, as investors’ fears of recession outweighed concerns about the inflation Ackman has been inveighing against since last fall.
Pershing Square’s three biggest stock holdings are down more than the market. Through June, Universal Music Group is down almost 23 percent, Lowe’s Companies fell more than 32 percent, and Chipotle Mexican Grill is down 25 percent.

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

He is now significantly underperforming both the S&P 500 and the HFRX Global Hedge Fund Index.

Ackman’s fund had $18.48 billion under management at the beginning of the year. This 26% drop means a loss of approximately $4.8 billion.

In addition to his stocks falling, Ackman also made a large bet that short term interest rates would increase. When they fell on recession fears, he took substantial losses.

Ackman is still betting on higher short term rates. This could expose him to further huge losses.

Over the past two weeks, rates have declined dramatically purportedly due to fears of a recession. Friday’s move was particularly stunning for the scale of the move and for the degree of intraday volatility. I put forth here a theory of what is going on:
— Bill Ackman (@BillAckman) July 4, 2022

Ackman is predicting 4-5% interest rates, but markets disagree.

Markets expect short term interest to go no higher than 2.5% next year. Ackman is forecasting 4-5%.

Longer-term inflation expectations are also modest. This could mean less need for rate increases.

The 5 Year Breakeven Inflation rate measures inflation expectations over the next five years. Today, it sits at just 2.51%.

Perhaps Ackman will be proven right in time. But as he nurses this big loss, he’d do well to remember these (perhaps apocryphal) words:

“The market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent.”
John Maynard Keynes

What do you think of Ackman’s big stumble? Leave a comment at the bottom and let me know.

More on Fundrise in this post.

If you decide to invest in Fundrise, you can use this link to get $100 in free bonus shares!

Misfits Market

I’ve used Misfits for years, and it never disappoints! Every fruit and vegetable is organic, super fresh, and packed with flavor!

I wrote a detailed review of Misfits here.

Use this link to sign up and you’ll save $15 on your first order.

Photo: Bill Ackman

New Law Could Put Big Short Sellers on the Endangered Species List

July 5, 2022

A new law introduced in Congress could mean the end of some major short sellers. According to a report that broke this morning on TheStreet, the law would require disclosure of short positions by large investors.

Today, big investors like hedge funds have to disclose the stocks they own quarterly. But they can keep secret any short position they have, no matter how large.

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

If the bill passes, those days are over. From TheStreet:

The Short Sale Transparency and Market Fairness Act will modify the reporting requirements applicable to certain institutional investment managers who have more than $100 million in assets under custody and who are required to file ownership reports with the SEC. Key modifications include:

1 Reducing the reporting window from 45 days to 10 days after the end of each month for such asset managers.
2 Expanding such reports to require reporting of direct or indirect derivative positions or interests (including short positions).

This could make it dangerous for hedge funds to heavily short a stock. Soon, everyone would know about their position.

That means other hedge funds could buy the same stock to engineer a short squeeze. They may be joined by retail investors, as was the case in shares of GameStop Corp. and AMC Entertainment Holdings Inc. last year.

A short squeeze can cause catastrophic losses for a hedge fund, as in the case of Melvin Capital.

The new law could also make naked short selling more difficult. This generally illegal practice involves selling short shares without borrowing them first.

I’ve long suspected naked shorting in shares of meme stocks like AMC and GameStop, along with many other investors.

But what if regulators or the public could count up the amount of short positions out there? If big investors have far more shares short than exist, it would be strong evidence of naked short selling.

In all, I think this bill would be a very positive change for markets. If investors have a right to know about long positions held by big institutions, why not short positions?

What’s more, in a future financial crisis, knowing who shorted what could be critical. A huge short position that blows up could push an institution to insolvency, perhaps dragging others with it.

We don’t know yet whether the bill will pass or what final form it might take. But here’s hoping Congress acts to make markets safer, fairer, and more transparent.

What do you think about the new bill? Leave a comment at the bottom and let me know!

More on markets:

AMC Fails to Deliver Pass 2.6 Million in New Report

Hedge Fund Tiger Global Losing $136 Million a Day, Down 52%

$6B Hedge Fund Cut Off from Trading As Investigation Looms

Get the blog before anyone else…subscribe!

If you found this post interesting, please share it on Reddit/Twitter/etc. This helps more people find the blog!

Save Money on Stuff I Use:

Fundrise

This platform lets me diversify my real estate investments so I’m not too exposed to any one market. I’ve invested since 2018 with great returns.

More on Fundrise in this post.

If you decide to invest in Fundrise, you can use this link to get $100 in free bonus shares!

Misfits Market

I’ve used Misfits for years, and it never disappoints! Every fruit and vegetable is organic, super fresh, and packed with flavor!

I wrote a detailed review of Misfits here.

Use this link to sign up and you’ll save $15 on your first order.

Photo: “U.S. Capitol building” by Gage Skidmore is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.