2026-02-24
PayPal is trading at a PE of just 8.3x. The market is obviously no longer excited about its growth prospects and earnings that are below Wall Street's estimates. Yet it doesn't mean PayPal isn't growing or doesn't have a moat. But, the company needs a new strategy and narrative. [image]
Bloomberg
Sources: PayPal is attracting takeover interest after a stock slide over the past year wiped out almost half of its market value; PYPL closed up 5.76%
PayPal Holdings Inc., the digital payments pioneer, is attracting takeover interest from potential buyers after a stock slide wiped …
I guess Uber realized that it had won the demand-side of ridehailing, so it decided to scrap its autonomous vehicle R&D efforts and pivoted its energy on the supply-side to partnering with companies with the best AV technology. It's cheaper too. https://www.ft.com/...
Financial Times
Uber launches Uber Autonomous Solutions, offering services like insurance, roadside assistance, and “AV mission control” tools, and will offer fleet financing
2026-02-23
I guess Uber realized that it had won the demand-side of ridehailing, so it decided to scrap its autonomous vehicle R&D efforts and pivoted its energy on the supply-side to partnering with companies with the best AV technology. It's cheaper too. https://www.ft.com/...
Financial Times
Uber launches Uber Autonomous Solutions, offering services like insurance, roadside assistance, and “AV mission control” tools, and will offer fleet financing
App says new operation will boost commercialisation of AVs — Uber has set up a new initiative to serve a growing number …
PayPal is trading at a PE of just 8.3x. The market is obviously no longer excited about its growth prospects and earnings that are below Wall Street's estimates. Yet it doesn't mean PayPal isn't growing or doesn't have a moat. But, the company needs a new strategy and narrative. [image]
Bloomberg
Sources: PayPal is attracting takeover interest after a stock slide over the past year wiped out almost half of its value; PYPL closes up 5.76%
PayPal Holdings Inc., the digital payments pioneer, is attracting takeover interest from potential buyers after a stock slide wiped …
2024-11-30
European regulators rebuked Wise, the UK crossborder fintech, over its money laundering controls and forced the company into a formal remediation plan. In sum: Folks sending money to Africa with Wise should brace for a new round of KYC and AML torture. https://www.ft.com/...
Financial Times
Sources: European regulators rebuked Wise in 2022 after finding it lacked proof of address for hundreds of thousands of customers, forcing it into remediation
Akila Quinio / Financial Times :
2024-11-29
European regulators rebuked Wise, the UK crossborder fintech, over its money laundering controls and forced the company into a formal remediation plan. In sum: Folks sending money to Africa with Wise should brace for a new round of KYC and AML torture. https://www.ft.com/...
Financial Times
Sources: European regulators rebuked Wise in 2022 after finding it lacked proof of address for hundreds of thousands of customers, forcing it into remediation
Regulatory review in 2022 found fintech lacked proof of address for hundreds of thousands of customers
2024-11-05
Revenue at China's ByteDance may soon overtake Facebook parent company Meta, The Information reports. Meta's half-year revenue: H1 2023: $60.7 billion H1 2024: $75.5 billion ByteDance/TikTok's half-year revenue: H1 2023: $54 billion H1 2024: $73 billion https://www.theinformation.com/ ...
The Information
Sources: ByteDance's international revenue grew 60%+ YoY to ~$17B in H1 2024, and overall revenue grew 35% YoY to ~$73B, after growing 40% YoY in H1 2023
The Information :
2024-09-02
The businessman didn't even attempt to address the SEC complaint: “[The judge] entered a final judgment by default against Mmobuosi and his companies after the entrepreneur failed to make any representations in the civil complaint filed last December by the SEC.” 🫢🫢
Financial Times
A US court fines Dozy Mmobuosi, the founder of Tingo, which sells phones to African farmers, $250M+ after the SEC said he inflated financial performance metrics
WHEREAS Plaintiff Securities and Exchange Commission (†… TechCabal : Tingo Group CEO Dozy Mmobuosi must pay over $250m after inflating financial performance X: Abubakar / @iatalk...
2024-08-01
Abraham Shafi founder of SoftBank-backed app IRL accused of fraud by SEC. He allegedly deceived investors and spent millions of dollars on personal expenses including his wedding, flights and luxury hotels. At its peak, IRL raised $170M and was worth $1B. https://www.ft.com/...
Financial Times
The US SEC sues former IRL CEO Abraham Shafi, accusing him of a $170M fraud by misleading investors about the company's growth and concealing personal expenses
Joe Miller / Financial Times :
TikTok was paying nearly $20 million per month to Microsoft for access to OpenAI's artificial intelligence models as of March. The ByteDance company is one of several clients driving Microsoft's plans to build a new multibillion-dollar AI profit machine. https://www.theinformation.com/ ...
The Information
Source: TikTok was paying Microsoft ~$20M/month to use OpenAI's models in Azure OpenAI Service as of March, ~25% of the total revenue the service was generating
2024-05-30
New: Seven months after a short-lived ouster of Sam Altman as OpenAI CEO, Altman is more powerful than ever, having eliminated his primary foes within the company and succeeding in striking a key deal with Apple to boost the impact of OpenAI's technology. https://www.theinformation.com/ ...
The Information
Sources: Sam Altman and Satya Nadella recently met to discuss Microsoft's concerns about how OpenAI's deal with Apple might affect Microsoft's product ambitions
When OpenAI's board of directors ousted Sam Altman as CEO last year, it looked like a shocking derailment of a fast-rising career.
2024-05-24
“The case of Tigran Gambaryan, the former US federal agent and Binance executive unjustly detained in Nigeria, has taken a sudden and dramatic turn as he fell severely ill in court yesterday.” The Nigerian govt has handled this case poorly; it's going to blow up in their face! [image]
Reuters
A Nigerian court adjourned a money laundering trial against Binance and two of its executives to June 20 due to health issues of one executive, Tigran Gambaryan
Camillus Eboh / Reuters :
2024-03-29
New w/ @erinkwoo: Bolt, the $11B checkout startup, is embroiled in yet another legal battle with a high-profile retail partner, Fanatics. Fanatics claims Bolt “unjustly enriched itself” with the deal, which includes a multimillion-dollar co-marketing fund. https://www.theinformation.com/ ...
The Information
Bolt told investors that it had revenue of $19.4M for the nine months ending in October 2023, essentially flat YoY; Bolt's troubles grow with a Fanatics lawsuit
The Information : X: @iatalkspace and @erinkwoo X: Abubakar / @iatalkspace : New w/ @erinkwoo: Bolt, the $11B checkout startup, is embroiled in yet another legal battle with a hig...
2024-03-23
Microsoft doesn't want its plan to hire two of Inflection AI's co-founders and most of its 70-person staff to be seen as an acquisition. But it's still writing a hefty $650M check to the two-year-old artificial intelligence startup for a licensing deal. https://www.theinformation.com/ ...
Newcomer
As regulators constantly and unreasonably block acquisitions, Microsoft is pioneering the non-acquisition acquisition with its OpenAI and Inflection deals
Microsoft doesn't want its plan to hire two of Inflection AI's co-founders and most of its 70-person staff to be seen as an acquisition. But it's still writing a hefty $650M check to the two-year-old artificial intelligence startup for a licensing deal. https://www.theinformation.com/ ...
Financial Times
Microsoft's deal with Inflection is a further sign that the emerging AI economy will probably be dominated by the US tech giants, as the AI talent war heats up
Microsoft's agreement with two founders of Inflection is the latest sign that deep-pocketed companies are scooping up much of the expertise in AI
2024-03-22
Microsoft doesn't want its plan to hire two of Inflection AI's co-founders and most of its 70-person staff to be seen as an acquisition. But it's still writing a hefty $650M check to the two-year-old artificial intelligence startup for a licensing deal. https://www.theinformation.com/ ...
The Information
Source: Microsoft agreed to pay Inflection ~$650M when hiring its staff, mostly via a licensing deal that makes Inflection's models available for sale on Azure
2024-01-17
New: Even as Google makes a major round of staff cuts, it is tapping a special pool of stock compensation to retain its top artificial intelligence researchers as rival OpenAI lures them with multimillion-dollar pay packages https://www.theinformation.com/ ...
The Information
Source: Google has increasingly awarded large grants of restricted stock worth up to millions of dollars to select DeepMind researchers to rival OpenAI's offers
2023-12-25
Nigeria's CBN has removed restrictions on cryptocurrency transactions. The original 2021 order banned banks from crypto-related transactions. The latest circular, however, gives clear guidelines supporting crypto, but with stringent customer KYC and anti-money laundering checks. [image]
Reuters
The Central Bank of Nigeria lifts a ban, imposed in February 2021, on cryptocurrency transactions but says global trends show a need to regulate such activities
2023-04-14
I thought Clubhouse would explore a feature that allowed users to listen to radio and podcasts directly from the app. This would have made it the “Twitter of audio,” mirroring what Twitter does for news. But Spotify moved faster: “broadcast-to-podcast.” https://techcrunch.com/...
The Hollywood Reporter
Spotify brings its “broadcast-to-podcast” tech, which it acquired from Whooshkaa in 2021, to Megaphone, letting publishers convert radio shows into podcasts
Publishers will be able to input the URL to a livestream of their broadcasted content and automatically have a podcast created from that programming … Tweets: Abubakar / @iatalkspa...
2023-01-22
World's largest tech companies and layoffs: Microsoft (market cap, $1.7 trillion), 10k+ layoffs. Alphabet ($1.2 trillion), 12k+ job cuts. Amazon ($955 billion), laid off 10k+ workers. 😕 https://twitter.com/...
New York Times
Emails and sources: Google fired 16% of its ~400-person Fuchsia OS team, Research cut jobs in lower traction areas, and Cloud cut operational and other roles
The layoffs amount to about 6 percent of the global work force at the company, the latest tech giant to make cuts after a pandemic hiring spree.