Venture Capital

2022-08-28 14:00:08 More Data

1) Coinbase is laying off 18% of its workforce, about 1,000 employees, citing a "crypto winter". We wrote about tech layoffs last week here.

2) Ford has recalled 2.9 million vehicles that are at risk of rolling away when parked.

3) Some good news for your wallet amidst the bad: the US dollar has hit a 20-year-high, suggesting that you should get a little more vacation for your buck if you go abroad.

4) New data shows extraordinarily fast global warming in the Barents Sea in the Arctic Ocean, with warming up to seven times the speed of the global average.

5) Your breakfast eggs just got a lot more boring; a shortage of spicy sauce Sriracha is coming.

6) Apple has signed a 10-year-deal with Major League Soccer to broadcast the matches on its TV+ service, its latest investment into exclusive content. Open / Comment

2022-08-27 21:00:09 ​The Best-Selling Video Game Consoles of All Time

In 1972, the first-ever commercially available home video game console hit the market—the Magnavox Odyssey. Players of the Odyssey had a choice between two built-in games that were stored directly in the device, and would use a joystick and dials as a controller.

Video game consoles have come a long way since then, and the console market has grown into a multi-billion dollar industry that’s expected to reach $72.67 billion in value by the end of 2022.

This graphic by Enrique Mendoza uses data from VGChartz to show the market leaders in the industry, by highlighting the top-selling video consoles of all time, as of May 8, 2022. Open / Comment

2022-08-27 14:00:09 Master Of All Trades, Meet The 17 Members Of The Elite "EGOT" Club

Taking home just one of the biggest awards in entertainment is a dream for many artists and performers.

But some manage to receive the biggest awards in every major discipline — earning them a place in the EGOT club. This week Jennifer Hudson joined that club, winning a Tony Award as a producer for A Strange Loop.

That makes Hudson the 17th person to have won a top award in television (Emmy), music (Grammy), film (Oscar) and theatre (Tony). She joins a star-studded list of actors, artists, producers and creatives including John Legend, Whoopi Goldberg, Audrey Hepburn and Andrew Lloyd Webber.

Perhaps most impressive on this list is songwriter Robert Lopez, who strung together his first four wins in just 9 years, and has since gone on to become the first member of the "double EGOT" club, claiming each award at least twice for his songwriting on Frozen, The Book of Mormon, Coco and more. Open / Comment

2022-08-26 21:00:09 ​The 10 Largest Gold Mines in the World, by Production

Gold mining is a global business, with hundreds of mining companies digging for the precious metal in dozens of countries.

But where exactly are the largest gold mines in the world?

The above infographic uses data compiled from S&P Global Market Intelligence and company reports to map the top 10 gold-producing mines in 2021.

Editor’s Note: The article uses publicly available global production data from the World Gold Council to calculate the production share of each mine. The percentages slightly differ from those calculated by S&P. Open / Comment

2022-08-26 14:00:10 US Stock Are Officially In A Bear Market, Down 22% From Their Peak

The bears are coming

US stocks are officially in a bear market, with the S&P 500 Index closing down 22% below its previous peak yesterday as investors sold stocks for any number of valid concerns.

As we've discussed previously, the tech-heavy NASDAQ and other market trackers had already breached the 20% decline threshold, but this is the first time the broader S&P 500 Index has done so... at least since March 2020.

A 22% fall in the value of stocks in a little over 6 months isn't really good news for anyone, but sometimes it's helpful to zoom out and get some perspective. Looking back 18 months shows that the index is basically back to where it was at the start of 2021, which isn't too terrifying, and on a really long horizon this latest crash looks a lot like the crashes that have come before it, all of which eventually saw the market recover and move higher. Open / Comment

2022-08-25 21:00:11 ​How Do Big Tech Giants Make Their Billions?

In 2021, the Big Five tech giants—Apple, Amazon, Google (Alphabet), Meta, and Microsoft—generated a combined $1.4 trillion in revenue.

What are the sources of this revenue, and how does it breakdown?

Below, we’ll dive into the main ways that these big tech giants generate revenue, and take a look at how much their revenues have increased in recent years. Open / Comment

2022-08-25 14:00:10 Once King Of Browsers, Internet Explorer Is Officially Shutting Down

Internet Explorer's market share was estimated at one point to be as high as 90%, primarily because of the success of the Windows operating system, which often stipulated users use Internet Explorer — a practice that got Microsoft in trouble with the Justice Department in the late '90s.

The writing has been on the wall for Internet Explorer for some time, as Microsoft has pushed users towards its latest browser — Microsoft Edge — for the last few years. Unfortunately, Edge hasn't exactly caught on. The latest data from StatCounter shows Edge with only a 4% share of the browser market, way down on Apple's Safari, which has just shy of 20% of the market, and nowhere near the dominant Google Chrome, which has 65%.

Though some may look back with fond nostalgia, Internet Explorer was often criticized for being slow, cumbersome, buggy and insecure. Open / Comment

2022-08-24 21:00:11 ​A Recent History of U.S. Sanctions on Russia

When a direct military confrontation is off the table, how should countries respond to acts of foreign aggression?

One tactic is sanctioning, which applies economic restrictions on a country’s government, businesses, and even individual citizens. In theory, these penalties create enough impact to dissuade further hostility.

Today, the U.S. maintains more sanctions than any other country, and one of its most comprehensive programs is aimed at Russia. To learn more, we’ve compiled an overview of these sanctions using data from the Congressional Research Service and U.S. Treasury. Open / Comment

2022-08-24 14:00:11 Mortgage Rates Spiked 0.55% Last Week, The Fastest Rise For 35 Years

The average interest rate on a fixed 30-year mortgage has hit 5.78% in the US, jumping 0.55% on the week before — which is the sharpest one-week rise since 1987.

Cooling off

The sharp upward movement, which has seen rates almost double in just 6-7 months, is a big deal when you account for the fact that house prices themselves are still near record highs. High prices, and now high(er) rates = a record drop in housing affordability.

More expensive mortgages are likely to curb demand for houses, which in theory should take some of the heat out of the red-hot housing market. That said, rates in the US are still not particularly high relative to much of recent history. In 2000 they were up over 8%. In the late 80s they were 10-12%. Open / Comment

2022-08-23 21:00:10 ​Which Ports are Receiving the Most Russian Fossil Fuel Shipments?

As the invasion of Ukraine wears on, European countries are scrambling to find alternatives to Russian fossil fuels.

In fact, an estimated 93% of Russian oil sales to the EU are due to be eliminated by the end of the year, and many countries have seen their imports of Russian gas plummet. Despite this, Russia earned €93 billion in revenue from fossil fuel exports in the first 100 days of the invasion.

While the bulk of fossil fuels travel through Europe via pipelines, there are still a number marine shipments moving between ports. The maps below, using data from MarineTraffic.com and Datalastic, compiled by the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA), are a look at Russia’s fossil fuel shipments during the first 100 days of the invasion. Open / Comment