Oh, to be a feral 25 year old.
Happy Friday. Welcome to The Chaos Coordinator! We are Brain Candy's snarky little sister, delivering carefully curated news happening across the industry (that you should probably care about) right to your inbox, with a hefty dose of irreverence.
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In this issue, we dive into:?
What's happening in.....
PE/VC?
Keeping the 'Private' in 'Private Equity'
Individual investors, don't say we didn't warn you.
So, you’re thinking of jumping into the private equity game? Well, maybe give it a second - potentially even a third - thought. According to new research from Dimensional Fund Advisors, the average PE fund actually underperforms compared to some plain, old index funds. Private equity used to be the exclusive playground of the wealthy, but now individuals are being welcomed in. Vanguard and Schwab are even rolling out the red carpet. Of course, it’s probably not out of pure generosity, especially since institutional investors (the ones who’ve been in this game for a while) are starting to lose their enthusiasm for alternative assets like PE. Richard Ennis even compared them to "kryptonite" for returns. Ultimately, while PE can enhance risk-adjusted returns through diversification, it may not provide the spectacular gains many individuals anticipate. Dimensional’s study shows that while some PE funds manage to beat the S&P 500, they still fall short of small-cap value funds—ironic, considering that’s the kind of companies they typically invest in. Yes, a few PE funds do knock it out of the park, but the tricky part is finding one that keeps doing it consistently.
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Capital Markets
A New Penny Stock Has Entered the Villa?
Welcome to 23andMe.
23andMe, once a Silicon Valley (and middle school project) sensation, is facing a troubled future as seven of eight board members resigned over CEO Anne Wojcicki's take-private offer. The genetic testing company, founded in 2006,? went public in 2021 via a special purpose acquisition company, has never turned a profit. It has seen its stock plummet to 33 cents, with a market value down from $6 billion to $170 million. According to WSJ, the company is now worth less than the cash it has in its reserves. Financial publications have taken to calling 23andMe a penny stock. Despite a buyout offer from Wojcicki, the board criticized the proposal as inadequate, leading to their mass resignation. Wojcicki remains determined to take the company private and pivot towards health care, though 23andMe's cash concerns and struggles in drug development pose significant challenges. In an email to 23andMe staff members, chairwoman Wojcicki - now the board's lone existing member and chair - reacted to the resignations by stating that she was "surprised and disappointed" and that the firm will "immediately" start hiring new board members. Anyone interested??
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领英推荐
Generative AI / Tech?
?? Got New Rules, I Count 'Em ??
In today's regulatory rules...
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) has proposed a new rule requiring banks to keep detailed records for customers using fintech apps, following the collapse of tech firm Synapse, which left thousands of Americans locked out of their accounts. The rule targets accounts opened by fintech companies that partner with banks, where customer funds are pooled into large accounts. Under the proposed regulation, banks would be responsible for maintaining clear records of account ownership and daily balances, improving transparency and ensuring proper allocation of funds. The new rule aims to help the FDIC pay depositors more quickly in case of a bank failure by satisfying conditions for "pass-through insurance." While FDIC insurance doesn’t cover fintech provider failures, enhanced records would still assist courts in determining customer claims during bankruptcies. In addition to this proposal, the FDIC released a statement heightening scrutiny on bank mergers, particularly those creating banks with over $100 billion in assets, to assess the impact of consolidation in the industry.
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Marketing
"Great Ideas Die with Too Long an Approval Process"
The secret behind the ‘feral 25-year-olds’ making Kamala Harris go viral.?
Vice President Kamala Harris’s TikTok team has developed a unique, youthful approach to digital campaigning, creating viral content that mocks Donald Trump and appeals to young voters. Led by a small, under-25 team (some working their first jobs), the campaign blends humor, internet culture, and rapid-fire posts to boost engagement. While Trump's social media content focuses on fear-based messaging, Harris’s approach adopts a more playful, snarky tone. Over the past eight weeks, Harris’s social media team of ‘feral 25-year-olds’ has helped supercharge her campaign, "harnessing the rhythms and absurdities of internet culture to create one of the most inventive and irreverent get-out-the-vote strategies in modern politics." "In 2016, a single Hillary Clinton tweet might have required 12 staffers and 10 drafts; today, many of Harris’s TikTok videos are conceived, created and posted in about half an hour," shares the Washington Post.?The team faces minimal content-approval checks and "barring objection, we’re gonna go. Everything goes on a five-minute warning," said Deputy campaign manager Rob Flaherty. "You just gotta trust your people. Our f---up ratio [is as low] as if there were 19 layers of approval." The team records and edits the videos on their phones before sending them over Slack to Parker Butler, the 24-year-old director of Harris’s digital rapid response content, who typically reviews and signs off in less than 15 minutes. Yes, you read that right: one person, 15 minutes. "Our job is to create the news," said Butler. "This campaign empowers young people to speak to young people."
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Chaos Connections
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