Good Morning and Happy Friday! We’re wrapping up NYC’s busiest networking week of the year - Climate Week, the UN Symposium, and Fashion Week. It’s basically spring break but for managing directors at investment banks. Speaking of washed-up, Rupert Murdoch’s finally retiring from Fox and News Corp at 92 years old.

Wall Street investors are finally accepting that higher interest rates are here to stay following a series of hawkish Fed speeches - and we’re in the thick of a September stock sell-off. And private equity firms are in hot water - the FTC is suing to block their favorite acquisition strategy - roll-ups.

If you are interested in getting in front of a smart, young audience of business leaders, bankers, investment professionals, policy influencers of over 500,000 people, then fill out this form, we’ll be in touch.

_{SQUEEZ OF THE DAY}

4th Time’s The Charm

You gotta give it to Bezos - he’s built a dominant business, and he did it all by really just building three pillars. You have the classic online retail marketplace and the Prime membership program - both of which have become so many Americans’ go-to.

But you also have Amazon Web Services, the cloud computing platform most large companies use. These three pillars account for almost 90% of all of Amazon’s $514 billion in sales.

But Amazon’s been searching for its fourth pillar - it’s taken years, and the company hasn’t found one that pays off yet. They’ve made big bets in healthcare, in-person shopping, entertainment, and hardware - but they’re not paying off. In fact, they’re losing the company billions of dollars.

There’s no doubt - Amazon is a blue-chip, brand-name stock. But some Wall Street analysts and institutional investors are starting to lose patience with Amazon's big swings. They say it’s always the same story - Amazon says they’re entering a new arena with plans to dominate. And whenever the company moves into a new industry, the "Amazon effect" hits Wall Street, and the company creates a massive buzz that causes big market reactions.

But they still haven’t found that fourth winner yet. Despite the company’s dominance in online shopping and cloud computing - the assumption they’ll dominate other industries just isn’t proving true.

Takeaway: We’re keeping our eye on Amazon and thinking they’ll bet on the satellite industry and autonomous vehicles next. But Amazon might be trying to do too much. They’re pursuing so many ideas, and the bad ideas might be taking energy away from good ones.

_{CAPITAL PULSE}

Markets Rundown

Stocks closed lower because the Fed plans on keeping rates high long-term.

Movers & Shakers

• (+) Splunk ($SPLK) +21% after Cisco announced it’s acquiring the company.

• (+) Fedex ($FDX) +5% after earnings rose despite weaker demand.

• (–) Eli Lilly ($LLY) -3% because the company is suing clinics for selling knockoff diabetes drugs.

Private Dealmaking

• Cisco bought cybersecurity startup Splunk for $28 billion 

• CMR Surgical, a developer of surgical robotics, raised $165 million

• Openly, a homeowners insurance startup, raised $100 million

• Curve, a personal finance startup, raised $62 million

• DuckDB, a data analytics platform, raised $52.5 million

• Magnet Biomedicine, a biotech based in Massachusetts, raised $50 million

Get access to private deal flow here.

_{SPONSORED BY ACRETRADER}

The Asset Class Right Under Your Feet

Any savvy investor is typically looking for under-explored asset classes, and AcreTrader can give you access to one that helps put dinner on your plate. You probably zipped by miles of it on your last road trip.

OK, enough hints, we’re talking about farmland.

US farmland is worth $2.7 trillion, and it’s generated positive returns every year for the past 30 years, while assets like gold and stocks dipped and bobbed all over the place.

And the laws of supply and demand favor farmland: US acreage is shrinking while the global population grows.

AcreTrader allows you to get in on this real, tangible asset, which is a great way to round out your portfolio, and incorporate what has historically been an effective inflation hedge.

Explore farmland investing with AcreTrader today.

_HEADLINES

Top Reads

• The billionaire keeping TikTok on phones in the U.S. (WSJ)

• Ares CEO says private credit to double in five years (YF)

• MBAs are spurning McKinsey and Google to buy small companies (BB)

• FTC sues private equity firm for price fixing (Axios)

• Klaviyo IPO mints $3.2 billion fortune for Harvard physicist (YF)

• Goldman Sachs raised $15 billion for secondary deals (WSJ)

• Tech giants see chatbots everywhere (NYT)

• BlackRock, State Street among money managers closing ESG funds (BB)

• Why NYC’s subway is struggling (CNBC)

• Rates staying higher for longer means at least through 2026 (YF)

_{BOOK OF THE DAY}

Fast Forward

Backed by psychological research and brain science, Fast Forward’s 5 Power Principles have helped more than 100,000 professionals achieve extraordinary success and happiness. As they have excelled, so have their businesses and teams.

For the first time, authors Wendy Leshgold and Lisa McCarthy share their proven system along with compelling stories from the people who have made their boldest ambitions a reality.

Through powerful exercises that generate insights and action, they’ll help you:

Declare a bold vision for your whole life that creates focus and inspires you to play big and move beyond limiting beliefs.

Reframe negative stories that hold you back into empowering narratives that propel you forward.

Gain control of your time and energy and make steady progress on important goals.

Use language of action to produce meaningful results and improve relationships.

Become a conscious, curious listener who is free from solving other people’s problems.

Fast Forward will help you and your teams create the life you want this year and every year.

“Discover how leaders from the world’s most successful companies are dealing with stress, pressure, and constant change—and still thriving.”

_{ENLIGHTENMENT}

Short Squeez Picks

• How he turned $25k into a $65 billion empire (23 min documentary)

• 10 things emotionally intelligent people do in conversations

• The problem with Fridays at the office

• 3 habits of people who get promoted quickly

• 13 powerful Slack features for team productivity

• Is the new iPhone 15 worth it?

_{DAILY VISUAL}

10-Year Treasury Hits 16-Year High

_{SPONSORED BY ARRIVED}

Invest In Real Estate With Just $100

We all know real estate can be a stellar investment (after all, it has outperformed the S&P 500 for the past 20 years).

But the everyday investor probably doesn’t have the up-front capital, time, or experience to invest in lucrative real estate projects.

Introducing Arrived. Backed by Bezos himself, Arrived lets you invest in real estate properties (like vacation rentals) with just $100 and share in the profits.

Simply browse from properties curated by Arrived’s experts, invest $100 up to $50k, and relax as Arrived handles all the end-to-end management.

Over $2.6 million in dividends has already been paid–invest in real estate today!

_{DAILY ACUMEN}

Relationships

"Your relationships will rarely be healthier than your self-esteem.

If the time you spend alone is already enjoyable to some degree—that is, if you have a healthy internal monologue and generally feel good about yourself—then you will have a fairly high bar for the type of relationships you'll enter.

But if you're unhappy with yourself, then you are more likely to put up with bad relationships because they may occasionally make you feel better than you do alone. If you want a great relationship, the first thing you want is to be comfortable with yourself."

Source: James Clear

_{MEME-A-PALOOZA}

Memes of the Day