Good Morning! The average Wall Street bonus dipped 2% last year to an average of $176.5k. Microsoft hired DeepMind co-founder to head its consumer AI division. Selena Gomez may be joining the billionaire club as she weighs offers for her cosmetics brand valued at $2 billion. Deloitte is planning its biggest shakeup in decades, and Unilever is spinning off Ben & Jerry’s.

Looking for exposure to the fast moving world of AI? Invest in the supercomputers powering AI with NVIDIA elite partner, NexGen Cloud. Download the strategy brief to learn more.

_{SQUEEZ OF THE DAY}

Asset-Backed Bops

Wall Street is bracing for a boom in music licensing deals because, in 2024, your favorite songs are being morphed into bonds.

Asset-backed securities have become all the rage over the past decade, especially as private equity firms look for alternative investment opportunities. And music royalty securitizations are turning your favorite songs into investment opportunities. 

Some investors are willing to pay 30 times the annual royalties of these tracks, betting big on the never-ending stream of streaming revenue.

The music securitizations industry has grown from $55 million in 1997 to an estimated $5 billion in 2024. 

And some of Wall Street’s largest investors are getting in on the hype. A little over a year ago, Apollo bought the music royalties of Daft Punk, Pink Floyd, and Imagine Dragons for $1.8 billion.

Takeaway: We’re seeing private equity firms invest billions of dollars in the music industry. And it makes sense - in the era of streaming - every play equates to a steady stream of dollars. So the next time you’re listening to Pink Floyd’s Comfortably Numb, remember you are sending cold hard cash to Apollo.

_{PRESENTED BY NEXGEN CLOUD}

NVIDIA Elite Partner Introduces — Supercomputers as an Asset Class

A new bull market is here, and here’s one AI asset class to buy and hold forever. Last year, NVIDIA swam in profits thanks to their GPUs serving as the backbone for AI.

This year, it’s time for you to share those profits. NexGen Cloud, an Elite NVIDIA partner, is giving investors the opportunity to directly invest in the heart of AI. 

You can now own and profit from the supercomputers driving AI and large language models.

The company is projecting 30-50% annualized returns and other impressive fundamentals:

• Targeting 150% profit over 5 years 

• Uncapped ROI 

• Income-producing hands-off asset 

• Early mover advantage with a deep NVIDIA partnership .

Don’t miss out: Download the strategy brief from NexGen Cloud to learn more.

_HEADLINES

Top Reads

• The average Wall Street bonus dipped 2% last year, to $176,500 (CNN)

• Microsoft hires DeepMind co-founder (CNBC)

• Nvidia stock dips after company unveils latest AI chips (CNBC)

• The 16 worst-paying college majors, five years after graduation (CNBC)

• Deloitte plans biggest shake-up in decades as dealmaking dries up (YF)

• Ben & Jerry's splits in restructuring (CNBC)

• Selena Gomez weighs sale of cosmetics brand valued at $2 Billion (BB)

• 2024 is the year of zirpless memes (Axios)

• JPMorgan appoints heads of new sports investment banking group (BB)

• Cisco stock still isn't back to its 2000 high (YF)

• The TikTok sales pitch (Axios)

• It's time to stop waiting for the Fed (YF)

_{CAPITAL PULSE}

Markets Rundown

Stocks closed higher ahead of the Fed rate decision.

Movers & Shakers

• (+) Nordstrom ($JWN) +9% after the retailer is reportedly trying to go private.

• (+) Endava ($DAVA) +5% after JPMorgan upgraded the British software company.

• (–) Super Micro Computer ($SMCI) -9% because the AI server maker is looking to sell shares.

Private Dealmaking

• Francisco Partners bought Jama Software, a product development platform, for $1.2 billion

• Carlisle bought MTL Holdings, a metal provider, for $410 million

• Engrail Therapeutics, a precision neuroscience startup, raised $157 million

• Moove, a fintech for entrepreneurs, raised $100 million

• BigID, a data security company, raised $60 million 

• HiLabs, a healthcare data mining startup, raised $39 million

For more PE, VC & M&A deals, subscribe to our Buysiders newsletter.

_{BOOK OF THE DAY}

Extremely Hardcore

When Elon Musk took over Twitter, commentators were rooting for the visionary behind Tesla and SpaceX to succeed. Here was a tough leader who could grab back power from Twitter’s entitled workforce, motivate them to get “extremely hardcore,” and supercharge Twitter’s profit and potential. And it was all out of the goodness of his own heart, rooted in his fervent belief in the necessity of making Twitter friendlier to free speech. "I didn’t do it to make more money,” Musk said. “I did it to try and help humanity, whom I love.” 

Once Musk charged into the Twitter headquarters, the command-and-control playbook Musk honed at Tesla and SpaceX went off the rails immediately. Distilling hundreds of hours of interviews with more than sixty employees, thousands of pages of internal documents, Slack messages, presentations, as well as court filings and congressional testimony, Extremely Hardcore is the true story of how Musk reshaped the world’s online public square into his own personal megaphone. 

“You simply won’t be able to put this book down.”

_{DAILY VISUAL}

Inflation Is Sticky at 3%

The Fed’s inflation target is 2%

_{PRESENTED BY JURNY}

Beyond Nvidia: Explore AI’s Hidden Jewels

With Google Bard, ChatGPT and the like sculpting the future of nearly every industry, VCs are betting big, pumping billions into AI startups with huge potential growth. 

But profiting from the AI wave isn’t just for major players–savvy investors can take advantage, too. 

Jurny and its AI-powered platform is streamlining hotel and short-term rental operations, targeting over $1 trillion in inefficiencies.

With customers already reporting improvements upwards of 80%, are we surprised Jurny has the backing of leading investors Mucker Capital, Okapi Venture, and others?

Over $12 million in capital has already poured in, but there’s still time to jump aboard. 

_{DAILY ACUMEN}

Poor Thinking

One way to spot a poor thinker is to see how many of their decisions boomerang back to them.

If poor thinkers make poor decisions it stands to reason those decisions will eventually create more problems.

More problems consume more time, leaving them even less time to think about new problems.

The time used to correct poor thinking comes from the time that could be used for good thinking.

Good thinkers understand a simple truth: you can’t make good decisions without good thinking and good thinking requires time.

Good thinking is expensive but poor thinking costs a fortune.

_{ENLIGHTENMENT}

Short Squeez Picks

• 4 reasons to reject a promotion at work

• An introverts’ guide to visibility in the workplace 

• 2 phrases to use to be a more successful employee or manager

• The best yoga poses for better sleep

• Why you should measure success by time, not output

_{MEME-A-PALOOZA}

Memes of the Day