🍋 When Wall Street meets the Dance Floor

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Good Morning! Looks like return-to-office season is upon us, with office capacity reaching a post-pandemic peak of 50% last week. Elon Musk emerged victorious from his securities fraud case - turns out he is not liable for his infamous 2018 tweet where he sought to take Tesla private for $420 a share.

Investors are starting to price a soft landing into the market. But economists are grappling with a hotter-than-expected job market and what it means as the Fed tries fighting inflation. Last month, the US added 500k jobs, shattering economists’ expectations of around 180k. And New York City finally snapped its over 300-day streak without snow last week.

In 2022, investors lost a whopping $350 billion, while fintech unicorn Masterworks had its best year ever (returning investors $25.8 million). Masterworks is unlocking an asset class that was once only available to billionaires. Start investing in art today.

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1. Story of the Day: DJ-D-Sol: Spinning Tunes and Raising Eyebrows

When the man at the top of Goldman Sachs takes on a side hustle, you know inflation and the cost of living in New York has gotten bad. Goldman Sachs CEO, David Solomon, is trying to have it both ways - running a financial powerhouse by day and spinning sick beats by night as his alter ego, DJ D-Sol. His music career took off during Covid and since then, he’s performed at Lollapalooza, New York, and the Bahamas.

But while Solomon might be killing it DJing, Goldman has struggled to keep up with the beat. Goldman had a rough 2022 and lost billions of dollars on its consumer finance unit. Some investors are starting to think his DJ gigs are bringing unwanted attention to the bank.

Goldman insists that Solomon’s roles as CEO and DJ are entirely separate. However, some in the music industry are raising their eyebrows and wondering how exactly this CEO moonlighting as a DJ snagged a deal to remix Whitney Houston’s classic hit, “I Wanna Dance With Somebody.” Some starving artists feel that this is rubbing salt in the wound, as Solomon’s musical prowess is questionable compared to his financial prowess.

Is Solomon's DJ prowess merely a side-effect of his day job as CEO of a worldwide financial behemoth? The music and finance industries seem to be tangoing, with big players like Sony snapping up Bob Dylan's tunes last year and Blackstone shelling out a whopping $200 million for Justin Bieber's music. But with investment banks like Goldman Sachs playing matchmaker, one has to wonder if there's more to this union than meets the ear. Some experts think it’s a distraction at best and a conflict of interest at worse.

Takeaway: DJ-D-Sol's music might be music to some ears, but for others, it's a tune they'd rather skip. While Goldman Sachs tries to appeal to the everyday Joe with their consumer banking unit, their CEO moonlighting as a DJ in the world's hottest nightclubs seems to be a misstep.

2. Markets Rundown

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Stocks closed lower because the new employment data shocked investors.

Movers & Shakers

• (+) Nordstrom ($JWN) +25% after activist investor Ryan Cohen took stake and eyes board changes.

• (+) Clorox ($CLX) +10% after a revenue beat and updated 2023 outlook.

• (–) Amazon ($AMZN) -8% after issuing weaker-than-expected guidance despite a revenue beat.

Private Dealmaking

• Google invested $300 million in Anthropic, a rival of ChatGPT

• Colossal Biosciences, a startup that addresses de-extincton, raised $150 million

• Zopa, a British digital bank and consumer lending platform, raised $93 million

• Fairphone, a Dutch startup focused on producing sustainable electronics, raised $53 million

• JOKR, a European instant grocery delivery startup, raised $50 million

• Lulalend, a South African digital lender, raised $35 million

A Message from Masterworks: Could This Be the #1 Investment for $101K+ High Earning "Financial Kings"?

“Financial Kings,” or investment bankers, make an average salary of $101,049 per year.

Not half bad if you ask us.

The only problem? As a Financial King, making your money work for you is hard. 

After all, it's hard getting market-thumping returns when you’re just investing in the S&P 500. Plus you’ve gotta crush spreadsheets, juggle clients, and deal with your MD, so you can’t time the market.

A finer alternative?

Investing in multimillion-dollar paintings by artists like Basquiat, Banksy, and Warhol. After all, over two-thirds of billionaire collectors like Steve Cohen allocate more than 20% of their overall portfolios to art.

Sounds crazy? Take a look at this:

• Contemporary art prices outpaced the S&P 500 by 131% from 1995 to 2021.

• Has a near 0 correlation to stocks on average according to Citi

• Alternative investments like art can hedge against inflation.

That’s amazing if you have $5,000,000 on hand to buy Picassos and Warhols. For the rest of us, there’s Masterworks— the investing platform securitizing multimillion-dollar paintings. And with over 630,000 registered members, demand is clearly high.

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3. Top Reads

• It’s not the Covid economy - it’s just the economy now (Axios)

• Elon Musk says Twitter trending towards breakeven after near bankruptcy (CNBC)

• Is the economy kind of good now? (Vox)

• Stock funds rose almost 8% in January (WSJ)

• The 7 most in-demand tech skills for freelancers (CNBC)

• Here’s what’s driving the 2023 stock market (Axios)

• How Zelle is different from PayPal, Venmo, and Cash App (CNBC)

• US soft landing more possible than even a few months ago (BB)

• Why do Teslas keep catching on fire? (Vox)

• Big Tech layoffs could have a serious impact on culture (YF)

4. Book of the Day: Think Like A Monk

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Shetty grew up in a family where you could become one of three things—a doctor, a lawyer, or a failure. His family was convinced he had chosen option three: instead of attending his college graduation ceremony, he headed to India to become a monk, to meditate every day for four to eight hours, and devote his life to helping others.

After three years, one of his teachers told him that he would have more impact on the world if he left the monk’s path to share his experience and wisdom with others. Heavily in debt, and with no recognizable skills on his résumé, he moved back home in north London with his parents.

Shetty reconnected with old school friends—many working for some of the world’s largest corporations—who were experiencing tremendous stress, pressure, and unhappiness, and they invited Shetty to coach them on well-being, purpose, and mindfulness. Since then, Shetty has become one of the world’s most popular influencers.

In this inspiring, empowering book, Shetty draws on his time as a monk to show us how we can clear the roadblocks to our potential and power. Combining ancient wisdom and his own rich experiences in the ashram, Think Like a Monk reveals how to overcome negative thoughts and habits, and access the calm and purpose that lie within all of us.

“The more we define ourselves in relation to the people around us, the more lost we are.”

5. Short Squeez Picks

• 8 misconceptions of time that make you less productive

• The secret to better habits in 2023

• 40 useful concepts you should know

• How to let go of your need to be informed at all times

• Why OnlyFans is about to get screwed by Elon Musk

• 28 short pieces of life advice

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6. Daily Visual: Who Gets Audited?

Audit rates by reported annual income

_{Source: Axios}

7. Daily Acumen

“Nothing is as desired as much as the thing you want but can’t have.

In fact, for most people there’s a hierarchy of wants that goes something like this:

If you don’t want something and don’t have it, you don’t think about it.

If you want something and have it, you might feel OK.

If you want something and don’t have it, you might feel motivated

If you want something and can’t have it, you drive yourself mad.

A few years after leaving office, Richard Nixon mentioned that the richest people in the world are some of the unhappiest, because they can afford to never struggle.

“Drinking too much. Talking too much. Thinking too little. Retired. No purpose,” he said.

To ordinary people, it sounds amazing. To those who can afford to do anything, it often falls flat.”

Source: Collab Fund

8. Memes of the Day

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