🍋 Investing in People

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Good Morning! Job openings hit their lowest point in two years, and big companies like IBM say they’ll pause hiring for thousands of jobs that could be automated with AI.

Meanwhile, all eyes are on today's Fed meeting, as the central bank gears up to hike rates even further, just two days after the collapse of First Republic Bank. And first, it was Buzzfeed, but now Vice Media looks like the latest casualty in the digital media industry. Vice was once valued at a staggering $5.7 billion but is now preparing to file for bankruptcy.

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1. Story of the Day: Investing in People

Investors are always tweaking the latest priorities they’re pressing companies on. And in 2023 they’re no longer just concerned about the financial bottom line and are also focusing on employees' rights.

This shift is becoming apparent in annual company meetings where shareholders and investors are pushing companies to address pressing employee-related issues such as paid leave, health and safety, benefits, and labor rights. With over 140 shareholder resolutions filed this year alone, it's clear that the pressure is on companies to act.

And it’s not just because investors are social justice warriors - they’re realizing human capital risks can have a significantly negative impact on a company’s bottom line. Take Dollar General, for example. The retail company was accused of neglecting its workforce’s wellbeing, and placed on the Labor Department’s severe violator list. And, as a result, some towns and cities don’t want Dollar General stores in their towns and are denying the company’s requests to open new stores, hindering its growth prospects.

Investors are worried that other major companies like Walmart and Amazon could suffer a similar fate if they fail to prioritize the rights of their employees. Proposals aimed at improving worker health and safety are gaining traction, with a third of the requests already agreed upon by shareholders and companies. However, the response from companies has been mixed. While some companies admit they need to do more to balance shareholder and employee interests, Walmart and Amazon oppose most of their shareholders' resolutions.

Takeaway: Investors have significant power in shaping how companies operate in the 21st century, and they can influence how CEOs make decisions. Human capital risks are real, and shareholders don’t want the headaches that negative headlines entail - and that’s not even considering the ethical implications.

2. Markets Rundown

Stocks closed lower over bank failure contagion.

Movers & Shakers

• (+) Uber ($UBER) +12% after the company beat revenue expectation, defying the tech slump.

• (-) PacWest ($PACW) -28% after regional bank fears shake markets.

• (-) Chegg ($CHGG) -48% after the education company says ChatGPT is killing its business.

Private Dealmaking

• Astellas Pharma bought Iveric Bio, an eye disease treatment developer, for $5.9 billion

• Simpplr, an employee experience platform, raised $70 million

• Berachain, a blockchain startup, raised $42 million

• Whisper, an electric propulsion device manufacturer, raised $32 million

• Veo Robotics, a robotic awareness systems provider, raised $29 million

• Earned, a financial management platform for physicians, raised $12 million

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3. Top Reads

• Yellen breaks the debt ceiling ice (Axios)

• SEC’s Gensler blasts hedge fund fees as agency readies new rules (BB)

• Carl Icahn targeted by short seller Hindenburg (YF)

• Morgan Stanley plans 3,000 more job cuts on dealmaking slump (CNBC)

• What UPS tells us about the economy (Fox)

• How banks can finally get risk management right (HBR)

• The lingering banking problem (Axios)

• In unsteady banking industry, First Republic’s problems stood out (NYT)

• The music industry has an AI problem (BB)

4. Book of the Day: The Myth of Normal

In this revolutionary book, renowned physician Gabor Maté eloquently dissects how in Western countries that pride themselves on their healthcare systems, chronic illness and general ill health are on the rise. Nearly 70 percent of Americans are on at least one prescription drug; more than half take two.

In Canada, every fifth person has high blood pressure. In Europe, hypertension is diagnosed in more than 30 percent of the population. And everywhere, adolescent mental illness is on the rise. So what is really “normal” when it comes to health?

Over four decades of clinical experience, Maté has come to recognize the prevailing understanding of “normal” as false, neglecting the roles that trauma and stress, and the pressures of modern-day living, exert on our bodies and our minds at the expense of good health.

For all our expertise and technological sophistication, Western medicine often fails to treat the whole person, ignoring how today’s culture stresses the body, burdens the immune system, and undermines emotional balance.

Now Maté brings his perspective to the great untangling of common myths about what makes us sick, connects the dots between the maladies of individuals and the declining soundness of society—and offers a compassionate guide for health and healing. Cowritten with his son Daniel, The Myth Of Normal is Maté’s most ambitious and urgent book yet.

“Trauma is not what happens to you but what happens inside you.”

5. Short Squeez Picks

• 3 ways to shift the perfectionist habit

• 3 ways to tell you’re developing as a leader

• 5 principles from Sun Tzu relevant to startups

• Focus on character 

• Zuckerberg ran a surprisingly fast 5k

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6. Daily Visual: Federal Funds Rate Mooning

_{Source: Axios}

7. Daily Acumen

“A huge obstacle to success is a fear of appearing foolish.

When we learn to walk, we fall over and over again until we can do it. We look foolish until the minute we don't. That is how we learn. As adults we often tell ourselves that failing in front of other people is bad, so we don't try things that might make us look foolish.

During boom times, people who aggressively went all in appear to be prospering and make a more financially stable approach seem foolish. Only those who were properly positioned, however, can take advantage when the boom ends.

So much advantage in life comes from being willing to look foolish in the short term.”

Source: Farnam Street

8. Memes of the Day

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