Tom White
Sep 08, 2022·Newsletter
Euro Gas Crisis
No Gas For You
There’s no way you haven’t heard about this already, but we’re going to point it out anyways. Western Europe has been sanctioning Russia ever since they invaded Ukraine and now Russia is cutting off the gas supply. They’re saying it shut down due to a “leak” (lol) and that it will be shut down “indefinitely” (convenient). The decision is a severe blow to Europe as the countries scramble to store enough energy to last through a winter energy shortage. Without the Nord Stream 1 (the Russian gas pipeline) operating at full capacity, Germany and most of Europe, for that matter, enter a dramatic new phase of the energy crisis.
The implications of this are terrifying.
ETH Merge Actually Happening
You may have heard the word “merge” get thrown around crypto circles over the course of the last year and it is indeed (knock on wood) finally happening. Do you have no idea what that means? Don’t fret. We’re on it. Super basically: ETH is moving to “proof-of-stake” from “proof-of-work” - which means that they’re using a new more energy efficient way to verify transactions. Supposedly gas will be cheaper.
Bessemer’s Big New Fund
Bessemer, one of the oldest and fanciest VC funds around, recently finished raising an awe-inspiring $4.6B in two new funds with $3.85B earmarked for early-stage startups. It’s their biggest fund to date and it’s one of the top 10 biggest of all time. Bessemer Partner Jeremy Levine recently gave an interview with The Information about it and they pulled some incredible quotes:
“If you were a monkey investing in the tech market over the last 10 years and you didn’t have good returns, then shame on you.”
“Now the game has gotten a lot more interesting; now we are going to start to see who’s actually really good at this.”
“I can’t pay a stupid price anymore.”
“There were plenty of people who dove head first into [crypto] and made a killing.…I envy them. We didn’t do that because we were too petrified about timing.”
