Female-founded and led IPOs, self-driving cars, and ITM’s summer reading list
Welcome to Nº 29 of In The Money, your weekly newsletter on keeping up with all things finance, tech, and startups. As always, this week’s newsletter is filled with all the financy things. This week we learned that women at major US banks are close to reaching another milestone on the way to gender parity. In Sweden, we celebrated the first female founder and CEO to take her company public. Anne Wojcicki took her company 23andMe public through a merger with Richard Branson’s SPAC. We are looking into a self-driving future as Waymo raised new investment of $2.5 billion and GM ups spending. You can now purchase the original source code for the world wide web as an NFT. Microstrategy offered corporate bonds so it can buy more Bitcoin. The UK is getting its first tech direct listing. Also, in this edition ITM’s summer reading list. This and much more. I hope you enjoy this edition.
Women now control almost a third of S&P 500 bank boards 🏦
Women are close to reaching another milestone on the way to eventual gender parity. Of major US banks, women now control almost a third of director seats on the boards. In May, the percentage of female directors on US banks in the S&P 500 Banks index rose to 32.9% from 32.8%, thanks to two males retiring as well as one female director. That percentage compares with 29.7% for the broader S&P 500 Index. “It’s notable, but it’s not the end game,” said Malli Gero, co-founder and vice-chair of the 50/50 Women on Boards group in an interview with Bloomberg. “How can you say that it’s okay to have 30% women, and it’s okay to have 70% men? In 2021, that’s not something we should be saying.” As part of a broader drive for improvements in equality, banks are under pressure to show more rapid gains for women in the C-suite and boardroom. Bank CEOs were grilled by Congress last month, in part for their lack of progress on diversity. Still, there have been notable moves at the top, most prominently Citigroup promoting Jane Fraser to chief executive officer this year, the first woman to lead a Wall Street bank. Notable regarding bank boards: Citigroup has the most women on its board; KeyCorp is the only company to reduce the number of women directors; Comerica, People’s United Financial, Regions Financial, Wells Fargo, and Citizens Financial Group have the fewest women on their boards; US Bancorp and JPMorgan Chase have the youngest average board age, at 58 and 61 years, respectively; there are 12 S&P 500 Banks Index companies at or above the key threshold of 30% female board membership; The Bloomberg Gender-Equality Index returned 3.6% in May, outperforming the MSCI World Index, which returned 1.5%. The Bloomberg Gender-Equality Index is a modified capitalization-weighted index that tracks the financial performance of those companies committed to supporting gender equality.
The first female-founded and led company went public in Sweden 🔔
On Wednesday the Swedish activewear company, Revolutionrace went public on Nasdaq Stockholm’s main market. Simultaneously co-founder and CEO, Pernilla Nyrensten became the first female founder and CEO to take her company public on the main stock market in Sweden. When the shares in Revolutionrace began trading, it was the first time a company went public with a female founding CEO in the Stockholm Stock Exchange's over 160-year-old history. “It's time to smash the glass ceiling so more people can follow. That's what I really hope for now," said Pernilla Nyrensten in an interview with the Swedish tech news site Breakit. She and her husband Niclas Nyrensten founded the company about eight years ago. The duo has grown the company completely organically and the clothing company now has sales (which are made entirely without retailers or physical stores) well over SEK 700 million. Prior to the listing, Revolutionrace’s valuation was SEK 8.5 billion. The company did not raise any new capital in connection with the listing. Instead, it was existing owners who sold shares: Altor (a Swedish private equity firm) for approximately SEK 1.9 billion and the founding couple Nyrensten for just over SEK 600 million. During the initial trading, shares changed owners around SEK 88, 16% higher than the listing price. Pernilla Nyrensten, and her husband, still have 26.5% of the company after listing. At the current exchange rate, that holding is worth SEK 2.6 billion. Today Revolutionrace sells its products to approximately 35 countries. The company’s net sales grew from SEK 284.5 million in 2020 to SEK 731.9 million in the period that ended March 31, 2021, corresponding to an average annual growth rate (CAGR) of about 71.6%. During the twelve-month period ended March 31, 2021, RevolutionRace adjusted EBIT amounted to SEK 196.2 million, which corresponds to an adjusted EBIT margin of 26.5%.
23andSPAC 🧬
The newest ticker you can find in the stock market is “ME.” A ticker is an abbreviation used to uniquely identify publicly traded shares of a particular stock on a particular stock market. On Thursday, the personalized medicine and at-home genetic testing kit company 23andMe went public through a merger with a Richard Branson SPAC, VG Acquisition Corp., in a deal that raised close to $600 million and valued the company at $3.5 billion. You can read more about SPACs and how they work in a previous edition of ITM. 23andMe shares rose by 21% on the Nasdaq in its first day of trading as a public company. 23andMe was founded by Anne Wojcicki (and CEO) 15 years ago. The company has helped pioneer the idea that genetic testing is not just a medical field, but a big consumer business. Its at-home testing kits, allow people to learn about their genetic profiles and ancestry by sending a bit of saliva through the mail. Wojcicki says the company sees big things ahead for both its consumer and drug research & development platforms. Roughly 80% of 23andMe’s current 11 million members opt into sharing their genetic information (de-identified) for research in drug development. “Our genetics represent all of life on this planet, and we have the opportunity to understand what it means and with that, it will improve your own life but also contribute to all kinds of research discoveries,” Wojcicki said in an interview with CNBC. Currently, the company has 40 programs underway on its drug discovery platform. It also recently launched a subscription product to introduce more content and services for consumers who want to take additional steps after their genetic reports.
Tech for the climate 🌎
A group of seven tech companies has urged the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to require businesses to regularly disclose climate-related matters to their shareholders. Last Friday, in a letter to SEC Chairman Gary Gensler, Alphabet, Amazon, Autodesk, eBay, Facebook, Intel, and Salesforce shared their view in response to a request for public input on such disclosures. The tech industry has been vocal on climate issues in the past, even as employees have pressed the companies themselves to do better. “We believe that climate disclosures are critical to ensure that companies follow through on stated climate commitments and to track collective progress towards addressing global warming and building a prosperous, resilient zero-carbon economy,” the companies wrote. The group outlined several principles they believe the SEC should incorporate into rules around climate disclosures. They said businesses should report on their relevant greenhouse gas emissions measured by relevant global standards and the SEC should lean on existing frameworks to ensure disclosures are consistent and comparable to one another. The group said that collectively, it has purchased 21 gigawatts of clean energy and each company aims to procure 100% renewable energy.
Women in finance are held back by mediocre male middle managers 🤦♀️
New research by Women In Banking and Finance and the London School of Economics, which has been supported by groups such as Goldman Sachs, Barclays, and Citi, as well as the Financial Conduct Authority, shows that careers for some women in finance are being held back by “mediocre” male middle managers adept at playing internal politics. Furthermore, the research found a tendency among such managers to fake empathy when managing women, recognizing that the trait was seen as valuable. The report stated this tendency was a particular worry during the pandemic given the need for greater management skills. Women in finance perceived they had to show sustained excellence to progress, with more room for men to make mistakes or be average performers. Various reasons were given for this, from male-dominated social scenes, disrupted careers owing to maternity leave, and a bigger reluctance to manage out men regardless of ability as they were still viewed as breadwinners. The research highlighted the problems many women still face in their careers in finance, even as boardroom data suggest improvements among the numbers of female non-executives (see above). The numbers of female chairs, chief executives, or finance chiefs are much lower, and campaigners have warned there are problems bringing women to top managerial positions to feed this talent pool. In front office roles specifically, women viewed themselves as more visible given they were a clear minority, and as such scrutinized more. Of the interviewees, 11 were black women, several of whom said their performance level had to exceed both men and white women to receive the same recognition. Grace Lordan, an associate professor at the LSE and founding director of The Inclusion Initiative, said that often women were not specifically being held back, but that men were more likely to go out of their way to enhance the career of somebody who was more like them. The report also identified ten areas where companies could take action, aiming to help improve the culture around advancement prospects. These included audits of the allocation of “stretch” assignments, pay increases and promotions, encouraging flexible work styles, and redesigning bonuses to reflect the performance of team members and working collaboratively. The study used qualitative research based on interviews with 79 women working in the City of London within areas of banking, asset management, professional services, fintech, and insurance. Women in Banking and Finance is a non-profit organization founded in 1980 and staffed mainly by volunteers. You can read the full report here.
Self-driving future 🚘
Google sibling company and self-driving car project, Waymo announced on Wednesday a $2.5 billion investment round. The fresh investment will go toward advancing its autonomous driving technology and growing its team. The funding round follows the departure of Waymo CEO John Krafcik in April and criticism that the company is moving slower than expected toward commercialization of its technology. Waymo and other self-driving companies have found adoption to be more difficult than expected. For example, still last summer, Waymo largely relied on human safety drivers. Waymo is one of Alphabet’s (Google parent company) “Other Bets” unit that continues to lose money. This funding round shows the company is increasingly relying on other investors to help support the unit. Waymo has already deployed its autonomous vehicles in Phoenix as a ride-hailing service. The company’s delivery unit, Waymo Via, is also working with freight partners and delivery clients such as UPS to transport goods. The company previously raised $2.25 billion in its first external funding round last year. Prior to that, Alphabet supported the business itself, as it does the rest of its “Other Bets.” Waymo says it eventually wants individuals to own and operate vehicles using its autonomous driving technology. The company said that so far it has driven tens of millions of miles on public roads across 25 cities in the US. The latest round includes funding from Waymo-parent company Alphabet, Andreessen Horowitz, AutoNation, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Magna International, Mubadala Investment Company, Perry Creek Capital, Silver Lake, funds and accounts advised by T. Rowe Price Associates, Temasek, and Tiger Global.
This week it was also reported that a Waymo vehicle struck a person riding a motorized scooter on Wednesday evening in San Francisco, but the Alphabet-owned autonomous vehicle developer says that a person was driving the car manually at the time of the collision. Fortunately, no serious injuries were reported.
GM also ups spending on autonomous vehicles 🚗
On Wednesday General Motors said it will increase spending on electric and autonomous vehicles to $35 billion through 2025, a 30% increase from plans announced late last year. The additional money will be used to expand its rollout of EVs and accelerate production of its battery and fuel cell technologies, including two new US battery plants in addition to two under construction, by 2025. The US’s largest automaker is racing to catch up to the electric vehicle market leader Tesla and compete for a leadership position against other well-established automakers such as Volkswagen. GM plans to sell more than 1 million EVs annually by 2025. GM has previously said it would roll out 30 new EVs by 2025. On Wednesday the company said it will add to those plans, but it declined to provide more details. The plans to expand GM’s electric and autonomous vehicle lineup and technology have been praised by Wall Street. Its stock has almost tripled since reaching a 12-month low of $23.33 last July. Early Wednesday, shares were up by as much as 4% to about $63 a share.
Microstrategy offers bonds to buy more Bitcoin 🤑
Less than a week after announcing the offering of its secured notes, business analytics firm MicroStrategy, which owns more bitcoin than any other corporation in the world, raised $500 million in bonds (see definition of corporate bonds below) to acquire more of the world's largest cryptocurrency. On Monday, MicroStrategy said it completed the $500 million offering in secured notes due 2028 ($100 million more than its $400 million target announced last week). MicroStrategy says net proceeds from the sale (after deducting commissions and other expenses) will be approximately $488 million, all of which the company will use to acquire additional Bitcoin. In a sign of massive interest from institutional investors, the firm reportedly received more than $1.5 billion in orders for the offering, at the same time as Bitcoin prices were at a one-month low of about $33,400. Bitcoin prices spiked more than 13% Monday morning after Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who's fueled volatility in the token before, said Sunday the company would resume Bitcoin transactions once roughly half of all mining is done using clean energy. Tesla is Bitcoin's second-biggest corporate investor but stopped investing in the token last month due to Musk’s concerns over its carbon footprint. Given its outsized crypto investment, MicroStrategy's stock tends to ride Bitcoin's incredibly volatile price wave. In a filing last Monday, the firm said it expects to incur an impairment loss of at least $284.5 million in the second quarter “based on the fluctuations in the market price of Bitcoin.” Since February, the company’s shares have plunged more than 50%. This was at the time when Bitcoin sank after Tesla CEO Elon Musk said prices seemed “a little high.” The cryptocurrency is down about 40% over the same period, but like MicroStrategy, its prices are up more than 300% over the past year.
Definition
Corporate bonds are debt issued by a company in order for it to raise capital. An investor who buys a corporate bond is essentially lending money to the company in return for a series of interest payments. Typically, corporate bonds are seen as somewhat riskier than US government bonds, as such, they usually have higher interest rates to compensate for this additional risk. The highest quality (and safest, lower yielding) bonds are commonly referred to as "Triple-A" bonds, while the least creditworthy are termed "junk". Corporations Sell Bonds because they are a major source of capital for many businesses (along with equity, bank loans, and lines of credit). Often, they are issued to provide the ready cash for a particular project the company wants to undertake. Debt financing is sometimes preferable to issuing stock (equity financing) because it is typically cheaper for the borrowing firm and does not entail giving up any ownership stake or control in the company. Generally speaking, a company needs to have consistent earnings potential to be able to offer debt securities to the public at a favorable coupon rate. And if a company's perceived credit quality is higher (think Triple-A), it can issue more debt at lower rates.
WWW as an NFT 🖼
The creator of the original source code for the world wide web, Sir Tim Berners-Lee is auctioning his original source code for the web in the form of an NFT or a non-fungible token. The auction at Sotheby’s will be the first time that Berners-Lee has been able to raise money directly from one of the greatest inventions of the modern era. The proceeds will be benefiting initiatives that he and his wife Rosemary support. Auctioneers hope that the one-of-a-kind digital artefact will ignite interest in NFTs beyond their mainstay of artworks, games, and sports memorabilia. Investment in NFTs has waned since March’s record-breaking $69.3 million sale of Beeple’s artwork “Everydays: The First 5000 Days”. Unlike the founders of Google, Facebook, and Amazon, who gained enormous riches through the web, Berners-Lee is no billionaire. The source code behind the world wide web and its first browser, which were conceived and coded by Berners-Lee between 1989 and 1991, was never patented. Instead, it was released for free into the public domain by Cern, the particle physics laboratory in Switzerland where the British scientist worked at the time. The move enabled widespread uptake of a technology now used by more than 4 billion people every day.
TikTok owner doubles its revenue 💸
The owner of TikTok, ByteDance saw its revenue for 2020 more than double. Revenue for last year totaled $34.3 billion, up 111% year-on-year, and gross profit rose 93% to $19 billion. At the end of 2020 ByteDance had 1.9 billion monthly active users across all of its platforms which include its TikTok, the Chinese version Douyin, and news aggregation app Toutiao, among others. The rapid growth underscores the excitement around ByteDance, a private company, and why its valuation has reportedly been pegged north of $100 billion. ByteDance’s 2020 operating loss was $2.1 billion versus a $684 million operating profit the year before. The loss was mainly due to the cost of share-based compensation for shareholders. Advertising is a key part of ByteDance’s revenue on its platforms, but it has started pushing into new areas such as gaming and is pitting itself against some of China’s other tech giants like Tencent. However, the past year has been rocky for the company. ByteDance was dubbed a national security threat by former US President Donald Trump’s administration last August as it ordered ByteDance to divest its US TikTok business. In China, ByteDance has been caught up in a broader regulatory crackdown on the country’s technology sector.
UK’s first tech direct listing 🔔
On Thursday, UK-based fintech firm Wise said it expects to go public on the London Stock Exchange through a direct listing. Wise, formerly known as TransferWise, said it was seeking a direct listing rather than an initial public offering as it doesn’t need to raise any fresh capital. Direct listings allow companies to go public without involving underwriters or issuing new shares (read more about direct listings in a previous edition of ITM). Its stock market debut will be the first direct listing of a tech company in London. Founded in 2010 in Estonia, Wise says it now has 10 million customers who use its money transfer service to send £5 billion ($7 billion) each month. News of Wise’s debut marks a big win for the UK, which is hoping to convince more large tech firms to list in London rather than New York. The UK government is considering proposals to relax London’s listing rules making it easier to issue dual-class shares, which give founders and early backers more control. “We chose a direct listing because everyone has the same opportunity to own a part of Wise from large institutions to customers. It’s less expensive than an IPO which helps us keep costs down and ultimately helps us on our mission to lower prices,” Kristo Kaarmann, CEO and co-founder of Wise, told reporters on a conference call on Thursday. Wise was last privately valued at $5 billion in a secondary share sale last year. As the company is going public in a direct listing, there won’t be a share pricing process, which firms would normally go through with an IPO. Wise is opting for a dual-class share structure on the standard segment of London’s main market. The firm said it intends to issue two classes of shares, class A and class B. The class B shares would entitle holders to nine extra votes per share. They are non-tradable, will not be listed, and expire on the fifth anniversary of Wise’s listing. The structure means that Kaarmann will be entitled to more voting rights than other investors. However, no existing shareholder will have more than half of the voting rights purely by virtue of holding class B shares. In the past, investors have raised concerns over governance issues in dual-class structures. Deliveroo, which chose a dual-class structure, sank as much as 30% on the first day of trading in one of the worst IPOs in London’s history. However, the food delivery app’s float was overshadowed by other issues, including its treatment of gig workers and questions around profitability. Wise said it would also introduce a customer shareholder program called OwnWise, which would let users own a stake in the company. Customers participating in the scheme would be entitled to receive bonus shares worth up to a maximum of £100 ($140) after 12 months.
This week in the stock market 🎢
The week started off with the major US indices hitting new records. On Monday, S&P 500 gained 0.2% to close at a new record of 4,255.15, while the fell 85 points. Nasdaq was the relative outperformer, gaining 0.8% to close at an all-time high of 14,174.14. Investors are pouring back into growth stocks as bond yields keep falling. The 10-year Treasury rate hit a three-month low last Friday and continued to hover around 1.5% on Monday. Then on Tuesday stocks pulled back from record levels with the S&P 500 closing 0.2% lower, the Dow sliding nearly 100 points and Nasdaq dipping 0.7% amid weakness in big tech shares. Also, on Tuesday the Federal Reserve (the Fed) kicked off its two-day meeting. The meeting comes as inflation heats up, with producer prices rising at their fastest annual rate in nearly 11 years during May. On Wednesday, US stocks fell on after the Fed raised inflation expectations and forecast rate hikes as early as 2023. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed the day 265 points lower to 34,033.67. The S&P 500 edged 0.5% lower to 4,223.70 and Nasdaq dipped 0.2% to 14,039.68. While the Fed on Wednesday considerably raised its expectations for inflation this year and brought forward the time frame on when it will next raise interest rates, the central bank gave no indication as to when it will begin cutting back on its aggressive bond-buying program. On Thursday, the decision from the Fed caused a sell-off in equities. The Dow fell 210 points, or 0.62%, to 33,823.45. The S&P 500 fell 0.04% to 4,221.86, while Nasdaq rose 0.87% to 14,161.35. The blue-chip Dow has lost 1.9% week to date and the S&P 500 has fallen 0.6%, while Nasdaq has gained 0.65% on the week.
Plus ➕
Tech trade: The US and the European Union announced a new joint technology and trade initiative to counter China’s rising influence. The Technology and Trade Council will devise new standards for emerging technology; promote democratic values online, and help the US and EU collaborate on cutting edge research
Cashierless: For the first time, Amazon brings cashierless tech to a full-size grocery store at new Seattle-area location
Philanthropy: MacKenzie Scott, the billionaire philanthropist, and ex-wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, announced in a blog post that she has given away more than $2.7 billion to hundreds of groups this year
Greenroom: In March, Spotify acquired Locker Room to help speed its entry into the live audio market. On Wednesday, the company made good on that deal with the launch of Spotify Greenroom, a new mobile app that allows Spotify users worldwide to join or host live audio rooms (much like Clubhouse) and optionally turn those conversations into podcasts. Also, today on Friday, Spotify announced it acquired Podz, a startup that’s trying to solve the problem of podcast discovery
Podcasts: Speaking of podcasts, in an email to creators, Facebook says it will launch its podcast platform on June 22. Eventually, it will also add a feature that will allow listeners to create clips from their favorite shows
Robo advise: JPMorgan Chase has agreed to buy UK online investment management platform Nutmeg for an undisclosed sum. The US banking giant said the deal, which is still subject to regulatory approval, would complement its plans to launch a standalone digital bank brand in the UK later this year. With more than £3.5 billion ($4.9 billion) in assets under management, Nutmeg is one of the UK’s largest robo-advisors
Speed limit: Snap eliminates Snapchat's speed filter, which let users show how fast they were moving after a US court ruled that Snap could be sued for a fatal car crash
Woman of the week
Katie Moussouris
Katie Moussouris is the founder and CEO of Luta Security.
Already at a young age, Moussouris was interested in computers and learned to program in BASIC on a Commodore 64 that her mother bought her in 3rd grade. She was the first girl to take AP Computer Science at her high school. She attended Simmons College to study molecular biology and mathematics and simultaneously worked on the Human Genome Project at the MIT Whitehead Institute. While at Whitehead she transitioned from a lab assistant to a systems administrator role, and after three years she became the systems administrator for the MIT Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, where she helped design the computer system for a new lab that was to open in 2000. During this time she also worked as the systems administrator at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. She moved to California to work as a Linux developer at Turbolinux and started their computer security response program. She was active within the West Coast hacker scene and formally joined @stake as a penetration tester in 2002 by the invitation of Chris Wysopal. In 2004 Moussouris joined Symantec in October 2004 when they acquired @stake. While there, she founded and managed Symantec Vulnerability Research, which was the first program to allow Symantec researchers to publish vulnerability research. In 2007, Moussouris left Symantec to join Microsoft as a security strategist. At Microsoft, she founded the Microsoft Vulnerability Research (MSVR) program. The program has coordinated the response to several significant vulnerabilities, including Dan Kaminsky's DNS flaw, and has also actively looked for bugs in third-party software affecting Microsoft customers (subsequent examples of this include Google's Project Zero). From September 2010 until May 2014, Moussouris was the Senior Security Strategist Lead at Microsoft, where she ran the Security Community Outreach and Strategy team for Microsoft as part of the Microsoft Security Response Center (MSRC) team. She also created Microsoft's first bug bounty program. In May 2014, Moussouris was named the Chief Policy Officer at HackerOne, a vulnerability disclosure company based in San Francisco, California. At HackerOne Moussouris was responsible for the company's vulnerability disclosure philosophy and worked to promote and legitimize security research among organizations, legislators, and policymakers.
While still at Microsoft, Moussouris began discussing a bug bounty program with the federal government; she continued these talks when she moved to HackerOne. In March 2016, Moussouris was directly involved in creating the Department of Defense's "Hack the Pentagon" pilot program, organized and vetted by HackerOne. It was the first bug bounty program in the history of the US federal government. Moussouris followed up the Pentagon program with "Hack the Air Force". HackerOne and Luta Security are partnering to deliver up to 20 bug bounty challenges over three years to the Defense Department. Moussouris has also helped edit the ISO/IEC 29147 document since around 2008. In April 2016, ISO made the standard freely available at no charge after a request from Moussouris and the CERT Coordination Center's Art Manion. Also, in April 2016, Moussouris founded Luta Security, a consultancy to help organizations and governments work collaboratively with hackers through bug bounty programs. Big name clients like the UK National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), Facebook, and Zoom have all been clients of Luta Security. In 2018, Moussouris testified in front of the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety, Insurance, and Data Security about security research for defensive purposes. In 2021, Moussouris donated $1 million dollars to start the Anuncia Donecia Songsong Manglona Lab for Gender and Economic Equity, at Penn State Law, named after her mother. The “Manglona Lab” will start with a gender equity litigation clinic intended to address workplace financial discrimination while promoting economic equity under the law. In 2018 Moussouris was featured among "America's Top 50 Women In Tech" by Forbes.
ITM Summer reading list
ITM’s summer reading list constitutes some books that I have enjoyed reading lately. Some are money and investing-related. One is a story of entrepreneurship and the financial industry. All of them include psychology to some extent. Whether you prefer reading a physical book, an e-book, or listening to it as an audiobook, I hope you find inspiration from this list.
Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know by Adam Grant
Think Again reveals that we don't have to believe everything we think or internalize everything we feel. It's an invitation to let go of views that are no longer serving us well and prize mental flexibility over foolish consistency. If knowledge is power, knowing what we don't know is wisdom.
Noise: A Flaw in Human Judgment by Daniel Kahneman, Olivier Sibony, and Cass R. Sunstein
From the Nobel Prize-winning author of Thinking, Fast and Slow and the coauthor of Nudge, a revolutionary exploration of why people make bad judgments and how to make better ones. In Noise, the authors show the detrimental effects of noise in many fields. Wherever there is judgment, there is noise. Yet, most of the time, individuals and organizations alike are unaware of it. They neglect noise. With a few simple remedies, people can reduce both noise and bias, and so make far better decisions.
Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones by James Clear
No matter your goals, Atomic Habits offers a proven framework for improving every day. James Clear, one of the world's leading experts on habit formation, reveals practical strategies that will teach you exactly how to form good habits, break bad ones, and master the tiny behaviors that lead to remarkable results.
The Psychology of Money: Timeless lessons on wealth, greed, and happiness by Morgan Housel
Money, investing, personal finance, and business decisions are typically taught as a math-based field, where data and formulas tell us exactly what to do. But in the real world, people don’t make financial decisions on a spreadsheet. They make them at the dinner table, or in a meeting room, where personal history, your own unique view of the world, ego, pride, marketing, and odd incentives are scrambled together. In The Psychology of Money, Housel shares 19 short stories exploring the strange ways people think about money and teaches you how to make better sense of one of life’s most important topics.
Banking On It: How I Disrupted an Industry by Anne Boden
In this awe-inspiring story, Anne reveals how she broke through bureaucracy, tackled prejudice, and successfully countered widespread suspicion to realize her vision for the future of consumer banking. She fulfilled that dream by founding Starling, the winner of Best British Bank at the British Bank Awards in 2018, 2019, and 2020, and in doing so has triggered a new movement that is revolutionizing the entire banking industry.
Thank you so much for reading In The Money. I would love to hear your feedback and please share this with a few friends you think would find this interesting. Have a lovely weekend 💜
I’m Marianne, an early-stage VC based in Stockholm. You can reach me by replying to this email, or find me on Twitter or LinkedIn.