What we’re reading (2/6)
“Morningstar Calls Cathie Wood The Worst 'Wealth Destroyer’” (Investor’s Business Daily). “No one wants to be known as the largest wealth destroyer — especially when the S&P 500 is rising. But that's exactly what Morningstar is calling Cathie Wood's ARK Family of funds. ARK ETF Trust, which runs the popular ARK Innovation ETF (ARKK), has wiped out $14.3 billion in investors' wealth over the past 10 years, says a new analysis from Morningstar.”
“ESPN, Fox And Warner Team Up To Create Sports-Streaming Platform” (Wall Street Journal). “ESPN, Fox Corp. and Warner Bros. Discovery are teaming up to create a supersize sports-streaming service that will offer content from all major leagues, a deal that will reshape the sports and media landscape. The as-yet-unnamed service will be offered directly to consumers, who would be able to stream all of these companies’ sports content, the companies said in a statement, following a report in The Wall Street Journal about the new venture.”
“Deepfake Scammer Walks Off With $25 Million In First-Of-Its-Kind AI Heist” (ars technica). “The scam featured a digitally recreated version of the company's chief financial officer, along with other employees, who appeared in a video conference call instructing an employee to transfer funds.”
“Fundraising Is Tough. Just Ask This Hedge-Fund Star.” (Semafor). “Money once flowed into funds founded by big name portfolio managers at big name funds striking out on their own, like Jain’s fellow Millennium defector Michael Gelband, who launched ExodusPoint Capital Management in 2018 with $8.5 billion under management. But things have changed. Investors pulled more than $100 billion out of hedge funds in both 2022 and 2023, and the average shop returned about half the S&P 500. And Jain is trying to hire in the shadow of established multi-manager giants — known as “pod shops” — like Millennium, Citadel, Point72 and ExodusPoint. Meanwhile, The Financial Times reported that Jain has cut his performance fees to 10% for investors looking to funnel more than $250 million, and has steadily lowered his fundraising goal.”
“Seaweed As A Resilient Food Solution After A Nuclear War” (Jehn, et al., Earth’s Future). “Abrupt sunlight reduction scenarios such as a nuclear winter caused by the burning of cities in a nuclear war, an asteroid/comet impact or an eruption of a large volcano inject large amounts of particles in the atmosphere, which limit sunlight. This could decimate agriculture as it is practiced today. We therefore need resilient food sources for such an event. One promising candidate is seaweed, as it can grow quickly in a wide range of environmental conditions. To explore the feasibility of seaweed after nuclear war, we simulate the growth of seaweed on a global scale using an empirical model based on Gracilaria tikvahiae forced by nuclear winter climate simulations.”
