The Daily Index — Friday, September 15, 2023 · TLDR Index

HEADLINES & TRENDS

TLDR Founders

TLDR Founders

SWAN’S $40M RAISE

Despite global fintech funding being down 84% YoY, French fintech Swan bags $40m to scale their embedded banking services across Europe. Hope for fintech and Europe?

biz.crast.net · 2 min

TLDR Founders

FTX GETS APPROVAL TO SELL ITS CRYPTO ASSETS

FTX has been given approval to liquidate its assets in order to begin paying back its users in USD. However, it still has a lot of assets. How will this liquidation impact the crypto market as supply floods the market?

reuters.com · 2 min

TLDR Founders

XBOX INTRODUCES EMBEDDED FINANCE IN GAMING

Xbox has launched the Xbox Mastercard in collaboration with Barclays. The Xbox Mastercard is a rewards card that players can use to earn points through everyday purchases to redeem on games. Wasn’t it Angela Stange who said in 2019 that every company will be a fintech company?

news.xbox.com · 2 min

TLDR Founders

SIGNS YOUR CHIEF PEOPLE OFFICER ISN’T SCALING

If you have a Chief People Officer who is overly focused on the transactional parts of their operations, like payroll and benefits, doesn’t speak up in executive team meetings, and has morale or turnover issues in their own team, you’ve got big problems.

startupceo.com · 3 min

TLDR Founders

HOW I CEO: ON TAKING ADVICE AS A LEADER

Leadership is challenging, but getting advice from experienced peers and investors makes the job much easier. The key to getting the most out of advice is considering the situational context around the advice and maintaining enough humility to properly receive the advice.

mercury.com · 4 min

TLDR Founders

REVERSE ENGINEERING YOUR IDEAL LIFE

As founders, we can often get lost in the to-do’s. The details of these tasks consume us. Here’s a nice reminder to reflect on the real goals of life, which often don’t involve money. It’s about the people you retain and live with along the way.

sahilbloom.com · 3 min

TLDR Founders

THE IMPORTANCE OF FOUNDER PEDIGREE IN EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES

This is a fascinating read that argues how investors behave around new technologies. Without benchmarks and historical insight, investors will revert back to founder-market-fit, using signals like pedigree and education. A canonical example of this is the amount of researchers and PhD wielders that have been recipients of the latest AI funding boom.

michaeldempsey.me · 7 min

TLDR Founders

HOW YOU ENDURE IT MATTERS MOST

A healthy reminder that as a founder you’re going to be banging your head against the wall almost daily. How you handle the bumps and continue on course matters.

dailystoic.com · 2 min

TLDR Founders

THE MOST IMPORTANT SKILL

Qui-Gon Jinn nailed it, your focus determines your reality.

critter.blog · 1 min

TLDR Founders

ELEMENTS OF EXCEPTIONAL STARTUPS

All exceptional startups have some things in common: an exceptional CEO, executive team, investors, talent, and product.

tylerhogge.com · 8 min