Techmeme
July 26, 2022, 6:45 PM

Top News

Ian Hamilton / UploadVR:
Meta plans to increase the prices of its Quest 2 headsets to $400 for 128GB and $500 for 256GB on August 1, and bundle Beat Saber for free through December 31  —  The price for a new Quest 2 is jumping to $399 as Meta says “the costs to make and ship our products have been on the rise.”
The Verge:
As Mark Zuckerberg says “there are probably a bunch of people at the company who shouldn't be here” during a weekly Meta Q&A, a survey suggests staff anxiety  —  As Meta's growth slows, Mark Zuckerberg is pushing even harder.  Will his employees melt under the pressure?
Microsoft - Investor Relations:
Microsoft reports Q4 revenue up 12% YoY to $51.87B, net income up 2% YoY to $16.7B, Azure up 40% YoY, LinkedIn up 26% YoY, Surface up 10% YoY, and Xbox down 6%  —  REDMOND, Wash. — July 26, 2022 — Microsoft Corp. today announced the following results for the quarter ended June 30, 2022 …
Ashley Capoot / CNBC:
Responding to criticism, Adam Mosseri says Instagram's full-screen feed is “a test” that is “not yet good” and that the app has to lean into the shift to video  —  - Instagram head Adam Mosseri shared a video on Twitter Tuesday explaining recent changes to the social media platform.
Travis Clark / Insider:
Scott Rosenberg / Axios:
Alphabet - Investor Relations:
Alphabet reports Q2 revenue up 13% YoY to $69.69B, net income of $16B, down from $18.53B YoY, and Google Cloud revenue of $6.28B, up from $4.63B YoY  —  MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. - July 26, 2022 - Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG, GOOGL) today announced financial results for the quarter ended June 30, 2022.
Vipal Monga / Wall Street Journal:
Memo: Shopify plans to cut ~1,000 workers, or 10% of its global workforce, citing consumers pulling back on online shopping; SHOP drops 15%+  —  CEO Tobi Lütke says company made wrong bet on pandemic-fueled boom in e-commerce growth lasting  —  Shopify Inc. SHOP -16.29%▼ …
New York Times:
Sources: the US Treasury Department has been investigating US-based crypto exchange Kraken since 2019 for potentially violating US sanctions on Iran and more  —  The Treasury Department is investigating whether the crypto exchange allowed users in Iran to buy and sell digital tokens, said people with knowledge of the matter.
Bloomberg:
Sources: before its probe into alleged insider trading, the SEC started probing whether Coinbase improperly let Americans trade digital assets; stock drops 21%+  —  Coinbase Global Inc. is facing a US probe into whether it improperly let Americans trade digital assets that should have been registered …
Max Chafkin / Bloomberg:
Jesse Hamilton / CoinDesk:
Senators Toomey and Sinema introduce a bill to exempt crypto users from being taxed on transactions of under $50, similar to a bipartisan bill in the House  —  The top Republican on the Senate Banking Committee joined Democrat Kyrsten Sinema in legislation to exempt transactions of less than $50.
Liron Shapira / @liron:
[Thread] A look at Helium, a crypto network of 500K+ IoT hotspots, which raised $365M from a16z and others and generates an est. $6.5K/month in network revenue  —  .@Helium, often cited as one of the best examples of a Web3 use case, has received $365M of investment led by @a16z. Regular folks have also been convinced to spend $250M buying hotspot nodes, in hopes of earning passive income. The result? Helium's total revenue is $6.5k/month https://twitter.com/...
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
Neon, which provides developers with a serverless option for Postgres databases, has raised a $30M Series A-1 led by GGV, bringing its total funding to $55M  —  Neon, a startup providing developers with a serverless option for Postgres databases, today announced that it raised $30 million …
More: Going Long and FinSMEs
Bloomberg:
The UK's CMA publishes its music streaming report, saying the market being dominated by a handful of major players is not “currently causing consumers harm”  —  The music streaming market dominated by a handful of major players is giving consumers a fair shake …
CNBC:
SEC filing: Twitter schedules a shareholder meeting to vote on Elon Musk's $44B acquisition deal for September 13, 2022, at 10am PT  —  Twitter said that it would hold a shareholder meeting to vote on the company's $44 billion acquisition by Elon Musk on September 13.
More: SEC
Emily Baker-White / BuzzFeed News:
Four former ByteDance employees say the company promoted pro-China content to Americans in its now-defunct news app TopBuzz; ByteDance denies the claims  —  Former employees claim the company placed pieces of pro-China content in its now-defunct US news app, TopBuzz, and censored negative stories about the Chinese government.

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Kadhim Shubber / Financial Times:

Earlier Picks

Jeffrey Dastin / Reuters: