Aug 3, 2021 Sign Up

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"1,000 books get written about leadership and change and all that stuff. Knowing what to do isn’t that hard, knowing how to do it isn’t that hard. Knowing when to do it is really hard." — Jeff Immelt (former GE CEO)

Good morning! It's been a long time coming but there's finally good news for Goldman Sachs' analysts & associates. Base salary for first-year analysts is increasing to $110,000, a nearly 30% increase from the previous starting salary of $85,000. Second-year analysts are set to make $125,000, up from $95,000. Salaries for first-year associates will jump to $150,000 from $125,000.

If you still have not subscribed to Short Squeez yet, now is the time and this is the link.

Note: Yesterday we incorrectly stated that Tipsy Scoop is valued at $66B. As excited as we got Tipsy Scoop investors, the $66B is the total addressable market for ice-cream internationally. We are letting the intern keep his job for now but he's been severely reprimanded.

1. Story of the Day: Reese Witherspoon’s $900M Deal

Reese Witherspoon's company, Hello Sunshine, is selling itself to private-equity giant Blackstone for $900 million, only 5 years after founding in 2016. Hello Sunshine is a media business, creating content focused on female voices. Its productions include the HBO drama "Big Little Lies," "Little Fires Everywhere" and Apple's "The Morning Show."

The acquisition is part of Blackstone's plan to build an independent entertainment company for Hollywood’s streaming era and will be run by former Disney execs Kevin Mayer and Tom Staggs. Ms. Witherspoon and Hello Sunshine Chief Executive Sarah Harden will join the board of the new company and will continue to operate Hello Sunshine.

Reese Witherspoon said that the deal is a major endorsement of her bet that Hollywood needs more stories told by and for women. "I’m going to double down on that mission to hire more female creators from all walks of life and showcase their experiences," she added.

Short Squeez Takeaway: Amazon recently bought MGM for $8.45 billion and SpringHill Co, founded by LeBron James, is exploring a sale seeking a valuation of $750 million. As the content and streaming wars heat up, we only expect to see more deals in the sector, with Blackstone being a key player going forward. "We’ve had among our highest conviction investment themes, the continued and long-dated demand for high quality content," said Joseph Baratta (Blackstone’s global head of private equity).

2. Markets Rundown

• Stocks gave up early gains to end mostly lower Monday, over signs of peaking economic growth and the continued spread of the delta virus variant 

Movers & Shakers

• (+) Affirm ($AFRM) +15% on news of rival Afterpay being acquired by Square.
• (+) Square ($SQ) +10% on news of acquiring Afterpay.
  
• (–) Global Payments ($GPN) -11% despite reporting second quarter earnings of $2.04 that beat analysts’ expectation of $1.90.

3. Top Reads

A Message from Daloopa: Automate Your Modeling

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Get in touch with Daloopa and automate your life.

4. Book of the Day: Essentialism

Have you ever found yourself stretched too thin? Simultaneously overworked and underutilized? Busy but not productive? If you answered yes to any of these, the way out is the way of the Essentialist.

Essentialism is more than a time-management strategy or a productivity technique. It is a systematic discipline for discerning what is absolutely essential, then eliminating everything that is not, so we can make the highest possible contribution toward the things that really matter.

Essentialism is not one more thing, it’s a whole new way of doing everything. It’s about doing less, but better, in every area of our lives.

5. Daily Visual: Most Expensive Cities for Construction 
(Avg. Construction Cost in USD per square meter in 2021)

Source: Statista

6.  Daily Acumen: Downsides

Dr. Dan Goodman once performed surgery on a middle-aged woman whose cataract had left her blind since childhood. The cataract was removed, leaving the woman with near-perfect vision. A miraculous success.

The patient returned for a checkup a few weeks later. The book Crashing Through writes:

Her reaction startled Goodman. She had been happy and content as a blind person. Now sighted, she became anxious and depressed. She told him that she had spent her adult life on welfare and had never worked, married, or ventured far from home – a small existence to which she had become comfortably accustomed. Now, however, government officials told her that she no longer qualified for disability, and they expected her to get a job. Society wanted her to function normally. It was, she told Goldman, too much to handle.

Every goal you dream about has a downside that’s easy to overlook.

Source: Collaborative Fund

7. Memes of the Day

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