Week in Review - Facebook tastes a cool trillion

Hello friends, and welcome back to Week in Review!

Last week, I wrote about ByteDance’s existential threat in China. This week, we’re taking a peek at Facebook’s latest milestone on the back of a market bull run.

If you’re reading this on the TechCrunch site, you can get this in your inbox from the newsletter page, and follow my tweets @lucasmtny.

The big thing

A billion dollars isn’t cool anymore, you know what is cool? A trillion dollars.

This week, a legendary market bull run took Facebook’s market cap past the $1 trillion marker, a major milestone for the company which went public at a historic $100 billion+ just over nine years ago. It also marked a unique moment for America’s five major technology stocks which are now all worth more than $1 trillion each with Microsoft and Apple both worth more than $2 trillion each.

This is just three years after Apple became the first US company to earn a trillion market cap from investors. Facebook, the most recent IPO of the top 5 US tech stocks, has had a blistering swell in recent years, outpacing growth from Amazon, Google, Apple and Microsoft, up nearly 500% in the past five years.

The pandemic has served as a major rally for the major tech stocks, but Facebook has seen the clearest spike since market drops in March of 2020, with its share price up more than 140% since.

Facebook’s rise this week came on the back of a federal judge’s dismissal of an FTC antitrust suit against the company, the social media giant’s stock rose some 4% on the news, blasting through the milestone. It’s a suggestion that the company’s rise can’t be stopped despite it being the poster child for antitrust action among American legislators.

Other things

Here are the TechCrunch news stories that especially caught my eye this week:

Robinhood files to go public
The favorite stock trading app of meme stock connoisseurs and dogecoin acolytes dropped its IPO filing Thursday, the day after FINRA levied a historic $70 million fine on the company. The documents painted a positive financial picture for the now-profitable tech startup which is expected to be one of the year’s major tech IPOs.

Shopify drops app store commissions
Shopify is looking to entice developers to its marketplaces, with the company announcing this week that it’s slashing the company’s commissions to 0% across its Shopify App Store and Theme Store for a developer’s first million in revenue.

Federal judge squashes FTC Facebook antitrust suit
One of the more high-profile antitrust efforts fell flat on its face this week as a federal judge largely dismissed a suit against Facebook brought by the FTC and dozens of attorneys general.

Duolingo readies for IPO
The language app with the ever-persistent owl mascot is heading to Wall Street, also unveiling their S-1 documents this week, showcasing climbing subscription revenues and a sizable English certifications business.

Twitter is making NFTs now
Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey has been pretty vocal of his bitcoin love, but Twitter has been less active in the crypto space for the most part. This week, Twitter launched its own line of NFTs, a move that doesn’t seem to be accompanied by any major integration across the broader platform.

Facebook launches newsletter platform
Facebook has had its own Substack-killer in the works for a bit, but it finally launched this week and it seems fairly underwhelming? The platform has assembled a network of exclusive writers, but plenty are wondering why a writer without a sweetheart deal would sign-up for it.

Extra things

Some of my favorite reads from our Extra Crunch subscription service this week:

How Robinhood’s explosive growth came to be
“The consumer trading service’s products became so popular and enmeshed in popular culture thanks to both the “stonks” movement and the larger GameStop brouhaha, that the company’s public offering carries much more weight than that of a more regular venture-backed entity. Robinhood has fans, haters, and many an observer in Congress..”

Common mistakes Indian startups make when relocating to the US
“When considering a move to the United States, Indian startup founders first need to make a mental pivot to face the market they want to sell into and ask themselves how much risk they are willing to own.“

A startup’s guide to software delivery
“As your startup grows, it’s important that your software delivery strategy evolves with you. Your software processes and tool choices will naturally change as you scale, but optimizing too early or letting them grow without a clear vision of where you’re going can cost you precious time and agility. I’ve seen how the right choices can pay huge dividends — and how the wrong choices can lead to time-consuming problems that could have been avoided.”

• Software Engineering Manager at Imperfect Foods (Anywhere)
• Senior Software Test Engineer at WillowTree (Ohio, USA)
• Associate Technical Producer at The Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago, IL, USA)
• Principal Software Engineer at Stanley Martin Homes (Reston, VA, USA)
• Enterprise Development Analyst at Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (Middletown, PA, United States)

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