Wall Street gets walloped, Oculus gets probed, and the "worst house" on the "best block" of SF fetches $2 million

Hope you have a happy and safe weekend, everyone. We *will* be publishing the newsletter this coming Monday, which is also Martin Luther King Jr. Day, though it will likely be an abbreviated version in honor of the occasion.

Major bank stocks declined after their earnings reports today, with Wall Street notching a second straight negative week to start the year. The Dow Jones Industrial Average slid 201.81 points, or 0.56%.

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission and multiple states are investigating Meta Platform’s virtual reality unit Oculus over potential anti-competitive practices, says Bloomberg. The antitrust scrutiny could complicate Meta’s plans to build out its version of a metaverse, the outlet notes. 

The Russian Federal Security Service announced today that it has raided and shut down the operations of the notorious REvil ransomware gang. The move -- seemingly aimed at engineering good will toward Russia as it reportedly plots to invade Ukraine -- saw the Russian authorities conduct raids at 25 addresses across the Moscow, St. Petersburg and Lipetsk regions that belonged to 14 suspected members of REvil. As a reminder, the gang is believed to have orchestrated some of the most damaging attacks of the past 12 months, including the Colonial Pipeline attack. The specter of Russia's invasion of Ukraine has prompted threats by the Biden administration to impose widespread economic sanctions against Moscow, including cutting the country off from SWIFT, the international messaging system that banks and financial institutions use to send and receive money.

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Accelerant, a three-year-old, London-based data intelligence insurance platform that aims to help underwriter share and exchange risk, has raised $190 million in funding led by Eldridge. Other backers in the round include Deer Park, Marshall Wace, MS&AD Ventures and earlier backer Altamont Capital Partners. More here.

Bolt, the nearly eight-year-old, San Francisco-based checkout technology company with a one-click product, just closed on $355 million in Series E financing at an $11 billion post-money valuation. (Big week for companies named Bolt!) Funds and accounts managed by BlackRock led the Series E investment, with new investors Schonfeld, Invus Opportunities, CreditEase and H.I.G. Growth joining earlier backers Activant Capital and Moore Strategic Ventures. Bolt has now raised nearly $1 billion altogether. TechCrunch has more here.

Lukka, an eight-year-old, New York-based crypto firm that analyzes and sells to its business customers post-trade blockchain data, has raised $110 million in Series E funding at a post-money valuation of $1.3 billion. Marshall Wace led the round, joined by Miami International Holdings, Summer Capital, SiriusPoint, and earlier backers Soros Fund Management, Liberty City Ventures, S&P Global, and CPA.com. The outfit has now raised more than $200 million altogether. The Block has more here.

Zero Hash, a 6.5-year-old, Chicago-based startup that's helping fintechs offer digital currencies, has raised $105 million in a Series D funding round. Investors in the company now include Bain Capital and earlier backers Nyca Partners and Point72 Ventures, The latter two also participated in the company $35 million Series C round, which closed in September. CoinDesk has more here.

Daasity, a 4.5-year-old, San Diego, Ca.-based e-commerce analytics and data company, has raised $15 million in Series A funding. VMG Catalyst led the round, joined by earlier backers Cove Fund, Exeter Capital, 1855 Capital, Mooring Ventures, Okapi Venture Capital and Serra Ventures. The outfit has now raised $20.7 million altogether. TechCrunch has more here.

EVage, an eight-year-old, Chandigarh, India-based maker of commercial electric vehicle trucks that are already being used by a range of e-commerce companies, just raised $28 million in seed funding led by RedBlue Capital. TechCrunch has more here.

Evernest, a two-year-old, Hamburg, Germany-based tech-enabled real estate brokerage, has raised €13 million in Series A funding led by Prudence, with participation from Kibo Ventures, Bonsai Partners, Project A and APIC. More here.

Fermata Energy, a 12-year-old, Charlottesville, Va.-based maker of vehicle-to-grid bidirectional chargers that turn electric vehicles into energy storage assets, just raised $40 million in funding, including from funds managed by Carlyle and Verizon Ventures. More here.

Observable, a 4.5-year-old, San Francisco-based data visualization platform, just raised $35.6 million in Series B funding led by Menlo Ventures, with participation from earlier backers Sequoia Capital and Acrew Capital. The company has now raised $46.1 million altogether. VentureBeat has more here.

Sastrify, a year-old, Germany-based startup  that sells automated SaaS procurement software for organizations to select, buy, and manage their SaaS subscriptions, raised $15 million in Series A funding. FirstMark Capital led the round, which follows $7 million in seed funding that the company closed five months ago. More here.

Ubiquitous Energy, an 11-year-old, Redwood City, Ca.-based company that makes solar cells and windows for commercial buildings, raised $30 million in Series B funding from investors including Andersen Corporation, ENEOS, Safar Partners, Hostplus, Red Cedar Ventures, and Riverhorse Investments. Business Insider has more here.

Vitt, a months-old, London-based startup that offers SaaS outfits non-diluting financing against their monthly recurring revenues, has raised $15 million in equity and debt funding co-led by Better Tomorrow Ventures and SpeedInvest. Other backers in the round included Village Global, Entrepreneur First, Zayn Capital, and an assortment of angel investors. (The company declined to disclose to us how much equity funding it raised versus debt.) Tech.eu has more here.

Friktion Labs, a Singapore-based organization building a Solana-based options and structured product protocol, has raised $5.5 million in capital including from a long line of backers. Among them is Jump Crypto, DeFiance Capital, Pillar VC, Libertus Capital, Delphi Ventures, and Tribe Capital. More here.

Lawtrades, a 5.5-year-old, Long Island N.Y.-based company that helps legal professionals run their own virtual law practices, has raised $6 million in Series A funding led by Four Cities Capital, with participation from Draper Associates, 500 Startups, and roughly 100 individuals, including customers. TechCrunch has more here.

Superhi, a six-year-old, New York-based online coding school (whose name, because we are immature, makes us giggle), just raised $5 million in Series A funding. Frameworks Ventures led the round,  joined by Designer Fund, Torch Capital, Reach Capital and Expa. Its platform, CEO Rik Lomas tells us, is designed to "help people gain new skills but also get paid for sharing those skills." More here.

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Bausch & Lomb has filed paperwork for an IPO nearly a year and half after its parent company, Bausch Health Cos., said it would spin off the eye-care company. The WSJ has more here.

Dog-walking startup Wag Labs is in talks to go public through a merger with special purpose acquisition company CHW Acquisition Corp, with the combined entity  set to have an enterprise value of about $350 million. Wag, which counts Battery Ventures and ACME as investors, in 2019 repurchased a 50% stake in itself from SoftBank Vision Fund. SoftBank first invested $300 million in the company in 2018. Bloomberg has more here. 

Federal prosecutors have recommended that the Justice Department drop criminal charges against Gang Chen, a MIT mechanical engineering professor accused of hiding his China ties. The WSJ has more here.

It was former Google CEO Eric Schmidt who just bought that $65 million piece of land from Paul Allen's estate. (We'd referenced this 120-acre hilltop spread with sweeping views of L.A. a few days ago.)

Martin Shkreli, the former pharmaceutical exec best known for hiking the price of a lifesaving medication, must pay $64.6 million and will be barred for life from the drug industry for violating antitrust law, a federal court ordered today. Shkreli is currently serving a seven-year prison sentence that's unrelated to the drug pricing saga. The New York Times has more here.

The "worst house" on the "best block" in San Francisco just sold for $2 million. Its features include two bathrooms and zero bedrooms.

Netflix is raising prices.

A look at Google's alleged scheme to corner the ad market. 

Earlier this week, CityDAO -- a "decentralized autonomous organization" that hopes to collectively govern a blockchain city, offering citizenship and governance tokens in exchange for the purchase of a “land NFT” bestowing ownership rights to a plot of land in Wyoming -- was scammed by hackers. The attack was the latest done over Discord and is a growing concern for the vast majority of DAOs and NFT communities. Vice explains it all here.

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Busy simulator. 

It could be time to revisit your moldering comic book collection.

A luxury stroller for luxury babies.

How men's hype bags became the new sneakers.

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