Crypto Winter: Coinbase is laying off another 20% of its workforce

1/10/23 7:00PM

Winter is here

‍Coinbase’s CEO, Brian Armstrong, announced yesterday that the crypto-exchange would be cutting 20% of its workforce. As a bellwether for the sector, Coinbase’s second round of cuts — following an 18% reduction in headcount back in June 2022 — suggests the “crypto winter” is yet to show any signs of thawing.

‍Self-help

‍These recent layoffs, along with other restructuring measures, aim to bring Coinbase’s operating expenses down 25% this quarter to offset falling revenues that have tumbled alongside digital asset prices and activities.

The measures may help reverse some of the 82% slide in Coinbase's share price over the last 12 months, but the biggest driver of Coinbase’s fortune is simply still the prices of digital assets. The weekly returns of both Coinbase’s shares and Bitcoin, show that they move almost in lockstep. It seems nearly impossible for the company to get back to where it was without an uptick in crypto trading, prices or both.

Armstrong admits the impact that external factors have had, saying that thanks to “unscrupulous actors in the industry” the crypto world now has a “black eye”, presumably a reference to disgraced FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried. Additionally, the extra scrutiny the sector is now receiving from regulators will likely add to expenses, with Coinbase receiving a $50m fine this year from New York regulators and having to commit another $50m towards the company’s compliance.

Jon Keegan9h

Report: Google is backstopping Anthropic’s $35 billion data center deal

Google and Anthropic have always had close ties. The search giant invested early in the maker of Claude, which boosted Google’s investment returns last quarter.

But the two companies appear to be closer than we knew. According to a new report from Bloomberg, it turns out that Google is backstopping $35 billion worth of data center leases for Anthropic.

Last fall, Anthropic announced that was getting into the data center business, pledging $50 billion in a partnership with Fluidstack.

The revelation adds to concerns of so-called “circular deals,” which could lead to a domino-like collapse if one company fails.

Google’s Backstops Underpin $35 Billion Chip Deal for Anthropic

Last fall, Anthropic announced that was getting into the data center business, pledging $50 billion in a partnership with Fluidstack.

The revelation adds to concerns of so-called “circular deals,” which could lead to a domino-like collapse if one company fails.

Jon Keegan

11h

Anthropic releases Claude Fable 5, a locked-down, safer version of Mythos

Claude Fable 5 will cost twice as much as Claude Opus 4.8, Anthropic’s current flagship model. The company also released Claude Mythos 5, but only for trusted partners for testing.

Rani Molla12h

Amazon shatters record in Canada’s “maple bond” market

Amazon has set a record in the Canadian corporate bond market by issuing CA$14 billion ($10.04 billion) of Canadian dollar-denominated notes, according to a new Securities and Exchange Commission filing. The five-part deal officially eclipses the previous record of CA$8.5 billion established just last month by Alphabet.

This massive push comes as hyperscalers aggressively diversify funding to bankroll historic AI capital expenditure, a strategy mirrored by Alphabet’s parallel expansion into European debt markets to fuel its soaring infrastructure demands.

Man using smartphone, his head is replaced with a huge brain

Apple wants to finally give smartphones a brain

Releasing the iOS 27 developer beta is a start, but Siri can’t rescue us from app overload until it can run the third-party apps we actually use.

Rani Molla15h

Jon Keegan6/8/26

OpenAI files confidentially for IPO

Today OpenAI announced it has filed confidentially with the SEC to go public. The company said in a blog post that it filed the draft S-1 form.

OpenAI’s filing comes a week after archrival Anthropic — now valued at $965 billion — also filed a confidential S-1 for its own public offering. Both IPOs are expected to be among the largest in US history.

In a press release, OpenAI wrote:

“We expect it to leak so we’re just announcing it. We have not decided on timing yet; it may be a while because there are things we want to do that are likely easier as a private company. But it’s a complicated set of tradeoffs and this gives us the option to go public sooner if that ends up being best.”

Confidential submission of draft S-1 to the SEC