AnalytixInsight

Major indices reverted back to their pre COVID peaks, and the S&P posted its worst week since March 2020 despite a slight rise yesterday, according to Morning Brew. M&A is likely to pick up, and is likely to be a significant driver of value for Canadian tech firms in 2022, according to PwC. Telus Corp. (T-TSX) said Thursday it agreed to pay $2.3 billion (US$1.8 billion) plus assume $600 million in debt to buy LifeWorks Inc (LWRK-TSX), a Toronto-based human resource consulting and technology services company in the health and wellness sector. Thirty-five privately-held Canadian tech startups are on their way towards reaching $1 billion in annual revenue, according to a new data-based initiative from Kitchener-Waterloo tech hub Communitech. Voyager Digital (VOYG-TSX) signed a term sheet for US$200 million and 15,000 BTC revolving line of credit with Alameda Research. Klarna Bank AB is considering raising fresh funds at a significantly lower valuation than it achieved a year ago, according to people familiar with the situation, a sign of the punishing environment for tech companies. Roku stock jumped after unveiling Walmart e-commerce partnership. Shares of e-commerce companies Jumia and MercadoLibre plummet following Insider’s report about Amazon’s expansion plan in Africa and South America. Alibaba, NIO stocks soar after report Ant Group OK’d to set up financial holding company. The U.S.-listed shares of China-based companies were seeing big and broad gains in premarket trading Friday, after Reuters reported that China’s central bank accepted Ant Group’s application to set up a financial holding company. MicroStrategy CEO Michael Saylor says there’s no margin call on its bitcoin loan and it has plenty of collateral. Coinbase stock falls 15% as cryptocurrencies lose billions.

Late last week, major stock indices suffered another leg down, with the NASDAQ having an especially bearish close on Friday. Clio, a Canadian provider of cloud-based legal technology, announced it had achieved “Centaur” status, a title reserved for private SaaS companies that achieve more than US$100 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR). To date, approximately 150 companies globally have passed this threshold, making this designation seven times rarer than the now plentiful tech unicorn. Elon Musk said SpaceX’s Starlink will not go public for another three to four years, CNBC reported. Twitter will now give Elon Musk ‘firehose’ data access to settle bot complaints, and the Texas Attorney General opened an investigation of Twitter bots. Twitter, at the same time, is gearing up for its most ambitious quarter of user growth, leaders of the social media company’s consumer products division told staff on Tuesday. Alibaba shares dropped 8% after Jack Ma’s Ant Group and regulator squash talk of revived IPO. At the same time, DiDi Global and two other Chinese firms soared on WSJ report that probe will end. U.S.-listed shares of Chinese tech firms rose amid signs that Beijing’s crackdown on the Chinese tech sector is easing. Roku stock rebounded 20% amid reports of a possible acquisition by Netflix. Apple’s mixed reality headset is now said to be coming in Q2 2023 and the company announced a Buy Now Pay Later feature amid a services push. Meta is reportedly scaling back plans for its AR glasses, pivoting away from marketing Portal as a consumer device. Meta also halted development of Apple Watch rival with two cameras. Seventy-three percent of “affluent” investors in Asia intend to hold some form of digital assets by the end of 2022, according to a new report from consulting firm Accenture. TSMC plans to start mass production of new 3nm ‘M2 Pro’ chip later this year.