What I Read This Week...

Feb 24, 2024

Many companies use corporate venture capital funds to make strategic investments into potential suppliers and customers, but there is something unique about OpenAI’s ‘Startup Fund’. The fund, which was launched in late 2021, is legally owned by Sam Altman, not OpenAI. While the company claims that this was a temporary measure to reduce administrative headache, this arrangement has stood for more than a year. The revelation is part of a broader insight into OpenAI’s messy corporate structure, which may have been responsible for Sam Altman’s removal in November last year.
Credit card lender Capital One announced that it will acquire card network Discover for $35Bn in an all-stock transaction. The deal is part of Capital One’s strategy to build a vertically-integrated global payments network - akin to American Express, but antitrust issues loom as federal regulators may have concerns over a merger between two of the largest credit card companies in the U.S.
Venezuela has stopped accepting flights of migrants deported from the U.S. and Mexico. The U.S. has sent home ~1,800 Venezuelans on 15 flights since an initial deal was struck between the two countries to return illegal migrants home - a crucial deterrent to migrants crossing the border illegally. But with no way of deporting illegal Venezuelan migrants, the U.S. is now reliant on enforcement in Mexico and Panama to halt illegal migrants before they enter into the U.S.

Chamath Palihapitiya