⚡ Zash Community Update 22: Investing's coming home?...
Building the future of retail investing
Dear All,
Here’s a quick update for you on latest happenings, developments.
At the moment we’re growing our social media presence, so if you’re not already following us on Twitter and LinkedIn make sure to 😃
We’ve been doing this weekly since Feb! You can read all of our previous Community Updates here.
Creator of the Week 🧠
Sameer Singh is a startup advisor and early-stage investor focused on network effects and is currently working with the Zash team.
Sameer created Breadcrumb.vc, an industry-leading resource for network effects, and part is of the Atomico Angel Program. He has spent the last 12 years of his career working across tech startups & investing. He worked for several years at App Annie, a startup originally built on data network effects. Leading a global team working across product, marketing, and sales. He’s also advised leading tech companies like Spotify, Shpock and Trainline!
What do you generally like to invest in?
Stocks of companies operating marketplaces, networks or other forms of network effect-based products
How would you describe your investing style?
I would describe myself as a Long-term Investor
What industry/company’s future are you excited by and why?
Roblox and Snap. They're building platforms that can become the building blocks of an eventual metaverse.
What do you love about the Zash Community?
I tend to go deep into a handful of companies. That naturally means that my focus is narrower than broad. Because of that, it's easy to miss out on new companies that fit my thesis. Zash's community is essentially crowdsourced discovery for me. It helps me identify companies what I'm not looking at yet, but should be.
Zash Learn 🤓
This week we’re looking at crypto staking, what it is and why it’s so popular at the moment.
So far more than $13 billion worth of ether has been staked on Ethereum 2.0. But what does it mean to stake coins on a network? Staking comes down to how a network is validated.
Originally most all cryptocurrencies were created on a Proof of Work basis. This meant that to create more Bitcoin miners would have to solve puzzles in order to complete a block. They would then be rewarded with newly minted coins.
Unfortunately miners can improve their chances of solving puzzles by increasing computational power. This has led to huge concerns over the environmental impact. Luckily, there’s another way to validate work on the blockchain, Proof of Stake.
Proof of Stake relies on deterministic probability. In essence, your chances of creating a valid block will be proportional to the number of coins you stake.
Example: Someone with 30 coins is 3x more likely to be the next block validator than someone with 10 coins.
All of the coins are created at the beginning and no new coins are created in Proof of Stake mining. Instead of coins validators are rewarded with transaction fees.
So, when you stake crypto you lend it to the validation process in return for a fee. As crypto moves away from Proof of Work staking will become increasing more popular and all crypto enthusiasts should consider the benefits and risks going forward!
Swiss bank Sygnum announced this week that they would be offering Eth 2.0 staking in yet another move towards mainstream crypto adoption!
What is staking crypto? Check out this useful piece from Newsweek if your appetite for learning hasn’t been met just yet!
Call for Help 😀
We’re on the lookout for a brilliant Mobile Developer, to be based either in London or Ankara!
If you know a mobile engineer who is ferociously relentless when it comes to weaving the most delightful experience for our users at Zash, we'd love to hear about them!
Please feel free to share this with any suitable candidates you might know!
Reading of the Week 💡
Here’s some pieces we found interesting and insightful this week. Sadly we can’t get ahead of the news like some U.S. politicians, but we do the research so you don’t have to 💪
Tech News
Last week America celebrated independence and so did Jeff Bezos. He is officially no longer the CEO of Amazon as of this week! Check out a this wonderful piece by the Economist mapping his time in charge of the online behemoth.
Stock Market
A couple of weeks back we discussed the different options available to companies looking to bring their business public and yesterday British Fintech Wise did just that. Going public through a direct listing Wise set records by becoming the largest ever tech listing in London by market cap.
Crypto Market
Last week Nexo announced it would be offering Cardano on its platform. Cardano (ADA) is a fast growing cryptocurrencies which now offers smart contracts. With real world applications across the African continent the blockchain network is another disruptive game changer that is well suited to being on the Nexo platform.
There was more confusion surrounding the FCA’s ban on Binance this week as the crypto exchange claimed that Barclays bank had misunderstood the warning from the FCA.
Read about lending on blockchain and the Evolution from Crypto Pawn Shops in this wonderful Bankless newsletter.
Food for thought
Iceland championed the 4-day-week and found it to be an overwhelming success, read more on why this was the case here!
Looking for a great podcast?
Cut through the noise with this fantastic overview of Venture Capital from a couple of years ago with legend Bill Gurley
That’s all for now and we’ll see you next week,
Team Zash