On Thursday (June 9), Coinbase Ventures associate Connor Dempsey took “a look at the overall macro downturn with an eye towards the crypto markets.”
In a blog post published on June 9, Dempsey said:
- “Central Banks and governments responded to the March 2020 COVID market shock with unprecedented interest rate cuts, money printing, and stimulus”
- “These easy money policies kicked off a multi-year bull run for equities and crypto, before eventually causing inflation that was further exacerbated by COVID supply shocks”
- “BTC, ETH, the NASDAQ, and S&P each peaked at the tail end of 2021, when it became clear that inflation was not under control and that Central Banks would have to unwind the same policies that propelled stocks and crypto to new heights in the first place”
- “This cycle crypto has been broadly correlated with tech stocks, and has traded like risk assets”
- “While not immune to Central Bank policy in the short run, the prospects of crypto and Web 3 in the long run remain stronger than they’ve ever been”
On May 17, Emilie Choi, President and Chief Operating Officer, President and Chief Operating Officer at Coinbase, announced via a blog post that her firm is “slowing hiring” in order to “reprioritize” hiring needs vs. “highest-priority business goals”.
Choi said:
“Heading into this year, we planned to triple the size of the company. Given current market conditions, we feel it’s prudent to slow hiring and reassess our headcount needs against our highest-priority business goals. Headcount growth is a key input to our financial model, and this is an important action to ensure we manage our business to the scenarios we planned for, specifically the potential Adjusted EBITDA we are aiming to manage to.
“Importantly, now is the time to ensure we are fully integrating all recent hires — so we can ensure that they are successful at Coinbase. This slow down will also force us to be more rigorous in our prioritization.“
