Extra Crunch roundup: Fintech stays hot, Brex doubles, and startup IRR is up all over - TechCrunch

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Tech companies in Silicon Valley, the geography, have had an incredible year. But one indicator points to longer-term changes. The internal rate of return (IRR) for companies in other startup hub cities has been even better. A big new analysis by AngelList showed aggregate IRR of 19.4% per year on syndicated deals elsewhere versus 17.5% locally. A separate measure, of total value of paid-in investment, revealed 1.67x returns for other hubs versus 1.60x in the main Silicon Valley and Bay Area tech cities.

The data is based on a sample of 2,500 companies that have used AngelList to syndicate deals from 2013 through 2020. Which is just one snapshot, but a relevant one given how hard it can be to produce accurate early-stage startup market analysis at this scale. I believe we’ll see more and more data confirming the trends in the coming years, especially as more of the startup world acclimates to remote-first and distributed offices. You can increasingly do a startup from anywhere and make it a success. Not that Silicon Valley is lacking optimism, as you’ll see in a number of the other stories in the roundup below!

Eric Eldon
Managing Editor, Extra Crunch

(Subbing in for Walter today as he’s enjoying a well-deserved break and definitely not still checking the site.)

Optimism reigns at consumer trading services as fintech VC spikes and Robinhood IPO looms

Image Credits: Nigel Sussman (opens in a new window)

With the Coinbase direct listing behind us and the Robinhood IPO ahead, it’s a heady time for consumer-focused trading apps.

Mix in the impending SPAC-led debut of eToro, general bullishness in the cryptocurrency space, record highs for some equities markets, and recent rounds from Public.com, M1 Finance and U.K.-based Freetrade, and you could be excused for expecting the boom in consumer asset trading to keep going up and to the right.

But will it? There are data in both directions.

After going public, once-hot startups are riding a valuation roller coaster

Image Credits: Nigel Sussman (opens in a new window)

A short meditation on value, or, more precisely, how assets are valued in today’s markets.

Long story short: This is why I only buy index funds. No one knows what anything (interesting) is worth.

Should you give an anchor investor a stake in your fund’s management company?

Image Credits: Matthias Kulka (opens in a new window) / Getty Images

Raising capital for a new fund is always hard.

But should you give preferential economics or other benefits to a seed anchor investor who makes a material commitment to the fund? Let’s break down the pros and cons.

2021 should be a banner year for biotech startups that make smart choices early

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Last year was a record 12 months for venture-backed biotech and pharma companies, with deal activity rising to $28.5 billion from $17.8 billion in 2019.

As vaccines roll out, drug development pipelines return to normal, and next-generation therapies continue to hold investor interest, 2021 is on pace to be another blockbuster year.

But founder missteps early in the fundraising journey can result in severe consequences.

In this exciting moment, when younger founders will likely receive more attention, capital and control than ever, it’s crucial to avoid certain pitfalls.

Two investors weigh in: Is your SPAC just a PIPE dream?

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The fundamental thing to remember about the SPAC process is that the result is a publicly traded company open to the regulatory environment of the SEC and the scrutiny of public shareholders.

In today’s fast-paced IPO world, going public can seem like simply a marker of success, a box to check.

But are you ready to be a public company?

There is no cybersecurity skills gap, but CISOs must think creatively

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Those of us who read a lot of tech and business publications have heard for years about the cybersecurity skills gap. Studies often claim that millions of jobs are going unfilled because there aren’t enough qualified candidates available for hire.

Don’t buy it.

The basic laws of supply and demand mean there will always be people in the workforce willing to move into well-paid security jobs. The problem is not that these folks don’t exist. It’s that CIOs or CISOs typically look right past them if their resumes don’t have a very specific list of qualifications.

In many cases, hiring managers expect applicants to be fully trained on all the technologies their organization currently uses. That not only makes it harder to find qualified candidates, but it also reduces the diversity of experience within security teams — which, ultimately, may weaken the company’s security capabilities and its talent pool.

To be frank, we do not know how to value Honest Company

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We do not know how to value Honest Company.

It’s outside our normal remit, but that the company is getting out the door at what appears to be a workable price gain to its final private round implies that investors earlier in its cap table are set to do just fine in its debut. Snowflake it is not, but at its current IPO price interval, it is hard to not call Honest a success of sorts — though we also anticipate that its investors had higher hopes.

Returning to our question, do we expect the company to reprice higher? No, but if it did, The Exchange crew would not fall over in shock.

How Brex more than doubled its valuation in a year

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Brex, a fintech company that provides corporate cards and spend-management software to businesses, announced Monday that it closed a $425 million Series D round of capital at a valuation of around $7.4 billion.

The new capital came less than a year after Brex raised $150 million at a $2.9 billion pre-money valuation.

So, how did the company manage to so rapidly boost its valuation and raise its largest round to date?

TechCrunch spoke with Brex CEO Henrique Dubugras after his company’s news broke. We dug into the how and why of its new investment and riffed on what going remote-first has done for the company, as well as its ability to attract culture-aligned and more diverse talent.

Founders who don’t properly vet VCs set up both parties for failure

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There’s a disconnect between reality and the added value investors are promising entrepreneurs. Three in five founders who were promised added value by their VCs felt duped by their negative experience.

While this feels like a letdown by investors, in reality, it shows fault on both sides. Due diligence isn’t a one-way street, and founders must do their homework to make sure they’re not jumping into deals with VCs who are only paying lip service to their value-add.

Looking into an investor’s past, reputation and connections isn’t about finding the perfect VC, it’s about knowing what shaking certain hands will entail — and either being ready for it or walking away.

Fifth Wall’s Brendan Wallace and Hippo’s Assaf Wand discuss proptech’s biggest opportunities

Image Credits: Jeff Newton / Hippo

What is the biggest opportunity for proptech founders? How should they think about competition, strategic investment versus top-tier VC firms and how to build their board? What about navigating regulation?

We sat down with Brendan Wallace, co-founder and general manager of Fifth Wall, and Hippo CEO Assaf Wand for an episode of Extra Crunch Live to discuss all of the above.

SaaS subscriptions may be short-serving your customers

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Software as a service (SaaS) has perhaps become a bit too interchangeable with subscription models.

Every software company now looks to sell by subscription ASAP, but the model itself might not fit all industries or, more importantly, align with customer needs, especially early on.

What can the OKR software sector tell us about startup growth more generally?

In the never-ending stream of venture capital funding rounds, from time to time, a group of startups working on the same problem will raise money nearly in unison. So it was with OKR-focused startups toward the start of 2020.

How were so many OKR-focused tech upstarts able to raise capital at the same time? And was there really space in the market for so many different startups building software to help other companies manage their goal-setting? OKRs, or “objectives and key results,” a corporate planning method, are no longer a niche concept. But surely, over time, there would be M&A in the group, right?

Image Credits: Nigel Sussman (opens in a new window)

Internal rates of return in emerging US tech hubs are starting to overtake Silicon Valley

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Tech innovation is becoming more widely distributed across the United States.

Among the five startups launched in 2020 that raised the most financing, four were based outside the Bay Area. The number of syndicated deals on AngelList in emerging markets from Austin to Seattle to Pittsburgh has increased 144% over the last five years.

And the number of startups in these emerging markets is growing fast — and increasingly getting a bigger piece of the VC pie.

Fund managers can leverage ESG-related data to generate insights

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Almost two centuries ago, gold prospectors in California set off one of the greatest rushes for wealth in history. Proponents of socially conscious investing claim fund managers will start a similar stampede when they discover that environmental, social and governance (ESG) insights can yield treasure in the form of alternative data that promise big payoffs — if only they knew how to mine it.

ESG data is everywhere. Learning how to understand it promises big payoffs.

Dear Sophie: What’s the latest on DACA?

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Dear Sophie,

My company is looking to hire a very talented data infrastructure engineer who is undocumented. She has never applied for DACA before.

What is the latest on DACA? What can we do to support her?

—Multicultural in Milpitas

Zomato juice: Indian unicorn’s proposed IPO could drive regional startup liquidity

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The IPO parade continued this week as India-based food-delivery unicorn Zomato filed to go public. 

The Zomato IPO is incredibly important. As our own Manish Singh reported when the company’s numbers became public, a “successful listing [could be] poised to encourage nearly a dozen other unicorn Indian startups to accelerate their efforts to tap the public markets.”

So, Zomato’s debut is not only notable because its impending listing gives us a look into its economics, but because it could lead to a liquidity rush in the country if its flotation goes well.

Investment in construction automation is essential to rebuilding US infrastructure

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With the United States moving all-in on massive infrastructure investment, much of the discussion has focused on jobs and building new green industries for the 21st century.

While the Biden administration’s plan will certainly expand the workforce, it also provides a massive opportunity for the adoption of automation technologies within the construction industry.

Despite the common narrative of automating away human jobs, the two are not nearly as much in conflict, especially with new investments creating space for new roles and work.

In fact, one of the greatest problems facing the construction industry remains a lack of labor, making automation a necessity for moving forward with these ambitious projects.

How to fundraise over Zoom more effectively

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Even though in-person drinks and coffee walks are on the horizon, virtual fundraising isn’t going away.

Now, it’s imperative to ensure your virtual pitch is as effective as your IRL one.

Not only is it more efficient — no expensive trips to San Francisco or trouble fitting investor meetings into one day — virtual fundraising helps democratize access to venture capital.

Hacking my way into analytics: A creative’s journey to design with data

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There’s a growing need for basic data literacy in the tech industry, and it’s only getting more taxing by the year.

Words like “data-driven,” “data-informed” and “data-powered” increasingly litter every tech organization’s product briefs. But where does this data come from?

Who has access to it? How might I start digging into it myself? How might I leverage this data in my day-to-day design once I get my hands on it?

Fintech startups set VC records as the 2021 fundraising market continues to impress

Image Credits: Nigel Sussman (opens in a new window)

The first three months of the year were the most valuable period for fintech investing, ever.

Where did the fintech venture capital market push the most money in Q1, and why? Let’s dig in.

Healthcare is the next wave of data liberation

Image Credits: PM Images (opens in a new window)/ Getty Images

Why can we see all our bank, credit card and brokerage data on our phones instantaneously in one app, yet walk into a doctor’s office blind to our healthcare records, diagnoses and prescriptions?

Our health status should be as accessible as our checking account balance.

The liberation of healthcare data is beginning to happen, and it will have a profound impact on society — it will save and extend lives.

What private tech companies should consider before going public via a SPAC

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The red-hot market for special purpose acquisition companies, or SPACs, has “screeched to a halt.”

As the SPAC market grew in the past six months, it seemed that everyone was getting into the game. But shareholder lawsuits, huge value fluctuations and warnings from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission have all thrown the brakes on the SPAC market, at least temporarily.

So what do privately held tech companies that are considering going public need to know about the SPAC process and market?

The era of the European insurtech IPO will soon be upon us

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Once the uncool sibling of a flourishing fintech sector, insurtech is now one of the hottest areas of a buoyant venture market. Zego’s $150 million round at unicorn valuation in March, a rumored giant incoming round for WeFox, and a slew of IPOs and SPACs in the U.S. are all testament to this.

It’s not difficult to see why. The insurance market is enormous, but the sector has suffered from notoriously poor customer experience, and major incumbents have been slow to adapt. Fintech has set a precedent for the explosive growth that can be achieved with superior customer experience underpinned by modern technology. And the pandemic has cast the spotlight on high-potential categories, including health, mobility and cybersecurity.

This has begun to brew a perfect storm of conditions for big European insurtech exits.

The health data transparency movement is birthing a new generation of startups

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The recent movement toward data transparency is bringing about a new era of innovation and startups.

Those who follow the space closely may have noticed that there are twin struggles taking place: a push for more transparency on provider and payer data, including anonymous patient data, and another for strict privacy protection for personal patient data.

What’s the main difference, and how can startups solve these problems?

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How 'Bad Trip' Brought Back the Gross-Out Comedy - The New York Times

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Why the tasteless humor of “Bad Trip,” starring Eric Andre, is a feat to be celebrated. Few can pull off transgression so skillfully.

If the comedy “Bad Trip” had premiered in theaters as intended until it moved to Netflix because of the pandemic, one already notorious scene would have surely sent crowds into a frenzy of groans and laughter. It involves an encounter between Eric Andre and a gorilla best not described in a family newspaper. Skillfully paced, preposterously tasteless, it’s a sequence that will alienate a portion of its audience, while cementing a cult reputation with another.

Whatever your reaction (I loved it), it’s as clarifying as any mission statement, showing that the makers of this movie are less interested in glowing reviews than visceral, raucous responses. It also signals the comeback of the gross-out comedy, a genre in decline, struggling with nerves about social censure and competition from the shock value of real life.

In a 2019 interview, no less an authority than John Waters, whose well-earned nicknames include the Pope of Trash and the Duke of Dirty, declared the death of the gross-out comedy. Last week, on Marc Maron’s podcast, he provided one explanation with this unassailable point. “It’s easy to be disgusting. It’s easy to be obscene,” he said. “But it’s not easy to be witty about it.”

This is what makes “Bad Trip” such a welcome feat, and why its impact may well eclipse that of all the movies that took home Oscars over the weekend. It’s cleverly crass, finding new ways to disgust with old-fashioned finesse.

Howery, left, and Andre. Their chemistry helps root the gross-out comedy.Netflix

The roots of the modern gross-out comedy can be traced to EC Comics and Mad Magazine, giddily demented publications devoured by kids in the middle of the last century, some of whom went on to create movies like “Animal House” and “American Pie.” This led to an arms race of vulgarity with increasingly rote bursts of taboo-busting along with hilarious landmarks: the contagious vomiting in “Stand By Me,” the hair gel in “There’s Something About Mary,” and the wildly influential “Jackass” franchise. (One of its creators, Jeff Tremaine, is a producer of “Bad Trip.”)

“Bad Trip” is firmly in this tradition, but updated for an era in which reality and fiction increasingly blur. It’s no surprise that Nathan Fielder and Sacha Baron Cohen, who have used the tools of documentary features to expand the palette of comedy, helped consult. “Bad Trip,” which has elements of a buddy movie, a romance and a prank show, spills every imaginable bodily fluid and stomps on delicate sensibilities, but manages to do this with warmth and earned sentiment.

Key to its success is the benevolently mischievous charisma of Eric Andre, an anarchic performer who always seems on the verge of accidental destruction, whether in his standup or his brilliantly experimental talk show. He moves through “Bad Trip” like a giant pane of glass in a silent movie. His fragility earns your sympathy right from the start.

In the first scene, his character, Chris, working at a Florida carwash, chats with a customer when he spots in the distance a woman who was his high school crush. Mouth agape, soupy music in the background, he explains how nervous he feels seeing her, before accidentally stepping toward a vacuum that suddenly sucks off his jump suit. He’s left naked as the girl approaches. He and the woman are actors, but the stranger watching this unfold is not, and this entire stunt is engineered to find comedy in his reaction while setting the gears of the plot in motion. It’s secondhand cringe comedy.

“Bad Trip” is organized around a series of increasingly elaborate set pieces that incorporate the response of real people not in on the joke. They are deftly integrated into a fictional story rooted in relationships that are given room to develop and fill out. Andre has superb chemistry with Lil Rel Howery, who plays his frustrated, sensible friend, Bud Malone, dragooned along for a road trip to find his lost love. They begin by stealing the car of Bud’s sister, performed brilliantly with an unhinged gusto by Tiffany Haddish, who plays off real people just as well as she does professionals.

Sacha Baron Cohen in a scene from “Borat Subsequent Moviefilm.” Like “Bad Trip,” the film relies on prank comedy, but for different purposes.Courtesy Of Amazon Studios/Amazon Studios, via Associated Press

These are some of the funniest comic actors working today, but what gets the biggest laughs here are their interactions with ordinary people. The director Kitao Sakurai (who has staged many episodes of “The Eric Andre Show”) alternates between slick action moviemaking and vérité shots that draw attention to the unscripted element. Just as prank comedy helped “Borat” add a spontaneity and danger to anti-Trump political humor, it does the same for gross-out humor. “Jackass” did this too, but it didn’t have the same narrative conviction.

There are some moments when you really worry for Andre, like when he gets drunk and causes havoc in a country bar. Whereas “Borat” takes a cutting satirical eye to many of the real people the character meets, “Bad Trip” aims for a much more endearing tone, even in its most confrontational scenes. It’s a movie that pingpongs between gross-out and feel-good.

The butt of the joke is usually Andre, and yet the movie is careful to keep the audience on his side. There’s an unexpected innocence here that makes the chaos more palatable. The way the sequences escalate demonstrates an alertness to structure and rhythm. There’s one scene where Haddish, in an orange jumpsuit, sneaks out from under a prison bus and asks a guy on the street for help escaping the police, who ultimately arrive. What follows is a series of chases, a farce that may remind some of classic Charlie Chaplin. But luckily, not too much. “Bad Trip” never wants to be too respectable. After all, who cracks up at good taste?

No mainstream film genre gets less respect than the gross-out comedy — not even its artistic cousin, gory horror, which also traffics in gushing bodily fluids, icky ids and gleeful transgression. There’s no comedy equivalent of the auteur David Cronenberg, who is often hailed for his intellectually challenging blood baths. Critics regularly dismiss gross-out movies as gratuitous and juvenile. Well, duh.

Kids understand some things better than adults, and that includes the comic potential of vomit. Gross-out comedy provokes explosive laughs, in part, because it exercises parts of the sense of humor that were abandoned when we grew up. It evokes the laughter we experienced before learning the proper ways to act. So while transgression is built into these movies, their pleasures are fundamentally nostalgic, which is why they can age poorly, trafficking in retrograde attitudes and tired stereotypes. But they don’t have to.

The best provocateurs pay close attention to shifts in sensitivities. And gross-out connoisseurs can be snobs, too. That’s why for a certain kind of fan, that gorilla scene signals a twisted kind of integrity, a commitment to those with a taste for demented moments of provocation above all else. You need high standards to be that lowbrow.

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India's 'Double Mutant,' What's Driving The COVID-19 Outbreak There : Consider This from NPR - NPR

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Enlarge this image

Indians who lost their lives to COVID-19 are cremated in funeral pyres in New Delhi. The aerial photo was taken on Monday. Jewel Samad/AFP via Getty Images

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Things have gone from bad to worse in the pandemic's global epicenter. India reported nearly 400,000 new COVID-19 cases on Friday — and the death count is likely higher than current estimates. Lauren Frayer, NPR's correspondent in Mumbai, explains why. Follow more of her work here or on Twitter @lfrayer.

The surge in India may be due, in part, to new coronavirus variants circulating in the country. NPR's Michaeleen Doucleff reports on one that's been referred to as a "double mutant."

In participating regions, you'll also hear from local journalists about what's happening in your community.

Email us at considerthis@npr.org.

This episode was produced by Brent Baughman, Brianna Scott and Ashish Valentine. It was edited by Patrick Jarenwattananon, Nishant Dahiya, Lauren Frayer, Michaeleen Doucleff, Rebecca Davis, and Wynne Davis. Engineering help from Dennis Nielsen. Our executive producer is Cara Tallo.

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Pitch your startup to seasoned tech leaders, and a live audience, on Extra Crunch Live - TechCrunch

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TechCrunch is known for its pitch-offs. We’ve had them in cities all over the world, and heard from hundreds of startups who have shared the story of their company on our stages.

We’re excited to be bringing the pitch-off to Extra Crunch Live.

Anyone in the audience on an episode of Extra Crunch Live can virtually “raise their hand” to be selected to pitch in front of the audience and get feedback from our all-star guests.

On ECL, pitch-off startups will have two minutes to tell us about their company. This is the equivalent of an elevator pitch — imagine running into a VC or potential customer at a tech conference like Disrupt or bumping into them at a park. As such, no visual aids are allowed, including decks, videos, demoes, etc.

Essentially, what can you convey with your words, in a short time frame, to get people to both understand your startup and be excited about it?

This is a critical skill, and we’re creating the space for founders to practice and improve.

I’m amped to have Firstmark’s Rick Heitzmann and Orchard founder Court Cunningham as guests on Extra Crunch Live on May 5. This founder/investor duo know exactly what it takes to deliver a great pitch. Do you have what it takes? You can register here for free!

To be selected for the pitch-off, you must be present in the audience during the live show. Instructions on how to raise your hand will come at the top of the show, so don’t be late!

See you on Wednesday!

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Powell's housing market: The good, the bad, and the somewhat unattractive - Powell Tribune

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In April 2020, during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, Park County’s housing market was fairly cool, which wasn’t entirely a surprise. Realtors were having to socially distance and sanitize houses after showings, and there was a lot of economic uncertainty across the world. The expectation was that it could be tough times ahead.

At the time, Eric Paul, broker/owner of Heart Mountain Realty, predicted the summer season, which is normally busier, would see an improvement; John Parsons, co-owner of 307 Real Estate, speculated the strict lockdowns in cities might lead to a growing appreciation for the open spaces of Wyoming. 

They turned out to be right. By the summer, the market was heating up — and it never slowed down. Today, the housing inventory in Powell is at lower levels than anyone can remember. 

“As realtors, we have to be more creative to find those properties, and buyers have to be more prepared and have all their ducks in a row so they can make the purchase seamless,” Parsons said.

In mid-April, Paul said he was down to about a dozen listed residential properties. That excluded farm and ranch and undeveloped lots, but he’s never seen the residential inventory so low.

Parsons agreed the inventory is unusually low, but he added that it’s the nature of the business to always present something unexpected, whether it’s prices, interest rates or inventory.

“One thing about our business is that I don’t know what’s usual, what’s normal anymore,” Parsons said. 

Paul said that as much as a sellers’ market sounds like a nice place to be for a realtor, it has a downside. With 45 to 50 realtors in the Powell market, it creates a lot of competition. Some buyers, unable to find the house they want, are moving on to other locations, he said. 

“I had some buyers stick with me six months or a year, and then they can’t find anything in Powell,” Paul said.

The inventory elsewhere in the Big Horn Basin, including Cody, is not any better, so those prospective residents are moving on to other states, which is one less person or family coming to Park County.

“We got buyers for the inventory, but the problem is unless you’re looking to sell your house and move to another locale,” then the inventory isn’t offering an opportunity, Paul said.

Parsons said there was a time in the mid 1970s to the late 1980s, when an oil and gas boom strained Powell’s inventory.

“Things got tight, but not like this,” he said. “This is just unprecedented.”

    

Moving to Wyoming

A big driver of the sales frenzy for Powell in particular is people moving in from other states — a trend that started with the pandemic. Paul said a lot of the people he serves are not moving from cities, but rather towns of similar sizes. Many of them are coming from northern Colorado and central California. 

“They’re trying to get back to a quality of life that they had 15, 20 years ago,” Paul said. 

Most are retirees, but he’s seen a few professionals who can work remotely buying homes in the area.

Holly Griffin, broker/owner of The Real Estate Connection, said many of her buyers are coming from California, Colorado and Washington. She’s had a few from Florida. She’s not seeing people coming from the Midwest. 

“We do have an excessive amount of buyers right now from people looking to move into Wyoming,” Griffin said. “Finding a property that’s going to work for them is proving to be difficult.”

Parsons is seeing people from all over the West, as well as some from Austin, Texas, who work remotely in the tech industry. 

“We have a very safe, desirable community with great schools, great resources, lots of outdoor recreation, and people are putting a greater value on quality of life,” Parsons said. 

While there are many benefits to people moving into the area, Paul said it contributes to “gridlock” for what are called “move up buyers.” These are people whose first homes are small. Then, as their salaries and families grow, they look to buy something bigger. 

Now, any house in the $350,000 to $400,000 range is going to get a lot of offers from all those well financed people coming from out of state. 

Parsons said buyers, acting with a sense of urgency, are overlooking things they normally wouldn’t. They’re sometimes skipping the inspections or appraisals. 

“They’re waiving all contingencies and making a clean purchase to make their offer more attractive,” Parsons said.

As a result, growing families of long-time Powell residents are stuck in their smaller homes. 

     

Uncorrected market

Paul did an analysis of home prices where they sat in March, averaged out over 10 years, compared to the same a year before. He found about an 11% increase in home prices.

“It’s a true effect of supply and demand,” Paul said. 

Parsons said he’s seeing the increase at 307 Real Estate, too. 

“People are having a little bit of sticker shock because our prices have gone up so much this past year,” he said. “More people are looking at existing [rather] than new, because it offers a better value, but there just isn’t much inventory.”

In response to the demand, home builders are getting work. According to the Federal Reserve Economic Data, new home starts hit a 14-year high in December. This has created a huge demand for lumber, and builders are seeing material prices sky rocket. 

“I’ve never seen anything like this before,” said Scott Shoopman, co-owner of Smooth Edge Custom Construction. “I don’t think we’ve seen a market correction, and it’s going to take a while to catch up.”

In April, Shoopman bought a bunk of oriented strand board (OSB), which is a type of engineered wood similar to particle board. It’s used for flooring and wall and roof sheathing. It cost Shoopman, he said, the same amount as three bunks did last year. 

The National Association of Home Builders estimates that current lumber prices are adding $24,000 to the price tag of a typical new single-family home. 

And the prices are changing very fast. Shoopman said he thinks some contractors might be shying away from bidding jobs because they don’t know what their costs will be. 

Josh Wiggins, co-owner of Wiggins Construction, said they’re giving their customers estimates that are valid for a few days, whereas they used to be good for a couple weeks, 

“We’re really protecting ourselves right now,” Wiggins said.  

He said it’s not all materials. Shingle prices, for example, are fairly stable, and their suppliers are doing a good job of telling them what to expect in the way of prices. Yet, business is booming in the housing industry, so until supply catches up to demand, the prices are going to continue to rise.

“As much business as we want, we can have it,” Wiggins said. 

There is some new home building going on in Powell, including the Cottonwood Subdivision, which Harvell Construction is building. It’s a three-phase development that is projected to be over 100 homes when it’s complete. However, that could take several years, with a first phase of 15 homes. 

Paul said most of the recent building in Powell is custom homes, meaning they’re being built for a buyer and not creating new inventory for prospective buyers.

Parsons concurred that most of the current building isn’t creating new inventory. 

    

A good problem

Besides the Powell office, 307 Real Estate has offices in Cody, Buffalo and Sheridan. Parsons said the strain on housing inventory is across their northern Wyoming markets. While the dollar has lost some value, interest rates remain low and so buying power is high. 

Parsons estimates that over the next 12 to 18 months, the bigger builders are going to get in on the action and start catching up to demand. However, he cautioned that there are a lot of unknowns, and it’s hard to say exactly what will happen.

For the time being, Parsons, Paul, Griffin and the other realtors in the area are making the most of a tough but good situation. The competition is hot, but they all reported record years last year.

To match her buyers up with houses, Griffin said she keeps in touch with people who are possibly looking to sell, putting “feelers out” in hopes she can find a house.

The sellers are “not always responsive, because if they sell, they’d have nowhere to move to,” Griffin said. “Sometimes we get lucky and we can make it happen. Right now, everyone is on their toes, watching for a property to come available. And when it does, they’ll get multiple offers on it very quickly.”

Parsons said over at 307, they’re keeping positive. 

“It’s been phenomenal for us as a real estate company,” he said. “We have to be creative, and you have to educate your buyers so they have all their tools ready to go when you do find that place.”

And now, as they creep up on their major selling season, they’re preparing for another record year. 

“We got a good team. We’re doing well,” Parsons said. “It’s hard, it is. But it’s hard for good reasons.”

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Trademark Re-Filing and Bad Faith CJEU Hasbro Ruling - The National Law Review

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On 21 April 2021, the General Court of the European Union refused Hasbro’s appeal to overturn a decision that partially invalidated its EU trade mark for MONOPOLY on the ground of acting in bad faith when filing the application. The judgement by the General Court has ramifications for brand owners in both the law of bad faith but also in the practice of evergreening (repeatedly filing for an identical mark covering a broad specification of classes as the period of protection for the mark draws to an end).

Background

As we have discussed in a previous alert, Hasbro Inc. is the owner of the renowned board game Monopoly and in 2011 registered a EUTM for the word MONOPOLY for goods and services in classes 9, 16, 28 and 41. Kreativini Dogadaji d.o.o (KD) a Croatian board game company filed an application for invalidation of the trade mark in 2015 arguing that the mark had been registered in bad faith on the grounds that the mark was a repeat filing of three identical earlier trade mark registrations for MONOPOLY. The EUIPO initially rejected KD’s request but the Board of Appeal decided that Hasbro had acted in bad faith in its 2011 filing and partially cancelled the 2011 registration in respect of those identical goods and services to those covered by earlier registrations. Hasbro then appealed to the General Court. Please see our previous alert for more background on the definition of bad faith in trade mark applications.

General Court Ruling

Hasbro’s appeal argued that the Monopoly board game was “so famous that it would be fanciful to suggest it has not used the trade mark in connection with games” and that “requiring it to prove use of that mark in connection with board games in invalidity proceedings would result in its incurring significant costs”. It added that the EUIPO would be “swamped in cases in which bad faith would be invoked with regard to any re-filed mark covering identical or similar goods or services”.

In response, the General Court determined that whether or not Hasbro could actually prove such use was irrelevant as it is the intention of the applicant for a mark which is to be evaluated. The General Court rejected Hasbro’s ‘swamped in cases’ argument on the basis it was speculation and not substantiated by any specific evidence.

A key part of the General Court’s ruling was that Hasbro had admitted to the Board of Appeal that staving off having to prove use of the Monopoly logo was one of the advantages of its refiling strategy. The General Court determined that it was Hasbro’s intentions, combined with its actions, that put the company’s trade mark registration at risk. The admission by Hasbro regarding their strategy of the repeat filings appears to have been particularly detrimental to their case and such an admission is one other brand owners would do well to avoid in future. Brand owners should also remember that the burden of proof will still lie with the party that is trying to prove invalidity, Hasbro’s admission appears to have resulted in the exception to that rule in this case.

Key takeaways

The ruling does raise questions and problems for brand owners with large portfolios of trade marks and who engage in evergreening to protect their marks. However the fact that the General Court said that refiling an EU trade mark does not automatically amount to bad faith should provide some comfort to brand owners. Applicants for trade marks which have previously been filed should ensure they can demonstrate a good reason why the trade mark has not been used in order to justify a refiling and maintain comprehensive evidence of use of their marks as well as documenting the reasons why the refiling strategy is pursued in order to avoid a finding of bad faith against their applications.

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Copyright 2021 K & L GatesNational Law Review, Volume XI, Number 120

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Is HIIT bad for you? The downsides of high-intensity workouts - CNET

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High-intensity interval training (HIIT) has a lot of good going for it. Studies show that HIIT workouts can burn more calories in less time than other types of workouts, specifically steady-state exercise such as jogging. In fact, one study suggests HIIT can produce the same health benefits as moderate-intensity continuous exercise in half the time. 

Other research proves HIIT to be a helpful tool for reducing resting blood pressure, increasing VO2 max, losing body fat and other benefits.

Given the benefits and that "lack of time" is one of the most common excuses for skipping out on exercise, it makes sense that HIIT has become a popular form of exercise. 

However, as the saying goes, too much of a good thing is a bad thing. 

Overdoing any type of exercise can spell damage for your body, but with HIIT, it's important to be especially cautious. Recent research has shown that performing too much high-intensity exercise may undo the very benefits you started doing it for in the first place. 

Defining HIIT

HIIT generally involves short bursts of near-maximal effort followed by short rest intervals.

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The term "HIIT" has become pretty ambiguous, and it means different things to different people. The definition of HIIT varies even in the scientific literature that studies this form of exercise. 

In general, HIIT has come to be defined as exercise characterized by short, vigorous bursts of energy followed by short rest periods. A classic and simple example of HIIT is 30 seconds of running, 30 seconds of resting. 

HIIT was initially a way to improve aerobic fitness and was generally only used by athletes to increase their capacity for running, cycling, swimming or other forms of cardio. But in the fitness industry, HIIT encompasses everything from straight conditioning to high-volume weightlifting to CrossFit-like workouts. 

What happens when you do too much HIIT

Too much HIIT can leave your body depleted. 

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"HIIT is very taxing on the body, hence the 'intensity' in the name," says Lee Jay, a personal trainer based in Tel Aviv. "For all of its benefits, HIIT can sometimes cause more harm than good." 

Below are six ways too much HIIT wrecks your body. 

Cortisol levels spike

Exercise, although usually a good stressor, is still a stressor. 

"HIIT can push our bodies to limits that spike our cortisol levels," Jay says. "As the primary stress hormone in the body, cortisol is involved in how our body handles 'fight or flight.' Although short-term spikes can help our body grow stronger, too high an increase over longer periods can result in a number of unwanted side effects, including digestive issues, bloating and weight gain." 

Such intense exercise can also cause lasting anxiety outside of your workouts, Jay points out, as the body's natural stress responses remain heightened due to the intensity. "The key is to achieve an optimal balance in hormone levels by interspersing intense exercise with enough rest and downtime," Jay says. 

Glycogen stores deplete

During exercise, your body first uses fuel that's available for quick processing. First goes free-circulating sugar in your blood and then it uses glycogen, the form of carbohydrates stored in your muscles and liver. 

Your body replenishes glycogen stores during rest, but if you never rest long enough between HIIT workouts, those stores will struggle to become fully replenished. Low glycogen can make you feel slower and weaker during workouts, and it can also negatively affect the way your body recovers from exercise. 

More HIIT is not the answer.

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Sleep becomes elusive

Exercise can improve sleep, but too much can cause sleep disturbances. 

"Given its intensity, bashing out a HIIT session too close to bed may not serve you well as your body is running on adrenaline, making it harder to settle down for some shut-eye," Jay says, although the effects of nighttime exercise differ among people. 

More impactful than timing is chronic elevation of adrenal hormones, as I mentioned earlier. "Raising your cortisol levels to a constant high, and without a natural rise and fall, can hinder steady sleep," Jay says. 

If you find yourself unable to switch off or waking repeatedly during the night, it may be time to cut back on exercise, she emphasizes.

Metabolism is disrupted

A 2021 study on the effects of HIIT found something spooky, but not so surprising considering what we already know about HIIT and hormones. 

The volunteers in the study experienced improved health and performance in the beginning of the study, but once they ramped up to doing HIIT workouts five days per week, things changed. Participants showed mitochondrial impairment (meaning, mitochondria weren't producing enough energy to power cells optimally) as well as disturbances in blood sugar and insulin production. 

In short, excessive amounts of high-intensity exercise disrupted their metabolism. 

Joints are taxed

Excessive HIIT really becomes a problem when exercise technique is an issue, Jay says. 

"When form is inconsistent, our joints may become misaligned which puts strain on the wrong parts of the body, leading to unwanted injuries," she explains. 

This is especially true for HIIT workouts that involve plyometrics or other explosive, high-impact movements. Those with sensitive joints or health conditions that affect the joints and bones, such as arthritis or osteoporosis, should take care to limit hard landings.

Very high impact movements, such as box jumps, burpees and jumping lunges, pose a greater risk for pain and injury if done incorrectly. 

High-impact movements are especially taxing.

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Demotivation persists

"Too much intensity can eventually lead to burnout and demotivation to exercise," Jay points out. If you overdo HIIT, you may find yourself dreading your workouts and ultimately skipping them, at which point you're not getting any of the health benefits of exercise. 

Forcing yourself to push through HIIT workouts you don't want to do isn't healthy, either. Instead, keep other, gentler exercise ideas in your back pocket and utilize them when HIIT just doesn't feel right. 

How often should you do HIIT?

Ideally, HIIT shouldn't constitute the bulk of your weekly workout routine. 

Many experts advise to opt for at least one rest or low-intensity day in between your HIIT workouts, amounting to two to three intense workouts a week -- and lasting no more than 30 minutes (rest, warmup and cool-down time included). 

The American Council on Exercise suggests performing HIIT one to two times a week in order to reduce the risk of injury, and to incorporate it periodically for six-week spells in order to maximize its benefits and enhance the results of other forms of exercise, such as strength training.

It's understandable that many people believe adding more exercise to their week will result in more results, Jay says. But the truth is, exercise is only one factor in living a healthy lifestyle. It goes hand in hand with diet, rest and personal well-being. 

Proactively add gentle, restorative exercise to your routine. 

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"If we continuously push our bodies past our capabilities, we're at risk of burnout, losing motivation and injury," Jay says. "In reality, very few of us need to follow a strict program. If your HIIT workouts are making you feel more low than high, it may be time to reevaluate your program."

Think about your goals and look to other forms of exercise to meet these. Low-intensity aerobic workouts, resistance training, yoga, pilates and outdoor activities are all effective forms of exercise that can bring powerful results. 

If you want to maintain some form of HIIT in your routine, Jay suggests incorporating shorter bursts, such as a couple of five-minute interval workouts in between weightlifting or aerobic sessions. Another option is to reduce your HIIT sessions to once a week and supplement with another rest day to give your body time to restore. 

You can also take a few months off of HIIT completely if you already feel like you're overtraining, and slowly reintroduce short intervals back into your workouts.

"Remember, HIIT is not for everyone," Jay says. "We each respond to exercise in our own unique way. Ultimately, if you want to keep your body moving long term, it's more important to stick to what you love, rather than what you think you should be doing."

The information contained in this article is for educational and informational purposes only and is not intended as health or medical advice. Always consult a physician or other qualified health provider regarding any questions you may have about a medical condition or health objectives.

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