Hi there, 

Here is this week in charts.

5-quarter decline. Venture funding fell 13% quarter-over-quarter in Q1’23 to hit its lowest level since Q4’19. This marked a whopping 68% drop from its peak in 2021. Notably, Q1’23 funding was inflated by Stripe’s $6.5B mega-round. If you exclude this deal from the mix, funding declined 22% over the first 3 months of 2023. With less funding available, startups are finding it more difficult to break into the $1B+ unicorn club. Just 13 new unicorns were born last quarter — the lowest birth count in 6 years. CB Insights customers can dive deeper into funding activity, unicorn performance, investor behavior, and more in our State of Venture Q1’23 Report.

Exposure. What type of jobs stand to be the most affected by language-based AI? Higher-wage occupations are more exposed than their lower-wage counterparts, according to research conducted by OpenAI, OpenResearch, and the University of Pennsylvania. When it comes to specific job functions, some of the positions most vulnerable to the introduction of large language models (LLMs) include accountants, auditors, and mathematicians. We explore how tech giants like Microsoft are leaning into the generative AI rush in this report.

Take my money. US consumers are increasingly turning to social media platforms like TikTok to start their online shopping search. The share of consumers beginning their journey on an e-commerce site like Amazon or a search engine, on the other hand, is shrinking. This trend aligns with the broader embrace of social commerce — an approach involving the direct sale of products and services through social media platforms. Discover 82 early-stage companies enabling brands, retailers, and individual sellers to take advantage of the practice in this market map.

Do you trust me? Three out of 4 US adults who have heard of cryptocurrencies have little to no confidence in their safety and reliability, according to a March 2023 survey. Only 6% of US adults with knowledge of cryptocurrency have a high level of confidence in trading, using, or investing in them. This divide breaks down differently across different age groups. US adults aged 50+, for example, are less confident in crypto than younger generations. This low level of confidence is likely driven in part by FTX’s collapse last year, and we cover what this means for the future of crypto and blockchain as a whole in this briefing.

Sea to shining sea. US housing market performance looks drastically different from coast to coast. In January 2023, the 12 major housing markets west of Texas all posted year-over-year declines in home prices. However, eastern metro areas (with the exception of Austin) watched prices climb over the same period. In a sharp reversal from the past couple of decades, some of the cities with the strongest connections to the tech industry (e.g., San Francisco, San Jose, and Seattle) experienced the most drastic year-over-year price drops.

Sigh. X-axis marks the chart crime. 

I love you. 

Anand

@asanwal

P.S. Fintech funding dropped 46% year-over-year in 2022. So what’s next? Join us on May 4 to dive into key fintech investment trends to watch.

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