‘The Ultimatum’ and social fintech have more in common than you’d think

This week was TechCrunch Early Stage, so Natasha and Alex got together - in person - to record the episode for the very first time. Shout out to Grace for somehow helping us figure out a tech set up in the middle of a sold out event.

We started with a recap of TechCrunch Early Stage so far, but check out TechCrunch+ for posts about every single panel next week. Pro listener tip: use code "EQUITY" for a solid discount, for your TechCrunch+ subscription.Then we of course pivoted to Elon, who is still making news about his newest fixation Twitter. This time, we led with the fact that he's trying to buy the whole darn thing.Deel made news with an ARR number that actually had some weight behind it, which got us thinking more about remote work bets.We had to talk about Braid, a new social fintech startup that wants to make shared wallets easier. We got into crypto culture without the coins, and then it took a turn when we started getting into Love is Blind and The Ultimatum.Finally, we ended the show with SoftBank's latest pivot: a spin out of its early-stage LatAm fund into a new firm called Upload Ventures.

And with that, we are back Monday morning. Chat soon!

Credits: Equity is produced by Theresa Loconsolo with editing by Kell. Bryce Durbin is our Illustrator. We'd also like to thank the audience development team and Henry Pickavet, who manages TechCrunch audio products.