Plus, Columbia University fell from No. 2 to No. 18 in this year's college rankings.
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U.S. inflation rose 8.3% in August compared to a year ago. Inflation declined from 8.5% reported in July and from 9.1% reported in June. Core CPI, which excludes food and energy prices, rose 6.3% in August compared to last year, up from 5.9% reported in June and July. More: - On a month-to-month basis, core CPI rose 0.6% in August.
- Gasoline prices rose 25.6% in August compared to last year but fell 10.6% in August from July.
- According to the American Automobile Association, the national average price for regular gas was $3.71 per gallon on Tuesday, down nearly 30% from its June peak.
- Food prices rose 11.4% in August compared to last year and rose 0.8% month to month.
- U.S. stocks fell following the prices report:
- By 3 p.m. ET, the Dow was down more than 1,000 points, or 3.16%.
- The S&P 500 declined 3.49%, and the Nasdaq fell 4.33%.
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Gay dating app Grindr has named a new management team as it prepares to go public through a SPAC merger planned for later this year. On Oct 19, George Arison, the founder of online sales firm Shift, will become CEO of the dating app. Former Disney Streaming CFO Vanna Krantz will become the company’s new CFO. More: - In May, Grindr announced it was going public via a SPAC merger with Tiga Acquisition Corp.
- The deal valued Grindr at $2.1B.
- Arison has previously noted that going public was the right move for Grindr right now.
- He has been on Grindr’s board since May.
- If the merger is completed, existing Grindr shareholders will own 78% of the company.
- Grindr will receive $384M in net proceeds from the deal, which it plans to use $137M to pay down its debt.
- Grindr has more than 11 million monthly active users, of which 723,000 are paying customers.
- Grindr said its revenue rose 30% YoY in 2021 to $147M.
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Uber and its subsidiary Raiser LLC have agreed to pay New Jersey more than $100M in back taxes after the state said the company misclassified its drivers. The new amount is much lower than the nearly $650M the state had accused Uber of owing in 2019. New Jersey said Uber improperly classified its drivers as independent contractors. More: - New Jersey's labor department said its audits found that Uber had misclassified hundreds of thousands of drivers as independent contractors.
- As a result, the ride-hailing company didn't make the required payments for unemployment, temporary disability, and workforce development.
- The New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce Development and the state attorney general's office said the company has paid $79M in unemployment taxes and fines.
- Uber also paid $22M in interest to the state.
- Uber and other ride-hailing firms tend to classify their drivers as gig-economy workers or independent contractors.
- Uber shares were down ~3% by afternoon trading.
NOTE: Inside.com founder and CEO Jason Calacanis is an investor in Uber.
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Connected fitness company Peloton said its co-founder and current board chairman John Foley and other executives are leaving the company. Foley has led the company since its founding 10 years ago; he stepped down from the CEO role and transitioned to executive chairman in February. Barry McCarthy, a former CFO at Spotify and Netflix, succeeded Foley. More: - Peloton has struggled this year with low demand for its fitness equipment following its peak during the pandemic.
- Foley resigned from the role of executive chairman on Monday and will be succeeded by Karen Boone, a former executive at Restoration Hardware.
- Boone has been a Peloton board member since 2019.
- Peloton also announced that its chief legal officer, Hisao Kushi, and its chief commercial officer, Kevin Cornils, are leaving the company.
- Peloton shares were down ~10% during afternoon trading; the stock is down more than 70% YTD.
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Former Walt Disney CEO Robert Iger joined venture capital firm Thrive Capital as a partner. He will advise on day-to-day initiatives, including mentoring startup founders and identifying new investment opportunities. More: - Thrive Capital was founded in 2009 by Joshua Kushner, a former Goldman Sachs banker and the younger brother of former Trump White House adviser Jared Kushner.
- The VC firm has backed many well-known startups, including Instagram, Spotify, Robinhood, and Stripe.
- Thrive raised $3B for two funds in February: $2.5B for its later-stage growth fund and $500M for a new early-stage fund.
- Iger stepped down from the role of CEO of Disney in February 2020 and left the role of board chairman in December 2021.
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According to internal research at Meta Platforms, Instagram Reels is lagging behind TikTok. When Meta, formerly Facebook, launched Reels in 2020, it was marketed as a competitor to the popular short-video social platform TikTok. The research document, titled "Creators x Reels State of the Union 2022," was published internally in August. More: - The research revealed Instagram users spent less than one-tenth of the time on Reels compared to TikTok users on that platform.
- Instagram users spend about 17.6 million hours a day watching Reels, while TikTok users spend 197.8 million hours a day on its platform.
- The research also revealed that engagement on Reels had been falling; it was down 13.6% over the previous four weeks.
- Meta spokeswoman Devi Narasimhan said the data on viewing hours were outdated and not the global scope.
- She noted that Reels engagement is currently up on a month-to-month basis.
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- Twitter shareholders voted to approve Elon Musk’s $44B takeover of the social media company. The vote comes as Musk has been trying to terminate the deal, citing doubt over the amount of spam and fake accounts on the platform.
- Columbia University fell from No. 2 to No. 18 in this year’s U.S. News & World Report college rankings. On Friday, the university admitted to reporting incorrect figures in two categories for the ranking. The latest ranking was released on Monday.
- The Detroit auto show is returning this week after a three-year absence but is not getting many of the major car companies. Industry executives said that auto shows have seen a decline in attendance, and automakers would rather spend their marketing dollars elsewhere.
- On Monday, Twitter said Elon Musk’s attempt to cancel the $44B takeover deal due to the social media company’s $7.75M settlement payment to whistleblower Peiter “Mudge” Zatko is invalid. In a letter on Friday, Musk’s legal team claimed the severance payment to Zatko is another breach of the takeover agreement.
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 |  | Vanessa Omeokachie is a Freelance Writer for Inside.com. She writes the Inside Business and Inside Cloud newsletters. Her interests include finance, technology, and entrepreneurship. In her free time, she enjoys reading, hiking, attending concerts and music festivals, exploring cities, and traveling. Connect with her on Twitter @VanessaOmeo or on LinkedIn. |   | | Editor | Aaron Crutchfield is based in the high desert of California. Over the last two decades, he has spent time writing and editing at various local newspapers and defense contractors in California. When he's not working, he can often be found looking at the latest memes with his kids or working on his 1962 and 1972 Fords. | |
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