Good morning and welcome to Wednesday. For those unfamiliar with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s backstory, it’s quite a doozy.

Zelensky is a former comedian who was best known for starring in a television show about accidentally becoming Ukraine's president, and then won the support of his people in a real-life election and actually became Ukraine's president in 2019.

Six years earlier, the dystopian futuristic UK show Black Mirror released an episode about a comedian who runs for office as a joke and almost gets elected.

I guess we know how the next election for British Prime Minister will play out…

🚀⏰ Ready, Set, Go: Today’s news takes 4.55 minutes to read.

Quick format note: We usually put the Dose of Discussion section further down in the email, but the topic we’re tackling is Russia, Ukraine and Rising Geopolitical Tensions... so we decided to put it front-and-center.

"Care about what other people think and you will always be their prisoner."

–Lao Tzu (b. 571 B.C.)

After announcing he would recognize two breakaway “republics” in eastern Ukraine on Monday evening, Russian President Vladimir Putin deployed an unknown number of troops to the regions for "peace keeping" operations.

The White House said the move means Russia is officially invading Ukraine. Yesterday, President Biden announced the “first tranche” of retaliatory sanctions on two Russian banks and the country's sovereign debt, and promised more sanctions targeting its elites and their family members would come today.

🇺🇦 A deeper dive… The two breakaway areas make up ~⅓ of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. They were created after Russia instigated a separatist war in eastern Ukraine in 2014, though Moscow has consistently denied its involvement.

• Putin on Tuesday said he believes the two republics should include the entire Donetsk and Luhansk regions, not just the area currently controlled by separatists.

🌏 Around the world: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky projected calm on Tuesday, saying he believes “there will be no mass war against Ukraine, and no broad escalation by the Russian Federation” but will declare martial law if there is.

• Germany suspended the $11 billion Nord Stream 2 pipeline designed to double the flow of Russian gas into the country, which was finished in September but has stood idle pending EU and German certification.
• UK PM Boris Johnson announced the “first barrage” of sanctions against Russia, targeting five banks and three “very high net worth” Russian oligarchs.
• The EU agreed to new sanctions, also chiefly targeting Russian banks and their ability to operate internationally.

🛢️📈 Market reaction… All three major US indexes were down over 1% yesterday, with the S&P 500 closing in correction territory (down at least 10% from a recent peak). Global energy prices jumped nearly 5% amid fears the conflict could stop the flow of Russian gas into Europe.

This week, we decided to split the 360° view to bring you opinions "From the US" and "From the World" – including Ukraine and Russia.

⚖️ The three men sentenced to life in prison for the murder of 25-year-old Black man Ahmaud Arbery were found guilty of federal hate crimes and attempted kidnapping by a jury yesterday.

• The guilty verdict means jurors found the three white men acted “because of Mr. Arbery’s race and color” when they chased and shot him while he was jogging through their neighborhood near Brunswick, GA, exactly two years ago today.
• The three men were convicted last November for Arbery’s murder. Father and son Gregory and Travis McMichael were sentenced to life in prison without parole, and their neighbor William Bryan was sentenced to life with the possibility of parole.
• Prosecutors initially declined to pursue the case, but eventually brought charges after a video of the killing went viral in May 2020. Last fall, Georgia’s AG indicted the local DA for misconduct related to Arbery’s murder.
• The case also inspired the passage of a new hate-crime law in Georgia for incidents where the victim was selected based on their race, religion, sexual identification or other bias.

+Dig deeper: From the Left | From the Right

🪞🐟 Fish may be self-aware, according to the results of a study published last week in the peer-reviewed journal PLOS Biology, which follows up on a controversial 2019 study claiming the same thing.

• In both studies, a team of Japanese researchers subjected a type of fish called the cleaner wrasse to a famous experiment known as the mark test (or mirror test).

⚙️ How it works...

• An artificial mark is placed on an animal while it’s ​​anesthetized in a place where it wouldn’t normally see.
• When the animal comes to, it’s given access to a mirror.
• If the animal inspects the mark on its body, or tries to touch it or remove it, that suggests the animal recognizes itself in the mirror and is self-aware.

📸 The big picture: A handful of mammals and birds have passed the mark test, including magpies, chimpanzees and dolphins. These researchers are the first to claim that a fish has done so, too.

But their initial 2019 study drew pushback from the scientific community, with some suggesting the tests fell short of establishing mirror self-recognition.

• Per the researchers, this updated study was intended to address the critiques of their previous work, and that the new results “increase our confidence” in the initial conclusions.

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They answered the call after identifying the disproportionate effect the pandemic was having on women's employment, income, and financial health. TheWMarketplace is founded by an all-woman team, and every product or service on the platform is woman-owned. (Read their full story here!)

And when we consider the facts, it’s a good thing a solution came sooner than later.

🔢 By the numbers…

• Women are responsible for 83% of household purchasing decisions.
• 1,800 businesses in the US are started by women every day.
• 17% of Black women are either running or starting a new business.
• 50% of business owners in Latin America and the Caribbean are women.

And one more:

• Only 2.4% of all venture capital funding goes to companies with all-female founding teams. 🤔

This month, TheWMarketplace is highlighting The Black Woman-Owned Collection.

• Make sure to also check out Ava's Pet Palace and Mia's Treats Delight, two businesses founded by Black teens!

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🏥 Mayo Clinic announced $785 million worth of new construction projects across three states. Since 2016, Mayo has invested more than $1 billion in major construction projects, and the clinic says it will have doubled its space in a decade with new facilities for patient care, research, education and technology.

🧬 Pharma giant Eli Lilly announced plans to invest $700 million to build the Lilly Institute for Genetic Medicine in Boston’s Seaport district. 

• The new institute is part of a broader strategy aiming to develop new genetic medicines, and builds on last year’s $880 million acquisition of Prevail Therapeutics, a clinical-stage biotech company whose lead program is a gene therapy for Parkinson’s disease. 
• Researchers in both locations will work together to use RNA and DNA-based technologies to develop new therapies.

🛠 Home Depot’s stock tumbled ~10% in afternoon trading after reporting Q4 earnings. Short, colloquial explanation: Dads keep buying more home improvement stuff for now, but it’s not making the company as much money. 

• Longer, more official explanation: Fiscal results beat expectations and the company raised its dividend, but reported gross margin that fell and provided a less than enthusiastic profit outlook. (Question: is it possible to read this story without hearing the jingle in your head?)

• ☝️ The fire onboard the Felicity Ace – a 60,000-ton merchant ship loaded with thousands of luxury cars – is starting to recede, which could allow salvage crews to begin towing as early as today; the collective value of the cars is estimated at $401 million.

BUSINESS & MARKETS

• 📱 Meta launched Reels, its short-form video product, for all global Facebook users yesterday and introduced several new features for advertisers.
• 🚫🌐 Technical glitches at Slack and Peloton left tens of thousands of users without service for several hours yesterday.
• ​​​​🏘️ New housing units under construction rose to their highest levels in nearly 50 years, though supply chain issues continue to leave a backlog of unfinished houses; separately, US home prices rose 18.8% in 2021, the largest increase in 34 years.

SPORTS, MEDIA & ENTERTAINMENT

• ⚽ The US Soccer Federation reached a $24 million settlement with dozens of members of the US women’s national team over claims of unequal pay based on gender; the ‘surprise’ move comes after a federal judge dismissed the players’ equal pay arguments in 2020.
• 🏀 University of Michigan basketball coach Juwan Howard was fined $40,000 and suspended for the rest of the regular season after he struck an opposing coach in the face following a game against the University of Wisconsin this weekend.
• 🍎 Apple is re-releasing its Oscar-nominated film CODA in theaters across all major US cities for free this Friday thru Sunday.

SCIENCE, SPACE & EMERGING TECH

• 📻 Spotify's "Car Thing”, the company’s first hardware device, is now on sale for $90.
• 🪙🏈 ​​BuyTheBroncos is a newly-formed DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization) looking to bring together sports fans, pro athletes and crypto enthusiasts to raise $4+ billion to buy the Denver Broncos.

BEST OF THE REST

• 📉 US Covid cases have dropped 90% from a pandemic record set five weeks ago.
• ​​🇨🇴 Colombia’s Constitutional Court voted to legalize abortion until the 24th week of pregnancy. (From the Left | From the Right)
• ⚖️ The Supreme Court agreed to hear a case brought by a Colorado web designer who says she should not have to design wedding sites for same-sex couples; it also declined to hear former President Trump's bid to block the January 6 committee from acquiring some of his White House records. (From the Left | From the Right)

💬 Quoted… “[A]bsent an immediate course correction, the party is headed for a wipeout in November, up and down the ballot."

Former NY Mayor and presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg had an apocalyptic warning for Democrats in an editorial published yesterday by the news org that bears his name.

🔢 Stat of the day: A new poll from Gallup and the Knight Foundation found just 33% of Americans are paying attention to national news – down from 54% when the poll was last administered in November 2020.

🤯 Did you know?… The term ‘computer bug’ was first coined in 1947 when famed programmer Grace Hopper discovered her computational errors were the result of a moth trapped inside the hardware of an early device.

📖 Worth a read… A Real-Life ‘Queen’s Gambit’ – the Brazilian Maid Who Became a Chess Champ → (WSJ)

What should the US do about the Ukraine/Russia situation?

Deploy troops/equipment to Ukraine and defend it from further invasion

Stay out of any military conflict, but impose sanctions on Russia/Putin

Nothing, it’s not our problem

Unsure/Other

+Note: A written response isn't required – all you need to do is click one of the links above and your vote is recorded. Poll results and the best comments for each response will be featured in tomorrow's newsletter.

After losing her sweet cat Tin Tin earlier this year, five-year-old Nevaeh Lowe decided to send him a letter in heaven.

• Knowing she wouldn't get a reply, Nevaeh's mom Tamara still encouraged her daughter to send the letter through the post, hoping it would bring her the closure she needed. 

💌🐱 You've got mail... They were both shocked when, a few weeks later, Neveah received a parcel with a letter from Tin Tin in heaven, along with a small stuffed animal and a book. 

The postman who wrote Neveah back simply wanted to make the whole process a little earlier for her. 

• "I was gobsmacked when the parcel arrived. It was so moving to open it with Nevaeh," shared Tamara. "I think she really needed some closure so she could start to move on after Tin Tin, and what this postman has done really did that for us." 

It’s called Positive DONUT, and we think you should check it out.

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🎶📱 Let’s get musical… Put the following songs in order of their total Spotify streams, lowest to highest. Bonus points if you can name the all-time most streamed song on the platform. (Hint: it’s not listed below.)

A) “Locked Out of Heaven” by Bruno Mars

B) “drivers license” by Olivia Rodrigo

C) “Lucid Dreams” by Juice WRLD

D) “Don’t Start Now” by Dua Lipa

🤔 Daily Trivia: When you spin a penny (not flip), which side is more likely to land face up?

keep scrolling for the answers

Check out our referral prizes you can get just for introducing people you know to this newsletter. 👇

Here’s your unique link to copy & send to anyone you think would like the DONUT:

Streaming order: Locked Out of Heaven (978M), drivers license (1.3B), Don’t Start Now (1.80B), Lucid Dreams (1.89B)

+Bonus: The most streamed song on Spotify is “Shape of You” by Ed Sheeran, with more than 3 billion listens.

Trivia: Tails, since the heads side weighs slightly more.