It’s Monday, which means that Alex and Grace were back as a team to cover the biggest, boldest and baddest technology news. We are once again back with your weekly kickoff! Here’s what we got into:

• More on the potential M&A boom this week, in light of this ftx-on-the-hunt-for-acquisition-targets-as-market-crashes.html">recent CNBC piece that got my mind turning. Sure, this is kinda like the CVC story we've been tracking but a bit more focused.
• China's venture capital market is taking body-blows, albeit from recent highs. Still, it is more than easy to track the country's regulatory crackdown to falling venture capital activity.
• Strong Compute raised money, highlighting the fact that early-stage companies can still raise, and that there could be huge unlocks coming in ML model training. Which would be good for all of us.
• And is on-demand pricing on the way out? Things aren't looking good for the model that once challenged the incumbency of SaaS.

Woo! Equity is live this Thursday, so come hang with us on Twitter Spaces or Hopin, yeah? Chat then!

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.