(Jon Cherry/Getty Images) |
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Looking for a job in finance might be harder than finding a 6'5 man in finance: Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan have cut their entry-level-analyst openings as internship opportunities shrink. Stock moves were muted yesterday ahead of this week's Big Tech earnings (Microsoft's set to report today). The Fed's expected to hold interest rates steady at its meeting tomorrow. |
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Fort Knoxchain… Donald Trump wants the US to HODL bitcoin. The former prez made his pitch Saturday at Bitcoin 2024, a crypto conference in Nashville, Tennessee. Trump said that if elected to a second term, he'd create a "strategic national bitcoin stockpile" starting with the crypto that Uncle Sam already holds: the gov't has 164K BTC worth $8.8B (seized by law enforcement). The announcement was part of Trump's effort to rally the crypto constituency: |
- Fired up: Trump said he'd fire SEC Chair Gary Gensler, who in recent years has led a crypto crackdown. Gensler's term ends in 2026.
- Buy in: After Trump's speech, Wyoming Republican Sen. Cynthia Lummis said she'd introduce legislation that'd see the Treasury buy 1M BTC over five years to create a "strategic bitcoin reserve." She doesn't think it'll pass this year.
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Uncle Sam the crypto whale… has investors seeing $$. The price of bitcoin popped 7% to a six-week high after Trump's talk, nearly hitting $70K on his pro-crypto reelection promises. The crypto cherry on top: on Saturday the Financial Times reported that Vice President Kamala Harris' team reached out to crypto cos like Coinbase, Circle, and Ripple for a relationship "reset." Crypto fans say the Biden admin has been antagonistic to the industry. |
- One step back: Bitcoin's price slipped yesterday as investors eyed the potential sale of $2B worth of BTC held by the US gov't (standard policy after seizures).
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The crypto constituency has arrived… With Trump and (reportedly) Harris trying to woo the crypto vote ahead of November's US presidential election, the industry is factoring into reelection strategies across the political spectrum. It's not playing around: three new pro-crypto PACs — Fairshake, Defend American Jobs, and Protect Progress — have raised $230M+. |
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This factory of the future could help solve the housing crisis |
Coming up short… The US simply doesn't build enough homes, with a shortage of ~4-7 million. But what if we could make affordable housing as efficiently as Ford and Tesla can make cars? Out-of-the-box solution: BOXABL is answering that question with the Casita, a 361 sq. ft. factory-made housing unit that can be unpacked and stacked to create kitchens, bathrooms, and more. BOXABL has plans for an entire system of stackable rooms (protected by 63 patent filings) that connect to form whole buildings. BOXABL has notched up 190,000+ Casita reservations*, which is currently selling across 12 states. With 3 functioning factory buildings and next-gen automation equipment currently being installed, BOXABL is ready to scale — so the company is now welcoming all investors to buy shares at $0.80 each.** |
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This factory of the future could help solve the housing crisis |
Coming up short… The US simply doesn't build enough homes, with a shortage of ~4-7 million. But what if we could make affordable housing as efficiently as Ford and Tesla can make cars? Out-of-the-box solution: BOXABL is answering that question with the Casita, a 361 sq. ft. factory-made housing unit that can be unpacked and stacked to create kitchens, bathrooms, and more. BOXABL has plans for an entire system of stackable rooms (protected by 63 patent filings) that connect to form whole buildings. BOXABL has notched up 190,000+ Casita reservations*, which is currently selling across 12 states. With 3 functioning factory buildings and next-gen automation equipment currently being installed, BOXABL is ready to scale — so the company is now welcoming all investors to buy shares at $0.80 each.** |
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Scraping off scrapers… The cat-and-mouse game of AI bots and bot blockers is getting more complicated. AI web crawlers — bots that scan and scrape content to train genAI products — are popping up faster than websites can block them. Thousands of sites have blocked crawlers from companies including OpenAI, Anthropic, and Nvidia. But as new bots roll out, it's become nearly impossible to stop them from hoovering up content without permission. |
- Whac-a-bot: Media giant Condé Nast has blocked two of Anthropic's crawlers, but its newer third bot isn't blocked. And the crawlers keep comin': Meta and Apple recently unleashed new crawlers.
- Crawlin' costs: By "visiting" sites millions of times, bots can also saddle website hosts with big fees. One coding site said AI scrapers accessed 73 terabytes' worth of its files in May, costing it $5K+ in bandwidth overage charges.
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Bot blocking is booming… because sites don't want their content used without permission. About 90% of top news outlets block AI crawlers, and Reddit has blocked nearly all web crawlers except for Google's (this year Reddit agreed to a $60M deal to make its content available for Google's AI training). Bot-blocking help has become a selling point too: Cloudfare, which just released an "easy button" for blocking AI bots, said 85% of its cloud customers block scrapers. |
- No.thx: Block attempts aren't guaranteed to work. Crawlers from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Perplexity AI have all been accused of bypassing efforts to block them.
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If you can't beat 'em, charge 'em… Some media companies have avoided blocking headaches by striking content-licensing deals with AI companies. This year Wall Street Journal owner News Corp. signed a $250M deal with OpenAI, which signed a similar ~$25M pact with Business Insider publisher Axel Springer. Others have opted to fight: last year The New York Times slapped OpenAI and Microsoft with a copyright-infringement lawsuit. |
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- McDeal: McDonald's quarterly same-store sales fell for the first time since 2020. McD's said consumers were shying away from its prices, and that it's now focusing on "value" (it recently intro'd a $5 meal deal).
- Marvelous: Disney and Marvel's "Deadpool & Wolverine" smashed box-office expectations in its opening weekend, hauling in $444M worldwide to become the highest R-rated debut ever.
- Update: Apple is reportedly delaying the rollout of its AI features until after the release of iOS 18 (expected in September). Apple has hyped AI features to drive upgrade demand as iPhone sales sag.
- Gassy: Chesapeake Energy kicked off this week's Big Oil earnings by reporting a loss (compared to a profit a year earlier) as natural-gas prices slid. US prices are down about 22% so far this year as supply rises.
- Buzzkill: Heineken stock fizzled after the brewer said the value of its stake in China Resources Beer had plunged, leading Heineken to swing to a loss. China's sluggish recovery has weighed on global companies.
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- US monthly house-price index, consumer-confidence index, and job openings
- Earnings expected from SoFi, PayPal, Pfizer, BP, Procter & Gamble, JetBlue, Phillips 66, Merck, Sysco, AMD, Microsoft, Starbucks, Pinterest, Caesars Entertainment, Live Nation, Match Group, Mondelez, and Denny's
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Authors of this Snacks own bitcoin and shares of: Alphabet, Apple, Disney, Match Group, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Starbucks |
Advertiser's disclosures:
*Reservations do not require purchase of a Casita and there is no assurance of how many will result in actual purchases. **Minimum investment in BOXABL is $1000. This is a paid advertisement for the Boxabl Inc. Regulation A offering. Please read the offering circular and related risks at www.boxabl.com/invest#circular. Start-up investments are speculative and involve a high degree of risk. Those investors who cannot afford to lose their entire investment should not invest in start-ups. Companies seeking startup investment tend to be in earlier stages of development and their business model, products and services may not yet be fully developed, operational or tested in the public marketplace. There is no guarantee that the stated valuation and other terms are accurate or in agreement with the market or industry valuations. Further, investors may receive illiquid and/or restricted stock that may be subject to holding period requirements and/or liquidity concerns. |
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Sherwood Media, LLC produces fresh and unique perspectives on topical financial news and is a fully owned subsidiary of Robinhood Markets, Inc., and any views expressed here do not necessarily reflect the views of any other Robinhood affiliate... See more |
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