MARKET MOVERS

  • Bored Ape Yacht Club creators acquire CryptoPunks & Meebits. Yuga Labs acquired 423 CryptoPunks and 1,711 Meebits. The terms of the deal weren’t disclosed. Yuga will also own the CryptoPunks and Meebit brands and logos, which it could potentially use in marketing and merchandising. The expectation is that Yuga could help build CryptoPunks and Meebits into even bigger brands. Read more here.

  • Uber imposes new customer fees to offset gas prices. The temporary surcharge is fixed per trip, which some industry watchers say discourages drivers from accepting longer rides. The fuel surcharge goes directly to drivers. It ranges from 45 cents to 55 cents for Uber riders and 35 cents to 45 cents for Uber Eats customers. The charge will be in effect for the next two months.

  • BlackRock funds hit by $17bn in losses on Russian exposure. Sharp markdowns at the world’s largest asset manager show the broad impact of sanctions and shuttered markets. Clients held more than $18.2bn in Russian assets at the end of January, the firm said but shuttered markets and worldwide sanctions imposed after Russian president Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine have made the vast majority unsaleable.

  • Congress passes a spending bill with major housing wins. The $1.5 trillion bipartisan package keeps the government running through Sept. 30 and includes money for priorities the National Association of REALTORS® supports, such as housing programs, rural broadband, and surface transportation projects. The bill also reauthorizes the National Flood Insurance Program.

  • The wage-price spiral is happening. People demand higher wages to compensate for inflation so they have more money to spend. And then prices go up again, so they ask for another pay increase, and the process repeats.  We've reached a point where inflation data is getting baked into wages. Once that happens, the genie is out of the bottle. Even if the Fed did some rate hikes, it will not be as aggressive as before. Source(39:45)

  • Gen Zs are not as innovative, says Allison Schrager. We now have a generation of rule followers so we're less likely to produce more innovators. To be an innovator, you have to be a rule-breaker by questioning the existing rules. Young people are increasingly becoming too compliant. They are not willing to take enough risk in order for the country to innovate. Source(50:43)

  • 5G expands to more-affordable phones as chip prices fall. Phone companies are more willing to upgrade the capability of phones in the $200 range, market researchers say. The key to this broader access to 5G service is the falling price of the specialized semiconductors needed for 5G phones, a trend that analysts expect to continue over the next two years. Read more here.

WHAT TO WATCH

  • There’s a 35% chance that the S&P 500 could fall into a bear market, Bank of America says. The S&P 500 has already tumbled into correction territory — down more than 10% from a record high set in early January. Stephen Suttmeier, the firm’s technical research strategist, wrote in a note Friday that an S&P 500 correction has turned into a 20%-plus drop 35% of the time. Read more here.

  • The US will target banks and crypto exchanges that aid sanctioned Russian oligarchs. The Justice Department says institutions allowing illicit money movement will be in its ‘crosshairs’. A senior DoJ official on Friday said the “KleptoCapture” task force launched last week would take a broad view, looking not only at parties that knowingly help people under sanctions. Read more here.

  • Warren Buffett buys more Occidental Petroleum. After spending around $4.5 billion last week to buy 91.2 million shares of Occidental Petroleum, he’s spent more than $1.5 billion this week to add another 27.1 million shares to Berkshire Hathaway’s stake. An SEC filing late Friday revealed the purchases were made on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.

  • Amazon plans to open more grocery stores. Focusing on expanding its physical grocery footprint should allow Amazon to build stores with the omnichannel experience in mind. Stores will be able to fulfill online orders from day one, unlike Walmart. Moreover, Amazon can provide a better in-store grocery shopping experience by integrating its technology as well as customer perks into the shopping experience.

  • The EV winners will be Tesla and legacy automakers. Jason Calacanis believes new EV companies like Nikola and Fisker will eventually go to zero. All the legacy automakers like Audi and Ford are also making Electric vehicles. Tesla was first and now it's a juggernaut and now you have these other juggernauts joining the space and have more money than other newer EV makers. Source(13:33)

  • Crypto users outperform the internet. Crypto has been significantly outperforming the internet in terms of adoption. We're way ahead of internet adoption. If we just continue at a kind of slightly slower pace we get to 5 billion users by the end of the decade. So that's basically the total adoption of crypto. Source(11:59)
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