SOMETHING INTERESTING

If you think crypto is a big deal, take a look at this chart. Luxury goods like blue-chip art are here to stay. It’s an exclusive asset class, it has unparalleled price appreciation, and there’s secondary market liquidity. Check it out:

MARKET MOVERS

  • Affirm’s stock skyrocketed this week after the company landed a partnership with Target. They also partnered with Amazon, resulting in an 89% stock boost in the last 3 months. Affirm is launching a debit card that will let consumers split purchases after the fact, as well as own crypto assets in their Affirm savings accounts. Read more here.

  • SpaceX hit a $100 billion valuation, up from $74 billion in February, after a secondary sale of existing shares. This milestone achievement is an ultra-rare status as a private company, making it the second most valuable private company in the world. Long live Elon, forever. Read more here.

  • Update on the debt ceiling debacle: The Senate voted on Thursday to approve a short-term increase to the federal debt ceiling by $480 billion through Dec. 3. A Democratic majority House will vote on Tuesday to avert a government default. Democrats have been trying to pass legislation that would have raised the debt limit through the end of 2022, which Republicans blocked. Read more here.

  • U.S. bank mergers & acquisition deals top $50 billion for the year. With three months left to the year, 2021 has already nearly doubled the total bank M&A dollar volume of $27.8 billion in 2020. Read more here.

  • Everything’s bigger in Texas, now including Tesla. Musk is officially moving Tesla HQ to Texas from California. Tesla will continue to expand in California, but even more so in the Lone Star State. The reason? It's tough for people to afford houses in Cali and the SF Bay area is limited in terms of scalability. Read more here.

WHAT TO WATCH

  • A global taxation overhaul is full-steam ahead. The international deal seeks to curb tax avoidance and provide a simpler way of dividing up existing tax revenues. We may see a 2023 implementation of a minimum 15% corporate tax rate, the most sweeping change in international taxation in a century. In addition to this minimum rate, that we’ll likely see a number of the world’s largest companies paying even more tax. Read more here.

  • Former U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin is warning that there’s a strong possibility for ongoing inflation and that we could easily end up with 3.5% 10-year Treasuries. Cue the increased national debt and budget issues. He also warned that debt-to-GDP could become dangerously excessive if Biden’s spending bill goes through. Read more here.

  • Home purchases and refinancings are dropping due to a sharp increase in mortgage rates. The National Association of Realtors said that the era of mortgage rates below 3% is likely over and they’re predicting that rates will average 3.5% by mid-2022. Read more here.

  • Prospective homebuyers that have been priced out of the market may see a reprieve soon. If the Low-Income First Time Homebuyers (LIFT) Act of 2021, is approved in Congress, it would offer 20-year mortgages with low-interest rates to first-time, lower-income homebuyers. Read more here.

  • Rent increases are predicted to slow in H1 2022 as home price growth slows, enough people finally move out of their parent’s homes or shed roommates, and housing construction bottlenecks decrease. Even though rents may moderate, don’t mistake this for negative rent price growth. Even if it slows, it’s still growing at a decent rate year over year. Read more here.

FINAL THOUGHTS

“To build capacity, we must systematically expose ourselves to more stress—followed by adequate recovery.” - The Power of Full Engagement by Jim Loehr & Tony Schwartz

Despite popular opinion, stress can be wielded as an invaluable tool to your advantage. It increases your urgency, it makes you more alert, and most importantly, it builds up your resistance to future stressors - aka resilience. Pair that intentional exposure to stress with proper rest and you’ll see unstoppable growth and expansion.

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