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One of the Robinsons' rental properties in Joshua Tree, California.
Courtesy of the Robinsons
Sara and Tony Robinson told their 30,000 YouTube followers they wanted to "quit" Airbnb.
They won't pull their 22 active properties off Airbnb, but they'll try to increase direct bookings.
They named six strategies they're using, from Wi-Fi email capture to influencer marketing.
Sara and Tony Robinson, California-based short-term rental owners, broadcast their advice on building an Airbnb empire β from how to deal with nightmare guests to renovating properties β to over 30,000 followers on YouTube and a combined 80,000 Instagram followers between two individual accounts.
The couple, who call themselves the "Real Estate Robinsons," documented how they left behind jobs at Tesla and iHeartRadio in the last two years to manage their portfolio of 22 active vacation-rental properties β mostly in Tennessee and California β full time. The homes together generate $1.3 million in annual revenue, mostly from Airbnb. The revenue was verified by documents shared with Insider.
But now they said they're turning their backs on Airbnb, as well as the competing vacation-rental site Vrbo.
"We just want a little bit more control over how we operate our business," Tony told Insider in an interview after the couple posted a November 28 video titled "We're Quitting Airbnb."
The move comes as hosts in some areas complain that bookings have slowed, Twitter chatters of an "Airbnbust," and market data shows an increased number of Airbnbs nationwide that has outpaced increases in traveler demand. Some hosts are responding by switching to medium- or long-term rentals.
For their part, the Robinsons aim to have at least 75% of their guests reserve their vacations via their personal website instead of going through the popular platforms. That way, they can pocket more of the minimum 3% booking fee Airbnb takes from hosts on every transaction.
The Robinsons also said they fear relying solely on big companies like Airbnb and Vrbo for their business because they could one day disagree with a policy or an algorithm change. The couple added that they will not delist their 22 active properties from Airbnb entirely, but rather embark on an aggressive push to lure direct bookings.
They broke down six of the ways they plan to do it.
The Robinsons left full-time jobs to pursue short-term rentals in 2019.
WiFi email capture: The first step for the Robinsons will be to purchase a WiFi system that captures guests' email addresses when they log on to use the internet during their stay.
Airbnb prohibits hosts from giving guests who book via Airbnb a direct-booking link, and bans moving conversations off the platform or embedding any links in instruction manuals.
The WiFi-capture plan, which the Robinsons said is common in the industry, will circumvent the policy. They can use the email addresses captured to follow up with guests after a successful stay through Airbnb and offer them the chance to book directly the next time for a slight discount.
Influencer marketing: The Robinsons plan to offer influencers a free night's stay in exchange for social-media posts about their experiences that include the direct-booking link. In their YouTube video about quitting Airbnb, Sara said she briefly worked for the fast-fashion brand FashionNova and saw the engagement power of micro influencers, or people with under 50,000 followers, who posted photos and videos of the clothes. The Robinsons hope to replicate that success with travel influencers showing off their properties.
Paid social-media advertising: The Robinsons will pay for advertisements on Instagram, Facebook, and Google that lead to their direct-booking website. The ability to "scale" this advertising is important to the couple, as it gives them the ability to "ramp up" advertising during slower times of the year, they said in their video.
The exterior of a Joshua Tree, California, rental property that the Robinsons own.
New Instagram profiles: The couple plans on setting up a separate Instagram just to show off picturesque scenes of their rental properties. They'll post snapshots of interiors and the surrounding areas and tag local landmarks, shops, and restaurants. The account bio and other places within it would prominently feature the direct-booking link.
More YouTube channels: The Robinsons want to create additional YouTube accounts with content showing off activities in the local markets for their properties. The Robinsons said that because YouTube is a "searchable" platform, they can connect with users who might be typing in, for example, "things to do in Joshua Tree."
Blogs: The Robinsons said that because blog posts are also "searchable," they can direct internet users to their direct-booking site. Posts themed around "vegan restaurants" or "sunset hikes" could bring in future visitors searching for those topics.
Every short-term-rental host in the market could easily replicate these strategies, they said.
"Any business today is going to benefit from having some kind of presence on social media," Tony said.
But the couple said it might be difficult for newbies to bypass Vrbo and Airbnb completely.
The Robinsons said they have an advantage in driving traffic to their direct-booking website because of their already large social-media following.
The couple said it would be "pretty difficult" for a newer host to get a "decently filled calendar right off the bat without using something like Airbnb and Vrbo."
But they emphasized that any host could implement their steps at the very start. Hosts can "start thinking even earlier in their journey" about building a "platform you own yourself."
Real Estate AirBnB YouTube | 2022-12-17T15:49:47Z | www.businessinsider.com | A Couple With 22 Active Airbnbs Says They Plan to Leave the Platform | https://www.businessinsider.com/couple-with-20-airbnbs-quitting-for-more-direct-bookings-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/couple-with-20-airbnbs-quitting-for-more-direct-bookings-2022-12 |
Alphonzo "Phonz" Terrell and DeVaris Brown have created an alternative to Twitter called Spill.
The former Twitter employees are catering to "culture drivers," especially Black and queer creators.
Spill is expected to launch next month and already has 20,000 people on its waitlist, Terrell said.
Today, two former Twitter employees announced the creation of a new social platform, Spill, designed as an alternative to the bird app catering to "culture drivers" and serving as a refuge for creators from Black Twitter.
Alphonzo "Phonz" Terrell and DeVaris Brown told TechCrunch that Spill is intended to be "a real-time conversational platform that puts culture first" when it launches in January.
Terrell served as Twitter's global head of social and editorial for three years β until last month, when he was among the thousands of employees laid off following Elon Musk's takeover. Brown worked on machine learning as a product manager lead at Twitter for over a year but pivoted in 2020 to create the Series A startup Meroxa, a real-time data service.
"While Spill is for everyone, we are catering to culture drivers who frequently set new trends yet routinely get overlooked and under compensated," Terrell tweeted in his announcement of the app. "Yes, we mean Black creators, Queer creators, and a variety of influential voices outside the U.S."
The founders told TechCrunch they bonded over being Black employees while working at Twitter and wanted to create a space to highlight the cultural contributions and influential content creation Black users frequently brought to the app.
Called "a cultural force to be reckoned with" by The Guardian, Black Twitter is at the heart of many viral digital culture moments as well as real-world social movements. Hashtags like #BlackLivesMatter, #SayHerName, as well as the Kermit the Frog drinking tea meme (among many others) either originated or were popularized by the unofficial online network.
The Spill app, named for the phrase "spill the tea," will use blockchain to compensate users for popular posts and will include a feature called "tea parties" where users can gather online or in real life to connect.
"It's not a web3 thing," Terrell told TechCrunch. "But the use of blockchain is for both crediting creators and setting up a model for us to compensate them automatically. If they have a spill that goes viral and we monetize it, it's really effective."
Since Elon Musk's $44 billion acquisition of Twitter in October, hate speech and slurs against Black users have skyrocketed and popular users from Black Twitter have used comedy to mourn the loss of their online community.
Following the announcement of the app, Terrell tweeted that Spill had received 20,000 reservations for handles within 12 hours.
"Thank you for love, the feedback, the skepticism and the numerous offers of support - you have no idea how much this means," Terrell tweeted.
Terrell, Brown, and Spill advisors April Reign, DeRay Mckesson and Dantley Davis did not immediately respond to Insider's requests for comment.
Twitter Spill Black Twitter | 2022-12-17T17:47:12Z | www.businessinsider.com | Introducing Spill, a Twitter Alternative Created by Former Employees | https://www.businessinsider.com/introducing-spill-a-twitter-alternative-created-by-former-employees-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/introducing-spill-a-twitter-alternative-created-by-former-employees-2022-12 |
The Taylor Chevrolet showroom in Taylor, Mich.
Don't let ads fool you: holiday car deals will be meager this year.
After three years of limited inventory, the auto industry is adjusting to a new normal.
Eventually, companies will have to appeal to loyal customers again.
The days of year-end blowout sales may be in the rearview mirror forever.
As the US auto industry enters its third straight winter of diminished inventories and long wait times, car companies are thinking differently about the holiday sales season.
Once a time of year when salespeople were desperate to move metal off the lot, December has become much like any other month of the year, according to Jessica Caldwell, an automotive retail analyst for car-shopping website Edmunds.
"Calling up the dealer in the last week of the month for a killer deal β I don't think that is such a thing anymore," Caldwell said in an interview. "If you're specific about what car you want, you're basically buying it whenever it comes into stock."
After pandemic-related factory shutdowns in 2020 were compounded by a global shortage of semiconductors in 2021, dealers and car companies learned to do business on leaner inventories. Both have found that keeping fewer vehicles on the lot has actually helped pad bottom lines even as demand cools and the economy softens, executives and analysts have said.
Both dealers and automakers forecast hefty profits for the year, even as the industry only expects to sell around 14 million new vehicles in the US this year. Before the pandemic, 16 to 17 million annual vehicle sales were considered the threshold for a healthy market.
While most car brands and dealerships still run holiday marketing to lure customers to the lot, most will find the incentive offerings measly. According to Caldwell, most holiday deals this year are finance-related, like subsidized APRs or a limited period of 0% interest. That's compared to previous years of generous cash-back deals, pricing slashes, and more extended periods of 0% interest rates.
"It's probably going to come as a shock to a lot of people," said Zack Krelle, an analyst for TrueCar. "The dollar savings β those types of things just aren't baked into the (marketing) campaign like they used to be."
The good news for customers is that this kind of sellers market can only last for so long before companies need to appeal to their most loyal buyers again, analysts say. And with supply chain woes expected to ease slightly next year, car companies could start building at higher rates again.
"People are getting frustrated and they're walking away from brands," Caldwell said. "The system we have right now is not quite working, and needs to be somewhere closer to the middle."
NOW WATCH: How a barn find covered in 22 years of mold is deep cleaned
car dealers Car sales Used cars | 2022-12-18T13:04:07Z | www.businessinsider.com | How the Pandemic Might Have Killed the Christmas Car Deal | https://www.businessinsider.com/cars-deals-december-holiday-end-of-year-sale-season-over-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/cars-deals-december-holiday-end-of-year-sale-season-over-2022-12 |
Foxconn unveiled the Model B prototype in October.
SAM YEH / Contributor / Getty Images
Foxconn, the biggest contract electronics manufacturer in the world, wants to make your next car.
The Taiwanese giant assembles iPhones, iPads, and all sorts of other devices.
It's making deals to build cars for electric-vehicle startups β and someday wants to build cars for Tesla.
There's a solid chance your next electric car β perhaps your first electric car β will be made by the same company as the iPhone in your hand right now.
And no, we're not talking about Apple's long-rumored autonomous vehicle, which Bloomberg reports has been delayed to 2026. Nor is Google cooking up a Tesla rival of its own.
Foxconn, the Taiwanese electronics giant that assembles all manner of popular devices including the iPhone, iPad, Kindle, and Nintendo Switch, is diving head-first into the world of electric vehicles. But rather than sell EVs under its own brand, it wants to design and manufacture cars for established automakers and the new crop of EV startups.
In other words, what Foxconn currently does for Apple, it hopes to do for Tesla. In October, Foxconn's chairman said the company aims to someday make 40-45% of the world's EVs, matching the success it's achieved in electronics.
Foxconn unveiled an electric pickup truck prototype in October.
Foxconn unveiled its first EV prototypes last year and has wasted little time lining up a roster of automotive clients. Earlier this year, the iPhone-maker bought a former General Motors plant in Lordstown, Ohio from struggling automotive startup Lordstown Motors. Lordstown Motors just recently started shipping out Foxconn-made electric pickup trucks to customers.
Fisker, another EV upstart, has tapped Foxconn to manufacture its second vehicle, the Pear, in Ohio starting in 2024. Foxconn will also build prototypes for yet another startup, Indi EV. And it's inked a partnership with Taiwan's Yulon Motor.
Volkswagen is considering hiring Foxconn to build its new Scout-branded electric SUV and pickup truck destined for US buyers, Germany's Automobilwoche reported in November.
Foxconn's foray into EVs is a savvy move, Bill Russo, founder and CEO of Automobility, a Shanghai-based auto-industry consulting firm, told Insider. The company has found great success shouldering the capital-intensive parts of manufacturing electronics, in part because it's able to buy components in such large volumes. And, he said, it's well-positioned to do the same for EV makers, who are eager to reduce the enormous investments required to develop and bring a car to market.
Plus, vehicles are becoming increasingly internet-connected and computerized, requiring more and more of the electronic components that Foxconn is familiar with.
"That sounds a lot like the devices that Foxconn builds today. A lot of screens, a lot of chips, a lot of stuff that they know how to buy in significant enough volume" to drive down costs, Russo said.
Tu Le, managing director of automotive consultancy Sino Auto Insights, says Foxconn's entry will be a boon for the EV startups that don't have the cash to build their own factories. US upstarts Rivian and Lucid have spent huge sums setting up plants of their own, but not all fresh-faced EV companies have that sort of access to capital.
"There's going to be a lot of asset-light EV startups that are going to come out in the next 24-30 months in the United States, and they're going to need a factory with capacity that can sell them a finished good at a wholesale price," he said.
And Le could see existing automakers without strong union ties β like Tesla β outsourcing production to Foxconn someday. But first, the company will have to prove it can churn out electric SUVs and pickup trucks to the same the same standard as its iPads and iPhones.
"It's a ton of opportunity in front of them if they can prove that the first vehicles that roll off the line in Ohio are at the highest quality, highest reliability, highest safety standards that Americans expect," Le said.
Transportation Tech Foxconn | 2022-12-18T13:04:19Z | www.businessinsider.com | Foxconn, a Major iPhone Maker, Wants to Sell Electric Cars | https://www.businessinsider.com/foxconn-iphone-electric-cars-fisker-lordstown-volkswagen-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/foxconn-iphone-electric-cars-fisker-lordstown-volkswagen-2022-12 |
Matt Turner, Daniel Geiger, Jordan Parker Erb, and Hallam Bullock
First off, we reported on Friday that Goldman Sachs will cut up to 4,000 jobs. Insider's finance team has been covering the Wall Street giant's struggles in its consumer business all year and will be continuing its sharp coverage of Goldman and its rivals.
You can get the latest on that and much more from our finance newsletter, 10 Things on Wall Street. It's a snappy weekday read with the biggest stories on the Street, plus the latest on hot-spot restaurants, industry parties, and so much more. Be sure to sign up here.
Inside the lavish, secretive, post-Google lives of Sergey Brin and Larry Page.
Laid-off tech workers are landing new jobs fast β and even scoring raises.
Everyone wants to be an activist investor these days. Here's why it's not that easy.
Young adults living with their parents are saving on rent and fueling a luxury boom.
Up first: Senior real-estate correspondent Daniel Geiger is giving us a behind-the-scenes look at the recent turmoil at Compass.
Inside Compass' horrible year
Compass went public with an $8 billion valuation in April 2021, powered by a suite of software tools it said makes its nearly 30,000 brokers more productive. Its revenue topped $6 billion that year, vaulting it well past rivals like Douglas Elliman and Redfin, senior correspondent Daniel Geiger writes.
This year, the company's outlook has darkened.
With home sales dipping amid rising interest rates, Compass has cut workers and bled cash. Its market cap fell to about $1 billion. It slashed revenue projections by about 25%. In June, it laid off about 450 corporate staff, and in October, it let go of about half its 1,500-person tech team.
CEO Robert Reffkin's once sunny public demeanor has become more somber.
In an internal memo to the company's leadership team in December, he said underperforming employees should be identified and terminated β and that management would be on hand to help fire subpar workers.
The missive sapped morale. "Everyone I work with has given everything and more to this company," one manager told Insider. "This message is a real stain on the organization."
Since stepping down from Google's parent company, Alphabet, in 2019, Google cofounders Larry Page and Sergey Brin have taken two diverging paths: Page became a virtual recluse, spending much of the pandemic holed up on his private island in Fiji. Brin, on the other hand, never strayed far from the spotlight, attending flashy events like Burning Man.
See how Page and Brin have used their newfound freedom.
Larry Page and Sergey Brin gave $438 million to charities through their foundations last year. Here's where the huge donations went.
Burning Man, mushroom parties, and jamming with math teachers: Inside Sergey Brin's whirlwind social calendar
See Larry Page's growing collection of tropical islands
Even as the tech sector has been hammered by mass layoffs this year β more than 140,000 workers have been affected since March, by one count β the vast majority who've been let go haven't remained on the sidelines for long.
According to an analysis of laid-off workers conducted by Revelio Labs, a workforce-data provider, 72% have found new jobs within three months. Even more surprising, a little over half of them have landed roles that actually pay more than what they were earning in the jobs they lost.
Insider's Aki Ito explains how that's possible.
Activist investing is harder than it looks
Mike Blake/Reuters; Lisa Lake/Getty Images; Neilson Barnard/Getty Images; Ipsumpix/Corbis via Getty Images; Vicky Leta/Insider
Investors like Carl Icahn wrote the modern playbook on shareholder activism: quietly take large positions in public companies and then agitate for change.
As stock prices plummet following the pandemic, large companies β like Disney, BlackRock, and Alphabet β are now vulnerable targets to activist investors. But while activists appear to have the wind at their backs, experts like Icahn lay out why it's not as easy as it seems.
Find out what's standing in their way.
A luxury boom is underway
High rental costs, enrollment in higher-education programs, and delayed marriage are keeping more young adults at home. Nearly half of Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 are living with their parents, a high not seen since the Great Depression era.
All that money they're saving on rent is freeing up more disposable income for discretionary spending, and it's fueling a surge in luxury spending, analysts found.
Get the full rundown here.
"Naauuuur," "slay," and "ick"!
Gen Zers, using new slang in the workplace. Here's a breakdown of their jargon.
Since the holidays are upon us, here are 48 thoughtful last-minute gifts that don't feel rushed.
The 34 tech companies most likely to be on the holiday-shopping lists of PE firms.
Parental leave is the greatest benefit workers don't take. Here's what's going on.
Junior bankers reveal the best β and worst β parts of working at Wall Street firms.
An Amazon exec was investigated by the company after allegations surfaced that she created a hostile work environment.
Some Salesforce managers were asked to rank their bottom 10% of employees.
Newsletter Insider Today Google | 2022-12-18T13:04:25Z | www.businessinsider.com | Compass Is Reeling From a Horrible Year | https://www.businessinsider.com/google-sergey-brin-larry-page-compass-memo-tech-layoffs-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/google-sergey-brin-larry-page-compass-memo-tech-layoffs-2022-12 |
David's proposal to Emily on a SignMyRocket shell.
Courtesy of SignMyRocket/Anton Sokolenko
A US supporter of Ukraine proposed to his girlfriend with a message on a Ukrainian artillery shell.
They used a Ukrainian service that offers customized notes on munitions in exchange for a donation.
They aren't the only ones to have become engaged this way, with others sending heartfelt messages.
A US couple who met through supporting Ukraine's defense have decided to tie the knot β with the man proposing via a 155mm Ukrainian artillery shell that said "marry me."
"When we first started dating, I made an offhand comment one night," 38-year-old Emily Knight told Insider. "I just said, if you buy me a rocket, I'll have to marry you."
A few months later that's more or less what her partner David did, using a then-burgeoning Ukrainian service known as SignMyRocket that the couple had been browsing.
βEmily Knight (@bonesknight) November 26, 2022
The project offers supporters of Ukraine the chance to add any message they like to munitions used by Ukrainian soldiers β which are then fired towards Russian forces β in exchange for a cash donation.
Donors get a picture, or even a video, of their customized rocket in the field. The cash goes towards supporting the troops, as Insider previously reported.
So on a bright day in November, a 155mm shell inscribed with the following words soared towards a Russian position: "Roses are red, violets are blue, Putin sucks, and I love you. Marry me, Emily?"
In a video that was sent back to the couple, a soldier can be heard yelling encouragingly: "Marry him, Emily," as the shell is loaded and fired.
The method of proposal may be unusual for most, but according to SignMyRocket's founder Anton Sokolenko, it's the third such request he's had.
The 21-year-old Cherkasy-based student told Insider that two other couples have proposed the same way β and that another donor had requested a rocket celebrating their divorce.
Over the last months, people have used the service to celebrate everything from Father's Day to fortieth birthdays, and it has raised more than $785,000, according to Sokolenko.
A composite image showing various shells inscribed with messages.
Courtesely of Anton Sokolenko
For Emily and David, the gesture is intrinsic to their romance.
The couple met online through a shared compulsion to follow news of Russia's invasion, passionately supporting the defense of Ukraine.
"I remember not sleeping, just thinking about what was taking place, what Russia was doing," Emily said. Having grown up in New Orleans and witnessing the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, Emily was strongly moved by the thought of ordinary people losing their homes.
According to David, 51: "Ukrainians defending themselves is clearly the most moral high ground any country has had in any kind of conflict in my lifetime."
(David asked for his surname to be withheld, saying he had received threats in relation to his speaking up for Ukraine. His surname is known to Insider.)
The couple closely followed events online for weeks, particularly through Twitter Spaces, and soon found themselves talking privately.
"She slid into my DMs," joked David, earning a rebuke from Emily for the "creepy" term.
"We just fell in love," Emily said.
Fellas in love
Online, they call themselves "Fellas" β a gender-neutral moniker for followers of the sprawling movement of Ukraine supporters known jokingly as the North Atlantic Fellas Organization, or NAFO.
NAFO emerged as a social media phenomenon in May, and is devoted to fundraising for Ukraine, as well as relentlessly countering pro-Russian disinformation online.
Powered by memes and jokes, they're most easily identified by Shiba Inu avatars, usually showing the dogs in army fatigues or a track suit.
Despite its humorous tone β Emily called it "gloriously absurd" β NAFO has been hailed in the media as a remarkably successful information tactic.
"It's a brilliant evolution of cyber warfare, on the level that you're fighting disinformation organically," said David. "You're not paying anyone to do it. You're just using good-willed people to go out there and say: 'No, that's a lie. Stop lying.'"
βmatthew. (@iAmTheWarax) July 9, 2022
Through friends made in the network, the couple managed to send a small consumer-grade drone to the front line, and say they have organized two Twitter Spaces with US Rep. Adam Kinzinger to discuss the war. (Kinzinger himself has added "fella" to his Twitter handle.)
Kinzinger did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.
Even with a wedding on the horizon β the couple haven't set a date yet β they say helping Ukraine is their only priority.
When the rocket-fueled engagement post hit their social feeds, online friends started contacting them, saying: "'Where do I send you money for your wedding?'" said Emily. "I'm like, 'no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.'"
They're planning to forego a fancy wedding and to simply head to the registry office, telling everyone who would have bought them gifts to donate to the Georgian Legion, a pro-Ukrainian volunteer unit, instead, they told Insider.
"People actually sent me a bunch of receipts from donating money," Emily said. Her mother, who was ready to foot the bill for a white wedding, has been told to send the equivalent cash to Ukraine, Emily said.
"We're not in our twenties," Emily said. "We don't need a white frills wedding, you know?"
"Everything goes to NAFO," said David.
russia ukraine Weddings Activism | 2022-12-18T14:39:28Z | www.businessinsider.com | Couple Proposes With 'Marry Me' Written on Ukrainian Artillery Shell | https://www.businessinsider.com/couple-proposes-marry-me-on-ukrainian-artillery-shell-signmyrocket-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/couple-proposes-marry-me-on-ukrainian-artillery-shell-signmyrocket-2022-12 |
A helicopter flies during military training in Moscow, Russia, on August 17, 2022.
Russia faltered in its air missions after invading Ukraine, stunted by the military's rigidity.
Russia's military generally needed up to 72 hours for approval to attack new targets, per The NYT.
Despite Russia having more military equipment than Ukraine, Ukrainian forces were more agile.
After Russia invaded Ukraine in February, Moscow felt confident in its scores of military fighter jets and planes to help complete their mission as the country sought to overwhelm Ukrainian forces.
But while Russia had significantly more fighter jets than Ukraine, Russian soldiers found themselves hamstrung by their own military's rigidity when seeking to attack new targets, according to a New York Times investigation published Saturday detailing the country's failures throughout the conflict.
The effectiveness of the Ukrainian air defense system gave the country a critical advantage early on, allowing them to blunt any perceived advantages that Russia may have brought to the table purely from the scope of their weaponry.
Per The Times, Ukraine's fighter jets "were outnumbered 15 to one in some early air battles" and Russia boasted "thousands of cruise and ballistic missiles" that American and Ukrainian intelligence officials thought would overwhelm the smaller military force.
But Ukraine came up with a plan, moving some of their defenses β including Buk and S-300 missile launchers and their control center β to different locations before the Russia began the conflict, according to senior Ukrainian officials who spoke with the Times.
Instead of attacking the new targets, Russia largely bombarded the old locations no longer being used by Ukraine.
Per US officials who spoke with The Times, up to "60 percent of Russian cruise missiles missed their intended targets."
Russia was also slow to launch blitzes on new targets, according to the report.
The country's "rigid and centralized" military generally required 48 to 72 hours to amend its intelligence and obtain approval to attack new targets, giving Ukrainian forces up to three days to move to different locations, per The Times.
This rigidity also hurt Russian forces, as their pilots struggled to cripple Ukraine's defenses and flew without backup from additional fighter jets.
A Ukrainian pilot, Oleksii, who spoke with The Times, said the Russian pilots "flew straight without any cover."
"Maybe the Russian Army didn't read the Soviet books," Oleksii told the newspaper. "They had bombs, they had rockets, but they didn't cover their attack aircraft."
The slow decision-making of the Russian military effectively shredded their plans to seize the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv and several other cities early in the conflict.
Ukraine Russia Russian Military | 2022-12-18T20:40:49Z | www.businessinsider.com | Russia Failed to Hit Ukraine Targets Due to Military Bureaucracy: NYT | https://www.businessinsider.com/russia-ukraine-military-delayed-strikes-putin-failure-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/russia-ukraine-military-delayed-strikes-putin-failure-2022-12 |
Twitter announced the end of 'free promotion' for certain social media platforms on Sunday.
In a series of tweets, the company said users are no longer allowed to promote accounts on Facebook, Instagram, and more.
Former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey asks, "Why?"
In a thread of tweets, Twitter's official support account announced its users are no longer allowed to promote their other social media accounts on the site.
The company said it would be putting an end to "free promotion of certain social media platforms on Twitter" in a series of tweets on Sunday and specifically named Instagram, Mastodon, Truth Social, Tribel, Nostr and Post as part of the prohibition.
Twitter co-founder and former CEO, Jack Dorsey, tweeted a one-word response to the change in policy.
βjack (@jack) December 18, 2022
"Chief Twit" Elon Musk seemed to indirectly answer Dorsey's query in a reply to one user Sunday afternoon.
According to one of the tweets from Twitter Support, accounts created only to promote those social platforms would be removed from Twitter. The company goes into further detail about the new policy on its Help Center site.
"We know that many of our users may be active on other social media platforms; however, going forward, Twitter will no longer allow free promotion of specific social media platforms on Twitter," the site read.
The Help Center also lists examples of tweets that would violate the new rule. The following phrases are now likely to get your tweet removed and your Twitter account suspended.
"'follow me @username on Instagram'"
"'username@mastodon.social'"
"'check out my profile on Facebook - facebook.com/username'"
Although free promotion of the listed sites is prohibited, Twitter says cross-posting content from any platform and posting links or usernames from any platform not named is still OK.
The social media platform has undergone many changes since Musk's $44 billion takeover in late October. The tech billionaire has labeled himself a "free speech absolutist" and quickly made changes to the site that weren't well received by users β like paid-for verification via Twitter Blue.
Twitter weekend BI US Elon Musk twitter | 2022-12-18T20:41:07Z | www.businessinsider.com | Twitter Says No More 'Free Promotion' of Other Social Media Sites | https://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-says-no-more-free-promotion-other-social-media-sites-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-says-no-more-free-promotion-other-social-media-sites-2022-12 |
Gov. Doug Ducey of Arizona.
AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin, Pool, File
Republicans hope that outgoing Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey will consider running for the Senate in 2024.
Ducey passed on a 2022 Senate run, but Sinema's party switch has upended the dynamics of the race.
"I hope that he'll get in," Utah Sen. Mitt Romney told The Hill of a potential Ducey candidacy.
When Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema left the Democratic Party to become an Independent, her decision immediately upended the landscape for the 2024 Senate contest in the swing state.
Sinema has not yet announced if she will seek reelection in 2024 but Democrats, with whom she still caucuses through her committee assignments in the Senate, will ultimately have to figure out how to approach the race if she runs as an Independent β and a Democrat like Rep. Ruben Gallego emerges as a contender.
But Republicans, who recently lost high-profile Senate and gubernatorial races in Arizona this fall, are now eyeing the 2024 race with a greater degree of intensity as they probe multiple contests across the country that could help them flip the upper chamber.
Many Republicans are looking at outgoing Gov. Doug Ducey as one of their strongest potential candidates, despite him telling reporters in Arizona last week that he was "not running for the United States Senate."
Still, several GOP lawmakers on Capitol Hill boosted Ducey, pointing to the governor's deep business background and his experience leading the fast-growing state over eight years.
Sen. John Cornyn of Texas told The Hill that he liked Ducey "a lot."
"He's been a great governor, and I think he's a fantastic guy," Cornyn told the publication.
Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah, the 2012 GOP presidential nominee, told The Hill that Ducey would be "excellent candidate."
"I hope that he'll get in," Romney said.
Ducey was talked about as a potential challenger to Kelly after the 2020 election, but former President Donald Trump made his distaste for the governor widely known to GOP voters in the state.
After the 2020 election, Trump challenged now-President Joe Biden's narrow victory in the longtime GOP stronghold, but Ducey stood behind the integrity of the vote count and certified the results, which incensed the former president.
This year, Arizona Republicans nominated venture capitalist Blake Masters as their Senate nominee, but he went on to lose to Kelly by 5 points last month.
Despite GOP losses in the state this year, Ducey's political brand is distinct from Masters or Kari Lake, the MAGA stalwart who was defeated by Hobbs.
"He's not our only chance, but he's probably our best chance," an Arizona-based Republican operative told The Hill of Ducey. "I view it as: He is a competent governor who understands how to campaign. He can raise money very effectively, and I think that makes him the best general election candidate we can get."
Doug Ducey Arizona Kyrsten Sinema | 2022-12-18T22:12:14Z | www.businessinsider.com | Republicans Boost Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey As Potential Sinema Opponent | https://www.businessinsider.com/republicans-boost-ducey-sinema-2024-arizona-senate-race-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/republicans-boost-ducey-sinema-2024-arizona-senate-race-2022-12 |
Outgoing GOP Sen. Pat Toomey says Trump's influence over the Republican Party is waning.
Toomey attributed Trump's weakened influence to the GOP's bad midterm performance.
Toomey also said it might have to do with Trump's "unbelievably terrible" 2024 campaign rollout.
Outgoing Sen. Pat Toomey says former President Donald Trump's hold on the Republican Party is finally waning.
"The election outcome from last month I think dramatically accelerates the waning. And frankly, his unbelievably terrible rollout of his election campaign is also not helping him," Toomey said on CNN on Sunday.
The outgoing Republican senator added that he thought Trump's influence was already declining, albeit "not as quickly" as he hoped it would. He added that it is a sign of Trump's weakness that other Republican candidates are expressing an intention to run even after Trump announced his campaign.
Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, for one, has expressed interest in a presidential bid of his own.
"In my travels after the election around Pennsylvania, I've heard from many, many formerly very pro-Trump voters that they think it's time for our party to move on," Toomey said.
Toomey also called Trump out during his Senate farewell speech on December 15, warning his GOP colleagues that the party "can't be about or beholden to any one man."
"We're much bigger than that. Our party is much bigger than that," Toomey said.
"And I hope we resist the temptation to adopt the protectionist nativist isolationist redistributive policies that some are suggesting we embrace," he added.
Trump's losing friends and allies after announcing his 2024 bid
Ever since announcing his 2024 campaign in November, Trump has raged against Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a popular, would-be rival in the next election.
He launched a sale of non-fungible tokens which were even mocked by Trump loyalist Steve Bannon. However, Trump might not be doing so badly for himself β Coin Desk reported on Friday that the 45,000 cards were already sold on that day, and may have raked in over a million dollars for Trump.
Toomey made the comments on the same day that former GOP congressman Carlos Curbelo told MSNBC he thinks Trump is in "deep trouble" due to a potential criminal referral from the House Select Committee for the Justice Department to prosecute Trump over the Capitol riot.
The January 6 panel is set to vote on the referral on Monday, per NPR.
"Donald Trump is in deep trouble. I don't think anything can rescue him. I do think that he can use these criminal referrals as a way to rally his base, but the end is near for Donald Trump," Curbelo told MSNBC. "His next bankruptcy is looming, you can see it coming on the horizon, and I don't even think this would save him."
Representatives for Toomey and Trump did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.
Donald Trump Pat Toomey GOP | 2022-12-19T05:04:53Z | www.businessinsider.com | Trump Is Losing Hold on the GOP: Outgoing Republican Senator | https://www.businessinsider.com/republican-senator-trump-losing-hold-on-the-gop-outgoing-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/republican-senator-trump-losing-hold-on-the-gop-outgoing-2022-12 |
China is planning to ramp up flight volumes next year.
Luo Yunfei/China News Service via Getty Images
China plans to restore passenger flight volumes to 88% of the 2019 daily average by end-January, per Caixin.
The country is shifting away from its COVID-zero stance and is rolling back restrictions.
But the number of cases and deaths have reportedly been surging β even though China reported 1,918 new local cases and two deaths on Sunday.
China plans to restore passenger flight volumes to nearly 90% of the 2019 pre-pandemic level by the end of January, as the country reopens its economy after three years of lockdowns, financial news outlet Caixin reported Friday.
The planned bump in flight numbers will coincide with the peak of the Chinese New Year season, when travel typically spikes as people return to their hometowns for the official week-long holidays beginning January 21, 2023.
Last week, the Civil Aviation Administration of China, or CAAC, released a three-stage plan to gradually increase flight numbers, following a shift in the country's COVID-zero stance earlier in December.
Under the plan, daily passenger flights are expected to rise to 70% of the 2019 daily average by January 6, 2023, according to Caixin. This will rise to about 88% of the 2019 levels between January 7 to January 31.
The final phase of the plan through March 25 will see the sector in a stable recovery mode, Caixin reported, citing the CAAC.
The CAAC did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.
China's soft reopening is clashing with surging COVID-19 cases
The CAAC's plan to ramp up flight volumes comes just as COVID-19 cases surge in China after the restrictions were loosened. The country reported 1,918 new local COVID-19 cases on Sunday, down from 2,028 on Saturday, according to China's National Health Commission. There were two deaths on Sunday and none on Saturday, according to the authority.
Sunday's reported cases was down sharply from 8,838 cases a week ago β but this number included asymptomatic cases, which China has since stopped counting. Anecdotal accounts also suggest much larger infection and fatality numbers than what is officially reported.
Crematoriums and funeral homes in Beijing and Shanghai are processing a rising number of people who have died from COVID-19, the Associated Press, Reuters, and Financial Times reported over the weekend.
An employee at the state-owned Beijing Dongjiao Funeral Home told the FT that it cremated 150 bodies last Wednesday, and that about 30 or 40 of them had COVID-19. "We're cremating them the same day they are brought in," the employee added to FT. China officially reported zero deaths last Wednesday.
"We're burning from morning until 10pm," an unnamed employee at the Tongzhou funeral home in Beijing told the FT. "The furnaces can't take it."
China Healthcare COVID-19 | 2022-12-19T07:24:00Z | www.businessinsider.com | China's Ramping up Passenger Flights for the CNY Holiday Season | https://www.businessinsider.com/china-covid-pandemic-ramp-up-passenger-flights-cny-holiday-season-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/china-covid-pandemic-ramp-up-passenger-flights-cny-holiday-season-2022-12 |
Candidates empowered by labor shortages are ghosting prospective employers. Here's why.
Younger workers are the biggest culprits of "professional ghosting," one survey found.
One-fifth of workers polled by ZipRecruiter said they ghosted an employer in their latest job hunt.
Workers in the 18-to-34 age bracket were the biggest culprits.
One ghoster told us: "I'm the classic younger millennial, and I'm very deliberate with what I like."
Most job seekers have a disappointing story about suddenly losing touch with a promising company. But ghosting β the practice of cutting off all communication without warning or explanation β goes both ways in the professional sphere.
Once a rare phenomenon, candidates in a tight labor market are increasingly abandoning employers after attending interviews β and sometimes even after accepting a formal job offer.
In an October survey by ZipRecruiter, 21.6% of respondents said they'd "ghosted" a prospective employer during their latest job hunt. The employment marketplace polled 2,550 US residents who'd started a new job within the previous six months.
Younger workers are the biggest culprits. In ZipRecruiter's survey, those in the 18-to-34 age bracket were three times as likely as workers over 55 to have left an employer in the lurch.
What's led to the rise in 'professional ghosting'?
Companies β especially smaller businesses β are feeling the pinch. One-third of small businesses polled in Canada recently said they'd hired people who never showed up or stopped coming in work shortly after starting. Some simply cut off all communication midway through the application process, according to research by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business.
CFIB's president, Dan Kelly, said this rise in "professional ghosting" might be a lasting symptom of the COVID-19 pandemic. Many companies fired and rehired staff amid successive lockdowns, and "employees understandably felt an erosion of confidence that their employer was providing them with stable work," he said.
Kelly added that he thought labor shortages in both the US and Canada were empowering workers to cut off communication. The US unemployment rate has been consistently low since the end of pandemic-induced restrictions β remaining below 4% throughout 2022.
"Employers are desperate for workers, and employees know that there are plenty of jobs out there. As a result, they're perhaps less concerned about potential damage to their reputation."
Young workers want employers that align with their values
Nicole Gray, a 27-year-old marketer in London, described herself as a "serial ghoster."
"I'm the classic younger millennial, and I'm very deliberate with what I like and what I don't like," she said.
Gray told Insider her recently diagnosed ADHD may have played into her recurrent pattern of ghosting but that she's proud of how mindful she was about whether a company aligned with her values.
Before accepting a job, Gray always checks out company reviews on sites like Glassdoor and examines the social-media profiles of the senior-leadership team.
This has sometimes prompted her to withdraw, or even abandon, applications. Gray once ghosted a prospective employer after an initial interview. She said she had noticed that the company's director had liked "a weird and disrespectful comment about women" on LinkedIn.
She's also ghosted companies after negative interview experiences. On one occasion, Gray said, the interviewers "were critiquing somebody else's CV in front of me and making fun of all the spelling mistakes."
Gray didn't respond to the hiring team after the interview. She said: "Deleted, blocked β that's not for me."
Another interviewer kept her waiting for about 40 minutes, she said, and didn't offer any apology or explanation.
Gray said: "That's just not the kind of company I want to work for."
She told Insider she's trying to become a "reformed ghoster" and make a conscious effort to offer specific feedback if she felt a prospective employer wasn't the right fit. Nevertheless, she doesn't feel too guilty about her past actions.
Gray said: "I felt like I'd be ghosted in return. Companies are really crappy at getting back to you."
Weekend BI UK Feature Job Applications Jobs | 2022-12-19T08:11:50Z | www.businessinsider.com | Here's Why Job-Hungry Candidates Are Ghosting Prospective Employers | https://www.businessinsider.com/heres-why-job-hungry-candidates-are-ghosting-prospective-employers-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/heres-why-job-hungry-candidates-are-ghosting-prospective-employers-2022-12 |
Casinos in Macau, the Vegas of the East, have managed to renew crucial gaming licenses. But there's a hefty catch β they need to pump in $15 billion into non-gaming sectors.
Macau's economy has been battered by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Macau's six casino operators pledged to invest nearly $15 billion in non-gaming sectors.
In return for the investments, Macau's government has renewed their gaming licenses.
This may put investors at east about the future of the gaming business, which is a key contributor to Macau's economy.
Casinos in Macau, also known as the Las Vegas of Asia, are starting their end of the year celebrations early this year β their casino licenses have just been renewed after a months-long agonizing wait, easing investor fears about the future of the businesses.
But there's a catch β they need to diversify their offerings away from gambling, at a hefty price tag.
Six casino operators β Sands China, Wynn Macau, Galaxy Entertainment, MGM China, Melco Resorts, and SJM Holdings β have pledged to invest 118.8 billion Macanese patacas, or $14.8 billion, collectively, into non-gambling related activities, Macau's government said in a Friday press release. Over 90% of the investment will go to the development of non-gaming projects and exploring overseas markets.
Gaming licenses for the six major casino operators had expired back in June, throwing into question Macau's future as a gambling hub. These six operators manage Macau's 41 casinos collectively.
The new 10-year gaming licenses come into effect on January 1, 2023.
Among the six gaming companies, Sands China has committed to spending the most in non-gaming projects β about 27.8 billion patacas, or $3.5 billion. It has pledged to develop the conventions and exhibitions sector, and will be reaching out to international markets including Japan, India, and the US.
Galaxy and Melco Resorts are planning to build new theme parks.
Tourism and gaming are crucial to Macau's economy, with casino revenues collectively making up half of the Chinese Special Administrative Region's annual GDP. Tourists from Greater China, which includes travellers from Hong Kong and Taiwan, made up over 90% of visitor numbers in 2019, according to Macau's tourism authority.
But Macau's economy has been battered by the COVID-19 pandemic, and its GDP plunged 33% in the third quarter of 2022 from a year ago.
While the Macau's economic diversification could buffer the territory against overreliance on one sector, experts say it could take some time for the results to become evident.
"This is inevitably going to be a slow, gradual process, given that Macau has really struggled to diversify away from its reliance on gambling for years, but only made limited headway. The pandemic has really driven that point home," Nick Marro, global trade lead at the Economist Intelligence Unit told Insider.
Macau Gaming Gambling | 2022-12-19T09:43:11Z | www.businessinsider.com | Macau Casinos Have Secured Gaming Licence Renewals but at a Hefty Cost | https://www.businessinsider.com/macau-vegas-china-diversify-gaming-gambling-casino-reliant-economy-covid-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/macau-vegas-china-diversify-gaming-gambling-casino-reliant-economy-covid-2022-12 |
The last Boeing 747 has rolled off the assembly line, ending a more than 5-decade era. See 7 ways things the jumbo jet changed the industry forever.
The first Boeing 747 at the Everett assembly line.
Bettmann/Contributor via Getty Images
Boeing's last-ever 747 jumbo jet rolled off the assembly line in Everett, Washington, on December 6.
The event marks the end of a revolutionary era that changed the way people travel.
The enormous plane was a marvel that played many roles, like carrying the space shuttle.
The Boeing 747 is one of the greatest feats of aerospace engineering and was an international success for the American planemaker.
British Airways Boeing 747-400.
For over 50 years, the aircraft shuttled travelers to nearly every continent across the globe, connecting people to more places than ever before.
No longer did customers have to stop for fuel on flights between the US and Asia or Australia β the 747 could operate these routes nonstop.
Qantas used the 747 as its transpacific workhorse.
REUTERS/Daniel Munoz
Airlines have been flying over the Pacific Ocean since the 1930s β here's how the practice evolved over the years
It wasn't long before the jumbo jet earned the hearts of airlines and passengers alike, becoming one the most beloved airliners in history and outliving equally popular planes like the Concorde.
A British Airways and an Air France Concorde pass each other at JFK.
The Concorde made its final flight a little more than 16 years ago and supersonic air travel has yet to return β here's a look back at its awesome history
The jet's longtime success can be seen in the numbers, with the huge plane shuttling over 5.9 billion people across 75.5 billion miles as of 2020, which is enough to fly to the Moon and back to Earth 137,000 times.
Lufthansa is one of the few airlines passengers can still fly on the 747.
However, innovations in dual-engine planes over the years made the 747βs four fuel-hungry engines and poor economics unattractive for operators.
Alexander Sidorov/EyeEm via Getty Images
What was once a marvel for international transport eventually became a cost liability, and most airlines worldwide have ditched the plane in favor of more efficient jets, like the Boeing 787 or the Airbus A350.
Airbus A350-1000.
Bryan Van Der Beek/Airbus
Even more iconic planes are disappearing from the skies earlier than planned as the coronavirus continues to wreak airline havoc
The coronavirus pandemic exacerbated the problem as carriers were already bleeding cash and needed to let go of expensive assets.
Boeing 747's at Pinal Air Park, which is an aircraft graveyard.
AirlineGeeks/Ryan Ewing
As a result, the 747 became a common casualty of COVID-19 as travel demand plummeted, with many airlines, like British Airways and Virgin Atlantic Airways, saying goodbye to the iconic double-decker forever.
The last British Airways 747 to take off from London Heathrow.
The iconic Boeing 747 is disappearing from the British Airways fleet after 49 storied years as the pandemic thrashes the airline industry
Boeing also decided to retire the program, having built over 1,550 jumbos. The final 747 rolled off the assembly line in Everett, Washington, on December 6, and will be delivered to cargo giant Atlas Air.
Boeing's last 747 rolled out of the Everett assembly line.
Source: CNET, Boeing's last-ever 747 just rolled off the assembly line, marking the end of an era. Here's the history of how the revolutionary plane changed the world.
"As we say goodbye to the Queen of the Skies, we're proud of her legacy as an airplane that propelled aviation innovation and later laid the foundation of our family of freighters," Boeing 747 and 767 program manager Kim Smith said.
Source: Atlas Air, Boeing's iconic 747 will leave the assembly line for the last time this year. See one of last jumbo jets the planemaker will ever build.
Although the 747 is ending its nearly 53-year reign, its revolutionary design changed the industry as we know it. Here are seven things that made the Queen of the Skies truly remarkable.
First Boeing 747-8F flight.
1: The legendary aircraft was built on request by Pan American World Airways founder and CEO Juan Trippe.
New York Governor Thomas E. Dewey (right) and Juan Trippe (left) in a Clipper cockpit with their two pilots.
Source: Northwestern University
At the time, Pan Am was already flying Boeing's quad-engine 707, which was the company's first jetliner and ushered in the jet age for air travel.
Pan Am Boeing 707
More airlines are choosing single-aisle jets for flights from North America to Europe β see the full evolution of jet-powered transatlantic flying
But, as demand skyrocketed, the industry needed bigger and better planes that could fly farther than any other commercial aircraft could.
Pan Am 747-100.
aviation-images.com/Contributor via Getty Images
So, Trippe went to Boeing in 1965 and asked for a plane more than twice the size of the 707β¦
A Pan Am Boeing 707 next to a Pan Am Boeing 747, showing the size difference.
β¦and it didn't take much for the manufacturing giant to jump on the opportunity, especially after recently losing out on a contract to build the massive C-5A military transport plane.
People in line to enter the 445th Airlift Wing's first C-5A Galaxy in 2005
US Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt. Charlie Miller
2: The 747 was built by a team of some 50,000 Boeing employees, known as the "Incredibles."
First Boeing 747 surrounded by employees and other admirers.
The workers were made up of engineers, mechanics, secretaries, and construction workers, among others, and built the plane in about 16 months in the late 1960s.
"We assembled the first 747 in snowstorms as they were constructing the building around us," wrote Boeing Incredible Dwight Bates in a 2016 post published on the planemaker's website.
Inside the factory in Washington where Boeing built its last Boeing 747s, pictured in June 2022.
He explained the conditions of being an Incredible meant sleeping at their desks and working crazy overtime hours. Not to mention, they were under immense pressure after being told they'll lose the company if they didn't get the 747 FAA-certified.
Boeing Incredibles building Boeing 747s in 1969.
Bernard Crochet/Photo12/Universal Images Group via Getty Images
Fortunately, their efforts didnβt go to waste. Led by veteran Boeing engineer Joe Sutter, who is known as the βfather of the 747,β the iconic plane took its first flight in 1969 and was in commercial service with Pan Am in 1970.
The flight crew after the first Pan Am 747 flight from New York to London Heathrow in 1970.
AFP/Stringer via Getty Images
3: The 747 was the world's first widebody passenger aircraft and the first with a partial second level.
A United Boeing 747 in the carrier's old livery.
Source: Museum of Flight
Boeing created five different 747 variants: the 747-100, 747-200, 747-300, 747-400, and the 747-8, which were bought by dozens of airlines, like Korean Air, Cathay Pacific Airways, and Delta Air Lines.
A lineup of Boeing 747s.
Museum of Flight Foundation/Contributor via Getty Images
From there, several models of each type were produced, like the 747-400F freighter and the 747-200C convertible, which can be used for both passenger and cargo operations.
An EVA Air Cargo Boeing 747-400F aircraft.
TIM CHONG/Reuters
As airlines say goodbye to the legendary Boeing 747 early, the plane still plays a vital role for cargo carriers and is aiding efforts to defeat COVID-19
The planemaker's largest and highest-performing passenger variant is the 747-8i.
A Boeing 747-8i.
Stephen Brashear/Stringer via Getty Images
Powered by four General Electric engines, it can reach speeds of about 660 miles per hour and fly up 8,895 miles. This means the plane can zoom across three FIFA soccer fields in one second.
A Lufthansa Boeing 747-8i engine.
The advanced specs have come a long way since Boeing's first 747-100, which could only fly up to 602 miles per hour across about 5,300 miles.
An Iran Air Boeing 747-100.
SOPA Images/Contributor via Getty Images
But, the original variant's innovative widebody design paved the way for high capacity, with Pan Am's carrying 347 people. The 747-8i, by comparison, can accommodate up to 467 passengers in three classes.
Inside Lufthansa's Boeing 747-8i.
Not only did the jet feature revolutionary performance and seating, but it also came with a unique "hump" that made it easily recognizable by travelers.
Maiden flight of the 747-8i.
Boeing created the iconic hump on the 747 because Trippe didn't think the plane would be a commercial hit and wanted it to be easily converted into a freighter.
A Boeing 747 freighter being built in Washington in June 2022.
This meant the nose needed to be able to open, which made this an unfavorable place to put the cockpit. So, Boeing moved the flight deck higher up, which also contributed to better aerodynamics.
Boeing 747-400 cargo loading.
Over time, the upper deck has grown to create more room for first and business class seats and amenities.
First class passengers in a BOAC Boeing 747 Jumbo Jet are served lunch.
The only other commercial airliner to truly compete with the Queen of the Skies was the Airbus A380, which had a second level that stretched the full length of the jet.
An Emirates Airbus A380.
Arnold Aaron/Shutterstock.com
The mammoth plane can carry up to 545 people in four classes and became a workhorse for airlines like Emirates, complete with a shower spa onboard for first class passengers.
Inside the cabin of a Lufthansa A380, which can carry up to 853 passengers in a maximum capacity layout.
Source: Airbus, Emirates is bringing its redesigned Airbus A380 with premium economy seating and upgrades in every cabin to the US β see inside
However, the superjumbo has also met its own end, with Airbus ending production in 2021 and airlines worldwide speeding up the A380's retirement during the pandemic.
Air France retired its A380s during the pandemic.
roibu/Shutterstock
This was particularly due to its inefficient four engines β similar to the 747's downfall.
Belish/Shutterstock
Double-decker planes are going extinct as Airbus and Boeing discontinue their largest models. Here's why airlines are abandoning 4-engine jets.
4: The revolutionary Queen of the Skies made international travel accessible for more than just the rich and famous.
Lufthansa Boeing 747-8i flight deck.
The 747 was considered a step up from the 707 with its size, range, and low operating costs, which are thanks to its more powerful bypass engines that could reduce fuel consumption by 33% compared.
The TWA "Star of Paris" Boeing 747 after it landed at Orly airport in 1970.
Source: Deutsche Welle, Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, Airline Ratings
And, because the jet could carry twice as many people compared to its predecessor, airlines could reduce fares without sacrificing passenger comfort.
Lufthansa Boeing 747-8i economy. Airlines can fit 10-abreast rows on the plane.
Source: Smithsonian Magazine, Airlines Ratings
This effectively changed the way people fly, and for the first time allowed those who couldn't afford a seat on the 707 to travel to places that were previously unreachable.
Passengers inside the cabin of a 747 in 1970.
Gerhard Rauchwetter/Picture Alliance via Getty Images
5: The double-decker plane featured bars and lounges on its upper level, which was accessed via a staircase.
A BOAC air hostess greets a passenger in front of a spiral staircase which leads to the upper deck lounge in a Boeing 747 Monarch
Source: Executive Traveller
In the early days of the jet age, flying was often a high-class experience with travelers dressing up for the occasion.
Interior of a British European Airways' Vickers airliner showing the passenger section.
Fox Images/Getty Images
THEN AND NOW: Photos that show how glamorous flying used to be
Through the 1960s, airlines started playing around with different cabin ideas, like business and economy, and some carriers decided to use the 747's upper level as an exclusive space reserved for premium customers.
Lufthansa 747 lounge.
Hutmacher/ullstein bild/Getty
Pan Am's first 747 had a "restaurant in the sky" for first class passengers who could sit at four-person tables with friends or strangers.
Source: Executive Traveller, Photos show the glory days of Pan Am, a symbol of a bygone era of luxurious air travel before the airline went bust 29 years ago
Meanwhile, Australian flag carrier Qantas had the Captain Cook Lounge in its 747's upper deck where premium flyers could relax, drink, or read a newspaper.
Source: Qantas
6: Boeing built several specially-modified 747s to transport the space shuttle, the president, and parts of other commercial aircraft.
Thiago B Trevisan / Shutterstock.com
Probably the most impressive feat is the two 747-100s that National Aeronautics and Space Administration asked Boeing to convert into Space Carrier Aircraft.
The planes β one from American Airlines and the other from Japan Airlines β carried the shuttles from their landing sites to the Kennedy Space Center, and to other locations that were too far to travel by ground transport.
The modified jets had three strong rods protruding from the top, which is where the orbiters were attached.
Moreover, most of the cabin was gutted, the pilots had special monitoring systems for the shuttle, and two extra vertical stabilizers were added to enhance the 747's "directional stability."
Another non-commercial use for the jumbo jet is presidential transport.
While the 707 had the job for nearly 30 years, two 747-200B variants were modified in 1990 to create Air Force One.
Air Force One as a Boeing 707 carrying Eisenhower in 1959.
Terry Fincher/Mirrorpix/Getty Images
Having carried presidents like George H.W. Bush and Barack Obama, the plane can refuel midair and is considered a flying Oval Office with myriad office and conference space, as well as staterooms.
President Barack Obama talks on the phone with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu aboard Air Force One en route to New Orleans, La., Nov. 8, 2013.
31 photos that show how Air Force One has changed through the years
However, both VIP jets are being upgraded to the more efficient and longer-ranged 747-8i variant, though they will not be able to refuel in the air and the timeline for delivery has been pushed from 2024 to potentially 2028.
Trump exiting Air Force One.
Source: DefenseOne, Boeing's new Air Force One jets are so late that the old ones may need to keep flying until 2028, costing taxpayers $340 million: report
Another impressive 747 variant is the Boeing 747-400LCF Dreamlifter.
cpaulfell / Shutterstock.com
Boeing's massive oversized cargo plane just flew its first COVID-19 mission from Hong Kong to South Carolina. Take a look at the 'Dreamlifter.'
The jet is one of the biggest cargo planes in the world due to its oversized fuselage and was designed to transport 787 parts β like the wings β between global assembly lines.
Wings being loaded into a Dreamlifter.
Kyodo/Getty
Specifically, the four-strong fleet each has 65,000 cubic meters of capacity, where oversized cargo is loaded through the giant plane's swing-tail door.
Robert Sorbo/Reuters
While Boeing's primary customer of the Dreamlifter is itself, it was also used during the pandemic to transport COVID-related supplies, like face shields, protective eye goggles, and masks.
Atlas Air operated the special mission.
7: The 747 is one of the only cargo aircraft with the ability to load freight directly through its nose.
Atlas Air 747-8 cargo loading.
Thomas Frey/picture alliance via Getty Images
The door reduces load time for carriers as they can also simultaneously load from the back of the jet, but also allows for oversized items to be loaded without first being dismantled.
Boeing 747 cargo hold.
M101Studio/Shutterstock
Airbus' Beluga, Ukraine's Antonov An-124, and the US Air Force's C-5 Galaxy cargo planes also have nose doors, but they are not widely used by multiple global carriers as the 747 is.
The Antonov An-225 was the world's largest cargo plane with nose-loading capabilities, but it was destroyed during Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
Russian Defense Ministry/TASS/Getty
The Ukrainian manufacturer of the world's largest plane says rebuilding it would cost $3 billion. See the full history of the famous six-engine jet that was destroyed.
However, with the production of the 747 complete, the nose-loading perk with be missed as more cargo carriers ditch the jet for better cost-efficient aircraft.
Air France A350F rendering.
Boeing ending production of the 747 means cargo carriers will lose a key feature and be left scrambling when it's gone
"The nose loader for oversized freight is what makes her so unique and capable to transport things other planes can't," a 747 cargo pilot told Insider in 2020.
A Qatar Airways Boeing 747-8F.
Not only will cargo operators miss the beloved 747, but so will passengers.
BOAC Boeing 747
Ameer Junejo, who manages a 747 converted into a hotel in Sweden, told Insider that the jet has "memories," saying pilots and couples visit his site to reminisce about their days onboard.
While it is much harder these days to fly on the jumbo jet, several can still be explored as tourist attractions, like Delta Air Lines' 747 Museum in Atlanta, Georgiaβ¦
Delta Flight Museum 747.
β¦and the flightless British Airways 747 "party plane" in England.
Negus 747
Features Business Visual Features Airlines | 2022-12-19T10:26:41Z | www.businessinsider.com | 7 Ways the Boeing 747 Double-Decker Jet Changed the Airline Industry | https://www.businessinsider.com/7-ways-the-boeing-747-double-decker-jet-changed-the-airline-industry-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/7-ways-the-boeing-747-double-decker-jet-changed-the-airline-industry-2022-12 |
Rebecca Torrence, Blake Dodge, Shelby Livingston, Yeji Jesse Lee, Andrew Dunn, Samantha Stokes, and Sarah Braner
We asked top healthcare and biotech investors to name the startups most likely to take off in 2023.
The threat of a recession will make it a lot tougher for startups to thrive.
Investors named startups they had invested in as well as ones to which they had no financial ties.
Abridge
Abridge CEO Dr. Shiv Rao.
Picked by: Jordan Nof, cofounder and managing partner at Tusk Venture Partners, and Morgan Cheatham, vice president at Bessemer Venture Partners (investor)
What the company does: Abridge, based in Pittsburgh, uses artificial intelligence to structure and summarize information from recorded conversations at the doctor office to reduce the amount of time clinicians spend on documentation.
Funding raised: $27 million
Why it's set to take off next year: Provider burnout is getting worse, and it's exacerbating healthcare's staffing crisis. Nof said he expected Abridge's technology to be in demand next year as hospitals worked to reduce the administrative burdens on doctors.
"They've reached a tipping point where people are desperate to gain efficiencies in their workday with all the physician burnout," he said. "And doctors love it."
Abridge's technology takes the audio from doctor-patient interactions and automatically turns it into documentation for billing purposes or a summary of the visit for the patient.
That means doctors are relieved of the "hours of pajama time in the evening that they previously spent doing clinical documentation," Cheatham said.
β Rebecca Torrence and Shelby Livingston
Alma CEO Dr. Harry Ritter.
Picked by: Nof (investor)
What the company does: The New York startup helps mental-health professionals manage their practices with tech tools for teletherapy, scheduling, and billing.
Funding raised: $220.5 million
Why it's set to take off next year: Late-stage fundraises were hard to come by this year, but Alma rose to the challenge, snagging a $130 million Series D in August. Nof said he expected Alma to continue to defy expectations as it dug deeper into the "recession-proof" sector of mental-health care.
"The worse the market gets, more people are going to see mental-health providers," he said. "In addition to that, their core offering is making this more accessible and affordable, so everyone takes insurance.
"That means the more-stressful time doesn't necessarily translate to out-of-pocket costs for individuals."
Araris Biotech
Araris Biotech CEO Philipp Spycher.
Picked by: Dima Kuzmin, 4BIO Capital (investor)
What the company does: Araris is a Switzerland biotech developing a class of drugs called antibody-drug conjugates to treat cancer. These medicines use antibodies to find and bind to cancer cells, then release a cell-killing component.
Why it's set to take off next year: Building on decades of research, ADCs are starting to have an influence on cancer. In 2019, two ADCs, Enhertu and Polivy, were approved to respectively treat types of breast cancer and lymphoma.
"The space is not a black sheep anymore," Kuzmin said.
Kuzmin said recent nonhuman-primate research results showed Araris could produce a more potent version of Polivy. In 2023, Araris plans to apply to start human testing for its first drug candidate, while identifying up to four additional drug targets for further research, Kuzmin added.
β Andrew Dunn
Artios Pharma
Artios Pharma CEO Niall Martin.
Picked by: Kuzmin
What the company does: Artios wants to harness how cells repair damaged DNA to develop cancer treatments. Specifically, the UK- and New York-based biotech has started human studies testing drug candidates that block certain proteins often found in cancer cells that are involved in that repair process.
Funding raised: $320 million
Why it's set to take off next year: Artios is well-funded, having announced a $153 million Series C round in July 2021, and it has multiple therapies in human trials. The company started a phase-two study in August to treat a type of breast cancer.
"They've made very robust progress and it's a very high-impact space," Kuzmin wrote in an email.
In an email, Artios said it planned to start several more clinical studies in 2023.
Atropos Health
Atropos CEO Brigham Hyde.
Atropos
Picked by: Cheatham
What the company does: Atropos uses data from hundreds of millions of anonymized patient records to help doctors answer clinical questions so they can deliver better care.
Why it's set to take off next year: Our collective medical knowledge is expanding far too quickly for any single doctor to keep up with. Palo Alto, California's Atropos makes it easier for doctors to access that knowledge "to make a real-time clinical decision based on millions of other patients versus the gut feeling or the call to their friends," Cheatham said.
Bayesian Health
Suchi Saria, the CEO of Bayesian Health.
Suchi Saria
Picked by: Lonne Jaffe, managing director at Insight Partners
What the company does: Bayesian Health uses AI to help doctors make better decisions in real time.
Funding raised: $15 million, according to PitchBook
Number of employees: 23, according to PitchBook
Why it's set to take off next year: AI's shortfalls in the healthcare industry have been well documented: Medical information is often more complex than the data health AI is trained on, and the tech continues to underserve minority patients. This is despite an explosion in health-AI funding over the past half decade.
New York's Bayesian Health acknowledges the challenges of bringing AI to healthcare and explains why its method is different: By integrating directly with a hospital's employee medical-data system, the startup's tech can flag high-risk patients without pressuring doctors to agree with its diagnosis.
As a "silent colleague," Bayesian hopes to be a second pair of eyes on patients to help doctors catch serious complications as early as possible.
β Samantha Stokes
Capital Rx CEO A. J. Loiacono.
Company name: Capital Rx
Picked by: Holly Maloney, managing director at General Catalyst (investor)
What the company does: The pharmacy-benefit manager, which serves as an intermediary between pharmaceutical companies and the entities paying for drugs, like employers and health insurers, wants to provide more-affordable and -transparent pricing for prescription drugs and make it easier for pharmacies to get reimbursed. Capital Rx is headquartered in New York.
Why it's set to take off next year: Maloney said Capital Rx was helping health insurers and health systems provide better patient care at lower costs, while driving down administrative spending. The approach has gotten the industry's attention, she said.
"The pharmacy space has glaringly lacked modern infrastructure and a fully transparent pricing model, so they are seeing significant interest from stakeholders," Maloney said.
Capstan Therapeutics
Capstan Therapeutics CEO Laura Shawver.
Picked by: Michael Baran, partner at Pfizer Ventures (investor)
What the company does: San Diego's Capstan is developing cellular-repair therapies that work inside the body. By packaging mRNA into nanoparticles, it hopes to program living cells inside the body to target harmful cell types.
Why it's set to take off next year: Baran told Insider that Pfizer was very interested in targeted medicine using lipid nanoparticles to build off the success of the COVID-19 vaccine it developed with BioNTech.
Research published in Science found that Capstan was able to program CAR T-cells to repair heart damage in a mouse model using lipid nanoparticles.
"I think anyone that can deliver RNA or DNA in the liver or beyond is going to be a very sought-after area," Baran said.
He predicted that near the end of 2023, Capstan would be able to show it could do a similar process in monkeys. Baran said he thinks Capstan will be among the first to start human trials, which are likely to begin in 2024 or 2025.
β Sarah Braner
Conceivable Life Sciences
Conceivable's cofounders, Alan Murray, Dr. Alejandro Chavez Badiola, and Joshua Abram.
Picked by: Aike Ho, a partner at ACME Capital (investor)
What the company does: Conceivable aims to create software and hardware that automate in vitro fertilization, helping technicians create embryos with fewer errors.
Funding raised: $9 million
Why it's set to take off next year: Ho predicts that in 2023, companies that merely bring existing services to the internet will fall out of favor, she told Insider. But Conceivable and similar startups that invent technology will likely receive more investment, she said.
Conceivable, which hasn't publicly launched, hopes to automate elements of the IVF process to make it less unpredictable and less expensive, because using robots instead of humans would cause the $20,000 to $40,000 price to nose-dive, Ho said.
"We're going through a really tumultuous time in digital health," she said. "It'll be a painful time for the industry, but I think it'll be good because it'll force us to really focus on the companies that are truly building something."
β Blake Dodge
Future Family
Future Family CEO Claire Tomkins.
Picked by: Ho
What the company does: Future Family provides loans to people for egg freezing, IVF, and related expenses so they can spread out the cost of care.
Why it's set to take off next year: As people continue to have children later and later in life, demand for fertility treatments is increasing, Ho told Insider. San Francisco's Future Family is making that care more affordable by working with clinics to help people finance their treatment plans instead of having to pay for everything up front, she said.
"IVF is going to be a way bigger thing than it is today for the next 20, 30 years," Ho said. "And I think a lot of companies and products that are tackling that space like Future Family β their market is only getting bigger."
Gilboa Therapeutics
Members of the Gilboa Therapeutics team.
Picked by: Issi Rozen, GV venture partner
What the company does: The Israeli biotech is researching new cancer-cell therapies that attack solid tumors.
Funding raised: $4.5 million
Why it's set to take off next year: While cell therapies like CAR T-cell therapy have been dramatically successful in treating types of blood cancer, they've disappointed against solid tumors for several reasons.
One is that the immune system can have a hard time identifying and targeting solid tumor cells. Gilboa hopes its new cell therapy, SolidT, can direct engineered immune cells to selectively destroy cancerous cells in these tougher-to-treat types of cancer.
Gilboa's technology comes from the laboratory of the cancer researcher Yaron Carmi at Tel Aviv University, though the company plans to eventually be headquartered in Boston as it grows. Carmi's research is "very creative, impressive, and differentiated," Rozen said in an email.
"This seems to lead to more potent and specific killing of cancer cells," he added.
He also highlighted that it hired in June an experienced biotech CEO in Barry Labinger. Labinger was most recently the CEO of Checkmate Pharmaceuticals, which was acquired by Regeneron Pharmaceuticals this year for $250 million.
In 2023, Gilboa expects to close a Series A round and finalize plans on starting its first human studies.
Harbinger Health
Harbinger Health CEO Dr. Steve Hahn.
Picked by: Stephen Berenson, managing partner at Flagship Pioneering (investor)
What the company does: Harbinger Health is a biotech company focused on developing blood tests to detect early cancer.
Why it's set to take off next year: Detecting cancer early can help patients get the treatment they need faster and increase survival rates. Led by Stephen Hahn, a former Food and Drug Administration commissioner, Harbinger Health is looking to develop a multicancer blood test to do just that.
The Cambridge, Massachusetts, startup said in June that it had started a 10,000-participant clinical study in collaboration with the Sarah Cannon Research Institute to test its platform to validate the accuracy of its tests for multiple types of cancer.
"The Harbinger platform is based on a range of unique insights into the biological origins of cancer, which have broad-reaching implications," Berenson said. He added that by targeting early cancer detection, the company was going after "the fundamental, unsolved problem in cancer diagnostics."
β Yeji Jesse Lee
Homeward Health
The Homeward Health cofounders Dr. Jennifer Schneider and Amar Kendale.
Picked by: Christopher Booker, partner at Frist Cressey Ventures
What the company does: Homeward provides primary and specialty care to rural communities through virtual care and mobile clinics.
Why it's set to take off next year: San Francisco's Homeward Health is tackling one of healthcare's biggest problems: improving access to care for people living in rural areas, where enough doctors are hard to find. The company, which launched in March, has already struck a partnership with the national pharmacy chain Rite Aid, helping to quickly expand Homeward's reach.
Frist Cressey invested in another company focused on improving care in rural areas, called Main Street Health, but the space is big enough for multiple winners, Booker said. He's betting Homeward will be one of them.
"That is a great company. They've raised from General Catalyst and several other groups, and they do a really good job," Booker said.
Included Health
Included Health CEO Owen Tripp.
Picked by: Fletcher Gregory, principal at General Atlantic (investor)
What the company does: San Francisco's Included offers navigation services, as well as primary care, psychiatry, expert medical opinions, and more, to employers and health plans.
Why it's set to take off next year: As employers tighten their budgets because of the worsening economy, they'll be looking for solutions like Included's, Gregory told Insider. Since the company tackles a bigger portion of patient care than those that handle only a single condition, such as diabetes, it's in a better position to reduce medical costs, he said.
Included is the combined entity of Grand Rounds, the navigator, and Doctor on Demand, a primary-care startup, which merged in 2021. The company had planned to go public in 2022, Insider reported in December 2021.
A spokesperson for Included declined to comment on a timeline for an initial public offering but said the company had healthy financials, expansion potential, and positive growth momentum.
"Regardless of whether we are a private or public company, our priority will always be to deliver value to our clients and members β a commitment that also happens to be in the best interest of our shareholders," the spokesperson said in a statement to Insider.
Innovaccer CEO Abhinav Shashank.
Picked by: Lily Huang, principal at NEA
What the company does: The San Francisco startup provides software that integrates health information from disparate sources, like electronic health records and insurance claims, and analyzes that data to help health systems and payers improve patient care.
Why it's set to take off next year: Huang said big data startups like Innovaccer would be in high demand next year as care-delivery organizations, including some of NEA's portfolio companies, sought to innovate their data strategies. Hospitals and health insurers will need data-analytics tools to provide predictive insights and prioritize better outcomes in patient care, she said.
"That infrastructure piece is going to get a lot of attention," she said. "Everyone's looking for a partner when it comes to a new way to care for patients and figure out how to staff and target your population health-management solution."
Innovaccer was one of many high-flying digital-health startups to lay off employees this year, cutting about 6% of its workforce in September.
Leyden Labs
Leyden Labs CEO Koenraad Wiedhaup.
Picked by: Rozen (investor)
What the company does: The Netherlands biotech is developing an addition to the tool kit for fighting pandemics and viruses: antibody sprays. These nasal sprays could prevent viruses from spreading beyond the nose and mouth. Leyden is initially focused on the flu.
Why it's set to take off next year: In a tough market, Rozen said he looked for two key attributes in companies: a strong scientific foundation and a leadership team that can translate that science into medicines. Leyden Labs checks both boxes, Rozen said.
Rozen called 2023 a "pivotal year" for Leyden. The biotech said it planned to start human testing of its first flu-prevention drug in the first half of 2023.
MedArrive
The MedArrive cofounders Dan Trigub and Inna Plumb.
Picked by: Missy Krasner, venture chair at Redesign Health (investor)
What the company does: MedArrive works with health plans and health systems to deploy providers such as nurses and paramedics to people's homes to connect them to local resources and provide exams, diagnostics, vaccines, and more. If needed, patients can consult with physicians via telehealth.
Funding raised: $32.5 million
Why it's set to take off next year: Krasner predicts a huge surge in home health in 2023.
Home visits are cheaper than hospital visits, and health plans are increasingly looking to offer care in people's homes to save money, she said. The trend has been helped by Medicare Advantage plans, private plans paid for by the government to take care of older Americans, getting more creative with home benefits and working with members' caregivers.
New York's MedArrive is focused on vulnerable populations like those enrolled in multiple federal health plans, helping them land key deals with the likes of Scan Health Plan in California, Krasner said.
Monogram Health
A Monogram Health in-home nurse reviews medications with a patient.
Picked by: Booker (investor)
What the company does: Monogram Health works with health plans to deliver at-home kidney care, primary care, and benefit-management services to people with chronic kidney and end-stage renal disease.
Number of employees: More than 1,000 full-time employees, including 700 clinicians
Why it's set to take off next year: Health insurers are increasingly looking for partners to help them tame the cost of expensive specialty care, and kidney care is one area getting a lot of interest from insurers and investors.
Brentwood, Tennessee's Monogram Health, which was founded in 2019 and is already caring for patients across 34 states, "has demonstrated, clinically and financially, significantly improved outcomes for the population they're going after," Booker said.
For example, according to its website, Monogram has managed to reduce its patients' hospital readmissions and nearly triple the rate at which patients undergo dialysis in their homes, compared with the national average.
Moon Surgical
Moon Surgical's Maestro robotics system.
Picked by: Antoine Papiernik, chair and managing partner at Sofinnova Partners (investor)
What the company does: Moon Surgical is a medical-robotics company that has developed a system called Maestro, which helps surgeons better perform minimally invasive soft-tissue surgeries.
Why it's set to take off next year: Moon Surgical, based in France and the US, is creating robotics to help doctors perform surgeries better, directly in the operating room. Its first robotics system, Maestro, is designed to help surgeons with minimally invasive β also known as laparoscopic β surgeries.
The FDA cleared the robot on December 6 for its use in surgeries. Papiernik cited the fact that Moon Surgical got clearance from the FDA just three years after its founding as one of the reasons it's likely to take off next year.
"Moon Surgical's surgical tools have the potential to empower surgeons by helping them to reduce discrepancies and imbalances in surgical care," Papiernik told Insider over email.
β Leah Rosenbaum and Yeji Jesse Lee
Notable Health
The Notable Health cofounders Adam Ting, Pranay Kapadia, and Justin White.
Picked by: Gregory
What the company does: Notable uses artificial intelligence to automate repetitive tasks at health systems such as patient intake and getting authorizations from health plans for care.
Why it's set to take off next year: Health systems and provider groups are dealing with a significant labor shortage, made worse over the past year by folks retiring early, burned out from the coronavirus pandemic and mundane tasks like dealing with insurance companies, Gregory told Insider.
With fewer workers around, health systems will have to turn to companies such as San Mateo, California's Notable for tools that allow clinicians to automate some of the paperwork, he said.
"Because they can't just create new nurses or doctors out of thin air, they'll have to do more with the existing providers that they have," Gregory said.
OneOncology CEO Dr. Jeff Patton.
Picked by: Devin Carty, CEO of Martin Ventures
What the company does: OneOncology in Nashville, Tennessee, helps community cancer practices remain independent by improving their operations and supporting them with capital and technology. Its network of 850 cancer-care providers has worked with about 500,000 patients, according to the company.
Number of employees: 200 corporate employees
Why it's set to take off next year: Cancer continues to be one of the biggest killers in the US and among the costliest diseases to treat.
Carty said he's a big fan of OneOncology's leadership team and its business model of partnering with cancer-care practices that want to stay independent.
Picked by: Jaffe (investor)
What the company does: Overjet uses AI to help dentists better treat patients.
Funding raised: $77.4 million, according to PitchBook
Number of employees: 124, according to PitchBook
Why it's set to take off next year: Founded in 2018, Overjet's AI helps dentists improve their efficiency and communication with patients and helps insurers streamline their claims-review process.
AI has been driving healthcare innovation for years, and investors have pumped billions into healthcare AI since at least 2019. In the dental space alone, Overjet, in Boston, is competing with a smaller startup, Pearl, which has raised $11 million in venture funding.
Overjet "makes it easier for dental payers, providers, and patients to communicate and work together to dramatically improve care worldwide," Jaffe, who led Oversight's $42.5 million Series B funding round in 2021, said.
Owkin
Owkin CEO Thomas Clozel.
Picked by: Papiernik
What the company does: Owkin is focused on discovering and developing precision drugs using artificial intelligence.
Why it's set to take off next year: The French American company uses AI to identify patterns in diseases and subtypes patients based on their biology, with the goal of developing better treatments for patients. It has partnered with pharmaceutical companies like Amgen to apply its AI platform in clinical trials to better understand and predict severe cardiovascular disease.
Papiernik said he believed 2023 would be another promising year for AI in healthcare.
"Because of their proprietary technology, more patients will be able to benefit from targeted therapies, making precision medicine more accessible to patients at an earlier stage of their disease," Papiernik said.
Real CEO Ariela Safira.
Ariela Safira
Picked by: Elizabeth Galbut, a cofounder and managing partner at SoGal Ventures (investor)
What the company does: Real offers digital tools such as check-ins, guided exercises, and live workshops to help people improve their mental wellness.
Why it's set to take off next year: Real is putting a cache of therapist-developed mental-wellness tools directly at peoples' fingertips. Founded in 2019 by Ariela Safira, the New York startup has raised $53 million in VC funding from firms like Lightspeed Partners, as well as from the US soccer star Megan Rapinoe.
Real uses a membership model to provide a suite of on-demand wellness tools such as audio and video learning, reflection exercises, and therapist-led live events. The startup charges $24 a month or $165 for a yearly membership.
"We're still dealing with all of the consequences of the past three years of a global pandemic, and with the massive layoffs occurring in tech, many individuals may lose access to their health insurance and need to look for more accessible and affordable ways to get access to mental-health care," Galbut said.
Rejuveron Life Sciences
Marianna Feretzaki, the CEO of Rejuveron Life Sciences, left, and Tristan Heintz, its scientific director, at Rejuveron's lab.
Picked by: Christian Angermayer, founder of Apeiron Investment Group (investor)
What the company does: Rejuveron Life Sciences is a biotech-platform company whose portfolio companies focus on developing drugs to treat age-related diseases.
Funding raised: 78 million Swiss francs, or around $83.5 million
Why it's set to take off next year: In addition to being a company itself, Rejuveron Life Sciences serves as a platform made of five individual startups, all of which are focused on the theme of longevity.
The Zurich, Switzerland-based startup focuses on ailments like muscular atrophy and age-related eye conditions. Two of its platform companies are in clinical stages, while three are in the preclinical stage.
For Angermayer, Rejuveron's business structure gives the company "multiple shots on goal with efficacy data," which, in turn, increases the chances of success.
"We believe in Rejuveron's view that its drugs eventually will serve a dual purpose as prophylactic drugs that can be taken by healthy people to extend the human health span and offset the health-related risks of aging," he said.
Simple HealthKit
Simple HealthKit's founding team.
Picked by: Parul Singh, partner at Initialized Capital (investor)
What the company does: The startup offers at-home and in-clinic lab tests, primarily through universities and employers, and delivers test results through its app, which helps connect patients with follow-up-care options.
Why it's set to take off next year: Singh said she thinks diagnostic tools will still be in demand as the economic downturn progresses β "people are still getting sick," she said.
Simple HealthKit's proprietary-diagnostic tools, which include tests for STIs, influenza, and other conditions, are "better, faster, and cheaper" than other tests on the market, Singh said. She said the Fremont, California-based startup plans to launch its products in retail stores next year.
Strive Health
Chris Riopelle, the CEO of Strive Health.
Picked by: Lily Huang, principal at NEA (investor)
What the company does: Strive Health works with primary-care physicians and kidney-care specialists to help manage care for patients with kidney disease.
Why it's set to take off next year: NEA helped build the Denver-based Strive Health in 2018, and the startup has been growing rapidly since then, Huang said. Kidney care requires frequent office visits, so patients see their kidney-care specialist more frequently than many other types of clinicians, and Huang predicted kidney-care companies will still be able to thrive in a looming recession.
Strive Health partners with health systems and kidney-care specialists, as well as insurers like Humana, to help manage outcomes-based care for patients with kidney disease by providing tech for predictive analytics and telehealth.
Huang predicted that there will be plenty of M&A in the kidney-care market next year, and she said she expects Strive Health to expand its partnerships.
Summer Health
Ellen DaSilva, the CEO of Summer Health.
Ellen DaSilva
Picked by: Parul Singh, partner at Initialized Capital
What the company does: With Summer Health, parents can message a clinician at any time with a question about their child's health and get a response within 15 minutes. The New York-based startup costs $20 a month and works with both pediatricians and specialist doctors.
Why it's set to take off next year: Summer Health is in its early stages, landing a seed round in July. Singh said there's plenty of room for the company to grow and cater to the millions of parents in the US looking for an easier way to get medical help for their children.
"There are all these pockets in healthcare where things are bureaucratic and not efficient," she said. "It's just really hard and stressful to get pediatric care."
Singh said she's also a fan of Summer Health's CEO, Ellen DaSilva, who she called a "fantastic founder." A former Hims & Hers executive, Insider named DaSilva to our list of the 30 leaders under 40 transforming healthcare in 2022.
Tome Biosciences
Shutterstock/vchal
Picked by: Baran
What the company does: The Watertown, Massachusetts-based Tome is taking CRISPR gene editing from editing short spans of DNA to targeted editing of entire genes.
Funding raised: 95 million, according to PitchBook
Why it's set to take off next year: Tome is bringing a new generation of CRISPR therapies into the limelight. Instead of editing short stretches of DNA, it uses a technique called PASTE to change whole genes.
Through this targeted editing, Tome aims to insert genes exactly where it wants them, ideally avoiding potential mistakes.
Baran predicted that Tome will raise a Series B, echoing what an investor told STAT News in September.
Treeline Biosciences
Josh Bilenker, the CEO and a cofounder of Treeline Biosciences.
Picked by: Berenson
What the company does: Treeline Biosciences is a biotech company focused on developing cancer treatments for targets in the body that are difficult to drug.
Funding raised: $473 million, according to PitchBook
Why it's set to take off next year: Josh Bilenker and Jeff Engelman, the cofounders of Treeline Biosciences, said in April 2021 that the company is incorporating an array of disciplines β like biology, chemistry, and computation β to develop its platform. The details around the therapies the company is working on have not been made public.
The Stamford, Connecticut-based Treeline did not respond to Insider's request for comment.
Berenson said that while Treeline has been working quietly over the past few years, he believes the company is well-positioned for an extended bear market.
The startup is "lasering in on the intersection of target validity, druggability, and unmet medical need" to develop a portfolio of new cancer therapies, he said.
Turquoise Health
Chris Severn, the CEO and a cofounder of Turquoise Health.
Picked by: Maloney
What the company does: The San Diego-based startup helps people shop around for affordable healthcare by comparing healthcare-service prices on its website.
Why it's set to take off next year: The healthcare industry is increasingly pushing for value-based care models, which reward clinicians for better patient outcomes rather than the volume of services they provide. Maloney said Turquoise Health's platform will support that shift by forcing providers to compete on high-quality, cost-effective care.
The startup "rewards providers and payers for enabling consumers to be fully informed and empowered in their decision-making," she said.
Wellvana Health
Kyle Wailes, the CEO of Wellvana.
Picked by: Carty (investor)
What the company does: The Nashville-based Wellvana helps independent primary-care doctors succeed in payment arrangements that reward doctors for improving patients' health and lowering their costs.
Why it's set to take off next year: Wellvana is growing rapidly thanks to a few trends, Carty said. The startup supports doctors taking care of seniors enrolled in the private-health-plan market for people 65 and over, where membership is surging, he said. It's also enabling the US health system's shift toward "value-based" care, which shows no signs of slowing.
"It's reducing total cost of care in the system," Carty said of Wellvana. "In a down economy, that's always a good thing."
Michelle Davey, a cofounder and the CEO of Wheel.
Picked by: Krasner
What the company does: The Austin, Texas-based Wheel sells access to its clinician network and technology solutions to provider companies β mostly startups, lab networks, tech companies, and retailers β looking to start up telehealth offerings.
Why it's set to take off next year: With the boom in virtual care, many clinicians are looking for part-time, online gigs, while many provider companies are looking for staff to expand their online offerings, Krasner told Insider. Wheel capitalized on that trend, providing the infrastructure needed to connect the two parties. She groups the company, which CEO Michelle Davey leads, into what she calls the "picks-and-shovels business," because it's doing the unsexy work to power healthcare behind the scenes.
"No one wants to invest in picks and shovels," Krasner said. "But this was brilliant. Michelle and team saw this huge virtual wave, and they were like, 'Hey, who's going to power this?'"
In August, Wheel cut 17% of its staff accompanying a business shift, Davey said in a memo shared with Insider. The company raised $150 million last January, closing the round earlier than planned to account for economic uncertainty, Davey said in the memo.
BI Graphics Anna Kim | 2022-12-19T10:26:47Z | www.businessinsider.com | 33 Biotech and Healthtech Companies to Watch in 2023 | https://www.businessinsider.com/biotech-healthtech-healthcare-startups-companies-to-watch-2023-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/biotech-healthtech-healthcare-startups-companies-to-watch-2023-2022-12 |
Goodbye to the good life: The cushy perks of tech work are rapidly disappearing.
Facebook employees relax with a game of ping-pong at Facebook's USA headquarters in Menlo Park, California.
Over the past year, more and more tech workers have seen perks pulled as companies try to ride out a tough market and potential recession.
Meta trimmed $1,000 off its health and wellness benefits per employee, canceled on-site laundry, ended a $200-a-month Lyft subsidy program, and is shrinking its free-food budget.
The same goes for Google, which started limiting employee travel to "business critical" trips this year. Salesforce joined the trend by axing its "wellbeing" days for fiscal year 2024.
When Elon Musk purchased Twitter, one of the first things he did was take away perks related to wellness, family planning, productivity, training, and home offices. He made sport of slashing as much as possible from Twitter, even getting rid of free lunch and going as far as demanding that workers go "hardcore" or resign.
As perks disappear and performance reviews become more brutal, tech workers' compensation will remain high. But for tech workers who, quite literally, enjoyed a free lunch, it still feels like the end of an era.
The end of perks
The disappearance of perks is a turn of events from the decade before. In the 2010s, perks helped companies differentiate themselves from their competitors in the battle to hire and retain engineers. Perks also kept employees in the office, or, in the case of Silicon Valley, on campus β you can't stray too far if your yoga class is down the hall from your standing desk.
But COVID eliminated the appeal of many perks. It's hard to enjoy an in-office-climbing wall when no one's going into the office.
Some companies replaced pre-pandemic perks with ones that addressed more immediate needs of employees like childcare, mental health support, and a stipend towards at-home office fixings. Now, those perks are on the chopping block, too.
Part of this is that tech management has the upper hand for the first time in many workers' careers. Layoffs have wracked the tech industry, with 150,000 tech workers losing their job in 2022. Those that remain are simply hoping to hold on. As Bernstein analyst Mark Shmulik put it in a note about potential layoffs at Google: "If you have a job at Google, you're keeping your head down and hoping that cutting toro from the sushi bar is the only cut that affects you."
A Gartner survey revealed 7 out of 10 CFOs are already planning on scaling back spending on real estate and facilities management as the option of remote work becomes a permanent fixture for many. It also means offices may be less fun and more functional.
Did tech workers even want perks?
But it's clear that for some tech workers, this perk correction has been overdue.
In May, Jessica Rose, a developer relations consultant at Katla, posed a question to Twitter: "What perks sound good but are a hard no from you?" Going first, she added "For me: anything clearly intended to keep me unhappily trapped in an office. Don't give me food or hammocks or video games, just let me work remotely or go home on time."
The tweet attracted responses that ranged from fitness centers at offices to ping pong tables. One Twitter user responded, "team activities, team vacations, and team retreats. I don't want to go to the Bahamas with Dennis from accounting."
Another user, JessingAbout, wrote, "Mental health benefits' that are actually apps and not like actual therapy coverage." And David Darnes, a lead developer at Nordhealth, tweeted "free lunches, desk beers, in-office game consoles," and takeout when working late into the night.
So in 2023, you can expect fewer peppy TikTok "day in the life" videos from young tech workers about the iced matcha latte, and what remains to be quite a bit grimmer.
Facebook Twitter Meta | 2022-12-19T10:26:59Z | www.businessinsider.com | Goodbye to the Good Life of Perk-Filled Tech Offices | https://www.businessinsider.com/google-perks-facebook-employee-benefits-office-life-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/google-perks-facebook-employee-benefits-office-life-2022-12 |
Royal Caribbean International invited me to spend two nights in the Wonder of the Sea's balcony stateroom.
My stateroom β which starts at $1,400 for 2023 itineraries β had all the essentials but minimal decor.
The rest of the ship was a sensory overload but my stateroom felt underwhelming.
I spent two nights in a balcony stateroom aboard Royal Caribbean's newest cruise ship, the Wonder of the Seas.
At 1,188 feet-long, it's currently the world's largest cruise ship.
The Wonder of the Seas.
But for a ship this grand, I was underwhelmed by my stateroom.
Before I dive into the negatives, I have to start on a positive note.
My balcony stateroom was in a great location on deck eight, home of the ship's Central Park neighborhood.
This open-aired walkway was lined with live plants, music, speciality dining venues that looked like everyday restaurants, and shopping.
And given its proximity to my stateroom, this tranquil park β which looked nothing like the rest of the ship β felt like my temporary backyard.
But besides this optimal location, I don't have an endless index of high praises to give my hotel room at sea.
Fair warning, I do have a handful of trivial complaints even though my stay was covered by the cruise line. Royal Caribbean hosted the two-night non-revenue sailing for travel agents and media.
But given the price tag of this stateroom β which starts at $1,400 in 2023 β I believe these grievances are warranted.
Like any typical cruise ship stateroom, the bathroom was well-sized for one person.
Luckily I was traveling alone β This bathroom would've been uncomfortably small for two people.
Despite its size, it had all the expected amenities.
There were shelves that held my toiletries as the waves rocked the ship β¦
β¦ a glass-walled shower next to the toilet β¦
β¦ and a long countertop that led to the narrow sink.
The clothesline and hooks in the shower were perfect for drying off my bathing suit.
But the two-in-one body wash and shampoo felt cheap, although I am glad it was provided in a refillable dispenser.
I acknowledge that I shouldn't be too judgemental given the ship's 7,084-guest capacity. That's a lot of body wash and shampoo to provide.
I'm just glad I brought my own conditioner.
The deep shelves provided plenty of storage for my toiletries. This became a necessity as the countertop was too narrow to hold more than a few of my belongings.
The sink was equally small. And because the faucet head was positioned close to the edge of the sink, water splashed out of the basin whenever I washed my hands.
This is definitely more of a personal pet peeve. But it felt like an issue that could've been easily fixed during the design phase.
Outside the bathroom, I don't have too many complaints about the bedroom. The "room" in "bedroom" is used loosely in this context.
Here, the comfortable queen bed was lined with plush pillows that enveloped me the moment I laid down.
And the bed faced a wall-mounted television that provided some background noise while I worked and scrolled through my phone.
There were small design features that made me appreciate the stateroom β¦
β¦ specifically the row of hooks to hang items like jackets and bags β¦
β¦ and the bedside lamps with built-in outlets and USB ports.
Both sides of the bed were also lined with large closets, giving me more storage space than I would've ever needed β¦
β¦ even if we were sailing on one of the cruise ship's 2023 six to eight-night itineraries.
Source: Royal Caribbean International
These closets were full of racks, hangers, shelves, and drawers to make unpacking and organizing easy.
And it was uniquely placed compared to other staterooms I've seen.
Stateroom closets are often tossed off to the side by the entry door or bathroom.
Source: Insider, Insider
But here, they separated the bed from the bathroom and living "room."
There was also a separate dresser in this living room space.
This, combined with the two large closets by the bed, provided what may have been the most storage space I've ever seen in a traditional stateroom.
The large dresser was located next to a desk facing the light-up vanity. I used this mirror more than the full-length one by the entry door.
Having a desk was convenient but I ended up doing most of my work on the couch parallel to the desk.
This couch could have pulled out into a bed to accommodate another two or so travelers.
It was so comfortable, I spent more time here than on my balcony.
The furnished balcony, located at the far end of my hotel room at sea, was like any other.
Some of the ship's balcony staterooms faced the Central Park neighborhood, giving travelers a view of the peaceful outdoor walkway and other people across the park.
Luckily, mine was located outwards, giving me an unobstructed view of the ocean.
The balcony wasn't too large, which was to be expected.
And like the bathroom, it would've been a tight squeeze for four travelers.
But for one guest, it was perfect.
That's not to say the stateroom isn't equipped to handle a full family.
There are definitely enough storage spaces to keep guests from fighting over the closet.
And like any stateroom on a new ship, my room had all the furniture families could want while vacationing at sea.
But the balcony stateroom was missing something all of the other staterooms I've been in had: robust decor.
Royal Caribbean's newest mega cruise ship is definitely one of the flashiest and most colorful vessels I've ever been on. Exploring it was a sensory overload.
But the same couldn't be said for my room.
It followed a general color scheme of neutral tans, blues, and whites.
And besides a small cluster of negligible art on the wall above my couch, the walls were barren.
The living room's ombre curtains, patterned carpet, and decorative pillows added some liveliness.
And there was a sliver of a blue and white backsplash between the bathroom's counter and mirror.
But the remainder of the stateroom felt muted and unexciting compared to the rest of the ship.
I understand there's only so much decor that can be placed in a small stateroom.
But in the past, I've stayed in ones with colorful murals β¦
β¦ wall panels β¦
The Infinite Veranda stateroom on the Celebrity Apex.
β¦ and framed artwork that reflected the destination or cruise brand.
So I was surprised a stateroom created by a brand as big as Royal Caribbean on a ship as giant as the Wonder of the Seas didn't provide this same excitement and decor.
Maybe this is justifiable. There are endless activities in the common spaces, including multiple water slides and pools, a zipline β¦
β¦ an ice skating rink β¦
... and a boardwalk.
I spent two days exploring the ship and barely had a grasp of where everything was.
In the end, I didn't spend much time in my private space.
But the Wonder of the Seas' balcony stateroom has a double occupancy starting rate of $1,400 for 2023 itineraries.
So maybe I'm being too picky. But at this price and aboard one of 2022's most highly anticipated cruise ships, I wanted more than just the essentials. I wanted to be wowed.
Royal Caribbean cruise line Wonder of the Seas | 2022-12-19T10:27:11Z | www.businessinsider.com | A $1,400 Stateroom on Royal Caribbean Wonder of the Seas: Review | https://www.businessinsider.com/review-stateroom-royal-caribbean-wonder-of-the-seas-cruise-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/review-stateroom-royal-caribbean-wonder-of-the-seas-cruise-2022-12 |
Tech recruiters from Meta and Microsoft share the best time to job search in the new year and their advice for laid-off workers
Jonathan Javier
Sophia Valdez, Nicole Fernandez-Valle, and Brittany Swan are tech recruiters who have worked at companies like Meta and Microsoft.
Nicole Fernandez-Valle, Brittany Swan, and Sophia Valdez
Jonathan Javier, CEO and cofounder of Wonsulting, previously worked at Snapchat, Google, and Cisco.
Three recruiters who've worked at places like Meta and Microsoft gave him their advice for laid-off workers.
Companies like candidates with personal brands; job seekers may need to wait until spring for search.
Lots of companies, including tech giants like Microsoft, Twitter and Meta, have conducted layoffs in the past year. While layoffs are always a possibility, this wave of job cuts won't last forever.
I've been laid off twice in my career: Once at my first-ever job at Snap, and another time at Cisco right before the pandemic hit. Both times, I thought it was the end of the world.
But the layoffs turned out to be a stepping stone for something new and better. After getting laid off at Snap, I landed a job at Google. After getting laid off at Cisco, my professional career coaching company Wonsulting, which had been a side gig until that point, grew significantly.
A LinkedIn post Javier made after getting laid off at Snap Inc.
Now, I run Wonsulting full-time and speak to tech recruiters on the daily. I asked three of them who specialize in early careers, product design, and engineers what they think about the current state of layoffs β and gathered their biggest tips and insights.
Recruiters are looking for specialized skills
Nicole Fernandez-Valle.
Nicole Fernandez-Valle
Nicole Fernandez-Valle, a former recruiter at Meta, said that as companies have slowed down hiring, there's an increased emphasis on hiring subject matter experts as opposed to jacks-of-all-trades.
"Candidates can take advantage of this by tailoring their rΓ©sumΓ©s per role, showcasing a breadth of work in applications (with portfolios, website links, etc.), and focusing on personal branding to showcase their unique value proposition to companies," she said.
Job seekers might need to hold out until March
Brittany Swan.
Brittany Swan
Brittany Swan, who's been in tech recruiting for over 17 years, said she the job market might not bounce back until the early spring. "Usually peak recruitment seasons are January and June," she said. "I'm predicting to see it gear up in March instead."
"We saw a lot of late season layoffs going into September and October, and because of that, companies are going to start building out new hiring plans later than usual."
Sophia Valdez.
Sophia Valdez
Sophia Valdez, a former technical recruiter at Microsoft and Meta, predicts candidates will be more aware of the market and more open to which companies they work for.
"More candidates are reaching out desperately looking for work," she said. "Job opportunities are limited and the job market is saturated. If large reputable companies are seemingly unstable, going to work at startups and small firms won't seem so risky anymore."
Layoffs are temporary setbacks meant for comebacks
As someone who's been laid off, there are many strategies that you can use to land another role, and thousands of professionals who are willing to help. Some of the best advice I'd give for those affected by layoffs is to prioritize your mental health, update your rΓ©sumΓ© and LinkedIn consistently, and most of all, post about your layoff on LinkedIn.
Most of all, remember it's sometimes out of your control β however, what's in your control is how you react to the setback.
Just know it'll be your biggest comeback yet.
Tech Recruiters | 2022-12-19T11:14:44Z | www.businessinsider.com | Tech Company Layoffs 2022: 3 Recruiters Share Advice for Job Seekers | https://www.businessinsider.com/tech-company-layoffs-2022-meta-layoffs-recruiter-advice-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/tech-company-layoffs-2022-meta-layoffs-recruiter-advice-2022-12 |
VCs say AI in the classroom and tech meant to help students who've fallen behind will be among the top edtech trends in 2023
Top edtech VCs shared their thoughts on the education startup trends to look out for in 2023.
Edtech became a hot sector for investing during the pandemic, but today the forecast is uncertain.
We asked investors from firms like Owl Ventures, Reach Capital, and GSV to share their predictions.
Here are their thoughts on what to look for in 2023, from more VR in classrooms to increased M&A.
For educational-technology startups looking for venture-capital funding, the coronavirus pandemic ushered in a boom. Schools and universities raced to adopt remote learning and tools to help them adjust to it.
In fact, annual venture-capital funding to edtech startups has more than tripled since 2019, according to PitchBook data. In 2019, funding in the space was $5.4 billion. That increased nearly threefold in 2020, to $14.1 billion, and then reached a record total in 2021 with $16.8 billion, PitchBook found. PitchBook estimates that edtech funding in 2022 stood at $8.4 billion as of December 15, as schools reopening led to less need for virtual teaching tools.
This uncertainty could lead to more-generalist firms shying away from the sector, Adriel Bercow, the founding partner of K50 Ventures, said. "Edtech specifically can face challenges due to the costs of scaling and finding product market fit or lack of appetite from downstream investors," he said.
Still, many investors remain optimistic about edtech in the long term, even if short-term prospects are tougher, they told Insider. Edtech startups across all sectors tend to be countercyclical compared with the economy at large, according to Amit Patel, a managing director at Owl Ventures. Continuing education and higher education boom when the job market is less reliable, he said.
And with an increasing number of students falling behind across education levels, schools and governments will be in the market for innovative solutions that can produce tangible results.
"The problems being addressed by global learning and skilling tech founders are larger and more urgent than ever as we see in declining academic results, absenteeism, and issues of engagement," the GSV managing partner Deborah Quazzo said.
Insider spoke with several top edtech venture capitalists to learn why, despite the anticipated downturn, they remain optimistic that the mass edtech adoption in schools and workplaces is here to stay. Here are the top four edtech trends to watch in 2023, according to top edtech investors.
Investors target startups trying to help students catch up academically and emotionally
Bill Varie/Getty Images
Parents and teachers are only beginning to understand the consequences of pandemic-era remote learning for K-12 students. Investors are looking to startups that can enhance in-classroom learning deficits and mental-health-related behavioral issues.
Reading- and math-proficiency scores for fourth to eighth graders are declining, according to results from the most recent National Assessment of Educational Progress in October. Combine these losses with increasing teacher turnover and a growing awareness of the emotional toll the pandemic has taken on students. and the situation becomes dire, Ian Chiu of Owl Ventures said.
"Schools and districts are looking for solutions that can make up this learning loss, whether through teaching augmentations or student support," Shauntel Garvey, a cofounder of the education-focused VC fund Reach Capital, told Insider.
One startup attempting to tackle this is Clayful, which lets students ages 8 to 18 text with behavioral-support counselors, Garvey said. These counselors can help provide emotional support to students.
Online-only learning programs will fall out of fashion in favor of hybrid and enhanced in-person learning
A teacher with some students in the classroom and some online at Sunkist Elementary School in Anaheim, California, in 2021.
Paul Bersebach/Orange County Register via Getty Images
Programs that offered online learning and virtual tutoring were a lifeline during COVID-19 outbreaks and lockdowns. But VCs told Insider they expected schooling to revert back toward in-person instruction whenever possible, even if there is some holdover from parents who pulled out of traditional schooling.
"There will be a lot of headwinds for the completely digital schooling methodology," Vinny Pujji, a managing partner at Left Lane Capital, said. "It will be shrinking from the peak levels of 2020 to 2021."
While some companies fully embraced online and virtual schooling as a business strategy, VCs say it's now essential that they build in some type of human interaction, like in-person small-group meetings or synchronous live video elements.
"People just crave community," Reach Capital's Shauntel Garvey said. "Solutions where there's no cohort or community are not as desirable."
More M&A, under strict scrutiny, will take place as the edtech market consolidates
Miguel Villagran/Getty
As interest rates rise and the hot startup market cools, VCs expect to see fewer new edtech companies springing to life in 2023 and more startups consolidating through mergers and acquisitions.
"A lot of companies that didn't raise this year are going to have to raise in the back half of 2023, and by then many of them will have been 18 to 20 months since their last fundraise," Ian Chiu of Owl Ventures said.
In terms of who will be doing the buying, the few public edtech companies, like the online-course library Coursera and the gamified language-learning app Duolingo, will be in a prime position to swoop up their rivals, Katelyn Donnelly, the founder and managing director of Avalanche VC, said.
Additionally, investors will generally demand higher scrutiny on a company's potential for growth.
"For edtech companies that want to raise a growth round, they better be able to demonstrate strong product market fit and be dramatically exceeding their plan," Niko Bonatsos, a managing director at General Catalyst, said.
Virtual reality and artificial intelligence will enter classrooms around the world
Metaverse digital cyber world technology, man with virtual reality VR goggle playing AR augmented reality game and entertainment, futuristic lifestyle
Thinkhubstudio/Getty
The pandemic ushered in a rapid adoption of new technology tools across K-12 schools and universities. For instance, a crop of virtual-reality startups sought to enhance math and science learning through gamified lesson plans.
Donnelly of Avalanche VC predicts that startups like these will see even more widespread adoption next year as school districts look for new ways to engage students in tricky subjects.
She said these tools would be more integrated into the classroom rather than what she called the "hastily put-together YouTube videos" that characterized much pandemic-era virtual learning.
Several VCs including Quazzo of GSV also bet heavily that generative AI, or artificial intelligence that can create content, would become increasingly prevalent in schools and universities in the form of tutoring tools or teaching aids. Some startups already attracting investor attention in the space include TeachFX, which offers AI-generated teaching feedback, and Prof Jim, which turns traditional textbook content into multimedia learning experiences.
And with increased federal funding from pandemic relief still flowing into schools, VCs predict school districts will be willing to try out this new tech because they'll finally have the budget to do so. | 2022-12-19T11:14:50Z | www.businessinsider.com | These Are the Key Edtech Trends to Watch in 2023, According to Top VCs | https://www.businessinsider.com/top-edtech-trends-2023-according-education-vcs-vr-teaching-ai-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/top-edtech-trends-2023-according-education-vcs-vr-teaching-ai-2022-12 |
Elon Musk takes photos with fans during the World Cup final in Qatar.
Elon Musk went to the World Cup final in Qatar on Sunday, and let the world know.
But as he was shown on live TV and tweeted about the game, many questioned Twitter's doxxing policy.
Musk had banned β then unbanned β several journalists for tweeting about his private jet's location.
As Elon Musk tweeted from the stands at the World Cup final on Sunday, Twitter users joked that he was breaking his own policy on "doxxing real-time location info."
The Twitter CEO banned several journalists last Thursday for sharing links to the ElonJet account, which tracked where Musk's private jet departs and lands. Those reporters were unbanned the following evening, after the billionaire ran a Twitter poll on the decision.
Now people are questioning how the doxxing policy is enforced, since news outlets and Musk himself have since shared his whereabouts. His private jet was earlier tracked from California to Qatar, with a stop in Luton, England.
Live television then showed Musk arriving at Lusail Stadium, and screenshots were tweeted by numerous news sites.
A senior producer at Sky News, Nick Stylianou, was left asking: "Are we allowed to tweet that Elon Musk is at the World Cup Final right now because it was just on TV or is that a ban?"
βSPORTbible (@sportbible) December 18, 2022
As Musk took his seat next to Donald Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, he tweeted several videos of the game β leading many to joke that he was doxxing himself.
Jordan, who runs a popular Formula 1 fan account, tweeted: "It appears Elon Musk has posted real time coordinates of the individuals shown in this video."
And Lee Carter, a socialist and former Virginia delegate, said: "Looking forward to Elon Musk being banned for tweeting Elon Musk's real-time location."
Another tweeter, Mike Murphy, questioned: "Is it real time doxxing if you do it to yourself?"
βMike Murphy (@mcwm) December 18, 2022
Musk was later pictured shaking hands with Turkish President, Recep Tayyip ErdoΔan, and taking selfies with fans.
Argentina lifted the World Cup trophy after one of the tournament's most exciting finals, which saw two goals scored in extra time before Argentina won on penalties.
Twitter did not respond to a request for comment, sent outside US working hours. | 2022-12-19T11:14:56Z | www.businessinsider.com | Twitter Users Joke Elon Musk Doxxed Himself at the World Cup Final | https://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-users-joke-elon-musk-doxxed-himself-world-cup-final-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-users-joke-elon-musk-doxxed-himself-world-cup-final-2022-12 |
Drones on display in an exhibition in the PMC Wagner Centre, associated with the founder of the Wagner private military group (PMC) Yevgeny Prigozhin in Saint Petersburg, Russia, on November 4, 2022.
The Wagner Group paramilitary, known for brutality, is fighting on behalf of Russia in Ukraine.
Per a UK intel update on the Donetsk region, even low-level officers are far from combat, watching.
It said they issue harsh commands to troops, often ex-prisoners, and send them to die from afar.
In an intelligence update on Wednesday, the UK's Ministry of Defence said the notorious Wagner Group paramilitary is likely protecting its officers letting them stay far from combat and lead via drone.
Instead, the ministry said, the private militia relies on "expendable" troops, often recruited straight from prisons, to march into harm's way.
Wagner is one of the many feuding factions carrying out Russia's invasion of Ukraine alongside its main armed forces.
It is led by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin who got close to the halls of power in the Kremlin by providing catering for its events.
The UK update said his Wagner militia was taking a "major role in attritional combat" in Ukraine's eastern Donetsk region.
Its tactics there involve commanders remaining under cover to "give orders over radios, informed by video feeds" from drones.
It described the orders given as simplistic and inflexible: a map with a route drawn on it which recruits have to follow. Sometimes they get help from artillery and armored vehicles, the update said, and sometimes they don't.
"Wagner operatives who deviate from their assault routes without authorization are likely being threatened with summary execution," the update said.
UK officials presented this as a way to "make use of a large number of poorly trained convicts it has recruited."
"These brutal tactics aim to conserve Wagner's rare assets of experienced commanders and armored vehicles, at the expense of the more readily available convict recruits, which the organization assesses as expendable," it added.
Prigozhin, was seen traveling to prisons and penal colonies in September to recruit soldiers after Russian troops suffered major losses in Ukraine.
He told the prisoners that even serious crimes would be forgiven in exchange for fighting in Ukraine β but that anyone who deserted would be killed.
The group, which has been repeatedly accused of war crimes and human rights abuses, has long been active in Syria and multiple African countries where Russia is seeking to project its power.
Since fighting in Ukraine, the group has been forced to lower its standards in order to replenish its ranks.
"Very limited training is made available to new recruits," the British Ministry of Defense said in a July 18 assessment, adding that the trend "will highly likely impact on the future operational effectiveness of the group and will reduce its value as a prop to the regular Russian forces." | 2022-12-19T11:58:39Z | www.businessinsider.com | Russia Wagner Officers Watch by Drone As Troops Sent to Die: UK Intel | https://www.businessinsider.com/russian-commanders-watch-drones-as-troops-sent-die-uk-intel-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/russian-commanders-watch-drones-as-troops-sent-die-uk-intel-2022-12 |
Why it stands out: UFB Direct is an online division of Axos Bank. UFB Best Savings could be a good option if you want a savings account with zero monthly service fees and a competitive interest rate.
What to look out for: Juno has two types of accounts: Basic and Metal. The main difference between the two accounts is that the Juno Metal Checking Account has higher limits for yearly cashback, crypto purchases, and other perks. | 2022-12-19T17:20:34Z | www.businessinsider.com | 9 Best High-Interest CDs and Savings Accounts Today: Dec. 19, 2022 | up to 4.50% APY on a 6-Month CD | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/todays-best-high-interest-accounts-december-19-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/todays-best-high-interest-accounts-december-19-2022-12 |
Alyssa, 13, was the first patient to receive a base-edited cell therapy to treat her leukemia in May 2022.
A 13-year-old girl was the world's first patient to get a cell therapy called base editing in May.
The experimental treatment has put her leukemia in remission for six months and counting.
Base editing is a new gene-editing technology that could lead to cures for many diseases.
A British teenager's leukemia went into remission after she received an experimental cancer therapy that used a new gene-editing technology called base editing.
Alyssa, 13, was the first-ever patient to receive a base-edited cell therapy after enrolling in a clinical trial in May. A month after the infusion and a subsequent bone-marrow transplant, her cancer, called T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia, went into remission, and the Leicester resident remains in remission six months later, the Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children said on December 11.
The dramatic success is an early sign of the potential of base editing, a new technology discovered less than a decade ago in a Harvard University laboratory. Base editing allows scientists to make ultraprecise changes to single letters of DNA in cells. The goal is to make genetic tweaks that could treat or cure diseases.
Alyssa, a teenager in Leicester, England, received a base-edited cell therapy to treat her leukemia.
Beyond leukemia, biotech companies are aiming to use base-editing therapies to treat sickle-cell disease and some types of cardiovascular disease.
In the case of Alyssa, her treatment used base editing to genetically edit T-cells, a type of immune cell, that came from a healthy donor. These cells were edited to allow them to destroy cancerous cells while not attacking her own immune system, and then infused into Alyssa.
"It's our most sophisticated cell engineering so far and paves the way for other new treatments and ultimately better futures for sick children," Dr. Waseem Qasim, a cell- and gene-therapy professor and consultant immunologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital, said in a statement.
Base-editing is an ultraprecise version of CRISPR gene editing
Base editing was discovered in the lab of the Harvard genomics researcher David Liu.
Alexis Komor, a base-editing pioneer and researcher at the University of California, San Diego.
Courtesy of Alexis Komor
In November 2013, a 26-year-old chemist named Alexis Komor exchanged emails with Liu to figure out a research project, as Insider has reported. Komor and Liu sketched out the base-editing idea in just a few days, which sparked years of research that culminated in their results being published in April 2016 in Nature, a top scientific journal.
That paper has now been cited over 3,400 times and has helped launch multiple biotech companies, including Beam Therapeutics, cofounded by Liu, and Verve Therapeutics.
"It's really crazy that this Frankenstein genome-editing tool put together from all these different parts works so well," Komor previously told Insider.
The technology addresses some of the limitations of CRISPR-Cas9, the Nobel Prize-winning gene-editing technology discovered in 2012.
CRISPR-Cas9 works by cutting a disease-causing gene out of the DNA double helix before stitching it back up. Instead of making a full cut, base editors nick a single strand of DNA, while simultaneously changing a single letter of DNA on the other strand. The cell then repairs that nick and uses the just-edited DNA as its template.
The technology gives researchers an unprecedented level of specificity, being able to make changes to the base elements of genetic code, or the nucleotides nicknamed A, C, G, and T. Researchers often compare base editing to using a pencil and eraser, while the traditional CRISPR system is more like using scissors and glue.
Despite these advantages, base editing also has its limits. Base editors can only change a single letter of genetic code, and researchers haven't yet figured out how to make all the changes. As of now, base editors can make only certain changes to nucleotides, limiting its potential. For instance, base editing can change an A to a G but not an A to a T.
Newer technology, like prime editing, can write and edit longer stretches of letters.
Big Pharma sees 'tremendous potential' in base editing
The potential of base editing doesn't stop with Alyssa, as researchers are starting to test base-editing therapies in a range of conditions. Earlier this month, the FDA cleared a different T-cell therapy that is similar to Alyssa's treatment to start initial human testing.
"Seeing more patients like Alyssa experience remission from this treatment would mean so much both to the researchers who developed base editing, and to the communities of patients who might benefit," Liu told Insider in an email.
Big Pharma has also shown interest, with Pfizer agreeing in January 2022 to pay $300 million up front to collaborate with Beam on several base-editing therapies.
Mikael Dolsten, Pfizer's chief scientific officer, told Insider at the time he anticipates base editing having an impact for large patient populations over time β and not just for rare diseases.
"This is a curative technology and can really transform genetic medicine for the future," Dolsten said. "It has tremendous potential."
Healthcare Biotech gene editing | 2022-12-19T18:04:33Z | www.businessinsider.com | What Is Base Editing, the Gene-Editing Leukemia Breakthrough? | https://www.businessinsider.com/what-is-base-editing-gene-editing-leukemia-breakthrough-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/what-is-base-editing-gene-editing-leukemia-breakthrough-2022-12 |
A Costco storefront in Mount Prospect, Illinois.
Costco will likely raise its membership fee in the next six to 12 months, Wall Street analysts say.
The wholesale club typically raises the price every 5 1/2 years or so, most recently in 2017.
Costco executives have said a fee increase is "a question of when, not if."
A $5 increase to Costco membership fees could be on the horizon, bringing the cost of a basic one-year membership to $65.
That's according to Cowen analysts led by Oliver Chen, who wrote in a note published Monday that a Costco membership fee raise "could be likely within 6-12 months." The Seattle-based wholesaler, which sells everything from groceries to electronics, hasn't raised its $60 fee for a standard Gold Star membership since March 2017.
"We believe a membership fee increase is imminent in FY23 as Costco has not raised fees in 5.8 years yet has historically increased fees by $5 for regular memberships every 5.5 years," the analysts wrote.
Indeed, this pattern of $5 fee-hike announcements has persisted since 2000:
August 2000: Fee increased to $45, effective September 2000
April 2006: Fee increased to $50, effective May 2006
October 2011: Fee increased to $55, effective November 2011
March 2017: Fee increased to $60, effective June 2017
Cowen's prediction aligns with what Costco executives have said about the company's membership fees. During Costco's earnings call in September, CFO Richard Galanti confirmed that five-year cycle and said that while Costco wasn't raising the fee at that time, a price increase could come in 2023.
"If you look at June of '17, plus five years and seven months, you're talking roughly January '23," Galanti said on the call. "Now I'm not suggesting it's January '23. I'm just saying it's not there yet anyway."
Galanti reiterated that price increases are coming during Costco's December 8 earnings call, calling them "a question of when, not if."
"There's no analytical framework we use other than we feel very good about our member loyalty and our strength. And if we wanted to do it yesterday, we could. If we want to do it six months from now, we can," he said. "So, we'll wait and see."
Costco has intentionally kept its membership price consistent in 2022 "given the current macro environment, historically high inflation, and the burden it's having on our members and on all consumers in general," Costco executive Bob Nelson said in June.
Costco's current membership price puts it in line with other warehouse clubs:
BJ's charges $55 a year for its standard Inner Circle membership.
Walmart-owned Sam's Club raised the cost of its basic membership to $50 annually in October, up from $45.
Costco costco membership Wholesalers | 2022-12-19T18:51:44Z | www.businessinsider.com | Costco Membership Fees Likely Increasing in 2023, Analysts Say | https://www.businessinsider.com/costco-membership-fee-increase-sams-club-bjs-compared-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/costco-membership-fee-increase-sams-club-bjs-compared-2022-12 |
Trump allies dangled a job before a Jan. 6 committee witness that would make her 'financially very comfortable' before her testimony, committee says
The House January 6 committee uncovered evidence that Trump allies dangled a job before a witness.
The witness described the offer as a job that would make her "financially very comfortable."
The panel said that the job prospect and other actions could have been a strategy to influence witnesses.
The House January 6 committee uncovered evidence that former President Donald Trump's allies dangled a lucrative job in front of a witness before her testimony.
Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a California Democrat and member of the panel, disclosed the potential bombshell allegation during a Monday hearing that presented the panel's findings from its lengthy investigation into the Capitol riot.
"These offers were withdrawn or didn't materialize as the reports of the content of her testimony circulated," Lofgren said. "The witness believed this was an effort to affect her testimony." The witness described the potential job as one that would make her "financially very comfortable," Lofgren said.
Lofgren added that the committee is "concerned that these efforts may have been a strategy to prevent the committee from finding the truth." A coordinated effort to stymie the committee could potentially amount to obstruction of justice.
The committee, Lofgren added, uncovered evidence that groups associated with the former president helped pay for lawyers for some of the witnesses that testified before Congress.
It is unclear who the witness in question is. The committee has promised to release its full report and supporting evidence, including transcripts from testimony, in the coming days.
Rep. Liz Cheney, the panel's vice chair, previously announced that the committee had passed on potential evidence of obstruction to the Justice Department without detailing what exactly transpired.
Lofgren also said that a lawyer for a witness encouraged that witness not to recall certain information even when the witness knew what they were being asked about.
january 6 Congress capitol riot | 2022-12-19T20:23:18Z | www.businessinsider.com | Trump Allies Dangled a Job Before a Jan. 6 Committee Witness Before Her Testimony, Committee Says | https://www.businessinsider.com/house-january-6-committee-witness-job-offer-trump-allies-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/house-january-6-committee-witness-job-offer-trump-allies-2022-12 |
The Jan. 6 panel says lawyers paid by pro-Trump groups may have obstructed its investigation.
In one instance, a lawyer allegedly told a witness that they did not need to clarify untruthful testimony.
The panel confirmed that it has turned over the evidence to the Justice Department.
The House January 6 Committee says it uncovered evidence that some lawyers paid by groups connected to former president Donald Trump encouraged witnesses to give "false or misleading" information to the committee.
"One lawyer told a witness that the witness could in certain circumstances tell the committee that she didn't recall facts when she actually did recall them," Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a California Democrat and member of the panel, said during a hearing presenting the investigation's findings.
In another instance, Lofgren said a witness was offered potential employment that would her "financially very comfortable" as her appearance before the committee approached. This job offer was, according to Lofgren, made by entities that were "apparently linked to Donald Trump and his associates."
The committee, Lofgren continued, is "concerned that these efforts may have been a strategy to prevent the committee from finding the truth. A coordinated effort to stymie the committee could potentially amount to obstruction charges.
Lofgren added that the same lawyer who told a witness not to be entirely forthcoming with the committee would not disclose who was paying for their legal services β even when the witness herself asked about the funding.
"He told her, 'We're not telling people where funding is coming from right now.'"
The report confirms what lawmakers on the panel have already said publicly, which is that the committee turned over evidence of possible obstruction of its investigation to the Justice Department. The report says that Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis also has evidence of possible obstruction. Willis is separately investigating Trump's efforts to pressure Georgia officials to overturn the state's election results.
In another episode involving the same lawyer, who was receiving payments from a pro-Trump group, the committee said the lawyer told their client that they should not talk about a subject that reflected poorly on the former president.
"'No, no, no, no, no. We don't want to go there. We don't want to talk about that,'" the report says the lawyer told the witness. The same lawyer also allegedly told the witness that it was not their job to clarify testimony that might not be truthful.
"'They don't know what you know', [witness]," the report quotes the lawyer saying. "'They don't know that you can recall some of these things. So you saying 'I don't recall' is an entirely acceptable response to this.'"
According to the committee, the witness decided to terminate their relationship with this lawyer. The committee promised that further details about what could amount to obstruction of a congressional investigation will be made public soon.
House january 6 committee capitol riot Capitol Siege | 2022-12-19T20:23:24Z | www.businessinsider.com | Trump-Allied Lawyers May Have Told Jan. 6 Witnesses to Give False Information: Panel | https://www.businessinsider.com/january-6-committee-trump-allied-lawyers-obstruction-justice-department-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/january-6-committee-trump-allied-lawyers-obstruction-justice-department-2022-12 |
A GOP strategist told Politico that Mike Pence "could not go to a Trump rally and be safe."
After Jan. 6, Pence has both chided Trump and sought to endear himself to conservative base voters.
Pence continues to tease a potential 2024 presidential run, which would pit him against Trump.
For four years, Mike Pence was a loyal vice president to Donald Trump, defending the president at virtually every turn while promoting the conservative agenda being pursued by the administration.
While Trump came to the White House as a political outsider, Pence had served in the US House for 12 years before his election as governor of Indiana and had deep ties with religious conservatives, something that the then-president lacked.
However, as Trump went through his term in office, his grip over the Republican Party became vise-like, with his loyalists soon taking control of state parties across the country.
After Pence rejected Trump's repeated entreaties to overturn Joe Biden's 2020 presidential win, the relationship between the two men shifted. Trump has continued to insist that Pence could have declined to certify the election results, while Pence has stood behind his decision, pointing to his adherence of the Constitution.
But among base Republicans, many of whom remain solidly behind Trump as the 2024 presidential election approaches, Pence has lost much of his luster.
Sarah Longwell, a GOP political strategist and publisher of The Bulwark, told Politico's Adam Wren that Pence doesn't animate primary voters and suggested that he would be largely unwelcome among the very rallygoers with whom he would routinely engage with just two years ago.
"Mike Pence could not go to a Trump rally and be safe," she told Wren.
Longwell told Wren that after holding roughly 100 GOP focus groups since 2020, the former vice president generally received "meh" reactions from prospective primary voters.
"A relic of a different time," she said of Pence.
Over the past year, Pence has opened up about the riot at the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021, speaking of his anger at seeing the desecration of the ornate building, while also remarking on Trump's role that day and the immediate aftermath of the attack.
During an interview on Fox News earlier this month, Pence said that Trump appeared "remorseful" about January 6 β when the then-president spoke at a rally at the Ellipse and perpetuated debunked theories of voter fraud to his supporters β in the days after the attack.
"I sensed he was deeply remorseful about what had happened," Pence said of Trump while on Fox News. "He immediately asked about Karen and Charlotte, who were with me all day and night on January 6th and 7th. He asked me how they were and I responded sternly, 'They're fine, Mr. President, they wouldn't leave.' And then he said to me, 'Were you scared?' And I said, 'No, I was angry.'"
Pence during the midterms campaigned for Republican candidates across the country β including ones like Gov. Brian Kemp of Georgia who have frustrated Trump in the past β while continuing to mull over a 2024 presidential bid of his own.
With Trump having already launched his campaign, a potential entry into the race by Pence would add another chapter in the unique political relationship between the two men.
Mike Pence Republican Party Donald Trump | 2022-12-19T20:23:30Z | www.businessinsider.com | GOP Strategist: Mike Pence 'Could Not Go to a Trump Rally and Be Safe' | https://www.businessinsider.com/republican-strategist-pence-relic-not-safe-trump-rally-2020-election-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/republican-strategist-pence-relic-not-safe-trump-rally-2020-election-2022-12 |
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (left) wrote a letter to the Tesla board, questioning CEO Elon Musk's Twitter takeover.
Patrick Semansky-Pool/Getty/Patrick Pleul/picture alliance via Getty Images
Sen. Elizabeth Warren wrote to Tesla's board, raising questions over Elon Musk's Twitter purchase.
The senator told the board it must ensure Elon Musk does not treat Tesla as a "private plaything."
Some Tesla investors have expressed concern that Twitter has become a distraction for Musk.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren sent a letter to Tesla's board on Sunday questioning whether Elon Musk's Twitter acquisition had led the billionaire to misappropriate the electric-car maker's resources and created "unavoidable conflicts of interest."
Warren said Musk's Twitter takeover has "raised questions about possible violations of securities or other laws, including whether Mr. Musk is funneling Tesla resources into Twitter, a potentially 'improper diversion of resources that might impact Tesla's sales and earnings' and could result in 'delays in programs at Tesla,'" The New York Times was the first to report.
The letter said those misappropriated resources could include labor, like software engineers and senior executives.
The senator warned Tesla's board members that it is their job to ensure "that a controlling shareholder (especially one who is also a Chief Executive Officer, or CEO) does not treat the company as a private plaything." Warren cited reports that Musk has brought in dozen of Tesla employees to assist in his Twitter takeover, saying it could violate the billionaire's "legal duty of loyalty to Tesla."
In her letter, Warren pointed out that Musk's ownership of Twitter could cause a conflict of interest as the billionaire could either scrap ad deals for Tesla competitors and boost the electric-car maker's posts, or give deals to rivals to Tesla's detriment. She also noted Musk could funnel Tesla's funds into Twitter by allowing the car company to overpay for ads on the platform.
A spokesperson for Warren directed Insider to the letter when reached for comment. Musk and a Tesla spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment ahead of publication.
On Sunday, Musk polled Twitter users over whether he should stay on as the CEO of Twitter, and 57% of the over 17 million users that voted in the survey said the billionaire should step down. It is unclear whether Musk will honor the poll and resign.
Tesla's stock has plummeted over 50% this year, but shares of the EV company appeared to respond positively to the possibility of Musk stepping down as CEO of Twitter. The billionaire has offloaded nearly $40 billion worth of Tesla stock in the past 14 months.
Earlier this month, some Tesla investors expressed concern that Twitter had become too much of a distraction for the carmaker's CEO. And Tesla's third largest shareholder, Leo KoGuan, said on Twitter last week that "Tesla needs and deserves to have working full-time C.E.O."
Warren has been critical of Musk in the past. Last year, Warren called the billionaire out for reportedly paying no federal income tax in 2018. Musk later took aim at Warren, calling her "Senator Karen" and saying she reminded him of a "friend's angry mom."
In her recent letter, Warren requested that the board respond by January 3, and that it outline how Musk will meet his fiduciary duties at Tesla amd how the company will avoid conflicts of interest. | 2022-12-19T20:23:36Z | www.businessinsider.com | Sen. Warren Warns Tesla of Musk's Twitter Conflicts, Questions Oversight | https://www.businessinsider.com/senator-elizabeth-warren-elon-musk-tesla-board-twitter-takeover-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/senator-elizabeth-warren-elon-musk-tesla-board-twitter-takeover-2022-12 |
US President Donald Trump poses with former communications director Hope Hicks shortly before making his way to board Marine One on the South Lawn and departing from the White House on March 29, 2018. - Trump is visiting Ohio to speak on infrastructure development before heading to Palm Beach, Florida.
White House advisor Hope Hicks told Trump she was concerned that the January 6 attack on the Capitol would hurt his legacy.
Trump responded that no one would care about his legacy if he lost, Hicks said.
"The only thing that matters is winning," she recalled Trump saying.
Former President Donald Trump said winning was "the only thing that matters" as he falsely asserted he won the 2020 White House contest in the weeks after the election, according Hope Hicks, a former top advisor.
Hicks made her comments during videotaped testimony to the committee investigating the January 6 attack on the US Capitol that was aired during the panel's Monday hearing. The video showed Hicks speaking publicly for the first time about the weeks after the 2020 election.
"I was becoming increasingly concerned that we were damaging his legacy," Hicks told the committee.
Asked what Trump's response was to these comments, Hicks replied, "He said something along the lines of: 'Nobody will care about my legacy if I lose, so that won't matter. The only thing that matters is winning.'"
Hicks started working with Trump during his 2016 campaign and served as a close confidante and White House communications director. She left the White House before returning as a senior advisor ahead of the 2020 election. She was one of Trump's closest and most loyal advisors.
The committee also showed a text message that Hicks exchanged with Hogan Gidley, then-White House deputy press secretary, in which he urged her to tell Trump to send a tweet stressing that his supporters in Washington should be "NON-violent."
Asked about it during her committee testimony, Hicks said she didn't make the suggestion to Trump directly but communicated it through other aides, including advisor Eric Herschmann.
Herschmann told Hicks he had already made the recommendation to Trump as well, but that Trump refused, Hicks said.
The committee's Monday meeting was the last time the group will convene during this Congress. It asked the Justice Department to prosecute Trump in connection with the violent siege.
NOW WATCH: Tina Brown: Why Melania Trump is the best aspect of the Trump presidency
Politics Donald Trump january 6th | 2022-12-19T20:23:52Z | www.businessinsider.com | Trump Told Hope Hicks 'the Only Thing That Matters Is Winning' 2020 Election | https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-told-hope-hicks-the-only-thing-that-matters-is-winning-2020-election-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-told-hope-hicks-the-only-thing-that-matters-is-winning-2020-election-2022-12 |
Industry experts have tips on how car-buyers can get the best deal in 2023.
After years of high prices and low inventory, car buyers might finally see things go their way.
But shoppers still need to weigh their options if they want a deal, experts say.
Consider certain brands or vehicle types if youβre car shopping in 2023.
After struggling with astronomical prices and a shortage of vehicles, car buyers are finally seeing some relief.
Right now, supply chain crises are easing, bringing more inventory to dealership lots, while demand is stabilizing. As a result, JPMorgan says, used car prices could fall by as much as 20% in 2023, and new car prices could drop by 5%.
But shoppers will still need to hunt to find a deal. Industry car-buying experts shared a few tips for what segments and brands may offer the best β and earliest β deals in 2023.
(Hope you like minivans!)
Buy domestic
Brands like Tesla, Volkswagen, and BMW are generally more expensive now than in the past, said Brian Moody, executive editor of Kelley Blue Book. But some of their competitors have backed off jacked-up prices.
"Looking for something like General Motors or maybe Hyundai, Mazda, Buick β some of those still have slight price increases, but just not as dramatic as some of the other ones," he said. Buicks, for example, are selling for roughly 2% below MSRP, Moody said.
TrueCar industry analyst Zack Krelle agreed, noting that domestic brands have had more success building up inventory.
"There are possibly some opportunities on the domestic brand side where they have slightly more inventory than some of the import brands," Krelle said. "The domestic brands have a 30-, 40-day supply, which is still very, very low compared to historic levels."
Stay away from SUVs
Not only does brand matter, but the type of vehicle a car-buyer is looking for does, too.
"There are some deals out there, if you happen to want a vehicle that is maybe lower in demand or if you're in a region that that particular vehicle doesn't sell as well as others," Krelle said.
Secondhand pickup trucks, minivans, convertibles, and coupes were all trading at below the average for used cars as of November, according to Karl Brauer, executive analyst at the car search engine iSeeCars.com.
"The biggest, fastest drop in prices in returning toward normal, pre-pandemic prices would probably be in those segments," Brauer said. More desirable SUVs will follow later on.
Pickup trucks, though popular in general, don't have great fuel economy, so prices have softened amid higher-than-normal gas prices, Brauer said. Coupes and convertibles are "fun cars" that shoppers stay away from when they're worried about inflation and economic turmoil.
Small cars, which haven't been historically sought-after and which may seem like an obvious road to a good deal, are now in high demand because of their relatively low purchase price and good gas mileage, experts say. Brauer expects that trend to continue into next year.
The pandemic may have turned the car market on its head. But the basic laws of supply and demand still hold true.
"Generally speaking, if you want to save money, I wouldn't be looking for the same thing everybody else is looking for," Moody said. | 2022-12-19T20:23:58Z | www.businessinsider.com | Where to Find the Best Car Deals in 2023 As Prices Drop | https://www.businessinsider.com/used-car-prices-drop-2023-best-deals-cheapest-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/used-car-prices-drop-2023-best-deals-cheapest-2022-12 |
Photos show Elon Musk hanging out with Jared Kushner at the World Cup final
Elon Musk and Jared Kushner were seen together at the World Cup final.
In an informal poll, Twitter users voted that Musk should step down as head of Twitter.
Musk suspended the accounts of several journalists following claims they were endangering him and his family.
Elon Musk was spotted with Donald Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, at the World Cup final on Sunday. This comes as Congress is investigating Kushner. Separately, in an informal poll, users voted that Musk should step down as head of Twitter. | 2022-12-19T21:06:36Z | www.businessinsider.com | Photos Show Elon Musk With Jared Kushner at the World Cup Final | https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-jared-kushner-world-cup-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-jared-kushner-world-cup-2022-12 |
Embrace pet insurance cost
Filing claims
Embrace vs. American Kennel Club pet insurance
Embrace vs. ASPCA pet insurance
Embrace pet insurance review 2023
Choosing pet insurance can be an overwhelming decision for pet owners. But it's wise to consider getting coverage for your furry family member, as vet expenses can add up quickly. Even a minor accident or illness could cost thousands. In addition, most vets want some assurance pet parents can pay before moving forward with surgeries and other costly medical care.
Embrace pet insurance offers pet owners customized coverage plans tailored to pets' health care needs and owners' budgets. Established in 2003, Embrace is also the primary pet insurance providerfor other well-known insurers like Allstate, GEICO, and USAA. American Modern Insurance Group, a part of Munich Re insurance group, underwrites all policies. If you buy through your auto or home insurance portal with companies like Allstate or GEICO, you'll be redirected to Embrace's site to complete the transaction.
This review provides an overview of Embrace pet insurance, exploring the various coverage levels, pricing, and more. With this information, pet owners should be able to make informed decisions when shopping for pet insurance.
Pet insurance plans from Embrace
Embrace keeps it simple by offering a single accident and illness plan with the option to add wellness coverage for an additional cost. Families enjoy coverage for common accidents and illnesses, hereditary conditions occurring later in life, surgeries, hospitalizations, and more. In most states, Embrace also offers $1,000 in dental illness coverage each year.
As with most other insurance providers, preexisting conditions aren't covered. However, Embrace differentiates between "curable" and "incurable" preexisting conditions. Embrace may cover "curable" diseases if asymptomatic for 12 months. This could include respiratory infections, UTIs, and gastrointestinal issues. Unfortunately, incurable conditions will not be covered even if your pet experiences no symptoms for 12 months.
When customizing your coverage with Embrace, you have options. You can personalize the plan with different choices for deductible, reimbursement, and annual limit.
Policy coinsurance: Embrace pays 70%, 80%, or 90% of each eligible bill
Annual deductible: Buyers pay up to $200, $300, $500, $750, or $1,000 per year before Embrace coverage kicks in
Annual maximum: Embrace pays up to $5,000, $8,000, $10,000, $15,000, or $30,000 per year
Additional coverage options from Embrace pet insurance
As mentioned above, you can add a wellness plan to Embrace's accident and illness policy. It isn't a policy but a budgeting tool. It allows you to save to cover wellness and preventative care items like grooming, spaying and neutering, and vaccinations.
Just note that any unused coverage from the wellness plan doesn't roll over from year to year. So you use it or lose it. For this reason, it may not be as competitive a savings option as you think.
How much does pet insurance from Embrace cost?
The price you'll pay depends on what levels of coverage you choose for your pet, along with your pet's breed, age, size, and location. Premiums are frequently under $50 per month for each pet, which is exceptionally affordable depending on how many pets you have. So while Embrace is not the most expensive pet insurance company, it's also not the cheapest.
It's not just comprehensive coverage giving the company an edge, though. While Embrace does not offer unlimited coverage like Healthy Paws or other similar competitors, it does offer a diminishing deductible model. Your deductible goes down $50 every year you don't file a claim. So your premium would adjust with age, location, and other factors. But if you choose a $200 deductible on a new puppy and don't file a claim for four years, you could qualify for coverage without a deductible on your 4-year-old dog when they need veterinary care. So how much do real pet parents pay for Embrace?
First, we'll examine sample premiums for a medium-sized mixed-breed 3-year-old dog living in Colorado.
If you go with the most popular coverage levels and limits, you will pay $35.69 per month. However, your premium would go up if you decided to buy more coverage.
For example, coverage for the same pet, but with higher reimbursements and percentages and a lower deductible, will cost you significantly more per month. As you can see, Embrace's website allows users to toggle between reimbursement levels, deductibles, and coinsurance rates to see the impact of any changes in seconds.
Next, let's look at premium options for a 5-year-old male Tabby cat from Colorado. With the most popular reimbursement limits, coinsurance, and annual deductible, you'd pay $51.90 per month.
Select higher levels of coverage, and you'll see the premium increase.
How do I file claims with Embrace pet insurance?
Embrace pet insurance gives you lots of options when it comes to filing a claim.
Claims can be submitted through the app, as well as by email, fax, or mail through the following:
Email: claims@embracepetinsurance.com
Beachwood, OH 44122-0188
Claims are generally processed within 10 to 15 days. For the fasted payment possible, choose direct deposit instead of receiving a check in the mail. Embrace's website will prompt you through the steps necessary to set up your bank account for reimbursement.
Compare Embrace pet insurance vs. American Kennel Club pet insurance
American Kennel Club Pet Insurance
40.5 out of 5 Stars
On American Kennel Club's website
Available for all dogs and cats including mixed breed pets
Covers exam fees, wellness care, and more
30 day free pet insurance if you register your dog with the AKC
Age restrictions after 9 years old for accidents
Pets have to sign up before age 2 to qualify for hereditary conditions coverage
Although both companies offer good pet insurance options, Embrace and American Kennel Club have some critical differences in the insurance plans.
For example, while both companies allow for reimbursement choices and have a similar range of deductibles, Embrace has an annual coverage limit of $30,000. On the other hand, American Kennel Club's reimbursement limits are unlimited. Furthermore, Embrace covers dental illness up to $1,000 per year, while the American Kennel Club only includes coverage for extractions related to accidental injury.
Lastly, Embrace offers coverage for hereditary and congenital conditions as a part of its standard package. The American Kennel Club doesn't. If you want this type of coverage for your American Kennel Club plan, you'll have to buy additional coverage and enroll your pet before their second birthday. Neither company restricts coverage based on breed (mixed-breed pets are also eligible for AKC pet insurance). Still, the discount AKC offers for registering your dog would only be available to AKC-eligible dogs.
Compare Embrace pet insurance vs. ASPCA pet insurance
Embrace and ASPCA pet insurance both offer great coverage for the market. Coverage options are similar as the companies provide coverage for accidents and illnesses, like emergency care, cancer, chronic conditions, congenital conditions, and prescription medications. Neither covers preexisting conditions, but Embrace and ASPCA pet insurance define said conditions differently. As previously noted, Embrace differentiates between "curable" and "incurable" types. You can read more about preexisting condition definitions on each provider's website.
A key difference is Embrace doesn't cover illnesses if your pet is enrolled after its 15th birthday. ASPCA pet insurance doesn't have any upper age limit restrictions. Of course, because of preexisting conditions exclusion, we recommend pet parents register their pets early and choose a trustworthy pet insurance provider. But pet parents adopting senior pets (even those who aren't 15+) might prefer ASPCA pet insurance coverage.
As for claims processing times, Embrace provides a shorter-than-average turnaround time of five days. In contrast, ASPCA pet insurance can take between 15 and 30 days for claims processing. However, ASPCA pet insurance may also be able to pay qualifying vets directly, which could save you the hassle of waiting for a claim to be processed in the first place.
Lastly, ASPCA pet insurance's coverage options are less expensive for most pets. But considering Embrace's exceptional customer service record and plan customization options, it could be worth paying a little extra.
When reviewing pet insurance companies, we look at various factors to determine the benefits and drawbacks of the provider and its plans.
Some of the factors we take into account are the customizability of the plans, reimbursement levels, wellness coverages, the ease of filing a claim, and claims processing times.
Customization - How many options does a customer have regarding coverages, reimbursement levels, and annual maximums? Options are essential when building a plan to fit your needs and budget.
Wellness coverage - Does the provider cover wellness and preventative exams and treatments? Are there add-ons available for this type of coverage?
Claims process β How does the claims process work? Is it straightforward and efficient?
Understanding these aspects of an insurance provider will allow customers to make the most informed decision.
How long does it take Embrace to pay a claim? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
Embrace normally processes claims within 5 to 10 days. But you must supply all necessary documentation to ensure your claim is paid efficiently.
Is Embrace wellness coverage worth it? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
The Wellness Rewards option from Embrace could be better. Instead, you'd be better off opening a savings account to use for these types of expenses. That's because if you don't spend money on your pet each year, you don't get it back.
Does Embrace have a waiting period? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
Embrace's waiting period for accidents is just 48 hours. Its waiting period for illnesses is 14 days. More specifically, coverage for a dog's orthopedic conditions is subject to a 6-month waiting period.
How long do you have to submit a claim to Embrace pet insurance? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
Embrace allows you to submit a claim at any point during the policy year the incident occurred, plus 60 days into the subsequent policy term. This provides you plenty of time to gather the required documentation and submit a claim for reimbursement.
Insurance pet insurance Embrace pet insurance | 2022-12-19T21:06:42Z | www.businessinsider.com | Embrace Pet Insurance Review: Plans, Rates, Benefits, and FAQ | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/embrace-pet-insurance-reviews | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/embrace-pet-insurance-reviews |
Mesa Airlines Bombardier CRJ-900ER aircraft seen at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport.
Alex Tai/Getty Images
American Airlines is severing ties with regional carrier Mesa Airlines, citing financial and operational struggles.
Mesa CEO Jonathan Ornstein said the airline was losing $5 million per month, partially due to increased pilot pay.
The regional carrier is currently finalizing a contract to fly its CRJ-900 planes for United Airlines.
American Airlines is breaking up with long-time regional carrier Mesa Airlines after a 30-year partnership.
Derek Kerr, American's CFO and president of American Eagle, told employees in a memo on Saturday that its relationship with Mesa will cease on April 3, 2023, citing what he said were Mesa's "various financial and operational difficulties this year." The memo was viewed by Insider.
In a separate memo sent to Mesa employees on Saturday, which was also viewed by Insider, company Chairman and CEO Jonathan Ornstein said Mesa was losing approximately $5 million per month because of its routes with American.
He partially blamed increased pilot pay for the losses. In June, American raised pilot wages at its wholly-owned carriers to attract more talent as the industry battles a shortage. Then, in August, Mesa also increased its pilot salaries, but Ornstein said the money came out of its own pocket β not American's.
Moreover, Ornstein said Mesa was being "penalized" for not meeting the American contract's pre-COVID so-called block hours β meaning it wasn't flying enough.
"Needless to say, this put us between a rock and a hard place," he said in the memo. "At that point, your management knew that something had to change. We just do not believe it is in Mesa's long-term interest to fund ongoing losses at American."
Mesa flies dozens of routes from Dallas/Fort Worth and Phoenix on behalf of American, but AA's Kerr said American's customers will not be affected by the severed contract.
"Envoy and PSA recently announced new crew bases at PHX and DFW, respectively," Kerr said in a memo, referring to two regional carriers American owns itself. "Additionally, SkyWest will continue to fly out of PHX and DFW, and Air Wisconsin is preparing to join the American Eagle family earlier than planned."
American's mainline operation will also backfill some routes, Kerr said. This, coupled with the wholly-owned carriers and other regionals, will ensure the airline "can continue to build and deliver the very best global network for our customers" and provide a "safe, reliable and convenient service," he said.
American and Mesa's partnership dates back to 1992 when the latter started flying codeshare flights for America West Airlines, which was one of the carriers that eventually merged to create the American Airlines known today.
Despite the breakup with AA, Mesa still has other contracts: On Monday, the Phoenix-based carrier announced a pending contract with United Airlines, which, once finalized, would see it begin flying its CRJ-900s as United Express in March 2023. The agreement would "compensate Mesa for the higher costs associated with regional jet flying" and add more service to small markets, Ornstein said.
While Mesa says it's ready to fly its CRJ-900s for United, the Chicago-based carrier's union said an existing agreement could prevent that from happening.
"United is already at their cap on these types of airplanes," the union contended. "Anything beyond that limit must be flown by United pilots" β not pilots from regional carriers like Mesa. Neither United nor Mesa responded to Insider's request for comment on the potential issue raised by the union.
Mesa currently flies Embraer aircraft on behalf of United, and the added CRJ-900s would expand its operation in Denver and Houston.
American Airlines Mesa Airlines American | 2022-12-19T22:37:55Z | www.businessinsider.com | American Cuts Ties With Regional Carrier Mesa: Pilot Pay Partly to Blame | https://www.businessinsider.com/american-breaking-up-with-regional-airline-mesa-finances-pilot-pay-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/american-breaking-up-with-regional-airline-mesa-finances-pilot-pay-2022-12 |
Former Vice President Mike Pence walks onstage before speaking at an annual leadership meeting of the Republican Jewish Coalition in Las Vegas, Nev., on November 18, 2022.
Gingrich said it would tough for Pence to topple both Trump and DeSantis in a 2024 GOP field.
"It's hard to imagine him getting by both Trump and DeSantis," Gingrich told Politico's Adam Wren.
While Trump has launched his 2024 White House bid, Pence and DeSantis are not currently in the race.
Former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich in an interview said that it would be difficult for former Vice President Mike Pence to topple former President Donald Trump and Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida in a GOP presidential primary if the former vice president were to jump into the 2024 race.
Gingrich, while speaking to Politico's Adam Wren, praised Pence as someone who could make a clear case for a White House candidacy but would not wholly embrace going negative against his opponents.
"He's got a huge problem," the ex-congressional leader said. "I think Pence is very, very comfortable making a positive case for himself. He'd be very uncomfortable running a negative campaign because it's just not really who he is."
While Pence might hesitate to launch negative broadsides, Trump would have no such qualms.
In 2016 Republican presidential primaries, Trump easily vanquished experienced politicians like former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida, then-Gov. John Kasich of Ohio, and Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas and Marco Rubio of Florida β along with figures like retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson and former Hewlett-Packard chief executive Carly Fiorina β through his aggressive campaigning and frequent political attacks.
Gingrich, a member of Pence's Advancing American Freedom advisory board, told Wren that the former vice president getting past Trump and DeSantis in a Republican primary would be tough.
"It's hard to imagine him getting by both Trump and DeSantis," Gingrich said.
While DeSantis has not announced a 2024 campaign, he has emerged over the past year as Trump's most direct potential rival for the nomination.
In recent weeks, DeSantis has even led Trump in several national surveys for the 2024 nomination among Republican voters, after a midterm election cycle which saw the Florida governor win reelection in a 19-point landslide while GOP gains at the federal level were more muted.
Republicans were unsuccessful in their goal of flipping the Senate, and while they did regain a House majority, it will be so narrow that current Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California or whoever emerges as the speaker will not have an easy time corralling votes.
Newt Gingrich Mike Pence Donald Trump | 2022-12-19T23:26:04Z | www.businessinsider.com | Gingrich: 'Hard to Imagine' Pence Besting Trump, DeSantis in GOP Primary | https://www.businessinsider.com/gingrich-pence-trump-desantis-2024-republican-presidential-primary-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/gingrich-pence-trump-desantis-2024-republican-presidential-primary-2022-12 |
Donald Trump, left, and 'Electric Avenue' singer-songwriter Eddy Grant, right.
JosΓ© Luis Villegas/AP, left; Andrew Winning/Reuters
The former president gave a court-ordered deposition earlier this year in Grant's $300,000 copyright infringement lawsuit, which is filed in federal court in Manhattan, a court filing revealed Monday.
"Mr. Trump was deposed in this action and did not object to answering questions about the tweet," said the new filing by Grant's lawyer, Brett Van Benthysen.
Trump was also to be asked about the process for the campaign deciding to have Trump post the tweet, and what "financial or political benefit" the campaign received from it, according to court documents.
"Mr. Scavino is reported to have frequently authored and/or reviewed Mr. Trump's tweets and defendants have represented that Mr. Scavino had a role in the alleged tweet containing the infringing video," Grant's lawyer wrote in an August 20 court filing that explains why Scavino's testimony is being sought.
Donald Trump Eddy Grant Lawsuits | 2022-12-20T00:57:06Z | www.businessinsider.com | Trump Did Not Plead the 5th in 'Electric Avenue' Copyright Deposition | https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-not-plead-fifth-electric-avenue-eddy-grant-copyright-deposition-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-not-plead-fifth-electric-avenue-eddy-grant-copyright-deposition-2022-12 |
Morningstar shares 2 trades they say will deliver 7% yearly returns over the next decade, even after accounting for inflation β and breaks down why the 60/40 portfolio strategy is starting to look attractive again
Stocks and bonds have seen significant sell-offs this year.
But long-term, the outlook for returns looks good, Morningstar's Philip Straehl says.
In a recent note, Straehl also shared two trades he's bullish on for the coming decade.
After one of the worst years for financial markets on record, investors are finally due to get a break in 2023 and beyond, according to Philip Straehl, the global head of research for Morningstar's investment management division.
Year-to-date, the S&P 500 is down more than 25% and the US Aggregate Bond Index is down more than 10%. But the sell-offs have put both asset classes in a better position to succeed for the long-term, Straehl said in a recent note.
The traditional so-called 60/40 portfolio of 60% stocks and 40% bonds is set to deliver 3.6% annualized returns over the next two decades, given the pullback in valuations for both this year. Last year, Morningstar projected the strategy would deliver 2% annualized returns for the next 20 years.
"The double-digit sell-off in investors' 60/40 portfolio which provided diversification during many previous downturns, left investors wondering whether low returns are in store for the foreseeable future. We doubt it," Straehl said. "Taking a longer-term perspective, the 2022 downturn has set the stage for a much-improved long-term investing environment."
The near-term outlook for financial markets is unclear as the Federal Reserve continues to tighten policy to fight inflation. Either a significant deceleration in inflation or a broad economic downturn seem to be prerequisites for a Fed pivot to more dovish policy. Straehl recommended investors keep a long-term outlook, however.
Other financial experts, like Citadel's Ken Griffin and JPMorgan's David Kelly, have voiced optimism in recent months about the 60/40 portfolio's prospects.
2 trades set to deliver 7% real returns
Straehl also highlighted two trades he thinks will deliver around 7% annualized returns over the next decade, even after accounting for inflation.
The first is investing in the communication services sector. The sector includes names like Netflix, Verizon, Meta, The Walt Disney Company, and Alphabet.
While communication services stocks have largely sold off this year, the sector is now the most attractive in the market, Straehl said.
"In part a function of weak recent share price returns β experienced by a number of its most significant constituents β global communication services now possess one of the highest valuation-implied return estimates among the sectors we cover," he said. "While we do see heightened fundamental risk present in the sector as opposed to other asset classes, valuations (both absolute and relative) as well as contrarian elements tip the scales on our conviction in favor of a 'Medium to High' overall score."
The Vanguard Communication Services ETF (VOX) provides exposure to the communications services sector.
The second trade Straehl said will deliver 7% real returns over the next 10 years is emerging market stocks.
The stocks are in a more favorable place valuation-wise than developed market stocks, Straehl said.
"This asset class, which encompasses a wide swath of countries in the 'developing' world, has experienced broadly negative share returns in 2022 β especially in U.S. dollar terms," he said. "Given our assessment of valuation, the fundamental risk picture, and contrarian elements, we conclude that absolute and relative valuations have improved to the degree that it merits an upgrade in our overall conviction to 'Medium to High.'"
Exposure to emerging market stocks can be found in funds like the iShares Core MSCI Emerging Markets ETF (IEMG) and the Schwab Emerging Markets Equity ETF (SCHE). | 2022-12-20T09:13:16Z | www.businessinsider.com | 2 Trades That Will Deliver 7% Yearly Returns Over the Next Decade | https://www.businessinsider.com/best-investing-opportunities-right-now-stock-market-trades-inflation-morningstar-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/best-investing-opportunities-right-now-stock-market-trades-inflation-morningstar-2022-12 |
ChatGPT is a viral chatbot that uses generative AI to create a compelling and interesting chatbot.
ChatGPT has been touted as a Google killer and the turning point for AI to enter the mainstream.
It's fascinating to play with, but ChatGPT is still limited, and the backlash has already started.
Emerging technology like ChatGPT is usually called overhyped until it becomes essential.
Over the past few weeks, social-media feeds and tech-pundit newsletters have been filled with stories and conversations written by artificial intelligence.
All it was written by ChatGPT, a project from the "capped-profit" research group OpenAI. ChatGPT lets users ask its bot questions or give it prompts using GPT-3, an impressive piece of natural-language-processing AI tech.
GPT-3 has been available to the public since earlier this year. What caused some people to call ChatGPT AI's "iPhone moment" was its ease of use. Depending on the prompt, ChatGPT can write an essay on the Napoleonic Wars or craft someone's cover letter for a job application.
Some are now saying ChatGPT could be the end of Google's search dominance, pave the way for widespread cheating in universities, or even do away with many types of white-collar jobs.
But tech insiders and pundits are already becoming cynical about ChatGPT, with some calling it "overrated," "overhyped," and "dumber than you think."
It's what comes next, during the period when general sentiment toward ChatGPT turns skeptical, that will determine if and how tech like ChatGPT becomes an essential part of our lives.
ChatGPT and the Gartner Hype Cycle
In layman's terms, ChatGPT is a chatbot using GPT-3, a state-of-the-art AI model that uses a massive amount of data to generate humanlike text. It's capable of performing a variety of natural language processing tasks, such as answering questions, summarizing text, and generating complete sentences and paragraphs. It's considered one of the most advanced language-processing AI models currently available.
How advanced? The above paragraph was written by ChatGPT. You can criticize the prose β an editor might take issue with the use of the adjective "massive" for something nonphysical, and the sentence structure tends toward the simplistic β but it reads as if a human wrote it.
GPT-3 is of a branch of machine learning called "generative AI." Generative AI analyzes huge amounts of data and trains models that can generate new things. Feed a generative-AI program millions of pieces of art, and it learns how to produce art, like OpenAI's other viral sensation DALL-E. Feed a generative-AI program a huge amount of computer code, and it can create code.
It's all very exciting and new, which is where the Gartner Hype Cycle, from the tech-research and consulting firm Gartner, comes in handy. Debuted by the analyst Jackie Fenn in 1995, it lays out the five stages for any emerging technology.
Gartner Hype Cycle.
Most of the significant tech innovations of the past 30 years β the internet, the smartphone, cloud computing β can be tracked using the Gartner Hype Cycle.
Take the internet. The "technology trigger" would be the first public demonstration of the World Wide Web in 1989. It's exciting but barely noticed by the general public, and very few understand its potential.
The "peak of inflated expectations" hits in the 1990s. The internet is rapidly expanding, fueled by exciting but sometimes overly ambitious or frivolous ideas and the dot-com bubble of the late '90s.
The "trough of disillusionment" is when the dot-com bubble burst. Excitement cools, and a period of disillusionment sets in. Companies get wiped out. The conventional wisdom is the internet was overhyped.
Finally, you get the longest part of the process: the "slope of enlightenment" into the "plateau of productivity." The internet matures. Developers and investors focus on practical applications and refining the user experience. The mobile web launches, and the modern internet, which undergirds a good portion of economy, blooms.
ChatGPT's future
So where is ChatGPT now? Gartner placed generative AI on the very beginning of the track in its August emerging-technologies trend report, its most recent. But a lot has happened since August, especially now that ChatGPT has emerged as an easier way for people to access its technology.
ChatGPT seems to have led to a surge in sign-ups for other generative-AI tools, like Lensa AI. Harvard Business Review wrote this latest version of ChatGPT "feels like a tipping point" for AI, as it shows the technology is ready for a wider variety of uses.
In other words, it feels like ChatGPT is nearing the peak of inflated expectations. That means people are already finding all the ways it falls short. At Barron's, Tae Kim wrote about all the ways he said ChatGPT was "overhyped," comparing it to Amazon's Alexa and Apple's Siri.
"While great AI tools for specific tasks," he wrote, "they never fulfilled their initial promise."
Ian Bogost in The Atlantic summarized all the ways he said ChatGPT was "dumber than you think." The tech-culture writer Ryan Broderick said that with ChatGPT and other generative-AI methods, "all the edges have been smoothed away, and I don't hate it, but, perhaps worse, I'm getting bored fast."
Insider's Tom Dotan on Friday detailed many of the tech shortcomings of ChatGPT, including the inability to verify information, its high cost, and its tendency toward "hallucinations" β or creating an answer not based on facts.
Much like the internet in 2001, generative AI like ChatGPT is a young technology. Developers will continue improving the underlying models, and other developers will figure out how to deploy generative AI for useful purposes, not just as interesting playthings.
If things work out, general users soon won't realize they're interacting with a bot. Workers will begin to work side by side with generative AI as a matter of course, the same way billions of workers today turn to Google to quickly figure something out. That's when tech like ChatGPT becomes essential β when it makes the long climb up the slope of enlightenment.
To be sure, the rise of generative AI and more forms of ChatGPT aren't assured. Many emerging technologies never reach the final stage of being productive and get mired in a failure of the tech or the business model β or a combination of the two.
Perhaps it's best to let ChatGPT predict its own future:
"As people begin to realize that artificial intelligence is not a magic solution to all of our problems, the hype around it will die down, and it will be able to develop and improve more effectively."
Well put, ChatGPT. In a couple of more years, you'll be able to say it even better.
Tech Gartner ChatGPT | 2022-12-20T10:48:49Z | www.businessinsider.com | ChatGPT Will Be Overhyped, Overlooked, and Then, Perhaps, Essential | https://www.businessinsider.com/chatgpt-will-be-overhyped-overlooked-and-then-perhaps-essential-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/chatgpt-will-be-overhyped-overlooked-and-then-perhaps-essential-2022-12 |
I paid a stylist $300 to determine which colors look best on me β and I've been oozing with confidence in my work wardrobe ever since
Jill Schildhouse in the colors that don't work for her (left) and her "wow" colors (right).
Writer Jill Schildhouse recently did a $300 "color analysis" session to reimagine her work wardrobe.
Schildhouse found out she's a "burnished winter" and now shops for clothes in her color spectrum.
"I'm oozing confidence now, which has positively impacted my bottom line," Schildhouse writes.
Ever since I was a little girl, I was drawn to various shades of pinks, purples, reds, and turquoises; those were the only hues I'd use when shading in my Barbie coloring books. When I turned 16, my first car was teal with matching rims.
As I grew older, I sought these same colors out when I went shopping for clothes, accessories, and even home decor, and I was no stranger to wearing bold colors in corporate settings β specifically choosing what I deemed to be my "power colors" for big meetings and presentations.
My work-from-home lifestyle changed my wardrobe β and not for the better
But somewhere along the way, when I transitioned into full-time freelance writing in 2017, I got away from wearing the colors I loved. I began shopping for comfort to match my new work-from-home lifestyle and worried less about how the colors looked on me. If it was cozy and could double as something I could wear while running errands, it got added to my closet.
Then the pandemic hit, and everyone suddenly wanted to do video meetings. After a few Zoom sessions, I realized I was looking quite plain. I was draped in drab colors that washed me out and somehow highlighted the very flaws I was trying to minimize with makeup. My eyes no longer felt bright and even my hair lacked luster. I was starting to feel like a wallflower who didn't command attention or instill confidence β even when I was leading the meeting.
That's when it hit me: My color choices weren't doing me any favors. But before I invested in a more flattering wardrobe, I wanted to make sure I was spending my money wisely.
I decided to book a color analysis session with House of Colour
The UK-based company has been using the principles of color science to help clients discover their season and palette for more than 35 years, and it has 200 color analysts and stylists across the United States.
I was matched with Crystal Thurber, a gregarious and impeccably dressed franchise owner who exudes passion for visually bringing out the best in her clients. A one-person color-analysis session with Thurber β listed as two hours and 30 minutes β costs $295.
While setting up the appointment, Thurber instructed me to arrive without any makeup, because a fresh face without outside influences interfering is needed to identify your best colors.
Once I arrived at my stylist's studio, I sat in a chair in front of a mirror and she got to work
In the natural light of her studio's large window, Thurber's first task was to determine if my natural undertones better harmonized with warm (yellow-based) or cool (blue-based) colors.
Thurber followed a time-tested color analysis process, draping a series of different colored cloths over my neck and torso. Together, we watched my face to see if my skin brightened or dulled, if fine lines or dark circles became more prominent, and if I looked washed out or overwhelmed.
Eventually, she zeroed in on the fact that I'm cool β which automatically eliminated the autumn and spring seasons. It also meant I'm silver (not gold) when it comes to jewelry, which was a relief since 99% of my jewelry collection is silver and white gold.
We then had to determine if I fit better with 'winter' or 'summer' colors
This took several more rounds of fabric swatches draped across my neck. It was truly remarkable to see just how much more I came alive when I was draped in the clear, bright, vivid, icy, and high-contrast value colors of Winter versus the soft, blue, smoky, and rose colors of summer. It was no contest: I'm a winter.
It was finally time to apply a little lipstick, eyeshadow, blush, and mascara from House of Colour's 90 Second Makeup brand. Thurber applied primer, dual mineral foundation, blush, and mascara to my face, and the products felt and looked great.
I pulled a few lipsticks out of my purse and we realized I was wearing all the wrong colors, so after trying on a handful she suggested, I bought several gorgeous shades β and what a difference they made!
Next, she went through my entire 'winter' spectrum of 36 colors to see which were most flattering
These are also known as my "wow" colors.
Thurber draped each of those colors across me once again, and she methodically charted which ones I can wear as a single block of color from head to toe (these included silver, charcoal, royal purple, navy, magenta, raspberry, burgundy, scarlet, lagoon blue, light emerald, and pine green), and which ones are best suited for about 75% coverage (such as dresses or coats), 50% coverage (like tops, sweaters, trousers and skirts), and 25% (accessories, like shoes, bags and scarves).
From here, she determined that I'm a "Burnished Winter," a subset of winter who looks best in the deepest and most saturated part of the palette. And while winters are the only season who can wear black, she decided that navy and charcoal are even better than black for me.
My 'wow' colors were mostly aligned with the colors I'd gravitated toward my whole life
That was funny to me but no surprise to Thurber, who said toddlers are drawn to the colors that best suit them. It's only when their parents and friends begin to influence their wardrobe that they stray from what Mother Nature intended.
Since my color analysis, I've discovered that building a new wardrobe around my color palette and "wow" colors really simplifies shopping and getting dressed. A wardrobe of clothes belonging to your spectrum means that everything in your closet coordinates β and that translates to an effortless and more cost-effective mix-and-match wardrobe.
It also makes packing for my frequent business travels a breeze, because the color combinations all work together.
House of Colour sends each client home with a fan of 36 color swatches for their season
You simply lay the fan on a garment and see how it harmonizes, then you make your purchasing decision based on those results.
Sure, it was hard at first to pass up an otherwise great outfit because the hue wasn't quite right for me, but the extra effort spent finding the perfect garment is definitely worth it. Learning not to settle in your clothing choices somehow spills over into all facets of your life.
I feel more friendly, approachable, and confident when I'm sporting my 'wow' colors
Those hues make my skin look smoother and my best features pop, and it makes a huge difference.
I travel a few times each month, and now strangers are complimenting me with such statements as, "You look so beautiful!" versus saying, "I like your outfit." It's as though the wrong colors separate your looks from the garment, whereas the right colors make you a cohesive pairing and you become the target of the compliment.
Family and friends have asked what I'm doing differently or why I'm glowing, and wearing these "wow" colors in my social media posts has even increased engagement. I'm literally oozing confidence on my Zoom calls and in client meetings now, which has already positively impacted my bottom line.
Wardrobe Clothing Retails | 2022-12-20T10:49:01Z | www.businessinsider.com | I Had a Stylist Find Which Colors Look Best on Me, and It Worked | https://www.businessinsider.com/i-had-stylist-find-which-colors-look-best-on-me-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/i-had-stylist-find-which-colors-look-best-on-me-2022-12 |
There will be another bear market in 2023, according to a top hedge fund manager.
Hedge fund manager Charles Lemonides is up 39% this year through November.
Sticking with value stocks has been his key to success in recent years.
Here are six undervalued stocks that Lemonides is bullish on right now.
Unlike most fund managers, Charles Lemonides has dominated in 2022.
Well-placed bets on winning stocks and against losing ones have helped his hedge fund, the ValueWorks Long Biased Composite, rise 39.4% after fees through November. Meanwhile, its benchmark β the Barclay Equity Long Bias Index β is down 11.3% year-to-date.
In a recent interview with Insider Lemonides said his success this year came from staying disciplined and believing that investing in value stocks still works, even though the group lagged their flashier growth peers for most of the past decade.
"The returns we're generating this year are mostly a result of the work we did two years ago when the markets were massively dislocated, and we put money to work in names that made a ton of sense," Lemonides said.
Investing in Lemonides' hedge fund isn't for the faint of heart. Since its inception in 1999, the long-biased fund has risen or fallen by at least 10% after fees 18 times, with annual returns ranging from -48% to 76%. But the fund has risen in six of the last seven years, and is up 230% since inception.
Why markets are set for more pain in 2023
The beauty of Lemonides' long-biased strategy is that he can profit in any market environment. Heading into 2023, Lemonides said that his fund's short position of 40% has never been bigger, though his long position of 140% implies that there are still opportunities for long-only investors. (Hedge funds can have a gross exposure over 100% through leverage, or borrowed money.)
Lemonides' cautious stance stems from his conviction that much like 2022, the year ahead will feature higher interest rates in a weaker economy. The Federal Reserve said last week that although inflation is slowing, it's still an issue. Barring a policy pivot from the US central bank or a surprisingly large drop in inflation, rates will stay high.
"I think we're going to go through an extended period of monetary tightening," Lemonides said. "And I think when too many dollars chase too few goods and you get inflation, that's the right adjustment for the Fed to be making."
Stocks and bonds may be in for a tough three- to six-month stretch as liquidity remains low, Lemonides said, though he believes risk assets will soar once the Fed cuts rates.
"You want to be invested into that rebound," Lemonides said. "I think the key is to not lose too much capital on the way down."
Another bear market for US stocks isn't off the table, Lemonides said, as he sees the S&P 500 falling to 3,300 before July β or even 3,000 in a worst-case scenario. But after that, Lemonides expects stocks to rebound sharply for two main reasons: weak-handed investors will have already sold, and the Fed will be ready to back away from its harsh monetary policy after inflation falls.
"I think there's a very good chance that 2023 will be a positive year for the markets β but goes down first," Lemonides said. "And it's going down because the Fed is draining liquidity, and draining liquidity has an impact on financial prices."
6 top stocks to buy in 2023
While markets may be headed for more losses in the near term, Lemonides said that there are six stocks that he has his eye on right now.
"It's a stock-picker's market environment, and I think there are companies that are well-priced and well-positioned today," Lemonides said.
Below are Lemonides' six favorite stocks right now along with the ticker, market capitalization, price-to-earnings ratio, and his summarized thesis for each.
Ticker: NFLX
Thesis: With the biggest subscriber base of any streaming service and an attractive valuation, Lemonides views Netflix as the clear leader in the streaming wars. The stock's price reflects the growth slowdown that the company has faced this year, but he's confident that management's plan to add ads to the service can help combat the issue.
"You've got a world-class franchise that is in a very dynamic business with a management team that has done an extraordinary job over 20 years and a valuation that's still very compelling," Lemonides said. "Not owning that stock because you think there could be market volatility over the next six months is looking a gift horse in the mouth."
Ticker: MU
Thesis: Micron is a leading semiconductor maker that benefits from low competition and steadily growing demand for its memory chips, Lemonides said. While chip demand is still economically sensitive and may wane in a recession, the fund manager is confident that Micron can do well regardless, thanks to its quality business and cheap valuation. If it keeps increasing earnings, Lemonides sees shares doubling or tripling in price.
"I think it'll be a $100-to-$150 stock," Lemonides said. "And I think you're getting in here today with a ton of bad news priced into it."
Thesis: Qualcomm has been unfairly punished as part of a broader technology sector sell-off but is being thrown out with the bathwater, Lemonides said. He believes it still dominates the 5G marketplace and can continue to raise its earnings in 2023 and 2024.
"The Nvidias of the world were at valuations that were very, very, very extended," Lemonides said. "Qualcomm never was. The space has come down. Qualcomm has come down half of what the overall space has come down, and it's come down simply because it's lower than it was yesterday β not because it was expensive."
4. Valaris
Ticker: VAL
Thesis: Valaris is an offshore drilling giant that β like many of its peers β has gone through financial turmoil in the last few years and taken on debt, though Lemonides noted that the firm has erased that burden through a bankruptcy reorganization that converted debt to equity.
The nearly debt-free organization is now trading at a cheap valuation relative to its tangible assets, including what it cost to build its giant fleet of vessels, Lemonides said. Demand for those vessels is "unending" with oil trading over $75 per barrel, he added.
"Even if inflation is 8%-to-6% to 5%-to-3%, this pool of assets is probably going to be appreciating along with that rate," Lemonides said. "And you are paying a very, very low price. Earnings will go from negative to massively positive over the next year."
Lemonides said that shares of Valaris could trade as high as $200 in the next few years if the company's earnings grow as much as he expects.
5. Tidewater
Ticker: TDW
P/E ratio: N/A
Thesis: Tidewater is another offshore drilling company that is also trading at a discount to its assets after going through a bankruptcy process that allowed it to wipe out its debt, Lemonides noted. He sees shares doubling.
"Those assets are increasingly in demand," Lemonides said. "The day rates for those vessels have gone from a place where they're just barely break-even to where they're generating 30% cash flow margins and probably getting to 50% cash flow margins. And again, the earnings are at an inflection place. So again, we see a $30 stock that could be a $60 stock."
6. Chord Energy
Ticker: CHRD
Thesis: Chord Energy came together back in the summer after a merger between Oasis Petroleum and Whiting Petroleum and is trading at a steep discount to where those two firms were trading five years ago, even though they've eliminated debt, Lemonides said. He added that the firm is "remarkably inexpensive" compared to the free cash flow it's set to generate. | 2022-12-20T10:49:07Z | www.businessinsider.com | 6 Cheap Stocks to Buy Now to Survive a Bear Market in 2023 | https://www.businessinsider.com/investing-stocks-to-buy-2023-bear-market-hedge-fund-manager-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/investing-stocks-to-buy-2023-bear-market-hedge-fund-manager-2022-12 |
Nike employees described 'sloppy drunk' men, witnessing oral sex, and requests to 'dress sexier' at work in newly unsealed surveys
Nike executive chairman Mark Parker.
More than 5,000 pages of records were unsealed in a gender-discrimination lawsuit against Nike.
Respondents called Nike a "boys' club" and described inappropriate sexual behavior.
In early 2018, female Nike employees were fed up with the company's response to claims of sexual harassment and gender discrimination, so they anonymously surveyed each other about their experiences at the company.
In handwritten and typed surveys, they alleged abhorrent sexual behavior combined with corporate bullying, fear of retaliation, and a lack of faith in Nike's willingness to do anything about it.
In one survey, a respondent wrote that she had been told by male coworkers to "dress sexier" and "show some skin" at the office. Another described certain executives as "well known philanderers with lower level employees whom they exert influence and power over." A third wrote that she caught a male executive receiving oral sex from a lower-ranking female in the campus gym. A fourth alleged "sloppy drunk" men put their arms around female coworkers on work travel, and others asked female subordinates to "work dinners" in hopes of sleeping with them. A fifth respondent relayed a story about a male manager saying, "No one gives a fuck about female empowerment."
Nike's CEO at the time, Mark Parker, who's since become the company's executive chairman, received the surveys on March 5, 2018, according to Nike, setting off an explosive series of news reports and sweeping efforts to address the company's alleged "boys' club" culture.
Last month, 10 of the surveys, known as the Starfish surveys, were included in more than 5,000 pages of records unsealed in an ongoing gender-discrimination lawsuit against Nike. The documents were made public after a legal challenge from Insider, The Oregonian, and the Portland Business Journal. The publications argued for the public interest in the records, which include deposition testimony, executive emails, drafts of speeches, and fiery back-and-forth messages between lawyers in the high-stakes case.
The documents give the most detailed look yet at the nature and details of the allegations that rocked the sportswear giant, as well as its efforts to become a more inclusive company. But the documents also leave critical questions unanswered, including how deeply the company investigated complaints and which employees were accused of inappropriate behavior. The surveys have some remaining redactions, including the names of respondents and those accused of misbehavior. Insider's reporting on the documents also raises the question of whether Nike complied with a court order to provide all of the employee surveys in discovery.
Nike initially fought to keep the surveys out of the court records, but a judge later ordered the release of the complete survey results. An attorney for the plaintiffs told Insider they received approximately 30 surveys. Ten are now in the court record, attached to various motions. But four former Nike employees familiar with the collection of the surveys told Insider closer to 100 were collected.
Insider provided written questions to Nike for this story, including whether it gave all of the surveys to plaintiffs in discovery. The company declined to answer the questions. A spokeswoman said the company does not comment on active litigation.
But Nike's response to 2018 questions from The New York Times, which reported on Nike's culture, is included in the new records. In that response, Nike attributed inappropriate behavior at the company to an "insular group of high-level managers, in pockets of the organization," who "protected each other and looked the other way."
Plaintiffs in the lawsuit, who recently lost a bid to convert the case to a class action (they plan to appeal), maintain the documents demonstrate that problems at Nike were systemic and not limited to a handful of executives.
"It wasn't limited to one vertical or one department," Laura Salerno Owens, the lead attorney for the plaintiffs, told Insider. "And it wasn't limited to one manager. This was a common experience throughout the company."
'Maybe if you dressed nicer I would be on time'
Nike employees β especially top management β frequently describe the company as a force for good. It brings people together on athletic fields, it helps people stay active, it opens economies for development, and it creates jobs, Nike's supporters have said.
The Starfish surveys describe a far different company.
One described Nike as "a giant men's sports team, where favoritism prevails and females couldn't possibly play in the sandbox."
The surveys contain allegations of executives getting oral sex from women in lower positions, bosses who scream at employees, inappropriate sexual remarks and behavior, and claims that a manager "phoned in a favor" to get away with calling a subordinate a "bitch." Numerous respondents described the company as a "boys' club."
"Maybe if you dressed nicer I would be on time," one female Nike worker said she was told by a male Nike executive. "Take that baggy jacket off and show some skin."
Few of the allegations were reported to the company's human-resources department because respondents generally didn't think anything would happen.
"(Employee resources) and HR at this company are a joke," one respondent wrote.
"Females at this company have felt very little power to change a culture and environment that has been and continues to be disrespectful to women," another wrote.
"Kept it to myself because of who he is at the company," wrote the person who was told to "show some skin."
"Get your act together Nike," one survey respondent wrote. "We have had enough."
Nike's world headquarters in Beaverton, Oregon.
'Do not reflect our core values'
Ten days after he received the surveys, Parker announced a management reshuffle and apologized to Nike employees in an email, writing, "Over the past few weeks, we've become aware of reports occurring within our organization that do not reflect our core values of inclusivity, respect and empowerment."
At least 11 executives left Nike after the surveys were given to Parker. The company has made progress on pay equity and more women have become vice presidents. In fiscal year 2018, 36% of Nike's vice presidents were women, according to the company. That percentage has since climbed to 43%, with a goal to hit 45% within three years.
Since 2017, Nike has also stopped collecting information about compensation at previous jobs, made hiring more competitive, and overhauled its compensation system. In July 2018, Nike said 7,000 workers would get raises after an internal pay review.
The new documents include the claim that Nike paid women $11,000 a year less than men between 2015 and 2019, a number that the company has refuted. Nike claims it has achieved pay parity.
While more details about Nike's efforts to become more inclusive are now available in the court record, it's hard to say how aggressively Nike investigated the allegations in the Starfish surveys.
In a 2021 deposition, Monique Matheson, Nike's top human-resources executive, testified the surveys were given to an outside law firm that investigated the allegations. Because an outside law firm handled the investigations, Nike successfully argued the work is protected by attorney-client privilege.
"We don't know because Nike refused to produce in discovery, and provide in testimony anything about its investigations, what the findings were, and what actions were taken," Salerno Owens said. "There's no evidence in the record that Nike completely and adequately investigated the complaints."
And discrimination complaints against Nike haven't stopped in the years since, according to Salerno Owens.
Still, one female worker who completed the Starfish survey, despite the blistering criticism, held out some hope that Nike could focus its deep-seated competitiveness on correcting its mistakes.
"For a company that prides itself on innovation, inclusion and equality, I fear that we are missing the mark," she wrote in the survey. "Nike can change and lead in this space."
BI Graphics Marianne Ayala Nike | 2022-12-20T10:49:17Z | www.businessinsider.com | Nike Court Records Detail Sexual Harassment and 'Boys' Club' Claims | https://www.businessinsider.com/nike-court-records-detail-sexual-harassment-toxic-workplace-claims-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/nike-court-records-detail-sexual-harassment-toxic-workplace-claims-2022-12 |
Panera workers place mobile orders on counters for customers to retrieve, but some workers say thefts are leading to orders being placed behind the counter instead.
Five Panera workers told Insider that thefts forced them to keep mobile orders behind the counter.
Some locations move orders behind the counter only at certain times of the day, workers said.
Panera didn't comment on the thefts, but has said before that dealing with fraud can be part of business.
Panera customers flock to its Rapid Pick-Up mobile ordering system, but some workers say it's also leading to more thefts of bags waiting to be picked up at the restaurants.
Insider spoke to five workers employed in stores across the US who said that their locations have moved mobile orders behind counters to prevent people from walking out with food they didn't pay for.
The workers' identities were verified by Insider, but they remain anonymous because they were not authorized to speak to the press.
Panera, like many other quick-service restaurants, leaves bagged mobile orders on shelves for customers to pick up. The chain introduced Rapid Pick-Up for customers who order food to-go in 2014 as part of its Panera 2.0 rebrand. Panera has since opened a digital-only location in Chicago, where all food is served on Rapid Pick-Up shelves.
"As long as I remember having RPU [Rapid Pick-Up] at Panera, there has always been theft," a cashier in the Midwest told Insider. During less-busy parts of the day, the worker said that their location keeps delivery and pickup orders behind the counter, with names facing away from customers.
When a customer approaches the pickup area, workers ask them for their name and then hand them the appropriate order. "This keeps theft down and still makes guests happy," the Midwest worker said.
"From my experience, thieves will look at what the order is before grabbing [a] random bag," the worker told Insider, suggesting the would-be thieves look for high-value orders to snatch.
Panera did not respond to Insider's requests for comment, but previously said that "fraud is a normal part of the restaurant business" when workers had flagged that some people were taking advantage of the chain's Unlimited Sip Club by stealing drinks they hadn't paid for. "We are always innovating to optimize the entire guest and associate experience," Panera said at the time.
Meanwhile, a manager in Michigan said stolen mobile orders were a "huge" issue at Panera. The shelf system used to work "flawlessly," the manager said, up until the last 18 months, when as many as 20 orders per week go missing, the person said.
In Oklahoma, another worker said that thefts were relatively rare, but typically happened with big-value orders of $100 to $200, which the store now keeps behind the counter.
"It takes a big toll, losing all that food β as well as having to remake the order," the worker said.
Workers at some Panera locations have also moved self-service drink stations that serve the chain's Unlimited Sip Club behind counters due to thefts, Insider reported. A manager in the Southeast told Insider that all caffeinated Charged Lemonades in her market are behind the counter because of theft.
Panera previously told Insider that moving drinks behind the counter is a "limited small test."
Mobile orders are responsible for billions of dollars of sales for the quick-service restaurant industry. Panera, which is privately held by JAB Holding Co., no longer publicly shares financial information, but it was on track to do $2 billion in digital sales by 2018 β a number that's almost certainly exploded.
Competing brands tell a similar story of big growth in mobile orders: At Chipotle, digital orders made up 37% of sales in the most recent quarter, and at Starbucks, they made up 40% of sales.
Retail panera Panera Bread | 2022-12-20T10:49:23Z | www.businessinsider.com | Panera Workers Say so Many Mobile Orders Are Stolen, They're Now Behind the Counter | https://www.businessinsider.com/panera-mobile-online-order-pick-up-stolen-theft-workers-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/panera-mobile-online-order-pick-up-stolen-theft-workers-2022-12 |
The Jan. committee said Ivanka Trump was not "entirely frank or forthcoming" in her testimony.
It said her former chief of staff had a better recollection of Ivanka's own actions and statements.
Ivanka Trump testified to the committee in April, angering her father.
The January 6 committee took a swipe at Ivanka Trump, saying she didn't seem to be straight with them in her testimony.
The House Jan. 6 select committee released its executive summary of its work on Monday. It pointed to Ivanka as someone who was not "entirely frank or forthcoming" with them.
It had the same criticism of Kayleigh McEnany, Trump's former press secretary.
It said that "Other witnesses, including certain witnesses from the Trump White House, displayed a lack of full recollection of certain issues, or were not otherwise as frank or direct as [Trump White House Counsel Pat] Cipollone," and then cited Ivanka Trump and McEnany.
In McEnany's case, the committee said that other people who spoke to the committee contradicted her testimony.
It said of Ivanka that she "was not as forthcoming as Cipollone and others about President Trump's conduct."
It said that Ivanka had notable gaps in her memory, writing that often "Ivanka Trump's Chief of Staff Julie Radford had a more specific recollection of Ivanka Trump's actions and statements."
Ivanka Trump voluntarily testified before the committee in April, where she said that she "accepted" former Attorney General Bill Barr's view that Joe Biden's victory in the 2020 election was legitimate.
Trump then hit back at her on his Truth Social platform, saying: "Ivanka Trump was not involved in looking at, or studying, Election results. She had long since checked out and was, in my opinion, only trying to be respectful to Bill Barr and his position as Attorney General (he sucked!)."
Ivanka Trump has distanced herself from her father since his presidency ended.
She said in November, after skipping her father's campaign launch, that she was was prioritizing her private life and had no plans to be involved.
News UK january 6 January 6 committee | 2022-12-20T10:52:58Z | www.businessinsider.com | Jan 6. Panel Dings Ivanka Trump As 'Not Entirely Frank or Forthcoming' | https://www.businessinsider.com/jan-6-committee-said-ivanka-trump-not-entirely-frank-forthcoming-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/jan-6-committee-said-ivanka-trump-not-entirely-frank-forthcoming-2022-12 |
Bill Gates discussed Elon Musk's leadership at Twitter.
Susan Walsh/AP; Mike Cohen/Getty Images for The New York Times
Bill Gates said Elon Musk has taken a "seat-of-the-pants" approach while at Twitter, per the FT.
Gates also told the FT that Musk's Twitter was "stirring up" digital polarization.
Musk reportedly authorized execs, lawyers, and engineers from his other firms to work at Twitter.
Bill Gates said Elon Musk has adopted a "seat-of-the-pants" style of decision-making at Twitter, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday.
Gates, the cofounder of Microsoft, said in an interview with the publication that Twitter was making digital polarization worse. He said it was unclear whether the challenge of tackling digital polarization was down to human judgment or engineering.
"I think, certainly, the Twitter situation is stirring things up. That, instead of an objective set of measures done by a broad group of people, you're sort of seeing seat-of-the-pants type activity," Gates told the FT.
The philanthropist added that social-media platforms needed to pay attention to what caused misunderstandings about vaccine safety or what incited riots.
Twitter and representatives for Gates didn't immediately respond to Insider's request for comment made outside of normal US operating hours.
Gates' comments came as reports suggested Musk enlisted executives, lawyers, and engineers from some of his other businesses, as well as his cousins and fans, to work at Twitter.
Thousands of employees, including senior bosses, have exited Twitter after rounds of layoffs, firings, and resignations, leaving the company with depleted teams.
Musk, who runs four other companies, including SpaceX and Tesla, has come under scrutiny for his management of Twitter since acquiring it in late October. In the 12 hours after Musk's deal was finalized, the use of the N-word on Twitter jumped by nearly 500%, per the Network Contagion Research Institute's findings. Not long after this, some companies started to suspend their advertisements on Twitter out of concern for content moderation on the site.
One of the biggest decisions Twitter made under Musk's leadership was reinstating the account of former President Donald Trump after poll users voted in favor of bringing him back to the platform. Twitter had suspended Trump's account after tweets he made during the US Capitol riots in January 2021.
Musk on Sunday posted a poll about stepping down as the head of Twitter β 57.5% of users voted for him to go. | 2022-12-20T12:20:09Z | www.businessinsider.com | Bill Gates Says Musk Takes a 'Seat-of-the-Pants' Approach at Twitter | https://www.businessinsider.com/bill-gates-elon-musk-twitter-leadership-digital-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/bill-gates-elon-musk-twitter-leadership-digital-2022-12 |
Mortgage rates have been holding steady over the past several days. Average 30-year fixed rates remain below 6%, the lowest this rate has been since September.
Last week, the Federal Reserve met to discuss the path it will take to continue taming inflation. It chose to raise the federal funds rate by 50 basis points, and Fed Chair Jerome Powell indicated that the central bank will continue raising rates in 2023.
"Chairman Powell's comments reiterated the Fed's commitment to tame inflation even if it negatively impacts employment and housing numbers," says Dan Richards, executive vice president of Mortgage at Flyhomes.
As the economy continues to slow in response to the Fed's tightening, it's possible we could experience a recession. This would likely cause mortgage rates to fall further. | 2022-12-20T12:20:43Z | www.businessinsider.com | Today's Mortgage, Refinance Rates: Dec. 20, 2022 | Fixed Rates Remain Relatively Low | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/best-mortgage-refinance-rates-today-tuesday-december-20-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/best-mortgage-refinance-rates-today-tuesday-december-20-2022-12 |
Emily Courter
Jason Ruiyi Chin, known online as Easlo, found six-figure success as a student selling Notion templates.
Jason Ruiyi Chin used Notion for taking lecture notes at school and then began toying with the app.
He tweeted free Notion-template downloads and grew a big following before he paywalled new content.
Chin has made $239,000 this year selling templates for budget tracking and organization.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Jason Ruiyi Chin, a 20-year-old from Singapore who sells Notion templates and goes by Easlo online. Insider verified his revenue with documentation. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
I graduated from high school in 2021. While in school, I often used Notion β a note-taking software platform β to organize my lecture notes.
I realized after graduating that people could customize Notion for different uses and decided to fiddle around with the program's functionality.
I started producing basic templates, like a budget tracker and a habit tracker, under my internet persona, Easlo.
I studied YouTube videos and other Twitter users to create my brand
I learned how to set up various functions in Notion by watching YouTube videos. I released these first templates for free, advertising them to my growing Twitter followers and posting on Product Hunt to get the word out.
While developing my templates, I was growing my Twitter audience. I followed popular productivity Twitter accounts and studied what formats and content they used. I modeled my Twitter behavior after theirs. This research has paid off because I now get significant support on Twitter for my products.
For about two months in summer 2021, I regularly released new, free Notion templates and made them available to anyone who wanted them. They could be downloaded from Gumroad for free, with the option of leaving a tip.
The audience for my free templates was happy to start paying for my new product
I realized that being Easlo might be a lucrative endeavor in fall 2021 when I began receiving tips of up to $100 on Gumroad. In November 2021, I decided to start charging for my new templates and turn "Easlo" into a business. I stumbled into this entrepreneurship opportunity; it was my first job ever.
To get the word out about my new, paid products, I sent an email to all the people who had downloaded my free templates. To my surprise, people started paying for my new product.
Gumroad made it easy to switch from free products to paid ones. I just changed the price from $0 to whatever I was setting it as. The paid template was profitable immediately, as it brought over $3,000 in the first month.
My audience came largely from Twitter, where I have over 211,000 followers, and Product Hunt, a website that elevates new software programs. My Notion templates performed well there, drawing tons of new customers to my website.
Running a business alone can be stressful, but I take pride in it
I'm a one-man machine, which can be stressful sometimes, but I take pride in that every template, tweet, and Product Hunt post is designed and implemented by me alone.
I've never paid for an ad campaign. I focus on growing my online audience organically. I invest a lot of time in growth on Twitter, which has brought me the greatest return on the investment of my time.
My tweets these days focus on helping others grow their audiences and ventures, which is a popular topic that gets a lot of attention. I tweet two to three times a day, reply to at least 10 tweets, and make an informative Twitter thread weekly. My working hours vary from week to week β it's definitely a full-time commitment.
I've made $239,000 in template sales this year. My less-expensive templates β such as my Bullet Journal, which costs $20, and Finance Tracker, which costs $40 β make up nearly half of my business.
But sales of my $130 flagship product, the Second Brain template, make up over $100,000 of the profit I've made this year. The template allows you to track personal finance, health and fitness, personal growth, and relationship goals. It also displays your inbox and schedule.
There is a lot more competition in the Notion-template market now
Over the past year, the landscape for Notion templates has changed significantly. More competition has emerged in the template market, and I've had to adapt Easlo around that. Alongside releasing new templates, I've pivoted to creating educational content for the Notion-using community.
I was a recently graduated student when I began my journey with Notion templates. I never imagined the success I've found in this niche.
My advice to anyone considering building their own template business is that you need to build your audience first by providing them with free, valuable content before you can start selling templates.
If done correctly, this method creates a loyal audience that multiplies over time, and your sales will reflect this growth.
Freelancer UK Notion as told to | 2022-12-20T12:21:13Z | www.businessinsider.com | How I Made $239,000 This Year Selling Notion Templates on Gumroad | https://www.businessinsider.com/selling-notion-template-twitter-marketing-gum-road-digital-product | https://www.businessinsider.com/selling-notion-template-twitter-marketing-gum-road-digital-product |
Twitter launched its new square badge for businesses and employees on Monday.
Twitter introduced a new square badge to show where company verified accounts are employed.
At least 10 Twitter staff have the new badge, but Elon Musk doesn't.
Musk's friend, David Sacks, and news outlet Bloomberg are among others to get the new feature.
Twitter rolled out a new feature for some verified users Monday, including a small square company badge next to the names of some business users, including a number of Twitter staff, but not owner Elon Musk.
One week ago, business accounts were given gold check marks, but on Monday the square badges were added as part of Twitter's "Blue for Business" scheme, which allows companies to display their logo on employees' profiles.
Esther Crawford, Twitter's director of product management β who went viral for sleeping on the office floor soon after Musk's takeover β was one of the first users to get the square badge.
βEsther Crawford β¨ (@esthercrawford) December 19, 2022
At least 10 Twitter employees have been marked with the company's logo, and they mostly appear to be software engineers, and people in Crawford's division. Musk himself, however, has not got a square badge, despite owning the company and spearheading the verification changes.
Musk retweeted the official announcement for the feature, but is yet to address the poll which saw Twitter users vote for him to step down as CEO. He has said that users will require a subscription to vote in future polls about the platform.
One London-based engineer with the new badge appeared to test the feature in a Twitter Space last Thursday, titled "test affiliated badges."
Even though Musk hasn't been given the badge, one of his friends does have it. David Sacks, who first met Musk while working together on PayPal, is marked with the logo for his venture capital fund.
Sacks was part of Musk's inner circle at Twitter β giving him advice on the company, but never holding an official position.
The news outlet Bloomberg also has access to the square badge, which is currently being used for different sections of the outlet's coverage, but not individual journalists.
David Sacks and Bloomberg are among the non-Twitter staff who have the badge.
On the same day, Twitter also introduced a new grey check for government accounts. While this has been automatically rolled out for some accounts, others which should be eligible don't have it.
For example, Joe Biden's personal account has a blue check, but the official President of the United States account is grey. In the UK, it's the opposite for Prime Minister Rishi Sunak's personal account and the official Number 10 Downing Street Twitter. | 2022-12-20T12:21:25Z | www.businessinsider.com | Twitter's New Square Badges for Some Staff, but Not Elon Musk | https://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-new-square-badges-for-some-staff-not-elon-musk-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-new-square-badges-for-some-staff-not-elon-musk-2022-12 |
The InSight lander photographs one of its solar arrays in December 2018, left, and May 2022, right.
The solar arrays on NASA's InSight lander are deployed for a test at Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, on April 30, 2015.
NASA/JPL-Caltech/Lockheed Martin
This artist's concept is a simulation of what seismic waves from a Mars quake might look like as they move through different layers of the Martian interior.
NASA/JPL-Caltech/ETH Zurich/ Van Driel
An illustration of the InSight Mars lander.
NASA/JPL-Caltech; Insider
An artist illustration of the InSight lander on Mars.
"The mole," halfway out of its hole, on October 26, 2019.
InSight's heat probe, or mole, backed about halfway out of the hole it burrowed, on October 26, 2019.
InSightβs solar panels produced roughly 5,000 watt-hours each Martian day, or sol, after the spacecraft touched down in November 2018. But by spring 2022, enough dust had settled on the panels that they were only producing about 500 watt-hours each sol.
NOW WATCH: How NASA painted the Perseverance rover to withstand Mars' extreme temperatures
NASA Insight Lander NASA Mars | 2022-12-20T15:22:45Z | www.businessinsider.com | Mars Dust May Have Killed NASA's InSight Lander After 4-Year Mission | https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-insight-mars-lander-mission-ending-dust-power-crisis-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-insight-mars-lander-mission-ending-dust-power-crisis-2022-12 |
Why artisans receive little profit even though Moroccan rugs can cost over $2,000
Clancy Morgan
Moroccan rugs are popular around the world for their complex patterns and thick wool.
On some rugs, each step is done by hand, from spinning yarn to dyeing the wool and weaving.
These rugs can cost hundreds or thousands of dollars, but the artisans usually receive the least profit.
Moroccan rugs are valued around the world for their complex patterns and thick wool. A large rug can take months to weave, but the women who complete each step by hand usually receive the least profit. Selling directly to consumers is challenging, so artisans often rely on middlemen who sell the rugs for several times more in big cities. Online, Moroccan rugs can sell for several thousand dollars. We went to Morocco to find out why these artisans struggle to earn a profit while the rugs are so expensive. | 2022-12-20T15:22:51Z | www.businessinsider.com | Why Moroccan Rugs Are so Expensive | https://www.businessinsider.com/why-moroccan-rugs-are-so-expensive-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/why-moroccan-rugs-are-so-expensive-2022-12 |
Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy awards a Ukrainian service member at a position in the frontline town of Bakhmut, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Donetsk region, Ukraine December 20, 2022.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy made a surprise visit to the frontline Ukrainian city of Bakhmut on Tuesday.
Russian forces have spent months attacking the city, and fighting has recently intensified.
Zelenskyy spent the risky trip presenting several Ukrainian soldiers with medals.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy made a surprise trip to the frontline city of Bakhmut on Tuesday, one of his riskiest visits to see troops since the war began nearly 10 months ago.
During his visit, Zelenskyy listened to a report detailing the ongoing fighting, gave awards to soldiers of several units who are defending the city, and held a moment of silence for those who have been killed on the battlefield, according to the country's presidential office.
The office did not specify how close Zelenskyy got to the Russian lines, though it said he visited the "frontline" positions of a mechanized brigade "confronting the enemy on the approaches to the city."
Zelenskyy posted photographs to his Telegram on Tuesday showing him shaking hands with Ukrainian soldiers and awarding them medals in Bakhmut.
"The East is holding out because Bakhmut is fighting. This is the fortress of our morale. In fierce battles and at the cost of many lives, freedom is being defended here for all of us," Zelenskyy wrote later on Telegram. "Bakhmut defenders deserve our maximum support and our highest gratitude. That's why I am with them today. They are superhumans. They are our strength and our heroes."
βStratcom Centre UA (@StratcomCentre) December 20, 2022
Zelenskyy's visit on Tuesday is the latest high-profile trip that the Ukrainian leader has made to cities and towns near the frontlines since the war began, and one of the riskiest due to the intensity of fighting in the area. By contrast, Russian President Vladimir Putin has avoided coming close to the conflict that he started earlier this year.
For months, Russian forces have been trying to capture Bakhmut, a city with a pre-war population of over 70,000 people in eastern Ukraine's Donetsk region. During a nightly address, Zelenskyy called it the "hottest spot" of the war's entire front.
In addition to the Russian soldiers attacking the city, mercenaries from the infamous Wagner Group paramilitary organization have played a "major role" in fighting around the city, Britain's defense ministry said in a Monday intelligence update.
Meanwhile, Zelenskyy said this week that Russia has suffered nearly 100,000 casualties while fighting in Ukraine. His comments echo recent estimates by UK Defense Secretary Ben Wallace and top US Gen. Mark Milley, who have both said that they estimate Russian casualties have passed 100,000.
Speed desk Zelenskyy Ukraine | 2022-12-20T16:45:18Z | www.businessinsider.com | Zelenskyy Visits Frontline in One of His Riskiest Trips to See Troops | https://www.businessinsider.com/zelenskyy-visits-frontline-bakhmut-riskiest-trips-ukrainian-troops-russia-war-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/zelenskyy-visits-frontline-bakhmut-riskiest-trips-ukrainian-troops-russia-war-2022-12 |
Amazon has only gotten started with its ambitions to be a serious player in healthcare. Here are 3 acquisitions it could make next year.
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy. Amazon has been building out its healthcare segment for the past few years, adding services from pharmacy to primary care.
Amazon dug deeper into healthcare in 2022, making moves in primary care and consumer health.
Analysts think Amazon will keep building out its healthcare business next year with new deals.
The analysts said Amazon could buy startups in behavioral health, data analytics, and chronic care.
Amazon has been pushing steadily into healthcare for years.
But in 2022, the retail giant made a splash β and analysts expect it to keep making waves next year.
The company bought the primary-care provider One Medical for $3.9 billion in July, proving Amazon's commitment to its healthcare business as one of its biggest acquisitions ever. The next month, it abruptly announced it would shut down Amazon Care, its app-based primary-care service for employers, three years after launch. Amazon declined to comment for this story.
In November, Amazon launched Amazon Clinic, a virtual service where patients can pay Amazon directly to get treatment for common conditions like allergies and acne. Natalie Schibell, a vice president and research director at Forrester, said that was a sign Amazon had learned from its mistakes at Amazon Care.
"They're moving quickly," Schibell said. "Their shutdown of Amazon Care wasn't a sign of failure β it was a strategic move towards going directly to the consumer."
Amazon is in a position now to keep building its healthcare business. Experts think Amazon could notch deals in three key areas next year, including behavioral health and chronic care, to keep up its momentum.
Adding behavioral-health services to Amazon's newly acquired primary-care business could be the natural next step for the company, experts told Insider. In fact, Amazon had already planned to dip its toe into the mental-health market this year.
Amazon's original vision was to provide on-demand access to therapists and psychiatrists both employed directly by Amazon and in partnership with the behavioral-health provider Ginger, which merged with Headspace in 2021.
When Amazon shuttered Amazon Care, it put those mental-health ambitions on hold. The SVB Securities senior research analyst Stephanie Davis said she thought Amazon would have to make an acquisition for that venture to be successful.
"They have that ick factor of a therapist working directly for Amazon, versus working for a known brand that patients have positive trust associations with," she said.
Both Schibell and Davis said they thought Amazon would seek out a company that sells its mental-health services directly to consumers, since that's where the retail giant has historically excelled.
Acquiring Neuroflow, a startup that creates software to integrate behavioral-health care into primary care, could allow Amazon to automate some aspects of mental-health care, said Alexander Lennox-Miller, CB Insights' lead analyst in healthcare IT. Neuroflow's platform has clinical-decision support tools for providers and supports patients with automated check-ins and self-care activities. Neuroflow didn't respond to a request for comment.
Health data analytics
With its hundreds of millions of customers across its businesses, Amazon has access to countless health-related data points it could use for its healthcare business, Schibell said.
She thinks Amazon Web Services' healthcare solutions, which offer cloud services that can help healthcare organizations with tasks like pulling data from medical text and creating machine-learning models, will be where Amazon starts.
"They can leverage AWS's dozens of data centers and ultimately move the needle on value-based healthcare," Schibell said. "It's just a matter of scaling responsibly across the country and contending with some fierce competitors."
Lennox-Miller said Amazon could buy health data startups the company had already invested in, like the health-equity-focused Harmony Health or the value-based-care data company Clinify Health. Harmony Health and Clinify Health didn't respond to requests for comment.
Both Harmony Health and Clinify Health have tools that could transform the wealth of data Amazon already has access to, which Lennox-Miller thinks could be a selling point for the retail company.
"What they really need is the ability to synthesize a swath of healthcare data into meaningful metrics and meaningful datasets," Lennox-Miller said.
Or, if Amazon wanted to make a bigger purchase, Lennox-Miller said, it could go after the healthcare-analytics company Health Catalyst, which went public in 2019.
Amazon could try to make a dent in the $3.2 billion US chronic-care market next year by building out its specialty care services for chronic conditions, Schibell and Lennox-Miller said.
Amazon's most recent healthcare buy, One Medical, has some chronic-care services already, which use a care-team approach to treat conditions like diabetes and heart disease.
Biofourmis CEO Kuldeep Singh Rajput started the company in Singapore in 2015.
Lennox-Miller said Amazon could go for Biofourmis, which uses remote patient-monitoring technology to manage a variety of chronic conditions from home, as well as acute and post-acute care, with software powered by artificial intelligence.
"They have the combination of chronic-care services and their devices," Lennox-Miller said. "If Amazon was to go in the direction of one of their big-splash buys, that's what they would look for."
Biofourmis' CEO, Kuldeep Singh Rajput, told Insider the startup was positioning itself for an initial public offering in the next two to three years β but said Biofourmis would consider getting acquired by the right partner.
"If an opportunity arises where there are strategic partnerships in a way where we could accelerate our growth and the number of patients we impact, certainly we would take a look at it," he said. "In the short term, we're heads-down focused on growth of the business."
Schibell agreed that Amazon was likely to go beyond One Medical's primary-care services next year to dig deeper into specialty care.
Its main challenge, Schibell said, will be acquiring practices to expand across the country, augmenting what it's able to do with virtual care with physical locations as well.
That's where Walmart currently has a competitive advantage, she said β Amazon's biggest retail competitor has thousands of stores, including many in rural areas with chronically ill populations that have diminished access to care.
Amazon Neuroflow | 2022-12-20T16:54:00Z | www.businessinsider.com | 3 Healthcare Acquisitions Amazon Might Make in 2023 | https://www.businessinsider.com/3-healthcare-acquisitions-amazon-might-make-in-2023-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/3-healthcare-acquisitions-amazon-might-make-in-2023-2022-12 |
The Church Street Inn in Lenox, MA.
Business Wire/AP
Ryan Salame, a co-CEO at FTX, bought $6 million of restaurants and real estate in Lenox, Massachusetts.
Officials in the 5,000-resident town are concerned that they might suffer as a result.
A local newspaper reported last year that Salame owned almost half the town's restaurants.
The 5,000-resident town of Lenox, Massachusetts is closely following the FTX fallout, thanks to one of the company's co-CEOs owning a significant portfolio of property in the town.
As first reported by local news outlet The Berkshire Eagle, Ryan Salame, who was co-CEO at FTX Digital Markets, invested $6 million in restaurants and real estate in Lenox.
But now locals are raising concerns after FTX filed for bankruptcy and its founder, Sam Bankman-Fried, was arrested last week. Bankman-Fried has been accused of funneling customer funds into his trading firm, Alameda, and using some customer money to buy luxury real estate and fund political donations.
Salame also received a $55 million loan from Alameda, according to bankruptcy filings, and donated $23 million to mostly Republican political candidates.
Jennifer Nacht, executive director of the Lenox Chamber of Commerce, told The Berkshire Eagle in November: "It's so crazy that something of this global magnitude has such a direct effect on our little town."
"I have been following the FTX fallout all week," she added. "I feel really badly for Ryan and yes, I am concerned about what it means for Lenox.
Salame, a Massachusetts native, had his first job aged 14 washing dishes in Great Barrington, a 20-minute drive from Lenox. Last year, The Berkshire Eagle reported he owned nearly half the town's restaurants.
Salame first bought the Firefly Gastropub in July 2020, when his friend Laura Shack put it up for sale after the COVID-19 pandemic hurt its revenue.
"I had never really planned to own a restaurant," he told the local paper. "It came at a good time for me and made sense."
Salame's assets in Lenox include The Olde Heritage Tavern, a sports pub which locals compare to the "Cheers" sitcom, because it's "where everybody knows your name."
The assets are held through six private companies which list Salame as a director or manager. A seventh, registered in Connecticut, operates a private landing strip near his home.
Nacht told the local paper that "Heritage and Firefly are continuing to operate as normal. Everything else is on hold until further notice."
Two days before FTX's bankruptcy, Salame alerted authorities about potential wrongdoing at the company, according to court filings. The Wall Street Journal also reported that Salame vomited upon hearing about FTX's impending collapse.
Salame's company Lenox Eats, and his attorney, Jason Linder, didn't immediately respond to Insider's requests for comment.
Trending UK ftx alameda | 2022-12-20T16:54:12Z | www.businessinsider.com | FTX Exec Invested $6m in Small MA Town, Worrying Local Officials | https://www.businessinsider.com/ftx-exec-invested-6m-small-ma-town-worrying-local-officials-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/ftx-exec-invested-6m-small-ma-town-worrying-local-officials-2022-12 |
"Violent Night" is now available to buy or rent online.
"Violent Night" stars David Harbour as an action-hero version of Santa Claus.
The movie follows Saint Nick as he fights a group of mercenaries on Christmas Eve.
The film is now available to rent or purchase from digital retailers for a starting price of $20.
Just in time for the holiday weekend, "Violent Night" is now available to watch at home. The action-comedy can be purchased or rented from digital retailers, including Amazon, Apple TV, and Vudu.
Offering a "Die Hard" inspired twist on traditional Santa Claus movies, "Violent Night" shows just what happens to those on the naughty list. On Christmas Eve, a group of mercenaries takes a wealthy family hostage. Not long after, Santa drops down the chimney for his yearly visit, ready for a fight to save the family.
Check out the 'Violent Night' trailer
David Harbour ("Stranger Things") stars as Santa Claus in "Violent Night." John Leguizamo, Alex Hassell, Alexis Louder, Edi Patterson, Cam Gigandet, Leah Brady, and Beverly D'Angelo round out the rest of the cast. The movie is directed by Tommy Wirkola, whose previous films include "Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters" and "What Happened to Monday."
How to watch 'Violent Night'
You can now watch "Violent Night" at home through digital retailers like Amazon, Apple TV, and Vudu. The movie costs $20 to rent or $25 to buy in up to 4K quality.
'Violent Night' (Digital Purchase)
If you opt for a rental, you'll have 30 days to start watching the movie, and 48 hours to finish it after you hit play. If you buy the film, you can stream it whenever you like with no restrictions.
Apps for digital retailers are available on most smart TVs, mobiles devices, and streaming players from major brands. You should check each store's website to ensure your device of choice is supported before making a purchase.
When will 'Violent Night' be on Peacock?
As a Universal Studios release, "Violent Night" is expected to hit the Peacock streaming service before any other subscription platforms. Though an exact date hasn't been announced yet, we expect that it'll arrive around 45 days after its theater premiere, which is the release window that a lot of other Universal movies have followed.
If that's the case, "Violent Night" can be expected on Peacock around January 16, 2023. Once the movie hits the streaming service, it will be exclusive to Peacock Premium ($5/month) and Peacock Premium Plus ($10/month) members.
Why is 'Violent Night' rated R?
Though holiday movies are typically family friendly, "Violent Night" is anything but. The film received an R rating for vulgar language, some sexual references, and of course, bloody violence throughout.
Is 'Violent Night' worth watching?
As of December 20, "Violent Night" has a "73% Fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Though some critics say the film isn't as entertaining as its outlandish premise might imply, it's still a fun watch for action-loving viewers.
Will there be a 'Violent Night' sequel?
A "Violent Night" sequel hasn't been confirmed yet, but recent interviews with the movie's cast and crew make it clear that a followup is something the filmmakers are planning for.
In an interview with Collider, producer Kelly McCormick mentions a sequel as something she hopes to start work on soon. While speaking to CinemaBlend, star David Harbour talks about introducing Mrs. Claus and Santa's elves in a potential sequel. | 2022-12-20T16:54:18Z | www.businessinsider.com | How to Watch 'Violent Night': Rent or Buy New Christmas Action Movie | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/streaming/how-to-watch-violent-night | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/streaming/how-to-watch-violent-night |
Elon Musk wants to portray himself as a magnanimous chief who listens to his constituents.
Elon Musk ran a poll asking Twitter users whether he should quit as CEO, and the majority said yes.
The poll allowed Musk to portray himself as a democratic leader.
In reality, he's spinning a narrative to suit his plans and desires to return to Tesla.
The people of Twitter have spoken, and they want Elon Musk out.
For those trying to tune out the billionaire CEO's latest antics, Musk ran a poll Sunday night asking Twitter users whether he should step down as the head of the social-media company. The majority of voters, 57.5%, said yes. Musk said he'd abide by the results of the poll, though he hasn't commented on the outcome.
Speculation about the referendum is rampant β why on earth did he run the poll, and will he, in fact, leave? β but the fact is Musk knew what the results would be, and he intends to use the vote as a justification for a decision he made long ago.
By posing the stay-or-go question in an online poll, Musk portrayed himself as a magnanimous chief who listens to his constituents. In reality, he's spinning a narrative about his forthcoming resignation to suit his desires to return to Tesla.
"Given all the flak he's gotten over the past few months for how he's handling Twitter, it was pretty obvious he was going to get a negative vote," Peter Bamberger, a professor at Tel Aviv University's Coller School of Management, told Insider. "Now he can gain a sense of legitimacy in terms of stepping down, while also creating an image that he's a democratic leader β and maximize his personal wealth, too."
An egalitarian and community-minded leader who does what he wants
Many companies use online polls and social-media surveys to build engagement with customers and gather market intelligence, however imperfect that market data might be.
Musk also likes using polls. Some cases in point: Should he sell more Tesla stock? Should Donald Trump be allowed back on the platform? And should Twitter offer a general amnesty to suspended accounts?
But Musk doesn't conduct polls to engage or to inform. Rather, it's to rationalize his plans and point of view.
"He doesn't seem impulsive," Bamberger said. "He runs his polls selectively, and he does them when he knows what the outcome will be."
In other words, by allowing Twitter users to ostensibly make decisions for him via unorthodox means, he can frame his leadership as egalitarian and community-minded, while doing whatever he wants. And what he wants is to resign as the CEO of Twitter and refocus his energies on Tesla.
This shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. In May, Musk told investors he'd serve as a temporary CEO of Twitter for a few months after he completed his $44 billion takeover. During his first meeting with Twitter employees in June, Musk said he didn't care about being the company's CEO. He reiterated that sentiment in November, saying, "I expect to reduce my time at Twitter and find somebody else to run Twitter over time."
Leaving Twitter would seem a savvy business move for Musk. His leadership of Twitter is viewed as a disaster in many circles, and even many Musk loyalists want him to go. They see his stint as the head of the social-media platform as a distraction from Tesla. Investors appear to agree: The value of Tesla has plummeted since Musk bought Twitter.
In resigning his post by virtue of a vote, Musk can boost his personal wealth and return to his beloved car company under the guise of democratic leadership. Shares of Tesla rose Monday after the poll results came in, though they ended the day largely unchanged, trading at just below $150.
Of course, it's plausible that a tiny part of Musk thought the poll would have turned out differently. Maybe he thought users would beg him to stay on as CEO for life.
Perhaps his silence on the vote is a sign of his wounded pride.
"I am not in his mind," Ariane Ollier-Malaterre, a professor at the School of Management at the UniversitΓ© du QuΓ©bec Γ MontrΓ©al, said, "but I don't see how people voting on you leaving makes you look good." | 2022-12-20T16:54:30Z | www.businessinsider.com | Elon Musk Ran His CEO Poll Under the Guise of Democratic Leadership | https://www.businessinsider.com/musk-ran-his-ceo-poll-under-the-guise-of-democratic-leadership-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/musk-ran-his-ceo-poll-under-the-guise-of-democratic-leadership-2022-12 |
15 music power players at TikTok, YouTube, and other platforms who are innovating and using social to shape the industry
Spotify's Elissa Ayadi, Meta's Scott Sellwood, SoundCloud's Tracy Chan, and Roblox's Karibi Dagogo-Jack.
Elissa Ayadi/Meta/SoundCloud/Roblox/Sydney Bradley.
Social media has become a key tool for music discovery, and increasingly, monetization.
Execs at TikTok, Roblox, YouTube, and Snapchat are betting on music as a driver for engagement.
Here are 15 power players who are using social to shape the music industry in 2022.
2022 was a massive year for music on social media, as short-video apps like TikTok became the dominant platforms for fans to discover new songs.
Music-industry execs are now setting their sights on social as the next big money-making opportunity. And tech leaders across platforms as diverse as Roblox, Peloton, and Snapchat are putting music front-and-center in apps as they recognize songs as a powerful way to drive engagement.
"Every short-format platform's got music on it now," Ted Suh, global head of music partnerships at Snap Inc., told Insider. "All this engagement on these types of services is really leading to the music industry finding incremental business value, whether it's leveraging this data to help them get radio play, or more spins on Pandora, to even kicking off national tours."
The marriage of short-form video and music has become so pervasive that it's become a focus for tech incumbents including YouTube, which has 80 million paying subscribers across its YouTube Music and Premium services. Legacy music brands like the satellite-radio company SiriusXM are even creating TikTok-branded radio stations.
"I've always taken a very agnostic view as to where a piece of music comes from," Steve Blatter, the senior vice president and general manager of music programming at SiriusXM, told Insider in November. "Through our relationship with TikTok, we are able to learn about new artists, new songs that are bubbling under."
The shift to social for music discovery has had a big impact on artists' career development, as well. A fleeting TikTok trend or viral YouTube video can jumpstart a career for an up-and-coming performer. A&R managers at record labels scan social media for new talent.
The process has been both democratizing and exhausting for performers who often have to maintain active accounts across social media to succeed.
"TikTok has now become a whole other part of our job that takes up such a significant amount of time," music artist Taylor Upsahl told Insider earlier this year. "As artists, we're all still in a transitional phase of like, 'Okay, cool, how do we find time and energy to now be essentially content creators and influencers?'"
Insider created this inaugural list of power players at tech platforms who are doing innovative work in music and social as we seek to understand the myriad ways that social media is changing the industry. We considered companies across media categories, including gaming, music streaming, messaging, and short and long-form entertainment, drawing nominations from our audience, experts in the industry, and the companies themselves.
All of the 15 leaders, listed below in alphabetical order by company, work collaboratively on teams. Insider is recognizing these particular individuals due to their work on specific projects that were new or innovative in music and social in 2022.
Meta: Malika Quemerias and Scott Sellwood
Malika Quemerias, director of music-artist partnerships; Scott Sellwood, director of music-business development and music-label and publishing partnerships.
Meta Platforms.
2022 was a transitional year for Meta, the tech giant that runs social apps including Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, and builds VR hardware like the Quest 2.
The company rebranded in late 2021 to make a long-term bet on the metaverse while also investing in social features like short-form video to compete with relative newcomer TikTok.
In the past year, the company's music team worked with artists and rights holders to integrate songs deeper into apps like Instagram, Facebook, and its virtual-reality play, Horizon Worlds.
Malika Quemerias, Meta's director of music-artist partnerships, led a team that worked directly with artists and their associates to build custom experiences across the company's various apps. Those efforts included a Post Malone VR concert in Horizon Worlds, a project with The Notorious B.I.G. estate to bring Biggie to fans through VR, and the launch of a digital-collectibles product on Instagram with Jaden Smith. Quemerias' team also partnered with Girls Who Code and RCA Records to create augmented-reality filters for artists Doja Cat and Latto.
"As we build towards the metaverse and the expansiveness of what it will mean for artists in the future, this year we focused many of our partnerships on building the bridge between our existing social platforms and what is to come," Quemerias told Insider in an email.
Scott Sellwood, Meta's director of music-business development and music-label and publishing partnerships, oversees the company's business relationships with labels and publishers for its suite of apps and platforms.
In July, Sellwood's team launched a new model for music and creator monetization for Facebook that allowed users to add licensed music to videos and still earn a cut of ad revenue, which was previously uncommon on most major platforms including YouTube.
"This launch both delivers on our promise to the music industry to build sustainable win-win businesses and provides creators with monetization options they didn't have before," Sellwood told Insider in an email. "We worked closely with the music industry to forge this model and share a belief that building community between creators and music (and the artists who make it) will grow the pie for everyone over time."
Roblox: Karibi Dagogo-Jack
Karibi Dagogo-Jack, head of music partnerships.
Gaming is increasingly becoming a focus for the music industry as artists and labels look for new ways to grow digital revenue.
Roblox in particular has taken center stage as a new promotional tool for performers, with executives at the major labels calling out their work on the platform in earnings calls throughout this year.
Karibi Dagogo-Jack oversees Roblox's music partnerships, a role that centers on helping artists and their labels find creative ways to engage with the platform's roughly 59 million daily-active users.
Artists like Elton John and 24kGoldn have performed virtual concerts on the platform this year. Other performers have used Roblox to sell custom virtual merchandise for users to put on their avatars, such as band t-shirts. And several performers and music brands created custom environments within Roblox, such as the "Festival Tycoon" game launched by Gamefam Studios on behalf of The Chainsmokers, Columbia Records, Sony Music Entertainment, or Spotify Island, a custom gaming-and-sound-creation experience crafted for the digital streamer.
"We understand that this is a new space and we have to help partners onboard," Dagogo-Jack told Insider. "We've seen uplift in off-platform listening from on-platform activity. I think that's what's encouraging so many partners to continue to think about us as a space to promote and market their music."
Snapchat: Ted Suh and Manny Adler
Ted Suh, global head of music partnerships; Manny Adler, head of music strategy.
Rocky Mountain Photography/Moisnomois.
Snapchat has invested heavily in its music offering over the last few years, opening up the ability for users to add songs from major labels, publishers, and thousands of other rights holders to messages, stories, and Spotlight videos.
Since licensed music was added in 2020 to features across Snapchat, the company said more than 2.7 billion videos have been created using songs that have been heard at least 183 billion times.
The company's focus on direct messaging and its head start in augmented reality have made it a unique promotional tool for the music industry.
Ted Suh, the company's global head of music partnerships who joined the company in 2018, was instrumental in securing its global licensing agreements with the major labels and independents. Suh also helped the company set up partnerships with distribution platforms like DistroKid that focus more on emerging artists.
"Because we're a messaging platform, about 40% of all these videos that are created with music are going straight to the chat side of the app," Suh told Insider. "You're sending something to your best friend or a few of your best friends. They're more likely to actually view that content and do something with it, whether it's reply or go onto a streaming service and discover that full song."
Manny Adler, Snap's head of music strategy who joined in 2015, worked with Suh to launch the company's Sounds product. In July, Adler helped roll out a creator fund specifically for music artists. He's also worked on developing augmented-reality partnerships with music brands and performers, including working with Live Nation on a live-music experience project and helping artists with their music-promotion strategies that incorporate AR lenses.
"The opportunity that I've really spent a lot of time on is thinking about other distribution opportunities for that content outside of just sending a message with the song," Adler told Insider. "How can we integrate it into augmented reality? How can we extend that content, give it a new life, and a new opportunity to reach an audience on Snapchat?"
SoundCloud: Tracy Chan
Tracy Chan, SVP of creator.
SoundCloud offers a set of social features that are unique for a music-streaming platform.
Users have the ability to add comments at a specific moment in a song beneath each track's waveform, for example. Artists can also chat with fans directly using the platform's built-in messaging tool.
In October, the company rolled out "SoundCloud for Artists" in a push to blend features around creator monetization, analytics, and distribution into a single toolkit for performers. The company pays artists based on specific listenership through its fan-powered royalties program.
Leading the charge on the company's creator strategy is Tracy Chan, its SVP of creator, who joined the company in June after serving as head of music at Twitch. Before Twitch, Chan was at Spotify where he helped develop its Spotify for Artists program.
"Our goal is to connect artists and fans and just help artists understand who their fan base is and make it really easy for them to have that bidirectional conversation," Chan told Insider. "Most platforms are just this broadcast outwards and we think the power is actually that two-way conversation."
The company views its platform as complementary to other streaming and social apps in the ecosystem.
"We know that creators have to be everywhere," Chan said. "You have to be on TikTok. You have to be on YouTube. You have to be on Instagram, and all of those places. And that's why through our distribution offering in SoundCloud for Artists, we distribute to TikTok. We'll help you figure out what's the right snippet that gives you the right heat that will eventually convert them over to listening to you."
Spotify: Elissa Ayadi
Elissa Ayadi, global head of social-media marketing.
Elissa Ayadi.
As a dominant player in the streaming ecosystem, Spotify's built-in music-discovery features are an important tool for artists and labels. But the company's off-platform social-media strategy, including its end-of-year Wrapped campaign, made the biggest splash in 2022.
Elissa Ayadi, global head of social-media marketing, helped execute the company's organic social strategy on platforms like Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, and YouTube this year.
Most notably, Ayadi oversaw the company's strategy for original social content for Wrapped, its annual data-based review of each user's listening habits.
In the first 24 hours of the 2022 Wrapped campaign, the company nearly doubled its social mentions year-over-year, becoming a top 10 trending category on Twitter in more than 85 countries, and achieving around 678 million new TikTok views on videos featuring the #SpotifyWrapped and #SpotifyWrapped2022 hashtags.
The company began its "warmup phase" in social promotions for Wrapped in late October when users began chattering about the upcoming data drop.
"We started playing in the conversation as it was happening and really just talking back to fans on Twitter and participating with them and playing with them and sharing some of these memes," Ayadi told Insider. "They're really driving the conversation and we're participating in it."
TikTok: Lysa Cardenas, Kelli Slade, Steven J. Horowitz, Madina Sissoko, and Henrique Fares Leite
Lysa Cardenas, global music program manager.
TikTok has become a dominant player in music discovery.
Songs that first appear as 15-second snippets in TikTok videos often end up charting on the Billboard 100 or Spotify Viral 50 after users later stream full versions. Its influence in music has even become a source of leverage in negotiations with music-rights holders.
In 2022, the company expanded its music ambitions into new categories, launching a song-distribution tool called SoundOn, testing out new sound-editing features on and off its app, and encouraging producers to build remixed versions of tracks through its StemDrop promotion. Its parent company ByteDance may even be planning to launch a standalone "TikTok Music" app, per a trademark filing.
TikTok has a global team of music execs that oversee editorial content, events, licensing negotiations, and work with partners like record labels and artists.
These TikTok staffers helped execute some of the company's innovative projects in 2022:
Lysa Cardenas, the global music-program manager at TikTok, oversaw the launch of "Rompiendo," a company program designed to highlight Latin music both on and off TikTok during a year where the genre dominated across all platforms.
"Rompiendo" began as an editorial feature on TikTok's sounds page and eventually expanded into artist performances and a segment on SiriusXM's TikTok Radio channel. Artists featured through the program include Anitta, Daddy Yankee, Camilo, Feid, Yahritza Y Su Esencia, and Paopao.
"The number of Latin music artists trending and gaining traction specifically in the US but globally as well has just been enormous in 2022," Cardenas told Insider. "We're really looking at all of the ways that music can exist and be highlighted on platform and also out in the world."
Kelli Slade, the company's commercial music and creative licensing lead in EMEA, helped TikTok roll out its SoundOn product, organizing a three-day writers camp with BMG Publishing and SoundOn artists that led to the creation of 12 near-complete tracks. Slade also helped craft the commercial and UGC licensing agreements that enabled the company to launch its remix-artist focused StemDrop promotion with Samsung.
Steven J. Horowitz, the company's music-editorial lead in the US who formerly served on the music-programming team at YouTube Music and as a senior editor and associate editor at Billboard, led all music-related live programming for TikTok in the region. This included overseeing livestreams for artists like Daddy Yankee, Madonna, Meghan Trainor, Becky G, and Pink. Horowitz also directed the company's social-content strategy around off-platform events like the Billboard Music Awards and Latin Grammys.
Madina Sissoko, a music content and trends manager at the company, focuses on curating content for TikTok's sounds page in North America as well as working with partners at SiriusXM to curate its TikTok-focused channel. Sissoko also led editorial initiatives at TikTok for campaigns around Black Music Month, Arab Heritage Month, Black History Month, #Afrobeats, and #RnBVibes.
Henrique Fares Leite, TikTok's music-focused head of markets and partners development in Latin America, helped the company build its presence in the region, including hosting the company's biggest livestreamed performance of a single artist, J Balvin, which drove 6.1 million unique views. Fares Leite also directed the company's music-festival strategy in the region, with presences at events like EDC Mexico, Corona Capital MX, Vive Latino MX, and Lollapalooza AR and CL.
YouTube: Tuma Basa, Lyor Cohen, and Vivien Lewit
Tuma Basa, YouTube's director of Black music and culture.
David M. Benett/Dave Benett/Getty Images for YouTube Music.
YouTube has long been one of the most important social-entertainment platforms for monetization in the music industry.
"YouTube's aspiration is to be the biggest generator of revenues for the music industry," Boyd Muir, CFO and president of operations at Universal Music Group, said in November at the Morgan Stanley TMT Conference.
In addition to serving as a music-video hub, YouTube has a standalone streaming service, YouTube Music, and a copyright-detection toolkit that has supported monetization for music-rights holders for years.
In 2022, the company's highest priority project tied to music has been YouTube Shorts, its answer to TikTok. Thus far, Shorts has primarily served as a promotional tool for artists and record labels. Starting early next year, the company announced plans to begin sharing a portion of Shorts ad revenue with music-rights holders.
YouTube's music strategy, including its approach to music on Shorts, is overseen by Lyor Cohen, YouTube and Google's global head of music. Cohen, a former Warner Music Group exec who founded the label 300 Entertainment, told GQ that short-form video is his biggest focus when it comes to competition.
"I want our short-form video not to be a sugar high, but actually lead them to something more profound: a fandom that's engaged," he told the magazine in November.
Vivien Lewit, the company's global head of artists, heads up its music-content-programming strategy, including coordinating artist performances and events.
Tuma Basa, YouTube's director of Black music and culture, leads its efforts as it pertains to Black music, which he said includes genres like Hip Hop, R&B, Afrobeats, Amapiano, and Dancehall. Basa works across divisions like marketing, ad sales, artist-and-label relations, trust and safety, and communications. Like Cohen, Basa also touted short-form video as the next big opportunity for the music industry in a November interview on YouTube's blog.
Features TikTok | 2022-12-20T16:54:42Z | www.businessinsider.com | Power Players Using Social to Shape Music in 2022: TikTok, YouTube, Snap | https://www.businessinsider.com/power-players-social-media-influence-music-industry-tiktok-youtube-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/power-players-social-media-influence-music-industry-tiktok-youtube-2022-12 |
TikTok has laid off a 'significant portion' of its Russian workforce as it evaluates the 'evolving circumstances' in the region
TikTok laid off a "significant portion" of its Russian workforce, the company confirmed to Insider.
The news was first reported in Russian Telegram channels and picked up by Forbes Russia.
TikTok said in statement to Insider that it "will continue to evaluate the evolving circumstances in Russia."
TikTok has cut "a significant portion" of its Russian workforce, many of whom were working in its Eastern Europe division, a company spokesperson confirmed to Insider.
The cuts come after TikTok reduced its services to Russian users following Russia's invasion of Ukraine earlier this year. The ByteDance-owned company blocked access to livestreams and the posting of new videos in the country.
"We have had to make a number of decisions this year about our service in Russia, which now unfortunately includes reducing our Russia-based workforce," TikTok said in a statement to Insider.
The layoffs will go into effect on December 30, according to three LinkedIn posts from people who identified themselves as dismissed employees.
The news was first reported in Russian Telegram channels and picked up by Forbes Russia. One source told the publication that about 500 people were affected. A TikTok spokesperson told Insider that these figures are "very far from accurate," but did not provide further comment on the number of people affected.
Two former employees Insider contacted said they couldn't comment on the layoffs due to non-disclosure agreements they'd signed. One of them wrote in a message that the information leaked to Russian-speaking Telegram channels included "very explicit and correct details."
At least 25 people posted have on LinkedIn since December 15 announcing that their time at TikTok was coming to an end.
"I'm looking for a new job," said a LinkedIn post from someone who identified themselves as a partnership manager at TikTok. "Today was a shock for me as I finish my work at TikTok in 2 weeks. I would like to ask for your support."
TikTok said in its statement: "We greatly appreciate these employees and their contributions to our community and will ensure they are supported at this difficult time. We will continue to evaluate the evolving circumstances in Russia to determine when we might fully resume our services with safety as our top priority."
Are you a TikTok employee with insight to share? Got a tip? Contact Marta Biino at mbiino@insider.com using a non-work device. For secure messaging via Signal, send a Twitter DM to @martabiino.
TikTok Layoffs Tech layoffs | 2022-12-20T16:54:48Z | www.businessinsider.com | TikTok Has Laid Off a 'Significant Portion' of Its Employees in Russia | https://www.businessinsider.com/tiktok-layoffs-russia-significant-portion-staff-eastern-europe-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/tiktok-layoffs-russia-significant-portion-staff-eastern-europe-2022-12 |
From ads in video games, retail media, and cookieless tracking β experts predict these surging areas will drive ad industry M&A in 2023
Despite an economic downturn, experts predict there will be plenty of advertising M&A in 2023.
While that could include some and firesales, deals are expected in hot areas like retail media and CTV.
Insider spoke to more than a dozen industry experts who dished on the trends that will drive advertising M&A next year.
After a frenzied year of dealmaking and IPOs in 2021, advertising industry M&A was more subdued this year.
Venture funding in the advertising space has also cooled, and the share prices of many public adtech and martech firms dropped precipitously.
While this the first three quarters of this year saw roughly the same number of deals as the same period in 2021, the aggregate value of those transactions dipped, according to investment bank Luma partners.
"Sellers have been reluctant to adjust valuation expectations downwards," said Alex DeGroote, media and tech analyst at the research firm Arden Partners. "But now they have no choice."
But despite economic headwinds, experts say the explosive growth in areas such as streaming television and retail media, plus the push for more privacy-focused ad tools could drive a number of strategic deals next year. Added to that, private equity companies β which accounted for almost half of the acquisitions in the sector in the first three quarters of 2022, according to M&A advisory firm Ciesco β are sitting on an estimated $1 trillion-plus in yet-to-be-invested cash reserves. At least some of that capital will be deployed in the advertising sector, experts said.
Insider spoke to more than a dozen experts β from consultants, to investors, founders, analysts, and corporate development executives β to identify the industry's predictions for the biggest advertising M&A trends in 2023.
1. Numerous companies launched ad businesses in 2022, and some will acquire to differentiate themselves.
From Netflix to Lyft to Marriott β there was no shortage of companies launching ad businesses for the first time in 2022.
Netflix's "Stranger Things," season four.
But these new ad businesses will need to add value to keep customers coming back, experts said. They might provide that value by picking up technologies in areas like measurement or AI, or even acquiring entire teams of specialists.
"The math for an acqui-hire makes sense, especially if a team that already knows how to work with each other effectively can be plugged in immediately," wrote consultancy firm Sparrow Advisers in a December blog post.
2. Companies in hot areas like performance marketing, retail media and CTV will buy others to build out their offerings
Performance marketing, retail media, and the growth of connected TV advertising have been among the hottest trends for advertising companies and agencies in recent years. Now the experts in these spaces want to broaden their capabilities, experts said.
Companies looking to quickly scale up their retail media business could look to buy firms with big client bases or large troves of data. Analysts at Arete Research predicted in November that adtech company Criteo could be a target for acquirers like Shopify, Pinterest, or The Trade Desk.
Performance marketing companies already have strong data and tech chops, but Tristan Rice, head of SI Partners' European M&A practice, thinks these companies will want to acquire their way into some creative heft, much like how adtech company MNTN acquired actor Ryan Reynolds' marketing agency Maximum Effort.
"You need grown-up creative thinking to layer on the data and tech wizardry," Rice said. "That was out of favor for a while as everyone focused on the bottom end of the marketing funnel."
Also look out for mergers and acquisitions centered around connected TV, particularly among companies that can improve targeting and measurement, said Jorge Poyatos, cofounder of the adtech firm Seedtag.
3. "Traditional" adtech will further consolidate
Experts predict major consolidation in the adtech sector next year, as some publicly-traded companies underperform, and private companies find their cash reserves dwindling.
"Two things are going to happen in acquisitions: fire sales and mergers," said Chad Engelgau, Global CEO of Acxiom. "As investors require something for their money besides growth, many companies are on the ropes."
Kunal Nagpal, chief business officer at adtech company InMobi, predicts there will be "at least three to five deals" among companies that provide technology to publishers next year to create bigger and more financially robust players. Similarly, he said there would likely be mergers at the demand-side platform end, as those companies look to build scale.
4. Influencer marketing specialists will snap up tech companies
Influencer marketing represents a growing proportion of marketers' budgets. Insider Intelligence forecasts that companies will spend $6.2 billion on influencer marketing in the US next year, up from $5 billion in 2022.
Spend on influencer marketing in the US is set to reach $6 billion next year.
M&A deals in the creator economy space ramped up in 2022, and there will likely be more in 2023.
As influencer marketing matures, there will be demand for data-driven companies that can prove return on ad spend, and for companies that help marketers determine which influencers to work with, said MiQ Global President of Corporate Development Paul Silver.
5. Ads in gaming gain steam
In-game advertising once focused around free-to-play mobile games, but that's changing as brand integrations come to consoles, massive multiplayer online games, and metaverse-type environments.
Gaming will see a lot of M&A in 2023, said the media and tech analyst Alex DeGroote, because it's a sector where where companies benefit from scale β both in terms of users and their content libraries.
Sea of Thieves is published by Xbox Game Studios.
FREDERIC J. BROWN / Stringer / Getty
Both Microsoft's Xbox and Sony's Playstation are building their ad divisions, while adtech giant The Trade Desk has built a team for video game ads. Experts said potential acquisitions in the space could include ad serving tech that makes it easier for brands to deploy their ads within games and firms that make it easy to measure the effectiveness of those ads.
"Gaming is a really big market for brands and agencies to tackle: 82% of global consumers are gamers, which means it's also as big as the audience who watch live TV," said Carrie Seifer, chief customer officer at research platform GWI.
6. Advertising agency holding companies will go shopping for cookieless adtech
The big advertising agency holding companies have shown remarkable resilience in 2022. But they'll need technology to continue adding value beyond media buying, said Albert Nieto, cofounder of the adtech company Seedtag.
Of particular interest will be companies that are building technology that doesn't rely on third-party cookies, as Google plans to phase them out from its popular Chrome browser in 2024. Meanwhile, the industry still needs new privacy-focused approaches to target and measure ads, especially across different online platforms or offline.
"I would not be surprised if there is a large play by one or more agency holding groups to buy out an existing universal ID player that has scale on the sell side to power their identity graph," said Kunal Nagpal, chief business officer at adtech company InMobi.
Ad Tech Advertising Agencies | 2022-12-20T18:25:23Z | www.businessinsider.com | 6 Predictions for Advertising M&A in 2023 | https://www.businessinsider.com/6-predictions-for-advertising-ma-in-2023-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/6-predictions-for-advertising-ma-in-2023-2022-12 |
5 ways reading 'Atomic Habits' changed how I live and work for the better
Dayana Aleksandrova.
Courtesy of Dayana Aleksandrova
Dayana Aleksandrova is a copywriter and digital nomad based in Costa Rica.
She read "Atomic Habits" by James Clear to improve her productivity and address distractions.
Decluttering, auditing her day, and creating temptation have helped her avoid procrastination.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Dayana Aleksandrova, a 30-year-old copywriter, mentor for online entrepreneurs, and digital nomad based in Costa Rica, about her experience reading "Atomic Habits." The following has been edited for length and clarity.
When I expanded my online business from copywriting to business mentorship for online entrepreneurs, I started getting a ton of questions from clients about building good habits and time management.
So I asked some of my high-performer friends who do 20 things at once and make it all look effortless what book they could recommend for improving upon this β and they unanimously said "Atomic Habits: An Easy and Proven Way to Build Good Habits and Break Bad Ones" by James Clear.
I decided to read it in order to best serve my clients. So far, the lessons I've taken away from the book have worked at an 100% success rate β especially when it comes to addressing procrastination.
Here are five ways that my life changed for the better after I tried Clear's principles:
1. I beat distractions in my space
According to "Atomic Habits," the first law of behavior change is to "make it obvious." In the book, Clear refutes the idea that we're organized due to our willpower or genes and argues that our habits are a product of our environment.
I'd been feeling very distracted at work, constantly jumping from one project to the next and leaving incomplete Notion tasks and half-finished emails. So, following the book's advice, I decided to upgrade my space.
My desk used to be a complete mess β sticky notes, pens, journals, and clementine peels everywhere, alongside multiple half-drunk takeaway coffee cups.
After reading "Atomic Habits," I set an alarm for 20 minutes so I'd get it done under pressure and separated everything into three piles: essentials, nice-to-have, and extras. The "essentials" on my desk now are my laptop, a podcasting microphone, a journal with a single pen, and a water bottle. I stashed all my "extras" β my Kindle and any hardcover books, pencils, business cards, and highlighters β in my closet.
Getting rid of the clutter has helped me focus, and I no longer lose ideas. Now everything that crosses my mind is in that one journal rather than spread across 20-odd sticky notes. Plus, all the tasks I start actually get done.
Clear's book inspired me to do the same inside my laptop, too. I grabbed all of my desktop folders and put them in one "Omega" folder, so now I enjoy a pristinely empty screen that doesn't give me anxiety.
Finally β this was the toughest β I began closing all my browser tabs before bed. I try to have no more than five open tabs at any given time now, which are my email, Canva, Teachable, and one or two Google docs.
2. I stopped dreading video calls
"Atomic Habits" advises making new habits attractive and dividing them into small increments that over time build up to produce massive changes.
One habit I wanted to improve upon was being comfortable on Zoom, especially after two years of video fatigue. So to emulate what the book said, I started asking people I admire to join me on 20-minute long "coffee dates." I would sit down with creators, CEOs, authors, podcasters, astrologers, and coaches β most of whom I met on Instagram β and just talk about work and life.
When my timer went off, we'd wrap it up. That way, I could look forward to the next conversation.
These calls went on for about two months. Finally, I'd totally forgotten why I started them, and Zoom no longer intimidated or drained me. As James Clear says, small habits generate big changes, as long as you don't quit.
3. I created more time and comfort in my day
When I read Clear's suggestion to "audit" my day by writing out every little thing I did for 24 hours, I found it painstaking, which is how I could tell it was going to be worth it.
First, it made me realize that waking up at 7 a.m. was too late for my sleep chronotype. I was shocked to find out how much time I wasted on Netflix every evening β close to four hours β and how many consecutive hours I'd sit in a chair without getting up for a walk.
After this eye-opening audit, I began waking up at 5 a.m. and immediately felt in control versus "late to the party." The extra two hours per day allowed me to get a headstart on writing, and by the time 10 a.m. rolled around, I'd get up for an hour-long walk. I incorporated two more walks into my day β one around 3 p.m. and one at 8 p.m. when my Netflix binge would have been taking place.
Adding these extra walks to my day has been a game-changer for my lower back, which hurts a lot less than before. My eyes feel less fatigued as well, as I'm spending less time looking at a screen, especially late at night.
4. I made chores and dreaded tasks more manageable
Clear teaches his readers to do something called "temptation bundling." This means marrying two opposing actions: something you dread and something you love.
I hate folding laundry, so inspired by Clear's idea, I "bundled" that task with listening to my favorite YouTube playlist. Whenever I feel too lazy to work out or do my daily walk, I pair that exercise with listening to my favorite podcast. I have two picks: one on manifestation and spirituality, and one on marketing.
I now also save voice notes I get from my coaching clients to listen and reply to while I'm on my walk. That way, time flies and I get work done in the process. Plus, many of my clients love hearing the waves when I message them from the beach instead of the hollow echo of my home office.
5. I built a new habit with the 2-minute rule
I've always loved the idea of picking up new habits β but the reality is that it's hard. One of my goals last year was to get really good at recording Instagram Reels and posting every day, and "Atomic Habits" gave me a tangible strategy that helped me achieve this.
Clear suggests practicing the "two-minute rule" β setting your alarm for two minutes to test-drive a new habit, which is the only time you're allowed to practice that new habit for the day. So just as you start getting into it, time's up, and it leaves you craving more.
This is exactly what happened. I'd sit down to shoot a Reel in just two minutes. Before I knew it, time would be up. The tight limit helped me stop overthinking and just speak authentically and with passion, which really resonated with my friends and clients.
The two-minute rule is also extremely powerful if you're a procrastinator. Since you know it's only going to take 120 seconds, you just start. There's no room for second-guessing, and you don't need to prep too much, either. So before you know it, the habit becomes second nature.
Careers Entrepreneurship Atomic Habits | 2022-12-20T18:25:29Z | www.businessinsider.com | 'Atomic Habits' by James Clear: 5 Takeaways From an Entrepreneur | https://www.businessinsider.com/atomic-habits-book-james-clear-review-worth-reading-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/atomic-habits-book-james-clear-review-worth-reading-2022-12 |
Visa offers free credit repair for cardholders through Dovly Uplift
Why is credit monitoring important?
With identity theft on the rise and a growing number of errors appearing on consumer credit reports, credit monitoring is increasingly appealing.
Moon Safari/Getty
Visa has announced all cardholders now have free access to Dovly Uplift, a smart credit tool.
Dovly Uplift provides credit monitoring and monthly TransUnion credit reports and credit scores.
Cardholders who sign up for Dovly Uplift can upgrade to a paid service at a discounted rate.
With a potential recession next year threatening to tighten lending standards, building good credit and keeping it there is as important as ever. However, errors in your credit reports can hold you back, and they're surprisingly common. A Consumer Reports survey from 2021 found that 34% of Americans found errors on their credit report.
There are plenty of credit monitoring services on the market with varying prices and advantages, but if you're a Visa cardholder, you're already eligible for free credit monitoring and improvement services with Dovly.
Visa offers free credit services for cardholders through Dovly Uplift
On Tuesday, smart credit services company Dovly announced an agreement with Visa. The agreement will provide Visa cardholders with Uplift, a smart credit improve service created by Dovly for Visa cardholders, free of charge. Dovly has previously a partner with Visa under their Small Business Hub. Already soft launched, Visa customers with a consumer credit, consumer debit, or prepaid card can go to Dovly Uplift's site to check for eligibility.
Note: When signing up for Dovly, users should be prepared to provide their name, birthday, social security number, home address, email, and phone number. Users will be prompted to answer identity-confirming questions as if they were requesting a credit report.
Users of Dovly Uplift get a monthly TransUnion credit report and VantageScore credit score. Dovly Uplift also includes basic credit monitoring, notifying consumers when there are any changes to their credit report or if their credit score drops 10 points or more. These can be done through their browser site or app.
Cardholders also get access to Dovly's signature product β an algorithm that detects potential errors on their credit report and will dispute them on behalf of the consumer. Dovly will also track the progress of the dispute until you have an answer. "Let's say you're a victim of identity fraud, and you've selected 10 items," says CEO and co-founder Nirit Rubenstein. "Our algorithm will look at those 10 items and determine what to dispute, when to dispute, how to dispute, the cadence, the frequency, the pairing of the items. All of that is taken into account."
Dovly Uplift is geared specifically toward helping cardholders with lower credit scores improve their credit. "The Credit Karmas of the world, they're really focused on the upper echelon," Rubenstein says. "We really want to focus on people that don't have access." She says that customers who come to Dovly with low scores often see higher-than-average credit score increases; the average credit boost of a customer using Dovly Maximizer, its paid service, is 56 points according to their website.
Dovly's financial literacy knowledge center plays a large role in their goal, giving them access to credit-related financial advice. "We're constantly giving our members tips that are specific to their credit goal," Rubenstein says.
Cardholders who sign up for Dovly Uplift will have discounted access to Dovly's paid services which include credit monitoring and disputes with all three of the major credit bureaus, not just TransUnion. The current discount for the monthly Dovly Maximizer is 50% off ($39.99 to $19.99 per month), which gives consumers three disputes per month and $1 million in identity theft insurance.
In broad strokes, credit monitoring describes the process of checking your credit reports consistently to see if there are any errors or inaccuracies on your credit reports. These could be as simple as a typo in your name or address or something more sinister, like a line of credit that you didn't open, which can be a sign of identity theft. Left undisputed, identity theft can hurt your credit score and cost you thousands of dollars.
While consumers can currently see their credit reports every week through the end of 2023, when that period ends, the Fair Credit Reporting Act only affords consumers three credit reports each year. While you can space these out every four months for light credit monitoring, it's a good idea to employ some other form of credit monitoring service in the spaces between reports.
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Personal Finance Insider Credit credit repair | 2022-12-20T18:25:59Z | www.businessinsider.com | Visa Cardholders Now Get Dovly Free Credit Repair and Monitoring | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/visa-free-credit-repair-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/visa-free-credit-repair-2022-12 |
By Lydia Logan, VP of Global Education and Workforce Development, IBM
The benefits of experiential learning have been touted for years. We know that immersive, active learning helps students apply and retain knowledge at remarkable rates. And while we see cutting-edge technologies cropping up each day in business and entertainment, there can be a lag when it comes to the classroom.
Why is this a problem? The disconnect between technologies used for life and learning contributes to the skills shortage. In software-related fields alone, there are more than 1.2 million US job vacancies. American cybersecurity jobs suffer from more than 700,000 vacancies.
As we face a historic skills shortage across industries and particularly in STEM, I'm inspired by programs that offer a fresh approach to skilling our future colleagues and leaders. Experiential programs like hackathons and accessible technologies like virtual reality are creating more opportunities to deliver richer learning to more students. This is key for many STEM professions like cybersecurity analysts, which require problem-solving and collaboration.
For "Capture the Flag" experiences, IBM volunteers provide encouragement and instruction in real time. Darryl Terrell, a computer science major at Xavier University of Louisiana, recently participated in a "Capture the Flag" cybersecurity training exercise, using IBM Security Software to log, track, and analyze his findings.
While these exercises are for advanced students, other courses offered by cybersecurity training centers appeal to students from other majors, potentially sparking interest in STEM careers. For instance, Dr. Robert Owor, executive director of Albany State University's Center for Innovation and Emerging Technologies, is using IBM's curricula from his school's cybersecurity training center to expose non-computer-science majors to cybersecurity.
We're seeing more and more examples of how new technologies are cultivating the next generation of STEM leaders. From early pilots of virtual reality teaching, to innovation challenges, students are benefitting from access to cutting-edge technologies and multi-disciplinary collaboration.
Throughout 2022, we expanded our work at IBM SkillsBuild with an emphasis on partnerships between academia and employers across the public and private sectors. Through our work with the Specialisterne Foundation, the US Department of Veterans Affairs, and the Hispanic Heritage Foundation, among many others, we are reaching more learners than ever before. In 2023, we're excited to explore new experiential learning technologies and help tackle the skills shortage.
Sponsor Post Studios Tech Tech | 2022-12-20T18:26:11Z | www.businessinsider.com | New Teaching Technologies Help Train Tomorrow's Top Talent | https://www.businessinsider.com/sc/new-teaching-technologies-help-train-tomorrows-top-talent | https://www.businessinsider.com/sc/new-teaching-technologies-help-train-tomorrows-top-talent |
McDonald's CEO Chris Kempczinski.
Michael Peaster, a Black McDonald's security executive, is suing the chain and its CEO.
Peaster, a 35-year company veteran, was fired for performing his job poorly, McDonald's said.
Peaster said he was ousted for criticizing a controversial 2021 text by CEO Chris Kempczinski.
As McDonald's vice president of global safety, security, and intelligence, Michael Peaster was responsible for overseeing the personal security of CEO Chris Kempczinski.
Yet according to a racial-discrimination lawsuit that Peaster filed this month, the CEO ignored the 35-year McDonald's veteran for the better part of a year.
McDonald's said it fired Peaster last month for performing his job poorly. But in the lawsuit, the Black executive said he was let go as part of a monthslong effort to oust him after he criticized Kempczinski in a 2021 town-hall meeting. The meeting was held to discuss Kempczinski's controversial 2021 text, in which he blamed the parents of two children who were fatally shot. He was widely criticized for the text message.
The CEO sent the text to Chicago's mayor, Lori Lightfoot, shortly after the shooting of 7-year-old Jaslyn Adams at a Chicago-area McDonald's in April 2021. The CEO wrote: "p.s. tragic shootings in last week, both at our restaurant yesterday and with Adam Toldeo. With both, the parents failed those kids which I know is something you can't say. Even harder to fix."
When the media uncovered the texts about six months later, a backlash against the CEO erupted as critics called his text ignorant and racist. The CEO responded that his text "lacked the empathy and compassion I feel for these families."
Peaster said Kempczinski held a town-hall meeting to discuss the texts after they were published. During the meeting, Peaster challenged Kempczinski. He said he believed the CEO was in "denial as to why many people believed his texts were racist and were offended," according to the suit.
The lawsuit said these were Peaster's words or the substance of his words: "Think about the kids who are in their homes and playing on playgrounds who are killed by stray bullets. We cannot broad brush the violence issues in Chicago to make it appear that all parents who have children who are victims to gun violence are bad parents. We have to have empathy and compassion for the majority of families who live in tough communities that work hard to provide for their family and keep them safe."
Peaster's comments drew applause, according to the suit.
The lawsuit said Peaster was not immediately retaliated against or punished for his comments. But he felt discriminated against and ostracized in the year leading up to his dismissal, effective December 31, according to the suit. The suit described a year in which Kempczinski overtly treated Peaster like an "invisible officer."
In 2022, Kempczinski refused to meet with Peaster to discuss his security needs and banned him from flying with him on the company's private jet during a business trip to Mexico City and SΓ£o Paulo, the suit said. During the trip, Peaster "was relegated to fly commercial" and was later criticized for making the CEO feel "unsafe in these cities."
"This termination was discriminatory against Michael Peaster because of his race," the suit said. "It was retaliatory against Michael Peaster based on his respectful but legitimate contradiction of Kempczinski on the subject of race."
McDonald's said Peaster's timeline runs "counter to the facts in this case." The company said Peaster was a "senior director" when he made those town-hall comments and was promoted to vice president two months later in January 2022.
"The claims run completely afoul of the facts and the values our leadership team and company uphold," the company said in a statement. "Mr. Peaster was promoted in January 2022; however, he was subsequently terminated due to serious performance issues in his expanded role. To suggest that his termination was based on retaliation or anything other than performance lapses is to completely ignore the facts. We intend to vigorously defend against this lawsuit and to continue to lead with our values."
A representative for Peaster told Insider via email: "Michael Peaster had the same job since 2010. In 2022 he was restored to officer-level position, which had been in the works before the town hall."
This isn't the first time McDonald's, under Kempczinski, has been accused of racial discrimination.
In January 2020, two Black McDonald's executives, Vicki Guster-Hines and Domineca Neal, filed a discrimination lawsuit against McDonald's. The suit said that the company, under former CEO Steve Easterbrook and later Kempczinski, cost them millions of dollars combined in lost pay and benefits, in addition to suffering "emotional distress, humiliation and related physical suffering." The suit is in the discovery stage, according to a representative from Carmen D. Caruso Law Firm, which is representing the plaintiffs, as well as Peaster. McDonald's said in 2020 that it disagreed with characterizations in the complaint.
In August 2020, 52 Black ex-franchisees filed a $1 billion racial-discrimination lawsuit against McDonald's. The operators accused the burger chain of misleading them about the economic opportunities of owning restaurants and purposely placing them in stores in "crime-ridden" neighborhoods with underperforming sales, according to the suit.
McDonald's disputed the claims in the suit, which is ongoing.
"Not only do we categorically deny the allegations that these franchisees were unable to succeed because of any form of discrimination by McDonald's, we are confident that the facts will show how committed we are to the diversity and equal opportunity of the McDonald's System, including across our franchisees, suppliers and employees," the company said in 2020 in response to the suit.
Fast Food lawsuit McDonald's | 2022-12-20T18:47:08Z | www.businessinsider.com | McDonald's Exec Files Racial-Discrimination Suit After Being Fired | https://www.businessinsider.com/mcdonalds-exec-files-racial-discrimination-suit-after-being-fired-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/mcdonalds-exec-files-racial-discrimination-suit-after-being-fired-2022-12 |
Auto execs are concerned about market dynamics and supply chain snafus standing in the way of EV adoption, a survey found.
Auto execs are nervous about transitioning to EVs, consulting firm KPMG found in a new survey.
That's amid supply chain crises and inflation problems.
Auto executive confidence in high EV sales in the US by 2030 dropped from last year.
Auto executives aren't as confident in electric car adoption as they once were β but they're largely blaming their concerns on all sorts of market dynamics and supply chain snafus, rather than consumers.
In a survey of more than 900 auto industry execs, KPMG found that respondents think only 37% of new vehicle sales in the US will be electric by 2030.
That's a dramatic drop from this time in 2021, when surveyed executives expected 62% of car sales in the US would be EVs by 2030.
The Biden administration has said that it's targeting EVs to make up half of all vehicles sold in the US by that year.
Since KPMG's last survey's optimistic results, the industry has grappled with a variety of roadblocks. Requirements set forth in this summer's climate bill make it harder to qualify for EV incentives. Battery prices have risen and electric vehicle prices continue to climb, hitting an average cost of $65,041 in November, according to Kelley Blue Book.
For comparison, a new gas-powered car cost about $48,681 that same month.
KPMG said the results of its 23rd annual executive survey indicate that EV expectations are becoming more realistic, which could be driven by production issues and affordability challenges.
One industry-wide point of optimism centers on pricing. Some 82% of execs surveyed believe that in the next decade, EVs can be adopted widely without subsidies, indicating costs could go down.
The survey results come two days after Toyota's CEO came under fire for comments that indicate he's not all that sold on EVs just yet. "That silent majority is wondering whether EVs are really OK to have as a single option," Akia Toyoda said according to The Wall Street Journal. "But they think it's the trend so they can't speak out loudly."
The KPMG survey also reported that 76% of respondents said inflation and high-interest rates will impact their business in 2023. The industry is seeing some of that manifest through end-of-year consumer's car-buying trends.
The industry has already committed $526 billion into electrification through 2026, according to firm AlixPartners. KPMG found the industry is generally feeling good about that spending and more, with 83% of auto executives confident the business will see profitable growth in the next five years β that's substantially up from 53% last year.
Transportation Automakers Electric Vehicles | 2022-12-20T19:56:43Z | www.businessinsider.com | Auto Execs Are Losing Faith in Electric Cars, Study Finds | https://www.businessinsider.com/auto-executives-electric-vehicle-transition-not-sure-consumer-adoption-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/auto-executives-electric-vehicle-transition-not-sure-consumer-adoption-2022-12 |
Every year, my family and I shop for people in need. We've found families though local homeless shelters, the school system, and visiting nurses' associations. Once we have their wishlist in hand, I head out with my own kids to teach them a hands-on lesson about giving to others.
Gift Cards Charitable Giving Personal Finance Insider | 2022-12-20T19:57:19Z | www.businessinsider.com | Why Gift Cards Are Part of My Charitable Giving Strategy | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/gift-cards-charitable-giving-strategy-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/gift-cards-charitable-giving-strategy-2022-12 |
Home Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options. Military & Defense Contributors
Natalie Armbruster, Defense Priorities
As long as China remains reliant on external sources of oil and Saudi Arabia is looking to make a profit, it is only natural for Saudi Arabia and China to expand their economic cooperation β bilateral trade which currently amounts to $87.3 billion.
This remains true for China's heavy investment in the Middle East through the Belt and Road Initiative. China's BRI investments have focused largely on the construction of ports and industrial parks in countries such as Egypt, Oman, Saudi Arabia, or the United Arab Emirates.
NOW WATCH: Here's why China won't use its leverage to make North Korea give up its nuclear weapons
Defense Priorities News Contributor China | 2022-12-20T19:57:37Z | www.businessinsider.com | US Shouldn't Overrate Saudi-Chinese Cooperation Threat in Middle East | https://www.businessinsider.com/us-shouldnt-overrate-saudi-chinese-cooperation-threat-in-middle-east-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/us-shouldnt-overrate-saudi-chinese-cooperation-threat-in-middle-east-2022-12 |
How to change your Wi-Fi password and name to improve the security of your internet network
By Jennifer Still
Change your Wi-Fi password when you buy a new router to help keep it secure.
You can change your Wi-Fi password and access in your router's configuration page in an internet browser.
When you buy a new router, you should change its password and name to keep it secure.
If you forgot your Wi-Fi password, you can connect to the router with an ethernet cable or reset it.
A Wi-Fi network allows you to connect your devices to the internet without the need for bulky ethernet cables. However, to keep your internet secure, you'll need a Wi-Fi password.
Without a password, anyone can connect to your Wi-Fi network. This means that strangers can hog the network, reducing your internet speed. In the worst-case scenario, they can even exploit your devices to install malware and steal sensitive information.
To prevent this, you should change your Wi-Fi router's default password.
Doing this is simpler than it seems, although it'll require you to log into your router's configuration page. While you're at it, you can even change your Wi-Fi name as well.
How to find your router's IP address
Before you can change a router's password or name, you need to know its IP address. This is what you'll enter in your internet browser (Google Chrome, Firefox, or Microsoft Edge) to access the configuration page.
The default IP address for most routers is usually 192.168.1.1 or 192.168.0.1. If these IP addresses don't work, check the bottom, back or side of the device or its user manual for an IP address or access URL.
If the IP address written on your router doesn't work, it could mean that the manufacturer or internet service provider has changed it recently. Luckily, you can easily find a router's IP address using your computer or phone.
Quick tip: If all else fails, check the manufacturer's website or contact them to ask what the IP address of your router is.
Once you have your router's IP address, you're ready to change your Wi-Fi password.
1. Open an internet browser on your Mac or PC, type in your router's IP address, and hit the Enter key.
Enter the router's IP address in your internet browser.
2. Log into your router using its username and password. The default username and password are often admin or userAdmin. If they don't work, check your device, as they can be written on its back, side, or bottom. You can also contact the router's manufacturer or your internet service provider to find out what they are.
Log in to your router's configuration page.
3. Locate the Wireless, Wireless Security, WLAN, or Wi-Fi Settings option. It'll likely be listed in the top or left side menu of the page.
Look for the "Wireless," "Wireless Security," "WLAN," or "Wi-Fi Setting" option.
4. In the Wi-Fi Password or Key text box, enter a strong password you want your connection to have.
Enter the new password in the "Wi-Fi Password" textbox.
5. Click Save or Apply to save the changes. The Wi-Fi password will immediately change.
If you find yourself lost, contact your router's manufacturer. If you received your router from your internet service provider, such as Spectrum or Xfinity, you could also try contacting them.
Note: Once you've changed the password, the router may disconnect previously connected devices, so you might need to reconnect them.
How to change your router's name
Your router's default name or, to use the more technical term, Service Set Identifier (SSID) will be something generic, but you can change it to something easily identifiable and more meaningful, like Smith's Home Wi-Fi.
Furthermore, changing the name might warn any cybercriminals that you care enough to name your Wi-Fi connection, which can make them think twice about hacking it.
Usually, the option to change the router's name is on the same configuration page where you edit its password. Here's how you can find it:
1. Open the internet browser on your Mac or PC, type in your router's IP address, and hit the Enter key.
2. Long into your router using its username and password.
4. In the Wi-Fi Name or SSID Name text box, enter the name you want your connection to have.
Enter a new name (SSID) for the Wi-Fi network.
5. Click Save or Apply to save the changes. You'll then see the Wi-Fi name you entered appear in the list available networks on your computer or phone.
Note: Changing the Wi-Fi name of your router will sign out any devices connected to the wireless network, and you'll need to sign them in again.
What if I forgot my password?
If you can't remember your Wi-Fi password, you can bypass the password requirement by connecting to the router using an ethernet cable. Then, follow the steps mentioned above to reset your Wi-Fi password.
If you don't have an ethernet cable, you can reset the router. Doing this will return it to its factory default settings, meaning the current Wi-Fi password will be erased, along with the router's password.
But don't worry. You'll have all the information you need to access the configuration page. Here's how you can reset your router:
1. Press the Reset button on your router. It will be inside a pin-sized hole usually located at the back of the router with the words Reset next to it. To reach inside and press the button, use a pin, paper clip or any long and narrow object that can fit through the hole.
Press the "Reset" button, which will be in a pin-sized hole on the router.
2. Connect to the router's Wi-Fi network (it won't have a password at this point) and enter the IP address to the configuration page in the browser.
3. Enter the default username and password for your router. The manufacturer will place this information somewhere on the back, or underneath the device. If you can't find it, contact the manufacturer.
You can find the username and password for the router at the back.
4. Proceed to change your Wi-Fi password.
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Wi-Fi Tech How To Reference Library | 2022-12-20T20:31:54Z | www.businessinsider.com | How to Change Your Router's Wi-Fi Password & Name | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/how-to-change-wifi-password | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/how-to-change-wifi-password |
9 ways to fix Snapchat if it's not working
You can troubleshoot Snapchat in several ways.
If Snapchat is not working properly, there are a number of possible causes.
The most common fix is to restart the app, or if that doesn't work, restart your phone.
Clearing the app's cache or deleting conversations may also help fix the issue.
Whether you use Snapchat to share ephemeral pictures and messages that expire after a short time or rely on it for video chats, it can be frustrating when the service is offline or doesn't appear to be working.
If you encounter a problem with Snapchat, there are a number of ways you can try to get it up and running again.
What to do if Snapchat is not working
When Snapchat stops working, there are generally a handful of possible causes. The best approach is usually to troubleshoot the issue by trying the most likely fixes, one at a time, starting with the ones that are easiest or fastest to test.
Log out of your account
One potential quick fix is to log out of your account and then log back in to see if the app has sorted itself out. You'll just need to make sure that you have your Snapchat password on hand so you don't get locked out, or have to request a new password.
Log out of your account.
Check your Snapchat permissions
Is Snapchat mostly working, but there are certain things you can't do in the app? For example, suppose you can't take a photo or you can't use filters. This sounds like a permissions issue, in the sense that you haven't granted the app the right permissions to use all of your phone's features. Open the permissions settings and make sure you turn them all on.
If you have an iPhone, do this:
2. Scroll down to the list of apps and tap Snapchat.
Tap Snapchat.
3. Turn on each permission with the button swiped to the right β important permissions to check include Location, Photos, Camera, Cellular Data, and Microphone.
Turn on the desired permissions.
If you have an Android:
1. Start the Settings app and tap Apps & notifications.
2. Find Snapchat in the app list β you might need to tap See all apps.
3. Tap Permissions.
4. Check each permission and turn them on.
Quick tip: If you use a VPN on your phone, that may also be causing an issue. So it's worth disabling that (at least temporarily) to see if Snapchat works without it.
Restart Snapchat (or your phone)
If you're experiencing a software glitch, often the fastest way to resolve it is to simply "reboot" the app. In other words, close Snapchat and then restart it. If you need a refresher about how to do that, here is how to close an app on Android and close an app on iOS.
If that doesn't solve your problem, try to restart the phone (here's how to restart an iPhone). Often, rebooting your entire phone can solve a problem with an app like Snapchat.
Quick tip: If you aren't able to close or restart the app on your Android device, you may have to do a forced stop instead. Then relaunch the app to see if it's working again.
Check to see if Snapchat is down
Snapchat is a very reliable service. In general, if you are having a problem accessing the service, you can assume the issue is probably with your phone, not Snapchat. But no service can be "up" 100% of the time, so it's worth checking to see if Snapchat's network is experiencing an outage. You can easily check Snapchat's network status page at DownDetector β or search for "Is Snapchat down?" in a Google search.
Check DownDetectorβs Snapchat network status page.
Quick tip: You may also find more up-to-date information from Twitter users by searching for "Snapchat outage" or "Snapchat down."
Make sure you have an internet connection
This might sound obvious, but make sure you have a good connection to the internet. Make sure you have a WiFi connection, or at least have a solid cellular signal. If you're using cellular data to use Snapchat, make sure you turned on the cellular data permission β see the first section in this article.
Check your internet connection.
If it seems that you might have a connection issue with WiFi, reboot your router and cable modem (turn them both off for at least two minutes, then turn them on again. If it's still not working, there might be a local service outage, so you may want to contact your internet service provider to see if there's a problem.
See if there's an update available
If you haven't updated your apps recently, you might be running an older version of Snapchat that has a bug or incompatibility with your phone's operating system or software. It's a good idea to leave automatic updates turned on in your phone's Settings app, but if you need to update Snapchat, you can turn on automatic updates on your iPhone or update apps on your Android phone.
Check for updates on your phone.
Clear your cache
If you are still having problems getting Snapchat to work properly, you might have a problem with corrupted data in Snapchat's app data cache. That's fine β you can clear the cache.
If you are using an Android phone, the steps to clear the cache might vary slightly depending on which version of Android you are running, but here's the general process:
3. Go to the list of apps, tap See all apps if necessary, and tap Snapchat.
If you're using an iPhone, you'd need to go into the Snapchat app's settings, then scroll down to Account Actions and then tap Clear Conversations. Another way to get this done is to uninstall the app and then reinstall it from the App Store.
Delete conversations to fix your Snaps
If you restarted the app and even cleared the cache or reinstalled Snapchat and it's still not working properly β in particular you can't send Snaps to one or more people β you might have run into a fairly uncommon problem with cache of conversations. The solution? Delete the conversations associated with the problematic friend, and try again. The downside to deleting conversations is that you'll lose those messages, including any unopened Snaps.
1. In Snapchat, tap your account avatar at the top left of the screen.
2. Tap the Settings icon (shaped like a gear) at the top right.
3. Scroll down to Account Actions and then tap Clear Conversations.
Tap Clear Conversations.
4. In the list of friends, tap the X to the right of the conversation you want to remove.
Tap the X to delete the corresponding conversation.
Quick tip: If you find that your Android keeps opening Snapchat links in a browser, rather than the app, you can fix that. Go into the app info section of your settings, then choose Snapchat. Then tap Set as default, followed by Open supported links.
Check the Snapchat support site
The Snapchat support site may also offer guidance on your specific issue. For example, they can provide context whether you're having trouble logging into your account, your network is blocked, or if you forgot which phone number is associated with your account.
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Snapchat Tech How To Reference Library | 2022-12-20T20:32:07Z | www.businessinsider.com | Snapchat Not Working? 9 Ways to Fix It | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/snapchat-not-working | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/snapchat-not-working |
What 'pinned' means on TikTok, and how to pin a video to your profile
A "pinned" TikTok appears at the top of a user's profile page.
TikTok allows creators to pin up to three featured videos to the top of the video feed on their profile page.
To pin a video, simply tap the three-dot menu on the video and choose Pin.
Creators use pinned videos to draw attention to special videos they want people to see.
TikTok has become the undisputed social media video hosting destination to watch and share short-form video, and so from the arts to comedy to science and politics, there's a lot of content vying for everyone's attention.
To help users find and watch the best content, TikTok creators often pin certain videos to the top of their feed. These videos might be the creator's best work, clips that explain the mission or philosophy of the channel, or represent a recent event that the creator wants to share with followers.
Here what it means to pin a video on TikTok and how to do it.
What it means to pin a video on TikTok
A "pinned" video on TikTok is more or less what it sounds like β a creator can pin a video to the top of the feed on their profile page, where it's easy to find.
If someone goes to the creator's page and looks at their video feed, they'll see pinned videos first and foremost at the top, followed by their other videos, listed in reverse chronological order (sorted from the newest to the oldest). This allows the creator to draw people's attention to certain videos, since they're always at the top of the profile page.
TikTok allows you to pin up to three videos to your page, and they are easily identifiable because each pinned video has the word "pinned" on it, set against a red background. If you've pinned three videos, to pin another video, one of the pinned videos must be unpinned to make room.
You can pin up to three TikToks to the top of your profile.
TikTok; Insider
How to pin a video on TikTok
2. On the Videos page, tap a video you want to pin.
3. At the bottom right, tap the three-dot menu.
4. In the pop-up window, tap Pin.
When you tap the three-dot menu for a video in TikTok, you'll see options that include pinning it to the top of the video feed on your profile page.
You should see a message appear briefly at the top of the screen indicating the video is pinned to the top of your profile, and if you tap the Back arrow, you'll see the video now has a label marked Pinned.
To unpin a pinned video, simply repeat the above steps for said video, and tap Unpin.
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TikTok Pinned Social Media | 2022-12-20T20:32:13Z | www.businessinsider.com | What 'Pinned' Means on TikTok, and How to Pin a Video | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/what-does-pinned-mean-on-tiktok | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/what-does-pinned-mean-on-tiktok |
College graduation.
Rattanakun Thonbun/EyeEm
The new government spending bill did not increase funding for the Federal Student Aid office.
But it did include language on holding student-loan companies accountable for misleading borrowers.
Biden's administration has previously expressed the need to strengthen enforcement over those companies.
The new government spending bill wants to ensure student-loan companies don't get away with bad behavior.
On Monday, the House appropriations committee released the text of its $1.7 trillion government spending bill for the upcoming fiscal year. The bipartisan package rejected President Joe Biden's request to increase funding for the Federal Student Aid (FSA) office to allow it to overhaul the federal student-loan servicing system.
Instead, the over 4,000 pages of text, which covered everything from social media censorship to healthcare, kept federal student aid steady at $2 billion. And, the bill does includes some provisions to protect student-loan borrowers.
It said that new borrowers' accounts will be allocated to servicers "on the basis of their past performance," and that the Education Department will "re-allocate accounts from servicers for recurring non-compliance with FSA guidelines, contractual requirements, and applicable laws, including for failure to sufficiently inform borrowers of available repayment options."
The bill also said that Federal Student Aid will "incentivize more support to borrowers at risk of delinquency or default," along with increasing transparency by publishing data on the performance of student-loan companies.
In February, FSA Director Richard Cordray unveiled a plan to revamp the student-loan repayment system for borrowers by creating a Unified Servicing and Data Solution (USDS), which he said will hold all servicers accountable for "high level of performance" and work to reduce delinquency and default. But given the lack of increased funding in the spending bill, its likely the implementation of that system will be delayed.
Borrowers have reported a number of issues with student-loan companies over the past year. For example, MOHELA β which manages all accounts under the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program β has been criticized for its role in a lawsuit that blocked student-loan forgiveness (the company denied any explicit involvement in the case). Some borrowers have also reported hours-long wait times with the company to just get a simple question on repayment answered.
Still, Cordray has previously expressed the importance of holding loan companies accountable for misleading borrowers. After three companies announced they would be ending their federal servicing contracts last year, he said that "some servicers have decided to exit the program rather than contend with these new realities" of strengthened accountability.
"We will work closely in partnership with our servicers to make sure we deliver quality service to everyone who faces the prospect of repaying their student loans," he said.
This package also comes as the fate of Biden's broad student-loan forgiveness plan remains highly uncertain. After announcing up to $20,000 in debt relief for federal borrowers at the end of August, a number of conservative-backed lawsuits arose seeking to block the plan. So far, two lawsuits have placed the plan on pause, and the Supreme Court will be hearing arguments to the cases on February 28.
But if the highest court ultimately rules Biden's student-debt relief plan is legal, a summary of the government spending package clarified that it provides "no new funding for the implementation of the Biden Administration's student loan forgiveness plan." | 2022-12-20T20:32:37Z | www.businessinsider.com | New Government Spending Bill Has Funds to Police Student-Loan Companies | https://www.businessinsider.com/new-government-spending-bill-student-loan-companies-borrower-protections-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/new-government-spending-bill-student-loan-companies-borrower-protections-2022-12 |
Representative-elect George Santos
A recent New York Times report details how Representative-elect George Santos misrepresented his past.
But voters have already elected Santos as the next representative for New York's 3rd Congressional District.
The avenues the GOP can take to address Santos are few and unlikely.
A charity with no IRS records to be found.
Lies about where he attended higher education.
An employment history that doesn't add up.
The tale spun on the campaign trail by Representative-elect George Santos of New York's 3rd Congressional District about his life appears to be nearly entirely made up, according to a recent New York Times report.
Santos' attorney, Joseph Murray, responded to the New York Times' allegations by attacking the publication and using a misattributed Winston Churchill quote. Murray did not, however, deny any specific parts of the report.
With just weeks remaining until the next session of Congress begins and Santos is sworn in, there's little the GOP can do about the situation.
Members of the party could publicly denounce Santos, but a denouncement from current House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, a hopeful to take over as House Speaker, is unlikely: Santos has already espoused his support for McCarthy as Speaker of the House, and McCarthy needs all the votes he can get for the role.
Walt Shaub, the senior ethics fellow at the Project on Government Oversight, told Insider that it's unlikely the GOP will be able to actually remove Santos from office. He said there are two separate procedures for removal: exclusion and expulsion.
An exclusion would mean that the House would refuse to seat a representative-elect for not meeting the "qualifications to be a member of Congress or because the election itself was invalid."
Neither of those scenarios appear to apply to Santos.
Expulsion is when the House or Senate explicitly removes a member from the chamber for character issues, misconduct, or general fitness to serve. This can only happen via a two-thirds vote.
Santos' expulsion is unlikely, Shaub said, because "if we banned members of Congress for lying, other sitting members would have to worry about their jobs right now."
Schaub also noted that Republicans in Congress could deny Santos committee assignments, an action that could affect Santos' future reelection chances.
Debra Perlin, the policy director at the legal watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, said Santos "should not be permitted" to be seated in a committee related to national security or one that receives any intelligence and suggested he wouldn't even be able to pass the standards to receive a security clearance in the first place.
"When an individual applies for a security clearance the background investigation includes record checks to verify citizenship, employment, residency, and education among others," Perlin said. "According to the New York Times story, none of those were verifiable. If in the regular course of events Rep.-elect Santos would not be given a security clearance, it is mind-boggling to think that our security infrastructure might nonetheless give him access to our nation's most guarded secrets simply because he was elected to Congress."
Geroge Devolder-Santos George Santos politics enterprise | 2022-12-20T21:28:09Z | www.businessinsider.com | There's Little the GOP Can Do to Address Incoming GOP Rep. George Santos' Apparent Lies | https://www.businessinsider.com/george-santos-apparent-lies-republicans-kevin-mccarthy-response-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/george-santos-apparent-lies-republicans-kevin-mccarthy-response-2022-12 |
Ameris Bank mortgage interest rates and fees
How Ameris Bank mortgages work
Is Ameris Bank trustworthy?
Ameris Bank mortgage FAQ
The bottom line: Ameris Bank is an extremely affordable and flexible mortgage lender, and a particularly good choice for first-time homebuyers. It has options for borrowers with no credit score, those with unique situations, and more. It also offers a down payment assistance grant. But it doesn't lend in every state.
Ameris Bank Mortgages
Conforming, FHA, VA, USDA, jumbo, Ameris Dream, construction, rehabilitation, recent housing event, physician, bank statement, HELOC
On Ameris Bank's website
Offers many different mortgage types
Flexible credit requirements
First-time homebuyer grant up to $12,500
Low down payment jumbo loans
Not available in Alaska, Hawaii, Maine, or New York
Only has branches in a handful of states
Doesn't display rates online
Lender fee includes a mortgage administrative fee, which is around $1,025
Available in 46 states and Washington, DC
Has branches in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia
Jumbo loan amounts up to $3 million
Affordability 5
Offers a wide variety of mortgages
Accepts non-traditional credit from borrowers with no or limited credit
The Ameris Down Payment Grant program offers up to $12,500 for eligible first-time homebuyers
The Ameris Edge jumbo loan allows down payments as low as 5%
Doesn't lend in Alaska, Hawaii, Maine, or New York
Only has physical branches in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia
Lacks rate transparency
Ameris Bank doesn't display any sample mortgage rates online. If you want to get a rate quote, you'll need to reach out to an Ameris loan officer near you.
Ameris Bank charges a mortgage administrative fee that's approximately $1,025. You'll pay this in addition to any third-party closing costs you incur during the process of getting your mortgage.
Ameris Bank vs. Guild Mortgage
Conforming, jumbo, FHA, USDA, VA, reverse, renovation, manufactured, bridge, energy-efficient, doctor, 3-2-1 Home Plus, Payment Advantage, ITIN mortgages
Ameris Dream mortgage
Complete Rate program
Both of these lenders offer a remarkably wide range of mortgage products. If you have an unusual situation or are looking for a specific type of loan, the right fit may come down to which offers the mortgage you're looking for.
Guild Mortgage is similar to Ameris Bank in that it also accepts non-traditional credit (like proof on-time rent or utility payments) from borrowers who have no traditional credit score through its Complete Rate program. Because of this benefit and its convenient online process, Guild is our top lender for first-time homebuyers.
However, if you're struggling with your down payment, Ameris might be the better fit, thanks to the down payment grant it offers and its Ameris Dream mortgage, which allows 0% down with no mortgage insurance for eligible first-time homebuyers.
Ameris Bank vs. Bank of America mortgages
Conforming, jumbo, FHA, VA, Community Affordable Loan Solution, HELOC
Bank of America and Ameris Bank both have similar offerings for cash-strapped first-time buyers. Bank of America offers down payment assistance up to $10,000 and closing cost assistance up to $7,500.
For borrowers who are having trouble qualifying through traditional means due to having a limited credit history or insufficient savings, Bank of America could be a good choice. Its Community Affordable Loan Solution requires no down payment and no closing costs, and you can use non-traditional credit to qualify.
Both of these lenders are affordable choices for first-time homebuyers, so it could be worth getting preapproved with both. But Ameris could be the better choice overall if you're looking for a wider range of loan options to choose from.
To get a mortgage with Ameris Bank, you'll need to search on the lender's website for a loan officer near you. Then, you can get started over the phone or online. If you prefer to apply in person, you can visit one of the bank's physical branches in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, or Virginia.
Ameris Bank lends mortgages in 46 states and Washington, DC. It isn't available to borrowers in Alaska, Hawaii, Maine, or New York.
Ameris Bank offers basic mortgage types, including conforming, FHA, VA, USDA, and jumbo mortgages, as well as more niche products. It has both construction and construction-to-permanent loans, rehabilitation loans, and medical professional mortgages.
Its Bank Statement Advantage program is a good option for self-employed borrowers who need to use bank statements to show their income. It also offers a Recent Housing Event mortgage for borrowers who have experienced a "housing event" (this could include a foreclosure or short sale) due to financial hardship.
The Ameris Dream mortgage is for first-time homebuyers who meet income and location requirements. It allows up to 100% financing with no mortgage insurance. Ameris Bank also offers a down payment grant of up to $12,500. The grant is a second mortgage that will be fully forgiven as long as you stay in your home for at least five years.
This lender also offers home equity lines of credit (HELOCs).
Ameris Bank lets borrowers with no or limited credit apply with non-traditional credit on some of its loans. The lender may look at your rent payment history or evaluate your cash flow using bank statement data to establish your creditworthiness in lieu of a traditional credit score.
Ameris Bank currently has a C rating from the Better Business Bureau due to having two complaints filed against the business and a failure to respond to one complaint. The BBB measures trustworthiness based on response to customer complaints, honesty in advertising, and transparency about business practices.
Ameris Bank has no recent public scandals.
On its Zillow lender page, Ameris has a 4.95 out of 5-star rating, based on 854 online customer reviews.
Is Ameris Bank a good lender? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
Ameris Bank is a strong and affordable lender, particularly for first-time homebuyers. But whether it's a good fit for you depends on your needs, your financial situation, and what kind of rate you can get. It's a good idea to shop around with multiple lenders to see which one suits your needs and is the most affordable.
Who is Ameris Bank owned by? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
Ameris Bank is a subsidiary of Ameris Bancorp. Its current CEO is Palmer Proctor.
Does Ameris Bank have fees? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
On its mortgages, Ameris Bank charges an administrative fee. This fee is approximately $1,025.
Ameris Bank Ameris Bank mortgages Mortgages | 2022-12-20T21:28:21Z | www.businessinsider.com | Ameris Bank Mortgage Review | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/ameris-bank-mortgage-review | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/ameris-bank-mortgage-review |
Once again, the US won't fulfill its promises on climate aid for developing countries. The White House had hoped to quadruple spending.
A man transports belongings salvaged from his flood-hit home in Pakistan's Sindh province in late August 2022. Pakistan is one of the most vulnerable countries to climate risks but has done little to cause the crisis.
AP Photo/Fareed Khan
Congress' sweeping spending bill for next year includes $1 billion for international climate aid.
The amount falls short of President Joe Biden's promise to quadruple climate aid to $11 billion.
Many poorer countries are facing costs for a crisis they did little to cause.
Congress just dealt a blow to President Joe Biden's pledge to quadruple climate financing for poorer nations to $11 billion a year.
Lawmakers on Tuesday released a more than 4,000-page government funding bill for the coming fiscal year that would spend just over $1 billion on international climate finance, according to an analysis that the Natural Resources Defense Council shared with Insider. The amount is only a 0.09% increase over fiscal 2022, the environmental group said.
Congress is expected to pass the bill this week.
The White House hoped Congress would appropriate $5.3 billion for climate assistance. The remainder needed to hit the $11 billion target would have come from various federal agencies that have discretion over their spending.
The budget package arrived a month after world leaders at a United Nations' climate summit in Egypt promised to boost funding for developing countries on the frontlines of a climate crisis they didn't cause. Wealthy countries like the US and those in Europe account for 80% of greenhouse gas emissions after more than a century of burning fossil fuels to industrialize their economies.
"This really undermines trust in the US," Joe Thwaites, NRDC's international climate finance advocate who conducted the group's analysis, told Insider. "It's disappointing because the US was just starting to show up. The Inflation Reduction Act provides a pathway to deliver emissions-reductions pledges. But the US commitments on international climate finance just aren't credible."
In August, President Biden signed into law the Inflation Reduction Act, which includes nearly $370 billion in new climate spending and tax breaks for clean energy, electric vehicles, and homes along with other green initiatives.
Thwaites noted that prior federal spending proposals by House and Senate Democrats included about $3 billion for climate finance, but those amounts were likely shot down by Republicans who have long opposed funds like the UN's Green Climate Fund β the largest global pool of money to help developing countries deploy clean energy and adapt to rising temperatures.
Democrats have a slim majority in the Senate and need at least 60 votes to clear a spending bill. Finding new money for climate efforts is likely to get harder because Republicans will soon take control of the House following the recent midterm elections.
Neither the House and Senate Appropriations committees, nor the White House, returned Insider's request for comment.
Thwaites said that even though Congress failed to fulfill US climate aid promises again this year, the Biden administration could increase spending through other channels. US agencies like the Export-Import Bank and International Development Finance Corporation have flexible accounts that could be steered toward climate projects.
"Congress has made clear what they're what they're willing to appropriate," Thwaites said. "The focus now really needs to move towards to the White House. The Biden administration needs to light a fire under these agencies and make sure they're looking under the couch cushions to find every possible way to ramp up the spending."
Sustainability Climate climate summit | 2022-12-20T22:11:34Z | www.businessinsider.com | Congress Just Dealt a Blow to President Joe Biden's Climate Aid Pledge | https://www.businessinsider.com/congress-us-spending-president-joe-biden-climate-finance-developing-countries-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/congress-us-spending-president-joe-biden-climate-finance-developing-countries-2022-12 |
The Kindle Scribe is Amazon's first e-reader with a surface you can write on.
The Kindle Scribe is Amazon's first note-taking e-reader.
With a 10.2-inch screen, the Scribe is Amazon's largest Kindle ever.
If you're not interested in note-taking, you're better off with a cheaper Kindle.
Amazon's Kindles are considered the best e-readers in the business, and for good reason β they let users store a huge library of books in one compact device, complete with a paper-like screen and adjustable reading settings. And now, the latest addition to the brand, the Kindle Scribe, takes the lineup one step further.
The new Kindle Scribe expands upon its predecessors by offering writing capabilities using its included pen. Readers can annotate, take notes, make lists, and more right on the screen. It's not the first device of its kind β the Kobo Elipsa, for example, also has writing capabilities β but it is the first Amazon e-reader to offer such a feature.
After putting the new device to the test, we think it's a solid addition to the Kindle collection, but its appeal is limited to a specific kind of user. Here's how the Scribe stacks up, and why we think you may or may not want to buy one.
Amazon Kindle Scribe with Basic Pen (16 GB)
Scribe is the first Kindle e-reader to support handwritten notes, using the included pen. The 10.2-inch screen also makes it the largest Kindle yet, and the battery can last for up to 12 weeks on a single charge.
Smooth and responsive stylus
Large, sharp screen for writing
Well-organized notebooks with intuitive settings and tools
High price point that may be better spent on a smarter device
Awkwardly big to use as an e-reader
Thin form factor is delicate and requires a case
Kindle Scribe specs at a glance
Attribute Specs
Display size 10.2-inch glare-free
Dimensions 7.7 x 9 x .22 inches
Storage options 16 GB, 32 GB, 64 GB
Front Lights 35 LEDs
Color Tungsten
Pen Battery free Basic Pen included
Battery life Up to 12 weeks reading, up to three weeks writing
Other features Parental controls, flush-front design, adjustable warm light, auto rotating page orientation
The biggest Kindle ever, but it may not be ideal for all readers
The Scribe is the largest Kindle yet, making it a bit awkward to hold.
With a whopping 10.2-inch display, the Scribe is the largest Kindle that Amazon sells, besting the Oasis by about three inches. Like every other Kindle, it also features a premium 300 ppi screen with a glare-free finish.
The huge size gives users a vast amount of space to write on using the included stylus pen. But as impressive as that sounds, the design is also a bit inconvenient.
The device's super-thin build, combined with its wide form factor, makes for a somewhat delicate user experience. That's not to say the Scribe comes out of the box flimsy. But it's not hard to imagine the damage a precarious drop or roughly thrown bookbag could do. A protective case is highly recommended, especially if you plan to travel or commute with your Scribe.
The wide screen doesn't really add to the reading experience, either. The 10.2-inch display gives ample space for writing, but if you mostly plan to read, it doesn't really enhance the experience any more than a cheaper model. If anything, it just makes the device awkwardly large for holding. It's best for use on top of a flat surface.
A reading experience on par with other Kindles, but it's not waterproof
The Kindle Keyboard (2010), Kindle Paperwhite (2018), Kindle (2022), and Kindle Scribe (2022).
The Scribe offers very similar reading performance compared to Amazon's other high-end Kindles, including the closest step down in the lineup, the Kindle Oasis ($250). That said, despite its bigger screen and added writing capabilities, the Scribe is actually missing a couple of features that you'll find on the Oasis.
In exchange for writing support, the Scribe forces buyers to give up perks like page turn buttons, cellular connectivity, and perhaps most importantly, a waterproof finish. Yep, that means no more reading in the bathtub. If that's more important to you than note-taking support, you'll want to consider the Kindle Oasis or Paperwhite instead.
Beautiful, paper-like display and a responsive pen
Writing on a Kindle Scribe is smooth with no latency.
The Scribe's real selling point is its writing feature. And thankfully, writing on the Scribe is excellent.
The pen glides, but doesn't slip, on the paper-like finish of the glare-free display, making for a better stylus experience than that of an Apple Pencil with an iPad. Latency when writing is low, so it almost feels like you're actually transferring ink to the screen β but we promise, you're not.
The battery free pen magnetically attaches to the side of the device for easy and secure storage. Buyers also have the option to upgrade to a Premium Pen, which costs $30 extra. The step-up Pen adds a few thoughtful features, like a programmable shortcut button and a functional eraser on the back. After testing, we think it's worth the extra money.
The Scribe lets you easily take notes and make lists
Users have several different page types to choose from.
Note-taking is sure to be a big draw for many buyers considering the Scribe, and the device offers good performance in this regard.
Notebooks get their own section in the Scribe's browser. There, you can create new notes with different page formats, including lined sheets, dot grid pages, checklists, and more. If you're a student, or just love writing things down, you can even sort your notes into folders for clearer organization.
The stellar pen design makes note-taking on the Scribe a joy. The writing interface also includes a simple, intuitive toolbar, complete with variable line weights for your pen, along with highlighter, eraser, undo, and redo options. However, the toolbar lacks some basic features like zoom, layers, and ink opacity. These omissions basically mean you can't use the Scribe like a true digital drawing device.
Annotation takes center stage, but integration leaves something to be desired
Sticky notes take up half of the page when you're reading.
Since it combines writing with reading in one device, one of the Scribe's most marketable aspects is the ability to annotate as you read e-books. By simply tapping the sticky note icon on the collapsible toolbar, users can handwrite or type in notes that then remain attached to the page and can be easily browsed all in one place afterward.
Unfortunately, this feature proves to be lackluster. Annotation is poorly integrated into the reading experience, with sticky notes taking up half of the screen, making the text behind unavailable to read at the same time. Finding the text highlight feature isn't very intuitive either; using the highlighter tool does nothing to the page, you need to hold and drag your pen or finger over the text in order to select and annotate a specific section.
Ultimately, this sticky notes approach means you can't just write directly on a book's page and have the words appear where you put them. You can still annotate in a separate box, but why give readers a pen if they can't scribble in the margins?
Battery life is just as impressive as other Kindle models
Kindles can last for weeks on a single charge, and the Scribe is no different.
As with the rest of the Kindle lineup, the Scribe delivers incredible battery life. A single charge can last up to 12 weeks when being used solely for reading or up to three weeks with the addition of writing. Actual stats depend on just how much of either you do, combined with your light and Wi-Fi settings.
After using our test Scribe to both read and write for two weeks, we've gotten the device's battery down to 50%, which falls in line with the expected usage.
The Scribe (bottom center) feels great to use as a notebook, but it's not for everyone.
The Kindle Scribe is a good device but it's best suited for a very specific type of user: people who are both avid readers and notetakers. It's an especially good fit for students who want an all-in-one device to store their notes and e-books.
You get most of the premium reading features you'd expect from a high-end Kindle, along with the expanded ability to write on the screen. And though pricier than other Kindles, the Scribe costs less than some competing e-readers with writing support, like the Kobo Elipsa.
However, it's important to remember that the Scribe's writing feature can't match what you'd get on a genuine tablet. It's limited to annotating and note-taking; it can't replace the capabilities of an iPad when it comes to word processing, drawing, or even just note organizing. And of course, it's missing all of the other features you'd get with a full-fledged tablet, like web browsing and games.
With its writing capabilities and $339 price tag, the Scribe finds itself in a slightly awkward position in between an e-reader and tablet, which makes it tricky to recommend over just buying a regular e-reader or tablet. For instance, you could get a bunch of extra features with a ninth-gen iPad and Apple Pencil for about $100 more, or forgo writing and save $100 with a Kindle Oasis.
Still, if you're a student who wants to replace physical books and notepads with one device, the Scribe is definitely a worthwhile option β but if you're someone on the fence questioning whether you need it, you probably don't.
Amazon Kindle Scribe with Premium Pen (16GB) | 2022-12-20T22:59:37Z | www.businessinsider.com | Amazon Kindle Scribe Review: Big E-Reader You Can Write on | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/amazon-kindle-scribe-review | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/amazon-kindle-scribe-review |
How Royal CU works
How to join Royal CU
Is Royal CU trustworthy?
Royal CU vs. CoVantage CU
Royal CU vs. Associated Bank
Royal Credit Union review: Midwest credit union with zero monthly maintenance fees on checking and savings
The bottom line: Royal Credit Union could be a worthwhile option if you want to avoid common bank fees and earn decent interest rates on savings, money market accounts, or CDs. The credit union primarily serves residents in Minnesota or Wisconsin, though.
How Royal Credit Union bank accounts compare
Royal Credit Union Primary Savings Account
Royal Credit Union Smart Checking Account
Royal Credit Union Share Certificates
Royal Credit Union Money Market Account
On Royal Credit Union's website
Checking 4
CD 3.75
Solid interest rates on savings, CDs, and money market accounts compared to other brick-and-mortar financial institutions
Free stop payments for checking account
High minimum opening deposit for money market account
High CD early withdrawal penalties for some terms
Online banks may pay higher rates for savings options
Decent rates compared to other brick-and-mortar banks
Online banks offer higher interest rates
26 Royal Credit Union offices in Minnesota and Wisconsin
To become a member of Royal Credit Union you or a family member must meet one of the following requirements: 1) You live or work in an eligible county in Minnesota or Wisconsin; 2)You live in Minnesota or Wisconsin and make a $5 donation to the RCU Foundation; 3) You are employee of a participating employer or 4) You are a member of the UWEC Alumni Association
Access to over 5,500 shared branches through the Co-Op Shared Branch network
Need to maintain at least $5 in account to maintain membership
The average savings account pays 0.30%, according to the FDIC. With the Royal Credit Union Primary Savings Account, you'll be able to get a slightly higher interest rate.
This savings account also might be a good choice if you want to avoid monthly maintenance fees.
50 free checks
Free stop payments
$10 to $30 overdraft fees
No reimbursements if you're charged by an out-of-network ATM provider
Make surcharge-free transactions at over 40,000 ATMs throughout the US as part of the MoneyPass, Visa Plus Alliance, and Alliance One ATM networks
$10 overdraft fee if you overdraw $0.01 to $10
$30 overdraft fee if you overdraw more than $10.01
Free overdraft protection that lets you link your checking account to a savings account or apply for a line of credit
The Royal Credit Union Smart Checking Account is a solid account if your goal is to avoid common bank fees. The checking account doesn't charge monthly service fees or out-of-network ATM fees.
You also won't be charged a fee if you place a stop payment to cancel a transaction.
Higher interest rates than other brick-and-mortar banks
Variety of CD terms
Online banks may offer higher interest rates for most CD terms
CD special for 18-month CD: Earn 4.25% APY if you open an account by December 31
Early withdrawal penalties: 90 days of interest for terms 1 year or less; 180 days of interest for terms between between 1 year and 3 years; 365 days of interest for terms over 3 years
Royal Credit Union might be worthwhile if you'd like to open a share certificate (sometimes referred to as a CD) with a low minimum opening deposit.
If you're searching for an 18-month term, Royal Credit Union also could be a great option since it offers a competitive interest rate for this particular term. You can earn 4.25% APY on an 18-month term if you open an account by December 31.
Check writing included
Solid interest rate
Earn 1.60% APY on account balances of $100,000 or more
You'll get the most out of the Royal Credit Union Money Market Account if you maintain a high account balance. To earn 1.60% APY, you'll need to keep at least $100,000 in your account.
The Royal Credit Union Money Market Account might not be the best option if you'd like to open a money market account with a low initial deposit. Our best money market accounts guide features accounts with lower minimum opening deposits.
How Royal Credit Union works
Royal Credit Union has 26 branches in Minnesota and Wisconsin. Customers can make surcharge-free transactions at MoneyPass, Visa Plus Alliance, and Alliance One ATMs.
The credit union is part of the CO-OP Shared Branch network, which means you''ll have access to over 5,500 shared branches throughout the US. If you visit another credit union in a shared branch network, you may take out money from your account, make loan payments, or deposit money. You won't be able to open new bank accounts specific to your credit union, though.
To contact customer representatives, call Monday through Friday, from 8:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. CT, or Saturday, from 8:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. CT.
The credit union's mobile app has 4.6 out of 5 stars in the Google Play store and 4.8 out of 5 stars in the Apple store.
Royal Credit Union accounts are federally insured by the NCUA. Up to $250,000 is secure in individual bank accounts, and $500,000 is safe in joint bank accounts.
How to join Royal Credit Union
Credit unions require membership to open accounts. To become a member of Royal Credit Union, you or a family member must meet one of the following eligibility requirements:
You live or work in a select county in Minnesota (Anoka, Carver, Chisago, Dakota, Goodhue, Hennepin, Isanti, Olmsted, Pine, Ramsey, Scott, Sherburne, Wabasha, Washington, Winona, and Wright Counties are all eligible).
You live or work in a select county in Wisconsin (Adams, Ashland, Barron, Bayfield, Burnett, Buffalo, Chippewa, Clark, Douglas, Dunn, Eau Claire, Jackson, Lincoln, Marathon, Pepin, Pierce, Portage, Polk, Price, Rusk, Sawyer, St. Croix, Taylor, Trempealeau, Washburn, and Wood Counties are all eligible).
You live in Minnesota or Wisconsin and donate at least $5 to the Royal Credit Union Foundation, which provides funding for projects that serve the community and focus on the arts, education, and health.
You work for a participating employer on this list.
You are a member of the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire Alumni Association.
If you fulfill one of the requirements for membership, you may join Royal Credit Union by opening a savings account with at least $5.
Royal Credit Union has a Community Give Back Day where it closes all its branches and volunteers for local organizations. The credit union also created the Royal Credit Union Foundation in 2012, which has awarded $3 million in grants to local community projects since it was founded.
Royal Credit Union trustworthiness and BBB rating
We include ratings from the Better Business Bureau so you can see how an institution addresses customer issues.
The BBB gave Royal Credit Union an A+ rating. A great BBB rating doesn't necessarily guarantee a smooth relationship with a financial institution, though. Read online customer reviews and talk to current customers to see if Royal Credit Union could be a good match.
Royal Credit Union hasn't been involved in any recent public controversies.
Royal Credit Union vs. CoVantage Credit Union
CoVantage Credit Union is another CDFI with branches in northern Wisconsin and upper Michigan. To become a member of CoVantage Credit Union, you or a family member must meet one of the following requirements on this list.
If you are eligible for membership at both credit unions, you'll want to consider which accounts you'd like to open to see if a particular institution stands out to you.
For example, if you're searching for a high-yield savings account with a solid interest rate, CoVantage Credit Union might be more appealing than Royal Credit Union. The CoVantage Credit Union savings account pays 0.75% APY, while the Royal Credit Union Primary Savings Account offers 0.45% APY.
Royal Credit Union will have to be your default choice if you would prefer to open a money market account with check writing included. CoVantage Credit Union doesn't have a money market account.
Royal Credit Union vs. Associated Bank
Associated Bank is one of the biggest financial institutions in the state of Wisconsin. It has over 200 branches in Illinois, Minnesota, and Wisconsin.
Royal Credit Union will likely be a better option for avoiding monthly service fees on savings and money market accounts. At Associated Bank, you'll need to meet certain requirements each month to avoid being charged monthly service fees for these accounts.
If you're looking to open a checking account, it will likely be toss-up between Associated Bank and Royal Credit Union. Both banks have free checking accounts with low minimum opening deposits.
What is Royal Credit Union? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
Royal Credit Union is CDFI with branches in Wisconsin and Minnesota. A CDFI is a financial institution that receives a designation by the US Department of Treasury's Community Development Financial Institutions Fund because it supports underserved communities.
Where is Royal Credit Union located? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
Royal Credit Union offices are located in the following cities:
Apple Valley, Minnesota
Edina, Minnesota
Hugo, Minnesota
Stillwater, Minnesota
White Bear Lake, Minnesota
Altoona, Wisconsin
Colby, Wisconsin
Eau Claire, Wisconsin
Hudson, Wisconsin
Medford, Wisconsin
Menomonie, Wisconsin
New Richmond, Wisconsin
Osceola, Wisconsin
Rice Lake, Wisconsin
River Falls, Wisconsin
Somerset, Wisconsin
St. Croix Falls, Wisconsin
Whitehall, Wisconsin
Is Royal Credit Union NCUA insured? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
Yes, Royal Credit Union is federally insured by the NCUA. Up to $250,000 per depositor is secure in a Royal Credit Union account.
PERSONAL FINANCE The average bank interest rates for CDs, money market accounts, savings accounts, and loans
PERSONAL FINANCE You can cancel a check if you make a mistake or it gets lost. Here's how to fix it
PERSONAL FINANCE Key differences between checking accounts and CDs may sway where you keep your money
Royal Credit Union Royal Credit Union Primary Savings Account Royal Credit Union Smart Checking Account | 2022-12-20T22:59:55Z | www.businessinsider.com | Royal Credit Union Review: Midwest Credit Union, No Monthly Fees | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/royal-credit-union-review | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/royal-credit-union-review |
Flight delays are likely during the winter storm set to bear down on a large swath of the US. But the Department of Transportation says passengers can arm themselves with information in case of flight disruptions.
EchoVisuals/Shutterstock
The National Weather Service has warned of a strong winter storm expected to affect holiday travel.
Two-thirds of flights are likely to be affected on Thursday and Friday, according to AccuWeather.
The Department of Transportation outlined what customers are entitled to during flight disruptions.
A winter storm is expected to wreak havoc on parts of the Midwest and Northeast this weekend, potentially affecting millions of travelers right as the Christmas holiday travel season kicks off in full force.
The National Weather Service has predicted strong winds, freezing temperatures, and heavy snow will move across several US states starting on Wednesday and lasting through Christmas Eve on Saturday.
The agency said the storm will be dangerous in some cities β with near-blizzard conditions. It warned people that it may be safer to change or cancel travel plans and stay home.
Nevertheless, nearly 30 million people are expected to depart US airports over the Christmas week from December 18 to December 26, which is a 4% increase from 2019, according to travel website Hopper. And, the busiest days are slated to be Thursday and Friday β the time when AccuWeather meteorologists say 66% of US flights will likely be affected by weather.
Major airports like Denver, New York, Indianapolis, and Detroit could face significant delays, creating a snowball effect across the country due to displaced aircraft and flight crews. Many airlines are already gearing up for the expected chaos, with carriers like American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, and Southwest Airlines offering travel waivers for certain airports across the nation.
And, with ongoing issues plaguing the industry, like staffing shortages that contributed to thousands of flight cancelations over the summer, the winter storm is not the only factor at play.
With all of the uncertainty coming this holiday weekend, here is the best advice for what to do if your flight is canceled or delayed.
1. Know your rights as an airline passenger in the US
According to the Department of Transportation, there is no law requiring US airlines to compensate passengers for disruptions due to weather β which is likely to be the most common case this weekend.
The only rule carriers must follow is to refund customers in the event of cancelations, even for non-controllable events. And that does not mean travel credits or vouchers β it has to be cash.
When you get that dreaded notification of a delay or cancelation, ask a customer service agent for the reason, in writing if possible, so you know what you are entitled to in terms of reimbursement. Many carriers have their own internal policies regarding what passengers can get if the reason is within their control, like crew staffing or maintenance.
This information is collected in the DoT's Airline Customer Service Dashboard, which rolled out in September and outlines what each carrier will offer for controllable disruptions, like rebooking on a different carrier or getting a comped meal.
The guide represents the US's 10 largest airlines and their regional affiliates, which make up about 96% of domestic scheduled flights.
2. Monitor your airline's app for rebooking options
United mobile app.
When a flight delay or cancellation is announced, expect people to flock to the nearest customer service agent for assistance, and for the phone lines to become congested.
Wait times can be painfully long, and the best alternatives will likely go quickly. But, some airlines offer to rebook on their website or mobile app and waive any fees, so it's sometimes easier to make changes online than in person.
However, if all the available options are gone, have a plan B, like waiting to talk to a live agent, contacting the airline via social media, or grabbing a hotel for the night. Direct messaging on Facebook or Twitter can actually act as a virtual placeholder, and you may hear back via chat before you speak to a live agent.
Here are the phone numbers for each airline:
Allegiant: 1-702-505-8888
Avelo: 1-346-616-9500
Breeze: No phone number to call, but you can text the airline at 501-273-3931. You can also contact Breeze via email or Facebook Messenger.
Frontier: No phone number. The best way to contact Frontier is via chat or email.
Sun Country: 1-651-905-2737
3. Ask for a hotel or meal voucher
Vendors in Delta's Terminal C at LaGuardia Airport.
For delays or cancelations that result in a customer waiting at least three hours for a new flight, or requiring an overnight stay, several airlines will offer meal or hotel vouchers.
Carriers offering both are Alaska Airlines, Allegiant Air, American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Hawaiian Airlines, JetBlue Airways, Southwest Airlines, Spirit Airlines, and United Airlines, according to the DoT dashboard. Frontier Airlines is the only carrier that does not offer accommodations in the case of an overnight delay or cancelation.
For US airlines not on the dashboard, or in cases where the compensation is not clear, just ask. It never hurts to request a meal or hotel during flight disruptions, and you might get lucky with a goodwill gesture from the carrier.
4. Check if your credit card company offers travel insurance
Passport and Chase Sapphire Reserve credit card
Evgenia Parajanian/Shutterstock
Several major banks offer credit cards that come with travel insurance, like Chase's Sapphire Reserve or American Express's Platinum Card. Both offer trip protection, meaning customers who purchased their flight with that specific card can reap the benefits.
For example, in the case of a winter storm, it's likely many passengers will end up stranded in random cities across the US. However, banks with travel insurance included can reimburse cardholders for unexpected expenses outside their control, including hotels, meals, and transportation.
Travel insurance does not apply in all circumstances, like short delays, so be sure to check your policy before making a claim β but it also doesn't hurt to make the claim anyway, even if the answer is no.
5. Know when to walk away
Man hailing a cab outside an airport.
During the holidays, it's easy to get tunnel vision on the mission β like seeing friends and family, or just getting away from home for a few days. However, delays and cancellations are bound to happen, especially this weekend.
But, don't spend all day sitting around waiting β give yourself a cut-off time. Once that moment passes, consider other means of getting to your destination, like driving or taking a train (which may also be covered with travel insurance), though these options may not be doable during a winter storm.
If you are stuck in another city and there is no other option other than to get a hotel or sit at the airport, decide how you want to spend the time and make a plan.
Travel Aviation Airlines | 2022-12-20T23:51:38Z | www.businessinsider.com | What to Do If Flights Get Canceled or Delayed by Airlines | https://www.businessinsider.com/flight-delays-cancellations-airline-canceled-airport-passengers-what-to-do | https://www.businessinsider.com/flight-delays-cancellations-airline-canceled-airport-passengers-what-to-do |
A BetterHelp therapist told a 22-year-old gay man he should consider turning straight to repair his relationship with his family, the man told the Wall Street Journal.
BetterHelp matched a gay patient to a therapist who attempted conversion therapy, the WSJ reported.
The company has prioritized growth. Some patients say they are dissatisfied with their care.
BetterHelp is one of several online mental health platforms that grew quickly during the pandemic.
When Caleb Hill, a 22-year old gay man from Tennessee, sought online therapy with the platform BetterHelp after his conservative parents kicked him out of the house, he didn't expect to be told to change his sexual orientation.
But according to Hill, the therapist that online provider BetterHelp matched him with did exactly that. "He said either you sacrifice your family or you sacrifice being gay," Hill told The Wall Street Journal. "I needed someone to tell me I was gay and that was OK. I got the exact opposite."
While BetterHelp says it's provided beneficial online mental health services to more than three million clients, Hill is among several who said they had issues with the company, according to a recent investigation by the Journal.
BetterHelp, which is owned by publicly traded Teladoc Health, uses algorithms to match patients like Hill to therapists. However, many therapists on the platform aren't accepting new clients or have left the platform entirely, people familiar with the service told the Journal.
The company says it has 29,900 therapists; they're not employees, but independent contractors paid by the hour, the Journal reported. A BetterHelp spokeswoman told the Journal that the company pays more than the median for a licensed therapist in many places.
Amid the pandemic, BetterHelp, like many online mental-health providers, doubled down on growth. The company's ad budget was increased to hundreds of millions of dollars a year and it spent $64 million on podcast advertising alone during the first 10 months of 2022, according to estimates that the research firm Magellan AI gave the Journal.
At the same time, the company's process for training therapists is minimal, the Journal reported. A former clinical director at the company told The Journal that therapists were "treated like Uber drivers." The company told the Journal it goes thorough background checks and also relies on state licensing boards, which certify therapists.
Meanwhile, digital mental health startups are a growth area, especially as telehealth has skyrocketed during the pandemic: They received an influx of $4.8 billion in investment over the last year, research and investment firm Rock Health told the Journal.
But providers have had challenges: Cerebral, another online therapy platform that rode the pandemic wave, laid of 20% of its employees in October and has since made plans to slow growth, Insider reported. It's now facing federal investigations regarding its prescriptions of stimulants to patients. Done Global Inc. is also up against a Justice Department investigation based upon The Journal's reporting that its clinicians felt pressured to prescribe stimulants for ADHD.
A spokesperson for BetterHelp told Insider by email: "We firmly stand behind the high-quality service provided at BetterHelp, both in successful therapist matching and ongoing care." The company said 85% of its clients who do their first session continue on with other sessions.
Meanwhile, the therapist who was assigned to Hill's case declined to discuss the issue with the Journal, citing what he said was patient confidentiality. BetterHelp also declined to comment to the Journal specifically on Hill's case. He had requested an LGBTQ counselor, but the site didn't match him with one, according to the WSJ.
Real the full story here.
Betterhelp Mental healthcare Telemedicine | 2022-12-21T01:31:40Z | www.businessinsider.com | Gay Patient Said BetterHelp Therapist Told Him to Turn Straight: WSJ | https://www.businessinsider.com/gay-patient-said-betterhelp-therapist-told-him-turn-straight-wsj-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/gay-patient-said-betterhelp-therapist-told-him-turn-straight-wsj-2022-12 |
Robert Pene
Erik Soto Ayala, 23, quit his warehouse job after launching a successful Etsy shop.
Erik Soto
Erik Soto Ayala, an ex-warehouse forklift operator, started a side hustle to escape the 9-to-5.
He was willing to start selling anything and researched Etsy products that had minimum competition.
After landing on personalized wallets, he made $67,000 in profit in his first 10 months in business.
This as-told-to essay is based on a transcribed conversation with Erik Soto Ayala, a 23-year-old entrepreneur selling engraved wallets on Etsy. It has been edited for length and clarity.
While I was thankful for my warehouse job as a forklift operator and floor product stacker, I wanted to escape the 9-to-5 grind. I knew there was more to life than just clocking in and out.
I quit my job in October after almost four years β handing in my two weeks' notice was one of my most freeing experiences ever.
I was quitting because I'd launched a side hustle six months earlier and was making more income than my salary. I made $2,600 a month at my warehouse job. In September, my side hustle made $26,000 in revenue, and I took home $14,300.
I tried launching side hustles before, but my Etsy store was different
My side-hustle journey wasn't easy. I tried launching side hustles in the past β Fulfillment by Amazon, investing in cryptocurrency, drop shipping, and even social-media management β but they all failed. I spent between $2,000 and $3,000 on each venture, working overtime to finance them.
My Etsy endeavor was different because I wasn't chasing an oversaturated market.
I researched products with low competition instead and improved on what was already out there. Rather than selling brand names on Amazon, I saw a big opportunity with personalized gifts on Etsy.
From wood crafts to embroidery, I was open to starting an Etsy store for anything, and I was constantly brainstorming, watching YouTube videos, and reading blogs by successful Etsy sellers.
By the middle of January, I stumbled across a video on laser engraving that caught my attention. I had never heard of or seen a laser engraver before. I felt in my gut that this was my product.
From January to February, I'd sometimes spend up to eight hours after work researching the Etsy engraving market.
I invested in the best laser-engraver package I could find, which cost me $1,200. I started working overtime in January to save up money to put into my Etsy store. I had saved up enough to buy the laser engraver by the end of February.
The next step was deciding what to engrave. At the beginning of March, I found myself needing a new wallet, and that's when it hit me: "Why don't I try engraving wallets?"
I landed on a niche product that didn't have much competition
After searching for personalized wallets on Etsy, I saw massive potential. There were only two or three competitors on the site. I thought I could offer a better product and better customer service than what was out there. I'd noticed that the comments at my competitors' stores were mixed at best.
I spent $200 to buy a small order of wallets from Alibaba. When it arrived, I tested the engraver on them, and it looked great. I invested another $400 to start building my inventory.
My fiancΓ©e took product photos using my iPhone, and I uploaded them to my Etsy shop. Five days later, my first sale came in.
I knew customer service was something I could control and use to differentiate my store, so I committed to providing the best customer service. This meant replying to customers' comments as quickly as possible and ensuring next-day shipping.
Prioritizing customer service helped me gain an audience quickly
May was the first month my business was open. I had 16 orders, which totaled $521.20. I made it a point to keep in touch with my customers through Etsy messaging and sent a notification when their orders shipped.
My competitors were shipping three to five days after a purchase, and customers sometimes received their orders two weeks after purchase. I was processing orders the next day. I think this is a big part of why my store took off.
By June, I had made nearly $1,000 in sales. At that point, I was buying bigger bulk orders of wallets to keep up with demand. As sales increased, I knew I had to do something different. I was still juggling my store with my full-time job.
I purchased a second engraving machine in July so my fiancΓ©e could help with fulfilling orders. I organized my time into two blocks: engraving and packing at night and customer service early in the mornings and during my breaks at work. This helped me manage work and the Etsy shop.
My Etsy shop was successful enough that I quit my warehouse job
After six months, I'd generated over $80,000, and I quit my warehouse job in October to take my business full time.
I ran Etsy ads to test new products and spent $3,500 over the first six months. I now mainly rely on organic Etsy traffic. I selected a market and a product that people seemed to like, and as long as I deliver great customer service, I believe sales will continue to grow.
By the end of November, I'd made over six figures in revenue in only seven months of selling wallets on Etsy; $67,000 of that was profit.
I control my hours and can be creative while running the store with my fiancΓ©e. I invest everything back into the business. I'm hoping to start paying myself a salary and have saved some money in the event the store slows down, but right now, I'm very excited about its future. | 2022-12-21T09:21:30Z | www.businessinsider.com | I Quit My Warehouse Job to Run My 6-Figure Etsy Shop Full Time | https://www.businessinsider.com/quit-warehouse-job-etsy-side-hustle-profit-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/quit-warehouse-job-etsy-side-hustle-profit-2022-12 |
The foodtech falloff isn't spooking these new VCs. Here's where they're looking to make bets in 2023.
Foodtech startups were hammered in 2022, cutting staff as VC funds dried up.
Restaurant tech firms raised $2.7 billion in the third quarter, down 63% from 2021.
Despite the volatility, two new VC funds are bullish on backing foodtech β but with a new mindset.
The foodtech space was hammered this year, with hundreds of workers laid off as investors pushed for profits over growth, and the economic downturn putting a damper on venture capital deals.
VC investment in restaurant tech firms, from ghost kitchens to delivery robots, slowed in the third quarter, according to Pitchbook. It was the fourth consecutive quarterly drop. Foodtech startups raised $2.7 billion, half of what they raised in the second quarter, and down 63% from the same period in 2021.
Despite the volatility in the space, two new VC funds are bullish on backing foodtech, where funding in the past has focused on a glut of digital ordering solutions for restaurants. But instead of leaning into kiosks and QR codes, Redstick Ventures and Rethink Food are entering the space with a different investing game plan.
These founders believe in the importance of innovation that helps solve real-world problems for restaurants and consumers β from labor-saving kitchen automation to planet-saving alternative proteins.
"I think the big big wins are going to come out of the back of the house," said Cam Crowder, cofounder of Redstick Ventures. "Automating processes in the restaurant. Those are going to be the big wins because they're the hardest things to do."
Crowder owned six Tim Horton's franchises for nearly seven years before giving it all up to become a venture capitalist. The pandemic didn't drive him out of the industry. It was the constant turnover of employees at his restaurants.
"It really bothered me because we were good to our team. We paid them well," Crowder told Insider in a recent interview. "The light went off that people don't want to make 150 sandwiches an hour. There's gotta be a way to fix this."
That's why Crowder and his VC partner, Shane Larisey, formed Redstick Ventures this year. Despite an investment slowdown in foodtech, Crowder and Larisey believe there are massive opportunities in the sector. Redstick plans to focus on startups that are solving the same problems he faced as an operator β namely, labor issues.
Another new foodtech VC firm, Rethink Food, is also looking differently at food innovation.
The firm, which formed in January, is backing early-stage companies that bring systemic change across the food chain, such as assisting restaurants in reducing carbon emissions. Their average investments, thus far, are about $2 million.
Rini Greenfield, a food tech VC investor, is betting on lab-based meat.
"Our most recent investment is one of the most disruptive and exciting, and it's in cultured meat," said Rini Greenfieldβ, a founding managing partner at Rethink Food.
She said the startup, Omeat, produces "real, regenerative meat" without the slaughter. The cultured-meat company plans to be more cost-effective than regular meat, she added.
She is betting consumers will love the taste of lab-based meat over plant-based foods β a market that grew fast under Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat, but whose sales are slowing.
"Cultured meat is fully bio-mimic, made in a reactor where you're growing these exact same cells," she said. "And my conclusion now is that we as a society have been trained to know what meat tastes like for centuries now. And I don't think we're going to give that up."
Redstick is also looking at the food-supply chain, but differently from Rethink.
The fund, launched in September, is looking at ag-tech companies that help increase yields in the field, cofounder Larisey said.
"It could be robotics in the field, where they're zapping weeds or picking crops or planting," he said.
Larisey said Redstick, which has yet to invest, is reviewing companies with "really gritty founders" who know how to turn a profit in the following fields: lab-grown meat, automated restaurant equipment, and bulk delivery.
Crowder and Larisey quickly point out that they are not interested in investing in marketplace meal delivery companies, which have yet to show profitability.
"Delivery is always going to be expensive until you have autonomous vehicles because people are expensive," Crowder said. "If you're doing one-off delivery, it's never going to be profitable."
But, if there are 15 workers in a building ordering from the same Chipotle, that works because everyone pays one delivery fee, Crowder said. "Now it's profitable," he said.
That's why Redstick wants to back bundled delivery platforms. "I like that area of delivery. I think it's going to be disruptive."
Venture Captial VC Startups | 2022-12-21T10:52:52Z | www.businessinsider.com | New VC Firms Reveal Why They're Still Bullish on Foodtech Investments | https://www.businessinsider.com/2-vcs-reveal-why-theyre-bullish-on-investing-foodtech-ventures-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/2-vcs-reveal-why-theyre-bullish-on-investing-foodtech-ventures-2022-12 |
Here are the 7 investments the top-ranked inflation fund on Morningstar used to hedge against higher prices this year β and how the portfolio will change as inflation peaks in 2023
High inflation should linger into 2023, which may lead to continued outperformance for inflation-focused funds.
The AXS Astoria Inflation Sensitive ETF is the top-ranked inflation fund of 2022.
Greg Bassuk of AXS Investments shared how his firm invests with inflation high.
Here's how the fund is preparing to tackle persistent inflation in 2023.
It's hard to imagine a better first year than the one the AXS Astoria Inflation Sensitive ETF (PPI) just had. The inflation-focused fund, which launched on December 29, 2021, is up 1.8% in this year, while its benchmark index is down 17.2%. That's good enough to earn it the No. 1 spot out of the 409 funds in its Morningstar category.
With price growth widely expected to peak next year, cynics may look at that performance in light of multi-decade-high inflation this year and wonder if the fund can have a successful encore in 2023.
But Greg Bassuk, CEO of AXS Investments, is confident that his firm's fund can continue to provide solid returns as inflation stays higher than normal β even if the rate starts to slide.
"The way we look at it is whether inflation has peaked or not, and that's debatable," Bassuk said in a recent interview with Insider. "We'll continue to see the monthly data as we move into 2023."
Bassuk continued: "But what's not debatable is that we are in a period of elevated prices. And even if those continue to drop, 2023 is going to remain a year in which we expect prices will be elevated on a historical basis."
Follow this 7-part strategy to beat inflation
The AXS Astoria Inflation Sensitive ETF became one of the fastest-growing exchange-traded funds this year as investors noticed its ability to hedge against higher prices with relatively low volatility while acting as a "portfolio completion" tool, Bassuk said. In other words, both financial advisors and at-home investors used it to diversify away from traditional 60-40 portfolios.
Having inflation hedges like commodities and Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities (TIPS) as well as stocks in sectors that actively benefit from higher prices allowed the fund to play defense and offense at the same time, Bassuk said.
"Not only does that set this ETF apart from other investments that investors allocate to manage their portfolios and inflationary periods, but importantly, that combination of securities has also really poured gas on the fire, in a sense, in the very strong performance of the ETF," Bassuk said.
When inflation is historically high, Bassuk said that the fund focuses on seven investments: TIPS, precious metals like gold, agricultural goods like farmland and timber, and stocks in the energy, financials, industrials, and materials sectors.
TIPS are a logical inflation hedge since their yields rise as prices do, Bassuk said, while precious metals and agricultural products are real assets that see their value increase along with inflation.
Meanwhile, stocks in cyclical sectors like energy, financials, industrials, and materials have all beaten the S&P 500 this year, and oil and gas companies have performed especially well. All are strong choices when inflation is still high but isn't necessarily rising, Bassuk noted.
Although the one-year-old PPI ETF has never navigated a period of low inflation, Bassuk said that in such an environment it would become more like other AXS funds and buy stocks and bonds broadly while underweighting commodities and cyclical stocks.
The fund would gravitate toward defensive sectors in a weak inflation backdrop, Bassuk said, adding that communication services and technology would stand out if investors were willing to take on risk, while healthcare and utilities would be preferable if markets were choppy.
As for how the fund will handle peaking inflation, Bassuk said that investments are made based on whether price growth is currently high or low instead of where it may be headed.
"The way we think about it is a little different than most, which is we're not so much in the game of trying to figure out, 'Has inflation peaked or hasn't it peaked?'" Bassuk said.
Bassuk added: "We're not making very large immediate shifts in the portfolio based on the Fed or the news or any single month's inflation data points. We're looking at it more from a macro standpoint."
That means that the AXS Astoria Inflation Sensitive ETF will stick with its seven-part portfolio of TIPS, precious metals, agricultural products, and stocks in the energy, financials, industrials, and materials as inflation stays higher than normal in 2023.
Investing Inflation | 2022-12-21T10:52:58Z | www.businessinsider.com | How to Invest As Inflation Peaks in 2023: Strategy From #1 Ranked Fund | https://www.businessinsider.com/2023-investment-outlook-inflation-how-to-invest-stocks-fund-strategy-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/2023-investment-outlook-inflation-how-to-invest-stocks-fund-strategy-2022-12 |
The report is the latest dataset to illustrate just how inequality has widened and accelerated over the last few decades, as it became increasingly harder for the normal families to substantively grow their incomes while the top 1% has more money than the entire middle class. The gap between CEO and worker pay is at its highest since 1965, with the 350 top executives making 399 times more than their workers.
Economy Income Inequality Inequality | 2022-12-21T10:53:10Z | www.businessinsider.com | Lowest Earning Americans Got a Pay Cut, While Richest Made More | https://www.businessinsider.com/lowest-earning-americans-got-pay-cut-while-richest-made-more-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/lowest-earning-americans-got-pay-cut-while-richest-made-more-2022-12 |
"I still think the environment is asymmetrically biased to the downside," said fund manager James Abate.
Centre Asset Management
James Abate's flagship fund has beaten 99% of its competitors so far this year.
He foresees the S&P 500 falling another 30% and bottoming within the next three to nine months.
Abate shared 11 compelling stocks to buy to mitigate looming recessionary risks.
When portfolio manager James Abate suggested during a September 2020 interview with Bloomberg Radio that investors trim their positions in Apple and instead buy ExxonMobil stock, his idea was considered absurd at the time β especially since the latter had just been kicked out of the Dow Jones Industrial Average in favor of technology titan Salesforce.
But two years later his contrarian trade has proven to be a home run, and has helped propel Abate to the top 1% of portfolio managers in his investment category for the second time in three years.
Despite a year-to-date loss of 2.5%, Abate's Centre American Select Equity Fund (DHAMX) has beaten 99% of competitors in its category, which have averaged a 16.9% loss so far in 2022 β repeating the fund's top 1% performance in 2020. Abate's fund is also in the top percentile as measured by one-, three-, and five-year trailing returns, according to Morningstar data.
But with the looming threat of a recession, Abate believes that the days of big contrarian trade ideas are now behind us. Going forward, he foresees a "stagflationary-light" environment riddled with tepid growth and sticky inflation β and an equity market bottom looming on the horizon.
The S&P 500 will fall 30% within the next 9 months
Abate believes that the historical macroeconomic environment most analogous to the one today is the period following the dot-com bubble, which was characterized by a run-up of very easy monetary stimulus followed by a dramatic collapse.
"The entire gain of the euphoric period that followed the introduction of ultra-easy money was retraced, basically," he told Insider. "Unfortunately, I still think the environment is asymmetrically biased to the downside."
He continued: "If we follow the same pattern and we wipe out all the ultra-loose monetary policy gains today, the S&P 500 could end up at the bottom of this bear market down another 30%, which would be around the 2,700 level."
In his worst-case scenario, Abate forecasts it could take as long as nine months for the market to bottom. On the other hand, if the Federal Reserve pulls off a genuine soft landing and the US economy is able to completely avoid a recession, Abate foresees the bottom coming within the next 3 months. But he's skeptical that this latter scenario will happen, especially as he believes that the Fed might accidentally extend the inflation problem with its aggressive rate hikes.
While his market bottom prediction may go against current consensus, Abate firmly believes that history is on his side β the 2001 recession theoretically started in March 2001 and was over by September, but the bear market at the time lasted another 16 to 17 months. Obviously, the length of the bear market was influenced by the September 11 attacks, but Abate pointed out that the market still took another two years to bottom.
"The S&P's gotten itself so distorted and top-heavy like it did back in the late 1990s," he explained. "That's where there can be a huge disconnect between economic recovery and the stock market."
11 compelling stocks to buy to mitigate recessionary risks
One major issue investors will be forced to contend with in the new year, according to Abate, is that profit margin gains are expected to shrink, providing companies with negative operating leverage and contributing to a decline in earnings.
"We've been in a period of exceptional profit margin gains because labor's been cheap β¦ And obviously companies are better run than they used to be and have much more of a profitability focus," he said. "But when you start having the impact of recession and falling sales, there's nothing that destroys profit margin acceleration like declining revenue."
Going forward, Abate said that equal-weighted portfolios are the right move for investors, since he believes that they'll widely outperform a cap-weighted S&P 500 portfolio. Defensive stocks, particularly in the utilities, consumer staples, and healthcare sectors will also come out on top.
But Abate said the best thing investors can do is to seek out idiosyncratic ideas β companies with compelling business models, strong earnings growth, can command high pricing power, and are disciplined with their capital spending.
"In a market where the index is not your friend, find ideas that have something idiosyncratic about them," he explained. Especially "idiosyncratic stocks that have kind of already felt the pain of a downturn, so even if a recession happens, their backlogs can get them through recessionary conditions."
Two biotechnology names Abate noted as standout idiosyncratic ideas are Biogen (BIIB) and Gilead (GILD). Medical device companies Zimmer Biomet (ZBH) and Medtronic (MDT) are also compelling, due to pandemic-induced pent-up demand for medical procedures.
Thanks to ongoing shortages in the commodities space, Abate also likes ATI (ATI) for its titanium exposure, CF Industries (CF) on the nitrogen side, and Corteva (CTVA) for its large market share in the seed industry.
Abate also has his eyes on Boston Beer (SAM), a company he said is finally turning itself around after a difficult 2021. "And who knows, THC beers might be the next thing to supplant the hard seltzers out there," he joked. And as Boeing has begun clearing up its supply chain issues, Abate suggested composite manufacturer Hexcel (HXL) as a potential beneficiary.
Abate listed mid-cap industrial firm Kirby (KEX) as a recent buy. "They have tugboats β really unsexy stuff, but they're the kind of business that has been backed up in terms of supply chain issues and other things," he explained. Along that vein is Flowserve (FLS), which Abate said services the domestic energy sector's flow control and currently looks very attractive due to its huge backlog. | 2022-12-21T11:10:34Z | www.businessinsider.com | 11 Stocks to Buy in 2023 to Navigate a Recession: Top Fund Manager | https://www.businessinsider.com/stock-picks-to-buy-2023-investing-strategy-recession-market-bottom-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/stock-picks-to-buy-2023-investing-strategy-recession-market-bottom-2022-12 |
The 10 most active European and US investors betting on India as Asia's tech powerhouse, as it hits 100 startups worth $1 billion or more
A Zomato food delivery driver.
India claims to be the third-largest startup ecosystem behind the US and China.
The country hit a milestone of 100 unicorns in 2022 β a sign of its growing momentum.
Using Dealroom and PitchBook data, we profiled the top US and European investment firms in the region.
The southern Indian city of Bangalore is renowned for two things: its traffic, and its bustling tech scene.
The region, often billed the Silicon Valley of India, is a hub for founders and investors. Western venture capital brands such as Accel, Sequoia, and Bessemer Venture Partners have all set up shop in the city.
The past decade has seen an influx of foreign investors dive into the city and India more widely. In May 2022, India hit a milestone of 100 unicorns β companies valued at $1 billion or higher.
The country's startup ecosystem is now showcasing a faster pace of growth than Europe or the US, according to Ivan Draganov, analyst at Dealroom. In its annual economic survey for 2021-2022, India claimed to be the third-biggest startup ecosystem behind the US and China.
In 2021, startups in India attracted a record $49.9 billion in funding, with nearly 75% of investor funds ($37 billion) coming from Europe and the US, per Dealroom data. The data also shows foreign investors plugging bigger rounds of over $100 million since 2018.
Japan's SoftBank has backed Indian edtech Byju's, ride-hailing app Ola, and fintech PayTM, which went public in November last year.
New York-based private equity firm Tiger Global has invested in 225 startups in India, according to PitchBook, including PhonePe and Byju's.
Funding from US and European HQ'd investors into Indian startups. 2021 was a banner year, with nearly 75% of the total funds into Indian startups coming from foreign investors.
A tech crackdown in its neighbouring competitor China has also helped India's cause, with more investors pivoting to the region as an alternative Asian hub.
The country's earlier-stage companies have been relatively insulated from the global tech downturn, with many raising record rounds in 2021 that have give them extended runway, said Ashutosh Sharma, head of India investments at Prosus Ventures.
Growth-stage startups may eventually feel the pain as they refocus from growth to profitability. Ola, Unacademy, and Byju's have all conducted mass layoffs, mirroring their European and US counterparts.
Foreign investor traction in India remains strong, said Draganov, who expects US and European venture capitalists to maintain their presence in India in the coming years.
Using data from Dealroom and PitchBook, Insider profiled the most active investors that are headquartered in Europe and the US that have backed Indian startups since 2016.
Based on the deal volume and size of investments into Indian startups since 2016, here are the top European and US firms investing into Indian startups, in alphabetical order.
Venture capital firm Accel has an office in Bangalore
Accel haΘ backed e-commerce marketplace Myntra.
HQ: California
Amount invested in India since 2016: $1.9 billion
Number of recorded deals in India since 2016: 289
Key deals: Infra.Market, Ninjacart, Myntra, Vedantu
Bessemer Venture Partners has been a long-time backer of Indian startups, opening its India office 15 years ago
The team at Bessemer Venture Partners.
Amount invested since 2016: $827 million
Number of recorded deals since 2016: 83
Key deals: Swiggy (exited), Zopper, Cashify, Lentra
CDC Group is the UK's development finance institution
HQ: London
Amount invested since 2016: $1.05 billion
Key deals: Bigbasket (exited), Medikabazaar, Agrostar
Eight Roads Ventures has allocated over $1.6 billion in capital to Indian startups
Key deals: PharmEasy, Aye Finance, DeHaat, Waycool
Lightrock expanded its India operations in 2019, launching Lightrock India
Lightspeed Venture Partners raised a $500 million fund for startups in India and Southeast Asia this year
Bejul Somaia, partner at Lightspeed Venture Partners
Number of recorded deals since 2016: 112
Key deals: Udaan, Byju's, OYO Rooms
Norwest Venture Partners backs early and mid-stage startups in India, with checks ranging from $2 million to $15 million
NVP's general partners Jeff Crowe, Promod Haque, and Matt Howard.
Key deals: Swiggy (exited), Xpressbees, ElasticRun, CityMall
Prosus Ventures, which invests from its balance sheet, has poured nearly $9 billion into Indian startups since 2016
Ashutosh Sharma, head of India investments at Prosus Ventures.
HQ: Amsterdam (founding location)
Amount invested since 2016: Between $8 billion to $9 billion
Key deals: PharmEasy, Cashify, Dotpe, Mensa Brands
Sequoia Capital was founded in California, but has since created a new venture entity for its operations in Asia
The Sequoia office in California.
Katie Canales/Business Insider
Key deals: Byju's, Cred, Razorpay, Ola
Tiger Global doubled down on earlier-stage investments in India, having previously backed the country's biggest unicorns
Tiger Global has backed Byju's, one of India's biggest edtech unicorns.
SOPA Images / Contributor, LightRocket collection / Getty Images
HQ: New York
Amount invested since 2016: $5.9 billion
Key deals: Byju's, PhonePe, Polygon, ShareChat | 2022-12-21T11:10:40Z | www.businessinsider.com | The 10 Most Active US and European Investors in India | https://www.businessinsider.com/top-us-and-european-investors-in-india-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/top-us-and-european-investors-in-india-2022-12 |
Biden and Harris give their first press conference as presidential nominee and running mate on August 12, 2020.
Joe Biden said early in his presidency that Kamala Harris was a "work in progress," according to a new book.
"Fight of His Life," by Chris Whipple, chronicles the first two years of the Biden administration.
Extracts from the book were published by Politico.
President Joe Biden described Vice President Kamala Harris as a "work in progress" in the difficult early months of his presidency, according to extracts from a new book, published in Politico.
"Fight of his Life," by journalist Chris Whipple, chronicles the first two years of Biden's presidency and details tensions between the president and his vice.
Biden made the "work in progress" remark about Harris to a close friend, according to the book.
It says the president was annoyed when told that Harris' husband, Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff, had complained about his wife's policy assignments.
A senior White House advisor quoted in the book says Harris' inner circle "didn't serve her well in the presidential campaign β and they are ill-serving her now."
It's not the first time reports have emerged of tension between Biden and Harris. Earlier in 2022, Jonathan Martin and Alex Burns detailed disputes between the camps in their book "This Will Not Pass".
Harris was at one point a contender for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination and clashed with Biden during primary debates over his record on race. Biden later named Harris as his running mate.
After the Democratic election victory in 2020, Harris was handed responsibility for core Biden policy areas, including migration from the southern US border and voting rights. She faced criticism amid faltering or slow progress on both issues.
Whipple told Politico that the Biden administration faced major setbacks in its first year but turned things around in its second year, citing the US response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the renewed Build Back Better bill.
Joe Biden Kamala Harris News UK | 2022-12-21T12:24:13Z | www.businessinsider.com | Biden Called Harris 'Work in Progress' Early in Presidency: Book | https://www.businessinsider.com/biden-called-harris-work-in-progress-early-in-presidency-book-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/biden-called-harris-work-in-progress-early-in-presidency-book-2022-12 |
Help wanted: Someone to keep Twitter running. I'm Diamond Naga Siu, and if I didn't enjoy writing the newsletter so much, I'd definitely throw my hat in the ring.
It's a big project to continue. Within weeks of taking over, he dramatically transformed Twitter's company culture and started major projects β seemingly with one foot already out the door. The new leader would have the intense responsibility of keeping Twitter alive with half the staff, all while reporting back to owner Musk.
Before submitting your application, let's get caught up on today's tech.
1. We won't think about ChatGPT until it's taken over. ChatGPT is currently the it-girl of generative artificial intelligence. The technology can write essays on niche topics, craft cover letters, and produce movie scripts. It's currently one of the most advanced AI models and is even touted as the Google killer. But this still isn't ChatGPT's time to shine.
The technology needs to lose its hype, mature, and then become useful in society, according to the Gartner Hype Cycle, from the tech-research and consulting firm Gartner.
An analyst from Gartner came up with this theory. It's a pattern that the smartphone, internet, and other significant tech inventions all followed.
Although a successful future for any technology is not guaranteed, ChatGPT feels like a tipping point for generative AI.
Look into Gartner's crystal ball for ChatGPT.
2. Inside the self-destruction of Pollen, a once high-flying music startup. Once worth $800 million, the startup's parent company, StreetTeam Software Limited, has since gone bankrupt. From the outside, Pollen's collapse was a shock, but according to 31 former employees who spoke with Insider, the company's implosion was years in the making.
3. Is your vacuum taking pictures of you? Roomba, an automatic vacuum cleaner, took multiple sensitive photos that were shared on social media. An image of a woman sitting on the toilet was included in the leaked pictures. More on the private business here.
4. HBO series like "Game of Thrones" will run with ads on HBO Max. As Warner Bros Discovery scrambles for new revenue, it's exploring a reversal of its earlier streaming strategy β a move that could be controversial to creators and people inside the company. What we know about the possibility of ads in HBO content.
5. The way we discover new music is changing. After short-video apps like TikTok became the dominant platforms for fans to listen to new songs in 2022, music-industry execs are now setting their sights on social media as the next big money-making opportunity. Here are 15 power players using social media to shape the music industry.
6. Experts outlined three healthcare acquisitions Amazon could make next year. In 2022, the retail giant dug deeper into healthcare, making moves into primary care and consumer health. Analysts expect it to keep making waves next year, and predicted the company could notch deals in three key areas in 2023.
7. The work-from-home whistleblower. Do you hear that? It's a new symphony of remote workers blowing the whistle on their employers' bad behavior. The number of whistleblower complaints has more than doubled since 2019. Dive into the unexpected impact of people reconsidering their relationships with work.
8. How do you vacation? Chances are, not like these tech billionaires. As we gear up for the winter holidays, we're taking a look at how Silicon Valley execs from Jeff Bezos to Richard Branson spend their vacations. Hint: most include lavish vacation homes. Check out how the wealthy and powerful relax.
9. We reviewed the 10th Generation Apple iPad. In a complete redesign from last year's model, the new iPad has a bigger display, faster processor, a USB-C port, and improved video calls. But the upgrades come at a price ($120, to be exact). Read our full review here.
10. If you need an $11,500 toilet, you are in luck. Kohler just revealed that its pricey Numi 2.0 Smart Toilet β which comes equipped with Alexa, LED lights, and speakers β is ready to be installed in homes. The Verge has look at the loo of the future.
CarMax, Micron, and others are reporting earnings. Keep up with earnings here.
Season three of "Emily in Paris" will be released on Netflix.
Curated by Diamond Naga Siu in New York. (Feedback or tips? Email dsiu@insider.com) Edited by Jordan Parker Erb in New York and Hallam Bullock in London.
Tech Newsletter Newsletters | 2022-12-21T12:24:25Z | www.businessinsider.com | It's Not ChatGBT's Time to Shine β yet. Here's Why. | https://www.businessinsider.com/its-not-chatgbts-time-to-shine-yet-heres-why-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/its-not-chatgbts-time-to-shine-yet-heres-why-2022-12 |
Hi friends. I'm senior reporter Phil Rosen, writing to you from Los Angeles.
If you didn't see, Elon Musk last night said he would step down as CEO of Twitter once he finds someone "foolish" enough to take the job.
So... any takers?
Anyway β Christmas is four days away but Santa's nowhere in sight. The S&P 500 is down about 19% on the year, and those losses could spill over into the new year if stocks don't see the usual holiday rally.
This means that any equity returns next year will be dependent on what the Fed does next.
1. The window for a Santa Claus rally on Wall Street doesn't open until the final five trading days of the year, which begins this Friday.
But if the S&P 500 misses that final rally, that bodes poorly for rebound odds in 2023.
"When the index is down in the double digits as it is today, the odds of it being positive next year is essentially a coin flip and the returns aren't nearly as promising as they would be if the S&P ended down less than 10%," DataTrek co-founder Jessica Rabe wrote in a Tuesday note.
She pointed out that if the major index sheds more than 10% for a year, the average return in the following 12 months falls from 17.5% to 6.4%.
The lack of a holiday rally so far suggests that more rocky markets await when the calendars change.
Investors already have plenty of reason to fear what could come next. Concerns about an imminent recession, declining corporate earnings, and more Fed rate hikes are mounting β add in a downbeat stock outlook and the holiday cheer gets even more muted.
The Fed's aggressive monetary policy has driven this year's equity sell-off, but Rabe said any returns in 2023 will come down to the central bank.
"As for what turns US equities around after a hard year, the essential ingredients are: help from the Federal Reserve in the form of lower interest rates or Federal government spending," Rabe said, pointing to the 2008 financial crisis as an example.
Fiscal and monetary policy stimulus could lift stocks after a forgettable year, she added. Recall that while the S&P 500 tumbled 37% in 2008, it rebounded 26% in 2009.
"That's why US equities are so volatile now," Rabe said. "As no one knows when the Fed will pivot to being more accommodative."
What's your stock market outlook for 2023? Tweet me (@philrosenn) or email me (prosen@insider.com) to let me know.
A man loads pieces of two-by-four wood onto his cart in the lumber section at a home improvement store on August 16, 2022 in Alhambra, California.
2. US stock futures are rising early Wednesday, setting the S&P 500 up for a second day of gains as those traders still on duty adjust to the BoJ's shock move. Here are the latest market moves.
3. Earnings on deck: Micron Technology, Herman Miller, and more, all reporting.
4. This hedge fund manager is up over 39% this year. He shared six undervalued stocks that he's bullish on ahead of the new year β see the names here.
5. Russian oil exports have cratered by 54% in the first full week of the EU embargo. At the same time, there's been a shortage of tankers willing to carry those supplies, and energy giants like Exxon Mobil and Shell are avoiding hiring tankers that previously carried Russian oil.
6. The chief US economist of Pantheon said homebuilding still has room to fall and odds for recovery are "next to nil" until demand returns. The housing market is far from a recovery, Kieran Clancy added. The latest data showed single-family home starts declined 4.1% last month.
7. FTX is trying to recover voluntary payments made to third parties. And those include political contributions and charitable donations. Disgraced founder Sam Bankman-Fried made tens of millions of dollars in political contributions before his exchange filed for bankruptcy.
8. Bank of America recommended a batch of stocks that have been oversold this year and have suffered steep losses. Strategists selected top-rated names to watch in an uncertain market. Here are the 21 stock picks poised for outsized moves in 2023.
9. Even with inflation, certain market moves can still deliver profits over the next year, according to Morningstar. The firm shared two trades that can bring 7% returns β and why the 60/40 portfolio strategy is starting to look attractive again.
10. ARK Invest's flagship fund has plunged to new five-year lows. Tesla stock's historic decline has dragged the ETF more than 80% from its February 2021 high. That represents a loss of roughly $20 billion in assets under management.
Newsletter 10 things Markets | 2022-12-21T12:24:37Z | www.businessinsider.com | Santa Rally for Stocks Looks Unlikely - and That's Bad News for 2023 | https://www.businessinsider.com/santa-rally-for-stocks-looks-unlikely-and-thats-bad-news-for-2023-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/santa-rally-for-stocks-looks-unlikely-and-thats-bad-news-for-2023-2022-12 |
The TUI flight was due to fly from Cape Verde to Manchester but was forced to stop to replace the crew.
Passengers on a TUI flight were delayed in Tenerife overnight due to staffing issues.
The plane was due to fly from Cape Verde to Manchester but was forced to stop to replace the crew.
Passengers were told airline staff had reached their maximum working hours, per the Liverpool Echo.
Passengers on a flight from Cape Verde to Manchester were stuck overnight in Tenerife in the Canary Islands after their plane made an unscheduled stop.
Shortly after the TUI flight took off on December 16, passengers were told the plane needed to make a stop because the crew had reached the maximum number of hours they were allowed to work, the Liverpool Echo reported.
All airline staff have mandated working hours to prevent them from working when fatigued. The maximum flying time for commercial pilots is 100 hours in 28 consecutive days, per the Civil Aviation Authority's (CAA) website.
The TUI crew was due to be replaced during the stop in Tenerife. Instead, passengers said they arrived at a largely deserted airport. The flight was then delayed overnight and passengers were taken to hotels on the island, one passenger told the Liverpool Echo.
A TUI representative told Insider that the airline had arranged hotels, transport, and food for all the passengers.
The passenger told the local news outlet: "The communication and co-ordination from TUI was embarrassing. We were not told where we were going. It was very disorganized and chaotic. There were about 150 of us and some people were visibly distressed and trying to organize plans back home."
A spokesperson for TUI told Insider: "We understand the frustration of customers on flight TOM439, who were delayed overnight in Tenerife."
They said: "We do our best to ensure customers get to and from their destinations on time, and we'd like to apologize for this inconvenience. Situations like this are rare, and we thank customers for their patience and understanding."
TUI flight Airline | 2022-12-21T12:24:49Z | www.businessinsider.com | Airline Passengers Spend Night in Wrong Country Due to Staffing Issues | https://www.businessinsider.com/tui-passengers-airline-wrong-country-flight-staffing-issues-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/tui-passengers-airline-wrong-country-flight-staffing-issues-2022-12 |
7 top bankers and investors share their boldest 2023 healthcare predictions, from a big bet on AI to more funding for startups selling directly to patients
Shelby Livingston and Rebecca Torrence
Initialized Capital/Bessemer Venture Partners/Andreessen Horowitz/Frist Cressey Ventures; Jenny Chang-Rodriguez/Insider
We asked top healthcare VCs and bankers to give us their boldest predictions for 2023.
Their predictions included new ways to use AI and more funding for direct-to-consumer startups.
See the full list of predictions below.
Hospital systems will lead the charge to innovate in 2023, Christopher Booker, a partner at Frist Cressey Ventures, predicts
Christopher Booker.
Frist Cressey Ventures
The COVID-19 pandemic has left many hospitals struggling. They've faced shortages of healthcare workers and big financial losses.
Meanwhile, hospital systems increasingly face competition from health insurers, retailers, and tech giants, which have begun to deliver medical care directly to patients in clinics and online.
In 2023, hospital systems will be forced to get creative and change up their clinical and business models because the status quo won't be sufficient, Booker said.
"You're going to see a lot of new projects, new initiatives, and new innovation coming out of these hospital systems in 2023," Booker said.
For some hospitals, that may mean shouldering more responsibility for the cost and quality of the care they deliver under novel "value-based" care arrangements, he said. Others may invest in new technology or push deeper into treating patients in their homes.
"They're going to do everything they can to get outside of their four walls of the hospital and try something different," Booker said.
The market downturn will create opportunities for more M&A, Devin Carty, the CEO of Martin Ventures, says
Devin Carty.
Martin Ventures
If 2021 was the year of big venture checks and wildly oversize valuations among healthcare startups, 2022 was when it all came crashing back to earth.
Amid surging interest rates and the rising cost of capital, digital-health funding tapered off this year, compared with record levels in 2021, when investors poured $29.1 billion into the healthtech market.
But the down economy will be an opportunity for venture-capital and private-equity firms, said Carty. His Nashville, Tennessee, venture-capital firm invests in and launches healthcare startups, including companies transforming primary care, such as Wellvana, or kidney care, such as Evergreen Nephrology.
Startups that raised money at the peak of the funding boom and burned through it may be forced to make tough decisions now that the market has normalized, Carty said. That could include raising capital on less favorable terms, he said. If they're not willing to do that, startups may explore combining with other organizations.
At the same time, investors have cash to spare, he said.
"You've got many venture firms or private equity firms that are raising mega funds and it's just going to create this opportunity for mergers, consolidations, and rollups in the healthcare startup, tech-enabled services space," Carty said.
Carty said Martin Ventures hasn't encouraged any of its startups to slow growth at the moment but has had conversations with each CEO about ensuring they have enough cash to get through the next couple of years.
So far in 2022, the firm invested in six new companies and nine startups already in its portfolio. Some of those investments were meant to provide a bridge for the startup to get through 2023 and into 2024, Carty said.
"We continue to deploy capital to companies that we believe in and care about, but they're not at marked-up valuations, so we see it as opportunistic as well," he said.
New artificial-intelligence technology will unlock more than $1 trillion of value in the healthcare industry by 2040, Morgan Cheatham, a vice president at Bessemer Venture Partners, bets
Morgan Cheatham.
There's a lot of buzz around generative artificial intelligence and what it can do for healthcare.
Cheatham is betting that the technology β a type of machine learning that can create data and other original content β will unlock more than $1 trillion in industry value by 2040.
"A lot of people are seeing how generative technology is transforming consumer social, gaming, art, and all of these other areas, and the applications in healthcare are going to be much bigger because of the amount of data and impact that we can drive with it," Cheatham said.
We're already seeing generative technology at work in healthcare, he said.
One startup Bessemer invested in, Abridge, is using the technology to combat provider burnout by turning audio from doctor-patient interactions into documentation for billing purposes, or a summary of the visit for the patient, he said.
Another company, Atropos Health, which spun out of Stanford Health Care in 2020, is leveraging generative AI to help answer doctors' clinical questions so they can deliver better care. The company generates evidence-based studies from hundreds of millions of old patient records.
Cheatham said other healthcare companies were thinking about how they could leverage generative AI to create product opportunities or become more efficient. He also predicted there would be an explosion of new companies formed to tackle problems using AI.
"You're seeing a lot of people using these technologies and exploring the bounds of it as it relates to healthcare and life sciences, and I think there's going to be a lot more work in this space in the next year," he said.
AI is ready for prime time in healthcare, and some startups could use the technology to diagnose patients, Jordan Nof, a cofounder and managing partner at Tusk Venture Partners, says
Jordan Nof.
Tusk Venture Partners
Healthcare's staffing crisis keeps getting worse, and it's affecting patients, who are now faced with diminishing access to care and longer wait times.
The staffing gaps are crushing other providers, too, who are forced to take on more patients and reporting increasing burnout.
Nof thinks something radical will have to be done in 2023 to solve physician burnout. There are a few solutions, he said β but he thinks artificial intelligence may be the key.
"We've been talking about AI in healthcare forever, but I don't think we've seen it in action in any real form," he said. "We'll be able to leverage AI in applications that are getting us to the point where they need FDA approval because they can make a clinical diagnosis."
Several healthcare solutions exist that use AI to analyze health data or patient scans to point out problems, and those technologies flag the findings to the clinician, who's then able to more quickly make a diagnosis.
But Nof said he thought AI in healthcare was advanced enough to make the diagnosis itself to a patient, which would classify the technology as a medical device and require Food and Drug Administration approval. That could give clinicians valuable time back to spend with the patient.
Nof said he believed those technologies would be applied to lab tests before moving to other areas of healthcare.
Direct-to-consumer healthcare startups with strong technology will still get venture backing in 2023, Parul Singh, an Initialized Capital partner, predicts
Parul Singh.
Kelly Mason
Healthcare startups that sell their products or services directly to patients, rather than through a third party like a hospital or health insurer, thrived earlier in the pandemic.
This year, as the hype died down and the market slumped, those direct-to-consumer businesses fell out of favor with investors as startups grappled with high customer-acquisition costs.
But Singh thinks the direct-to-consumer approach in healthcare is far from over.
"We still see cool companies every single week that are building stuff there, and it's really exciting for consumers," she said. "So we're really actively still looking there."
Singh pointed to Ro, a $7 billion company Initialized Capital first backed in its 2017 seed round. The patient-first approach that helped Ro take off, an approach that seeks to empower consumers and personalize their healthcare experience, is still driving innovations in patient care, Singh said.
She said she expected startups that sold diagnostics and companies that leveraged consumer health data, like by using artificial intelligence to analyze data from wearables like the Apple Watch, to nab investor attention in 2023.
"There's so much data, but what do you do with it?" Singh said. "And now we finally have the ability with AI to process that data and actually tell patients something really useful."
Several direct-to-consumer mental-health startups that took off earlier in the pandemic, like Cerebral and Elemy, have come under scrutiny this year as some say they put growth over quality of patient care.
Some mental-health and women's health startups will go public in the second half of the year, SVB Securities' Jon Swope says
Jon Swope.
2021 was a blockbuster year for digital-health exits. With the market flying high and record funding pouring into the sector, 23 US digital-health companies went public, with 15 of those companies exiting via an initial public offering, according to Rock Health.
This year, those exits were all but nonexistent. Only one digital-health company has gone public this year β Akili Interactive, in an August special-purpose-acquisition-company deal. As the market downturn progresses, other digital-health companies have put their IPO plans on hold.
But Swope thinks the second half of the year will see a handful of digital-health companies taking the plunge.
"It will be a nonzero number next year," Swope said of companies taking the IPO route. "It won't be 15, but the market will reopen, and there will be IPOs again."
Swope is a senior managing director of investment banking at SVB Securities and leads the firm's digital-health practice. He's worked on a number of IPO deals throughout his career.
He said he thought mental-health and women's health startups, especially those that serve patients by partnering with employers and health plans, would be in the best position to go public.
"For the companies that are weathering this storm in mental health and women's health, because those areas are still so important, broadly speaking, but also to their customers, the employers β there will be an opportunity for them to go public next year," he said.
Get ready for a surge of innovative startups focused on the ACA health-insurance marketplace, Julie Yoo, a general partner at Andreessen Horowitz, predicts
Julie Yoo.
A wave of innovative startups focused on the Affordable Care Act marketplace will surface in the coming years, Julie Yoo, a general partner at Andreessen Horowitz, said.
It takes about a decade for any big healthcare initiative to get the kinks out and start working well, and the ACA marketplace has finally reached that point, Yoo said.
There was a first crop of upstarts, such as Oscar Health, that attempted to innovate in that market, where about 14.5 million people get health coverage. Oscar, which has never turned a profit, now expects to do so in 2024.
Dominant health insurers, such as UnitedHealthcare and Aetna, that largely pulled out of the ACA marketplace in its volatile early years have since returned and are expanding their plans there.
To Yoo, the return of the incumbents signals that the ACA marketplace is here to stay, and companies now have an idea of how to make money in the business.
She expects new startups to capitalize on that stability, similar to how the private health-plan market for seniors, called Medicare Advantage, has seen a flood of interest from new companies. Andreessen has backed Devoted Health, a Medicare Advantage insurer, and Firefly Health, a startup that offers virtual-first health plans to small employers.
"We're going to see a resurgence of interest amongst upstarts, even though the first generation of pioneers really kind of had to struggle through building the business case for how they do this in a profitable fashion using technology," Yoo said.
Features Predictions | 2022-12-21T13:51:51Z | www.businessinsider.com | Healthcare Investors and Bankers Share 2023 Predictions | https://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-investors-and-bankers-share-2023-predictions-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-investors-and-bankers-share-2023-predictions-2022-12 |
The former crypto boss has been charged with eight counts, including wire fraud.
Bankman-Fried's lawyer in the Bahamas, Jerone Roberts, told reporters that his client had defied "the strongest possible legal advice" and agreed to extradition voluntarily, per The New York Times.
The disgraced former crypto boss has been charged with eight counts, including wire fraud.
US federal prosecutors have accused Bankman-Fried of misappropriating FTX customer funds, including using customer money to repay loans owed by Alameda Research, a separate company owned by Bankman-Fried. Prosecutors have also accused the FTX cofounder of defrauding lenders.
On Monday, he appeared in court in Nassau, the capital of the Bahamas. Per Reuters, he had to be awakened by a court official after closing his eyes during his extradition hearing.
Trending UK Sam Bankman-Fried ftx | 2022-12-21T13:52:03Z | www.businessinsider.com | SBF to Be Flown to the US From Private Airport With FBI Escort: Report | https://www.businessinsider.com/sam-bankman-fried-us-private-aport-fbi-escort-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/sam-bankman-fried-us-private-aport-fbi-escort-2022-12 |
'Zero-budget parties': Cost-cutting is coming for startups, and big office holiday parties are first on the list
Darius Rafieyan, Madeline Renbarger, and Samantha Stokes
VC and startup holiday parties are looking a little smaller this year in light of budget cuts.
For startup founders and venture capitalists, the office holiday party is a December tradition.
But poor financial forecasts for the new year are leading VCs to tell founders to cut costs fast.
Many are scaling back their parties, but some are finding creative ways to still celebrate.
For many venture capitalists and the startup founders they invest in, December is synonymous with two things: end-of-year paperwork and office holiday parties. Last-minute business is usually balanced with collegial cheer in a rented event venue or a restaurant featuring an open bar and lots of tinsel.
But this year, holiday parties in startup-land look a little different.
"Usually around this time, my social media blows up with pictures from holiday parties, but this year it's been radio silent," Oriana Papin-Zoghbi, the founder of the Y Combinator-backed ovarian-cancer-research startup AOA Dx, said.
After years of seemingly unstoppable growth, the "Patagonia vest recession" is upon us. From social media to e-commerce to enterprise software, once high-flying companies across the digital economy have been hit by a tidal wave of layoffs and forced to slash spending on beloved passion projects.
Meanwhile, venture capitalists have been warning of impending "death spirals" and instructing their portfolio companies to cut spending wherever possible, which now includes the beloved office holiday party. Today, with deal volume dwindling and many founders hesitant to raise new venture funding for fear of a dreaded "down round," holiday frugality can feel especially important.
"We're in a new world where you can't burn the same as you could before," Brian Hirsch, the founder and managing partner of Tribeca Venture Partners, said. He adds that cutting "burn rate," or the rate at which startups are spending down their cash reserves, which often fund end-of-year celebrations, has been the main topic of conversation at every board meeting he's attended in the past few months.
"Every investor, unless they're living on another planet, is advising their portfolio to cut spending," Hirsch said.
Some startups are opting for low- or zero-budget parties
Brooke Kiley, a partner at VMG, told Insider that questions about holiday parties have come up often in her conversations with founders, and she's advising startups to have fun even when on a budget.
"My biggest advice is that you can still do something special, meaningful, and impactful at a reasonable cost," she said, adding that teams should think about what's most important for their organization's culture, be it relationship-building or letting off steam.
"Align those goals with your holiday party, and you can do something powerful and cost-effective," she said.
For Nadya Okamoto, the 24-year-old cofounder of the consumer feminine-products company August, renting a venue as a small seed-stage startup was out of the question. Still, she and her team were able to host a "zero-budget" holiday party this December in their New York office by partnering with another startup, Wander and Ivy, an organic-wine producer, which catered the food and beverages.
She and her coworkers set up and broke down the decorations themselves, staying at the office until well past 10 the night before the party.
"We were sweeping floors, putting lights up with thumbtacks, and we ordered paper snowflakes," she said. "Our whole community knows we're scrappy, but it doesn't feel scrappy β they know how much we care about the company and the community."
Jessica Spivack Lowenstein, K50 Ventures' head of platform, said more intimate "micro parties" have been a way for her fund to still get its portfolio founders and investors together this year without breaking the bank.
"People are getting creative to find ways to get people together in fun ways that are less expensive," she said. "If companies and firms are doing it, it's smaller, so people are doing it for the team and not the full network β it's easier to connect with people because it's a small group."
Spivack Lowenstein shared that K50 Ventures opted to throw smaller, regional founder meetups in SΓ£o Paulo and Bogota, where many of their portfolio companies are based, in lieu of a large office party near their headquarters, since the firm had thrown a large event for New York Tech Week just a couple of months ago.
This has been the preferred party style for Artem Semjanow, the founder and CEO of the healthtech-AI startup Neatsy.ai. He told Insider that he opts to host a company-wide trip to a bathhouse around the holidays, a tradition the seed-stage startup can afford to continue this year because it only employs 12 people.
"There is a great place in the mountains where you, steamed from the bath, go down the water slide right into the icy mountain river," he said. "After that, you sit wrapped in towels in a large vat with decoction and look at the stars. Many good ideas were born during this."
Even virtual parties may not be enough to cut costs
Other founders, including AOA Dx's Papin-Zoghbi, are bringing back the "Zoom happy hours" of the pandemic era to accommodate their remote teams and save on big costs at the end of the year.
"In better market times, we would have done our team retreat in person," she said, but she still plans to make the party a fun break for her team by mailing them a care package beforehand of treats and games to play together on the call.
Erin Fabio, the founder of the creative agency Grit Studio, took a similar approach and decided to host a virtual wine tasting with a sommelier on Zoom for her team, she told Insider.
Sean Harper, the CEO of the venture-backed insurance startup Kin, said that he's been looking to make cuts wherever he can, because he's reluctant to raise more money in the current environment, where investments often come saddled with onerous terms and lower valuations.
"We need to be able to, you know, maintain our growth with our own resources," Harper said, "because I don't know if I'm gonna be able to go raise more equity."
But while holiday festivities may be an easy place to pare down expenses, Harper said it may not be enough for companies that are truly struggling.
"You should maybe cut some travel, maybe you don't have a big holiday party, but that's all drop in the bucket compared to head count," he said. "People are the most expensive."
Holidays Holiday | 2022-12-21T13:52:09Z | www.businessinsider.com | How VCs and Startups Are Cutting Back on Holiday Parties to Save Cash | https://www.businessinsider.com/vc-startups-cut-costs-recession-holiday-parties-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/vc-startups-cut-costs-recession-holiday-parties-2022-12 |
Eric Roberge
When we bought a house, for example, we set our price range so that the monthly mortgage would be less than what we were paying in rent. When we bought a car a few years ago, we planned ahead and saved for three years before paying in cash instead of financing the purchase and adding a car loan to our balance sheet.
We've spent almost a decade saving very large percentages of our income each year. We usually take upwards of 40% of our earnings and invest that money into long-term investments including our 401(k)s, HSAs, and brokerage accounts.
Putting away that much money into investments in the past has allowed us to have a lot of choice in what we do in the future. That includes having the wiggle room in our financial plan to make an adjustment like saving less, at least for this year.
Eric Roberge, CFP, is the founder of Beyond Your Hammock. He helps professionals in their 30s do more with their money and has shared his money tips with the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, CNBC, Forbes and MONEY Magazine. Follow Eric on Instagram @beyondfinances.
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saving money Budgeting Personal Finance Insider | 2022-12-21T14:13:04Z | www.businessinsider.com | A Financial Planner Explains Why He Plans to Save Less Money Next Year | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/financial-planner-save-less-money-next-year-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/financial-planner-save-less-money-next-year-2022-12 |
Since Elon Musk took over, Twitter's conduct has been "incredibly egregious," lawyer Shannon Liss-Riordan said.
A lawyer filed demands for arbitration on behalf of 100 Twitter employees who lost their jobs.
Since Elon Musk took over, Twitter's conduct has been "incredibly egregious," Shannon Liss-Riordan said.
She added that this was just the "first wave" of arbitration demands against the company.
A lawyer representing former Twitter staff says that the company's conduct has been "incredibly egregious" since new owner and CEO Elon Musk took over in late October.
Shannon Liss-Riordan on Tuesday filed 100 demands for arbitration on behalf of 100 former Twitter employees who lost their jobs and signed arbitration agreements after Musk bought the company, according to a press release from her firm, Lichten and Liss-Riordan.
"My firm has spoken with hundreds of Twitter employees who are seeking to preserve their rights and receive the compensation they are owed," Liss-Riordan said in a statement.
"The conduct of Twitter since Musk took over is incredibly egregious, and we will pursue every avenue to protect workers and extract from Twitter the compensation that is due to them."
She added that this was just the "first wave" of arbitration demands against the company. "More are coming," she said.
Liss-Riordan told Reuters that the workers had signed agreements saying they would bring legal disputes against the company in arbitration rather than in court, likely barring them from participating in the four pending class-action lawsuits she has already filed against Twitter.
The law firm said that Tuesday's filings incorporated claims that had already featured in the class-action suits, including accusing the company of breach of contract related to severance pay, of targeting female workers with layoffs, and of laying off staff on parental or medical leave in violation of federal law.
Some of the new filings also include claims that employees lost their jobs because Musk had placed "unreasonable demands" on the workforce.
After Musk's $44 billion takeover deal went through on October 27, he swiftly fired some of the company's top execs, including CEO Parag Agrawal and CFO Ned Segal.
The next week Musk started laying off staff, with around half of the company's 7,500-strong workforce being cut. Musk also began firing some workers who criticized him and his leadership of the company.
Remaining employees were then given an ultimatum. Staff were asked to respond to an email from Musk and commit to his vision for "Twitter 2.0," which he said would involve working "long hours at high intensity." Staff who didn't sign up by a certain cutoff time were laid off.
One of the pending class-action lawsuits filed by Liss-Riordan in California accused the company of pushing disabled employees to leave because they didn't feel they could meet the new performance standards. | 2022-12-21T15:27:08Z | www.businessinsider.com | Twitter's Conduct 'Egregious' Under Musk Takeover: Lawyer for Ex-Staff | https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-twitter-layoffs-liss-riordan-conduct-incredibly-egregious-firing-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-twitter-layoffs-liss-riordan-conduct-incredibly-egregious-firing-2022-12 |
Mutual of Omaha cost
Filing claims with Mutual of Omaha
Ideal customers
Mutual of Omaha vs. New York Life
Mutual of Omaha vs. Northwestern Mutual
Mutual of Omaha vs. Globe Life
Mutual of Omaha life insurance review
Since its founding in 1909 (by a medical student at Nebraska's Creighton University and his wife), Mutual of Omaha has evolved into a Fortune 500 company offering financial solutions and insurance coverage to over 5 million people across the country. It remains a big player in life insurance for good reason. A policy from MOH empowers individuals to leave loved ones with choices for navigating long-term financial futures, not expenses.
Life insurance plans from Mutual of Omaha
When steered by the right company, a life insurance policy becomes an investment vehicle for death and retirement. Mutual of Omaha boasts a wide range of life insurance products. Here's the rundown:
Term life insurance: This affordable choice offers coverage for a specific period (say, an individual's critical income-earning years) or purpose, like a home mortgage. Term life insurance is simple. It comes with a death benefit for a specific "term," carries no cash value, and remains the most affordable option. If the policy is not converted to a whole life insurance policy within the guidelines in your policy documents, it will expire, and no death benefit will apply.
Term Life Express: This is available for individuals ages 18-80 (with maximum age varying by state and risk class) in standard terms of 10, 15, 20, and 30 years. Death benefits begin at $25,000 and top out at $300,000. This option, available without a medical exam, comes with lower maximum coverage to offset the company's risk. In addition, Term Life Express offers an accelerated death benefit rider, unlike standard term life insurance policies. If the buyer can prove they will die within 24 months, buyers can withdraw up to 92% of the value in a lump-sum payment.
Term Life Answers: This policy is available for individuals ages 18-70, depending upon the term. Choose from 10, 15, 20, and 30 years, with coverage beginning at $100,000. A medical exam is required for qualified life insurance applicants.
Whole life insurance: This option offers stability via a handful of guarantees, including a minimum rate of return on cash value, plus premium rates that won't increase and death benefits that won't decrease, no matter how long you live (so long as premiums are paid). Interested buyers can add riders to protect their death benefit if they miss payments. Some buyers can convert term policies to whole life insurance with Mutual of Omaha.
Guaranteed Whole Life Insurance: As you might expect, the Guaranteed Whole Life Insurance product from Mutual of Omaha comes with guaranteed coverage with no medical exams or health-related questions. Like other no medical exam life insurance policies, not all interested buyers are qualified, and the payouts are limited. This policy is available for individuals ages 45-85, and benefits range from $2,000-$25,000. Premiums are also fixed for the life of your policy. This option allows the insured to access cash value and comes with a graded death benefit. If the insured suffers a non-accidental death within the initial two years, the beneficiary only receives premiums paid plus 10%. After the initial two years, the full death benefit becomes available in most states.
Universal life insurance: This type of permanent life insurance comes with a lifetime death benefit plus cash value along with the flexibility (and inherent risk) of fluctuating premiums and death benefits within certain limits. In other words, your monthly premium could increase or decrease based on market rates. Universal life insurance provides options for buyers who want a more significant death benefit if they live longer (and make more premium payments).
AccumUL Answers: AccumUL boasts a lifetime death benefit with payouts between $25,000 and over $1 million. Individuals ages 18-85 may qualify. With growing (tax-deferred) cash value over the life of your policy, the premium you choose determines how fast your death benefit grows, but it's not based on one limited death benefit. While this option is guaranteed to earn 2% annually, canceling or surrendering this policy within the first nine years may result in a surcharge.
Indexed universal life insurance: Another type of permanent life insurance, these flexible policies carry lifelong coverage but few guarantees. Enjoy the option of adjustable premiums and death benefits if your life situation changes. That said, the policy's cash value is tied to a specific index, which means it will rise and fall with said index. While floors and caps ultimately limit gains and losses, an IUL requires aggressive account management. So it's coupled with high account management fees.
Life Protection Advantage: This plan offers a fixed-interest cash value with no less than 0% downside protection. In the worst-case scenario, you can lose interest gains but not the premiums you paid). So you'd leave with exactly what you contributed. This option has a guaranteed minimum death benefit of $100,000 through age 90. Canceling a policy within 14 years may lead to surrender charges. Discussing these with your life insurance agent at the time of purchase is best.
Income Advantage: This plan is available to individuals ages 18-85 and has zero limits on coverage. It has more significant growth potential for cash value than Life Protection Advantage as it is tied to the S&P 500 and offers no less than 0% downside protection and a guaranteed rate of 2% interest on fixed premiums. Canceling a policy within 14 years may involve surrender charges.
Additional coverage options from Mutual of Omaha
When shopping for life insurance, add-ons and extras typically take shape as a rider. A rider is optional coverage, at additional cost, for circumstances not included in your standard policy. At Mutual of Omaha, a whopping 14 riders (spanning Overloan Protection to Waiver of Surrender Charges plus a dozen in between) allow for customizable coverage. Rider availability is dependent upon policy type.
Accidental death benefit rider: This rider provides additional benefits for accident deaths as opposed to illness or old age. It offers a minimum benefit of $10,000 with a maximum benefit based on the insured's age at the time of policy issuance.
Additional insured term rider: This rider offers an additional death benefit to the insured or up to four other individuals named on the policy, assuming they meet all requirements. It provides a minimum death benefit of $25,000 and a maximum benefit of two times the base value.
Child life insurance rider: The child coverage rider offers coverage for dependent children ages 15 days to 20 years (to be paid up until their 23rd birthday or until the insured turns 65. This is a term rider, meaning the covered children should buy permanent life insurance policies as adults. It comes with $1,000 minimum coverage and a $10,000 maximum, dependent upon the base life insurance plan.
Chronic illness rider: Chronic illness protection offers early access to death benefits to help pay for the costs associated with chronic illness. The insured must meet specific qualifications. The use of this rider is based on their ability to perform routine daily activities for 90 days. Physician certification is also required.
Critical illness rider: The critical illness rider provides early access to death benefits upon diagnosis of a physician-confirmed condition, including major organ failure, terminal cancer, or ALS (among others). Your life insurance agent can review the exact distribution of payments at the time of purchase or when used.
Disability rider: This rider provides a monthly benefit: the lesser of 1.5% of the issued face amount, $3,000 per month, or 60% of one's gross monthly income. It activates should the insured become disabled.
Guaranteed insurability rider: This insurability rider provides the option to increase coverage upon each eligible life event. Eligible life events include marriage, the birth/adoption of a child, or the third anniversary of a policy and every three years after). Increases of $10,00-$50,000 are available with this rider.
Lapse protection rider: This rider protects against policy lapses and the taxes incurred upon borrowing or withdrawing too aggressively against the policy. It is included in all policies for individuals aged 76 and younger.
Long-term care rider: The long-term care rider offers early access to the insured's death benefits to cover in-home or nursing home care costs. The insured must be aged 30-79 when the policy is issued.
How much does life insurance from Mutual of Omaha cost?
Ranked #3 in overall customer satisfaction according to the JD Power 2022 US Individual Life Insurance Study, Mutual of Omaha earns consistently high marks from customers based on five factors, including price.
Since life insurance costs are calculated based on an individual's age, health, and chosen coverage, prices run the gamut. While Mutual of Omaha's term life insurance rates are average, its Guaranteed Whole Life Insurance (the company's only whole-life option) is one of the industry's cheapest insurance plans.
At first glance, cheap rates and high payouts make term life insurance popular. That said, once the term expires, uncertainty prevails. There are no guarantees a term policy will convert to a whole-life policy. If it does, rates will no longer be locked, which means rising premiums.
How do I file claims with Mutual of Omaha?
Following the death of a loved one, contact Mutual of Omaha to begin the claims process. For individual coverage, call 888-493-6902. For employer-based coverage, call 800.775.8805 or use Mutual of Omaha's online form as a first step.
Before beginning, be sure you have the following details:
Policyholder's information (including dates of birth and death)
Insurance policy number
Beneficiary's information
Who are the ideal customers for Mutual of Omaha?
Individuals looking for extra layers of protection will find Mutual of Omaha's robust array of additional options a relief. Mutual of Omaha's life insurance riders provide peace of mind in an uncertain world.
Mutual of Omaha's diverse offerings go beyond traditional life insurance. For example, those who don't qualify for its more popular life insurance policies might be eligible for the Mutual of Omaha Accidental Death Insurance. It comes with up to $1,000,000 in available benefits and provides a low-cost alternative.
Are you in the market for traditional whole-life insurance? Then keep looking. Mutual of Omaha has minimal options in this department. The same goes for no-exam options that rival the price of conventional medical exam life insurance plans.
What does "no medical exam" mean with Mutual of Omaha?
Qualified buyers can purchase Term Life Express and Guaranteed Whole Life policies with no medical exam. However, as health-related questions are required to determine eligibility, being transparent about preexisting conditions is essential. Dishonesty can lead to a policy being canceled or death benefits being withheld. These rules apply to life insurance policies in general.
Compare Mutual of Omaha vs. New York Life
Qualifying New York Life customers can convert its policies to permanent life insurance. Remember, any conversion is processed as a new application. In other words, you still have to go through the underwriting process accounting for your age and health at the time of application. A whole life insurance policy from New York Life builds cash value very well early on. This leaves the insured options to bolster retirement income or borrow against the policy when needed, up to age 90. Unlike term policies, there's no expiration date. So no conversion is necessary. We recommend talking to your New York Life agent about riders to protect you should you miss a payment.
New York Life's Variable Universal Life Accumulator II comes with guaranteed death benefits and cash value that grow with the market. Market Wealth Plus offers buyers open to more risk the option of enhanced cash value accumulation. Quotes are unavailable online, and policy prices reflect life insurance agent commissions. One of the best things about New York Life is its knowledgeable agents trained to answer any questions you might have about its policies. The most significant difference is Mutual of Omaha focuses on term policies, no medical exam life insurance, and other death benefit policies. New York Life's life insurance plans are built for investment and long-term retirement planning.
Compare Mutual of Omaha vs. Northwestern Mutual
Northwestern Mutual is known for competitive pricing on whole life insurance for individuals of all ages and health risks. Its financial strength means policies build cash value early on (which equals quick access to more money). Variable universal insurance allows buyers to borrow tax-free or withdraw from the cash value, but at a cost: significant fees and considerable risk. Minimum death benefits range from $50,000 to $500,000.
Both Mutual of Omaha and Northwestern Mutual offer trusted life insurance plans and services with high financial strength ratings from sites like AM Best and S&P. Mutual of Omaha provides better options for buyers looking for easier application processes and lower death benefits. However, both companies offer accelerated death benefits, more comprehensive life insurance policies, etc.
Compare Mutual of Omaha vs. Globe Life
Affordable pricing on whole and term life insurance products
Available in all states except Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, and New York
Whole life insurance death benefits are limited
No options for investment or accelerated death benefits
No claims filing options online
Globe Life offers both term and whole life insurance with no medical exam. As you might expect, these policies come with significantly lower coverage limits (read $100,000 and $50,000 for term and whole life insurance, respectively) across the board. Term life insurance rates also increase with age, to the tune of once every five years when buying from Globe Life. Mutual of Omaha offers plans with set premiums to protect your budget and payout.
Those on limited incomes will appreciate low-cost options like burial insurance. Death benefits range from $5,000-$25,000, and these are solely used to cover funeral expenses or residual debts of the deceased. Overall, Mutual of Omaha caters to a diverse range of life insurance customers.
Life insurance companies are compared based on product quality, available insurance riders, net performance scores, pricing, and customer service. In addition, we look at the diverse range of life insurance products to compare death benefit plans with life insurance designed for long-term financial planning. Our opinions are wholly based on facts gathered.
Ensure you find the policy to fit your needs by shopping for life insurance with a qualified agent. Experienced life insurance agents can run quotes and advise you on premiums, life insurance loans, accelerated death benefits, and more.
What is life insurance? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
Like all insurance, life insurance is a safety net designed to protect your family with a lump-sum payout at the time of death. Modern life insurance policies offer the option to buy more coverage to be used on a set schedule. Some buyers use life insurance to save for retirement or pay medical bills for a terminal illness.
Life insurance benefits can cover a wide range of financial needs, from meeting final expenses following the death of a loved one to paying college tuition for a deceased's dependent minor or scheduling monthly mortgage costs.
What type and amount of life insurance do I need? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
Your unique situation dictates your life insurance needs. Consider things like monthly expenses and outstanding debts as a starting point. This online calculator is another valuable tool.
How much does life insurance cost? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
Life insurance options are available to fit almost every budget. Your choice will ultimately depend on where you are and what you have planned for the future. Generally speaking, annual premiums range from a couple of hundred dollars to several thousand, depending on your age, risk factors, and coverage options. The average life insurance customer makes payments monthly.
Hannah Van Sickle is a freelance writer who lives and works in the Berkshires of western Massachusetts. After a decade teaching English at public and private high schools, she made the switch to freelancing. Hannah works with college-bound seniors on their application essays and contributes regularly to Berkshire magazine and The Berkshire Edge; essays about her journey parenting daughters can be found at Refinery29, Modern Loss, and SheKnows.
Insurance Life Insurance Mutual of Omaha | 2022-12-21T15:27:26Z | www.businessinsider.com | Mutual of Omaha Life Insurance Review: Plans, Rates, Benefits, and FAQ | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/mutual-of-omaha-life-insurance-reviews | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/mutual-of-omaha-life-insurance-reviews |
Creator economy insiders share the 5 trends that could change the industry in 2023, from a flood of Gen X and millennial creators to a startup reckoning
Amanda Perelli, Sydney Bradley, Marta Biino, and Shriya Bhattacharya
Insider asked creator economy industry professionals to share their predictions for 2023.
Their predictions include more Gen X and millennial creators, and startups closing their doors.
See which trends to watch for in 2023 below.
2023 will be an adjustment year for the creator economy as it adapts to fears of a recession and to the potential consequences of an economic downturn.
Some influencers began developing strategies to stay afloat well before 2023. Creators and managers told Insider in November that business could take a hit if cash-strapped advertisers become pickier about who they sponsor.
Pamela Zapata, the CEO of talent-management firm Society18, told Insider that she is preparing for 2023 by looking to diversify her firm's offerings beyond influencer management, and expanding into helping brands execute deals.
But even with an impending downturn, social-media usage is still expected to rise. Insider Intelligence expects nearly 70% of Gen Z to use TikTok monthly in 2023, up from 64% in 2022.
We spoke with investors, influencer marketers, and industry experts, who shared their best predictions for the creator economy in 2023.
They expect to see more Gen X and millennial creators, more influencers who identify as YouTubers, and a shakeup in the startup sphere.
1. More creators β and more generations β will join the industry
Shannae Ingleton Smith, cofounder of talent-management firm Kensington Grey, predicted that TikTok would attract more Gen X and millennial creators as the platform continues to grow and expand in 2023.
"Gen Z will definitely continue to shine and continue to have their moment, but we are going to start to see some really huge rising stars that were not ever successful or big on Instagram or YouTube previously that will start from scratch on TikTok and become super-star huge," Ingleton Smith said.
She's recently seen people like the actress Julia Fox talk about "the glamorization of aging" as a new TikTok trend, for example.
YouTube; Rachel Mendelson/Insider
YouTube, in particular, could see a new wave of creators.
"In 2023, I think we're going to see a record number of creators identify as YouTubers for the first time," said Lia Haberman, adjunct marketing professor at UCLA Extension. "Shorts lowered the barrier to entry for creators who never saw themselves as part of that ecosystem and the addition of AdSense payouts for short-form videos makes the platform so much more appealing. For professional creators, YouTube is currently the best bet for a sustainable income through predictable content distribution."
Zack Honarvar, founder of talent-management firm One Day Entertainment, predicted that more creators would hire larger production and business-development teams. He also said he believes that there will be a nostalgic return to "old" YouTube formats like vlogging, and that content will become more global, such as dubbed videos in foreign markets.
Non-US creators could also become more popular next year, said Josh Glodoveza, SVP of talent at merch company Fanjoy.
"With technology being more available in the next few years in different countries, we're going to see a more global idea of a creator," he said.
2. Creators will expand their content beyond photos and short-form video
Darren Lachtman, cofounder of digital-production company Brat, predicted creators would continue to expand into podcasts as they look to grow their audiences across multiple platforms.
"We will continue to see the evolution from just pure audio into more 'vodcast' productions as creators blend audio and video," he wrote to Insider. "This format allows creators to post the same content across various platforms."
More creators may also develop strategies for livestreaming next year, predicted Christen Nino De Guzman, founder of startup Clara.
"When I worked at TikTok, livestreaming was huge for the Chinese version of TikTok, and they tended to see many trends originate first in China and the US would follow shortly after," she said.
Similarly, Haberman thinks that there will be more education around helping platforms, retailers, marketers, and creators find new ways to connect with audiences and get more potential customers into the funnel, especially when it comes to livestreaming.
Livetreaming takes a different set of skills and talent than "staging the perfect photo op or storyboarding a 20-second video clip," she said.
But creators who develop those skills may be able to hold audiences' attentions for longer.
"Creators who can be on live for hours at a time are going to start doing really well, because it's more than just scrolling through content," said Julian Andrew, founder of the influencer talent-management firm Talentiish. "People want more long-form content, so just keeping someone's attention on live will become a trend in 2023."
3. Live shopping could finally have its moment in the US
Industry insiders may have been premature in declaring 2022 the year of social and live shopping.
While a number of social-media platforms have launched new shopping features, some platforms like Meta and TikTok have reevaluated their plays in this space. Live-shopping startups, such as Popshop Live, have also had to cut costs as the market soured this year.
2023 could be different, though.
Viral Nation cofounder Joe Gagliese said he thinks that the market is bound to grow, citing how live shopping was a $300 billion market in China as of 2021 (according to Insider Intelligence data).
"Both people and brands have come to realize that streaming not only serves for entertainment, but creates profit as well," he said.
Adoption in the US market may be an uphill battle, however.
Insider Intelligence found that US customers have been slow to adopt live shopping and other social commerce methods. According to an October survey by Insider Intelligence, 43% of US adults said that they "have neither engaged in livestream commerce nor are interested in doing so."
eMarketer/Insider Intelligence
But broader social commerce could have a moment as more and more people make purchases via platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok.
"The creator-guided shopping experience will become the preferred way to shop for more people because it's efficient in saving time and money and more personalized," said Amber Venz Box, cofounder and president of the shopping app LTK.
4. Some creator economy startups might close their doors
This past year, layoffs have been rampant in the creator economy, as companies like Patreon and Jellysmack reacted to the economic slowdown by letting employees go. Nick Chen, cofounder of creator-monetization startup Pico, said that the negative impacts on startups will not only continue in 2023, but could become worse.
"A lot of creator startups are going to die next year," he said. "Venture capitalists think this isn't the time to be betting on the creator economy, so the next nine months will be really tough."
Since many startups came into the space at the height of the pandemic, Chen thinks that some will run out of money in the next three to six months, especially because venture-capital funding has been more difficult to come by this year compared to 2020 and 2021. As a result, some startups running low on cash could decide to close their doors permanently.
Qianna Smith Bruneteau, founder of the American Influencer Council, said she believes that some creator startups will have a tough time surviving.
"Many of them will fail because they raised at insane valuations that they can't keep up with, and a lot of them struggle to acquire a user base," she said.
Several experts pointed to the link-in-bio space as one category where doors could shutter. Cynthia Ruff, creator and founder of Hashtag Pay Me, said that she wouldn't be surprised if the space "lost 10 link-in-bio companies" this coming year.
However, Chen predicts that the economy might pick back up in Q4 2023, at which time startups that are still around could replenish their purses.
"I think we'll recover by Labor Day, if startups can wait until then to fundraise," Chen said.
5. Meanwhile, there could be an M&A frenzy on the horizon
As a result of the tougher macroeconomic environment, a looming recession, and a funding chill, the startup space could experience a wave of dealmaking and consolidation.
"Depressed valuations and multiples mean that most acquisition targets are effectively 'on sale,'" said Alex Zirin, an associate at consulting firm RockWater Industries. "As a result, institutional acquirers, like private-equity firms who still have dry powder to spend, will start snatching up mid-to-large sized creator startups at much more advantageous prices."
Heading into the new year, industry experts are eyeing saturated niches within the creator economy, such as link-in-bio companies or fintech solutions for creators.
"From the creator's end, there's just so many choices," said Avi Gandhi, founder of the advisory firm Partner with Creators. "The odds that they're going to pick your service β or any given service β are suddenly exponentially lower, and sometimes they're not even picking a service because it's overwhelming."
Influencers Creators | 2022-12-21T15:27:44Z | www.businessinsider.com | Top 5 Creator Economy and Influencer Marketing Trends to Watch in 2023 | https://www.businessinsider.com/top-2023-creator-economy-influencer-marketing-trends-predictions | https://www.businessinsider.com/top-2023-creator-economy-influencer-marketing-trends-predictions |
"This potential recession is the most anticipated in modern history," says Michael Arone.
In a recent note, the SPDR strategist shared 3 ways investors can prepare for the downturn.
Arone also said the market's recovery could come before the recession is over.
The bad news for investors in 2023, according to Michael Arone, is that a recession is likely to hit the US economy.
The good news is that the market's recovery could come quick.
"This potential recession is the most anticipated in modern history," said Arone, the chief investment strategist of State Street Global Advisors' US SPDR business, in a recent client note. State Street Global Advisors currently has $3.2 trillion in assets under management.
"Wildly, when it finally arrives, investors may breathe a welcome sigh of relief and begin looking ahead to the inevitable recovery," he continued. "Before the economic, earnings, and job market data hit rock bottom, investors will have already begun to price in the next phase of the economic cycle."
To prepare investors for that recession and subsequent recovery, Arone shared a three-part strategy.
How to structure your portfolio for a recession β and subsequent market recovery
The first is to step into stocks that pay high dividend yields. This will allow investors to defend against ongoing downside risk until the economic outlook materially improves.
"Given that dividend payments are more stable than stock price movements β providing an income cushion for total return β dividend strategies have had reduced drawdowns and lower volatility during bear markets, on average," Arone said. "In the 13 bear markets since 1960, high dividend stocks outperformed low dividend paying firms, as well as the broad market by an average of 12% and 8%, respectively."
The below chart shows high-dividend stocks' outperformance during downturns.
What's more, Arone said, is high-dividend stocks also outperform in high-inflation environments like the current one. When inflation is 3.25% or higher β right now the CPI sits at 7.1% β high-dividend stocks beat low-dividend stocks and the market as a whole.
The Vanguard High Dividend Yield ETF (VYM) is one way to gain exposure to high-dividend stocks.
Second, Arone said he likes short-duration Treasury bonds as well as investment-grade corporate bonds.
This is because they now offer more attractive yields relative to longer-duration bonds thanks to Federal Reserve tightening, and have limited risk exposure to rates rising dramatically thanks to their short duration.
"Higher rates have created attractive defensive yield opportunities on the short end of the curve β namely Treasurys with less than one-year of maturity given the recent inversion of the 3-month and 10-year yield spread," he said. "An aggressive Fed and the likelihood for more rate hikes to come mean yields on 3β12 month T-bills are now higher than those of all different tenors. And given the maturity band, the rate risk for this exposure is minimal, as shown in the following chart."
The Goldman Sachs Access Treasury 0-1 Year ETF (GBIL) and the SPDR Portfolio Short Term Corporate Bond ETF (SPSB) are two ways to gain exposure to shorter-duration bonds.
And third, Arone said to look to "discarded," or undervalued markets. For him, that has a variety of meanings.
One is non-US stocks, which he says have attractive valuations.
"Non-US equities now trade at 12.17 times next year's earnings, 20% below their historical median average of 14.94," he said. The broader US market, meanwhile, is still valued above its historical average.
Some pockets within US stocks, however, are also undervalued, he said. For instance, he likes small-cap stocks. The same is true for various markets around the world, like emerging markets.
The below chart shows areas of the market most undervalued relative to history.
Semiconductor stocks are also historically undervalued, Arone said.
The SPDR Portfolio S&P 600β’ Small Cap ETF (SPSM), the Schwab Emerging Markets Equity ETF (SCHE), and the VanEck Semiconductor ETF (SMH) offer exposure to the areas above.
Investing 2023 outlook | 2022-12-21T15:44:20Z | www.businessinsider.com | Where to Invest in 2023 for Returns As US Sees Recession: State Street | https://www.businessinsider.com/2023-outlook-where-to-invest-recession-stock-market-returns-spdr-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/2023-outlook-where-to-invest-recession-stock-market-returns-spdr-2022-12 |
Take a look at the sold-out $11,500 smart toilet that features Alexa, surround sound speakers, and LED mood lighting
Kohler's Numi 2.0 smart toilet includes a built in Amazon Alexa, surround sound speakers, and customizable LED lighting.
Courtesy of Kohler
Kohler's Numi 2.0 smart toilet has launched with a starting price of $8,625.
Numi 2.0 includes a built-in Amazon Alexa, surround sound speakers, and customizable LED lighting.
The out-of-stock toilet comes more than two years after Kohler's unveiled its design.
Kohler's "intelligent toilet" known as the Numi 2.0 is finally for sale after it was first unveiled in 2019.
The Numi 2.0 toilet starts at a whopping $8,625, though customers can pay up to $11,500 with installation.
The highly anticipated smart toilet includes a built-in Alexa smart speaker with voice controls so users can check the weather and listen to music when nature calls.
It also includes built-in surround sound speakers, ambient LED colored lighting, a heated seat, a lid that automatically opens and closes, a bidet, and personalized cleansing and air-dryer features.
Kohler says the smart toilet was designed to "create a fully-immersive experience for homeowners."
The Kohler Numi 2.0 smart toilet was unveiled at the 2019 Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas.
David Becker /Getty Images
These features are controlled using a handheld remote, though the sound features can be managed through the Kohler Konnect app, according to the Kohler's homeowner's guide for the toilet. Users can even use Spotify on a personal device as a remote control.
Kohler did not say whether the toilet can connect with other smart home devices.
The launch comes after Kohler discontinued its first Numi smart toilet, which included wireless bluetooth features.
The Numi 2.0 was out of stock on Kohler's website at the time of writing, though the product listing mentions it may still be available at local stores or Kohler showrooms.
NOW WATCH: All the ways Amazon is taking over your house
smart toilet Amazon Alexa Kohler | 2022-12-21T15:44:32Z | www.businessinsider.com | $11,500 Smart Toilet With Alexa, Mood Lighting Sells Out | https://www.businessinsider.com/kohler-luxury-smart-toilet-with-alexa-bidet-led-mood-lighting-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/kohler-luxury-smart-toilet-with-alexa-bidet-led-mood-lighting-2022-12 |
21 real-estate startups to bet your career on in 2023
Andrew Luong and Justin Kasad/Doorvest, Carter Malloy/AcreTrader, Koda Wang/Block Renovation, Tyler Le/Insider
Thousands of proptech employees were laid off in 2022 because of industry-wide struggles.
With the new year approaching, many workers will be looking for new opportunities.
Insider created this list of proptech startups that have all the makings of future success.
The word of the year for proptech startups is β¦ layoffs.
Thousands of employees at companies like Zillow, Redfin, and Opendoor found themselves looking for new opportunities as the real-estate market cooled because of rising interest rates, stubborn inflation, and lower homebuyer demand after a pandemic-driven frenzy.
Even so, there were plenty of companies that continued innovating different aspects of homebuying, from pioneering "fix-now, pay-later" models for home renovations to digitizing the closing process. Some startups also helped investors diversify their portfolios with new assets like farmland and timberland, while others focused on providing a better rental experience for renters and landlords alike.
The companies mentioned in this list have been able to raise capital from investors and avoid conducting large layoffs despite the predictions of economists who foretell a tough road ahead for the real-estate industry in 2023. This list is not meant to be all-inclusive, but instead offers a glimpse at some of the bright spots of the real-estate industry.
In other words, these companies β which are listed alphabetically β could separate themselves from the pack in 2023.
Carter Malloy, the founder and CEO of AcreTrader.
Headquarters: Fayetteville, Arkansas
Total funding: $80 million, according to the company
What it does: AcreTrader is working to improve the financial health of America's farmers by giving investors a place to invest in farmland. It offers investors access to an asset that is typically hard to get into, and gives farmers a way to raise capital without having to get a loan from a bank.
Why it's a good bet: The company expanded considerably in 2022 and now has more than 100 farms under its investment umbrella. It also closed on a $60 million Series B funding round in February, which let it expand into timberland and acquire AgValuation, a web-based company that appraises farmland values.
Alfred cofounders, CEO Marcela Sapone, left, and COO Jessica Beck.
Hello Alfred
Headquarters: New York
Total funding: $144.8 million, according to Crunchbase
What it does: Alfred, also known as Hello Alfred, is a one-stop shop for all things that renters need to live comfortably in their apartment buildings. The app can help renters request maintenance, pay their bills, or even order takeout from their favorite restaurants. It's available in 52 markets across the country and supports more than 300,000 residents, according to the company's website.
Why it's a good bet: Alfred has partnered with some of the nation's largest landlords like Greystar to offer its services. This year, the company raised more than $125 million and acquired RKW Residential, which will allow the company to expand into the single-family-rental market.
Ryan Frazier, the cofounder and CEO of Arrived Homes.
Lisi Wolf Photography
Headquarters: Seattle
Total funding: $135 million, according to the company
What it does: Arrived Homes is a real-estate-investment platform that allows people to buy a share of an investment property for as little as $100. This model dramatically reduces the initial investment capital needed to enter the real-estate market, which is one of the most prohibitive factors of real-estate investing.
Why it's a good bet: While real-estate-investment activity soured because of high interest rates, Arrived Homes expanded its investment offerings into vacation rentals in popular cities like Joshua Tree, California, and Scottsdale, Arizona. There are about 16,000 active investors on its platform, and each home the company owns attracts up to 500 investors, according to the company.
Ankur Jain, Bilt Rewards' founder and CEO.
What it does: The unicorn Bilt Rewards, valued at $1.5 billion, according to the company, is a loyalty program where renters can earn points and build their credit scores by paying rent. Rewards points can then be redeemed for personal expenses or accrue toward a down payment on a home.
Why it's a good bet: The company raised $150 million in October as other proptech companies were conducting layoffs because homebuying demand was at an all-time low. Other large companies are also looking to change the way rent is paid, which is a sign that Bilt Rewards is entering an emerging market ahead of the curve.
Block Renovation
Koda Wang, the CEO of Block Renovation.
Courtesy of Block Renovation
Total funding: $104 million, according to Crunchbase
What it does: Block Renovations seeks to simplify the home-renovation process with its digital platform and network of licensed contractors. The company gives homeowners a design-build experience by helping them design their perfect project and select the right contractor for the job.
Why it's a good bet: The company is run by Koda Wang, who was an executive for The Huffington Post and Rent the Runway, and Luke Sherwin, who cofounded the mattress company Casper. It also has backing from SoftBank's Vision Fund and Spencer Rascoff, the cofounder of Zillow.
CompStak's CEO and cofounder, Michael Mandel, left, and chief technology officer and cofounder, Vadim Belobrovka.
Courtesy of CompStak
What it does: CompStak is one of the first public databases for commercial-real-estate-transaction information, which allows investors and analysts to get a more granular view of local markets.
Why it's a good bet: Commercial real estate continues to be a hot commodity despite the economic challenges posed by high interest rates and low construction activity. CompStak is also run by industry veterans who together have more than two decades of experience.
Crexi
Mike DeGiorgio, the founder and CEO of Crexi.
Courtesy of CREXi
Total funding: $54 million, according to Crunchbase
What it does: Crexi is the Zillow of commercial real estate. The website has listing data, deal comps, lease information, and details about local auctions.
Why it's a good bet: Crexi partnered with other leading multiple-listing services like My State MLS in November, which helped expand its current listings to more than 500,000 and grew its active user base to more than 2 million monthly users.
CrowdStreet
Total funding: $67.9 million, according to Crunchbase
What it does: CrowdStreet is an investment platform that helps retail investors access the commercial-real-estate market without spending a boatload of cash. Investors can contribute to individual multifamily projects or allocate funds to multi-asset portfolios.
Why it's a good bet: The company recently raised $43 million in a Series C round from proptech heavyweights such as Rally Ventures and The Dinerstein Companies. It is also expanding into wealth management, giving the company another avenue to earn revenue during a tough economy for proptech companies.
Rick Rudman, the CEO of Curbio.
Courtesy of Curbio
Headquarters: Potomac, Maryland
What it does: Curbio is pioneering a "fix-now, pay-later" model for home renovations, which can be both time-consuming and expensive. The company walks homeowners through the entire renovation process, from estimate to payment.
Why it's a good bet: Curbio was named among the 500 fastest-growing companies in North America after growing by 913% between 2018 and 2021, according to the global consulting firm Deloitte. The company also offers generous benefits like performance bonuses and unlimited PTO, according to Glassdoor.
Dealpath
Mike Sroka, the CEO of Dealpath.
Headquarters: San Francisco
What it does: Dealpath is a cloud-based platform that aims to help real-estate owners, developers, and brokers manage property acquisitions with real-time market data.
Why it's a good bet: Dealpath raised $43 million in a Series C round from backers like Morgan Stanley and JLL despite real-estate-transaction volume dwindling because of high interest rates and low homebuyer demand. The company also has several big-name clients ranging from Oxford Properties to Blackstone.
Doorvest
Doorvest cofounders Andrew Luong, left, and Justin Kasad.
Total funding: $97.5 million, according to the company
What it does: Doorvest is an all-in-one digital real-estate-investing platform that helps investors locate good deals, renovate homes that have been purchased, and manage investment properties.
Why it's a good bet: As other companies like Zillow and Redfin exited the iBuying sector, Doorvest was able to raise money and expand its platform to Sunbelt markets with growing rental bases like Arizona.
EasyKnock
Jarred Kessler, the CEO of EasyKnock.
Courtesy of EasyKnock
What it does: EasyKnock is pioneering a sale-leaseback model that allows homeowners to sell their homes to the company and then lease it back as renters while they use the cash gained from the deal to pursue their financial goals.
Why it's a good bet: The company's business model allows homeowners to cash out their home equity during market downturns. EasyKnock is also planning on expanding and raising new venture capital in 2023, the company's CEO told Mortgage Professional America.
Endpoint Closing
Scott Martino, the CEO of Endpoint.
Headquarters: El Segundo, California
What it does: Endpoint Closing is a digital title and settlement company that seeks to streamline the closing process for homebuyers and real-estate agents.
Why it's a good bet: Endpoint is currently available in 36 states and plans to grow its footprint to 43 states by the end of 2022. The company also launched a platform in August that will make it easier for other proptech companies to partner with Endpoint going forward.
Funnel Leasing's cofounders, chief technology officer, Mike O'Toole, left, and CEO Tyler Christiansen.
Courtesy of Funnel Leasing
Headquarters: Odessa, Florida
What it does: Funnel Leasing is a rental-management-software company that simplifies the process of leasing apartments by centralizing all of the pertinent information that renters need to pick their next place to live in one digital platform.
Why it's a good bet: A growing number of renters are choosing to keep renting instead of pursuing homeownership as home prices continue to rise. Funnel Leasing's platform has also been adopted by large rental-property owner-operators like Essex Property Trust.
TheGuarantors
Julien Bonneville, the founder and CEO of TheGuarantors.
Courtesy of TheGuarantors
What it does: TheGuarantors is a technology company that offers services like rent and damage protection to residential and commercial real-estate landlords.
Why it's a good bet: CEO Julien Bonneville told Commercial Observer in November that the company has doubled in size over the past two years. The company's technology is also used in more than 3 million apartments nationwide, and it has insured more than $1.5 billion in rent.
HappyCo cofounders Andrew Mackenzie-Ross, left, and Jindou Lee.
Courtesy of HappyCo
What it does: HappyCo is a real-estate-software company that gives property managers, lenders, and investors real-time in-unit data about the performance of more than 3.5 million rental properties.
Why it's a good bet: HappyCo is backed by proptech heavyweights like Camber Creek and has expanded its footprint in North America by acquiring Yuhu, one of Canada's largest rental life-cycle-management companies, in November.
Hometap
Jeff Glass, the CEO of Hometap.
Headquarters: Boston
What it does: Hometap buys a portion of homeowner's equity, which allows homeowners to use their equity to pursue their financial goals without taking on new debt through a home-equity line of credit or refinancing their mortgage with a bank. The homeowner has 10 years to repay Hometap, including when the property is sold.
Why it's a good bet: Hometap grew its customer base by about three times by partnering with small businesses in the first quarter of 2022, according to the company. It also doubled its employee count and expanded its footprint to 18 states in 2022.
Mynd
Doug Brien, the CEO of Mynd.
Headquarters: Oakland, California
What it does: Mynd is a software company that helps investors and first-time homebuyers find and buy single-family-rental properties in 25 markets across the country using its digital platform.
Why it's a good bet: The company has nearly doubled its single-family-property portfolio over the past 12 months and expanded its footprint into fast-growing single-family markets like Indianapolis; Nashville, Tennessee; and Jacksonville, Florida.
Eddie Lim, the CEO of Point.
What it does: Point's flagship home-equity-investment product allows homeowners to sell a stake of their equity in exchange for cash. Homeowners are not obligated to pay Point back for 30 years, similar to how mortgages work.
Why it's a good bet: Point was founded by Alex Rampell, a general partner at Andreessen Horowitz and a cofounder of the buy-now, pay-later company Affirm. The company also serves more than 5,000 customers and sealed a $120 million Series C round in early 2022.
Nick Romito, the cofounder and CEO of VTS.
What it does: VTS, valued at $1.7 billion, is a commercial real estate life-cycle-management and marketing company that is trusted by more than 45,000 real-estate brokers and asset managers across the globe.
Why it's a good bet: VTS raised $125 million in September from commercial-real-estate behemoths like CBRE, Fifth Wall, and Trinity Ventures at a time when commercial property prices and office usage were both declining. It also hired a new chief technology officer on December 1 to help expand its tech offerings.
Abhijeet Dwivedi, the founder and CEO of ZeroDown.
What it does: ZeroDown is a rent-to-own company that will buy a home for a homebuyer and then rent it back to them for a monthly payment that goes toward an eventual down payment. Homeowners have three years to buy the home from ZeroDown.
Why it's a good bet: The company is supported by investors such as Y Combinator and Goodwater Capital, both of which are very active in the proptech space. It also plans to take on Zillow and Redfin with its home search engine. | 2022-12-21T16:58:18Z | www.businessinsider.com | 21 Real-Estate Startups to Bet Your Career on in 2023 | https://www.businessinsider.com/21-real-estate-startups-to-bet-your-career-on-2023-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/21-real-estate-startups-to-bet-your-career-on-2023-2022-12 |
How to set and achieve your career goals for the new year
With 2023 upon us, many people will be setting goals, both personal and professional, for the new year.
But New Year's resolutions aren't just for personal goals. It's a great time to set professional goals for the year ahead.
A new year is upon us, which means it's officially goal-setting season.
"It's important to set goals because if you don't, it's like trying to get somewhere without putting directions into a GPS," says career coach Chelsea Stokes.
"Ask yourself, 'How is my career supporting my ideal life? What do I want my ideal life to look like?' Then reverse-engineer your career goals from that," Stokes said.
Some of the most common professional goals are getting promoted or landing a new job. If that's one of your goals, consider the skills you need to improve to achieve that.
"Some companies will have published competencies for various levels of seniority," says Kendall Berg of That Career Coach. "In the absence of published expectations, have a meeting with your boss where you discuss your desire to move to the next level and solicit feedback regarding any performance or competency gaps that they see between you and those operating at the next level. Ask for specific examples and use that feedback to set your goals for the following year."
"A lot of people set goals because they think they should, or they're comparing themselves to somebody else, but they're not actually thinking about their intention behind those goals," Stokes said. "Thinking about why you want to set this goal, how will it change your life, how will it impact the people around you, what is the purpose behind it β this can not only help you set more specific goals for yourself, but it'll also help to keep you motivated throughout the year."
It's also important to be specific with what you want to achieve.
An example from Berg: "Rather than saying 'Revolutionize the operations process,' be specific: 'Revamp Operations Fulfillment Process to drive a 15% efficiency gain across the team and improve employee satisfaction 1 point.' The latter is clear, measurable, and possible to attain within a year."
Finding the sweet spot between being too safe and too ambitious can be tricky. Aim for goals that are "slightly uncomfortable, but something that your brain can still get on board with," Stokes said.
"A lot of people go from 0 to 100 and try to go overboard at the start of the year and then just get overwhelmed," Stokes said. "It's better to limit yourself to an amount of goals that feels manageable and sustainable and then go after those goals and if you reach them, you can set a new one."
Check in on your progress quarterly. Don't be afraid to adjust your goals or their timelines later as you better understand your priorities, or as your priorities shift, says Stokes.
Keeping a "kudos folder" where you log any praise, achievements, or small wins along the way can help you monitor your progress; Stokes also recommends using project management tools. You may also consider sharing your goals with a close friend who can help hold you to them.
"For each of your major goals, you should be tracking deliverables all year long that will impact your ideal outcome," Berg said. "I like to keep mine in an excel with a Category (which high-level goal it impacts), Task, Groups Collaborated With, Lead, Success (yes or no), and Impact. Then continue to measure the outcomes (money saved, number of projects, percent efficiency improved, etc.) so that you can clearly articulate the value of your time and efforts."
Careers Career goals Goals | 2022-12-21T16:58:24Z | www.businessinsider.com | How to Set and Achieve Your Career Goals for 2023: Expert Tips | https://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-set-career-goals-for-new-year-expert-tips-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-set-career-goals-for-new-year-expert-tips-2022-12 |
Newly unsealed surveys, completed by female Nike employees in 2018, describe a "boys' club" culture.
Insider on Tuesday first reported on unsealed employee surveys that rocked the company in 2018.
Nike in 2018 attributed innapropriate behavior to an "insular group of high-level managers."
The surveys described sweeping problems, including "normalized negative ... sexist behavior."
In 2018, allegations of a "boys' club" culture rocked Nike.
On Tuesday, Insider first reported on the never-before-seen employee surveys that played a key role in bringing the allegations to light and prompting Nike's ongoing work to become more inclusive.
Ten of the surveys are now in the public record, after a successful court challenge by Insider, in partnership with the Oregonian and Portland Business Journal.
The surveys, written by female Nike employees in 2018, detail graphic allegations such as witnessing a male executive receiving oral sex from a lower-ranking employee, "sloppy drunk" men putting their arms around coworkers on business trips, and workplace affairs. And they describe a pressure-cooker environment where women felt they were treated as inferior and called "bitch," "honey," and "girls." In several multi-page surveys, female employees said the behavior contributed to an "overarching" theme of "normalized negative, manipulative and sexist behavior" at the company.
"When I received this questionnaire, I asked several of my female coworkers what they thought of working at Nike," one female employee wrote in a survey. "I asked how fairly they were treated based on performance vs gender. All unanimously talked about the 'the Boys Club' of Nike. A giant men's sports team, where favoritism prevails and females couldn't possibly play in the sandbox."
Another survey described a meeting where an executive pounded his fists and screamed "to the point spit was coming out of his mouth" in front of 10 employees.
"The network of men hold unwritten rules that define insider vs outsiders," the survey respondent wrote in two pages of typed, detailed concerns. "They get to decide who is successful and who is not. Females at this company have felt very little power to change a culture and environment that has been and continues to be disrespectful to women. Even women are disrespectful to women without consequence. This company must lay a new foundation and it must start at the highest level of the organization."
In 2018, in response to questions from The New York Times, which reported on Nike's culture, Nike attributed inappropriate behavior at the company to an "insular group of high-level managers, in pockets of the organization," who "protected each other and looked the other way."
An attorney for plaintiffs in an ongoing gender discrimination lawsuit against Nike said the surveys show problematic behavior at the company wasn't isolated.
"It wasn't limited to one vertical or one department," Laura Salerno Owens, the lead attorney for the plaintiffs, said. "And it wasn't limited to one manager. This was a common experience throughout the company."
Nike declined to answer written questions from Insider about the surveys, including whether it stood by its earlier characterization of the behavior being limited to an "insular group of high-level managers."
The company has since taken a series of steps to become more inclusive, including pay adjustments, changing its hiring process, overhauling its compensation system, and disclosing more information about the demographics of its workforce.
Read the full Insider story.
Sportswear Retail Workplace | 2022-12-21T16:58:30Z | www.businessinsider.com | Nike Employees Described 'Boys' Club' Culture in Unsealed Surveys | https://www.businessinsider.com/nike-employees-described-boys-club-culture-in-unsealed-surveys-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/nike-employees-described-boys-club-culture-in-unsealed-surveys-2022-12 |
Happy Money
Should I consolidate credit card debt?
How do I get a credit card consolidation loan?
Credit card consolidation loans are personal loans used to pay down multiple credit card balances and simplify your debt into one fixed monthly payment. They also can reduce the overall cost of your debt by offering lower interest rates than those you pay on your credit cards.
Here are our picks for the best personal loans for credit card consolidation.
Payoff Loanβ’
Origination fee between 0% and 5%
7.99% - 29.99% APR
No prepayment or late fees
Low minimum credit score requirement
Slow access to funds
Limited loan purpose
Origination fee anywhere between 0% and 5%
Won't be able to get a loan from Happy Money if you live in Maine, Massachusetts, Nebraska, or Nevada
Can only use for credit card debt consolidation
Loans made by one of Payoff's lending partners
Happy Money's Payoff loans are designed specifically to help borrowers consolidate credit card debt. Its loans have competitive minimum APRs and are accessible to borrowers with credit scores of 640 or higher.
However, Payoff doesn't serve borrowers in Maine, Massachusetts, Nebraska, or Nevada, so you can't get a personal loan in these states.
Watch out for: Slow access to funds. It will take between two and five business days to get your money, which is slower than many other personal loan companies.
Read Insider's full review of Payoff by Happy Money.
Lightstream Debt Consolidation Loan
7.99% β 23.99% (with AutoPay)
Lightstream is a great choice for borrowers with good credit scores, as its minimum requirement is 660. It has a very wide range of amounts you can borrow, from $5,000 to $100,000, making it a solid option for borrowers with a variety of credit card debt.
The lender also doesn't charge any fees, which will reduce the overall cost of your loan.
Watch out for: No preapproval. Many borrowers prefer shopping around to compare rates. Often, this involves getting preapproved by several companies and evaluating the offers before settling on one. LightStream doesn't offer preapprovals for its personal loans.
Marcus' unique feature is that it offers an on-time payment reward. If you pay your loan on time and in full every month for one year, you can forgo a month of payments, and interest will not accrue during that period. Marcus will then extend your loan by one month.
The company also doesn't charge any fees, and has a very competitive minimum interest rate.
Watch out for: No co-borrower allowed. If your creditworthiness isn't in the best shape and you're hoping to add a coborrower to boost your chances of approval, you won't be able to do so with Marcus.
Reach Financial is another lender designed specifically for debt consolidation. The lender has relatively fast funding speed. It will pay off your creditors directly β you won't see any money hit your account β and will do so within roughly 48 hours after your loan is approved.
Watch out for: Origination fees. Reach Financial charges an origination fee that ranges from 0% to 5%. Origination fees are a percentage taken out of your total loan proceeds and increase the over cost of your loan. Many other lenders don't charge origination fees.
High maximum loan limit
Unemployment protection
High minimum credit score requirement
Usually receive your money in a few business days after your application is approved
Unemployment protection if you lose your job during your loan repayment, allowing you to apply for a three-month forbearance, up to a total of 12 months
Loans are made by SoFi Lending Corp.
SoFi has very high loan amount limits. A maximum of $100,000 could be helpful for borrowers who need a large loan. Some competing lenders won't lend nearly as much.
It also features unemployment protection. SoFi offers forbearance in case you lose your job during your loan repayment. This unique feature gives you as many as 12 months of forbearance, which you apply for in three-month increments.
Watch out for: High minimum credit score requirement. The minimum credit score required for approval is 680. Many other personal loan lenders have lower requirements.
Read Insider's full review of SoFi.
LendingClub Personal Loan
Origination fee between 1% and 6%, late fee of 5% of the minimum payment amount or $15, whichever is greater
Low minimum loan amount
Can add co-borrower to loan application
Slower access to funds
Origination fee between 1% to 6%
You'll get access to your funds within two to four business days
Loan amount range between $1,000 to $40,000
Loan terms are either 36 months or 60 months
Loans made through either WebBank, Member FDIC or LendingClub Bank, N.A., Member FDIC
A big perk of LendingClub is that you're able to add a coborrower to your application. This means if your credit score isn't good enough to qualify for a loan, you may be able to enlist a cosigner to help.
Additionally, the lender has a minimum loan amount of just $1,000. This is good if you only need to consolidate a small amount of debt.
Watch out for: A few different types of fees. You'll have to pay an origination fee between 1% and 6% of your total loan amount, and that fee will be baked into your loan APR. If your payment is more than 15 days late, you may be charged a late fee and other penalties.
Read Insider's full review of LendingClub.
Upstart's loan approval doesn't solely depend on credit scores. For people who don't have the best credit history, Upstart will factor in a few other pieces of information for a better shot at approval.
You also may be able to get your money on the same day you apply for your loan.
Watch out for: High origination fees. Upstart's personal loans can have origination fees up to 8%. Compared to competing lenders, this is a higher maximum β LendingClub tops its fees at 6%, respectively.
Best credit card consolidation loans
Other credit card consolidation loan companies we considered
Navy Federal Credit Union. You can take out a loan of as little as $250 from the military-focused credit union to consolidate credit card debt. But you'll need to be a member to qualify. Membership requirements are relatively strict. You're only eligible if you are active military member, veteran, employee or retiree of the Department of Defense, or family member of someone in one of those groups.
Rocket Loans personal loans. Rocket Loans has same-day funding for a few kinds of loans. But borrowers can only choose from two repayment term lengths and you're not able to take out a joint or co-signed loan.
Best Egg personal loans. Best Egg gives borrowers with good credit low rates. But if your credit score is lower than 640 you won't be eligible for a loan. Read Insider's full review of Best Egg.
OppLoans personal loans. OppLoans doesn't have a minimum credit score to be eligible, but its APR range is significantly higher than any lender on our list, spanning from 59% to 160%.
We've looked at each institution's Better Business Bureau score to offer you another piece of information to pick a company that provides personal loans for credit card consolidation. The BBB measures businesses based on factors like their responsiveness to customer complaints, truthfulness in advertising, and openness about business practices. Here is each company's score:
Payoff by Happy Money
Marcus High Yield Savings
Our top picks are rated A or higher by the BBB. Know that a high BBB score does not ensure a positive relationship with a credit card consolidation loan provider, and you should keep researching and talk to others who have used the company to get the most complete information possible.
Should I consolidate credit card debt? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
Consolidating credit card debt is a decision you should make based on your unique financial situation. It may help you keep track of your debt more easily with one fixed, monthly payment.
To consolidate credit card debt, you get a loan from one lender for the total amount of debt you'd like to combine. Then, you use those funds to pay off the individual, smaller debts. At the end, you have all of your debt rolled into one monthly payment, one deadline for debt repayment, and a smaller interest rate.
How do I get a credit card consolidation loan? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
There are several factors that go into qualifying for a credit card consolidation loan, including your credit score, income, and credit history.
In addition to a good credit score, you'll need proof of your employment and ability to repay to determine eligibility. Lenders will check your debt-to-income ratio to ensure you haven't borrowed more than you can feasibly pay back.
What are the drawbacks of a credit card consolidation loan? Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.
While credit card consolidation loans can be a good way to get your debt under control, there are also some drawbacks to keep in mind when considering if one is right for you. For instance, it may be difficult to get approved for a low rate if you don't have good credit. Lenders may also tack on fees, and the time you have to pay off the debt could be shorter than you had with the credit cards, which could mean higher monthly payments.
It's also important to remember what got you into debt in the first place. Consolidating your debt doesn't solve any problems you've had with spending or saving. And you might fall back into those habits if you feel less burdened with zero balances on your credit cards.
Payoff Payoff personal loans lightstream | 2022-12-21T16:58:36Z | www.businessinsider.com | The Best Credit Card Consolidation Loans for 2022 | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/best-credit-card-consolidation-loans | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/best-credit-card-consolidation-loans |
How to 'half swipe' on Snapchat to view an unread message without letting the sender know you've read it
With a "half swipe," you can read unread messages on Snapchat discreetly.
Using a "half swipe" on the Snapchat conversation page, you can preview an unread message without sending a read receipt.
To do this, tap the user's avatar and drag it to the right without fully opening it to reveal the Message page and its contents.
Thanks to a technique commonly known as a "half swipe," you can get a sneak peek at a Snapchat message without actually opening it, which would ordinarily send a read receipt and let the sender know you've seen the message. It's cheating, but only sort of, because this workaround is a relatively well-known way to see messages on both iPhone and Android.
How to half swipe on Snapchat
It's worth noting that this half-swipe technique isn't documented by Snapchat and, as a result, it's not clear if it's considered an official feature or a bug that might be removed in a future update to the app. Either way, it works just fine right now.
2. Find a conversation with a new unread message you want to preview. This technique works with conversations with unread and fully read messages, but it's essentially pointless on conversations that don't have unread messages, because there's no reason to be secretive about it.
3. Tap the user's avatar at the left side of the screen and drag it to the right. As you drag the avatar, you should see the message page swipe in from the left. Be sure you tap and drag the avatar β if you drag any other part of the conversation, you'll swipe to the Map page.
Tap and drag an avatar to the right to get a sneak peek at that user's conversation.
4. Continue dragging as far to the right as you like so you can read the message. Don't drag it all the way to the right and release, though, or you'll essentially swipe to the Message page, and the message will be marked as read. Instead, drag it partway to the right, read the message, and then drag it back to the left to return to the Chat page.
Quick tip: You can use this technique to swipe quickly to the message page for any conversation. Swiping to the right and releasing is the same as tapping on a conversation.
TECH What 'pending' means on Snapchat, and how to fix it
Snapchat half swipe Social Media | 2022-12-21T17:15:42Z | www.businessinsider.com | How to 'Half Swipe' on Snapchat to View an Unread Message | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/how-to-half-swipe-on-snapchat | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/how-to-half-swipe-on-snapchat |
8 people share how they use Facebook groups to score freebies and market their businesses
Sonah Lee-Lassiter
Sara Dahan, Michelle Kim, and Sonya Reynolds with her child.
Sara Dahan, Michelle Kim, and Sonya Reynolds
Around this time last year, Facebook experienced its first-ever drop in users.
Still, more than 1.8 billion users flock to the site to be part of Facebook "group" communities.
Insider spoke with people who use groups for parenting advice, fan clubs, and running businesses.
Between privacy violations, misinformation, hate speech, and more, Facebook is no stranger to bad press. The company recently saw a drop in users for the first time during the last quarter of 2021. Yet more than 1.8 billion people still use Facebook for one feature that sets it apart from other platforms: groups.
Users turn to these groups for career advice, upcycling belongings, parenting tips, and even to market their small businesses. This is not only because of Facebook's vast diversity of groups to join, but also thanks to a wide network of volunteer moderators and admins who keep them functional.
Small and niche support groups
"Siblings Raising Siblings" is a small group started by Heather Dennis, who has been raising her two younger siblings since she was 21. As a sibling guardian, she relied on food stamps and found difficulty getting legal and financial support.
"I wanted to make a career change and be able to help other people who are in the situation I was once in," said Dennis, who started the Facebook group as part of her master's degree program in social work. The online community welcomes caretakers and their dependent siblings from across the world, whose parents either could not or would not fulfill their parental obligations.
Learning new things
Cassier Weiner is in more than 50 mostly hobby-based Facebook groups. Although Weiner has witnessed many people conduct themselves in bad ways on the platform, she stays out of toxic comment sections. While she doesn't have a favorite group, she loves to learn new things through different ones. One example of a group she regularly visits is called "Home for Peculiar Artists."
"This is a home for art that is any medium, off the mainstream," Weiner said. "I love that group because you see so much creativity and everyone there is there to encourage one another."
Cassier Weiner standing in front of a hot dog mural.
Cassier Weiner
Opportunities to connect locally
"The Buy Nothing Project" is a global network of Facebook groups that aims to help people give things away or ask for things they need without any exchange of money or bartering. In densely populated areas like Brooklyn, these groups are broken into sub-neighborhoods.
After having her baby, Sonya Reynolds turned to a Brooklyn neighborhood group of more than 2,000 members for help with items. She said she hasn't had to buy anything new and has gotten everything she needs from neighbors, except for some perishable items like diapers.
Sonya Reynolds at a park with her child.
Sonya Reynolds
"We got a crib and a stroller through the local 'Buy Nothing Group,' and it's totally changed my view of consumerism," Reynolds said.
The generosity of members seems to only breed more generosity in the neighborhood, she said. It's also turned her into an enthusiast for giving things away and avoiding online shopping.
Doreen Maag, another neighbor in Brooklyn, said being a part of the "Buy Nothing" group has been socially beneficial, helping connect her to the community during the isolation of the pandemic.
"We've gotten to know more of our neighbors through this group than we have any other way," Maag said, adding that she's found it easier to let go of sentimental items when she knows someone nearby will be personally using it.
Strong leadership of moderators and administrators
Facebook groups aren't all happy, though, and it takes a lot of volunteer hours to manage these communities. Some groups have seen behaviors like doxxing, where private information is posted about users. That's led them to demonstrate their values up front, such as "The Non-Toxic Star Wars Fanbase."
As the number of members grew from 2,000 to more than 81,000, former moderator Nick Chamberlin began seeing more toxicity in the group. That's when the group decided to tighten up the admittance questions and rules.
Nick Chamberlin wearing sunglasses and a headset while operating a large camera.
An interview process is required to become one of the group leaders, which ensures that monitors understand how to handle bad behavior. A common chat room is used to communicate around the world, covering multiple time zones, so there's always someone monitoring.
When there are disagreements, they discuss it in the chat and vote. Leaders regularly interact within the online community, building trust among members.
Sarah Dahan, an online community strategist, said the root of a thriving community online and offline is maintaining a consistent value system.
Sarah Dahan standing in front of a yellow taxi.
Sarah Dahan
"The Buy Nothing Group," for example, maintains values of generosity, sustainability, and a focus on the environment. If someone tries to sell an item, moderators will step in with a comment that this is against the rules of the group and ask them to delete or adjust their posting. Members are also encouraged to ask for something they' are in search of or need before buying it new.
Buy Nothing Group member Maag said she loves it when she sees "people rushing in the comments to help somebody who is asking," and Dahan said this kind of culture of values on display is key to keeping a community from becoming toxic.
Because moderators often keep their profiles public to receive messages, it leaves them vulnerable to harassment and even death threats. Chamberlin said Facebook does its part when it comes to such threats, blocking or shutting down accounts when these users are reported.
Cliff Lampe, a professor of information at the University of Michigan and an expert in online communities, said moderators have an emotionally draining role. Lampe said they often have to deal with conflict and can experience burnout.
"Moderators should have a succession plan," Dr. Lampe said. "Identifying volunteer members, training, and investing in them."
Facebook doing its part
Jonathan Twombly runs a real-estate business through his Facebook group "Multifamily Investment Community," which has about 12,000 members. He relies on a group managing service in the Philippines, some friends, and volunteers to moderate the page.
Jonathan Twombly in a green shirt.
Jonathan Twombly
But in the past few years, he said he's seen downsides with using Facebook. One issue is seeing some appropriate content flagged by the system, while inappropriate content passes through. A larger more persistent issue is Facebook changing the algorithm without warning, which can impact what a user is often seeing on the platform.
Lampe said moderators and group founders can only do so much. He thinks groups can improve with more finely grained moderation tools, like the ability to remove the use of emoji reactions, and more mechanisms for crowdsourced moderation, like Reddit's up and down voting. Lampe also thinks moderators should have more resources than they have already, like mental health professionals specializing in online harassment.
"Facebook themselves do have an ethical responsibility from a technology standpoint, because algorithms versus individual people is never a fair fight," Lampe said.
Self-policing and individual responsibility
Given the way algorithms guide users to certain content, it can be hard for monitors to keep up with everything posted in their group.
Michelle Kim is one of the 560,000 members of the "Noodles and Asian Dishes" group. She said being raised around different online platforms as a member of Gen Z has given her intuition on how to avoid group toxicity.
Michelle Kim sitting in front of greenery in a white dress.
Michelle Kim
Kim believes Facebook was intended to connect people locally, but she said she sees more people using it as if they have complete anonymity. Sometimes she responds to a mean comment once, but sets a boundary to not engage again.
Kim says she uses Instagram for friendships, TikTok "just for fun," and stays on Facebook for the groups and because some family members are on it. She finds the groups being most useful to her as a resource to find roommates, sublets, and freelance writing opportunities.
"Facebook groups are very underutilized by people my age," Kim said. "If you haven't been on it since 10 years old, it's seen as archaic. But it's a very nice way to be involved in the hobbies that I really enjoy while also getting great insight and advice on certain things."
Despite Facebook's ongoing pitfalls, Lampe said groups are probably the biggest benefit for people who use the platform. At least that's true for Cassie Weiner, who said she only uses it to her benefit.
"Facebook is as good or as bad as you let it be," Weiner said. "I choose to let it only be good."
Facebook Facebook Groups Facebook private groups | 2022-12-21T17:15:48Z | www.businessinsider.com | 8 People on How to Use Facebook Groups for Freebies, Marketing | https://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-use-facebook-groups-market-small-businesses-build-communities-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-use-facebook-groups-market-small-businesses-build-communities-2022-12 |
Famed bearish strategist Albert Edwards says the Fed will extract a high price to bring down inflation β and outlines why its success will only be temporary
Stock market volatility, high inflation, and looming recession are all weighing on investors' minds heading into 2023.
Albert Edwards, global strategist for Societe Generale, says inflation should dip to 3% before long.
However, Edwards says the reprieve will be brief, and inflation will spike after a recession.
He says the combination of easy monetary policy and future stimulus will cause more inflation.
There isn't much holiday cheer on Wall Street right now, but there's near-universal agreement that things will get better when interest rates peak and when there are more signs that inflation is declining.
True to form, Societe Generale strategist Albert Edwards says investors shouldn't get too excited when interest rates level off. Edwards, who is famous for his bearish views on markets, says that rates usually peak after the Federal Reserve has already raised interest rates to a level that's too high.
"The peak of a rate cycle is more often than not associated with the Fed having overdone the tightening cycle and the economy sliding into recession, resulting in pitiful equity returns," he wrote in a recent note to clients. "History shows that equity investors cheering on a Fed pivot is akin to turkeys voting for Christmas."
Still, Edwards says that core inflation is going to come down fast, as many of the causes of high inflation are now unwinding. And he expects higher unemployment and a steep drop in home prices.
"I can't imagine how anyone thinks there won't be a hard landing with house prices falling this steeply," he wrote. "House price deflation also further confirms that the dominant shelter component of CPI (and some 40% of core CPI) should head toward zero as 2023 unfolds."
He writes that core inflation should decline from November's rate of 6% to around 3% over time. The Federal Reserve has said it wants to reduce inflation to about 2%, but Edwards and many other observers think the central bank will tolerate a slightly higher inflation rate.
From there, Edwards parts company with many other market watchers. He says that inflation will pick up again before long, with the loose monetary policy of recent years combining with pandemic-style economic stimulus in dangerous ways.
"I believe that the pandemic recession has allowed policymakers to cross the Rubicon of fiscal rectitude to a reach a new land - one where their existing monetary profligacy can now be coupled with fiscal debauchery," he wrote in 2021. "Any government which attempts post-GFC style austerity will be cast into the electoral wilderness.
There are already signs the US economy is slowing down due to rising interest rates, and central banks around the world are embarking on similar campaigns to get inflation under control. Edwards says inflation will likely come down as the economy slows.
But Edwards wrote this week that this will set the stage for another wave of inflation β a secular one driven by monetary and fiscal policy ideas that are going to remain in place for years to come.
Something similar happened in the mid-1970s, when inflation caused by spiking food and energy prices started to come down, then surged again. It was only after the Fed raised interest rates to record levels that inflation finally "broke."
Edwards also said that investors who were hoping for a sustained rally in the bond market are going to be disappointed, as higher yields and higher interest rates are going to cap bond prices at lower levels.
Investing recession 2023 | 2022-12-21T17:15:54Z | www.businessinsider.com | Long-Term Stock and Bond Outlook, Inflation Spike: Albert Edwards | https://www.businessinsider.com/stock-market-bond-outlook-2023-inflation-investing-recession-federal-reserve-2022-12 | https://www.businessinsider.com/stock-market-bond-outlook-2023-inflation-investing-recession-federal-reserve-2022-12 |
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