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A financial planner says retirement isn't the only way to combat burnout — a sabbatical might be the answer
Retirement isn't the only way to get a break from work.
Superb Images/Getty Images
I hear it from clients and friends all the time: Everyone is experiencing some level of burnout.
I recommend taking a sabbatical, or an extended break from work, if you need to reset.
The past two years have been stressful for so many of us. Whether I'm speaking with friends, colleagues, or clients, I notice that everyone is experiencing some level of burnout.
Do you feel like you need a break from the daily grind that a one- or two-week vacation is not enough? Has the pandemic caused you to rethink your priorities and career path? Taking extended time away from work — otherwise known as a sabbatical — comes with many benefits. It can help reduce stress and give you the time needed to relax. It can also be an opportunity to learn new skills or plan your next move.
A sabbatical might seem far-fetched if you don't have a lot of money. With proper planning, though, it can be closer to your reach than you'd think. Here are a few tips on planning for a sabbatical and making the most of your time away.
Get your financial ducks in a row
Very few companies offer a paid sabbatical to employees, so making a plan for your finances is essential if you're looking to take extended time off. If your company offers a paid sabbatical, review the policy in detail. If there is no sabbatical policy, you have several factors to consider.
Start by reviewing your current income and expenses. How much do you need to cover your basic living expenses? Will you need additional funds to cover hobbies, travel, or educational costs that you have planned? How much cash do you have set aside? Do you have a spouse or partner who can help cover expenses or children dependent on your income? You'll need enough cash to cover your bills while you're not working plus an additional cushion to cover any unexpected expenses that may come up. Save as much as you can ahead of time. The more you can save, the better.
In addition to current expenses, consider how a sabbatical might impact your long-term retirement or financial freedom goals since you probably won't be in a position to save while you're away from work. Depending on the amount of time you want to take off, a sabbatical could also affect your future earnings potential. There's a chance that you could extend the timeline for a promotion or miss out on an opportunity to grow your career. Understanding this upfront will help your decision-making process.
Decide how you want to spend your time
Do you want to travel or spend quality time with loved ones? Are you considering a new career and need the time to develop new skills? Is this a good time to dedicate to a passion project or giving back? Thinking about how you will spend your sabbatical in advance will help you make the most of your time away. Having an idea of what you want to do gives you direction on how much time you may need off, what time of year makes sense, and how much money you'll need.
It's ultimately up to you to determine why you're taking the sabbatical and what you'd like to accomplish during your time away. Make a list of all the possibilities, reflect, and narrow the list. Then, factor in associated costs and the time needed to accomplish your goals. No matter what you decide, take the opportunity to relax and unwind in the beginning of your sabbatical. That way, you can return to work or start your next endeavor with a clear head.
Create your own paid sabbatical
Taking extended time away from work without pay is not always feasible, but you still might need a break if you're experiencing burnout. Consider the right time to take leave. Assuming you plan to return to your current company, you want to feel secure about your position and prioritize any important projects or deadlines.
It's a good idea to start a conversation with your employer early. Explain why you want to take a sabbatical and how the timing has been well thought out. Be prepared to discuss how taking leave can benefit your employer, how much time you'd like off, whether you will be accessible, and whether you will return to the same position. Sharing details of your plans, especially if they involve learning new skills, can help your employer get on board.
I've had a few clients with unlimited paid time off (PTO) take extended vacations for up to six weeks. An easy way to do this is to plan around existing holidays. For example, maybe it's possible to take off between Thanksgiving and New Year's Day or between Memorial Day and Independence Day. Even with unlimited PTO, your employer may need to approve an extended period away from the office.
Should your employer deny your request for a sabbatical, you might contemplate quitting your job. Or your leave could be sandwiched between jobs or a career change. Factor this into your budget so you're in a good position in any situation.
Having time to rest and recharge throughout your career instead of waiting until retirement can be a gamechanger. If you're lucky enough to work for a company that offers paid sabbaticals, take full advantage of this rare opportunity. If not, don't worry! Sabbaticals can be possible and meaningful with proper planning.
Chloe A. Moore, CFP, is the founder of Financial Staples, a virtual, fee-only financial planning firm based in Atlanta, Georgia and serving clients nationwide. Her firm is dedicated to serving tech employees who are entrepreneurial-minded, philanthropic, and purpose-driven. Chloe believes that money is an emotional topic and it impacts many aspects of our lives. She enjoys helping clients unpack their money history and discover how they can use money to support a life that is most meaningful to them.
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More: Rethinking Retirement Burnout Financial Planners sabbatical | 2022-06-01T14:49:43Z | www.businessinsider.com | Take a Sabbatical to Combat Burnout, Says a Financial Planner | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/take-sabbatical-combat-burnout-says-financial-planner-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/take-sabbatical-combat-burnout-says-financial-planner-2022-6 |
The majority of employees say work travel is critical for growing their company's bottom line. Here's how corporate travel managers are adapting.
Business travel is changing.
Enterprise Rent-A-Car and National Car Rental
Business travel is slowly returning, but it looks different. Eight in 10 companies are currently reworking their travel policies.
In-person meetings can help drive growth. The majority of employees report work travel is critical for increasing sales, even in the era of constant videoconferencing.
The future of work travel is all about maximizing the value of each trip. That's why it's so important to have corporate travel partners like Enterprise and National.
Raise your hand if the thought of joining one more video call gives you an urge to drop your laptop into a lake.
Kerplunk.
Don't worry. You're not alone.
Videoconferencing technology has been a godsend throughout the pandemic. It has empowered many of us to connect with teammates, clients, and vendors from the comfort of our living rooms. But facing an endless brigade of virtual talking heads can be exhausting, and a lot of nuance is lost over 1,500 miles of ethernet cable. For many companies, in-person meetings still have a critical role to play. So, what will meetings look like in the new era of work?
Business travel is slowly returning, but it looks quite different
According to a 2021 BTN Group survey of business travel decision-makers, 80% of respondents are reimagining what travel looks like at their company, including who goes, when they go, and how they go.
Corporate travel policies are evolving to reflect new business realities and behavioral trends. For example, many employees now expect to drive rather than fly: Enterprise Rent-A-Car and National Car Rental report that the average length of their business rentals has doubled over the past year. Respondents say they're more likely to hit multiple cities in a single trip, too.
Meeting face-to-face is a critical sales tool
Anyone who's started a presentation with the mute button on understands that face-to-face meetings are generally less awkward than video chats. But more importantly, survey respondents said the benefits of in-person encounters are good for their bottom line: 75% report work travel is critical for increasing company sales, and more than half said it is important for building relationships and achieving their company's goals.
"We continue to hear from our partners and customers that they still find value in face-to-face meetings," said Don Moore, senior vice president of global business rental sales. "So now more than ever, and as business travel continues to evolve, it's critical that transportation partners provide the flexibility and support to help people reconnect with the people they need to see."
BTN Group / Enterprise Holdings Inc. Value of Business Travel online survey of 101 executives responsible for managed travel, conducted in May and June 2021
Face-to-face interactions, particularly between different offices, are a benefit for employee morale, too: 65% of respondents are planning to revive company culture by finding ways to get together with their colleagues in real life.
For companies and employees, it's important to make the most of every trip
Simply put, the future of business travel involves more red tape.
That's why the right travel partner is so important to a company's bottom line. With budget concerns top-of-mind and more employees potentially traveling by car, it's important for businesses to have access to an expansive network of neighborhood locations and a wide variety of vehicles. Negotiated rates matter — especially when they're honored at 100% of locations.
A seamless travel experience benefits companies in more subtle ways, too.
Enterprise and National provide customized car rental programs and exceptional customer service to businesses navigating a brand-new world of travel.
"As companies continue to navigate the dynamic business travel environment, their partners need to remain flexible, as well," Moore said. "We understand it's more important than ever to partner closely with our clients to ensure we're providing the benefits and value that match the evolving needs of business travelers."
Learn more about how your company can reinvent business travel with The Combined Power of Enterprise and National.
This post was created by Insider Studios with Enterprise and National
More: Sponsor Post Studios Enterprise Studios Travel Studios Custom | 2022-06-01T14:50:01Z | www.businessinsider.com | The Rules for Business Travel Are Changing | https://www.businessinsider.com/sc/the-rules-for-business-travel-are-changing | https://www.businessinsider.com/sc/the-rules-for-business-travel-are-changing |
Every month, Insider looks at the most anticipated new TV shows using data from the app TV Time.
The list is derived from US users who use the app to track and react to what they're watching.
Disney+'s latest Marvel series, "Ms. Marvel," premieres in June.
5. "Baymax!" — Disney+, June 29
Description: "The all-new series of healthcare capers returns to the fantastical city of San Fransokyo where the affable, inflatable, inimitable healthcare companion robot, Baymax, sets out to do what he was programmed to do: help others."
4. "First Kill" — Netflix, June 10
Description: "Teenage vampire Juliette sets her sights on a new girl in town Calliope for her first kill. But much to Juliette's surprise, Calliope is a vampire hunter. Both find that the other won't be so easy to kill and, unfortunately, way too easy to fall for…"
3. "Dark Winds" — AMC, June 12
Description: "Follows Leephorn and Chee, two Navajo police officers in the 1970s Southwest that are forced to challenge their own spiritual beliefs when they search for clues in a double murder case."
2. "The Old Man" — FX, June 16
Description: "Based on the bestselling novel by Thomas Perry, 'The Old Man' centers on Dan Chase who absconded from the CIA decades ago and has been living off the grid since. When an assassin arrives and tries to take Chase out, the old operative learns that to ensure his future he now must reconcile his past."
1. "Ms. Marvel" — Disney+, June 8
Description: "Marvel Studios' 'Ms. Marvel' is an original series that introduces Kamala Khan, a Muslim American teenager growing up in Jersey City." | 2022-06-01T14:50:07Z | www.businessinsider.com | Top New TV Shows of June: 'Ms. Marvel,' 'the Old Man' | https://www.businessinsider.com/top-new-tv-shows-june-ms-marvel-the-old-man-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/top-new-tv-shows-june-ms-marvel-the-old-man-2022-6 |
Danny Jachowski, Acrisure
Brandon Sim, ApolloMed
Chase Lochmiller, Crusoe Energy
Denis Dancanet, Jetoptera and Theorem
Tarun Chitra and Rei Chiang, Gauntlet
Daniel Morillo, Opendoor Technologies
Krešimir Penavić, TEClens
The fascinating lives and careers of 8 Wall Street math wizards who quit quant trading to build innovative startups
Like Jeff Bezos did in 1994, these 'quantreprenuers' ditched Wall Street to apply their skills to real life problems — from reducing greenhouse gases to developing safer eye surgery.
Following in Jeff Bezos's footsteps, these "quantreprenuers" ditched Wall Street to build startups. From left: Denis Dancanet, Tarun Chitra, Daniel Morillo, and Krešimir Penavić.
Point72; Gauntlet; Opendoor; TEClens; Insider
The year was 1994, and D.E. Shaw, one of the earliest hedge funds to specialize in computerized, algorithmic trading, was about to lose a key employee.
A headhunter had placed him at the fund only four years prior, but he'd made a quick impression on founder David Shaw and risen to senior vice president. Walking through Central Park, Shaw tried to convince him to stay — he'd be giving up millions in compensation and a significant role at the firm.
It didn't work. He got on the phone with Rick Wastrom, the Smith Hanley headhunter who'd placed him at the hedge fund, and explained he was headed west to start his own company and "sell things over the internet," according to notes Wastrom still has from the call that he shared with Insider.
"You're crazy," Wastrom remembered thinking.
Not long after, a young Jeff Bezos started selling books online in Seattle.
The Amazon.com founder is likely the earliest quantitative trading professional to quit Wall Street to start a major technology company — and undoubtedly the most successful. Even after the recent market swoon, Amazon is worth over $1.1 trillion, and Bezos remains the second richest person on earth.
A new generation of quants, the most brilliant minds at systematic hedge funds and high-frequency trading firms, is following the same path Bezos blazed. The move has grown more common in recent years, in part because Silicon Valley's soaring fortunes and the ease of remote work have made it more attractive, but also because the onerous and lengthy noncompete clauses endemic to quant trading firms has forced people to get creative and look beyond Wall Street.
But some of the same, time-honored motivations are at play that pushed Bezos three decades ago — a chance to do something new and meaningful and fear of future regrets.
"When I'm 80, am I going to regret leaving Wall Street? No. Will I regret missing a chance to be there to be there at the beginning of the internet? Yes," Bezos recalled asking himself, according to a 1999 profile in Wired.
Insider has compiled a list of notable "quantrepreneurs" — that is, quants who in recent years have left vaunted trading firms including Citadel, Jump Trading, Renaissance Technologies, and PDT to pursue entrepreneurship.
We've focused primarily on people who made a direct leap from Wall Street to a prominent role either with a growing tech company or building a new one from scratch.
This is not an exhaustive list. We avoided startup founders and executives who've primarily had careers in Silicon Valley and made only brief appearances on Wall Street.
We also didn't include some early movers in this trend who have already sold their companies — such as Nancy Hua, a former Getco standout, who founded a company called Apptimize in 2013 that facilitated app development for large companies. It was acquired in 2019.
Others are just getting started. Michael Turok only just this March left Goldman Sachs, where he led a quant investment strategies team, to join autonomous driving startup Ghost Locomotion as the chief architect and VP of engineering. Keone Hon and James Hunsaker departed Jump Trading Group in February to start Monad Labs, which is building a platform to make crypto app development faster and more efficient, applying their years of know-how in building high-speed trading systems.
And Bezos, the original quantrepreneur, is now decades removed from his hedge fund days and isn't on the list either.
Here are 8 quantrepreneurs who left Wall Street to chase unicorns and build the next great tech company.
To some, it might've seemed like an odd move: Leaving Jump Trading, a premier name in proprietary trading, and joining a startup that didn't even have a name.
But Danny Jachowski had his reasons. For one, nearly a decade of Chicago winters had worn on him and the Maui-raised and Stanford-educated machine learning expert wanted a less bone-chilling climate.
More importantly, Jachowski was growing bored with the lucrative but Sisyphean world of quant trading and was itching to tackle something that
Danny Jachowski has spearheaded artificial intelligence projects at Acrisure since 2020.
Danny Jachowski
could have a greater impact on society.
"You go in every day and you're solving the same problem. You're trying to predict where the price of X will be on a time horizon," Jachowski said. "It just became a little stale."
Initially, he'd found the work energizing. He'd started out at Jump in 2010 as an algorithmic trader, following fellowships at prestigious machine-learning labs at the University of Michigan and Stanford. Whereas the nature of success in academic research was nebulous, Jachowski was taken with the rapid, real-time feedback loop in high-frequency trading.
He quit his master's degree a few courses shy of graduating to join Jump.
"That's what took me into trading. There's an opportunity to measure your success in a real way," he said. It didn't hurt that his older brother already worked at the young trading company and could vouch for it.
But after success in a variety of roles across development, research, and operations, he decided in 2019 to call it quits and search for new challenges.
A robotics enthusiast, autonomous driving intrigued him. But the stakes were grave — an error could mean blood on your hands.
Then, he connected to a nameless startup that would eventually be called BlueNote AI.
Based in Austin with backing from Thomas Tull, the billionaire businessman and founder of film studio Legendary Entertainment, BlueNote was looking to build a modern platform for pricing business insurance risk.
In theory, identifying new and more precise risk characteristics by applying machine learning techniques to caches of alternative data could unlock savings and efficiencies. But insurance companies are heavily regulated and don't have as much incentive to rock the boat with innovation.
They needed an AI wiz, and the opportunity resonated with Jachowski.
Location? Check. Austin's hospitable weather and startup scene fit the criteria for Jachowski and his husband, who also worked in tech.
New challenge? Check. Jachowski would need to tap the full suite of statistics and engineering capabilities to help develop pricing models that outstripped insurance actuaries.
"I bought into the vision that the insurance industry is outdated and there's not a lot of impetus to change," said Jachowski, who joined what would become BlueNote AI at the start of 2020 as head of artificial intelligence.
As it turned out, the company name was short-lived. BlueNote's first customer was insurance brokerage Acrisure, which liked the prospects of the startup so much that it acquired the company, along with another insurance subsidiary owned by Tull, in July 2020 after only eight months in operation.
"They wanted to build out their technology division, and I think they saw us as a reasonable target," Jachowski said.
As with Jump, Jachowski has taken on several roles with Acrisure since the buyout. Most recently, he's gotten back to his Wall Street roots, helping build asset portfolios as head of AI at Acrisure Capital Management, a new investment advisory subsidiary.
Brandon Sim/ApolloMed
When Brandon Sim graduated from Harvard, he recalls a survey of his class found a healthy majority were going into finance or consulting, himself included. It's a well-worn career path, so the poll result wasn't particularly surprising.
What did surprise him was another question that asked graduates what field they planned to work in a decade later. The percentage favoring finance and consulting plummeted.
"People wanted to go into more aspirational things like healthcare or nonprofit," Sim recalled.
The insight has mirrored Sim's remarkable career trajectory, from high-octane quantitative trading researcher to co-CEO of a medical technology company, all over the course of several years.
After completing his master's in computational science from Harvard in 2015, Sim started out at Citadel Securities in algorithmic trading and research. He was quickly blown away by the culture and caliber of his colleagues.
"Everyone there was absolutely exceptional," Sim said. "They've done a great job of collecting brilliant folks from all parts of the world."
But after four years of crunching data to develop trading strategies, Sim started to get restless. He'd always dreamed of building something more impactful that he had more ownership of, though he wasn't certain yet what that would be.
He quit in 2019 without a game plan, but Citadel Securities' two-year paid noncompete provided a stress-free avenue to experiment.
His father, Kenneth Sim, suggested the quant join his firm until he figured out the next big thing. The elder Sim worked as a surgeon and long-time chairman at Apollo Medical, a relatively small company at the time that specialized in acquiring and helping scale independent medical practices, historically in the Los Angeles region.
It was an old-school firm that couldn't typically hire elite quantitative talent, so the abilities of a Wall Street math wiz could come in handy, even for a few months.
Sim was intrigued. He had some experience in the healthcare field — while at Harvard, he spent a year as a fellow at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, researching algorithms to improve drug design. He'd also cofounded a medical device startup that worked on a drug delivery patch.
He decided to join ApolloMed, initially as a project manager on a $58,300 a year salary.
The contrasts between his old gig and the creaky medical company were immediately apparent. The competition in systematic trading is so fierce that you might spend weeks or months to unearth a half basis point of edge; for every 10 ideas, less than one might produce meaningful alpha.
At ApolloMed it was just the opposite: There was alpha laying around everywhere he looked.
"For me, it was almost a dream come true," said Sim, who compared the opportunities to make an impact with data and technology to an all-you-can-eat buffet. "I really gorged, having starved on morsels of alpha for years."
Among his early wins, Sim helped automate 90% of the company's claims, most of which were previously handled manually.
He also saw opportunities to tap into the vast troves of data the company regularly amassed through the course of managing medical care for more than a million patients.
He helped launch experimental pilot programs, including one to see what impact a wellness center might have on their population of patients. In addition to offering yoga, meditation , and fitness classes, it was also an opportunity for nurses and other staff to engage with higher-risk seniors.
"We found people who came to classes had lower blood sugar levels," Sim said. Although this was correlation — ApolloMed hasn't undertaken causal studies — he clarified, it's still a propitious development for patients that could reduce serious and expensive medical visits, such as a trip to the ER, over the long run.
Sim, 28, quickly ascended higher in the company — first to CTO, then COO, and then last fall co-CEO — and ApolloMed's direction pivoted in tandem as he helped digitize and streamline its operations. The company is increasingly focused on helping its primary care doctors transition to the value-based care model, a movement that disincentivizes unnecessary procedures and overbilling, in part by giving doctors a budget per patient.
"The idea is to save costs for taxpayers and the medicare system, which is heavily burdened, and to align incentives with doctors," Sim said.
"It's really hard for doctors, especially those ingrained in the more volume is good model, to shift their mindset," he added.
ApolloMed eases that pain. Its platform helps these medical practices run more efficiently by removing the bureaucratic headaches and handling administrative chores like billing, insurance claims, prior authorizations, and data reporting required by the government. It's a bit like Shopify for independent doctors, Sim says.
The company also maintains a corps of staffers to handle tasks that often slip through the gaps or get short shrift in the traditional healthcare model. Unglamorous duties like scheduling appointments, fixing prior authorizations to speed up care, and translating documents to a patient's native language don't translate to big bucks for doctors but can be crucial for patients.
"For the most part, our doctors make more money than they did before," Sim said.
ApolloMed has benefited as well — the company's revenues and stock price have soared since he joined.
Sim may have stumbled into the opportunity, but in many ways the work was exactly what he was looking for.
"At Apollo, it's been fulfilling to build something where I see the impact on communities I was born and raised in in LA," Sim said.
ApolloMed has now expanded beyond LA to the rest of California and a couple other states, and its goal is to cover the entire US, Sim says.
Chase Lochmiller got inspiration for Cruse Energy while climbing Mount Everest in 2018.
Chase Lochmiller
Startup ideas can form in unorthodox places. For Chase Lochmiller, that place was Mount Everest.
Lochmiller is the cofounder and CEO of Crusoe Energy, a recently minted tech unicorn that harvests excess methane from oil fields to power energy-intensive computing such as cryptocurrency mining and AI research. The ideas that led to Crusoe first began to percolate for Lochmiller in 2018 after he ditched the world of quantitative trading after a decade to spend time working toward a different goal — completing the so-called Seven Summits, climbing the tallest mountain on each continent.
"I was always inspired by the mountains," said Lochmiller, who was raised in the shadows of the Rockies outside of Denver.
During his two months in Nepal ascending Everest, Lochmiller contemplated the evolutions in the cryptocurrency space as well as developments in artificial intelligence that had transformed other industries. He had conviction these trends would continue to drive societal advances and wanted to contribute, though the right idea for a company hadn't crystallized.
It was the first time in his career he had nothing planned — no next job or academic pursuit.
"What was beautiful about that was it gave me this entirely free space and time to think about what I wanted to do," Lochmiller said.
After returning home to Colorado, he went on a climbing trip with Cully Cavness, an old high school friend, and they got to talking about the same themes he'd dwelled on in Nepal. Cavness came from a multi-generation oil-and-gas family, and he explained the concept of "flaring," one of the industry's most intractable problems: At freshly drilled oil wells, natural gas that can't be piped away is burnt off into the atmosphere — 144 billion cubic meters worth per year, or enough to power the whole of sub-Saharan Africa, according to the World Bank.
"When I heard about how we were wasting so much energy on flaring, my mind was blown," Lochmiller, who'd never stepped foot in an oil field, recalled.
Cryptocurrency mining is notoriously energy-intensive. What if they could bring the digital mining rigs to the oil fields and repurpose that wasted energy?
"The reason flaring is a problem is there's no economic way to physically transport the gas to a market where it will be used to benefit people," Lochmiller said. "But computing is a unique application and very modular; you can transport the data instead of the gas, and data is much easier to transport than gas."
That was the genesis of Crusoe Energy — named after Robinson Crusoe, the resourceful fictional character who was stranded on a desert island.
A career in quant trading and building unicorns wasn't a foregone conclusion for Lochmiller, who had initially planned to become a theoretical physicist when he enrolled at MIT in 2004.
That dream faded as the glacial pace of academic research dawned on him. Looking for work with a bit more zip, and with an inclination to bank some savings, he turned to Wall Street, landing a job at high-frequency trading firm Getco in 2008 to work on its electronic market-making business.
He left Getco after nearly six years, spending his noncompete period working on his master's in computer science and AI, as well as his Seven Summits quest. He'd tackled Mount Aconcagua in Argentina and Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania in 2008 before starting up at Getco, and Mount Vinson in Antarctica was next on his list, which he completed over Christmas of 2013. An attempt at Mount Everest in early 2014 was cut short after the deadliest accident in the mountain's history.
He mulled working on a Ph.D., but ultimately accepted a job at Jump Trading helping build out its equity trading business.
While he and his team at Jump brought in hundreds of millions in profits and grew substantially, the impact was somewhat abstract and after a while Lochmiller felt a tug toward different pursuits.
"In the quant space, you're making markets more efficient by being this profit-taking mercenary, essentially. But it's a fun problem from an academic perspective. It's a fun problem with a lot of data, modeling, and cool mathematical techniques," Lochmiller said.
"At the end of the day, what you're building is a moneymaking optimization engine," Lochmiller continued, referring to quant-trading firms. "At some point I thought, if I look back on my career 20 years from now and I just did this, I think I'd be disappointed with the impact I had on the world."
In the summer of 2017, he took the plunge and left Jump to join Polychain Capital. At the time, it was a small cryptocurrency investment fund with roughly $25 million in assets. But amid a boom in crypto interest, assets ballooned to over a billion dollars in less than a year — all while staff worked out of a two-bedroom loft in the SoMa neighborhood in San Francisco that at times doubled as a home to staff, including Lochmiller. He recalled the experience as "surreal."
He didn't stay long. With kids looming on the horizon, Lochmiller in 2018 left Polychain and took another crack at Mount Everest before paternal obligations kicked in.
Lochmiller seeded Crusoe later that year, and it quickly gained steam, especially as ESG concerns gained prominence with investors.
Brand name backers including Bain Capital, the Founders Fund, and Valor Equity invested.
Crusoe has deployed 86 mobile data centers — which can fit on the back of a truck and are connected via fiber-optic cables and microwave towers — to remote oil fields, which have the capacity to repurpose up to 650,00 metric tons of flared gas a year, the equivalent of 140,000 gas-fueled cars, Lochmiller sys.
The company has a presence in a handful of states, including projects with Exxon Mobil in North Dakota, but is looking to expand globally. In April, Crusoe raised another $350 million in funding at a valuation of $1.75 billion.
Point72's Denis Dancanet helped build Theorem and Jetoptera for several years after leaving PDT.
But Dancanet has also played a key role in the launch of not one but two start-ups: Theorem, which applies data science to underwriting and investing in consumer loans, and Jetoptera, which is essentially building flying cars. Dancanet, a late-comer to the appeals of entrepreneurship, is partial to viewing the world like a chess board — a seemingly small move in one corner can reverberate far and wide.
He didn't return after the competition, instead defecting to the US, where Dancanet applied for asylum and began pursuing a career as a computer science professor.
Two things helped reorient his mind toward entrepreneurship and Wall Street: He started reading Forbes Magazine, which routinely profiled problem-solving business leaders, and the book "Market Wizards" by Jack Schwager, which included a chapter on Bruce Kovner, the billionaire founder of macro hedge fund Caxton Associates.
Kovner's description of the world as a chess board — sound familiar? — where a minor decision on interest rates in a small country can affect markets across the world, resonated with Dancanet.
After completing his degree in 1997, he ditched academia and jumped to Wall Street, starting out building computer applications for bond traders before transitioning to the firm's Process Driven Trading group, the progenitor to the systematic hedge fund PDT that the bank spun out in 2012.
While at PDT, Dancanet made an angel investment in Theorem. He wasn't previously familiar with the marketplace lending arena. But for a statistical arbitrage expert accustomed to making thousands of small bets on stocks at once, the business model was catnip — it applied a similar approach to credit, an asset class traditionally constrained from wagering in such high volumes.
Simultaneously, Dancanet cofounded a company of his own with an old high school pal named Andrei Evulet, who worked as a research scientist at GE and spent a couple decades in R&D working on jet engines and propulsion systems.
Jetoptera, Greek for "jet wings," aimed to build jet-propulsion powered flying vehicles capable of vertical lift-off, hovering, and landing. Drones by then had graduated from curiosity to the mainstream, especially with Jeff Bezos' chattering about employing them to deliver Amazon Prime packages.
But drones, powered by electric batteries, are severely constricted by battery energy density — the auto industry has cracked the code for ground transport, but air flight is an entirely different matter.
A design drawing of Jetoptera's aircraft, which is like "a Dyson fan on steroids," according to Dancanet.
It's still relatively early days, but the lighter, sleeker solution Jetoptera is building "looks like a Dyson fan on steroids," he added, and its fluidic propulsion system uses compressed air to power thrusters.
If the company succeeds, packages air-dropped via drone will feel quaint compared with the possibility of flying cars, where applications extend beyond logistics and delivery to military, humanitarian relief, agriculture, ride-sharing, or pure recreation.
Tarun Chitra exploited his network of quant traders sitting out noncompetes to build Gauntlet into a unicorn.
Tarun Chitra
Tarun Chitra first started building trading tools for cryptocurrencies as a hobby in 2016, while working full-time as a quant researcher and developer at high-frequency trading firm Vatic Labs.
He'd dabbled in bitcoin mining starting in 2011, while he was a programmer at D.E. Shaw Research, the biomedical research arm of the famed quant hedge fund. But he didn't take the movement — relegated then to the societal fringes — too seriously at the time, selling all of his bitcoin "way too early" in 2013.
The movement gradually gained momentum amid a flurry of papers from cryptographers and academics, as did demand for Chitra's talents. By 2016, Chitra was becoming a frequent face at crypto meetups, where budding entrepreneurs frequently courted him to join forces.
The quirky characters inhabiting crypto in this era were rough around the edges, especially compared to MIT and Harvard Ph.D.s Chitra was accustomed to working with.
"I just didn't really trust any of them – so I was like, 'I'll consult for you instead,'" Chitra told Insider.
By 2018, Chitra's work moonlighting for crypto startups had ballooned, and he decided to take a calculated leap: He quit Vatic to consult full-time — and he began building a company of his own.
Ditching the lucrative world of systematic trading was a gamble.
A key factor in Chitra's decision was that Vatic, like many quantitative trading firms, enforced a lengthy noncompete that banned him from working for competitors in any capacity for up to two years after he left the company.
Because Vatic would continue to pay his salary for the duration of his noncompete, he viewed the contract as an insurance policy. It bought him time to gamble on uncertain and entrepreneurial ideas far afield of a trading floor while still earning a solid income, regardless of whether the efforts succeeded.
"I was like 'I'll be on noncompete anyways, so who cares?" Chitra said.
If the adventure in tech didn't work out, he could always head back to Wall Street once his noncompete expired.
But that didn't happen.
In mid-2018, he met Rei Chiang through some mutual quant trading friends. Chiang had worked in high-frequency trading at Getco and 3Red Trading before spending three years at Uber, and he'd been considering pursuing a similar idea. The pair joined forces.
They quickly got validation that they were on to something that summer when Facebook tried to acquire Gauntlet — about a year before it would announce its own ill-fated digital coin Libra.
"People are putting real money in this. We should just go raise money and actually make a run for it," Chitra remembered thinking.
They rebuffed the offer from Facebook, and instead the duo Chiang tried to ramp up as quickly as possible. They raised a seed round from First Round Capital.
They also intentionally exploited the noncompete dynamic at Wall Street quant firms to bootstrap Gauntlet.
"Our first few hires were actually just people on noncompetes. That was our network, we also knew, and they knew, that they would just be sitting out doing nothing during that time period," Chitra said. "It was a great way to bootstrap a start-up."
As of March, Gauntlet is a unicorn and a leading provider of software that helps financial institutions stress test and manage risk for their crypto lending operations.
The firm, now with more than 40 employees, raised $24 million in its series B from VCs including Ribbit Capital, Paradigm, and Polychain Capital.
Chitra thinks more Wall Street quants, who have a reputation for risk aversion won from their daily grind of obsessing over Sharpe Ratios, would benefit from learning to live a little bit and taking a calculated career gamble every once in a while.
"They're so unwilling to do something with a tiny amount of risk," Chitra said.
"Life is a little too short to be always focused on that," Chitra added.
At the last two quarterly earnings calls, Opendoor Technologies has reported record revenues, handily beating estimates from Wall Street analysts. The iBuyer — the moniker for tech companies that price and purchase homes from consumers with algorithms — was helped along by industry tailwinds, as well as the exit of a top competitor in Zillow, which suffered deep losses after its pricing models malfunctioned.
The firm's business also benefited from the addition of some senior quant trading firepower.
After decades in quant finance, Daniel Morillo found the tangible impact he could have at Opendoor rewarding.
Born and raised in Ecuador, Morillo came to the US in the mid-1990s to pursue his doctorate degree at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. He joined PanAgora Asset Management in 2000 as a research manager but after a few years jumped to Blackrock, where he ascended the ranks and ended up leading a global team of 30 employees responsible for portfolio management and modeling.
"The things that get me out of bed and always did were how innovation in modeling and forecasting can have a big impact," Daniel Morillo told Insider.
"I was always attracted to the idea that if I were to move on it would have to be an opportunity where I could honestly be impactful with my skill set," he added
With Opendoor, Morillo saw a company upending an old-school industry, and his expertise in data science and modeling for quant trading research would directly translate.
Market-making in home buying is at a high level not dissimilar to quantitative trading, Morillo explains. Opendoor is like a market maker of residential homes, he said, forecasting and modeling to buy them at scale and provide liquidity to sellers while maintaining a diversified and profitable portfolio.
He also found alluring the tangible, real-world impact his work could have.
Trading provides quick and concrete feedback, but it can feel abstract. Homebuyers or sellers are often propelled by significant life changes — a new job, a baby, or downsizing after children leave the home.
All-hands meetings at Opendoor start and end by highlighting the experience of real-life customers, something that resonated with Morillo after two decades of more nebulous impact.
After leaving Renaissance Technologies, Krešimir Penavić raced Ferraris and helped build an alternative to LASIK eye surgery.
On the one hand, for those departing Renaissance Technologies, the options in finance are severely limited. Secrecy is paramount at Jim Simons' Long Island-based hedge fund, and lengthy noncompetes and ironclad NDAs are enforced with enthusiasm.
But, on the other hand, most people with any considerable contribution to RenTech leave filthy rich, and the alternatives beyond investing are bountiful.
Krešimir Penavić joined Renaissance in 1993, when it was a small firm with only a dozen or so employees, as a mathematical programmer and later a research scientist. By the time he left nearly 25 years later in 2016, he was eager to try something new.
Penavić, who stands 6'6", also raced Ferraris for three years in the Ferrari Challenge, but he eventually sold his cars.
In 2017, he got an opportunity to exercise the quant muscle he'd flexed for so many years at RenTech, when he caught up with David Acker, a medical devices entrepreneur he'd known for decades. The two were neighbors in the early 1990s, their children went to the same daycare, and both had close ties to Stony Brook University; they each earned their post-graduate degrees at the school and Acker is a long-time trustee and vice chair of the Stony Brook Foundation, which manages its endowment.
Acker's latest start-up, TECLens, was attempting to solve a thorny medical problem — creating a cheaper, noninvasive alternative to LASIK eye surgery — and he needed a talented mathematician.
The TECLens procedure softens the cornea with droplets of vitamin B12 and then applies a single-use lens — which is connected to a small computer — to a patient's eyeball, mapping the eye with ultrasound and then stiffening it into the corrected shape using a low UV light. The whole ordeal takes less than 30 minutes, and the device is small enough to sit on a doctor's desk.
Penavić estimates TEClens devices, which are in clinical trials, aren't that far from public consumption — the CXLens could begin to sell in two years, he says.
More: BI Graphics Startups Technology
Renaissance Technologies
Citadel Securities
Jump Trading | 2022-06-01T15:11:15Z | www.businessinsider.com | Quantrepreneurs: Wall Street Quants Who Left Trading to Build Startups | https://www.businessinsider.com/quantrepreneurs-wall-street-quant-traders-build-silicon-valley-unicorn-2022-3 | https://www.businessinsider.com/quantrepreneurs-wall-street-quant-traders-build-silicon-valley-unicorn-2022-3 |
NSA Director Gen. Paul Nakasone testifies on Capitol Hill in 2018.
US Cyber Command's top general said the US has conducted "offensive" cyber operations to help Ukraine.
Gen. Paul Nakasone said operations have involved offense, defense, and information activities.
US officials tend to be careful with how they discuss America's offensive cyber capabilities.
The top US cyber official revealed on Wednesday that the US has conducted "offensive" cyber operations supporting Ukraine as it battles Russia.
US Army Gen. Paul Nakasone told British media outlet Sky News that "we've conducted a series of operations across the full spectrum; offensive, defensive, [and] information operations." He did not specify the targets of these operations.
Nakasone heads US Cyber Command and serves as director of the National Security Agency. Though short on details, his disclosure is rare and notable given that US officials tend to be cautious when publicly discussing America's offensive cyber capabilities and the Biden administration's efforts to strike a balance between supporting Ukrainian forces against Russia's invasion without taking actions that Moscow might interpret as an escalation.
During his discussion with Sky News, Nakasone praised Ukraine for its ability to repel Russian cyber attacks and chided critics who have suggested that reports of Moscow's cyber operations against the country have been blown out of proportion.
"If you asked the Ukrainians, they wouldn't say it's been overblown," he said. "If you take a look at the destructive attacks and disruptive attacks that they've encountered — you wrote about it in terms of the attack on [satellite company] Viasat — this is something that has been ongoing."
FBI Director Christopher Wray warned that Russia is taking "specific preparatory steps" to carry out damaging attacks. Addressing cyber concerns in particular, Wray said Russia's strikes are becoming "more destructive as the war keeps going poorly."
"We've seen the Russian government taking specific preparatory steps towards potential destructive attacks, both here and abroad," Wray told a Boston College cyber security conference, The Wall Street Journal reports.
In addition to the cyber operations Nakasone acknowledged, the US has, along with its allies, also provided Ukraine with weapons and other forms of assistance, but there are limitations.
President Joe Biden himself outlined on Tuesday night the limits of US involvement, stressing his long-held view in a New York Times op-ed that the US wishes to keep its own forces out of the war. Biden also sought to continue to clean up his vague suggestion of regime change after his March assertion that Putin "cannot remain in power" irked some Western allies.
"As much as I disagree with Mr. Putin, and find his actions an outrage, the United States will not try to bring about his ouster in Moscow," Biden wrote. "So long as the United States or our allies are not attacked, we will not be directly engaged in this conflict, either by sending American troops to fight in Ukraine or by attacking Russian forces."
More: Russia Ukraine Paul Nakasone cyber | 2022-06-01T15:11:27Z | www.businessinsider.com | US Has Supported Ukraine With 'Offensive' Cyber Ops, General Reveals | https://www.businessinsider.com/us-supporting-ukraine-with-offensive-cyber-operations-general-reveals-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/us-supporting-ukraine-with-offensive-cyber-operations-general-reveals-2022-6 |
I'm 23 years old and facing my first economic crisis as an adult. Career experts share 6 tips for managing financial anxiety.
Cost of living and unemployment are Gen Z's top two concerns, a 2022 Deloitte survey found.
With a potential recession, it's important for Gen Zers to make smart financial decisions right now.
Insider spoke with career coaches about how Gen Zers can grow their careers in an economic crisis.
As a 23-year-old Gen Zer, the Great Recession shaped my childhood, but I've never faced tough economic times as a financially independent adult — until now.
Over the past two months, I've had friends affected by layoffs; inflation is starting to scare me; and at some point, I'll have student loans to repay. I'm nervous about what the next year will bring, and I don't know how to make sense of all the mixed signals about the economy.
My peers share these concerns. Deloitte's 2022 global survey of Gen Zers and millennials, gathered between November 2021 and April 2022, found that the cost of living and unemployment were two of the top concerns for this generation. Of the 14,808 Gen Zers polled, 46% reported living paycheck to paycheck, and 72% expected the economy to get worse in the next 12 months.
To learn how young professionals like me can keep our heads on straight in economic uncertainty, I decided to consult two career experts: Ashley Stahl and Lindsey Pollak. Stahl is a career coach at SoFi and the host of the "You Turn" podcast. Pollak is a career coach and the author of "Recalculating: Navigate Your Career Through the Changing World of Work."
Both had their careers completely upended by the Great Recession, but they also found new opportunities. As a millennial, Stahl started her career in the recession. Pollak, who is a Gen Xer, lost her job after her company went bankrupt, which drove her to start her own business.
They shared six pieces of advice for persisting through economic uncertainty and continuing to grow your career in tough times.
Talk to people who've been through it before
The economy always goes through ups and downs, and if young people are upset and scared by this moment, Pollak encourages them to have multigenerational conversations.
"It can be really helpful and comforting to talk to those of us who have been through this before," Pollak said. "Talk to your parents, your mentors, your professors and teachers, your older colleagues because there is a tremendous amount of wisdom in people who have lived through these experiences before."
Keep your network active
Stahl said now is an important time to invest in your career growth. When she was coming out of college into a recession, she had to put herself in front of employers with new energy. She came up with a list of 2,000 names of alumni in her city and reached out to every single one of them.
"The recession turned me into an innovator for my own career," Stahl said. "There's no such thing as no opportunities."
For Gen Z, she highlighted LinkedIn groups and professional organizations to connect with online. She encouraged reaching out to mentors, former bosses, or other connections for online coffee chats to keep your network warm in case you need a hand in the future.
Learning how to have these conversations will serve you well regardless of what comes next.
It's one of the most important lessons to learn from the Great Recession: "Live within your means," Pollak said. "Know how much you're spending, know where that money is going."
Now is not the time to take out loans or let credit-card debt pile up. Pollak also encouraged young people to think about where they could cut back spending or supplement their income.
Be resilient
With uncertainty about the economy, it's important to take a second and think about your mindset toward your career, Stahl said. She encouraged young people to think about this statement: "I'm not getting where I want to be because …"
Especially in tough economic times, resiliency is essential to weathering the storm. Rejection is a part of networking and job hunting, and handling these setbacks helps to regulate your anxiety about the future.
"Real career development takes place when you look at the meaning you're making of rejection," Stahl said. "Use your job hunt as a tool to strengthen that muscle that can rebound and be resilient after rejection."
Acknowledge burnout
Mental health is one of the top concerns for Gen Z. The Deloitte survey found that 46% of Gen Zers reported feeling burned out because of the intensity of work.
Stahl said it's important to acknowledge the effect of burnout and find its root cause. On a recent podcast episode, Stahl spoke with Emilie Aries, the CEO of Bossed Up, who highlighted a lack of sleep, community, purpose, and agency as the main causes of burnout.
"First, I would look at your work reality," Stahl told Insider. "Am I burned out because I'm just walking on a path that just isn't meant for me?"
You can't slow inflation. You can't fix the stock market. But Pollak emphasized that you could focus on excelling at your job, connecting with your network, and shifting your mindset.
And there are always ways to end up on top, even when things are difficult. She pointed to businesses such as Zoom and Instacart that thrived during the pandemic. Some of the biggest companies we know today started during the recession, including Uber and Airbnb.
"There's always opportunity in times of change," Pollak said. "It might be challenging. It's nobody's fault, but there are actions you can take."
More: gen z career advice Great Recession
economic anxiety | 2022-06-01T18:18:33Z | www.businessinsider.com | Gen Z Is Scared for the Economy. Here's How We Can Manage Our Anxiety. | https://www.businessinsider.com/gen-z-economy-financial-anxiety-career-advice-recession-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/gen-z-economy-financial-anxiety-career-advice-recession-2022-6 |
Google Cloud insiders say CEO Thomas Kurian's strategy is leaving salespeople fighting with each other over deals and constantly worried about job security
Rosalie Chan, Hugh Langley, and Martin Coulter
Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian at Google Cloud Next 2019
Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian has grown its salesforce and revamped its sales compensation plan.
Employees say they can make more money, but the culture has gotten more competitive.
Sales goals have shifted many times, while teams fight for credit in closing deals, employees say.
One of the first things Thomas Kurian did when he took over as Google Cloud CEO in 2019 was set a lofty goal to triple the unit's dedicated sales staff.
Kurian has long made sales a cornerstone of his strategy for Google Cloud as it battles for market share with leaders Amazon Web Services and Microsoft. To accelerate that push, he soon revamped Google Cloud's compensation plan by reducing the sales team's base salary and giving aggressive bonus incentives for exceeding their quotas.
The pay arrangement made Google Cloud's sales teams function more like those at Microsoft, SAP, or Oracle, at the last of which Kurian spent decades as a key executive. It introduced a new system of metrics to track and targets to meet, even as it set its sights high to catch up to its larger rivals – and helped Google Cloud grow by leaps and bounds, say employees past and present.
But the break from how Google Cloud used to do things has hurt morale and increased stress at the unit, fostering what those company insiders say is a more "cutthroat" culture, as salespeople compete to close the big deals they need to win their maximum payouts.
Employees described ever-shifting compensation plans, teams battling to take credit for closing deals, and a buggy internal data system for tracking sales, all of which they say contributes to an overarching sense of "anxiety."
And for those who can't hang, the sources said, they fear that it's their jobs on the line.
"On the whole, people who are good at their job get paid well," a current employee said. "People who are unlucky, or have a bad set of accounts, or aren't as talented – they don't make as much money. If they're not talented, they'll get pushed out."
In a statement, a Google Cloud spokesperson said that this story is "without merit."
"Our compensation attainment rates are not only aligned to the industry average, but our average payout per sales rep is considerably higher than the industry average," the spokesperson said. "Nearly 90 percent of Cloud employees say this is a great place to work, and we have one of the lowest attrition rates at the company. Last year, we received hundreds of thousands of resumes because we provide the culture, compensation and experience top talent are looking for."
Changing compensation structures
The advantage of a bonus-heavy pay structure is that it opens the door for salespeople to make even more money than they had previously, assuming they smash their goals. On the other hand, it also introduces more uncertainty, with missing those goals carrying higher stakes than ever before. The conventional wisdom is that most Silicon Valley jobs pay at least $100,000 a year (if not more), while a former employee said a low-performing Google Cloud salesperson could find themselves "at risk of making less than six figures."
In other words, when the new pay structure came into effect, "the majority of people got more money and a lot more anxiety," another employee said. "They don't know how the outcome will be until it's over."
In addition, Google Cloud has made several changes to its sales targets, including tying bonuses to winning new "greenfield," clients and walking back incentives for selling partner products, Insider previously reported. All of these changes left some with a sense of whiplash, making them feel unsure of whether a successful sales approach would still work another few months down the line.
"People don't trust that whatever they put into the comp plan is actually going to stick around," a former employee said.
A 'land grabbing' fight
A focus on hitting quotas also contributed to a more competitive culture, sources said. Teams battle each other to take credit for closing deals, thanks in large part to how Google Cloud categorizes its sales teams. Specifically, each team is given a mandate to sell to "small," "medium," or "large" corporate customers, based on the size of the account, according to four employees.
The issue is that as those customers grow in revenue, headcount, or cloud spending, Google Cloud will reassign them to the next largest team. A customer that was considered "medium" last year could meet the criteria for a "large" company this year. When that happens, the company insiders say, the customer is shunted from one sales team to another: Customers might be working closely with certain salespeople, only to have to suddenly switch over to someone else.
A Google Cloud spokesperson said that the company has clear processes for matching an account to a team as a customer grows. The team in charge of that account will get credit for closing deals, but there's also bonus for sellers who graduate customers to the next segment, the spokesperson said.
Still, this rubs some salespeople the wrong way, the insiders say, because the new sales team will get all the credit for deals signed with that customer, even if the previous salespeople did all the hard work of building the relationship. Internal critics at Google Cloud tell Insider that it's disruptive to the customer, even as it pushes salespeople to get into "land grabbing" fights to keep a tight hold on their accounts.
"It affects everyone, really," an employee said. "You lose your big spending accounts. You build relationships. You lose your momentum with your clients."
Employees complain of buggy systems
Apart from the culture, a common complaint voiced by Google Cloud insiders is problems with its sales data tool. The internal system that tracks sales quotas and other data is riddled with bugs, making it hard to interpret the data, two sources said. A spokesperson said Google Cloud rolled out a new program in February to address those issues.
This data system, among other tools, weren't popular among the sales teams. In its annual Googlegeist survey, conducted late last year with the results released internally in March, only 39% of Googlers in the North America sales organization rated its internal tools and systems favorably — 20% lower than Google and Cloud, according to screenshots from a sales meeting viewed by Insider. At an all hands for the organization, North America president Kirsten Kliphouse said Google Cloud will address continued issues with them, according to an employee who attended.
"It's ironic because Google is a big data company," a former employee said. "There would be issues with company data and info. Here's an account that's high potential, and then it's actually a small biz without a growth potential. There's a lot of data quality issues, and that can be a problem with deals."
More: Google Cloud Google Alphabet Cloud Computing | 2022-06-01T18:18:45Z | www.businessinsider.com | Google Cloud Has 'Cutthroat' Sales Culture Like Oracle, Employees Say | https://www.businessinsider.com/google-cloud-cutthroat-sales-culture-oracle-2022-5 | https://www.businessinsider.com/google-cloud-cutthroat-sales-culture-oracle-2022-5 |
The 5 best Amazon Kindles and e-readers we tested in 2022
Apple; Amazon; Rakuten Kobo; Savanna Durr/Insider
Here are the best e-readers of 2022
Best e-reader under $100
Best touchscreen e-reader
Best tablet for reading
E-reader FAQs
Read our top Kindle how-tos for more tips and tricks
Kindle how-tos, tips, and tricks:
E-readers have come a long way since Amazon introduced the first Kindles in 2007. Current models run much faster and are more portable than older ones, but Amazon hasn't been the only brand making its mark on e-readers for some time. Kobo, Amazon's main competitor, has a wider range of devices now, offering six models to Amazon's three.
It's important to note that Kobo devices each come in one version, while Amazon sells each of its Kindles in two: with special offers (ads) and without. If you choose the ones with special offers, you will see ads on the lock screen instead of a neutral screensaver or the cover of the book you're currently reading. Typically, the ads will be for romance novels available with a Kindle Unlimited subscription.
We have extensively tested nearly every current e-reader over the past few months, flying through novels to determine which devices are the best ones for readers across the price spectrum. As e-book lovers, we have found that each e-reader below has something different to offer — whether you love page turn buttons, need something waterproof, or even a stylus — across a range of budgets.
Best overall e-reader: Kindle Oasis, available at Amazon, starting at $249.99
Amazon's Kindle Oasis delivers the best reading experience due to its ergonomic design, responsive page turn buttons, and auto-adjusting screen brightness, in addition to a huge library of ebooks.
Best e-reader under $100: Kindle, available at Amazon, starting at $89.99
At less than $100, Amazon's basic Kindle, which has a front-lit screen and space for thousands of books, is the best e-reader option for readers on a budget.
Best e-reader under $200: Kobo Libra 2, available at Amazon, starting at $179.99
The Kobo Libra 2 has page turn buttons, an easy-to-use interface, and makes it very easy to get library books directly on the device.
Best touchscreen e-reader: Kindle Paperwhite, available at Amazon, starting at $139.99
With a newly updated design, waterproof rating, and great battery life, the Kindle Paperwhite is the best choice for readers who prefer touchscreens.
Best tablet for reading: iPad, available at Apple, starting at $329
Apple's basic iPad is cheaper than Kobo's similarly sized e-reader and has a color screen, making it the best choice for people who read a lot of comics and graphic novels.
Angela Tricarico/Insider
Screen: 7-inch flush, E Ink screen with 300 ppi sharpness, adjustable brightness and warmth
Storage: 8GB up to 32GB
Battery life: Up to six weeks with a half hour of reading a day.
Water resistance: IPX8 rating for up to two meters (6.5 feet) of fresh water for up to 60 minutes or 0.25 meters (0.82 feet) in seawater for three minutes
Read our full Kindle Oasis review
Pros: Bright and responsive screen, page turn buttons, design ideal for one-handed reading, huge ebook store, easy library access, Bluetooth for Audible audiobooks, dark mode
Cons: It's one of the most expensive e-readers on the market
The greatest feature of the Kindle Oasis, and part of the reason why it's the best e-reader we've ever read on, is its design. Unlike the other two Kindles Amazon makes, the Kindle Oasis has aluminum casing and a matte, fingerprint-resistant glass screen. The sleek metal is incredibly lightweight and a unique tapered design creates a built-in grip to help you hold the device one-handed.
The page turn buttons, which we find to be more responsive than buttons on other e-readers we've tested, make it easy to read no matter which your dominant hand is. The device's default is for right-handed people, but the screen and buttons automatically rotate when being held in the other hand.
Much like an iPhone, the Kindle Oasis has an automatically adjusting brightness sensor. There are two on either side of the page turn buttons that read the light of the environment you're reading in and adjust the screen's brightness accordingly.
A feature many of these e-readers now have is a warm light that helps with eye strain by softening the harshness of the screen brightness. The Kindle Oasis has this, too, but also the ability to not only schedule it to turn on and off at specific times, but also choose how warm the screen gets. The warmer you go, the more sepia-toned the screen will look.
The Kindle Oasis supports files purchased from the Kindle store, in addition to PDFs and soon, even EPUB files will load on Kindles, closing the gap between Kindle and its competitors even more. You can even get library books on the Kindle Oasis through a process with a few steps, but it's all done over Wi-Fi.
With a thin, sleek construction and a responsive interface, the Kindle Oasis is the best e-reader on the market right now. It has everything we want out of a good e-reader: page turn buttons, access to library books, and a nice, bright screen.
Screen: 6-inch inset, E Ink screen with 167 ppi sharpness and adjustable brightness
Battery life: Up to four weeks with a half hour of reading a day
Read our full Kindle review
Amazon's basic Kindle is a great e-reader for the price, especially considering it frequently goes on sale. Though the screen may not be the largest or the sharpest, it performs well over long periods of time and is a manageable, compact size. All Kindles come with the same interface, so while the device itself may differ from the more expensive Kindles, it works in the same way.
While the screen isn't as bright or sharp as the Kindle Paperwhite, Amazon's more expensive touchscreen e-reader, the four LEDs in the front light are bright enough that you can use the Kindle to read in the dark. The device itself has a 6-inch screen and it's very light, making it comfortable to hold for long periods of time.
This Kindle isn't much larger than the average smartphone, fits inside of most bags nicely, and is ideal for reading on-the-go (for example, on public transportation or waiting in line somewhere). However, this could also be seen as a detriment to people who prefer a larger screen — you can make the font size bigger to make up for that, but it only does so much.
Amazon has a large library with millions of ebooks available for purchase on the e-reader itself in addition to phones and Amazon's website. Like the Kindle Oasis, you can bolster your ebook library with a Kindle Unlimited subscription and download eligible books right on the device as long as you're connected to Wi-Fi.
Screen: 7-inch inset, E Ink screen with 300 ppi sharpness, adjustable brightness and warmth
Battery life: Weeks depending on usage
Water resistance: IPX8 rating for up to two meters (6.5 feet) of fresh water for up to 60 minutes
Pros: Easy to get library books with OverDrive integration, page turn buttons, Bluetooth for Kobo Audiobooks
Cons: Doesn't support Kindle files, battery does not last as long as other e-readers, no ebook subscription service
Kobo Libra 2 is the cheapest in Kobo's line of six e-readers to have page turn buttons, which is a heavy preference of mine when I'm using an e-reader.
The page turn buttons on the Kobo Libra 2 are customizable, so you can change the configuration if you'd rather the back button be the bottom one instead of the top one, which is the default. Unique to the Kobo line, you can also read in landscape mode with the page turn buttons on the bottom of the "page" instead of the right or left.
Kobo Libra 2 has Kobo's ComfortLight Pro technology built into the screen. In addition to having a really crisp, bright display (we've found that 50% brightness is best on this e-reader), you can turn on scheduled warmth for more natural nighttime screen color. This is helpful for people who primarily read at night because it cuts down on blue light that strains your eyes and disrupts your sleep.
To get books on the Libra 2, you can go through Kobo's store, which has millions of books, directly on the device. You can also get library books directly on the device, something that none of the Kindles have support for. Simply sign into OverDrive with your public library credentials and you can start borrowing available books directly from their store pages.
At this price point, Kobo is better than Kindle because the Libra 2 most closely resembles our best overall pick, the Kindle Oasis, but is up to $100 cheaper. Though the interface differs from the Kindle, the page turn buttons and easy access to library books make it the best e-reader under $200.
Screen: 6.8-inch flush, E Ink screen with 300 ppi sharpness, adjustable brightness and warmth
Battery life: Up to 10 weeks with a half hour of reading a day.
Pros: Great battery life, bright screen, waterproof rating, access to Kindle store, Bluetooth for Audible audiobooks, dark mode
Cons: No page turn buttons, only comes in 8GB
Amazon's mid-range Kindle, the Paperwhite, takes some of the high-end features of the Oasis and applies them to the design and shape of the basic Kindle. The 6.8-inch screen, which is bigger than the basic Kindle but smaller than the Oasis, is flush with its border and has 17 LED front lights which make the display crisp at the highest brightness.
Readers who are dead-set on their e-readers having page turn buttons should consider the Kindle Oasis instead, but the Kindle Paperwhite delivers such an enjoyable reading experience that we don't find ourselves missing them when we pick up the Paperwhite and settle in for some reading time. The slight curved edge and rubbery plastic back make it easy to hold one-handed without too much slipping — as long as you're holding it in your right hand.
The Kindle Paperwhite has an unrivaled battery that is said to last 10 weeks, to the Oasis' six, with similar use. In the process of testing, we took a fully charged Paperwhite on a long day trip with me; after reading on it for most of a train ride from New York City to Washington DC and back again (about seven hours total) with the brightness set at 13, we had only used 9% of the battery.
We've noticed that sometimes touch-screen e-readers that don't have any buttons are less responsive to page turns and menu selections with a lag time between touching the screen and the device responding, but we never have that problem with the Kindle Paperwhite. The matte finish to the screen is glare-free and fingerprints and smudges don't show up.
Finally, Audible subscribers can also use the e-reader's built-in Bluetooth to listen to audiobooks with a pair of wireless headphones.
Screen: 10.2 inch LED-backlit Multi-Touch Retina display
Storage: 64GB up to 256GB
Battery life: Up to 10 hours on Wi-Fi
Read our full iPad review
Pros: Color screen, good battery life, carries the apps from all major e-reader brands
Cons: Not strictly an e-reader, not water resistant
Though we are primarily e-reader users, we'll always default to our iPad for graphic novels and comics because it's easier to see full pages on a bigger, full color screen. Graphic novels and comics can be read on e-readers including all of the ones listed above, but since none of them have a color screen, a major part of the reading experience is lost.
The basic iPad, which last saw an update in September 2021, isn't strictly an e-reader, but it's our pick for the best tablet for reading. Through the app store, you can download the app from your e-reader company of choice, whether it's Kindle, Kobo, or Nook, plus apps like Libby and Hoopla for library users looking to borrow ebooks. Apple even has their own bookstore and Books app if you don't own ebooks from other retailers.
Even with a Retina display instead of the standard E Ink of an e-reader, the iPad has ways to mitigate eye strain. The Night Shift setting will soften the harsh blue light from the screen, and you can also turn on dark mode, which swaps the background and text colors.
We tested other e-readers in the process of writing this guide. Here are a few that left an impression:
Nook GlowLight 4 ($149.99): Considering the price, the Nook GlowLight 4 does not deliver much more than the basic Kindle. The e-reader has page turn buttons but its construction, size, design, and features are nearly identical to the Kindle.
Kobo Sage ($259.99): This e-reader is comparable in price to our overall best pick, but it's a little bigger and the size makes it less comfortable to hold for long periods of time.
Kobo Elipsa ($399.99): While the Kobo Elipsa, with support for a Kobo Stylus, is a great e-reader for students who want to mark up readings for class, the device is large, heavy, and really difficult to handle.
To test an e-reader, you have to read extensively on it. We set up all of the e-readers, noting how easy or difficult that process was, before checking out the device's bookstore to see what the process of purchasing and downloading a book was like. We then purchased and downloaded a book. Additionally, we researched how to get library loans on each e-reader.
We read one full novel on each e-reader, noting differences such as the number of adjustable fonts and text sizes, and if it was easy to turn the page either using the touch screen or page turn buttons. We took note of the brightness settings on each e-reader and whether it had adjustable warmth in addition to adjustable brightness. We also took into consideration the e-readers' sizes to determine if they were easy to hold one-handed and comfortable to hold and read on for extended periods of time.
Interface and features
We went through the settings menus as well, trying out any settings we thought would enhance our reading experience. This included listening to audiobooks where applicable and testing out features like dark mode and adjustable warmth scheduling.
All of the e-readers' manufacturers have claims about battery life. After charging the e-readers to 100%, we spent a week per device testing the batteries myself to see how they hold up under identical conditions that reflect the most common use: Wi-Fi on, Bluetooth off (in the case that the e-reader had Bluetooth), and brightness set at 50% with any auto-adjusting sensors turned off.
Should we get an e-reader or a tablet?
If you read daily, you should get an e-reader instead of a tablet. The E Ink screens and warmth settings that most e-readers have now help mitigate eye strain that typically comes from extended exposure to blue light screens. However, if you typically read a lot of graphic novels or comics with color illustrations, a tablet may actually be a better choice for you.
What is the best e-reader for library books?
It's simple to get library ebooks on Kobo and Kindle devices with the introduction of the Libby app. Kobo e-readers come with OverDrive pre-installed, so all you have to do is sign in with your public library credentials and you'll be able to borrow books from the library directly on the device.
If you have a Kindle, it's a few more steps and you'll need a smartphone connected to Wi-Fi as well, but through the Libby app, you can connect multiple library cards to an account which increases the amount of books you're able to borrow.
What is the cheapest e-reader?
The cheapest e-reader is the Amazon Kindle, which we also recommend as the best e-reader under $100.
Is there a color e-reader?
Yes, but color e-readers are few and far between. Barnes and Noble sells an HD Nook tablet, which we have not tested. If you're the kind of reader who prefers larger, color screens for reading, we recommend the iPad.
Malarie Gokey/Insider
Our complete guide on how to use a Kindle
How to read Kindle books on a PC
How to buy and read Kindle books on your iPhone
How to buy and read Kindle ebooks on a Mac computer
How to send PDFs to a Kindle
What generation of Kindle do I have?
How to restart a Kindle
How to delete books from a Kindle
How to return a Kindle book
How to buy books on Kindle
How to reset the Kindle Paperwhite
How to change the font size on a Kindle
How to connect a Kindle Paperwhite to WiFi
How to sign out of the Kindle app
More: Insider Picks Guides e-reader Kindle best e-reader | 2022-06-01T18:18:58Z | www.businessinsider.com | Best E-Reader of 2022: Still the Amazon Kindle Oasis | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/best-ebook-readers-kindles | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/best-ebook-readers-kindles |
BankFirst Kasasa bank accounts vs. regular accounts
How BankFirst works
Is BankFirst trustworthy?
BankFirst vs. First Horizon Bank
BankFirst vs. the First Bank
Sophia Acevedo
BankFirst has 29 branches in Alabama and Mississippi.
Bankfirst; Rachel Mendelson/Insider
The bottom line: You may like BankFirst if you live in Alabama or Mississippi and want to explore local banking options. BankFirst's strongest products are its high-yield checking account and Kasasa bank accounts — all of which offer competitive interest rates if you meet certain requirements.
High-yield checking account option
Kasasa checking and savings account option
High interest rates on CDs compared to other brick-and-mortar banks
Only available in Alabama and Mississippi
Low interest rates on money market account
May get a higher CD rate at online banks
Monthly service fees on money market account account
BankFirst FIRSTSavings Account
29 locations in AL and MS
Access to over 39,000 free ATMs through the MoneyPass ATM network
To waive the $4 monthly service fee, keep at least $300 in your account daily
The BankFirst FIRSTSavings Account may be worthwhile if you can keep at least $300 in your account daily so you won't have to pay the $4 monthly service fee.
If you're looking to open a high-yield savings account that is easy to manage, consider reading our best high-yield savings accounts guide.
BankFirst High-Interest Checking Account
Refunds up to $15 in out-of-network ATM fees per month
No monthly service fees if you enroll in online statements
$5 paper statement fee
Get reimbursed up to $15 per month in out-of-network ATM fees if you maintain an account balance of at least $0.01
Earn 1.25% APY on account balances up to $15,000 if you meet the following requirements: Make at least 20 debit card transactions of $5 or more each month; Receive a total of $500 or more in direct deposits each month
Earn 0.15% APY on account balances over $15,000 if you meet the following requirements: Make at least 20 debit card transactions of $5 or more each month; Receive a total of $500 or more in direct deposits each month
Earn 0.01% APY if the requirements aren't met
BankFirst offers a unique high-yield checking account that might be ideal if you keep less than $15,000 in your account and meet the requirements to earn the highest interest rate.
To earn 1.25% APY each month, you'll need to meet the following requirements with an account balance under $15,000:
Make at least 20 debit card transactions of $5 or more monthly
Receive $500 or more in direct deposits monthly
BankFirst Certificate of Deposit
Solid CD rates compared to other brick-and-mortar banks
Standard-to-low early withdrawal penalties
High minimum opening deposits
Online banks may offer a higher interest rate on CDs
Terms range from 1 month to 5 years
Minimum deposit will depend on the term you choose
Early withdrawal penalties: 30 days of interest for CD terms under 1 year; 180 days of interest for CD terms over 1 year
BankFirst pays solid interest rates on CDs compared to other brick-and-mortar banks. However, you'll need to have at least $1,000 to open a CD, and the minimum opening deposit varies depending on which term you choose.
BankFirst BankFirst Money Market Account
BankFirst Money Market Account
You must have at least $5,000 in your account daily to earn interest
The BankFirst Money Market Account might be a decent choice if you can maintain an average daily balance of at least $5,000. By meeting this requirement, you'll be able to earn interest on your account and waive the $15 monthly service fee.
If you'd like to open a money market account that doesn't have a monthly service fee, consider going through our best money market accounts guide for options.
BankFirst Kasasa bank accounts vs. BankFirst regular accounts
Kasasa is a financial services company that works with local financial institutions to offer special perks on bank accounts, like high-interest rates or cash back.
The BankFirst Kasasa Cash Account makes it slightly easier to earn the same interest rate as the BankFirst High-Interest Checking Account. You'll only need to make 18 debit card transactions and a direct deposit of any amount to earn 1.25% APY on account balances under $10,000.
If you have a daily account balance between $10,000 and $15,000, you may prefer the BankFirst High-Interest Checking Account, though.
The BankFirst Kasasa Saver Account might be ideal if you're searching for a savings account with a higher interest rate than the BankFirst FIRSTSavings Account, but you'll need to open BankFirst Kasasa Cash Account to qualify for it. If you only want to open a savings account you may favor the BankFirst Kasasa Saver Account.
BankFirst is a local bank in Alabama and Mississippi with 29 locations.
Customers have access to over 39,000 free ATMs throughout the US through MoneyPass ATM network.
Customer service is available by phone from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. CT Monday through Thursday, and 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. CT on Friday. The bank's mobile app is rated 4.6 out of 5 stars in the Google Play Store and 4.8 out of 5 stars in the Apple store.
BankFirst is FDIC insured. You may safely keep up to $250,000 in an individual bank account.
BankFirst trustworthiness and BBB rating
The Better Business Bureau assesses businesses to see how they address customer issues.
BankFirst has an NR ("No Rating") from the BBB because the BBB doesn't have enough information to give a rating.
A BBB rating won't necessarily be be-all and end-all. You may want to talk to current customers or read online customer reviews to get a more well-rounded perspective of whether BankFirst is right for you.
On the bright side, BankFirst hasn't been involved in any recent public scandals.
BankFirst has a Kasasa high-yield checking account and high-yield savings account.
See how BankFirst stacks up against First Horizon Bank, another popular brick-and-mortar bank available in the same states.
Bankfirst
AL, MS
High-yield checking account
You may like First Horizon Bank if you prioritize a large branch network. First Horizon Bank has over 400 branches in 12 states. Meanwhile, BankFirst serves as a local banking option — it only has 29 branches in 2 states.
Your decision between these two banks may also hinge on specific bank account features. First Horizon Bank doesn't charge monthly service fees on its checking account, but charges a monthly service fee on its savings account if you don't meet certain balance requirements. Meanwhile, at BankFirst you could earn a high interest rate on your checking or savings account if you frequently use a debit card.
We've compared BankFirst to another CDFI in the same states: The First Bank.
AL, GA, IL, MS, LA
Second chance bank account
Many CDFIs offer unique banking products that address banking barriers.
At The First Bank, you'll be able to open a second chance checking account even if you have a negative banking history. Meanwhile, BankFirst has Kasasa checking account and savings account where you may earn a high interest rate.
If you are searching for a traditional savings account, both banks charge monthly service fees if you don't meet certain minimum balance requirements. You'll need to keep at least $100 in your account daily at The First Bank. Meanwhile, BankFirst requires you to keep a daily account balance of at least $300.
How many locations does BankFirst have?
BankFirst has 29 branches in Alabama and Mississippi. You'll also have access to over 39,000 free ATMs through the MoneyPass ATM network.
Is BankFirst safe?
BankFirst is an FDIC-insured bank. This means you can keep up to $250,000 in an individual bank account, and your money will be secure even in the rare event that the bank shuts down.
Sophia Acevedo is a junior banking reporter at Insider who covers banking and savings for Personal Finance Insider. She joined Insider in July 2021 as a fellow for the Personal Finance Insider Reviews team. Before joining the Insider team, she was a freelancer based in Los Angeles and worked briefly in publishing. She also graduated from California State University Fullerton in 2020. You can reach out to her on Twitter at @sophieacvdo or send a quick email at sacevedo@insider.com. Read more about how Personal Finance Insider chooses, rates, and covers financial products and services >>
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More: BankFirst BankFirst FIRSTSavings Account BankFirst High-Interest Checking Account BankFirst CD | 2022-06-01T18:19:22Z | www.businessinsider.com | BankFirst Review: Bank With a High-Yield Checking Account | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/bankfirst-review | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/bankfirst-review |
Warner Bros. chairman Toby Emmerich to exit in latest shift after the Discovery merger
Emmerich at CinemaCon in Las Vegas in April.
Warner Bros. Picture Group chairman Toby Emmerich is stepping down.
He'll be replaced by former MGM heads Michael De Luca and Pamela Abdy.
Emmerich's exits comes soon after the WarnerMedia-Discovery merger completed.
Toby Emmerich, the chairman of Warner Bros. Picture Group, will step down from his role, multiple outlets reported on Wednesday, including Variety, Deadline, and The Hollywood Reporter.
Michael De Luca and Pamela Abdy, formerly the heads of the MGM film studio, are expected to replace Emmerich, the outlets reported. De Luca and Abdy exited MGM in April after it was acquired by Amazon.
A Warner Bros. representative did not immediately return a request for confirmation.
De Luca and Abdy's oversight would include Warner Bros., New Line, and, for the time being, DC, according to the outlets.
THR reported that Walter Hamada, who oversees movies based on DC comics, would report to De Luca and Abdy until new leadership for the DC unit is found.
In April, Variety reported that Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav was eyeing an "overhaul" for DC, including finding a person like Marvel's Kevin Feige to oversee DC's creative strategy, and revitalizing underused characters like Superman.
Zaslav has also made repairing the relationship between Warner Bros. and movie theaters a priority, after the studio released all of its 2021 movies simultaneously in theaters and on the streaming service HBO Max .
That was the backdrop for Warner Bros.' appearance at April's exhibitor conference CinemaCon, where the major studios highlighted upcoming releases to theater owners. It came on the heals of the WarnerMedia-Discovery merger, which was finalized earlier that month. Emmerich spoke to the crowd about the importance of the theatrical experience.
A little over a month later, he's on his way out in favor of De Luca and Abdy, who focused on theatrical output at MGM before it was purchased in March by Amazon.
Emmerich's exit is the latest in a line of post-merger executive shakeups, including the ouster of WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar.
More: Warner Bros. Hollywood Movies Warner Bros. Discovery | 2022-06-01T18:19:34Z | www.businessinsider.com | Warner Bros. Chairman to Step Down, Former MGM Heads to Take Over | https://www.businessinsider.com/warner-bros-chairman-to-step-down-following-discovery-merger-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/warner-bros-chairman-to-step-down-following-discovery-merger-2022-6 |
Americans are still saying 'I quit' in near-record numbers, showing that the Forever Resignation is sticking around
Over 4 million Americans have quit every month for 11 months, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data as of April 2022.
Mladen Zivkovic/Getty Images
Over 4 million Americans have quit every month for 11 months straight in the Great Resignation.
The trend didn't slow in April 2022, the latest month the Bureau of Labor Statistics released data for.
It shows how quitting has become a new norm that employers are adjusting to.
The economy has taken a host of twists and turns over the past year, but one trend has consistently stuck around: Everyone is quitting their jobs.
In April 2022, 4.4 million Americans put in their resignation letters, according to the latest data release from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Preliminary data for April shows there were about 25,000 fewer quits in April than in March. Job openings also declined in April 2022, falling from 11.9 million in March to 11.4 million in April, bringing them still close to record highs. Daniel Zhao, senior economist at Glassdoor, told Insider that "openings and quits tend to move hand in hand."
"When you have a higher level of openings, you also tend to have a higher level of quits as well because workers have more opportunities to actually go out and find a job that is a better fit for them," Zhao said. "So in the context of very high openings right now, the Great Resignation is actually not that unusual."
April was the 11th month in a row that over 4 million Americans have thrown in the towel. It also marks a year since the country first notched a new record-breaking quits rate, which was quickly bested when quits reached a series high in November 2021 — showing that workers quitting in droves was far from just a reaction to early pandemic conditions.
April also showed just how much businesses want to hold onto their workers: Layoffs and discharges reached a new record low. Just 1.2 million people were laid off or discharged in April, a rate of 0.8%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
"From the turnover data, we can see people still have a large amount of confidence, as they're quitting jobs, but there's also a large amount of security as layoff rates are very low," Nick Bunker, economic research director at Indeed Hiring Lab, told Insider.
Of course, the new report shows numbers through April and don't completely reflect the current labor market. A series of recent high-profile layoffs have shaken the tech industry amidst concerns over a recession , although Zhao said the labor market is "still healthy" based on today's report.
"I think there's also the possibility that what's happening for a few tech firms isn't representative or emblematic of what's happening for the whole labor market," Bunker said.
But, even so, the data shows that employers for the most part want to keep their workers, and they won't voluntarily let them go. At the same time, 2.9% of the workforce quit.
It could signal that employers are adapting to their new reality: Their workers can — and will — leave, and there's not much they can do about it. Insider's Aki Ito reported that employers may be staring down a Forever Resignation. Research firm Gartner found that high turnover will probably stick around, with voluntary turnover rising by almost 20% more than the average pre-pandemic.
There is one measure that has reliably lured workers in: Raising wages, especially with inflation still roaring. A Pew Research Center study found that over half of the Americans who quit in 2021 and took new roles were making more money.
"The last year's really shown how much strong demand for workers — how much a tight hot labor market — can really empower workers," Bunker said.
Julia Pollak, ZipRecruiter's chief economist, told Insider that one reason people may be quitting is because they are searching for remote work positions, a work model that has become particularly popular during the pandemic.
"So you have people moving from industries where remote work has not become the norm, where it can't really expand because of the nature of the industry," Pollak said, for example.
For employers who are struggling to keep workers around during the Great Resignation and labor shortage, they can try improving their benefits, according to Zhao.
"I would say that the first tool in the toolbox for employers is to raise wages and benefits," Zhao said. "That can mean quite simply just increasing pay overall or offering a bonus or expanding and experimenting with new benefits, like tuition reimbursement, for example, that's one that has become more popular over the last few years."
More: Economy great resignation quit job Quits
Quitting job | 2022-06-01T19:48:43Z | www.businessinsider.com | Americans Quit at Near-Record Rate, Great Resignation Is Forever Resignation | https://www.businessinsider.com/americans-quit-at-near-record-rate-great-resignation-forever-resignation-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/americans-quit-at-near-record-rate-great-resignation-forever-resignation-2022-6 |
How Best Western is building an in-house creator program to hire travel influencers for long-term partnerships
A sponsored post for Best Western from influencer couple @allieandsam
@allieandsam / Instagram
Best Western is looking to build long-term business relationships with travel influencers.
Its creator program currently has over 200 active clients.
Marissa Daniela, one of two employees running it, explains how she trials influencers and finds the right fit.
Travel influencers have become a key way that some hotels can market themselves globally in a cost efficient way.
And some chains like Best Western have even begun to build out official creator programs to help foster these relationships.
Marissa Daniela is a brand manager at Best Western who was one of two employees hired in 2021 specifically to help formalize the process around how the company works with influencers. Daniela told Insider that hotels like Best Western are no longer interested in taking deals with anyone with clout, but thinking more strategically about the types of travel creators who are in good brand alignment with them.
"Before, it was who was influential, we'll give you free hotels for content," Daniela said. "Now, it's more thoughtful: What influencers do we want, who can be highlighting the 18 Best Western brands. We need influencers who can storytell."
Daniela said she looks at Marriott and InterContinental Hotels Group as her company's biggest competitors in the influencer space. But while many chains do some deals with influencers through their marketing teams, or through third-party agencies, the drive to build a dedicated in-house influencer-marketing team — as Best Western is doing — is a relatively recent phenomenon.
Daniela was hired specifically to forge a more direct relationships between the hotel and the individual.
"When I was brought on, I wanted the brand to be much more hands-on with content, and become creators ourselves to engage with potential clients," she said.
Daniela outlined for Insider how the Best Western creator program works, and how the team selects who it wants to work with.
@part.time.tourists / Instagram
How Best Western finds and hires travel influencers
While the company still gets a high volume of pitches from travel influencers, about half the time Daniela uses a third-party customer relationship management system to help research and reach out to various personalities.
Specifically, Best Western is looking for travel creators who are family oriented, travel often for business, and those who have a very cohesive online identity.
"Everyone seems to be an influencer now — everyone can talk about whatever they want, everyone has a following, that's not the issue," Daniela said. "A lot of what I look for is how they align their audience. They have to know why their audience follows them. This is how you craft your story to align with Best Western."
As an example, she pointed to Instagrammer @part.time.tourists, who has over 30,000 followers.
"Her niche is traveling with a one-year-old; She does an amazing job weaving in tips and tricks and incorporating the Best Western brand that seems natural," Daniela said.
Daniela will at times help an influencer craft the copy for an Instagram or other social-media post, but she is really looking to work with someone who has that narrative ready on day one.
On the more technical front, Daniela added that knowing how to cut video or make a Reel is a bonus, as Instagram's algorithm seems to be heavily favoring the short-form videos. She also makes sure that an influencer's following can appeal to both men and women.
The initial trial period, and cultivating repeating brand deals
Daniela described a "test" period when she inks the first paid trip with an influencer client.
"The first trip I put them on it's kind of a test for me to see if they follow instructions, because a lot of people don't do that well," she said. "It's all about the second trip. There's a lower chance they'll do a second trip with us, and continue that relationship."
According to Daniela, most of her influencer clients simply ask for a free stay as compensation. But some, depending on their reach and ROI, will ask for additional compensation. She said about 30% of the time she'll negotiate and work with the talent to structure a unique payment plan.
It can be a competitive program, so a lot of the time she's had to send difficult rejection emails out. But if an influencer seems to be a good fit and is reliable, there are 4,000 hotels around the world that she can easily send them to.
Currently, the program has about 200 active influencers who Daniela is building a more sustained relationship with.
Expanding the program and what's ahead
Best Western's creator program was founded in 2018, but Daniela said it's seen a major overhaul in the last year.
"2020 and 2021 was a challenge for us," she said. "In 2021, we revamped how we look at influencers, and we revamped our storytelling. I was brought on to be the social strategist."
In 2020, influencer tourism hit its lowest recent point with global shutdowns putting an abrupt halt to airline travel, lodging, and posting content. In early 2020, the volume of travel and tourism sponsored content had dropped by 66%, according to research from the influencer-marketing firm Izea. But travel content rebounded in 2021 and into 2022, though some travel influencers have recently had to contend with rising airfare costs and Instagram changing its algorithm to prioritize video formats.
As travel comes back, Daniela and her colleague are looking to grow their program and budget in 2022 to be able to work with more influencers, as well as those with larger followings.
"We do have a great budget but we can't give everyone prices that we want," she said. "We're trying to expand that."
More: travel influencer creator program Best Western | 2022-06-01T19:48:56Z | www.businessinsider.com | How Best Western Built a Creator Program to Hire Travel Influencers | https://www.businessinsider.com/how-best-western-built-creator-program-to-hire-travel-influencers-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/how-best-western-built-creator-program-to-hire-travel-influencers-2022-6 |
Finn Wolfhard as Mike Wheeler, Millie Bobby Brown as Eleven and Noah Schnapp as Will Byers in "Stranger Things" season four.
"Stranger Things" season four was watched for 286 million hours in its debut weekend, Netflix said.
It's the biggest series premiere for Netflix ever.
The new season also lifted viewership for previous seasons last week.
"Stranger Things" season four debuted on Netflix on Friday, three years after the third season premiered. And it's already breaking Netflix viewership records, according to the company.
The season was watched for 286.8 million hours over the weekend, making it the biggest premiere weekend yet for an English-language Netflix series. It topped "Bridgerton" season two's 193 million hours and "Money Heist" season five's 202 million hours.
"Stranger Things" season four will be five hours longer than any previous season, Netflix said. It's being released in parts, and the first seven episodes that debuted on Friday featured longer-than-usual episodes that each clocked in at more than an hour. The second part, which consists of the supersized episodes eight and nine, debuts in July.
"Bridgerton" season two is still Netflix's biggest English-language season ever, based on hours viewed in its first 28 days.
The new season of "Stranger Things" also lifted the previous seasons in viewership last week. Each of the first three seasons were on Netflix's top 10 most-watched shows list for last week.
Below are the top 10 TV shows on Netflix from May 23 through May 29 (Insider combined Netflix's English-language and non-English-language lists):
10. "Love, Death, and Robots" season three — 15.39 million hours
Description: "Uncanny worlds, strange creatures, and twisted tales await in the third volume of the Emmy-winning animated anthology from Tim Miller and David Fincher."
What critics said: "Arguably the strongest collection yet: nine genre shorts without a weak link among them." — The Verge
9. "The Boss Baby: Back in the Crib" season one — 19.89 million hours
Description: "Framed for a corporate crime, an adult Ted Templeton turns back into the Boss Baby to live undercover with his brother, Tim, posing as one of his kids."
What critics said: "A chilly, thrilling narco saga told from the perspective of the Mob's money launderer, Ozark deserves its place among the very finest TV takes on American dope, crime and corruption." — Empire
"Stranger Things 2."
What critics said: "How many other shows about alternate dimensions and Dungeons & Dragons monsters operate with such emotional subtlety? Haters to the left." — AV Club
What critics said: "Even while some things go a bit too predictably, the last two episodes tie everything and everyone together in spectacular, emotional fashion." — Dallas Morning News
What critics said: "'Stranger Things' might feel like a mere retro roller coaster were it not for that slow drip of sorrow and trauma, the residue of Reagan-era anxiety about the nuclear family." — New Yorker
What critics said: "Absolute nonsense, of course, from axle to axle. But you can work with it, even if no one's winning here." — Guardian
1. "Stranger Things" season four — 286..79 million hours
What critics said: "Those completely enamored with the show might decide there's no such thing as too much of a good thing, and Stranger Things rewards them with a fresh assortment of pop-culture references and homages." — CNN | 2022-06-01T19:48:59Z | www.businessinsider.com | 'Stranger Things' Season 4 Viewership Breaks Netflix Record | https://www.businessinsider.com/stranger-things-season-4-viewership-breaks-netflix-record-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/stranger-things-season-4-viewership-breaks-netflix-record-2022-6 |
Since 2020, there have been about 500 shootings at major supermarket chains in America, study finds
Law-enforcement officials surround the Tops Friendly Market in Buffalo, New York. A gunman killed 10 people at the grocery store in racially motivated attack.
High-profile mass shootings have highlighted the issue of violence within grocery stores.
Guns Down America is calling on large retailers to do more to stop gun violence.
12 large chains have experienced a combined 137 firearm-related deaths since 2020.
Supermarkets have become a battleground as the United States continues to grapple with mass shootings. And some gun-control advocates are challenging companies to do more.
When a white supremacist gunman murdered 10 people at a Tops Friendly Market in Buffalo, New York last month, the store became just the latest retailer to experience a deadly mass shooting. In recent years, mass shootings have also occurred at King Soopers in Boulder, Colorado, a Weis Markets in Eaton Township, Pennsylvania, and a Walmart in El Paso, Texas. But even beyond these high-profile mass shootings, supermarkets have long been the target of gun violence, according to exclusive data from gun-control advocacy group Guns Down America. By analyzing media reports, the group found that nearly 500 incidents involving firearms have happened in large grocery chains in the past two years.
Specifically, Guns Down America used the Gun Violence Archive to track "gun incidents" and gun deaths from January 1, 2020 to May 14, 2022. It found a total of 448 incidents and 137 deaths across 12 large national retailers. Guns Down America estimated that the numbers come out to four shootings a week at large supermarket chains.
"There's a whole range of actions they can take in order to be part of the solution — not only on a moral level, but also more specifically, on a more pragmatic business level," Igor Volsky, executive director of Guns Down America, told Insider. "That's the philosophy of this campaign. During a period of federal inaction, retailers who are directly impacted businesses must help lead if they care about the safety of their customers, employees, and communities."
Guns Down America shared with Insider the messages that it sent out to companies like Walmart, calling on the companies to cut ties with NRA-funded lawmakers and to instead lobby for gun-violence prevention.
Walmart — the largest retailer in the United States — saw the most violence, including 310 gun incidents, and 89 firearm-related deaths.
Kroger saw 36 gun incidents and 16 deaths. Ahold Delhaize's Food Lion and Stop & Shop saw a combined total of 29 incidents and eight deaths. Safeway experienced 22 incidents and seven deaths, Publix saw 16 incidents and five deaths, and Aldi had nine incidents and four deaths. ShopRite, H-E-B, Meijer, Whole Foods, and Costco were also included in the analysis.
Volsky said that the numbers were "artificially low" because many gun incidents never "make it into the news." The retailers on Guns Down America's list did not immediately respond to Insider's requests for comment.
Volsky told Insider the shootings that his group tracked at supermarkets fall into several categories. Most of the deaths were homicides, although there were a few suicides included as well. The shooting incidents included escalating disagreements between armed parties, armed robberies, and random shootouts.
Volsky said businesses are left with traumatized employees and customers, higher turnover and insurance rates and the lingering perception that the shopping environment isn't safe.
"This is as much a business issue as it is a moral issue and a political issue," Volksy said. "Businesses across America need to start acting like it."
NOW WATCH: Henry Blodget: Will arming teachers with guns help stop school shootings?
More: Buffalo mass shooting Buffalo BI Select workplace safety | 2022-06-01T19:49:03Z | www.businessinsider.com | 500 Shootings at Major Supermarket Chains Since 2020 | https://www.businessinsider.com/supermarket-shootings-america-statistics-grocery-store-guns-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/supermarket-shootings-america-statistics-grocery-store-guns-2022-6 |
5 tips for maintaining a tidy, productive workspace, according to a professional organizer for CEOs
Kacy Paide.
Kacy Paide is a professional organizer for home and corporate offices.
She said to get rid of stuff you don't need before buying storage bins.
She also suggested having an evening ritual and switching up your wall art regularly.
After spending years working in your home office — or even just at your kitchen table — it's not unusual for your workspace to start resembling more of a storage room than mission control. And if you've returned to the office recently, your desk may be in the same state of disarray that you left it in.
Ready to take the season of spring cleaning to heart and clear up the clutter in your work area?
Kacy Paide of The Inspired Office has been a professional organizer of home and corporate offices since 2001. Her clients, who pay $185 an hour for her services, include CEOs, politicians, artists, and retirees, and her talents are so sought after she currently has a two-month waitlist and has even been flown by private jet to clients' houses.
Insider asked the office organizing expert for her tips on how to wrangle your workspace in the office and at home.
Get rid of rubbish, then buy storage
Paide said to start your organization by getting rid of what you don't need.
The biggest mistake that people make when starting to declutter, Paide said, is buying organizational supplies instead of doing the hard work of processing and letting go.
"Then they have an abundance of supplies, which are the wrong size or don't suit the purpose, and they become part of the problem," she said. Instead, she added, only buy supplies after you've already sorted through what you intend to keep.
If you're clearing a home office, Paide suggested starting with a quick win by separating personal from professional items. You'll then be able to see what needs to stay in the office and what needs to be returned to other places in the house.
When you're ready to start storing items, she said, Post-it notes can be used as temporary labels until you decide what you want to label a box or folder, as you may find you change the contents as you start to store your belongings. Also, she added, consider using a credenza or filing cabinet to create a second workspace to store things you may need throughout the day but don't use regularly. This enables you to keep your desk clear and still have working files within reach.
Use a pile system for paperwork
When Paide starts sorting paperwork, physical or virtual, she immediately splits it into piles that need to be actioned or archived. "I want to get people to a place that no matter what comes through the door, it has a home," Paide said. "They can quickly say, 'Does it need to be actioned, filed, or thrown away?'"
Clearing the clutter makes you richer in more ways than one: Paide said her clients regularly find tens of thousands of dollars in uncashed checks and gift cards they'd forgotten were there.
Establish an evening ritual
Paide recommended adopting an evening cleaning routine, such as putting your laptop, notepad, and other tools and electronics in drawers or storage bins each night, so you can return to a clear space the next morning.
If your kitchen table is your office, it's even more important to turn this back into a personal space. Paide said she likes to use small filing carts that clients can place next to them when they're working, then roll into a closet at the end of the day.
You can also prepare yourself for the next day with a couple of productive tasks. "This could come in the form of updating your to-do list or shredding paper you no longer need," Paide said.
Regularly switch up your wallspace
Changing up your wall art can help you get inspired, Paide said.
Paide's in favor of placing beautiful items on your walls, but she said you should change it up regularly to keep you inspired.
"People like having small posters featuring inspirational quotes, but after a while they'll stop seeing it and the poster can become dusty and tired," Paide said. "It's good to rotate that stuff out and put another quote up so it feels alive."
Don't treat your office like a museum
Your office should be as inviting as any other room in your home, but this often isn't the case. "Sometimes they're frozen in time. We find 30 years of paperwork or old tech, such as obsolete wires or floppy drives," Paide said. She added there's no reason for your workspace to have cast-off furniture or be a dumping ground for junk.
"Recognize that getting it organized may take a lot of time and focus, but it's worth putting the time in," she said.
More: BI-freelancer Declutter Spring Cleaning | 2022-06-01T19:49:09Z | www.businessinsider.com | 5 Tips to Keep Your Workspace Clean, Organized, and Stress Free | https://www.businessinsider.com/tips-keep-workspace-desk-home-office-clean-organized-2022-5 | https://www.businessinsider.com/tips-keep-workspace-desk-home-office-clean-organized-2022-5 |
Wells Fargo CEO Charlie Scharf says the bank is considering pulling back on parts of its mortgage business amid scrutiny of its lending practices
Wells Fargo CEO Charlie Scharf
Wells Fargo's CEO suggested more rocky days may be ahead for the bank's mortgage business.
The home lending unit won't "be as large" because it's not a "standalone profit center," Scharf said.
Scharf also cited the "reputation" challenges of underwriting loans for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
On Wednesday, Wells Fargo CEO Charlie Scharf said the bank's embattled mortgage business could have a smaller footprint in the future — and suggested criticism of Wells Fargo's home lending practices are partly to blame.
Speaking at Bernstein's annual Strategic Decisions conference in New York City, Scharf said that Wells Fargo is "in the process of changing strategically where mortgage fits in," adding that "mortgage is a hard business."
Scharf cited in part the lending standards for conforming loans set by government-sponsored entities like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, according to a transcript of his remarks from data provider Sentieo.
"We basically process the applications according to guidelines that the GSEs tell us we should. When those produce results, the people like them, we get the kudos for it. If they don't like them, we get the blame for it even though we're just following other people's underwriting guidelines," Scharf said.
"There are some things like that which do put you in a difficult position, which we do need to be very thoughtful about from a reputation perspective," he continued.
This March, Bloomberg reported that in 2020, Wells Fargo rejected more than half of Black homeowners refinancing applications. The bank's 47% approval rate for Black customers was the lowest among major lenders according to federal mortgage data, Bloomberg said.
According to Bloomberg's analysis, Wells Fargo broke with industry-wide trends by accepting fewer refinancing applications from Black borrowers in 2020, a pandemic boom year for refinances as interest rates fell, than it did a decade earlier.
Given the standards banks are held to relative to other mortgage lenders , Scharf said, "It's very different today running a mortgage business inside the bank than it was 15 years ago, and I think appropriately so. That does force you to sit back and say, 'What does that mean? How big do you want to be? Where does it fit in?'"
In a statement provided to Insider, a spokesperson for Wells Fargo said, "Recent media stories ignored critical information about Wells Fargo's lending to Black homeowners and the full range of our efforts to help meet the homeownership needs of diverse customers, and relied on an analysis that presents a skewed picture of our lending performance."
"Most importantly, we are confident that our underwriting practices are consistently applied regardless of the customer's race or ethnicity," the spokesperson added.
Wells Fargo, the spokesperson also said, funded "twice as many loans overall" to Black borrowers in 2020 as the next largest bank, if loans originated and purchased from correspondent sellers were included.
Home lending layoffs
Scharf said home lending will remain an important part of Wells Fargo's business even as the bank considers trimming its mortgage footprint.
"Mortgage and home lending generally is extremely important to what we do as a company, both for our customers and the communities that we serve. We are very committed to ensuring that we continue to support those two populations," Scharf said.
But its decision to focus on those populations could also mean Wells Fargo "won't be as large as we were historically," he continued.
In addition to the reputational challenges of dealing in GSE loans, he also cited profitability concerns.
"We don't think of it as a standalone profit generator, where you have production, servicing, balancing. Those days are gone in terms of the right way to think about it inside our company," Scharf said.
Scharf's comments on Wells Fargo's underwriting business echoed those recently made by the bank's head of diverse segments, representation, and inclusion, Kleber Santos.
This May, Santos told Insider that criticism over the bank's low approval rates for Black borrowers was misplaced. But while Santos also said Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's own underwriting guidelines were to blame for any gaps in refinancing approvals, he didn't suggest Wells was reconsidering its approach to its home lending business. Instead, Santos said, Wells Fargo was looking to speak to industry executives on changing current application criteria.
Scharf also discussed the layoffs impacting Wells Fargo's mortgage business in recent months.
This April, Insider reported that Wells Fargo laid off home lending employees, including loan processors and underwriters, across at least five markets like San Antonio, Phoenix, and Des Moines. The job cuts come as rising interest rates lead to falling mortgage volumes across the industry. This spring, Wells Fargo reported that home lending revenues fell to $1.5 billion in the first quarter of 2022, down 33% on the same period last year.
"In this kind of environment, that means that we'll have less people, and we're doing what's necessary for that to happen. From a production side, making sure that we're again properly staffed to process the business but not beyond what's necessary in this environment," Scharf said.
Scharf added that there's roughly a quarterly lag to how quickly Wells can take costs — including by laying off employees — out of the mortgage business. He added that while job cuts in the mortgage business get bad press, "every mortgage business is doing it," and that Wells has worked to place mortgage employees in other openings across the bank.
More: Wells Fargo Charlie Scharf Mortgages | 2022-06-01T19:49:23Z | www.businessinsider.com | Wells Fargo CEO Charlie Scharf Said the Bank Could Pull Back on Mortgage Lending | https://www.businessinsider.com/wells-fargo-ceo-charlie-scharf-bank-could-pull-back-mortgages-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/wells-fargo-ceo-charlie-scharf-bank-could-pull-back-mortgages-2022-6 |
Amazon did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The company has previously said that it supports trans rights and its LGBTQ employees.
—Katherine Long (@_katya_long) June 1, 2022
Nearly 600 Amazon employees signed a petition earlier this year asking Amazon to stop selling the books "Irreversible Damage" and "Johnny The Walrus," and to give workers more say over which books the company decides to stop selling. Employees say both books fall under Amazon's 2021 ban on selling books framing transgender and other sexual identities as mental illnesses. Amazon's decision to continue selling those books and others in the face of employee dissent has led some employees to resign.
One longtime Amazon employee who participated in Wednesday's protest said they weren't in a financial position to resign. The employee asked not to be named, noting that Amazon has previously fired employees who protested the company's policies.
More: Amazon Diversity and Inclusion Transgender Protest | 2022-06-01T21:19:18Z | www.businessinsider.com | Amazon Employees Protest Sale of Transphobic Books Outside Company Headquarters | https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-employees-protest-transphobic-books-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-employees-protest-transphobic-books-2022-6 |
Buick revealed an electric concept car with some wild features — meet the Wildcat.
The car can sense an elevated heart rate and calm down its driver.
The Wildcat is just a design exercise. Buick's first real electric car will hit the market in 2024.
Buick, General Motors' century-old brand, said Wednesday that it plans to only sell electric vehicles by the end of the decade.
It unveiled a sleek electric concept car to illustrate the new direction.
The Wildcat doesn't just preview what future Buicks could look like, it also showcases some experimental features that could make their way into the brand's electric models.
The two-door EV debuts Buick's new logo.
The coupe has a low, wide stance and four seats.
Part of its roof opens up to make getting in and out a bit easier.
The Wildcat has big, bold, checkmark-shaped taillights...
... that mirror a similar design up front.
The entire vehicle has exaggerated, aggressive looks.
Its turbine wheels take inspiration from the Jet-Age cars of the 1950s and 1960s.
In place of regular side-view mirrors, the Wildcat concept has cameras and small screens.
The interior gives off spaceship vibes, but has some elements that could end up in actual production Buicks — like a giant, curved screen.
Other parts of the Wildcat are hard to imagine in a real car. For example: it's designed to detect a driver's mood and react.
Say a fellow motorist just cut you off or won't stop honking. If the Wildcat senses an elevated heart rate, it will dim the lights, switch on massaging seats, and deploy its integrated aromatherapy functions.
Buick's future electric models will be sold under a new Electra brand, the company said on Wednesday.
Its first electric model in North America is set to go on sale in 2024. | 2022-06-01T21:19:19Z | www.businessinsider.com | Electric Buick Offers Sleek Design, Calming Aromatherapy | https://www.businessinsider.com/buick-electric-car-wildcat-ev-concept-aromatherapy-massaging-seats-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/buick-electric-car-wildcat-ev-concept-aromatherapy-massaging-seats-2022-6 |
In 2020, the Trump campaign boasted of assembling a sophisticated poll watching option that largely failed to materialize across the country, although Republican election observers got into clashes with officials at vote-counting centers in big cities like Philadelphia and Detroit.
The Trump campaign also lost over 50 lawsuits, including ones relying on affidavits from partisan poll watchers, seeking to halt the counting of votes, the disqualification of ballots, and blocking the certification of election results.
More: 2022 midterms Voting GOP Cleta Mitchell | 2022-06-01T21:19:22Z | www.businessinsider.com | Conservative Activists Recruiting 'Army' of Election Workers: Politico | https://www.businessinsider.com/conservative-activists-recruiting-army-of-election-workers-politico-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/conservative-activists-recruiting-army-of-election-workers-politico-2022-6 |
Disney Plus review: Come for its robust family-friendly catalog, stay for exclusive access to brand-new Marvel and Star Wars series
Disney Plus price
Classic movies and shows
New original series
Does it feature mature programs?
App and devices
Interface and navigation
Disney Plus launched in November 2019 and has amassed more than 130 million subscribers.
Subscriptions cost $8/month or $80/year, and you can bundle it with Hulu and ESPN+ for $14/month.
The service has lots of classic Disney programs for kids, and its new original shows add value for adults.
Disney Plus launched in November 2019 to great fanfare. An aggressive marketing campaign and the popularity of "The Mandalorian" helped propel the service to a successful debut. And now, roughly two and a half years after its rollout, the service boasts over 130 million subscribers.
Disney is still working to catch up to Netflix 's 221.64 million global subscribers, but Disney Plus has been able to carve out a position as one of the world's most popular streaming services, thanks in large part to iconic franchises, like "The Avengers" and "Star Wars," and the company's huge library of animated classics.
Disney Plus has expanded its selection of exclusive content since launch too, adding Marvel shows like "Loki" and "WandaVision," and "Star Wars" series like "Obi-Wan Kenobi" and "The Book of Boba Fett." The service also features original musicals, like a filmed version of "Hamilton," and concerts from artists like Taylor Swift, Beyoncé, and Billie Eilish.
With more original shows and several new features now available, we decided to take a fresh look at how Disney Plus stacks up against the streaming competition in 2022.
Disney Plus review: Competitive pricing and bundles offer great value
Disney Plus costs $8 a month or $80 per year, which makes it one of the most affordable streaming services on the market. The standard subscription is ad-free and includes support for up to seven profiles and unlimited downloads. A cheaper ad-supported plan will roll out in late 2022, but an exact price and launch date are still unknown.
Unlike Netflix, Disney Plus doesn't charge extra for 4K and high dynamic range (HDR) streaming, so all subscribers can get the best quality for the same price. Though the service initially offered a free seven-day trial, this promotion is no longer available.
There's also an option to buy a bundled package with Disney Plus, Hulu, and ESPN+ for $14 a month. Individually, Hulu and ESPN+ both start at $7 a month each. Subscribing to the bundle, rather than signing up for each service separately, saves you about $8 a month.
If you don't have other streaming services, the Hulu and ESPN+ bundle adds a ton of value with the discounted price. Hulu's large library of movies and shows is a nice complement to the family-friendly Disney Plus catalog, and ESPN+ provides access to live sports, including UFC fights and select baseball games.
Disney Plus opens up the studio's complete vault of movies and shows
Disney Plus' greatest strength comes from Disney's iconic catalog of movies and shows, including dozens of classic animated films that were previously locked away in the "Disney Vault." In addition, the studio's newest releases, like "Encanto," all get added to the service after they play in theaters.
In the past decade, Disney has acquired the rights to Marvel, "Star Wars," "The Simpsons," and 20th Century Fox, and the core of Disney Plus is built on nostalgia for these iconic franchises. Subscribers can watch virtually any movie from the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) or the "Star Wars" series.
The streaming service has also done an impressive job cataloging dozens of original Disney cartoons and TV shows, from the 1960s "Spider-Man" cartoon that's spawned dozens of memes, to all 65 episodes of "Lizzie McGuire."
Netflix still has more originals, but Disney's exclusive franchises are a big selling point
Like its competitors, Disney Plus offers exclusive original content. Marvel and "Star Wars" shows like "The Mandalorian," "WandaVision," and "Loki" were the most watched streaming programs in the US during their debut seasons.
Unlike Netflix, Disney Plus gives its new original series a weekly release schedule rather than launching the entire season on the same day. Personally, I've found myself spending more time watching original shows on Disney Plus than classic content, and this weekly approach to releases makes shows like "The Mandalorian" feel like appointment viewing for fans.
Disney Plus is also home to a number of exclusive movies, like Pixar's "Turning Red" and "Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers." Members can also stream a handful of musical specials, including Billie Eilish's "Happier Than Ever," Beyoncé's "Black is King," Taylor Swift's "Folklore," and The Beatles' "Get Back" documentary.
Netflix, HBO Max , and even Amazon Prime Video still offer a wider range of original shows for adults with varying taste, but the mass appeal of Disney Plus' lineup is hard to ignore. If you're a fan of the studio's big franchises, the regular flow of "Star Wars" and Marvel exclusives makes the service worth the price of admission alone.
There's plenty to watch for families, but Disney Plus only has a small selection geared toward adults
Charlie Cox as Daredevil on "Daredevil."
Patrick Harbron/Netflix
Unfortunately, Disney Plus' greatest weakness might be its focus on family-friendly content. As of writing, the service still excludes R-rated movies in the US. This means that popular R-rated films that Disney owns, like "Deadpool" and "Logan," are left off the streaming service entirely, despite their Marvel ties.
There have been some recent developments in this regard, however. In March 2022, Disney Plus added several Netflix-produced Marvel series like "Daredevil" and "Jessica Jones" that feature explicit violence and sexual content. To coincide with this addition, the service updated its parental controls. This could signal that Disney is open to adding more mature programs from its catalog in the future.
It should also be noted that Disney Plus does offer some R-rated movies in regions outside of North America. In the US, most of these offerings are included on Hulu instead.
As it stands, the PG-13 approach doesn't prevent Disney Plus shows like "The Falcon and the Winter Soldier" from depicting mature themes, but it does limit the overall catalog for adult viewers.
The Disney Plus app is available on many devices
You'll need to sign up for a Disney Plus account before you're able to browse the Disney Plus catalog online or with the Disney Plus app.
Once your account is activated, you can watch Disney Plus via the official website or by downloading the app on your smart TV, streaming player, or mobile device. The app is available on Apple and Android devices, Roku, PlayStation, Xbox, Chromecast , Amazon Fire, and most smart TV brands.
You can create profiles for up to seven different viewers with a single account, and each profile can create their own personal watchlist that carries over between devices. However, only four devices can stream using the same account at once, which is the same number as Netflix's Premium plan.
Adults can create kid profiles to restrict PG and PG-13 content for children as well. An update in March 2022 also added support for PIN codes to lock profiles, so parents can now better prevent kids from accessing adult content.
The Disney Plus interface is simple and easy to navigate
The Disney Plus interface is relatively standard fare for a streaming service. The landing page lacks the busy animated thumbnails and flashy trailers that Netflix showcases on its homepage, but a carousel displays new and popular content at the top. Disney's main franchises are also pre-sorted into simple categories, like "Marvel," "Pixar," and "Star Wars."
Disney Plus does suffer from some small navigation issues that can become ongoing problems depending on your viewing habits. For example, choosing a show or movie from the "Continue watching" tab will always leave you where you left off, with no option to "Play from beginning."
It's not a huge deal, but what if, for example, you fell asleep at the end of a movie, or your roommate watched the episode before you? Now you run the risk of spoiling yourself while you try to rewind to the beginning.
Disney Plus offers a standard set of accessibility features; there are closed captions on nearly every title with the option to adjust subtitle size. Viewing Disney Plus in a supported browser will also give you access to audio descriptions to help you navigate the homepage and text-to-speech can be used in place of a keyboard.
Disney Plus has premium performance and features for cheap
Subscribers can always stream "The Avengers" in 4K without paying extra on Disney Plus.
In terms of streaming quality, Disney Plus is on par with Netflix at a fraction of the cost. By offering 4K resolution support, HDR color and contrast with Dolby Vision, and Dolby Atmos audio capabilities with every subscription, Disney Plus is doing its best to guarantee that members can maximize their home theater.
A handful of Marvel movies even offer support for IMAX's expanded aspect ratio, which fills more of the screen with action during select scenes.
Disney Plus also allows you to download movies and shows for offline viewing on up to 10 devices, making it ideal for trips and family vacations. A GroupWatch feature is supported as well, enabling multiple viewers with Disney Plus accounts to sync up and stream shows together online.
The service's low price and iconic catalog make Disney Plus a solid investment for any movie watcher, even if the platform is clearly built to appeal the most to families with children.
The consistent release of new Marvel and "Star Wars" shows, like "Moon Knight" and "Obi-Wan Kenobi," make Disney Plus more appealing to fans of these huge franchises, but adult viewers who want more variety in their media diet may want to consider options like HBO Max, Netflix, and Prime Video first.
We also highly recommend the Hulu and ESPN+ bundle to viewers who want Disney Plus but also crave more variety. This package provides the perfect complement to Disney Plus with more mature programs, network shows, and sports.
Pros: Affordable, timeless library of Disney classics, robust kids catalog for families, exclusive "Star Wars" and Marvel titles, 4K and HDR streaming included
Cons: No R-rated films, fewer new library additions compared to competing services, original programming is still behind Netflix, HBO, and Amazon Prime Video
More: Disney Disney Plus Reviews IP Streaming
Disney+ Pixel | 2022-06-01T21:19:23Z | www.businessinsider.com | Disney Plus Review: How Does the Streaming Service Stack up in 2022? | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/disney-plus-review | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/disney-plus-review |
A new startup wants to teach kids math through virtual reality. It just raised $4 million from A16z and the cofounder of Oculus.
A student uses Prisms' math curriculum in a classroom.
Virtual reality has become a growing trend in edtech, including startups that make VR classwork.
As VR headsets become more affordable, more schools can purchase them for classroom learning.
Now, a new startup is using VR to teach STEM lessons in K-12 schools more effectively.
Adoption of virtual-reality software as a tool for workplace training has become more mainstream in the past year, and now the technology could be headed into your local K-12 schools.
At least that's what Anurupa Ganguly, an education expert and Prisms founder, is hoping for. After studying engineering and computer science at MIT, working as a teacher with Teach for America, and leading math and science education for charter-school organization Success Academy, Ganguly found that American schools were failing to engage most of their students when teaching math and science.
"One of the top indicators of success in STEM is the ability to spatially reason, or rotate 3D objects in your mind and maintain perspective about objects," Ganguly said. However, most math-lesson plans rely too heavily on memorization and regurgitation, and do not help children understand math and geometry in a spacial context, she explained.
"Kids should be able to experience something spatially through doing and moving, but we haven't had the tools to scale it even though teachers want to do it," she said.
Ganguly built her first VR-class model — with the help of animators and designers — on exponential functions in algebra, or math problems surrounding exponential growth. They created a virtual scenario where a virus begins to spread inside a dining hall, and students have to calculate the spread of the virus.
They tested it out in a pilot program in 2021 with research-grant money from the National Science Foundation, and the feedback was overwhelmingly positive. "The kids told me, 'That was the first time I understood what an exponential function was,' because they derived it from their body and series of experiences," she said. "That's when I knew we were onto something."
Now, Prisms has raised $4.25 million in a seed round led by A16z (Andreessen Horowitz) to expand its algebra and geometry curriculum into schools across the US. Additional investors in the round include WXR Fund, Anorak Ventures, Avalanche VC; Nate Mitchell, the cofounder of Oculus; Andrew Sutherland, the founder of Quizlet; Hans Tung, the managing director of GGV Ventures; and Zahir Dossa, the founder of Function of Beauty, among others.
Over 20,000 students currently use Prisms, and it is compatible with multiple VR headsets like Pico and Oculus. The team hopes to grow to 100,000 students in 65 school districts across 15 states by this fall.
Ganguly thinks that the educational setbacks from online schooling combined with the increase in federal pandemic-relief money to schools have made educators more willing to try new technologies in their classrooms. "I think that right now, kids are coming back multiple years behind in math, and districts are desperately looking for ways to accelerate learning so that kids aren't falling into remedial spirals, and there's an unprecedented amount of money in the system," she said.
"I really fundamentally believe that VR headsets and devices are going to be the next Chromebook in terms of one-to-one adoptions," she said.
Prisms is joining a small, but growing crowd of VR lesson-plan startups that cater to teaching school-age children through virtual reality. Other companies include the 360-video chemistry-lab simulator Labster or ELB Learning's CenarioVR, which offers a customizable geography module for social-studies teachers, said John Blackmon, CEO of CenarioVR.
"The thing about VR is you have much higher retention value than with traditional learning because of the experiential nature of it," said Blackmon. "It's the act of doing that's accessing your longer-term memory."
More: Startups Venture Capital Education | 2022-06-01T21:20:08Z | www.businessinsider.com | Prisms Raised Funding From A16z to Teach Kids STEM in Virtual Reality | https://www.businessinsider.com/prisms-vr-startup-edtech-a16z-oculus-kids-stem-virtual-reality-2022-5 | https://www.businessinsider.com/prisms-vr-startup-edtech-a16z-oculus-kids-stem-virtual-reality-2022-5 |
Fintech investors outline red flags they screen for as the fundraising environment tightens up amidst a market downturn
Investors are being more cautious with investments into startups amidst a difficult market.
An index of 50 publicly-listed fintechs is down over 70% amidst a larger market downturn.
Fintech investors sounded off on things they consider red flags in startups at a recent conference.
Cash burn along with lack of a clear mission statement were among the biggest concerns.
The markets are looking bearish as inflation and interest rates rise, leading investors to scrutinize potential investments with a more discerning eye.
After a record-breaking year for fintech fundraising in 2021, the market has begun to come back to Earth. Fintech valuations in the public markets began to cool off in the first quarter and have continued to drop. F-Prime's index of 50 publicly-traded fintech companies was down 71.5% as of mid-May.
The bear market has gradually crept into the private markets, with companies like Fast, Bolt, and Klarna either announcing significant layoffs or shutting down entirely.
Meanwhile, investors are instructing their portfolio companies on how to navigate a market that might be difficult to raise money in.
Last Thursday, a group of fintech investors speaking at the Fintech Nexus conference in New York outlined red flags they are screening for as fintechs look for more funding in an environment where cash might be tough to come by.
Cash-burning companies, rudderless fintechs, and management teams out of sync with each other, are high on the list.
For Jennifer Lee, partner at Princeton-based Edison Partners, a growth-equity firm that has invested in fintechs such as Yieldstreet and MoneyLion., a top red flag is "companies that continue to burn way too much money, blindly."
Just a few months ago in April, the industry saw Fast, a one-click checkout company for online merchants that was backed by investors like payments company Stripe, become defunct after burning through $10 million a month, essentially $120 million of investors' money.
Jennifer Lee, Edison Partners.
Edison Partners
Emmalyn Shaw, managing partner at Flourish, a venture-capital firm located in Redwood City, Calif., said Flourish wants to know details like what the company did with its money in the past 24 months and whether the fintech's product is differentiated enough in the market.
"Where are you in the continuum of product market fit, because, depending on where you are, it's pretty hard to raise capital at the rates you want with the momentum that's required to be successful down the road," she said.
Investors are also weary of fintechs that can't articulate their mission: "Companies where you walk out of the meeting and you're like 'I literally don't know what your company actually does. It doesn't make sense to me," said Kelly Fryer, head of Fintech Sandbox, a Manhattan-based nonprofit that helps fintech startups .
Fryer added that bad dynamics among management teams are also a red flag for her.
"I definitely think where you're already having like team dynamic issues between cofounders and you can start to see it in the meetings," she said.
Fryer also sees "not even taking feedback when you're talking to them" as another top red flag.
More: BI Graphics Samantha Lee Fintech | 2022-06-01T21:20:14Z | www.businessinsider.com | Fintech Investors Watch Out for These Red Flags in Startups | https://www.businessinsider.com/red-flags-in-fintechs-investors-screen-for-during-market-downturn-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/red-flags-in-fintechs-investors-screen-for-during-market-downturn-2022-6 |
JetBlue Airways A321neo.
JetBlue Airways is postponing the launch date of its upcoming service from Boston to London.
The carrier confirmed to Insider that "unexpected production delays" of two Airbus jets forced the change.
JetBlue partner American Airlines has also adjusted its summer schedule due to delayed aircraft deliveries.
Customers booked on JetBlue Airways' upcoming transatlantic service from Boston may need to take a different flight.
The New York-based carrier confirmed to Insider Tuesday that it is postponing its upcoming service between Boston and London due to "unexpected production delays" of Airbus A321LR aircraft. Specifically, the carrier was set to launch two routes to the UK capital this summer, with flights to London Gatwick slated to begin July 19 and service to London Heathrow planned for August 22.
"Two aircraft scheduled for delivery this summer – which offer greater range than standard A321 aircraft in JetBlue's fleet – are on order specifically to operate transatlantic routes from Boston, and JetBlue was recently notified by Airbus that their delivery will be delayed," JetBlue said in an advisory sent to Insider.
The carrier will now launch flights to Gatwick Airport and Heathrow Airport on August 4 and September 20, respectively. JetBlue told Insider that customers booked on either route will be re-accommodated on flights out of New York's JFK International Airport, put on a partner airline, or given a full refund.
Both flights will operate daily once officially launched and will join JetBlue's current service to London from New York. The A321LR aircraft are configured in a two-class layout, according to JetBlue, including 114 economy seats and 22 "fully-enclosed" Mint business class suites.
JetBlue's adjustments come after its Northeast Alliance partner American Airlines announced it would be pulling out of five international markets this summer due to delayed Boeing 787 Dreamliners, like Edinburgh, Scotland, and Shannon, Ireland.
More: JetBlue routes JetBlue airways london heathrow
A321LR
transatlantic flying | 2022-06-01T22:46:45Z | www.businessinsider.com | JetBlue Postponing Highly-Anticipated Boston to London Routes; Airbus | https://www.businessinsider.com/jetblue-postponing-highly-anticipated-boston-to-london-routes-airbus-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/jetblue-postponing-highly-anticipated-boston-to-london-routes-airbus-2022-6 |
President Joe Biden spoke at a roundtable with baby formula manufacturers on Wednesday.
President Joe Biden said he wasn't aware of the baby formula shortage crisis until April.
Manufacturers said they started warning retailers in late February, after a major plant closed.
Biden announced that the US would fly in 680,000 pounds of baby formula from overseas next week.
President Joe Biden said on Wednesday that he wasn't aware of how critical the baby formula shortage was until April, months after the nation's largest formula manufacturers warned retailers of an impending crisis.
"I became aware of this problem sometime in April, or in early April, about how intense it was. We did everything in our power from that point on," Biden said at a White House roundtable session with infant formula manufacturers.
"I don't think anyone anticipated the impact of the shutdown of one facility," he added.
The shortage has resulted from the February shutdown of a leading formula manufacturing plant owned by Abbott Nutrition. It was closed after strains of bacteria that are potentially deadly to infants were discovered at the facility.
Abbott issued a safety recall of its products that month.
However, Biden's comment on Wednesday contradicted the claims made at the roundtable by manufacturers, who said they knew that the plant's closure would cascade into a significant shortage.
"We were aware of the general impact that this would have," said Robert Cleveland, senior vice president at formula maker Reckitt, when asked by Biden if the crisis had been anticipated.
Cleveland said his company immediately reached out to retailers such as Walmart and Target to warn them, and told them to push their remaining formula inventory to shelves "as fast as possible."
"We knew from the very beginning this would be a very serious event," Cleveland added.
Murray Kessler, CEO of store brand formula maker Perrigo, said: "The very first thing we did when we heard about the Abbott recall was — we could foresee that this was going to create a tremendous shortage. We significantly increased all our material orders."
According to Biden, Abbott's output accounts for 40% of the infant formula market in the US. No representatives for Abbott were present at the roundtable.
Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, later said at a press briefing: "We understand Abbott is working hard to get back to safely making infant formula, that process is ongoing and should be kept between them."
When asked about Biden's comment on when he knew about the shortage, Jean-Pierre rejected the idea that the administration had taken too long to act.
"We have been working on this issue since day one of the recall," she told reporters.
When reporters pressed her further on what Biden had said at the roundtable, Jean-Pierre responded: "He spoke to that himself, so I'm going to let that stand."
"Let me just say that the President is frustrated himself about the situation, about the issue that we have, and he's frustrated on behalf of the American families," Jean-Pierre added. "He is doing everything he can to make sure that we take action and we have been doing that 24/7. He gets what families are going through."
At the roundtable, Biden also announced the next stage of "Operation Fly Formula," in which 680,000 pounds of baby formula — or 8.3 million standard baby bottles' worth of powder — will be airlifted from the UK and Australia to the US starting next week.
He added that more such shipments are set to arrive in the next few weeks.
More: insider news baby formula recall Baby formula Joe Biden | 2022-06-02T04:49:52Z | www.businessinsider.com | Biden Said He Was Made Aware of Baby Formula Shortage Only in April | https://www.businessinsider.com/biden-baby-formula-shortage-only-aware-april-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/biden-baby-formula-shortage-only-aware-april-2022-6 |
The founder of a $3.2 billion Tiger Global-backed blockchain infrastructure startup with clients like Citibank breaks down how the company survived 2 crypto bear markets – and explains 3 ways investors can make it through volatile trading cycles
Blockdaemon founder Konstantin Richter
Blockdaemon
Konstantin Richter is the founder and CEO of Blockdaemon.
Blockdaemon's clients include Citibank, Binance, and Paradigm.
The exec explains how the company flatlined for nearly two years due to bearish cycles.
Investors are panic-selling their crypto holdings. Whether it's due to LUNA and UST's collapse or inflation challenging the narrative that bitcoin is a safe-haven asset from macro pressures, the market continues to go down and to the right.
Sell-offs in the nascent space are nothing new, however, to Konstantin Richter, whose company Blockdaemon has weathered two major bear markets.
"We've been here a few times and we've seen it a lot worse," Richter, the founder and chief executive officer, told Insider.
Blockdaemon provides a blockchain node infrastructure, which allows users to stake, scale, and deploy nodes. Founded in 2017, clients for the company include the likes of Citibank, Binance, and Paradigm. The company supports over 50 blockchains, with financial backers including JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, Citi Ventures, and Softbank.
In January, the company announced a $207 million Series C funding round at a post-money valuation of $3.25 billion. The raise was led by Tiger Global and Sapphire Ventures.
But what is a node and why are big-name investors backing its related-infrastructure? A node, for the uninitiated, is an individual component of the blockchain. Think of this system, Richter said, as a shared Excel sheet.
When a new transaction comes in, i.e. if someone sends ethereum to someone else's wallet address, a line needs to be added to that Excel sheet to document its activity. The only way to do this is through a node. It's a communication point that can add the transaction to the ledger.
Richter, who often saw this system experience difficulties, said Blockdaemon was built to provide institutional-grade security and scalability. The company's goal is to connect commercial stakeholders to blockchains efficiently in part through its proprietary model.
"The idea was to tame the craziness of crypto with solid infrastructure and solid governance," Richter said.
Blockdaemon operated through two major bear markets. In 2018, the company survived the infamous "crypto winter" – an 18-month period with a sustained price decline in major cryptocurrencies. Once the space began to recover in 2020, however, Covid hit. This induced another sell-off, known as the "Black Thursday" crash. Both of these cycles wiped out over half of Bitcoin's value.
"We had nearly two years of flatlining, which was really hard," he said.
The company, Richter added, eventually found success operating similar to a normal software company. Blockdaemon aims to be capital efficient, work with larger institutions, and publish financial audited accounts to appease investors.
Making it through a bear market
Approximately 40% of bitcoin investors lost money from their holding this year, per a May 9 report from crypto research firm Glassnode. The oldest crypto hit a 10-month low last month, according to data from crypto dashboard Messari, sliding below $30,000.
Bear markets, however, are "always healthy" and "a normal tide", according to Richter. Cycles of volatility allow investors to focus on the fundamentals of a project, instead of the hype.
"In a bull market , it's all about narrative. People try to go with all of these news things and everyone begins pricing very aggressively," he said.
Richter outlined three ways investors can make it through a bear market .
The exec recommends investors maintain no more than 5% exposure to crypto, educate themselves about the space, and utilize platforms that are externally validated to make sure their assets stay secure and safe.
"In terms of investing, I'd say continue applying normal caution," he said. "But markets are unpredictable. You don't really know what you're getting into."
More: crypto Bear Market Tiger Global
digit assets | 2022-06-02T09:31:18Z | www.businessinsider.com | How to Survive a Crypto Bear Market: Tiger Global-Backed Founder | https://www.businessinsider.com/crypto-bear-market-tiger-global-blockchain-volatile-staking-startup-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/crypto-bear-market-tiger-global-blockchain-volatile-staking-startup-2022-6 |
Lin Wood (left), a pro-Trump lawyer, has gone after MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell (right).
Apu Gomes/Getty Images; Hyoung Chang/MediaNews Group/The Denver Post via Getty Images
Wood called both Lindell and Sabal's patriotism into question in a series of Telegram posts.
On Wednesday, Wood laid into Mike Lindell, the CEO of MyPillow, and John Sabal, a QAnon influencer also known as "QAnon John," on his official Telegram channel. QAnon is a baseless conspiracy theory that claims former President Donald Trump is fighting a cabal of satanic pedophiles.
In a Telegram post, Wood suggested that the MAGA movement was being compromised by "deep state operatives" disguised as "patriots" who were actually "communist infiltrators."
"Mike Lindell. Patriot or traitor? You decide," Wood wrote. "Do the research. Connect the dots. Draw your own conclusions."
"I have drawn mine. I know this: God does not lie. And god never overpromises and under-delivers," Wood added.
The post shared by Wood also claimed, without substantiation, that Lindell once offered a 66.6% discount on his pillows, implying that the pillow salesman had links to Satanism. The number 666 is sometimes used in popular culture to refer to "the mark of the beast," a Satanic symbol.
Some of Wood's followers also chimed in, criticizing the pillow CEO.
"I ordered a pillow from him awhile ago and that's the first thing I thought when I saw his enclosed 66% off coupon inside of the package. Out of all the available numbers he could have used and he chose 66%," read a post by one of Wood's followers.
Wood also attacked Sabal, telling his followers to "watch out" for the latter.
"I have had my eyes on Ol' QAnon John from the very beginning. He thought he was playing me. I was playing him to expose him as a FAKE Patriot," Wood wrote.
The Trump-allied lawyer also appealed to Sabal to "confess and repent." "I pray for you, John. I don't want anyone to spend eternity in hell," Wood wrote.
Also mentioned in Wood's posts were other conservative figures like former Attorney General William Barr and Trump-era special counsel John Durham. Wood asked his followers to consider whether they were "patriots or traitors."
Sabal has hit back at Wood, sarcastically quipping that he was "feeling the love" from the lawyer.
"I get be to placed with Mike Lindell too, another one of the GREATEST Patriots this country has ever seen! On top of Bill Barr and John Durham?!?!" he said in a message to Wood that the latter re-posted. "I gotta say … I am beyond words, Lin."
In December, Wood went after Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, calling her a pawn of the devil and representative of the deep state. The month before, Wood stirred drama in the QAnon universe when he accused "Stop the Steal," a group of fellow Trump allies, of being a deep-state campaign.
Wood was also one of the right-wing figures who laid into Texas Sen. Ted Cruz in January, calling him "stupid" for suggesting that the January 6 Capitol riot was a violent attack.
More: MAGA Lin Wood Mike Lindell QAnon
feuding | 2022-06-02T09:31:24Z | www.businessinsider.com | MAGAverse Feud Brewing Between Lin Wood, Mike Lindell, and QAnon John | https://www.businessinsider.com/magaverse-civil-war-brews-lin-wood-mike-lindell-qanon-john-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/magaverse-civil-war-brews-lin-wood-mike-lindell-qanon-john-2022-6 |
TikTok real estate advice is 'misleading,' financial advisors say. Social-media stars counter that they're just trying help followers make money.
One in four TikTok real-estate investing videos were "misleading," Online Mortgage Advisor said.
Influencers pushed back, saying they are bringing critical knowledge to the masses.
One financial advisor said the videos are best viewed as "entertainment."
Pete Mugleston, a managing director at Online Mortgage Advisor, said he has started to see clients with starry-eyed notions of what they could afford and how rich they'd become by investing in real estate.
They were "unrealistic inquiries," he told Insider.
The company, which matches prospective homebuyers with mortgage brokers and claims to have helped over 120,000 customers, wondered if TikTok might be the culprit, where hashtags such as #property and #realestateinvesting rack up over 1 billion views from users all over the world.
So Mugleston and others reviewed popular advice available to the average TikTok user, looking at 25 creators with the biggest followings under the #realestateinvesting tag, and viewing their 25 most recent videos.
In results released earlier this month, the company — which has a 4.5 out of 5-star rating on the consumer-review site TrustPilot — found that 25% of the over 600 videos advisors reviewed were "misleading."
Errors of omission were common. The videos had no disclaimers about the riskier sides of real estate or cautionary tales of investors suffering losses, according to the study. Price growth is not guaranteed, houses can require expensive repairs, and interest rates can change on a dime. Reducing an investment decision to guaranteed riches is irresponsible, argued Mugleston.
What's more, Online Mortgage Advisor said that creators should acknowledge the limitations of their expertise and hedge their advice. Unsurprisingly, Mugleston also suggested talking to a traditional mortgage broker.
Insider approached three of the creators that Online Mortgage Advisor called out. They pushed back against the firm's characterization, saying they are making the real-estate industry more accessible and are helping people on the path to financial freedom.
Bite-sized simplicity
One video in the study, posted by Austin Rutherford (@austinrutherfordo), lays out a plan on how to "live for free" while renting out bedrooms in a $300,000 property while living there, a practice known as house hacking.
Online Mortgage Advisor flagged Rutherford's post for its lack of disclaimers and oversimplification of the process. Similar videos on TikTok could give casual viewers the wrong impression, said Mugleston.
"The bite-sized nature of this content struggles to convey complex details about the housing market," he said.
Rutherford was surprised his content was the subject of criticism.
"You only have so much time" on a TikTok video, he said, and even the casual viewer can grasp that he's talking in broad strokes. "It's not a statement of, 'Do this,' it's, 'Hey, this is an option,'" he added.
Online Mortgage Advisor also found that nearly 65% of the creators it analyzed in the study weren't "transparent" about their qualifications for doling out advice. Spelling out credentials is important because influencer opinions can be "easily misinterpreted by younger, financially inexperienced audiences," said Mugleston.
Creators believe they are helping others
Hayato Hori (@hayantoo), another influencer Online Mortgage Advisor studied, wasn't shocked by the results but still believes in the value of his content.
Hori, a 35-year-old investor based in California, owns five properties across the country and runs RocketOffr, a company that finds off-market listings for investors. It all began when he bought his first property, a $70,000 home in Memphis, sight unseen, in 2019. He wants to help others take that bold first step.
"I'm just a normal kid who was able to buy real estate and found out that it's a really good path. I just wanted to share that with everyone," he told Insider.
Hori acknowledges that on TikTok "anyone can say anything," and he's seen plenty of videos that he'd consider suspect in their intent. Because of that, he said Online Mortgage Advisor is warranted in saying that some content could lead viewers astray.
"I get where their concerns are," he told Insider.
But creator Antonio Cuccinello (@investarters) says the disclaimers and risk analysis demanded by Online Mortgage Advisor aren't practical for every video, or even some books. Videos seem to only perform well if they're "under a minute," said Cuccinello, who — like Rutherford — argued it'd be impossible to pack everything you need to know into one sound bite.
Instead, he sees his content as a stepping stone for the casual viewer.
"The dream gets them in," he said. "Then they'll start to get the full picture."
A caricature of the industry
Eben Burr, a financial planner at the Toews Corporation, said TikTok real-estate-investing videos are best viewed as "entertainment." Viewers should see influencers as selling their brands, not acting as personal advisors, he said.
"Speaking in such generalities, it's almost like a caricature of what that industry is," he told Insider.
Burr noted that many of these creators most likely started investing during the past 10 years when rising prices floated all boats. He worries that "people out there looking for a dream" might be too late, and that those people might be the least able to sustain a financial hit on damaged properties or properties that they're not able to fix. Worse, an overly risky investment could lead to bankruptcy, he said.
Looking at the bigger picture, Burr noted that people whipped into a state of excitement through social media are more likely to jump into a real-estate venture without understanding the full breadth of responsibilities.
"Nobody mentions time on here, they only mention dollars," he said of TikTok. "And that to me is the biggest thing you're going to spend."
More: Real Estate TikTok | 2022-06-02T09:31:30Z | www.businessinsider.com | TikTok Real-Estate Advice Misleads and Lacks Caveats, an Advisor Says | https://www.businessinsider.com/real-estate-investing-advice-tiktok-misleading-financial-advisors-say-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/real-estate-investing-advice-tiktok-misleading-financial-advisors-say-2022-6 |
An MQ-1C Gray Eagle unmanned aerial vehicle.
The Biden administration plans to sell Ukraine four MQ-1C Gray Eagle drones, Reuters reported.
The drones, which can fly for up to 30 hours, can be armed with Hellfire missiles.
The sale may not proceed if Congress votes against the President's plan.
The Biden administration plans to provide Ukraine with four drones that can be armed with Hellfire missiles, Reuters reported.
The MQ-1C Gray Eagle drones would allow Ukrainian troops to conduct longer missions as they can fly for at least 30 hours and can gather huge amounts of data for intelligence purposes, according to the report.
Sources told Reuters that the sale of the drones could still be reversed if Congress votes against the plan.
Drone expert Dan Gettinger from Vertical Flight Society told Reuters: "Generally the MQ-1C is a much larger aircraft with a max take-off weight around three times that of the Bayraktar-TB2, with commensurate advantages in payload capacity, range, and endurance."
Ukraine forces have used smaller shorter-range unmanned aerial systems against Russia, such as the AeroVironment RQ-20 Puma AE, and the Turkish-made Bayraktar-TB2.
According to the news agency, the sale would be significant because it would give Ukraine advanced reusable US systems capable of multiple deep strikes.
President Joe Biden said in a statement announcing the new security assistance to Ukraine: "This new package will arm them with new capabilities and advanced weaponry, including HIMARS [High Mobility Artillery Rocket System] with battlefield munitions, to defend their territory from Russian advances."
The drones, made by General Atomics, are also compatible with a greater variety of munitions than the ones Ukraine currently uses. The Bayraktars are equipped with 22 kg Turkish-made MAM-L missiles, for example.
Sources told Reuters that arming the drones with Hellfire missiles would be done via a future Presidential Drawdown Authority, but only once training has been completed.
Gettinger said training operators for the drone systems usually takes months, but plans to speed up that process have been drawn up, the news agency reported.
More: Weekend BI UK Drones Ukraine Russia
Hellfire missile | 2022-06-02T09:32:06Z | www.businessinsider.com | US to Sell Drones That Can Carry Hellfire Missiles to Ukraine: Report | https://www.businessinsider.com/us-plans-to-sell-ukraine-drones-hellfire-missiles-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/us-plans-to-sell-ukraine-drones-hellfire-missiles-2022-6 |
SpaceX launched 49 Starlink satellites Thursday.
Startup AstroForge has booked its first test mission with SpaceX.
It aims to gather valuable rare minerals in space and bring them back to Earth.
The company was founded in January by former SpaceX and Virgin Orbit engineers.
A new asteroid mining company has booked its first test mission with SpaceX.
AstroForge plans to mine asteroids by breaking them up and returning valuable materials to Earth. It was cofounded by former SpaceX engineer Jose Acain and ex-Virgin Orbit and Galactic engineer Matt Gialich.
It is scheduled to test its technology in orbit next year, using a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket to launch.
Asteroid mining has long been tipped as a lucrative industry, but it is yet to become commercially viable.
The company will start with platinum group metals, which are used in everything from catalytic converters in cars to electronics. "A very worthwhile metal to have, but they're very limited," said Gialich, who is CEO, on a LinkedIn video.
Metallic asteroids contain mostly iron and nickel, but some also have platinum, gold, and cobalt.
The shift to a green economy has seen demand for some metals soar. Cobalt, for example, is primarily used in lithium-ion batteries found in electric vehicles.
"We are continuously mining the Earth for all of its resources, not just platinum but everything. We see this damage cross the board. I mean, on the electric vehicle side, we have a huge lithium problem right now. We're making these hugely destructive mines ... there's economic problems [and] there's social problems caused by them. Overall, they're just not a good thing," Gialich said.
"We have all of these resources in space flying around us at high concentrations."
The startup, founded in January, is backed by the prestigious accelerator Y Combinator, which has helped ventures including Reddit, Airbnb and Stripe.
AstroForge recently raised $13 million in seed funding from venture capital firm Initialized Capital.
More: SpaceX Tech Insder Business News BI Tech | 2022-06-02T11:02:34Z | www.businessinsider.com | Asteroid Mining Startup Books Its First Test Mission With SpaceX | https://www.businessinsider.com/asteroid-mining-startup-has-booked-its-first-test-mission-spacex-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/asteroid-mining-startup-has-booked-its-first-test-mission-spacex-2022-6 |
A credit card is being swiped on a Square mobile payment terminal.
Americans are opening credit card accounts at record pace, but they're in for a rude awakening.
The Fed's fight against inflation is expected to lift credit card rates to record highs.
Higher rates could leave shoppers paying thousands of dollars in interest.
It's a bad time to rack up a credit card balance. That's not stopping Americans from opening accounts at a blistering pace — and all this activity threatens to erase the financial progress many households made during the pandemic.
Americans' finances generally fared well throughout the coronavirus recession . Household balance sheets quickly recovered early in the crisis thanks to generous government stimulus and extraordinarily fast job creation. By comparison, it took about a decade for households to stage the same rebound after the financial crisis.
That swift recovery could soon have consumers overextending themselves. Americans have opened a record 11.5 million credit card accounts in the first two months of 2022, according to data from credit-reporting firm Equifax. Credit limits on those new cards total $55.5 billion, up nearly 60% from the same period last year. Retail sales data has already shown Americans spending more than ever through April, and Equifax's report suggests the spending spree has room to run.
The timing, however, couldn't be worse. The Federal Reserve is squarely in inflation-fighting mode, with policymakers expected to back double-sized rate hikes in June and July. Those increases lift borrowing costs throughout the economy, including through higher credit card rates.
The average card rate sits at 16.41%, according to Bankrate, but the Fed's battle against inflation could drive it to all-time highs. The Fed's rate-hike cycle could push that average to "well over" 18%, Ted Rossman, senior industry analyst at Bankrate, said in a note. That's above the April 2019 record of 17.87%.
At the consumer level, that represents a much higher bar to clear for Americans paying off high balances. The average credit card balance is $5,525, and it would take 195 months to pay that off by making the minimum payment with a 16.41% rate, Rossman said. It would also cost about $6,276 in interest. At an 18.91% rate, it would take that consumer six more months and another $1,040 in interest payments to pay off the balance, the analyst added.
The uptick in card rates wouldn't be very concerning if consumer debt was low, but the last several months have seen balances climb fast. Revolving consumer credit — which largely counts credit-card debt — leaped to $1.04 trillion from $1.02 trillion in March, according to Federal Reserve data. Americans aren't just spending big, they're racking up much larger card balances.
Higher rates, then, present a new threat to Americans already hammered by inflation. Prices continue to rise at a pace not seen since the 1980s as supply chain snags and Russia's invasion of Ukraine boost inflation pressures around the world. The price-growth problem has been enough to drag consumer sentiments to the bleakest levels in a decade. With rates on the rise, Americans' spending spree can quickly get much harder to pay off.
"With credit card debt, they can just keep pushing it along, so you get that higher rate onto larger and larger amounts. And it's very difficult to tell, in the short term, if an extension of credit card debt is because people are borrowing more or are paying back less," Susan Sterne, president and chief economist at Economic Analysis Associates, told Insider. "That is where you get into 'is this scary or not?'"
To be sure, revolving credit is still below the pre-pandemic high of about $1.09 trillion. Interest rates still sit at historically low levels, meaning Americans won't feel the crunch for at least a few months. And while paying down credit card balances will soon get harder, consumers' finances are generally in great shape. Pent-up savings and stimulus from earlier in the pandemic leave most households in a good position to cover their card payments.
Still, the unrelenting nature of Americans' demand raises concerns around the coming rate increases. Even though consumers feel positively dreadful about the state of the economy, they're still spending at an extraordinary clip. At the same time, the Fed is raising rates at the fastest pace in two decades. If spending doesn't cool off, surging credit balances could pull Americans out of the superlative economic recovery and into a new debt bind.
More: Economy Credit Card Debt Credit Cards Consumer Credit | 2022-06-02T11:02:46Z | www.businessinsider.com | Americans Are Opening Credit Cards at Record Pace Just As Rates Soar | https://www.businessinsider.com/credit-card-debt-accounts-climbing-interest-rates-making-accounts-expensive-2022-5 | https://www.businessinsider.com/credit-card-debt-accounts-climbing-interest-rates-making-accounts-expensive-2022-5 |
Happy Friday eve, readers. I'm Phil Rosen coming to you from New York. There are so many inflation calls that it can be difficult to keep track of where the top voices say we stand.
At least one official is ready to admit they were wrong on the issue as prices continue to rise.
Let's jump in.
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1. Janet Yellen says she was wrong about inflation. Last year, Treasury Secretary Yellen shrugged off inflation. She had called it a manageable risk.
This week, Yellen gave a different take.
"I was wrong then about the path that inflation would take," she told CNN. "There have been unanticipated and large shocks to the economy…that at the time I didn't fully understand, but we recognize now."
Now, the Fed is going to have to do whatever it takes to tame surging prices, according to top economist Mohamed El-Erian, even if it means going full bore with multiple rate hikes.
"We're going to be talking about this problem next year" if the Fed loses conviction, he said Wednesday. "And the consequences are not just for the markets but for the real economy and the most vulnerable segment of our society are going to be even more consequential."
The implications of prolonged inflation for the stock market are dire. Stocks could see more steeper declines if Fed Chair Jerome Powell doesn't act fast. Already, indexes have plummeted this year, but high prices could keep dragging on shares, Barclays analysts wrote yesterday.
"As a result of the current high levels of inflation, our fair value model points to further downside risk for valuations (~10%), especially if inflation does not subside quickly," analysts wrote.
2. US stock future rise early Thursday. Meanwhile, oil prices were down, following a report that Saudi Arabia is prepared to raise crude production if Russia's output sinks under EU sanctions. Here are the latest market moves.
3. On the docket: Asana, Lululemon Athletica, Tillys, and Okta, all reporting. Plus, OPEC and non-OPEC oil producers, which include Russia, are meeting today for a regular policy meeting. Also, look out for the Unemployment Insurance Weekly Claims Report at 7:30 am ET.
4. The investing chief for a $120 billion wealth manager breaks down what could spur stocks to rally and break out of the bear market. Alexander Chaloff laid out three scenarios where stocks rebound by the end of 2022: "We're clearly near the bottom."
5. Oil should be around $70 as demand drops and a recession looms, according to Citi. The firm cut its demand expectations by 1.4 million barrels for this year as economic turmoil looms. In an interview with Bloomberg, Citi's head of commodity research broke down why oil is overvalued at $120 a barrel.
6. Goldman Sachs warned that Russia could further choke off natural-gas supplies in response to the EU's oil ban. The European continent has been battling with Russia over energy, with Brussels banning oil imports — however, Goldman Sachs' analysts said more energy squeezes could seriously dent economic growth for Europe.
7. Solana tumbled Wednesday after its blockchain network suffered its second outage in a month. The token suffered similar turbulence on May 1, when the network had remained down for about seven hours. Get the full details here.
8. A top market technician told investors to double down on energy just before it surged 42%. JC Parets broke down five trades that could now buck the bearish trend in the markets — and shared three signals to watch before going all in on crypto and stocks.
9. Deutsche Bank's chief strategist said stocks could jump another 15% by the end of the year. There's still more downside ahead, but that doesn't mean a strong rally is out of the question, according to the top exec. Here's why he's bullish even if a recession kicks off soon.
Madison Hoff/Insider, data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics
10. Job openings dipped from record highs in April. The US boasted 11.4 million job openings at the end of April, down from the prior month's 11.9 million. The data shows companies are still grappling with the labor shortage. | 2022-06-02T11:02:52Z | www.businessinsider.com | Opening Bell: Inflation Woes Keep Coming | https://www.businessinsider.com/opening-bell-inflation-woes-keep-coming-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/opening-bell-inflation-woes-keep-coming-2022-6 |
Today's mortgage and refinance rates: June 2, 2022 | After brief volatility, rates are back down
Mortgage rates experienced some volatility early this week, with the 30-year fixed rate briefly spiking above 5%. Now, it's settled back down just below 5%.
High rates coupled with high home prices have strained affordability for many buyers. This dynamic has started to have a cooling effect on the housing market. In April, sales of new homes dropped to the slowest pace since April 2020, when few people were buying homes due to pandemic-related shutdowns.
But buyers who are having trouble now might find some relief toward the end of the buying season, says Ralph DiBugnara, president of Home Qualified and senior vice president of Cardinal Financial, as overpriced homes are reduced down to market prices.
The current average 30-year fixed mortgage rate is 5.1%, according to Freddie Mac. This is the second week in a row that this rate has fallen, though it's still up nearly 2% from the average rate of 3.11% it ended 2021 at.
The average 15-year fixed mortgage rate is 4.31%, a decrease from the prior week, according to Freddie Mac data. This is the third week in a row this rate has dropped.
The average 5/1 adjustable mortgage rate is 4.2%. As fixed rates have been moderating, this rate has continued inching up. | 2022-06-02T11:02:58Z | www.businessinsider.com | Today's Mortgage, Refinance Rates: June 2, 2022 | After Brief Volatility, Rates Are Back Down | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/best-mortgage-refinance-rates-today-thursday-june-2-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/best-mortgage-refinance-rates-today-thursday-june-2-2022-6 |
The hot rapid grocery delivery sector just cut over 1,700 jobs in a week. Investors are gearing up for a bloodbath in Europe.
Callum Burroughs, Hasan Chowdhury, and Tasmin Lockwood
Gorillas faced protests against working conditions last year and has since moved to cut hundreds of jobs.
Investors pumped billions of dollars into the rapid grocery delivery sector throughout the pandemic.
Now, the sector is facing a "bloodbath" as startups swap hyper-growth plans for profitability.
The economic downturn and rising cost of living have set the stage for widespread consolidation.
Raise millions of dollars, open a network of dark stores en masse, and offer groceries at discounted prices in minutes to consumers sitting at home.
That was the game plan for a batch of largely newly-minted rapid delivery startups that ferried everything from milk and eggs to gnocchi and olives to doors across Europe.
The burgeoning industry lured in some of the world's biggest investors such as Sequoia, Tiger Global, Coatue, and Tencent. To date, Turkish startup Getir has raised $1.8 billion, German competitor Gorillas has landed $1.3 billion, and Berlin-based Flink has secured $1.1 billion.
But those giddy valuations are now at risk, as an economic crunch and pessimism about the financial viability of tech force firms to refocus from growth to profitability.
In the past week Gorillas cut 300 staff, London-based Zapp is set to lay off 10% of its employees, and Romania's FoodPanda could see around 40% of its staff go. Elsewhere, Getir slashed 14% of its workforce, the equivalent of 980 jobs based on its total headcount listed on LinkedIn.
The downturn, underpinned by the war in Ukraine, high inflation, and a looming recession , has kicked off a "natural selection process," according to Gorillas CEO Kagan Sumer. The founder has predicted that just two companies will be alive and kicking by this time next year – down from the 30 he said were around in January 2022.
The race for survival
The industry will shape up into two groups of "the haves and the have nots," according to one US investor who preferred not to be named given their investment in a high-profile startup in the sector.
The investor expects just a small handful of mega startups to exist in Europe, such as Gorillas and Getir, who are armed with enough cash to buy up or see off dozens of smaller competitors that don't boast the same financial might.
"The haves are Gorillas, Flink, Getir, and GoPuff and there are about 40 have-nots and they're all for sale," the investor told Insider.
Many have already fallen prey to larger rivals. US-founded GoPuff, reportedly valued at $40 billion, gobbled up European rivals Dija and Fancy in 2021, while $12 billion 'decacorn' Getir acquired its British competitor Weezy. Most recently, Germany's Flink agreed a deal to acquire Carrefour-backed French company Cajoo while Gorillas bought another French startup called Frichti.
"There's no way that all of these companies could continue raising at the same rates," one London-based source added.
Gorillas, which raised $1.3 billion across four funding rounds in 14 months, is suddenly finding capital hard to come by in 2022. The firm's global head of comms, Rene Beutner, said in a now-deleted Slack message it was "not getting any more money from investors anyway", shortly after the startup laid off 300 corporate staff.
—Gorillas Workers Collective (@GorillasWorkers) May 31, 2022
That jeopardizes the prime way these firms have chased growth and new customers: promotions, vouchers, and endless discounts that almost amount to giving money away.
"Europe has just been a bloodbath, all-out war," the US investor said. "We're kind of just watching these guys slug it out … It's like who can give more promotions, who can put more free stuff in the bag to acquire the customer."
Private markets, for so long funded with cheap money by growth funds, are now being hit by the valuation crashes in the stock markets. Companies like GoPuff, DeliveryHero, and DoorDash are down in the double-digits, battering the resolve of the sectors' backers in the process.
Compounding the pain is a cost-of-living crisis that switches consumers away from convenient but expensive options like grocery-delivery apps.
"These environments are good for high-quality players and bad for the rest as not all companies will continue to get funded," another investor in the sector told Insider. "You will always see consolidation in these situations as weak players get flushed out of the market."
For some investors, the sector has never made much sense.
"We know that grocery delivery is a low-margin business so it's all about scaling fast and grabbing market share before competitors," Maria Wagner, investment director at Beringea, told Insider.
"It, therefore, requires a tremendous amount of marketing spend and hence large fundraisings, to win. You only have to look at the amount of advertising that Gorillas, Getir, and Zapp have bought across London to realize this."
In its pitch deck from its $128 million funding round in 2021, Getir claimed it had developed the "best delivery model in the world."
The incumbents are coming
One emergent question is whether it'll be an independent player that wins rapid grocery delivery at all.
22-year-old Just Eat joined the online grocery delivery market in late 2021, but focuses on partnerships with existing retailers rather than operating its own dark stores. It also makes use of its existing delivery infrastructure.
"We have built an infrastructure that has helped us achieve substantial growth — and when you couple that with customer demand we think Just Eat can bring something new to the rapid grocery market," said Amy Heather, Just Eat's UK director of strategic accounts.
Deliveroo, the listed UK food-delivery firm, has similarly expanded into grocery delivery.
And the retail giants who have been doing standard grocery delivery for years are starting to edge into rapid services. Ocado offers delivery within one hour with its new Zoom service, while British supermarket stalwart Tesco rolled out its Whoosh service in May 2021.
All of these firms boast existing infrastructure, storage capacity, marketing power, and huge amounts of customer data.
The rush by investors to bankroll the rapid delivery sector has led to intense competition among dozens of startups.
Meanwhile, times are set to get tougher for the newcomers.
"Profitability matters more now than 6 months ago for sure," one industry investor said. Another said backers were asking more questions about burn rates, driver usage, per store unit economics, and discount execution.
"We're now going through a macroeconomic 180 and capital markets don't want to fund growth at all costs," one executive at a London-based startup in the sector said.
More: Gorillas Getir rapid delivery
Grocery apps | 2022-06-02T11:03:10Z | www.businessinsider.com | Rapid Delivery Startups Ditch Hyper-Growth Plans for Profitability | https://www.businessinsider.com/rapid-grocery-delivery-market-primed-for-consolidation-amid-tech-downturn-2022-5 | https://www.businessinsider.com/rapid-grocery-delivery-market-primed-for-consolidation-amid-tech-downturn-2022-5 |
Stocks are crashing. The tech industry is imploding. Retail giants are struggling. And the economy has never been stronger.
The tech industry is dealing with layoffs, stock crashes, and executives warning about a recession. but the US economy is actually doing just fine.
Neil Dutta
Everywhere you look, it seems like there's a new headline warning of a recession . The stock prices of major retailers like Target, Walmart, and Lowe's have declined substantially after earnings stumbles. Layoff announcements, hiring freezes, and slowdowns at big tech companies like Facebook, Snap, and Uber are on the rise, and the venture-capital community is souring on the outlook for once high-flying growth companies.
But for all the doom and gloom, I don't think we're headed for a recession.
The pandemic was an economic shock that produced clear winners and losers. Now that we've reopened the economy, many of the winners from the early part of the shutdown and recovery are seeing their fortunes change. The losers of this latest shift — most notably tech companies and those big-box retailers — are prominent, and their problems are generating disproportionate interest. But while these industries may face a kind of localized "recession," the US economy is still expanding, and the likelihood of contagion that would lead to a true recession remains low.
Less stuff, more services
The first reason for all the recession hullabaloo is a misguided conflation of the slowdown in spending on durable consumer goods — big-ticket items like washing machines, couches, laptops, and cars — with a broader recession.
As people were stuck inside during the pandemic, spending on physical goods skyrocketed. This makes intuitive sense: People were spending a lot of time at home, so they bought stuff they could use there. But spending on goods peaked over a year ago and has declined by about 5% since March 2021. Recent reports from retailers suggest that consumers continue to spend less on goods. This also makes sense: If people aren't at home as much, they no longer need all that home-related stuff.
But this does not mean that consumers are suddenly spending a great deal less overall. They're just shifting where they spend.
American consumers are picking up the pace across the service industries. They're going out to restaurants, heading to the movies, and taking to the skies. Data from the travel-booking site Kayak indicates that flight search interest on May 22 was up 22% compared with the same day three years ago and that searches for international flights are at fresh highs. People don't research expensive overseas trips when they are worried about a recession at home.
And people are still buying things — they're just different kinds of things. Executives at Target, whose stock collapsed by nearly 40% after reporting worse-than-expected earnings in mid-May, said during a call with Wall Street analysts that consumers' spending was shifting "more toward experiences and going-out categories," or things like luggage, beauty products, and clothing.
That's the real story here: Spending is shifting, not declining. And a shift in spending does not signal a recession.
Tech tanks — but tech isn't the whole economy
This transition back to services and experiences has dealt a serious blow to another big winner of the pandemic: the tech industry. One reason stock markets did so well initially in the pandemic is that tech and tech-adjacent firms that benefited from people staying at home — online shopping, streaming entertainment, social media — make up an outsize portion of the major US stock indexes. As these companies raked in money, the market boomed along with them. Now this dynamic is working in the opposite direction, and those same companies are seeing major slowdowns. Correspondingly, the stock market is experiencing a sharp decline.
A similar phenomenon is playing out in the labor market. Several firms have announced hiring freezes or layoffs, including Meta (formerly Facebook), Netflix , Uber, and Peloton. Folks are spending less time at home or on social media and more time at gyms and on public transit. Who needs food delivered when they are now comfortable going out to eat? Hiring slowdowns or small rounds of layoffs at companies in a handful of industries — no matter how high-profile — is normalization, not recession.
The clearest sign that these tech stumbles aren't a canary in the coal mine for the broader economy comes down to a fundamental function of the market. One reason interest rates have risen is that economic growth is more widespread. Instead of a few uniquely positioned companies sucking up most consumer spending, an array of industries are open and getting a slice of the pie. This sort of broad-based strength is the opposite of what the recessionistas want you to believe. Higher rates also mean that making bets on future returns from high-flying tech companies isn't as appealing as investing in bread-and-butter companies with strong profits. Why roll the dice on a tech startup when the outlook has improved for a traditional industrial conglomerate?
Meanwhile, people keep spending
Despite the warnings from tech companies and panic from the commentariat, the biggest driver of the economy — average Americans' consumption — continues to expand at a solid pace. According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, real consumer spending has advanced by 2.6% at an annual rate over the past two quarters. And according to the GDPNow tracking estimate from the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, consumption for the current quarter is running close to a healthy 5%.
Still not convinced? Weekly data on payment-card transactions tell the same tale. According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, for the week ending May 10, total card spending on retail and food service rose by an estimated 11% against a prepandemic baseline. Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan made a similar observation using the firm's consumer data.
So why are consumers still spending despite the sour news? I think it boils down to three factors:
The labor market is strong. Unemployment remains incredibly low, and workers are enjoying increased compensation. Aggregate wages and salaries have been growing by about 8% at an annual rate so far this year.
Households have plenty of room to take on more debt. As an example, the ratio of revolving credit — short-term borrowing through credit cards and similar accounts — to disposable income is still more than a half percentage point below where it was just before the pandemic. This means that even as rates rise, households have the ability to safely take on more short-term debt without getting into serious financial trouble. As households continue to borrow and banks remain willing to extend credit to those consumers, Americans can continue to spend.
Households continue to sit on savings. Excess saving — the amount of extra cash households have on hand after cutting back on spending, stashing their stimulus checks, and incorporating other pandemic changes — remains close to $2 trillion. Whether consumers spend out of this savings hoard remains to be seen. But at a minimum it's a buffer in the face of economic shocks.
Despite all these positive indicators, the specter of recession seems to be dominating Americans' thinking. I mentioned in April that Google search traffic for "recession" had been soaring.
Bottom line: The economy is not in recession, but it is normalizing after a highly abnormal period. There are winners and losers in this process. Focusing on the losers is understandable, since many of these firms loom large in our culture and have big footprints in the market. But in the final analysis, normalization is necessary and welcome.
The normalization of spending on goods is likely to lead to slowing price growth, helping rein in inflation while maintaining a relatively strong labor market. Normalizing also makes it less likely that the Federal Reserve will drastically hike interest rates, a move that would actually elevate the risk of recession. And ultimately, normalizing should be the goal as we try to keep the economy out of recession — even if there are bumps along the way.
Neil Dutta is Head of Economics at Renaissance Macro Research.
More: Recession Stock Market Crash Facebook Retail Sales | 2022-06-02T11:03:16Z | www.businessinsider.com | Recession Outlook: Tech, Retail, Stock Market Crash Will Not Cause US Economy Meltdown | https://www.businessinsider.com/recession-outlook-tech-stock-market-crash-us-economy-meltdown-gdp-2022-5 | https://www.businessinsider.com/recession-outlook-tech-stock-market-crash-us-economy-meltdown-gdp-2022-5 |
Major retailers are stuck with way too much inventory — and have 2 risky options for getting rid of it
Shoshy Ciment/Insider
Retail stocks dropped after Target, Walmart, Costco, and others reported having too much inventory.
Retailers laid out two main strategies to deal with their excess inventories.
Which tactic they choose could have a big effect on results for the rest of the year and beyond.
The next phase of the pandemic for retailers may be messy, first-quarter earnings reports and industry analysts indicate. In the past two weeks, retailers have shown that the anticipated, but hard to time, cooling in consumer demand for goods has arrived. And many retailers reported holding more inventory than they'd like — and the goods they have might not be the ones they need now.
Simeon Gutman, an analyst at Morgan Stanley, called it a "perfect storm of overbuying, weather, inflation, and spending shifts."
Demand is shifting and supply chains may be getting a little closer to normal. The National Retail Federation projects that total retail sales will grow between 6% and 8% this year, putting it between last year's record-breaking 14% growth and the 10-year pre-pandemic norm of about 3.5% growth.
"These retailers have a lot to get right," said Kate McShane, a managing director at Goldman Sachs, on a Wednesday call with reporters. "They need to get the amount right from an inventory standpoint in order to get it right from a demand standpoint, but also get the mix right."
Most retailers reported increased inventories in the first quarter, but the numbers can be deceiving since this time last year, stocks were low, and the inflationary pressures consumers are seeing on the shelf are also evident on retailer balance sheets. UBS estimated that Williams Sonoma's 28% inventory growth from this time last year was a 1% increase in actual merchandise units — so mostly rising costs.
Still, Target, Walmart, Nordstrom, American Eagle, Kohl's, and more all reported having some inventory excess.
Several retailers mentioned late deliveries of spring merchandise, which compounded their inventory glut when mixed with the cooling demand. In perhaps the most dramatic market reaction, Target's stock price plunged 25% after its mid-May earnings call explaining the overstocks and lowering its expectations for profitability in the rest of the year.
Blame the overhang on the "bullwhip effect." When demand changes quickly, the time it takes to reverberate up the supply chain can turn an under-stocked retailer into an overstocked one. And since supply-chain snarls have made it difficult to get product into retailers' warehouses in a timely, predictable manner, the bullwhip cracked even harder this time.
How retailers handle excess inventories will affect their results through the end of the year and possibly beyond. So far, two main strategies have emerged, and each one comes with risk.
Mark it down
One option when goods aren't selling fast enough and inventory threatens to stick around too long is to lower the price.
"We expect higher markdowns as we clear through excess inventory, combined with continued freight inflation and the impact of our supply chain," said Michael Mathias, the chief financial officer of American Eagle Outfitters, on the company's May 26 earnings call.
Old Navy went straight for the markdowns when demand waned in the first quarter, and executives expect more to come. Macy's, American Eagle, Urban Outfitters, Nordstrom, Target, and Walmart all mentioned markdowns, too.
A discount-based strategy always affects profit margins. This year, that risk is even higher because the transportation costs to get those goods into retailers' warehouses are historically high. Depending on how much of that cost retailers passed on with raised prices, marking down goods enough to encourage consumers to buy could be particularly painful to the bottom line this year.
"As the supply-chain challenges continue to drive higher freight costs, our initial product margins will continue to be negatively impacted," said Melanie Marein-Efron, the CFO of Urban Outfitters, on a May 24 earnings call.
For retailers less inclined toward discounts, "pack and hold" was a term heard on many earnings calls this year. Quite literally, it means to pack inventory away to sell when its season comes back around. Many retailers that pulled this lever in 2020, the last time demand was uncertain, are pulling it again.
"As we think about the lower revenue trend for the balance of the year, we are packing and holding fashion inventory that we think we can sell next year or at a relevant season. And we employed that during the pandemic, so we know how to do that," said Katrina O'Connell, the CFO of Gap Inc.
Gap plans to pack and hold spring, summer, and autumn inventory even after cutting incoming orders where possible, the CFO said. Nordstrom plans to stow away inventory for next season, too. Kohl's intends to pack and hold $80 million in merchandise.
"There were a lot of goods that came late that weren't salable, but we didn't want to have to just mark them down," said Jill Timm, Kohl's CFO, on the company's May 19 earnings call.
The first risk within the pack-and-hold strategy is the necessity to pick the items with a high chance of selling at full price at a later date.
Target is choosing markdowns over pack and hold for this reason. John Mulligan, its chief operating officer, told analysts on the company's May 22 earnings call that though marking prices down was the "tougher call," meaning it would negatively affect results in the near term, it was the right one to ensure Target's shelves continued to look "fresh and inspiring."
On top of the risk that the product may not be attractive in the future, holding inventory means paying for storage. Though the slowdown in consumer spending is bringing down some transportation costs, demand for warehouse space shows no signs of cooling and is likely to be exacerbated by the widespread need to pack and hold.
Next normal
The best-case scenario is to avoid both markdowns and packing and holding. But the next best thing is precise execution of either strategy, which requires good data on existing inventory and a solid forecast for future demand. That's a tough order in this unprecedented environment.
Dick's Sporting Goods' investments in this area paid off, said Lauren Hobart, Dicks' CEO, on a May 25 earnings call. "Surgical" markdowns on only specific items kept clearance relatively low, the CEO said, adding that the brand is moving away from sitewide discounts and broad sales.
Though they may have inventory to unload in the current moment, building up overall inventory levels is intentional on the part of some retailers trying to avoid the stockouts of the past few years.
McShane said she expected higher markdowns in the second half of 2022 since retailers were still struggling to get back to normal stock levels in certain categories. Once those stocks are replenished, a less confident consumer could keep the discounts coming. But retailers are likely to stock up nonetheless.
"We do think we're going to start to see inventory for the seasons earlier on the balance sheets so that these retailers can guarantee that they have things on their shelves in the back half of the year for back to school and for holiday," McShane said. "Of course that's a little scary because if we are entering into a tougher macroeconomic environment, it begs the question if there's going to be more markdowns, if there is too much inventory."
More: BITranspo Retail Supply and Demand | 2022-06-02T11:03:22Z | www.businessinsider.com | Retailers Stuck With Too Much Inventory Face Risky Decisions | https://www.businessinsider.com/retailers-stuck-with-too-much-inventory-face-risky-decisions-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/retailers-stuck-with-too-much-inventory-face-risky-decisions-2022-6 |
With rates generally on the rise and inflation putting pressure on everyday costs, Americans are likely to have a harder time affording housing — let alone a new home purchase in 2023.
Experts forecast a possible recession in 2023.
A downturn in the economy would hit a housing market that's been running hot for years.
But there's still a shortage of available housing and prices are not widely expected to drop.
The US economy is in a strange place– and that means the housing market is too.
As rising interest rates do their job to tamp down demand, fears of a coming recession are on the rise. Prospective buyers may be wondering what it all means for their dreams of owning a home.
In short, price growth will likely slow down as demand falls, and mortgage rates have begun to edge lower after soaring earlier this year. But with a persistent lack of available homes for sale, an economic slowdown won't bring a new era of affordability to the US housing market.
A recession could hit in 2023 — but it will likely be mild
Though there are plenty of jobs to go around, wages are rising, and spending is booming, some Americans are having a tough time.
Inflation has climbed to a forty-year high while consumer sentiment has fallen to a decade low. Rising interest rates have also made all forms of borrowing from car loans to mortgage payments more expensive than they were just a few months ago.
As the economy falls further out of whack, fear of a possible recession is spreading. And while experts believe it's unlikely to happen in 2022, signs do point to an economic downturn in 2023.
"Financial conditions have tightened significantly, and the economy is slowing faster than previously expected as markets adjust to the Federal Reserve's tightening guidance," Doug Duncan, senior vice president and chief economist at Fannie Mae, said in a statement referring to the Fed's interest rate hikes that began in March in an attempt to cool sky-high demand throughout the economy.
Home prices will likely continue to grow in most markets, but at a slower pace
If a recession is on the horizon for 2023, it could mean the housing market is bracing for a cool down after years of hot demand driving prices higher — but that doesn't mean homeownership will become more affordable for prospective buyers.
"If the economy were to weaken or a recession were to hit, that would further weaken demand," Len Kiefer, the chief economist at Freddie Mac, told Insider, adding that it could lead to a deceleration in price growth.
Although home prices have actually declined in some markets, they're still rising in other parts of the country — but at a much slower rate. While price growth is expected to slow further, Kiefer says that doesn't mean prices will go down.
"We expect house price growth to moderate over the summer," Kiefer said. "However, we still expect house price growth to remain positive. That means that coupled with higher mortgage rates homebuyer affordability will be stretched even further."
The rock-bottom mortgage rates of the pandemic era are gone
Pandemic-era mortgage deals are over and it's making homeownership more costly.
Although mortgage rates fell slightly in May, they are much higher than they were in 2021.
According to Freddie Mac, the average U.S. fixed rate for a 30-year mortgage fell to 5.10% last week, from a pandemic high of 5.30% — but that's significantly up from a pandemic low of 2.68% in December 2020.
As mortgage rates put additional pressure on housing costs, buyers of a median-priced home are looking at monthly mortgage payments that are more than $400 higher than a year ago.
There still aren't enough houses on the market to meet demand
"Not only is the worsening affordability of homes a problem for potential entry-level homebuyers, but current homeowners are less likely to trade in their existing lower-rate mortgages and list their homes for sale, both of which will likely weigh on sales," Duncan said.
To boost housing market equilibrium, home prices will need to fall — and that means more homes will need to be built in 2023. "Cooling of the market is necessary to bring supply and demand back into balance," Kefer said. "The rate of house price growth over the past two years is not sustainable over the long run."
Even with more new listings hitting the market, the number of homes for sale are still at historic lows.
To address home price growth and the nation's lack of housing affordability, the Biden Administration has launched an initiative that proposes using federal dollars to boost the affordable housing supply. But there's a catch — the plan will take course over the next five years.
That means Americans are unlikely to see a surplus of new inventory introduced to the real estate market next year. With a possible recession looming and mortgage rates trending near a thirteen-year high, the nation's lack of housing inventory will continue to dampen affordability for buyers in 2023.
More: Homebuyers homebuying Housing Market Recession | 2022-06-02T11:03:34Z | www.businessinsider.com | Home Prices During Recession: What It Means for Demand, Mortgage Rates | https://www.businessinsider.com/what-a-reccession-means-housing-market-home-prices-mortgage-rates-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/what-a-reccession-means-housing-market-home-prices-mortgage-rates-2022-6 |
The VP of investment strategy at $46 billion Glenmede shares his 2 criteria for calling a market bottom — and his 3 favorite investment ideas right now
Glenmede
Mike Reynolds says the selling likely isn't done yet in the stock market.
He shared the top 2 conditions he'd like to see met before he sees a bottom.
He also shared the three investment opportunities he likes most right now.
It's one of the biggest questions on investors minds right now: when will stocks finally bottom?
The S&P 500 has staged late-March and late-May rallies, but more selling has followed both. Investors have grappled with a risk-laden outlook in 2022, with inflation elevated, the Federal Reserve turning aggressively hawkish, global supply chains being disrupted by COVID-19 lockdowns, and geopolitical tensions.
According to Mike Reynolds, the vice president of investment strategy at Glenmede, which manages over $46 billion in assets, two things need to happen for him to call a bottom more conclusively.
One is that valuations have to fall further than they already have for the market as a whole. Large-cap growth stocks especially have further to fall, he said.
"We're still seeing some premium valuations on growth stocks despite their underperformance year-to-date," he told Insider last week. "We think they have further to fall before they hit fair value."
He added: "We're just not there yet. Maybe there's a bit more of a correction to be had before we hit that level."
Reynolds said he thinks the S&P 500 would have to fall to around 3,585, about 12% below where it closed on Wednesday, to hit fair-value levels.
Second, Reynolds said investor sentiment has to worsen more than it already has. According to Glenmede's proprietary model, investor sentiment still isn't as bad as it was during prior market corrections. Still, from the model's current levels around -8, the S&P 500 has returned an average of 2.3% over the following month, 7% over the following three months, and 25.8% over the following 12 months.
"One of the hallmarks of major market bottoms is widespread investor capitulation — sentiment really hitting the fan," he said. "We haven't, in our estimation, seen that yet. We maintain a proprietary market sentiment index which has not hit its top-percentile reading yet."
Below is Glenmede's model, with data last updated on May 24.
Investor sentiment is difficult to measure uniformly, however. According to Bank of America's model, for example, investor sentiment around a month ago hit its worst levels since 2009.
3 opportunities to watch
Reynolds said he likes three areas of the market in particular at the moment. The first is small-cap stocks because of how much their valuations have fallen.
"Within equities we have our focus on small-caps," he said. "We are seeing small-caps much closer to fair valuation, typically better earnings trends too."
He added that small-caps are among the best-performing areas of the market coming out of a bear market environment. "This is an asset class that you'd like to own if your investment horizon is beyond at least a year," he said.
The Vanguard Small Cap Value ETF (VBR) offers exposure to small-cap stocks.
Second, Reynolds likes shorter-duration municipal bonds. Municipal bonds invest in public entities like cities and universities, and are tax-exempt.
Yields have been spiking throughout the bond market as investors seek better returns amid inflation above 8%.
"We're just trying to get yield that we just haven't seen for so long. You're getting that reward for holding these instruments," he said.
The iShares National Muni Bond ETF (MUB) offers exposure to US municipal bonds.
Finally, Reynolds is bullish on real estate.
He said it's "something a little bit more domestically focused" and not vulnerable to supply chain woes stemming from the Russian invasion of Ukraine and COVID-19 lockdowns in China. Plus, valuations in the space are attractive relative to much of the rest of the equity market, he said.
Investing in a real-estate investment trust, or REIT , is one way to gain exposure to the real-estate space. Two examples include Boston Properties (BXP) and Simon Property Group (SPG).
More: Investing Stock Market Analysis Stock market advice | 2022-06-02T14:05:14Z | www.businessinsider.com | 2 Criteria for Calling a Stock Market Bottom, 3 Investments to Make | https://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-know-when-stocks-have-bottomed-investment-ideas-glenmede-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-know-when-stocks-have-bottomed-investment-ideas-glenmede-2022-6 |
The worst money advice on the internet
Here's what: How to wade through the swamp of internet money advice
Spend any time on TikTok, Reddit, YouTube, or other social platforms and you're sure to come across money advice of one stripe or another. Plenty of qualified professionals share solid advice on their popular channels, like Tiffany "The Budgetnista" Aliche and Soledad Fernández Paulino of Wealth Para Todos. But there are also plenty of "tips" you should ignore, ignore, ignore — or at least question.
I recently spoke to Anne Lester about how to identify bad internet money advice. Lester is the former head of retirement solutions at JPMorgan, where she worked for nearly three decades, and founder of the Aspen Leadership Forum on Retirement Savings; she left JPMorgan to focus on helping Gen Z and millennials save more for retirement and invest well. Given that almost 40% of Gen Zers say they learn about money from social media, Lester is working overtime to ensure young people start their retirement journeys on the right foot.
"I think there's some extraordinarily sound advice out there," said Lester. "But I also think there's some stuff that, when I put my JPMorgan hat on, the hair on the back of my neck stands up because it's so terrible."
She said there are two red flags to look out for when you're scrolling through money advice online.
First: Anyone telling you to BUY or SELL anything in big, bold, all-caps letters
You should never buy or sell something just because an influencer says you should. Period.
"Especially things like crypto and individual stocks," said Lester. "Some people are true believers that are out there pounding the table, but a lot of people — it's a classic thing of, talk up something you have a stake in and then quietly sell it behind the buyers. That's been going on as long as there have been financial markets."
She said that, as an investor, you should be able to explain in simple terms why you have returns from something. For example, X company makes a product that people want to buy. Over time, if the company is well-run, that gets reflected in the value of the company.
On crypto, however, "I don't see anyone who's given a reasonable argument for why it should keep going up in value," she said.
Second: Blanket absolutes that "everyone" should follow
When you see blanket advice — like "everyone should buy a house" — Lester said to question it. It may make sense for you, but no single financial decision — like buying a home — is going to be right for everyone.
Lester explained that, for all financial advice, there's a headline that's almost always true — for example, you should save — but beyond that it all depends on your situation. Yes, you should save, but how much to save, where to put your money, and what you save for will all depend on your specific scenario and goals.
"You should have your long-term savings, like for retirement, invested in a mix of stocks and bonds. That's good advice. But beyond that, it all starts depending," she said. For example, "One of the things I've seen lately is, 'You must buy a house,' or, 'You should never buy a house.' Those are both terrible pieces of advice, because the real answer is: It depends."
Ultimately, Lester's recommendation is twofold: First, take time to question the money advice you're consuming, and think about its source. Most people sharing this kind of information are making money in some way, either through clicks (which explains the Big! Bold! headlines, since they're designed to use our emotions and anxieties to get us to click) or from something they're selling.
"Younger people are very distrustful of 'the system' because they perceive to be being sold all the time. I think there's a healthy degree of skepticism around that," she said, "But I would point out that most people online have got a revenue model associated with their internet presence."
Making money online isn't bad in and of itself. But influencers should be transparent about their revenue models so you can consider their advice in context.
And her second recommendation: If it seems too good to be true, it is. "You can always look back at the one stock" that blew up and made early investors rich, like Apple or Tesla, said Lester. That will always be true. "But the reality is that's not a sustainable or reliable way to make money." With every single "easy" way to make money, "It works until it stops working."
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More: Newsletters PFI Newsletter Money Advice TikTok | 2022-06-02T14:05:44Z | www.businessinsider.com | PFI Newsletter: This Is the Worst Money Advice on the Internet | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/pfi-newsletter-worst-money-advice-internet-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/pfi-newsletter-worst-money-advice-internet-2022-6 |
Big-money investors favor these 9 stocks this quarter, according to a Goldman Sachs analysis of over 1,300 funds with a combined $5.2 trillion in assets
Wall Street's top fund managers have, on average, beaten the market in 2022.
Mutual funds and hedge funds have both beaten the S&P 500 so far in 2022.
Fund managers are aligned on which sectors they're targeting, but not in the growth vs value debate.
Here are nine stocks that both mutual fund managers and hedge fund managers love.
While few investors have emerged unscathed during this year's dramatic stock market selloff, professional money managers seem to be holding up rather well.
Over the course of 2022 mutual funds and hedge funds have suffered average drops of 13% and 9%, respectively, but have still managed to top the S&P 500's 14% year-to-date decline, wrote David Kostin, the chief US equity strategist at Goldman Sachs, in a late May note.
To better understand how large-cap mutual funds and equity hedge funds have beaten the market this year, a team of Goldman Sachs researchers led by Kostin put together a pair of reports that analyzed the stock picks of 1,333 funds with a combined $5.2 trillion in assets.
Below are a few top takeaways from the reports, as well as the nine stock picks that both mutual funds and hedge funds are fond of right now.
Pros agree on sectors but differ on value vs growth
Managers who ran the 534 mutual funds and 799 hedge funds that Goldman Sachs analyzed had strikingly similar sector allocations in the first quarter of 2022, but drastically different strategies for adjusting to what quickly became a bear market for growth-oriented stocks.
Professional investors added exposure to three economically sensitive sectors in Q1: industrials, materials, and energy. The tilt toward industrials was the largest in the past decade, Kostin noted.
"Mutual funds and hedge funds both held record exposure to cyclical sectors," Kostin wrote. "Funds generally agreed on sectors but financials was the exception, where mutual funds were 135 bp (1.35%) overweight and hedge funds were 334 bp (3.34%) underweight."
The strategy chief also pointed out that fund managers fled in droves from the information technology and consumer discretionary sectors in the first quarter and now have the smallest weighting to those two more richly valued groups since 2012.
What most clearly separates mutual fund managers and those running hedge funds is their differing views on growth and value stocks.
Mutual funds examined by Goldman Sachs tended to be overweight value stocks but pivoted to growth names in Q1 for the fourth straight quarter, Kostin wrote. The inverse was true of hedge funds, which were underweight value but continued to move away from growth stocks.
The nearly 20-percentage-point outperformance by value stocks over their growth peers this year has been a tailwind for mutual funds and a headwind for the hedge funds trying to catch up by adding exposure to the group, Kostin wrote.
Large-cap mutual funds are beating their benchmarks at a 56% rate — the highest level since at least 2009 — largely because the stocks that mutual funds are most overweight have fared well compared to the broader market, Kostin wrote.
By contrast, a basket of hedge funds' top stocks that Goldman Sachs compiled has fallen by a market-lagging 25% this year and has trailed the S&P 500 by 28 percentage points since early 2021, Kostin wrote. About one in three stocks in the basket of hedge fund favorites are tech names, even though hedge fund managers have reduced their exposure to that sector.
When considering their suboptimal bias toward growth stocks and the dismal performance by their largest names, it's remarkable that hedge funds have topped mutual funds this year.
9 top picks from the pros
Mutual fund managers and their hedge fund counterparts were especially bullish on nine stocks as the second quarter of 2022 kicked off, according to Goldman Sachs.
But while mutual funds and hedge funds have outperformed the market so far this year, those nine so-called "shared favorites" are down 22%, which is eight percentage points worse than the S&P 500. Though perhaps surprising at first glance, Kostin wrote the fact that pros' go-to stocks aren't working during the sharp selloff is "consistent with other periods of market stress."
"Popular positions are particularly vulnerable during market sell-offs since investors tend to unload liquid stocks first," Kostin wrote. "Equity allocation across households still appears elevated and selling pressure may resume if the macro outlook does not improve."
Another explanation for the lackluster performance by professional investors' top picks is that five of the nine names are in the information technology sector , which has been hit especially hard this year as interest rates rise and earnings multiples contract. Kostin noted that the nine favored stocks trade at a 23% valuation premium to the market based on forward earnings.
Still, history shows that fund managers' favorite positions tend to fare well over time. Shared favorites have generated 14 percentage points of excess returns over the S&P 500 since 2013 and have had a hit rate of 58%, Kostin wrote.
Below are the nine stocks that were favored by both mutual fund and hedge fund managers at the start of Q2. The first seven names are ones that made the list last quarter, Kostin noted, while the two new entrants replaced General Motors (GM) and Charles Schwab (SCHW). Each name has its chart, ticker, market capitalization, and price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio.
1. Fiserv
Ticker: FISV
Ticker: MA
Ticker: NOW
Ticker: UNH
6. Workday
Ticker: WDAY
7. Wells Fargo
Ticker: WFC
Ticker: ANTM
Ticker: UBER
mutual fund investing
mutual fund top stocks
hedge fund top stocks
goldman sachs stocks to buy
goldman sachs stock picks
growth stock picks
growth stock rotation | 2022-06-02T14:05:56Z | www.businessinsider.com | 9 Top Stocks That Fund Managers Love Right Now: Goldman Sachs | https://www.businessinsider.com/top-stocks-to-buy-value-growth-fund-managers-goldman-sachs-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/top-stocks-to-buy-value-growth-fund-managers-goldman-sachs-2022-6 |
Chris Kline
Chris Kline.
Chris Kline is the COO and cofounder of Bitcoin IRA, a cryptocurrency IRA company.
He suggests that global uncertainty is contributing to the crypto downturn.
But he says that crypto has always experienced shifts in pricing.
While the volatile nature of Bitcoin (and crypto) can be seen as exciting by some, its recent dip below $30,000 has left many investors questioning what led to such a drastic change.
I'm the chief operating officer and cofounder of Bitcoin IRA, one of the leading cryptocurrency IRA platforms. And here are some of the factors I see driving the lull.
1. Global uncertainty is driving an economic downturn — those headwinds affect crypto-markets too
We're currently faced with a bout of uncertainty as the era of "free money" is behind us and more investors are leaning toward making prudent choices.
For instance, when it comes to saving for retirement, people are living longer these days, and thus, a key factor to consider is the need for one's retirement savings to last just as long. Therefore, investments with a lower risk tolerance seem like the safer bet, but a bet nonetheless.
While the duration of this current state is uncertain, it's being addressed by the US central bank in the form of increased interest rates to restore price stability. In this year alone, we've seen the benchmark policy rate increase by three-quarters of a percentage point and it's predicted to reach 2.75% or higher by year end, according to CME Group data.
Another contributing factor for market uncertainty is today's Ukraine crisis
Significant global market swings have been reported in recent weeks as many investors attempt to predict the rise in costs for oil, wheat, and other European commodities.
In conjunction with inflation, the Russian-Ukraine conflict has stirred up more investor uncertainty along with questions of whether a recession could potentially follow.
2. Investors are split about how to handle the dip
Another key driving factor is the mixed bag of sentiment shared by consumers and institutional players, alike. There are two schools of thought: Some investors are cutting their losses and liquidating their cryptocurrency assets. Others have kept their faith and have acquired more digital assets.
El Salvador, is a prime example of "buying the dip." The country recently added $15.5 million worth of bitcoin to its balance sheet.
The fact is that consumers and institutions have seen the rise and fall of crypto prices throughout the years. Perhaps, another history lesson is a foot — one which shows crypto having a knack for bouncing back, despite its high volatility .
Given the market uncertainty tied to inflation and the current geopolitical crisis, many US investors are distracted and have yet to fully feel the effects.
The recent uptick in travel, for instance, is an example of the fact that many people are overlooking inflated costs. Having just come out of a pandemic and global lockdowns, it seems that many are choosing to focus on other things.
3. The collapse of Terra Luna reverberated throughout the market
As the primary asset for stablecoin reserves, Bitcoin, among the broader crypto market, has been affected by the sheer volume of recent liquidations.
Known for their ties to another currency or asset class, stablecoins were essentially designed to hold a fixed value. Thus, when an asset appears vulnerable, its reserve asset will be implemented.
The recent collapse of Terra (LUNA), a popular coin whose stablecoin, TerraUSD (UST) had been de-pegged from the US dollar, stirred up quite the buzz and anxiety with regulators and investors.
It's important to note that this is just one case of a stable coin, and yet its impact seemed to be felt by other coins. That said, the market for stablecoins is still over $160 billion, according to CoinGecko.
Cryptocurrencies have always had peaks and valleys
When it comes down to it, Bitcoin is the people's currency, and we remain to be the largest driver for crypto prices.
Cryptocurrencies have experienced peaks and valleys, followed by more peaks and valleys, throughout the years.
It's a volatile asset class for the modern investor that has shown many times over that it's not only here to stay but will continue to weave itself into the fabric of our lives.
Chris Kline is the COO and cofounder of Bitcoin IRA, a crypto IRA company.
More: original contributor contributor 2022 Jenna Gyimesi | 2022-06-02T15:36:25Z | www.businessinsider.com | Crypto Price Crash: Reasons for the Dip, According to Bitcoin IRA Cofounder | https://www.businessinsider.com/crypto-market-price-crash-reasons-bitcoin-ira-chris-kline-2022-5 | https://www.businessinsider.com/crypto-market-price-crash-reasons-bitcoin-ira-chris-kline-2022-5 |
WATCH: A software developer who begged people to buy $1 of bitcoin in 2013 shares 3 cryptos investors should be stacking up during this bear market — and drops new predictions, including why other layer-1s could plunge
In 2013, Davinci Jeremie, a software developer and crypto content creator, made a short YouTube video begging his viewers to buy at least $1 of bitcoin. He predicted it would become a leading currency that would be self-regulated.
At the time of filming the video, which now has 3.8 million views, he recalled that bitcoin was trading between $100 to $200. Despite the crypto's volatility , if an investor had taken his advice, they would have seen gains of over 15,750% to date.
As a software developer, he understood that bitcoin's proof-of-work concept meant that no one can change the blockchain or roll back a transaction, including governments. For him, this was a big deal. Ultimately, he believes bitcoin will become currency.
Bitcoin is one of three cryptos he says investors should stack up on during this bear market . He also recommends buying ethereum (ETH) and binance coin (BNB) while they are trading at a discount. This gives an investor exposure to the leading platform for transactions and smart contracts, as well as a leading crypto exchange, respectively.
Davinci doesn't think bitcoin will dip below $21,000 during this bear cycle because it's never traded below its 200-week moving average; bitcoin fell below $26,000 in May. Ethereum could dip as low as $1,700, he said.
He also believes that once ethereum upgrades to ETH 2.0, there will be fewer use cases for other layer-1s. Instead, roll-up chains such as layer-2s built on ethereum's blockchain or those that can connect to it will be a more desirable investment.
Davinci is currently building his own marketplace for nonfungible tokens because he believes these digital assets will revolutionize media ownership. He said crypto investors should also start building on the blockchain and even create content such as a book that can be verified as theirs and sold.
More: Investing crypto 2022 crypto accountant
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eth 2022
eth outlook | 2022-06-02T15:36:28Z | www.businessinsider.com | WATCH: Davinci Jeremie on 3 Cryptos to Buy During This Bear Market | https://www.businessinsider.com/cryptos-to-buy-during-bear-market-davinci-jeremie-2022-5 | https://www.businessinsider.com/cryptos-to-buy-during-bear-market-davinci-jeremie-2022-5 |
According to weekly data from the US Energy Information Administration, regular gas prices increased to a series high of $4.62 per gallon on May 30 from $4.59 per gallon a week ago.
"So far, the pent-up urge to travel caused by the pandemic outweighs high pump prices for many consumers," Andrew Gross, AAA spokesperson, said per the AAA newsroom. "But 67% of drivers recently surveyed told us they would change their driving habits if gas hit $4.50 a gallon. That number rises to 75% at $5 a gallon. If pump prices keep rising, will people alter their summer travel plans? That remains to be seen."
According to a Morning Consult survey commissioned by the American Hotel & Lodging Association as reported by CNBC, over two-thirds (69%) of Americans said they probably will travel this summer. But the survey shows that despite travel plans, 57% reported they "are likely to take fewer trips" and 54% "are likely to take shorter trips" because of gas prices.
"The pandemic has instilled in most people a greater appreciation for travel, and that's reflected in the plans Americans are making to get out and about this summer," Chip Rogers, president and CEO of the American Hotel & Lodging Association, said per a press release. "But just as COVID's negative impact on travel is starting to wane, a new set of challenges is emerging in the form of historic inflation and record high gas prices."
More: Gas Prices Gas EIA BI Graphics | 2022-06-02T15:36:30Z | www.businessinsider.com | How Much Gas Prices Have Gone up Across the US in 2 Years | https://www.businessinsider.com/how-much-gas-prices-gone-up-compared-two-years-ago-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/how-much-gas-prices-gone-up-compared-two-years-ago-2022-6 |
Former House Speaker Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin of Republican Rep. Tom Rice of South Carolina.
Mark Wilson/Getty Images and Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call via Getty Images
Paul Ryan campaigned on Wednesday with Tom Rice, an endangered pro-impeachment Republican.
The former House Speaker had a strained relationship with Trump and retired after the 2018 midterms.
Rice has called Trump a "would-be tyrant" and said what he did on January 6 "is what dictators do."
Former House Speaker Paul Ryan traveled to South Carolina on Wednesday to campaign for Republican Rep. Tom Rice, who faces a Trump-backed primary challenger after voting to impeach the former president for incitement of an insurrection.
"You have with you a congressman who is at this key juncture on this key committee, with this wealth of knowledge representing your interests," said Ryan at a roundtable with local business leaders, according to The Post and Courier. "So I'm just here to say 'thank you for sending this man to Congress.'"
Rice, one of ten House Republicans who voted to impeach Donald Trump for his role in the January 6, 2001 attack on the US Capitol, faces a primary challenge from South Carolina State Rep. Russell Fry.
Since voting to impeach, Rice has remained vocal in his condemnation of Trump's actions surrounding the Capitol siege, comparing the former president to a dictator in a May 2021 interview with the Washington Post.
"If the president, by force, can intimidate Congress into voting their way, then we might as well do away with Congress and hand it over to a king," Rice said. "What he did in my mind is what dictators do."
And in March, following a rally in South Carolina where Trump criticized Rice, the Republican congressman released a statement lambasting both Trump and Fry.
For Ryan, it's not the first time he's supported a Republican who voted to impeach Trump — he's also held fundraisers for Republican Reps. Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, both of whom serve on the select committee investigating the January 6 attacks.
"There are workhorses in Congress and there are show horses in Congress," Ryan told reporters in South Carolina. "Law gets written by workhorses. Differences are made by workhorses. Tom Rice is a workhorse. That to me is what matters, and so you want to support the people in Congress who actually do the work of solving people's problems."
But that puts him at odds with Trump, who's backing Fry.
"Congressman Tom Rice of South Carolina, the coward who abandoned his constituents by caving to Nancy Pelosi and the Radical Left, and who actually voted against me on Impeachment Hoax #2, must be thrown out of office ASAP," said Trump in a February statement announcing his support for Fry.
A Trafalgar Group poll released yesterday showed Fry leading the incumbent Rice by more than 17 points. Asked by reporters about the poll results, Rice brushed it off.
"There's only one poll that matters, and that's on Election Day," he said. "I feel pretty comfortable."
Ryan, a Republican from Wisconsin, served as Speaker of the House from 2015 until his retirement in 2019. While working with Trump to pass the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act in 2021, the two often clashed, with Ryan frequently called upon to denounce the former president's conduct.
Over the weekend, Ryan said on CNBC's "Squawk Box" that too many lawmakers in Congress are casting aside policy-making in order to be "entertainers" on social media.
More: Elections Paul Ryan House Republicans Trump | 2022-06-02T15:36:35Z | www.businessinsider.com | Paul Ryan Stumped for Pro-Impeachment Republican Who Called Trump 'Tyrant' | https://www.businessinsider.com/paul-ryan-tom-rice-impeachment-trump-tyrant-south-carolina-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/paul-ryan-tom-rice-impeachment-trump-tyrant-south-carolina-2022-6 |
Salesforce's business model and willingness to cut back spending make it well equipped to weather a downturn, analysts say
Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff
Salesforce reported earnings this week that were "better than feared," analysts said.
The results show that Salesforce is well positioned to get through a downturn, they said.
The company is willing to rein in spending and has a strong business model, analysts said.
Wall Street is breathing a sigh of relief after Salesforce reported earnings on Tuesday that were "better than feared," which showed the cloud-software giant was in a good position to weather a downturn.
Analysts looked to Salesforce's earnings report to gauge how hard the downtown would hit the entire cloud-software industry, as software stocks have been hit hard in recent weeks amid a broader market downturn. Its report showed that its subscription business model, wide variety of products, and willingness to rein in spending when necessary made the company resilient, analysts said.
Salesforce reported revenue of $7.41 billion, up 24% year over year. It beat analyst expectations for the quarter and lowered its revenue guidance for the fiscal year, while boosting its profit guidance.
The results were "much better than feared," Dan Ives, a Wedbush analyst, wrote in a note to clients. "Guidance which will be a major relief for tech investors showing that core enterprise demand is holding up well despite the macro and geopolitical swirls."
Still, Salesforce took cautious measures in response to the market downturn, showing that it's "willing to be the company that will dial back on investing when necessary," Rishi Jaluria, an RBC analyst, told Insider.
Executives addressed its move to slow hiring and put a hold on recruiting for some open roles to control expenses, which Insider recently reported.
"We've asked each leader to step up to really look across their business and to strategically prioritize their investments," Amy Weaver, Salesforce's chief financial officer, said on a call with analysts after the earnings were released. "We're going to continue to hire, but we're doing it at a much more measured pace, and we're focusing the majority of our new hires on roles that will support customer success and the execution of our top priorities."
In addition, Salesforce's broad portfolio of products will help get it through the downturn, some say. As companies look to cut costs, Salesforce can offer a single platform to address various needs across a business, analysts said.
"In a really tight environment, companies need to figure out where to save on IT," Jaluria said. "And if you can save your IT dollars by saying, 'I'm going to just put everything on Salesforce and move away from some of these niche tools,' I think that ultimately benefits Salesforce.
Salesforce execs also highlighted its subscription model as a reliable source of business. Its subscription-based business model allows the company to see what customers will spend on software a few years into the future because big customers typically sign multiyear contracts with Salesforce.
On the flip side, software companies that use consumption-based pricing models, like Snowflake, could suffer during the downturn as customers look to cut costs, Insider previously reported.
While Salesforce's earnings provide relief, analysts are still cautious.
"I think it's too soon to wave the victory flag," Steve Koenig, an SMBC America analyst, said.
But the company is equipped to handle a downturn given the nature of its business and its focus on profitability, analysts said. That increased focus on profitability has investors more optimistic about the company's course, Pat Walravens, a JMP analyst, told Insider.
"Historically, Salesforce has been viewed as a big spender," Walravens said. "And so from an investor standpoint, it's a positive change to see this increased focus on profitability, and that's the main reason the stock's up."
More: Salesforce Marc Benioff Bret Taylor Software As A Service
cloud software stocks | 2022-06-02T15:36:51Z | www.businessinsider.com | Salesforce's Earnings Show It's Well Equipped to Weather a Downturn | https://www.businessinsider.com/salesforce-earnings-q1-2023-weather-downturn-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/salesforce-earnings-q1-2023-weather-downturn-2022-6 |
Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) speaks during a Senate Appropriations Subcommittee hearing on June 9, 2021 at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C.
Biden just wiped out student debt for all remaining student defrauded by for-profit Corinthian Colleges.
Sen. Patty Murray lauded the relief – and said it should be provided to every other borrower.
She also called for Biden to extend the student-loan payment pause through 2023.
President Joe Biden just gave thousands of student-loan borrowers relief. A top Democratic lawmaker says it's time to extend the benefit to everyone else.
On Wednesday, Biden's Education Department announced all remaining 560,000 student-loan borrowers defrauded by now-defunct for-profit Corinthian Colleges will be getting $5.8 billion in debt wiped out. Corinthian shut down in 2015 following investigations into the chain's predatory behavior that misled students into taking on more debt than they could afford to pay off, and since then, lawmakers like Senator Patty Murray — the chair of the Senate education committee — have been fighting to ensure those borrowers get the relief they deserve.
"Today, every single borrower ripped off by Corinthian Colleges can finally breathe a huge sigh of relief knowing that they will no longer be saddled with debt and anxiety," Murray said in a statement. "No student working towards a higher education should ever have to worry about getting lied to or cheated by their institution—and they absolutely shouldn't have to stress about being denied the debt relief they are owed."
"But we can't stop here," Murray added. She called for Biden to provide relief to all federal borrowers, along with extending the pause on student-loan payments — now set to end after August 31 — through 2023 to allow time to fix broken loan forgiveness programs.
Pressure is building on Biden to deliver on his student-loan forgiveness campaign pledge. He said over a month ago he would make a decision "in the next couple of weeks" on broad student-loan relief, and while he has yet to make an announcement, recent reports suggested he is considering $10,000 in loan forgiveness for borrowers making under $150,000 a year.
Many Democratic lawmakers have expressed disappointment Biden is not considering a larger amount, especially if millions of borrowers will be thrown back into repayment in September. While Biden has extended the payment pause four times while in office, Education Secretary Miguel Cardona recently said that "at some point, people are going to have to start paying what they can afford to pay." And Brian Deese, White House director of the National Economic Council, said during a press briefing this week that student-loan relief will likely have a "quite small" impact on inflation because restarting loan payments will balance it out.
But since Biden extended the most recent pause in April, Murray has been calling for an additional extension to allow time for broad student-loan relief and permanent reforms to income-driven repayment plans and the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program, which have shut many borrowers out from deserved relief.
"This pause is urgently needed and will take stress off the shoulders of so many borrowers, but we need long-lasting change and a student loan system that actually works for students and borrowers—not just quick fixes," Murray previously said.
More: Policy Politics Economy Patty Murray | 2022-06-02T15:36:57Z | www.businessinsider.com | Biden Should Extend Recent Student-Loan Forgiveness to All Borrowers: Murray | https://www.businessinsider.com/student-loan-debt-forgiveness-corinthian-colleges-all-borrowers-patty-murray-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/student-loan-debt-forgiveness-corinthian-colleges-all-borrowers-patty-murray-2022-6 |
Bolt's CEO just fielded questions from employees in an AMA a week after layoffs rocked the fintech: 'How can we have faith?'
Kylie Robison and Ben Bergman
Maju Kuruvilla is the CEO of fintech firm Bolt.
Fintech firm Bolt announced layoffs last week after raising $355 million earlier this year.
The company held an AMA Wednesday with CEO Maju Kuruvilla to address employees' concerns.
In screenshots viewed by Insider, employees probed the executive on the firm's layoff strategy.
Bolt, a San Francisco-based financial-technology company that provides a one-click checkout solution, held an "ask me anything" all-hands meeting Wednesday morning in the wake of layoffs the startup recently conducted that saw it shed roughly a third of its employees.
The meeting, which lasted approximately 72 minutes, included questions about the firm's plans for additional layoffs, customer strategy, and attrition concerns.
The firm announced layoffs on May 25, just months after raising $355 million in new funding at nearly an $11 billion valuation. The primary Slack channel for Bolt employees had shrunk from 900 employees in the morning to 660 midday, according to the New York Times. Insider confirmed from a current employee that the number is 657.
The tech industry boomed during the pandemic with some of Silicon Valley's biggest names hitting record-breaking market caps, while private companies like Bolt received large funding injections from venture-capital firms brimming with cash. But now, an unsightly downturn has hit the industry with layoffs threatening even the most well-funded firms.
This series of layoffs at Bolt comes shortly after one-click checkout Fast, the firm's closest peer, closed its doors after reports revealed the firm overhired and spent cash like "drunken sailors."
In screenshots viewed by Insider, 80 questions were asked by employees for Bolt CEO Maju Kuruvilla. Employees could bump a question higher in the queue by upvoting it.
One of the top comments asked why Bolt founder and former CEO Ryan Breslow, who left the company in February 2022, hadn't publically discussed the layoffs.
"Ryan has never shied away from sharing his thoughts," the comment from an anonymous employee said. "I am surprised he has not spoken up about recent layoffs. Why haven't we heard from him?"
Another comment questioned whether there were more cuts to come.
"We're hearing that leadership doesn't anticipate another round of layoffs," a second anonymous employee wrote with 62 upvotes. "How can we have faith in this when just weeks ago, layoffs weren't in sight?"
'Motivational speeches' and a lack of answers
Employees reacted to Kuruvilla's answers in a private Slack group containing current and recently laid-off employees.
"Maju is the go big or go home type," one former employee wrote in the group. "Well then we're all going home," a current employee replied. Insider was able to verify the identity of the users in the group.
Many employees criticized that Kuruvilla deflected some of the questions he was asked, using "motivational speeches" in lieu of direct answers.
"I understand the need to galvanize," a current employee wrote in the private Slack group. "But it can't be delusional, which is what it's bordering on right now."
In the AMA, one employee asked Kuruvilla if they can opt to lay themselves off in order to get a severance package, a source familiar with the matter confirmed to Insider. He answered with a curt "no" before moving on.
Another employee wrote in the private Slack group that Kuruvilla said not to worry about money and that raising more funds would, in fact, be a bad thing because they don't want to rely heavily on investors. The CEO added that he wanted Bolt to have a really big "up round," which is when a firm raises money at a higher valuation, rather than a large down round, which is when the company raises money at a lower valuation.
In fact, Breslow had frantically e-mailed investors over a month ago, trying to raise hundreds of millions in new funding at a $14 billion valuation, according to one of the VCs who was pitched.
"He was desperate for cash and everyone said no to him," said the VC, who doubted Bolt would even be worth half of what Breslow was seeking.
"I just don't want to touch it," the VC added.
"I can feel Maju is under lots of pressure right now," a current employee wrote in the private Slack group, adding that he believes the repetitive motivational speeches from the CEO are a way to dilute the facts. "He's not okay. It's the first time he becomes a CEO and his reputation is on the line."
More: Fintech Startups Bo.lt Ryan Breslow
Maju Kuruvilla | 2022-06-02T17:07:43Z | www.businessinsider.com | Bolt CEO Fielded Employees' Questions in an AMA a Week After Layoffs | https://www.businessinsider.com/bolt-layoffs-fintech-startup-ceo-fields-questions-ama-meeting-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/bolt-layoffs-fintech-startup-ceo-fields-questions-ama-meeting-2022-6 |
I graduated into remote work. I felt so alone and left behind that I was desperate to return to the office.
Josh Axelrod
The author during virtual graduation.
I graduated from college in 2020, which meant everything was disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
We got a lot of sympathy for that. But things remained difficult as people like me entered the workplace.
The isolation and departure from my norm — seeing people — made me desperate to return to an office.
Us 2020 college grads got a lot of sympathy back in the day. With pandemic-induced remote learning and virtual graduation ceremonies, we were missing out on what was supposed to be one of the best years of our lives.
But our class' actual trials began just when the attention started to shift away from us, as we clumsily navigated the pivotal transition to the working world from our childhood bedrooms.
When that fateful March afternoon first rolled around — the day a healthcare crisis officially became a pandemic — college campuses closed, sending students scrambling and initiating a diaspora of remote learning. For seniors, it was a bitter anticlimax to our four glorious years of schooling, with in-person graduation yanked out from under us to cap off our unceremonious finish.
The class of 2020 received a lot of early pandemic sympathy because we were missing rites of passage
As I defended my honors thesis over Zoom and ironically wore my girlfriend's ill-fitting high school graduation robe for a virtual couch-viewing of commencement, our neighbors and community members consoled us.
But as we settled into our quarantine silos, individually trying to make sense of our new daily rhythms, recent college graduates like myself quietly struggled. I had chanced into a steady gig with my hometown newspaper after doing some freelance reporting during school, but my unemployed classmates endured an even bleaker daily routine as they strained to find jobs in a historically turbulent labor market.
The months following college are already challenging enough for graduates
Therapists agree that "post-grad depression " is a prevalent issue, as 20-somethings leave their previously known worlds behind for the tribulations and frequent boredoms of adult life. But maneuvered successfully, the post-grad period should allow students-turned-workers to acclimate to their new lifestyle: a consistent wake-up time, the routine of a morning commute, the workplace socialization with a cohort of peers and colleagues.
The author working remotely.
Instead, I spent many mornings lazily checking emails under the covers, unmotivated to make the 15-second commute from bed to desk to begin another day of isolated work, my only social contact coming from disembodied Slack avatars.
In lieu of an orientation or any on-the-job training, I was sent virtual training materials to leaf through on my own time. Save for my first day, when my boss went above and beyond to onboard me from his backyard patio, my job offered no other in-person introductions to colleagues or supervisors. No nice-to-meet-you lunches or welcome-to-the-office happy hours.
As I tried to orient myself to the skills of my job, I was also struggling with feelings of isolation
These feelings were familiar to many in those early days of the pandemic. As an extroverted 20-something used to being surrounded by people in dorms, dining halls, and classrooms at all times, I didn't take kindly to my new solitary surroundings.
Instead of confabbing with coworkers, my daily lunch hour entailed slinking down to the kitchen to dispassionately assemble sandwich fixings. Just like kids miss out on socialization when school moves online, so do workers — and lacking that small talk or midday strategy session can erode one's sense of belonging and drive to contribute to a team.
As time went on, long after my diploma arrived in the mail and temperatures had shot up to the sweaty heights of summer, I began acclimating to the job. Yet I still can't help but feel like I'd be leagues ahead in my career if I'd been able to shadow veteran colleagues, mingle with a cohort of similarly aged peers, and receive the real-time feedback that so often falls to the wayside when work moves online.
I've finally found a job where I can work in the office, and it's changed my life
It took a long time to get here. I moved out of my childhood bedroom and into an apartment in Washington, D.C., though the promise of returning to the office post-Labor Day was dashed a day after I unpacked my boxes. I worked in a silo, producing content and repeating labor cycles over and over again in isolation.
As others joyously discovered the freedom of working remotely, I quietly hoped to return to the office. Two years into the pandemic, I finally have.
Especially for new employees, there's simply no replacement for the camaraderie, education, and communication that comes from in-person work. As a student, I spent four years cultivating my professional skills and studying tirelessly to ready myself for the working world. I was desperate to put those skills to their full use.
But first, I needed to be in an office environment where I could thrive. I'm so relieved I finally am.
More: COVID covid and economy Careers Economy
College grads
college grad | 2022-06-02T17:07:49Z | www.businessinsider.com | I Graduated Into Remote Work. I Felt Alone and Left Behind. | https://www.businessinsider.com/college-graduation-remote-work-felt-alone-left-behind-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/college-graduation-remote-work-felt-alone-left-behind-2022-6 |
11 creator economy execs explain why they left TikTok, YouTube, and other top social brands to join startups
Meta; Tik Tok; Youtube; Insider
Creator economy startups have been nabbing talent from TikTok, YouTube, and Meta this year.
Dozens of staffers with experience at the big platforms have opted to move to smaller companies.
Insider spoke to 11 employees about why they left — and how they feel about the decision.
The creator economy is in the midst of a reshuffling.
In the first half of 2022, dozens of employees left roles at companies like YouTube, TikTok, Meta Platforms (formerly Facebook), and Pinterest to work at creator-focused startups like Koji, Creative Juice, and Kajabi, according to an Insider review of job updates on LinkedIn.
Take Matt Koval, who worked at YouTube for nearly a decade before leaving in March 2022 to join Mighty Networks, a startup that helps creators monetize courses and online communities.
"I looked out at the industry and saw so many exciting things happening in the creator economy that I wanted to be a part of and contribute to," Koval told Insider. "And ironically, it seemed like it wasn't as exciting being a part of one of the big platforms anymore."
This flurry of departures falls into the broader "Great Resignation" occurring across the US as workers have left their jobs en masse in search of higher pay and better work environments.
Meanwhile, the creator economy has boomed over the past few years, buoyed by a shift toward digital content that accelerated during the pandemic.
Companies like YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and Snapchat spent hundreds of millions of dollars building out creator-focused revenue streams, and a new crop of startups has emerged to fill in the gaps where the big tech platforms fall short.
These newcomers are designing marketing, engagement, fintech, and teaching tools specifically for content creators — and many are poaching talent from the big social-media companies to do so.
"There's this perfect storm of opportunity," said Aaron DeBevoise, the CEO and founder of creator economy startup Spotter, which recently hired Derek Reynolds (from YouTube) and Monica Khan (from Meta) as executives.
For startups hiring talent from some of the largest social media platforms, the "why" is quite clear.
"They bring a lot of qualities," DeBevoise said. The talent pool is known to be intelligent, "process-oriented," and to "work well with teams," he added. "It's worth paying them what's necessary to get them."
But why the talent chooses to leave cushy positions at some of the highest-valued companies is not always as obvious.
Some said they saw creator needs that weren't being addressed by the big platforms, and they figured scrappier startups could solve those problems more quickly. Others said they wanted to join earlier-stage companies where they could have more influence.
In many cases, these employees made the choice to leave big, more stable companies before the global economy — and specifically tech and media sectors — showed signs of a slowdown. Some joined startups that raised sizable war chests from investors in the past year, which they hope will give their companies a better shot at weathering a choppy economy.
"This is a risk, but it's a calculated risk," said Khan, a product manager who left Meta to join Spotter. Spotter raised a $200 million Series D round led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2 earlier this year.
Insider spoke to 11 creator industry professionals who left their jobs at big social entertainment platforms in 2022 to take a chance on creator-focused startups.
Here are their stories on why they made the switch:
Note: Insider has edited and shortened some responses for clarity.
Paul Bakaus: Google to Koji
Philipp Ammon
Paul Bakaus was the head of creator relations at Google, where he worked closely with web developers and creators. In April, he joined Koji, a link-in-bio startup focused on creator monetization, as the company's head of creators.
Why Bakaus made the switch:
The thing about working at Google is "you can live your life at Google and never exit the office," Bakaus told Insider.
"I felt like I was too comfortable, I didn't really grow any more — I wasn't challenged enough," Bakaus said. "I wanted to feel discomfort again."
That desire led Bakaus back to the world of startups. Koji was the "sweet spot" with its link-in-bio tool and growing app store that can grow alongside creators using it, Bakaus said.
"The creator economy is evolving at a pace that bigger companies cannot evolve at," he said. "There is so much new stuff happening."
"If you're not highly adaptive, you're going to lose," Bakaus said.
Sam Christie: TikTok to Pearpop
Dillon G Artzer Photography.
Sam Christie worked at TikTok and its parent company ByteDance for nearly four years, most recently serving as a regional vice president for ByteDance's software sales division, and before that as the national lead for the entertainment vertical on the sales team at TikTok.
He left in March to become VP of business development at Pearpop, a marketplace for creators to connect with brands for sponsored content deals, as well as with other creators or fans on sponsored "duets" and collaborative campaigns.
Why Christie made the switch:
Christie joined TikTok in 2018, shortly after ByteDance began its global push into short-form video by merging the lip-synching app Musical.ly with TikTok.
"I got to see everything," he said. "The full gamut of the first 40 people all the way up to what it is now."
While working on the global business solutions team at the company and pitching its ads platform to entertainment brands like Netflix and Hulu , he saw an opportunity to make it easier for brands and creators to connect directly.
"The way in which creators were partnering with brands and vice versa, the way that brands were partnering with creators, I saw that there were a lot of gaps there," Christie said. "I saw that there was a well of opportunity in terms of making it better for creators."
He also was interested in joining an earlier stage company to help build something from the ground up again.
"This was an opportunity to go solve another problem and to go build new teams and to go really make a big splash in a space that I think a lot of eyeballs are paying attention to," Christie said.
Mauricio Costa-Neres: TikTok to Superjoi
Courtesy of Mauricio Costa-Neres
Mauricio Costa-Neres left TikTok, where he was a strategic partnerships manager for two years, to join a fresh startup called Superjoi at the end of March.
Costa-Neres is the head of creator partnerships at Superjoi, a platform that will let creators monetize their audience in a similar way to Kickstarter.
Why Costa-Neres made the switch:
A veteran of Twitter, Meta, and TikTok, Costa-Neres is no stranger to large social-media firms.
"These platforms are always leaving a gap for the creators to run the businesses," Costa-Neres told Insider.
For example, they don't always share in-depth data that lets creators identify their most loyal viewers or fans — something Superjoi can help solve, Costa-Neres said.
Costa-Neres has worked closely with creators throughout his big tech career, receiving plenty of feedback from the creators who were using the actual platforms.
"That feedback, very often, is so hard to bring it up to the decision-makers of a big corporation, let alone implement them," he said.
At a startup, however, Costa-Neres realized he could leverage those years of creator feedback, as well as his expertise and network, to "shape how that company will move forward."
"The key is to join a startup that you really feel connected to, to the product [and] the problem that it's solving for your target audience," Costa-Neres added. "That will carry you through all the doubts."
And while Costa-Neres believes that "every startup has the potential to succeed," it's crucial to "go in knowing that you might not succeed" and consider an exit strategy.
Monica Khan: Meta to Spotter
Monica Khan left her post as a product marketing lead at Meta in April to join Spotter, a financing solution for video creators, as the startup's head of creator community.
Why Khan made the switch:
While at Meta working on the Facebook team, Khan was focused on community partnerships and marketing. But before that, Khan had spent several years working at YouTube. Throughout her career, she's kept her eye on where the industry was going.
"The creator economy blew up in the past two years," Khan told Insider. "As someone on the inside at these big platforms, it was incredible to see how much enterprise was happening."
Khan watched as peers made exits to go to creator-focused startups, including some who Khan looked up to and would never have imagined leaving big tech platforms.
"It's not just where the money's going," Khan said. "Where are the people going?"
Spotter reached out to her just as she was considering her options, Khan said.
"All of a sudden, it just felt like there was a whole industry of buzz and support for creators," Khan said. "I wanted to see if I could have an impact there."
Sean Kim: TikTok to Kajabi
Sean Kim, chief product officer and president at Kajabi.
Sean Kim.
Sean Kim left his role as head of product at TikTok in January to become the chief product officer and president at Kajabi, a platform that helps creators monetize digital courses, newsletters, online coaching, podcasts, and other content.
Why Kim made the switch:
Kim joined TikTok in 2019, heading up product strategy at the company after working on product at Amazon. One of his focus areas at TikTok was building products for creator monetization.
"We've launched things like the Creator Fund," he said. "We launched a video gifting feature, similar to what we have in live gifting, for instance. We launched a tipping feature recently when I was there."
Kim's research on creator monetization at TikTok led him to learn about Kajabi, a creator economy unicorn that raised $550 million last year.
"With Kajabi, I had a chance to come into an earlier stage startup and get really involved with the strategy, and build trust to have a huge impact that could potentially help creators scale their businesses globally," he said.
"I think the demand for online content and information is only going to grow. That's why it's really the perfect time for Kajabi's business, and why I decided to join," he added. "While there are companies out there that provide tools and services for creators, I don't think there's a company out there that provides an all-in-one solution like Kajabi provides."
Read more: TikTok's former head of product is betting on fan monetization as the next big trend as he joins creator economy startup Kajabi
Matt Koval: YouTube to Mighty Networks
Courtesy of Matt Koval
Matt Koval left his position as head creator liaison at YouTube in March to join Mighty Networks, a startup that lets creators make money from courses and online communities.
Why Koval made the switch:
Nearly a decade after Koval went to work at YouTube, he found himself taking a moment to consider his career.
"I felt like I had learned just about everything I could possibly learn at YouTube, both about the platform and its creators, but also from a professional standpoint," he told Insider. "I learned as many skills as I could there."
But when it came to deciding his next move, he wasn't quite sure about a startup.
"Geez, aren't I supposed to be going to TikTok or some other huge platform?" he asked himself. "There's a lot of security in working for these big platform."
"Ten years later though, I'm willing to take some risks again and experience that rough water," he added.
So Koval decided to bid farewell to "big platform life" and joined Mighty Networks as SVP of creators.
"Gina [Bianchini], the CEO, and I really hit it off around our concern around creator longevity," said Koval, who used to be a video creator, himself. "Creators on the big entertainment platforms really feel like they have to just keep running on that content treadmill, on that hamster wheel, to make a living."
Annelies Jansen: Meta to Spring
Courtesy of Spring
Annelies Jansen was the vice president of commerce partnerships at Meta (formerly Facebook) for two years before she joined Spring, a creator merchandise and commerce startup, as president and COO in April.
Why Jansen made the switch:
"Many roads led to Spring," Jansen told Insider in April. "I've always been obsessed with social commerce ."
While at Meta, Jansen said she and her team "fill the store and we enable the store."
Meaning, they would find people to sell their inventory and seek out strategic partners "to help the store run better," she said.
In the process of seeking out commerce partners for Meta, Jansen met Chris Lamontagne, Spring's CEO, and the startup has partnered with Meta in a variety of ways over the past few years.
"I realized, here was a company that was there to do what I believe in — that digital can really unlock potential for individuals," Jansen said. "And in this case, unlock commercial potential as a creator."
"In Spring, I found a company who made the creator economy real to me," she added.
Christen Nino De Guzman: TikTok to Clara
Alexey Reyes
Christen Nino De Guzman was part of TikTok's creator and community partnerships team before she left to launch her own startup, Clara, in January. Clara is a "Glassdoor for creators," where influencers can share rates, post reviews of brand partners, and make profiles.
Why Nino De Guzman made the switch:
"My entire career I've been building creator communities and that's been my whole job," said Nino De Guzman, who has also worked at Instagram and Pinterest.
Having worked in influencer marketing , at big tech platforms, and as a content creator, herself, Nino De Guzman felt "compelled and confident to go and launch something on my own."
"I wanted to create a platform where creators could be discovered by brands for their skills, talent, and content category niches," she said.
She also wanted to build a tool that would let creators share reviews of brands and how much those brands pay in an effort to amplify pay transparency in the influencer industry.
While working closely with creators at platforms like TikTok, "I would see a Hispanic creator getting paid half of what a white creator was being paid and the Hispanic creator would have more followers," Nino De Guzman told Insider in an earlier interview in January.
"It feels like such a turning point and there's so much opportunity," Nino De Guzman said about the creator economy in April. "Why wouldn't you take a chance and pursue something that you know people — creators — need?"
Read more: How an ex-TikTok employee is using the app to market her new startup to potential users and investors
Derek Reynolds: YouTube to Spotter
Derek Reynolds spent over five years at YouTube as its director and global head of business affairs for YouTube Originals. He joined Spotter in May as EVP of business and legal affairs.
Why Reynolds made the switch:
Reynolds spent several years working in the entertainment industry, including for companies like Miramax.
"I wanted to move beyond that traditional media space into the creator economy space," Reynolds told Insider.
He added that he took the amount of capital being invested into the space as a sign to make the leap.
Working at a startup like Spotter also offers him the opportunity for "professional growth," Reynolds said. "I found that I have much more exposure to so many different kinds of legal issues in deals."
Colleen Stauffer: Pinterest to Creative Juice
Colleen Stauffer left her role as global head of creator marketing at Pinterest to join Creative Juice, a fintech creator economy startup, in February.
Why Stauffer made the switch:
During Stauffer's four-year tenure at Pinterest, she played a crucial role in building the platform's marketing team for creator-facing products and initiatives.
But after receiving a message on LinkedIn from Creative Juice, she took a step back and thought about her career.
"I built something from the ground up within Pinterest," Stauffer told Insider. "This is an opportunity to build something truly from the ground up without those training wheels with bigger companies."
While she recognized the risk that accompanies joining a startup, Stauffer said she was comforted by who she would be working with, specifically Creative Juice's CEO and cofounder Sima Gandhi.
"There are not many female CEOs in Silicon Valley," Stauffer said.
Stauffer's decision to leave Pinterest was also swayed by the ebbs and flows of the pandemic, she said. And like many other US workers who were part of the Great Resignation, Stauffer sought out something new.
"I'm just a little bit more of a risk-taker, but I think the pandemic also made me that," she said. "I do think the silver lining of the pandemic is this creator economy."
Ryan Wyatt: YouTube to Polygon Studios
Lens & Soul, LLC.
Ryan Wyatt left his role as global head of gaming at YouTube in February to serve as CEO at Polygon Studios, a division of the NFT and Web3 company Polygon that helps developers build games using blockchain infrastructure.
Why Wyatt made the switch:
Wyatt joined YouTube around eight years ago at the age of 27. He was tasked with building out the platform's gaming vertical, a content category that grew rapidly over the last decade.
As he looked beyond YouTube, he was drawn to the idea of joining a company that was still in its building phase.
"I'm a builder and operator. I'm most excited when I'm doing that," he said. "Companies like YouTube reach a size and scale where you're touching billions of users, and so the building and innovating and operating stuff becomes less of a core focus."
Wyatt said he was drawn to Polygon Studios in particular after becoming an angel investor in Web3 upstarts and seeing demand across the business world for metaverse-style digital products.
"You're seeing more people spend time in these immersive digital worlds," he said. "I got very interested in that as a personal interest of mine."
More: Features BI Graphics Influencers | 2022-06-02T17:07:55Z | www.businessinsider.com | 11 Creator Economy Execs on Why They Left TikTok, YouTube for Startups | https://www.businessinsider.com/creator-economy-execs-explain-great-resignation-tiktok-youtube-to-startups-2022-5 | https://www.businessinsider.com/creator-economy-execs-explain-great-resignation-tiktok-youtube-to-startups-2022-5 |
Elon Musk reportedly told Tesla and SpaceX employees to return to the office or resign on Tuesday.
Twitter was one of the first companies to allow employees to work remotely indefinitely.
A spokesperson told Fast Company Twitter has no plans to change its policy amid Musk's takeover.
Twitter was one of the first major tech companies to declare a work-from-home "forever" policy in 2020, but Elon Musk's stance on remote work could cause yet another shake up at the company.
On Tuesday, the billionaire — who is in the process of buying Twitter — reportedly issued an ultimatum to his employees at Tesla and SpaceX via email: return to the office or resign. The leaked emails were verified by The Washington Post and The New York Times.
The billionaire took a dig at companies that have been more lenient with remote work.
Musk did not respond to a request for comment on whether the policy would eventually apply to Twitter. A Twitter spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider, but told Fast Company that it has no plans to change its policy.
"Our priority is for employees to work wherever they feel most productive and creative," the spokesperson said.
Twitter might not have a choice if Musk completes his purchase of the social-media company.
Musk's stance on remote work runs counter to that of Twitter founder Jack Dorsey, who is friends with the Tesla CEO. The former Twitter CEO has been known for his bohemian lifestyle. Dorsey has said he found inspiration for work in Africa and Myanmar, as well as the company's headquarters in San Francisco.
When Twitter initially announced that it would allow employees to work-from-home indefinitely, Dorsey sent a companywide email with the subject line "#lovewhereyouwork."
"We're serious about a distributed workforce, and we've proved we can make it work," he wrote.
Even before the COVID-19 outbreak, Dorsey had voiced plans to encourage a "distributed workforce."
"I don't fear any slowness as we work to distribute our workforce now, and I do think we have to build a company that's not entirely dependent on San Francisco," Dorsey said during an earnings call in February. "As we look forward, we're reaching a talent pool that expects a lot more remote work … We should be building our company around that. I haven't made any plans just yet for this year, but I do expect that I will travel."
Twitter is one of several tech companies who are seeking to diversify their talent through remote-work policies. In May, Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky said the office was "from a pre-digital age" after the company announced that employees could work from home forever. Other companies like Apple and Microsoft have been forced to modify return to work policies amid pushback from employees.
Remote working opportunities have become a key benefit amid the great resignation. Last year, a Harris Poll found that 62% of Americans said they would take lower pay in exchange for the ability to work-from-home forever. Insider's Isobel Asher Hamilton reported that three economists said remote work had little impact on workers' ability to get stuff done and may even increase productivity.
Musk's opinion on remote work could become yet another hurdle in his relationship with Twitter employees. In a regulatory filing last month, Twitter warned that the purchase could affect the company's ability to attract and retain employees.
On Wednesday, Bloomberg reported that news of Musk's $44 billion purchase had sparked negative feedback from many workers — with some questioning how Musk might change the company's culture. Last month, Musk said "work ethic expectations would be extreme" for Twitter employees.
Work From Home Economy | 2022-06-02T17:08:01Z | www.businessinsider.com | Musk's in-Office Ultimatum Could Disrupt Twitter's Remote Work Plan | https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-return-office-ultimatum-could-disrupt-twitter-remote-work-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-return-office-ultimatum-could-disrupt-twitter-remote-work-2022-6 |
3 easy ways to recession-proof your career right now
Reach out to your network now before you have to.
Eileen Smith coaches executives in public speaking, executive presence, and career achievement.
As the economy shows signs of a possible recession, she says now's the time to bolster your career.
Her suggestions include tapping into your network, reframing your skills, and trying a side hustle.
Employees have enjoyed a seller's market for the past two years, in which they've been able to demand more flexibility and better pay and enjoy the confidence of knowing they can find a new job at any time.
But a recent downturn in the economy could change all that and put an end to The Great Resignation. Rising prices, falling stocks, and the global supply chain crisis may well be pointing us toward a recession — and with it, layoffs, hiring freezes, and budget cuts.
Instead of sitting back and waiting for the economy to impact your employment status, you can recession-proof your career by activating your network, doubling down on your skills, and considering a side hustle.
Activate your network
There are few things in your professional life that are more painful than calling up someone you haven't spoken to in years and asking if they know of any job leads for you, so don't let it get to that point: Start now, when you aren't looking for or in need of a job.
"No one likes to be hit up by a desperate job seeker, but everyone likes to help their friend get a foot in the door," Ashley Quinto Powell, a self-advocacy expert, author, and startup founder, told Insider.
Start catching up with old friends and colleagues now. If you haven't been working long enough to have old colleagues, reach out to people you look up to outside your immediate organization. It can be flattering when you ask someone about their career path and what's inspired them along the way. Lunch, coffee, dinner, drinks, or even an easy Zoom chat or phone call — with no ask — can make all the difference down the road.
And don't drop that ball after you've caught up. Keep the relationship fresh by checking in over email or text every couple of months, Powell said. "If you have two to three networking 'dates' a week, at the end of a year, you'll have fostered relationships with more than 100 people who can help when you need it," she added.
Double down on your skills
Now is a great time to use your flexibility to learn a new skill that will make you better at your job or earn a certification, such as in project management or computer networking, that recognizes skills you already have or will make you stand out. Taking classes in person can help you build your network with people in your field, but learning online can be an easier way to fit training into your lifestyle.
You should also learn how to better market your current skills. "Recession-proofing your career is more about packaging your existing skills to meet shifting market demands. For many people, what they really need is a new story about the skills they already have," Chris Donohoe, a career coach and host of the "Career Lab Podcast," told Insider.
If your work function is an expense for your organization, like HR, rather than a revenue generator, like sales, reframe how you explain your skills. For example, rather than saying you do internal corporate communications, repackage your description as someone who supports large organizations through strategic business transformation. This can speak to the heart of the challenge for a company downsizing in a recession.
Similarly, a teacher can describe themselves as someone who teaches students and grades homework, or they can reframe what they do in business terms. The same teacher leads and motivates a goal-oriented group of 25 people, sets metrics, provides guidance to meet those metrics, identifies performance gaps, and modifies their approach for continuous improvement.
Consider starting a side hustle
During a recession, freelancers are more appealing to employers because they don't have to commit to full-time employment, and they don't have to pay for benefits. This can be a boon to an independent worker who's built up a diverse client base.
You can start your side business right now by identifying what parts of your skill set you can do on your own, such as a graphic designer creating logos or a marketer managing websites. You can build your income and your options while you have a steady job. "Big data shows that you can reliably make more than you did in your full-time employment — and do so in less than six months of starting your independent consultancy," Sam Lee, the founder and CEO of IndeCollective, a modern MBA-style program for independent consultancies, told Insider.
If you're going to start moonlighting, be sure to follow the rules your company has in place about activities you can undertake during company time and on company equipment. Your current employer may well be your first big client if you decide to take your side hustle full time, so make sure you stay on good terms.
Eileen Smith, a former diplomat and founder of Spokesmith, is on a mission to help you and your organization show up at your best. She coaches business executives and policy experts in public speaking, executive presence, and career achievement. Find her tips at spokesmith.com.
More: BI-freelancer Recession Careers | 2022-06-02T17:08:07Z | www.businessinsider.com | 3 Easy Ways to Recession-Proof Your Career Right Now | https://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-recession-proof-career-job-side-hustle-networking-skills | https://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-recession-proof-career-job-side-hustle-networking-skills |
Lawyers for Doug Mastriano turned over documents to the House's January 6 committee.
Mastriano, a state senator, is the Republican nominee for governor in Pennsylvania.
Mastriano charted buses to the January 6 rally and was outside the Capitol on January 6, 2021.
Doug Mastriano, the Republican nominee for governor in Pennsylvania who attended the January 6, 2021 protest outside the Capitol, has provided documents to the House committee investigating the attack in response to a subpoena.
Lawyers representing Mastriano turned over documents to the January 6 committee that detailed Mastriano's payments for charter buses to the Capitol on January 6, POLITICO first reported.
Mastriano, who is currently a state senator, was subpoenaed by the committee in February.
The cache of documents contains receipts for charter buses and social media posts, POLITICO reported.
Pennsylvania outlet WHYY reported that Mastriano's state senate campaign committee had paid $3,354 to Wolf's Bus Lines to charter buses to the January 6, 2021 Stop the Steal Rally. Mastriano advertised tickets on the charter buses on Facebook in the days before the riot.
The documents Mastriano's lawyers provided to the committee verified these payments, POLITICO reported.
Mastriano's lawyers and a spokesperson for the House select committee investigating January 6 did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.
"Sen. Mastriano has nothing to hide and has provided all responsive documents and will be sitting for a voluntary interview as the committee has agreed to forego a formal deposition for him," Tim Parlatore, the lawyer who submitted the documents on behalf of Mastriano, told POLITICO.
Mastriano has been open about his attendance at the pro-Trump rally on January 6, and multiple social media posts place him at the event.
The protests began outside the White House, where Trump gave a speech to his supporters before they began marching to the Capitol building.
The ensuing riot outside the Capitol quickly turned violent as hundreds of supporters of Donald Trump forced their way into the building to try and stop Congress from certifying the election results for Joe Biden. The rioters' assault on the Capitol caused at least $30 million in damages to the building and left hundreds of Capitol Police officers injured.
Mastriano spread conspiracy theories in the days after the 2020 election. After Biden won Pennsylvania, Mastriano called for the state legislature to appoint electors that would defy the will of the voters and deliver Pennsylvania's electoral votes to Trump, which they could not do.
Trump intervened in the Pennsylvania Republican gubernatorial primary at the 11th hour, endorsing Mastriano over his opponents. Mastriano outstripped his competitors, earning 43% of the primary vote.
"There is no one in Pennsylvania who has done more, or fought harder, for Election Integrity than State Senator Doug Mastriano," Trump said in a statement.
More: doug mastriano january 6 January 6 committee Donald Trump | 2022-06-02T17:08:25Z | www.businessinsider.com | PA Gubernatorial Candidate Doug Mastriano Sends Documents to January 6 Committee | https://www.businessinsider.com/pennsylvania-governor-republican-doug-mastriano-january-6-committee-trump-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/pennsylvania-governor-republican-doug-mastriano-january-6-committee-trump-2022-6 |
Amex Gold cardholders can use their monthly dining credit at Milk Bar bakery.
Ellen Hoffman / Insider
The American Express® Gold Card offers a dining credit worth up to $10 per month at eligible restaurants and merchants.
Amex has added three new participating partners: Milk Bar, Wine.com, and Goldbelly.
If you already shop with these retailers, you could save a bit of cash — but you won't find items for under $10.
Read Insider's guide to the best American Express cards.
Premium credit cards that charge high annual fees often come with benefits, such as statement credits or travel perks, that can help justify their yearly cost. At times, it's hard to pin a dollar value on these extras when you're evaluating whether or not a card's annual fee is worth paying.
The Amex Gold Card makes this calculation simple because its $250 annual fee (See Rates) is easily offset by two key benefits:
Up to $120 per year (up to $10 per month) in Uber Cash (this is only applicable to U.S. Eats orders and Rides, and the Gold Card needs to be added to the Uber app to receive the Uber Cash benefit)
Up to $120 per year in dining credits** (up to $10 per month), which you can use at Grubhub, Seamless, The Cheesecake Factory, Ruth's Chris Steak House (through August 1, 2022), Boxed (through August 1, 2022), and participating Shake Shack locations (enrollment required)
Now, Amex has added three more merchants to the dining credit list: Milk Bar, Wine.com, and Goldbelly. However, two retailers — Boxed and Ruth's Chris Steak House — will no longer qualify for the credit effective August 2, 2022.
While having more options for using card benefits is a good thing, these new partners aren't as broadly useful as some of the existing retailers that are eligible for the credit.
Amex Gold adds 3 new dining credit partners
16.74%-23.74% variable
Great rewards for dining and for shopping at US supermarkets
Monthly statement credit for eligible dining purchases recoups some of the annual fee
Underwhelming welcome bonus
Earn 60,000 Membership Rewards® Points after you spend $4,000 on eligible purchases with your new Card within the first 6 months of Card Membership.
Earn 4X Membership Rewards® Points at Restaurants, plus takeout and delivery in the U.S., and earn 4X Membership Rewards® Points at U.S. supermarkets (on up to $25,000 per calendar year in purchases, then 1X).
$120 Uber Cash on Gold: Add your Gold Card to your Uber account and each month automatically get $10 in Uber Cash for Uber Eats orders or Uber rides in the U.S., totaling up to $120 per year.
Updated $120 Dining Credit: Satisfy your cravings and earn up to $10 in statement credits monthly when you pay with the American Express® Gold Card at Grubhub, The Cheesecake Factory, Goldbelly, Wine.com, Milk Bar and select Shake Shack locations. Enrollment required.
Choose the color that suits your style. Gold or Rose Gold.
Annual Fee is $250.
Milk Bar, Wine.com, and Goldbelly are (mostly) online merchants that sell products on the pricier side. So these additions may not be terribly practical if you're looking to maximize the Amex Gold Card dining credit by making purchases close to the $10 mark each month.
However, if you regularly order from these sites anyway, this news could help you save a bit of cash. Here's what to know about the new Amex Gold Card dining credit partners if, like me, you've never ordered from them before.
Milk Bar is a trendy bakery chain with over a dozen shops, mostly in New York City, plus single locations in Los Angeles, Boston, Las Vegas, Toronto, and Washington, DC. You can also order Milk Bar cakes, cookies, pies, and even ice cream online at milkbarstore.com.
Prices here range from $32 for a gift box of cake truffles to $140 for a 10-inch gluten-free birthday cake.
According to its website, Wine.com is the world's largest wine store, offering wines by the bottle, in gift sets, or through a subscription service. Before you order, be sure to check out online reviews — many are quite negative with reports of inflated pricing and poor customer service.
The Better Business Bureau (BBB) gives Wine.com a D- rating, with an average customer review of one star (out of five).
Gourmet food and gift retailer Goldbelly sells fancy treats, regional specialties, and iconic dishes from well-known restaurants all over the country. From lobster rolls to macarons to in-season produce, you'll find all things foodie on this website.
These delectable goodies don't come cheap, though. For instance, right now you can order a gift box of 13 Georgia peaches for about $60 before tax. Here's Insider's Goldbelly review to find out if it's worth splurging.
How does the Amex Gold dining credit work?
Once you've enrolled in the Amex Gold Card dining credit (more on that below), you'll receive up to a $10 statement credit after you make a purchase at any of the participating partners. Amex says it can take up to eight weeks for the credit to appear on your account, although in practice it typically only takes a few days.
These credits don't roll over, so if you don't use the full $10 credit each month, you'll lose it. Keep in mind Amex's terms and conditions say you can't use the dining credit for gift cards, so if you had those purchases in mind as a way of accumulating credits to use all at once, you're out of luck.
How to register for the Amex Gold dining credit
If you haven't yet taken advantage of your Amex Gold Card dining credit, you'll have to enroll your card first. It's easy enough to do — just sign in to your American Express account online and navigate to the "Benefits" menu for your card.
You'll see the enrollment link with the title "$120 Dining Credit" near the top of the benefits page. Alternately, you can enroll by calling the number on the back of your card.
You can learn more about all of the card's benefits and how to make the most of your rewards in our full Amex Gold review.
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More: Personal Finance Insider Credit Cards Credit card news American Express | 2022-06-02T17:08:31Z | www.businessinsider.com | Amex Gold Card Adds 3 New Monthly Dining Credit Merchants | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/amex-gold-card-dining-credit-milk-bar-wine-goldbelly-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/amex-gold-card-dining-credit-milk-bar-wine-goldbelly-2022-6 |
A new wave of tech layoffs brings the year's total to over 21,000 people affected, according to online layoffs-tracker Layoffs.FYI.
Talent experts say there are a few ways for companies to soften the blow for affected workers.
Insider spoke to 11 talent partners at top-tier venture-capital firms to get their recommendations.
Enable employees to keep their laptops.
A woman smiles while looking at her laptop computer.
Many companies are allowing laid-off employees to keep their company-issued laptop, realizing that it will do a lot more good for the employees than it will sitting in an office closet, said Susan Alban, chief people officer at Renegade Partners. Airbnb did this publicly in 2020.
Workers can use their computer to find their next job, and the company avoids the logistical hassle of collecting devices. Besides, if the computer is more than 18 months old, most companies will not issue it to a new employee and instead buy them a new one, Alban said.
Companies will want to wipe data remotely, added Jackie Xu, a talent partner at Kleiner Perkins.
Share a spreadsheet of affected workers.
Workers are quitting or switching jobs in droves, leaving CEOs scrambling for top talent.
Spreadsheets of dismissed workers, also known as "opt-in lists" because employees add their details voluntarily, took off early on in the pandemic as startups slashed their workforces and tried to help employees find new jobs. The lists are back as a new wave of layoffs sweeps tech, with companies like Peloton, Bolt, and Klarna sharing their spreadsheets far and wide.
Such lists compile people's contact information, function, job level, and location, and make it hassle-free to share with a company's network, said Saydeah Howard, chief talent officer at IVP.
"It's much easier if the company takes the time to organize it and share it," she said, "so that people know they were impacted by something beyond their control and wasn't performance-related."
Work with your investors.
A stock photo shows a job interview taking place in an office.
vgajic/Getty Images
Investors have a bird's eye view of companies that are hiring across the firm's portfolio. So founders should share those spreadsheets of dismissed workers with their investors for more visibility, said Stephanie Manning, an operating partner at Lerer Hippeau. She helps the firm maintain a job website and a candidate-tracking tool that has placed thousands of people at portfolio companies.
Beth Scheer, head of talent at Homebrew, tells founders to leverage the talent partners at the venture firms that backed them. They can serve as an "employee concierge," she said, helping with job searches and intros.
Start a company alumni group.
Employees can share job listings, give resume reviews, or simply commiserate on a private messaging group for company alumni, says Melissa Taunton, a talent partner at NEA.
Provide a document that answers common questions.
To rebound against having consecutive bad days, focus on progress rather than perfection.
Atli Thorkelsson, director of talent network at Redpoint Ventures, tells companies to provide laid-off workers with a written document that answers logistical questions, such as when healthcare benefits run out, what equipment they're expected to return, and severance details.
"Being laid off can be distressing and disorienting," he said, "so having something they can refer back to if they forgot to ask a question or forgot your answer can be comforting."
Waive the one-year cliff on their vesting schedule.
A woman climbs a steep cliff.
Employees should be able to reap the fruits of their labor through stock options. Traditionally, they can't purchase their shares until a year after their employment started, when the options become available to buy — or "vest" in startup-speak. So employees who get laid off before their work-anniversary are forced to leave those options on the table, said Renegade's Alban.
"This means that employees are missing out on value that they helped create," she said.
She suggests companies waive the one-year "cliff" in the event of layoffs.
This has one downside. If the outgoing employees vest their shares, it shrinks the pool of available shares for distributing to future investors and hires. And some employees might find it unfair if the company moves up the vesting schedule for only departing employees.
"I'd be cautious about equity acceleration," said Katie Hughes, an executive talent partner at the firm General Catalyst, adding, "while this turnover is regrettable you have to be mindful of the cost to your overall pool and think about the long-term impacts to all shareholders."
Extend the window to exercise options.
At home workout equipment can overwhelm a small space.
The drawback of speeding up an employee's vesting schedule is that it can dilute shareholders. Instead, companies can extend the window to purchase or "exercise" their stock options from the traditional 90 days to a year or longer, said Hughes, the General Catalyst talent partner.
Lengthening the exercise window only applies to employees with vested stock options, so the company won't deplete the pool of total shares nearly as much as if it accelerated vesting.
In 2020, scooter startup Bird cut almost a third of its workforce and gave those employees an extended time frame of 12 months to exercise their stock options, Insider previously reported.
Matt Hoffman, head of talent at the firm M13, added: "It's often hard for laid-off employees to come up with cash to purchase options (not to mention the additional tax implications) right when they are losing their primary source of income, so this gives them more time to do so."
Maintain healthcare benefits.
30-year-old Ivonn Cruz getting a dose of COVID-19 vaccine at the First African Methodist Episcopal Church (FAME) in Los Angeles on January 29, 2022.
For laid-off workers, one of their biggest concerns is access to healthcare benefits, said Lauren Illovsky, a talent partner at the firm CapitalG, a firm backed by Google parent company Alphabet. Employers can soften the blow of layoffs by extending benefits. A good rule of thumb is to cover the cost of premiums for healthcare benefits or Cobra insurance for at least the time of the severance — so, one month of healthcare for every month of severance pay, Illovsky said.
An easy way to extend benefits is to set the formal layoff date for early in the month, so that health coverage continues through the end of that month, said Redpoint's Thorkelsson.
After it laid off hundreds of employees in April, the weight-loss app Noom told staff it would subsidize their premiums for Cobra insurance for two months, according to a memo seen by Insider. Noom also offered its employees 8 weeks of severance pay.
Spin up a financial wellness benefit.
David Sacks/Getty
No longer a fringe benefit, a financial wellness program is one of the trending perks that give employees access to advisors to help them manage their finances. Services like Northstar, Learnlux, and Brightside are traditionally offered to all employees as a benefit, said Matt Hoffman, head of talent at M13. Companies should continue the benefit for laid-off workers.
"Losing a job can be one of the most traumatic and financially stressful periods in a person's life," said Hoffman, a Northstar investor. "Having access to a certified advisor can make a big difference in planning out next steps and being able to manage the transition to a new role."
These methods can help companies soften the blow of layoffs, but "there is nothing that really truly takes the sting away for affected employees," said CapitalG's Illovsky.
The best thing companies can do is treat their workers with kindness, talent partners say.
"Where possible, allow affected employees to handle their departure on their own terms — do they want to pack up immediately and walk out, come back on the weekend and clear out their things then, or take two weeks to say their goodbyes and hand off critical work?" said Redpoint's Thorkelsson.
"If you are doing layoffs, make them deep and early — nothing is worse than the wait and multiple layoffs is a big demoralizer. Also, companies who believe the won't need to do layoffs should communicate that too!" said NEA's Taunton.
"Our guidance around RIFs [reductions in force] is to treat those affected kindly. The impacted employees are individuals and not just a line item on a spreadsheet," said Kleiner's Xu.
Talent partners | 2022-06-02T17:09:07Z | www.businessinsider.com | Layoffs Are Sweeping Tech. How to Help Employees Who Get Laid Off | https://www.businessinsider.com/tech-layoffs-how-to-help-employees-laid-off-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/tech-layoffs-how-to-help-employees-laid-off-2022-6 |
A top AstraZeneca exec shares the $200 billion pharma giant's gene-editing ambitions and the timeline to starting human testing
The British pharma giant AstraZeneca has quietly been working on gene-editing research over the past few years.
The $200 billion pharma giant AstraZeneca has been quietly ramping up its gene-editing research.
The drugmaker has been developing its own advanced technology to repair genes.
Steve Rees, AstraZeneca's research leader, said he hoped to test it in people within two years.
One of the world's biggest drug companies is quietly ramping up research in one of the hottest areas of biotech, and it aims to start human testing soon.
A team of 25 scientists has been researching gene-editing tools over the past few years at AstraZeneca, and the $200 billion British pharma giant is now beginning to develop therapies based on their work. The company plans to start clinical trials and begin testing the treatments in people within two years, said Steve Rees, AstraZeneca's vice president of discovery biology.
"Our aspiration is to treat rare diseases for which there is currently no treatment in the marketplace with what could be a curative therapy through typically repairing the gene," Rees said in an interview with Insider.
Steve Rees, AstraZeneca's vice president of discovery biology.
While other major pharma companies, such as Pfizer, Bayer, and Regeneron, have partnered with smaller biotechs that specialize in gene-editing, AstraZeneca is betting that its own inventions, which it says boost the efficiency and versatility of gene-editing, can separate it from the pack.
AstraZeneca is mainly known for its lucrative oncology business, which brought in more than $13 billion last year, led by cancer drugs such as Tagrisso and Lynparza. Entering gene editing over the next few years would push the pharma giant into a new research focus beyond traditional drug technologies.
If AstraZeneca's technology is successful, it could open up cures for new diseases that can't be tackled by other CRISPR approaches. A company blog post mentions cystic fibrosis as one potential example.
Rees declined to say what diseases the company was focused on or what particular technology AstraZeneca's first programs would use.
AstraZeneca plans to improve on CRISPR technologies
The gene-editing technology CRISPR was first discovered in 2012. CRISPR holds the potential to be a quick, powerful tool to edit genes by acting like molecular scissors.
AstraZeneca began looking into CRISPR in 2013. It signed multiple research deals in 2015 to investigate CRISPR's use as a way to see if specific genes would make good targets for drugs.
But it wasn't until 2018 that the AstraZeneca team's CRISPR plans grew. The scientists published research with J. Keith Joung, a professor at Harvard Medical School and gene-editing pioneer, showing that CRISPR could be used inside the body of mice without causing unintended changes to the genetic code, addressing a critical safety unknown. That work created a system to identify these unwanted edits and built confidence inside AstraZeneca that the technology was perhaps ready for human testing.
"Since this publication, we started to consider it not only a research tool but also a possible therapeutic agent," Marcello Maresca, AstraZeneca's senior director of genome engineering, told Insider.
Since then, clinical results in a range of diseases have solidified CRISPR's promise across the biopharma industry. A gene-editing program for sickle cell disease developed by Vertex and CRISPR Therapeutics is aiming to apply for FDA approval before the end of 2022. Early human data published last summer by Intellia Therapeutics and Regeneron showed the first instance of CRISPR being delivered inside the body and effectively knocking out the target gene.
Yet, for all the excitement, the original CRISPR system, called CRISPR-Cas9, has major limitations. It's best at knocking out problematic genes rather than correcting genetic code.
"There are relatively few diseases that can be treated through deleting a gene," Rees said. "In most cases, you need to either repair or replace the gene."
That's spurred next-generation editing tools, such as base editing, which can change a single letter of genetic code, and prime editing, which can write and edit longer stretches of letters.
Marcello Maresca, AstraZeneca's senior director of genome engineering.
AstraZeneca's genome-editing research unit has developed its own fixes, including a new system called prime insertion, which shows higher efficacy compared to competing techniques, said research published in March in Nature Communications.
Unlike competitors, the pharma giant is going into CRISPR solo
AstraZeneca could become the first major pharmaceutical to independently embark on gene editing.
Other large drugmakers have partnered their way in. Pfizer paid $300 million up front in January to work with Beam on base-editing therapeutics. Regeneron and Vertex Pharmaceuticals have respectively partnered with Intellia and CRISPR Therapeutics on other gene-editing programs.
Beyond the prime-insertion program, Maresca's team has been working on other gene-editing ideas that have yet to be published.
"There are other things that we're doing which we haven't yet published, which we believe will underpin our first programs," Rees said, without detailing them.
What Rees did say was these programs would feature AstraZeneca's own innovations and try to deliver CRISPR inside the body to edit cells in the liver.
As these programs near the clinic, patent questions will likely come up. CRISPR has become a notoriously litigious space. Rees said AstraZeneca would seek to secure licenses to appropriate IP as the need arose.
More: Healthcare Pharmaceutical gene editing
base editing
prime editing | 2022-06-02T18:35:03Z | www.businessinsider.com | AstraZeneca's Gene-Editing Research on CRISPR Prime Editing | https://www.businessinsider.com/astrazeneca-gene-editing-research-on-crispr-prime-editing-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/astrazeneca-gene-editing-research-on-crispr-prime-editing-2022-6 |
An exec at a $150 million crypto hedge fund breaks down the 'most overlooked' investment opportunity in digital assets amidst a market downturn
Carlos Betancourt is a founding principal of BKCoin Capital LP.
BKCoin Capital LP
Crypto hedge fund BKCoin Capital is changing its strategy to attract institutional investors.
The firm recently tapped former Coinbase executive Paul Magahis to lead the transition.
Co-founder Carlos Betancourt shares what he thinks will kick the crypto market back into gear.
Crypto hedge fund BKCoin Capital is readying itself to add more institutional investors to its Rolodex of clients.
The $150 million Miami-based hedge fund is moving from a market-neutral investment approach to a multi-strategy one to accommodate institutional investor clients like pension funds, endowments, foundations, and sovereign wealth funds.
BKCoin Capital co-founder Carlos Betancourt told Insider that when investing in digital assets, investors are now looking for capacity and diversification across sub-strategies, asset classes, and trading timeframes.
"It also means that new alpha-generating strategies, such as options trading, can be added to the strategy mix, and ones suffering from alpha decay — due to the flood of new entrants into crypto — can be removed on an ongoing basis," said Betancourt.
The 15-person firm recently tapped Paul Magahis, former head of capital strategy at Coinbase, as president to help build relationships with institutional allocations.
The company's evolution comes amid a massive Bitcoin and cryptocurrency meltdown. In May, cryptocurrencies tanked to some of their lowest levels since 2020, wiping out roughly $1 trillion worth of value. Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, is down more than 50% from its all-time high of $69,000 seen in November 2021 and down 35.4% year to date.
For its part, BKCoin is up 5.8% year to date through April, according to a spokesperson for the firm.
Betancourt, who previously founded physical commodities brokerage Yorkville Commodities, thinks there are two factors that could catalyze the crypto markets: China opening back up after lockdowns and a resolution between Russia and Ukraine.
Cities and towns across China shut down in April as another spike in Covid ravaged the country, which dampened its workforce and has closed shipping ports.
"China is especially important for crypto, not just because the populace is more used to cryptocurrencies than North Americans, but because crypto is now a fully-fledged asset class and under some regimes, we tend to be heavily correlated to traditional markets," he said.
"In other words, if all asset classes are experiencing fear, uncertainty, and doubt it will likely continue to spill over to and impact crypto markets."
Opportunities in the nascent crypto derivatives market
Despite the enormous dip, Betancourt and his team are identifying opportunities in the options market, which Betancourt believes is "one of the most overlooked areas in crypto."
Deribit, one of the most established crypto options and futures exchanges is maturing, after offering Bitcoin and Ethereum options in the last few years, he said. As they continue to add new offerings, including more trading pairs, a term for assets that can be traded for each other on an exchange, Betancourt said there will be alpha opportunities for traders that have the proper strategies and infrastructure in place.
Deribit is also increasingly facing competition from exchanges like Bit.com, Delta Exchange, and CrossTower, which are starting to offer similar products.
"The moment new exchanges list their own options pairs they will likely not be priced exactly as they are on Deribit, which will provide interesting arbitrage opportunities," Betancourt said.
While mainstream investors — both institutional and retail — have been warming up to cryptocurrencies, one roadblock to the industry maturing further is the lack of regulation in the US. Last week Securities and Exchange Commissioner Hester Pierce said the US has dropped the ball on regulating crypto.
"There's a lot of fraud in this space because it's the hot area of the moment," she told CNBC at a Blockchain Summit.
The Federal Trade Commission received nearly 6,800 complaints of cryptocurrency investment scams from October 2020 through March 2021, up from 570 in the same period a year prior, according to FTC data.
"We can go after fraud and we can play a more positive role on the innovation side, but we have to get to it, we've got to get working," said Peirce at the conference.
Betancourt agrees that the industry is not doing enough to regulate the digital asset space.
"I think the biggest issue with the regulators is that they just don't have enough human capital and resources to keep up with the innovation that a space like crypto is having," he said.
Still, he fully expects "crypto to be here for the long haul." | 2022-06-02T18:35:15Z | www.businessinsider.com | How BKCoin Is Switching up Its Strategy to Win Over Big Investors | https://www.businessinsider.com/crypto-hedge-fund-bkcoin-capital-changing-strategy-investors-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/crypto-hedge-fund-bkcoin-capital-changing-strategy-investors-2022-6 |
15 banks and credit unions that accept cash deposits
How to deposit cash at an online bank or credit union
How to deposit cash at an ATM
How to deposit cash at a store
Additional tips for choosing an online bank
14 online banks and credit unions that allow you to deposit cash easily at an ATM or store
You may have to pay a fee to deposit cash at some online banks.
RgStudio/Getty Images
Online banks usually don't have branches, so there may be limited ways to deposit money.
Some online financial institutions allow you to deposit cash directly into your bank account.
You may be required to pay a fee for cash deposits.
Online banks are well-known for high-yield bank accounts and low bank fees. But for easily depositing cash? Not so much.
If you're looking for an online bank or credit union that allows you to deposit cash directly into your account, we compiled a list of institutions you may want to consider exploring. We'll walk you through the steps of depositing cash, and go over tips on how to choose an online financial institution.
Here's a list of banks and credit unions featured in our best guides that allow you to deposit cash at in-network ATMs.
Alliant: Some Alliant ATMs accept cash deposits. You won't have to pay a fee for the transaction.
Axos: You may deposit cash by visiting Green Dot locations like ACE Cash Express, CVS/Pharmacy, Dollar General, Kmart, Rite Aid, 7-Eleven, or a Walgreens store. You may have to pay a fee for the deposit.
Bethpage: Bethpage is a part of the CO-OP Shared Branch and ATM network. You can make deposits at credit unions with a CU Service Center Logo for free.
Capital One 360: Capital One 360 has several ways of depositing cash. You can visit a nearby CVS/Pharmacy and ask a cashier to help you deposit cash into your bank account using the bank's mobile app. Capital One ATMs also accept cash deposits.
Charles Schwab: Charles Schwab offers unlimited refunds for ATM fees since it doesn't have an ATM network. You may use any ATM that accepts cash deposits, and you'll be reimbursed if you are charged by the ATM provider.
Chime: Chime lets you deposit cash at Walgreens without paying a fee. You may also make cash deposits at Green Dot locations but there may be a fee.
CIBC Bank: CIBC has ATMs that accept cash deposits. There isn't a fee involved.
Consumers: Consumers is s a part of the CO-OP Shared Branch and ATM network. You can make deposits at credit unions with a CU Service Center Logo for free.
HSBC Direct: You may deposit cash at certain bank ATMs. There isn't a fee involved.
LendingClub: LendingClub lets you deposit cash at some MoneyPass and NYCE ATMs. You may have to pay a fee initially, but LendingClub will reimburse you any ATM fees once per month.
NBKC: NBKC is part of the MoneyPass ATM network. You may deposit cash at select ATMs. NBKC also reimburses up to $12 in out-of-network ATM fees per month.
Pentagon Federal Credit Union: PenFed permits surcharge-free cash deposits at over 1,200 Allpoint ATMs.
USAA: USAA has ATMs that accept cash deposits. There isn't a fee involved.
Wings Financial: Select Wings Financial ATMs accept deposits. You won't have to pay a fee for depositing money.
When choosing an online financial institution, you may want to review how you can deposit money into a bank account.
Some online banks and credit unions won't allow you to deposit cash directly into your account. Instead, you'll have to deposit cash in a roundabout way. You'll deposit cash into an external bank account. Then, you'll initiate a transfer from your external bank account to your online bank account.
The online financial institutions included in our list offer more direct ways to deposit cash. You may deposit cash at select ATMs or stores. Here are quick step-by-step guides on how to deposit cash at these locations.
First, visit your bank's website to confirm which ATM accepts cash deposits. Some financial institutions offer a limited number of ATMs with this feature, so you'll have to use your bank's location search tool to find a nearby ATM you can use.
Once you've arrived at the ATM location, insert your debit card to initiate access to your bank account. After putting in your PIN, you'll be asked which type of transaction you'd like to perform. You'll select the option Deposit, and insert cash into the ATM. The ATM will ask you to verify the amount of cash deposited, and you'll complete the transaction.
Financial institutions will provide a list of retailer locations you may visit to deposit money.
You'll go up to the cashier at an eligible store and ask them to load cash onto your online bank's debit card. The cashier will process the transaction by swiping your card, and you'll have money deposited into your bank account through your bank's debit card.
If you bank with Capital One, you can also ask the cashier at CVS/Pharmacy to help you add cash to your bank account. You'll log into your bank's mobile app and use the "Add Cash in Store" feature to process the transaction.
Quick tip: You may be asked to pay a fee of up to $4.95 per transaction if you're visiting a Green Dot location.
Additional tips for choosing an online financial institution
Alvin Carlos, CFA, CFP®, financial planner and managing director of District Capital Management, shares that he's had clients who are hesitant to deposit money into an online bank because they don't trust banks.
"It's fair. It's fear of the unknown. They haven't done that before. They don't know anyone who's used that thing. The myth is online banks are not safe, or through online banks, you won't be able to have access to money," says Carlos.
If you're unsure whether a bank is safe, Carlos suggests checking if the bank is FDIC insured.
"If they are a legit bank, then it's most likely FDIC insured," says Carlos. "If they really want to be diligent, you can actually go to the FDIC website and look up the bank."
Carlos also advises people to see if there are limits on how much money you can transfer out of an online bank or how much you can withdraw from an ATM per day. This may be helpful insight if you frequently make transactions or expect to make big purchases.
PERSONAL FINANCE 24 banks and credit unions with live chat customer service
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USAA Bank | 2022-06-02T18:35:45Z | www.businessinsider.com | 14 Online Banks & Credit Unions That Accept Cash Deposits | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/online-banks-that-accept-cash-deposits | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/online-banks-that-accept-cash-deposits |
Cannabis startup Eaze quietly laid off as many as 25 employees as pressure mounts for the once high-flying company
Kylie Robison and Jeremy Berke
Cannabis startup Eaze laid off 25 employees on Wednesday.
Eaze
Eaze quietly laid off as many as 25 employees on Wednesday.
The layoffs include members of its engineering and live operations team.
Eaze didn't respond to requests for comment.
Cannabis tech startup Eaze quietly laid off as many as 25 employees, Insider has learned.
The layoffs took place on Wednesday, and the cuts included members of Eaze's engineering team and live operations team, which handles its delivery service. Two former employees described the job cuts to Insider. They asked not to be identified to preserve relationships and protect future job opportunities in the industry.
Eaze didn't respond to requests for comment sent to its press line and to an outside PR firm.
Eaze began as a cannabis delivery service in the Bay Area and has weathered a few tumultuous years of executive churn, layoffs, and business pivots.
The latest layoffs come after a round of job cuts in February which affected members of Eaze's communications team among others, according to a person familiar with the matter. The company laid off 36 employees in 2019.
In August of last year, the startup — once a darling of the young cannabis industry — acquired Green Dragon, a chain of cannabis dispensaries with storefronts in Colorado and Florida, in an all-stock deal. The acquisition was an effort to pivot into selling cannabis itself rather than just delivering it, as Insider has reported.
In 2020, Eaze shifted to running its own dispensaries, rather than partnering with other companies, Insider previously reported. The company was forced to pare back expectations that it would sell over $1 billion worth of cannabis that year as well.
Eaze's struggles aren't unusual in the broader tech industry. During the earlier part of the pandemic, the US technology industry boomed. Firms like Amazon and Apple reached record-breaking market caps, while private companies received large funding injections from venture capital firms loaded with cash. But now, an ugly downturn has hit the industry with layoffs brewing.
Eaze CEO Rogelio Choy told Insider in August that the company was looking to raise a $75 million Series E funding round at a $700 million pre-money valuation, with 80% of the capital already committed as of last August. While it's not clear if that round closed as intended, venture capital database Pitchbook shows that Eaze raised $60 million in new funding in September.
More: Eaze Cannabis Startups | 2022-06-02T20:10:12Z | www.businessinsider.com | Cannabis Tech Startup Eaze Laid Off 25 Employees | https://www.businessinsider.com/cannabis-tech-startup-eaze-laid-off-employees-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/cannabis-tech-startup-eaze-laid-off-employees-2022-6 |
The CEO of fintech unicorn Array used the names of a yoga instructor and the mothers of his children to evade a credit-card processor ban, an updated lawsuit claims
Jack Newsham and Ben Bergman
Christian Horz/Getty
A former Array executive says Martin Toha, its CEO, has a history of dodgy business tactics.
He says Toha used the names of three women he knew to avoid a payment-company blacklist.
An Array spokesman said the claims are false and called it a "nuisance suit."
The CEO of a startup that got tens of millions of funding from top VCs like Battery Ventures and General Catalyst has a history of duping consumers and payment processors and has used the names of the mothers of his children to evade a payments blacklist, a former executive claims.
The allegations come in an amended complaint filed against Array and its CEO Martin Toha in late May by the company's former chief strategy officer, Jason Owen. Owen first sued in March, accusing Toha of fudging Array's valuation for tax reasons and cheating him out of a $70 million stake in the company.
His new complaint adds details of what he claims are unethical business tactics.
"Mr. Toha and certain affiliated entities have found themselves on the blacklist of at least one payment processor as a result of deceptive practices," Owen said in the complaint.
Processing agreements for some of Toha's businesses were submitted under the names of mothers of two of Toha's children, according to Owen, and another used the name of a yoga instructor.
Aidan Ryan, an Array spokesman, said in an email that Owen's claims about the two mothers were "entirely false and fabricated" and that they created accounts, of which Toha was listed as the ultimate beneficial owner, "in the context of an estate planning exercise in 2017." He said no one at Array knew of the "alleged, unnamed yoga instructor."
Array bills itself as a fintech for fintechs, using its connections with credit bureaus like Experian, Equifax, and Transunion to help start-ups offer the same in-app credit score and coupon widgets that big banks do. But some of Array's top clients are actually credit-repair companies and other questionable businesses that Array isn't supposed to be sharing credit data with, Owen said.
Owen claims that he was promised a 5% stake in Array over a $100 million valuation. He claims to be entitled to $70 million based on a valuation of $1.5 billion that was reached in late 2021, but not announced publicly. A source at one of Array's biggest investors told Insider that they believe Owen is a disgruntled former employee.
Toha previously made a fortune by founding and running a company called Pentius. The company runs a network of websites and call centers that sell monthly subscriptions to credit repair and credit monitoring services. Owen claims that Array's access to credit data comes through Pentius or other entities that Toha controls.
Owen's previous complaint also accused Toha of unscrupulous behavior, including that one of Array's supposed customers is actually a California tea shop run by an employee's father.
In his new filing, Owen claims that Array engages in "load balancing" and selling "friendly" fake accounts to its clients. Online marketers and retailers use such techniques to avoid having their merchant accounts suspended because of high chargeback rates.
"We are investigating Owen's claim," said Ryan, the Array spokesman. "This is not a practice or service that Array provides."
The new complaint also lists more than 80 corporate entities and 200 websites that Array allegedly controls, or previously controlled. Many of the websites use the same templates and list addresses in shared office spaces. They offer subscriptions to credit-monitoring products or rent-to-own real-estate listings for as much as $69.90 per month, after a $1 seven-day trial.
Some of the websites are no longer online, and others appear to require users to log in.
Joshua Berman, a lawyer at White & Case who represents Owen, said in a statement that his client was wrongly fired because he "uncovered alarming evidence of wrongdoing by the defendants."
"Mr. Owen stands behind the allegations in the amended complaint and he deeply regrets that Mr. Toha and Array were not willing to accept his assistance in taking steps to address the information he had uncovered," he said.
"These claims are meritless and contradictory, and we have every confidence in defeating this nuisance suit in court," Ryan said in an email. "Our staff and leadership team remain focused on supporting our customers, expanding relationships, and developing products that improve financial wellness."
More: Fintech Lawsuits Startup | 2022-06-02T20:10:19Z | www.businessinsider.com | Former Array Exec Claims the Company Evaded a Payments Blacklist | https://www.businessinsider.com/former-array-exec-claims-payments-blacklist-lawsuit-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/former-array-exec-claims-payments-blacklist-lawsuit-2022-6 |
KineMaster
PowerDirector
Vimeo Create
The 7 best free video editing apps for your phone
Nico De Pasquale Photography/Getty Images
The best free video editing apps can get the job done, but in some cases will also have in-app ads or upgrade reminders.
You can choose a full-featured video editor like KineMaster or PowerDirector, or rely on a simple video editor like iMovie or CapCut.
Here are the seven best free video editing apps for iPhone and Android.
Video editing is a processor- and memory-intensive task that has traditionally required the resources of a desktop computer . In the last few years, though, the resources in a smartphone have caught up, and now there are a slew of video editing tools you can use to edit video on your phone. Here are seven of the best free video editing apps you can get for your iPhone or Android.
KineMaster is a traditional video editor that's been packed into a smartphone screen. The display is landscape, which makes it easier to see your video timeline at the bottom of the screen, preview at top and tools on the right. You can trim, split, slip, reverse, pan and zoom, and mirror your video; you can also apply filters and make exposure adjustments. You get a full-bore video editor with the ability to add multiple video and audio tracks as well. And while the core features are free, upgrading to the paid version removes the watermark from the finished product and access to a generous store of assets. It's available for iPhone and Android.
KineMaster is a powerful and full-featured video editor for your phone.
Similar to KineMaster in overall scope of features and ease of use, PowerDirector for iPhone and Android lets you work with multiple video tracks, audio tracks, and do a lot of the sorts of editing you'd do on the desktop — including trimming and splitting video, adding filters, adjusting color and exposure, and so on. Some features, like digital stabilization, are only available if you upgrade to the paid service, but both the free and paid versions of the app have a handy auto-rotate interface that lets you use it in portrait or landscape orientation.
Need to create polished short-form videos for social media or other online applications? Vimeo Create lets anyone take video clips and incorporate them into a wide variety of templates on both iPhone and Android. You can customize colors, text, fonts, filters, and more, and even choose from a large catalog of royalty-free music options. Even when just using the free version, there are plenty of free templates and features, but you can upgrade to the paid plan to unlock additional templates (and the 30-second video limit). Vimeo Create doesn't look or behave like a traditional video editor, so you don't need any video skills to start using the app immediately.
Vimeo Create simplifies the process of rapidly making videos for social media.
You don't need a GoPro camera to use GoPro Quik for iPhone or Android. Free for anyone to use, the app excels at making a highlight reel from video clips you specify. Just choose the videos, add a title, choose some music, and Quik uses AI to find the most compelling video bits for you. There are some other editing options at your disposal, but the appeal here is Quik's ability to whip up fun videos with little effort.
iMovie is the only video editing app here that's only available for the iPhone (it is an Apple product, after all) but it's worth including for iOS users because of its ease of use and elegant interface. The app has a Magic Movie mode in which the app does almost everything automatically — just choose the clips and let the app take it from there. Even so, you can tweak the theme, title text, and music, or make a movie from scratch and control all those elements from the start. Either way, your options are more limited than what you get with a full-strength video editor than something like KineMaster.
You can make a polished video with just a few taps using iMovie.
Packing about the same punch as KineMaster and PowerDirector but without being hassled with in-app ads or to constantly upgrade for additional features, Splice is one of the best free video editors for iPhone and Android. It has a clean and easy-to-master interface that has a timeline and video preview, with the ability to trim, clip, filter and adjust colors and exposure of your video clip. You can also add titles and music, add closed-caption subtitles, and more.
CapCut for iPhone and Android works like a standard timeline-based video editor and has a healthy assortment of editing tools, like split, speed, and exposure controls. It also has some cool additions you won't find in a lot of other video editors, like the ability to automatically remove the background, leaving just your foreground subject in a sea of black. There's also audio tracks, title text, stickers, overlays, and more. But the most interesting feature in CapCut is its ShortCut option. ShortCut will make a TikTok-friendly video, complete with transitions and effects, with a single tap after selecting the clips to include. That's not surprising – CapCut is published by Bytedance, the owners of TikTok.
CapCut has an impressive array of video editing features in an easy-to-use interface.
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More: Tech How To Reference Freelancer Video editing Software & Apps | 2022-06-02T20:10:25Z | www.businessinsider.com | The 7 Best Free Video Editing Apps for Your Phone | https://www.businessinsider.com/free-video-editing-apps | https://www.businessinsider.com/free-video-editing-apps |
23 must-read books by LGBTQIA+ authors, from stunning memoirs to heartwarming romance novels
LGBTQIA+ authors bring a necessary perspective to queer literature.
We rounded up the best books by queer authors, including YA, memoirs, romance novels, and more.
Want more books? Check out our list of the best LGBTQ-friendly books for kids.
LGBTQIA+ authors bring an authentic and unparalleled perspective to queer literature with the ability to inspire, influence, and encourage readers to celebrate sexuality, no matter their identity. These books often bring to light the serious emotional, mental, and physical trials that queer people endure, while also depicting beautiful love stories or inspirational triumphs.
We chose the books on this list based on queer authors we love. We also included a wide range of genres, from romance to memoir, so whether you're part of the LGBTQIA+ community or an ally, the books on this list are sure to blow you away.
23 great books by LGBTQIA+ authors:
James Baldwin was an American novelist and activist whose writing proved vital during the Black and gay liberation movements of the 1950s and '60s. "Giovanni's Room" follows an American man named David who is alone in Paris while his fiancé is away on a trip. While David is determined to live a conventional life, he's drawn to an Italian bartender named Giovanni and finds himself spending the night in Giovanni's dark bedroom. Baldwin's novel is a passionate tangle of love, mortality, and sexuality, controversial when it was published but now a queer literature classic.
'Memorial' by Bryan Washington
Benson and Mike are two young men who love each other, but aren't exactly sure why they're still together. When tragedy pulls them to opposite ends of the world, each sets out on their own journey of self-exploration and transforms outside of the confines of their relationship. This book is about family, vulnerability, and embracing our truest identities, beloved for its sensitive touch and multicultural lens.
'Birthday' by Meredith Russo
Meredith Russo is a trans author who shines in exploring gender identity, sexuality, poverty, and trauma in her writing. This novel follows Morgan and Eric once a year on their shared birthday, as the two are forever bonded by coming into the world on the same day, at the same time, in the same hospital. As the years pass, they're sometimes close and sometimes drift apart, the story soaring as we watch Morgan and Eric embrace and slowly become their true selves. Russo's writing captures a brutally honest and ultimately heartwarming story about exploring our identities.
'On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous' by Ocean Vuong
Little Dog writes a letter to his mother who cannot read. As he tells the story of his family's history in Vietnam to the present, unearthing factions of his identity previously kept secret, the novel demonstrates the importance of being heard. "On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous" is tender and graceful, — when I read it, I felt like I was holding my breath so even an exhale would not interrupt his story. Even the prose when Little Dog expresses anger, rage, and violence is darkly eloquent and desperate to be understood. It's a beautiful novel of healing, surviving, and embracing ourselves.
'History is All You Left Me' by Adam Silvera
Adam Silvera is a bestselling author who continues to stun readers with his work. This novel follows Griffin, who moved to California for college after his first love, Theo, died in a drowning accident. Though he's started seeing Jackson, Griffin never truly dealt with the traumatic events that are now haunting him. As he continues to spiral downward, Griffin struggles to cope with his secrets, his destructive choices, and his future. Griffin is a profoundly interesting character, a puzzle of a person who is trying to put himself back together.
'The Death of Vivek Oji by Akwaeke Emezi'
This book moved me and made me cry more than once — it's one of those stories where you slowly put together the pieces as you read until suddenly, you realize how intense and emotive the plot truly is. In eastern Nigeria, a mother opens her front door to find her grown child lying on her front step, wrapped in colorful cloth, dead. The story follows the family as they try to understand someone they never fully knew. While Vivek felt disconnected from his parents, he found friendship with a close few and formed a deep relationship with his cousin, Ostia. With a rising crisis that climaxes with an act of violence, this novel is one I personally recommend often because the beauty captured in the writing is nothing short of stunning.
'How We Fight for our Lives' by Saeed Jones
Saeed Jones is most well-known for his poetry collection "Prelude to Bruise" and now his memoir, which won the 2020 Stonewall Book Award/Israel Fishman Nonfiction Award. "How We Fight For Our Lives" is told in a series of vignettes depicting Saeed's personal coming-of-age story as a young, Black, gay man in the South. The stories are a powerful mix of poetry and prose that cumulate to a stunning portrait of how race, sex, queerness, power, and love clash and harmonize as we fight to become ourselves. Saeed's memoir explores the vulnerable avenues of his life and demonstrates the inspiring strength of an individual.
Meredith was once a young boy with albinism from a rural village in the Philippines. As a US immigrant passing as white, she went to Harvard on an academic scholarship and discovered communities where she could explore the complexities of sexuality, gender, race, class, and her place within all of it. Talusan's memoir is a reflection of an eventful and thoughtful adolescence and young adulthood, one where she bares her struggles of navigating life in a deeply human way — a fluid construction, changing and evolving as she discovers more about herself and the world.
'All Boys Aren't Blue' by George M. Johnson
From navigating bullies to love, George M. Johnson, a prominent journalist and activist, writes about his childhood through young adulthood to paint a searingly honest portrait of the successes and setbacks experienced by Black queer boys. Johnson's memoir is both an exploration and a guide for readers who might be looking for affirmation that their identity is not only valid, but deserves to be celebrated and cherished.
'Over the Top: A Raw Journey to Self-Love' by Jonathan Van Ness
Jonathan Van Ness is most well-known for their bubbly, positive personality on "Queer Eye," constantly encouraging self-love. Their memoir tells the story of the dark days that preceded the shining person we see today. Jonathan reveals their more personal side in this book, including years of trauma and countless secrets they've hidden from the public. Despite the hard times they've faced, the passion and positivity still radiates through their writing. If you're able to listen to the audiobook, JVN's narration adds every bit of the fun and flair for which they're known and loved.
'In the Dream House' by Carmen Maria Machado
Carmen Maria Machado spent years trying to tell the story of her abusive same-sex realationship, finally finding the voice through chapters told through different narrative horror tropes. Addressing her religious upbringing, she notes the stereotype of physical safety within lesbian relationships while demonstrating the effects of abuse on victim's memory, reality, and voice. Where society has previously failed to acknowledge same-sex domestic and emotional abuse, Machado offers a structure with which readers are familiar and uses it to tell a challenging truth.
'Gender Queer' by Maia Kobabe
Maia Kobabe, who uses e/em/eir pronouns, is both the author and the illustrator of eir optimistic and bright graphic memoir. This is the journey of Maia's identity through eir young crushes, coming out, and navigating gender in a world built for the binary. This graphic novel began as Maia's way to explain what it meant to em to be non-binary and asexual, and evolved into a liberating story of freedom and bravery.
'Something to Talk About' by Meryl Wilsner
When actress Jo is photographed making Emma, her assistant, laugh on the red carpet, rumors of their romance swirl and threaten both of their careers. Despite offering "no comment," the gossip grows from anonymous sources to the relentless paparazzi. Brought together over their situation, Emma and Jo find they find more happiness in each other than they thought — and the rumors might contain a hint of truth. Brought to you by Meryl Wilsner, a non-binary author, this queer romance is a slow burn as the friendship between Emma and Jo gets deeper before it develops into more.
'Boy Meets Boy' by David Levithan
$9.99 $9.19 from Bookshop
David Levithan's books are gay teen fiction staples, and this romantic novel continues to prove why. It takes place in a world uniquely from Paul's perspective, one spinning with fascinating classmates and entertaining tales. When Paul meets Noah, he feels it's the magical "boy meets boy" scenario of which he's been dreaming, until he blows it. Juggling friendships, family, and past relationships, Paul knows everything might have to fall apart before it can be put back together, and he's ready for the journey if it means winning Noah back. "Boy Meets Boy" a heartwarming rom-com with characters we can't help but want to follow ton their journeys.
'Red, White, & Royal Blue' by Casey McQuiston
Non-binary author Casey McQuinston's debut novel, "Red, White, & Royal Blue," garnered adoration from readers who were drawn to it for the queer and interesting characters and a swoon-worthy enemies-to-lovers romance. Alex and Henry are bitter rivals, one the First Son of the United States and the other a British prince. When photos of their rivalry reach the tabloids, their PR teams' plan to save their image of diplomacy is to stage a fake friendship between the two. But as they begin to spend more time together, their fake friendship begins to blossom into a real one — and perhaps even more.
'Juliet Takes a Breath' by Gabby Rivera
In an empowering novel that tackles some hard perspectives on racial bias, we follow Juliet — a proud, self-proclaimed "Puerto Rican Baby Dyke" as she leaves the Bronx for an internship in Portland. After coming out to her mother is met with poor reception, Juliet looks forward to interning for her idol, feminist author Harlowe Brisbane. Though Harlowe is a hippy white woman, Juliet is hoping to explore the feminist world and her new identity as a Puerto Rican lesbian. Written by Gabby Rivera, a queer Puerto Rican author, this YA is explorative, driven by a protagonist who is searching for answers.
'You Should See Me In A Crown' by Leah Johnson
This YA hit is Leah Johnson's debut novel, earning incredible accolades including a Stonewall Book Award Honor. It follows Liz Lighty, a teenage girl who believes she is "too Black and too poor" to shine in her small town, dreaming instead of attending Pennington College, playing in their renowned orchestra, and becoming a doctor. When Liz struggles to secure financial aid, she finds a solution: the scholarship granted to her school's prom king and queen. Her fear of the spotlight is overshadowed by her drive to leave her high school, which is only bearable because of the cute new girl, Mack, who is also gunning for the prom queen spot. "You Should See Me In A Crown" is a wonderful Black, queer love story, and too irresistibly cute to put down.
'Kate in Waiting' by Becky Albertalli
Becky Albertalli is a bisexual author best known for "Simon vs. the Homosapiens Agenda" — a popular novel about a teen coming out in high school. "Kate in Waiting" is Albertalli's latest, a totally unique story of Kate and Anderson, inseparable best friends who love theater and pining over the same unattainable boys. When one of their long-distance crushes comes to their school, very real feelings complicate their friendship. While this book is absolutely cute and full of funny banter, it's perfectly balanced with a juicy plot and highly emotional moments.
'The Henna Wars' by Adiba Jaigirdar
When Nishat comes out to her parents, they tell her that Muslim women simply cannot be lesbians. To further complicate her life, Nishat's (very cute) childhood friend, Flávia, is suddenly back in her life, and her main competition in a school project to create a small business. Though Flávia isn't Muslim, she and Nishat create rival henna businesses, Flávia's quickly flourishing despite appropriating Nishat's culture. As Nishat struggles with her sexuality, running her business, and attempting to shake her crush on Flávia, readers also navigate the complex subjects of race and identity. Adiba Jaigirdar is a queer Bangladeshi and Irish author, whose debut novel is a lovely tale of friendship.
'Like a Love Story' by Abdi Nasemian
Abdi Nasemian is a gay Iranian-American screenwriter, producer, and author of "Like A Love Story," a love letter to queer history that received a Stonewall Honor in 2020. It follows three teens in New York City in 1989 during the height of the AIDS crisis. Reha is an Iranian boy who knows he's gay, but is afraid to acknowledge his sexuality. Judy is an aspiring fashion designer who adores her uncle, Stephen — a gay man with AIDS who dedicates his time to AIDS activism. The third teen, Art, is out and proud but struggling to find his place — and sets out to document the AIDS crisis through photography. This is a deeply emotional and honest navigation of sexuality and coming-of-age in the '80s, beloved for each character's unique voice.
'We Set the Dark on Fire' by Tehlor Kay Mejia
Tehlor Key Mejia is a queer Latinx writer who is passionate about representation of marginalized communities in literature. In her debut YA fantasy novel, "We Set the Dark on Fire," readers enter the Medio School for Girls, where young women train for one of two jobs in society: Running a man's house or raising his children — either way, protected in a life of comfort away from the uprisings of the lower class. Daniela is the school's top student, quickly approached by rebel spies after graduation, caught in a tapestry of choices with intense consequences. It's the story of former rivals-turned-girlfriends leading a revolution against a corrupt government.
'All the Birds in the Sky' by Charlie Jane Anders
In this epic mash-up of fantasy and science fiction, there resides an ancient society of witches and a hipster, tech start-up. With a backdrop of international chaos, a war wages in San Francisco. Patricia and Laurence were once childhood friends who parted ways, only to reunite as the battle between science and magic threatens to either save the world — or end it. This book is a unique amalgamation of genres — a mix of fantasy, dystopian science fiction, and magical realism all woven together by Charlie Jane Anders, a talented trans writer.
'The House in the Cerulean Sea' by T.J. Klune
"The House in the Cerulean Sea" follows 40-year-old Linus Baker, a Case Worker for the Department in Charge of Magical Youth, as he's given a top secret assignment to travel to a remote island where six dangerous children reside with their caretaker, Arthur. As he meets the children — including a green blob, a gnome, a transformable Pomeranian, and the literal Antichrist — he finds that the mystery and fear surrounding both them and their caretaker may be unwarranted, especially as he finds his relationship with Arthur getting closer. T.J. Klune is an asexual author who demonstrates the importance of queer representation in all kinds of stories. | 2022-06-02T20:10:31Z | www.businessinsider.com | 23 Books by LGBTQ, Queer Authors to Read During Pride Month | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/learning/books-by-lgbtq-authors | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/learning/books-by-lgbtq-authors |
A man who retired at age 34 says a lot of retirement investing advice won't work for early retirees, but he has some that will
Brandon, who retired at age 34.
Courtesy of Brandon, "Mad Fientist" podcaster
Brandon, the "Mad Fientist," retired at 34, six years ago.
The most impactful choice he made, he says, was to be strategic about minimizing taxes on his savings.
He invested the bulk of his savings in pre-tax accounts, then converted them to a Roth IRA and executed a Roth Conversion Ladder.
If you're planning to retire early, some traditional retirement advice might not work.
"Mad Fientist" blogger and podcaster Brandon, who retired six years ago at age 34, tells Insider that while the traditional retiree has a high income that keeps increasing until they reach retirement age in their 60s, the early retiree's income peaks before they quit their job in their 30s or 40s — and then it suddenly drops.
"All the advice that I was reading on these financial sites and blogs at that time was geared to those normal retirees, and we're not like that at all," Brandon, who uses only his first name online, says. "We have this 10 or 20-year period where our income is lower."
This can be a problem, because you can't withdraw penalty-free from many kinds of tax-advantaged retirement accounts until you reach age 59 ½. But for after-tax accounts without those penalties, like Roth IRAs, you can only contribute money that's already been taxed, diminishing your ability to save as much.
The "most impactful" thing Brandon did in order to be able to retire early was put everything into pre-tax accounts only — which for him, included 401(k)s, 403(b)s, and traditional IRAs. "That really helped me accelerate it because I was paying very little on taxes, and I was just able to invest a lot more," he added.
Early retirees might consider the Roth Conversion Ladder
On his blog, Brandon describes the next step for his money: a process known as the Roth Conversion Ladder, which allows early retirees to access the money before age 59 ½ without paying massive penalties.
The fact that early retirees have a 10 or 20-year period of low income before they reach traditional retirement age "means that there's this period of time that you can take all those traditional IRAs and 401(k)s and convert them to Roth IRAs," he says.
The Roth Conversion Ladder is a multi-step process that takes years to complete, but doing so can allow you to access your retirement funds early without having to pay the 10% penalty. In order to do it, you need to start the process about five years before you think you'll want to retire.
1. Roll all pre-tax money into a traditional IRA 5 years before you retire
This first step is fairly quick and easy, and comes with no penalties because the rules for most pre-tax retirement accounts are the same: Convert any retirement savings you have into a single, traditional IRA.
Rolling over a 401(k) into an IRA is also something many people do after they leave a job for another. Typically, it just involves opening an IRA with a broker or financial institution and completing some paperwork from your 401(k) provider. Sometimes the 401(k) provider will send a check directly to the institution where you opened your new IRA; other times, you'll get a check you must deposit into your IRA no more than 60 days later to avoid penalties.
You'll need to roll your retirement savings into a traditional IRA no less than five years before you plan to retire to be able to do the process successfully while avoiding the 10% penalty for withdrawing funds.
2. Then, convert some of your funds from a traditional IRA to a Roth
You're not going to convert all of your funds, now stored in a traditional IRA, into a Roth. You're still five years out (or more) from retiring, so you should only convert as much as you've calculated you'll need for the first year of retirement. Because you'll have to pay taxes when you make the conversion, converting only some of the funds will minimize the taxes due now.
You're planning five years ahead because of what's called the "5-year rule," in which the IRS requires anyone who has converted a traditional IRA to a Roth to wait five years before withdrawing converted funds (which includes both contributions and earnings), or pay a 10% penalty.
However, in the meantime, you will have to pay some regular income taxes on the funds, and the lower your tax bracket at the time of conversion, the less you will pay in taxes. Eric Bronnenkant, a CPA, financial planner, and the Head of Tax at Betterment, tells Insider it's also important to keep in mind at this stage that taxes for the conversion must be paid with non-retirement funds to avoid that 10% penalty.
3. Do a series of annual conversions for withdrawals in subsequent retirement years
After you do the initial conversion five years in advance for your first year of early retirement, do one conversion each year to finance your next years of retirement: A year after your first conversion, you'll convert the funds you need to finance year two. The next year, you'll convert the funds for year three, and so on. Like for your first year, making your conversions in pieces will reduce the total amount of income tax you'll pay each time.
This step is why this process is called a "ladder" — you're "laddering" your conversions so you have a smooth and steady stream of penalty-free retirement money for the extra 10 or 20 years that you're retired before traditional retirement age 59 ½.
4. Withdraw the funds in pieces as planned
After the five-year waiting period, you should be able to access the money for the first year of your retirement without paying the 10% penalty. If you've done the annual conversions correctly, you should have money parked in your Roth IRA, waiting for future annual withdrawals for several more years.
If you're planning on trying the Roth Conversion Ladder, one thing to remember is that while you can pull contributions from the Roth IRA as planned, you can't take out any investment earnings from the account without penalty until you hit 59 1/2 (no matter how much they grow!). "If the earnings are withdrawn prior to age 59.5," Bronnenkrant said, "they will be taxable as ordinary income and subject to a 10% early withdrawal penalty."
This process can be complex and it does require careful planning, so it may not be for everyone, and you may want to enlist the help of a financial planner or accountant.
Also, the Roth Conversion Ladder is not the only strategy that early retirees can use, Bronnenkant said. Other methods, such as Substantially Equal Periodic Payments distributions can also help you avoid the 10% penalty on early withdrawals from retirement accounts. However, he added that the SEPP distributions have "very limited flexibility" when compared to the Roth Conversion Ladder.
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More: Retirement Advice Roth conversions Early Retirees Traditional IRA | 2022-06-02T20:10:37Z | www.businessinsider.com | Practical Investing Advice to Minimize Taxes for Early Retirees | https://www.businessinsider.com/investing-advice-minimize-taxes-early-retirees-2022-5 | https://www.businessinsider.com/investing-advice-minimize-taxes-early-retirees-2022-5 |
Trump endorsed Blake Masters, a self-described nationalist backed by millions in funding from Peter Thiel.
Masters is running for the US Senate in Arizona and has claimed that Trump won the 2020 election.
Trump's lengthy endorsement including a tirade against Attorney General Mark Brnovich, who's also running.
Former President Donald Trump endorsed Blake Masters, the former president of the Thiel Foundation, in the Republican Senate primary in Arizona on Thursday.
Touting Masters' investment and business career, Trump labeled Masters a "a great modern-day thinker" while highlighting the Senate candidate's stated belief that the former president won the 2020 presidential election.
"Blake knows that the 'Crime of the Century' took place, he will expose it and also, never let it happen again," said Trump. "It is my great honor to give Blake Masters my Complete and Total Endorsement!"
But while Trump did note aspects of Masters' personal biography — including his Stanford University education and his co-authorship of "Zero to One" with tech billionaire Peter Thiel — much of his endorsement message served as a condemnation of Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich.
"Mark Brnovich is such a disappointment to me," said Trump. "While he understands what took place in the 2020 Presidential Election, and that it was Rigged and Stolen, he only views it as something he would like not to see happen again."
Brnovich has generally led in polling of the primary race thus far, though Trump made clear in a statement weeks ago that he would not be endorsing the attorney general. Trump has frequently expressed frustration that Brnovich has not more forcefully pursued baseless claims of a stolen 2020 election in the state.
A recent analysis by Insider found that Trump-endorsed candidates in competitive races receive 63.5% of the vote on average.
Thiel — a tech billionaire and increasingly prolific Republican who also backed JD Vance in the Ohio Republican Senate primary — has contributed $13.5 million to date towards an outside spending effort on behalf of Masters's candidacy.
Masters, a self-described "nationalist" and populist who says he believes the country is run by "psychopaths," is running for elected office for the first time, though he served on Trump's 2016 transition team alongside Thiel.
He also recently declared that the gender pay gap is a "fake left-wing narrative" because men do "the most dangerous jobs."
More: Blake Masters Peter Thiel Arizona Donald Trump | 2022-06-02T20:10:43Z | www.businessinsider.com | Trump Endorses Thiel-Backed Arizona Senate Candidate Blake Masters | https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-endorses-peter-thiel-backed-blake-masters-arizona-senate-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-endorses-peter-thiel-backed-blake-masters-arizona-senate-2022-6 |
Republican Rep. Greg Steube of Florida displays his handgun while Zooming into a House Judiciary Committee mark up hearing on gun legislation on June 2, 2022.
The House Judiciary Committee is holding a hearing on bills to prevent gun violence on Thursday.
The hearing turned into a partisan exercise, with Democrats and Republicans debating gun restrictions.
Participating remotely, GOP Rep. Greg Steube ranted about proposed restrictions while brandishing guns.
In the midst of a Thursday hearing on new gun violence prevention legislation proposed by congressional Democrats, Republican Rep. Greg Steube of Florida tuned in remotely and ranted against proposed changes to gun laws while brandishing various guns that he owns.
The Florida Republican, apparently participating in the hearing from his home office via video, argued that each of his guns would be banned under proposed changes to gun laws.
At one point, he displayed a Sig Sauer P365XL Pistol, which he said he carries "every single day" in order to "protect myself, my family, my wife, my home."
"I hope that gun is not loaded," said Democratic Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas, cutting Steube off.
"I'm at my house, I can do whatever I want with my guns," he replied.
Steube then launched into a comparison of the gun restrictions and homicide rates in various American states and cities, including Maryland, Washington, DC, Cook County, Illinois, and his home state of Florida.
"Would the gentleman yield for questions?" asked committee chairman Rep. Jerry Nadler of New York, repeating himself five times.
"No, I'm trying to get my point across in the two minutes that I have left," Steube replied. "The murder rate was more — now let me start back over, and I hope you give me my 10 or 15 seconds back that you just took."
The partisan bickering at the hearing — which was scheduled in response to the shooting last week at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas and a push by Democrats to address gun violence — underscores the difficulty of passing legislation on guns, particularly on such a charged partisan issue and with an evenly-divided Senate.
House Democrats unveiled the "Protecting Our Kids Act" this week, which includes a variety of provisions including raising the minimum purchasing age for semi-automatic rifles from 18 to 21, banning the import, sale, manufacture, transfer or possession of high-capacity ammunition magazines, and a variety of other tweaks.
Additionally, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said at an anti-gun violence event on Wednesday that the House would be voting on an assault weapons ban next week.
But the bill is not expected to pass the Senate, or even necessarily receive a vote.
Instead, a group of senators led by Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut and Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas are trying to hammer out a more modest agreement that could potentially reach the 60 votes necessary to pass legislation in the upper chamber.
Murphy penned an op-ed for Fox News on Thursday seeking to assure conservatives that he's not interested in wide-ranging gun restrictions, writing that he doesn't have a "secret agenda to take people's guns away" and that his "agenda isn't radical."
"In order to find common ground, I will need to agree to a smaller set of reforms than I would prefer," wrote Murphy. "I'm willing to pass incremental change, like tightening up our background checks system and helping states pass laws to allow law enforcement to temporarily take guns away from individuals who pose a threat to themselves or others."
"For me, the only thing we cannot do is nothing," he added.
More: Greg Steube Congress Uvalde Buffalo mass shooting | 2022-06-02T20:11:01Z | www.businessinsider.com | Video: GOP Rep. Brandishes Guns During Rant Against Gun Safety Bills | https://www.businessinsider.com/video-greg-steube-florida-republican-guns-rant-hearing-gun-violence-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/video-greg-steube-florida-republican-guns-rant-hearing-gun-violence-2022-6 |
Is earthquake insurance required in California?
What does earthquake insurance cover in California?
How much does earthquake insurance cost in California?
How to buy California earthquake insurance
Deductibles for earthquake insurance are higher than those for homeowners insurance.
Skarie20/Getty Images
While earthquake insurance is optional in California, home insurers must offer it to new homebuyers.
Earthquake insurance covers your dwelling, personal property, and provides loss-of-use coverage.
You can purchase earthquake insurance through your homeowners insurance provider.
California has a well-earned reputation as the earthquake capital of the US. Yet only 10% of California residents have earthquake insurance, according to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Many homeowners are underprepared for financial losses associated with earthquakes, which are not covered by standard homeowners insurance policies. If you're a Californian living near a major fault line, you can protect yourself with earthquake insurance.
California homeowners are not legally obligated to buy earthquake insurance, and mortgage lenders don't require it, says Glenn Pomeroy, chief executive officer of the California Earthquake Authority (CEA), the nation's largest earthquake insurance provider. However, California law makes it mandatory for providers like State Farm and Allstate to proactively offer earthquake insurance in conjunction with a homeowners insurance policy to new homebuyers, according to Pomeroy.
Homeowners insurance will not cover earthquakes. You must purchase a separate policy to get coverage. Given the large number of damage-causing earthquakes in California each year, it is wise to carefully consider doing so.
Here are a few things you should take into account to determine if you need an earthquake insurance policy, according to the United States Geological Survey (USGS):
Your home's location from active earthquake faults
The frequency of earthquakes in your region
When the last earthquake occurred
The materials on your home's building and foundation
The architectural structure of your home
The quality of workmanship of your home
Earthquake insurance covers the cost of replacing and repairing your dwelling and home contents after an earthquake. It will also cover any additional living expenses you incur if your home becomes temporarily uninhabitable.
Earthquake insurance only covers losses that are caused by land movement or landslides. It will not cover fire and water damage. Your homeowners insurance policy covers that. Earthquake insurance won't pay for flood damage, which requires separate coverage.
"Earthquake insurance can cost anywhere from $730 to $2,000," Pomeroy says. The cost varies based on several factors, such as your home's and construction material. Earthquake insurance is not available as a standalone policy and must be purchased in tandem with your homeowners insurance policy.
Deductibles for earthquake insurance are usually 5% to 15% of your earthquake insurance policy limit, according to the Insurance Information Institute. They're generally higher than deductibles for a homeowners insurance policy.
While earthquake insurance can be quite costly, especially in high-risk areas, you can still reduce your premiums through mitigation efforts. The CEA, for example, offers a discount for older, wood-framed homes with raised or other non-slab foundations. Many providers also offer discounts for seismically retrofitted homes.
The CEA advises taking these steps to purchase insurance in California.
Step 1: Know your risk
Knowing how prone your area is to earthquakes is the primary consideration when determining if you need earthquake insurance. FEMA offers seismic maps that show this. The colors on the maps indicate the risk levels of an area, also known as seismic design categories.
Seismic design category/Map Color
Earthquake Hazard
Potential effects
A/White
Very little probably of damage from earthquakes
B/Gray
Could experience shaking of moderate intensity
Some heavy furniture moved
Fallen plaster
Little to no damage to homes with poor and well-built structures
C/Yellow
Strong shaking
Little to no damage to buildings with good design and construction
Considerable damage to structures with weak designs
D/Light brown
D1/ Darker Brown
D2/Darkest brown
Very strong shaking (the darker the color, the stronger the shaking)
Slight damage to well-designed structures
Significant damage to poorly built structures
E/Red
Near major active faults, with more intense shaking
Significant damage to well-designed structures to the point of partial collapse
Shaking intense enough to destroy poorly designed buildings completely
Source: FEMA
Step 2: Get a free cost estimate
The cost of your policy will vary based on several factors. You can obtain a premium estimate using the CEA's free premium calculator.
You will be asked a series of questions about your home, such as your address, the year your home was built, how much homeowners coverage you have, and the type of roof and foundation your home has.
Then, you'll see your estimated monthly premium. You can adjust your deductible, personal property, loss-of-use coverage, and add coverage to your policy if you wish.
Quick tip: About two-thirds of the homeowners insurance providers in California are members of the CEA. See a list of them here.
Step 3: Call your insurance company
You must purchase an earthquake insurance policy through your residential insurer. Once you get your earthquake insurance estimate, speak with your insurance agent, and they will process your application.
Your provider will also manage your premium payments and policy renewals. Additionally, they can help you file a claim if an earthquake damages your property.
Note that most insurers will not sell new policies for a certain amount of time after an earthquake occurs — usually 30 to 60 days, according to the National Association of Insurance Commissioners. The best time to buy a policy is before an earthquake happens.
PERSONAL FINANCE Earthquake insurance covers your home after earthquake-related damages, with some exceptions
PERSONAL FINANCE Does homeowners insurance cover hurricane damage, or do you need additional coverage?
PERSONAL FINANCE How to get a homeowners insurance quote and 4 ways to save on your policy
More: California California earthquake insurance earthquake insurance Homeowners Insurance
California earthquake authority | 2022-06-02T21:41:25Z | www.businessinsider.com | California Earthquake Insurance: Requirements, Coverage, Cost | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/california-earthquake-insurance | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/california-earthquake-insurance |
SoftBank-backed ghost kitchen startup Reef Technology quietly ousts key exec responsible for signing deals with top chains like Wendy's
Former Reef president Michael Beacham speaking on a panel at the Food On Demand conference in Las Vegas in May 2022.
Reef has replaced president Michael Beacham, who spearheaded deals with key chains like Wendy's.
"Reef is choosing to end my employment before I was able to fully complete the mission," Beacham said.
The departure comes as the ghost kitchen startup slowed its growth and laid off 750 people.
Reef Technology, a ghost kitchen startup backed by SoftBank, has ousted a key executive who spearheaded crucial licensing partnerships with top restaurant chains such as Wendy's and TGI Fridays, Insider has learned.
Restaurant industry veteran Michael Beacham, who most recently held the title of president of kitchens at Reef, said in an exclusive statement to Insider that "Reef is choosing to end my employment."
"I spent the last 18 months, working day and night and traveling the globe, trying to build a world-class food and beverage executive team. I utilized my thirty years of personal and professional industry relationships to bring the most recognized brands into the REEF ecosystem," Beacham told Insider. "It is regrettable that REEF is choosing to end my employment before I was able to fully complete the mission I came here to achieve. There is more to this story and to what happened to me, which will come out at the appropriate time."
His last day is June 12.
Beacham, who regularly represented Reef at industry conferences, has been quietly replaced with Kenneth Rourke, who is now president of kitchens and retail at Reef. Rourke's previous title was executive vice president and head of enterprise brands. Before joining Reef, he was president at the experiential restaurant group Barton G.
Reef declined to go on the record about the departure, only confirming that Beacham is leaving and has been replaced by Rourke. The news comes a month after the ghost kitchen company cut 5% of its workforce in early May.
A current operations manager said Reef was looking for a fall guy for its operational issues and Beacham took the hit. "Although not a great leader, Michael did not singlehandedly make every poor decision for the company," the manager said. "There are more leadership roles than actual working roles at the company, so until Reef starts cleaning house at the leadership level, we will keep seeing the same issues. It's a shame Michael is taking the backlash solo when so many people in leadership are directly responsible."
The manager asked to remain anonymous because they are not authorized to speak to the press, but their identity is known to Insider.
Beacham had decades of experience in the restaurant industry, previously holding executive positions for the parent companies of Olive Garden, Chuck E Cheese, and Hard Rock Cafe (where he and Rourke were coworkers). He started working at Reef in October 2020, a month before the Miami-based startup landed $700 million in funding led by SoftBank.
In February 2021, Beacham replaced Bruce Schroder as president of Reef. During his tenure, he oversaw massive growth at Reef, which operates mobile trailers that sell food for delivery through apps like DoorDash and Uber Eats.
Beacham was responsible for striking partnerships with high-profile restaurant chains like Burger King, Popeyes, and Subway, as well as celebrity-backed delivery-only brands like MrBeast Burger and Guy Fieri's Flavortown Kitchen.
Reef's mobile kitchen vessels are typically set up in parking lots managed by Reef, formerly known as ParkJockey. Reef grew from 100 kitchen vessels in late 2020 to 320 kitchen vessels operating in the US and globally in late 2021.
In January, Reef temporarily closed about one-third of its food trailers for underperforming. Around the same time, the company began stepping up its partnerships with large enterprise brands like Wendy's, which made more money compared to virtual brands.
But the startup's rapid growth has been hounded by operational chaos and missteps, as documented by Insider. The company has been caught operating trailers without permits in multiple US cities, has been cited for violating food safety protocols, and has been accused of stiffing vendors.
Most recently, Insider reported that real-estate firm JLL sued Reef, alleging nonpayment of invoices totaling about $3.5 million. This week, Reef filed a motion to dismiss the JLL suit, stating the complaint contains "numerous fatal flaws."
Are you a Reef Technology insider with insight to share? Got a tip? Contact this reporter via email at nluna@insider.com or via Signal encrypted number 714-875-6218 on a non-work device.
More: Reef Technology ghost kitchen food delivery | 2022-06-02T21:41:31Z | www.businessinsider.com | Reef Technology President Michael Beacham Out at Ghost Kitchen Startup | https://www.businessinsider.com/reef-technology-president-michael-beacham-ghost-kitchen-startup-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/reef-technology-president-michael-beacham-ghost-kitchen-startup-2022-6 |
Donald Trump can't say where 12 former executive assistants are; the NY AG is giving him 'til Friday to figure it out.
Donald Trump has until Friday to explain why he can't find 12 of his former executive assistants.
The AG in New York hopes to hear how they handled documents as part of a 3-year probe into Trump's business.
It's 'striking' that Trump's lawyers couldn't say where they are, the AG said in a court filing.
Donald Trump has until Friday to explain why he hasn't been able to locate 12 former executive assistants that the Attorney General in New York is hoping to hear from as she winds down her 3-year probe of the former president's business.
Failing to provide a judge with a good explanation could trigger a retroactive, $10,000-a-day contempt-of-court fine, costing the former president more than a quarter-million dollars in additional fines.
There are three agreed-upon hoops that the Trump legal team must yet jump through by Friday to keep the costly fine from being reinstated — backdated to May 7 . One is the requirement that former executive assistant Molly Michael sign an affidavit explaining how she kept Trump's documents.
Another hoop: finding those 12 executive assistants, or explaining why they can't be found.
"Counsel for Respondent Donald J. Trump will provide a supplemental affidavit or affirmation as to their efforts to contact the former executive assistants of Mr. Trump by June 3," according to a stipulation agreed to by both sides this week.
Andrew S. Amer, Special Counsel to AG Letitia James, wondered in another recent filing why they wouldn't have left forwarding addresses.
"Presumably, the Trump Organization has a last known address and contact number for each of these individuals," Amer wrote.
It's "insufficient" for Trump to merely claim that "attempts ... to contact them to obtain an affidavit were unsuccessful" without further explanation, Amer wrote. "
What specific steps were taken and when to reach each former executive assistant? Did any of them respond, and if so, what did they say?" he said he wants to know.
Trump's most longstanding executive assistant, Rhona Graff, was to be deposed by James' office on Tuesday as the final condition of the contempt order being lifted permanently and the fine capped at the current $110,000.
A lawyer handling the Trump document subpoena matter, Alina Habba, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
More: Letitia James Donald Trump executive assistant | 2022-06-02T23:12:02Z | www.businessinsider.com | Donald Trump Can't Say Where 12 of His Former Executive Assistants Are | https://www.businessinsider.com/donald-trump-cant-say-where-12-of-his-former-executive-assistants-are-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/donald-trump-cant-say-where-12-of-his-former-executive-assistants-are-2022-6 |
CHART: Facebook's new executive structure as Sheryl Sandberg exits and Javier Olivan takes over as COO
As Sheryl Sandberg leaves Facebook, a new executive structure is being put in place.
New COO Javier Olivan will have many more direct reports in the role.
The move is an effort to centralize parts of the company.
Sheryl Sandberg is leaving Facebook after 14 years as its chief operating officer and her exit is prompting broader changes to the executive reporting structure within the company.
Her successor, Javier Olivan, has been with the company for 15 years and will have almost twice as many direct reports as Sandberg had in the same role, Insider has learned. Olivan previously had several people reporting to him in his role as chief growth officer. He will be keeping essentially all direct reports, while adding most of those that previously reported to Sandberg, according to an analyst note from investment research firm Bernstein and Insider's own reporting.
Further changes to the way Facebook, which last year changed its name to Meta Platforms, is organized seem likely. Founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg hinted at as much in a note on the departure of Sandberg, saying his company has "reached the point where it makes sense for our product and business groups to be more closely integrated, rather than having all the business and operations functions organized separately from our products."
Having Olivan oversee nearly all top executives dealing with product, infrastructure, engineering and business appears to be a move toward a more combined structure. As COO Sandberg previously oversaw business, diversity, and strategic communications, as well as Instagram, while Olivan's oversight was almost entirely product-related.
There are a few other changes, too, Insider has learned. Lori Goler, Facebook's head of people, who previously reported to Sandberg, will now report directly to Zuckerberg. And Molly Culter, vice president of strategic response who previously reported to Sandberg, will now report to Naomi Gleit, the company's vice president of product management. She is another longtime Facebook employee, having joined in 2005.
For a complete comparison of Facebook's new executive reporting structure and its previous one, see the charts below: | 2022-06-02T23:12:20Z | www.businessinsider.com | Sheryl Sandberg's Exit From Facebook Prompts Reorganization for Successor Javier Olivan | https://www.businessinsider.com/sheryl-sandbergs-exit-from-facebook-prompts-reorganization-for-successor-javier-olivan-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/sheryl-sandbergs-exit-from-facebook-prompts-reorganization-for-successor-javier-olivan-2022-6 |
Biden says that America cannot fail to "act" on gun control after mass shootings: 'This time we must actually do something'
Biden's address comes as America confronts yet another mass shooting, this time in Oklahoma.
Senators are engaged in bipartisan talks about some limited legislation.
But Washington has failed to act after repeated mass shootings, including after Sandy Hook.
President Joe Biden on Thursday evening urged federal action to curb gun violence while outlining a list of policies he supports, a plea that comes as the nation confronts a series of mass shootings.
"After Columbine, after Sandy Hook, after Charleston, after Las Vegas, after Parkland, nothing has been done," Biden said during a rare prime-time address. "This time that can't be true. This time we must actually do something."
Biden drilled into the specifics on policies that he would support. He listed several ideas he said should become law, including expanded background checks, requiring gun owners to safely store their firearms, a federal "red flag" law, and repealing the liability protections for gun manufacturers.
The president also repeatedly went back to the theme that lawmakers cannot fail to act. "How much more carnage are we willing to accept?" Biden asked at one point.
"This is about protecting children, this about protecting families, this is about protecting whole communities," Biden said. "It's about protecting our freedom to go to school to go to a grocery store or church without being shot and killed."
Biden also renewed his call for a federal assault weapons ban that would include a limit on high-capacity magazines. He conceded that a renewed ban might fail, so he also re-upped his push for raising the age that anyone can legally purchase an AR-15 or similar style gun.
The US has seen a devastating spurt of mass shootings in recent weeks. Ten Black people were targeted during a racist massacre at Buffalo supermarket on May 14. Just days later, 19 elementary school students and two teachers were gunned down in Uvalde, Texas. And then on Wednesday evening, at least four people were killed when a gunman opened fire on a Tulsa, Oklahoma, medical center.
Democrats responded to the Buffalo and Uvalde shootings by pushing for federal action. Top Democrats have expressed cautious optimism about bipartisan talks while conceding that previous tragedies have failed to spur Congress to act.
Until Thursday night, Biden had largely left it to lawmakers to figure out a path forward. Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut, who has made passing gun legislation one of the focuses of his career, has led his party's talks with Republican senators such as John Cornyn of Texas and Susan Collins of Maine.
Biden said he supports those talks, but he made clear his frustrations with the modern Republican Party's near-complete opposition to even some limited gun control action at the federal level.
"My God the fact that a majority of the Senate Republicans don't want a majority of these proposals even to be debated or come up for a vote, I find unconscionable," he said.
Biden arrives to his speech in the White House cross hall. The hall is flanked by candles representing the 56 states and territories.
Biden himself has experienced this frustration firsthand. While he was vice president, President Barack Obama made him the point person on the federal response to the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting. But a bill to expand background checks failed on the Senate floor months later, a stinging defeat that Obama called a "pretty shameful day" after the vote. Their struggles were only exacerbated by the fact that four Democrats opposed the legislation.
During the 2020 primary season, Biden repeatedly bragged about beating the National Rifle Association, a reference to his role in passing a sweeping 1994 crime bill that included a federal assault weapons ban. The ban expired during George W. Bush's administration and there is little chance that Congress could pass it again.
Biden outlined that lawmakers are mostly focused on more limited measures like red flag laws, which generally allow for authorities to temporarily confiscate a person's firearms if they pose an immediate threat to themselves or others. Some Republicans Insider previously spoke to at the Capitol expressed openness to such legislation, but they stressed that it should be mainly left to individual states to act. Conservatives and gun rights groups have previously opposed some state red flag laws over concerns that there were not enough due process protections for gun owners.
Any new law would effectively need 60 votes in the Senate to pass due to the chamber's filibuster. This means that Democrats must find at least 10 Republicans to back any measure.
More: Joe Biden White House Guns gun violence | 2022-06-03T00:44:56Z | www.businessinsider.com | Biden Urges Federal Action on Gun Violence in Prime-Time Address | https://www.businessinsider.com/biden-urges-action-on-gun-violence-in-prime-time-address-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/biden-urges-action-on-gun-violence-in-prime-time-address-2022-6 |
"Ghost guns" are displayed at the headquarters of the San Francisco Police Department in San Francisco, on Nov. 27, 2019.
AP Photo/Haven Daley, File
The House will soon vote on a package of gun safety bills called the "Protecting Our Children Act."
One bill would raise the buying age for some firearms from 18 to 21. Senators are also negotiating.
The measures come as Biden begs Congress to finally act to control gun violence.
The recent spate of deadly shootings has pushed Congress once again to try to take action on a host of gun-safety measures. The latest attempt at controlling America's gun violence comes as Biden begs Congress to finally act on it.
The House will in the coming days vote on an expansive gun-control package called the "Protecting Our Children Act." And House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has also said there will soon be a hearing on legislation to ban "assault weapons." More limited bipartisan measures are under negotiation in the 50-50 Senate, where anti-gun-control Republicans are likely to block more aggressive action.
"Saving our children can and must be a unifying mission for our nation," Pelosi wrote in a letter Thursday to Democrats. "To all those in the Congress who would stand in the way of saving lives: your political survival is insignificant compared to the survival of our children."
The action follows mass shootings last month that killed 10 mostly Black people in a racist rampage at a Buffalo, New York supermarket, and 19 children and two teachers at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas. On Wednesday, five people were killed on the campus of a Tulsa, Oklahoma hospital, including the gunman who shot himself.
Pelosi noted that House Democrats have already passed legislation to expand background checks for gun sales. The Senate has not taken up the legislation. The latest package of bills coming from the House also faces tough prospects in the evenly-divided Senate, but Democrats are still pushing them in part to put their Republican colleagues on the record for opposing gun safety measures.
"For the children we've lost, for the children we can save, for the nation we love, let's hear the call and the cry," President Joe Biden said Thursday. "Let's meet the moment. Let us finally do something."
Here's a look at the measures under consideration and what's ahead:
Raising the purchase age for semi-automatic rifles to 21
The House will vote next week on the Protecting Our Children Act package, which would raise the purchasing age for semi-automatic rifles from 18 to 21, limit access to high-capacity magazines, and ban bump stocks for civilian use. Bump stocks use the recoil of a semiautomatic firearm to rapidly pull the trigger and mimic fully automatic firing.
Purchases of ghost guns, or homemade guns that are assembled from parts, would be subjected to existing firearm regulations and new federal offenses would be established for gun trafficking and straw purchasers.
Another measure in the package would create criminal penalties for violating requirements for the residential storage of firearms.
'Red Flag' bill to remove firearms from people who pose a danger to themselves and others
The House will also vote next week on the Federal Extreme Risk Protection Order Act, a federal "Red Flag" legislation that would allow family members and law enforcement to seek a court order to temporarily remove access to firearms for those who pose a danger to themselves or others. It would also encourage states to enact their own "extreme risk" laws. Nineteen states and the District of Columbia currently have extreme risk protection orders in place.
The legislation is proposed by Rep. Lucy McBath, a Georgia Democrat who lost her son to gun violence, and Rep. Salud Carbajal, a California Democrat, whose sister took her own life with a gun.
Lindsey Graham, a former Senate Judiciary Committee chairman, introduced similar legislation in the past, saying "it seeks to balance the Second Amendment rights of the individual with concerns from law enforcement and family members about those who may be experiencing a mental health crisis."
—Steny Hoyer (@LeaderHoyer) May 25, 2022
Creating an Amber-alert style notification for mass shootings
In her letter to colleagues, Pelosi said the House will also consider legislation to create an "AMBER Alert-style notification" in the event of a mass shooting.
This bill — dubbed the Active Shooter Alert Act — introduced by Reps. David Cicilline, a Rhode Island Democrat, and Fred Upton, a Michigan Republican, will be brought to the floor "in the weeks ahead," she said.
"I've talked to my law enforcement at home in Michigan and they support this," Upton said in a statement. "It's a way that they can be there to respond to the scene and get innocent people out of the area to safety.
Rep. David N. Cicilline, a Rhode Island Democrats speaks during a House Judiciary Committee mark up hearing on gun safety measures on June 02, 2022 in Washington, DC.
'Assault weapons' ban
Pelosi said the House will "soon" hold a hearing on legislation to ban "assault weapons," or military-style weapons that Congress banned in 1994. Congress allowed the ban to expire a decade later, in 2004.
Pelosi said the ban "was proven to save lives and one that the American people support today." During the time of the ban, some researchers have found, gun massacres dropped by as much 37% but rose by 183% in the decade after the prohibition expired.
Two overlapping bipartisan groups of senators are discussing measures that include red flag laws, expanding background checks, school safety measures, and mental health resources.
Sen. Chris Murphy, the Connecticut Democrat who pleaded with his colleagues to do something after the Uvalde shooting, is at the helm of the negotiations.
In a Fox News op-ed, Murphy, a leading gun-control advocate since the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newton, Connecticut, wrote on Wednesday that he acknowledges that he will need to accept a smaller set of reforms than he would prefer to find common ground.
"My desire is simple – to find a way for Republicans and Democrats to come together around a small but meaningful set of changes to our nation's gun laws, along with major investments in mental health, that will make it less likely that another Sandy Hook or Uvalde ever happens again," he wrote.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has signaled he's willing to work with Democrats on gun safety legislation but has not said which measure he'd endorse.
More: Uvalde Buffalo robb elementary school Guns
bump stocks | 2022-06-03T00:44:56Z | www.businessinsider.com | The Gun Safety Measures Congress Is Considering | https://www.businessinsider.com/gun-control-safety-bills-congress-tulsa-uvalde-buffalo-mass-shootings-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/gun-control-safety-bills-congress-tulsa-uvalde-buffalo-mass-shootings-2022-6 |
Brad Smith, Microsoft's president, said the company respects its employees' "legal right to choose whether to form or join a union."
On May 23, the quality-assurance workers' vote to form a union passed, making it the first labor union in the video-gaming industry , the Guardian reported. Microsoft said it wouldn't obstruct any efforts at unionization, per the article.
"Rather than manage that in a contentious way, we'd rather address those kinds of situations in a constructive and amicable way that lets employees make informed choices and that avoid public disputes that we think can be unconstructive, at least for our company and our culture," Smith said in an interview with The Washington Post.
More: Microsoft Brad Smith unionization Activision Blizzard | 2022-06-03T05:20:37Z | www.businessinsider.com | Microsoft Opens up to Unions and Breaks Ranks With Other Tech Firms | https://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-collaborate-labor-union-breaks-ranks-other-tech-firms-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-collaborate-labor-union-breaks-ranks-other-tech-firms-2022-6 |
Rep. Matt Gaetz speaks during a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Thursday.
Rep. Matt Gaetz blasted "red flag" gun laws even though they've been touted by GOP lawmakers.
Gaetz and other GOP members of the Judiciary House Committee said such laws are easily exploited.
The Florida congressman said Republican senators who back such laws would "betray" their voters.
Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz said on Thursday that any Republican senator in favor of "red flag" laws for guns would "betray" their voters and the US Constitution.
His opposition to red flag laws — a measure previously backed by former President Donald Trump and many Republican lawmakers — was raised during the Judiciary House Committee's debate on a gun safety bill to address the recent surge in high-casualty gun violence.
"Let the message from this committee hearing to Republican senators be astonishingly clear," Gaetz said to the camera. "If you back red flag laws as some reflexive response to some emotion that you have, you betray your voters."
"You are a traitor to the Constitution, the Second Amendment, the Fifth Amendment, you do nothing to make mass shootings less likely," he added.
Gaetz said red flag laws would "put a target on the back" of constituents "to be subjected to bizarre proceedings" that impact their rights. "And these will be abused, they are being abused," he added.
Gaetz, who sits on the committee, tabled an amendment declaring that Congress "disfavors the enactment" of red flag laws, writing that they "trample on an individual's due process and Second Amendment rights."
Red flag laws, enacted individually by states, typically allow family members, law enforcement, medical officers, or school authorities to seek quick court intervention over a person they believe is a gun threat to themselves or others.
Next week, Congress will address another act covering federal red flag laws.
Thursday's debated bill, however, mainly focused on raising the purchase age for semi-automatic rifles from 18 to 21 and restricting high-capacity ammunition magazines.
Republican representatives on the committee, including Rep. Jim Jordan (R-TX) and Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), rallied behind Gaetz's amendment on Thursday, arguing that red flag laws could easily be exploited.
They warned that the speed at which a reported person can be barred from owning a gun means there's not enough time for a proper investigation or due process.
For example, someone seeking revenge on an ex-lover could have their guns stripped from them, removing the latter's ability to defend themselves, Gaetz said.
'Spare me the bullshit'
Responding to Gaetz's proposed amendment, the committee's chair, New York Rep. Jerrold Nadler, said it wouldn't make sense for the amendment to "declare" what Congress disfavors because the House of Representatives hasn't even voted on the matter yet.
Democrat lawmakers in the committee also pointed out that Florida — the state Gaetz represents — already has a red flag gun law following the 2018 Parkland school shooting, and that the Trump administration also supported such legislation.
"You know who didn't have due process? You know who didn't have their constitutional right to life respected? The kids at Parkland, at Sandy Hook, in Uvalde, in Buffalo, and the list goes on and on," Rhode Island Rep. David Cicilline said. "So spare me the bullshit about constitutional rights."
Rhode Island Rep. David Cicilline struck back at Gaetz's argument against red flag laws.
Cicilline said that red flag gun laws are modeled after the government's response to domestic abuse cases and that they involve enough due process for the reporting system to be fair.
Gaetz's amendment failed to pass in a 24-18 vote along party lines. The bill, without his addition, received a 25-19 vote in favor of sending it to the House floor next week.
It's likely to pass in the House of Representatives, where Democrat lawmakers hold the majority, but whether the legislature will survive a Republican-led Senate is still in question.
The stance held by Gaetz and his GOP colleagues also comes as President Joe Biden on Thursday urged lawmakers to act on gun control. A federal red-flag law was among the legislation he supported.
"How much more carnage are we willing to accept?" he asked during his televised address.
More: insider news Matt Gaetz Politics Gun Control | 2022-06-03T06:52:11Z | www.businessinsider.com | Matt Gaetz Brands Any GOP Senator Supporting Red Flag Laws a 'Traitor' | https://www.businessinsider.com/red-flag-gun-laws-matt-gaetz-republican-senators-traitor-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/red-flag-gun-laws-matt-gaetz-republican-senators-traitor-2022-6 |
Airlines are struggling to hire enough maintenance workers — and it could wallop them just as they bounce back from the pandemic
Commercial airlines will need hundreds of thousands of new maintenance workers in the next two decades.
Airlines are facing a shortage of maintenance workers that's expected to worsen.
The shortage will mean higher costs for both airlines and consumers, experts say.
Maintenance companies are responding by raising wages and aggressively recruiting.
Commercial airlines, which are still recovering from a pandemic-induced historic drop in demand and coping with a shortage of pilots, are now facing a new issue: They don't have enough maintenance workers.
Experts told Insider that while this shortage didn't create a safety risk, it could result in longer wait times for routine maintenance, which would mean higher costs for airlines — costs they're likely to pass on to consumers via steeper fares.
Over the next five years, this lack of technical staff could be the biggest disruptor for the maintenance industry, a survey conducted by the consulting firm Oliver Wyman found. Over the next two decades, the industry will need 626,000 new maintenance technicians globally, 132,000 in North America alone, according to estimates Boeing released last year.
Line workers
The maintenance, repair, and overhaul, or MRO, industry consists of four main categories:
Line maintenance — workers who perform maintenance at airport gates.
Airframe — workers who maintain the structure of the aircraft.
Engine — workers who maintain aircraft's engines.
Components — workers who maintain the many parts of an aircraft that can come off and be replaced.
Most MRO jobs don't require a college degree, but they do demand an airframe and power plant, or A&P, certificate, which requires two years of technical school.
Half a century ago, airlines did their MRO work internally. These days, line maintenance is typically the only work airlines still do in-house, since it's critical to flights staying on time, with airlines outsourcing the rest of the maintenance work because it's cheaper. About 3,500 companies in the US handle the work, according to the market-research platform Statista.
The labor shortage has hit all sectors of the MRO industry, though independent players are struggling more than airlines, which can typically pay more and offer benefits like free flights.
It's also hitting all levels of talent, from entry-level workers to experienced ones, Bill Collins, the president of HAECO Americas, a third-party MRO firm in Greensboro, North Carolina, told Insider. Not as many people are coming into the field, and those who have many years of experience are taking higher salaries at airlines.
"We're bringing them in as quickly as they're leaving, but we're not able to get ahead, and what we're bringing in is much more junior talent," Collins said.
MRO workers scatter
Many MRO firms laid off workers during the pandemic when flight demand plummeted. Now that demand is rising, they need workers back, but many of them went to competitors or other industries.
"COVID has displaced workers. It's caused a great upheaval of skilled talent," Richard Brown, a managing director at the aerospace firm NAVEO Consultancy, told Insider.
MRO jobs often involve working overnight or weekend shifts outdoors in the elements. Mechanics could instead work at a car dealership with regular daytime hours Monday through Friday and get paid just as much, Jonathan Berger, a managing director at Alton Aviation Consultancy, told Insider.
Aviation is also not seen as stable an industry as it once was, Berger said. Over the past 15 years or so, airlines have typically made very little to no profit, and many have gone bankrupt.
"Aviation is not quite as sexy as it used to be," Berger said.
Another factor is that fewer people are enrolling in A&P programs, according to Brian Prentice, a partner in the transportation and operations practices at Oliver Wyman. Mechanically inclined people are heading into space, electric vehicles, solar, telecom, renewable energy, and other industries looking for their talents.
Meanwhile, the MRO workforce is aging. As of a few years ago, the average age of a maintenance technician was late 50s, Prentice said. Many retired during the pandemic, though the number of aircraft on the market grew.
MROs raise wages, amp up recruiting
There's no single thing MRO firms can do to combat the shortage of talent, analysts agreed, but they're responding by raising wages, being more flexible with shift schedules, and recruiting more aggressively. Some are starting apprenticeship programs to train young workers or partnering with technical schools to get more people into A&P programs, Prentice said.
Sign-on bonuses are also becoming more common as an incentive. Matteo Peraldo, a director in the aerospace, defense, and aviation practice at AlixPartners, told Insider he'd heard of bonuses of up to $15,000 for experienced technicians.
Some MRO firms are also looking to create veteran programs to attract mechanics from the military.
"It's very effective because you hire people with 10,15, 20 years of experience on engine maintenance or airframe maintenance, so you can leverage them in different positions compared to the apprentices," Peraldo said.
Rising fares
The main result of the MRO labor shortage will be rising costs for airlines, which they'll pass on to consumers, analysts said.
"Ultimately, a lot of these things are going to have to be solved by increasing the wages, if that's what we need to compete," Brown said. "But if we do that, that has a real knock-on effect, ultimately, to you and I as passengers with how much we're going to pay on the ticket price."
More: Aviation Aerospace Commercial airline | 2022-06-03T09:54:22Z | www.businessinsider.com | More Expensive Plane Tickets Loom Amid Maintenance-Worker Shortage | https://www.businessinsider.com/airlines-face-maintenance-worker-labor-shortage-high-ticket-costs-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/airlines-face-maintenance-worker-labor-shortage-high-ticket-costs-2022-6 |
Tesla CEO Elon Musk at the Cybertruck launch in November 2019.
Elon Musk says Tesla AI Day has been delayed until September 30.
He tweeted that the electric car maker may have an "Optimus prototype" ready by then.
Musk said in May that AI Day aimed to convince top tech talent to join Tesla.
Elon Musk has pushed back Tesla's AI Day to September 30 from the planned date of August 19.
This will be the second time the electric car maker has held such an event.
Last year's AI Day aimed to lure top talent to the company, Musk said, but also provided insight into Tesla's progress toward fully autonomous cars.
This year's event should be very similar, as Musk said in May the purpose of AI Day is to convince great AI, software and chip talent to join Tesla.
The tech mogul said that the 2022 day could see "an Optimus prototype working by then."
Optimus, a human-sized robot Musk envisions will be able to perform common tasks like grocery shopping, was unveiled at the first AI Day.
Musk said in April on Tesla's first-quarter results call, according to CNBC: "I was surprised that people do not realize the magnitude of the Optimus robot program. Those who are insightful or who listen carefully will understand that Optimus ultimately will be worth more than the car business and worth more than full self-driving. That's my firm belief."
Tesla has been contacted for comment.
Musk recently issued an ultimatum to the company's staff, telling all workers to start coming into the office full-time and stop "phoning it in" or quit.
He said on the podcast Recode Decode in 2018 that his work at Tesla and SpaceX sometimes led him to sleep on the Tesla factory floor and work for more than 120 hours a week. He later reduced that to between 80 hours and 90 hours a week.
Musk believes that COVID-19 stay-at-home measures had "tricked people into thinking they don't actually need to work hard," he said in a tweet.
The Wall Street Journal reported that Musk no longer plans to fund his $44 billion takeover of Twitter with Tesla shares after its stock fell by about a third this year.
More: Elon Musk Weekend BI UK Tesla Twitter
AI day | 2022-06-03T09:54:34Z | www.businessinsider.com | Elon Musk Says Tesla's AI Day Has Been Pushed Back to September | https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-tesla-ai-day-pushed-to-september-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-tesla-ai-day-pushed-to-september-2022-6 |
Coinbase said on Thursday that it was withdrawing some job offers and freezing hiring indefinitely.
Coinbase sent the emails to affected candidates on Thursday evening.
Read the full text of the email that one recipient has slammed as "unprofessional."
Coinbase, one of the world's largest cryptocurrency exchanges, sent mass emails to alert some job candidates who had already accepted job offers that the company was withdrawing those offers.
At least one recipient has slammed the missive as "unprofessional."
Coinbase's Chief People Officer L.J. Brock said in a Thursday blog post that the company was rescinding some job offers and hitting pause on hiring, citing a need to "navigate this macro environment and emerge even stronger."
Coinbase became the first crypto company to enter the Fortune 500 earlier this year with revenues of more than $7.8 billion for the fiscal year 2021, CoinDesk reported last month.
But a recent cryptocurrency slump weighed on Coinbase's fortunes. Bitcoin prices are down by more than half since peaking in November, and investors have cooled on crypto, Bloomberg reported on Thursday. As a result, the company's share price hit rock bottom in May and, after bouncing back, is still 80% from when it debuted, per the article.
The email, a copy of which was seen by Insider, was sent on Thursday evening. It was titled "Update to your Coinbase offer."
One recipient who was supposed to start with Coinbase in late June told Insider he emailed Coinbase right after reading the letter. He then received a call from a Coinbase human resources manager soon after sending his response out. The recipient asked not to be named for fear of how it would impact his future job prospects.
According to the recipient, the manager said that the company had to make a "prudent decision" to prepare for the "foreseeable future," which was why it withdrew its job offer to him.
"What do they mean by their future?" he told Insider. "Do they not see my own foreseeable future that's now uncertain?"
Coinbase promised recipients would receive two months' salary as severance pay, per the email.
It also said it would set up a "Talent Hub with resources and services" to support recipients in their "transition to new employment."
The recipient told Insider that he was angry at how impersonal Coinbase's response was.
"They told me they're going offer me training to help me find new jobs," he said. "I don't need that shit. The way they handled this, it was very unprofessional."
"I'm very bitter with how there were no details and lack of documentation over how they came to this decision," he told Insider.
Coinbase did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comments on Friday morning. It is unclear how many prospective Coinbase employees received the email.
Read the full text of the letter that Coinbase reportedly sent to those who had their job offers withdrawn (bold text reflects the emphasis in the original email).
From: Coinbase People Update
Date: Thurs, Jun 2, 2022 at 5:50 PM
Subject: Update to your Coinbase offer
Today we shared an announcement on our blog that includes some significant updates to our hiring plans in response to rapidly changing market conditions.
I regret to inform you that as a result we have made the very difficult decision to rescind your offer of employment at Coinbase. As such, you will no longer be starting with us on your previously agreed start date.
We understand that this is a very disappointing update to receive at this stage of the process. While it's necessary to slow our headcount growth in light of the macro environment, we deeply regret the impact this has for you and for your experience with Coinbase. I want to be clear that this decision is not a reflection of our regard for your talent or the incredible contributions we believe you would have brought to our team.
As an acknowledgement of the significant inconvenience to you, and to help offset the financial impact of this decision, we are offering a severance payment of 2 months salary. We are also committing additional support via a dedicated talent hub to help provide high quality job search benefits.
A member of our talent team will follow up with you via email to arrange a 1:1 discussion.
You will receive a severance agreement by the end of next week.
We will be establishing a Talent Hub with resources and services to support your transition to new employment. These services include, but are not limited to; job placement support, resume review, interview coaching and access to our strong industry connections.
I want to thank you for the time and effort you have dedicated to Coinbase throughout our recruitment process and apologize for this disappointing outcome. We are honored that you chose Coinbase and that you see a future for yourself helping to build the next generation of crypto products. We hope to stay in contact and are eager to reach out in the future when new opportunities arise.
L.J. Brock
More: Coinbase Cryptocurrencies cryptocurrency | 2022-06-03T09:54:52Z | www.businessinsider.com | Read the Email Coinbase Sent En Masse to Withdraw Job Offers | https://www.businessinsider.com/read-email-coinbase-sent-en-masse-to-withdraw-job-offers-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/read-email-coinbase-sent-en-masse-to-withdraw-job-offers-2022-6 |
Ben Winck and Joseph Zeballos-Roig
Business leaders, politicians, and economists are split on how a looming recession could look.
One group sees the US sliding into a crippling downturn, while others think the recession will be mild.
Here are both sides of the biggest debate facing the US economy.
Talk about an economic downturn has only grown louder in the past six months: Republican lawmakers, JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon, and even Coldplay's Chris Martin have all brought up the possibility of a recession in the near future.
But all things considered, the American economy is fairly strong at the moment. The labor market is historically hot, with wages climbing at the fastest pace in decades and plenty of jobs to go around. But inflation stands to squander the progress made over the past two years. Prices are climbing at the fastest pace since the 1980s, forcing the Federal Reserve to aggressively lift interest rates in hopes of slowing demand.
The central bank is trying to engineer a "soft landing," a win-win situation in which inflation cools but unemployment remains low. Pulling one off is a difficult thing to do, and if the Fed errs, it could slow the economy more than anticipated and throw the country into a self-inflicted downturn.
More and more experts expect a recession to hit the US in the next 12 months. Yet what the slump will look like has become a topic of furious debate.
In one corner: 'Hurricane' warnings about the state of the economy blamed on persistent inflation
A growing cast of figures is sounding the alarm on a major recession that can set the recovery back with huge layoffs and weak spending.
Many pin the blame on Biden's $1.9 trillion stimulus law for flooding the economy with cash, boosting demand while supply chains were still snarled due to the pandemic.
Former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers was among the first liberal-leaning economists to sound the alarm. As the stimulus package made its way through Congress, he warned that it risked triggering inflation by overheating the economy. Now, he believes a recession is possible within the next two years due to a combination of stubborn inflation and low unemployment.
"I think that we need to recognize that a soft landing is going to be very difficult in these circumstances," Summers told the Washington Post last week.
In addition, Republicans in Congress are assailing the White House for rising prices bedeviling Americans just about everywhere they turn. With voters expressing pessimism about the state of the economy in numerous surveys, the GOP is hoping to ride that distress back into power in the November midterms.
Others, though, like Tesla CEO Elon Musk are going further. He says the US is in a recession right now. That doesn't seem to be the case at the moment since the economy is still growing.
JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon is warning of an economic "hurricane" that's headed for the American economy. "Right now it's kind of sunny, things are doing fine. Everyone thinks the Fed can handle this," he said this week. "That hurricane is right out there down the road coming our way."
In the other corner: Forecasts of a mild downturn that won't harm Americans' strong financial position
Not all recession outlooks call for a crippling downturn. Some of the loudest voices in economic forecasting see a much more shallow recession on the horizon. Others are still hopeful the US can avoid a slump entirely.
The first economists on Wall Street to forecast a recession are fairly optimistic. Deutsche Bank economists led by Matthew Luzzetti penciled in a 2023 downturn in April, arguing the Fed's efforts to rein in inflation will slow growth to a halt. Still, the recession will be a "mild" one, and not like the downturns of 2008 and 2020, the team added.
"The type of recession we're looking at is not like a serious, massive downturn in consumer spending across the board," Brett Ryan, a senior US economist at Deutsche Bank, told Insider in May.
Bank of America followed with a similar projection in April, saying an "inflation shock" will drag on the economy in late 2022. Yet there are "no strong signs of overleverage" in the economy, Alex Lin, a senior US economist at BofA, told Insider. As such, households are in much stronger positions to ride out an economic slowdown compared to the Great Recession.
Americans' spending has also held strong throughout the inflation surge. That's yet another sign the recovery can push forward unscathed, Jason Furman, a former top economist in the Obama administration and an economics professor at Harvard, told The Harvard Gazette in an interview published May 11.
Spending counts for about two-thirds of all economic activity, making it a critical fuel for the recovery. With demand showing little sign of easing, growth is likely to push forward, Furman said.
"I'm relatively unworried about a recession over the next year because consumer spending has continued to be very strong," he added.
Fed Chair Jerome Powell has repeatedly pointed to the labor market's strength as a sign the US can weather higher interest rates. Job creation continued to surpass the pre-crisis trend through April and the unemployment rate remains at historic lows, signaling the economy doesn't need as much pandemic-era support to keep recovering. Avoiding a recession will be "a challenging task," but the US can still pull off a "soft or soft-ish landing," the Fed chair said in May.
President Joe Biden has maintained a rosy outlook for the US, which isn't too surprising since his party's political ambitions hinge on the economy continuing to heal. The president said in a May 23 press conference that he doesn't think a recession is inevitable, and that the US's recovery has built a healthy buffer for the economy as the Fed fights inflation.
"We have problems that the rest of the world has, but less consequential than the rest of the world has because of our internal growth and strength," Biden said at a press conference in Tokyo. "This is going to be a haul. This is going to take some time." | 2022-06-03T11:25:57Z | www.businessinsider.com | Recession Debate: Predictions From Wall Street, Economists, Politicians Differ | https://www.businessinsider.com/recession-outlook-debate-inflation-economic-downturn-forecast-federal-reserve-recovery-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/recession-outlook-debate-inflation-economic-downturn-forecast-federal-reserve-recovery-2022-6 |
Twitter is building new features including a version of Google Alerts despite Musk takeover uncertainty
Elon Musk is yet to complete his $44 billion offer for Twitter.
Twitter is building new features, including one similar to Google Alerts.
The feature was discovered by a developer who published screenshots on Twitter.
It comes despite a hiring freeze, internal reshuffle and potential takeover by Elon Musk.
Twitter is building new features, including one similar to Google Alerts despite the uncertainty caused by Elon Musk's takeover offer.
"Search Subscribe", first spotted by developer Dylan Roussel and reported by 9to5Google, will allow users to subscribe to search results. They will then receive push notifications for tweets relating to the query, similar to Google Alerts send to an email inbox.
The feature is not yet available but Roussel managed to enable it, according to 9to5Google.
In screenshots posted on Twitter, Roussel shows a bell icon to the right of the search bar after searching in the Twitter app. After hitting this button, he was signed up to receive push notifications from that search term.
https://twitter.com/evowizz/status/1531753374047260674
Users can already receive search notifications via TweetDeck by turning on alerts for specific columns, as noted by 9to5Google. Bringing the feature in-app would be an innovation, however.
Roussel added that he is yet to receive a notification, suggesting the feature is still a work in progress or only sends notifications periodically to avoid constant updates.
The developer also spotted a "Notes" tab on his profile, sitting next to "Tweets & Replies". Its functionality remains unclear.
Twitter is also testing chronological timelines in its Communities feature despite employees being told to scale down long-term plans including communities, according to Bloomberg.
It comes as Twitter was plunged into turmoil following the apparent takeover by Musk and an internal shake-up.
The company announced a hiring freeze in May, following the exit of two top executives, including the consumer product lead. A subsequent reshuffle of this team will shift focus to user growth and personalization and away from audio spaces, newsletter, communities, Bloomberg reported.
Musk has "alienated" employees, Bloomberg said, by publically criticizing the company's speech and harassment policies. In posts it reviewed, many of the 446 comments sparked by an employee asking others if they were "excited" to have Musk on board were negative, Bloomberg reported.
The SpaceX and Tesla owner continues to delay the $44 billion deal over the number of bots on the platform. A Twitter shareholder has sued Musk for market manipulation after he claimed the deal was "on hold".
Twitter did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.
More: Elon Musk Twitter Tech BI Tech | 2022-06-03T11:26:09Z | www.businessinsider.com | Twitter Is Building New Features Including a Version of Google Alerts | https://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-new-features-google-alerts-despite-chaos-musk-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-new-features-google-alerts-despite-chaos-musk-2022-6 |
A 2018 survey found that about one in three Americans between 18 and 29 reported having student debt.
President Joe Biden could cancel $10,000 worth of student-loan debt for certain borrowers.
This would free up income for current and aspiring business owners with debt.
But people considering starting a business still need to consider other factors, an expert said.
President Joe Biden's loan-forgiveness plan could include $10,000 in relief for federal borrowers who made under $150,000 in the previous year, three people familiar with the matter told The Washington Post last week.
As part of his presidential campaign, Biden pledged to enact widespread student-debt forgiveness. In 2020, borrowers had $1.5 trillion in federal student-loan debt, three times the total of about $516 billion in 2007, according to the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, an education and entrepreneurship nonprofit.
Biden hasn't made an announcement, but loan forgiveness could provide more disposable income for entrepreneurs with student-loan debt, said Philip Gaskin, the foundation's vice president of entrepreneurship. After all, some entrepreneurs have had to slow or stop their business operations because of debt, while others have found it difficult to secure business loans because of their credit scores.
"Paying back student-loan debt requires a steady and predictable income, and starting your own business is inherently riskier than taking a job that already exists," Gaskin said.
Here's what Biden's plan would mean for young people looking to scale or start their own businesses, according to Gaskin.
Student debt affects entrepreneurs
Young people are gravitating toward entrepreneurship thanks, in part, to the fact that some successful influencers are earning more than America's top CEOs. However, a Pew analysis of a 2018 Federal Reserve survey found that about one in three Americans between 18 and 29 reported having student debt.
Gaskin said this is a hurdle for entrepreneurial hopefuls, especially Gen Zers and millennials.
"The concern around paying off student-loan debt can both potentially dampen hope or future confidence in starting a business and impact a person's ability to infuse capital into their business," Gaskin said.
It's one of the best times to open a business thanks to virtual work and online platforms that reduce startup costs. Gaskin said this means that reducing student debt for borrowers could make it easier for them to get a business up and running.
Reduced debt could free up income for entrepreneurs
If Biden were to cancel $10,000 in student debt for certain borrowers, those borrowers would have more disposable income to put toward current and future businesses, Gaskin said, adding that the creation of more businesses could help the economy.
"Providing more opportunities to encourage entrepreneurship can have incredible impacts on local economies," Gaskin said. "More new businesses mean more opportunities to create jobs and help communities build generational wealth."
But he added that having more money to invest in a business isn't the only factor in success. Young people need to assess their risks and access to capital before committing to a new venture. Gaskin said they should also first gain some professional work experience.
Having less student debt "has the potential to take a small amount of risk out of starting a new business for aspiring entrepreneurs, but it doesn't remove the risk entirely," he said.
More: Entrepreneurship Small Business Student Loan Debt student loan crisis
Millennails | 2022-06-03T12:56:53Z | www.businessinsider.com | How Biden's Student-Loan Plan Could Help Entrepreneurs | https://www.businessinsider.com/biden-student-loan-plan-entrepreneurship-budgeting-for-business-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/biden-student-loan-plan-entrepreneurship-budgeting-for-business-2022-6 |
Industry insiders say the biggest risk of Broadcom's $61 billion acquisition of VMware is a 'brain drain' from a talent exodus
Rosalie Chan
Broadcom plans to acquire VMware for $61 billion, and analysts say there could be a talent exodus.
Broadcom said in an investor presentation that it would cut "duplicative" functions at VMware.
Customers are also worried about retention of tech talent and salespeople.
Any deal as big as Broadcom's planned $61 billion acquisition of the software maker VMware comes with challenges. While many analysts expect the deal to pass regulatory scrutiny, the biggest risk for Broadcom may be a VMware talent exodus after the acquisition, analysts and customers say.
Broadcom said in a conference call on May 26 that it was acquiring VMware in large part because of its team. VMware's chief people officer, Betsy Sutter, also told employees at a town hall that day that Broadcom is "very interested in our talent."
"One of the reasons we became very interested in VMware was because of its world-class team, engineering-centric culture, and strong customer and partner relationships," Broadcom CEO Hock Tan said on the call.
But churn tends to be high after a company gets acquired, and Broadcom has already made clear its plans to cut costs at VMware, which could mean layoffs.
Broadcom said in an investor presentation that as part of its plan to increase VMware's profitability, it would be "eliminating duplicative general & administrative functions across information technology, finance, legal, human resources and facilities." And on TheLayoff.com, people anonymously expressed fears about layoffs at VMware.
"Turnover in IT is generally pretty high, and in other tech companies we've observed it exacerbated by such an event, as some personnel are concerned about future culture and roles," said Andrew Lerner, a vice president and analyst at Gartner. "So we would expect a 'brain drain' with almost any tech-vendor acquisition."
Layoffs could harm VMware's customer relationships
Some customers are skeptical of the deal overall — one customer of both companies told Insider that some view Broadcom as a "retirement home for companies" that will stifle innovation. Other customers, particularly smaller ones, have said they're worried about not getting the same quality of support they're getting from VMware.
Departures or layoffs of salespeople, who're in contact with customers the most, could affect relationships with customers.
"With these larger companies, when sales are down especially, that's what they do," said Todd Rychecky, the vice president of sales at the networking company Opengear.
Jeff DeVerter, the chief technology evangelist at the cloud company Rackspace, a customer of VMware and Broadcom, said he hopes Broadcom will work hard to retain VMware's "amazing tech talent."
"Uncertainty can breed anxiousness about employment," DeVerter said. "There's no telling what's going on in the brain, but hopefully it has good retention. They need to make sure their most valuable assets will stick around, that engineers stick around."
'I wouldn't be surprised if there is a lot of churn'
Any VMware teams that perform the same functions as Broadcom could be laid off. Dan Morgan, a trust-portfolio manager at the financial-services firm Synovus, said that in mergers, the acquiring company will often clean out "duplicative operations" to get "leaner and meaner."
"If I were a VMware employee and I was in an area that would be duplicated with what is already existing with the Broadcom software segment, I think there would be some risk there," Morgan said.
What's more, cuts that Broadcom makes could affect product lines that are not yet mature, said Naveen Chhabra, a senior analyst at Forrester. Broadcom would likely look at VMware's offerings and prioritize investing in the tools that generate more revenue.
Chhabra said that even if employees don't get laid off, they'll likely start looking elsewhere.
"It is very typical of any acquisition that employee confidence goes down, especially when there is apparently no real visible synergy between the acquiring company and the acquired company," Chhabra said. "I wouldn't be surprised if there is a lot of churn."
Do you work at VMware? Got a tip? Contact this reporter via email at rmchan@insider.com, Signal at 646.376.6106, or Telegram at @rosaliechan. (PR pitches by email only, please.) Other types of secure messaging available upon request.
More: Enterprise Software VMware Broadcom | 2022-06-03T12:56:59Z | www.businessinsider.com | Broadcom Acquisition Deal Could Lead to a VMware Talent Exodus | https://www.businessinsider.com/broadcom-vmware-acqusition-deal-risks-talent-exodus-brain-drain-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/broadcom-vmware-acqusition-deal-risks-talent-exodus-brain-drain-2022-6 |
Driverless taxis approved in California for the first time – but the rollout will be gradual
A passenger leaves a driverless Cruise taxi.
BaxTowner/Cruise
Autonomous car company Cruise is rolling out driverless taxis in San Francisco.
It has secured California's first driverless deployment permit.
Cruise joins an exclusive list of autonomous vehicle companies operating commercially.
Californians will soon be able to hail a driverless taxi for the first time.
Autonomous car company Cruise is on track to operate driverless taxis in San Francisco after winning California's first driverless deployment permit on Thursday.
The permit allows it to charge passengers for the driverless rides, chief operating officer Gil West announced in a blog post.
The public has been able test Cruise's vehicles since February but can now pay to get picked up without anyone behind the wheel.
West said moving into commercial operations was a major milestone for the autonomous vehicle industry: "And it's a giant leap for our mission here at Cruise to save lives, help save the planet, and save people time and money."
The rollout will be gradual, he added.
There has long been a buzz around driverless cars. More than $100 billion has been invested in autonomous vehicle technology since 2010, according to McKinsey.
Such vehicles are fitted with an array of technology including radar sensors, cameras, and AI-driven object recognition to ensure safety.
Autonomous vehicles are expected to help reduce congestion, decrease the number of crashes, and make cars more accessible for those who can't drive.
This could be the year that the potential of driverless cars is realised as Cruise joins an exclusive list of companies operating commercially. In May, competitor Argo AI launched its operations in Miami and Austin.
Waymo, Google's driverless car company, has been offering rides in the suburbs of Phoenix, Arizona, for years. It announced in March that it was expanding to downtown Phoenix and to San Francisco for Waymo employees.
NOW WATCH: We tested BMW's largest SUV to see if its tech features are helpful or gimmicky — here's the verdict
More: electric vehicle driverless cars Tech BI Tech | 2022-06-03T12:57:05Z | www.businessinsider.com | Driverless Taxis Approved in California for the First Time | https://www.businessinsider.com/driverless-taxis-california-for-the-first-time-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/driverless-taxis-california-for-the-first-time-2022-6 |
5 companies Microsoft could buy as it tries to become an ad powerhouse
GERARD JULIEN/AFP via Getty Images
Microsoft is trying to become the next big advertising company.
The tech giant has lots of holes to fill in streaming TV, gaming, and business-to-business advertising.
Insider identified five companies that Microsoft could buy to build its ad business.
In 2021, Microsoft stepped up its investment in its advertising business with the pending $1 billion acquisition of adtech platform Xandr. But the tech giant, which made $10 billion in ad revenue last year, has suggested that it's not done shopping yet.
"There are scenarios where we can grow organically, and candidly, there are areas where we will have to grow inorganically," Rob Wilk, corporate VP of Microsoft advertising, said at Luma's Digital Media Summit in New York in May.
Wilk wants to get the ad industry to take notice of Microsoft's entire ad offering, not just its core search business that it has run for years. Microsoft also sells e-commerce, streaming TV, gaming, and business-to-business ads.
Industry experts named five companies Microsoft could buy to supercharge its ad business.
Microsoft referred Insider to its statement about acquiring Xandr in December 2021. None of the companies named as potential acquisition targets were immediately available for comment.
Bolstering its streaming TV ad capabilities could be Microsoft's top priority
Microsoft's first priority could be streaming TV since it's one of the fastest growing sectors in the industry. Xandr manages some streaming TV ad spend but trails competitors like The Trade Desk, said Jesse Redniss, a former WarnerMedia exec who used to work with the Xandr business when they were both owned by AT&T.
"I could see Microsoft wanting to bolster that capability first to position it as a market leader more," he added.
Sources named two TV-focused firms that Microsoft could acquire: Innovid and Magnite.
Innovid helps marketers buy and measure streaming TV ads and it would let Microsoft serve ads in streaming TV, said a VC investor who invests in the space but doesn't have a stake in Innovid.
This person said that Innovid has the added benefit of providing one of the industry's best offerings in shoppable ads, a format that Innovid helped pioneer. He added that shoppable ads are a must-have capability for Microsoft because direct-to-consumer brands use this ad format to drive sales.
Magnite helps a wide group of publishers of differing sizes sell ads in streaming TV apps and made $143 million from streaming TV in 2021. Two adtech CEOs said that it could be a potential acquisition for Microsoft. Acquiring Magnite would increase the number of publishers that Xandr works with.
Microsoft will need a video game adtech company to monetize its huge gaming inventory
Microsoft also has a stake in video game advertising. It's buying the game publisher Activision Blizzard, which sells ad space on its video games, and plans to build an in-game ad platform for XBox.
Buying a company like video game adtech startup Anzu would allow Microsoft to dynamically place ads inside games on digital objects like billboards, said Kevin Krim, CEO of streaming TV measurement platform EDO.
Microsoft could use this capability to monetize its massive library of games, which includes studios like Bethesda and Minecraft developer Mojang. It would get even more titles if the $68.7 billion Activision Blizzard acquisition goes through.
Microsoft needs B2B marketing tools to deepen its LinkedIn ad offering
LinkedIn is one of Microsoft's biggest assets in B2B marketing, having recorded more than $1 billion in advertising revenue in 2021, up 97% year-over-year.
If Microsoft integrated Xandr with LinkedIn, it could acquire Demandbase or Bombora to find new ways of reaching and targeting audiences, two adtech CEOs said.
Krim said Demandbase would give LinkedIn the tools to launch off-network ads like email ads and provide another way for B2B marketers to reach potential clients and hires. And Bombora could help advertisers target LinkedIn ads more effectively, Krim added. Bombora sells data about the products and services that companies research for.
But not everyone thinks Microsoft needs more acquisitions to bolster its advertising division. Industry analyst Ana Milicevic noted Microsoft already has a leading positions in things like B2B marketing and gaming.
"Microsoft is and has always been an advertising powerhouse," Milicevic said. "I'd say they can not only compete with Google and Amazon, they already are."
More: Microsoft Innovid Magnite | 2022-06-03T12:57:17Z | www.businessinsider.com | Microsoft: Potential Adtech Acquisitions That Could Grow Its Ad Business | https://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-potential-adtech-acquisitions-that-could-build-advertising-business-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-potential-adtech-acquisitions-that-could-build-advertising-business-2022-6 |
It's Friday — Phil Rosen here. I'm happy to report we've made it to the weekend, but that doesn't mean relief for global energy markets.
Crude oil prices continue to show volatility , and OPEC's big move may not be big enough to make a dent in the supply gap.
Launching Monday: If you dig this email, you'll love 10 Things on Wall Street, which will cover the biggest stories in banking, private equity, hedge funds, and fintech. Launching next week — sign up here.
1. OPEC+ announced a big boost to oil output Thursday. Even though it was larger than expected, the 648,000 barrel-per-day increase may not be enough to offset missing Russian barrels in the global market, according to the CEO of Hess.
The release comes as US crude inventories have slipped, with EIA data showing that current stockpiles are some 15% below the five-year average for this time of year.
Still, the OPEC+ announcement clears the way for Saudi Arabia to ramp up oil production to try and fill in for Russia's absence from the market. As concerns mount over a dire supply squeeze, sources told the Financial Times that the Kingdom is prepared to pump more crude.
Saudi Arabia is aware of the risks in oil markets, and "that it is not in their interests to lose control of oil prices," a source told the FT.
With China potentially easing COVID lockdowns, questionable Russian output, and soaring gas prices in the US, the White House faces a complex task.
And, closer to home, consumers are still wondering why gas prices keep rising even in times when crude oil falls from record highs.
(You can listen to me talk oil and OPEC+ today on The Refresh from Insider.)
A security surveillance camera is seen near the Microsoft office building in Beijing, July 20
Associated Press/Andy Wong
2. Stocks slipped premarket Friday morning following Thursday's volatile session. Futures for each of the major indexes dropped Tesla shares moved lower as Reuters reported Elon Musk wants to slash 10% of jobs at the EV maker. Here's the latest.
3. On the docket: North Bud Farms Inc is reporting earnings today, and keep an eye out for May employment data publishing later today.
4. Big-money investors are eyeing this handful of stocks this quarter, according to a Goldman Sachs analysis of over 1,300 funds. All together, the firms oversee $5.2 trillion in assets — see the list of nine stocks here.
5. The Fed isn't likely to pause its rate hikes anytime soon, Vice Chair Lael Brainard said Thursday. The economy still has a lot of momentum: "Right now, it's very hard to see the case for a pause."
6. Microsoft stock dropped after it cut its quarterly guidance on "unfavorable" currency moves. The tech giant isn't alone among multinational corporations in warning that a strengthening dollar can dent revenue or earnings. Here's what you want to know.
7. Hedge fund giant Tiger Global has reportedly lost 52% this year. Losses have piled up for the top firm thanks to the ongoing decline in tech stocks. In May alone, the fund dropped 14.2% — even though the Nasdaq only slipped 2% on the month.
8. This millennial saved enough money to quit his day job at 29. He explained why he didn't max out his 401(k) plan — and where he invested his money instead.
9. A 25-year Wall Street veteran said "choppy seas" are still ahead even as recession concerns ease. He laid out a growing risk heading into the summer that could send food prices through the roof — and four strategies to hedge these conditions.
10. It's getting more expensive to use your credit card. The Fed's fight against inflation is expected to lift credit card rates to record highs. That could result in shoppers paying thousands of dollars in interest and overextending themselves. | 2022-06-03T12:57:29Z | www.businessinsider.com | Opening Bell: OPEC Production Boost May Be Too Little | https://www.businessinsider.com/opening-bell-opec-production-boost-may-be-too-little-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/opening-bell-opec-production-boost-may-be-too-little-2022-6 |
A Black couple who retired early say there's a 'Black tax' on common wealth-building strategies
Kiersten and Julien Saunders left their corporate jobs before they turned 40.
They joined the Financial Independence/Retire Early (FIRE) community.
However, the couple didn't feel like the wealth-building strategies they learned accounted for their lived experience.
Kiersten and Julien Saunders first met at their corporate hospitality job, then got married a year and a half later. At the time, the couple subscribed to the idea of "Black excellence."
Julien says, "Black excellence is this term that we use to label anyone who is doing really well, or even just a term of endearment that is used whenever someone is shining brightly in an area where less may have been expected of them."
Kiersten and Julien both had six-figure corporate jobs in Atlanta that allowed them to travel all over the country. It looked glamorous from the outside, but the couple says their personal lives were strained. On their delayed honeymoon to South Africa, they still found themselves "work-obsessed," checking their phones "addictively."
Julien adds, "What we found is that the term" — Black excellence — "created a warped sense of existence, and it really led us to work as hard as we did. We wanted to be the example of the shining exception. We wanted to be the people who were able to do all of these amazing things, but unfortunately we just weren't paying attention to the toll that it took on us."
That's when they knew things had to change.
When the couple joined the FIRE movement, they said the community was 'mostly white'
Waking up to their workaholism, the couple became committed to "leaving the corporate treadmill" as early as possible. Julien learned about FIRE online first, but it wasn't until after their honeymoon that he seriously tried to convince Kiersten to start their early retirement journey.
True to the principles of the FIRE movement, which stands for Financial Independence/Retire Early, the couple started saving and investing aggressively in real estate and the stock market to meet their early retirement goals.
According to records viewed by Insider, the couple paid off two mortgages, one on their own home and another on their rental property, totaling $200,000. They were able to retire from their corporate jobs before they turned 40 thanks to the stability provided by their rental income, as well as cash flow from their blog, Rich & Regular.
But, they say, they found that the community was "mostly white," and much of the advice shared didn't account for their financial reality.
They encountered a 'Black tax' within the FIRE movement
FIRE devotees are generally pretty open about sharing their wealth-building tips online, but the Saunderses quickly realized a lot of the advice shared on the forums did not take into account the racial wealth gap that many Black Americans face. The couple said they encountered "Black taxes" — extra money spent due to racial economic imbalance — while getting started in the FIRE movement.
For example, the Saunderses say, the FIRE movement doesn't speak to individuals or couples who financially support their family or other community members in some way. The Saunderses found that their white counterparts, many of whom came from generational wealth, generally didn't need to worry about supporting anyone else.
"One thing that's often overlooked is how Black Americans are far more likely to have elders who have underfunded retirement accounts," Julien tells Insider.
Indeed, according to the Employee Benefit Research Institute, 46% of all retirees retired earlier than expected, however, the reason Black elders retire early is typically due to health reasons instead of access to resources that allow them to retire comfortably. Additionally, the Economic Policy Institute's State of Working America report shows that Black Americans have 14.9% less than white workers in their retirement accounts.
Says Kiersten, "White people will have more time to build and follow the standard rules of thumb than we do. They have more valuable social networks because of nepotism."
How the racial wealth gap restricts Black people from planning for early retirement
When it comes to building wealth, the most common strategies include real-estate investments, building a diverse investment portfolio, or holding equity in the company you work for. However, the racial wealth gap can restrict Black Americans from planning for early retirement, the Saunderses say.
For example, says Kiersten, "If you happen to own a home in a Black neighborhood or have Black art up while the appraiser walks through, your home is going to be valued lower than your white counterparts." Since rental income is a common cash source that keeps early retirees afloat, she says, having a home that's considered "less valuable" can restrict cash flow.
Additionally, pathways to early retirement through equity are typically less available to Black workers. Carta's 2021 Annual Equity Report shows that only 4% of Black employees hold equity in the companies they work for, even though they make up 12% of the workforce. That's compared to 65% of white people holding equity while they make up 62% of the workforce.
"Getting a 9-to-5 at a blue-chip company is a great path to wealth," says Kiersten. "But if you're a Black person, the odds of holding stock in companies like Google or Netflix is really small, and when you look at leadership in those companies, it's even smaller."
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More: Rethinking Retirement FIRE movement Financial Independence retire early Early retirement | 2022-06-03T14:28:44Z | www.businessinsider.com | Common Wealth-Building Strategies Come With 'Black Tax,' Couple Says | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/common-wealth-building-strategies-black-tax-2022-5 | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/common-wealth-building-strategies-black-tax-2022-5 |
What is Scam Likely?
Why Scam Likely appears
How to block Scam Likely calls
If an incoming call is labeled Scam Likely, it's probably a call from a spammer, scammer, or telemarketer.
Your carrier maintains a database of likely telemarketing phone numbers and flags these calls automatically.
You can choose to ignore calls marked Scam Likely, or you can block them and prevent them from ringing.
A meme made the rounds on the internet a few years ago that joked that, "Scam Likely is the only person who calls to check up on me every day." In fact, you've probably gotten your share of Scam Likely calls as well, particularly if you are a T-Mobile customer. It's that carrier's way of letting you know the incoming call is more than likely some sort of spam or scam.
Due to a meteoric rise in the number of telemarketing calls in the last few years, wireless carriers like T-Mobile, AT&T, and Verizon have taken steps to automatically detect when incoming calls are coming from unwanted sources like telemarketers and scammers. Incoming calls are checked against a database of numbers known to be operated by scammers, and if a match is made, your wireless carrier labels the call. If you are a T-Mobile customer, you will see the label Scam Likely.
T-Mobile's unwanted call detection identifies spam and telemarketing calls as "Scam Likely."
To help combat the epidemic of spam and scam calls on mobile phones, the Federal Communications Commission mandated the implementation of a set of standards designed to ferret out telemarketing and other spam callers. T-Mobile implemented these protocols in 2018, and since then has made an effort to verify calls automatically.
If you see Scam Likely appear for an incoming call, you can generally assume it's an unwanted call and ignore it. Of course, scam warnings like these cannot ever be foolproof, so it's always possible that a valid phone call can get flagged as a scam risk. If you find that you've missed an important call from someone who is not already stored in your phone's contact list, you might want to check your phone app's call history to see what numbers you recently missed.
Seeing the Scam Likely warning is without a doubt a useful tool in avoiding unwanted calls. But it's far from a perfect solution because these telemarketing and scammer calls still interrupt your day by ringing your phone.
Depending upon which smartphone you use, there are steps you can take to block Scam Likely calls. You can block specific phone numbers on both iPhone and Android, use a third-party robocall blocking app, or even put your phone number on the National Do Not Call Registry. None of those solutions are perfect, but each one can help reduce the number of scam and spam calls you receive.
TECH How to block spam group texts on an iPhone and prevent them from reaching you
More: Scam Likely Spam Smartphones Reference Freelancer | 2022-06-03T14:29:02Z | www.businessinsider.com | What Is Scam Likely? Why It Appears and How to Block Calls | https://www.businessinsider.com/scam-likely | https://www.businessinsider.com/scam-likely |
A Silicon Valley veteran who's worked at Cisco and Motorola shares the leadership strategy she swears by
Padmasree Warrior.
Padmasree Warrior
Padmasree Warrior is the CEO and founder of Fable and was formerly an exec at Cisco and Motorola.
Over her two decades in executive roles she's developed rituals for getting to know her employees.
She says that's the key to being a good leader. This is her story, as told to Robin Madell.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Padmasree Warrior, the founder and CEO of the social-reading app Fable, a former chief technology officer of Cisco and Motorola, and a former CEO of Nio US, an electric-vehicle company based in China. Warrior also sits on the boards of Microsoft and Spotify. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
People choose people, not companies. Increasingly, everyone wants to work for or with others they feel a deeper connection with. Two of a leader's most critical abilities are empathy and creating a sense of belonging, so that everyone on their team brings their whole authentic self to work.
To do that, my top piece of leadership advice is get to know the person behind the job title.
For the past nearly 20 years I've been making an effort to get to know people, and I make it a point to come up with rituals to do so that depend on the size and scale of the team.
I established a weekly gathering that I call fika
It's named after the traditional Swedish coffee break and allows people from across my company, Fable, to come together (physically or virtually) to chat about things other than work — hobbies, interests, pet peeves, families, friends, movies, music, art, food, wine, cocktails, and, of course, books.
A different team member hosts fika every Friday, and they come up with a question for everyone to think and chat about. Past questions have included:
What are you hoarding in your pantry that you should throw away but have not, and what does that say about you?
If you could live in any fictional world, which would you choose?
If you could time-travel and not return, which time period and location would you go to? Why?
This creates a safe space for everyone to be their true and whole self, not just their work persona. It's amazing how much we learn about each other this way — a big impact with practically no cost that creates goodwill within teams.
The only rule for these chats is don't talk about work
Also, share by example. The leader should open up as much as they expect the members of their team to open up. If the leader is guarded and reticent, people won't feel comfortable sharing personal experiences.
Attendance should be optional; recognize that everyone may not be able to attend, and that's OK.
This allows people to get to know each other more deeply. I noticed how people's eyes lit up when they talked about their hobbies or families or what they cared about deeply.
This strategy helps me understand each individual on my team a little better — which, in return, helps me become a better, more empathetic leader.
At Cisco I hosted birthday chats, where everyone who had a birthday in a given month was invited to join me for breakfast, in person or virtually.
I want to foster a work culture that thrives on authenticity and approachability
People should not feel that they have to leave a part of themselves behind when they come to work.
What we need to change is the notion that you shouldn't bring both your personal and professional mindsets to work. Building personal connections with the people we work with helps blur these boundaries and definitely helps everyone's work-life integration.
In return, people on my team get to see me as a human being and not a robot exec. This increases mutual respect and creates loyal bonds between team members and leaders, which, in return, fosters a sense of belonging at work.
This is a universal strategy for anyone leading people, regardless of your industry or the size of your company or the country you're in.
More: Contributors 2022 Nora Biette-Timmons BI-freelancer
leadership advice | 2022-06-03T14:29:08Z | www.businessinsider.com | A Silicon Valley Veteran Shares the Leadership Strategy She Swears by | https://www.businessinsider.com/silicon-valley-veteran-leadership-strategy-padmasree-warrior | https://www.businessinsider.com/silicon-valley-veteran-leadership-strategy-padmasree-warrior |
Supply-chain tech startup Stord lays off 59 people one month after announcing $120 million in fresh funding and a $1.3 billion valuation
Supply-chain startup Stord laid off 59 employees Thursday, the company told Insider.
The startup announced an additional $120 million in funding and a $1.3 billion valuation on May 10.
Laid-off employees told Insider the news was a shock due to the recent funding and a high valuation.
The wave of tech layoffs has reached the supply-chain sector. Flexible-warehousing startup Stord laid off 59 employees — about 8% of its 700-strong workforce — Thursday, the company confirmed to Insider. The layoffs came from multiple business units within the company, a spokesperson said via email.
Founded in 2015, Stord is a cloud-based platform that connects hundreds of independent warehouses to a network so shippers can keep inventory close to consumers without leasing space. It began offering trucking and e-commerce-fulfillment services during the pandemic.
"While this was a challenging day for everyone, the company remains in an incredibly strong position as brands continue to invest in the technology and logistics solutions they need to meet customer expectations and fuel growth," a spokesperson told Insider via email. "Stord has achieved record revenue growth, is on pace for greater growth in Q2, and has an extremely strong balance sheet with the additional capital raised in May."
Stord announced an additional $120 million in Series D funding less than a month ago, which brought its Series D total to $210 million. Franklin Templeton Investments led the round and was top of mind for some of the laid-off employees.
"Our CEO specifically came out and said this is our war chest — this is going to hold us through any tough times," a laid-off Stord employee, who asked to remain anonymous to protect their future job prospects, told Insider Thursday.
Stord notified affected employees Wednesday night of a meeting the next morning and some started to expect layoffs when the calendar invite for the meeting said it was only scheduled for 15 minutes.
During the meeting — conducted on Zoom with no visible participants — Stord cofounders Sean Henry and Jacob Boudreau said they'd hired too quickly, according to two affected workers. Ahead of the new funding announcement on May 10, the founders told multiple media outlets they would reach 1,000 employees by the end of the year.
"We all got off the phone very confused because they had just raised all that money a few weeks ago and had a $1.3 billion valuation," said another laid-off employee speaking on the condition of anonymity.
Stord's spokesperson said the company "has a stronger balance sheet and more capital than ever," and that "running a responsible business requires regular reviews of our entire business to ensure that we are operating as efficiently as possible. Stord is in a position of strength and set up for long term success."
Stord will continue to pay laid-off employees until June 15, when the firm will give them severance packages with amounts based on the time they worked with the company, Stord confirmed. The company will also provide "career assistance, résumé writing, and networking on an ongoing basis," according to the spokesperson.
During the pandemic, customers and funders took a new interest in supply-chain tech, specifically warehousing startups like Stord. The company entered the pandemic with less than $20 million in funding and reached 2022 with a fundraising total above $300 million.
Santosh Sankar, an early Stord investor and managing partner at Dynamo Ventures — which led the company's seed round — told Insider the business still has "impressive fundamentals."
"Parting ways with colleagues is hard," Sankar told Insider via email. "But Stord is in a strong position and continues to make the right investments for sustainable success."
Have you been laid off by a supply-chain tech startup? Got a tip? Contact Emma Cosgrove at ecosgrove@insider.com or through secure messaging app Signal at 862-294-3077. | 2022-06-03T14:29:20Z | www.businessinsider.com | Stord Lays Off 59 One Month After Raising $120 Million | https://www.businessinsider.com/stord-layoffs-supply-chain-tech-startup-after-raising-120-million-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/stord-layoffs-supply-chain-tech-startup-after-raising-120-million-2022-6 |
U.S. Education Secretary Miguel Cardona.
Education Sec. Miguel Cardona said he's "been working nonstop" on broad student-loan forgiveness.
He declined to comment to Insider on potential income caps with that relief.
Reports said Biden is considering $10,000 in relief for those making under $150,000 a year.
President Joe Biden is getting closer to making a decision on broad student-loan forgiveness, and his Education Department affirmed they're ready to implement it whenever it's announced.
"We are prepared, we're ready to roll up our sleeves... we've been working nonstop," Education Secretary Miguel Cardona told Politico during a Thursday press gaggle.
"We're ready to move forward on these policies," he added. "But we're also looking for ways to improve the policies that were poorly implemented, or that weren't really done well so that we can take advantage of helping students and things that we can control today. So we're really revamping the higher education practices to keep students at the center."
Recent reports have suggested Biden is considering $10,000 in student-loan forgiveness for federal borrowers making under $150,000 a year. This amount is in line with what he pledged on the campaign trail, and while many Democratic lawmakers wanted him to go bigger on relief, he said $50,000 in debt cancellation is off the table.
Cardona declined to comment to Insider on details surrounding what an income cap would look like, but Under Secretary of Education James Kvaal told Insider the department is "looking at a variety of options."
"There are a lot of aspects involved, but our focus today is on the announcement that the Vice President made which is the single biggest action in department history to deliver loan relief to students," Kvaal added, referring to the department's announcement it would be wiping out all remaining student debt for borrowers defrauded by now-defunct Corinthian Colleges.
Insider previously reported that making student-loan forgiveness subject to income caps would take time to implement and likely be an administrative burden. Mike Pierce, executive director of nonprofit Student Borrower Protection Center, told Insider that an income cap is "not making the policy more progressive because of how hard it's going to be for folks to demonstrate that they have a low enough income to benefit."
Still, Biden has yet to announce a final policy, and the only thing that is certain is that borrowers will know of any relief before student-loan payments are set to resume on September 1. And while Republican lawmakers do not want to see any relief at all, using the argument it will hurt the economy, Democrats want to ensure Biden uses this opportunity to go big.
"In order to reduce the racial wealth gap and advance a just and equitable economic recovery for all, we must alleviate the burden of student debt," Rep. Joyce Beatty, chair of the Black Congressional Caucus, previously said. "Nothing is off the table, except inaction." | 2022-06-03T14:29:27Z | www.businessinsider.com | Ed Dept. Has 'Been Working Nonstop' on Broad Student-Loan Forgiveness | https://www.businessinsider.com/student-loan-forgiveness-education-dept-working-nonstop-cardona-biden-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/student-loan-forgiveness-education-dept-working-nonstop-cardona-biden-2022-6 |
I'm in charge of the branding and design you see on airplanes. Here's what my job is like and how I broke in.
Huot in front of an airplane sketch.
Courtesy of Edmond Huot
Edmond Huot is a 63-year-old aircraft livery designer who was obsessed with airplanes as a child.
Now he works on projects that range up to $1 million in budget at his company Forward Media.
Here's what his job is like, as told to writer Kaila Yu.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Edmond Huot, a 63-year-old aircraft livery designer from Winnipeg, Manitoba, about his job. It has been edited for length and clarity.
I've always been obsessed with airplanes. Growing up on a rural farm, we didn't even have cable television, so I used my imagination to entertain myself. I would spend hours drawing planes and building models, but I never thought that I would do it for a living.
I studied English and history at the University of Manitoba, and one of my first jobs out of college was handling reservations for Air Canada in 1989. I worked there for nine years, and I was able to travel worldwide with employee airline passes, which opened me up to the world of travel.
In 1992, my friend, Peter Clarke, an account manager and entrepreneur, had an idea to start a graphic design business together called ClarkHuot. I didn't have any formal training, but I did have a talent for drawing and innate artistic ability.
I trained myself and learned to program independently
I studied architecture briefly in college and gained knowledge of depth of field, scale, and graphic conceptualization, which helped prepare me for a future in graphic design. My technical skills as a graphic designer were primarily self-taught by tinkering with Mac-based creative design platforms like QuarkXPress and the Adobe Suite. Additionally, drawing planes as a child helped me develop a talent for illustration, which proved helpful for sketching concepts and mock-ups for clients.
I left Air Canada once my branding design agency allowed me to sustain myself financially.
In 2019, we started Forward Media in order to shift our positioning from a Canadian graphic design agency to a digital media company for Canada and the US because our airline clients were also in need of PR and digital media services as well as the branding and design services we offered at ClarkHuot. I'm now the chief creative officer, and I co-own the company.
I'm directly in charge of our aircraft livery design projects
Edmond Huot.
Airline livery design is a creative process that uses brand elements, specific paint schemes, and sticker design which are then produced and then applied to an aircraft. There's something quite unusual about painting a 155-foot-long canvas. It's exhaustive, but clients want someone who's going to go deep and flesh out all possible directions and concepts to end up with the one we show the client.
Most of my clients are referrals, and we had to start by networking and finding our own business. One of our early projects was a former client who got a new job with an airline.
Additionally, my partners and I will attend after-work cocktails and dinners with stakeholders, including prospective clients, key vendors, possible new hires, connected friends, and influential colleagues. We'll also attend conferences and trade shows such as the InteliSys Aviation Airline Growth Summit, Independent Lodging Conference (ILC), and the Wall Street Journal's Future of Everything Festival to network and meet prospective clients.
Airline livery projects range quite a bit in cost
The Island Air design.
We started small, working on projects with budgets of $25,000 to $100,000, and now we're working within the $500,000 to $1 million range. These projects not only include livery design but encompass brand consulting, campaign initiatives, and more. In addition to Clarke and me, our team includes a PR person and a UX designer. I'll also bring in specialists like developers, renderers, designers, and media buyers on a case-by-case basis.
Timelines can be extremely short. Our first livery project was for Island Air — a small interisland carrier based in Honolulu — in 2012, and I got the call on a Friday. The client told me that they would require initial concepts and design directions by Wednesday, and I could only complete the project if I worked quickly and efficiently.
My latest project was intense but rewarding
Northern Pacific Airways Boeing 757 aircraft.
My design is going on the plane's exterior and interior for a new airline projected to launch in fall 2022 called Northern Pacific Airways. The project came about because the CEO, Rob McKinney, was a former client. He called us up and said that he had a top-secret project — the brand development of a new airline.
We worked on everything branding-related, from producing the airline name and logo to the ancillary design that flowed from it, including the livery. One of the airline's selling points is that it offers low-cost flights to Asia that stop over in Alaska, so Northern Pacific Airways made sense. The airline wanted to highlight Asian culture and local indigenous communities in Alaska, so we had to deep dive into cultural sensitivity and market-review customer segments before starting work on the creative aspect.
The process of developing the mock-up for the aircraft was intense. A typical day would include research, then we'd transform those concepts into graphic elements. Later in the day, we'd edit down hundreds of different ideas to a handful that were really on the money. I might tell the team, "Explore the notion of mountains," and they'll return with hundreds of visuals of mountains, or "Explore the concept of flight with graphic elements and motifs." My inspiration for design is typically not driven by my understanding of airlines but rather my interest in learning broader, more abstract themes and notions.
We bring all the ideas into the studio and review together in what we call a crit — pinning everything to a wall and talking about it. It's super fun, and we edit hundreds of different directions and ideas to a handful we think are really on the money.
After that, we present a mood board to the client. My job is to bring context to what might seem like an abstract collage of colors, imagery, and typeface and explain how everything on the board can tell the brand's story. We executed the research, design, and branding for this project in about two and a half months.
One of the challenging parts of my job is the rigorous commuting schedule
For the Island Air design, I had to jump on a 13-hour flight every two weeks from New York to Hawaii with designers, photographers, and videographers in tow. Working in Hawaii seems glamorous, but I rarely left the office in reality.
Time zones can also be a stressor. Often when our workday is ending, a client's day in another country is just beginning. But it's all worth it. I'm lucky to have the opportunity to work on livery designs because these projects, since they're often referral-based, are few and far between. At heart, I'm an artist. Now I get to live out my dreams of designing real planes for real people.
To break into the industry, research and apply to creative consulting or design agencies who have completed livery designs, which are usually part of overall branding assignments. The more knowledge one has of airplanes — even recreationally — the better your designs will be because understanding the aircraft's physical scale and dimension makes a difference in the final execution.
Want to share your career story? Email Lauryn Haas at lhaas@insider.com.
More: BI-freelancer Airplanes Design | 2022-06-03T15:55:36Z | www.businessinsider.com | I'm an Aircraft Livery Designer — Here's What My Job Is Like | https://www.businessinsider.com/aircraft-livery-designer-branding-what-job-is-like-2022-5 | https://www.businessinsider.com/aircraft-livery-designer-branding-what-job-is-like-2022-5 |
Financial planners say women need to save more than men to cover their longer lives.
Extra emergency savings can be useful if a break from work is necessary, such as for caregiving.
Robust emergency funds also give women options when they want to start businesses.
A couple weeks ago I found myself in an argument with a guy friend over how much cash I have in my emergency account. This friend told me to take out 30% of that money and put it into riskier investments, such as cryptocurrency and individual stocks.
As a solopreneur whose income drastically varies month to month, that advice was not only alarming, it also didn't fit with my financial strategy and goals. Not only that, but as a woman, I always wondered if I should contribute more to my emergency fund than the three to six months that experts generally recommend.
When I reached out to financial experts to ask them if that was true, they agreed. Here are the four main reasons women need to save more cash than men in their emergency funds.
1. Women live longer
According to the World Health Organization, women live between six and eight years longer than men. And according to financial planner Carly Carbonaro, that fact alone can sometimes mean more financial complexities.
Because they are expected to live longer, Carbonaro says women should spend more time focusing on beefing up their savings in both their emergency and retirement funds.
"As women live longer lives, they may need to save for a retirement that lasts more than 30 years," says Carbonaro. "Despite the fact that women are more likely to save, they fall behind in retirement savings because they are less likely to invest."
The gender wage gap plays a role, too — women, and especially women of color, earn less in their lifetimes than men for the same roles, and so have less money to save and invest.
2. Women pay more for personal-care products
While it might not be something we think about often, financial planner Danielle Miura says that women are often paying more for personal-care products than men are on an everyday basis. According to a study by the New York City Department of Consumer Affairs, products marketed for women cost 7% more than similar products for men.
"In general, women pay more for skin products, hair products, personal-care products like razors and deodorant, and clothes," says Miura.
In a time of financial crisis, women might have to turn to their emergency funds to pay for personal-care essentials, and pull more cash out of there than men would.
3. Emergency funds give women options
Financial planner Nicole Peterkin Morong says that women who are starting their own businesses need to save even more in their emergency funds than they might have thought to originally.
According to a WBENC report, 25% of women were likely to seek financing for their business and more women used credit cards versus equity investors to fund those businesses. Plus, 88% of women-owned businesses generate less than $100,000 in revenue.
These statistics are the reason Peterkin Morong urges women entrepreneurs to save more money in their emergency funds.
"Women are starting and running businesses at a faster clip than ever before, and in my experience it's often out of necessity and without much, if any, cushion," says Peterkin Morong. "That means higher interest paid on startup costs that are financed with higher-interest debt, more financial stress, and a higher likelihood that those businesses will fail because of lack of adequate runway to build."
Peterkin Morong says a woman's emergency fund can not only help in case of unexpected costs but it also gives them options.
"An emergency fund gives women the choice to switch careers or start businesses with a good foundation, or to stay home and have an extended maternity leave while they plan their next move," says Peterkin Morong.
4. Women are often caregivers
According to a report from the National Alliance for Caregiving, women are 67% more likely to be a primary caregiver than men. Financial planner Lauren Wybar says that since women often take the caregiver role, whether to their own children or to eldery parents, it can create income gaps.
"When women are caregivers, they can step away from their career or miss out on peak earning years," sas Wybar. "An emergency reserve — with a minimum three to six months' worth of expenses — is a financial safe haven of sorts, allowing access to liquid funds during any short-term time away from a career."
Plus, financial planner Jay Rishel says the pandemic made things even worse for women who left the workforce to become primary caregivers who were unable to attend schools or daycare.
"They still haven't returned to the workforce in the same numbers that men have. This disruption makes the hill that much steeper for women who are saving for retirement," says Rishel.
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More: Emergency Funds Retirement Savings Gender pay gap gender wage gap | 2022-06-03T15:56:12Z | www.businessinsider.com | 4 Reasons Women Need to Save More in Their Emergency Funds | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/reasons-women-need-more-emergency-funds-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/reasons-women-need-more-emergency-funds-2022-6 |
President Donald Trump looks on as Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker speaks at a 2018 event.
Trump made a risky endorsement by going against much of the Wisconsin GOP establishment.
The former president announced his support for businessman Tim Michels' Wisconsin gubernatorial bid.
This follows a recent spate of embarrassing flops of Trump-endorsed candidates.
Former President Donald Trump made a risky bet on Thursday evening, weighing in on the Wisconsin Republican gubernatorial primary by backing a different candidate while snubbing the current frontrunner who has received support from former Gov. Scott Walker.
"Tim is an America First Conservative who Supports our Second Amendment, Honors our Brave Law Enforcement and First Responders, and Stands Strongly against the Woke Mob trying to destroy our Country," Trump said in a statement announcing his support for Tim Michels, a millionaire businessman.
Walker, once a conservative darling for his campaign against public-sector unions, previously endorsed his former Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch. Former White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who will likely be the next governor of Arkansas, has backed her as well. An April Marquette Law School Poll showed Kleefisch had a commanding lead before Michels entered the race. By all accounts, Kleefisch was considered the frontrunner in the race.
Trump's endorsement will certainly shake up the contest. But the former president's frequent entries into contested GOP primaries have blemished his endorsement record, especially when Trump goes against the GOP establishment.
Trump backed businessman Charles Herbster in Nebraska, Lt. Gov. Janice McGeachin in Idaho, and former Sen. David Perdue in Georgia. All three candidates failed to win their respective state's GOP nomination for governor. In McGeachin and Perdue's cases, Trump made the decision to endorse challengers to incumbent GOP governors.
The former president has found much more success at the federal level. He endorsed author JD Vance for US Senate over the wishes of many Ohio Republicans, vaulting the venture capitalist to first place. Trump was also ahead of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and other Senate Republicans in announcing his support for former Heisman Trophy winner Herschel Walker, who will challenge Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock in Georgia this November.
Ahead of a possible 2024 run, Trump's endorsements are being closely tracked. The recent failure of many of his picks to oust Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger has not gone unnoticed.
The Wisconsin gubernatorial race will be closely watched come November.
Incumbent-Gov. Tony Evers, a Democrat, ousted Walker in 2018 by just under 30,000 votes. President Joe Biden later narrowly carried the state in 2020. Since then, Trump-allies have sought to raise baseless claims to question the results and some even have pushed the unconstitutional and unfounded step of "decertifying" Biden's win in the state.
More: Donald Trump Wisconsin Scott Walker 2022 midterms | 2022-06-03T15:56:18Z | www.businessinsider.com | Trump Makes Another Risky Endorsement, Defying Some in Wisconsin | https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-tim-michaels-risky-endorsement-wisconsin-governor-scott-walker-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-tim-michaels-risky-endorsement-wisconsin-governor-scott-walker-2022-6 |
Bryan Metzger and Kimberly Leonard
Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida and Democratic congressional candidate Maxwell Alejandro Frost.
Paul Hennessy/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images and Frost for Congress
A Florida congressional candidate disrupted a live taping of the Rubin Report featuring Gov. Ron DeSantis.
"Floridians are dying. We need help!" yelled Maxwell Frost, a former organizer with March for Our Lives.
This comes on the heels of several mass shootings and a similar disruption by Beto O'Rourke in Texas.
Florida congressional candidate Maxwell Alejandro Frost and a group of activists disrupted a live event featuring Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida on Thursday night, yelling that "Floridians are dying!" while demanding action on gun violence.
Frost, a leading candidate in the Democratic primary for Florida's Orlando-area 10th congressional district, was promptly escorted from the room as DeSantis repeatedly declared that "no one wants to hear" from him.
DeSantis was speaking with Dave Rubin, a conservative activist and media personality, when he was interrupted by Frost.
"Governor DeSantis, we're losing 100 people a day due to gun violence," said Frost. "We need action on gun violence!"
A video shared by Frost on Twitter shows security officials quickly escorting Frost out of the auditorium.
—Maxwell Alejandro Frost (@MaxwellFrostFL) June 3, 2022
In addition to Frost, a few other Florida-based activists disrupted the Orlando event.
—Jen 🏳️🌈 SAY GAY 🏳️⚧️ Cousins (@slytherbitch6) June 3, 2022
—Jack Petocz (@Jack_Petocz) June 3, 2022
The protest follows several mass shootings in recent weeks, including at a hospital in Tulsa, Oklahoma, an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, and a grocery store in Buffalo, New York.
It also comes after Beto O'Rourke — a former congressman and Democratic presidential candidate who's now running for governor of Texas — made a similar disruption during a briefing by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott and other officials last week following the Uvalde shooting.
—The Recount (@therecount) May 25, 2022
Insider recently spoke with Frost, a 25-year-old former March for Our Lives organizer who's running to replace Democratic Rep. Val Demings in Congress. If elected, he would be the first Generation Z member of Congress.
DeSantis, who's up for reelection this year and is widely considered to be a likely 2024 presidential candidate, has been notably absent from live events ever since the shooting in Uvalde. He said in April that he wanted Florida to become a constitutional carry state. Under current state law people have to receive a concealed weapons permit to carry hidden guns in public. A constitutional carry state would allow people who legally own firearms to carry it in public — hidden or not — without training, registration, or government licensing.
DeSantis signed the state budget publicly in a ceremony in The Villages, a Florida retirement community, on Thursday but didn't take questions afterward. The governor typically fields numerous questions from journalists on a range of topics. One budget item he vetoed would have funded 83 positions to process and review concealed carry permits.
The funding request had come from Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried, a Democrat who is running to unseat DeSantis in November.
When DeSantis was running for his first term as governor, in 2018, he said he would have vetoed Florida's gun-control law passed after the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.
His predecessor, GOP Gov. Rick Scott, who is now a US Senator, signed the bill into law. It raised the minimum age to buy rifles and shotguns from 18 to 21, banned bump stocks that allow firearms to work like automatic weapons, and required a three-day waiting period for long guns.
More: Elections Ron DeSantis Florida Maxwell Alejandro Frost | 2022-06-03T15:56:24Z | www.businessinsider.com | Video: FL Candidate Disrupts DeSantis Event, Demands Action on Guns | https://www.businessinsider.com/video-florida-maxwell-frost-disrupts-ron-desantis-gun-violence-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/video-florida-maxwell-frost-disrupts-ron-desantis-gun-violence-2022-6 |
Visa brings virtual cards to M-Pesa users to capitalize on Africa's payment digitization
Visa and Safaricom launch a virtual card to let M-Pesa users transact over Visa's network.
Digital payments are quickly replacing cash in Africa—making the region an attractive destination for digital payment powerhouses like Visa.
The news: Visa partnered with Kenya-based mobile money platform M-Pesa (owned by telecom giant Safaricom) to launch the M-Pesa GlobalPay virtual Visa card, per TechCrunch. The virtual card will let users make payments across Visa's global network with the M-Pesa app or the USSD mobile payment method.
What is M-Pesa? M-Pesa is a mobile money platform that offers digital payment services through a user's SIM card. M-Pesa is similar to peer-to-peer payment platforms in that it also lets users send, receive, and hold money in their accounts. However, M-Pesa transactions are sent via SMS messages and no bank account is required to use the service.
Since its 2007 launch, M-Pesa has amassed 51 million users, 30 million of which are in Kenya alone. The system has been quite successful for Safaricom and has become the telecom's biggest revenue source. M-Pesa's revenue increased nearly 40% annually, hitting $927 million in the year that ended March 2022, per TechCrunch.
Why it's worth watching: Digital payments are quickly replacing cash in Africa—making the region an attractive destination for digital payment powerhouses like Visa.
Cash use in the Middle East and Africa slid 16.3% annually in 2021 and is expected to decline nearly 30% between 2021 and 2025, according to FIS. This trend may be why global payment players are ramping up their presence in the region:
In April, Visa opened an innovation hub, aimed at helping develop digital payment and commerce tools tailored to the region.
And just last week Mastercard signed deals with payments fintech Sokin and issuer-processor i2c to expand its presence in the Middle East and Africa.
The opportunity: Here's how the tie-up can help fuel growth for Visa and M-Pesa:
Visa can use M-Pesa to deepen its ties in Africa. M-Pesa is one of the most popular mobile money providers in Africa, which accounts for 70% of the global $1 trillion mobile money market, per data from GSMA cited by Quartz. Working with M-Pesa lets Visa capitalize on Africa's growing digitization by raking in volume from the mobile money system.
M-Pesa can broaden its acceptance network with Visa. The partnership will let M-Pesa users make digital payments across Visa's network of over 100 million merchants. Previously, M-Pesa users were confined to transacting within the system's network of 400,000 merchants. M-Pesa's tie-up with Visa can increase the system's utility by giving users a wider purchasing network, which also helps boost the system's revenue potential.
Since card tech infrastructure is still developing across Africa, Visa and M-Pesa must continue their development efforts for their virtual card solution to see long-term growth. | 2022-06-03T15:56:24Z | www.businessinsider.com | Visa Partners With Kenya-Based M-Pesa to Launch Virtual Cards | https://www.businessinsider.com/visa-partners-with-mpesa-to-launch-virtual-cards-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/visa-partners-with-mpesa-to-launch-virtual-cards-2022-6 |
Juliana Kaplan, Madison Hoff, and Alex Ford
In May, the US added more jobs than economists estimated, part of a robust recovery.
But the retail sector lost 61,000 jobs in May.
It's another example of Americans turning away from spending on goods and moving towards services.
Even as fears of economic turmoil loom, labor market data is telling a different story: The country is adding jobs just fine.
In May, the US added 390,000 nonfarm payrolls, down from the 436,000 gain in April. That's above the 325,000 jobs that economists polled by Bloomberg estimated the country would add.
The recovery is also fairly widespread.
"The report shows that the job market is shrugging off fears of a potential slowdown," Daniel Zhao, senior economist at Glassdoor, told Insider.
But, while almost every major industry saw jobs created in May, that wasn't the case for retail trade, which saw a net loss of 60,700 jobs, with most of the loss coming from general merchandise stores. It shows how Americans are shifting their spending priorities away from price-inflated big box stores — and putting that cash towards nice experiences instead.
As seen in the above chart, leisure and hospitality led the way in job growth. While leisure and hospitality had a net gain of 84,000 jobs in May, it's still 1.3 million payrolls below February 2020's level — a sign of the recovery still left to go.
Nick Bunker, economic research director at Indeed Hiring Lab, said that it may be some time before leisure and hospitality in the US is back to where it stood before the pandemic in February 2020. One reason for this could be because there's not as much demand as there once was, he added.
When everything costs more, Americans want to spend on experiences
The job loss in big box retailers makes sense given recent dreary earnings calls, Bunker pointed out. The dip may also be because of concerns over overstaffing, he said.
"It's sort of surprising" that losses "showed up that quickly and so largely in the data — but that seems a likely culprit for what we're seeing there," Bunker said.
Bunker said that if there was a slowdown in transportation and warehousing, which saw a net gain of 47,000 in May, then that could show "we're seeing the labor market impacts of a shift in consumption."
Consumer spending is rotating from goods to services, according to Zhao: "We should naturally see a pullback in retail and a resurgence in industries like travel and tourism."
There were already signs that retail trade was cooling off. The number of job openings in retail tumbled in April 2022. Big box retail stores have been reporting weaker-than-expected earnings, and retailers may even start discounting items again as they're stuck with excess inventory.
Some of that may be due to American customers acting with their wallets, and pushing back against rising costs. With gas prices hitting record highs and inflation still hovering near 41-year highs, it makes sense that Americans are spending less — especially amid fears that consumers are burning through the savings they already have.
They're still willing to shell out money for a summer break, though. Vacations are also growing pricier and high gas prices mean some Americans are thinking about taking fewer or shorter trips this summer, but that's not deterring them from seeking out some time away. TSA checkpoint travel numbers show people are still traveling at rates nearing pre-pandemic levels. Spending on goods is fairly flat, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, but spending on services is chugging along.
That's part of a "normalization," according to Zhao, where the economy is moving from a pandemic era to a more post-pandemic era, and shifting away from elevated retail spending.
"We aren't in the phase that we were in last year, where the economy was accelerating really dramatically," Zhao said. "Now we're settling into this new normal, where growth might be a little bit slower — but that slowing is more of a normalization rather than a sign that we're about to fall off a cliff."
More: Economy Inflation inflation 2022 Retail Jobs
Retail Apocalypse
Vacation Days | 2022-06-03T17:30:46Z | www.businessinsider.com | Americans Spend Less on Goods and More on Vacation, Fewer Retail Jobs | https://www.businessinsider.com/americans-spend-less-goods-more-on-vacation-fewer-retail-jobs-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/americans-spend-less-goods-more-on-vacation-fewer-retail-jobs-2022-6 |
How Coatue shielded itself from the worst of the bloodbath crippling Tiger Global, Melvin Capital, and other tech funds
Coatue Management's founder Philippe Laffont during the Sohn Investment Conference in New York, May 16, 2012.
Eduardo Munoz/ Reuters
Coatue liquidated positions and moved to 80% cash during the recent market selloff, according to an investor presentation from May.
The fund is down 17% this year — better than rival tech hedge funds — and its short book is up 32%.
Founder Phillipe Laffont is well known for quickly cutting positions amid market turbulence.
Like most so-called Tiger Cubs, the tech-focused hedge fund Coatue has lost significant money this year.
But it has fared better than rivals, thanks in part to founder Philippe Laffont's longstanding propensity to slash exposure and build up piles of cash during market turbulence, according to sources familiar with the fund and a recent investor presentation.
Coatue would be down as much as 40% through May had it held on to its positions from the start of January — losses that would put it in league with the likes of Melvin Capital and Tiger Global. Instead, Coatue is down just 17% for the year, according to the mid-May investor update.
Coatue's portfolio was buoyed by strong short performance, but also a dramatic liquidation of its positions. The fund's portfolio stands at more than 80% cash — an enormous allocation that outstrips the amount of greenbacks it hoarded during the Great Financial Crisis or the Covid-19 selloff in 2020.
A spokesman for Coatue, which managed $59 billion at the end of 2021, declined to comment.
While double-digit losses are nothing to celebrate, the firm's performance amid the market sell-off this year has outpaced other tech hedge funds as well as the Nasdaq Composite Index, the tech benchmark that has fallen 24% this year.
Tiger Global is down 52% for the year, Bloomberg reported Thursday. Melvin Capital is shuttering operations after posting extensive losses in the first five months of the year on top of a dismal 39% decline in 2021.
Other hedge funds with a technology focus, like D1 Capital, Lone Pine, and Whale Rock, have also suffered. Viking Global was the rare marquee Tiger Cub, the name given to hedge funds spawned from Julian Robertson's Tiger Management, with single-digit losses through April.
Coatue's long bets, including DoorDash, Netflix , and Peloton, have gotten smoked as well, losing 45%. The fund wasn't fast enough to recognize the abrupt shift in investor sentiment away from growth stocks that surged during the pandemic, according to the investor update.
Strong performance from its short book, which was up 32%, helped mitigate the pain.
Coatue also benefitted from founder Philippe Laffont's penchant for turning to cash in a crisis. Sources familiar with Laffont's management said he's known for liquidating positions when markets get choppy.
"Whenever things aren't ripping, he cuts," a former employee said.
That was born out in the investor update, which revealed the fund had its greatest allocation to cash since the Dotcom bubble in 2000, when cash exposure ranged from 40% to 80%. During the market meltdown in 2008 and 2009, cash topped out at 60%, and during the early days of the pandemic, cash stood at more than 20%.
To be sure, Coatue wasn't the only tech-focused cutting positions — the tech-stock swoon contributed to a flurry of first-quarter selling among Tiger Cubs, according to data from the Securities and Exchange Commission compiled by Bloomberg.
But Coatue's approach has shielded it from the worst of the carnage.
Preparing to play offense
The fund is now preparing when and how to redeploy its staggering cash pile, according to the presentation. It's bullish on opportunities in structured equity, which has performed well during bear markets — companies need cash but don't want to sell equity at beaten down prices. Anchor investors have committed more than $1.2 billion for a new fund dedicated to structured equity and is targeting $2 billion, according to the investor update.
Coatue is also cobbling together a wish list of 40 stocks it's keen to buy if the price is right, the presentation said. In Laffont's view, the broad market selloff has unfairly hit some profitable tech stocks — "babies get thrown out with the bath water" — priming them for a stronger rebound eventually.
But Laffont told investors the market likely has further to fall before many of them become attractive — potentially another 20%. | 2022-06-03T17:31:04Z | www.businessinsider.com | Coatue Is Down -17%. It Boosted Cash Exposure to 80% to Stem Losses | https://www.businessinsider.com/coatue-is-down-17-boosted-cash-exposure-to-80-percent-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/coatue-is-down-17-boosted-cash-exposure-to-80-percent-2022-6 |
Security and data privacy concerns motivate digital bank consumers to embrace new authentication technologies
Concerns about the privacy and the security of financial data makes US digital bank customers view alternative authentication methods more favorably.
Venture capital firms are catching on to the importance of frictionless authentication and the increasing demand for this technology.
The news: US digital bank customers prioritize the security of their financial data over convenience, but new technologies might merge the two, per PYMNTS.
More on this: Two-thirds of US digital bank users would prefer knowing that their private information is secure over having a simple, convenient digital application, per a report from PYMNTS and Entersekt.
But as banking progresses, frictionless passive authentication may bridge the gap between the two.
73% of consumers who access financial accounts via multiple devices are willing to log in with alternative authentication methods.
Some alternative authentication methods include multi-factor authentication, biometric authentication, and single-sign-on solutions. These methods can reduce the need for passwords, make it difficult for fraudsters to imitate a user or for attackers to infiltrate user accounts, and provide an authentication process without security holes.
The future of banking : Our report, The Bank in 2025, discusses how heavily the future of banking will rely on sharing data through application programming interfaces (APIs) and open banking infrastructure—and consequently, on the implementation of strong privacy and security controls.
To access the tools and services offered by fintechs and other brands, banks will need to build an infrastructure to support open APIs.
Increasingly, banks will have access to more and more of their users' financial data. But consumers will also have control over what is shared and how it is used.
Access to data will allow banks to customize their services and offerings for each customer, but that access means security and privacy will be top of mind.
Banks are already migrating much of their data to public cloud platforms. While the cloud makes it easier to share and store data, it also creates more opportunities for data to be manipulated or stolen, than for data stored on a local server. But technological developments are easing concerns. Artificial intelligence (AI) is one way banks can verify transactions and other customer actions in real time. AI capabilities are able to process large amounts of data quickly and can flag potentially fraudulent situations. Banks leveraging these capabilities, however, must ensure that the authentication fintech firms providing these tools are trustworthy and will maintain strict privacy protocols.
Funding trends: Venture capital firms are catching on to the importance of frictionless authentication and the increasing demand for this technology. Funding in the authentication fintech space is heating up.
In February, biometric user authentication Passage raised $4 million in new funding to promote its FaceID and TouchID products.
In April, OwnID, another biometric authentication provider, raised $6.2 million in seed funding to double its workforce and further develop its biometric service that uses a customer's smartphone to verify their identity for access to certain websites.
This week, mobile identity startup Incognia raised $15.5 million in series A funding. Incognia provides software that uses location signals and motion sensors on the device to verify the user's identity. The company claims the software is 10 times more accurate than facial recognition software.
The big takeaway: The digitization of people's everyday lives has revealed just how much data companies have gathered on their customers. Customers have learned that the ease of some new features can potentially open them to risks. Banks need to shift their focus from reducing friction in the customer experience to protecting their customers' data, thereby earning their trust and retaining their business. For now, customers may be willing to take extra steps to verify their identity to ensure their safety. But as digital experiences continue to evolve and grow in sophistication, customers will expect solid security measures to be seamlessly integrated into the service they receive. | 2022-06-03T17:31:10Z | www.businessinsider.com | US Digital Bank Customers Prioritize Financial Data Over Convenience | https://www.businessinsider.com/data-privacy-concerns-prompt-new-authentication-technology-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/data-privacy-concerns-prompt-new-authentication-technology-2022-6 |
A hiring sign is displayed at a retail store in Buffalo Grove, Ill., Thursday, Feb. 10, 2022.
If the pace of job creation holds, the US will finish its employment recovery in July.
The country added 390,000 payrolls in May, only slowing slightly from prior months.
The recovery is also running three times as fast as the rebound from the 2008 financial crisis.
Job creation through May was the weakest in a year, but that's not stopping the labor market recovery from charging toward the finish line.
Data out Friday morning showed the US economy adding 390,000 nonfarm payrolls last month, slowing from the 436,000-job gain in April but still surpassing the forecast for 325,000 new jobs. The print extends a long slowdown in the pace of nationwide job growth. Yet it also brings the country within spitting distance of a full jobs recovery. The economy has now recouped more than 96% of the jobs it lost at the start of the coronavirus crisis.
That puts the US on pace to complete the labor market recovery by the end of July, according to Insider calculations. The country boasted 152.5 million payrolls in February 2020, just before lockdown measures led to a record plunge in employment. As long as the average pace of job creation doesn't slow dramatically, the economy will return to exactly that level in just a couple of months.
The amount of progress left to be made is so small — just 820,000 jobs — that a stunning surprise to the upside in June could put the US back to that threshold by the end of the month. The economy added 714,000 in February, and while new dynamics have weighed on job creation, such a surprise isn't completely out of the picture, especially if an influx of Americans come off the labor market's sidelines in search of work.
To be sure, returning to the pre-pandemic payroll count only sets the labor market back to where it stood two years ago. Without the pandemic and resulting economic downturn, the economy was on pace to keep adding jobs at a healthy clip of about 200,000 per month. That leaves more than 6 million jobs left to be created if the labor market is to make up for its lost growth. Still, with how quickly the economy is still adding jobs, that goal could be reached by the end of 2022 or early 2023.
Even if the recovery slows further, the current rebound stands alone when compared to other downturns of modern history. The coronavirus recession saw the deepest decline in employment early on, yet the recovery is running faster than those seen after the 1990, 2001, and 2008 slumps.
Employment currently sits just 0.5% below the pre-pandemic high. It took nearly three times as long for the US to achieve the same rebound after the 2008 financial crisis.
The May slowdown, then, is a mild easing in an otherwise superlative rebound.
More: Economy Economic Indicators Jobs Report NFP | 2022-06-03T17:31:16Z | www.businessinsider.com | Economic Recovery: US on Track to Recoup Lost Jobs by End of Summer | https://www.businessinsider.com/economic-recovery-recession-outlook-jobs-labor-market-hiring-summer-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/economic-recovery-recession-outlook-jobs-labor-market-hiring-summer-2022-6 |
'Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness' hits Disney Plus on June 22 — here's how to watch Marvel's latest blockbuster at home
Rachel McAdams as Dr. Christine Palmer, Benedict Cumberbatch as Dr. Stephen Strange, and Xochitl Gomez as America Chavez in "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness."
Where to watch 'Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness'
When will 'Multiverse of Madness' be on Disney Plus?
When will the movie be available to rent or buy?
"Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" hits Disney Plus on June 22.
The movie is also expected to be available to buy or rent through VOD retailers on or around that date.
Disney Plus costs $8/month or $80/year, and all members can stream the movie without paying extra.
"Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" will stream on Disney Plus starting June 22, according to an official announcement from Disney. The Marvel film's streaming debut will come after playing exclusively in theaters for 47 days.
"Multiverse of Madness" led the box office charts for three consecutive weekends before being dethroned by the premiere of Tom Cruise's "Top Gun: Maverick." The film has garnered generally positive reviews as it continues to expand the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU).
Check out the trailer for 'Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness'
Along with Benedict Cumberbatch returning in the starring role, the "Doctor Strange" sequel continues the story started in Marvel's "WandaVision" with Elizabeth Olsen's character, the Scarlet Witch. The film includes even more Marvel cameos as the heroes leap between parallel universes.
Like many Marvel films, the movie features connections to several previous entries in the MCU. Check out our roundup of seven Marvel movies and shows to stream before "Multiverse of Madness" to get caught up on the story.
"Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" is now available to watch only in theaters. The film will remain a theater-exclusive release until June 22. You can find tickets to your local theater online from sites like Fandango.
When will 'Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness' be on Disney Plus?
"Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" will be available to watch on Disney Plus starting June 22. Disney Plus usually adds new content at 3 a.m. ET the day it's released, but there are some exceptions.
Disney Plus costs $8 a month or $80 a year. "Multiverse of Madness" will be available to all subscribers without any extra fees. You can access the Disney Plus app on most smartphones, tablets, media players, smart TVs, and gaming consoles. Check the Disney Plus website for a full list of supported devices.
You can expect 'Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness' to support 4K playback and HDR contrast on supported devices when it's released. Several Marvel movies on Disney Plus also support IMAX's enhanced aspect ratio, which fills slightly more of the screen than the standard widescreen format.
When will 'Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness' be available to rent or buy?
It's unclear exactly when "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" will be available to rent or purchase. The last Marvel movie to hit Disney Plus, "Shang-Chi and the Legends of the Ten Rings," became available to buy from video-on-demand streaming retailers like Amazon and Vudu on the same day it hit Disney Plus.
With this in mind, it's likely "Multiverse of Madness" will also hit VOD platforms on June 22. A Blu-ray and 4K Blu-ray release is expected to follow shortly after, likely within a month of the film's streaming debut.
We'll update this article when Disney announces official digital and Blu-ray release dates for "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness."
More: Movies Disney Disney Plus Doctor Strange | 2022-06-03T17:31:22Z | www.businessinsider.com | How to Watch 'Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness' Online | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/streaming/how-to-watch-doctor-strange-in-the-multiverse-of-madness | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/streaming/how-to-watch-doctor-strange-in-the-multiverse-of-madness |
A customer shops at a supermarket in California.
Shoppers are buying cheaper, private-label products more amid record inflation.
It's become a trend during periods of economic downturn, like the 2008 recession.
Retailers with a strong roster of private-label brands, like Walmart and Target, are set to benefit.
In grocery and big-box stores across the country, shoppers have a decision to make: Stick to the brands they know and love, or switch to the store's brand and save?
In the face of record inflation, shoppers are increasingly choosing the latter.
The rising cost of everything from gas to food has forced many consumers to think twice about name-brand items and opt for stores' private-label products instead — meaning, products from brands owned by those same grocery or big-box retailers. This switch has happened during other periods of economic downturn, and it's a boon for retailers like Walmart and Target, who have a strong roster of private-label brands.
At Walmart, which operates over 3,500 grocery locations nationwide, rising costs are shifting the way customers shop. The company said during its first-quarter earnings call in May that customers are buying more private-label products as they feel "inflation pressures."
"We do see some switching, which would include switching specifically from brands to private brands," John Furner, CEO of Walmart US, said during the call. "We see categories like deli, lunch meat, bacon, dairy, where we see customers trading."
Target places a slightly different emphasis on its private-label brands: They're designed to "drive trips to Target, not simply to provide another option when guests are already in a store," Christina Hennington, Target's chief growth officer, said during the company's first-quarter earnings call in May.
Still, Target is likely benefiting from inflation, given that its in-house brands, much like Walmart's, tend to be cheaper than products with better name recognition.
"I think it's important as we think about consumers looking for value, the strength of the owned brands in food and beverage: Good & Gather and Favorite Day," CFO Michael Fiddelke said during the call. "The guest response we've seen to those two owned brands has just been incredible."
Private-label products have grown so much that big brands are starting to take notice. Clorox executives noted private-label growth during the company's most recent earnings call, while Procter & Gamble said it will start making more "overt" claims about the quality of its Dawn dish soap, presumably over private-label products.
But at Walmart, the company's own Great Value dish soap costs $2.28. Dawn's dish soap, though slightly larger in volume, costs $2.94.
'It just has to be cheaper'
This type of shopping behavior — switching from name brands to private labels — happened during another period of economic uncertainty: the 2008 recession .
Between 2008 and 2009, shoppers started spending less on dining out, skipped manicures and hair appointments, bought smaller amounts of items, and, notably, switched to private-label goods, according to data from IRI, a market-research firm that tracks data in the consumer packaged-goods industry.
Now, similar patterns are repeating themselves. In March, as gas prices started to rise and consumers started to feel the strain on their finances, private-label purchases started to climb compared with 2020 and 2021. At grocery stores, shoppers started buying more off-brand baby formula, oil, butter, and milk — when it came to "non-edible" items, gloves, foil, and toilet paper became popular private-label purchases, according to IRI data.
But it's not a given that shoppers will always trade down to private-label when times are tough — there are a few factors that get customers to make the switch, according to Sucharita Kodali, a retail analyst at Forrester.
"Consumers don't really have an issue with it if the packaging looks nice and the pricing is the right pricing and the quality of the merchandise is good," Kodali told Insider.
But at the end of the day, it does need to provide meaningful cost savings to the consumer.
"There's no formula that says, 'if it's 10 to 20% cheaper ...', it just has to be cheaper," Kodali said. "It's not the difference between something being $9.95 and $9.99. That's not going to make a difference. But in some categories, if there's a dollar difference, that's substantial."
More: Walmart Target Inflation Private Label
Big-box stores | 2022-06-03T17:31:28Z | www.businessinsider.com | Inflation Driving Private-Label Purchases at Walmart, Target | https://www.businessinsider.com/inflation-driving-private-label-purchases-walmart-target-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/inflation-driving-private-label-purchases-walmart-target-2022-6 |
Leaked documents show Klarna scrambling to sweeten its severance package amid backlash over cutting health care for US-based workers
Klarna recently updated its severance package for laid-off employees in North America, Insider has learned.
Klarna updated its severance package for laid-off employees in North America, Insider has learned.
On May 23, the company announced it would reduce its headcount by around 10%.
View the startup's entire package and how it compares to what Airbnb offered employees.
Buy now, pay later provider Klarna updated its severance package for laid-off employees in North America after its initial offering prompted backlash, according to people familiar with the situation.
The Stockholm-based fintech announced in a pre-recorded message to employees on May 23 that approximately 10% of its nearly 7,000 employees would be affected by the cuts. Klarna's CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski cited the war in Ukraine, rising inflation, market volatility , and an impending recession as key reasons for the layoffs.
The initial severance package offered North America-based employees a minimum of six weeks of pay and continuing COBRA health care coverage for employees in the United States for two to six weeks.
But current and former employees told Insider the company changed course after laid-off employees expressed concern about losing access to health care coverage.
Laid-off employees will now receive a minimum of 14 weeks of severance, with some longer-tenured employees receiving more than seven months of pay, according to an internal document viewed by Insider.
US employees will now also be able to continue to receive health care coverage for a full year through COBRA.
The one-year vesting cliff for equity in the company has been removed for laid-off employees, who will also be able to keep their company-issued phones and laptops.
Klarna confirmed to Insider that the changes to severance were accurate and occurred following the original May 23 announcement of layoffs.
"We included healthcare coverage via COBRA reimbursements in our initial packages, but we increased the number of months we'll cover in the updated package to try to better set up outgoing employees for success," a Klarna spokesperson wrote in an email to Insider. "The additional COBRA reimbursement will ensure that everyone will have more time to figure out their next steps without having to worry about healthcare coverage, especially during a pandemic."
In the internal document detailing the updated package, Klarna's severance was compared to Airbnb.
Airbnb laid off approximately 1,900 employees in May 2020 in a move that sparked a wave of disillusionment amongst some staffers who had bought into the startup's family-like culture. Despite the disappointment, the severance package that Airbnb offered laid-off employees garnered praise for its generosity.
"We took into consideration a broad range of companies that have gone through similar processes and benchmarked against all of them — Airbnb ended up being the one we communicated as an example," the spokesperson said of the comparison.
Here's the full chart breaking down Klarna's update severance package and how it compares to Airbnb.
Are you a current or former Klarna employee with a tip about the company? Contact this reporter via email at agehan@insider.com, via Twitter direct message @anngehan, or via encrypted message on Signal at +1 (646) 374-8461 using a nonwork device.
More: E-Commerce Klarna Fintech BNPL | 2022-06-03T17:31:34Z | www.businessinsider.com | Klarna Just Updated Its Severance Package Following Layoffs | https://www.businessinsider.com/klarna-updated-severance-package-layoffs-similar-to-airbnb-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/klarna-updated-severance-package-layoffs-similar-to-airbnb-2022-6 |
How a freestyle rapper and YouTuber makes thousands of dollars every livestream from 'Super Chats'
One of Harry Mack's freestyle livestreams featuring a Super Chat donation/suggestion.
YouTube / Harry Mack
Harry Mack is a freestyle rapper with almost two million subscribers on YouTube.
He hosts livestreams where fans will pay via Super Chat to suggest phrases to use in a rap.
The rapper makes about $4,000 to $8,000 from fan donations and suggestions per livestream.
YouTube's tipping feature, called Super Chat, may seem like an add-on, but it's become the main source of revenue from the platform for some creators.
Harry Mack, whose legal name is Harry McKenzie, is a freestyle rapper who gained much of his fandom and fame on social media. He's active on most social platforms — TikTok, Instagram, Twitch — but he's been the longest on YouTube, which he calls his "central hub."
McKenzie, 32, told Insider he wasn't super familiar with Super Chat when he was first starting out on YouTube. Now, he makes more from tips while livestreaming than from ads in his videos.
He streams once a month for about two hours, when fans will pay to highlight words or phrases to challenge him to use in a freestyle.
"I earn more from direct contributions from my fans via Super Chat than from selling ads, or the ad revenue you generate from regular videos on YouTube," he said, estimating that 60% of his overall YouTube revenue comes from livestreaming once a month.
In fact, McKenzie usually makes between about $4,000 and $8,000 per livestream from Super Chat contributions. Insider verified his revenue stream with his internal analytics.
The convenient and creative way Harry Mack uses Super Chat for both his income and craft
YouTube launched Super Chat in 2017 to help creators monetize livestreaming. It's similar to the tipping feature on Twitch .
When a YouTuber goes live, fans can set a price to have their comment pinned or highlighted in a deluge of live comments. The more you pay, the longer your comment will stay at the top of the chat box to catch the YouTubers' attention. Price points are even color-coordinated: For example, a $5 contribution will be highlighted in teal, and a $10 comment will appear in yellow. Contributions can range from $1 to $500. A $500 comment will stay at the top of the feed for a maximum of two hours.
YouTube then takes 30% off the top of total payments generated during the stream, and the creator gets the rest.
For McKenzie, it's become an unexpected but lucrative part of his art and work. He naturally began livestreaming in 2018 to engage with his fans more directly. As part of an ongoing freestyle series, he asks fans to throw out words or phrases to challenge him to use in his freestyles. He wasn't even aware that Super Chat was enabled in his live sessions until he saw people paying to get him to use their suggestions.
"When I first started streaming on YouTube I didn't know what Super Chats were," McKenzie said. "There were maybe a hundred people watching me. I heard this notification sound, and I saw so-and-so donated $5 and their comment was highlighted in this big teal green box."
He incidentally made almost $100 in his first livestream from Super Chat donations.
"I remember thinking that's not bad for a couple hours of streaming," he said. "As I continued to stream, it started to grow. More and more people started to realize that they can grab my attention this way."
McKenzie compared it to fans holding up a sign for him at a concert — except he's directly compensated for noticing it and infusing it in his craft.
McKenzie made $33,000 from a 10-hour livestream
McKenzie is starting to tour, and most of his time is focused on making more evergreen content across his social-media channels. He only has about two hours a month he can currently allocate to livestreaming, but if he were to segment more of his time to it, his potential Super Chat earnings can feel almost limitless, he said.
During a 10-hour livestream last year to celebrate reaching one million subscribers, McKenzie made about $33,000 from Super Chats. He said his fans were extra motivated to donate to help him celebrate this big milestone.
"I never would have predicted it," he said about using Super Chats. "It's wild how it unfolded organically for me. It's so well-suited for the work I do."
The potential of Super Chats, from lawtube to calligraphy
Over the last month, YouTuber earnings from Super Chat have surged for accounts streaming and commenting on the defamation trial between Johnny Depp and Amber Heard.
For lawyers on YouTube, or "lawtubers," like Alyte Mazeika and Emily D. Baker, most of their funds as creator comes from fans inquiring about high-profile cases and other general questions about the law. Prior to the Depp v. Heard trial, Baker was already earning half of her YouTube income from Super Chats. And Mazeika told Insider that streaming the trial every day it was airing earned her $5,000 in a week from Super Chat donations.
McKenzie urged any YouTuber who qualifies for the Super Chat function, which is anyone over 18 whose channel is already monetized, to think about how to utilize it creatively.
"There are tons of opportunities for anyone who improvises," he said. "If you were a calligraphy person, you can make live calligraphy art based on names and phrases, and do dedications to people on a livestream. That could be awesome."
More: YouTube super chat Livestream freestyle rap | 2022-06-03T18:58:37Z | www.businessinsider.com | YouTube Rapper Harry Mack's Reveals Income From Livestream Super Chats | https://www.businessinsider.com/youtube-rapper-harry-macks-reveals-income-from-livestream-super-chats-2022-6 | https://www.businessinsider.com/youtube-rapper-harry-macks-reveals-income-from-livestream-super-chats-2022-6 |
The new Surface Laptop Go 2 is designed around replaceable parts, making it easy to repair — here's how to pre-order
$599.99 from Microsoft
The new Surface Laptop Go 2 is Microsoft's next portable, budget-friendly touchscreen laptop.
Key improvements include an updated processor, more secure hardware, and more easily replaced parts.
Surface Laptop Go 2 pre-orders are available now, and it ships on June 7 starting at $599.99.
Microsoft's latest portable, budget-minded Surface Laptop is here. Microsoft's Surface Laptop Go 2 brings a brand-new Intel Core processor to the ultra-light laptop series along with smaller refinements to the camera, battery, and more.
Like the original released at the peak of the work-from-home boom in 2020, the Surface Laptop Go 2 is more portable and affordable, but less powerful, than the Surface Laptop Studio and Surface Laptop 4.
The Surface Laptop Go 2 screen is 12.4 inches, and the laptop weighs just under 2.5 pounds. Microsoft's base model starts at $599.99, which is notably $50 more than the previous generation. Here's everything else you should know before pre-ordering a unit.
Surface Laptop Go 2 pre-orders are live now, with shipments starting on June 7. The base model, with 4GB of memory (RAM) and a 128GB solid-state drive ( SSD ), starts at $599.99.
Going up to 8GB of RAM takes the cost to $699.99, and both 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage sits at $799.99.
These are significantly more affordable prices than the Surface Laptop Studio, but also more budget-friendly than Apple's $999 MacBook Air with 8GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD.
Display 12.4-inch (1,536 x 1,024) PixelSense display with 10-point multi-touch
Processor 11th Gen Intel Core i5 (quad-core)
Cameras 720p HD webcam (f2.0)
Memory and storage 4GB or 8GB RAM; 128GB or 256GB SSD (removable)
Biometric authentication One-touch fingerprint power button
Connections 1 USB-C, 1 USB-A, 3.5mm headphone, Surface Connect Port
Wireless Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax); Bluetooth 5.1
The next generation Intel processor
The biggest change in the Surface Laptop Go 2 is the updated Intel processor. That gives a $599.99 laptop the same processor as the Surface Laptop Studio base model. However, the Surface Laptop Go 2 has less maximum RAM available.
That doesn't mean the new Laptop Go 2, which runs Windows 11, is a slouch. This processor is designed for typical productivity, namely Microsoft Office and internet browsers. Microsoft says the Surface Go 2 will handle some gaming, but still consider a gaming laptop for the most intense PC games and tasks, like video editing.
Enhanced security and telecommute features
This is the first Surface Laptop to use an Intel-based secured-core. A secured core isolates certain components, like the memory, to protect from cyber attacks and hacking. This is designed for work that handles sensitive personal information, such as healthcare, adding to the laptop's abilities as a mobile office.
Other enhancements for telecommuters include updates to the camera and sound, though the camera is still a 720p HD type with an f2.0 aperture lens. This model also promises 30 extra minutes of battery life.
Easier repairs and more colors
Like the original Surface Laptop Go, the SSD is a removable component. But now, the keyboard, trackpad, display, and battery (and some cabling) can now be more easily replaced for more accessible repairs.
Better yet, the laptop now has a fourth color option: a metallic sage green. It's also available in Ice Blue (light blue), Sandstone (metallic pink) and Platinum (silver). | 2022-06-03T19:54:10Z | www.businessinsider.com | Microsoft Surface Laptop Go 2 Price, Specs, and Release Date | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/microsoft-surface-laptop-go-2-price-specs-release-date | https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/microsoft-surface-laptop-go-2-price-specs-release-date |
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