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Dumb Money is the Funko Pop version of the GameStop story

History as written to soothe the bagholders.

Bob Iger and Bob Chapek’s CEO battle made Disney the pettiest place on Earth

Current Disney CEO Bob Iger didn’t make Bob Chapek’s short-lived takeover any easier, according to this revealing report from CNBC.

Live updates from the trial and sentencing of FTX co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried

The former crypto billionaire’s punishment of 25 years in prison could have huge implications for the industry.

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Visa and Mastercard agree to put a limit on credit card swipe fees.

The proposed settlement, which stems from a years-long legal battle, will require Visa and Mastercard to lower swipe fees for merchants by 0.04 percentage points for three years, while capping these rates into 2030.

Even though it may seem like the deal will lower fees for customers, that may not be the case for everyone. The settlement will allow retailers to charge more when customers use premium cards that offer cashback rewards and other perks, as these come with higher swipe fees.


Humanoid robot providers are eyeing up manufacturing jobs.

According to this Financial Times report, AI and robotics providers have some lofty expectations regarding how popular their technology will be in manufacturing environments.

One company claims that 14 percent of manufacturing and automotive jobs will be automated in the next four years, and Goldman Sachs projects that the humanoid robot market could reach $38 billion by 2035 — at least if robots like Tesla’s Optimus can become as capable as their makers are claiming they will be.


A graph showing the forecast global humanoid robot market size in billions.
This graph from Goldman Sachs includes anticipated demand for humanoid robot specifications that simply don’t exist yet.
Image: Goldman Sachs Research
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Amazon Pharmacy expands its same-day deliveries.

Patients in New York City and greater Los Angeles can now get same-day medications through Amazon’s digital pharmacy, joining cities like Austin, Miami, and Seattle. The company also offers one-hour drone delivery in College Station, Texas.

Amazon says this will grow same-day deliveries to over a dozen cities in the US by the end of the year. Pharmacy chains like Walgreens already offer same-day deliveries for a variable fee depending on location.


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Boeing’s CEO will step down at the end of this year.

In a letter to staff, Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun writes the Alaska Airlines door blowout was a “watershed moment” for Boeing and that now is the “right time for a CEO transition.” Boeing will select a new CEO before Calhoun steps down later this year.

Additionally, Boeing announced that its Commercial Airplanes CEO Stan Deal is retiring and will be replaced by Stephanie Pope starting today. The company’s board chair Larry Kellner will also not stand for reelection, with Steve Mollenkopf serving as his replacement.


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Reddit shares jumped as much as 70 percent in their NYSE debut before dropping back.

Reddit (RDDT) is officially open for trading. According to CNBC, Reddit and selling shareholders raised about $750 million from the IPO.

With its current share price of $48, the 19-year-old website now has a market cap of $7.6 billion as it pursues business growth via “advertising, monetizing commerce on the platform, and licensing data.”


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Paramount reportedly got an $11 billion offer for its film and TV studio.

Sources tell The Wall Street Journal that Apollo Global Management, a private equity firm that owns the majority of Yahoo, has put in a bid to acquire Paramount’s studio.

Paramount is also reportedly discussing a deal from Skydance Media, which has offered to merge with the entertainment giant and buy Paramount's parent company National Amusements.


The Twitter deal is all downside risk for Elon Musk

Elon Musk has everything to lose and only retweets to gain

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Reddit’s IPO could cost $34 per share.

Reddit’s IPO, which will have the ticker symbol RDDT, is making its debut tomorrow. Sources tell CNBC it’s priced at the “top” of the $31 to $34 range it targeted, which puts the social platform at a valuation of around $6.5 billion.


A $40 billion AI investment fund?

That’s what this NYT report says a16z and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund are considering, which may explain the rumors that Elon Musk (who denied them), Sam Altman, and others looking to the Middle East to fund their AI dreams.

It also recalls last fall’s news that the US government added an “additional licensing requirement” for Nvidia and AMD AI shipments to unspecified Middle Eastern countries.


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Nokia tells Reddit it might be infringing on Nokia's patents.

In an amended SEC filing ahead of its IPO, Reddit warned potential investors that "...on March 18, 2024, Nokia Technologies sent us a letter indicating they believed that Reddit infringes certain of their patents. We will evaluate their claims."

Nokia, of course, leaned into, ahem, patent licensing and networking equipment as its business many years ago, and reminded people of it with last year’s logo redesign. Companies paying Nokia licensing fees include HTC, Apple, and more recently, Oppo.


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If “Hulu for Sports” works, this guy could be the next Disney CEO.

There’s a lot in this Wall Street Journal profile of ESPN boss Jimmy Pitaro. The switch to streaming; the Hulu for Sports plan; the battle over ever-more-expensive sports rights. But the undercurrent here is pretty clear: if ESPN can make all that work over the next couple of years, Pitaro might get Bob Iger’s office. (But that’s a really, really big if.)


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SpaceX can reportedly block employees from selling shares over “dishonesty.”

Leaked documents viewed by TechCrunch say SpaceX can prevent former or current employees from selling shares during a tender offer if they engaged in “an act of dishonesty against the company” or violated policies.

Since SpaceX is a private company, this could prevent employees from selling their shares until SpaceX goes public — which may not even happen. SpaceX also reserves the right to buy back vested shares six months after an employee leaves the company, TechCrunch reports.


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Apple settles class-action shareholder lawsuit for $490 million.

The iPhone maker was accused of defrauding shareholders when it cut its quarterly revenue forecast by up to $9 billion in 2019 due to US-China trade tensions. That announcement literally decimated its share price, just a couple of months after CEO Tim Cook declined to put China in the same category as other emerging markets where Apple faced sales pressure.

Reuters notes that the settlement, which covers any investors who bought shares in those two months, amounts to under two days of profit for Apple.


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A bloc of private equity and hedge-fund types are holding talks about how to minimize SEC fines over disappearing messages.

The firms include Citadel, KKR. and Blackstone. “Their goal is to minimize any fines and ensure that if they reach a settlement, no firm is singled out for a harsher penalty,” according to Bloomberg.

The SEC is investigating whether WhatsApp, Telegram and Signal use at these companies broke disclosure rules. Citadel in particular is still willing to fight the SEC on this.


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This e-commerce darling couldn’t cut it IRL.

Outdoor Voices, a popular athleisure brand once seen as the next Lululemon, is closing all of its stores on Sunday. The direct-to-consumer lifestyle brand was valued at $110 million in 2018, but has been on the decline following internal friction. It’s the end of an era for the e-comm startup once considered a model for founders — the company will go back to selling strictly online.


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A Cybertruck owner shopped around and found out.

Tesla’s owner agreement expressly forbids owners to “sell or otherwise attempt to sell” the truck within a year of buying it, or the company would take action, including refusing future sales.

Well, someone in the Cybertruck Owners Club forum says they tried listing theirs “on multiple sites to feel it out” anyway, and the company canceled their two (2!) other reservations.


Be careful selling your Cybertruck! Tesla found sale listings...

[Tesla Cybertruck Forum - News, Discussions, Community - Cybertruckownersclub.com]

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Andreessen Horowitz was behind Kickstarter’s doomed Web3 pivot.

According to Fortune, the crowdfunding platform got a $100 million investment from the VC firm’s crypto fund — and the 2021 deal was meant to get Kickstarter into the Web3 hype cycle.

If you recall, the pivot was a disaster: after public outrage, Kickstarter formed a community advisory council, and the company ultimately decided to shift its attention away from the blockchain.

Correction March 12th 10:56AM ET: The Web3 pivot wasn’t a formal stipulation of the deal, as initially stated.


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Reddit seeks $6.5 billion valuation in IPO.

The company hopes to raise up to $748 million when it goes public by selling about 22 million shares at $31 to $34 per share, according to a public filing issued Monday after Bloomberg first reported the number.

Part of its plan will rest on its own users and moderators, for whom the company will set aside 1.76 million shares. Reddit’s valuation would be down from the $10 billion it hoped for when it first filed to go public in 2021.

Update March 11th, 6:41AM ET: Added official filing.


Marketers are about to infiltrate your favorite subreddits.

Ahead of its IPO, Reddit announced a set of tools for businesses that want to be more active on the platform — including the ability to see which subreddits are mentioning a brand. For businesses, Reddit says it’s a way to “establish and grow a meaningful organic presence on Reddit.” In other words: the brands are coming.


Reddit’s free business dashboard showing “Top communities mentioning Camp Glow” and trending topics.
Image: Reddit
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So there’s a Chinese policy directive to “delete America.”

The idea is to get American tech giants out of the country:

Document 79 was so sensitive that high-ranking officials and executives were only shown the order and weren’t allowed to make copies, people familiar with the matter said. It requires state-owned companies in finance, energy and other sectors to replace foreign software in their IT systems by 2027. 

Also, the Chinese government plans to splash out on science and tech — spending $51 billion this year, a 10 percent increase over last year.


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Xfinity internet plans get a free speed upgrade.

Comcast says it’s doubled the throughput for Connect plans, from 75Mbps to 150Mbps, while its prepaid plans go from 50Mbps to 200Mbps. Connect More and Fast will each get a 100Mbps boost, as well, bringing those up to 300Mbps and 500Mbps, respectively.

The company says it’s not raising prices for these increases.

Disclosure: Comcast is an investor in Vox Media, The Verge’s parent company.


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Rooster Teeth is shutting down after an over two-decade-long run.

In a memo to employees obtained by Variety, Rooster Teeth general manager Jordan Levin wrote that the company is closing “due to challenges facing digital media resulting from fundamental shifts in consumer behavior and monetization.”

Warner Bros. Discovery, which owns Rooster Teeth, is in talks to sell the rights to some of the production company’s series, including RWBY, Red vs. Blue, and Gen:Lock, Variety reports. And while WBD is also reportedly looking to sell the Roost podcast network, it will remain operational.


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Seven banks who have Elon Musk-related debt are trying to negotiate with Musk.

They are discussing options that may make the debt less risky to hold. After the events of 2022, when Musk bought Twitter, it was difficult for these banks to offload the debt; they’ve agreed — for now anyway — to coordinate a sale together when X is “on firmer financial footing.”


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Whole Foods is planning to launch convenience stores for city-dwellers.

The Amazon-owned upscale grocer is launching Whole Foods Market Daily Shop stores.

The Seattle Times reports that, like at the larger stores, customers can pay using a palm print and associate it with their payment method through Amazon One, the biometric payments system Amazon debuted in 2020 that can be used to buy things or even verify you’re old enough to buy beer.


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Reddit will reportedly seek an up to $6.5 billion valuation when it goes public.

That’s according to The Wall Street Journal, which says Reddit could shoot for a price range between $31 to $34 per share when launching its IPO. The $6.5 billion number is significantly lower than the more than $10 billion Reddit was valued at in 2021 following a round of funding.


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Elon Musk has punked Matt Levine again.

“oh it’s a rare friday money stuff, i wonder who could have brought that about,” Levine wrote on Twitter.

And yes, that means an update on my Levine story is forthcoming.


Aston Martin’s first electric car has been pushed back another year.

Aston Martin boss Lawrence Stroll is probably focused on F1 at the moment, but he just revealed another delay in its plan to build an EV with help from Lucid Motors.

While its first plug-in hybrid EV is on track to enter production in 2024, the report says, “the Company’s first battery electric vehicle (BEV) is now targeted for launch in 2026.” Automotive News Europe reports Stroll said that there’s “much more driven demand” for it to offer a plug-in hybrid right now.


An outline of two car bodies over a drwing of an electric car platform with wheels and battery cells, demonstrating what Aston MArtin is building.
Aston Martin BEV platform
Image: Aston Martin