Financial Virgin - Issue 21
Walmart take a different approach to education and Pfizer earnings released
Thank Goodness its Friday! Despite COVID concerns, the Federal Reserve opted to keep rates unchanged. However, Fed chair Jerome Powell claimed the US economy was strengthening, a sign that the central bank should begin to dial back low interest rates.
As jobless benefits expire, the labor market will once again battle for new employees. In May 2021, 25.8% of 9M job openings hailed from the leisure, hospitality, trade, transportation, and utilities industries
🌪️There’s a major Blizzard at Blizzard
Activision Blizzard, the game makers of popular games like World of Warcraft, Call of Duty and my personal old school favourite Starcraft. Currently, Blizzard Entertainment has four main franchises: Warcraft, StarCraft, Diablo, and Overwatch. Each franchise is supported by other media based around its intellectual property such as novels, collectible card games, comics and video shorts. Blizzard has been in the news of late as the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing filed suit against the gaming giant last week ⚖️ The lawsuit responds to reports that the company has allowed rampant sexual harassment and a “frat boy culture’ to run unchecked. Adding fuel to the fire women have been passed over for promotions and received lower starting pay for “substantially similar work.” Read more about this topic here
💉 Pfizer reported earnings, flexing its immunity to the market blues.
They raised their 2021 vaccine sales forecast to over $33.5 billion (an increase of 28.8%)
COVID aside, Pfizer reported increased growth in its rare disease, hospital, oncology, and internal medicine segments. 🎉 more here
💉And so Mandatory office vaccines Start
Google and Facebook will require US office workers to get vaccinated. Makes sense. But raises the slightly amusing possibility of people claiming they haven't been vaccinated so they can stay remote.
💰Scammers are making NFTs of a dead artist's work
Right now, the market is an unregulated wild west, so it's incredibly hard to stop them. Wired UK
🛍️Shopify earnings killed it in the latest earnings results and analysts’ estimates got blown out the park. Revenue exceeded $1B for the first time ever.
EPS: $2.24 vs $0.97 est
REV: $1.12B, +57% YoY
🚗Tesla surpassed $1B in quarterly net profits for the first time ever, beating forecasts on both the top and bottom lines. ⚡ Just so its clear, that kind of net income is a 10x improvement YoY. 🎉 Read more here
EPS: $1.45 vs $0.98 est
Rev: $11.96B, +98% YoY
🥳Coinbase add new coins to its exchange
Its common knowledge by now that Coinbase is the biggest US crypto exchange and any crypto/token listed on its exchange gets huge validation by the market on the listing day. The latest coins added are, Mask, Rally, Cloverr Finance, Fetch.ai and Paxos Standard.
📚Walmart Steps up Education
Walmart will spend $1B to expand one of its most aggressive employee benefits: free tuition. Attracting and retaining good staff is a major push for some future thinking companies and Walmart are offering to cover 100% of education costs for its employees. About 1.5M part-time and full-time employees at Walmart and Sam’s Club will be eligible.
🚬Microsoft’s Cutting Edge AI is Relegated to Picking Up Cigarette Butts
LINKS THAT DON’T SUCK
🦩A pink Lake?
🐒Can you type quicker than a monkey?
👚 Singer Pink Offers To Pay Olympians’ Fine Over Clothing Fiasco
Have a great weekend all!