“They do say imitation is the best form of flattery. Maybe Beyonce is so Crazy In Love with our brand, she made her own.” — Lululemon, in a now-deleted tweet. Beyonce announced that she’s set to release an “athleisure” apparel line. Clearly, Lululemon thinks it’s Irreplaceable.
MARKET SNAPSHOT
Big Picture
- After another strong week last week, U.S. stocks have been positive six out of the last seven weeks
Alternatives to Watch
- Oil dropped 4% after Saudi Arabia claimed the kingdom would not freeze production unless other major producers agreed to do the same
Market Movers
- Petrobras, Brazil’s state-run oil manufacturer, skyrocketed 81% in March, as investors anticipate the politician that plunged the company into debt will be impeached and the company will begin to repay some of that incredible $400 billion debt
__________
U.S. MACRO
All About Jobs
With April already here, we’d be remiss not to take the time to appreciate March, a month that was chock-full of economic fun—most notably, jobs: the U.S. added 215,000 of them, beating estimates of 199,000. The dust has settled, and the unemployment rate now stands at 5%, a slight tick in the wrong direction from its previous 4.9%. But this is thanks to more Americans entering the workforce, which is actually promising for the economy. Slow wage growth remains a concern, however, as wages have increased a mere 2.3% since a year ago. Historically, job growth has also brought about wage increases, but as of late, the trend has bucked, leaving many Americans wondering about that pay raise…
__________
.
CORPORATE PRIMER
Tesla Shows How It’s Done
The Brew doesn’t give out props often, but we’ve got to hand it to Elon Musk. Days after long lines formed outside of Tesla stores all over the world, CEO Elon Musk announced over the weekend that the company had doubled the number of expected Model 3 preorders. The Model 3: Tesla’s triumphant, affordable answer to “Tesla cars are awesome but are you kidding me with that price?” Anyways, the pre-order numbers aren’t too shabby, especially considering many who pre-ordered hadn’t even seen the new model. That’s what you call brand loyalty. It all adds up to a staggering 253,000 preorders in just 36 hours—and high fives all around at Tesla.
Swing and a Miss for BlackBerry
Brace yourselves: we’ve got more deeply disappointing news from BlackBerry. Its comeback via integration with Google’s Android operating system has failed to break its impressive losing streak: three years of falling revenue. With BlackBerry phones starting to make Buzzfeed “throwback” lists, you can likely guess the culprit. Specifically, phone sales dropped another 14%. On the bright side, BlackBerry saw its software revenue increase by 113% (yes, it does software too). With yet another disappointing earnings report under its belt, the software win was a small one. Plus, as far as tech fruit goes, consumers are big into Apples.
Alaska Air Pulls it Off
Amidst the fallout of the Marriott-Anbang bidding war for Starwood, another big one is coming to an end. This time, it’s airlines. After multiple rounds of bids, Alaska Air came out victorious over JetBlue. Its prize? Virgin America. Virgin America’s prize? $2.5 billion—which is a solid billion bucks over its market value. Alaska Air is expected to move up the rankings to #5 among airlines, with this acquisition greatly boosting its presence in California. To the victor go the terminals.
__________
OTHER STORIES
- Facebook pulls out of talks to stream NFL games
- Reddit hints that U.S. now spying on its users
- “Batman v Superman” rules box office for second weekend
- Airbnb reveals 20% of SF listings are by hosts listing multiple homes
__________
ECONOMIC CALENDAR
- Monday: Factory Orders
- Tuesday: Walgreens, Darden Restaurants Earnings; International Trade; ISM Non-Manufacturing Index; Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey
- Wednesday: Bed Bath & Beyond, Monsanto, Constellation Brands Earnings; Fed FOMC Minutes
- Thursday: Rite Aid, Ruby Tuesday; Weekly Jobless Claims
- Friday: N/A
HOUSES YOU CAN CATCH A FOUL BALL IN
If you’re a baseball fan, having a home within walking distance from the ballpark is a big bonus. As it happens, it’s a perk for your home value too. 18 out of 29 residential areas close to MLB stadiums had median values well above averages in their respective cities—here’s a breakdown of some of these cities:
- Overall, homes near stadiums were worth 15% more, and New York’s Yankee Stadium had the most influence: homes near the stadium were worth 82% more, averaging $740,106.
- In second, third and fourth, we’ve got the Houston Astros, Boston Red Sox and Cincinnati Reds, at 79%, 66% and 57%, respectively.
- In fifth, we’ve got the Detroit Tigers, with home values near Comerica Park 48% higher than the city average. What’s notable about this? The city average is $62,101—which is less than half of the cheaper towns on the list, and one sixth of the most expensive.
- But hey, at least the stadium bumped up Detroit home values. Homes near the Baltimore Orioles stadium were actually worth 16% less. And home values near the Oakland Athletics? 56% less.
INTERVIEW QUESTION OF THE DAY
How many times a day do the minute and hour hands of a clock overlap? (Answer)
__________
BUSINESS TERM OF THE DAY
Shell Corporation — A shell corporation is a corporation without active business operations or significant assets. Shell corporations are not necessarily illegal or illegitimate (and often serve important purposes), but this weekend’s mind-shattering data leak, titled the Panama Papers, provides a stark example of shell corporations gone wrong: the leak reveals an exhaustive account of government officials and powerful icons (like Vladimir Putin’s top associates and Iceland’s Prime Minister) who used shell corporations to hide their money, running away from taxes and obligations to further their net gain.
__________
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
2.6 terabytes: the combined size of all the files in the Panama Papers, or the “biggest data leak in the history of data journalism,” in the (tweeted) words of Edward Snowden, who knows a thing or two about data leaks.
[protected-iframe id=”eb8a0f8733220b3caed25af2be8f960b-97886205-61771510″ info=”//s3.amazonaws.com/downloads.mailchimp.com/js/mc-validate.js” ]