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🍋 Finfluencer Fraud

🍋 Finfluencer Fraud

Eight people were charged with a $114 million meme stock pump-and-dump scheme, including influencers @MrZackMorris and @Ultra_Calls who used social media platforms like Discord and Twitter to promote their illegal activities.

December 15, 2022

Together With

"Competition brings out the best in products and the worst in people." — David Sarnoff

Good Morning! The Fed slowed pace of rate hikes and lifted its benchmark rate 50 bps, taking it to a targeted range between 4.25% and 4.5%, the highest level in 15 years.

Investors used to dismiss nuclear fusion as the stuff of science fiction, but now it's the stuff of venture capital dreams. After a major physics breakthrough this week, nuclear startups are suddenly the hot ticket in town.

Twitter is apparently delinquent on its rent and has been stiffing vendors since Elon Musk took over the company. And Tesla investors feel like they’re in the slow lane and are getting more vocal about their displeasure with CEO Elon Musk. With Musk's attention seemingly focused on Twitter, the electric vehicle giant's shares keep tumbling.

If you are in the market for investing in short-term rentals without the hassle of owning or maintaining properties in top vacation destinations, then check out today's sponsor Voyax.

If you are interested in getting in front of a smart, young audience of business leaders, bankers, investment professionals, policy influencers of over 500,000 people, then fill out this form, we’ll be in touch.

1. Story of the Day: SEC Goes After Finfluencers

It looks like the SEC has been on a fraud-fighting spree lately, going after not only SBF but also the Discord community 'Atlas Trading'.

Eight people were charged with a $114 million meme stock pump-and-dump scheme, including finance influencers @MrZackMorris and @Ultra_Calls who used social media platforms like Discord and Twitter to promote their illegal activities.

Finance influencers frequently combine unofficial trading advice with flashy displays of success on social media. These eight influencers may have thought they were slick, posting pictures of their fancy cars and bling on social media, but they were caught red-handed making grandiose claims about their investments only to secretly sell off the stock once their followers drove up the price.

In the end, they made a cool $114 million in profit before the stocks they promoted tanked, and now they could be facing possible jail time.

Takeaway: It seems like every celebrity and their mother is trying to sell you some sort of investment on Instagram or TikTok. But they can’t just say anything - and some learned their words can have real consequences.

Even Kim Kardashian and Floyd Merriweather have gotten in on the action, getting caught up in their own pump-and-dump scandals this year. So next time you're scrolling through Instagram and see a celebrity pushing a "can't-miss" investment, remember: sometimes influencers can give even worse advice than Jim Cramer.

2. Markets Rundown

If you want access to Wall Street insider interviews, industry deep-dives, premium research/resources and weekly Knowledge Drop newsletter, check out our Insiders membership.

Stocks closed lower after the Fed is expected to hike rates even higher than expected in 2023.

Movers & Shakers

(+) SoFi ($SOFI) +6% because the CEO bought $5 million of shares.
(+) Canada Goose ($GOOS) +3% as finance bros bundle up for the winter.
(–) Caesars Entertainment ($CZR) -5% as spending on gambling flattens.

Private Dealmaking

Trimble bought German transport logistics software Transporeon for $2 billion
Havfram, a wind farm equipment owner, raised $250 million
Dataiku, a business data analytics platform, raised $200 million
Malwarebytes, a cybersecurity company, raised $100 million
HistoSonics, a tumor treatment startup, raised $85 million
Equinom, a plant-based protein producer, raised $35 million

A Message from Voyax Capital

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4. Book of the Day: Mis-inflation

In this conversational book, Douglas Wilson takes all his burning economic questions and pitches them to David L. Bahnsen. Doug starts their discussion with this one: Politicians have been prophesying hyperinflation for generations now…so where is it?

Readers get to follow along as David’s answer to this question exposes false assumptions on both the right and the left (yes, even some of Doug’s).

More questions follow: The inflation-hawk approach to public policy screams about creating inflation without realizing that that’s what government policies intend to do--they’re just terrible at it, as David shows.

And those on the left continue to suffocate economic growth as they pursue their own counterproductive goals. But what both sides miss is that the best solution against inflation, deflation, and stagnation is found in enterprise.

And it’s in their discussion of wealth creation that Doug and David begin to sketch a vision of how a faithful, successful nation might handle its people and their money.

“Prolonged inflation never 'stimulates' the economy.”

5. Short Squeez Picks

Postanly Weekly. Feed your intellectual curiosities. Curated tools for wealth, wisdom and smarter living. Join curious people from Microsoft, Google, LinkedIn, Apple and BBC who receive hand-picked long-form essays on building a meaningful, smarter, more fulfilling life. Sign up for free.
The outside power of tiny breaks
How to improve at anything with the 30-for-30 approach
The professionals waking up at 8:59a
How to look extremely confident - even when you’re not
There’s only one place to look for approval

6. Daily Visual: Crocs Reports Record Revenue in 2022

Quarterly revenue since Q1 2019

Source: Axios

7. Daily Acumen

The journey from potential to useful:

“The visual mental model I like for self-improvement is imagining something like a Lathe.

A lathe, for the non-engineer, is a tool that molds a piece of material into some shapely form.

A machinist would use a lathe to take a hunk of metal and turn it into a usable engine part, for example.

The lathe takes something with potential and shapes it into something useful by slowly refining it and shaving away the excess.”

Source: Farnam Street

8. Job Board

Robinhood - Crypto AML Investigator - New York, NY
Amazon Conservation Association - Director of Finance - Washington
Ultra Evolution - Web3/Crypto EVM Code Engineer - Remote
Apple - Silicon Validation Software Engineer: Crypto and Security IPs - Beaverton, OR
MUFG - Strategic Finance Change, VP - Hybrid, NYC
Morgan Stanley - Vice President - Market Risk Analytics (Risk Management) - New York, NY

9. Memes of the Day

Advertise With Us / Merch Store / Private Equity Course

*****

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