🍋 Fullployment

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Good morning! Hope y'all had a great weekend. The 2022 Winter Olympics have kicked off and Americans are currently in 14th place with 3 silver medals. Need the athletes to start getting golds soon because that's a much better inflation hedge. Bezos' ex MacKenzie Scott donated a cool $134 million to a nonprofit focused on education. If your ex is trying to leave the planet, you can focus your energy on endeavors other than trying to ruin their life. A drawing (like a tangible NFT) bought in 2017 for $30 at a yard sale is now worth over $10 million. Houston native "Mattress Mack" placed the largest mobile sports bet ever on the Super Bowl. He's taking the Bengals moneyline over the Rams, putting down $4.5 million to win $7.7 million.

As promised, please find the results of the Wall Street compensation survey split by bank here.

If you are sick of working on your tiny laptop screen while on the road, check out today's sponsor, ViewSonic's portable monitors.

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1. Story of the Day: Fullployment

In one of the biggest twists of the year so far, the US monthly payroll report showed that job growth in January rose by 467,000, which absolutely crushed the Wall Street estimate of 150,000.

These numbers dismiss a record-breaking surge in COVID cases nationwide which theoretically should have kept workers and consumers at home. Another hitch in the information is that the unemployment rate increased a smidge to 4%. This makes sense considering the labor force participation rate now sits at 62.2%, which is the highest level since February 2020, the start of the pandemic.

Biggest employment gains came from leisure and hospitality sectors, which added 151,000 jobs, professional and business services added 86,000, and retail 61,000. Economists now expect the growth to increase even more in the next few months as this change of tune shows people are starting to put the omicron variant in the rearview mirror.

The positive news continues with wages increasing 5.7% and positive revisions to November and December 2021's payroll reports (647,000 instead of 249,000 and 510,000 instead of 199,000, respectively).

Short Squeez Takeaway: Higher wages are great but inflation remains at historically high levels too. The positive development when it comes to employment gives a green light to our friends at the Fed to not only continue with the plans to raise rates, but also potentially move forward with larger or more frequent raises (after the report, the probability of 50 bps raise increased 27% and the probability of 6 increases this year rose to 51%).  

Source: CNBC

2. Markets Rundown

While everyone has been worried about a correction, markets have actually rallied and the S&P 500 is within 7% of record highs. Bullish technical indicators for Bitcoin spread helped cryptos overall.

Movers & Shakers

• (+) Amazon ($AMZN) +14% recorded the largest single day gain in market value for a US company ever.

• (+) Twitter ($TWTR)  +7% flipped the script on two days of losses affecting major tech stock.

• (–) Clorox ($CLX) -14% after reporting lower-than-expected results for Q2 fiscal year 2022 and lower full year guidance.

3. Top Reads

• "The Eight Wonder of the World": 529 college savings plans (Yahoo)

• Joe Rogan isn't Spotify's biggest problem (Atlantic)ue

• Facebook's underperformance of Big Tech isn't new (Ritholtz)

• Private equity loves wealth management (IN)

• Gamer turned M&A whale (WSJ)

• Mortgage rates highest since October 2019 (MND)

• Even with bipartisan support, politicians may not be banned from trading (Atlantic)

• Student loan forgiveness is bad policy (FSE)

• PPP helped businesses way more than workers (NYT)

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4. Book of the Day: Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order: Why Nations Succeed and Fail

From legendary investor Ray Dalio, author of the #1 New York Times bestseller Principles, who has spent half a century studying global economies and markets, Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order examines history’s most turbulent economic and political periods to reveal why the times ahead will likely be radically different from those we’ve experienced in our lifetimes—and to offer practical advice on how to navigate them well.

A few years ago, Ray Dalio noticed a confluence of political and economic conditions he hadn’t encountered before. They included huge debts and zero or near-zero interest rates that led to massive printing of money in the world’s three major reserve currencies; big political and social conflicts within countries, especially the US, due to the largest wealth, political, and values disparities in more than 100 years; and the rising of a world power (China) to challenge the existing world power (US) and the existing world order. The last time that this confluence occurred was between 1930 and 1945. This realization sent Dalio on a search for the repeating patterns and cause/effect relationships underlying all major changes in wealth and power over the last 500 years.

In this remarkable and timely addition to his Principles series, Dalio brings readers along for his study of the major empires—including the Dutch, the British, and the American—putting into perspective the “Big Cycle” that has driven the successes and failures of all the world’s major countries throughout history. He reveals the timeless and universal forces behind these shifts and uses them to look into the future, offering practical principles for positioning oneself for what’s ahead.

“No system of government, no economic system, no currency, and no empire lasts forever, yet almost everyone is surprised and ruined when they fail.”

5. Short Squeez Picks

• Hundreds of thousands of investors are automating their money with this fintech platform*

• The next "Great Recession" may be in talent

• Learn how to run a soccer club through lessons from investing

6. Daily Visual: Labor Force is Back

Chart of labor force participation rate

Source: Axios

7. Daily Acumen: 6 Easy Ways to Become More Likable at Work

Call people by their name. People like to hear their own name. What they don't like is being referred to by their title, or not referred to at all.

Look for the positive in every situation. Pessimists don't win many friends. Bringing up your negative feelings about a situation, even though the situation itself might be unfavorable, is a sure way to alienate your coworkers and bring the entire mood of the establishment down. Instead, always look for the bright side.

Avoid competition when possible. Workers are competing for promotions, for recognition, and sometimes just for pride. But the moment you come to be seen as a competitor, people will shy away from you and may even come to resent you.

Provide help, and ask for favors. Humans are social creatures, and we get along by helping one another. Go out of your way to help people who need your assistance, and never be afraid to ask for a favor of your own.

Get past the small talk. You might be perfectly content talking about the weather or your local sports team, but those types of conversations won't win you much long-term favor. Ask genuine, down-to-earth questions of your coworkers when you have time to chat.

Be consistent. You don't have to become a predictable robot, but adding consistency to your behaviors and routines is important. People need to know what they can expect from you, or else they might immediately write you off.

Source: Inc

8. Crypto Corner

• The difference between equity and crypto markets

• MIT and Boston Fed look at future of crypto

• We've got some time until crypto regulation

• Despite Chinese sentiment, crypto thrives in Asia

• Bullish ETH trade with zero liquidation risk

• Is IMF worried about El Salvador's Bitcoin experiment succeeding?

• Olympics join others embracing NFTs

9. Memes of the Day

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