🍋 Not So Happy Valentine's Day

Author

Short Squeez
February 15, 2022

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"We have to be willing to confront the world as it is, not as we want it to be if we're going to be successful." — Barry McCarthy

Good morning! Get five friends to subscribe if you think the Monday after the Super Bowl should be a National Holiday. Props to everyone who powered through yesterday and made it to Valentine's dinner with their boo. Harvard Business School is offering a class on happiness, led by “Gross National Happiness” author Arthur C. Brooks. Students learn that “happiness isn’t just a product of chance, genes or life circumstances but of habitually tending to four key areas — family, friends, meaningful work, and faith or life philosophy.” Turns out prior to Microsoft's acquisition of Activision, Berkshire Hathaway bought $1 billion worth of shares. Microsoft may be paving the way for the tech world by having employees return to the office in certain locations.

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1. Story of the Day: Not So Happy Valentine's Day

If you've seen Netflix's recent documentary called "The Tinder Swindler," you were probably shocked to learn about a Simon Hayut making millions off of Tinder. Well turns out, he isn't the only one.

According to the Federal Trade Commission, romance scams have reached a five year high. Just in the US, 56,000 people said they lost $547 million in love-bait ploys in 2021. That's an insane increase from 2017 where 17,000 people said they were screwed out of $87 million.

The Tinder Swindler himself posted some next-level stats by scamming women out of approximately $10 million. He was arrested in 2017 but was released after five short months. Since then, he’s supposedly gotten into business consulting, real estate and... bitcoin. Three victims who were featured in the Netflix film have created a GoFundMe page that, at the time of writing, has raised nearly £120,000.

The way this stuff generally works is they'll make up a backstory and fake profile, then manipulate their dating app matches into giving them money to help them out of their debacle. Of course, they can't ever meet in person because their situation is sooooo dire.

Short Squeez Takeaway: Social media is absolutely unbearable when you’re single on Valentine’s Day. Hope my single gang didn't manifest their loneliness into getting scammed on Tinder yesterday.

Nowadays everyone is hustling trying to get a side gig, or secondary income stream. Why become an influencer when you can just rob hopeless romantics of their money? If it seems too good to be true, it probably is. It's not all despair on the apps either. According to a 2019 study 1 in 10 US adults (12%) reported they have married or been in a committed relationship with someone they met on a dating app. The number is probably much higher now given pandemic inspired boom in online dating.

Source: Axios, NBC

2. Markets Rundown

All major indices have finished lower three days in a row, with the S&P leading the charge and having the biggest three day drop since October 2020. The pullback is likely caused by the turmoil between Russia and Ukraine.

Movers & Shakers

  • (+) Knightscope ($KSCP) +33% after announcing a partnership with Allied Universal.

  • (+) SQL Technologies ($SKYX) +12% since they closed their upsized IPO.

  • (–) Dave Inc. ($DAVE) -37% because the financial services firm said they intend to offer up a ton of shares in a public stock offering.

3. Top Reads

  • Block trading blocked on Wall Street (WSJ)

  • President Trump's old tax firm fired him as a client (CNBC)

  • Meta sued by Texas over facial recognition practices (WSJ)

  • A look at the valuations of FANGAM stocks (Musings on Markets)

  • Omicron subsides, which is great, but Moderna and Pfizer take a hit (CNBC)

  • Oil lower because of potential concessions from Ukraine to Russia (Fox Business)

  • The Fed is in a pickle (Bloomberg)

  • Different strategies in VC (The Generalist)

  • Persistence pays off (The Diff)

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4. Book of the Day: The New Confessions of an Economic Hit Man

Former economic hit man, John Perkins, shares new details about the ways he and others cheated countries around the globe out of trillions of dollars. Then, he reveals how the deadly EHM cancer he helped create has spread far more widely and deeply than ever in the US and everywhere else—to become the dominant system of business, government, and society today. Finally, he gives an insider view of what we each can do to change it.

Economic hit men are the shock troops of what Perkins calls the corporatocracy, a vast network of corporations, banks, colluding governments, and the rich and powerful people tied to them. If the EHMs can’t maintain the corrupt status quo through nonviolent coercion, the jackal assassins swoop in.  T exposes the fact that all the EHM and jackal tools—false economics, false promises, threats, bribes, extortion, debt, deception, coups, assassinations, unbridled military power—are used around the world today exponentially more than during the era Perkins exposed over a decade ago.

As dark as the story gets, this reformed EHM also provides hope. Perkins offers specific actions each of us can take to transform what he calls a failing Death Economy into a Life Economy that provides sustainable abundance for all.

“Who can see twenty-five years into the future? Your guess is as good as theirs. Confidence is everything.”

5. Short Squeez Picks

  • Did you know 67% of Americans identify as sports fans? And there's a reason 12,000 of them start their day with Sideline Sprint. In less than 5 minutes, they keep you informed and entertained on the world of sports. Subscribe for Free

  • Black unemployment will drop as businesses focus on skills-first hiring

  • Return to office and return to hot-desking

6. Daily Visual: Time Lost in Traffic Per Year

Source: Axios

7. Daily Acumen: Pieces of PIE

Success in your professional career has very little to do with how well you do your job. About 10% of your overall success will be determined by how well you complete the prescribed work.

That’s according to Harvey Coleman in his book Empowering Yourself, The Organizational Game Revealed. Briefly stated, Coleman asserts that career success is based on the 3 key elements of Performance, Image and Exposure (a.k.a. PIE):

Performance: This is about the day-to-day work you’re tasked with and the quality of the results you deliver.

Image: This is what other people think of you. Your personal brand. Do you maintain a positive attitude? Do you lead with solutions to issues, or are you the person that solely offers roadblocks when others suggest changes or alternatives?

Exposure: Who knows about you and what you do? Does your boss know what you do?  Does their boss know you and what you do? Do others inside and outside your organization know anything about you?

Source: Mondo Frank

8. Crypto Corner

9. Memes of the Day

 

 

 

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