Money Rehab with Nicole Lapin - Yellow Is The New Bankrupt

Episode Date: August 9, 2023

You know what Wednesday means - it's the weekly wrap-up of the biggest headlines on Wall Street. This week Nicole decodes the new crypto coin that is straight out of a science fiction fever dream, the latest on Musk vs Zuck and Yellow's bankruptcy. Want to start investing, but don't know where to begin? Go to moneyassistant.com and meet Magnifi, your AI money assistant, designed to help you make a plan for your financial goals. Want one-on-one money coaching from Nicole? Book a meeting with her here: intro.co/moneynewsnetwork 

Money rehabbers, you get it. When you're trying to have it all, you end up doing a lot of juggling. You have to balance your work, your friends, and everything in between. So when it comes to your finances, the last thing you need is more juggling. That's where Bank of America steps in. With Bank of America, you can manage your banking, borrowing, and even investing all in one place. Their digital tools bring everything together under one roof, giving you a clear view of your finances whenever you need it. Plus, with Bank of America's wealth of expert guidance available at any time, you can feel confident that your

money is working as hard as you do. So why overcomplicate your money? Keep it simple with Bank of America, your one-stop shop for everything you need today and the goals you're working toward tomorrow. To get started, visit bofa.com slash newprosmedia. That's b-o-f-a dot com slash n-e-w pros p-r-o-s media. bfa.com slash newprosmedia. I'm Nicole Lappin, the only financial expert you don't need a dictionary to understand. It's time for some money rehab. it's time for some money rehab. It is officially the lazy days of summer. Even the stock market is too hot to move these days. So for this week's news roundup, it's kind of all about memes. To kick things off, I am pleased to announce that Musk and Zuckerberg have set a date. Well, kind of. The two tech titans have resumed snipping at each other

on their respective social media platforms, with Musk claiming that the fight will be live-streamed on X, a platform formerly known as Twitter, and Zuck clapped back that they should probably use a more reliable program. Burn! Musk has also announced that he'll need an MRI and possibly surgery to strengthen the titanium rod in his back before any of this can go down. The rod was necessary because Musk participated in a sumo fight about eight years ago and crushed two discs. When not lifting weights in his office to prepare for the fight, Musk is also moving forward with his latest vision for X, the everything app. With the latest rumors swirling that he is again shopping around

for a partner to help facilitate stock market trades in the app. Not that you should ever be trading based on stock tips from some dude on X, but at least for now people have to leave the app to go trade, giving them a little time to think things through. With Musk though distracted by X, Tesla has been having a banner year turning a profit even after slashing prices. That growth happened under their CFO of 13 years, Zach Kirkhorn, who will be stepping down in December. So investors will be watching closely to see who steps into the leadership vacuum. In other meme-based market news, come with me on a journey to a world where along comes a special, special

crypto token, a world coin, if you will. This token is limited and yet universal. Created by scanning the irises of every human on earth, a small number of tokens are generated using that biometric data. And yet, because they are universally available, they are accepted everywhere. It no longer matters that no one can find a job because everyone can generate some amount of currency using their eye scans. Crypto and weird science have come together to save not just the day, but the whole world forever. No, this is not some kind of sci-fi movie where the characters all whisper to each other in dark rooms. This is an honest-to-goodness product pitch from Sam Altman, co-founder of Tools of

Humanity, has been laying on people around the world both in and out of boardrooms. The orb, which looks like, okay, picture a smooth silver basketball with a camera in it to scan people's eyeballs designed by a crypto pro. So yeah, whatever you're picturing, it's probably pretty accurate. Anyway, the orb exists and is out there doing its thing, scanning people's eyeballs. Altman and Tools of Humanity have raised hundreds of millions of dollars for this project. And globally, people have been lining up to have their iris scanned in exchange for a small amount of WorldCoin. In the United States, they've been lining up as well to have their iris scanned, but mostly for memes, since tools aren't offering WorldCoin in the U.S. yet due to regulatory concerns.

However, in places like Kenya, where they're offering 25 personalized WorldCoins per iris scan worth about 7,100 Kenyan shillings or 50-ish US dollars, demand for the scans have been so high that people have been lining up by the hundreds and waiting for hours to get scanned. The Kenyan government has actually suspended the scans for now over privacy concerns, but tools claim that over 2 million people have been scanned so far. While WorldCoin is getting put on hold in Kenya and hosting eyeball scanning parties in Manhattan, PayPal plans to launch its own stablecoin. Since this is crypto, there are already scammers out there selling fake tokens to trick unsuspecting

investors. So be careful out there and maybe think twice before having your eyeballs scanned by a mini Death Star for cryptocurrency. Just saying. And for our final meme update today, we have to start with a little backstory. In 2019, the Department of Justice sued Yellow Transportation Inc., a shipping company with a surprising orange logo for a company named Yellow, but I digress, for overcharging the Pentagon for transportation services. So during the early stages of the pandemic, when Yellow came looking for a CARES national security loan from the federal government, the response was generally,

nah, especially since Yellow was found to have vastly overstated just how much shipping they were still doing for the Pentagon. But senior Trump officials overruled that decision and gave the corporation a $700 million loan. Now the troubled company is declaring bankruptcy, potentially leaving that massive loan debt unpaid. While Yellow is selling their warehouses and trucks to help repay that debt, as of last week, they would have been able to sell some of their stock, which inexplicably went up 400% after the company shut down their operations. Remember, in bankruptcy, shareholders almost never get paid out. The stock just becomes worthless and vanishes. But certain parts of the

internet picked up chatter around the company, making it almost a meme stock. A small number of people were making a little bit of money trading the stock, and as the hype around it grew, more people bought it so they could turn around and sell it to the next sucker in line. The stock price has been coming down this week, but remains higher than it was in the spring before the company declared bankruptcy. The trick, I guess, is just to make sure you aren't holding when they turn out the lights and the price goes to zero. And this brings me back to why Musk's idea to allow people to trade instantly on X is a terrible one. It's easy to get caught up in other people's excitement about the market and want to be part of it. It's easy to get caught up in other people's excitement about the market and want to be part of it. But in the long run, most retail traders, not investors, traders lose money, which is why

I recommend index funds and chill. The long-term studies are there to back it up. It's an easy way for anyone to generate solid returns over their lifetime. For today's tip, you can take straight to the bank. Did you buy stock during the pandemic meme stock craze and lose money on it? If it's held in a taxable account like a regular brokerage account, you can sell it and use that loss to offset some of your capital gains taxes that you might owe on other investments. You can claim up to $3,000 a year, depending on your tax situation. But even if you don't have three thousand dollars in realized gains this year the loss will roll over and you can continue to use it to reduce your tax bill on any capital gains in the future money rehab is a production of money

news network i'm your host nicole lappen money rehab's executive producer is morgan lavoy our researcher is emily holmes do you need money rehab? And let's be honest, we all do. So email us your money questions, moneyrehabatmoneynewsnetwork.com to potentially have your questions answered on the show or even have a one-on-one intervention with me. And follow us on Instagram at Money News and TikTok at Money News Network for exclusive video content. And lastly, thank you. No, seriously, thank you. Thank you for listening and for investing in yourself, which is the most important investment you can make.