The Best One Yet - Bitcoin’s best friend, Amazon is a shipping company, and Superhuman pioneers “luxury email”

Episode Date: June 28, 2019

While Bitcoin is rising, we looked at Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), which is the “shovel” to Bitcoin’s “mining.” A crazy stat about Amazon reveals how it’s become a shipping company. And Superhuman just raised $33M for its mission to make email a luxury thing.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is Nick. This is Jack. And this is Snacks Daily. It is Friday, June 28th. We're bringing a T-Blo I read to you. This is the best one yet. Also, happy birthday dad and my mother-in-law, May. Yeah, Mike Martel, the honorary captain of Snacks Daily today.

I love it. Now, three wonderful stories we found. We got in deep on these three. The first one, Snackers have told us they want a Bitcoin story. Everyone wanted a Bitcoin story. We heard a lot of us. So we found a story about advanced micro devices. Very true.

But it's also kind of about Bitcoin. But it's technically about advanced micro devices. But it's also about Bitcoin. But it's basically an AMD story. Second story is a crazy statistic about Amazon that surfaced yesterday. Can we share this thing? It ships almost half of its packages itself. It has officially become a shipping company.

This has monumental implications. Really big. And came out of nowhere. Out of a single stat. I can't wait to hit this. Third and final story is superhuman. It just hit a $260 million valuation with a unique business model. Luxury email.

It's like a Gmail account plus a little assistant. Plus a way to show people that, yeah, you spend money on email. It's like Batman plus. Robin. Plus, again, a signal you spend a lot of money on Gmail. But first, please, did you hear Abercrombie and Fitch is planning to sell CBD products in their stores? I heard they did a 10 store pilot and now they're taking this thing nationwide. CBD lip bomb, CBD cream. CBD cream bomb. But honestly, aren't CBD products only for people over 18 years of age? And this is hitting 160 stores. And Abercrombie customers are under 18. I'm pretty sure they're, oh, hey mom, can you please put in this lip bomb with

the medium sized t-shirts? Sure, honey. What's in what's in the Oh, nothing. Just a little bit of lotion. Just a little bit of lotion, please. Let's hope they don't put CBD in that ridiculously potent Abercrombie-Fitch Cologne. You could kill people. It could be a problem. Let's move on to our three stories. You're tuned in the snacks daily. The snacks about the hair ain't food. It's air candy. They don't reflect the views of the robberhood family. It's all informational just so. You know, we're not recommending any securities. Nope. It's not a research report or investment advice. Not an offer or sale of a security. Right. Snacks is

Digestible. Business news for you. Robberhood Financial, LLC. Member Fenra slash SIPC. For our first story, we just discovered that Amazon ships a whopping 48% of its own packages. Wow. Did you expect that number? No. I did not expect that number.

No. No one expected that number. I always known like Amazon's dream is to have a two-car garage and to cut out UPS FedEx and the United States Postal Service. I was going to say 10%, 8%, 6%. I didn't know it was halfway there already. No one expected 48%. So according to Rakuten, this company called Rakuten, which collects data, they've been tracking all Amazon packages for two and a half years.

It's a thankless job, but someone's got to do it with a confusing name. So back in January of 17 when they started tracking, Amazon was shipping 15% of its own goods. Still a big number, but not a whopping big number. But today, it's climbed up to 48%. Now, the whole market, if you'll look at everyone who's shipping for Amazon, this is how it breaks down. First, you got Amazon on top with a plurality, great middle school terms. at 48%. Then second is the United States Postal Service,

the mailman. There are 33%. Then you got UPS shipping 17% of packages for Amazon. And FedEx does just 1.6% at the bottom. That's it. So those four make up 100% of things bought on Amazon. Add it up. Now there are two key reasons why Amazon's doing this.

The first. It's faster. True. According to the data from Rackerton, the moment after the click is pushed by you when you order like a 16 pack of toy paper because you don't want to walk home with that out of the store. I hear you've been there.

It takes 3.2 days to get to your door. on average if Amazon does it, and it takes six days if anybody else does it. And then the second key reason, it's just cheaper, naturally. They're cutting out of middleman. Right. I dare you to say racketing again for a third time correctly. I'm done. I'm done. We're retired. So, Amazon has under the radar built a huge shipping company. Okay, it started with like gig Amazon delivery. These white vans that you don't see, they're kind of unmarked and they're just doing like Amazon packages. I saw one recently. It was in front of my building. It's a little scary. What? Those are definitely Amazon packages. Who are those guys? I saw one. It opened up the

where only Amazon inside, no signs of Amazon on the outside. It's a little bit of alarming. Second was the delivery service partners, which was Amazon's attempt to like encourage entrepreneurs to start their own mini logistics company. Exactly. They were even lending Amazon employees, like $10,000 to start one of these businesses. Right. Third, you got Amazon lockers. True. Like grocery stores and college campuses, if you don't have a reliable place to get your stuff delivered, it can go to like an Amazon centralized locker. And then perfect timing for this statistic. Amazon and Wright Age just announced. yesterday, that Amazon counters becoming a thing at 1,500 right aid locations, which popped right-aid

stock. Right. So if you got a stoop that's not got good security and you got theft problems, or if you need a signature and you're not home, you're not home. You can have it sent to the right aid. Exactly. Now, there's bigger things, which we've reported on in Snacks Daily, like the Air Hub in Hebrew and Kentucky. These are big things that Amazon's been investing in that are very clear and apparent everyone's aware of them. Yeah, you can't hide a logistics center that has 5,000 employees that are all over the country. Hide an Air Hub in Contell. And can tell, where you've got a bunch of airplanes. Or the 15 Boeing airplanes it just bought last week at the Paris Airship. Or you can't hide all the drone initiatives that you're pulling out and testing worldwide.

What's shocked us with this story is those other initiatives and that 48% they're already doing. Key number. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at Amazon? Amazon is proving that data matters more than experience. I can't believe you want there. I hate admitting this. It's a painful one. It kind of hurts. I know. I'm looking at Jack now. It's a little tear down the nose. Now, there is an interesting pattern here. with Amazon. First, it partners with the company. Then it learns about the company. Then it collects data about the company. And then it does whatever that company did better. Yeah, it cuts it out. So it starts as a friend, moves to frenemy status and then ends up an enemy. And classics next time. We were looking for case studies. We found a bunch of them with Amazon. Shipping. We just covered it.

Physical stores. Amazon Go store. Physical products. Amazon basics products. Video. Amazon original videos. They act like they're partnering you with you. And then they do the same thing. And then they cut you out. For our second story, Bitcoin has been on a surge, but we want to talk about AMD stock. This story is about Bitcoin, but it's really about AMD. Right. So it's pretty much about Bitcoin. You might have heard the Bitcoin mania is happening. It's on a tear again. We've all got that buddy. He's like, hey, this time, it's for real. Yeah, we do. We all have that buddy. It's risen the Bitcoin from $4,000 just three months ago in March to almost $14,000 this week. I love that he said the Bitcoin. Drop the, as an update. As in update,

as of this recording, Bitcoin has fallen back down to around $10,000 today. It's been very volatile. There's a ton of attention right now on Bitcoin, which is one of the reasons we're covering it. The reason we want to cover it is because we think there's some interesting context here with AMD, aka Advanced MicroDevices. AMD has some stakes in Bitcoin. We'll tell you why in a second. But first, AMD stock is up this week on reports that Microsoft is switching from Intel to AMD for all of its surface tablets. Because AMD is the maker of a bunch of different microchips that are critical to powering a lot of different devices, including some ones that you have a lot of fun with. Yeah, PlayStation, the fifth version, PlayStation 5, and the newest version of Xbox, they're both going to AMD.

So Christmas 2020 will be huge for AMD chips. Okay, now back to Bitcoin for a bit. AMD has kind of hooked its wagon a little bit to Bitcoin in a pretty interesting way. Yes, it really has. Now, AMD was a believer in Bitcoin. And back in November, it unveiled, when Bitcoin was priced at like nothing. I don't even remember November. AMD unveiled a suite of tools for Bitcoin miners and blockchain developers.

Basically, AMD positioned itself as the partner if Bitcoin ever came back. Right. Because to create a Bitcoin, you need like hardcore computing power. And that's called mining. You mine for Bitcoin with your computer. And the higher the value of Bitcoin, the more miners who want to get involved to mine more of this valuable substance. And the more miners who want to get involved, the more demand for AMD chips and services.

So if you're thinking of Bitcoin, you also want to think of AMD in like, a really great analogy, and we think we have a good one here. The shovel and the gold rush. The gold rush and the people providing the shovels. Back when the gold rush happened, you could make money trying to mine for gold, or you could just make shovels. Seems here AMD has made shovels for Bitcoin miners. They're just computer. So, Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at AMD, but really also at Bitcoin? Nobody knows for sure why Bitcoin is up or down. It's only theories. Maybe it was Zuckpucks, you know, Facebook's new cryptocurrency, Libra, which could accelerate adoption of cryptocurrency. And some see Bitcoin as a safe haven like gold and buy it in case something crazy

happens in the economy. Full disclosure. That's why I bought one Bitcoin. So many people also think that it will become a currency eventually, so you can buy half a pizza with it, but not yet. It's not there yet. So there's no underlying fundamentals to Bitcoin that we know about. There are no profits. There's no economy behind the cryptocurrency. Right. So we don't want to speculate what's going to happen, but we like tracking the companies affected like AMD. Because they're relevant. For our third and final story, Superhuman just raised $33 million to make luxury email a thing. Are you sick and tired of BCCing yourself?

Do you want to live the inbox zero lifestyle? Are you willing to pay $30 a month for premium email? And tell people you do. That's why Superhuman became a thing. Superhuman describes itself as visually gorgeous, subtle and minimal. This is an invite-only $30 a month premium email service that like everyone in Silicon Valley is trying to talk about. It's kind of like TSA Pre-Jack or even clear, but for email.

Exactly. So, Jack, what's the pitch on this? All right, you spend more than three hours a day on email. Guess what? You can do it twice as fast through this elite email club. Now, ironically, this whole thing is designed to help you spend less time on email. Wow. Amazing. Wow. It just raised $33 million and has a valuation of $260 million.

Now, the interesting thing here is that it only has 15,000 customers despite hitting that high valuation. But the demand is very high, as evidenced by the wait list. there are 100,000 people who put their email name, their email address on the wait list. And you can hop on the line and then get up the line by referring more people. It's a very nice effect. It's a viral marketing strategy. Okay, so this is a wild idea. We've got to jump into this further. Here's how superhuman goes down if you get in and you're lucky enough post wait list. Which we're not lucky enough. We actually both got on the wait list today. But apparently once we're done, they'll give us a long questionnaire to like learn about our email habits. Sounds nice.

And then we get a mandatory video conference with some employees to like learn how to use the superhuman tool. I like the handholding. But what I'm curious about more are these ridiculous features for email. Yeah. First, the auto BCC. So when you introduce Tommy with Jerry, then response from that, you're auto BCCed. Hey, Jerry, moving you to BCC. Want to spare your inbox. So I don't like that's automatic. Also, instant calendar. It recognizes you're trying to schedule an event. Exactly. Your calendar pops right up and it makes it super easy. You don't have to pre-think about putting up your calendar like you do with Gmail. And then this one I love, instant stalker. You got to this feature. When an email arrives from someone new, it immediately searches the web and tells you

everything in a sidebar about that person. Pops up. No more Googling their LinkedIn profile to figure out where they were three years ago. No more checking out their social media accounts. It's right there in the inbox. Finally, inbox zero. It's something we all strive for. They preach it. It's basically like the religion of this company. They prompt you to get there by like nudging you to archive emails you don't need. Deleting ones you don't even want. It's Thursday. They're like Friday's coming up. Sorting ones that you'll deal with on the weekend. Guilt is a powerful, powerful driver. Now, it doesn't mean superhuman's perfect because there are some flaws. It really only works at this point on desktop.

It's still working on mobile, but that's why it raised $33 million. Exactly, because not all those features work on mobile. But one more feature I got to mention, triage emails. It escalates emails in your inbox based on the importance. Boom. When you get an email from your mother-in-law, that says, Jack, they ran out of salmon, rehearsal dinner's got tuna. I know that feeling.

That goes to the top of the inbox. I just can't believe you're serving fish at a landlock wedding. The in-laws were born by the sea. So, Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at Superhuman? It's all about the size of the pie, and the email pie is big. We know what you're thinking right now. There's one big question out there. Why doesn't Google just do this?

Well, our theory is that Superhuman is targeting a super skinny but highly lucrative slice of that email pie. Those are the power email users. And one little niche is not big enough for Google. It's got 1.5 billion people already with its Gmail app. But that little slice of power users could be lucrative enough for a company like superhuman. Jack, can you whip up the takeaways for us before the week?

The Amazon's quest for shipping domination is going much faster than expected. The key number here, 48%. It's a huge number. Bitcoin has surged in the past three months, which is good news for advanced micro devices. You got to keep this image in mind. The classic shovel company making money off the gold rush. And then Superhuman is targeting super email users with super email. Which means we can all start expecting those sent for you superhuman at the bottom of an email so we know which of our friends are paying $30 a month. Such a humble brag, minus the humble. Yeah, no big deal. Now time for our snack fact of the day. This one's ended by John Reinstra from Menlo Park, California.

Right down the road. Fun fact, there are more millionaires in the world than there are Bitcoin. There are 36 million millionaires in the world, to be exact. According to Credit Suisse, and there are 17 million Bitcoin that have been mined as of last year. Fun double fact, end of the fact. The maximum number of Bitcoin there can become are 21 million to be mined. It's a finite currency. Now, a couple other great stories we're covering in our Snacks newsletter.

First, Ford Motor Company is laying off 12,000 workers in Europe. And then Johnny Ive is leaving Apple, who was critical to design of some key Apple products. Snackers, it was a pleasure as always. It was so much fun. We like being with you this week. We'll be back with you Monday. Happy weekend. Let's do it Monday. I'm in.