The Best One Yet - 🔗 “New name, who dis?” — Square’s new Block. Baseball’s lockout. Grab’s extra super app.

Episode Date: December 3, 2021

Square’s CEO isn’t Twitter’s CEO anymore and his 1st order of business is to change Square’s name… to Block. Major League Baseball players are demanding more $$$ — and so are the rest of America’s workers finally. And Grab’s Super App just became the biggest SPAC in history, but it’s more than a Super App (it’s an Extra Super App).$SQ $GRABGot a SnackFact? Tweet it @RobinhoodSnacks @JackKramer @NickOfNewYorkWant a shoutout on the pod? Fill out this form:https://forms.gle/KhUAo31xmkSdeynD9Got a SnackFact for the pod? We got a form for that too:https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSe64VKtvMNDPGSncHDRF07W34cPMDO3N8Y4DpmNP_kweC58tw/viewformLearn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

All right, here we go, baby. We got the weekend. Here we go. Three, two, one. This is Nick. This is Jack. And this is Snacks Daily. It is Friday, the real Friday, December 3rd. You got your Christmas tree yet? No, I don't. Do you? You cut this thing down? I bought a wreath like six days ago, and I haven't figured out how to hang it. Jack, you're getting away from the question. I know it's not on your mind. Can we celebrate a little early here? Celebrate what? It's your three-quarters birthday on Sunday, man. It's my fiscal birthday. It's your three-quarter birthday on Sunday, Jack. March 5th, December 5th, happy early three-quarters birthday.

And three months to 34. Today's pod, though, is also the best one yet. So perfect timing. For our first story, now that Jack Dorsey has quit Twitter, he just made his first big decision for his favorite child, Square. Hey, Square, get over here. Cute kid. Come here.

Sit on my knee. Here's the deal. We're changing your name. For our second story, for the first time in 27 years, Majorly Baseball just got locked out. What's happening with pitchers is happening with Starbucks baristas too. And for our third and final story, Grab, just went public in the biggest SPAC listing in the history of stock markets. But here's the thing, Snackers.

This isn't just a super app. This is an extra super app. Which is crazy because in America, we don't even have a super app. Right. So this is like two steps ahead of everything we thought we weren't even doing. But Snackers, before we hit that wonderful mix. I love this mix. It's the first Friday of the month, which means we have the big monthly jobs report.

for November. So Snackers, if you were one of the estimated 500,000 Americans who got a new job last month, Jack and I have a little thing we got to tell you about. It's a new thing. Prepare for the stay interview. The stay interview. It's a new thing. It's a work thing. And it's a strange thing. Now, we all know about the regular job interview. You know the regular job interview. You walk in, you got the briefcase. Maybe you laminated the resume. You have six copies of your resume, just a case. And they're like, why would you be a good fit here at Inat Tech? Can you tell you? Tell me about three times you solved an ambiguous challenge using data. What does leadership mean to you?

And we all know about the exit interview too. Hopefully you've had the pleasure of voluntarily leaving a job. The exit interview. They're not asking where you're going to be in five years. They're saying, hey, tell us why you're quitting. Why are you leaving us? Was it something we said? Was it we ended Taco Tuesdays?

Was it because we ended Taco Tuesdays? But now we have to tell you about the new thing. The stay interview. The stay interview. Snackers. The stay interview is when you're still working at a company. and your company can't believe you're still working at that company. The company is shocked.

You're still there. So they interview to ask why you're still there. They're like, what are you doing here? Like, let's be honest. You haven't left like Deborah, Rakeem, Sydney, or Brad, like what's going on, buddy? We have no idea why you're still here. What are we doing right? Because we want to double down on whatever we're doing that's making you feel good.

Is it the Taco Tuesdays? Because we can do more of the Taco Tuesdays. We can do them on Wednesdays too. Snackers, companies are so desperate to keep workers these days. They're asking workers to give them a performance review. If so facto, we got the new thing, a stay interview. Can you tell us about a time you thought about leaving, but decided not to leave us? But seriously, like, why are you still here?

Loyalty. Let's sit on three stories. Please don't leave on here. It snacks about to hear rain food. It's air candy. They don't reflect the views of the robberhood family. It's all informational just so. 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, Square, the fintech phenom just renamed itself.

Just changed his name. Square is now block, but it's more than just a name. It is. Jack Dorsey, by the way, apparently he and his beard wanted to get on two snacks episodes this week. They weren't satisfied with one. He succeeded. He was co-parenting two companies going in. of this week. He was the CEO of both Twitter and Square. Mr. Dorsey, next time you want to be on snacks,

just DM us and like, we can make this happen. We can work something out. Okay, so instead, on Monday, he quit Twitter, got on snacks. And then on Wednesday, he made his first very big decision with the company he's still CEO. So Jack Dorsey walks into Square, puts down his bag not filled with lunch and says, we're changing the name. Square is now block. Now they are keeping the word square as the name of a product, but they renamed the whole parent organization to block. Block as in blockchain for crypto. Yes, we know what you're thinking. Facebook did the same thing last month with meta platforms.

And yes, we know you're thinking who's going to be next. Who's going to do this before the end of the year? Are we thinking of Amazon? I don't know if people are thinking that, but you have a great idea for Amazon. Okay, Amazon, here's what you do. You drop the Amazon and you change. Well, first of all, Amazon is the e-commerce. It's not like appropriate for the whole company to be called that in.

Actually, this is perfect because I was just leading up to it. And now we have this very, very big, dramatic ending. Amazon, you should become smile. Like, you know, the logo? That's the little smile. And it'd be ironic because so many of the employees there, yeah, we'll leave it at that. While we're at Microsoft, you should change to macro and Twitter, you should change your name to Square. How about that?

I like the Microsoft macro. That's brilliant. Okay, let's go with that. But in the meantime, Snackers, Square is doing this because they aren't just Square anymore. That's the difference. Square has five really distinct business lines. Square has five absurdly distinct business lines we noticed. Get this. Square?

Yeah, that's the OG business. The classic. You know it. Those white dongles and tablets for merchants to process credit card payments. Yeah, you see them at the farmer's markets. Then Square also has the product cash app. Which is both peer-to-peer payments and investors. And Square has a whole other business called Spiral.

That's a new name. They also announced Wednesday. It's Square's crypto ambitions, which are mining, physical crypto wallets, and probably more. Oh, and wait, there's more. Let's say you want to, you know, listen to a song while you're mining some crypto over there. They own title. Yeah, they totally randomly bought the music streamer of Jay-Z. Jack Dorsey was on a yacht with Jay-Z and so bought his version of Spotify.

The fifth business line, and this is no joke, I have to just spell it out for you. Please do, Jack. The fifth business line is called TBD-5-6-975. I don't know what that stands for. The business, again, is TBD-5-5-66-975. The website describes it as an open developer platform to make it easier to access Bitcoin and other blockchain technologies without having to go through an institution. We'll translate that for you. They make it easier to change regular money into crypto money.

I'm looking at that without having to go through an institution. Does that mean they're replacing themselves? Because currently people go through them, the institution. This feels like Square is the institution, so this is a product to go around square. And there's probably a geometry joke. Like, I don't know. There's probably something there. Shakespeare said, what's in a name?

So, Jack, what is the takeaway for our buddies over at Block? We're in the era of the tech conglomerates. Snackers, Google, they change their corporate name to Alphabet because they are so much more than Google search. Facebook changed their name to Meta because they want to be so much more than just the Facebook app. And now Square is Block because its ambitions are way more than Square. These three are the new tech conglomerates. They are one company with one single stock, but they each. have a bunch of different business lines. The old conglomerates, by the way, they kind of went extinct

over this year and last year. General Electric, Toshiba, Johnson & Johnson, United Technologies. They're all breaking up into smaller chunks. Old conglomerates, they're getting replaced by even more powerful tech conglomerates. We're in the era of the tech conglomerate. For our second story, Major League Baseball just entered its first work stoppage in 27 years. It's a lockout, not a strike. but both happen only when labor has power. Can we talk about like the biggest issue like facing baseball recently, Jack? Takes too long. Yeah.

I went to a Giants game the other day. I wrote a novel between the fourth and fifth inning. There should be a pitch clock. Like the pitcher has to pitch in five, four, three, three, two. In the seventh inning, Jack, I started streaming a hockey game in my phone. That's how slow this game was going. Well, maybe you'd pay attention if this happens, which some people are asking for. I like this idea.

The runner has the choice to run. run to first base like normal, or go in the opposite direction around the bases and go to third. Hey, Rod, what do you think of this? Like, the defense has to react to what the base runner does. Oh, you thought you're a third baseman? You're actually a first baseman. He's going that way. That would be a hoot.

That's how you get baseball players in shape. But the biggest issue right now for baseball, it isn't speed. It's actually work stoppage. They stopped baseball. The $11 billion a year business of MLB is frozen in place. Yeah, this is a classic lockout, which means that the owners of the 30, baseball teams refuse to open up for business. Which is basically the same as a strike.

Just the protest is happening from the other side of the negotiation table. Literally a lockout because the owners have the keys to stadiums. Oh, you left your thing in the locker room? You're not going in because we're locking you out. You want to get that thing on your side treated? The trainer, they're locked out too. The lockout is happening because the five-year pact between all the players and the owners has expired. The collective bargaining agreement.

And they couldn't agree to an extension. So spring training, it's not until February. So they got some time to like hammer out a deal, you know, dot the eyes crossed the T's. But the great baseball dispute, it comes down to T things. Pay and playoffs. Which come down to one thing, which is money. True. The players want a higher minimum salary for Major League Baseball players.

Right now, the minimum salary in baseball, it's $571,000 a year. Must be nice. The players also want young players to get paid more, more quickly. Yeah, the rookies aren't getting paid what they think they should be paid. And of course, the owners refuse all that. Instead, the owners want more games, specifically more playoff games by expanding the pool of playoffs to 14 teams. They want baseball to be more like the NFL, the NBA, the NHL, because playoff games,

that's where the big money's made. Those are the big money games. But the players thinking, it's cold in November. I don't want to play baseball in November. Like, no, we're good as is. I don't want to hit the ball with my hands. I got cold. So Jack wants to take away from it.

You know, they play hockey. indoors, right? With like so much stuff on. It's like a giant sweater. So, Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over in baseball? We are used to work stoppages in pro sports, but now it's happening in the rest of the economy. Snackers, this is baseball's ninth work stoppage, like overall. The NBA has had four.

The NHL has had four. And the NFL has had six work stoppages. And the reason is because each of these pro sports leagues has had a powerful labor union representing the players for decades. So players union versus the owners, that's a good matchup. And sometimes it results in a strike. But in the private sector with us workers, typically it's just the owner or the boss who like calls the shots on pay. But this year in 2021, workers are standing up and making demands like they never have before. Because that Starbucks burristers is an even higher demand, workers are demanding more pay and benefits just like the players

unions always have done for the pro athletes. You also see it. in the unionization and strikes that are happening in this country that haven't happened in decades. So what corporate workers are finally doing right now? Demanding more pay. Baseball players have been doing it for decades. For our third and final story, Grab, just went public as the biggest fact deal in, really in like the history of ever. Grab is a thriving super app because of the physical world.

Grab, by the way, Grab was Southeast Asia's most valuable startup, not too shabbing. And now with ticker symbol grab, it is the world's biggest SP acquisition, publicly trading at a valuation of $40 billion. Snackers, if you travel from Thailand to Malaysia with a little stop at Fouquet Beach, you've downloaded the Grab app where you should have downloaded the Grab app. The Grab app was founded 10 years ago in Singapore. It was a ride hailing app, basically the Uber of Southeast Asia. But here's the thing. Back in 2018, they beat Uber in Southeast Asia, kicked them out of the region. But Grab is kind of limping into public style. They are. Because of the pandemic, revenue has been down and losses grew to a billion dollars.

This should be a fast-growing company, but the revenues actually went down last year. But with 187 million users across 465 cities, it's a pretty freaking big business. Which is why they may have mentioned the word largest eight times in their going public paperwork. It was actually just a press release. And I mentioned largest ever six times. I remember my first fact. Because grab isn't just Radhill. No, it's not. describe Grab as a super app, but they're wrong. Because Grab is an extra super app. Super app, Snackers, they're common in Asia, but not here in the U.S. It's when a bunch of different things are combined

into just one app on your phone. Uber, for example, is not a super app because it's just rides and food delivery, which is not so super. But you got super apps in China. They're common there. Like WeChat. You can order medicine, hire a dog walker, pay a friend, and make a reservation at your favorite restaurant, all in the same app. So Jack and I jumped in Snackstyle. We downloaded Grab and yeah, this is RideHale. And yeah, you can get Pad Ty on Grab. But we're thinking this is an extra super app.

You can book your entire vacation. There's like an Expedia there. You can get a loan and open a bank account. There's like a JP Morgan there. You can pay for a coffee. There's like a Venmo in the corner of the app. You can do all of that without leaving Grab. Get this.

Grab lets you stream entire shows and movies like Netflix. So like imagine if you were in an Uber and they had an Uber plus streaming channel built into the Uber app and you could watch the Uber documentary about Uber while you were in an Uber watching all this on the Uber app. That's the experience that Grab users get when they download the app in Southeast Asia. What we're trying to say here is the Grab app is really Uber and Venmo and JPMorgan and TripAdvisor and Netflix all in one app. It's an extra super app. It's not just a super app. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at Grab and all the super apps? The physical world shapes our digital apps.

Snackers, we know you're thinking, why would you merge 12 apps into one extra super app? Like, this feels pretty disorganized. It's stressing me out. The homepage on my smartphone works fine. I've got dozens of apps there. Why would I jam those dozens of apps into one single app? So the rest of my home screen is like naked. In fact, when you click into the grab app, it kind of just looks like the home screen in your phone because it's got all these other apps within the one app.

It's super app. It's like, oh, okay, here's all my app. It's like if you were given a stack of papers and we're like, nah, I'll just keep it in one pile of papers. Why organize it into 12 drawers? A key reason why super apps exist and are finding so much success in Asia is broadband. Internet infrastructure and most of the developing world is less developed. And because of that, if you download and run like 12 apps at once, like we all have on our phones at all times, we've been there.

It's going to clog up your phone. It's slow. But one super app running, even though it has like 25 services, won't clog up your phone. So tech companies, they're building super apps in Asia because of physical limitations. We think of apps as purely digital, but they're shaped by a physical reality. Jack, can you and your Friday outfit whip up the takeaways for us for the weekend? Square is now block and it has five business lines. And we think Amazon should rename to Smile.

Throw it at Amazon. This Snackers is the era of the tech conglomerate. Baseball players have always made demands to their employers. This year, like everyone who's not a baseball player, is too. For our third and final story, Grab, is now publicly traded in the U.S. Super Apps. They aren't a thing here yet, but they are in Southeast Asia because broadband. Now, time for our snack fact of the day sent in by legendary snacker LaSallevon from lovely San Antonio, Texas.

The first successful electric car wasn't Tesla. And it actually wasn't like in the past 10, 15, 20, or even 50 years. Get this, Snackers. The first electric car actually was invented and came out. out in 1828 in the Netherlands. 1828, Nick and I fact-checked the hell out of this because we didn't believe it either. To call people. But energy.gov confirmed it.

By early 1900, electric cars had become so popular, there was an entire fleet of electric vehicle taxis in New York City 120 years ago. Here's the thing. It's all about the battery. And the batteries were small. So range was small. So eventually these things lost out to the gas-powered combustion engine vehicles. The electric car revolution we got today, it's actually the second electric car revolution.

Snackers, you look fantastic this week. Jack, I know what win you're going to celebrate this weekend. Or what win you should celebrate this weekend? Three quarter birthday. You can have three quarters of a cake, three quarters of a cocktail, three quarters of a hug. I'll celebrate that win. Do a full celebration for the three quarter birthday. You should celebrate two.

I'll see you on next. Can't wait. If you know, you know. And before we go, a mausel over to Eric Diamondstein, who's having his bar mitzvah in lovely Highland Park, New Jersey. Have a great one. Get on that chair. Congrats to Maya Anderman for getting promoted at Pixar Studios. There we go. And Annie just made her first sale in her first new soap business in Boston. I do think soap is the next Bitcoin.

Megan just got a raise over in Nashville. Congrats to Ellie, who just got her fellowship in Boston. And Axel Perani is turning four happy birthday down in San Mateo. We wish we could pod with you on weekends, too. We do. And Kyle Kennedy, happy birthday. And congratulations on having triplets last week over in South Carolina. Happy birthday to Eric Luck in Rosemeed, California. And to Apurva at a Polly in Chennai, India.

Happy birthday to Taylor O'Brien in Seattle. Anybody else celebrated today? Make it a T-Boy. Celebrate the weekend wins. This is Jack. I own stock of Amazon and Netflix. Nick own stock of Apple and Square. And we both own some Bitcoin and some Spotify.

Bitcoin's name is Ben. Robin Hood Snacks, newsletters, and podcasts reflect the opinions of only the authors who are associated persons of Robin Hood Financial LLC and do not reflect the views of Robin Hood Markets Inc. or any of its subsidiaries or affiliates. They are meant for informational purposes only and are not a recommendation to buy or sell any security, cryptocurrency, or investment strategy in any account. This is not an offer or sale of a security, not a research report, and is not intended to serve as the basis for any investment decision. Any third-party information provided therein does not reflect the views of Robin Hood Markets, Inc., Robin Hood Financial LLC,

or any of their subsidiaries or affiliates. All investments involve risk, including loss of principle and past performance, does not guarantee future results. Robin Hood Financial LLC, member FINRA, SIPC. But seriously, like, why are you still here?