The Best One Yet - ⛷️ “The Ski-conomy” — Vail Resorts vs Independent mountains. Lyft’s $3B typo. Walmart’s Vizio TV acquisition.

Episode Date: February 15, 2024

There’s record low snow, but Vail Resorts is still enjoying record high revenue — And it’s all thanks to a pricing strategy from Heidi Klum: “You’re either in or you’re out.”Lyft’s just made the most expensive typo ever — The stock surged 67% on a $3B typo, so we jumped into the history of Wall Street typos.Walmart is reportedly trying to acquire Vizio TVs for $2B — Because Big Tech’s next battle is for your living room.Plus, chocolate prices have doubled, so don’t eat your Valentine’s candy… invest it. And we’ve got one more publicly-traded poem from the Yetis.$MTN $LYFT $WMT $VZIOSubscribe to our newsletter: tboypod.com/newsletterWant merch, a shoutout, or got TheBestFactYet? Go to: www.tboypod.comFollow The Best One Yet on Instagram, Twitter, and Tiktok: @tboypodAnd now watch us on Youtube Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is Nick. This is Jack. It's Thursday, the new Friday, February 15th, and today's pod, today's pod. It is the best one yet. Nick and I are serving up the top three pop business news stories you need to know today. Now we are, but tomorrow, Jack, we're whipping up a little something special for the Yetis, aren't we, man? On Friday, you're going to get a special show in your feed to kick off the long three-day weekend. In the meantime, today's show, Jack, best one we've ever done. What are we got for our first story, man? For our first story, lift stock. Surged 60% yesterday, thanks to a typo in their earnings report. A typo! A $3 billion typo. Executives, they're just like us. For our second story, Vizio, the TV company, may get acquired by Walmart. Because the most valuable screen isn't in your hand, it's in your living room. And our third and final story.

This long weekend, you may be going skiing. Full disclosure, Nick and I are both going skiing. True stories. So Jack and I are jumping into the one pure play ski. stock. What is that, Jack? Vail Mountain Resorts. But Yeties, before we hit that wonderful mix of stories, Jack, love the mix. You may have been gifted some chocolate by your Valentine yesterday. Do not eat it. Put it down. If you got chocolate yesterday, do not eat that chocolate. Step away from the chocolate. It turns out you may get more satisfaction holding that chocolate

than eating that chocolate. Because in the last year, Yetis, chocolate prices have more then doubled. Right before Valentine's Day, cocoa prices reached an all-time high. In the last month, cocoa prices have jumped 40% on us over here. That's why, and no embellishment here, a pound of chocolate right now costs more than a pound of live lobster. I love that you pointed out there is no embellishment, because we didn't believe this. We had to triple check this fact. We called someone in Maine. I think that Reese's could make you rich. That Twix bar beats a gold bar. How's your portfolio, Greg? I own some stocks. I own some bonds. And I own 14 M&Ms. Now, there's a fascinating reason behind the all-time high spiking chocolate prices.

60% of the world's chocolate actually comes from cocoa produced in just two countries. Ghana and Cote d'Ivoire. That's it. Just those two countries, 60% of the cocoa. But extreme weather in West Africa has been hurting supply and pushing prices to an all-time high. And that's why, if you got chocolate yesterday, it's probably worth more than a. So seriously, eddies, don't eat that chocolate. Seriously, besties, don't indulge in that milk dud. Hold the chocolate for a long-term game.

And then resell it on Mother's Day for a long-term profit. Now, we know what you're thinking about this scheme, Nick and I have just cooked up. Doesn't chocolate have an expiration date? Jack, you want to sprinkle on the context here? No, it doesn't. Chocolate just has a best buy date. What they mean is it's best to buy chocolate because the price keeps on rising. How did you make all your money?

Well, I got into Butterfinger at just the right time. I bought a Hershey bar in February. I sold it on Halloween. Nick, I just dropped 100 grand on 100 grand bar. Jack, I threw a kickout of my money. My 401k. Yetis, this is not financial advice. Jack, let's in our three stories.

Fifteen years before this song, two boys from the Northeast met in the dorm. They had an idea to cause a cultural storm. It's the best one yet, but the best is a norm. 50%. That's a fat tip. Tea Boy City on your at list. If you know, you know, because we're ready to go. We can't wait no more.

So just start the show. Start the show. For our first story, shares of Lyft surge 60% on Wednesday. but it was all because of a typo. Lyft's best earnings report ever was ruined by one huge typo. Jack, let's whip open the grammar books over here. Common typos in America, common typos. What are some hard words to spell?

What do you got in there? I can never spell bureaucracy correctly, ever. Oh, bureaucracy. There's like two use in that thing? It's so bad. Autocrack doesn't know how to auto correct. They're like, I don't know what you're going for. They've given up on you, Jack.

For me, it's liaison. liaison is like four vowels in a row? What's going on there? Is this French? Well, Lyft had a typo yesterday that was a little more expensive than our typos. Lyft had the most expensive typo ever. It all began with Lyft announced their fourth quarter earnings. And how they look, Jack. The earnings sounded fantastic. Highest number of bookings ever, record 22 million riders, cash flow positive, 5% profit margins. It was without question Lyft's best quarter ever. So the stock jumped by 60% yesterday. 60% that is a big.

big lift, Jack. That is a big lift even for a lift. I know. Nick and I were like, it was a good quarter, but 60%. Well, Jack and I jumped in T-boy style. We were listening to the call, and there was one problem with that earnings report. They added an extra zero to a very important number. They added a typo. Midboy threw the earnings call. The CFO was like, oh, shoot, did we say 5% profit margins? We actually meant 0.5%. So sorry about that 5%. It's actually, one-tenth that amount. They added an extra zero. Executives, they're just like us. To quote every kid's book out there, everybody makes mistakes. The CEO had to go on CNBC yesterday to defend like the mistake. He added that thousands of eyes had reviewed that earnings report and all of them missed that extra

zero. He's like a spell check. You caught bureaucracy, but you couldn't catch the missing zero. Somehow I feel seen right now, Jack. But yet he's Jack and I got curious about this issue. And we wanted to know, How common exactly are typos in the business world? There have been some legendary typos, Nick. There have been some legendary typos yet. As it turns out, Lyft isn't the first company to drop a whoopsie on Wall Street. Get this. In 2019, a cybersecurity company called Cyberstrike forgot the number one in a very important place, so the stock drops.

This company's Cyberstrike said revenues were $38 million, but they were actually $138 million. In 2017, a biopharmaceutical company called Galena said they were under investigation, so the stock dropped. But here's the funny thing. They forgot the word not. They were not under investigation. So they said they were under investigation, but they were not under investigation. That's an unforced error. You got to keep the knot. Not as key. Now, all the stocks in question got corrected by the market once the correct information came out. A lift was up 60%, but then it came back down and it finished up 30%. Not too shabby. But Lyft's $3 billion typo, it reveals something bigger about the entire stock market.

Something not bureaucratic. So, Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at Lyft? The stock market is also the bot market. Now, Eddie's, Wall Street has seen typos before, but Wall Street has never seen such an extreme and fast stock market reaction as with Lyft yesterday. Within one second of Lyft's erroneous earnings report hitting the wire, the stock was up by 60%. Jack, one second, no human being can read and digest an earnings report and then trade the stock that quickly. Nobody even noticed the typo until like a few minutes, right? Well, our first instincts and the consensus among analysts, it was bots doing the trading.

Algorithms saw that extra zero, and they automatically went nuts with buy orders. Get this, Yeties. According to the SEC, 78% of stock trades on the market are bots. And bots, they all behave the same. With artificial intelligence, extreme swings. driven by bots are even more likely and will be more severe. So looking forward, maybe there's a regulatory way to monitor this. Maybe we just need new stock exchange rules for how to deal with bots. But in the meantime, lifts typo. And the stock market craziness that happened afterward, it highlights a new reality. The stock market is also the bot market. For our second story, according to reports,

Walmart is trying to acquire Vizio. Walmart wants to own a TV company because the there's a big tech battle for your living room screen. Yeties, back in 2002, William Wang was on a Singapore airline flight zero zero six to Los Angeles. It crashed during the takeoff into some equipment that was on the runway. It was a horrible accident. Now, sadly, half of the passengers died. But shockingly, half of the passengers survived, including William. William took some time off, organized his life, quit his job, and started over.

And a year later, he launched a company. A company called Vizio. Vizio, the $2 billion affordable TV company. Vizio sells a 50-inch 4K TV screen for $248. That is so cheap. I don't care who you are. At some point in your life, you have been working with a Vizio, Jack. You've put and installed a Vizio in that living room.

20 years ago, the first HD TV you ever bought was probably $1,000. Today, it's 50 times better in a quarter of the press. Jack, we moved into our East Village apartment. Our buddy Timmy brought a Vizio, and that was our source of TV. And Vizio happens to be the largest TV brand at Walmart by sales. Well, funny thing about that yet is Walmart doesn't want to just sell Vizio anymore. No, no, no, no, no. Walmart wants to own Vizio.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Walmart is about to offer $2 billion to acquire the entire company, which sent Vizio's stock price up 25%. Walmart thinks it's Sony, and it's kind of cute. We kind of love it. Now, to sprinkle on some context, the television business, it's not a very profitable business. I mean, look at how low-priced TVs have become out there. There's a lot of plastic and a lot of technology for just $248. Here's the key.

Walmart doesn't want to sell TVs. They want to sell ads on TVs. That's why Walmart is doing this. Here's the vision. Jack, could you set the scene for us from like the Walmart board meeting, please? You're watching Sunday night football, and your Walmart TV reminds you to order your weekly groceries on Walmart. Smuckers Jelly pays Walmart for their smuckers jelly ad to show up on that Walmart TV. Or he might be streaming Bridgerton and Yogi Tea pays Walmart to show that viewer some tea and scrumpets.

And why not a little ad with some scones? Now all of these food and drink companies, they already sell their products in Walmart stores, but Walmart wants them to start buying ads from Walmart too. Plus, Amazon has got its own TV as well and Amazon is making big ad revenue off of those Amazon TVs. And Walmart's always chasing what Amazon is doing. So they're trying to get into TVs and TV advertising as well. So yet he's Jack and I are looking at this story. And we're thinking, this has got to be about something bigger than just eyeballs, right, Jack? This is about the home that we all live in. We all live in Jack's home. Oh, I'm sorry, sorry. I went in the wrong

direction there. Sorry, Jack. That's not what I meant. Okay, but I know what you're thinking? You're thinking takeaway. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at Walmart? Big Tech has a battle for your living room. Yet he's exactly one year ago. Jack and I did a story on this very podcast about Roku, the digital streaming company. One year ago, Roku launched its first ever physical television because they want to control the content and the ads that you see when you're on the couch. Well, one year later, Walmart is now getting into TVs for the same exact reason. Walmart wants your living room. Everyone talks about the phone screen, but the TV screen is actually the most valuable screen in your home.

Yetis, of the seven hours Americans spend on average staring at a screen each day, the majority of those seven hours are a TV screen. Cable TV used to own the living room, but in the streaming age, tech companies are controlling it. And that's why we've noticed Google and Apple and Amazon and Roku, and now maybe Walmart will own their own smart TVs. The living room is the arena of consumption. It's where the most attention and the most time is spent. And that is why big tech is battling over the remote control. They're in a battle over your own. living room. For our third and final story, strap on the boots and whip out the Ricola. This weekend is the most popular ski weekend of the year. Whip out the Ricola. I always got Ricola.

You always need a Ricola. Yadis, the ski industry today is actually like Heidi Klum told you. You're either in or you're out. Yadies, when Jack and I want to talk about the ski industry, the first thing we think about is what a rapper once told us. A rapper once told us that land is the only truly scarce resource there is. Well, Jack, what type of land is the most scarce of all the land out there? The mountains with ski resorts on them. Mountain ski resorts, like they're an endangered species. Like, ski resorts are literally like the polar bear of real estate. Because no major ski resort has been developed on a mountain in America since the 1980s. It has been 40 years since we've gotten a brand new ski resort. So the ones we have are the ones we got. And the top five most popular

ski resorts in North America, they all happen to be owned by one publicly traded company. Vail Resorts owns the five most popular ski resorts in North America. Vale Resorts, they're a $9 billion company and they own 38 mountain resorts across the world. But they sell one ski pass that lets you attend all 38, the epic pass. Now, yet here's what Jack and I found fascinating about this story. Despite a warming globe and despite less snow, Vail is making more money. on skiing than they've ever made before. How is Vail living its best life in the era of climate change with a strategic pricing plan?

Just like Heidi Kloom said, you're either in or you're out. Because the ski industry has become binary. You either have a season pass or you don't ski at all. Ten years ago, the average lift ticket in America for one day of skiing, it was under a hundred bucks. But today, you can't go skiing for just one day because Vail resorts charges $299 for their best resort. for a single day. $299 a day just a ski. That is not inflation.

That's just unreasonable, Jack. It's unreasonable, Nick, because they don't want you to buy that ski ticket. That's the wild part about Vail's pricing strategy. Vail sets their single-day lift ticket prices so high to push you to buy the season pass instead. They want you buying the $1,000 Epic Pass, which looks more expensive, but it feels like the better value. If you ski more than three days, it's more cost effective to get the season pass. So how has Vail's pricing strategy affected their revenues, Jack?

Is the Epic Pass push working? Absolutely, Nick. Hit us with the numbers, Jack. In 2016, VAL Resort sold 650,000 Epic Passes. By 2019, they doubled the number of Epic Pass sales to $1.2 million. I'm impressed, and I will be shocked if you have more numbers. Last year, they doubled that number again. 2.4 million skiers bought the Epic Pass.

Sit down, stand up, and sit back down in the gun. dollar, Jack. Vail ski business is booming because they're getting everyone to buy the epic pass. Yeah, it is. To skiers, Vail calls this epic pass, a ski pass. To investors, they call it a subscription. The most expensive subscription there is. And that pricing strategy is why Vail is making record revenue on skiing despite record low snow. So, Jack, can you grab an $18 hot chocolate without marshmallows from Vail for us and tell us the takeaway for our buddies over there? Sometimes in business, the big guy doesn't hurt the little guy. It is interesting thing we noticed.

In most industries, the bigger the big company gets, the smaller, the small companies get. But the ski industry is experiencing the opposite phenomenon right now. All right, follow us on this one. Vail and Altara, they dominate North American skiing. They control the 80 biggest resorts on the continent. But, Nick, there's 400 other ski resorts. They're independent ski resorts. And they're not dying.

They're actually thriving. Yet these independent resorts, they got slower lifts, they got old carpeting, they kind of smell like a spoiled tater tot half the time. There's the smell of dried ketchup everywhere. Yeah. But those local resorts are having a renaissance because people like those local vibes. They like the less corporatey feel and they like not getting nickeled and dined with like a parking fee. Jack, great example. Pat's Peak in New Hampshire right by your mom.

They're thriving right now, right? It's a family-owned business for 60 years and their business has never been better, despite the giant Vail resorts. So besties, it's a surprise, but Vail's corporate success has also created a whole new market for the less corporate independent ski competition. The ski industry. It's the rare industry where the big guys aren't hurting the little guys. The big guys may even be helping them. Jack, could you whip up the takeaways for us for the new Friday? Lift stock jumped 60% yesterday thanks to a huge typo about their profit margin. And that huge and instant reaction to that typo shows the stock market is also,

the bot market. For our second story, Walmart might acquire Vizio to supercharge their ad sales with a smart TV. There's a big tech battle, and it's for your living room. And our third and final story, Vail Resorts is enjoying record revenues while independent mountains are winning too. Skiing, it's the rare industry where the big guy doesn't hurt the little guy. But Yeties, this pod's not over yet. Here's what else you need to know today. First, inflation rose in January, pouring some cold water on our hopes for an interest rate cut. The Fed may have to keep rates higher longer to make 100% sure that inflation doesn't come back. And second, UPenn, the University of Pennsylvania, just became the first Ivy League school with an AI degree.

A master of artificial intelligence. Hopefully you're smarter than your artificial intelligence. And finally, John Stewart's return to The Daily Show had its opening night this week, and we just got the numbers, 2 million viewers. That's like six times more viewers than a typical episode of The Daily Show. Now, time for the best fact yet. This one sent in by Lindsay Argenti from Lovely Ohio. And this isn't exactly a fact, is it, Jack?

This is our one last poem. I love poem about this show, actually. Earlier this week, we asked you for publicly traded poetry, some poems about the brands and the companies you love. And Lindsay wrote a lovely poem about this podcast, so we wanted to share it with you. To Nick and to Jack, our favorite hosts. When dropping some knowledge, we need you the most. The best one yet is what you bring us each day.

So how can we thank you for your deep dives, for distilling the facts and enriching our lives? An impossible task, but just let us say, may your sweaters be slamming, whether Argyle or Salmon, as you read us the pop business facts. Yes, we know that you're taken, so don't be mistaken. We just want you to feel like snacks. Daily.

Happy Valentine's Day. Sit down, stand up, and snaps, man. I mean, that is incredible. Thanks to everyone who sent in a publicly traded poem because there were so many good ones. Too many to put on the show. We have to put together like an anthology of this poetry, Jack. But Lindsay, special thanks to you because that was wonderful for Nick and me to experience.

That was a T-boy. It was a win to celebrate. Thank you. But yeties, you are looking fantastic for the new Friday. Jack and I are going to mix things up and whip up something a little different for you tomorrow. It's still going to be a T-boy. And then Nick and I will be back with you on Tuesday after long president's weekend.

Enjoy the three-day weekend. Enjoy the skiing. Jack, enjoy the $18 hot chocolates over there. I'm actually going to an independent mountain, so it's going to be like two bucks. Actually, Jack, don't drink the hot chocolate. You've got to save that chocolate because that chocolate is an investment.

Oh, yeah, good point. Jack, I got a Kit Kat. I've had in my drawer since 1996. That's worth gold at this point. I'm not selling it because a tax reason. Okay. Okay, that's enough. Okay, okay.

Yates, we can't wait to see tomorrow. Have a fantastic weekend. Celebrate the wins. And before we go, a happy birthday to Yeti Elizabeth Boyle, a Philly gal over in Beantown who's running marathons every year. She's a snacker turned Yeti and definitely a best. And a happy birthday, double birthday to Richard and Reggie Ogo, who are twins celebrating down in D.C.

Happy birthday to Paige Powers in Tulsa, Oklahoma. I don't know about you, but she's turning 22. And Juan Tapia is celebrating with his buddies in Cancun. Mexico. Happy birthday to Sarah Flynn, who's getting ready for work with her husband right now in Chesapeake, Virginia. And Beek-Quan Lowe, the inventor of the Lumo Sleep Mask, is celebrating a birthday in Costa Mesa with some Zs. And happy birthday to Andrew Chagrin, turning a big 10 years old in Libertyville, Illinois. And Sarah and Tiles is turning 25 years old with legendary Yeti Chris down in Austin. Happy 39th birthday to Eduardo Pereira. An happy 15th anniversary to him and his wife in Boko

Florida. Gabe Reed is celebrating a birthday and just finished a Rubik's Cube, so we sent him a free hat and he looks fantastic in it, Jack. And congratulations to Alexa Lawrence for getting a new job in Queens, New York City. Queen of the City, celebrate that win. This is Jack. I own stock of Amazon and Roku, and Nick and I both own stock of Apple. So, Bessies, it's surprising, but Vail's corporate success has also created a whole market of demand for the less corporate smaller individual independent competence. That was great. You didn't need quite so many adjectives. I was on a treadmill, Jack.

I was actually over my skis. I was over my skis. Literally. Literally.