The Best One Yet - “Wonder Woman snitches on Mulan” — Disney’s secret numbers. Goldman’s build-vs-buy. Amazon’s suburban dream.

Episode Date: September 17, 2020

We still don’t have the numbers on Disney’s experiment sending Mulan direct-to-living-rooms instead of theaters – but we still figured out it was probably a failure. Goldman Sachs acquired a startup that reveals when to build or when to buy. And Amazon’s having fun in cities, but it’s also buying up 1,000 strategic locations in the suburbs.$GS $DIS $AMZNWant a shoutout on the pod? We got the form for Snackers to fill out right here:https://forms.gle/KhUAo31xmkSdeynD9Learn 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 Thursday, September 17th. Did you hear what our buddy Jerome Powell just said? Jerry, great old-time Snacker. O's this a snack fact, by the way, Jack. The Fed just said that interest rates will stay close to zero for at least three more years. All right, Snackers, Jack, I don't want to sound like an infomercial here,

but maybe refinance your student loan slash mortgage slash car right now. Let's put it this way, Snackers. Your lender doesn't want you to refinance. No. So you should probably refinance. We've never ever seen the cost of borrowing this low. Oh, and by the way, this is definitely not financial advice. We've never ever seen a podcast, this T-boy for this T-boy. It happens to be the best one yet we've ever done. First story, Jack, what do we got? Goldman Sachs is about to launch a

budgeting app that's a lot like Mint. Jack Mint never became a verb. The story answers the question of when to buy versus when to build. For our second story, Disney hasn't told us whether Mulan for $30 on Disney Plus. Was that a success or was it a flop? No one knows, but we don't need the number Snackers to know the numbers. For our third and final story, Amazon is a big fan of running Samarans and horsing around with the kiddos in the backyard. It's adorable.

It got themselves a big lawn because Amazon is launching 1,000 strategic locations in the Burbs. This is the coolest thing to happen to New Canaan since Greenwich. But before we jump into those wonderful three-story snackers, we got an early snack fact for you. Last year, the United States generated more electricity from renewable sources than it did from coal for the first time since 84. Uh, 1884. That's right. 1884, probably the year we learned that if you burn those rocks in the earth, you can somehow charge your iPhone. General Grant's like, ah, do I need another dongle? I need another dongle. Great. Thanks,

now, funny thing, the first renewable energy in the world was water wheels, way back in 200 BC. Makes sense because I think the first meal was corn meal, which you get from corn, you just add in some water wheel. Then the Dutch discovered in 1590s that you could harness the power of wind with windmills. And honestly, the Dutch today still big fans of the windmill. Huge fans of the windmill. But then in 1935, the United States took renewable energy to a whole new level.

Yes. With the Hoover Dam. Jack, can I buy a number here for you? Over five years, 5,000 people pouring concrete between. two giant mountains that created a huge lake. Yeah, that huge lake is a huge lake, and the water from that lake actually flows through generators, creating hydroelectricity. Now, Snack, before we go to Bill Nye on you, there is enough water behind that dam to cover Connecticut, the state of Connecticut, in 10 feet of water. Again, best thing to happen to New Canaan since Greenwich.

Jack, I'm getting earth, wind, and fire vibes, and I'm not talking about Boogie Wonderland or the 21st of September. Let's hit our three stories. snacks daily. We spoke to the lawyers and we got to get something legal out the way. 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. We're not recommending any securities. It's not a research report or investment advice. Not an offer or sale of a security. Snacks is digestible. Business news for you. Robberhood Financial, LLC, member FINRA For our first story, Goldman Sachs just launched a personal finance feature that's critical in its Marcus app.

We're calling this story acceleration by acquisition. But Snackers, before we do, throw on a tie, throw on a pencil skirt, let us tell you about a personal finance product story. All right, Nick, one app links all your bank accounts. Okay. And each month, it shows you how much you spend on what? I'm following you. And at any moment, you can open the app and see what all your balances are across all your

financial accounts. I'm stressed, but I like where you're going. You'd think it's mint, right? You would think it's mint. Remember, they used to email you at 3 a.m. on a Saturday that you ate too many burritos? I know. I'm spending too much on Chipotle. But Snackers, you'd be wrong because it's not mint. It's actually a Goldman Sachs thing now. It's called Marcus Insights within Goldman Sachs's Marcus app. By the way, Nick, what happened to mint? No one knows it happened to mint. Didn't become a verb, guys. That's what happened to mint. Now, a reminder, Snackers, Goldman Sachs historically, has only worked with big, rich customers. You know, let's say you manage the sovereign wealth fund of a small nation, Goldman's interested in your business. If you're trying to IPO your SaaS enterprise cloud company,

they're the worst. Goldman wants in on your business. And if you've got a personal table of Nobu, Goldman wants your business. But Nick, for a few years now, Goldman's been doing retail banking with like the regular old peasants like you and Mick. A little less of the miso black cod, a little more of the hoagy sandwich. Not just Walt Disney's bond issuance, also Walter Disney's personal checking. account. Marcus, by the way, Snackers, a little context here. They've got $100 billion in deposits right now. I'm glad you said context, Nick, because J.P. Morgan Chase has trillions of dollars in deposits. So this golden thing is still small. All right, so let's talk about this finance

product that fascinated Jack and I. It's only available to Marcus customers who have loans or bank accounts with Marcus already. But Jack and I think that eventually we can expect this to be available to everyone. Maybe you start by linking your Bank of America accounts into this Marcus app because it gives you a nice picture of your finances. You do it on a Saturday, use it for a few weeks, and you're like, you know what, I like it so much. Maybe I'll close my Bank of America app and switch over to Goldman's Marcus instead. So we think this tool will start as Goldman's engagement strategy. Right, it keeps the existing Marcus customers at Goldman super happy. But eventually, it'll transition to a growth strategy. Yeah, Goldman then says, you know what, this is now getting us new clients

for Marcus. Because we're stealing them from Bank of America. And the next big step for Goldman's retail banking app, it's going to be digital checking accounts and investing services. Those are expected to be released next year, according to PFWTM, who'd see NBC interview. Goldman's getting obsessed with retail banking. So, Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at Goldman? Goldman just served up a classic build-or-buy dilemma. Snackers, back in 2018, Goldman acquired a little company called Clarity Money. Clarity's underlying technology is the stuff that makes this personal finance feature that we're talking about, possible. All right, so let's Zoom out to Goldman. Goldman is worth $70 billion. Lift translation? Seven lifts. Which means they're the

kind of company with the resources that they could have probably built this feature themselves. Yeah. Goldman doesn't spare expenses. So why did they decide to buy it instead of build this new service? One answer, Snackers, speed. Speed kills. Goldman has the resources to build this, but that would have taken over two years. Hey, you got to hire engineers, you got to build, you got to iterate, you got to build, you got to put more job postings out for engineers. and someone's got to read those. And even after they're done building it, it might not even work and customers might not even like it.

So if acquiring a company instead at the right price can save months or years, then it's worth the acquisition. This was acceleration by acquisition. For our second story, the second biggest COVID movie theater experiments ever just failed terribly.

We think we have enough data to call Tenet and Mulan, both commercial failures. That's right, Snackers. So we got to talk about this. Like, honestly, it's an awkward situation that movie theaters are in right now. Hollywood has canteens and canteens full of blockbuster movies ready to go. Jack, can we talk about the canteens? Is this a hiking reference? Where are we going

with this? We're in a desert of entertainment looking for a oasis somewhere. But Snackers, it feels like somewhere outside still. So you still kind of want that blockbuster entertainment, don't you? But the movie studios with all those blockbusters, they don't want to miss out on the big movie theater box. That's why they whipped up what we're calling experiment number one. Debuttube a blockbuster movie in theaters during the COVID-19 pandemic. All right, so Warner Brothers just did this. They're owned by AT&T, and they just released their action thriller, Tenet. It's by Christopher Nolan, so it's got five plot twists over six different dimensions.

The fourth scene always has to involve Michael Kane, or it's not a Christopher Nolan movie. Warner Brothers took the brave and risky move of releasing that movie to theaters two weekends ago during Labor Day weekend. And they nicely just gave us the numbers. Turns out it made $9.5 million. in the opening Labor Day weekend. And Labor Day weekend is a three-day weekend. So they had an extra day.

Yeah. And they made $9.5 million. $9.5 million over a three-day weekend is a terrible result. In one normal two-day weekend, Avengers Endgame brought in 30 times that much revenue last year. That's right. 30 times for a single... Lyft brings in more money from a movie blockbuster. It doesn't even do movies.

Now, the reason Tenet was a flub wasn't the content. No, Christopher Nolan is guaranteed. thrill again, Michael Cain. The reason is only 65% of movie theaters were open in America on Labor Day weekend, and they were typically capped at 50% capacity to allow for some social distancing. We're doing the waterfall math on that. That means that 32.5% of normal seats were even available, and the sales just didn't even match that. Sales were only 3% of what Avengers Endgame did. All right, so that's experiment number one, but let's back up the beakers. Let's hit experiment number two, Jack. Add a blockbuster movie to your streaming service so people can watch at home, but charge extra for it.

Voila, this brings us to Disney, whose historical fiction movie Mulan also just came out. Disney took the brave and risky move of letting Disney Plus subscribers watch Mulan. Right, so you're paying seven bucks a month for your monthly Disney Plus subscription, but now you got to pay an extra 30 bucks to get Mulan because it would have been in theaters. They're basically like, how much does it cost to go to the movie theaters? Yeah. Let's charge that much for people to watch Mulan at home. Now, here's the funny thing, Snackers. The numbers, the official numbers aren't actually in yet,

but a data company reports that Disney made $34 million over that same Labor Day weekend. Now, considering Moulon costs $200 million to produce, Jack, have you seen the costumes? I have. I've never seen so much silk. It's because they all came from a canteen. Experiment number two looks like also an epic failure. So, Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over in the movie industry? Sometimes you don't need to know the numbers to know the numbers. Snackers, true story here. Jack and I almost didn't cover this Moulon story because Disney hasn't officially announced the numbers.

But we did because we're pretty sure the numbers were bad for two clear reasons. All right, so reason number one, if the numbers were good, Disney would have announced them. Just like they announced, they had like 25 million subscribers in the first 24 hours of Disney Plus. Yeah, Mom, the grades were great. Don't even worry. Just trust me on this. one, you're going to tell. Also, if the numbers were good, why did Wonder Woman just delay its debut until Christmas? That's right. Warner Brothers just announced on Friday that Wonder Woman 1984

will remain in the Blockbuster Canteen and not see the light of day. Until Christmas, but it's probably going to get delayed then. Studios aren't convinced that they can make money with big movies during COVID-19. So they're waiting for things to change, and they still won't tell us the numbers. for our third and final story, Jeff. By the way, Jack, Jeff is not happy. This is our third story. I don't think Amazon's ever been our third story. Spoiler. According to PFWTM, Amazon has a new thing for the suburbs. They're launching a thousand strategic suburban shipping hubs. Jack, let's pop up to Boston, two pumps of hazelnut. You got Waltham, Weston, Welsley, Wattetown, Wamscott, and WAMazon. Get off eggs at 495. We Amazon's right out of Amacorn.

It's the best of time, Snackers, and it's the worst of times for Amazon. Amazon's stock has never been this high. It's worth over a trillion dollars. Meanwhile, Walmart just launched Walmart Plus, and they're doing same-day delivery. Another competitor to Amazon, Target? Yep, they're also doing same-day delivery. So Amazon's had to up the ante. They hired 175,000 new workers, but they're still having trouble meeting the two-day delivery

promise of Prime. Where's my package, man? Where's my package? So Amazon has another idea for a real. response, they're going to put a thousand hubs in the suburbs. What time of soccer practice do we have time to grab a creamy before we get home? Jack, don't make me pull the minivan over. Twelve Amazon regional shipping hubs are being built in the state of New Jersey alone. Right. Which is pretty much the suburbs of New York City. But the biggest move here for what Amazon's doing is they're repurposing

some mall space. Think about it. J.C. Penny and Lorden Taylor have both gone bankrupt this year. so the malls that they used to take up a ton of square footage in, they are desperate for new people. So the malls are looking at this. They're like, hey, let's squeeze an Amazon distribution center in between the Abercrombie and the Panda Express. Amazon, if it moved into malls, would transform them from customer-facing retail space to like a back-end distribution warehouse. Retail Pocklops means pottery barn is closing a store, and there's some space next to Jamba Juice.

Guess what? The mall needs a new tenant. Well, Amazon also needs a smaller fulfillment center for lower. local delivery in the suburbs. The mall has a perfect place for that. Oh, and Amazon also needs parking for all those delivery vans that are going to be doing all those local suburban deliveries. Have you seen the acreage of parking lots surrounding malls? Honestly, it's basically a parking lot with a building next to it. This is kind of a beautiful repurposing if we take like the old JC Penny space and turn it into a distribution center. But Jack and I are also thinking

there is a beautiful irony here as well. A sad irony, in fact, malls are struggling because of Amazon. True. And now mall tenants are going to have to look at Amazon every day on their way to work. Let it sink in and let us know what's the takeaway jack for our buddies over at Amazon. Amazon is building an entire post office network in this country. Snackers, according to Bloomberg, these suburban hubs by Amazon are only walking distance from like a nearby UPS or U.S. Postal Service office. Amazon already delivers a shocking two-thirds of all the packages ordered on Amazon.

Yeah, that's expected to grow to 85%. But the typical Amazon fulfillment center, it's like in the middle of nowhere. It's that mysterious gray box next to a cornfield somewhere. So Amazon is setting up an entire delivery infrastructure, a thousand locations right in Americans' backyards. Maybe end up stopping by the mall, starting to do some drop-offs, maybe some pickup all on your way home at an Amazon suburbia. These thousand locations at the mall could open up a retail desk and become the post office.

Jack, can you whip up the takeaways for us over there? Goldman Sachs isn't just into the high rollers. It wants to bank the little guys, too. So it acquired a personal finance feature because acquisitions can accelerate. For a second story, someone had to be the first to bravely release their rockbuster films during COVID-19. It was Disney and AT&T. You don't have to see the numbers, though, to know the numbers were bad.

Third and final story, Amazon is building out its own postal service across the U.S. It's already in cities. Now it's conquering the suburbs, and they'll probably let drones just handle all the rest of rural America. Now, time for our snack fact of the day. This one tweeted in by Jesse Breffley, Jack, coffee, where we got. There are 2.25 billion cups of coffee consumed every single day. Worldwide. It's like one out of three humans is having a cup of coffee. No, not until I have my coffee. Or one out of six humans is having two cups of coffee. Or billions of people are having no coffee and one dude is having way too much coffee.

Now, according to legend, the first cup of coffee was brewed by an Ethiopian goat farmer in the 9th century AD. How did he come to this conclusion? Well, he noticed that his goats seemed energized when they brushed by the coffee beans. This is true story. And by true story, I mean, legend has it. I feel this is why we should end it with. And that's why it's called... Actually, it's not why it's called coffee.

Snackers, before we go, though, congratulations to Kimia and Jay Baxter anniversary in San Francisco. anniversary to Dustin and Chandler in Greenville, South Carolina. And a big happy birthday to three, Venkatikari in Columbus, Ohio. And Aaron Wong in Pleasanton, California. And Gaiatria Anon in Atlanta, Georgia. And Zach D. Cristifarro in Orange Park, Florida. And Kaylee McDonald in in Detroit, Michigan. And Catherine Stevens in Dallas, Texas. And Aaron Day in Indianapolis, Indiana. And Jasmine Bayless in Rialto, California. And finally, Joel Bell in Gainesville, Florida, chomp, chomp, chagher. Go gators. Also, Snackers, if you want to shout out on the pod, make sure to fill out the form in the description of this pod episode. And help us grow snacks

by asking H-Y-H-Y-S-D. Have you had your snacks daily? We'll see you tomorrow. We can't wait. This is Jack. I own stock of Amazon. The Robin Hood Snacks podcast you just heard reflects the opinions of only the hosts who are associated persons of Robin Hood Financial LLC and does not reflect the views of Robin Hood Markets, Inc. or any of its subsidiaries or The podcast is for informational purposes only and is not intended to serve as a recommendation to buy or sell any security and is not an offer or sale of a security. The podcast is also not a research report and is not intended to serve as the basis of any investment decision. Robin Hood Financial LLC, member FINRA, SIPC.