The Rundown - Tesla Approved as Government Vehicle in China, Bezos to Sell More Amazon Stock

Episode Date: July 5, 2024

Stock market update for July 5, 2024.

Public.com presents the rundown, your daily market update in five minutes. My name is Zadmani, and today is Friday, July 5th. In today's episode, we tell you why crypto is having one of the worst weeks of the year. Also, Saks Fifth and Neiman markets are joining forces with a help from Amazon, and Macy's has a new buyout offer. Then stick around to the end of the show to learn how much Amazon stock Jeff Bezos is planning to sell. All right, let's go. It's been a great week for the U.S. stock market.

The S&P and NASDA closed at record highs again on Wednesday. Now, the stock market was closed on Thursday for the 4th of July holiday, and while it does feel like 90% of people are taking off today, the stock market will be open. So let's see if we can end the week at record levels. Remember what I told you guys earlier this week? According to Bank of America, the first 10 days of July have historically been the best trading days of the year going back all the way to 1928.

And so far, July has been off to a great. Great start for the stock market. Unfortunately, the same can't be said for crypto. Bitcoin has been tanking the last 24 hours, dropping below 55,000, which is the lowest price since February, and Ethereum dropped below $3,000 this morning. Bitcoin is headed for its worst weekly fall in more than a year, and it has to do with Mount Gox. Now, some of you OG Bitcoin investors might remember Mount Gox.

It was one of the first Bitcoin exchanges. In fact, it was the biggest Bitcoin exchange at one point until it collapsed about a decade. to go. The Japanese exchange went bankrupt, but now the exchange is actually starting to return Bitcoin to creditors that lost Bitcoin because of the collapse. I didn't know it took 10 years to go through bankruptcy, but it's finally happening. Mount Cox is expected to return 141,000 Bitcoin, which has investors worried that people that get their Bitcoin from Mount Cox are going to sell it immediately, which is putting downward pressure on the price today. And what's crazy is when Mount Cox collapsed back in 2014, Bitcoin was worth around $600.

Today it's worth over a hundred times that. So, you know, I really wouldn't blame these users for selling their Bitcoin immediately after getting it back. And breaking news, the jobs report for June just came out from the U.S. Department of Labor and kind of a mixed bag. The U.S. economy added 206,000 jobs in June, which is more than the 200,000 jobs that was expected. But it is less than the jobs that were added in May. Also, the unemployment rate ticked up to 4.1%, the highest level since October of 2021. So the economy is still adding jobs, but at a slower pace, and unemployment rate is starting to creep up. So I wonder what this means for the Fed. What are they going to do with interest rates? The Fed is meeting at the end of this month. The FMC meeting is on July 31st.

When that rolls around, we'll let you know what they decide. Let's run through some headlines. Starting with luxury retailers. The owner of Saks Fifth Avenue is buying its rival Neiman Marcus. This is a $2.65 billion deal, and it's going to create a new high-end shopping giant with an estimated combined sales of $10 billion. This company is going to put department stores like Sacks Fifth Avenue, Neiman Marcus, Sacks Off Fifth. All these stores that were really popular back in 2006 are all going to be under the same ownership. Now, what's funny is that Amazon is actually going to be a minority owner in this newly combined company, which is called SACS Global. And the reason I find this funny is that Amazon is one of the reasons why these Brings, brick and motor companies like Sacks Fifth Avenue are struggling these days.

The rise of e-commerce has been a major reason people don't go to the malls anymore. On top of that, you have luxury brands now selling directly to consumer. There's also been a slowdown in spending on luxury goods in the U.S. due to inflation. So these old school luxury retailers are now consolidating to try to save some costs and, frankly, survive. Not sure if it's going to be enough, but they're trying. And speaking of struggling retailers, let's talk about Macy's because they may be getting bought out pretty soon. not from another retailer, but from private equity.

An investor group is raising its offer to buy Macy's by $300 million. The investor group is Ark House Management and Brigade Capital Management. They initially submitted a $5.8 billion bid back in December. Then they increased it to $6.6 billion in March. Well, now they're increasing it to $6.9 billion. Nice. That's about $24.80 a share. Macy so far has rejected the previous two offers.

Not sure if they're going to accept this one. Shares of Macy's did close just under $18 as of market close on Wednesday, giving it a market cap of nearly $5 billion. So they're getting a pretty nice premium. We'll see if Macy's management will accept this offer. Investors did get some confidence that this deal might go through. Shares of Macy's are up about 8% in the pre-market today. Let's talk about some stocks making moves today.

The Tesla rally is continuing this morning. The EV maker got some positive news out of China. For the first time ever, Tesla vehicles have been added to. a list of EVs that are allowed to be bought by Chinese government groups. Now, this is big because China accounts for 60% of global EV sales, and Tesla has been facing a lot of tough competition in that market from Chinese EV makers. Tesla's market share of China dipped to 6.4% in May, down from 6.9% a year ago, but a couple recent regulatory wins in China by Tesla could improve its competitive position in the region.

In April, China said data collected by Tesla fleets were compliant, which is an important step forward for rolling out self-driving systems there. The stock is up 2% in the pre-market. Huge week for Tesla. It's up more than 25% this week. Shout out to all the Tesla investors, man. They were having a rough first half of the year, but second half of the year is off to a fantastic start.

On the flip side, stocks not doing so good are the crypto-related stocks, Coinbase, Micro Strategy, all down around 5% in the pre-market. Not a surprise here. Whenever Bitcoin and Crypto has a bad day, these crypto-related stocks also follows suit. Micro Strategy, especially,

it's the company owned by Michael Saylor. It owns over 226,000 Bitcoin. It's essentially a Bitcoin holding company and pretty sensitive to Bitcoin price movement. By the way, just a heads up, you can actually buy Bitcoin on the public app. So if you're getting the itch to buy the dip, go open up the public app,

look for Bitcoin, you can find it there. All right, let's wrap the show with a fun fact. Jeff Bezos is about to cash out big time on his Amazon shares. The Amazon founder outlined his plan to sell 25, million shares in July, just as the company's shares hit all-time highs and a $2 trillion valuation for the first time ever. If Jeff Bezos sells all of his $25 million shares at $200

a share, that's going to net Jeff Bezos $5 billion. And as a reminder, this sale, it follows a separate trading plan of 50 million shares that Jeff Bezos filed in February. So Bezos is cashing out on his Amazon stock. I don't know if he needs that money to buy an even bigger yacht. I don't know if he plans to buy the Boston Celtics, which recently went on sale. I don't know what he's doing, but dude is cashing out right now. But even after selling all these shares, Jeff Bezos will still remain Amazon's largest shareholder with a stake of under just 9%. Jeff Bezos is the world's second richest person with a net worth of $219 billion and he trails only Elon Musk. Well, all right, guys, that's the rundown for today. That's the rundown for this week. Another week in the books.

It was a short week, but looks to be a good one with markets making all-time highs. Hope you guys had a great 4th of July. Hope you guys are enjoying the holiday week. If you guys enjoy the show and have like eight seconds, please hit us with that five-star rating on Apple and Spotify. That engagement really does help the show. All right, that's all we got for you this week. Thank you guys so much for listening. Shout out to Connor and Mike for all the help behind the scenes. We'll see you guys back here on Monday. This is the rundown, your real-time resource for news events and trends in the markets. All views presented in the show reflect the opinions of the guests. You should not take any mention of a publicly traded security as recommendation

to buy, sell or hold that security. Run-down guests are not financial advisors and are not affiliated with public holdings or its subsidiaries, you should make your own financial and investment decisions or consult, respective professionals. Learn more at public.com disclosures. In partnership with Zaidamani, brokerage services for U.S. listed, registered securities are offered by Open to the Public Investing Incorporated, member FINRA and SIPC.