The Rundown - Warren Buffett Buys Stake in Domino's Pizza, Vaccine Stocks Hit by RFK Jr. Nomination

Episode Date: November 15, 2024

Stock market update for November 15, 2024.

Public.com presents the rundown. Your daily market update in five minutes. My name is Zaid Admani, and today is Friday, November 15th. In today's episode, we tell you about Jerome Powell's comments from yesterday that caught the market's attention. We also tell you about a couple of decisions by Donald Trump that have the markets moving. Then stick around to the end of the show to find out why Domino's stock is cooking and an NFL player that went all in on Bitcoin.

All right, let's go. Well, stocks can't. continued to slide this week. Both the S&P and NASDAQ were down 0.6% on Thursday. And the healthcare sector was the hardest hit yesterday after President-elect Trump announced RFK Jr. as his pick for Secretary of Health and Human Services. We're going to talk more about the market's reaction to that nomination later in the show. And yesterday we also heard from the Fed daddy himself, Jerome Powell. He made some comments that caught the market's attention.

He was giving a speech in Dallas, and he hinted that the Fed might stop cutting rates, moving forward. We're moving policy over time to a more normal setting, but the path for getting there is not preset. The economy is not sending any signals that we need to be in a hurry to lower rates. And that comment right there moved the markets lower. The Fed has cut rates twice this year for a total of 75 basis points, and the expectation was the Fed was going to cut another 25 basis points at the December meeting. Now that might not be the case anymore. I guess Jerome Powell is seeing the stock markets make record highs. And, you know, inflation while being under control, is still being annoyingly sticky around the 2 and a half percent range. And remember, the Fed's target is 2%.

So we'll see what Jerome Powell and the Fed gang do at the December meeting. The odds of a 25 basis point cut went from 80% yesterday down to 60% this morning, according to the CME Fed Watch tool. Let's run through some headlines. Let's start with Amazon. The e-commerce giant is ready to help you with your health issues. Amazon will start offering treatments for hair loss, erectile dysfunction, skin care, and eyelash growth. Never thought I'd be saying erectile dysfunction on a podcast, but here we are. Now, the way this works is that customers have to pay for a telehealth consultation, which Amazon will offer directly through One Medical. One Medical is a healthcare company that offers telemedicine services that Amazon acquired back in

2022 for like almost $4 billion. It was part of Amazon's push to get more into healthcare services, and they're starting to make more moves now. So yeah, soon you'll be able to buy your hair loss treatment directly on Amazon. There are a few companies that are already in this space, the most prominent one being Hymns. We've mentioned Hymns a few times on this podcast. They offer these telehealth services like treatment for hair loss and ED, just like Amazon

plans to do. And they've had a pretty good year so far. Their stock was up more than 150% as of yesterday. But then as soon as this announcement came out, their stock dropped 24%. Investors are worried that Amazon is going to take a chunk of their business. This could be a classic case of a big tech company coming into a space and just dominating all the smaller players. We'll have to see if Hymns can compete.

I mean, just looking at prices, Amazon's hair loss products will cost anywhere between $45 and $65 a month after the consultation fee. While Hymns, on the other hand, ranges between $15 and $60 a month. And Hymns offers their initial consultation for free. So his right now would be the cheaper option. But I guess we'll have to see what customers prefer. If you want to check out all the healthcare services that Amazon offers, just open up the Amazon app and on the top dashboard next to groceries, you should see a tab that says medical care.

I just check my Amazon app and I do have it. Oh, and I also see a tab for Amazon Hall. That's Amazon's new service that takes on Timu and Shee in where you can buy cheap stuff from China. We actually talked about it on yesterday's episode, so go check that out if you missed it. They're rolling it out to everyone in the U.S., and I have access to it in my app. Hopefully my wife doesn't see this tab. Otherwise, I'm going to get hit with a bunch of Amazon packages.

Let's shift gears and talk about EV, specifically EV tax credits. According to reporting from Reuters, Donald Trump is planning to remove Biden's tax incentives for buying an electric vehicle. See, currently, anyone that buys a new EV can receive up to $7,500 in tax credits. And up to $4,000 if you buy a used EV. But Donald Trump wants to cut that in order to make room for other plans to lower taxes. Now, you might think that Donald Trump, being boys with Elon Musk, who runs Tesla, the largest EV maker in the U.S., wouldn't want to remove these tax credits, right? But no, actually, Elon Musk supports this.

The reason is that other EV makers and other carmakers in general depend on these tax credits to sell EVs. So removing these EV tax incentives could end up being beneficial for Tesla because they could hurt their competition. I mean, I think that removing these tax credits would hurt Tesla as well, but we'll have to see how Tesla and other EV makers hold up in a post-incentive world. Let's talk about some stocks making moves today. Shares of Domino's pizza are cooking this morning after a new 13F filing showed that Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway bought 1.3 million shares of Domino's for $549 million

in Q3. And when the goat makes moves like that, the rest of the market follows. Domino's stock is up around 5% this morning in reaction to that news. Also, according to the 13F filing, Warren Buffett sold more Apple stock, which he's been doing all year. Quick fun fact, Berkshire has sold two-thirds of their Apple holdings so far this year. So Berkshire continues to dump Apple, and I guess Warren Buffett is more bullish on pizza than iPhones and Apple Intelligence moving forward. Now, speaking of dumping, shares of pharma companies are down across the board as President-elect Donald Trump nominated Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to lead the Department of Health and Human Services. And the markets do not like it. The RFK Jr. is a vaccine skeptic, to put it lightly,

and the department that he would run oversees the FDA, the Center for Disease Control, Center for Medicare and Medicaid. So it's a pretty big role and has pretty big influence when it comes to public health. On top of that, RFK Jr. has been pretty critical of big pharma companies. So yeah, that's why investors and farmer companies are kind of freaking out right now. Shares of Pfizer, Moderna, and Novak. Novavax dropped around 2 to 7% late yesterday as this announcement was made, and they continue to slide this morning. Let's wrap the show with a fun fact. Russell Okun was the first NFL player to accept his salary in Bitcoin. Back in 2020, he agreed to receive $6 million in Bitcoin when he signed with the Carolina Panthers. And that decision ended up working out for him because Okun recently

shared that his $6 million investment is now worth north of $20 million. By the way, Russell O'Kung is now retired. He announces retirement back in June of 2023. Honestly, I don't know what the better decision is, the fact that he took his salary in Bitcoin or the fact that he's not playing for the Carolina Panthers anymore. Sorry, Panthers. Hey, David Tepper, though, the owner of the Carolina Panthers, he might be a terrible NFL owner, but the dude is a legendary investor.

All right? Too bad. Those skills don't translate over to running a. sports team. Well, all right, guys, that's the rundown for today. That's the rundown for this week. Another week in the books. Definitely not as dramatic as last week, but still a lot to talk about. By the way, earnings season pretty much comes to a close next week, and it's going out with a bang. Next week, we're getting earnings from Walmart, Target, and Invidia. So next week should be real fun. By the way, if you guys aren't tired of hearing my voice for five days a week, then keep an eye on your

podcast feed on Saturday morning. We're dropping another weekend deep dive episode. The weekend deep dive's is on one topic. Last week we talked about Elon Musk and Donald Trump's bromance and what it means for the future of Tesla. We got a great response to that episode. So thank you to everyone that listened to that episode, that commented on that episode. So yeah, look forward to another weekend deep dive tomorrow. And if you guys enjoyed the podcast overall, consider giving us a five-star rating on Apple and Spotify. Vote in today's Spotify poll. Leave us a review on Apple. All that engagement really does help us out and it helps other people find the show. Thank you guys so much for listening. Shout out to Mike and Connor for all the help behind the scenes.

And we'll see you guys back here tomorrow. 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 Zayid Money, brokerage services for U.S. listed, registered securities

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