May 10, 2021 Sign Up

By Overheard on Wall Street

“It’s not about ideas. It’s about making ideas happen.” –Scott Belsky

Good morning! Dogecoin did not hit $1 and we found out Melinda Gates had been planning her divorce since 2019, but we hope y'all had a fantastic Mother's Day weekend. 

1. Story of the Day: SNL Day

Saturday was a big day for the Dogecoin community as Elon Musk made his much awaited appearance on Saturday Night Live. While the episode was full of cringey jokes, Musk did mention Dogecoin a few times; told his mom her Mother's Day gift was Dogecoin, called himself "the Dogefather," and Dogecoin a "hustle" and "an unstoppable financial vehicle that's going to take over the world." You can watch the full episode here.

On April 24, when SNL announced Elon Musk would be hosting the show, Doge was trading at 25 cents, and on Saturday it hit a high of 74 cents, in anticipation of Doge name drops that would drive it to $1. Unfortunately for Doge holders, the opposite happened, and Doge started tanking (hit a low of 42 cents just after the show ended). Whether the cringey jokes are to blame or the dumping of Doge from a whale, we are not sure. 

Short Squeez Takeaway: Much of Dogecoin's rise from 1 cent to now over 50 cents can be attributed to Elon Musk, and we'll bet all of our Dogecoin that Elon Musk will not stop pumping Doge to the moon, quite literally; on Sunday he tweeted that SpaceX will be launching a satellite, Doge-1, to the moon next year and the mission will be paid for in Dogecoin. Doge to $20 any one?

2. Markets Rundown

• S&P 500 hit a record on weak jobs data that added to the case for ongoing stimulus
• Bitcoin remained stable for the week (once in a while), while Ethereum crossed the $4k mark on Sunday

Movers & Shakers

• (+) Moneygram ($MGI) +23% after strong Q1 2021 results.
• (+) Funko ($FNKO) +20% on outperforming earnings estimates.

3. Top Reads

• When does it make sense to take profits from your biggest winners? (AWCS)
• Bankers, please return to your desks (NYT)
• The stock market loves Biden more than Trump. So far, at least (NYT)
• The jobs report: The boom that wasn’t (NYT)
• As scrutiny of cryptocurrency grows, the industry turns to K street (NYT)
• Apollo to buy Verizon Media (TechCrunch)
• Peloton treadmill recall dings stock (TechCrunch)
• Sotheby’s, Christie’s aim for comeback at spring art sales (WSJ)
• Summer jobs for teens make a comeback—but not all types (WSJ)
• The NFT origin story, starring digital cats (WSJ)

4. Book of the Day: The Future is Faster Than You Think

History teaches us that technology always moves faster than we think. The authors (Peter Diamandis and Steve Kotler) walk us through how the next wave of technologies will impact our daily lives and society as a whole. This book is crash course on all the technological developments that are on the horizon; innovations in agriculture, commerce, education, entertainment, finance, food, real estate, retail and transportation. We recommend it to any one who is trying to catch up on all the emerging technologies and imagine what our world will look like a few years from now. 

5. The Daily Visual: US Mother's Day Gift Spending (in Billions)

Source: Insider

6. Tip of the Day: Scratch Modeling

What is the best way to get better at Excel modeling? There is no need to buy expensive online courses, that have way too much detail and will only end up confusing you. 

The best way to get better at financial modeling is to do scratch modeling, which means to build a model from a blank excel. The first step of this is to learn how to build a simple 3-statement model. (There are a number of YouTube videos, which can teach this to you in less than two hours). Once you get a hang of how a 3-statement is built, open a 10-K for any company, and try to model out a 5-year projection, making some simple assumptions. Do this a few times and you will get better at modeling in no time. An LBO/DCF is then just a few lines added to a projection model, and no rocket science that many will have you believe.

7. Memes of the Day

@LloydOstertagg Twitter

@overheardonwallstreet Instagram

@KarlSmithCFA Twitter