March Madness gets influencer-ized… Competition on the b-ball court is dribbling into competition in your Insta feed. Thanks to last year’s Supreme Court ruling, players can now earn $$ from sponsored posts during this month’s NCAA tourney. Some have already scored $2M sponsor deals. By “Selection Sunday,” you’ll see hundreds of college-hoop stars doing #sponcon for brands like Dunkin and Gatorade. It’s a slam dunk for female players, who typically have larger social followings: female NCAA players have raked in more sponsor cash than men.
Short circuit... Investors are looking for the next EV maker to take on Tesla, but production snafus and chip shortages are making it tough. China's EV leader, Nio, shipped 6K of its sleek Tron-esque cars last month, up 10% from a year ago, but behind its January deliveries. US-based Rivian, which went public in November, blamed #flation for jacking up the price of its preordered e-pickups by $20K (update: the company reversed it). We’ll see how the customer backlash and supply-chain snarls could hit the Tesla rivals when they report this week.