🐋 *When you're so big even your tiniest move makes a splash…*

A "crypto whale" is a person or entity that holds so much cryptocurrency that they have the power to affect its price. Picture: selling large amounts of a token at once. __Binance__-owned __CoinMarketCap__ said it'll [launch](https://www.coindesk.com/web3/2023/05/01/shark-tank-but-make-it-crypto-coinmarketcap-launching-new-competition-tv-show/) a reality-TV show, "Killer Whales," which will feature entrepreneurs pitching web3 biz ideas to a panel of whales and investors. Picture: “Shark Tank” for crypto.

DEFI(NE)

Heard on the Block: "crypto whale"

Snacks

November may historically be the best month for US stocks, but you wouldn’t know it from the start o...

Toby Bochan

Managing Editor

Luke Kawa

Markets Editor

Markets

The lack of bear cups is almost too much to bear. A $30 ursine coffee cup offered by Starbucks seems...

A popular  game being developed for the big screen could test the limits of the recent success of vi...

Max Knoblauch

Culture

 is expanding its low-cost Amazon Haul experience to a new stand-alone app called Amazon Bazaar. Ama...

Rani Molla

Tech

Holiday cheer turned into chaos this week for  after the coffee giant’s new “Bearista” holiday cup s...

Nia Warfield

Business

This week,  announced plans for “Fastnet,” a new undersea transatlantic fiber-optic cable running fr...

Jon Keegan

Tech Reporter

Here’s one noteworthy feature of the recent market downturn that has the S&P 500 poised for its wors...

Target just rolled out a new rule for store employees: “smile, make eye contact, and greet or wave” ...

Hyunsoo Rim

Data Reporter

 more than reversed its 11% drop in the wake of its post-close earnings report Thursday, after brief...

Matt Phillips

Senior Markets Correspondent 

Your inbox is ready

Subscribe and thrive

 Report: US Army will buy 1 million drones

As  once again dipped under $100,000 Friday morning, down 20% from its October 6 all-time high, some...

Yaël Bizouati-Kennedy

Contributing Reporter

Crypto

Air taxi maker  is deep in the red on Friday morning after reporting its third-quarter results after...

Nuclear power plant operator  reported Q3 earnings Friday before the start of trading in New York th...

Roughly half of new US startups make it to their fifth birthday — and the most recent ones have even...

Make hay while the sun is shining, or so the saying goes. And that’s exactly what America’s quantum ...

Claire Yubin Oh

Data Journalist

Shares of  leapt in early trading Friday after the travel platform posted a strong third quarter.  A...

Expedia Group headquarters in Seattle, Washington, USA

Over the past few months, the biggest catalyst for quantum computing stocks has been the prospect of...

Shares of  climbed 5% after the bell on Thursday, and held most of those gains into early trading on...

Millie Giles

 reported Q3 earnings that were not well received by the market, with shares cratering in after-hour...

 shareholder meetings are like no other. Where else does a man, just awarded a $1 trillion pay packa...

__May Day was yesterday…__ but worker momentum is just heating up. US labor unions have been making headlines as looming deadlines could lead to a power shift. Most pressing: the 11.5K film and TV writers represented by the Writers Guild of America are [set to strike](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/30/business/media/hollywood-writers-strike.html) against studios today, barring an 11th-hour agreement. It’s not just your fave shows that could come to a halt: workers in other key industries are engaged in tense negotiations. 

- __Taking off:__ yesterday 15K __[American Airlines](https://robinhood.com/stocks/AAL/)__ pilots voted overwhelmingly to authorize a strike, though federal laws make it harder for airline unions to join walkouts.

- __Gearing up:__ __[UPS](https://robinhood.com/stocks/UPS/)__ and 340K unionized delivery workers have kicked off contract negotiations for their July 31 deadline. Contracted __[Amazon](https://robinhood.com/stocks/AMZN/)__ drivers in California unionized last month, gaining a $30/hour wage.

- __Foaming:__ About 300 US __[Starbucks](https://robinhood.com/stocks/SBUX/)__ stores have voted to unionize so far. Last week, federal labor prosecutors alleged that the latte leader refused to negotiate fairly at 144 locations.

__Big stories, low numbers…__ Despite splashy organizing efforts, US union membership was just 10% last year, the lowest rate on record. Still, Americans’ support of unions is nearly at a 60-year high, with over half seeing the decline of organized labor as negative. Meanwhile, with historically low unemployment and still-high inflation, workers’ wage expectations are rising, reaching $76K/year in March.

The union train gains steam (Jason Redmond/Getty Images)

Organized

__The power dynamic’s in flux…__ While the pandemic saw the employee/employer dynamic tilt in favor of workers in areas like remote work and wage hikes, layoffs and RTO plans have shifted power back toward the boardroom. But even in defeat, labor movements can bring about change: public criticism of a blocked nationwide rail strike in December led major rail companies to grant workers paid sick leave.

While union membership is at a record low, US labor movements are gaining steam

__Inflation nation…__ As Argentina’s economic crisis [deepens](https://www.reuters.com/markets/rates-bonds/argentina-plans-huge-rate-hike-91-stem-peso-slide-inflation-source-2023-04-27/), its citizens are relying on the *dolar blue*, aka the US dollar. Inflation breached 100% last month for the first time in decades as prices doubled. To combat that, Argentina’s central bank jacked its interest rate by 10 percentage points, to 91%, last Thursday — tacking on to a massive 300-point lift the week before. 

- __For context:__ The Fed has cranked the US’s rate to about 5% from zilch over the past year, in response to inflation that hit 9%.

- __Not enough:__ For Argentina, 20 to 30% inflation is typical, but triple digits means time to hit the panic button. However, aggressive rate hikes, along with price freezes and other scattershot attempts to cool prices, aren’t working.

__*Dollarization* nation…__ Argentines trust the greenback to maintain its value more than the peso. The USD has become so prevalent in the country that some experts think its circulation there is second only to the US. Argentines trade pesos for American dollars at illegal swap hubs, where the exchange rate is often cranked to double the official rate.

- __Paging Washington:__ One of Argentina’s presidential candidates, Javier Milei, wants to fully swap the national currency out for the USD and dissolve the country’s central bank. FYI: 11 countries, including Ecuador and Zimbabwe, use the USD as their currency.

Greenback

__The buck still has Superman status…__ Concerns about the US dollar being dethroned as the world’s “[Superman Currency](https://sherwoodmedia.com/snacks/newsletters/4ogc6lVdR6XOMD2eU3NQcI/articles/4tXfBbA0fHrtQFfTkjI5ht/)” may be overblown. Despite its value slipping this year, the USD is still relied on as the world’s go-to currency for international purchases (think: oil trades), accounting for 58% of global forex reserves. Meanwhile, other countries’ preference for the dollar can make their own currencies weaker.

Argentina leans on the US dollar as the value of its national currency tanks

Dow Jones

S&P 500

Nasdaq

Bitcoin

“The Super Mario Bros. Movie” is the first film of the year to top $1B+ in sales

📣 US workers get loud

Heard on the Block: "crypto whale"

Get Your News

Subscribe and thrive

Latest Stories