Vaping has fallen — and 1 stock fell with it
Hey Snackers,
The 209th Oktoberfest just kicked off (it's really more of a September thing). FYI, here are some rules worth knowing.
The market's 3-week winning streak is over — now everyone's hydrating before Peloton's spin-tastic IPO on Thursday.
Walmart bans e-cigarettes, unofficially marking them mainstream "canceled"
Aisle 6 is going cold turkey... Walmart officially shut down e-cigarette sales just before the weekend as 8 people have died in connection with using them. The situation for vaping pioneers like Juul has gone from bad to badder to worst since the FDA declared teen vaping an "epidemic" in 2018 — Here's how things accelerated in just the last 3 months:
- June 25th: San Francisco bans e-cigarettes, saying they get teens hooked to nicotine.
- September 4th: Michigan becomes the 1st state to ban flavored e-cigarettes because the sound more like Starbursts.
- September 11th: President Trump says he plans to ban flavored e-cigs.
- September 18th: China removes Juul vaping products from online stores just days after they launched across the Great Wall.
- September 19th: India kicks China's moves up a notch and bans all e-cigs.
- September 20th: Walmart makes its moves.
When a unicorn falls, the rider goes down with it... Juul charged vaporized tobacco into the mainstream with its iPod-looking devices, reaching a $38B private valuation late last year. But publicly traded Altria is the old school Marlboro-owning cigarette-maker that splurged $12.5B for 35% of Juul's private shares. We don't know exactly what's happened to Juul's stock (since it's private), but Altria's is down 35% since vape-lash began.
Mission statements can be completely wrong... "Improve the lives of the world's one billion adult smokers by eliminating cigarettes." That's Juul's mission statement (they write it in all-caps), which could be completely wrong in 2 big ways:
- Underage kids are Juuling, too (1 in 5 US high schoolers vape).
- It's not totally clear vaping is healthier than smoking.
Who's up...
Because dating wasn't already stressful... Tinder-owner Match wants to make it apocalyptic. To give you a reason to ditch Bumble and to boost engagement from people already swiping-right, Tinder launched "Swipe Night": a make-your-own-adventure interactive show. The 4-episode mini-series starts 10/6 within the Tinder app, and each episode expires after 6 hours. Your decisions determine your love destiny.
Zuck's coming over... Facebook unleashed a $149 Portal TV — a streaming device that doesn't include the Netflix app. Portal TV is all about a camera that tracks your movements for "Watch Together": Enjoy streaming that Facebook Watch show while your remote friends watch simultaneously on your screen. Privacy? A little dongle you slide to block the camera.
When you need emergency Nyquil ASAP... Google hears ya. So its drone company, Wing, just partnered up with Walgreens and a couple other brands for a 1st-of-its-kind delivery option. The team will start drone delivering pills, prescriptions, and whatever's on the shelf in Virginia starting next month. Over 75% of Americans live within 5 miles of a Walgreens, and the Department of Transportation has green-lighted this pilot.
...and who's down
Worst day in a decade... FedEx plummeted 13% one day last week after cutting its profit expectations for next year. But FedEx isn't just FedEx. Watching its global shipping network gives helpful insights on how the world's economy is doing (it's a "leading indicator"). That single earnings report was enough to worry investors.
The huge cardboard box... within a box within another bubble-wrapped box? Not sustainable. Since Amazon delivers 10B packages per year, CEO Jeff Bezos pledged to be 100% renewable by 2030 and carbon neutral by 2040 — a decade before Paris Climate Accord targets. Employees still walked out Friday to pressure Amazon to reduce its absurd carbon footprint. To start, it ordered 100K Rivian electric delivery vans (Amazon's a Rivian investor).
What else we’re Snackin’
- Work: 6 emails you should send every week (like the "Appreciation Email")
- Life: 10 private islands you can rent on Airbnb
- Money: You know the Dow and S&P 500 stock indexes — get to know the Russell 2000
- Venture: International private flights with weed. Tequila shot mass firings. A Run-DMC concert. The WSJ's inside scoop on WeWork's co-founder (who some board members want replaced right now to save the IPO)
- Crypto: Now Wells Fargo is launching its own cryptocurrency (it's for the bank's internal transactions)
This Week
- Monday: Our 1st look at iPhone 11 per-sales (purchases began last week)
- Tuesday: Earnings from Nike, Blackberry, and Nio. The 74th UN General Assembly begins in New York
- Wednesday: Earnings from KB Home, AAR Corp, and Pier 1 Imports
- Thursday: Peloton's IPO @ Nasdaq. Earnings from Rite Aid, Factset, and Micron
- Friday: Consumer Sentiment Report
Disclosure: Authors of this Snacks own shares of Amazon
Submission ID: 959781