Facebook's 1st big ZuckBucks meeting

Please RSVP no later than Friday... Visa, eBay, Mastercard, and Stripe all sent their regrets to Facebook's inaugural meeting in Geneva today about the global cryptocurrency (it's very jedi council-y). PayPal ditched a week before. Now the "Libra" project is raising questions from the business partners who would've governed its dollars without borders. Next, Zuckerberg chats with Congress about it this month.

Add ad problems to the crypto problems... 2020 could be worse than 2016. Zuck decided this past week that political ads won't be subject to fact-checks like other content — he thinks people should decide themselves. Then this happened:

• On the right: President Trump paid Facebook for a campaign ad that included false statements. CNN isn't airing it — Facebook and other networks are.
• On the left: Elizabeth Warren falsely claimed in an ad that Zuck endorsed Trump for president — just to troll him/prove a point.
• Across the spectrum: Both ads got approved, showing FB's political ad revenue will be salt-and-peppered with instense controversy.

Carb battles... Domino's is stuck in two food-armed conflicts: the Pizza Wars and the Delivery Wars. Rival Papa John's stock is up 35% this year, while Uber Eats steals more of Dom's delivery market. But Domino's shares rebounded last week as its new CEO focuses on a secret weapon — takeout. He mentioned "carryout" 17 times on the earnings call, since it makes up 40% of Dom's sales and is more profitable because it doesn't require paying a delivery guy.

If you can't beat 'em... hire their best person. Target's stock is up 80% in the last 5 years, while Bed Bath & Beyond's is down the same amount. So the bathroom go-to is snagging Target's Chief Merchandising Officer to be its new CEO. Bed Bath shares surged 21% on word offline retail legend Mark Tritton will bring his Target gameplan with him: He launched 30 new brands that looked just like Millennial startups you want to try out, but they were actually owned by Target.

Tattoos only get you so far... Harley's core customer sticks its logo on their biceps, but sales have shrunk in the US each year since 2014. So Harley sliced some avocado and released a $30K electric bike this year called "LiveWire". But Reuters research revealed that pre-orders are low and mainly going to existing customers — the “young, green, affluent 1st-time motorcyclists" Harley was targetting don't really exist (and you could almost get a whole Tesla for that price instead).

Because, profits... Walmart spent years investing in innovative ecommerce to take on Amazon: it spent $3.3B on Jet.com in 2016 and acquired khaki king Bonobos a year later. Now it's trying to refund those unprofitable pursuits. Walmart's seeking outside investors for its private concierge app JetBlack that loses $15K per customer, it's firing dozens of Bonobos employees, and just sold its femme online clothing brand ModCloth. Old school Walmartians won't waste time on these unprofitables.

• Work: How to answer 5 common interview questions designed to trip you up — "tell us about a time when..."
• Life: 26 of the greatest product fails of all time (ESPN cell phone? Really?)
• Money: The Bloomberg chart that ranks everyone (including you) by net worth
• Venture: Venture Capitalists on how to get into Venture Capital
• Crypto: The IRS issues its 1st cryptocurrency tax guidance in 5 years

• Monday: Bond markets are closed for the holiday, but stock markets and Snacks are open for business
• Tuesday: The 3rd quarter earnings season kicks off with a bunch of banks: JPMorgan, Citi, Wells Fargo, Charles Schwab
• Wednesday: Earnings from Netflix, Bank of America, IBM, Comerica
• Thursday: Earnings from Morgan Stanley, ETrade, Honeywell
• Friday: Earnings from Coca-Cola, American Express

Disclosure: Authors of this Snacks own stock of Amazon

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