Offshore
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App Economy Insights
🍿 Netflix + Warner Bros. 📊
The $83B deal visualized:
• What Netflix is buying
• The bid vs. Paramount
• Who wins & who loses
• Balance sheet madness
• Vertical vs. horizontal merger👇
https://t.co/dGBendVe7H
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🍿 Netflix + Warner Bros. 📊
The $83B deal visualized:
• What Netflix is buying
• The bid vs. Paramount
• Who wins & who loses
• Balance sheet madness
• Vertical vs. horizontal merger👇
https://t.co/dGBendVe7H
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Offshore
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Fiscal.ai
Future share cannibal?
Crocs has now reduced its total shares outstanding by 10.4% over the last 12 months.
Current Buyback Yield: 13.9%
$CROX https://t.co/TYQXGpAtYe
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Future share cannibal?
Crocs has now reduced its total shares outstanding by 10.4% over the last 12 months.
Current Buyback Yield: 13.9%
$CROX https://t.co/TYQXGpAtYe
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Offshore
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Clark Square Capital
RT @AstutexAi: The Curious Case of Vera Bradley: Influencer Stock Pumper, the Fund 1 Partial Exit, and the Pre-Sale Signals
I don’t typically address issues like this, as they’re outside my competence and I don’t bet on such outcomes, but this situation is a bit special. So here’s what happened recently with Vera Bradley. I’ll also attach a link to Gemini Deep Research in the first comment in case you want to dive into more details.
1) The company extended its poison pill for 1 year on October 10th
2) It amended the JPM credit agreement, pledging IP to unlock asset sales on October 27th
3) It listed its HQ for sale/leaseback - 1-year lease only (!) - on October 28th
4) Ivan Brockman from PJT was appointed to the board on November 17th
So sale preparations were going at full speed, but then comes the fun part (not so fun actually if you held through these days like me 😵💫):
5) Felix Prehn, a finfluencer, pumps the stock, which had technically started to improve earlier (entered Stage 2 on October 27th). Volume shoots up, shorts cover, some merger arbitragers and quants step in betting on a buyout, and the stock flies
6) Fund 1 decides to sell into this event and unloads all physical shares (10%), leaving exposure only through swaps (6.7%). they previously claimed an additional 10% exposure through swaps
7) Fund 1 files its updated ownership on November 20th, leaving a lot of speculators disappointed, stock crashes 18%
8) Now the hot air is coming out and distributing into the market with very few buyers before earnings on Thursday - the same pattern as CTKB, which Felix Prehn pumped earlier (November 14th)
But what is actually going on with the business itself? Two things worth mentioning:
1) The company is aggressively liquidating old inventory in the off-price channel - Costco, TJX, Marshalls, and even Dollar General. That means margins might be weaker than expected, but this is totally fine. Any potential buyer wouldn’t want to deal with inventory that’s similar in size to the deal value, so company prioritizes cash over margin
2) Several new products are doing very well - the Anthro collab, 100 Handbag, all Star Patchwork products, Peanuts collection and Aristocats (101 Dalmatians not so much, so cats win this time 🐱) mostly sold out. There might be an issue with artificially limiting availability to create online hype, but I’m not sure you’d want to do that before a sale
I still think $VRA is worth at least $5 per share, and at $2 it’s a steal. I own shares, so wish me luck🫡
Also big thanks to @ClarkSquareCap for valuable insights - he’s the man and a must-follow!
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RT @AstutexAi: The Curious Case of Vera Bradley: Influencer Stock Pumper, the Fund 1 Partial Exit, and the Pre-Sale Signals
I don’t typically address issues like this, as they’re outside my competence and I don’t bet on such outcomes, but this situation is a bit special. So here’s what happened recently with Vera Bradley. I’ll also attach a link to Gemini Deep Research in the first comment in case you want to dive into more details.
1) The company extended its poison pill for 1 year on October 10th
2) It amended the JPM credit agreement, pledging IP to unlock asset sales on October 27th
3) It listed its HQ for sale/leaseback - 1-year lease only (!) - on October 28th
4) Ivan Brockman from PJT was appointed to the board on November 17th
So sale preparations were going at full speed, but then comes the fun part (not so fun actually if you held through these days like me 😵💫):
5) Felix Prehn, a finfluencer, pumps the stock, which had technically started to improve earlier (entered Stage 2 on October 27th). Volume shoots up, shorts cover, some merger arbitragers and quants step in betting on a buyout, and the stock flies
6) Fund 1 decides to sell into this event and unloads all physical shares (10%), leaving exposure only through swaps (6.7%). they previously claimed an additional 10% exposure through swaps
7) Fund 1 files its updated ownership on November 20th, leaving a lot of speculators disappointed, stock crashes 18%
8) Now the hot air is coming out and distributing into the market with very few buyers before earnings on Thursday - the same pattern as CTKB, which Felix Prehn pumped earlier (November 14th)
But what is actually going on with the business itself? Two things worth mentioning:
1) The company is aggressively liquidating old inventory in the off-price channel - Costco, TJX, Marshalls, and even Dollar General. That means margins might be weaker than expected, but this is totally fine. Any potential buyer wouldn’t want to deal with inventory that’s similar in size to the deal value, so company prioritizes cash over margin
2) Several new products are doing very well - the Anthro collab, 100 Handbag, all Star Patchwork products, Peanuts collection and Aristocats (101 Dalmatians not so much, so cats win this time 🐱) mostly sold out. There might be an issue with artificially limiting availability to create online hype, but I’m not sure you’d want to do that before a sale
I still think $VRA is worth at least $5 per share, and at $2 it’s a steal. I own shares, so wish me luck🫡
Also big thanks to @ClarkSquareCap for valuable insights - he’s the man and a must-follow!
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Offshore
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EndGame Macro
Lower Rates Don’t Matter If Confidence Collapses First
What this chart actually shows is how sensitive the system is to small rate moves once you account for who bought homes recently and how thin their margins are.
A drop from 6.3% to 6.0% sounds tiny. But mechanically, it flips millions more mortgages into refinance territory because closing costs, points, and break evens eat most of the savings unless you clear a certain threshold. That’s why the bar jumps from 3.5 million to 5.8 million almost overnight. It’s a cliff, not a slope.
But cliffs work both ways…you don’t get the upside unless everything else in the background is stable.
The Real Fragility Is That Most New Buyers Built This on Hope, Not Cushion
The majority of mortgages originated over the last three years were extremely tight deals…
High home prices.
High interest rates.
Little equity.
Rising cost of ownership.
Those buyers didn’t buy because the math worked on day one; they bought because they believed they’d date the rate and refinance later. That logic only works if the economy cooperates. It needs falling rates, stable jobs, and stable home prices happening at the same time.
What happens if unemployment is rising?
What happens if home values flatten or dip?
What happens if lenders tighten standards exactly when people need flexibility?
Suddenly the refinance escape hatch becomes a brick wall.
When the Economy Slows, the Housing Math Breaks First
Look at any past easing cycle. When the Fed starts cutting in a sustained way, unemployment doesn’t stabilize, it usually keeps rising for 12–18 months. The cuts don’t cause the job losses; they respond to them. And markets always forget that yields fall because the economy is weakening, not strengthening.
That’s why lower mortgage rates are not automatically bullish. If the 10 year is falling because growth is softening, earnings are weakening, and layoffs are accelerating, then the lower rate is actually a distress signal. Banks see that too. Which is why, in every downturn, they tighten LTV ratios, demand more equity, raise overlays, and get more conservative.
So even if rates drop enough to make refinancing look attractive, the most vulnerable homeowners often can’t pass underwriting and the people who can qualify may not feel psychologically safe enough to take on new debt.
Housing isn’t math first. It’s confidence first.
A Slow Grind Is Much More Likely Than a Smooth Landing
Let’s combine everything…Rising consumer delinquencies, Record corporate bankruptcies, over 1.17 million layoffs in 2025, a housing market where nearly 20% of homeowners are locked into 6% and higher mortgages, cost of living surge that raised the all in cost of homeownership dramatically.
Pair that with Home Depot’s recent outlook of flat comps, weak big ticket spending, and a recovery that doesn’t start until after rates fall and the economy resets and the picture becomes clearer.
History shows that demand doesn’t come back until people feel secure, and you don’t get that feeling in a rising unemployment environment.
So the real point I am making is this…
Lower rates can unlock refinancing. But they can’t unlock confidence. And without confidence, the housing market doesn’t actually turn, it just breathes a little easier while the real economy works through its pain.
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Lower Rates Don’t Matter If Confidence Collapses First
What this chart actually shows is how sensitive the system is to small rate moves once you account for who bought homes recently and how thin their margins are.
A drop from 6.3% to 6.0% sounds tiny. But mechanically, it flips millions more mortgages into refinance territory because closing costs, points, and break evens eat most of the savings unless you clear a certain threshold. That’s why the bar jumps from 3.5 million to 5.8 million almost overnight. It’s a cliff, not a slope.
But cliffs work both ways…you don’t get the upside unless everything else in the background is stable.
The Real Fragility Is That Most New Buyers Built This on Hope, Not Cushion
The majority of mortgages originated over the last three years were extremely tight deals…
High home prices.
High interest rates.
Little equity.
Rising cost of ownership.
Those buyers didn’t buy because the math worked on day one; they bought because they believed they’d date the rate and refinance later. That logic only works if the economy cooperates. It needs falling rates, stable jobs, and stable home prices happening at the same time.
What happens if unemployment is rising?
What happens if home values flatten or dip?
What happens if lenders tighten standards exactly when people need flexibility?
Suddenly the refinance escape hatch becomes a brick wall.
When the Economy Slows, the Housing Math Breaks First
Look at any past easing cycle. When the Fed starts cutting in a sustained way, unemployment doesn’t stabilize, it usually keeps rising for 12–18 months. The cuts don’t cause the job losses; they respond to them. And markets always forget that yields fall because the economy is weakening, not strengthening.
That’s why lower mortgage rates are not automatically bullish. If the 10 year is falling because growth is softening, earnings are weakening, and layoffs are accelerating, then the lower rate is actually a distress signal. Banks see that too. Which is why, in every downturn, they tighten LTV ratios, demand more equity, raise overlays, and get more conservative.
So even if rates drop enough to make refinancing look attractive, the most vulnerable homeowners often can’t pass underwriting and the people who can qualify may not feel psychologically safe enough to take on new debt.
Housing isn’t math first. It’s confidence first.
A Slow Grind Is Much More Likely Than a Smooth Landing
Let’s combine everything…Rising consumer delinquencies, Record corporate bankruptcies, over 1.17 million layoffs in 2025, a housing market where nearly 20% of homeowners are locked into 6% and higher mortgages, cost of living surge that raised the all in cost of homeownership dramatically.
Pair that with Home Depot’s recent outlook of flat comps, weak big ticket spending, and a recovery that doesn’t start until after rates fall and the economy resets and the picture becomes clearer.
History shows that demand doesn’t come back until people feel secure, and you don’t get that feeling in a rising unemployment environment.
So the real point I am making is this…
Lower rates can unlock refinancing. But they can’t unlock confidence. And without confidence, the housing market doesn’t actually turn, it just breathes a little easier while the real economy works through its pain.
A mortgage rate of 6% vs. 6.25% probably does little to move the needle for a prospective home buyer.
But the number of homeowners “in the money” to refinance jumps 25% between a rate of 6.2% and 6.3%. https://t.co/qlLO8WMoB4 tweet
WealthyReadings
Was discussing with a colleague who told me she refuses to use $UBER.
Because it's "exploitation".
How hard is it to understand that without $UBER, thousands of immigrants wouldn't have a job?
She fights for those immigrants to have the right to come. But refuses to use the service which gives them the opportunity to have a better life.
Because it isn't "moral".
How can someone be that limited, contradictory? How is it possible not to understand such a simple situation?
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Was discussing with a colleague who told me she refuses to use $UBER.
Because it's "exploitation".
How hard is it to understand that without $UBER, thousands of immigrants wouldn't have a job?
She fights for those immigrants to have the right to come. But refuses to use the service which gives them the opportunity to have a better life.
Because it isn't "moral".
How can someone be that limited, contradictory? How is it possible not to understand such a simple situation?
tweet
Offshore
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EndGame Macro
JOLTS Didn’t Flash Red But It Whispered Trouble.
If you only look at the headlines…job openings flat, hires little changed, separations steady you’d think nothing important is happening. But when you dig into the details, especially knowing the data collection was disrupted by the shutdown, the picture shifts. What looks calm on the surface feels more like a labor market slowly exhaling after two years of running hot. And that kind of softening usually happens before the downturn becomes visible.
Job Openings Are Calm on Top But Cooling Underneath
Openings holding at 7.7 million sounds steady, but steady isn’t strength…steady is stalling. We’ve dropped from the 2021–22 frenzy of 10–12 million openings and have now flattened into a range that doesn’t move much. That plateau alone is a sign of cooling demand. And the sector level data matters because the financial activities and information, two forward looking parts of the economy both saw meaningful declines.
The Hiring Slowdown Is the Real Tell
Hires dipped again, down to 5.1 million, and the hiring rate slipped to 3.2%. That’s one of the softest prints since before COVID. This is how labor markets turn in real time because companies don’t start with layoffs; they start by pulling back on hiring. Small businesses, which usually sense stress first, barely hired at all in October. When hiring cools at the edges, it’s usually because firms are feeling the slowdown internally long before it appears in the big aggregate numbers.
Fewer Quits Equals Fading Confidence
Quits are down to 2.9 million, a full 276,000 lower than last year. And quits are as close as we get to a confidence gauge. People quit when they feel secure. They stay when they’re unsure. The drop across healthcare, food services, and government isn’t a sign of contentment; it’s a sign people sense fewer safe opportunities outside their current job. That’s an emotional shift, not just a statistical one.
Layoffs Aren’t Exploding They’re Creeping In
Layoffs stayed at 1.9 million, but the details matter…accommodation and food services saw a sharp jump, and some government categories did too. That’s how downturns begin, not with a tidal wave of layoffs, but with small cracks in sensitive sectors. The rest follows only if the pressure builds.
A Data Fog That Hints at More Beneath the Surface
Because September’s release was canceled and October’s alignment methodology was suspended, the numbers have more noise than usual. Whenever the measurement gets fuzzy, the underlying shift is usually larger than the reported one. Smooth data in a choppy environment is rarely a sign of actual stability.
The Real Signal Beneath the Calm
Here’s what the report is actually telling you…
• Openings are flat because demand is softening.
• Hiring is slowing because businesses are getting cautious.
• Quits are falling because workers feel less secure.
• Layoffs are starting where they always start, in the sectors closest to the consumer.
That’s a labor market giving up altitude quietly and slowly.
Pair that with rising delinquencies, record high bankruptcies, over a million layoffs announced this year, and weakening consumer sentiment, and the soft landing story starts feeling more like wishful thinking than a durable trend.
My Read
The economy is drifting into a cooler, more fragile phase. JOLTS is often the first place you can see that shift because it captures employer behavior before payrolls show anything. And right now, employers are acting like the turn has already begun.
The slope isn’t steep yet but it’s no longer flat.
tweet
JOLTS Didn’t Flash Red But It Whispered Trouble.
If you only look at the headlines…job openings flat, hires little changed, separations steady you’d think nothing important is happening. But when you dig into the details, especially knowing the data collection was disrupted by the shutdown, the picture shifts. What looks calm on the surface feels more like a labor market slowly exhaling after two years of running hot. And that kind of softening usually happens before the downturn becomes visible.
Job Openings Are Calm on Top But Cooling Underneath
Openings holding at 7.7 million sounds steady, but steady isn’t strength…steady is stalling. We’ve dropped from the 2021–22 frenzy of 10–12 million openings and have now flattened into a range that doesn’t move much. That plateau alone is a sign of cooling demand. And the sector level data matters because the financial activities and information, two forward looking parts of the economy both saw meaningful declines.
The Hiring Slowdown Is the Real Tell
Hires dipped again, down to 5.1 million, and the hiring rate slipped to 3.2%. That’s one of the softest prints since before COVID. This is how labor markets turn in real time because companies don’t start with layoffs; they start by pulling back on hiring. Small businesses, which usually sense stress first, barely hired at all in October. When hiring cools at the edges, it’s usually because firms are feeling the slowdown internally long before it appears in the big aggregate numbers.
Fewer Quits Equals Fading Confidence
Quits are down to 2.9 million, a full 276,000 lower than last year. And quits are as close as we get to a confidence gauge. People quit when they feel secure. They stay when they’re unsure. The drop across healthcare, food services, and government isn’t a sign of contentment; it’s a sign people sense fewer safe opportunities outside their current job. That’s an emotional shift, not just a statistical one.
Layoffs Aren’t Exploding They’re Creeping In
Layoffs stayed at 1.9 million, but the details matter…accommodation and food services saw a sharp jump, and some government categories did too. That’s how downturns begin, not with a tidal wave of layoffs, but with small cracks in sensitive sectors. The rest follows only if the pressure builds.
A Data Fog That Hints at More Beneath the Surface
Because September’s release was canceled and October’s alignment methodology was suspended, the numbers have more noise than usual. Whenever the measurement gets fuzzy, the underlying shift is usually larger than the reported one. Smooth data in a choppy environment is rarely a sign of actual stability.
The Real Signal Beneath the Calm
Here’s what the report is actually telling you…
• Openings are flat because demand is softening.
• Hiring is slowing because businesses are getting cautious.
• Quits are falling because workers feel less secure.
• Layoffs are starting where they always start, in the sectors closest to the consumer.
That’s a labor market giving up altitude quietly and slowly.
Pair that with rising delinquencies, record high bankruptcies, over a million layoffs announced this year, and weakening consumer sentiment, and the soft landing story starts feeling more like wishful thinking than a durable trend.
My Read
The economy is drifting into a cooler, more fragile phase. JOLTS is often the first place you can see that shift because it captures employer behavior before payrolls show anything. And right now, employers are acting like the turn has already begun.
The slope isn’t steep yet but it’s no longer flat.
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Offshore
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memenodes
When you realize no matter how much muscle you gain you will always be as weak as the day you got liquidated https://t.co/09Fi8pqpOo
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When you realize no matter how much muscle you gain you will always be as weak as the day you got liquidated https://t.co/09Fi8pqpOo
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