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| Axios Closer |
| By Hope King and Nathan Bomey ·Jan 03, 2022 |
| Happy New Year! We are Hope King and Nathan Bomey, your new Closer team. (More on that below.) - Courtenay Brown is off to new adventures soon. We couldn't be more grateful for what she's built.
Today's newsletter is 683 words, 2½-minute read. 🔔 The dashboard: The S&P 500 closed up 0.6% and reached a new record. - Biggest gainer? Tesla (+13.5%) shares soared on the news that it delivered a record number of vehicles last year.
- Biggest decliner? Moderna (-7.5%) shares sank along with its peers Pfizer and BioNTech as investors weigh a future with smaller vaccine sales.
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| 1 big thing: Engines of change |
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| Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios |
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| To start the year, we want to share a few of our obsessions and critical trends we're eyeing in the business world. Why it matters: These shifts will change the way companies think about their workers and impact the way people save and spend their money. What we're watching... Near-immediate delivery of goods and food prep consolidation. - DoorDash, Instacart and startups like JOKR are bringing food, groceries and other items to your door in 10–15 minutes.
- Local restaurants, national chains and virtual brands are relying on delivery-only locations ("ghost kitchens") to meet the rising demand for in-home dining.
- Labor supply and costs are at the heart of making both business models successful.
Car and home prices keep rising. - Prices of cars will continue to tick higher, but the pace could slow with analysts expecting the chip shortage to improve, aiding vehicle production by late 2022.
- Home prices will continue to climb amid low inventory, prompting pressure on policymakers to jolt housing starts.
What's next (for better or worse)... - Physical and digital businesses blur. The "metaverse" scramble that kicked off in earnest with Facebook's name change will yield a continuous stream of announcements — many of which will be branding and marketing exercises, while a few (like Apple's purported AR/VR headset) will kick-start a new phase for digital economies.
- Bankruptcy court becomes a ghost town. Vanishingly few companies will go belly up amid strong consumer spending.
The bottom line: Corporate evolution affects our lives as consumers and workers. Understanding change can help us better grapple with the present and prepare for the future. |
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| 2. Charted: A $3 trillion first 🍎 |
 Data: FactSet; Chart: Kavya Beheraj/Axios Apple's market capitalization topped $3 trillion on Monday, becoming the first publicly traded company to reach that milestone, Nathan notes. By the numbers: The iPhone maker passed $2 trillion less than two years ago, showing its meteoric rise as CEO Tim Cook has kept the company focused on its core products and services. |
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| 3. What's happening |
| ⚖️ The Elizabeth Holmes jury says it's deadlocked on three criminal fraud counts. It's unclear which way it's leaning on the other eight. (NPR) 🚙 Tesla delivered a record number of vehicles in the fourth quarter. The electric vehicle maker is managing the chip crisis. (Axios) |
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| A message from Axios |
| Use smart, brief writing to engage employees |
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| The premium on effective communication has never been higher. Craft, deliver and track engaging all-staff updates with Axios HQ. - Readers are 2x more likely to open an Axios HQ email than other internal updates.
See Axios HQ in action. |
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| 4. Election objectors land corporate donations |
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| A scene from the Capitol insurrection on Jan. 6. Photo: Victor J. Blue/Bloomberg via Getty Images |
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| The banking lobby, plane maker Boeing and shipping giant UPS are among the companies or organizations that have resumed political contributions to members of Congress who objected to the 2020 election results, according to a new report, Nathan writes. Flashback: Many companies pledged to end or pause such donations amid a hailstorm of pressure following the Jan. 6 insurrection. Our thought bubble: The pressure is wearing off. - Companies and trade groups have given $8.1 million to the 147 members of Congress who refused to certify the election, according to the report by corporate watchdog nonprofit Accountable.US.
The top 5 donors as of Jan. 1, 2022: - American Bankers Association ($203,000)
- Boeing ($190,000)
- Credit Union National Association ($188,500)
- Raytheon Technologies ($186,000)
- Lockheed Martin ($184,500)
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| 5. Omarion's Omicron comeback |
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| Omarion performs in 2021 in Atlanta, Ga. Photo: Prince Williams/Wireimage |
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| Musician Omarion wants you to know he's definitely not the Omicron variant, Courtenay Brown writes. - Memes have been using his name to refer to the most contagious strain of the virus.
- "My lawyers asked me to read this ... I, Omarion, am a musician and entertainer — you knew that — not a variant, OK," he joked on TikTok this weekend.
The artist's brand is the latest to become connected to the pandemic. - The last was Delta Airlines, whose CEO refused to refer to the Delta variant by that moniker. "We just call it the variant," he told WSJ.
- There was also Corona beer, which saw a flood of misinformation around a link to the coronavirus. (But sales didn't take a hit because of that.)
The bottom line: Omarion hasn't been name-dropped this much since the early 2000s — and he's using the attention to plug his craft: You don't need "a negative test result in order to dance to my music," the singer said. |
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| 6. What they're saying |
| "We're not seeing joins slowing. We're not seeing cancelations rising." — Planet Fitness CEO Chris Rondeau to CNBC on Monday, refuting fears that the Omicron variant will dampen the typical New Year's resolution rush of exercisers. |
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| A message from Axios |
| Use smart, brief writing to engage employees |
| |
| |
| |
| The premium on effective communication has never been higher. Craft, deliver and track engaging all-staff updates with Axios HQ. - Readers are 2x more likely to open an Axios HQ email than other internal updates.
See Axios HQ in action. |
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| 🙌 Thanks for reading! We'll see you back here tomorrow. |
 | Bring the strength of Smart Brevity® to your team — more effective communications, powered by Axios HQ. | | |
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