Wednesday, June 15, 2022

☕️ Iced out

Apple and the MLS link up on a major deal...
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Morning Brew

Miso

Good morning. Step out of the humidity and into the cool embrace of knowledge: Morning Brew's fall Accelerator courses, designed to help top-performing professionals advance in their careers, are now open for enrollment.

Here's what to expect:

  • Choose between several virtual courses, including Business Essentials, Business Analytics, and Leadership Accelerators.
  • Hear from leaders across different industries who will provide real-world scenarios and insights.
  • Make friends as an adult (not easy!) by learning alongside a bunch of cool, like-minded people.

Early bird pricing is available now, so apply before tuition goes up.

Neal Freyman, Jamie Wilde, Max Knoblauch

MARKETS

Nasdaq

10,828.35

S&P

3,735.48

Dow

30,364.83

10-Year

3.484%

Bitcoin

$21,916.08

FedEx

$229.95

*Stock data as of market close, cryptocurrency data as of 12:00am ET. Here's what these numbers mean.

  • Markets: The S&P 500 might be looking at an extended stay in bear market territory after dropping for its fifth straight day. One of the few bright spots on Wall Street was FedEx, which posted its best trading day since 1986, after raising its dividend and adding board members in a deal with an activist investor.
  • Economy: Happy Fed meeting day to all who celebrate. This afternoon, we'll find out just how aggressive Fed Chair Jerome Powell is willing to get to tame soaring prices. Investors had been predicting that the Fed would raise interest rates by 50 basis points, but now they're saying a gigantic 75 basis point hike is more likely, because Friday's inflation report came in hotter than expected.

MEDIA

'Ted Lasso' season 3 is going to be super realistic

Photo collage depicting Apple's deal to buy the broadcast rights to MLS Dianna "Mick" McDougall, Photos: Apple, Getty Images/Vaughn Ridley

Apple's TV service, already synonymous with a mustachioed American soccer coach, is about to become synonymous with American soccer.

The tech company agreed to broadcast every Major League Soccer (MLS) game for the next 10 years in a landmark deal for the streaming industry's big push to acquire live sports rights. With the deal, MLS becomes the first major US sports league to hand over its exclusive global media rights to a digital media shop.

The details: Fans of the MLS will have to subscribe to a new service embedded in the Apple TV app to watch all the games, but won't be hit with any blackouts or restrictions. Apple is paying a minimum of $250 million a year for the rights to air MLS, according to the Sports Business Journal.

The way we watch sports is changing

As pioneer Netflix conceived of it, streaming was meant to offer an escape from all the news, sports, and weather we're constantly bombarded with. Netflix and chill, right?

But live sports, which can draw eyeballs like no other type of content these days, have become too attractive for streaming services to ignore—especially as they try to differentiate themselves among the approximately 3 bazillion other companies all competing for the same customers.

After overcoming some initial technical difficulties, streamers are increasingly making live sports a core value proposition for their services:

  • Amazon made waves last year by securing the exclusive rights to 15 Thursday Night Football games beginning in 2023.
  • Disney added to its robust sports streaming lineup with a deal to exclusively air 75 regular-season NHL games on ESPN+ and Hulu.
  • NBCUniversal's Peacock is the destination for the Olympics and Premier League matches, while Paramount Global's Paramount+ features the Masters and March Madness. We could go on…

So what about Netflix? In 2018, co-CEO Reed Hastings declared, "We don't do (live) news, we don't do (live) sports. But what we do do, we try to do really well."

That formula isn't really working anymore, as Netflix loses subscribers and its stock tanks. So just as the company has pivoted to embrace an ad-supported tier, it could dip a toe into live sports as well. And what better place to start than with Formula 1, which has surged in popularity in the US in large part due to Netflix's Drive to Survive series? According to Insider, Netflix is one of several companies in the running to buy US F1 rights starting next year.—NF

        

TOGETHER WITH MISO

You have one week to get robo fry cooks in your portfolio

Miso

Time is running out to invest in Miso Robotics.

Let's face it: Restaurants are struggling. Notoriously low margins paired with the labor shortage (which isn't getting better anytime soon) are an *expensive* recipe for hardship.

Miso is revolutionizing the commercial food-service industry with robotic solutions that address some of the largest gaps in back-of-house kitchen operations. These robot kitchen helpers boost restaurant margins up to 3X higher and cost only 1% of typical QSR spend. That's why household brands like White Castle and Jack in the Box have "hired" Miso's bots to increase their kitchen efficiency.

You have less than one week to send these lean, mean cooking machines to the kitchen. Invest in Miso Robotics before June 23.

WORLD

Tour de headlines

Flooding is seen on June 14, 2022 in Livingston, Montana Flooding in Livingston, Montana, near Yellowstone National Park. William Campbell/Getty Images.

Reschedule your Yellowstone trip. The beloved national park was shut down Monday and visitors were evacuated as heavy flooding caused rockslides and mudslides, and damaged roads and power lines. Forecasts show even heavier rains in the coming days, so the park will be closed at least through Wednesday. Superintendent Cam Sholly said, "We will not know timing of the park's reopening until flood waters subside and we're able to assess the damage throughout the park."

BTS is taking a hiatus that isn't a hiatus. During an annual dinner celebrating their founding, global sensation BTS announced that they would be taking a hiatus to focus on individual projects as solo artists. The reason for the pause? Members cited exhaustion and pressure around schedules. The band's label later clarified that they were not in fact going on hiatus, although members will spend more time exploring solo projects at the moment.

Anyone got travel recs for Saudi Arabia? President Biden is heading there next month to meet with leaders including Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the kingdom's de facto ruler, as Biden tries to reset relations with a country he once promised to make a "pariah" due to its woeful human rights record. But Biden's bigger priority now is taming record US gas prices, and during his visit, he'll press MBS to increase Saudi oil production and bring supply more level with demand.

CRYPTO

Coinbase ices out nearly a fifth of its workforce

Squidward frozen in ice SpongeBob SquarePants/Paramount Global via Giphy

1,100 Coinbase employees, or 18% of its workforce, are being laid off via a message in their personal email inboxes—because Coinbase blocked workers from their corporate email accounts before telling them the news.

In announcing the layoffs, CEO Brian Armstrong wrote that "we grew too quickly" since the start of 2021, and that now it's time to "manage expenses" and "increase efficiency."

This wasn't entirely unexpected. Even before these mass layoffs, the crypto exchange rescinded offers to hundreds of recent recruits, and froze future hiring.

Candidates whose offers were torn up are miffed—especially those who turned down cushy, traditional tech and finance jobs to join Web3. One of those unlucky recruits, Ashutosh Ukey, told Bloomberg, "I would say my experience with Coinbase strayed me away from working in crypto. In the immediate future, I am looking into more long-established tech firms."

Ukey's return to tried-and-true sectors could become a common sentiment as crypto enters its villain era: Other crypto companies, including Gemini, Crypto.com, and BlockFi, collectively announced plans to lay off thousands of workers this month.

Bottom line: If crypto looked like loaded nachos to prospective talent last year, now it's more like a pile of soggy chips.—JW

        

GOVERNMENT

Happy isn't people and people aren't happy

An Asian elephant Getty Images

New York's top court ruled on Tuesday that an elephant—even a particularly intelligent one—can't be considered a person. So just to keep track of recent updates: Elephants are not people, but bees are fish.

The case, called the most important animal rights case of the century, involved Happy, a female Asian elephant who has been at the Bronx Zoo for 40+ years. In a 5–2 vote, the state Court of Appeals rejected an animal rights group's claim that Happy is being illegally detained and deserves to be transferred to a larger elephant sanctuary. In the ruling, the court determined that habeas corpus—a fundamental right protecting against unlawful detainment—does not apply to nonhuman animals.

The Nonhuman Rights Project asserted that Happy has been in a form of solitary confinement—living on about one acre of land, separated from the zoo's other Asian elephant by a fence. Elephants are social animals, traveling in herds over wide swaths of land, and given their self-awareness (in 2005, Happy became the first of her species to pass a mirror self-recognition test), activists consider this form of containment to be cruel.

Looking ahead…a similar case in California involving three elephants is currently underway, and an online petition seeking to end Happy's confinement at the Bronx Zoo has garnered more than 1.4 million signatures. To read more about Happy, we recommend Jill Lepore's piece in The Atlantic.—MK

        

GRAB BAG

Key performance indicators

Chai Pani restaurant in North Carolina @chaipani/Facebook

Stat: Chai Pani, a spot that serves Indian street food in Asheville, NC, was named the most Outstanding Restaurant in the US by the James Beard Foundation Awards. And Mashama Bailey of The Grey in Savannah, GA, was awarded Outstanding Chef. See the entire James Beard winners list here for foodie recs.

Quote: "If the legislation ends up reflecting what the framework indicated, I'll be supportive."

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said he liked what he saw in a gun reform bill currently being written by a bipartisan group of senators. McConnell's support would go a long way toward getting the 60 votes necessary for the bill to pass the Senate.

Read: A Titanic fraud? (The Coast)

TOGETHER WITH BAMBOOHR

BambooHR

Make HR your superpower. Delivering a next-level employee experience hasn't become just a huge expectation in recent years—it's also become harder to knock outta the park. That's why BambooHR makes hiring easier and faster, turns onboarding into an enjoyable experience, and offers a payroll process your employees can actually get pumped about. Click here to see what better HR looks like.

WHAT ELSE IS BREWING

  • WNBA star Brittney Griner's detention in Russia was extended for another 2.5 weeks.
  • Leading tampon manufacturers in the US said they're ramping up production to make up for shortages.
  • Layoffs hit real estate: Compass and Redfin said they were cutting 10% and 8% of their workforces, respectively.
  • Mortgage rates spiked to 6.28% yesterday, up from 5.55% a week ago.
  • Serena Williams will make her return to tennis at Wimbledon after a one-year absence from playing any matches. Elsewhere in the tennis world, the US Open said it's allowing players from Russia and Belarus to compete in the tournament this fall; Wimbledon has banned them.

BREW'S BETS

People are all right: A young fan asked baseball player Joey Votto to make a TikTok with her, and…he did.

People are all right x2: Another video that will make you smile.

For the transportation geeks: Feast your eyes on models of transit stations all over the world.

GAMES

The puzzle section

Pikdoku: We've got a new game for you to try today, and it's called Pikdoku (pictures + sudoku). Check it out and let us know what you think.

Internet browser trivia

Microsoft is pulling most support for Internet Explorer today, meaning the browser is effectively entering retirement. Instead of hosting a party and making corny speeches, let's celebrate Internet Explorer's nearly 27-year career with internet browser trivia.

We'll give you a year, and you have to name the most popular internet browser (the one with the most market share) then.

  1. 1996
  2. 2002
  3. 2011
  4. 2018

Don't miss out on more from the Brew

Olympian Shawn Johnson East explains why gold medals weren't enough. Listen or watch now.

Master your finances: We have two challenges with Money Scoop to make you smarter about budgeting and investing in just four weeks—sign up here.

Get in the business of gifting. Shop Right Here Right Now candles for the desk upgrade your co-workers can only dream of.

ANSWER

  1. Netscape
  2. Internet Explorer
  3. Internet Explorer
  4. Chrome

Here's a video showing their relative popularity through the years.

         

Written by Neal Freyman, Max Knoblauch, and Jamie Wilde

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