A Second Roundup of Events
I was scanning the airwaves and various news sources in both digital and physical forms today after balling out in a golf tournament with my uncle and dad. I did not see anything I wanted to talk about specifically, so we are going to do a shotgun attempt at various news stories, another version of the article from a few days ago. We will cover three topics in particular: The end of the Boeing strike (impact on Boeing, whether this makes Boeing a good investment), Adidas’s investment in Patrick Mahomes (they are trying to make him their Michael Jordan), and my final election prediction (the impacts that my predicted winner will have on the economy and stock market).
Okay, let’s start with the Boeing thing. Boeing and the union have not officially reached a deal, and it is possible that the union members will vote not to accept this new deal, but I think this will get passed. These people have been on a strike for a month already, Boeing is taking some desperate measures, and I think overall, these employees have rightly wrung as much as they could, as opposed to the dock workers strike.
If the union members vote to agree to this deal, they would get a 35% pay bump, a $5k payment to all of their 401ks, a resumption of annual bonuses, and employees will be able to call into work. From the employee perspective, this would be meh. The number one thing they want is a return to pensions, but they will not get that. Boeing can, in no way, afford pensions for all of their employees. From Boeing's perspective, this is not great. They are now forced to pay quite a bit to employees, they have no leverage, and they have been humiliated for the umpteenth time in the past half-decade.
This deal, if accepted, changes nothing about the quality of Boeing. Boeing is an awful, toxic company. There is something rotten and broken at the center of this company. They are staying alive right now only because the US Government will not allow them to fail. Eventually, though, capitalism demands that the weak be killed and removed from the pack. A more innovative, efficient, and younger company will replace them. It does not matter the price, the valuation, the changes this company makes, the airlines, and governments that refuse to leave them for some reason, Boeing is done.
Another brand that is, in my opinion, floundering or dead, is Adidas. Where Boeing is down 38% YTD, Adidas is up 28. This does not make much sense to me, and I disagree with any marker that tells a story in which Adidas is doing well.
Adidas has nothing that is fresh or cool. Their only relatively successful commercial output right now is soccer cleats and Sambas, which are impossibly and maddeningly, doing well right now. There are now new designs or innovative thinking beyond their Yeezy partnership, which they understandably, had to end, even though that partnership made both Ye and Adidas billions upon billions.
Adidas is somehow less cool than Nike on every front, and Nike is sort of lame. Nike, and Air Jordan in particular, were jumpstarted by the greatest basketball player of all time, Michael Jordan. Adidas is hoping to replicate this with their own highly skilled player, Patrick Mahomes. The only problem is that Patrick Mahomes is really lame. Michael Jordan had and still has this scary, intimidating edge that screams for attention while still maintaining an edgy nature. Patrick Mahomes is too mainstream, too The Rock. He is bland, boring, and nobody outside of the NFL respects him as a brand.
I would not invest in Adidas because they are investing in Patrick Mahomes. They are trying to capture the US market, but they will fail. Nobody is buying anything because Patrick Mahomes wears it or told them to buy it.
Okay, finally, we have the election. My prediction is that Kamala wins a nailbiter. This could obviously still go either way, and honestly, the more I think about it, the more I think Trump could pull it off, but I am going to stick to my guns. I think Kamala Harris will win the popular and electoral vote.
Stock-market-wise, I think this is relatively insignificant. Donald Trump’s largest possible influence on the stock market was his corporate tax cut plan which would likely flounder and die in Congress. His second most impactful move would be getting rid of Lina Khan, which I think, despite what many would think, is a mistake. However, I think Kamala is also going to show Khan the door. Both of them have some business ties that Lina is messing up for them.
Honestly, the election of either does not change too, too much for the stock-market.
