The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Q1

• The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Quarter
• Airbnb to Compensate Hosts With $250 Million Package
• Instacart and Amazon Workers Strike
• A Well-Earned Vacation from Planet Doom & Gloom

 MARKETS 

The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Quarter

Stocks sank when the market opened this morning, as investors looked back on a month that will go down in the history books as “generally not a very good time.”

Today marks the end of Q1 2020; a trading period with the distinct privilege of being the all-time worst first quarter in the history of the stock market.

(Graphics department, could I get a graphic with a giant pile of money being climbed by a hoard of coronavirus-infected zombies and everything on fire and exploding, please?)

Ha. Ha.

Shortly after the opening bell, the three core indexes slid about 0.4%. But as we headed towards lunch, the markets staged a cautious push into the half-remembered realm of gains. (Ok. Maybe I need to cut back on the low budget Netflix fantasies.)

Over the last week, stocks have rallied from the doldrums of the coronavirus selloff, thanks in large part to a $2 trillion stimulus package and a countrywide case of Stockholm Syndrome. (I LOVE NOT HAVING TOILET PAPER, HAHA.)

The DJIA has risen 20% from the lowest point this month (around the time we were considering switching our official currency to bottle caps). While the S&P 500 has gained 17% since then.

That stocks are rallying even as the government delivers disastrous economic data (and fun projections of hundreds of thousands of deaths) suggests we may have seen the bottom of this crash, according to Tom Lee, head of research at Fundstrat Global Advisors.

“If we are rallying on bad news, I think that’s a sign that we are probably at a bottom,” Lee said on CNBC’s very fun sounding Markets in Turmoil Special last night. “I don’t know if this is October ’08 here; we still have some wood to chop.”

As we came closer to closing bell, stocks took a volatile turn into the red, possibly as a result of Governor Cuomo’s announcement that New York coronavirus cases jumped by 14% overnight to more than 75,000.

 BUSINESS 

Airbnb to Compensate Hosts With $250 Million Package

Airbnb will fork over $250 million in cash to hosts whose guests have cancelled because nobody can go outside because of the fog that turns your organs inside out.

The sleep – in – some – dude’s – spare – bedroom company said it will pay hosts 25% of the cancellation fee, which it waived for customers earlier this month because of the radioactive dinosaurs patrolling the pacific rim.

As you can imagine, some hosts weren’t too happy with Airbnb letting customers off the hook for those fees, even if the great sky wolves Hati and Skoll have eaten the sun, bringing about an era of endless darkness and heralding the final destruction of the Viking gods.

And by “not too happy” I’m mean they’ve gone completely off their gourd.

This guy is the heart and soul patch of the Airbnb host movement.

The payments will apply to the cancellation of reservations between March 14 and May 31, a three-month period which historians predict may last millions of years.

The drive – rent – prices – so – high – nobody – can – afford – to – live – in – the – city app said its funding the payout program itself and will start to issuing the payments in April, when the high priests have foretold the great serpent Nidhogg will wrap the world in its tail and consume us all.

Airbnb said in September it planned to list its shares in 2020. But that was before the dark lord got his hands on the heart of the universe and I ran out of toilet paper.

 LABOR 

Instacart and Amazon Workers Strike

Instacart and Amazon workers walked off the job yesterday to demand hazard pay and better safeguards against the coronavirus (because they’re the only one’s keeping society functioning right now and if they get sick I can’t drunkenly order a $200 hamburger chair at 3 am).

Many of the workers are classified as part-time or “gig workers,” so they don’t qualify for benefits such as paid sick leave or healthcare. Which kinda sucks when you’re on the front line of a global pandemic. (Well maybe not the front line. Those are the doctors and nurses. What’s one or two back from the front line? Radar from M*A*S*H?)

“They need to give us hazard pay right now and it should be guaranteed,” Shanna Foster, a single mother who stopped working her Instacart gig out of fear of getting the virus, told U.S. News. “It wasn’t worth the risk.”

Instacart workers (who are doing an incredible job during the apocalypse but have never 100% got my order right even in the best of times) are demanding an extra $5 in hazard pay for every order and a “default tip” of at least 10%.

In the age of the coronavirus, delivery drivers and warehouse workers are in a unique position where their jobs have transitioned from ”unskilled” labor to essential services (I need that hamburger chair damnit). But any leverage that status may give them is going to be diluted by the onslaught of hiring in these industries.

In the past week alone, Instacart has hired more than 250,000 people as full-service shoppers in order to accommodate the surging demand for someone else to go get my pork rinds for me. Meanwhile, Amazon is hiring 100,000 workers to staff their warehouses, drive their trucks, and hold in their pee until their lunch break.

The majority of new hires come from the rapidly expanding pool of workers laid off as a result of the coronavirus. These folks are just happy to have an income right now and no desire to rock the boat in the first week on the job, which severely weakens activist workers’ bargaining power.

In fact, Instacart said the strike had no impact on its business yesterday, even with 40% more traffic on the app compared to the same day last week.

We at the Society of Pissing into the Wind would classify that as hurricane level activity.

ONE LAST THING

A Well-Earned Vacation from Planet Doom & Gloom

Last week, I made a promise to you folks.

No matter how bad things get during this whole end of the world thing… No matter how may toilet rolls I have left (not a lot, folks!)… One Last Thing is going to be here for you, doing what we do best.

Covering the biggest money-moving news of the week and making some terrible, terrible jokes in the process.

The outpouring of support after that issue was incredible – and probably would have made me emotional if I wasn’t dead inside.

I had planned to spend today’s One Last Thing on some pretty depressing research and data. But to be perfectly honest, I ain’t feeling like it right now.

Instead I’d just like to highlight some of the support we received from you folks, as a reminder that you ding dongs are the only reason this ding dong is able to keep doing what he’s doing in a time like this.

The doom and gloom will keep until tomorrow. But right now, let’s hear from you guys with a sampler from the mailing bag:

“Thanks Shane for your fabulous writing skills and encouraging sense of humor. Stay safe.” – Sarah D.

“Many Thanks Shane, You are doing a GREAT public service with your wit and humor. Keep it coming!!! Cheers.” – Chris B.

“Shane, why would anyone be upset about your newsletter? It’s one of the few things that arrive in my g-mail account worth reading. Always well-written, with something interesting to say. And as a nod the Americans reading it, you’ve written in ‘American’ rather than ‘English’. So nothing to grouse about here, at a time like this. I think you’ve hit the right tone. Stay well and safe.” – Rosalyn B.

“Thanks Shane, I appreciate the humor, and to hell with the whiners. Keep doing you.” – Eddie

I also got a bunch emails from “German widows” who want to leave me their multi-million-dollar inheritance for some reason. Go figure.

Stay safe and well, folks.

MARKET MOVEMENTS

Closing Data for Today

• New York’s attorney general is looking into the privacy practices of Zoom, the videoconferencing app whose traffic has surged during the pandemic.

• Retailers including Macy’s, Kohl’s, and Gap Inc. are furloughing thousands of employees. The National Retail Federation estimates $430 billion in retail industry revenue could disappear in the next three months.

• Walmart will start taking temperatures of U.S. store workers and offering optional masks to employees.

Cheers,

Shane Ormond
Editor, One Last Thing

The post The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Q1 appeared first on Laissez Faire.