The not-so-evil empire
A conspiracy-theory target
Good morning, my gifted children. This is your Stock Market Rundown for July 14th, 2023. Sincere thanks, as always, for reading. Let’s dig in:
TODAY’S TOP STORY: NO, BLACKROCK DOESN'T OWN THE NEIGHBORHOOD ICE CREAM TRUCK (WE CHECKED) 💵
Who’d have thought that the son of a shoe salesman could become the target of loony conspiracy theorists? Larry Fink is a legendary American success story who should be lauded for his accomplishments.
Born in Van Nuys, California, to an English-professor mother and a father who owned a shoe store, he launched his career as an investment banker. In 1988 he co-founded asset management firm BlackRock, and in 1999 the firm went public.
Today, BlackRock manages over eight trillion dollars. How’d they get so big? By betting on index investing, which has been a juggernaut sucking up every spare dollar in the corporate pensions business.
As we know, active managers on average don’t outperform low-cost indexes. Awkward for most of the investment industry, but not for BlackRock, who built their biz on index-tracking products with rock-bottom fees.
Yup, Fink is actually saving workers money on their pensions versus most of his competitors. Wait, a rich guy who isn’t a thieving prick? This is some topsy-turvy stuff, folks.
Okay, so we’ve established Larry Fink is a G. How did BlackRock become a target for conspiracy theorists? Well, BlackRock’s products track major indexes, so they own a few percentage points of every major public company. Some bright sparks interpret that as them “controlling” those companies.
Last time I checked, owning a single-digit percentage of a public company isn’t enough for a board seat, much less to have the CEO on speed dial, but why let reality interfere with fearmongering?
They even assert that BlackRock was part of a shadowy cabal that planned COVID. I actually admire these conspiracy theorists… so stupid, yet so confident. Funny how people lose their damn minds when trillions of dollars are involved.
SO WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON?
Your swimmers just got a little safer: the FDA just approved an over-the-counter birth control pill.
Set ‘er down nice and easy, Jerome. All the big-brains think the economy is going to have a soft landing much like a five-year-old swan-diving into the ball pit at Chuck E. Cheese.
Wanna make an airline cope and seethe? Save money on some flights by booking a multi-leg flight and getting off at the layover city. Airline error in your favour, collect $200.
Just like boot-cut jeans and mullets: Bitcoin is back, baby.
As if operating sweatshops wasn’t enough, super-scummy Chinese fast-fashion apparel retailer Shein has been accused of copyright infringement by big brands like Oakley, Stussy, and Ralph Lauren.
Amazon just had its highest sales day in history, which I contributed to by buying a food dehydrator. Big Beef Jerky has squeezed its last dollar out of me!
That’s it for this week, homeslices—have a weekend to remember, and I’ll see you bright and early Monday morning. Yours in capitalism, The Axe