Sporting life
An IPO hits the ground running
Good morning, trendy trailrunners. This is your Stock Market Rundown for January 19th, 2024. Thanks for joining me. Let’s dig in:
TODAY’S TOP STORY: WHERE TECH MEETS TREK
The Silicon Valley tech bro uniform is a cliché: raw denim jeans, checked shirt, Hokas, and an Arc’teryx zip-up to stay warm and cozy when those chilly winds come in from the Bay.
Arc’teryx is part of the fashion trend known as “gorpcore”, which has street-style hypebeasts adopting garments you’d typically see on an off-grid campsite. Given Arc’teryx gear can run you $1,000 for a Gore-Tex jacket, these clothes are tough enough to climb Mount Everest in, but so expensive they should come with a personal Sherpa.
Arc’teryx is owned by Amer Sports, whose other products include Salomon hiking boots, Louisville Slugger baseball bats, and Wilson tennis rackets, famously favored by stars like Roger Federer.
Wilson started out, improbably, as a division of a meatpacking company in 1914. Animal byproducts from slaughterhouses were used to manufacture strings for tennis rackets and violins. (These days, the strings on your tennis racket are made from nylon rather than cow guts.)
In 2019, Amer Sports was acquired and taken private by a consortium of investors led by China-based Anta Sports Products, the second-biggest sportswear retailer in China. Now, Anta wants to cash out of the hiking boot and tennis racket business.
Amer Sports just filed to go public in the US in an IPO that’s expected to value the company at $10 billion. And given that management just disclosed revenue was up 30% during 2023, the selling shareholders are likely looking forward to a financial grand slam.
SO WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON?
You might think the secret to success in sales is relentless cold calling, or mastering the art of objection handling. But for software giant SAP, it turns out the secret is bribing government officials. The company just got fined $222 million for greasing palms in seven different countries.
Greenwashing alert: Starbucks is being sued for falsely advertising its tea and coffee as “ethically sourced” when its supply chain is fraught with human rights violations. Thinking about child labor at coffee farms in Guatemala really ruins my enjoyment of my chai latte.
Forget horsepower—think kilowatts. Global electric vehicle sales were up 31% in 2023. The best part of owning a Tesla is saving on gasoline; the second best part is putting your Whole Foods groceries in the frunk.
Robotics company ABB just acquired a start-up that aims to give industrial robots “eyes and brains” via sensor technology. These robots are getting so realistic, soon they’ll be bitching about the boss on their smoke breaks.
That’s it for the week, amigos—have yourselves a delightful weekend, and I can’t wait to check back in with you first thing Monday morning. Yours in capitalism, The Axe