Finance Culture

Keep up to date with all the latest finance news and insights, as well as political, geopolitical, tech and AI developments

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 Louisiana sues Kalshi, Polymarket, Robinhood and seven other prediction markets

- Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill has sued 10 prediction market platforms, including Kalshi, Robinhood, Polymarket, Coinbase, Crypto dot com and Gemini, accusing them of breaking state law
- She is seeking an immediate restraining order and injunction, saying the companies have violated Louisiana law "with impunity"
- Louisiana is the 11th state to take legal action against prediction market operators, joining Arkansas, Utah and Connecticut among others
- Kalshi has responded by filing for an emergency temporary restraining order
- States mainly object to sports-related contracts, arguing they amount to illegal betting that avoids taxes, while the platforms say only the CFTC should regulate them
- The CFTC itself is investigating Kalshi over contract filings and Polymarket over whether it breached a 2022 agreement to block US users

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 PEPE sits 25% away from overtaking Shiba Inu by market cap

- Memecoin PEPE is now within about 25% of overtaking Shiba Inu's market cap, historically one of the closest gaps between the two
- Both tokens have been dragged lower by the wider crypto selloff
- PEPE has been among the day's biggest losers, down more than 10% in 24 hours

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 December is historically the best month for momentum stocks, but it often reverses in January

- Momentum strategies, buying the past year's best-performing stocks and shorting the worst, have historically done best in December, according to MarketWatch's Mark Hulbert
- The catch: those gains tend to reverse in January, with December's winners often becoming January's losers
- Hulbert attributes the effect to tax-loss selling and year-end "window dressing," when fund managers dump losers and buy winners before reporting to clients
- Stocks on his high-momentum list include Lumentum, Micron and Hewlett Packard Enterprise
- His low-momentum list includes Boston Scientific, CoStar, Intuit and Charter Communications

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 Zcash proposal to cut off community grants becomes an official draft ahead of the vote

- A proposal to end Zcash Community Grants' 8% share of every block reward has been formally merged as a draft, with community polls opening on 16 November
- The coins would instead flow into a new "Future Dev and Legal Defense Fund Lockbox," but no way of spending that money has been defined yet
- The grants committee would also have to remove 50,000 ZEC from circulation within 30 days, about 347 days' worth of its funding stream
- ZEC's rally left the committee holding about 91,453 ZEC plus roughly $8.8M in dollars, while it still owes about $2.4M on committed grants
- The proposal was only accepted after a dispute among Zcash's editors over whether governance changes belong in the protocol upgrade process at all
- Editors made an exception for this round, but say they'll block future governance proposals until that process is sorted out

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 XRP selling spreads from futures traders to spot holders for the first time this year

- XRP futures traders have been net sellers since late August, two and a half months straight, according to CryptoQuant data
- In October, spot traders also turned sell-dominant for the first time all year, a sign that people holding actual XRP may be getting out
- XRP has fallen from about $1.55 in late September to around $1.05
- Trading volume in both futures and spot has been running hot during the dip, rather than during a rally
- Large whale-sized orders have been active in both markets since early October, but the data doesn't show whether whales are buying or selling

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 Solana treasury firm Forward Industries trades at a 30% discount to its SOL, but there's a catch

- Forward Industries shares trade at a 29.7% discount to the value of its net assets, based on its common shares alone
- Counting all potential future shares, including warrants and options, that discount shrinks to just 2.4%
- The biggest factor is 13.38M one-cent warrants held by advisors and lead investors, which unlock in stages if the stock hits $27.75, $37 and $46.25
- The company holds about 8.73M SOL and equivalents worth $755.9M, against $187.5M in debt
- Shareholders can't redeem their stock for SOL, so there's no direct way to capture the discount
- Forward added Barclays to its up-to-$4B share sale programme, but has sold only about $12.1M worth of shares so far

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 US seizes $1.2B in crypto stolen from Binance and disrupts a North Korean deepfake scam

- The US Justice Department has obtained court approval to seize or restrain more than $1.2B in crypto stolen from Binance by North Korean military hackers known as "TraderTraitor"
- In total, more than $2.7B of the $6B+ stolen on 29 October has now been frozen by US authorities and the private sector
- The DOJ also seized cloud infrastructure behind "FaceStealer," a North Korean social engineering scheme that has stolen more than $400M in the past 18 months
- FaceStealer lures victims into video calls from hijacked accounts of people they know, then plays recorded videos and AI deepfakes of trusted contacts and well-known crypto figures
- The hackers then fake a technical glitch, such as claiming they can't hear the victim, and send a "fix" that secretly installs malware
- The group is increasingly targeting open-source software developers, apparently to set up supply-chain attacks, and the FBI seized over 900 webcam videos of victims
- "If you can't imagine a scenario where you might fall prey to it, you are not thinking creatively enough," the FBI warned

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 Vitalik Buterin says ETH's value shouldn't depend on burning fees

- Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin argues ETH should be valued as a store of value based on the network's resilience, not on how much ETH gets burned through transaction fees
- Holders shouldn't be disappointed if fee burns stay below 10% of what's needed to offset new issuance indefinitely, he said
- So far in 2026, Ethereum has issued about 890,446 ETH and destroyed just 21,153, offsetting only about 2.4% of issuance
- Chasing higher fees to burn more ETH would make the network less useful for people and businesses, Buterin warned
- He wants Ethereum to prioritise censorship resistance, open source, privacy and security, which he calls "CROPS"
- About $15.1B in real-world assets now sit on Ethereum, though that doesn't necessarily translate into equal demand for ETH itself

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 Venezuela ends the state's 19-year power monopoly, with oil producers first in line

- Venezuela's National Assembly has voted unanimously to open its electricity sector to private companies for the first time since Hugo Chávez nationalised it in 2007
- Oil producers can now build their own power plants for their fields without state approval, as long as they stay off the national grid
- Other private generators need a concession for plants above 50MW, and will mainly sell to large consumers at tariffs not yet published
- The state keeps control of the main grid, which produces about 12,000MW against demand that hit 16,400MW in September, leaving households facing blackouts of up to 16 hours a day
- Stabilising the grid will cost at least $15B over three years, according to power expert Miguel Lara
- Grid failures have helped keep Venezuela's oil exports stuck around 1.25M barrels a day, and Chevron, which pumps about 290,000 bpd there, plans to roughly double that by 2031

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 Supermicro and Nvidia reportedly face separate DOJ inquiries, and SMCI stock plunges

- Super Micro Computer shares fell more than 12% after reports that the US Justice Department is looking into the AI server maker
- The DOJ is reportedly investigating whether entities linked to the woman at the centre of the Nvidia scandal, whom US officials suspect of ties to Chinese intelligence, tried to smuggle Supermicro products into China
- A separate DOJ antitrust investigation is reportedly focused on Nvidia itself
- Her former company, Megaspeed, is also under investigation over suspected chip smuggling, which it denies
- Former Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang is not a target of US law enforcement investigations, and there's no indication of criminal charges against Nvidia or Huang, according to reports
- Nvidia shares fell another 3.8% on the reports

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 Apple: from near bankruptcy to £97.75bn profit

- In FY1986 Apple made £1.30bn in revenue. Steve Jobs had gone, and John Sculley was running the company.
- By FY1997 Apple was in crisis: £1.16bn ($1.86 bn) of losses in two years. Microsoft invested $150.00m and Jobs came back.
- Then came the iMac, the iPod, iTunes, the iPhone, the App Store and the iPad. From FY2007 to FY2015, revenue grew 9.51× and profit 15.28×.
- Tim Cook took over in 2011. In his 15 full years as CEO, Apple made £797.03bn ($1.07 tn) in profit, and it became the first company to reach $3 tn.
- FY2026: a record £354.02bn in revenue ($478.80 bn) and £97.75bn in profit ($132.20 bn). That's a 27.61% margin, the highest in 41 years.
- Now John Ternus is in charge, Cook is executive chairman, and Apple is the world's most valuable company again.

Can Ternus keep Apple on top?

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 Fed's Barr warns the US should prepare for "serious" AI job disruption and widening inequality

- Fed Governor Michael Barr says the US should be ready for "serious short-term disruptions" to the job market from AI, which could displace workers at scale depending on how fast it's deployed
- He said AI could become "a cheap and ubiquitous commodity, with gains widely shared," like the internet, if competition among AI companies continues
- The alternative, he warned, is gains concentrating among a handful of winning companies and their investors
- "We are already seeing signs that AI may be a labor substitute in some sectors, especially for younger, less-experienced workers," Barr said
- Labor's share of US national income hit a record low of 52.8% in Q2 2026, down from 60%–65% for decades after World War Two
- His remarks come ahead of a public Fed forum on AI and the economy in San Francisco on Monday

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 Aave slides 10% despite approving native Bitcoin as collateral

- Aave's AAVE token fell about 10.4% to around $111, and is down roughly 12% this week and 36% over the past month
- Aave's DAO has approved using native Bitcoin as collateral on Aave V4, pending final onchain confirmation
- It also launched Aave V3.8 across 15 markets, adding stronger protection against reentrancy attacks, a common DeFi exploit
- A possible governance vote is being discussed on freezing $279M in osETH collateral, requested by StakeWise's founder after risk assessments
- AAVE is trading below its 20-day and 50-day moving averages, a sign of continued selling pressure

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs lose $444.6M in a day as BlackRock leads outflows

- US spot Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs saw combined net outflows of $444.6M on 11 November
- Bitcoin ETFs lost $299.8M, their fifth straight day of outflows, up from $95M the day before
- BlackRock's IBIT accounted for $269.7M of that, about 90% of the total, while Grayscale's GBTC lost $39.1M
- Ethereum ETFs saw $144.8M in outflows, also a fifth straight day, led by $129.8M from BlackRock's ETHA
- Solana ETFs lost another $5.9M
- Despite the selling, US spot Bitcoin ETFs still hold about $55.17B in cumulative net inflows since launch

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 From Blockbuster to Bust

- October 1985: the first Blockbuster opens in Dallas. In 1986 it made £5.05m ($7.40m) and lost money.
- Then Wayne Huizenga took over. By 1993, revenue was up 300.95× to £1.48bn and profit hit £162.28m ($243.65m), the most it would ever make.
- In 1994 Viacom bought it for $8.40 bn.
- In 2000, Blockbuster turned down the chance to buy Netflix for $50.00m.
- In 2004 it peaked at $6.05 bn in revenue, with 9,094 stores and 84,300 staff.
- But it lost money in 13 of the 22 years with full results, including £1.08bn ($1.62 bn) in 2002 alone. Total losses: £3.94bn.
- In September 2010 it filed for bankruptcy with about $900.00m of debt.
- Dish bought what was left for $320.00m.
- Today there's one Blockbuster left, in Bend, Oregon.

What's your best Blockbuster memory?

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 Samsung and Google unveil AI smart glasses to take on Meta

- Samsung has unveiled "Intelligent Eyewear," AI smart glasses co-developed with Google, Gentle Monster and Warby Parker, with online pre-orders now open in the US and South Korea
- The glasses run Google's Gemini AI, letting users ask about what they're looking at, translate menus, get directions or summarise a whiteboard without taking out their phone
- At about 41g, they're roughly 20% lighter than Meta's second-generation Ray-Bans, and pack a 12MP camera, two speakers and four microphones
- Battery life is up to 9 hours, or 72 hours with the charging case
- An LED lights up during recording, and the camera disables itself if the light is covered; Samsung says visual data won't be used for AI training or ads
- They go on sale on 10 December, with pre-orders starting at $395 in the US
- Meta currently dominates AI glasses with 81.3% market share, and Apple is reportedly planning its own pair next year

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 Binance freezes a $400K USDT account after a Colorado court order

- Binance has restricted withdrawals from a user's account holding about 400,000 USDT, following a freeze request from a Colorado district court
- About 340,000 USDT of the balance came from futures trading profits
- The user says they gave Binance the requested information about where the funds came from
- Binance says it can't lift the restriction without court approval, and advised the user to get legal advice or contact the court to appeal
- The user says they found no public way to submit an objection on the court's website, highlighting how hard it can be to challenge such freezes

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 Trump says "only one man" can replace Jensen Huang at Nvidia: Tim Cook

- President Trump says former Apple CEO Tim Cook should be Nvidia's next CEO after Jensen Huang's resignation
- "There is only one man to take his place - TIM COOK of Apple. A Legend replaces a Legend!" Trump posted on Truth Social, also saying Huang "has done a fantastic job"
- Cook stepped down as Apple CEO earlier this year and is now its executive chairman
- Trump has long praised Cook, previously calling him an "amazing manager and leader"
- Huang resigned on Thursday after an independent board investigation into two extramarital affairs, one with a woman US intelligence officials allegedly believe was gathering information for China, and one with an executive who reported directly to him
- "There is no excuse for what I did. I am deeply sorry," Huang wrote to staff on Sunday

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 Bitcoin sentiment is near its lowest since the FTX collapse, says James Lavish

- Investor James Lavish says Bitcoin sentiment is extremely negative, comparing it to the mood during the FTX collapse in 2022
- He says it feels even worse than during the COVID crash
- Despite the gloom, he noted Bitcoin is still holding just above $70,000
- Lavish earlier reported that more than $10B in leveraged short positions have built up on Bitcoin up to the $83,000 price level
- The Crypto Fear & Greed Index has fallen to 23, deep in "Fear" territory

[Finance Culture @CultFinance_]

🚨 Zcash holders to vote on pulling 50,000 ZEC, worth about $50M, from its grants treasury

- Zcash holders and community panels will vote from 16 to 30 November on removing 50,000 ZEC, about 55% of the Zcash Community Grants treasury, from circulation
- The coins' value would be returned gradually through future mining rewards
- The plan would also end the grants committee's 8% share of newly created ZEC, redirecting it into a new development and legal defence fund until the next halving
- The proposal was written by co-founders Sean Bowe and Zooko Wilcox, alongside Jason McGee
- ZEC's rally left the treasury big enough to cover about 13 years of grants, and removing 50,000 ZEC would cut that to roughly six years
- It replaces an earlier plan to redirect about 98,000 ZEC, which was dropped on 3 November after criticism
- Even if voters back it, the change still needs a network upgrade, and no activation date has been set