The new RiskHedge Report… Should you be worried about Fedcoin?... Will Disney retreat from wokeness?... Our newest advisory is signaling big changes.
Welcome to the new RiskHedge Report!
Starting today, we’re making the RiskHedge Report even more valuable to you.
In short, with our new “rundown” format, my team and I will bring you more opportunities in a timelier manner. You’ll hear from the same experts—me (Chris Wood), Stephen McBride, Justin Spittler, and Dan Steinhart—but we’ll deliver them to you in a quick-hit format that lets us pivot to wherever the best opportunities (and biggest threats) are.
Expect unfiltered insights, unique opinions, and more ways to profit from today’s disruptive trends.
You’ll get this new RiskHedge Report every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
Imagine if the government could’ve simply “turned off” your money to keep you home during COVID?
Last month, the Fed launched a 12-week program to test a new blockchain-based “digital dollar.”
Like any powerful technology, Blockchain can be used for good... or evil. By putting a sovereign currency on the blockchain and requiring citizens to use it, a government could track everything you ever buy or sell.
There are legitimately good reasons to move the dollar to the blockchain. Blockchain-based payments are more efficient, secure, and ultimately cheaper because they make banks obsolete.
But we’d all be better off if the government were less involved in our financial lives, not more. Unfortunately, a Blockchain dollar opens the door to some chilling possibilities. It could give the government godlike power to shut down purchases of certain citizens, or of certain things, or at certain times.
Our crypto expert Stephen McBride shared this image. It’s a joke for now... let’s hope it stays that way:
Here’s Stephen:
There’s a lot at stake here. Whoever controls the blockchain, controls the money. Fedcoin opens the door to total surveillance of every transaction.
There’s a bright side, though. There’s always been an arms race between citizens who want privacy and governments who want to pry into it. “Zero-knowledge” cryptos are the antidote to Fedcoin. They’re tokens that are private and essentially untraceable.
Zcash is one such protocol already in existence. Hundreds more will rise up as the Fed releases the digital dollar. I even see Ethereum, the world’s second-largest crypto, adopting a privacy approach in the future.
He’s replacing Bob Chapek, who will go down as one of the worst major media CEOs in history. Under Chapek’s leadership, Disney shares fell by 19%. Meanwhile, the S&P 500 rose 34% over the same period.
I met Iger at a Disney board meeting back in 2007, when he was a relatively new CEO. He’s impressive and if anyone can turn Disney around, it’s Iger. As former CEO of Disney, he oversaw acquisitions of Pixar, Lucasfilm, and Marvel... all of which grew to be wildly successful.
Iger must accomplish two things in order to right the ship. His first order of business has to be to fix Disney’s streaming service, Disney+. Disney’s theme parks and resorts businesses are doing great. But they’re subsidizing major losses from the “growth at all costs” approach the company has taken with Disney+.
Disney+’s average revenue per user (ARPU) is a pitiful $3.91. For comparison, Netflix's ARPU is around $10. Disney+ reported a loss of $1.5 billion in the most recent quarter.
Fortunately, there’s an easy fix: raise prices. Disney+ has amazing content that hundreds of millions of people want to watch. Netflix keeps raising prices and manages to retain subscribers. No reason why this won’t work for Disney too.
Disney+ subscribers should expect a price hike for the service soon.
I don’t care where you fall on the political spectrum. It is bad business for a family-oriented company like Disney to be seen as a political activist.
It’s not yet clear how Iger plans to address this. But he’s a pragmatist and a great business leader. There are ways to be inclusive and respectful without actively antagonizing half the country and therefore alienating half your potential customers.
I expect Iger to figure it out, and for Disney’s stock to recover, in time. But I’m not buying here.
What are your thoughts on Disney? I’d love to hear from you—write me at chriswood@riskhedge.com.
Our newest advisory, Cornerstone Club, is probably the most unique service in all of financial research. Using a rules-based method with a 50-year track record of beating the market, it’s a way to help manage your core portfolio and keep you on the right side of markets in less than 5 minutes a month.
For most of 2022, Cornerstone has recommended an extremely defensive position—investing mostly in commodities and staying out of stocks and bonds.
But at the start of every month, new allocations are released. The Cornerstone Model is flashing 3 new “buy now” sectors, which publisher Dan Steinhart wrote about in the latest issue, published Friday.
If you’re not a member, go here to discover more.
Chris Wood
Editor, Project 5X