Watching Sports Has Become a Nightmare, Mentioning AI to Increase Stock Prices, Meta Becoming the Digital Ad King, Beware of Income Taxes When Gifting & More

Has watching your favorite sports become a nightmare?

It used to be easy to watch a football game as you generally had maybe two different networks it would be on and it was easy to find. Well, now the promise of streaming, reducing costs and making it easier for people to watch the shows and sports they want when they want has really missed the mark. The list can go on and on of where to watch the football game or sports you want to watch. Maybe the game will be on ESPN, Paramount+, TNT, NBC’s Peacock, CBS or maybe you’ll have to go to Amazon prime or the YouTube channel. It can be very frustrating trying to find the game you want and then you find out you don’t have the right subscription, and you have to pay extra to sign up for it. Well, maybe the justice department is coming to your rescue. Last week it was reported that the justice department is investigating whether the NFL is engaging in anti-competitive tactics that harm consumers. The investigation involves whether having many outlets for sports viewing is costing consumers far more and the NFL is taking advantage of its behemoth size and demand. There is no doubt that sports are getting out of control and just recently the NBA signed a record payday for their media rights. This has opened the door for many other sports, including the NFL, which apparently because of the change in ownership of CBS they may have to negotiate a new contract with the NFL. No doubt in my mind it will be a far higher contract than before. I’m not sure when the last straw will break the camel’s back, but it seems to be getting close as advertisers are starting to back away from the large amount that networks are asking for advertising during the games. It is possible that sports could eventually go to a cost per game because even subscription rates are getting so high that people are not keeping them long-term.

To increase your stock price, just mention AI

I’m of course being facetious, but in many cases, it appears that way. This past week, Allbirds, which was a popular shoe company just a few years ago, announced it was pivoting from shoes to artificial intelligence and the stock at one point spiked by more than 700%. A large reason for the craziness is the market cap of the company was tiny at just about $21 million as of Tuesday’s close. When companies are this small there is more room for manipulation and wild swings as fewer capital inflows are needed to drive the stock higher. What is even crazier about this stock is that just a few years ago it was a hot company valued above $4 billion and that was because of excitement around its shoes. The company introduced its debut shoe in 2016 and went public in 2021. As I said they are now making the switch to AI as they closed all their U.S. full-priced stores in February and will be focusing on AI compute infrastructure. Allbirds will be called NewBird AI and in a recent statement they said, “The Company will initially seek to acquire high-performance, low-latency AI compute hardware and provide access under long-term lease arrangements, meeting customer demand that spot markets and hyperscalers are unable to reliably service.” This is just crazy to me, and you must ask what qualifications this company has to make such a drastic shift. I know I will not be investing in this stock!

It looks like Meta will become the digital ad king

Meta has been very patient growing its ad sales by establishing substantial user habits with their products like Reels, the microblogging site Threads, and even WhatsApp. All have been very slow to introduce advertisements to their users, but that patience has paid off as worldwide ad growth for Meta increased around 22.1% in 2025 and it’s estimated it will increase another 24.1% in 2026. Because of how large Meta is, it was expected that growth would slow, but that has not happened. Their growth is far higher than Google’s growth, which is projected to be around 11.9%, about the same as last year. The ad revenue numbers are staggering with Meta expected to reach $243.46 billion, about $4 billion more than Google’s $239.54 billion. That growth has not been cheap for Meta as the company uses AI to enhance performance and capital spending is now estimated to be around $135 billion this year. I was also surprised to learn that Google’s share of the US search ad market is expected to only be 48.5%. This would be the first time it’s fallen below 50% in over a decade. There is so much competition out there from AI companies, like OpenAI, and other social media companies, like TikTok, that the ad market is continually changing. When companies compete, consumers generally win, but I’m not sure about investors as the cost of spending on technology has become a very heavy weight for many of these big tech companies. 

Financial Planning: Beware of Income Taxes when Gifting

When parents give assets to their children, the income tax impact depends on what’s being gifted. Cash is usually the easiest and most tax-friendly option because there’s no built-in gain. There is no direct income tax to the giver or receiver, but if parents gift things like appreciated stock or real estate, the child receives the original cost basis as well. This means they will owe capital gains tax on all the appreciation when they sell it. In contrast, if the child inherits those same assets after the parents pass away, the basis typically steps up to current market value, wiping out that taxable gain. Because of this, it’s often smarter to gift cash or assets with little appreciation and hold onto highly appreciated assets to pass on at death.

Are people mentally prepared for retirement?

Your first thought may be oh yeah, I can’t wait to retire and have nothing to do. It sounds like a great idea, and many people spend many hours planning financially for retirement but don’t understand that it is a completely different lifestyle. Your whole life since kindergarten you have had everything planned out and structured. You went to school and knew what the schedule was and where you had to be and when. Then many of you went to college, you had your groundwork laid out for you with goals to meet and a feeling of accomplishment when you reached those goals. Then you went into the workforce for around 40 years or so and you had a set schedule and progression throughout your 40 years of pay raises and promotions, not to mention taking care of your family. You likely felt very inspired to keep moving forward. Now you’ve hit retirement age and the structure that you had for your entire life is gone. There are no more commitments of getting the kids ready for school or sports or getting to work on time for that important meeting. When you retire you don’t have to be at work at any special time or be anywhere or any place you don’t want to be. There are no more progressions in life because you pretty much accomplished everything you had planned out to do and now, you’re supposed to just “relax”. It used to be someone who would work their whole life, and they would retire at 65 and maybe live another 5 to 7 years and virtually just sit on the porch because their body was worn out. Today, however, people are living in retirement for 25 to 35 years almost as long as they had worked to get there and they’re feeling rather lost. The concept is great, but you should have some plans on what you’re going to do next during that last phase of your life. You can only clean the garage so many times and playing golf five days a week, eventually does get boring. Especially if you’re playing the same course with the same people. I recommend reading a book or some magazines about what to do in retirement as we are all different. Some want to travel, some may start a hobby, and some may go back to work. Hopefully, you’ve done a great job of being financially prepared, now you might want to spend a few years planning out your free time in retirement so you don’t feel lost or no longer needed. 

How to invest when the government interest rate exceeds the nominal economic growth rate in five years

If there are not big changes to how the US government taxes and spends, by the year 2031 the average interest rate paid on the federal debt will exceed the country’s rate of economic growth. 2031 sounds like a long way away, but it will be here in only five years. This will be a problem because it could lead to a debt spiral. This would be the same as you borrowing on your house at 6% and investing in a 3% CD, you’ll never get ahead. If the government raises taxes on individuals or corporations to pay down the debt that will take money out of the economy, and we could slip into a recession that could last a couple years. What is most likely to happen is that we’ll start to see rapid inflation, which would allow inflated dollars to pay off old debt. It is not a great solution, but I believe it is far better than the alternative. This will make it very difficult for investors because you’ll probably see interest rates rise, which will be bad for bonds and in the short term, it will likely not be good for stocks, especially you’re overvalued ones. During a potential period like this, I believe it is best for investors to invest in low valuation equities that have products or services to sell. In the short term, the price of the stock will likely go down, but investors could still collect dividends and because of inflation, prices for their products/services will rise, which will increase earnings in future years. We have begun to move some of our portfolio into these types of investments and we may be early to the party, but this is a party that you do not want to be late to or miss because you don’t understand what’s happening.  

Has the economy class in planes been getting smaller?

When you tried to book your flights for economy class on your recent trip, you may have found they were all booked. Or when you walked down the aisle of the plane, it may have seemed like there’s not as many economy seats as there used to be. Well, you would be right. Since January 2020, about six years ago, the number of business and first-class seats on domestic flights has increased by roughly 27%. Over the same timeframe, economy seats have grown by just 10%. The airlines are taking out some economy seats to add more first-class and premium and they’re buying new planes where a larger share of the seating is for premium seats. New planes delivered by Airbus such as the airbus A350–900 have an average of 40% premium seating, which obviously means it’s only 60% economy seats. Why would the Airlines be doing this? Obviously, it is for profits because premium seats only take up slightly more room than the economy seats, but people will many times pay twice as much for premium or business class. The airline executives also know that households that make more than $100,000 account for around 75% of all airline leisure spending. What this will mean for travelers is if you want the lower priced economy class seats, you probably have to book pretty early or be prepared to cough up more cash for the premium seats. 

Understanding the language of oil

Every industry has its own verbiage, and the oil industry is no different. Because of the craziness and the movements in the price of oil, it makes it hard for the average person to understand what is really going on and what the true cost of oil is. First, you may hear the term Brent crude oil. This is light sweet crude that is coming from the North Sea. It is currently most affected by the situation in the Strait of Hormuz. The price of Brent crude is a concern to Europe, Africa, and the Middle East. You may be wondering what light sweet crude is and no it’s not about the taste. It’s about the light density of the oil and is considered sweet if it has a low sulfur content. This is the desirable type of oil because it’s cheaper to refine and used in high demand products like gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel. The other type of oil you hear about is WTI, which stands for West Texas Intermediate crude oil. West Texas Intermediate crude is also high-quality light sweet crude, but it is primarily used in the United States. It can get really confusing when it comes to the pricing of oil as both Brent and West Texas crude have different prices. If you are wondering where the name Brent crude came from it was discovered by Shell UK in 1971 who named its oil fields after sea birds. There is a sea bird called a Brent goose and that’s where Brent crude got its name from. Regarding prices, there are two important terms to know, spot price and front month price. It is different for Brent crude and West Texas crude. The current front month price for Brent crude is two months out; however, the front month for West Texas immediate crude is only one month out. The spot price is the current market value that is paid on that day.  To make it even more confusing, there are future prices that go further. For example, as of April 14th, the December 2026 crude oil for West Texas was trading around $75.50. Based on this future price it is expected by December that oil will be back down to round the mid-70s. So now, when you hear on the news talk about the price of oil, you’ll have a little bit better understanding of what they are talking about. You may even know more than the person doing the news.

Do you love the start and stop feature on your car?

I was surprised to learn that there are many people who hate the start and stop feature on their car, even though the feature can improve the fuel economy anywhere between 5 to 26%. If you’re unfamiliar with the feature, every time you stop, the engine will shutoff and restart when you take your foot off the brake. There are many people that complain about this feature and even have anxiety at a stoplight with concerns it won’t start up quick enough. I don’t know what type of startup they need, but it’s estimated it takes roughly a half of a second for the car to start. There are also complaints of a very rocky start and that it’s noisy when it starts. I drive a recent model Escalade, and I never thought twice about it. I just knew it was a good feature saving on fuel and the hesitation when the light turned green was not a big deal. This technology came out decades ago but became popular in 2012 when President Obama was in office because the EPA was pushing for improved air quality. Only one percent of new cars in 2012 had the feature but by 2024 it was pushing 60% on gas powered cars. If you’re one of those people that hates that start and stop feature and want to prevent it, in many cases you can put your car in a sport mode. If you really hate it, for $99 you can get the auto stop eliminator, which on some cars will disable the start stop feature. If you’re not handy, you’ll have to ask your Auto Mechanic what the cost would be to install it. I am curious, how many of you hearing or reading this are part of the group that hates the stop, start feature?

Everything you need to know about yacht sales

In reality most people will never own a yacht or probably even ride on one, but there’s still something entertaining to look at when it comes to what the billionaires are spending on yachts. Overall, the super yacht business is about a $13.8 billion business that sold 360 preowned super yachts last year that were over 100 feet. There were 211 new super yachts sold, which was an increase from 199 the prior year. Around the world, super yachts account for about 6200 vessels, which is up from 4550 10 years ago. Some billionaire will always want to have the biggest and most expensive yacht. Last year the recognition for the largest yacht went to a member of the Abu Dhabi royal family as they purchased a yacht that was 446 feet. It was not the most expensive though as an unknown buyer purchased a 390-foot yacht that is powered by hydrogen fuel cells with an eye popping $793 million purchase price. Sustainability seems to be a growing theme with fuel cells and hydrotreated vegetable oils used in diesel-powered yachts becoming more prevalent. Also, roughly 14% of the super yachts for sale use wind sails. The founder of Amazon, Jeff Bezos, obviously likes to sail since he is a proud owner of a 410-foot sailing yacht that had a cost somewhere around $500 million. Now you know more than you ever thought you would know about yachts, which will make for a great conversation the next time you’re at a party or a social setting and trying to find something interesting to talk about.