The 11th Hour Dispatch — Thursday, October 11, 2018
BINGE WATCH
Walmart has formed a partnership with interactive video startup Eko to produce content aimed at the parts of the country that aren’t a coast. Walmart believes its core customer base of “middle- and low-income shoppers in rural and suburban communities” is a demographic “underserved by current streaming services.” The big box giant also signed a deal with MGM earlier this week to churn out originals for the Walmart-owned Vudu. The latter partnership has already spurred a digital reimagining of the 1980s comedy favorite Mr. Mom, which is expected to drop next year. It could be an interesting venture for Walmart. In a world where everyone and their mom seems to be spinning up a service, there is definitely still a gap in content aimed at and focused on working class families (Politico nicely examined this socioeconomic gap). Walmart definitely has the wallet to potentially make something really interesting, so we’re excited to watch and see.
YOUNG MONEY
ICYMI, the stock markets had a terrible Wednesday, but it was especially bad for tech giants. FAANG companies — Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, and Google — lost a collective $172 billion in value in a single day, with Amazon alone losing $56 billion in market capitalization. Netflix was hit hardest in terms of percentage, with its shares dropping 8% on Wednesday (roughly $13 billion). It was part of a larger picture of declines all around on ye ole Wall Street. On Wednesday, the S&P dropped 3.3%, the Dow Jones fell 3.2%, and the Nasdaq, which is more tech-heavy, fell 4.1%, its largest drop in two years. Today didn’t prove to be as bad of a day for everyone, but still not great. The Dow and the S&P again dropped pretty hard, but the Nasdaq fared much better than it did yesterday. As for the FAANG companies, they finished the day a bit all over the place:
- Facebook was the only stock that finished up. It closed the day up 1.3% to $153.35.
- Amazon had the worst day of the five, falling 2.04% to $1,719.36.
- Netflix closed down 1.47% to $321.10.
- Apple fell 0.88% to $214.45.
- Google parent Alphabet was down 0.18% to $1,079.32 at the closing bell.
BIG BUSINESS
Likely in an attempt to compete with the quickly diversifying Bumble (which, side note, is in “very deep discussions with banks” for an IPO on the Nasdaq), Tinder has launched an editorial lifestyle site. Swipe Life will put out content relevant to the modern day lonely sad sack — I mean dater — with verticals that tie into dating lives such as Style & Beauty, Food & Drink, and Money. Most of the site’s content will be targeted at younger Tinder users, specifically in the 18–25-year-old category, and it will also include a specific section for users of the college-centric arm of the app, Tinder U. The project is being led by Senior Director of Content Kelsey Blodget and a shiny new team of editorial staff. Said Blodget, “Swipe Life is an editorial lifestyle website where we’re covering today’s dating culture. So really the journey of being single, the ups and downs — we really want to be a companion on that journey for our users.”
NOTHIN’ BUT ‘NET
Billy McFarland, founder of the failed Fyre Festival, will be in the slammer for six years.
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