What I wrote last week
My trip to Scottsdale, Arizona
Business
Mark Tomasovic – WEX: Fleet Cards. I am a fan of the Business Breakdowns show. It teaches me a lot about businesses I hadn’t known about before. WEX is another example. A very good overview of this business.
Fed to Propose Lowering Debit-Card Swipe Fees. This ear has not been kind to banks. First, rounds of regulations on capital, following the collapse of three big banks in the country. Second, it’s the upcoming cap on late fees that goes straight into the bottom line. Third, there were attempts by some politicians to lower interchange rates for credit cards. Now, the government wants to take a whack at interchange rates for debit cards, which for big banks are already tiny.
Visa, Mastercard Want a Slice of Africa’s Mobile Money. “By the end of this year, the U.S. Commerce Department expects some 435 million Africans will be spending money online, nearly double the level before the coronavirus pandemic. Since then, many consumers on the continent have continued to shop, study and entertain themselves using electronic payments. Africa is fertile territory for mobile money because of the lack of traditional bank branches, their distance from most rural areas and the fact that many people earn little money.”
Federal Reserve Beige Book. The Federal Reserve publishes several issues of this Beige Book every year. This book does not represent the official opinion of the agency. Rather, it contains anecdotal samples of what the Federal Banks around the country gather from talking to executives around the country. It provides an interesting look at the economy. Unofficial truth on the ground, if you will.
Amazon Confronts a New Rival: TikTok. Amazon may trail TikTok in terms of engagement and popularity among young shoppers, but it’s not the biggest factor in the shopping war. It’s logistics, convenience and speed. In that regard, Amazon is THE gold standard. It recently revamped the whole fulfillment system, rendering the distance between shoppers and items shorter and decreasing the delivery time. TikTok, as ambitious, well-funded and popular as it is, has a long long way to go before it can truly challenge Amazon. With that being said, I am sure executives at Amazon don’t fall asleep at the wheel.
Electric Cars Were Already Having Issues. Then Things Got Political. In Marketing, Five Porter’s Forces is a common tool used to analyze a company’s health and outlook. Macroeconomics, including influences from lawmakers, is a concern. And it will be for EV manufacturers. To sell a lot of EV vehicles, manufacturers need to make them accessible by lowering the prices. To do so, they need scale. So that’s a chicken-and-egg problem. The way to overcome it is to rely on tax incentives, subsidies and favorable regulations from the government. The question becomes: who is in charge and how high the EV market is on the person’s agenda?
Other stuff I find interesting
Getting Into This Fitness Trend Is Simple. Just Pack a Bag. Rucking – walking while carrying a weighted backpack – becomes increasingly popular among health conscious folks, especially those that don’t like running. Running is great, but it can be demanding on the joints. Rucking is an alternative to improve fitness and lose weight while protecting your body.
These seven U.S. regions will receive $7 billion in federal funding to produce hydrogen. “Hydrogen is the simplest element and the most abundant on earth, but it seldom exists on its own, so generally has to be split from other atoms (as in the case of water, or H2O). This can be done with an electrolyzer powered by electricity. Hydrogen can also be produced from natural gas in a process called steam methane reforming. That said, hydrogen is only a good tool for reducing CO2 emissions if it can be produced with minimal emissions itself — today, that often does not happen. The new hubs will be focused on that goal.”
The Great Zelle Pool Scam. Working at a bank that enables Zelle, I can tell you that fraud is our biggest concern and so is it for other financial institutions. This article details an unfortunate case in which the victims lost a big amount of money to fraudsters. Granted, they could have been more vigilant and careful. But the point is that perpetrators get increasingly able and sophisticated in scamming innocent people.
Chicago Is Losing Supermarkets. Does a Small Kansas Town Have the Answer? Since poor margins and crimes are the reason why national operators pulled out of major markets, what makes the local officials convinced that they can stave off the decline of poor neighborhood by operating grocery stores? Well, at least that should not be the ONLY approach. And I find it interesting that some stores, while wishing to offer inexpensive food to low-income citizens, had 30% margin. I mean, grocery items are not supposed to have that kind of margin…
Stats
“U.S. sales of non-alcoholic beer were up 32% from a year earlier in the 52 weeks through Sept. 9”
Same-day ACH payments in Q3 2023 exceeded the 212 million mark, a 20% YoY increase over Q3 2022
Minh Quang Duong 
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