Business
Skimp on Yogurt, Splure on Skydiving: The Rise of The Frugal Rich. Even high earners are shopping more at discounters and Walmart on essentials while maintaining their spending on experiences like travel. Consumers are smart. At a time when everything is increasingly expensive, even those with disposable income want to find the biggest bang for their buck. Hence, don’t underestimate consumers’ ability to compare the options and figure out what’s best for them.
Inside Giant Food’s strategy for linking healthy eating with affordability. It’d be really cool if shoppers could access to health-centric content easily at the time of purchase. For instance, if there were a QR code or a tablet that shows information on nutritions and recommended recipes for each aisle, that would be amazing. A podcast is great. But then shoppers would have to access to the podcasts and not everyone carries earphones with them all the time.
Why Amazon is buying Starlink rival Globalstar in $11 billion deal. “Amazon’s Leo has more than 200 satellites so far, and the company has secured permission to deploy more than 7,000 broadband satellites. Amazon didn’t specify Tuesday how many direct-to-device satellites it plans to launch over time. SpaceX’s overall Starlink fleet numbers around 10,000 operational satellites, and the company plans to launch thousands more in the years ahead. Starlink has deployed more than 650 satellites dedicated to providing connections to cellphones as of the end of last year, connecting more than 12 million people, according to the company.”
Other Stuff I Find Interesting
Why food in Okinawa is nothing like the rest of Japan. Bittermelon and pork, surprisingly that it is not seafood, are staples of the Okinawan cuisine. This short documentary already made me want to visit this archipelago.
Soaring Tungsten Adds Impetus to Vietnam Mine Sale Effort. I did not know that my home country was home to the second largest reserve of Tungsten in the world, behind only China. That would give Vietnam leverage when negotiating with other countries. It’s great to benefit from just the luck of the draw and what Mother Nature gives us. The challenge now is how the government can use this gift to benefit its own citizens. Merely selling rare earths for profits only benefits a select few. It’s another matter to lift everyone else up.
Long-term Money. I think about this at least once a week. My parents did not go to college. They were not poor, but not rich either. I did not have to suffer a lot growing up, but did have to work hard to build a better life for me and my family. My son was born an American and already flew more in the first year of his life than many adults in Vietnam. It’s my duty to give him a better life than what I had and prepare him for his future. While I think he benefits from my wife and my hard work, I can see he will have his own problems to deal with: climate change, deteriorating job market, the bombardment of distractions around us, AI, etc..As long as he turns out to be a good person and has the resilience and the work ethic, I won’t feel guilty for giving him a better start to life. And nobody should for helping their children.
A brief history of instant coffee. The world should know more about Max Morgenthaler. The Swiss scientist was tasked by Nestle to research on instant coffee. The company saw no success and decided to cut funding. Max persisted and made a breakthrough which would lead to the instant coffee we have today. Such a fascinating history.
Why Japan has such good railways. “Japan has partly solved this problem by enabling railway companies to do a great deal beside running railways. Take the example of the Tokyu corporation, one of the legacy private railways in southern Tokyo. You can not only travel on its trains, but also ride a Tokyu bus, live in a Tokyu-built house, work in a Tokyu office complex, see a doctor in a Tokyu hospital, buy groceries in a Tokyu supermarket, spend an afternoon at a Tokyu museum-theater-cinema complex, take your children to their amusement park, and even die in a Tokyu retirement home. The positive spillover effects of the railway on these things are captured by Tokyu because it owns them. Core rail operations are profitable for every Japanese private railway company, but they usually only account for a plurality or a small majority of revenue. The rest is contributed by their portfolio of side businesses. There is a natural financial synergy between the reliable but unremarkable cash flow of train fares and the profitable but riskier real estate and commercial side of the business. Railway companies’ side businesses also attract people to live and work on their rail corridor, reinforcing the customer base for the railway services themselves.“
Stats
34% of small businesses added credit card surcharges in 2025, according to JD Power
The average tax refund is about $3,400 in 2026, 11.2% higher than the same period in 2025
Minh Quang Duong 
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