Theranos & Trump 💉
This Week in Review ☕️ : Silicon Valley Star on trial | Luxury Sector reports record sales | GenZ becomes the most lavish generation | The Most Popular Food this festive season | Thanksgiving FoodComa
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Quick Bites:
Business 💉: Elizabeth Holmes, the founder of Theranos, was sentenced to more than 11 years in prison for defrauding investors.
Holmes is 38 years old. She has a 1-year old and is currently pregnant with baby #2. Gonna miss their childhood, surface from federal prison as a freaky 50-year old with 2 tweens in middle school who barely know her
Moral of the story: Don't do the crime if you can't do the time. Period.
PS. She had requested house arrest and at most, 18 months in prison.
Girl got CLOBBERED 👋
Background:
💡Elizabeth Holmes launched 'Theranos' in 2003, after dropping out of Stanford at age 19
💡She claimed her revolutionary technology- the 'Edison machine'- could detect cancer, diabetes and other disease using just a few drops of blood
💡This made her a star in Silicon Valley, with people calling her 'the next Steve Jobs'
💡In 2014, Forbes named Holmes the world's youngest self-made female billionaire at 30 years old, with a net of worth $4.5bn
💡Holmes, however, knew her device was not producing accurate and reliable results, yet continued to raise almost $1bn from investors over the years- all without ever achieving meaningful revenue
💡Holmes has also been accused of vastly exaggerating her company's performance to its investors
💡Jurors ultimately found her guilty on four counts of fraud, with a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison
Our Thoughts💡: Holmes made the mistake of stealing from the rich; Bill Gates, the Clintons, the CVS family, high-powered Republicans, including former secretaries of state Henry Kissinger and George Schultz.. real oligarch money we talkin' here
The world prosecutes white collar crime when it hurts the top 1%. Not so much when it hurts the average joe🤷🏻♀️
Tech x Politics 📲 : "The people have spoken. Trump will be reinstated."
Elon Musk has lifted the ban that kept the former President off Twitter.
His account was reactivated after Musk conducted a poll on the platform, where a slim majority of 51.8% voted 'Yes'.
On Jan 6. 2021, as pro-Trump mobs stormed 1400 Pennsylvania Avenue, the world watched a shocking riot unfold on live television and their social media feeds.
The overall sentiment being that Trump incited his supporters (many via his raving mad tweets) to march to Capitol Hill.
He was reinstated with 0 followers and has over 90mn now- more than 3 times that of Joe Biden without making a single damn tweet.
Hmm.. Now it's your move, Postmates. Restart that Steak Sauce to Mar-a-Lago 🥩
Our Thoughts💡: Kinda funny how Musk has encouraged his whopping 118mn followers to vote Republican in the midterms AND reactivate Trump's account in the same month..
Seems like he has NO groundbreaking plan to reform Twitter. Looking much more like a groundbreaking plan to peddle his own political agenda from out here.. 🤔
Fashion 👜 : Despite fears of an upcoming recession, leading fashion conglomerate LVMH has declared record sales in the luxury sector.
On track to achieve total sales of £1.22 trillion this year, up 21% from 2021, the likes of Kering and Hermès have reported booming revenue this year.
Fuelling the growth, Credit Suisse reports that a record 218, 200 people are now classed as "ultra-high net worth."
Thanks to their “more precocious attitude to luxury", Gen Z and Gen Alpha are said to be key to the sector’s performance, and are expected to make up a third of the market by 2030.
Luxury brands have been increasing their prices- and it seems like shoppers simply don't give a f**k.
Chanel, in particular, has been raising prices at a faster rate with 3 price hikes last year itself.
The price of their iconic 2.55 bag has increased from $5200 in 2019 to $8200 this year, The Wall Street Journal.
"The best things in life are free. The second best things are very, very expensive"
-Coco Chanel
Touché
Our Thoughts💡: To all the divas out there, have you all paused your splurging or y'all still flocking to stores?
PS. Our mom's been right all along. Luxury handbags really are a better inflation hedge than TIPs!
Food 🥧 : As we step into the festive season of 2022, it's helpful to have new recipes revamp our kitchen arsenal!
With zero parties/ weddings/vacays in 2020 and some of 2021, the closest we got to Holiday season was scrolling through Conde Nast on Instagram!
However, with the pandemic being finally over, the festivities are back- and so are the extra pounds!!
The Top 3 desserts this festive season:
💡Apple, Walnut and Figs Pie with Mulled Wine Syrup : This one is for the habitually drunk. Eat cake and get boozed up while you're at it!
We know it can't just be us ruthlessly browsing on Food and Wine and The Weekend Mixologist in the middle of the night this time of year. Here's a recipe to bring in 2022 in the sweetest way possible!
Flourless Chocolate-Chip Cookies: No need for the time-honored tradition of eating ourselves into a Thanksgiving FoodComa with this dessert.
Easiest to make, flourless chocolate cookies are a classic go-to this festive season!
Pecan Pie: Everyone’s favorite pie, year and year again. PERIOD.
Quicker Bites:
FIFA World Cup: Saudi Arabia beats Messi’s Argentina 2-1.
Magnitude 5.6 earthquake leaves over 200 dead in Indonesia.
Fauci to brief reporters for the last time after leaving government after 50 years
Ukrainians brace for bleak winter as Russian strikes cripple power capacity.
The 2022 Atlantic Hurricane season is underway.
Elon Musk says Twitter to hold off relaunching blue tick verification.