Welcome to the WHAT THE TRUCK?!? newsletter sponsored by Legend Transportation Inc. In this issue, spot market stabilizes, Bezos steps down as CEO at Amazon, top truck stops in America, Robinhood tanks meme stocks, trucker dumps salt on cops, spinach that can email and more.
Spot stabilizes
Dead even — After multiple weeks of negative returns on the spot market, including a 14 cent drop last week, the national dry van average according to TruckStop.com stayed even at $2.71. What’s promising for carriers is that we’re still seeing more than 1-in-5 contracted loads get rejected, according to OTRI. As our Freight Intel team wrote, “OTRI and spot rates are highly correlated. When rejections fall, spot rates almost always follow.” So what happened this week? Rejects saw a slight rise since last Wednesday, which helped stop the bleeding in the spot market.
Highest/lowest paying dry van lanes — $4.35 Elkridge, Maryland, to Hartford, Connecticut / $1.34 Salt Lake City to Los Angeles.
Diamond hands lose their grip, or have they?
Meme stocks: An epilogue — In last week’s newsletter I wrote about the unlikely rise of meme stocks like GameStop, BlackBerry, AMC and Nokia just as trading had struck a fever pitch. By Wednesday, GameStop hit a new high score of $376 before trading was suspended on numerous platforms, and by Friday Robinhood had limited purchasing to just five shares and options of GameStop. With these measures in place, and despite r/WallStreetBets calls to hold strong with diamond hands, GameStop stock was driven down to a low of $80.60. Many tendies were lost, but Mark Cuban did have some advice for Redditors during an AMA.
Elon and Vlad break Clubhouse — Social media audio app Clubhouse had its breakout moment as Elon Musk joined The Good Time Show, on which he interviewed WallStreetBets’ public enemy No. 1 and Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev. Robinhood started last week as the darling of retail traders but by Sunday saw its user base turn against it as #DeleteRobinhood trended across Twitter. When Musk asked Tenev why he limited trades on the app, the CEO said, “We knew this was a bad outcome for customers. But we had no choice as we had to conform to our requirements.” You can listen to the full interview here.
Then they came for $doge — Just as purchases of meme stocks were being limited, an unlikely cryptocurrency swelled on Thursday evening as Redditors and other retail traders turned their attention to assets without buying limits. In a four-hour span, dogecoin took off like a rocket as it went from $0.028 to $0.081. However, on Friday Robinhood killed the coin’s momentum by not allowing traders to purchase cypto with instant deposits or unsettled funds. By the afternoon, dogecoin fell to $0.024.
“The most ironic outcome would be Dogecoin becomes the currency of Earth in the future.” – Elon Musk
The silver squeeze smoke screen? —The story of Wall Street vs. WallStreetBets is far from over. In fact, the subreddit is now accusing the financial media of championing a misinformation campaign revolving around the group’s interest in buying silver. In addition, many Robinhood users have vowed to delete the app and move on to other trading platforms. Last Thursday 700,000 new Robinhood accounts were added, a new daily record. How many accounts are canceled this week and next will be telling as to just how damaged the brand may be.
A salt and battery
NaCL in the wound — Redditors weren’t the only ones who were salty this week. According to Fox19, “a driver in a city of Cincinnati salt truck faces multiple charges after Reading police say he led them on a chase and sprayed salt on officers and a cruiser.” Police say that Omar Armstrong was driving his 2016 Freightliner when he almost struck a police officer conducting an unrelated traffic stop. Officers then gave chase. They claim Armstrong looked back, raised the bed of his truck, turned on the spreader and covered their cruiser in salt. Armstrong’s attorney said in court that the driver was just doing his job.
America’s top truck stops
Fill ’er up — Trucker Path has released its Top 5 Best Truck Stops list. For its annual Best Truck Stops award, Trucker Path uses in-app ratings, reviews and driver feedback to determine the top 20 chain and independent truck stops.
“We have more than 6,000 chain and independent truck stops listed in the Trucker Path app and we’re constantly adding new locations.” – Steven Lopez, vice president of business development at Trucker Path
What makes for a good truck stop? — According to Lopez, “Facilities for parking, restaurant options and food quality, amenities like showers, repair services, laundry facilities and Wi-Fi, and customer service.” No word if any of these participate in the World Armwrestling Championship circuit as portrayed in “Over The Top.”
Fo’ drizl my nizl
Uber eats up Drizly — Uber will pay approximately $1.1 billion in stock and cash for Boston-based booze delivery startup Drizly. While Drizly currently serves 1,400 cities across the U.S., Uber’s CEO sees an ever bigger bear-sized footprint in the company’s future.
“By bringing Drizly into the Uber family, we can accelerate that trajectory by exposing Drizly to the Uber audience and expanding its geographic presence into our global footprint in the years ahead.” – Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi
Best regards, Spinach
You’ve got kale — This VeggieTale may sound like science fiction but I assure you, it is science function. According to EuroNews, “Through nanotechnology, engineers at MIT in the U.S. have transformed spinach into sensors capable of detecting explosive materials. These plants are then able to wirelessly relay this information back to the scientists.” MIT calls it “nitroaromatic detection and infrared communication from wild-type plants using plant nanobionics.” To learn more about what that word salad means, read MIT’s paper here.
Just in: Bezos moving to executive chairman, Andy Jassy will be AMZN CEO
Fellow Amazonians:
I’m excited to announce that this Q3 I’ll transition to Executive Chair of the Amazon Board and Andy Jassy will become CEO. In the Exec Chair role, I intend to focus my energies and attention on new products and early initiatives. – Jeff Bezos in an email to employees
WTT?!? Wednesdays
Pierre Laguerre, founder and CEO at Fleeting — Pierre talks to us about how to be humble and successful entrepreneurs in trucking — all while motivating us to run through walls like Kool-Aid Man.
Marcus Cooksey, CEO at DUKE.AI — Marcus tells us his comeback story of going from UPS loader to developing an automated bookkeeping and factoring invoicing solution called Duke.ai.
Hope Zvara, creator of STIFF Mother Trucker Pain-Relief Cream — Hope is a yoga and lifestyle expert, motivational speaker, CEO of Mother Trucker Yoga and the creator of STIFF Mother Trucker Pain Relief Cream.
Britton Wesson of J.B. Hunt — Britton brings a big voice and his acoustic guitar to the show to #PlayItForward.
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Now on demand
2021 best fleets to drive for, moving a 200-foot turbine, Rolling Strong, more
The great toilets in trucks debate, reefer in reefers, transforming brokerages through tech
Gig economy or desk job? Finding your next role in freight.
We’ve got a truck for that
How do you move a 200-foot turbine via truck? — Very carefully! Watch the video here. What’s the biggest load you’ve ever booked or hauled? Email me here, reply to this newsletter, connect on LinkedIn or tweet me below and if it’s a great story we’ll feature you on the show!
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One love,
Dooner