Trump Inauguration News, Cryptocurrency Trends, and Amazon NOT Prime

0:00This is Right About Now with Ryan Alford, a Radcast Network production. We are the number one business show on the planet with over 1 million downloads a month. Taking the BS out of business for over 6 years and over 400 episodes. You ready to start snapping next and cashing checks? Well, it starts right about now. What's up guys? Welcome to Right About Now. It is our weekly business and marketing news of the week here on January 17th, 2024. I'm joined as always by my good friend, Chris Hanson. What's up, brother? What's up, Brian? How are you today, bro? Good. I'm good. Always getting right. Always right here in good old Greenville, South Carolina.

0:50Home of the Swamp Rabbit Trail that we're on here at Social House. My company, the best co-working lounge in Greenville. If you're in Greenville, South Carolina, give me a shout out. Just Google Social House. We've got a social lounge and club and hangout and co-work, mixed-use space. It's where our studio is here in the beautiful downtown heart of Greenville, South Carolina. You know, I don't give Greenville enough love. I'm trying to do that a little bit more. It's a great town. Come visit. You know, everyone else does. So we love you. Come on. We'll break some more tourism dollars to the city.

1:27It's a beautiful place. Come see the bridge. Come see the green trees. the foliage, and, you know, stop by and see us at Social House. We love our hometown. What's up, brother? What's cooking this week? You know, just still getting back in that New Year's rhythm, but doing good. Yeah, New Year's, and we've got an inauguration coming up on Monday. President Trump. I mean, it's a pretty unique thing. Like, is it? It was like one other time. I forget. I think I read this a while back. I should know my history better. I know. But we're in between like presidents like elected, not elected, elected in office.

2:12Like it's a pretty unique situation, right? Yeah, I don't know. I can't think of anything that's happened. Some random president that I should remember. Someone's going to give me some schooling over that. But Trump will be back in office. Whoever's asleep at the wheel will get out and we'll get on with this thing. Talk about policies, not about elections and everything else. So, look, we do have part of the show notes because I thought it was pretty interesting, like all the business-related stuff that's happening in and around the inauguration. Some of the things, and today's episode is going to be pretty loose.

2:50Chris and I are going to kind of flip-flop on a few topics as we opened up the playbook here on Right About Now. We're going to talk crypto. We're going to talk the impacts of the inauguration, financial news, inflation, some store closings, the impact of that, and a few other topics that we'll get into. But we'll start right off the top, the inaugurations on Monday. and I was fascinated, I don't know about you, Chris, just like the overall list of attendees. Like, it's a powerhouse, man. I know that a lot of important people show up for every presidential election, but there's a substantial business flair, business aroma from this inauguration with the people that are going to be there.

3:42I'm going to give you the list to get your reaction here. So, which billionaires will attend other than Elon Musk? Well, Tesla's SpaceX CEO Elon Musk will be there. His net worth is$423 billion. We have CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who we talked about last week,$205 billion net worth. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos,$232 billion. Lots of bees flying around here, you know. Damn, dude. will attend. And so Mark, Jeff, and Elon are going to be seated together on the platform alongside Trump's cabinet. CEO Sam Altman of OpenAI will also be, I love this, man. I'm just going to tell you, as a business guy, haven't always agreed with all of these people, and you can call it politics, pandering, whatever you want.

4:40I like what it signals for business and for what it and unity on some level. You know, all the other side and what's been happening last four years, they painted this picture of unity coming in, but it's been anything but. And as polarizing as I can admit, maybe Donald Trump was at one time or another. I think he learned and I think he's bringing a lot of powerhouse people together. A lot of people are excited about business and it's time to get down to brass tacks and make America do a business again. Big time. So I love this. I don't know what you think about it. I dig it. I mean, I'm Elon. I like what he's doing.

5:24You know, obviously my whole thing, I was telling someone earlier today, like we need people with business experience. And I think this is being talked about a lot more where we have too many lawyers in politics, right? We got too many teachers or whatever. All I know is - Career politicians. Right. No one's worked in the private sector and ran a business. Therefore, why would you be in charge of handling a budget or any type of management if you've never managed anything in your life? So I love all these business guys. You know, Zuckerberg, I'm glad he's had an about face, supposedly, right? Yep.

6:02It doesn't matter if it's genuine or not. He's removing censorship. That's good. And you want, I mean, these are arguably the largest companies on the planet with the most influence and power. I want them to be in alignment with our president, you know? Yeah. If anything for national security interests, right? Like you said, we need cohesiveness. 2020 was very, you know, big tech versus Trump. It felt like, right? Or even censorship when it came to something like COVID, for example. so it wasn't necessarily just politics. Right. But I like seeing all these guys, man. I think, you know, especially, you know, me being time I spent Houston, someone like Tillman Fertitta, like I've seen what he's built there.

6:50You know, he's owner of the Rockets, hotel owner. He wants to do casinos. The guy's a business guy. He's experienced. He was big on TV shows. Um, so it's like people have track records. These are the type of people that I want making decisions. Yeah, smart business people, you know, that have put aside maybe their differences. I mean, freaking Mark Zuckerberg is going to be hosting a black tie event like Monday night. You know, Bezos and Zuckerberg, their companies have both pledged a million dollars to Trump's inauguration fund. Again, call it politics, call it pandering, whatever you want to call it.

7:29But it helps America that these people are getting along. And you can play the fiddle, all the rich get richer and all that. I'm sorry. But we want – it don't always work from the bottom up. I know that a lot of people like to trump that, pun intended. And I'm just here to tell you that there's a balance in all of this. But we need innovative, smart business people being a part of key decisions and removing friction and tension internally. It doesn't mean everybody has to always agree, but we want the smartest minds talking more about policies that help America and America's people rather than infighting.

8:20That does nothing. There's no good for anyone. everyone's playing a game but yeah at least now we're all playing the same game right yeah it's called let's all get ahead you know it's called america winning you know and like you always say high tide raises all ships right so yep yeah i'm liking where this tide's going we got to see it in action so nobody's nobody's waving the flag of victory here like that every problem is solved That's not what we're doing. I'm just saying I like the direction and the unity that I'm seeing from a lot of smart people. That's what it comes down to. A lot of smart people.

8:58Done a lot of important things for business. I run multiple business. I know how hard that shit is. It's hard. You got to be smart. You got to be lucky sometimes. You got to know how to ride the waves and do all those things. But it takes real chutzpah to manage a budget, manage a company, manage people. And people that have done it at the highest level, having say and having influence and having, you know, like we can all play. I mean, you can play the victim card all you want. Oh, Rich is good. I mean, we could do that. But I think the upside here is good for all Americans on the whole if you choose to see it that way.

9:43country singer Carrie Underwood will perform. You know? NFL. She's done the new in the... Oh, Carrie Underwood. She's everywhere. Who ever knew? American Idol. Now she's doing NFL football. Singing at the inauguration. And not to be outdone, the village people. Look, hey, all people, baby. We'll do a YMCA. It was a Trump rally staple. They'll be performing at multiple inaugural events. I wonder if they'll play YMCA. Oh, no doubt, baby. Yeah. They'll be YMCA-ing it up. That song stood the test of time, I guess. Yeah, that's one of the theme songs. Yeah, exactly. I know they tried to get him to stop playing it at rallies.

10:42So, I mean, as related. So, okay. Let's give you some action. So stuff here, get in with a crypto, Chris, our new name for Chris. I look, I'm a marketing guy. I like to give everybody kind of a name, you know, this one may or may not stick, but we may or may not have a jingle made, but what are the impacts? Okay, Trump's coming in off. What's the business impacts? We're going to talk about a few of those. I think starting with crypto, I'm officially back on the train. I've been off the train for about four years. You can align that with certain things or not, but more just the reality of not wanting to keep up with it every day and it seemingly kind of fluttering.

11:27But the game's back on. Talk to me, Chris, about what you're hearing, what you're seeing. You know, I know we've got some headlines related to that, but what's cooking on the crypto front? Yeah. Crypto Chris in the house. I think the main the two biggest things probably that were mentioned, right, is Trump's inauguration. Trump is vocally, you know, pro crypto. The crypto community is a huge supporter of Trump. So just naturally, the sentiment is very positive around that. And then you have Trump also basically firing, he's stepping down and resigning. I think it's Gary Gensler, the SEC head, who is not a crypto guy, not a fan of crypto, very stringent policy.

12:15So he steps down the day of the inauguration. So that also is a good sign. So, you know, a lot of assumptions there. Right. And then, you know, we talked a little bit before we were talking about XRP. you know where it is xrp will be handing a lot of the digital payments for a lot of the major institutional banks here probably this year um and i think you were talking about that's went up quite a bit i don't hold any xrp anymore oh it does i'll i'll stop there to just give you a little xrp update hey xrp crowd some love they're they're loyal they are a loyal bunch and i'm gonna name on. I'm going to give him credit.

12:55Callan, he's an amazing, talented, creative guy that was on my team for a number of years. He's independent now, like all those good guys do. But he told me about XRP. He's one of the fanboys. Oh my God. He would talk to me for hours about XRP and all this stuff. And look, he had me at hell up. I was just like, because I was trying to get into it. This is three or four years ago. And so I bought some and sold some and all that. I made a little coin, But then it's been kind of like everything else with the policies, you know, kind of been a little flat line, just kind of like not doing going up a little, going down a little, all that shit.

13:33But nonetheless, when I got back in the game, you know, three or four months ago, I went heavy with XRP sub a dollar, like 77 cents, 90 cents, somewhere in there. And let's just say it's I think it crested three bucks a day for the first time or it's going over. It's pumping. And all, like Chris said, all the metrics, all the stuff behind it is pretty solid. So this is not financial advice. Consult your financial advisor, banker, rabbi, priest, whoever you, whoever, your wife, your significant other, your husband, whatever, whoever, whenever. But this is an opinion show. We do share what we do, sometimes for good, sometimes for bad.

14:23If you need to know what not to do with your wife, I can tell you that. But, you know, but on the crypto front, XRP is pumping. And shout out to Callan for that advice back in the day. Because that's why it is why I kind of jumped back in. I knew, you know, a lot of the details behind it. And it seems to be validated. Most people in the know think 5, 10 plus over the next 12 months. So there's my XRP spin. And, you know, it is professional gambling. So only a bet which you can afford to lose. Yeah. That's what I would say. That'd be my advice. Which also, there was word that the banks, many of the major banks will soon be announcing that they can be custodians of your cryptocurrency holding.

15:13So if you were, this is probably, you know, for your older people, right, that don't understand technology as much. But for example, if you want to own Bitcoin, I'm sure the banks will have it where you can even purchase Bitcoin through your bank and they'll be the custodian and they'll hold it for you. So I think as far as mass adoption, that's a step where this is now easily accessible to everyone that uses a bank. so good news yes and so crypto news seek your financial advice accordingly but i would say put in what you can afford to lose and i think it's it's definitely safer than college football gambling at this point for sure better return uh because i will say you don't see the complete like okay, a dollar one day, zero the next swings.

16:11I don't see that. You definitely see a lot of sense. It's kind of a fun. It might jump up 10 % or down 10 % within a week. Yeah, it's still a little more volatile and the swings are a lot greater than the stock market, but it's more in line with the stock market than it ever has been. as far as the percentage of swings. You just don't see, like, I remember four or five years ago, you'd see 3 ,000 % swings in a day. Now today, like, your biggest gainers might be up 40 % or 50%. And I'm not saying that's not significant. That is significant. But it's not 4 ,000%, like five years ago. It was a lot of...

16:58And it might be up 3 % for six hours. Yeah. And it drops back down. So it just depends how aggressive you want to be, how involved and active. Exactly. And so crypto is on the upswing. I did see inflation. The numbers were so-so. So interest rates were probably going to hang tight. And we like to keep it on the positive end. So this isn't meant to be deborah down or stuff. It's really meant to be more WTF. This is, I'm a business and marketing guy, but I'm not a financial planner expert. I don't pretend to be. We bring you knowledge and articles and things and some opinions. But with that said, here's where I start to go.

17:49Hmm. And just saw the news. JP Morgan just posted record annual profits as major U.S. banks thrive in the final quarter of 2024. So J.P. Morgan's net income soared 50 % to more than$14 billion in the fourth quarter as the bank's profits and revenue easily beat Wall Street forecasts. Other major banks reported better banner earnings for the year. So we've had a so-so business year. We've had a high interest rate year. And the banks have banked it. Hmm. I just, what do they say? There's smoke. It stinks. And it gets in your eyes. There's usually a fucking fire somewhere. It just smells to me. You know, like, I'm sorry that I'm cynical, but I am.

18:52And so when it feels like it's been a mediocre year and the real estate market sort of floundered and I'm not the biggest defender of real estate either. But like but I would say the bank's making all this money just doesn't smell right to me. What says you? It seems just doesn't make sense. Right. When. Interest rates are high. Everyone's kind of tight, running lean. and then it almost makes me think of that huge Chase scandal member when everyone was hacking the ATMs, or they could deposit a check for$100 ,000 and pull out$20 ,000, and they really had no money. It's almost like, do they do stuff like that on purpose to write it off and claim losses on the earnings?

19:40Yeah, exactly. That literally went through my head, which is crazy, but... Emotional damage. That's where I go. I just think in a society that we're in, We should all look at it in question, you know, does that make sense? When, I mean, banks were, I don't know. I just, I don't like it. I'll say that. I'm not a fan of the banking system. We'll leave it there. We'll give that comment a ding. Because I think, let's just say, my intuition's normally right. For good and bad. Unfortunately. And I think this is what we should be hearing related to us in this.

20:30That's what happens, I think, when the banks go up. I think it's that for everyone else, unfortunately. I'm not a bank hater. I have some friends that are bankers. I think it's an inverse relationship. Yes, inverse. What's good for them isn't always good for us, especially fees. But now, hey, they don't have to make money on fees. It's just all these interest rates that are so favorably in their favor. Anyway, we'll leave it there. So impacts from Trump. We've got the market, you know, inflation hanging around, unfortunately, which is helping the banks. I saw this. I thought it was interesting.

21:09It comes from our good friends at CNN.

21:16And Starbucks ends its open door policies. I didn't know they still had this. So Starbucks ends its open door policies. Starbucks has introduced a new code of conduct for customers. I didn't know you could actually do that. I don't know. They just started doing that, you know, code of conduct for my clients. ending its open door policy that allowed non-paying individuals to use restrooms or hang out in cafes. Maybe that'll boost my cowork business. You know, they can't hang out at the Starbucks. They're not drinking coffee anymore. The policy aims to prioritize paying customers and enhance the cafe experience.

21:58Wow. They actually wrote that in print. kind of wild yeah exactly go figure it shouldn't every policy do that i mean it's even as you keep going it's like you can tell they're targeting a certain demographic that they that their problems that everything swung too far just like old zuck getting in line like you know and it's the it It says the open door policy faced challenges. No shit. Oh, when you start denying people the bathroom they've been using for the last 20 years? Well, no, it's more that the open door, it's faced challenges, which is why they've changed it. They said with non-paying customers, homeless individuals, and those seeking shelter or restroom access.

22:47It caused tension among employees and distracted from paying customer experiences. i mean i mean it's like did you not see that coming uh yeah and i get it you gotta go to the bathroom but it's a business sorry i have been there and you know what i normally do i'll go buy a cup of coffee or i'll go buy a cheeseburger i'll go use the bathroom you know like it was kind of like your duty there it's not their duty to run a business out of bathroom for you to use it. Sorry. And yeah, it's neighborly and nice and all that. And if you know your local, and if you're giving them patronage throughout the week and they know you and you stop in and you had the emergency, okay, fine.

23:33You know, of course, but like same time, it's not a public restroom. It's a place of business. So ban says new rules and incentives. Bans include panhandling, vaping, discrimination, and outside alcohol consumption. I'm just picturing a bunch of homeless guys drinking beers. Sitting at the table. Sitting at the table listening to... Hitting a cherry ice vape. Yeah. This could be a great SNL skit. Playing one of those songs that's so typical coffee house with the smell of the coffee. training will be provided to employees to enforce the rules i mean i'll be honest there's a starbucks in my neighborhood there's homeless people in my neighborhood and for the most part it's the same people i see them every day they they go in but i'm in my mind when i read this i'm thinking portland san francisco starbucks bread and butter home locations right where because this isn't happening in the starbucks that i go to yeah no not not really the ones i do either but i'm not a big metropolis city and look i'm not hating on homeless people or people that use it this isn't a hate bash on any of them it's just more of the i don't know the common sense of business and what and like your private business you're allowed to refuse customer service and yeah and like you're not running a public bathroom Like that's not their job and they're not beholden to that.

25:09So. And anyone who's owned a business with a bathroom knows you already, no one wants to clean it anyways. And now you've got a bunch of non-paying customers using it. That's, I mean, that is going to cause disruption to your business. Yeah. And this is where I think we're getting like rid of some common, like some things that have crept in that are not, you know, great for business, not competent, not good for paying customers, not good for overall. Another one would be Amazon ending its try before you buy program. I never really did that. Yeah. It's moving to Tinder.

25:46Sorry. It's all Tinder. I had to go there. You better as well call it that. Yeah. Amazon ends try before you buy program. Can't have that milk or you buy the cow. Now, launch and closure. Amazon launched. These are the dates. Amazon launched the program in 2017. It'll phase it out at the end of this month. It allowed Prime customers to try up to six apparel items at a time for a week before deciding what to keep in return. I.e., they just wear it, go to the event, and send it back. reason for ending stated by them customers prefer a broader selection of items and faster delivery speeds growing alliance on AI powered features like virtual try on personalized size recommendations and improve side charts size charts I mean they didn't say what we know to be true which is too many people truly trying before they're buying I know that people would come back in the Ed Hardy t-shirt days.

26:55Come in and buy like$120 Ed Hardy t-shirt on a Friday and then come back Sunday with like literally makeup and like cologne. And I'm like, you're right. That's exactly what people are doing. And I think I, to be fair to Amazon, their sizing is all over the place. They need to improve the size charts. I hope they did. And I know a lot of it was because you had products being manufactured in Asia and they're smaller than most Americans. Yep. You ever order like your normal size dress shirt on amazon and it's for like a child oh yeah it's like a kid's xl it's usually child look i mean you don't i have a we have a full episode of me talking about size issues as a six foot 270 pound man i bet you dude yeah either i get the bermuda cut off the you know or yeah, yeah.

27:46I've, uh, I've gone through that. I, you know, I, I'm XL double XL slim, you know, like that I'm a weird size anyway, cause I don't have a gigantic fat stomach, but I'm broad shouldered. So unless it's a, you know, a muscle fit or something like that, it's out to here, you know, a foot wider than I am. And so, oh God. And, you know, I think the Asian size is not the standard. If I get an XL men's made in Asia, my eighth grade son can't wear that thing. So I can't get it over my head. It's a nice medium. I can't pull that off. But yeah, the sizing is a big issue. It's not universal. I knew that Asian triple XL.

28:44Yeah. I'm like, I'm like five X in the Asian XL. I don't know why. You got to really dig to find it out. You have to go to like their little click down link and then it'll tell you, you know, Oh, our XL is men's whatever, but maybe they improve that. But I, I, I have to totally agree. I think the majority of it is people buy stuff and return it. And after they wear it, you know, you get the photo. They do. And I think here's what I'm going to say. I don't want to pick a fight with Amazon. I like him overall. I really do. Jeff, I love you, man. Jeff Bezos, call me. We'll have you on the show anytime.

29:22You can talk about any of this. But I'll say this. Here's my bigger problem with Amazon. Get rid of the tribe before you buy a thumb anyway. So totally fine. Here's where I have a bone to pick. if you're going to be two-day shipping or you're going to tell me that you will have this tomorrow or Friday when you go to buy it, that ship better be there nine out of 10 times. Let's just say I've ordered four or five things the last month based on, okay, I don't want to go buy it locally because I don't need it today, but I need it tomorrow or the next day. And it tells me I bought this camera case.

30:09You know, we got productions, you know, freaking running an agency here. I needed a rig for one of the cameras and I needed it Friday. Ordered it last Wednesday. It said, be there Friday. You just casually get these emails on Friday. Ah, not going to come today. It'll be there to you on Tuesday. day. And let's just say that used to be one out of every 20 things you'd order. Okay. Not going to always get it right. I'm reasonable, not the unreasonable customer, not that guy that thinks you're going to get perfect every time. But it's getting to be like three, four out of every 30 to 40 % of the time we are not hitting the date.

30:51And this isn't weather delays. This isn't, we got seven feet of snow on the ground here in South Carolina. And I know there's snow elsewhere, but you know, and I'm not expecting it the same day or even overnight. But when you tell me you're going to have it that day and I'm planning on it, you got to get that shit right more than you get it wrong. And it's getting bad. Like two days, no longer two day prime. You bought the prime. I pay the prime fee for the guaranteed two day. And it ain't guaranteed two days anymore. I was literally reading about this like two days ago and a ton of people complaining about it and exactly what you just said.