#61 – Twitter, Meta, Amazon

December 23, 2022

Markets

Down 20%. Was 25%, but rallied up 5% just this week.  

GDP growth 2.6% (-1.6 and -0.6 in Q1 and Q2). So no recession…currently. 

Apple. +7%

Amazon. -14% 

Meta. -25%

Amazon. AWS insanely profitable. All other biz combined is break-even. Sales of $127b and Operating Income of only $2.5b (2%).

  • Story: AWS $5.4b. All Other: $-2.9b. Everything losing money!! 
  • Tesla: $5b on $21b. 

Meta: meltdown. 

"Meta's results last night was an absolute train wreck that speaks to pervasive digital advertising doldrums ahead for Zuckerberg & Co. as they make the risky and head scratching bet on the metaverse," Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said in a report. 

Revenue flat to Q4 20 at $27b. NI 4.3 vs 7.8!! 

Viral Video (Play audio)

Twitter: what “products” does a 23 yr old product manager manage? 

  • 71% off high. 
  • Mkt cap $265b. Was 913b.
  • Headcount growth! The number of employees is up over 3x from 25k to 85k employees in just the last four years! 
  • Wants everybody to work in MetaVerse!? 
  • Brad Gerstner letter.
    • To accomplish this goal, we recommend a three step plan that will double FCF to $40 B per year and focus the company’s teams and investments:
      • Reduce headcount expense by at least 20%;
      • Reduce annual capex by at least $5 B from $30B to $25B; and
      • Limit investment in metaverse / Reality Labs to no more than $5B per year.

The Netflix rebound.

  • Hammered too hard initially. 
  • Reached “profitability” and growing. No one else has.
    • Disney will. 
    • Amazon spending too much! 
  • Advertising more appreciated. Not affected by Apple tracking. A rich ocean to fish in. 
  • Comcast. Peacock has 15m subs and lost $614m in the quarter. 

Twitter takeover. 

  • Walks in with Kitchen Sink. Entering Twitter HQ – let that sink in!”
  • Fires CEO and CFO and head lawyer. $100m in severance pay
  • Denies that he’ll fire 75% of workforce. 
  • Tesla engineers reviewing code. 
  • Employees walking out with boxes. Hoax? 
  • Just tweeted: Twitter will be forming a content moderation council with widely diverse viewpoints. No major content decisions or account reinstatements will happen before that council convenes.
  • People threatening to leave.. Where? Truth Social, Parler? 

Tesla: 

  • Cruise vs Tesla FSD in SF. 

Recommendations: 

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I'm Sean Hathaway

Hi, I'm Sean

20 years of finance experience and obsessed with high quality results.

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