thehustle.co table {border-collapse: collapse;} table, td {mso-table-lspace: 0pt;mso-table-rspace: 0pt;} img {-ms-interpolation-mode: bicubic;} body { font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif; } body a { color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; } @media screen and (max-width:480px) { .templateColumnContainer { display: block !important; width: 100% !important; padding-left: 0 !important; padding-right: 0 !important; } } PLUS: A very important Supreme Court case. December 2, 2020 TOGETHER WITH Hewlett-Packard Enterprise announced that it’s shifting its HQ to Houston. It is the latest California tech firm to follow in the footsteps of The Hustle and relocate to Texas. The Big Idea A wave of bargain shopping IPOs are coming. Why now? For the longest time on the internet, the best places to lowball-offer your way to a great bargain were eBay and Craigslist. But things changed in the wake of the 2008-09 financial crisis. Powered by the smartphone revolution (and tight budgets), 3 bargain shopping apps were founded in quick succession: ThredUp (2009), Wish (2010), and Poshmark (2011).  Amid another crisis, the apps have come of age Per The Information, all 3 companies are looking toward an IPO. ThredUp and Poshmark -- both active in the $28B apparel resale market --  filed confidentially. While their numbers aren’t available, Coresight research pegs Poshmark as the 2nd-biggest reselling platform after eBay. Wish (which sells insanely cheap items of all sorts, typically sourced from China) claims it’s the world’s most-downloaded shopping app. According to the $11B startup’s prospectus, it has: 100m monthly active users in 100+ countries  500k+ merchants selling 150m items (~1.8m sold daily)  $1.7B revenue through September (vs. $1.1B in 2017) An underserved part of the market According to Forbes, Wish’s CEO Peter Szulczewski targets “the bottom 25% of U.S. households by income, scraping by on $31,000 or less a year.” On the site, you’ll find things like $4 “lux” watches, $253 laptops and (why didn’t anyone tell me about this) $12 engagement rings. ThredUp and Poshmark also appeal to tight budgets but have the added tailwind of “socially conscious” shopping. In an effort to avoid waste, millennials are happy owning secondhand goods, which are projected to make up “17% of a person’s share of closet space by 2029, up from just 3% in 2009,” according to GlobalData Retail. In July, Wish lost a big shipping subsidy… … which allowed Chinese merchants to ship directly to the US at a cheaper cost than shipping within the US. With most goods coming from China, Forbes described this development as an “existential threat.”  To offset this loss, Wish is building a network of 100k small shops across the US. Customers can keep scoring low costs if they pick up multiple bundled items in person. There’s no guarantee it’ll work. But with a long economic recovery ahead, bargain hunting (and aggressive lowballing) are here to stay. (Related: Read our Trends Q&A with ThredUp’s founder and CEO) Snippets Amazon Web Services will run Apple Mac instances on its cloud (EC2). This puts the word “friend” in “frenemy” because -- by doing this -- Amazon will accelerate “software development on Apple Silicon” and help the Cupertino tech giant keep moving away from Intel computing chips. Kind of sad: Xerox’s research arm -- PARC (Palo Alto Research Center) -- was famed for creating the laser printer, Ethernet, and graphical user interface, which Steve Jobs got his hands on. Now, it’s literally a patent troll, suing Facebook, Snap, and Twitter for infringement. File this under “didn’t know I needed it”: Google Maps just launched a news feed; it’s designed to help you find updates and reccos from trusted local sources. To differentiate it from Facebook’s anchor product, Google cleverly named it the Community Feed. Does this scale? (Apparently not): Facebook’s oversight board has received 20k+ submissions and it’s reviewing -- wait for it -- 6 of them. So many Goldman Sachs alumni (Gary Cohn, Steve Mnuchin, Henry Paulson, Bob Rubin) have worked in the White House that it's been dubbed “Government Sachs.” In a switch, President-elect Biden is tapping BlackRock folk for key roles. $27.7B is how much Salesforce is spending to buy the best stock ticker on the market, $WORK AKA Slack (read our analysis of the deal here). $35B is the top of the range of Airbnb’s IPO offering. $529B is a completely random number we plucked out of thin air.   In The Cards This $700m deal proves that collectible cards are no joke This is the most valuable advice you may get today: Go to your closet and pull out that box of old sports trading cards.  You might have gold. From 2016 to 2019, card sales on eBay jumped 40%, to $600m+, according to ESPN. This year, the wave of liquidity from pandemic stimulus -- and the rise of secondary markets like StockX -- has the card biz on fire some notable sales: MLB’s Mike Trout ($3.84m) NBA’s Giannis Antetokounmpo ($1.86m) NBA’s LeBron James ($1.8m and $1.08m) Now, a major collectibles appraiser has cashed in Hedge fund billionaire Steve Cohen just teamed up with entrepreneur Nat Turner to acquire Collectors Universe, a leading 3rd-party collectible authentication and grading service. The deal is valued at ~$700m, which is triple Collectors’ market cap from just one year ago. The company claims its various designations -- like PCGS (for coins) and PSA (sports cards) -- boost sale values at auction. Latest quarterly sales were up 52% YoY… … totaling $30.8m, which puts it on an annual run rate of $120m+, double its 2015 revenue of $62m. Collectors’ latest earnings call suggests the firm has more growth coming: It has a huge backlog of authentication requests and is doubling its facilities (to 126k+ square feet) to accommodate demand. So, if you find something in that shoebox, definitely send it to us and we’ll send it along for you… SPONSORED Between HR, payroll, and other platforms, the average person has 100 different passwords You don’t need to be a security whiz to realize the problems that causes: Poor security due to password reuse (hey, we all do it...) Wasted time trying to figure out what login works for each account Endless confusion over which information lives where In other words, you’re not just asking for trouble -- you’re practically begging for it.  Which is why it’s time to switch to Paycom’s HR and payroll software.  One suite of products, one database, one login And one seriously stress-free software. Paycom’s unified approach makes it an employee fave, allowing them to easily access important info and handle everyday tasks anytime, anywhere (without having to dust off their Notepad Full of Sensitive Info).  Want to let your employees manage payroll, submit expense reports, request and approve PTO, and handle benefits -- all in one place?  Then get to clickin’, folks, because Paycom awaits.  Simplify with Paycom → The Supreme Court The future of online security and privacy is being decided right now On Monday, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments for a case with wide-ranging implications for how the digital sphere will be policed.  Here’s what you need to know, per Protocol: The case: Van Buren v. United States  What happened? In 2017, former Georgia police officer Nathan Van Buren “accepted money to look up a woman’s license plate in a law enforcement database.” What law was broken? Van Buren was convicted of violating the 1986 Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), specifically a vague clause that says accessing a computer “without authorization or exceeding authorized access” is a crime.  What’s the defense saying? Van Buren clearly did something wrong, but because of how vague the standard is, he’s arguing that he had “authorized access” to the database but used that access for “unauthorized” purposes.  OK, how does this affect me? Odds are you’ve done something that could be considered “unauthorized” under an expanded CFAA standard: 1) using a work computer to look up the value of a Lebron James rookie card (guilty); 2) not abiding by a tech firm’s terms of service (e.g., creating a fake account).  Who wants Van Buren to lose? If CFAA is expanded, Big Tech firms can use TOS violations as a way to enforce whatever rules they want.  What wants Van Buren to win? Online privacy groups (e.g., Electronic Frontier Foundation) don’t want Big Tech to be able to expand their powers. Further, journalists and researchers, who often set up fake profiles to study Big Tech, are concerned about facing legal liability.  So far -- according to Law and Crime -- the Supreme Court seems to be leaning with Van Buren. Justice Samuel Alito noted that expansion of CFAA “would criminalize all sorts of activity that people would find innocuous.” SPONSORED What happens when we let our copywriter try Noom? He loses 11 lbs. (And then writes about it in the third-person.) I (Bobby, not Sam) have been doing Noom for a few months now, and folks, I gotta tell ya… I look good.  And with the holidays coming up, I finally feel like I’m in control.  That’s because Noom’s approach to weight loss -- which involves focusing on behavioural change, instead of burning anything containing gluten -- is actually sustainable.  I used the app to build healthy habits (byeeee, 11:55PM Crunch Wrap Supreme trips), and everything else followed.  Want help staying in control this Holiday Season? Get a 7 day trial of Noom for $0.50 right here: Start your trial → List of the day Forbes released its popular “30 Under 30” list and we were delighted to find an interesting wrinkle for this year: an “800 under 800” list.  Not to be wet blankets but Forbes made some mistakes:  Yoda is 900 years old  Gandalf the Grey is 2019 year old  The 2 dudes from Interview With The Vampire are not clear  We can confirm that Wolverine -- aged 137 -- belongs on the list; that young man has a bright future.  If you have any nominees for the list, please comment here.  Company of the day Heritage Auctions is the world’s largest collectibles auctioneer and the 3rd-largest general auction business behind Christie’s and Sotheby’s.  The items above come from Heritage Auctions’ “Hall of Fame.” Founded in 1976, the Dallas-based company -- which scored the enviable URL www.HA.com -- has an impressive track record:  $800m+ in sales for 2019  Valuable pricing data based on 5m auction lots and 1.1m online bidders  $10B+ total sales in fine art and collectibles, selling 279k+ consignments  Here’s how Heritage makes money: For every transaction, it makes money from both the buyer (~15% surcharge) and the seller (up to a 15% commission). It also offers appraisal services for various legal reasons (bankruptcy, taxes, insurance donations, divorce).   The majority of lot auctions are coins and currencies (57%), comics (13%), and movie posters (7%).  (For a deep dive on Heritage Auctions, check out this Trends report.) SHARE THE HUSTLE Refer coworkers, get exclusive Hustle gear Step 1: Peek our sweet, sweet rewards Step 2: Copy your referral link below Step 3: Share your link across social media and beyond Step 4: Collect rewards, rinse & repeat Share The Hustle → Copy & paste your referral link to others: https://thehustle.co/?ref=bed0be7154 How did you like today’s email? hate it meh love it Today's email was brought to you by @TrungTPhan. Editing by: Zachary "Don’t lowball me, bro" Crockett, Hassen Ben Sober (Wine Taster from the Abu Dhabi Office). PODCAST JOBS ADVERTISE CONTACT US 2131 THEO DR. STE F, AUSTIN, TX 78723, UNITED STATES • 415.506.7210 Never want to hear from us again? Break our hearts and unsubscribe.