The Liquidity Event | Money and Finance with Shane and Ally Jane

Today is our birthday! This week's episode is filled with fun jabs at billionaires and financial knowledge that's mostly useless to you. We've got news stories on AriZona iced tea, old ladies, Elon Musk, and Airbnb cleaning fees. And you know it wouldn't be The Liquidity Event without a rant about the IRS. This one is celebratory.

Links

As inflation soars, how is AriZona iced tea still 99 cents?

Why Airbnb Cleaning Fees Cost So Much Now

Elon Musk Makes $43 Billion Unsolicited Bid to Take Twitter Private

Princess Mako Has a New Title: the Unpaid Intern

Treasury makes a plea for more I.R.S. funding on Tax Day.

Welp! We finally have a big olde IPO in 2022 folks! Excelerated Energy Energy, a Texas-based natural gas company took advantage of market fears around rising gasoline prices to have a very successful IPO on Tuesday. We've got the first successful Amazon union at a warehouse in Staten Island. And in other union-ish news, Etsy sellers are not happy with the company's decision to raise their transaction fees. We've got a great scam of the week with a former Yale administrator. This one strikes hot.

Links

Excelerated Energy's IPO

Why Etsy Sellers Are Going on Strike

Amazon workers in Staten Island vote for the company's first unionized warehouse in U.S.

A former Yale employee admits she stole $40 million in electronics from the university

Meta employees look to ditch jobs amid stock crash: 'Feeling like s–t'

There are big changes afoot in the retirement space and Roths are about to get a big glow-up. Our hosts discuss the SECURE ACT 2.0 and the implications for boomers and millennials alike. Student loans are back in the news with payments and interest on pause through August 31st which leads us to believe there may be forgiveness in the future. We've got a killer interview with French economic bad-boy Thomas Piketty who has some spicy things to say about income inequality. And finally, Yellowstone National Park is selling annual park passes for use 150 years in the future. This one is electric!

Links

Your 401(k) Statement Will Soon Have Lifetime Income Estimates. What to Know.

Secure 2.0 Retirement Bill Mandates Roths And More

Thomas Piketty Thinks America Is Primed for Wealth Redistribution

It's a Perfect Time for EVs. It's a Terrible Time for EVs

The New Tax Playbook for Draining Your 401(k) in Retirement

White House Is Said to Pause Student Loans Again, Pushing Payments to September

How Your Shadow Credit Score Could Decide Whether You Get an Apartment

Yellowstone National Park wants you to plan ahead for the year 2172

In this week's episode, The Onion weighs in on the housing market and England's first witch gets to write off her spells on her tax forms. We've got OnlyFans making a second attempt at going public via SPAC, good for them. In the IPO space, we finally have a little action: a teeny tiny company in California called Hempacco filed their S-1 last week with just over a million dollars in revenue last year. Our hosts are on the fence about The Routing Company, a Boston-based start-up producing management software to re-route public transportation for private users. This one is magical.

Links

New Zillow Feature Lets Users Track Happy Lives Of People Who Outbid Them For Dream House

Why your student loan payments may be delayed (again)

Here comes the sun: Senate agrees on permanent daylight saving time

The Routing Company lets you hail a ride — on public transit

Tax Pros Preparing 46 Percent of E-filings - CPA Trendlines

Britain's 'first official witch' files tax returns and claims expenses on potions and spells

Ukraine authorities say seized Russian tanks don't need to be declared on tax form

Biden's Budget Would Reshape His International Tax Plan to Match Global Deal

Scoop: OnlyFans wants to go public through a SPAC

Another week, another lifeless IPO market. Come on tech bros! Get it together. Our hosts are back on their soapbox and ranting and raving about clients who won't sell their dang stock just because they don't like the price. There's the awful news that romance scams reached a 5-year high, made even more popular by the devious Tinder Swindler. Folks, never send a wire to someone you don't know. Speaking of wire transfers and therefore banks, Wells Fargo is in hot water for a damning report that shows they denied mortgages to black borrowers at a much higher rate than other lenders. And finally, we've got Forbes' list of the 500 best startup employers. If you're not offering remote work, what are you even doing. This one is highly motivated.

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Links

Why Selling Your Equity at a Low Still Makes Sense

Something Has to Give in the Housing Market. Or Does It?

America's Best Startup Employers 2022

Mortgage Rates Rise Above 4% for the First Time Since 2019

Romance scams reach five year high

Wells Fargo Rejected Half Its Black Applicants in Mortgage Refinancing Boom

MacKenzie Scott donates $3.8 billion to 465 organizations

Tax Pros Preparing 46 Percent of E-filings - CPA Trendlines

In this episode of the Liquidity Event we've got inflation fears, interest rates spikes, 3D printed homes, another Grimes baby, gin martinis, and Dolly Parton. And that's just the first ten minutes. With the IPO market a little slow, our hosts are left with the scraps of the internet. Wall Street is kvetching about a 0.25% interest rate hike and our hosts display their disdain for fear-mongering. But the high priestess of country music, Dolly Parton wrote a novel, so that's nice. This one is a little bit country.

Links

AJ's glass olive martini glass

Why the Fed is Poised to Raise Interest Rates

Dolly Parton and James Patterson team up for a novel about an aspiring country singer

Go read this Vanity Fair piece about Grimes and her secret baby with Elon Musk

When It Comes to Taxes, Being Tracked Can Be a Good Thing

Wingstop has filed a trademark to sell chicken wings in the metaverse

Luxury 3D-printed homes debut in Texas

Our hosts are caffeinated and extra silly today. There's the ongoing war in Ukraine which is just heartbreaking. Some slightly good news though, the company Grammarly that fixes all of our typos and spelling errors is donating millions to relief efforts. We've also got Pfizer executives pretending they didn't know the stock price was going to up when vaccines got announced, 323 million in stolen Ethereum, self-driving Waymo taxis, and the pros and cons of LinkedIn. This one is crunchy.

Links

Ukrainian-founded Grammarly is donating all the money it made in Russia since 2014

Operation Warp-Pay: How 10b5-1 Plans Allowed Pfizer and Moderna Executives to Cash In - Glass Lewis

Startup launches crypto-less NFT vending machine in New York City

$323 million in ETH stolen from cross-chain protocol Wormhole

Betterment Enters the Cryptocurrency Market by Acquiring Makara

Let's Face It, LinkedIn Might Be the Best Social Network Right Now

Waymo to start charging money for its robotaxi rides in San Francisco

On this episode, we've got a flaccid IPO market and some somber news out of Ukraine. AJ is back and mad at the IRS, but not as mad as John and Shane were last week. We've got tech companies in a hiring crisis, a town in Indiana luring tech workers with free grandparents, and many other shenanigans. We've also got Russian oligarchs skirting sanctions with all their assets in crypto. Yikes. This one is stinky.

Links

An Indiana Town Is Offering Free 'Grandparents' For People Who Are Willing to Move There

Tech Companies Face a Fresh Crisis: Hiring

Cryptocurrency Is a Potential New Tool for Billionaires to Avoid Sanctions

Tax Return Season 2022: IRS Form 1040 Changes Impact Stock Options, RSUs, ESPPs

Amex Send & Split with Venmo & PayPal: Send Money and Split Purchases

On this extra special episode our hosts are talking about the sad state of the IRS. The entity that collects revenue for our great country is underfunded, understaffed, and out of time. It's tax season and the IRS still hasn't processed millions of returns from last year. That's a big yikes. AJ is out this week so we've got the one and only John Owens to go deep on what's wrong with the tax system. Don't worry, these two make taxes a blast. This one is taxing.

Links

Accountant Shortage, Resignations Fuel Financial Reporting Risks

News Releases for Current Month | Internal Revenue Service

The Liquidity Event turns 30 today! That's 30 episodes in the can folks! Our hosts are a little loose this week and may have some extra lukewarm takes. We've got the Joe Rogan controversy at Spotify and the tech giants Alphabet, Amazon, and Apple laying on some sweet sweet RSUs bonuses to keep employees from quitting. AJ bows down to the reigning queen of our hearts Dolly Parton and admits that she most definitely has a crush on Pete Davidson. He's our unofficial CEO crush of the week. He'll eventually be the CEO of something, right? Shane fakes a southern accent and is excited about a UAE-based advertising firm called Aleph going public with an attempt to raise 300 million dollars. This one should probably be canceled.

Links

Amazon, Apple, Google: Restricted Stock Grants Evolve To Retain Top Talent

Dolly Parton Wants To Eliminate Your Student Loans. So, Dollywood Will Pay 100% Of Your Tuition.

Neil Young urges Spotify workers to quit as Trump tells Joe Rogan to 'stop apologizing'

Kanye West Goes on Civil War-Themed Meme Rampage Against Kid Cudi, Billie Eilish, and Pete Davidson, Then Deletes Everything