This is Nick. This is Jack. And this is us telling you to mark your Outlook calendar (on private mode) for next Thursday, August 24, because it’s America’s sickest day of the year. More Americans call in queasy (or “queasy”) next Thursday than any other day.

Us? We’ll be off these next two weeks, and we’ll see you on the other side of Labor Day. Watch out for a special OOO edition of this newsletter next week (spoiler: you’ll want to bookmark it).

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1) Blame the Tablet for Tip Fatigue

We’re at our tipping point: Two-thirds of Americans are fed up with the tipping guilt trip. And your favorite coffee spot suggesting 25% gratuity for your $4.75 oat milk latte? You can kinda blame restaurant tech company Toast.

What’s worse than doing the mental math for “20% of $14.72 is X?” Having to tap “no tip” right in front of Barista Tim. But the tension at the payment tablet is no problem for Toast, the $12B publicly traded company that helped usher in the era of tap-to-pay and screen tipping.

• Toast added its payment, rez, and ordering tech to 7,500 locations in just the last 3 months.

• Today, Toast tablets are at 93K restaurants and stores nationwide and the stock’s up 30% this year.

That major expansion has led to “Tip Creep” (tipping at places you wouldn’t historically tip). Hence the “Tip Fatigue.”

The Takeaway →

We’re in the middle of a tip turnaround. Payment tablets and digital payments give us no excuse to not tip, but how much we tip is actually down to a 5-year low of 16.7% on average. Tablets led to Tip Creep ➡️ which led to Tip Fatigue ➡️ and now the Tip Turnaround.

Now the screen is just going to ask you a quick question…

2) The Voldemort of Investing Is Betting Against the Stock Market

Michael Burry, the money manager who correctly predicted the ’08 housing bubble, bet $1.6B against the stock market last quarter, according to recent filings with the ol’ SEC.

Who is Burry and should we buy the doom?

• Burry runs a hedge fund, but more importantly: Christian Bale played him in the movie The Big Short.

• He doesn’t wear shoes, plays the air drums, and gets his hair trimmed at SuperCuts (no shade).

• But his quirks have let him see what others can’t—including that the housing market was a debt-bloated house of cards back in 2008.

He was the only one who bet against the housing market, and it made him a fortune. So when he bets against the stock market today, we pay attention (and search for our blankie). If Warren Buffett is the warm ‘n’ fuzzy Dumbledore of our stock market, Burry is Voldemort.

The Takeaway →

Burry could be sensing the same threat today as he saw back in 2008…debt. The US economy is crushing it right now—the S&P 500 is up 14% near an all-time high, unemployment is the lowest in decades, and businesses are investing big time. But debt—on credit cards, car loans, and student loans (which resume in 2 weeks, not to be downers)—is creeping up. Our credit card debt just passed $1 trillion for the first time. Different decade, different debt, same risk to the economy: Those debt-eaters will sneak up on ya.

Also: If you like big bets like Burry, here’s the playlist he listens to while shorting the market.

3) Joy’s Cone Empire Proves Being Vanilla Is Good Business

The ice cream cone industry is virtually a monopoly. Specifically, cones. Two out of every 3 cones are made by one company—Joy Baking Group.

With 17K ice cream makers trying to win us over with flavors that are bananas (hold the split), there’s only one Joy. It makes an estimated 60–70% of the cones sold in America—from exclusivity deals with Dairy Queen and Mister Softee to your local spot. Its closest competition? Keebler. Those elves have just 15% of the market.

What’s the recipe for Joy? Turns out cones are harder to make than the cream: 

• It operates four 500K-sq. ft. factories, each whipping up 20M cones/day (enough to feed NYC 2x, not including Nick).

• Joy’s job is part baking, part engineering, part architecture—they bake cones in cast-iron molds while rotating them in 400 degree heat.

That’s the secret Ben & Jerry won’t tell you: The cone is more complex to make than Americone Dream ice cream.

The Takeaway →

Familiarity can beat creativity. When you’re licking a scoop of honey balsamic cookie dough, the cone is playing a supporting role. Joy knows their three cones—cake, sugar, waffle—have staying power by being dependable to consumers and scoop shops alike. Boring is better when it comes to cones.

Here’s what else you need to know today—

🏠 Mortgage rates just passed 7%, their highest level in 20 years. Yes, housing can get more expensive.

🚀 SpaceX, Elon Musk’s private space company, allegedly tallied a small quarterly profit in Q1 after two annual losses.

⌛ You have 1 week left to file a claim to get a piece of Facebook’s $725M data privacy settlement if you’ve had an account in the last 16 years (FYI, we filed—here’s the website).

🍗 Chick-fil-A is supreme in US fast food chain in terms of sales per location ($6M per spot)…and it isn’t even open 7 days/week.

🍦 McDonald’s launches McFlurry apparel that disguises the shake so people don’t ask for a sip.

🧐 Goldman Sachs is under scrutiny after students wrote a letter accusing its CEO of “blatant ignorance and disrespect” at a university event.

🍌 Banana Ripeners (real job) have a new machine learning tool to turn hard green ‘nanners to the perfect mushy brown.

😅 Peloton has a new strategy: selling to gyms, hotels, and apartments.

👟 On the pod today: Skechers just signed a lifetime deal with England’s star soccer player, Harry Kane—seemingly pivoting from grandpas to elite athletes.

And one more thing. We’re sharing our vacay reading lists (soon) to give you something to digest while we’re OOO. Until then…tell us what sickness you’re coming down with on the sickest day.👇

—Nick & Jack