“I’m about to embark on a seven-week road trip around the U.S.” Kepnes says. “I'll be focusing on national parks and outdoor adventures.”
Continue to follow CDC guidelines for travel, but book sooner than later to save money for summer trips.
Getting fully vaccinated is the first step toward travel safety , but it’s not the last. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have issued updated guidelines for vaccinated travelers, giving the go-ahead to domestic travel. Yet it still recommends following the familiar protective protocols: wearing a mask, maintaining social distance and avoiding crowds.
“Right now, we’re still awash in cheap summer flights,” says Scott Keyes, founder of travel deals newsletter Scott’s Cheap Flights. “But with vaccinations accelerating quickly and interest in travel spiking, cheap summer flights may not be available much longer.”
How to travel cheaply
“Even with a vaccine, the fundamentals of COVID-19 still apply,” Dr. Jessica Shepherd, chief medical officer of Verywell, an online health website, said in an email. “With travel, only the scenery changes, not the reality. As we move towards more of a normal life, it is important to approach it carefully rather than abruptly in lifestyle changes.”
Before you book a flight overseas, know that most countries are still enforcing restrictions on U.S. travelers and that the CDC and State Department have issued blanket “do not travel” advisories for most countries worldwide, even for vaccinated travelers. That doesn’t mean international travel is off the table, but it does limit the options.
If the CDC recommends maintaining social distance, is it safe to fly at all?
And many countries remain fully off-limits to U.S. travelers for the foreseeable future. Even countries that are allowing tourists, visitors are still subject to local restrictions and curfews. Do your research beforehand to make sure you can enjoy your destination once you get there.
Diving in, its global streaming revenue grew by 65% year-over-year, fueled by strong increases in user and product monetization. It also added 6 million global streaming subscribers to reach 36 million total subscribers in the quarter. Total revenue for the quarter was a whopping $7.41 billion, a 14% increase year-over-year. Viacom also reported a diluted earnings per share of $1.42 for the quarter. During the quarter, the company achieved a free cash flow of $1.59 billion.
One of the major financial stories in the stock market this year would be Bill Hwang’s Archegos Collapse earlier in March. In fact, it was the first big scandal to hit the family office industry. In case you’re not familiar, Archegos fell apart during the last week of March after amassing large leveraged positions in a concentrated portfolio of U.S. and Chinese companies.
Against the backdrop of a lackluster stock market today, investors are searching for cheap stocks to buy. Keep in mind though, that we’ve seen plenty of trends come and go in the stock market. But it’s worth pointing out that those stocks that Soros snapped up have yet to fully recover. Thus, if those names are good enough for the man who broke the Bank of England, could they be good enough for you too? Here are three stocks to watch.
Generally, hedge funds are a type of investment partnership that utilizes pooled funds to invest. They may have fairly flexible and aggressive investing styles. Therefore, it is no surprise that many would consider them to be high-risk investments. Borrowing heavily to invest in a booming stock market is certainly an attractive option for many hedge funds over the past year. But when share prices continue to fall (which they did), many banks called in their loans and Archegos defaulted. This has led to a domino effect that has cost nearly $20 billion to date and Archegos’s own implosion. But this sell-off may also have created an opportunity for investors to buy on dips.
Baidu
Discovery Communications is an upcoming name in the streaming industry right now. For the uninitiated, Discovery is a mass media company that boasts a massive portfolio of unscripted content. This ranges from wildlife documentaries to lifestyle improvement programming. Earlier today, AT&T (NYSE: T) and Discovery announced that they will combine AT&T’s media unit, WarnerMedia, with Discovery to create a premier, standalone global entertainment company.
In fact, some consider Baidu to be among the most prominent AI and internet companies worldwide. As its advertising business recovers, it will continue to work on Apollo. For the uninitiated, Apollo is an open-source software platform for autonomous vehicles. Remarkably, Baidu will be the first company in the region to test out AV-based monetization mechanisms. For investors looking to bank on these growing automotive trends, BIDU stock would be a go-to at the moment.
According to a 13F filing, Geoge Soros reportedly snapped up stocks that took a hit amid the collapse of Archegos in March. Amongst them include Vipshop Holdings Ltd (NYSE: VIPS) and Tencent Music Entertainment Group (NYSE: TME). Now, it is not clear if Soros has sold those stocks recently, but it’s helpful to know that he considered those stocks attractive at those prices. The liquidation of these stocks in massive blocks allows retail and institutional investors to buy in at steep discounts. During the “Front Row” interview on Bloomberg TV, Dawn Fitzpatrick, Chief Investment Officer of Soros Fund Management said, “When there’s a dislocation, we’re prepared to not just double down but triple down when the facts and circumstances support that.”
Viacom is a diversified multinational mass media conglomerate that is headquartered in New York City. In essence, the company delivers premium content to audiences across traditional and emerging platforms worldwide. It operates over 170 networks and reaches approximately 700 million subscribers in over 180 countries. The company reported its first-quarter results earlier this month.
This ratio, he says, keeps ultimate relationship power in the hands of men. “To plenty of women, it appears that men have a fear of commitment. But men, on average, are not afraid of commitment,” Regnerus writes.
Now with porn on demand and greater reproductive freedom, sex is a commodity available at any time. This has left men with little motivation for marriage, writes Regnerus, who cites demographer Steven Ruggles’ prediction that one of every three people in their 20s will never marry.
The share of Americans ages 25-34 who are married dropped 13 percentage points from 2000 to 2014. A new book by sociologist Mark Regnerus blames this declining rate on how easy it is for men to get off.
“The story is that men are in the driver’s seat in the marriage market and are optimally positioned to navigate it in a way that privileges their (sexual) interests and preferences. It need not even be conscious behavior on their part.”
Inside a woman's elaborate attempt to get back at her ex-boyfriend
All of this, Regnerus concludes, means that as long as sex is so low-cost for men, heterosexual women will have increasing difficulties finding a partner worth committing to.
Regnerus argues that while women have maintained their role as sexual gatekeepers, men control the marriage market. And given the ease with which sex can be accessed, Regnerus believes that men’s motivations for marriage have all but disappeared. He surveyed 15,000 people and found that among unmarried respondents under 40, “for every 82 men who wished to be married, 100 women said the same.”
Meanwhile, many will go it alone. Self-love for men and women is at an all-time high. A 1992 study found that 29 percent of men (and 9 percent of women) masturbated at least once a week. In 2014, 49 percent of men (and 32 percent of women) confessed to doing it at least once in the previous six days. Unsurprisingly, “as frequency of [watching] porn increased, so did masturbation.”
Regnerus backs this theory up with a quote from social psychologists Roy Baumeister and Kathleen Vohs, who study this phenomenon. “Nowadays young men can skip the wearying detour of getting education and career prospects to qualify for sex,” they write. “Sex has become free and easy. This is today’s version of the opiate of the (male) masses.”
This ratio, he says, keeps ultimate relationship power in the hands of men. “To plenty of women, it appears that men have a fear of commitment. But men, on average, are not afraid of commitment,” Regnerus writes.
Now with porn on demand and greater reproductive freedom, sex is a commodity available at any time. This has left men with little motivation for marriage, writes Regnerus, who cites demographer Steven Ruggles’ prediction that one of every three people in their 20s will never marry.
The share of Americans ages 25-34 who are married dropped 13 percentage points from 2000 to 2014. A new book by sociologist Mark Regnerus blames this declining rate on how easy it is for men to get off.
“The story is that men are in the driver’s seat in the marriage market and are optimally positioned to navigate it in a way that privileges their (sexual) interests and preferences. It need not even be conscious behavior on their part.”
Inside a woman's elaborate attempt to get back at her ex-boyfriend
All of this, Regnerus concludes, means that as long as sex is so low-cost for men, heterosexual women will have increasing difficulties finding a partner worth committing to.
Regnerus argues that while women have maintained their role as sexual gatekeepers, men control the marriage market. And given the ease with which sex can be accessed, Regnerus believes that men’s motivations for marriage have all but disappeared. He surveyed 15,000 people and found that among unmarried respondents under 40, “for every 82 men who wished to be married, 100 women said the same.”
Meanwhile, many will go it alone. Self-love for men and women is at an all-time high. A 1992 study found that 29 percent of men (and 9 percent of women) masturbated at least once a week. In 2014, 49 percent of men (and 32 percent of women) confessed to doing it at least once in the previous six days. Unsurprisingly, “as frequency of [watching] porn increased, so did masturbation.”
Regnerus backs this theory up with a quote from social psychologists Roy Baumeister and Kathleen Vohs, who study this phenomenon. “Nowadays young men can skip the wearying detour of getting education and career prospects to qualify for sex,” they write. “Sex has become free and easy. This is today’s version of the opiate of the (male) masses.”
Or course, since then shares have fallen sharply, down by double-digits since the start of the year and off more than 20% from the highs in mid-January:
The economics of energy are becoming increasingly in favor of renewables, and global demand is on the rise. Whether you're looking to capture a high-yield stream of income or grow your wealth for the long term, Clearway shares are both cheap and attached to a very high-quality business.
The company configures commercial and municipal fleets with electrification options. It provides hybrid and plug-in hybrid electric drive systems for commercial fleet vehicles built by automakers and for large fleet owners like PepsiCo and FedEx. It's also developing a fully electric offering and is adding XL Grid, a division to address the charging infrastructure needs of its more than 200 customers.
Howard Smith (XL Fleet): When investors study the electrification of transportation, most thoughts go to popular electric-vehicle (EV) makers like Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) or the myriad of EV makers that have gone public through special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs).
One of my top stocks for 2021 is on sale right now
Travis Hoium (First Solar): Very few renewable energy companies have the history of profitable operations and rock-solid balance sheet that First Solar has. During the third quarter 2020 earnings release, management said it expects to close the year with $1.2 billion to $1.3 billion of net cash on the balance sheet and $3.65 to $4.15 per share in earnings. Given the current stock price, that's a price-to-earnings multiple of 22, which is cheap for a renewable energy stock today.
The company's current market capitalization is approximately $2 billion. That's less than 1.5 times 2024 sales if XL Fleet achieves its growth expectations. Though there are always risks, the company already has an established product with an established customer base. So it seems plausible XL Fleet can achieve those goals. Relative to other EV valuations, that makes XL Fleet stock look cheap at current levels.
First Solar has proven that it has solar panels that can command a premium in the market and has increased production quickly to meet demand. If the solar industry continues to grow, the company could have a chance to increase production further. And with the cost improvements from competing silicon solar panels seeming to level out, we may not see the pricing pressure of the last decade in solar manufacturing.
As some solar companies try to expand the services they provide to the market, First Solar is specializing in what it does best: produce solar panels. That's served the company well, and given how cheap the stock is, I think it makes shares a good buy today.