{"id":64540,"date":"2021-01-16T02:15:11","date_gmt":"2021-01-16T10:15:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lenpenzo.com\/blog\/?p=64540"},"modified":"2021-02-06T09:52:07","modified_gmt":"2021-02-06T17:52:07","slug":"black-coffee-16-jan-2021","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lenpenzo.com\/blog\/id64540-black-coffee-16-jan-2021.html","title":{"rendered":"Black Coffee: Painting the Town Red"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"It’s time to sit back, relax and enjoy a little joe<\/em> …<\/p>\n

Welcome to another rousing edition of Black Coffee, your off-beat weekly round-up of what’s been going on in the world of money and personal finance.<\/p>\n

Okay, let’s get right to it this week …<\/p>\n

If getting drunk is how people forget they’re mortal, then hangovers are how they remember.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

— Matt Haig<\/strong><\/p>\n

Credits and Debits<\/strong><\/p>\n

Debit:<\/strong><\/span> Did you see this? Inflation expectations got another kick as oil climbed to a new 10-month high on Tuesday as the dollar declined. If you haven’t noticed, the price of oil has surged more than 45% since November. That helps explain why the average price of gasoline in the US is also at its highest level in 10 months<\/a> — despite demand being at its lowest<\/strong><\/em> level since May 2020. How can that be, you ask? Two words: dollar debasement.<\/p>\n

Credit:<\/strong><\/span> Meanwhile, the bitcoin craze continues, with the cryptocurrency now pushing $40,000. But wait … it gets better: Some analysts are predicting that Morgan Stanley’s aggressive expansion of, what is now, its 10.9% stake in business-intelligence firm, Microstrategy — a company with $1 billion in bitcoin holdings<\/a> — may<\/strong><\/em> be the catalyst that sends bitcoin past the psychological $100,000 level<\/a>. No, really.<\/p>\n

Debit:<\/strong><\/span> And the craze isn’t limited to bitcoin. Thanks to a recent tweet from Elon Musk urging his followers to “use Signal,” Robinhood and other amateur traders jumped en masse<\/a> into a penny stock for an obscure manufacturing firm known as Signal Advance, catapulting its share price from 60 cents to $38.70 — an increase of 6350%. In just three days. And if you think that’s<\/strong><\/em> absurd, consider this: Musk was referring to an encrypted messaging app — not<\/strong><\/em> Signal Advance.<\/p>\n

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don’t get mad – get E*Trade pic.twitter.com\/rz90L49rsO<\/a><\/p>\n

StockCats (@StockCats) January 8, 2021<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n