Matt's Blog

I started this blog for my Marketing class, however I tend to post about other things that interest me, such as rock climbing, ice climbing, hiking, thru hiking, and rowing.

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One of the last stream crossings in the 100 Mile Wilderness, NOBO from Monson

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Hazel Findley @ Reel Rock 8

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fuckkkk

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This was one of the best winter hikes I have been on. It was a little cold but a great time and good conditions. 12/29/13

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I just want to be on the AT right now. Only three more years until my dream comes true

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The market struggled after Janet Yellen signaled the federal funds rate could climb as soon as April 2015.

With the federal fund rate now about to go up from its almost 0 percent since 2008, people are unsure what could happen with the market. While overall it is good that the Fed is pulling money out, it shows that the market is recovering well, it is also nerve wrecking for people and causes some unsertinty with people. It is believed that the S&P will remain about constant or have a little loss in 2014, but overall by 2015 it will be on the upward swing. I think it can be a good thing that this is happening but hopefully people do not get afraid and sell out of the stock. Hopefully the US will finally become for financially stable.

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Top American marathoner Kara Goucher is leaving Nike, aligning instead with a little-known women's apparel startup based in Seattle. Nike reported a 13% rise in sales for its latest quarter on strong global demand.

While Nike can say that losing kara Goucher to another running apparel company will not really effect their over all profit, they may be true, but it shows something about them handling their athletes. I feel that Kara leaving Nike was not about money, but more about personal beliefs. Nike is a controlling company with a large share in the sports industry and advertising, due to this she left because with a small company she can be more outspoken and is not as controlled by the company. I also think it is interesting to see that companies as large as Nike and Adidas still depend on gifted athletes to advertise for them. I honestly think that having athletes advertise for these companies is more important than the actual TV and online advertising that they do. When kids see their favorite athletes wearing NIke gear it is more appealing to them than seeing some cheesy commercial for the product. I remember being a little kid and always wanting to have the cool cleats that my favorite soccer player would wear. 

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The U.S. Justice Department extracted a record $1.2 billion criminal penalty from Toyota for misleading consumers about safety problems and sounded a strong warning to General Motors, now in prosecutors' cross hairs.

As of right now there is a lot of trouble going around the car industry. We have GM facing major recalls, and now Toyota is paying a criminal penalty for lying about safety to its consumers. I feel like the car industry is doing a very poor job on educating their consumers about the actual safety of the companies cars, and they deserve to have to be paying these fines. However, I think it would look better for the company if they stopped caring about profits so much and just told people that there may be a problem with their cars and they should recall them as soon as a problem is found. Keeping people alive is much more important than money.

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Pandora Media said it will be making some changes to its Pandora One subscription plan, including a price increase for new subscribers.

I think that Pandora is making a bad decision by raising their monthly subscription price to $4.99 a month instead of $3.99 per month. I think that people are just going to decide that it is not worth paying that much for music. As of right now I think that Spotify has the best deal going and that they will soon start taking business from Pandora. I am a big Spotify fan and like how you can chose songs to listen to, I think it is a very cool feature and is better than what Pandora has to offer. Pandora also gets stale after awhile and needs some change if they are going to start charging the consumer more money. 

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Surging prices for food staples from coffee to meat to vegetables are driving up the cost of groceries in the U.S., pinching consumers and companies that are still grappling with a sluggish economic recovery.

While I know that it is hard to keep prices of food down when farmers are not able to produce as much as they would like to, due to natural problems such as droughts and such, I do think it is not right that food prices are increasing so much. In the United States there are strong efforts to get people to eat better, due to the rising rate in childhood obesity. However how does anyone expect these programs to work, when the cost of healthy food is exponentially rising. I think that the government needs to step in and help keep the prices of food down, instead of letting the prices uncontrollably rise on people. I think if the food prices keep going up I think people are going to be eating more fast food because the prices do not really change, and its more convenient. Hopefully though the prices do not get out of hand and people can still afford to eat healthy without it putting a huge dent in their pocket.

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Adjustable-rate mortgages, one of the main culprits of the housing crisis, are back in vogue. But banks say this time is different.

Adjustable-rate mortgages are back in the market and it could be a good or bad thing. Adjustable-rate mortgages, also known as ARMs can be a good thing for many people with high set mortgage rates, however they were the problem of the housing crisis in 2008. The interest rate for the mortgages reset every 5 years, so potentially within a 5 year period you could end up with an astronomically high interest rate that you cant afford. This is what happened in 2008 and many people lost their houses and it cripples the housing industry and economy. It is said that there are many more restrictions on the new ARMs, but who knows that will actually end up happening. I hope that these work our this time and do not once again seriously mess up the economy. Even though the ARMs are high risk I think it is a better option for some people to go with, than the fixed rate mortgages. 

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General Motors said it would take a $300 million charge to earnings in its first quarter to cover recall costs for faulty ignition switches and for three new recalls covering about 1.7 million Cadillac, Chevrolet, Buick and Saturn vehicles world-wide.

GM has really gotten themselves into a mess with its consumers, and could potentially loose thousands of them to other car manufacturer's. GM has waited way to long to put out a recall on their cars, and too many have been injured or killed in car accidents due to manufacture malfunctions than should be tolerated. GM has done such a poor job at the recall process I think people will feel unsafe driving their cars, and feel like the company is more into making money than the consumers safety. This could potentially turn into a big problem for GM and they could lose millions of dollars because they did not fix a simple but deadly problem when they found out about it. 

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As Tesla Cools, A Few Brave Shorts Creep Back In - MoneyBeat - WSJ

Short-selling of Tesla shares has plunged over the past year. Until now.

Tesla has been surprising everyone lately with its stock on the up and up. As of right now it seems to have settled down for the time being, currently trading at roughly $247 per share. I believe that Tesla stocks will continue to go up as the company starts to stream-line its self a little more, and when and if they announce a partnership with Apple. I firmly believe that Tesla will be the car of the future, and if they come out with a cheaper model for the middle class, it will only boost their reputation and sales.

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Facebook agreed to buy messaging company WhatsApp for $19 billion in cash and stock, a blockbuster transaction that dwarfs the already sky-high prices that other startups have been able to recently command.

I am a little surprised that Facebook bought WhatsApp for 19 Billion dollars. I am not sure how much this purchase will help out Facebook because they already have Facebook messenger which I feel is a lot like WhatsApp. I also think that if this new purchase does not pan out and help Facebook boost its revenue, it will soon be on its way out. I just feel like people are over the fad of Facebook and it will not really get that many more users.

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Netflix has been at odds with Verizon and other broadband providers over how much Netflix streaming video they will carry without being paid additional fees. Now the conflict is slowing Netflix traffic.

I know that this whole problem with Verizon that netflix is having is really bothering me when I watch it. I think that Netflix should just pay Verizon the additional fee's because if they do not, they are going to start losing customers. It is absurd to have a show stop mid way through, because it has to buffer. Since this has started I have been watching more HBOGo, just because it is more convienant is satisfying my needs more than Netflix is.

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The House approved a bill to extend the federal government's borrowing authority with no strings attached, after GOP leaders dropped all policy demands to avoid a market-rattling confrontation in an election year.

How long will the House keep approving the raising of the debt ceiling? As nice as it is to see that the government will not be shutting down in 2014 it is scary to see that the US is still driving itself into debt. I feel that the government has gotten itself so deep into debt it will never be able to get out of it. It is sad to see the country depending on others countries to keep letting us borrow money and spending it when in reality we probably will never pay a substantial amount of it back. I hope one of the political parties will eventually take a stand and get our countries debt under control, we can't keep spending money that we do not have. The government needs to get its spending under control.

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Sprint said its fourth-quarter loss narrowed, with higher subscriber rolls boosting the cellphone carrier's revenue, though expenses continued to weigh on results.

I am happy to see that Sprint is narrowing its losses that they have endured over the past few months. I think that Sprint is an under rated cellphone provider and that it deserves more credit than it is getting. I hope to see them merge with T-Mobile. I believe that the merger will make them stronger and also provide them with more coverage, allowing them to be even more competitive with Verizon. 

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L.A.'s 'Dumb Starbucks' Imitates the Real Thing - Corporate Intelligence - WSJ

Is “Dumb Starbucks” performance art, marketing ploy, or something else entirely?

I have never heard of a company doing this before but I thought that it was ver unique and quite clever. Dumb Starbucks, has everything a normal Starbucks would have, however the word Dumb proceeds it. This company was allowed to set up a business like this due to the " parody" and "fair use" laws. This parody coffee shop is classified as a form of art, and the coffee they serve is also classified as art too. This is a tricky way to get to use someone else marketing slogans, and logo. I think this is an ingenious way to start up another coffee shop and I am sure they will get a lot of publicity and service for doing this.