Good morning and Happy St. Patrick’s Day! May the luck o’ the Irish be with you.☘️

🚀⏰ Ready, Set, Go: Today’s news takes 3.84 minutes to read.

"The joy of life comes from our encounters with new experiences."

–Christopher McCandless (1968-1992)

🇺🇦 Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky addressed Congress virtually yesterday, urging lawmakers to recall Pearl Harbor and 9/11 as a comparison for what his country is going through each day.

• Zelensky renewed his appeal for a no-fly zone over Ukraine – which NATO has explicitly ruled out – and said absent such a move, anti-aircraft weapons should be provided to his troops.
• Following Zelensky’s address, President Biden pledged an additional $800 million in military assistance to Ukraine, including 100 drones, 800 Stinger anti-aircraft systems and 2,000 anti-armor missiles, and also called Russian President Vladimir Putin a “war criminal.”
• Ukraine’s military has launched a counteroffensive in the north pushing outwards from the capital of Kyiv. In the south, Ukrainian forces advanced towards Kherson, the only regional capital captured and occupied by Russia.
• Melitopol Mayor Ivan Fedorov, who was abducted by Russian forces last week, was freed as the result of a "special operation" carried out by Ukraine.
• The UN confirmed at least 724 Ukrainian civilians have been killed and 1,174 injured since the invasion began, but said the actual numbers for both are likely much higher.

+The latest news: From the Left | From the Right

🏦 The Fed’s Open Market Committee voted to raise interest rates by 0.25% following the conclusion of its two-day meeting yesterday afternoon, the first increase in over three years.

• The rate hike was approved by an 8-to-1 margin, with the lone dissenting vote pushing for a 0.5% increase instead.
• The committee also updated its projections for this year’s GDP (from 4% to 2.8%) and overall inflation (from 2.7% to 4.1%).
• Fed officials indicated an aggressive path ahead, with plans to increase rates again after each of the six official meetings left this year. If carried out, this would result in a minimum 1.75% increase by the end of the year; rates currently range from 0.25%–0.5%.

📸 The big picture: The Fed’s decision to raise the overnight rate on lending between banks will have a domino effect on borrowing costs throughout the entire US economy.

You can expect to see higher rates on mortgages, credit cards, student loans, saving accounts, corporate debt and more. How much those rates increase will depend on how investors, businesses and households respond.

+Dig deeper: From the Left | From the Right | What exactly is the role of the Federal Reserve?

☕️ Howard Schultz is back in charge of Starbucks – for a third time. The coffee chain’s current CEO Kevin Johnson will retire in April after five years in the position and will be replaced in the interim by Schultz, the company announced Wednesday.

• Schultz previously served as CEO from 1986 to 2000, presiding over the chain’s multibillion dollar rise, and then again from 2008 to 2017. He also weighed a potential presidential run in 2020.
• Over Johnson’s tenure, shares of Starbucks rose more than 50% but underperformed the S&P 500, which went up 83% over the same period.
• The company’s shares are down almost 30% this year as it struggles with higher costs overall and weaker sales in China.

📸 The big picture: Starbucks sales nosedived when the pandemic started, but roared back as customers shifted to to-go and drive-thru and placed orders on Starbucks' mobile app.

The coffee chain also shifted its approach to building new cafes and is now adding more smaller stores with less room for seating and more emphasis on to-go orders in urban areas, while adding more drive-thru space in suburban locations, Reuters reports.

And its search for a permanent CEO comes amidst growing unionization efforts by the company’s baristas. To date, roughly 140 Starbucks stores in 26 states have petitioned the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to unionize.

• Six locations so far have voted in favor of a union – and on Tuesday, the NLRB filed a complaint over accusations Starbucks retaliated against two employees in Phoenix who were seeking to unionize their store location.

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🏀 The first full round of March Madness starts just after noon ET today – and the US is ready to gamble. An estimated 45 million Americans will combine to bet over $3 billion on this year’s men’s tournament, according to the American Gaming Association.

• More than 80% of those bettors plan to wager via bracket contests. (For example: everyone tosses in $10 and the winner takes all.)
• But nearly 80% of the money is expected to go towards non-bracket bets, up from 55% last year.
• Twenty-nine million more Americans can legally (😉) bet on March Madness this year than last year, after markets launched in nine states: AZ, CT, LA, MD, ND, SD, WA, WI and WY.

💰 Zoom out: The legalized US sports betting market more than doubled last year, with 12% of American adults saying they now wager on sports at least weekly (up from 5% in January 2021).

• Goldman Sachs predicts the online sports gambling market will grow from ~$1 billion today to $39 billion by 2033.

+Fun fact: The odds of achieving a perfect bracket are 1 in 9,223,372,036,854,775,808. But if you know a little something about basketball, the odds drop to roughly 1 in 120,000,000,000. 

• ☝️ A swarm of drones formed a QR code in the sky above Austin, TX, to promote Paramount’s new Halo TV series; the South by Southwest festival wraps up on Sunday.

BUSINESS & MARKETS

• 📈 US stocks closed up across the board following a volatile session, especially during the period around the Fed’s interest rate announcement. (Dow: +1.5% | S&P: +2.2% | Nasdaq: +3.8%)
• 🏬 Walmart is hiring 50,000 more workers by the end of April.
• ⛽ DoorDash announced a gas rewards program for drivers to offset rising prices at the pump; unlike Uber and Lyft, DoorDash says it isn’t passing the extra cost to customers. (Not to toot our own horn or anything, but we kinda called this yesterday.)

SPORTS, MEDIA & ENTERTAINMENT

• 📱 Instagram is adding parental controls in the US for the first time.
• 🏈🎤 Joe Buck & Troy Aikman signed multi-year deals with ESPN to announce Monday Night Football.
• 📺 Fired CNN anchor Chris Cuomo is seeking a $125 million wrongful termination settlement from the network. | The "Ellen DeGeneres Show" is coming to an end.

SCIENCE, SPACE & EMERGING TECH

• 💉 The NIH launched Phase I clinical trials of three experimental mRNA vaccines to prevent HIV.
• 🛰️🪞 The James Webb Space Telescope’s main mirror is now fully aligned and performing better than expected, NASA revealed yesterday.
• 📺 A Ukrainian TV station was reportedly hacked and made to broadcast a deepfake of President Volodymyr Zelensky surrendering to Russia.

EVERYTHING ELSE

• 💻 Read about hacking group Anonymous’ “cyber war” against Russia.
• 🌐📲 Starlink's mobile app was the most downloaded App Store app in Ukraine over the weekend.
• 🏛️ California lawmakers introduced a bill that would make tech companies liable for social media addiction in children. (From the Left | From the Right)
• 📱👂 Looking for new podcasts? Check out Dr. D's Social Network and delve into deep, unscripted conversations with professionals in music, kink, psychology, fitness, politics, spirituality and more. Follow along as Dr. D tackles taboo topics head-on with guests from all over the planet and listen here.*

*This is sponsored advertising content

💬 Quoted… “We are working on bringing NFTs to Instagram in the near term.” –Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg in an interview at SXSW this week.

🏀 Number of the Day… 60 points – the NBA’s highest single-game scoring total this season, achieved this week by both Karl Anthony-Towns and Kyrie Irving. They each did so with just 31 shots.

🤯 Did You Know?... The largest buyer of explosives in America is the US Department of Defense (surprise!). The second-largest is Disney World.

📖 Worth a Read… Meet the Woman Who Builds the World's Most Unique Airbnbs → (The Hustle)

Permanent standard time – “For people who start work early and have to go into the office, the lack of sun in the morning can quickly get depressing and makes it more difficult to get out of bed.”

Permanent Daylight-Saving Time – “More daylight in the afternoon / evening hours means more opportunities to spend time outside. We should build on the Covid momentum where many of us again learned to enjoy our personal and public outdoor spaces.”

I like the current system how it is – “Time changes are brutal, but starting the day or ending the evening in full dark for months on end is much worse. I think the system we have now is set up to maximize the benefits of both standard time and DST.”

Unsure/Other – “No more time zones; every country should be on the same 24 hour clock. The main difference would be that morning and night would be at different hours depending on where you live, but it makes global timing so much easier.”

+Note on sample size: We received 6,009 responses. Some may have been lightly edited for grammar or clarity.

When Kevin Eubanks suffered a stroke eight years ago and lost much of the use of his left arm, he knew his day-to-day life would look different. But one thing he didn't think of was just how much he would miss hugs.

Luckily for Kevin, his daughter Emily is an occupational therapy adjunct professor at Arkansas State University. She recently asked her students to design a device that could help her father in some way. 

• Moved by the idea of helping Kevin hug again, her students got to work. 

🤗 Simple device, big payoff... After the first prototype was finished, Emily brought the "Hug Again" home to test it on her dad. 

• His grandchildren, whom he hadn't held or hugged since they were babies, were first in line. 

💬 The reaction: Kevin was overcome with emotion as he thanked the students through tears. "I appreciate everything y'all have done," he said. "This is a dream of mine." 

🔢 How Good Are You With Numbers? The last person to get all three puzzles right hit the Powerball the next day… and we haven’t heard from her since. (Sarah, if you’re reading this, call us back. We’re not after your money – just your lake house twice a year.😉)

Obtain the desired result by adding, subtracting, multiplying or dividing the numbers provided below. Each provided number can be used only once, and you don’t necessarily have to use each one.

Series #1

Numbers: 2, 3, 9, 10, 50

Result: 570

Series #2

Numbers: 4, 5, 7, 25, 50

Result: 496

Series #3

Numbers: 5, 7, 10, 15, 50

Result: 472

❓ Daily Trivia: There are 63 total games in a March Madness bracket. What’s the record for most games picked correctly to start a tournament?

(keep scrolling for the answers)

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Here’s your unique link to copy & send to anyone you think would like the DONUT:

Numbers:

#1: 9 - 2 = 7; 7 + 50 = 57; 57 x 10 = 570

#2: 5 x 7 = 35; 35 - 25 = 10; 10 x 50 = 500; 500 - 4 = 496

#3: 50 - 5 = 45; 45 x 10 = 450; 450 + 7 = 457; 457 + 15 = 472

P.S. There are other answers, too; these are just the easiest ones we could find

Trivia: 49; Ohio native Greg Nigl became the first person to carry a perfect bracket past the second round in 2019.