Good morning. In today’s edition:

• 💰 More consumer debt is going into delinquency
• 🌌 Behind Europe’s plan to unlock the secrets of the universe
• 📺 A sports bundle is coming to the streaming world

… and more.

🚀⏰ Ready, Set, Go: Today’s news should be about a 5.18-minute read.

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"Reasoning will never make a person correct an ill opinion, which by reasoning they never acquired."

–Jonathan Swift (1667-1745)

Data indicates that Americans are increasingly finding themselves overextended financially. According to a New York Fed report published yesterday, the amount of US consumer debt in serious delinquency – aka 90 days or more past due – rose at an annual rate of more than 40% last quarter.

• In particular, serious delinquencies for credit cards (+59%) and auto loans (+20%) rose to their highest levels in over a decade, while delinquencies for student loans and home equity lines of credit moved slightly lower.

Driving the trend… Fed officials say the data indicates more US consumers – especially younger and lower-income households – are struggling with increased borrowing costs that stem from the central bank’s interest rate hikes over the past two years.

• Average credit card interest rates are currently sitting at 24.3% – the highest level on record and up from 16.3% a year ago.
• The typical interest rate on a five-year auto loan has risen from 4.0% to 7.7% since January 2022.
• The average 30-year fixed mortgage rate has nearly doubled over the past two years (3.87% → 7.0%).

📸 Big picture: By many counts, US consumers are facing favorable economic conditions. Unemployment is at its lowest level in half-a-century, consumer spending saw better-than-expected growth in 2023, and employee wages have outpaced inflation for the past 12 months and counting.

But some experts warn that a growing number of Americans – mostly lower- and middle-income renters – are facing significant financial stress due to high inflation, elevated interest rates, and the resumption of federal student-loan payments last fall.

📊 Flash poll: How would you rate your personal financial situation?

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🌋🇮🇹 Researchers used AI to decipher a scroll burnt by Mount Vesuvius 2,000 years ago. The Vesuvius Challenge offered a $700,000 prize to the first researchers who decoded part of the hundreds of scrolls – now lumps of carbonized ash – discovered in the only surviving library from the ancient world. Three student researchers won the prize after training an AI algorithm to identify ink patterns and translate hundreds of words written by a follower of the Ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus. Scientists say the breakthrough paves the way for AI to translate the scrolls in their entirety.

💥 Israel announced a ground offensive in Rafah, a Gaza city on the Egyptian border. Israeli officials say the offensive is aimed at taking control of the last city where Hamas still has a significant presence, as well as dismantling Hamas’ infrastructure for smuggling weapons from Egypt. More than 1 million Palestinian civilians are sheltering from the war in Rafah, which had a pre-war population of ~250,000. Separately, Israeli intelligence officials said at least 30 of the remaining 136 hostages held by Hamas have died since being captured on October 7.

🇪🇺 The EU scrapped an anti-pesticide proposal in response to mass farmer protests. The proposal would’ve required farmers to cut the use of pesticides by 50% by 2030 to help curb climate change, a move farmers argued would increase the price gap between their products and imports without such restrictions. The EU also announced a combined $290 million in aid to 140,000 farmers, though protests continued across Europe after the funds were unveiled.

On Monday, CERN unveiled plans for the “Future Circular Collider” – a new $17 billion particle accelerator that will be over 3x larger than the Large Hadron Collider, aka the biggest machine in the world.

Some quick background: The Large Hadron Collider’s mandate is like the Incredible Hulk – to smash. The machine collides hadrons (aka subatomic particles) together at 99.99% the speed of light using an underground circular tunnel 17 miles in circumference.

And its overall contribution to science may be as impressive as its size. The LHC has generated 3,000+ scientific papers on many areas of fundamental particle physics, including the discovery of the Higgs boson in 2012.

• But, but, but: Over the past decade, the machine hasn’t revealed any significant new physics that could help answer some of the deepest mysteries of the universe.

CERN is hoping an even larger particle accelerator will change that. The proposed Future Circular Collider would have a 57-mile circumference, and aim to smash subatomic particles together at a maximum energy 30x higher than the LHC.

• CERN says the increased energy will help scientists figure out some of the key unanswered questions about our universe, including whether our reality contains hidden extra dimensions and what makes up dark matter or dark energy (mysterious and invisible substances comprising ~95% of the universe).

👀 Looking ahead… If approved, the FCC would start smashing its first particles together around 2050, and start its highest-energy collisions around 2070.

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Sports fans are getting their own screaming streaming bundle of joy. Disney’s ESPN, Fox, and Warner Bros. Discovery are launching a jointly owned sports streaming platform this fall, the companies announced yesterday.

The deets:

• No name or subscription price has been announced. Each company owns one-third of the newly created entity.
• The platform’s content will be specifically tailored to sports fans. Subscriptions provide access to all the broadcast and cable networks owned by Disney, Fox, and Warner Bros. Discovery that carry sports, along with ESPN+. Collectively, the networks have rights to all of the major professional sporting league events, including the NFL, MLB, NHL, NBA, the major college sports divisions, and more.
• While consumers will be able to subscribe directly via a new app, they’ll also have the ability to bundle the sports product with the companies’ streaming platforms (Disney+, Hulu, and Max).

🤔 Is this cable’s actual death knell?... The TV seesaw: As streaming usage has gone up, cable subscriptions have gone down. But there are still a few holdouts, and data indicates the ability to watch live sports is a major reason why. According to a 2023 CableTV.com survey, ~41% of people who still pay for cable say they do so in order to watch live events, including sports, entertainment award shows, and news.

💬 Quoted… "We're not going to completely change our schedule and do something crazy. We'll deal with what we got."

• This week, San Francisco 49ers Head Coach Kyle Shanahan and his team are channeling Allen Iverson and talking about practice – practice fields, that is. Per the 49ers, the Las Vegas-located practice fields they were provided leading up to the Super Bowl are too soft, a potential safety issue for players. For context, sources told ESPN’s Adam Schefter that the NFL hardness score for fields averages 78, with no field's score being less than 70. The 49ers' field for the week reportedly landed somewhere in the 50s.

🚗 Stat of the Day: Hybrid vehicles are like Pookie and Jett – having a moment. About 1.4 million hybrid and plug-in hybrid vehicles were sold in the US last year, compared with 1.1 million EVs, per new data from car-shopping website Edmunds. And growth-wise, hybrid sales are looking absolutely fire right now. They rose 63% from the previous year, while EV sales rose 51%.

🤔 Did You Know?... Historically, gas gets pricier as spring approaches and people start driving more. Starting around this time in February, wholesale prices have advanced in each of the past 14 years over the next 12 trading sessions, with the overall average increase being ~$0.10/gallon, per data reported by the WSJ. The average gas price in the US is currently sitting at $3.15/gallon.

📰 Worth a Read: Why the Super Bowl halftime show is the most important commercial on TV → (The Hustle)

• ☝️ The Los Angeles area experienced nearly 400 mudslides this week due to one of the wettest storms in Southern California history; over the past two days, LA has seen more than half the amount of rainfall it averages in an entire year.

BUSINESS & MARKETS

in partnership with Chartr

• 💰 US markets rose across the board (S&P: +0.2%; Dow: +0.4%; Nasdaq: +0.1%).
• 🏢 Adam Neumann, cofounder and former CEO of WeWork, is attempting to buy WeWork out of bankruptcy, per multiple reports.
• 📈 Eli Lilly reported strong Q4 earnings amid the launch of Zepbound, its new weight loss drug, and higher prices for Mounjaro, its diabetes treatment. | 🌯 Chipotle reported strong Q4 earnings; same store sales rose 8.4%, above estimates of 7.1%.

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SPORTS, MEDIA & ENTERTAINMENT

• ⚖️ Actress Gina Carano is suing Disney and Lucasfilm for discrimination and wrongful termination over her firing from The Mandalorian; the lawsuit is being partly financed by the Elon Musk-owned X because she was allegedly axed for her posts on the platform.
• 🙏 Country singer Toby Keith died from stomach cancer at 62.
• 🏷️ Meta will begin to label third-party AI-generated content on FB, Insta, and Threads; the social giant also said it’s working on technical standards for labeling AI-generated content that companies across the industry can use.

SCIENCE, SPACE & EMERGING TECH

in partnership with Hers

• ✂️ NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory is laying off 8% of its workforce, or ~530 employees and 40 contractors, due to budgetary issues.
• 🚫📻 A powerful solar flare caused radio blackouts across Australia and Southeast Asia last night; scientists say there’s an elevated possibility of similar flares over the next few days.
• ☀️🪐 Astronomers detected a rare "super-Earth" planet located 137 light-years away that orbits its star within a habitable zone.

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MISCELLANEOUS

• 📝 70 current and former employees of the New York City Housing Authority were charged with bribery and extortion yesterday; the number of bribery charges amounted to a single-day record for the Justice Department. (Read more)
• ⚖️ The mother of the Oxford (MI) school shooter was found guilty of manslaughter by a Michigan jury yesterday; it's believed to be the first time a parent has been held directly responsible for their child committing a school shooting. (Read more)
• ⚖️ A federal appeals court rejected former President Trump’s claim that presidential immunity shields him from charges that he plotted to overturn the 2020 election; Trump’s legal team plans to appeal the decision, potentially to the Supreme Court. | 🏛️🗳️ A House vote to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas failed by a 214-216 margin; four GOP lawmakers and all Democrats opposed the measure.

CLICKBAIT

• 🤔 Harvard-trained nutrition expert: If I could only prioritize one food in my diet, it'd be this.

Last month, Irish musician Seán Magee and his wife flew from Belfast, Ireland, to the Canary Islands for a gig. 

✈️ 🎻 A memorable flight... To avoid storing his precious fiddle in cargo, Sean bought an extra ticket to keep the instrument in a seat. About an hour into the flight, he decided to whip it out and play a little ditty. 

• Fellow passengers began clapping and singing along to the Irish tune; things got even more exciting when another passenger stood up and began Irish dancing in the aisle.  

How it works: We provide an incorrect stat. Then you guess whether the actual number is over or under the stated value.

1. ⌨️ 50%: The amount of typing your left hand does, on average.
2. 🗼 4,000,000: Number of rivets in the Eiffel Tower.
3. 🍌 70%: Amount of a banana that is water.

(keep scrolling for the answers)

👆 Check out the referral prizes you can get, just for introducing people you know to little old us. 

What to do: Copy your unique link below, then send it to anyone who you think would like the DONUT. Once you hit each milestone, you'll get an email with a link to claim your prize. (Pro tip: there's no need to ration points, you're entitled to a prize at each tier.)

Start referring.👇

1. ⌨️ Over, 56%
2. 🗼 Under, 2.5 million
3. 🍌 Over, 75%

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