Here’s what’s on the docket today… it’s time for us to do our part in lowering the national debt, the US and EU reach a trade agreement, and Astronomer puts on a PR clinic. But first…

In the July 28, 2021 edition of The Water Coolest, we got into the US government’s sale of Martin Shkreli’s 1-of-1 Wu Tang album. You might recall that the fun police seized the asset that the Pharma Bro bought for $2M in the year of our lord 2015. The proceeds from the sale would go towards fulfilling the $7.4M that a court ordered Shkreli to pay in restitution.

ICYMI, last week, the gumshoes over at Bloomberg figured out that the US government sold Once Upon a Time in Shaolin for $2.23M to WTC Endeavours Limited back in 2021. And this might have been the most impressive dealmaking by the US government since the Louisiana Purchase.

Enjoy the next 4 minutes and 38 seconds of blue-chip news and commentary.

Keep on snapping necks and cashing checks,

– tyler

PS, loving The Water Coolest? Forward it to someone who would tip the US government. If you CC me ([email protected]), I’ll send you both something.

PPS, did someone with great taste (who knows you want to help pay down the national debt) forward this to you? Subscribe here.

This whole ‘tip your landlord’ thing is really getting out of hand…

Last week, the guy who runs the NPR TikTok account noticed something only someone who works at NPR would: you can now send donations to the US government to help pay off the national debt via Venmo or PayPal.

Previously, you could only use a credit card or ACH transfers to contribute to the land of the free and the home of the brave’s GoFundMe. Which, yes, means that making donations to the government to help control the spiraling national debt is nothing new.

In fact, the US government has been out here like the Red Cross at Christmas time since 1996. And probably the most shocking part is that the total “Gifts to Reduce the Public Debt” have reached $67.3M since the program’s inception.

Of course, Uncle Sam going all “spare some change?” hasn’t put much of a dent in the nearly $37T national debt. Friendly reminder: the national debt has nearly doubled since 2010, and the big beautiful bill is expected to add more than $3T to our black hole of economic despair.

But, hey, look on the bright side… the US government took some initiative and implemented a payment option that has been around since like 2001. At this rate, we can expect Uncle Sam to accept Bitcoin sometime around the turn of the century.

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+ “Best I can do is 15%.” - POTUS to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen

Saturdays are for the boys… and Sundays are for the deals. The EU and US reached a trade deal during a sit down between Donny Deals and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen… and if there’s a better name for an American adversary, I can’t think of it.

The deal looks and feels a lot like the agreement with Japan: 15% tariffs on EU goods coming into the US, including cars. Aircraft and aircraft parts (so, Airbus), some chemicals, and pharmaceuticals (those sweet, sweet GLP-1s) will be exempt from tariffs.

The EU has also decided to do the home of Freedom Fries a solid in the form of $750B in energy purchases, $600B of additional investment in the US, and the purchase of a f*ck ton of ‘Merica’s weapons of mass destruction.

+ What in the Ryan Reynolds’ “fastvertising” marketing company did I just watch?

For some reason, Astronomer brought on insufferable actress/v*gina egg slinger Gwyneth Paltrow as a “temporary spokesperson.” You might recall that Gwen is the ex-wife of Coldplay singer Chris Martin. You know, the guy who gave the play-by-play of the Astronomer CEO and CHRO’s respective marriages and career falling apart.

The data ops company went for Selena-Gomez-cameo-in-the-Big-Short vibes (it definitely wasn’t Margot Robbie’s scene…). Investors will undoubtedly be stoked to see that the company is being a good steward of capital…

+ There’s only one thing that erodes shareholder value quicker than cutting dividends… and that’s a CEO who starts ending statements with a question mark a la Ron Burgundy…

Despite a pretty decent quarter (by Intel’s $INTC ( ▼ 2.77% ) standards), new-ish CEO Lip-Bu Tan raised some red flags about the company’s future on Thursday… which led to a selloff on Friday.

He didn’t come out and say that Intel would scrap its chip manufacturing biz, which has cost it billions. But he also didn’t commit to it. Instead, he said he’d invest in the fab technology only if there was demand.

Tan said, “I do not subscribe to the belief that if you build it, they will come.” Investors said, “grow a spine, you jellyfish.”

+ I’m not exactly sure why, but it just feels right that xAI’s Grok has a chokehold on the prediction market.

Just a few weeks after becoming the official AI partner of Polymarket (think: “Grok, do you think the Epstein list will be released before or after Caitlin Clark wins a WNBA Championship?”), Kalshi has inked a similar deal. That means the Uber and Lyft of the event-based betting ecosystem have chosen the same AI partner.

Grok will help summarize markets and provide context on wagers. And, spoiler… the partnerships will be a fire hose of valuable prediction data for xAI (… that Sam Altman will probably just scrape illegally anyway).

+ According to The Atlantic, ChatGPT is really, really good at coaching you through self-multiation and is even willing to offer up words of encouragement if you’re a bit unsure.

And in a totally unrelated, but poorly timed interview… Sam Altman reminded everyone: “If you talk to a therapist or a lawyer or a doctor about those problems, there’s legal privilege for it. There’s doctor-patient confidentiality, there’s legal confidentiality, whatever. And we haven’t figured that out yet for when you talk to ChatGPT.”

Meanwhile, I am still trying to figure out why Sam Altman was on Theo Von’s pod…

+ The preferred cooler brand of every dude with a shirtless fish pic on their Tinder profile popped on news that it had become the latest meme stock darling it was a takeover target. Yeti $YETI ( ▲ 1.16% ) jumped more than 5% on rumors that it could have a proud new (PE) owner soon.

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+ US stocks “rose Friday, pushing the S&P 500 to its fifth-straight record this week and lifting the Nasdaq to a new all-time high. Earnings and trade optimism boosted investor sentiment, while President Trump eased market nerves by downplaying talk of firing Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell.” (Yahoo! Finance)

+ The 10-year yield “moved lower on Friday as investors weighed the slate of trade developments and economic data over the past week.” (CNBC)

+ Oil “eased on Friday and settled at a three-week low as traders worried about negative economic news from the U.S. and China and signs of growing supply.” (Reuters)

+ The “smart” money gives both Pope Leo and AI a 33% of winning TIME’s Person of the Year in 2025. (Kalshi)

⏪ On Friday…

+ HCA Holdings, Phillips 66, and Charter Communications reported before the opening bell

⏩ Today we’re keeping an eye on…

+ Abercrombie & Fitch, Dick's Sporting Goods, and Macy's report before the bell

+ Nvidia, Salesforce, e.l.f., C3.ai, Synopsys, SentinelOne, HP, Veeva, and Pure Storage report after hours

+ Target will officially end its price-matching program after a ten-year run of matching prices that customers found for the same item at Amazon and Walmart

Friday, I asked, “What was the best Hulk Hogan?”

63.1% of you said “Hulkamania.“

Here’s what some of you guys had to say…

Here’s today’s question…

Oh, and one more thing…

Sent from my Amazon Fire Phone. Please excuse any mistakes and typos.

Does this look like the face of a guy you should take financial advice from?

No, it’s the face of an individual who is financially irresponsible/dumb enough to be talked into spending money on a family photo shoot that he could have just done with his iPhone. So, act accordingly...

This is not financial advice. Nothing in this newsletter is an investment recommendation. All content is created for entertainment, educational, or informational purposes only. Do your own research, or do yourself a favor and hire a professional.