Daily Archives

The SEC is pissed… at who else but Tesla CEO Elon Musk. Musk is accused of making “false and misleading” statements to investors via Twitter. Remember that? If not, let us refresh your memory. On August 7th, Musk tweeted that he was considering taking his company private at $420 per share with funding secured. The SEC is claiming that he didn’t secure funding.

On the day of the tweet… Tesla’s share price shot up by 9%. However, Tesla hasn’t been doing so hot since and Tesla dropped another 11% in after-hours trading on Thursday. Elon Musk, of course, disagrees with the SEC’s claims and released a statement saying, “This unjustified action by the SEC leaves me deeply saddened and disappointed.”

And it gets stupider… because the SEC’s complaint alleges that Musk rounded up the go-private price to $420 because he thought it would be funny (get it? 420). Musk also failed to consult with, well, anyone of importance about the decision before putting it out there. And, if you know anything, you would know that Musk abandoned his well thought out plan three weeks after the tweet. We’ve said it before, and now we’re repeating it – Elon Musk needs to stay the hell away from Twitter.

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Cadillac is going to Michigan… and GM plans to move the company’s headquarters back to Detroit near its technical center. And if you’re wondering what a “technical center” is, it is where GM gets most of their vehicle design and engineering done.

GM and Cadillac are close… but not that close, and the Cadillac will remain its own brand and business. Cadillac has big plans for the future that include luxurious electric cars and self-driving vehicles. For this reason, the company thought it made sense to bring the marketers and executives closer to the design team in Michigan.

Forget New York… because Cadillac would like to. Since moving to the Big Apple, Cadillac has seen US sales and its luxury car market share decline slowly but surely. However, global sales have done significantly better, up 45% over the same period. And apparently, the international market is where it’s at – 60% of Cadillac sales are now sourced outside of the US compared to 40% three years ago.

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Cut the crap… and visit Amazon’s store that only sells high-rated items. Amazon currently has a physical store that only sells products with high customer ratings – and this includes non-Amazon items, too. To qualify to be featured in the store, the merchandise must be a top-seller, have a 4-star rating or better, or be new and trending on the website.

It is a 4,000 square foot store… that has sections for ‘Most-Wished-For’ and ‘Trending’ that showcases categories normally listed on the website. These sections carry items like the baby blue Fujifilm instant camera and bottles of Gorilla Super Glue. The 4-star ratings are displayed on customer review cards and include snippets from real customer reviews.

This store is yet another example… of how Amazon is moving toward brick-and-mortar. The company will maintain a massive online presence, of course, but it is an interesting move nonetheless. And believe it or not, most retail spending still happens in physical stores.

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