Newsletter #73: 20 April 2025

just some not headlines for you.

Hellooo everybody,

Happy Easter. I spent an afternoon in the sunshine so I don’t have a true letter, but I do have some Not-Headlines to share. Enjoy, and have a lovely rest of your holiday.

• A recent study found that when you eat caloric foods, neurons in the brain actually store the “sensory and emotional details” of the experience. That’s why I can taste EXACTLY what a handful cashews taste like.

• LVMH, the fashion house typically considered a pacesetter for the luxury sector, reported a 3% drop in their first quarter sales. their leather goods sales dropped 5% and spirits 17% in the same time period.

• Gold has risen in price by about 30% since the beginning of the year. Experts in the commodity describe this move as “totally expected.” during incredibly uncertain times, a broad base of investors (retail and institutional) turn to gold as an inflation hedge. Two things, though, are unique this time: (1) back during covid, gold was trading at just over $1000, while today it is $3,341 and (2) this is the first time chaos caused by the principal global economic power is what is driving interest in the commodity.

• Current dining out trends are characterized by inflation and willingness to endure long wait times. 86% of diners have changed their habits according to increased prices and 90% of diners will wait on line for a ‘must have’ item, 92% for a seat at a ‘must have’ table.

• Sleeping on your stomach can make you more injury-prone and can contribute to chronic pain by flattening and compressing your spine. That sucks, because it’s SOO GOOD.

• X finance bros freaked out the other day about the S&P 500’s death cross, but they really didn’t need to. A death cross happens when an index’s (or stock’s, or any commodity’s) 50-day moving average drops below its 200-day moving average, reflecting a recent weakness of price. Historically, economists point to this inversion as a signal the market is moving into bear market territory. Yes, it’s true a death cross preceded the 1929 and 2008 recessions (to name a few). But, it has occurred in advance of simply a 10% drop in an index’s value plenty of times, too.

Weekly WRAP

Wearing: my hair up.

Reading: Noble Rot.

Admonishing: Umm. Who to choose this week.. perhaps overzealous letter-senders at the White House. See: Harvard debacle and a ‘mistaken’ letter.

Pondering: Who the Rangers’ next coach should be.

XO,

Natasha

and now, the last word: BURN