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Your 'Not Financial Advice' Guide to Navigating Thanksgiving: Tips to Avoid Politics and Focus on What Matters… Football and Trading

Tuesday, November 23, 2021 03:23 PM | Neal Farmer

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Your 'Not Financial Advice' Guide to Navigating Thanksgiving: Tips to Avoid Politics and Focus on What Matters… Football and Trading

The holiday season is upon us once again which means it's time to gather around and enjoy way too much food and indulge in way too many political discussions that help no one at the table.

Although maybe this year the questions can be steered away from election results to "what are NFTs?" and explaining why your cousin is constantly screaming “TO THE MOON!!” while playing Fortnite in his Tesla.

Cryptocurrencies and meme investment have taken over the conversation in 2021 with the development of assets such as non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and retail traders engaging in a herd mentality to trade Dogecoin, Gamestop (GME), AMC Entertainment (AMC), or even Digital World Acquisition Corp (DWAC).

How to Bore the Family to Silence

There may be some confusion by those outside why this is happening now but social media has really allowed for this kind of development as more people engaged in trading during the pandemic and were given stimulus checks that they could afford to use for investing. Most know what Gamestop and AMC are but had to learn why traders were pushing those stocks as hedge funds had heavily shorted the stocks making them susceptible to a short squeeze.

Topics such as how a short squeeze, or it's even more complicated cousin, the gamma squeeze, work are wonderful topics to ramble on about and bore family members so that they won’t want to ask you any more questions on how you’re keeping up with inflation. Explaining what a special acquisition company (SPAC) is to your aunt or uncle should help finish the job in case they haven’t given up yet. And don't worry, if you don’t know the answer, then just say it's something that goes up in value if it has a highly divisive political and social figure behind it.

After conversations on meme stocks, someone is bound to ask what the heck a dog coin is.

This is it. Perfect time to explain, ad nauseum, the intricacies of blockchain technology and why cryptocurrencies and NFTs are the future. People love art, memes, and dogs.

Why are People Buying Dogecoin?

Who doesn’t want to pay for goods and services with a currency represented by an extremely good boy? Abraham Lincoln and George Washington are cool but sorry they are no match for a furry ball of joy that will love you unconditionally. Dogs are the best and it's about time we PAY them the respect they deserve.

nFtS ArE WoRtHlEsS

Cool, that's a great argument. Also the Mona Lisa is worthless and has no intrinsic value outside of the cost of fabric is what is painted on. Art is worth what someone will pay for it and if you want to make fun of someone buying NFTs no problem. Just keep that same energy and make fun of someone paying millions for art when I can buy a copy for $20 online.

Crypto

Cryptocurrency and blockchain technology aren’t exactly brand new technology but are still something that very few understand in 2021. Everyone’s heard of Bitcoin and more people are learning about Ethereum and the thousand other crypto projects currently being developed. For the family members that ask what crypto is and why are Matt Damon and Tom Brady constantly trying to get them to start trading it, blockchain technology allows for high security with each computer cross checking transactions in a decentralized structure that theoretically cannot be manipulated by a central authority.

Cryptocurrency has had its moments in the past but is becoming more mainstream with technology advancing and more purchases moving online during the global pandemic. Meanwhile, more businesses accepting these currencies as payment are allowing for people to finally use crypto as a means of payment for goods instead of just holding because they believe it will become more mainstream in the future. Discussing the application of El Salvador making bitcoin an official currency and the controversial energy sources for proof-of-work (PoW) cryptocurrencies should help table any heavy political discussions for a while.

What Really Matters

Thanksgiving is a great excuse for eating way more food than you should and spending all day hanging out with the family watching some (usually subpar) football games. There may be some contentious topics but keeping it financial could never go wrong in any way. Even if it does, bringing the conversation back to how bad the Lions look or how Dallas is once again not living up to expectations late in the season is always entertaining.

Meanwhile, the Saints and Bills should have been a nice little matchup of two sneaky Super Bowl contenders a few weeks ago but now looks like two frauds fighting for a playoff spot.

Matching Teams to Financial Assets

If you want to compare the football teams financially for literally no reason whatsoever it's pretty easy.

Organizations that can’t seem to ever get it right and are stuck in mediocrity (hello Lions and Bears) if not worse… meet Wells Fargo (WFC).

Teams that constantly don’t meet expectations and flail out late in the season… Raiders and Cowboys meet your new partner Intel (INTC).

Franchises looking poised for a Super Bowl run recently but now suddenly look like also-rans in need of reconstruction… Bills and Saints fans can look to Zoom (ZM), Slack, Nikola (NKLA), DraftKings (DKNG), and Uber for help understanding what went wrong.

Finally, for those who just want to invest in an organization that can’t seem to stop winning even when major figures leave the team… Patriots fans can hold their Apple (AAPL) stock.

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