Hello, N2K’ers!

Vote for the winner of this week’s world famous News Haiku^TM competition in today’s poll below ⬇️. Now let’s talk about the news you Need2Know, eh?

—Matt Davis, Need2Know Chedditor

News You Need2Know

• Wall Street rises toward more records

• Kimmel suspension and Trump’s growing power

• Why ‘great legs’ matter for today’s movies

• Founder tells how Poppi made two billion bucks

• Babbel takes on Duolingo on ‘speaking anxiety’

• Poll of the day: Haiku time

What’s the stock market up to, eh?

$SPX ( ▲ 0.26% ) $DJI ( ▲ 0.09% ) $NDX ( ▲ 0.61% )

Companies mentioned in today’s newsletter

$INTC ( ▼ 0.42% )  $NVDA ( ▼ 0.2% )  $PEP ( ▼ 0.99% )  $DIS ( ▲ 0.7% )  

Wall Street rises toward more records

Wall Street hit new records again yesteday as technology stocks rallied. Leading the charge was Intel $INTC ( ▼ 0.42% ) , which soared 26%, marking its best trading day since 1987. The surge came after Nvidia $NVDA ( ▼ 0.2% ) announced a $5 billion investment in Intel stock and a new collaboration to develop products for data centers and personal computers. Nvidia, Wall Street’s most valuable company, rose 2.9%, providing significant momentum to the market.

Positive economic reports also added fuel to the market’s optimism. Growth in mid-Atlantic manufacturing exceeded economists' expectations, while jobless claims dropped, signaling a potential slowdown in layoffs. These factors eased concerns raised by last week’s four-year high in unemployment claims. “The strength in manufacturing and improved labor market data are providing much-needed relief,” analysts noted.

Critics continue to warn the market may be overvalued, but whatever. Check your 401(k), and smoke ‘em if you got ‘em. That’s #NotFinancialAdvice.

Song of the day: Big Thief, ‘Los Angeles’

Here’s a warm, soulful, and atmospheric track that serves as a "love hymn" to Los Angeles, a city where I once spent my life savings on camera equipment because the saleswoman was so persuasive. It’s also where my wife and I consummated our relationship in a Hollywood AirBnB on the eve of Donald Trump’s first election. Happy anniversary! My best Los Angeles story, however, is the time I drove a rental car from the airport on cold medication and thought, sincerely, that I was driving a space rocket. What a place.

Kimmel suspension and Trump’s growing power

President Donald Trump has used threats, lawsuits, and government pressure as he remakes the American media landscape.

He has already reached settlements with ABC $DIS ( ▲ 0.7% ) and CBS $CBS ( ▲ 1.17% ) over their coverage. He has filed defamation lawsuits against The Wall Street Journal $NWSA ( ▲ 0.08% ) and The New York Times $NYT ( ▲ 0.3% ) . Republicans in Congress stripped federal funding from NPR and PBS.

Now Trump’s efforts appear to be escalating after Charlie Kirk’s assassination, the Associated Press reports, with possible broader implications.

The latest push began Monday night, when Kimmel began talking about last week’s shooting. Trump allies said Kimmel was falsely suggesting that the shooter was right wing, which led to Kimmel’s show’s suspension. Authorities have not formally presented a motive for the killing. Gov. Spencer Cox, R-Utah, said “there clearly was a leftist ideology.”

Kimmel has yet to comment on his suspension.

Today on the ‘gram: More points? More prizes?

Post of the day: This documentary is going to be so much better than the actual movie

Quote of the Day

Why ‘great legs’ matter for today’s movies

The way people go to the movies has been changing, but don’t be fooled into thinking the future is bleak for movie theaters. When you crunch the box office numbers, they reveal some optimistic trends. 

Some analysts panicked when James Camerons’ latest “Avatar” chapter debuted $20 million under box office projections on its opening weekend back in December 2022. However, in due course, the film made five times that number in box office. There is no reason to fret this summer’s box office, either, because numbers seem to be showing us that people tend to go out less for opening weekends of major movies than they used to. Instead, the secret to success for modern movies seems to lie in their long “legs.”

“Superman” (pictured above), “Weapons,” and “F1: The Movie” each had solid opening weekends, but their real success was in their long legs. Not Aunt Gladys’ stellar gams, but the films’ weekend-to-weekend holds, with each making about three and a half times the amount of their debut weekend over the course of their theater runs. It means people actually liked these movies, told their friends and families to go, or returned themselves. 

There have been a few other surprising trends in recent box office numbers. First up, reboots originally bound for streaming have outperformed. Both “Freakier Friday” and the summer’s biggest winner ”Lilo & Stitch (2025)” were originally bound for streaming, so Disney would’ve been thrilled if they brought in any money at all, and they happened to bring in a lot. The Lindsay Lohan reboot bought in almost $150 million, and the Lilo and Stitch remake made $423 million domestically. 

Different kinds of movies were making a splash in a way they haven't in a while, with two R-rated horror films, “Weapons” and “Final Destination: Bloodlines” cracking the top 10 domestic summer box office, as well as A24’s romantic dramedy ”Materialists” making over $100 million globally.

There were some surprising losses with films like Pixar’s “Elio” and “Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning”, which made $600 million globally but needed to make around $800 million to justify its $400 million production budget.

Those losses aren’t the main story — filmgoing culture is rebuilding itself. The future looks bright with great holds, studios making their streaming content profitable, and variety returning to the big screen. 

–Grant Keller

Should you check your 401(k) today?

👍️ 

Oh, YES.

Founder tells how Poppi made two billion bucks

Alison Ellsworth, founder of Poppi, shared the inspiring journey of transforming a home kitchen experiment into a billion-dollar soda sensation with us.

"I always say I'm living the American dream. I started this in my kitchen," Alison said, highlighting her passion to share it with as many people as possible. After a successful appearance on Shark Tank and a rebrand, Poppi has become "one of the fastest growing beverages in the history of beverage."

Poppi's mission is clear: "to revolutionize soda for the next generation because we give you the freedom to drink soda again," she said. With just five grams of sugar and “understandable” ingredients, Poppi offers a guilt-free alternative to traditional sodas. "It's 89% less sugar than traditional soda," Alison said, neglecting to say that she has evidently taken all the fun out of it.

The new partnership with PepsiCo $PEP ( ▼ 0.99% ) (they bought Poppi for almost $2 billion in May) has been pivotal for distribution, allowing Poppi to reach a wider audience.

"Poppy is able to get into more hands. Literally, it's as simple as that," Alison said, anticipating a massive expansion from 50,000 to 350,000 locations. Despite the acquisition, Poppi maintains its independent spirit in product development, Alison said, with a lab in Austin, Texas, where the firm continues to innovate.

"Taste is king," she said, advising other company founders to "put your ego aside" and collaborate with great people.

Babbel takes on Duolingo on ‘speaking anxiety’

You know how you’ve been doing Duolingo for like five years but you’re still scared to speak the language? Or is that just me?

That’s why Babbel has started "Babbel Speak," an AI-powered conversation agent designed to help learners overcome speaking anxiety. (I’m trying to figure out how this is different from Duolingo Max, with its new conversational elements, but I can’t figure it out because I’m not paying the extra money to try it out.)

Julie Anson from Babbel explains, "The whole point of Babbel Speak is to remove that fear and to support you gently on your language learning so that you gain confidence." She stressed the importance of a "judgment-free zone" where "the machine does not care how bad your accent is, how many times you ask it to repeat itself."

Sounds perfect. While acknowledging the marvel of instant translation in Apple’s new earbuds, Anson did point out that understanding a language is nothing like being able to speak it. "Only when you learn a language can you immerse yourself in the culture and really understand another people," she said.

Poll of the day: Haiku time

Pick a winner for this week’s world famous News Haiku^TM competition, would you? The theme is that Albania has hired an AI-generated “minister” to root out corruption.

Poll results: Unemployment is worrying you

We asked: Are you worried about rising unemployment among college graduates?

You answered:

🟨🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ Yes. I am a college graduate, ergo this news concerns me. (146)

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 Yes. I am not a college graduate but any rise in unemployment worries me. (328 votes)

⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ No. I am a college graduate but I have a lovely job and am not scared at all about losing it. Ha ha ha. (31)

⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ No. I am not a college graduate, and I'm very happy working this job at the abbatoir, thank you very much. (17)

🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ Other. (71)

593 Votes via @beehiiv polls