Holiday Shopping on Facebook and Instagram?

More than half of consumers are open to the idea [View in browser]( Proprietary Data Insights Top Mega/Large-Cap Credit Services Stock Searches This Month Rank Name Searches #1 Visa 131,630 #2 PayPal 122,350 #3 Mastercard 43,238 #4 Ally Financial 28,272 #5 Discover Financial Services 8,708 #ad [Don’t Miss these 3 Investment Trends for 2023]( Don’t Say We Didn’t Warn You The Juice has been [sounding the alarm on credit card debt]( since early this year. If the latest report from the New York Fed is any indication – and we think it is – we’re headed toward a consumer debt crisis. Bad news for some consumers. But potentially amazing news for investors. Credit Card Debt Just in Time for Holiday Shopping In a minute, interesting data on holiday shopping along with a bonus and maybe unexpected stock pick. But first… - Credit card debt among U.S. consumers is up 15% year over year, the largest annual increase in 20+ years. [chart] Source: NY Fed - For cardholders ages 30 to 59 and 60 to 79, balances are rising but remain below pre-pandemic (Q4 2019) levels. - For people between 18 and 29, credit card balances haven’t risen as fast as for older folks in dollars, but they rose faster percentage-wise and have eclipsed pre-pandemic levels. - Among low-income borrowers, credit card debt is higher on average than it was in December 2019. While delinquency rates remain low, they’re increasing across the board. And they’re rising fastest among low-income earners and 18- to 39-year-olds. Even more alarming, the personal savings rate dropped again in September, to 3.1%. That’s down from 3.4% in August and the second lowest reading in nearly 15 years. This means trouble’s brewing for the people inflation has impacted most as well as Generation Z and millennials. Either these groups have turned to credit cards to make ends meet or people under 40 have thrown caution to the wind, as people post-lockdowns do things again with the attitude that they can make more money later. It’s probably a mix of both and then some. This bodes well for investors. After digging into the data on credit card debt, we dug into our proprietary Trackstar database of the tickers investors search for most. No surprise, Visa (V) ranks #1 among credit services stocks. But searches for V surged dramatically – roughly 101% – over the last few days. As news of credit card balances continuing to climb made headlines, financial pros and retail investors investigated Visa as an investment opportunity. This helps confirm our interest in and subsequent bullishness on the stock. Our sister newsletter, The Spill, gives Visa an [8 out of 10 rating](. At The Juice, [we love Visa equally](. In a nutshell, if consumers keep swiping (not on Tinder), it’s good for Visa. Brought to you by [The Alt]( [Power Your Portfolio with Alternative Investments**]( Cryptos… commodities… real estate… startups… They can help you make a fortune. But it’s hard to figure out which to invest in. That’s why we launched [The Alt**]( – a free newsletter focused on these and other alternative assets. Each issue shows you the latest trends, ideas, and discoveries happening outside of the mainstream. Ready to learn how to take your investments to the next level? [Click here to sign up for The Alt**]( **By clicking the link, you are automatically subscribing to The Alt newsletter. Unsubscribing is easy. Full disclosures [here](. Investing Holiday Shopping on Facebook and Instagram? Key Takeaways: - As we look at how consumers feel about holiday shopping, we wonder if there’s a bargain stock hiding among us. - A large share of people will start holiday shopping earlier this year. - They seem more than willing to utilize social media for gift purchases. As we hit you with data about how consumers feel about holiday shopping this year, a bonus, in-the-investor-doghouse stock for you to consider. Trackstar shows that search interest for Meta Platforms (META) – the parent company of Facebook and Instagram – tanked 46.5% over the last week. And when investors lose interest, there’s often as much opportunity as when interest rises. Remember this old adage: Buy when others are fearful. There’s often opportunity in once-loved, now beaten-down stocks that appear to have life left in them. While everybody seems to hate Facebook and Instagram, not to mention Mark Zuckerberg, these days, check out this interesting data: [chart] Source: Smartly.io - 52% of consumers would consider buying a holiday gift via Facebook. That’s tops among all social media. - 37% would use Instagram, placing the social network third behind Facebook and Google-owned #2 YouTube (GOOG, GOOGL). This puts Meta properties ahead of TikTok, Pinterest (PINS), Snap (SNAP), and Twitter (TWTR). Why does it matter? Because it takes a mix of meaningful reach, loyalty, trust, and strong advertising to get somebody to buy something on social media. So as annoying as Facebook and Instagram ads might be, maybe they’re effective? While Meta stock has bounced back from its earnings crash, it’s still down roughly 16% over the last month and 67% year to date. Makes sense given the 4%, or $1.04 billion, crash in Meta advertising revenue between Q3 of this year and 2021. However, the sell-off in the stock might have been overdone, particularly if Facebook and Instagram gain better-than-expected traction with shoppers this holiday season. Something to think about as you shop for gifts. Some other interesting tidbits: - 40% of consumers say they’ll start holiday shopping earlier this year than they did last. - 26% have already started shopping. - 62% are open to making a purchase through social media. - The top factors consumers consider when contemplating purchases via digital ad are discounts, trustworthiness, and personalization. Say what you want about Facebook and Instagram, people trust the two platforms enough to endlessly scroll through them daily and, according to the data, buy things through them. And, in The Juice’s experience, if Meta does anything well, it’s getting relevant, personalized ads in front of you, over and over again. [Our Best Stock Pick Every Day]( Stop wasting time scouring the internet for stock picks. Get daily rankings and expert analysis of popular stocks and rare finds – including our top pick – directly to your inbox when you sign up for The Spill. [Sign up today.]( The Bottom Line: Put yourself in Meta’s shoes as a Meta sales VP or on-the-ground salesperson. Despite the downright scary Q3 and stock market carnage, you still have data to take to advertisers. And we assume the data Meta has on how users shop via its platform is richer than the third-party data the rest of the world sees. This has to be the hard sell: Ignore the noise. We can still convert your holiday ads into holiday purchases. If this works, Meta’s Q4 could surprise, which could send the company’s stock soaring in Q1 2023. News & Insights Freshly Squeezed - [Bill Gates’ Top 10 Dividend Stocks]( - [What Financial Professionals Are Researching]( - [Domino’s Pizza Stock Looks Like a Bargain During Thanksgiving]( - [Block Is the Most Shorted Crypto Stock: How Do Coinbase, Microstrategy Compare?]( [We want to hear from you! 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