Historical Scenarios

Zoom announces $14.7B acquisition of Five9 contact center software. Intended to expand beyond video meetings. Five9 shareholders vote down deal—Zoom stock…

Zillow's iBuying business (buying homes directly) collapses spectacularly. Algorithm can't predict home prices. Bought high, selling low. Takes $881M loss…

Dollar Shave Club launches with viral video. 'Our Blades Are F***ing Great' gets 26M views. Subscription razors delivered to door undercut Gillette's 70%…

Slack goes public via direct listing. Pioneered workplace messaging. But Microsoft Teams bundled with Office 365 aggressively. Pandemic boosts both but…

Peabody Energy, world's largest private coal company, files bankruptcy as coal industry collapses. Natural gas and renewables crushing coal. China demand…

RadioShack, electronics retail icon, collapses as Amazon and Best Buy dominate. Tried becoming mobile phone store but failed. Couldn't compete on price or…

Affirm IPOs as buy-now-pay-later leader. Founded by PayPal co-founder Max Levchin. Partners with Peloton, Shopify, Amazon. Transparent financing vs credit…

After Parkland school shooting, Dick's stops selling assault-style rifles and raises age to 21 for gun purchases. CEO Ed Stack takes activist stance despite…

Okta pioneers identity-as-a-service for enterprises. Every employee login goes through Okta. Cloud applications proliferating—Okta becomes connective…

LVMH announces $16.2B acquisition of Tiffany at $135/share. Then pandemic hits—luxury spending collapses. LVMH tries to back out citing pandemic impact.…

Riot Platforms (formerly biotech company) pivots to Bitcoin mining. Essentially pure-play on Bitcoin price. Builds massive mining facility in Texas. Stock…

Blockbuster dominates video rental with 9,000 stores. Netflix offers to sell for $50M—Blockbuster declines. DVD-by-mail and streaming destroy store model.…

Roku IPOs as streaming platform leader. Smart TVs with built-in streaming threaten hardware business. But Roku's platform strategy succeeds—licensing OS to…

EA's Star Wars Battlefront II loot box controversy explodes. Players must grind 40 hours or pay to unlock characters. Most downvoted Reddit comment ever.…

NVIDIA launches CUDA platform, enabling GPUs for general computing beyond graphics. This is visionary bet on parallel computing. Market doesn't…

Chipotle recovers from E. coli crisis through digital transformation. Mobile ordering and delivery partnerships (DoorDash, Uber Eats) create second…

During worst recession since Great Depression, Costco's membership model proves remarkably resilient. Renewal rates stay above 90%. Value proposition…

AMC, facing bankruptcy from pandemic theater closures, becomes meme stock. Reddit traders push stock from $2 to $72. CEO Adam Aron embraces retail…

Pinterest IPOs as visual discovery platform. 80% female user base with high purchase intent. Different from Facebook/Instagram—positive, aspirational…

WeWork attempts IPO at $47B valuation. S-1 filing reveals massive losses, self-dealing, and corporate governance disaster. Adam Neumann's behavior exposed.…

Wall Street Journal exposes Theranos blood-testing technology as fraudulent. Elizabeth Holmes claimed revolutionary testing from finger prick. Reality: used…

Domino's admits pizza tastes bad in honest advertising. Then transforms into technology company that happens to sell pizza. Pizza tracker, mobile ordering,…

Apple sues Qualcomm over patent licensing fees, calling them excessive. FTC antitrust suit follows. Multiple countries investigate. Qualcomm's licensing…

Shake Shack, premium burger chain, goes public at $21 (opens $47). Only 63 locations but cult following. Danny Meyer's hospitality expertise. Premium…

Apple announces revolutionary iPhone with touchscreen and no physical keyboard. BlackBerry CEO Jim Balsillie dismisses it as not enterprise-ready, lacking…

Seven people die from cyanide-laced Tylenol capsules in Chicago. Product tampering, not manufacturing defect. J&J immediately recalls 31 million bottles…

FedEx ends ground delivery contract with Amazon, saying it's de-prioritizing relationship. Amazon building own logistics network—drones, planes, trucks,…

Reddit's WallStreetBets orchestrates massive short squeeze on GameStop. Stock surges from $19 to $483 in weeks. Melvin Capital and other hedge funds lose…

Elon Musk offers $44B to buy Twitter, then tries to back out claiming bot issues. Twitter sues to enforce deal. Musk eventually forced to complete…

Ryan Cohen (GameStop chairman) buys BBBY stake and options. Reddit traders pump stock to $30. Then Cohen dumps entire position for profit. Stock crashes.…

Goldman Sachs charged with helping Malaysian officials steal billions from 1MDB sovereign wealth fund. Bankers earned $600M in fees facilitating bonds.…

Mylan faces outrage after raising EpiPen price 500% to $600+ for 2-pack. Life-saving allergy treatment now unaffordable for many. CEO Heather Bresch…

Uber goes public at $45, valuing company at $82B. Massive losses continuing—over $1B per quarter. Path to profitability unclear. Competition from Lyft,…

Michael Dell takes company private in $24.9 billion LBO with Silver Lake. PC market declining—shift to enterprise solutions requires transformation. Public…

Southwest's revamped Rapid Rewards loyalty program driving customer stickiness and premium revenue. Points-based system more flexible. No blackout dates.…

California sues Activision Blizzard over 'frat boy' culture and sexual harassment. Damning details of misconduct and management indifference. CEO Bobby…

Altria spins off Philip Morris International—pure international tobacco play without US litigation risk. Emerging markets tobacco consumption growing. PMI…

Lehman Brothers, 158-year-old investment bank, collapses in largest bankruptcy in US history. Subprime mortgage exposure devastating. Government refuses…

Match Group's Tinder successfully monetizes with Tinder Gold, Boost, Super Likes. Swipe-based dating revolutionized industry. Freemium model with premium…

Zoom IPOs as video conferencing leader with superior user experience. Already profitable unlike most tech IPOs. Then pandemic hits, making Zoom essential…

GM recalls 2.6 million vehicles for defective ignition switches linked to 124 deaths. Company knew about problem for decade but didn't fix it. Internal…

Sears, iconic American retailer, in death spiral. Eddie Lampert strips assets while retail business collapses. Store closures accelerating. Amazon and…

CVS announces $69 billion acquisition of Aetna, creating pharmacy-insurance behemoth. Vertical integration strategy to compete with Amazon healthcare entry…

Airbnb nearly collapses as pandemic stops all travel. Bookings crater, hosts suffer, IPO plans shelved. Company cuts costs dramatically. Then surprising…

Tesla struggles with Model 3 production, camping in factory. Elon Musk tweets 'funding secured' to take company private—SEC charges follow. Bankruptcy fears…

Carvana, online used car dealer, collapses from $80B valuation to bankruptcy concerns. Pandemic used car shortage created temporary windfall. Then rates…

DoorDash IPOs during pandemic food delivery boom. Company has 50% US market share. Beneficiary of restaurant closures forcing delivery adoption. Questions…

Robinhood IPOs after controversial year including GameStop trading restrictions. Commission-free trading revolutionized brokerage industry. Accused of…

Under Armour discloses federal investigation into revenue recognition practices. Questions about pulling forward sales from future quarters to meet current…

MongoDB successfully transitions from open-source database to cloud Database-as-a-Service (Atlas). Atlas revenue growing 80%+ annually. This shift to…

AT&T launches HBO Max streaming service with Warner Bros content library. Competes against Netflix, Disney+, others in streaming wars. However, AT&T is…

Beyond Meat, after explosive IPO gains reaching $234, crashes as lockup expiration allows insiders to sell. Reality sets in about competition, margins, and…

Cryptocurrency mining drives massive demand for Nvidia's gaming GPUs. Bitcoin and Ethereum prices soaring, making mining extremely profitable. Nvidia's…

Lucid Motors, luxury EV startup, goes public via SPAC merger. Former Tesla engineer Peter Rawlinson leads company. Air sedan targets high-end market with…

DocuSign, the e-signature leader, sees explosive growth as pandemic forces digital transformation. Companies that resisted digital processes adopt…

Spotify goes public via direct listing—no underwriters, no new shares issued. The music streaming leader has 157 million users but isn't profitable. Faces…

Chinese regulators suspend Ant Financial's $37 billion IPO two days before listing. Jack Ma criticized regulators in speech, triggering crackdown. This…

Wells Fargo admits employees created 2 million fake accounts to meet sales targets. Bank fined $185 million. CEO John Stumpf eventually resigns. This…

Nike announces it's pulling products from Amazon and doubling down on direct-to-consumer strategy. This is major strategic shift away from wholesale…

After second fatal crash of 737 MAX (Ethiopian Airlines), killing 157 people, all MAX aircraft grounded worldwide. Two crashes in five months reveal MCAS…

Hertz files for bankruptcy as pandemic destroys car rental demand. Stock should be worthless as equity wiped out in bankruptcy. But retail traders on…

Peloton IPOs in September 2019 with controversial ad campaign. Stock initially struggles as investors question unit economics. Then COVID-19 hits and closes…

Enron, once America's seventh-largest company, reveals massive accounting fraud. Special purpose entities hid billions in debt. The company announces $618…

E. coli outbreak linked to Chipotle restaurants sickens dozens across multiple states. CDC investigates. Company temporarily closes restaurants. This is…

Gilead announces $21 billion acquisition of Immunomedics for Trodelvy, a breast cancer drug. This is Gilead's largest acquisition ever, trying to offset…

Square announces $29 billion acquisition of Afterpay, the buy-now-pay-later leader. This is Square's largest acquisition, betting on BNPL as future of…

Coinbase, largest US crypto exchange, goes public via direct listing at peak of crypto bull market. Bitcoin at $63,000. Company profitable with 56 million…

Starbucks announces aggressive China expansion plan: opening a new store every 15 hours. China to become larger than US market. Partnership with Alibaba for…

Disney announces $71.3 billion acquisition of 21st Century Fox's entertainment assets. Deal includes Fox movie studio, FX Networks, National Geographic, and…

Twitter permanently bans President Trump following Capitol riots. This is unprecedented action against sitting president. Raises questions about social…

Shopify, the e-commerce platform for small and medium businesses, sees explosive growth as pandemic forces retail online. Physical stores close, creating…

Adobe announces radical shift from perpetual software licenses to Creative Cloud subscription model. Customers can no longer buy Photoshop, Illustrator,…

PayPal separates from eBay after 13 years. Carl Icahn pushed for the split, arguing PayPal constrained by eBay relationship. As independent company, PayPal…

Roku, the streaming platform leader, surges as pandemic drives streaming adoption. Active accounts grow to 55 million. Platform business model means…

Snapchat rolls out controversial redesign separating social content from professional content. Users revolt with 1.2 million signing petition against…

Target announces massive data breach affecting 40 million credit card numbers and 70 million customer records during holiday shopping season. Hackers…

Russian hackers compromised SolarWinds' Orion software, affecting 18,000 customers including US government agencies. This is one of the most sophisticated…

Lululemon recalls black yoga pants after customers complain they're see-through. This affects 17% of women's pants inventory. Manufacturing quality control…

Equifax announces massive data breach exposing personal information of 147 million Americans—nearly half the US population. Social Security numbers, birth…

Google goes public with an unconventional Dutch auction IPO at $85 per share. The search engine dominates internet search with 75% market share. The company…

Intel announces its 7-nanometer chip production delayed by another year, falling further behind TSMC and Samsung. Meanwhile, AMD using TSMC manufacturing is…

GE, the iconic American conglomerate, cuts its dividend 50%—breaking 118-year streak. This signals deep financial problems. GE Capital losses mounting.…

EPA reveals that Volkswagen deliberately installed software to cheat emissions tests on 11 million diesel vehicles worldwide. The 'defeat device' made cars…

Moderna announces its mRNA COVID vaccine shows 94.1% efficacy—stunning success for novel technology. This is Moderna's first product ever to reach approval.…

Nvidia reports blowout earnings and raises guidance dramatically, revealing that demand for its AI chips has exploded beyond anyone's expectations.…

Amazon announces its first stock split since 1999—a 20-for-1 split that will make shares more accessible to retail investors. The company also announces a…

Microsoft announces it will integrate OpenAI's ChatGPT technology into its Bing search engine and Edge browser. This is Microsoft's most aggressive move yet…

Beyond Meat, a plant-based meat substitute company, goes public in one of the most anticipated IPOs of 2019. The company's products are in major retailers…

Lehman Brothers, the 158-year-old investment bank, files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy—the largest bankruptcy in US history. The firm held over $600 billion in…

The Deepwater Horizon oil rig explodes in the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 workers and causing the largest marine oil spill in history. Millions of barrels of…

COVID-19 pandemic forces the world into lockdown. Offices close, schools go remote, and social gatherings move online. Zoom becomes the verb for video…

Elon Musk, the world's richest person and Twitter's most influential user, offers to buy Twitter for $54.20 per share, valuing the company at $44 billion.…

Netflix announces aggressive measures to crack down on password sharing, a practice the company estimates affects over 100 million households. The company…

A Missouri jury orders Johnson & Johnson to pay $4.69 billion to 22 women who claimed the company's talc powder caused their ovarian cancer. This is the…

On November 16, 2020, S&P Dow Jones Indices announced that Tesla would be added to the S&P 500 index on December 21. This is one of the largest companies…

GameStop, a struggling brick-and-mortar video game retailer, has become the center of a historic market event. The r/WallStreetBets community on Reddit,…

Apple is preparing to launch its iPhone 12 lineup in October 2020, during the global COVID-19 pandemic. This is Apple's first 5G-enabled iPhone, marking a…

On November 9, 2020, Pfizer announced that its COVID-19 vaccine candidate, developed with BioNTech, showed over 90% efficacy in Phase 3 trials. This is the…

The New York Times and The Guardian published investigations revealing that Cambridge Analytica, a political consulting firm, harvested personal data from…