Hey Rebels! Let's dive into this week's issue to help you become smarter about money, investing and business in less than 10 minutes a week.
Weekly Intel
Stay current with top news from the business, money, and investing world.
Top Stories
🥇 Cold Cash (because glory doesn't pay rent): As much as we love watching athletes throw themselves down icy slopes, what are they getting out of it, financially? It depends. Singapore, which has yet to have an athlete medal in the winter Olympics, is reported to offer an incredible $792,000 for an individual gold medal. Norway, which has the most winter Olympic medals in history, does not offer a cash prize. (more)
👵🏽 Okay Boomers, time to log off: Older Americans are spending more time on their phones…though just barely. But go check on your parents’ screen time, just in case. (more)
🛰 Glued to your phone? Going to space won’t help: People are “bricking” their phones to lower their screen time, and now even astronauts can't escape. NASA announced that astronauts can now bring their personal phones to space, though without wifi or cell service, they’re basically like your 8-year-old nephew using their mom’s old iPhone as a camera and to play Candy Crush. (more)
By the numbers
🤳🏽 6.3 hours: How long the average American spends on their phone (more)
🛋 7 hours: how long the average American spends at home, alone (not sleeping) in 2024, an 18% increase from 21 years ago. Well, now we know where all that screen time is coming from… (more)
🎿 5.3 billion: how many euros the Milano-Cortina Winter Olympics are estimated to generate. (more)
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The Financial Rebellion Way
Manual Saving Is Dead. Go for Gold with Automation.
Waiting until “the end of the month” to save whatever’s left? That’s like waiting for judges’ scores before you start your routine.
Your gold medal automation playbook
Day after payday = launch day: Schedule transfers for 24 hours after your check hits. Like a ski jumper who can’t change course mid-air—can’t spend what never touches your checking account.
Start with bunny slopes: $10 per account beats a face-plant at $0. Nail the basics before attempting the triple axel. Level up monthly as you build momentum.
The “podium progression” method: Every raise or bonus, increase your auto-transfers before lifestyle inflation melts your gains. What you don’t see doesn’t tempt you off-course.
Big picture: You’re not bad with money—you’re just competing against human nature without proper training. Automation is your coach that never sleeps. Set it once, forget it forever, wake up on the podium.
Markets - stocks and crypto
In under 3 minutes, start investing spare change, saving for retirement, earning more, spending smarter, and more.
Click the image above or this link to earn a special $40 bonus.
Prices for the week ending January 30, 2026:
▼ S&P 500 | 6,836 | -1.23% |
▼ NASDAQ | 22,547 | -1.84% |
▼ GOLD | 4,998 | -1.09% |
▼ WENDY’S (WEN) | 7.48 | -6.48% |
▲ SHARKNINJA (SN) | 131.06 | +11.32% |
▲ BITCOIN (BTC) | 67,648 | +0.83% |
▲ ETHEREUM (ETH) | 1,969 | +1.27% |
Stock and Crypto Moves
Playing it safe is so hot right now: Investors have been shunning riskier, AI-hyped tech stocks and instead bidding up traditionally “safe” companies (like consumer staples), leading to odd market behavior where major indexes are near all-time highs even as many individual stocks slide. (more)
Hedging AI: With volatility rising in both AI-linked stocks and cryptocurrencies, some traders are using futures contracts to hedge (insure) their positions against short-term downturns, though this protection can reduce gains if markets rise. Futures work like insurance: they can offset losses during market drops but add cost or dampen profits if prices advance. (more)
Shaky market: U.S. stock markets showed mixed performance last week, with the broad S&P 500 barely moving, tech indexes weak, and smaller stocks doing relatively better, as investors reacted to economic data and lingering uncertainty — especially around tech and AI. Essentially, markets were shaky and uneven rather than confidently up or down. (more)
Wendy’s business is getting Frosty: Fast-food’s redheaded stepchild Wendy’s expects to close between 5% and 6% of its U.S. restaurants – or 298 to 358 locations – in the first half of this year. (more)
Jaws-dropping sales: SharkNinja absolutely devoured the competition this holiday season, circling up $6.4 billion in sales while other retailers floundered. (more)
Real Money Moves
Katie - Des Moines, Iowa (Age 44)
Each week, we feature a reader’s smartest and dumbest money moves. We’re all in this together; let’s learn from each other.
Best Money Move - Invested in myself repeatedly
“I’m continuing to invest in myself. Every single time that I invest in myself, whether I’m investing in coaching or I invest in my master’s degree in HR or invest in certifications, or I go back to school to become a coach and get certified there.”
“It always, always has a positive ROI.”
“Continuing to invest has been the thing that I think has always been the theme of my life where it’s a good money decision.”
Worst Money Move - The drawer of shame
“When I graduated from college, I had my first apartment, and at this time, it was before anything was really online, and they sent you actual paper bills in the mail.”
“I got a bill, and I thought I’d just take care of that later, and I put it in a drawer. I just kept not paying them. I just kept putting them in this drawer. The idea of having to deal with it was so uncomfortable to me that it was easier to just ignore it.”
“It led to months of me not sleeping well at night because I knew I was avoiding this really big, scary thing. I was so deep in this shame of what I had gotten myself into that I had to dig myself out of it. Within six hours, I had everything paid, everything was handled, and it felt like this giant gorilla off of my back.”
The bottom line: Every money move teaches you something — whether it builds your net worth or humbles your ego.
Got a story? Send it in. You might help someone dodge a mistake or make a smarter call.
Side Hustle Differently
Each week, we focus on money-making opportunities for a side hustle that could potentially become a full-time venture. No MLM schemes, no “passive income” lies, just real strategies for stacking cash outside your 9-5.
Katie Hostasa with KMH Leadership
Katie Hostasa was a “worker bee” crushing it in corporate HR until motherhood collided with her office’s face-time obsession. She reluctantly became an entrepreneur, turning her talent for asking uncomfortable questions into KMH Leadership, a business that helps executives figure out why success can feel so empty.
Your executive coaching blueprint:
Target the secretly miserable: High performers with big titles who “look great on paper” but can’t sleep at night. Directors and C-suite execs will pay premium rates to stop feeling like impostors in their own success stories.
Questions beat advice: “I’m not a consultant. I’m not an advice-giver. My job is to ask really interesting questions that help people reflect on what’s actually happening inside of themselves.” Let clients discover their own solutions, then charge them for the mirror you held up.
Fear is the product: “Just because fear is present or discomfort is present, that’s not an automatic signal that you shouldn’t do it anyway.”
Big picture: Katie never wanted to be an entrepreneur—she just wanted control over her days when her newborn and her boss both demanded everything. Five years later, she’s got pom-poms in her desk drawer to celebrate client wins and a business built on one radical truth: “I’m finding that it’s a human thing, not a female thing, to have fear.” She sells the permission to admit you’re lost, and the accountability to find your way out.
Check out the Financial Rebellion podcast to learn about how to turn your passion into profit.
Bank Like A Rebel
While big banks profit from your mistakes, credit unions invest in your financial education. Weird how doing the right thing is considered rebellious.
Did you know the myths about credit unions versus banks? Debunked here.
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Interested in becoming a Financial Rebellion Partner? Reach out to [email protected].
We’ll catch you next week. Rebels OUT.
Todd Romer: Founder and Writer
Corinne Clarkson: Writer and Editor
Dallin Merrill: Chief Newsletter Overlord
Disclaimer: The advice provided in Financial Rebellion is not considered to be financial or legal advice of any kind. It is your responsibility to dig deeper on any opinions or recommendations given.