🌠Bennu the Earthbound Asteroid

Welcome to the Thursday Newsletter, where we cover top industry news stories to keep you in the know.

Good morning. There have been two types of people over the last three years. Those who’ve paid off their interest-free student loans, and those who could afford groceries. Whether you held your breath on any sort of loan-forgiveness or not, repayment plans start back this Sunday, putting an end to the nationwide deferment or forbearance.

It’s not all bad though… well that’s what ChatGPT told us when we couldn’t think of any reasons to be excited about less money in our pockets. These are the top 10 “positive aspects” of resuming your student loan payments presented by ChatGPT:

1. Financial Responsibility

2. Credit Score Improvement

3. Loan Forgiveness Progress

4. Reduced Interest Accrual

5. Financial Freedom

6. Potential for Tax Deductions

7. Access to Federal Benefits

8. Peace of Mind

9. Loan Rehabilitation

10. Building Good Financial Habits

_{-Bailey Hepler}

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SPACE

Asteroid could collide with Earth in the year 2182 & the $800 million project to stop it

The prodigal Bennu. Discovered in 1999, Bennu is an asteroid the length of more than 4 ½ football fields. Bennu orbits our Sun every 14 months and is believed to be a leftover fragment from the origins of our solar system. The asteroid was named by a 9-year old boy in North Carolina after an Egyptian deity linked with the Sun, creation and birth.

Bennu is an NEO (Near-Earth Object) that could pass through a “gravitational keyhole” in the year 2182. This newly found gravity would pull it to Earth causing the two to collide. A new study shows that Bennu could pass closer than the moon to our Earth in 2135 and eventually our planet's gravitational pull could put it on the path to striking Earth on September 24, 2182.

😌Don’t panic. Not only is this over a hundred years from now when we’ll be gone, but NASA says there is a 1 in 2,700, or 0.037%, chance of Bennu actually striking our planet that year.

OSIRUS-REx Mission. NASA’s $800 million mission sent an unmanned, solar-powered spacecraft 4.4 billion miles over the past seven years to bring back samples from Bennu. The samples landed safely in Houston this past Sunday.

NASA plans to share these initial findings, plus first images of the sample, in a live broadcast on October 11.

Acronym: OSIRUS-REx (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer)

POLITICS

Sen. Bob Menendez & Wife Indicted on Bribery Charges

Remember the scene from Wolf of Wall Street where the FBI arrests Jordan Belfort in the middle of filming an infomercial? Benihana? BENIHANA? Anyways, maybe not quite as exciting of a life, but New Jersey Senator Menendez is facing allegations that were also a ripple effect of suspect business doings.

What to know. Democratic Senator Bob Menendez and his wife, Nadine, are being charged with bribery for accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars from three New Jersey businessmen and the Egyptian Government in exchange for the senator’s influence to enrich them all.

The couple received a number of bribes:

• $480k in cash found stuffed in clothes with the senator’s name printed on it and $70k in Nadine’s safe deposit box.

• Gold bars worth “hundreds of thousands of dollars”.

• Payments towards home mortgage.

• Compensation for a “low-or-no-show job” (a paid position that requires zero effort from the compensated).

• Mercedes-Benz convertible worth more than $60k.

NJ businessmen Jose Uribe, Wael Hana, and Fred Daibes bribed the senator and his wife in exchange for interference in a state prosecution of Uribe’s associate and investigation into an employee whom Uribe referred to as a relative. Gold bars & Mercedes-Benz were exchanged.

Menendez Defends. Menendez defended himself as many senators called for his resignation, “When all of the facts are presented, not only will I be exonerated, but I still will be the New Jersey’s senior senator.”

WEATHER

El Niño to bring Warm Winter

“Winter must be cold for those with no warm memories”, or however the old saying goes. Lucky are those with no warm memories because the weather phenomenon, El Niño, is bringing them with it. Even though Fall has only just begun, it’s never too late to look ahead.

🌶️What is El Niño? This climate phenomenon brings abnormally warm surface temperatures to the tropical Pacific Ocean every 2-7 years and has widespread effects on weather patterns around the world. One key contributor to the warmer weather is the jet stream which shifts south during an El Niño winter, bringing wetter weather to the South while the North becomes drier and warmer.

This year’s El Niño began in June and is expected to be strong this winter through early spring according to NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center. North America usually sees:

• Increased Precipitation in the southern United States, including parts of California, the Southwest, and the Gulf Coast.

• Warmer Winters in the northern United States and Canada. This can lead to reduced snowfall and milder temperatures, which can affect winter sports, agriculture, and water resources.

• Reduced Hurricane Activity for the southeastern United States and the Gulf Coast. However, it can increase the risk of hurricanes in the eastern Pacific.

POLITICS

Republican Presidential Debate Scoring Metrics

The second Republican Presidential debate aired last night with a smaller cast than the first as former Arkansas Governor, Asa Hutchinson, missed the cut. The undisputed front-runner for the republican nomination, Donald Trump, was also absent again deciding there’s little upside joining the debate with his big lead.

Other than playing hooky, there are other reasons you might not see candidates in the next debate. Candidates are required to meet a number of markers set by the republican party:

• Including achieving benchmarks in polling and donor numbers

• As well as signing a pledge to support the eventual Republican nominee

THURSDAY SHORTS

• 📷Photo of the Week: Taylor Swift cheers on Travis Kelce last Sunday at Arrowhead Stadium. The new couple has sparked a lot of conversation with Swifties, but it’s her influence on the numbers that prove just how big she is:

  • 400% spike in Travis Kelce jersey sales

  • Kelce's podcast ranks #1 overall on Apple

  • Kelce adds 383K Instagram followers

  • 24.3M viewers watch, #1 game this week

  • 63% jump in female viewers age 18-49

  • 3x increase in 'Chiefs' searches on web

  • 3x increase in Chiefs sales on Stubhub

  • Chiefs sold more tickets in a single day since start of season

• 🤖ChatGPT has learned to talk. An updated OpenAI chatbot allows you to have conversation, similar to Siri or Alexa, but better. ChatGPT can also respond to images. People can upload a photo of the inside of their refrigerator, and the chatbot can give them a list of dishes they could cook with the ingredients they have.

• 🏢👨‍💼The Office creator, Greg Daniels, is moving forward with a reboot of the beloved NBC sitcom.

• 🍎Check out this video on new Apple iOS 17 features that will surely make your life easier.

  Which is the most watched YouTube video of all time?

  -Answer: Baby Shark Dance (Pinkfong Baby Shark - Kids' Songs & Stories) with 13.36 billion Views

  -2nd most: Despacito (Luis Fonsi) with 8.26 billion views

  -11th most: Gangnam Style (officialpsy) with 4.90 billion viwes

  -20th most: Sorry (Justin Bieber) with 3.71 billion views