Finance Friday: Jeff Bezos Added Liverpool to His Basket

Hey you,

Apparently $100,000 a month is now the price of reading Trump’s posts before everyone else… completely normal behaviour from the financial markets.

Meanwhile, a consortium (an organisation of several businesses or banks) involving Jeff Bezos could soon own part of Liverpool FC (because apparently one of the world’s richest men needed something else for his basket).

Closer to home, households near new pylons could receive up to £2,500 off their energy bills and the UK economy has managed a little more growth. Across the Atlantic however, America is paying its highest borrowing costs on 30-year debt since 2001.

To me, it feels like money is buying access to everything, information, influence and even football clubs, while governments are paying increasingly eye-watering amounts just to keep borrowing.

But let’s get into it.

Trump Media has launched a service giving financial firms faster access to influential Truth Social posts, potentially including Donald Trump’s.

More than ten firms are reportedly paying between $60,000 and $100,000 a month. That may sound ridiculous, but Trump’s announcements about tariffs, oil or Iran can move markets instantly and high-frequency traders operate in milliseconds.

The company could certainly use the income, it recently reported a $238m quarterly loss on just $1.7m of revenue.

Commercially, I understand it… ethically, I find it deeply uncomfortable. When a sitting president’s posts can move global markets, should firms really be allowed to pay to see them first? I’d love to know your thoughts.

It feels less like public information and more like presidential announcements with a premium subscription.

The UK economy grew by 0.4% between April and June, this was slightly slower than the 0.6% recorded in the first quarter. June was stronger, with GDP rising by 0.3% most likely due to the good weather and World Cup encouraged spending.

So, if you’re wondering how this may affect you, economic growth can help protect jobs, support wage increases and give the government more tax revenue to spend on public services. It may also make businesses more confident about hiring and investing.

However, 0.4% growth sadly won’t suddenly make everyday life feel cheaper. Prices are still high and GDP doesn’t tell us whether your salary is keeping pace, your rent is affordable or you have more money left at the end of the month.

So this is positive news, but the number will only feel meaningful if it eventually translates into better wages, more secure jobs and rising living standards.

Households living within 500 metres of eligible new or significantly upgraded electricity infrastructure could receive up to £250 off their energy bills each year for ten years (potentially £2,500 in total).

The first payments are expected in early 2027, with between 120,000-160,000 homes eventually set to benefit as the scheme expands.

Britain needs to expand and modernise its electricity grid, but local communities are the ones expected to live beside the new infrastructure. The discount is basically designed to ensure they receive a direct financial benefit in return.

However, it won’t apply to every existing pylon and some of the proposed projects have not yet received final planning permission. Eligible households will also receive up to £250, rather than a guaranteed £250 (they’re always very clever with the wording).

What are your thoughts, would that be enough to change how you felt about a new pylon being built near your home?

Word on the street, is that Fenway Sports Group is close to selling roughly a third of Liverpool FC to a consortium potentially involving Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin.

The deal could value Liverpool at more than $6bn (a MAJOR increase from the £300m FSG paid for the club in 2010).

Liverpool is no longer just a football team, it’s a global entertainment brand earning money through broadcasting rights, sponsorships, merchandise and millions of incredibly loyal fans. That loyalty is commercially valuable because football fans don’t just change clubs when prices rise or ownership changes.

Selling a minority stake would allow FSG to secure a significant return while potentially retaining control. The new investors could also bring additional funding and valuable commercial connections.

However, fans will reasonably want to know where the money is going, will it be invested in players, the stadium and the club’s future or realistically just to provide a payday for the existing owners? (I hope not the latter)

Football clubs may be extremely valuable assets, but they’re also cultural institutions that belong emotionally to their fans (the whole thing seems slightly crazy to me but each to their own - I guess it’s my equivalent of F1).

The US government has sold $25bn of 30-year bonds at a yield of approximately 5.22% (its highest borrowing cost for this type of auction since 2001).

Government bonds are effectively IOUs, investors basically lend money to the government and receive interest in return. A higher yield means America must now pay more to persuade people to lend.

With national debt creeping up to $40tn, replacing older, cheaper borrowing with more expensive debt will push the interest bill even higher.

Now this matters to more than just America because US bond yields influence global mortgages, business loans and financial markets.

The basic rule still applies, even to governments… the more debt you carry and the riskier lenders believe you are, the more expensive borrowing becomes.

Reddit shares have jumped by around 11% after it was announced that the company will join the S&P 500 on 18 August.

Being added to the index matters because enormous investment funds track the S&P 500. To continue matching it, those funds will need to buy Reddit shares.

That creates automatic demand (even if the fund managers themselves have no particular opinion about Reddit).

This is one of the interesting things about passive investing, when you buy an S&P 500 fund, you’re not only buying companies you personally selected, you own a small amount of every company included in the index and that mix changes over time.

This price jump doesn’t necessarily mean Reddit suddenly became a better business, it just means investors expect index-tracking funds to become forced buyers.

Reddit was still down considerably this year before the announcement, which is a useful reminder that joining a famous index doesn’t remove investment risk.

Finance tip: Remember an index fund isn’t fixed. When companies enter or leave an index, funds tracking it automatically update their holdings, so S&P 500 investors will soon own a small piece of Reddit without buying it directly.

(I personally invest with Trading 212, you can use my link to get access to free fractional shares.)

Sponsored. Capital at risk. Not financial advice.

• Gold climbed back above $4,000 after a strong week.

• OpenAI cut the price of its GPT-5.6 Luna model by 80% and Terra by 20%.

• William Hill and 888 owner Evoke expects the gambling-tax increases to add roughly £80m to its costs this year.

• Thames Water reportedly paid its new finance chief a £1m signing-on fee while carrying nearly £20bn of debt and facing serious uncertainty over its funding.

• Subscription rules expected from spring 2027 will require clearer renewal reminders, simpler cancellations and a 14-day cooling-off period.

• Vertical Aerospace is targeting 2029 certification for its six-seat electric Valo aircraft.

So, that’s the roundup for the week.

What do you honestly think about firms being allowed to pay to access information earlier than others? I mean, ordinary investors already have to compete with institutions that have faster technology, larger teams and better access and allowing firms to pay up to $100,000 a month to receive politically significant posts first just makes that imbalance feel so much worse.

I’m not convinced that makes for a particularly fair system, but I guess understanding how it works means we can at least ask better questions.

Anyway, I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and survive the heat, I’m off to Venice for the weekend!

Abi x

P.s. I posted a video this week on my YouTube about the things I wish I’d known in my 20s… I’ll leave it below in case you fancy watching!