A wild ride

Christopher Cross’ music career had an explosive start. In 1980 his debut single Ride Like the Wind climbed to the top of the charts, but his fortune didn’t stop there. He’d go on to ride that success to an unprecedented Grammy sweep—taking home the top 4 awards— in ’81.

The yacht rocker may have rode like the wind, but Dutch-based design studio Blade-Made is helping people live like the wind—sort of. They’ve taken a decommissioned wind turbine, and converted it into a stellar tiny home. 

What’s wind without a little earth and fire ;)

(Love nostalgia? Play today’s trivia below for a chance to win a $25 Amazon eGift Card!)

IN THE NEWS

Could Canada’s pension plans boost the Loonie?

Canada’s big five pension plans collectively have $1.1 trillion in foreign assets under management, including an nearly a trillion that relies on the strength of the U.S. dollar.

This is becoming a growing concern for asset managers, given the seemingly broken relationship the greenback usually has with the stock market. Historically, when one goes up, the other goes down, insulating foreign asset holders from major realized losses.

President Donald Trump’s trade war appears to have driven the two to move in parallel with one another rather than against. While U.S. markets were cratering in the immediate aftermath of President Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariff announcement, the dollar was also losing steam, with investors second guessing whether the global reserve currency is still the safe haven it once was.

The US dollar is down 8.6% this year against a basket of other foreign currencies, including the Canadian dollar, which is up 6% since January. According to Mirza Shaheryar Baig, a foreign exchange strategist at Desjardins Group, Canada’s pension plans can drive that growth further either by converting U.S. holdings into Canadian assets, or by outright currency swapping.

ECONOMY

Another rate cut on the table?

Despite retail sales growing 0.8% in March, eclipsing a forecast of 0.7%, economists have noted the increase was mostly driven by a spike in auto sales as consumers rushed to purchase a car before tariff prices kicked in.

Other than that, sales were lacklustre, and with the consensus forecast for April currently at 0.5%, some are suggesting an interest rate cut may be back on the table when the Bank of Canada meets in early June.

“What was key was the woeful 0.7 per cent plunge in the ex-auto segment. That was the steepest slide since May of last year,” David Rosenberg, founder of Rosenberg Research & Associates Inc., said in a note.

Markets are only giving a rate cut a 30% likelihood after core inflation came in higher than expected in April, but Rosenberg says that was mostly due to food prices rising, with little else truly driving the spike.

Overall, any appearance of stronger sales growth has likely been an illusion as consumers scramble to buy now in order to avoid paying the “tariff tax” later. In reality, sentiment and confidence have plummeted for both consumers and businesses, suggesting a rate cut may be more likely than markets think.

MONEY MONDAYS

Latest scam? Money mule

Financial fraud has been on the rise in recent years, with fraudsters increasingly finding new ways to dupe people into handing over their money.

Older people are often a target of these types of scams, and it’s not always the case that criminals want their money. Some money mule scams involve hiring a person to unknowingly move illicit money for a criminal enterprise. The unsuspecting employee believes they’re working as an associate of a legitimate business.

Scammers use offers for jobs with titles like “finance officer” or “money-processing agent. The target of the crime is asked to deposit funds into a bank account in their name, and then transfer them while taking a percentage as commission.

Another method is telling the victim they’ve won a portion of a lottery prize, but they have to transfer some of their winnings as “fees” or “taxes.” This particular example will usually involve requests to send the fees through gift cards or cryptocurrency.

As is usually the case, when someone you don’t know randomly tells you that you’ve won money or can easily make money, but it involves giving away money as well, it’s almost always a scam. When it involves gift cards or crypto? Definitely a scam.

MEDICINE

Women’s hearts beat faster

A study recently published in Circulation: Arrhythmia and Electrophysiology found women possess genes that can make their hearts beat faster, whereas men have genes that are more likely to lead to heart problems like atrial fibrillation.

"We found for the first time that the genes controlling how the [sinoatrial node] works are influenced by sex," said Vadim Fedorov, Ph.D., professor of physiology and cell biology, Corrine Frick Research Chair in Heart Failure and Arrhythmia at the Ohio State University College of Medicine and senior author of the study.

"That helps explain why women generally have faster heart rates and are more likely to experience inappropriate sinus tachycardia, while men face a greater risk of heart rate disorders like conduction block and atrial fibrillation."

The difference in genealogical systems was found in the sinoatrial node, which is the area of the human heart that regulates its pace and causes it to beat—it’s a natural pacemaker.

The specific differences in male and female cardiovascular systems found that men possess more genes related to inflammation and collagen production, whereas women have genes that can lead to a faster rhythms.

The researchers wrote that their findings could be instrumental in treating conditions which these genes make each gender prone to, potentially saving lives in the process.

GARDENING

The rise of chaos

Modern gardening kind of flies in the face of nature. It requires rigid planning and adhering to a strict strategy; that doesn’t sound very natural, does it?

Gardeners have increasingly been gravitating towards the concept of letting nature take its course, leading to the rise of chaos gardening. It’s taken centre stage on the trendlines of Instagram and TikTok over the last couple of years.

Instead of following the script, gardeners will randomly and chaotically toss seeds all around the garden, disregarding the rules of spacing and timing, and fully embracing disorder.

As the trend has grown in popularity, other gardeners have moved on to picking and choosing from the disorderliness, leading to what can only be described as organized chaos.

Either way, to get started all you need is some soil and some seeds, and the rest is up to the budding bravery of biodiversity daring to take root in a small plot of land known as your backyard. It requires little effort, respects the process but without any guarantees, and could be your next source of joy and entertainment this summer.

CURIOSITIES

Think you cleaned your bedroom? Not quite

You might think of your bedroom as one of the cleanest and tidiest place in the house. Newsflash! It’s typically flooded with germs in areas you probably don’t want to think about.

“We all have this image of our bedrooms as being a sanctuary, but actually, there’s a surprising amount of bacteria, fungus and allergens there,” says Carol McLay, an infection preventionist and president of the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology.

For example, take Exhibit A: your pillow!

“A professor who worked on the study said that we know the pillows are inhabited by the house dust mite, which eats fungi,” McLay said. “A theory is that the fungi are, in turn, using the house dust mites’ feces as a major source of nitrogen and nutrition, along with human skin cells. There could therefore be a miniature ecosystem at work inside your pillow.”

Exhibit B: bedsheets!

“Bed sheets can be similarly contaminated but also have additional risk of excess fecal and skin bacteria accumulating from our bodies along with large amounts of sweat, skin oils and dead skin cells,” said Kelly Reynolds, a professor and chair of the community, environment and policy department at The University of Arizona’s Zuckerman College of Public Health. “If you eat in bed or sleep with pets, the contamination levels of bacteria, dust, hair, and pet dander can dramatically increase.”

You can read on here, if you dare. 😲

MUSIC

Freddie Mercury’s secret daughter

48 years after being born to a woman with whom Freddie Mercury had an affair in the mid-1970s, a woman identified simply as “B” has revealed herself in the recently released book, Love, Freddie as the secret daughter of the late great frontman of Queen.

Considered by many to be the greatest rock ‘n roll vocalist of all time, Freddie Mercury was thought to have died with no next of kin when he tragically passed in 1991. Aside from B herself and Freddy’s tightly knit inner circle who kept his secrets for decades, no one else on earth knew about her.

Three and a half years ago, B approached rock biographer Lesley-Ann Jones with the intention to reveal herself and the decades’ worth of journals Freddie left in her care when he died.

“After more than three decades of lies, speculation and distortion, it is time to let Freddie speak,” B says in a letter published in the book. “Those who have been aware of my existence kept his greatest secret out of loyalty to Freddie.”

“He entrusted his collection of private notebooks to me, his only child and his next of kin, the written record of his private thoughts, memories and feelings about everything he had experienced.”

STAKE TRIVIA

Party like it’s 1979

Maybe you still do, maybe you don’t, but once upon a time you probably wouldn’t go a day without putting on the radio 📻️ 😎 

And if you were tuning in to the radio everyday in 1979, you’ll dig this—we’re quizzing you on the top Billboard hits from ’79 with today’s trivia! Complete the game and earn a shot at a $25 Amazon eGift Card ;)

Winner will be notified tomorrow afternoon. Keep an eye on your inbox!*

Have a great day ahead Staker!

Today’s issue written by Michael Cowan, Joey Cowan, and Maureen Norman.


*SEE FULL STAKE TRIVIA CONTEST RULES HERE.