In today’s newsletter I discuss what's behind America's obsession with protein maxxing, Berkshire Hathaway invested $10 billion dollars in Alphabet, the new movie “Backrooms” had a pretty scary opening weekend, Tesla started construction on their Optimus robot factory, the economy is diverging between the have’s and the have not’s, Anthropic just confidentially filed to go public ahead of OpenAI, Blue Origin just suffered a massive rocket explosion on the launch pad, and the New York Giants just signed Odell Beckham Jr. to a 1 year, $1.3 million dollar contract.

Let’s get into it!

What's behind America’s obsession with protein maxxing? It’s the latest health trend, and it’s having real-world economic effects thanks to supply chain issues, so it’s the perfect economic story to dive into.

Right off the top we need to break down what exactly a protein is, because I thought I know, but WoW was I wrong. Merriam-Webster defines a protein as “a substance found in foods (such as meat, milk, eggs, and beans) that is an important part of the human diet”, but that doesn’t really explain what a protein really is and why it’s important to our diets. They go on to expand upon what a protein really is by saying it’s “any of various naturally occurring extremely complex substances that consist of amino acid residues joined by peptide bonds, contain the elements carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, usually sulfur, and occasionally other elements (such as phosphorus or iron), and include many essential biological compounds (such as enzymes, hormones, or antibodies).” Ok, so that was way more geeky of a definition than we needed, but basically we need proteins because they’re a fundamental building block that provides the amino acids needed to build and repair muscles, organs, skin, hair, and nails. So without protein we can’t grow or heal. Sounds pretty important.

The recommended daily allowance of protein is currently 46 grams for women and 56 grams for men. That’s the recommended amount, but Americans just love to supersize everything! People following the viral social media trend known as "protein maxxing" are consuming between 150-200 grams or more of protein every day, which is 3-4 times higher than the recommended daily allowance of protein.

What happens when you “protein max”? When you consume multiples of the recommended daily allowance of protein that triggers several biological processes to kick off. Your body begins to burn a higher rate of calories during digestion, which then increases your heart rate, leading to heavy breathing to supply more oxygen to your organs, which causes your body to sweat in order to try and regulate body temperature. When you eat more than the normal amount of meat, which is high in protein, that’s what some people call “meat sweats”. Gross! When the body kicks into this high gear it rapidly burns through all of the protein that you just consumed, and then it starts to break down any fat you may have, because you’ve tricked the body into working overtime and this can lead to a runaway cycle of calorie burning. That’s why it’s become so popular for athletes and people chasing the latest health fad, because when done correctly it really can help people to lose weight and bulk up on muscle from working out. However, with all things you should probably “protein max” in moderation, because the excessive consumption of protein really provides no extra nutritional benefits, and can actually lead to digestive distress, dehydration, and potential long-term strain on your kidneys.

American consumers have been ramping up their intake of meats for the last 6-7 years, causing the average annual beef consumption in the United States to hover around 58 pounds per person per year. That’s a lot of beef! Not content to just get their proteins from meat alone, Americans have turned to using supplements for their “protein maxxing”. The global protein powder and supplements industry was close to $30 billion dollars in 2025, and is projected to expand to over $60-$70 billion dollars by the mid-2030s, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of approximately 7%-10%.

The ready-to-drink shake market is estimated to be worth as much as $4.2 billion dollars. Gym members, busy office workers, and elderly citizens are swapping traditional snacks for protein bars, which was a $4 billion dollar market in the U.S. in 2025. Where are they getting all these protein bars and shake mixes? Online of course, because why waste energy and burn calories when you can order it from Amazon and get same-day delivery. E-commerce accounted for $11 billion dollars of total protein supplements in 2025, while traditional health food stores and supermarkets brought in $13 billion dollars. The average American user of protein powders spends roughly $50-$80 dollars a month on protein powders and supplements. Even the snack food industry has gotten in on the “protein maxxing” trend with new protein-enriched cookies and chips, which generated $2 billion dollars in domestic sales in 2025. The supply chain behind these convenience products relies heavily on industrial dairy manufacturing, and that’s where the industry is facing a serious production bottleneck leaving many Americans hungry for their protein supplements.

In order to 3X their protein intake Americans have turned to protein supplements, and the industry is running at full speed to try and keep up. A staggering 36.71% of the global protein supplement industry spending comes from North America where the U.S. protein supplement market alone reached a valuation of $11.6 billion dollars. Americans’ fascination with the “protein maxxing” fad, because let’s be honest that’s what it really is, and it’s leading to an industry shortage of protein powder and dietary supplements. Food companies have responded to the “protein maxxing” fad by adding whey to foods to maximize the amount of protein they can then claim a product has.

Now I know what you’re asking yourself: what exactly is whey? Well, it’s kinda gross, but here we go. Whey is a yellowish liquid that separates from milk curds during the cheesemaking or yogurt-straining process. It’s incredibly high in protein, which is why it's used widely in dietary supplements, infant formula, and baked goods.

The global market for whey was roughly $13.5 billion dollars in 2025, while the alternative plant-based protein supplement category reached a global market size of $7 billion dollars. At the same time, the specialized market for collagen protein supplements, which are marketed heavily for skin and joint health, reached a global value of $4 billion dollars. Companies like Glanbia, which owns a 12% market share of the industry, as well as Abbott Laboratories, Arla Foods, and Fonterra are working to scale up industrial filtration plants to meet the public’s relentless demand for protein.

America’s obsession with “protein maxxing” is driving a health food fad that’s having real-world effects on the global supply of protein supplements, and the production of whey, which is leading to the expansion of the industry and the development of new factories and production facilities to try and meet the never-ending appetites of Americans for protein.

Berkshire Hathaway just invested $10 billion dollars in a private placement of Alphabet stock. This is part of new Berkshire Hathaway’s CEO Greg Abel’s AI investment thesis. The newly purchased 28.5 million shares of Google parent company Alphabet will be added to Berkshire Hathaway’s growing stake in the company, which now stands at approximately $32 billion dollars in Alphabet stock or an estimated 72 million shares, making it one of Berkshire Hathaway’s top five equity holdings in its entire portfolio.

The sale of $10 billion dollars worth of Alphabet stock was only one part of the company’s fundraising efforts. Alphabet is also underwriting an offering that will raise $30 billion dollars for the company, which is split evenly between their Class A and Class C common shares and mandatory convertible preferred stock. Alphabet also plans to conduct a $40 billion at-the-market offering in the third quarter of 2026, which is a fancy way of saying that Alphabet plans to sell new shares directly to consumers at market prices. The issuance of new Alphabet stock and sales into the public markets will have a diluting effect on the company's existing shareholders by reducing their proportional ownership stake, thus potentially lowering Alphabet’s overall earnings per share.

They might be able to get away with that while the stock market is still hot for all things AI related, but if the market begins to cool or we see a sell off in AI-related stocks, then watch out below.

The new movie “Backrooms” had a pretty scary opening weekend, bringing in a mind blowing $118 million dollars worldwide, with $81.50 million dollars coming from the domestic box office and $36.50 million dollars internationally during its opening weekend of release. This is a record opening weekend box office haul for independent distributor A24.

What’s even more impressive is the movie had a shoestring production budget of just under $10 million dollars. That’s nearly unheard of these days, when the average Hollywood movie costs between $65-$95 million dollars to make. So how did A24 make “Backrooms” so inexpensively compared to their Hollywood peers? The cast consisted entirely of fresh faces, with the exception of lead actor Chiwetel Ejiofor who received a baseline salary of just $200,000 dollars as did the rest of the cast for the movie. The movie also stuck to an extremely tight promotional budget of only $10 million dollars, when most Hollywood movies sport marketing budgets north of $35 million dollars with some blockbuster movies like last year’s Apple movie F1 having a marketing budget of $175 million dollars.

The origin story of the movie “Backrooms” can be traced back to an anonymous creepypasta posted back in 2019 on 4chan, the chaotic, unfiltered Internet subculture and memes.

If you didn’t know what “creepypastas” are, then you’re not alone, because I had to look it up since I don’t spend literally any time on 4chan. Creepypastas are short, user-generated horror stories or urban legends that are shared, copied, and pasted across the internet on meme sites like 4chan. The naming nomenclature can be broken down as "creepy" and "copypasta", which is internet slang for a block of text that is copied and pasted across different forums.

Kane Parsons, who goes by the name Kane Pixels online, took the “Backrooms” idea and turned it into a popular YouTube found-footage series that he wrote and directed, and then Will Soodik wrote the screenplay for the movie and Kane Parsons directed it.

“Backrooms” follows Clark, played by Chiwetel Ejiofor, who’s a dejected, failed architect running a struggling furniture store. He notices some weird power surges and goes to the basement to find out what’s causing them, because no horror movie is complete without someone thinking it’s a good idea to go look in the basement. In the basement he discovers a portal to an endless maze of liminal yellow rooms, which are basically transient rooms that are empty but have an eerie feel to them because there's no one in them. Clark becomes obsessed with the dimension, and the movie spirals into a psychological horror film from there.

Now is probably a pretty good time to share that I am not a fan of horror movies. Don’t get me wrong, I love the idea of horror movies, and I’m a big fan of zombies and vampires, but I’m probably the most easily just scared person in the world, and I just can’t even begin to deal with anything supernatural. And if there’s kids, or nuns in a movie, I’m out. That said, I do love a good psychological thriller, and I’ll be checking this movie out when it comes to streaming.

Tesla has started construction on a dedicated manufacturing facility that will build their new Optimus humanoid robots on the same campus as Tesla's Gigafactory in Austin, Texas. This massive new robot factory is part of Tesla’s giant 5.2 million square foot North Campus expansion that will eventually stretch to over 4,000 feet in length, and come close to matching the incredible scale of Tesla’s main vehicle assembly plant. This new building will stand right next door to Tesla’s Terafab advanced chip manufacturing facility that they are building in partnership with Elon Musk’s other trillion dollar company, SpaceX.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk said he expects the Optimus robot factory to be able to ultimately produce as many as 10 million units per year, which breaks down to an insane 27,000 humanoid robots manufactured every single day. That’s 6X the number of Optimus robots that Tesla will make compared to the total number of vehicles they make each year.

But mass producing humanoid robots ain’t cheap. Tesla has budgeted between $5-$10 billion dollars for the buildout of their Optimus robot factory, which represents nearly half of their entire worldwide $20 billion dollar capital deployment budget. With a projected price tag of $30,000 for each Optimus robot, they’re gonna have to sell a lot of them just to break-even, but there’s no way I’m betting against Elon Musk!

There is a distinct divergence taking place with consumer spending as the domestic marketplace fractures into highly polarized segments. Chief Economist Michelle Meyer, of the Mastercard Economics Institute in New York, recently spoke about how middle income households are actively migrating away from the standard consumer goods, and instead directing their buying dollars toward the premium economy sector to focus on purchasing experiences, entertainment, and purposeful travel. This phenomenon is referred to by economists as the experience economy.

The underlying macroeconomic driver of this shift is an increase in the value consumer’s portfolios and retirement accounts and in assets like their homes, instead of wage growth. Recent Federal Reserve reports indicate that the top 20% of households by income now control over $115 trillion dollars in total net worth, which is largely driven by the value of their real estate and growth of their portfolios. This big nest egg, as I like to refer to it, is enabling these consumers to absorb higher prices for experiences and travel even though their incomes haven’t gone up. On the flip side, retail tracking data from companies like Walmart and Target is showing that low income consumers are facing some serious budget constraints, with traffic to these discount stores rising by 8% over the past year.

This split between the Haves and the Have-nots is a big challenge for the monetary policymakers. Former Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell didn’t have an enviable job when he tried to set economic policy through the use of interest rates to curb spending while consumers on the higher end continued to spend freely on premium experiences. It remains to be seen how Kevin Warsh, the new Chair of the Federal Reserve, will tackle this predicament given President Donald Trump’s stated desire to see the Federal Reserve lower interest rates even in the face of rising consumer inflation.

Anthropic just confidentially filed to go public in their race against OpenAI to get to the public markets first. If I were a betting man, I’d guess that OpenAI is only a few weeks away from their own S-2 registration with the SEC to go public.

Anthropic recently completed a private funding round of $65 billion dollars, which valued the company at an insane $965 billion dollar valuation, allowing them to claim the title of the most valuable AI startup, with OpenAI valued at a lowly $840 billion dollars. Wah-wah!

Blue Origin just suffered a massive rocket explosion on the launch pad at their Launch Complex 36 on the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The $150 million dollar rocket was in the process of undergoing a routine static-fire engine test when it exploded. Fortunately no one was hurt during the incident, but the damage to the launch pad is extensive to say the least. Blue Origin was also lucky that the rocket’s satellite payload of 48 internet satellites for the Amazon Leo broadband constellation weren’t loaded into the rocket yet.

The biggest loser in all this might be the launch pad, which received so much damage to the structural steel of the launch tower, which was actually bent and melted from the heat of the explosion, that NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said repairs could take until 2028 to finish and could cost upwards of $400 million dollars.

A multiyear launchpad repair could dramatically delay NASA’s future Artemis missions to the moon, with Blue Origin holding the contract to deliver a lunar lander to the surface of the moon using a New Glen rocket that is similar to the one that just exploded on the launch pad. This was Blue Origin’s only launch pad. NASA had already invested over $3.4 billion dollars into Blue Origin’s lunar lander project scheduled for the Artemis V mission, which is scheduled for late 2028. So there’s still a glimmer of hope that Blue Origin can figure out what went wrong, rebuild their launch pad, and safely return to flight without too much of a delay. Maybe.

I never thought this day would come, and I couldn’t be happier. The New York Giants just signed Odell Beckham Jr. to a 1 year, $1.3 million dollar contract. This is a homecoming for the wide receiver, who’s bounced around to the Cleveland Browns, LA Rams, Baltimore Ravens, and then the Miami Dolphins after he played for the New York Giants from 2014-2018.

It’s also a reunion for the New York Giants’ head coach John Harbaugh, who previously coached Odell Beckham Jr. for the 2023 NFL season when they both were with the Baltimore Ravens.

Now I know a lot of haters are gonna say that Odell Beckham Jr. is washed up, and that he’ll never again repeat his performance from the New York Giants game against the Dallas Cowboys where Eli Manning threw a 43-yard pass to Odell Beckham Jr. who caught it with his right hand while falling backward into the endzone for a touchdown.

All I have to say to those haters is “Let’s go!”

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The Business Behind The News is written, edited, and published by Chris Thompson.