EV Charging Improving; Friday the 13th Weird Trend; World Events Affecting Us
Friday the 13th feels like the right day to give three quick stories rather than one longer one.
This is another example of a multiple-story edition piece of SimpMe Says. We’ll look at three different business stories in bite-sized chunks. Thanks to those who have given their feedback on this style of piece, including in the SimpMe Community Portal.
Electric Vehicle Charging Might Finally Be Getting Easier
Charging has always been the biggest problem with potentially buying an EV. That is both my personal opinion, as well as the #1 finding in the unscientific polls I’ve conducted with friends who have bought a new car in the past several years. But it also accounts for the top two reasons that potential consumers give to J.D. Power, according to this New York Times piece by Lawrence Ulrich.
Car buyers say that problems with charging and the time it takes to actually charge are the biggest blockers for their hesitance to buy an EV. I would guess that electric vehicles’ battery lives and the lack of availability of EV chargers would be the next two. Either way, chargers are the big problem. But, there’s good news to report, and better news on the horizon.
First, charging failures have fallen from a whopping 20% of charging attempts to a slightly more respectable 16%. That’s still too high, but that drop represents much needed progress that should continue.
Second, the numbers of chargers that really get the job done is finally rising. Here’s what Ulrich wrote verbatim:
“The number of chargers has also increased. There were about 55,200 fast chargers in the United States in May, up from 42,200 a year earlier, according to federal data.”
Notice that he specifically said “fast” chargers. That’s a huge deal. The amount of time that it takes to charge, which constituted the #2 blocker for people in that J.D. Power poll, simply has to decrease if people will buy more EV’s.
For work, I often am renting cars in cities that don’t have a huge history of EV infrastructure. I always try to see if I can get an EV car, even if it costs a few more dollars. But if I’ll be driving more than one charge’s worth of miles, I often can’t do it. To recharge, it can take maybe 6-10 hours to charge… and that’s at a Level 2 charger. For a Level 1, it can be a full day.
But for a “fast” charger, which I’m assuming is what Ulrich calls a Level 3 charger, it can be about 30 minutes. While that’s still much slower than a gas tank, at least that’s doable.
That increase by more than 20% in fast chargers from May 2024 to May 2025 is a huge deal. And maybe most importantly, it represents progress that won’t slow down. And given the third story in this SimpMe Says piece, you should keep an eye on EV charging availability if you’re going to buy a car anytime soon…
Friday the 13th Has a Weird History of Being Good for Stocks
Ok, so this is easily the single most inconsequential thing I’ve ever written about for SimpMe. I’ll own that. But this Axios piece by Ben Berkowitz caught my eye today.
On past Friday the 13ths, the stock market has gone up by an average of .09%, according to LPL Financial’s Chief Technical Strategist, whom Berkowitz cited. That rates higher than the average Friday, which is .05% in the black, and an average day, which is .03% in the black.
Additionally, stocks are up 57.6% of the time on Friday the 13th, so it’s not just an example of one or two amazing days in history distorting the average.
As I admitted, this is largely a ridiculous story. But there are a few serious notes to be made here that could actually be a teaching mechanism:
First, notice just how small those percentages look of daily gain. And that’s because they are small. But that shows you why every financial advisor will tell you that “time in the market” is better than “timing the market.” Everything is so variable when looking at a short term basis, but it’s always important to play the long game and let the incremental, frustratingly slow gains work for you over time.
Second, Fridays are higher than the average day. That is important to note. Stocks are picked by humans who have biases, and even in something like picking stocks, people have biases that affect their moods and cause (potentially) excess optimism.
Third, as Berkowitz points out, these stats may speak to why Warren Buffet said to be greedy when others are fearful. Going against the grain and being optimistic on a day that everyone believes in crazy superstitions could be beneficial.
As someone who was born on the 13th of the month, shares a birthday with his mother, and turned both 13 and 18 on Friday the 13th, I care too much about Friday the 13th not being seen as a negative day. Glad to see that the stock market agrees. Although this Friday the 13th feels a little bit different…
Stocks Plummet After Israel’s Strike on Iran
By now, you know that we do whatever we can to avoid politics. It’s usually only discussed here when it matters for business. For that reason, this won’t touch on the strategic or even moral implications of the Israel-Iran news today.
(This story is also the reason why I did the multi-story format today, frankly. Nobody wants to read a full piece about this story in a business newsletter on a summer Friday.)
After Israel’s strike on Iran and Iran’s inevitable response, the U.S. stock market plummeted. I type this just after the markets’ close, and the Dow Jones was down 1.79%, the S&P 500 was down 1.13%, and Nasdaq was down 1.30%. Not the worst day ever, but pretty bad, especially with that weird Friday the 13th bump we usually get.
So why am I putting this here? Here’s why. The markets have fallen largely for two reasons:
First, there’s concern over the rising price of oil, given the oil in the Middle East.
Second, there’s general concern about worldly instability, which understandably makes people nervous.
As much as politics are either annoying or disheartening and stress-inducing (and likely both), a day like today shows why it’s important to pay attention. I’m not saying it’s easy, but it is the truth. If for no other reason than this: What happens politically around the world and here at home does have an effect on your life.
Humans tend to assume that what happens away from us doesn’t affect us, but then we find out that it does when it’s all too late. So it’s important to keep track of what’s going on in the world, even if SimpMe is not a place to go too deep on it.
It’s good to pay attention to world events strictly for the sake of it. But even if you’re just thinking about selfish reasons – such as the price of gas when you’re about to buy a new car and debating EV vs. gas – it’s always important to know what’s going on and how the world’s events affect all of us.