Since late July, meme stock fever has had a moderately more contained new outbreak, led by struggling retailer Bed Bath & Beyond (once known simply as the store where everyone discovers how expensive trash cans are). Following a staggering August rally, shares of BBBY flopped nearly 20% on Thursday.

Prior to the drop, which we’ll unpack in a bit, BBBY enjoyed incredible gains from retail trading in August—surging 400% from a July low. This week, individual traders bought a record $73.2 million of the stock on Tuesday, and followed it up by buying $58.2 million worth on Wednesday, according to data compiled by Vanda Research. On Wednesday, 1.4 million BBBY options contracts were traded and the stock saw more activity than market giants Tesla or Amazon.

• Also this week: A college student (with $25 million to invest) made $110 million in profit selling his BBBY shares as they surged Tuesday.

But what goes up, etc., etc., and BBBY experienced a dramatic change in fortune on Thursday.

So what happened?

Much of the hype around Bed Bath & Beyond that can be explained via simple human logic stems from the activity of billionaire investor and GameStop Chairman Ryan Cohen. In March, Cohen—who’s seen as a Pied Piper for meme stocks—disclosed a nearly 10% stake in Bed Bath & Beyond through his firm RC Ventures.

That, along with a filing on Tuesday revealing Cohen’s bullish BBBY call options, were seen by meme stock traders as a sign of Cohen’s confidence in the company. On Wednesday, though, RC Ventures filed a notice with the SEC to allow it to sell the entirety of its nearly 9.45 million shares (including options) in the company.

Ensuing headlines sparked a sell-off in Bed Bath & Beyond and led some high-profile investors to call for an SEC investigation into Cohen’s actions. A filing late Thursday afternoon revealed Cohen did in fact exit his position, and BBBY shares plummeted 45% in extended trading (on top of the 20% drop during market hours).

Zoom out: Like other meme stocks, Bed Bath & Beyond’s share price appears decoupled from its IRL outlook. Analysts have raised concerns about liquidity, and four Wall Street banks have recommended clients sell the stock in the last two weeks.—MK

Judge “inclined” to release parts of Mar-a-Lago affidavit. The judge that approved the warrant for the FBI to search former President Donald Trump’s Florida home said yesterday he was not prepared to rule that the affidavit justifying it should be fully sealed. The judge gave the DOJ until next Thursday to submit proposed redactions to the document, which it had argued could compromise its witnesses if made public. Meanwhile, in the other big investigation into possible criminal activity that touches the ex-president, former Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg pleaded guilty to dodging taxes on benefits he received from the real estate company, setting him up to be a star witness in the Manhattan DA’s case against the Trump Org.

The Big Ten gets a big TV deal. How big? Well, the reported $7.5 billion across seven years amounts to the most expensive media deal ever for a collegiate sports league. Games with Big Ten teams (yes, even Rutgers) will be aired on Fox, CBS, and NBC on Saturdays in a format that mimics the NFL-style gauntlet on Sundays. As megaconferences like the Big Ten and the SEC bulk up with more teams and richer partnerships, the line between college and professional sports is blurring.

Saudi woman sentenced to 34 years for tweets. A court in Saudi Arabia handed down the unusually harsh sentence to university researcher Salma al-Shehab after authorities claimed she followed and retweeted dissident accounts on Twitter and spread “false rumors.” The sentence, which comes amid a broad crackdown on dissent in the kingdom, has drawn condemnation across the globe as activists call for al-Shehab’s release. Al-Shehab’s Twitter account had fewer than 2,000 followers at the time of her arrest.

When the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, tech companies were among the first to announce that they would help employees access reproductive care no matter what state they live in. But now employees at Google are demanding more.

Over 650 staffers at Google parent Alphabet signed a petition this week calling on executives to update policies on abortion for its workers—and its users.

The petition, organized by the Alphabet Workers Union, asks the company to:

• Provide contractors with all of the abortion-related benefits offered to full-time employees.
• Stop collecting data on users searching for information on abortion.
• Remove search results for crisis pregnancy centers that advise women against abortions.

Google has declined to comment.

Zoom out: The fight over how data privacy intersects with abortion bans is just getting started, and Alphabet’s not the only company getting dragged into it. Facebook messages sit at the heart of one Nebraska abortion case, and the FTC is threatening to sue an ad tech company it claims reveals location data, including visits to women’s health clinics.—AR

OK, inflation has officially gone too far: This year’s Iowa State Fair Big Boar Contest only had two entries. People involved with the competition point to higher-than-normal feed prices and excessive heat as the main reasons why the 2022 pen was so empty.

Normally, there are five-to-10 big boys competing for the title of most humongous hog. But this year the winner, Pee-Wee, only had to beat one other pig, Brock Purdy.

Pee-Wee’s secret? Over three dozen cream-filled long johns and almost five gallons of whole milk every day for two months.

Big picture: Not all livestock can substitute expensive grain with donuts. The owners of the runner-up hog said he didn’t have a sweet tooth, and that they spent almost double what they have in the past—nearly $6,000—to bulk him up with traditional feed for the fair.

The feed inflation reaches beyond competitive big pig farmers: Prices for both corn and soybeans (two ingredients in pig feed) hit nine-year highs in the last six months due to skyrocketing fertilizer prices from the war in Ukraine and lingering Covid disruptions.—MM

Stat: While no single service has emerged as the victor of the streaming wars, streaming itself notched a major win in July when it surpassed cable TV’s share of Americans’ couch time for the first time ever. Streaming accounted for 34.8% of US television viewing time over the month, while cable only took up 34.4%, per Nielsen.

Quote: “I picked a bad day to violate the ABC rule—Always Be Charging.”

Brian Stelter fretted that his phone had only 2% battery life when news dropped that his show about media, Reliable Sources, was being canceled by CNN as part of broader cost cuts by parent Warner Bros. Discovery. At 30 years old, Reliable Sources is CNN’s longest-running show, and Stelter has hosted it for the past nine. He’s departing the network.

Read: The crypto geniuses who vaporized a trillion dollars. (Intelligencer)

The feeling of getting a 5/5 on the Brew’s Weekly News Quiz has been compared to suddenly realizing that PSL season is around the corner.

It’s that satisfying. Ace the quiz.

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Fresh perspective: The case for Brutalist architecture.

How are you preparing for a recession? With the economy hitting the brakes, we’re asking readers to share how they’re preparing for an upcoming downturn. We’ll compile all the results (anonymously) and share them with the entire community. Take the quick survey.

When you think you have a spending problem, what you probably have is a purpose problem. This week, Money with Katie dives into a series of revelations she had when transitioning from Spendy McSpenderson to Sally Saver. Listen or watch here.

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You don’t need a crystal ball to see the future—you need data and forecasts. Prep for the future with our seven-week Business Analytics Accelerator, tarot cards not included.