Transcript of Musk vs. Altman, Trump Admin's DEI Crackdown, and Netflix Stock Surge

Mike has always wondered what makes some people want to play action hero.

When I see people speeding or skydiving or surfing on 100-foot waves, I always think, Are you crazy?

What are you doing? Because I'm risk averse.

I'm trying to keep Mike in one piece.

But what about people who get their thrills from playing cop? This week on explain it to me, Citizens Arrest. Is it a real thing, and should it be? New episodes every Wednesday.

Hey, it's Andy Rodick, and I'm not just a former tennis player.

I am a tennis fan, a tennis nerd.

I just can't stop watching it. I can't stop analyzing it, I can't stop talking about it to anyone that will listen, which is why I started my podcast, Serve with Andy Roddick, now a part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. On the show, we talk about everything from new up and coming players to the champions dominating the narrative to whatever is on my mind. This January is the Australian Open, and you know I've got some thoughts. So tune in for our Australian Open coverage, find served wherever you get your podcast or on our YouTube channel.

It's Donald Trump's first week in office again, and it sure feels like it. There is a great deal of, as Heather said, a great deal of anger about oligarchs, about rich people controlling everything. I'm Priet Barara. And this week I'm joined by Kara Swischer, Astead Herndon, and Heather Cox-Richardson for a special Inauguration Week episode of Stay Tuned with Prit. The episode is out now. Search and follow Stay Tuned with Priet wherever you get your podcasts. Let me just say, let's go around and give tips to really successful people.

Well, isn't that what this show is? Isn't that what Pivot is? Yes, it is. Unsolicited advice.

Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Cara Swischer.

I'm Scott Galloway, and I endorse Lauren Sanchez's dress code.

I do, too.

I'm here for them. I mean, it. No. Singular, double, chest, chest of Now, listen. Help me.

Listen, we at Pivot do not like talking about people's personal foibles and looks and everything else. We don't. We never do.

Who is we, white man? I very much enjoy objectifying people. I understand. I'm an equal opportunity objective fire. You got to give me that.

Here's what I think got Scott going. Megan Kelly went on a rant about Lauren Sanchez's lady parts. It was really strange and weird about essentially calling her a whore. That's what she was essentially doing. I felt like I ran to her defense. I'm like, if she wants to wear a bustier in the capital of the time, then- She looked great. She looked good. It was sexy, and I like it. We're all for you, Lauren. We're not We're not so much loving your boyfriend, but we really like your outfit. And whatever. I feel like people should wear what they want.

You know what? I relate to her because when I'm on the beaches of Saint-Tropez, I wear a banana hammock, a speedo, because it would just be unfair not to share this youth, this raging hot sexuality. You got to put it in the window a little bit. Yeah, okay. No, I'm serious. I thought she looked great. Everyone was saying she wore a bra. I thought she looked great.

Well, it was a boostier. It's called the boostier.

Whatever. Okay. I agree.

I don't like people calling women sluts for wearing boostiers.

He's banging a porn star and a woman who was in Playboy. Like, play to the crowd.

It's apparently boostier. Boostier is how you pronounce it.

I just say yay. I just say yay. Megan wears sleeveless dresses. My guess is that's not her natural hair color. She wears form-fitting dresses because she's got fantastic genetic attributes and more power to her. She I think people should do what makes them feel right. Quite frankly, I'm more uncomfortable with the way Senator Federman showed up.

Really? Because it's sloppy.

He showed up in shorts.

Yeah, that's his thing, though. I mean, it's his brand. He has to wear that all the time. It's like Richard Simmons.

Yeah, but it's like I'm bigger than you. It's this whole Sam Bankman-Fried thing. Anyways, back to much more interesting topics.

Anyway, Lauren, we're with you.

We're with you.

We're with you. We're with you. Team Sanchez. Team Sanchez on on the boosty. Whatever. Yay for the boosty.

If Musk can have double E breast, so can she. No, I'm sorry. If Bezos.

Oh, God.

He's got big tits. That guy's got really big tits.

He's got a set.

Oh, my gosh.

It's all real, every bit of it. Anyway.

Not really. There's a definite amount. Take it for me, there's a lot of HGH and testosterone running through those.

Do you take that?

No, I've been on testosterone for about two or three years. For what reason? Other than that, I'm aging, and I want to be stronger in the gym and have longer erections. Would you like to go into greater detail?

Just I'm curious. No one ever asks, so I ask.

Go ahead. But I go off it Anyways, we're on it to try and make sure that I can still actually produce my own man juice, my own man gravy.

Wow. You didn't just say that word.

Anyways, but- All right, that's enough information.

Thank you. All right, sorry. Okay. All right. Does it affect you in any way taking it? I know steroids can make your penis smaller. That's what I understand.

Yeah, that would be difficult.

We've got a lot to get to today.

We've got a lot to get to. I'm I'm not saying my nickname in college was Tripod. I'm not going to say anything more. Oh, that is such an old- I'm not going to say anything more. That's a twelve-year-old- That's a twelve-year-old-wise joke. Stop inquiring about my personal life.

That is a twelve-year-old boy's joke. That is a twelve-year-old. You could up the level of your jokes.

My other one was aunt Eater. No more. I'm not saying any We're done.

I'm not saying anymore. We're done with the boobs and penises now, people. Let's get to the news because there was not a dick measuring contest going on between Elon Musk and Sam Altman, trolling each other to get Trump's favor and lavishly trying to get Trump's favor, including by Sam Altman. That was quite a tweet. By the way, Bill Gates is doing the same after having trashed him previously. Anyway, whatever. It's a new day, apparently. A scary new day in many ways, and we'll talk about that, too. Plus, new names in the mix for the TikTok We have a lot to get to today, Scott. We got to get off of Lawrence and just his proofs. Anyway, this story is really disturbing, honestly. Federal employees have been warned if they don't report coworkers working in DEI and accessibility positions, they will face repercussions. The Warning told employees to notify the Office of Personnel if they were aware of any change in position descriptions to obscure the connection to DEI. I think it's DEI Truth is the email address, which is frightening. It feels like 1984. One employee told the New York Times they felt like they were being recruited into the Gestapo.

The Trump administration also called agency heads to place DEI roles on pay leave by Wednesday. They haven't fired them, but they're putting on pay leave. This is one of their promises to rid the government of DEI. Of course, at the same time, there's all these lawsuits trying to get corporations to pull back on those things, and some are dying it and others aren't. But it was really disturbing. The last time they did this, I think it was the Eisenhower Administration, it was targeting gay people, report gay people so that we can get them out of government. I'm not loving the report and commies. I'm not loving the reporting thing. Essentially, because Amanda and I, I love your thoughts, but Me and I have a little bit of a thing. I said, Biden Administration shouldn't change the names of these jobs just to hide them and obscure them. They should make them fire these people in plain sight. That's to me, instead of trying to hide them away. At the same time, getting employing employees to report on each other? That is a freakish thing to do. It's really quite disturbing. I find it very disturbing and creates all kinds of different problems between employees.

It has that Gestapo-y feel to it.

What do you think? Actually, that's the wrong analogy. I think the correct analogy is the Stasi. By the way, one of the best movies, most underrated movies, The Lives of Others, about an East German who eventually gets to the West and the life he led in East Germany. But essentially, there was currency and power in ratting out your neighbors. Over time, people started ratting out innocent people, and it created such a society of distrust that no one wanted to talk to their neighbors. Which was the point.

Which was the point.

Yeah, but it's really... Well, okay. But it leads to everything that's horrible about America. That is, we used to be a group of people that when we bound together to try and help other Americans we didn't know, we were down with that because we knew that we had more in common with them. We had regard for them. We trusted them. We generally assumed that other Americans were good people. We were willing to invest. We were willing to be drafted. We had a certain comity of man as it related to other Americans. When you create this, this is just terrible for a culture. It also speaks to mismanagement in the sense that they should be able to figure out who these positions are without incenting people- It's their job if they really want them gone. To rat on each other. But something you inspired another thought, and that is, I would argue that this is really not the first example, but the most brazen example the last two weeks about how much ridiculous, brazen, outrageous corruption and grift in general, weirdness has taken place. In any other era, there would have been nonstop coverage and shaming of exactly all the scenarios, the grift of these meme coins that the President launched.

You know what? I just don't think there's enough. I think there's too much grift.

They do it. They flood the grift zone.

They've just flooded it. I don't think people can focus, and I don't think there's enough journalists out there to actually cover this and do actual reporting.

Agreed. I think one of the things we'll get to, there were some layoffs in CNN and one thing that Mark Thompson said, which I do not agree with, and I think I can say it pretty clearly, that you take them, let's cover them, let's not have an opinion. I think you can have an opinion once you do a report. Reporting. My opinion on this is, Snitches get stitches. You know that expression? It's snitches. That's what you are if you do things like this. Again, if Trump wants to get DEI out of things, which, by the way, probably targets women and people of color more in those positions, would be my guess, but I don't have the statistics. If you want to get rid of that, get rid of it in plain sight and say you're doing it and find them, and find the people and get rid of them. That's how you do it. If you really believe in your ridiculous obsession with DEI, then do it and be proud of your shitty behavior. That's my feeling, instead of forcing employees to rat on each other.

I hate rats. You know how I feel about it. As it relates to DEI, I think there are likely government agencies that were DEI and affirmative action were needed, and I'm not sure they're as needed now. I think in many instances, they create more problems than they solve. I'm not an enormous DEI fan. In government agencies where you might have 60% non-white or 30% non-white. In other words, the problem, and we should collectively celebrate this, a lot of the problem has been addressed, not all of it, but a lot of it. Oftentimes, it ends up in propagating the exact things you're trying to solve for. Now, having said this, just some advice to younger people or people in the workplace. A really smart strategy is that you always talk well of people behind their back. That is, you are the first person to acknowledge someone's work behind their back. You're not kissing their ass. You talk up your colleagues when someone does something good. You constantly talk well of people behind their back. This is the polar fucking opposite. It is. It creates distress. By the way, if word gets out, that you're the one narking on people.

Yeah, I know. Yeah, try and manage a group of people after that.

Snitches get stitches.

This is ugly. And also, just generally speaking- No one likes snitches. Couldn't they figure this shit out on their own?

Yeah, I agree. Now, there's a difference between snitches and something terrible happens in the workplace and you report it like a whistleblower, right? That is a different thing. This is snitches. You know what I mean? I do think people, if their abuse is happening, should feel safe to whistleblow.

But anyway. If it's a crime, but I'm actually a fan. I hate suggestion boxes. I like identity. You should be able to assign People say, well, granted, it's easy for you to say because you're wealthy and can afford lawyers, but I hate anonymous anything. I just think it creates... I don't like this person for the following reasons. We had this shit at schools. We had parents of kids who had been broken up with by other kids calling anonymous hotlines for child abuse. I mean, this shit gets so ugly so fast, and this is not a way to build a culture around a group of people.

If you guys are real proud of what you're doing and you're so obnoxious about it. By the way, they're so obnoxious about it, then just do it and let people see it and then decide if they think you're an asshole. They want to hide behind everything. Anyway, well, moving on. The SEC's new leadership has created a crypto task force. The force will develop a regulatory framework for crypto assets and address issues surrounding registration of coins. Bitcoin rallied in response to news and is up almost 10% last month. Nothing wrong with a crypto task force. It just depends on who's on it. There should be critics and people who more regulation. There should be boosters, I suppose. There have to be legitimate people on it. Anyone that thinks meme coins that Donald Trump pushed are the best thing ever should not be on it. I don't know. What do you think? Nothing wrong with a task force. They're usually useless, but you know.

This thing is castrated before it forms. The person whose idea this is, who's assembling it and has total influence over and can fire any of them on a dime, has He introduced two coins under the cover of darkness, letting a few people that he knows get a 7,000% gain and then seeing ordinary investors absolutely take a bath. The Melania coin is off 67% in the last 72 hours. What do you want in an asset class? You want credibility, you want people to trust it, you want the rule of fair play, you want it to be a store of value or have utility. Just as my generation has pulled prosperity forward in the form of deficit, I want your future prosperity, Gen Z and millennials, pulled forward to my current prosperity. Donald Trump, President Trump, took the increasing credibility of this asset class, and it has been increasing over the last year, and future increases in credibility and pulled it forward for essentially what was a grift and a scam. You know who was outraged about this? The crypto community. They were? They're like, Jesus Christ.

The legitimate crypto community.

The legitimate. But what is going to happen with this thing You are going to see whenever they try, whenever this Task Force attempts to pass anything resembling laws and regulation that would have given crypto more of a shot, I can't wait to see the Democratic representatives and senators and some Republican senators putting up the data on the Trump and Melania coin and saying, Let me get this. This is what we want. Right. Yeah. The idea... I mean, it's literally like Jeffrey Jeffrey Daumer puts a task force together on lunchtime meals. This task force has lost all credibility because the guy assembling it is the greatest offender.

I like that you got high dudgeon about the crypt that the meme coin, the shit coin. I love that. You're offended because you don't not believe in it, but that it's not fair play. It isn't something that's not done in a way that improves the use of crypto or makes it legitimate instead makes it It's like Alex Jones selling vitamins or whatever, selenium tablets or whatever. That's the stuff it feels like.

Physical violence is the most heinous crime. But when you steal from people, when you're already rich, money is the transfer of time and work. When you take people's trust or their desire to help you or whatever it is, and they lose 70% of their money in what is an obvious grift, you're taking time from their kids. You're taking the retirement. The whole point of having an operating system in capitalism is that we do need some protections. We do need some guardrails because some people will try and exploit it. When the person in charge, the person who's supposed to be the ultimate exemplar of trying to prevent a tragedy at the Commons, engages in the theft of other people's time and money, the whole fucking thing collapses. How do my kids get rich when no one trusts this economy?

Then everyone wants to be in on the grift, Then the grift is the thing and not everyone wants to.

Everyone's like, I'm grifting.

I'm grifting. It's a race to the bottom. He's grifting. It's a race to the bottom. I have a compassion to make. I almost stole your cashmere sweater, but I didn't. It was so soft.

Well, if you taken it and started wearing it, it would mean we're going steady. The next thing is I borrow your car.

I know it's true. It was so cold and I did wear it, and then I gave it. It was so soft.

I have some very nice sweaters. I have the GDP of a Latin American nation in Laura Piano and Bruno Cucinelli sweaters.

You I do. This happened to be out. That's what it was. That was when Laura Fian. It was very soft. I thought about it, and then I thought, I can't take it. Anyway, it was warm. All right, let's move on. You're right, completely. Netflix is upping its prices after reporting its biggest ever subscriber jump. The streamer gained 19 million new subscribers in Q4, bringing the global total to 302 million. Revenue increased 16%, topping $10 billion for the first time. Netflix attributed the growth to Mike Tyson and Jake Paul boxing match in November. Interesting, these live events. They're doing these live-ish which drew in 108 million viewers. Probably a whole new class of people using Netflix, I would guess. Shares are up 12% in five days at the time of the taping. Wow, this group of executives really does not make very many mistakes these days, I have to say. They're doing all kinds of live events, this live event thing, which I'm curious if they ever jump in a news, right? If they jump in a news, probably not. But live TV, certainly around sports and whatever that fight was, which was a shitty fight, but still it drew in a lot of people.

Thoughts on their continued march toward dominance everywhere?

Well, you asked, will they jump in a news? The answer is they're going to jump into everything. At one point, it was unthinkable they were going to have their own Before House of Cards, it wasn't obvious they were going to have their own production. Then no one ever thought they'd have live events.

Which is how HBO started, FYI. That's right.

Hbo used to be movies that would be broadcast.

Other people's movies.

That's right. Then they had HBO Boxing. Boxing. They're going into live. They'll be in news. Amazon broke the seal with their election night coverage. I don't know what the results are here. They always thought, well, it's bifurcated into the large, actually the bigger part of the market, think of it as Android, that is ad-supported. That broadcast television was supposed to own that for people who don't want to pay or are willing to endure the ads. Guess what? 55% of the new subscribers were in their ad tier model. If you look at, they have basically doubled their price over the last 10 years when inflation is up 33%. Netflix has so much pricing power in the face of everything. Can I say, worth it? That's called pricing power.

I know. What is that? What are you saying? I get a lot of value out of my Netflix things. I watch a lot on that.

So do 300 million other subscribers because these things are very easy to subscribe. So what do you have? They not only have power, but they've just raised prices. They are getting so much more money and have so many more people. No one else is going to be able to compete unless they go very niche.

Well, why do you think the Amazon? Amazon, I sometimes go to. I have to say I go to Peacock I'm finding more stuff I like there. Why does Amazon seem so flaccid in terms of... They have some good shows, but Netflix always has something I want to watch. Say, the three places would be Disney for my kids and everything, although Disney has some other stuff I really like with Hulu. Peacock and Max are the other ones. Max, I think it's getting better and better. It is 100%. It has a lot of shows I want to watch. But Netflix just is always interesting to me. If I had to get rid of any of them, they would be the last one I'd rid of. Well, maybe Disney would be the last one because of my kids. But why do the others seem so much of them? Why are they so far behind the other streamers?

Well, quite frankly, Netflix is spending $18 billion on content. Even Apple, with a $3 trillion market cap, has said, We can't spend more than $4 or $5 billion. You have just the biggest investor, the biggest company that offers the most for the lowest price. If you looked at the amount of shows they have relative to the they're charging, it's still the best value. Then the only way you compete is through focus. You have HBO, which has still managed to maintain this incredible culture that is artisanal. If there's someone talking at the water-cooler about a show, it's usually on HBO. Their ability to attract top talent. When I was pitching our show, we ended up with Netflix, but there were a lot of people in the group that wanted to go with HBO because HBO has Ruppie, you can see that HBO attracts the cream of the crop in terms of talent. They've created a culture where they punch above their weight class. Then Disney has the best positioning. Disney is family. If you have kids, you got to take your kids to Disneyland and you got to have Disney Plus. Everybody else, Cara- There's a Spider-Man on there.

Everybody else is a guy at 3: 00 AM who's fucked up, who's just got to find a dance partner. It's just like everybody else has either got to merge, cut costs, or sell to some billionaire's son.

That's it. Some of them are interesting. Like Tubi is... I really like Tubi. I think they're fun. I just interviewed the CEO as a young woman CEO, but she used to work for Barry Diller, I think. But they have interesting stuff. I go around and look at it just to see what I like. They've put together some... Because of the way you pick it, stories about sadsack lawyers or whatever. They do a lot of that, and that's interesting to me. But you really have to be creative in getting people the things they want to watch, if that makes sense. I have to say, Netflix is a little bit down. You're right, HBO feels fancy restaurant. Not fancy, but really good restaurant. Netflix feels a little bit like Cheese Factory sometimes. Again, I like the cheesecake. I know it sounds crazy, but it doesn't always feel... There's a new Cameron Diaz movie. I love Cameron Diaz. This is her first movie in a decade. Not a very good movie, but I watched it anyway. It It was not great, but I don't care. Or a Jared Butler movie. You know what I mean? I'm perfectly happy in those genres that they don't have to be spectacular in some way.

Look, Netflix is Toyota. It'll be the biggest in the world. It is the most or the lowest price. It's really well managed. Hbo is more like an Audi or maybe even a Mercedes. It's a higher-end. Netflix's strength is how much they produce produce. Hbo's strength is how much they don't produce. They've just got a higher bar, and there's more trial. I think when HBO comes out with a big series, you're very inclined to trial it because there's a chance it's going to be the thing. Whereas Netflix says, Okay, 99% of our stuff is shit, but 1% of a shit ton is enough for you. Everything else is like features. It's like heated seats, so I can't live without GPS. But Netflix is now the car.

Apple It does some really interesting things, I have to say. They have some very, like Severance and Ted Lasso, and there's a bunch of shows, and Horses, whatever. They have some shows that are quite good. They're going for HBO, it seems like, but they're not quite there.

They hired Plepler.

Yeah, they hired Plepler.

Anyway. It's a great time to love edibles and have a really nice couch.

That is true. Okay. I thought that was a dick joke, but it wasn't.

I won't go there.

Do you remember couch fucking? Anyway, that was a while ago.

I I never understood that one. Oh, Katie Vings? Oh, yeah. That's the guy formerly known as the VP.

Yeah, right. Anyway. I love streaming. That story got lost in somewhere, but that was a good story. Okay, Scott, let's go in a quick break. When we come back, Elon Musk attempts to undermine Trump's new AI deal. Badly, I have to say. Of course, his nemesis is back, Sam Altman. It's Today Explained. I'm Noelle King with Miles Bryant.

Senior reporter producer for the program.

Hello. Hi. You went to public school, right Miles? Yes. Go South High Tiger's. What do you remember about school lunch? I remember sad lasagna, shrink-wrapped in little containers.

I remember avoiding it.

Do you remember the nugs, the chicken nuggets? Yeah, if I had to eat school lunch, that was a pretty good option. I actually liked them. But in addition to being very tasty, those nugs were very processed. At the moment, America has got processed foods in its crosshairs.

It's true. We are collectively very down on processed food right now, none more so than Health and Human Services Secretary Nominy Robert Floride Kennedy Jr.

I'll get processed food out of school lunch immediately.

About half the school program goes to process his food.

Penn, the man who once saved a dead bear cub for a snack, fixed school lunches. Today explained every weekday, wherever you get your podcasts. Support Look for pivot comes from delete me. The personal data that you enter online every day, it might be worth more than you think. Data brokers can make a profit off of selling it, which can lead to fishing, identity theft, endless spam calls. But you can help protect your data with delete me. When you sign up for delete me, you can see exactly what information you want deleted, and their experts take it from there. Delete me sends you regular personalized privacy reports showing what information they found, where they found it, and what they removed. I've tried delete me myself, and I'm honestly so shocked by how much information there is about me out there. I am a very big privacy nut. I know all about how the tech works, and so it's pretty shocking that they could get me so badly. Some of the people that have it, I mean, just these companies, I don't know who they are. This is one way of getting especially the more pernicious stuff off the internet.

You can take control of your data and keep your private life private by signing up for Delete Me. Now at a special discount for our listeners. Today, you can get 20% off your Delete Me plan when you go to joindeleteme. Com/pivot and use the promo code pivot at checkout. The only way to get 20% off is to go to joindeleteme. Com/pivot and enter the code pivot at checkout. That's joindeleteme. Com/pivotcodepivot. Scott, we're back with our first big story. President Trump is embracing artificial intelligence in a big way, announcing Stargate, a joint venture between OpenAI, SoftBank, and Oracle that aims to build up AI infrastructure in the US. Trump unveiled it. There's no government money here. I got so many people like, Why is the government giving these people money? They're not. This is an initiative. It's just a press release from the White House is what it is. That's why he was there. Had Sam Altman was there, Larry Ellison was there, Masayoshi Son was there. All of you have up and down startup experience, if you want to say that. They're big-time investors. Sam Altman took the opportunity to briefly thank Trump. Let's listen.

I'm thrilled we get to do this in the United States of America. I think this will be the most important project of this era.

As Masa said, for AGI to get built here, to create hundreds of thousands of jobs, to create a new industry centered here.

We wouldn't be able to do this without you, Mr. President, and I'm thrilled that we get to. This has been in the works. Just so you No, it's been in the works for a long time. This is not a new thing. I believe they offered it to the Biden people to do it sooner, and they didn't bite, I suppose. Trump unknow how to bite. Trump's done almost nothing here to do that except for with them in the White House, which is not a bad thing. It's already broke ground. I know a lot about this. I've talked to all the different players in it. Just for history's sake, Mahsa had promised this in the last administration and didn't really make a lot of the investments that he said he was going to make the last Trump administration. That said, he's also a very good entrepreneur on many things and a very bad one on others. There also was Foxconn in the last era, never got built, which Trump had promised and touted and everything else. That said, this is a much more substantive group of people, and they're already building the thing. After the announcement, though, Elon Musk, who was not in the room and purposely not in the room, in case everybody's interested.

I have talked to a lot of people. They made sure he wasn't there. He was stirring the pot, posting on X that these companies don't have the capital to invest. Sam Altman responded wrong. He went on to say, I realize what is great for the country isn't always what's optimal for your companies, but in your new role, I hope you mostly put America first. The word mostly is doing a lot of It's such a troll. It was such a perfect troll. I think part of... Let me say, because I've done a little reporting into it, is they don't have the money yet, but they have a lot of money also, and they'll get the money. I've talked to all the parties. Microsoft's a partner, there's other partners. Essentially, it's to build a data center and build them all over the country. They still also need energy centers. They need all kinds of chips, building chips here. There's going to be a lot of this stuff. A lot of money, not much result yet. So start on that, because I want to also get into this tech telenovela, as I'm calling it, between Musk and Altman, because they continued through the night to troll back and forth.

We'll talk about that in a minute. But talk about the announcement itself, Scott.

It's genius branding on the part of the administration, the President, because he basically took other people's assets and money and pretended it was his idea. I mean, most of this was underway during the Biden administration, but what he's done is he's branded it and taken credit for it. Most Americans will go, a half a trillion dollars US government, weighing in the space program, we're going to be number one in AI. That's leadership day five. When all he really did was just take an existing efforts in capital and brand it. This was brilliant from the President, quite frankly. The one I don't get, I can't figure out that Masayoshi Son is still hanging around the hoop. I don't think he's a great entrepreneur. I think he's one of the luckiest investors in history. I'm convinced, and this is my theory, that Masayoshi Son is an officer in the Central Intelligence Agency that has been tasked with transferring oil capital back from the Gulf to American entrepreneurs. There's been few people that have lost more of other people's money, more of other people's money than Masayoshi Son. Softbank, I mean, come on, Cara.

Yes, I agree. I think he's had some wins.

Well, okay. Broken clock. I used to speak a lot at your code conferences. Whenever there was a really attractive entrepreneur on stage saying, I have this internet-powered mattress and we just raised money at a valuation of seven billion. You knew it was a soft bank back company. Yes. They weren't drunk and sailors. They were drunk sailors on meth with dad's credit card and doing rails. They just found out they had terminal ass cancer, and they were at a weekend in Vegas.

Yes. Let's put the context here. Scott was incredibly critical and correctly throw on WeWork on the WeWork example, of which Son lost a lot of money and then continued to throw good money after bad. You're right. He's had more disasters than he has pluses. There's all kinds of controversies around his companies. He gets a lot of money from the Gulf States. As you know, he was one of the first to go there. He would drive technologists and venture capitalists crazy in Silicon Valley because he'd spend like a crazy person, and then they'd have to. It got really ugly in terms of messing up the venture capital ecosystem in a way that was weird. There were all these bad companies, like one after the next. Go ahead, Scott.

Yeah. In terms of the group, the other interesting thing is the group. I have no idea what Masayoshi San is doing in this group. I think it diminishes the credibility of the whole thing. The biggest winner is the President here, and the other big winner, quite frankly, is Oracle. Oracle is all of a sudden... I went to It's wonderful. Our friends Patrick and Tateam had this wonderful Christmas dinner, and there's a kids table and an adult's table. I said to my 14-year-old, Why don't you join the adult's table? We played these games, and he was just so excited to be there. I feel like Oracle, with this announcement, is officially at the grown-ups table around AI.

Agreed. They've been behind in this area quite a bit. Sam needs capacity. That's what he needs because he's not getting enough from Microsoft. He needs computing capacity. That's really the situation. Because I'll tell you, Musk has done a great job scaling in terms of shoving all those chips in the place, polluting an area where he was opening one of the things. He's done a great job of scaling, and Altman needs to keep up here and needs to look like he's on his front foot. The two of them, what a relationship. They were very close and now are arch enemies. They've continued this back and forth, trolling through the night. Elon has been resharing some of Sam's old anti-Trump tweets. They existed. Sam posted he's not going to agree with Trump on everything, but he thinks he'll be incredible for the country in many ways. Very much like Bill Gates saying, I was impressed with him, more impressed with him than I thought. Obviously, every one of these people is going to do a kiss ass to Trump because it works so But Elon is trying to paint him as anti-Trump. Elon should be careful. I have some text from Elon that are not so positive towards Donald Trump.

A lot of them were not pro-Trump, a lot of them, and then they were. In this case, I think Sam is doing it for... I think a lot of people are pissed at him for doing it, and I can see why. But he's definitely... All these people, whether it's Bill Gates now in an interview with the head of the Wall Street Journal or Sam, are going to say, Trump's going to be incredible. It's the only way to get through to this guy. But it's interesting that Elon was shoved out a little bit here, which I think is vintage Trump. Again, I think a win for Trump to have all these people competing. That's my feeling.

Yeah, but I initially thought that, that, Oh, this was Trump saying, I'm on top. But basically, Trump just played the hand he was dealt. This group, I think, was already assembled and already on their way, and he just wanted credit for it. I do think show that this is probably the beginning of the end of their bromance, because I don't think Trump likes sharing the mic with anyone. Musk fired Vivek because he didn't want to share the mic with Vivek. Musk is used to doing whatever the fuck he wants. And Trump, when he appoints you to something, and now you're off hogging all of the media echo chamber and you're criticizing his new pet project, I got to think that Trump and his folks are like, All right, everybody said we couldn't control this guy, but we were under the impression he wouldn't shitpost us five days into the administration. I got to think that Trump and his circle are like, Okay, this is not- But what do they do?

They rely on his money. They want to use him as a cuddle against the primaries. They gave him a West Wing office, not an East building office.

So you're saying it's more powerful. There's nothing they can do.

Except they kept him out of this meeting. People there, one of the many people involved said it was the greatest engineering feat of all time to keep him out. I think Sam felt emboldened to attack him or to make fun of him. What's really interesting about Musk that you really have to understand is he loves to troll people. He loves to troll people. It gives him his greatest pleasure. He loves, If I do this, what will they do? I've heard out of his mouth so many times. It's usually a stupid prank, right? That he got pushed back on by Sam, who he's also in a loss with OpenAI, by the way, calls him a liar all the time, et cetera. That he got pushed on. When he gets pushed back on, very typical bully, he gets all mad. He gets all beside himself. He trolls, but he can't take a troll in any way with any sense of humor whatsoever. I think that's something Trump will not like. Sam is a more appealing character. If he's assembling billionaires to have around him, you want the Gateses and the Sam's and the Tim Cooks. Musk is a lot if you have him in proximity, and he takes a lot of attention.

But my theory, and I talked to you about this, and you said, and you may be right here, you're just closer to this and more knowledgeable than I am. I thought that the twofer that Musk was getting, one, he likes to troll and two, he has to push out of the news cycle this Roman salute/Heil Hitler gesture. He just needs to change. It's like when Don Draper said, If you don't like what people are saying, change the conversation.

Well, he doesn't want to change the conversation, and Elon seems to be doubling down on the Nazi thing. He put up a post on Thursday morning with all sorts of puns playing on the names of Nazi leaders like Rudolf Hess and Joseph Goebbels, and writing, Bet you did not see that coming. That was the least irritating one of all of them. They were really quite a heinous group of stupid jokes about Nazis. Of course, CEO Linda Yaccarino, also known as the quizling ad lady from Queens, responded with a laughing emoji. There is no low she will not sink to. He's just strange. I don't know what to say. She is. Anyway, does he get the benefit of the doubt? I don't know, Scott. You can have your own opinions about this, but he's absolutely what I just said. He's a complete troll, and he just wants attention, focus on him. I think the Trump administration, believe me, which is the Olympics of trolling, doesn't like this because it takes focus on their own troll, who is a much better troll, by the way. These are not funny jokes. This is a 53-year-old man. Let me just underscore this.

He just has to have all the attention on himself and to cause all kinds of controversy on himself. I think the best thing that has been said, of all things, you can like or dislike Sam Altman all you want, but I think his tweet today, I thought, was said it all, Just one more mean tweet, and then maybe you'll love yourself. I actually don't think he will. I think he's a sad, sad man, Elon Musk, and he will never feel loved because he's unlovable. Scott?

Where I go with this is, you don't make jokes about AIDS. There are certain things that are so painful and so raw and represent so much of the worst of us that you just don't go there. Beyond the decorum, which he seems to enjoy poking, and some people like that he does that, what this is for me is, look at what money has done to us. If you showed up, if you wrote this, if you were a late-time TV host and you started making these jokes, if you were the President of a school board or a member of Congress and you started making these jokes, you'd be pretty swiftly reprimanded in your career and your status, your social capital would erode pretty But when you're worth $400 billion, you have your CEO weighing in with a crying emoji because they want money from you. You have your stands weighing in. I go to the whole dad thing. If my son was If my son was having trouble with drugs, was saying his employees were committing sex crimes when they weren't such that they had to leave their house, living with a gun next to me, not living with any of my 13 kids, and then mock or making fun or light of the Holocaust, you'd move in.

You'd say, Look, son, you're not acting like a man. You're causing unnecessary harm. The definition I like Carlos Chippola. You could say this is cruel. What this is is stupid, and that is there's a great matrix. People who help themselves and help others are intelligent. People who help themselves and hurt others are abandoned. See above, videos. People who help others but don't help themselves, philanthropists/artists, if you will. People who hurt others and hurt themselves, that's just stupid. This is a definition of stupid. This hurts others and it hurts themselves. I'm writing a post about corruption and money for no mercy no malice, and my closing line is, look what money has done to us. I was on my kid's school board, and I had the pleasurable assignment of calling someone knew and saying, You can no longer drop your kid off at drop off because you cut in line and it's pissed everybody off. The cutting in line. Well, yeah, but imagine showing up to a parent-teacher night and accidentally making a fucking Nazi gesture. Try doing that at work and see what happens. By the way, that gesture in Germany is against the law.

It is. In any case, Elon, not a good week for you. I don't know when you're going to break up with Donald Trump, but you have enough money. The only reason he's still there is there's not quite enough billionaires kissing Trump's ass yet.

And once they do- Or willing to spend that money.

Well, they don't. You don't see Sam Altman funding Donald Trump in the next- But does Trump need the money any longer? No, he doesn't. So that's the thing. Or unless he wants to be permanent dictator of the United States. But we'll see. I shouldn't say that in such a glip way. It's scary if that would happen. Let me just ask the last question. Oracle shares jumped over 7% on the heels of the Stargate announcement. Again, Oracle has been behind other people in this area, and it's their sweet spot, by the SoftBank surged 11%, NVIDIA was up more than 4%. This idea of them raising the money, let me just take away. They don't have the money yet. I think they will get the money. I think Elam was making a point which is vaguely accurate, but he left out the fact that they'll probably get the money because he raises money for all manner of good things and nonsense. He'll get the money. I think they'll get some of the money or at least a lot of it. I think we do need to start doing this stuff on US soil, and it has a great political benefit.

It'll probably be Gulf money, by the way, FYI.

Well, it already is. There's a Gulf entity in the group.

Saudi Arabia just said they're going to invest even more in this country.

I hope they do. I want their cheap capital, and I want to increase our ties and binds with the Gulf, quite frankly.

In any case, who benefits the most from this idea of Stargate and projects like this? Because the money is not there in terms of profits. There may be overspending. We've talked about that before.

Well, I mean, it's easy just to get incredibly excited about AI when you spend any time on it. It does blow your mind. The applications are just endless. Having said that, the revenues have not kept pace with the valuations. These companies are willing to make these staggering commitments and investments because the last time they made these staggering investments was in the cloud, and the cloud has paid off wildly. They have the confidence to make these types of investments. Who benefits? If America maintains its lead, I was on Diary of a CEO with Steven Bartlet. People always ask me, or the question I get the most living in London is, how would you summarize the difference between the US and the UK? The way I would summarize it is, my mom and dad had in the late '50s at the age of 19 and 23, got on steamships from Glasgow and London and came to the US with $300. I say, Everyone here, referencing people who are in London, you're the ones that decided to stay. What I mean by that is that there's $5 million in venture capital for every business started in the US versus $1 million in the US.

There's five times the number of entrepreneurs. It is in our DNA to take crazy risks like this. Occasionally, it ends up being crazy genius. In about 90. Name an important AI company that's not in the US. Okay, list over. It's because we are willing to take these staggering risks.

I agree. It's always been like that. It's always It's the same thing with people who stopped in Pennsylvania and didn't go to California. I always think about that. Who stopped and who kept going?

We don't think small. I was on one of my other panelists on Steven Barlett. It was this really impressive, intelligent guy named Konstantin, who you who's, I would call him center-right, if not right. But he made a lot of really interesting points. He said, In the UK, if you go into a restaurant and you like it, you eat there. In the US, if you go into a restaurant and you like it and you have money, you give them your card and you want to open a second, a third, and a fifth. You want to try and scale to 200. We benefit from this economic growth. I think it's amazing and wonderful how big we think, a half a trillion dollars?

There'll be a lot of failures. I said that to someone. I said, Imagine not investing in the internet when they were overinvesting. You know what's interesting is when you talk about that, years ago in the UK, I went on this thing. It was called Silicon Valley in the UK. We went to Cambridge and Oxford, and we did debates at the Oxford, the famous debate series that they had there. It was me and Reid Hoffman on one side saying, The deposit was the US or Britain will create the first $1 billion company. It was billion at the time. That was Reids and my side was the US would win, and then they had some British people. Must have been trillion.

You mean trillion?

No, it was billion at the time. Swear to God, it was billion. How long ago was this? It was almost 15, 20 years ago.

There was billion dollar companies. I'm not going to split hairs here, but go ahead.

Yeah, it was billion. I have the stuff from it. Who's going to create the most billion-dollar companies? I guess it was in the internet. All Reed and I did is we got up because we're shitty debaters and we're like, We just listed Google, It was early on before they were really big. We listed 20 US companies and we go, England. And that was our whole debate. We still lost. We still got voted against because the British were better talkers than us. But I remember thinking, they're not going to make these here? It was with the guy, Mike Lynch's company was the only one. He died. Remember, he died in that weird voting accident. His company was the only one that was pretty big.

Since 2020, our economy has grown 10%. It's barely half of that in Europe and in Germany, in the UK, it's like a third of that. There is something about the culture here, and I can't quite figure it out. They have all of the... Well, in America, I'm a beneficiary of this. I I raised crazy amounts of money on really stupid fucking ideas, and occasionally one panned out. Not only that, the amazing thing about America is even when my crazy ideas didn't work, as long as you're a good person, as long as you treat people well, you can go raise more money. In Europe, you have one startup failure and you're that guy that was a high flyer but crashed and burned. They're more interested in cutting the daisies or trimming the daisies, whatever the term is. The US really embraces risk-takers.

We're crazy cruel greedy.

We're the ones who left, Cara. We're the ones who said, I'm out of here. I want religious freedom. I want to practice breathwork. I want to wear a boosty 8.

This is the exemplification of our country. I wore a bustier, and I'm proud of it. All right, let's go on a quick break. I love how we come back to bustier all the time. Bustier. When we come back, we'll talk about TikTok's potential suitors and take a listener mail question on those drones in New Jersey. Scott, we're back with our second big story. Bytedance is exploring a deal to keep TikTok running in the US without a sale, according to one of its directors, General Atlantic CEO Bill Ford, who sits on bite dances board, told Bloomberg that one of the options is to change in control locally that could comply with US legislation. They're always looking for tricks. Meanwhile, President Trump told reporters he'd be open to Elon Musk buying TikTok or Oracle chairman Larry Ellison, YouTube star Mr. Beast. See, I was right about that. Thank you. Youtube star Mr. Beast is also rumored to be in the mix to buy the Apple, though his rep says he hasn't officially joined any bids. Or willing to spend that money. What do you think about... Well, Oracle is already in there. Oracle is one of TikTok's leading server providers.

But does Trump need the money anymore?

He's in shutdown at risk to the company. Tiktok is still not on the Apple or Google app stores, and they are not going to be on the Apple and Google stores. Trump hasn't imposed his promised terrorist on foreign countries just yet. He's threatening to do so by February first. Maybe he's going to hold off to get leverage on the TikTok deal. Very over thoughts. I knew he would say Elon Musk, of course, but Allison seems an obvious partner in that. As I said, they're going to do some deal that hides the fact that China still runs the place. But Anyway, your thoughts?

Look, the criteria for anyone who potentially does a deal here, first and foremost, it's capital. That just sweeps off the deck Mr. Beast and what's his name? Mr. Wonderful. They're just, Hey, look at me. I'm relevant. I have a big idea. There's just no chance in hell. You need to compute. Oracle brings that. But more than anything, you need China, you need the TCP. That probably, I hate to say it, puts Musk and some other people in a bit of a pole position because the primary criteria for if and who this gets sold to is who the CCP believes they can control.

No, it's true. Unless Trump says no CCP, but he's not going to do that.

Well, it'll be a negotiation, but there's just no They own the asset. You don't have to sell your house if you don't want to. And 20% of the revenues come out of the US. There's a lot of pressure, but they will spin this as if it was some great victory. But the only thing I know here is the Chinese are going to have a lot of influence. Everybody says about Musk, well, he's a child. You got to give him some break. He has Asperger. He just says this thing. He doesn't mean... Never says anything mean about China. China. He's got a lot of maturity and discipline around China. He does. I think China, given us... You've highlighted this to me.

He's a fuck. He's a fuck, F-O-C. I was the first person saying he was going to get it.

But you pointed this out to me. They have real leverage over him because a lot of his factories and a lot of his sales are in China, or it'll be someone they see as very friendly to their interests. But look, the bottom line is everything has changed because our negotiating leverage has been dramatically reduced. When you say, unless you do the following things, I'm leaving, and the next day, your spouse does those things and you don't leave, your threats become somewhat hollow. They know they have the upper hand here. The CCP doesn't need TikTok, doesn't need the capital, especially when they can say, Look, guys, you're getting 80% of your capital overseas. We're not going to They're not going to put up with this shit. If they come up with some accommodation that gives Trump a win- That looks like it.

Yeah, that looks like it. It's going to be very, I call it the Elon faint.

It's going to be a pretzel. This deal is going to be a pretzel if it happens.

Yeah. One of the things that will be interesting is how senators like Tom Cotton, who've been very adamant, who's a China Hawk, it reacts to whatever the deal happens to be. If they get him in on it and say Elon's a great owner, it's over. The second thing, I was just thinking of one the other day that could be... See, if you were doing this in a really fair way, the company you might give it to is Snapchat, who is very strong in video, has been an innovator. It creates a much more competitive playing field in the area. Here's a company that knows how to do this stuff and is, again, meta-steals ideas from them all the time. I don't know. I just was thinking of them the other day. Give this company an opportunity to really compete. They'd be creative. Creators love them. They're based in LA, et cetera. That was my weird thought of the day.

It is a weird thought. That's like giving a bazooka to an eight-year-old.

No way. They have been the most innovative in these spaces.

No, what I mean, that was the wrong analogy. Evan is a super smart guy, super creative. My guess is he would do a pretty good job managing it. They don't have the capital or the compute.

No, with capital, with partners. I'm just thinking that's who would make it something really interesting. That's all I'm saying. Then you have a competitor to Instagram, you'd have a real competitor that's US-owned. Then you have a real competition and you get better products. I just was like, that would be- My idea, and I'm name-dropping, I met with Ted Surroundas, and I'm like, If you want to a trillion dollar company, you should start a competitor to TikTok, and you should take all of your 99%- Mark Cuban is doing it.

I take all of your 99% that doesn't get viewed, chop it into little digestible bits, and start a Netflix, start a TikTok competitor called- Great idea. Called Fibes or something like that. I think actually the best partner here would be a giant compute company and Netflix.

That's a great one. Another one, Mark Cuban is trying to put something together using Blue Sky protocols. I love competition, and so that's all I'm thinking of. Giving it to Elon is just such a weird gimme and thank you, and he would not innovate on it, and he will ruin it. I want it to be a really good competitor Instagram. I want there to be a US-owned competitor Instagram. I love the Snapchat idea. I really like the Netflix It's a great idea. That's a great idea. I like what Mark Cuban's doing. It should not go to Elon. He will wreck it, and it's a gimme and a payback for... It's corruption again, and it's the worst thing. Then the Chinese will have much more control over it. I don't think there's any deal done without Oracle involved.

Netflix has a $420 billion market cap. Say they paid 80. That's like a 15%, what is that? 15, 20% dilution. It's worth it.

Without the algorithm.

And they have all the content.

They should buy Snapchat. That's who should buy Snapchat.

Think about Netflix. Netflix should buy Snap?

Yeah, and then do that there, too, and they also get TikTok. Anyway.

I don't think Netflix wants to be in the business of messaging kids.

I know, but they do a lot. They're doing a ton of videos.

Ted had the right response. He's like, Scott, we're killing it, and we use TikTok to market our products. Yeah. Why do I need to get distracted? That's always- As evidence by the fact that they just increased their subscriber base 17% year-on-year.

Thanks for the tip, Scott. It's like giving a tip to Michael Jordan.

It reminds me.

Hey, if you spin your ball just a little bit more with your thumb, you might have a better shot or something.

Now, I remember saying to... In my past life, I was a consultant, and I used to consult the CEO of a big consumer brand. I remember meeting with Johann Rupert, and they prepared me. It was this big deal. He's the head of Richemont. He's this larger than life character with this deep rumbly voice. All of his brands, from Cartier to Panerai, they have the best watch brands in the world. I said, You have to get on the internet. You have to establish this as a distribution channel. This is 10 years ago. He's like, Let's just listen. He's like, Young man, I can't find enough parts in Switzerland for my watches. I don't have to do anything. That's true. He's like, My watches are sold out. You're telling me I have to be on the internet? He's like, No, I don't have to do anything. That was pre-Apple Watch, by the way.

That's true. Fyi. They're still going to buy these guys' watches. But let me just say, let's go around and give tips to really successful people.

Isn't that what this show is? Isn't that what Pivotous? Yes, it is. Unsolicited advice.

Let's guide people who are really killing it and say...

I start almost every sentence with my friends, I think, Look, I'm really good at running other people's lives. Other people's lives. Let me tell you what you should do.

Okay, let's pivot to a listener question so we can advise them. This question comes from Kelly. Let's listen.

Hi, Cara and Scott.

My name is Kelly Applegate-Nicol. And I live in Champaign, Illinois.

I don't know if you need to know that or not, but I'm calling to say that of all the things that Trump said, I am very disappointed that he did not tell us what the mystery drones in New Jersey are because he said that he was going to do that on day one. So I want to know, what do you two think about the mystery drones? Thank you.

I love you guys. Bye. Oh, that's funny. I just interviewed Mayorkas, Secretary Mayorkas, who is Biden's Director. We talked a lot about the mystery drones. Apparently, they were private drones. People were flying. That's what he seemed to indicate. I agree. Why didn't they tell him? Trump has said he's going to shoot them down if they come back, I guess. That's the shoot first, ask questions later. Of course, people on the ground could be killed, which is why Mayorkas said that's why they didn't shoot them down. I don't know. What do you think, Scott? Any quick drone thoughts? What do you think? And by the way, we love Champagne, Illinois. I just like the name.

Urbana, Illinois, or the Illini. She sounds like she's from Illinois, by the way. Look, this reminds me of a couple of personal experiences, because I don't talk enough about me on this show, I was a mammoth mountain when I was 16 on a high school skiing trip, and this, what was at the time, Stealth Bomber came rolling over the mountain. Those are scary. You'd never seen a picture of one before.

A friend of I went to work- The one went down the mall once when I was living here, George Bush's Administration.

It was terrifying. Yeah, but in 1980, whatever it was, '85, I don't know what, with these things, a friend of mine went to work for Lockheed Martin Marriotto. I remember him telling me, I into this weird place, through an elevator in a hangar, and I'm like, Wow, you must see... I've seen a bunch of cool stuff in aviation. He's like, No one has ever seen any of this shit. Anyways, I remember seeing it and thinking, Wow, our government does a lot of weird things. I wouldn't be surprised if there's some government surveillance drones. The honest answer is, I don't know. But what was one of the most enjoyable flights I've ever taken, I used to commute from Teller Beach to New York, and I was flying up, and I saw a bunch of fighter jets rolling the other way. Then I looked up and the pilot said, Up to your ride around 11: 00 is the balloon. You went by the balloon? I went by the balloon, and I looked up, and it said, We're calling about extending your automobil's insurance plan. No, just kidding. Then literally 30 minutes later, they shot it out of the sky.

They shot it out. They had to wait till it's somewhere safe. You know, Trump's not going to do this. He makes all kinds of demented promises. What do you think they are? What do you think they are? What do you think they are? What do you think they are? What do you think they are? What do you think they are? What do you think they are? What do you think they are? What do you think they are? I think they're probably private commercial things that were just up there fucking with people to see what would happen. Maybe they were a government thing. I know they couldn't have shot them down with areas of people. You just can't do that because you'll kill a kid or something like that. I want him to tell us who killed JFK, and I'd like to know, this is the alien. Those are the two things I want out of this administration.

Who invented Bitcoin? I'd like to know that. Who invented Bitcoin? Who invented Bitcoin? The CIA did that, too. The CIA is the only organization in the world that can keep it secret. For the rest of you listeners, it's time for this week's Threads poll.

This one open-ended. Who do you think will be the next member of Trump's inner orbit to get the boot? Oh, that's good. Let us know. What is your choice?

I don't know. I don't know who's going to go first. I haven't really thought about it. Have you thought about it?

I don't know. Probably Eric. Anyway, visit us at pivotpodcastofficial on threads to answer.

Oh, Cash Patel. I think it's going to be over before it starts. I do think there is a line, I think.

They like him. They like him. He was loyal to Trump when he was on the out.

Then again, I said that about Pete Hexeth. But in honor of Pete Hexeth, I last night tried to do five sets of 47 pushups, and tonight, I couldn't do it. I got three. Tonight, I'm going to start with a gin and tonic and see if it helps.

Okay.

I'm going to do five sets of 47.

All right, good luck. If you got a question of your own you'd like answered, send it our way. Go to nymag. Com/pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-515-pivot. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for predictions. Predictions. Okay, Scott, let's hear a prediction.

I just want to call Balls and Strikes here. I've been indignant, outraged, incredibly upset about these meme coins. That is 3D-level chess compared to the checkers of the corruption of Speaker Pelosi. The most recent example of Speaker Pelosi's corruption is a Tempest AI, which is a healthcare AI company, announced on Tuesday, or it became public on Tuesday, that Speaker Pelosi, who is in confidential hearings about where Medicaid is going to spend their money, it's not unthinkable that she saw Tempest on a list of where they might be investing in AI diagnostics and care management. It comes out that parties affiliated with Speaker Emerta Pelosi bought $50,000 to $100,000 of call options in Tempest AI. When that was announced on Tuesday, Tempest AI had its biggest gain in its history, it was up 35%. That is bullshit. Now, granted, if you're going to abuse your position do it for billions like Trump, and his is more outrageous and more brazen, but this is the same flavor of the same sorbet, and that sorbet is corruption. It is an abuse of power. To have the speaker of the House buying call options on a company that could be getting hundreds of millions of dollars from our agency.

This is a bipartisan issue here, this corruption. Okay, enough of my ranting. My prediction is the following. Oracle is We've officially been invited to the grownups table. They trade at a price to sales ratio of about eight. Microsoft is at 13, Open AI is at 40, NVIDIA is, I think, at 28, Anth Anthropic, interestingly enough, trades at more like 60 to 90, depending on how you define revenues. Oracle is at eight. Oracle is a great company, great revenues, great management. They're going to start to get... The peanut butter and chocolate right now of a Ectleptocracy are, one, proximity to Trump, and two, and this isn't a kleptocracy, is how close you are to the epicenter of AI. Now, Oracle, with its proximity to Trump and its credibility in AI being invited into Stargate is going to result in multiple expansion. I think in the next 90 days, Oracle is going to outperform its peers.

All right. That's a good one. That's a great one. Okay. All right. That's an interesting choice. I would agree. I think they've been behind. They have been behind, and now they're trying to make a move and using Altman to do so.

The speaker is buying call options.

I got it. No, they shouldn't be doing this. At the very least, it's a perception of thing. Anyway, elsewhere in the Karen Scott universe this week, this week on Profgee Markets. Scott spoke with Rich Greenfield, partner and media and technology analyst at LightJed Partners. He's very smart. Let's listen.

I think it's highly likely that you're going to end 2025 and TikTok is still going to exist. Will there be some subtle shifts in its ownership? The word salad that came out of Trump when he was signing the executive orders about needing to own or someone in the US owning 50%, it It's hard to understand what that means, Ed, because TikTok is already 58% owned by well-known international investors.

Yeah, that's right. It's going to be some deal that is a faint. It's going to be all a faint. We are still in danger of China having influence over our world. Good job. Rich is really smart. Okay, Scott, that's the show. We'll be back on Tuesday with more Pivot. Can you read us out?

Today's show is produced by Lara Naiman, Tommi Marcus, and Taylor Dryfen. Ernie Irtot engineered this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows, Ms. Severo, and Dan Shulon. Nisha Kurwa is Fox Media's executive producer of audio. Make sure you subscribe to this show wherever you listen to podcast. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York magazine, Fox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine at nmymag. Com/pod. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. We're headed to the movies. We'd like Lauren Sanchez to sit in between us..