Pivot - Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump

Episode Date: March 11, 2025

Kara and Scott are live at SXSW — taking shots and dancing around like Elon (okay, that's just Scott). They discuss how Elon's business empire is struggling, and how much money DOGE is really saving. Then, Trump's crypto summit, and his plan to create a Bitcoin reserve. Plus, as the IPO slump continues, will any major company go public this year? Follow us on Instagram and Threads at @pivotpodcastofficial. Follow us on Bluesky at @pivotpod.bsky.social. Follow us on TikTok at @pivotpodcast. Recorded on March 9th at SXSW in Austin. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Your Crocs, your story, your world. Do you think we'll ever have sex? Do you think we'll ever have sex? Do you think we'll ever have sex? The two of us? Yeah. Just kidding. I'm down as long as I don't have to be there. Hi, everyone.

This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. This is a live broadcast. As we said, we were going to do it here. We're very excited. We always have a great time at South by Southwest. How is a live broadcast. As we said, we were going to do it here. We're very excited. We always have a great time at South by Southwest. How is your South by Southwest, Scott? I love it here.

Oh, you want to say, hi, I'm Scott Galloway. Go ahead. I'm Scott Galloway. OK. By the way, 9 AM on Sunday of daylight, say what the fuck are you thinking? I know. I know.

I agree. It's like a dog whistle from Mormons or people with no life. Yes, it's true. Literally, this is a negative forward-looking indicator of your social option. What the fuck are you doing here? I have to be here.

Why do they schedule us at 10? That's what I was thinking. It's like Doge in charge of this shit? What is going on? Oh, but they have you and Senator Warren at the prime time at 4 p.m. Billionaires should not exist. Up next, Mark Cuban.

Sorry, go ahead. Sorry. Yeah. Tax the rich. Somehow I became worth $11 million serving in Congress. Sorry. No, it's her house. She has a house.

Oh yeah, it's her house. It is. No, she's eight million. She's eight million. Yeah. Yeah, that's not rich by these people's standards. Okay, is. That's right. No, she's $8 million. She's $8 million. Yeah. Yeah. That's not rich by these people's standards. OK.

All right. OK. She doesn't trade stocks. Anyway, how is your South by Southwest? I love it here. I like the food. I like the people. What does a Texan German car enthusiast say?

What? Audi. It's Sunday morning. It's Sunday morning. It's Sunday morning. Have you been partying? You want something dirtier? Yeah, go ahead. I come down here because my urologist is down here. Oh, here we go.

And you get to my age, you get a drip. It takes a good, I don't know, three weeks to pee now. And so I go into my urologist and he's like, did you have sex recently? And I said, yeah, about five days ago. And he said, does she live near here? And I said, yeah, and he's like, well, you may want to get back, I think you're coming.

Good morning. Good morning. And yes, they do serve Bloody Marys at 730 at the proper hotel. Vegetables. God, I am jet, god. I am jet lagged. I am jet lagged from coming back from Australia. Are you interviewing Dr. Peter Attia? I am aware of him.

Well, Peter Attia and Andrew Huberman were like the poster children for big, handsome guys who work out all the time. They've declared war on alcohol. I'm taking alcohol back. Young people need to drink more. That is, what is the bigger issue? The alcohol your liver can absolutely

handle when you're between the ages of 18 and 40, or the fact that none of you are having sex and making connections. Drink more for God's sakes. I think they're doing a lot more weed is what's happening. There's a lot more weed. Well, I wouldn't know about that. What do you mean by weed, Kara? I just say, that's my impression from my children. Yeah, they're doing a lot more weed is what's happening. There's a lot more weed. Well, I wouldn't know about that. What do you mean by weed, Kara?

I just say, that's my impression from my children. Yeah, they're doing drugs, but the thing I don't like about those drugs is I don't think they're as social. Yeah. Right. You drink alcohol and you just become more attractive to you, which gives you the confidence to go up to someone

who likely does not find you attractive, but maybe over time, and I'm being somewhat serious here, gives you a chance to demonstrate excellence. Do you wanna know the scariest stat I have seen, or Dilly going off script here? I'm so jet lagged, I'm fine with it, go ahead. She came in from Australia. I did.

Anyways, more than half, 51%, 51% of 18 to 24-year-old males have never asked a woman out in person. Think about just how tragic that is. Half, 51%, 51% of 18 to 24 year old males have never asked a woman out in person. Think about just how tragic that is, that these young men are not developing the skills to much less potentially meet a romantic partner, have kids, which I think is the whole shooting match,

not that you can't be happy without that, but I think everyone should have the option. And then they're not developing social skills. And we don't like to talk about this, but your ability to open and establish contact and connection with someone. All right, question. How many women are asking men out? Just curious.

Oh, isn't that nice? Oh, it's nice. I'm just curious, why can't that happen? Here's the bottom line. We talk a big game, but somewhere between 70 and 80% of women. I mean, isn't that nice? What does that mean?

Between 70 and 80% of women still say they want the man to initiate contact. So they still expect, I mean, think about it. Young men, quite frankly, are getting a lot of mixed messages in my view. And it's making them asocial. And then we have the most talented companies in the world who sponsor this conference trying

to convince them they can have a reasonable facsimile of life on a screen with an algorithm. Trust me on this. Trust me. Go out, drink more, make a series of bad decisions that might pay off. I'm not sure you're right on the statistics, honestly, but you should do that. Everybody should ask each other out. My sons were both asked out by the girls they are now seeing, their girlfriends.

Yeah, but your sons are handsome. Yeah, okay. The rest of us have to take our shot. The rest of us have to do something like this. Do you know what I think you need? Oh, God, here he goes again. Do you believe in love at first sight? No, no. Or should I walk by?

Show your abs. How about breakfast? Oh, God. Do you want all you or not you? Do you know what I'm thinking right now? I'm reconsidering the possibility of doing another four-year deal with Scott Calloway, but I've just re-re-considered it.

You'll be 78, I'll be 36. Do you think? By the way, by the way, for men, for men, 50 is the new 30, and for women, 40 is the new 90. Oh My god, I don't I I should have slept in and watched church chat. All right You know what? We're gonna end up together in like a like you'll be willing me around. Yes I'll be willing you looking over the wheelchair

Yes And then I'll keel over and you'll be sitting there like by yourself, because no one's gonna wanna talk to you. Anyway, speaking of shots, we're gonna do shots here like we promised on the show. I don't do shots. Really? Yeah, I don't do shots.

What do you mean you don't do shots? I don't do shots. Why? Someone, it's like that propaganda. You literally just told him to drink and now you don't do shots? Well, put sugary shit on top of it and a lime and pretend like you're sophisticated.

You're gonna do a shot today. Literally, this is me at the Stowe House last night. The loveliest people come up to me and they're like, thank you for your work on the story. Just get me off, fucking makers and ginger. I don't wanna talk about anything. All right, well, you're doing a shot because it says don't mess with Texas.

All right. We're gonna fuck with Texas today. Anyway, as I was saying, we're doing our thing. We've got a lot to get to today. We're taking questions from the live audience, of which are going to be most of the show. But we want to talk about a couple of things. Following the news that Trump is reigning in Elon Musk, neither of us believe this, and Doge, let's talk about how Elon's actual business are doing as he dabbles in government.

SpaceX's largest starship exploded this past week during a test flight. That's the second time it's happened. He does blow up a lot of rockets. Tesla sales and stock price are down and the company is at risk of bleeding cash. Is this business missteps happening because of his role in government or in spite of it? What, how do you look at these?

Because the bit, and then Starlink, which may or may not go public, we'll talk about that in a minute, has seen competition from China, from Jeff Bezos, from all kinds of stuff. What's happening here? Well, I think it's a tale of two cities here, and that is Tesla is crashing in the sense that,

I mean, you've heard, so I'm doing breakfast with the Nike people tomorrow. Nike went political with their embrace of Colin Kaepernick, but they did the math. And that is two thirds of Nike sales are outside of the US. And no one outside of the US thinks the US has got race relations right. Two thirds of their revenue and probably 70% or 80%

of their profits come from people under the age of 30. They also have a huge customer base in non-whites. So essentially the people who burned their Nikes after they endorsed Nike, that was probably their first pair of Nikes. And that is they knew that their core audience would probably feel very good about that move. As smart as that was, Musk's political forays or adventures are that stupid because 75% of Republicans say they would never buy EV. He's gone very red pill.

In California, his biggest market, EV sales for Tesla are down dramatically. And even after this crash in sales in Europe, if you look at the company, it's lost about a third of its value in February. It's lost all of its kind of Trump bump gains. If you look at it from a valuation perspective, Apple only grew 2% last year, but it trades at a 38 times earnings multiple. Amazon grew 10%, 38 times PE.

Nvidia grew about 114% and it has a PE multiple of 40. Tesla grew 1%, Tesla's flat, and it has a price earnings multiple of 144. So Tesla is still, even after shedding a third of its value, is the most overvalued company in tech, maybe the exception of Palantir, and the sales are just not, it's crashing. His political calculus as it relates to Tesla was just irrational. Now, to be fair, SpaceX and the value proposition of SpaceX is that rockets blow up. And that is they can take risks that NASA and the government can't.

And 99% of their launches are successful. They're responsible for about 78% of the launches right now. The Falcon Heavy rocket can get shit into the air, into orbit for $1,500 a kilogram. The next best is a Russian company called Angara that can do it at three times the cost. So their ability to take those sorts of risks and put shit into space for a third of the price

of the second best per kilogram launch vehicle, I think SpaceX is gonna be worth more than Tesla in 2025. But taking your eye off the ball, because there are now competitors, there's gonna be increasing amounts of competitors, will the same thing happen? Is this political Caucasian a good one for him?

Because they may use Starlink at the FAA, they may use, but they were buying Cybertrucks for some reason for the State Department. I think more than trying to increase revenues, it's trying to clear out obstacles. So there are 11 federal agencies that have 32 investigations currently underway for different Musk companies.

And a lot of those inspectors and people seem to be getting the axe. So I don't think his foray into government underway for different Musk companies. And a lot of those inspectors and people seem to be getting the axe. So I don't think his foray into government is about trying to increase revenues. I think it's about trying to clear out the inspectors and potential regulation. But it doesn't look like the calculus is very smart here.

David Sacks getting involved in crypto and then getting Trump to have dinner with the guy from Ripple, who probably promised him money, and then all of a sudden deciding to include Ripple in the strategic Bitcoin reserve. By the way, there's nothing strategic about that. And then all of a sudden Ripple rips. That's smart political kleptocracy corruption, but at least that's smart.

His political forays so far, I don't think are paying off for him. You don't think so. What will happen then to Tesla from your perspective? A just a downward slide of the, I mean they have to obviously update the cars. They're talking about self-driving, full self-driving. They're talking about robo-taxis,

which already are in effect here with Waymo for years actually. Yeah, but you said it, Waymo's just light years ahead of them. And if Tesla starts trading like a regular automobile company in terms of price to earnings, it would be at 14 bucks a share. It's just impossible to rationalize the valuation.

I still think it's a really good car. I think, you know, I can't help it. I got a Tesla on my Uber app, I cancel, or I let them wait outside. I know that's wrong. But it is a good car, it's a great company. It should trade at a multiple of 50 to 100% more than the other car companies,

meaning it's a 25 or a $30 stock. So where's the benefit for him in this kleptocracy you speak of? That's the correct question. I don't know, fame, narcissism, go red pill, clear out inspectors. To me, the calculus is not smart here. Tesla has basically become a brand

that means has some very negative brand associations. What do you... I think that too. I think people who are buying it are repulsed by it, are actually repulsed by it and are not. But you see all these stories and actually you're seeing violence at Tesla facilities, not just there, but at charging stations, the cars are getting defaced. I think people are embarrassed to have them. I mean, the Uber thing is simple. I actually don't

want take a Tesla Uber. I just don't I don't like the cars actually myself. I find them it feels like I'm sitting in the inside of an egg. I know it sounds dumb, but if you're in there, it feels sterile. And if I'm going to pay more for a car, an Uber, I want a nice, comfortable car. But that's besides the way, I think it's just a brand destruction is what's happening. And he doesn't seem to mind because I think he's bored with his other businesses. And this is interesting to him, what he's doing. But the pushback is real from the thing. Do you think that the case with him and Marco Rubio? There was a very funny SNL skit last night on that.

Do you think the pushback is actually real? People keep predicting he and Trump finally. So 92% of Trump's advisors were fired. So there's a 90% it's like being second lieutenant in Vietnam, you're probably not gonna last very long. That was ugly. Yeah, it's dark. 92% of those advisors in the first administration were fired, more than all the advisors that were fired

in the previous three administrations. He's very good at creating human heat shields. If in fact he has told his cabinet they're now in charge and he's an advisor, it means he's done. He does not have the complexion to go to you know Senator Rubio, excuse me, Secretary Rubio, and also these individuals have no incentives to trim their departments. They have very difficult jobs and their departments, all of this is a giant fucking distraction. So far according to the Wall Street Journal,

Doge has saved $2.6 billion. If you wanted a 6X Doge just caught off all subsidies to Tesla, which had been $15 billion, this is a giant misdirect. Yep, yep. Woo! This is a giant misdirect to get you and mostly young people to look away.

Oh, Doge, oh, he's crazy, he's firing people. All these sad stories about federal employees being let go. Well, they're actually real. They are actually getting fired. I get it, and people in the private sector are fired every day, but they want you to look over here such that you don't look at the tax plan,

they're just gonna add $800 billion to the deficit. So this is the conspiracy that is elegant and that people aren't looking at. Talk about DEI being a helicopter crash. Talk about Doge. Talk about inflame people by saying, by stupid laws like male versus female, that's how they're spending their time?

Because look over here, not at the fact that the point. They're making the tax cuts they want to do. Not at the fact that the 0.1% who will say under the breath, yeah, I don't want to go to his inauguration, but my accountant tells me I'm going to get another $11 million this year. This is a conspiracy between the 0.1% and an administration that wants you to look over here and ignore the fact

that we're about to levy the greatest increase in taxes in history called a deficit. Anyone under the age of 40 in here at some point is either going to have to pay that back or the forward-leaning investments we've been able to make in the past in technology and space and education are going to get crowded out by the interest on this debt, which is now greater than our military. So we need to reframe this discussion and say, America is about to incur the greatest tax increase in history on young people that's

deferred called the deficit. Don't look at that. Look at that they just fired three people to the National Forestry Service. Who the fuck cares? I know it's sad. I know it's bad. Well, no, Scott, I think it is actually a hollowing out, not just of the regulators of Elon, although I think that's

very clear that that's, I mean, they're definitely charged. But what is the percentage, the actual numbers? He's a very small amount. He's not saving any money. I mean, the whole thing is kind of a phase. It's a misdirect. It is a misdirect. And at the same time, they were going to pass this tax law anyway.

They were not going to not pass this tax law. And I do think the Democrats, as we talked about last week, focusing in on Elon, is good politically because he's disliked from poll after poll. The polls are very clear. So I'm not so sure it's the smartest idea to have this misdirect is different than DEI crashed planes versus something else. I do think it's at the heart of what Trump's doing. And I think he's I do think it's at the heart of what Trump's doing. And I think he's antagonizing a lot of his base. And by that, I mean people in Washington for no good reason, when he could get these things passed no matter what.

I think there's a large percentage of moderates that feel like breaking some eggs and laying off people in the public sector. and laying off people in the public sector. First off, if this were an audit, the net results of the audit so far is there's dramatically less inefficiency, fraud and waste than we thought in government. They're just, if you look at their

quote unquote wall of receipts, they don't be, they haven't been able, it appears, to actually find any fraud or waste. That's exactly right. We saved $8 billion. Oh no, it's actually $8 million and the money's already been spent. And then numbers two, three, and four

that they supposedly saved money on weren't real. If this is an audit, the government is getting an outstanding clean bill of health around fraud and waste. But having said that, I do think moderates kind of like the idea, and every administration has done some form of this, just not so weird. They do, there's always that sentence,

like of course we're all for government before, if you notice, they always do that. But these departments are, Senator, Senator or Secretary Rubio isn't gonna agree to cuts, if he's actually in charge now, he's got a tough job, he's not gonna say, yeah, you snort, do a few rails of ketamine and then come in here and tell me what ambassadors

or what people we should lay off. He's not gonna say that. So if in fact- He does look like his soul has come out of his body. If he has to report into him now, it means Doge is over, in my view. Yeah, yeah, we'll see. It'll take a while to get him out.

Elon is a bit like mold. So let's talk about how Elon is influencing the business world by moving his Texas here to Texas. He's not the first to do it. Now Chevron, KFC, and Metta are talking about putting their HQs here. The governor of Delaware, where most Fortune 500 companies are incorporated, is now scrambling to keep companies

there. You and I have talked about that. I mean, do people, you have talked about being a good thing because Texas is more business friendly versus other places. I assume other states will try to do the same thing. Wyoming, I know, is doing that. Nevada, there's certain states that are doing that.

Do you think Delaware is over as a place to do business? No, Delaware is traditionally seen as very corporate friendly, especially when they're efficient around their chance record and the way they decide so. I don't think you can be for competition and ask Big Tech to break up and not support competition among states. I think the thing that's going to incent California to get its shit together is a lot of people are leaving for Texas

because they do. The three greatest arbitrages available, I think, in economic history are one, the arbitrage from fossil fuels to things that build everything from this to, you know, the tennis shoes you have probably have petroleum in them. Second is to find young, ambitious people who will work as hard or harder cause then I'm dogs and kids and will be 80 or 90% as good as the person who's been with your company 20

years. But because they're naive and can live in a 300 square foot apartment, you'll have to pay them 30 or 40% as good as the person who's been with your company 20 years, but because they're naive and can live in a 300 square foot apartment, you don't have to pay them 30 or 40% as much. The most successful companies in the world participate in the arbitrage of young people who don't know any better, right? Those are your most valuable employees.

Is the over-educated, really hardworking 25-year-old that you pay 80 grand instead of 250 grand to the 40-year-old who has kids? The other big arbitrage right now economically in the United States is state arbitrage. And that is people who basically say, okay, and I did this in 2010, my son was denied, he's doing great now

because he was speech delayed when he was four, from seven out of seven schools that wanted to charge us $58,000 a year for him to play with blocks. We moved to Florida, and the school there, a lovely little school, was 12,000. So the geographic arbitrage that's taking place across America where people are moving to lower cost, higher quality of living states like Texas and Florida

is a great thing. So companies coming here I think is a good thing. I think it's important. What's weird is Metta, Chevron, and KFC. So, carbon, teen depression, and diabetes. Would you move to Texas? It's a little high. Florida hasn't worked out as well.

The whole Miami Tech thing is sort of a bust right now. Yeah, it's a good quality of life though. It's a really nice quality of life. I understand, but that didn't take off. I can see living here. Don't you think you could live there? This seems pretty nice. No. No? It's a really nice quality of life. I understand, but that didn't take off. I can see living here. Don't you think you can live there? This seems pretty nice.

No. No? No. Austin? They don't like the gays. Austin doesn't like gay people, is that fair? Well, maybe Austin does, but I know that. I'm aware of that.

I'm aware. But let me say, I worry about my family a lot, like in different certain states. I love Austin, I love this area, but you have a state government that's hostile to my family. So it's really hard when I'm making... Florida, forget it. And I'm even worried in DC. My kid's in a DC public school. And she brought home, they did like a little diversity moment where they were just, it was coloring in a coloring thing. And I thought, oh oh wow, one of these fucking senators

from some state who has no values that I have are gonna try to mess with my kids' education. I think about it all the time. And then I'm like, right. I don't want it in your shoes, so I take your word for it. Yeah, it's just, you just, you have to be thinking really hard about where you wanna raise your kids and where they're gonna to attack your family.

I mean, I just, I think about it. I didn't think I'd have to think about it again in my life, except now I do. So again, I don't have your lived experience. Right. But the tax is fantastic. Like I- Well, I now-

I can hire extra security. As a Florida resident, I think a lot of Florida citizens are horrified by some of the laws that have been passed around restricting a woman's rights. There's no doubt about it, that's rattling. But just on the ground, I live in Delray Beach. It feels like a pretty progressive community

that's very open and welcoming. I get it, but anytime a state can fuck with me, I'm very aware of it. And it's one of the reasons I love California and stuff. But I get it, I get it. There's definitely a cost benefit analysis, but I just find I'd rather be in states that support my family, that's all.

So what do you think a lot of states will move here? You do, you do think they'll move? Oh, there'll definitely be companies that incorporate here and move here. And you know what? Oracle is here. I think that's a great thing. I think competition, intrastate competition is really important. I think that's a great thing. I think competition, intrastate competition

is really important. I think it's good for the economy. You guys are building like crazy here. What in the hell's going on? I've never seen such, like every time I come back here, I think there can't be another building here in Austin. And then there's another fucking building. It's getting a little much, I'll be honest with you.

All right, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, we'll have more for you. All right, let's go on a quick break when we come back. We'll have more for you. Support for this show comes from Smartsheet. You know that look the basketball player gets as they step up to the free throw line or the rock star right before they belt out the high note or maybe even your dog as she gnaws through your favorite sneaker. That all-accompassing, nothing-else-matters, right-here-right-now feeling has a name. It's called Flow. But you don't have to be a professional athlete or musician or a happy dog to experience Flow. You can access a focused Flow state in everything you do, and Smartsheet is here to help you

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Okay, Scott, we're back on Friday. President Trump held the first ever crypto summit at the White House. Such a pro, right? What an elegant segue. How did she pull it off? Oh my God. What are you doing here on a Sunday morning? Let me just tell you. here on a Sunday morning?

Let me just tell you, can I just tell you, there is no way you could do what I do. See? The crowd agrees. On a lot of levels. Let me just say, you're the, if you understood what's happening here, you're the pretty one, incredibly. You're the pretty one who just sits there and says things. I'm sorry, Kara, what did you say? Yeah, I'm the pretty one.

Do you think we'll ever have sex? That's what I get. Do you think we'll ever have sex? Do you think we'll ever have sex? The two of us? Yeah, just kidding. I'm down as long as I don't have to be there. Okay.

That would be so weird. I was just thinking so. Oh God, you don't know what it takes to get me going now, Kara. Yeah. It's a Pam Grier film, eight bottle of cocaine and a cattle prod up my ass, and then it's go time. It's go time for a good 90 seconds.

I was just thinking about that. And then when I climax, I scream out, surrender Dorothy! Or my favorite, from Wicked, I'm melting. How did we get here? Get us out of this. No, I'm just curious. Get us out of this now.

You probably cry. I've never thought about having sex, just so you know. Yeah, which is why you brought it up. Yeah, I'm just. Yeah. It just seems like the inevitable end of our relationship. Oh, God. Suddenly we'll look at each other.

It's like a movie, like a home-art movie. I just ate! Okay, all right. Okay, now we're back. Okay, President Trump held the first ever crypto summit at the White House. Crypto experts, lawmakers, administration officials gathered as Trump cleared a war on crypto is over. A day earlier, Trump signed an executive order creating

a strategic Bitcoin reserve and separate digital assets stockpile. The reserve will be established with Bitcoin that has been seized from federal law enforcement. I don't know how much that is. During Trump's second term, the SEC had already closed several investigations into cryptocurrency firms. Sam Bankman freed, if you saw him on Tucker Carlson the other day. He's hoping to get in on that forgiveness. The Disgrace FTX founders have probably been campaigning for a pardon from President Trump, I bet he gets it. What do you think of the reserve and will you be thinking about more crypto investments now that this is happening? You and I have been sort of in and out on whether crypto is good.

I ultimately think it's probably more, some of it's okay, some of it isn't. Some of the people in crypto find this disturbing, the way they're doing this, in the way they found the Biden administration to be too difficult in terms of rolling things out. So this is essentially just pure pay for play. And Republicans would argue that, OK, we're just

more transparent about it. But the crypto community gave $285 million to the Trump campaign. And what do you know? He's decided to have a, quote unquote, strategic Bitcoin reserve. It makes absolutely no sense. You have a strategic petroleum reserve,

and it is strategic because if there's a war or a supply chain of fossil fuels gets cut off, we don't want our economy to come to a halt if we need to build tanks or just keep the economy open. So we have a strategic reserve. What's going to happen if we run out of Bitcoin? How is that a defense threat? So there's nothing strategic about it. What it is is the following.

You give me $285 million, so I'm gonna increase the deficit. I mean, when we seize assets, when the FBI seizes assets, they immediately sell them because they don't wanna be in the business of owning boats or Bitcoin or whatever. That's not their job. They're not hedge fund managers.

If you have a nation that's creating more revenue than you're spending, then you have a sovereign fund that tries to find alpha. Which they're also trying to do with sovereign fund. He's talked about that. But why? We don't of a sovereign fund that tries to find alpha. Which they're also trying to do with sovereign fund. He's talked about that. But why? We don't need a sovereign, we need higher taxes and lower spending.

We don't have any additional money because then you're saying the government is better at allocating investment capital than the investment community. And by the way, all this is again, another increase in a deficit to transfer wealth to his 0.1 percenters such that you can own a little bit of Bitcoin.

Here's a crazy idea. Go buy your own fucking Bitcoin. I mean, it just, this makes no sense whatsoever. This is pure. You gave me $285 million, so I'm going to come up with a bunch of jazz hands around why we should have a strategic reserve. And by the way, there's a negative implication. Bitcoin is terrible for the United States strategically because the biggest, baddest

carrier strike force in our arsenal is an invisible one called the US dollar. And when we put sanctions on a country, it has teeth because we can stop them from trading in dollars, which makes it very hard for them to do business globally. So if you're going to create another global reserve currency, all you are doing is attacking our aircraft carrier squadron called the dollar. So this is not only kleptocracy and pay for play and make no sense. It's actually damaging to the underlying strength of America because it's diminishing the dollar. So what should they do? Because a lot of people felt the Biden administration had been hostile, especially Gary Gensler, who you and I both talked to.

That they had been hostile to the development of it, trying to overregulate it. I do understand why their inclination is to regulate it, because it's currency. It does affect other parts of the economy. It's a legit, Bitcoin is established. First off, I don't think you can talk about Bitcoin in the same breath as the other ones. Bitcoin has established itself as a credible store of value because the genius of Bitcoin is they've created this algorithm or this methodology

where you have to constantly throw numbers to unlock or mine Bitcoin. And people now believe, the market now believes that they're gonna stop minting at 21 million. So Bitcoin is increasing less fast than gold reserves than we're printing US dollars. So the market says this is a legitimate store of value. That is an asset class. What's to stop anyone at Doja or Ripple or ETH from massively increasing the supply? It's supposed to be one of three

things. It's supposed to be a payment mechanism. No one's using this shit for payments. It's supposed to have utility. You could argue ETH and some of them, maybe they make payments, maybe other stable coins go on their tech night. But for the most part, there's no real utility here, folks. It's not like Dennis used Bitcoin to fill your cavities. There's no real utility. What it could be is a store of value. And one of them, in my view, has created a store of value, and that is a legitimate store of value, and that's Bitcoin. Other than that, it's pure speculation, which is fun, but the notion that we're going to get involved, you're about to see in 36 months, you're going to see a raft of stories about

crypto scans that happened between now and the next 36 months because you could make an argument that it was being over regulated or there was a lack of regulation which created insecurity like people I think Brian Armstrong will fairly say just tell us what the rules are and we'll comply but they couldn't get any clarity so you could argue there was an under regulation but there was opaque regulation but now it's it's the wild west. You're going to see so many stands. Would you buy Bitcoin right now? I'm a no coiner. I was on the board of a company called Ledger,

which was a crypto hardware wallet because I wanted to learn more, but I generally don't invest in things I don't understand. And I speak, I'll go down and I'll have lunch with Michael Saylor whenever I'm in Miami. And within about 10 minutes of hearing him, he's brilliant, I start thinking, put everything into Bitcoin. This guy's just so much fucking smarter than me. Put everything into Bitcoin. And then by the time I leave lunch,

I'm like, I have no fucking idea what Bitcoin is. I don't understand it. I just don't get it. So I'm a no-coiner. Do you own any? I do, but I can't find it. You can't find it. Yeah. That's right. You told me that. Yeah, I bought can't find it. You can't find it. Yeah.

That's right. You told me that. Yeah, I bought it at the beginning. People know this story. I bought it at the beginning. I was writing a story about Wences Kisaris who started Zappo, and I bought 10 or 50 Bitcoin. I don't know, but it was like 50 bucks each, and it must have been 10 because they spent $500.

I've been using that to our advantage. That story is out there. that Kara has like $50 million in Bitcoin in like a drawer somewhere. It's not in a drawer. I don't know where it is. It's probably at Lucky's house, but whenever I'm with Bankoff, we're in the midst of negotiating.

Yeah, go get my mother, do something. We're in the midst of negotiating a new four-year deal with Vox, and I'm just malicious and Machiavellian. Last night I'm like, oh hey Jim, he's like, what are you doing? I'm going to the Spotify party, they want to talk to us. And also, I heard Kara found her crypto.

From Spotify. Anyway, anyway. By the way, Netflix is getting into podcasting. Just saying. Just saying. Just saying. So no Bitcoin for us. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break and we'll be back with our next big story. By the way, Netflix is getting into podcasting. Just saying. Just saying. Oh, God. So no Bitcoin for us.

All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break and we'll be back with our next big story. Support for this show comes from Smartsheet. You know that look the basketball player gets as they step up to the Frito line or the rock star right before they belt out the high note or maybe even your dog as she gnaws through your favorite sneaker. That all-accompassing, nothing-else-matters, right-here-right-now feeling has a name.

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I have liquor for you. So she makes the big bucks. That's I do. I make the big bucks. We're back with our next big story. Let's talk very quickly about IPO. So I want to get to the questions from the audience. I want you to be brief here.

I know it's difficult for you. 2025 was expected to be a big year for IPOs, thanks to Trump and his pro-business anti-regulation administration. But with tariff whiffblash, regulatory changes, inflation concerns out there. We're not seeing an IPO just yet, although StubHub and Discord are reportedly getting ready to dip their toes in the waters. Some other long rumored is Xi'an, OpenAI and SpaceX. is it good time to go public? It doesn't seem like there haven't have been any. Shein, for example, is facing some headwinds with Trump

ending the de minimis loophole that allows them to ship cheap goods from China to the US without paying taxes and import duties. Where is the IPO market briefly? It's kind of the walking dead. In 2021, there were 1,000 IPOs that raised $280 billion. Last year, there were 150 IPOs that raised $30 billion. The IPO market is just literally dead.

It hasn't been this bad for this long in a long time. And we keep hoping something is going to set the starting gun for it again. And I thought it thought it was gonna I got this wrong I thought reddit was gonna ignite the market and it hasn't the IPO the IPO market is still really dormant it's just very um cold terrible and will it come back with any of these well these are promising companies obviously you would think but I mean is this a cyclical thing or is it structural?

Because it used to be you couldn't get these types of valuations unless you tapped into deep institutional capital. But now that institutional capital is moving into the private markets. And when OpenAI can raise money to $300 billion market cap, which creates a greater value than 90% of public companies. And you have opportunities or access to liquidity,

secondary markets. Anthropic was 60 billion? Is that right? Something that somebody maybe had. 40 to 60. But the point is, do we need the public markets? The problem is, is that yet again, we are sequestering the majority of the upside

of our prosperity to the private markets that consists mostly of point one percenters and Institutional investors the people who got to invest in Google, you know retail investors have done exceptionally well same as Apple The problem is institutional money figured out. Why are we giving away these gains to the retail market? We can capture them privately and offer employees liquidity and have less regulation can capture them privately and offer employees liquidity and have less regulation. So unfortunately right now, the retail markets have become the last stop

when you can't find private investors to take your valuation up. And most of the margin, most of the juice has gets squeezed out. So yet again, the IPO market is another indication of the fact that we're cramming all the prosperity into a small number of institutions. There's also the lack of interest in being public.

Because of regulation. It's not the thing you want anymore, because of regulation, because of public facing things. I've been a lot of these companies may go private. Do you ever see one of the very big companies going private? That is an excellent point. If you look at some of the fallen angels, and you look at the amount of money capital sitting

on the sidelines in private equity, it's over $4 trillion of capital waiting to be deployed. I think we're going to see, I did my prediction stack yesterday, I think we're going to see the biggest take private in history this year. And it'll be, in my opinion, my three favorite targets are Intel,

which is arguably the worst managed company in tech over the last 20 years. It's, I mean, it's one thing when your stock goes into the shitter when your company's in structural decline. Warner Brothers Discovery, they can claim we're facing headwinds. Intel has literally been in the best business in the world for the last 30 years and they have been one of the worst performing stocks. Someone might step up, I think it's got a 70 or 80 billion dollars, someone might step up

and go there. The two others I like are Boeing and the third is Target. Big, big outstanding brands, decent management, great businesses, and the opportunity to get them, you know, they're fallen angels. They're on sale right now, and there's so much money. I think there could be a club deal to take one of those companies private. To take one of the private, those are the three. Would you be part of that, one of those?

I don't think so. Yeah. No, I don't think so. Yeah. No, I don't. Yeah, that's interesting. All right, get ready to ask questions. Taylor, bring out the liquor, please. Thank you, Scott. You're going to have a shot.

You promised. Thank you. You can do a little one. You can do it. This is Taylor, everybody. This is Taylor. Taylor is amazing. She's one of our, go ahead.

Taylor is from Texas. Where are you from, Taylor? Porter Anzis. Porter Anzis. Porter Anzis. Yeah. Oh my God, hello. Anyway, she's amazing. We haven't, by the way, take a moment.

All our staffs and all our podcasts are amazing. Ish. Ish. No, they're great. They have to put up with Scott, obviously. Thank you, Taylor. Okay, give him the big one. I'll take the little Texas boot. I'll do that one, the boot. Give him the boot. Okay, give him the big one. I'll take the little Texas boot.

I'll do that one, the boot. Give him the boot, okay. Give him the boot, give him the boot. You're trying to get me drunk. Yes, I'm not. Yes, because I want to have my way with you. Okay. Here we go. All right, enjoy this. There it is again.

Thanks for that. All right, okay. Let us begin with audience questions. Everybody, line up here, please. Stand up and ask questions of us. Start walking. You can ask anything you want, anything. All right.

You gotta introduce yourself though. Yes, please, yes, please introduce yourself. Is this on? All right, hello, I'm Malcolm. Okay, start here. My question is, how do you guys go about avoiding audience capture and making sure you're not just going over the same points over and over again because it's what your audiences

come to expect from you? Meaning I don't even know what that means. So like certain people like Joe Rogan and other podcasters have kind of gotten into a silo where they only talk about a certain topic because that's what their audience comes to expect from them. Yeah. How do you guys avoid that? It's hard. It's actually hard. We think about it a lot, especially because we have other podcasts and we're doing other things. But one of the things that I think is important is actual narrative in stories.

And I think one of the things that's attractive about our podcast is you follow us over time, right? And I notice when we talk to our fans when they come up to us, they like the story about us, about our relationship, not just, you know us, they like the story about us, about our relationship, not just, you know, and they like the whole story. And I think as we follow things and we learn and sort of start to analyze, it's not a bad thing necessarily.

Obviously, sometimes we worry about the Elon-ness of it, like at this point, we get it, but I gotta tell you, we're growing. Like it's hard to, it's like Trump, you're sort of like stuck in a situation. He really is consequential. And so you can't ignore him. But we definitely think about how to be fresh

and not repetitive. And that's hard because you have to come up with new insights all the time, Scott. Yeah, I do think, and we've talked about, I think we talked about politics too much. And I think a lot of people came in expecting us to talk about tech and business. And oftentimes, sometimes justifiably,

but we are both passionate about politics and we both feel very invested and we get triggered by some of this stuff. But if we were purely about what I'd call purity of editorial and trying to be as appealing to as larger group as possible, which oftentimes involves not alienating 49% of the US, we would talk probably less about politics,

but I don't think we can resist. But it's hard now because they're really fucking in Washington, these assholes. I mean, it's really, I always joke. Case in point. Yeah, it's hard not to, they're there. And David Snacks is deciding on this idiotic crypto reserve. You've got, like they're all wandering.

I live in Washington now. I moved and then there they are, like the top day. And I'm like, fuck, how did they get here? Half the nation is right or center right. I'm center left, she's crazy fucking left. No, I'm not. You are so much leftier than I am these days, but go ahead.

You think? Yeah, really, you've become somewhat of a San Francisco lesbian if I had to be honest with ahead. You think? Yeah, yeah, really, you've become somewhat of a San Francisco lesbian, if I had to be honest with you. You have gone rather left. That's right. I'm more expecting the Trump people right here. Let's get through as many as we can, go ahead.

My name is Tatum, this is about trade schools, and Scott, it's kind of for you, but my family owns cosmetology schools in hair and skin, so Kara, you're certainly able to answer this question. Okay, all right, thank certainly able to answer this question. No shade, Scott. You've talked a lot about the diminishing ROI on traditional four-year college degrees and the need for more practical, high-earning career paths. Given the rising costs of college and labor shortages and skilled trade, what systematic changes, whether in policy, culture, or corporate investment, do you think are necessary to

reposition trade schools as a first choice pathway rather than a fallback option? That's a great question. I'll start very quickly. I think it's critically important. They do it in Europe, like all the time, and it's not, it's without the shame of it, there's something in this country thinking that college is a better option. It's just stuck in the minds of parents, I think, in a lot of ways. I have a son who I would love to be a chef, for example, and go to school. I don't think he happened to like college and it

went really well. He's gone and he's graduating this year, my oldest son. But I do think I thought a lot about like if he wanted to do other things. For my other son, college was critical because he's going to be in fusion energy and he needs to be trained and stuff. But it's definitely getting this, for some reason, there's a stink on the idea of it in this country. And I don't know why because these are great professions. They're very difficult. They're AI proof in many ways, right?

And I don't know why there is a sense that that's not the way to go in this country. It's true. I'm a hairdresser, but went to college first. And saying one or the other, a totally different reaction from people. Yeah. We don't have an apprentice culture. And if you look at, there's so many factors that have led to young men struggling, falling further faster than any other court in America. And part of it is like, what happened to Otto Wood wood, and metal shop? Two thirds of males just aren't cut out for a liberal arts education.

They don't have the discipline. They don't have the demeanor to get through college. That's just not what they want. And unfortunately, a lot of those jobs are passed to the middle class have been outsourced or no longer existent. I didn't like Biden's bailout plan of student loans. I just thought that was creating more moral hazard. And people were going gonna borrow more money

from a nice lady in a pantsuit with an NYU logo. I was saying, your education investments and your self-loan pay off and then they get out and with a philosophy major and they have $130,000 in debt. So I didn't like the bailout. What they could have done and should do is the following. If they were to take a hundred billion dollars and take the hundred biggest of our public universities,

which are the best in the world, and said, I will give you a billion dollars over the next 10 years if you do three things. One, you have to expand your enrollments greater than population growth. Two, you have to cut your tuition 2% a year, which would result in 10 years, a doubling in the number of freshmen seats at half the cost.

Take it back to the 80s when I applied to UCLA and the admissions rate was 76% and the cost for all seven years of undergrad and grad for me at UCLA and Berkeley was $7,000. I am here because of the generosity of the California taxpayers. And the third thing they need to do is at least 20% of their certificates

need to be non-traditional, non-four-year degrees, nursing, specialty construction, installation of HVAC. These jobs, we need these people. And there's this obnoxious self-aggrandizement. I have given a lot of my money to UCLA and Berkeley for what's called continuing education because they couldn't call it vocational programs because me and my colleagues are such fucking snobs.

We need, think about how little the college degree has not innovated. There's amazing, I was on a plane with this woman who's the IV whisperer. She works at a hospital and she can find any vein. That's her whole thing. When they can't find a vein on somebody, they call her. And she makes $180,000 working three a year, working three 12-hour shifts.

That's a fucking amazing job and she needed two years of training. Universities need to innovate and they need to recognize we're not there to make ourselves feel important to this bullshit rejectionist culture, but to train people to have the economic security for them and their families. One, you have to grow your population, your freshman class faster than population growth. You have to cut costs 2% a year, which inflation in 10 years, you cut it in half, and at least 20% of your certificates have to be some sort of occasional programming. That's how we take our universities to the next level and create more. It's also a good message for Democrats, for example, to talk about.

Big ideas and also reignite, give younger people, quite frankly, mostly men, more past on-ramps in the middle class. I'm not saying you wouldn't see women, but the program I'm involved in, 70% of the people who show up who aren't cut out for college are men. So many avenues have been shut off, traditional means to economic security for men who are not quite frankly, they're just not cut out as well for college. They're less mature, they're less disciplined. There's now more women in college. It's 60-40 globally now.

And by the way, we should do nothing to get in the way of that when I'm suggesting is let's not forget the people who are never gonna go to college. They're just not cut out. Remember that guy in high school? They were everywhere. They were just not gonna go to college, but they could fix a fucking car.

They were really good with their hands. And instead we got rid of those classes and put in computer science and got rid of civics and we ended up with fucking Mark Zuckerberg. Bring back Metal Shop. That's how it happened. All right, I'm gonna cut you off. Sorry. We're gonna try to get.

Thank you for the question. Yeah, good. My name is Moritz, I'm from Germany. I'm a big fan of the show. Where in Germany? From where? From Cologne. Oh cool.

Most beautiful cathedral and the best beer in all Europe. Yes, there are people who would argue with that, but probably you're right. Yeah, so you talked about that on the show recently, how Elon Musk interfered with the German election and tried to bring down our democracy as well. My question is, are we going to see more of that and what's the end game here? As you often put it, Scott, what's the effective response probably?

And also, if I'm saying I love you to my wife who's at home, is that going on the show? Yes, yes, it just did. It just did. I love you, Anna. I'll answer, I just was in Australia and they're terrified of Elon Musk coming over there and doing something like Trump getting paying attention to them, especially on their online safety bill that they passed. And they're worried about they're they're absolutely worried about him funding.

They have a less active right wing group there, but they're worried about him funding that group. He's going to do it all over the world. I don't see him stopping. I think this is his... He thinks... I don't think it was particularly effective in Germany as much as the amount of... I think it was a negative effect with... especially with the most charmless person in politics. They doubled their results. They did, but it was already on the way. They thought it would be more. They thought they'd really goose it. But JD Vance is the most charmless politician in existence right now. And I think that, you know, when they said Hillary Clinton was likeable enough, when

Obama said, he's not likeable enough. That's why I don't think he's the next president or whatever. But I think that he will continue to do so, Scott, briefly. I'm not as worried about foreign nations as I am about the U.S. But I think that he will continue to do so, Scott, briefly. I'm not as worried about foreign nations as I am about the US. I don't think we wanna come to grips with the fact that democracy and rights are now purely a function of wealth.

The R is almost one, it's almost perfectly correlated. And if shit gets real and there's some sort of economic shock and they start rounding up people, which we have done, by the the way in the past, right? Japanese families who were good citizens who had kids fighting in the European theater were rounded up in this country. So we like to believe we're above that, we are not.

But the thing is, I have the money to shove a bunch of Bitcoin up my ass and peace out to Dubai. You're gonna have to stick around and deal with this bullshit. I don't know where I'm going with this. I know, I think that- Anyways. All right, quickly. Oh, I know where I'm going with this. I know. Anyways. All right, quickly.

Oh, I know where I am. Musk, the wealthiest man in the world, basically in my view, probably swung the election. It's always like 48, 48 and the two or 4%. And then it's a small number of counties and a small number of states, $285 million. Very smart, weaponized the platform. And what do you know?

That's the, I'm more worried about the US because the thing about Germany and the UK is they're like money in politics? Let corporations and individuals spend as much as, are you fucking crazy? They're like, we're not gonna do that. The whole point of democracy is the demo. And democracy, we want checks and balances

of a populist voting, not a small number of very wealthy people. So in the UK, they've started to finish election in six months, and it's much more difficult, I think, to weaponize an election with just sheer brute force of money. I'm more hopeful, I think European nations and other nations have decided that money

can't pervert their politics to the same extent in the US. I think he's given a new playbook to beyond you know the other rich people who have done it in the past but I think he's given a new playbook to a lot more people and that is where he's been innovative and unfortunately. Alright quickly let's try to get through as many as we can. Hey I'm'm Charlie from Vancouver, Canada. Go Canada. Scott, the last time I asked you a question, you actually asked me a question of what it was like to live in an apartment above a meth lab in Canada. Okay.

What would your advice be to Canadians today, given everything going on between our two countries? I think you're doing it just right. I think your country seems reunited. I can't believe Doug Ford is attractive as a candidate right now. I think you're all pushing back at a really terrific way. Three quarters of Americans see Canada as an ally,

or only one third of Canada see America as an ally now. You wanna talk about the most immoral and stupid decision, turning an unbelievable ally and friend into an enemy. The largest undefended border in the world is the US-Canadian border. What does that tell you about us? They don't even know why we're trying to fuck with their economy. They're like, why are you doing this to this?

We know it's gonna raise costs for all of us, reduce our prosperity, shrink the economy. Why are you doing this? And the answer is fentanyl. The amount of fentanyl that's come over the US-Canadian border could be stuck in a backpack. They think it's less than 1%. They don't even know why we're doing this shit. And here's the thing about Canada. Followed us into World War I. We're ahead of us in World War II. Went over to year of the European theater and started training pilots into Kosovo helped us fight

The Taliban. I love the question and I said this yesterday About a woman that weren't his friends with Warren Buffett. I was very powerful Holocaust survivor She said my definition of friend is I asked myself with this person hide me and then you really think about that It's a very intense Puncturing question about what it means to be a real friend. You know who's a real friend to America? Canada. In the Iran hostage crisis, the embassy there hid six Americans and at immense personal risk got them out of Iran. And then they stuck around. If they had been caught, they could have been

hanged from cranes. Canada hid us. Thank you. Okay. I think you handled it very well. We're handling it. Okay, here. Sure answer, Scott Galloway. Go ahead. Well, that'll be tough because I'm going to ask something that pertains to specifically to Scott. I'm Charles from Austin. Scott, I admire the work that you do related to championing young men. I do wonder perhaps if, are there any similar efforts out there related to trying to really challenge older men? When it comes to this idea of leadership, where are we?

So many of the problems that we have, it seems to me, could be better addressed if we had true leadership. And I don't mean from a left and right political point of view, where are we? So many of the problems that we have, it seems to me could be better addressed if we had true leadership. And I don't mean from a left and right political point of view, but honestly, more from a just truly leading and being in a position where at our core, we know what's right and wrong and having that overvalue or perhaps step above

just those baseline, what makes me more money concerns? Pete Do you want to? Julie I think the problem is older men. One time my son said, and I think this is a common thing, is we should send old men to war rather than young men and maybe they'll stop. Like, you know, he was making the, which seems to be a pretty obvious point. I think we really have a problem with the people above them and it affects younger men, as anyone who has a young man as a son or relative or something like that knows. But I do think getting people to change at a higher level is much more difficult, as anyone knows, like when you're dealing with someone like that.

It would be great, but I don't think they change. I think they get worse and more stuck in their ways. I don't know, very briefly, because I want to get to the rest. People my age are 72% wealthier than they were 40 years ago. People under the age of 40 in this room are 24% less wealthy. Every major economic policy, whether it's capital gains deduction or mortgage interest rate deduction, is nothing but a transfer of wealth from the young to the old, right? Who owns homes and stocks?

People our age. Who rents and makes their money through current income salary? Young people. Until we have a series of class traders, older rich people who say enough is enough, if we don't reinvest in youth, what's the point of any of this?

For the first time in the nation's history, and I think all of our problems can reverse engineer to one data point. For the first time in our history, a 30-year-old isn't doing as well as his or her parents was at 30. And that's even worse than a 50-year-old not doing well, because when your kid's not doing well, when your daughter's not doing well, it brings down the whole house. You just feel bad about America. So let me now list corporations and corporate leaders. There's a lot of amazing leaders. Let me now list every guy my age in corporate America who is really taking a stand for America

and the values that made them rich. All right, well land on that one. I'm gonna do one thing. I'm gonna bring up a woman because we've had all men ask questions. So, sorry. First woman right there. Go ahead, yeah.

I don't really care what gender you are. There's more than two genders. Scott, I just, my name's Leah. I'm from Austin. I grew up in Houston. I've lived in this city off and on since the early 80s, so I, you think you seen some shit. Yeah. I seen some shit. And also, I just want to let you know, Scott, you are on my list of future ex-husbands. Okay. I feel you, babe. Anyway, so there's a- Why don't you show your stomach, like, as if that's the most attractive part? He works harder at it than I do.

I guess. So my- I got a million questions, because I listen to you- All right, one quick question. So I wanna make it quick. You and Ed talked about how this is Brexit 2.0. This is what we're going through in this country right now. This election we just had is kind of a Brexit 2.0. Like we made a decision or somebody,

I didn't make the decision, somebody did. So how do we vocalize this? How do we get active with people and really have them understand that we've shot ourselves in the foot? They think it's a good thing. So Brexit, probably the greatest self-inflicted, unforced errors are entering the Southeast Asia,

going into Iraq and in Europe, Brexit. I live in London. It's like, how can we figure out a way to make everything more expensive and reduce our salaries? And they managed to do it elegantly with Brexit. This is worse than Brexit because it's essentially, it's not only morally corrupt and taking away rights for the first time in the history of a democracy,

but it's essentially tearing up amazing 80-year-long alliances with the world's biggest economy such that we can blow a murderous autocrat. This is economically stupid. It's morally corrupt. So what can we do? One, try and not have the indignance I have, the emotional reaction, because I think it just tickles the sensors of the right. Show up with facts, focus, pick your punches on the one or two things. I'm focused on Ukraine and the deficit. And quite frankly, we just need to get very activated and send a strong signal in the midterms in 26 and start working on 28.

So I don't know what else to do other than to say, let's be focused, let's not be emotional, let's bring data and let's focus on the midterms and 20. Yeah, the Democrats need a project 2029. Yeah. A really serious one and then, and get ready to put it in place. All right, very sorry. We only have time for one more question.

Sorry, right here. Sorry, thank you so much. David from Boston. I'm confess I'm a reasonably satisfied seven year Tesla owner. That's all right, it's a good car. We don't think it's not a good car. It's a good car. It's a, we don't think it's not a good car. It's a decent car.

But at what point, there's no way that Musk is attending to Tesla, right? In a timely way as CEO, how long before the board of which he is no longer chairman starts to push back on him being absent? Never. Won't happen? Never. They made so much money. They made so much money.

And he's picked them, he's handp? Never. They've made so much money. They've made so much money. And he's picked them, he's hand picked them, they've made so much money. Yeah, Robin Denholm, the chairman, just sold 100 and some million dollars. And also, just to be fair to him, he's clearly got a talent in finding good people. So I don't think he's been focused on Tesla for a while.

He doesn't, we have a bias against Elon Musk, I don't know if you've noticed, but he's been focused on Tesla for a while. We have a bias against Elon Musk, I don't know if you've noticed, but he's clearly good at attracting and retaining very talented people. Because I would argue these are well-run companies. But his board is not a board of directors. It's not. They're not representing. They're representing Elon.

And quite frankly, he's been right. He's created a ton of shareholder value. So if you've made 150 million bucks, are you really gonna dress him down for tweeting or calling someone a pedophile? You're like, no, I got 150 million reasons to ignore this shit. Yeah, there's some really good

Wall Street Journal reporting on this, not just the money they've made as a board, it's really quite unprecedented. Like this is not a board of directors that has any independence in the way you think about a board. And most boards are not by the way, but this one is a particularly in the tank for Elon and they've done well because of it. So the shareholder that they're most interested in is Elon Musk and that's it. And the company has suffered because of

it. And when it goes, you know, we'll see it goes down, but if he has a great car that comes out or suddenly robotaxes work, that would be great. I just don't see it at this point going forward. I had a Tesla, I had a great car. He started calling me names on Twitter, so I sold it. And right before I sold it, I took a giant dump in the passenger seat. Back to you, Kara.

It's like an episode of White Lotus. Thank you. Anyway. Who's in White Lotus? He is. I just wanted to mention- Voice cameo, face to radio. Yeah.

Should I be insulted when they call you and say we want you in Light Lotus? And they go, but just your voice. Yeah. Just your voice. Well, it's really about you. White Lotus is about people like you, just so you know. Hot?

No. I am, let's be honest. Irritating fucking rich people. I am so Sidney Sweeney. Seriously, seriously. You're more Steve Zahn, I think, anyway. The guy that showed his nut sack? That's correct.

And he's not gonna do that right here for you people, right? Big head in the twins. No, we're not gonna do that. Self by self blessed. We're not gonna do that. Anyway, I'm sorry we can't right here for you people right now. Big end to twins. No, we're not going to do that. We're not going to do that. Anyway, I'm sorry we can't answer any more questions because we've got another podcast coming up. That's all we have.

Thank you for listening to your favorite podcast on your favorite podcast platform. And for watching us on YouTube. We're killing it on YouTube. This is for some reason. I don't know why. We'll be back Friday with more Pivot. Scott, please read us out. Today's show is produced by Laren Aiman,

Zoe Marcus, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie and her Todd engineered this episode. Thanks also to Mia Silverio, Dan Shulone, and Drew Burrows. Nishant Kaur, is Vox Media's executive producer of podcasting. If you'd like to subscribe to the magazine, go to nymag.com. We very much appreciate you waking up on a Sunday morning during Daylight Savings.

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