Pivot - Stock Market Sell-Off, Google Antitrust Verdict, and Guest Jonathan Kanter

Episode Date: August 6, 2024

Kara and Scott discuss the global stock market sell-off, and why people shouldn't panic. Then, Berkshire Hathaway unloads nearly half of its stake in Apple as the company's cash stockpile increases, and what's behind the reported growing tensions between Warren Buffett and Bill Gates. Plus, Donald Trump ditches the previously scheduled ABC debate, and insists on Fox News or nothing. Our Friend of Pivot is Jonathan Kanter, the Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department's Antitrust Division. Jonathan gives his immediate reaction to the landmark Google antitrust ruling, and explains the repercussions for tech and beyond. Follow us on Instagram and Threads at @pivotpodcastofficial. Follow us on TikTok at @pivotpodcast. Send us your questions by calling us at 855-51-PIVOT, or at nymag.com/pivot. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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As a Fizz member, you can look forward to free data, big savings on plans, and having your unused data roll over to the following month. Every month. At Fizz, you always get more for your money. Terms and conditions for our different programs and policies apply. Details at Fizz.ca. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine, the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm

Kara Swisher. And I'm Scott Galloway. How you doing, Scott? I'm great. I've been hiking. I've decided that if I'm going to hang out and spend a lot more time in Colorado, which I'm planning to do, I've taken up hiking. I've been hiking three times in the last three days. Really? How far do you go? Difficulty level? What do we do? We take this one trail called the U-Trail.

I don't know. I think we go probably two or three miles, but everyone is just way too nice on the mountain. And now I've got, I get bored. I'm not like a hiking guy. I'm just going to ask you this because I just have a fascinating idea of you hiking. I think you would get bored in seconds. Oh, it's hilarious. So I listen to me. I listen to Tom Petty, Prince and George Michael, what I call my trail mix. Get it? Trail mix. And then when people pass you there, it was so lively and lovely. There was like beautiful mix. And then when people pass you, they're always so lovely. They're always like, beautiful day.

And I'll say something like, yeah, but my stomach's really upset just to see the reaction. Or I'll say, oh, look at them. And I'm really concerned. I'll go, what day is it? What day is it? I'm just wandering. Or have you seen 13, 18-year-old boys? I'm wandering.

Or have you seen 13, 18-year-old boys? Just to see if I – my objective is to see – people are very, very disciplined about hiking here. They're very serious about it. Just to see if I can get them to pause or register what I said. Anyways, I'm hiking. I'm a hiker now. No, you're not. Let's go on a hike.

You know, I have friends in Aspen who are, like, dedicated hikers. And I was like, would you like to go up to the top of like, it's always Billy Goat Trail. And it's like, you know, straight up like 100 degrees, you know. Everybody claims they know like the better trail. It's very much local knowledge. And I met a bunch of people and they're like, well, we'll take you on a hike. It's a lot of trees. I did a hike relatively recently. It was nice.

It was nice. It was fine. I get bored. I get bored. You know, I did Outward Bound. You know, I told you that. I did a hike relatively recently. It was nice. It was nice. It was fine. I get bored. I get bored. Do you know I did Outward Bound? Do you know I told you that? You did Outward Bound? Sure did.

Several times. Yeah. I could save you several times. I liked it. I liked knowing survival skills. I did a canoeing one. Is this a lesbian thing? No.

I needed to just get away. I was in college and I did 26 days in Maine on Hurricane Island. And it was great. Sailed around on, like, basically a, you know, a bathtub with a sail on it. That sounds like camp. Why is that? It was, but it was like you ran, like, six miles every day. You did all the ropes courses.

You did hiking, hiking, hiking, a lot of orienteering. I'm very good in the wild, Scott. I'm very good. Don't doubt it. No, my survival skills are superior, though. I have an Amex black card. Boom, that gets you out of any problem. No, I'm quite good. And then they put you on an island. I don't know if you know this. It's called Manhattan. It's where they put all the gays. Without any food. They just give you like a knife, a match, and a tent fly. And then, and water.

They do give you water. And they put you on like an isolated island and you have to like survive, like figure out food and figure out what's good and what's not. Anyway.

Let's eat the white Republican guy. Right, exactly. So anyway, yeah, no, I'm like ready to go. I'm ready to go. Actually,

I had a really interesting, I'm deciding whether to take gun lessons or tennis lessons today. Gun or tennis? Yeah. I just feel like, I just read Roxane Gay and she wrote an essay about buying a gun at her age. And so I, anyway, I just. Don't buy a gun. I'm not going to buy a gun.

I have children. Are you kidding? Yeah. Anyway, but I'm thinking of taking, I'm a pretty good shot and I would like to retake them. My oldest son, Alec, is here with his good buddy, Santi. And, you know, you're just trying to keep him busy all day. And one of the things they've been doing is shooting and pistol, clay pigeons and pistols.

They absolutely love it. Yeah. That's what I signed up for you at your birthday, your 50th birthday. Oh, what'd you sign? You signed up for shooting? Yeah. Clay pigeons. Oh, that's nice. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, good. I'm going to just chase you. Not you sign? You signed up for shooting? Yeah. I claimed 50. Oh, that's nice.

Yeah. Yeah. Oh, good. I'm going to just chase you around. Not axe throwing? Did you see axe throwing in there? I saw it. I've done that.

I've done that already. I'm not good at that, but I'm good at shooting. Or you can go to Balmoral. Or we have the whole spectrum. Or you can just grab tea. Tea. We're offering a tea service. I want to chase you around the manor and pretend we're in like one of those British movies

where people lose their fucking minds. What do you think? I think that would be great. That's your birthday thing. If you can run and outrun me and a bunch of people with rifles, you know, we'll hunt Scott, then you get to say you're 50. How about that? Oh, this is like that movie where you think it's like hunting humans? Yeah. There's one coming out that's with Channing Tatum playing a billionaire who brings these people to an island and all kinds of, it's like an Elon Musk fantasy kind of thing. It's kind of an old story where humans hunt other humans. I think we should just chase you around quite a bit. Yeah. Anyway, fun times.

Gee, I'm really excited you're coming, Kara. I think you're showing up with the right spirit. Bringing the rifle. If I see you talking to a group of people in hushed tones, that's going to raise my blood pressure. You'll be like, you want to make this weekend really interesting? It's going to be interesting. Thanks. Oh, my God, we should film the whole thing.

We have something to tell you. We're all here, but we're not all your friends. Yeah, that's right. Exactly. We'll give you those funny looks, and then we'll give you those funny looks and we'll give you some, like, psychedelic and we'll let you go. We'll give you a 10-minute head start, a Gatorade and a slingshot. Go. Some ketamine.

Get going. Yeah. Ketamine. Anyway. Oh, by the way, thank you for letting me stay at your apartment. I didn't even know you were there. I know you didn't. That's our relationship.

How was it? It was great. It looked the same. It looks like the lovely Four Seasons that it is. A very expensive Four Seasons. We took Louie to school. It was lovely. I looked the same. It looks like the lovely Four Seasons that it is, a very expensive Four Seasons. We took Louie to school. It was lovely. I met his girlfriend, Ivy, who's lovely.

Yeah. Oh, Louie has a girlfriend now. Yes. Yeah. We went to Ping's in Chinatown for dinner after we moved him in. Yeah. Well, I shouldn't ask questions about her, but he's back at NYU. Is this his sophomore or junior year?

He's at NYU. He's got an apartment. We moved him in. It's tiny, but it's adorable. Yeah. And this is in his last year. So we moved all his stuff up there. This is his last or junior year? He's at NYU. He's got an apartment. We moved him in. It's tiny, but it's adorable. And this is in his last year. So we moved all his stuff up there. This is his last year at NYU? Yeah.

Oh, I didn't know. Wow, that's going fast. God, before you know it, I'll be 50. I know, true. And I picked up Lucky. I told you, prisoner exchange. She's here in this complex. Prisoner exchange.

That's good. Yeah. That's good. So Lucky's with you right now? She will be. Yeah, she's with me. Look at you. That's good. Yeah. That's good. So Lucky's with you right now? She will be. Yeah, she's with me. Look at you. She will be.

I'm emotionally preparing for it. I'm going to take her all around D.C. tomorrow. That would be nice. Do things. Yeah, I'm going to fix her iPhone. Things like that. That's what we do. Anyway, we've got a lot to get to today, including there's a global stock meltdown happening.

I love your thoughts on this. Donald Trump ditching an ABC debate to call for a Fox News face-off. And plus our friend of Pivot is a big deal, Jonathan Cantor, the Assistant Attorney General for Justice Department's Antitrust Division. He's got a lot of cases against a lot of big tech companies. There's a lot to talk to him about. But first, Meta is offering celebrities millions to use their voices for AI projects. The company is reportedly talking to Judi Dench, Aquafina, and Keegan-Michael Key. I'm really perplexed as to the choices here, although I like Judi Dench. Negotiations have been on and off. Both sides struggle to agree

on terms of use. Voices are expected to be used for digital assistant chatbots. I would have a Judi Dench friend, wouldn't you? I don't know. Yeah, I think it sounds really cool. Yeah. Used to do it with phone companies, right? When you had a message machine and you could get a famous person to buy one. Do you remember that? Yeah, I remember when you were young your creative expression

as a creator was to have a really funny, outgoing message on your answering machine. Yeah. I'm not surprised celebrities are considering these. Are you? Do you have any thoughts? Why wouldn't they? It's content. They're your kids do it. I'm not surprised celebrities are considering these. Are you? Do you have any thoughts? Why wouldn't they? It's content. They're getting paid for it. I don't know.

I guess how much they can use of them, right? Right. I mean, everyone, I guess the question is, so everyone should have rights to their digital twin. The question is, if you sign over rights, to what extent can they use it and for how long and all that stuff, right? Yeah, but that's a deal, right? That's just a deal. I don't know why it's so complicated. Yeah, I don't get it either.

I don't find anything wrong with these things. I think it's when they use it without your consent. But, you know, when you're on Waze, they have like tender, they have a voice of a boy band. They've got a voice of like a British person. They've got a voice of a German. Like, I don't know. It just seems like these are not. People ask the questions.

What is your voice? My voice is the boy band on Waze. They sing. I don't know. What is your voice? My voice is the boy band on Waze. They sing. I don't know. I don't think that much. I mean, so it gets complicated fast, though,

because it's, okay, they have mostly agreed that if you have Judi Dench's voice, she should be compensated. Okay, but could you use

an LLM to say, and there's, and you also can't mimic it. You can't have somebody mimicking their voice without paying them. So where does it go? It's pretty easy to see where it goes

and the problems that arise. It could say, okay, dear LLM, please give us a voice that sounds like Judi Dench but is just different enough not to trigger IP violations, right? It just, the cheese is gonna get sliced so thin here and there's gonna be so many lawsuits. I wonder if there should just be some sort of blanket. Yeah, some sort of blanket deal. But I don't I don't know. I think it's if people can make more money. Would you do you think they haven't asked for our voices? That's interesting, the voice world was all up in arms because it used to be, there used to be professional voices.

And these were people that had voices for voiceovers. They weren't good looking. I dated someone who did this. They weren't actors. All of a sudden, actors, famous people started becoming voices. And the voice world was outraged. They're going to use celebrity. And certain voices are so well known.

You know them when you hear them, right? Like, well, Matthew McConaughey is a spokesmodel. But, you know, he does a lot of voiceovers too. Another thing, Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway dumped nearly half its stake in Apple. It's held Apple for a long time. The company reported over the weekend it sold about 390 million Apple shares in the second quarter after selling 115 million shares earlier this year. This is part of a larger trend for Berkshire Hathaway. The company sold 75 billion in stocks during Q2. Berkshire Hathaway's cash holdings now a whopping $277 billion. Warren thinks you need to be in money. It looks like he was smart because of the stock sell-off,

which we'll talk about in a minute. But what do you read into these moves, if anything? Yeah, I felt like when I read the headlines this morning about the, you know, quote-unquote Dow crashing or plunging, which I thought was a bit of clickbait, and I saw the biggest headline or the third or, excuse me, second or third biggest headline was about Buffett pairing his stake. He's taken a stake from 40% of his total holdings in Apple to 20%. And the lesson here is the following. I don't think there's a lot of reason to read too deep into it other than the Apple PE is trading at what are typically kind of cyclical or historical

highs for it. So it's a good time to pair his holdings. It's still now his biggest holding. His second biggest holding is B of A. But the thing that spooked the market a little bit is he has definitely moved to cash. He now has a quarter of a trillion dollars in cash, which connotes that he thinks the market is fully valued. But the lesson here is the following, especially when you have something resembling economic security or starting even on your way to economic security. even on your way to economic security, you never want to let, if possible, any one position garner more than 30% of your total net worth because you're just subjecting yourself to risks that you don't need to subject yourself to. And that's what he's done here was 40% of his portfolio. Yeah, the cash number is so high, though. It's so interesting. I have a lot of cash, by the way. Well, there's no doubt. He's definitely, if you look at historically his

cash position relative to his equity position, it's safe to draw a conclusion that he feels stocks may be overvalued and he wants to be in a position to strike if there's a correction. Permanent capital, like we talked about last week. Captive capital. Bill Ackman does not have, but go ahead, sorry. You can say that, you know, Warren Buffett, and Warren gets it wrong all the time like the rest of us, but he probably, you know, over the last several decades, he's gotten it less wrong and more right, feels that stocks are either fully or overvalued and wants to put himself in a position to strike when he sees, you know, a correction. But going from 40% of your portfolio to 20%, that's just good risk management. Yeah, good cleanliness. Cleanliness.

Investing cleanliness. Hygiene. Financial hygiene. Speaking of Buffett, the long friendship with Bill Gates has become strained. That was an interesting story. I was sort of surprised by it. Buffett's been bothered for years about the bloat and inflated operating costs of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. He also reportedly upset by comments related to Bill Gates being rude and condescending.

He's an incredibly polite person, Warren Buffett, I can tell you. He recently said the Gates Foundation no longer gets his money after he dies. The money will go instead to a charitable trust overseen by his children. It's an interesting story. I wasn't quite saying what it wanted to say. Did you feel like there was a lot withheld there? They were super careful on how they were saying it um i just think they've had a long relationship and it's and he he didn't ever think he'd want to talk to someone like porn buff and then they talked all night apparently and they've had this sort of joshing joking romance funny yeah little videos and things like that and you know he committed a lot of his money to the gates foundation or the giving fund and everything else. But, you know, I think he's

probably getting older. He's very old. And he's like, I think my children are okay. And I think I'll let them invest our money and give it away. I trust them to give it away more and in a better way. That's all. I don't see this as anything. I'm more TMZ on this, because he was planning to, I mean, this is pure speculation and gossip, all right? But it won't stop me. His path, his glide path was, this is one of the smartest people in the world, thought Warren Buffett, and would be a great steward and fiduciary for a great deal of my wealth. And he's decided that's no longer the case. And sort of the top line story is that he was upset with the blow to the Gates Foundation.

But if you look at what the Gates Foundation has done, they've made huge investments to develop and distribute COVID-19 vaccines, reduced global child mortality rates, and invested billions in improving K-12 education in the U.S. If I had to speculate, quite frankly, I don't think it's an accident that Gates is going through this, what we would call, pretty serious midlife crisis. His divorce, some of the things that came out that he was actually kicked off the board of the company that he started. He was asked to leave. And I think his, what I'll say, his personal behavior, I would bet a guy like Warren Buffett finds really offensive. Warren is very, I would argue, in terms of the way he acquits himself, he's very conservative. He's been married to the same woman, lives in the same house. Except he had a separate relationship, but go ahead. I think it was all well-known between and among them, but go ahead. Is that right? I didn't know that.

I just feel like there, I mean, this was pretty, this feels like, quote unquote, a professional divorce. Because he was planning, my understanding was he was planning to don't know. I just feel like he, I think he probably has been offended by some of the stuff around with Melinda and his behaviors, for sure. If I, I've met him a couple times, and he is that guy. He is exactly what he, what you see is what you get with Warren Buffett in a lot of ways. And I think he probably, someone being rude would bother him a lot, actually. It would bother a person like him because he's very not rude. He's quite the opposite of rude. But I do suspect he, when you are about to die versus before you're about to die, or you're closer to death, I think he probably has thought at first his children couldn't do it. And now he feels confident in them. I don't know. And why should I give it to him when I could have my children? Because everything has to be given away in 10 years. You know that? Like he has this rule. Is that right? Yeah. So he's of your ilk of why give your kids money, give them enough money to do damage,

but not very much, right? Not as much as I have. And so I don't know. I just feel he probably has gotten closer to his kids as he got older. I don't know. I find the whole story boring. So, no question here. Okay, all right. Anyway. Let me pivot to something interesting. That's why I'm here. Okay, go ahead. What are the three biggest regrets of people about to die? This is from my colleague, Adam Alter. I did a bunch of research on people in palliative care. In reverse order three, they wish they'd stay in better touch with their friends and kept up with better relationships too. They wish they'd lived the life they wanted to lead, not the life that their church, their parents,

society wanted them to lead. But the number one regret of people who have the perspective of being towards the end is they wish they'd been less hard on themselves. And I think there's a real takeaway there, and it's something that's helped me a lot. And that is, when you look back on the things you regret, you don't regret the action or the mistake. What you regret is how hard on yourself and how upset you were about it. And that the present value of shock and disappointment

is so great in the moment. What you realize as you get older is it just wasn't that big a deal. And you're not upset about losing money. You're not upset about making a wrong decision. You're upset about how upset you were. So at the end of the day. Are those your regrets? Are those your regrets? I have a lot of regrets because I struggle with depression.

So I'm constantly in the past. No, I have none. You have no regrets? No. I think it's You have no regrets? No. I think it's hard to live an informed life without some level of introspection. Well, I wish I had more kids, but I have a lot of kids. Yeah, I wish, when we're talking about actions, I wish I'd had a daughter. I wish I'd had a third one.

I really wish I'd had a daughter. But the point is, you know, be less hard on yourself. Forgive yourself. That's kind of the takeaway from people at the end. Let yourself be happy. I wish I was Snoop Dogg. That's one of my regrets. Anyway, let's get to our first big story.

Stocks worldwide are tumbling as investors worry that the U.S. is headed into recession. A weaker than expected U.S. jobs report caused the panic. That seems odd. At the time of the taping, the Dow was down 4.3% in the last five days, the S&P down 4.8%, and NASDAQ down 6.5%. Outside of the U.S., big plunge. The Nikkei in Japan dropped 12.4% overnight, its biggest fall since 1987. That's a long time. In Europe, the stocks 600 index, it's down 2.5%. That's not so bad. So what was happening here, Scott? You were just saying, you know, there was uncertainty with tech earnings because they're a little disappointing, although they've been going like gangbusters,

I guess they stopped gangbustering. We can just so people are aware at the time of the taping, Amazon stock is down 13% in the last five days after missing expectations on revenues and sales. Also to blame, Amazon says it plans to continue spending big in AI at the expense of short-term profits. This is everybody. Apple beat expectations for net sales and income, but revenue in the China region declined. China is seeing a real problem with consumer spending. As a company faces local competition and bans on governmental use also. Intel had the worst trading day in 40 years, announcing it would be cutting 15% of its workforce

and suspending dividend payments as part of a restructuring plan. Tech stocks have overall seen their steepest three-week slump in two years. But they were getting a lot of profit taken in that regard. I don't know. Scott, big thoughts? Again, I think this is a little bit,

you know, CNBC or whoever it is at the Dow or name your digital media company wants to get as many clicks as possible. As we stand here, the Dow is down, it's down 1.9% and it's plummeted to levels not seen since July. I mean, this is not, it's not that big a deal. Scott says calm down, but go ahead. Well, it is true. It's had a historic run. I think this is a bigger deal in Asia. They're worried about – what's interesting, Pankaj Jemawat, again, another one of my colleagues at NYU, always talks about trade is much more regional than people think. Our biggest trading partner is Mexico.

I think our third after China is Canada. Basically, countries almost always have their biggest trading partners based on proximity. And when China is going in, when the second largest economy is going into a slowdown, it's just going to impact the entire region. The weird, if you look at the data, what they're trying to draw is that one, there's something called the SOM rule, named after economist Claudia SOM, said if you look at the data, every time there's a three-month moving average increase of 50 bps of unemployment from the low, you almost always, or traditionally, it's been a great forward-looking indicator of recession. And that's happened. Unemployment has ticked up. The jobs report, new jobs report was disappointing. So the market seems to believe that we may be going into recession. The other thing, quite frankly, is just stocks are, we're expecting a rate cut. And there's a fear that the rate cut has not come soon enough. And the expectation of a rate cut had been built into stocks. But if you look at what's really gone on here, it's just not,

it's more, it's more spectacle than significant. When you drill down on some individual stocks, what I think you find is just some incredibly interesting stories. Okay, let me put this another way. NVIDIA is worth 20 times what Intel is worth right now. Intel in the last five years has lost half its market cap. I mean, this is a company, when I was in graduating from business school in 1992, the two premier jobs that everyone wanted to get companies were Intel and Dell, which is good. Kind of marks the age. And Apple was a shitty company that might not come back. It had kind of lost the script and everyone said it was underpowered and overpriced. But everyone wanted to go to the best company in terms of reputation for growing management and had just kept killing it in terms of the stock price was Intel. Another thing, these CEOs need to stop tweeting. The CEO, Pat Gelsinger, posted a quote from the Bible on Twitter. Open quote, let your eyes look straight ahead. Fix your gaze directly before you. Give careful thought to the paths for your feet and be steadfast in all your ways.

Proverbs 425-26. Here's another proverb, Pat. What the fuck are you going to do to save shareholder value here? proverb, Pat? What the fuck are you going to do to save shareholder value here? Said the Jesus of all markets inquiring to CEOs who are doing stupid shit like putting proverbs out on. Anyways. I would agree. I was just thinking this. Jamie Dimon did another. I was like, sit down, Jamie Dimon. Just run your bank. Stop pontificating at us in your arrogant fashion. But anyway, go ahead. Sorry. Well, there's a difference between...

No, seriously. His opinion was called, the next president must restore our faith in America. We got plenty of faith, Jamie. Jesus. Sorry. Must restore our faith in America. That's the thing. The first line is, we live in a perilous time. But go ahead. Wouldn't that be nice? Yeah.

Okay. That's hard to disagree with. But there's a huge, I think, opportunity for tech CEOs, not even tech CEOs, to have very well orchestrated working with IR, working with good production people to put out earnings releases or statements about their earnings out on YouTube. I think it's powerful. I think it's a means of meeting retail investors and it signals innovation. I think it's powerful. I think it's a means of meeting retail investors and it signals innovation. But I'm almost at the point now where CEOs, part of being a CEO is a few of the following things. One, you don't talk about religion or politics. You just give that up because you're just going to alienate 50% of whoever, right? And we're not really interested in knowing about your views on Christianity or the president or whatever it might be. Two, you are not allowed to ever have sex with anyone at this organization. Doesn't matter if you fall in love. Doesn't matter if you're divorced. Doesn't matter if you've known each other. And then three, I would have no social media from you. It's just not worth it. On a risk-adjusted basis, sure, some people are good at it. Tory Burch was really good at it. Some CEOs was really good at it. Some CEOs are very good.

You could argue Elon Musk has built a huge following on Twitter. But on a risk-adjusted basis, the world does not need to know what the CEO of Intel is thinking at that moment. It's just not a good idea. Right. Yeah. Well, I agree with you. I literally am so tired of reading, like, all of them. Like, stop talking, you know, and actually those that are causing

danger, like Elon Musk tweeting about these riots that are happening in Britain and this sad killing full of misinformation has caused all kinds of right-wingers to come out and attack Muslims. And he was encouraging it. It was, oh, sit down and do your jobs. That's my feeling. So you feel okay about this global sell-off? Everyone's all like, should the Fed's going to do an emergency cut? That's what they think. Well, see, I hate that

because, I mean, a couple things. It looks panicky. It looks panicky, right? Doesn't it? Okay, but my generation has convinced Louis and Alex's generation and the generation of people

who mostly work with me, the average age of Prof G, or I would say the median is 26. The average is probably 32 because me and Catherine who run the company are both really fucking old. But the median, the number of almost 12 of our 14 employees are under the age of 30. And what my generation has managed to do is convince them of a myth. And that is that market highs and strong markets are a good thing and that it's worth mortgaging their future in the form of debt and artificially suppressed interest rates to keep the markets high. And they're not. The markets touching all-time highs are good for Kara Swisher and Scott Galloway, who already own real estate and already own stocks,

because there's two phases in your life. There's the investment phase, where hopefully you've established professional currency, you are spending less than you're making, and you are investing that money. There's the harvesting phase. To a certain extent, you and I are still making good money, but we're kind of harvesting. We're slowing down. We have nice lifestyles. We want to give money away. We want to take care of our kids. We want to do nice things. We want to go to Scotland. We want to hunt Scott Galloway, right? We want to start spending money. The harvesters, my generation, wants markets at all-time highs. But what the youth don't recognize, or that we've tried to evangelize this total fucking myth, is that they should have market highs. No, when you're investing, you want the markets to crash. The reason I am wealthy, I'm talented, I've started companies, but the reason I'm really, really wealthy is that in 2008, we let the markets

crash and you could buy Apple, Netflix, and Amazon for about eight to 12 bucks a share. Netflix closed at $640 a share. So what will my generation do? My generation will panic. If there's anything resembling a notion that my generation gets to be less wealthy and see my stocks and real estate go down, so we will mortgage their fucking future by issuing more debt and creating stimulus

and pretending that it's good for everybody. You should let the markets fall such that young people can take advantage of what is a natural part in a capitalist cycle, churn, disruption, so they can have their shot at buying real estate, at buying stocks at a reasonable price. But instead, you're already hearing these- Well, I got to tell you, the newspapers are freaking out. You're already hearing this bullshit narrative of, oh, we've got the government needs to intervene with stimulus or bring down interest rates. No, we need to let the markets do their job.

And the next generation of people needs to appreciate how wonderful capitalism is. And the other thing for people to realize, it's always said it all the times whenever there's a crash, it's a good reason to sit tight, right? That's right. Don't panic here. The market has already recovered most of its gains here. But what I hate is the notion that if you're a 30-year-old producer of a podcast and you're finally making some good money and you can invest 20 grand a year in a stock, you want the markets to crash because you're investing. You're in the investing part of your life. And this bullshit that we need to pull out our kids' and grandkids' credit card to keep us wealthy, it's a virus that infects our society.

We need churn. We need disruption. Yep. Yep. Anyways, thank you for my TED talk. I like your take. That's a take. We'll see where it goes.

Everyone loses all their money. I'm going to call you, Scott. Anyway, we'll see what happens. And the tech stocks, I think, have just been so on a charge that it's hard not to imagine that they had to take a minute. And they have, you know, they've been growing like crazy. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, we'll discuss Donald Trump's debate dodge and speak with friend of Pivot, DOJ antitrust chief, Jonathan Cantor, who's popping the champagne right now about the landmark ruling in the Google antitrust case. Fox Creative. This is advertiser content from Zelle.

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vox.com slash Zelle. And when using digital payment platforms, remember to only send money to people you know and trust. Scott, we're back. A debate between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris is looking increasingly unlikely. Trump said over the weekend that he will no longer appear at a previously scheduled ABC debate in September and will only debate Harris on Fox News with a full arena audience. Harris has given no indication she would agree to that, and she said she'll show up for the ABC debate regardless of whether Trump attends. Wow. This is kind of stupid. Like, and I have to say, New York Times had a real fail here where they said Trump agrees to Fox debate, you know, and didn't say that he just pulled out of a debate. That's what he did.

He ran screaming from the room. Is there any, he's saying he's ahead. So why should he debate her? He is, in fact, not ahead anymore. The Harris campaign has invigorated the Democrats. It's looking to win over Republican voters in a new effort called Republicans for Harris, by the way. The idea is to use well-known Republicans to activate their networks, with particular emphasis on primary voters who back Nikki Haley.

Lots of former governors, members of Congress, some White House officials for Trump. So what's the pros of this debate thing? I don't think there's going to be one, or maybe he can't. You said he can't not take her bait, but what do you think? I think he's going to try. But look, my sense is he's trying to run other than the biggest debates, the biggest stubtoe so far was his VP selection. And you got that right. I got that wrong. And that is dominating the news cycle out of his party, other than him saying that Vice President Harris turned black.

I agree. And she is, in fact, black. He keeps pushing it, by the way. His aides are going crazy because he keeps pushing it. But go ahead. But that's what happened. I think his aides, and he's been fairly on message. I forget the name of the woman who's supposedly running the campaign.

Susie Wiles. Susie Wiles. Supposedly, he really does defer to her. He's one of the few people that defers. And my guess is she has accurately assessed that he loses the debate the moment he shows up. Because what you see is a 77 or 78-year-old obese man who goes meandering. I mean, here's the thing. The big issue in the presidential election remains the same. It's age, except it's gone from a feature to a bug for the Trump campaign. Because relative to Biden, Trump looked vigorous and youthful.

Now he's going to look old and he's going to look reckless. He looks old and crazy is what he looks like. Yeah. And his kind of, the crazy just will add to this notion that he's kind of lost it. And then you put this very attractive, very youthful, very sort of disciplined, you know, woman on stage, and you just, you just, the image of her six feet from him, unless she really fucks up, she's won. And I think they realize that. And so they're going to come up with all kinds of conditions that I bet the Harris campaign would, would understandably not agree to. And

he'll claim, the both sides will claim that the other has run from it. The campaign should absolutely hammer him and do all sorts of motifs about him running and being a chicken and everything. Do you think those are effective? I think it looks pretty bad for him if it's clear that he is scared to debate her. Because his whole image is one of macho and don't back down. It's the little stuff behind the scenes that moves the needle. And we actually had someone on Pivot that I think is already, his fingerprints are already on the Harris campaign.

And I don't know if this is true. I'm just speculating. David Plouffe. He joined it. He's joined it. He's joined the campaign. He managed the messaging. Yeah, I know.

That's what I'm saying. And I think they're just more disciplined and very thoughtful about messaging. And he's clearly, he was outstanding. The Obama campaign was incredibly disciplined and on message. And he's joined the Harris campaign, I think, as of two weeks ago. A little later. But I think the people have been surprised about how slick she's been, like in terms of not making a mistake. And she's added these people on, a lot of Obama people and very experienced people, and is taking their advice, right? That's the thing. And I think Trump is going off message for his people, who I think are going crazy, because he keeps talking about race, he keeps talking about sharks and Hannibal Lecter. He talks about Hannibal Lecter on his speeches a lot. Oh, that's right.

Yeah. He's doing all kinds of crazy nonsense. Anyway, we'll see. I think, you know, she should not do a debate in an arena. They're screaming people. That's where he thrives, right? You can't do it at Fox News. I would not show up on that network if I were her.

Although there would be some power in showing up there, correct? I don her. Although there would be some power in showing up there, correct? I don't, it'd be a pretty gangster move if she said, listen, boss, I'll debate you anywhere, anytime. Because I do think Fox, I think if the only debate was going to be on Fox, I do think some of the anchors on Fox would feel an obligation to at least appear to be not ridiculously biased. Well, it would be Brett Baer and Martha McCallum, who are their best. Who are both really good. Yeah, they are. Brett is not, you know, I mean, that you've seen that clip of Brett going, going through every one of his appointments and how they've either in jail, discredit him, aren't supporting him. I mean, Brett is good. So if I were her, I'd go gangster.

I would demand, if they say Fox, if I were the Harris campaign, I would absolutely push to have mics turned off and no crowd. No crowd, yeah. And then say, we'll do it on Fox then, sure. But no arena. How ridiculous.

What does he think this is? Anyway, whatever. All right, we'll see what happens. But so far, so good. We'll see who she picks. Again, last minute, I guess she's picking tomorrow. So do you have a guess so we can see how good we are? diminishes, immunizes the cudgel of Israel. All of his things that are, quote-unquote, controversial about him are features, not bugs, school choice. It takes them to the middle. It makes them more moderate. And you want to talk about someone who's ready to attack, he immediately filed suit against the Trump administration on, quote-unquote, the Islamophobia of this anti-immigration law. So that kind of protects

him of saying, look, I'm about following the law. He's already gone after and filed suits and knows the script for all of this election denial bullshit. He would be so incredibly effective. And they're trying to position him as saying, well, he's compared protesters, the people are protesting for Palestinian rights to the KKK. The truth is, what he said was, if the KKK illegally trespassed and put up encampments, they wouldn't allow it. These universities would not allow it. But it's, you know, I think it would be interesting to see if there are, though, protests at the convention, which we are likely to be going to,

because of it, because of him. We'll see. We'll see. Anyway, the progressives are really pushing Waltz, who is so folksy, but I just don't think

he's up to the task. The thing about Waltz is, quote-unquote, regional appeal. He's an adorable daughter, too. The question around Waltz is, does he carry, is his popularity in Minnesota carry over to Michigan and Wisconsin, right?

And he's very folksy, but I just think, I don't know. You need someone who's really sharp. He's lovely and folksy, and I'm like, you should host Saturday Night Live, sir. But I don't know. What do you think, Kara? I think it will be Shapiro. I worry that she will do Waltz because I like him too. I see this appeal, but I just think it's just not enough to be, you know, a corn dog eating, gun shooting liberal.

I just don't know. You know what I mean? Like, I don't think it works. I don't think he's sharp enough. But I think Shapiro has to be the choice as much as Waltz is charming and Kelly is terrific. It's the boring shit that you learn from. She's supposedly announcing tomorrow, Tuesday. Where is she campaigning?

Where is she doing a rally? I know, I know, but that might be a... Well, is that just too boring for us, the obvious shit? That's true. That's a good point. That's an excellent point. Excellent point. On that note, let's bring in our friend of Pivot.

Jonathan Cantor is the Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department's Antitrust Division. Welcome, John. Good to be back with you. So we recorded an interview with you just a few hours ago, but in the meantime, there's been some breaking news. The DOJ just won a major victory in the Google antitrust case. U.S. District Judge Ahmet Mehta ruled that Google acted illegally to maintain a monopoly in online search, violating Section 2 of the Sherman Antitrust Act regarding general search and general text advertising, saying Google is a monopolist and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly. It kind of says it all there. I want to get your reaction.

I'm still digging through the 288-page ruling, but let me hear your initial reaction. We talked earlier and I said, what's going to happen next? And you're like, a ruling. Here we are. Well, the last few hours, you know, certainly have, you know, been a long year. It's been an exciting time here at the Antitrust Division. I think, you know, first and foremost, the people here worked so hard for so many years to achieve this result.

And they are the finest lawyers on the planet. They are the finest antitrust minds on the planet. I'm extraordinarily grateful to all of them. The work they did really delivered for the public today. So let me read through a couple of Judge Mehta's ruling, which was something else. The fact that Google makes product changes without concerns that its users might go elsewhere is something only a firm with a monopoly power could do. Google, of course, recognizes that losing defaults would dramatically impact its bottom line.

For instance, Google has projected that losing the Safari default would result in a significant drop in queries and billions of dollars in lost revenue, probably why they pay up to $26 billion for it to Apple, Mozilla, Samsung, largely Apple. And then lastly, time and again, Google's partners have concluded that it is financially infeasible to switch default GSEs, general search

engines, or seek greater flexibility in search offerings because it would mean sacrificing the hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars that Google pays them as revenue share. These are Fortune 500 companies. They have nowhere else to turn other than Google. So the case was built around these revenue sharing deals, right? And then the tech thing comes off of the search part, correct? Yeah. I think when you look at a lot of our monopolization cases, they focus on mobility. And so the concept in remote building is that in these technology markets and network industries, the more scaling you get, the harder it is for anyone to compete.

And that scale has exponential impact. And so this is something that was certainly present in this case. You can see in the opinion, but it's something that's a theme that you can see throughout many of our cases. And so the deeper and more trenched a company gets in their technology market, the harder it is for anyone to compete, the higher the barriers to entry. And so when we're bringing a sophisticated antitrust case, it's important for us to make sure that we're explaining those market realities.

And that essentially means that they just paid people off to put them in front, correct? Put them to the front of the line, and then no one else could get to the front of the line. I mean, I'll let the court's opinion speak for itself. It's pretty clear. That was your argument, correct? That was very much the flavor of my argument. And Google's was that people could switch easily. Now, if you do dig deep into Apple, you can, an iPhone, say, you can switch.

It just, everybody is sort of gets stuck into this system. One of the things I used to argue a lot, 10, even 10, 15 years ago, was that it wasn't easy to shift even for consumers, which wasn't an argument you were making, correct? Well, I think we were making that argument. So we talked about, and one of the, I think, important innovative approaches we took to this case is we put up, on the first day of trial, behavioral scientists. We talked about the real way in which consumers react in response to things on the screen. And I think those market realities, the way consumers behave in the wild, is something that's really important in all of our work to incorporate. The second is a question that we asked at trial that I think was important, which is,

if something is so easy, why pay a lot of money for it? In this case, if the fault's a company who's paying billions of dollars in money for defaults, and then turn around and say, no, it doesn't matter, the two don't necessarily line up. Those are themes that we certainly emphasize at trial and ultimately for the court and its opinion, but we're pleased with the outcome. So let's talk about that. The ruling didn't include a remedy because it wouldn't have. The judge still needs to decide that in another trial. You have talked about some remedies you'd like. You've spoken of structural ones like a breakup, I would assume. You also want to limit advantages of future tech like AI, correct? Well, again, I want to be careful in this case. I want to respect the court's process here. And so we haven't received the ruling today. We're very excited about that. I think the next step is to weigh the court's instructions in terms of how to

proceed regard to remedies. One of the things we discussed in our earlier conversations about our approach to running these more broadly in the process, that it's important technology industries for that to be forward looking. And it's important, particularly if you have this kind of low building concept that the remedies address the moat that might protect the company from future inflection points. And so I think all of this is really important in a context-spanning case, but I want to be thoughtful and careful to ensure that we are proceeding at a pace here.

We have a lot of work still ahead of us. One of the things I think people won't notice as much is the second part, the text advertising came from the first part. With the search dominance, they were able to have text advertising dominance, correct? So that you build, it's like a daisy chain, including into AI, correct? Yeah, I mean, these are the flywheels that we talk about a lot of our cases. And again, whether it's contract tickets or operating systems or search engines, there are often multi-sign-in markets where you have a massive amount of scale, and scaling one side of the market fuels the other side of the market. It makes it harder to compete. Often, you have to compete on one side of the market, give the product away for free,

and then build enough distribution of traffic in order to then sell it off to advertisers or another side of the market. Again, are, again, market realities. It doesn't suggest that these business models themselves are problematic. It does mean that these business models have characteristics that might lend themselves to tipping. And so the effect of a contract or a restriction or an impedimental switch in a default might have an outsized effect in a market that has these characteristics. So the remedy phase, does it enable you to revisit any of the arguments,

say, made by Yelp and other companies that have used Google pushing them down? Does that allow you to do that? Or is that a different thing here? So I think, you know, again, I do want to be respectful of the court's process here. And so I'm going to hold off talking about any remedies in this specific case. I'll just refer to my comments that I made during our conversation earlier today, which is that the remedies have to matter, and they have to map to the theory of liability. But one of the themes that came out of the court's decision back in the US through Microsoft was that remedies and technology markets have to be sufficient to address the current competitive harm, but they also have to be forward-looking because technology, more often than not, it's the next inflection

point that presents the competitive threat or the competitive alternative. And so I think we have to look ahead and see where it's coming down the pipe and then make sure that the conduct that we have successfully proven to be illegal can't be replicated in a new form. In a new form. You don't want it to happen over and over again. One of your DOJ colleagues said during the opening arguments, this case is about the future of the internet. What's the immediate and long-term impact here besides you being very excited to win this? It's the first and biggest result in forever since I have been yelling about it, I know. Yeah, so the future of the internet is one that is built on data, it's built on information,

it's built on content, and it's built on matching users to that content, whether it be in a search result, in a cancer generated by AI, or any other app or service. And so I think understanding what the rules of the road are from the antitrust perspective is a table stakes to understand how those technologies can develop. I will say another thing, which is the importance of bringing cases like the one we want today is that it creates decisions, judicial decisions. Those decisions help explain where the rules are, what the rules are and what the boundaries are.

So we're hopeful that the precedent that we create through successful decisions like today's not only create clarity in this market, but explain what the rules of the road are for technology companies or any company in any industry going forward. So speaking of rules of the road, the judge was very upset about the

lack of a paper trail and internal chats deleted after 24 hours, which is Google's policy unless the setting has changed. He declined to punish them, which the states had asked, I think you had asked, but he certainly gave them a tongue lashing the company. Any company that puts the onus on its employees to identify and preserve relevant evidence does so at its own peril. So it's warning them for the future, presumably, correct? All tech companies. Yeah, again, I'll refer, defer to the court's words and its decision. Generally speaking, in conversations that we have, our process is extremely important.

And when we engage in legal discovery, we expect companies to abide by its obligations to preserve documents in response to subpoenas. Yeah, that was an interesting part. Yeah, we've got to, I mean, this is the whole system creators in the absence of compliance. Yeah, yeah, that was an interesting thing. Last thing, the case, for people who don't know, did start under the Trump administration in 2020, but you took it to court in 2023 and continued it. It's somewhat bipartisan in that way. Obviously, other lawsuits are happening. Your biggest question, you and I have been talking this for a long time.

Is this the moment, finally, where tech gets to be treated like every other industry? No company is above the law. And so, you know, I think, you know, the antitrust laws have been in existence since 1890. And we've seen them enforced against companies off railroad, oil, and telecommunications operating systems. The internet and internet companies are not above the law. And so if a company breaks the law, the antitrust laws, we'll be here to help them count. All right. John, thank you so much.

Congratulations. This is a big deal. It's a, you know, and you never know where it's going to go because Microsoft trial was a big deal and then it fell apart. But thank you for jumping back on with me. And we'll return to the rest of our earlier conversation. Thank you. Let's start with the recent reports.

The DOJ has launched two separate antitrust probes into NVIDIA. One investigation will report the examined NVIDIA's buyout of Israeli startup RunAI. The other will determine if NVIDIA abused its dominance to push customers away from its competitors. What can you tell us about these probes? I suspect not much because you're not supposed to, but go right ahead if you feel like it.

Yeah, unfortunately, I can't comment on specific companies, which you know, but what I can say is important for us to understand how these markets function. AI has the potential to be an incredibly transformative technology and, frankly, generate a lot of great innovations. And that's really exciting. I think we want to make sure that that happens in an environment that's free of anti-competitive obstacles. in an environment that's free of anti-competitive obstacles, or we avoid a situation where a small number of companies capture so much power and then use that power to stifle innovation and competition. We studied the last go-around in technology, and I think one of the things that we learned is that lack of intervention in real time can often make it really difficult

to go in after the fact and try to undo decades of monopolistic behavior. So we're going to make sure that we get it right, and that if there's a need for intervention, we're going to make sure we do so in a timely and effective manner. What do small interventions look like, just putting them on notice that you're looking at them? NVIDIA is not unlike a bunch of companies that had this sort of hammerlock on a certain thing that was hot for the moment.

Cisco was like that in the early internet, for example. What does small interventions mean from your perspective? Yeah, small interventions might mean making sure that we are addressing conduct, for example, contractual restrictions or terms and conditions that are applied to developers or acquisitions that might deepen a moat and create an environment that's difficult to compete. So those are the kinds of interventions that I think many look back in the last 20 years as the current tech environment emerged and wish had taken place

because perhaps we would have seen a more competitive environment for today. So just to be clear, the DOJ and the FTC agreed to divide and conquer investigating AI companies back in June. The DOJ took the lead on NVIDIA and FTC has open AI in Microsoft. Is that correct? Yes. Again, I can't confirm those kinds of... But that's what you've done in the past. But in the past, there's a Venn diagram where the two agencies overlap, and it's quite substantial on a lot of the antitrust conduct. And so it's important for us not to duplicate efforts or have the same company being investigated by the two different agencies. And so it's important

for us through a process that is a bit clunkyunky but has been on the books for a long time called the clearance process to make sure that we are allocating our resources, scarce resources effectively. regulators will be looking into acquihires. We've talked about this a lot, the Microsoft purchase of inflection AI, for example. What are your biggest concerns? Can you talk about what a monopoly choke point and acquihires, why those would be of concern? Yeah, I think there are two distinct categories. In terms of choke points, think of it a lot like moat building or gatekeepers. And in a lot of these sort of network technology industries, as you know better than anybody, the power is not usually from a store across the street. It's from a network where the ability to enter the capital you need, the scale you need, the participation in the platform that you need becomes so massive that it really doesn't make sense for others to compete. And then those choke points become the platform

that the entire industry relies on for specific tasks or specific access to markets. And then that gives the choke point a lot of power. And so we just want to make sure we understand where those choke points and moats might emerge in the context of AI. In terms of acquihires, it's really substance over form. And so I think we have to make sure that if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, well, then it's probably not an elephant. And so we want to make sure that we are focused on following the facts however they present themselves. Would inflection AI be one of those things?

You mean an elephant? Yeah. Who knows? But I won't talk about specific companies. But again, I think substance over form is really the message I would deliver. Good to see you, Jonathan. Something I don't think gets enough attention is the impact of when you have an industry that becomes so concentrated, is its impact on inflation. Can you speak to the connection between a lack of competition and inflation?

Sure. To me, it's obvious, right? I think we all understand even the most kind of fundamental work in, and I trust people, that competition can result in higher, lack of competition can result in higher prices, right? And so if you have lack of competition throughout a supply chain,

whether it's in shipping or in manufacturing or at the retail level, it creates the opportunity to exercise and extract market power. And so if you're against the backdrop of an inflationary environment, absolutely, you want to make sure that you have competition to help lower prices. The thing I always try to emphasize is that competition isn't a switch that you can flip on and off at will. And so we saw around the time of the pandemic, we had very vulnerable

supply chains and their resiliency concerns, I think, were on full display. And at the time, we needed more access to products and services. We needed to open the spigot in terms of manufacturing and imports in order to meet growing demand, and we didn't have it. And so the lack of competition available to deliver those products and services, the lack of resiliency in terms of our existing supply chains, led to an environment that certainly was not helpful against the backdrop of inflation. So just a follow-up question. We always have a tendency when we talk about antitrust, when we bring you on and we talk about Lena Kahn, to talk about tech or big tech.

But a concentration or unfettered M&A and a consolidation, which is, in my view, it's incredibly damaging to the economy. It's not only tech. I mean, there's big chicken, there's big pharma, there's big home improvement. What industries? I think there's big ed. I think education has been allowed to consolidate. But anyways, when you look at industries outside of tech, generally speaking, where do you think,

which industries represent, in your opinion, the most unhealthy concentration of power? Yeah, let me walk you through some of the areas where we've taken action over the last couple years. Transportation, airlines, people are pissed off about the cost of air travel. A family of four trying to afford a hard-earned vacation or a college student trying to travel home for the holidays. Healthcare is becoming penetrable, and we have a world where health insurance companies are now the largest healthcare providers. Doctors and nurses who used to be these smart country small business owners are now under the thumb of big corporate provider systems.

should be able to realize a reasonable return on the investment of their hard work and content creators. Concert tickets, the affordability or lack thereof of live music. Farmers and ranchers who want a reasonable return on investment from meatpackers for their livestock and for their chickens. Students and education, you talked about that earlier. We've brought cases about financial aid and the NCAA and college athletes. I would say just this week, there was a great article in Politico about my super badass colleague Doha Meki and her views on education and antitrust. I would encourage you to take a look at that. Fast food workers want the ability to move from one establishment to the other. Because of non-competes, right? Exactly. The cost of housing commissions, the cost of rent, the cost of groceries,

the cost of advertising. These are all issues that we have taken on front and center, and I'm really proud of the work we've done. By the way, I just want to say I just love that. I just love that. I could listen to you do that for an hour. I'm sorry. Go ahead, Kara. Thank you, Scott. Okay. So another of your cases is also making news. Apple has asked for the DOJ suit, which accuses the company of monopolizing the smartphone market to be thrown out. The company said in a filing last week that DOJ's lawsuit bears no relation to reality. It will harm innovation. The time the case was brought in March, you said at the time Apple inflicted anti-competitive harm that is acute and substantial. So what's your response

to their claims that you bear no relation to reality? We look forward to providing our response in writing. And so, you know, again, this case is an act of litigation. An interesting experience a couple weeks ago, I was out in the Bay Area and had the opportunity to sit down and talk to lots of different VCs and founders from really across the technology continuum. And one of the things that I heard was overwhelming support for our tech cases. And a lot of enthusiastic- Overwhelming? Enthusiastic support, truly. Yes, the biggest tech companies, but it's not just the other big companies, it's the VCs, it's the founders.

I think they feel like they're often in kill zones. I think they feel like they're often under the thumb of tech companies that essentially function as regulators in their markets, and there's very little to process, and that the ability to bring a company forward and have it thrive and maintain its durability is something that has been threatening their ability to realize the fruits of their investments and stifling innovation. to realize the fruits of their investments in stifling innovation.

And so I was really overwhelmed by the degree of support that I heard behind closed doors about these cases. Did anyone give you a case that you were wrong, that you said, okay, I'll listen to it? No. I mean, there are some, listen,

there are instances where there are some tech companies want to exit by selling to the massive tech companies. But I think, you know, privately, what I heard was, you know, there's an understanding that, you know, making the biggest companies even bigger. And I'm not talking about a lot of companies. number, you know, really risks the long-term success of businesses and long-term success of startups in the Bay Area and elsewhere. One of the things I did hear is that there's, you know, the importance of making sure that there's a pathway for companies, particularly small-cap but even micro cap companies to go public and

remain durable so that they could take on larger companies and build new businesses without having to think about an exit strategy to, you know, three or four companies. Yeah. And so I think that's a legitimate conversation to have. My sense is there's quite a few Republicans who are actually fans of what you're doing. Any thoughts on where you're getting support or resistance that you didn't expect? Yeah, I'm not surprised by the support we receive across the political continuum. And I think there is a broad understanding that if a small number of companies have too much power, that that's a real risk, not just to our wallets, but to our freedom. have too much power, that that's a real risk, not just to our wallets, but to our freedom.

I think also when it comes to the marketplace of ideas, when it comes to the distribution of information and news, nobody in this country, whether you're on one side of the political continuum or the other, wants a small number of oligarchs deciding what we see and don't see, or a small number of plutocrats deciding, you know, who gets to be platformed and who doesn't. And I think the diversity of viewpoints and ideas depends on the diversity of viewpoints of distribution channels and access to information. We all just celebrated the return of a journalist who was unfairly imprisoned for being a journalist. And I think we all recognize that the reason why that was such a threat, not just to this person who was unjustly detained,

but to our society is because that, you know, journalism and ideas are free, are the equivalent of, are necessary ingredients for freedom and democracy. Well, if we don't have industries that have the ability to succeed here, then those same concerns start to manifest. And so we have to make sure that we protect the marketplace of ideas. Except they haven't funded you in the same way, as much as they may support you, Matt Gaetz, or unusual, unlikely people, or conservatives, right, with Lena Kahn. They don't still give you the resources you both the agencies need, correct, for this kind of stuff?

Well, we have an issue. Sitting here today, we have more than 200 fewer people than we had at the Antitrust Division in 1979. More often than not, we have a single company on the other side of the litigation that deploys more lawyers than we have people the entire antitrust division. And so we're used to punching above our weight. We're used to facing down companies with vast resources, certainly more than we have. But we've made progress too. And I don't want to overlook that. A Senate mark just came, and I'm really grateful to people like Senator Shaheen and Klobuchar who fought for additional funding, and hopefully that'll come through in the budget. But I often like to say that the return on investment from antitrust enforcement is a multiple that would make the street jealous. So one of the things in that sort of vein, we have to be thinking about the election coming. I'd love to hear your thoughts on how you think Donald Trump and Kamala Harris will approach antitrust. But interestingly, Barry Diller and Reid Hoffman, two major Democratic donors, both said they hope Kamala Harris will replace FTC Chair Lena Kahn. Explicitly, they said that. Barry said something rude about Lena and took it back, but he still said it. How are you thinking about that? Yeah.

So just to be very clear, I'm a sitting government official. I can't and won't talk about politics or prognosticate about elections or outcomes. But I, listen, I, you know, these are a small number of really rich people who want to be even richer. And I get that. I used to be in private practice. I spent over 20 years doing M&A. And I understand that they have a very small now or set of interests that they are serving, which are their own. But when we enforce the law, when I, at the Antitrust Admission, our focus is on making sure that we're delivering for the public more broadly. But we also want to make sure that we're working for businesses who are not violating the law, right?

I want to be very clear. Most businesses never get a call from us. Most businesses who obey the law are doing just fine. And not only that, they deserve the opportunity to compete in an environment that's free from anti-competitive conduct and kill zones.

And so we want to make sure that they have the ability to realize the return on their investments. And so, yeah. If Kamala Harris wins the election and asks you to stay on the DOJ, would you say yes? And same thing for Donald Trump. Well, I'll worry about that if and when the time comes on either side. I really, and I know that's the politician's answer, but I'm genuinely not a politician. I'm a law enforcer. I'm here to do my job. I've been here, I'll be three years in November. I work with the most talented team that I've ever had the privilege of seeing,

and we're just going to try to deliver results day in and day out with every resource we have. The Borg test of consumer harm or prices as this litmus test for when antitrust should kick in or antitrust scrutiny should kick in is obviously a bit outdated with some of the most dominant companies in the world offering their products for free. In your mind, roughly speaking, what are sort of the basic tests for the trip of tripwire in terms of concentration of an industry? It's competition, right? And so we have merger guidelines and other things that go into the technical nature of how much increases in concentration tend to focus. But I think taking a step back, the purpose of the antitrust laws is to protect competition. Congress decided that competition is important. Yes, it results in better prices, but it also results in better wages. It results in competitive process. It's rivalry.

It's the fighting it out in the marketplace that results in all these benefits. And our job is to make sure there's enough rivalry and that companies, especially when they get too big, are not using anti-competitive tactics to win in the marketplace, but instead winning on the benefits of their own innovations, prices, and acumen. All right, John, thank you so much. We're excited to hear, to find out what happens with your various cases. Thanks. It's always delightful to see you both and really appreciate

it. All right. Okay. Take care. Thank you so much. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for wins and fails. Okay, Scott, let's hear some wins and fails. Would you like to go first? You go first, Cara. All right, I shall. Well, a fail is Elon Musk has revived his lawsuit against OpenAI in federal court. He had dropped it and now it's back again. I can't believe it.

It's no different. I can't believe it. He's now saying, I know, he's saying he was manipulated into believing that the artificial intelligence company was helping launch was a non-profit. He was manipulated. Altman assured Musk that the non-profit structure guaranteed neutrality and a focus on safety and openness for the benefit of humanity, not shareholder value. But as it turns out, this was all hot air philanthropy, the hook for Altman's long con. He's really attacking him. You know, I just recently, we were talking about the case being away, and I said, don't be so sure. And here it is.

He had previously filed one in March saying the company had, the excuse then, had broken its founding agreement by giving priority to profit over technology's potential benefit humanity. And then he filed a complaint and then he closed it out and now it's back. He's got to just move on. And by the way, you know, state's attorney generals across the country are asking him to fix Grok because it's so fucking bad. And of course, he won't do it. So why don't you mind your own P's and Q's, Elon, on that thing? do it. So why don't you mind your own P's and Q's, Elon, on that thing. You lost out there. So we'll see where it goes. My win

is it's the 100th anniversary of Caesar salad. And I love Caesar salad. I was not expecting that. I know that, but it is. You know where Caesar salad was from? Do you know? No, Kara, where is Caesar salad from?

Oh, stop it. It's from, it was born in Mexico. Really? It was born in Mexico. Son ensalada Cesar? I guess, yeah. I'll just say, those salads origins are family contested. It's most likely the invention of restauranteur Cesar Cardini. And last month, 30 Mexican chefs gathered at Cesar's to celebrate the centennial.

I feel like it's the greatest salad ever. I love Caesar's salad so much. Louis makes an amazing, friggin' Caesar's salad. That's a bold salad. You think it's better than the Cobb? I do. I don't like the Cobb. The Cobb is very aggressive.

I love the Caesar. It is an aggressive salad. It's just like, loose enough. It's a loose salad. It's a slutty salad. I like the whole thing. Watermelon and goat cheese? That doesn a, it's a slutty salad. I like the whole. Watermelon and goat cheese, that doesn't flick your back? I don't, no, the Caesar, it's, it's slimy and fantastic and anchovy-ish and I just, my win is Caesar salad. And my, it's a weird loss.

My loss is, or my fail is, I'm a corporate governance, I'm a total boomer when it comes to corporate governance. My attitude is shareholders are the owners, employees are, you know, the CEO is management and the board are fiduciaries for shareholders. And I feel as if there's just so much outrageous behavior on the part of CEOs that there is almost just a total lack of corporate governance. And I think it's bad for shareholders. I think it's bad for the market. CEOs who are the new kind of idols, right? Israel, they idolize their military. The UK, it used to be their politicians. In America, it used to be entrepreneurs and athletes. America, slowly but surely, it's become CEOs, are a new kind of objects of affection. And then you couple that with their ability to share their thoughts on why they should be treasury secretary or that

their losses are actually an asset, said Cathie Wood, the most ridiculous fiduciary for other people's capital. It just feels to me that this is a failure of boards to put in place guardrails that say, you represent stakeholders, and you need to be more thoughtful about your communications. And what's happened is, I just feel as if we have the most entitled group of children and we're supposed to be as directors, the adults in the room, and we're literally scared of our kids. Because typically the dynamic that's developing in companies is there's the CEO and one large investor. And the large investor is just hoping to get their money out at a good point. And if the CEO seems to be fairly good,

to get their money out at a good point. And if the CEO seems to be fairly good, they just let them act like totally indulgent children. And I've been on boards for 25 years. Boards used to represent shareholders and used to, on a regular basis, sit down a CEO and say, hey, this is inappropriate. And regardless of whether or not the stock's going to go up this quarter or not, you have to acquit yourself and behave in a certain way. That is good for all stakeholders. And I feel as if we have totally lost that, that the majority of boards are there just to collect a check and a free dinner every three months and kiss the CEO's ass. And I have seen this. And to be fair, it's flipped. It's gone. It used to be the other's ass. And I have seen this. And to be fair, it's flipped.

It's gone. It used to be the other way around. It used to be the tech companies were backed by VCs and the founders were idiots that if the company showed any progress, they needed to be replaced. They needed to bring in a CEO from Pepsi. And now it's totally, which was unfair because some CEOs were actually the right person to keep in the seat. And it has swung so far the other way that corporate governance is sort of just a total afterthought. They're over-sugared toddlers, I swear. I want them to shut up. I want CEOs to shut up this week. I really thought that. What's your win?

My win is, I just think, so the Olympics, and it was my win last week, but I still think- It's okay. It's even better this week. The Olympics are not about medals. They're about moments. And some of these moments have just been fantastic. So I don't know if you saw last night, but Noah Lyles ends a drought in men's 100-meter. Just this incredible race where he barely photo finished. where he barely photo finished.

The 27-year-old sprinter took the gold in the 100-meter final becoming the first American since 2004 with Justin Gatlin to do so. And just an incredible photo finish after 24 grand slams. And I should also just highlight that I'm getting this from where I get all my sporting news, and that is from Vogue magazine. Who would have thunk it? Anyways. No, everyone's doing great coverage.

Great coverage. Martha and Snoop together. That's hilarious. It's hilarious. After 24 grand slams, Novak Djokovic won a gold medal, something, one of the few things he had not accomplished, beating 21-year-old Spaniard in straight sets. Who was the guy?

Carlos Alcaraz. The guy who's Superman with the glasses and the depth perception who won the pommel horse guy? That's right. I saw that. That was fantastic. And the footage of him on the bench. Chinese badminton player picks up a gold medal and an engagement ring. I don't know if you saw that.

Yeah, I did. The whole thing was adorable. I thought that was just lovely. The Chinese synchronized swimming women. I think Olympians swimming in the Seine was fantastic. I thought it was just so cool and creative. Katie Ledecky. And let's just say, who is the Simone Biles?

Oh, well, that's a given. I mean, she's established herself as a different species. I mean, anytime I see her on my TikTok, I just stop and I watch. I love her. You know what they should do? They should bring her to the DNC. You know, she tweeted after she got her last gold medal.

She got a silver today, I think. That's a great idea. She said, I love my black job. Remember? She tweeted, I love my black job when she won, which I love. It was such a kick in the pants to Donald Trump. Well, actually, Cara, I do think there's some credibility to the notion that immigrants are taking black jobs.

The last time it happened was when Melania Trump became first lady. That's correct. So I think there's some truth there. I don't like sports, and I now, Amanda has shifted me. I love the Olympics now. Oh, it's fantastic. It really is. I was not interested, but now it was really

delightful. Tim USA wins gold in women's gymnastics team final. The men's four in rowing won a gold medal for the first time in 40 years. The discovery of the air pistol becomes, as I said, with the South Korean Yi Ji Kim, like that's kind of the sport. Remember when archery was like all of a sudden caught everyone's attention, but the air pistol. An Egyptian fencer, once she was knocked out of the round, made an announcement that she was competing while seven months pregnant, which is especially impressive. The U.S. men's gymnastics team, under the leadership of John Spira, who led the Bruins to five national titles, is 3-0 and has earned those spots. And the quarterfinals will be watching for that. And by the way, Bruins have 49 Olympians, 40 athletes, and nine coaches.

So, it's exciting for UCLA alumni to watch. But it's just been a series of wonderful moments. Congratulations to the IOC. Congratulations to the host nation. And I think it's been fantastic. And if you look at what is really drawing attention, it's not the events itself, it's the athletes and their emotions before and after the event. I love that. I think it's been really, really wonderful. Yeah. Speaking of air pistols, it was this Turkish shooter named Yusuf Dikek or something like that. He has the casual attitude when he's shooting. He's like, he'll just shoot

the pistol and he wins and everything. Anyway, we want to hear from you. Send us your question about business, tech, or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. Okay, Scott, that's the show. We'll be back on Friday for more. Please read us out. Today's show is produced by Lara Naiman, Zoe Marcus, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie Andertodt, engineer of this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows and Neil Severio.

Nishat Kharoua is Vox Media's executive producer of audio. Make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. Thank you for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine at mymag.com slash pop. We'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Go Team USA.