The Rundown - Apple Brings Video to Podcasts, Warner Reopens Paramount Talks

Episode Date: February 17, 2026

Market update for Tuesday February 17, 2026Check out the Public app for incredible investing tools and to support the show (LINK)Software Selloff Deep Dive: Spotify, YouTubeFollow us on Instagram (@TheRundownDaily) for bonus content and instant reactions.In today’s episode:Apple brings video to Podcasts, taking on YouTube and SpotifyWarner Bros. reopens talks with Paramount after a sweetened bidActivist Elliott takes a 10% stake in Norwegian Cruise LineGeneral Mills cuts its outlook as consumer spending weakensLogan Paul sells a Pokémon card for $16.5 million

Public.com presents the rundown. Your daily market update in under 10 minutes. My name is Zaid Admani, and today is Tuesday, February 17th. In today's episode, we'll tell you why stocks keep falling despite strong economic fundamentals. We'll also give you an update on the Warner's Netflix Paramount saga, the surprise announcement from Apple. Then stick around to the end of the show to find out how much a Pokemon card just sold for at auction. and why I think it's a bubble. We got a great show for you today.

Let's go. Well, guys, stocks are coming off the worst week since November. The S&P 500 fell by 1.4% last week, while the NASDAQ fell by 2.1%. You know, it's been a brutal stretch for the NASDAQ. Last week was the fifth straight losing week for the Tech Heavy Index, and you have to go back to 2022 for the last time that happened. You know, tech stocks,

have been taking a beating lately. The market is freaking out about AI disrupting the existing business model of software companies. And big tech stocks continue to slide as well because investors are starting to question whether the hundreds of billions of dollars these big tech companies plan to spend on AI infrastructure will ever actually pay off. Fun fact, every Mag 7 stock is down more than 10% from their recent highs and some like Microsoft and Amazon are down more than 20%. Now, this might be a bit of an overreaction. I actually did a deep dive over. the weekend about the software sell-off and what people are calling the SaaSpocalypse. In that deep dive, I broke down why investors are worried that AI could upend the business model

of these SaaS companies and a few reasons why I think that it's an overreaction. So if you want to learn more about that, go check out that episode. If you missed it, I'll put a link in the description. Now, outside of the AI disruption freak out, the economic fundamentals seemed to be pretty solid. Last week, we got the January jobs report, which showed that the U.S. economy added 130,000 jobs in January, which was way more than expected. We also got a CPI report, which came in at 2.4% showing that inflation continues to cool and getting closer to the Fed's 2% target.

So we'll see if the market bounces back this week. I wouldn't be surprised if we continue to see more volatility, though. You know, we got some interesting earnings coming up. I'm most looking forward to Walmart, which reports earnings on Thursday morning. Walmart stock has been on fire, so we'll see what they have to say. We're also hearing from DoorDash, Figma, Carvana, and more. So we'll break down those earnings this. week, so make sure you guys are subscribed for the podcast and tuning in every day to stay in the loop. Let's run through some headlines, starting with an update on the Warner Brothers takeover. Netflix is granting Warner Brothers a seven-day waiver to re-engage deal talks with Paramount

Skydance. Remember, back in early December, Netflix agreed to buy Warner Brothers Studio and streaming business for $27.75 per share, valuing the deal at $72 billion. Well, then Paramount fired back with a hostile takeover for the company offering $30 a share for the entire company, including streaming and their cable business, and they might actually increase that bid to $31 a share. So now Warner's has until February 23rd to negotiate with Paramount and then get a best and final offer from them. Now, here's the important part, though. If Paramount's offer is better, Netflix has the right to match it. So this is turning into a full-blown bidding war for the company. At least we'll get some sort of conclusion on who else.

ultimately ends up buying Warner's in the next seven days. But keep in mind, whoever ultimately wins the bid still has to get regulatory approval, and that's not a guarantee no matter which company ends up buying them. By the way, Netflix stock has quietly lost 30% of its value since they first announced the Warner Takeover back in early December. I wonder if Netflix saw that and might be okay with just backing out of this deal completely and letting Paramount overpay for the company. Let's shift gears and talk about Apple.

is finally bringing videos to its podcasting app. This spring, Apple will roll out a fully integrated video experience on its Apple podcast app. And honestly, it's about time. Apple literally invented modern podcasting when they added a feature to iTunes back in 2005. In fact, the name podcast is a nod to the iPod. But they stopped caring about podcasts lately,

which allowed Spotify and YouTube to take market share from them. And one of the big changes that's happened to the podcasting space has been the rise of video podcasts. Spotify launched video podcast back in 2020 and now host over 530,000 video shows on their platform. And YouTube has been one of the biggest winners. They're actually the number one podcasting platform in the U.S. now. And now even Netflix is getting in on it too.

They signed deals to bring at least 34 video podcasts to their platform this year. You know, at this point, video is pretty much required for podcasting now. About 37% of people over the age of 12 now watch video podcasts every month, according to Edison Research. You know, Mike Connor and I noticed this trend towards video podcasting, and in fact, we pivoted this podcast to be fully video last summer. You know, before only our weekend deep dive episodes were videos,

now we post videos seven days a week. And look, video does require more effort and setup time, and we're continuing to level up our game by investing in better graphics, studio enhancements, and more. So I want to thank public.com again for making all that possible. They continue to invest in the show so we can put out the best content out there. And I want to thank all you guys for tuning in daily that I've made this show one of the most popular investing podcasts out there. So thank you to everyone for all this support as we continue to make improvements to the show.

And I'm just glad to see that Apple is embracing video podcast. I wonder if they're going to start taking market share back from YouTube and Spotify. I kind of think it might be too late, though. Also, one more quick thing about Apple, they're holding a product launch event on March 4th. Rumor has is that they're going to be releasing new Macs, iPads, maybe even a budget iPhone. So we'll find out more details in a couple of weeks and tell you more about it here on the rundown. And who knows, maybe we'll get an update on what's going on with this Siri revant that we've been hearing about for the last year or two. Let's talk about some stocks making moves today.

Shares of Norwegian Cruise Line are jumping this morning after the activist investor Elliott Management revealed that they have built a 10% stake in the company. And they're pushing for major changes. You know, Norwegian has lag competitors like Royal Caribbean and Carnival. Their stock has lost over 10% in the last five years. In fact, last week, the company's CEO was replaced with John Chidzee taking over, who was the former CEO of Subway. Kind of a weird replacement, if you ask me. But yeah, Elliot is coming in.

They're ready to shake things up. They're planning to nominate Adam Goldstein, a former C.O. of Royal Caribbean to join the Norwegian Board of Directors. And Elliot wants Norwegian to improve their private island experience. Norwegian Cruise owns one of the largest private cruise islands in the Bahamas, but development there has been slower than their rivals. Meanwhile, you have Royal Caribbean, they've turned their island experience into a massive revenue driver.

So we'll see if Elliott's influence will result in any changes. They do have a strong track record. They took a stake in Southwest Airlines a couple years ago. They pushed for all the changes like charging for bags and assigned seating. And now Southwest stock has nearly doubled since Elliott first took their stake. So the same thing might happen to Norwegian Cruise, and that's why the stock is up more than 5% this morning at the time of this recording. Now, on the flip side, shares of General Mills are falling after the company cut its annual sales and profit forecasts. General Mills is the maker of

things like Cheerios, Lucky Charms, Pillsbury, Hagenas, and more, and they're blaming to slow down on weak consumer sentiment and economic uncertainty. We've heard similar to things from other companies like Kraftines, PepsiCo and Coca-Cola. As a result, General Mills stock is down more than 5% this morning at the time of this recording. Let's wrap. The show with a fun fact. Logan Paul just sold a Pokemon card for $16.5 million, which is the most expensive trading card ever sold at auction. The card he sold was the Pikachu Illustrator. Apparently there are only 39 copies ever made of this card. And Logan's card is the only one in the world graded at PSA 10, which means that it's in perfect condition. Logan Paul called it the Mona Lisa of collectibles.

And he made a nice profit on it too. He bought the car. back in 2021 for $5.2 million, which was a record amount at the time. So he tripled his investment in like five years. And for some context in the last five years, the S&P 500 has gone up 75%. So yeah, a Pokemon card was a better investment in the S&P. Honestly, I think we might be in a trading card bubble here. Not just for Pokemon cards, but like for all types of cards, sports cards, Ui-Gi-O cards, magic the gathering cards, all kinds of collectibles, I think we're in a bubble. Some of the numbers for these cards are just going through the roof. What I want to know was like the that are buying these cards, do they think the value of this card is going to keep going up?

Like, is this Pokemon Illustrator card going to be worth, what, $35, $40 million in five years? I don't see that happening. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if it's worth far less in five years. So yeah, I think that we're in a trading card bubble. But that's just my take, though. Let me know what you guys think in the comments. Do you think these trading cards are going to keep increasing in value? Well, all right, guys, that's the rundown for today.

Hope you guys enjoyed today's episode. if you did, and you have like five extra seconds, consider giving us a five-star rating on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, wherever you listen to your podcast. If you are listening on Spotify, don't forget to vote in today's Spotify poll. Leave us a comment on Spotify. All that engagement really does help us out, and it helps other people find the show.

Thank you guys so much for listening, watching, and commenting. Shout out to Mike and Connor for all the work behind the scenes. And we'll see you. You guys back here tomorrow. Rosen lasagna, medium power, 15 minutes. Sounds like Ojo time. Let's play. Feel the fun with Play Ojo.

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