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Iran War- Trump's Endgame, Economic Fallout, and Polymarket Profiteering

Pivot

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  • War Lacks Clear Objectives And Political Oversight
    • The Trump administration launched strikes on Iran without a clearly articulated off-ramp or objective, creating strategic uncertainty.
    • Scott Galloway and Kara Swisher highlight mixed messaging about regime change, nuclear threats, and lack of congressional consultation as core problems. Transcript: Kara Swisher President Trump says the U.S. Military intends to continue its assault on Iran for four to five weeks if necessary. He keeps changing his tune. We’ll get to that in a second. The U.S. And Israel began strikes on Saturday, killing Iran’s supreme leader, the Ayatollah, as well as several senior officials. Iran is retaliating all over the place with missiles and drones, targeting Israel, the U.S. Bases in Gulf countries, Dubai, all manner of places. Four American service members have been killed, and Trump says there will likely be more, but, quote, that’s the way it is. Kind of a callous way to put it. Three U.S. Jets were also shot down at a friendly fire incident over Kuwait. The crew members got out safely, thank goodness. These are $90 million jets, so that’s $270 million. Trump has justified the attack on Iran, which did not receive congressional approval by citing, quote, imminent threats, though he had not provided evidence that it looks like he Doesn’t have any. That said, a lot of people are celebrating the death of the Ayatollah. Defense Secretary Pete Hegg says held a presser a little while ago. He said this is not so-called regime change war, but a regime sure did change. Clear of either of them is true because Trump has talked about regime change and it doesn’t appear as the regime has changed. Hegsex was also asked about the timeline. Let’s listen to what he said if we can hear him directly. Scott Galloway To the media outlets and political left screaming endless wars. Stop. This is not Iraq. This is not endless. I was there for both. Our generation knows better, and so does this president. He called the last 20 years of nation-building wars dumb, and he’s right. This is the opposite. Kara Swisher Well, it’s nice to hear from a Stoke Boats model who doesn’t know what he’s talking about, but I also want to note about this interview I did with California Governor Gavin Newsom of the Weekend for the latest episode of On with Kara Spisher. It’s really interesting because one of the issues was all the misinformation online. It was really quite, it wasn’t just something you tweeted, but it was all over the place misreporting where he stands on all this. Let’s listen to what he told me. And this was just a small piece of it because he went on for a while decrying Donald Trump’s action. Let’s go. And that’s Donald Trump, the chaos president, this wrecking ball president across the board. Destruction is not strength. And once again, we’ve seen him destroy not only our allies in relationship to the rest of the world, but we’re seeing him destroy any capacity to explain fundamentally what the core American interest is at this moment to declare war, to go to war with the regime. And all of this is playing out in real time. News posted on X over the weekend, the corrupt and oppressive Iranian regime must never have nuclear weapons. Leadership of Iran must go, but that doesn’t justify the president of the United States engaging in a legal, dangerous war. Very similar to what Senator Warner said. All the senators pretty much said this guy deserved to die. And at the same time, this seems like a chaotic mess. Let’s talk a little bit about it. And especially the economic impact. The fighting has effectively shut down the Strait of Hormuz, which carries one-fifth of the world’s oil supply. As is recording, oil prices are up about 7%. Gas futures jumped as much as 9%. Spike in energy places, supply chain strain, broader ripple effects across the global economy, especially because of the uncertainty. And the last thing I would note is, and it’s interesting because Trump does respond to this, is that there’s much reporting, including in the Washington Post, about how he was convinced To do it through Mohammed bin Salman and Benjamin Netanyahu, and even J.D. Vance and General Cain did not want to do this, but here we are. So talk a little bit about where it’s going to go from here and your thoughts. Scott Galloway Well, the honest answer is I have no idea, or I have a vision for where you hope it goes. But I’m sympathetic to Governors Newsom and Senator Warner, the notion that we’re going to end up, after Trump is gone, we have to be thoughtful about how we improve the tensile strength Of our democracy by stopping the slow but steady leak of power from Congress, which is the people to the president under the auspices or cold comfort that they will stick to certain norms. Because effectively, a president should not be able, military action you can maybe justify, but this is war. He used the word war. I know, this is war. It is war. And I’m sympathetic to the notion that the reason we have 535 members of Congress representing, you know, two per state in the Senate and one for every 750,000 people is the American People are supposed to have a say. But Democrats at 7% are actually in favor of this. So there’s going to need to be, the best thing we could do coming out, or one of the best things I think coming out of the Trump administration, and this highlights that, is to have structural Reform around gerrymandering, Citizens United, and that Congress has to be involved or briefed, or that we have to go back to this notion where only Congress can decide if in fact we Go to war. Now, where could this go? As you know, I’m in favor, loosely speaking, around this action, because I always like to ask myself what could go right. Iran is 90 million people, sits on the second largest natural gas reserves, the third largest oil reserves, incredible science, incredible universities, incredible entrepreneurial Spirit, actually quite a non-secular. Kara Swisher It was, that’s for sure. Scott Galloway Non-secular. Well, I would argue, anyways, fairly non-secular, a lot less anti-West than people have been led to believe by what I think is one of the most oppressive, brutal regimes in history. So what could go right? You could have one of the largest economies in the Middle East become more pro-West. It’s been punching below its weight class for 20 or 30 years now because of poor technology and sanctions. You could immediately see it come up and be an economic power that is pro-West, pro-trading, pro-capitalist, what effectively might be one of the biggest tax cuts in history if you Saw more consistent flows of oil and technology and a great trading partner. I actually think Europe would be the biggest beneficiary and turn what has been the primary agent of chaos and terror in an unstable region into something resembling, I don’t even call It pro-West, but neutral West. So I think there’s a lot that could go right here. And I think the risk assessment provided to the president, in my view, had a lot of asymmetric upside. Now, having said that, what they missed here was part of the Powell Doctrine, and that is you have to have clearly articulated objectives. Kara Swisher Or plans for next beyond the problem. Scott Galloway Well, they haven’t. And to your point, they just haven’t (Time 0:06:16)
  • Oil Spike May Be Temporary If Iran Becomes Trade Partner
    • Disruptions to the Strait of Hormuz and Iranian retaliation pushed oil and gas futures higher, but Galloway sees medium-term asymmetric upside.
    • He predicts potential lower oil prices within six months if Iran becomes a more neutral trading partner unlocking supply. Transcript: Kara Swisher The fighting has effectively shut down the Strait of Hormuz, which carries one-fifth of the world’s oil supply. As is recording, oil prices are up about 7%. Gas futures jumped as much as 9%. Spike in energy places, supply chain strain, broader ripple effects across the global economy, especially because of the uncertainty. And the last thing I would note is, and it’s interesting because Trump does respond to this, is that there’s much reporting, including in the Washington Post, about how he was convinced To do it through Mohammed bin Salman and Benjamin Netanyahu, and even J.D. Vance and General Cain did not want to do this, but here we are. So talk a little bit about where it’s going to go from here and your thoughts. Scott Galloway Well, the honest answer is I have no idea, or I have a vision for where you hope it goes. But I’m sympathetic to Governors Newsom and Senator Warner, the notion that we’re going to end up, after Trump is gone, we have to be thoughtful about how we improve the tensile strength Of our democracy by stopping the slow but steady leak of power from Congress, which is the people to the president under the auspices or cold comfort that they will stick to certain norms. Because effectively, a president should not be able, military action you can maybe justify, but this is war. He used the word war. I know, this is war. It is war. And I’m sympathetic to the notion that the reason we have 535 members of Congress representing, you know, two per state in the Senate and one for every 750,000 people is the American People are supposed to have a say. But Democrats at 7% are actually in favor of this. So there’s going to need to be, the best thing we could do coming out, or one of the best things I think coming out of the Trump administration, and this highlights that, is to have structural Reform around gerrymandering, Citizens United, and that Congress has to be involved or briefed, or that we have to go back to this notion where only Congress can decide if in fact we Go to war. Now, where could this go? As you know, I’m in favor, loosely speaking, around this action, because I always like to ask myself what could go right. Iran is 90 million people, sits on the second largest natural gas reserves, the third largest oil reserves, incredible science, incredible universities, incredible entrepreneurial Spirit, actually quite a non-secular. Kara Swisher It was, that’s for sure. Scott Galloway Non-secular. Well, I would argue, anyways, fairly non-secular, a lot less anti-West than people have been led to believe by what I think is one of the most oppressive, brutal regimes in history. So what could go right? You could have one of the largest economies in the Middle East become more pro-West. It’s been punching below its weight class for 20 or 30 years now because of poor technology and sanctions. You could immediately see it come up and be an economic power that is pro-West, pro-trading, pro-capitalist, what effectively might be one of the biggest tax cuts in history if you Saw more consistent flows of oil and technology and a great trading partner. I actually think Europe would be the biggest beneficiary and turn what has been the primary agent of chaos and terror in an unstable region into something resembling, I don’t even call It pro-West, but neutral West. So I think there’s a lot that could go right here. And I think the risk assessment provided to the president, in my view, had a lot of asymmetric upside. Now, having said that, what they missed here was part of the Powell Doctrine, and that is you have to have clearly articulated objectives. Kara Swisher Or plans for next beyond the problem. Scott Galloway Well, they haven’t. And to your point, they just haven’t been able to articulate in the last 24 hours, what is the off-ramp and the objective here? Is it regime change? Is it a more friendly regime? Is it, I mean, what exactly, and not only that, you’re not going to get this notion that all of a sudden we’re going to provide air cover and the Iranian people are going to rise up and overtake 150,000 members of the IRGC who are deeply integrated into- They have outside plans. Kara Swisher There’s some great reporting on this, by the way, by legitimate news organizations. They have contingency plans in place for what happens if the Aitola dies and they’re carrying them out. Scott Galloway With a central figurehead, the RGC is very deeply embedded into the economy. So when your mortgage and your salary is being paid by the RGC, it’s not like, oh, okay, the top guy, Assad is gone and boom, it’s a new administration. So there’s a lot about the ground game. There’s a lot about intelligence assets. And if they had said, we are going to, for example, a potential offer, we’re going to neuter their Navy. We’re going to diminish their air defense capabilities, we’re going to make sure for sure there is absolutely no ability to create or enrich nuclear stockpiles, and then we’re going To leave it up to the Iranian people, that’s technically an off ramp. But I have seen in the last 24 hours them talk about regime change. No, this isn’t regime change. So they haven’t been able to articulate what is next. Kara Swisher Well, I don’t believe they thought about it. I mean, one of the things that a lot of people are pointing out is the involvement of Netanyahu and the head of Saudi Arabia, who publicly had said he was against this, but privately was Quite for it and pressing for it. The linkage between the corruption with the Trump family and this coin-operated presidency that I talk about all the time is really very clear because most, I would say, they’re trying To come up with a story after the fact. Oh, it hasn’t worked. It isn’t an endless war, although it feels kind of like an endless war. It feels very Bushian, right? You definitely had echoes of that. I think he thought it was going to be like Venezuela, right? That it was like, just take that guy out. And by the way, he’s in business with the Maduro administration. He didn’t regime change that place at all. Like speaking of regime change. Scott Galloway This is much more complicated. Kara Swisher I agree. But I think he thought it was like that. Scott Galloway No, I’m agreeing with you. This is not take out Maduro and this is much more. Kara Swisher He just has cowed the regime into it, but it’s the same regime. In this case, it’s really fascinating how they have put themselves into this economy in a way that’s very hard to get them out, right? Of course, this is their point of these very corrupt and I would say evil mullahs in Iran. But one of the things that’s fascinating to me is, one, the continued corruption of Trump’s family and Trump within this region. And second of all, that he keeps calling. Have you noticed he’s calling all I’m waiting for a call from him myself. Like he called Jake Tapper. He called, you know, a bunch of John Carl. He’s called (Time 0:09:25)
  • Two Divergent Economic Paths From Conflict
    • Two macro scenarios: a costly forever war with higher deficits and oil shocks, or asymmetric upside from liberated Iranian economy benefiting Europe and the West.
    • Galloway favors the upside if action limits Iran’s regional proxy capabilities. Transcript: Scott Galloway Well, just to go in reverse order, I actually would argue that we have diminished. I mean, you have what was the superpower in the region with their proxies, Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis wreaking havoc economically and in terms of oppression of different people In the region. And their organizing principle was death to Israel and death to America. If we don’t have the regime change or a quote unquote liberated capitalist, West friendly Iran, that their ability to strike at us and our proxies overseas and our basis has actually Been diminished. That they’re not now, we need to be more worried. I think we need to actually be less worried. There are two scenarios here. One scenario is we end up in another forever war that explodes our deficits and we keep incrementally making excuses for trying to impose democracy, which is an oxymoron. And oil prices, the Strait of Hormuz gets blocked off and oil prices skyrocket. Now, to a certain extent, if you wanted to be really Machiavellian, that doesn’t hurt us that much because we are energy independent. Who this really is hurting, Venezuela and Iran is China. 80% of Iran’s oil was going to China, the same with Venezuela. So we can survive an oil shock, but you could have an increase in deficits of a forever war, disruption in supply chain, straining our relationships with the allies. I personally think there’s more asymmetric upside where we unlock stronger oil flows, better technology, a potential trading partner for Europe and the US. And I would argue, I would bet, I believe in six months that oil prices will be lower than they are today. (Time 0:23:34)
  • Anthropic Blacklist And Claude’s App Surge
    • Kara Swisher reports Trump ordered agencies to stop using Anthropic after failed deal negotiations with the Pentagon.
    • Anthropic’s Claude climbed to the top of Apple’s free app charts even as the company planned to legally challenge the supply chain designation. Transcript: Kara Swisher Scott, we’re back. President Trump ordered federal agencies to stop using Anthropic after it did not come to a deal with the Pentagon on safety. The Defense Department will phase out the use of Anthropic products over the next six months, which will, I will tell you, hurt national security. Anthropic plans to challenge a supply chain designation in court. Good for them. When it comes to the app store, Anthropic is winning. Claude is the number one spot in the Apple’s free apps as we tape. Anthropic also faced a major outage on Monday, with the company saying it’s been dealing with, quote, unprecedented demand. Meanwhile, OpenAI, of course, Sam, ever the opportunist, OpenAI’s Sam Altman reached an agreement with the Pentagon. The company claims it found a way to ensure its technologies would adhere to its safety principles by installing technical guardrails. However, when Sam Altman was asked on S whether he worried about there be future disputes with the Pentagon or what’s legal, he responded, yes, I am. Oh my God, Sam, I got to tell you, you need to stop talking. A former Trump official called the anthropic order attempted corporate murder. It’s the backdrop of OpenAI raising $110 billion in its latest funding round, including $50 billion from Amazon and $30 billion from both NVIDIA and SoftBank and these continued round-tripping Kind of deals. I read a lot this weekend about this, and one of the people involved was a guy named Emil Michael, who used to be an executive at Uber, who was possibly one of the most bullying and awful Executives and full of all manner of bad behaviors. When there, he left the company. We wrote some stories of a thing he was involved in that was just so not a good behavior, I would say. I have spent time with him. He was the one that was negotiating this. Not a surprise. He kept calling Dario Amodi from Anthropik God-like. God, he thinks he’s God or whatever. I’ve never met anyone who thinks he’s God more than Emil Michael, and he’s usually a toady to more powerful people in this case, Pete Hegseth. Anyway, it seems a ridiculous overreach on the behalf of government. Probably Anthropik win. I think it probably will benefit from this, as you’ve noted many times. Any more thoughts on this? I don’t think we’re any safer as a people for having done this. (Time 0:37:13)
  • Political Favoritism Shrinks Market Multiples
    • Government picking tech winners and punishing companies based on political favor scares capital and reduces market multiples.
    • Scott warns selective regulatory targeting undermines investor confidence and can shrink 401(k) returns. Transcript: Scott Galloway What people miss is that over the last 12 months, out of 23 markets, we’re the 21st best performing or the third worst. Yep. And what has changed? We’ve had incredible innovation. The Dow is up 50,000. Kara Swisher Sorry. Scott Galloway We still have incredible innovation. We dominate the most tectonic shift in technology. The thing that’s changing is I believe we’re experiencing a rotation out of U.S. Stocks and a compression of multiples. And the reason why is the following. The underpinnings of why so much capital flows into the U.S. From every other market in the world is our incredible IP developed mostly through funding of research at universities, an incredibly risk-aggressive culture based on immigrants Who take huge risks to get here. And also, I think more than anything, probably, or chicken and egg, it attracts the deepest pools of capital in history. There’s $5 million in venture capital for every startup in the US. There’s only $1 million for every startup in Europe. Anthropic started six years ago. If it was in Europe, it’d be one of the 10 most valuable companies. But when governments start selectively punishing and rewarding companies based on political favoritism, that capital gets scared and starts withdrawing. Because why do you invest in open AI or Anthropic if you don’t know who you’re waking up next to in terms of its ability to raise capital based on the blood sugar level of whoever’s president? So this is not only the wrong thing to do and makes us feel less safe and it’s probably illegal. It’s going to hit your 401k, folks. And even in places like the Gulf that are run by autocracies, they have a real respect for systemic laws in the market because they recognize the moment they start fucking with companies Based on their own who’s in or out of political favor, which has no stock market, because nobody wants to invest and then find out the CEO got a call from the wrong person or got on the wrong List and is all of a sudden out of business. So even in China, people, I think they learned their lesson a little bit with Didi, where they got angry at Didi and basically crushed Didi. They have a lot of respect for essentially regulatory bodies, consistent application of rule of law, trying not to play favorites. So the immediate reaction will be, okay, they’re wrong. This is illegal. Fine. (Time 0:39:25)
  • Support Rule Of Law Through Commercial Choices
    • Corporations and investors should back companies that defend consistent rule of law to preserve market stability.
    • Galloway suggests commercial support for Anthropic as a stance against politicized enforcement. Transcript: Scott Galloway And also from a commercial standpoint, I’ve been saying for the last year that someone has an incredible commercial opportunity to say enough. We’re the good guys. We do not buy into this. If this costs us money in the short term, fine. But the very American values that gave us so much opportunity are under attack and we’re just not down with it. And I don’t know if you remember me saying this. I said six months ago, the biggest opportunity for Nike, which is trading at a 10-year low, was to run a bunch of ads saying we’re about American values and what’s going on here is wrong. What’s interesting is the corporate America needed a hero and it looks like it’s Dario. Kara Swisher I know. It’s interesting. Scott Galloway What’s really interesting here is I think, and it’s finally happening, they’re shaping up to be Joe Frazier and Muhammad Ali here. And I think that Dario is being very smart. And I think it’s up to us and the media are progressives. And I’m obviously stitching this into the resistance and unsubscribed thinking. I think it’s time to start figuring out if there’s a way to be more commercially supportive of Anthropic and less supportive of OpenAI. Basically, OpenAI has decided to enable and be complicit in the Trump administration’s efforts. And Dario and Anthropic have said, no, we’re not going along here. We’re not gonna be intimidated. This is, quite frankly, Kara, I have been waiting for this matchup for a year. (Time 0:41:56)
  • Silicon Valley Beef Shapes Pentagon Tech Disputes
    • Kara recounts Emil Michael’s involvement negotiating with Anthropic and her negative past experience with him at Uber.
    • She contrasts Emil Michael and other advisors with Dario Amodei’s public stance resisting government pressure. Transcript: Kara Swisher Yeah, I know you have. Let me say, I don’t know Dara Amodi. I don’t actually. And he might be arrogant, which is in line with most people in tech. That may be true. But I do know Emil Michael, who did negotiate this. And I do know David Sachs. And both of them are Aryan operators, ceaseless bullies, and unctuous toadies to the powerful, in my experience of covering them. Sam Altman is a little more complex, but he’s a gifted opportunist, which doesn’t make him that different from anybody in Silicon Valley. And has made his choice here, right? He wants the business. And so it’s a really, knowing the characters involved here, and then on the top of it, you have an idiot, like a moron, like Pete Hegseth, who doesn’t know what’s happening, communicating To someone who’s even more moronic on these issues, which is Donald Trump, who I think just, I suspect Sachs is whispering in his ear, and Neil Michael’s whispering in Hegseth’s ear. And this is all a Silicon Valley beef, right, between and among these people. Emile had to leave Uber under very not great circumstances, was pushed out. I think all these people is payback for other people. It’s just there’s a lot of Silicon Valley drama happening here. And I don’t know Dario Amoni. I don’t. I don’t. I really don’t. It’s unusual that I don’t. And I’ve asked for interviews with him. He has not agreed to do an interview with me. Thanks, Chris Nelty. But I do. And he did a very good interview with CBS News, actually, which I thought was interesting. Scott Galloway He handled himself really well. He handled himself really well. He starched his hat white in that interview. Kara Swisher Yeah, it was a good interview. But one of the things that I know is the people on the other side of him are very, people I covered for years who are just not good. How can I say this nicely? They’re the worst of the people I had to cover over the many years. I have to say they’re literally the worst. And to see them in these positions of power is making these decisions and hurting a company that just doesn’t want to do business with them. And actually, Michael tweeted out against Emote weeks ago. You know, it’s so unprofessional as a government. Like, it’s so, it’s such based in beefs that were happening elsewhere. And Emil, I’m really, I had ended up having drinks with him after he was sort of drummed out of Uber. And he said something to me, it was so strange. He goes, well, I’m so glad we can be friends. And I remember saying to him, we’re not friends. I think what you did there is terrible. I don’t know where you operate, but let him just do what he wants and don’t bring your stupid, insecure beefs out on the thing. And it will benefit Anthropik. It will. I think he’s handling himself. And he may be arrogant. He may have a God-clamps. I don’t know. (Time 0:43:15)
  • Netflix Gains Talent Leverage After Walking From Bid
    • Netflix walked away from the Warner Brothers bid, gained $2.8 billion and saw its stock surge, shifting creative talent incentives.
    • Galloway argues top creators will now prefer Netflix, weakening HBO/Warner negotiating power. Transcript: Scott Galloway But he’s certainly not like these people. And in that case, the bar is low. I’ve had my say. Don’t, that these are the rules you get to play by. And full stop, everyone is entitled to and obligated to the same set of rules, not who you like or who you don’t like. And which kind of leads into our next story, which is Netflix and Paramount. Kara Swisher Right, Netflix. Speaking of that, Scott, let’s take a quick break. When we come back, Netflix emerges as a winner after losing the Warner Brothers battle. Scott, we’re back. Netflix may have lost the battle for Warner Brothers, but it’s looking like a winner. Boy, this is incredible. The company stock surged 14 percent of it formally exited the bidding war. It also now has $2.8 billion in the bank after Paramount paid the Warner Brothers breakup fee. Went after the plan all along was to saddle Paramount with debt, drive up the price and walk away with more money. Ted Sarando said there are easier ways to make $2.8 billion. Very funny. He’s also trashing it so beautifully. I have to say, what a pro the way, like, it’s ridiculously expensive. He’s dropping all sorts of bone mouths in that Bloomberg interview you did. I’m hoping to do an interview with him relatively soon. He noted that Paramount deals dependent on cost cutting, leading to less production, less people working. He’s 100% right. On the Paramount front, CEO David Ellison, who got strafed by Barry Diller as a stunt pilot in speech, another thing, just announced that Paramount Plus and HBO Max will be combined Into one streaming service. He also said there would be a lot less, I think, a lot of cuts, $6 billion in cuts that he can quickly deleverage it. Nobody believes him or thinks he’s capable of doing it. Sarandos had talked more about $16 billion. Let me just tell you, Hollywood, look out below. This is, look, I don’t think Allison means to be incorrect, but he is incorrect about what’s about to happen here because the pressures on this much debt. I talked to, as you know, Bill Cohen, because you weren’t around last weekend, but this much debt is enormous amounts of debt. It’s like crazy. They don’t have enough income. They have barely enough income, so they can’t grow. They have to cut. There’s going to be, there is obvious duplication that they will cut, but even more than that, anything they say at this point is just absolutely untrue. It’s just, and I, again, I don’t think they mean it that way. I think they believe it, that they can, you know, turn shit into a chicken shit into chicken salad. But most smart math people don’t think they can do it, especially with competitors like Netflix breathing down and YouTube breathing down their neck. Your thoughts? Scott Galloway Well, I think I’ve been consistent on this. You have. The biggest losers are the creative community. They don’t realize it. I don’t know, half a million of them just got lined up and shot. The amount of AI slop we’re going to see come out of Paramount and Warner trying to pass for, you know, great breakthrough content. It’s just going to be, like I said, you know, in space, no one can hear you scream. Oh, trust me, you’re going to hear a lot of people scream. And the biggest winner, hands down. And I told Ted this. I said, if you walk from this, you realize your stock’s going to go up 10%. I was wrong. In the last five days, the stock’s up 30%. Yeah. Kara Swisher Back to other levels. Yeah. Okay. Scott Galloway So let’s look at it this way. They quote unquote technically save $120 billion by not acquiring it. And their stock’s up 100 billion, Kara, they could go buy Disney right now for walking from Warner Brothers. (Time 0:46:40)
  • Studio Debt Pressures Threaten Creative Jobs And Quality
    • Consolidation and debt pressure at Paramount/Warner will drive cost-cutting and increased use of lower-budget or AI-generated content.
    • Kara warns those cuts will hurt the creative community and reduce production quality. Transcript: Scott Galloway Well, I think I’ve been consistent on this. You have. The biggest losers are the creative community. They don’t realize it. I don’t know, half a million of them just got lined up and shot. The amount of AI slop we’re going to see come out of Paramount and Warner trying to pass for, you know, great breakthrough content. It’s just going to be, like I said, you know, in space, no one can hear you scream. Oh, trust me, you’re going to hear a lot of people scream. And the biggest winner, hands down. And I told Ted this. I said, if you walk from this, you realize your stock’s going to go up 10%. I was wrong. In the last five days, the stock’s up 30%. Yeah. Kara Swisher Back to other levels. Yeah. Okay. Scott Galloway So let’s look at it this way. They quote unquote technically save $120 billion by not acquiring it. And their stock’s up 100 billion, Kara, they could go buy Disney right now for walking from Warner Brothers. And if I were them and I was Ted and I’d be pissed off, I’d be firing up my lobbyists and my lawyers and I’d be like, delay an obvious game, make it create so much havoc for this deal to close And by the way every studio every crib they’re all going to want to go to work for one place okay do i want if i’m pitching i just had my uh latest book option for a series and for a documentary Which means absolutely nothing i’ve figured out in hollywood your man your notes on being a man yeah for an original scripted series and a documentary anyways Anyways, think of it as An R-rated Wonder Years is how I’ve been pitching it. Kara Swisher Who’s playing me? Herve Villach. Very funny. Scott Galloway Herve Villach is in a little tiny Subaru. Chalamet. I say Chalamet plays me. With a puppy German shepherd. Kara Swisher No, Chalamet can work. He looks like a teenage boy too. Scott Galloway Anyways. Chalamet. So these guys, the amount of money, let me go this way. Say you’re in the creative community and you have the hottest script or you’re the hottest actor and you have offers from the Paramount Studio, from Warner or for Netflix. Who are you absolutely going to pick? Netflix. Oh my God. They going to… Every day of the week and twice on Sunday. They look like heroes. You all hated Netflix. Kara Swisher Now you’re going to love them. It’s really… And by the way, when the Democrats come into power, that’s going to be good for them, too. Scott Galloway HBO just lost 30% of its value because HBO’s asset was it always was able to punch above its weight class. It did $2 billion in content relative to Netflix’s 18 billion. But if there was a show people were talking about around the water cooler, whether it was Girls or Euphoria or Game of Thrones or Succession, it usually was HBO because HBO’s culture And ability when, I’m talking a lot about me, my favorite subject, but when we pitched my big tech series, everybody, all the creatives and all the stars, they all wanted to go with HBO. They love Netflix, but if we had our choice, we would have gone with HBO. (Time 0:49:17)