Mamdani’s Tax List, Zuck's Media Blitz, and SpaceX’s Trillion-Dollar Wipeout

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So, I don't know if you've heard, but Mayor Mamdani has decided to release a list of the 950,000 residences with addresses and names that might be eligible for his pied-a-terre tax. Yeah. This is from the Wall Street Journal. This is his story. Explain it. Do you want me to explain it? Let me read from the Wall Street Journal. Mamdani's administration fired a warning shot last week when it published an online list of property owners that might be subject to a surcharge of luxury. Second homes. The list includes owners' names, addresses, and market value of properties. The release of the list threatens to stir up existing tensions between the mayor and the city's elite. The city has also been sending out notifications to homeowners they might be subject to the new tax. If you have a second home in New York worth more than $5 million, check your mailbox when you're back in the five boroughs because you've got mail, the mayor said in a post on social media. I assume, I am not, I have an apartment here, but I don't, I'm well below that number. I don't love this. I can't, I can't say I love this. It feels like a little bit like doxing. Just tax them and get on with it is my feeling. Here's the definition of doxing. Okay. Doxing is publishing private identifying information to expose someone to publicly pressure or harm without their consent. Tied to status, the publisher's disapproval, swap elite for any other disavowed group, and nobody's calling this a tax roll. I'm a fan of this tax. I was supportive of it. Yeah, I know that, yep. Rich absenteeism should subsidize a nurse in the Bronx paying 40% of her income on rent. I came out in favor of this tax. This is the definition. He's taken a legitimate source of tax revenue and he's turning it into a wanted poster. Yeah. And the question I would have is, other than trying to identify and imply these people have done something wrong, and then 18 months after, a healthcare CEO was executed in the street and then published the list, what is the upside here? Why is he doing this? Yeah, there's two things. I think he's been largely successful, but there's two things that I think are real misses, and they're both, well, they're not related. They're all related in some way. One is this luxury tax. They should not have focused on Ken Griffin. I understand what, if they got it passed, Hochul agreed to do it, just tax people. That's it. That should be it. It got passed. The leader is going to be mad about it. Some are, some aren't like you, and then just tax them. This was a big mistake to try to put targets on these people. I find it really disturbing. The second thing was, even though I agree with problems with Benjamin Netanyahu, to say you're going to arrest, want to arrest him seems ridiculous because it's not your job, right? It's not, I get why you might say I don't like him and I wish I could arrest him, but it was sort of weird. I thought it was a weird, another weird flex about, which is not his job, and so in this case, I think he's going to piss off the elite anyway, or many of them, not all of them, over this tax. I don't know why he would, these records are public, I think, I believe, but why call attention to them, correct? Is that, I can look up any home if you know the address, essentially, but maybe not who's here as a second home. I don't know. That I don't know. Well, I'll just touch on the, him saying he would, he would arrest Benjamin Netanyahu, he basically, the justification was that he's been convicted in the International Criminal Court. There are dozens, if not hundreds of people who've convicted him in the International Criminal Court, but he's decided to announce he's arresting the Jew. Well, I'm not sure, okay. Okay, who else has he announced he's arresting? He hasn't, he shouldn't have done this. I said he shouldn't have done it. I just, I think it's-- So you and I are in violent agreement on this, and when he's decided, he's not only playing into the worst fears about him, but he's making it harder for all progressives. I believe in a progressive tax structure. I believe we should raise tax rates, and the Republicans, in order to create deficits and continue to transfer money from the poor to the rich, they argue that progressive tax structures are persecution, and this plays exactly into that entire narrative. And let me, of course, I never miss an excuse to talk about myself. I moved to San Francisco in 2000 'cause I thought I was gonna be rich. Red envelope was going public, and I thought, what do I wanna do with my life? And I thought, I wanna teach, and I wanna live in New York. New York is the greatest collision of proximity, humanity, culture, creativity, weirdness, and I'm like, I want that. Yes, you've said that, yeah. And I moved there in 2000. I ended up, I was not rich, and I worked my ass off in New York, and I decided, you know what, I can't afford to live here, and I moved to Florida. But I decided I'm gonna start a business in Texas, and I moved to New York. And I started a business intelligence firm called L2, and I started it in New York, because A, it's an amazing place to start a business, and B, I always wanted to have a foot in New York. I started L2 in 2010, I sold it in 2017, and I've spent a bunch of time this morning trying to figure out, what are the taxes? Not the federal taxes, but the state franchise tax, real estate taxes, payroll taxes paid by L2 from 2010 to present, to New York State. And it's about $51 million. The average, in other words, L2 is paying for what the budget for one of the largest firehouses in downtown Manhattan is, $26 million a year. But quite frankly, what he's saying is, okay, and when I sold my company in 2017, I was living in faculty housing. My dean called me and said, "Congratulations, "I just saw you sold it for this. "You need to move out of faculty housing," which was fair. Right, you bought your apartment, yes. And I bought an apartment. And now, when you start that, it's like, yeah, that's it. When he starts putting, quite frankly, when he starts putting a tar, implying, he's implying we've done something wrong. He's implying that we're guilty of something. There's no, they have the tax rolls. They don't need this for tax reasons. As a matter of fact, if Amazon released a list of a million names and said these people actually owe taxes or they've done something wrong or they're implied something bad about them, and it had a 95% error rate, the same attorney general under Mamdani would be issuing subpoenas. Right, yeah, I don't know about that. This is, this plays into- It's taxing. This is just playing, and like we've, he's implying we've done something wrong because we're successful. No, I agree, I agree, I agree. New York is the last place you wanna demonize success. Yep, I would agree. The reason people move to New York is they think, "I wanna be successful on Broadway. "I wanna be successful in business. "I wanna be successful in the arts. "And no one's gonna get in my fuckin' way "if I'm really talented and work hard." We're gonna celebrate it. We're not gonna put a big R on your door and say you've done something wrong because you're successful. Yeah, yeah, I don't know quite why he did it since he got the tax, the tax was going through. I don't, I don't, he's seeing some polling where it's not. I don't, he's already won, and I'm not sure why he's doubling down with a losing move. It's bizarre, I find that bizarre. And I don't, you know, in a time when people's public information, even if it's public, to call attention to it when you're so prominent, is a real problem. I mean, we all complain about Facebook and others using our information, and justifiably. To do this is very similar. It feels very creepy. It feels very surveillance. It feels very, even if you don't like Ken Griffin, even if you don't like all these rich people lording it over New York, they should pay their taxes. And that's that, it should be that's that. And it is, seems really unusually pugnacious toward, I don't know. I don't understand, I was sort of shocked by this story. And I'm gonna wait for more reporting on this, but it seems, ridiculous to call attention to it when it's people you want to also stay here and you want to get their taxes. Anyway, I would agree with you, Scott. I just, I don't like it. I don't like it. And people can call us friends of rich people, but it seems unfair on every aspect. 95% of the people on the list suppose they're not going to be subject to the tax. Like what, other than implying these people have done something wrong and publishing their address without their permission, without their consent, what possible upside is there from publishing this list? I'd like to know. I would like to know what the idea is. It's not a good one. I mean, it's not good. It's not good. I know it's been a tough morning. By the way, I've gotten yelled at by Facebook and then Ari Emanuel called and yelled at me too because I didn't like his column. So that was my morning. Yeah. I didn't like your Jeffrey Dahmer joke. Didn't like it. Well, I'm sorry. Meta called you about something I said? Well, because it's on social media. Social media. All the jokes we made on the last show about you did remarketing. I was like, you know what? We didn't like the Michelle Obama is a man joke and you didn't object to it enough, you know, or whatever. I just feel like, anyway, let me say, I feel like there's not going to, that they were not happy with our jokes about Mark. But he's still on his AI optimism tour. In an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal, Zuckerberg asked whether AI will be centralized and restricted to a certain extent. And he said, no, it's not. It's not. It's not. It's not. a few institutions or a tool that empowers everyone. His own proposal, he says, is a philosophy based on individual empowerment as a source of prosperity and a balance of power as a foundation of safety. In the piece, which was rather long and in desperate need of editing, Zuckerberg expresses concern that others creating AI talk about it in a way that is filled with doom. He continues this idea in the New York Times interview, which he's on a chatting tour, saying developing AI in a tightly controlled manner is akin to abandoning values and stifling innovation. He was taking aim at open AI and anthropic who are way ahead of him, actually. I suspect he wouldn't be making this speech if meta was ahead. It was interesting that they're really doubling down on this we love humanity thing and AI optimism, and rightly so because they went too far in the other direction and saying how bad it would be for everybody except themselves. And so they're sort of doubling down on that. What do you make of this? I know Jeffrey Dahmer jokes today, if you don't mind. No, no, it's not like he's buying bottle service after being dumped and trying to pretend everything's okay. CEOs consistently try to focus on their reputation, right? And a CEO trying to convince us that AI will empower everyone, it's not marketing, it's preemptive regulation. And I thought it was just so hilarious that he's claimed to be worried about the concentration and power of AI. What he's worried about is it's not concentrating around meta. I would agree with that. Yeah. Well, when one company controls, I think it's 63% of all or 68% of all social media, he's worried about the concentration of power. So that comes across as cynical. Companies with the largest distribution will likely be the most successful and meta has 3 billion users. That's an unfair advantage if you want to talk about concentration of power. And history highlights that we can't just focus on the concentration of power. We have to focus on the fact that we consistently overestimate the short-term impact of technology and underestimate the long-term impact. So AI will likely disappoint this year, but will likely permanently reshape certain parts of our society and economy over the next decade. And essentially, it feels like every AI ad right now is an attempt at a reputation management campaign. It's not even talking about the products. It's saying, I mean, it's really interesting. They're running their ad saying it'll connect everyone. And then someone who founded one of these companies will say it's a human extinction event on PBS. It's just sort of, well, which is it, guys? Is it going to connect us or is it going to destroy us? Well, I think they're coordinating their talks now. They're like, maybe we should slow down on the doom saying, right? Or maybe we should say open is good because Dario Amodi also noted that there should be open systems. I think what it is, is they've got microphones in front of their phones. They've got microphones in front of their phones. They've got microphones in front of their faces, and they've said too much. And now they're trying to pull it back. And so Mark is sort of walking into this breach by saying, I believe it's for everybody, except he's not handing. He did this in the beginning of the, I remember very vividly, a late night phone conversation when he did this long essay, another long essay in Desperate Need of Editing, where he talked about how it was about how social media was about community, and he wanted to lean into people, and that we're all in this together. And I recall asking him, if we're all in it together, why do you control everything? Why are you the monarch of Facebook? And he never had a good answer for that. He was like, well, I said, if we're all in it for community, why don't we all share your money? Why don't we all share, if our privacy is being used, why aren't we being paid? We're in this together, Mark. We're in this together. Together, I would like some of the money you're using my privacy to sell. I had the same argument with Steve Case many, many years before that. They all are like, we're here for you, but- Except when it comes to divvying up the goodies or control. And so, it's the same. If you go back to that essay he wrote about social media, none of which came true. It became a very negative force in society, although there are some definite positive aspects, no question. It's weird that he's trying this out again, because I think he actually believes he's helping people. You were right, I have to say, away from all your jokes, which they did not like. And I feel like they're not forthcoming in the future, is that they should just stick to, we're making capitalism and there's going to be a lot of jobs from the things we make. I think that's, or here's a vocational training, or here's, like, I think they should lean into the stuff that they actually deserve credit for, I suppose. This is not only wasteful advertising, which is everyone's worried about, this hurts. This brings up, this will just inspire a lot of conversations like this one. Showing just how cynical this is. And reminding people that this is a firm that, when social went on mobile, we saw the greatest increase in young adult depression that we've registered since we began tracking it. I mean, it just stirs up a lot of things that are not going to be good for them. I think this was a real own goal, but just going to the story of, if you will, open AI versus closed AI, open systems usually win. Linux won the cloud, Android won mobile. The internet beat AOL. You were talking about Steve Case. Closed models try to ring fence and maximize profits. Open models optimize for adoption, right? And you're probably, and this is how this war is playing out with China. You don't win or beat China by restricting knowledge. You beat China by commercializing it faster. Now, NVIDIA's incentives are obvious. They sell the picks and shovels. The more AI models that exist, the more GPUs they sell. But, you know, trying to stop open source AI is like trying to ban calculus. It's just, it's not going to work. But for Zuckerberg to talk about it, it's because he failed trying to ring fence his own AI. Yeah, I would agree. All right, let me do an exercise. Instead of calling Jeffrey Dahmer, if he was sitting in front of you, you obviously aren't going to insult him, possibly. Maybe you would. What would you say to him? How should he be messaging this? How should he be marketing this? How should he be messaging around AI or meta? Meta, AI, whatever. At some point, your actions reveal more than your words or an ad campaign from someone hot you want to hang out with who wears black. I fell into that. When Red Envelope went public, I hired all these ad agencies so I could hang around cool people and see ads on bus shelters and have lunch with David Carey at the Condé Nast cafeteria. His actions are his branding now. I mean, anything meta does is worth hundreds of millions of dollars in print advertising because it gets reported on and crawled on by a ton of people, including us. The best branding that Mark Zuckerberg could do right now would be for him to age-gate his platform. Yeah. I think Mark Zuckerberg never intended to hurt children. I don't think that's who he is. Their evil and their mendaciousness is not a function of their malice. It's a function of their ignorance and their obfuscation. And they're guilty not of errors of commission, but omission. And they constantly push back and say ridiculous shit like, well, we're worried about 14-year-old First Amendment rights, as opposed to saying, look, we make a lot of money from teenagers, and until it's a law, we're going to continue to serve them ads, even if it's extreme dieting. Yeah, I would agree. I did push back. I said, it's really interesting that you would cut all ability to stop really heinous speech about trans and gay people. That's what you did recently. And then you're worried about Scott making this Jeffrey Dahmer joke. Or I noticed there wasn't a real pushback on Michelle Obama as a man. I noticed there wasn't a real pushback by anyone in the GOP on the heinous things that Trump said about this time, any day of the week, but Caitlin Collins. I was like, no one said anything. So he's sort of in the vein of what you were talking about with, speaking of Ari Emanuel, he did an essay saying this deal should go through. I wrote him back saying, you might point out that because it makes us a banana republic, essentially. He's got money all over this deal. Exactly. I agree. agree with that. But aside from that, it was, I think he does actually believe that there needs to be four strong studios to have a healthy Hollywood system. I think that's fair. I agree with, I completely agree with him. But he was, I was like, the reason why the state's attorney generals, all of whom are dramatically pushed back, is because the very first approval, which was the Justice Department, was so tainted with political things. So if you're going to do politics, they're going to do politics. And he was like, but that's not the point that there should be four. I said, yes, but they've wrecked it from day one by being so egregiously political in so many ways that this was the natural, this, Democrats are, there's a song by the, by the Chicks, which is not ready to make nice. And the Democrats are not ready to make nice now. And they better get used to this. That's my, and Trump started it all by like insulting people and having the GOP stay silent, like doing these egregiously cruel things. And the same thing with Zuckerberg. He's created a, he's created a platform where ugliness is far too, is far too powerful. And then he's like, why are things so ugly? And you're like, I don't know, maybe you could have done something. Like you said, the actions, I agree with you. Can I, can I go on about the open source? NVIDIA, SpaceX, Microsoft, and other tech companies have launched an AI safety initiative to develop open source tools for AI safety and cybersecurity. The initiative follows a recent cyber attack involving an open AI agent that breached Hugging Face, during internal testing, raising new concerns about AI security, notably absent from the alliance. Our open AI, Google and Anthropic, highlighting the growing divide between supporters of open models and companies building clothes systems. This follows Anthropic and open AI lobbying Washington for some restrictions on the latest open source models coming out of China. However, Anthropic's Dario Amodi, as I noted, emphasized in a letter this week that the company has never advocated for a ban on open weight models. Like you said, openable, and correct, no matter what they do. The honest answer is what I think is going to happen. And I said this on our last one, I think the market for AI is bifurcating into a series of frontier models that aren't open source, that are better. And, and people will pay a premium for them. And I think they'll still be the largest businesses by a dollar volume level. And then the Toyotas and Hondas and Hondas of the world will be the open source coming out of Asia. Yeah, Corolla is a great way to think about it, Toyota Corolla. And there'll be a market for both. But I think the more relevant one is, are the open weight models. They tend to, in technology, they tend to be the ones that kind of win long term. Now, iOS is, I guess, technically a closed system and Android's open. Android has more users. iOS creates more shareholder value. But there's, you know, there's huge, I mean, you could argue that Android creates more shareholder value because it informs what is the greatest tollbooth in history. You could argue both ways. I think there's a market for both. I mean, it's so funny. Business and technology usually comes down to iOS versus Android. And that's what's happening. Yeah, it does. That's what's happening here. It's the frontier models versus the open weight Chinese models. It's weird they're having this weird beef. It sort of happens all the time, doesn't it? Well, there was so much pushback when Linux and the others came around. It's always the same. Mark, you fucking reek. You have terrible B.O. I just got you another call. I tried. I tried. I tried. I smell the Axe, but there's something else I smell here. Oh, it's teen depression and self-cutting. All right. And we're out. OK, I tried. It's polarization of our elections. It's a coarsening of our discourse. I think they have a lot to answer for. I don't say he has B.O. There was a lot of B.O. on the subway this morning, by the way. While we're on the topic of A.I., we've been hearing feedback from some of you who have been impacted by data centers in your communities. So we wanted to bring an expert voice. Let's listen to a clip from Evan Halper, a business reporter at The Washington Post, who's been covering data center buildouts and their impacts about how tangible these issues are. This is not propaganda. This is not media misinformation. The backlash is driven by very real concerns in these communities, many of which I've been to. They get all kinds of promises made to them by tech companies that things are going to be run on clean energy. They're going to bring all kinds of jobs into the community. They're not going to have impact on the water, et cetera, et cetera. But what we're seeing on the ground is the impacts are very real. Suddenly, a community that wasn't expecting it, that was rural, has been has seen a large amount of land rezoned, big power plants getting built. The power plant is big enough to serve a medium sized American city, all to serve just one data center. It's run on gas. Gas creates public health problems. It creates climate problems. There's backup diesel generators on top of the data center. Those backup diesel generators are major polluters that are supposed to run very infrequently. But now, because there's not enough power on the grid, because the data centers need so much, these emergencies get declared and the backup diesel generators get to function even more, often on the lowest air quality days, creating an even bigger air quality problem. So these problems are real. This is not just an imagined thing. This is not political opportunism. These communities are suffering real impacts from these data centers. Yeah, I think, you know, as you said, some of them should be fine if they're done correctly, but they aren't being done. They're getting, they're running over these areas. And people, real people are very concerned. They really are. And this is, this is a message that I have been trying to get through to these tech companies. They really do think it's fake. They think it's the media being negative. I've heard this over and over again. By the way, Willie Nelson just spoke out about data centers saying an AI data center is the last thing his Texas hometown needs. So, again, one of the things is, it's the same theme that we're talking about. They have painted themselves into villains, and then they wonder why we think they're villains. And we don't trust them. And, you know, you can talk all you want about trust the media. I agree. People have never trusted the media, but they really don't trust tech companies at this point. And it's a real problem. And doing these ads about humanity is not, you're right, actions speak louder than words. And these data centers, we are going to suffer as a country if we don't stay ahead in this area but the way they're introducing data centers is so overwhelmingly feels corrupt, feels like, feels bad to the citizens of this country. And I like that they speak up. I do. Even if some of them are necessary. You know, like, I think his comments are powerful. And our nation has a terrible legacy of outsourcing the externalities of progress, whether it's the factory, the coal plant, a chicken processing plant, or a plant that contaminates the water table. We have a habit of putting these in the most vulnerable communities who have the least resources to push back on it. That is nothing new. So I think it is up to local civic officials. And I think it's great that when the populace speaks up and asks their fiduciaries, elected representatives, to make sure that the upsides, and I do think there's an upside around tax revenue and growth, to a data center that's well planned and well regulated. I do think there's an upside. It's up to the local civic official to say, is the upside greater than the downside here? Or is this a function of me getting money from Meta for my next campaign or just making a stupid decision? I do think it has become, I think a lot of people talking about this are having a knee-jerk reaction around what has become an empty vessel being filled around rage, around income inequality, and because these individuals have not acquitted themselves. And I think what could fix this is essentially a Facebook ad that says, "Facebook, where your parents go to get catfish by AI Jesus." I think that would solve everything. Seriously, Meta putting out ads right now is like trying to put lipstick on a landfill. Should I stop? At what point should I stop? It's just funny. It's just funny. I'm going to get in their call. In any case, it is a real issue here. And I think Gavin is speaking exactly, Willie Nelson is speaking to it. You better listen to these people, all you tech companies. You really better. It'll become an issue in the next electoral cycle. 100%. Anyway, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, SpaceX's trillion-dollar wipeout. Support for the show comes from ZBiotics. Being in rough shape the day after drinks comes with the territory. It feels like it's just a constant contract you sign with that first drink. But what if you could change that before you even take that first sip? Enter pre-alcohol. ZBiotics pre-alcohol probiotic drink is the world's first genetically engineered probiotic. It was invented by PhD scientists to tackle rough mornings after drinking. Here's how it works. When you drink, alcohol gets converted into a toxic by-product in the gut. It's a buildup of this by-product, not dehydration. That's to blame for rough days after drinking. Pre-alcohol produces an enzyme to break this by-product down. Just remember to make pre-alcohol your first drink of the day. I have been using, no joke, ZBiotics before they became an advertiser. I like to drink. I am drinking less as I get older. But I find in general, if I take ZBiotics before I indulge, it takes away about a third of kind of the, I don't know, the gross feeling the next day. So I'm a customer. With free alcohol, you don't need to choose between a great night and a great next day. July is packed with barbecues, fireworks, and late Saturday nights with friends. Keep the good times rolling into the next day. drink pre-alcohol before you go out and wake up ready for whatever Sunday brings. Remember to head to zbiotics.com slash pivot and use the code pivot at checkout for 15% off. AI isn't just a new tool, it encompasses so much more. It's spurring a revolution across all industries and reshaping itself to become a big part of our future together. CoreWeave is at the center, powering some of the biggest names in AI. 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Odoo replaces multiple expensive platforms for a fraction of the cost. That's why over thousands of businesses have made the switch. So why not you? Try Odoo for free at odoo.com. That's O-D-O-O dot com. Scott, we're back. The SpaceX rollercoaster continues. The stock plunged more than 20% below its IPO price this week, wiping out more than $1.2 trillion in market value, roughly the market cap of Tesla. Tesla is also suffering. The stock has bounced back somewhat as of this recording, but it's down 3%. Next week could be another wild ride, with SpaceX reporting earnings on Tuesday and the first insider lockup expiring two days later. How low can these shares go? They look like they're headed to, they look like they're headed to 100. I feel like they, I feel like they're going down, but I don't know. I'm not, again, I'm not a stock picker. And again, Elon has enormous power, but it seems like, especially after that interview, he seems insane. Like it seems people are not memeing him as much. Well, price is what you pay. Value is what you own. And the price that people paid after what was arguably, I think, one of the greatest engineering feats in history between Goldman, JP Morgan, and Elon Musk, and the NASDAQ 100, and President Trump, and the head of the SEC, to get this thing out at 120 times revenues. There's a, my son told me this, and it just fascinated me. No basketball, no basketball player has ever been able to be in the air longer than a second. It's really weird. For some reason, the unit of measurement of a second, no one can stay in the air for a second. Gravity eventually pulls them down. Valuation is gravity. Eventually, I don't care if it's game stock. No one has been able to defy gravity. No one gets closer to that one second limit than Elon Musk. Hey, look over here. Oh, we're autonomous. Oh, we're robots. Don't value me like a car company. Let's talk about being an interplanetary species. Let's not talk about the fact that it's an interesting company, and one great company, and not a bunch of money-losing companies. The lockup expiration here matters more than earnings, and that is supply. I think any reasonable math shows that supply is going to overwhelm the fundamentals in the short run. And retail investors, and this is what happened at the IPO, retail investors constantly confuse a great company with a great stock. And at some point, the best company in the world is overvalued. And at some point, the worst company in the world, unless it's going to zero, is undervalued. Rather than making a recommendation, I tell people what I'm doing. I'm not getting near this thing. Because Elon's not afraid to come out and say, I have funding secured at $450 and not get punished and run up the stock. His stocks tend to be meme stocks that totally disassociate from actual values. So stay the fuck away from this thing. But if you're looking for a bottoms-up valuation in terms of comparing this to its competitors and saying it's the best in that space, that bottoms-up valuation would put it at like $20 to $30 a share, which, by the way, would still make it one of the most valuable companies in tech. Right. Yeah. It's down, it's down 30%. It was at $201 when it, when it, its highest has been $201 or $202, $202 really. And now it's at $113. If it crosses that $100 barrier, I would worry. You know what I mean? I think I would worry of where it was going, 100%. And I would, and same thing with Tesla. They seem like that, right, today it's on a real decline. But over the past six months, it's dropped. If you think about it, it's dropped like a, like a, like it's incredibly, it's down to $302. It probably will pass $300 barrier. And those are, those are mental things for people. You know, I think they're mental things for people. And, and again, valuation may be making a, making a very strong return here. And Elon's various, you know, jazz hands is not seeming to work here. I don't know what he could do to, well, he could have results, right? Well, he's, okay. But even to look at the glass is half empty. The fact they were able to engineer. Yeah. Such an incredible valuation out of the gates gives some people the impression that it's cheap now. Yeah. If it went public at this valuation, we'd all be like, Jesus Christ, can you believe this? Yeah, you're right. So like the IPO was a win for him, even if no matter what you say, even if it's down and it's technically a broken IPO now, the fact that he was able to put that number on this, this set of assets, it's not nothing short of remarkable. And also a lot of the people who he has said finance a $44 billion purchase of a, of a microblogging platform that I signed the paperwork under probably some sort of drug infused haze that by most measures is worth three to 5 billion. He said to his investors, just hold on. Trust me. I always, I always make you whole. And you know what he did? He probably gave those same people. Those are probably many of the same people who have invested along the way frankly, they didn't, they're not subject to lockups. I had, you got it at 20. It sounds great. Like a hundred is great. 200 better, but a hundred is great too. Yeah. But I had lunch with a guy here in LA who's this really charming, smart, intelligent guy. Who's what I would call totally agnostic about all this stuff. And he's known Elon for a long time and he's invested in everything Elon does. And so we had started investing in SpaceX like 10, 12 years ago. Someone just told me he's made $5 billion. And regardless of what you think of, of Elon's paranoid white nationalist rant on with the head of the economist and calling her a traitor because she asked him tough questions. If someone makes you that wealthy and if someone is able to create that kind of value, you just put money into anything they do. Right. And so, you know, his, his ability to do that. I mean, there's a lot of positives. It's a huge win for him. I do think there's positives for the economy, but in terms of any bottoms of valuation, forget that it was a two, two or four, just look at it now. And you would, in the absence of any history, you would go, this thing is the most overvalued stock in America right now. Right. Yeah, absolutely. Well, speaking of a very valuable stock, Apple briefly hit a $5 trillion market cap for the first time, a day after passing NVIDIA to become the most valuable public company. It's a busy week for Apple. The company is launching a new program for customers to lease iPhones, iPads, Macs, and Apple watches, instead of buying them outright. This was interesting. The program called Apple Updates and the company is launching a new program for users to lease iPhones. Apple Upgrade uses buy now, pay later company Klarna to let people make monthly payments on the device and upgrade, buy or return when the lease ends. The cheapest iPhone option is $17.99 a month. Apple's move comes a month after the company raised prices on iPads and Macs, citing skyrocketing chip costs. iPhone prices are expected to rise later this year. Do you like this idea? I didn't know what you would think of it. And also note, we're recording ahead of Apple's reporting the Q3 earnings, Tim Cook's final earnings as a CEO. And whatever we think of his stupid golden statue, he has done an astonishing job here as CEO in the years after Steve Jobs died. What an impressive CEO he's been, except for the golden statue, which will follow him the rest of his days and going to the millennium premiere. But go ahead. I don't know who the head of strategy is at Apple, but I think this group of people, this man or woman, are literally some of the brightest people in the history of business. And whether it was taking $6 billion out of broadcast advertising and moving it into 550 temples of the brand in a market, one of the biggest markets in the world, technology, that had just shitty distribution. Remember we used to go to buy computers? Yes. Ugh. Egghead, CompUSA. Egghead, CompUSA. Oh, CompUSA. You literally walked in and, or where you'd go to get your computer fixed, there'd be some guy in a Harley Davidson shirt, and he'd give you a number and put it on a steel rack and tell you to come back in two weeks so he could tell you it doesn't work and you need to buy a new computer. And then they built these places. I'd like to live in an Apple store. I think if Apple owned an open coffee counter in their stores, it'd be the most the most successful retail in the world per square foot. And it already is. It surpassed Tiffany when they opened their stores. Most successful retailer in history as a tech company. In addition, their stock. Okay. You want to talk about genius? Genius is not only what to do, it's what not to do. Who has invested the least in big tech and AI? Warren Buffett? I don't know. Apple. Apple, yeah. Apple's decided, okay, kids, you go plan traffic. We'll wait till this all gets sorted out after trillions of dollars in CapEx. And then we'll move in with an elegant interface and ownership of the consumer. And we'll monetize it. Or we'll just rent it from you and give you access to the billion wealthiest consumers in the world. Apple's stock. It's no accident that the company, the one company that's decided not to get into these AI wars is up 61% over the last 12 months. The most valuable company in the world. The most valuable company in the world is up 61% over the last 12 months. These guys, these guys, and this is, this is the, this is what separates the truly, the great CEOs from the iconic CEOs. It's not what they do. It's what they don't do. So what do you think of this upgrade then? What do you, what do you think of this? I think it's actually a good idea. Oh, Kara, I'm sorry. Long-winded, long-winded preamble. This is fucking genius. Because the reason why hardware companies and services companies don't trade. It's the same multiple of software companies. It's not because software is just, quote unquote, a better product. It's because it's a better business model because it's recurring revenue. Adobe changed everything. Adobe used to sell, I forget what it was called, director, whatever, for, you know, software in a box for $2,500. And then they hope three years later you go buy another one for $2,400. And instead they said, we're going to charge you 25 bucks a month. And their stock got cut in half. And since then it's up 40X. Because the market loves recurring revenue. You can better. Plan your capex. You can better plan your revenues. It's just more. The way I described, I was in a relationship with someone who was bipolar. And I said, I'm in a relationship with a transactional business model. I don't know who I'm waking up next to. I don't know how to predict this person. A recurring revenue business is in a being in a relationship with someone who's just totally consistent. And, you know, you know what to expect. But, no, you don't always like, you often decry buy now, pay later. Yeah, but that buy now, pay later. This is different. Buy now, pay later is you come up to the till. At Urban Outfitters. And you're going to Coachella. And they go, you know what? Go shop and buy another $300 and we'll give you instant credit. I think that's different than this. This is basically selling a subscription to the Apple ecosystem. I would agree. It's hardware as a service. It's has. And people, it's easier to say I'm not going to buy the next iPhone versus I'm going to cancel my subscription. It increases lifetime customer value. And it lowers the psychological barrier to higher prices. So, I believe, I've just presented, I'm bragging. I just presented. To the CEO and the management team of Mercedes. And I basically said, the future of consumer products isn't ownership. It's recurring revenue. It's subscription. And they asked me for one idea. And I said, I love the Mercedes brand. I think it's, they do great products. Love the brand. I want to pay a monthly fee and have you just show up with the car I should have. Take care of everything. Service it when I'm out of town. Know everything about me. Maybe you'd invite me to a cool couple events. Say, okay, you've had this thing three years. You just had a kid. You need a truck now. And take all of the decisions, all of the brain damage. I never want to go into a car dealership again and give me a good deal. I don't want to know the, I don't want to negotiate price. By the way, include insurance. Include finesse. Just do everything for me and charge me a monthly fee. It might be slightly more. But you don't care because it's the convenience factor. I'm doing this. I have to say, I had never, I have not bought a new phone. And I was going to buy another one. I'm like, oh, it's $1,000. It probably will cost me more, but I can always upgrade. Like, I feel, like, good about it. I know it sounds, I feel that I just want to rent it. I just want to rent it, really, in many ways. If Apple said to you and me, all right, Scott, you buy everything Apple. We have your purchase history. With your permission, we want to use AI to know exactly what you need, when you need it. We're going to charge you $100, $200, $300 a month. And you're going to get everything a month early. And by the way, in case you're interested, you can come to the cool Apple event or whatever, if you're really that big. Oh, and by the way, we're going to invite you occasionally to a premiere of a great Apple movie. You're going to become, and it's $300 a month. And I think, oh, $300 a month? I spent so much on these for our $200. I spent so much. We're going to send you the latest MacBook. We're going to send you the coolest AirPods. We see you're an AirPod weirdo, and you love these things. We're going to send them with your name inscribed. You want a T-shirt, cool T-shirt. Whatever it is. I'm in. And then the market turns around, and it says, okay, my first company, Profit Brand, was a strategy firm. It sold for 2.8 times revenues. I started the same business called L2, basically helping firms make better decisions with data, but I charged an annual membership fee. I charged Nike a half a million dollars a year instead of charging them a million dollars every three years for a strategy engagement. L2 got sold for eight times revenues. The market loves recurring revenues, and Apple keeps figuring out big decisions and ways to not only be the most valuable company in the world, but to provide unbelievable return on investment. I'm just, I'm so impressed, not with what they do, but what they don't do. Do you remember how many people were calling for Apple to launch new products, launch a car? You know what it takes big balls? Not to launch a car, but to pull the plug on a car, because you don't think it's going to offer the same return on invested capital as other projects. Yeah, absolutely. I'm very impressed with Apple. I agree. I agree. I actually had just a funny little basket of tech stocks with $10,000, and Apple, just, I was losing money on a bunch of them. I'm just testing things, and Apple has taken me back up the top. I was like, "Thank you, Apple." I, just interesting things we talk about is just sort of a test thing, and I do thank them. I'm going to do this program. I am. It's just easier. It's just easier. It's just easier and more convenient, and it also lets people who want to have an Apple phone and can't maybe, can't afford the $1,000 to be part of it, like in a way that's much more, you know, it sort of, it gets them to the lower-priced customers. I do think this happens, and it doesn't break these customers the way, say, like a ridiculous mortgage or something would do, and it gives them a better phone. All right. Let's go on a quick break. But just before we go on a quick break, I do have another tagline for Facebook. Sure. Okay. You ready? Meta. Meta. Ignore the smell coming from the basement. Oh, my God. I shouldn't have said anything. Oh, my God. Thank God it wasn't that stupid. Oh, my God. It gives me so much joy. I know. It does. All I'm doing is I'm addicted to the meth, and I'm shitposting the dealer. I'm allowed to do that. Okay. Okay. When we come back, Mitch McConnell gets an ultimatum. You might need Mitty if you ever hairsprayed your bangs into a waterfall, layered slouch socks, tied a scrunchie to the bottom corner of your T-shirt, or tried to go for a run with a CD player. If this took you down memory lane, you might need Mitty. Perimenopause can start 10 years before you actually go through menopause. 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Home of the save. Scott, we're back. Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear is giving Senator Mitch McConnell an ultimatum. Prove you can still serve or resign. Beshear sent McConnell a letter this week demanding he directly and verbally address the people of Kentucky to prove his capacity to serve. If that doesn't happen, Beshear is urging Senate Majority Leader John Thune to investigate McConnell's condition. This comes as McConnell's office released another photo that, again, sparked conspiracy theories because of the shirt or something. With a statement, the senator is not medically cleared to leave his rehab facility. It was very, I have to say, the note was very, what it left out, speaking of omission, it didn't talk about cognitive issues. It just talked about physical issues. which was interesting. tried his best to tell the truth is what i when i looked at it but it's not enough uh for bashir let's listen to what he told reporters on tuesday all i'm asking for and the people of kentucky are asking for is transparency and honesty that senator mcconnell still has the capacity to serve and i hope he does i wish him well i hope his health is improving but if he can have a 17 minutes conversation with his protege he can call into any of your news stations for three all we're asking is just a little bit of proof and i get that everybody wants a certain level of privacy but when you run for these jobs you know you're given uh some of that up we have seen rampant speculation across social media and elsewhere it could all be fully avoided and it's all within senator mcconnell's power so under kentucky law senate vacancies are filled by a special election bashir is not allowed to appoint a temporary replacement um it's also important for his presidential run for him to look strong here uh it's that's what it's playing into um is this a strongly worded letter gonna do anything here because that's what it is it's just i i urge you to say something um or would they just ignore it i would assume mcconnell who is you know has always been sort of taking the lowest road he could in many ways um although trump has managed to get on lower roads than he has um i i think he they'll do nothing they'll just they'll just ignore this i don't know i i think the pressure will will mount i mean i feel like mitch mcconnell has become the modern day equivalent of bigfoot like oh wait we saw him it's not real and look this is america has mandatory retirement ages for airline pilots but not for people making decisions about nuclear weapons and fiscal policy which is just insane and this is an example of it this is this story really isn't about senator mcconnell it's about a political system that has no graceful exit for aging leaders and every institution especially democracy needs succession planning and politicians are some of the few people that are allowed to ignore mortality and biology and just to another shout out to apple and tim cook again one of the hardest things in leadership isn't knowing when to take over it's knowing when to leave and it's insane that these people when you get older we purposefully have a difficult time believing that we're ever going to die we know it but we don't believe it and that is we think oh i'll figure it out and i'm still adding value and also to be blunt for a lot of these people who have devoted their lives to work them leaving is them acknowledging they're about to die and so they don't want to leave and they keep coming up with reasons why they should stay the political system rewards incumbency i i know and so we need mandatory retirement ages and term limits well can i one of the things that's been interesting about the besides the social media stuff which some of it is very funny some of the fake things it's it's been a very it's been a very amusing uh people doing things around mcconnell and actually um i was at joanna cole's and uh ben sherwood last night at dinner and they were saying the mcconnell stuff really is popular like i was surprised i thought it would be all trump or whatever but mcconnell stuff is really popular on this on the daily beast but what's interesting is some things that i think are more serious where people are going okay i had a cesarean and i had to get back to work in five seconds like you know i had i was out for a medical thing and my work didn't let me and i think even if it's like kind of like that to me is actually very resonant is like he gets to be quiet he has one of the most important jobs in the country and he gets as much time off as he wants and he doesn't have to explain himself i have like a minor a thing that requires a lot of medical attention and i've got to get back to work there is something brewing it's like the data centers i feel like there's sort of this anger like why does this guy get to be have privacy when i have to get back to work immediately i've seen a ton of that lately and i i think it's people it's a very good it's another vessel it's mitch mcconnell is another empty vessel for for rage and it's people look i think the most secretive thing in the world right now would be if if all of a sudden everyone over the age of 70 had had to announce their retirement would the world be a better place benjamin netanyahu and donald trump are too old to be serving they're too old and yeah you you need wisdom but more than that you need rigorous critical thinking and energy and also you need a fresh creative dynamism the best thing in my opinion that the far left that we talk a lot about they are bringing the creativity and the dynamism you need that you need turnover and it's the same this is this is why i think we're going to win the the seat in maine or when i say we democrats i think people see are going to see at some point susan susan mcconnell seems to be like hiding in mitch mcconnell's hospital bathroom it's not susan mcconnell i'm sorry susan collins you can call it might as well be susan mcconnell i get the sense she's in the room next door i mean she's not she's an old lady and she presents is even older yeah and aging comes for all of us it comes for all of us that's not it's not an indictment it's a reality and i think that's why we're going to win the seat we found a guy with chest hair who doesn't appear to be a rapist and he's not 105. ding ding ding ding ding but it is a proxy it is a proxy of like why don't we know about the president's health all of them like why don't we get why do they get off why why do they get to build data centers and we have to put up with it why do we have why do they get all the money why do they get all the deals there is a it's part of the same like you're getting these people are you and i i do think it's i think it could take very ugly turns as as it i agree mom donnie should not have done that it takes ugly turns instead of yeah why not why can't we get our fair share and i think it's a very good i think it's a very good fair share is a very good way to talk about it and why does mitch mcconnell get to be quiet why does he precisely i don't care about his privacy he shouldn't have been the majority leader or whatever that's like saying a 65 year old pilot yeah can't have can't be tested for cognitive ability or reflexes because of his privacy yeah exactly same thing like i feel like i said this to a public official they were giving me our time i go you know what you work for me like sorry like i know you've forgotten that but the fact of the matter is you work for the public and you don't get to you don't get like we don't have to be nice about it i just i there's just a brewing thing and it could go in a really ugly direction i wish it wouldn't if these people would just he should resign he's clearly not able to do his job he should resign that's well this is all isn't this like they're trying to hold out such that such that the governor doesn't get to a point it's the republican no i don't think there's i don't i think he's not there so he doesn't vote so great let him sit there like and stew he doesn't get to vote he doesn't it there's the vote is gone in the senate right now is what it is the vote is gone if he tries to vote that's he better walk in that's all you know if he tries to vote or anything no i meant in terms of who's his replacement who gets to decide when he dies it doesn't matter at this point i think it doesn't no i think it's just a it's just a point that and i think basheer's presidential election is going to hinge a little bit on this i'm sure he doesn't love it but if i if i were him i'd show up at the hospital i would for the people of of of the state i'm here for the representing as the governor of the state i want to see how you are and assess your ability to do your job for the people of the state that's what i would do he won't do it but that's what i would do and then just get turned away and get turned away even if he did it i think it's a pretty good stunt anyway one more quick break we'll be back for predictions tammy regularly hauls stuff to her kids at college that's why she shops at bj's wholesale club saving up to 25 off grocery store prices beef jerky microwave meals laundry pods even they can't screw up have you met my kids and with bj's gas she gets there for less they call me the road warrior this is your home road warrior mom home of the save join for just twenty dollars at bjs.com slash mesquite and save ten cents per gallon for six months open your door and you're good to go soon limited time offer new members only bj's home of the save have you ever wondered who invented rock and roll or why fleetwood mac fell apart or what it was like at motown in the early years well do i have a podcast for you my name is will anderson i'm a songwriter a musician and a huge music history buff and i'm so excited to announce my new podcast the monday music club i teamed up to make this podcast with the vox media podcast network because ever since i was a kid i loved hearing and reading stories about classical music and i've been a big fan of the music club artists recording sessions and music history and i wanted to have a place to be able to take what i've learned and share some of those favorites with you every monday i'll be releasing a new episode and deep diving into a new story with experts and special guests and it's going to be a blast so if you're a music history geek like me or even just a casual music fan jump in because i promise the monday music club is going to be the podcast for you okay scott let's hear a separate part if you can it's really yeah no this it's totally inappropriate what i've been saying my prediction is that this ridiculous notion that uh one of the most corrupt organizations is going to get financing from a crime family the trump family to take fifa private and or turn it into a public company, this won't happen or it's going to get watered down beyond recognition. And here's why. It's a $20 billion. It's a $20 billion company. UEFA has already fired an opening shot and they have, and they effectively have veto power. I'm not, I'm not just saying this because of what I want to see happening. I think just, if you look at the industrial logic here, the mechanics, this isn't going to happen. The bottom line is the World Cup is not FIFA's to sell. And, and UEFA, the governing body has already said, none of us are the owners of football. That's not a press release. That's the body that controls the Champions League, FIFA's most credible commercial threat, declaring war on day one. And there's also a precedent in 2018, Infantino tried the exact move with SoftBank's Saudi money at $25 billion and UEFA killed it because they saw it as a threat to their own prize assets. So this is the same playbook, same approach. Same opponent and same likely outcome. He's, you know, he's already tried this and he's 0 for 1 in the exact same context. And 211 members have to say yes. And FIFA is already trying to buy their votes with cash, not consensus. You know, and also the Kushner connection makes this whole thing radioactive, just not, you know, not just controversial. Kushner is even less popular. Have you seen what's happened at this Albanian island that Ivanka decided was just magical? Yeah. Yeah. The Albanians are not having it. Son-in-law running the money side of the World Cup right after Trump and Infantino stood together at the final, after Infantino gave him a peace prize. It's a conflict of interest story that writes itself for every journalist and every rival federation looking for a reason to vote no. Anyways, this isn't, FIFA doesn't need the money. By the way, it's Josh Kushner's investment vehicle. Right. It's Josh Kushner's. Someone's going to finance it. Look, they're trying to monetize what is this global asset of goodwill. They're separate. So you're aware they're separate. But go ahead. So anyways, my prediction, this thing gets rebranded or negotiated or shrunk to a much smaller Kushner optic scrub version before September 19th because Infantino keeps proposing commercialization deals that die the moment a rival confederation smells a threat to its own assets. There are competing assets here. So he'll probably get some increased member payouts, but he won't get FIFA. He won't get kind of a privatized World Cup. The soccer, you want to talk about an asset that the world believes they have a vested ownership in. Everybody does. Yeah. So I just. It's the same themes we've been talking about. This is going to be more, you want to see the emotion of data centers times eight. By the way, speaking of which, I'm going on Bill Maher today or whenever this thing's released. And you know who the upfront interview is? Who? Erin Brockovich. Oh, yeah. She's coming on my podcast in a couple of, in two weeks. Yeah. She's doing the data center stuff. So that'll be make for an interesting, that'll make for an interesting conversation. She's actually galvanized a lot of people, which is interesting. Let me just read something from a story in Politico that that Infantino's political future may be on the US midterm ballot. There's a lot of Democrats waiting to pounce here because it's such a popular thing. He's, of course, this says if control of Congress flips in the fall, those same ties could become a political liability for Infantino as he seeks reelection atop the Senate. A Swiss-based nonprofit he has led for a decade. Listen to this quote. The perfect storm scenario in the FIFA world, said one person involved in the highest levels of global soccer, granted anonymity to discuss sensitive internal politics. I think they will find a candidate to run against him, especially if midterms slip control and if things were to start pouring out. But a lot needs to happen in the next three or four months. I think he's reached too far. Actually, you know what? That would have been a better prediction because his rival competing for the top spot will just attach him to Trump, who's even less popular overseas than he is domestically. Yeah. That would have been a better prediction. That would have been more elegant. Anyway, I'm excited to listen to you on Bill Maher, by the way. Oh, thanks. Anyway, we want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business, tech, or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com/pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. Okay, that's the show. Thanks for listening to Pivot. Make sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll be back next week. Today's show was produced by Lara Naiman, Zoe Marcus, Taylor Griffin, and Todd Wiseman. Ernie and her Todd engineered this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows, Mia Saverio, and Dan Shalon. Dishak Kerouac is Vox Media's executive producer podcast. Make sure to follow Pivot on your favorite podcast platform. Thanks for listening to Pivot from Vox Media. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business care. Have a great weekend. Hank joined BJ's Wholesale Club the day he became a father of 30. I coach football. Coach Hank saves up to 25% off grocery store prices, 30 pounds of pasta, three cases of protein bars, 75 sports drinks. And that's just pregame. He knows teamwork and BJ's knows savings. This is your home, coach. Home of the save. Join for just $20 at bjs.com/mesquite and save 10 cents per gallon for six months. Open soon. Limited time offer. New members only. BJ's. Home of the save.