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Netflix Weighs Amending Warner Bros. Bid to Make It All Cash · Bloomberg Intelligence

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  Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news. You're listening to the
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  Speaker 2: Through Netflix shares are down about twenty five percent since
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  Speaker 2: they began pursuing Warner Brothers in October. So is Netflix
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  Speaker 2: in a race against time here?
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  Speaker 3: I think so, Scarlett. I mean, you know, there has
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  Speaker 3: obviously been a lot of worries about that falling stock
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  Speaker 3: price and investors kind of questioning, Okay, so really what
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  Speaker 3: is the value right if that's an eighty five fifteen
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  Speaker 3: split for Warner Studio and streaming assets. I mean, Warner
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  Speaker 3: shareholders obviously worried about the falling value of you know,
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  Speaker 3: the Netflix stock, and so obviously Netflix, you're really trying
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  Speaker 3: to estivate those investors by making it an all cash offer.
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  Speaker 3: But yes, they are, you know, very much running against
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  Speaker 3: the clock. There is the January twenty first deadline from
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  Speaker 3: a rival, Paramount Skidance for tendering shares at thirty dollars
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  Speaker 3: for all of Warner Brothers, Discovery, so there are multiple
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  Speaker 3: things going on here, but this definitely should spark some
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  Speaker 3: sort of response we think from Paramount Gita.
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  Speaker 4: It feels like we're getting one escalation after the other
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  Speaker 4: in the bidding war. Do you think that proposing an
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  Speaker 4: all cash offer could actually exped expedite the closing of
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  Speaker 4: this deal by Netflix or do you expect that Paramount
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  Speaker 4: will fight back again.
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  Speaker 3: We definitely think that Paramount will fight back because for them,
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  Speaker 3: the cost of not doing the deal is definitely greater
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  Speaker 3: than it is for Netflix. Paramount is in a very
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  Speaker 3: dire situation. They need these assets very, very badly. Not
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  Speaker 3: the case for Netflix, which has a really strong, you know,
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  Speaker 3: financial profile, has a really strong content library. This is
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  Speaker 3: really more of a nice to have rather than a
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  Speaker 3: must have. So expect expect something from Paramount Skydance. We
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  Speaker 3: don't expect them to go away quietly.
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  Speaker 2: We don't expect them to go away quietly. But there's
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  Speaker 2: a real question mark here because Paramount Skidance's bid for
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  Speaker 2: Warner Brothers Discovery assumes that the value of the legacy
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  Speaker 2: cable channels is zero, and of course it's bid covers
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  Speaker 2: the entire company, whereas Netflix is only looking for the
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  Speaker 2: streaming and the studio business. Yet what does that say
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  Speaker 2: about Paramount Skuydiance's own legacy cable business zero? I mean,
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  Speaker 2: does that mean that its business is also worth something
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  Speaker 2: similar to zero?
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  Speaker 3: I mean, that's just such a brilliant point that you raise,
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  Speaker 3: Scarlett absolutely. I mean, when they, you know, basically devalue
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  Speaker 3: the Warner Brothers assets, they risk doing the same for
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  Speaker 3: their own cable networks. But there is, you know, there's
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  Speaker 3: absolutely no way to sugar coat the fact that the
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  Speaker 3: cable network business is a declining business. What Paramount is
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  Speaker 3: doing to its you know, kind of favoring its argument
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  Speaker 3: is basically using the poor stock performance of Versut, which
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  Speaker 3: is the cable network group from or the cable network
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  Speaker 3: spin off from Comcast. Its poor performance is kind of
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  Speaker 3: the reason their justification for why the Warner Brothers legacy
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  Speaker 3: networks should not really be worth much. But I still think,
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  Speaker 3: you know, obviously they're still Yes, there is cord cutting,
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  Speaker 3: Yes advertising is under pressure, but they are still cashcows.
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  Speaker 3: They still do throw out a good amount of cash.
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  Speaker 3: And that is true both for Warner Brothers as well
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  Speaker 3: as for Paramount. And obviously Paramount still sees a lot
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  Speaker 3: of you know, rationale and kind of combining those two
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  Speaker 3: portfolios Paramounts own cable networks along with warners to kind
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  Speaker 3: of just stem that whole melting ice cube argument that said, yeah,
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  Speaker 3: it's it's this, This is really turning out to be,
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  Speaker 3: you know, very very interesting. I think Warner Brothers still
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  Speaker 3: kind of sees a lot of value in its networks.
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  Speaker 3: They do want, you know, that the separation. They think
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  Speaker 3: they can extract a lot more value with the separation
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  Speaker 3: of their global networks business, which is supposed to happen
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  Speaker 3: by the third quarter of this year. So again it's
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  Speaker 3: still a wait and watch, but I think at this point, Scarlett,
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  Speaker 3: the ball is definitely in Paramounts court.
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  Speaker 4: Githa not too long ago, Bank of America said that
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  Speaker 4: this bidding war is reshaping the broader media industry. What
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  Speaker 4: are the consequences of it for the broader media industry,
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  Speaker 4: do you think, and what kind of precedent does it
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  Speaker 4: set for future media company acquisitions?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, Alex. I think one of the things one
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  Speaker 3: of our key takeaways from this whole exercise is that,
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  Speaker 3: you know, obviously, linear networks are in a really precarious position,
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  Speaker 3: no doubt about that. But then the studio assets as
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  Speaker 3: well as the streaming platforms, the content generation part of it,
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  Speaker 3: there's still quite a lot of value in those. So
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  Speaker 3: any of you know, the studios that you see out there,
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  Speaker 3: whether it's Alliance Gate or you know, maybe even an
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  Speaker 3: AMC Networks which has a television production studio, maybe all
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  Speaker 3: of that still has some value. But I think really
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  Speaker 3: the biggest question for us, and I think for media
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  Speaker 3: investors at large, is what happens with Comcast and what
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  Speaker 3: happens with its NBC media group that really is somewhat of,
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  Speaker 3: you know, this hidden jewel. I would say they have
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  Speaker 3: to extract value for that. They probably have to spin
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  Speaker 3: off that asset. So I think everybody is really super
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  Speaker 3: focused on what they do next.
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  Speaker 2: Okay, so in terms of what happens next, we are
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  Speaker 2: waiting to see if Netflix actually does revise the term
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  Speaker 2: of its offer to something that's all cash. And then
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  Speaker 2: on the paramount skidance side, you said the deadline is
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  Speaker 2: coming up for the tender offer.
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  Speaker 5: When is that exactly?
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  Speaker 3: Jan twenty first?
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  Speaker 2: Jan twenty first, So next Wednesday we'll get a sense
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  Speaker 2: of whether shareholders are in favor of it, and what
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  Speaker 2: do we think is the reception right now.
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  Speaker 3: Very very poor. The last we heard, only about two
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  Speaker 3: percent of outstanding shares had been tendered, so really a
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  Speaker 3: shareholder is still kind of holding out for that sweetened offer.
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  Speaker 1: Stay with us.
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  Speaker 2: More from Bloomberg Intelligence coming up after this.
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  Speaker 2: Some big news out of Big Tech this week when
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  Speaker 2: it comes to jobs as well, Yeah, layoffs from meta platforms.
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  Speaker 4: It is beginning to cut more than a thousand jobs
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  Speaker 4: from the company's Reality Labs division, part of its plan
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  Speaker 4: to redirect resources from virtual reality and metaverse products, which
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  Speaker 4: is really really interesting given the facts that it invested
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  Speaker 4: so much into this endeavor, even change its name accordingly,
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  Speaker 4: and we have with us Man Deep Saying, Global Tech
• 6:24
  Speaker 4: Research head of Bloomberg Intelligence, to discuss this. Man Deep,
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  Speaker 4: what does this all mean for Meta's bottom line? What
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  Speaker 4: do these jobs job cuts?
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  Speaker 3: Do?
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  Speaker 5: I mean Reality lab segment is almost losing twenty billion
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  Speaker 5: dollars a year and cumulatively they've lost about seventy billion
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  Speaker 5: dollars over the past three years, so a lot of
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  Speaker 5: investors questioned, you know, how long they were expected to
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  Speaker 5: remain patient on those kind of losses. And I think
• 6:54
  Speaker 5: the initial rumors were about a thirty percent cut in
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  Speaker 5: that unit. So this is somewhat build expectations in terms
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  Speaker 5: of ten percent job cut, but it just goes to
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  Speaker 5: show that right now, the companies obviously focus more on
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  Speaker 5: the AI side in terms of building the infrastructure, building
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  Speaker 5: their own large angrid model, and it may take a
• 7:15
  Speaker 5: while to you know, really bring it, bring that LLLM
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  Speaker 5: concept in that variables or the whether it's a VR
• 7:24
  Speaker 5: headsets or the glasses. And I mean when you compare
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  Speaker 5: VR headsets or the glasses that they're selling to let's
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  Speaker 5: say air pods, the number of units pale in comparison.
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  Speaker 5: We're talking, you know, ten million, maybe if they do
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  Speaker 5: twenty million. Apple does more than one hundred million AirPods
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  Speaker 5: a year, So what's the opportunity here? And I think
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  Speaker 5: that's where you probably will see more cuts in that business.
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  Speaker 2: That is a really really important contrast to make their
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  Speaker 2: in terms of what Meta is trying to do, because
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  Speaker 2: they want to be a part of the mass market here,
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  Speaker 2: but it's not quite there yet. Mindy, As Meta pivots
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  Speaker 2: away from VR in the metaverse to AI, what does
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  Speaker 2: that mean for spending? I mean, they obviously had to
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  Speaker 2: spend a lot to build out the metaverse, to build
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  Speaker 2: out their VR offerings, and now they're going to shift
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: everything to building out the AI offerings, large language models,
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  Speaker 2: these AI glasses. What do you think that the pace
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  Speaker 2: of spending would just kind of continue, It won't really
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  Speaker 2: shift all that much.
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  Speaker 5: Yes, On the AI side, the opportunity is huge. What
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  Speaker 5: everyone is chasing right now is an AI agent that
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  Speaker 5: can book your travel, your Uber trip, order food, you know,
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  Speaker 5: do shopping for you. That's the vision Google is chasing.
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  Speaker 5: That's what Amazon alexaplus launch was all about. So Meta
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  Speaker 5: has that surface area with you know, Instagram and WhatsApp,
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  Speaker 5: and you could argue they could in theory develop such
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  Speaker 5: an agent, but the hard part is integration and getting
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  Speaker 5: the AI to where it's you know, reliable and pretty.
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  Speaker 5: And that's where I mean, it's anybody's guests who is
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  Speaker 5: best positioned. I think that Apple Google partnership that we
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  Speaker 5: saw this week is probably a negative for Meta in
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  Speaker 5: this sense. Like, if Apple is setting up defaults in
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  Speaker 5: their phone, then that makes it hard for an external
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  Speaker 5: kind of agent to do these kind of things. So
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  Speaker 5: from that perspective, distribution really matters and operating system control
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  Speaker 5: really matters. So Meta is somewhat at a disadvantage when
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  Speaker 5: it comes to, you know, their distribution on Apple and
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  Speaker 5: Android devices.
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  Speaker 4: Mandy. We also got news today that Airbnb hired Meta's
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  Speaker 4: head of General AI, which is really interesting because wasn't
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  Speaker 4: it not too long ago that they declined to work
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  Speaker 4: with open AI. What does this all mean for its
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  Speaker 4: artificial intelligence endeavors.
• 9:52
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I think Brian Chesky has been quite vocal about
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  Speaker 5: using open source llms as opposed to you know, proprietary
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  Speaker 5: llms like open AI and Gemini, and so his thing is,
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  Speaker 5: I've got a direct customer traffic coming to my website.
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  Speaker 5: If I give away you know, my bookings interface to
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  Speaker 5: these llms, then I'm losing that customer direct customer touch,
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  Speaker 5: and he doesn't want to do that. He instead wants
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  Speaker 5: to build his own LM based on an open source
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  Speaker 5: model that's already out there, and that's where you know,
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  Speaker 5: Meta has open source their model in the past, so
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  Speaker 5: it makes sense to have somebody from Meta come in
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  Speaker 5: and do something along those lines. ABNP has been open
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  Speaker 5: to using Chinese open source models and building on top
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  Speaker 5: of that. So from that perspective, it's an interesting strategy
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  Speaker 5: that they are going ahead with in terms of using
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  Speaker 5: all kinds of open source and not just you know,
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  Speaker 5: the US based model.
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: Who in the tech world is winning the talent war
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: because it felt like for a long time open AI
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  Speaker 2: and traffic they were, you know, picking up a lot
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: of talent.
• 10:58
  Speaker 4: Is that still the case?
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  Speaker 5: I mean right now, the talent is going to where
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  Speaker 5: the compute is. If you don't have the compute, you
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  Speaker 5: just cannot attract the talent because these models need a
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  Speaker 5: lot of compute for training. And you may be the
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  Speaker 5: smartest person, but if you don't have the computer, you
• 11:15
  Speaker 5: can't test your idea. So from that perspective, infrastructure bill
• 11:19
  Speaker 5: really matters, which is why in Nvidia, even though they
• 11:22
  Speaker 5: are the chip provider, now they launch their own foundational
• 11:25
  Speaker 5: model in autos self driving that just goes to show
• 11:30
  Speaker 5: what compute can do, you know, and Vidia is definitely
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  Speaker 5: moving up the stax. It will be interesting to see
• 11:35
  Speaker 5: how many areas where they compete in with their own foundational.
• 11:39
  Speaker 4: Model man Deep. We're early into the earning season, but
• 11:42
  Speaker 4: big tech results will be here before we know it.
• 11:44
  Speaker 4: And obviously the bar is really high when it comes
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  Speaker 4: to what these companies are saying about how they're monetizing
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  Speaker 4: their heavy AI in investments. Do you think that they'll
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  Speaker 4: live up to the expectations.
• 11:54
  Speaker 5: I think right now you have to focus on where
• 11:56
  Speaker 5: you will see positive earnings revisions, and given the KAPEX
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  Speaker 5: investments are going up for this year, it's going to
• 12:04
  Speaker 5: be hard to show, you know, positive revisions when it
• 12:07
  Speaker 5: comes to earnings, except for someone like Alphabet that really
• 12:12
  Speaker 5: has seen a big shift in sentiment because everyone realizes
• 12:17
  Speaker 5: that their models have caught up, and they also are
• 12:20
  Speaker 5: the most efficient when it comes to their stack, the
• 12:22
  Speaker 5: use of TPUs and low cost inferencing. So from that perspective,
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  Speaker 5: I think Alphabet clearly is best position to deliver positive surprises.
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  Speaker 5: But for someone like Meta, I mean, if you're hearing
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  Speaker 5: job cuts, then you know probably it's going to be
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  Speaker 5: hard for them to you know, show positive revisions this year.
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: And I feel like the counterpoint to an Alphabet a
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: Google that's doing really well is Oracle. We've seen it
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  Speaker 2: really fall from grace of it, and I wonder how
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: critical investors are going to be when they hear from
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  Speaker 2: the company this earning season.
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  Speaker 5: Well, they will have to give foof points of the
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  Speaker 5: build out, the open AI backlock that they have and
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  Speaker 5: how that translates into revenue. Because the good thing is
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  Speaker 5: market is skeptical of, you know, really far out revenue streams,
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  Speaker 5: and so from that perspective, this is quite healthy that
• 13:14
  Speaker 5: you know, there was a correction in Oracle even though
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  Speaker 5: they have given a four or five year revenue guide
• 13:20
  Speaker 5: and they have the backlock, market doesn't believe it. The
• 13:23
  Speaker 5: market wants to see more proof points. So I think
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  Speaker 5: that's what companies will have to do when it comes
• 13:27
  Speaker 5: to open AI monetization and ROI. They'll have to start
• 13:31
  Speaker 5: showing more tangible proof points.
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: Stay with us more from Bloomberg Intelligence coming up after this.
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• 13:54
  Speaker 2: We are talking about the big take that Bloomberg has
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  Speaker 2: published today, and it's called the CEO playbook to navigate Trump.
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  Speaker 2: This is kind of the question of the president's second,
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  Speaker 2: second four year term. How do you manage this president?
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: And the answers with difficulty because the rules kind of
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  Speaker 2: keep changing. Matt Boyle is one of the co authors
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: of this story, and Matt joins us now in studio.
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: Great story, Matt, and it was something that you had
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: trouble reporting on insofar as a lot of people wouldn't.
• 14:23
  Speaker 6: Talk to you exactly. I mean, the usual sort of
• 14:26
  Speaker 6: voices of Corporate America, the Chamber of Commerce, the Business Roundtable,
• 14:31
  Speaker 6: We're just like, you know, we're going to take a
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  Speaker 6: pass on this one, and just about every CEO under
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  Speaker 6: the sun, you know, just they just don't want to
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  Speaker 6: go there. It's like the third rail. So it was
• 14:41
  Speaker 6: challenging to report. But we had a lot of great conversations,
• 14:43
  Speaker 6: let's say, on background, with those who are advising CEOs,
• 14:47
  Speaker 6: and that led to our playbook. Here the five Rules
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  Speaker 4: Matt. We've seen a growing number of business leaders recently
• 14:55
  Speaker 4: kind of push back more than usual on some of
• 14:57
  Speaker 4: President Trump's policy proposals. We had City CFO this morning
• 15:01
  Speaker 4: pushing back on the credit card cap, x On Mobile
• 15:04
  Speaker 4: CEO calling Venezuela an investable? Is this unusual in what
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  Speaker 4: might be the consequences for them?
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  Speaker 6: Yeah, it takes a certain CEO to push back. It
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  Speaker 6: takes a Jamie Diamond or the CEO of ex On
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  Speaker 6: Mobile who have the clout and the authority and the
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• 15:23
  Speaker 6: as we saw with tariffs, it was happening behind the scenes.
• 15:26
  Speaker 6: You know, remember this is going back aways. But when
• 15:29
  Speaker 6: Trump told the Walmart CEO, Doug McMillan to eat the tariffs,
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  Speaker 6: Walmart said nothing, and that was probably pretty wise. There
• 15:36
  Speaker 6: was no reason to get into a public spat on
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  Speaker 6: true social with Trump. So but now maybe it's because
• 15:42
  Speaker 6: Trump is in a different position twelve months later, or
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  Speaker 6: it's the issues involved. You know, banking CEOs are very
• 15:48
  Speaker 6: happy to go out against interest ratecaps, but we are
• 15:52
  Speaker 6: seeing in certain cases some CEOs pushed back.
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: Yes, and direct engagement does seem to pay off. If
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: you can find your way to the President and mobile phone,
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: which apparently he pans out the number pretty willingly to
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: certain top CEOs. You talk about in videos Jensen Huang
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: having a direct line to the President, also Lipboon Tam
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: of Intel being able to do that as well.
• 16:15
  Speaker 6: Exactly. I mean Jensen in video CEO one on Joe
• 16:18
  Speaker 6: Rogan in December and said, you know, Trump is extraordinarily accessible.
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  Speaker 6: The United Airline CEO said the same thing to us.
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• 16:27
  Speaker 6: answer his cell phone, as we've seen. Sometimes at four
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  Speaker 6: thirty in the morning, he will pick up his cell phone.
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• 16:44
  Speaker 6: one of the sort of lower level aids. Also, I
• 16:46
  Speaker 6: mean we found that, you know, the director of the
• 16:49
  Speaker 6: White House Office of Public Liaison is somebody you can
• 16:52
  Speaker 6: you can go to also, So the point is to
• 16:54
  Speaker 6: find a way in, no matter how you do it.
• 16:57
  Speaker 4: Matt, what are some of the differences in how President
• 16:59
  Speaker 4: and Trump deals with business leaders in his second term
• 17:02
  Speaker 4: from his first term.
• 17:03
  Speaker 6: Well, the second term he's a little bit more unshackled.
• 17:07
  Speaker 6: Let's say in the first term, you had a few
• 17:09
  Speaker 6: more traditional Republican voices, you know, you had Rex Tillerson
• 17:13
  Speaker 6: in there and other folks who you know, were able
• 17:16
  Speaker 6: to maybe play little defense. They were able to slow
• 17:19
  Speaker 6: walk some of Trump's more outrageous policy proposals. Now it's
• 17:24
  Speaker 6: just all true believers. So he's sort of unfettered, he's unshackled,
• 17:29
  Speaker 6: and there's really not many checks. So what this means
• 17:31
  Speaker 6: for CEOs is, yeah, they really can't hide. They can't
• 17:34
  Speaker 6: just say well, we'll let our industry association take care
• 17:37
  Speaker 6: of this or don't worry. I mean, look at just
• 17:39
  Speaker 6: the past week what's been going on. CEOs really need
• 17:42
  Speaker 6: to be on watch.
• 17:43
  Speaker 4: Yeah, shackles is a fantastic word, a free range Trump right,
• 17:46
  Speaker 4: there we go, There we go.
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: The other thing that you could do, if you're trying
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: to get his attention or curry favor, is to give
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: him a made up award.
• 17:54
  Speaker 6: Yes, he does respond to these types of trinkets and trophies,
• 17:59
  Speaker 6: as we've seen of the Apple CEO, Tim Cook was
• 18:02
  Speaker 6: able to give him this sort of glass you know,
• 18:05
  Speaker 6: trophy with a twenty four carrot gold base or something,
• 18:07
  Speaker 6: you know, with the Apple logo on it. And you know,
• 18:10
  Speaker 6: guess what, you know, it was over tariffs and Cook
• 18:12
  Speaker 6: and Apple we're looking for some relief on foreign microchip tariffs.
• 18:17
  Speaker 6: So and you know that helped. It also helped though
• 18:19
  Speaker 6: that Cook had really put in the work though, talking
• 18:21
  Speaker 6: to Trump for years now, going back to the first administration.
• 18:24
  Speaker 6: So you can't just you know, sort of throw a
• 18:26
  Speaker 6: trophy at him. But it does take some groundwork as well.
• 18:29
  Speaker 6: But look at the Swiss business executives also giving him
• 18:32
  Speaker 6: a you know, a gold role X and you know,
• 18:34
  Speaker 6: so these things do tend to have an impact. As
• 18:37
  Speaker 6: we say, everything is a transaction with this president.
• 18:40
  Speaker 4: Matt, you mentioned it's been difficult getting people to speak
• 18:43
  Speaker 4: to you for this story. Did any of the business
• 18:45
  Speaker 4: leaders you spoke to give you reasoning for why they
• 18:48
  Speaker 4: might be afraid to talk or did they kind of
• 18:50
  Speaker 4: just brush you off?
• 18:51
  Speaker 6: It's I mean, many brush us off through their gatekeepers.
• 18:54
  Speaker 6: They just the thing is, they just don't see much upside.
• 18:56
  Speaker 6: They don't want to be the one CEO talking to
• 18:59
  Speaker 6: any report are on the record. But as we've seen now,
• 19:02
  Speaker 6: maybe we might see some more come out of the
• 19:03
  Speaker 6: woodwork now that Diamond and others are talking about you know,
• 19:07
  Speaker 6: the interest rates. The defense companies also might have something
• 19:11
  Speaker 6: to say about Trump pressuring them, you know, to up
• 19:14
  Speaker 6: their game. So we'll see. But it's that, you know,
• 19:17
  Speaker 6: CEOs again that they might be speaking out on certain issues,
• 19:20
  Speaker 6: but when it comes to Trump again, they just fail
• 19:23
  Speaker 6: to see the upside. But at this point, as we say,
• 19:26
  Speaker 6: or it was a Yale School of Management person wrote
• 19:30
  Speaker 6: today in Bloomberg Opinion, the chaos is not just no
• 19:33
  Speaker 6: longer in the background. The chaos is baked in. It's
• 19:35
  Speaker 6: in the system. It's coming for them, So they might
• 19:38
  Speaker 6: want us talk.
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: So yeah, it's front and center, and it feels in
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: many ways like those who know how to navigate governments
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: and emerging markets might be better positioned.
• 19:46
  Speaker 6: Yeah, so you have that experience exactly, you know, of
• 19:48
  Speaker 6: that sort of slightly more chaotic, slightly more freewheeling environments,
• 19:52
  Speaker 6: and many of these big multinationals, of course, do operate.
• 19:55
  Speaker 5: In those areas.
• 19:57
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