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Caroline Hyde
The right technology can strengthen human judgment. That's why Deloitte brings together AI and data analytics with multidisciplinary teams who can help you connect the dots across your enterprise, from risk to operations to customer needs. So opportunities don't slip by and surprises don't spread. Because the smarter your systems, the sharper your instincts. That's how technology makes people better at what they do best. Deloitte Together makes progress. Learn more@deloitte.com TogetherMakesProgress
Podcast Narrator (Visibility Gap)
for many men, mental health challenges aren't recognized until they've already taken a toll. Work pressure, financial stress, changing relationships and traditional expectations around masculinity can quietly wear men down, often without clear warning signs. In season three of the Visibility Gap, Dr. Guy Winch and his guests explore how these pressures show up, how to spot them earlier, and how men can access meaningful support. Listen to the new season of the Visibility Gap, a podcast by Cigna Healthcare.
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Caroline Hyde
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Caroline Hyde
Bloomberg Tech is live from coast to
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Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
This is Bloomberg tech. Coming up, GameStop eyes eBay for $56 billion in cash and stock, an audacious bid for a company four times its size. EBay says they'll review that offer. Plus, AI chip maker Cerebras has been looking to raise as much as 3 1/2 billion dollars for a potential IPO later this month. Part of a growing cohort looking to challenge in video and OpenAI raises more than $4 billion for a new joint venture that aims to help businesses adopt its AI software. First we check in on that extraordinary M and a news. The first dropped on Friday and continues to now GameStop looking to buy a company four times its size. GameStop currently off by 7%. Ebay up by more than 6%. But we have to get the inside track with Bloomberg reporter Cecilia Dan A stasio with an extraordinary story and one that the market tries to understand whether it's for real or not. Can you just talk us about the technicalities of what Ryan Cohen here is offering for ebay?
Caroline Hyde
Sure.
Cecilia Dan-Astasio
So Ryan Cohen is offering a deal to purchase ebay, which is, like you said, many times the size of GameStop, along with $20 billion. He says he has received a highly confident letter from TD bank to acquire. Analysts are unsure this deal will ever go through. But Ryan Cohen says that if he manages to purchase ebay, it would make a lot more money.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Make a lot more money. Okay, let's take this for real, that he's good for the money he's able to afford. What synergies are analysts kind of trying to pass through at the moment?
Cecilia Dan-Astasio
GameStop has really struggled over the last several years because gamers are increasingly purchasing their wares in online stores like Valve, steam. And so GameStop has shrunk its footprint in their retail marketplace. But Ryan Cohen has tried a lot of different strategies to make it work. He's tried esports, he's tried E Commerce, which is from his background as the co founder of Chewy. And while he's managed to help the business sustain a little bit more than people had hoped, nothing's really stuck. Ebay gives him the opportunity, he says, to compete with Amazon potentially, which of course is very, very ambitious in E commerce.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Well, Jamie Ioannoni over at ebay has been impressing investors with his turnaround. He's been leaning into AI, has been leaning into partnerships with Matter. He's been thinking about M&A himself with Depop. Just how do we understand eBay is digesting this and thinking about it from its own business and shareholder perspective?
Cecilia Dan-Astasio
EBay is evaluating the bid. I think, you know, analysts again are not sure whether the math is mathing when it comes to GameStop's ability to purchase the significantly larger company. And we'll see what happens. Ryan Cohen has not given in specific details on what he imagines the synergies to be or what he imagines the combined company to look like.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
I think Truist said this is stunning and they're skeptical. I mean, just in terms of how M and A gets done. Letters from TD bank saying they're good for it ultimately are going to be dependent on the debt markets here. But GameStop has always shocked the markets with its meme stock potential with Roaring Kitty's Love and even with Sky On Capital, well now pivoted more into a substack news letter. But the guy who was known for for trades on on the mortgage market back in 2008, Michael Barry, is coming out saying this could be a really good story.
Cecilia Dan-Astasio
It could be A really good story. Also, people have pointed out that GameStop loves attention. They make a lot of flashy moves. Chief Executive Officer Ryan Cohen posts very controversial things on social media about the American business market. He has a lot of like moving braking strategies that he's excited to explore Express and, you know, that's worked for GameStop. GameStop managed to raise some significant money from the meme stock frenzy and that's allowed it to sustain a little bit longer. So who knows, this could be a really exciting, fresh, strange way to keep GameStop going. Or it could be like some of the analysts are saying, a little bit improbable.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Well, you're going to be across it. It was a busy weekend for Cecilia Dennis Sagio. We're pleased that she joins us to break it all down today. Meanwhile. Well, let's, let's just take a look at the broader markets because tech stocks are again outperforming. We're building on records that we set back on Friday. We're up about a quarter percent but still the NASDAQ 100. As I say, at a record. And it's not just what's happening over in America. Look, the trade is back on track and we're seeing that play out in Asia trading as well. SK Hynix, extraordinary moves for the high bandwidth memory maker up 11%. Samsung as well up 3.4%. Even as the company may be having to navigate some sort of strike potential going on with the business. But records being set in Asia following through from what we saw in America. Can this last? We could see more audacious M and A. What are we going to see in terms of IPOs? Perfect person to talk it through is that Nancy Tangla. She's CEO, CIO of Lafittangla Investments. Look, your TGLR ETF is already outperforming even the S&P 500, which we note is basically at or near record highs. You're outperforming by 6%. Nancy, is tech going to remain the dominant force here?
Nancy Tangla
I think so. Caroline, thanks so much for having me. I do think so. If you, if you just think about what is driving margins on the S and P companies, it is either the technology companies themselves or the use of technology by old economy companies. One of the noteworthy earnings comments came from L3Harris where they said revenue per employee has increased. This is CEO by almost 25% over the last couple of years. So if you can produce more with less than that is what we call productivity and that will continue to drive stock prices higher. As we've seen in increasing earnings estimate
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
revisions up Are you buying that that's a fueled productivity gains. There's such mixed messages BIS out of Europe really the bank of International Settlements has said they'd seen about 4% productivity gains more generally and that's the seems to be wing what sustained but if L3Harris is seeing 25% what more are these CEOs doing?
Nancy Tangla
Well so I think you have to listen to the companies. My team sits on all the earnings calls and we develop themes out of those earnings calls and then we discuss them and we're hearing it from a broad base across economic sector group of companies, not every company but most companies. I mean you even heard it from GE Vernova that said yeah we're benefiting from AI in the build out but we want you also to to know that we're utilizing AI to produce our productivity, our margins, our output per employee as well and managing the supply chain. So I mean just use acts ask B on Bloomberg and it can save you a colossal amount of time as an analyst if if in fact you utilize it. So I mean we've been pounding the the tech trade for about four years now on the theme of old economy companies pivoting to the new technologies and then in fact the companies that are the suppliers. I think it continues not forever but
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
for now what's been interesting is the sort of the haves and the have nots. Now I'm in no way going to say matters not a have not yet we can't write them off but they're what they don't have is cloud compute that they sell to others. They're busy investing in their own AI infrastructure. Meanwhile Alphabet was applauded for the fact that it's investing in raising capital expenditure but also able to benefit with the growth of Google cloud. How are you seeing earnings play out? Because both we've seen from matter they are having to cut people they're having to talk about laying off a sizable amount of the workforce to be able to redeploy capital back into the infrastructure. Is that something I'm going to hear time and time again? And who do we congratulate for it or not?
Nancy Tangla
Well so I've talked about it quite a bit on your show that we got out of Matt I just didn't like to the business model I didn't see the opportunity we went into Spotify which at the time was a good transaction. We were wrong about matter to some extent but we were right about Spotify and we now think that we are somewhat vindicated on the matter model because they aren't able to monetize AI in a way that Google and Amazon and even Microsoft are able to do. They are able to improve their advertising business. But Mark Zuckerberg has made these colossal pivots and been wrong in the past. So we own all of the Magic 7x Metta. It will have its day again just like intel did. The question is how long will one have to wait and what is the
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
opportunity cost and the global opportunity cost or global opportunity. We were just talking about how Asia trade has just seen colossal gains still for the infrastructure bets Nazis. That's still going to be the winning formula. The chip makers, the designers right now
Nancy Tangla
I think in the near term Caroline But I think what we're going to start pivoting to and we launched a thematic portfolio with a focus on space and robotics, Quantum and then nuclear and then of course the metals and minerals that are needed to drive those technologies. So I think for the near term, I mean we're hearing that the backlogs are enormous again in the infrastructure names, in the the chip names and I think at some point we will begin to see software as a major beneficiary. Not every software company. We exited Adobe and, and CRM quite some time ago and we've been wrong about ServiceNow so far. But I think you'll start to see the winners there and then you'll see the market pivot at least back to software. So I think there's still a lot of opportunities in in this new industrial revenue revolution we're living through.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Nancy Tangla it's always great to have you on CEO and CIO of lafittangla Investments on all things and tech trade. Meanwhile, coming up more I OpenAI Anthropic are each forming joint ventures aimed at boosting AI adoption. We'll have the details next. This is Bloomberg Tech. OpenAI and anthropic are each forming partnerships aimed at boosting the use of of AI tools by businesses. A sourcing saying that Open Air has raised more than $4 billion for a new joint venture that includes backing from TPG, Brookfield Asset Management and Bain Capital. Meanwhile, rival Anthropic is partnering with Blackstone, Helman Friedman, Goldman Sachs, according to a statement. Let's get the latest Bloomberg. Seth Figureman this is all about getting private equity companies, portfolio companies to use the technology, right?
Seth Figureman
Yeah. And their list of portfolio companies that work with them. And I think it's a real moment in AI for most of the boom. A Lot of the focus has been on the competitive landscape of who can build better and more sophisticated models. Now we're seeing a really important vector is who can do better at getting businesses to understand and adopt that technology in their day to day work.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
There's just different tactics in which it's being deployed. So OpenAI is raising money themselves alongside outside investment for a company that's going to be worth, all told, 10 billion, not including that funding. And then how does it roll out? Because they've also had this interesting deal where they helped invest in Thrive holdings, which is Thrive Capital's ability to sort of deploy AI into other parts of the ecosystem.
Seth Figureman
Yeah, I mean, on some level this is being pitched as a separate venture, but OpenAI will be the majority owner and in control of it according to the sourcing that we have here, which suggests that they will have a key role in dictating how this proceeds. And I think again, the idea is rather than open AI on its own balance sheet, within its own ranks, figuring out how to get their technology into the hands of more business leaders, they will now work with this consortium of partners and investors across thousands of potential portfolio companies to do that work.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Meanwhile, the timing just sensational. The Anthropic is announcing the same thing on the same day.
Seth Figureman
Again, it speaks to the moment that we're in right now. These two companies are following somewhat similar, similar playbooks to bolster revenue and business traction heading into the potential IPOs.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Seth Figureman across an astounding amount of stories. As ever, we thank you very much Indeed. Sticking with OpenAI. Look, the startup's president, Greg Brotman is set to take the stand today in a company's legal battle against Elon Musk. Brotman is expected to face probing questions about a personal journal he kept, which Musk's legal team says is evidence he and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman intended to abandon the company's non profit mission. Now for all this, I guess what you need. Compute and chip maker and datacenter operator Cerebras is looking to capitalize on that very demand. The Nvidia rival, as it likes to see itself, is seeking to raise as much as three and a half billion dollars from a public offering later this month. Price range in its securities filing really confirms Bloomberg's earlier reporting. Let's get to one of the reporters who's always across IPOs. Bailey Lipschultz. Look, this is a company that wants to offer more inferencing capacity. Is it really a competitor?
Bailey Lipschultz
Nvidia in their mind, yes. And Even when I talk to investors, there's a world that they will kind of be another option, if you will. It goes back to kind of the debate around Starlink and saying, okay, well, yes, they dominate that potential market, but there have to be other players. So while there is, at least for now, a monopoly of sorts for Nvidia, when you look at the partnerships that Sarah Bros. Has inked, obviously G42 was a big risk, but now leaning into OpenAI and kind of diversifying the customer flow, it does seem like that's a bit of a bull case. And keep in mind, even with this potential IPO, we're talking about a company potentially valued at $33 billion, not $4 trillion.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Good context. Look, this could all come to bear as soon as May 13, right? We're thinking that's when the pricing is happening, the trading begins. Is this going to be a retail focused name who's going to be understanding the cerebra story? Because G42, as you know, as you were just illuminating to us, this is a geopolitical story as well.
Bailey Lipschultz
It is a geopolitical story, but you have to keep in mind that this is a company that fits into the themes that are dominating capital markets right now, AI and infrastructure. So we've seen investors lean into the energies of the world that want to promise a nuclear future. We're talking about this name with a number of hedge funds and long only investors. And they're saying you kind of have to own this company if you play the IPO calendar. So it will broaden across, reach across kind of the broader investor group, if you will. And the one thing to keep in mind with this launch, we're expecting potentially $8 billion of IPOs proceeds being raised in the next two weeks. This will be a big part of that. And how this performs will help set the stage for Space X likely next
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
month and then maybe open air anthropic. Look, this is a great time considering where the market's trading out, right?
Bailey Lipschultz
I mean, that's been the interesting thing, right? As you look at the stocks, we were up more than 35% in the last month. So when you look at expectations for this company in particular, a month ago you would have said, okay, 25, 30, sure, you can sell me on that. Now it's like 35 to 40 billion dollars. Just because your comps are up so sharply just starts to make sense when you're looking at how you have to value a company when it's going public is what do your comparables look like? Take A little bit of a discount. And that math is kind of working in the company's favor. Again, just given the move higher that we've seen for some of those peers,
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
it's a different company, but it's almost tangential to the likes of a core weave, which is all about trying to solve the compute issues. For core weave, the headache has always been, I've got more customers than you realize. Is this where maybe Cerebras is going to have to convince the market too?
Bailey Lipschultz
Well, I think that was the big pitch and the big reason that diversifying away from G42 at least eased some indigestion for investors. Yes. When they try to go public the first time over a year ago, it was concentration rate risk, it was cfius uncertainty. It was obviously kind of every number of potential bear cases. Whereas now the tide really has shifted. So you do have the kind of hyper focus of one customer, similar to a core weave, where there was such a bear case of, okay, well how reliant are you on one company now? We're seeing that spread out just a little bit. The interesting thing will be how do they structure this lockup and what does the performance really look like six months from now, as opposed to day one Trading, which we've seen, kind of can be all over the map.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Well said. It's going to be a busy old week old month for you. I think many Schultz, we so appreciate it and all things IPO is now coming up. Got plenty more to come on the world of AI and inference. We're going to be hearing from a company that's leading that charge in the private space. CEO of Deep Infra is going to be joining us. Nicola Orasov, this is Bloomberg Tech.
Caroline Hyde
The right technology can strengthen human judgment. That's why Deloitte brings together AI and data analytics with multidisciplinary teams. People with deep industry experience who can challenge assumptions and help you connect the dots across your enterprise. From risk signals to operational pressure points to shifting customer needs, Deloitte helps you see what's coming sooner so opportunities don't slip by and surprises don't spread. It's not just dashboards. It's real clarity in the moments your decisions are made. When models reveal patterns, people can ask better questions. When data and people are connected, leaders can move faster with confidence. And when your teams are aligned, smart choices can scale from the frontline to the C suite. Because the smarter your systems, the sharper your instincts. That's how technology makes people better at what they do best. Deloitte together makes progress. Learn more@deloitte.com TogetherMakesProgress for many men, mental
Podcast Narrator (Visibility Gap)
health challenges aren't recognized until they've already taken a toll. Work pressure, financial stress, changing relationships and traditional expectations around masculinity can quietly wear men down, often without clear warning signs. In season three of the Visibility Gap, Dr. Guy Winch and his guests explore how these pressures show up, how to spot them earlier, and how men can access meaningful support. Listen to the new season of the Visibility Gap, a podcast presented by Cigna Healthcare.
Adobe Acrobat Advertiser
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Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
In the race to build the next great AI models, the industry is tackling various bottlenecks, one of course being access to compute. Deep Infra is trying to alleviate access to AI inference with a purpose built cloud platform. It's just secured $107 million in a series B funding backed by the likes of Nvidia Samsung. Joining us now from San Francisco is Deep Infra CEO Nicola Boris of Nicola, it is great to have you on the show. Why would Nvidia want to put money into you? How are you helping the GPU story?
Nicola Borisoff
Yep, thanks for having me. Well we're helping companies get access to this great open source models and we're building this purpose built inference cloud. So it's really you need to build a specialized infrastructure to do inference efficiently and it really helps everyone access this great open source AI models really well. Well and I mean that's why Nvidia was excited to participate in our round.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
We were just hearing that Cerebras, which also wants to speed up inference offerings, is going to be tapping the public markets. It sees itself as an Nvidia competitor. How Nicola, are you more of an adjacent to the Nvidia story? How are you looking to help deploy GPUs? Why is your compute different?
Nicola Borisoff
You know we, we've tried a number of different inference accelerators but we believe like Nvidia's hardware is still the most efficient the best to do inference at and we're just doubling down on that kind of hardware platform and we like working closely with teams at Nvidia on just making inference more efficient. Lowering the price per token is what we really like to focus on. And so that's kind of our path. We you know there would be a lot of demand for inference down the line. Like we think that 80% of the compute is going to go towards inference. But at the moment, you know we've invested heavily into the Nvidia hardware stack.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
What, what's interesting is you're already processing what, 5 trillion tokens per week. How do you get the efficiencies? How do you drive down the cost per token?
Nicola Borisoff
It's, it's a lot of hard work and, and we, we look at it through the whole stack of like where we build this kind of inference clusters, which data centers we go in, how we structure them and then a lot on the same software on top of it. We believe like one of the key things is to have very good caching of tokens as these agents kind of interact with the AI models They, they basically make many requests in a loop with roughly the same context. So like I mean KB caches are really key to efficiency of inference. And you know it's, we've been doing this for, for about four years. We, we saw the demand for inference coming and, and we really focused on like how do we build a purpose built inference cloud.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
And I think therefore you are scaling out. You have was it. You're operating out of eight data centers. I think it is already with this new money, 100 million more than. Where do you deploy that?
Nicola Borisoff
We will use the, the capital from this fundraise to scale our platform. We will you know deploy more of the latest in video chips and, and then scale our inference platform across the US but also we're looking to expand in, in Europe and Asia later this year.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Samsung also part of the strategic investors. It's not just GPUs from Nvidia. One needs, you need an awful lot of the high bandwidth memory. We know about memory costs soaring because of the demand. Is that why Samsung comes forward? How are you thinking about the supply chain headaches or not that you might face?
Nicola Borisoff
Yeah, you know in the last couple since the beginning of the year it's been like struggle to find some of the chips that we need for, for our inference clusters. Memory and disks have been an issue and so it's important for us to have you know in our corner good investors that they're helping us including Super Micro and Samsung and Nvidia to make sure we have the right supply and we don't struggle as much. But the chip shortages are pretty real and I feel like, you know, inference needs like million times more compute than like traditional computing.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Mm.
Nicola Borisoff
And so we would see more and more demand for chips including CPUs, GPUs, memory.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Nicola, it's been great speaking to you. Thank you very much indeed. Deep Infra CEO Nicola Borisoff on the latest funding round. Coming up we've got more on funds being deployed in adjacent areas, particularly crypto. We're going to be speaking to Katie Horn in a bit to talk about her new $1 billion fund in the state of the crypto market. But let's also focus in on these markets more broadly. Right now crypto had been outperforming. Tech had been outperforming. Actually we're starting to see a pullback. There is tension once again, particularly with the uae. The UAE is saying its air defense systems are currently responding to a missile threat. They're posting on X about a third missile threat they've currently been facing. In particular. This is in response to Iran Geopolitics once again front and center is all prices is extend their gains. Brent crude is to see $114. That means risk sentiment just turned sour. Nasdaq 100 now down 3. 10%. We were higher at the start of this particular show. The semiconductor index also off by 8, 10% off of its record high. We're going to keep you up to speed what's happening in the markets and in geopolitics more broadly. This is Bloomberg Tech. Welcome back to Bloomberg Tech. We look at broader markets for a moment now because, well, we're back in risk off sentiment amid rising geopolitical concerns regarding the conflict with Iran. We're currently off by 2.10of a cent on the NASDAQ 100. Flicking into negative territory. We had been higher. You're seeing the semiconductor index coming off of its record high. Brent crude up to 1 13, $114 let's call it. This is UAE is issuing missile warnings. Rising tensions are risking the U.S. iran truce. And yet it's just coming hours after an oil tank run by the UAE state oil company was also struck by Iranian drones. So keep an eye on what's happening with the bond market as the anxiety builds and we see maybe inflationary pressures coming from oil. We see the 30 year eclipse 5%. Look, we haven't seen this sort of level on the 30 year bonds in terms of yields since July. You're seeing 10 year ramp higher 6 basis points, 2 year also up 7 basis points. Let's Call it. So we keep an eye on the broader market. We also also keep an eye on risk sentiment just across this entire asset classes. And we want to focus in on our big number today. It's $80,000. Guess what managed to touch it again? Bitcoin. For the first time since January, it has seen some love as the tech trade has powered on higher in the previous week. And we hit a record high on Friday. And of course, this asset trades over the weekend. I want to talk more about the crypto sector. Bloomberg Cross asset reporter Isabel Lee, fresh back from an event in Vegas. What are the vibes right now in crypto?
Isabel Lee
Honestly, very optimistic and enthusiastic. Like when I was there, it was in Vegas, the bitcoin conference from Monday to Wednesday. Everyone was just so happy to be there. There were orange suits, orange cowboy hats. Cftc, Mike Selig. Selig is there. Paul Atkins of SEC was there. They were wearing orange necktie.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Why? Why? The orange vibes is just the color. The color of Bloomberg Terminal Channel.
Isabel Lee
Unfortunately not. Could be.
Seth Figureman
No.
Isabel Lee
Orange is like the unofficial color of bitcoin. And every booth had a big B plastered on it, which is the symbol of bitcoin. You could just feel the vibes in the air. Mike SAYLOR Again predicting 10 million for Bitcoin. Eric Trump dropped by on Wednesday saying 1 million for Bitcoin. So even if the daily price fluctuations weren't any more a focus there, the big 1 million goal is still in the horizon. Or 10 million if you ask Saylor.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
But was any of this bitcoin? And then some. Look, what we keep seeing is that there are other areas of excitement. More infrastructure being built, more thought around, where the world of cryptocurrencies go rather than the OG in the space.
Isabel Lee
Definitely. So they were thinking about bitcoin and the future of it. Of course, there were a lot of talks about AI and how that will affect bitcoin, especially when it comes to mining. And I've talked to a couple of people who really still insisted that bitcoin is different from other crypto assets because bitcoin coin is bitcoin. It's the original, it's the largest, it's the oldest. And others are pump and dump, you know, others have smart contract that may vanish in a few minutes. But then for them, bitcoin is the OG. And I'm sure now they were looking at 80,000 too, because for a while the bitcoin price has been hovering between that and not really hitting 80,000. So I'm sure if the bitcoin conference was this week. They would be happy.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
So the enthusiasts around the store of value mentality or that more can be done with crypto topography more generally, it's
Isabel Lee
still the store of value mentality. Although I did talk to some people roaming around. A first time attendee said that what's next after this one? Because what else could bring this price higher? I mean it's already so institutionalized. I also talked to Adam back, who is not satoshi according to him. He did say again, he's not satoshi. And I asked him, how do you feel? Because the institutionalization of bitcoin kind of goes, goes against the ethos of bitcoin. But he was like, no, actually it's more access for everyone. 1 and he said when people say that BlackRock or Strategy are the biggest holders of bitcoin, he said they're really just the custodians in his eyes, but it's still the people who owns it. So really lots of interesting characters. It was an electric kind of conference. Just really good vibes all around. If you're a skeptic, I think you'd doubt it.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
At least if you're there, you're not wearing orange. I know Isabel Lee. It's great to have her on the show on all things crypto. Look, I'm very pleased to say we can bring in someone who knows a thing or two about the world of crypto. Katie Hahn's with us who's made her name investing in digital assets and crypto startups. Her firm Hahn Ventures has just closed a $1 billion fund. You've had notable exit something a BBNK you acquired by MasterCard. Another startup that you backed early on. Bridge has been bought by Stripe. Katie, is this what it's about? Is it about finding the startups that are likely to just drive this ecosystem forward?
Katie Hahn
Good morning, Caroline. Thanks for having me. Yeah, it's. The world's a very different place than it was four years ago when we raised our first pair of funds. And we're really excited now to have $1 billion in fresh capital across a pair of funds to back founders. And what we, we say are building the new economy. And the new economy is, is we think there's an intersection really between AI and between digital assets. We're calling it an agentic future. That's one structural shift we've seen. Another structural shift we've seen is the creation of new assets. Things like stablecoin.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
That has been an area that clearly you saw coming, you lent into. And the stablecoin ability. I Think we just had a few tech issues with Katie. We'll get back to you in a minute. There we are. I think the stablecoin area has been something that clearly you've seen work with M and A and portfolio companies being bought by really institutional adoption who are now trying to embrace, I think of the likes of MasterCard for example. But what's happening in terms of the adjacency for those who've been hidden away from how crypto is now thinking of itself as the future of AI agents? How does that work?
Katie Hahn
Well, if you think about a world where financial products and services are really being built for an end user that's not necessarily a human, but might also soon be an agent or a computer, that's a really different world. I mean if you think about agents, agents, what do one thing we humans do, we stop. We have a finite period of time that we work during the day. So we might be okay with a bank that's closed on a weekend or that has a wire cutoff or deadline or bankers hours. But of course air agents are powered 24 7, they are globally, they work globally from day one and they're always on. And so I think that there's a lot of opportunity there and what we're calling the agentic finance sector. But you also mentioned Caroline stablecoins and I think that's another area where we've seen the digital asset space grow and we're, we're seeing it grow ever more. Of course now we're at a point where stablecoins and you mentioned BVK which just exited to MasterCard for $1.8 billion. By the way, that was MasterCard's third largest ever acquisition. And I think it's reflective of that you now have double digit trillion dollars in stablecoins and this is an innovation that didn't even exist a decade ago. And if you can tokenize a dollar, it turns out you can tokenize other things. So we see institutional players like BlackRock and FinTech, giants like Robinhood and Coinbase start to tokenize stocks and it turns out you can tokenize all kinds of other products and services.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
For that to really be adopted is of course a future where the regulatory, regulatory environment has been far more warm, shall we say, towards crypto and these innovations. And that's where you sit at this intersection. Katie, that's so interesting. I mean Brian Armstrong himself, someone that you've helped oversee the company of coinbase, you perform a 16Z. What was so interesting about you is also you sat on the DOJ side of things, you understand government. You can talk to both sides of the community. What is the regulatory environment like right now?
Katie Hahn
Yeah, look, I've been following the flow of assets my entire career.
Lizette Chapman
Career.
Katie Hahn
I started as a Supreme. I started my career actually at the Supreme Court as a law clerk to Justice Kennedy and then spent over a decade at the Justice Department. And what I can tell you is this is one of the most transformational periods in technology and finance that I've really ever witnessed. You mentioned regulatory, Caroline, and I think that's a part of it, but also the infrastructure is a part of it. And let's also be honest, the institutional story is a part of it. As far as regulatory environment, I think, I think people often also overlook what the courts have been involved in, the regulatory, in shaping the regulatory environment. And this has been happening kind of in the background over the last several years. Now we have something coming up which is the crypto market structure bill. And so everyone's eyes are on that. And of course we had the Genius act passed last year.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
There are still lawmakers that need convincing. Katie, I think of Elizabeth Warren who's worried about perhaps one of your new and really, well, many would say the exciting startup that has been co founded by Palmer Lucky. Now you're in a company that is Erbal, which is all about, I think I'm pronouncing it correctly. Right. Erebor is. Erebor is this new sort of bank. It's just had OCC sign off that it's able to go out there and after got an application, granted a preliminary application at least for approval to become a bank. But Elizabeth Warren is like that's happened to. Happened all too fast. And it seems to be that they're close to the administration. How do you get comfortable that these companies are being vetted in the way that you want to see them being vetted?
Nancy Tangla
Sure.
Katie Hahn
Well, we always look at the founding team whenever we're looking for an opportunity to make an investment. We look at the founding team and you've alluded to part of the founding team here. So we think this founding team of Erebor is incredibly strong. And actually Palmer Lucky's co founder is a founder that we had backed in our first fund. So we have a long history going back with him and have seen him over the years and we are actually the second largest investor I believe at this point in, in Erebor. And I think the exciting thing about Erebor, so it's also the product market fit and they just crossed $1 billion in deposits. And it's also the size of the opportunity. And that's where I think Arabor and companies like it really shine. I mean it's really built for the the future. And if you think about it, it opened on a Sunday. Caroline and I think who's ever heard of a bank opening on a Sunday? Now I think that for the digitally native generations, and certainly for the native generations, wire cutoffs are going to be a thing of the past. It will be kind of like when you see a payphone booth on the corner and you're like what is that for in a world where everyone's now on their cell phones.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Very briefly, Katie, you've already had success with exits on the M and A side of things. You personally have invested in some, invested in some of the most exciting companies. We're anticipating IPOs from Space X. I know they were in Andrew Another business. You're an open AI. Is the market feeling solid right now?
Katie Hahn
You know, I think right now what we're seeing is we're seeing a period of transformation and tremendous opportunity. And I think this is something I've been alongside the unfolding of transformational technology my entire career. And there will be ups and there will be downs. And one thing I've noticed is that there are periods of irrationality on the way up and there are periods of irrationality on the way down and our job as long term venture investors who are investing by the way, Caroline, over a 10 year decade. Although your colleague Natasha reported that we had already returned capital four years in to some of our LPs around the world from our first pair of funds. And we're looking at what the world looks like in 10 years, not what it looks like right now. And we think at bottom it's a period of tremendous opportunity, generational opportunity.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Natasha Mascara and as did that great story talking about how you were able to lean into dislocations in the market and beaten up areas of of crypto more broadly to return those funds to LPs. Katie Hahn, it's great to hear about the new raise. The CEO and founder of Han Ventures, congratulations on the latest 1 billion that has been putting to work in two funds. Meanwhile, coming up, we're going to be live from Milken Institute Global conference. We speak with Scott Turner. He's the U.S. secretary of Housing and Urban Development. This is Bloomberg Tech.
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Caroline Hyde
faster than ever, companies need an environment that accelerates strategic growth and Michigan delivers on that promise. From emerging startups to global enterprises, Michigan offers what executives value most a resilient innovative ecosystem, diverse communities that attract top talent and a quality of life that supports work life balance with our unified Team Michigan approach, businesses scale faster and compete at the highest level. Michigan Pure Opportunity Seize your opportunity@MichiganBusiness.org.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
And to your earnings they're out after the market closed later today. So far today, shares in the Firm is up 1 1/2% outperforming the rest of the market. But they haven't outperformed the rest of the market since they peaked back at the end of October, losing a significant amount of market capitalization as they got caught up in perhaps the software anxiety and sell off. Is that right? That it is. Let's talk about what to expect the Bloomberg's Lizette Chapman fundamentals first. We always know there's fireworks when it comes to Dr. Karl up is that but what are we expecting in terms of growth of the business Right.
Lizette Chapman
Well analysts are expecting another massive quarter of a lot of growth, 74% revenue spike, a doubling of profits from the same period last year. They've been this is pretty consistent with past quarterly growth that they've been that they continually set the bar high and ask Palantir did the deliver. There's you know a history of Palantir meeting or beating those expectations. So we'll that's that's what a lot of people are looking for. That's what some of the betting markets are looking at as well this morning.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Oh I like that you're folding in some of the betting or at least different ways of predicting which way the market's going to go. Is that the market, if you're looking at analysts think that the price target is much higher than where we currently trade. So, so is there sort of a vibe shift that we can get from Dr. Karp as well as clearly the growth that they continue to deliver from the bottom line and top right?
Lizette Chapman
He will definitely be speaking with analysts today. Typically issues some type of shareholder letter as well where he outlines everything that you just kind of alluded to with the vibe shift, trying to distance Palantir from the other AI software stocks and also to position it as a type of company that is going to support US Policy no matter how controversial or, or difficult. There's also a lot of focus right now on what they've done to support efforts in, you know, Iran also and Israel and with, you know, U.S. department of War as well as many of our allies. So there's going to be a big focus on. He usually speaks to that topic as well and that's what many will be looking for for him to continue with that vibe.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Bloomberg intelligence analyst Mandeep Singh is talking about the government segment, how it continues to benefit from the company's exposure to these increased US Defense spending on on products such as Maven amid the war in Iran. But the commercial side, that really has been an area of growth. Are we expecting what's expecting to see that pick up and particularly if it's just US Bound or whether we see more international adoption?
Lizette Chapman
That's a great question and I think that's something a lot of people are going to be looking at if they've been able to drive it internationally. US Commercial growth has been on a blockbuster tear for, you know, at least the last year plus since they introduced AI, aip. And so they're looking at growth rates very, you know, about, you know, in the 90% or so for commercial growth and for the government growth, they're looking around 59%. Again, government is about half of the revenue. It's about half and half. And slowly commercial is starting to build up. They haven't been in as commercial as they haven't been in commercial as long or as strong as government. So that's an area area that a lot we'll be looking at, especially specifically here in the US Whether they can gain traction abroad as well.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
And then there's the man, the myth, some would say the legend himself, Dr. Karp, the way he speaks to his own loyalists when it comes to shareholders. He's often quite rude to the analyst community and in Wall street more broadly. But he's had some thoughtful insight as to the future of the workforce and where humanity takes us in terms of an area of study. Are we expecting any sort of philosophical perspective coming today?
Lizette Chapman
I think that that would be a pretty good guess that would land. Well, he and CTO Sham Sankar have been on this quest, as you say, to kind of, you know, mobilize the, you know, not just the software and the bits, but they're not, not just the bytes, but also the bits. And so, you know, they are both looking for, you know, to kind of establish that and kind of continue that narrative that not only Alex Karp wrote about in Technological Republic, but, you know, Shaum wrote about in his new book about mobilizing the techno industrial workforce and reshoring a lot of the industrial and manufacturing capacities that are, you know, have traditionally been abroad that they're looking to bring back onshore here in the United States. They had a commercial software win recently with Cleveland Cliffs to use their software to assist with the steelmaking capacity. So it's, it's a pretty good bet, like you said, Caroline, you've been watching these for these earnings for a long time as well, that he will continue with that and, and talk really more about the big changes to American society writ large that Palantir and its software is looking to enforce.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Well, we're lucky to have you watching them for us. Tonight's Lizette Chapman. Thank you very much indeed. Coming up, we're live from the Milken Institute Global Conference. We're going to speak with Scott Turner. He's the U.S. secretary of Housing and Urban Development. This is Bloomberg Tech. Let's head out to the Milken Institute Balance of Power co host Joe Matthew standing by with a special guest. Joe?
Podcast Narrator (Visibility Gap)
Yeah, Caroline, thank you. The Secretary of Housing and Urban Development is with me right now live in Los Angeles at the Milken Global Conference. Secretary Turner, it's great to see you. Welcome to Bloomberg.
Scott Turner
Thank you.
Podcast Narrator (Visibility Gap)
Questions about the housing market on this day that the 30 year treasury tops 5%. This is a big deal for our audience. It's a big deal for a homeowner or anyone looking to buy a home. How much will interest rates be a challenge to what you're trying to do in increasing access to a foreign affordable housing?
Scott Turner
Well, thank you so much. And I think you see, you know, the President Trump is laser focused on housing affordability. He's focused on keeping our country safe, you know, from a regime having a nuclear weapon, but also laser focus here domestically to make sure that the Americans can achieve the American dream. And so as we see the fluctuation in interest rates. We're also, you know, looking at the regulatory environment to bring down burdensome regulations to make it easier for builders to build and for buyers to buy some. So I'm grateful for the President's leadership and that hud, we're following that and encouraging localities to do the same.
Podcast Narrator (Visibility Gap)
You are pointing specifically to your rescission of the iecc. Yes. An energy efficiency requirement that the Biden administration put in place that you say added over $30,000 to building a home.
Scott Turner
Yes, sir. So this is the final determination for 2024 during the Biden administration. Really? It's the International Energy Contribution Conservation Code. And it added up to $30,000 per project when builders are already building to these energy code. And so we rescinded that to make it easier for builders to build, which will make it better for buyers to buy. On top of that, you know, $100,000 in regulation and regulatory fees is added to the final price of a single family home. That's not sustainable in our country. So we've been very focused on bringing down the regulatory environment, making a it easier for builders to build better for buyers to buy and raise in a supply in our country.
Podcast Narrator (Visibility Gap)
We're having a big conversation in America right now about affordability. We talk about it on the air all day, whether it's four dollar a gallon gas. Although where we are, you've probably seen, Mr. Secretary, it's above $6 in California, which is pretty wild. But the cost of everything from food to gas is an issue for Americans. Making your mission that much more urgent but also more difficult?
Scott Turner
No. Well, you know, like I said before, the President is laser focus on domestic policy. From the time he was campaigning to the time he came into office, he said we're going to make it more affordable in America. And I know personally being in the cabinet and knowing the President working with him, that to be able to help Americans to afford, to buy a home, to buy groceries, to buy medications is top of mind for the President. And so you see the actions that have been taken to restrict decision of these regulatory environments to take and down burdensome regulations to help American people is a great priority for the President and myself. And so while it may seem to be difficult, we've made great strides, but there's still a lot of work to do.
Podcast Narrator (Visibility Gap)
We're at a time, Mr. Secretary, but how many houses can you build if you stay with President Trump for the remainder of this term? How many affordable units can you add in this country?
Scott Turner
Well, we're going to add many, many and in particular with opportunity zones. There's already been been 400,000 so we want to duplicate that and do even more.
Podcast Narrator (Visibility Gap)
It's great to see you. Good luck at Milken and thanks for being with us.
Scott Turner
Thank you.
Podcast Narrator (Visibility Gap)
Secretary Scott Turner with us live from Los Angeles. Caroline, back to you.
Bloomberg Host (Caroline Hyde)
Joe. Matthew, so good to hear from you. On the other coast right now, west coast, all things Milken will be throughout the day and the week here on Bloomberg tv. But now that does it for this edition of Bloomberg Tech. Don't forget to check out our podcast you can find on the terminal as well as online on Apple, Spotify and I heart we return to the markets which have seen some geopolitical anxiety around them today. We currently see we're off by 3.10percent on the NASDAQ. NASDAQ 100 are under pressure as we see once again missile threats. For the UAE. The semi index is up by 6. 10% down from a record high Brent crude up to $114 a barrel. We're seeing yields move higher, particularly in the world of the debt markets. Bitcoin though $79,000. This is Bloomberg Tech.
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Caroline Hyde
industries evolve faster than ever. Companies need an environment that accelerates strategic growth and Michigan delivers on that promise. From emerging startups to global enterprises, Michigan Michigan offers what executives value most. A resilient, innovative ecosystem, diverse communities that attract top talent and a quality of life that supports work. Life balance with our unified Team Michigan approach, businesses scale faster and compete at the highest level. Michigan Pure Opportunity Seize your opportunity@MichiganBusiness.org.
Episode Date: May 4, 2026
Hosts: Caroline Hyde, Ed Ludlow
Guests: Cecilia Dan-Astasio, Nancy Tangla, Seth Figureman, Bailey Lipschultz, Nicola Borisoff, Isabel Lee, Katie Haun, Lizette Chapman, Scott Turner
This episode pivots around GameStop’s jaw-dropping $56 billion takeover bid for eBay—an unprecedented move making headlines across the tech and financial worlds. Hosts Caroline Hyde and Ed Ludlow dissect the deal’s feasibility, market reactions, and possible synergies, while leaning on expert reporting and analysis. The episode then branches out to cover AI ventures (including OpenAI’s and Anthropic’s enterprise strategies), tech sector earnings, deep-dive discussions on AI infrastructure (with Deep Infra’s CEO), the buoyant crypto scene, the challenges in technology markets due to geopolitics, and live coverage from the Milken Global Conference with a focus on affordable housing.
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The episode is brisk, sharp, and engaging, reflecting both the urgency and unpredictability of today’s tech and market headlines. Interviewees provide direct, often skeptical analysis; hosts blend insightful questioning with a pulse on breaking news and big themes.
This episode captures a pivotal moment in tech and finance: GameStop’s blockbuster move on eBay exemplifies audacity supercharged by meme energy; undercurrents of skepticism run deep among analysts and market watchers. The episode weaves in the relentless advance of AI (from OpenAI’s JV deals to hardware supply chain battles), the shifting sands of fintech and crypto adoption, and the inescapable influence of macro/geopolitical tremors on sector sentiment. It’s a snapshot of an industry in flux—ambition, volatility, and innovation on display.
For more insights and full interviews, listen to Bloomberg Tech – May 4, 2026 on your preferred podcast platform.