Did the Trump Memecoin Kill the Crypto Boom?

Summary

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Podcast Summary: Everybody’s Business - "Did the Trump Memecoin Kill the Crypto Boom?"

Podcast: Everybody's Business by Bloomberg and iHeartPodcasts
Episode Date: December 19, 2025
Host(s): Max Chafkin & Stacey Vanek Smith
Guest(s): Zeke Fox (Bloomberg crypto reporter), Amanda Mull (Businessweek columnist), Brett Vergara (tech worker)
Focus: The intersection of crypto coins and US politics in 2025—with a deep dive on the Trump memecoin phenomenon and its ripple effects in both the financial and political worlds.

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Main Theme / Purpose

This episode takes a close look at the wild ride of crypto in 2025, centering on Donald Trump and Melania Trump's launch of personal "meme coins," and asking: did the spectacle of the Trump memecoin fuel or kill the broader crypto boom? The hosts unravel how former President Trump and his allies’ moves reshaped both the regulatory landscape and the speculative culture around digital assets. Additional segments discuss economic trends, buy now/pay later loan booms, and shifting ideas about age in sports—and the workplace.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. US Economy & Job Market Check-in

(03:05–07:18)

• Mixed Economic Data Post-Shutdown:
  • Unemployment crept up to 4.6%. More workers hold multiple jobs than any point in the past 25 years (5.7%).
    • “The job market is a little bit dead…The only sector that’s like really hiring this year was health care. Everything else almost was shedding jobs.” — Stacey Vanek Smith (04:10)
• Worker Anecdote:
  • Tech worker Brett Vergara describes applying into "the void" and the emotional toll of near-instant AI-powered rejections.
    • “It’s always fun too when you get a rejection like immediately after applying...it does have the power to completely ruin your day.” — Brett Vergara (05:08)
• Layoff Fatigue & Competition:
  • Highly skilled applicants flood a shrinking job market, “competing against all those people immediately.” — Brett Vergara (06:36)
• Outlook:
  • Mild optimism for 2026 due to improving inflation, though data is muddled post-government shutdown.

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2. Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) Lending Boom

(09:46–21:23)

• What is BNPL?
  • Amanda Mull explains BNPL: essentially short-term, often interest-free microloans at retail checkout, rapidly approved algorithmically.
    • “Buy now, pay later...is like a fintech type of business. They specialize in basically what is like short-term microloans.” — Amanda Mull (10:21)
• Consumer Trends & Concerns:
  • 91 million US users, mostly young, single, and sometimes with shaky credit. Growing tendency to use BNPL for very small purchases—“burrito-backed securities.”
    • “That same LendingTree survey found that it was 41% of buy now, pay later borrowers in the last year had missed a payment. Wow.” — Amanda Mull (16:37)
• Risk Factors:
  • Missed payment rates are soaring (41% in 2025, up from 31% in 2023), though default rates remain under 3%. Lack of transparency in the debt market.
    • “It’s kind of a red flag…how much debt exists in this form…is just sort of difficult to discern.” — Amanda Mull (20:26)

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3. Crypto and Politics Collide: The Trump Memecoin Saga

(24:13–39:42)

Crypto’s Regulatory Crossroads

• Crypto Industry’s Political Fix:
  • Faced with stifling lawsuits, the industry throws immense financial support at political candidates—spending more on the last election cycle than any other industry.
    • “The crypto industry actually spent more on the last election cycle than any other industry. Even, like, oil...They spent 150 million.” — Zeke Fox (26:56)

Trump Embraces, and Profits from, Memecoins

• The “Crypto Ball” & Trump Coin Debut:
  • On inauguration weekend, Trump announces Trump Coin at a “crypto ball.” Meme coins defined as tokens with no underlying value—just speculation.
    • “A meme coin is a coin that transparently does not do anything…it’s just saying, ‘Hey, here I am. It’s kind of fun. If people buy it, it will go up.’” — Zeke Fox (30:12)
• The Melania Coin Twist:
  • Shortly after, Melania Trump launches her own coin—crashing both.
    • "When Melania crashes, Trump coin goes down too. Trump coin is down about 90%...Melania coin is down 99%." — Zeke Fox (33:43)
• Market Dynamics:
  • Community outrage wasn't rooted in ethical concern, but in the breach of meme coin “attention economics”—Trump was accused of “rugging” holders by steering hype to Melania’s coin so soon after his own.

Financial Impact & Legal Ambiguity

• Trump Family Haul:
  • On paper, the Trumps briefly sat on $50 billion in meme coin value. Research puts their realized earnings at $350 million.
    • "The Trump family made more than $350 million off these two meme coins combined. And that's a lot." — Zeke Fox (38:13)
• Legal & Ethical Lapses:
  • No real legal precedent for meme coins by politicians; ambiguity (and a sense of impunity) reigns.
    • "There are no rules about meme coins. I couldn't even tell you why a president-elect’s meme coin is better than a president's meme coin, legally speaking." — Zeke Fox (31:45)
• Notable Moment:
  • When pressed at a press conference, Trump seemed to not even know his total haul, laughing it off and comparing it to Musk’s wealth (38:48).

Industry & Political Fallout

• Conflicted Reactions:
  • Some in crypto disliked the optics, but trading platforms still listed the Trump coins. Others see it as aligning Trump’s interests with the industry’s deregulation agenda.
    • "Now he's in on it himself...he's better deregulate crypto." — Zeke Fox (36:48)

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4. Underrated Segment: Age in Professional Sports (and the Workplace)

(45:30–50:47)

• Elderly Quarterbacks & “Gerontocracy”:
  • 44-year-old Philip Rivers returns as an NFL starter, sparking debate on age and performance.
    • “There's something just sort of fun...about an out of shape professional athlete.” — Max Chafkin (46:48)
    • “I think there is a place for zoomers and a place for boomers in the same workplace...I think we should honor older workers. I think older workers have a lot to contribute.” — Stacey Vanek Smith (48:08)
• Startup Success & Age:
  • The most successful US startups are run by founders in their 40s—not twentysomethings.
    • “The most successful startups were started by people in their 40s.” — Stacey Vanek Smith (49:27)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments with Timestamps

• On the Job Market’s Mood:
  • “When you’re just applying into the void and never hearing anything…it does have the power to just completely ruin your day.”
    — Brett Vergara, 05:08
• On the BNPL Explosion:
  • “Over a billion in E commerce spending was done via Buy Now, Pay later services in the US which is the first time it's cracked a billion dollars in a day.”
    — Amanda Mull, 17:52
• On Meme Coin Chaos:
  • “A meme coin is nothing…there’s never any expectation…The only thing he [Trump] can do is talk about it.”
    — Zeke Fox, 34:17
  • “When he started talking about his wife’s coin…this is kind of like a breaking of the implicit contract with your meme coin buyers.”
    — Zeke Fox, 34:48
• On the Trump Family’s Crypto Wealth:
  • “On paper, the Trumps at one point were sitting on $50 billion of meme coins.”
    — Zeke Fox, 37:35
  • “The Trump family made more than $350 million off these two meme coins combined. And that's a lot.”
    — Zeke Fox, 38:13
• On Crypto-Presidential Conflicts of Interest:
  • “Now he's in on it himself...he’s better deregulate crypto.”
    — Zeke Fox, 36:48
• On Older Workers in the Spotlight:
  • “I think there is a place for zoomers and a place for boomers in the same workplace...I think we should honor older workers.”
    — Stacey Vanek Smith, 48:08

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Economic update & job market: 03:05–07:18
• Buy Now, Pay Later deep dive: 09:46–21:23
• Crypto: Trump memecoin saga: 24:13–39:42
• Age in sports/business: 45:30–50:47

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Overall Tone

• Informal, witty, accessible, and at times playful—while firmly anchored in factual reporting and expert analysis. The hosts mix skepticism with dry humor, especially when unpacking the Trump memecoin drama (“He’s like the Hawk Tua of America…”, Max Chafkin, 32:11).

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Conclusion

This episode combines sharp economic reporting and cultural commentary with an exposé of the wildly speculative intersection of crypto, politics, and celebrity. The saga of the Trump and Melania meme coins is presented as both symptom and cause of crypto’s current volatility—and perhaps as a cautionary tale of where finance and publicity stunts collide.

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For more deep dives into business, markets, and the headlines behind the headlines, subscribe to Everybody’s Business wherever you get your podcasts.

Transcript

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[Zeke Fox]

Bloomberg Audio.

[Max Chaffkin]

Studios Podcasts Radio News.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

This is everybody's business from Bloomberg Business Week. I'm Stacey Vanek Smith.

[Max Chaffkin]

I'm Max Chaffkin. Stacy it's the holiday season. I feel like we've been in the holiday season for a while, but it's still here.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Feels like it never ends.

[Max Chaffkin]

It's never going to end. But you but you know what? Companies are finally in the black. All these retail stores, right? They depend on holiday sales. We're about halfway through and now is the time when they're making money. And one of the ways they're making money, as we'll learn in one of our segments, is through these Buy now, pay later loans.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Yes, one of the ways they're making money is by demanding less money.

[Max Chaffkin]

It's odd. Amanda Mull's gonna talk about that. And speaking of buying things, we're gonna talk about the hot item of 2025. I'm of course talking about the Trump Meme coin as well as the Melan coin with Zeke Fox, our colleague crypto expert. He's coming here to talk to talk about his new story in Businessweek about all the weird ways that crypto and politics are intersecting.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

And Max, for our underrated story, you have brought us the story, and it is apparently about age inclusive sports or something.

[Max Chaffkin]

That's right. Yeah.

[Zeke Fox]

Right.

[Max Chaffkin]

It's about opening up professional sports to the elders.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

To the wizened elders.

[Max Chaffkin]

To the wizened elders.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Excellent.

[Max Chaffkin]

All right, Stacy, it's been a couple of weeks since we've gotten any kind of economic data. Maybe I'm. Maybe I hallucinated that, but it feels like it's been a while, but now all of a sudden there's a lot, a lot of information coming out about the economy. Kind of mixed, I guess.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Yes. I mean, you're right. The government shutdown meant that a lot of government data wasn't collected and wasn't, you know, given out. And it's hard because this is a really. Feels like a really crucial time in the economy. Things feel a little bit fragile and shaky. This week we did get some jobs information out. Some of the jobs numbers, it was mixed. Yeah, I would say mixed to not great. Three major takeaways here. The first one is the unemployment rate crept up a little bit more to 4.6%. It's not good that it's been rising, rising, but under 5% is still historically really low. So it's not terrible news, but it's not great. Also, there's a really interesting statistic in there that the share of workers working more than one job has risen to 5.7%, which is the highest it's been in 25 years, which may point to maybe people not being able to afford things as much or having to take on multiple jobs or wages being not.

[Max Chaffkin]

Not growing as quickly as people would hope. Or maybe there's just a lot of freaking jobs in the economy and all. So many jobs.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

You got to do different styles of working. I think that's a really good point, that this isn't necessarily bad, that, like, the way we work is a little different now. But in addition to that, what you said about the hiring, I think is the big jobs news of this year, which is the hiring is just at the lowest level it's been in years and years and years. The job market is a little bit dead and layoffs are rising slightly. And so I think people, workers do not feel great about the job market. Everyone feels a little bit like they're kind of holding onto their jobs. And then in certain sectors, the only sector that's like really hiring this year was health care. Everything else almost was shedding jobs. Or barely adding jobs. I talked with one worker for our Business Week story. This. This guy, Brett Vergara, he worked at a big tech company. He was actually a project manager on an AI team, and so he thought his job was pretty safe. But then he was laid off in October. And he said, right now, trying to apply for jobs is really tough.

[Brett Vergara (Job Applicant)]

When you're just applying into the void and never hearing anything, it can definitely be tough to keep up momentum. Be like, but let me do that again. And it's always fun, too. When you get a rejection, like, immediately after applying something, it's like, okay, well, it does have, like, this power to just completely ruin your day. I wish I was better at being able to shrug those things off, but I am not. I'm not the best at that.

[Max Chaffkin]

Yeah, that's. I mean, that's a universal thing.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Oh, yeah.

[Max Chaffkin]

I mean, it's always. That's all, you know, whatever's going on with the economy, I think that is a. That's a feeling people have, right? This kind of.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Yes.

[Max Chaffkin]

You gotta apply to a bunch of things cold. There's a lot of rejection and there's.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

A lot of AI built into the job system now.

[Amanda Mull]

So.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

So what he's talking about, like, the. Sometimes the second you fill out an application, they're like, nope, you don't fit this bill. So it. It is, like, kind of shocking to get a return immediately.

[Max Chaffkin]

Have you ever tried to return something on Amazon and you have to talk to the chat bot, but, like, you don't. It's like that. But you're applying for circular. This is like my future. And the thing on the other side of it is just like, thank you.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

For your interest, dear applicant. And the. The other thing Brett said. So at the same time this is happening, he's also hearing about more and more layoffs in his field. And he said, on the one hand, it's really. It's kind of comforting because he's seeing really good people losing their jobs. Like, okay, well, really, really great people with great skills are losing their jobs. But then also he's realizing that now they're all applying for the same jobs.

[Brett Vergara (Job Applicant)]

When you hear that next wave of layoffs from Amazon or, like, Target or Meta or Google or whatever, it's like, oh, I'm now competing against all those people immediately, you know, and like. And like, you know, and it's like, oh, we're getting put against each other even though we're in the same circumstances or similar circumstances. But, yeah, it's like, oh, all these people Who I also know who are plenty qualified as well.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

And he said the people he knows that do have jobs are also unhappy because they feel stuck. So it's just. It's a bad moment in the job market, I think. Exactly. Because of the hiring numbers.

[Max Chaffkin]

Yeah. All right, well, let's look ahead. Brighter days. Maybe 2026.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Hopefully 2026. I mean, there are some signs that 2026 might be getting better. We got good inflation numbers. Inflation seems to have come down a little. The data is a little difficult because a lot. It wasn't collected in the normal way because of the shutdown. But here's hoping that the hiring rate picks up in the new year.

[Max Chaffkin]

All right, well, we wanted to hear about your New Year's resolutions.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Yes. It's resolution time.

[Max Chaffkin]

So we sent Charlie Gorven, Bloomberg reporter, out onto the streets to sort of ask people what their resolutions were, what their financial resolutions were, what their personal resolutions were. And this is what he came back with. Do you have a resolution of any kind? Yeah, I have a New Year's resolution.

[Public Sponsor Voice]

Get outside more.

[Zeke Fox]

Yeah, I would like to read more books.

[Public Sponsor Voice]

Probably trying to better myself mentally.

[Max Chaffkin]

Smoking less weed.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

We're entering 2026 with a big question mark.

[Max Chaffkin]

I'm gonna shop more. What are you hoping to shop for as part of your resolution? Just whatever I need.

[Zeke Fox]

Well, I'm planning on getting rid of my smartphone this year, so I'm like, I'll have more time to not, like.

[Brett Vergara (Job Applicant)]

Look at my Facebook reels.

[Max Chaffkin]

Cause everyone says, like, stay healthy, go to the gym, but let's see how long that lasts.

[Morton Buildings Sponsor Voice]

My New Year's resolution is to watch fewer reels.

[Zeke Fox]

My New Year's resolution. I think that just being a city like this, growing my career, connect with old friends and new ones, I think it's something that I really want to be present for.

[Amanda Mull]

January is like, an arbitrary number.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

It's an arbitrary date. Like, if you want to change your life, do it tomorrow. I'm also of a certain age where.

[Amanda Mull]

I'm like, I'm really just, like, happy to be alive.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

I do have to say I love the woman who's like, my resolution is to shop more. That is the American economy saying yes.

[Max Chaffkin]

Yeah. I'm just struck by how prominent Facebook reels are in that. In those responses.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Well, I think less screen time, right?

[Max Chaffkin]

Yeah, they want to. I was thinking maybe my resolution is going to be, like, lots of screen time.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Oh, yeah. What is your resolution?

[Max Chaffkin]

I'm just going deep in Facebook.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Shop more and spend more time online. I need to help These less time with friends.

[Max Chaffkin]

I need to help these trillion dollar online, you know, Internet companies increase their per user time spent every week. I'm going to do my part.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

I like that.

[Max Chaffkin]

Because the stock market needs it.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Excellent. Well, I feel like I'm going to eat more sugar and try to spend more time inside alone. So Max, we just heard a bunch of resolutions and obviously, you know, the difficult economy right now is weighing on everybody's minds.

[Max Chaffkin]

Yeah, a lot of uncertainty. And I know that the way I deal with uncertainty is by putting it off into the future.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

I think, I think that's always a good plan. And in fact a lot of people are doing that not just with their futures, but with their finances. We've got senior reporter Amanda Mole with us. She is the author of the Buying Power column at Businessweek. Amanda, you just wrote a great article about Buy Now, Pay Later.

[Amanda Mull]

Yes. The topic of our times. Really.

[Zeke Fox]

Yes.

[Amanda Mull]

Or at least I would argue.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

So if you don't mind first describing what Buy Now Pay later is and then also just talk about what's been happening lately.

[Amanda Mull]

Yeah. So Buy Now Pay later, which is often abbreviated bnpl is like a fintech type of business. They specialize in basically what is like short term microloans. So if you are buying a new couch, if you want a new outfit for your birthday, if you want a new handbag that you don't want to pay for right now, then what you can do at retailers that offer Buy Now Pay later vendors for payment is that you can split that purchase up into small payments over a short period of time. The most common type of Buy Now Pay later loan is a what they call pay in four, which splits it up and splits the purchase up into quarters roughly. And then you pay like every two weeks, every week, every month. Like it depends on the the terms of the lender you're dealing with. These lending decisions are made algorithmically, very quickly at the point of sale. For in most cases there's also like membership programs that some of them offer.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Also like when you're online buying stuff, I feel like this will often come up. It would like. Would you like split this into four.

[Amanda Mull]

Pages, try to get you to do.

[Max Chaffkin]

This instead of putting your credit card in.

[Amanda Mull]

Right. And on a lot of like individual product pages that you're. If you're looking at like a new refrigerator, it say this is the price today or as low as however much with Affirm or with Klarna. These services are pretty widely advertised like within the shopping experience. They are part of the decision calculus For a lot of purchases in the US and they are getting more and more popular and more and more difficult to understand exactly how they function within the world of consumer finance. Because they do not, you know, do a hard credit pull. The debt you accrue to them generally does not show up on your credit score or on your credit report.

[Max Chaffkin]

So until you default probably.

[Amanda Mull]

Yeah, until you default. They, some of them might start messing with your credit history if you stop paying.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

I mean it sounds a lot like a credit card in some ways, right? Like you, you buy the thing and then your, you know, your credit card payment comes in and we all know, you know how credit card works. So if you, if you don't pay off fully for the month, you end up paying a little bit more. Buy now, pay later. I think if you make the four payments, you don't pay interest. But what happens if you don't make those payments?

[Amanda Mull]

In a lot of cases, especially with these like four part loans, there's no interest. If you opt into something longer, there may be interest. The more you spread it out, the more they're going to charge you generally. And it depends on what kind of loan you take out with them as to what, how it works. If you stop paying, some of them will just sort of like continue trying to collect some of them. Depending on the size of the loan and the policies of the particular lender, you may get hit with interest that wouldn't have been there otherwise. They may pursue you through the credit bureaus if they can.

[Max Chaffkin]

Do they come to take your fridge back though, if you don't pay. Is it like a car loan?

[Amanda Mull]

No, not necessarily. Yeah, they, most of these loans are like fairly small for a couple hundred, couple thousand dollars. And a lot of them are done sor of informally relative to like taking out a car loan.

[Max Chaffkin]

At first glance it really seems like one of these zerp businesses.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

What's that?

[Max Chaffkin]

Zero interest rate policy. So like a bunch of tech companies got big when interest rates were really low because basically borrowing money was free. So giving away a gazillion interest free loans to buy refrigerators is a, is like maybe a good deal when interest rates are low, the economy is good, et cetera, et cetera. But seems like, not obviously like a great business to me today. And so I'm wondering like what is happening there, like how have they managed to keep growing and how are these businesses actually making money if they're just like giving away free money to anyone without even bothering to like check their credit?

[Amanda Mull]

Yeah, well the, the main revenue stream that they have is that they do transaction fees with the retailers they partner with. So if you use Klarna, which is the market leader both in the US and worldwide in this type of service, it's a Swedish to buy a new, you know, designer handbag and it costs you $3,000. Klarna will be paid a portion of that sale, a small percentage of that sale by the retailer. And this happens with credit cards too. Interchange fees, transaction fees, swipe fees. If you use an electronic form of payment, anything other than cash really, there is a little bit of money going from the retailer to the person who processes that payment. So that is generally how they make their money. Some of them also offer longer term, larger loans that do charge interest. So they do have interest payments coming in from some of their borrowers.

[Max Chaffkin]

So this is like an entry point to having a deeper financial relationship with you, the borrower. Like I see this, I click on it, I buy the fridge, and then Klarna convinces me down the road to borrow some more money from them.

[Amanda Mull]

Yeah, and like, as with any sort of like consumer choice, like getting people to do something the first time that they're not used to doing or that they're not sure if it will work is like the big thing. Once you have made a Buy Now Pay later purchase, you're really likely to make a second one. In a recent survey that LendingTree did of like a couple thousand Buy Now Pay later users, the majority of them had at some point in the past had two or more loans going at once. And it's definitely true that these types of lenders over index in their customer base with types of people who are not necessarily credit worthy by traditional credit card issuer or lender standards. Their customer base, which is about 91 million people in the US right now. So it's a huge. Yeah, it's grown a lot in the past several years. So their customer base tends to skew young, it tends to skew single. There's a lot of young parents that use it. There's a lot of overlap between people who are young and single and have a child. So because they don't have a credit history, they have other debt or they.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Might be able to get a credit card with a really high interest rate, but wouldn't be able to get like great credit.

[Amanda Mull]

Right. And what's interesting is that in the numbers that I've seen, like the percentage of people who use Buy Now Pay later who have missed a payment or been late on a payment in the past year is really big. And it's growing. That same LendingTree survey found that it was 41% of buy now, Pay later borrowers in the last year had missed a payment. Wow.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

And that's gotta be way higher than a credit card.

[Amanda Mull]

Yeah, that's a lot of people. And it's up from 34% the year before and 31% the year before that. So people are missing more payments. However, the default rate on these is only like 2 to 3%, which is much lower than a traditional credit card, which is closer to 10%.

[Max Chaffkin]

We talked about this when we were recapping the Black Friday sales, which were good, but there was a lot of Buy Now, Pay later in there. And Stacy and I were kind of like trying to tease out good thing or bad thing. Is this bad or good? Like, to me, that sounds like people don't have enough money. They're spending me on their means. You tack that on with default rates going up on credit cards and you're like, oh, this seems bad. This seems like the kind of like fintech industry has, like, gotten together with the retail industry to convince people to spend money that they don't have.

[Amanda Mull]

Yeah, I think it's something that, like, should be looked at as a red flag, although we don't necessarily know exactly what it means at this point. The Black Friday to Cyber Monday or like Thanksgiving to Cyber Monday period was enormous for Buy Now, Pay Later. It was. Usage of those services was up, I think 6 percentage points over last year, according to one survey. And on Cyber Monday, over a billion in E commerce spending was done via Buy Now, Pay later services in the US which is the first time it's cracked a billion dollars in a day. And, you know, about 7% of all online purchases that day were Buy Now, Pay later, which is for a type of payment plan that only really became widely available in the US like 10 years ago.ish.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Really got traction during the pandemic, I think. I mean, it's not that old.

[Amanda Mull]

Yeah, it's really not that old. Some of these companies started in the 2010s, Klarna was started Sweden, and then came here in the 2000 and tens. This is all like fairly new.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

I mean, the other thing I think I've heard a lot about Buy Now, Pay later is that some things are big purchases like couches and refrigerators. But also Buy Now, Pay later has started to show up in things like grocery services.

[Max Chaffkin]

And we gotta talk about the burrito back security.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Burrito back security. I mean, people are splitting up very small purchases, which seems like another Potential red flag and maybe a, a signal from consumers that like of distress. But what do you think?

[Amanda Mull]

Yeah, you know, if you look at like the purchase of a refrigerator, the purchase of a new laptop, a new iPhone because the, your one just broke and you didn't plan for that expense, something like that. If you look at an option to pay it over the course of a couple of months at no interest, like that is a rational decision to make. Like I think that there are good use cases for these, especially when consumer credit card interest rates have, have really risen in the past several years.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Then there's the burrito.

[Amanda Mull]

Then there's the burritos.

[Max Chaffkin]

Yeah. So are there. So in case people haven't followed this like you can, there are some doordash offers the buy now. And so that has led to jokes like people are buying burritos in four.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Parts and then that is like groceries, which is.

[Max Chaffkin]

Yeah, and groceries. And that has led to another level of, of sort of joke which is the prospect that these finance companies that are lending you money to buy burritos are then securitizing that debt and selling them to like Goldman Sachs or something as burrito backed securities. Are there burrito backed securities abandoned Mull?

[Amanda Mull]

Essentially, yeah. Like I think in a, in a manner of speaking, yes. Because the, the pot of money that these lenders are drawing from is you know, private investors, it's private equity. It's all of these things that are how. Private credit, private credit. It's how, you know, any company that needs a big pot of money is getting money nowadays. Klarna is a public company now. They went public in September. But a lot of these services either aren't public or they're part of like a much larger company that like isn't necessarily a bank. So it doesn't have to adhere to banking regulations and transparency. So like where how much debt exists in this form and like where it is and like what it was used on and the likelihood of it getting paid back is just sort of difficult to discern, I would say.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Amanda Moll, thank you so much for talking with us. Come back later.

[Amanda Mull]

Yeah, thanks for having me.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Thanks for being here.

[Max Chaffkin]

Now. Come back later.

[Narrator/Host (Intro/Outro)]

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[Stacey Vanek Smith]

From an innovation standpoint, I've actually never been more excited. A lot of the companies that shouldn't have ever experienced existed have gone out of business. Now we're turning the cards over for some pretty impressive companies run by impressive people with great drugs.

[Narrator/Host (Intro/Outro)]

In a market focused on actual innovation, durable profits might be on the horizon. Learn [e-mail] focused insights sponsored by Fidelity.

[Public Sponsor Voice]

Support for the show comes from Public, the investing platform for those who take it seriously. On Public you can build a multi asset portfolio of stocks, bonds, options, crypto and now generated assets which allow you to turn any idea into an investable index with AI. It all starts with your prompt. From renewable energy companies with high free cash flow to semiconductor suppliers growing revenue over 20% year over year, you can literally type any prompt and put the AI to work. It screens thousands of stocks, builds a one of a kind index and lets you back test it against the S&P 500. Then you can invest in a few clicks. Generated assets are like EFTs with infinite possibilities, completely customizable and based on your thesis, not someone else's. Go to public.com podcast and earn an uncapped 1% bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com podcast paid for by Public Investing Brokerage Services by Open to the Public Investing Inc. Member FINRA SIPC Advisory Services by Public Advisors llc SEC Registered Advisor Generated Assets is an interactive analysis tool. Output is for informational purposes only and is not investment recommendation or advice. Complete disclosure [e-mail] Disclosures Hey, Ryan Reynolds.

[Max Chaffkin]

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[Zeke Fox]

So that means a half day.

[Max Chaffkin]

Yeah, give it a try.

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[Stacey Vanek Smith]

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[Max Chaffkin]

All right Stacy, we have talked about crypto a bunch this year partly because.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

The big story of 2025 big story.

[Max Chaffkin]

In 2025 partly because, you know, cryptocurrencies, the asset class have boomed. Some of that I think because of hype caused by the Trump administration and some of it because the Trump administration itself, and in particular Trump and his family members are like Making tons and tons of money.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Now they're releasing their own coins, crypto ventures.

[Max Chaffkin]

This is all kind of crazy. There are a bunch of crazy little angles of this. And, and the craziest one, I think, are these meme coins, the. The Trump coin. And we have in our midst Zeke Fox of Bloomberg Businessweek. He just wrote a story with Max Abelson, Donald and Melania Trump's terrible, tacky, seemingly legal meme coin adventure. Zeke is also the author of Number Go up, which is best book that has been written about the weird world of crypto. And Zeke is here now. Hey, Zeke.

[Zeke Fox]

Hey. Thanks for having me.

[Max Chaffkin]

All right, so before we talk about this Trump coin, which is what your story's about, I just have to ask you, like, before Donald Trump was elected, it kind of seemed like this entire industry was going to go away. And like the. I may have. I think I've made this point the last time you were on this podcast, but, like, there were all these guys, former titans of industry, who were, like, in prison or disgraced, and the whole industry seemed like in the doldrums. And if you wake up now and look, and not only are they all back, but they are all in positions of kind of power. And I'm wondering how that happened.

[Zeke Fox]

Yeah, I mean, it's pretty amazing. The regulators in the US Were kind of asleep at the wheel during the last crypto boom under Biden. And then towards the end, they woke up and they said, hey, all of this, like, crypto trading you're doing, we don't actually think almost any of this is legal at all. And they filed big lawsuits against all of the big crypto exchanges like Coinbase, Binance. These lawsuits basically would have put the crypto industry out of business. And the industry realized they had a political problem and that there could be a political solution. And they tried two different approaches. One group raised a lot of money and they donated a lot to congressional candidates. The crypto industry actually spent more on the last election cycle than any other industry. Even, like, oil, is that right? Yes.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

More than, like, tech or anything crypto.

[Zeke Fox]

They spent 150 million they spent against one senator who had said some kind of critical things about crypto, but didn't even really seem to have strong opinions about it. Sherrod Brown. They spent $40 million on his election and defeated him. He was replaced by a used car dealer with some crypto experience.

[Max Chaffkin]

Bernie Moreno.

[Zeke Fox]

Yes.

[Max Chaffkin]

And a used car entrepreneur, owner of dealerships.

[Zeke Fox]

But there was a second group of crypto people. They said, you know what? This Lobbying is all fine, but the Democrats are the ones who've gone after us. Why don't we get behind Trump? And this wing was led by some really enthusiastic bitcoin fans, in particular, the guy who runs Bitcoin magazine, and he runs this annual conference for every year, like, 10,000 Bitcoin fans get together and talk about how cool bitcoin is and how it's going to solve all the world's problems. And last year, he arranged a fundraiser before the conference. They got people to pledge something like $25 million to Trump and RFK, who was then a candidate. He was supposed to be the main attraction, but he got bumped for Trump. He held this fundraiser, he came out on stage and he gave this speech in which he promised the crypto industry everything they could have hoped for. He said he would fire the head of the sec, the one who had filed all these lawsuits against the biggest players. He said that if the. If crypto is going to the moon, the US should lead the way.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

And because this is, like, maybe a critical time for crypto at this moment.

[Max Chaffkin]

Well, and Trump wanted money. I mean, he wanted their support. He wanted their. He wanted their dollars and their votes, I think. So the industry, they get behind Trump. And I think the plan is he's going to do a bunch of things to help them from a regulatory level.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

And he kind of said it.

[Max Chaffkin]

He's going to. He's going to fire Gary Gensler. He's going to make a strategic victim reserve. He's going to, you know, make a. Do a bunch of stuff that's going to be great for the industry. That's the plan. And then there's like, this one, this thing that I think they did not entirely count on, which is that he would also enter the industry himself. So, like, just before the inauguration, we get this Trump Coin.

[Zeke Fox]

Yes. So it's inauguration weekend, and some of these crypto guys who had backed Trump put on a crypto ball in D.C. at a big auditorium just down the street from the White House. And a who's who of the crypto industry had gathered there, and Trump on Truth Social, announces that he's created Trump Coin. And people aren't sure what to make of it. This is a meme coin, and I want to explain what they are a little bit.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Yeah, yeah, define meme coin.

[Zeke Fox]

So a lot of cryptocurrencies make promises that they're going to make finance more efficient, that they're going to make it cheaper to transfer money across borders, or.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Stablecoin, like, they're going to be pegged to a currency.

[Zeke Fox]

They're going to be pegged to a currency. It's like a new venture. That new trading venture, like Defi. And a meme coin is none of that. It's a coin that transparently does not do anything, and it's just saying, hey, here I am. This is kind of fun. If people buy it, it will go up.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

It's like a joke sometimes.

[Max Chaffkin]

Okay, so. So my question is, and this is.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Kind of at the end of the day of the cyberball, at the center.

[Max Chaffkin]

Of your story, just before the inauguration, how involved was Trump in this? I mean, like, he. We've read a lot of stories suggesting he made a lot of money or on paper, a huge amount of money initially, and then less money as it. As it fell. How involved was Trump and, like, who are the players in this Trump Coin?

[Amanda Mull]

What?

[Zeke Fox]

We. We were told that in the weeks before inauguration down at Mar a Lago, there was kind of a parade of crypto guys coming through. A lot of them had donated to the inauguration. They donated to the campaign, and that there was this push to get this meme coin done. There's a belief that a president elects meme coin was somehow more legal than a president's meme coin.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

It had to be locked into place. That's why it happened at the cyberball.

[Zeke Fox]

Yes. Now, I want to say, though, there are no rules about meme coins. No one. I couldn't even tell you what. Why a president elects meme coin is better than a president's meme coin, legally speaking. So something else weird happened that weekend, though, which was that when Trump announced his coin. I mean, this is by far the biggest celebrity who's ever done a meme coin. It's like, I don't know what niche hobby to compare it to, but, like.

[Max Chaffkin]

He'S like the Hawk Tua of America is what you're saying.

[Zeke Fox]

So the coin really got going. It gets up to, like, 70 bucks in that day on that weekend. But then something else happened that, within the crypto world, was viewed as a rugging. Oh, okay.

[Amanda Mull]

What happened?

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Yeah, because how did the crypto. So how did the people at the crypto ball feel as this coin was launching? Like, are they excited? Does this feel not quite right?

[Zeke Fox]

The crypto ball, during. At that time, people there were worried that Trump had been hacked because there was this trend of hackers getting into people's Twitter and announcing meme coins.

[Max Chaffkin]

Oh, there's nothing stopping you from launching your own Trump coin. That has nothing to do with Trump, like you just call it the DJT token or whatever. And it wasn't totally clear that he was involved with it until he Truth. Until he posted on Truth.

[Zeke Fox]

Even though there was some concern that was not.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

People were just like, this isn't real.

[Zeke Fox]

Yeah, okay. So it becomes clear it's real. It's really going. And then Melania announces her own meme coin.

[Amanda Mull]

Okay.

[Zeke Fox]

And this one takes off too, but less so.

[Amanda Mull]

I remember.

[Zeke Fox]

Less so. Then it crashes and it brings Trump coin down with it. And people that day, on the day the Melania launch, when the Melania crashes, Trump coin goes down too. Trump coin has not crashed as hard as Melania coin. It's down about like 90%. It's kind of been a slow.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

90% is a lot down.

[Zeke Fox]

Melania coin is down 99%, which is a lot worse.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

What was the time frame here between when the coin launched and when it lost 90, 99% of its value?

[Zeke Fox]

Trump coin, it got all the way. We're talking about the decline from the peak once it hit 70, I think within like a day of that, it lost at least half its value. All the action is that weekend. It's been much less exciting since then. So again, a meme coin is nothing. There's never any expectation.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

It's not backed by things that the.

[Zeke Fox]

President'S going to do anything to make this meme coin valuable. The only thing he can do is talk about it. And when he started talking about his wife's coin, this is kind of like a breaking of the implicit contract with your meme coin buyers. How come when you announce a meme coin, you are basically promising that you will promote that coin for at least a couple days. You can't then start talking about your family members coins.

[Max Chaffkin]

Wait, so it's like he's taking too much from them.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

The problem is he like promoted his coin and then immediately promoted as well. It was like too many coin launches at the same time.

[Zeke Fox]

Yes.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Why is that breaking the code? That doesn't make any sense to me.

[Zeke Fox]

The meme coin thrives on attention. And if you start driving attention to some other coin, you're splitting attention. And also, there's only so many people that want to gamble on meme coins and they only have so much money, which, and I'm going to say like a lot of money, like billions of dollars, but not like trillions. So if you start telling people about a new coin, it's not a deep market. They're gonna sell their existing coins to get in on the new one.

[Max Chaffkin]

The view is that he got greedy. Right. It's like you're getting greedy.

[Zeke Fox]

Yeah. So people weren't sure. I mean, it seems hard to believe, but, like, did Donald and Melania speak to each other about these coins? Were these two opposing camps?

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

This is a little bit blowing my mind. So the problem that the crypto community felt was not that someone who was about to go into the White House had launched a crypto coin and all the potential implications of that. The was that he launched another coin which took attention away from that and potentially was like, rugging the people who had believed in him enough to buy his coin.

[Zeke Fox]

Yes.

[Max Chaffkin]

To be clear, there were people in the crypto world who hated this. In particular, the camp that Zeke brought up early on, the people who were, like, investing in campaigns and, like, they found this. There's some crypto people who didn't like this.

[Zeke Fox]

Yeah. So, I mean, I will say so a lot of people would say they found this distasteful. This isn't what crypto stands for. And now what I will note is that they were all very quick to list the Meme coin on their trading platforms. And that when I think what some of them told me is that, yeah, this is kind of a helpful conflict of interest, like, Trump has made a lot of promises to us. We don't know if he's going to follow through, but now he's in on it himself.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

He's got skin in the game.

[Zeke Fox]

He's better deregulate crypto.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Right. He's got skin in the game. He's got a reason.

[Max Chaffkin]

Yeah, that's a great point. And great, great transition, because I wanted to ask you, like, how much money he made? And, like, on paper, there were some crazy estimates. It's gone down a lot. I mean, how rich did the President get and the president's wife on these two meme coins?

[Zeke Fox]

Yeah. So it can be a bit tricky to calculate because it's so easy to create wealth. On paper, if I make a billion Zeke coins, I sell you one for a dollar. Now, I'm a billionaire technically, but because. And on paper, the Trumps at one point were sitting on $50 billion of meme coins.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Do they own it?

[Zeke Fox]

We don't know exactly what their split is with their business partners, but yes. Now, because a lot of this trading happens on the blockchain, where it can be. If you know what to look for, you can gather a lot of data about how the. About the trading. I talked to two crypto research firms, Chainalysis and bubble maps. Together, they had calculated that the Trump family made more than $350 million off these two meme coins combined. And that's a lot.

[Max Chaffkin]

That's cash money that they've. Coins that they've sold and turned not on paper into dollar. Real money.

[Zeke Fox]

Yes. I mean, this really beats Trump sneakers, Trump guitars, Trump fragrance.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Fight, fight, fight. Did not make nearly $350,000.

[Amanda Mull]

Million.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Oh, million.

[Max Chaffkin]

Million.

[Zeke Fox]

350 million. Yeah. And now Trump, he has acted and this seems very believable that he really does not know very much about any of this at a.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Well, he's old school. I mean, in fairness, it is a whole world and it's not his world.

[Zeke Fox]

Yes. And so at a press conference, on his first press conference as president, he was asked about this. Then he flipped the question on the reporter and was like, how much did I make on that? And the reporter was like, Mr. President, I think like billions of dollars. The data wasn't quite so good then. And he was like, ooh, but that's nothing compared to. He was standing with like Elon Musk. He's like, billions. Who cares? At a different press conference, and this was one of my favorite parts of the story. The press secretary was asked about an event that a dinner that Trump was hosting for the top buyers of his meme coin. And she said it wasn't relevant that he was doing that in his personal time. Like he just clocked out for the day. He's not president anymore. Just whatever he does, who cares?

[Max Chaffkin]

Zeke Fox, author of Number Go Up Inside Crypto's Wild Rise and Staggering Fall. Thanks for being here.

[Zeke Fox]

Thanks Fax. Thanks, Stacy.

[Public Sponsor Voice]

Support for the show comes from Public, the investing platform for those who take it seriously. On Public, you can build a multi asset portfolio of stocks, bonds, options, crypto and now generated assets, which allow you to turn any idea into an investable index. With AI. It all starts with your prompt. From renewable energy companies with high free cash flow to semiconductor suppliers growing revenue over 20% year over year, you can literally type any prompt and put the AI to work. It screens thousands of stocks, builds a one of a kind index and lets you back test it against the S&P 500. Then you can invest in a few clicks. Generated assets are like EFTs with infinite possibilities, completely customizable and based on your thesis, not someone else's. Go to public.com podcast and earn an uncapped 1% bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com podcast paid for by Public Investing Brokerage Services by Open to the Public Investing Inc. Member FINRA SIPC Advisory Services by Public Advisors, llc. SEC Registered Advisor Generated Assets is an interactive analysis tool. Output is for informational purposes only and is not investment recommendation or advice. Complete disclosures available at public.comdisclosures tis the.

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[Max Chaffkin]

That's MortonBuildings.com Stacey I had to share a little listener feedback that came into the Everybody's Business mailbox last week. Really fun email from Matt in regards to our conversation about Donald Trump and the difference between football and soccer.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Oh yes, yes. This was when Donald Trump was like we should call soccer football. Which is very shocking.

[Max Chaffkin]

I was offended on behalf of all American sports chauvinists, but here's Matt as an avid fan of the beautiful game in North America, I would welcome being able to call the sport football or football, like the rest of the world, soccer is just one more mistake we got from the British. Much like imperial units, which we should have dumped in Boston. Boston harbor, along with the T. Worth noting as well that Britain itself has since fixed both mistakes. He goes on to talk about how popular soccer is and. And then says the NFL, in contrast, is an American entertainment franchise and could be renamed something more catchy by their immense marketing team. Perhaps touchdown, exclamation point. Or, I don't know, Desperate Quarterbacks. Thanks for the fun podcast. I'll sign up.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

He wants to change the name of football to Desperate Quarterbacks.

[Max Chaffkin]

He wants to change it. Okay, I don't think that's gonna fly. Matt. Matt in Seattle. Sorry, Desperate quarterbacks is not good, but touchdown, exclamation point, excellent.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

I think you think the game of football should now be called the game of American football should now be called touchdown.

[Max Chaffkin]

I am on the record saying that it's soccer and that. And I think Matt is very confused. Like, I understand like this. There's kind of like a patriotism thing here. Like, we dumped soccer, but we have football. But. But, like, football is also a British word. So I just think I am on the record saying it should be called the NFL should be called football. The beautiful game should be soccer. But I do like Matt's idea that Touchdown.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Touchdown.

[Max Chaffkin]

Okay, it has to be with the exclamation point.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

I mean, I just feel like football, you know, listen, I love free trade. I mean, I think globalization is a. I am a person. I like to consider myself a cosmopolitan person. And it's just football. I don't know why. Break it. Yeah, no, there's sort of saying, I feel like there's so much changing in our world right now. I just want this one thing to stay the same.

[Max Chaffkin]

Okay, thank you, Matt, for the email.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Yes, thank you, Matt, for the email.

[Zeke Fox]

Everyone.

[Max Chaffkin]

Please keep writing in everybody's bloomberg.net we really like the emails. We'll keep reading it.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Okay, well, while we were on the topic of sports, Max, you have an underrated story also about sports. What's. What's your underrated story?

[Max Chaffkin]

You're probably familiar with this problem we have in American society and in American corporations where you have these kind of older workers who are crowding out younger workers, right? Like the. The kind of zoomers and millennials who feel like they can't get a job, they can't rise within the organization because. Because there are too many old people taking their jobs. And you.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Frequently people won't Retire.

[Max Chaffkin]

Yeah, yeah. You frequently see these very smart op EDS written in like, you know, whatever the Atlantic or Bloomberg opinion about the gerontocracy. Talking about Joe Biden being very old or Donald Trump being very old. It seems bad. Now I have another example of this in an unlikely area which is professional football. I don't know if you're paying attention, but last weekend the new quarterback, the fresh faced quarterback for the Indianapolis Colts, who is Philip Rivers, who is 44 years old and who retired almost five years ago, go for the NFL, who got into a game last week essentially out of desperation and although he did not lead the team to victory, it was kind of like an honorable defeat. And he's got another starting job. He's going to be starting this weekend for the Colts as they play, I believe the 49ers. So we're going to have a 44 year old NFL.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

That's great.

[Amanda Mull]

Is it though?

[Max Chaffkin]

I mean I, So this is what's weird to me. Everyone thinks it's great and I guess it is kind of great. There's something just sort of fun I think about like an out of shape professional athlete. Like we all.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

Why do you say he's out of shape? He is a professional athlete.

[Max Chaffkin]

If you watch him play, you will see like he is, he is on the older side.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

He's not a scrambler.

[Max Chaffkin]

He's definitely, he's, he's lumbering at this point, I think in his, in his career. But you know, so there's this like interesting thing happening where yes, like the physical gifts aren't there, the passes aren't great, he doesn't move very well. But a big part of being a quarterback is like understanding the offense and making smart decisions. And it's kind of like the reason why the boomer is still in that, you know, middle management job and not a millennial or a zoomer. It's because they may be a little slower, they may not be as hip to the kids, but they understand kind of the ins and outs of the organization. But anyway, what I think is just funny is that everyone is like rooting for Philip Rivers and it feels like a weird, it feels like kind of discordant with our, with the rest of the conversation on, on the gerontocracy. How come no one is rooting for Joe Biden when he's like slowing slurring his words or whatever during a debate or Donald Trump as he's falling asleep in the Oval Office? Like, I feel like we need to kind of get on one page on Whether it's cool to have elderly people in jobs.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

I think actually this is a big conversation that we should have and I, I think we will be working later and later and longer and longer because our health has improved, our healthcare has improved. And also like retirement is just a much different thing than it used to be. I think it's a good thing that the workplace is not. I mean I feel like the US we're just so youth obsessed. It's always like, what's the next thing? What's the next thing? Like, what are the 18 to 24 year olds buying? But the reality of like our demographics is that things are, should be more holistic. I think there is a place for zoomers and a place for boomers in the same workplace. Like I don't think one precludes the other. I don't think it's a zero sum game. I think, I think we should honor older workers. I think older workers have a lot to contribute.

[Max Chaffkin]

Well, exactly, like, so I'm 43, one year younger than Philip Rivers.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

See, you've still got some years in your career.

[Max Chaffkin]

My kids, they think like I'm pretty good at, you know, baseball, pretty good at kicking the soccer ball. They think I could be a professional athlete. And they always tell me like, oh well, like you could, you could be in, you could be a baseball player, you could do this because. And they bring up one example or like my son watches American Ninja Warrior and he's always telling me like, dad, There was a 60 year old on American Ninja Warrior, so you're fine. So yeah, so this is like another data point I guess in that case. But I don't know, we'll see if he, if what happens this weekend.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

I do have an interesting data point that kind of backs up what your kids are saying in the business world. There was this really interesting study done about the startups and like the most successful startups and as it turned out the most successful startups were started by people in their 40s.

[Max Chaffkin]

Obviously in the business world the kind like youth doesn't give you the same advantage as it gives you, as it gives you in the NFL where like, you know, you need to be able to cut or whatever and the heel faster and yeah, and the fact that even like physically limited his sort of experience and, and, and decision making is enough to make up for that to the point they can't find any quarterback out there anywhere who, anyone who just graduated from college who can, who can compete in the NFL. Like it tells you something that, that like these skills these like maybe these soft skills.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

I'm sure they could find other people, but he might just be better.

[Max Chaffkin]

No, no, I think, I think it's. I mean I think there's something with where the coach knows him or whatever but. But still I think there is something to the fact that. To the fact that like once you get down to your third string quarterback, which is where they were, you're ba. You might be better off just getting a guy who was coaching high school football in Alabama for the last five years, which was what Philip Burgers was doing.

[Stacey Vanek Smith]

This show is produced by Stacy Wong. Magnus Henriksen is our supervising producer and Amy Keen is our executive producer. Sam Rogich handles engineering and Dave Purcell fact Checks. Sage Bauman heads Bloomberg Podcasts. Special thanks to Jeff Muskus, Julia Rubin, Charlie Goravan and Maria Ling. If you have a minute, please rate and review the show. It does mean a lot to us and if you have a story that should be our business, please email us. Everybody's loomberg.net that is everybody's with an sloomberg.net thank you for listening and we'll see you next week.

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