Will Horror Gruel Save Hollywood?

Summary

Everybody's Business – "Will Horror Gruel Save Hollywood?"

Hosted by Max Chafkin & Stacy Vanek Smith
Date: October 31, 2025

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Episode Overview

This Halloween-themed episode examines both the business of fear—literally and figuratively. Hosts Max Chafkin and Stacy Vanek Smith explore:

• The state of the movie industry and whether horror can "save" Hollywood, with expert guest Sean Fennesee (co-host of The Big Picture Podcast).
• A deeply personal, ground-level perspective on recent ICE raids and their economic impact, as recounted by economist Leo Feller.
• Lighter Halloween fare: a trip through a haunted bank and a taste test of trending candies.

The episode captures the interplay between pop culture, politics, and everyday business, all wrapped in the holiday spirit.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Current Political & Economic Updates

• Trump Administration Policy Wins
  • Argentina: Javier Milei's successful avoidance of economic disaster post-U.S. bailout.
    • Max: "If you have not been paying attention, the bailout worked. Javier Milei was successful during the Argentine midterm election...the chainsaw lives on." (02:06)
  • China Tariffs: Temporary truce where China paused their threat to withhold rare earths, and the U.S. paused new tariffs for a year.
    • Stacy: "Any small change, any small truce, even if it's temporary, is a big deal. It's good for our economy." (04:09)
    • Max, skeptical: "This is a nothing burger, Stacey...It's just a truce." (03:51)
• Lighthearted ribbing between hosts about the value—or lack thereof—of watching the stock market as a real-time economic indicator.

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2. Halloween Business: The Haunted Bank Experience

• Stacy visits a haunted house set up in an old, historic New York bank—a nod to financial panic as a real modern-day fear.
  • Stacy: "Financial crises can mess you up way more than, like, a werewolf or something." (06:14)
• Anecdotes from the event highlight tongue-in-cheek financial horror: visitors interacting with "evil" bank tellers and scary clowns in the vault.
• Max wishes for "horror consultants" for scarier economic themes: "They need to explore the terrors of like, a credit crisis or...financial panic." (09:10)
• Historical context: The building’s origin as the National City Bank of New York, implicated in the 1929 crash.
• Quick hit on the business side: Tickets cost $50; 500 people go through daily.

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3. ICE Raids: The Real-Life Economic Chiller

Guest: Economist Leo Feller (segment begins ~[10:43])

Feller’s Firsthand Account:

• Construction site at his home raided by masked ICE agents; warrants never shown; agents scaled four-foot spiked fences.
• Feller watched events unfold live via security cameras from Toronto, intervened over Ring camera audio.
  • "I'm a U.S. citizen. I never thought I would be this afraid of my own government." (16:00)
• Aftermath: Violence, a worker detained, others injured, legal scramble to contest the detention.

Economic Impact of Immigration Crackdowns:

• Feller’s research confirms chilling effects:
  • Documented drop in consumer spending among first-generation Hispanic households.
  • Fearful workers avoiding public spaces, even gyms and stores like Home Depot.
  • Feller: "We’ve seen consumption come down amongst this cohort...they’re less able to earn income...there might be fear about going to construction sites." (18:21)

Debunking Economic Myths:

• Feller disputes the claim that such enforcement “frees up jobs” for citizens, citing Nobel Prize-winning economic research:
  • Immigrants take undesirable ladder-rung jobs, which pushes everyone up, ultimately stimulating demand.
  • "AI is not going to be able to put windows and siding on my house." (21:12)
• Ripple effect: If work halts, so does demand for U.S.-made products (e.g., windows from Marvin in Roanoke, VA), tying local raids to a nationwide slowdown.

Personal Response:

• Feller suspends his own renovation indefinitely: "There is no just crew of American workers that's sitting around waiting to finish up this project." (24:43)

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4. State of the Movie Industry

Guest: Sean Fennesee, co-host of The Big Picture Podcast and Head of Content at The Ringer (segment begins ~[26:12])

Movie Theaters in Decline:

• Long-term ticket sales trending down for 50 years—due to streaming, changing habits, and expense.
  • "Going to the movies necessitates a night out...It’s also a hobby that can be conquered if you're willing to wait two months till the film comes to streaming." (27:10)
• Still, 2025 saw success with Ryan Coogler’s “Sinners” and the continued cultural impact of Barbenheimer.

2025’s Underwhelming Summer:

• Big-budget IP (Superman, Jurassic Park, Fantastic Four) failed to revive the box office.
• Original horror (“Weapons”) succeeded with modest budgets and major returns.
  • "Weapons was a huge positive...made well over $200 million on a budget way lower than that." (29:18)

What “Success” Means in Hollywood Now:

• Blockbusters need to justify enormous marketing and production budgets.
• Arty hits (like P.T. Anderson’s “One Battle After Another”): critical darlings can become enduring assets (“forever movies”)—even if initial box office is only borderline profitable.
  • "If you become a forever movie, it's an annuity...a revenue stream in perpetuity." (31:24)

Outlook:

• Fennesee: "You have to accept that the movie business is getting smaller...but it doesn't mean that it isn't going to exist." (32:52)
• Theatrical events are likely to become rarer, more “premium,” akin to concerts or Taylor Swift albums.
• Hope remains: tentpoles and horror still draw crowds.

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5. Horror: The One Genre That Still Works

• Communal horror moviegoing is “very fun.” Fans (including Sean) tolerate lower-quality entries just for the experience.
  • "The bar[rier] quality is lower and we're willing to eat gruel even if it gives us our horror hit." (35:28)
• Case in point: “Final Destination: Bloodlines” (the sixth entry) grosses over $200 million.
  • "Whenever we get into the doomsaying conversation, I do point to things like that to say, like, hey, people did get a babysitter...to go see Final Destination Bloodlines." (36:36)

Sean’s Horror Recommendations (37:15–39:35):

• "The Strangers" — home invasion terror.
• "The Changeling" — classic supernatural chills.
• "Cannibal Holocaust" — infamous, intense cult favorite.
  • (Though not for everyone: “Cannibal Holocaust is very dark.” — Sean, 39:31)

Hosts’ Horror Comfort Zones:

• Stacy: Fears supernatural/ghost stories ("Slashers don't scare me...But ghosts scare me a lot." 39:56)
• Max: Not a horror fan; plans to watch the World Series instead.

Notable Quote:

"I always say that I love going to the movies to feel something. And horror movies...make people feel the most consistently."
—Sean Fennesee (40:34)

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6. Candy Trends: Extreme Flavors & Global Sweets (Segment starts ~[41:08])

Candy Consumption Hits Record Highs

• U.S. candy spending projected at $3.9B for 2025.
• Trends: Extreme sour, textured, "experiential" candies appeal to Gen Alpha.

Live Candy Taste Test

• Nerds Gummy Clusters: "It's actually pretty delicious." — Stacy (43:25)
• Super Sour Gushers: Actually, “kind of bland.”
• Gummy Burger: Comically tough to chew ("It's like a sole of a shoe." — Stacy, 44:31)
• Salted Swedish Licorice (from producer Magnus’s mom): Divisive ("It gets worse and worse as you masticate it." — Max, 45:25)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Leo Feller on civil liberties:

  "I never thought I would be this afraid of my own government." (16:00)

• Sean Fennesee on horror as escapism:

  "The bar[rier] quality is lower and we're willing to eat gruel even if it gives us our horror hit." (35:28)

• Max mocking the ‘haunted bank’:

  "They need to explore the terrors of like, a credit crisis or...structural spillover." (09:10)

• Stacy’s Halloween philosophy:

  "Financial crises can mess you up way more than, like, a werewolf." (06:14)

• On Swedish salted licorice:

  "It gets worse and worse as you masticate it." — Max (45:25)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 02:06 — U.S.-Argentina bailout update
• 03:18 — U.S.-China tariff “truce” debate
• 05:39 — Stacy’s haunted bank field report
• 10:43 — Start of Leo Feller’s ICE raid story
• 13:55 — Leo intervenes via Ring camera
• 16:00 — Feller on fear of government
• 18:21 — Economic effects of ICE raids
• 21:12 — Debunking the “immigrants take jobs” myth
• 26:12 — Movie business roundtable w/ Sean Fennesee starts
• 29:18 — “Weapons” and success factors for horror
• 31:24 — The enduring value of “forever movies”
• 35:28 — Why horror remains a box office stalwart
• 37:15 — Sean Fennesee’s horror movie recs
• 41:08 — Candy trends & taste test
• 45:25 — Salted licorice disaster

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Tone & Style

Upbeat, irreverent, and smart. Chafkin and Smith trade playful barbs while giving weight to serious business and societal issues. Guests offer expertise punctuated with relatable, emotional moments. The episode is as interested in “spooky season” and pop consumption as it is in policy and economic hardship.

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Summary

Whether confronting economic fear—via haunted banks or the realities of immigration enforcement—or seeking escapism in gory horror and cavity-inducing candy, "Will Horror Gruel Save Hollywood?" encapsulates the powerful ways business, culture, and personal experience intersect in today’s America. The future of movies may be smaller, but the appetite for fear—real or manufactured—remains as big as ever.

Transcript

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Bloomberg Audio Studios.

[Leo Feller]

Podcasts Radio News.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

This is Everybody's Business from Bloomberg businessweek, I'm Stacey Mannix Smith.

[Max Chafkin]

I'm Max Chavkin. Stacy, there's a lot that's going on in the world that is upsetting or difficult or scary. But on a happier note, it's Halloween.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

It is Halloween. Happy Halloween.

[Max Chafkin]

Happy Halloween. My children's favorite day of the year. It's also on a Friday, which is awesome. And we at Everybody's Business are going all in on the spooky season. We've got a great conversation with Sean Fennesee. He's the co host of the Big Picture Podcast. He's gonna catch us up on what's been happening in the film industry, give us some recommendations for what to watch tonight. You visited a haunted bank I Lots of Halloween cheer. And then we also have a really difficult conversation.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Yes, we do. We speak with economist Leo Feller, who experienced an ICE raid on his property. He talks a little bit about what that was like firsthand, but also about the economic impacts of some of the Trump administration's immigration policies and how that's likely to play out.

[Max Chafkin]

And our underrated story. Stacey, it's sweet. That's what we have to look forward to.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Yeah, candy. I've been promised candy.

[Max Chafkin]

Maybe a little sour. Also, I've been told a little salt.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

What kind of candy did you get?

[Max Chafkin]

All right, Stacey, before we get to all that's ahead of us for this episode, I just want to quickly catch people up on a couple of basically, like, modest wins for the Trump administration that have made news this week. First off, we've talked about Javier Milei in Argentina and the U.S. bailout. And I got to tell you listeners, if you have not been paying attention, the bailout worked. Javier Milei was successful during the Argentine midterm election. He's going to avoid any of the things that were sort of worst case scenarios for his administration. For Argentina, the chainsaw lives on.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

And also a huge deal with China. I would argue this is, is a major win. So President Trump met with President Xi of China and obviously there have been a lot of tariffs back and forth. Most recently, China was threatening to withhold rare earths from the US which would be a big deal because rare earths are in all of our computers and phones and China controls 90 plus percent of that market. So that was going to be really bad. In exchange, Trump agreed to hit pause on tariffs on Chinese goods for a year.

[Max Chafkin]

You genuinely think this is a big. This is a nothing burger, Stacey. This is like a modest compromise over like one tiny aspect of the US China thing. It's just a truce. It only lasts a year and it only relates to the stuff that's happened over like the last month. The rare earth thing. And like this, like a.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Do you want to put a dollar sign on this nothing burger, Max? Because if we do, it's like, it's almost unimaginably big. It is important to keep focus that China is quite simply one of our most important trading partners. The business we do with them is huge. And so any small change, any small truce, even if it's temporary, is a big deal. It's good for our economy.

[Max Chafkin]

I mean, I totally agree that China's an important trading partner, but like this deal, I mean, come on, like, you know what the stock market is doing as we record this? It's 11:29 on a Thursday. A deal was announced.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

You take your cues from the stock market.

[Max Chafkin]

It is down a third of a percent this the S and P. So like basically, investors were not surprised at all. No one's surprised you. Everyone can sleep through this. Press the snooze button. There are other and more important things happening in the world.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

All I have to say is if you are taking your cues on the economic wisdom of things from, from the stock market, you have way bigger problems.

[Max Chafkin]

I listen to the stock market when it agrees with me.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Okay, that actually seems like that. That I believe that I believe.

[Max Chafkin]

Let's get to Halloween, Stacy.

[Leo Feller]

Yes.

[Max Chafkin]

Obviously, this is a holiday where there's a lot of consumption. There's candy, there's kids on the street. I mean, look, it's a special day in the United States and in most of the world now, because we have managed to export this holiday even to Halloween, doesn't necessarily come naturally.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Well, Halloween is very delightful, and I think it gives us a moment in time to look at our fears and to face them, which is interesting, especially at this moment when there's a lot of economic fear broiling around. And as a matter of fact, I visited the site of some economic fear here in New York. They have a haunted bank that you can visit. So it's like a haunted house, but it's set up in an old bank building.

[Max Chafkin]

I love how, like, normal people are, like, afraid of, you know, dying or, like, falling from a high place or having their teeth fall out. But you, Stacey Vanek Smith, are afraid.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Financial crises. Financial crises are so much scarier. Do you. Financial crises can mess you up way more than, like, a werewolf or something. Anyway, I went to the haunted bank and talked with the people of the haunted bank to see why they had come. And I also went through the haunted bank myself. So here. Here's our trip through the haunted bank. What brought you to the haunted bank? I was just like, well, it looks fun. Do you guys find banks scary?

[Sean Fennesee]

Normally?

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

No.

[Haunted Bank Visitor]

No.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Do you find banks scary?

[Sean Fennesee]

Not really.

[Max Chafkin]

Oh, hello.

[Sean Fennesee]

Are you here to make withdrawal?

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Yes.

[Sean Fennesee]

Fabulous. Ow.

[Leo Feller]

Who's got the deposits ripped? Who's got the sl.

[Max Chafkin]

Fools. This vault was not made to hold cash. No. This vault was made to hold evil. What are you waiting for? Why are you standing here?

[Chase Inc. Business Premier Card Announcer]

It was pretty good.

[Sean Fennesee]

Yeah, it was pretty good.

[Leo Feller]

That was scary.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

We love scary stuff.

[Sean Fennesee]

I never screamed so much before.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

I don't know. Do you find banks scary? Normally, banks are not scary, but when they fail, it is scary. Right?

[Max Chafkin]

I work for J.P. morgan. That's why no one will work.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

That's why he quit. Well, does coming to this bank feel cathartic? Like a ghost bank?

[Max Chafkin]

Feels great. The whole place shut down. Happy for it. Wow, Stacy. That is why you get paid the big bucks. I gotta say, that was. That was phenomenal.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

My trip through the Hanukkah. Let me tell you what is even more wild. So I started looking into the history of this building. It's this beautiful building in Chinatown. I think you might know it. It's this big kind of art modern structure. It was built in 1927.

[Chase Inc. Business Premier Card Announcer]

Ooh.

[Max Chafkin]

Not great timing.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

There Right before the Black Friday, which crashed the stock market, led us into the Great Depression. And the bank in question was National City bank of New York, was at the time one of the biggest banks in the world and was one of the main banks that was pushing, borrowing money to buy stocks. So that bank is very responsible for the crash itself. That. That is so much scarier than the killer clowns in the vault.

[Max Chafkin]

I totally agree with you. And it makes me wonder, like, who put this together? Like, who's. Whose haunted house is this? Like, how much did you pay? Like, what?

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

The tickets are almost $50.

[Sean Fennesee]

Wow.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

And 500 people a day are going through it.

[Max Chafkin]

I gotta say. Like, I think they need to hire some, like, consultants to, like, you know, punch up their horrors, right? Like, they're like. It sounded like it was like a evil bank teller or whatever.

[Leo Feller]

Like, they.

[Max Chafkin]

They need to explore the terrors of like, a credit crisis or. Or like, structural spillover or like, you know, financial panic.

[Sean Fennesee]

Credit def.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

The private credit market is imploding. That, Max, is scary. By the way. It goes through the early part of November, so good luck. You can still visit and take the family.

[Max Chafkin]

A lot of kids there. A lot of kids at the haunted bank there were.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Oh, the only kid I saw came running out crying. The scary clowns in the vault were really scary. They were like yelling at you and it was scary. I don't like clowns.

[Max Chafkin]

What did the clowns say? This is a vault for evil?

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

No, the clowns were the ones like the deposit slay. They were the ones you had to give the deposit slip, too. I couldn't figure out what was going on, but I did manage to hand over the deposit slip.

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[Stacy Vanek Smith]

So, Max, the Trump administration has been making some pretty seismic changes to the US economy. We just talked about tariffs. Another one of the big, big ones is immigration.

[Max Chafkin]

Yeah, and in a way, I think harder to get your arms around because it's happening in this way that's extremely diffuse, right you have, you have all of these sort of raids. You have kind of people maybe who.

[Leo Feller]

Are afraid to go to go to.

[Max Chafkin]

Work or concerned about arrest. But also, in addition to being very diffuse, we. You see it, it's also in your face. There have been these images, these very powerful images of. Of immigrants being hauled off into detention sites.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Yes. I mean, the images, like you say, have been very powerful. And I got a call, in fact, from economist Martha Gimbel earlier this week. She.

[Max Chafkin]

Friend of the show.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Friend of the show, yes. She heads the Yale Budget Lab. And she told me that an economist she knew had just had his home raided by ICE agents. His home renovation project.

[Max Chafkin]

You know, economists normally don't get into the news this way. And. And this is even more amazing because our guest, Leo Feller not only had this experience, but he had been tracking the economic impact of all of this policy. All of this trump immigration policy professionally.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Yes. And its effect on consumer spending. And so we're very lucky to have him with us. Leo Feller, an economist who's worked at ucla, Johns Hopkins, the Justice Department. Welcome to the show.

[Leo Feller]

Thank you for having me on your show.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Absolutely. You know, a lot of us have been reading about and seeing images of ICE raids for months, but you experienced one firsthand. Do you mind just kind of laying out what happened?

[Leo Feller]

So I've been doing a construction project on my home. I own a home. Starting in around October. Construction crews have been here to remove the old siding, remove the old windows, put new ones in. And this past Friday, October 24, at 11:50am the workers were taking a lunch break and eating lunch on the stoop. And suddenly a white van pulls up. Another white SUV pulls up. Nine agents jump out of the car, or we presume they are agents because they were masked and wearing camouflage gear. But they never announced themselves. They hopped over a locked fence and chased the workers through a construction site into the backyard. One of the construction workers was able to come in through an unlocked door in the back. Another construction worker climbed onto a balcony. The federal agent climbed onto the balcony of my private home trying to chase this construction worker. A third construction worker went to the garage. A federal agent entered that garage. Throughout this time, my tenant who was home was asking, where is your warrant? Show me your warrant. You do not have a warrant. This is private property. Get off.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

You weren't home at this time?

[Leo Feller]

I was not home at this time. I was actually in Toronto, Canada, for a client meeting. I was watching this all through security camera footage. And so I was watching it live. As it was occurring. And I also yelled into the ring cameras for them to get off the property.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

So how did this look when you got the alert? So you're at this meeting and like, something pops up on your phone, like, tell us, like, walk us through that moment.

[Leo Feller]

It was jarring. I can see the agents jumping over a locked fence. And this is a five foot tall fence with spikes on top, right? This isn't like a little white picket fence. This is a wrought iron security fence meant to keep people off the property that was locked. And you can see the agents jumping over it. At that moment, I thought, oh, my gosh, this is. This is really bad. I called the tenant right away and I said to her, I was assuming it was ice. ICE is on the property. Make sure the doors are unlocked so that the workers can get in. I was actually in a hotel lobby as all of this was happening, and I start shouting into, you know, the phone, into the ringcut camera, right? Ice, you do not have permission to be on my property. Get off my property. You do not have permission to be here. Where is your warrant? Canadians are looking at me like, what. What the heck is going on? And I looked back at them and I said, you. You can't possibly be imagining what's happening right now in the United States.

[Max Chafkin]

I mean, the amazing thing, and you kind of alluded to this, Leo, is that this whole raid is documented. And, you know, because of ring cameras and because, I guess as this unfolded and, and this is one of the things that, to me is so interesting. Just, you know, a bunch of the neighbors came out and. And also were upset about this. And so there's cell phone videos there. There's videos from the cameras on your property. I think we should just play like a tiny bit of the audio from this just to give people a sense of. Of what's going on and what this sounded like, what it felt like.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

That is, I don't. What is it like to hear that right now?

[Leo Feller]

It gives me chills to hear it. I'm a U.S. citizen. I never thought I would be this afraid of my own government. This is the kind of thing that you see in third world countries where, you know, armed military men and fatigues raid your property without a warrant. This isn't the kind of thing that should be happening in the United States. We have a Fourth Amendment to the Constitution that protects us as U.S. citizens, as property owners from these kinds of raids.

[Max Chafkin]

How did this resolve itself? Was anyone detained? Yeah. Did any of them go away in the van?

[Leo Feller]

So one Worker was detained. One worker managed to run, and a neighbor pulled that worker into their car and drove them away. Two other workers were pretty beat up, right? They were bloody. And they were eventually able to come into my home since the door had been unlocked. When I came home, I spent pretty much an all nighter cleaning up the blood. There was blood everywhere. Right? This was a very violent raid. The one who was detained was taken to a facility in Broadview. I and the neighbors raised money to pay for an attorney and we pulled an all nighter together to write a writ of habeas corpus to say that the way that this worker was detained violated the Constitution. Because it appears, right, that agents came onto my property without a warrant, since they never showed a warrant, and essentially, effectively, you know, burglarized my property by coming into my garage, by coming onto the balcony, and then, you know, took someone away.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

I mean, the legality of these raids has been questioned in a number of ways by a number of judges. The raids, however, are continuing, and the Trump administration is insisting that they are legal. As an economist, I imagine you've been reading about the ICE raids and the sort of change in policies towards immigration the Trump administration has put in place. You experienced it firsthand. Did that change at all your thinking about this issue or illuminate part of it? Like, how has this experience changed your thinking? I guess if it has, I already.

[Leo Feller]

Knew that these raids were having a chilling effect on the consumption of the buying patterns of first generation Hispanics. I have access to wonderful proprietors data that shows me the purchases that 200,000 households are making at representative households across the United States are making at places like Walmart and Costco and Home Depot and also mom and pop bodegas. And one of the things that we can see is that Hispanic households, first generation Hispanic households, have been pulling back. And that suggests to me that, that, you know, they're less able to earn income, right? As is the case with these construction workers, right now, they're out of work because they can't come to a construction site. They are injured. There might be fear about going to construction sites, but also it just might be harder for them to get a job because people like myself, who would normally hire a repair person to come to their property and do something, who might hire a gardener or a cleaning lady, we are going to be more fearful of hiring these people if it means that the government can invade our properties to try to detain them. And so we've seen consumption come down amongst this cohort. I'll give you an anecdote. I had one worker here for a separate project, right? This is a big home renovation project. I had another worker here who is a US citizen, speaks perfect English, but is very clearly Hispanic. And he told me that he's no longer going to the gym because he's afraid of being picked up. He goes to work, which he has to do, and he goes home. And he was admiring, I have some free weights here at the house. And he was asking me about those because he said, you know, I might just have to pick up some free weights so I can continue working out at home simply because I'm afraid of going to the gym. He also asked me to go and pick up some items at Home Depot for him because he was afraid to go to Home Depot. And that's because there have been raids at Home Depot, right? At the parking lot of Home Depot against day laborers. And he said, like, look, I'm happy to do the work for you at your home, but I will not drive to Home Depot.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Now, a lot of the argument that the Trump administration has made has been economic and campaigned on around immigration has been economic. The idea that people are coming to this country, they're not necessarily documented, and they are taking jobs in an economy that is softening, in a job market that is getting weaker. And so this is actually sort of going to eventually boost the US Economy. Like, yes, this may cool spending among people, this may have a dampening effect on certain things, but in the end, this is gonna open up jobs for citizens. Can you talk about that?

[Leo Feller]

There is so much economic data that says that that theory is incorrect. So when immigrants first come into this country, they do take that very first rung on the ladder, right? They take the jobs that no one else wants to take, but that pushes everyone else who is on that first rung up the lap, on the ladder, up into the second rung. We saw this. There's some great research by, you know, Nobel Prize winning economists on what happened when this surge of immigrants came to Florida. When you had the Muriel boat lift, right? When Cubans were allowed to flee into Florida. Florida accepted these immigrants with open arms, right? For a year or so, it was a hardship on Florida because they were supporting all of this new immigrant population. But ultimately, these immigrants generated so much demand, right? Immigrants demand housing, they demand food, they demand services. They also work very hard in sectors that, you know, that we really need more labor for, right? AI is not going to be able to put windows and siding on my house. Artificial intelligence can do lots of things. It can't do that. Right. Artificial intelligence right now is not going to care for my aging parents as a home health care aide. So there's a lot of jobs that immigrants do that actually free up labor to then take other sorts of jobs. And I will give you an example right now with construction. Construction. The fact that there's construction workers working on putting windows in sidings allows the American worker to become the head contractor to be the one that's going out and generating new business, being the one who's going out and creating the business that does the installations of sidings and windows, the way that this has an impact on the broader economy. And again, let me give the example of my home construction project. It's a $300,000 project on a multifamily building with three different units. Even though I'm paying $300,000, only a tiny fraction of that is actually going to the workers that were here putting up the windows and the siding. Most of that money is actually going towards Marvin Windows, which are the windows that we're installing. Marvin Windows. I looked at their website. It says all Marvin products are proudly made in the usa. They are made in Roanoke, Virginia. So if I'm not buying Marvin Windows because I can't find workers to install the Marvin windows, ultimately most of the harm isn't just concentrated in Chicago. It's also affecting those workers in Roanoke, Virginia, who are producing Marvin windows. The James Harding siding is produced in Prattville, Alabama, as well as Illinois, Texas, Florida, Nevada, Virginia, Washington. It's not a huge impact since it's just right now. My project that I'm speaking of may be projects in Chicago, but the more these raids occur, the more this is going to have a broader effect on the overall U.S. economy.

[Max Chafkin]

You know, we're talking about the economic impact of this. You're talking about it in very broad terms. I'm kind of curious. What is your strategy as an employer going forward on a very, very small scale?

[Leo Feller]

Well, so first, let's back up, right? I didn't hire these workers directly. I hired a large and reputable contracting company. That large and reputable contracting company then hires subcontractors.

[Sean Fennesee]

And.

[Leo Feller]

I'm a little limited in going out and trying to find subcontractors and checking their legal status. And so most of us, when we go out and hire for a big project, we're hiring a company, and that company then hires workers. In my case, I'm just going to pause this project. Right. We've cleared the construction site. It's now completely clean. Maybe in April, May, when things are safe, the work will continue. There is no just crew of American workers that's sitting around waiting to finish up this project. And so, you know, it's really not that easy to go out and find workers who want to hang off of a four story ladder to put up a window and put up siding.

[Max Chafkin]

Leo Feller, thank you for joining us.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Yeah, Leo, thank you for talking with us.

[Leo Feller]

Thank you.

[Felix Salmon]

What are the consequences of getting on Europe's bad side?

[Canva Advertiser]

The rationale is more like those guys.

[Felix Salmon]

How is stealth wealth changing retail?

[Leo Feller]

You can have taste and still buy dupes.

[Felix Salmon]

What does a $6.2 million banana have to do with any of us? People don't like the attribution of serious financial value to comedy. Join me, Felix Salmon and my co hosts Emily Peck and Elizabeth Spires as we talk about the most important and obscure stories in business and finance. Follow Slate Money wherever you like to listen.

[Max Chafkin]

Stacy, I don't know if you knew this, maybe it kind of came up a couple weeks ago, but 2025 was supposed to be the year that saved the movie industry. It was supposed to be. This was supposed to be a big year at the box office.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

I mean, I feel like I did hear that, although I thought 2023 saved the movies.

[Max Chafkin]

Well, but it hasn't with Barbenheimer. It hasn't gone that way, though. The start of the year was bad. There were a bunch of flops this summer. They were all excited about Superman. Superman flopped.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

I didn't even remember that it came through.

[Max Chafkin]

It was a big deal. But anyway. Well, our next guest definitely remembers and is here to kind of help us try to understand what has been happening in the business of entertainment, where it's going. Sean Fenasee. He is the head of content at the Ringer, the co host of the wonderful Big Picture podcast with his co host, Amanda Dobbins. Sean, thanks for being here.

[Sean Fennesee]

Thanks for having me, guys.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

So, Sean, just to get us started, describe for us what the state of the movie business is right now.

[Sean Fennesee]

I think in general, the movie business is down. The number of tickets that are sold annually is down. It's been going down for 50 consecutive years as the onset of all kinds of new entertainment technologies have come into people's lives in more convenient ways. Going to the movies necessitates a night out. It necessitates you have to pay for your tickets and your concessions and your parking and if you're a parent, babysitters and a number of other things. And so it's an expensive hobby. And it's also a hobby that can be conquered if you're willing to wait two months till the film comes to streaming. So it's harder than ever to get people interested in doing that. But there are still definitely successes. I mean, this year is marked by a couple of really fascinating successes. Ryan Coogler's Sinners is probably the most important and interesting one. An original movie from a major studio and a celebrated auteur who also happens to have made a bunch of billion dollar movies in the past in the Black Panther films. And audiences love that movie. It made a ton of money. It was a huge part of the cultural conversation and is almost certainly going to be nominated for Academy Awards. That's like the old school movie business style. That's tic tac toe for a movie. So that is still possible. It is still possible to make a movie a special event along the lines of Barbenheimer, but it is fewer and farther between. It is no doubt harder to get people out on that opening weekend to get them to see a new film, especially if they don't know exactly what it is. And it's an original story.

[Max Chafkin]

I was just gonna say, and the crazy thing is, even Barbenheimer, like, it was good, but it wasn't like, historically speaking, it wasn't like a hu. It wasn't great. It was just kind of almost like getting back to some version of the past.

[Sean Fennesee]

I would argue it was a pretty big event. I mean, to me, that was the most significant cultural thing that happened in that year. It's just that it was just two movies. Like there weren't like 12 movies that did that. But there are not a lot of occasions where two movies are released on the same day and they both make a billion dollars. There's not a lot of precedent for that in Hollywood history.

[Max Chafkin]

So, Sean, the industry consensus was that the summer of 2025 was gonna be kind of the moment, the season that things really turned around. Coming out of the pandemic and all that. What has gone wrong?

[Sean Fennesee]

I think it's a series of events. There's some exhaustion in a handful of certain storytelling styles. Like obviously superhero films are at a low relative to the last decade. Jurassic Park, Rebirth was one of the biggest movies of the summer, but it was was the least successful of the recent Jurassic World movies. And so there wasn't a ton of other IP known legacy products for people to go check out. And so when you take a couple of those things off the board and a movie like Fantastic Four underperforms and Captain America 4 underperforms. All of a sudden when you look at the total box office numbers, it feels weak. But there were also positives. Weapons was a huge positive. You know, original horror movie from Warner Brothers that came out the first week of August, which is historically more of a dumping ground and made well over $200 million on a budget that is way lower than that. But that those are much harder to predict and much harder to identify if you're in the business to say, okay, we're going to put $40 million into this original horror movie and hope it becomes a sensation. And when the, when the IP stuff isn't working as well, it does threaten the scope of the business, how big it can possibly get. Whether we can ever get back to a time like 2019 when it felt like there was no stopping movie going.

[Max Chafkin]

I mean, the weird thing for me is that my friends, at this very moment, the thing they're talking about is a movie. It's the movie. One battle after another. That movie has been this huge critical success. It also has made a lot of money for like a P.T. anderson movie. P.T. anderson, the director? Like a lot for like an indie, a serious like arty movie. But also like I've read these stories saying actually it's like not going to make any money because even though it's done like 180 million at the box office, it cost over 100 million to make. And like when you add in the marketing and so on. So like, I'm curious, Sean, like, first of all, is that movie a success? And like, how do studios think about movies like that that get like a lot of buzz, that maybe get Oscar nominations, that maybe build a lot of goodwill but don't necessarily like earn out.

[Sean Fennesee]

It's a little hard to say on that one in particular until the spring. It's a movie that I think it making. It will end up making roughly $200 million worldwide at the box office, which for a Paul Thomas Anderson movie, as you mentioned, is extraordinary. That's essentially three times as much as any movie he's made has ever earned. But it did cost, it sounds like well over $140 million. So then, yeah, when you add the marketing, that's basically 2x it would need to make $300 million or so they say at the box office to be profitable in theaters. But here's the thing. It's the best reviewed movie of the year. It's probably going to be nominated for somewhere between nine and 12 Academy Awards right now. It's the odds on favor to Win Best Picture. And that means it's a movie that has a chance to become a forever movie. And if you become a forever movie, it's an annuity. It means that it is a revenue stream in perpetuity because it's a movie that people love and want to rewatch and want to pay for on streaming and want a license on streaming and they want to own physical copies of it and it can play in repertory theaters forever. And so there are a lot of films like this in the studio business, libraries that are still valuable to them that were made 30, 40, 60, 80 years ago.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

So you mentioned that moviegoing has been on the decline for a while. 2025 is not a great year for movies, or at least hasn't been. Are you worried about the industry as a whole?

[Sean Fennesee]

Not really. I think you just really, if you're a person in my job, you have to accept that the movie business is getting smaller. And I'm a big believer in a practitioner of the philosophy of movies as the great American art form that it is, the thing that we helped to develop and perfect and ship overseas and influence the world with. It is the most powerful art form that we ever created. And it isn't as important as it was in 1958. And it's never going to be that important again. You kind of got to get your head around that a little bit and accept it. If you are talking about movies every day like I am, but it doesn't mean that it isn't going to exist because like I said, I'm raising a four year old and every day she's like, can we watch a movie? Like, it's just, it's the perfect container for emotional entertainment. And it's better than a streaming TV show. It's better than a record that you've heard a hundred times. It is something, it is like it's the sensation of new and the opportunity to be thrilled every day. So I'm not worried about movies going anywhere. I don't think they're threatened in any meaningful way. I do think that the way that the movie business is organized is obviously dramatically changing and is going to continue to dramatically change. And I think it's probably going to end up being something closer to more like live events where it feels more like a concert, you know, and everything will be a little bit more premium and there will be fewer things to choose from. But the things that you're choosing from might look more like Christopher Nolan's the Odyssey next summer where everyone you know is going to say have you seen that? We have to go see that. This is really important that we all see that. They want it to feel more like a Taylor Swift album than they do an art house film. That's not great for the art, in my opinion, but it will help the business in some ways.

[Max Chafkin]

So do you think like we're going to look back on 2025 as like another down year for movies once the bookkeeping is all done?

[Sean Fennesee]

I think it's going to be more or less a hold, maybe a slight disappointment. The numbers are not like dramatically down in any way. It's just that I think some titles that were expected to be massive were not as big as expected. It's just like baseball for me. It's just wait until next year. Every year where like anticipating what's coming soon is a huge part of the work that I'm doing on my show. And so, you know, next year. The Odyssey is coming next year. There's a new Alien film from Steven Spielberg. You know, like there are a couple of things that are coming out next year that are gonna be very exciting. I never give up hope on the movies.

[Max Chafkin]

Let's talk about these horror movies. Cause Sean brought them up, right? Like this is like one, this is like a real bright spot for the industry. Not just the two you mentioned, but I think there are a bunch of other big ones that have come out recently. Why is this genre such a great business?

[Sean Fennesee]

It's a good question. I think there's a few reasons. One, that communal aspect that I was talking about. It's very fun to see a horror movie with a crowd. It's fun to hear people scream. It's fun to hear that nervous laughter. It's fun to hear people yelling at the screen sometimes. Don't go in that room to. The movies are pretty cheap to make relative to Jurassic World and Superman. And you have a really a built in fan base. I say this as, as a horror psycho fan who will pretty much show up for anything. You know that the Bard quality is lower and we're kind of like we're willing to eat gruel even if it gives us our horror hit. And that doesn't mean that there isn't like great artistic horror films out there. There have been a bunch this year. But you know, like one of my favorite movies of the year is called Final Destination Bloodlines. It's the sixth movie in the Final Destination.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Oh my gosh. Really? That's one of your favorite movies of the year?

[Sean Fennesee]

Yeah, it is final.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Is the villain still death?

[Sean Fennesee]

Yeah, the Villain is still Death. Yes. Okay.

[Max Chafkin]

Spoiler alert.

[Sean Fennesee]

Whoa. Death's design.

[Max Chafkin]

Actually, if you don't know that by.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Now, you have bigger problems.

[Sean Fennesee]

There hasn't been a Final Destination movie in, like, over 12 years.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

And it was.

[Sean Fennesee]

And they revived this franchise, and it was really, really fun. And this movie made over $200 million as well. Like, as a huge hit, despite being the sixth entry in kind of a second tier horror franchise. So, like, movies can still do this. Whenever we get into the doomsaying conversation, I do point to things like that to say, like, hey, people did get a babysitter. You know, they did board their dog for the night. Like, they did do all the things they had to do to go see Final Destination Bloodlines. So not all hope is lost.

[Max Chafkin]

All right, so, Sean, you're a horror psycho. Like, what are you gonna be watching? Give us some recommendations, those of us who are looking for something. Something to watch on Halloween night or over the weekend.

[Sean Fennesee]

Okay, I'll preface this by saying that I am very much a disciple of all of the masters, of John Carpenter, of Tobe Hooper, of Wes Craven. I worship all those filmmakers. I love Ridley Scott's Alien, all of the classics. I don't know if listeners need to hear, like, you should check out John Carpenter's Halloween. Like, I think everyone knows that that's a. A very special movie. There are a couple of movies in more recent history that I think are very effective. Some known, some not as well known. But I was just speaking with my wife about this the other night, and I said, let's try to watch this movie. I want to say it was roughly 2009. A director named Brian Bertino, who kind of came out of nowhere, had a horror movie called the Strangers. Have you seen the Strangers, guys?

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

No.

[Max Chafkin]

No.

[Sean Fennesee]

Okay. The Strangers stars Liv Tyler and Scott Speedman as a couple who live in a cabin in the woods. And one night, a group of people wearing masks knock on their door and just start menacing them. And at first it seems like it may be teenagers playing a prank or someone like a townie who just has a problem with these people who've just moved into town. And then over time, it becomes much more malevolent and not necessarily supernatural, but genuinely unnerving. Okay, that's one. I'll give you another one. Have you seen the Changeling? Do you know about the Changeling?

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

I do know about the Changeling, but I have not seen it.

[Sean Fennesee]

Okay. It's a movie from the late 70s starring George C. Scott, about a widower who moves into a Lonely old house by himself. And things start happening in the house and they're not good. George C's got one of the great, like, convulsive yellers. Yes, Patton, of course. A very intense actor, Kind of a maniac himself, a psycho himself. And he is being taunted by this force that is in the home. So I highly recommend that one third one. How crazy do you want to get crazy? Do you want to hear me say the word cannibal Holocaust? Like, there's a movie that is called Cannibal Holocaust that maybe most people would not want to watch. But, like, we could go.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Magnus is. Is nodding his head gravely.

[Max Chafkin]

He's like, cannibal Holocaust. That's the good one.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Like Sharknado.

[Max Chafkin]

He's giving us a thumbs up.

[Sean Fennesee]

It's much more evil than that. No, Sharknado is fun. Cannibal Holocaust is very dark.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Okay, Max, what about you? Like, what are your favorite horror movies?

[Leo Feller]

I gotta.

[Max Chafkin]

I gotta admit something. It's kind of. I feel like.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

What?

[Max Chafkin]

Like, this is not a cool thing to say, but I am not a huge horror fan. My plan was to watch the World Series on Friday night. Well, depends on, like, a real American feelings about baseball.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

That could also be quite scary.

[Max Chafkin]

What about you, Stacey?

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

So as far as things that scare me, I am. Slashers don't scare me that much. But ghosts scare me a lot. I get really scared by the supernatural. I don't get that scared by, like, killers. Cause I feel like you can just lock the door. You know what I mean? Like, you're aware of the limitations of the killer, but the ghosts.

[Max Chafkin]

Cause they can go through the door.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

They can go through the door, right? You don't know the rules. That is just terrifying to me. So the scariest movies for me that I have seen, the Shining is definitely up there. The Exorcist scared me so much I started crying in the middle of the movie. I really love watching horror, but it affects me way too deeply.

[Sean Fennesee]

I always say that I love going to the movies to feel something. And horror movies think is the genre that makes people feel the most consistently. You know, to be scared and to be excited by a movie is very powerful. And horror is the best at that.

[Max Chafkin]

All right, Sean, Fantasy, thanks for being here.

[Sean Fennesee]

Thanks, guys. Great talking to you.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

So, Max, it is now time for our underrated story of the week. And I am especially excited for this week because it involves candy.

[Max Chafkin]

I hope you didn't eat too much before this podcast. So Underrated story. There have been a couple of pieces about this. The One I found was in the New York Times. It was about the hot trends in candy in honor of Halloween. Now, I gotta say, like, I don't know. First of all, according to the National Retail Federation trade group, spending on candy is gonna be a record $3.9 billion in 2025. That's the prediction in the United States. And this story proposes a bunch of trends, some of which I kind of question because there's not a lot of data, some of which I can 100% back up based on my anecdote of my three children. For instance, the big trend now, the big trend in candy, Stacy, is sort of extreme flavors. Like, okay, forget like Reese's peanut butter cups. It's all about extreme sour and also extreme textures. So experiential candy, experiential candidate. And there's a funny quote in this story from a. A like, I don't know, consumer behavior person trying to explain why these kind of extreme candies are so popular. It says one theory is that young people, quote, want an antidotes to increasingly virtual, repetitive and isolated daily lives. Says somebody who's the director of food and drink at a market research that's.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Putting a lot on candy.

[Max Chafkin]

So, Stacy, I have dumped a bag of candy on the table. I went with my daughter Alice, who's 10, to a new York City bodega.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Thank you, Alice.

[Max Chafkin]

In Queens. And asked her, like, Alice, show me the hot candy. Show me the candy that all the Generation Alpha is excited about. And. And the first one that she picked, which I knew she would pick, because, like, my kids are crazy about these things. It's called a nerds gummy cluster. Have you ever?

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

I have heard of these. I've never had one.

[Max Chafkin]

All right, so I've got some of them here. I'm gonna open it up. I've never had one either.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

What is the big deal with.

[Max Chafkin]

With these, like, honestly don't know. They look really bad for you. Here, I'll put a few on the table for you. It sort of looks like. You want to describe it? Sure.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

It is like the size of a marble. And it's like a little gummy sphere and it's covered in nerds.

[Max Chafkin]

It's like a raspberry. Almost like mine looks sort of like a berry.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

It's very sugary foul.

[Max Chafkin]

Okay.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

It's actually pretty delicious.

[Max Chafkin]

All right, the next one. And she was really excited about these. These are sources sour. Sorry, super sour gushers.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Oh, I remember gushers.

[Max Chafkin]

Well, now you've got super sour gushers. So.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Okay, super sour Gushers.

[Max Chafkin]

Gushers look foul, but they look like gushers.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

I mean, I used to eat gushers when I was a kid.

[Max Chafkin]

All right, ready?

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Okay. I think they taste the same. They're not sour at all. Is your source.

[Max Chafkin]

No, that's kind of bland. I don't know what this is. It's a.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

That's a gummy burger.

[Max Chafkin]

It's a gummy burger. I. I think she just wanted to eat this, like, when she bought it. And I don't know how we're gonna split it.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

We can. We can take it apart.

[Max Chafkin]

Here you go.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

It's okay.

[Max Chafkin]

And then we have to. Okay, well, let's have the gummy burger first.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Okay. It's a mini burger. It basically looks like a tiny gummy hamburger. Here, we'll split it.

[Sean Fennesee]

It.

[Leo Feller]

All right.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Oh, my gosh.

[Max Chafkin]

Are you into that?

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

It's really. I'm not sure I can bite through it.

[Max Chafkin]

It's, like, so hard.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

It's like a sole of a shoe.

[Max Chafkin]

All right.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

This is the future of the candy economy.

[Max Chafkin]

Now, the last.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

I am underwhelmed by these candy innovations. I think these just taste like the candy I grew up with.

[Max Chafkin]

The other thing that I understand to be a hot new candy is salted licorice from Sweden.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Swedish candies is very hot right now.

[Max Chafkin]

And luckily, our producer, our supervising producer, Magnus Hendrickson, is Swedish, and his Swedish mother sent us some salted licorice.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

This is Magnus's mom.

[Max Chafkin]

I know that you love salted licorice, Stacy, so I like licorice.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Oh, my God.

[Max Chafkin]

Before we started taping, Stacy was like, it tastes like peanut pee. It doesn't taste great.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Oh, I don't understand.

[Max Chafkin]

Oh, my God.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

I don't understand.

[Max Chafkin]

It gets worse and worse as you. As you masticate it.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Oh, my God. See, the pee comes later.

[Max Chafkin]

It's. It's a bottom note or whatever.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

See in the back of your mouth.

[Leo Feller]

Right.

[Max Chafkin]

Listeners, if you have a favorite candy or if you have any thoughts on this episode, send us an email. Everybody'[e-mail] that's. Everybody's with an [e-mail] we heard that super powerful story about the ice raids from Leo Feller. Like, I'm kind of curious what people thought of it. Whether they've had similar experiences.

[Sean Fennesee]

Yeah.

[Max Chafkin]

Whether. Whether you agree with Leo's perspective. Disagree. Let's hear it. We'll read some of those emails when they come in.

[Stacy Vanek Smith]

Also, if you've experienced something like that, if you're hesitating to go out, to go to the gym, anything like that, we would love to hear your story.

[Max Chafkin]

This show is produced by Stacy Wong. Magnus Hendrickson, noted fan of Licorice, is also our supervising producer, Amy Keen. Our executive producer Sam Rogich handles engineering and Dave Purcell fact Checks Sage Bauman heads Bloomberg Podcast. Special thanks to Jeff Muskus, Julia Rubin and Maria Ling. If you have a minute, give us a rating or a review. It'll mean a lot to us. And if you have a story that should be our business, email us at everybody that's Everybody with an sloomberg.net thanks for listening and we will see you next week.

[Leo Feller]

Happy Halloween.

[Haunted Bank Visitor]

I'm Barry Ritholtz inviting you to join me for the Masters in Business podcast. Every week we bring you fascinating conversations with the people who shape markets, investment, investing and business. CEOs, fund managers, billionaires, Nobel laureates, traders, analysts, economists, everybody that affects what's going on in the market. Whether you own stocks, bonds, real estate, commodities, crypto. You really need to hear these conversations. Sometimes it's behaviorists like Dick Thaler or Bob Shiller. Sometimes it's fund managers like like Peter Lynch, Bill Miller, Ray Dalio. Sometimes it's authors. Michael Lewis, author of the Big Short and Moneyball. Regardless of the conversation, these are the folks that move markets each week. That's the Masters in Business podcast with me. Barry Ritholtz. Listen on Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.