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Meta Trims its Workforce for AI? & Trump Stamps 25% Tariffs on Steel
00:32:59
Meta announces another round of layoffs & more tariffs that hurt steel importers
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- [00:01]
Toby Howell
It's smart to always have a few financial goals and a really smart one. You can set earning cash back on what you buy every day. And with Discover, you can get this. Discover automatically matches all the cash back you've earned at the end of your first year. Seriously, all of it. And we trust you to make smart decisions. After all, you listen to this show see terms@discover.com credit card.
- [00:25]
Neal Freyman
Good morning Brew Daily Show. I'm Neal Freyman.
- [00:28]
Toby Howell
And I'm Toby Howell.
- [00:29]
Neal Freyman
Today hold on to your piggy banks because the Penn could be going extinct.
- [00:33]
Toby Howell
Then bust out the cardboard boxes in Menlo Park. Meta's layoffs have begun. It's Tuesday, February 11th. Let's ride.
- [00:47]
Neal Freyman
If you live in the U.S. open up Google Maps and scroll to the big body of water west of Florida. You'll notice a big change. The Gulf of Mexico has been officially renamed Gulf of America. The company said that it made the update in accordance with a new executive order from President Trump, citing long, long standing practice of changing labels based on guidance from countries. So at least for the next four years, people in the US Will see Gulf of America, people in Mexico will see Gulf of Mexico, and people everywhere else will see both names. Toby, what did you think when you saw this change?
- [01:20]
Toby Howell
I didn't think anything, Neil, because I didn't even notice it. I use something called Apple Maps which still has it as Gulf of Mexico. Yes, I will use this as an opportunity to advance my Apple Maps is superior to Google Maps agenda. People still remember Apple Maps original launch and how glitchy it was. But I'm telling you, give it another chance. It is far superior, but yes. Back to the news. Apple hasn't made any changes in Apple Maps yet, but it does redirect searches for Gulf of Mexico or Gulf of America to Gulf of Mexico Mexico. So clearly they are thinking about it. I wonder how long they will hold out. And I also wonder if a new administration comes in, if they'll change it back and it's just like a snip snap, snip snap. Gulf of America, Gulf of Mexico back.
- [02:06]
Neal Freyman
And forth, Apple behind Google. I mean Apple Maps buying Google Maps. It's what it's been like for the past decade.
- [02:13]
Toby Howell
My gosh, you are a Google Maps user. Okay, but let's hear a word from our sponsor. Wise business. Neil, have you ever tried to send money overseas?
- [02:22]
Neal Freyman
Unless you count buying Irish butter, then no.
- [02:25]
Toby Howell
Consider yourself lucky. There's hidden fees, there's stress. By the end, you almost want to send a thank you note to your.
- [02:31]
Neal Freyman
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- [02:41]
Toby Howell
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- [02:46]
Neal Freyman
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- [02:49]
Toby Howell
Why do you buy Irish butter?
- [02:51]
Neal Freyman
Deal higher butterfat content compared to the stock Standard American Butter obviously so Wise.
- [02:56]
Toby Howell
If you want easy international payments, visit wise.com/business that's wise.com/business if you're seeing a lot more open to work banners on LinkedIn this week, you're not alone. Metta began mass layoffs on employees across the world yesterday. According to reports, the company is cutting nearly 4,000 rolls, equal to about 5% of its workforce. These aren't your normal layoffs, though. Metta just reported record profits, a 48% operating margin, and the stock has gained 15 straight trading days, its longest streak ever. By every metric, this is a very healthy company, but Mark Zuckerberg thinks it can be healthier. These layoffs are performance based, targeting underperforming employees as determined by internal talent evaluations. It's a continuation of principles laid out in Meta's vaunted Year of Efficiency, which started in 2023 and aims to streamline operations in redirection resources towards AI initiatives. Case in point, Metta plans to start hiring machine learning engineers and other AI related roles over the next month, even as it trims its overall headcount. Neal the performance termination, as Metta calls them, are upon us.
- [04:06]
Neal Freyman
There is a big HR strategy shift underway in Silicon Valley. It's happened over the past few years and that is more cuts consistently. I mean, if we talked about this in 2017 or 2018, it would have been almost unheard of. These companies were growing very fast. They grew even faster during the pandemic. They grew their workforces substantially and now they're doing more periodic cuts. And it's not just Metta, it's Amazon too. It's Microsoft, it's Salesforce. There have been a lot of layoff announcements recently and it has to do with, yeah, it's these performance based cuts. It's not to reduce headcount. They're going to rehire the same amount of people just in other areas. And let's hear from Zuck to explain why he why this massive strategy change. And at a town hall meeting he says, I think this makes the company better. I'm not going to be apologetic for it. And I think most people here want to work with people who are going to be better fits. It seems like Silicon Valley CEOs want to shed their reputation of employing people like Big Head, who I don't know if anyone's seen Silicon Valley, but Big Head is this character who is a part of this massive tech company who consistently gets promoted despite not doing much work. And he's, he's just this small cog in a larger system. And I think that we've seen over the past few years tech companies are trying to shed that reputation.
- [05:31]
Toby Howell
And there has been almost a vibe shift, a lack of trust now between Silicon Valley companies and their employees. Because there used to be this model where employees had immense power. It's kind of what led to the nap pod in the office, the food every day, the perk, heavy culture. But now that vibe has shifted and a lot of people who are affected by this most recent round of layoffs say it's actually a huge black mark on your employment record. Because calling them performance based layoffs, now you have to enter the workforce having being laid off from matter under this label of saying you were an underperformer. So it really is, I mean we're talking, we're saying all these words, vibe shift, but it is distinctly a different era that we are entering into right now. And you're right that Zuck isn't shying away from it. He does say, if I think it can make the company better, why wouldn't I do it? I'm making your, the people you work with, higher performers. So this should be a good thing overall for the company.
- [06:24]
Neal Freyman
And this is part of the broader, what we'll call a white collar recession where high wage professional services workers are facing a much tougher job market than pretty much anyone else right now. If you go to the, the jobs report for January we just had last Friday, professional business services information sectors, which had been booming, shrunk by around 9,000 positions in January. Many job cuts have been announced in this area in particular. Once you're laid off from these type of positions, finding people that are willing to hire you is much tougher. And we haven't even mentioned the two letters that are hanging over all of this, which is AI. And a lot of the positions that Metta and Salesforce and Amazon and Microsoft, all these companies that have done these cuts are going to be hiring for is machine learning engineers and AI. So it's not necessarily a one to one match of AI is doing your job, but someone who is working with AI is going to be doing your job right.
- [07:22]
Toby Howell
There is this interesting subtext to all these layoffs is the fact that these companies are technically developing, employing employee replacing technology. AI agents are getting to the level where they can replace mid level coders. And don't take my word from it, that is Mark Zuckerberg's opinion. He said that AI agents will match good mid level engineers this year. That is a quote from 2025. So that is the subtext to it all, that you're cutting roles so you can hire up an AI, so you can technically cut more roles in the future.
- [07:54]
Neal Freyman
Now, just for some big picture numbers, it sounds like there's been or it feels like there's been a lot of job cuts this January. But if you go back to last January, there was a lot more. The figure for this January is down 40% from last January. Last January there were tons of cuts, especially in the video game industry, which was the most job cuts in January for 15 years. The trade war entered a new theater yesterday, one with a steel curtain. President Trump announced 25% tariffs on all steel and aluminum imports to the US beginning March 4 in a move that intends to protect and grow American production, but at the same time could disrupt trade with close allies. When it comes to making steel and sending it around the world, China is the world leader and no one else is close. Chinese mills crank out more steel and aluminum each year than the rest of the world combined. But the US Gets its steel from a group of closer friends. Canada is the number one supplier, followed by Brazil, Mexico, South Korea and Vietnam. And those are the countries most likely to be affected by 25% tariffs. But as Trump's tariff plans go, that he's targeting metals isn't surprising. Steel, which is a relatively small industry in the US But a politically sensitive one because of its home base in Pennsylvania, has been a pawn in trade wars for years. Trump imposed tariffs on steel and aluminum his first go round in office, and Biden mostly maintained those trade barriers when he was in the White House. Anyway, this caused a major market reaction. Stocks of American steel and aluminum producers like U.S. steel, Cleveland Cliffs and Alcoa surged while European producers fell. Toby Another big shake up to trade weeks into the new administration.
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Toby Howell
Yeah, let's actually go back to that 2018 year that you mentioned when Trump first instituted those 25% tariffs on steel. At the time, he cited national security as the big reason for it, but said another reason why he wanted to do it was to strengthen domestic production. And what were the results from that? They were a little complicated. Technically, steel imports to the US did fall, fall. They fell 35% from 2014 to 2024. But domestic steelmakers were still not producing enough to satiate U.S. steel demand. And they were still complaining that imports were continuing to harbor them. They're still complaining that to this day. So, technically, yes, it did bolster the domestic industry, but it's just we don't quite have enough production here to fully, you know, replace the demand that you would get from importing from countries like Canada, countries like China.
- [10:21]
Neal Freyman
And just to take a step back, the goal of tariffs is to make the steel and aluminum coming in from abroad much more expensive so that it makes the American production, American steel, more competitive. But there does appear to be just broad sectoral challenges and headwinds facing the steel industry of things like higher labor costs, higher energy costs. And the reason we import so much aluminum from Canada specifically is they have really cheap hydropower that power these mills, and they send it to the United States. United States is the largest consumer market. We consume the aluminum, and then we send the scrap metal abroad. We are the largest exporter of scrap metal. So that's kind of how the trade system has worked in a lower tariff environment. Now that tariffs are going up 25%, it could shake things up. But the US steel industry is still facing an uphill battle for various broader. For broader challenges. And unlike other tariffs that Trump has announced, these are not easily negotiated away. Right. So Trump. Trump announced tariffs, 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico, all imports. And then he went back on that because Canada and Mexico made concessions. But it's not clear whether there are any concessions that these countries can make to have these tariffs go away. This is more economic based. It's not based on immigration or drugs coming across the border. It's very clearly that Chinese steel is very cheap and depressing prices all around the world, which is making American steel less competitive.
- [11:53]
Toby Howell
Yeah, you're right. There is a distinction between tariff threats that are aimed at, you know, getting countries to the negotiating table, dealing with things like fentanyl, dealing with things like migration, and those that address us, you know, trade deficits, trade irritants. It looks like we're seeing this bifurcation of Trump's tariff strategy. One, let's go to the negotiate table. One, we're actually trying to bolster US.
- [12:15]
Neal Freyman
Domestic manufacturing, and we'll probably see some retaliation because whenever you put a, you know, a trade war, takes two to two to trade war. If you put tariffs on other countries, they are going to slap tariffs on you. And Europe has said that they're going to come out with tariffs on high profile American goods like Tennessee Kentucky bourbon and Harley Davidson motorcycles and Levi's jeans. Guess the coin flip was on President Trump's mind because right before the super bowl he dropped a copper plated bombshell. Trump said that he had ordered the Treasury Secretary Scott Besant, to stop producing new pennies. Why no new pennies? Government efficiency, according to Trump. He said, let's rip the waste out of our great nation's budget, even if it's a penny at a time, adding that pennies literally cost us more than 2 cents. He is absolutely right about that. The US Mint said last year that it cost 3.69 cents to produce and distribute a single penny, far more than the coin's face value of $0.01. All told, the Mint lost $85 million last year producing 3 billion pennies, which made up more than half of all the coins the Mint made. Why are we making so many pennies? Is an excellent question that no one has a good answer to. And Trump would seem to have broad support in his attack against the penny, which has no clear role in today's economy. The only problem is it's not clear whether he has the authority to unilaterally stop penny production. Congress, not the treasury, nor Fed for that matter, oversees the production of coins and operations at the Mint.
- [13:40]
Toby Howell
I thought you were going to ask a penny for my thoughts on this one, Neil, but I will give you my thoughts anyway. Elon Musk has come out and said this is not going to be a huge savings for the government, but any time we're spending more money on something that people don't actually use, that's an example of something we should probably change. But what if I told you Elon Musk didn't actually say that at all and in fact Barack Obama said it all the way back in a speech in 2013. So it really shows that this has been a decades long debate about keeping the penny around. It is this very emblematic thing of government waste. It's not huge amounts of government weight is $85 million in the grand scheme of things, but it's certainly one of those things where you look at it and say it's just brutal to produce something that literally is worth $0.01 for over $0.03. So you can just look at around the world though, to see that other countries have successfully done this. Many would probably be surprised to learn that Canada got rid of its $0.01 coin more than a decade ago. They just round up or round down at this point. So it might be tough psychologically for American consumers. You know, go to a convenience store and see their 99 cent Arizona Iced tea rounded up to a dollar. There is a legitimate psychological tax that happens when, when that occurs. So maybe it's been tough to get Americans on board with it, but this could be finally the death knell for the penny that is just probably overstayed. Its welcome.
- [15:04]
Neal Freyman
Can I play devil's advocate? Sure. So here's the, here's the argument for keeping the penny and you can tell me if you, if you are convinced. Well, the advocates for the penny are, are few, but they say that it would increase demand for nickels. And guess what? Nickels cost almost 14 cents to produce, which is way more than their face value of 5 cents. They're way more expensive to produce than nickels. And then as you just mentioned, we're going to be paying more for things. So Arizona iced tea is, is priced at 99 cents. Where we're all going to be pissing playing a dollar for that. Now is that not going to spark inflation? So are you convinced?
- [15:46]
Toby Howell
I mean, I'm not convinced really, because if you look at the cash transactions that Happen in the U.S. 86.9% of all transactions in the U.S. were cashless in 2024. So there, there really isn't going to be, you're not going to even know if you're using Apple Pay or credit card and you're tapping like, I don't think there's going to be this moment where you're like, oh shoot, I just got rounded up or rounded down. So I do think that we're just moving into a cashless society. So.
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Neal Freyman
Well, even if you're paying by credit card, they won't round up around.
- [16:13]
Toby Howell
Right? See, no, exactly, that's, that's the difference here is that, I mean, I guess some people still do use cash. Like again, the 86.9% isn't 100%, but it does look like this is something that just has enough momentum behind it. I really do wonder though, because part of the thing that keeps, you know, it around is just nostalgia for people. Like people don't want to get rid of this keepsake. They don't want to get rid of, of Abraham Lincoln. Which by the way, my fun penny fact is that Abraham Lincoln is technically the most reproduced piece of art in the world. The portrait of Abraham Lincoln on the penny. Because there have just been so many of them. There's been half a trillion produced over its entire run. So if you want a fun fact or a fun trivia fact, the most reproduced piece of art on earth is Abraham Lincoln's portrait. I completely zag there at the end.
- [16:59]
Neal Freyman
For a fun that's yeah, I guess my final point here is we're not really sure what the future future holds for the penny because as I said, Trump can't probably unilaterally do this. So he's going to have to get Speaker Mike Johnson on board and have have someone pass a bill that'll go through both chambers of Congress to end the penny. So we'll see what happens. There clearly is more momentum than there has been in recent memory to get rid of the penny.
- [17:24]
Toby Howell
Up next, it's time for Toby's.
- [17:30]
Neal Freyman
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Toby Howell
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Neal Freyman
Fund your account in five minutes or less and you could earn up to $10,000. Yes, 10K. When you transfer your old investment portfolio, start at public.com/morning brew that's public.com/morning brew paid for by Public Investing Full Disclosures in Podcast Description Listen to this fresh take on cruises.
- [18:26]
Toby Howell
Let's hear it.
- [18:26]
Neal Freyman
Virgin Voyages is not your average cruise line. Let's start with the food. You get access to more than 20 eateries on board, menus curated by Michelin star chefs.
- [18:36]
Toby Howell
Yeah, that does not sound like your average cruise experience. Plus, everything is catered to adults on these kid free cruises. Whether it's the entertainment, parties or relaxing spaces throughout the ship, it's all super lux.
- [18:49]
Neal Freyman
Virgin Voyages also hits so many interesting destinations on top of exotic ports throughout the Caribbean. They're launching themed summer cruises to the British Isles, Iceland, North America and the Mediterranean.
- [19:00]
Toby Howell
They've got the accolades too. They were just voted the world's best cruise line by Travel and Leisure and Conde Nast readers for the second year in a row.
- [19:09]
Neal Freyman
Book now@virgin voyages.com or contact your travel advisor.
- [19:14]
Toby Howell
All right everyone, I have a bit of a bizarre trend for you today. Ankle watches. No, people aren't rocking Rolexes above their cankles. Instead, it's Apple watches that have migrated down from the metacarpals to the metatarsals. The New York Times reported that a growing number of people are relocating their Apple watches down south in pursuit of better fitness tracking or a workaround to everyday inconveniences. Say you have tattoos on your wrist or a skin condition that interrupts the watch's sensors. Put it on your ankle. Maybe you're a health care worker who is barred from wearing things on your wrists. Put it on your ankle. Or maybe you're under the desk. Treadmill steps aren't getting counted while you work. Ankle watch could solve all your problems. The New York Times calls the small but growing group of believers ankle watch acolytes and describes how their fashion choice sometimes elicit some second or third glances while working out at a gym. One fitness influencer told the outlet that she often has to explain that no, she's not on house arrest wearing an ankle monitor. She just likes wearing it down there. But Neil, my big issue with this trend is that the sensors aren't designed for ankle use. Even if some people swear it tracks their steps more accurately when it is on their ankle.
- [20:27]
Neal Freyman
No. So the folks at Apple Insider did a test. They tried this one morning where they put an Apple Watch Ultra on their wrist and another Apple Watch on their ankle and took measurements and saw whether these were consistent. And no, they were not consistent. Blood oxygenation readings varied by 5%. Read 98% on the wrist, 93% on the ankle. Heart rate varied as well. The wrist sensor showed 75 beats per minute. The ankle watch read 63 and warned twice about a low heart rate. So there were some certain inconsistencies. They didn't make the Apple Watch for the ankle. And there are good and interesting reasons that I've never thought about why why an Apple watch would not work on someone's wrist. But maybe putting it on your ankle is not going to work for anything except maybe tracking steps.
- [21:16]
Toby Howell
Well, don't bury the lead here. What are those good and valuable reasons you put an Apple Watch on your wrist?
- [21:21]
Neal Freyman
You are. You're the Toby's trends.
- [21:23]
Toby Howell
Okay, okay.
- [21:24]
Neal Freyman
Well, I will tell you. One of them is if you have tattoos, it doesn't work. If you have tattoos, another person was was a mom walking her kids in a stroller. She would put her hand on the stroller and it would not count the steps that she was doing because apparently your arm has to swing and that is how Apple tracks your steps. So there are a number of use cases where people might not have the ability to wear an Apple watch. Another person just had a very small, small wrist and the band didn't work so she put it on her ankle. So there are reasons and maybe there is a market here for wearables that don't go on your wrist. That's what this kind of sparked.
- [22:05]
Toby Howell
For me, that really is. The final point that I will add here is that wrist watch heart rate monitors are actually not very reliable at all. There is just something about the skin contact that gets interrupted every once in a while. It is, you know, firing this green colored light and seeing how many red blood cells reflect it back. So it's just not quite as accurate as something like a chest rate monitor, a chest heart rate monitor or an arm heart rate monitor. So I will use my platform right now to say if you are seriously into fitness tracking, go get a reliable heart rate monitor. The Apple watch is whether it's on your wrist or your ankle isn't probably going to give you the most accurate data overall. Now let's sprint to the finish with some more headlines you may have missed. Up first, Elon Musk still hasn't closed the book on his beef with Open Air. A consortium of investors led by the Doge chief has submitted an offer of $97.4 billion to buy out the nonprofit that controls Open AI. It throws a multibillion dollar wrench into Sam Altman's carefully laid plans to convert the company into a for profit entity, something Elon has long railed against. Almond quickly rejected the offer, writing on X no thank you, but we will buy Twitter for $9.74 billion if you want for some decimal related smart smack talk. Neil is this must be fully serious? Who knows. But what the offer does do is stir up some questions as to how the nonprofit should be valued.
- [23:32]
Neal Freyman
Elon Musk replied to that Sam Altman ex post saying swindler. And really this is like Kendrick Lamar versus Drake. But for people whose favorite book is Sapiens. And the reason that this throws a wrench into Sam Altman's plans to make turn AI and Open Air into a for profit private enterprise is that this they need to when they break off from the nonprofit, which is what they want to do, they need to compensate the nonprofit arm of OpenAI and they probably don't want to pay that much. But the nonprofit has to accept the bid. That is accurate market value. So if there is an external actor saying oh, we'll pay $97 billion for the nonprofit, then the nonprofit can say Open Air lowball Bid will take that. They have to assess all bids, you know, compare them against each other. So what this does is set a starting price that OpenAI has to come and pay, probably pay a lot more than they wanted to for this nonprofit and sets up a bidding war.
- [24:33]
Toby Howell
Yeah, it's literally the fiduciary duty of the nonprofits board to accept the bid that values it at a fair market price. And Musk has said that he or will actually continue to bid up to outbid whatever bid Altman and co kind of come up with. So I don't think this is the end of it. I'm not sure if the board will ever get on board with Elon because the board is filled with some, you know, Sam Altman supporters. But it is a fascinating like again, I'm not sure how serious the bid is, but it is serious. Like he does have a consortium of investors. So I don't think this will be the last we hear of, you know, Elon Musk trying at the last gasp to regain control of the company that he and Sam Altman originally founded. All those years ago.
- [25:14]
Neal Freyman
President Trump signed an executive order that instructed the DOJ to stop enforcing a half century old anti bribery law. The Foreign Corrupt Practices act introduced in 1977, bans American companies from bribing foreign officials to win business. But Trump said while that sounds good on paper, in practice it's a disaster. He said the anti bribery law puts American companies at a disadvantage when competing for contracts overseas and that any firm that wants to do business internationally, even legitimately, gets investigated under the rule. Anti corruption critics say the executive order defanges what had been a key tool officials used to crack down on companies doing sketchy things. Last year, the SEC and DOJ filed 26 enforcement actions under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
- [26:00]
Toby Howell
Yeah, under Trump's interpretation of this is that a lot of deals get killed because nobody wants to run afoul of this law. They say he says that every time they pick up a phone they think that they might be going to jail. So he's trying to loosen these restrictions. It also is just a pause on enforcement. They're saying they just want to get a better understanding of how this law, fcpa actually functions. But remember, the intent of this law was to prevent American firms from, you know, taking part in a lot of the public corruption that does roll and run in some parts of the world. It was supposed to be this bedrock principle of how Americans do business abroad in how they operate overseas. So you can see why there's some, you know, pushback and some alarm bells ringing that we are going to undermine this bedrock of kind of doing business with integrity abroad. But you see, the DOJ did announce enforcement actions, 24 cases in 2024. So it isn't like this rampant thing that is constantly violated. But it is something that the DOJ does keep an eye on. 126 million people tuned in to watch Patrick Mahomes throw the ball repeatedly to Eagles players. And what was another record setting Super Bowl, Fox's main broadcast averaged 111.5 million viewers. But the sugar on top was its free streaming service tubi, which drew 13.6 million to push it into record setting territory. As cord cutting leads to drops in traditional TV viewing, the super bowl remains an unstoppable force. This was the third big game in a row to set a new viewership record. Neil the only people happier than Fox execs right now are probably Kendrick Lamar fans.
- [27:36]
Neal Freyman
Maybe Roger Goodell knows what he's talking about because we want the super bowl to happen on Saturday. He insisted that Sunday would lead to or always leads to better viewership. And this is an absolutely monster number. 126 million. Go back to 2021. 95 million people watch the Super Bowl. That came in under 100 million. Now we're back to 126. The most ever monoculture. The NFL is monoculture. Monoculture and I can't say that word. And I think, you know, most people tuned in, you're right, not for the football itself. But this was packed with celebrities both in commercials and on the, in the stands themselves. Trump Swift was there, Kendrick Lamar, Samuel Jackson, Anne Hathaway, I mean, the list goes on. And the super bowl does have a very long half life after the fact because these videos go viral and the chatter continues to stay. So we're on Tuesday and you know, a lot of super bowl storylines, whether it's Kendrick Lamar's jeans or Anne Hathaway dancing has still continued to this day.
- [28:39]
Toby Howell
I know I'm still reading all the, you know, the references in our halftime performance. I feel like I'm studying for a test, trying to pick up everything that, you know, he dropped in that performance.
- [28:48]
Neal Freyman
Don't even think about busking on the streets of Bangalore without a permit, even if you're a pretty famous ginger from West Yorkshire. Over the weekend, Ed Sheeran was stopped by police while holding an impromptu, impromptu street concert in Bangalore, a city of 13 million people in India. A viral video showed a police officer approaching Sheeran while he was singing the Shape of you and unplugs his microphone, which led to jeering from the crowd who was singing along. The police deputy commissioner defended their party foul, claiming Sheeran didn't have a permit and that their job was to keep this busy street moving. Lawmakers joined in, saying even global stars must follow local rules. No permit, no performance. Toby this would never have happened to Benson Boone.
- [29:30]
Toby Howell
Two takeaways from this one. Never knew the word busking until reading this story. Which just means to play music on the street for donations and to Ed Sheeran loves India. He is there in India for the second year in a row 15 day tour and it also shows that demand for live music in India has been heating up. He's got Ed Sheeran's got the rest of his tour to complete. It's on the heels of Dua Lipa doing a concert there. Coldplay went on a multi city tour as well. So I do think you are seeing the concert economy in India start to heat up.
- [30:00]
Neal Freyman
I don't know if he's going to like them anymore. I know he claims they got a permit. He said we we did all the paperwork. I was supposed to be out there. Everyone knew and he was putting on this, you know, strumming his guitar and his little little Elvish style. But apparently the officials crack down. Maybe we'll see Ed Sheeran, Super Bowl Performer one day. One day. Let's wrap it up there. Thanks so much for starting your morning with us and have a wonderful Tuesday. For any questions, comments or feedback, send an email to Morning Brew daily at Morning Broadcom. And if you're enjoying the show, share it with a pal, family member or co worker. Friends, don't let friends be uninformed about the cost of the penny. Toby who should everyone listening share the pod with today?
- [30:41]
Toby Howell
I want you to share the podcast with someone who should test out the ankle watch trend. Maybe it's just a small wristed friend, maybe it's someone with a sick wrist tattoo. But share with them, then report back as to how their ankle wearing went.
- [30:54]
Neal Freyman
Let's roll the credits. Emily Milian is our Executive producer. Raymond Lu is our producer. Olivia Graham is our Associate producer. Eugenio Ogu is our Technical director. Scoop Star Darius is on audio Hair makeup is free on Valentine's Day if anyone needs a hot date. Devin Emery is our Chief Content Officer and our shows are production of Morning Brew.
- [31:13]
Toby Howell
Great show today Neil. Let's run it back tomorrow.