Everybody's Business: The Business of KPop Demon Hunters

Summary

Odd Lots/Bloomberg Businessweek: “Everybody's Business: The Business of KPop Demon Hunters”

Air date: September 7, 2025
Hosts: Max Chafkin & Stacey Vanek Smith
Featured Guests: Joe Weisenthal (Odd Lots), Sam Sanders (The Sam Sanders Show)

Episode Overview

This episode dives into three central themes, all united by the concept of “situationships”—entities and relationships that are unstable, undefined, or in flux. The episodes’ key explorations include the legal and economic chaos surrounding U.S. tariffs (with a focus on the uncertainty for markets and businesses), the AI revolution as seen by students and experts, and the surprising blockbuster business of “KPop Demon Hunters,” Netflix’s breakout animated hit. The show is laced with pop culture references, lighthearted banter, and pointed economic observations.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Situationships in Economics and Policy (00:41–06:28)

• Theme Setting: Stacey defines “situationships” as “a relationship that’s kind of messy, not entirely defined, a source of a lot of drama.” Max and Stacey connect this to the uncertainty and drama in today’s economic climate—especially around U.S. tariffs, AI, and even the pumpkin spice latte economy.
• AI ‘Situationship’: At the heart of this week’s episode is the ambiguous relationship between companies, workers, and AI—“the ultimate situationship in our economy right now, at least this week.” (02:17, C)

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2. AI on Campus: Student Voices & Skepticism (02:32–06:28)

• Student Views on AI: Stacey interviews Columbia and NYU students about their use of AI. Notably, most students use it for light editing or research but caution against blindly trusting it:
  • “Take AI with a grain of salt... always double check, honestly.” (03:23)
  • “I don’t trust gen AI on super deep academic stuff yet.” (02:59)
  • One notable moment: Stacey slips in an actual chatbot’s (ChatGPT) answer—“AI is the greatest cheat code for college. I’m not even kidding.” (03:38)—and Max briefly wonders if she’s interviewed a robot.
• Skepticism from AI Experts: “The biggest AI haters are AI experts... because they actually understand the limitations of these technologies.” (05:09, B)
• Tech Adoption Insights: The “youngs” (young people) are more comfortable with AI, but also more critical and aware of its flaws than older users.

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3. Deep Dive: Tariff Turmoil & Market Reactions with Joe Weisenthal (06:28–22:43)

A. Tariff “Situationship”: Legality and Market Uncertainty (06:28–15:19)

• Tariff Legal Uncertainty: Trump imposed “Liberation Day” tariffs using the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). Now, their legality is questioned; the Supreme Court may invalidate them.
  • If overturned, “all the tariffs were invalidated and the US would have to refund the money it’s collected so far. It would be a mess.” (07:50, C)
• Markets Hate Uncertainty: “There probably is some truth to the idea that policy uncertainty is not great for the market and this would clearly reinject... policy uncertainty.” (09:31, D)
  • Trump claims, “the stock market needs the tariffs, they want the tariffs” (09:01, E/B), prompting Max to question if there’s any truth to it.
• Short- and Long-Term Mess: Removing tariffs = legal, logistical, and economic confusion for businesses and the government.

B. The Real Market Drivers & “Uncharted Territory” (09:31–22:43)

• Stock Market Thriving Despite Tariffs: The market is dominated by “gigantic tech companies... an industry and space largely unaffected by the tariffs.” (10:07, D)
• Federal Revenue Worries: Tariffs generate significant government revenue. If lost (due to legal action), there’s anxiety about “the fiscal equilibrium.” (10:51, D)
• Institutions in Crisis:
  • “A lot of institutional arrangements which had been perceived to be stable are perceived to be less stable.” (18:43, D)
  • Discusses the weird “situationship” where TikTok is technically illegal but the ban isn’t enforced, forecasting greater instability if similar chaos spreads to tariffs.
• Tariff Persistence & Path Dependency:
  • “The longer these tariffs exist... the more likely it is that they will exist forever... any company that is making domestic investments predicated on the existence of tariffs—that company is a perpetual lobbyist for the existence...” (15:19, D)
• Bond Markets React: Elevated bond yields reflect political and institutional risk, not just direct tariff effects.

C. Memorable Musical Analogy (21:04–22:43)

• Stacey invokes The Clash: “‘Should I stay or should I go’—if [tariffs] stay in place there’s going to be trouble, if they go away it’ll be double.” (21:33, C)
• Joe Weisenthal: “We sort of arrive at these forks in the road and we’d sort of want them never to be resolved because neither of the resolutions seem great.” (21:40, D)
• Tone: Light, sardonic, referencing “uncharted territory” and investor anxiety.

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4. KPop Demon Hunters: The Surprise Blockbuster & Streaming Revolution (23:37–36:51)

A. How a Netflix Animated Film Became a Global Hit (23:50–28:39)

• Movie of the Summer: “KPop Demon Hunters” (animated musical) became Netflix’s cultural juggernaut, outpacing traditional box office hits and breaking into Spotify’s top global music charts.
• Sam Sanders’ Take: “It really surprised everybody—it surprised Sony, it surprised Netflix and I think that says a lot about how most executives in the entertainment industry actually don’t know anything.” (26:23, E)
• Business Model Shift: Netflix’s streaming success with this film (and bundled music impact) is changing how profitability and ‘hit-making’ are measured: “Whatever hard number [Netflix] give you about this movie, it’s less about that and more about winning the conversation and being seen as the biggest... streamer.” (28:29, E)

B. Why Nobody in Hollywood Saw It Coming (28:39–36:44)

• Collapse of Theater-First Model: Moviegoing is way down; studios bet on existing IP, but original hits like “KPop Demon Hunters” can break through via streaming.
  • “Only about 12% of Americans now go to the movies at least once a month... about a quarter... don’t go at all.” (29:21, E)
• Sony-Netflix Deal: Pre-pandemic deal gave Netflix all rights in exchange for a flat fee; Sony saw little upside from the mega-hit. “Even when Netflix put [the film] in theaters for a weekend... Sony... saw none of that money.” (31:31, E)
• Moviegoing ↔ Opera Comparison: Sam Sanders: “Moviegoing in the classical sense... is going the way of opera.” (34:15, E)
• Need for Originality: Sanders warns Hollywood that reliance on sequels and IP has diminishing returns; “They’re gonna have to start taking chances again because the trough they’re feeding from is going to run dry.” (35:46, E)

C. Notable Quotes

• Sam Sanders (33:13, E): “I think that moviegoing does a lot for social and cultural adhesion... But I think the trend lines are inevitable... It’s going the way of opera.”
• Stacey (29:02, C): “Why does nobody know nothing right now?”

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5. Pumpkin Spice Tariffs and The Price of Nostalgia (37:00–41:20)

• Pumpkin Spice Latte Economics:
  • “Pumpkin spice season has launched... it is an economic force... visits to Starbucks go up by 24% in pumpkin spice season.” (37:46, C)
  • Prices for PSLs have risen ~70% since 2005, now approaching $7–8 (39:02, C).
  • Key Insight: All primary spices (cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves) are imported and hit by tariffs—raising costs.
• Wider Impact: “Pumpkin spice inflation alone... is going to reverberate earthquake style through the economy.” (40:56, C)
• Tariffs in Everyday Life: Max: “You don’t have to argue about it, you can just look at the prices... the prices don’t really lie.” (39:45, B)

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6. Listener Feedback & AI Skepticism (41:20–45:20)

• Emails Highlight:
  • AI critics among listeners describe its resource use and lack of real added value.
  • ML engineer listener: “Although [hosts] don’t always agree with Ed’s approach... he’s right about the fundamental disconnect between hype and reality... the ROI is highly suspect.” (42:59, B)
• Max’s AI stance: “Everyone should be an AI skeptic, especially if you’re a journalist.” (43:52, B)
• Ongoing Invitation: Listeners are encouraged to contribute stories and thoughts, especially on AI and media.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Joe Weisenthal on Tariff Instability (18:43, D):
  “A lot of institutional arrangements which had been perceived to be stable are perceived to be less stable... once again the Fed is a part of that and could have a factor in the degree of payment you want in order to keep your money in dollars long term.”
• Sam Sanders on Streaming’s Transformation (28:29, E):
  “Whatever hard number they give you about this movie, it’s less about that and more about winning the conversation and being seen as the biggest baddest best streamer.”
• Stacey on PSL Tariffs (39:36, C):
  “All these spices, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves... we do not grow them in the U.S... the places where the spices come from are all being hit by tariffs.”

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:41 — Theme intro: “situationships” explained
• 02:32 — Student interviews on AI; chatbot cameo
• 06:28 — Tariff uncertainty, legal jeopardy, and market dynamics
• 09:01 — Trump’s claim: “the stock market needs the tariffs”
• 10:51 — Tariffs as a revenue stream for the Treasury, fiscal worries
• 15:19 — Tariffs’ permanence, path dependency, and lobbying
• 18:43 — Institutional instability: Fed, TikTok ban, U.S. governance
• 21:33 — The Clash analogy: “Should I Stay or Should I Go” (Tariffs)
• 23:37 — KPop Demon Hunters: premise, impact, surprise success
• 26:59 — Explaining Netflix/Sony’s deal and the economics
• 34:15 — Sam Sanders: Moviegoing is “going the way of opera”
• 39:02 — Pumpkin spice latte inflation and tariff impact
• 41:27 — Listener feedback: AI skepticism and hype vs. reality

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Conclusion

This wide-ranging episode deftly connects the granular (tariffs on cinnamon) to the macro (political and institutional instability), layered with fresh reporting and cultural commentary. Listeners keenly interested in how global economic uncertainty, policy flux, and digital disruption reverberate from Wall Street to movie streaming—and even to their local Starbucks—will find this episode both lively and illuminating.

Transcript

[A]

Every business has an ambition paypal open is the platform designed to help you grow into yours with business loans so you can expand and access to hundreds of millions of paypal customers worldwide and your customers can pay all the ways they want with paypal venmo pay later and all major cards so you can focus on scaling up when it's time to get growing there's one platform for all business paypal open grow today at paypalopen dot com loans subject to approval in available locations bloomberg audio studios podcasts radio news.

[B]

This is everybody's business from bloomberg business week i'm max chaffkin i'm.

[C]

Stacey vanek smith and max i think the theme for this week is situationships.

[B]

I don't know where this is going.

[C]

But okay situationships as in a relationship that's kind of messy not entirely defined source of a lot of drama situationships.

[B]

All right stacy i'm going to work with you here because i think you're right a little bit like it does kind of describe our situation with tariffs right now yes maybe they're awesome maybe they're not maybe they're legal maybe they're not we've got joe wiesenthal of bloomberg's odd lots podcast friend of the pod here talking markets and tariffs also the.

[C]

Movie of the summer is well it's not in theaters max it is on netflix i'm sorry movie of the summer.

[B]

It'S on netflix i'm so exc i just want to say the title i.

[C]

Know the great sam sanders is here to talk go ahead k pop demon hunters k pop demon hunters max is very into this movie and we'll talk.

[B]

With sam about it and finally i'm told it's pumpkin spice latte season now i'm told americans love the flavor it's everywhere nothing is complicated about that one.

[C]

Right stacy except most of the ingredients are imported so tariffs are complicating our relationship with pumpkin spice lattes it's pumpkin spice tariff season season now i think right now in our economy the ultimate situationship is between companies workers and ai.

[B]

And we talked about this two weeks ago on the episode with zitron which people should check out if they haven't listened to there's all this promise with ai we're all a lot of businesses are super excited about it they're investing billions in some cases tens of billions.

[C]

Of workers that will be replaced by.

[B]

This technology in some cases right also the promise that it could create more jobs it's just it just feels like so much there is up in the air we really don't know anything yet except we're all spending tons of money.

[C]

On it yes well and i think things are changing really fast and everyone's like is this going to take my job is this going to help me do my job but i thought i would go to students because they are tend to be more comfortable with new technology on the cutting edge to columbia to nyu to kind of track down some students and ask them how they are using ai and here's what they said do you guys use ai yes all the time all the time we're actually ai students grad students really yes what do you use it for editing so like if you write a paper it could be like as simple as just like a text just to polish my language or just like some simple researches i don't trust gen ai on like super deep academic stuff yet and what about like with schoolwork is it like a big helper i would say take ai with a grain of salt because they make mistakes just like humans do as well always double check honestly.

[B]

It'S basically the greatest cheat code for college like i'm not even kidding i.

[D]

Do know a few people who have.

[C]

Used ai or chatgpt as kind of.

[B]

Like a friend like getting advice from.

[C]

I agree but i definitely think that.

[D]

Other people might find more comfort in.

[C]

Ai as a friend than what we might like to think i study actually.

[D]

In the field of public health i studied cancer and epidemiology we are actually working with ai like science studying and.

[C]

Working with it with the rise of ai like pretty much anything is possible.

[B]

Yeah i agree yeah oh my god oh god i'm so worried for our future really the ai students are they ai's or are they actual people what.

[C]

Do you mean well i just got.

[B]

Worried for a second that you had interviewed like a couple of chatbots there.

[C]

Was in fact a chatbot in the mix there was one of the answers was a computer it was the one who said that ai was the best cheat code i asked chatgpt to come up with like it's like defense of ai was like if you were an ai enthusiast what would you say and you were a student so he said like ai is the greatest cheat code i'm not even kidding and then i used descript the software program has ai voices that you can interject and so i mix that in but everybody else was real everybody else was a real.

[B]

Student okay a couple of things one is i'm glad at least one person said yeah you can't trust it for everything because yes yeah she was one.

[C]

Of the ai grad students yeah well.

[B]

That makes sense because she's actually an expert and the funniest thing about being an ai hater is that the biggest ai haters are ai experts in many cases because they're the ones who actually understand the limitations of these technologies whereas like people who are just like you know dipping in and out i don't know in some cases they're using it in dangerous ways like trying to trick their co host into misidentifying i think.

[C]

I was doing that for illustrative purposes not for gas mal intent no there was no mal intent i was just kind of showing you that if that voice had been like ten percent better i don't think you would have picked.

[B]

It up no yeah i don't know it's super interesting like i do think that the in terms of these like questions of new technology they're probably like two categories that are worth looking at like one is pornography because that's where all new technologies seem to start and the other are the are the youngs.

[C]

Who are using ai well i chose to go with the youngs for this episode because we are a family podcast max you do what you need to do for research max without a doubt the situationship i believe is dominating our economy right now at least this week.

[B]

Is tariff i hate the word but you're right this is that is what.

[C]

This is and i felt like it was really worth exploring this because i looked into this and since liberation day the tariffs have been like postponed paused modified you know enacted redacted more than a hundred times it has been so so much back and forth a lot.

[B]

Of defining the relationship going on lot.

[C]

Of like dtr talks that just seem to be going nowhere and in the latest twist there's a big question about their legality so trump used something called ipa to pass the tariffs that's the international emergency economic powers act it was put in place in nineteen seventy seven and it essentially because normally congress has to okay the tariffs this gives the president like an emergency power to override congress and just make it happen yeah.

[B]

And og listeners of everybody's business will remember that we talked about this when a lower court initially invalidated this basically said no the trump is sort of abusing this law he doesn't have all the power that he says he has to do these liberation day tariffs right.

[C]

He'S claiming the trade deficit is the emergency and so our trade deficit with all these countries is an emergency the supreme court is now going to be hearing this case and trump has asked to fast track it but if it doesn't happen it would mean all the tariffs were invalidated and the us would have to refund the money it's collected so far it would be a mess it was very complicated we decided we would bring in someone to help us kind of navigate like why the markets are reacting to this as they are.

[B]

Yeah we walked all the way over to the other side a journey of the floor where our desks are and.

[C]

Found joe weisenthal leaping over desks odd.

[B]

Lots podcast which is awesome if you don't listen to it joe is like one of the smartest one of the most entertaining people on markets agreed we.

[C]

Could find and here he is in the studio with us joe wiesenthal co host of odd lots welcome joe hi.

[D]

Thank you for having me well we're.

[C]

Very excited to have you here especially since we are confused max and i are confused right now and we're hoping you can clear this up so when tariffs were first put in place i think it's fair to say that some people liked them some people hated them the markets did not like them sure correct now that they their legality is being questioned it seems like the markets do not like the idea of the tariffs going away yeah and amid this.

[B]

Like ruling trump got up at a podium the market was going down and he said he said this let's just listen and now it's going to the.

[E]

Supreme court and we're going to ask.

[B]

For expedited and expedited ruling because you know when you look at the stock markets down today the stock market's down because of that because the stock market needs the tariffs they want the tariffs like i listened to that yeah and i was like okay trump's probably just saying that because he's likes the tariffs but like it made me wonder is there any truth to that does the stock market we can talk about the bond market too do the markets like the tariffs and some is there any aspect of this that is that that.

[D]

He'S right about i will try to maybe make the strongest defense of that claim which is there probably is some truth to the idea that policy uncertainty is not great for the market and this would clearly reinject i guess i suppose policy uncertainty on the volatility of the tariff policy is probably narrower than it was back in early april although there still seems to be changes every day so i guess the idea that the tariffs could be pulled out the rug from the whole thing i would not entirely i suppose discount the possibility that investors aren't crazy about that i don't really believe it directly i mean the thing is this market is driven by a handful of gigantic tech companies and it's mostly an ai story at this point and that is an industry and space that largely is unaffected by the tariffs so the market is up a lot since early april in part because there's been some walk back from the liberation day levels and also because nothing has derailed the ai story now there's one other element that could be interesting which is that there is quite a bit of revenue coming into the federal government thanks to the tariffs yes one of the anxieties in markets is what's been happening at the long end of developed market yield curves and sort of bond yields blowing out if there is some perception that okay deficits are already very wide and one of the few sources of growing revenue is going to suddenly disappear maybe there could be something where people get more concerned about the fiscal equilibrium and that having an effect that was kind of the story on tuesday like how far i would take that i'm not sure but i suppose i wouldn't completely say this is.

[C]

Not a factor i mean beyond just the uncertainty which markets notoriously do not like it also seems like if for some reason the tariffs are declared illegal this is just gonna be a mess because everybody would have to get their money back i can imagine businesses could sue the government for like lost business or increased costs i mean it seems like as much as you might dislike the tariffs as much as someone might dislike the tariffs doing away with the tariffs is a mess yeah it would.

[D]

Be a mess i mean there's sort of two things going on at once here that are both very interesting i think longer term economists would say look even if it's messy in the short term tariffs are bad tariffs create inefficiencies they create all kinds of problems they create divisions between trading partners and allies that make it hard to plan there are all kinds of issues that tariffs raise and they would probably say look yeah maybe it'll be a mess in the short term to dial them back but does not compare to the mess that tariffs introduce so better to like.

[C]

Wade through the mess yeah i mean.

[D]

I think most economists would say let's just please get rid of them now the one complication i would say here is that i would say that there is a perception in the united states right now that we have this dysfunctional public sector and decisions essentially can't get made things can't get built legislation can't get passed etcetera this is because of the sort of very diffuse nature of democracy where there are a lot of veto points et cetera and a lot of people aren't crazy about how many veto points there are in american democracy whether at the court level or the local level et cetera how hard it is to build things et cetera there is this frustration of stagnancy in the built environment and in the policy environment and perhaps someone would say well if the supreme court undermines the trump tariffs this just confirms the fact that nothing can get done in america we can't set a new chart a new policy course now again like the ability to tariff is something that is theoretically in the congress's purview and theoretically should only be used by the white house in emergency situations congress has not invoked those.

[C]

Emergency situations but like for all the.

[D]

Countries in the world and congress has not stood up for itself so if trump is sort of usurping this power that belongs to congress it's not like congress has really complained or certainly the republican leaders of congress nonetheless i suppose if the supreme court were to rule the tariffs invalid the money was no longer be connected it may feed into this idea that the american sort of presidential three system of power it's difficult.

[B]

Well there's also the risk three branches when you were talking about uncertainty i was trying to think okay well what is the uncertainty because if they invalidated the tariffs and like i don't know it seems pretty certain we don't have we don't have those tariffs but it seems like part of the risk is that trump would somehow ignore the supreme court or do some other additional thing that would further create a sense of uncertainty and well we're in a very.

[D]

Weird situation right now with the tiktok ban where there does not seem to be any legal basis whatsoever for tiktok to exist on the app stores in the united states that law has not been repealed at all but the white house unilaterally said we're just gonna not ignore it we're just not gonna pay attention to the law we're not gonna enforce it but that's a very weird situation like right why does forgetting that.

[B]

Tiktok i know it was like supposed.

[D]

To be illegal no it is illegal by the law and yet no one is enforcing the ban for better or worse but that is what if the supreme court said no tariffs can no longer be collected and the white house instructed the ports to keep collecting the tariffs i mean there's potentially some very.

[C]

Weird situations here i mean also if you're running a business and you're trying to figure out what to do and you're like okay should we if the tariffs are locked in it would be better for us to build a factory and start making things here or invest in an iron mine or whatever it is but it's just hard to know if it's gonna get overturned or if it's gonna go away with the next president it's like where do you invest your money you can't really grow and expand the way you could if you had like a clear course totally so.

[D]

This is a really important dimension which is that the longer these tariffs exist in any form the more likely it is that they will exist forever because once you start getting any company that is making domestic investments predicated on the existence of tariffs that company is a perpetual lobbyist for the existence of not.

[B]

Only a lobbyist but like a lobbyist with a pretty good case to make we should talk about the bond market a little bit because like what joe said about the stock market is true like the stock market has done really well during the trump presidency but it's it could just be a comment on like nvidia and maybe maybe in fact if if there weren't tariffs video but.

[D]

We know that a huge amount of it is attributable to these companies anyway.

[B]

Keep going yeah yeah so anyway i was just that's a segue for stacey.

[C]

Yes so since the tariff conundrum happens it seems like the legalities come into question in a serious way the bond market has reacted in this way where like yields have gone up in other words kind of interest rates have gone up the us is perceived to be a riskier place to put your money so what is going on i guess.

[D]

One way to think about this question and it gets back to i think you really have to talk politics and you really have to talk about this idea of whether you feel that over the next several years we will still even have a nominally or truly independent central bank that can set rates at will or set rates sort of independent of the political cycle regardless of who is in the white house and so if you're going to put your money in the us for a long time if you're going to lock up your money for a long time you probably would like that the central bank to feel you would like that confidence that the central bank will do at its job to preserve the value of your currency avoid high inflation if you are worried about the political status of the central bank if you're worried that an entity will no longer exist that is committed to doing getting to two percent inflation sort of whatever the cost because of something upstream in the political cycle etcetera i don't know maybe you want a little bit more compensation in your long term holdings to compensate you for.

[B]

This risk well wait that doesn't really have anything to do with liberation day though or like the tariffs i mean.

[D]

Or no it doesn't really you're right no no it's only true so it only has anything to do with it insofar as all of this is a commentary on us political stability well totally.

[B]

Like if you're if you're lending money to the us government you're like okay i've liked the most of those people like the global financial system as it exists today like the us is like integrated this like incredibly successful experiment in politics and capitalism that played out starting after world war two yeah and if trump is blowing that up that makes you nervous i think that's what it.

[D]

Is yeah i think that's right and all of these things are just sort of novelties within the american political system right say the supreme court were to say tariffs are illegal i mean broad based first of all the broad based tariffs on these emergency claims that's a novelty the idea of the supreme court then reversing tariffs that's a novelty a potential dispute between the white house and the judicial branch that's a novelty all of these things right that we sort of took for granted certain institutional arrangements and this is where it gets back to the fed itself the way i think about the fed is it's been encased in glass right and it sort of let operate to do its own.

[C]

Thing and the independence is like a.

[D]

Little glass but it could get shattered and maybe it will get shattered at some point or maybe it already has been shattered or at least cracked based on the fact that it's already coming under a lot of criticism so a lot of institutional arrangements which had been perceived to be stable are perceived to be less stable and once again the fed is part of that and could have a factor in the degree of the payment that you want in order to keep your money in dollars long.

[B]

Term well and just to bring it back to this initial question like treasury yields went up yesterday which again kind of feeds trump's idea that like yeah we need those tariffs and what you're saying is this is another the story is kind of the same it's an uncertain it's a certainty versus and i.

[D]

Think part of this too you know where it's really bad is in the uk right now that it's getting a lot of attention is how much their bond yields are blowing out at the long end but it's really it's japan too and they're you know for them long term rates are like one one point eight percent which is very low but it's japan so for them that's very high by their grand standard of things but there is this concern i would say two concerns at least in maybe three concerns within rich developed countries which is that they have unfavorable demographics that they have aging populations that are going to require a lot of resources that and a lot of that will soak up and burden a lot of the productive labor to some combination of this burden of the aging population and then other sort of the hollowing out of industrial activity specifically because of competition with china is this fear that the productive base of rich western or you know sort of rich liberal countries is going to get hollowed out et cetera and then finally add on to these things this sort of evident political dysfunction which kind of exists everywhere i mean we see it i think people perceive political volatility in the us they certainly you look at the uk it also doesn't look like they can get anything done they're always having these very picayune scandals that seem to be at the COVID of the paper but everywhere you look there's similar things going on there's these sort of stresses that are being put on the sort of political arrangements so you combine all these three things together and there's sort of this global story going on that is beyond just the question of tariff revenue so joe.

[C]

Little known fact well maybe not that little known but you are in a band that's right called ly sweet cruise that's right and i had a musical questions for you because this is so weird max is going to die but it's it's the first thing that came into my head when i read about the illegal possibly illegal tariffs which was that song by the clash like do i stay or do i go oh yeah great song because it seems like with the tariffs this is the case kind of like if they stay in place there's going to be trouble if they go away it'll be double it'll.

[D]

Be double i love the setup that.

[C]

Was thank you it's a really long setup no but it paid off i appreciate you rolling with it i think.

[D]

There are a lot of things like that these days where we sort of arrive at these forks in the road and we'd sort of want them to never be resolved because neither of the resolutions seem great i mean i think about this with ai do we want the ai bubble to burst or do we want ai to take all our jobs i'm not sure at this point i think with tariffs i look i have no i'm a journalist i have no opinion on tariffs i just i just report the news and usually i just ask the questions rarely am i answered them yes the all of these things are very strange and i don't you know from a sort of when you balance out economics with sort of institutional stability et cetera i think there's this feeling that we're hurtling towards genuinely.

[B]

Uncharted territory i feel like that clash song is how investors feel about everything like not just terrorists yeah i mean.

[C]

I feel like it also works with the ai bubble too i mean do we want things to keep going and get super overheated no do we want the bubble to burst no yeah i.

[D]

Gotta retire not soon but yeah joe.

[B]

Weisenthal thanks for being here thanks for.

[D]

Having me that was a lot of.

[E]

Fun should i stay or should i.

[D]

Go.

[E]

If you say that you are mine.

[B]

I'Ll be here till the end of time.

[A]

This message is brought to you by nuveen how would you invest if you knew the future was watching at nuveen this isn't a theoretical question it's a perspective that comes from navigating one hundred twenty five years of market cycles using foresight to innovate and adapt to the changing needs of investors around the world and remaining steadfast in the pursuit of lasting performance for clients communities and the global economy nuveen invest like the future is watching visit nuveen dot com future to learn more investing involves risk principal loss is possible stacey have.

[B]

You seen k pop demon hunters okay.

[C]

Yes this is this movie on netflix it's this huge hit i had not watched it until last night when you your enthusiasm about this topic encouraged me to watch it and i really liked.

[B]

It all right so listeners of the show know that i have three children my oldest is ten i think this movie i think snuck up on everyone who isn't ten years old it is on netflix came out almost three months ago maybe two and a half months ago it is on track to be the most watched film or maybe it already is the most watched film on netflix two hundred seventy sixty six million.

[C]

Views definitely the movie of the summer.

[B]

As we're recording yeah and it is the movie of the summer i think which is weird because there have been a couple other big netflix movies before big streaming things before but i don't think they've ever quite broken out culturally in the way that this one has and again it's not just netflix if you pull up spotify their global one hundred list of top songs you got what it sounds like which is number nine this is a musical by the way how it's done number six your idol number five soda pop number four.

[C]

And these are all songs so this.

[B]

Song golden is a banger it is like the hottest song right now it's.

[C]

On my exercising mix this movie is.

[B]

Gonna make a fortune and we have a great person to talk about it yes we do sam sanders is here he is host of the sam sanders show which you should subscribe to if you don't just a really smart cultural commentator sam how you doing i'm good.

[E]

Y' all finally got me to watch k pop demon hunters which had been on my list and let me tell you i was dancing in the living room with the dog last night it's really cute and it's really fun all.

[B]

Right so stacey you wanted to just kind of quickly summarize the premise here i mean it's basically in the title they're k pop stars and they hunt demons it's like snakes on a plane.

[C]

Level like obvious well okay so there is a band it's three women and they are like born like demon slayers and they slay the demons of the world with their voices which creates some kind of a network that slays demons anyway but there's also a an evil boy band made up of like five very handsome men who are singing for.

[B]

Evil they're demons too it's an animated film it's a musical and it came out like i said like back in june and i think it snuck up on a lot of people it snuck up on me for sure like i only really became aware of it over the last week when i was on vacation and my children watched it like seven times in a row but like i'm kind of curious when you started to kind of hear chatter about this like when you became aware that this was going to be a phenomenon that you were going to be talking about this you know in a professional capacity.

[E]

At some point the songs kind of crept into my algorithm i use spotify mostly for streaming and all of a sudden golden began to show up and for the longest time i just said oh that's some new k pop band they always got a new one over there in k pop world then i realized oh this is from a movie then i google the movie and i'm like oh it's a massive massive hit it really surprised everybody it surprised sony it surprised netflix and i think that says a lot about how most executives in the entertainment industry actually don't know anything they don't know anything yeah this.

[B]

Movie i didn't know this going in to taping this but like i guess animated movies are really expensive to make this movie cost one hundred million dollars to make oh wow i've read that like it is going to be one billion dollars movie and that's a big deal because it didn't have a theatrical release sam like people who don't pay attention to this business like how do you get to a billion dollars or a big number for a movie that like i can go on netflix and stream for free my kids are streaming for free nonstop like where is the money in something like this for netflix.

[E]

It'S fuzzy math and they'll never tell us everything the biggest shift between watching movie and tv viewing go to streamers as opposed to being in networks back in the day and in movie theaters back in the day we had really distinct measures of how shows and movies did there were nielsen ratings that told you that seinfeld had thirty five million view viewers a week and box office numbers that said this movie made one hundred million dollars this weekend netflix hides a bunch of that data but what they're hoping is that this movie being so popular keeps people coming back and subscribed and those subscriber fees will help their bottom line there's also an ad tier of netflix now that exists but most people i know don't use it so all this to say whatever hard number they give you about this movie it's less about that and more about winning the conversation and being seen as the biggest baddest best stream right that.

[B]

Matters subscription fees i mean is the short answer like people like this and they keep subscribing to netflix or they don't subscribe and they resubscribe because they gotta watch k pop demon hunters i.

[C]

Want to jump in here and ask you about something you said earlier sam which is that nobody knows anything which i think is really interesting i mean the summer movie of the summer has always been this big deal this big deal in business too nobody hit it right netflix seems to have accidentally hit it right like what's going on here why does nobody know nothing right now.

[E]

So there's a few things going on we are seeing moviegoing in general just go down there used to be a time in our youth where on the weekends you would go to the movies even if there wasn't a movie that that you really wanted to go watch.

[C]

Well barbie heimer happened not that long ago there was the but those are.

[E]

Few and far between yeah there are very few monoculture moments in movies anymore and only about twelve percent of americans now go to the movies at least once a month and about a quarter of americans don't go to the movies at all wow in the midst of this these studios rely a lot more on ip like barbie and other things that folks already know and will go see and so if you look at the biggest performing movies of this year so far it's all existing ip how to train youn dragon fantastic four jurassic world superman the lilo and stitch sequel so moviegoing is going down which means that movie studios rely on old names that we all know which means that a movie like k pop demon hunters they don't know what to do with it because it's new and they're afraid to take that chance and put it in theaters there's also a really weird story about the way that sony and netflix made the deal that put this film on netflix and not in theaters.

[B]

Yeah sam you want to just explain.

[E]

That yeah so as i mentioned on top of americans just going to movies less the pandemic and that era of lockdown really decimated movie theaters for a while they're still bouncing back but they're not back to what they were pre covid and they might might never get there if i'm being honest however during that lockdown moment a lot of movie studios said what can we do to keep making movies and not close our businesses and not lay off all of our staff sony inked a deal with netflix during lockdown that basically said we'll make movies but we know they can't go to theaters so we'll sell movies at a flat rate to netflix that will then stream these movies on their platform and then they'll get all the rights so k pop demon hunters was a part of this deal which meant that even though sony made the movie they were paid twenty million dollars for it and netflix got all the rights and the benefits from having this big.

[B]

Hit and netflix paid to make it too paid the hundred million bucks to make it and then another twenty yeah on top of that that was the.

[E]

Flat fee part to sony yeah yes yes but that means that sony will see no upside from this movie and even when netflix put k pop demon hunters in theaters for one weekend for a special sing along edition of this film sony the movie studio saw none of that money whoa netflix you know.

[B]

There'S been this debate in hollywood i think over over some period of time sam and i know you're probably familiar with this but like we have traditional hollywood including a lot of like filmmakers and so on who feel like theaters are really important theatrical releases are really important there's like a kind of cultural reason for that which is like they feel like that's what a movie should be but there's also like a marketing argument which is that theaters are how you create like cultural moments like you can't have a movie of the summer without a theatrical release yeah the producers.

[C]

Of crazy rich asians turned down more money from netflix because the theatrical release was so important to them and netflix.

[B]

Has been kind of like the the one saying no no you don't need this so so ted sarandos is the ceo of netflix at the time one hundred summit in april which that's funny i don't know what that is but but it's an event in april held by time magazine and he was asked about theaters just listen to what he.

[E]

Said folks grew up thinking i want to make movies on a gigantic screen and have strangers watch them and play for the in the theaters for two months and people cry and sold out shows it just doesn't happen very much.

[B]

It'S outdated so i'm kind of curious sam if you agree with that or if there's anything to what he's saying and if k pop demon hunters maybe helps make the point because they did create a cultural moment in a kind of an interesting and maybe arguably new.

[E]

Way yeah i mean i talk a lot about the ways in which americans are just not going to the movies like they used to it kind of makes me sad i love movies i actually think that moviegoing does a lot for social and cultural adhesion like it is a community experience there are few feelings better than watching a really good movie in a theater and then talking to the stranger next to you about how it was afterwards i think it's good for like society so i'm sad that we don't go as much but i think that the trend lines are just inevitable i tell folks a lot i compare movie going right now to opera going there was a time in western culture where opera was the most popular thing ever and on the weekends you went to the opera and at night for a date you went to the opera and everyone went to the opera right opera doesn't not exist now it still exists there are people who sing opera and make money doing opera but it's not nearly as dominant as a cultural force i think moviegoing in the classical sense at the movie theater is going the way of opera we're.

[C]

All just gonna be like old people in like overdressed old people coming out of movie theaters is that what is am i going to be one of.

[B]

These people do you buy the marketing argument everything you're saying could be true but opera or some movie releases that are not necessarily big money makers could be events that like allow a project to gather enthusiasm or excitement or whatever i think there have been a lot of people arguing this is a way to signal to people like this is a thing you need to see this is a big deal like any of that but you think that could also.

[E]

Go away when's the last time that.

[B]

Happened probably it's like barbie the last.

[E]

Several years but like those were things where christopher nolan as a director is as close to existing ip as you can get in a human being and barbie is a brand that we've all known for decades i really think that as movie goes the way of opera the only things that will work and become cultural moments are things that were already a cultural moment before we let.

[B]

You go sam i wanted to ask you about kind of like what happens next i mean we were talking about the money earlier like some of the money is going to be in sequels right there hasn't actually been a ton.

[C]

Of merch we have not seen the last of k pop demon hunters because.

[B]

This took people by surprise like they didn't have enough time to like oh.

[C]

Really the merch hasn't even caught up.

[B]

There'S some a little bit but not as much as you would normally have for something like this they're going to be sequels i'm kind of curious sam what you think the lessons are i mean beyond just like we're going to see i'm sure copycat type stuff what are people in entertainment how are the smart ones thinking about this what are they going to learn from this i.

[E]

Mean there has been a decade plus of movie studios relying a lot on existing ip to make their money so big brands that you already know and love sequel after sequel after sequel but all the trend lines say that this won't last forever most of the time when you extract all these sequels from ongoing ip is diminishing returns with each sequel that's happening with the biggest franchises in hollywood and so hollywood's about to face a problem they actually need new ip and you know what k pop demon hunters is it's new ip so i think the lesson here for all of hollywood and all these executives is that they're gonna have to start taking chances again because the trough they're feeding from is eventually going to run dry how many jurassic world movies can we.

[B]

Put up with stacey don't ask that.

[C]

Question sam cause the answer could be.

[B]

A lot sam sanders thank you for.

[E]

Being here thanks sam to everyone listening it's good for america go to the movies yes please go to the movies.

[C]

Co sign and be sure to check out sam's show the sam sanders show i just listened to their year interview so far episode it's great check it.

[E]

Out.

[D]

We'Re going up it's our moment.

[E]

You go together we're going to be.

[D]

Gonna.

[B]

All right stacey max i have a confession to make and i feel like this makes me almost like anti american like what i hope i don't get deported for saying this but i am not a big fan of like a pumpkin spice coffee and i feel like that is one of the institutions of this it's as american as apple.

[C]

Pie and baseball well i have something to admit as well which is i've never actually had a pumpkin spice latte.

[B]

We'Re going to do this whole segment without actually trying one that's that seems harsh but you have an underrated story and it pertains to this yes in.

[C]

Fact so pumpkin spice season has launched it's official and it is an economic force the pumpkin spice which is apparently like cinnamon nutmeg cloves little mix apparently visits to starbucks go up by twenty four percent in pumpkin spice season people love this mix apparently you and i are just in the extreme minority of non pumpkin spice well but also pumpkin.

[B]

Spice is also what you need if you're making a pumpkin pie right or a sweet potato pie i love pumpkin pie which is a delicious thing yes so it can't just be i like.

[C]

My coffee to taste like coffee i'm.

[B]

A purist i'm just glad that starbucks has something to look forward to because you know we were talking the other day about the challenges that they've had but yes pumpkin spice season this is going to be great for them well.

[C]

It is and it isn't so starbucks is possibly now in a situationship with the pumpkin spice latte because not only are coffee prices up like fifteen percent over last year which is enormous for a number of reasons but all the spices in the pumpkin spice latte are imported and so those are all being affected by tariffs and the pumpkin spice latte since two thousand five when it started being the price started being tracked is up by almost seventy percent okay.

[B]

Wait wait break that down for us so how much did it cost back.

[C]

In three dollars and thirty five cents.

[B]

Okay and now it is it's like.

[C]

Around seven dollars fifty cents eight bucks.

[B]

And that's before these tariffs kicked in.

[C]

Well the tariffs may have slightly kicked in i don't know if starbucks has been stockpiling pumpkin spices one can only imagine that when they saw this coming they were like you know it's a very important thing but you know if these tariffs get locked into place all these spices cinnamon nutmeg cloves like we do not grow them in the us.

[B]

So right they're mostly coming from asia.

[C]

I think yes india and indonesia and like the places where the spices come from are all being hit by tariffs.

[B]

I find it funny there's so much political discourse right now where you have sort of like democrats saying these tariffs are are really bad and republicans say no they're not bad and and it's like well we don't really have to argue about it you can just look at the prices of of certain goods and like they're going up i mean and you can sort of debate whether or not that's a big price increase whether that's like a politically a pro like there there are a bunch of debates you can have about it but like the the prices don't really lie.

[C]

And lest you think max that coffee is the only thing on the line here i would just like to posit that pumpkin spice has now infiltrated almost every corner of consumer culture there is pumpkin spice cup of noodles oh god there is pumpkin spice spam there are pumpkin spice doritos slurpees hummus ramen pringles cough drops my personal favorite cat litter there's pumpkins cat litter it's everywhere everywhere i mean imagine the pumpkin spice inflation alone the the economic impact is going to reverberate earthquake style through the economy.

[B]

If we had like scott benson here he would say look the president is just trying to reorient the us economy away from pumpkin spice and i would say amen to that you're all for.

[C]

It you're not going to start drinking pumpkin spice lattes or cat litter.

[B]

All right stacey before we go i gotta just read some of the emails we got to the ai thing i mentioned.

[C]

We got a lot this we should say the show was we had on.

[B]

Ed zitron noted ai hater a really awesome conversation about i mentioned it at the top of about sort of the ways in which no matter how excited you are about this stuff there are there seem to be some real economic.

[C]

Risk possibly very overvalued in a way that could crash the economy yeah and got a lot of people we got a lot very strong i gotta tell.

[B]

You stacey we got some some haters listening to this show so rick wrote in complaining that i don't use it unless it's forced upon me take that college students complaining essentially about the the electricity the water usage and like the fact that as a consumer you don't always get value talking about customer service phones being converted over to ai he complained about doctor's offices which actually came up in another note from another correspondent i think his name is yoshin but wrote in complaining about basically having his doctor's office put him in touch with like a an ai agent and i feeling really interesting really icky i mean the most interesting note we got was a sort of lengthy one from josh who is by his account anyway a carnegie mellon trained machine learning engineer and and he's basically saying like although he wrote well i don't always agree with ed's approach to arguing against the current hysteria gripping markets around ai he's right about the fundamental disconnect between hype and reality i don't see this to mean that there's no utility in llms there are clearly are narrow applications where they provide value however the roi is highly suspect and given the capital required to produce what we'll likely remember as the twenty first century eliza now i had.

[C]

To twenty first century eliza look as.

[B]

In like eliza doolittle no eliza was a a like very early chat bot from like the nineteen sixties okay and i had to i had to google that but i mean again it didn't.

[C]

I was all in my fair lady.

[B]

I was you know anyway awesome emails all around on this topic like keep them coming i think we really liked that conversation in particular we're gonna as we said on the other one we're gonna try to keep coming back to this topic so so keep sending us ideas examples let us know what you thought of k pop demon hunters what it could tell you about what we can learn from hollywood that's everybody's at bloomberg dot net everybody's with an s at bloomberg dot net do you still.

[C]

Consider yourself an ai skeptic i feel.

[B]

Like everyone should be an ai skeptic especially if you're a journalist like journalists by nature are supposed to be skeptical of everything i try not to use ai because i think it's going to actually make me a worse writer and i think that everyone is kind of melting their brains a little bit so.

[C]

You wouldn't want us to like put it on the show or give it a job on the show definitely not well we should probably do the credits this show is produced by stacy wong magnus henriksen is our supervising producer and amy keen is our editor we get.

[D]

Engineering from blake maples and dave purcell fact checks sage bauman heads bloomberg podcasts special thanks to jeff muskus julia rubin.

[B]

And maria ling who are these voices.

[C]

If you have a minute please rate.

[A]

And review the show it means a.

[B]

Lot to us if you do max will drink a venti pumpkin spice latte.

[A]

During next week's show this will be.

[B]

Enforced and if you have a story that should be our business email us at everybodysoomberg dot net that's everybody with an sloomberg dot net thank you for listening see you next week resistance is.

[C]

Futile max chaffer you will be assimilated accept your fate i would like to thank the descript ai generated voices that contributed to this including owen and grace.

[B]

Thank you contributed to this they're not voices they're just mathematical models it's an autocomplete apparently you have to drink a.

[C]

Bendy spice latte if somebody reviews the show so that's interesting.