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Are the Billionaires Smothering HBO?
00:47:32
Oil prices spike globally, HBO’s elite status is slipping, and Reuters reveals Banksy’s identity (again).
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- [00:08]
A
Hello, and welcome to Slate Money, your guide to the business and finance news of the week. I'm Felix Salmon of Bloomberg. I'm here with Emily Peck of Axios.
- [00:21]
B
Hello.
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C
Hello.
- [00:22]
A
I'm here with Elizabeth Spires of the New York Times.
- [00:25]
B
Hello.
- [00:25]
A
We are going to talk about oil this week, how it's very good for rubbing into your body and getting a suntan. No, not that kind of oil. We're going to talk about crude oil. We're going to talk about the global benchmark. We're going to talk about what's going on with the straight of Hormuz and the oil markets and whether it matters. We are going to talk about David Zaslav, who's very rich and what that means for the future of hbo. We are also going to learn about what disco dance is, which is going to rhyme with Emily's number this week, which you really do need to stay to the end of the show because Emily has the best number ever. We have another segment which is basically just me ranting about Banksy journalism.
- [01:05]
C
It's a can't miss.
- [01:06]
A
It's a can't miss. It's Felix ranting. It's all coming up on Slate Money.
- [01:17]
C
Slate Money is brought to you by Charles Schwab. Decisions made in Washington can affect your portfolio every day, but what policy changes should investors be watching? Listen to Washington Wise, an original podcast for investors from Charles Schwab to hear the stories making news in Washington right now. Host Mike Townsend, Charles Schwab's managing director for legislative and regulatory affairs, takes a nonpartisan look at the stories that matter most to investors, including policy initiatives for retirement, savings, taxes and trade, inflation concerns, the Federal Reserve, and how regulatory developments can affect companies, sectors and even the entire market. Mike and his guests offer their perspective on how policy changes could affect what you do with your portfolio. Download the latest episode and follow@schwab.com WashingtonWise or wherever you listen.
- [02:11]
A
This message is a paid partnership with Apple Card, my favorite travel hack Easy. It's using Apple Card. It's great knowing that every time I dine out, buy souvenirs or pay my hotel bill using my Apple Card, I'm actually earning up to 3% daily cash back. So if you're like me and love to travel, then apply for Apple Card in the Wallet app today. Subject to credit approval. Apple Card issued by Goldman Sachs Bank USA, Salt Lake City branch terms and more@applecard.com okay, so let's get into this. Emily, how many stories have you written about oil in the past couple of weeks.
- [02:51]
C
I don't have a count, but it's a lot. I have written that Brent crude oil is the global benchmark in stories approximately 6422 times.
- [03:02]
A
And this is important why?
- [03:04]
C
Oil trades on a global market. And if you take a bunch of oil off the global market, the price goes up because demand stays constant for a while at least, and there's not enough supply to meet demand. Therefore the price rises. And when the price rises, it's bad news. Bear price rises. Nobody likes in the US because it means that gas prices rise. We all know we live through inflation. We know that gas price is a big billboard of an administration's failure.
- [03:31]
A
Right or wrong, that's the salient price in the economy. As we have said many times, we've
- [03:36]
C
said it a million times. But more significantly for other countries, the oil that's come off the board because the Iranians are blockading the Strait of Hormuz, which 20% of the world's oil flows through. That's really, really dire for countries, especially in Asia, who import all or nearly all their energy. And those countries are already seeing like very serious consequences and are afraid of shortages and putting measures into place already to prevent.
- [04:03]
A
They started banning cremations in India and that kind of thing.
- [04:08]
C
Yes, they switched the cremations to use coal or wood instead, instead of gas. And some places. Philippines is doing four day work weeks. It's getting bad. And Australia apparently is facing a bit of a gas shortage. It seems like it's more from hoarding than actual shortages, but I mean, it's all of a piece. Right.
- [04:27]
B
Do you get the sense that Trump maybe just didn't think this through very much?
- [04:32]
C
Who can say what's in his mind?
- [04:35]
A
So let's take that seriously for a minute. It strikes me in Emily, you've been covering this much more closely than I have, so tell me if I'm wrong here, but it strikes me that for all that there are a change in cremation procedures in India and the price of gas is higher than it was and there's a few early sort of signs of number go up. This is a million miles away from a 1973 style oil crisis. This is just, you know, there's a significant part of the economy which just got more expensive. This kind of thing happens quite a lot. And if this is the worst that happens in terms of the deleterious effects on Americans, I'm sure that Donald Trump can cope with it. It's not that big of a deal.
- [05:23]
C
Okay, so I'm Going to go ahead. So yes and no. Yes. And I've written about this and we've talked about it. The oil shock in the US is not going to be comparable to the 1970s. No, it is going to matter. Already we are seeing central banks around the world sort of reassessing or rethinking their sort of rate forecast. We see in the UK there's now pricing in rate increases. So, like, inflation forecasts and predictions are getting all jumbled up. So inflation, people are worried now that it's going to rise and I'm just going to stay on the US So in the US there are signs that it is in fact already rising that might rise a little more. So you say, okay, well, we just lived through this. In 2022, there was a war in Russia. Gas prices rose more than they have risen so far in this situation. Oil prices rose back then higher than they are right now. We can live through it. The economy was fine. But I say to you, no, Felix, the difference now is we have a really lousy labor market. It's no hire, no fire. Chair Powell said the day before we taped that there was no hiring growth last year. And that's really, really weird. So now there is a fear of some kind of, like, stagflationy vibe. Powell said, no, we're not going to have stagflation again. But I'm saying there's a fear of less economic growth and at the same time, inflation. At the same time, that's different and new.
- [06:54]
A
This is so 100%. Yeah. Growth will be slower, inflation will be higher. I'm just saying in the grand scheme of things, we're not talking enormous, we're not talking crisis. We're just talking growth is lower, inflation is higher. But let me keep you on the subject. Since you brought it up, let me keep you on the subject of central banks, because I was always under the impression that central banks kind of ignored energy prices when it came to inflation. And they talk about core inflation, which explicitly excludes energy precisely because energy is so volatile and is not something they can have under their control. So if inflation goes up because of oil prices, why would that cause central banks to raise rates or to not cut rates?
- [07:40]
C
I mean, that's a good question. I'm not sure I have the best answer for it, although I did learn recently that the reason we have a core inflation measure that strips out volatile oil is because the central banker didn't want to include oil because it would make the inflation number look worse. That is literally why we have that. So zooming out, I question why, I question its usefulness because what I'm saying is oil and energy prices do really seem to matter, especially maybe not for the US as much as Europe because this crisis is really hitting their lng, their liquefied natural gas and that really would raise prices.
- [08:15]
A
So to put it clearly, obviously it matters for households. Right. If you're measuring inflation in the country and how much it's hurting your buying power and you have to go out and fill up your car or whatever, you it affects households 100%. It is a real part of real inflation. The reason why central bankers generally ignore it is not because it's not real inflation, it's because they have no control over it. The idea behind monetary policy is that if you raise interest rates, then that will bring down inflation for various reasons that we don't need to go into. But that lever doesn't affect oil prices. Ringing up interest rates is not going to bring down oil prices. So that like it's a solution in search of like it is not a solution to the problem. If the problem is rising oil prices, then raising interest rates does not help that problem.
- [09:08]
C
But can I ask a question? And then Elizabeth really needs to speak. The idea behind raising rates is slows growth and slowing growth would do some demand destruction when it comes to oil and energy. Right?
- [09:19]
A
Maybe a little. But we're 70% of the economy of services. But Elizabeth.
- [09:25]
B
Yeah, yeah, well now I forgot my point that I was going to make like 10 minutes ago. But another thing to sort of to think about is just that, you know, this affects households. Yes. But also, you know, truckers and commercial enterprises that need gas as well. But I also there, there seems to be an assumption that this is not going to go on forever. And I'm not sure that Trump really has an exit plan right now. So I think the knock on effects of keeping the Strait of Hormuz blocked could be far more reaching than gas prices in the U.S. for the U.S. economy.
- [10:00]
C
Yes. I think that's the least of the issue.
- [10:02]
A
I think the reason why people think it won't go on forever is just because the US Is going to run out of Tomahawk missiles. We've used up most of them already. I mean, short of a physical invasion of Iran where we send in the army.
- [10:15]
B
You say that like Pete Hegseth wouldn't consider it.
- [10:18]
A
I mean, I'm sure they've talked about it. Right. But they're not going to do it for a bunch of obvious reasons. I mean, I mean, yeah, come back to me in a month and quote me and say, felix, you were wrong about that. But I'm quite comfortable saying they, that the limit to sending in troops is going to be like, well, we might send in like a special team to try and grab some uranium or something, but they're not going to try and physically take over a country the size of Iran. It would be even more insane than what we've seen already.
- [10:47]
B
Well, I hope you are correct. Another factor that might make a difference for Trump politically, he is obsessed with oil or stockpiles at the lowest it's been in 30 years. And as a result of what's happening now, we're about to release a big chunk of it. When he's talked about places like Nigeria and Colombia and these countries that he probably before he became president, couldn't find on a map, they're all oil rich countries. So I'm also curious about what happens if Trump sort of chasing oil resources in other countries expands beyond what he's doing now, especially if the conditions worsen.
- [11:23]
A
I just spent this morning in a little sort of breakfast discussion about Venezuela. And one of the interesting things there is that Trump does seem to have kind of forgotten about Venezuela. He's kind of moved on to Iran at this point. But Venezuela is obviously the first big source of oil revenues and oil reserves that is top of the list of non Iran places that Trump is interested in. And one of the big questions there in Venezuela is how long can Delsey Rodriguez hold on without having some kind of a coup? And the answer is basically for as long as the Venezuelan army is afraid of Trump and is afraid of what he might do to them if they take over. And the longer this war in Iran goes on, and the more distracted he is by this war in Iran, the less threatening the army is to Venezuela. Because as I say, there are a finite number of missiles and we've used up most of them. And as you say, there is a finite number of barrels of oil in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and we're using up most of those. There is this kind of crazy front loading thing where Trump is just spending a whole bunch. I mean, I saw a report saying that he's going to ask for $200 billion to replace the munitions, that he's the materiel that he spent in Iran. You're like, what? He's doing all of this spending? And he's like, well, we'll work out the consequences later. But he's a very sort of short termist kind of person. And the long term consequences of how are we going to rebuild munitions and how are we going to rebuild our oil reserve that he's going to leave to whoever his successor is quite clearly.
- [13:04]
C
Felix, you were saying that this isn't a crisis. And from the perspective of just like the US Economy, it might not be like we can maybe absorb the higher gas prices, we're an energy exporter, all of that. We're not going to have 1970s lines or whatever, but in terms of geopolitics and relationships and economic relationships between countries and allyships and all of this, what Trump did by invading Iran was sort of like throw the whole balance of power that he's been pushing on for the past year and a half with his tariffs and his and the war in Venezuela. And now this sort of like pushed it over the edge and sort of like rejiggered like the sanctions balance of power that the US had been sort of holding, holding on to. And I've been talking to Nicholas Mulder at Cornell, he's the guy who wrote the sanctions book about this a bit. And basically we put all these sanctions on Iran, but then we invaded them and they were like, well, what? Nothing matters anymore. So they did their own economic warfare finally back to us, closed down the Strait of Hormuz and like threw everything off kilter. Then the US Then pulls back temporarily, but who knows, maybe temporarily so far pulls back Russia sanctions because it can't enforce them anymore because it needs the oil too bad. And then today, right before we were taping, the treasury secretary says we might lift Iranian sanctions on oil. We might let sell its oil. Like what?
- [14:33]
A
The Venezuela sanctions, to be clear, are still in place. The Iranian ones might be lifted. The Russians are the only winners of this war. They are making money hand over fist with them oil. None of this makes any geopolitical sense whatsoever.
- [14:49]
B
I have a theory about this. It's part of my recurring theory that Trump is permanently stuck in 1988. And in his mind, the only kind of geopolitical environment that he's accustomed to is a bipolar environment where you have two superpowers who have the most, both hard power and soft power and can wield economic sanctions against the rest of the world. He doesn't think far enough ahead to imagine a country like Iran having that power or being able to use its own economic chits in order to have.
- [15:21]
A
Well, I mean, I think the lesson of 1973 is that Iran has a lot of economic power, right, with Saudi Arabia, with the rest of opec, but the Middle east, broadly, I think had more power, I think we know, had more power in the 1970s than it does now and they were not afraid to use it. But yes, I think you're right that there are going to be all manner of sort of unintended consequences in second and third order effects here. But I want to go back just to where we started, Emily and Brent Scroode being the global benchmark oil price global benchmark. Because it strikes me that this is a nice little cute little journalistic trick, right? We look at the number that has gone up a lot and we're like, now we need to explain why we're looking at this number and we say it's the global benchmark. The fact is that the reason why we're looking at this number as American journalists is because that's the one that's gone up and there is this divergence between Brent crude and West Texas. Right. And if you look at wti, it hasn't gone up nearly as much and Brent crude has because it trades on a different market and oil is not, it turns out, quite as fungible as we all thought. Right.
- [16:29]
C
Yeah, no, you're still right. I was just checking to make sure you were still right. I wanted to dispute it. One reason I was hearing today that there's this big disparity in the US oil and the Brent crude, which is, did I mention it was the global benchmark. One reason for the big spread between the two. People were thinking that the US might do a ban on oil exports, but the White House said it wasn't going to do that. And that would have made WTI the US oil benchmark, sorry, trade lower, but it's still trading lower even after they denied that. So yeah, I think you're right is what I'm trying to say. I tried to make it as wordy as possible to say Felix was right because I didn't want to never just
- [17:08]
A
come out and say that because that would just be embarrassing. But it does show that we have inflicted much more energy related pain on Eurasia than we have on ourselves.
- [17:20]
C
Yes, that you don't even need to look at numbers for that. You could just read the reports of all the shortages and the cremation switch over and I mean the four day work week, although let me be the first, that would be an interesting way
- [17:32]
B
to get to a four day work
- [17:33]
C
week that we all think about imposing four day work weeks. Right. I mean that would be a wonderful benefit. And already we're seeing the hot takes about like maybe this incident will get everyone toward using renewable energy or whatever.
- [17:47]
A
Or they work weeks and everyone moves to solar.
- [17:49]
C
Yeah, it's the wokest move yet from the White House actually.
- [17:53]
B
Maybe Trump will suddenly embrace windmills.
- [17:56]
C
Did you see Stephen Miller's wife? I forget her name. Katie something. Katie Miller. Thank you. She has tweeted about solar energy being like a good thing. So I mean, I don't know. Things are changing.
- [18:08]
A
Well, doesn't she have a thing with Elon Musk who's big into solar energy?
- [18:11]
C
I cannot comment on such speculation. I just know she tweeted about solar energy.
- [18:15]
A
She's working for Elon Musk now.
- [18:16]
C
Yes, right. Working for him.
- [18:30]
A
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- [23:22]
B
Is there really talent involved though in getting the Ellisons to name the highest number a la succession?
- [23:28]
A
I mean, I don't think I could have done it. I mean, maybe.
- [23:32]
B
I also have a question. His compensation, his parting compensation is $700 million, but also around $300 million in tax reimbursements. Is that normal?
- [23:44]
A
Oh yeah. Tax gross ups, that's very common in.
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C
How does that work, Felix?
- [23:48]
A
CEO compensation agreements, which is basically like we will give you this much of stock for your working, but we don't know what the tax regime is going to be. So we're going to just give you a tax gross up of whatever stock you need to pay in taxes. On top of that, we're going to give you like a post tax number and then whatever the extra needs to be in order to make it a
- [24:12]
B
post tax number, we're going to pay your taxes. For you person who needs your taxes paid by an external source least of all.
- [24:20]
C
It's just, I mean, yeah, maybe he did a good job, but like give him a watch. Like why does he get to have a billion? Do you know what I mean? Like when I do a good job, I get like a taco emoji and a Slack channel. I'm just saying like the rules are different I guess when you have a lot of money.
- [24:34]
A
Well, maybe he got a billion dollars and a taco emoji in a slack.
- [24:40]
C
He is a survivor though, right? I mean we have. This is actually not the first time we have talked about Zaslav's ability to sort of deal make and like come out on top.
- [24:51]
A
Like he was running a bunch of crappy fucking third rate Discovery television channels called the Discovery Network. And everyone was like, well that is a doomed business. And somehow to this day, I'm not entirely sure how this crappy bunch of television cable channels managed to buy Warner Brothers, which was many multiples of its size. And he's like, hey, now I own Warner Brothers. I am now a fully fledged media mogul, even though I just came out of crappy cable channels. And then he realized that the combination of Warner Brothers and Discovery, which he inventively called Warner Brothers Discovery, was also too small to compete and was going sideways and nowhere. And he sold that to an equally stupid company called Skydance, which was even smaller than one or other. It was about, I think it was
- [25:46]
B
kind of failing up like a. Yeah.
- [25:48]
A
And so they're all just like merging these dumb small companies which are never going to be Big enough to compete. But guys, I just need to get your buy in on this, right? What is the combined company of Discovery and Skydance going to be called? Obviously it has to be called Disco Dance. Right?
- [26:06]
C
Love it. So good.
- [26:07]
A
We need to make this happen.
- [26:09]
C
Disco Dance. I couldn't remember. I was trying to remember just now and I was like, it's disco something. Disco Dance. Of course.
- [26:16]
B
Yeah, of course. But this doesn't answer the most pressing question of all of this, which is, is HBO going to suck now?
- [26:23]
A
So, yeah, the answer is that HBO has been sucking ever since Zaslav bought it and it became loaded up with debt and it has not had the opportunity or the ability to just go out. Part of why HBO was HBO was it was uniquely capable to spend gazillions of dollars on making Game of Thrones and no one else was able to do that. That has not been the case for a while. If you're looking for a TV channel that has unlimited amounts of money to throw at making prestige TV and that doesn't have any ads and has a really like sleek and user friendly and highbrow kind of audience, that exists, it's called Apple tv. It is not hbo. It hasn't been HBO for a while.
- [27:04]
C
I'm not ready to declare that HBO is bad now because I just did a whole podcast about its show industry, which I thought was excellent and very HBO super hbo. Hbo, like they have some new Game of Thrones spin off that people really seem to enjoy. Like they're still doing their thing.
- [27:22]
A
Yeah, it's not nothing, right? It's definitely not nothing. And I was talking to Felix Gillette about this and Felix, he wrote a book on hbo. He literally wrote a book on hbo. And one of the great pleasures of working at Bloomberg is that I get to wander over to Felix's desk and have a chat with him. And he was like, yeah, industry is interestingly reminiscent of the golden era of hbo. The first couple of seasons were kind of shit and they kept on funding it until it started getting good. That violates the contemporary laws of streaming, which are much more like if it doesn't work within the first two episodes, then you just give up on that and you, you trash it. So there is still something there. There is still a franchise there. But right now, HBO is sitting there in the name of a streaming service, right? There's this streaming service called HBO Max. They tried to take the name out for a hot minute and rebrand it to just Max. That didn't work very well. And so they Went. They unrebranded and went back to HBO Max. But now they're going to merge the HBO Max streaming service with this other streaming service no one watches, called Paramount Plus. And when those two merge, I can guarantee you, and this is as much of a guarantee as Trump is not going to invade Iran. The HBO brand, the HBO name is not going to be in the name of that streaming service.
- [28:43]
C
That'll be a mistake.
- [28:44]
A
We're going to have Apple having a streaming service named after itself. We're going to have Disney having a streaming service named after itself. We're going to have Amazon having a streaming service named after itself. We're going to have Netflix having a streaming service named after itself. HBO is going to be a tiny little vertical corner of some massive disco dance streaming service.
- [29:03]
B
It's going to be called Disco Dance Max.
- [29:06]
A
That's the inevitable Disco dance to the Max. I think we should call it that. Definitely.
- [29:11]
C
You were saying before, and you say in your very nice piece that you wrote about this, that Apple TV is like the new HBO because it has the rich, elite audience of wealthy people high in their own supply, watching fancy people in fancy places do fancy things, which I really stick to my description there, because that's what it is.
- [29:28]
A
That's what severance is, and people love it.
- [29:31]
C
Apple tv, it has to be brand safe because it's not. It's not simply streaming. It's not a content company. It's a company you buy phones from. It has to be brand safe. Their shows lack what HBO has always had, which is edge, which in some eras just meant boobs, but in other areas meant actual edge. And I just. I mean, that's gonna go away. If HBO can't keep being hbo there. There really isn't a substitute.
- [29:57]
B
Where are you gonna get your boobs if there's new?
- [30:02]
A
I feel like the boobs. We're on the Internet, people finding bo, that has never been easier. But if I try and think to myself, what is the edgiest, grittiest, the kind of stuff that HBO would fund and no one else would fund at the highest quality. The thing I come up with is the Wire, which is probably the best television series of all time.
- [30:23]
C
Apple TV would never make the Wire,
- [30:24]
A
and I think it would. I think the Wire would be okay on Apple tv. I think they would be okay with the Wire. There's nothing in the Wire that isn't fine for Apple and Apple's brand.
- [30:35]
C
I think I watched an Apple show last night and they had an extended product placement in it. For the Olive Garden. I don't think that's happening with the Wire. There was product placement for the Olive. Yeah, I'm watching Shrinking on Apple tv. Good show, very nice. Not edgy. And there was a whole scene in an Olive Garden. I don't know for sure that it was product placement, but don't you think
- [30:58]
A
it had to be like, like Kool Aid in the studio?
- [31:01]
C
They talked about the breadsticks. They mentioned the fried ravioli. Nissi. This is not product placement for Olive Garden. By the way, I'm just recounting a story.
- [31:09]
A
We should do some reporting on this.
- [31:11]
C
Sorry, I took us totally off track with that.
- [31:12]
A
No, no. Off track.
- [31:13]
B
This is.
- [31:14]
A
This is what? Slate Money.
- [31:15]
C
This is the track.
- [31:16]
A
Wherever we go, that is. This message is a paid partnership with Apple Card, my favorite travel hack. Easy. It's using Apple Card. It's great knowing that every time I dine out, buy souvenirs or pay my hotel bill using my Apple Card, I'm actually earning up to 3% daily cash back. So if you're like me and love to travel, then apply for Apple Card in the Wallet app today. Subject to credit approval. Apple Card issued by Goldman Sachs Bank USA Salt Lake City Branch terms and more at applecard.com Slate Money is sponsored this week by Stash. Have you dabbled in investing here and there, but haven't been happy with how things are going? Stash helps turn good intentions into consistent progress. Stash isn't just another investing app. It's a registered investment advisor that combines automated investing with expert personalized guidance so you don't have to worry about gambling or figuring out on your own. It's simple. It's smart, it's stress free. It has a smart portfolio that helps you invest in a diversified balanced portfolio and on a regular schedule, which can help you build wealth over the long term. Join over 1,000,000 Active Stash subscribers and finally, let your money work as hard as you do. Don't let your money sit around. Put it to work with stash. Go to get.stash.commoney to see how you can receive $25 towards your first stock purchase and to view important disclosures. That's get.stash.commoney. get stash paid non client endorsement, not a guarantee nor representative of all clients. Smart portfolios of discretionary managed accounts and subject to additional fees. Citi Advisory Agreement and Deposit Account Agreement for details Investment advisory services offered by Stash Investments llc, an SEC registered investment advisor. Investing involves risk I hate to say this about my former employer And I loved working for them for five years, and they were a very good employer. But, dear God, this Reuters investigation into Banksy. What the actual fuck?
- [33:47]
B
I love that this story really irritates you. I brought it up because I thought it would be up your alley.
- [33:52]
C
And then, yeah, Elizabeth was like, he likes art. Here's an art story.
- [33:56]
B
Well, it was about the market value of Banksy responding to. And I didn't realize he had been outed, I guess, in 2008. Or also by the Daily Mail, though, which the Mail on Sunday is fancy.
- [34:08]
C
Daily Mail. There's, like, Daily Mail and the unfancy one.
- [34:12]
B
Okay, explain why it's irritating.
- [34:13]
C
Explain it all. Felix, maybe back up and, like, break it all down.
- [34:17]
A
Okay, so do we need to explain who Banksy is?
- [34:20]
C
Honestly? Why not? She says because she only kind of knows who Banksy is.
- [34:25]
A
So Banksy is a street artist. He also does works on canvas. He's sold works for millions of dollars. That's all been good for him. Like most graffiti artists, he just refers to himself by this sort of nom de streit, which is Banksy. And that's the important brand who makes the art. And bank, when he first started becoming famous, because he was famous, people were like, well, who are you really? And he wouldn't say. And it was this kind of, like, dumb art world guessing game of, who is Banksy? Is he the guy from a Massive Attack? No, he probably isn't, because his stencils are. Are flopping up in places when Massive Attack is on tour somewhere. And then eventually, in 2008, the mail on Sunday reveals who he is. He's some guy called Robin Bunk. He's some guy called Robin Gunningham. And that actually makes sense why he's called Banksy because his name is Robin. And so it's Robin Banks, Banksy. Get it? Dumb English humor. And so everyone kind of sees this and everyone goes, well, I have no idea who Robin Cunningham is. So the fact that he has this other name, Robin Cunningham, and not just Banksy, it tells me really nothing about Banksy. And Banksy goes on having a lucrative career. His work sell for more and more money. They peak in the sort of crazy meme Stock Years of 2021, 2022, sell for, like, over $10 million, I think, for some of them. And, yeah, he has a kind of like, viral moment when one of them gets, like, shredded in the middle of an auction. Anyway, it's all very dunty and whatever. And Banksy becomes this quite popular artist. A lot of people, a Lot of individuals like him. He generally has more popularity than he does critical acclaim, let's put it that way. In that sense, he's not dissimilar from the other great sort of graffiti artist who has become worth hundreds of millions of dollars, which is Jean Michel Basquiat. And we're in this world where Banksy is a thing and people like him and he often sells for large sums, and that's a perfectly normal world to be in. And then Reuters, in its infinite fucking wisdom, decides it's going to spend about 800,000 words doing this incredibly loop, de loop, circuitous, misdirection filled, random. I can't even. I was. It's not an essay, it's not a feature, it's not an investigation. It's just a mess of. We are going to reveal who Banksy is. And you're like, but we know who Banksy is. It was revealed in 2008 by the Mail on Sunday. But no, we are going to reveal who Banksy is. And then at the end of these 18,000 words, they reveal that Banksy is exactly the same guy that Robin, this Robin Cunningham guy that we have known was Banksy all along. And their great new piece of information is number one. They worked it out in a different way than the Mail on Sunday. Worked it out, great, fine, whatever. And guess what? He has another alias. So not only does he go by Robin Cunningham, he also goes by David Jones, which is a deliberately boring name that makes him easy to hide in plain sight. Whatever. For some reason, this complete nothing burger of a story goes massively viral. Everyone picks it up. Even the male picks it up. The New York Times does a follow up. The Wall Street Journal does a follow up. Everyone's like, banksy has been revealed. Does this mean something for his family? They'll fuck off. We've known who he is forever. No, it doesn't mean anything. Why do we care? Like, ugh.
- [38:01]
B
Some people just didn't buy the original story because it wasn't as sourced as this one. But although I do agree that this story was overlong and overwrought, I mean, I enjoyed it. I didn't. I'm not a. Did you read the whole thing?
- [38:14]
A
Because I have to admit, I didn't. I started skimming it.
- [38:16]
B
I did. I mean, it's full of good Banksy trivia. Like, I didn't realize his company is called Pest Control Office, which I kind of love. But he said that he was inspired to start doing graffiti by a scene in Jaws, you know, where the mayor is standing in front of a big Amity tourist sign, and there's a woman in a bikini kind of lounging on the sand. And somebody has graffitied on the billboard, help Shark. And so there's a still of that scene in the piece that says, this is what made Banksy want to be an artist
- [38:48]
A
again. Maybe it's because I'm too close to the art market. And Banksy's official office is called Pest control. Like. Yeah, that we've known for 25 years, but, you know. But now.
- [38:59]
B
Yes, but Elizabeth Spires did not know that.
- [39:01]
A
Yeah, no, but that's what's more important. This is the. Somehow the thing that makes Banksy cross the sort of species barrier into people who don't care about art is this, like, we reveal who he is and you've never heard of him, and you don't learn anything by learning who he is.
- [39:17]
C
But this is the thing. I don't think it's weird at all. Because of you working in media, this happens all the time, right? You write a story, no one reads it. Then, like, the New York Times writes it or the Journal writes it, and then everyone's talking about it and you're like, I fucking told you that two weeks ago. Do you know what I mean? And it does not matter. What matters is whoever gets it right? You know, whoever gets the attention in a way that people actually pay attention to it. And that has been true forever.
- [39:45]
A
That is true, Emily. That is absolutely true. But let me ask you this. When was the last time everyone has ever talked about a Reuters story? Reuters has been, like, the opposite of viral forever. They write boring stories that no one reads and mean, there are stories and there's nothing in this story stylistically that makes it popular, right? It's a terribly written story, and it's a terribly edited story, and it should have been a tenth of the length. And like, the whole thing was just. And it's. Yeah, I mean, it's written like they were trying to pitch it as some kind of dumb podcast series or something. I have no idea.
- [40:24]
B
I think, again, it just goes back to arts publications, not really buying the sourcing on the first story or you would have seen Art News. Banksy, AKA Robin Cunningham. They haven't done that. So I think there was some doubt.
- [40:38]
A
Still, Banksy is the name of the artist, Elizabeth. And I can guarantee you that going forward, when a banksy sells for $10 million and an art publication reports on it, they're still just going to call it Banksy. They're not going to say whose real name.
- [40:52]
B
Okay, well, the New York Times would say no.
- [40:56]
A
Okay, well, let's see. Because I will take the other side of that. Next time Banksy gets in the news for doing something Banksy ish and he creates a hotel in Palestine or whatever stunt he does, are they going to say whose real name is Robin Cunningham? I'm gonna say they're not.
- [41:11]
B
I think the Times will. And I'll bet you a banana taped to a wall with a piece of duct tape
- [41:18]
C
also 2008. Felix, I'm gonna say something. Just. They'll blow your mind. But like, 2008 was a long time ago. Okay. It was 18 years ago.
- [41:30]
A
If a story's worth writing in 2008, it's worth rewriting in 2026.
- [41:34]
C
Yeah.
- [41:35]
A
Quite hilariously, I think for a minute there was a Daily Mail pickup of the Reuters story, and some 23 year old hamster wheel person not working on the Daily Mail website just did a big headline of Banksy revealed without having any clue that they had actually broken it back in 2008 because they were
- [41:55]
C
probably like five years old.
- [41:57]
A
Exactly.
- [41:57]
B
When I was the editor of the observer, one of my reporters came to me and said, I have a story. I know where Jimmy Hoffa is buried. And I told him, if you actually get that story, I'm just gonna hang up my journalistic hat and go home. But what he had was basically the equivalent of what we're talking about. There'd been another story that had been written a long time ago that seemed plaus to him.
- [42:20]
A
The other reason and the story, the Reuters story, brings this up in an attempt to shoot it down. The other reason why it's dumb is that so much of Banksy's artistic practice, whether you like it or not, it is what he does is based around this anonymity and this idea that he's. He's just this name and this brand and no one knows who he is. And yeah, like, technically people did know who he was, but he still had that mystique. And Reuters is like, ha, ha. We will puncture that mystique bubble and we will bring you down to earth and reveal that you're a man named Dave. And you're like, why? You know, like, yes, I know you can. But they put so much effort into this. They went to fucking Ukraine and they were like interviewing people in Ukraine and showing people police mug shots in Ukraine. And they go, come on, man. If you're reporting from Ukraine, you obviously earthly have more important stuff to report on.
- [43:16]
C
They have a Lot of resources.
- [43:17]
B
They do some hand wringing in the piece about whether they should say his real name. Because the logic was, well, a lot of his art is kind of based on vandalizing public spaces. Is he gonna start getting in trouble for it now?
- [43:30]
A
Well, evidently not, because he's just got this alias that he can work under, and no one knows which of the 18,gazillion David Joneses he is. Yeah, it's all dumb as sand.
- [43:40]
C
Wait, before we log off on this one, as our resident art expert, is Banksy's art, like, good, Felix, or what do people think? What do you think?
- [43:53]
B
This is your make it or break it taste making?
- [43:56]
A
There was one piece I liked which he did a collab with Damien Hirst, and he took a Damien Hirst spot painting and he sort of spray painted a woman with a broom, sort of picking up the corner of it and trying to clean up the spots and. Which was a funny joke because it was an actual Damien Hirsch spot painting. And it kind of broke the fourth wall. It did interesting things, like. I'm not saying he's never done anything good. He has got some imagination. He did a fun thing with, like, a telephone booth once. So, yeah, there are flashes of inspiration in his catalogue, but a lot of it is just very repetitive and simplistic.
- [44:36]
C
And what about this notion? I think it's in the Journal piece, that unmasking him, giving him a real name, establishing that he's a real person, would make the value of his art go up. What do you make of that?
- [44:45]
A
So, yeah, the Journal decides, and this is a little bit of, like, you know, dumb media insider bullshit, The Journal decides that they need to follow their story somehow. Why they make this decision? Probably just because the Reuter story is getting so much traffic. They're like, we need our version of this story. And so the Journal version of the story is, let's get Kelly Crowe to phone up a couple of collectors and say, does this make you more likely to buy his art? And they say, what? Maybe. I don't know. And so they write this toy going, yeah, his prices could go up as a result, or maybe they could go down. Who knows? And then the New York Times, amazingly, does exactly the same thing. And they're like, what does this mean for his prices? And then New York Times basically winds up on the other side of that trade saying, yeah, no, it's not going to make any difference at all. So the answer is, maybe it will make a difference on the upside, and maybe it will make a difference on the Downside. Or maybe it will make no difference at all. The point is, it's all dumb speculation. No one knows. And why are we writing these stories? They are stupid stories.
- [45:45]
C
Wow.
- [45:49]
A
Okay. I've managed to get that off my chest now. I hope you forgive me. Okay, so numbers round. Elizabeth, do you have a number?
- [46:09]
B
Yes, My number is 12 billion. And that's a dollars. And that's how much the company Align Technology is worth. They make Invisalign, which it turns out, is the biggest user and buyer of 3D printing machines, all of which they have to kind of retrofit for their purposes. But they just bought a small 3D printing company because they want to be able to just print the entire aligners directly. Right now, they print molds of some sort. And then, you know. But if you wonder who's buying up all of the 3D printers, it's the Invisalign company.
- [46:39]
C
I was just at the JP Morgan's new headquarter building, and when you walk in the building, there's a giant flag pole with a giant flag on top waving as if in the wind. And there's a manufactured air blowing on it. So it looks like that, but the flag is resting on a bronze flagpole that I was told was made in a 3D printer. That's my story.
- [47:00]
A
That flagpole was designed by Norman Foster. He's the architect of the building. It is bronze. It is very expensive. It is very stupid. And I didn't say it was stupid. But you also didn't say the dumbest thing about it.
- [47:14]
C
What is it?
- [47:14]
A
Which is the direction that the flag is flying is the direction of the wind outside the building.
- [47:22]
B
Building.
- [47:22]
A
So they have these little wind sensors on the outside of the building working out is the wind coming from the west or the north or the east or whatever. And then they make sure that the flag flies inside the lobby in the direction that it would be flying if the building wasn't there.
- [47:36]
C
I don't. That's. I'm sorry. But that is cool. It's cool. You walk in there and you're like, this company has a lot of money. You're like, this is a fucking rich company. Like, it is so clear. I don't know. I was impressed.
- [47:49]
A
No, I mean, it is true that Norman Foster is very good at making buildings that feel very expensive. I just spent this week working out of the Bloomberg offices in London, which are also Norman Foster. And you walk in there and you're like, these are expensive offices.
- [48:02]
C
Expensive.
- [48:04]
A
But since we are on the subject of overpriced artists. What did you make of the two Gerhard Richters in the lobby?
- [48:10]
C
I don't even. I just noticed there was art. I don't know if I noticed who did the arts. I was like, wow, this art looks fancy. That's all. I'm so sorry, I really let you down.
- [48:20]
A
That's exactly it. It looks fancy. Like no one rates it, but I'm sure they paid tens of millions of dollars for them.
- [48:26]
C
Yeah. Again, I was like, expensive.
- [48:28]
A
Yeah. Everything is in shades of luxury. Beige.
- [48:31]
C
It's so. I've never been in an office that fancy. I had to like upgrade all my, like, perceptions of what an office could be are now like, they have a sweet green in the middle of.
- [48:41]
A
On the like, they have 10 different restaurants, all of which are like run by Danny Mayer somehow.
- [48:46]
B
Yes.
- [48:46]
A
And if you're at your desk, they will deliver from the restaurant to your desk.
- [48:51]
C
Yes. There's sushi bar, there's salad. There's like multiple salad places. I think there's a bar bar. I mean, it was.
- [48:58]
A
Did you go to the pub at the top where they do a photo of Jamie Dimon's face and the foam on the Guinness?
- [49:05]
C
I walked by it there. There are people in the pub pubbing. Yes. But you're not allowed to drink until 4, until the markets close or whatever.
- [49:12]
A
Keep it professional. My number is 0.2, or as you might also call it 20%, which is the proportion of students at St Andrews University in Scotland who are American.
- [49:26]
C
Wow.
- [49:27]
A
This is a number that just keeps on going up. And every American kind of has this love hate relationship with the fact that Centantrius has become so incredibly American and. And St. Andrews has been very early to this game of basically getting a whole bunch of American students by being relatively cheap by the standards of first rate American universities and also accepting your standard sort of SAT scores and high school transcripts and whatever that you normally apply to universities in America with, rather than forcing American students to do the International Baccalaureate or whatever they normally have to do in order to get into a UK university. And so put those things together. And this really, honestly, quite grim northeastern Scottish town, which has lots of granite and very little sunshine, has suddenly become this place where like loads of rich American kids just hang out and go to college for four years.
- [50:22]
C
Is there like a culture clash or anything in the school or is it all good?
- [50:26]
A
The English don't like the Americans. The Scots don't like the English. The Scots like, probably like the Americans just because the English don't. I have no Idea. But St. Andrews, to be clear, was also, before it was overrun by Americans, was overrun by English. It was always the university that had the highest proportion of English students.
- [50:45]
C
Huh.
- [50:46]
A
What's your number, Emily Jessmyn? Is this an ABBA number?
- [50:55]
C
Yes, my number.
- [50:58]
B
Cut it.
- [51:00]
C
My number is 5.5 billion. That is dollars. That is the estimated value of the AMU, the ABBA music universe. I got this number. I got this number from a guy, Daniel Paris, who has an amazing substack called stats significant. The amu, or ABBA music universe consists of all time music sales by abba, proceeds from the movies and from the Broadway show and from the London production, but does not include. It's probably an underestimation because it doesn't include Turing Revenue, other adaptions. And so that's one thing. ABBA's real popular. They're still making lots of money. The other thing I learned from this amazing substack. Everyone should just read it is. And I don't know, Felix will be like, I knew this, but I didn't know this. Okay.
- [51:47]
A
Voyages. The holograms.
- [51:49]
C
No. ABBA's origin story begins with tax regulation. Yes. In the 1970s.
- [51:59]
A
Why is this not an entire segment? Why is this being relegated to the numbers round?
- [52:03]
C
Because I forgot. I meant to read it like three days ago and I forgot because stupid war. And then I was like, wait, I gotta read this. So. So, okay. In the 1970s, Sweden introduced. I'm reading directly from the substack introduced. Taxation laws have to do with the deductibility of, quote, poorly styled work clothing. If you could prove that your work outfits were unwearable outside of work, you could claim your clothing as a tax deduction. Thus. Thus, the newly formed band ABBA decided to capitalize on this and claims the substack out of frugality and their tax strategy. The band's aesthetic was born. They wore these wild, outrageous clothes, these crazy outfits. It propelled them to fame. They wound up winning. What's that thing that everyone talks about?
- [52:51]
A
Eurovision.
- [52:52]
C
Eurovision also with their hit track Waterloo. Whatever. And the rest of the is history. Billions of dollars of history.
- [52:58]
A
So basically the idea is that if I wear a super skin tight, silver lame jumpsuit, that is something I would never be able to wear out on the street as a normal thing. Therefore, it is tax deductible.
- [53:12]
C
Yes.
- [53:12]
B
And I think you have to insist that the lame jumpsuit is required for your work.
- [53:18]
A
Which it kind of is if you're average.
- [53:19]
B
Doing a podcast.
- [53:20]
C
Exactly.
- [53:21]
A
Yeah. I mean, I think this is true. It is clearly required to be a Swedish pop star. I don't think it is required to be a podcaster, sadly. But yes, I'm recording this week from London, where ABBA Voyages is still going strong, where all four ABBA holograms perform many times a week at enormous ticket prices and managed to get a steady stream of tourists going out to Stratford, which is the only thing that would ever get a steady stream of tourists going out to Stratford is apparently Aber Voyages, the Hologram Experience.
- [53:52]
C
His theory for why they're so popular is that they're very positive. There's a lot of positivity and vibes, good vibes and people like it.
- [53:59]
A
Also, right now they are vibing in New York where Chess the Musical is doing enormously well, much better the second time around than when it opened the first time round. And that's basically an ABBA production as well.
- [54:12]
C
Amazing.
- [54:13]
A
Thank you for listening to Slate Money. Thank you to Jessamyn Molly of Seaplane Armada for producing. Thank you for sending US emails on slatemoneylate.com and we will be back next week with more Slate Money.
- [54:44]
C
Slate Money is brought to you by Charles Schwab Decisions made in Washington can affect your portfolio every day, but what policy changes should investors be watching? Listen to Washington Wise, an original podcast for investors from Charles Schwab to hear the stories making news in Washington right now. Host Mike Townsend, Charles Schwab's Managing Director for Legislative and Regulatory affairs, takes a nonpartisan look at the stories that matter most to investors, including policy initiatives for retirement, savings, taxes and trade, inflation concerns, the Federal Reserve, and how regulatory developments can affect companies, sectors and even the entire market. Mike and his guests offer their perspective on how policy changes could affect what you do with your portfolio. Download the latest episode and follow@schwab.com WashingtonWise or wherever you listen. Hey, this is Paige from Giggly Squad and you guys, it's here. McDonald's Big Arch Burger the new Big Arch is here and it's the most McDonald's McDonald's burger yet. It has two quarter pound patties, three slices of cheese, tangy Big Arch sauce, lettuce, pickles, crispy and slivered onions and a poppy and sesame seed bunch of it's everything you love about McDonald's burgers. Between two buns, the big Arch sauce is tangy, creamy and it's the perfect pair to the Big Arch Burger. Go grab a Big Arch burger today. But warning, you're going to need both hands to hold it at participating McDonald's for a limited time while supplies last.