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The Globalist
Japan’s new prime minister, what’s next for Israel and Gaza and L’Oréal acquires Kering’s beauty portfolio
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A
Craft matters in small ways like how a coffee is brewed, and in not so small ways like how your money is cared for. Which is why for 160 years, UBS has elevated banking to a craft, tailoring unique strategies that combine human expertise with the latest technologies, all happening across 24 time zones and and 12 key financial hubs. With you at the heart of it all, UBS advice is our craft.
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B
You're listening to the Globalist, first broadcast on 21st October 2025 on Monocle Radio. The Globalist in association with U Live from London. This is the Globalist with me, Emma Nelson. A very warm welcome to today's program. Coming up, Japan has its first female prime minister, the ultra conservative former heavy metal drummer Sanae Takaichi. That was the announcement of her appointment just a couple of hours ago. We'll be looking at a new era in the country's politics and why she had a tougher time than expected to secure the job. Also ahead in the next 60 minutes, with all eyes on the Middle east, what happens next with the Gaza ceasefire? Plus, have Russian drones disrupted not only the scale skies above Poland but also the politics down below? We'll examine the disruptive effect on the ground. Plus, l' Oreal buys Kering's multi billion euro beauty portfolio. Monocle's fashion director Natalie Theodosi is joining me with the story. Natalie?
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C
Yes, Emma. The deal is priced at US$4.6 billion, giving L' Oreal exclusive rights to make beauty products for both brands and other fashion houses like Gucci.
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B
We'll be hearing more from Natalie a little bit later on. We'll also have the newspapers, the business news and we meet the Canadian alt pop provocateur Ali X. That's all ahead on the Globalist live from London. First, a look at what else is happening in today's news. The US President and Australian Prime Minister have signed a rare earths and critical minerals agreement and aimed at ensuring a steady supply of the materials as China tries to tighten control over global supply. France's former President Nicolas Sarkozy is expected to begin serving his five year prison sentence today. And demolition has begun on the historic East Wing of the White House in preparation for the construction of President Trump's new ballroom. Stay tuned to Monocle Radio throughout the day for more on these stories. But first, Japan has a new prime minister. Sanae Takeichi has officially become the first woman to hold the post. A vote in the lower house secured her formal appointment an hour or so ago. Her cabinet is scheduled to be Inaugurated tonight. Well, she's a self styled Japanese Margaret Thatcher. She's known for her ultra conservative views and for her unusual past as a heavy metal drummer and biker. Well, I'm joined now from Tokyo by Jeffrey J. Hall who's lecturer at Japan's Kanda University of International Studies. Good afternoon Jeffrey.
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D
Hello Emma.
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B
So this has just happened in the last couple of hours?
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D
Yes, this is just about an hour ago I would say she the vote was taking place and she won a majority in the House of Representatives becoming the first female Prime Minister.
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B
And is Japan happy with its new Prime Minister?
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D
Well, I would say they are cautiously optimistic. A recent poll indicated just over 50% of people had some sort of positive expectation from her administration. So there's some change taking place. They're going to give it a chance but I think a lot of people aren't really sure what's going to happen next.
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B
Well, let's just lay out how the political land is at the moment. We have her heading a coalition government between her ruling Liberal Democratic Party and the right leaning Japan Innovation Party known as Isshin. But it doesn't give them a complete majority, does it? So just explain to us a little bit about how the politics are.
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D
Well right now with their partnership with Isshin, they, they just need a handful of votes in both houses to pass legislation. So they have to reach out to independents or to other smaller opposition parties to try to pass anything such as the budget. So there still will be a degree of negotiation required to do almost anything.
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B
And where does that therefore leave the way that politics will be done in the future? Because if we just look at where the change has taken place, Isshin has replaced the party Komeita which has been a partner to the LDP, Ms. Takeichi's party, they've been partners for a very, very, very long time. So this is actually a very big change, isn't it?
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D
Yes, it's, it's the end of this 26 year relationship in which Comito, which was sort of a centrist party that put a stop on some of the LDP's more hardline conservative views on national security. It, it's now gone and it's been replaced with a right leaning party that agrees with the LDP on a lot of security issues. And one of the things they announced was maybe Japan should build nuclear submarines. I really doubt that that would be happening if Komeito was still around. But Komeito left the coalition because in part they didn't think Takaichi was moderate enough and in part because they thought she wasn't doing enough to address the money scandals that the LDB has been mired in for years.
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B
So tell me a little bit more about this ultra conservative view that she takes. Much is made about the fact that she models herself on Margaret Thatcher. Apparently she met Thatcher not long before Thatcher died. So there's clearly a dedication to this. But how does this translate into her policies and view of how Japan should be?
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D
Well, being a Conservative in Japan is very different from being a Conservative in the uk. Margaret Thatcher's autobiography is one of her favorite books, but she believes in fiscal policy that's very different from Thatcher. She thinks that Japan can spend more deficit spend without cutting programs very much. But when it comes to being a hardline conservative in Japan, that tends to come out in security issues, whether it being hawkish on China, saying very aggressive things, saying that every Chinese resident and every South Korean resident of Japan is a potential spy or security threat. She has very revisionist views on World War II. She's written in the past that she didn't think it was a war of aggression. So these kind of conservative views are the ones that her very nationalistic supporters on the Internet and within her own party very much like.
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B
And is this something that Japan is comfortable with as a country?
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D
Well, that's a different matter. I'd say that there's about 20 to 30% of the country who hold very conservative views and the rest are a little bit more in the middle. So they might be turned off by some of her more extreme positions. But there's already signs that she might moderate a bit because she has appointed several moderate rivals to her cabinet. The defense minister is Mr. Koizumi, who was her main opponent in the presidential race. So it seems that she isn't making a cabinet that's entirely ultra conservative.
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B
And where does her party, the ldp, stand now? Obviously shifting its alliances in terms of who it tries to build coalitions with. But it had its second worst ever electoral result in September last year. They are two votes short of a majority. The LDP has really sort of its star has fallen, hasn't it?
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D
Yes. Its brand is tarnished by scandals. And with the end of its relationship with Komeito, it also loses a special electoral cooperation which would give the LDP sometimes as much as 5 or 10% of the vote in urban districts. So we're now in a situation that is very unpredictable. If there was an election, there's no telling really how much the LDP would lose. It's expected it would lose if it called an election soon. Or maybe Takechi could bring in new voters who went to far right parties or other center right parties. So this is one of the most unpredictable times in Japanese politics in the last several decades.
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B
Indeed, when you look at the, you know, the revolving door of the prime ministerial office in the last couple of years, one does wonder how long Takaichi will last the course.
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D
Well, if she can survive not provoking a vote of no confidence from the opposition parties, she can stay on for several years. And her position as LGB president is a three year term. So theoretically she could last that long. But if she isn't able to convince the public and the other opposition parties in the Diet that she's making some kind of progress, if prices continue to rise, if other issues like scandals erupt from the ldp, it could be yet again another revolving door.
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B
Prime Minister, let's talk more generally about foreign policy and in particular Donald Trump. He's coming to Tokyo week after next. I believe he likes her. He's already said he's ready to rock and roll with I think the New Yorker said Trump ready to rock with heavy metal drummer. He likes Takichi's leadership. Does this mean that Japan will have a smoother ride of it when it comes to tariffs and indeed the wider relationship between the United States and Japan?
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D
Well, I think that he definitely used very nice words. He called her strong and I believe, wise in his truth, social post. And so there is maybe an expectation that because she's seen as a successor to Abe's conservatism that they will get along as Abe and Trump did. She doesn't play golf and he doesn't play the drums as far as I know. But they do have a lot of ideological overlap that will make it quite easy for them to get along. I think Japan for the last few months has been following what is basically Abe's style of diplomacy, which is to be as friendly as possible with Trump, praise him constantly, never criticize him, and that tends to make Trump happy. I don't think there'll be much change after the trade agreement that they made earlier this year. So Japan will just have to deal with the existence of those tariffs. But I don't think there will be a significant drop in the relationship either.
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B
Jeffrey J. Hall, lecturer at Japan's Kanda University of International Studies, joining me on the line from Tokyo. Thank you so much for joining me on the Globalist. 9:11am in Tel Aviv, 711 here in London. And we turn to Israel now, where yesterday there were furious international diplomatic Efforts to keep the peace. After a temporary collapse of the ceasefire between Hamas and Israel in Gaza, senior figures from the Trump administration dashed over for a meeting with the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. Well, to bring us up to date, I'm joined now by Julie Norman, Associate professor of Politics and International Relations at ucl, also co author of Gaza the Dream and the Nightmare. Good morning. Welcome back, Julie.
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E
Good morning, Emma.
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B
What happened yesterday, then?
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E
Well, so yesterday we saw what had been a planned visit by Trump's envoys, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, to Israel to meet with Netanyahu to really try and shore up the ceasefire, even before the events on Sunday, which really gave evidence to how fragile the ceasefire is with fire on Israeli troops, with Israeli strikes on Palestinians, and dozens killed. So we did see, again, meetings trying to push things forward, push Israel towards this next phase of the deal. Israel did, Netanyahu did address the Knesset afterwards, and we expect a meeting between Vance and Netanyahu today.
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B
Okay. And what is expected to be said in that meeting?
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E
Yeah. So again, right now, the Trump administration is really trying to, I would say, push Israel to not completely give up on the ceasefire. There have been enough incidents that I think without this kind of pressure, Israel would say the ceasefire is over. Hamas is abrogating the deal. That includes not returning all of the deceased hostages remains. About 15 still remain in Gaza. And then the incidents on Sunday, you know, this could be an excuse, if you will, to say the deal is off. The US Is saying, look, we need to stay the course. We need to get past these types of disruptions, spoiler effects that we think would somewhat be anticipated, and try and get a stabilization force, try and start focusing on disarmament and trying to get those. Those tougher issues. But, Emma, those are really tough issues, and they're going to take a lot of time and a lot of negotiation to get those across the line.
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B
And indeed, one wonders whether Steve Witkoff, Jared Kushner, and J.D. vance are going to be the ones who are able to keep a lid on this.
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E
That's right. I mean, I think what I've always been told in the region is that Trump's personal involvement is very key into if this deal moves forward and how it's going to work. And, and again, with Vance's deployment, this is obviously very high level US Commitment. It is a show of a commitment, for sure. But again, it's always very unpredictable with Trump with when he, too, will kind of throw up his hands and change course. So, again, we do see this effort this week there are also visits to some of the military sites. That's not super usual to have US US Leaders visit Israeli military sites and leaders to discuss things moving forward. But that has been happening. And meanwhile we also see Arab and Muslim mediators meeting in Cairo to try and see what they can do on that side of things. But again, the real face to face technical discussions are still yet to come.
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B
Tell us a little bit more about what was happening in Cairo because we had the Hamas delegation sent there, didn't they? There was officials from Qatar and Egypt who've played such a key role behind the scenes when it comes to communicating with Hamas. Do we know what happened there?
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E
Yeah, I would say the output of that, I would say is still somewhat unknown. But we do know that Qatar, that Egypt and then also Turkey to some degree are still trying to work their different sides of this negotiation with Hamas to also keep the deal going. On that end, there's different concerns, I would say, for both sides, so to speak. Israel is obviously very focused on Hamas, Hamas's disarmament, Hamas is very focused on Israel's withdrawal. So some of what the negotiations are starting to focus on at least is the lines of where Israel was withdrawing to in Gaza. Those were put forward in a map by Trump, but it's not exactly clear on the ground where they lie. And that's one reason why we've seen, you know, we've seen violence continuing in Gaza because people on the ground, these lines are not drawn yet. And so there's, there's a need to get, get those. But I think the bigger questions again is what governance is going to look like in Hamas in Gaza and what security is going to look like in Gaza.
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B
Let's move away from what's happening in Gaza itself and the situation on the ground and the more longer term support given by, by other nations to try to make this happen. We've obviously seen this flurry of energy in the last couple of days. But back in America, when you've got the far right wing Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene is now saying that Americans are sick of paying for war. She brought the Ukraine conflict into that statement as well. But the fact remains is that the issue of the US Involvement in wars in the Middle east and also in Ukraine, is it wearing down Americans and will this have any effect on the decisions made in the White House?
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E
Well, you know, Emma, I think a large part of Trump's base, certainly the MAGA base, really is averse to US Involvement overseas and that includes military, financial, diplomatic involvement. So to speak. I think Trump's response to that is saying, look, that's why I'm trying to get these peace deals to, you know, keep us out of these other conflicts, to, you know, avoid us kind of giving this endless military aid. But at the end of the deal, at the end of the day, you, you can't really have both at the same time. You either need to be an invested leader willing to kind of use different forms of leverage or you're, or you're not. What I would say with the case of Gaza, it's a bit different, I would say, than Ukraine, obviously, for many reasons. But one thing with Gaza is for reconstruction efforts. You know, there are many states in the region that are committed to reconstruction if there are other elements in place. And also Trump is framing his commitments to that largely in terms of, you know, investments and interests for the US which is what he's done in other places as well. So I think we'll start seeing a shift away from the sort of old US way of doing business of aid things people are probably used to, and a bit more of interest based investments, economic lanes.
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B
Julie Norman, thank you as ever for joining us on Monocle Radio. Still to come, I think I ask.
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F
A lot of questions in my work, but I don't really answer them. I pose questions and I try to answer them, but even the X in my name, it's sort of representative of like infinite possibility, you know, that's the.
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B
Old pop provocateur Aliex talking to Monocle Radio. Stay tuned. There's more from her later.
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A
Craft is a matter of perspective, a unique outlook, an obsessive attention to detail. With UBS's Chief Investment Office House View, we're focused on identifying the latest investment opportunities and market risks to help you achieve your financial goals. So you get the big picture broken down into thought provoking insights delivered daily and curated by over 200 globally connected, locally active analysts. UBS banking is our craft.
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B
Let's continue with today's newspapers. Joining me is Charles Hecker, author of Zero Sum. I can't speak today. Charles, welcome. What book have you written?
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G
Good morning, Emma. I've written a book called Zero Sum the Arc of International Business in Russia.
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B
There you go. And you're dressed very smartly today. Do we have a thing?
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G
Doing my best.
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B
We're having a thing. Right. Okay, let's have a look at the papers. This is what I. You're here. Tell us. There's this story in the New York Times and actually it's being documented widely. A bulldozer is going into the White House.
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G
Emma. This is a picture that I never thought that I would see. And it is the sort of picture that speaks a thousand words. And it is and will evermore be an indelible metaphor for the Trump presidency, because not only is he taking a sledgehammer to a lot of America's political institutions, but he is literally demolishing part of the White House, specifically the East Wing. And so we're looking at a story in the New York Times that says part of White House is reduced to rubble. Trump's ballroom will rise. In its place, trucks and various sorts of digging implements are smashing the East Wing to bits. And the pictures are quite dramatic. And you can just see the sort of shards of concrete and wiring and things hanging loose and rubble on the ground. And this is making way for a 90,000 square foot ballroom. 90,000 square feet, by the way, is a football pitch and a half, according to UK regulations.
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B
That's a lot of balls.
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G
That's an awful lot of balls. And so this is a project that is being funded, we're told, by the White House, by the private sector, more business involvement in public affairs. The East Wing of the White House, of course, is the home to the office of the first lady. And perhaps its demolishment is not that big a deal. The first lady doesn't appear in the White House very often. There are several other administrative offices that are being torn down. President Trump reassures readers of the New York Times that the East Wing will be rebuilt and its admin offices will be renovated to an even better state than they are now. But right now, Washingtonians are watching the face of their city change quite dramatically.
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B
We were talking about this before we went on air and how we feel about this, and there is that sense that although, well, there's this sort of decision, this sort of feeling, these two feelings, isn't there that Donald Trump is doing an awful lot in the world, good or bad? He's very busy. It is affecting lives absolutely everywhere. And yet one wonders whether in 5,000, 100, 200 years time, he will be something in a history book, you know, a man who created an awful lot of change. But the fact remains is that once you tear down an historic building, it can never come back.
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G
Well, precisely. And once you build a 90,000 square foot ballroom, the only thing that you can do with it, if you don't want it to be a ballroom, is perhaps converted into a football pitch. And that's why the metaphor is so apt, because not only will the White House be forever changed in its structure. But the global and national political system is being changed in ways that can't be put back. And so when you think about what happens when the Trump presidency ends, as surely it will at some point, certain things can be undone and certain things are indelible. And the restructuring of the White House is one and the reordering of the global order is another one.
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B
Okay, let's move on to the Financial Times, which has been doing some outstanding reporting on what happened between Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Donald Trump in the White House at the end of last week. They've got another chapter to this today, haven't they?
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G
That's right. I'm glad you mentioned that because the FT's Russia reporting, I follow it very closely and the FT's Russia reporting is absolutely astonishingly good. And they broke in an amazing story about the Trump Zelensky meeting last week in the White House, which of course was spectacularly interrupted the day before by a phone call from Vladimir Putin himself. And it was a very effective phone call because it really did disrupt the meeting agenda and President Trump's attitude going into the meeting. And so what the FT broke the other day was a description of what was going on inside the White House when the two presidents met. And it was a reversion apparently to type. And it was a reversion to the Trump Zelensky meeting in the Oval Office of February where there was finger wagging and screaming and reading of lectures from President Trump to President Zelensky. What they've done today is they've the headline in the FT says Europeans rushed to Volody Mirzalinsky's defense after tense Donald Trump meeting. So having broken wide open what happened in the White House last week between the two presidents, they're now saying that that Europe is going to pick up the pieces. And I have to say that having read this piece, it's quite frustrating because as Europeans rush to Zelenskyy's defense, nothing in this article, this is not the fault of the ft, whose reporting is meticulous. Nothing in this article is new. Absolutely not a single new proposal for helping Ukraine. Yes, they're talking about seizing and repurposing Russia central bank assets that are stuck in Belgium and various other places. But you then have sort of David van Wheel, the Dutch foreign minister, saying the EU should put Ukraine in a strong starting position by providing military assistance. Really? We are now coming up February will be four years of this war. And as groundbreaking as the FT's reporting is the European response appears to be significantly less groundbreaking.
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B
It requires more consensus. Let's have a look at the Guardian. It has a wonderful, wonderful article about the big blackout thing that happened yesterday when the Internet fell over and it was all terribly serious. And actually it did explain or did sort of of cast some light on just how dependent so many of us are on these one or two central centers of sort of literal power. The Guardian has this wonderful article called what did you do when the Internet went out? What did you do in the Internet? I didn't notice I was doing something else. It was most embarrassed about that.
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G
I suppose I should start with a personal gripe, and that is that the crash of Amazon Web Services, apparently what happened was you found out that all of your favorite websites rely on Amazon Web services. And I have to say that my personal gripe on all of this is the reason why I discovered this was happening, is that my wordle streak was reset to zero. Yes.
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B
Crushing.
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G
Well, I mean, that's the thing is that I have to immediately then follow up by saying it wasn't that high to begin with.
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A
I'll show you mine in a minute.
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G
But it was zeroed out.
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D
Oh, no.
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G
That's actually quite heartbreaking because of the AWS collapse. And so what the Guardian does is it takes us through. First of all, this was a tech glitch. It's important to point out this was not a cyber hack, it was not a cyber terrorism incident. It was a simple internal technological glitch. But it ranks among one of the largest global Internet outages. And, you know, then the Guardian goes into sort of the more humorous and more human side of what happened and is trolling so trawling, I should say, various websites and looking how people reacted. And there's just one hilarious quote here that says, due to the Amazon outage, Alexa wasn't working this morning. So I had to stumble out of bed in the dark, find my way to the kitchen and turn the coffee maker on manually. I can't live like this. You guys go on without me.
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B
It is a suggestion that actually that we have become a little bit lazy.
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G
We've become a little bit lazy, we've become a little bit Internet dependent. It's like stories that you see about blackouts and sort of other things where you find people saying things like, oh, I read a book for the first time in six months, or, oh, we spoke at the kitchen table for the first time in a year.
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B
Finally, a quick look at what's happened at the Louvre. The front page of Le Parisien today has just talked about how effectively France's history has been stolen. It's gone as serious as that. But the reaction to the theft at the Louvre has been. It's been really difficult, hasn't it? Because it's not relevant to many of us, but it's incredibly interesting.
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G
That's right. And so we're looking, well, this is in every paper everywhere. But we're looking at the moment at the Times with an article entitled how the Louvre Museum Heist Unfolded. And it is an absolutely painstaking textual and graphic reconstruction of what was a 10 minute burglary that, as you point out, Emma, is not just an attack on a museum, but genuinely was an attack on the French Republic. The items that were stolen include pieces of jewelry and regrettas and items of royalty really akin to the crown jewels here that are held in the Tower of London, that were then sort of scurried out of the Louvre, down one of those sort of laddery escalator things and then onto the sort of scooter that you see thousands of every day in the streets of Paris and out beyond the peripherique. I have to say that as a British American or an American Brit, there is a certain amount of schadenfreude in the British reporting of this misery that is visiting the world's most visited museum. And of course, we should probably only dig back a tiny bit in our own memories when items from the British Museum were showing up on ebay. But this is not just an attack on some of the world's rarest treasures, but it's an attack on history.
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B
Charles Hecker, thank you so much for joining us on the Globalist. Now a quick look at some of the other stories we're following today. The U.S. president and Australian Prime Minister have signed a rare earths and critical minerals agreement. The deal is aimed at ensuring a steady supply of the minerals as China tightens its control over the global supply. France's former president Nicolas Sarkozy is expected to begin serving his five year prison sentence today. Sarkozy was convicted of criminal conspiracy in the financing of his 2007 election campaign with money from the Libyan dictators Muammar Gaddafi. An appeals court in the US has ruled that Donald Trump can send National Guard troops into Portland, Oregon. The decision, made despite the objections of the leaders of the city and state, is an important legal victory for Mr. Trump. And demolition has begun on part of the historic East Wing of the White House in preparation for the construction of President Trump's new ballroom. Mr. Trump had previously said he wouldn't change the existing structure of the building. This is the globalist. Stay tuned. Tuned. 8:30am in Warsaw, 7:30am here in London. Now, the last few weeks, incursions of what's believed to be Russian backed drones into airspace belonging to the likes of Poland and Denmark and Germany surprised Europe. The move was bold and it was provocative. But what it actually provoked in one nation at least, was probably not what Moscow intended. Because in Poland there has been a profound effect on the dynamics of the country's politics as a result of all this. And I'm joined now by Alex Szczerbiak, who's professor of politics at the University of Sussex and author of the Polish Politics blog. Good morning, Alex.
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H
Good morning.
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B
There was this initial show of unity, wasn't there, in Poland. So just tell us what happened.
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H
Well, on the night of September 9th and the 10th, we had a major drone incursion into Polish territory. There have been drones flying over into Poland, one or two in recent months, spilling over from the war in Ukraine. But this time it was a significant number. It was around about 20. And it was the first time since the conflict broke out that NATO has actually had to shoot down Russian armed forces. So this is why it was such an important escalation. And as you say, initially at least, the Polish political class had a show of unity. The government led by Donald Tusk and the president Karol Novrotsky, the two key figures here who are absolutely daggers drawn, are sworn enemies, politically united and put on a united front when this happened, registering the fact that this was such a potentially significant escalation in the, the international attention on the Polish Ukrainian border.
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B
And when they united. I mean, you've written about this extensively online. This idea that the prime minister and the president, who are politically at odds, suddenly came together, that this unity stepped up in both a sort of a Polish national way, but also in adherence to what the European Union's values are and indeed NATO.
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H
Yes, that's right. I mean, I think that in a sense they didn't really have any choice. The political imperative is at these kind of times for politicians to come together and not try and score political points off each other. But it's also obviously in the national interest for Poland's leaders to act in this way. And I think one particularly significant thing worth noting here is that there was some questioning as to whether the targeting of the Russian drones was actually deliberate. Indeed, at one point, US President Donald Trump suggested that it might have been accidental, which is something that the Russians Themselves claim. And it's very interesting because, Karen, the president and the party that supports him, the right wing Law and Justice Party, who have very close ideological relations with, with Mr. Trump, Mr. Nosky's first foreign visit as president was to the United States, stood foursquare behind the government and indeed pretty much every other European leader in insisting that this was a deliberate provocation. So although on many issues they're very, very close to each other, Mr. Trump and Mr. Novrotsky and the Law and Justice Party on this issue, the whole political class ranging from right to left, stood shoulder to shoulder that it was indeed a Russian provocation.
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B
And has that shoulder to shoulder position remained or are there signs of division once again?
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H
It was very, very short lived. I mean, we've seen a couple of examples of this, you know, when there's been an international crisis, when the war in Ukraine broke out, when the COVID pandemic begun. But very quickly, politicians resumed their hostilities. To start with, both the current government and the current opposition blamed each other for inadequate civil defense preparations, for not having a proper anti drone system system. And then Mr. Tusk, who's found himself very much on the back foot politically since Mr. Navrotsky was elected in June, has tried to use this as an opportunity to present himself as a kind of a war leader, to put forward what you might call a security narrative. And part of this involves criticizing Mr. Navrotsky and the opposition for the fact that they're insufficiently supportive, as they would say, of the European Union and have questioned Poland's links with Berlin and what you might call the European mainstream. He's used it as an opportunity to put forward the argument that Poland's enemies are to the east and not to the West. And anyone who undermines EU unity is undermining EU, is undermining Poland's security. And this, as I say, is an attempt to try, try and bolster his domestic political situation, which has been very, very weak since Mr. Novarotsky won the presidential election.
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B
But from within the polls themselves, watching the Polish political party's reaction to what happened, how used, how normalized are polls to what is happening next door?
- [36:18]
H
Well, this is maybe the surprising thing given, as I said, the nature of the escalation regulation that this involved. Very quickly, this kind of passed over the news agenda. The government didn't get any kind of a bounce in support. People, political scientists often talk about a thing called a rally effect, which is when people feel insecure due to the international situation, they rally behind the incumbent. This doesn't seem to have happened at all. People have moved very quickly back onto domestic politics where the government's in a very weak position. And I think the reason for this is because, because precisely as you say, the war has become somewhat normalized. I think polls are simply used to it being an item on the news. It appears number two, three, sometimes even number one. But essentially it's kind of background noise. It's something that's going on which they've kind of assimilated. And I think the contrast is here from when hostilities first began in March 2022, when there was a real shock. And that really did shape up Polish politics and frighten people, if you like. And I think now the fact that people have moved so quickly on from this drone crisis, which was, you know, a major crisis, back onto domestic politics, back onto these kind of national issues like the economy, shows that as you say, the situation, the war has become somewhat normalized. It's sort of moved into the background of Polish politics rather than being at the forefront.
- [37:48]
B
Alex Czabiak, author of the Polish Politics blog, thank you so much for joining us. On Monocle Radio now, the beauty giant l' Oreal plans to acquire the cosmetics portfolio of another giant, Kering, for 4 billion euros. L' Oreal is expected to gain the likes of the luxury perfume brand Creed, plus an agreement to create the fragrance and beauty products of Kering's fashion houses, including Gucci and Balenciaga. Or for more on this, I'm joined now by Monocle's fashion director, Natalie Theo Adoti. Good morning, Natalie.
- [38:21]
C
Good morning, Emma.
- [38:23]
B
Good to have you with us. Why was caring why was caring selling?
- [38:29]
C
So I think this is actually the first big move by Luca Di Meo, the new CEO. And the easy answer to why they're selling is that they've had big debt. I think their debt is actually over 9 billion euros. And this is a way to get started with a turnaround, which is the Mayo's biggest job. Also, Kering is inherently a fashion house. They've been licensing their Gucci beauty line. So it does make sense that they would go back to focusing on fashion to turn things around and have l' Oreal on board to help them with beauty.
- [39:09]
B
So let's list what L' Oreal gets for 4 billion euros. What what is actually in the bag, in the shopping bag.
- [39:17]
C
So there is Creed, like you were mentioning, but then there is Also it's a 50 year licensing deal which would allow them to create beauty products and fragrances for any of the of the Fashion brands, I think under the caring portfolio. So there's Balenciaga, there's Bottega, Veneta, Gucci. I think those are the three bigger ones. They've started to dip their toes, especially in the case of Balenciaga and Bottega in fragrance. But I'm sure with someone like l' Oreal behind them with much bigger resources, we would see full on makeup lines and an expansion of existing very small niche fragrance ranges.
- [39:59]
B
How big a move is this? I mean because on, on first glances, $4.6 billion I think is, is, is an enormous amount of money and the, and there seems to be a seismic shift now in the ownership of, of so many parts of international beauty on this one deal alone.
- [40:16]
C
You're right, it's a huge business. And aside from Creed Kering's beauty business is actually quite small. So what they're buying is the ability to license the fashion brands and develop big beauty brands into the future. So it's quite a bold move from l' Oreal as well, which is also rumored to be contestant to buy Giorgio Armani as well, which is also up for sale. So it does really shift the dynamics of the fashion and beauty industries.
- [40:47]
B
Yes, this is an issue for the Armani estate, isn't it? Just explain, just outline for us why this deal actually becomes an interest.
- [40:57]
C
Something interesting for Armani, you mean? Yes, well, Armani is, after Giorgio Armani's death is now on sale. Giorgio Armani left very specific instructions for his family and team to start selling a percentage of his business gradually until there's a full acquisition. And l', Oreal, but also LVMH Luxottica are among the top contestants. So the more power l' Oreal gets, so especially with the ties to caring and getting closer to the, to fashion as well, I think the more likelihood there is for us to see an acquisition of our money as well. I would say.
- [41:42]
B
Tell me more generally, Natalie, about the creativity aspect of all this, because when these brands, I mean you mentioned that they, that most fashion houses license beauty production out anyway. But when you have everything coming under one umbrella, which is commercially highly powerful, what happens to the creative side of things?
- [42:00]
C
Things? I think that's a really good question. And I think, I mean it's happening in fashion itself because it has become so mainstream and things have become much bigger, but especially in the beauty area. And when there's everything is licensed, creativity becomes completely diluted. And in fact I think you, you can see a beauty hall in a department store filled with, with different brands and packaging and colors. But in reality you think that there's so much option, but in truth, there's very little option. It's the same ingredients, the same manufacturer, the same conglomerate behind the majority of it all, and a lot of cookie cutter campaigns. So it is definitely less creativity, which is why for a long time we have seen the rise of the niche fragrance business. Smaller makeup brands, organic people that use organic materials and do things quite differently because there's still a thirst for creativity. So it will be interesting. I think it's a very good point that you make. It will be interesting to see if the same will happen with the caring brands. Because so far, especially when I look at Bottega Veneta and what they did with their fragrance, it is a very creative niche product.
- [43:23]
B
And just very briefly, that trickled down as well, because you often know that if you walk into a large high street beauty store, you will find brands which you can pick up lipstick for less than €10. But you know that it belongs to a much bigger fashion house.
- [43:42]
C
Exactly. But even that is changing. I think we've seen Louis Vuitton now go into beauty and launch of a full range this summer. But, but the lipsticks were actually, there's a lot of conversation because Those lipsticks were €150 or around €100 if I'm not mistaken. So the prices are changing, but the manufacturing model, the quality, the licensing is not. So we will see pricing change and it will not be as accessible to go and buy something from one of these brands anymore.
- [44:18]
B
Monocle's Natalie Theodosi. Thank you as ever for joining us on the global.
- [44:26]
A
Iq, EQ and AI. Three components key to the craft of innovation at ubs. Because to stay ahead in a rapidly evolving age, you need a partner with decades of experience, endless passion for the work and a finger on the pulse of leading technologies. Bridging human expertise with artificial intelligence. All to elevate you. Ubs. Banking is our craft.
- [45:04]
B
Now, if you're a fan of the Monocle Radio playlist, and frankly, who isn't, you'll be excited to find out that the alt pop provocateur Ali X is back with Is Anybody Out There? It's her first new single of 2025. It forms part of her produced and written fourth record, Happiness is going to get you, a meditation on existential isolation and shared societal malaise. Well, Aliex joined Monocle's Tom Webb here at Midori House to share the story of her new record and to reflect on her hits of the past. Including one you may recognize.
- [45:46]
I
Now. We've just listened to A little of Black Eye. It's one of our most popular songs on the Monocle playlist. Listeners will recognize it. We do have to release it.
- [45:55]
F
Really?
- [45:55]
I
Oh, yeah.
- [45:56]
F
That's cool. I didn't know that.
- [45:57]
I
It's a huge banger because we have a seasonal playlist. This one sits across summer, winter, autumn, spring, because it has that effect.
- [46:05]
B
Great.
- [46:06]
I
What can you tell our listeners about it? Can you give us a little insight? Because we are so used to it.
- [46:10]
F
Yeah. Black Eye was the first single off my last album, which was called Girl with no Feature. That was a record that was sort of a maddening record that I produced myself. Obviously very referential to the post punk and the new wave movement of the early 80s in the UK. And when I think of that one, what comes to mind is that I have like 20 versions of it where I had to just keep going and going until I could sort of quote, unquote, crack it. The baseline changed a bunch of times. That's what I think about. I think about opening up my Ableton live session and seeing 20 versions.
- [46:48]
I
You've completed the album and you've now completed your fourth album. How was it coming out of Girl with no Face as a process coming.
- [46:56]
F
Out of it, it was fun to get out of it because being in it was, like I said, pretty maddening. It was the first sort of self produced endeavor that I had taken on and it was very isolating and. And it was sort of without a feedback loop because there was no one else collaborating with me. And I'm really glad I did it because I think, like, therapeutically, I think it dug up a lot of stuff that had been dormant in me for a long time. It's quite an angry record. And coming out of it, that release of Anger seemed to have opened up this space for something completely different, which is happiness is going to get you.
- [47:36]
I
So do you ever plan how you're going to release or when you're going to release a new album? Are you here faster than you maybe thought?
- [47:43]
F
Big time. Yeah, I'm here way faster than I thought I thought. I actually didn't think I was going to produce another album. I thought, I'm just going to go write this with someone else because I was so tired after. After A Girl with no Face. But this one sort of just fell out of the ether into my lap and I got, you know, I got excited as that was happening. And so then I. Then I started pushing it a bit. And by December like the whole album was written. I basically wrote half of it on that Canadian summer vacation, and then half of it when I was in central California in December on a vacation. Like these two sort of relaxed situations. And I thought, I think I've got a. Think I've got an album here. And so then I. This year I was like, you know, I'm gonna put this out this year. And so I really pushed things to make that happen, which has been a bit stressful, if I'm being honest. But, yeah, I felt like she just wanted to come out, you know.
- [48:37]
I
When you say she, you do have an alter ego currently.
- [48:42]
C
Yeah.
- [48:42]
I
And you introduce us to her.
- [48:44]
B
Yes.
- [48:44]
F
It's the enfant Marie, the Infant Marie, who is a time traveler. She has landed in various spaces in time in a 6x6 perspex cube. And it's sort of this play on. Yeah, Time and space. There's a lot of nostalgia in this work and a lot of sort of like dreams and projections as well. So there's this idea that it's like a metaphysics idea that you can exist in two places at once. And that's sort of the representation of that.
- [49:15]
I
And what does she offer you as an artist or a performer?
- [49:19]
F
I don't really know how to answer that. I think every album I do, I like to have just some visual representation of the concept which is rooted in some sort of poetic sonic idea. And I don't know, I'm just quite indulgent, you know, I think I like. I just like to create worlds. It's fun for me. It's fun for my fans. There's sort of an expectation of it now. And Infant Marie felt like, yeah, she really sort of makes this complete circle of a world with the songs that I wrote and the idea of, yes, nostalgia. This album feels like a full circle in some way. I've almost traveled back in time to who I was when I used to write at the piano. Or these songs in some way felt like they were the songs that I wanted to write when I was 21 and I started writing, but I hadn't found my voice yet. So I don't know. She sort of. She just helps me sort of complete the idea, I guess.
- [50:39]
I
And returning to the piano, the opening spot song leads with those piano notes. Big question for you then. Is there anybody out there?
- [50:51]
F
I was doing an interview yesterday and I think I'm going to repeat what I said there, which is. I think I ask a lot of questions in my work, but I don't really answer them. I pose questions and I try to answer them. But even the X in my name, it's sort of representative of like, of a, a infinite possibility. You know, the idea that I don't have the answers but that I'm allowed to ask questions has sort of almost always been a thesis for what I do.
- [51:18]
B
Is anybody out there? Is anybody else?
- [51:26]
I
And would you say that opener sets that tone for the rest of the album?
- [51:31]
F
Yeah, yeah. And we sort of bookend the album. Like the last track has those same notes, actually.
- [51:37]
B
And that was the Altbork provocateur Aliex talking to Tom Webb. You can listen to the full interview on the Monocle Weekly online now. And Happiness is going to get you hits shelves and streaming sites on November 7, but fans will have the chance to preview the project at any of her Rough Trade Record Store tour dates, which start in New York on October 30th. You're listening to the Global Finally, a look at the business news. I'm joined now by Victoria Scholar, head of investment at Interactive Investor. Good morning, Victoria. How are you? Morning.
- [52:13]
J
I'm good. Thanks for having me back.
- [52:14]
B
Good to have you. Right. We mentioned the Amazon outage a little bit earlier on in the paper review, but from the point of view of Generation Spoilt, which found that it couldn't ask Alexa to turn the lights on for the them. But but there were much, much more serious areas to explore with this story.
- [52:37]
J
Yes, you're right. And I think it really is really the extent of the outage that is kind of catching the headlines because according to down detector, over 2,000 companies around the world were hit by this major outage. There were over 8 million reports of problems in the US, the UK, Australia and other countries. And in the UK, big companies like H. Lloyds Bank, Vodafone, BT were among some of the companies and apps affected. This morning when I was trying to join our Zoom call, we couldn't actually connect because of the outage in a funny twist of events. So it does feel as though kind of all corners of the world are affected somehow or other by this technology outage and kind of poses questions about how we are quite vulnerable in terms of our dependence on a handful of tech giants.
- [53:33]
B
Indeed. And we are very glad that you sorted out the glitch and can join us today. That dependence really has come to the fore.
- [53:40]
J
Hasn't really has because, you know, there have been some serious tech systems that have been impacted, like in hospitals and airports and banks. And it really just shows how vulnerable we are, perhaps in ways that we didn't really understand because to the average person, obviously Amazon is best known for its e commerce platform, the fact that we get things delivered to our door the same day or the next day. But really even a bigger part of its business is Amazon Web Services, which is its cloud computing division. And this is used by businesses around the world for cloud storage. And this is intertwined into this outage, as I say, affecting all sorts of different businesses. And I think we'll find out more about the fallout as the days and weeks go by.
- [54:35]
B
Indeed we will. Well, let's move to Apple, which has had a really, really good few months simply because its iPhone 17 is brilliant.
- [54:44]
J
Yes, absolutely. So that we have some new research from Counterpoint to suggest that its iPhone 17 series has outperformed the previous model in its early sales in the US and China. It was released in September, and In the first 10 days of the market, the 17 series has grown in sales by 14% versus series 16. And sales in China nearly dou compared to the previous model over that same period. And the analyst on the report said that some of the reasons are the fact that it's pretty good value for money. It has a better chip, improved display, higher base storage, and the camera has been upgraded as well. And this seems to have really won over customers. And Apple is really benefiting from that because we've seen that its shares have been propelled to an all time high on Monday, surging as the iPhone looks set to become the third company need to reach $4 trillion. I think it's at $3.9 trillion in terms of its market valuation as well. It's currently the second most valuable company in the world after AI stock market darling Nvidia.
- [55:53]
B
There's a slight sort of contradiction, a problem for Apple here, isn't there? Because one of the areas of growth has been China. And of course we're seeing what's happening with Donald Trump and a trade war with China, particularly over bringing back manufacturing to the United States. States from China, which is where the iPhone is made. Where does Apple. How does Apple navigate its way through this?
- [56:16]
J
Well, I think Tim Cook is having to tread a fine line because clearly Apple's growth has been heavily dependent on China and the Chinese market, both in terms of manufacturing and also its consumers. But Cook is having to negotiate with Donald Trump and he's agreed to billions of dollars or hundreds of billions of dollars worth of investment into American manufacturing. But to bring Apple's manufacturing onshore into the United States would be pretty much impossible and way too costly. So I think he's having to tread a fine line by keeping Donald Trump happy, bringing some manufacturing to the US but without kind of fully pulling away from China, because that just wouldn't be possible.
- [57:04]
B
Finally, let's touch on Netflix. It's reporting its third quarter quarter results today. What is expected from that?
- [57:11]
J
Yes, that's right. So we're in earnings season in full swing now and Netflix is the first tech giant to kick us off and it's expected to report some strong numbers. Subscriber numbers were always what were closely watched by investors. But Netflix aren't reporting these anymore because it doesn't think that this is the most important metric anymore because of the release of its extra member feature and ad supported plans, but is instead, Netflix looks like it's set for a positive quarterly set of results, benefiting from a weaker US Dollar, higher subscription prices, increased ad revenue now that it's got that ad supported option and membership growth as well. And there have been some major streaming successes in the quarter like Squid games and Black Rabbit. And also Netflix has been expanding beyond traditional kind of TV and series into things like live sporting events. And so there's a lot of potential growth. One of the risks for Netflix, of course, is the rise of AI content and AI video. We don't really know how that's going to play out, but that's something that analysts have flagged as a potential headwind going forward.
- [58:24]
B
Victoria Scholar, head of investment at Interactive Investor, thank you so much for joining us on the Globalist. And that's all the time we have for today's program. The warmest of thanks to all my guests. And thanks too to the producers, Laura Kramer, Tom Webb, Carlos Rebelo and Rima Takahashi. Our research was Joanna Mercer and our studio manager was Elliot Greenfield. After the headlines. More music on the way. The briefings live at midday here in London. The Globalist is back at the same time tomorrow. Hope you can join me for that if you can. But for now, from me, Emma Nelson, goodbye. Thank you very much for listening. Sam.
- [59:41]
A
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