Kara and Scott Shred Zuck’s Vision for AI | Pivot

Scott Galloway 0:00 If I asked AI-

Kara Swisher 0:01 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 0:01 ... to give me an image of Mark Zuckerberg that defines who he is, I feel like it would be a guy at a really sad malt shop, sucking up the world's user data through a straw, and every time he made eye contact with you, he'd apologize and look away.

Kara Swisher 0:18 (instrumental music) Hi everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher from Scott Galloway's living room.

Scott Galloway 0:29 And I'm Scott Galloway.

Kara Swisher 0:30 We got a lot to get to today here from your apartment in, uh, Manhattan. Uh, blowup tech earnings, crazy, a big shakeup on the weight loss drug market, I really am interested in what you think about this, and how much does Trump need to worry about Joe Rogan? Joe Rogan is turning rogue on Trump on several topics.

Kara Swisher 0:49 Uh, but first, the man who opened fire in a Manhattan office building on Monday, not, not terrifically far from here, killing four people and injuring a fifth, was targeting the NFL headquarters with a note claiming he suffered from CTE. A page, uh, in the shooter's note accused the NFL of concealing the dangers to football players' brains in order to maximize profits. This is a longtime thing. I, I, uh, I, I am, uh, lots of people are concerned. I didn't let my kids play football because I was worried about that. The shooter played high school football, but did not play professionally. And of course, what he did was heinous. Um, but pretty, uh, devastating that people, you know, same thing with Luigi Mangione, people acting out on anger. The, the level of anger in this society, and maybe, uh, well, m- you can only find out if you have CTE after you die, so I assume they'll check this and see if that's the case. But I think Sanjay Gupta said 40% of the people who claim they have CTE, uh, before they die actually have it, like of 100%, which is quite a lot. It's not nothing. So, I don't know. Any thoughts?

Scott Galloway 1:50 Yeah. I mean, well, first off, we don't know if and what role CTE played here. Um-

Kara Swisher 1:55 Right. We don't.

Scott Galloway 1:56 Um, so just distinctive whether or not it- this was- CTE played a role here, it is, you know, they, they... There was a study of former NFL players, and it found that of the 306- 76 players studied, 91% had CTE. I mean, you just have people running... It's not even the impact. I guess it's the rotation, sudden rotation, that a helmet can't solve for, right?

Kara Swisher 2:18 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 2:19 Your, your head twists, and the, the, whatever it is, the cortex or the brain spine just can't, can't respond that quickly.

Kara Swisher 2:26 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 2:26 Um, everyone's been talking about it for a while, but it's an- it, it's sort of an example of capitalism. I'm not sure for- you could really justify this sport if it didn't make billions each year, if it wasn't s- if it wasn't psychologically and economically just so ingrained in our culture. But they really are sort of modern-day gladiators, and they pay an enormous price. But the, the thing that struck me about this, Kara, or I think what the, uh, o- obviously, in addition to the tragedy of the families of the people who are-

Kara Swisher 2:54 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 2:54 ... who were murdered is, you know, we're back to office mostly.

Kara Swisher 3:00 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 3:00 Actually, it's interesting. The US has had kind of the most anemic return to office of almost any nation. And young people have gotten very used to... I think as the employment market is so strong here and tech is so strong, the companies have had a difficult time getting everyone to return to the office, especially five days a week.

Kara Swisher 3:17 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 3:17 And something I've always noticed about, that I can't stand about going to meetings, is that from the time you get to the lobby, by the time you go through check-in, security, and all that and get up to the of- it's like 10 or 12 minutes, at least-

Kara Swisher 3:30 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 3:30 ... 10 or 15 minutes.

Kara Swisher 3:31 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 3:32 And this is only gonna make security that much more complex/robust because-

Kara Swisher 3:37 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 3:37 ... the last thing you wanna worry about is going to a place that is, you know, i- is less safe than the place you came from.

Kara Swisher 3:45 And it is also porous in a lot of ways. People are, um... You know, it was interesting because immediately, because there's a mayor's race, there was sort of like an on, kind of like, "Why didn't Mamdani do something about him?" 'Cause he's not mayor, you know. The, his- 'cause he's way ahead actually, among Jewish voters, a bunch of other things, which is interesting. Uh, I thought he handled it rather well. He said, "We're only as strong as our weakest gun laws across the country," and called attention to, you know, the fact that even though New York has very strict gun laws, you can't be protected, because y- this guy was in- from Nevada, and I think his boss got him the thing that made the assault, that he assembled the assault weapon. And I think it's, again, it's a, you know, it's such a complex problem. Like here we have CTE. We've got gut, the ability to create weapons of mass destruction, for people to have assault weapons. Um, what, it'll be interesting, like again, it's another thing where they'll talk about it and then do nothing about assault weapons or the ability to assemble assault weapons, um, in the country. And probably if he does have CTE, blame it on that. Um, but it does, you know, I've always- I always feel unsafe at, um, at, at buildings. I don't know why. I feel like it's- they're such, like, a place where someone who has, has mental illness, which is growing, or people that are angry, like Luigi Mangione can take it, like it's, y- you can see how easy it is in a big city like New York.

Scott Galloway 5:09 Well-

Kara Swisher 5:09 I don't know if you've noticed.

Scott Galloway 5:10 ... this one will get... I mean, there's already been dozens of mass shootings every year. And you, you said something once that struck me. You said that as a species, we're good at adapting, and that's a bad thing here. We have normalized and adapted to something that we should not adapt to. And also, this will get more attention, and I'll be interested. There'll be articles basically saying that when it's nice, white executives in Midtown Manhattan, that mass shooting gets, gets play in the media. When it's just a mass shooting of some, a bunch of nice people at a mall in Kentucky, no one gives a shit because there's so many of them. So this will be, I think you'll, this will get a lot of attention. But again, this is really basic math or science or, you know, X, Y, validate, nullify a thesis. And if your thesis is the following, that guns are the primary, or weapons of war really are the primary culprit-... you, that theory would be validated because we do not have a, we do not have a monopoly on head injuries. We do not have a monopoly on angry young men. We do not have a monopoly on mental illness. What we have a monopoly on is that all of these people have access to (laughs) weapons of war.

Kara Swisher 6:16 Right. Exactly.

Scott Galloway 6:17 And it is just-

Kara Swisher 6:18 And exa- And there's ways around it. There's w- w- one, there's ways around it. That's, that's all, the only way you can think about it.

Scott Galloway 6:24 And also this bullshit notion that you can't do anything about it, that it's too late, that, uh, Australia had a mass shooting, reasonable people, okay, we should ban assault weapons, and they have had a dramatic decrease-

Kara Swisher 6:34 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 6:34 ... in mass shootings. The UK had a deadly mass shooting back in, uh, I think it was in '96 in Dunblane, Scotland. Kids and teachers were killed. Next, you know, right away, no more assault weapons. So this is something, and I've said this before, one, one of the free gifts with purchase of moving to the UK, it's like a lot of things. If you actually look at statistically, I mean, a mass shooting, there's no reason that, it, it, there's no reason not to go out. There's no reason not to go work. There's no reason, in my opinion, not to send your kids to school. If you look at the real hard numbers, your ki- you, you and your kids are still, uh, at least mathematically pretty safe. The problem is the fear. And that is when I'm in the UK, I don't have these horror fantasies about turning on the TV and seeing my kids' school on the screen.

Kara Swisher 7:21 Yeah. I agree. I think about it a lot actually (laughs) with my kids in school, my young kids in school, in public school. I ju- it's just, it's just the mental illness combined with the availability of these-

Scott Galloway 7:31 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 7:31 ... guns-

Scott Galloway 7:31 The most anxious-

Kara Swisher 7:32 ... is really-

Scott Galloway 7:33 ... most anxious, depressed generation in history. And then you have-

Kara Swisher 7:36 (laughs)

Scott Galloway 7:36 ... weapons of mass, uh, we- weapons of war. And the other thing I go to is just what is happiness in a society? And we tend to think that... We're studying to the wrong test. We think if the Dow hits new highs that we're happy. No, the Dow Jones and the NASDAQ, which in my opinion are two of the most damaging metrics in history, are basically just wealth indices. And that is an indices on the wealth of the top 10% who own somewhere between 50 and 90% of the stock. And spoiler alert, they're doing really well. But if you think about real happiness in a society, it's not only a function of what you have, it's a function of what you don't have. If you find out your wife has lung cancer and you live in Norway, it doesn't mean you're going bankrupt. And that's-

Kara Swisher 8:13 Right.

Scott Galloway 8:13 ... not necessarily the case here.

Kara Swisher 8:14 Yep.

Scott Galloway 8:14 And also, they have an absence of this type of fear that we have to live under.

Kara Swisher 8:21 Yeah. Yeah.

Scott Galloway 8:22 So it's not... I mean, we keep talking about this. The thing that drives me crazy is we'll hear from a bunch of people on the right, thoughts and prayers and all this bullshit. But I'll be very curious to see what the studies are. They track people going in and out of buildings in Manhattan, just-

Kara Swisher 8:36 They do.

Scott Galloway 8:37 And, and-

Kara Swisher 8:37 There's all kinds of technology. Absolutely.

Scott Galloway 8:39 But it'll be interesting to see what the trends are if people just sort of ignore this or if people think, "You know-"

Kara Swisher 8:43 I don't know what, how you could harden buildings, you know, given-

Scott Galloway 8:47 (laughs) Metal detectors?

Kara Swisher 8:48 ... I, I don't, honestly-

Scott Galloway 8:48 I don't know. What could you do?

Kara Swisher 8:49 If you're clever enough or you're violent enough, you can get through to these things.

Scott Galloway 8:52 Or just sit in front of the building. I mean... (laughs)

Kara Swisher 8:54 Right.

Scott Galloway 8:55 Like-

Kara Swisher 8:55 I mean, just that's what the great city of New York is about, is being able to go anywhere.

Scott Galloway 8:59 It's the crutch of humanity.

Kara Swisher 9:01 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 9:01 Yeah. It's-

Kara Swisher 9:02 And it just, it-

Scott Galloway 9:03 Uh, anyway.

Kara Swisher 9:03 The assault weapon, I think they're, I mean, I think Hochul has called for an assault weapon ban. But again, as Mamdani correctly said, you, you can, if you can go buy it in Tennessee, what's the difference? And drive yourself, you know, through the Lincoln Tunnel. That's the end of it.

Scott Galloway 9:15 It does help though. It, it, the, uh, New York's gun laws do help. Um, and I was saying to someone a couple nights ago, New York City is actually, is actually one of the safest big cities in the world.

Kara Swisher 9:26 Yeah. Except for this. But, uh, our, I mean, it's just, uh, again, another senseless tragedy for our country. And, and it's so common and we've become used to it.

Kara Swisher 9:35 Um, speaking of something you've talked about a lot, Scott, a Senate committee voted to advance a bill that would ban stock trading by members of Congress, presidents and vice presidents with a convenient carve out for Donald Trump. Lawmakers would be banned from buying stocks once the bill goes into effect and blocked from selling stocks 90 days after that. But divestments wouldn't be required until the beginning of the new term. So Trump is in the clear. The bill originally called the Pelosi Act, for Nancy Pelosi who you like to give a hard time too, was introduced by Senator Josh Hawley, the only Republican who voted for it. Trump initially said he supported the ban conceptually, but later lashed out at Hawley accusing him of being a pawn for the Democrats. Uh, he wanted to put in a Pelosi thing just 'cause he's such a revenge-minded person. Um, the future of the bill is uncertain, uh, but it is moving forward. Uh, Trump has also called for an investigation in Nancy Pelosi's stock trading. But the problem for him is there's tons of Republicans doing the same. For her part, Pelosi put out a statement saying she supports the legislation. Um, you know, of course, he, he's just cutting off his nose to spite his face, but, and has attacked Hawley as a second rate senator, um, who the... and then Hawley tried to suck up to him again. But, um, the fact that they cannot get this through and, and you've talked about the idea of just paying these Co- Congress people more. Um, it's just astonishing. Uh, 80%, it's an 80/20 thing, I think. 80% of people across the country think they should do this, and they're not doing this.

Scott Galloway 10:58 Yeah. So it's some of the most popular or it has more support of any proposed legislation in a long time. It's, this is largely performative. My understanding is it's not gonna go through. But I mean, uh, one of the real advantages, uh, that the US has is that we have the deepest pools of capital. And that is, there is a giant river of capital that flows in, has arteries reaching into the deepest corners of Thailand, that if a, somebody's working there and has something like a 401 (k) or invests in stocks, 50% of that capital will ultimately end up in the US, flow to the US because of our incredible companies' IP, um, colleges, R&D, risk, you know, risk aggressiveness, but also because we have a rule of fair play. And that if someone thinks, "If I invest in an S&P or a NASDAQ fund..."... even though I'm not in the know. I d- I'm not in Congress, I'm not on a board of directors, I'm not gonna get fucked. Someone else isn't gonna make a ton of money at my expense. There's rule of fair play. And as a result, startups in the United States have five million dollars for every startup. In Europe, it's one million. We have five times the venture capital here per company. And if you... These deep pools of capital, which are just enormous l- an enormous advantage, a lot of that is because there is, quote unquote, "rule of fair play." It's not a... The reason why th- the Russian stock market is, is not worth what NVIDIA loses or gains every day is everyone assumes the game is rigged, so they're not gonna put their money in the stock market. The person at or could score in St. Petersburg is like, "No, i- this is rigged." And to be blunt, Speaker Pelosi and her husband, their net worth is estimated at $420 million. And last year, their net worth increased 54%. And Democrats managed to eke out a 31% return in 2024, and Republicans a 26%, both overperforming the S&P. This is-

Kara Swisher 12:52 And Trump's crypto. Trump, talk about someone who's really ch- cashed in, is the Trump family.

Scott Galloway 12:57 Here's the problem, a small amount of corruption leads to big corruption. And to a certain extent, Trump said these, these con- you know, these congresspeople are playing s- s- small ball. They're, they're doing insider trading for hundreds of thousands or millions. I'm gonna do it for billions. But Speaker Emerita Pelosi, in my view... B- but let's talk specifically about the legislation. He was not serious. When you call something the Pelosi Act, you're saying, "Fuck you" to the other side, because a lot of people, understandably, have a great deal of affection for Speaker Emerita Pelosi. When you call something... W- when you're purposely being aggressive-

Kara Swisher 13:30 I think they changed the name. I think it's the Honest Act now. S-

Scott Galloway 13:32 Yeah, they did change the name, but it showed he wasn't-

Kara Swisher 13:34 S- or-

Scott Galloway 13:34 It showed he wasn't really serious about what would be required to pass this, and that-

Kara Swisher 13:39 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 13:39 ... is bipartisan support.

Kara Swisher 13:41 Right.

Scott Galloway 13:41 When you come out of the gate swinging like that-

Kara Swisher 13:43 I agree.

Scott Galloway 13:43 ... the Democrats are just like, "You know, fuck you, boss. I, you just didn't need to do that." We should... The moment you are elected to office, the moment, even as I think you go through the primaries, you have to put your money in a blind trust. And i- if you're not willing to do that, what you're acknowledging is you have some sort of special access or information that other people don't.

Kara Swisher 14:04 Yes.

Scott Galloway 14:05 The not supporting this bill means that you wanna continue to, quote unquote, "engage in insider trading." The fact that you have people in intelligence briefings where they are making decisions on tens of billions of dollars that may or may not be, uh-

Kara Swisher 14:16 Can't help it.

Scott Galloway 14:16 ... spent by companies that are publicly traded, and then you can literally leave that briefing and go call someone, and you're not supposed to-

Kara Swisher 14:23 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 14:23 ... but you can, the fines are b- the, the fines are such that everyone ignores it, and say, "Honey, go buy, um"-

Kara Swisher 14:32 Whatever.

Scott Galloway 14:32 "Go buy-"

Kara Swisher 14:33 Palantir.

Scott Galloway 14:33 Yeah. Uh, or DisAI. What was the one that, uh, she bought call options on in the morning that it was-

Kara Swisher 14:39 Marjorie Taylor Greene did it a bunch of times too.

Scott Galloway 14:41 But Pelosi announced, when Pelosi announced or disclosed she'd bought options, call options in a healthcare AI company, I forget the name of the company-

Kara Swisher 14:48 (laughs)

Scott Galloway 14:48 ... um, uh, the stock spiked like 10 or 15%. I mean, it's just-

Kara Swisher 14:52 Uh-huh.

Scott Galloway 14:53 Anyways, they should have to put it in a blind trust, and, and also the other side of this, we need to pay these people a lot more so they don't-

Kara Swisher 14:59 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 15:00 ... feel the temptation to do these things. It, it, it, it's the s-

Kara Swisher 15:04 Right. I think they get 174 s- they're both equal in the Senate and the Congre- I think it's 174,000, which is a lot of, for people, for regular people, it seems like a lot.

Scott Galloway 15:12 To live in DC, support two homes-

Kara Swisher 15:14 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 15:14 ... it really isn't.

Kara Swisher 15:15 So what would be the, what would you give them? Like, first of all, they could put the, their current... They don't not have to have stocks. They just put it in an index fund or a blind trust.

Scott Galloway 15:22 Yeah, they just have no control over it. Just a blind trust.

Kara Swisher 15:25 Right. So what-

Scott Galloway 15:25 These are everywhere.

Kara Swisher 15:25 ... um, what would you pay them?

Scott Galloway 15:28 I would pay congresspe- I would pay my representatives a million dollars a year, our senators two million a year, and you know-

Kara Swisher 15:33 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 15:33 ... the president fi- I would go the Singapore model.

Kara Swisher 15:35 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 15:35 And that is pay them really well, and then absolute zero fucking tolerance for any of this nonsense.

Kara Swisher 15:40 Right.

Scott Galloway 15:40 None.

Kara Swisher 15:41 Yeah. Right.

Scott Galloway 15:41 You can't... Anything you have control over in terms of capital allocation of your own personal funds, you no longer have control over it. If you do you're-

Kara Swisher 15:48 Well, they, they're, the, the-

Scott Galloway 15:48 ... kicked out.

Kara Swisher 15:49 There is a criticism that like people who are good at money won't go into Congress, but I'm like, "Yes, they" they do it-

Scott Galloway 15:54 No, they don't.

Kara Swisher 15:54 ... for other reasons.

Scott Galloway 15:55 That's not-

Kara Swisher 15:55 And by the way, it's become a rich person's game because it costs... I think I was on a panel last night and he was saying it used to cost a couple hundred thousand dollars to run for Congress, now it's eight or nine million. So only rich people can afford it or people with access to funds, and then they're on the hook for rich people, right? So it creates a really bad situation.

Scott Galloway 16:13 It's not gonna discourage anyo- uh, uh, something like that would not discourage anyone from running, and it creates a distraction. And then you feel like you've gotta engage in playing this game because your, you know, the, the representative from Kentucky is making millions of dollars while you're not. And also, after taxes, that amount of money, if you're trying to support two homes.

Kara Swisher 16:33 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 16:34 And I, look, these people deserve to make more money. They're impressive, important people doing important work.

Kara Swisher 16:39 Yeah. I would agree.

Scott Galloway 16:40 And if we're gonna have zero tolerance, which we should here, we, we have to pay them really well.

Kara Swisher 16:45 Or give them a housing allowance. Like, you know what they could create? Um, like a congressional apartment building, and then we could have a reality show of who can make money.

Scott Galloway 16:52 Oh my God, that would be hilarious.

Kara Swisher 16:54 (laughs) It would be so good.

Scott Galloway 16:55 What happens when Ted Cruz-

Kara Swisher 16:57 Oh my god.

Scott Galloway 16:57 ... r- you know, runs into Bernie Sanders in the shower?

Kara Swisher 16:59 (laughs) Romancing Scenes.

Scott Galloway 17:02 There you go.

Kara Swisher 17:03 (laughs) It would be so good. But they, they could like do that. They could-

Scott Galloway 17:06 And the sparks fly.

Kara Swisher 17:07 For the congresspeople, they could. For the younger ones, why not? I, I don't know.

Scott Galloway 17:10 Well, some of them do live together, don't they?

Kara Swisher 17:11 Do something fun, like make a thing of it. Like it would be kind of int- or give them housing allowances or something. I don't know. They get all kinds of perks. Um, but, uh, but this is, this is just ridiculous. Josh Hawley, we're behind you, even though I'm not really behind you. Um, every time they do a picture of Josh Hawley it's the, it's the insurrectionists like-

Scott Galloway 17:32 The pump?

Kara Swisher 17:32 ... you know.

Scott Galloway 17:33 The fist pump?

Kara Swisher 17:33 The fist pump. (laughs)

Scott Galloway 17:34 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 17:36 That guy's never escaping that picture.

Scott Galloway 17:37 I'm with you.

Kara Swisher 17:38 I'm with you.

Scott Galloway 17:39 Run!

Kara Swisher 17:39 I'm running from you.

Scott Galloway 17:40 Run!

Kara Swisher 17:41 (laughs)

Scott Galloway 17:42 These people are fucking crazy. Run! I'm with you!

Kara Swisher 17:46 (laughs)

Scott Galloway 17:46 I'm with you!

Kara Swisher 17:47 (laughs)

Scott Galloway 17:48 ... I'm right behind you.

Kara Swisher 17:50 (laughs) Oh, Josh.

Scott Galloway 17:50 I'll be, I'll be in Rehoboth.

Kara Swisher 17:52 Josh, you're never gonna be president, just FYI. Anyway, um, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, Joe Rogan has some criticism for President Trump. He's ramping up. He's turning into a San Francisco lesbian. Support for this show comes from United Airlines. Let's skip the travel myths. Newark has actually been New York City's most on-time airport since June. So you have places to be? Don't change your airport. Book United Airlines through Newark with confidence. According to A14 on-time performance and cancellation data for arrivals and departures among DOT-reporting carriers from MassFlight for June 2nd through July 14th, 2025. Copyright 2025 United Airlines Inc. All rights reserved.

Kara Swisher 18:32 Scott, we're back. Joe Rogan is turning into a real thorn in the side for President Trump. Let's listen to what he had to say about Trump's administration's crackdown on immigration and international students. Let's listen to a clip.

Guest 18:43 It's an overcorrection. Right. And, and it's also like they have a mandate, I think, of like 3,000 people a day they wanna deport. Just, you know, you're gonna... A bunch of people that are totally innocent are gonna get caught up in that- Right, right. ... and they have been. Right. You know? They have been. Right. A lot of people that have, have green cards, a lot of people that are supposed to be over here, and then they're kicking students out that, like, write articles they don't like. Yeah, that's nuts. Fucking crazy. Yeah.

Kara Swisher 19:07 And that's not all. Let's listen to a clip of Rogan talking, uh, about Trump's reaction to all things Epstein.

Guest 19:12 This one's- Yeah. ... a line in the sand. Yeah. Because this is one where th- there's a lot of stuff about, you know, when we thought Trump was gonna come in and then a lot of things were gonna be resolved. Yeah. We're gonna drain the swamp, we're gonna figure everything out. And when you have this one hardcore line in the sand that everybody had been talking about forever, and then they're trying to gaslight you on that.

Kara Swisher 19:33 So it's interesting. I'm not sure if Rogan's disapproval carries as much weight as this endorsement did. Uh, I don't know. What do you, what do you think of this? I think it's actually, you know, it's sort of late, you know, Joe. He, he, of course he was gonna do this. Um, k- he seems, seems kind of fatuous to what Trump is, but I don't know. What do you think?

Scott Galloway 19:52 I don't know. I, I think that, I, I do think it matters. Um...

Kara Swisher 19:56 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 19:56 A lot of, when I speak to young men, I, I feel like-

Kara Swisher 20:00 They love Rogan.

Scott Galloway 20:00 ... a lot of times they're reading back a script from Joe Rogan. I, I think-

Kara Swisher 20:05 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 20:05 I think arguably, Joe Rogan, in terms of young men, has more influence because he's seen as an honest broker. I think the most... I don't want to call it dangerous thing about Joe Rogan, but I think Joe is like... It's not an act. I think Joe is genuinely-

Kara Swisher 20:19 Mm-hmm. No.

Scott Galloway 20:19 He's not reading, he's not FOX News reading from a teleprompter saying-

Kara Swisher 20:22 He's not.

Scott Galloway 20:22 ... "Smart manic has been weaponized by Hugo Chavez because we told you to say it." I think what he's saying, he believes. And also, the manosphere, if you will, or, m- m- you know, male-dominated or male-centric podcasts, there has been a significant...

Kara Swisher 20:36 Turn.

Scott Galloway 20:36 ... tide shift. So...

Kara Swisher 20:38 Shane Gillis, Andrew Schultz, all of them.

Scott Galloway 20:39 Andrew Schultz. Uh, all these guys-

Kara Swisher 20:41 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 20:41 ... who quite frankly, if you were to point to one person, uh, who potentially put Trump in office, it would be, number one, would be Musk, right?

Kara Swisher 20:52 Musk.

Scott Galloway 20:52 Quarter of a billion dollars, great, uh, platform.

Kara Swisher 20:54 Turned on him.

Scott Galloway 20:55 Very smart. And then, probably number two is Joe Rogan.

Kara Swisher 21:00 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 21:00 And the stat I love is that if you wanna talk about how brilliant the Trump campaign was and how non-brilliant the Harris campaign was, and it kind of reminds me of Modani and Cuomo, Trump went, flew right into the manosphere, which was not only good for positioning, but by going on Rogan that one time, with 40 million YouTube videos or views and 15 million audio downloads, for Harris to get the same level of exposure, she would have needed to go on MSNBC, CNN, and FOX every night for three hours for two weeks. So quite frankly, whatever... Unless it was gonna take her two weeks to get down and back from Austin, she should have done it. So these guys carry a ton of weight, and there has been a real significant shift. And I also-

Kara Swisher 21:43 It's the combo of all of them. It's not just Rogan. I mean, Schultz has been particularly, uh, vehement about it, and Shane Gillis is now mocking, mocking him, making fun of him.

Scott Galloway 21:52 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 21:52 And you have the South Park guys on his ass 'cause they're considered pretty, right in the mid... Like, not in the middle, but they're, they don't beholden to anyone, right?

Scott Galloway 21:59 Yeah, Honey Badger don't give a shit. They, they're-

Kara Swisher 22:01 Yeah. Exactly.

Scott Galloway 22:02 They go after everybody.

Kara Swisher 22:04 But they're particularly going after Trump with that penis, which wasn't AI. Um, but what, what do you think the r- I mean, it's interesting because he's, he's moved from the Epstein things, which I think animates a lot of these people. A lot of them are angry about the Epstein stuff. And now it's moved to colleges and deportations, which they're like, "Why can't these, you know, um, kids say what they want as long as they're not violent?" I think Tr- Rogan said that. He's like, "If they're not violent, they can write whatever they want." So that, that is, that is consistent with their thing of the left, uh, quashing them, but now they're applying it to Trump.

Scott Galloway 22:38 Yeah. I, what was... Again, there was, I thought of you last night. There was another weapon of mass distraction yesterday, something ridiculous, something outrageous.

Kara Swisher 22:45 What was it?

Scott Galloway 22:45 What was it yesterday? Oh, it'll come to me.

Kara Swisher 22:47 Giving Diddy a pardon?

Scott Galloway 22:48 Oh, God, there... Exactly.

Kara Swisher 22:50 Yeah. Megyn Kelly's mad about that.

Scott Galloway 22:51 Giving, giving Diddy a pardon. Okay.

Kara Swisher 22:53 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 22:53 That's-

Kara Swisher 22:54 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 22:54 That's what the president should be focused on right now. I mean, I'm telling-

Kara Swisher 22:57 Right.

Scott Galloway 22:57 ... you, every day. Again, we got to, we, w- it, the moment he does this shit, you gotta start referring-

Kara Swisher 23:02 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 23:02 ... to Diddy as Diddy Epstein. You just gotta-

Kara Swisher 23:05 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 23:05 ... make... You gotta let him know, uh-

Kara Swisher 23:07 Do it.

Scott Galloway 23:07 ... "Folks, we're not, we're not falling for it. If you're sawing your assistant in half and expect us to look over here, we're not gonna do it." We want to see you pulling the rabbit, uh, you know, out of your coat pocket, not out of the hat.

Kara Swisher 23:17 Yeah, and a lot of people aren't going along. Like, uh, uh, Rogan is, is pretty, has been pretty Trump-positive, and he's, he's doing it a lot. I'm li... I'm interested to see what he'll, what he'll move on to if something he doesn't like, right? But there's quite a lot. It's not just one thing. And as I said at the beginning of this whole thing, and I, and let me tell you, I think Elon started this, this Epstein thing. He absolutely-

Scott Galloway 23:38 Yeah. I agree.

Kara Swisher 23:38 ... by that tweet, he did. Um, but I think w-... Epstein is at the core, as I said, the pillar, but then there's all these other things that are consistent with what they said before, which was, "Why can't those students say what they want, even if I don't agree with those students? Why can't humor..." Right? ... when he's threatening all kinds of entertainers and stuff like that. "Why can't they say what they want, even if they're left?" Um, and I think they are consistent in that, uh, they should be consistent in that regard. They should, if they say, "E- people should say what they want," it should apply to the left and the right. Right? And so, that was interesting when Rogan did that. I'm curious what he'll do next.

Scott Galloway 24:14 Well, they can, they can claim, and I, actually it's, uh, I think it's good for the medium. No matter what happens, CNN and Fox, you kind of have a sense for which (laughs) way they're gonna go on every story.

Kara Swisher 24:24 Yeah. Exactly. Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 24:25 W- these guys, to their credit, are saying, uh, you know, "I was wrong. I do not support these policies." A f- couple of them have said, "I regret voting for him." And I think the immigration raids really rattled a lot of them because I think a lot of them know, you know, are exposed to it, see how cruel it is. The thing is I don't get is it's ineffective. There were actually more people being deported during the Obama administration than are being deported right now. They just worked more cohesively or seamlessly with local law enforcement.

Kara Swisher 24:55 Right.

Scott Galloway 24:55 And this just feels like, okay ...

Kara Swisher 24:56 Well, 'cause they, i- they are going after people who are, like, gardeners in, in Home Depot a lot. They're kind of cloddish about it in a lot of ways. They're doing it so performatively with the masks and the whole, the whole fear-

Scott Galloway 25:07 Yeah. Fear is the point, that is the point.

Kara Swisher 25:07 ... and Kristi Noem. Did you see that picture of Kristi Noem riding around a horse with her alleged paramore, Corey Lewandowski-

Scott Galloway 25:15 I didn't-

Kara Swisher 25:15 ... um-

Scott Galloway 25:15 ... I'd like to, though.

Kara Swisher 25:16 ... in Argentina. They're just riding horses around. (laughs) Like, what are you doing there? What are you doing?

Narrator 25:21 I think it's *******--

Scott Galloway 25:21 She's in Argentina riding horses?

Kara Swisher 25:23 I, something like that.

Scott Galloway 25:24 I'm here for it.

Kara Swisher 25:25 It's crazy.

Scott Galloway 25:25 I think, I've decided-

Kara Swisher 25:26 What is going on there?

Scott Galloway 25:26 ... Kristi Noem is super hot, and I, the whole, like, w- weird thing.

Kara Swisher 25:29 Oh my God, her whole-

Scott Galloway 25:30 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 25:30 ... Ice Barbie is so strange. It's like, what are you-

Scott Galloway 25:32 Yeah. No, I think she's hot.

Kara Swisher 25:33 Should there not be a president from that? I'm, like, trying to figure out where this is going-

Scott Galloway 25:36 It's, it's straight to the W-

Kara Swisher 25:37 ... for a reality show.

Scott Galloway 25:37 It's straight to the White House or straight to Cinemax. Either way-

Kara Swisher 25:40 Cinem- no. (laughs)

Scott Galloway 25:40 ... I'm here for it.

Kara Swisher 25:41 A reality show, right? I'm sort of like, "What are you doing, girl?"

Scott Galloway 25:43 Like Sarah Palin in Alaska?

Kara Swisher 25:46 Oh, that didn't work out so well for her.

Scott Galloway 25:47 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 25:48 Yeah. That's not gonna work out for you, Kristi, 'cause you're a lady. Doesn't work out for ladies. I'm sorry. Y- y- y- it just doesn't. It's not gonna work out. Anyway, speaking of late- ladies, and she's not a lady, 'cause Ghislaine Maxwell has offered, uh, to testify before Congress if, uh, uh, pr- in the Epstein situation, but only with conditions that include immunity. Um, and on Tuesday, President Trump told reporters that Epstein stole Virginia Giuffre, one of Epstein's accusers from Mar-a-Lago, who died by suicide in April following a period of serious health issues. Uh, she was the 17-year-old involved, uh, that Prince Andrew allegedly, uh, abused. Um, paid off, I think. Um, th- anyway, she was, she was one of the more outspoken ones that had a very tragic life. Uh, she worked in Mar-a-Lago in the spa, and, um, Ghislaine Maxwell got her to come over to his house. And, uh, president keeps changing his story of why he got in a fight with Epstein. First it was because he, some real estate thing. Then it was 'cause they found him creepy, and now it's 'cause he stole, stole... The use of the word stole around sex trafficking sort of says it all to me, or, "I didn't have the privilege to go down to, to Epstein Island," which was a crazy word to use. Um, he just continues to, every day, to dig himself into another hole and keep this story alive. Uh, like I said, it's almost suicidal. It's weird, um, on his behalf to continue this. As for Ghislaine Maxwell, uh, she deserves nothing. I, I, I said on CNN that, you know, what do y- what does she want, cocoa and a warm blanket? Give me a break. She needs to stay in jail. If they give her immunity or did immunity, it's, it will continue. This story for Trump will, will never go away, and it's already not going away.

Scott Galloway 27:29 Yeah. Uh, he's, he's really got... And that's why he just comes across as so guilty here, 'cause he's got such weird judgment. You know, he said that he wishes Ghislaine Maxwell... He didn't wish any of the victims well. He wishes her well. And then he says, oh, uh, you know, the, uh, why he's disappointed or offended by Epstein, he took his employees.

Kara Swisher 27:53 Stole.

Scott Galloway 27:53 Yeah. I'm like, okay, so that's, that's why you want, don't want to be associated (laughs) with this guy? Like, is-

Kara Swisher 27:59 Right.

Scott Galloway 27:59 ... th- were any of his other activities that were reported and widely covered, did any of those offend you?

Kara Swisher 28:04 Problematic. (exhales)

Scott Galloway 28:05 No, it was that he hired, uh, you know, his valet for under, under him from Mar-a-Lago. It's like, okay.

Kara Swisher 28:11 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 28:11 You're, you're kind of missing the forest for the trees here. So, he continues to act like someone advised him to s- try and act as guilty as possible. And so, the idea of a, what effectively would be a pardon, whi- which is what immunity wou- immunity would offer-

Kara Swisher 28:25 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 28:25 ... almost, it's, it's different-

Kara Swisher 28:26 Clemency.

Scott Galloway 28:28 For Ghislaine Maxwell, it's like, well, I... Again, this... Uh, why are they speaking to her now? The only reason, the only motivation to speak to her now is a desire to clear the president. There's always been a desire to find out what exactly happened here and who was involved. And if you weren't able to get that information and offer whatever it is you needed to offer back then, then the only reason that you largely can get it, derive from this, uh, or deduct from this is that you're hoping she will say something to exonerate the president 'cause the only thing that's happened is there's new heat on the president. And so, I don't... The whole thing really stinks.

Kara Swisher 29:05 It won't exonerate him now because it looks like he's doing that, right? So it'll-

Scott Galloway 29:08 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 29:08 ... look like the fix is in.

Scott Galloway 29:10 Percep- from a perception standpoint.

Kara Swisher 29:10 So, uh, it's weird. I find this the strangest thing. I actually believe wh- everything the White House says, I don't believe what he say. I kind of believe that's what he think. He's mad at him for taking, stealing an, uh, a person who works in the spa. That's what I... He doesn't care about these women. He doesn't care about the abuses. He cares that someone stole his employee. That's... I actually believe that when he says that. I don't think he's making it up in that re- I think this addled old man thinks that. He's like all pissed that he stole one of his employees.

Scott Galloway 29:43 Yeah. I don't-

Kara Swisher 29:43 I could see that.

Scott Galloway 29:44 Yeah. The whole thing, uh, the whole thing is just something-... yeah.

Kara Swisher 29:48 I have to say, a lot of people who didn't think it was a conspiracy theory or just were not really paying attention to it many years on are... oh, that's the noise outside my apartment.

Scott Galloway 29:58 Oh, shit, I forgot to call 911 back and tell them, "You're not intruders. I know you."

Kara Swisher 30:03 (laughs)

Scott Galloway 30:04 Oh, God.

Kara Swisher 30:04 Yeah, we're doing

Scott Galloway 30:05 ... there's a strange lady-

Kara Swisher 30:06 ... getting lots of people now. (laughs)

Scott Galloway 30:06 ... rifling through my things and mumbling to herself.

Kara Swisher 30:09 My things, I do that. "I'm taking that buttery coat." That buttery coat. It was-

Scott Galloway 30:12 I have, I have-

Kara Swisher 30:14 Buttery.

Scott Galloway 30:14 Somebody has slaughtered several dozen animals who were llamas that were only raised on, like, Japanese Wagyu rice. I u- went through that skin phase where I couldn't buy enough, like, leather coats.

Kara Swisher 30:24 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 30:24 Anyways, have at it.

Kara Swisher 30:26 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 30:27 Have at it.

Kara Swisher 30:27 They're very nice. I might take one, but it's sort of warm out.

Scott Galloway 30:28 But if you borrow my coat, it means, if you borrow my coat, it means I then borrow your car and we're going steady. That means we're going steady.

Kara Swisher 30:35 We're going steady. We are going steady.

Scott Galloway 30:36 Oh, my first girlfriend, Melanie Kagan-

Kara Swisher 30:38 Locked up away.

Scott Galloway 30:38 ... who's-

Kara Swisher 30:39 When she wore your coat?

Scott Galloway 30:40 Oh, yeah, and she might... Letterman coat. I w- I was a Letterman.

Kara Swisher 30:43 Ah.

Scott Galloway 30:43 A D1 athlete and then-

Kara Swisher 30:44 This is c- college?

Scott Galloway 30:45 College. You know it, baby.

Kara Swisher 30:46 Do you have any clothes from people... I- I still have clothes from people I went out with.

Scott Galloway 30:50 Yeah. I mean, David Hasselhoff still has a few of my loose sweat shirts, but that's another story, Kara.

Kara Swisher 30:57 (laughs)

Scott Galloway 30:57 That's another story.

Kara Swisher 30:58 That was a loving relationship. So beautiful and poignant. But if you weren't married, I'd love you to go out with Paul Giamatti. I think that would be good for you.

Scott Galloway 31:06 Oh, wait. Hold on. Hold on.

Kara Swisher 31:07 What? More.

Scott Galloway 31:08 Let's unpack that.

Kara Swisher 31:09 (laughs) Okay.

Scott Galloway 31:10 The- the person-

Kara Swisher 31:11 I love him.

Scott Galloway 31:11 ... you have decided is for me is Paul Giamatti?

Kara Swisher 31:15 Yeah. Oh, my God. I'd totally like to hang out with Paul Giamatti.

Scott Galloway 31:16 I'm totally down if Paul Giamatti can be Emily Ratajkowski. Has she asked about me?

Kara Swisher 31:21 No.

Scott Galloway 31:22 Seriously. She has asked about me, right?

Kara Swisher 31:24 No, she has not.

Scott Galloway 31:25 She's totally asked about me.

Kara Swisher 31:26 Nobody who looks like Emily Ratajkowski.

Scott Galloway 31:28 Yeah, I know.

Kara Swisher 31:28 You know who asked me about you? Let me tell you.

Scott Galloway 31:30 Oh, here we go.

Kara Swisher 31:31 Men.

Scott Galloway 31:32 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 31:32 Shermichael w- asked me about you, the guy you debated in Detroit. Uh, this lovely guy, Chuck Rocha, I was on a panel with, asked me, men ask me about you. N- they have such a man crush on you, it's disturbing on many levels.

Scott Galloway 31:45 Well, tell them to swing by. Why, why shouldn't they come by my apartment? (laughs)

Kara Swisher 31:49 This is what women say to me, including attract- very attractive women. They're always like, "Oh, Scott."

Scott Galloway 31:53 Oh, God.

Kara Swisher 31:54 That's all they, that's, that's all they say.

Scott Galloway 31:55 Just keep them away from me.

Kara Swisher 31:56 They don't say, "Oh, Scott, I want to fuck him." It's, "Oh, Scott, mm, your eyebrow."

Scott Galloway 31:58 No, it's literally like I need to... that reminds me I need new mace cartridges. Yeah. (laughs)

Kara Swisher 32:05 (laughs) But men are like, "He's so dreamy. Scott is so-

Scott Galloway 32:08 Oh, my God.

Kara Swisher 32:08 "I love that Scott. He's so dreamy." It's-

Scott Galloway 32:10 You bring up my name and, like, the next sentence from women are like, "You know, I'm thinking about, like, just having sex with women from this point forward."

Kara Swisher 32:16 (laughs) That is so true.

Scott Galloway 32:17 And I don't think we need men-

Kara Swisher 32:18 It is so true.

Scott Galloway 32:20 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 32:20 There's... I haven't had a woman say she's hot for you. Men I have heard saying how hot so- anyway-

Scott Galloway 32:24 You know-

Kara Swisher 32:25 Paul Giamatti, call us.

Scott Galloway 32:26 That's something.

Kara Swisher 32:26 It would be great.

Scott Galloway 32:27 That's something.

Kara Swisher 32:27 I know it's something. All right, we have to move on. We, at the t- tariffs, tariffs. And Jer- Jerome

Kara Swisher 32:33 Powell has a set, let's just say. At the time of this taping, President Trump says he will not extend the latest August 1st tariff deadline. The President reportedly plans to sign new executive orders after we tape, imposing higher tariffs on several countries that have not reached deals. He's particularly mad at Brazil. Um, the administration has managed to get only eight deals done in 120 days, but with a n- a number of partners. In the last few days, Trump has announced a 25% tariff on India with a penalty for over-reliance on Russian energy and military equipment. South Korea has made an offer to buy down the 25% it faces. He's interested in hearing it. Um, uh, one of the things that, uh, that, it's interesting is whether he's gonna extend that deadline. Uh, fear not, everyone. Treasury Secretary Scott Besson, who seems to be living his best life as Trump's favorite person, told Corporate America it's, quote, "Not the end of the world if these tariffs are on for days or weeks." Meanwhile, the Fed held interest rates steady, as I said, on Wednesday for the fifth meeting in a row, as the Commerce Department reported that the US economy grew at a stronger than expected pace. But there's lots of troubling things in the report actually, and now inflation today just ticked up a little bit. Um, and so Powell seems to be waiting till September to see the impact of the tariffs, which I think is probably a good thing to do. Um, so what do you, what do you think about what's happening? In- in some cases, some of the countries are saying what he said happened didn't happen. Obviously, a lot of these numbers are gonna be paid by American consumers in the, in the end. Um, w- any thoughts on this?

Scott Galloway 33:58 The only thing you know you're gonna get... first off, none of them, I hate it they call them deals. They're all frameworks that they can put out a press release, and in the press release is some giant number that is unenforceable, specifically the amount of money they're gonna invest in the US.

Kara Swisher 34:11 Yes. Thank you.

Scott Galloway 34:12 So I hope that, I hope we just get through this, get on it. Um, you know, I- I saw someone of Bill Maher, a very intelligent woman saying that tariffs, she's like why... Said to Bill, "Why do you want... Why are you against making American workers more productive? They're kind of like wrapping themselves in the flag." And folks, let me just remind you that free trade or tariffs are inversely correlated to economic growth. That telling American consumers that they have to pay more money for a Japanese car such that they get a shitty car for 40,000 instead of a great car for 30,000, that not only makes us consumers less prosperous, you know, paying more for shittier things, but it also makes us less competitive because we don't need to compete. So, uh, and I'm gonna talk about this, um, in, in my, uh, prediction. But Figma, this design, uh, company is going public, and it was supposed to be acquired by Adobe. The fact that it wasn't because EU regulators blocked the deal is gonna make that market much more competitive. And so when all you're doing is making things less competitive in the short run for companies because they have the advantage of taxing foreign companies, you make our companies less competitive, you make our consumers less prosperous. And it has been shown that over the medium and long term, it decreases, uh, productivity, and the, the GDP numbers were really strange. I don't know if you saw those, but the GDP numbers-

Kara Swisher 35:30 Yes, I did.

Scott Galloway 35:31 It was... So this was the strangest thing that came, came out of the GDP numbers. You subtract or you add to GDP... or excuse me, you subtract out of GDP imports because that is economic activity or production that took place offshore. Uh, imports were down 30% year on year.

Kara Swisher 35:45 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 35:45 Like 34%.

Kara Swisher 35:46 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 35:46 I mean, it's not even that c- th- that, that prices are too high or that American consumers don't want them. But foreign companies that build businesses importing products into the US, making our lives more prosperous and our products less expensive and our... you know, better quality of life-... have kind of stopped because they don't know how to plan. They don't even know how to price stuff, they don't know what it means, they don't know, you know, they don't know what the demand's going to be because they don't know what these tariffs are. So I'm at the part of the program now where I just hope, for the purposes of just getting back to work, that they get a, quote unquote, a bunch of these frameworks done and- The, all these nations are learning. Yeah, agree to, agree to the tariff-

Kara Swisher 36:23 Nothing.

Scott Galloway 36:23 ... and then announce, uh, uh, a trillion dollars in investment in the United States over-

Kara Swisher 36:29 Which will never happen.

Scott Galloway 36:29 ... the next 10 years, which will, is not enforceable-

Kara Swisher 36:30 That's what happened with all the tech companies, remember? They were like-

Scott Galloway 36:33 Oh, yeah.

Kara Swisher 36:33 ... "We're gonna invest." And then they never did.

Scott Galloway 36:35 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 36:35 That's the thing. And so Trump can tout a deal. One of the things, Richard Quest, who I like, on CNN, was so frustrated by Trump's plan-

Scott Galloway 36:42 Oh, really? That guy?

Kara Swisher 36:42 (laughs) I love him. Yeah, that guy. He's great. But he, the point he was making is the 15% is getting eaten by these companies. They're just gonna take the cost and you'll see-

Scott Galloway 36:52 Mm.

Kara Swisher 36:52 ... numbers like Ford or GM. They had, first time since 2023 Ford is losing money, which it wasn't. It was doing well. Um, they'll start, they'll eat the cost because it's low enough, but eventually they won't. Second thing is, consumers will pay for this in the end. Like not the money that's going to-

Scott Galloway 37:08 Oh, 100%.

Kara Swisher 37:08 ... the Treasury. And, uh, and it just, it just, it literally these, and he's like these are, he said the same thing you did. These are frameworks. They are not the thing.

Scott Galloway 37:17 They're not deals.

Kara Swisher 37:17 And so you'll never, how are you gonna know if they're gonna invest? Like just saying they're gonna invest, they will not do it. And so it's all nonsense and, and kind of unnecessary, um, shaking of the economy for, for no reason. Now, that's not to say that being tough on people or sort of playing a game of chicken with some of these countries where it's not a synchronous trade is not a bad idea, right? Like we always say that. Um, but one of the things that's i- important to understand is that they're n- it's not in place. It's just not... Like a lot of things with Trump, it's a lot of vaporware, and that's a, that is the real problem. And so when Jerome Powell comes in and says, "We're just gonna wait about cutting interest rates."

Scott Galloway 37:57 Yeah. We wanna see what happens.

Kara Swisher 37:58 We'll see what happens. That's the adult thing to do. And of course, Trump attacks him because it doesn't work without an acquiescent Fed, right? To, to try to feed this thing. Um, and, and he's not gonna be acquiescent. And interestingly, with the Fed meeting, two of the Trump appointed-

Scott Galloway 38:16 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 38:16 ... uh, people voted-

Scott Galloway 38:18 Disagreed, yeah.

Kara Swisher 38:18 ... against the, the, the, keeping it the same rate. Um, so now it's totally politicized, which are, which are good economic decisions. Powell, this guy has a set. He really does. (laughs)

Scott Galloway 38:29 Oh, yeah. He's, he's, he's, does, he's doing exactly what you're supposed to do when you have a Supreme Court justice or long tenure appointments. The reason we do that is such that we get stuck with some bad people sometimes. But the reason we do that is such that they can be independent minded. But one of the, one of the biggest risks I think to our economy is... So the definition of robust. A robust industry is, for example, the fast food industry. If McDonald's goes out of business, you're still gonna be able to get $1,800 of calories for five bucks, right? Because there's a ton of competitors. If JP, if Jamie Dimon called the president right now and said, "Oh, we had some rogue trader. He levered up, got past our compliance, and if I don't get $500 billion by tomorrow, we're out of business." That existential or systemic risk, because JP Morgan is so big now and so powerful, they have become, in my opinion, too big to fail. That makes an economy weaker. We now have seven companies that represent over 40% of the S&P's value of which represents 50% of the world's value. So you have essentially 20% of the market cap of the world is tied up in seven companies. And what these tariffs are doing, it, it, there's so many second order effects here is that, okay, you know who's not affected by the tariffs? You know who's just champagne and cocaine right now? Tech companies.

Kara Swisher 39:45 Yeah. We will talk about that. Yes.

Scott Galloway 39:47 But I, but, but if you're an investor, are you gonna invest in the 70% of companies in the S&P 500 that are subject to some sort of tariff risk?

Kara Swisher 39:54 Correct. You're just doing tax on them.

Scott Galloway 39:55 You're like, "Oh, fuck it. Just buy Meta." Right?

Kara Swisher 39:57 Right.

Scott Galloway 39:57 I don't know how to predict this. I don't know how to model against it. So what do we have? Even greater concentration of wealth and of market cap in a small, increasingly small group of companies and people. So-

Kara Swisher 40:09 Who will not be able to deliver in the end actually. They can't keep up with the, with the, with the numbers.

Scott Galloway 40:15 Oh, with the... It, but, but, but it's like, it, that's the last thing. Does the president really think it's good economic policy to basically transfer market capitalization from Dow Chemical and Ford to Alphabet and Meta? Is that what we need right now? That's not-

Kara Swisher 40:29 (laughs) No.

Scott Galloway 40:30 These companies-

Kara Swisher 40:30 The opposite. It's the opposite.

Scott Galloway 40:32 Th- th- these great American companies that are either in manufacturing or consumer products that are subject to these tariffs and subject to this insecurity and chaos, that's kind of, those are the companies quite frankly that-

Kara Swisher 40:43 That is a really good point.

Scott Galloway 40:44 ... to, to keep, and not only that they tend to be, they don't pay their people as well, but they tend to employ many more people. And it's like, okay, if we were gonna do any economic policy that transferred capital or advantage back from one group of companies to others for a more robust market, quite frankly a stronger, more diverse economy, we would probably want to let some air out of the AI tech balloon-

Kara Swisher 41:05 Right.

Scott Galloway 41:05 ... and transfer it across the rest of our American, great American companies.

Kara Swisher 41:08 Well, that's not what they're doing.

Scott Galloway 41:09 And this is effectively saying to every institutional manager, "Fuck it, just invest in tech."

Kara Swisher 41:15 That's right. All right. Well then, actually, we'll get to that. We'll go on a quick

Kara Swisher 41:18 break. When we come back, we'll talk about Microsoft and Meta's earnings, which were blockbuster. Scott, we're back with earnings news. Microsoft just reported a blockbuster quarter with total revenue surging 18% year over year to $76 billion. But as Microsoft doubles down on AI, the capital spending is climbing up 27%. Meta also had a huge Q2 with $47 billion in revenue, up 22%, and 18 billion in profit, up 36%. Meta's AI hiring spree also acknowledged in the earnings with compensation for technical talent in priority areas cited as the second-largest driver of cost growth. These big deals, they're paying all these AI researchers. Um-... ye- y- what... How do you look at this? Are these AI bets paying off or it's, it's advertising for Meta that it's their old business that's doing well, probably helped by AI, but not in the way, mm, M- Zuckerberg is spending. Um, any thoughts on, on this? They're really, they're really doubling down on AI, obviously, whether it's, it's research costs or, uh, talent costs, or just simple investment and compute. Um, any thoughts on these two earnings?

Scott Galloway 42:21 So you forwarded me an article from The Wall Street Journal that was really fascinated, and it said basically, this is the weirdest GDP report we've seen in a while, 'cause when imports go down 30%, it sort of artificially juices GDP. And, um, if you're thinking about... I mean, these numbers... Well, one, okay, so the numbers of traditional business is just staggering. It's just, uh, they continue to perform, they're using AI for better targeting, and I think every media planner in the world is just throwing up their arms and saying, "Just spend more money on Meta-"

Kara Swisher 42:54 Yeah. Right.

Scott Galloway 42:55 ... um, or, or on Alphabet. They also have the benefit of the market has decided that it loves CapEx in AI. The market has decided that AI is going to be enormous, and whoever wins the war, it's going to be a function of brute force and that is as represented by CapEx. So Oracle, when Oracle went public, Larry Eli- Ellison, I think, owned about f- 24%. He now owns closer to 41%. Well, how is that possible? They would use their cash flow to buy back shares, thereby decreasing the amount of shares and increasing the relative ownership of people who own shares. Except about two years ago, he decided, nope, it's now a capital war on AI. We need to be a distant number two of infrastructure to NVIDIA. We're going to massively spend in CapEx. Arguably, that was one of the better business decisions of the last 10 years. And Larry Ellison, you want to talk about elephants can dance, is now the second wealthiest person in the world. And the most crazy stat from that article, and I still can't believe it's true, but it stated in that article that there was more spending last quarter on AI investments than there was consumer spending.

Kara Swisher 44:04 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 44:05 So think about this-

Kara Swisher 44:06 It is.

Scott Galloway 44:06 ... 355 million people in the US-

Kara Swisher 44:09 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 44:09 ... everything they're spending money on, their, their Netflix, their Starbucks, going to see F1, all the, all consumer spending was less-

Kara Swisher 44:18 Yep.

Scott Galloway 44:18 ... than the investments in AI. I mean, my God, that is-

Kara Swisher 44:23 I know. The numbers are that-

Scott Galloway 44:25 ... that is just-

Kara Swisher 44:26 ... massive.

Scott Galloway 44:26 ... that is just staggering. But, uh, g- Meta up 12% in pre-market, earnings beat of a massive earnings beat, 714 versus 589, revenue of 47.5 billion, eh, expected 44.8, a 22% year on year. And one of the things that was so impressive is they grew their customer, they, they, uh, grew their customer base or their users by 6%, which may not sound like a lot, but when your-

Kara Swisher 44:51 No.

Scott Galloway 44:51 ... base is 3.5 billion, that's two hund-

Kara Swisher 44:53 There's no other game in town. There's no other game in town.

Scott Galloway 44:55 They added, they added the population of Brazil to their user base, uh, year on year. So it-

Kara Swisher 45:02 And more products.

Scott Galloway 45:02 ... and in addition, the market loves this CapEx. They, their CapEx's spending was $17 billion, by the way.

Kara Swisher 45:09 Right.

Scott Galloway 45:10 That's double what it was last year. It is an-

Kara Swisher 45:12 Yep.

Scott Galloway 45:13 And the market just loves it. They, they-

Kara Swisher 45:15 Well, someone has to pay for all those, those young men that they're hiring. (laughs)

Scott Galloway 45:19 (laughs)

Kara Swisher 45:19 I mean, billion dollar deals. Uh, they, uh, you know, whatever you say about Marco Zuckerberg, he goes for it, right?

Scott Galloway 45:25 Oh, no doubt.

Kara Swisher 45:25 And even if he made a mistake-

Scott Galloway 45:27 No doubt.

Kara Swisher 45:27 ... uh, with Meta. And, eh, same thing, uh, over at Microsoft. Uh, the question is what, when does it not pay off? Like who you have Grok doing it, you've got Amazon doing it. Amazon just paid even The New York Times $20 million a year for its stuff, which is nothing, which is peanuts. Um, you know, I just think the, the, uh, this is, uh, this is a arms race for these people. And, uh, and it, there, it's being paid off in the market right now for them. And they're using that in order to, to, like, goose themselves, rather. And you're right. Their everything is being shifted over to these seven tech companies and nobody else. And so Ford and GM who have made strides are just gonna suffer. So will John Deere, so will

Kara Swisher 46:07 all the other companies at the expense of these people. Now interestingly, Zuckerberg, uh, he had to put out one of his essays. These people love to put out essays and letters and vision manifestos. Um, he loves to do this. And, and they're always long and badly edited. But, um, he said AI superintelligence is now in sight. He put out this letter and video, uh, uh, outlining his vision for it. It was described by one outlet as a mini manifesto. Uh, let's listen to Mark Zuckerberg if we have to.

Mark Zuckerberg 46:33 A lot has been written about the scientific and economic advances that AI can bring, and I'm really optimistic about this. What I think an even more meaningful impact in our lives is going to come from everyone having a personal superintelligence that helps you achieve your goals, create what you want to see in the world, be a better friend, and grow to become the person that you aspire to be. This vision is different from others in the industry who want a direct AI at automating all of the valuable work.

Kara Swisher 47:00 Blather. This is his tip, this-

Scott Galloway 47:01 Grow to the person you-

Kara Swisher 47:03 Uh.

Scott Galloway 47:03 ... aspire to be.

Kara Swisher 47:04 Ugh. It's so... He did this before-

Scott Galloway 47:06 (laughs)

Kara Swisher 47:06 ... on his-

Scott Galloway 47:06 That's the guy that's gonna-

Kara Swisher 47:07 ... social media will bring up-

Scott Galloway 47:08 ... "I'm gonna be the person I-

Kara Swisher 47:09 (laughs)

Scott Galloway 47:09 ... aspire to be-"

Kara Swisher 47:11 Honestly, let me just say-

Scott Galloway 47:11 "... because of Mark Zuckerberg." (laughs)

Kara Swisher 47:12 Ugh. One time, he called me when he wrote-

Scott Galloway 47:14 Oh, God.

Kara Swisher 47:14 ... one of these ridiculous manifestos. He called me and asked me what I, when he was speaking to me, what I thought of it. And I said, "One, you need an editor. Two, I, I don't understand this, this whole thing about community." He just was like, "Social media will bring us together." Like, such fucki- And it, of course, it didn't. And I, I was, at the time, I was like, "This is such bullshit." Just s- just say you just want to make money on automating all our valuable work, I'm fine with that, right? But th- this is, these people just aspire to be these visionaries, and they are the smallest intellects, they have the smallest intellects and the least amount... They just love to put these things out. You know, Jamie, you don't hear this from Jamie Dimon much, right? And who is... Uh, by the way, he's been meeting with President Trump, which is a good thing. Like, you don't hear this nonsense from our smarter people in, on our society because they don't feel the need to do th- Remember when Gates put these essays, The Road Ahead? It was so nonsensical, like, to do this. Now, o- one thing Zuckerberg did say, which I agreed with, but I didn't think he had to put on such, such thing, is he said smart glasses will be the primary way people interact with AI. Of course he said that 'cause he has a smart glass business. Um, and without them, people will be at a cognitive disadvantage. Do you think you're gonna be at a cognitive disadvantage without, you know, AI glasses? What do you think?

Scott Galloway 48:31 Well, (sighs) I mean, uh, the, the idea...So these LLMs, I've always said that the LLM is just a function of who we are, but unfortunately, who we are in a certain medium, and I wish the LLMs could crawl the real world, 'cause I think, generally speaking, in the real world, that people are lovely. But the fact is, they're crawling our complexion, our personality online, and it gets really ugly, really fast. And if this AI... I've always said that companies were the closest thing I had to kids before I had kids, and that is, you conceive of them. They look, smell, and feel like you. They're sort of a corporate embodiment of the personality. And if, if LLaMa, the LLM from, from Zuck ends up being anything a- anything like him, it'll be emotionally stunted, brilliantly efficient, and constantly urging you to reconnect with your ex. I mean, it's just gonna be such a weird...

Kara Swisher 49:26 (laughs)

Scott Galloway 49:26 Eh, i-i-if this thing ends up like... He... W-w-when you heard that, didn't it sound AI generated? It's like the-

Kara Swisher 49:34 No, it just...

Scott Galloway 49:34 ... non-human human.

Kara Swisher 49:35 No, 'cause he's done it before. It's like so anodyne. It is so... I, like, literally had this bad memory for... I was at my ex's house, like, sleeping on a couch, and he called me, and he was talking about-

Scott Galloway 49:46 You got kicked out on the couch? Talk to me about that.

Kara Swisher 49:48 No, 'cause we were broken up, but I was staying-

Scott Galloway 49:49 Lesbians do that too? (laughs)

Kara Swisher 49:51 No. We were... No. So, it was just so fucking ridiculous. It was like, I remember going, "Oh my God. How can I get off this fucking phone call with this idiot who just thinks, who just thinks he's a visionary?" Like, literally no... There's so many visionaries. Like John Malone's recently written a book. He's a visionary. Like, he doesn't talk that much, and what he says is choice. These guys can't stop fucking talking and giving you their predictions of the future.

Scott Galloway 50:16 I don't know. The f-... Look, it's-

Kara Swisher 50:17 It's ex- like, I wanna hear it from you, Scott. I don't wanna hear it from this-

Scott Galloway 50:20 Yeah, look-

Kara Swisher 50:20 ... this guy.

Scott Galloway 50:21 (sighs) You gotta give it... He is a visionary. He really is. But his vision is a legless universe where people are cutting themselves.

Kara Swisher 50:27 (laughs) Exactly.

Scott Galloway 50:27 That's his vision.

Kara Swisher 50:28 Exactly.

Scott Galloway 50:28 And unfortunately, that vision-

Kara Swisher 50:29 But, like, but he says, like, "I'm here to help you achieve your goals, be a better friend, and grow (a person who aspired me) . It's not about automating all your value work, Mark. It's about automating all your valuable work, and so you can make money off of it." Could just say that. Like, I, like, honestly, this, this nonsense of being... Facebook is not gonna make you, A, is not going to make you a better friend. It, Facebook isn't gonna allow you to create what you want to see in the world and grow to be a better person, and neither does Mark Zuckerberg care about that. Like, and then, oh, by the way, buy my glasses. Like... (laughs) That's it.

Scott Galloway 51:00 If, if I asked AI to give me-

Kara Swisher 51:02 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 51:02 ... an image of Mark Zuckerberg that defines who he is, I feel like it would be... Granted, I, I... May... This might be the edible speaking.

Kara Swisher 51:10 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 51:11 But it would be a guy at a really sad malt shop, sucking up the world's user data through a straw, and every time he made eye contact with you, he'd apologize and look away.

Kara Swisher 51:21 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 51:21 I just-

Kara Swisher 51:21 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 51:22 ... think this guy is so unusual, so strange-

Kara Swisher 51:26 He is. He's so strange.

Scott Galloway 51:26 ... and, and he... To his credit, he is really, he is actually smart enough to, I think he knows, he realizes it, so he brings in really likable people, whether it's Nick Clegg or Sheryl Sandberg.

Kara Swisher 51:37 (laughs) Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 51:37 But just getting back to... I, I just want to talk a little bit about earnings. I, I'm so blown away by this quarter's earnings, just the amount of CapEx these guys are throwing at it. I think Microsoft may be the organization as of today that has (laughs) invested more money, more capital in the future than any organization in history with the exception of countries during war. And by the way, it's paying off. They're up 8% in pre-market trading. They blew away their earnings, 365 versus 337. The revenue was 76 and a half billion versus 73.8 expected. Revenue was up 18% year on year, and then its cloud-based unit, Azure, grew 39% this year. This, that is just... So if Microsoft... Basically, if you applied the same price to sales ratio to its cloud unit, it would be a one trillion dollar business, and right now, it's sev- it's a $75 billion revenue business. And they're planning to spend 30 billion on capital next quarter. That's up 50% from the same time last year, and if it kept constant, it would work out to be $120 billion, and that means right now the, the category that is getting the most CapEx of any category in the world is AI, and the company spending the most is, is, is, um, is Microsoft. Microsoft is right now spending more money on AI than I think almost any organization in history has spent on anything with maybe the exception of a percentage of GDP what Britain and Russia have spent during wartime or something like this. It is... This is... Meta's quarter, I think, is the biggest investment by a private company in history on anything, and it's paying off. This company... These companies... I mean, it's just this tariff bullshit. These companies... While Ford is trying to figure out how many times a windshield wiper comes across or not from Canada or Mexico and how to fucking build their-

Kara Swisher 53:33 Yep.

Scott Galloway 53:33 ... business and estimate it and spending all this time-

Kara Swisher 53:35 Yeah, Trump is kneecapping them while these guys (laughs) -

Scott Galloway 53:36 Then you have these guys that are just running-

Kara Swisher 53:39 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 53:39 ... flat out and just killing it, just-

Kara Swisher 53:43 Right.

Scott Galloway 53:43 ... literally running away with it.

Kara Swisher 53:44 But why wouldn't they kill? They have nothing in their way. Like they never have anything in their way. Like Ford and GM and John Deere, they have things in their way. These guys have no obstacles. So... Or they have no regulatory obstacles. They have no... Like, they just buy their way into s- seamlessness, which is their favorite part.

Scott Galloway 54:02 But, but think about, think about... This is what these guys do. They're like, okay, the two of them-

Kara Swisher 54:07 All the time.

Scott Galloway 54:08 ... added-... 550 billion dollars in market cap since 4:00 PM last night.

Kara Swisher 54:13 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 54:13 Since, since they announced their earnings last night-

Kara Swisher 54:15 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 54:15 ... they've added 550 billion dollars-

Kara Swisher 54:19 Right.

Scott Galloway 54:19 ... in market capitalization. So they just, they just added, "Oh, let's add Netflix. Let's add-"

Kara Swisher 54:25 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 54:25 I would imagine the French stock market. I mean, I, the, the-

Kara Swisher 54:28 Yeah. It is.

Scott Galloway 54:28 ... people don't get a sense of the

Scott Galloway 54:30 scale.

Kara Swisher 54:30 It's working for them. It's a, it's a machine. Anyway, speaking of things that aren't a machine, let me, let's finish up. Novo Nordisk shares are plummeting after the company slashed its full-year guidance, citing weaker-than-expected US growth for Ozempic and Wegovy. The stock dropped 30% at one point on Tuesday, wiping out nearly $93 billion in market value. Novo Nordisk is blaming the downturn on increased competition from Eli Lilly's Mounjaro and Zepbound, as well as, I think more significantly, cheaper GLP-1 knockoffs, and which are not going away. They thought they were going away when the, when the, um, when things got settled in terms of manufacturing. The company also named a new CEO, replacing previous CEO who was ousted by the board in May as the stock was sliding. This is incredible. W- a p- a product that is going to be so big, and the company at the top of it is just losing it. Th- this, to me, is just one of these amazing stories, um, because of all kinds of, you know, pressures from... Of course competition was gonna get here. It's only gonna get bigger in the GLP-1 market. But, uh, very quick thoughts on this, 'cause it's the opposite here, right? Uh, an amazing opportunity that's been blown, I guess.

Scott Galloway 55:35 Well, speaking of tariffs, the number one, um, import into United States from Europe is pharmaceuticals. And I said two years ago, and I was mocked for this, that I thought the more important technology in terms of on-the-ground change to society was not AI, it was GLP-1.

Kara Swisher 55:49 You did.

Scott Galloway 55:49 And what's happened here is that because of a shortage and kind of a loophole, some companies have been able to offer compounded GLP-1, which is basically like-

Kara Swisher 55:57 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 55:57 ... saying generics. And HIM's stock went crazy because they were able to basically sell GLP-1 drugs for a fraction of the price. And then, as you mentioned, Eli Lilly's, uh, GLP-1 offering, Zepbound, um, uh, is now more popular than Wegovy. I absolutely love this. I still think the category is gonna grow like crazy. Only 8% of Americans have taken a GLP-1, but about-

Kara Swisher 56:20 Agreed.

Scott Galloway 56:20 ... but about, um, a third of them are interested. I think if you want it, I think the most accretive thing you could do for our economy right now would be to offer, um, access to GLP-1 drugs to everybody. I think if you look at the obesity industrial complex that wants people to buy a sugar bomb, eat shitty food, take advantage of the lowest, like, calories to cost that, uh, uh, people have to turn to in food deserts, and then hand these people over to the companies producing statins, hip replacements, knee replacements, knee-, uh, kidney dialysis, they would... Effectively, we're monetizing people's health, and so much of it is obesity-related.

Kara Swisher 56:56 It is.

Scott Galloway 56:56 Especially the obesity-related-

Kara Swisher 56:58 Heart disease.

Scott Galloway 56:58 ... uh, healthcare costs-

Kara Swisher 56:59 Strokes.

Scott Galloway 56:59 ... are one to one and a half trillion a year.

Kara Swisher 57:01 Yeah. Yeah.

Scott Galloway 57:02 So similar to what the equivalent of the FDA did in the UK, I think it's the UK Health Ministry, they said, "If you are smoking, we'll send you for free an electronic nicotine delivery service, because while that is not good for you, it's much less bad for you than tobacco."

Kara Swisher 57:15 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 57:16 I think, uh, over the medium and long term, if you really wanted to have an impact on healthcare costs, you would make GLP-1 drugs accessible to absolutely everybody.

Kara Swisher 57:24 Correct. So what did this company, which is the front, forefront of it, do wrong?

Scott Galloway 57:28 Well, the, the honest answer is I don't know. I don't know if it's distribution or branding, but, uh, I would argue right now, it's a great value because this is-

Kara Swisher 57:36 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 57:36 ... if not the market leader, one of the market leaders in what is a, a, an unbelievable, uh, business and category. And it's trading at a PE because it's been hammered because it's not performing well.

Kara Swisher 57:50 Well, interesting, they did a deal with Him and Hers, right? And then they continued to sell the knockoffs, so then they got in a fight with Him and Hers, right? So Him and Hers were selling the knockoff. Then Novo Nordisk did a deal with them, and then it fell apart because they were al- they, the continued selling of the compounds, which need to be regulated by the way, um, i- i- is really something, that loophole really has... You know, these guys should have been riding off into the sunset because they kind of... but they don't because of these GLP-1 knockoffs.

Scott Galloway 58:17 The market has a tendency to over-punish and over-reward, and the momentum right now is against these guys. So where their five-year average PE has been 33, it's been as high as 50, today it's gonna open at 14.6. And when you think about the average S&P company trades at a PE of 26, to get the market leader, even though it is underperforming expectations in GLP-1 at 14.6 times earnings, I actually think the stock is a buy right now. But there's no doubt about it, this is a national champion for Europe that is, quote unquote, "faltering" or not living up to the expectations. But I actually think the stock has been over-punished, and I have... Uh, of all the technologies of the last 10 years, the one I'm most-

Kara Swisher 58:56 Absolutely.

Scott Galloway 58:57 ... excited about is GLP-1.

Kara Swisher 58:58 Absolutely.

Scott Galloway 58:59 I think it's a game changer.

Kara Swisher 58:59 In fact, in doing this secret documentary, one of the things that every doctor said is... I asked them what they think the most important developments, technology and pharmaceutical, and they're always like, "MRNA vaccines," um, CRISPR-

Scott Galloway 59:11 That's interesting.

Kara Swisher 59:12 ... CRISPR and GLP-1s everyone... They make, they're like, "I don't know which one's more important." And they all mention GLP-1s on a range of things 'cause it's, it's just beginning, we're beginning to understand it. I would agree with you. All right, we have to move on. Uh, one

Kara Swisher 59:25 more quick break. We'll get, uh, we'll be back for predictions. Okay, Scott? Uh, let's hear a prediction. I have a very quick one very quickly. Kamala Harris announced this week she's not running for governor of California. She also revealed she's written a book about her campaign called 107 Days. I'm not so sure she's gonna run for president. I didn't think... As I told you, I didn't think she was gonna run for governor. I, I don't think she's gonna run for president. I think she knows that she can't win and she has enough responsibility to understand that. And, um, and so I predict she will also not run for president.

Scott Galloway 59:57 Well, I'm good at running other people's lives.

Kara Swisher 59:59 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 59:59 If I was the vice president, I would go be the chairman of a hedge fund, make a shit ton of money, and just wait for the next Democratic administration and be a Supreme Court justice.

Kara Swisher 1:00:07 Yeah. That's what-

Scott Galloway 1:00:08 I don't think-

Kara Swisher 1:00:08 That's what I want to see. Yeah.

Scott Galloway 1:00:09 I don't think she needs the risk of potentially lose... I'm not sure she'd win governor, uh, and-

Kara Swisher 1:00:13 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 1:00:13 She just doesn't need that, and does she really-

Kara Swisher 1:00:15 She has to win by a lot if she wins, right? So if she even, if she wins and doesn't win by enough, she'll be, she'll be tart.

Scott Galloway 1:00:22 And Cal- a lot of people describe California as ungovernable. That- that it's just, uh, that special interest groups are so entrent. Uh, people say this is a v- even, even Republican governors will say, "I would not want that job." Right? That it's a very difficult, uh, I think it, I think it's the right move, and also-

Kara Swisher 1:00:38 I don't think she wanted to do it. I don't, I think she'd, uh, as a, as an executive, she didn't want, uh, she don't, she didn't have the fire. When I talked to her, you could tell. Like, "Mm-mm." But th- it was like she's supposed to versus she wants to. So, um...

Scott Galloway 1:00:50 She's probably sick of running.

Kara Swisher 1:00:51 ... I don't think she wants to run for president.

Scott Galloway 1:00:52 I, I, I hope... Yeah, I don't, I don't think she should. And, and, uh, you know, I thought she did a, uh, you know, s-

Kara Swisher 1:00:58 Good try. She did. She had a good try.

Scott Galloway 1:00:59 Given the hand she was dealt, I think one of the greatest performances in history by any athlete or person.

Kara Swisher 1:01:05 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 1:01:05 When I saw her walking into that debate with the president-

Kara Swisher 1:01:08 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 1:01:08 ... and the amount of pressure on her shoulders, and the way she handled herself, I thought-

Kara Swisher 1:01:14 Good job. Great job.

Scott Galloway 1:01:14 ... y- yeah. She (laughs) deserves a lot of credit for trying to run a US-style, uh, race hamstrung by what was, uh, you know, British election.

Kara Swisher 1:01:25 Old man Biden. Yeah.

Scott Galloway 1:01:26 Yeah. British election cycle time... I mean, she had what? 111 days or something to try to pull this off.

Kara Swisher 1:01:30 And she had to, she had Biden hanging around there.

Scott Galloway 1:01:32 I hope she's happy. I don't, I don't know.

Kara Swisher 1:01:33 Yeah, I hope so too. I think she's a, she's been a great public servant. And I don't, I just don't think she's gonna run for president.

Scott Galloway 1:01:37 But she, she'll be a sup- sh- she's literally the first Supreme Court justice appointee of a Democratic presidency.

Kara Swisher 1:01:44 Uh, it should be.

Scott Galloway 1:01:44 She'll be a-

Kara Swisher 1:01:44 I don't know how she'd do it.

Scott Galloway 1:01:44 She's an easy one.

Kara Swisher 1:01:45 It's a lot of work.

Scott Galloway 1:01:45 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 1:01:46 That's a lot of work. Okay, what's your prediction, very briefly?

Scott Galloway 1:01:49 Um, so each year, I pick an IPO of the year, and that is an IPO I think is gonna do really well. Airbnb, last year it was Reddit. Uh, today, I believe will be the IPO of the year, and I think that IPO is a company called Figma, and it's a design company. And I've been building these... My son's been trying to find a business in building these sites, and it is just so obvious that design is the salsa to the chip of all AI. And that is whenever AI returns anything, it just looks so, you know, anodyne, generic, just e- e- a- a- and if you look at designers-

Kara Swisher 1:02:26 Eh. Eh. Right. Eh.

Scott Galloway 1:02:27 If you look at, for example, IBM used to hire one designer for every 70, uh, programmers. Now it's-

Kara Swisher 1:02:32 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 1:02:32 Now it's one to ten. Design is a booming field, and seems to be somewhat, so far, immune from AI. And Figma is essentially this kind of collaborative software company. It's great for design. The thing that got me looking at it was my partner at PropG, Katherine Dillon, who is a professor of the visual arts at Tisch, or professor of the arts, teaches a very popular course called Design Language. And the first thing she does for her students is she asks them to download, uh, Figma. And this company... So there's this thing called the Rule of 40, uh, in SaaS, and that is you take your growth rate plus your profit margins. The Rule of 40 for Figma, its profit margin's around 20% and its growth this year was 44%, giving it a Rule of 40 of 64, which puts it in the top five of SaaS companies. And just to give you a sense of how profitable and how economically efficient this company is, Uber spent $21 billion between 2009 and 2021. Figma has raised 750 million, but has 1.5 billion on its balance sheet, meaning that it has acc- it has accreted $750 million. It works with between seven and eight of the 10, uh, of every Fortune 2000 companies. Adobe is sort of the Mercedes, a little bit over-engineered. Um, an amazing company. Uh, they have responded with competition with Adobe Express because Figma's known as being more collaborative. But Figma's a little bit easier to use. Figma, I think, is more like Toyota. It's going out at 18 times revenues. And the most interesting, I think, thing about this is this was the IPO that wasn't supposed to happen, and this IPO, which I think will offer investors an opportunity to invest in a great company, more competition, corporations will be able to have better products for a lower price.

Kara Swisher 1:04:23 Yeah, it's great that Adobe didn't get it. I think that was a great move by the government.

Scott Galloway 1:04:25 That's exactly right, and we'll come back to that.

Kara Swisher 1:04:27 $20 billion valuation right now. Just yet.

Scott Galloway 1:04:29 And also-

Kara Swisher 1:04:30 $20 billion out of the gate.

Scott Galloway 1:04:31 Also, from an employee standpoint, we're worried, you know, obviously about employees. When companies are acquired, generally speaking, within a year, 18% of the employees have left of the company that was acquired. When a company goes public, usually they hire, increase their hiring in year one of 23%. And the reason this company is going public is not because of our antitrust, not because of our regulation, but because of EU antitrust, which blocked this merger. So while we're sitting on our hands, letting companies concentrate power and become, create a less competitive market, the EU regulators said, "No, this makes no sense to take the numbers one and two player and let them, let you know, let the upstart." Figma is sort of to Adobe what AI is to search. Adobe's still gonna be an amazing business, but this is the new stuff. These guys are kind of the, th- the new guys, and the EU blocked this. And as a result, Figma got a breakup fee of a billion dollars in last year.

Kara Swisher 1:05:26 On top of it. Yep.

Scott Galloway 1:05:27 Massively increased-

Kara Swisher 1:05:28 Can I- it's just, it's still shy of the Adobe deal, but in terms of creating more billionaires, in terms of creating more economic value for people, this is the right way to go, as you're saying.

Scott Galloway 1:05:38 Anyways, my prediction is the following. So as, as... Uh, yesterday, I was literally calling everybody I, I could to try and get shares in this thing for the IPO.

Kara Swisher 1:05:46 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 1:05:46 Typically, they want to build a book of somewhere between eight and 12 times demand, and the way it works is institutions call and say, "I want a million shares." And they always vastly overestimate how much they want, 'cause any decent IPO, you're gonna get, you're gonna get cut back, right? You're gonna get trimmed back. So you put in an overallocation. A really good IPO builds a book of eight to 12 times the request for the number of outstanding shares or the shares being issued. I found out yesterday that Figma was 40X oversubscribed. And if you look at the companies going out this year, not only of IPOs, there's been fewer of them, but the companies that have performed well are what I call... It's not that they're not great companies, it's just that they're fashionable. Like Chime or Circle, like stablecoin shit.

Kara Swisher 1:06:29 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 1:06:29 This is, in my opinion-

Kara Swisher 1:06:31 A real company.

Scott Galloway 1:06:32 A real company that's a great company, that's killing it, that has amazing economics.

Kara Swisher 1:06:37 Great products.

Scott Galloway 1:06:38 Great products. We haven't had many of those, if any this year.

Kara Swisher 1:06:42 Yeah. Yeah, bullshit.

Scott Galloway 1:06:42 So anyways, my prediction is the following. Always dangerous to make predictions about stocks. This is not financial advice.... but this is what I have been trying to do. I have been trying my damnedest to try and find (laughs) shares in this thing-

Kara Swisher 1:06:54 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 1:06:54 ... because I think the first trade today, I think this thing closes up-

Kara Swisher 1:06:57 It heavily has, it's going, yeah.

Scott Galloway 1:06:57 ... monstrously-

Kara Swisher 1:06:59 Yep.

Scott Galloway 1:06:59 ... uh, today. And we're recording on a Thursday morning, uh, but I think, yeah, Figma is what I'll call the first great company to go public in-

Kara Swisher 1:07:08 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 1:07:09 ... 2025, and I think it's gonna be seen as one of the better IPOs of the year.

Kara Swisher 1:07:12 All right, I like it.

Scott Galloway 1:07:12 I'm really excited about this company. And also, it's a lesson on the importance of antitrust and regulation. Who wins here? More employment, investors have an opportunity to invest in a pure play, amazing company.

Kara Swisher 1:07:23 More competition.

Scott Galloway 1:07:24 Corporations, more competition, more tax revenue. And thank you, EU. They actually said, "No. This is not a good idea. We would be better with two great companies, not one here." And as a result, this company is now going public. It was supposed to be acquired two and a half years ago for 20 billion. It was gonna be acquired for 50 times revenues, but now investors will get a chance to invest at about 18 times revenues.

Kara Swisher 1:07:47 (laughs)

Scott Galloway 1:07:47 So, this is just a win-win-win.

Kara Swisher 1:07:50 Anyway, uh, thank you. That's an excellent prediction. I love that one. Uh, we wanna hear from you. Send us your questions about business, tech, or whatever is on your mind. Go to nymag.com/pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51- PIVOT. Elsewhere in the Kara and Scott universe this week, this week on Prof Deep Conversation, Scott was with Ezra Klein, a New York Times columnist and host of the Ezra Klein Show. Let's listen to a clip.

Guest 1:08:11 What's not working is the Democratic Party being leaderless and rudderless. Uh, I'm not shocked that at the moment if you ask people in a poll who they'd vote for, like, they don't really know what to say. Like, which Democrat? What do they know about them? But the Democratic Party is in a pretty shattered place. I've had a little bit of more trouble than other people or let me put it differently. I'm a little bit less confident than other people seem to be in interpreting those polls because one of the kind of structural characteristics of the past couple decades is people's dislike of the parties is getting higher and higher and higher. And it doesn't drive their voting decisions in quite the way it has at other times, but nevertheless, they do not like the parties. And so, one of the reasons the Democratic Party is very unpopular right now is Democrats do not like it. Now, those people are not gonna vote Republican, but they are pissed off at the Democratic Party, which has, to them, been ineffectual, which has, to them, been unable to stop, uh, the worst of what Trump is doing, which has, to them, not come up with a message or come up with a set of leaders. It's gonna have to be a process of... I mean, first it's gonna be the midterms and they're gonna have to figure out how to be in- in opposition in a way that coheres, but there's gonna be a process of having to find leaders again. This is the first time the Democratic Party has been leaderless in a very, very long time.

Scott Galloway 1:09:24 Ezra is the kinda guy that wants to talk to you about his mushroom microdosing, but first asks if he can share-

Kara Swisher 1:09:29 (laughs)

Scott Galloway 1:09:29 ... his screen.

Kara Swisher 1:09:30 (laughs)

Scott Galloway 1:09:30 You know, it's like... (laughs)

Kara Swisher 1:09:32 That was a good interview. He's really smart. He's really smart. I don't agree with him on everything, but he's really smart. Um, now, Scott, the time has come. The time has come. You usually get testy by this time of year, but scot-free August is upon us.

Scott Galloway 1:09:45 It is. It is.

Kara Swisher 1:09:46 It is upon us. You're, I think you're, like, happier this year. You- you usually get real testy and, like, wrangly-

Scott Galloway 1:09:51 I'm in a good place.

Kara Swisher 1:09:52 ... you know?

Scott Galloway 1:09:53 No, I'm in a good place.

Kara Swisher 1:09:53 But you're- you're not.

Scott Galloway 1:09:54 I think it's Ezra Klein. Every time I listen to Ezra Klein, it's like listening to a meditation app describing the- the collapse of democracy.

Kara Swisher 1:10:02 But how much are you gonna miss me, Scott? We have some... How much are you gonna miss me, really? A lot? A little?

Scott Galloway 1:10:08 I don't miss anybody. I'm, I miss people when I see them.

Kara Swisher 1:10:10 Oh, you totally miss people.

Scott Galloway 1:10:10 Like, I saw you this morning.

Kara Swisher 1:10:11 When you come back, you're always greedy-

Scott Galloway 1:10:11 It's true.

Kara Swisher 1:10:12 ... to see me.

Scott Galloway 1:10:12 It's true.

Kara Swisher 1:10:12 Stop it.

Scott Galloway 1:10:13 I miss my boys.

Kara Swisher 1:10:14 Okay.

Scott Galloway 1:10:14 They're the only people I've ever missed in my life.

Kara Swisher 1:10:15 Okay. You miss me. Okay, that-

Scott Galloway 1:10:16 What I do know-

Kara Swisher 1:10:17 ... that's just the same.

Scott Galloway 1:10:17 Are you this way?

Kara Swisher 1:10:18 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 1:10:18 I don't miss people and then I see them, and I think, "Oh, I miss them." I'm just like-

Kara Swisher 1:10:21 No, I miss you.

Scott Galloway 1:10:21 ... "Good to see them."

Kara Swisher 1:10:22 I- I miss when you're not there. But, we have some amazing co-hosts coming up, guest co-hosts. Mel Robbins, the Let Th- Let Them Lady, who's amazing. She has