Transcript
Live. Oh, I didn't even write a new joke from the ESG Taffy wheel. It's the ESG Industries. Only weakly woke data about what are we doing a podcast? So what we're doing podcasts, that's what we're doing, okay? You can hear me. She was complaining of not being able to hear me. I just I screwed up intentionally a year. I'm With You featuring, Jesse the money Whisperer and BS man, Matt mascardi sort of, I have a pre-recorded conversation with Matt that I'll play at the end of the show Jessie so you don't get to see Matt today. Oh. In today's enormous, super giant called April 5th 2023. Some ESG headlines featuring Sage CEOs and shareholder protests. Juicy sounds juicy as well as a deep dive into the merger between two horrible, sweaty companies, led by horrible white sweaty Bros. Why are they spotty? Well you know one of the companies runs WWE, the other one runs UFC. Oh yeah, we're just sweaty, dudes. They're just as Matt eloquently points out there. Real horrible human beings. Unfortunately, we'll get to that later. I'll spare, you know, here we go. Let's discuss the headlines. All right, let's talk about the headlines, Jesse. Okay. What do you have? Okay, so there's a bunch of annual meetings that are starting to happen. This is technically proxy season. It's about to pick up real speed. So we have some meetings that happened at companies that we've been talking about a lot. Okay, we'll start at Credit Suisse. Oh yes. So this is the first opportunity since covid for investors to show up and actually talk to the board and management and ostensibly. This is the last meeting before UBS swallows Credit Suisse, okay. Just see, I'm going to take you right to some of the protests that came from the shareholders. Okay, first of all, outside, several protesters had a were hoisting. A severed boat labeled crisis. Suis What do you like? A full-size. What are we? Talking a canoe? I don't know, I don't know. Does that one land that hard crisis? Swiss know, I don't know. Clever enough but Could do better inside one shareholder, blasted something that they refer to as bonus Mania. Referring to. Look at the executives are still walking away with large failure. I don't know. I think you're gonna see a theme going here that the Swiss polite. Yeah, I mean, it's great that they're being Exposed case, have you been reading about the executives getting bonus? Well I'll get to that another another shareholder. Used a metaphor. From Christianity to repeat the last. Yeah, this is one of the reasons why I was gonna do this show solo. But since I have no understanding of Christianity, I wanted to bring somebody on use a metaphor to repeatedly asked when is enough enough? What's the metaphor there? I don't know. The Bible is a. That's it. Yeah, another I feel like that could be used widely in any contacts. Another shareholder held up. A bag of walnuts as prop as a prop saying, a bag of these is worth about one share. I don't know. Fair that one. Because of the small town, I lived in in France, would have every, I think it was like every weekend during Walnut growing season all the local Walnut. Growers would come with their bags of what these giant bags of walnuts is I kind of an auction. It's like a walnut auction. I think it's I think it's a pretty decent way to visually represent the decline in value. But are we undervaluing a giant bag of walnuts that could be a pretty expensive. I just don't know if that protests lands either. I don't know if I feel that one couldn't a big bag of walnuts be worth as much as a share. Yeah. So I don't know if I really how big was the bag that was holding up? Yeah I don't really know. That's a good question. One young investor took off his shirt. To reveal a t-shirt with the words. Stop the Swindle written in red. I don't really got this one much about this one. Another shareholder, wore a red tie to represent the fact that I and plenty of others today. Are seeing red. he said, I rather feel that I've been cheated by these institutions, Again, very polite. No. Yeah. How about this one? I like this one. Shareholder Marcus Huber said the whole thing. How this happened makes me a little bit angry. What's strong statement? Maybe I'm jealousy because we live in a country now, that is just so heated and divided that I'm mostly scared to talk to anyone. I don't know. But this just seems like a very polite way to deal with this incredible collapse, right? I these people just seem really charming and played about it all. Yeah, I'll give you that. That would look very differently here, it would. So you referenced before about the bonuses. So shareholders, had a chance to vote on the chair of credit Suites, they had a chance to vote on all the directors. They had a chance to vote in all the pay and and unlike in the US, these are binding vote. So If they vote thumbs down, it loses, right? It's not, it's not an opinion. These things lose But again, the Swiss being very polite, everything past, but the slimmest of margins. Most things were like in the 50s like 55% but everyone but everybody got their bonuses. Everybody got their pay, all the directors were passed through the chair. Got everything, even everybody in these angry people enough of them were polite in their vote. Yes, the whole thing seems just very Swiss to me. Yeah. Okay. All right. Let's move on. Jamie, dimon, CEO and chair, JP Morgan. He has a new shareholder letter out. We talk a lot about CEOs, running letters to shareholders. The last one we talked about was Larry Fink's BlackRock. So I want to talk about Jamie dimon to see if anything seems different to me. And, and normally I make fun of these things but this one's not really to make fun of it. Which strikes me about Jamie dimes letters is I oddly agree. With them. And I know Matt would make fun of me for this and he always makes fun of me because I always buy with Jamie. Dimon is saying, But I don't know why. I just he just gets me. Here we go. And first of all, this first quote is way more than Larry Fink said in his entire letter, he said The window for Action to avert the costliest impacts of global climate change is closing. Wow. Yeah, I mean I know Matt would would laugh at me because Jamie could directly affect all this and big deal but he at least said it Larry's to say, like one of the worst banks in terms of probably they're funded by and who sure and fun, I know so yeah, I mean cool, very cool that he's saying it and Bringing the topic of conversation. Encouraging that the topic of conversation, but I'd like to see well, his actions are at least he's saying it to Larry Fink at BlackRock is now afraid away from it. What did he not? It didn't even show up once, right? It was Zero times and don't forget a few years before 2021. I think he was all about this is the number one problem in society. We are doomed. If we don't take care of this, what a fair weather fan of the climate crisis unintended or no pun intended. Okay. This one another reason why I brought you and Jesse he says our board is responsible for succession planning. We already have a hit by the truck plan ready to go. Do we have it means that if Jamie Diamond gets hit by a truck which, you know, it does happen in Manhattan, I guess they have a plan ready to go right at that moment when he gets hit by a truck. Wow, this is a really good use of their time and efforts. Actually, I think this is fabulous. I mean most companies struggle with sexual planning, they don't even try. I I like that means. He's leaving soon. Meaning like he's gonna get hit by a truck soon. Know, just wants out or no. No, I think it means that companies. As important as JP Morgan that if they're CEO did suddenly die, they better damn. Well, have a plan in place, right? I mean, you laughing but and as he points out that not all companies, can say they have something like this. I don't think most companies take this very seriously, and maybe it's the ego of the CEO doesn't want to think they can be replaced. But I just appreciate this, because I think every company responsible for not only the economy but for, you know, 100,000 employees, they should have a plan in place of something catastrophic happens. That's fair. Yeah. They don't just see, they don't, that's pathetic. Is that a governance issue or? No? Yes, absolutely governance issue. Definitely. And Jesse do we have? This does each one of us at free flow? Do we have a hit by a truck plan? If you get hit by a truck on your way to get like a crumb cake, do we do we have a replacement for you immediately. Do we know? We do not have to work on that. Good. Thank you. Have enough to work on this week. Thank you. Jamie Diamond. Also went on to say that there are only two ways of mending, The Frayed American Dream, okay? Okay, again this is where he gets me and Larry Fink never gets me. He says, moving towards skills, based hiring and paying minimum wage workers more. Okay, the moving to skills-based hiring, does that, is that a knock on, like, diversity hiring? Or I actually it's a good question. I think what's a knock on is college educated college educated workers? His idea is to create a whole new Workforce with practical skills and he's focuses on a few Industries. Advanced manufacturing cyber data, science, and technology and Healthcare. And he specifically says that this is about skills not necessarily degrees and that we are overlooking, the people who come out of community colleges, for instance, what they hire people that didn't go to college like what they hire, they could High School. They could I think the suggestion here is that our education needs to focus more on having skills? Ready people to enter their Workforce? Yeah, I agree with that. Yeah. And I know for instance, in a country like a lot of European countries like France that the kids pick their career path, pretty early on and then they're, they're essentially set up to find a job. Whereas here, it's a bit of a mystery after college, you know? I mean, it was for me, that's for sure. Yeah. I had a friend in college, who picked her career in her in high school and then they like, tailored classes towards that. But then isn't that like, how do you how the heck, do you know what to pick? And it's a good question. Middle school or High School. Here's My Philosophy is a. I agree. Like we do have to remove the stigma of non Ivy League colleges in general. But beyond that, I think that colleges, if you can't place your graduate in a job within say, two to five years, whatever, random number you want to pick, how about you give the money back? How about you give you refund the tuition money, right? It's a concept. Hey, I mean it seems pretty easy, do it, love it. The thing that strikes me most about Jamie's letters. Is he always sounds like a presidential candidate to me? Do you think he's used ripen and that's why he's pushing for this? Are you plugging the the ripen because we use right in sounds. A lot like he's using a and loves it loves the concept of it. For those who don't know, ripen is this incredible company that pairs businesses with current college students, right? Yes, it's like a internship program, essentially, but it's free. It's free to the free to all businesses, right? Yes, yes. And then he says his second fix upping pay for low wage workers. Unskilled laborers are barely scraping by on a so called living wage. It is hard to live on 15 dollars an hour blah blah blah. So look again Matt would would laugh at me because I'm sure Jamie is in place to make this have already happened, but I still like that. It's being said, I know I'm a sucker but I can't believe more CEOs don't address this issue. Just like this, which is the say, how the hell are people living off these wages? I mean, how are they, how are they managing their lives? Were there any? events, or Holes that he outlined. Fair question. I, I probably should have looked a little bit more deeply to see if that I can get back to you look he said jobs in living wages. Bring dignity. I'm sorry. But CEOs, don't speak that way. I know I just, you know, I know is he just a smooth talker or is he gonna back this up? He is probably just a smooth talker. Yes. But again, I just like these issues being raced. I think if all hold them to a higher standard don't you? You like the issues being raised now, come on, ante up, put the you are practices in place, you are absolutely correct but there is a lot of peer pressure in the Fortune 500 and you see this as an example. You see this with this revolution of more women on the boards in the last 10 to 15 years is that they all do it now because they don't want to be the pier. They don't want to be the person in the industry, who's not doing it, because I don't actually think they all believe. In it necessarily but they're doing it. They could do more, of course, but there at least doing it. And I think that these issues were talked about more often, I think that that we would actually see some change its a good stuff, right? Yeah fine let me move on. Starbucks. This is a good one for you because you do a lot of our social media posting. I just felt like this reminded me of you. Starbucks Union is using Billboards, a brass band and a Butters sculpture to pressure board members. From Nike Land, O Lakes Lego. So so Jesse they're actually protesting individual directors. The companies Starbucks. The Starbucks Union? The members unions. Okay. All right, so this comes a week after shareholders voted in favor of an investigation into Starbucks, labor practices. Okay. So and again this sounds a little bit like us. Not that we're, you know, we're not a protest organization but that they're actually taking the fight directly to individual board members. You don't, you really don't ever see this and I'll give you examples New York that had a brass band and a skit. Which also sounds like us in front of the theater. Yes. In front of Nikes Flagship location. Near New York City. Another one went to Portland. Oregon asking Nike Chief Operating Officer Andrew. Campion to just do it again. He's one of the directors at Starbucks. They went to Minnesota with a Butters sculpture to Target Land O'Lakes. CEO Beth Ford. And then finally, in San Diego, they had a Lego Movie style trailer targeting Jorgen veg, nude storm who's also director at Starbucks. I might be, I might be missing something here. Go ahead. But do they does the union hold shares of these companies or why are they acting like activist investor like They're just doing it on principle that they're trying to pick some fights with these companies. Or is there a vested interest in? Well, there's definitely best interest. So I mean, a lot of the major unions do absolutely owned shares in these companies. And this is why a lot of them are shareholder. They put up, and that's through their 401k plan. Right? Exactly. But in this instance, these are unionized Starbucks workers, right? These are the unions representing the actual workers but this is because shareholders voted in favor of an investigation into Starbucks labor practices right a week ago and in the United States, for some reason, these votes are not binding so the company can ignore this vote. So they're going right to the directors to say, don't ignore this vote. We want you to push through this this investigation. So love that. Yeah, so they're going right to the again. Like, I've just never seen this before, it's great. Yeah, it's impressive. And the fact that they were Able to organize this Myriad of protesting vehicles in the form of butter, statues and whatnot. It's in the form of stupid but often the best protest is kind of stupid. So I like it. They're making statements and to flip Nikes slogan around and use it in their protests kind of cool. Yeah. Agreed. And finally, let's go to Disney. Disney had a shareholder meeting where Bob Iger was grilled about all the political turmoil going on at Disney versus Florida. I mean, specifically versus Governor Ron DeSantis, the headline here is that Baba Eiger called run to Santa's actions against Disney anti-business and anti Florida, okay? A little bit about background, some shareholders, stood up and asked CEO, Bob Iger. If Disney should be taking stances on political issues, another stood up, and said that Disney has turned from a place of magic to accompany. That is grooming children to lgbtqi deals. Yeah. And this is what Bob like her to say. He said, as long as I'm in the job, I'm going to be guided by decency and respect when we weigh in. It's because it's truly relevant to the business and the people and Disney seeks to tell stories that reflect the world around us. So I guess, that's his very professional way of saying, go after yourself. I like that. I mean, you can't separate. You really can't separate politics in business. Yes. I mean we try to and then sometimes we have to talk about certain political news because it's also business news. Especially when you are essentially a media company that is generating content to believe politics out of that in 2020. Three means you're not even reflecting the society in which you operate in know, right? Right. Our show today is being sponsored by ESG your ESG Data Solutions, provider. So thank you for joining me today. Jesse. Oh, you're welcome. Thank You for supporting us. Absolutely. Anybody else want to support us? Feel free to reach out. Okay, let's bring Matt in here. He's gonna talk about. The merger between WWE and UFC owner. Endeavor agreed to a massive merger worth 21 billion dollars. Endeavor CEO, Ari Emanuel. Will run the combined company as CEO. While WWE majority owner and executive chair, Vince McMahon. Who we've talked about many times in this show, is assuming the role as executive chair. Wow. Let's get into this. Let's do this. Right. I feel like sweaty and gross just I'm gonna before you get into it, I want to tell our audience, that Aria manual Emmanuel if you don't know him, Is known to be probably the biggest a-hole in Hollywood and in fact so such a big a-hole that there is a character based on him in a very popular HBO show called Entourage. Where there is a super agent who is just a characterization of how terrible this person is a kid. They actually that I saw an interview with Aria manual and the agent in the show is called Ari Gold, where they asked? How do you feel about? Yeah. How do you feel about this portrayal? Which people say is a lot. Like you in our Emmanuel said like well at first, I was upset because I thought there were a lot of things that were true but there were a lot of things that were true and that and it made me upset to see them play out that way. And now I look back and it's actually been good for my career like he really said it's like a true a hole that's like it is like I am and I made money from it. I watched the show 99% of what that character did was truly of horns. Yeah, so winning all the way around. And let's just say that this combination Is. The ultimate, the ultimate, bro, pun intended night. Yeah, this is the broestl. If it makes you feel any worse, Elon Musk was on the Endeavor board, right? He was on the Endeavor board previously. So, there is a lot of he only stepped off because he was busy ruining Twitter, buying Twitter, right? Um, and here is, here's the breakdown, okay? Durbin is 36% of the influence on Endeavor and Steven Evans has 29%. He's also of Silver Lake, so they're both the same firm. Okay. They own a combined 69% controlled by effectively Durbin. I'm already Disturbed. I'm really I'm just two Tech brothers who, like control all of this like heinous sweaty pumping and punching and if you don't know what Endeavor is they own the UFC? They all ultimate ultimate ultimate fighting. Yeah, they own they own a lot of like sports news including like professional bull riding. Oh they yeah they do and they own like advertising and content creation and stuff like that. It's a big like content. They only Will William Morris agency know is that we're already manual came from because in the show William Morris, Actually, William Morris buys. I am G, which is like another live event group and the merger of those two becomes Endeavor, that's where Endeavour is. So, but here is endeavor's the decision-making body of the Endeavor, the management team Is one of the few times I've ever seen. At a publicly traded company, a fake public company. In this case, a hundred percent white male management team won 100%. Yeah. Why would anyone not white and male want to be a part of that? It's really and well I don't want it. So you already talked about remain you all, but you haven't talked about some of the other managers, including Mark Shapiro. Who used to be at ESPN? He's the ex CEO of Six Flags. I was brought in by Dan Schneider rings a bell. I just feel like you're painting. I feel like you've dipped a paintbrush into a can of vomit and you just wait for it. Yeah, he then went on after Six Flags like that was a debacle. He went on to be the CEO of Dick. Clark Productions. Which also was bought by Dan Schneider, who brought him on Dance Schneider. Adam, be the CEO of that, he turns out Mark Shapiro, grew up in the town, next to Aria manual and they were friends go up. So they're like school friends. Got it. Mark is the chair of a board called the Captivate Network which is A private company but they are also an all white male board and management team, who is this endeavor Captivate Network that? You know, they do like billboards you see, like, Moving billboard, bulshit. Shapiro's on the board of equity residential with Sam zelle. Zelle is well known for owning the Chicago Tribune. Where Executives to openly discuss sexual suitability of female employees. That was something that they like to do. Classy. This is the worst Spiros. Also been on the board of Live Nation Frontier Communications, which declared bankruptcy and Papa John's. Like this is his legacy. Patrick white cell is another of the management team he's a colleague of a manual at William Morris. Jason Loveland was at William Morris. Seth Krause seems to be the only one of the degree in the Arts so I think that's why they gave him. This moniker the executive Champion for lgbtq at Endeavor. What's the he's the? He's the gay Champion executive Champion like he's an executive Champion but this board is a professed like a manual and white cell or both on the board Durbin joined in 2014 and actually Durbin. Invested joins in 2014 musk joins afterwards Durbin, invests in Twitter Durbin's on the board of a company called learfield white cells. On that board Durbin worked at Morgan. Stanley Krause worked at Morgan Stanley. Even the women on this board, which there are two Are directly broy with these people. Jacqueline Reese's was the people lead at block with Dorsey, Dorsey had Durbin on his board, and they all loved musk Ursula burns on the board of Exxon and Uber. Uber has Dara on the board and Dara is a Barry Diller. Acolyte Diller was an investor in Dan Schneider. Who danced Schneider brought in Mark Shapiro for everything. They all are one Little Love Fest but here's what board sabermetrics says to round this out. So it's not a six hour show. There is a massive 29%, power gap for women on the Endeavor board shocking. And it's about to get massive her because Vince McMahon is joining it. Like, Vince McMahon joining the board means now it's all basically an all-male Port. It's already pretty much all my board. Of 107 publicly traded media companies in the United States. WWE ranked last. For influence of elite schools and Elite degree board members. An Endeavor, ranked 70th of the 107, it's literally a marriage of the less educated. That's basically what we're watching. That's terrible. Endeavor all so ranks 98 out of 107 for board. Performance overall, with a miserable batting average of 236, the average company ranks 500. So they are batting 236 and they bet 202 for earnings. Imagine going to your like if the board wasn't in controlled company, imagine having to explain why your earnings are amongst the worst in the entire us sector. Somehow. Not great. That's the show for today. April 5th, 20203, thank you, Matt. Thank you Jesse. Thank you ESG. Tomorrow on business plan a quiz. See you then?