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Odd Lots

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Bloomberg's Joe Weisenthal and Tracy Alloway explore the most interesting topics in finance, markets and economics. Join the conversation every Monday, Thursday, and Friday

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Today · 58 min
Why a $2 Billion Law Firm Suddenly Collapsed
At the end of October, seemingly overnight, a major law firm called Weil Gotshal announced it was winding down after a number of partners departed and talks of a merger with another firm failed. So how did a $2 billion big law firm collapse in the span of a few weeks? In 2015, Yale Law professor John Morley published a paper called "Why Law Firms Collapse," that now looks very prescient, with his idea of a “partner run," or the law firm version of a bank run. What is especially interesting about Morley's paper is his forensic examination of partner-led businesses and the idea that the model might be inherently fragile. In this episode, we talk to Morley about his newly relevant paper, the collapse of Weil Gotshal, whether AI will really change how law firms are run, and the future of big law. Read more: Weil Gotshal Says Remaining Partners Can Resign Now, Keep Profit Weil Gotshal Partners Vote to Dissolve Firm, Name Committee Only Bloomberg - Business News, Stock Markets, Finance, Breaking & World News subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox each week, plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots Subscribe to the Odd Lots Newsletter Join the conversation: discord.gg/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Yesterday · 54 min
What Nvidia's Megaspeed Scandal Is Really All About
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang’s extramarital relationship with a woman named Alice Huang, whom US intelligence reportedly identified as a Chinese intelligence asset, is one of the biggest stories in the world right now. Bloomberg News tech reporter Mackenzie Hawkins has been paying close attention to Megaspeed, the Singapore-based neocloud that Alice Huang was a former executive at — and one of Nvidia’s largest buyers of chips in Southeast Asia. Hawkins is an expert when it comes to the geopolitics of chips, and she tells us that the story that blew up in the last week has been brewing for a while. The US government was investigating suspected chip diversion involving Megaspeed as early as last year. (Megaspeed denies wrongdoing and Nvidia says it found no evidence of chip smuggling.) On this episode, we talk to Hawkins about how she and our Bloomberg News colleagues began investigating Megaspeed and its relationship to Nvidia, the raging debate in Washington over chip export controls, and the incredibly sophisticated and opaque mechanics of chip smuggling itself. Only Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox, plus unlimited access to the site and app. bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Wednesday · 51 min
The Perfect Storm That Clobbered Hedge Funds
Even before the US midterms, the AI trade was weakening. Just look at all the headlines from October in the hedge fund world — it was one of the bloodiest periods the industry has faced in recent memory. Now, after the blue wave, things continue to look uncertain. So what's going to happen with the AI buildout now? And what about the big Anthropic IPO? Today's episode is a two-parter, one that examines both the hedge fund carnage of the last few weeks and the broader macro conditions we find ourselves in after the midterm elections. We speak with two of our Bloomberg News colleagues — Nishant Kumar, chief correspondent for hedge funds, and macro strategist Michael Ball — and they help lay out why October was a historic month for hedge funds and what they are paying attention to now as jitters from the AI trade continue to work their way through the market. Read more: Crowded Hedge Fund Trades Unwind Fast After Ugly October Only Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox, plus unlimited access to the site and app. bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Monday · 52 min
This Is How New York City Takes Out Its Trash
According to Joshua Goodman, trash collection in New York is one of the last services the city offers that is not yet touched by neoliberalism. What he means is that it's the last free and unlimited city service — there is no opt-in; it is not means tested. Goodman — who is the DSNY's deputy commissioner for public affairs and customer experience — tells us that the city deals with 24 million pounds of trash every day, and on today's podcast, he explains the logistical dance required to sort through all that garbage. We also get into why NYC produces less trash than you might think, the DSNY's new containerization program (and the new side-loading trucks they built in less than 18 months), and why recycling is not a scam. Only Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox, plus unlimited access to the site and app. bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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November 6 · 37 min
The Macro Implications of the Blue Tsunami
We don't need to tell you that the midterm elections were historic: The Democrats won bigger than even they imagined. But as the dust settles, an open question we are puzzling over is the market's ongoing reaction to this massive political sea change. Democratic control of Congress — and control over a number of formerly red statehouses, like Texas and Iowa — will influence everything from the composition of the FOMC to data center construction. And what we're seeing right now, with stocks like Tesla and SpaceX tumbling, is a direct response to these conditions. To get a better sense of this macro moment, we turn to Odd Lots regular, Employ America's executive director Skanda Amarnath to talk about how the midterms will influence the Fed's battle with inflation, Elon Musk's political instincts, and what a Democratic majority means for the market, tariffs, and AI. See Odd Lots live in NYC on Dec. 9. Tickets on sale! See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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November 5 · 32 min
James Bosworth on What Comes After Lula's Stunning Win
When we last talked to James Bosworth, it seemed like an “orange wave” was going to take over Latin America and further realign the region’s interests with those of the Trump administration. But with Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s surprise victory in Brazil’s presidential election last month, and opposition leader María Corina Machado’s return to Venezuela, it now looks like the orange wave might be cresting. Bosworth — a non-resident fellow at the Stimson Center and the author of the Latin America Risk Report newsletter — comes back to the show to explain how Lula pulled off his upset win over Flavio Bolsonaro, the impact of Machado’s return to Venezuela, and why 2027 might further reshape the politics of Latin America. See Odd Lots live in NYC on Dec. 9. Tickets on sale! See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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November 3 · 42 min
An Election Day Special With Nate Silver
Nate Silver tells us he is calling this midterms the “rock and a hard place election” — the background conditions are great for Democrats to win both the House and the Senate, but for that to come to pass, the party has to pull off some things that haven't happened in generations, like winning Texas. To believe that will happen requires a certain leap of faith, which is anathema to pollsters. Still, the polls generally believe Democrats are favored, but many professional pollsters would end up with egg on their face if the night does not go that way. Silver — the founder of Silver Bulletin — joins us today to discuss why popular narratives around polling error are wrong, prediction markets, why he doesn't think AI will replace pollsters, and what he is paying attention to tonight as the polls close. Read more: When Will We Know Who’s Won the Midterm Elections? Trump’s DOJ Turns to Supreme Court in California Ballot Case Only http://Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox each week, plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots Subscribe to the Odd Lots Newsletter Join the conversation: discord.gg/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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November 2 · 51 min
The $300 Billion Structured Notes Market Is Booming
The structured products business in the US has gotten very large recently — on track to hit $300 billion in sales this year. That they are all the rage means a once opaque financial product is getting a lot more attention. So what are structured products, exactly, and how are they influencing the economy? In short, structured products are basically a fusion of a bank IOU with a derivative product, but that underplays how complex these things are and how they are shaping market dynamics. What is particularly interesting about structured notes is how they've become a stand-in for how investors are betting on the AI trade — the ways these products are structured allow market actors to really capitalize on some of the turbulence we're seeing. On this episode, we speak with Alex Micalizzi, who is the international head of equity structured notes at Nomura, and he gives us what might be the clearest explanation of how structured products are created, how they work, and why sales in structured products have grown so much in the last year. Only Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox, plus unlimited access to the site and app. bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots Join the Odd Lots Discord: discord.gg/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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October 30 · 49 min
PHP2Shell Won't Be the Last Big AI Cybersecurity Risk
Earlier this year, cybersecurity researchers discovered a vulnerability in PHP, an open-source coding language used in roughly 70% of the world's websites, that had been lying dormant for a long time, and if exploited, could have led to disaster. And the researchers only understood the extent of this bug through the use of frontier AI models. Today, we talk to two staffers at Calif (CEO Thai Duong and engineer Bruce Dang), the cybersecurity firm that was among the first to discover the PHP vulnerability. Their firm partners with the major AI labs and neoclouds, and they help these companies test models and look for vulnerabilities in their infrastructure. Duong and Dang tell us how Calif uncovered the PHP hack, what the firm exactly sells, and what the future of cybersecurity looks like in the age of AI. Read more: How AI Is Making Cyberattacks a Bigger Threat Japan’s Cyberattack Surge Tests Its Push to Strengthen Defenses Only http://Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox each week, plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots Subscribe to the Odd Lots Newsletter Join the conversation: discord.gg/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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October 29 · 41 min
What Wall Street Really Thinks About the AI Trade Now
It has been a big week for the AI trade — we've seen wobbles in the market, many of them in response to headlines like the Anthropic S-1 and earnings from the hyperscalers (Oracle, Microsoft, etc.). So what does Wall Street make of all the news, and how are they processing an increasing sense that the laws of the economy barely apply to AI? Today, we speak with Alexander 'Alty' Altmann, global head of equities tactical strategies at Barclays, and he helps us make sense of how Wall Street really feels about the AI trade right now. We also talk about the KOSPI-fication of the S&P 500, if there are any historical precedents for the capex going into the AI buildout, and if AI is really immune to interest rates. Read More: Microsoft Reports Rising Cloud Sales That Show Payoff From AI Only Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox, plus unlimited access to the site and app. bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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October 26 · 50 min
AI Agents Are Already Changing the Price of Goods
It's obvious that things are getting more expensive, and there are plenty of reasons behind the surge in prices — whether it's wars or inflation or companies padding their profit margins. But with the release of AI agents like Meta's Muse, tech companies are promising consumers that agents will start saving them tons of money by finding the best deals. According to today's guest, Lindsay Owens, the history of price gouging does not bode well for claims that things might get cheaper because of new technology, and research conducted by her think tank Groundwork Collaborative shows that a number of consumer facing agents end up serving customers more expensive items after learning more about their financial situation. Her new book Gouged: The End of a Fair Price — and What That Means for Your Wallet gets into the history of how companies got away with charging more for their goods, through means like data collection and surveillance. Today we talk to Owens about how AI agents are already changing the idea of a fair price, all the pre-AI ways that companies price gouged, and her new book. Read more: Uber Wins Bid to Dismiss £250 Million Black Cab Driver Suit Ryanair CEO Predicts Historic Jump in Air Fares Next Year Only Bloomberg - Business News, Stock Markets, Finance, Breaking & World News subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox each week, plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots Subscribe to the Odd Lots Newsletter Join the conversation: discord.gg/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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October 24 · 48 min
How a Chicago Restaurant Has Stayed Open For Nearly Three Decades
Richard Mott's first foray into hospitality was in the 1980s at the University of Chicago, where he started running a coffee shop in the basement of the business school when he was a grad student. By the time he graduated, he helped grow that single coffee shop into four locations across campus. He's a longtime Chicago-based restaurateur and his farm-to-table restaurant North Pond has been around since the late 1990s. Lately, he's expanded his business to include Spark Shared Kitchen, a catering facility and incubator for food entrepreneurs. He knows a lot about the practical economics of restaurants and hospitality at large, and in his decades-long career in the Chicago scene he's seen about everything. On our recent trip to Chicago, we sat down with Mott to talk about the ever-increasing price of food and labor, why diners are drinking less, and the expected and unexpected reasons that restaurants so often fail. Read more: Chicago Seeks to Borrow for Police Settlements, Revive Head Tax Chipotle’s Softening Sales Force Analyst to Throw in the Towel Only http://Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox each week, plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots Subscribe to the Odd Lots Newsletter Join the conversation: discord.gg/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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October 23 · 43 min
The Forgotten Godmother of Economic Literature
In 1776, the field of economics was born with the publication of Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations. And among the book's earliest readers, and most ardent advocates, was a Regency-era novelist named Maria Edgeworth. In her time, Edgeworth was one of the most famous literary figures in England, and she smuggled into her stories economic concepts and debates around rent seeking, the idea of productive labor, and so on. These works were enormously influential and they helped expose a generation to practical applications of Smith's new theories. Yet when you read about the history of economics, Edgeworth's name is hardly ever mentioned. Jeanna Smialek, a veteran reporter and the Brussels bureau chief at The New York Times, thinks Edgeworth's name needs to be placed back in the pantheon of economic history. On this episode, we speak with Smialek about her biography, The Invisible Hand of Maria Edgeworth, and we discuss Edgeworth's friendly debates with the likes of Thomas Malthus and David Ricardo, how the Irish potato famine reshaped economic thought, and how Edgeworth used the novel form to educate the masses on the value of economics. Only Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox, plus unlimited access to the site and app. Sign up at bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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October 22 · 53 min
Bhaskar Sunkara Thinks the Market Has a Place Under Socialism
In September, Gallup released a poll that showed that 43% percent of Americans viewed socialism positively, the highest approval since Gallup began the poll back in 2010. Since Zohran Mamdani won the NYC mayoral election, the left has made a number of gains across national politics. Still, the majority of Americans view socialism negatively, according to Gallup. As a longtime DSA member and veteran of leftist media, Bhaskar Sunkara is one of socialism's leading advocates, and he's spent much of his career charting what a socialist economy in America might look like. Unlike some other leftists, he believes the market has a place. In fact, he thinks markets and entrepreneurs are an objective good in society. He proposes a vision of so-called "market socialism" in his recent co-authored book The Blueprint, and he lays out this system for us in today's episode. We talk about how many features of capitalism — from small businesses to monetary policy — might be remade under socialist principles. Read more: Ocasio-Cortez Boosts El-Sayed and 2028 Talk With $1 Million Check An Economist Makes the Case for Mamdani-Style Populism Only Bloomberg - Business News, Stock Markets, Finance, Breaking & World News subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox each week, plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots Subscribe to the Odd Lots Newsletter Join the conversation: discord.gg/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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October 21 · 37 min
James Robinson on What It Looks Like When a State is Failing
The third and last episode from our Chicago live show is with James Robinson, a professor at the University of Chicago and a recipient of the 2024 Nobel Prize in economics (which he shared with Daron Acemoglu and Simon Johnson). His most famous work is 2012's Why Nations Fail, and in that book he and his co-author Acemoglu document the institutional factors — whether it is reliably run elections or open markets that help facilitate innovation — that determine why some states thrive and others don't. So we ask Robinson the big question: What would have to happen for the US to be considered a failed state? Read More: ‘Middle Powers’ Grapple With New Survival Strategies Under Trump Only Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox, plus unlimited access to the site and app. bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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October 20 · 29 min
CME's Terry Duffy on the Disconcerting State of Finance Regulation
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission was practically brand new when Terry Duffy started working at CME Gropu almost five decades ago, and over the course of his career at the exchange, this legend of the trading world has seen an enormous amount of change when it comes to finance regulation, including the rise of prediction markets, 24/7 trading and perpetual futures. Duffy is set to transition out of his current position as CEO next year, and this conversation, recorded live at City Winery in Chicago, is a sort of exit interview. He tells us how regulation has evolved since the start of his time at the CME. We also talk about why he is against perps, the credibility issues prediction markets face, his definition of spreads versus futures, and what he wishes he knew at the start of his career, now that he is nearing retirement. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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October 19 · 26 min
Don Wilson on the GPU Market's Trillion Dollar Question
When we spoke to Don Wilson, founder and CEO of DRW, in Chicago last year, he told us he wanted to build a market for GPUs that would eventually be bigger than oil. A year's time in the age of AI is an eternity, and so for the first episode of this year's Chicago live show - recorded at City Winery - Wilson joins us on stage again to talk about what's changed and what hasn't in his quest to help build this market. We get his take on the recent tech selloff, including credit concerns around neocloud CoreWeave. And we also discuss how DRW is developing a “crunch spread” (the GPU version of a crack spread), the latest on his plans to launch GPU futures, and the possibility of token futures too. Read more: Jump, DRW Bet on New Compute Market as AI Boom Faces Scrutiny Only Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox, plus unlimited access to the site and app. bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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October 17 · 1 hr
David Byrne Explains How Forgotten Ideas Come Back to Life
History is littered with ideas that have been tossed aside, only for them to gain relevance at some later date. Think of Moby-Dick: forgotten in Melville's time, but now regarded as the great American novel. Or the work of economist Hyman Minsky, which became influential a decade after his death, when the 2008 financial crisis made “the Minsky Moment” a mainstream term. These are just a couple of the things we talk about with the legendary musician David Byrne on today's podcast. Byrne's new book, Sleeping Beauties: Why Good Ideas Go Dormant and How They Wake Up, looks to categorize numerous “sleeping beauties” - ideas that were lost but then rediscovered. Besides Melville and Minsky, we also talk about the lost Roman recipe for concrete and we get into Byrne's thoughts on how to write a song and his own experience of having his music rediscovered by a new generation. Only Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox, plus unlimited access to the site and app. bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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October 16 · 47 min
The French Political Crisis That's Turning Into a Debt Crisis
Just about everyone is worried about what is going on in France right now: the country's public finances are in sorry shape and there are fears that the French bond selloff, and the country's growing debt crisis, might spillover into the rest of Europe. On top of that, the 2027 elections have investors worried: The two leading candidates, Marine Le Pen and Jean-Luc Mélenchon, aren't seen to be up to the task of taming France's fiscal turmoil. Shahin Vallée was an advisor to Emmanuel Macron when he was an economic minister and during his first presidential election campaign. Since then, he's paid close attention to the situation in France — he is currently a senior fellow at the German Council of Foreign Relations and he advises institutional investors — and he understands, better than most, what went wrong during Macron's nine years in office. Today, he speaks to us about the origins of the current French debt crisis, how similar it is to the challenges Greece faced during the first euro crisis, and why the 2027 elections are making an unstable situation even worse. Read more: Market for Funding Bonds in France Shows Crisis Is Way Off Bank of France Survey Shows Sharp Jump in Business Uncertainty Only Bloomberg - Business News, Stock Markets, Finance, Breaking & World News subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox each week, plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots Subscribe to the Odd Lots Newsletter Join the conversation: discord.gg/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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October 15 · 58 min
Jeff Yan's Plan to Bring the Entire Financial Industry Onto Hyperliquid
Traders and market watchers around the world started talking about a crypto platform called Hyperliquid earlier this year, when speculators used markets built on top of it to trade crude oil after war broke out in Iran. What Hyperliquid allowed for was a 24/7 market on the blockchain. Then in August, President Trump said the CFTC was working on bringing “Hyperliquid into the United States in a fully compliant and legal fashion.” Hyperliquid currently operates outside the US, but that hasn't stopped it from growing prodigiously in the last year. Jeff Yan, CEO and co-founder of Hyperliquid Labs, joins us today to explain how exactly the platform works: He walks us through the protocol he and his co-founders built, the ecology of actors and assets that are tied to Hyperliquid (like the platform's cryptocurrency HYPE), how perps are bought and sold on the platform, he explains what a blockchain oracle is, and he discusses what has to happen for Hyperliquid to start operating in the US. Read more: Strategy’s Saylor Sees Bitcoin Moving Back Up Beyond $100,000 A $90 Million Spyware Hack Sparks Review of Crypto Wallet Sales Only http://Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox each week, plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots Subscribe to the Odd Lots Newsletter Join the conversation: discord.gg/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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