Finance & Investing

James Daunt

James Daunt, who went from running one small London bookshop to reviving both Waterstones and Barnes & Noble, tells Stephen Dubner how physical stores can compete with Amazon. He shares the philosophy and turnaround tactics that brought two iconic chains back from the brink, arguing that the in-person experience can do what e‑commerce cannot.

Walter Russell Mead

Walter Russell Mead discusses the historical pattern that has allowed the US, Britain, and the Dutch to repeatedly defeat centralized continental rivals. He outlines his five-point playbook for global dominance and analyzes how Trump turned fame into political power. The conversation also covers the four schools of American foreign policy, the rise of tech Hamiltonians, how drone warfare is reshaping military power, and why deterrence is eroding in the Middle East.

Paul Haavardsrud

The Indicator examines the latest round of the US-Canada trade war, with Canada imposing retaliatory tariffs on American dairy, steel, and electronics. Guest Paul Haavardsrud from CBC’s Cost of Living podcast discusses Canada’s strategic approach to countering US tariffs. The episode analyzes how Canada is choosing its targets to maximize political pressure on the United States.

Marketplace examines Canada's new retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods, which a historian calls an unprecedented escalation in the two nations' trade relations. The episode also covers small business owners' mixed economic outlook, a cautionary tale of ChatGPT inventing a fake deodorant brand, Monterey Park's community-led model for resisting data center developments, and the surprising comeback of brick-and-mortar bookstores.

The Indicator examines how AI is disrupting the job market and whether any careers are safe from automation. The episode turns to the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Occupational Outlook Handbook, a resource that provides data on job growth, pay, and required education, to help listeners gauge which roles might be future-proof.

The Indicator covers three economic stories: the growing teacher pay penalty, where comparable college graduates now earn about 33% more than teachers; Meta's major legal settlement; and struggles at Nike and Dick's Sporting Goods in the footwear market.

In this episode, the host puts two popular real estate investing strategies head-to-head: buying a value-add fixer-upper using the BRRRR method versus buying a new construction home. They detail how the market has shifted in 2026, with builders now sitting on excess inventory and offering significant buyer incentives like mortgage rate buydowns, closing credits, and direct price reductions. The host runs a side-by-side numerical comparison of two deals in the same market to determine which strategy provides better cash flow and appreciation in the current environment, exploring the specific pros and cons of each approach.

Austan Goolsbee

Chicago Fed President Austan Goolsbee joins Odd Lots to discuss his concerns about the US economy overheating. He explains why inflation remains stubbornly above the Fed's 2% target, the puzzling state of the labor market with low churn, and how AI-driven growth is dominating GDP. Goolsbee shares his skepticism of traditional metrics like r*, his support for Kevin Warsh's approach to forward guidance, and the intense uncertainty central bankers face in trying to cool the economy.

The produce aisle is changing. Once filled with generic fruits and vegetables, it's now dominated by branded, trademarked products like Honeycrisp apples and Cotton Candy grapes. Planet Money teams up with Dan Pashman of The Sporkful to explore this trend, visiting Rutgers University to taste a new grape tomato variety and speaking with agricultural economist Miguel Gomez about the risk of market saturation.

In this update to a series about repatriation, Freakonomics Radio examines the trend of museums returning looted artworks and artifacts. With insights from curators, legal experts, and economists, the episode explores the ethical imperatives driving these returns, the legal challenges involved, and innovative solutions like long-term leases and shared stewardship agreements. The case of the Nigerian Benin Bronzes illustrates the tension between national politics and museum-level repatriation. Ultimately, the conversation asks what it means to be a museum in the 21st century when old collections are under new scrutiny.

This Marketplace episode examines the economic damage of intensified ICE raids on Latino-owned businesses more than a year into the Trump administration's deportation push. It also covers small businesses facing fresh tariff uncertainty, including a camping chair company that has halted production. Canada reports strong GDP growth as it heads toward a trade conflict with the U.S. The program analyzes Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh's first Jackson Hole speech and whether it contained forward guidance. A final story looks at a 21-foot-tall space cowboy statue that has revitalized a strip of Route 66.

Harry Stebbings breaks down a blockbuster week in AI, starting with NVIDIA's $12B acquisition of Poolside and its investments in Mercor and Perplexity. He discusses OpenAI's confirmed 2027 IPO, Anthropic's bold $30 trillion revenue assumption, and Citadel's exit from its AI trade. The episode also covers the boom in open models, Stripe's reacceleration, and VC warnings that customer service, defense, and robotics are overinflated sectors.

The movie "Coyote vs. Acme" will finally get a theatrical release after a years-long saga involving supposed tax write-downs, negotiations, and multibillion-dollar studio deals. This episode revisits the unusual story of how a film that was shelved for financial reasons ended up making it to theaters. It's a drama the show frames as being almost straight out of a Hollywood screenplay.

Ira Flatow

Planet Money's Summer School finale travels to Antarctica, starting with a look back at NPR's scrappy 1979 South Pole reporting by Ira Flatow that put the network on the map. A former McMurdo Station store manager explains why normal retail economics break down when you're on an uninhabited continent. An economist argues we should measure Antarctica's value not as real estate, but by its ecosystem services — the environmental benefits it provides to the entire planet. The episode closes by sharing listeners' best economic ideas for making life better.

Dave Meyer, Henry

Dave Meyer and Henry answer listener questions from the BiggerPockets Forums, covering key decisions for new real estate investors. They discuss how to allocate a large down payment, the viability of house hacking with minimal cash in an uncertain market, whether to use a 1031 exchange to convert a flip into rentals, and when to cut losses on a troublesome property. Their advice emphasizes conservative underwriting, diversification of capital, and avoiding speculative bets on future appreciation.

Jennifer Egan

Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Jennifer Egan discusses her creative process, revealing that her confidence comes not from believing in her first drafts but from trusting her ability to revise extensively — sometimes over 35 drafts. She explores the role of luck in a writing career, the importance of trusting editors and early readers over her own initial judgment, and how sustaining a long career requires embracing uncertainty rather than seeking formulaic success.

Mark Cuban

The Indicator explores the cost of Medicare for All, a single-payer healthcare proposal. Mark Cuban, a billionaire investor and healthcare advocate, discusses the wide range of cost estimates, from trillions in savings to much less. He explains why the figures are convoluted and what parts of the plan could actually work. The episode highlights the political nature of the numbers and the difficulty of pinning down a definitive cost.

Marketplace examines the Federal Reserve's struggle to bring inflation down to 2% after more than five years, questioning the central bank's power. Other economic news includes falling consumer confidence, a bump in transportation equipment orders, and a look at how Arizona's creative budgeting during the Great Recession could inform tax policy in an AI-driven future. The show also profiles a historic Route 66 motel and water conservation efforts by the Gila River Indian Community.

This episode examines how a future where AI replaces human labor could trigger a tax revenue crisis, using Akron’s decline after losing its tire industry as a cautionary example. It also covers a new Colorado River management plan that is already facing pushback, and checks in on a small business’s recovery two years after Hurricane Helene. The show opens with what economists hope to hear from Fed Chair Warsh’s Jackson Hole speech.

In this solo episode, BiggerPockets Real Estate argues that the easy rental deals of 2015–2022 are gone and that 2026 is an era of finding upside in seemingly unspectacular properties. The show walks through 10 hidden signs of high-upside rentals, including value-add opportunities, owner-occupied strategies, zoning upside, properties in the path of progress, and a land play Henry describes as free. Any one of these advantages is unlikely to make a buyer rich on its own, but stacking two, three, or more could make a property's value skyrocket five, ten, or twenty years from now. The emphasis stays on buying high-quality assets at good prices today rather than relying on market-driven appreciation alone.

The latest CPI report, measured against last week's jobs numbers, shows the average American household's buying power slipped about 0.1% over the past year — in effect, a pay cut even as inflation has slowed. Economists remain split on what comes next, with wage growth still lagging price gains. The episode also covers why drivers should expect continued high gas prices, what fractional homeownership startups offer — and the tradeoffs they carry — in a squeezed housing market, and what lesser-known economic indicators reveal.

The Indicator examines three concurrent shortages in blood, water, and helium. Through economic lenses, the episode explores the supply-and-demand imbalances causing each, from hospital blood inventory crises to regional water scarcity and the industrial crunch in helium supply.

This episode of The Indicator examines the term 'industry plant'—an artist whose popularity appears organic but is fueled by undisclosed paid promotions to influencers. It traces the practice from the Rolling Stones to contemporary pop star Bella Kay, showing that the strategy has a long history. The show explores why some audiences feel deceived and whether the quality of the music ultimately excuses the promotional tactics.

Hussein Aboubakr Mansour

Egyptian-born analyst Hussein Aboubakr Mansour argues that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a self-sustaining system in which various groups benefit from Palestinian suffering. Drawing on his childhood in an Egypt centered on Palestinian liberation, he explains how Arab regimes, NGOs, Western academics, and Gulf states convert victimhood into political and economic capital. He suggests that breaking this cycle requires more than policy — it demands addressing the human need for meaning that the conflict currently fulfills. Mansour reflects on how identity and narrative lock the conflict in place, and why purely rational solutions fall short.

Marketplace covers several economic stories: high oil prices from the Iran war are boosting Permian Basin profits, but drillers are cautious about over-expansion; the US spends billions to support the Japanese yen; small businesses are careful about hiring; and a Colorado peach farmer braces for drought.

Nathan Nicholson

Nathan Nicholson cashed out his retirement fund to invest in small, affordable rental properties and now owns 23 units generating over $100,000 in annual cash flow. He lives solely on his W-2 income, reinvesting every dollar of rental profit back into his business. In this episode, he shares his slow, conservative buy-and-fix strategy, the four levers he uses to boost cash flow without buying more properties, and why he has no plans to retire despite reaching financial independence.

David Fickling

Bloomberg Opinion columnist David Fickling explains how the tungsten market acts as a century-old prediction market for war. Due to its extreme density and melting point, tungsten is crucial for armor-piercing munitions and other military hardware, so its demand spikes ahead of conflicts. Fickling describes the Dolphin Mine in Australia, which historically opens during wartime and closes in peacetime, illustrating the boom-bust cycle of strategic mineral supply. The conversation also focuses on China's dominance of global tungsten production and why diversifying mining outside China has proven extremely difficult.

Anastasios Angelopoulos

Anastasios Angelopoulos, CEO of AI model evaluation platform Arena, discusses the state of the AI industry. Topics include Chinese models surpassing US benchmarks, the commoditization of models, and why America's open-source community lags behind China. Angelopoulos shares his views on enterprise fears of frontier labs, stubborn inference costs, and the rise of AI-enabled cyberattacks. He also explores the survival odds for neo labs, data as a trillion-dollar market, and whether model providers will swallow the application layer.

President Trump’s social media platform, Truth Social, plans to sell investors early access to its posts. The episode examines whether giving paying subscribers a split-second trading advantage over the public constitutes corruption, whether it is legal, and what economic research says about how corruption affects economic growth. The segment draws on Ray Fisman and Miriam Golden’s book 'Corruption: What Everyone Needs to Know'.

Yeganeh Torbati, Bozorgmehr Sharafedin

After Iran's 1979 revolution, its leaders promised wealth redistribution and independence from the West. Instead, according to guests Yeganeh Torbati and Bozorgmehr Sharafedin, the economy transformed into a "mafia state" where loyalty to political and religious factions determines economic power. The episode explores how ordinary Iranians navigate pervasive cronyism, how the regime suppressed a once-promising tech sector, and why recent peace talks are unlikely to reshape the underlying patronage networks.

Gary Gulman

Comedian Gary Gulman sits down with Stephen Dubner to discuss how he transforms depression into comedy, the lingering grudges he holds, and the importance of recovery and creativity. They also play basketball together, a key part of Gulman's wellness routine. The conversation touches on getting fired and how that experience reshaped his path.

Planet Money Summer School explores how Norway avoided the resource curse after striking oil. The episode contrasts Norway's handling of its oil wealth with its salmon glut, examining how the country managed a sudden resource boom by exercising restraint. Key economic concepts like the Dutch disease, coordination problems, and the free-rider problem are explained through Norway's experience. The story highlights strategic decisions that allowed Norway to get rich and stay that way, while creatively dealing with an oversupply of salmon.

For decades, consumer technology like laptops and gaming systems followed Moore's Law: they got better and cheaper. Now, the AI boom is creating massive memory shortages, upending that trend. The Indicator explains why even Moore's Law can't protect consumer tech from rising prices and supply constraints.

Marketplace fact-checks President Trump's claim that his tariffs have reshored manufacturing jobs, revealing a net loss of 75,000 jobs since he took office in 2025. The episode also explores emerging insurance products for AI errors, a slight dip in the trade deficit, UPS's strategic shift away from Amazon delivery, and how homebuyers are adapting to persistently high mortgage rates. With a focus on the Michigan auto industry's future, the show dissects the gap between political rhetoric and economic data.

The Indicator hosts air their petty economic grievances. They complain about the difficulty of redeeming fast-food rewards points inside airports, the frustration of not knowing the full price of a meal until you receive the bill, and the slowdown caused when a restaurant server tallies your check by hand. It's a lighthearted look at small economic annoyances that many listeners will recognize.

Marketplace examines the economic fallout from the end of Temporary Protected Status for over 330,000 Haitians, focusing on the impact to the healthcare sector. Other segments cover a new survey showing cautious business optimism, a Baltimore club's wealth-sharing model, and airline efforts to reduce contrails' climate impact.

The Indicator’s weekly roundup covers three disputes. The Trump administration took issue with Brazil’s popular instant-payment system Pix, which has made digital payments nearly universal in the country. Meanwhile, an outbreak of cyclospora infections linked to Taco Bell has raised questions about the chain’s legal responsibility for food-borne illness. And in San Francisco, trial lawyers are lobbying against the expansion of driverless taxi fleets, arguing that current liability frameworks aren’t equipped to handle robot-caused crashes.

Marketplace examines the U.S. government’s stake in Intel one year after the Trump administration invested: Intel’s quarterly sales jumped 25%, and the stake is now worth about $40 billion. The episode also looks at Gen Z’s shift away from regular soda toward functional drinks like mushroom soda, why business loan rates may be poised to rise, and the story of a 63-year-old who left a tech career to restore statues full-time.

The BiggerPockets team cuts through the headlines to reveal a housing market that is far more stable—and opportunity-rich—than the media suggests. Interest rates remain elevated and transaction volume is low, creating the continuation of the "Great Stall." However, investors are finding homes trading well below average sale prices, with seller concessions quietly rising in specific markets. The hosts outline where the real discounts are, why a "boring" market can be an investor's best friend, and how to assess the real—not perceived—risk of a housing crash in 2026.

Planet Money's Summer School visits Kenya and Nigeria to explore radical economic experiments that tackled poverty. The episode highlights how the town of Busia, Kenya, became a real-world laboratory for randomized controlled trials, a methodology that won some economists the Nobel Prize. It also revisits Nigeria's 'You Win!' program, a business plan competition that tested a new way to allocate development grants. Along the way, the show unpacks key concepts like human capital, the 'missing middle' in business financing, and the challenge of translating economic research into large-scale policy.

Harry Stebbings (host analysis)

Harry Stebbings examines whether Chinese AI models (Kimi, Qwen) pose a genuine threat to OpenAI and Anthropic, debates the merits of a US ban on Chinese open-source AI, analyzes OpenRouter's positioning as an AI routing layer, and unpacks the strategic implications of Stripe's potential acquisition of PayPal. The episode covers infrastructure-heavy AI trends, late-stage venture capital's dominance, and supply chain bottlenecks in semiconductor manufacturing.

Paramount's proposed $111 billion merger with Warner Bros. Discovery faces a critical hurdle: approval from the Federal Communications Commission. A recent investigation, however, has revealed a concerningly close relationship between the company and the FCC, raising flags about potential conflicts of interest. The episode examines whether this merger, which would create an unprecedented media giant, can navigate the regulatory process fairly when the regulator itself appears compromised.

Marketplace covers a range of economic stories. Despite a 55-year low in jobless claims, the labor market remains tough for the long-term unemployed, underemployed, and new graduates. States are suing the federal government over new Medicaid work requirements. Uber is laying off a tenth of its customer service department and replacing them with AI chatbots. Meanwhile, a surge in family travel is changing the luxury resort landscape.

Dave and Henry

A practical comparison of building versus buying your first rental property. Dave and Henry weigh the trade-offs: new construction offers fewer repairs and higher rents, but requires significant time and effort. They also discuss when older properties stop being worth renovating, Henry's lender-friendly renovation budgeting strategy for BRRR deals, whether wholesalers add value, and the ethics of hiding ownership from tenants.

Avishai Abrahami

Avishai Abrahami, co-founder and CEO of Wix, discusses the SaaS market's misunderstanding of AI's impact on platform businesses, the economics of AI-powered "vibe coding," the strategic challenges of Wix's Base44 acquisition and massive buyback program, and why most AI customer support startups fail. He argues that Wall Street fundamentally misvalues Wix's core business and makes a contrarian prediction about AI hype cycles.

Dario Amodei

Harry Stebbings interviews Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei on the state of AI business models, open-source competition, geopolitics, and market consolidation. The episode covers Coinbase's 50% AI spend cut as a signal of market maturation, Anthropic's stance against open-source commoditization, regulatory concerns around Chinese AI, Microsoft's strategic challenges, and the emerging mega-trend of SaaS roll-ups exemplified by Bending Spoons' IPO. Core themes: the AI market is shifting from hype to unit economics, proprietary models face existential threats from open-source, and consolidation will dominate 2026.

Cory Turner

The Trump administration is implementing a new policy to cap federal student loans for graduate students, hoping to force colleges to lower tuition prices. The plan is based on the Bennett Hypothesis—a 40-year-old economic theory claiming that reducing student borrowing capacity will pressure schools to reduce costs. NPR Education Correspondent Cory Turner explores whether this hypothesis holds up under decades of actual data.

Ryan Sterling

BiggerPockets debates whether real estate is the best path to passive income with Ryan Sterling, CEO of NerdWallet Wealth Partners. Sterling, who owns real estate but has sold some holdings, challenges the narrative that rental properties are truly passive or the fastest wealth-building vehicle for most Americans. The discussion covers whether passive income is a misnomer, who should actually invest in rentals versus index funds, and how investment strategy should differ by age and financial stage.

Cory Turner

The Indicator examines how the One Big Beautiful Bill Act will affect federal student loans starting July 1, with stricter borrowing caps and new repayment plans. NPR Education Reporter Cory Turner explains the upcoming changes and their potential impact on the 43 million Americans with federal student debt.

Winston Cheng

Lenovo CFO Winston Cheng joins Odd Lots to discuss how companies are navigating the unprecedented AI capital expenditure boom. Cheng outlines Lenovo's strategy of moving beyond personal computing by integrating AI agents into devices and building an AI cloud infrastructure alongside Nvidia. The conversation also covers the intense market involution (内卷) in China and how Lenovo is adapting its supply chain to tariffs. The episode provides a rare window into the financial decision-making behind one of the biggest capex cycles in history.

Artificial intelligence is currently pushing consumer prices higher, with Microsoft and Apple announcing price hikes on flagship products due to skyrocketing memory and storage costs. While economists forecast AI-driven inflation in the near term, the technology could eventually bring down many costs across the economy. The episode also profiles a union that negotiated dramatic healthcare savings, the unique garage sale culture in Alaska, and the nostalgic resurgence of restaurant matchbooks as a branding tool.

Rory Johnston

Rory Johnston, founder of Commodity Context, revisits his earlier prediction that a prolonged closure of the Strait of Hormuz amid the Iran conflict would send oil to $200 a barrel. With the strait mostly reopened and prices only modestly elevated, he explains the key factors that kept a lid on markets: re-routing of shipments, jawboning from the Trump administration, and most importantly a surprise drop in Chinese imports. The conversation reveals how demand-side adjustments and logistical flexibility can offset even major supply disruptions.

Dave Meyer, Henry Washington, and Ashley Kehr

BiggerPockets hosts Dave Meyer, Henry Washington, and Ashley Kehr break down 12 specific real estate investing markets across four strategies: long-term rentals, short-term rentals, house hacking, and house flipping. They discuss overlooked affordable suburbs with growth, tourist towns with high nightly rates, and surprising expensive cities where creative house hacking still works. The focus is on metrics like population and job growth, and where the numbers make sense in 2026.

Carmen Li

Carmen Li, CEO of Silicon Data and Compute Exchange, discusses building infrastructure for GPU markets at scale. Working alongside DRW's Don Wilson, Li is constructing a GPU pricing index and spot marketplace to address the volatility and standardization challenges in compute procurement. The episode covers GPU price discovery, the economics of used compute hardware, and what it takes to create an entirely new asset class.

Erika Brown

Erika Brown shares her ten-year journey from corporate banker to financially independent real estate investor. Starting with a house hack in 2016 while raising three kids, she scaled through multiple strategies—short-term rentals, Section 8 properties, room rentals, and portfolio expansion—to achieve financial freedom by 2026. Now she's deliberately scaling down to enjoy the lifestyle her real estate investments enabled.

SpaceX went public and the episode explains why employees and early investors face a lock-up period before they can sell their shares. It also covers an unlikely city topping the list for best metro area for recent college graduates, an AI chatbot helping a reporter sell his house, and a roundup of the week's economic headlines.

The Indicator’s weekly roundup covers three economic numbers in the news: a resurgence of inflation, data linking remote work to lower well-being, and disappointing early ticket sales for the FIFA World Cup.

Backgammon, the ancient board game, is having a modern renaissance. Stephen Dubner explores how it brings strangers together in face-to-face play, teaches probability, strategy, and emotional control, and has even been used by NFL teams to help win the Super Bowl. The episode is part two of the series 'We Are All Gamers Now.'

Can the government stop you from cutting down your own tree? This Planet Money episode, hosted by Jeff Guo and Amanda Aronczyk, explores the growing conflict between individual property rights and environmental regulations. It tells the story of a Portland homeowner denied a permit to remove a backyard tree, raising fundamental questions about what ownership means. The hosts examine the legal history of zoning power and the 'bundle of rights' theory, and they talk to experts about whether tree-protection ordinances have gone too far or are necessary for the common good.

Marketplace reports that three economists predict a summer gas-price hike as the war in Iran continues to drain U.S. and global oil reserves — even an immediate end to the conflict would not relieve the supply-demand tension. Bond investors signal that they expect inflation to persist for some time. Upcoming IPOs are unlikely to move the needle on total market capitalization, and Kansas City faces lower-than-expected short-term rental demand as the World Cup kicks off.

The Indicator examines the SpaceX IPO, the largest public offering in history. The episode discusses what the listing reveals about the tech sector, the NASDAQ, and the pipeline of upcoming mega-IPOs. It highlights that Elon Musk is set to become a trillionaire after the IPO. The team also explores what a megacap company entering public markets means for everyday retirement accounts.

This episode explores two policy approaches to lowering rents: reviving boarding houses and single room occupancy units, a once-popular affordable housing model that nearly disappeared; and the curious effect of corporate landlords, which studies suggest may actually reduce rents even as they drive up purchase prices. The episode also discusses the Trump administration's proposal to restrict corporate home ownership.

The May CPI report shows inflation at 4.2% over the past year, bringing both cautious optimism and immediate consumer pressure. Wages are rising more slowly than prices, squeezing household budgets. The episode explores an optimist’s and pessimist’s reading of the data, plus the long-term economic effects of slowing immigration and a trend of summer camps adapting to serve anxious teens.

Bank of America advised investors that red flags pointed to a market peak and it was time to take profits—meaning sell before a potential downturn. The episode unpacks why the bank made that call now, what it signals for markets, and ties it to other economic currents. It also covers how the ongoing war in Iran is lifting oil and gas outlooks, how foreign trade zones are adapting under Trump-era rules, and the multiple headwinds facing packaged food brands.

The Indicator examines the UK's economic struggles: elevated youth unemployment, high government borrowing costs, and a series of short-lived prime ministers, all set against the global strain of the Iran war. The episode asks whether the UK should be the country we're most worried about, probing whether its troubles are a sign of deeper rot or temporary turbulence.

A top labor economist

A top labor economist, recently fired by President Trump, navigates the notoriously difficult unemployment benefits system. The episode examines why applying for unemployment is so complex and whether the process can be streamlined.

Wages grew 3.4% year over year, but inflation is eroding those gains, creating a tension between workers’ experience and the Federal Reserve’s perspective. Meanwhile, Campbell’s soup sees a boost from home cooks, the company behind Vimeo, AOL, and WeTransfer files for an IPO, and a former diplomat turns to restoring old movie theaters.

Host Solo

A solo episode arguing that buying just one rental property every two years is sufficient to reach financial freedom with $16,000+ monthly cash flow. The host, a successful real estate investor who hasn't bought dozens of properties but has made millions, demonstrates through math how consistent, strategic acquisition beats the influencer narrative of buying hundreds of units. The episode covers capital recycling, the BRRRR strategy, and dollar-cost averaging as accessible paths to wealth.

Fareed Zakaria

Fareed Zakaria challenges the narrative of American decline in the face of Middle East conflict, international order retreat, and domestic political chaos. He argues that structural fundamentals—economic strength, military capability, demographic advantages, and institutional resilience—suggest the U.S. retains capacity for renewal despite real governance failures. The episode explores how perception of decline often misses the deeper patterns that determine civilizational trajectory.

Iain Dunning

Hudson River Trading's head of AI discusses how the firm is deploying large language models at scale, seven months after our last conversation. The episode covers token costs, compute bottlenecks, memory pricing, employee spending on AI inference, and whether HRT might build its own chips to manage the exploding economics of running AI systems in production.

Dan Loeb

Dan Loeb, founder and CEO of Third Point, reflects on 30 years of investing evolution—from credit and event-driven strategies to quality, thematic technology, and a major credit business. He discusses activist investing at companies like Sotheby's, Sony, and Yahoo, his approach to AI stack investing, the importance of governance, lessons from FTX's collapse, and the power of clear written communication with boards.

Toby Wilkinson

Egyptologist Toby Wilkinson discusses the Ptolemaic period (300 years after Alexander the Great), exploring how this era transformed Egypt from a divine kingship centered on monuments into a cosmopolitan, commerce-driven empire. Alexandria became the ancient world's intellectual and economic powerhouse, home to unprecedented scientific achievement. The conversation ranges from why the Ptolemaic model failed to match Rome's durability, to Cleopatra's actual historical significance, to what made Ptolemaic Egypt feel oddly modern compared to pharaonic Egypt.

Ozan Tarman, Aditya Singhal

Ozan Tarman, Deutsche Bank's vice chair of global macro, and Aditya Singhal, head of EM trading across rates, FX and credit, discuss how professional traders interpret conflicting macro headlines and market signals. The conversation covers the sustainability of the tech stock rally, the tension between fast money and central bank policy, and how markets are pricing US versus Chinese AI developments. Recorded live at Wilton's Music Hall in London.

Nick Burke

Nick Burke built a seven-property rental portfolio in just two years by targeting undervalued markets in affordable cities that most investors overlook. Using the BRRRR method (buy, rehab, rent, refinance, repeat), he created hundreds of thousands in equity with minimal cash out of pocket—including buying his first rental with a credit card at 0% APR and partnering 50/50 when capital was tight. The episode reveals his exact buy box criteria, team structure, and proof that real estate scaling is possible even while working a 9-5 job.

Javier Blas, Lorcan Roche Kelly

Commodity prices are experiencing shock-driven volatility across oil, beef, fertilizer, and other goods, but the patterns are fragmented and strange—corn prices barely move while fertilizer skyrockets. Javier Blas and Lorcan Roche Kelly analyze how the Strait of Hormuz closure, energy shocks, UAE's OPEC exit, and US trade policy are reshaping global commodity markets and farmer economics.

A surge in the Producer Price Index, rising Treasury yields, and a tightening global oil supply are all pointing to more inflation ahead. The latest PPI shows producer costs up 6% in April, a signal that consumer prices could follow. Meanwhile, a drawdown of roughly 4 million barrels a day from global oil stocks is pushing up fuel prices, hitting diesel truckers especially hard. All of these pressures trace back to the ongoing war in the Middle East, showing how geopolitical instability quickly feeds into the American economy.

The episode examines the concept of "transitory" inflation, used to describe price spikes from temporary events like the Iran war, tariffs, and pandemic supply shocks, and asks when the label no longer applies. It also covers small business owners' struggle with rising costs, MIT's new AI-focused graduation majors, and Quebec's hydropower exports to the U.S. Northeast, reflecting broader economic and educational shifts.

The April jobs report surprised to the upside, but economists expect the upcoming CPI release to be dreary as the conflict in Iran pushes prices higher. The episode also examines how adult education programs promise better wages, why retail investors are piling into semiconductor stocks, and how climate change is reducing the nutritional value of food.

Alysha Clark

Dallas Wings forward Alysha Clark, the oldest player in the WNBA, co-negotiated a groundbreaking collective bargaining agreement for the league's players alongside a Nobel Prize-winning economist. The episode follows her minute-by-minute account of the high-stakes negotiations that capitalized on the league's explosive growth—from a $36,400 starting salary era to a new era powered by a $3.1 billion media rights deal. Clark's journal entries reveal what it's like to be a player turned negotiator fighting for the future of women's basketball.

David Lang

Stephen Dubner explores the emotional and logistical aftermath of a major artistic premiere through conversations with composer David Lang following his new work's debut with the New York Philharmonic. The episode examines what happens to a creator after the public unveiling of months or years of work, including the psychological arc from anticipation to doubt to reflection, plus reactions from audiences and orchestra leadership.

Dave (host)

A deep dive into real estate investment strategy comparing two paths to financial freedom: holding five fully paid-off rental properties versus scaling to 15 mortgaged units. Using inflation-adjusted 2026 numbers ($400K homes, $250/month cash flow, 30-year loans), the host models which approach reaches financial independence fastest, builds greater net worth, and generates more usable cash flow. The analysis reveals that fewer paid-off properties may be undervalued by investors obsessed with portfolio size.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection is processing tariff refund applications after a Supreme Court ruling struck down swaths of import taxes, but eligibility restrictions have left some businesses out. The episode also covers the latest jobs report, ongoing tech layoffs, the Spirit Airlines shutdown and its implications for a Florida airport, and a visit to Sparrow’s Nest Studio, a Manhattan mahjong parlor.

This episode examines three business deals linked to President Trump since his return to office: one involving a Florida-based drone company, another with a crypto billionaire, and a third concerning a European steelmaker. The show raises questions about potential conflicts of interest as these deals involve the president, his family, and friends. Each deal is scrutinized for how it might blur the line between personal profit and public duty.

Annie Lowrey

Host Kai Ryssdal interviews Atlantic staff writer Annie Lowrey about the implications of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act's tax cuts, which reduced taxes for 85% of households but disproportionately benefited high-income earners. The episode examines how a shrinking tax base could impact public works and national debt, while also covering Whirlpool's recession-level demand, lower-than-expected productivity, and business approaches to tariff refunds.

Marketplace previews the April jobs report amid mixed signals from private payroll data, which showed a strong March followed by a significant April slowdown. The episode also examines how Corpus Christi’s water crisis is colliding with a booming energy sector, and why Disney’s recent streaming price hikes led to increased revenue despite subscriber concerns. From labor market uncertainty to resource conflicts and media economics, the stories tie together the tension between growth and fragility.

Curt Flood, the best center fielder in baseball, was traded against his will and sued Major League Baseball to overturn its reserve clause. For decades, courts had upheld owners' control over players, but Flood argued workers should sell their labor freely. His case destroyed his career but sparked a chain of events that created free agency and reshaped professional sports economics.

Unidentified food economist

A food economist examines how the US-Israel war in Iran could raise American grocery bills. The episode connects already-rising gas prices to future food inflation, explaining that oil price shocks increase farming and transportation costs. The economist forecasts which food items may see the biggest price jumps and when consumers might notice the impact at the supermarket.

This episode examines the political tug-of-war over Adam Smith's legacy. Economists and politicians often cast him as the patron saint of free-market ideology, but critics on the left argue that this reading ignores the moral philosophy underpinning his work. The show revisits the debate in an updated replay, asking whether the right has misread Smith and what his true contribution to economic thought should be.

This short episode explores how early signs of dementia can appear in financial behavior — missed bill payments, erratic investments — years before a diagnosis. It examines why the financial health of seniors often goes unnoticed until it's too late, and discusses what can be done to catch these warning signals.

Mayor Brandon Scott

Since taking office in 2020, Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott has focused on reducing the city's vacant housing stock. In this episode, recorded at the Bloomberg CityLab conference in Madrid, he discusses how deindustrialization, redlining, and gun violence historically contributed to the crisis, the city's approach to block-by-block redevelopment, and its work matching empty properties with publicly-minded developers. The number of vacant homes has fallen from 16,000 to just over 11,800 under his administration. He also shares why many Baltimore natives are not fans of the TV show The Wire.

Marketplace covers several economic stories: the fallout from court rulings that most Trump tariffs were illegal, leaving businesses to decide whether to refund consumers — a process that could drag into the 2030s. Also, the airline industry faces changes with Spirit Airlines gone, GameStop is pursuing an acquisition of eBay, and states are exploring ways to reclaim tax dollars.

Gary Belsky

Gary Belsky and host Russ Roberts discuss how golfing alone transforms the game into a unique experience. Unlike playing with others, solo golf can induce flow, foster physical mastery, and deepen self-awareness. They explore what golf reveals about character and why even non-golfers might appreciate its solo version for the life lessons it offers.

Brett Hundley

Former NFL quarterback Brett Hundley explains how he used the skills from running an offense to build a house-flipping business. He now aims to complete 24 projects a year, not just for income but for the financial freedom to spend time with family and travel. The episode covers how he finds deals in competitive markets, builds a team, and scales his operation without working long hours.

Tobi Lütke

Tobi Lütke, CEO of Shopify, discusses his reluctance to become CEO, the impact of AI on entrepreneurship and labor markets, and why he believes companies are using AI as a scapegoat for layoffs. He also critiques charitable giving inefficiency, government dysfunction, and Canada's political reaction to Trump, while offering career advice based on compound learning and skill differentiation.

Chris Painter, Joel Becker

Odd Lots examines METR's viral capability benchmark charts that show AI models performing complex tasks at superhuman speed. The episode explores how researchers measure autonomous AI capability, what these charts actually measure, and why this matters for understanding AI risk. Hosts speak with METR President Chris Painter and technical staff member Joel Becker about the mechanics and philosophy behind AI capability evaluation.

Amjad Masad

Amjad Masad, CEO of Replit, discusses why AI coding models are hitting performance plateaus and why this matters for the future of development tools. He explains Replit's strategy of not building their own model, why product quality beats cost optimization, and makes a provocative case that the SaaS apocalypse—where AI displaces traditional software—is justified and inevitable. Masad also challenges narratives about IDEs being dead, addresses whether PMs survive the next 3-5 years, and reflects on what true product-market fit actually means.

Dave (host)

Dave dismantles the most destructive real estate investing myths circulating on social media and among amateur investors. He argues that negative cash flow speculation, zero-money-down deals, passive income expectations, and abandoning day jobs too early can delay financial freedom by decades. Based on his own path to financial independence through disciplined rental investing over 10 years, Dave outlines which strategies actually work and which ones set investors up to fail.

James Bosworth

James Bosworth, founder of political risk analysis firm Hxagon, discusses the "orange shift"—a region-wide realignment of Latin American leaders toward dealmaking with the Trump administration. The conversation covers how different countries are positioning themselves relative to US power, inflation management strategies, the popularity of leaders like Mexico's Claudia Sheinbaum and El Salvador's Nayib Bukele, Brazil's Lula's economic surprises, and the strategic calculus leaders face knowing Trump's tenure is temporary.

Elizabeth Reid

Elizabeth Reid, VP of Search at Google, discusses how AI is fundamentally reshaping search and information discovery. The conversation centers on Google's integration of Gemini into search via AI Overviews, the tension between maintaining ad revenue and adopting AI-native interfaces, and the practical challenges of search quality in an era of LLMs and internet misinformation.

Dylan Patel

Dylan Patel, founder of SemiAnalysis, discusses the explosive demand for frontier AI models and the supply constraints limiting their scaling. He explains why frontier models command nearly unbounded willingness to pay, how his firm's AI spending has grown from tens of thousands to $7M in a year, and the critical bottlenecks in memory, logic, and fab equipment that will determine how fast AI infrastructure can scale. The conversation also covers perception challenges facing leading AI labs.