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

  1. 7 hr ago

    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 SuitRyanair 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 NewsletterJoin the conversation: discord.gg/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

  2. 2 days ago

    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.

  3. 3 days ago

    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.

  4. 4 days ago

    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 CheckAn 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 NewsletterJoin the conversation: discord.gg/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

  5. 5 days ago

    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 TrumpOnly 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.

  6. 6 days ago

    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.

  7. 19 Oct

    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 ScrutinyOnly 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.

  8. 17 Oct

    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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About

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

Information

  • Channel
    Bloomberg
  • Creator
    Bloomberg
  • Years Active
    2015 - 2026
  • Episodes
    1.3k
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    2026 iHeartMedia, Inc. © Any use of this intellectual property for text and data mining or computational analysis including as training material for artificial intelligence systems is strictly prohibited without express written consent from iHeartMedia
  • Show Website
    Odd Lots
  • Provider
    Bloomberg L.P.

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