Good morning. Andrew here. Here’s an unusual story to chew on before Thanksgiving. In 2016, I wrote a column about a wild legal fight between Isaac Perlmutter, then the billionaire C.E.O. of Disney’s Marvel Entertainment division, and Harold Peerenboom, his neighbor in Palm Beach, Fla. Peerenboom had sued Perlmutter, accusing him of sending letters to their neighbors claiming that Peerenboom was a “sexual predator.” Peerenboom even claimed that he had found a DNA match on the outside of one of the sent envelopes that implicated Perlmutter’s wife, Laura Perlmutter. (He lost that case.) The Perlmutters countersued. Well, nearly a decade later, a jury decided in favor of the Perlmutters, awarding $50 million to Laura Perlmutter for defamation. Josh Dubin, who represented the Perlmutters, argued in court that the DNA was stolen as part of a plot against the Perlmutters. You can read more about it here — and hopefully your Thanksgiving won’t be as fraught. Have a great holiday. We’ll be back next week before our annual DealBook Summit on Dec. 3. (Was this newsletter forwarded to you? Sign up here.)
Replacing PowellCalm has returned to markets as investors rally around the belief that the Fed will cut interest rates next month. But succession drama hangs over the central bank, too, which some Fed watchers fear could undermine Fed independence — a kind of North Star for global investors. The latest: Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told CNBC yesterday that there was a “very good chance” President Trump could announce before Christmas his choice to replace Jay Powell as Fed chair. Powell’s term as chair ends in May, and there are five candidates on the shortlist. But one — Kevin Hassett, the director of the National Economic Council who also worked closely with Trump during the president’s first term — is now seen as the front-runner, according to Bloomberg. Trump signaled in September that Hassett, along with Kevin Warsh, a former Fed official, and Christopher Waller, a current Fed governor, were his top candidates. The skinny on Hassett: He has been in lock step with Trump, criticizing Powell and his colleagues for risking an economic slowdown by not lowering borrowing costs quickly enough. Trump may want a close confidant installed at the Fed as he has fumed that he has no sway over the central bank; he even drafted a letter firing Powell this summer, only to decide against pursuing it after pushback from House Republicans. Hassett has been clear that he’ll do what Trump asks. “If he were to ask me to be Fed chair, then of course I would have to say yes, because I want to serve my country and I want to serve my president,” he told Fox News last week. Would a loyalist in charge create further instability at the Fed? The central bank’s policymakers are already deeply divided on rates policy, saddling Powell with the burden of wrangling consensus between inflation hawks who want to keep rates high enough to cool inflation, and doves who want to see lower rates to bolster growth and hiring. Some Fed watchers believe that Trump’s pick will face credibility issues from the start if he or she is seen to be taking orders from the White House. Another wild card: Powell could opt to stay on the Fed as a governor through January 2028, limiting Trump’s ability to further remake the central bank. The markets have already weighed in. The S&P 500 and Treasury notes and bonds rallied yesterday after the Bloomberg report came out, as investors cheered the idea of a more dovish Fed chair. This morning, traders have put the odds of a rate cut next month at 82 percent, up from 27 percent a week ago.
The White House faces pushback from Republicans over its health care plans. Speaker Mike Johnson told President Trump, whose aides are drafting a plan to extend Obamacare subsidies for two years, that he didn’t have support in the House to retain them beyond year end, according to The Wall Street Journal. Political observers see rising health insurance costs as a major concern for voters worried about affordability — especially with midterm elections coming up next year. Trump defends a top envoy over revelations about a Ukraine peace plan. After Bloomberg published the transcript of a call in which the U.S. diplomat, Steve Witkoff, secretly offered detailed advice to a top Russian official about how to sell Trump on the proposal, Trump shrugged: “That’s what a deal maker does,” the president told reporters yesterday. The negotiations between Washington and Kyiv have changed the terms of the plan, but a big question remains what Vladimir Putin of Russia will accept. Campbell’s puts an executive on leave after allegations of offensive comments. Martin Bally, the food company’s chief information security officer, was accused in a lawsuit by a former employee of calling its products “highly process food” for “poor people,” disparaging Indians and suggesting that some of its products use “bioengineered meat.” Campbell’s said Bally had been put on leave while it investigates the lawsuit’s claims and said it didn’t use artificial meat in its offerings. Nvidia’s growing burdenNvidia, the darling of the artificial intelligence boom, has faced a rough time lately. The chip giant’s shares are down in premarket trading today after falling yesterday amid concerns that it faces steeper competition. And Michael Burry, the short seller of “The Big Short” fame, last night published a newsletter that raised further questions about its business. It’s another sign that investors are getting increasingly selective about which A.I. giants they’re willing to back. Nvidia’s shares are now down 9 percent since they opened for trading on Nov. 20, after it reported knockout quarterly earnings. (That’s about $441 billion worth of erased market value.) The biggest driver appears to have been a report by The Information that Meta, a major customer, was in talks to buy billions of dollars’ worth of Google-made processors for its data centers. Then Burry further elaborated on his concerns about A.I. valuations on his new Substack. Much of the post focused on how tech giants were accounting for the depreciation of processors for their data centers’ servers (and criticizing Nvidia’s effort to rebut his criticisms of the company). But perhaps his most interesting point involved comments by Satya Nadella, Microsoft’s C.E.O., cautioning about the quickening obsolescence of data centers, given how fast Nvidia processors are advancing: I don’t want to build out a whole number of gigawatts that are only for a one-generation, one family. In other words, future demand for Nvidia chips is under question. The company’s processors still hold some advantages over competing Google offerings, tech experts say. But Google’s also cost less to run. And the tech giant has the financial means to wage a price war if it wanted to. If Meta and other so-called hyperscalers shop for Nvidia alternatives — they’re also designing their own processors — that could weigh heavily on the chip giant’s forecasts. So, too, could the scenario Burry posits, where A.I. giants slow down the astonishing race to build out data centers to avoid being saddled with rapidly aging infrastructure. All of this could have wider consequences. Shares in several Nvidia partners, including CoreWeave, Oracle and Super Micro Computer, have all fallen over the past week. (The Information also took a look at the potential financial risks facing companies building out data centers for Oracle.) That said, not all companies in the sector are faltering. Alphabet is up nearly 2 percent in premarket trading today and over 13 percent over the past five days, suggesting that the A.I. tide is no longer lifting all boats. Trump’s Hollywood interventionThe Trump administration hasn’t been afraid to break with Republican free-market orthodoxy by using government money to take ownership stakes in private enterprises and put pressure on individual companies. Now, President Trump’s interventionist streak appears to have spread to Hollywood tastemaking, raising questions about the costs of doing business in this era. Paramount has agreed to distribute the latest “Rush Hour” movie, according to Puck and other news outlets. The why is the interesting thing here: Trump is said to have pressed Larry Ellison — the billionaire co-founder of Oracle who helped finance the purchase of Paramount by his son, David Ellison — to do so, according to Semafor. The president reportedly did so on behalf of Brett Ratner, who has sought to make a comeback in Hollywood after six women accused him of sexual harassment or misconduct. (Ratner has denied the misconduct claims.) Ratner made a documentary about Melania Trump, the first lady, for Amazon Prime Video, which is said to have paid $40 million for the title. Another producer of the “Rush Hour” franchise, Arthur Sarkissian, was a producer of “The Man You Don’t Know,” a documentary about Trump that premiered at Mar-a-Lago last year. Hollywood trades have noted the improbability of a “Rush Hour” comeback. Besides the accusations against Ratner, the leads of the franchise, Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker, haven’t headlined many major releases in recent years. And while the previous three movies made about $850 million at the global box office, “Rush Hour 3” came out nearly 20 years ago. The context: The elder Ellison is a major Republican donor with close ties to Trump. He and his son are also seeking, via Paramount, to buy Warner Bros. Discovery, a contest in which they’re competing against Comcast and Netflix. (Any deal would require government approval.) Revised bids for Warner Bros. Discovery are due by Dec. 1, according to Bloomberg. DEALBOOK QUIZ Who’s shopping with A.I.?This question comes from a recent Times article. Click an answer to see if you’re right. (The link will be free.) The chatbots are ready to plan your Black Friday shopping list. Retailers such as Target and Walmart have recently introduced artificial intelligence-powered shopping assistants. And Amazon has a new A.I. feature that can track price reductions and automatically make a purchase if an item falls into your budget. What portion of shoppers are already using A.I. tools for their holiday shopping, according to a recent survey? We hope you’ve enjoyed this newsletter, which is made possible through subscriber support. Subscribe to The New York Times.
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