Ron Insana 3:24
Yeah. Yeah, we were dealing with fair use, right? I mean, if you were, I can’t remember exactly how long the duration of the clip was that you were allowed to use without getting sued or without having to compensate the creator. It was relatively short.
Steve Brotman 3:37
And it’s also on a b2b basis. Yeah, like you sold a clip for business purposes versus consumer use. The company ended up being a b2b play versus a b2c play, which is a much smaller market. But it’s really, you know, astonishing that we were right there. And if we had taken a left instead of a right, we both would be probably doing something very different.
Ron Insana 4:05
It’s funny that we have the CFO councils that CNBC and I can’t necessarily disclose who we talked to, but I was talking to somebody today who’s in a business very similarly, that in the internet days, everyone thought it was going to explode and then disappeared. And this company has come along now and made a roaring success in the exact same category. And it’s amazing that if you miss by that much, when you’re when you’re coming up, it’s the difference between you know, being a bust and being a rousing success and some of its timing some it’s been too early. You know, in the internet days, there were a lot of companies that were just simply too early and the mechanisms for, you know, success weren’t necessarily their great idea at the wrong time. Me, even though only back to Compaq computers or even John Sculley with the personal digital assistant, which is now an iPhone effectively and You know, in Compaq had one and everybody had one and Blackberry had one, then Apple comes out with the iPhone and blows everybody out of the water. So the margin for error is always kind of slim, you know.
Steve Brotman 5:11
So talking about that, you know, you know, getting back to your career. I mean, how did you like, how did you wake up
Ron Insana 5:22
Talk about margin for error.
Steve Brotman 5:24
Yeah, talk about and you know, CNBC was a huge startup success.
Ron Insana 5:29
The really funny thing about it was that it was a financial news network where I worked originally was the pricer work and so that launched in November of 1981. And if you remember Bill Griffith and Sue Herrera, they were the two of the thinkers in November of 1981. They were actually there before FNN went on the air. They were practicing in the parking lot to do live business television somewhere in the neighborhood of eight or so hours a day. A friend of mine from high school got me a job at FNN when I got out of college, I was a film major actually, and I couldn’t find any work on the entertainment side. So I was just desperate to get a gig in the media of some sort. And he got me an entry level position at a financial news network as a production assistant, which was ripping wires, Taran scripts, getting coffee, doing all that kind of stuff. I got fired four months later, actually, because they went through a bout to go through a massive cutback. I was the last one hired. So I was the first one let go. And a week, three days after I got let go. Our assignment editor called me up and said, Hey, looks like we’re going out of business come on down for a party. They weren’t really going out of business. They were gonna break even overnight, they fired 95% of the editorial staff and kept my friend in the position of producer, my friend Casey Lyon, who went on to not just FNN and CNBC but also CNN. And then he, he stayed for four months, called me up after they were down to a skeleton staff, Bill Griffith and Sue Herrera were the only two anchors on the air. And he called me up in February of 85. So I was released in October, baby for four months after I started my job. And he asked me if I wanted his job as a producer. Now, in the intervening months, Bill and Sue were ad libbing eight hours of live business television between them every day. And so when I came back, three months after that they both call in sick on the same day, I put myself on the air for two updates, because there was no one else in the room. And we had to bring back people who had been fired, just to just to clear the day. And three months after that, I got a full time gig paid.
Steve Brotman 7:30
So you were like an intern?
Ron Insana 7:32
I went from production assistant to producer to anchor in the space of one year and four months. So no, no experience with the content because I was a film major and never took an economics class in my life. Mark had nothing, no idea what was going on in financial markets. And I ended up at anchor by the time I was 24. And it was a learn as you go happily, I had some people around me, Bill and Sue included Michael Greitens, younger brother, Doug, who ultimately became my best friend. And sadly, about 10 years ago, passed away as an early mentor of mine, and he would tell me what to read. And you know, I would go to the light of my college library in Southern California and I’d read Wall Street Journals from the 1920s. Because the 80s were starting to feel a little bit like the 20s. At that time, he gave me books to read, we would call people back then who literally folks like Henry Kaufman, really big names on Wall Street would take our phone calls, and give us explanations as to why what was happening was happening even though they didn’t know us personally, and they barely had ever heard of FNN. And so that process went on for, you know, seven years, we ended up going bankrupt, we were acquired by CNBC, I came out to New Jersey, from Los Angeles, where FM was originally based in 1991. And then by 1997, it actually really took off. That’s when things really, really really got hot. That’s when I was doing crossover stuff at MSNBC, NBC Network. Today Show nightly news, Dateline, all that kind of stuff, I am missing the morning radio. And then, you know, my I, by the time 2006 Or so rolled around, I’d done pretty much everything I could do in my space. And so I started to venture out to do some other things like a hedge fund, which you’re familiar with from my experience here, which was 2006 to 2008. And that was its own unique and less than enjoyable experience in my career, but great learning experience having said that, about getting to meet
Steve Brotman 9:30
people who created alpha, yeah, what everybody who has hedge fund managers? Yep, your call. Yeah. And it was just bad timing for us.
Ron Insana 9:40
Oh, yeah. Listen, when I was leaving, and so I called upon guys who were sources of mine and who I knew, you know, or either knew of me and I knew of them guys like art Sandberg. I mean, Steve Cohen was the first person to say I’ll give you $100 million of capacity in one of my funds. And right after that, 34 other people fell in line. So our sample size is Cooperman. It was D. Shaw. I called David Shaw directly actually and asked him about Renaissance. The guys at the fortress. Everybody said Yes, Dan Benton, a whole host of individuals were perfectly fine. Giving me capacity. So when I, when we launched the fund on Deutsche Bank’s platform in 2007, I had $100 million of capacity with 35 different managers. We launched with 15. And added five more. We were down 23% in 2008. But the gentleman who had put in the operating capital for my business, I’ll leave his name out of it declined to put the third year in. So in 2008, we were doing the revenues of 900,000. Net, burn a 2 million had to sell the fund. And once it was sold, it did great in 2009. So yeah, as they say stuff happens in
Steve Brotman 10:56
probably just any other year, you would have been any other year. Yeah, another year earlier, we would have had a billion dollars. So tell me like, you know, that was a I mean, I guess you can’t that I guess of all those folks that you just mentioned, or even folks that you’ve interviewed, who is who is the folks that who was the person that was the most impressive, the most striking, like most memorable to at least to you just was like, Well,
Ron Insana 11:20
yeah, there were a couple actually. I mean, I you know, Clinton when he was my first presidential interview, towards the end of 99, he was on the sandy poverty swing that I traveled with him through Appalachia. And we did do on a furniture factory floor in an enterprise zone, in Clarksdale, Mississippi. So those are always a little different, you know, in a circumstance because they have a different protocol than most other interviews. But he was fascinating. I ended up interviewing him three times in seven months, and each one got better. Interviewed Bush, interviewed Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs. Gosh, really, a whole host of individual Warren and I had an interesting relationship. I didn’t know him. When I was on the air one morning, early 1990s. And Joe Kernan used to do a segment called stocks to watch and so Berkshire Hathaway earnings were out. And so we were kind of going over birchers, component companies and having come from California to New Jersey at that time, See’s Candy, which Warren owns inside Berkshire Hathaway. The candy was not available in New Jersey. And so we were talking about our favorite companies inside Berkshire Hathaway. And I said, mine was C’s. And Joe said he was net jets. So 20 less than 24 hours later, I got to my desk. There were these two huge boxes sitting on my desk and I opened up 10 pounds of See’s Candy. I opened the note and it says thanks for the mentioned Warren. Now I didn’t know he didn’t know that he watched CNBC or had somebody who watched it for him. So I called him up. He took the call and he said, You know, I said thank you very much. It’s really a nice view. He said, You’re gonna share that with the office, right? And I said, Absolutely not. I said, I’ll leave one pound here. I said, I can’t get it here. I said, Take a nine pound zone. And he said, Tell Kernan. He’s not getting the jet. And yeah, that was my introduction to Warren Buffett. So we ended up doing a couple of things together over time. And, you know, he was always nice enough to take the call, always nice enough to talk and that was the same with a lot of these individuals. You know, Bob Rubin I thought was always fascinating. Had a lot of off the record time with Alan Greenspan during during his time at the Fed, and you know, and then Hillary Clinton or animal Katie or Queen Rania of Jordan, Mikhail Gorbachev, after he was Soviet Premier, you know, what I found really fascinating, but all these different people and it was true. You know, Stan Druckenmiller, George Soros, Julian Robertson, all those guys as well. You know, they all had an insatiable curiosity. And they would quiz me as much as you know, after we were done as much as I quizzed them during an interview, it was always a two way street, they’re always looking for more information, they’re always looking for another nugget. And that’s what I really found fascinating about the people that I liked. Talking to the most was not necessarily that it was kind of a sign of respect, but it was also just the intellectual curiosity that as my late friend, Doug used to, say, having rats in your belly, the fact that you couldn’t rest until you knew the answer was something that was really common about among all these folks, Jack Welch included my own boss. For many years, Jack would call up and just ask questions about stuff going on, you know, and Bob Wright would do the same if they had, you know, if they saw something or they thought you saw something, they’d be like, you know, what, what it what was it, you know, filming it. And that was always pretty cool. That was a very cool part of the gig, you know. Wow.
Steve Brotman 14:46
Wow. That’s just right. That’s just sort of that’s like, that’s like what I would call psychic board. It’s funny, you know, it just occurred to me, you know, we’ve formed a relationship over 20 years, blah. And I’d be asking you questions about different things. Because if you’d asked me as many questions as I asked you back, and um, that’s, that’s sort of that that’s what was remarkable about our relationship. I always thought I was like, why does this guy even care about what I do? What do I think about this? Well,
Ron Insana 15:24
you just never know what you’re missing, right? I mean, and so, you know, having been a practiced questioner, right, which is, which was my job for all intensive purposes, right? You’re, in a sense, you’re a glorified teacher when you’re on the air. And then in the other sense, you’re a glorified researcher when you’re when you’re off. And so you get paid to ask questions, both on air and off air, and then you in the old days anyway, it was tell me what you know, not what you think now, it’s telling me what you think not what you know. But, you know, we actually went out and tried to, you know, beat the bushes for real information. So talking to you, or some of your counterparts going to Alan Patricof, or other folks in the VC space, the private equity space, or, you know, and any one of these other areas where you guys all had your fingers on the pulse, you know, the hedge fund world, everybody had, and everybody understood the fact that they needed an edge. So you want to talk to the people who require an edge. Because if you’re talking to anybody else, you’re behind the curve. Right? So you wanted people, you wanted to talk to people with the forefront of something which included VCs like yourself, you know, you guys were seeing things that other people didn’t see. So that’s, and that’s always that’s kind of the difference maker and what we did, right, which was a few dug up one of those nuggets, that’s a differentiator for you or me and my case, you know?
Steve Brotman 16:42
That’s entirely Yeah. Some your edge, if you will, and that’s why people tuned in, because they just needed to, you know, get that edge. And, um, that’s, yeah, that was your job. So what you’re changing, changing direction a little bit, you know, and this is sort of more, you know, there’s a lot of change happening in, in financial media, you touched on it. So tell me what you think versus what, you know, what’s the future of financial media? Like? What’s the like, if there might not be a good answer? But, like, the whole TikTok mass? And I mean, it’s just, you know, Twitter, and just all sorts of craziness going on? Do you think that fragmentation is going to continue? Yeah, no. Is there going to be some centralization or sort of fragmentation, then centralization?
Ron Insana 17:33
I mean, typically, that’s what happens in any business. Right? I mean, but the question is, like, we’ll see NBC, which, you know, has for quite a long time now been the centrifugal force in the business? Do they suddenly become quite an acquirer of other assets that, you know, broaden our reach? And I don’t know the answer to that, because it’s not those conversations I’m not privy to. But if I were in that chair, certainly, I’d be looking to acquire digital assets that extend our reach, obviously, there, they’ve done a lot, quite frankly, with cnbc.com CNBC Pro, which is a subscription service, that I might not supposed to reveal the number of subscribers, but it’s a substantial number, then Jim has his investment club, that too, is a way to monetize some of what we do, you know, we’ve gone for being in 110 million homes, and it’s no secret about cord cutting, I think we’re down to 65 or 70 million. So that has an impact on subscription fees, and audience size and to a certain extent, advertising rates as well, not rates, but the advertising the gross dollars. So yeah, I think the fragmentation is going to continue for a while. And like I’m getting involved in an AI based FinTech that has some interesting properties to it, where we can provide forecasted returns on individual stocks or ETFs. And additional information beyond that asset allocation, modeling portfolio, construction tools. And to a certain extent, now you’re you know, you continue to disaggregate the business, right, where if you’re in a sleeve that can provide a service for individuals, self directed traders, investment advisors, you’re suddenly taking up some of the space that places like CNBC used to occupy by bringing on guests with that expertise. So to the extent that AI is gonna affect that, I think that’s something we need to be cognizant of its CNBC, and learn to use and adopt those tools to add value to the people who are watching, and then we reach them, again, digitally through cnbc.com, and these other various services that we have, and we’re also you know, branching further out into events. And you know, what everybody’s found is that events are really powerful and popular as you suggested, you know, with driving Alpha when you start putting people together, that has its own magic as well.
Steve Brotman 19:50
You mentioned AI FinTech. Are you at liberty to talk about that anymore?
Ron Insana 19:55
Most will say 50 years 12 days.
Steve Brotman 20:01
I might get some calls then from some of my friends.
Ron Insana 20:08
I think we’re doing a series pretty soon.
Steve Brotman 20:10
So all right. Well, certainly that’s great timing. So shift gears. I mean, you talk to some of these world leaders. I’m not getting political. But
Ron Insana 20:21
You know, Trump too. So are you?
Steve Brotman 20:24
Are you? Are you? Are you sort of an optimist or a pessimist about America? Like, I think?
Ron Insana 20:34
I mean, generally, I’m an optimist. I am concerned about the period in which we find ourselves right now. And the jury’s out as to which way it’s gonna go. I mean, listen, I don’t look at the polls. I look at you know, what, what people are saying about the upcoming elections in November, I tend to believe that it is actually a decision that’s going to determine whether we stick with democracy or veer towards autocracy, whether or not an autocrat can be successful in the United States, I think isn’t in the longer run is an open question. And there’s still checks and balances that exist. When you read, you know, some of the excerpts of Project 2025, which the Heritage Foundation put out, suggesting the President Trump would a President Trump would would gut the civil service and put in 54,000 loyalists or do things that would circumvent, you know, other controls that are typically typically used on the executive branch, and then use the Department of Justice, you know, in a weaponized fashion, you know, those things do worry me, and we’ll see, and we’ll find out and, you know, sometimes you get the government you deserve, if that’s really what people want. And then we’ll see how it plays out. After that I, you know, I’m not, I don’t effectively or efficiently play for either team. I’ve voted both ways in a wide variety of elections. And I think, you know, you take the good ideas where they come from, irrespective of party, I do think this is a different environment, I don’t think the party of Trump is the Republican Party that I grew up with. And so it’s a little unnerving, having covered him as well, and having, you know, kind of seeing him in a different light than, than most people get to see him. He worries me, even from a human perspective, not just a political one. Yeah. But having said that, I would prefer as much as I can. I have a certain fondness for Joe Biden, because I’ve known him on and off for a long time, since he was a senator. And he was always kind of a square shooter with, you know, if we encountered him in those days, and so on, and so forth. So, and I also happen to think some of his policies of late were fairly, you know, wise, the chips and science Act, the poorly named Inflation Reduction Act, which was really infrastructure and energy transition, those things seem to have, you know, borne some fruit at least so far. So I, you know, I think he’s done a good job with it, and, and was dealt a horrible hand. So, in that respect, you know, I would . My personal preference is that things continue on as they are, because I prefer we not experiment with another system. This was working pretty well, for a while, you know, it’s got, it’s got its good points, and it’s bad points, but net net, you know, the US is still a pretty good place to hang your hat. And I hope that that is something that I can say again, you know, several months from now.
Steve Brotman 23:23
Yeah, I’m, yeah, I think I think I said similarly, I have more confidence in our system. But, you know, to your point, the executive PowerPoint, um, something I hadn’t really thought too much about, you know, I think that the, the, the judiciary and legislative branches are going to hold. Um, but you know, it’s, it’s, it’s going to be, it’ll be interesting to see if that happens, but, you know, what, eventually you see what’s happening in Argentina, are they? Yeah, you know, what, six branches of government or six, six bureaucracies and, you know, I’m sort of sharing from here, but at the same time, like that happened in the US? Um, it’d be remarkable for one. Sounds like, I think there’s a lot of digging in there. So it’ll be it’ll be, we’ll see what happens.
Ron Insana 24:19
You know, I mean, to answer your question, I’m generally I mean, certainly about the economy and the markets for the remainder of this year. I’m optimistic. It seems like it’s an okay environment. It’s a probably a 2% growth year, it’s probably a decent, mid, you know, mid single digits, which are already at the high single digits, you know, equity return year, my guess is the Fed cuts rates a couple times, which will soften, you know, any slowdown that might be ahead of us. So in that regard, I’ve been talking about having an abnormally normal year as far as the economy and markets are concerned. But having a wild year, both politically and geopolitically that might be, you know, unsettling to not only people who watch this professionally, but you know, to really anybody who’s paying attention.
Steve Brotman 25:00
Before allowing you to turn the tables here. We’re making this new podcast. Do you have any advice or, you know, key things we should focus on? I think the first thing that you said to me when we talked we were talking a few weeks back, was you like, get a good book or meaning get good people on? Yeah, I was like the number one thing he said, I was like Booker, what’s a booker?
Ron Insana 25:27
Yeah, you know, it’s in jargon, and associated otherwise a great Rolodex and find you. Fantastic guests. So yeah, that’s just that’s, you know, that’s what we generally call associate producers, of which my wife was one when I was an anchor. So you know, and it’s funny. And the funny thing is, most of the young people who have that job, hated it. Because they felt it was a fairly menial job, where you just make phone calls, ask people to come on the air. And you know, you do a pre interview, I’m like, Look, this is your education. Right? This is how you learn. You’re talking to people that you would never otherwise speak to ask them questions, write down the answers, and go to school, you know, and use it as an opportunity. And by the way, tuck away their numbers in your personal Rolodex.
Steve Brotman 26:15
Just in case you will never really even call you back.
Ron Insana 26:19
Yes, exactly. Yeah. I used to book a lot of my own guests. In the early days of my career when I was an anchor, which, you know, was big just for lack of resources. We all did that ourselves. And it proved to be in my life, a phenomenally valuable experience, the fact that you learn how to pick up the phone, you know, after Alan Greenspan had his irrational exuberance, exuberance. Comment in early December of 1996. We’d never been to the Fed before at CNBC. So I called up his top PR person, and I said, Listen, I said, you know, we’ve been locked out forever. You guys talk to everybody else? What are the chances I can come down and have an off the record with him? Because we really don’t know. And we’re having an internal argument at CNBC, about what he met with respect to irrational exuberance. Question, was it a throwaway line? Or did they really mean to have an impact on the markets, which, if you recall, I think the market felt like 2%, the next day, maybe a little more than that, because everybody thought he was trying to burst the internet bubble that was just forming at the time. And so they let me come down. And that started the process of, you know, like three times a year of going to the Fed, and chatting with Alan Greenspan. So, you know, when someone else you know, when a younger person gets that opportunity to call folks, I think it was a great opportunity for them. And it’s a great benefit to you, because you just tell them to reach for the stars. You know, most of those people will take the call. It’s pretty shocking, I’ll tell you when I was at FNN, really on. I remember I was lining up regular guests. When I first got on the air. I called Elaine Garza rally, who at the time was one of the hottest analysts on Wall Street. I called Larry Wachtell, who was a famous Wall Street personage back in the 80s. And art Cashin, who was on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, and two or three other people to make them regular guests on the show. And they all said yes. And they were doing foreigners every morning at 10. Eastern or somewhere around that time. And it’s just, it’s amazing how much people want to interact, and want to do things like this, and they enjoy the conversation. They enjoy the experience. I think that’s first and foremost, and then going into areas that no one else is touching, I think makes a big difference. So there’s, you know, 1000 political, you know, podcasts right now. They’re, they’re, you know, market podcasts, you know, ad nauseam. I think we’re in a space where you operate. If you start talking about cutting edge technologies, and what you see coming down the pipe that nobody else happens to see. That’s, you know, that’s gonna be something people are gonna want to know.
Steve Brotman 28:56
Oh, well, thanks. Thanks, Ron. This is excellent, excellent.