Episode summary
Embarrassment of Something: IQ, PE, BX | Money Stuff: The Podcast
Money Stuff The Podcast
· · 26 min · Hosts: Matt Levine, Katie Greifeld
Summary
The hosts start with JPMorgan’s move away from ISS and Glass Lewis for proxy voting, saying the bank will use its own AI system to decide how to vote the shares held through JPMorgan Asset Management. They argue that this is a natural use case for AI because proxy voting is time-consuming, often low-stakes, and mainly requires showing that someone thought carefully about each ballot item rather than making a highly consequential judgment.
They also suggest that an in-house model could shift voting toward management-friendly outcomes, especially at a bank that wants to maintain business relationships with corporate clients. The hosts joke that the model may not need much sophistication if its practical instruction is simply to vote with management, though they note it may still matter for major cases like contested mergers or huge compensation packages.
The episode then turns to private equity recruiting, where Jamie Dimon’s complaints about on-cycle hiring have helped push the market to recruit later, though “later” still means early January. The hosts say banks and PE firms both have incentives to tolerate the system, even if they dislike it, because analysts are expected to leave eventually and become part of the industry’s broader ecosystem.
They finish with Trump’s Truth Social posts on banning institutional investors from single-family homes and discouraging defense-company buybacks. The hosts treat both as populist-sounding ideas that can move markets or shape debate even if the policy logic is messy and the practical effects are uncertain.
Key takeaways
- The hosts say JPMorgan’s in-house AI proxy system is a plausible replacement for ISS and Glass Lewis because most proxy votes are routine and low-stakes.
- They argue a bank-owned voting model could tilt more toward management, which is especially attractive for a firm that also wants corporate banking and advisory business.
- Jamie Dimon’s long-running complaint about on-cycle PE recruiting helped push hiring later, but the market still rushes to recruit all at once.
- The hosts say private equity recruiting remains self-reinforcing because firms fear missing candidates if they do not move with everyone else.
- Trump’s Truth Social posts on housing and defense buybacks are presented as populist ideas that sound powerful politically even if their policy impact is uncertain.
Notable quotes
“if you're an asset manager, you have a fiduciary duty to vote thoughtfully on hundreds of questions and hundreds of proxies for all the companies that you own”
“you could imagine you want some human input when it comes to trillion dollar pay packages”
“everyone plans for a certain natural attrition and banks hire analysts not expecting all of those analysts to become managing directors right”
“The first mover advantage I mean it's real”
How the episode opens
Bloomberg Audio Studios podcasts radio news. — Katie, you got to live my dream today. — What's that? — You interviewed White Cliff Jean. — I did actually. — Uh, that was super interesting. He is — Katie came to me and is like, I'm interviewing White Cliff Jean.
Hopefully he never listens to this uh podcast. — Hopefully he does. Hi, White Cliff. A huge fan. He was — Black was like the soundtrack of my college years and so I'm very jealous that you got to talk to him about crypto.
Yeah, he's involved in a lot of hits that I didn't realize. So I'm going to have to educate myself. But yeah, he signed on to be Circle's chief culture officer. So they have a bunch of activations planned. We talked about stable coins. It was pretty interesting. I did email Katie to say how could I arrange to casually bump into him and I got no response. So it's fine. It's fine.
You know, — Looking to take a selfie with Wcliffe at the office — When you're interviewing an actual famous person. You know, it's it's funny being like — Not famous to you. — Well, it's funny being a financial news anchor because you know,
Right? Every so often there's like a true celebrity and you're like, "Huh? — Oh god." Like this is like a real this is an actual star, you know? And then you get a little bit nervous. — Not a hedge fund manager who featured in the big short. This is a
This is a — Fuji. — Yeah. This is a household name — In some household — In the Lavine house. — My household. — Yeah. — Hello and welcome to the Money Stuff Podcast, your weekly podcast where we talk about stuff related to money.
From the episode’s captions: roughly the first two minutes, lightly cleaned. Keep watching on YouTube →
Topics
- proxy advisers backlash
- ai proxy voting
- writing proxies for llms
- private equity recruiting
- housing affordability
Companies and tickers mentioned
- BX
- Blackstone
Watch the episode
Watch “Embarrassment of Something: IQ, PE, BX | Money Stuff: The Podcast” on YouTube
Summary, takeaways and quote selection by Octagon. Quotes are short excerpts; the full conversation is in the episode.
More from Money Stuff The Podcast
Money Stuff The Podcast, this episode and its artwork belong to Bloomberg. Octagon is not affiliated with the show; this page is an independent summary.
