Big Take

If all the news lately about cryptocurrencies–and the fall of Sam Bankman-Fried and his FTX exchange–have left you wishing you had a better handle on the maddeningly complex world of crypto, we’re with you. So we asked Bloomberg Opinion columnist Matt Levine to join Wes this episode to answer: What exactly is crypto, both in theory and reality? (In case you missed it, Matt wrote a cover-to-cover s...

It was huge news when Carlos Ghosn, the once-celebrated auto executive, vanished from Japan in 2019 after being charged with financial crimes. He later emerged in Beirut, where he’s lived ever since, beyond the reach of Japanese authorities. Now the American father and son team who helped carry out his spy-novel escape are coming forward. They served time in a Japanese prison and are hoping Ghosn...

For many years, pharmaceutical companies have tried and failed to find a treatment to slow symptoms of ALS–the debilitating, fatal illness also known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease. A potentially promising new drug from Biogen may offer some relief to those afflicted with an uncommon and especially insidious form of ALS that runs in families. Patients are urging the US Food and Drug Administration to spe...

From Beijing to Boston, the food on our dinner plates is starting to look more and more alike. It used to be, we ate the local fruits, vegetables and grains native to where we live. Now, with the rise of industrial agriculture and cheap exports, the Western diet is taking over the globe.  Turns out that’s a big problem – and not just for health reasons. As the world grows dependent on an ever-narr...

Billionaires are increasingly taking advantage of a provision in the US tax laws that lets them park money designated for charity in something called a donor advised fund. They get a tax break up front…and can let the money sit in the fund for as long as they like. It’s eventually got to be given to a charitable cause, but they don’t have to say when, or where it’ll go.  Bloomberg reporters Noah B...

In the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, some of the biggest mortgage lenders in the US promised to extend billions in new loans to Black homebuyers. That hasn’t happened. Instead, the numbers are going in the opposite direction. Bloomberg senior economics writer Shawn Donnan joins Wes this episode to talk about why banks have fallen short of the goal–and what it means for families across th...

As the US coal industry dwindles, big mining companies that once made a fortune are packing up–and leaving behind a staggering mess of destroyed land and poisoned water . So who’ll pay to clean it up? Bloomberg reporters Josh Saul and Zachary Mider spent time in coal country and join this episode to talk about the multi-billion-dollar game of pass the buck now playing out in Appalachia. Learn more...

In 2019, US officials seized a massive cargo ship called the MSC Gayane in the Port of Philadelphia. On board, they found containers filled with products of all kinds that the ship had picked up along its global route. They also discovered cargo that didn’t appear on the ship’s manifest—40,000 pounds of cocaine. Bloomberg investigative reporters Lauren Etter and Michael Riley join this episode to...

This year saw some important advances for #MeToo. The US Congress passed two bills, now signed into law, that protect the rights of women who come forward to report sexual abuse in the workplace–and make it harder for companies to try to silence them. Two members of Congress who pushed that legislation through the House, Rep. Cheri Bustos and Rep. Lois Frankel, join this episode to explain the far...

Well, some of them anyway. Each year, Businessweek’s Bloomberg 50 list introduces you to people in business, entertainment, finance, politics, science and technology whose work helped define the year. The 2022 list includes familiar names doing new things (Tom Cruise) and new names doing historic things (Tom Oxley, whose company invented an implant that lets users communicate with brain waves). Bl...

While everyone was focused on Covid over the past few years, America’s decades-old opioid crisis entered a new deadly phase – largely because of one drug in particular: fentanyl. Potent, cheap and ubiquitous, it’s sometimes mixed by street dealers with other drugs including marijuana, cocaine and even adderall, creating a ‘cocktail’ that kills people who unwittingly buy it.  Bloomberg reporters Em...

Bloomberg Investigative reporter Olivia Carville has spent months delving into TikTok, the hugely popular video social network. In November, she joined the podcast to talk about children who have died copying dangerous video challenges of the kind that can be seen on the app. Today, Olivia is back to talk about her latest story about TikTok for Bloomberg Businessweek.  It follows the life of a 16-...

Our insatiable appetite for meat, eggs and cheese means there are billions of chickens, pigs and cows the world over. One consequence: animal agriculture is a leading contributor to greenhouse gas emissions and pollutants like ammonia and nitrogen. In Europe, governments are starting to crack down—demanding farms dramatically cut the size of their herds to meet environmental goals. Farmers are, to...

A group of Taylor Swift fans is suing Ticketmaster, the big live event ticket provider, after sales for her upcoming concert tour went haywire. It’s also drawn the attention of the US Justice Department. The government is investigating whether Ticketmaster is using its dominance in ticket sales to drive out competitors and drive up prices. And Ticketmaster isn’t the only big company in the governm...

The secretive Al Nahyan family of Abu Dhabi has amassed a fortune of $300 billion–and they’re investing it around the globe, in everything from green energy and healthcare to Manchester City Football Club, SpaceX and Rihanna’s lingerie line. Bloomberg reporters Devon Pendleton, Ben Bartenstein and Nicolas Parasie join this episode to talk about the family’s global reach. Learn more about this stor...

In the early, scary days of the coronavirus pandemic, before vaccines, patients hospitalized with severe cases were often put on ventilators to keep them alive. That invasive treatment saved a lot of people. But the heavy sedation that sometimes went along with it has left many of them with debilitating side-effects. Doctors are now taking a hard look at how they’ve used sedation–and rewriting the...

Democrats kept control of the US Senate in November’s midterm elections. So why is the political world so obsessed with who’ll win Tuesday’s Senate runoff election in Georgia between Democrat Raphael Warnock and Republican Herschel Walker? Bloomberg’s US politics editor Mario Parker, White House correspondent Nancy Cook and National editor Craig Gordon join Wes to answer that question–and explain...

Senior executive editor John Liu joins Wes from Beijing to talk about the protests happening across China, as anger at the government’s Covid Zero policy boils over. John walks through why and how the demonstrations began, what the government is doing to tamp them down and what he saw and heard on the streets. Learn more about this story: https://bloom.bg/3H5cVNt   Listen to The Big Take podcast e...

Online gambling is enormously popular in the UK. Millions of people spend hours a day playing  catchy games on their phones that keep them spinning–even when they’re losing big. No surprise that online gambling addiction is a serious issue. Now, some US states are loosening their gambling laws. And with it comes concerns that the problems gamblers in the UK are experiencing will soon play out on a...

A heads up: This episode is on a difficult subject and some of it isn’t easy to listen to. You might want to listen with headphones if children are nearby. In just a few short years, TikTok has become as ubiquitous as Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. The brief videos and fun dance challenges that TikTok’s one billion users post on its app often become viral sensations.  But there’s a darker side t...

As China seeks to grow its economy and increase its global influence, it’s lending billions of dollars to help governments around the world fund big, expensive projects that otherwise would be out of reach. In Asia, Africa–and, notably, in Latin America, next door to the US.  That money could pay off politically, too, in the ongoing rivalry between Washington and Beijing.  For a look at China’s gl...

A good boss can make the difference between a job you love and one you can’t stand. Workers are more willing to suffer bad bosses when the job market is tight. But when they have choices–like now in the US–they’re quicker to demand better working conditions, or up and quit. One place taking notice of employee discontent: America’s business schools. Senior reporter Matthew Boyle joins this episode...

Green bonds are surging in popularity across the globe, as companies and governments want to show they’re investing in environmentally friendly projects–and people want to feel good about where they’re putting their money. The thing is, it’s not always easy to tell if a green bond is actually going toward a cleaner future–or if it’s mostly a marketing ploy. Aaron Rutkoff, Executive Editor at Bloom...

A growing number of workers at Apple Stores across the US believe the company they once loved to work for is changing–and they’re not happy about it. They say the famously low-key, no-pressure showcases for Apple’s products have turned into just another retail floor, where associates at some stores and technicians at the Genius Bar are expected to upsell customers–or encourage them to buy new devi...

Shein is one of the biggest fast-fashion brands in the world. Young women and girls film their “Shein hauls” for TikTok — showing off piles of trendy, cheap clothes they bought from the Chinese company. It’s on track this year for sales around $8 billion in the US alone. But a new investigation traces the origin of the cotton in some Shein clothing to the Xinjiang region of China, where the US and...