CEO turnover boom, Texas rejection, and white guy leadership victimhood (man feelings)

What this episode covers

Story of the Week (DR): Apple names John Ternus as CEO to replace Tim Cook, who will become chairman Apple CEO Tim Cook is stepping down Meet John Ternus, the 51-year-old former swimming champ who will succeed Tim Cook as Apple CEO Tim Cook to step down as Apple CEO. In letter, describes 15 years of emails Tim Cook’s exit is part of a CEO reckoning sweeping Corporate America Are internal CEOs the way to go? Best Buy taps insider Jason Bonfig as new CEO, Corie Barry steps down She’s actually leaving the board Lululemon names former Nike exec Heidi O'Neill as CEO MM Lululemon CEO Pick Heidi O’Neill Faces Skeptical Wall Street AND Lululemon shares dive on new CEO pick — as investors fear she may not have chops to save struggling company O’Neill brings more than 30 years of experience in performance apparel, footwear, and sports, including over 25 years at Nike, where she was credited with transforming their women’s business from a side-project into a global juggernaut. Her leadership spanned product creation, brand strategy, marketing, and global operations, making her one of the most influential executives in the company’s modern era. Most recently, she served as President, Consumer, Product & Brand, overseeing Nike’s global consumer and product engine Golden hello: $7M equity, $2M cash Roughly 75% of Lululemon’s customers are women Lululemon board: 7 of 11 F Chair Martha Morfitt Committees: Audit: 2 of 3 F, including chair Nomination: 3 of 5 Pay: 3 of 5 F, including chair Also: CFO, Chief Merchandising Officer, Chief People & Culture Officer, Chief Legal and Compliance Officer, Chief Brand & Product Activation Officer Now we get why Chip is so mad: Chip Wilson, Lululemon’s founder, largest shareholder and chief agitator, has not weighed in on the pick yet, although he previously advocated for waiting to name a new CEO until the board could be reset Best Buy taps insider Jason Bonfig as new CEO, Corie Barry steps down Best Buy taps insider Bonfig to succeed veteran Barry as CEO amid demand slowdown Oil giant BP suffers shareholder revolt over climate transparency at tense AGM “BP suffered a shareholder revolt at its AGM over the election of a new chair and resolutions that included dropping some climate disclosure obligations” BP failed to get majority shareholder approval on two highly anticipated motions, which would have permitted online-only AGMs and retired two company-specific climate disclosure obligations. Each resolution received around 47% support, far short of the required 75% required to pass. Ahead of the AGM, BP’s board blocked a motion tabled by Follow This that would have required the company to share plans on creating value for shareholders under future scenarios of falling oil and gas demand. Resolution 1: Annual Report and Accounts – 98% For / 2% Against Resolution 2: Directors' remuneration report – 95% For / 5% Against Resolution 3: Directors' remuneration policy – 95% For / 5% Against Resolution 4: To elect Albert Manifold as a director – 82% For / 18% Against Some activist investors had said even a 5% vote against Manifold, who has only been in post as chair since October, would represent a severe reprimand, particularly after a historic 24% vote against outgoing chair Helge Lund last year. Resolution 5: To elect Meg O'Neill as a director – 97% For / 3% Against Resolution 6: To re-elect Kate Thomson as a director – 96% For / 4% Against Resolution 7: To re-elect Dame Amanda Blanc as a director – 95% For / 5% Against Resolution 8: To re-elect Tushar Morzaria as a director – 96% For / 4% Against Resolution 9: To re-elect Ian Tyler as a director – 96% For / 4% Against Resolution 10: To re-elect Satish Pai as a director – 92% For / 8% Against Resolution 11: To re-elect Dr Johannes Teyssen as a director – 89% For / 11% Against Resolution 12: To re-elect Hina Nagarajan as a director – 96% For / 4% Against Resolution 13: To elect Dave Hager as a director – 97% For / 3% Against Resolution 14: Reappointment of auditor – 100% For / 0% Against Resolution 15: Remuneration of auditor – 100% For / 0% Against Resolution 16: Political donations and political expenditure – 98% For / 2% Against Resolution 17: Directors' authority to allot shares – 96% For / 4% Against Resolution 18: Special resolution: Authority for disapplication of pre-emption rights – 99% For / 1% Against Resolution 19: Special resolution: Additional authority for disapplication of pre-emption rights – 99% For / 1% Against Resolution 20: Special resolution: Share buyback – 100% For / 0% Against Resolution 21: Special resolution: Notice of general meetings – 94% For / 6% Against Resolution 22: Special resolution: New Articles of Association – 47% For / 53% Against Resolution 23: Special resolution: Revocation of previous 2015 and 2019 resolutions – 47% For / 53% Against Resolution 24: Special resolution: ACCR shareholder resolution – 26% For / 74% Against Netflix authorizes $25 billion share buyback after stock drop Populist Math Time: Employees: As of 2026, Netflix employs roughly 16,000 people. If you took that $25 billion and distributed it directly to the workforce = $1,562,500 per employee Alternatively: They could fund a $100,000 annual salary for 250,000 new people for an entire year. Customers: Netflix has roughly 325 million subscribers globally. If they decided to use that money to subsidize the service instead of buying back stock: $77 per person. Netflix could give every subscriber on the planet roughly 4 to 5 months of service for free. Or, they could lower the price of every subscription by about $6.40 per month for a full year. Social impact: Various estimates (including from HUD) suggest that ending homelessness in the US would cost roughly $20 billion to $30 billion. It could provide a full four-year scholarship (at an average cost of $100k total) to 250,000 students. It could fund the eradication of several neglected tropical diseases or provide clean water infrastructure for tens of millions of people globally. For perspective, the entire annual budget for NASA in 2025 was around $25 billion. Netflix is essentially spending one "National Space Program" worth of cash just to tweak its stock price. Shareholders: If Netflix successfully retires that 6.4% of shares and the market maintains its current valuation, the stock price should mathematically rise by about 7% to compensate for the reduced supply. If the price jumps 7% (from $93 to roughly $99.50), here is the wealth jump: Vanguard: $2.5B BlackRock: $2.1B Fidelity: $1.4B Reed Hastings: $138M Goodliest of the Week (MM/DR): DR: Lufthansa Cuts 20,000 Flights to Save Fuel Amid Iran War Price Surge MM: The Onion Says It Has Again Struck a Deal to Take Over Infowars MM: Texas Capital stays incorporated in Delaware after shareholders reject 'Dexit' vote Are investors waking up??? They rejected TEXAS CAPITAL redomestication to TEXAS! Assholiest of the Week (MM): White guy victimhood DR ‘The disfavored groups, No. 1, obviously, would be white males’: Ron DeSantis is still signing anti-DEI legislation White males are… 70% of governors 70% of congress 60% of US corporate boards 31% of US population What percentage of DEI programs for companies were designed by white male CEOs? 90% of CEOs in Fortune 500 are white guys - so ALL OF THEM So when we read: White House study says DEI policies cost US economy by promoting unqualified managers… Even if the premise and math and methodology and concepts are literally all make believe, we SHOULD take away that “white men pretending to do DEI are bad for the economy” right? Federal Job Cuts Hit Black Women Hard—a Year Later, Unemployment Is Up Donald Trump 'Honours' UGA Women's Tennis Champions With Bizarre Photo Featuring Only Men In The Foreground The anti DEI, white male victimhood movement should entirely OWN DEI itself - this is the great blame transfer - somehow manage to blame black women and gays for the fact that white men running the world instituted shitty policies not meant to distribute equal opportunity, just meant for press releases - anti DEI is actually anti white male leaders. Make every company CEO a black woman and then see what DEI looks like White guy manifestos Palantir published a mini manifesto calling some cultures ‘harmful’ and ‘middling’ and said Silicon Valley has ‘a moral debt’ to the U.S. Why are tech bros so insistent we listen to everything they think? Were you not listened to as a child? Did no one ever validate you? Is this just about sex? Could you not get laid, and now because you have money you need to get everything you ever thought off your chest? Here are snippets of what Alex Karp, man who couldn’t get laid, thought so important that we know: The postwar neutering of Germany and Japan must be undone. The culture almost snickers at Musk’s interest in grand narrative, as if billionaires ought to simply stay in their lane of enriching themselves . . . . Any curiosity or genuine interest in the value of what he has created is essentially dismissed, or perhaps lurks from beneath a thinly veiled scorn. The ruthless exposure of the private lives of public figures drives far too much talent away from government service. Man who exposes private lives as a business model says it’s bad We, in America and more broadly the West, have for the past half century resisted defining national cultures in the name of inclusivity. All very important points from a man we should clearly listen to about everything - the lane I want you to stay in is “shut the fuck up” lane where, BECAUSE you have billions, I’m not forced to listen to you as if you matter White guy philanthropy Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sánchez Bezos Donate $34 Million in Fashion Grants MacKenzie Scott’s latest donation takes her HBCU giving to well over $1 billion MacKenzie Scott has donated more than $26 billion—but it’s barely made a dent in her net worth because of the power of Amazon shares Headliniest of the Week DR: The blowhards: Sam Altman opens up about the Molotov cocktail attack on his home: 'The way Anthropic talks about OpenAI doesn't help' Nvidia CEO says that AI agents will make workers busier than ever—they’ll ‘harass’ and ‘micromanage’ you, instead of take your job McDonald's boss on abuse claims: 'I don't want to talk about the past' Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang says you won’t lose your job to AI—you’ll lose it to your coworker who uses it ‘I think it’s a mistake’: Delta CEO Ed Bastian refuses to call it ‘artificial intelligence’ because it scares people AI will boost productivity so ServiceNow won't have to backfill open jobs, CEO says DR: The Nutter Chutter Butter Double: Morgan Stanley biotech banker Jessica Chutter joins Tectonic board AND Tectonic Therapeutic Appoints Jessica Chutter to Board of Directors I screwed up: blanked and thought that was two different companies. But then I did 3 seconds of research and found that she had joined a second board: PTC Therapeutics on March 24, 2026. MM: Apple’s New CEO Needs to Be a ‘Cowboy’ — But Can He With Tim Cook Still There? MM: SEC Imposes Strict Nine-Year Cap on Independent Directors Phillipines Who Won the Week? DR: Jessica Chutter MM: The Philippines, whose corporate boards will no longer be allowed to have Edward Sylvester of WestAmerica Bancorp, born in 1938 and on the board for 47 years Predictions DR: Nobody ever talks about Jason Bonfig MM: Edward Sylvester steps down as Lead Independent Director of WestAmerica Bancorp to take the role of Non Executive Advisor to the Lead Independent Director Emeritus of WestAmerica Bancorp, says the rise of AI calls fresh blood on the board