Matt Levine - Wall Street’s Art Critic - [Making Media, EP.35]

Making Media

Today we speak with the Wall Street Wonder, Matt Levine. Matt's Bloomberg column, Money Stuff, has become a must read for most of the finance community. It's that rare place where you get laughter, learning, and complex topics. During the conversation, we talk with Matt about his ability to translate those complex topics, how his early legal career at Wachtell Lipton, and then his banking career at Goldman Sachs have played a role in his success, and we cover a ton of topics in terms of what's going on in the markets today - the overall regulatory structure and some very abstract questions. Please enjoy this conversation with Matt Levine.

For the full show notes, transcript, and links to the best content to learn more, check out the episode page here.

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Show Notes

(00:01:51) - (First question) - Today's regulatory efficiency versus history

(00:07:26) - The area of finance he would like to investigate the most

(00:09:39) - The access he has to both public and private finance for his articles

(00:10:21) - His relationship with his readers

(00:11:08) - Responses from the individuals he writes his columns about

(00:12:24) - Legalization of unregulated activities making for the most interesting articles

(00:14:31) - His reason for defending finance and banks

(00:17:19) - His view on whether derivatives around financial securities are a net positive

(00:18:22) - His view on himself and how he would categories what he does

(00:19:16) - What it’s like being an opinion writer for Bloomberg

(00:21:35) - His view on large companies owning individual writers IP’s

(00:25:24) - Twitter's relevance in today's society and its continued impact on social culture

(00:26:39) - Replacements for Twitter and where journalists look for interesting writing topics

(00:27:28) - Topics he feels trapped into writing about due to their popularity

(00:30:27) - His knowledge of special purpose acquisition companies or SPACs

(00:31:52) - His perspective on the fallout from SPACs

(00:35:34) - His process on researching topics he finds most interesting to write about

(00:37:00) - Strategies he uses to choose topics he wants to write about

(00:37:51) - The moment he knew readers were interested in his opinions

(00:39:25) - Analytics and the importance of how his columns perform

(00:41:03) - Performance reviews he receives from Bloomberg

(00:42:02) - How writing columns has detached him from his previous financial careers

(00:43:24) - His future in writing and whether he plans to change or expand his endeavors

(00:44:56) - Harnessing the power of his readers and expanding his reach with media

(00:46:33) - The transition from traditional media career paths to creator-led career paths

(00:50:28) - Debrief