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Squawk Pod

5 Things to Know Before the Opening Bell 1/12/26

Squawk Pod

CNBC

Business News, News, Investing, Business

4.2543 Ratings

🗓️ 12 January 2026

⏱️ 2 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The White House is threatening to indict Federal Reserve Chair Jay Powell over comments he made to Congress about a renovation at Fed headquarters, Allegiant Air is acquiring Sun Country Airlines in a $1.1B deal, a Senate committee investigation says UnitedHealth deployed aggressive payment-boosting tactics, Walmart and Google are teaming up on AI-assisted shopping, and the FCC has approved a request from Starlink to deploy another 7,500 satellites. Squawk Box is hosted by Joe Kernen, Becky Quick and Andrew Ross Sorkin. Follow Squawk Pod for the best moments, interviews and analysis from our TV show in an audio-first format.

Transcript

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0:00.0

Hi, I'm Andrew Ross Sorkin, co-host of Squawk Box, and this is five things to know before today's

0:07.3

opening bell. The White House threatening to indict Fed Chair Jay Powell. So for comments that he made to

0:12.9

Congress about a renovation project at the Fed in a video statement last night, Powell framed the

0:17.8

move as an assault on the Fed's independence.

0:26.9

Meantime, low-cost airline, a Legion acquiring Sun Country Airlines in a $1.1 billion cash in stock deal.

0:28.6

And a Senate committee investigating United Health says the company deployed aggressive tactics

0:32.8

to collect payment-boosting diagnoses for its Medicare Advantage members.

0:37.7

That's according to a Wall Street Journal report that says the Senate investigation found that

0:41.9

United Health turned risk adjustments into a business which was not the original intent.

0:46.8

The insurer is now facing multiple probes into its practices.

0:50.6

And Walmart and Google are teaming up on an AI shopping program.

0:54.2

Customers will be able to use AI Assistant Gemini to discover and buy products from Walmart and Sam's Club as well.

1:01.2

And then the FCC approving a request from SpaceX to deploy another 7500 Starlink satellites.

1:08.3

That'll bring its total to 15,000 satellites in the skies worldwide.

1:13.6

We're going to be back later today with an all-new Squawk pod, our daily podcast,

1:17.6

featuring the best of SquackBox.

1:19.4

Check it out wherever you get your podcast and listen anytime.

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