Slate Money - The Index Fund Problemtunity
Slate News
Slate Podcasts
4.5 • 6K Ratings
🗓️ 6 June 2026
⏱️ 47 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week: Google’s parent company announced an unexpected move to raise $80 billion for their AI ventures. Felix Salmon, Elizabeth Spiers, and guest host Mary Childs– host of the new show Mary in America–discuss the logic behind Alphabet's stock-based fundraise, which includes a $10 billion share sale to Berkshire-Hathaway. Then, Mary explains why it’s getting harder for investors to avoid exposure to AI thanks to the index funds who are bending their rules for companies like SpaceX. And finally, they examine why Spain’s unemployment rate has dropped significantly and what that tells us about the relationship between immigration and the labor market.
In the Slate Plus episode: Is “f— you” money a myth?
Want to hear that discussion and hear more Slate Money? Join Slate Plus to unlock weekly bonus episodes. Plus, you’ll access ad-free listening across all your favorite Slate podcasts. You can subscribe directly from the Slate Money show page on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Or, visit slate.com/moneyplus to get access wherever you listen.
Podcast production by Jessamine Molli and Cheyna Roth.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Hello! |
| 0:07.0 | Hello! |
| 0:10.0 | Did I do good? |
| 0:11.7 | You did good. |
| 0:12.9 | Mary Childs, who are we? |
| 0:14.5 | What is the name of the show that we are welcoming people to? |
| 0:17.9 | Mary in America. |
| 0:19.1 | No, it's Slate Money. |
| 0:21.1 | What if I did a hostile takeover? |
| 0:22.9 | I am Felix Sam and Bloomberg. |
| 0:24.9 | I don't know how much longer I'm going to be hosting this show because Mary Childs is doing |
| 0:29.2 | hostile takeover thing. |
| 0:30.4 | Elizabeth Spires is here as well. |
| 0:32.2 | Hello. |
| 0:32.9 | Mary Charles, of course, lovely friend of the show, stepping in for Emily Peck this week, who is doing |
| 0:38.7 | an Axios retreat in Washington. I am a knockoff Emily Peck today. And we are going to have some |
| 0:43.8 | awesome discussions, very up Mary's Alley, about stock and bond and that kind of stuff. We're |
| 0:49.7 | going to talk about the equity issuance that Alphabet just did. We're going to talk about employment and what |
| 0:56.8 | happens to it when you increase immigration. We are going to have a Slate Plus segment on |
| 1:02.1 | fuck you money and whether it exists. Mary in America is performing a hostile takeover of slate money. |
| 1:09.1 | So subscribe to that and stay tuned because lots of fun stuff is coming up on Slate Money. |
| 1:26.3 | So in an inversion of the usual slate money-ness, I am going to start with the number, which is $250 billion, which is more or less the amount of money that is going to be raised in fresh equity market issuance from AI type people this year. |
... |
Transcript will be available on the free plan in 26 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Slate Podcasts, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Slate Podcasts and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.