SEC ❤️oil, Skydance ❤️ sexual harassment, and “masculine energy” company fails
Story of the Week (DR):Skydance Adds Bobby Kotick and Laurene Powell Jobs to Board, Taps Tony Blair as AdviserFormer Activision CEO Bobby Kotick Was Once Reviled by Gamers. Now He's Joining Skydance's Board of DirectorsThe crisis began in July 2021 when the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing (DFEH) sued Activision Blizzard, alleging a pervasive "frat boy" culture of rampant sexual harassment, discrimination, and retaliationInitially, Kotick and leadership claimed they were unaware of the severity of the issues or blamed them on a few bad actorsHowever, in November 2021, The Wall Street Journal published a bombshell investigation that squarely implicated Kotick. The report detailed several severe allegations:Concealing Misconduct: The report alleged that Kotick had known about multiple allegations of sexual misconduct and assault across the company for years. He reportedly failed to inform the board of directors about the severity of these claims, including alleged rapes and out-of-court settlements. Protecting Accused Executives: In one specific instance, the HR department recommended firing a co-head of the developer studio Treyarch after an investigation found he had sexually harassed a female employee. Kotick allegedly intervened and overruled HR to keep the executive at the company.Threatening an Assistant's Life: The report surfaced Kotick’s own history of alleged misconduct, including a 2006 incident where he left a voicemail threatening to have his assistant killed. A spokesperson for Kotick later admitted to the voicemail, claiming it was "hyperbolic" and noting that he had apologized and settled the matter out of court.Private Jet Lawsuit: The WSJ also reported on an incident involving a private jet Kotick co-owned, where a flight attendant claimed she was sexually harassed by the pilot. When she complained, Kotick allegedly told her he would ruin her financially.Kotick was never formally fired or removed by the board, instead his exit was orchestrated through a massive corporate buyout.Amid plummeting stock prices and reputational damage, Microsoft swept in to buy Activision Blizzard for nearly $69 billion in January 2022.Kotick officially stepped down in December 2023.Because he left as part of a successful merger rather than being fired for cause, he walked away with an enormous "golden parachute" payout, cashing out hundreds of millions of dollars in stock and severance packages. Anthropic Has Been Aggressively Lobbying the Vatican to Consider AI ConsciousnessAccording to new reporting from the New York Times, the company has for months been wining and dining religious scholars across the world in secret, NDA-secured meetings to convince them that AI models think and feel, too. Anthropic even reportedly went after the Pope.Christopher Olah, a cofounder and senior researcher at the Claude chatbot maker, aggressively lobbied the Vatican after learning Pope Leo XIV’s official position on AI, per the reporting.Christopher Olah: Canadian; studied mathematics at the University of Toronto for one year before dropping out to "support a friend accused of terrorism;" received a Thiel Fellowship in 2012; previously worked at Google and OpenAI; atheistSam Altman Warns Against 'Religious Force' in AI After Elon Musk's Grok Calls Jesus 'Son of God'OpenAI's Altman: Ascribing religion to models a "safety issue"'SEC Warns Activist Investors After Climate Push at Exxon Mobil, see Matt (1) MM DRStory of the Week (MM):OIL #1: SEC Warns Activist Investors After Climate Push at Exxon MobilReport of Investigation Pursuant to Section 21(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934:Climate Action 100+ and the Election of Directors at the May 2021 Annual Meeting ofExxonMobil CorporationIn the context of ExxonMobil’s 2021 director election, the investigation examined whether members of CA100 used the organization as a means of coordinating their votes to influence the outcome of the contested director election at the 2021 annual meetingThe evidence also suggested CA100 and its members pressured BlackRock and State Street to support CA100 ̶flagged matters submitted to a shareholder vote, including the May 2021 election of dissident directors to ExxonMobil’s board. On the other hand, Vanguard never became a member of CA100, and the investigation did not develop evidence that BlackRock or State Street agreed to vote proxies in certain manners or shared their proxy voting intentions with investors or others associated with CA100.Report goes on to say that Ceres pressure Blackrock and State Street (and conveniently ignores Vanguard, who also voted for Engine No 1 directors but DIDN’T join CA100) - but Blackrock only joins after GPIF pulls 25bn in assets (GPIF, not a Ceres member, a Japanese pension fund)Most of this report is an indictment of Mindy Lubber (retiring CEO of Ceres) and non profit culture, where they routinely overstate how important they are to change and their ability to actually create pressure - I worked there, they do shit all - they make noise and claim credit. My job was to “generate new investments in cleantech” - a non profit telling a multi trillion dollar asset manager how to allocate capital, pressure companies, or do due diligence, is fucking laughable.And the report says as much: the minutes also detail discussion between BlackRock and Ceres regarding the ExxonMobil board refresh campaign: “Talked about scoping good board candidates for Exxon campaign – [BlackRock] said there was ‘no chance that they would ever help us with that’.”The focus on convening non profits and the rescission of 14a-8 have one thing in common: protecting oil companies. According to MSCI data, from 2000 to 2026 there have been 15,425 shareholder proposals. That’s about 600 a year, targeting on average around 250 companies per year. Those are the LARGEST 250 companies on average - this is very much an S&P 500 issue. Scratch that - this is very much an OIL COMPANY issue. The top two US companies by shareholder proposals in the last 26 years are Exxon (222) and Chevron (160). Exxon has been so pissed, they diluted the board by increasing size and appointing their own directors, sued Arjuna Capital for a shareholder proposal (which Arjuna was legally allowed to file), and hired ATKINS HIMSELF as an advisorExxon was an Atkins’ CLIENT at Patomak and he owned at least $50k of the stock in his brokerage account according to his financial filingsOIL #2: To Block Solar Energy Projects, One Community Lumped Them in With Junkyards and Adult Bookstoresthere were 888 state and local laws restricting renewable energy across 48 states, according to Columbia Law School’s Sabin Center for Climate Change Law. The center’s database shows restrictions in more than 30 of Indiana’s 92 countiesMontgomery County is not one of them. Its limits are indirect, stemming from a comprehensive planning process in 2024 that includes wind and solar as undesirable land uses, based on focus groups with residents. The county’s list of undesirable uses also has junkyards, landfills and adult-oriented businesses, among othersMeanwhile, there are now 159 data centers in IndianaOIL #3:Oil Companies Are Begging the Supreme Court to Let Them Off the Hook For Climate ChangeAssholiest of the Week (MM/DR):DR: Kentucky bourbon CEO fired after lawsuit alleges hidden cameras recording family members, minors nude: report"The Board and leadership of TKC Distilling, the parent company of The Kentucky Castle and True Story Whiskey, have terminated the employment of CEO Wes Henderson, effective immediately, in light of allegations outlined in a recently filed lawsuit," Charity Bird, an attorney for TKC Distilling, said in a statement.the son of master distiller Lincoln HendersonKyle Henderson, one of Wes Henderson's sons, will take over as CEO of both The Kentucky Castle and True Story Whiskey while the board conducts a full and independent investigationOne of six sons: the entire leadership teamMM: Men (again)‘Masculine energy’ is costing companies billionsMark Zuckerberg told podcaster Joe Rogan that the corporate world needed more “masculine energy” and a culture that “celebrates the aggression a bit more.”Association of Certified Fraud Examiners’ 2024 global study of occupational fraud, men committed 75% of cases and caused higher losses: a median of $158,000 per case, versus $100,000 for women.In 2018, a Harvard Kennedy School study described work as a “masculinity contest” governed by four implicit norms: show no weakness, display strength and stamina, put work first, and treat colleagues as rivals. These researchers then created a survey to measure how strongly a workplace follows these norms. When scores were high, they found more toxic leadership, less psychological safety, more bullying and harassment, and more burnout and intention to quit.[...] The damage shows up in harassment settlements, legal fees, and workers’ compensation claimsHarvard Business School researchers analyzed data on some 50,000 workers and found that avoiding a toxic hire is worth $12,489 to a company, more than twice the amount that a top-1% performer brings in.On the flip side:In 2025, private education and healthcare, where women hold 77% of jobs, added around 800,000 positions while all other sectors combined lost about 500,000, according to this analysis of BLS dataGoodliest of the Week (MM/DR):DR: Diesel prices are rising worldwide. So are electric truck salesElectric trucks cost too much. California has a law for that: SB 1213 will force truck manufacturers to disclose data to curb price gouging — and open new state financing options to help fleets switch to cleaner vehiclesHonda plans highway test of tech that charges moving trucksMM: PepsiCo's fizz fades as GLP-1 drugs and activist investor Elliott's targets test its snack businessRunner up: NFL tells Supreme Court prediction markets are gambling and should be regulated by the statesBlowhardiest of the Week (MM/DR):DR: UFC CEO Dana White says it's 'impossible' to build a successful business while working from homeGitLab (DevOps & Software Platform): $10B (Public, NASDAQ); Scaled entirely from home offices across 65+ countries into a 1,500+ employee public companyAutomattic/WordPress (Web Infrastructure & Software): $8B; Built from home into a 1,900+ employee workforce across 90+ countries powering over 40% of the webZapier (Workflow Automation): $5B; Grown from co-founders' apartments into a fully remote unicorn powering billions of automated tasksToptal (Elite Tech Talent Marketplace): $1B; Built zero-office operations into a global marketplace connecting enterprise clients with top freelancersRemote.com (Global HR & Payroll Infrastructure): $3B; Scaled from home offices in under four years to manage global hiring and payroll infrastructureArticulate (E-Learning Authoring Tools): $4B; Operated completely remote from day one to supply training software to 100% of the Fortune 100InVision (Product Design Platform): $2B; Scaled to over 800 employees and 7 million users working entirely from home offices with no corporate HQMM: “Has No Friends”: Amazon Is Keeping Amazingly Detailed Records on Its Customers and They Are Downright Insultinghasn’t worn a medium size in anything in yearshas a stomach that hangs over their vaginaUses phone in the shower to read Kindle booksseasonal rotation of decorative goose outfitsbrunettes with musclescannot keep real plants alivehas flat buttocksHeadliniest of the WeekDR: Two-Thirds of Americans See Social Media as Harmful to Democracy64% believe it is bad for democracy87% say it makes people more easily manipulated by false information and rumors81% say it makes people more politically divided70% of the U.S. population actively uses social mediaFor younger demographics, adoption is closer to 99%The average internet user actively maintains accounts across an average of 6.8 different social media platforms63% to 71% of Americans oppose the construction of AI data centers in their local communities70% of Americans believe tech companies and their billionaire executives hold "too much power" over political discourse, policy, and daily life66% hold an unfavorable view of Mark Zuckerberg76% of Democrats/60% of RepublicansMM: Teenage AI Meat Proxy Stranded on “Widowmaker” Mountain After Following AI InstructionsWho Won the Week?DR: Bobby K.MM: Bobby Kotick - after being sued for failing to police a culture of harassment and assault (and settling), never informing his board, and being fully aware of the problem, he failed up to a job on the Skydance board!PredictionsDR: Tony Blair gets blamed for something “woke” at Skydance; Laurene Powell Jobs gets blamed for something “DEI.”MM: Amazon’s shopper preferences for Bobby Kotick will now read a preference for “beer coozies”, “inappropriate hot tub behavior”, and “CSI Las Vegas”
