Latest Interviews
Showing 166–180 of 1,089 transcripts.
Clear all filters- Milken Institute58 min
Balance Sheet: The US Government Budget and National Debt | Global Conference 2025
Josh Barro, Maya MacGuineas, Steven T. Mnuchin, Paul Ryan, Alan Schwartz, Phillip Swagel, David Malani
A panel of economic experts and former officials projected that U.S. deficits will reach 8% of GDP within four years, driven by expiring tax provisions, rising interest costs, and an inflexible entitlement system facing insolvency by 2033. While policy proposals ranging from Value Added Taxes to sovereign wealth funds were debated, participants warned that political gridlock and current IRS reductions will likely delay necessary structural reform until a market crisis forces action. The discussion highlighted a potential erosion of dollar hegemony due to rising borrowing costs and foreign diversification, urging the creation of a bipartisan fiscal commission with enforcement powers to prevent a long-term debt spiral.
- Milken Institute14 min
A Conversation with US Secretary of Education Linda McMahon | Global Conference 2025
Appointee Linda McMahon, drawing on her business leadership background, has launched federal investigations into universities over civil rights compliance while initiating a strategic plan to dismantle the Department of Education by shifting authority to states and families. This agenda includes increasing charter school funding, integrating artificial intelligence into curricula, and prioritizing workforce development to reduce reliance on four-year degrees. Although the full elimination of the department requires congressional approval, the current administration has already cut major data collection budgets and redirected resources toward parental choice and local control.
- Milken Institute57 min
Macroeconomic Outlook | Global Conference 2025
Gregory Zuckerman, Khalid Al-Falih, André Esteves, Karen Karniol Tambour, Kathryn Koch, Ron O'Hanley
Leading financial experts analyze the convergence of political volatility, trade uncertainty, and shifting geopolitical alignments that are driving a global reevaluation of U.S. exceptionalism and prompting investors to diversify into Asian markets, the UK, and the Middle East. The panel highlights critical macroeconomic headwinds, including a "baked-in" recession risk and a Federal Reserve constrained by tariff-induced inflation, which are forcing a repricing of Treasury yields and exposing vulnerabilities in risk assets. Amidst these challenges, private credit emerges as a vital, though stress-tested, innovation for risk dispersion, while advocates for conservative lending strategies and active management position themselves to capitalize on the expected rise in defaults and liquidity dislocations.
- Milken Institute51 min
Author Talk: Jonathan Haidt, "The Anxious Generation" | Global Conference 2025
Jonathan Haidt, Jennifer Siebel Newsom, Conrad Kieschel
At the Milken Institute Global Conference, social psychologists Jonathan Haidt and California First Lady Jennifer Siebel Newsom addressed the youth mental health crisis by identifying the 2012 shift to smartphones as the primary driver of surging depression, anxiety, and social skill atrophy among teenagers. They advocated for four specific policy norms—delaying smartphone access until high school, mandating phone-free schools, raising the age of internet adulthood to 16, and promoting unsupervised free play—to counter the addictive designs of tech giants and facilitate proper neurodevelopment. The session concluded with a call for collective community action and a "mother's rebellion" to enforce these boundaries, aiming to restore physical interaction and resilience for future generations.
- Milken Institute1h 0m
Green or Gray: What's Next for Transportation? | Global Conference 2025
Susan Li, Adam Goldstein, Nina Hachigian, Alex Israel, Mark Morelli, Will Thompson
Industry leaders including Mark Morelli of Circle K and Will Thompson of Barclays convened to analyze the severe financial and operational headwinds facing the U.S. mobility sector, such as projected tariff losses for Ford and GM and a critical $400 billion grid infrastructure gap. The panel debated divergent paths forward, ranging from China's state-subsidized pricing advantages to the necessity of multi-fuel strategies and a "technological war" for AI dominance in defense and electric vehicle manufacturing. While consensus emerged that autonomous fleet deployment and EV charging profitability will likely materialize within two to three years, stakeholders uniformly dismissed the 2035 total electrification mandate as unrealistic given current fleet turnover rates and transmission constraints.
- Milken Institute1h 0m
The Global Landscape and Opportunities for Medical Breakthroughs | Global Conference 2025
Usha Lee McFarling, Jay Bradner, Doug Drysdale, Neil Kumar, Alice Pomponio, Grant Verstandig
Biomedicine leaders from BridgeBio, Amgen, and Zephyr AI outlined a strategy to accelerate the industry from discovery to commercialization by leveraging precision diagnostics, population-scale genetics, and AI-driven protein folding to overcome the "valley of death." While startups like Saiban pioneer high-efficacy mental health treatments and the American Cancer Society launches "BrightEdge" to blend venture capital with donor funds, panelists warned that eroding NIH funding threatens this innovation ecosystem. The discussion emphasized that sustaining global competitiveness requires public-private partnerships to fund basic research and expand diverse genomic databases beyond Western populations.
- Milken Institute56 min
Aging Societies: Opportunities amid Challenges | Global Conference 2025
Maneet Ahuja, Cynthia Hardy Maasry, Ted Koenig, Timothy Lyne, Andrew Milgram, Cynthia Masry, Tim Line
Panelists Andrew Milgram, Ted Koenig, and Tim Line characterize the current economic landscape as a technical recession driven by tariff uncertainty and wage compression, resulting in middle-market EBITDA margins near 5-6% and bankruptcy filings at 14-year highs. The institutional focus is shifting as non-bank lenders now execute 90% of leveraged finance while private equity capital flows toward private credit to navigate declining deal valuations and extended hold periods. Experts forecast a tepid 2025 followed by a recovery in 2026 and 2027, with lenders increasingly prepared to act as permanent owners of distressed assets through robust restructuring capabilities.
- Milken Institute54 min
The Future of Venture Capital: AI, IPOs, and Tech Investment | Global Conference 2025
Romaine Bostick, Raj Ganguly, Amir Husain, Dana Settle, Hemant Taneja
Venture capital leaders from B Capital, General Catalyst, and Greycroft discuss a strategic pivot away from the stalled IPO market toward inorganic growth and M&A as primary exit routes. The panel emphasizes that firms must evolve into "AI-native" entities to navigate geopolitical supply chain shifts and address liquidity constraints for the "long tail" of private companies. With a focus on deep industry transformation over application-layer speculation, investors are prioritizing technically elite founders capable of driving efficiency in hardware, robotics, and healthcare sectors.
- Milken Institute59 min
Charting the Rise of the Podcast Economy | Global Conference 2025
Jamie Patricof, Jessica Cordova Kramer, Mary Alice Haney, Josh Lindgren, Hernan Lopez, Ben Meiselas
Industry leaders define the evolving podcast ecosystem as a dissolving convergence of audio and video formats, evidenced by major market shifts such as PodX's acquisition of Lemonada and the Golden Globes' addition of "Best Podcast" awards for 2026. Economic analysis projects the global industry to reach $7.3 billion in 2024, driven by a 30% revenue share from consumer subscriptions and a migration of high-profile talent away from legacy cable networks toward independent production. While generative AI serves primarily as a localization and editing tool to expand global reach, the sector faces upcoming challenges regarding standardized cross-platform metrics and the preservation of entry-level job pipelines amidst these technological and media mergers.
- Milken Institute1h 2m
Institutional Investors: Charting the Course | Global Conference 2025
Christopher Ailman, Justin Barton, Jenny Chan, Edwin Denson, Jonathan Glidden, Guadalupe Rodriguez, Chris
Representatives from the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, the State of Wisconsin Investment Board, Delta Airlines, the UCLA Foundation, and a single family office convened to discuss how their distinct balance sheets and liabilities shape divergent capital allocation strategies. While SWIB and UCLA maintain long-term horizons and increased non-U.S. equity exposure, Delta prioritizes de-risking and liquidity management within its pension structures amidst a shifting macro environment. The panelists collectively signaled a cautious stance toward private market pricing and hedge fund correlation, anticipating stagflation and regulatory volatility that will likely dictate 2025 investment flows and secondary market activity.
- Milken Institute59 min
AI Leadership: Business Aspirations and Value Propositions | Global Conference 2025
Julia Boorstin, Aparna Chennapragada, Francis deSouza, Arianna Huffington, Clara Shih, Matt Wood
Moderated by CNBC's Julia Boorstin at the Milken Institute Global Conference, industry leaders from Meta, Microsoft, Google, PwC, and Thrive Global characterized AI as a transformative inflection point comparable to electricity rather than an incremental tool. The panel detailed rapid enterprise adoption, noting that AI now generates over 30% of code at Google and drives revenue growth for cloud providers, while predicting a shift toward an agent-to-agent economy where human roles evolve from task execution to orchestration. Ultimately, the discussion emphasized a dual strategy of accelerating innovation while establishing governance frameworks to mitigate risks such as disinformation and bias, forecasting a future where AI expands human capabilities across healthcare, science, and lean "frontier" business models.
- Milken Institute58 min
AI and Digital Transformation's Impact on Investing | Global Conference 2025
David Steinberg, Jim Breyer, Dipanjan "DJ" Deb, Greg Emerson, Dennis Gada, Jodie Wallis, Shanali Basak
A panel of industry leaders including Jodi, Dennis, DJ, Greg, and Jim established a consensus that organizations must adopt a hybrid "build, buy, and partner" strategy, favoring external foundational models while retaining in-house development for specific strategic assets. The discussion highlighted acute shortages of top-tier mathematical talent and warned of critical risks ranging from quantum decryption threats to deepfake fraud, necessitating robust, materiality-based governance frameworks. Looking forward, experts predicted AI will act as a catalyst for enterprise transformation and private equity value creation, though they cautioned that true value lies in revenue growth rather than mere productivity gains or marketing hype.
- Milken Institute1h 1m
Investing in Ukraine's Future | Global Conference 2025
Gillian Tett, Philip Bennett, Xavier Bettel, Wladimir Klitschko, Oleksandra Matviichuk, Yuriy Vitrenko
Panelists project a realistic three-year timeline for a peace deal, noting that Russia currently holds the initiative on ceasefire negotiations while Ukraine leverages its strengthened drone production. Key figures including Deputy Prime Minister Xavier Bettel and former Naftogaz CEO Yuri Vitrenko confirmed a U.S.-Ukraine minerals deal that aims to secure investment and serve as a precursor to an armistice, though legal complexities regarding Russian frozen assets remain a significant hurdle. Simultaneously, Nobel laureate Alla Aleksandr warned of impending impunity if war crimes are not prosecuted through a Special Tribunal, while the EBRD outlined a strategy to scale reconstruction investments to billions annually despite total costs estimated at $700 billion.
- Milken Institute59 min
Energy Transition to Energy Addition | Global Conference 2025
Daniel Yergin, Mohammad Abunayyan, Mohamed Al Hammadi, Ana Cabral Gardner, Amos Hochstein, Vineet Mittal
A high-level panel of energy leaders and policymakers warns that global energy discourse has pivoted from "transition" to "addition" as AI-driven demand accelerates, exposing critical bottlenecks in grid infrastructure and supply chain resilience. Key figures from the US, Middle East, India, and mining sectors agree that meeting these surging needs requires a diversified portfolio combining nuclear baseload, natural gas, and renewables while avoiding a "race to the bottom" in critical mineral standards. Strategic outcomes emphasize immediate investment in grid modernization, off-grid data center solutions, and an "alliance network" to decouple from single-source dependencies without triggering geopolitical isolation.
- Milken Institute49 min
Author Talk: Kevin Kwan, "Lies and Weddings" | Global Conference 2025
Kevin Kwan, Curtis S. Chin, Chris Tucker, Tiana, John Panatti
Author Kevin Kwan returns to the Milken Institute Global Conference to discuss his latest novel, *Lies in Weddings*, which uses a family drama format to critique intergenerational wealth inequality and racial stereotypes. Kwan outlines the stalled progress of the *Crazy Rich Asians* film sequels while detailing the active development of an HBO Max series, a Broadway musical, and new film adaptations of his other works. He concludes by advocating for underrepresented creators to own production infrastructure to sustain diverse storytelling and shares insights on his upcoming film projects and new literary directions.