BP’s new CEO (and failed ex-chair), nepo tantrum at WBD, tech bros say life’s not worth it

Story of the Week (DR):

1. Embattled BP replaces CEO, naming Woodside Energy chief as first-ever woman leader of a Big Oil giant MM

1. BP names new CEO — its fourth in 6 years

1. O’Neill will replace Murray Auchincloss, after less than two years in the role.

2. BP’s C-suite milestone: Women in both the CEO and CFO seats

1. Melody Meyer: Chair of the safety and sustainability committee

2. Dame Amanda Blanc: Senior independent director 

3. Interim CEO Carol Howle

4. CFO Kate Thomson

5. Emma Delaney: EVP, customers & products

6. Kerry Dryburgh - EVP, people, culture & communications and chief human resources and communications officer 

7. *Emeka Emembolu: EVP, technology

8. *William Lin - EVP, gas & low carbon energy

9. 2 of 8 white dude leadership

3. Even after Pamela Daley stepped down in July, still 43% female board influence

4. Meg O’Neill: ‘hard-nosed’ outsider who will head BP’s pivot away from green energy

1. First female appointment to a major oil company has faced fierce resistance from climate activists as boss of Woodside

1. 43% female board influence at Woodside

5. Carol Howle, current executive vice president, supply, trading & shipping of bp, will serve as interim CEO until Meg joins as CEO.

6. BP 'woke' agenda axed as it hires first female chief exec and doubles down on fossil fuels

2. Warner Bros Discovery board rejects rival bid from Paramount

1. WBD’s board of directors (chaired by Samuel Di Piazza Jr.) has unanimously rejected the Paramount tender as inferior and risky, urging shareholders to reject it and uphold the Netflix transaction instead.

2. David Ellison pulled the dad card early on

1. Right after WBD rejected one of multiple secret bids in September, David Ellison called Warner Bros. CEO David Zaslav to request that Zaslav meet with his father, Larry Ellison. The conventional wisdom was that the Oracle cofounder's billions would prevail. In the end, that didn't happen. WBD expressed concern that the bid relied on a revocable trust, whose assets or liabilities were subject to change.

3. A zealous Paramount pulled out all the stops to woo Zaslav

1. We already knew Zaslav stood to make over $500 million from a Paramount deal, based mainly on his shares that would vest immediately after it closed ($567,712,631, to be exact, according to the filing). Zaslav told the WBD board that the Ellisons had "indicated to him that" if a deal went through, he would "receive a compensation package worth several hundred million dollars," per the filing. Zaslav responded that it "would be inappropriate to discuss any such arrangements at that time," he told the board.

2. Paramount also offered Zaslav the position of co-CEO and co-chairman of the combined company, a role Netflix didn't offer, the filing said.

3. That runs contrary to the narrative put forth in a letter Paramount's attorneys at Quinn Emanuel sent to WBD, stating they suspected the process was biased in favor of Netflix due to WBD leadership's expectations that there could be roles for them at the new company. Paramount's legal and financial advisors didn't know about the "December 3 Quinn Emanuel" letter and, in their view, the letter should not have been sent, was "not helpful," and was a "mistake," the filing says.

3. TikTok signs agreement to create new U.S. joint venture

1. TikTok has signed binding agreements with investors including Oracle, Silver Lake and MGX for the sale of its US arm, creating a joint venture as part of a deal orchestrated by President Donald Trump.

2. The U.S. joint venture will be 50% held by a consortium of new investors, including Larry Ellison’s Oracle, Silver Lake and Abu Dhabi’s MGX, with 15% each. Just over 30% will be held by affiliates of certain existing investors of ByteDance, and almost 20% will be retained by ByteDance

4. House Democrats release more Epstein photos, including Bill Gates and a dinner full of wealthy philanthropists

1. Donald Trump

2. Bill Clinton 

3. Bill Gates – Microsoft co-founder

4. Sergey Brin – Google co-founder

5. Richard Branson – Virgin Group founder

6. Larry Summers – Economist, Harvard President, OpenAI director

7. Salar Kamangar – Former YouTube CEO 

8. Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem — Emirati businessman; Chair/CEO of DP World

9. Les Wexner — Founder of L Brands

10. Leon Black — co-founder and former CEO of Apollo Global Management

11. Tom Pritzker — Executive Chair Hyatt Hotels

12. Glenn Dubin — Hedge fund manager Dubin & Co.; co-founder of Highbridge Capital Management 

13. Ron Baron — Founder & chairman of Baron Capital Management

14. Josh Harris — co-founder of Apollo Global Management and managing partner of Philadelphia 76ers, New Jersey Devils, and Washington Commanders

15. Ariane de Rothschild — Wealthy banking heir; CEO of Edmond de Rothschild Group

Goodliest of the Week (MM/DR):

1. DR: Canada to Launch Sustainable Investment Taxonomy in 2026

1. According to the government, the new taxonomy will provide a set of criteria for the identification of investments that are eligible for a “green” or “transition” investment label, enabling companies to issue green or transition bonds, and investors to evaluate the credibility of sustainable investment products.

2. MM: Tesla’s having a good time at the DMV

1. California won the right to ban sales of Tesla vehicles in the state due to false advertising about “self driving cars”

3. MM: Walmart’s women truckers surge thanks to $115,000 starting pay and other perks bringing in nontraditional candidates

Assholiest of the Week (MM):

1. Helge Lund

1. Embattled BP replaces CEO, naming Woodside Energy chief as first-ever woman leader of a Big Oil giant:

1. O’Neill is “taking over the British energy behemoth at a time when it has fallen behind the other global oil and gas supermajors and was even a potential takeover target earlier this year by rival Shell.”

2. Is there anything glass cliff-ier than this stat:

3. Helge Lund has now overseen BP’s failed Murray Auchincloss tenure, Bernard Looney’s tenure, and Bob Dudley’s leaving (6 year tenure) and Novo Nordisk’s incredible succession failure, the failure of Nokia in 2013… I hate having to celebrate a female first - like becoming a CEO when eminently overqualified

2. Sam Altman again

1. Sam Altman says he has '0%' excitement about being CEO of a public company ahead of a potential OpenAI IPO

1. He changed it from a non profit to a for profit in order to go public and make all the money.

2. Also: “billionaire says”

1. Sam Altman Sounds Alarm As ChatGPT Explodes Globally: 'Rate Of Change' Sparks AI Anxiety, Job Fears

2. Sam Altman Uses His New Image Generator to Show Himself As a Jacked Fireman With Washboard Abs… With an Absolutely Hilarious Error

3. Sam Altman says OpenAI has gone 'code red' multiple times; and they'll do it again

2. The “sound the alarm” gaslight

3. Peter C. Earle, Ph.D, Director of Economics and Economic Freedom and Senior Research Fellow at American Institute for Economic Research DR

1. Stop Fixating on CEO Pay Ratios and Start Fixing Labor Markets

2. “The average employee is hired under conditions of broad substitutability — many people can competently perform the role with modest training. The CEO labor market is the opposite: extremely small, specialized, global, and contingent on track records that can shift a firm’s valuation by billions of dollars. The demand curve for top executive talent is steep; the supply curve is extraordinarily thin.”

3. “Skilled executives can influence strategy, capital allocation, risk management, and organizational culture in ways that affect firm performance far more than incremental labor inputs elsewhere in the organization, even if the latter are voluminous. If a CEO’s decisions add even a few percentage points to long-term returns, the economic value created dwarfs the compensation.”

1. Translation: CEOs are worth it, regular workers are not. 

4. “Such a ratio also ignores value creation. [...] The relevant question is not “Is the ratio of worker to executive pay too large?” but rather “Does the CEO create more value than their talent costs?”

1. Does not propose how to prove value creation of the CEO other than “stock go up”

5. Earle had this to say about leadership in 2019:  

1. “teams (also companies, organizations, groups, and so on) which experience outstanding success inevitably cite leadership as a factor — often the decisive one, and frequently emanating from a particular individual.”

2. “But it should come as no surprise that many successful sports teams, firms, and organizations readily identify leadership as the decisive factor in their triumphs. It’s a better story than merely having incredible resources and facilities, superior performance, or as is often the case: simple, garden-variety luck.”

Headliniest of the Week

1. DR: Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary plans to step down by 2035 & Chipotle chases the protein craze with new menu items — including meat in a cup

2. MM: LinkedIn CEO says it’s ‘outdated’ to have a five-year career plan: It’s a ‘little bit foolish’ considering the pace AI is changing the workplace

Who Won the Week?

1. DR: Powerful women at BP

2. MM: 4 year career plans

Predictions

1. DR: David Ellison cancels his Netflix subscription then hires Erika Kirk to run programming at Nickelodeon and MTV

2. MM: Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary steps down in 2035 and become executive chair, pledging to step down as executive chair in 2057.