All of this madness was caused by ESG. For too long companies where saying “it’s ok we are losing money, our ESG rating is great”. Well a good ESG rating doesn’t pay payroll or debt. The financials should push the financials. Cash doesn’t lie at the end of the day. The ESG model worked ok at the start for broadcast companies like ESPN (Disney), HBO (WB discovery), and Netflix because the left enjoyed the content and the right was “hate watching”. And ofcourse the socialist that drive ESG we’re giving these companies high ratings.
But Eventually the right got tired of it and just turned it off. Started fighting them the best way they could, by not buying their products. Then eventually the moderate left and middle just got tired of it too. Then investors started looking at these companies and going “great your ESG rating is fantastic but you lost 9 Billion dollars in operating income last year (WB/ HBO) or your cash flows are extremely awful (Disney/ESPN)”. Things that are actually measurable.
So now companies are starting to say “screw ESG, let’s look at getting back to good profitable business and let our companies economic health drive our stock price”.
Make no mistake, ESG is a socialistic program. The stock market is a capitalist as anything comes. Socialism and capitalism don’t mix, ever
Let’s be honest, McAfee would have been to “white” for ESPN two years ago as their ESG model drove the company. But financially he would have always been a no-brainer.