

Full Disclosure with Roben Farzad
Roben Farzad
The business of culture. The culture of business. Policy; media & tech; entrepreneurs and more.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Jul 18, 2021 • 52min
Stocks and the City
Ri Sharma, 21, the voice behind Instagram forum Wall Street Confessions, always thought she wanted to go into investment banking. Then she realized there's too much in the industry that no one is talking about. Nicknamed "the Carrie Bradshaw of Finance," the Manhattanite discusses her personal journey; the mental health of junior employees; and the traumas that go with being a woman on Wall Street.

Jul 11, 2021 • 51min
It Pays to Be Humble
As he approaches his own retirement, veteran personal finance columnist Jonathan Clements reflects on 35 years of covering investing and the markets. The author of several books (including From Here to Financial Happiness and How to Think About Money), he contemplates risk, humility, "normalcy," advice to his younger self -- and much more.

Jun 26, 2021 • 47min
Abandonment Issues
Photographer, documentary maker, author, child of the Rust Belt, self-proclaimed "urban explorer": Seph Lawless (VICELAND; the book Autopsy of America) documents decaying spaces -- from dead malls and haunted houses, to abandoned factories and motels; even alligators terrorizing defunct water parks. What do these tableaus tell us about America?

Jun 20, 2021 • 56min
Virginia: Battleground 2021
What is Virginia telling us on this trademark off-year election?
Guests:
•Jeff Schapiro of the Richmond Times-Dispatch and Michael Pope of Virginia Public Radio
•GOP strategist Taylor Keeney
•Ghazala Hashmi (D), who was elected Virginia's first Muslim state senator

Jun 14, 2021 • 52min
Parney, the Diamond-Hearted
Veteran baseball executive Todd "Parney" Parnell, CEO of the minor-league Richmond Flying Squirrels, on community, coping and cash flow during Covid. Relatedly, what can you do with an empty ballpark? Plus, tough questions from a fifth-grade super-fan.

May 30, 2021 • 51min
Amazon Unbound
Brad Stone, author of the bestseller Amazon Unbound: Jeff Bezos and the Invention of a Global Empire. Amazon is an e-commerce behemoth; a Hollywood studio; an essential cloud services provider to multinationals; the savior of Whole Foods. Founder Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post and plows his unprecedented wealth into rockets. So then what the heck is Amazon?

May 21, 2021 • 52min
Ma Bell's Hell (and Back?)
So much for AT&T's content + distribution empire. The telco is retreating from Hollywood -- unwinding its costly, debt-laden acquisition of HBO parent WarnerMedia. What does this mean for a media landscape increasingly dominated by streaming heavyweights Netflix and Disney? What about 5G, Amazon and Comcast? Edmund Lee of the New York Times and Michael Morris of Guggenheim Partners weigh in.

May 14, 2021 • 53min
The Economist on the Future of Banking
Alice Fulwood, The Economist's Wall Street correspondent, on her feature package on the future of banking. We discussed mobile payments; "govcoins," paper money and the unbanked; central banks' hegemony; and the struggle to untether from both dominant banks and the U.S. dollar.

May 10, 2021 • 46min
Jaytalking
CNBC executive editor Jay Yarow on markets, the roaring comeback of the individual investor, speculation, digital media consumption and much more.

May 2, 2021 • 46min
The Brain Trust of Kyle Grooms
In 2019, a near-fatal seizure and emergency brain-tumor surgery walloped comedian Kyle Grooms (Chappelle's Show, Comedy Central, Def Comedy Jam, BET, HBO); he woke up telling the doctor it was 1969. Then, Covid and nationwide racial unrest upended all of comedy. He delves into this -- and his standup special “Kyle Grooms: Brain Humor.”