Comcast’s Next Spinoff & The US Men’s National Team 6/29/26

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0:59This is Squawk Pod. Up and Becky, Q. You're watching Squawk Box right here on CNBC. I'm Becky Quick along with Joe Kernan and Andrew Ross Sorkin. The U.S. men's national team playing Wednesday night at 8 Eastern against Bosnia in the first round of the World Cup elimination round. And a key factor for the U.S. team's success has so far been Argentine coach. You told me, call him Potts, but it's Pocatino. Yes, sir. Is that OK? I just want to make sure I get it right. A key factor in hiring him. The man with U.S. with the U.S. here with us. I said with with the U.S. with us this morning is Scott Goodwin.

1:36He runs Diameter Capital Partners. He's helping pay for the U.S. team's coaching staff. How did that happen? So I was I was in July summer of 2024. They lost in the Gold Cup, which is the regional tournament. And I was venting to some friends who are big soccer guys. And are you just hold on back up? Are you just like a crazy soccer person to begin? Big soccer fan. Because of how did that even happen? I was born in Europe. I lived in France and Spain for a while growing up and was around the Real Madrid Galacticos era in the early 2000s. And I've had friends involved with the U.S. soccer team forever and venting to them in 2024 that we needed a better coach.

2:11The World Cup's going to be here in two years. This is an opportunity. And I saw in the press that they were talking to some big names. And these guys who were involved with the team said, well, we can't afford them. I said, well, we've just hired this amazing women's coach, Emma Hayes, who's the top women's coach in the world, and went on to win the Olympics hiring her. So I said, what about if I pay? And they thought I was kidding. So the next thing I know, I'm meeting with the head of U.S. soccer, JT Batson, who I think you guys have had on at some point in time. And he said, well, here's what we want to do.

2:44Here's what we want to build around having a really elite coach. I'd love to have you involved. And I said, sure, if you can get one of these top two or three guys, I'd love to be involved. What do you get from this? Do you get tickets? It's patriotic pride. Patriotic pride. I want to win. I hate losing. And for me, the opportunity to put a competitive team on the field with a real leader. We had good players, but we lacked leadership and lacked culture. And what Mauricio has brought is culture, leadership, intensity, passion. So is this right? So you're paying six million bucks a year? It's not public what we are paying.

3:19That's what some of the reports, though. Yeah, I'm not going to get into the numbers, but I'm paying less than Ken. This is not cheap. Not cheap. Not cheap. Very expensive, Coach. Is it worth it so far? Absolutely. How will you measure that, actually? Well, the cultural change is the most important thing. That happened first. The culture has been changed. And I think the bar for what we're going to have from a men's national team perspective has been raised. Women's have, we've done well for a long time. The bar needs to be higher for the men, which is winning real large tournaments. You know, the chalks, so to say, is probably that the team makes the round of 16.

3:53So wins on Wednesday and makes the round of 16. That's what the pundits have been predicting pre-tournament. I hope we can do better than that. We have a lot of momentum. We are on home soil. The country's buying in. The fans are buying in. And Mauricio's got a team that is really a family. So let's see if we can do better. Do you have other investments in soccer? No. None. So you're not like in Major League Soccer or something? Is this an investment? I just focus on my business. Yeah, is this an investment or this is just a philanthropic gift? It's philanthropic. It's not an investment. It's a gift to help the country.

4:26And the trickle-down effect of soccer, if we do well and we can start winning on the men's side, just like we're on the women's, the trickle-down effect of growing the game in the country, changing the pay-to-play at the youth level. Well, that's why I was asking whether you have a stake in or want to have a stake in Major League Soccer or anything else in the U.S. Not right now. I'm focused on my business. You know, investing in credit and bonds, not soccer.

4:51In terms of the U.S. team, what do you put the chances are? If you look, we were looking at Cal State this morning. Yeah. It's unclear. You can never know what's going to happen in a game. Random red card, like what happened in 2024 that created the opportunity for us to get Mauricio and Tim Way. I got a red card. But, you know, I feel good about Wednesday and I feel good about things moving forward. What's the, when you talk about the culture of the team, what was lacking before? How is it different? So what Mauricio does is, whether you're the kit man or the athletic trainer or you're the star player, everyone's the same.

5:25So he came in and there was a group of kind of seven, eight, nine, ten players who played in Europe that had been playing all the minutes. And the other people, the younger people, people on the outside, didn't really feel like they had a chance. he tried out 70 players over 18 months and found this group of 26 that's come together and some of the players that were playing before and some are new players like Antonio Freeman you guys will remember from the from the Green Bay Packers winning Super Bowls his son that I can see you have a picture of him right there is a 21 years old star player right back Mauricio basically discovered him he was barely playing in MLS when he took over the U.S.

5:59team and now he's playing in Spain in a Champions League team. So he's basically Ted Lasso. Culturally, he might be Ted Lasso. His soccer knowledge is a little bit better than Jason Sudeikis, I think. But what you said, like treating everybody equally across the team. It's really important. That lesson of, and also, he comes from a culture in Argentina where football is religion. Soccer is religion there. And here, the NFL is religion. So trying to bring that idea that this can be religion for the fans, this can be religion for people in the country, is something he's trying to instill in the team.

6:30And I think what you've seen in the game so far in L.A. and Seattle and back in L.A., the fans are really engaging nationally, which is great. And hopefully on Wednesday we'll have something similar in San Francisco. Back to Ted Lasso against soccer is life, right? Football is life. Interestingly, there's been a bunch of articles about this, though. How much of the fandom around World Cup in the U.S. do you think is U.S. fans versus corporates? And the reason I say that is the price tag, obviously, MetLife or anywhere else is astronomical. It is a lot of corporations buying into this either through boxes or seats or whatever, you know, in a way that's somewhat different.

7:10It's almost like the way the Super Bowl has become a corporate event. I've been to a lot of games so far. I went to the U.S. games. I've been to some games at MetLife. I went to the Brazil-Morocco game there. And I didn't see a lot of corporations. I saw a huge amount of Brazil fans, Morocco fans that had traveled from around the world. Listen, are the tickets expensive? Yes, but this is a wealthy country. No, no, I mean it more in the U.S. sense. By the way, I agree. People are flying in from all over. I'm saying, do you think that the, to the extent there are, quote, unquote, there's a big question about U.S.

7:38fandom for soccer and how much U.S. fandom for soccer is actually being driven at the corporate level. I think it's driven at the grassroots level. We marched to the stadium in Seattle with thousands of fans that were banging on drums. Me, JT, Cindy, and Dan Helfrich, who's the CEO of U.S. Soccer. And I really think it's that what's needed here is more of those kind of people coming in as fans of the national team. People are used to having their New York team, their Boston team. But if we can all become fans of the U.S., we talked I talked to Marisi about Miracle and what that did in 1980 for the U.S.

8:12bringing the country together. I think he and this team can have a similar impact in terms of bringing the U.S. together if we continue this run. It's very cool. Scott, thank you for coming in. Thank you for supporting the team. Infecting us all. I spent quite a bit of time yesterday trying to understand exactly, you know, if your fingernail is off sides, it doesn't count. And they try to see that, don't they? They've got good technology. And it's sort of, it's not arcane, but it's not immediately implicit how it works, right? Yeah, I haven't gotten too into it. I spent some time with how the U.S.

8:45is using AI around penalty kicks and trying to see which players deal with pressure differently. It's a huge bummer for me when it doesn't count. Imagine if you're the guy who scores the goal. That's what I mean. And then you have to wait to celebrate. I watched, and I don't regret it, but I watched Colombia-Portugal. Yep. That was close. 0-0. I spent four hours. I liked it. I ended up liking it, though. I did. But it was 0-0. What's great so far is the best players in the world are performing. Messi, Mbappe, Alain. These top players are showing up. You're telling me he's still hot. He's still ticking.

9:24He played for Real Madrid, which is my club team. So, you know, I like Ronaldo. All right. But people say, what is he, 40? Yeah, I think 40-ish. 40-ish. That's old, huh? Yeah. I love that. In soccer terms, it's old. Not in finance terms. That does it for Squawk Pod today. Thank you for listening. And thanks for starting your week with us. Squawk Box is hosted by Joe Kernan, Becky Quick, and Andrew Ross Sorkin. Tune in weekday mornings on CNBC at 6 a.m. Eastern to catch them live. You can always get the best takes and analysis from that three-hour TV show right into your ears if you follow Squawk Pod wherever you get your podcasts.

10:04We'll meet you right back here tomorrow. Have a great day. We are clear. Thanks, guys.

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11:05Bitcoin services provided by Block, Inc. Brand. For additional information, see the Bitcoin disclosures at cash.app slash legal slash podcast. It only happens every four years, and this time it's here. The biggest tournament in the world. Stadium shaking, flags waving. This is history, and you want to be there. But real life can make it tough. Work, busy schedules, and the price. That's where Priceline comes in. Priceline has millions of deals on flights, hotels, and rental cars, so you can go see it live. So find a great deal and make the trip happen. Rally the crew, go see the game live, turn your dream trip into reality.

11:43Book now with Priceline. We are live from Fetty's house. Hundreds gathered around the TV, all connected to reliable Wi-Fi from Xfinity. I'm Josie on a video call, krilling the referee. Get reliable fiber-powered gig Wi-Fi with Peacock included to stream the beautiful game this summer. Xfinity, imagine that. Restrictions apply. New gig internet members only. Speeds vary. Use of fiber coaxial cable. Peacock offer for Peacock Premium with ads currently$10.99 a month value. Activation required to access content. Terms apply. Peacock must be activated within first 90 days. Manage existing subscriptions to avoid multiple charges.

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12:18Welcome back to Squawk Pod from CNBC with Joe Kernan, Becky Quick, and Andrew Ross-Sorgan. Joining us right now to talk the markets and the economy is Roger Altman. He is founder and senior chairman of Evercore. And Roger, it's great to see you this morning. Thanks for having me, Becky. So there are a lot of people wondering this morning what to make of the sell-off last week, chip stocks in particular, but technology has been what's been driving the market to these levels. I realize when you look at it at the end of the quarter, we're still doing phenomenally well. Gains of better than 12 % for both the Dow and the S &P 500, up 17 % for the NASDAQ, up 22 % for the NASDAQ 100.

12:55How do you look at this as how you would take this measurement in time, what you would tell people? Well I think like many people say, you could think of it as two markets, big tech and everything else. Everything else I think is doing fine. It's strong, it's stable because it's underpinned by the remarkable resilience of the U.S. economy and we can come back to that, and corporate profits. I mean they're just strong. And I don't see anything out of whack between the non-tech side of the market and the underlying economy and corporate profits. On the big tech side, there's good news and other news.

13:31The good news is most of the big names are strong, very profitable companies. Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, and so forth. And there's no dot-com side to this. and, you know, there may be and there will be, I think, regular price dirations, corrections, but that's fundamentally healthy when companies are valued at those levels. I don't think anybody understands, at least I don't, how to value companies like SpaceX or Anthropic. And there are probably going to be some pretty, probably very volatile prices like we're seeing on SpaceX right now. on that side of it. But the companies are fundamentally good, impressive companies.

14:16And that is the right, the important thing for the long term. But people who own them have to be ready for a lot of volatility. Now, for example, the chips, chips sector, you mentioned last, last week, down eight to nine percent. But the index had been up 100 percent for the year. Correct. So it's just normal. It's healthy. Now, do I think the valuations on a lot of big tech are very high by historical standards. Objectively, they are. But I think the underlying businesses are good ones. There's this running debate, and obviously it takes two sides to make a market. David Bonson, his point was that we're only one of the major spenders in CapEx for AI.

14:57We're only one step away from one of them saying that they were going to spend less money and that that would trickle down. He doesn't necessarily believe the forward earnings numbers. Not that he doesn't believe valuations for a lot of these companies aren't out of whack, but if you have one of these super scalers saying that they're not going to spend as much money and then that brings into question the earnings for any of these companies down the road, that that's how it might start. Well, there is a giant debate, as you know better than me, because it plays out every day here on your show, whether these gigantic amounts being invested in all aspects of AI are going to generate strong returns.

15:36And I don't know anybody who truly knows the answer to that question. But the amount of spending has so much momentum behind it that I think if even one of the important participants scaled back, I'm not sure that alone would change the dynamic. I mean, these are astonishing sums. By the way, all around the world, in various places in the Persian Gulf, for example, not just America. And there's a lot of momentum behind that spending. You talked about the economy and being really strong. We do have a jobs number that we're going to get later this week. What's the key to the economy at this point?

16:15It's withstood higher oil prices. It's withstood all kinds of things. The U.S. economy, Becky, is a marvel. I mean, it really is a marvel. So first quarter GDP growth, 2.1 percent. Real consumer spending right now, 2 percent. unemployment very low corporate profits strong business fixed investment as we just discussed very strong inflation is an issue but we think that underlying inflation is running at about two and a half percent and you've got these three extraneous factors oil tariffs and AI and they're keeping it above its underlying rate and we think inflation will debate maybe slowly but it will I I personally don't think the Fed's going to hike in late July, but who knows?

17:01But this is a model of resilience. And there's a reason it's the envy of the rest of the world. And as you say, it's shaken off tariffs. It's shaken off higher oil prices. It's shaken off the Iran war. It's shaken off turmoil in Washington, at least so far, which is pretty amazing. What do you think of Kevin Warsh so far? Last time we had him on, you on was before his first speech. I'm impressed with Kevin Warsh. I'm impressed with the way he started, which I think is a self-confident way. I'm impressed with his emphasis on price stability. He's going to be an inflation hawk. And I'm impressed with the sense that I think he's conveying an effect through his body language of independence.

17:47So and I also think we're fortunate to have him because of all the other names that were bandied about during the preselection process. There were a lot of people who wouldn't have the capabilities that I think he has. So I give him I mean, I'm impressed with him. He's just starting, but I think he's a good choice. Let me ask you from your investment banker perspective, what you think about this news. We heard this morning Comcast splitting into two new companies. Does that make sense to you? It does. I think you could argue that that might have been better done a while ago. When Versant was still part of?

18:21Well, just in general, because Comcast share price obviously in recent months has done very poorly. But it's the right step. I commend Brian and Mike and the others for taking it. And I think it gives them now a lot of optionality once they complete the split on both sides of the company in terms of additional combinations and other things. So it's the right move. You could debate the timing of it. Maybe they should have done it a year or two ago, but it's the right move. What kind of transactions, when you start to think about, could play out as a result of this? Do you look at any of the businesses and say they stand alone and just continue for the next decade like this?

18:58Or do you think that it only creates genuine value if there's a transaction related to each? Well, they're both perfectly solid companies financially. And I don't know what may happen. But as an example, if this split had happened two years ago, I mean, actually effective, not just announced, The NBCU side of the company could have made a much more serious run at Warner Brothers Discovery. Right. And as you know, they tried to do that. But had they been separate and separately valued, they could have really been a serious competitor and maybe gotten that done. I don't know what particular, you know, transactions might occur.

19:34I think on the Comcast side, and you were talking about this this morning, I think. We're talking about charter. It's sort of the natural. Well, but I mean, the whole impact of Starlink, direct-to-device, I mean, that is going to be profound. So I think that whole industry, you know, not just Comcast and Charter, but Verizon and T-Mobile and so forth, is facing a little bit different future. So I don't know what will happen there, but there's some obvious possibilities. On the NBCU side, not sure, but the company just has more flexibility. What else are you watching in the markets these days? Because you sound pretty, I don't want to say complacent, but you sound pretty relaxed about what you see.

20:19Well, what is the one thing I worry about? I worry that there's going to be pressure against free and fair elections this November and efforts to disrupt them. President Trump talks about this all the time. And if they really were disrupted, and I hope that won't be the case, I think you could see some real coming apart in this country, which would be really bad. And those elections are only four months off. If I was an investor and I really thought they were going to be interrupted, prevented, curtailed, I wouldn't like it. But that's the only thing you worry about at this point? I mean, you worry that the Iran war goes the wrong way, but I doubt it because neither side wants a resumption of real hostilities.

21:06I think the whole thing is unfortunate, Iran. And I think every day that goes by, it becomes more clear that it is unfortunate or was. But I do think that'll be essentially steady as she goes for the foreseeable future. and you know the economy and the markets are just ignoring the turmoil in Washington and the turmoil in Washington is really unbelievable I mean you look at what's going on among the Senate Republicans and President Trump you look at what's going on and all this stuff around the filibuster and the SAVE Act talk about the SAVE Act because you talk about election integrity and being disrupted if it's 83 % the country thinks that you should have a voter ID.

21:55A voter ID is different. I favor voter ID. Okay, but we're talking about an election integrity because people do not trust elections in this country right now. So it's an overall problem from both sides, from your side and from the other side. Why is it so hard to get a single Democrat besides John Fetterman to say that we should have voter ID? Well, actually, I think there are quite a few Democrats who support voter ID. then it could pass. What's different in this bill than voter ID? Well, wait a minute. There's a big difference between the SAVE Act and voter ID. Okay. Voter ID, I really think most Americans support it.

22:31I think a lot of Democrats support it. Yes, some don't, but that's a very reasonable thing and we should have it. SAVE Act says you must produce proof of citizenship. Now, proof of citizenship means effectively a passport or a birth certificate. So only half of Americans a little less maybe, have a passport. Half of Americans. Now, could you find your birth certificate on short notice? Yeah, I know exactly what it is. Well, okay, I couldn't. I couldn't. I couldn't. Yeah, most people couldn't. So if you don't have a passport. Only because I had to get it when I changed my name. Okay, but if you don't have a passport, which is half of Americans, and therefore the only way you can vote is to produce your birth certificate, that's crazy.

23:14That's just crazy. Voter ID, that makes sense. We should do that. Just show a license. or something? Yes, any government issued ID. New York City issues, you know, various levels of ID. And obviously we have now national driver's licenses that you can use in many places instead of passports. You can get a driver's license if you're not a citizen, obviously. Do you think only citizens should be able to vote? Well, yes, only citizens should be able to vote. Took you a while. No, no, I had to think it through for a second in terms of who gets who gets driver's licenses. But but most forms of voter ID as proposed make sense.