Episode Details

In this episode, Marcus is back from Oaxaca and he and Vic dig into Wall Street's nerves over Meta's AI capex and what rising rates and the Iran war mean for the AI buildout, jobless claims that don't match what we're seeing on the ground, BMS leading Pathos AI's $237M Series E and the biotech surge, OMass's $310M raise for a rare endocrine disorder, the Trump administration tying rural health dollars to Certificate of Need rollbacks, Treasury sweeping biotech into the COINS Act while sparing Big Pharma's China deals, friend of the show Rick Abramson on why the FDA should assess GenAI tools like physicians, family health plan costs climbing past $28K, Elevance's raised guidance, what new insurer entrants think they can do differently, Abbott's nutrition spinoff, the Quest Diagnostics breach, violence driving nurses from the profession, Moderna's leaked cancer vaccine data, GSK's hepatitis B approval, GLP-1s and breastfeeding, the OCC's GENIUS Act stablecoin rules, the AI-found PHP bug putting 70% of websites at risk, unvetted AI agents inside bank accounts, and why Anthropic can't afford to delay its IPO — with insights into market trends, policy changes, and technological innovations shaping the future of health and money.

Chapters

0:00 Introduction

3:45 Meta's hunt for AI capital rattles Wall Street ↳

https://www.wsj.com/finance/stocks/metas-hunt-for-ai-capital-strikes-a-raw-nerve-on-wall-street-e2de1601

13:58 US jobless claims return to a downward trend ↳

https://www.wsj.com/economy/jobs/u-s-jobless-claims-return-to-downward-trend-9ba853fc

16:26 BMS leads Pathos AI's $237M Series E alongside an Alzheimer's collaboration ↳

https://www.fiercebiotech.com/biotech/pathos-ai-closes-237m-series-e-heels-bms-alzheimers-link

19:19 OMass raises $310M for a rare endocrine disorder drug ↳

https://medcitynews.com/2026/10/startup-omass-rare-disease-endocrine-hormone-melanocortin-2-mc2-cah/

20:19 Trump dangles rural health funds to push states to change CON laws ↳

https://www.modernhealthcare.com/politics-regulation/mh-trump-rural-health-certificate-need-laws/

29:06 Treasury sweeps biotech into proposed COINS Act restrictions, spares Big Pharma's China licensing ↳

https://www.fiercebiotech.com/biotech/treasury-sweeps-biotech-proposed-coins-act-restrictions-spares-big-pharma-china-licensing

35:35 FDA's Rick Abramson: GenAI tools will need to be assessed like a physician ↳

https://medcitynews.com/2026/10/fda-official-believes-genai-enabled-tools-will-need-to-be-assessed-like-a-physician/

38:46 Family health plan costs rise as employers shift more to workers ↳

https://www.wsj.com/health/healthcare/in-era-of-runaway-health-inflation-employers-scramble-to-keep-costs-in-check-fdae86df

42:04 Elevance raises full-year guidance on lower medical costs ↳

https://www.modernhealthcare.com/insurance/mh-elevance-earnings-third-quarter-2026-outlook

43:27 What new insurer entrants think they can do differently ↳

https://www.modernhealthcare.com/insurance/mh-health-systems-insurance-plans-included-nice

50:56 Abbott to carve out its nutrition business ↳

https://www.wsj.com/health/healthcare/abbott-to-carve-out-nutrition-business-into-independent-company-e9384a15

51:57 Quest Diagnostics' test-results system breached in cyberattack ↳

https://www.fiercebiotech.com/medtech/quest-diagnostics-test-results-system-breached-yet-another-medtech-cyberattack

55:35 Nurses are in high demand, but they're quitting in droves ↳

https://www.wsj.com/health/healthcare/nurses-are-in-high-demandbut-theyre-quitting-in-droves-d8ead94f

1:01:23 Moderna shares fall after cancer vaccine data leaks on social media ↳

https://www.wsj.co