🔥Johnny's Links #1🔥
A fresh collection of things that caught our resident idiot's attention.
Dear readers of PETITION. We hope you enjoyed the holidays and got yourself a little breather in what appeared to be a busier than usual December. Welcome back! We returned on Wednesday with some a$$-kicking coverage of a pair of late ‘25 filings so ICYMI, you can check that out here:
We recognize that our ‘25 editions got a wee bit unwieldy length-wise and so we’re going to come hot out of the gate in ‘26 with a new separate edition lazily called “🔥Johnny’s Links🔥” (open to better ideas, y’all, so hit us up). This will be — hopefully — a weekly edition full of links, videos and podcasts that our favorite resident dumba$$ has curated for you, our loyal readers. We hope you find this to be value-add: let us know in the comment section 👇.
🔗What We’re Reading (9 Reads)🔗
1. Bond Innovation (Short DTC?). ICYMI, per Bloomberg, “JPMorgan Chase & Co arranged the creation, distribution and settlement of a short-term bond for Galaxy Digital Holdings LP on the Solana blockchain, part of a push to make financial markets more efficient using crypto’s underlying technology.” We’ve long heard that public securities would eventually find their way “on chain” and so we look on with great curiosity as JPM tries to move this innovation forward.
2. Financial Nihilism (Long Vibes). Millennials and Gen Z feel betrayed by existing systems and “[t]hey’re responding to an economy where the usual advice no longer lines up cleanly with outcomes.” Hence crypto, meme stonks and Draftkings. More money there means less money on conventional consumerism.
3. M&A (Long Dealmaking). Here Wachtell Lipton Rosen & Katz provides a pithy summary of M&A activity in ‘25 and looks ahead to ‘26. They conclude:
“Notwithstanding concerns around tariffs, inflation and ongoing global conflicts, the M&A market ends the year energized across numerous industries. With many deals, of all sizes, in the pipeline, we expect that 2025’s momentum will continue into 2026, even with a continued undercurrent of economic and political uncertainty.”
4. Media (Long Aggregators). The indomitable Ben Thompson wrote this analysis of the proposed acquisition of (most of) Warner Bros. Discovery Inc. ($WBD) by Netflix Inc. ($NFLX). It’s a solid summary of what NFLX is trying to do and portends additional consolidation down the road.
5. Price Tests (Short Instacart’s Scumbaggery). We driveby commented on Instacart ($CART) using dynamic pricing, an initiative that led to costumers getting charged different prices for the same exact items based on their preferences. Seemed pretty predatory (inflationary?) and the (negative) reaction was swift and vehement. Well, good news y’all. CART decided to drop the program.
6. Private Equity (Long Large Deals). Here, yet again, is Wachtell Lipton Rosen & Katz with a recap of private equity in ‘25.
“2025 marked a continuation of the rebound in private equity acquisitions and exits that began in 2024 and we highlighted in our memo last year. In the first three quarters of 2025, global private equity deal volume was nearly $1.5 trillion, on track to surpass the levels seen in the prior three years. The growth in deal volume was primarily driven by the increasing size of private equity deals as opposed to the increasing number of deals. While aggregate deal value in the first three quarters of 2025 was up 29% over the same period in 2024, the number of private equity deals saw a more modest increase of only 11%.” (emphasis in original)
They predict more robust activity in ‘26 too:
“We expect that private equity dealmaking will continue to increase heading into 2026 due to high levels of older, un-exited investments; normalizing (and potentially declining) interest rates; a political and regulatory environment supportive of large M&A; and hoped-for stabilization of the U.S. tariffs situation.”
7. Professional Fees (Short Shame). Johnny’s old enough to remember when lawyers were embarrassed to charge $1k/hour and then $2k/hour but f*ck it clients continue to pay and bankruptcy continues to be a cash cow and as long as lawyers are getting paid 20 million bucks a year what else could possibly happen but 11-15% fee inflation? Of course, maybe we’re just overblowing the whole “professional fees are rising” narrative, 🙄 — at least that’s what our friends at FTI Consulting Inc. ($FCN) seem to think 👇:
8. Student Loans (Long Increased Odds). It seems it’s not as hard to discharge student loan debt as previously believed/proven.
9. ‘25 in Review (Short Sanity). It. Was. A. Year.
🎧What We’re Listening To🎧
On Venezuela:
On cooperation agreements, etc.:
📼What We’re Watching📼
📚Resources📚
We have compiled a list of a$$-kicking resources on the topics of restructuring, tech, finance, investing, and disruption. 💥You can find it here💥.