Well, shares of Meta trading slightly higher on another analyst upgrade. Following the launch of Threads, we're looking at gains of just about one percent Cowan Upgrading the stock to outperform raising its price Target Nearly 60 percent. One of the reasons that common is bullish. potential Upside: If and when Meta starts to monetize threads, Thread so far has been a huge hit, surpassing 100 million users in the first five days of the apps launch.

from more on this and some of the other trending Topics in your feed we want to bring in Matt Core he's host of the Matt Core show Matt It's great to have you here so we love talking to you because you have a very good sense. You have a pulse on what retail Traders Investors are thinking about really everything, but when it comes to threads, the launch of threads, clearly it has been a massive hit in terms of consumer adoption at the get-go How bullish are retail Traders On this launch and what it means for Meta I Mean with this newest Battle of the billionaires, there's a lot of excitement and I think it goes both ways. but for Meta and specifically Threads, a lot of people are talking about it every single day. and I think that 100 million number of the signups I think that took Everyone by surprise and as the analyst rightfully pointed out, if this can be monetized which if men is good at one thing, it's definitely monetizing its users I Think this could be very impressive for the business, but then that leads to the larger conversation of will it win out I Don't think so.

My personal opinion is that between threads and Twitter there's a very realistic shot that both end up coexisting coexist. I Mean when you look at just uh, usage in terms of Twitter I mean it's seen a dramatic drop. We've seen an exodus of advertising. Could this potential really be because there's been talk of this a Twitter killer? I Don't really think so I Understand that some of the decisions and some of the things that have played out on Twitter has left a sour taste and some of the advertiser's mouth for sure.

But even today it was just an ounce of a new ad sharing program and a lot of people are sending screenshots of how much they're making. As many people don't like Elon There's a lot of people that absolutely love them. so that's why I Think we're going to see almost a fractured written social media economy. So Matt You think that there's a use case obviously here for both of these companies for Twitter and threads to coexist or both these apps I should say what is a use case? Is there a different use case for Threads versus why people would also be using Twitter Not a reasonable one that I can come up with.

I Think it's more of the overall company that they're supporting right now. Obviously it's new, we're not even a week old. and with threads obviously there's some UI in Ux that needs to be improved. My personal opinion is right now: Twitter is a better functioning app, but also if we give it a couple months a couple quarters, I'm sure it's going to be like in the same waiting fighting class and then you say you say it's a better functioning.

do you see Meta pulling out that functionality and developing it better and also speaking to the monetization aspect I mean analysts are expecting them to be able to monetize it better in general. like for instance, when you compare it to Reels which they haven't been able to monetize as well as they'd like what's your expectation I Definitely agree with you that that monetization will come. but I Think what I'm personally more excited about and why I'm actually bullish now on Meta more than I have been in a while is because they've subtly tried to pull away from this branding of Metaverse. Obviously, it was a large large issue for them.

like financially resource-wise so they're getting out of that stock plummeted from I believe what 380 all the way down to 80. now up 250 percent. I Think it'll keep going because of what's going on in the world of AI Between Instagram and Facebook, they already had a very unique data set and now adding in Threads it's a whole nother data set that they'll be able to train their own proprietary AI on. So beyond just revenue of selling ads and whatnot, because it's it's a little bit more brand safe we'll say relative to Twitter I Think the AI play of what they're going to do with the data is very exciting, all right.

Matt Let's talk about another trending topic that I know that you've been watching and that's a Bitcoin spot. ETF The Sec's decision on Bitcoin Spot ETFs is something that has certainly been trending and all this in the news because BlackRock just last month did file some paperwork to launch its own spot. Bitcoin ETF We spoke to Grayscale Investments EO Michael Sonnenshine on the show yesterday. He talked about demand or what demand would be like for this type of product.

Let's take a listen to what he had to say. It continues to show that you know investor interest and appetite for this asset class isn't going away and the continuation of Bitcoin Futures Bitcoin levered. Futures ETFs These are all additional access points that investors now have there are you know, trillions of dollars on the sideline, even just in the Financial Advisor Market that are looking for a convenient solution to give their clients exposure to Bitcoin. Um, so we do think it could be a material you know moment for Bitcoin to say the least.

Matt Do you agree? How do you think that that a product like this would be received amongst investors? I Mean obviously as the CEO of Grayscale, he's far more informed than I Am. But I would love to re-echo what he's saying. On top of it, it is definitely win for Crypto and Bitcoin specifically and today, positive news coming out with Ripple as well. So right now, the SEC is kind of lose in some cases while the crypto loving public is starting to win, but just to throw some numbers on it.

what interests me is if we get this spot. ETF That really allows far more people to invest in Bitcoin that never would have before if you look at the IRA Total Money in the US. Right now, it's just over 12 trillion. If you look at 401ks, we're getting closer to 20 trillion if a small percentage of that now.

Feels comfortable getting into Bitcoin through this. ETF because there's just more Highway on-ramps for Wall Street to be able to serve this to their clients I Mean that's not negligible by any means. So for me, this is bullish and that's probably part of the reason why we're seeing coinbase. I Believe Rip 25 today, so really quickly I Want to ask you So Yes, it does give of more credibility to the crypto space, which has certainly been a concern, especially with the Crackdown.

But I've heard that retail Traders aren't too keen on this. Uh, so these. I guess this institutional push. What is your audience saying about this push into crypto from say, a black rock? Fidelity Trying to get in? What are they saying to you I Think a lot of my retail audience who already enjoys Crypto they did it.

They have their own Keys they're storing it on their own Ledger But there's a lot of just the investing public who they don't want to remember a 12 phrase code for them to recover. They they like some of the credibility. So I don't think my audience is particularly against it. It's not really for them, but right now, uh, I think it's exciting of how many people will be able to invest in a general sense.

All right. Matt Another big topic for millions of Americans And that student loan debt borrowers are going to start needing to repay their student loan debt this fall? How do you see this affecting the trader? Community Just the amount that people are willing to risk in trades, is that going to affect Behavior at all? I Don't think it's the wildest jump to think that it might come down a little bit, but it's tough because we're already coming from quite a peak of record highs and zero DTE trading. so I could see it kind of going both ways. but I do think maybe less money also because of the timing of it.

I Mean if the average, according to Morgan Stanley the average payment is going to be the realm of three to four hundred dollars a month. That's three to four hundred dollars a month. That's not going to be going on flights to restaurants in your trading account. So I think there are going to be some Ripple effects, but it'll be interesting to say how it plays out.

I Believe starting in October Welcome back to Yahoo Finance Live I'm Alexandra Canal joined by Josh Shafer Prostimoranian and mask Matt cores from the Matt Core show on YouTube Matt You picked a good day because we have a lot to talk about with Disney extending Bob Iger's contract by another two years through December 31st 2026. that contract was originally supposed to end at the end of 2024., now two years later, there's a lot to get done. Disney says it still says that the succession plan who comes after Iger that's still a priority, but you have to wonder who. Could That Be At This Point as Bob Iger ever truly going to be ready to step down? There have been rumors of some internal candidates, some external candidates, but this is a big decision for this company moving forward.

Oh, and it seems like the extension at least just looking at that part of it makes sense when you think about timeline for some of the things they're trying to do right now. right when you talk about maybe bringing Sports on ESPN a la carte to a direct-to-consumer platform when you talk about what are they going to do with Hulu when you talk about some of those stuff we're going to get into about the linear networks, but big big things happening at Disney that Bob Iger is putting into motion, it didn't really make sense when you think about the timeline for him to then be done in a year. So I think just overall. this kind of maybe fits what the narrative was a little bit more.

I think it's a reassurance for investors here, right coming after that kind of surprise move when Bob Jpeg was kind of let go and Iger brought back kind of like the uh, he returns right? so he's back now new to your contract, we're not surprised to see that. But I mean, is there any talk of who could actually like who is in that succession succession plan We just saw full screen some of the internal candidates: Dana Walden Who leads the entertainment division Josh Tomorrow he leads a park division. Could he bring back Kevin Meyer Potentially. Uh, you know there's been the Mattel CEO has been rumored, so there's talk Tom Stags They they let him go too.

right? Exactly. People go and then they come back at Disney Clearly, but like Josh was saying there is, There are so many issues at this company that although succession probably is and should be the most important thing, it sort of feels like it's in the back burner given all these pressing issues. I Personally, as an investor in Disney I want Bob Iger there right now as a Fame business operator, it I feel more comfortable him pulling off like whatever's going on Hulu ABC ESPN So feeling pretty positive about it and really, even if you look at the stock, it's not a bad opportunity here. About ten dollars of downside to Serious support and quite a bit of upside.

So who's leading the Helm of the ship and he's obviously a proven record of doing it before? I Think the next two years could be pretty exciting with them all, right man. I Want to get your take on what he said about linear networks? then I'll I'll read the full quote of part of what Bob Agar told CNBC in this interview that was sort of the headline of what came out of this. He said that we are expansive and are thinking about the linear business and we're going to look expansively for opportunities there because clearly it's a business that that's going to continue to struggle. You look at the Linear Network's Revenue down about a billion dollars in the most recent quarter compared to last year.

Just what do you make of if they were to either scale back when your networks get rid of Linear Network What did you make of the comments overall there? I Just agreed I Thought it was fully spot on and I think it's something that for all of us who's like communally consuming social media, that's the trend. Like there's just no popularity there. Like, of course, it is consumed. but he called it out years ago in himself and he's like he just kind of came back and said yeah I was right.

So obviously this is the direction we have to go because the market is always changing. But I could ask I mean Live Sports Live Events that's the driver of linear, right? I mean is he basically just kind of hiving that off into ESPN and then and then ABC ABC family. All other stuff is kind of on its own. He basically said he wouldn't Define what the word expansive means, but you can surmise that probably that means unloading some of those assets selling them off.

The big question though, is who's going to buy ABC He himself self said that the Linear Network business as a whole is broken. The distribution model is broken. so who who's going to snatch that up? I don't know. Yeah, you would think that maybe I guess you.

It's like most things, there's some parts that maybe are attractive when you think about live news or something. I think there's always probably room for some aspect of that in the streaming services because you're going to want some sort of news to go with what you're building out if we fully were to get rid of cable, right? or you get rid of that part of it. but I think when you think about sports, it's interesting to think about what they want to do with ESPN plus and go to bringing all of the sports and bringing live sports onto ESPN Plus because that's when they've seen the most subscriber growth in the past is when they brought NHL games to ESPN plus live games. If they're able to do that with this NBA deal that could come up in 24 25, then I think you're talking about a more attractive product and ESPN is clearly the exception here when it comes to some of those cable networks some of those linear assets because Bob Iger did say this is going to be an over-the-top direct-to-consumer platform.

it's going to happen. We don't know when he says he has a better idea of when, but he's not ready to say that now. So once that happens, I think it's going to put a lot of pressure on the other streaming Giants to get into the live sports game and it's going to give Disney a Competitive Edge Yeah, what? I'm sorry, do you want to? Oh no. I just agree.

without a doubt. Uh, obviously. Bob Iger I'd be willing to bet far better negotiator than I'll ever be, but it's still kind of odd if you're trying to sell something and then in the interview you're like I'm selling it because I don't want anymore. It's not good at all.

Like that's weird. but the last time I had the fortunate time of being here, we were talking about ESPN and that where that could go that touches on what you were saying of I think out of all of what's going on in cable and all of it as a whole it is sports like. that's going to be the interesting thing. So if I had to guess right now kind of a Hail Mary guess I think it's going to be a partnership for maybe better distribution.

but I think it's going to a premium paid model. Yeah, I Thought it was interesting too. He gave a shout out to that big company out of Cupertino right? And they're nice. And they're nice headset that might go well with sports.

A company that has a lot of money that could maybe help you fund something that might cost 75 billion dollars? I Just we're really extrapolating there. but I do think that's interesting when you think about Apple wanting to get more into sports. Maybe that's where the future of Sports boxing goes if those headsets become popular. Sort of some sort of merge there.

He didn't single out one company by accident. obviously so kind of. Beyond virtual and augmented rallies. Real reality and that's theme parks, right? So uh, in that same interview talking about how whether his kind of few Disney DeSantis has affected Parts attendance he says no, we're not seeing any effects there so far and I'm not really surprised by that if you think about it.

I mean what parents gonna tell their kids you know we're not going, we're going I'm gonna have throw a fade if we're not going to go. So they went right so the settings is still happening there. I Think for someone like a DeSantis uh, you're taking on the state's largest employer there with Disney I think it kind of hurts his sort of business. bonafides to go after Disney and then now it's either Back is a formidable guy to deal with.

If you're DeSantis and you heard the news that Iger's on for another two years, you have to be like Oh I Thought he was gonna be out way sooner election year exactly because this is a feud that's not going away anytime soon. but in regards to the parks, there is a Slowdown The company did say that Park attendance is going to, you know, slow down a bit towards the back half of the year due to a variety of factors. That's something that analysts have called out. It'll be interesting to see in the upcoming earnings report in August whether that was the case and what Disney is guiding towards in the future, but Bob Iger He is very bullish on the parks.

He thinks they have a lot to offer and it's really the one true area of Disney where they get a lot of data on all of these uh, attendees, all of the fans and that could trickle into other areas of the business as well. You wonder where it relates to original content too, right? I Feel like that's been a big part of the conversation when you talk about Disney trying to turn itself around right now and maybe coming back to some better original content? It seems like a lot of people have been harping on the original content not being strong recently. How does that relate to then new rides you can build out and sort of get to that next. Generation When's the last time a good Mickey Mouse movie came out right? Like just as far as getting to that younger generation and coming out with I Don't know if it's new movies with old characters, new characters that connect to that new generation, but it seems like that might be the leg that is kind of missing here.

That needs to happen a little bit too. I Think you're touching on a very interesting point. Out of the last eight movies Disney's released, it's a cumulative loss of 900 million dollars, so that could be an interesting Focus if they pull that around and then tie it in with the parks to kind of drive more people showing up. Uh, definitely a problem that has to be at least addressed.

It's sort of the Marvel train kind of slowing down. Is that what's happening here? I Mean we're just getting too marveled out to Star Wars out Yeah. I Think when Disney Plus was launched, there was this rush to create as much content as possible. So these creators they were pumping out Marvel series for TV that they haven't done before they've focused on Films They were also doing the same with Star Wars and that's something Bob Iger brought up.

He said creatively, we weren't hitting the Mark we were pumping out way too much money, so they are going to be pulling back pretty significantly on that content spend. So it seems like the focus here is quality over quantity on the content side moving forward. And that's really where streamers have been successful, right? And as far as getting people into a show and getting people excited about what they're doing, it seems like doing a little bit less and not sort of force feeding us too much content because Disney has a lot of characters that people do like. and then when you start forming them into new people and you add all these TV characters and stuff, fans are loyal to those kinds of characters and I think that maybe there's a little bit of frustration or friction that builds and that's why some of the shows don't do as well.

Yeah, well, we'll see how this all shakes out. We have until the end of 2026 to see what happens. Matt Core is from the Matt core show. Thank you so much for joining us!.