WSJ's Gunjan Banerji on how ultra-wealthy spend: million-dollar vacations, the luxury travel boom, and AI wealth reshaping real estate

Speaker 1: I'm sure you've seen these all over social media. What's going on? We have some crossover in our guests, tons of crossover in our interests. Thank you so much for taking the time to join the show. How are you doing?

Speaker 6: Good. Thank you for having me. I'm excited to join you.

Speaker 1: Thank you for joining. Since it's the first time on the show, give us a little bit of your backstory. How long have you been with the journal? What were you doing before? What led you to the host The Wall Street Journal money interview?

Speaker 6: Yeah. I've been at The Wall Street Journal for nine years now, which seems crazy to

Speaker 1: say. Success. We love an overnight success. Congratulations.

Speaker 6: Exactly. Thank you. It's funny. I started as our options market reporter before options trading became cool during the meme stock mania.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 6: And I've gotten to really broaden out, write about so many different markets topics, including the recent AI madness.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 6: And just this year, I started hosting the WSJ money interview, which has been such a blast. Got to travel around the country to sit down with the coolest and most interesting tycoons of many different industries.

Speaker 1: Yeah. What what are you noticing in terms of trends that are intergenerational? Like, we've been talking about the Jensen story. He's sort of the last boomer CEO in tech, but I'm sure you're interviewing lots of folks who are Gen X or Millennials. Like what have you learned about either the way different eras, generations of successful business people think about money, think about wealth, think about luxury? How has that changed or evolved over your reporting?

Speaker 6: There's one big thing that really sticks out to me, and that's applicable especially now, where I think the most successful investors, entrepreneurs, they don't shy away from periods of market madness. And I think a lot of them have actually made their money during crises. You know, a lot of them were doubling down during the financial crisis, during the COVID pandemic. They were not afraid. In fact, they were putting money to work. They were buying build... Buildings. They were buying stocks. So I think that's especially applicable right now when you have all this AI craziness to remember that I think the people who've been really successful in markets, they really pounce on periods of crises and turn them into opportunities.

Speaker 1: Yeah. We, yeah, we saw that a little bit with situational awareness, extremely dramatic story. Ken Griffin comes in and then a few weeks later we're here and then Leopold's back in the market and and and running the strategy again. What what...

Speaker 2: Also Ken had been... Had some choice words that were

Speaker 1: What did he say?

Speaker 2: Leaking out prior to Oh, yeah. Capitulation.

Speaker 1: Expecting a rate hike? Is that...

Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 1: Sure. Sure. Sure.

Speaker 2: So understands the market cycle.

Speaker 1: Yeah. Do do you... Speaking of Ken Griffin, I believe he's a dinosaur collector. Do you... Have you been seeing an upswing in dinosaur collection through the folks that you talked to? We're we're huge fans of it here. Haven't purchased a dinosaur skeleton myself, but maybe in the future. Something to strive for, certainly.

Speaker 6: So I haven't spoken with too many dinosaur collectors.

Speaker 5: Okay.

Speaker 6: I will say I think collectibles are becoming huge.

Speaker 3: Yeah.

Speaker 6: I mean, look at all of the money that people are spending on things like baseball cards

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 6: Basketball cards. Like, recently, I heard about someone paying for a basketball card that was tens of thousands of dollars. So I think collectibles are really huge. I always love asking people how they are spending their money, and I gotta say that one thing kind of came up in a lot of my different conversations, which was a lot of these ultra wealthy investors, entrepreneurs, they love a million dollar vacation. So a million dollars spent on a month in Europe or a few weeks in Europe. You won't be surprised to hear that private jets came up several times, and I actually had a really fascinating private jet mogul, Ken Ricky, on our show.

Speaker 1: Yeah. We love him.

Speaker 6: And he talked a little bit about how... Yeah. I I think he's been on here too.

Speaker 1: He's been on here too. Fantastic. And he gave you a fantastic scoop about his tipping strategy, which is crazy. Oh, my... Did you remember the details? It's like something crazy.

Speaker 6: It's it's epic. And to be honest, I've started using it. He says he tips when he gets there. Yeah. I'm not tipping as much as him, unfortunately, but he says he tips when he gets to a restaurant. So the first time he gets to a restaurant, he'll tip pay a thousand dollars to the manager. The first time he gets to a hotel or a vacation rental, he might tip $10,000 when he gets there, and he says, that way people know what type of service or hospitality you you expect. I I love... Abundance mentality about that.

Speaker 2: I worked at a I worked at a hotel in college and I've always... Through that I realized like when you're going to any like specifically valet or really any service valet in particular, if you tip when you come in, you're gonna get an amazing Mhmm. Service. You often they'll keep your car at the top Yep. Close by Yep. Oftentimes the real hack is most valets don't actually charge you for parking. Oh, interesting. If them Sure. The way in because Yeah. They're just gonna keep your car...

Speaker 1: Faster because you don't have to

Speaker 2: deal with the and

Speaker 1: they know who you are and stuff. That's great. What is how how do you spend a million dollars on a vacation in Europe? I imagine that getting there on a Gulf Stream back and forth, that's expensive, but that's not a million dollars necessarily. What what's the breakdown? What are people doing? What does it look like?

Speaker 6: Oh, what a great question. And and I asked I asked the same thing. I think private jet travel

Speaker 1: Mhmm.

Speaker 6: Is a big part of it. Right? But then I also heard that yachts for several weeks can can cost a million dollars. Like, think about how the prices of hotels have surged. You know, the journal had some great reporting how the number of hotels charging a thousand dollars a night. These are not even, you know, the imams of the world. These are sometimes three or four star hotels. It has just surged over the past few years. So I think you can get vacation rentals that are charging $510.15, $20,000

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 6: A night. So that... That's how it adds up. And I think the people I spoke with really viewed these as family experiences, experiences, like, right, investing in time with their friends and family. And that's part of the the broader luxury travel boom we've seen in the past few years.

Speaker 1: Yeah. It it does seem like there's an entirely new class of hotel that's up at, the $5,000 a night range. That is something new. All part of like this k shape that's developing in so many categories. Are there any areas that aren't k shaped yet? Is there an opportunity to k shape something? I... I've always I've always laughed about the fact that like, you know, me me and Jeff Bezos probably watch the same movie. It's not like he has access to like a a $100,000,000 movie that no one else has seen or like we use the same devices. I don't know. Maybe... Amazon does Studios. Think

Speaker 2: about like an an album that one person has that the rest of the world doesn't and you can really only think of like

Speaker 1: Martin Scarelli. Yeah. With the Wu Tang Clan

Speaker 2: He says he says the

Speaker 1: album He was doesn't like it. But is I didn't there think about

Speaker 6: the the members clubs though. Sure. Right? Like you say, is is anything not k shaped? And I feel like things are just getting more and more k shaped. I live in New York, and just the number of members clubs that have popped up is is insane. Yeah. So, yeah, it seems like things are heading that way.

Speaker 1: That's interesting. What what... Have you noticed any patterns with the the new AI boom specifically, changes in preferences around luxury or or or the way tech people spend money? Obviously, there's a liquidity wave coming with labs going public and whatnot, but I'm interested in anything that you've seen that... We we we were talking about the the collectible cars often. It's like the poster that you had on your wall as a child and that used to be like a Lamborghini Countach, but for many millennials it was something much later and something that was probably from 2005, maybe a Carrera GT or a 09/18 Spider. But what are you seeing among the the young AI wealth that's being developed? Is that is that shaped differently?

Speaker 6: So what I would say, it's it's still really early there. Right? And I think we're gonna see a ton of it with the anthropic IPO the next few weeks. The journal has had some really great reporting on how, you know, this young technology money has reshaped real estate markets Yeah. Around the country. Right? In in SF, I was talking to a friend in San Francisco who was telling me how impossible it is to find, like, rental because people are just swooping in, offering to pay hundreds, if not thousands of dollars more a month for for a rental. Yeah. I think, again, it's showing up in travel. I was talking to a private jet executive who was like, I can't get my hands on enough Gulf streams

Speaker 3: to

Speaker 6: meet the demand. Like, there's not enough planes on the planet right now or under construction to meet the amount of demand that we have and and the wealth that we're gonna have. Yeah. I also think some of these are tried and true true wealth indicators. I was chatting with, like, a YouTube executive who had a big exit recently, and he got a Rolex. Right? So I think some things kind of are popular among many different generations.

Speaker 1: Sure. Sure. When when you go into an interview, how do you think about the pre work that goes into dialing in the level of questions so you don't necessarily cross a line? I feel like when somebody sits down for the WSJ money interview, they're there to talk about money, they're there to draw out some numbers, but there still might be... You're not just going to say, hey, show me your bank account. Right? How do you think about getting a good interview out of someone that is about a somewhat sensitive subject but they know that they're going into a place where they're supposed to be a little bit more open than they might be in other scenarios?

Speaker 6: I like to be really upfront about it. You know, we have a no surprises rule here at the Journal, and I kind of try to adopt that going into the interview. I mean, I would say it can be a little bit of a dance, and you never want someone to be uncomfortable. But I I like to tell people kind of even when we're preinterviewing or when I first met them or when a a source first tells me, hey. This person would be really great for the interview. I like to say, like, hey. We we also wanna hear about how you approach this. I think there are a million markets and money and finance podcasts. I think not enough people are attaching real numbers as it pertains to wealth Yeah. Into these conversations. And so I I tell them, I think there are really ambitious WSJ subscribers who wanna hear about this. And some of them are game, and and some of them aren't. And, you know, that's not always numbers based. Ken Ricky, who who you guys had on, like, one of his viral moments was talking about these family money meetings that he has with these conversations. And I can't tell you how many people reached out to me afterwards saying, hey. We learned so much from that. Like, we had a family money meeting, and I can't imagine a better response. And Yeah. That's what I'm hoping we get out of that candor, and and I say that upfront. I'm sure you guys have have something similar. Right? When you guys are walking into interviews and telling people what to expect or Definitely. Or where to go with something.

Speaker 1: Yeah. Totally. I I think... I I... I'm interested in those viral moments. How how do you think about the fact that I feel like the WSJ money interview particularly performs well in short form? Like the clips do very well. There are other Wall Street Journal shows that maybe don't... Maybe they're just more in the weeds, more detailed and you can't get a one minute or two minute clip. Do you think about that in the way you ask questions and the way you design the interview and the way you edit? How how integrated are you into the the the the editorial process that goes into the distribution of the content once it's actually been recorded?

Speaker 6: I feel like we should have you in like our audience strategy meetings.

Speaker 1: I'd love to. That'd be great. I'm happy to talk about this stuff all the time. I love I love content.

Speaker 6: Have you have some really great observations about this. I will say, I don't think you can manufacture a viral moment. I wish you could. Yeah. I just... I don't think you can. And I... There are moments where I'm sitting there in an interview. I'm like, oh my god. I cannot wait to share that with the world. I think people are gonna love it.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 6: And then there are moments we put things out on social, and I'm like, really? That got millions of views? Like, I had no idea. You know, one of those moments for me was Vinod Khosla talking about how he doesn't get stressed. And I was like, okay. This is incredible. I wish I did not get stressed. I cannot wait to share this with my followers, the journal subscribers.

Speaker 1: Sure.

Speaker 6: But it just went so viral on social, and I could never ever have predicted that. So I think the best that you can do is try to have a candid conversation and try to cover ground that has not been covered before.

Speaker 5: Sure.

Speaker 6: And, you know, have an illuminating conversation with nuggets that people have not heard before, and that's the best formula I've come up with so far for success on waj.com and Yeah. Success on show... On social.

Speaker 1: Yeah. So you don't want people sitting there saying, I pay myself first. Right? Isn't that the cliche, Drew? Yeah. I guess. You you want a little bit more detail, a little bit more meat on the bone. Well, thank you so much for coming on the show.

Speaker 2: Yeah. Great to finally meet and congrats on the run.

Speaker 1: Yeah. It's been I I I look forward to the next episode dropping. Have a great day and have a great

Speaker 6: Same here. Thanks guys.

Speaker 2: Good talk to

Speaker 1: you soon. Goodbye. Let me tell you about console. Console builds AI agents that automate 70% of IT HR and finance support giving employees instant resolution for access requests and password resets. Good.