Name: Squawk Pod: AI deals go round and round & Cava’s CEO - 08/12/26 | Audio Only
Uploaded: 2026-08-12T16:47:09+00:00
Duration: 1670 s

Speakers

Jensen Huang — CEO, NVIDIA

Ed Zitron — Author of Where's Your Ed at Newsletter, Host of Better Offline podcast

Brett Schulman — Co-Founder and CEO, Cava

Scott Gottlieb — Former FDA Commissioner; Board Member (Pfizer, Illumina, UnitedHealth); Partner at NEA (Venture Capital)

Summary

The episode centers on Nvidia's $500B AI infrastructure deal and Ed Zitron's bearish view that it is circular vendor financing with unsustainable demand from OpenAI and Anthropic. It also covers Cava's resilient quarter amid foodborne illness outbreaks and management's value-driven traffic strategy. Finally, former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb discusses the limited near-term impact of Trump's vaccine executive order but warns of state-level mandate fights and food-supply oversight risks in Mexico.

Nvidia announces a $500B AI infrastructure financing arrangement with six large Wall Street firms.
Jensen Huang frames AI computing as a new asset class comparable to stocks and commodities.
Ed Zitron argues the AI buildout is circular vendor financing, with Nvidia backstopping customers including CoreWeave.
Zitron says Microsoft and Google Cloud revenue is heavily dependent on OpenAI and Anthropic despite massive capex.
Cava reports strong traffic and profit, says its supply chain was not tied to outbreak areas, and sees trends rebound.
Cava is under-pricing CPI and holding 2026 menu price increases to drive traffic and market-share gains.
Scott Gottlieb says vaccine executive order could pressure states to weaken school mandates and widen red-blue divides.
Gottlieb says US food supply is not less safe but flags oversight risk in Mexican produce regions with cartel presence.

Ideas

Jensen Huang CEO, NVIDIA 1:46

AI compute is new asset class.

Nvidia's $500B arrangement with Wall Street is still a memorandum of understanding and amounts to vendor financing; Nvidia raises the funding, finds customers, pays them to rent back GPUs, helps raise debt, and backstops deals including CoreWeave's IPO, so it does not resolve circular financing concerns.

Ed Zitron Author of Where's Your Ed at Newsletter, Host of Better Offline podcast 3:14

CoreWeave is circular vendor-financed AI demand.

CoreWeave is a clear example of circular AI financing: Nvidia pays it contract revenue, helps raise its debt, invested over $2 billion and propped up its IPO, while CoreWeave's demand is heavily reliant on OpenAI and Anthropic, making it a vendor-financed compute front.

Ed Zitron Author of Where's Your Ed at Newsletter, Host of Better Offline podcast 5:06

Microsoft AI revenue depends on OpenAI.

Microsoft's AI revenue is dangerously concentrated: about 70% of fiscal 2026 AI revenue came from OpenAI, while Microsoft 365 Copilot is only a single-digit billion business despite $261 billion in capex since 2022, making its AI growth dependent on unsustainable, unprofitable AI labs.

Ed Zitron Author of Where's Your Ed at Newsletter, Host of Better Offline podcast 9:34

Google Cloud revenue tied to AI labs.

UBS estimates 48% of Google Cloud's next-year revenue will come from Anthropic and OpenAI, meaning Alphabet's cloud growth is heavily tied to circular compute demand from unprofitable AI labs rather than durable end customers.

Brett Schulman Co-Founder and CEO, Cava 11:47

Cava resilient with traffic and pricing.

Cava reported a strong quarter with traffic uptick, its ingredients were not sourced from food-safety outbreak areas, sales trends are rebounding, and its intentional underpricing of CPI plus no additional planned 2026 price increases is driving traffic growth and share gains across income cohorts.

Squawk Pod: AI deals go round and round & Cava’s CEO - 08/12/26 | Audio Only

Summary

Ideas

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