Stock Sharks: The Deep End

“Netflix didn’t kill us.”
 
Former Blockbuster and 7-Eleven CEO Jim Keyes joins Stock Sharks to explain what he believes really brought Blockbuster down—and why the familiar Netflix story misses crucial details.
 
Jim shares his account of the billion-dollar debt burden, the 2008 financial crisis, and a proposed Google partnership that could have changed Blockbuster’s future. He also addresses the $50 million Netflix acquisition story and why he gets blamed for a decision made before he arrived.
 
From his first job at McDonald’s to leading two iconic brands, Jim opens up about leadership, adapting to change, and the decisions he would make differently.
 
IN THIS EPISODE
• Why Jim believes debt was decisive in Blockbuster’s collapse
• Blockbuster’s digital strategy and the Google partnership that almost happened
• Working with Carl Icahn and navigating a corporate turnaround
• Warren Buffett’s advice during a difficult period
• The business lessons behind 7-Eleven’s success
• Education, creativity, and careers in the age of AI
• How small businesses can compete with large corporations
 
FREE HORIZON AIRCRAFT REPORT
This episode is presented by Horizon Aircraft. Get the free research report mentioned in the episode, covering the company, its hybrid electric aircraft technology, and its future potential:
https://stocksharksmedia.com/horizon
 
ABOUT JIM KEYES
Jim Keyes is the former CEO of Blockbuster and 7-Eleven and the author of Education Is Freedom.
 
WATCH THE VIDEO
https://youtu.be/i2x-lMJE5zI
 
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Kevin O'Leary — Mr. Wonderful — sits down across the table to reveal where his money is actually going next. It's not the AI stocks everyone's chasing.

Kevin breaks down the 5% rule that's protected his portfolio for decades — and the brutal dot-com margin call that taught it to him, losing $3-4 million an hour as Bear Stearns called every four hours. Then he gets into the trades: why the real AI winners are the companies producing electricity (including Google's $3 billion power deal in Finland), why he bought a 10% weighting in Canada the day the trade war started, and why uranium and the Nordics are his highest-conviction power plays for the next three years.

We also cover his IPO playbook, how he researches a stock in 20 minutes, buying private companies at 3.5x free cash flow, AI transforming medicine, Bitcoin and the tokenization debate, Q-Day — the quantum computing threat to crypto — stablecoins yielding over 3%, and the $11 million Mickey Mantle card he thinks trades like a Picasso in 20 years.

In this episode:

The 5% rule and surviving the dot-com crash

The power trade behind AI

The contrarian Canada bet

Uranium, nuclear SMRs, and the Nordics

Bitcoin, quantum computing, and stablecoins

The $11M Mickey Mantle card

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Nothing in this episode is financial advice.

Dan Niles of Niles Investment Management joins us for a wide-ranging conversation on where the market actually is right now. Dan called the June AI speed bump two days before chip stocks rolled over. Here he explains why he thinks we're 100% in a bubble, why he's still buying anyway, and where he sees the hardest-run stocks falling 30 to 50% before this AI cycle busts.

We cover the memory shortage almost nobody is pricing in, why today looks more like 1997 than 1999, and what happens the day good news stops moving stocks. Dan breaks down the AI arms race, OpenAI vs Anthropic and who actually wins, whether AI itself is getting commoditized as models get cheaper, plus a quick take on Elon Musk's companies.

Then we go macro: where interest rates settle with the Fed on hold, and the national debt now near double the level that once terrified investors. Dan has been through two busts before, the dot com collapse and the 2008 crisis with his fund housed inside Lehman the week it failed, and he walks through what breaks first when the music stops.

He also opens up on the story behind it all: the $50 Merrill Lynch account he opened in college, walking away from designing microprocessors at Digital Equipment for Wall Street, standing alone with zero buy ratings at the top of the dot com bubble, and why emotional control is the trait he says matters most in this business.

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