Tomorrow's Business Today
A PR trick on the rest of us
In the competition for the most FT story ever published, we may have a winner.
The Pink ‘Un reports that guests at Davos – the hangers on, not the big cheeses – will see the cost of tickets rocket ten-fold from $115 to more than $1000.
This is a staggering above-inflation increase, presumably aimed at keeping out the riff-raff, such as climate change experts and reporters from The Telegraph.
Davos has always been an event asking for satire, but mostly the journalists with their faces pressed against the windows of the rooms where the important stuff happens have shied away from making fun of billionaires jetting to a posh part of Switzerland to chin-stroke about global warming.
(I’m nearing my first private jet myself. Once I acquire it, I promise I shan’t lecture the rest of you on recycling.)
Donald Trump likes to go to Davos, since he hardly gets the chance to say what’s on his mind otherwise.
Will he make it in 2025, or will inmate P01135809 have to podcast from his prison cell? It’s exciting!
If he wins the US election tonight, people say, that’s a clear victory for the billionaire class.
As if they presently languish in fear.
For 54 years, Davos has been a powerful brand, persuading the media that something important is happening, that powerful people have uniquely come together to talk, as if they don’t do that all the time anyway.
An enraptured journalistic class pretends it’s on the inside while it copies out press releases and writes thinky pieces on what the mood at the only event they were allowed into really signifies.
Comments below the article suggest the readers get it, even if newspapers do not.
A sample: “Personally, I would not want my future wellbeing determined by a bunch of billionaires swanning about in the Swiss Alps with tier 2 sycophants trying to influence them.”
“Greedy mingling with the super greedy and hangers on trying to curry favour. The whole circus is capitalism at its worst.”
“If you see the CEO of a large quoted company attending Davos, sell the stock.”
Will this scepticism be reflected in reporting of the event come January?
Nope.
Davos is a spoof the PR industry plays on the media.
Score so far: Flaks 54, Hacks 0.
Please send candidates for press release of the day to: Simon.english@roxhillmedia.com
Press release of the day
A welcome u-turn here from the City regulator on how firms can pay for investment research.
Since it stopped brokers from bundling up the research inside trading fees many shares have had to live without any cover from analysts. Which meant less interest in the shares and a moribund market.
The FCA now says it will “allow fund managers to combine payments for research with trade execution, subject to certain guardrails”.
The City reaction to all this will be telling.
Stories that will keep rolling
We're more than just a database
Sign up now for a free trial, and see how you can distribute winning campaigns every time.
We're more than just a database
Sign up now for a free trial, and see how you can distribute winning campaigns every time.
