Looks like no one loved the baby enough, so it’s getting cut in half. Comcast announced yesterday that it would be shedding most of its cable channels and spinning them into a new publicly traded company that it’s creatively calling, for now, “SpinCo.” It’s a stark acknowledgement by Comcast that its cable networks, while still highly profitable, have little growth potential and are weighing down the broader company.

SpinCo will include channels CNBC, MSNBC, E!, Syfy, Golf Channel, USA, and Oxygen, as well as the ticketing site you hate to find yourself on, Fandango, and review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes. Meanwhile, Comcast will retain its golden children like Bravo, NBC properties, Telemundo, its film and TV studios, theme parks, and most importantly, the streaming service Peacock.

Peacock, which everyone laughed at during its clunky rollout, is now standing up to its bullies. As it deftly handled the Paris Olympics over the summer, it increased paid subscribers by 29% last quarter and revenue increased 82% to $1.5 billion. Comcast’s last remaining cable channel, Bravo, and its hoard of housewives and Sandoval haters have also proven to be a major driver of Peacock viewers.

Comcast is also preparing to open Universal’s Epic Universe in Orlando next year, which it claims will be the “most technologically advanced theme park to open ever.”

Prepare for M&A-palooza

Comcast President Mike Cavanagh said in a company memo that SpinCo venturing out on its own will help it and its group of “powerful assets” navigate the rapidly deteriorating landscape for cable TV.

But in that shrinking industry, having scale matters, so don’t be surprised by a wave of deals involving SpinCo properties, especially since the incoming Trump administration will likely take a more M&A-friendly approach. Comcast could even be eyeing a streaming merger now that Peacock has broken free from the cable networks dragging the parent company down.

Looking ahead…while Disney and Warner Bros. Discovery execs have dismissed plans to break apart their empires, some experts predict that the Comcast spinoff is the starting bell of the next big re-glomeration as entertainment behemoths try to ditch dusty cable channels.—MM

Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy want federal workers back in the office. In a WSJ opinion piece outlining their plan to curb government waste, the co-heads of the newly created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) wrote that they want to bar federal employees from working from home and compel them to come into the office five days a week. “American taxpayers shouldn’t pay them for the Covid-era privilege of staying home,” Musk and Ramaswamy wrote, and if workers don’t comply, it “would result in a wave of voluntary terminations that we welcome.” If adopted by the incoming Trump administration, mandating fully in-person attendance for the country’s largest workforce could set off fierce battles with federal worker unions.

Yesterday, in fraud news…Gautam Adani, one of the world’s richest people and chair of Adani Group, was charged by US prosecutors with participating in a bribery scheme in which more than $250 million was sent to Indian government officials to obtain solar energy contracts. Adani and other defendants were charged in New York federal court for fraud, as prosecutors accused them of lying about their plan when raising money from US investors. Meanwhile, Archegos founder Bill Hwang was sentenced to 18 years in prison for massive fraud that led to more than $10 billion in losses for Wall Street banks. And FTX co-founder Gary Wang avoided prison time for his role in the historic fraud orchestrated by Sam Bankman-Fried because of his cooperation with the government.

Bomb cyclone pummels Pacific Northwest; more bad weather on the way. A hurricane-strength storm tore through Washington State, Oregon, Northern California, and parts of Canada yesterday morning, bringing tremendous rainfall and heavy winds that knocked down trees, killing two people near Seattle and leaving over 600,000 Washington homes without power. A record drop in air pressure offshore caused a cyclone to rapidly intensify and join forces with an atmospheric river to drench the region with a predicted 20% of a year’s worth of rainfall this week. Heavy rain is expected today and tomorrow along the coast from Northern California to Oregon, with blizzard warnings issued in northern Sierra Nevada and the Cascade Range mountains.

Missing profit goals probably feels even worse when your corporate logo is a bull’s-eye. Target reported its largest earnings blunder in two years this week and cut its full-year outlook, sending its stock plummeting more than 20% to a 52-week low.

For the latest quarter ending Nov. 2, Target reported that:

• Profits shrank 12% to $854 million, from $971 million during the same period last year. That was below the bottom end of Target’s forecast and 20% lower than Wall Street’s expectations.
• Same-store revenue declined 1.9%, but a 10.8% jump in online business helped keep Target’s comparable sales just barely in the green at 0.3%. That still fell well short of the 1.5% growth analysts projected, per FactSet.
• Digital and in-person traffic actually increased 2.4%, in part thanks to thousands of price cuts.

What happened? Shoppers spent less on appliances, toys, and other non-essential purchases that account for almost half of Target’s business, CEO Brian Cornell said. It also cost Target extra to rush shipments in preparation for the October port strike that ultimately only lasted four days.

Meanwhile…Costco and Amazon are ripping, while chief rival Walmart especially is dunking on Bullseye the Bull Terrier. Walmart said its comparable sales grew 5.3% last quarter, and discretionary spending also ticked up for the second quarter in a row.—ML

It’s one banana, Michael, how much could it cost? Well, we’ll tell you: $6.24 million.

That’s how much the viral duct-taped banana art piece “Comedian” sold for at Sotheby’s auction yesterday. It was purchased by crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun, who beat out six rival bidders for the potassium prize.

Banana? Banana. Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan shook up the art world when he debuted the absurdist work five years ago and sold three editions for $120,000–$150,000 each. Cattelan said in 2021 that the piece is not a joke, but “a sincere commentary and a reflection on what we value,” and moreover, that the presence of the item in the world of high art is “as if the auction house is leaning on a provocation to keep the show alive.”

Broad strokes: The art market is attempting to recover after a brutal 2023 when the average amount spent on art dropped 32% from the previous year. This week was promising—aside from the banana, the sale of a surrealist masterpiece by the Belgian artist René Magritte reached $121.2 million at a separate auction.

But it’s too early to tell if this week’s autumn sales signify a substantial shift in art market dynamics or a bright spot among the darkness. Some industry experts predict that the art market will get a boost from President-elect Trump’s business-friendly policies, while others are waiting to see how inflation and interest rates shake out under the new administration.—CC

If you’re opening a handmade silk handkerchief boutique, New York’s Fifth Avenue is no longer the costliest address for it. According to real estate firm Cushman & Wakefield, Via Monte Napoleone in Milan is now the world’s most expensive street in terms of top storefront rents, with a square foot going for $2,047, up 11% from last year. This marks the first time in decades that a European high street earned the priciest-on-the-planet designation. Meanwhile, Fifth Ave. slipped to second place, with the prime square foot price staying flat at $2,000.

Why is this street so pricey? First, Milan is experiencing a luxury tourism boom, and the uber-wealthy have relocated to the city in droves to take advantage of generous tax incentives. Second, it’s a matter of supply and demand: This street is short, making retail space more competitive and driving up prices. Gucci’s parent company Kering bought a $1.4 billion building on Via Monte Napoleone this year.—SK