Industry (2020) s04e03 Episode Script
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1
(ENERGETIC DREAMY MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
You know, people mistake
their needs being satisfied
for freedom,
but when it drinks this well,
who are we to argue?
HILARY WYNDHAM: How did you know
I was a Lagavulin man?
I just wish you'd sent
a revolver instead.
Oh, well, you're going
to get that next week.
You can quote SternTao's view,
"The shares are trading
above fair value
and stand to correct."
JIM DYCKER:
I have more valuable sources
than a barely nascent fund to quote,
especially as you're yet
to give me anything
more material on Tender
other than what I already have.
Look, I think they're processing porn
and gambling payments in jurisdictions
where it's illegal and using
third-party acquisitions
to wash them, even
though Halberstram has mooted
that he may wind up
those income sources.
Well, shit.
I will give you a quote.
"SternTao are actively pursuing Tender
as a potential short,
among other positions."
Yeah, my article isn't a cotillion
for your new venture.
Are you calling Tender
fraudulent or not?
I mean, I don't think I'll get
the F-word past my editor.
HARPER STERN: Is there
a not insignificant chance
that your piece gets gutted
or squashed by legal?
No. The worst-case scenario is
the more alarmist language is
sanded down.
I view it as the first
in a potential series.
I'm trying to get financial sign-off
from my editor
for underground reconnaissance
further afield.
Can I be blunt?
Are you short Tender
in a personal account?
Excuse me?
Do you stand to gain financially
by speaking negatively about them?
I saw your piece
about getting fleeced in FTX.
I'd understand if you were
looking for shortcuts
to rebuild your life.
You know what?
I am rebuilding my life.
Through my honest work. All right?
Certainly not by being
naive enough to go back
to the thing that burned me.
I don't even have an active
trading account anymore.
Doesn't sound like you're on your way
to our new investor breakfast.
HILARY: Eric,
I would have been excited
to have come
and listened to you and
- ERIC TAO: Harper.
- (GASPS MOCKINGLY)
Ah, unforgettably forgettable memories
from the Pierpoint killing floor.
ERIC: Well, we're
calling ourselves "SternTao."
Between you and me,
the short only fund is
a little high-risk for us
at the Railway Pension Scheme.
Well, if there's any more protein
on the illegal payments
laundering thesis,
- I want it.
- JIM: Yeah, you know,
this isn't
how this relationship works.
FINDIGEST STAFF 1: Yeah,
stop calling it "click-bait"
and call it "curiosity gathering."
Hello?
ERIC: I hope your son gets
your money's worth at Yale,
and don't worry,
he'll come back to you eventually.
Do you really believe that?
For a loan, yeah.
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
Just trying to find
common ground with the guy.
What is this, the Deadbeat Dads Club?
I think this might be
too intimate a space
to be working together.
ERIC: Who were you on the phone to?
(INTRIGUING SYNTH MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
The Railway Pension scheme
was long odds anyway.
They don't have that kind
of appetite for risk.
The composition of our audience
who've confirmed for breakfast
family offices,
high-net worth individuals.
Dumb money?
You lead us off.
I'll fill in the gaps.
Okay.
(HENRY MUCK CHUCKLES)
(INTRIGUING MUSIC CONTINUES) ♪
When you fuck my mouth
with your tongue like that,
I know I've got you back.
- (SOFT KNOCKING)
- HAYLEY CLAY: Sorry.
I just wanted to tell you
that Jennifer Bevan's here.
Your 9:00 a.m.
Great.
- Thanks, Hayley.
- HAYLEY CLAY: Yeah.
(YASMIN KARA-HANANI CHUCKLES)
You can't talk like that in here.
I can.
And I will.
Now, you need to focus
on the societal benefit angle
of the app,
financial well-being.
But I also think that we should
really use this time with Bevan
to highlight
the Muck Renaissance, you know?
Just as much
as you feel comfortable with.
Men shouldn't feel a stigma
when talking
about their mental health,
that kind of thing.
Yeah, won't she Won't she
see through me, I don't know
weaponizing my trauma?
But, Henry, narrative is important.
People are gonna
narrativize this for you,
so you might as well control it.
She saw you at your worst.
She's gonna be
feeding back to government.
We just need
to build her trust in you.
HENRY: Yeah, Whitney
and the Tender board trust me,
that's what matters.
I mean, they made me CEO
for fuck's sake,
but th this isn't about me.
This is about the details
of the company,
and and in the immediacy,
it's about getting
the IBN Bauer merger
over the line with the regulator.
No, no, look, if I make it
too personal, I'll
I'll just put my fucking foot
in my mouth.
- (EXHALES SHAKILY)
- Darling
(DREAMY MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
you are the company.
You're the head and the heart.
It's all about you.
I'd be dead without you,
you know that?
(YASMIN CHUCKLES)
(MUSIC SWELLS) ♪
- Ready?
- Yeah.
Yeah.
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
Tender's ambitions predate me.
I never made any attempt to, um
to cover up my failure at Lumi,
nor have I oversold my successful,
if, uh, short-lived, political career.
These are the vicissitudes of life
in the arena as I see it.
And Jennifer, you
and Henry are on the same page.
I mean, you surely know
what it's like to live
in the firing line
simply because you care enough
to be engaged.
HENRY: Yeah, you know what? Um
(INDISTINCT CHATTER)
If you want to talk
about me, let's, uh
(CLEARS THROAT)
let's talk about me.
I could talk
about my profound struggles
with mental health, uh,
my family's barbaric history.
I could talk about the fact
I most likely wouldn't be
sat here if my wife
hadn't have pulled me
out of a pretty dark hole
after the election.
But your party consistently
voted to underfund access
to mental health on the NHS.
Yeah, and if you check my record,
you'll see that I defied
a three-line whip
to oppose that legislation.
Jenni, you saw the worst of it.
HENRY: Yeah, look, um
(INDISTINCT CHATTER)
I had to be told
how appalling I was to you,
and I have never felt
- such shame
- Henry.
Your letter said it all.
I know the cycles.
My brother also
had issues with alcohol.
It's day by day.
Yeah.
Anyway, uh I want to make
your voters' lives a little easier,
and a banking license will
allow Tender to do just that.
First, you need
to let us buy this bank.
(PENSIVE DREAMY MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
The business secretary is
going to reason
that Tender's merger
with a European bank
like IBN Bauer is anti-competitive.
Consolidation of the banking
and fintech sectors
across Europe.
Yeah, well, we don't sell it
to Lisa like that.
We sell it to her and the regulator
as the consumer being
given a fresh choice,
away from fossilized institutions,
and maybe even an opportunity
for a post-Brexit relationship
with the European banking sector.
We don't talk about Brexit.
Yeah, look, nobody believes
we can be the next Silicon Valley.
Nobody believes that we can attract
that kind of direct foreign investment
because of your government's
over-regulation.
Every day for the past month,
I've walked these floors,
and working with our team,
I have never felt more strongly
that this is our chance
to be a genuine leader
in a new frontier.
You guys can own it.
Let Tender help you
help the government.
Push through the merger.
We're 100 percent net short.
Fads, secular losers,
five to ten core shorts
with smaller satellite positions
and sector overlay.
Running that concentrated,
you could get taken out
by one position.
MICHAEL ABBOTT:
The market's way too volatile
to be taking a large
short-directional bet. Bonkers.
Short-only,
you've essentially given up
before you've even started.
HARPER: You want differentiation.
You see a market that only goes up.
We see a target-rich environment.
The family offices
that you invest for,
the clients that you represent,
demand an uncorrelated return profile.
High risk, high reward.
ERIC: I've worked with Harper
for many years.
That's a bone-deep moneymaker.
I know her as the woman
who petulantly gated her fund.
(UTENSIL CLINKS SOFTLY)
Or the woman
who orchestrated her freedom
so she could be stood
in front of you today.
INVESTOR 1: Tell me
SternTao isn't just two people.
Where's the team?
Who's your trader?
PIERRE WOMACK: In truth,
I feel a little disappointed.
I was very excited
to meet you both, but
(BREATHES DEEPLY)
you've either got a short that puts
the cat inside the pigeon,
or you don't.
Who says I don't have that idea?
Eric didn't misspeak
about secular losers.
Broken business models? Okay.
Slightly sketchy
management teams? Fine.
(INTRIGUING DREAMY MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
But my real passion lies
with finding dead men walking.
Where the base case is
a total reevaluation
and a re-rating of the equity story.
We have our eyes on Tender.
(MUSIC TURNS TENSE) ♪
AVA ANAND: The market is
treating that as a growth stock.
What exactly is your thesis?
We have fundamental misgivings
about their core offering.
PIERRE: Too high risk
for such a generalized,
detail-poor take.
HARPER: Pierre (CHUCKLES)
anyone who wants
to place money with us
will have full access
to our researched view
above and beyond cursory remarks
at an introductory breakfast.
(CHUCKLES SOFTLY)
FERDINAND SCHWARZWALD
On our IBN Bauer merger,
the Prudential Regulation
Authority dragging their heels
has allowed a quiet noise in Vienna
- to develop into a bit of a din.
- (TENSE MUSIC CONTINUES) ♪
FERDINAND: Given the family voted
in favor of the merger,
I thought this was a non-issue
I could handle personally
without it reaching you.
But the Bauer family still
represents two board seats.
Moritz and his mother have been
audibly re-litigating
the concerns they raised
when we were negotiating.
They've now asked for a sit-down
with your executive team.
His opposition is immaterial.
There was a majority vote.
Moritz and his mother voted
to sell their family bank.
It's a legacy board seat.
They're paid to have no issues.
They're paid to shut the fuck up.
Yeah, we can't strike
such a hostile tone.
We have to act quickly here.
The meeting with the regulator
is tomorrow,
and we need that banking license.
Bevan's in hand,
but Dearn will be
a harder nut to crack.
But this is all for the fucking birds
unless IBN Bauer
follow through and sell.
Who's the agitator?
The son or the mother?
FERDINAND: The son.
Moritz's issue is security.
Says he fears the data
of IBN's banking clients
being targeted, harvested,
what have you, post-merger.
LOUISA STÖCKL: Uh, it's ludicrous.
Our anti-fraud systems are
state of the art,
and they're
an antiquated Austrian bank.
Didn't the Bauers finance the Reich?
It's a bit late
to be growing a conscience
on GDPR issues in 2026.
They've given huge financial support
to Shoah survivors. Tens of millions.
No varnish. My reading,
this guy is an Alpine fuckboy
with an outsized sense
of his own relevance and recourse.
Sorry to add my voice here,
but in my experience,
testy family members respond
well to a bit of face time.
You know, an ego massage.
Exactly.
Support scaffold for delusions
of his own grandeur.
Working title for my biographer.
- (BOTH CHUCKLE)
- (SCATTERED CHUCKLING)
HENRY: Uh, in all seriousness,
we can't risk postponement,
or God forbid,
pay the termination fees
if this thing falls apart.
I think if they've asked,
we should all go.
You know? Multiple faces will
make him feel
important and heard.
Lend him our ears.
Pretend we're listening.
Come back, deal with the regulator.
- ROBIN WILLIAMSON: Henry, I
- No, no, no No.
It's his executive decision.
Sorry, I don't mean to be too direct,
but in what capacity are you
in this room exactly?
Oh, um, she's a paid consultant,
and, uh and we need her here.
(INHALES, CHUCKLES)
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
That Tender idea,
was that just contrarianism,
or you think there's a there there?
(CUP CLATTERS)
I read that they're
in the process of acquiring
an Austrian bank.
I got a tip that there might be
more going on
underneath the hood.
What do you mean a fucking tip?
A journalist shared
an unpublished hypothesis.
Does he or his employer
have enough caché
that the market will care?
Or is he just
a self-published scribbler?
No, he works for FinDigest.
Why the fuck is he leaking
this stuff piecemeal to you?
The ethical blowback
for him could be huge.
HARPER: (SIGHS) He's sending
pre-publication questions
to Tender, but I don't know
when he's publishing.
How much does a stock re-rate
when a market darling's been
proven to be overvalued?
(SUSPENSEFUL DREAMY MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
Well
the operative word there is "proven."
You can't kill a blue chip
with a thousand cuts
from some reporter.
Look at Herbalife.
Looks like a pyramid scheme.
Smells like a pyramid scheme.
Ackman intellectually lays out
how it functions as one.
Maybe that's the truth.
But what good is the truth?
You've got timing.
You got Herbalife's PR machine.
You got Carl Icahn talking up
the other side of the trade.
How good a storyteller are you?
And how long
can you sustain the story?
Without a smoking gun, you will lose.
Ackman closed out Herbalife, he lost.
So can we prove it? And then
can we be loud enough?
Short-only work is ugly,
hard, investigative.
It's anti-status quo,
anti-establishment
anti-power.
Which part of that is meant
to be a problem for us?
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
- No, no, no. Hold on a sec. Whit?
- I'm
HENRY: FinDigest have just sent
pre-publication questions.
Who the fuck is this Dycker guy?
Where's he getting it from?
WHITNEY HALBERSTRAM:
Ah, it's just conjecture.
Yeah, well, he says,
"With these figures in mind"
- Hayley.
- "it cannot be ruled out
that Tender continues
to process illicit transactions,
including gambling
and pornography payments
through African jurisdictions,
where such services are legal
for non-residents."
I mean, is he saying
we're being willfully blind
to money laundering,
or is it intentional? Which is it?
All it demonstrates
is his incompetence
in reading a balance sheet
with as many moving parts as ours.
We're not giving this guy
oxygen. You know why?
More than likely, he's had some rogue,
trumped-up report slipped to him
by some amateur short-seller
looking to make a quick buck
day-trading our shares
when this grubby
little piece gets airtime.
Yeah, well, how can you be so sure?
I guarantee he's talking
to someone
in the hedge fund community.
It happens all the time
in the retail space
with celebrated stories.
It's market manipulation,
pure and simple.
There's no large
institutional short base
for good reason.
Okay, well, what's our response?
LOUISA: Robust legal action,
if needs be.
Regardless of their accusation,
I'll draft up an airtight response.
Their in-house legal will be
pushing back
on a lot of this pre-publication.
I think we don't engage.
A story like this could
threaten the merger.
Moritz doesn't need
another rock to throw.
Yasmin, what do you think?
Well, you know,
I don't have the qualifications,
but, um, yeah.
I I'd say, to Whitney's point,
a blanket statement, if they publish.
"The allegations are
spurious," et cetera.
WHITNEY: Yeah, leave it there.
If it even sees daylight.
The story ends where we say it ends.
- (ELEVATOR DINGS)
- (DOORS WHIRRING OPEN)
Can I talk to you privately,
- quick?
- Yeah. Yeah.
- Of course.
- HAYLEY: Okay, thank you.
YASMIN: Uh, I
I'll catch up with you.
HENRY: Yeah, meet us
at Farnborough, darling.
Plane sets off in two hours.
(ELEVATOR DOORS CLOSE)
Um
Um
I have a confession to make.
YASMIN: Mm-hmm.
Well, yeah.
Anything you say stays with me.
(TENSE MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
I nearly slept with the journalist
asking those questions.
He, like, followed me
like, into a club.
And I think I fell asleep,
and I don't
really remember the play-by-play.
W Wait, so what,
he forced himself on you?
HAYLEY: No.
No, not not really at all.
I mean
I was pretty fucked up.
Did you fuck him?
Did you answer any of his questions?
HAYLEY: No.
I hate when men try and take something
that isn't theirs.
(BREATHES DEEPLLY)
(CLEARS THROAT) Well
thanks for telling me.
I like this transparency,
and of course, I, um,
- I I won't tell anyone.
- (SIGHS) Thank you.
Yeah.
When we get there,
feel free to explore Vienna tonight.
- Have the night off.
- HAYLEY: Oh, well,
I'm Whitney and Henry's EA, so
I need to hear from either of them.
YASMIN: Mm.
Great, okay.
- Eric, I got us lunch.
- (DOOR CLOSES)
Eric?
TEEN: Are you her?
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
- Who?
- You.
- Lara?
- Lily.
HARPER: Damn.
You're, like, so grown compared
to what was in my head.
You shouldn't really
be thinking about me.
(FOOTSTEPS APPROACHING)
Tell Tell Mom you, uh
(BILLS RUSTLING)
enjoyed yourself.
I will.
I did, mostly.
(FOOTSTEPS DEPARTING)
ERIC: Okay.
LILY TAO: Bye.
Bye.
(DOORS CLOSES)
How's Operation Normal Guy going?
Having a twin who's better at stuff
like sports and socializing
fosters a bloody resentment
of the world.
Who knew?
You have siblings?
I got somewhere with brokers
and trading lines.
- I spoke with Kenny.
- Goldman still?
I I'm not sure how he'd feel
about covering me
since I fired him on a hangover.
Deutsche Bank.
Fuck, ouch.
I hope he didn't fall off the wagon.
(TELEPHONE RINGING)
Your 3:00 p.m. is here.
So this is your set-up? (CHUCKLES)
HARPER: Yeah, it's a little lo-fi.
Eric handles the overhead.
It's mostly club sandwiches and fries.
- (SWEETPEA GOLIGHTLY CHUCKLES)
- How's Mostyn's?
SWEETPEA: Ooh.
Hmm, the misogyny swings
between patronizing and lecherous.
- HARPER: God.
- I don't know.
Sometimes, I I feel like, um
Cherry pie left on the windowsill?
It's a bunch of men running around
hitting themselves
over the head with a hammer
like fucking cartoon wolves.
(LAUGHS) Yeah.
Well, it's my own fault, so
HARPER: Hey.
No, it's not.
No, it's not.
That Siren leak was not your fault.
You did something for you,
and some asshole made it
not for you.
And I hope he fucking suffers for it.
Thank you.
When you sent me
that email about Tender,
you piqued my interest.
And you know what I'm like.
I couldn't stop looking.
Mostyn would never.
Tender's IPO deck from two years ago.
Compare it to their annual reports.
What am I looking at?
They use euphemisms
about the kind of payments
they're processing.
"Emotional content" is porn.
"Gaming" is gambling.
Clearly, that is a key source
of their revenue back then,
but since the IPO
and over the next five years,
the EMEA region is maturing
into a key driver of their growth.
And that's not possible?
No, I'm not saying it's not possible
for EMEA acquisitions to drive growth.
I'm saying that this
- (TOILET FLUSHING)
- constant erratic evolution
of their strategy isn't
even slightly reflected
in their in their projections.
So much risk isn't baked
into the share price.
- The
- ERIC: Hi again, Sweetpea!
Hi! Hi, Eric!
So (CLEARS THROAT)
if your thesis is correct,
they're still continuing
to process illegal payments,
even though they've made overtures
that they're stepping away from this
as their core business.
I mean, in any case, it's primed
for a mega correction and re-rating.
Analysts are recommending
25 Buys, 2 Sells.
SWEETPEA:
Mm. Incentive and groupthink.
The star fintech analyst
at MS, he's just upgraded,
a couple of smaller places followed.
The market's reading
Muck's appointment
as a positive catalyst, not sure why.
ERIC: Even a basket case could win
if enough influence wanted it to.
Yeah, well, nobody wants to stand
in front of a moving train.
Nobody wants to get off it
when it's full of cash.
(SWEETPEA CHUCKLES)
- Thank you.
- My pleasure.
HARPER: We would love you
to come on full time.
- (CHUCKLES SOFTLY)
- (KNOCKING ON DOOR)
Don't know if you can make
head or tail of it,
- but it's what you asked for.
- Anywhere is fine.
What the
Sorry, what the fuck is he doing here?
- (BOX THUDS)
- SWEETPEA: No, genuinely,
stay the fuck away from me,
- honestly.
- I am not staying.
You're working
with this piece of shit?
We're helping him out a little.
You're (SCOFFS) Um
This guy is a fucking psychotic liar,
a fucking pathological degenerate.
I have read every horrible detail.
ERIC: Sweetpea, relax.
Don't tell me to fucking relax.
He's a fucking murderer.
I'm not, okay? I'm not a murderer.
Please, just stay
the fuck away from me.
I'm not a murderer!
If you put me in a room
with this cunt again,
you will never hear
from me again, okay?
Yeah. Yeah.
(RECEDING DEPARTING)
(RISHI RAMDANI SIGHS)
Looks good.
("O DU MEIN ÖSTERREICH"
BY FRANZ VON SUPPÉ PLAYING) ♪
- YASMIN: Hello.
- CASTLE HELP: Welcome.
Please come with me.
- (EXHALES)
- (CAR DOOR CLOSES)
(FERDINAND SPEAKING GERMAN)
HENRY: Hope it's got a fucking loo.
FERDINAND: Moritz.
Ferdinand.
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
(FERDINAND GREETS IN GERMAN)
This is Tender's new CEO
- Hi.
- Henry Muck.
Moritz-Hunter Bauer.
I think we had mutual friends
at Winchester.
I was unlucky enough
to spend five years at Harrow.
I tell you,
for every genuine homosexual,
nine are created
by British boarding schools.
- (LAUGHS)
- FERDINAND: And his wife, Yasmin.
I also do some comms consulting
for Henry's office.
- Hi.
- MORITZ-HUNTER BAUER: A pleasure.
My mother, Princess Johanna.
Welcome.
- Thank you.
- JOHANNA BAUER: It's a pleasure.
Well, look, um, Moritz,
we're here to assure you
that we will be dutiful custodians
of your family's bank
Part of the depredations
of neoliberal late capitalism is
there is no central authority
to appeal to.
Just a patchwork of economic zones
to facilitate capital flight.
We'll be subsumed, unhappily, and say,
"Ah, it's the free market.
This is supposed to happen."
Well, Tender doesn't want you
to be unhappy.
Happiness is a full stomach,
Mr. Halberstram.
So let's save this conversation
for dinner, yeah?
JOHANNA: What a splendid
idea of yours.
Allow me to show you to your rooms.
- Please, after you.
- YASMIN: Oh, fantastic.
- (DOOR OPENS)
- AUTOMATED VOICE: (OVER PHONE) Hello.
- You've reached Tender.
- ("ORINOCO FLOW" BY ENYA PLAYING ON PHONE) ♪
- (DOOR CLOSES)
- AUTOMATED VOICE: Your call is important to us.
Please continue to hold
while we find
the next available operator.
- What are you looking for?
- AUTOMATED VOICE: Or press zero
HARPER: Uh, I don't know, actually.
Patterns in Tender's
payment transaction history,
routed
through their EMEA acquisitions.
Didn't you tell me
you had plans tonight?
This shit ain't going anywhere.
Yeah, I'm not sure that I should.
You're not sure you should?
Is it a dude?
Go. Operation Normal Girl.
Go!
HARPER: I've tried calling four
of the payment processors
they acquired in Africa.
Every time I was put
on this eternal fucking hold
through Tender's Dublin call center.
AUTOMATED VOICE:
Hello. You've reached Tender.
- Your call is important to us.
- HARPER: Ugh, this endless
- fucking Muzak. Shut up.
- AUTOMATED VOICE: Please continue
- (ERIC LAUGHS)
- (BREATHES DEEPLY)
I genuinely feel like I'm losing
my grip on reality.
Pierre called.
Good news is he thinks Tender,
at the very least, feels toppy.
Bad news is he wants
quite specific terms and structure.
How aggressive?
ERIC: He wants
a first-loss arrangement.
Pierre acts as guarantor.
I put up ten million dollars.
He puts up 90.
But the first ten million
the fund loses
is my ten million.
Depending on how
our main position performed,
I might have
to liquidate my family office
my girls' inheritance.
HARPER: I would literally
never ask you to do that.
Don't really see
where that leaves the health
of our little venture here, then.
Unless we find our short,
raise capital
and put a team together,
we're gonna be stalled
on the launch pad.
We don't even have a trader,
for fuck's sake.
Maybe get the fuck outta here
for a bit.
HARPER: I want to work.
ERIC: Hey, I've lived a life
where everything is work.
I've lived a life
where everything is leisure.
I'm telling you,
for a few hours on a Tuesday evening,
there's a middle ground.
This is all gonna be here
when you get back.
- (KNOCKING ON DOOR)
- (DOOR OPENS)
I just came to settle you in.
I hope you feel comfortable.
I put you in my favorite room.
Oh!
It's full of our habseligkeiten.
Do you know this word?
(IN GERMAN)
(BOTH CHUCKLE)
(CHUCKLES SOFTLY)
literally translated,
it means "possessions
closest to your soul."
- That's beautiful.
- JOHANNA: Hmm.
(IN GERMAN)
(CHUCKLES)
if you need anything,
just let me know.
- Danke schoen.
- JOHANNA: Gern.
(CHUCKLES)
(DOOR OPENS, CLOSES)
I I admire the UK system.
The pendulum swings, of course,
but at least you don't
muzzle insurgents.
Well, your mother tells me
that you were a bit of a historian.
Most of our political quagmire
can be answered
- by the early modern period.
- YASMIN: Hmm.
That's why my political hero
is (IN FRENCH) Louis XIV.
with the Sun King.
I'm sorry. I, uh
I don't think I've ever
heard anyone say that.
- (BOTH CHUCKLE)
- (YASMIN LAUGHS)
Eh, anyone with eyes can see
Western liberalism has failed.
Decades of political gridlock,
partisan divisions accelerated
by social media,
a short-term policy driven
by a need to win elections.
The most successful central government
in the world today
functions as an absolute monarchy,
and for that, calls itself communism.
Okay, Moritz.
This isn't very riveting
dinner conversation.
YASMIN: Oh, Johanna, please sit down.
We can't have you wait on us.
Oh, please.
It's an absolute privilege.
Oh, um, I read your Substack.
- MORITZ: I'm flattered.
- Yeah.
Uh, fragmentation
and the acceleration of atomization,
it is killing us as a species.
Take any successful corporation
in America.
They're not a collectivist enterprise,
they're dictatorships.
Then why do Foxconn
and many industrial parks need
worker-suicide nets?
All I'm saying is
that they are not democracies.
FERDINAND: Sad
that we must always wash up
on the reef of politics.
JOHANNA: Oh, I couldn't agree more.
- So, bon appétit.
- (UTENSILS CLINKING)
- YASMIN: Thank you.
- (HENRY CLEARS THROAT)
MORITZ: Although, for me,
my, uh, politics and my business,
to the extent
to which it still is mine,
are one and the same.
What some see
as protectionism, isolationism,
I see as respect for tradition.
IBN Bauer is
a 300-year-old institution.
I'm concerned this merger represents
a threat to our customers' privacy.
I do know how fast and loose
modern fintech companies play
with their customers' data.
HENRY: Moritz, um
this merger, it represents
growth for both parties.
We respect the past, um,
but we will drag IBN Bauer
into the future.
(CLOCK TICKING)
I'm speaking to Julian Wullschläger
and others on the board to ensure
that this merger receives
the full scrutiny it deserves,
even if that means re-engaging
the Austrian regulator
around data protection.
Train's left the station.
You thought because I am
a small individual voice,
the weight of your capital
would bury me?
You voted for this,
and you'll be compensated
incredibly well.
Ah, it's always money,
(STERNLY) Mr. HalberSchtram?
JOHANNA: Moritz, it's enough said.
(SPEAKING GERMAN)
- I never mean to embarrass you.
- I know, Schatz.
We just have to be practical
and just humor him.
There's practicality,
and then there's acquiescing
to some tinpot tyrant.
Fine, he's a bit
of an intellectual pseud.
No, no, no, he's a fucking fascist.
We're his guests! You want
to fucking call him out
in front of his mum?
What about that thinly-veiled
anti-Semitism, hmm?
That's not what that was, come on.
- Whitney.
- For someone whose last name is Hanani,
you seem pretty relaxed.
We need to fly out
as early as possible.
But this is now a live issue.
I don't think it's a very bright idea
to just abandon the problem
and hope for the best.
HENRY: Yeah, but we can't
no-show with the regulator.
We have to fly out first thing.
Okay, I'm staying. I insist.
(JOHANNA AND MORITZ ARGUING IN GERMAN)
You're lucky
your wife is such a pragmatist.
(YASMIN CHUCKLES SOFTLY)
("SUKIYAKI"
BY KYU SAKAMOTO PLAYING) ♪
(INDISTINCT CHATTER)
(GLASSES CLINKING)
(CHATTER CONTINUES)
KWABENA BANNERMAN: Hey. Sorry,
sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry.
HARPER: I've been sitting here
for 15 fucking minutes.
KWABENA: Bro. Fuck.
Whole civilizations have risen
and fallen in 15 minutes.
(CHATTER CONTINUES)
Hey, hey!
I was joking. What the fuck?
I'm trying to build a business.
I don't have 15 minutes.
So for the two I plan
to stand right here,
I might as well tell you
that I fucked somebody else.
Okay.
Okay, you don't care?
KWABENA: What, in the last 15 minutes?
(CHUCKLING) Remind me
never to be late again.
Were you gonna say that
before I was late?
Is it even true?
Are you not sleeping
with other people?
No.
Not as far as I'm aware.
Okay.
Do you want
to put a pin in this, then?
I just thought we were hanging out.
But you like me?
You make it pretty fucking hard.
But yeah, if you'll let me.
(HESITATES)
You're a tiny bit
too punctual, though.
It's my It's my only note.
Be on time.
I have a job
that I left to be with you.
KWABENA: Yeah, so leave it there.
God, we both came here
for biodynamic sake
and maybe some mutual fellatio.
Try separating church
and state sometimes.
It's easy.
Yeah, fuck this.
I actually came
to offer you a job. (SCOFFS)
KWABENA: Really?
Maybe this relationship is
done better over email.
Harper.
(RAISES VOICE) What's prompted
this enormous sense
of humor failure?
Harper?
- (MUSIC STOPS) ♪
- (DOOR SLAMS SHUT)
How was it?
- I hope that means good.
- (OBJECTS CLATTERING)
ERIC: You mind me being
this casually dressed?
Don't be so fucking weird.
Hard-coded, I'm afraid.
You good on presents?
What are 14-year-old girls into?
How the fuck should I know?
You should know
what your daughters like
and dislike.
I followed up with the rest
of the family offices.
In truth, I I had to chase.
A few eyes were on stalks
at you suggesting Tender was anything
but a blue-chip safe haven.
I dropped Tender
to be spiky and controversial
in a meeting that I thought
was headed south.
It's gonna take labor and sweat,
and turning stones, and fucking time.
ERIC: I have plenty of time.
If that's all you've got to offer me,
I think we should reevaluate
what's going on here.
Why are you being so sharp with me?
Because this is not some
recreational fucking game
or some lame extension
of your retirement,
while you're floating around
trying to rehab your life,
or, I don't know, cosplaying the roles
that you have
spent your life ignoring.
When the fuck did I ever say
I wanted it to be recreational?
If you don't want my daughter
in our workspace
When the fuck did I say that?
ERIC: You seem
a little triggered is all.
Tri Sorry, triggered?
Who the fuck uses that word seriously?
Are you kidding me?
Shit that people fucking say,
"Oh, my trauma made me stronger."
No, no!
My trauma traumatized me.
And it made me fucking weak.
And I have had to deal
with consequences
that were not my fault.
And it has nothing to do
with what I am doing right now!
Do you know why I do this?
Because I enjoy it,
and I'm fucking good at it!
It starts and ends with work
and being proven fucking right.
(SIGHS HEAVILY)
(ASHTRAY CLINKING SOFTLY)
This is life or death for me.
You used to act like it too.
(ASHTRAY CLINKING SOFTLY)
Sounds like you're a little triggered.
Okay.
I can act like it.
And you
you come to meetings
I spend days wrangling
with ideas that aren't half-baked.
(HARPER SIGHS)
(SIREN WAILING IN DISTANCE)
Do you know I'm a twin?
No, because you've never mentioned it.
Uh, I did a cursory Google.
A good percentage of the addresses
and contact numbers
of these acquisitions are listed
to the same place.
- Guess.
- I'm too tired.
The Dublin call center.
HARPER: An impasse then?
ERIC: I thought so too.
Plus, I'm not sure
it's altogether incriminating,
but I did notice something
in the documents.
- It's printed small
- (INTRIGUING MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
but on every hundredth or so page,
there's a "care of" address. See?
Google Street View, it looks like
well, it doesn't look like much.
I I sorta want to use
the term "shithole."
HARPER: Show me.
ERIC: That can't be right, right?
Does it look like a satellite office
of an enterprise
with a nine billion market cap?
Who, what, or where is Sunderland?
Sounds cold.
- SWEETPEA: (OVER PHONE) Hello?
- HARPER: Hey, Sweetpea.
Um, I'm really, really sorry
about today.
- SWEETPEA: No shit.
- And I know that you said
that you were going
to take a beat, but, um
swing time for a field trip?
I think this may
satisfy your curiosity,
and I need your expertise.
(KNOCKING ON DOOR)
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
(ANIMALS HOWLING IN DISTANCE)
Hi, um
Whitney wanted me to share
three different versions
of prospective rebuttals
to the FinDigest article.
(CHUCKLES)
You could have emailed them.
- (CHUCKLES)
- HAYLEY: Yeah.
Right. (CHUCKLES) Sorry.
Sorry, I didn't, um
YASMIN: Can I smell martinis
on your breath?
Raya must see a pretty
lean scene in Vienna.
- (BOTH CHUCKLE)
- (DOOR OPENS, CLOSES)
- Hi, Hayley.
- HAYLEY: Hi.
- HENRY: Sorry.
- It's okay.
Calabasas here just tried
and failed to get laid.
(LAUGHS)
Well, Yasmin, I'm sure
she doesn't want us speculating
about her youthful misadventures.
Well, I'm not speculating.
Tell him. (CHUCKLES)
HAYLEY: She's right.
But more like,
he tried and failed. (CHUCKLES)
(CHUCKLES) Classic.
Well, I mean
you're too good for most.
She's very frustrated.
Aren't you, Hayley?
I don't
I don't know if I'd say that.
A little.
Sure.
Yas, what the fuck are you doing?
Hayley
- Come here.
- HENRY: (WHISPERING) Yas, Yas, you're all I need.
YASMIN: Do you, um
Do you like him?
Do you
- like this?
- (HENRY MOANS DEEPLY)
("BASSICALLY" BY TEI SHI PLAYING) ♪
(HENRY SIGHS HEAVILY)
Do you want to kiss him?
I want this for you.
- Um
- Baby, I'll behave ♪
Do you (HESITATES)
Do you want this?
Mm-hmm.
If you let me stay ♪
Please don't think ♪
That I'm begging you For love ♪
Baby, let me stay ♪
When the world is gone ♪
Promise I'll behave ♪
Never right your wrongs ♪
(BREATHES HEAVILY)
- Is that what you want? ♪
- Is that what you want? ♪
Like the other boys ♪
Someone you can flaunt ♪
Like the other toys ♪
Good. (EXHALES)
Now spit on it.
(HAYLEY HAWKS SPIT, SPUTTERS)
(EXHALES)
(MOANS DEEPLY, SIGHS)
(HENRY BREATHING HEAVILY)
(HAYLEY GASPING)
- (MUSIC STOPS ABRUPTLY) ♪
- (HENRY, HAYLEY GRUNTING)
(HENRY GASPS, WHIMPERS)
YASMIN: Calabasas, look at me.
- (HAYLEY GASPING)
- (HENRY PANTING)
(HENRY PANTING)
(SOFT INTRIGUING MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
YASMIN: Get off her, Henry.
(FLUIDS SQUELCHING)
- (HAYLEY PANTING)
- (BED CREAKING)
Now turn around on the bed,
open your legs and show me your cunt.
(EXHALES)
- (PANTING)
- (BED CREAKING)
(EXHALES HEAVILY)
Now I believe you have something
that belongs to my husband.
And therefore, to me.
(SLURPING)
(BIRDS CHIRPING)
(GULPS)
(BURPS)
JOHANNA: Well, it seems
the men have been scattered
by the wind.
They've abandoned you with me.
Help me take the dogs out.
Moritz's name on the bank is no more
than an honorific, really.
And he knows
that the Tender deal is a good deal.
He just craves attention.
YASMIN: How so?
Well, he simply
doesn't want to be defined
by his family name only.
- (BIRDS CHIRPING)
- (DOG BARKING)
W Well, I mean,
I could speak to one
of Alexander's editors.
Yeah, even if it's a one-off column,
it will make Moritz feel
like the world's actually
listening to him for once.
- This is such a wonderful idea.
- (CHUCKLES)
You know, I think
seeing his thinking valorized
by Norton masthead,
I think this would give him meaning.
- Mm-hmm.
- You know, even if it's just
for an instant, to see his name,
his view printed, black and white.
Yeah, I mean,
legacy media still has weight.
Yes, the weight of history.
Yeah, he has a way
for not couching his views
for polite company.
But the general direction of travel
of his thinking is
undergirded by common sense,
wouldn't you say?
He (BURPS) Oh.
Sorry. (CHUCKLES)
Yeah.
Yeah. I would.
("HORST-WESSEL-LIED"
BY MILVA PLAYING) ♪
- (WHISTLES)
- (DOG BARKS)
- (JOHANNA WHISTLING)
- (DOG BARKING)
("HORST-WESSEL-LIED"
CONTINUES PLAYING) ♪
(VOCALIST SINGING IN ITALIAN) ♪
(SINGING IN ITALIAN CONTINUES) ♪
(SINGING IN ITALIAN CONTINUES) ♪
(SINGING IN ITALIAN CONTINUES) ♪
(SINGING IN ITALIAN CONTINUES) ♪
- (MUSIC CONCLUDES) ♪
- EDWARD BURGESS: Fuckin' James.
James!
FINDIGEST STAFF:
1,800 comments on this piece
about parents helping their kids buy
shoebox properties in London.
I haven't had a postbag this full
since that piece about the beauty
of London's mosques.
You asked for the right to reply?
Yeah. Yeah, just
nothing back as of yet.
Cunts.
(HESITATES) Why wait to publish?
I mean, we know they're just gonna say
the allegations are baseless
and pull up a drawbridge.
What? "Tender, investigated.
The high-growth
fintech company's results
lack transparency
and should spook investors."
Oh, fucking hell, can't we be blunter?
I mean,
"Ex-porn payments company still
illegally processing porn payments?"
(CHUCKLES) James,
you failed to have noticed,
the night lawyer wants to take out
a large chunk of your copy.
JIM: How much?
(TENSE MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
- Oh, fuck off.
- EDWARD: Mm.
See, you can't imply circuitous
accounting without evidence.
We don't have
the luxury of speculating
without an insider.
Why are you so desperate to get this
out of here half-cooked?
Ah, 'cause Paddy Radden Keefe
or someone will get the scent
and a serious outlet
with budget will beat us to it.
Look, mate, all I'm saying is
the faster we publish,
the safer my man
will feel going on record.
Now, you know I have someone who may,
they may, play ball
in corroborating this.
You know he's too intimidated
to do it electronically.
Well, these guys,
they're fucking litigious.
So it either goes out
with the changes,
or it doesn't go out at all.
- Sorry.
- (JIM GRUMBLES)
All right.
Uh, yeah Yeah, fuck it, print it.
It's a start.
But if you won't unlock budget
for me to go to Accra,
I guess I'll book
my own fucking ticket, yeah?
- BURGESS: Hmm.
- JIM: Yeah.
You prat!
(DOOR CLOSES)
HARPER: Took fucking long to get here.
It's a bit sketchy.
SWEETPEA:
I grew up on a street like this.
So we gonna tell 'em
we're in finance or what?
Just let me handle it.
- (DOORBELL RINGS)
- (DOOR OPENS)
Hiya.
We're actually from the Office
of National Statistics.
We might have rung your bell
by mistake, so forgive me.
- No worries.
- SWEETPEA: No, sorry.
We were under the impression
that this was an office.
Is there anyone who works here?
ALISON STODDART: Well, me
me son works from home.
(MOUSE CLICKS)
You girls okay?
BOTH: Fine.
JEFFREY STODDART:
So I get a ton of emails
from various payment sites in Africa.
That's the graft, really.
The amount.
Lots of attachments.
- Can you show me one attachment?
- JEFFREY: Sure.
(MOUSE CLICKS)
- JEFFREY: It's
- Transactions.
JEFFREY: Yeah.
How'd you know?
What do you do with them?
JEFFREY: Well, it's loads of
transactions at different price points.
I collate them and bucket them.
It's not all that taxing, like.
Don't put yourself down. Work is work.
JEFFREY:
So anywhere between zero pound
and 12 pound gets labelled "PZ202."
Whereas between 12 and 80
gets "PZ303."
Eighty and 200.
200 and 500, it goes on.
And those buckets populate
a new spreadsheet
- (MOUSE CLICKS)
- here.
ALISON: I'm just
popping out, Jeffrey, love.
(INTRIGUING DREAMY MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
He's not
building the charts
in Tender's earnings report.
Um, Jeffrey,
do you mind if I just note
some of those codes down?
So, every one of Tender's
available transactions is coded
- by hand by gorgeous Jeffrey.
- Yeah.
They must have a dozen Jeffreys,
coding by price,
not by origination or service.
And that is
how they're hiding the porn
and the gambling, right?
So they're recording it, then
Yeah. So, like,
if you buy hardcore porn,
or flowers for your nan,
or you piss away your money
at roulette,
- it is all categorized the same.
- Ah.
I mean, as long
as it roughly costs the same.
It's just like one big bucket
of slop called "consumables."
Right. Well, we have
to see this through.
- Yeah, I agree!
- Okay.
- Fuck me!
- (LAUGHS)
Fuck us! That was such
a fucking mental buzz!
Sweetpea.
Come work with me. Please.
Harper, you left Petra.
And you left Mostyn.
I need your word
that you will actually
see this through.
No distractions.
Understood.
If you come, you have my word.
Okay.
(CHUCKLES)
Great. Get Eric on your phone.
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
HARPER: James, it's Harper.
What if I told you
you were 100 percent correct
on your Tender payments
laundry thesis?
Well, as you'll no doubt remember,
earlier this year,
Lisa, your government
promised to "rip up the bureaucracy
that blocks investment"
and urged the regulator,
that's you, Colin,
to "take growth seriously."
Blocking this deal would, um,
break both those promises.
Global innovators, large and small,
would take note that,
despite the Labour Party's
often, um lofty rhetoric,
the UK is closed for business.
It would represent a major blow
to UK citizens,
who currently at least, remain largely
in the dark about how parlous
their economic circumstances
really are.
LISA DEARN: Noblesse oblige,
aristocracy-knows-best type stuff.
(SCOFFS)
It's hard to stomach from you.
People have short memories.
I see my role in politics
as maintaining a very long one.
And that includes seeing
through a charlatan's rebranding.
And I haven't forgotten
making you squirm
during the Lumi inquiry.
(TENSE DREAMY MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
It would be an act of narcissism,
bordering on self-harm,
to allow personal history
to deliver a fatal blow
to what we're on the verge
of achieving here.
This merger will give us
a banking license,
- meaning more choice, lower prices
- (DOOR OPENS)
a wave of innovation
to follow in our slipstream.
Bold statements,
but they're hardly backed up
in any of the literature
that you've
Ricky Martyn, with a Y.
WHITNEY: Ah.
Chief of Staff to the Prime Minister.
So the floor's all yours,
I'm all ears.
- (FINGERS SNAP)
- Oi, did you know about this?
DEARN: Ricky, thanks for stepping in.
You interrupted my next
You interrupted my next question,
which was to Colin.
Uh, how does anything
we've heard have any bearing
on whether a merger
with an Austrian bank
represents an antitrust issue?
- The banking system
- WHITNEY: Colin, the complaints
you've heard from our rivals are
obfuscating their real fear.
They're not scared
of a reduction in competition.
- They're scared of an increase of it.
- (SCOFFS)
WHITNEY: This is an objectively
pro-competitive deal.
Colin. Ricky, Jennifer, Lisa,
it's not just a question
of whether Labour's Britain
is pro-business.
It's about whether Labour is
pro-reducing financial fraud,
pro-teaching financial hygiene
to its electorates,
pro-the consumer's agency
in his own financial life.
Your last government
isolated you from Europe.
I urge you to see this as a first
of many necessary steps
towards reintegration.
Don't you think?
WHITNEY: Henry!
(HENRY CLEARS THROAT)
Uh, sorry. Yeah.
You know, of course. Yeah.
COLIN CULLEN: As I understand it,
your securing
of an Austrian banking license
to trade in the EU will be followed
by an application for a UK license.
We're a UK company.
- That's not how
- RICKY MARTYN: Colin,
the PM wants it stated in here
how much he admires Tender's vision
for making Britain
the fintech capital of Europe,
if not the world.
(HESITATING) And we respect
the PRA's independence
and honor their decisions.
Lisa, we could sidebar with Colin
about this later, I'm sure.
HENRY: Thank you, Ricky.
(TENSE DREAMY MUSIC RISES) ♪
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
HENRY: Whitney was right.
The FinDigest piece reads
like sensationalist nonsense
to manipulate the share price.
Louisa's drafting a response.
I guess this is why Moritz backed out.
Yeah, Alexander put me
in touch with Percy
in the opinion pages.
So,
you went behind my back
to my uncle
to give this guy a platform?
Alexander agreed with me, Henry.
It's soft-skill negotiation.
This isn't some crank writing
in The Spectator,
"In Defense of The Wehrmacht."
This is a national newspaper
with responsibility.
It's a kook running his mouth.
- It's, you know
- It's It's what?
It's tomorrow's fucking chip paper?
Don't be so fucking naive.
(SCOFFS)
Don't you think
you should be thanking me?
I mean, the deal
wouldn't have gone through
without me giving Moritz
this opportunity.
HENRY: What you did with Hayley
(SCOFFS)
HENRY: didn't feel right.
You know I'm an addict.
It felt very like enabler behavior.
YASMIN: You wanted her, Henry.
So you fucked her.
I was just bold enough
to know what to give you.
HAYLEY: Hi.
(HESITATES)
Big weekend, Calabasas?
I'm too young for hangovers.
Uh, your morning is pretty stacked,
and I booked your car for 7:00 tonight
for your dinner at Arlington.
Did I book that?
Uh, she did.
Do you want to join us
for a nightcap, Hayley?
I mean, there are some introductions
that we can make for you.
Yeah, I I have plans,
but I could cancel
- easily.
- HENRY: No, no, no.
Keep your plans, Hayley.
(INDISTINCT DISTANT CHATTER)
Who the fuck did I marry?
(CHUCKLES SOFTLY)
Shouldn't you know that, darling?
("ORINOCO FLOW" BY ENYA PLAYING) ♪
(INDISTINCT CHATTER)
FinDigest's article hasn't been
as stock negative as I'd hoped.
The market eventually will be forced
to price Tender's deception,
and they will punish them for it.
No guarantee.
- (CELL PHONE BUZZING)
- SWEETPEA: Hiya.
The Sunderland discovery
puzzle piece is useless
to the market without the full image.
It's as good as a hunch
without a groundswell
of investor sentiment behind it.
I thought the trader you hired
was supposed to show to this?
Ah.
I agreed to Pierre's terms,
by the way.
I told you I didn't
want that from you.
Well, you have it.
I gave it to you.
And all I ask
is that we widen the perimeter
of what we consider to be
acceptable discourse between us.
I won't hurt you just by knowing you.
I really appreciate
your financial backing.
It is more than I deserve.
And I will break my back
to ensure that your faith
is rewarded. (BREATHES DEEPLY)
But it is already a miracle
that we are in any position
to be working together again.
And you and I both know
that nothing good comes from us being
any more intimate than that.
Ah!
Deutsche! Goldman spit you out?
Well, the universe has quiet designs
- to keep us humble.
- HARPER: Huh.
- KENNY KILBANE: Just come this way.
- HARPER: Okay.
So, we would like
to place a short with you.
Buy-side is full of tyrants
who deny their tyranny.
Sell-side is full of slaves
who deny their servitude.
Somewhere in the middle,
all of human life.
- Right.
- (CHUCKLES)
How does it feel
to finally have the power?
A constant nerve-jangling desire
to enshrine it.
- (LAUGHS)
- KWABENA: Harp!
- I'm sorry I'm late.
- ELEVATOR VOICE: Door opening.
- ERIC: This your man?
- Yes.
- Eric.
- KWABENA: Kwabena.
Turn it up, turn it up ♪
ERIC: Kenny, I wanted
I'm just glad I got a chance
to say sorry.
I am. I am sorry.
Well
it's not the worst thing
anyone's ever done.
ELEVATOR VOICE: Door closing.
(DOORS THUD, ECHO)
sync & corrections awaqeded
("ORINOCO FLOW" BY ENYA CONTINUES) ♪
Sail away
Sail away, sail away ♪
From the North to the South
Ebudae unto Khartoum ♪
From the deep Sea of Clouds
To the Island of the Moon ♪
Carry me on the waves
To the land I've never been ♪
Carry me on the waves ♪
To the lands I've never seen ♪
We can sail, we can sail ♪
With the Orinoco Flow ♪
We can sail, we can sail ♪
Sail away
Sail away, sail away ♪
We can steer, we can near
With Rob Dickins at the wheel ♪
We can sail, we can sail ♪
Sail away
Sail away, sail away ♪
(SONG CONCLUDES) ♪
(ENERGETIC DREAMY MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
You know, people mistake
their needs being satisfied
for freedom,
but when it drinks this well,
who are we to argue?
HILARY WYNDHAM: How did you know
I was a Lagavulin man?
I just wish you'd sent
a revolver instead.
Oh, well, you're going
to get that next week.
You can quote SternTao's view,
"The shares are trading
above fair value
and stand to correct."
JIM DYCKER:
I have more valuable sources
than a barely nascent fund to quote,
especially as you're yet
to give me anything
more material on Tender
other than what I already have.
Look, I think they're processing porn
and gambling payments in jurisdictions
where it's illegal and using
third-party acquisitions
to wash them, even
though Halberstram has mooted
that he may wind up
those income sources.
Well, shit.
I will give you a quote.
"SternTao are actively pursuing Tender
as a potential short,
among other positions."
Yeah, my article isn't a cotillion
for your new venture.
Are you calling Tender
fraudulent or not?
I mean, I don't think I'll get
the F-word past my editor.
HARPER STERN: Is there
a not insignificant chance
that your piece gets gutted
or squashed by legal?
No. The worst-case scenario is
the more alarmist language is
sanded down.
I view it as the first
in a potential series.
I'm trying to get financial sign-off
from my editor
for underground reconnaissance
further afield.
Can I be blunt?
Are you short Tender
in a personal account?
Excuse me?
Do you stand to gain financially
by speaking negatively about them?
I saw your piece
about getting fleeced in FTX.
I'd understand if you were
looking for shortcuts
to rebuild your life.
You know what?
I am rebuilding my life.
Through my honest work. All right?
Certainly not by being
naive enough to go back
to the thing that burned me.
I don't even have an active
trading account anymore.
Doesn't sound like you're on your way
to our new investor breakfast.
HILARY: Eric,
I would have been excited
to have come
and listened to you and
- ERIC TAO: Harper.
- (GASPS MOCKINGLY)
Ah, unforgettably forgettable memories
from the Pierpoint killing floor.
ERIC: Well, we're
calling ourselves "SternTao."
Between you and me,
the short only fund is
a little high-risk for us
at the Railway Pension Scheme.
Well, if there's any more protein
on the illegal payments
laundering thesis,
- I want it.
- JIM: Yeah, you know,
this isn't
how this relationship works.
FINDIGEST STAFF 1: Yeah,
stop calling it "click-bait"
and call it "curiosity gathering."
Hello?
ERIC: I hope your son gets
your money's worth at Yale,
and don't worry,
he'll come back to you eventually.
Do you really believe that?
For a loan, yeah.
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
Just trying to find
common ground with the guy.
What is this, the Deadbeat Dads Club?
I think this might be
too intimate a space
to be working together.
ERIC: Who were you on the phone to?
(INTRIGUING SYNTH MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
The Railway Pension scheme
was long odds anyway.
They don't have that kind
of appetite for risk.
The composition of our audience
who've confirmed for breakfast
family offices,
high-net worth individuals.
Dumb money?
You lead us off.
I'll fill in the gaps.
Okay.
(HENRY MUCK CHUCKLES)
(INTRIGUING MUSIC CONTINUES) ♪
When you fuck my mouth
with your tongue like that,
I know I've got you back.
- (SOFT KNOCKING)
- HAYLEY CLAY: Sorry.
I just wanted to tell you
that Jennifer Bevan's here.
Your 9:00 a.m.
Great.
- Thanks, Hayley.
- HAYLEY CLAY: Yeah.
(YASMIN KARA-HANANI CHUCKLES)
You can't talk like that in here.
I can.
And I will.
Now, you need to focus
on the societal benefit angle
of the app,
financial well-being.
But I also think that we should
really use this time with Bevan
to highlight
the Muck Renaissance, you know?
Just as much
as you feel comfortable with.
Men shouldn't feel a stigma
when talking
about their mental health,
that kind of thing.
Yeah, won't she Won't she
see through me, I don't know
weaponizing my trauma?
But, Henry, narrative is important.
People are gonna
narrativize this for you,
so you might as well control it.
She saw you at your worst.
She's gonna be
feeding back to government.
We just need
to build her trust in you.
HENRY: Yeah, Whitney
and the Tender board trust me,
that's what matters.
I mean, they made me CEO
for fuck's sake,
but th this isn't about me.
This is about the details
of the company,
and and in the immediacy,
it's about getting
the IBN Bauer merger
over the line with the regulator.
No, no, look, if I make it
too personal, I'll
I'll just put my fucking foot
in my mouth.
- (EXHALES SHAKILY)
- Darling
(DREAMY MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
you are the company.
You're the head and the heart.
It's all about you.
I'd be dead without you,
you know that?
(YASMIN CHUCKLES)
(MUSIC SWELLS) ♪
- Ready?
- Yeah.
Yeah.
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
Tender's ambitions predate me.
I never made any attempt to, um
to cover up my failure at Lumi,
nor have I oversold my successful,
if, uh, short-lived, political career.
These are the vicissitudes of life
in the arena as I see it.
And Jennifer, you
and Henry are on the same page.
I mean, you surely know
what it's like to live
in the firing line
simply because you care enough
to be engaged.
HENRY: Yeah, you know what? Um
(INDISTINCT CHATTER)
If you want to talk
about me, let's, uh
(CLEARS THROAT)
let's talk about me.
I could talk
about my profound struggles
with mental health, uh,
my family's barbaric history.
I could talk about the fact
I most likely wouldn't be
sat here if my wife
hadn't have pulled me
out of a pretty dark hole
after the election.
But your party consistently
voted to underfund access
to mental health on the NHS.
Yeah, and if you check my record,
you'll see that I defied
a three-line whip
to oppose that legislation.
Jenni, you saw the worst of it.
HENRY: Yeah, look, um
(INDISTINCT CHATTER)
I had to be told
how appalling I was to you,
and I have never felt
- such shame
- Henry.
Your letter said it all.
I know the cycles.
My brother also
had issues with alcohol.
It's day by day.
Yeah.
Anyway, uh I want to make
your voters' lives a little easier,
and a banking license will
allow Tender to do just that.
First, you need
to let us buy this bank.
(PENSIVE DREAMY MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
The business secretary is
going to reason
that Tender's merger
with a European bank
like IBN Bauer is anti-competitive.
Consolidation of the banking
and fintech sectors
across Europe.
Yeah, well, we don't sell it
to Lisa like that.
We sell it to her and the regulator
as the consumer being
given a fresh choice,
away from fossilized institutions,
and maybe even an opportunity
for a post-Brexit relationship
with the European banking sector.
We don't talk about Brexit.
Yeah, look, nobody believes
we can be the next Silicon Valley.
Nobody believes that we can attract
that kind of direct foreign investment
because of your government's
over-regulation.
Every day for the past month,
I've walked these floors,
and working with our team,
I have never felt more strongly
that this is our chance
to be a genuine leader
in a new frontier.
You guys can own it.
Let Tender help you
help the government.
Push through the merger.
We're 100 percent net short.
Fads, secular losers,
five to ten core shorts
with smaller satellite positions
and sector overlay.
Running that concentrated,
you could get taken out
by one position.
MICHAEL ABBOTT:
The market's way too volatile
to be taking a large
short-directional bet. Bonkers.
Short-only,
you've essentially given up
before you've even started.
HARPER: You want differentiation.
You see a market that only goes up.
We see a target-rich environment.
The family offices
that you invest for,
the clients that you represent,
demand an uncorrelated return profile.
High risk, high reward.
ERIC: I've worked with Harper
for many years.
That's a bone-deep moneymaker.
I know her as the woman
who petulantly gated her fund.
(UTENSIL CLINKS SOFTLY)
Or the woman
who orchestrated her freedom
so she could be stood
in front of you today.
INVESTOR 1: Tell me
SternTao isn't just two people.
Where's the team?
Who's your trader?
PIERRE WOMACK: In truth,
I feel a little disappointed.
I was very excited
to meet you both, but
(BREATHES DEEPLY)
you've either got a short that puts
the cat inside the pigeon,
or you don't.
Who says I don't have that idea?
Eric didn't misspeak
about secular losers.
Broken business models? Okay.
Slightly sketchy
management teams? Fine.
(INTRIGUING DREAMY MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
But my real passion lies
with finding dead men walking.
Where the base case is
a total reevaluation
and a re-rating of the equity story.
We have our eyes on Tender.
(MUSIC TURNS TENSE) ♪
AVA ANAND: The market is
treating that as a growth stock.
What exactly is your thesis?
We have fundamental misgivings
about their core offering.
PIERRE: Too high risk
for such a generalized,
detail-poor take.
HARPER: Pierre (CHUCKLES)
anyone who wants
to place money with us
will have full access
to our researched view
above and beyond cursory remarks
at an introductory breakfast.
(CHUCKLES SOFTLY)
FERDINAND SCHWARZWALD
On our IBN Bauer merger,
the Prudential Regulation
Authority dragging their heels
has allowed a quiet noise in Vienna
- to develop into a bit of a din.
- (TENSE MUSIC CONTINUES) ♪
FERDINAND: Given the family voted
in favor of the merger,
I thought this was a non-issue
I could handle personally
without it reaching you.
But the Bauer family still
represents two board seats.
Moritz and his mother have been
audibly re-litigating
the concerns they raised
when we were negotiating.
They've now asked for a sit-down
with your executive team.
His opposition is immaterial.
There was a majority vote.
Moritz and his mother voted
to sell their family bank.
It's a legacy board seat.
They're paid to have no issues.
They're paid to shut the fuck up.
Yeah, we can't strike
such a hostile tone.
We have to act quickly here.
The meeting with the regulator
is tomorrow,
and we need that banking license.
Bevan's in hand,
but Dearn will be
a harder nut to crack.
But this is all for the fucking birds
unless IBN Bauer
follow through and sell.
Who's the agitator?
The son or the mother?
FERDINAND: The son.
Moritz's issue is security.
Says he fears the data
of IBN's banking clients
being targeted, harvested,
what have you, post-merger.
LOUISA STÖCKL: Uh, it's ludicrous.
Our anti-fraud systems are
state of the art,
and they're
an antiquated Austrian bank.
Didn't the Bauers finance the Reich?
It's a bit late
to be growing a conscience
on GDPR issues in 2026.
They've given huge financial support
to Shoah survivors. Tens of millions.
No varnish. My reading,
this guy is an Alpine fuckboy
with an outsized sense
of his own relevance and recourse.
Sorry to add my voice here,
but in my experience,
testy family members respond
well to a bit of face time.
You know, an ego massage.
Exactly.
Support scaffold for delusions
of his own grandeur.
Working title for my biographer.
- (BOTH CHUCKLE)
- (SCATTERED CHUCKLING)
HENRY: Uh, in all seriousness,
we can't risk postponement,
or God forbid,
pay the termination fees
if this thing falls apart.
I think if they've asked,
we should all go.
You know? Multiple faces will
make him feel
important and heard.
Lend him our ears.
Pretend we're listening.
Come back, deal with the regulator.
- ROBIN WILLIAMSON: Henry, I
- No, no, no No.
It's his executive decision.
Sorry, I don't mean to be too direct,
but in what capacity are you
in this room exactly?
Oh, um, she's a paid consultant,
and, uh and we need her here.
(INHALES, CHUCKLES)
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
That Tender idea,
was that just contrarianism,
or you think there's a there there?
(CUP CLATTERS)
I read that they're
in the process of acquiring
an Austrian bank.
I got a tip that there might be
more going on
underneath the hood.
What do you mean a fucking tip?
A journalist shared
an unpublished hypothesis.
Does he or his employer
have enough caché
that the market will care?
Or is he just
a self-published scribbler?
No, he works for FinDigest.
Why the fuck is he leaking
this stuff piecemeal to you?
The ethical blowback
for him could be huge.
HARPER: (SIGHS) He's sending
pre-publication questions
to Tender, but I don't know
when he's publishing.
How much does a stock re-rate
when a market darling's been
proven to be overvalued?
(SUSPENSEFUL DREAMY MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
Well
the operative word there is "proven."
You can't kill a blue chip
with a thousand cuts
from some reporter.
Look at Herbalife.
Looks like a pyramid scheme.
Smells like a pyramid scheme.
Ackman intellectually lays out
how it functions as one.
Maybe that's the truth.
But what good is the truth?
You've got timing.
You got Herbalife's PR machine.
You got Carl Icahn talking up
the other side of the trade.
How good a storyteller are you?
And how long
can you sustain the story?
Without a smoking gun, you will lose.
Ackman closed out Herbalife, he lost.
So can we prove it? And then
can we be loud enough?
Short-only work is ugly,
hard, investigative.
It's anti-status quo,
anti-establishment
anti-power.
Which part of that is meant
to be a problem for us?
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
- No, no, no. Hold on a sec. Whit?
- I'm
HENRY: FinDigest have just sent
pre-publication questions.
Who the fuck is this Dycker guy?
Where's he getting it from?
WHITNEY HALBERSTRAM:
Ah, it's just conjecture.
Yeah, well, he says,
"With these figures in mind"
- Hayley.
- "it cannot be ruled out
that Tender continues
to process illicit transactions,
including gambling
and pornography payments
through African jurisdictions,
where such services are legal
for non-residents."
I mean, is he saying
we're being willfully blind
to money laundering,
or is it intentional? Which is it?
All it demonstrates
is his incompetence
in reading a balance sheet
with as many moving parts as ours.
We're not giving this guy
oxygen. You know why?
More than likely, he's had some rogue,
trumped-up report slipped to him
by some amateur short-seller
looking to make a quick buck
day-trading our shares
when this grubby
little piece gets airtime.
Yeah, well, how can you be so sure?
I guarantee he's talking
to someone
in the hedge fund community.
It happens all the time
in the retail space
with celebrated stories.
It's market manipulation,
pure and simple.
There's no large
institutional short base
for good reason.
Okay, well, what's our response?
LOUISA: Robust legal action,
if needs be.
Regardless of their accusation,
I'll draft up an airtight response.
Their in-house legal will be
pushing back
on a lot of this pre-publication.
I think we don't engage.
A story like this could
threaten the merger.
Moritz doesn't need
another rock to throw.
Yasmin, what do you think?
Well, you know,
I don't have the qualifications,
but, um, yeah.
I I'd say, to Whitney's point,
a blanket statement, if they publish.
"The allegations are
spurious," et cetera.
WHITNEY: Yeah, leave it there.
If it even sees daylight.
The story ends where we say it ends.
- (ELEVATOR DINGS)
- (DOORS WHIRRING OPEN)
Can I talk to you privately,
- quick?
- Yeah. Yeah.
- Of course.
- HAYLEY: Okay, thank you.
YASMIN: Uh, I
I'll catch up with you.
HENRY: Yeah, meet us
at Farnborough, darling.
Plane sets off in two hours.
(ELEVATOR DOORS CLOSE)
Um
Um
I have a confession to make.
YASMIN: Mm-hmm.
Well, yeah.
Anything you say stays with me.
(TENSE MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
I nearly slept with the journalist
asking those questions.
He, like, followed me
like, into a club.
And I think I fell asleep,
and I don't
really remember the play-by-play.
W Wait, so what,
he forced himself on you?
HAYLEY: No.
No, not not really at all.
I mean
I was pretty fucked up.
Did you fuck him?
Did you answer any of his questions?
HAYLEY: No.
I hate when men try and take something
that isn't theirs.
(BREATHES DEEPLLY)
(CLEARS THROAT) Well
thanks for telling me.
I like this transparency,
and of course, I, um,
- I I won't tell anyone.
- (SIGHS) Thank you.
Yeah.
When we get there,
feel free to explore Vienna tonight.
- Have the night off.
- HAYLEY: Oh, well,
I'm Whitney and Henry's EA, so
I need to hear from either of them.
YASMIN: Mm.
Great, okay.
- Eric, I got us lunch.
- (DOOR CLOSES)
Eric?
TEEN: Are you her?
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
- Who?
- You.
- Lara?
- Lily.
HARPER: Damn.
You're, like, so grown compared
to what was in my head.
You shouldn't really
be thinking about me.
(FOOTSTEPS APPROACHING)
Tell Tell Mom you, uh
(BILLS RUSTLING)
enjoyed yourself.
I will.
I did, mostly.
(FOOTSTEPS DEPARTING)
ERIC: Okay.
LILY TAO: Bye.
Bye.
(DOORS CLOSES)
How's Operation Normal Guy going?
Having a twin who's better at stuff
like sports and socializing
fosters a bloody resentment
of the world.
Who knew?
You have siblings?
I got somewhere with brokers
and trading lines.
- I spoke with Kenny.
- Goldman still?
I I'm not sure how he'd feel
about covering me
since I fired him on a hangover.
Deutsche Bank.
Fuck, ouch.
I hope he didn't fall off the wagon.
(TELEPHONE RINGING)
Your 3:00 p.m. is here.
So this is your set-up? (CHUCKLES)
HARPER: Yeah, it's a little lo-fi.
Eric handles the overhead.
It's mostly club sandwiches and fries.
- (SWEETPEA GOLIGHTLY CHUCKLES)
- How's Mostyn's?
SWEETPEA: Ooh.
Hmm, the misogyny swings
between patronizing and lecherous.
- HARPER: God.
- I don't know.
Sometimes, I I feel like, um
Cherry pie left on the windowsill?
It's a bunch of men running around
hitting themselves
over the head with a hammer
like fucking cartoon wolves.
(LAUGHS) Yeah.
Well, it's my own fault, so
HARPER: Hey.
No, it's not.
No, it's not.
That Siren leak was not your fault.
You did something for you,
and some asshole made it
not for you.
And I hope he fucking suffers for it.
Thank you.
When you sent me
that email about Tender,
you piqued my interest.
And you know what I'm like.
I couldn't stop looking.
Mostyn would never.
Tender's IPO deck from two years ago.
Compare it to their annual reports.
What am I looking at?
They use euphemisms
about the kind of payments
they're processing.
"Emotional content" is porn.
"Gaming" is gambling.
Clearly, that is a key source
of their revenue back then,
but since the IPO
and over the next five years,
the EMEA region is maturing
into a key driver of their growth.
And that's not possible?
No, I'm not saying it's not possible
for EMEA acquisitions to drive growth.
I'm saying that this
- (TOILET FLUSHING)
- constant erratic evolution
of their strategy isn't
even slightly reflected
in their in their projections.
So much risk isn't baked
into the share price.
- The
- ERIC: Hi again, Sweetpea!
Hi! Hi, Eric!
So (CLEARS THROAT)
if your thesis is correct,
they're still continuing
to process illegal payments,
even though they've made overtures
that they're stepping away from this
as their core business.
I mean, in any case, it's primed
for a mega correction and re-rating.
Analysts are recommending
25 Buys, 2 Sells.
SWEETPEA:
Mm. Incentive and groupthink.
The star fintech analyst
at MS, he's just upgraded,
a couple of smaller places followed.
The market's reading
Muck's appointment
as a positive catalyst, not sure why.
ERIC: Even a basket case could win
if enough influence wanted it to.
Yeah, well, nobody wants to stand
in front of a moving train.
Nobody wants to get off it
when it's full of cash.
(SWEETPEA CHUCKLES)
- Thank you.
- My pleasure.
HARPER: We would love you
to come on full time.
- (CHUCKLES SOFTLY)
- (KNOCKING ON DOOR)
Don't know if you can make
head or tail of it,
- but it's what you asked for.
- Anywhere is fine.
What the
Sorry, what the fuck is he doing here?
- (BOX THUDS)
- SWEETPEA: No, genuinely,
stay the fuck away from me,
- honestly.
- I am not staying.
You're working
with this piece of shit?
We're helping him out a little.
You're (SCOFFS) Um
This guy is a fucking psychotic liar,
a fucking pathological degenerate.
I have read every horrible detail.
ERIC: Sweetpea, relax.
Don't tell me to fucking relax.
He's a fucking murderer.
I'm not, okay? I'm not a murderer.
Please, just stay
the fuck away from me.
I'm not a murderer!
If you put me in a room
with this cunt again,
you will never hear
from me again, okay?
Yeah. Yeah.
(RECEDING DEPARTING)
(RISHI RAMDANI SIGHS)
Looks good.
("O DU MEIN ÖSTERREICH"
BY FRANZ VON SUPPÉ PLAYING) ♪
- YASMIN: Hello.
- CASTLE HELP: Welcome.
Please come with me.
- (EXHALES)
- (CAR DOOR CLOSES)
(FERDINAND SPEAKING GERMAN)
HENRY: Hope it's got a fucking loo.
FERDINAND: Moritz.
Ferdinand.
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
(FERDINAND GREETS IN GERMAN)
This is Tender's new CEO
- Hi.
- Henry Muck.
Moritz-Hunter Bauer.
I think we had mutual friends
at Winchester.
I was unlucky enough
to spend five years at Harrow.
I tell you,
for every genuine homosexual,
nine are created
by British boarding schools.
- (LAUGHS)
- FERDINAND: And his wife, Yasmin.
I also do some comms consulting
for Henry's office.
- Hi.
- MORITZ-HUNTER BAUER: A pleasure.
My mother, Princess Johanna.
Welcome.
- Thank you.
- JOHANNA BAUER: It's a pleasure.
Well, look, um, Moritz,
we're here to assure you
that we will be dutiful custodians
of your family's bank
Part of the depredations
of neoliberal late capitalism is
there is no central authority
to appeal to.
Just a patchwork of economic zones
to facilitate capital flight.
We'll be subsumed, unhappily, and say,
"Ah, it's the free market.
This is supposed to happen."
Well, Tender doesn't want you
to be unhappy.
Happiness is a full stomach,
Mr. Halberstram.
So let's save this conversation
for dinner, yeah?
JOHANNA: What a splendid
idea of yours.
Allow me to show you to your rooms.
- Please, after you.
- YASMIN: Oh, fantastic.
- (DOOR OPENS)
- AUTOMATED VOICE: (OVER PHONE) Hello.
- You've reached Tender.
- ("ORINOCO FLOW" BY ENYA PLAYING ON PHONE) ♪
- (DOOR CLOSES)
- AUTOMATED VOICE: Your call is important to us.
Please continue to hold
while we find
the next available operator.
- What are you looking for?
- AUTOMATED VOICE: Or press zero
HARPER: Uh, I don't know, actually.
Patterns in Tender's
payment transaction history,
routed
through their EMEA acquisitions.
Didn't you tell me
you had plans tonight?
This shit ain't going anywhere.
Yeah, I'm not sure that I should.
You're not sure you should?
Is it a dude?
Go. Operation Normal Girl.
Go!
HARPER: I've tried calling four
of the payment processors
they acquired in Africa.
Every time I was put
on this eternal fucking hold
through Tender's Dublin call center.
AUTOMATED VOICE:
Hello. You've reached Tender.
- Your call is important to us.
- HARPER: Ugh, this endless
- fucking Muzak. Shut up.
- AUTOMATED VOICE: Please continue
- (ERIC LAUGHS)
- (BREATHES DEEPLY)
I genuinely feel like I'm losing
my grip on reality.
Pierre called.
Good news is he thinks Tender,
at the very least, feels toppy.
Bad news is he wants
quite specific terms and structure.
How aggressive?
ERIC: He wants
a first-loss arrangement.
Pierre acts as guarantor.
I put up ten million dollars.
He puts up 90.
But the first ten million
the fund loses
is my ten million.
Depending on how
our main position performed,
I might have
to liquidate my family office
my girls' inheritance.
HARPER: I would literally
never ask you to do that.
Don't really see
where that leaves the health
of our little venture here, then.
Unless we find our short,
raise capital
and put a team together,
we're gonna be stalled
on the launch pad.
We don't even have a trader,
for fuck's sake.
Maybe get the fuck outta here
for a bit.
HARPER: I want to work.
ERIC: Hey, I've lived a life
where everything is work.
I've lived a life
where everything is leisure.
I'm telling you,
for a few hours on a Tuesday evening,
there's a middle ground.
This is all gonna be here
when you get back.
- (KNOCKING ON DOOR)
- (DOOR OPENS)
I just came to settle you in.
I hope you feel comfortable.
I put you in my favorite room.
Oh!
It's full of our habseligkeiten.
Do you know this word?
(IN GERMAN)
(BOTH CHUCKLE)
(CHUCKLES SOFTLY)
literally translated,
it means "possessions
closest to your soul."
- That's beautiful.
- JOHANNA: Hmm.
(IN GERMAN)
(CHUCKLES)
if you need anything,
just let me know.
- Danke schoen.
- JOHANNA: Gern.
(CHUCKLES)
(DOOR OPENS, CLOSES)
I I admire the UK system.
The pendulum swings, of course,
but at least you don't
muzzle insurgents.
Well, your mother tells me
that you were a bit of a historian.
Most of our political quagmire
can be answered
- by the early modern period.
- YASMIN: Hmm.
That's why my political hero
is (IN FRENCH) Louis XIV.
with the Sun King.
I'm sorry. I, uh
I don't think I've ever
heard anyone say that.
- (BOTH CHUCKLE)
- (YASMIN LAUGHS)
Eh, anyone with eyes can see
Western liberalism has failed.
Decades of political gridlock,
partisan divisions accelerated
by social media,
a short-term policy driven
by a need to win elections.
The most successful central government
in the world today
functions as an absolute monarchy,
and for that, calls itself communism.
Okay, Moritz.
This isn't very riveting
dinner conversation.
YASMIN: Oh, Johanna, please sit down.
We can't have you wait on us.
Oh, please.
It's an absolute privilege.
Oh, um, I read your Substack.
- MORITZ: I'm flattered.
- Yeah.
Uh, fragmentation
and the acceleration of atomization,
it is killing us as a species.
Take any successful corporation
in America.
They're not a collectivist enterprise,
they're dictatorships.
Then why do Foxconn
and many industrial parks need
worker-suicide nets?
All I'm saying is
that they are not democracies.
FERDINAND: Sad
that we must always wash up
on the reef of politics.
JOHANNA: Oh, I couldn't agree more.
- So, bon appétit.
- (UTENSILS CLINKING)
- YASMIN: Thank you.
- (HENRY CLEARS THROAT)
MORITZ: Although, for me,
my, uh, politics and my business,
to the extent
to which it still is mine,
are one and the same.
What some see
as protectionism, isolationism,
I see as respect for tradition.
IBN Bauer is
a 300-year-old institution.
I'm concerned this merger represents
a threat to our customers' privacy.
I do know how fast and loose
modern fintech companies play
with their customers' data.
HENRY: Moritz, um
this merger, it represents
growth for both parties.
We respect the past, um,
but we will drag IBN Bauer
into the future.
(CLOCK TICKING)
I'm speaking to Julian Wullschläger
and others on the board to ensure
that this merger receives
the full scrutiny it deserves,
even if that means re-engaging
the Austrian regulator
around data protection.
Train's left the station.
You thought because I am
a small individual voice,
the weight of your capital
would bury me?
You voted for this,
and you'll be compensated
incredibly well.
Ah, it's always money,
(STERNLY) Mr. HalberSchtram?
JOHANNA: Moritz, it's enough said.
(SPEAKING GERMAN)
- I never mean to embarrass you.
- I know, Schatz.
We just have to be practical
and just humor him.
There's practicality,
and then there's acquiescing
to some tinpot tyrant.
Fine, he's a bit
of an intellectual pseud.
No, no, no, he's a fucking fascist.
We're his guests! You want
to fucking call him out
in front of his mum?
What about that thinly-veiled
anti-Semitism, hmm?
That's not what that was, come on.
- Whitney.
- For someone whose last name is Hanani,
you seem pretty relaxed.
We need to fly out
as early as possible.
But this is now a live issue.
I don't think it's a very bright idea
to just abandon the problem
and hope for the best.
HENRY: Yeah, but we can't
no-show with the regulator.
We have to fly out first thing.
Okay, I'm staying. I insist.
(JOHANNA AND MORITZ ARGUING IN GERMAN)
You're lucky
your wife is such a pragmatist.
(YASMIN CHUCKLES SOFTLY)
("SUKIYAKI"
BY KYU SAKAMOTO PLAYING) ♪
(INDISTINCT CHATTER)
(GLASSES CLINKING)
(CHATTER CONTINUES)
KWABENA BANNERMAN: Hey. Sorry,
sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry.
HARPER: I've been sitting here
for 15 fucking minutes.
KWABENA: Bro. Fuck.
Whole civilizations have risen
and fallen in 15 minutes.
(CHATTER CONTINUES)
Hey, hey!
I was joking. What the fuck?
I'm trying to build a business.
I don't have 15 minutes.
So for the two I plan
to stand right here,
I might as well tell you
that I fucked somebody else.
Okay.
Okay, you don't care?
KWABENA: What, in the last 15 minutes?
(CHUCKLING) Remind me
never to be late again.
Were you gonna say that
before I was late?
Is it even true?
Are you not sleeping
with other people?
No.
Not as far as I'm aware.
Okay.
Do you want
to put a pin in this, then?
I just thought we were hanging out.
But you like me?
You make it pretty fucking hard.
But yeah, if you'll let me.
(HESITATES)
You're a tiny bit
too punctual, though.
It's my It's my only note.
Be on time.
I have a job
that I left to be with you.
KWABENA: Yeah, so leave it there.
God, we both came here
for biodynamic sake
and maybe some mutual fellatio.
Try separating church
and state sometimes.
It's easy.
Yeah, fuck this.
I actually came
to offer you a job. (SCOFFS)
KWABENA: Really?
Maybe this relationship is
done better over email.
Harper.
(RAISES VOICE) What's prompted
this enormous sense
of humor failure?
Harper?
- (MUSIC STOPS) ♪
- (DOOR SLAMS SHUT)
How was it?
- I hope that means good.
- (OBJECTS CLATTERING)
ERIC: You mind me being
this casually dressed?
Don't be so fucking weird.
Hard-coded, I'm afraid.
You good on presents?
What are 14-year-old girls into?
How the fuck should I know?
You should know
what your daughters like
and dislike.
I followed up with the rest
of the family offices.
In truth, I I had to chase.
A few eyes were on stalks
at you suggesting Tender was anything
but a blue-chip safe haven.
I dropped Tender
to be spiky and controversial
in a meeting that I thought
was headed south.
It's gonna take labor and sweat,
and turning stones, and fucking time.
ERIC: I have plenty of time.
If that's all you've got to offer me,
I think we should reevaluate
what's going on here.
Why are you being so sharp with me?
Because this is not some
recreational fucking game
or some lame extension
of your retirement,
while you're floating around
trying to rehab your life,
or, I don't know, cosplaying the roles
that you have
spent your life ignoring.
When the fuck did I ever say
I wanted it to be recreational?
If you don't want my daughter
in our workspace
When the fuck did I say that?
ERIC: You seem
a little triggered is all.
Tri Sorry, triggered?
Who the fuck uses that word seriously?
Are you kidding me?
Shit that people fucking say,
"Oh, my trauma made me stronger."
No, no!
My trauma traumatized me.
And it made me fucking weak.
And I have had to deal
with consequences
that were not my fault.
And it has nothing to do
with what I am doing right now!
Do you know why I do this?
Because I enjoy it,
and I'm fucking good at it!
It starts and ends with work
and being proven fucking right.
(SIGHS HEAVILY)
(ASHTRAY CLINKING SOFTLY)
This is life or death for me.
You used to act like it too.
(ASHTRAY CLINKING SOFTLY)
Sounds like you're a little triggered.
Okay.
I can act like it.
And you
you come to meetings
I spend days wrangling
with ideas that aren't half-baked.
(HARPER SIGHS)
(SIREN WAILING IN DISTANCE)
Do you know I'm a twin?
No, because you've never mentioned it.
Uh, I did a cursory Google.
A good percentage of the addresses
and contact numbers
of these acquisitions are listed
to the same place.
- Guess.
- I'm too tired.
The Dublin call center.
HARPER: An impasse then?
ERIC: I thought so too.
Plus, I'm not sure
it's altogether incriminating,
but I did notice something
in the documents.
- It's printed small
- (INTRIGUING MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
but on every hundredth or so page,
there's a "care of" address. See?
Google Street View, it looks like
well, it doesn't look like much.
I I sorta want to use
the term "shithole."
HARPER: Show me.
ERIC: That can't be right, right?
Does it look like a satellite office
of an enterprise
with a nine billion market cap?
Who, what, or where is Sunderland?
Sounds cold.
- SWEETPEA: (OVER PHONE) Hello?
- HARPER: Hey, Sweetpea.
Um, I'm really, really sorry
about today.
- SWEETPEA: No shit.
- And I know that you said
that you were going
to take a beat, but, um
swing time for a field trip?
I think this may
satisfy your curiosity,
and I need your expertise.
(KNOCKING ON DOOR)
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
(ANIMALS HOWLING IN DISTANCE)
Hi, um
Whitney wanted me to share
three different versions
of prospective rebuttals
to the FinDigest article.
(CHUCKLES)
You could have emailed them.
- (CHUCKLES)
- HAYLEY: Yeah.
Right. (CHUCKLES) Sorry.
Sorry, I didn't, um
YASMIN: Can I smell martinis
on your breath?
Raya must see a pretty
lean scene in Vienna.
- (BOTH CHUCKLE)
- (DOOR OPENS, CLOSES)
- Hi, Hayley.
- HAYLEY: Hi.
- HENRY: Sorry.
- It's okay.
Calabasas here just tried
and failed to get laid.
(LAUGHS)
Well, Yasmin, I'm sure
she doesn't want us speculating
about her youthful misadventures.
Well, I'm not speculating.
Tell him. (CHUCKLES)
HAYLEY: She's right.
But more like,
he tried and failed. (CHUCKLES)
(CHUCKLES) Classic.
Well, I mean
you're too good for most.
She's very frustrated.
Aren't you, Hayley?
I don't
I don't know if I'd say that.
A little.
Sure.
Yas, what the fuck are you doing?
Hayley
- Come here.
- HENRY: (WHISPERING) Yas, Yas, you're all I need.
YASMIN: Do you, um
Do you like him?
Do you
- like this?
- (HENRY MOANS DEEPLY)
("BASSICALLY" BY TEI SHI PLAYING) ♪
(HENRY SIGHS HEAVILY)
Do you want to kiss him?
I want this for you.
- Um
- Baby, I'll behave ♪
Do you (HESITATES)
Do you want this?
Mm-hmm.
If you let me stay ♪
Please don't think ♪
That I'm begging you For love ♪
Baby, let me stay ♪
When the world is gone ♪
Promise I'll behave ♪
Never right your wrongs ♪
(BREATHES HEAVILY)
- Is that what you want? ♪
- Is that what you want? ♪
Like the other boys ♪
Someone you can flaunt ♪
Like the other toys ♪
Good. (EXHALES)
Now spit on it.
(HAYLEY HAWKS SPIT, SPUTTERS)
(EXHALES)
(MOANS DEEPLY, SIGHS)
(HENRY BREATHING HEAVILY)
(HAYLEY GASPING)
- (MUSIC STOPS ABRUPTLY) ♪
- (HENRY, HAYLEY GRUNTING)
(HENRY GASPS, WHIMPERS)
YASMIN: Calabasas, look at me.
- (HAYLEY GASPING)
- (HENRY PANTING)
(HENRY PANTING)
(SOFT INTRIGUING MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
YASMIN: Get off her, Henry.
(FLUIDS SQUELCHING)
- (HAYLEY PANTING)
- (BED CREAKING)
Now turn around on the bed,
open your legs and show me your cunt.
(EXHALES)
- (PANTING)
- (BED CREAKING)
(EXHALES HEAVILY)
Now I believe you have something
that belongs to my husband.
And therefore, to me.
(SLURPING)
(BIRDS CHIRPING)
(GULPS)
(BURPS)
JOHANNA: Well, it seems
the men have been scattered
by the wind.
They've abandoned you with me.
Help me take the dogs out.
Moritz's name on the bank is no more
than an honorific, really.
And he knows
that the Tender deal is a good deal.
He just craves attention.
YASMIN: How so?
Well, he simply
doesn't want to be defined
by his family name only.
- (BIRDS CHIRPING)
- (DOG BARKING)
W Well, I mean,
I could speak to one
of Alexander's editors.
Yeah, even if it's a one-off column,
it will make Moritz feel
like the world's actually
listening to him for once.
- This is such a wonderful idea.
- (CHUCKLES)
You know, I think
seeing his thinking valorized
by Norton masthead,
I think this would give him meaning.
- Mm-hmm.
- You know, even if it's just
for an instant, to see his name,
his view printed, black and white.
Yeah, I mean,
legacy media still has weight.
Yes, the weight of history.
Yeah, he has a way
for not couching his views
for polite company.
But the general direction of travel
of his thinking is
undergirded by common sense,
wouldn't you say?
He (BURPS) Oh.
Sorry. (CHUCKLES)
Yeah.
Yeah. I would.
("HORST-WESSEL-LIED"
BY MILVA PLAYING) ♪
- (WHISTLES)
- (DOG BARKS)
- (JOHANNA WHISTLING)
- (DOG BARKING)
("HORST-WESSEL-LIED"
CONTINUES PLAYING) ♪
(VOCALIST SINGING IN ITALIAN) ♪
(SINGING IN ITALIAN CONTINUES) ♪
(SINGING IN ITALIAN CONTINUES) ♪
(SINGING IN ITALIAN CONTINUES) ♪
(SINGING IN ITALIAN CONTINUES) ♪
- (MUSIC CONCLUDES) ♪
- EDWARD BURGESS: Fuckin' James.
James!
FINDIGEST STAFF:
1,800 comments on this piece
about parents helping their kids buy
shoebox properties in London.
I haven't had a postbag this full
since that piece about the beauty
of London's mosques.
You asked for the right to reply?
Yeah. Yeah, just
nothing back as of yet.
Cunts.
(HESITATES) Why wait to publish?
I mean, we know they're just gonna say
the allegations are baseless
and pull up a drawbridge.
What? "Tender, investigated.
The high-growth
fintech company's results
lack transparency
and should spook investors."
Oh, fucking hell, can't we be blunter?
I mean,
"Ex-porn payments company still
illegally processing porn payments?"
(CHUCKLES) James,
you failed to have noticed,
the night lawyer wants to take out
a large chunk of your copy.
JIM: How much?
(TENSE MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
- Oh, fuck off.
- EDWARD: Mm.
See, you can't imply circuitous
accounting without evidence.
We don't have
the luxury of speculating
without an insider.
Why are you so desperate to get this
out of here half-cooked?
Ah, 'cause Paddy Radden Keefe
or someone will get the scent
and a serious outlet
with budget will beat us to it.
Look, mate, all I'm saying is
the faster we publish,
the safer my man
will feel going on record.
Now, you know I have someone who may,
they may, play ball
in corroborating this.
You know he's too intimidated
to do it electronically.
Well, these guys,
they're fucking litigious.
So it either goes out
with the changes,
or it doesn't go out at all.
- Sorry.
- (JIM GRUMBLES)
All right.
Uh, yeah Yeah, fuck it, print it.
It's a start.
But if you won't unlock budget
for me to go to Accra,
I guess I'll book
my own fucking ticket, yeah?
- BURGESS: Hmm.
- JIM: Yeah.
You prat!
(DOOR CLOSES)
HARPER: Took fucking long to get here.
It's a bit sketchy.
SWEETPEA:
I grew up on a street like this.
So we gonna tell 'em
we're in finance or what?
Just let me handle it.
- (DOORBELL RINGS)
- (DOOR OPENS)
Hiya.
We're actually from the Office
of National Statistics.
We might have rung your bell
by mistake, so forgive me.
- No worries.
- SWEETPEA: No, sorry.
We were under the impression
that this was an office.
Is there anyone who works here?
ALISON STODDART: Well, me
me son works from home.
(MOUSE CLICKS)
You girls okay?
BOTH: Fine.
JEFFREY STODDART:
So I get a ton of emails
from various payment sites in Africa.
That's the graft, really.
The amount.
Lots of attachments.
- Can you show me one attachment?
- JEFFREY: Sure.
(MOUSE CLICKS)
- JEFFREY: It's
- Transactions.
JEFFREY: Yeah.
How'd you know?
What do you do with them?
JEFFREY: Well, it's loads of
transactions at different price points.
I collate them and bucket them.
It's not all that taxing, like.
Don't put yourself down. Work is work.
JEFFREY:
So anywhere between zero pound
and 12 pound gets labelled "PZ202."
Whereas between 12 and 80
gets "PZ303."
Eighty and 200.
200 and 500, it goes on.
And those buckets populate
a new spreadsheet
- (MOUSE CLICKS)
- here.
ALISON: I'm just
popping out, Jeffrey, love.
(INTRIGUING DREAMY MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
He's not
building the charts
in Tender's earnings report.
Um, Jeffrey,
do you mind if I just note
some of those codes down?
So, every one of Tender's
available transactions is coded
- by hand by gorgeous Jeffrey.
- Yeah.
They must have a dozen Jeffreys,
coding by price,
not by origination or service.
And that is
how they're hiding the porn
and the gambling, right?
So they're recording it, then
Yeah. So, like,
if you buy hardcore porn,
or flowers for your nan,
or you piss away your money
at roulette,
- it is all categorized the same.
- Ah.
I mean, as long
as it roughly costs the same.
It's just like one big bucket
of slop called "consumables."
Right. Well, we have
to see this through.
- Yeah, I agree!
- Okay.
- Fuck me!
- (LAUGHS)
Fuck us! That was such
a fucking mental buzz!
Sweetpea.
Come work with me. Please.
Harper, you left Petra.
And you left Mostyn.
I need your word
that you will actually
see this through.
No distractions.
Understood.
If you come, you have my word.
Okay.
(CHUCKLES)
Great. Get Eric on your phone.
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
HARPER: James, it's Harper.
What if I told you
you were 100 percent correct
on your Tender payments
laundry thesis?
Well, as you'll no doubt remember,
earlier this year,
Lisa, your government
promised to "rip up the bureaucracy
that blocks investment"
and urged the regulator,
that's you, Colin,
to "take growth seriously."
Blocking this deal would, um,
break both those promises.
Global innovators, large and small,
would take note that,
despite the Labour Party's
often, um lofty rhetoric,
the UK is closed for business.
It would represent a major blow
to UK citizens,
who currently at least, remain largely
in the dark about how parlous
their economic circumstances
really are.
LISA DEARN: Noblesse oblige,
aristocracy-knows-best type stuff.
(SCOFFS)
It's hard to stomach from you.
People have short memories.
I see my role in politics
as maintaining a very long one.
And that includes seeing
through a charlatan's rebranding.
And I haven't forgotten
making you squirm
during the Lumi inquiry.
(TENSE DREAMY MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
It would be an act of narcissism,
bordering on self-harm,
to allow personal history
to deliver a fatal blow
to what we're on the verge
of achieving here.
This merger will give us
a banking license,
- meaning more choice, lower prices
- (DOOR OPENS)
a wave of innovation
to follow in our slipstream.
Bold statements,
but they're hardly backed up
in any of the literature
that you've
Ricky Martyn, with a Y.
WHITNEY: Ah.
Chief of Staff to the Prime Minister.
So the floor's all yours,
I'm all ears.
- (FINGERS SNAP)
- Oi, did you know about this?
DEARN: Ricky, thanks for stepping in.
You interrupted my next
You interrupted my next question,
which was to Colin.
Uh, how does anything
we've heard have any bearing
on whether a merger
with an Austrian bank
represents an antitrust issue?
- The banking system
- WHITNEY: Colin, the complaints
you've heard from our rivals are
obfuscating their real fear.
They're not scared
of a reduction in competition.
- They're scared of an increase of it.
- (SCOFFS)
WHITNEY: This is an objectively
pro-competitive deal.
Colin. Ricky, Jennifer, Lisa,
it's not just a question
of whether Labour's Britain
is pro-business.
It's about whether Labour is
pro-reducing financial fraud,
pro-teaching financial hygiene
to its electorates,
pro-the consumer's agency
in his own financial life.
Your last government
isolated you from Europe.
I urge you to see this as a first
of many necessary steps
towards reintegration.
Don't you think?
WHITNEY: Henry!
(HENRY CLEARS THROAT)
Uh, sorry. Yeah.
You know, of course. Yeah.
COLIN CULLEN: As I understand it,
your securing
of an Austrian banking license
to trade in the EU will be followed
by an application for a UK license.
We're a UK company.
- That's not how
- RICKY MARTYN: Colin,
the PM wants it stated in here
how much he admires Tender's vision
for making Britain
the fintech capital of Europe,
if not the world.
(HESITATING) And we respect
the PRA's independence
and honor their decisions.
Lisa, we could sidebar with Colin
about this later, I'm sure.
HENRY: Thank you, Ricky.
(TENSE DREAMY MUSIC RISES) ♪
(MUSIC FADES) ♪
HENRY: Whitney was right.
The FinDigest piece reads
like sensationalist nonsense
to manipulate the share price.
Louisa's drafting a response.
I guess this is why Moritz backed out.
Yeah, Alexander put me
in touch with Percy
in the opinion pages.
So,
you went behind my back
to my uncle
to give this guy a platform?
Alexander agreed with me, Henry.
It's soft-skill negotiation.
This isn't some crank writing
in The Spectator,
"In Defense of The Wehrmacht."
This is a national newspaper
with responsibility.
It's a kook running his mouth.
- It's, you know
- It's It's what?
It's tomorrow's fucking chip paper?
Don't be so fucking naive.
(SCOFFS)
Don't you think
you should be thanking me?
I mean, the deal
wouldn't have gone through
without me giving Moritz
this opportunity.
HENRY: What you did with Hayley
(SCOFFS)
HENRY: didn't feel right.
You know I'm an addict.
It felt very like enabler behavior.
YASMIN: You wanted her, Henry.
So you fucked her.
I was just bold enough
to know what to give you.
HAYLEY: Hi.
(HESITATES)
Big weekend, Calabasas?
I'm too young for hangovers.
Uh, your morning is pretty stacked,
and I booked your car for 7:00 tonight
for your dinner at Arlington.
Did I book that?
Uh, she did.
Do you want to join us
for a nightcap, Hayley?
I mean, there are some introductions
that we can make for you.
Yeah, I I have plans,
but I could cancel
- easily.
- HENRY: No, no, no.
Keep your plans, Hayley.
(INDISTINCT DISTANT CHATTER)
Who the fuck did I marry?
(CHUCKLES SOFTLY)
Shouldn't you know that, darling?
("ORINOCO FLOW" BY ENYA PLAYING) ♪
(INDISTINCT CHATTER)
FinDigest's article hasn't been
as stock negative as I'd hoped.
The market eventually will be forced
to price Tender's deception,
and they will punish them for it.
No guarantee.
- (CELL PHONE BUZZING)
- SWEETPEA: Hiya.
The Sunderland discovery
puzzle piece is useless
to the market without the full image.
It's as good as a hunch
without a groundswell
of investor sentiment behind it.
I thought the trader you hired
was supposed to show to this?
Ah.
I agreed to Pierre's terms,
by the way.
I told you I didn't
want that from you.
Well, you have it.
I gave it to you.
And all I ask
is that we widen the perimeter
of what we consider to be
acceptable discourse between us.
I won't hurt you just by knowing you.
I really appreciate
your financial backing.
It is more than I deserve.
And I will break my back
to ensure that your faith
is rewarded. (BREATHES DEEPLY)
But it is already a miracle
that we are in any position
to be working together again.
And you and I both know
that nothing good comes from us being
any more intimate than that.
Ah!
Deutsche! Goldman spit you out?
Well, the universe has quiet designs
- to keep us humble.
- HARPER: Huh.
- KENNY KILBANE: Just come this way.
- HARPER: Okay.
So, we would like
to place a short with you.
Buy-side is full of tyrants
who deny their tyranny.
Sell-side is full of slaves
who deny their servitude.
Somewhere in the middle,
all of human life.
- Right.
- (CHUCKLES)
How does it feel
to finally have the power?
A constant nerve-jangling desire
to enshrine it.
- (LAUGHS)
- KWABENA: Harp!
- I'm sorry I'm late.
- ELEVATOR VOICE: Door opening.
- ERIC: This your man?
- Yes.
- Eric.
- KWABENA: Kwabena.
Turn it up, turn it up ♪
ERIC: Kenny, I wanted
I'm just glad I got a chance
to say sorry.
I am. I am sorry.
Well
it's not the worst thing
anyone's ever done.
ELEVATOR VOICE: Door closing.
(DOORS THUD, ECHO)
sync & corrections awaqeded
("ORINOCO FLOW" BY ENYA CONTINUES) ♪
Sail away
Sail away, sail away ♪
From the North to the South
Ebudae unto Khartoum ♪
From the deep Sea of Clouds
To the Island of the Moon ♪
Carry me on the waves
To the land I've never been ♪
Carry me on the waves ♪
To the lands I've never seen ♪
We can sail, we can sail ♪
With the Orinoco Flow ♪
We can sail, we can sail ♪
Sail away
Sail away, sail away ♪
We can steer, we can near
With Rob Dickins at the wheel ♪
We can sail, we can sail ♪
Sail away
Sail away, sail away ♪
(SONG CONCLUDES) ♪