A global team of betting whizzes hatched a scheme to take down the Texas Lottery. The plan was led by a London banker-turned-bookmaker and a mysterious professional gambler nicknamed ‘The Joker.’ The duo partnered with a Texas company and local retailers to print more than 99% of all the lottery tickets sold. And the jackpot was worth almost $100 million. Th ... Show More
Jul 10
Who Will Be the Next Fed Chair? Maybe Kevin
For years, President Trump has feuded with the Federal Reserve and Chair Jerome Powell over interest rates. And now, two Republicans named Kevin (Kevin Hassett, one of Trump’s closest economic advisers and Kevin Warsh—a former Fed governor) are vying to be the next chairman of th ... Show More
22m 47s
May 6
How a CEO’s Faked Results Led to a $300 Million Wipeout
In late 2018, five years after launching fish-feeding company eFishery, Gibran Huzaifah found himself all out of cash. To save his business, the CEO started plugging fake numbers into financial reports. The brighter picture drew hundreds of millions of investor dollars. But his h ... Show More
16m 39s
Apr 3
Get Rich Quick: The American Lottery
Want to get rich quick? You're not alone. Right now, Americans spend over $100 billion, yes billion, every year on lottery tickets. Today on the show, in collaboration with Scratch and Win from WGBH, how the mafia, Sputnik, medical equipment, and the electoral college led to Amer ... Show More
49m 41s
Mar 2025
The Sunday Read: ‘The Cryptocurrency Scam That Turned a Small Town Against Itself’
Jim Tucker could hardly believe what he was hearing. It sounded like fiction, a nightmare too outlandish for an unassuming town like his.It was July 2023, and Tucker was hosting a meeting of the board of Heartland Tri-State Bank, a community-owned business in a small Kansas town ... Show More
27m 37s
Dec 2024
12/22/2024: The Pager Plot, The Iron River, Joy to the World
For the first time, ex-Mossad agents who led the exploding pager and walkie-talkie plot against Hezbollah, which garnered worldwide attention in September, detail their 10-year undercover op in an interview with correspondent Lesley Stahl. Meeting in Israel, the agents, who recen ... Show More
51m 24s
Aug 2024
👁️ “Nvidia’s watch party” — A.I.'s Biggest Day. Mister Softee’s soft-serve biz. Ozempic’s Direct-To-Tummy.
Nvidia just announced earnings that were so big, people hosted parties… but the results were a Rorschach Test for Wall Street.Mister Softee’s ice cream trucks have shrank in number by two thirds… because of competition, climate change, and street corners.Ozempic has a new strateg ... Show More
23m 43s