Hot Money: Who Rules Porn?

When Financial Times reporter Patricia Nilsson started digging into the porn industry, she made a shocking discovery: Nobody knew who controlled the biggest porn company in the world. Now, Nilsson and her editor, Alex Barker, have figured out who the guy was, and much more. Their reporting reveals a shadowy power structure that includes billionaires, tech geniuses and the most powerful finance companies in the world. Coming June 7th. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Pushkin. I'm Patricia Neilson and I'm Alex Barker. We're journalists
for the Financial Times. We write about business, but over
the last year we found an amazing financial story in
an unexpected place, the porn industry. No one really likes

(00:28):
to talk about porn. We're embarrassed to even though most
of us have watched it at some point, and there's
a contradiction at the heart of it. Porn relies on
performers to literally bear it all, yet information about the
people and businesses who run the industry is kept like

(00:49):
a state secret. I am so exposed, and the people
who really own these tube sites get to be reclusive
and not publicly held to account. Obviously, it's not a
fair that the person who get the least, say, get
the most money. That is so unfair. I don't like it.

(01:11):
Who are these secret owners? We wanted to follow the
money and workout who really controls online porn. It was
who's got the largest penis here kind of thing, and
they hate each other. So it was all about that
people with nefarious backgrounds and companies that are hidden, who

(01:31):
are not part of the industry come into the industry.
Make a lot of money in the industry. On our mission,
we met directors and adult performers, plus people with real power,
tech pioneers and Wall Street billionaires. You probably who are
a catalyst for one of the biggest takedowns of media
content in the history of the Internet. Like when nine

(01:54):
million videos ever been taken down overnight? That felt good
about it. The survey episodes will be taking you inside
the porn industry. So this man who is getting very
nervous about us standing around and recording here, he chased
me up the stairs and he very politely escorted me
off the premises. Do you have regrets on how you
handled it? Looking back, For a lot of people, it

(02:16):
was it's like being cut down at the knees telling
you about the rivalries, the power battles. You can make
a choice in business to be friendly competitors or you
can be enemies. And I think that that was just
the decision that was made between the two of them
to be completely antagonistic. We were surprised by what we
discovered and by who's really in charge. There is two

(02:40):
players on this planet that can kill porn online, and
they can literally kill it, and if they decide to ally,
it's Dead. This is Hot Money, a show about power
and finance, coming June seventh from Pushkin Industries and The
Financial Times. Listen Wherever do you