Today: The S&P 500 lost more than 1% on Friday, taking it back below 6,000. Nonetheless, the broad U.S. index of stocks has gained nearly 26% this year — which some analysts regard as “miraculous”. Russia’s ruble lost another 12% of its value in the post-Christmas period, reflecting high inflation generated by Putin’s war against Ukraine, and currently stands at 112 to the dollar.
Former president Jimmy Carter died aged 100. Like Biden, he was a Democrat who served only one term in the White House and also struggled to control inflation.
Curbing the CEO exodus
Good morning. I’ve been thinking about the record number of CEOs who’ve announced this year that they’re stepping down: 1,991 and counting, according to the latest report from Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
Some may be looking at their lofty stock prices and deciding that cashing out on a high is as good a time as any. A few, like Ellevest CEO Sallie Krawcheck, have stepped aside for personal reasons, which may mean they’ll return once those issues are resolved.
Others may be stepping down because they’ve presided over a stock price that went the wrong way for reasons that have been well-chronicled, for example Boeing’s Dave Calhoun, Intel’s Pat Gelsinger and Starbucks’ Laxman Narasimhan. (Here’s Jeffrey Sonnenfeld’s take on how their replacements will do.) The perceived and real hostility against corporate leaders after the murder of UnitedHealthcare’s Brian Thompson doesn’t help, either.
I spoke last week with Klaus Kleinfeld, the former CEO of Alcoa and Siemens. After running two Fortune 500 companies on different continents, he founded and ran the investment company K2Elevation, launched a probiotic company with his daughters, advised clients like the government of Saudi Arabia, workied with McKinsey to educate future leaders, and wrote a book called Leading to Thrive. The last one was inspired by what he sees as a problem with burnout at the top.
“What concerns me most is, when I work with startup companies, how many leaders get burned out in their late 20s or early 30s,” he said. “They get pushed in the hope of a quick buck and quick wealth and they literally break down.”
Kleinfeld believes high-performance CEOs are like high-performance athletes in that both learn how to efficiently recharge and reset.
Leaders need to pay as much attention to their inner game—cultivating their energy, focus and sense of purpose—as they do to their outer game. “If you don’t have your inner game in check, you will eventually burn out,” said Kleinfeld, who has long used breathing and relaxation techniques to stay calm and focused. “I like ‘box breathing.’ It is a simple breathing technique where you inhale, hold, exhale, and hold again for equal counts, like 4 seconds.”
But most important is figuring out your purpose, not your passion. “Passion can burn through relatively quickly. Purpose keeps you going and is more sustainable.”
Also on the radar:
- Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite network — plus his closeness to Donald Trump — is making Musk’s political influence with non-U.S. governments harder to resist. A fascinating longread from Bloomberg.
- Investigators continue to examine why the landing gear on Jeju Air Flight 2216 failed to deploy as the jet hit the runway in South Korea, killing 179 of 181 people on board.
- The massive construction site at Neom in Saudi Arabia is a haven for crime, disorder, rape, and dangerous working conditions, according to an investigation by the Wall Street Journal.
- United Healthcare reportedly presents its doctors with preset lists of diagnosis that are often irrelevant, inflating Medicare bills. UnitedHealth said its diagnoses were accurate and prevented more complex health problems later.
- The president of Azerbaijan accused Russia of covering up its role in the shooting down of a passenger plane, revealing a split between the former Soviet Republic and Putin’s Moscow.
- Russia has a “dark fleet” of ships that drag their anchors across the sea bed in Europe, severing communications nearly every month.
From the analysts:
Bank of America’s Savita Subramanian and her team say “momentum” “has been the best performing [investment] factor group this year and also the most crowded … but [in 2025] a spike in the VIX could be especially painful as Momentum has historically underperformed when the VIX was above 25.”
More news below.
Diane Brady
diane.brady@fortune.com
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TOP NEWS
What can America and the world expect after the passing of Jimmy Carter, the peanut farmer who became the 39th U.S. president
Jimmy Carter, the longest-lived president in American history, passed away on Sunday aged 100. Carter, who was in the White House from 1977-1981, led the U.S. during the height of the Cold War and through high inflation and energy prices. He did not win a second term and engaged in decades of humanitarian work after his presidency, which has bolstered his legacy. U.S. flags on federal buildings will now be lowered for 30-days, but the passing of an American president also marks the beginning of a highly-orchestrated process that involves a period of national mourning. Fortune
‘Trumpenomics 2.0’
Donald Trump is set to enter the White House for a second term in just under a month. His first term was marked by tariffs and trade wars, and tariffs are expected to return again under a second Trump administration. It’s been a guessing game so far on just how far Trump could go with tariffs, but analysts from major U.S. banks are certain on one thing. ‘Trumpenomics 2.0’ will complicate the Federal Reserve’s efforts to get inflation back to 2%. Fortune
A ‘one-man economy’ who no one dared to oppose
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs, the American rapper and producer, is now in a Brooklyn jail awaiting a trial scheduled for May, 2025. Diddy was indicted in September on federal charges that included sex trafficking and racketeering. His net worth currently stands at just about a third of the $1 billion in 2022 and his first assistant Pam Lewis-Rudden is one of only a handful of people willing to go on-record to detail how Diddy built his empire. Fortune
AROUND THE WATERCOOLER
China's Xi Jinping asked 'What’s so bad about deflation?' amid economic slowdown, report says by Jason Ma
Jeju Air crash kills 179 in worst-ever South Korean accident by Bloomberg
How do you teach kids in a war zone? An award-winning edtech team explains how to support teachers in a crisis by Nicholas Gordon
Most restaurants don’t make it. Here's how Jean-Georges restaurants have survived the test of time—and even a pandemic by Jane Thier
How Pret’s CEO went from a $3 an hour McDonalds worker at 16 years old to earning $5 million last year by Orianna Rosa Royle
If Dry January is too much for you, try its more lenient cousin—Damp January by Alexa Mikhail
This edition of CEO Daily was curated by Lionel Lim and Jim Edwards.
