NBCUniversal's Linda Yaccarino reportedly in talks to be named new Twitter CEO

The Yahoo Finance Live team discusses NBCUniversal's Linda Yaccarino in talks to be named Twitter's new CEO, Elon Musk transitioning to CTO, and how this will impact Twitter.

Video transcript

JULIE HYMAN: Elon Musk's reign at Twitter looks like it's soon coming to a close, or at least changing. In a tweet, Musk announcing that he's found a new CEO. NBCUniversal advertising head Linda Yaccarino in talks to take over that spot. That's according to the "Wall Street Journal" and the "Washington Post."

Under Musk, Twitter cut staff by roughly 75% and saw a big exodus of advertisers. Insider Intelligence cutting the company's ad revenue forecast by $2 billion after the takeover.

And I say his role there is changing. It's not like he's stepping down. He's saying he would still be the CTO.

BRAD SMITH: Right.

JULIE HYMAN: And I think there are a lot of questions remain about how much control he would cede, right? It seems like he is looking for someone very specifically to wear the advertiser hat, and he would wear the sort of programming and product hat.

BRAD SMITH: Yeah, systems operation, chief technical officer, things that he's done in the past, if he does remove himself from that chief executive officer role. At SpaceX, he is still vocal, though he is not necessarily the head of the operation on a day in, day out basis that takes place.

But this also gives an indication of where he does need to spend his time elsewhere at a publicly traded company in Tesla, as we continue to watch that particular story unfold in front of our eyes. And the public markets tracking that extremely closely as well and the pricing wars all the way into entry into new markets. And then on the SpaceX front too, remember, just a few weeks back, SpaceX had a failed launch, a rapid unscheduled disassembly, as it was called in their press release, just minutes after it took place.

And so all of that considered, when you've got these major businesses that one entity or one person in Musk is running and for shareholders that are very much watching to see where that time is spent-- I think for Tesla shareholders, they're watching this and saying, OK, this couldn't have happened soon enough as we're now waiting to see where you're going to perhaps maybe not be sleeping on the factory floor as much anymore but at least spending more of your time focusing on Tesla right now.

JULIE HYMAN: Right, focusing on Tesla and focusing on what he's good at as well, right? He has been sort of disdainful of advertisers or sort of gone between being disdainful and begging them to come back, right? And I think some of the figures that the "Wall Street Journal" has reported citing Sensor Tower, which is a market intelligence firm, are really telling. That of the top 100 advertisers on Twitter pre and post Musk, 37 were not spending any money on advertising on Twitter in the first part of this year. So that's quite a high number. I mean, we don't know what their proportion was of spending before. We just knew that they were of the top 100. But, you know, we know that there have been cuts across the board.

So he doesn't have to pay attention to that as much anymore. And then as you say, he's got a lot of stuff to take care of at Tesla. There have been a lot of price changes in the Tesla vehicles throughout the year. Most recently, it looks like there have been reports of them raising prices again on Tesla on the Model S and Model X.

BRAD SMITH: Right.

JULIE HYMAN: There's a big recall in China going on that we're going to talk about much more later in the show. So he's got pressing issues that need his attention. And the team at Tesla is sort of more formed here, but nonetheless, it's something to think about.

BRAD SMITH: And just to briefly give a spotlight to Linda Yaccarino as well here, a person that has, in the role currently right now at NBCU, been able to put together partnerships with the likes of YouTube, Snapchat, Twitter in the past even, kind of having more direct focus on where those other opportunities for the entity could move forward.

JULIE HYMAN: Right. And there's now a report from CNBC that says she has resigned from NBC Universal.

BRAD SMITH: Wow.

JULIE HYMAN: The timing of this, by the way, is really fascinating and potentially negative for NBCU because she was set to lead their upfronts presentation this coming Monday. That is the key presentation that the various networks, streaming services give to advertisers. It's their sales pitch to advertisers for the upcoming slate of programming. She was set to do that on Monday. So when this news came out, when these reports came out that she was going to potentially be heading Twitter as CEO, there was a question there. Like, this lady is supposed to do a very important job on Monday--

BRAD SMITH: Not anymore.

JULIE HYMAN: --for NBCU. But now, again, CNBC is reporting that she has resigned. So again, this gives credence, obviously, to these reports that are out there that she would be taking the Twitter job.

BRAD SMITH: Yeah, absolutely. And for Twitter as well, this would kind of put them on a different platform if Yaccarino-- if Yaccarino does take over this role, which it now has more signs pointing to that being the reality. A person that's also involved within the World Economic Forum. You wonder as she chairs the task force for the organization on the future of work and media as well-- media, entertainment culture-- where all of this will lead to a better profile for Twitter, how Twitter can have a seat at the table in one way or another. But all of that considered, it seems like we're moving more full speed ahead than we were even just two hours ago on Linda Yaccarino becoming the next CEO of Twitter.

JULIE HYMAN: And one more small thing as we talk about that. NBCUniversal is owned by Comcast. So my first instinct was to take a look over at Comcast to see if there was any kind of reaction there, perhaps, to her stepping down since she is seen as a major player there and an important figure for NBCUniversal. Right now, I'm not seeing any particular reaction in the shares it looks like.

So either-- Comcast is not always super heavily traded in the premarket. We should note that. But still, that's something that we're going to be keeping an eye on to see if there ends up being any kind of reaction.

BRAD SMITH: Absolutely. We're going to be watching shares of CMCSA going into the start of today's trading activity as well and continuing to track this story.