Insider Today: CEOs in Training

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Welcome back to our Sunday edition, a roundup of some of our top stories. Goldman Sachs' 2024 summer internship class had an acceptance rate of less than 1%. Two who made the cut shared their first impressions of Wall Street and tips for success.

On the agenda today:

• Your guide to America's weird new economic tribes.
• The CEO training program that's harder to get into than Harvard.
• Andy Sieg could be Citi's next CEO. First step: fix a broken business.
• Thirty years later, Amazon's book business is thriving.

But first: On the ground at Cannes Lions, aka summer camp for the ad industry.

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This week's dispatch

The biggest names in marketing made for the south of France last week for the annual Cannes Lions festival. Lara O'Reilly and Julia Hood were among them.

What was the overall mood?

Lara O'Reilly: Jubilant. The sun was shining, the rosé was flowing, and companies were back to spending big on their enormous setups along the beach. No signs of the so-called "ad downturn" along La Croisette this year.

What were the topics du jour?

LO: Artificial intelligence. Or, more specifically, why the industry needs to stop talking about AI — and other under-the-hood tech — and instead refocus on the kind of creative ideas that make a cultural and business impact.

Julia Hood: Sports was the star of the show. Athletes on site included Megan Rapinoe, Sue Bird, the Kelce brothers, and many more. Sports is accelerating as a convener of people across the political spectrum — a safe way to bring people together.

What did the event reveal about the industry?

LO: For all the talk of automation, advertising remains a relationship business. Yes, this place is a hedonist's playground of partying, VIP yacht experiences, and questionable ROI, but (I'm told) deals do actually get done here.

What was the hottest ticket in town?

JH: Wednesday night was the time to party for a lot of the attendees. Highlights included The Chainsmokers at Yahoo Beach and Arcade Fire at Spotify Beach. On Thursday morning, Jason and Travis Kelce recorded their "New Heights" podcast at Stagwell's Sport Beach. Despite the rumors, Taylor Swift was not seen.

Meet Business Insider's most innovative CMOs of 2024.

America's new economic tribes

You may have heard about ALICEs, DINKs, and maybe even HENRYs. But what about DIPS? Have you thought about the FIRE movement?

Coverage of America's economy is filled with acronyms and descriptors for all demographics. It can be hard to keep up with all the terms — so we built a glossary to help you out.

A guide to ALICEs, DINKs, and everyone in between.

Also read:

• Gen Z and millennial NEETS are on the rise — many say they'd rather do nothing than be unhappy at work

The MBA to CEO pipeline

Alpine Investors, a $17 billion private-equity firm, is quickly becoming one of the most sought-after workplaces for business school grads.

That's thanks to Alpine's CEO-In-Training program. The program places MBAs in leadership positions at companies within just a few weeks, and promises to turn them into CEOs in a few years. It's not easy, though: Just 1.6% of applicants got a spot this year.

Inside the highly selective program.

Citi's wealth fixer

Andy Sieg, Merrill Wealth Management's former president, took a gamble leaving its strong business for Citi's much smaller wealth division.

But according to industry insiders, including some of his colleagues, Sieg might have his eye on a bigger prize. If he's able to turn Citi's wealth unit around, he could become the bank's next CEO.

A look at Sieg's next steps.

Read it at Amazon

Despite shuttering all of its brick-and-mortar bookstores in 2022, Amazon's bookselling business is booming.

The e-retail giant sold $16.9 billion worth of books in the first 10 months of 2022, an internal document obtained by BI shows. The figure demonstrates how Amazon's original business is thriving 30 years after its inception.

The book business breakdown.

Also read:

• Jeff Bezos' plan for The Washington Post is imploding
• Amazon employees slam the company in leaked Slack messages for apparently hosting a private Foo Fighters concert for senior leaders

This week's quote:

"We try to buy our way into looking and seeming young."

— Devon Price, a social-psychology professor, on companies selling to millennials who are afraid of aging.

More of this week's top reads:

• A lawyer dreamed of disrupting the legal industry with private equity. It turned into a nightmare.
• An Amazon VP shares eight career-advancing strategies.
• Wall Street's solution to the retirement crisis: force boomers to work longer.
• Reddit's traffic is way, way up.
• There's a pipeline of former Tesla staffers to Elon Musk's new startup xAI.
• Apple Intelligence seems to have a ChatGPT-shaped problem in China.
• Elon Musk wants advertisers' money — and to keep tweeting. He can't have both.

• Businesses are rushing to use generative AI. It's about to get messy.

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  The Insider Today team: Matt Turner, deputy editor-in-chief, in New York. Jordan Parker Erb, editor, in New York. Dan DeFrancesco, deputy editor and anchor, in New York. Lisa Ryan, executive editor, in New York. Amanda Yen, fellow, in New York.