There's a tautological undercurrent to this piece. Matt Levine is rare because he has certain characteristics, which are rare.
It misses a larger point which is that advertisers pay for readers who are interested in financial content, and they tend to pay less in most other areas of coverage. So other industries do not produce Matts as easily, or takes bets on writers to see if they work well driving people into the wide end of the funnel.
In the case of Bloomberg, it's a little more nuanced than ads, since the company treats content as a loss leader to make people aware of the financial data it sells through its terminal.
Matt Levine exists because Bloomberg can charge more than $400k per year to a terminal subscriber, which means they will gladly absorb a really high CAC.
It misses a larger point which is that advertisers pay for readers who are interested in financial content, and they tend to pay less in most other areas of coverage. So other industries do not produce Matts as easily, or takes bets on writers to see if they work well driving people into the wide end of the funnel.
In the case of Bloomberg, it's a little more nuanced than ads, since the company treats content as a loss leader to make people aware of the financial data it sells through its terminal.
Matt Levine exists because Bloomberg can charge more than $400k per year to a terminal subscriber, which means they will gladly absorb a really high CAC.