Motley Fool Money
Travis Kelce’s Six Flags Activist Role & the Rise of Celebrity Investors
22 Oct 2025
We discuss the growing prevalence of celebrities being involved in big investment moves by VC and hedge funds, including Travis Kelce taking a role in Jana Partners’ 9% stake in Six Flags. We also debate the launch of ChatGPT Atlas and a potential deal between Warner Bros. Discovery and Skydance. Travis Hoium, Lou Whiteman, and Rachel Warren discuss: - Six Flags activists - ChatGPT gets a browser - Interest in a Warner Bros. Discovery buyout Companies discussed: Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD), Alphabet (GOOG, GOOGL), Six Flags (FUN). Host: Travis Hoium Guests: Lou Whiteman, Rachel Warren Engineer: Dan Boyd Disclosure: Advertisements are sponsored content and provided for informational purposes only. The Motley Fool and its affiliates (collectively, “TMF”) do not endorse, recommend, or verify the accuracy or completeness of the statements made within advertisements. TMF is not involved in the offer, sale, or solicitation of any securities advertised herein and makes no representations regarding the suitability, or risks associated with any investment opportunity presented. Investors should conduct their own due diligence and consult with legal, tax, and financial advisors before making any investment decisions. TMF assumes no responsibility for any losses or damages arising from this advertisement. We’re committed to transparency: All personal opinions in advertisements from Fools are their own. The product advertised in this episode was loaned to TMF and was returned after a test period or the product advertised in this episode was purchased by TMF. Advertiser has paid for the sponsorship of this episode. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Full Episode
Travis Kelsey is taking an activist role at Six Flags, so are we gonna get Taylor World next? Motley Fool Money starts now. Welcome to Motley Fool Money. I'm joined today by Lou Whiteman and Rachel Warren. Look, the big news over the past 24 hours has been Travis Kelsey taking an activist role. At least that's what the headlines say at Six Flags.
Jana Partners is actually the one I think fronting a lot of this money. But Lou, this is at least interesting. The interest here is that he has a background going to Six Flags, but we also have Dolly Wood, Dolly Parton. Is this going to be Taylor Swift building her own theme parks? Is that the next thing here?
I hate to say it, it would probably work, right? Absolutely, it would work. I'd go. I don't think that's what's going on here. But look, at the end of the day, I love activists. I've worked with activists my whole career. A lot of it is, activists is just a PR campaign at heart. You can have correct ideas about a company.
But if you can't get those ideas out into the world, to the shareholders, you're still going to lose, even if you're right. So there is always an element of trying to attract attention to yourself. A lot of times it's with really over-the-top language. It's about accusations. There's a lot of ways to do it. But look, Jana has used celebrities before.
They used Dwyane Wade of the NBA and pitcher CeCe Sabathia when they went after Fresh Pet. Famously, Starboard Value, another firm, they used Shaquille O'Neal to go after Papa John's.
That at least seems more successful. You see Shaq in those commercials.
But it all works. This is just a way of going at it. If you look at Six Flags, very, very ripe for an activist here. It's been a disaster. The stock's down 50% year-to-date. No one is going to these parks in the volumes that we're supposed to. They did a merger with Cedar Fair that was supposed to solve this. It didn't.
So, you know, Jana, I don't know if... Jana wants to say, you need to improve marketing. You need to improve your customer experience. In a way, Six Flags already tried that. We're going to, you know, have fewer people coming through, but we are going to treat them better, and they're going to spend more.
So, I don't know if this will actually work, but I do think that this is just... This is the classic activist campaign with just a little twist from... the Swifty world.
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