What happened at the COP climate summit?
Who from the Pierpoint and Lumi cohort is, in our opinion, the the least well adjusted? I keep changing my mind. There’s Harper, constantly harboring a grudge as big as her homeland – and willing to abandon all principles in its name. There’s Yasmin, underestimated and aimless, always at the mercy of rich men no matter how hard she tries to manipulate them to her advantage. Of course, Robert has a lot going for him, too! The poor man has a recently deceased lover who assaulted him, nursed him, and then suffered a stroke in his sleep. And Muck has his own baggage: In tonight’s episode, we learn that his father committed suicide, and that Muck, too, struggles with suicidal thoughts. (This revelation comes just moments before he tries to hit on Yasmin with the pick-up line of the century.) But perhaps no one in episode 3 can top Eric, who ends the Pierpoint family’s trip to the Alps with glitter on his cheeks and a colossal failure on his record.
The Swiss standard situation is a significant change for industry Season 3 so far, even if the hotel’s decor – by Petra’s standards – “looks like something Trump threw up in the ’80s.” The cast descends on the mountains for the COP climate change conference, a gathering with the ostensible goal of combating climate change – although that isn’t the most important thing to any of our protagonists. They’re more concerned about Lumi’s rapidly falling stock price and whether Muck’s upcoming panel appearance can serve as the “positive catalyst” he promises.
Especially after a tense conference call on Lumi’s earnings earlier in the episode, Eric is determined to make sure the COP panel goes smoothly. Wilhelmina Fassbinder (Georgina Rich), Pierpoint’s CFO, has assigned Eric to appear alongside Muck on the panel, where Eric will be Bill Adler’s deputy. (Adler is “taking some time with his family in Europe,” Wilhelmina says, which seems like an obvious distraction.) She doesn’t have to remind Eric how important it is for Lumi to do well in Switzerland. If Lumi’s IPO falls through, the other ESGs seeking to subscribe to Pierpoint could lose confidence in the investment bank’s ability to do well.
On the flight there, Yasmin and Robert prepare Eric for the panel. (Yasmin is eager to make herself useful, suspecting that she was invited not to help Eric but to appease Muck.) In the coming days, the underwriters will issue “buy,” “hold,” or “sell” recommendations for Lumi stock. “Buy” recommendations are good; they serve as a clear signal that Lumi is on the up. But “hold” or “sell” recommendations are an indication that Lumi is overvalued. Eric believes the recommendation of Frank Wade (Joel Kim Booster)—an internal Pierpoint analyst who is considered a “trendmaker” in the energy sector—will carry the most weight. But Rob is suspicious of Frank; the analyst’s tone at Lumi’s earnings call was a “somewhat hostile.” Eric dismisses all concerns: Pierpoint “did the IPO. (Frank) knows who puts the butter in his bread.” Translation: Frank will not betray his family.
When Muck arrives on the plane, he herds the bankers into the back of the cabin so his own crew – a sleazy DJ-investor-producer who is “not into” porn unless it’s “shot by women” and his Prada-bucket-wearing girlfriend – can join him up front. (The way Harington says, “Ah, fabulous,” in response to this awkward social scrum is hysterical.) Yasmin, of course, snags an invitation to the rich kids’ club, although she seems uncomfortable with Muck’s obvious romantic campaign. When the DJ-investor-producer assumes Yasmin is Muck’s girlfriend, Muck makes no real attempt to correct him.
At FutureDawn, Petra is annoyed by the “golden handcuffs” that Anna has imposed on her when renegotiating her contract. Petra decides that it is time to set up her own fund, but not alone: She will poach Harper, much like “Jerry Maguire’s goldfish”. Together they plan to intercept Anna’s meeting at COP and poach the ESG heavyweights who would otherwise invest with Anna. But once in the Alps, the meetings are chaos. Neither Petra nor Harper can get anyone to take their “event-driven equity long/short positions with macro overlay” seriously, least of all the team that manages the Church of England’s money. (Petra tries with this particular offer: “Let’s get Jesus out of his sandals and into Jordans!” That has to be at least snappy. industry‘s top 25 lines, right?)
After the bad meetings, Petra has just gotten cold feet and Harper’s calculations are getting desperate. She has already introduced herself to Otto Mostyn and it’s clear that she thinks she can secure his investment with a little more time. But without a physical track record of Petra’s returns at FutureDawn, Harper and Petra pitch their fledgling fund without having any evidence of her effectiveness as a trader. Harper asks Yasmin for help and Yas relents again: she reveals that since Pierpoint is a FutureDawn investor, someone at the company will have access to the performance of FutureDawn traders. Yas refers Harper to Sweetpea, who can get access to these records, but Yas wants the commission from Harper’s fund as thanks. “Bitch, you know I always wanted you to work for me,” Harper scoffs.
Robert and Eric have booked the same king room thanks to a receptionist’s poor planning, and they share a bowl of nuts while lounging in robes and eye masks. A dialogue card in the silent film they’re watching makes Eric think of Yasmin: “I inspected all the female employees – and not a single one of them has ‘IT’!” (This line is the title of Episode 3, “It.”) Eric asks Robert if he and Yasmin are more than friends, but Rob insists they’re just roommates and coworkers. Sure, honey.
Eric isn’t the only one interested in Yasmin’s sexual activities, either. The DJ-investor-producer from Muck’s plane corners her at a party and says he figured she’d “spread her legs for a bottle of (Don Julio) 1942, given her situation.” Rightly disgusted, Yasmin evades him, but he follows her and asks her point blank if the reason her father is missing is because she killed him. Muck tries to apologize for his friend’s outrageous behavior by insisting that Yas can leave the conference whenever she wants; she was never at the COP for work anyway, he tells her. “Yeah, I Was” she hisses, angry at the collective paternalism of all the men she has ever met?
The next day, the discussion begins. Despite cornering a naked Frank in the hotel sauna—a scene that seems to indicate that Frank and Robert have slept together—Robert fails to convince Frank to wait to publish his recommendation. Just as the conversation between Eric, Muck, and Anna onstage gets into full swing, Harper swipes a notification on her phone: Frank has published a “hold” recommendation. Delighted, Harper takes the opportunity to humiliate Eric and demonstrate her own competence in the most petty way possible. During the live Q&A of the COP discussion, she jumps to her feet. As soon as she announces her name to the audience, Eric grimaces. Harper introduces herself as a macro trader working with Petra on a new fund, causing both Petra—in the audience—and Anna—onstage—to recoil.
Harper’s speech is worth reproducing in full: “Why is Pierpoint holding this festival of ideas in the shadow of a climate conference? We have a green energy CEO, a senior prime minister of a green-focused fund and a random salesman from an American investment bank? Is the media and financial complex just patting itself on the back? Surely your sales talk is moot when you consider that Pierpoint’s Frank Wade has now published a ‘hold issue’ for Lumi. Since you are the lead signatory, that amounts to a ‘sale.'” Oops. There’s nothing more exciting than watching Harper become scorched earth. Her favorite pastime is pressing her thumb into a bruise, if only to see how much pain she can inflict.
Then Petra wants to know – erm – “what the shit is wrong with” Harper. But Harper’s bullshit has actually manifested Otto Mostyn, just as she predicted. He strolls into Petra’s hotel suite shortly after the panel, curious about her female-led “new look, same great taste” approach to money printing. With Sweetpea’s help, Harper has also manifested Petra’s return on investment record, and she encourages – well, actually, Claims– that Petra and Otto’s companion go over it together in a separate room. (“Petra, show him,” Harper commands in a deceptively coaxing voice. “Show him.”) That leaves Otto alone with Harper. He gives her perhaps the most satisfying compliment Harper has ever received, at least in her own eyes: “You’re one of us. You’re one of the bandits.” After that, he gives them the green light to start their hedge fund, subtly named Leviathan. Hilarious.
The Leviathan crew emerges victorious, while Eric endures one humiliation after another: Europa Gas, the next ESG to go public with Pierpoint’s backing, is pushing ahead with its IPO after witnessing the COP panel disaster. Eric copes by blowing nearly $20,000 to spend the night with a sex worker, but he disappears before he can pay the bill. (Unbelievable.) And to cap off his already disastrous climate change experience, Yasmin arranges a meeting between him, Petra, and Harper. Seeing these two face to face again after Eric fired Harper in Season 2 was a devilish treat. Petra and Harper want Pierpoint to be Leviathan’s broker, and as such, Harper wants Eric to know that she expects “top-notch service.” She demands that he look her in the eyes, then mocks him for the glitter that covers his face after his night of drinking. Eric bursts into manic, tortured laughter. What else could go wrong?
Eventually, Muck sells his stake in Lumi to “crystallize” his personal gain before the company’s stock hits rock bottom. But that doesn’t happen before the CEO finally confesses his attraction to Yasmin during a skinny-dipping incident at the hotel pool. On the flight back to London, Muck and Yasmin do it in the front cabin while Robert and Eric lounge alone in the back, both trying to drown out the couple’s whining with earplugs. Yasmin wants her boss to take her seriously, but she seems to have no problem showing him that she has an edge over Muck. She can use him. And since Hanani Publishing is demanding compensation for the money her father embezzled, she might need him.
Lauren Puckett-Pope is a culture writer at ELLE, where she mainly covers film, television, and books. She was previously deputy editor at ELLE.
