Hi, I'm Danpermac and welcome to Axios Recap. Today is Friday, February 26th.

Household income is up, AT&T is cutting down its stake in direct TV, and we're talking with

Airbnb co-founder and CEO, Brian Chesky. Airbnb and DoorDash are very different companies.

One's a platform for getting out of your house, the other is for bringing food to your

house.

But in some ways, they're inextricably linked.

For starters, they both went public late last year within 24 hours of each other.

And yesterday, they both released their first

ever quarterly earnings report. But, and this is really much more important, they're kind of

flip sides of the same pandemic coin, where the pandemic's eventual end could mean very different

things for each one. So today we're doing something a little bit different. Two episodes.

In this episode, we dig into Airbnb, whose business was decimated at the beginning of the

pandemic to the point many thought the company might not survive.

It did manage to turn things around from those early days, and everyone now agrees that Airbnb

is on the precipice of a business boom, as travel is expected to

surge once herd immunity is achieved. So we're pleased to be joined now by Brian Chesky

to discuss what he expects for the future of his company and for the future of our travel

plans.

So Brian, let's start here. Airbnb was part of kind of the stay private longer trend for a very long time.

Part of the reason, at least the reporters always seem to think you guys and others were doing this,

was to avoid having to deal with days like today, which is reporting your earnings publicly,

dealing with bank analysts and the call and the whole thing.

...