Speaker 1: From the heart of where innovation, money and power. CALLI
Speaker 1: in Silicon Valley and beyond. This is Bloomberg Technology with
Speaker 1: Emily j I'm Caroline Hyde in New York. This is
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Technology. Coming up. In the next hour, we explore
Speaker 1: the latest sanctions that the Biden administration is levying a Russia.
Speaker 1: This country inches forward to a possible invasion of Ukraine,
Speaker 1: classic tensions heightened, how Russia could also use cyber attacks
Speaker 1: to retaliate for those sanctions. Plus the revolving down in
Speaker 1: Washington between those in crypto when those tasked with policing
Speaker 1: it some surprising number of people who have been making
Speaker 1: the move from crypto to government and vice versa. And
Speaker 1: for the first time in nearly two decades, there will
Speaker 1: be no new call a duty next year. Well, that
Speaker 1: means the gaming industry, and that's why the gaming world
Speaker 1: is going crazy off elden Ring and my fans a
Speaker 1: Game of Thrones might be intrigued as well. We'll get
Speaker 1: to all of that good stuff in a moment, but first, well,
Speaker 1: it was another pretty bleak day on the market, particularly
Speaker 1: for your long technology, but most pretty good to has
Speaker 1: the update for us, Yeah, a risk off day in
Speaker 1: the market's read on the screen, which is interesting given
Speaker 1: that we had a pretty big sell off yesterday. That
Speaker 1: usually means you have a pretty strong rebound. But even
Speaker 1: though we opened in the green, we weren't able to
Speaker 1: hold those games. You can see that right behind me
Speaker 1: the SMP five hundred closing down one percent, but like
Speaker 1: you said, Caroline, a lot of that pain showing up
Speaker 1: in the NASDAC down almost to all which shy three
Speaker 1: percent two point six percent. What's important to keep in
Speaker 1: mind here is that big tech, although at least those records,
Speaker 1: it also leads the declines, and that's really what you're
Speaker 1: seeing seeing. One of the only sectors in the green
Speaker 1: today was of course energy, which brings me once again
Speaker 1: to those geopolitical tensions. You can see that's what weighed
Speaker 1: the stock market down but actually fed into commodities, and
Speaker 1: you can see that Brent crude getting closer and closer
Speaker 1: to that one dollar. There's a barrel that is going
Speaker 1: to be significant when we talk about inflation feeding back
Speaker 1: into what actually weighs on those tech stocks. Let's talk
Speaker 1: about technicals though, because that absolutely plays into this dynamic.
Speaker 1: You actually saw the SMP close into correction territory yesterday.
Speaker 1: So once again, Caroline, the assumption here is that you're
Speaker 1: going to see a bounce back. Pretty normally, when the
Speaker 1: SMP five hundred drops ten from its all time peak,
Speaker 1: you do see a pretty strong bounce back. Yet we
Speaker 1: are not there. We are now down eleven from its
Speaker 1: peak earlier this year. There was some green on the screen,
Speaker 1: though a little pockets, and when it comes once again,
Speaker 1: it comes to geopolitical tensions. Traditionally in those kind of
Speaker 1: safe haven moves, you tend to go to big tech.
Speaker 1: But today that green on the screen happened to me
Speaker 1: and cybersecurity stocks a little bit of a last miss
Speaker 1: self when it comes to CrowdStrike, vm Ware and fort neet,
Speaker 1: but Paulo Alto once again actually gaining some pretty blockbuster
Speaker 1: earnings there at the end of the day, when you're
Speaker 1: talking about geopolitical risk, when you're talking about invasion risk,
Speaker 1: and of course cyber tax on Ukraine, what better play
Speaker 1: than those defense stocks, And right now, that's the purpose
Speaker 1: cybersecurity is playing right now on the stock market. Pretty
Speaker 1: such a great round up, really tying together all of
Speaker 1: the headwinds and tail winds in the market in their
Speaker 1: own moment, and I want to talk more about those
Speaker 1: headwinds and precisely the sanctions that we were just talking about,
Speaker 1: the Biden administration once again opping the anti in that respect,
Speaker 1: we want to bring in of course, Blue WEG's Washington correspondent.
Speaker 1: He's not in Washington, so New York, Amory Horden. The
Speaker 1: reason your hero is because you had a really great
Speaker 1: exclusive interview. But first and foremost, bring us up to
Speaker 1: speed with well where we are in terms of sanctions.
Speaker 1: They seem to be ramping up slowly. Yeah, the Biden
Speaker 1: administration today is going to be sanctioning nord Stream too
Speaker 1: and the individuals that are part of nord Stream two.
Speaker 1: And this is, I have to say, is a pretty
Speaker 1: aggressive step. This is something that the US has really
Speaker 1: held back from doing. And this isn't just now that
Speaker 1: the Germans say we're going to wait for that certification,
Speaker 1: because remind us nor Stream to the gas pipeline between
Speaker 1: Germany and Russia, right, and this is something Putin wants
Speaker 1: eleven billion dollars. He can start to not go through
Speaker 1: Ukraine as much for those gas, but instead use another
Speaker 1: pipeline direct clean into Europe, the heart of Europe. And
Speaker 1: now even though the Germany says they're going to wait
Speaker 1: to potentially certify it with the US putting sanctions on
Speaker 1: and that means that certification may never come through. But
Speaker 1: the Ukrainian Foreign minister who I sat down and said
Speaker 1: this is very welcome. They've been against north Stream too
Speaker 1: for years. But he said more sanctions are needed to
Speaker 1: take lessen. It sends a strong message to put In,
Speaker 1: but it still doesn't stop him. So it means we
Speaker 1: need more sanctions, we need the second wave and then
Speaker 1: probably the third way until it gets clear to him
Speaker 1: that he shouldn't make any step further. Dmitro phuleb there
Speaker 1: and he's heading back to Kiev. Now we should know
Speaker 1: Kiev now, Caroline and Ukraine as a whole. It's a
Speaker 1: state of emergency. The separatists have asked Putin to send
Speaker 1: in troops. So it does feel like things are really
Speaker 1: starting to escalate, starting to escalate, and also not only
Speaker 1: in physical form, but also in cyber form as well.
Speaker 1: There was another cyber attack on Ukraine's key sort of
Speaker 1: infrastructure to and including the foreign minister his website, so
Speaker 1: that all these ministry as were attacked. This was the
Speaker 1: second cyber attack that's happened in about a week. But
Speaker 1: this has happened to Ukraine a number of times. One
Speaker 1: of the biggest ones was in when literally everyone's power
Speaker 1: went out in the country, or maybe three hundred thousand
Speaker 1: consumers right, it felt like a lot at the time.
Speaker 1: But they've attacked cyber attacks have been at banks, the
Speaker 1: metro a number of issues. And I asked him about
Speaker 1: this and he said they have been working for to
Speaker 1: really fortify it and make it a little bit more robust.
Speaker 1: But I was curious about if you're going tipped for
Speaker 1: toe or tip for tat with poutin tote to toe
Speaker 1: when it comes to sanctions trying to deter him any
Speaker 1: of his conversations have Western leaders said they would also
Speaker 1: issue cyber attacks on Russia and he said, no, that
Speaker 1: hasn't come up yet. We'll see how cyber wolf haes
Speaker 1: stoughts to be factored in a little bit more. I'm
Speaker 1: reholding such a great interview. Go onto dot com and
Speaker 1: seek it out because it was a great conversation. But
Speaker 1: we want to, of course discuss a little bit more
Speaker 1: about what's been happening with several of the Ukrainian government
Speaker 1: and banking websites not functioning due to distributed to not
Speaker 1: of service attacks d d US. This comes after Ukraine
Speaker 1: said just last week that of course it suffered its
Speaker 1: worst cyber attack also targeting banking and government websites is
Speaker 1: and Marie was just telling us, let's dig into it.
Speaker 1: Marcus Fowler, he's a senior vice president for Strategic Engagements
Speaker 1: and Threats for dark Trace. He also spent fifteen years
Speaker 1: working at the CIA as its global cyber operations. You're
Speaker 1: a man who is in the know on these things.
Speaker 1: Just talk to us about the level of threat that
Speaker 1: distributed denial of service attacks have on Ukraine. How impactful
Speaker 1: are they? Carolina and great to be here, So, you know,
Speaker 1: these distributed denial service attacks really go at basically flooding
Speaker 1: a network or a website with traffic so that they're unusable,
Speaker 1: they're overloaded, and they really don't function, and they can
Speaker 1: be disruptive kind of at that, you know, if I'm
Speaker 1: a consumer trying to get to a specific website, and
Speaker 1: they can really frustrate kind of the the Internet connectivity
Speaker 1: of a specific website. But in terms of like broader,
Speaker 1: more disruptive attacks, I think those are still to come. Okay,
Speaker 1: still to come and still to come level DoPT Ukraine
Speaker 1: or do you start to think that here in the
Speaker 1: United States, with sanctions being upped by the Biden administration,
Speaker 1: we could to see infrastructure as we've seen before, or
Speaker 1: perhaps websites and the like start to be attacked as well.
Speaker 1: Great question. I think the easy answers both. You're going
Speaker 1: to see them ratchet up. You're gonna see the Russians
Speaker 1: ratche up, ratchet up cyber attacks within Ukraine, potentially moving
Speaker 1: into ransomware, data theft, data encryption to further cripple organizations
Speaker 1: and businesses, as well as potentially move into critical infrastructure
Speaker 1: as a as a higher escalation point. As for the
Speaker 1: U S and the West, as harsher and harsher sanctions
Speaker 1: and more economic damage is done on Russia, you will
Speaker 1: see them. I think I want you an attempt to
Speaker 1: respond in kind in terms of economic disruption, thinking financial institutions,
Speaker 1: banks maybe potentially tightening and or more damage to the
Speaker 1: supply chain through either their own actions or proxies such
Speaker 1: as cyber criminal groups or in ransomware actors. Yeah, to
Speaker 1: that point, when you are looking at the data, when
Speaker 1: you're trying to see when you're understanding where these attacks
Speaker 1: are coming from, how do you discern whether it's indeed
Speaker 1: from the government, whether or need it's more using other
Speaker 1: actors at their will. How you can ensure that you're
Speaker 1: joining the dolts in a sophisticated manner. No, your attribution
Speaker 1: within cyberspace and who the actor actually was is incredibly difficult.
Speaker 1: So I was very pleased to see what the earlier
Speaker 1: version of the denial of service attacks. The US government
Speaker 1: come out fairly quickly to identify the Russians as the actor,
Speaker 1: as the attackers in that space, and I think assessed
Speaker 1: attribution is really important, that it is done as quickly
Speaker 1: as possible, and that Russians, where there is evidence, can
Speaker 1: be held accountable. But I think they will absolutely be
Speaker 1: leaning on proxy organizations, potentially new ransomware groups we haven't
Speaker 1: heard of before. You're gonna see more activity within that
Speaker 1: space as the Russians either provide more state directed you know, actions,
Speaker 1: or are increasing not only trying to blind ive but
Speaker 1: kind of turned the shackles, you know, released that the
Speaker 1: shackles a bit in terms of those ransomware groups operating
Speaker 1: out of their backyard as it were, Marcus, I mean,
Speaker 1: obviously this is I'm asking you to talk your book
Speaker 1: a little bit. But have we seen an uptick in
Speaker 1: demand for cyber protection? Are we seeing the defenses being fortified?
Speaker 1: Are we ready for the fight to be perfectly frank So,
Speaker 1: I would say one of the silver linings of the
Speaker 1: increasing ransomware over the last two years is absolutely seeing
Speaker 1: the private industry, especially prioritized cybersecurity more directly right and
Speaker 1: really start to put more resources, personnel, you know, advanced
Speaker 1: emerging technologies into that space. And I think that the
Speaker 1: US government has as well, right and as well as
Speaker 1: as mother Western allies, recognizing the increased threat, have they
Speaker 1: done enough, you know, as quickly? I think you we
Speaker 1: aren't a bit of a race condition against what will
Speaker 1: be a spike in in cyber attacks and getting the
Speaker 1: right pieces in place to properly defend right. It's kind
Speaker 1: of what that that old adage of you go to
Speaker 1: war with the army you have, not the army you'd
Speaker 1: wish you'd built and resourced and prioritized appropriately. Moist the
Speaker 1: way Marcus Fowler really interesting. We thank you so much
Speaker 1: as VP of Dark Trace. Let's just take a moment
Speaker 1: to think about, well, the future of marketing from Palaton
Speaker 1: to Facebook or US. We now know it meta. The
Speaker 1: world is seeing its shares of brands facing kind of
Speaker 1: a post pandemic marketing challenge. More I want to bring
Speaker 1: in on the back of its earnings and also it's
Speaker 1: forward looking thinking on all of this. The marketing firm
Speaker 1: sat to Global, the CEO and co founder and chairman
Speaker 1: David Steinberg's with us also, of course, as I say,
Speaker 1: pushing to a fourth court of sales number that beat
Speaker 1: estimates under thirty five million. Talk to us first and
Speaker 1: foremost about your numbers first, David and the growth that
Speaker 1: you're seeing. Are we seeing continued demand and knowledge need
Speaker 1: in the marketing space. Yah? So, first of all, thank
Speaker 1: you for having me, Caroline. I appreciate it. It's great
Speaker 1: to be here. Uh So, in SATA, what we're really
Speaker 1: seeing is what I think a lot of organizations are seeing.
Speaker 1: There's a tremendous amount of disruption in the ecosystem. Is
Speaker 1: most marketers are moving from analog marketing to digital marketing.
Speaker 1: And as a lot of the very large tech players
Speaker 1: are sort of trying to consolidate control. Apple got rid
Speaker 1: of their tracking mechanism called the I d f A.
Speaker 1: Google is eliminating their cross app tracking, They're eliminating the
Speaker 1: third party cookie. Platforms like at A Global, which do
Speaker 1: not use any of those to resolve to an identity,
Speaker 1: have been able to grow fairly dramatically. I mean, I
Speaker 1: think that we grew the business when normalized for the
Speaker 1: presidential election by thirty two percent in the fourth quarter,
Speaker 1: and we grew earnings for the year by over sixty
Speaker 1: I think a lot of that is coming from this
Speaker 1: big disruption in the marketplace where organizations are trying to
Speaker 1: figure out how to navigate those changes, and Zeta Global
Speaker 1: is a bespoke platform to help them do so. And obviously,
Speaker 1: feeling that you've got enough confidence in your growth strategy
Speaker 1: that from a full year revenue of about four fifty
Speaker 1: eight million, you're looking to get that into an excess
Speaker 1: of a billion dollars in annual revenue over the next
Speaker 1: well up to talk to us about the kind of
Speaker 1: companies that are coming to at the moment. So it's
Speaker 1: a great question. Obviously, not only did we roll out
Speaker 1: our plan to get to over a billion year in
Speaker 1: revenue and plus operating margins, we fairly dramatically increased our
Speaker 1: guidance for two as well. Uh, you know, we're seeing
Speaker 1: very large enterprises. In fact, thirty four percent of the
Speaker 1: Fortune one hundred today use the Zata marketing platform who
Speaker 1: are trying to get to consumers in a way that
Speaker 1: is very cost efficient. And our platform is not just digital,
Speaker 1: it is built to be efficient in the way the
Speaker 1: marketing operates. And we've been able to really scale very
Speaker 1: very quickly with our clients. And so, how how do I,
Speaker 1: as a client wanting to get in front of the
Speaker 1: right use of the right demographic, the right timing, how
Speaker 1: do I do that in a cost efficient way at
Speaker 1: the moment, because I feel that there's a lawful lot
Speaker 1: of wall of money is being spent on the likes
Speaker 1: of Instagram, on the likes of TikTok. But is it
Speaker 1: really being that efficient to your perspective, Yeah, so a
Speaker 1: lot of it isn't right. So the old joke is,
Speaker 1: you know, marketers would say, I know that of my
Speaker 1: marketing is a waste of money. I just do not
Speaker 1: know which half the beauty of the data marketing platform,
Speaker 1: combined with our data cloud, which has over two hundred
Speaker 1: and thirty million opted in US individuals alone, is we
Speaker 1: can weed out the individuals that do not have a
Speaker 1: propensity to want to buy our clients products, and we
Speaker 1: know exactly when they're in market, so we're able to
Speaker 1: hit them at the precise time with the precise message,
Speaker 1: and we're able to pull out of that marketing funnel
Speaker 1: the fifty percent of customers who would not be credit
Speaker 1: approved and or have a propensity to want to buy
Speaker 1: that product. So just by removing them, you're able to
Speaker 1: massively increase the efficiency. And then by using our data
Speaker 1: cloud where you're interacting with these two hundred and twenty
Speaker 1: million opted in US individuals, were able to know when
Speaker 1: they're in market for particular products and services and specifically
Speaker 1: target them when their thinking about the products. So those
Speaker 1: two things allow us to be very efficient with our
Speaker 1: enterprise client's budgets. Said opted in, how are we in
Speaker 1: terms of general trend lines, how many people are going
Speaker 1: to be wanting to to opt in? How many people
Speaker 1: see the quid pro quo and say I'm in, I
Speaker 1: wanted I want to be targeted that little bit more efficiently. Yeah, listen,
Speaker 1: we we came about this in a very different approach
Speaker 1: from most companies so we have acquired a large number
Speaker 1: of technology platforms that power publishers. In an exchange for
Speaker 1: the publisher getting our software platforms at no cost and
Speaker 1: the consumer being able to use those tools at no cost,
Speaker 1: we simply ask them to opt in. In return, we
Speaker 1: guarantee the consumer we will never sell their data to
Speaker 1: anybody at any price at any time. We simply use
Speaker 1: that data to build intent based scores on what does
Speaker 1: the consumer intend to do next? Do they intend to
Speaker 1: buy a particular credit card, do they want a blue
Speaker 1: car of a particular model, are they going to churn
Speaker 1: off a wireless platform? And we use that data to
Speaker 1: build the curriculum of contact on behalf of our enterprise
Speaker 1: clients to help them lower churn or create customers more efficiently.
Speaker 1: So by always keeping the consumers data private, we get
Speaker 1: a lot more consumers who are willing to opt into
Speaker 1: the platform and work with us because they know their
Speaker 1: data is never going to be sold. Here's hoping we
Speaker 1: get stalked a little bit less by ads for things
Speaker 1: we've only just purchased. So thank you very much. Indeed,
Speaker 1: there's a global CEO and co founder and chairman David Steinberg.
Speaker 1: Are you making the time for us when he's just
Speaker 1: released his earnings and indeed a serial entrepreneur, they're so
Speaker 1: great findings. Now we're going to talk about it called
Speaker 1: a Duty being delayed. It's the first time the franchise
Speaker 1: will be without an annual main line release in nearly
Speaker 1: two decades. It's all according to people familiar with the plan.
Speaker 1: Now we want to talk to our expert and all
Speaker 1: of this, Bloomberg's Jason Schreyer for more on the reasoning
Speaker 1: behind it. It feels as though what the previous release
Speaker 1: just didn't live up to expectations. Yeah, that's exactly what happened.
Speaker 1: So Call of Duty, um it has been an annual release,
Speaker 1: has come out every fall since two thousand and five.
Speaker 1: So this is pretty stunning. It's a it's a big change.
Speaker 1: And just for a little context, is the last time
Speaker 1: we did not have a Call of Duty UM, I
Speaker 1: believe was the beginning of the first Obama administration, So no, sorry,
Speaker 1: at the beginning of George W. Bush's second term. So yeah,
Speaker 1: so we're talking about a very long time. And yes,
Speaker 1: so the previous year's last year's Call of Duty game underperformed,
Speaker 1: which led activism Exacts to start thinking, hey, maybe we
Speaker 1: need to rethink this whole release schedule thing. Maybe gave
Speaker 1: some of these titles a little bit more breathing real Okay,
Speaker 1: so maybe a little bit more desire working up our
Speaker 1: appetite for the latest release. But it also comes at
Speaker 1: a time that there's a lot of change and Activision
Speaker 1: of course, notably that they're being boored. Could it be
Speaker 1: anything to do with that, Yeah, I mean, I'm sure
Speaker 1: there's some There's been some conversations there another about how
Speaker 1: Microsoft will react. But you know what, I think, legally,
Speaker 1: even though they've announced the acquisition, the Microsoft is buying Activision, um,
Speaker 1: it is not quite closed. They need to go through
Speaker 1: regulatory approval, which is expected to be finished by the
Speaker 1: next summer at the at the latest, summer three at
Speaker 1: the latest. So until then, Activision is legally required to
Speaker 1: just continue operating autonomously. And I'm sure they're in conversations
Speaker 1: and Microsoft exects all the time. They are still making
Speaker 1: their own calls. And I think this was more about
Speaker 1: the health of the College Duty franchise than it was
Speaker 1: about Microsoft coming in and wanting to make some changes
Speaker 1: and talked to us. Therefore about maybe some of the
Speaker 1: independent changes they're making ahead of the sale from an
Speaker 1: executive shake up perspective, because they were once the acquirer,
Speaker 1: particularly of the maker of candy Crush. And then there's
Speaker 1: some executive chan that yes again, um that was actually
Speaker 1: just today is that king to make a mechanic? Car
Speaker 1: Sta announce that their president and chief creative officer both departing.
Speaker 1: Um again, who knows if that is really related to
Speaker 1: the Microsoft exposition or if, as they said, they want
Speaker 1: to go spend more time with their family. I mean,
Speaker 1: we all know what what that typically means and exact speak. Um.
Speaker 1: But again, I just don't think that, Um, well, it's
Speaker 1: possible of these folks saw the writing on the wall
Speaker 1: and they're like, you know what, Microsoft is going to
Speaker 1: make some changes anyway, we better might as well get
Speaker 1: out of here early. I do not think that Microsoft
Speaker 1: is actually getting involved too much just yet. Okay, lastly,
Speaker 1: like talk to us a little bit about where is
Speaker 1: hot right now? So if we're going to have to
Speaker 1: wait for Activision to release Call a Duty, there is
Speaker 1: another game that everyone seem to be talking about. Elden Ring. Yeah,
Speaker 1: alden Ring comes out on Friday today. The review embargo
Speaker 1: lifts a bunch of criticism just hit. Last I checked,
Speaker 1: it was tracking to be um one of the if
Speaker 1: not the best reviewed games of all times. Um So,
Speaker 1: which is the game a lot of what was the
Speaker 1: winner before UM I should check? I think, uh the
Speaker 1: legend of Zelda Breuss of the while it was a
Speaker 1: top one, Mario Odyssey was another chop one um let.
Speaker 1: As I checked on the Open Critic, which is a
Speaker 1: review aggregation site, it has a ninety six out of
Speaker 1: a hundred, which is by far the biggest game of
Speaker 1: the year, and I think one of the biggest games ever.
Speaker 1: But yeah, so this game, UM, it's getting a lot
Speaker 1: of heights, largely because it's a crossover between George R.
Speaker 1: Martin UM. George R. Martin was the writer of the
Speaker 1: Game of Thrones series UM and from Software, which is
Speaker 1: a Japanese developer that, as you tell them, absolutely the
Speaker 1: loved among a lot of gamers for its series Dark
Speaker 1: Souls UM, which is known as like a really interesting, mysterious,
Speaker 1: difficult um action action RPG series. And so the game
Speaker 1: combined the two and it really just takes a lot
Speaker 1: of smart ideas from a lot of other games. And uh,
Speaker 1: it's really brilliant. I've been a whole an of it
Speaker 1: over the past week. Jason, you're doing your reporting for us.
Speaker 1: We thank you. Jason Schreyer, He's always so smart on
Speaker 1: all things gaming. So go check out the latest. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: coming up, despite while supply chain issues and shipping delays,
Speaker 1: it didn't seem to slow down over stock, which is
Speaker 1: reported about than expected fourth quarter earnings. We're gonna be
Speaker 1: breaking down all of the numbers when it comes to
Speaker 1: you're purchasing a big ticket items for the CEO Jonathan Johnson.
Speaker 1: But also remember there for ay into blockchain. He's been
Speaker 1: a big proponent of the technology and looks as though
Speaker 1: his early investments there seemed to still be bearing fruit.
Speaker 1: Suddenly people liking the stock on a key investment in
Speaker 1: the financial exchange area. So stick with us of that
Speaker 1: conversation from beautiful sunny New York. This has been back.
Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Technology. I'm Caroline High in New York.
Speaker 1: Let's get back to some market moves today because we've
Speaker 1: seen tech in particular under pressure, particularly amid the rhymesing
Speaker 1: tensions between Russia and Ukraine. Why let's talk to run Blastelica,
Speaker 1: who's with us of course over in Chicago and run
Speaker 1: is it is it theoretically risk off or is it
Speaker 1: more a rising rates environment that means in tech feels
Speaker 1: the pressure the most. Well, we're really seeing both of
Speaker 1: those factors coming to play at the same time right now.
Speaker 1: We already have we've long had concerns about the prospect
Speaker 1: of rising interest rates and inflation fed policy, and then
Speaker 1: on top of that we had this new geopolitical tension
Speaker 1: that it's just another reason for investors be a little
Speaker 1: bit more cautious about the growth side of the market.
Speaker 1: And it's another reason why we've seen people just pull
Speaker 1: back from tech and a pretty broad based fashion. I'm
Speaker 1: looking at a child and now it's like one hundred
Speaker 1: from us all time high. I mean, that's basically heading
Speaker 1: into bear territory now as we saw the SPI in
Speaker 1: a technical correction level. Ryan talked to us about what
Speaker 1: analysts are saying, because on the one side, you've got
Speaker 1: Goldman Sacks sort of talk calling about a regime change
Speaker 1: that we're seeing, particularly in the hedge funds area selling
Speaker 1: out a big tech but Morgan Stanley sort of looking
Speaker 1: at maybe the silver lining the opportunities therein absolutely so
Speaker 1: Morgan Stanley came out with some Daddy yesterday that looks
Speaker 1: at a fund ownership from major technology stocks, and it
Speaker 1: found that when it comes to names like Apple and Microsoft,
Speaker 1: these are under owned relative to their weight in the
Speaker 1: SMP five hundred, which the firm interprets as a positive signal.
Speaker 1: Perhaps people have communities for so much there's maybe a
Speaker 1: little bit room on the upside from here. Therefore, are
Speaker 1: you likely to see a bounce? Are we likely to
Speaker 1: hend head to a bad territory? Are we thinking that
Speaker 1: in this rising tension with Russian Ukraine and we're really
Speaker 1: in for more pain to come? Everyone I've spoken with
Speaker 1: expects a lot more volatility in the space, and certainly
Speaker 1: no one is ruling out the potential for additional aside
Speaker 1: from here. But when it comes to these major names
Speaker 1: like your Apples and Microsoft and Amazon and so forth,
Speaker 1: people continue just to really see very strong long term
Speaker 1: growth potential here, strong earnings power, and those are factories
Speaker 1: that do have people continuing to be a fan of them,
Speaker 1: even if in the short term there is a potential
Speaker 1: for further volatility and downside and questioning evaluations. Ryan, we
Speaker 1: thank you so much. When Ryan Lastelica stays warm over
Speaker 1: in cold Chicago, and let's talk about sort of the
Speaker 1: down day that we had on the overall markets, but
Speaker 1: the companies outperformed. One of them was Overstock, in fact,
Speaker 1: surging in terms of its share price, announcing better than
Speaker 1: expected fourth quarter earnings, as well as navigating, of course,
Speaker 1: the ongoing headwinds that are supply chain issues, labor issues, inflation,
Speaker 1: re isssues. Let's talk about how you managed to navigate that,
Speaker 1: and also a little bit of blockchain to see of
Speaker 1: Overstocks with us Jonathan Johnson, Jonathan, congrats on the numbers
Speaker 1: and and talk to us a little bit about how
Speaker 1: you've managed to ensure the inventories where you need it,
Speaker 1: that supply is where you need it when the rest
Speaker 1: of the world is really struggling with it. Yeah, we
Speaker 1: had another great quarters, our seventh consecutive quarter of profits,
Speaker 1: second consecutive year of market share growth. We have a
Speaker 1: vast and distributed supply chain, uh so, over three thousand
Speaker 1: partners that have goods for us. We have always had
Speaker 1: goods in inventory. We're very good at forecasting for our
Speaker 1: for our carriers where demand will be, so we weren't
Speaker 1: hit with ship again two years ago, and we weren't
Speaker 1: hit with any delivery problems this past year. And of
Speaker 1: course supply chain is tough, but we think our distributed
Speaker 1: asset light model really helps us navigate a well. And
Speaker 1: do you see any easing all some of those pressures
Speaker 1: in general in the industry. I think the bottlenecks and
Speaker 1: kinson the supply chain probably will last for the bulk
Speaker 1: of uh that that supply chain is pretty stressed, and
Speaker 1: so any small kink in it tends to be amplified
Speaker 1: more than it normally would. We think our system works well,
Speaker 1: particularly well in times of high demand and low supply.
Speaker 1: What about inflationary pressures as well? Because people come to
Speaker 1: you for value, is that going to be a headwind
Speaker 1: tailwind for you? As we start to see people worrying
Speaker 1: about the price point, people do come to us and
Speaker 1: recognize us for smart value, which means, you know, the
Speaker 1: best product they can get for their dollar. Of course,
Speaker 1: there are inflationary headwinds for everyone, whether it's labor or
Speaker 1: goods or you know, gasoline prices. We've done a nice
Speaker 1: job being able to absorb those with our suppliers and
Speaker 1: pass as little of those as possible onto the onto
Speaker 1: our customers. Our customers when they come to over stock,
Speaker 1: she expects a great deal for her dollar, and we're
Speaker 1: still able to deliver that. I'm interested when you say gasoline,
Speaker 1: because an awful lot of people would say, actually, it's
Speaker 1: it's the delivery, it's the trucking. Is that sort of
Speaker 1: choke point that has been difficult? How are you finding
Speaker 1: you know, when we look at geopolitical tension, we look
Speaker 1: at oil prices heading towards a hundred dollars? Is that
Speaker 1: something you just braceful that little bit more? How do
Speaker 1: you lean on your suppliers in that respect? Well, you know,
Speaker 1: we we have to lean on them. We work closely
Speaker 1: with you know, the ups s and the Fedexes of
Speaker 1: the world, which are the last mild delivery from our
Speaker 1: suppliers warehouses. Uh, it's it's a difficult thing to manage.
Speaker 1: We've got a great supply chain team than the nagies,
Speaker 1: each of those relationships really well. Just looking at your
Speaker 1: share price obviously doing incredibly well on the day, but
Speaker 1: has been under pressure over the year. How are you
Speaker 1: sort of talking to investors at the moment they're feeling
Speaker 1: that you're getting caught up in an evaluation question mark
Speaker 1: in the time where we start to look at rate
Speaker 1: hikes and issues like that, or what what do you
Speaker 1: make of the valuation of your business? Well, as I
Speaker 1: mentioned on our call today, we have a board off
Speaker 1: rise to share we purchase amount we think our stock
Speaker 1: is undervalued today. Uh, we've been in a a company
Speaker 1: black out BRAOD since the first of December. That's been
Speaker 1: the bulk. When when the time when the price has
Speaker 1: gone down, I think we're in a good position to
Speaker 1: exercise our buy back. Should that be the right thing
Speaker 1: to do? Interesting, so making the most of it yourself.
Speaker 1: Of course, you're a man who's known for being front
Speaker 1: of the pack when it comes to dream homes, but
Speaker 1: also a man who's really understood and got to grips
Speaker 1: and blockchain before many did and before it became the
Speaker 1: catchual term that we would love to make out the
Speaker 1: way further afield in crypto than we actually are. I'm
Speaker 1: interested in Medici ventures, of course, that was originally the
Speaker 1: part of the business that you had making investments in
Speaker 1: some of the blockchain technology. You've doubled down in that
Speaker 1: T zero talk to us about why this is a
Speaker 1: spinoff of yours and said well, a company that you're
Speaker 1: in a minority stake in, and Piper Satellite analysts really
Speaker 1: liking the new funding round that T zero has been getting.
Speaker 1: Remind this what T zero does and why it's additive
Speaker 1: to your business. So T zero is blockchain meets capital markets.
Speaker 1: It's UH. It's a registered alternative trading system or exchange
Speaker 1: UH that uses blockchain to settle trades more quickly. It's
Speaker 1: able to deal in cryptocurrencies and n f t s
Speaker 1: and security tokens and the normally traded NMS securities UH.
Speaker 1: This week, T zero announced that it received a significant
Speaker 1: minority investment from ICE, the parent company to the New
Speaker 1: York Stock Exchange, among others, and that the former chief
Speaker 1: strategy officer at Ice would become the new CEO at
Speaker 1: T zero. We think this is a great omen for
Speaker 1: the future as markets moved to the century. We think
Speaker 1: they're going to use blockchain. We think you're gonna be
Speaker 1: able to trade you know, crypto and stock and n
Speaker 1: f t s all in one place. T zero is
Speaker 1: set up for that to have Ice on the cap table.
Speaker 1: And David goon is the is the CEO. I just
Speaker 1: think bothes really really well, well, how long will you
Speaker 1: will overstall Cremaine a key investor. What is your feel
Speaker 1: forward looking plan in this respect? So we have interests
Speaker 1: investments in twenty one different blockchain companies. About a year
Speaker 1: ago we formed a limited partnership and helling On Ventures,
Speaker 1: which is a venture capital firm, is the general partner
Speaker 1: of that fund and it manages or oversees those uh
Speaker 1: twenty one companies, including T zero. Hellyan was instrumental in
Speaker 1: closing this deal with David Goon and Ice and so,
Speaker 1: uh we're letting Hellian manage the exits and how those
Speaker 1: things work within that fund. But I see a long,
Speaker 1: strong future for T zero, really fascinating and being able
Speaker 1: to talk about the consumer and indeed the rock Chane
Speaker 1: Well were you all at the same time Overstock CEO
Speaker 1: Jonathan Johnson stay well in Salt Lake City. Meanwhile, coming
Speaker 1: up Crypto and Washington is a relationship between the industry
Speaker 1: and the Hill all that transparent we're talking about, well
Speaker 1: the swapping of talent from one to the other as
Speaker 1: Bloomberg and is of course time now for our Crypto report,
Speaker 1: and we want to dive into the relationship between crypto
Speaker 1: and Capitol Hill because well, sen since I was getting
Speaker 1: more entangled people increasingly moving between jobs and crypto and
Speaker 1: the government agencies that actually police that very industry. Well,
Speaker 1: there's therefore the potential for conflicts of interest. They seem
Speaker 1: to be growing and could it potentially undermine efforts to
Speaker 1: really regulate the sector. There's been a deep dive done
Speaker 1: by my colleague and Bloomberg, Allison Verse Brill, and you
Speaker 1: join me now, Allison, to really talk about the data
Speaker 1: being crunched by the Tech Transparency Project. What do they
Speaker 1: make of the amount that she has scale of the
Speaker 1: revolving duel between Capital Hillen CRYPTI. So they characterized this
Speaker 1: as as really an explosion and an activity in recent years.
Speaker 1: Um you know, I talked to them a little bit
Speaker 1: about when they started analyzing this data and they said,
Speaker 1: you know, it was slow to start, and now we're
Speaker 1: seeing more and more of it. And I can tell
Speaker 1: you from personal experience having covered this now for a
Speaker 1: couple of months that on a near regular basis, I'm
Speaker 1: getting announcements about first mal shifts, you know, individuals moving
Speaker 1: from jobs at the White House, regulators UH into companies
Speaker 1: like Finance, coin Base, um or or groups that lobby
Speaker 1: or represent them at law firms. Do is there a date,
Speaker 1: Is there a time? Is there a tipping point that
Speaker 1: in started this move? Do you think so? You know,
Speaker 1: I talked to the director of the Tech Transparency Project
Speaker 1: and she said they started looking at that as far
Speaker 1: back as UM but that there wasn't really a you know,
Speaker 1: grow in this until and that we've just started to
Speaker 1: see that increase since then. And I can also say
Speaker 1: that the infrastructure bill that was passed last year contained
Speaker 1: some provisions of crypto industry didn't didn't like all that much,
Speaker 1: and that's definitely spurred some some activities, some moves, uh
Speaker 1: you know, also on the lobbying side. So seeing a
Speaker 1: lot of that going back to that time when it
Speaker 1: was that particular bill that took I mean, a lawful
Speaker 1: lot of people by surprise that they suddenly were really
Speaker 1: doubling down on the crypto space. And we did a
Speaker 1: lot of number crunching then about the sheer lack of
Speaker 1: lobbying and the money that is spent by other industry
Speaker 1: groups visa VI crypto, and it was just paled into
Speaker 1: in comparison. They had hardly anyone up on Capitol Hill
Speaker 1: fighting for them. Is that now really changing, and what
Speaker 1: are the concerns being highlighted by this particular bit of reporting.
Speaker 1: So that's definitely changing. We're seeing, um, you know, we're
Speaker 1: seeing superpacks that are designated just to crypto. We're seeing um,
Speaker 1: you know, companies like coin base and and others beating
Speaker 1: up their lobbying height, hiring more outside firms. Um. So
Speaker 1: in general, we're just seeing a lot more money flooding
Speaker 1: into Washington. And that was really one of the concerns
Speaker 1: that was raised in this report. They said, you know,
Speaker 1: having this greater flow of former regulators into the industry
Speaker 1: or vice versa, you know, could have potentially impact the
Speaker 1: regulatory process um and prevent the rules from being as
Speaker 1: tight as they should be. And for full disclosure, my
Speaker 1: husband is a senior manager over at coin base, so
Speaker 1: when I highlight that fact, But I'm interested in whether
Speaker 1: this is unique or not. I mean, is this kind
Speaker 1: of what happens. Crypto is so unique because of the
Speaker 1: sheer scale of money that was being made and I
Speaker 1: can imagine that an awful lot of you know, money,
Speaker 1: once we put to work to ensure that the industry,
Speaker 1: they will believe and survives. But what about a revolving
Speaker 1: door between Capitol Hill and other industry groups, other lobbying areas.
Speaker 1: UM this, I will say, this is one area where
Speaker 1: crypto is definitely not unique. We see that at in
Speaker 1: all different types of sectors. We see it in banking,
Speaker 1: we see it in tax um. I think pretty timely actually,
Speaker 1: we saw a pair of lawmakers, including Senator Liz Warren,
Speaker 1: asking for an investigation into sort of the a flow
Speaker 1: of officials from large accounting firms into the I R
Speaker 1: S and Treasury and back and how that impacts tax rules. UM. So,
Speaker 1: definitely a common trend all across different sectors. I think
Speaker 1: the one difference is that this is now a growing
Speaker 1: trend in crypto, which is such a new industry, and
Speaker 1: it really reflects that it's gaining more maturity and it's
Speaker 1: you know, getting more influence in Washington as investment. Thank
Speaker 1: you so much for being us the insights on that
Speaker 1: revolving deal. We thank you. What it will take is
Speaker 1: not just simply putting simple bandages and putting in programs,
Speaker 1: so to speak. It's about fundamentally, um redesigning the culture
Speaker 1: that exists with thee. The old way of doing things
Speaker 1: is no longer the way of the future. The data
Speaker 1: shows that individuals from the historically excluded communities are having
Speaker 1: a different experience. That it also starts with the data,
Speaker 1: and that will help us think about strategies and solutions.
Speaker 1: We have to address some of the root problems. At
Speaker 1: the moment, what we do is play like diversity musical chairs,
Speaker 1: and at the end of the day, we have to
Speaker 1: expand the actual cool of that talent itself by addressing
Speaker 1: educational equities and other systemic variants. Some of the d
Speaker 1: I experts from Uber to Spotify to Snapchat talking about
Speaker 1: really tackling discrimination in the tech industry and well as
Speaker 1: one of the key goals of my next guest to
Speaker 1: Twilio is out with its own annual Impact and d
Speaker 1: I report just today talking about how business leaders and
Speaker 1: corporations need to think about doing good overall. CEO Jeff
Speaker 1: Lawson and say is joining us now, And I mean
Speaker 1: so focused are you on this that you're taking time
Speaker 1: out of your well deserved break. So we appreciate that, Jeff,
Speaker 1: and I'm interested about really the findings what business responsibility
Speaker 1: means to you at Twilio. Now, Yeah, thank you go,
Speaker 1: And I mean it's um really interesting when I think
Speaker 1: about the contract, the social contract between our society and companies.
Speaker 1: The idea is that companies make our society better, and
Speaker 1: that's why we allow things like a piece of paper
Speaker 1: files from the state of Delaware or in Dublin can
Speaker 1: own property and earn the contracts and all sorts of
Speaker 1: interesting things. And historically we've said, well, it makes society
Speaker 1: better because you know, increases production and increases jobs and
Speaker 1: things like that, and companies big process. But I actually
Speaker 1: think now society is asking more from that contract. We
Speaker 1: a tilio have this belief that our existence should make
Speaker 1: communities around us and society overall stronger because we exist.
Speaker 1: And that's a multifaceted aspect of this contract that I
Speaker 1: think goes well beyond what you know, the last generation
Speaker 1: of business leaders thought that it was really just about
Speaker 1: making a profit. It's also a lot about the data.
Speaker 1: How you ensure that you are gaining true diversity, How
Speaker 1: indeed you ask saying that pay equality is coming about,
Speaker 1: how are you tracking the impact that you make from
Speaker 1: an environmental perspective, a social perspective, a governance perspective. Well,
Speaker 1: obviously we try to track our impact along all those aspects.
Speaker 1: But you know, we do it not to have like
Speaker 1: the number to show now we are transparent about the
Speaker 1: impact that we're having, but we actually use Like when
Speaker 1: you think about d E I A lot of companies
Speaker 1: think about, oh, this data, we have to put it
Speaker 1: out there to to to to prove something to the world. Um,
Speaker 1: what we think about it is the data is necessary,
Speaker 1: but you use the data to move, not prove. You
Speaker 1: use the data to impact your activities and to drive
Speaker 1: how you're building the company, to make a company that
Speaker 1: is ever more inclusive and ever more diverse. And that's
Speaker 1: how we think about using data. Okay, So can you
Speaker 1: give us an example. I mean, I know that you've
Speaker 1: been in particular helping certain non for profits organizations sort
Speaker 1: of and align themselves with you and with other businesses.
Speaker 1: Is that can you give us like exact data of
Speaker 1: how you're doing it. I'll give you another example. And business,
Speaker 1: what do we do? We set goals and we put
Speaker 1: our mind to which eating them. So when the vaccine
Speaker 1: for COVID came out last year, we set a goal
Speaker 1: to help vaccinate a billion people worldwide and we and
Speaker 1: we put to work our product, our technology, we put
Speaker 1: to work our people and their volunteer time and the
Speaker 1: resources are funding from the company. And as a result
Speaker 1: of that, already just a year in we have already
Speaker 1: helped to vaccinate three fifty million people and that is
Speaker 1: a huge number, but we've just started a third of
Speaker 1: the way hey to our goal of a billion. But
Speaker 1: we did that by partnering with organizations who are on
Speaker 1: the ground, like Dovey, who is out there trying to
Speaker 1: vaccinate people in poorer countries that don't have readily access
Speaker 1: to the vaccine. And so we donated ten million dollars
Speaker 1: to gather were the second largest corporation to donate to
Speaker 1: that cause um And so I'm very proud of what
Speaker 1: Toyo has done. And it's just another example of how
Speaker 1: we set goals and we use data to move to
Speaker 1: get outcomes that we want as opposed to just to
Speaker 1: try and prove something. Do you have that it sort
Speaker 1: of disrupts from within? And are you leading my example
Speaker 1: in some way? And how you seeing other companies embrace
Speaker 1: what you often use your own tools to do the
Speaker 1: same sort of thing. You know, the opposite of trying
Speaker 1: to have a monopoly on doing good. We actually want
Speaker 1: to open source any idea that we have and help
Speaker 1: other people to do good as well. You know, one
Speaker 1: of the last pages of our impact report that we
Speaker 1: released today actually says our lessons learned in this past year,
Speaker 1: and it talks about some of the things that you know,
Speaker 1: mistakes we've made and learned from it and hopes that
Speaker 1: other people can do that. Another example is we started
Speaker 1: a program called we Pledge one Percent. It's a program
Speaker 1: for our employees to pledge one percent of their time,
Speaker 1: their income, or their totally out equity to do good
Speaker 1: in the world for nonprofits. And we help them to
Speaker 1: execute that by giving them ideas, help them donate the
Speaker 1: equity effects that they want to do. And we've open
Speaker 1: sourcens and invited any other company who wants to bring
Speaker 1: this program to their employees as well. And so far
Speaker 1: we've got dozens of companies including at Lastian and Zoom
Speaker 1: and many others who have actually brought this program to
Speaker 1: their employees well. And now we've got tens of thousands
Speaker 1: of employees at of variety of different companies, all participating
Speaker 1: by giving one percent of their resource just to do good. Interestingly,
Speaker 1: do you think that it sets you apart from a
Speaker 1: talent perspective, and you're getting that feedback that people are
Speaker 1: coming to Twilio because of this or is this sort
Speaker 1: of an added benefit quote unquote if you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. Well, we've made impact a really integral part
Speaker 1: of our business. At some companies, you know, doing good
Speaker 1: as a cost center or we got to donate to
Speaker 1: this so we don't look bad in the press. Right
Speaker 1: at Twilio, that's not how we think about it all.
Speaker 1: We think of it as a virtuous cycle. The more
Speaker 1: good we do in the world, the more of that
Speaker 1: is going to engage our employees and build great awareness
Speaker 1: and like high esteem for our company. That will attract
Speaker 1: more customers, that will attract more employees that will then
Speaker 1: help us build a stronger company that then can allow
Speaker 1: us to do more in the world. And that is
Speaker 1: a nice virtuous cycle. And that's why Toyo dot org
Speaker 1: at at our company is not a cost center. It's
Speaker 1: actually a business unit, and it actually does business to
Speaker 1: get our product into the hands of nonprofits who could
Speaker 1: be using our product to do good at great discount.
Speaker 1: And then we partner with those organizations make them successful
Speaker 1: and that allows us to them do more good in
Speaker 1: the world and I think that's a new model that
Speaker 1: I'm very proud of having really elevate that. And just briefly,
Speaker 1: I've got about a minute left. When you are looking
Speaker 1: at billion people vaccinated? Is this very much on the
Speaker 1: emerging markets focus? Because I'm thinking of our academs who
Speaker 1: are in the Union in New York. Potentially you're not
Speaker 1: needing people to be vaccinated to go out to restaurants
Speaker 1: and the like. Well, you know, think about it. A
Speaker 1: lot of this is in emerging countries where there isn't
Speaker 1: as easy access to vaccines. And we're very happy to
Speaker 1: partner with a number of organizations sort of doing amazing
Speaker 1: work like Save the Children's another great organization with something
Speaker 1: to educate the world on the safety of these vaccines.
Speaker 1: But even here in the United States and other wealthier countries,
Speaker 1: you still see vaccine hesitancy. We still have a huge
Speaker 1: effort to mobilize and get even the US population vaccinated,
Speaker 1: and we're still not done, obviously, And so I see
Speaker 1: this as a as an effort that truly spends the world.
Speaker 1: Jeff Lawson, so great to speak with you. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Go back to your break now, really appreciate the time.
Speaker 1: Trilio CEO. Meanwhile, what does it for this edition of
Speaker 1: bloom Bag Technology? Join us tomorrow. We're gonna be joining
Speaker 1: John Woo, the president of Ava Labs, to talk about
Speaker 1: well earnings of crypto. It's the bring back