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Speaker 1: Well, let's get to our guest, Carol Pepper, founder and

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Speaker 1: CEO at Pepper International Broadbrush. Question here at the beginning, Carol,

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Speaker 1: we've more or less moved on from COVID, and we

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Speaker 1: will move on from inflation at some point. In your gut,

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Speaker 1: when will that likely happen? Oh? Hi, Well, I think

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Speaker 1: in my gut I would say even this fall will

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Speaker 1: start to begin to feel a lot calmer about inflation.

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Speaker 1: There may be, you know, a couple more fifty basis

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Speaker 1: point raises coming our way, but honestly, I think going

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Speaker 1: into the end of the year beginning next year will

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Speaker 1: be in pretty good shape. Once we get you know,

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Speaker 1: the midterms will cause them uncertainty, and once we get

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Speaker 1: past the elections. UM. I also believe that possibly after

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Speaker 1: this winter, we will see a much more significant gains

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Speaker 1: by the Ukrainians which will impact the energy markets, the

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Speaker 1: oil situation, and globally give us a boost as well.

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Speaker 1: So I'm I'm betting on the Ukrainians going forward, which

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Speaker 1: which is a global event that will help everything. So

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Speaker 1: feeling calm about inflation, But isn't that the same as

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Speaker 1: the FIT achieving its inflation goals? How long before we

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Speaker 1: get there and how much pain will we suffer. Well,

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Speaker 1: I don't know if we will ever get exactly back

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Speaker 1: to the goal that they want right now. Perhaps, um,

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Speaker 1: I think they may back off if we see prices

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Speaker 1: dropping enough and if we see too much unemployment. Also

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Speaker 1: that you have to remember the housing starts. Housing markets

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Speaker 1: over here are pretty much frozen, so they have to

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Speaker 1: be a little bit careful or they're going to completely

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Speaker 1: tank the real estate market. And that's not even counting

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Speaker 1: the commercial real estate that's hurting at the moment as well.

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Speaker 1: So I'm not so sure that they're going to go.

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Speaker 1: You know, we're not going to see interest rates over here.

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Speaker 1: I don't see any reason for that. The economy has

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Speaker 1: absorbed what we've had so far pretty well, and I think,

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Speaker 1: you know, it's it's yeah, it's a little bit overheated,

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Speaker 1: but honestly, it's not massively overheated. We're not seeing runaway inflation.

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Speaker 1: We are seeing gas prices and food come down a bit, So, UM,

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Speaker 1: I think we're slowly cooling. Fully could be it could

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Speaker 1: be a coold hard rain for markets if inflation comes

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Speaker 1: down but then hovers around five, because that means that

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Speaker 1: the FED will have to get the FED funds rate

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Speaker 1: up around that level, and we're not used to that

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Speaker 1: at this point. Definitely. I mean, I think that would

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Speaker 1: have a massively cooling effect on the housing market, for example,

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Speaker 1: that would make mortgages pretty unattractive and would have a

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Speaker 1: lot of knock on effects. Um So I hope that's

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Speaker 1: not the case. I would I would like to think

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Speaker 1: that again, if Ukraine wins, that's kind of really affect

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Speaker 1: oil and energy prices that rolls through the entire economy.

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Speaker 1: If we can catch up on supply chain and a

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Speaker 1: lot of people are on shoing supply right now, so that,

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Speaker 1: let's say, by next year, that won't be as much

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Speaker 1: of a problem. And the world has radically readjusted between

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Speaker 1: the pandemic and this war, and certainly I think you'll

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Speaker 1: start to see the way things have restructured. And Carol,

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Speaker 1: I just wanted to return to your observations there about

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Speaker 1: the oil price before. I didn't get to major a

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Speaker 1: second ago, but w T I just keeps on pushing

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Speaker 1: higher every day at the moment nine four. I know

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Speaker 1: you have some optimism about the way the war in

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Speaker 1: Ukraine is hitting, but we also heard from the Saudi

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Speaker 1: Energy minister this week talking about maybe having to curb supply.

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Speaker 1: What is your outlook for the oil price. What do

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Speaker 1: you see it's settling over the next few months. Well,

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Speaker 1: I think certainly it's going to be a cold winter

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Speaker 1: in Europe unfortunately, and as as hard as they're trying

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Speaker 1: to restructure everything, um, we will see shortages, we will

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Speaker 1: see spikes, you know, God forbid, it's a heavy winter.

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Speaker 1: It will be a difficult winter, and prices will remain

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Speaker 1: high throughout the winter. But I would say that in

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Speaker 1: the long term, what this is causing everyone to do

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Speaker 1: is double down on renewable energy. UM. I'm working in

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Speaker 1: a lot of carbon credit projects, for example, and carbon

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Speaker 1: renewable energy alternative projects in Europe with some of the

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Speaker 1: families that I work for. I work for family offices

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Speaker 1: with over a hundred million in assets, and there's definitely

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Speaker 1: a consensus that in the long term renewable energy should

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Speaker 1: be a good, reliable alternative. I don't think it will

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Speaker 1: ever replace oil completely in my lifetime, UM, but I

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Speaker 1: do think that, you know, we will stay in the

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Speaker 1: nineties certainly, maybe through the spring, and then we'll see

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Speaker 1: how next year goes. A lot of it will depend

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Speaker 1: on the war, whether it gets resolved or not, and

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Speaker 1: how quickly we can restructure everything. So you mentioned a

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Speaker 1: couple of things there that could stoke inflation. I wanted

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Speaker 1: to ask you about the student debt forgiveness. Does that

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Speaker 1: add to inflation or do you agree with Biden that no,

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Speaker 1: not at all. I think it's very helpful for again,

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Speaker 1: young people coming out of college who absolutely need to

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Speaker 1: have some relief. I mean, I know when I got

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Speaker 1: out of college, it was a very heavy burden forever

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Speaker 1: ten years to get all the student loans paid off

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Speaker 1: and held me back from what I could do. I

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Speaker 1: think it will help the housing market, it will help

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Speaker 1: consumer spending, and you know, just sort of lengthening the

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Speaker 1: time you take to pay back debt and then forgiving

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Speaker 1: some of it. I think that's a very smart move.

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Speaker 1: We are seeing a lot of volatility on markets at

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Speaker 1: the moment. Where do you put money to work in

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Speaker 1: an environment like this? Well, I think again, I work

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Speaker 1: for families and we try to think long term. What

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Speaker 1: are the long term trends that you can capitalize on?

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Speaker 1: So when the market is having a fearful day, you

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Speaker 1: can take good positions and winners out of this new

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Speaker 1: Inflation Reduction Act or Climate Bill would be the climate

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Speaker 1: um sectors which are going to get a lot of

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Speaker 1: money flowing into them. So renewable energy, you can look

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Speaker 1: at Q clean or I Clean, I c l N

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Speaker 1: clean energy stocks. You can look at electric vehicles which

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Speaker 1: are going to be big winners from this latest bill.

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Speaker 1: Look at Forward which is really making big pushes into

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Speaker 1: electric vehicles, or even the E T F D R

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Speaker 1: I V or L I T for batteries. Because these

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Speaker 1: I would say electric cars are probably one of the

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Speaker 1: first major changes that are going to happen. California just

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Speaker 1: announced you can't buy cars gas hard cars in California

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Speaker 1: after five so that trend we know is coming. In

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Speaker 1: the long term, you want to get in early to

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Speaker 1: things and ride them over time if you can, with

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Speaker 1: the portion of your portfolio where that makes sense. But

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Speaker 1: we are at all till times, so it's important to

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Speaker 1: keep a large percentage in cash and short term bonds.

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Speaker 1: You know, don't over invest. There could be quite a

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Speaker 1: few unexpected surprises or whip lashes. Nobody can see what's coming,

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Speaker 1: but where you know that's fy like a barbell. You know,

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Speaker 1: a large part of cash and short term fixed income

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Speaker 1: on one end, and then make the bets long term

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Speaker 1: bets that you feel strongly about for the other half

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Speaker 1: of your barbell. There are aspects of tech that don't

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Speaker 1: look that good right now. Software consumer electronics, for instance,

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Speaker 1: if you look at PCs and smartphones, but then cybersecurity

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Speaker 1: and data center and cloud all look pretty good. What

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Speaker 1: are you looking there? Yeah? I love all of those.

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Speaker 1: I mean cyber security, I mean simply put and go

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Speaker 1: by Google. You know they're getting heavily into the cybersecurity world.

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Speaker 1: They just made a major purchase of Mandanet for five

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Speaker 1: point four billion. You've got CrowdStrike, I Hack if you

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Speaker 1: like E t F or Bug are also good to

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Speaker 1: look at um and then even companies like raytheon which

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Speaker 1: or technology based defense companies. So I agree with you.

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Speaker 1: There are a lot and Amazon, Amazon, Amazon. No matter

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Speaker 1: what happens, that company is going to keep growing. That company.

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Speaker 1: Will you know it's the g E of our generation.

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Speaker 1: Put it in your children's college fund and you won't

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Speaker 1: be sorry. All right, Very quickly, Carol, all the strength

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Speaker 1: very much a theme at the moment. How long do

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Speaker 1: you see that enduring full of teen seconds? M I

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Speaker 1: think quite a while. I would say another year at least.

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Speaker 1: I don't see anybody else catching up or much of

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Speaker 1: anything to stop the dollar from being very strong, particularly

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Speaker 1: during the war. Okay, thank you so much, Carol Pipper,

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Speaker 1: founder and CEO at Pipper International. There