Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week from Bloomberg Radio. Hi. I'm
Speaker 1: Jason Kelly and I'm Carol Masser. Welcome to the weekend
Speaker 1: edition of Bloomberg Business Week. As you know, it's not
Speaker 1: business as usual. Jason and I spending the week at
Speaker 1: our homes doing our broadcasts as we're all of our
Speaker 1: guests that we talked to, and this edition of Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Business Week again, we're taping this largely on Thursday. As
Speaker 1: the story continued to evolve in terms of stimulus packages,
Speaker 1: in terms of market reaction, and in terms of course
Speaker 1: of the virus count and the spread. Jason, Well, and Carol,
Speaker 1: what I found so interesting about this week so far,
Speaker 1: and as you say, weeks not over yet and we
Speaker 1: know things can change very quickly, there were diverging storylines
Speaker 1: in many ways. We saw the markets get a little
Speaker 1: more enthusiastic, maybe a lot more enthusiastic in some cases
Speaker 1: about stimulus, as you mentioned, economic monetary actions by the
Speaker 1: federal government at this same time, and you and I,
Speaker 1: as you pointed out, are both in the New York
Speaker 1: City area, we are seeing still a deep and seemingly
Speaker 1: abiding health crisis in certain parts of this country and
Speaker 1: so the push and the poll is really hard to
Speaker 1: synthesize in a lot of ways. Yeah. Absolutely, And you
Speaker 1: saw that play out within officials at the White House
Speaker 1: and in Washington versus some of the governors in the
Speaker 1: hardest hit states, whether it was New York, whether it
Speaker 1: was New Jersey, whether it was California. There is this
Speaker 1: growing divide about getting the nation back, getting the economy
Speaker 1: back on track, versus those states who are still just
Speaker 1: trying to get uh, trying to really deal with the crisis,
Speaker 1: which has yet to peak. And so that was certainly
Speaker 1: a bit of attention this week overall. I also want
Speaker 1: to say, Jason, it was the week of big numbers,
Speaker 1: that weekly jobless numbers. We all knew it was going
Speaker 1: to be a big number, three point three million jobless
Speaker 1: claims surging for the most recent week, and that number
Speaker 1: when it hits still, you know, it was a chakra.
Speaker 1: And then let's not forget this bailout or stimulus package
Speaker 1: that was working its way through Congress, you know, two
Speaker 1: trillion dollars and folks saying that this is only phase three,
Speaker 1: and Phase four and five expected to come as well.
Speaker 1: So it was a number that on many different levels,
Speaker 1: of course was shocking, and of course the personal feelings
Speaker 1: and this is uh the personal impact, I should say,
Speaker 1: in terms of folks still coming down with the virus
Speaker 1: and folks losing their lives because of the virus. Well,
Speaker 1: and it's important going back to the numbers for a
Speaker 1: second to understand that superlatives really fail us at this
Speaker 1: point because the orders of magnitude larger that these measures,
Speaker 1: these figures are. It's just incredible. You think about that
Speaker 1: three point three million that you pointed out. If you
Speaker 1: go back to the last sort of darkest time that
Speaker 1: we had, which is the depth of the financial crisis,
Speaker 1: the weekly number then the worst weekly number was about
Speaker 1: six hundred thousand giver take, so you're talking about five times,
Speaker 1: you know, four or five times what we saw in
Speaker 1: the Great Recession. And that's why people are really struggling.
Speaker 1: That's why you see the market taking these wild swings.
Speaker 1: That's why you have individual people, as you say, some
Speaker 1: of whom were struggling with this disease in particular, but
Speaker 1: others who are just struggling living their daily lives in
Speaker 1: an economy that has completely been turned upside down. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: and that leads us to a story that's in the
Speaker 1: magazine this week. It's by our economics editor Peter coy
Speaker 1: and Peter has been such a great person to talk
Speaker 1: to and to read his work because he really is
Speaker 1: looking at this, you know, from a bigger perspective, from
Speaker 1: a historical perspective, from an economic perspective, because ultimately one
Speaker 1: of the conversations that really came to the forefront Jason is,
Speaker 1: you know, we do have to think about keeping our
Speaker 1: economy going or getting it back on track. And the
Speaker 1: bigger the fall is because of the coronavirus, it's going
Speaker 1: to be much more difficult to get it moving again
Speaker 1: on the other side. And so Peter writes about in
Speaker 1: the magazine this week about big ideas to say the
Speaker 1: economy from bailouts to super chapter eleven. But it's all
Speaker 1: specifically about how do you help companies right, how do
Speaker 1: you keep them going as much as you can through
Speaker 1: the virus so that they don't come come undone or
Speaker 1: file bankruptcy or so on, so that when we get
Speaker 1: on the other side, there is there are still companies
Speaker 1: out there, there are still jobs to be had, there's
Speaker 1: still economic input. All right, let's check out that conversation
Speaker 1: with Peter Coin. Well, I decided to focus on business.
Speaker 1: We are Business Week, after all, and I take it
Speaker 1: for granted that we have to do a lot to
Speaker 1: save the individuals, people who are laid off, people who
Speaker 1: aren't laid off but are still in financial stress. That
Speaker 1: goes about saying, well, maybe it doesn't go without saying.
Speaker 1: It should be said very clearly. But what I'm talking
Speaker 1: about is what to do to rescue businesses. And I
Speaker 1: think that cannot be given short shrift. Because when a
Speaker 1: company fails, if if it, if it goes through hard
Speaker 1: times and comes back, that's one thing, but it actually fails.
Speaker 1: If it, if it, if it's looked it aidd goes
Speaker 1: out of business, there is real damage done, not just
Speaker 1: to the employees of that firm and its owners, but
Speaker 1: to the economy as a whole. It's going to be
Speaker 1: much harder for the economy to bounce back after this
Speaker 1: COVID virus fades. If people, uh, if companies have been
Speaker 1: dismantled and have to be started from scratch, there's organizational capital,
Speaker 1: there's social capital that's permanently lost. I'm thinking about teams.
Speaker 1: We have a lot of teams working at Bloomberg so
Speaker 1: we know about this, but there are teams throughout the economy.
Speaker 1: When those teams are broken up, it's hard to put
Speaker 1: them back together again. Yeah. I love this line you
Speaker 1: have in your story, Peter herb. But don't kill bend it,
Speaker 1: but do not break it. Uh. Certainly policymakers are thinking
Speaker 1: along those lines. But CEOs have to be thinking that
Speaker 1: way too, right, Right, if you're a CEO, you're thinking, Look,
Speaker 1: I've got to just find some way to get past this.
Speaker 1: And if if it means reaching out to the government
Speaker 1: for help, you know, I'll do it because I can't
Speaker 1: afford to lose these people. They might not come back
Speaker 1: to me. You know. We we had a tight labor
Speaker 1: market before this crisis hit, and I hope we'll have
Speaker 1: a tight labor market after it passes. Uh, because there's
Speaker 1: a shortage of skilled people in the economy. There has
Speaker 1: been and there will be again. You don't want to
Speaker 1: lose your teams. And that was Peter Cord, the economics
Speaker 1: editor for Bloomberg Business Week, talking about his story in
Speaker 1: this week's edition of the magazine. You're listening to Bloomberg
Speaker 1: business Week coming up, How the coronavirus outbreak is impacting
Speaker 1: the early stage investment community. This is Bloomberg. You're listening
Speaker 1: to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason Kelly
Speaker 1: from Bloomberg Radio. We're bringing you some of the most
Speaker 1: important and informative conversations that we had on our daily
Speaker 1: radio show about the coronavirus this week and Jason, as
Speaker 1: we want to remind everybody, this story was very flu
Speaker 1: and constantly advancing and changing, but some of these conversations
Speaker 1: just really struck home well absolutely, and I think part
Speaker 1: of what we heard consistently Carol was what happens next?
Speaker 1: What are the impacts? And we try and look at
Speaker 1: that throughout the course of the show. And one of
Speaker 1: the voices we caught up with Carol was Michael mo
Speaker 1: He's the co founder of GSV Asset Management and author
Speaker 1: and investor, longtime resident and entrepreneur investor there in Silicon Valley.
Speaker 1: We started by asking him what it's like they're in
Speaker 1: the valley. Clearly everywhere people are are UM, you know,
Speaker 1: a little bit of a shock. And I think the
Speaker 1: you know, the fear of the virus, you know, has
Speaker 1: UM really kind of consumed many people's thinking and behavior,
Speaker 1: and when people get scared, and I think many a
Speaker 1: lot of people are scared. You know, it's hard to
Speaker 1: focus on much else, and so I think generally speaking,
Speaker 1: that's kind of it. It's a little bit eerie. It's
Speaker 1: you know, I live in a place where there is
Speaker 1: typically a lot going on, a lot of energy, and
Speaker 1: it's very very quiet. Yeah, and I think we do wonder, Michael,
Speaker 1: you know, how much of kind of how we're adjusting
Speaker 1: our lives at this point, how much of it once
Speaker 1: we get through this. I'm assuming we of course, will
Speaker 1: you know that how much of it stays with us
Speaker 1: in terms of you know, concerns about viruses because there
Speaker 1: will be more viruses to come, but also how we're
Speaker 1: kind of adapting our work lives, a lot of us
Speaker 1: working from home and the ability to do that. I
Speaker 1: just wonder, you know, we had a conversation with someone
Speaker 1: who talked a well known investor, Cathy Wood, who invest
Speaker 1: in disruption, and she says, you know, when you see
Speaker 1: market disruption, that's where you kind of get innovation, uh
Speaker 1: and opportunity. So I wonder, you know, if you're looking
Speaker 1: at it in a similar way, that's clearly where the
Speaker 1: half is glass half the glass is half full. I mean,
Speaker 1: you've seen this over and over again where you've had
Speaker 1: this location and disruption, you've also had huge opportunities, and
Speaker 1: so I think, what's exciting And then again, this is
Speaker 1: a very serious situation and and obviously the most important
Speaker 1: thing is health and safety, but you are saying people
Speaker 1: in their creativity and the innovation thinking about what, you know,
Speaker 1: what does this mean and where does this go? So
Speaker 1: I like to say, is we were it was it
Speaker 1: was BC before, that's before Corona, and now we've got
Speaker 1: a d which is going to be you know, after
Speaker 1: the disease, and these opportunities that emerge a d UM,
Speaker 1: I think are going to be very exciting. And so
Speaker 1: that's part of what we're doing is focus on what
Speaker 1: those opportunities might be and also understand what it means
Speaker 1: for kind of companies that UM grew up in the
Speaker 1: old world. Right. Well, one of the things I wanted
Speaker 1: to make sure we talked about Michael was you know,
Speaker 1: normally this time of year, you are like in the
Speaker 1: thick of planning this massive conference that you do in
Speaker 1: in San Diego and partnership with Arizona State. I believe
Speaker 1: you know, you bring together some huge speakers to talk
Speaker 1: about the future of education, education, technology, and tech specifically.
Speaker 1: I guess two things. It seems like you've made a
Speaker 1: big decision to do a lot of that virtually this year.
Speaker 1: Tell us about that. First, Well, we're shifting the physical
Speaker 1: conference to the fall UM with the hopes that things
Speaker 1: will be UM more or less back to normal by that.
Speaker 1: But we didn't want to lose the UM opportunity to
Speaker 1: convene people that we're gonna do it virtually, So we're
Speaker 1: gonna have a one day virtual event UM next Wednesday,
Speaker 1: April one, and we called this, you know, the dawn
Speaker 1: of the Age of Digital Learning, because while digital learning
Speaker 1: has been growing at a very healthy clip up until now,
Speaker 1: UM you know this, the coronavirus has really been a
Speaker 1: major catalyst to accelerate this. And with whether you're a parent,
Speaker 1: whether you're a K twelve school, you know, there's one
Speaker 1: point four billion kids around the world right now that
Speaker 1: we're going to school now our home. UM. You know,
Speaker 1: universities are scrambling to figure out what they do to UM,
Speaker 1: you know, to provide courses for for their for their
Speaker 1: college students, and corporations are reimagining what they need to
Speaker 1: do to upscale, re school their their work force. So
Speaker 1: it is as much of this is a a very
Speaker 1: difficult situation for society, for the economy, for online learning. Um,
Speaker 1: it's it's I think of you know, it's based on
Speaker 1: accelerts to the future well, and the same thing with
Speaker 1: like I think, um, you know, using the virtual world
Speaker 1: in terms of distance and reaching out to our medical community,
Speaker 1: right in terms of telehealth. UM, I mean I wonder
Speaker 1: if that is something that we look at very differently
Speaker 1: coming out on the other side, for sure. I mean again,
Speaker 1: I think this has been it has been a total
Speaker 1: shift in terms of how people think about you know
Speaker 1: what you know, those sort of the realities of of
Speaker 1: an interconnected world, urbanization and and and globalization that that
Speaker 1: you know, the pandemics. You know, people that are you know,
Speaker 1: worry about you know, things that could happen in the
Speaker 1: future have been worried about demics for some time. But
Speaker 1: really this is the first time where it's been you know,
Speaker 1: basically relevant to everybody. And I think that kind of
Speaker 1: you know, mind shift is going to affect this isn't
Speaker 1: because the genie is not going back in the bottle.
Speaker 1: I think it's a permanent shift about how people think
Speaker 1: about UM activity and how they've done how they do
Speaker 1: things in the future differently than maybe they did in
Speaker 1: the past. You know, you wrote a book a couple
Speaker 1: of years ago that I read. It's fantastic, and it's
Speaker 1: about Global Silicon Valley. This whole notion of the Global
Speaker 1: Silicon Valley is the Global Silicon Valley Handbook is the
Speaker 1: technical title. UM but you have really explored this notion
Speaker 1: of this interconnected world and this notion that the ideas,
Speaker 1: the ethos of Silicon Valley is much wider spread than
Speaker 1: just the place where you happen to be sitting right now.
Speaker 1: Does this dent that ambition at all or does it
Speaker 1: strengthen it? Yeah, I think it's actually is going to
Speaker 1: strengthen it. And I think that's partially You've had this
Speaker 1: trend that's been going on for a dozen years. You know,
Speaker 1: the front g s V stands for Global Silicon Valley,
Speaker 1: and so to your point, you know, the mindset of innovation,
Speaker 1: entrepreneurship that's made Silicon Valley that's an amazing place and
Speaker 1: I've been fortunate to live in for twenty five years,
Speaker 1: is going you know, spreading throughout the world, and you're
Speaker 1: looking at the ambition that exists with young people that
Speaker 1: want to not work for the large company but want
Speaker 1: to start their own business. And you know, in today's world,
Speaker 1: where you know you're gonna have more difficultd hiring is
Speaker 1: going to not be as robust as what we've seen
Speaker 1: the last five years, you're gonna see that likely accelerate
Speaker 1: because your opportunity costs to start a business is lower.
Speaker 1: And so what we're seeing is from you know, from
Speaker 1: Austin to Boston, from Chicago to Salpallo, from Mumbai to Shanghai,
Speaker 1: do by this emergence of this global Silicon Valley. And
Speaker 1: that's Michael mo co founder of gsc Asset Management, speaking
Speaker 1: to us from his home in Silicon Valley. Everybody working
Speaker 1: from home, Carol, but trying to make sense of this.
Speaker 1: And you know, it was an interesting perspective a given
Speaker 1: Michael's vast historical institutional knowledge, global knowledge, but also the
Speaker 1: idea that he's in a part of the country as
Speaker 1: we are, that has been deeply affected on a very
Speaker 1: human level by this virus. And I'm just gonna say,
Speaker 1: why you're at home, you might want to check out
Speaker 1: some of his books. He wrote the Global Silicon Valley
Speaker 1: Handbook and also Finding the Next Starbucks. So um, certainly
Speaker 1: some books to check out. You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week.
Speaker 1: Coming up a valuable lesson that three M learned after
Speaker 1: the stars epidemic of two thousand to two thousand three
Speaker 1: that's going to let them make more than a billion
Speaker 1: medical masks by the end of the year. This is Bloomberg.
Speaker 1: You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and
Speaker 1: Jason Kelly from Bloomberg Radio. This week we're bringing you
Speaker 1: some of our most important and we hope informative conversations
Speaker 1: we had on our daily radio show that runs two
Speaker 1: pm to six pm Wall Street Time every weekday, and
Speaker 1: of course all of it was about the coronavirus and
Speaker 1: the cover story of the magazine this week, Jason is
Speaker 1: about three M. Three M is a company you know
Speaker 1: really well. They make post its, they make Scotch tape. Well,
Speaker 1: this company is now looking to make more than a
Speaker 1: billion medical masks, something that everyone needs to get through
Speaker 1: the coronavirus. Now. The company's CEO, Mic Roman, spoke with
Speaker 1: Bloomberg's David Weston we've been working very closely with the government.
Speaker 1: We've been working, you know, with with Vice President Pence
Speaker 1: from his visit, looking at how to make sure that
Speaker 1: we can shift what have been the industrial and ninety
Speaker 1: five respirators into healthcare. So it was really appreciate the
Speaker 1: Emergency Use authorization out of the SPA and then the
Speaker 1: prep Act amendment which enabled us to be able to
Speaker 1: deliver our industrial respirators at the healthcare workers of the
Speaker 1: front line. That was the first big step. So that
Speaker 1: is the three M CEO, Mic Roman talking with our
Speaker 1: own Blueberg David Weston Well three M and it's overall
Speaker 1: team caught up with our Brian. Really, he's got a
Speaker 1: great story. That's the cover of the magazine this week.
Speaker 1: Brian is Projects and Investigations reporter at Bloomberg News. He's
Speaker 1: with us right now on the phone from Chicago. Also
Speaker 1: with us Joe Webber, editor of Bloomberg Business Week magazine.
Speaker 1: He's on the phone from Brooklyn. So Brian, let me
Speaker 1: kick it off with you. I mean, three M man,
Speaker 1: this is a company that has learned from past crises
Speaker 1: and figured out how to be ready for what we
Speaker 1: needed today. Talk to us about what they learned. I
Speaker 1: believe it was through Stars. Years ago. You had the
Speaker 1: Stars outbreak two thousand two, two thousand three, and after
Speaker 1: that prem realized they really weren't geared up two uh
Speaker 1: to address a real big surge in demand until then
Speaker 1: they decided that they would build into their plants what
Speaker 1: they called surge capacity. And over the years, um they
Speaker 1: would find this. But but essentially what it is is
Speaker 1: putting in idle lines, you know, lines you don't use,
Speaker 1: which assembly lines you don't use, which runs contrary to
Speaker 1: most um business sense. I mean when when we talk
Speaker 1: about automobile manufacturers, for instance, so we talk about down capacity,
Speaker 1: that's money going out the door because you're not you're
Speaker 1: paying for that. You have carrying costs on that equipment
Speaker 1: and machinery, and you're not getting any money for it.
Speaker 1: So or something that three M thought would would be
Speaker 1: helpful in times of crisis, and and they've used it
Speaker 1: over and over again, but but um, it never has
Speaker 1: it come into such important play as it is now.
Speaker 1: So Joel Weber, come on in here. What struck you
Speaker 1: about this story? Because obviously everything is a business story,
Speaker 1: as you often say, and man, this is just a
Speaker 1: business squarely in the heart of a crisis. Yeah, so,
Speaker 1: I um, I've thought about this story a lot, because
Speaker 1: it was one of the first things that came to
Speaker 1: mind a couple of weeks ago as we were just
Speaker 1: seeing a huge um surge in demand for for a
Speaker 1: lot of consumer products actually, from things like toilet paper,
Speaker 1: to Go Joe hand sanitizer and even Clorox bleach right like,
Speaker 1: and that the idea kind of just jumped in my
Speaker 1: head of like, you know, how do you make more
Speaker 1: of these products yesterday? How does how does three M
Speaker 1: manufacture millions and millions of maths in addition to the
Speaker 1: ones that they were already doing. So I sort of
Speaker 1: just started kicking that idea around with people like Brian
Speaker 1: and Rick Klus also the code island on this story,
Speaker 1: and three M just kind of came back to us
Speaker 1: again as like the company like in the middle of
Speaker 1: a crisis like this, and lo and behold, it turns
Speaker 1: out that they're a company that actually has built this
Speaker 1: manufacturing technique into its factories for precisely this moment, and
Speaker 1: so they've been able to go into overdrive actually back
Speaker 1: beginning in January, and what we're seeing now is like
Speaker 1: by the into the year, they may have been able
Speaker 1: to make as many as more than a billion face masks.
Speaker 1: And that's just incredible when you think about a company
Speaker 1: that was just sort of potentially in the right please
Speaker 1: at the right time and and have the capacity and
Speaker 1: wherewithal to kind of plan for the future. What's interesting
Speaker 1: too is, you know, and Brian, I just think about
Speaker 1: this is a company. If we think about three AM,
Speaker 1: they have just so many different products under their roofs
Speaker 1: under their roof, and most of us think about the
Speaker 1: post it notes and you know, those things, but I mean,
Speaker 1: they do so much more. This is a company that's
Speaker 1: been around for a long time. They're really expertsing materials,
Speaker 1: creating materials, and you mentioned one post which is one
Speaker 1: of their it's part of you know, the adhesives they make.
Speaker 1: They have I think forty six different technology platforms they
Speaker 1: build from. This is a good thing for them, and
Speaker 1: sometimes it's a bad thing because it's tough to keep
Speaker 1: all those different businesses going in the right direction, and
Speaker 1: when one or two are not. Wall Street doesn't like that.
Speaker 1: They've had some struggles over the last couple of years.
Speaker 1: But you're doing pretty pretty well right now, especially in
Speaker 1: this particular spot, and it's sort of an odd feel
Speaker 1: good story in the midst of this crisis which produces
Speaker 1: so much great And that's Business Week reporter Brian Grooley
Speaker 1: and Business Week editor Joel Weber. Listen. This is in
Speaker 1: some ways a story about hope and preparedness. Carol, you know,
Speaker 1: we hear so much about people not learning the lessons
Speaker 1: of the past three m clearly got the message and
Speaker 1: acted very differently going into this crisis than in previous iterations.
Speaker 1: You're listening to Bloomberg business Week. Coming up, the CEO
Speaker 1: of Travago explains how COVID nineteen is impacting the travel
Speaker 1: industry and his team. This is Bloomberg. You're listening to
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason Kelly from
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Radio. We're bringing you some of the most important
Speaker 1: and informative conversations that we had on our daily radio
Speaker 1: show about the coronavirus is this week, and Jason, we
Speaker 1: were really lucky. Our team man really hard at work,
Speaker 1: bringing us folks from the corporate communities, from the medical communities,
Speaker 1: from academia really so that we could get the full
Speaker 1: picture on what's going on with the virus. Well, and
Speaker 1: certainly this global lockdown of sorts. You've got people staying
Speaker 1: in play, sheltering in place in some of the world's
Speaker 1: biggest cities, and travel has been brought to a complete halt.
Speaker 1: We wanted to get inside that industry understand some of
Speaker 1: the nuances, so we caught up with Axel Heaper, he
Speaker 1: is the CEO of Travago, to find out what the
Speaker 1: coronavirus is doing to his company. To start with the
Speaker 1: most important I mean, obviously the situation has significantly deteriorated
Speaker 1: UM in Europe, but really all around the world. And
Speaker 1: we have a very global workforce, so we have a
Speaker 1: lot of effect that UM. UM friends and family in
Speaker 1: the company, UM that are living in in areas that
Speaker 1: are completely locked down, that are severely affected. UM. We
Speaker 1: have a company have have moved to home office operation.
Speaker 1: That's pretty much every company a few weeks ago and
Speaker 1: UM so far okay, UM and nobody in the company
Speaker 1: has been affected. But yeah, the situation is is pretty
Speaker 1: dramatic in and a lot of regions and particularly around Europe. Well,
Speaker 1: and Axcel, you have a window like almost no no
Speaker 1: one else into the travel industry. I mean, this industry
Speaker 1: has been absolutely for the moment just brought to a standstill.
Speaker 1: What what does that look like? From from where you sit?
Speaker 1: I think the the the most important thing is to
Speaker 1: to think about what is actually right and in the
Speaker 1: current situation. UM. And by now, I think that's that's
Speaker 1: pretty much clear to all the Western leaders. The right
Speaker 1: thing is not to travel, but to actually not move
Speaker 1: and have as little contact as possible. So UM, we
Speaker 1: also communicated that to our our users, UM, that they
Speaker 1: should actually not travel if they don't have to. UM.
Speaker 1: And and obviously and at times like that, UM, there
Speaker 1: shouldn't be any travel activity unless it's absolutely necessary. And
Speaker 1: and that's also what what you what you would expect
Speaker 1: and so UM, yeah, I mean that that that that
Speaker 1: is obviously affecting the business. UM. But UM, that's that's
Speaker 1: that's okay. In times like this, I mean, everybody has
Speaker 1: to sacrifice to really get it under control. As you
Speaker 1: look at it, what are you seeing in terms of
Speaker 1: different geographies when it comes to the virus impact? I
Speaker 1: think too in a certain way, in all the Western
Speaker 1: economies are pretty much all the Western economies, UM, the
Speaker 1: governments have decided to slow down the virus by shutting
Speaker 1: down pretty much the daily life. And and that that
Speaker 1: obviously has um has a huge impact on travel activity.
Speaker 1: I mean, nobody should travel, nobody wants to travel, nobody
Speaker 1: is allowed to travel unless absolutely necessary. In in Asia. UM.
Speaker 1: There are some countries where UM where the shutdown or
Speaker 1: the lockdown seems to have had a positive impact and
Speaker 1: where things seem to normalize to a certain extent, But
Speaker 1: overall from a from a travel perspective, I think it's
Speaker 1: still too early to tell. UM. I think it will
Speaker 1: be will be very important to think about our travelers. UM.
Speaker 1: Not only right now where everybody is really sitting at
Speaker 1: home UM and and and would like to to be
Speaker 1: out there, UM if things would would have normalized, but
Speaker 1: more at one or two months in the future, when
Speaker 1: people will have had a lot of indoor activity or
Speaker 1: it will have been locked down into their apartment in
Speaker 1: certain areas without even being allowed to leave the apartment
Speaker 1: other than going to the supermarket and um. And that's
Speaker 1: really what is driving us as a business to think
Speaker 1: about that moment in time when we can actually help travelers.
Speaker 1: And right now we can only help travelers by not
Speaker 1: encouraging anybody to travel, but to to just try to
Speaker 1: stay disciplined, UM, to really slow down the spreading as
Speaker 1: much as we can, and so accel. You know, we've
Speaker 1: been posing this question too to a lot of experts
Speaker 1: we've been speaking with, and and that is, you know,
Speaker 1: working under the assumption which I think we all should,
Speaker 1: that this will abate and and uh and we will
Speaker 1: get our arms around it and there will be a
Speaker 1: peak and recovery and all of those things. What do
Speaker 1: you think changes about the business of travel in the
Speaker 1: aftermath of this, I think they they it is it's
Speaker 1: it's fair to assume that that the whole industry will
Speaker 1: be a different, different one. UM to what extent the
Speaker 1: user behavior will change. I think in the short term
Speaker 1: it will change. UM, it's likely that initially, and particularly
Speaker 1: in times of uncertainty, where the virus is under control
Speaker 1: in one country and perhaps not another, or in one
Speaker 1: region not in the other, that there will be a
Speaker 1: trend to shorter trips that feel safer, or generally travel
Speaker 1: that is perceived as a stafer, and that that will
Speaker 1: only normalize over time. But the much more difficult question
Speaker 1: to answer is to what extent this will completely change
Speaker 1: the structure of the industry, Because this has never happened before.
Speaker 1: That that the industry basically globally has come to a
Speaker 1: complete standstill within a few weeks and um, and it's
Speaker 1: likely to stay in in that mode for quite some time. UM.
Speaker 1: And obviously it has a huge impact on everybody who
Speaker 1: is is active in any leisure activity, not only travel,
Speaker 1: but anything that is that is really requiring people to
Speaker 1: be active and to be out there. And you are you,
Speaker 1: Folcus at Robago actual are thinking about you know this time,
Speaker 1: you are thinking about the recovery, right and I'm assuming
Speaker 1: kind of planning for it already. Absolutely, I mean, it
Speaker 1: is obviously very difficult to to really deal with this situation.
Speaker 1: I mean for all of us individual really, um, in
Speaker 1: particularly I mean in the company with with friends and
Speaker 1: families in very severely affected areas and and when they started, um,
Speaker 1: I mean, the first reaction of everybody is really damage control,
Speaker 1: I mean, and that that's that's very natural, um. To
Speaker 1: make sure that every employee is safe, to make sure
Speaker 1: that that really the business is safe, so that costs
Speaker 1: are are coming down, that marketing is top, etcetera. UM.
Speaker 1: But then it is also important to to look into
Speaker 1: the future because the present is is quite depressing, and
Speaker 1: and that's what we thankfully started very early UM. And
Speaker 1: really this thought that I mentioned before, the thought of
Speaker 1: our user who has not been able to travel for
Speaker 1: quite some time but would like to end and has
Speaker 1: been in his apartment UM sometimes as I said, with
Speaker 1: very very limited outside activity for quite some time. That
Speaker 1: is really the moment in time where we can really
Speaker 1: make a difference to our user. And and that's what's
Speaker 1: really we are focusing on. So what kind of service
Speaker 1: and what kind of product do we need to UM
Speaker 1: to bring to our users UM to really help them
Speaker 1: in that moment in time. And that is really it's
Speaker 1: really I think it's very important from a business perspective.
Speaker 1: It's also very important to help our users there, but
Speaker 1: it's also very important to keep focusing the business and
Speaker 1: and not get get get really to too taken away
Speaker 1: by by the very very difficult situation that everybody is
Speaker 1: facing personally within the family and also I mean the
Speaker 1: overall society right well. And actually that that raises such
Speaker 1: an interesting point because you know, ultimately people turn to
Speaker 1: you for information in a lot of ways. And I
Speaker 1: do wonder if the types of information that people will
Speaker 1: be looking for you know, whether it's as simple as
Speaker 1: you know, sort of health and safety type information, wellness
Speaker 1: type of information. I do wonder if that changes going
Speaker 1: forward and whether your team is is thinking about those
Speaker 1: sorts of things. Absolutely, I think that that that's that's
Speaker 1: you're absolutely right, that's exactly what we are what we
Speaker 1: are doing and then trying to do right now, we're
Speaker 1: trying to think from a user perspective, where is the
Speaker 1: user UM in in really one or two months from now,
Speaker 1: what is he thinking? What is important to him? And
Speaker 1: some things are obvious, UM, I mean it's it's clearly
Speaker 1: favorable to to show rates that you can cancel if
Speaker 1: there are still in particular in times where there's still
Speaker 1: a lot of uncertainty, but but safety overall will be
Speaker 1: a lot more important. Um. International air travel might still
Speaker 1: be disrupted for quite some time with all the major
Speaker 1: airlines reducing their networks. So so these are exactly the
Speaker 1: thoughts that that we are going through. UM, what is
Speaker 1: really the need of the user and how can we
Speaker 1: best serve that? And they're obviously you need to think
Speaker 1: about multiple scenarios because that's a global business. We will
Speaker 1: face multiple realities in different markets. As every country and
Speaker 1: sometimes in every state is reacting slightly differently to manage
Speaker 1: the control all of the spread and at the same
Speaker 1: time the impact on the overall economy. And um, yeah,
Speaker 1: different balances early to two different different situations or will
Speaker 1: lead to very different situations and a few months from now.
Speaker 1: And that's actual He for the CEO of Travago and
Speaker 1: what's fascinating Jason. We talked with him in late February when,
Speaker 1: of course there were lots of virus concerns and a
Speaker 1: lot more outside the United States, so we were able
Speaker 1: to kind of get the picture from there. But to
Speaker 1: get an update, especially as the virus has spread and
Speaker 1: he's got truly a global team, uh, and so to
Speaker 1: get his input was I think really crucial in understanding
Speaker 1: this story and the spread of the virus. Well, that
Speaker 1: wraps up the first hour the weekend edition of Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Business Week from Bloomberg Radio. I'm Jason Kelly and I'm
Speaker 1: Carol Mass. There plenty of coming up in our next hour.
Speaker 1: We're going to continue looking at all aspects of the
Speaker 1: coronavirus and really it's impact on our world. Cure Leave
Speaker 1: sporis Jordan's He's executive chairman of that company, will check
Speaker 1: in with him. It's a personal story for him, Jason.
Speaker 1: That cut me by surprise. So fascinating to hear what
Speaker 1: he had to say about at as well as how
Speaker 1: his company is getting through. Also an IVY League perspective.
Speaker 1: Barnard College president see on bilog. She has written extensively
Speaker 1: and studied the impact of stress on our lives, very
Speaker 1: relevant now, as well as the fact that she's running
Speaker 1: a major institution. Plus Carol, one of our favorites, Paul Rabel,
Speaker 1: the co founder and chief strategy officer of the premier
Speaker 1: lacrosse Lee. Jason was great to check in with Paul
Speaker 1: because the sports industry has just been shut down, and
Speaker 1: I feel like a couple of weeks ago when that
Speaker 1: started to happen, I think for many of us, we
Speaker 1: realized how widespread and how big the impact of the
Speaker 1: virus was. This is Bloomberg. You're listening to Bloomberg Business
Speaker 1: Week from Bloomberg Radio. Hello. I'm Carol Masser and I'm
Speaker 1: Jason Kelly. Today we're bringing you some of the most important,
Speaker 1: we hope informative conversations we had on our daily radio show,
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Business Week about the coronavirus, it's impact broadly on
Speaker 1: the economy, on businesses, executives, and human beings all across
Speaker 1: the nation, and Jason, that included the cannabis industry. We
Speaker 1: caught up with Cia Leafs Boris Jordan's he's the executive
Speaker 1: chairman of that company. This is a personal story for
Speaker 1: him because his own daughter impacted by the virus. So
Speaker 1: we talked to him about that as well as talk
Speaker 1: to him about continuing to run his business because that's
Speaker 1: what he's doing, and also how this is impacting his team,
Speaker 1: his team of workers well. And we also went into
Speaker 1: two worlds very much affected by the coronavirus. First the
Speaker 1: world of academia. We talked to the Barnard College president
Speaker 1: see on bylog. She has also studied stress, she understands that.
Speaker 1: And also the world of sports. Paul Rabel, of course,
Speaker 1: co founder of the Premier Lacrosse League. The sports world
Speaker 1: shut down completely. I gotta say both of those conversations
Speaker 1: really inspiring for for me certainly, and I hope to
Speaker 1: our listeners. First up, though, we did spend some time
Speaker 1: with Daniels were and he's the CEO of Arena Investors
Speaker 1: and he had Jason, A lot to say about the
Speaker 1: investment environment and just the world at large. It's been evolving.
Speaker 1: Over the last couple of weeks. We certainly saw equities
Speaker 1: breaking down, but the kind of over the counter institutional
Speaker 1: markets were relatively immune and really weren't reacting at all.
Speaker 1: Then we started seeing UM kind of institutionally held UM
Speaker 1: basically arbitrage related positions starting to come out and starting
Speaker 1: to get liquidated of various sorts across um rate of return,
Speaker 1: things in merger, arbitrage, and relative value. We then saw
Speaker 1: large scale selling and liquidations of kind of institutionally held
Speaker 1: loans and A B S offerings of which we probably
Speaker 1: haven't seen at these levels in several years. In most instances,
Speaker 1: still a good ways away from kind of where the
Speaker 1: bottoms of an O eight or an O two or
Speaker 1: ninety eight looked like. But UM certainly uh a level
Speaker 1: of activity and a type of activity that's been a
Speaker 1: long time coming. So Dan, how far are we do
Speaker 1: you think we are from that bottom? I think if you,
Speaker 1: if you did, it kind of apples to apples in
Speaker 1: a very general sense to where those other where those
Speaker 1: markets kind of bottomed out. UM. I think it looks
Speaker 1: like we're probably a third a halfway. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: there's a good, a good way to go because you know,
Speaker 1: as i've as we talked about in our earlier discussions,
Speaker 1: there was such an absolute frenzy of credit, fueled originally
Speaker 1: by the kind of depressed risk free rates from the
Speaker 1: monetary authorities, that things got so overdone that it just
Speaker 1: means that the trip back is going to be longer
Speaker 1: and harder. So I have a thought there though, So
Speaker 1: if it wasn't the virus from what you're saying, because yeah,
Speaker 1: it was such a frenzy of credit, right, we all
Speaker 1: talked about all the money that was slashing around there,
Speaker 1: whether it's the public markets and you know, especially even
Speaker 1: in the private markets. So was it just a matter
Speaker 1: of time? That's something, Um, maybe not in this magnitude,
Speaker 1: but we would have had some kind of undoing of
Speaker 1: all of this. Absolutely absolutely, And it's totally consistent with
Speaker 1: the last you know, several hundred years of market behavior. Ultimately,
Speaker 1: the thing that kind of knocks the market off it's
Speaker 1: off its chair is going to be something none of
Speaker 1: us counting on. By definition, if we were counting on it,
Speaker 1: then it wouldn't do that And so every every five
Speaker 1: or ten or fifteen years, you're going to see this.
Speaker 1: And and by the way, it doesn't really seem to
Speaker 1: uh fit the kind of normal distribution because we've had
Speaker 1: you know, we've had four or five one in a
Speaker 1: million year type things happened, you know, in the last
Speaker 1: twenty five years. So clearly something's amiss. And so when
Speaker 1: you saw this kind of frenzy happen, I would like
Speaker 1: in it potentially to you know, not to OH eight
Speaker 1: or O one or O one or nine, but really
Speaker 1: to O two where the world comp fraud happening in
Speaker 1: the wake of and Ron and others happened where there
Speaker 1: wasn't a fundamental change even in the general macroeconomic environment
Speaker 1: as much as a a a an absolute repricing of
Speaker 1: risk and reward across the credit spectrum. That's a really
Speaker 1: smart point. Yeah, keep going. I'm sorry, there have been well,
Speaker 1: there's just been there's just been so much. Uh, this
Speaker 1: party has been such a frenzy um that and it's
Speaker 1: lasted so long even relative to kind of normal careers,
Speaker 1: that the number of people even old enough who are
Speaker 1: still in the market, who were senior enough to be
Speaker 1: kind of at the trigger in some of these old
Speaker 1: time times, so to speak, has dwindled. And so this
Speaker 1: is a big surprise if you just haven't lived that
Speaker 1: mom uh. And so that really exacerbates what you what
Speaker 1: you see. And then, as I noted in a in
Speaker 1: a bit of a paper, I wrote, you know, there's
Speaker 1: a whole series of secular changes that happened in the
Speaker 1: wake of the of the crisis of the O a
Speaker 1: crisis that have changed the game, uh, such that it
Speaker 1: if a situation like this ever arose, the issues that
Speaker 1: it caused would be greatly exacerbated. And that stands weren
Speaker 1: He's the CEO of Arena Investors, He's a specialist in
Speaker 1: this is the term of art on Wall Street, Carol,
Speaker 1: special situations and listen, this is beyond special. It's extraordinary
Speaker 1: the time we're living in. And yet investors they are
Speaker 1: getting their heads around this. We saw that this week
Speaker 1: and you start to see strategies form around where we
Speaker 1: go from here. And I have to say, Jason, I
Speaker 1: found it really helpful, and I hope are our our
Speaker 1: listeners did as well. That listening to investors who have
Speaker 1: gone through some of these market disruptions, market cycles, whether
Speaker 1: it's the financial crisis or other. I think um was
Speaker 1: really helpful and understanding how we got through that and
Speaker 1: how it's different perhaps than what we're going through today,
Speaker 1: and how we get out on the other side. And
Speaker 1: I found it so interesting that he didn't make the
Speaker 1: comparisons that everybody else is making to two eight to
Speaker 1: two tho one his comparison World Calm. I found that
Speaker 1: so interesting. You're listening to Blueberg Business Week. Coming up
Speaker 1: Barnard College president see on by Luck. She explains how
Speaker 1: COVID nineteen is impacting higher education. I think this was
Speaker 1: a really thoughtful conversation about how it's impact in the
Speaker 1: student body, her administration, but also Jason about she's done
Speaker 1: a ted talk on stress and how that impacts us.
Speaker 1: I think really helpful at this time front of mine,
Speaker 1: for sure. This is Bloomberg. You're listening to Bloomberg Business
Speaker 1: Week with Carol Masser and Jason Kelly from Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: We're bringing you some of the most important and informative
Speaker 1: conversations that we had on our daily radio show about
Speaker 1: the coronavirus this week. One of the individuals we spoke
Speaker 1: to was in the sports world. Paul Reable, a friend
Speaker 1: of the show, Jason, and it was really great to
Speaker 1: hear what he had to say. He's the co founder
Speaker 1: of the Premier Lacrosse League and obviously this effects the
Speaker 1: world far beyond lacks. We have never seen anything like this.
Speaker 1: Certainly haven't imagined that a world would exist where there
Speaker 1: are no professional sports leagues in play at this moment um.
Speaker 1: And so for all of us at the league level,
Speaker 1: we've actually locked arms and are are having conversation daily.
Speaker 1: So between the p LLL, the NBA, the p G
Speaker 1: A tour um and then there's also a seasonal tranche
Speaker 1: of decision makers. So probably uh safest right now are
Speaker 1: fall sports and uh and we're in the summer, so
Speaker 1: we're certainly observing what the current leagues are doing that
Speaker 1: we're caught in the middle of the season having conversations
Speaker 1: with all the networks, the venues, shareholders, advertisers, and with
Speaker 1: the news about the Olympics postponing, which you know, it's
Speaker 1: I thought it was anecdotal to the way this whole
Speaker 1: you know, this this whole last seven to ten days
Speaker 1: have gone. Really it's felt like we've, uh, we've experienced
Speaker 1: a whole year's worth, so to put it in perspective
Speaker 1: the Olympics, they sent out an email to their membership
Speaker 1: around the prospect of discussion of postponement and they would
Speaker 1: have a decision in four weeks. They made a decision
Speaker 1: in twenty four hours. So it seems to be the
Speaker 1: state of leagues right now is we're having minute by
Speaker 1: minute and hour by our conversations. But our goal is
Speaker 1: to continue to persevere through this and get our product
Speaker 1: out to the communities because we're we're servicing a lot
Speaker 1: of constituents, from our fans to our players, and health
Speaker 1: and safety and following public official guidelines is sits at
Speaker 1: the top and as everyone's priority. But for a long time,
Speaker 1: and we're talking to century sports of being quote a
Speaker 1: human connection and their tribal and the way people feel
Speaker 1: entertained and motivated and so on. Yeah, and there is
Speaker 1: still this need, this drastic need, and I see it
Speaker 1: among even our our you know, editorial community of people
Speaker 1: being home and feeling very isolated. So to that point, Paul,
Speaker 1: what are you guys doing to continue to connect um
Speaker 1: with your fans. Yeah, that's that's a great question, Carol.
Speaker 1: So where there is challenge and I was listening to
Speaker 1: you guys talk about the public markets, they're they're also opportunity.
Speaker 1: And so if you look at the network television landscape,
Speaker 1: what we've seen is as as O T T and
Speaker 1: technology have disrupted, is that live news and live sports
Speaker 1: have become the last standing firewall. So right now network
Speaker 1: national and local news has seen a dramatic uptick. There
Speaker 1: is no live sports on right now. So the traditional
Speaker 1: sports networks are replaying old programming but also looking to
Speaker 1: acquire programming that hasn't hit the shelves yet, so they're
Speaker 1: looking at expedited documentaries and expedited docuseries timelines. We're gonna
Speaker 1: see a big pop in an NFL draft, but in
Speaker 1: the interim, we've seen big climbs in engagement on social
Speaker 1: media and in particular tools that these platforms launched, like
Speaker 1: Instagram Live, where you're seeing not only musicians but athletes
Speaker 1: go live on these platforms and communicate. So that's the
Speaker 1: silver lining is is finding through technology in an era
Speaker 1: where we've never had this level of connection with an
Speaker 1: audience to maintain that sense of entertainment and human action
Speaker 1: that sports have traditionally brought through live games. And so Paul,
Speaker 1: knowing that the timeline is incredibly fluid. You know, when
Speaker 1: does your team, what's your timeline for thinking about your season,
Speaker 1: which I believe is scheduled to launch at the end
Speaker 1: of May, right, that's right. So right now we're a
Speaker 1: May twenty nine and thirtie opening weekend, and it's getting
Speaker 1: tighter and tighter, Jason to to your point, and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, there's a there's a lot that we're gonna
Speaker 1: find out in these next two weeks. Is we're in
Speaker 1: the midst of of the curve, and uh, you know,
Speaker 1: there's a lot that our economic leaders and public health
Speaker 1: officials are are deciding on. And right now we can
Speaker 1: we consider ourselves very much a part of a horizontal
Speaker 1: strategy to to self quarantine as a nation, but I
Speaker 1: think it will evolve into a more verticalized strategy to
Speaker 1: focus on imminent threats um and and then from there
Speaker 1: what we'll see, uh kind of a trickle back up
Speaker 1: to normalcy hopefully. And so for us, given our cush
Speaker 1: and so to speak, in scheduling, matched with our tour
Speaker 1: based model, which we had announced with Bloomberg now about
Speaker 1: a year and a half ago, we actually have about
Speaker 1: a dozen scenarios that we've planned around contingency of if
Speaker 1: we have to delay the start, we can actually pull
Speaker 1: by virtue of that tour based model, similar like Jenga
Speaker 1: and re stacking your bloxes. We can take week one
Speaker 1: and slide it to our first bye week in July.
Speaker 1: We can take week two and slide it into our
Speaker 1: second bye week. So right now we have about a
Speaker 1: half half of our scenarios where we maintain a full
Speaker 1: regular season, playoffs and championship, and then the others. We
Speaker 1: can take a traditional game weekend where all of our
Speaker 1: teams are in market, extended a day or two and
Speaker 1: do doubleheaders. And that's Premier Lacrosse League co founder and
Speaker 1: player Paul Rabel, and I love his perspective. He's an entrepreneur,
Speaker 1: he's an athlete, obviously, but he's also clearly from that conversation,
Speaker 1: very much in touch with the broader sports world, Carol.
Speaker 1: He understands the McCann next, the media aspect to it,
Speaker 1: the fan aspect so much. You're listening to Bloomberg Business
Speaker 1: Week coming up, Executive chairman of Cure Leaf, Boris Jordan
Speaker 1: joins us on how the medical cannabis company is dealing
Speaker 1: with the coronavirus outbreak and how he's dealing with it
Speaker 1: as a parent. This is Bloomberg. You're listening to Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason Kelly from Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: And today we're bringing you some of the most important
Speaker 1: and informative conversations we had on our daily radio show,
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Business Week about the coronavirus it's impact across the world,
Speaker 1: and that includes Jason a conversation that we had with
Speaker 1: Cure Leaf executive chairman Boris Jordan. He's been a member
Speaker 1: of the Bloomberg fifty list, uh and we've talked to
Speaker 1: him several times over the past year about the industry overall,
Speaker 1: but this conversation definitely had a different tone. How do
Speaker 1: you deal with a crisis like the one that the
Speaker 1: world and the country is facing right now, and how
Speaker 1: do you deal with it when you're worried about your workers,
Speaker 1: you're worried about your company, and also of course worried
Speaker 1: about your family. I had actually a daughter who came
Speaker 1: down with the bars. She's young, she worked for us,
Speaker 1: twenty uh seven years old, and uh three days later
Speaker 1: she's feeling much better. So I hope that's encouragement everybody.
Speaker 1: That's obviously a scare for her, for me as a father,
Speaker 1: but it was good to hear from her this morning.
Speaker 1: She's she's in Manhattan, she said to me, she's feeling
Speaker 1: a lot better. Wow. That's interesting. And so I mean
Speaker 1: with that, we don't need to I don't want to
Speaker 1: get to invade your privacy at all. But um, it's
Speaker 1: so interesting and heartening to hear that that somebody, somebody recovered.
Speaker 1: Uh like that. Anything more you can tell us about
Speaker 1: her experience, I just think listen, I think that overall,
Speaker 1: there's a lot more cases out there that we don't
Speaker 1: know about today, and many of them are as we
Speaker 1: saw the statistics coming out in New York or with
Speaker 1: younger people, uh, and they seem to be recovering reasonably well.
Speaker 1: And I think that's the encouraging thing about this. Obviously
Speaker 1: that's not the it's with the older population. Uh. And
Speaker 1: obviously our our our hearts and and and and go
Speaker 1: out to their well being and and we're doing everything
Speaker 1: at our company. As you know, we've been granted the
Speaker 1: Essential Services designation and all of our key markets around
Speaker 1: the country, we provide a very important service for for
Speaker 1: our medical patients who are dealing with either cancer treatments
Speaker 1: or or pain treatments or or children's epilepsy, where we
Speaker 1: provide the necessary drugs to help these them UH and
Speaker 1: products to help these families through difficult times. And you know,
Speaker 1: our business, like everybody else's, has changed dramatically. UM. We
Speaker 1: are you know, we're serving curbside, we're doing mobile delivery services.
Speaker 1: We're doing anything we can to keep both our employees
Speaker 1: UH and our clients and and and partners and and
Speaker 1: and and patient states UH so that we can continue
Speaker 1: to deliver on the products that are necessary for their
Speaker 1: well being. And so boards help us understand, like what
Speaker 1: is that designation allow you to do in terms of
Speaker 1: increased latitude or or operations. Well, we've had to our
Speaker 1: business is very highly regulated. As you know, it's still
Speaker 1: federally illegal. So we've had to go state by state
Speaker 1: and negotiate with the various governors in order to give
Speaker 1: us these things. I have to say some most governors, UM,
Speaker 1: and I'd like to thank them in advance, have been
Speaker 1: very very responsive to this and making sure that we
Speaker 1: can deliver a safe uh in the products our products
Speaker 1: in a safe way and so you know, what we've
Speaker 1: done is we've negotiated the curb side delivery that was
Speaker 1: never allowed in any of the states before. We have
Speaker 1: negotiated mobile applications and online snails that hasn't been allowed,
Speaker 1: home deliveries in some states that was allowed in many
Speaker 1: states it wasn't. So there's a lot of changes taking place.
Speaker 1: I think the whole positive changes for both this terrible
Speaker 1: time that we're being faced with now, but also I
Speaker 1: think going forward, it will help the industry become much
Speaker 1: more mainstream. I think, you know, just several months ago,
Speaker 1: nobody would have thought that, you know, cannabis would be
Speaker 1: made a sent should would be designated essential services, and
Speaker 1: it's one of the few industries in the country that
Speaker 1: has been so far well. I think that's really revealing
Speaker 1: what you just said. And I do wonder, you know,
Speaker 1: we keep talking about what will be the longer term
Speaker 1: and lasting impact of some of the things that we're
Speaker 1: all doing to adapt in this situation, and I do
Speaker 1: wonder about the regulatory environment understanding, okay, what needs to
Speaker 1: be changed, what needs to be perhaps loosened up. Do
Speaker 1: you feel like this will ultimately um stick with us?
Speaker 1: I think so I think, listen, the biggest problem we
Speaker 1: all face is obviously federal banking and federal legalization. I
Speaker 1: think it's time for the federal government to understand and
Speaker 1: see that every governor in this country that's thirty some
Speaker 1: governors that have medical cannabis in their states have made
Speaker 1: it UH. Most of them have designated it as essential
Speaker 1: services UM. There's huge demand from the population for this
Speaker 1: um UH and it's time for the federal government to allow,
Speaker 1: for instance, credit cards, the banking services so that we
Speaker 1: can make the process even safer. Today, no matter what
Speaker 1: we do, we still have to exchange cash, whether it's curbside,
Speaker 1: whether it's in the store, whether it's on home delivery.
Speaker 1: That obviously adds to the you know, the danger of
Speaker 1: the spread of the virus UM and and we've been
Speaker 1: requesting this from the federal government now for that are
Speaker 1: part of ten years, and they're very slow to move
Speaker 1: on it. And I would say that's the last bit
Speaker 1: that we'd like to see UH changed. And we are
Speaker 1: working our our lobbyists working in Washington as we speak,
Speaker 1: to try and see if we can get that. But
Speaker 1: you know, they're they're ingrained in their ways in Washington
Speaker 1: d C and and there's still a lot of opposition
Speaker 1: even though the population overwhelmingly the population for medical cannabis
Speaker 1: around the country. Of course, I do need to ask
Speaker 1: you because I think this is a situation we're all
Speaker 1: trying to figure out. You know, what workers get really
Speaker 1: taken care of during a crisis like this, and some
Speaker 1: of the bigger companies, you know, those workers continue to
Speaker 1: get paid. Uh, we're certainly not seeing that necessarily in
Speaker 1: a lot of the hospitality industry. Can hear your workers
Speaker 1: are being taken care of, and everybody's up and working
Speaker 1: and will be. We are, we are, we are Our
Speaker 1: first priority is our employee, in our customers. We've broken
Speaker 1: teams into eight teams and beat teams that are working
Speaker 1: at different shifts. We've gotten masks and gloves for everyone,
Speaker 1: obviously we have We're paying bonuses at the end of
Speaker 1: the month for those workers that are on the front
Speaker 1: line in order to keep them incentivized. We are looking
Speaker 1: after those that are that have fallen ill um and
Speaker 1: and we haven't really had any so we've been very
Speaker 1: very lucky. But we know we will and so and
Speaker 1: and we're in you know, as you know, we're in
Speaker 1: in in nineteen states around the country, and so so
Speaker 1: we we we we have a very wide reach and
Speaker 1: we are looking after all employees and I have to
Speaker 1: thank all of them today. I'm sorry I'm doing that
Speaker 1: on the radio to say thank you very much for
Speaker 1: continuing to provide services to our patients. I'm curious too,
Speaker 1: as someone who runs a business understands that there needs
Speaker 1: to be safety nets for workers. You're seeing some of
Speaker 1: the bailout programs come along. Um, what's your take on
Speaker 1: everything that's happening out of Washington and the assistance. And
Speaker 1: I think it's very important for Washington to finally approved
Speaker 1: this package. I think it's um uh and for the
Speaker 1: workers in the country, so that we have millions and
Speaker 1: millions and millions of people that are out of work.
Speaker 1: I've heard estimates that layoffs could be somewhere between twenty
Speaker 1: and thirty million dollars over the next quarter. We need
Speaker 1: to address that. That would be bigger than even we
Speaker 1: saw in the Great Depression. And I think it's very
Speaker 1: important to federal government to step up. And uh, we've
Speaker 1: been waiting now for you know, for over a week
Speaker 1: for the federal government to get its act together with
Speaker 1: this uh. With this bill, I'm not you know, I
Speaker 1: don't know how much of this bill is going to
Speaker 1: be available towards workers, um uh, you know, and and
Speaker 1: how quickly it will be available. We're certainly all hopeful
Speaker 1: that it will be available to workers and to people
Speaker 1: that are laid off very very quickly. I mean, Schumer
Speaker 1: said it's unemployment on steroids. I think the the people
Speaker 1: that have been laid off in the restaurant industry and
Speaker 1: the hospitality and the airline industry are really hoping to
Speaker 1: receive some assistance here during these difficult times. So boris
Speaker 1: altas square something, especially given what we said at the
Speaker 1: top that you know, you have a personal experience with this.
Speaker 1: You know, certainly through your daughter, what it's like here
Speaker 1: in the New York City area in terms of this
Speaker 1: virus really ravaging this area. And yet we also at
Speaker 1: the same time have a call on the part of
Speaker 1: many business people, on the part of the president to
Speaker 1: really get back to work. You know, the president talking
Speaker 1: about Easter. How do you balance those things and how
Speaker 1: do you look at it as someone who's running a business.
Speaker 1: So I have to say it's it's I would not
Speaker 1: want to be the president United States right now. Um,
Speaker 1: somebody uh much smarter than me players this way. Just
Speaker 1: imagine he's got two shoulders. On the right shoulders got
Speaker 1: the medical community which is telling him, uh, you need
Speaker 1: to you know, uh, quarantine the country, you need to
Speaker 1: slow down transportation, you need to stop the virus. Uh.
Speaker 1: And on the other side, you've got, um, the economists
Speaker 1: that are telling him, you know, if you keep this
Speaker 1: going much longer, you could bankrupt the country, and that
Speaker 1: would create much more hardship, uh for the countries and
Speaker 1: what we're doing. And I think the biggest worry I
Speaker 1: have is the people that are losing their job to
Speaker 1: the people that need it the most. And that's what
Speaker 1: I am concerned about. And you know, the longer this
Speaker 1: goes on, the harder it is going to be for
Speaker 1: the more needed needing part of our population, the people
Speaker 1: that are in the in the in the uh you know,
Speaker 1: retail businesses, in the in the in the hospitality industry, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, union people. We we really need to look
Speaker 1: after these people. And so it's a very difficult decision
Speaker 1: whether we start the economy or not. But I do
Speaker 1: think they're not going to have much of a choice
Speaker 1: at some point. They're gonna have to. I hope that
Speaker 1: the country uses these next two weeks to really quarantine seriously.
Speaker 1: I'm more specifically focused on the young population, which in
Speaker 1: some places isn't taking this very seriously. They need to
Speaker 1: take this seriously. We need to slow the virus down,
Speaker 1: and then we need to get the country back to work.
Speaker 1: We are a capitalist, you know economy, uh and and
Speaker 1: and the capitalist economy cannot survive without being without working.
Speaker 1: So I think we need to get this country back
Speaker 1: to work how fast. I don't want to make that prediction.
Speaker 1: It's not mine. I'm not an expert. Well did you
Speaker 1: do you say that? Because yeah, the younger population. We've
Speaker 1: certainly seen New York City Mayor Build A Blasio talk
Speaker 1: about it, and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: threatening to shut down parks and things just to kind
Speaker 1: of stop it. You you have a younger community, right
Speaker 1: who are working at um, you know, your various retail outlets. Um,
Speaker 1: what are they saying about that? I mean, obviously there's
Speaker 1: a tremendous amount of nervousness. UM they understand. You know,
Speaker 1: the people that work in the cannabis undership are very,
Speaker 1: very dedicated Uh, and they and they and they truly
Speaker 1: believe in the product that they sell. And so we've
Speaker 1: had a tremendous um you know, sort of sort of
Speaker 1: effort on behalf of our employees stay there and to
Speaker 1: service our patients. That's force Jordan, the executive chairman of
Speaker 1: Cure Leaf. Jason, and I think it's safe to say
Speaker 1: that when he started talking about his daughter having the
Speaker 1: virus and having to you know, continue running his company,
Speaker 1: being worried about workers, but then having to of course
Speaker 1: first and foremost, being worried about his daughter and making
Speaker 1: she sure she was okay. Um, it really took the
Speaker 1: story in a whole different direction. Well, and it's also
Speaker 1: interesting to think about this industry and what it may
Speaker 1: mean a pivotal moment. We know that from covering uh,
Speaker 1: the cannabis boom as it were, over the last couple
Speaker 1: of years, he obviously is right in the middle of it.
Speaker 1: What happens next remains to be seen. And that wraps
Speaker 1: up the weekend edition of Bloomberg Business Week from Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for joining us. I'm Jason Kelly and
Speaker 1: I'm Carol Masster. Be sure to tune into Bloomberg Business
Speaker 1: Week Radio live Monday through Friday, starting at two pm
Speaker 1: Wall Street Time, And if you can't catch us live,
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Speaker 1: next week at the same time. This is Bloomberg