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Speaker 2: Welcome to the Bloomberg Markets Podcast. I'm Paul Sweeney alongside
Speaker 2: my co host Matt Miller.
Speaker 1: Every business day we bring you interviews from CEOs, market pros,
Speaker 1: and Bloomberg experts, along with essential market movin news.
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Speaker 2: the time. Series is a terrible year for MNA, I mean,
Speaker 2: less than three and a half trillion. You compare that
Speaker 2: to twenty twenty one, which was a banner year of
Speaker 2: about six and a half trillion of deals done. I mean,
Speaker 2: this is the weakest year since twenty thirteen. How about
Speaker 2: twenty twenty four any better? It's check in with Ted Smith,
Speaker 2: co founder and president of Union Square Advisors.
Speaker 3: Of course is highlight of.
Speaker 2: His career when he's a managing director of Credit Swiss
Speaker 2: First Fauston. I think we crossed passed there back in
Speaker 2: the day. Hey, Ted, talk to us about twenty twenty three.
Speaker 2: What did you see in the marketplace and more importantly,
Speaker 2: what are you guys in the M and A biz
Speaker 2: thinking about twenty twenty four?
Speaker 4: Morning, Paul, Great to be with you again. Thanks well,
Speaker 4: you hit the nail on the head. It certainly has
Speaker 4: not been a great year for M and A in
Speaker 4: twenty twenty three, off almost half from the peaks of
Speaker 4: twenty twenty one. We saw a lot of fits and
Speaker 4: starts this year. Heard the earlier commentary with Danielle about
Speaker 4: where things are with the FED. That certainly put some
Speaker 4: freeze on the market. The higher cost of capital for
Speaker 4: longer meant that some folks stayed on the sidelines. Also,
Speaker 4: as the large corporate acquirers were thinking about whether they
Speaker 4: wanted to get back into the market or not. Took longer,
Speaker 4: frankly than we thought at the beginning of the year,
Speaker 4: so we started to see some green shoots really in
Speaker 4: late late summer and right after Labor Day. We do
Speaker 4: think activity is picking up now and we'll continue into
Speaker 4: twenty twenty four, but we were delayed by about six
Speaker 4: months from our beginning of twenty twenty three forecast on
Speaker 4: when we thought M and A would start to pick
Speaker 4: up from twenty twenty two, which itself was significantly down
Speaker 4: from twenty one and ted.
Speaker 5: When you look at though question around regulatory uncertainty, it
Speaker 5: seems like the FTC is pushing back against everything. Is
Speaker 5: that something that's top of mind at all?
Speaker 3: It certainly is.
Speaker 4: I mean, we think about it, and obviously acquirers think
Speaker 4: about it. Such a big part of the market though
Speaker 4: today is about private equity as acquirers, not just the strategics,
Speaker 4: and they typically are not as wound around the issue
Speaker 4: from a regulator's perspective. And also we've seen an approach
Speaker 4: for a long time from the large strategic acquirers of
Speaker 4: asking forgiveness rather than permission to do a number of
Speaker 4: these deals. So we think that attitude will continue to pervade.
Speaker 4: The FTC clearly and the DOJ clearly want to flex
Speaker 4: their muscles here amongst the really large tech acquirers, and
Speaker 4: we think that will continue to be the case. On
Speaker 4: the other hand, there's a lot of other acquirers out
Speaker 4: there other than the Magnificent seven that we think don't
Speaker 4: get as much scrutiny and will probably rise up and
Speaker 4: participate in more m and.
Speaker 2: A ted the era of free money is over. We've
Speaker 2: got a ten year trading north of four percent here,
Speaker 2: So the cost of debt capitals higher for acquirers. How
Speaker 2: is that impacting kind of activity, structures, that kind of thing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we definitely saw a little more structure, both in
Speaker 4: terms because of the cost of debt, but also just
Speaker 4: uncertainty in the market generally. But the reality, at least
Speaker 4: for technology companies where USA we spend our time, is
Speaker 4: that the cost of debt is still cheaper than the.
Speaker 3: Cost of equity in most cases.
Speaker 4: So while it's more expensive than it was a year ago,
Speaker 4: two years ago, the total explosion in private credit that
Speaker 4: we've seen over the last couple of years has really
Speaker 4: made debts still a possible source of capital and meaningful
Speaker 4: source of capital. We just completed a four hundred and
Speaker 4: sixty million dollar transaction that was exclusively done in the
Speaker 4: private credit market for a large private equity firm in
Speaker 4: one of its portfolio companies.
Speaker 3: So it's available.
Speaker 4: Yes, it's more expensive than it has been, but we
Speaker 4: continue to see the private credit markets being really active,
Speaker 4: particularly in the tech sector.
Speaker 5: Inted. I talked to IPO bankers for the bulk of
Speaker 5: my day, and they keep kind of pounding the table
Speaker 5: on valuation discrepancy. When you look at private equity buyers
Speaker 5: who are in need to return some of the cash
Speaker 5: to LPs, are they going to caveon valuation or how
Speaker 5: are those conversations going to play out?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it's a really good question. I think.
Speaker 4: We continue to think that the IPO market is going
Speaker 4: to be tepid going forward. I was an IPO banker
Speaker 4: for the first phase of my career, and so I've
Speaker 4: seen this up and down movie before. But we really
Speaker 4: just don't see a lot of product likely to come
Speaker 4: loose in the IPO markets. We do think those private
Speaker 4: equity buyers who do need to return capital to their
Speaker 4: LPs are more likely to pursue sales to either Strategics
Speaker 4: or other private equity firms, but far more frequently and
Speaker 4: at more volume than we'll see in the IPO market.
Speaker 4: And if they do cave on value, we think that's
Speaker 4: going to be the exception to pursuing an IPO rather
Speaker 4: than the rule.
Speaker 2: Hey, Ted, I know you guys at Union Square Advisors.
Speaker 2: You know traffic a lot in the tech space. If
Speaker 2: I go out to sand Hill Road and look for
Speaker 2: some capital, or if I just go talk to the
Speaker 2: folks out there, who are their VC folks, who are
Speaker 2: the real capital folks out there for the tech industry.
Speaker 2: What's the mood out there on sand Hill Road these days?
Speaker 4: I think it's We're glad. Twenty twenty three is almost
Speaker 4: in the rearview. Mirror is one big part of that.
Speaker 4: There continues to be a lot of focus around investment,
Speaker 4: around all things AI, although I think the irrational exuberance
Speaker 4: around that is even coming down a bit.
Speaker 3: Again.
Speaker 4: I used the term green shoots earlier about what we
Speaker 4: were seeing in M and A. We're certainly seeing a
Speaker 4: little bit of an unloosening of the purse strings in
Speaker 4: earlier stage VC, which obviously then leads to mid stage
Speaker 4: and late stage VC investing for the right companies. So
Speaker 4: I think right now the mood is we're going to
Speaker 4: get through the end of the year. We're going to
Speaker 4: take stock of where our portfolio is, but we want
Speaker 4: to put more capital to work in twenty four than
Speaker 4: we did in twenty three.
Speaker 5: And looking at twenty four, how does that timeline play out.
Speaker 5: Do we see a flurry of activity call it second
Speaker 5: quarter ahead of an election in November and elections globally,
Speaker 5: or how does that shape up in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 3: It's a really good question.
Speaker 4: It's somewhat ironic that we're sitting here talking about that
Speaker 4: the more stable year is going to be the election
Speaker 4: year than the year that we just went through, but
Speaker 4: we do think that that may be there, at least
Speaker 4: for the first half of the year.
Speaker 3: That may be true.
Speaker 4: We're working on a number of transactions where we've been
Speaker 4: in prep mode for the fall that are going to
Speaker 4: launch in January. I aspect our competitors are doing exactly
Speaker 4: the same thing. So we do see sort of a
Speaker 4: Q one Q two flurry of activity well ahead of
Speaker 4: what we've seen in twenty twenty three. And then the
Speaker 4: uncertainty that the elections always inject into the markets, may
Speaker 4: take over as we hit summer and early fall leading
Speaker 4: into the elections. As we all know, markets hate uncertainty,
Speaker 4: so we'll see some up and down on that. We
Speaker 4: may see some slowing in both the investing and the
Speaker 4: M and A life cycle as we move closer to
Speaker 4: the election, and then we may see a lot of
Speaker 4: activity post November once it's clear one way or the
Speaker 4: other which way things are going, at least in this country.
Speaker 2: And Ted, one of the things that's new to me,
Speaker 2: at least compared to when I was in your game
Speaker 2: on the street is the growth of private credit. How
Speaker 2: important is that to just getting deals done? Because we
Speaker 2: talked to a lot of private credit people and the
Speaker 2: capital is flowing into their funds like crazy and they're
Speaker 2: really really active. Talk to us about that private credit business,
Speaker 2: what it means for your M and A market.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's today, Paul, it's north of a two trillion
Speaker 4: dollars asset class. So to your point, a lot of
Speaker 4: money has gone into it. We continue to have that
Speaker 4: be an incredible part of the work that we're doing
Speaker 4: in our capital Off of our Capital Market's desk. We're
Speaker 4: not underwriters we're arrangers, but we still have a tremendous
Speaker 4: business led by Mike Meyer, who's driving that for us.
Speaker 4: They're part of virtually every deal that we do on
Speaker 4: the financing side, unless it's a pure equity deal. And
Speaker 4: then when we're talking on the M and A side,
Speaker 4: if there is going to be a debt component associated
Speaker 4: with it, again, we'll tap a broad range of relationships
Speaker 4: in that private credit market. So it's a long winded
Speaker 4: way of saying they've become incredibly important not only to
Speaker 4: our business but to the tech business broadly over the
Speaker 4: last five years.
Speaker 3: And we don't see that dimming at all.
Speaker 5: And how does that structure play out in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 5: Are we seeing a mixture of debt being brought on
Speaker 5: in some of those cash offers? Do you see kind
Speaker 5: of earnouts being part of that? In twenty twenty four.
Speaker 4: We've seen more structure, We've seen some earnouts, We've seen
Speaker 4: other sort of bells and whistles, if you will, higher
Speaker 4: preferences in certain investments, not in every case, but in
Speaker 4: some over the course of twenty twenty three, as people
Speaker 4: evaluated being a little more risk averse. I think as
Speaker 4: we go into twenty twenty four, I heard again the
Speaker 4: great conversation about what's happening in and around the FED.
Speaker 4: As we start to see some stabilization and some easing there,
Speaker 4: we think some of that structure may fall away a
Speaker 4: little bit, but generally that market will be very active,
Speaker 4: and we will see a combination of debt capital used
Speaker 4: in cash on hand by strategic buyers and for private
Speaker 4: equity buyers who again have big checkbooks but also like
Speaker 4: to use debt to increase their returns, we think they'll
Speaker 4: be very active in doing that in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 2: Ded, thanks so much for joining us. Really appreciate getting
Speaker 2: your thoughts here At Ted Smith, he's a co founder
Speaker 2: and as president of Union Square Advisors.
Speaker 6: You're listening to the team Ken's Are Live program Bloomberg
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Speaker 2: I'm going to go to a big Pfeiser, big pharma here.
Speaker 2: Pfizer the stock off pretty substantially today, falls to its
Speaker 2: lowest in ten years on a disappointing forecast, and I'm
Speaker 2: looking at the stock right here. We're gonna bring in
Speaker 2: Sam Fazzelli. He is the head of European Research and
Speaker 2: he's a farmer analysts Bloomberg Intelligence. He's based in London.
Speaker 2: He has a PhD. Not really good with the zoom thing,
Speaker 2: but he's pretty smart. I've been told here. So Sam,
Speaker 2: what's going on with Pfizer? These are the great, great
Speaker 2: people that brought us the COVID vaccine stocks down fifty
Speaker 2: percent year to date. It's given up so much of
Speaker 2: kind of what it gained during the COVID period. What's
Speaker 2: the story on Pfizer with the guidance they gave and
Speaker 2: kind of maybe the longer term view.
Speaker 7: Yeah, Hi, Paul.
Speaker 8: By the way, I'm fully zoomed up here, so I
Speaker 8: don't know zoom thing was. Look, I mean it's I.
Speaker 3: Literally I don't know if you've got only one left
Speaker 3: in the office. I mean, just for the people on Uh,
Speaker 3: let me see this YouTube, all right.
Speaker 2: I'm making a I'm making a phone call to somebody.
Speaker 3: This is ridiculous.
Speaker 7: It's a no, no, no, they're all they're all.
Speaker 8: They're all having tea time.
Speaker 7: Come on, now.
Speaker 8: Look, the the thing with Pfizer is that they've there's
Speaker 8: been this uncertainty since the massive boom in COVID vaccine sales,
Speaker 8: et cetera, as to what is the long term shape
Speaker 8: of this business. And you know, frankly, we've just had
Speaker 8: cut after cut after cut, and we're now being told
Speaker 8: that maybe next year, instead of the eight billion that
Speaker 8: consensus was looking for for COVID vaccines is going to
Speaker 8: be five. Maybe instead of the a five billion of
Speaker 8: packed slovid sales.
Speaker 7: Is going to be three. So you know, that's a
Speaker 7: big cut.
Speaker 8: But in reality, if you take out Covid, and you
Speaker 8: take out the acquisition they've just completed today or yesterday,
Speaker 8: the at least going forward, if you take those numbers
Speaker 8: out for twenty twenty four, you're still a couple of
Speaker 8: billion or a billion or so short of consensus. So
Speaker 8: it's not just about vaccines, it's not just about pack slovid.
Speaker 8: Business is tough for this company, which is why they're
Speaker 8: doing the deal they're doing.
Speaker 5: Sam, you mentioned the deal they're doing acquiring Cgena, a
Speaker 5: canter drug manufacturer. What could Pfiser have done or should
Speaker 5: Piser have done differently with the best fit of hindsight,
Speaker 5: it's down fifty seven percent from a December twenty twenty
Speaker 5: one peak and lost almost two hundred billion dollars in
Speaker 5: market value.
Speaker 8: Yeah, I honestly don't think it's something that I mean,
Speaker 8: clearly they could have had a more exciting pipeline, you know,
Speaker 8: if things had gone better for them in the obesity
Speaker 8: drug that they reported a week or two ago. There
Speaker 8: are quite a lot of headwinds for this company, which
Speaker 8: is again why they're doing the deal.
Speaker 7: The reality is it's just the stock is resetting to.
Speaker 8: What the facts are in the world of COVID, and
Speaker 8: it was very difficult to second guest those. Nobody knew
Speaker 8: how bad the vaccine fatigue would be when it comes
Speaker 8: to dealing with the second and third year or fourth
Speaker 8: year of boosters.
Speaker 7: Nobody knows what is going to be next year. I
Speaker 7: actually think, and I think they've said it.
Speaker 8: Themselves today, that they're being as conservative as possible on
Speaker 8: the COVID vaccine front for next year. It's they're assuming
Speaker 8: the same as this year, but the lower sales in
Speaker 8: terms of foll use for lower sales, So let's see
Speaker 8: how this pans out.
Speaker 7: Is it going to be a better year for them?
Speaker 8: Is this the low point from which guidance is going
Speaker 8: to start going up is what I think everybody's going
Speaker 8: to have to be figuring out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and when you look at the an R function
Speaker 2: on the Bloomberg terminal professer, which is analyst recommendations, it's
Speaker 2: right as Sam was suggesting, fourteen buys, fourteen holes. The
Speaker 2: street has no idea what's going on with this name. Sam,
Speaker 2: let's broad that out a little bit. You mentioned the
Speaker 2: weight loss drugs, and that is boy if Ai was
Speaker 2: the early part of twenty twenty three's driver of the market.
Speaker 2: It seems like these weight loss drugs have been the
Speaker 2: driver for the second half of the year, big big store. Here,
Speaker 2: can you and I know you guys at Bloomberg Intelligence
Speaker 2: have done a ton of work on let's have a big,
Speaker 2: big seminal research report out on this market. Here, can
Speaker 2: you frame out kind of where we are today with
Speaker 2: these weight loss drugs and how much of a driver
Speaker 2: is it for the farmer industry going forward?
Speaker 8: Yeah, so for the industry as a whole. Let me
Speaker 8: just start with your last question. I think a lot
Speaker 8: of people are getting into the game. You know that
Speaker 8: Rash has just got announce a deal. You've got Astra
Speaker 8: Zenekos got into this. Pfizer is doing its best to
Speaker 8: stay in the game. One company that did rule themselves
Speaker 8: out is Johnson and Johnson. They said, it's two crowded,
Speaker 8: too busy, We're not interested, and they have a pretty
Speaker 8: powerful oncology business. But and then where are we going
Speaker 8: with this? With this u with these drugs. The reality
Speaker 8: is that the more we see from them in terms
Speaker 8: of the control of other obesity related side of issues,
Speaker 8: cardiovascular disease, kidney disease, and in time cancer and other
Speaker 8: types of diseases that are the results of this upsetting
Speaker 8: balance in the body, which is essentially what happens in
Speaker 8: these patients. They are what we call a constantly under
Speaker 8: a state of inflammation, which is bad. I mean inflammatory response.
Speaker 8: The whole body is under that stress when you have
Speaker 8: extra poundage around. So that's what I think. These drugs
Speaker 8: are going to be shown to continue to be powerful,
Speaker 8: but we're going to get more data, We're going to
Speaker 8: get more competitive competition coming. Prices are going to have
Speaker 8: to go up, and I'm assuming volume will go up
Speaker 8: on the back of it.
Speaker 5: And Sam, is there an indication or an area that's
Speaker 5: most similar or reminiscent to you of weight loss drugs
Speaker 5: in terms of the potential market. I'm just looking at
Speaker 5: some of the stock moves we've seen with Novo and
Speaker 5: Lily and a lot of the small caps, and it
Speaker 5: does remind me of the gold rush that was COVID vaccines.
Speaker 7: Yep. Except the COVID vaccines.
Speaker 8: You know, we were vaccinating an entire population to try
Speaker 8: and manage that pressure, and we I think we did
Speaker 8: the most countries at a pretty good job of that.
Speaker 8: But then you come back to the diseases endemic and
Speaker 8: most of the countries are now suggesting it for only
Speaker 8: sixty five plus, certainly in the UK where I am,
Speaker 8: and the reality.
Speaker 7: Is a lot of people got bored with it. I
Speaker 7: don't think people are going to get bored with obesity drugs.
Speaker 7: Some people are not going to tolerate them. Some people
Speaker 7: are not going.
Speaker 8: To be able to take them for fifty two weeks
Speaker 8: or whatever, eighty eight weeks, which was the latest data
Speaker 8: set that camera, But that doesn't matter as long as
Speaker 8: they can keep their weight down, take a holiday from
Speaker 8: the drug, come back to it. I think this is
Speaker 8: a much more sticky market than covid Vaccini's was.
Speaker 5: Yeah very quickly.
Speaker 7: Though.
Speaker 5: Is it reminiscent of kind of hepsi in terms of
Speaker 5: the fact that these drugs do require you to be
Speaker 5: on them forever? Essentially?
Speaker 8: Yeah, But again, if you remember Hipsey was a blip,
Speaker 8: we had a large rise and then everybody got under
Speaker 8: control and helps he was curative.
Speaker 7: We don't have a curative setting here.
Speaker 8: I think the best thing I'm going to equal it
Speaker 8: to potentially is if we get a highly effective Alzheimer's drug.
Speaker 8: Remember the obesity game has been in play for ten
Speaker 8: twenty years.
Speaker 7: Now we've got effective drugs.
Speaker 8: I think we might see that with Alzheimer's in the
Speaker 8: next ten to fifteen years.
Speaker 2: I mean, the headquarters for Bloomberg in London is spectacular
Speaker 2: Queen Victoria Street. It is the absolute coolest building you'll
Speaker 2: ever see or and these knuckleheads are not in the office.
Speaker 2: I'm going to make a phone call as soon as
Speaker 2: we're done here. Sam Fazzelli, head of European Research. He
Speaker 2: covers all the farmer stuff for Bloomberg Intelligence, one of
Speaker 2: the top form analysts in the city of London for
Speaker 2: Bloomberg Intelligence.
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Speaker 2: Some news out on Tesla today. They're recalling two million
Speaker 2: cars to fix autopilot safety flaws. That sounds kind of important.
Speaker 2: Let's check in with somebody who knows this stuff, cold
Speaker 2: Steve Man, Global auto market research leader Bloomberg Intelligence. He's
Speaker 2: based in Princeton, New Jersey. Not in and of itself
Speaker 2: is news because for ten years he ran our Asia
Speaker 2: business for Bloomberg Intelligence. Somehow he got back into this
Speaker 2: country despite all my efforts to keep him out. He's
Speaker 2: a good man, he's a great analyst. We appreciate getting
Speaker 2: some time, and Steve, don't be afraid. You can get
Speaker 2: on that New Jersey trains and get up to New
Speaker 2: York City, the capital of the financial world, anytime you want.
Speaker 7: Will do.
Speaker 2: Thanks for joining us, Steve. What do we make here
Speaker 2: of Tesla?
Speaker 7: Here?
Speaker 2: Is this a problem? I mean just sounds like it
Speaker 2: kind of a standard auto issue.
Speaker 9: It is it is a standard auto issue. If you
Speaker 9: just look at the surface, it's two million cars. There's
Speaker 9: a lot of vehicles, it's everything they've built so far.
Speaker 9: It's it's in terms of costs, it's a minor change,
Speaker 9: it's an over the air fix. But what's really I
Speaker 9: think we'll get into the investor's mind is how is
Speaker 9: this going to impact this company going forward? Because they
Speaker 9: do have an aggressive target to roll out AI, roll
Speaker 9: out autonomous vehicle at level five fully automated by next year.
Speaker 9: So now this recall it's about a simple fix at
Speaker 9: the level too, a much more basic level in UH
Speaker 9: driving automation. So it puts in a question like, look,
Speaker 9: you know, is ELON is a test like going to
Speaker 9: get to a level five, a much more sophisticate level
Speaker 9: next year.
Speaker 5: And see when you look at it, you mentioned that
Speaker 5: it's an over there where over the air software fix.
Speaker 5: This is a two year probe. So when you talk
Speaker 5: about expectations for fully autonomous vehicles, kind of where could
Speaker 5: that target move If this is just a signal that
Speaker 5: again Tesla is going to have to punt.
Speaker 9: Just a little bit, well, you know, I think the
Speaker 9: fix is kind of small and like you said earlier,
Speaker 9: it's I think it's a little bit too early to
Speaker 9: say if this was significant delay that, but it does
Speaker 9: put into an investor's mind, like you know, some doubts,
Speaker 9: right if you look at the valuation for Tesla, it's
Speaker 9: pretty a big chunk of it. It's about AI, it's
Speaker 9: about autonomous vehicle, and because of this recall, it's likely
Speaker 9: to you know, put some doubts into the investor's mind
Speaker 9: in terms of are they going to achieve it now?
Speaker 9: If they don't achieve it next year, I have no
Speaker 9: doubts they will achieve it. I mean, that's the where
Speaker 9: the world is moving to wright AI. They're going to
Speaker 9: achieve it now. You know, there are some questions in
Speaker 9: terms of how they're going to get there. Are they
Speaker 9: going to get their next year or they do they
Speaker 9: need to add other you know, other equipment for example
Speaker 9: to get them there.
Speaker 5: Uh?
Speaker 9: Do they have to add more software redundancy to get
Speaker 9: them there? Because of this recall? So delays potentially delays,
Speaker 9: But I still think they will get there eventually.
Speaker 2: Hey, Steve, you know, one of the issues out there
Speaker 2: as it relates to electric vehicles has been trying to
Speaker 2: get a sense of what the ultimate demand is for evs.
Speaker 2: I just bought a new vehicle, had zero interest in
Speaker 2: paying any kind of premium to get an EV so
Speaker 2: I went with the old internal combustion engine. What's your think,
Speaker 2: what's your take on kind of global demand for evs.
Speaker 2: Even Ford announce that they're cutting production of their F
Speaker 2: one fifty E truck.
Speaker 9: I think there's there's big, huge differences depending on what
Speaker 9: region you're talking about. You know, we've China that's definitely
Speaker 9: going higher. It's you know, they're selling one million vehicle
Speaker 9: EV's battery EV's one million battery evs, you know a month.
Speaker 9: That's how much US sells in a year. So they're accelerating.
Speaker 9: Now if you're at you know, if you're talking about
Speaker 9: US and Europe, there's some delay and the main reason
Speaker 9: why is the battery supply chain is not built out
Speaker 9: for the US and European market. So what that means
Speaker 9: is the cost, the end cost to the consumer will
Speaker 9: be much higher because they have to import those those
Speaker 9: batteries into into those regions. Now, we have the Inflation
Speaker 9: Reduction Act, you know, that's that's actually coming online, and
Speaker 9: with that act, it's actually uh, what they're doing is
Speaker 9: limiting the amount of materials and components battery materials, battery
Speaker 9: components from China. That will also raise price for consumer here.
Speaker 9: So there is some risk in terms of demand in
Speaker 9: the next i say, in the next three years, but
Speaker 9: because of the long term this inflation reduction Act, it's
Speaker 9: actually the whole intent is to build out the supply chain,
Speaker 9: the battery supply chain in the US, and hopefully as
Speaker 9: those capacity, battery manufacturing capacity ramps up, the costs will
Speaker 9: come down for battery production and that's going to get
Speaker 9: passed on to consumer and hopefully that will you know,
Speaker 9: create some demand lift and lift demand up for battery evs.
Speaker 5: And see if you mentioned the demand overseas. Just looking
Speaker 5: at the terminal the financials from Tesla, about half of
Speaker 5: their revenue generated from the US and just over twenty
Speaker 5: two percent based on twenty twenty two sales in China.
Speaker 5: How do those competitive dynamics though shape up? Given Neo
Speaker 5: and other companies operating in China, and as Paul mentioned.
Speaker 9: The US competition, yeah, it is, it is. It's I
Speaker 9: think evs in China. You know, China's always been a
Speaker 9: very hyper competitive market for the auto industry. It hasn't
Speaker 9: been for battery EV's, but it's becoming that. It's you know,
Speaker 9: there's Neil, there's x pun UH, there's leap motor. You
Speaker 9: can yeah. You know, in the last few years, there's
Speaker 9: been a lot of uh public companies. There's been the
Speaker 9: public companies that came uh that listed uh y you know,
Speaker 9: and there's all uh, there's all uh. There's a whole
Speaker 9: host of private companies that are producing battery EV's. So
Speaker 9: it's it's becoming a tougher market. But Elon, Musk and
Speaker 9: Tesla still have a niche. They still have I would say,
Speaker 9: you know, a m a majority uh of the market
Speaker 9: in in China for battery EV's, But if you look
Speaker 9: at if you include pahvs, that's a different story. Byd
Speaker 9: is the the market share leader. But if you just
Speaker 9: look at the battery ev Tesla still leads because of uh,
Speaker 9: the the brand cachet it carries.
Speaker 2: So, you know, one of the issues here in the States,
Speaker 2: I think there is This is just my opinion, not
Speaker 2: based on any research but just talking to people. I
Speaker 2: don't think the demand here for evs is as strong
Speaker 2: as maybe the companies think it is or maybe some
Speaker 2: analysts think it is.
Speaker 9: Yeah, that yeah, that's true. We're actually you know, sales
Speaker 9: is probably gonna definitely will slow down. You know, we're
Speaker 9: probably thinking around a ten percent range right from you know,
Speaker 9: high mid mid kind of double digits. So it's definitely
Speaker 9: going to slow down. And I think it's a major story.
Speaker 9: Major reason for that is the affordability. Like I said earlier,
Speaker 9: batteries are are still being imported. There's gonna be bans
Speaker 9: and materials, you know, because the China actually owns the
Speaker 9: battery supply chain. And if you're banning that technology from China,
Speaker 9: and where else are you going to get the batteries
Speaker 9: from really, But so that means they'll take time. It'll
Speaker 9: take time for the US to build up the supply chain.
Speaker 9: And once they have the supply chain, I think the
Speaker 9: costs will come down. Hopefully by then, the you know,
Speaker 9: the EV charging infrastructure will be you know, expanded, uh
Speaker 9: further to what it is what we have today and
Speaker 9: uh and with the lower pricing with uh you know,
Speaker 9: EV infrastructure built out, charging officure structure built out, hopefully
Speaker 9: it will create some demand for battery V. And but
Speaker 9: that's like I said earlier, that's probably two three years
Speaker 9: from now. I think we're gonna take a break, take
Speaker 9: a We're gonna slow down a little bit until the
Speaker 9: supply chain catches up.
Speaker 5: Is the cyber truck actually gonna drive sales for Tesla?
Speaker 9: I don't think so. I don't think it's a high
Speaker 9: volume product for cyber truck for Tesla. Uh, it's you know,
Speaker 9: the styling is not for everyone. Everybody everybody, uh, you know,
Speaker 9: everybody's used to the traditional truck. They have to prove themselves.
Speaker 9: You have strong incumbents GM, Ford and Chrysler that they
Speaker 9: have to overcome the mindset of the average consumer that
Speaker 9: buys pickup truck to go with the cyber truck. So
Speaker 9: I don't think so. But Tesla is planning to roll
Speaker 9: out a compact vehicle. You know, some have dubbed it
Speaker 9: as a model to uh. And you know, I think
Speaker 9: that could be the next things, that next thing that
Speaker 9: we should be focusing on, because that you know that
Speaker 9: that that's going to help them not only expand into
Speaker 9: other segments within the auto market, but also help them
Speaker 9: expand into other regions as well, because pickup trucks is
Speaker 9: really big in the US, but not so in other
Speaker 9: parts of the world.
Speaker 2: Right, Steve Man, absolute best Steve Man, global Auto market
Speaker 2: research leader Bloomberg Intelligence. He is back in the USA,
Speaker 2: as they say, based on our Princeton office. We'll be
Speaker 2: talking a lot more to Steve Man about the global
Speaker 2: auto industry, unique insights into Asia given his time over there,
Speaker 2: so good to have him back.
Speaker 6: You're listening to the Take Catcher Live program bloom Markets
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Speaker 2: Mike Green joints as Supportfolio Manager Chief Strategist to simplify
Speaker 2: asset management. Joins us live here in our Bloomberg Interactive
Speaker 2: Broker studio. Mike, I'm not going to be paying attention.
Speaker 2: I'll probably be sitting on a train somewhere. You will
Speaker 2: be paying attention to, as will other professional investors out there.
Speaker 2: What do you want to hear? What do you think
Speaker 2: we're going to hear? What should we hear?
Speaker 10: Do you think well, I think the market is pretty
Speaker 10: much prices in at this point, right, there's a zero
Speaker 10: percent probability slightly less than one percent probability that there's
Speaker 10: going to be any actual movement. Fed's not going to
Speaker 10: upset the apple cart in that process. At the same time,
Speaker 10: I think everybody is expecting, effectively a stern lecture on
Speaker 10: financial conditions and that we, you know, really should be
Speaker 10: more responsible in our thought process. And I think that's
Speaker 10: going to be the underlying story.
Speaker 7: Right.
Speaker 10: We saw with inflation today that the FED is actually
Speaker 10: rapidly moving towards the subjective of two percent. Some people
Speaker 10: would actually argue, myself included, that we're probably going to
Speaker 10: overshoot to the downside, and that becomes the key question.
Speaker 10: But I think the one thing, if I were to
Speaker 10: make a quick observation, it's that everybody keeps pricing the
Speaker 10: markets off of twenty five basis point moves and that's
Speaker 10: a pretty good model when you're talking about hikes, because
Speaker 10: the FED tends to hike in a somewhat conservative fashion.
Speaker 10: It was a surprise when they did seventy fives and
Speaker 10: fifties contributed to the volatility in twenty twenty twenty two.
Speaker 10: As we look at cuts, though those actually you have
Speaker 10: about a fifty to fifty chance about equal probability of
Speaker 10: fifty basis point cuts. And so a lot of the
Speaker 10: statements around we're going to cut early, we're going to
Speaker 10: cut in the first quarter, I think are contingent on
Speaker 10: the idea that the only cut that can occur is
Speaker 10: at twenty five. I think it's more likely actually that
Speaker 10: we probably see a fifty later in the year, and
Speaker 10: that would suggest that the probabilities that the market has
Speaker 10: are not quite as crazy as people think. Right if
Speaker 10: we were to wait and be more patient and not
Speaker 10: cut in the first quarter or certainly not January, but
Speaker 10: instead we're to wait and cut in July, August, September,
Speaker 10: et cetera, and do so in fifty basis point increments
Speaker 10: that would be consistent with pricing. Also feels probably more accurate.
Speaker 5: So what happened in the first half of the year.
Speaker 5: Though from a market's perspective, if the Fed, as you said,
Speaker 5: kind of punts until there's called a jumbo cut in
Speaker 5: the summer, well.
Speaker 10: That becomes the real question, right, because what we where
Speaker 10: we are today, is it a very bifurcated market. If
Speaker 10: I'm Apple or if I'm a wealthy US individual, I'm
Speaker 10: celebrating the fact that interest rates are higher because I've
Speaker 10: got a significant amount of cash on my balance sheet
Speaker 10: or in my bank accounts. I'm suddenly earning a really
Speaker 10: attractive return on that, and with the retreat and inflation,
Speaker 10: that makes me feel much wealthier. If I'm a senior citizen,
Speaker 10: I've benefited from an eight point three eight percent increase
Speaker 10: in social Security this year. That now looks like one
Speaker 10: of the greatest giveaways in history, right, So when we
Speaker 10: think about it from that perspective, actually, if the FED
Speaker 10: starts to cut it becomes actually a problem for those
Speaker 10: entities on the flip side of the equation. We're seeing
Speaker 10: from things like the NFIB small business surveys the credit
Speaker 10: availability is not loose for small businesses. That small businesses
Speaker 10: are really struggling, and the lower income of it, Americans
Speaker 10: who need access to credit to pay their daily bills,
Speaker 10: they're also really struggling using credit cards, thirty percent interest rates, etc.
Speaker 10: So this is a very bifurcated market, and it really
Speaker 10: becomes an interesting question of do we get to the
Speaker 10: point where something breaks and the FED is forced to
Speaker 10: do this or as many particularly that are active in
Speaker 10: the FED, FED researchers, etc. Are kind of hoping for
Speaker 10: it is the FED behave in a proactive fashion. I
Speaker 10: think the odds of that are low.
Speaker 2: Hey, Mike, you've been doing this a long time. Equities, credit, FX, commodities,
Speaker 2: all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 5: If we're in a higher.
Speaker 2: For longer kind of range here, I mean, I guess
Speaker 2: we'll start cutting at some point this year. Where do
Speaker 2: you see some of the best opportunities right here, just
Speaker 2: across asset classes.
Speaker 3: Well, I think that.
Speaker 10: There's a couple of interesting things that have happened that suggest,
Speaker 10: as we particularly come into the presidential election here, that
Speaker 10: the opportunities are relatively limited for Biden to goose the
Speaker 10: economy once more. And so some of the areas that
Speaker 10: have fallen deeply out of favor would include areas in
Speaker 10: green investment. Things tied to the Inflation Reduction Act actually
Speaker 10: point to some of those as having fallen significantly enough
Speaker 10: that now is a contrarian play. They become somewhat interesting
Speaker 10: some of the lithium plays, et cetera. On the flip
Speaker 10: side of that. And just to be very clear, the
Speaker 10: Inflation Reduction Act terribly named because it can be used
Speaker 10: to stimulate the economy, but you know, we have to
Speaker 10: actually acknowledge that that will be one of the goals
Speaker 10: going into twenty twenty four. The other thing that I
Speaker 10: would highlight is is that we've now seen a really
Speaker 10: interesting event where g has made the pilgrimage to Mecca, right,
Speaker 10: and that I think is as we're seeing in the
Speaker 10: weakness of the Chinese economy. That was something I called
Speaker 10: for earlier in the year. That's certainly borne out. A
Speaker 10: lot of people had expected this giant, you know, giant
Speaker 10: China rebound on a China reopening. We're now seeing that
Speaker 10: their economy is very structurally weak.
Speaker 2: That's something that continues into twenty forty.
Speaker 10: I think, well, that becomes the interesting question because that unfortunately,
Speaker 10: this is a situation with both in which both g
Speaker 10: and Biden need to stimulate their economy. They need to
Speaker 10: figure out ways to make sure that we don't go
Speaker 10: into deeper economic drawdowns that could be proved problematic for
Speaker 10: each of them. For Biden it would mean a failure
Speaker 10: to be re elected, or for the Democratic Party it
Speaker 10: would mean a failure to be re elected. If Biden
Speaker 10: doesn't stand Fji, it has far more dire consequences, he
Speaker 10: goes out with his boots on, and.
Speaker 5: So does that present an opportunity you're saying within Chinese equities.
Speaker 10: I think it's interesting if you look at some of
Speaker 10: the Chinese equities, for example, if you look at the
Speaker 10: large cap Chinese ETFs, or you.
Speaker 5: Look at the the FXI is what you're look.
Speaker 10: FXI would be an interesting example of that, as would
Speaker 10: you know Asher for example. Those are interesting contrarian opportunities
Speaker 10: where the pricing is I would argue underappreciating the potential
Speaker 10: for a stimulus type rebound.
Speaker 5: Actually, just to call that out, the FXI is return
Speaker 5: a loss of fifteen percent this year a wait in
Speaker 5: the face of ESPX being.
Speaker 10: A right without recovering in twenty twenty two. Right, So
Speaker 10: it's not like it's a reversal from last year. It's
Speaker 10: been down fairly significantly.
Speaker 2: How about just kind of the US versus international versus
Speaker 2: emerging markets, where do you see kind of the best
Speaker 2: I guess risk reward here.
Speaker 10: Well, China certainly falls into the potential for an emerging
Speaker 10: market rebound, and we are kind of at this situation
Speaker 10: where if I look at things like oil prices, etc.
Speaker 10: They've retreated significantly. Many people were very bullish on it
Speaker 10: going into this year. Obviously that's failed to materialize. That
Speaker 10: suggests that the growing consumption out of places like the
Speaker 10: emerging markets has been weaker than anticipated. We've seen supply
Speaker 10: cuts rather than dramatic additions, US production being the notable
Speaker 10: exception there. If I look at the emerging markets, you
Speaker 10: know they clearly have growth potential. India is obviously benefiting
Speaker 10: from picking up from China there, and I would highlight
Speaker 10: that is the notable outlier in the emerging market space.
Speaker 10: But if I look elsewhere around the world, a China
Speaker 10: slowdown is really problematic for the emerging markets, and so
Speaker 10: you can get a momentary bounce, But if we're really
Speaker 10: looking at kind of the much broader picture of how
Speaker 10: this develops, we're now in this uncomfortable time period where
Speaker 10: it's about how do we change supply chains as compared
Speaker 10: to how do we dramatically expand them as we did
Speaker 10: under the China regime. And so I think emerging markets
Speaker 10: continue to be challenged. They continue to be in a
Speaker 10: situation where, particularly with very strong US dollar against emerging
Speaker 10: markets and high interest rates, it's becoming harder and harder
Speaker 10: for people to justify investment in many of those regions.
Speaker 5: If we can say internationally, what's your view on the
Speaker 5: UK and Europe, it just feels like, again you pointed
Speaker 5: to Bloomberg TV talking about the IPO market, for all
Speaker 5: intents and purposes, Europe is nil in that front.
Speaker 10: Well, I think something really interesting is happening in Europe
Speaker 10: and that they're suddenly actually facing the same thing that
Speaker 10: they did with Japan in nineteen eighty nine. Right, So,
Speaker 10: if you look at the nineteen eighties, Europe enjoyed quite
Speaker 10: a bit of shaden freud at the idea of the
Speaker 10: United States becoming second fiddle to Japan. You saw that
Speaker 10: exact same type of shad and freud as it related
Speaker 10: to China. And what changed it, of course, was Japan
Speaker 10: began going after the European auto market. Same things happening
Speaker 10: right now. China going after the European auto market, I
Speaker 10: would argue, has been one of the key catalysts and
Speaker 10: changing the tenor and tone of behavior towards China. I
Speaker 10: think that's one of the reasons why China is slowly
Speaker 10: backing away from some of its aggressiveness on trade. On
Speaker 10: the flips out of it. Europe itself is just so
Speaker 10: structurally challenged that it becomes a really interesting question of
Speaker 10: how far does it have to go before change actually
Speaker 10: starts to emerge. And we just have not seen an
Speaker 10: incredible amount of emphasis on growth in Europe. They've effectively
Speaker 10: tried to limit the amount of damage to the euro
Speaker 10: limit the amount of damage to their economy from terrible
Speaker 10: choices they made around energy in particular over the last decade.
Speaker 10: And to change that is going to require a radical
Speaker 10: reimagination of Europe where they try to go for growth
Speaker 10: as compared to preserving something that really can't be preserved anymore.
Speaker 2: Have you ever gotten involved with crypto or what is
Speaker 2: your involvement or exposure to crypto? Well, so that's not
Speaker 2: my generation, but I mean.
Speaker 10: Yeah, well I think I think you and I are
Speaker 10: roughly the same generation. But look, I think that there's
Speaker 10: some really interesting stuff around crypto. It has some of
Speaker 10: the same positive bubble dynamics associated with the build out
Speaker 10: of the Internet in the late nineteen ninety and I
Speaker 10: think that there's actually an incredible need to move to
Speaker 10: what I call digital securities right digitally native securities, the
Speaker 10: idea of a smart token that has far more information
Speaker 10: contained in it than a qsip does. For example, opens
Speaker 10: up the ideas of creating all sorts of interesting structured products,
Speaker 10: investment vehicles that people could desperately use, et cetera. But
Speaker 10: crypto itself is basically a technology now in search of
Speaker 10: that of that need. And I think it's a fascinating
Speaker 10: insight in terms of crypto itself that the only thing
Speaker 10: we have is speculation after ten plus years.
Speaker 2: All right, Mike, thanks so much for joining us. Appreciate
Speaker 2: getting you on our studio. Mike Greenie's portfolio manager, chief
Speaker 2: strategist at Simplify Asset Management.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to the Bloomberg Markets podcasts. You can
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Speaker 1: at Matt Miller nineteen seventy three.
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