Speaker 1: Global business news twenty four hours a day. If Bloomberg
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Speaker 1: This is a Bloomberg business flag from Bloomberg World Handquarters.
Speaker 1: I'm Charlie Pellett. Stocks are trading lawer bouncing along the
Speaker 1: bottom on this Thursday afternoon. Let's head right over to
Speaker 1: the First Word Breaking news desk for today's afternoon call.
Speaker 1: Here he is Bill Maloney. Good afternoon, Charlie. That's right.
Speaker 1: US stocks are under pressure today on this busy day
Speaker 1: for earnings. DALLA is currently down a hundred and twenty
Speaker 1: five points, has to be drop thirteen and NASACT declines
Speaker 1: to small cap six hundreds, down six points, and the
Speaker 1: U S ten yield at one point five six percent.
Speaker 1: Eight out of TENNIS to B sectors are lower, led
Speaker 1: by losses in industrials, materials and energy only. Utilities and
Speaker 1: healthcare gained down. Transports drop one point four percent, and
Speaker 1: as a biotechs outperformed rights twenty points and the VIX
Speaker 1: is higher by eleven percent. Down. Leaders to the downside
Speaker 1: included Intel, American Express and Nike. Fractional games for Caterpillar,
Speaker 1: McDonald's and Microsoft, Southwest Airlines plunged eleven percent after its results,
Speaker 1: well eBay surged as much as twelve point three percent
Speaker 1: after its earnings, and finally, some of the names supporting
Speaker 1: after the belt tonight include Starbucks, A, T and T, Visa, Chipotle,
Speaker 1: and Schlumberg. Live from the first breaking news dask on,
Speaker 1: Bill Maloney, Charlie Okay, thank you very much, Bill Maloney.
Speaker 1: And to hear live breaking news over here, Bloomberg Time Squawk.
Speaker 1: Ask you a w K squawk on your terminal. I'm
Speaker 1: Charlie Pellock. That's a Bloomberg business flash. This is taking
Speaker 1: stock with Kathleen Hayes and Grim Fox on Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: Mario Draggy, the European Central Bank and interest rate policy
Speaker 1: to stimulate the economies of Europe. Here to tell us
Speaker 1: more is Dirk jon Epink. He is a journalist and
Speaker 1: a Senior Fellow at the London Center for Policy Research.
Speaker 1: He can be followed on Twitter at d j E
Speaker 1: E p I n K and he also happens to
Speaker 1: be the author of a book entitled Empire of Little
Speaker 1: Kings inside the European Parliament. Thanks very much for spending
Speaker 1: time with us, Thank you for having me. Now just
Speaker 1: before we get into Mario drag in the U San
Speaker 1: Central Bank, and so one just get people a snapshot
Speaker 1: of what is it like to actually work inside the
Speaker 1: European Parliament. What would be Is there an anecdote or
Speaker 1: a story that best describes the because I've read the
Speaker 1: book and I note that, you know, there are a
Speaker 1: couple sort of idiosyncrasies, like try getting elected as a
Speaker 1: member of the European Parliament from a country of which
Speaker 1: you are not a native. That's yes, that's actually what
Speaker 1: I did. I was the first Dutchman to be elected
Speaker 1: in Belgium for the European Parliament, and legally spoken, it's possible,
Speaker 1: because the European Parliament even supports that sort of legislation
Speaker 1: to get elected in another country. But of course with
Speaker 1: all these different cultures, it's very difficult to get elected.
Speaker 1: You have to first of all speak the language and
Speaker 1: set corently, you have to live there for quite some
Speaker 1: time to show people that you are part of their
Speaker 1: world and actually show them the least I was going
Speaker 1: to show the police that well, yes, actually I had
Speaker 1: to show the police in Belgium that I was really
Speaker 1: living in Belgium at a home there. So it's altogether.
Speaker 1: It's not not easy. For example, a Dutchman elected in
Speaker 1: Belgium is difficult. I think it would be impossible for
Speaker 1: a German to get a German to get elected in Holland,
Speaker 1: or for for somebody from Ireland to get elected in
Speaker 1: the United Kingdom, or somebody from Spain to get elected
Speaker 1: in Portugal. Sold there there are in general seven hundred
Speaker 1: and fifty members of European Parliament, but only a few
Speaker 1: of them are re elected, really elected in a country
Speaker 1: which is not the country of their nationality. You had
Speaker 1: to change your accent, yes, because you know where Dutch
Speaker 1: and Flemish are basically the same language. But there is
Speaker 1: a difference in intonation, which you would also find in
Speaker 1: the United States between a New york Or and somebody
Speaker 1: from Tennessee or from Texas. So if as if as
Speaker 1: a New Yorker, you want to be elected in Texas
Speaker 1: or you would have a constituency in Tennessee, you have
Speaker 1: to slightly adapt your your accent, and the same thing
Speaker 1: you have to do in in Europe, because if a
Speaker 1: New Yorker like Trump wants to get elected in Tennessee
Speaker 1: and he sounds like Trump, then people will say well,
Speaker 1: he's not really from here, um is he part of us?
Speaker 1: So you get questions what as you have to get
Speaker 1: their votes, so you have to create confidence. Talking about vote,
Speaker 1: what has been your reaction to the vote in the
Speaker 1: United Kingdom to leave the European Union. Well, there's something
Speaker 1: I really fear that would happen, because in the end
Speaker 1: the British were mobilizing all their celebrities to get the
Speaker 1: remains side to win, and I thought, when they have
Speaker 1: to do that all the time, something is wrong there.
Speaker 1: And particularly I was very worried about the vote of
Speaker 1: of lower income people and voters because the driving force
Speaker 1: of that election, or that referendum rather was was was immigration.
Speaker 1: And although the British have their own immigration system, they
Speaker 1: got their borders, they are not part of an open
Speaker 1: space of free circulation of people. They were under the
Speaker 1: impression that this flow of people that came to Europe
Speaker 1: last year as over two million to Germany only would
Speaker 1: finally also come to the UK. And so immigration was
Speaker 1: really the driving force that drove the British out of
Speaker 1: the EU. The European Union and the European Central Bank. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they don't always seem to see either eye do they Well,
Speaker 1: you see, the European Central Bank is part of the
Speaker 1: European Union, it's one of the institutions. But the Eurozone.
Speaker 1: I always compare the Eurozone to somebody buying a secondhand car,
Speaker 1: because if you look at the countries, there are different
Speaker 1: philosophies on money, there are different philosophies on budget, economic thinking,
Speaker 1: budgetary thinking. So it is not an optimal current his zone.
Speaker 1: And if the secondhand card starts leaking, something is not
Speaker 1: working and you have to muddle through and trying to
Speaker 1: repair here fixed there another problem comes up, and that
Speaker 1: is basically the euro Zone. Unfortunately, I have to say
Speaker 1: we should have started initially with a smaller group, more coherent,
Speaker 1: and then other countries could have joined when ready. We
Speaker 1: didn't do that. We started with all of us, everybody
Speaker 1: wanted to join, and now we have this problem. Do
Speaker 1: you foresee that Mario dragged his policy of bond buying
Speaker 1: and stimulus. Will it actually work? Um? Not really? In
Speaker 1: European Parliament, I was member of the Economic and Monetary
Speaker 1: Committee asked him very often, you know this q E
Speaker 1: is now going to work because you're going to do it.
Speaker 1: You're not going to taper anytime soon. I understand what
Speaker 1: he tries to do is to keep the Euro as
Speaker 1: a currency on his feet with a zero interest rate
Speaker 1: and with q E. That is the thing he can
Speaker 1: do because if not, if that would be a high
Speaker 1: interest rate and there would be not enough liquid means
Speaker 1: on the market, then basically many banks would get into trouble,
Speaker 1: and uh in institutions as well. And I always compare
Speaker 1: the Eurozone also to if if the United States you
Speaker 1: have a dollar and you would have a monetary union
Speaker 1: with Canada, that would work. But if you then ask
Speaker 1: ask Mexico to join, would already be difficult. If you
Speaker 1: then ask Venezuela to join, I can assure you will
Speaker 1: be disaster. Thank you very much for coming in and
Speaker 1: spending time with us. Dirk jan Epink, journalist, Senior Fellow
Speaker 1: London Center for Policy Research and the author of Empire
Speaker 1: of Little Kings inside the European Parliament. This is Bloomberg.
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