WEBVTT - Bloomberg Businessweek Weekend - June 16th, 2023 0:00:01.360 --> 0:00:05.720 This is Bloomberg Business Wait inside from the reporters and 0:00:05.880 --> 0:00:09.440 editors who bring you America's most trusted business magazine, plus 0:00:09.520 --> 0:00:13.440 bloom oall business finance and tech news. The Bloomberg Business 0:00:13.440 --> 0:00:18.880 Week podcast with Carol Messer and Tim Stenebeck from Bloomberg Radio. 0:00:24.120 --> 0:00:28.240 Says, f. 0:00:33.360 --> 0:00:36.000 Yes, indeed, we are living. 0:00:37.240 --> 0:00:37.680 Instagra. 0:00:38.200 --> 0:00:38.800 Good record. 0:00:38.840 --> 0:00:40.960 I remember listening to this record on my very first 0:00:40.960 --> 0:00:42.440 trip to Amsterdam. 0:00:42.680 --> 0:00:44.080 Oh yeah, was anything involved? 0:00:44.200 --> 0:00:47.800 No, well so I was nothing illegal there. 0:00:48.440 --> 0:00:52.760 That's so true, nicely said. We are living in strange time, 0:00:52.960 --> 0:00:56.440 strange days. This story we want to get to. It's 0:00:56.480 --> 0:01:00.320 in the Bloomberg BusinessWeek newsletter and you can read it. 0:01:00.320 --> 0:01:02.080 It's on the Bloomberg and of course at Bloomberg dot 0:01:02.120 --> 0:01:05.679 com slash newsletters. It is written by Joshua Green. Josh Green, 0:01:05.760 --> 0:01:08.880 National Coursepond at Bloomberg BusinessWeek, who's joining us right now 0:01:08.920 --> 0:01:12.120 on the phone from Washington, d C. And Josh, we 0:01:12.200 --> 0:01:16.160 want to get to it. Talk to us about. 0:01:16.400 --> 0:01:18.600 What is going on. 0:01:18.920 --> 0:01:21.880 Why are these people supporting the former president who hopes 0:01:21.920 --> 0:01:22.960 to be president again. 0:01:24.240 --> 0:01:26.400 Well, yeah, I was up in New Hampshire last week 0:01:26.480 --> 0:01:29.920 and one of the running themes, you know, at the 0:01:30.000 --> 0:01:33.399 various town halls and campaign stops for some of these 0:01:33.440 --> 0:01:37.880 candidates was that they were all either extolling Donald Trump 0:01:38.240 --> 0:01:41.920 or more likely attacking Joe Biden in the Justice Department 0:01:42.160 --> 0:01:46.560 for you know, for going after Trump for indicting him. 0:01:46.800 --> 0:01:50.080 And then of course at the scene in Miami where 0:01:50.080 --> 0:01:55.840 Trump was arrested yesterday was full of not just Trump protesters, 0:01:55.960 --> 0:01:59.680 but twenty twenty four presidential candidates or possible presidential candidates 0:01:59.680 --> 0:02:02.880 who are against him, and yet we're there to support him. 0:02:02.960 --> 0:02:05.480 So I wrote a little bit about the phenomenon of 0:02:05.520 --> 0:02:09.440 what I've come to think of as maga Swifties. Instead 0:02:09.480 --> 0:02:14.160 of being behaving like actual Republican political opponents trying to 0:02:14.160 --> 0:02:18.880 seek the Goop nomination, they're acting like craved Taylor Swift fans, 0:02:19.520 --> 0:02:23.120 fluffing up their hero and attacking his defenders. Have a 0:02:23.160 --> 0:02:25.240 I have a sixteen year old happens to be one 0:02:25.240 --> 0:02:28.400 of these Swifties, so I've I've studied the genotype. 0:02:29.000 --> 0:02:31.919 But my twenty year old daughters here, who's a Swiftie. 0:02:32.240 --> 0:02:34.160 She's going to be really embarrassed that I'm calling her 0:02:34.200 --> 0:02:36.040 out here. But yeah, totally get it when you. 0:02:36.120 --> 0:02:36.720 Make that aware. 0:02:37.080 --> 0:02:42.400 They're everywhere I just don't understandami. He's he's a little 0:02:42.400 --> 0:02:46.320 bit older. You know, he went to Harvard and then 0:02:46.440 --> 0:02:50.320 Yale Law School, So it's not like he completely lacks 0:02:50.360 --> 0:02:54.400 critical thinking skills or is totally ignorant. Why is he 0:02:54.720 --> 0:03:00.359 down here about in Miami, just like on his knee 0:03:00.520 --> 0:03:03.480 kissing up to former President Trump? Does he want to 0:03:03.520 --> 0:03:05.840 be on the ticket? Is there a romantic link we 0:03:05.880 --> 0:03:09.080 don't know about, Like, what's the deal? Joe Webber, by 0:03:09.160 --> 0:03:10.680 the ways, a great question. 0:03:11.080 --> 0:03:13.799 With the Veke who I saw in New Hampshire last week, 0:03:14.000 --> 0:03:15.720 he makes a point of mentioning that he is the 0:03:15.760 --> 0:03:19.600 only millennial Republican running for president. That might have something 0:03:19.639 --> 0:03:20.560 to do with the swift. 0:03:20.600 --> 0:03:21.880 Bragging about being a millennial. 0:03:22.320 --> 0:03:25.720 I think more likely is that these candidates are all 0:03:25.760 --> 0:03:28.560 looking at polls of who votes in Republican primaries, and 0:03:28.560 --> 0:03:30.880 we've seen a bunch of them since the indictment came out. 0:03:31.280 --> 0:03:35.240 And what Republican voters think is that Donald Trump got screwed, 0:03:35.640 --> 0:03:38.960 that the indictment is political. They don't like it. It's 0:03:39.000 --> 0:03:42.680 made Trump more popular, not less popular, and they're very, 0:03:42.760 --> 0:03:46.200 very angry at anybody who criticizes Trump over the indictment. 0:03:46.960 --> 0:03:49.200 And so I think a lot of these candidates who've 0:03:49.240 --> 0:03:52.320 been releasing supportive statements, or as the Vake did in Miami, 0:03:52.360 --> 0:03:56.000 mayor Francisco Suarez, who's rumored to baby beginning in the race, 0:03:56.520 --> 0:03:59.560 actually showed up to support Trump again, their opponent in 0:03:59.600 --> 0:04:02.040 the race. I think the way they're doing this is 0:04:02.080 --> 0:04:04.920 because they decided it's a way to get attention. It's 0:04:04.960 --> 0:04:08.560 a way to sort of like demonstrate their bona fides 0:04:08.640 --> 0:04:11.560 to Republican primary voters. But the problem in talking to 0:04:11.600 --> 0:04:15.480 Republican strategists, and I talked to Trump's old strategist Steve 0:04:15.520 --> 0:04:17.840 Bannon in this piece, is that if you're trying to 0:04:17.880 --> 0:04:21.279 run against Trump, ultimately, you need to have a strategy 0:04:21.320 --> 0:04:23.039 to beat it and going out there and saying what 0:04:23.080 --> 0:04:26.320 a great guy he is and have terrible his tormentors 0:04:26.320 --> 0:04:29.000 that the Justice Department are isn't doing anything to bring 0:04:29.040 --> 0:04:31.360 down Donald Trump. So Bannon told me for the piece 0:04:31.400 --> 0:04:33.240 he thinks the primary is already over and Trump's going 0:04:33.320 --> 0:04:36.240 to be the nominate. But it is a really bizarre 0:04:36.360 --> 0:04:39.640 kind of collective behavior that we see among these Republican candidates. 0:04:39.640 --> 0:04:42.440 Because while it may get them TV time, and while 0:04:42.440 --> 0:04:45.680 it may get them, you know, social media buzz or 0:04:45.680 --> 0:04:48.799 what have you, it's not getting them any closer to Trump. 0:04:48.839 --> 0:04:51.599 And the polls, who now has the biggest lead he's 0:04:51.680 --> 0:04:55.279 ever had in the twenty twenty four primary polls. You know, 0:04:55.360 --> 0:04:57.799 these guys are all falling further behind instead of catching 0:04:57.880 --> 0:04:58.320 up to him. 0:04:58.320 --> 0:05:00.680 But what if he can't run right? What if? What 0:05:00.720 --> 0:05:04.359 if he's actually not available, not on the playing field, 0:05:04.440 --> 0:05:06.560 and I'm allowed? And then and then I think the 0:05:06.640 --> 0:05:09.080 vex move becomes a little bit more clear, which is 0:05:09.720 --> 0:05:13.160 I'm the closest, most sympathetic guy that you have to 0:05:13.360 --> 0:05:16.159 that you have and I you know, basically in spirit, 0:05:16.320 --> 0:05:19.720 I am maga incarnate yet as a millennial. 0:05:19.640 --> 0:05:20.200 At your back. 0:05:20.279 --> 0:05:22.320 So I did a lot of calling around about that, 0:05:22.480 --> 0:05:25.279 talk to lawyers, talk to Republican strategists, talk to voters 0:05:25.279 --> 0:05:29.240 at these town halls in New Hampshire, and basically, you know, 0:05:29.320 --> 0:05:31.680 if it doesn't seem like the legal system is going 0:05:31.760 --> 0:05:37.719 to move quickly enough to hypothetically convict Trump before people 0:05:37.720 --> 0:05:40.520 start voting. But you know, he could get hit by lightning. 0:05:40.920 --> 0:05:43.760 He could, you know, I don't know, decide he'd rather 0:05:43.800 --> 0:05:45.480 spend his days on the golf course. I don't think 0:05:45.480 --> 0:05:48.159 anything is going to happen, but certainly it's possible that 0:05:48.240 --> 0:05:51.680 if you were somehow sidelined willingly or otherwise, then the 0:05:51.720 --> 0:05:54.479 field is ride open, and being the kind of you 0:05:54.520 --> 0:05:57.479 know Trump he also ran, becomes an actual emblem that 0:05:57.520 --> 0:05:59.880 could help you. In one of these new polls from CB, 0:06:00.680 --> 0:06:03.280 three quarters of Republican primary voters stead of Trump can't 0:06:03.279 --> 0:06:06.160 be president, they want somebody just like Trump. So all 0:06:06.200 --> 0:06:10.360 these guys are sort of scrambling role. I'm old enough 0:06:10.400 --> 0:06:13.880 to remember back in twenty sixteen when every candidate in 0:06:13.920 --> 0:06:16.560 the race wouldn't attacked Trump because they thought, oh, well, 0:06:16.640 --> 0:06:18.800 somehow he's going to get sidelined or his voters would 0:06:18.839 --> 0:06:21.600 just magically change their minds and lo and behold. That 0:06:21.640 --> 0:06:24.159 never happened, and it still hasn't happened. So I don't 0:06:24.160 --> 0:06:26.240 put a lot of stock in the kind of praying 0:06:26.279 --> 0:06:28.800 and hoping that he just bows out strategy, but that 0:06:28.920 --> 0:06:31.760 is that is what most Republican candidates seem to be 0:06:31.800 --> 0:06:32.520 doing at this point. 0:06:32.640 --> 0:06:34.840 Can we talk about the Nikki Haley approached a little bit, 0:06:34.880 --> 0:06:38.359 because I thought that one was an interesting one. What 0:06:38.400 --> 0:06:38.800 did she do? 0:06:38.920 --> 0:06:44.560 Yes, you know, Nicky Haley is sort of the Republican 0:06:44.600 --> 0:06:48.800 hamlet to cycle. When the indictment was first announced, she 0:06:49.120 --> 0:06:51.000 came out in the press and said it was terribly 0:06:51.080 --> 0:06:55.280 reckless to have done stuff like kept you know, classified 0:06:55.360 --> 0:06:58.760 nuclear documents in the mar Lago bathroom. But she got 0:06:58.800 --> 0:07:02.080 attacked so much that she she then pivoted yesterday and 0:07:02.120 --> 0:07:05.000 came out and said no, actually she was inclined to 0:07:05.120 --> 0:07:08.880 savor pardoning Trump if she were elected president. So she's 0:07:08.920 --> 0:07:11.440 managed to be on both sides of this issue. You know, 0:07:11.520 --> 0:07:13.720 she was she was four indicting him. I guess before 0:07:13.760 --> 0:07:14.600 she was against it. 0:07:14.680 --> 0:07:16.560 That was back when it was the party of law 0:07:16.560 --> 0:07:19.600 and order. They've decided they don't care about law and 0:07:19.720 --> 0:07:22.880 order anymore. By the way, can we well, can we stop. 0:07:23.440 --> 0:07:25.680 Only as far as it applies to Democrats. There was 0:07:25.720 --> 0:07:27.800 a lot you know, you ask about the Trump indictment, 0:07:28.000 --> 0:07:30.720 and you know, nine times out of ten the answer 0:07:30.760 --> 0:07:33.400 comes up being, well, why haven't they indicted Joe Biden 0:07:33.480 --> 0:07:36.840 or Hunter Biden? Which may, by the way, but but 0:07:36.880 --> 0:07:39.040 there's they're only the candidate of law. They're only the 0:07:39.040 --> 0:07:40.560 part of law and order in so far as it 0:07:40.640 --> 0:07:43.680 pertains Democrats, And I think for most Democrats that goes 0:07:43.720 --> 0:07:46.920 the other way to everybody's very interested in seeing Trump indicted. 0:07:47.640 --> 0:07:49.560 You know, not a lot of clamoring among the Democrats, 0:07:49.640 --> 0:07:51.560 I know to indict Hunter Hunter Biden. 0:07:51.800 --> 0:07:54.840 Well, that's not terribly unlikely, let's be honest, But I 0:07:55.200 --> 0:07:57.200 think we should. I think we should. 0:07:57.240 --> 0:08:00.560 We focused too much on he kept classified occupants in 0:08:00.600 --> 0:08:04.000 the bathroom, which doesn't matter because Biden kept classified documents 0:08:04.040 --> 0:08:07.640 in the garage next to his gorgeous nineteen sixty seven corvette. 0:08:07.680 --> 0:08:10.600 But the problem is the obstruction Yeah, the problem is 0:08:10.640 --> 0:08:14.840 the obstruction charge, right, And is anybody in the Republican 0:08:14.880 --> 0:08:20.880 Party obtuse enough to see beyond the irony of Donald 0:08:20.920 --> 0:08:24.400 Trump chanting or leading a chance of lock her up 0:08:25.040 --> 0:08:28.240 against Hillary Clinton? I mean, how do you These people 0:08:28.280 --> 0:08:33.240 went to Harvard and Yale. DeSantis and Vivek both went 0:08:33.360 --> 0:08:35.840 to both of those Ivy League institutions. 0:08:35.920 --> 0:08:38.400 Are they just they can't be just dumb. 0:08:38.800 --> 0:08:40.720 No, I don't think any of them are dumb. I 0:08:40.720 --> 0:08:44.560 think they're looking at the polls and reacting accordingly. And 0:08:44.600 --> 0:08:46.440 there is one candidate in the race, so I spent 0:08:46.520 --> 0:08:48.800 time with in New Hampshire when he made his announcement 0:08:48.920 --> 0:08:52.120 last weekend. Who isn't going along with us who's been 0:08:52.240 --> 0:08:54.560 very critical of Donald Trump, and that's Chris Christi, the 0:08:54.600 --> 0:08:57.920 former New Jersey governor. The problem, though, is, we see 0:08:57.920 --> 0:09:00.440 in one of these new polls, is that Republican voters 0:09:00.480 --> 0:09:03.560 don't want to hear Trump criticize Christy. As I wrote 0:09:03.559 --> 0:09:06.640 for Business Week last week, is very unpopular, not only 0:09:06.720 --> 0:09:10.319 among Republicans who like Trump, but even among Republicans who 0:09:10.400 --> 0:09:13.520 don't like Trump. And this new poll shows for Morning 0:09:13.559 --> 0:09:18.200 consult that Christie's favorability rating has actually fallen from thirty 0:09:18.200 --> 0:09:20.920 five percent down to twenty five percent since he got 0:09:20.920 --> 0:09:24.440 into the race last week. So the strategy of criticizing 0:09:24.480 --> 0:09:28.040 Trump doesn't seem to be helping Christie get ahead. But 0:09:28.160 --> 0:09:30.719 that being said, look, if any of these guys want 0:09:30.760 --> 0:09:33.800 to actually be the Republican nominee in twenty twenty four, 0:09:33.840 --> 0:09:35.840 and I'm less and less convinced that they actually do, 0:09:36.640 --> 0:09:39.360 they're going to have to figure out a way to 0:09:39.480 --> 0:09:43.040 lower Trump's favorability ratings with Republican voters or they're simply 0:09:43.040 --> 0:09:46.200 going to lose the GFP primary race and a blow. 0:09:46.240 --> 0:09:48.480 And that seems to be happening right now, which is 0:09:48.520 --> 0:09:52.360 why I do think that Canada like Vivek round Swami 0:09:52.400 --> 0:09:54.960 and maybe even Nikki Haley, whether or not they realize it, 0:09:55.160 --> 0:09:57.640 are really running for vice president, because that seems to 0:09:57.679 --> 0:10:01.080 be the only open spot this one. Trump, looking at 0:10:01.080 --> 0:10:04.520 the poll numbers, at least at this point, it seems 0:10:04.520 --> 0:10:06.480 to have the nomination all but wrapped up. 0:10:06.600 --> 0:10:08.840 And then there is the former vice president Mike Pence, 0:10:08.880 --> 0:10:13.720 who apparently said he cannot defend what is alleged in 0:10:13.760 --> 0:10:16.240 the most recent indictment against former President Donald Trump. I'm 0:10:16.280 --> 0:10:18.160 reading ABC News as a story. I guess. He did 0:10:18.160 --> 0:10:22.480 some interviews with other networks, but he talked about reading 0:10:22.520 --> 0:10:25.480 the full indictment. But he also is saying I'm going 0:10:25.559 --> 0:10:29.319 to wait until basically after he's had his day in court. 0:10:29.440 --> 0:10:32.760 He also was clearly afraid to really speak out right, Josh. 0:10:32.760 --> 0:10:36.120 I mean, this is a guy the former president sent 0:10:36.160 --> 0:10:39.560 an angry mob to essentially kill him, and he's never 0:10:39.640 --> 0:10:42.400 really said anything that bad about Donald Trump. 0:10:42.480 --> 0:10:44.920 But he's still saying I can't believe that politics. 0:10:44.679 --> 0:10:47.520 His campaign released a pretty tough kind of video ad, 0:10:47.600 --> 0:10:50.400 but Pence himself has more or less been kind of 0:10:50.400 --> 0:10:53.640 whimpering in the corner, you know, hoping this all goes away. 0:10:54.280 --> 0:10:57.920 Nobody I can find in Republican politics who isn't on 0:10:58.240 --> 0:11:01.440 Mike Pence's payroll or the payroll of his super pack 0:11:01.920 --> 0:11:04.120 can figure out why he's running for president, because it 0:11:04.200 --> 0:11:07.000 really does not seem to be any constituency at all 0:11:07.480 --> 0:11:10.400 that either respects him or is longing for him to 0:11:10.440 --> 0:11:14.000 be Indiana the White House, his unfavorability ratings are almost 0:11:14.000 --> 0:11:16.960 as high as Chris Christie's, and that's really saying something. 0:11:17.120 --> 0:11:20.440 So again, it's the strategy of kind of wanting to 0:11:20.440 --> 0:11:23.120 have it both ways, of not really wanting to attack 0:11:23.200 --> 0:11:26.520 or engage Trump and just hoping that somehow, by a 0:11:26.559 --> 0:11:32.360 stroke of magic, Trump disappears and voters crown either Pence 0:11:32.520 --> 0:11:35.040 or Hayley or one of these also want to be 0:11:35.160 --> 0:11:38.040 candidates in his place, and they kind of wind up 0:11:38.040 --> 0:11:41.480 with a nomination that way, because as we've seen throughout 0:11:41.480 --> 0:11:45.000 the indictment drama, Trump really isn't getting any pushback from 0:11:45.040 --> 0:11:47.400 the candidates that are running against them, and so voters 0:11:47.440 --> 0:11:50.320 don't seem to be under any pressure or have any 0:11:50.320 --> 0:11:53.360 interest in considering anyone but Donald Trump. And that is 0:11:53.400 --> 0:11:56.439 a recipe for Trump becoming the next nominee, whether or 0:11:56.480 --> 0:11:59.040 not he's indicted. A third or a fourth time, no 0:11:59.080 --> 0:11:59.760 matter what happens. 0:11:59.800 --> 0:12:03.360 But Matt, do you really think Pence could not not 0:12:03.520 --> 0:12:06.280 run like he kind of has to run even if 0:12:06.440 --> 0:12:08.600 I mean, I mean, you've got to put your foot out. 0:12:08.760 --> 0:12:11.760 I feel like Pence would have had a great shot 0:12:11.960 --> 0:12:16.120 at this had he immediately come out against his former 0:12:16.200 --> 0:12:18.400 boss and said, you know what, it doesn't work that 0:12:18.440 --> 0:12:21.720 way in America. You know, we don't attempt to overthrow Congress. 0:12:21.960 --> 0:12:24.920 We don't attempt to overturn an election. This is a democracy, 0:12:24.920 --> 0:12:28.079 and we're strong. If he had flexed at that point, 0:12:28.760 --> 0:12:30.000 it would have been awesome. 0:12:30.400 --> 0:12:32.360 I want to go back to you, Josh, because you 0:12:32.400 --> 0:12:35.120 wrote the book Devil's Bargain Steve Bannon, Donald Trump and 0:12:35.160 --> 0:12:38.120 the storming of the presidency. Really just you were there 0:12:38.120 --> 0:12:41.400 at the get go, at the beginning, watching Trump and 0:12:41.520 --> 0:12:43.720 his you know, his winning of the White House that 0:12:43.840 --> 0:12:46.600 first go round and the rise of the alt right. 0:12:47.000 --> 0:12:49.840 Having said that, what you were seeing at this time 0:12:49.880 --> 0:12:53.760 in place, do you see that indeed it's going to 0:12:53.800 --> 0:12:57.319 be trumped, depending on the legal cases play out a 0:12:57.360 --> 0:13:00.199 little bit, that he will be the Republican nomination. We're 0:13:00.240 --> 0:13:03.280 looking at the potential of Trump getting back to the 0:13:03.280 --> 0:13:03.800 White House. 0:13:04.200 --> 0:13:06.520 There's no real reason I can see, based on what's 0:13:06.520 --> 0:13:09.800 happening in Republican politics right now, to think that Trump 0:13:09.880 --> 0:13:13.479 is not going to be the nominee. Like obvious caveats, 0:13:13.520 --> 0:13:15.319 you know, he could drop de of a heart attack, 0:13:15.440 --> 0:13:18.520 he could somehow change his mind, the Earth could get 0:13:18.559 --> 0:13:21.880 hit by a meteor. But barring something like that, if 0:13:21.880 --> 0:13:25.480 you look at Republican voter sentiment, it's hugely favorable toward 0:13:25.520 --> 0:13:28.840 Donald Trump. In a new CBS News poll, Trump is 0:13:28.920 --> 0:13:33.160 leading his closest opponent, Rond De Santis by more than 0:13:33.160 --> 0:13:36.920 a three to one margin. Every time he gets indicted, 0:13:37.000 --> 0:13:41.920 his favorable numbers with Republican voters tick up. The one 0:13:41.960 --> 0:13:43.959 thing that Trump needs to worry about is that is 0:13:44.760 --> 0:13:48.640 popular with Republicans has grown, and as he's been indicted, 0:13:48.760 --> 0:13:51.920 you know, more and more times, he's become less popular 0:13:51.960 --> 0:13:54.559 with non Republicans. As far as Trump getting back to 0:13:54.600 --> 0:13:57.600 the White House, I think that's a pretty big hurdle. 0:13:57.679 --> 0:14:00.720 But Trump winning the nomination at this point seems far 0:14:00.760 --> 0:14:04.440 more likely than not. And especially when you see things 0:14:04.440 --> 0:14:06.640 like we saw in Miami, with all the sponents going 0:14:06.640 --> 0:14:09.640 down there to defend him, it's harder and harder to 0:14:09.640 --> 0:14:11.719 see him. Okay, losing to one of them? 0:14:11.760 --> 0:14:13.680 All right, we got to run great stuff as always. 0:14:13.720 --> 0:14:16.520 Josh Green, National correspond at Bloomberg Business Week, Joe Weber 0:14:16.559 --> 0:14:19.400 at the editor of Bloomberg BusinessWeek. Find this at Bloomberg 0:14:19.400 --> 0:14:21.800 dot com slash newsletters. This is Bloomberg. 0:14:22.400 --> 0:14:26.000 You're listening to the Bloomberg Business Week Podcast. Catch us 0:14:26.000 --> 0:14:29.680 live weekdays from two to five pm Eastern on Bloomberg Radio, 0:14:29.880 --> 0:14:32.760 the Bloomberg Business App, and you too. You can also 0:14:32.880 --> 0:14:36.880 listen live to our flagship New York station. Just say Alexa, 0:14:37.000 --> 0:14:38.960 play Bloomberg. You love them thirty. 0:14:40.320 --> 0:14:43.720 Bloomberg New Senior financial reporter Shrinanarajen here with Matt and 0:14:43.760 --> 0:14:46.280 myself in our Bloomberg Interactive Bookers studio. Were you a 0:14:46.280 --> 0:14:48.600 little fraid to walk in because Matt was a little heated? 0:14:48.880 --> 0:14:49.360 Of course. 0:14:50.240 --> 0:14:54.120 I've never seen anyone more excited about inflation than him. 0:14:54.200 --> 0:14:57.280 This is why we love Maddie's enthusiasm over all things, 0:14:57.280 --> 0:15:01.160 including FED meetings. FED meetings are fun. Also fun is 0:15:01.280 --> 0:15:07.680 watching firms navigate politics and kind of the global financial 0:15:07.720 --> 0:15:10.080 world and where business will be and where they need 0:15:10.120 --> 0:15:12.920 to focus their efforts. Talk us a little bit about 0:15:12.960 --> 0:15:15.600 gold Band and what they're doing in India. And you 0:15:15.680 --> 0:15:18.920 know this country right well born there, family there. 0:15:19.000 --> 0:15:19.600 Grew up there. 0:15:19.680 --> 0:15:21.680 Yes, I did know the country a little bit. It 0:15:21.760 --> 0:15:26.240 is fascinating the story and it is a mustreat. It 0:15:26.320 --> 0:15:28.200 is a window into Goldman in the fact that their 0:15:28.200 --> 0:15:31.240 biggest office outside of New York, their headquarters, happens to 0:15:31.280 --> 0:15:34.200 be in India and Bangalore. But equally it is a 0:15:34.240 --> 0:15:38.560 story about how India has become a attractive center for 0:15:38.640 --> 0:15:41.040 a large number of firms. Goldman might have eight thousand 0:15:41.080 --> 0:15:44.360 of it's roughly forty five thousand people there. JP Morgan 0:15:44.400 --> 0:15:47.280 has about fifty thousand people there, fifty thousand of about 0:15:47.520 --> 0:15:50.840 three hundred thousand. These are what they call these global 0:15:51.000 --> 0:15:53.640 capability centers, and so like when you. 0:15:53.600 --> 0:15:55.760 Call in like write a lot of the back office. 0:15:56.320 --> 0:15:58.840 That used to be the case. When you go back 0:15:58.840 --> 0:16:00.560 to the nineties, when you go back to the early 0:16:00.600 --> 0:16:02.720 two thousands, you will think about India. You will think 0:16:02.720 --> 0:16:06.080 about back office jobs. You will think about your you know, 0:16:06.200 --> 0:16:09.320 customer care centers, that's where most of your calls were 0:16:09.360 --> 0:16:13.200 getting answered. Then that was the stereotype associated with India 0:16:13.200 --> 0:16:15.200 about the kind of jobs. But what the story does 0:16:15.200 --> 0:16:18.280 a good job of explaining to us is how that 0:16:18.320 --> 0:16:22.200 has changed. It's not purely back office anymore. It's not 0:16:22.360 --> 0:16:25.040 just that companies are sitting around and saying, how can 0:16:25.080 --> 0:16:28.560 we lower costs? It has evolved into something more than that. 0:16:28.800 --> 0:16:31.280 We have Goldments, the head of India, the India business 0:16:31.320 --> 0:16:34.560 at Goldman Sachs talking about how they have a number 0:16:34.560 --> 0:16:38.760 of software engineers there now building and writing code for 0:16:38.920 --> 0:16:42.000 their trading platforms that quant firms here can use for 0:16:42.080 --> 0:16:45.760 their commodities analytics business. That is not back office by 0:16:46.960 --> 0:16:47.720 To me, it's a. 0:16:47.640 --> 0:16:52.040 No brainer, right if I look at the landscape in India, 0:16:52.080 --> 0:16:56.200 the universities, the educational system is so strong that you know, 0:16:56.920 --> 0:17:00.400 we see obviously some of our smartest analysts here Bloomberg 0:17:00.440 --> 0:17:02.120 Intelligence are from India. 0:17:02.240 --> 0:17:02.400 Right. 0:17:02.440 --> 0:17:04.760 You look across the banking landscape, You've got some of 0:17:04.800 --> 0:17:06.640 the big CEOs. 0:17:06.160 --> 0:17:07.159 Are from India, you know. 0:17:07.359 --> 0:17:09.879 To me, when I read this story, a light switch 0:17:10.520 --> 0:17:14.240 was flipped, like, oh, obviously you can hire pms, You 0:17:14.240 --> 0:17:17.520 can hire business heads there and you don't have to 0:17:17.560 --> 0:17:20.040 pay them, you know, ten million dollars a year. I 0:17:20.040 --> 0:17:22.480 would move a lot of my business to India. 0:17:22.119 --> 0:17:25.600 And move away from the banking landscape, and think about 0:17:25.600 --> 0:17:28.960 the tech landscape, Google, Microsoft, IBM, all of these places, 0:17:29.480 --> 0:17:32.359 a lot of their CEOs right now are products of 0:17:32.359 --> 0:17:35.359 the Indian educational system. And that's why it's important to 0:17:35.400 --> 0:17:38.440 sort of break down why it's so attractive. Right there 0:17:38.480 --> 0:17:42.919 is this vast pool of young talent. India just became 0:17:43.040 --> 0:17:47.520 the most populous country on Earth, just overtaking China. Yet 0:17:47.560 --> 0:17:50.240 the median age here and that is why this phrase 0:17:50.280 --> 0:17:53.960 has been associated with India for long, the demographic dividend, 0:17:54.320 --> 0:17:58.080 the median age. There's twenty eight in the US and China. 0:17:58.119 --> 0:18:00.840 That's thirty eight, Danias. Doesn't seem like a lot, but 0:18:01.040 --> 0:18:04.800 it is a lot. Yeah, twenty eight years old is 0:18:04.840 --> 0:18:06.919 sort of your average person in India. 0:18:07.000 --> 0:18:09.120 What I would give to be twenty eight, You could 0:18:09.119 --> 0:18:11.199 take my left arm if I can be twenty eight. 0:18:11.400 --> 0:18:13.639 We can easily rewind five years age if that's all 0:18:13.680 --> 0:18:15.240 you want. 0:18:15.000 --> 0:18:16.000 But not just that. 0:18:16.040 --> 0:18:19.920 There's an educational system that has this focus on science 0:18:20.000 --> 0:18:23.280 and technology. Right that again becomes a big thing in 0:18:23.320 --> 0:18:26.840 an attractive, attractive quality for a lot of these companies 0:18:26.840 --> 0:18:29.840 trying to set up these centers, and the most important thing, 0:18:30.880 --> 0:18:35.639 the unforeseen catalyst what happened with the pandemic. You learned 0:18:35.760 --> 0:18:40.000 that you could have your workers and your staff in 0:18:40.200 --> 0:18:44.080 distributed locations, in remote locations, and still do it seamlessly. 0:18:44.720 --> 0:18:47.560 Of course, that was a very dire example, and people 0:18:47.640 --> 0:18:50.200 working from their bedrooms and their living rooms and trying 0:18:50.200 --> 0:18:52.520 to get work done. And we were able to do that. 0:18:52.840 --> 0:18:56.600 Here you're talking about fully constructed, state of the art 0:18:56.600 --> 0:19:00.639 buildings with all the relevant technology that's needed. It just 0:19:00.760 --> 0:19:04.199 happens to be twelve thousand miles away that works, and 0:19:04.280 --> 0:19:06.960 companies are convinced that can happen. Of course, it's not 0:19:07.160 --> 0:19:10.359 all a plus. There are questions about the employability of 0:19:10.400 --> 0:19:13.760 many people who come through the booming education system. They 0:19:13.800 --> 0:19:15.280 have to make sure that a lot of time is 0:19:15.280 --> 0:19:18.399 spent on training. And I actually remember that around the pandemic. 0:19:18.640 --> 0:19:21.439 There was a phase when the pandemic struck the US 0:19:21.520 --> 0:19:24.200 that was March twenty twenty, and that's when we saw 0:19:24.200 --> 0:19:26.879 most of the impacts. But the peak pandemic impacts in 0:19:26.880 --> 0:19:28.880 a place like India was felt about a year later, 0:19:29.240 --> 0:19:32.200 and when you saw these national lockdowns. I remember having 0:19:32.280 --> 0:19:35.760 conversations with Goldman executives who were suddenly thinking we have 0:19:35.880 --> 0:19:39.520 moved a lot of our risk functions and some of 0:19:39.520 --> 0:19:42.640 the other critical operational functions to places like India. When 0:19:42.680 --> 0:19:45.720 suddenly the entire office is locked out, they had a 0:19:45.720 --> 0:19:47.880 moment of panic and they had to be sure, wait, 0:19:47.960 --> 0:19:50.760 are we too reliant on India. Of course it didn't 0:19:50.760 --> 0:19:53.200 cause any problems in the end, but it certainly sparked 0:19:53.240 --> 0:19:54.400 that conversation for them. 0:19:54.600 --> 0:19:57.520 Shri and I think about like China and what it 0:19:57.600 --> 0:20:01.280 developed into in terms of supporting the world, right versus 0:20:01.280 --> 0:20:05.440 what India is. I mean, it's really a very different story, right. 0:20:05.600 --> 0:20:08.560 This is these are highly educated workers that are becoming 0:20:08.560 --> 0:20:11.480 increasingly a really significant part of the global economy. 0:20:11.600 --> 0:20:15.320 China became a manufacturing powerhouse. It became the factory of 0:20:15.359 --> 0:20:19.880 the world. Looking at how this Indian ecosystem is developing, 0:20:19.920 --> 0:20:23.440 you're seeing more of a services exports system here, right, 0:20:23.480 --> 0:20:25.639 And that is what it is turning to. It is 0:20:25.800 --> 0:20:29.040 using the demographic dividend to its advantage. It is using 0:20:29.080 --> 0:20:32.199 its existent education system and the focus on science and 0:20:32.200 --> 0:20:34.520 technology or even the STEM fields if you may, to 0:20:34.720 --> 0:20:37.040 attract a lot of these companies and they're seeing the 0:20:37.080 --> 0:20:40.399 benefit in that. Goldman just Operate opened a second Global 0:20:40.440 --> 0:20:45.200 Capability Center India in Hyderabad because there is an infrastructure challenge. 0:20:45.240 --> 0:20:48.479