WEBVTT - Everybody's Business: Tariffs, TikTok, Torpedos 0:00:00.280 --> 0:00:07.240 Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio news. 0:00:08.119 --> 0:00:11.720 Hey Max Schafkin here, co host of elon Inc. You're 0:00:11.720 --> 0:00:14.520 about to hear a pilot of a new show that 0:00:14.720 --> 0:00:17.079 I've been working on for the past few months. It's 0:00:17.120 --> 0:00:22.000 called Everybody's Business. It features me and the great business 0:00:22.000 --> 0:00:27.280 and financial journalist Stacy Vanick Smith, plus just a huge 0:00:27.440 --> 0:00:31.560 contingent of some of the smartest, most interesting journalists we know. 0:00:32.080 --> 0:00:36.880 These include Lucas Shaw, Amanda Maul, brad Stone, Randall Williams. 0:00:36.960 --> 0:00:40.519 Each week, we're going to be taking the big business 0:00:40.520 --> 0:00:43.360 stories that everyone is talking about and we're going to 0:00:43.400 --> 0:00:47.600 spin them forward with fresh reporting, with analysis, with smart takes. 0:00:47.800 --> 0:00:50.240 It's a little bit like elon Ink, but a much 0:00:50.360 --> 0:00:52.839 broader look at the world. We've been working on it 0:00:52.880 --> 0:00:55.400 for months and just having a lot of fun, and 0:00:55.440 --> 0:00:57.480 we think you're going to enjoy it too. The show 0:00:57.600 --> 0:01:01.000 officially debuts on May sixteen. It'll be in its own 0:01:01.080 --> 0:01:03.880 podcast feed, but for now, for the next few weeks, 0:01:04.000 --> 0:01:06.920 it'll be here in the e lining feed every Friday, 0:01:07.160 --> 0:01:09.280 and we really hope you'll listen and let us know 0:01:09.319 --> 0:01:16.240 what you think. 0:01:18.400 --> 0:01:20.759 This is Everybody's Business from Bloomberg BusinessWeek. 0:01:20.800 --> 0:01:24.240 I'm Max Chafkin and I'm Stacy Vanixsmith. Hey, Stacy, Hello, 0:01:24.760 --> 0:01:26.080 I have a question for you, Max. 0:01:26.720 --> 0:01:27.479 What is your question? 0:01:27.520 --> 0:01:31.080 Fine morning? Are you feeling liberated? 0:01:31.400 --> 0:01:35.160 Well, I mean I am, because yesterday was Liberation Day. 0:01:35.240 --> 0:01:37.360 Was liberation now, but I am not sure what I 0:01:37.400 --> 0:01:38.320 feel liberated from. 0:01:38.319 --> 0:01:42.120 It almost feels like I'm liberated from any sense of normalcy. 0:01:42.720 --> 0:01:45.199 Yeah, reality, Yes, I feel like a lot of people 0:01:45.240 --> 0:01:46.720 are feeling that way. I think that has to be 0:01:46.800 --> 0:01:50.480 the theme of our show this week, liberation, because, of course, 0:01:50.520 --> 0:01:53.040 the big economic news like you just said, or maybe 0:01:53.040 --> 0:01:56.200 even kind of like an economic bombshell. It felt more 0:01:56.320 --> 0:02:00.520 like President Trump on Wednesday aka Liberation Day, unveiled our 0:02:00.520 --> 0:02:05.480 country's new tariff policy and it was pretty shocking. Markets 0:02:05.480 --> 0:02:08.680 are panicking, companies are panicking, countries are panicking. 0:02:09.040 --> 0:02:12.560 I am panicking also too. We can talk about that. 0:02:13.040 --> 0:02:15.240 I am not panicking, Stacy, but I'll tell you on 0:02:15.280 --> 0:02:16.720 the rest of the show, we're going to continue the 0:02:16.760 --> 0:02:17.600 liberation theme. 0:02:17.840 --> 0:02:19.119 We're going to talk about. 0:02:19.040 --> 0:02:22.720 The prospect that TikTok might be liberated from China. 0:02:23.000 --> 0:02:27.200 Yet one person's liberation is another person's acquisition. 0:02:27.480 --> 0:02:32.119 Indeed, and I've got an underrated story about liberating ourselves 0:02:32.440 --> 0:02:35.240 from the constraints of how we think about baseball bats 0:02:35.720 --> 0:02:36.760 that has loomed. 0:02:36.440 --> 0:02:38.639 So large in my mind for so many years. I'm 0:02:38.680 --> 0:02:45.360 glad to know that. But first, of course, you know, 0:02:45.480 --> 0:02:46.840 this is everybody's business. 0:02:46.880 --> 0:02:50.200 We wanted to see how everybody was feeling about the 0:02:50.240 --> 0:02:52.120 tariff news out of the White House this week, so 0:02:52.160 --> 0:02:55.320 we had our producer Stacy Wong and Magnus Hendrickson go 0:02:55.440 --> 0:02:59.000 out into the streets to ask the people, are you 0:02:59.120 --> 0:03:02.040 worried that tariffs are going to cause prices to go up? 0:03:02.760 --> 0:03:04.520 I am worried about prices going up. 0:03:04.760 --> 0:03:07.800 Yes, I'm very concerned about prices going up. 0:03:07.840 --> 0:03:09.680 I think it just feels like out of my control. 0:03:09.880 --> 0:03:11.440 On a scale of like one to ten, I'll probably 0:03:11.480 --> 0:03:12.520 say like middle of the. 0:03:12.480 --> 0:03:15.040 Pack, five. I haven't really thought of it that much. 0:03:15.400 --> 0:03:16.720 I expect to be surprised. 0:03:17.000 --> 0:03:19.000 I'm like, Okay, well, prices are growing up. 0:03:19.000 --> 0:03:20.360 I need to make some adjustments in life. 0:03:20.440 --> 0:03:24.720 I work in real estate construction. This affects especially like 0:03:24.960 --> 0:03:27.080 lives of New Yorkers. Have you been hoarding anything? 0:03:27.200 --> 0:03:27.399 Oh? 0:03:27.480 --> 0:03:29.200 No, honestly, I've thought about it. 0:03:29.360 --> 0:03:32.960 I am currently in the process of planning a wedding, so. 0:03:33.120 --> 0:03:36.360 Right now, I don't have a lot of purchasing capacity, and. 0:03:36.360 --> 0:03:39.000 Living in New York City, we have very little space 0:03:39.040 --> 0:03:40.040 to hoard anything. 0:03:40.720 --> 0:03:45.480 Toilet paper, beans, finny fish, the residual pandemic hoarding. 0:03:48.800 --> 0:03:51.080 Oh wow, I mean, do you think people people are 0:03:51.120 --> 0:03:53.600 really hoarding beans and toilet paper? 0:03:53.640 --> 0:03:54.360 That's crazy. 0:03:54.440 --> 0:03:56.640 I mean, if I sort of thought about it, I 0:03:56.720 --> 0:03:59.480 started to think about what products I really love that 0:03:59.560 --> 0:04:03.960 are from overseas that might get enormously more expensive in 0:04:04.040 --> 0:04:05.560 the next couple weeks. 0:04:05.920 --> 0:04:09.360 Honestly, like listening to that, I just feel deficient because 0:04:09.600 --> 0:04:13.040 I did not make any purchasing changes, no rewarding hallowing 0:04:13.880 --> 0:04:18.560 the incredible economic uncertainty, the chaos regime or whatever to 0:04:18.720 --> 0:04:19.560 just wash over me. 0:04:32.400 --> 0:04:34.080 All right, Max, let's get into it. 0:04:34.200 --> 0:04:38.520 Liberation Day tariffs The numbers that got unveiled this week 0:04:38.560 --> 0:04:41.160 were pretty shocking, I think, higher than anybody thoughts. 0:04:41.240 --> 0:04:44.080 Let's just listen to a snippet from this incredible event, 0:04:44.360 --> 0:04:45.520 my fellow Americans. 0:04:45.520 --> 0:04:53.200 This is Liberation Day waiting for a long time. April second, 0:04:53.240 --> 0:04:56.679 twenty twenty five will forever be remembered as the day 0:04:57.240 --> 0:05:02.320 American industry was reborn, the day America's destiny was reclaimed 0:05:02.920 --> 0:05:07.880 and the day that we began to make America wealthy again. 0:05:08.560 --> 0:05:11.840 L Day, Stacy L Day, A liberation Day, make America 0:05:11.880 --> 0:05:14.880 wealthy again. I mean, I hesitate to point this out, 0:05:14.880 --> 0:05:17.680 but like we are already the wealthiest country in the world. 0:05:17.800 --> 0:05:19.760 I don't even know what to say. I'm at a loss. 0:05:19.920 --> 0:05:20.480 I'm at a loss. 0:05:20.760 --> 0:05:25.920 Stacy's having trouble articulating here because what is happening is 0:05:26.000 --> 0:05:30.000 so weird and so surprising and so outside of the 0:05:30.160 --> 0:05:34.400 norms of what somebody who follows the economy, like having 0:05:34.400 --> 0:05:37.600 nothing to do with politics, expects out of a government. 0:05:37.920 --> 0:05:41.280 It's it's like we've instantly gone back in time. I 0:05:41.320 --> 0:05:43.040 don't know what, like one hundred and twenty years or 0:05:43.080 --> 0:05:43.600 something to. 0:05:44.000 --> 0:05:46.640 Do the time of mercantilism? Is that baby? 0:05:48.360 --> 0:05:51.880 So let's take a look at what exactly happened on 0:05:51.960 --> 0:05:54.960 Liberation Day. Let's let's look at these numbers. Thirty four 0:05:55.040 --> 0:05:58.320 percent tariffs on goods from China, twenty percent tax on 0:05:58.680 --> 0:06:00.960 anything from the EU to twenty four percent tax on 0:06:01.000 --> 0:06:04.080 goods from Japan. Those are our top trading partners, along 0:06:04.080 --> 0:06:05.000 with Canada and Mexico. 0:06:05.120 --> 0:06:08.000 Yeah, and the other thing, Stacy like, thirty four percent 0:06:08.320 --> 0:06:11.560 of good of tariffs on goods from China. But that's 0:06:11.600 --> 0:06:13.799 on top of tariffs are already there. So that's fifty 0:06:13.839 --> 0:06:14.680 four percent. 0:06:14.560 --> 0:06:16.839 Most of the stuff we import from China. That is 0:06:16.960 --> 0:06:19.919 fifty four percent tax on a. 0:06:20.160 --> 0:06:21.159 Lot okay stuff. 0:06:21.200 --> 0:06:24.719 And not only that, but over the past decade or so, 0:06:24.760 --> 0:06:27.280 a lot of companies have moved manufacturing away from China 0:06:27.320 --> 0:06:28.840 because they saw this coming. 0:06:28.839 --> 0:06:31.479 They moved it to places like Vietnam now there or. 0:06:31.480 --> 0:06:33.520 Apple moved a lot of its operations to India. 0:06:33.640 --> 0:06:37.080 Yeah, big tariffs on those countries as well. So the timing, 0:06:37.160 --> 0:06:39.479 it's not immediate immediate, but it's going to happen in 0:06:39.560 --> 0:06:40.719 the next couple of weeks. 0:06:40.760 --> 0:06:44.040 Basically, yes, I was really, really shook. 0:06:44.080 --> 0:06:47.640 I was not expecting the numbers to be as high 0:06:47.680 --> 0:06:50.720 as they were. And I've talked to economists of all 0:06:50.760 --> 0:06:54.040 political stripes for a lot of years, and I have 0:06:54.120 --> 0:06:59.640 to say, no serious economists thinks that like large scale 0:06:59.680 --> 0:07:01.720 protects of tariffs are a good idea. 0:07:01.960 --> 0:07:03.440 It's bad for an economy. 0:07:03.440 --> 0:07:05.120 I mean, it would be like finding a doctor that 0:07:05.240 --> 0:07:07.359 said smoking was good for your health, Like it just 0:07:07.440 --> 0:07:10.440 doesn't really exist. I think you can find economists say 0:07:10.440 --> 0:07:13.400 in certain situations like very targeted tariffs. 0:07:13.440 --> 0:07:15.960 But can you just explain quickly why, because like you've 0:07:15.960 --> 0:07:19.840 spent a lot of time supporting on the economy, why 0:07:20.120 --> 0:07:21.520 are they so against it. 0:07:21.840 --> 0:07:24.600 Well, tariffs are at tax essentially, right, I mean, this 0:07:24.680 --> 0:07:26.920 is the tax. JP Morgan actually came out saying this 0:07:27.000 --> 0:07:29.280 is the largest tax like the USS and since nineteen 0:07:29.320 --> 0:07:31.760 sixty eight. So if you think of it like a tax, 0:07:32.040 --> 0:07:36.360 it's pretty simple. So basically, you are taxing the things 0:07:36.360 --> 0:07:40.040 that we import. Two thirds of our economy is consumer spending. 0:07:40.120 --> 0:07:42.680 That is the load bearing beam of the US economy 0:07:42.800 --> 0:07:45.120 is you and me buying stuff. So anything that gets 0:07:45.120 --> 0:07:48.600 in the way of that really threatens to compromise our 0:07:48.600 --> 0:07:52.320 whole economy. So when prices go up by fifty percent, 0:07:52.400 --> 0:07:54.880 even twenty percent, thirty percent, we've all been through inflation 0:07:55.000 --> 0:07:58.200 from COVID. Those prices go what people buy less, which 0:07:58.240 --> 0:08:01.640 means companies sell less, they make less money, They stop expanding, 0:08:01.720 --> 0:08:03.960 which means they stop hiring, which means they can start 0:08:03.960 --> 0:08:06.080 firing people, which leads to economic contraction. 0:08:06.360 --> 0:08:07.320 And then like we're in. 0:08:07.240 --> 0:08:10.760 The situation of at least like darkness and dragons, except like, 0:08:11.160 --> 0:08:13.960 I'm not sure we can afford dragons. 0:08:14.320 --> 0:08:15.000 It's bad. 0:08:15.320 --> 0:08:17.040 It's bad, yeah, I mean. 0:08:17.200 --> 0:08:20.240 Writing in his Odd Lots newsletter this morning, our colleague 0:08:20.400 --> 0:08:23.920 and fellow Bloomberg podcaster Joe Wisenthal said it was one 0:08:23.920 --> 0:08:25.440 of the craziest days he could remember. You saw the 0:08:25.440 --> 0:08:29.000 stock market kind of tip in real time as they 0:08:29.080 --> 0:08:31.080 figured out just how. 0:08:30.920 --> 0:08:31.840 Big Trump had gone. 0:08:31.840 --> 0:08:34.160 There had been all these reports kind of over the 0:08:34.280 --> 0:08:37.360 last couple of weeks and even beyond that, about is 0:08:37.400 --> 0:08:38.920 it just gonna be a little tariff, is this a 0:08:38.960 --> 0:08:39.880 negotiating thing. 0:08:40.000 --> 0:08:41.360 And is it gonna be kind of vague? 0:08:41.600 --> 0:08:44.160 You had all these contingents both within the White House 0:08:44.480 --> 0:08:46.600 and maybe on Wall Street, who I think we're kind 0:08:46.600 --> 0:08:51.160 of wish casting, right, and of just hoping somehow they 0:08:51.200 --> 0:08:54.880 would be able to bring Trump around to the consensus view, 0:08:54.920 --> 0:08:57.280 the one that you just expressed, which is that, of course, 0:08:57.360 --> 0:09:00.719 tariffs are bad for our economy, as can instructed, it's 0:09:00.760 --> 0:09:04.080 like a massive tax on consumers. Trump had this weird 0:09:04.120 --> 0:09:06.440 moment during the event where he talked about groceries. 0:09:06.480 --> 0:09:08.079 He's like, I love that word groceries. 0:09:08.200 --> 0:09:08.640 Oh my god. 0:09:08.679 --> 0:09:10.040 It was a very strange. 0:09:10.960 --> 0:09:11.880 It was very long. 0:09:12.400 --> 0:09:14.760 It's like a policy designed to make groceries. 0:09:14.360 --> 0:09:15.920 More expensive moments of poetry. 0:09:16.080 --> 0:09:18.439 Many of these things that are being tariffed are things 0:09:18.520 --> 0:09:21.240 we do not grow in the United States. So that's 0:09:21.320 --> 0:09:23.800 why everyone was hoping it would be less bad. 0:09:23.840 --> 0:09:27.120 And here we are. It's sort of what the normy 0:09:27.720 --> 0:09:28.960 business types feared. 0:09:29.280 --> 0:09:32.440 I was watching the announcement here at Bloomberg in the newsroom, 0:09:32.559 --> 0:09:35.559 and here at Bloomberg, everybody's got like five computer screens. 0:09:35.600 --> 0:09:39.200 They're all covered in various charts and graphs at all moments. 0:09:39.640 --> 0:09:42.000 And I looked out across the newsroom and all the 0:09:42.120 --> 0:09:45.000 charts were read, Like as Trump was talking, all the 0:09:45.080 --> 0:09:45.760 charts were read. 0:09:46.160 --> 0:09:48.120 But this is where I was sort of hoping you. 0:09:48.040 --> 0:09:52.640 Could offer a ray of light, Max, because you have 0:09:52.760 --> 0:09:57.320 covered the people in this administration Trump, Trump's interactions with 0:09:57.400 --> 0:10:00.920 business for a long time. And I I thought, maybe, like, 0:10:01.040 --> 0:10:05.120 is this typical Trumpian blusters? This is shot across the bow, 0:10:05.760 --> 0:10:07.360 throw us some hope. 0:10:07.559 --> 0:10:10.480 I'm also just by nature like disagreeable, and my tendency 0:10:10.520 --> 0:10:12.400 when like all of these economics are like this is bad, 0:10:12.480 --> 0:10:12.800 I'm like. 0:10:12.760 --> 0:10:13.400 It must be good. 0:10:13.440 --> 0:10:16.000 Then I think there are two ways you can go here, 0:10:16.200 --> 0:10:18.240 and but they don't agree with one another. So one 0:10:18.280 --> 0:10:21.640 is this contingent I just talked about, which is like 0:10:22.200 --> 0:10:26.640 Scott the Scent, the Treasury Secretary, the CEOs of major banks, 0:10:26.800 --> 0:10:30.000 probably like many of the business journalists people like us 0:10:30.040 --> 0:10:31.960 who write about the economy and share this kind of 0:10:31.960 --> 0:10:34.640 consensus view is that Trump is actually not going to 0:10:34.679 --> 0:10:36.680 go through with this. Like the stock market is down 0:10:36.880 --> 0:10:40.360 as we speak on Thursday morning, but it's not down 0:10:40.400 --> 0:10:40.719 that much. 0:10:40.800 --> 0:10:42.200 It's like down four or five percent. 0:10:42.360 --> 0:10:45.079 You're talking like he just broke the world, and the 0:10:45.120 --> 0:10:46.160 S and P five hundred. 0:10:46.160 --> 0:10:49.079 It's a little bit that way when I was watching it, Yes. 0:10:49.000 --> 0:10:49.200 I know. 0:10:49.320 --> 0:10:52.480 So my point is clearly there are many people who 0:10:52.520 --> 0:10:55.920 think this is yet another negotiating post. We saw this 0:10:56.040 --> 0:10:59.240 with the situation with Mexico and Canada where he announced 0:10:59.240 --> 0:11:01.320 these huge tariffs and kind of basically pulled many of 0:11:01.360 --> 0:11:05.240 them back. You have people in Trump's inner circle already 0:11:05.360 --> 0:11:08.319 signaling that this is sort of a starting point of 0:11:08.360 --> 0:11:11.040 a negotiation that is not the ending point of a negotiation. 0:11:11.200 --> 0:11:13.319 He's making him an offer they can't refuse. 0:11:13.280 --> 0:11:15.160 And maybe that could work. 0:11:15.200 --> 0:11:19.040 The other thing, and this is a sort of different 0:11:19.080 --> 0:11:23.160 reason which you might feel optimistic, is like, look, there 0:11:23.200 --> 0:11:26.760 are things about this economy that you describe this consensus 0:11:26.840 --> 0:11:30.600 view that are very bad, like a world, a world 0:11:30.640 --> 0:11:33.960 where we just buy all this cheap crap and pay 0:11:34.160 --> 0:11:37.280 huge sums of money to ship it often by air, 0:11:37.720 --> 0:11:42.640 creating huge climate consequences around the world. Like it is 0:11:42.720 --> 0:11:45.000 not good for the world. It's arguably like a bad 0:11:45.080 --> 0:11:47.480 way for us to go through life. And maybe like 0:11:47.880 --> 0:11:50.880 this kind of consensus view did that to us. And 0:11:51.160 --> 0:11:53.720 if we were able to like move towards a world 0:11:53.800 --> 0:11:56.400 where more of our stuff is made locally, like that 0:11:56.440 --> 0:11:59.960 would be a stronger and more sustainable country. I could 0:12:00.200 --> 0:12:03.440 almost believe that the problem is that the other point 0:12:03.440 --> 0:12:06.600 I just made kind of undercuts it because businesses don't 0:12:06.640 --> 0:12:07.520 really believe. 0:12:07.200 --> 0:12:08.000 This is going to happen. 0:12:08.080 --> 0:12:11.200 Even now, We're not going to see like shoe factories 0:12:11.280 --> 0:12:14.000 or whatever open in the United States because no one's 0:12:14.000 --> 0:12:15.959 going to invest years and years and years to set 0:12:16.040 --> 0:12:17.800 up a whole new supply chain when they could just 0:12:17.840 --> 0:12:20.000 wait till the next election or till when you know, 0:12:20.040 --> 0:12:21.120 Trump changes his mind. 0:12:21.280 --> 0:12:23.800 Also, wages are really high in this country. I read 0:12:23.840 --> 0:12:26.439 a great article in Forbes about how much an iPhone 0:12:26.440 --> 0:12:29.560 would cost if it were entirely made inside of the US, 0:12:29.800 --> 0:12:33.520 and the estimate was between thirty and one hundred thousand dollars. 0:12:34.000 --> 0:12:38.400 So moving manufacturing back to the US and you know, 0:12:38.480 --> 0:12:42.120 making everything here, yes, you're right, it would be sustainable, 0:12:42.160 --> 0:12:44.959 but things would get massively more expensive. That's why we've 0:12:45.000 --> 0:12:47.520 outsourced in the first place, and it's made all kinds 0:12:47.559 --> 0:12:50.400 of goods affordable. I think you make a great point 0:12:50.400 --> 0:12:53.960 that maybe our economy is over dependent on US consumers, 0:12:54.000 --> 0:12:56.319 and in fact, sixteen percent of the global economy is 0:12:56.360 --> 0:12:58.040 Americans buying stuff. 0:12:58.160 --> 0:12:59.560 But I just want to say that kind of thought 0:12:59.600 --> 0:13:02.040 experiment and you just gave. Even somebody who's for these 0:13:02.080 --> 0:13:04.320 tariffs is not like, oh, yeah, we should pay one 0:13:04.360 --> 0:13:06.480 hundred thousand dollars for an iPhone. Now, they're just saying 0:13:06.720 --> 0:13:09.679 you should pay fifty percent more for some of these components. 0:13:09.760 --> 0:13:13.160 You should ask consumers to pay a tax for the 0:13:13.760 --> 0:13:16.880 downstream consequences of this supply chain. Like I only, that's crazy. 0:13:16.920 --> 0:13:19.000 We talk about that with environmental stuff all the time. 0:13:19.040 --> 0:13:21.240 I think a lot of these businesses and economists and 0:13:21.280 --> 0:13:23.760 so on don't think the idea of a carbon tax, for. 0:13:23.679 --> 0:13:26.960 Instance, is crazy, which also is just a massive drain 0:13:27.040 --> 0:13:28.000 on consumer spending. 0:13:28.120 --> 0:13:30.480 So yes, but then you put things way out of 0:13:30.520 --> 0:13:33.959 reach of a lot of people, especially lower income people, 0:13:34.040 --> 0:13:37.960 middle income people. Suddenly cars and smartphones are out of 0:13:38.160 --> 0:13:38.960 reach for them. 0:13:39.280 --> 0:13:41.640 That is not a great situation, I would argue, Okay, 0:13:41.640 --> 0:13:42.079 I want to. 0:13:42.040 --> 0:13:43.320 Stop defending this for a second. 0:13:43.360 --> 0:13:47.280 We have to talk about this formula, the science that 0:13:47.320 --> 0:13:48.800 produced these tariffs, the. 0:13:48.760 --> 0:13:52.559 Science that produce these tariffs. Actually, there was a formula 0:13:52.640 --> 0:13:55.440 that was used so that you take the trade deficit 0:13:55.720 --> 0:13:58.720 for the US in goods with a particular country, you 0:13:58.800 --> 0:14:03.559 divide that by the goods that that country imports. 0:14:04.040 --> 0:14:09.040 Wait, yeah, you take it's the train deficit divided by 0:14:09.080 --> 0:14:10.640 imports divided by two. 0:14:10.720 --> 0:14:11.360 For some reason. 0:14:11.679 --> 0:14:14.560 Okay, listeners, if we got that wrong, send us an email. 0:14:14.800 --> 0:14:18.320 Everybody's at Bloomberg dot net. But you know this is 0:14:18.360 --> 0:14:22.040 weird because number one, they talked about reciprocal tariffs. And 0:14:22.080 --> 0:14:25.800 you might think, oh, so that means like, if one 0:14:25.880 --> 0:14:29.720 country is charging a twenty percent tax on imports from 0:14:29.760 --> 0:14:30.840 our country, will. 0:14:30.680 --> 0:14:33.400 Charge yes, twenty percent on theirs. That is not what's happening. 0:14:33.480 --> 0:14:36.720 We're basing this on like how much stuff do we 0:14:36.800 --> 0:14:39.360 export to them? If we export a lot to them, 0:14:39.600 --> 0:14:41.920 the tariff's going to be lower. Yeah, and now maybe 0:14:41.920 --> 0:14:44.360 that makes sense from a negotiating perspective, but it's just 0:14:44.480 --> 0:14:47.280 kind of crazy because it creates all these weird situations 0:14:47.320 --> 0:14:50.720 where these like very poor countries are gonna have huge tariffs, 0:14:50.800 --> 0:14:53.840 gonna be all the harder for them to grow their economies. 0:14:54.280 --> 0:14:58.800 And also, like US consumers buying stuff is also like 0:14:58.840 --> 0:15:01.760 one of the biggest parts of is economy, Japan's economy, 0:15:02.280 --> 0:15:06.040 but also of Vietnam's economy, Mexico's economy. It's going to 0:15:06.080 --> 0:15:08.720 be a really tough situation for us and for everyone 0:15:08.760 --> 0:15:10.680 in the world. Like I can't think of a country 0:15:10.680 --> 0:15:11.840 that's not affecting all right. 0:15:11.680 --> 0:15:12.840 One other thing on this formula. 0:15:12.840 --> 0:15:17.280 And again this is speculation, but there are people suggesting, 0:15:17.400 --> 0:15:19.760 and I think this is plausible that the formula was 0:15:19.800 --> 0:15:24.960 created by chat gpt, because we're true. If you plug 0:15:25.320 --> 0:15:27.280 like how would you do a tariff into some of 0:15:27.280 --> 0:15:31.160 these chatbots, they give like these kind of similar formulations. 0:15:31.200 --> 0:15:33.360 And if this is true, which it very well might 0:15:33.440 --> 0:15:37.080 may not be, I think that it is maybe the 0:15:37.160 --> 0:15:40.720 first step in seeing the limits of AI. 0:15:40.840 --> 0:15:41.440 AI. 0:15:41.920 --> 0:15:44.320 Yeah, AI should not be setting tariffs, but I did 0:15:44.320 --> 0:15:46.240 want to end on the kind of a positive note, 0:15:46.720 --> 0:15:49.520 which is I did find a few silver linings in 0:15:49.560 --> 0:15:53.360 our tariff situation, and I brought them in to the studio. 0:15:53.720 --> 0:15:56.640 Are these like a good old fashioned American made products 0:15:56.720 --> 0:15:56.920 or what? 0:15:57.320 --> 0:15:59.800 No, quite the opposite. So one of them is this. 0:16:00.320 --> 0:16:02.280 It's a can of coke. It's like a tall boy 0:16:02.320 --> 0:16:02.600 of coke. 0:16:02.640 --> 0:16:04.320 It's like it's a can of diy coke. It was 0:16:04.320 --> 0:16:06.320 the only one I could find at the Dwayne read. 0:16:06.600 --> 0:16:09.480 President Trump apparently drinks twelve of these a day, twelve. 0:16:10.120 --> 0:16:14.320 But there was an exemption on aluminium steel, okay, which 0:16:14.360 --> 0:16:18.440 is really good because aluminium steel are literally in everything 0:16:18.480 --> 0:16:21.320 from buildings to home appliances to cans of coke. 0:16:21.480 --> 0:16:24.520 So that is one silver lining okay. 0:16:24.520 --> 0:16:27.040 And then there were a couple when you calculated out 0:16:27.040 --> 0:16:30.880 the formula, a couple countries that came out looking pretty okay. 0:16:30.920 --> 0:16:34.800 One of them flowers flowers from Columbia. 0:16:35.080 --> 0:16:37.840 So Columbia exempt or what ten percent? 0:16:38.040 --> 0:16:38.400 Okay? 0:16:38.640 --> 0:16:42.280 So these flowers, this is Dwyane Raid, so they're nineteen 0:16:42.400 --> 0:16:45.320 ninety nine, so they will you know, we're talking about 0:16:45.360 --> 0:16:48.920 like maybe twenty one dollars or twenty two dollars. 0:16:49.160 --> 0:16:53.200 Are there any other products, Stacy, Yes, that are are final. 0:16:53.880 --> 0:16:59.120 I think you're going to be very excited about this one. 0:17:00.080 --> 0:17:05.159 It's a bag of something idiot. It's Eastern candy Cadbury. 0:17:05.640 --> 0:17:09.120 So the UK ended up looking okay in all this. 0:17:09.480 --> 0:17:12.520 It's like the only moment where Brexit seemed like a 0:17:12.560 --> 0:17:17.720 good economic idea was on Liberation Day. Because because they 0:17:17.760 --> 0:17:20.920 don't you has like twenty plus percent tariffs, the UK 0:17:21.000 --> 0:17:25.560 got off with a ten percent tariff, meaning that chocolate 0:17:25.600 --> 0:17:28.680 from Cadbury and products from the UK, the prices will 0:17:28.680 --> 0:17:30.639 go up less than the prices for other things. 0:17:31.359 --> 0:17:34.400 We can eat our feelings a little bit. 0:17:34.400 --> 0:17:36.040 Drink them and get ourselves flowers. 0:17:44.200 --> 0:17:44.560 It's not. 0:17:58.920 --> 0:17:59.880 Okay, Stacey. 0:18:00.200 --> 0:18:03.040 Do you remember like when we were younger and more innocent, 0:18:03.480 --> 0:18:04.760 like two months ago, and the. 0:18:04.640 --> 0:18:06.720 Big source a couple of days ago of. 0:18:06.800 --> 0:18:11.000 Business uncertainty was TikTok, like wood trump band, TikTok, the 0:18:11.600 --> 0:18:15.760 very popular, very large social media Well, people probably missed 0:18:15.800 --> 0:18:19.240 it with all the excitement of Liberation Day. But two 0:18:19.320 --> 0:18:23.440 days from today, as we're recording, this is Liberation Day, 0:18:23.440 --> 0:18:24.040 park Dood. 0:18:24.119 --> 0:18:25.800 It's the day that TikTok. 0:18:26.000 --> 0:18:27.439 I think you have to pay a tax if you 0:18:27.520 --> 0:18:30.160 use friends to sell itself. 0:18:30.480 --> 0:18:33.440 It's the deadline for the Chinese owners of TikTok Byte 0:18:33.520 --> 0:18:37.560 Dance to sell it assumingly to a US owner. There's 0:18:37.560 --> 0:18:39.639 been a lot of news here and I want to 0:18:39.680 --> 0:18:41.800 talk about it, but because it's kind of related to 0:18:41.800 --> 0:18:44.080 the conversation we had, but also just because this is 0:18:44.119 --> 0:18:46.879 a huge story in its own right. And we have my 0:18:47.040 --> 0:18:50.480 favorite technology journalist Bradstone, who also is my boss, the 0:18:50.560 --> 0:18:51.640 editor of Bloomberg Business Week. 0:18:51.720 --> 0:18:55.200 Yes, indeed here with us virtually today. How are you doing, Brad? 0:18:55.600 --> 0:18:55.760 Hi? 0:18:55.840 --> 0:18:58.680 Guys happy TikTok almost TikTok. 0:18:58.320 --> 0:19:01.560 Liberation Day is part liberation part two? 0:19:01.680 --> 0:19:02.160 Is that right? 0:19:03.000 --> 0:19:03.760 That sounds right? 0:19:04.000 --> 0:19:06.160 So Brett, just to. 0:19:05.880 --> 0:19:09.520 Catch us up, like, where do things stand with TikTok 0:19:09.600 --> 0:19:09.960 right now? 0:19:09.960 --> 0:19:12.800 So April fifth? What do we expect to happen or 0:19:12.800 --> 0:19:13.640 what has to happen? 0:19:13.760 --> 0:19:15.760 Well, it may happen before then. 0:19:16.040 --> 0:19:19.760 It almost seems like as we speak right now in 0:19:19.840 --> 0:19:22.600 the Oval Office, there are discussions, led in part by 0:19:22.720 --> 0:19:27.119 Vice President jd Vance, evaluating some of these deals to 0:19:27.240 --> 0:19:31.440 buy the US arm of TikTok, And there is reporting 0:19:31.880 --> 0:19:35.359 that there is a coalition led by some very Trump 0:19:35.520 --> 0:19:40.600 friendly allies, including the venture capital firm Entries and Horowitz, Blackstone, 0:19:40.680 --> 0:19:44.440 of course, Steve Schwartzman, who sort of famously endorsed Trump 0:19:44.560 --> 0:19:48.680