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Speaker 1: In recent years, one of the most successful Wall Street

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Speaker 1: investors has been Bill Ackman. He's built Pershing Square into

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Speaker 1: one of the most successful and listened to firms in

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Speaker 1: all of Wall Street. But he's also been outspoken in

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Speaker 1: a number of other areas, including philanthropy and politics. I

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Speaker 1: had a chance to sit down with Bill in his

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Speaker 1: office recently to talk about a variety of issues, including

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Speaker 1: his latest bet on where the economy is going. There

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Speaker 1: is a general consensus in the United States in some

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Speaker 1: circles that we probably have avoided a recession for the

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Speaker 1: near future. We're going to have a so called soft landing.

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Speaker 1: That's the consensus. Is that your view as well?

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Speaker 2: I think it's really hard to predict. I do think

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Speaker 2: the economy is weakening. We're seeing evidence of that in

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Speaker 2: some of our companies. You're seeing and I have some concerns.

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Speaker 2: There's been a huge subsidy in terms of low interest

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Speaker 2: rates and companies. Most companies fix their rates or their

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Speaker 2: debt at very low rates, and certainly real estate investors

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Speaker 2: did the same. And that works until it doesn't work,

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Speaker 2: And so I think we're what's going to be interesting

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Speaker 2: is to see what happens when people get have to

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Speaker 2: reprice their debt, and I think that can have sort

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Speaker 2: of a cliff like effect, and you're certainly seeing that

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Speaker 2: in real estate now.

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Speaker 1: The markets are assuming, and the markets are not always right,

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Speaker 1: but the markets are assuming that there's going to be

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Speaker 1: a FED discount cut sometime next year. As we talk

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Speaker 1: now just about the end of November. It's not clear

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Speaker 1: what the Fed will do. But some people say that

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Speaker 1: the Fed, if they were to cut interest rates next year,

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Speaker 1: would help the Democrats and therefore be seen as very political.

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Speaker 1: The other hand, some people say the Fed can't wait

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Speaker 1: till after the election because the economy might need a stimulus.

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Speaker 1: So you have a view on what the FED is

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Speaker 1: likely to do.

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Speaker 2: I think they're going to cut rates, and you know,

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Speaker 2: I think they're going to cut rates sooner than people expect,

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Speaker 2: because you know, what's happening is the real rate of

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Speaker 2: interest ultimately, which is what impacts the economy, keeps increasing

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Speaker 2: as inflation declines. Right, So if the FED keeps rates

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Speaker 2: in the sort of middle fives and inflation is trending

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Speaker 2: below three percent or you know, that's a very high

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Speaker 2: real rate of interest, and I think that is having

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Speaker 2: a sort of retarding effect on the economy. And then

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Speaker 2: of course, again, you know, many businesses and certainly many

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Speaker 2: individuals have the benefit of fixed rate debt, and that

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Speaker 2: fixed rate debt, certainly for companies and for commercial real estate,

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Speaker 2: starts to roll off. So I think there's a risk

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Speaker 2: of a hard landing if the FED doesn't start cutting rates,

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Speaker 2: you know, pretty soon. So, you know, I think the

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Speaker 2: market expects sometime middle.

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Speaker 3: Of next year. I think it's more likely probably as

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Speaker 3: early as Key.

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Speaker 1: One for the economy itself. Do you think it really

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Speaker 1: is going to make a difference if President Trump is

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Speaker 1: if he's the Republican nominee it gets selected, or President

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Speaker 1: Biden is the Democratic nominee he's selected.

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Speaker 2: You know, I do think leadership matters enormously in everything

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Speaker 2: from the economy to geopolitics, and I hope we're going

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Speaker 2: to have a broader selection than Trump and Biden. I

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Speaker 2: think Biden's done a lot of good things, but I

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Speaker 2: think his legacy will not be a good one if he.

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Speaker 3: Is the nominee.

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Speaker 2: I do think the right thing for Biden to do

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Speaker 2: is to step aside and to say he's not going

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Speaker 2: to run and create the opportunity for some competition of alternative.

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Speaker 3: Do you think that I think that I think.

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Speaker 2: He's you know, past his prime in a kind of

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Speaker 2: meaningful way. I do think of It's a bit like

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Speaker 2: being CEO of a major company. It's a it's a

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Speaker 2: it's a full time job, and you need to be

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Speaker 2: at your you know, you need to be strong, you

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Speaker 2: need to be at your intellectual best. And I don't

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Speaker 2: think Biden is there. And I don't say that, you know,

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Speaker 2: with any derision of the President. I always respect the

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Speaker 2: president and want whoever the president.

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Speaker 3: Is to be successful.

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Speaker 2: But I think he's clearly past his physical and cognitive peak.

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Speaker 1: So you're a young, experienced investment professional. You ever thought

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Speaker 1: about running for office yourself?

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Speaker 2: I think, you know, if the country wanted me at

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Speaker 2: some point, you know, I would be open to it.

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Speaker 2: You know, it's not I think it's not my time.

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Speaker 2: I still have a lot of work to do, and

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Speaker 2: you know, like to if I ever would take that step,

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Speaker 2: I would have to do I'd have to find myself

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Speaker 2: at a time in life when I felt ready to

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Speaker 2: take on that kind of responsibility. But it's something where

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Speaker 2: the country would have to ask me, as opposed to

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Speaker 2: you need to put myself out there.

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Speaker 1: Let's talk a moment about the background of yourself, when

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Speaker 1: you grew up and how you came to this business.

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Speaker 1: So where did you grow up.

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Speaker 3: I grew up in Chappaqua, New York.

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Speaker 1: And did you say to your parents, I want to

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Speaker 1: be a hedge fund investor?

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Speaker 2: No, what do you want to be? I wanted to

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Speaker 2: be a businessman. It's probably what I told him at

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Speaker 2: age ten or something like this. So I always had

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Speaker 2: all kinds of entrepreneurial jobs and things.

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Speaker 1: So as a young boy, or did you have any

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Speaker 1: newspaper routes or things like that?

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Speaker 2: Sure, So my dad did not leave in allowances. He said, look,

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Speaker 2: you want to make money, you have to work. And

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Speaker 2: initially he offered me some job opportunities when early one

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Speaker 2: was digging a fifty foot long, you know, sort of

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Speaker 2: ditch as I would describe it, to help deal with

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Speaker 2: the water flow off of our property, and he offered

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Speaker 2: to pay me, you know whatever, It was a dollar

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Speaker 2: an hour or something like this, and it was a

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Speaker 2: good lesson in that I didn't want to get paid

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Speaker 2: per hours. So next time he gave me a project,

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Speaker 2: I said, look, let me price the project, and then

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Speaker 2: it doesn't matter how quickly I get it done.

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Speaker 3: I don't want to be paid on an hourly basis.

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Speaker 3: So those are some of the early things.

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Speaker 2: I wouldn't call them entrepreneurial, but they generated some some

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Speaker 2: money that I was spending money. In terms of early

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Speaker 2: life job experiences.

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Speaker 3: One of the most.

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Speaker 2: Valuable ones was actually when I was a Harvard student.

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Speaker 2: There's something called the Let's Go Travel Guides, which were

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Speaker 2: these books that students wrote.

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Speaker 3: About budget travel.

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Speaker 2: And a friend of mine, me Tilson, and I he

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Speaker 2: became a friend, sold advertising for those guides all over

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Speaker 2: the world, and so we had this working out of

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Speaker 2: the basement of dorm room. We sold hundreds of thousands

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Speaker 2: of dollars of advertising in these books, and we got

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Speaker 2: a commission for doing so, and it started that's got

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Speaker 2: a fifteen percent promote for selling advertising, and that kind

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Speaker 2: of led to this hedge fund thing.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and you did pretty well at Harvard, and when

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Speaker 1: you graduated, you then did what.

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Speaker 3: I graduated work for my dad.

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Speaker 2: Actually, my grandfather and his brother started a firm that

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Speaker 2: arranged financing for real estate developers and what you might

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Speaker 2: call commercial mortgage brokerage, and also raised equity financing for developers.

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Speaker 2: Sold property and I went to work there. I spent

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Speaker 2: a little under two years there before going to business school.

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Speaker 1: And you went to business school at Harvard.

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Speaker 3: I did.

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Speaker 1: And after you graduated from Harvard Business School, what did

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Speaker 1: you do?

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Speaker 3: That's when I started hedge fund and.

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Speaker 1: Just just said, Okay, I've got a Harvard Business School.

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Speaker 1: I don't need to have any more experience. I'm just

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Speaker 1: going to start a hedge fund.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: I had started investing in business school with a classmate. Actually,

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Speaker 2: I went to Harvard with the plan about I was

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Speaker 2: going to learn about investing so I could someday be

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Speaker 2: an investor. And there were no courses on investing at Harvard,

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Speaker 2: but there were courses on finance and accounting and competitive

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Speaker 2: strategy with Michael Porter, and that was the backdrop for

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Speaker 2: my education about investing. And I said, look, I'll open

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Speaker 2: a brokerage account. I've made a little money in my

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Speaker 2: real estate commissions, and this will be another year of

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Speaker 2: If I lose it all, it's another year of Harvard

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Speaker 2: Business School.

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Speaker 3: If I learned something from it, maybe it's a career.

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Speaker 2: And I kind of fell in love with investing and

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Speaker 2: it's something you can kind of figure out. Actually whether

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Speaker 2: you're good at or not pretty a couple of year

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Speaker 2: period of time.

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Speaker 1: So you started Pershing Square after that period of time

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Speaker 1: or right away?

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Speaker 2: I started a firm called Gotham Partners with a partner

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Speaker 2: named David Burkwitz, a classmate of mine a business school.

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Speaker 2: We started in September of ninety two. And yes, we

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Speaker 2: had no experience. And what was interesting is that none

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Speaker 2: of the people who knew me in high school, parents,

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Speaker 2: my friends, had no interest because they thought him as

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Speaker 2: a kid. But we raised money from mostly people who

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Speaker 2: were themselves good investors, and I think they could see

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Speaker 2: in us.

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Speaker 3: I guess some potential, right.

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Speaker 1: So you then transformed that into Pershing Square a year

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Speaker 1: or two later.

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Speaker 2: No, So Gotham was a decade and we did kind

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Speaker 2: of public equity and then private equity and some venture capital,

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Speaker 2: and then actually had a pretty challenging period that led

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Speaker 2: to a decision to wind up Gotham, and then I

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Speaker 2: launched Pershing Square in January of two thousand and four,

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Speaker 2: almost twenty years ago.

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Speaker 1: You specialize in picking stocks. You weren't a macro investor then,

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Speaker 1: where you were a stock picker.

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Speaker 2: Yes, I would say we were kind of an activist

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Speaker 2: stock picker. We would buy pretty concentrated portfolio by large

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Speaker 2: stakes and companies that we thought were great businesses or

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Speaker 2: had great assets but were undermanaged.

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Speaker 1: And when you're an activist, of course that word has

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Speaker 1: different meanings of different people. But you would you call

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Speaker 1: the CEO and say, we own five percent, we'd like

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Speaker 1: to be on the board, we'd like to tell you

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Speaker 1: how to run your company? Did you do that? And

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Speaker 1: was that intimidating to do that?

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Speaker 2: It's not exactly what we said, because again we were

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Speaker 2: young and inexperienced, But it was more that we'd find

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Speaker 2: a company. One of the early investments was Wendy's, the

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Speaker 2: Hamburger chain, and Wendy's owned one hundred percent of a

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Speaker 2: chain called Tim Hortons in Canada. And Tim Hortons was

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Speaker 2: a very profitable, successful, pure franchise of coffee and donut

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Speaker 2: chaining principally in Canada, and you could fairly clearly see

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Speaker 2: that business was worth about five billion dollars at least,

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Speaker 2: it had about four hundred and fifty million of operating income.

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Speaker 2: It's probably worth meaningfully more than that, but you could

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Speaker 2: buy all of Wendy's for five billion, So literally the

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Speaker 2: market was describing zero value to the Wendy's franchise, and

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Speaker 2: our advice to the CEO is, well, just spin off

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Speaker 2: tim Horton's and then focus on fixing Wendy's. But you

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Speaker 2: can create enormous value in just separating two companies. So

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Speaker 2: it was a bit like investment banking where we didn't

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Speaker 2: charge a fee and actually back then because we couldn't

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Speaker 2: get a return from phone call because we were a tiny,

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Speaker 2: little fun circa, you know, two thousand and four, we

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Speaker 2: hired Blackstone, which had an investment bank at the time,

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Speaker 2: and we hired them to say, put together a fairness opinion,

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Speaker 2: if you will, what Wendys would be worth if they

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Speaker 2: spun off tim Horton's.

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Speaker 3: And then we wrote a letter to the board.

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Speaker 2: We attached the Blackstone evaluation, which was nearly double where

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Speaker 2: the stock was trading, and then six weeks later, magically

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Speaker 2: they spun off tim Horton's.

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Speaker 1: Okay, so you did that with other companies and being

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Speaker 1: an activist, was it consistent with your personality to do this,

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Speaker 1: because you've got to be a tough guy to call

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Speaker 1: up CEOs and say, look, I got a better idea

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Speaker 1: abot how to run your company. Than you do.

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Speaker 2: It was consistent with my personality. I've think always been

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Speaker 2: some form of an activist.

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Speaker 1: Yet and today your focus is on the kind of

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Speaker 1: activist investing or you've stopped that.

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Speaker 2: So, you know, when you're no one knows who you

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Speaker 2: are and you're trying to affect change in a company,

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Speaker 2: you have to sort of be an activist, have to

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Speaker 2: use the media, the public platform to in some cases

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Speaker 2: shame a company into doing the right thing. Twenty years later,

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Speaker 2: having had a meaningful number of successful engagements with companies,

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Speaker 2: we don't really have to do that anymore, and so

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Speaker 2: a lot of the stuff we've done recently has been

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Speaker 2: either buying into a company that already has great leadership

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Speaker 2: and we're happy to share ideas. In some cases, you

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Speaker 2: know there needs to be a change in leadership, but

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Speaker 2: we're able to get things done without, you know, sort

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Speaker 2: of what you might call activism, more like engaged owners

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Speaker 2: of businesses.

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Speaker 1: And you've done the three extremely successful macro bets. One

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Speaker 1: during the period of the time of the housing crisis

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Speaker 1: seven eight, and that one was extremely successful. You did

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Speaker 1: one again during the COVID period of time, yes, which

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Speaker 1: was I think maybe your best investment ever you made

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Speaker 1: a ninety four times your money investment more or less

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Speaker 1: one hundred times actually one hundred times.

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Speaker 2: Yes, we bet that the credit spreads would widen because

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Speaker 2: we need we have to shut down the global economy.

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Speaker 3: And that's basically what happened.

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Speaker 1: So did people say, do you have any more deals

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Speaker 1: like that one? You did that one, Yes, and that

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Speaker 1: was a hard to find.

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Speaker 2: You know, the three black swan events in the last

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Speaker 2: twenty years, we were We've been able to make a big, big,

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Speaker 2: profitable bets on. But these kind of black Swan type

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Speaker 2: things hopefully occur only every seven years.

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Speaker 3: Let's say it, interest.

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Speaker 1: Rates went up and they started going up. You made

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Speaker 1: another macro back that turned out to be pretty successful

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Speaker 1: as well. Yes, So do you have any other macro

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Speaker 1: bets you can mention now or nothing you can mention?

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Speaker 2: We have another one on as we speak. Actually, we're

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Speaker 2: betting that the Federal Reserve is going to have to

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Speaker 2: cut rates more quickly than people expect.

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Speaker 3: That's the current macro bet that we have on.

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Speaker 1: You're going to continue to be involved in this issue

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Speaker 1: and try to push Harvard to do what you think

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Speaker 1: they should be doing.

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Speaker 2: Yes, I'm an activist but my activism today is probably

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Speaker 2: not in the corporate boardrooms on campus.

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Speaker 1: Some hedge funds, they've delegated the money decision making to

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Speaker 1: many of different people in the firm. You make all

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Speaker 1: the final decisions yourself.

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Speaker 2: It works as we have an eight person investment team,

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Speaker 2: and each idea is one that a two person team

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Speaker 2: will do a deep dive on.

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Speaker 3: I will do less of a deep dive.

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Speaker 2: I'll read the public filings, I'll read conference called transcripts.

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Speaker 2: I won't be the person that you know talks to

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Speaker 2: former employees that kind of thing. And then we talk

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Speaker 2: about every idea as a team, and ultimately the team collectively,

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Speaker 2: we don't do things generally that you know, we don't

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Speaker 2: have kind of collective buy in on. At the end

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Speaker 2: of the day, I do retain the ultimate vetails yeah,

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Speaker 2: your name, and the ultimate decision on sizing. One big

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Speaker 2: change I made in the last couple of years, I

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Speaker 2: pointed a CIO, a very talented guy named Ryan Israel

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Speaker 2: who's been with the firm for about fourteen years. And

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Speaker 2: Ryan is exceptional and he's taken a real leadership role

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Speaker 2: among that eight person team. But I use the word

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Speaker 2: team often here because that's how this place operates.

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Speaker 1: What type of people would get a job here. You're

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Speaker 1: looking for people who are really smart, good academic credentials driven.

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Speaker 1: What is it that you look for when you're interviewing people.

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Speaker 3: It depends on what role.

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Speaker 2: But people on the investment team generally, yes, they've graduated

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Speaker 2: to the top of their class at Wharton, They've always

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Speaker 2: been interested in business and investing. They went to work

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Speaker 2: at a Apollo a KKR Carlisle. We like people that

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Speaker 2: get private equity experience. We think that's the best background

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Speaker 2: for what we do. We're really private equity investors investing

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Speaker 2: in the public markets, and the sort of temperament of

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Speaker 2: a typical private equity person fits well here. We only

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Speaker 2: own really eight companies. They don't change that often, so

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Speaker 2: this is not a place where a typical hedge fund firm.

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Speaker 2: You know, people are cycling through, you know, the idea

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Speaker 2: of the week, the idea of the month. Here we

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Speaker 2: may do one new idea a year now.

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Speaker 1: Another area that investors have been very interesting lately is

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Speaker 1: artificial intelligence. Are you investing in things relating to artificial intelligence?

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Speaker 2: You know, the most direct investment we have in AI,

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Speaker 2: I would say is Google or Alphabet, which.

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Speaker 1: You're a biggest shareholder of an alphabet.

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Speaker 2: We're a small shareholder of Alphabet because it's a massive company.

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Speaker 2: We've got a large investments, approaching two billion dollar investment

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Speaker 2: in the business. And actually it was it was the

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Speaker 2: It was AI that created the opportunity for us to

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Speaker 2: buy Google at an attractive price. You know, basically Microsoft

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Speaker 2: and open Ai had a very powerful demonstration of a

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Speaker 2: launch of a new product, and then Google's kind of

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Speaker 2: launch or it was a bit of a disaster. Stock

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Speaker 2: cut crushed on the basis of fear that Google is

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Speaker 2: way behind an AI and you know, their advertising franchise

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Speaker 2: more than covered the value of the company, and you

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Speaker 2: got whatever they were doing in AI if you will,

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Speaker 2: for free. And our view based on work we had done,

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Speaker 2: is that actually Google was sort of neck and neck,

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Speaker 2: if not ahead of open Ai in terms of their

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Speaker 2: business progress.

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Speaker 1: So one of the pluses some people would say of

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Speaker 1: being a successful investor is you do make a fair

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Speaker 1: amount of money and then you have the opportunity to

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Speaker 1: be a philanthropist. So you were one of the early

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Speaker 1: signers of the Giving Pledge. Why did you do that?

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Speaker 1: Why did you commit to give away half of your

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Speaker 1: net worth.

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Speaker 2: Well, I think you committed half for more. That was

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Speaker 2: kind of my plan anyway. And then you know, one day,

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Speaker 2: you know, Warren Buffett calls up and says, Bill, you know,

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Speaker 2: I want you to sign the giving pledge.

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Speaker 3: So I think it's a you know, I've learned a

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Speaker 3: lot about philanthropy.

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Speaker 2: I started the Persian Square Foundation, actually, I think seventeen

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Speaker 2: years ago. My personal business plan was always to be

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Speaker 2: super successful and then take the resources I don't need

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Speaker 2: and then redeploy them in a way that I thought

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Speaker 2: was best for society. I do think that philanthropy is

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Speaker 2: often not the best way to solve problems. I do

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Speaker 2: think that capitalism and for profit business models are generally

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Speaker 2: the best way to solve problems. But there are still problems,

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Speaker 2: societal ones that can't be solved in the traditional capital markets.

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Speaker 2: There's sort of a gap, and so you know, those

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Speaker 2: are the areas that we tend to focus on.

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Speaker 1: One of the institutions you've been very philanthropic with is

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Speaker 1: your alma mater, Harvard, But recently you've been very public

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Speaker 1: about your criticism of the way Harvard handled the events

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Speaker 1: of October seventh. Then their aftermath. Could you talk about that? Now?

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Speaker 2: The first reaction of a group of thirty four Harvard

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Speaker 2: student clubs on the morning after October seventh was to

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Speaker 2: put out a statement saying that Israel was one hundred

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Speaker 2: percent responsible for the acts of Hamas. And my view

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Speaker 2: on that was, you know, that's ridiculous, and that's more

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Speaker 2: than ridiculous, I would say, and you know, these students

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Speaker 2: need to have some you know, judgment and perspective. You

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Speaker 2: can come out and say, look, I'm very unhappy about

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Speaker 2: Israel's treatment of the Palestinians in the West Bank, or

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Speaker 2: you can say, you know, we can talk about God's

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Speaker 2: a strip, but you can't support terrorists, and particularly terrorists

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Speaker 2: that rape and pillage and you know, murder and burn

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Speaker 2: and take hostages. And so my first point there was

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Speaker 2: not so much directed at Harvard, but you know, love

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Speaker 2: to know. I got actually a text from a CEO

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Speaker 2: in my industry. It's like, Bill, you know your you

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Speaker 2: know the people at Harvard. I'd like to know who

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Speaker 2: the students are behind these clubs, so I make sure

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Speaker 2: I don't inadvertently hire them. And so I tweeted out

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Speaker 2: that sort of made that point and caused a bit

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Speaker 2: of a firestorm, and I got a lot of pushback,

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Speaker 2: Why are you picking on students? I said, look, you

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Speaker 2: can't hide behind a corporate entity. If you're going to

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Speaker 2: support terrorism. You know, that's a that's a major decision.

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Speaker 2: So that was sort of my first initiative, if you will,

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Speaker 2: at Harvard. And then you know, there were protests on campus,

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Speaker 2: and the protests weren't The protests weren't supportive of terrorism

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Speaker 2: and supportive of things like you know, when you have

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Speaker 2: a group of students shouting into fada, into fada, you know,

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Speaker 2: let's free Palestine and from the river to the sea.

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Speaker 2: The meaning of into fada means to kill Jews. When

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Speaker 2: I raised this issue, Harvard said, well, we have a

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Speaker 2: commitment to free speech, and that's why we have to

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Speaker 2: allow this. Well, there's certain speech that is certainly permissible

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Speaker 2: under the First Amendment, and then there's certain speech that

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Speaker 2: I would say is undesirable on a campus.

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Speaker 1: Have you said you're not going to donate the Harvard anymore,

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Speaker 1: or have you said I'm not going to hire people

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Speaker 1: from these Harvard students anymore or people like those people?

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Speaker 2: No, Well, one, we're not going to hire anyone that

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Speaker 2: supports terrorism at person Square. I haven't made any statements about,

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Speaker 2: you know, economic support for Harvard. I want Harvard to

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Speaker 2: do the right thing. I don't want to threaten one

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Speaker 2: way or another. That's not my kind of approach. But

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Speaker 2: I do think Harvard needs to do a deep examination

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Speaker 2: of you know, one, there's been a meaningful rise in

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Speaker 2: anti Semitic incidents on campus and the university's done very little.

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Speaker 3: You know.

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Speaker 2: The reaction was, let's let's form a task force. And

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Speaker 2: I think again, had this been another ethnic group that

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Speaker 2: where this kind of activity took place, Harvard would be

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Speaker 2: suspending the people involved, not just allowing you.

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Speaker 1: So you're going to continue to be involved in this

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Speaker 1: issue and try to push Harvard to do what you

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Speaker 1: think they should be doing.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely, you know, I wrote a pretty thoughtful letter that

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Speaker 2: was you know, I think twenty five million people saw

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Speaker 2: it on Twitter, and remarkably I did not get a response,

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Speaker 2: which to me is a very very bad.

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Speaker 3: And weak approach.

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Speaker 2: Literally no response, no acknowledgment, no Dear Bill, I hear

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Speaker 2: what you're saying, but.

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Speaker 3: Nothing. So. Yes, I'm an act devist, but.

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Speaker 2: My activism today is probably not in the corporate boardroom

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Speaker 2: it's it's on campus.

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Speaker 3: And and this is not just.

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Speaker 2: A Harvard problem, you know, there's and it's an NYU problem,

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Speaker 2: It's a University of Pennsylvania problem. It you know, the

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Speaker 2: more I examine the issue, the more woke, the more

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Speaker 2: left leaning the institution, the more anti semitism, which is

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Speaker 2: a very unfortunate thing.

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Speaker 1: You've built Pershing from nothing to what it is today,

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Speaker 1: a very successful hedge fund. What makes you most proud

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Speaker 1: that having done that from the start? Or are the

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Speaker 1: things you've done in your philanthropic life? What are you

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Speaker 1: most proud of having achieved in your life so far?

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Speaker 2: So you know a number of things. I love having

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00:21:44,560 --> 00:21:48,080
Speaker 2: a company where I believe that pretty much everyone here

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00:21:48,160 --> 00:21:50,400
Speaker 2: is excited to come into work every day. I think

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00:21:50,440 --> 00:21:55,720
Speaker 2: we've made a kind of meaningful contribution to, you know,

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00:21:55,840 --> 00:21:58,919
Speaker 2: the capitalist system and the functioning of how you know.

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00:21:58,920 --> 00:22:01,080
Speaker 2: I think the probably the most ignist impact we've had.

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Speaker 2: We were sort of an early activist, and as you

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00:22:05,320 --> 00:22:08,880
Speaker 2: probably know, the nature of boardrooms, you know, twenty years

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00:22:08,920 --> 00:22:12,600
Speaker 2: ago is meaningfully different today, and a big part of

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00:22:12,600 --> 00:22:14,439
Speaker 2: that is the rise of shareholder activism, and I think

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00:22:14,440 --> 00:22:16,800
Speaker 2: we played an important role there. I think that's led

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Speaker 2: to the US capital markets, in the US stock market

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00:22:19,720 --> 00:22:22,200
Speaker 2: being one of the best performing markets in the world.

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00:22:22,280 --> 00:22:24,720
Speaker 2: And that has a huge impact on people's pensions, on

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00:22:24,800 --> 00:22:28,640
Speaker 2: people's savings, on people's livelihood, on US competitiveness, on our

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00:22:29,520 --> 00:22:32,439
Speaker 2: national security, and so, you know, I think, you know,

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Speaker 2: the good news about my day job is, you know,

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00:22:34,720 --> 00:22:38,960
Speaker 2: it's fun, it's profitable. It benefits our investors, but it

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Speaker 2: also on benefits kind of the market generally. So I

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00:22:42,040 --> 00:22:45,439
Speaker 2: think that's an important and good contribution. You know, Philanthropically,

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Speaker 2: we have invested in you know, six hundred million dollars

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Speaker 2: in a wider range of initiatives and you know, a

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Speaker 2: number of those.

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Speaker 3: You know, it's a bit like investing.

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Speaker 2: You have, hopefully you have a few Googles, and we

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00:23:01,920 --> 00:23:05,040
Speaker 2: have a couple of those, number of those filmthropically, and

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Speaker 2: I do feel like we've invested money that on which

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Speaker 2: society has earned unattractive return