Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week. I'm Karl Masser. Every day
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Speaker 1: The two things that bother people they say, well, maybe
Speaker 1: we did this too quickly. They need to understand the
Speaker 1: speed is really a reflection of the extraordinary scientific advances
Speaker 1: that have been made that allowed us to do things
Speaker 1: in weeks two months that normally would have taken several years.
Speaker 1: That was not compromising safety, nor was it compromising scientific integrity.
Speaker 1: The process that went into deciding the safety and efficacy
Speaker 1: was both independent and transparent. We need to make sure
Speaker 1: people on the stand that all right that of course
Speaker 1: you know that voice, Dry Faucci, Right, it's one of
Speaker 1: those few voices that everybody knows. Yeah, you don't even
Speaker 1: need to everyone knows Vauci at this point exactly. Um,
Speaker 1: he was talking though at the third annual Bloomberg Health Summit,
Speaker 1: and of course addressing concerns that are real about people
Speaker 1: maybe not wanting to take the vaccine concerned about safety.
Speaker 1: Let's get into a discussion with Dr Seth Letterman back
Speaker 1: with US, co founder, CEO and chairman of the New
Speaker 1: York based specialty pharmaceutical company Tonics Pharmaceuticals. Set Back with Us.
Speaker 1: He is on the phone in New York City. Dr Letterman,
Speaker 1: Nice to have you here with Tim and myself. Vaccine
Speaker 1: and what we've seen a lot of news coming down
Speaker 1: the UK starting there are still some concerns. How do
Speaker 1: you see it right now? Well, first, I agree with
Speaker 1: Dr Faucci that the progress UH on the the two
Speaker 1: or three leading vaccines has been remarkable. I mean, it
Speaker 1: is just awesome to be less than a year out
Speaker 1: from the first time this virus was recognized and have
Speaker 1: you know clinical trial data on you know, at least
Speaker 1: four vaccines. But I do think that we have to
Speaker 1: temper our expectations. While the data are intriguing so far,
Speaker 1: there are really four things that haven't been shown. There
Speaker 1: has not been shown. There are questions about the duration
Speaker 1: of protection. There are questions about whether these vaccines will
Speaker 1: protect against death and really severe symptoms. There are questions
Speaker 1: about whether these vaccines will block forward transmission, and finally,
Speaker 1: there are questions about safety. So while I share Dr
Speaker 1: Facy's enthusiasm, I think that we all have to remain
Speaker 1: cautiously optimistic and await more data. What are the questions
Speaker 1: about safety. It's not something that we've heard a lot about. Well, Uh,
Speaker 1: safety you have to think of two different groups. Uh.
Speaker 1: You have to think about the older people in retirement communities,
Speaker 1: who represent one population at risk, and then think about
Speaker 1: younger people for example, you know, college studes, healthy young adults,
Speaker 1: you know, particularly those without presisting medical problems. So for
Speaker 1: the older people in retirement communities, any vaccine will have
Speaker 1: some effect on their health. So I think we're gonna
Speaker 1: have to look at a large number of people to
Speaker 1: see how they react to this vaccine. Now, for the
Speaker 1: younger people, you know, let's call them college students with
Speaker 1: no pre existing conditions, they're really a pretty low risk
Speaker 1: of developing serious consequences anyway. So it's a lot of
Speaker 1: information is going to be needed before we can really
Speaker 1: recommend that would be beneficial to them, uh in terms
Speaker 1: of their own personal health to get any vaccine. But
Speaker 1: we've got a lot more information, certainly yesterday from the FDA,
Speaker 1: and I know there's a big review going on tomorrow
Speaker 1: that will ultimately decide, I guess whether or not there's
Speaker 1: US approval and we can move ahead. I mean, my
Speaker 1: understanding is the vaccine that you tend to know the
Speaker 1: worst of it in terms of any kind of side
Speaker 1: effects within the first month. Um. I wish that was
Speaker 1: the case, but you know, we're talking about you know,
Speaker 1: using these products potentially in hundreds of millions of Americans,
Speaker 1: let alone people all over the world, So I think
Speaker 1: that you need a larger samples. And by the way,
Speaker 1: you know, the kind of approval that they're getting now
Speaker 1: is really you know, emergency use authorization. It's not full
Speaker 1: FDA approval, and the guidelines for full FDA approval really
Speaker 1: required that they're going to have to show protection you know,
Speaker 1: quite a bit longer period out from from vaccination than
Speaker 1: where they are now. Well, that's sort of that at
Speaker 1: this point, that's sort of a worry for later because
Speaker 1: the idea here is to get as many people as possible,
Speaker 1: especially those vulnerable people inoculated as soon as possible. Right,
Speaker 1: That's that's correct. But but the question is will will
Speaker 1: these acts have to be administered repeatedly? Right? So, so
Speaker 1: would you take this Dr letterman Um, Well, that's an
Speaker 1: interesting question. First of all, I'm unlikely to be a
Speaker 1: candidate because they're being you know, essentially reserved for people
Speaker 1: at risk groups. And I think that what the pediatricians
Speaker 1: and other groups have done working with the CDC to
Speaker 1: work out in equitable and um efficient way to distribute
Speaker 1: the first vaccines is great. So it's really a theoretical question.
Speaker 1: I you know, I wouldn't qualify. Although I'm a doctor,
Speaker 1: I'm not currently a front healthcare worker. You know, said
Speaker 1: let me just because we're running out of time. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: got about forty five seconds here. You guys that are
Speaker 1: working on a vaccine right with a live COVID virus, Well, yes,
Speaker 1: well we're going on a live vaccine, but ours is
Speaker 1: based at Tonics. Ours is based on a live viral
Speaker 1: vector and we're designing it so it provides longer duration
Speaker 1: of immunity. And you know, Mark is also working into
Speaker 1: live viral vector vaccine so it's a different approach, right,
Speaker 1: But I think ultimately COVID is going to become endemic,
Speaker 1: so we're gonna have to think about vaccinating people for
Speaker 1: the long term and even people who haven't been born yet. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's I think it's definitely an upheaval when it comes
Speaker 1: to how we treat this. UM. Dr Seth Letterman, thank
Speaker 1: you so much, co founder, chief executive officer Tonics Pharmaceuticals
Speaker 1: with us on the phone from New York City. I mean,
Speaker 1: you know what we hear, Tim, right, is that we
Speaker 1: expect we're going to need multiple vaccine. Even if we
Speaker 1: see with fiser you have to wait three weeks to
Speaker 1: get the second dose of that, right, So it's gonna
Speaker 1: take a laugh. Interesting thoughts for perspective. This is Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Business Week with Carol Messer from Bloomberg Radio. Let's bring
Speaker 1: in Naomi Nicks. She is corporate Influence reporter at Bloomberg News.
Speaker 1: On the phone from Washington, d C. Sonami, we were
Speaker 1: expecting this, but now that we've got some of the headlines, Um,
Speaker 1: what jumps out at you? What do you think is
Speaker 1: the most significant? What could this mean for Facebook? Well,
Speaker 1: it's interesting, So the Federal Trade Commission specifically highlighted Facebook's
Speaker 1: per which just of WhatsApp Instagram in in the lawsuits
Speaker 1: that it filed just moments ago. UM. And part of
Speaker 1: what it's calling for UM is a potential unwinding or
Speaker 1: dibecter of those companies by Facebook. That would be a
Speaker 1: significant alteration of Facebook's business model um and one of
Speaker 1: the growing parts of its company. UH. And so that's
Speaker 1: really interesting. And what they're saying is, UM, you know
Speaker 1: that Facebook essentially looked around for for potential competitors rivals,
Speaker 1: uh and then just instead of competing against them, bought
Speaker 1: them up. Well, I mean, there's no question that that's
Speaker 1: what happened to Yeah, that's I mean, that's the way
Speaker 1: it goes. I guess the question is to what extent
Speaker 1: does the federal government do these states actually have a
Speaker 1: case here? It is that that is that is the question.
Speaker 1: And one of the defenses that Facebook will likely say
Speaker 1: is that, for for instance, in the case of Instagram,
Speaker 1: that Instagram became Intagram because Facebook bought it, and that
Speaker 1: actually at the time Instagram wasn't as much of a
Speaker 1: competitor in the market sense, and that Facebook was the
Speaker 1: one to help it grow and become such a popular
Speaker 1: I think I think that's a fair argument. I mean,
Speaker 1: Instagram was tiny, it had a staff that you could
Speaker 1: you could count on fingers and toes back then when
Speaker 1: Facebook brought it in a billion dollars and it was
Speaker 1: a huge acquisition back then. But I think a lot
Speaker 1: has changed since then. And I do think Facebook has
Speaker 1: a case that says, hey, Instagram is what it is
Speaker 1: because of our investment, right, And I want to just
Speaker 1: bring it like, is the consumer hurt in all of this? Naomi?
Speaker 1: Doesn't that ultimately what um? Those bringing the case? UM,
Speaker 1: all of these regulators and state attorneys in the FTC,
Speaker 1: the lawyers for the FTC, don't they have to prove
Speaker 1: that consumers were hurt in the process. Yes, And that's
Speaker 1: one of the tricky parts about some of these tech
Speaker 1: ant I trust cases because these UM, because these platforms
Speaker 1: are free UH, lawyers can't rely on the usual measure
Speaker 1: of harm UH that they would normally use, which is
Speaker 1: priced to establish that a company hurt competition by hurting consumers.
Speaker 1: And so in this case they're going to have to
Speaker 1: be really specific in their market analysis and defining the market,
Speaker 1: in defining the consumer and in defining the harm which
Speaker 1: might use less traditional measures. I'm just gonna remind everybody Microsoft,
Speaker 1: right when all of this first came down, how many
Speaker 1: years of lawsuits went on and on and on. I mean,
Speaker 1: who knows how long this could ultimately tim take. And
Speaker 1: and it's a it's a really good point. And I
Speaker 1: think people look back at what happened with Microsoft as
Speaker 1: creating this environment for all these startups that we're talking
Speaker 1: about right now when it comes to anti trust to
Speaker 1: actually succeed. And in the meantime, you have Microsoft turning
Speaker 1: into one of the most valuable companies in the world again,
Speaker 1: right exactly. I mean, Naomi, this is just the beginning
Speaker 1: of what's going to be probably a very long process.
Speaker 1: Just got about twenty seconds here. It will be a
Speaker 1: very long past. And the key for Facebook will be
Speaker 1: how does it maintain its competitive rigger in the marketplace
Speaker 1: while fighting, uh, this this issue on the regulatory front.
Speaker 1: That is always something that analyst investors right jump on
Speaker 1: and be like they're distracted. It's not a great thing,
Speaker 1: right overhang, Yeah, And as Charlie said, Facebook stock down
Speaker 1: three So it's not like investors are that concerned now exactly, Um, Naomi,
Speaker 1: thank you so much. Naomi Nick's corporate influence for Porter
Speaker 1: at Bloomberg News on the phone from Washington, d C.
Speaker 1: As a matter of fact, I was going to just
Speaker 1: take a quick check what is Facebook doing this year?
Speaker 1: They're up, So I mean, listen, we all understand kind
Speaker 1: of how this goes. Yeah, so we'll keep a watch
Speaker 1: on it, but definitely moving lower here a little bit.
Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer from Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: They're listening to Bloomberg Business Week Carol Masser along with
Speaker 1: Tim Stanivic Bloomberg Quick Take, and um, listen, this is
Speaker 1: gonna be a great story, great conversation because we just
Speaker 1: got the headlines about the FTC suing Facebook for illegal monopolization,
Speaker 1: for illegal monopolization. Let's get that out. Um. So they
Speaker 1: are certainly on the radar. And we love our Boomberg
Speaker 1: team because they understand companies. They understand nuances to when
Speaker 1: they do a deal or potentially what this could mean. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and this is a perfect time to get Kurt on
Speaker 1: the show because he writes about what's happen. His most
Speaker 1: recent Bloomberg Business Week story in Joel Weber also joining
Speaker 1: us live from Brooklyn right now, Hey Joel, Hello, and yeah,
Speaker 1: you couldn't have scripted this timing any better, but you know, yeah,
Speaker 1: had been so patient. He filed this story months ago
Speaker 1: and then we were like, yeah, well we're gonna do
Speaker 1: it soon. No time like the present Kurt um So story.
Speaker 1: You know, we we often try and have what I
Speaker 1: considered like a strategic lens on our stories. And you know,
Speaker 1: at Facebook, um this this behemoth that has you know,
Speaker 1: basically made a series of acquisitions that is obviously uh capturing,
Speaker 1: has captured regulators attention, hence the news today. But one
Speaker 1: of these is What's App? Right, and What's App they've
Speaker 1: basically added to the report folio. It's huge internationally, far
Speaker 1: bigger internationally than than here in the US. But the
Speaker 1: big question is has always remained sort of like, how
Speaker 1: could they go about monetizing this? And when they do
Speaker 1: monitor when Facebook does get around and monetizing things. You
Speaker 1: look at Instagram and it has just become a cash
Speaker 1: cow for for Facebook and it really relies on on advertising.
Speaker 1: But the question is has been sort of, you know,
Speaker 1: what's app is not Instagram, so how would you go
Speaker 1: about making money off of it? And that seems to
Speaker 1: be the big priority now at Facebook. So so walk
Speaker 1: us through what their plan seems to be. Curt Yeah,
Speaker 1: to your point, it is not advertising in the way
Speaker 1: that we know from the News speed or for from Instagram.
Speaker 1: And part of the reason of that is because it's
Speaker 1: hard to get the same level of data in a
Speaker 1: private messaging app that they are able to get from
Speaker 1: those other services. So it's harder to do the targeted
Speaker 1: ads that we're used to. So in this case, what
Speaker 1: Facebook wants to do is really turn what'sapp into a
Speaker 1: commerce and payments platform. And so imagine that you know,
Speaker 1: you're interacting with the business, perhaps in the way you
Speaker 1: do today. You might send them an email, you might
Speaker 1: actually pick up the phone and dial a number. They
Speaker 1: envisioned a future in which you're doing all of those
Speaker 1: interactions on WhatsApp, and you're using the service to maybe
Speaker 1: place in order make a payment, handle a customer service issue.
Speaker 1: And if they are sitting at the middle of all
Speaker 1: of those interactions between businesses and consumers, they see a
Speaker 1: really big business opportunity there, especially in markets outside the
Speaker 1: US where people are already kind of doing this behavior.
Speaker 1: They just don't have the structure in place to actually
Speaker 1: capitalize on it. So Facebook, but What's App for close
Speaker 1: to twenty billion dollars just a few years ago back
Speaker 1: in Kurt, what's the time frame for when we're gonna
Speaker 1: start seeing Facebook actually monetize this huge purchase. Well, this
Speaker 1: is something we've been talking about for years at this point,
Speaker 1: and when you pay nineteen billion dollars for a company, UH,
Speaker 1: you you have to answer those questions usually sooner rather
Speaker 1: than later. Facebook's abilities to continue to grow its ads
Speaker 1: business has bought it a lot more time, I think
Speaker 1: than many people thought they would have to make money
Speaker 1: from What's App. But what we saw in is that
Speaker 1: they're really starting to kind of double down on this investment.
Speaker 1: They made a five point seven billion dollar investment in
Speaker 1: an Indian technology company called Geo Platforms. The whole idea
Speaker 1: there is that they're hoping that What's acting kind of
Speaker 1: partner with Geo on a lot of this commerce and
Speaker 1: payment stuff. We saw them making the acquisition of more
Speaker 1: than a billion dollars just last week of a customer
Speaker 1: service UH software company, and so the fact that they're
Speaker 1: making these big strategic investments in these acquisitions right now
Speaker 1: is a signal to me that we're going to see
Speaker 1: this idea materialize in a more real way, probably sometime
Speaker 1: in the next six to twelve prot Kurt, Before this
Speaker 1: FTC moved, you mentioned that that Customer Service acquisition that
Speaker 1: was the last kind of big story from Facebook. Um,
Speaker 1: that was the purchase of a company called Customer Uh.
Speaker 1: And as you write in the story, you know, that
Speaker 1: was met with basically crickets and kind of a shrug
Speaker 1: from everyone. But how could how could the customer acquisition
Speaker 1: and this this Nissan strategy, with what's happened, how could
Speaker 1: that all sort of start to come together? Well, the
Speaker 1: idea of being that if you are again using what's
Speaker 1: up already to communicate with your family and friends, it
Speaker 1: makes sense that you might want to just kind of
Speaker 1: bring your business or retailer relationships, if you want to
Speaker 1: call them those that's kind of an optimistic word for Facebook.
Speaker 1: You have a relationship with these business businesses, but you
Speaker 1: might imagine if you bring all those into one app, right,
Speaker 1: and let's pretend that you're a large scale retailer. You're fielding,
Speaker 1: you know, questions or complaints from people on Twitter and
Speaker 1: Instagram and WhatsApp and Facebook you kind of want to
Speaker 1: bring all of those into one place so that you
Speaker 1: can manage them. That's what customer does. And so if
Speaker 1: Facebook is buying this with the idea that perhaps that
Speaker 1: they can make it easier for businesses to you know,
Speaker 1: message with people on one of their platforms, including WhatsApp,
Speaker 1: you know that they could make the whole Facebook ecosystem
Speaker 1: a lot more valuable to businesses around the world and
Speaker 1: to them, that's that's an incredibly important thing to not
Speaker 1: only grow you know, their ads business, but build out
Speaker 1: that payment stuff that we're talking about. Okay, so these
Speaker 1: are all kind of nuts, nuts and bolts questions and
Speaker 1: blocking and tackling and all that stuff. But can we
Speaker 1: talk about the drama because you do have some some
Speaker 1: some additional drama about the when WhatsApp was acquired, the
Speaker 1: drama that unfolded between uh those founders in Zegerberg. That
Speaker 1: is an ongoing thing that we we love to report about.
Speaker 1: Sarah Friar's book No Filter about the Instagram saga was
Speaker 1: Financial Times Business Book of the Year. Um So I
Speaker 1: just have endless appetite to learn more about the drama
Speaker 1: behind the scenes, and you know, basically inability to share power,
Speaker 1: what is what did you learn in the course of
Speaker 1: reporting this and what tech drama? Oh my god. I
Speaker 1: think that the very very simple way to summarize this
Speaker 1: is to say that, you know, Mark Zuckerberg acquired a
Speaker 1: company from two guys who had the exact opposite idea
Speaker 1: of of what they wanted to build. Whereas Facebook was
Speaker 1: building this thing that you shared publicly and they counted
Speaker 1: your data and they showed you targeted ads. What that
Speaker 1: wanted everything to be incredibly private. It didn't want to
Speaker 1: read your messages. And most importantly, the founders said, we're
Speaker 1: never going to show you ads ever, that's a promise.
Speaker 1: Don't even worry about it. So how did the company
Speaker 1: that makes that promise then go sell itself to Facebook? Right?
Speaker 1: That those two just do not align. And so really
Speaker 1: once they got in the door, we saw a few
Speaker 1: years after the acquisition was closed that that tension really
Speaker 1: start it to build. Where Mark Zuckerberg is saying, hey,
Speaker 1: we want you to start building an ADS business, that's
Speaker 1: what we do best, and these guys saying, hey, we promised,
Speaker 1: are you We're never going to do that. We're not
Speaker 1: going to build what you want us to build, And
Speaker 1: and ultimately we saw both the founders leave in the
Speaker 1: late seventeen early eighteen UM and and it's just you know,
Speaker 1: anytime you bring together clashing cultures like that, you're gonna
Speaker 1: have a lot of a lot of issues. That's right.
Speaker 1: When there's ever a merger, we think about salesforce and
Speaker 1: slack like this is a question we asked, like, how
Speaker 1: is that integration going to work right? Because so often
Speaker 1: they don't exactly right. We see it throughout history. Um,
Speaker 1: for those of you listening to New York d C
Speaker 1: in San Francisco watching a YouTube Bloomberg Business Week, Tim
Speaker 1: and I, we're gonna be back. If you're listening to
Speaker 1: Bloomberg one or six one in Boston, paste tape Business
Speaker 1: is coming up next or thanks to Kurt Wagner, tech
Speaker 1: reporter at Bloomberg News and to Jill Webber, editor Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Business Week. Find more Business Week stories on the Terminal
Speaker 1: and at Bloomberg dot com. This is Bloomberg Business Week
Speaker 1: with Kirol Masser on Bloomberg Radio. So you're listening to
Speaker 1: Bloomberg rad bu Bloomberg Business Week Carol mass along with
Speaker 1: Tim Stanivik, a Bloomberg Quicktake and you're on air live
Speaker 1: on nine and noon nine and Noon, you talked about stimulus. Oh,
Speaker 1: it was the lead story for both of our both
Speaker 1: of our shows today. Yeah, I mean it's listen, we
Speaker 1: keep talking about this that until we find out what's
Speaker 1: going to happen if we get it. I mean, this
Speaker 1: is kind of crucial for so many Americans and really
Speaker 1: I feel like for the US economy. Yeah, it's true.
Speaker 1: And you know, up until now, really I think that
Speaker 1: the story has been this disconnect between Main Street and
Speaker 1: Wall Street. But it does seem like, at least today,
Speaker 1: investors are taking a little bit of a pause because
Speaker 1: lawmakers certainly seem to be taking their time to get
Speaker 1: this stimulus done. They're taking a pause to So let's
Speaker 1: get into it. Let's find out the latest. Eric Watson
Speaker 1: is all over this busy guy congressional reporter at Bloomberg News.
Speaker 1: He's with us on the phone from the nation's capital. So, Eric,
Speaker 1: where are we Because we just looked at Tim just
Speaker 1: sharing your latest story with me, um that both sides
Speaker 1: of the aisle are working on a compromise pandemic relief plan.
Speaker 1: So where are we in this process? Well, there are
Speaker 1: different paths going on. But one thing we've been keeping
Speaker 1: an eye on is this gang of know eight to
Speaker 1: their coins seals are nine coalition. Uh. There were eight
Speaker 1: senators um from both parties as well as fifty Republicans
Speaker 1: of Democrats, and they had come up with an outline
Speaker 1: for a nine billion dollars stimulus. The details were lacking,
Speaker 1: and they released them along the way that outline of
Speaker 1: that but today, but they did not have the two
Speaker 1: key provisions, the lib liability protections for companies and state
Speaker 1: and local aid filled out. It just was kind of
Speaker 1: a placeholder there. So that was kind of a bad sign.
Speaker 1: We're talking to Joe Mansion at West Virginia just now
Speaker 1: and he's saying, you know, by tonight, perhaps we'll have
Speaker 1: some resolution on this. Now. For professional leaders, they don't
Speaker 1: really like these side groups to form and sort of
Speaker 1: take manage into their owned hand. They like to seize
Speaker 1: back control and we're hearing really from from Republicans they
Speaker 1: would like just to go be more of a leader
Speaker 1: to leader discussion. I think that's where we'reheaded. Next week
Speaker 1: is the deadline for government funding. A few more days,
Speaker 1: but I think that's when we'll see a deal come
Speaker 1: together and it probably won't be this gang which has
Speaker 1: at least quoted some ideas, but probably won't be able
Speaker 1: to close the deal. Well, now, it's not just liability
Speaker 1: protection four companies that's holding up this on Capitol Hill, right,
Speaker 1: it's also Republicans are sort of unwilling to budge when
Speaker 1: it comes to what they're saying, our bailouts of state
Speaker 1: and local governments. What's the progress there? Yeah, well that
Speaker 1: was an interesting move from from Secretary Minution of the Treasury.
Speaker 1: He put forward a nine hundred sixteen billion dollar a
Speaker 1: plan that has a hundred and sixty billion dollars in
Speaker 1: state and local eight in it. And that apparently one
Speaker 1: into our sources had McConnell on board. Kevin McCarthy said
Speaker 1: he was on board that the top of public commuter
Speaker 1: in the House. This is really the first time that
Speaker 1: they've gone on record supporting this this concept. Now, there
Speaker 1: were other parts of that proposal that were problematic for Democrats.
Speaker 1: To eliminate the three dollar per week a plus up
Speaker 1: for unemployment insurance that have been talked about. Democrats have
Speaker 1: been seeking six huntre dolls per week and uh and
Speaker 1: this just would zeal that out instead give a six
Speaker 1: hundred dollar payment uh to uh most Americans. Eric, I
Speaker 1: want to pause on that because that's a really big
Speaker 1: deal for people who aren't working right now. Yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: that's the thing, and it's not really target as Democrats
Speaker 1: are saying, Look, why are you giving payments to people
Speaker 1: who are employed? We saw in the spring a lot
Speaker 1: of people just pocketed that didn't even really spend it necessarily,
Speaker 1: while you know, short changing by four thousand dollars or
Speaker 1: so those who are unemployed because there's be four four
Speaker 1: months of benefits. Is it a clean measure or is
Speaker 1: it getting bogged down on a lot of side issues. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean because of you might clean. I mean they're
Speaker 1: they're they're the outline of the biparson thing has as
Speaker 1: many different provisions as a small business aid three hundred
Speaker 1: billion dollars or so, a child care centers, broadband internet education.
Speaker 1: It's a grab bag of of measures, you know. But
Speaker 1: it is also tied to this government funding UH bill,
Speaker 1: giant one point four chillion dollar billis need to keep
Speaker 1: the government open for us the year. Uh. You know,
Speaker 1: they're gonna extend that deirline for a week in December
Speaker 1: eighteens and that has been bogged down by a lot
Speaker 1: of small issues, indeed, but they're more likely to be resolved.
Speaker 1: If you remember, the President continues to push for a
Speaker 1: border wall. That's one of the signature issues there, as
Speaker 1: well as the money for immigration rates. So we're seeing
Speaker 1: those get worked out definitely on a separate track, but
Speaker 1: have to come together by the A team. That's what
Speaker 1: I was wondering. I was wondering how much you know,
Speaker 1: kind of horse trading was going on here. Um, cut
Speaker 1: to the chase, Eric, do you think we're gonna get
Speaker 1: something before the end of the year, Because I just
Speaker 1: like Tim said, I mean, Americans who are you know,
Speaker 1: facing eviction? Um, you know, just have nowhere to go anymore.
Speaker 1: You know. I actually I am optimistic when I saw
Speaker 1: the monution offer and the Republicans come into the nine
Speaker 1: hundred billion dollar ranged. Uh. You know, this is really
Speaker 1: within the scope that the by Parson group have been
Speaker 1: talking about, the level that that the Pelosi and Schumer
Speaker 1: the Tought Democrats had had endured. So on the numbers,
Speaker 1: they're really coming together. There there are policy differences, you know,
Speaker 1: but I'm I'm more optimistic that I had been. I
Speaker 1: don't know about you Carol, But it doesn't it feel
Speaker 1: like there's this more sense of urgency at least with
Speaker 1: what we're hearing from lawmakers and Eric, is that what
Speaker 1: you're experiencing on Capitol Hill? Do they do? They seem
Speaker 1: like there is this sense of urgency to get something
Speaker 1: done A S A P. Well, I wouldn't say I
Speaker 1: should be but by next week because cars always operates
Speaker 1: on the they always say it doesn't operate on the clock,
Speaker 1: operates on the calendar. And the fact that they need
Speaker 1: to go home for Christmas, they need to fund the government.
Speaker 1: That creates a deadline. And when you're trying to hurt cats,
Speaker 1: when you're trying to get all these people with very
Speaker 1: different viewpoints to finally this, you know, copy and do
Speaker 1: a deal, you need that kind of deadline. That's what's
Speaker 1: causing the urgency. Hey, just does it come down to
Speaker 1: also Erica a red blue thing that blue states are
Speaker 1: hurting a lot more than red and that's why we're
Speaker 1: not seeing Republicans play ball as much. I mean, that's
Speaker 1: certainly part of it. I think, you know, you have
Speaker 1: a sense that that people can feel like blue states
Speaker 1: are mismanaged, that they are super generous to their state
Speaker 1: employees have huge pension unfund unfunda pensioned my abilities, and
Speaker 1: that the states will just take this money and pocket it.
Speaker 1: So there's a there's a feeling of resentment on that,
Speaker 1: on that, but you know, you know that's certainly a
Speaker 1: part of the issue there. I mean, I have such
Speaker 1: a hard time hearing that because you know, I live
Speaker 1: in New York and I don't believe it. I don't
Speaker 1: believe it just when I hear lawmakers use that line
Speaker 1: of argument, I think about the federal tax contribution that
Speaker 1: large blues California, New York compared to the federal tax
Speaker 1: contributions that other states make and money that goes all
Speaker 1: around the country. So the argument rings hollow with me. Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: I'm you know, you're preaching to the choir. But it
Speaker 1: does make go ahead, go ahead, Eric. I mean that
Speaker 1: even may more important to Illinois or are there are
Speaker 1: other governments that are more famous to unable to really
Speaker 1: be physically responsible, But you know, yeah, it's certainly that
Speaker 1: Democrats make that argument that allow of the blue states
Speaker 1: contribute more federal text as well. Listen, thank you for
Speaker 1: keeping us up to date, because we are seeing multiple stories,
Speaker 1: multiple headlines and watching this process, so hopefully we can
Speaker 1: get something done here in crossed Yeah, exactly. Eric Watson,
Speaker 1: Congressional Report at Bloomberg New on the phone from Washington,
Speaker 1: d C. We'll see what maybe our our next guest
Speaker 1: has to say about it. Tom Plum watches the markets,
Speaker 1: really huns in on specific names. Specifically he is president,
Speaker 1: chief investment Officer plum Plum Phones, excuse me, and the
Speaker 1: plumb balanced vun top performer Incent Off of the past
Speaker 1: five years, returning on average annually. About let's bring Tom in.
Speaker 1: He's on the phone in Madison, Wisconsin. Tom, nice to
Speaker 1: have you here with Tim and myself. How are you?
Speaker 1: How do you make sense? I don't know. I'm always
Speaker 1: curious what you think about some of these i PO
Speaker 1: issues in the IPO market that we've seen this year. Well,
Speaker 1: obviously it's been the I p O market has been
Speaker 1: pretty exciting for the tech area. But you do I
Speaker 1: always wonder about the evaluations and then eventually you may
Speaker 1: have some overhead as some of the original families and
Speaker 1: some of the original investors basically start looking at selling
Speaker 1: some of their stock over the next few months. But uh,
Speaker 1: normally what we have been seeing is some real fast
Speaker 1: bounce and then a little digestion after that. The valuations,
Speaker 1: of course, are just like we're seeing in all the
Speaker 1: tech area where they're they're high compared to historical numbers,
Speaker 1: but they certainly may not be high compared to what
Speaker 1: the expectations are. Tom. What what are clients coming to
Speaker 1: you with right now? People whose money you manage? What
Speaker 1: are the questions that they have and what are the
Speaker 1: answers that you're giving them? Well, I think you know
Speaker 1: right now, a lot of people are concerned about whether
Speaker 1: or not the economy is going to advance next year.
Speaker 1: We hear a lot of people concerned even today. You
Speaker 1: get bounced around by are there going to be a
Speaker 1: type of a stimulus program or not? Is it going
Speaker 1: to be something that's going to affect all people? How
Speaker 1: does it affect me? Um. We do expect the economy
Speaker 1: to recover next year and usually in a recover three
Speaker 1: time that it's pretty good for the stock market in general.
Speaker 1: But what we warned people is that you know, there
Speaker 1: may be a rising tide, but it doesn't rise all boats,
Speaker 1: because some areas of our economy are boats that have
Speaker 1: big holes in their holes. Yeah, it's we've definitely seen
Speaker 1: that play out. Um just you know, we continued to
Speaker 1: have conversations over the past nine months. There are definitely
Speaker 1: winners and losers in this environment, even as we take
Speaker 1: out records on the major equity averages. So Tom, I'm
Speaker 1: curious in your fun which has done consistently so well,
Speaker 1: certainly as I mentioned, just even over the past five years.
Speaker 1: So where are you committing new money? Where? What do
Speaker 1: you like in this environment? Well, we've continue to think
Speaker 1: that the pandemic really just accelerated some secular trends and
Speaker 1: that we're going to be in a digital economy for
Speaker 1: a long long time and it's changed how we do everything.
Speaker 1: So you know, we look at what if you know,
Speaker 1: we talk about uh greenhouse gases, and we talk about
Speaker 1: all the different things we need for energy efficiency, and
Speaker 1: that's going to be a, um a big important point
Speaker 1: for the new administration. And we look at who's going
Speaker 1: to enable of that. And one of the companies that
Speaker 1: we look at as a company like Autodesk, which is
Speaker 1: the software company that provides all the architects and engineers
Speaker 1: with visualization and all the new digital tools that they
Speaker 1: need to address the current market Uh, they provide a
Speaker 1: lot of economies. We know that there's probably ten to
Speaker 1: thirty percent waste and materials on every new construction project
Speaker 1: because they over buy different things. With autodesks of virtualization, UM,
Speaker 1: you can actually minimize that quite a bit. But there's
Speaker 1: also going to be an incredible amount of energy put
Speaker 1: to reducing energy footprint. There's some people to think that
Speaker 1: the buildings that we have are greater than the automobiles
Speaker 1: as far as causing greenhouse gases and CEO two emissions.
Speaker 1: So if they're thirty percent of the world's CEO two emissions,
Speaker 1: there's going to be a continuous effort to reduce that.
Speaker 1: And Auto Desk is a company that could do that.
Speaker 1: We have seen you talked about secular trends just being
Speaker 1: accelerated and online payments, purchasing, direct delivery, the idea of
Speaker 1: using digital wallets. I know you argue that's something that's
Speaker 1: here to stay. How do you get exposure to that? Well,
Speaker 1: tim it's not just here to stay, but it's going
Speaker 1: to continue to grow and accelerate, and we've we definitely
Speaker 1: think that there's still a long path in front of
Speaker 1: papal and Ali Baba and Amazon and companies like that.
Speaker 1: But but if you look at some real opportunities in
Speaker 1: Latin America, for example, Brazil as historically shown about an
Speaker 1: eighteen percent online growth in their UM purchasing and this
Speaker 1: year and accelerate. And then the leader in that industry,
Speaker 1: Marcado Libre, had over a seventy revenue growth in last quarter.
Speaker 1: So we see the company that can combine fintech with
Speaker 1: managed logistics, so that there basically a lot like an Amazon.
Speaker 1: They delivered product in one to three days in a
Speaker 1: place like Brazil, and you have an incredible amount of
Speaker 1: underserved young people who are going to continue to use this.
Speaker 1: That is a seventy six billion dollar market cap company.
Speaker 1: I'm looking at the a d rs. It looks like
Speaker 1: the trade here and it's up a hundred and six
Speaker 1: and Tom, you see more growth here just quickly, Yes,
Speaker 1: we do. I think it's a lot like saying Amazon
Speaker 1: ten years ago or five years ago, where people thought
Speaker 1: it was all behind them, when there's still an incredible
Speaker 1: road in front of them. Yeah, that's definitely maybe a
Speaker 1: CEO we have to reach out to find out with
Speaker 1: the up to Let's do it. Yeah, let's do it. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: this is why we love Tom. He just brings these companies. Uh,
Speaker 1: definitely things like Adobe that we know that's a top
Speaker 1: holding for them, but also um Orcado Libre. Uh interesting
Speaker 1: to see what they're up to. Thanks so much for
Speaker 1: listening to Bloomberg Business Week. Download the podcast on iTunes, SoundCloud,
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