Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week. I'm Carol Masser and I'm
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stanibek. We're here every day bringing
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Speaker 1: pm Eastern Time on Bloomberg Radio or watch us on
Speaker 1: YouTube search Bloomberg Global News. President Buying expected to announce
Speaker 1: to more some new guidance on wearing masks outdoors for
Speaker 1: vaccinated people. That's coming from CNN. They're citing people familiar
Speaker 1: with the plan. We've also known that US tourists who
Speaker 1: have been fully vaccinated will be allowed to travel to
Speaker 1: Europe this summer, more than a year after an essential
Speaker 1: travel was shut down. That coming from The New York Times.
Speaker 1: At the same time, we are reminded that we are
Speaker 1: far from being over globally UH in our fight against
Speaker 1: COVID India recording more than three hundred fifty two thousand
Speaker 1: new coronavirus cases the a straight day of more than
Speaker 1: three thousand affections as the COVID nineteen crisis in that
Speaker 1: country continues to grow. So back with our daily check
Speaker 1: on COVID and great to have Joining us once again
Speaker 1: is Dr Alaga Day Williams. He's Chief of Staff of
Speaker 1: Neurology at Columbia University of Vagelost College of Physicians and Surgeons,
Speaker 1: and NIH funded researcher. A leading health disparities expert, his
Speaker 1: research is focused on community based behavioral interventions. He's also
Speaker 1: the founder, president, and board chair of Hip Hop Public Health.
Speaker 1: Check out their website. Uh Blueberg Philanthropy Philanthropies, by the Way,
Speaker 1: has provided a grant to Hip Hop Health and Dr
Speaker 1: Williams joining us once again on the phone in New
Speaker 1: York City. How are you hi, Great to be back
Speaker 1: with you. Nice to have you back. I feel like
Speaker 1: we as a nation here in the United States feel
Speaker 1: a lot of progress when it comes to getting the
Speaker 1: vaccine at and are looking ahead to maybe our world
Speaker 1: reopening more. But when you look at numbers from India
Speaker 1: and some other emerging areas of the world, you are
Speaker 1: reminded that we are far from out of COVID nighte teen.
Speaker 1: How do you see it? Dr Williams, Well, I'm I
Speaker 1: I kind of I do have hope, but I also
Speaker 1: have deep, deep concerns at the same time. It's I'm
Speaker 1: kind of in this twilight place where on the one hand,
Speaker 1: I see all the progress that has been made, and
Speaker 1: on the other hand, I'm concerned that that we are
Speaker 1: not going to make it to the finish line unless
Speaker 1: we really really come together and solve not only the
Speaker 1: disparities within this country, but also help other less developed countries.
Speaker 1: Because you know, the truth of the matter is UM.
Speaker 1: You know, these the virus is constantly mutating UM. And
Speaker 1: the way it mutates is when it's given an opportunity
Speaker 1: to replicate in our bodies. And so if you have
Speaker 1: unvaccinated clusters either way then within our own communities or
Speaker 1: within the community outside of the world, it gives that
Speaker 1: that is a scary scenario for for us because that's
Speaker 1: where these variants emerge and potentially can come back and
Speaker 1: set us way way back. I mean, that's the point, right,
Speaker 1: And so what are you hearing in terms of conversations,
Speaker 1: are are potentially global conversations about I think we're seeing
Speaker 1: it more about the importance of developed world helping the
Speaker 1: developing world to make sure that we get vaccines out there.
Speaker 1: Are you hopeful are you hearing things that we will
Speaker 1: be providing a much major assist and needed assist to
Speaker 1: the likes of Indian elsewhere. I mean, I'm I'm, I mean,
Speaker 1: I think there are efforts, but I think that they
Speaker 1: are insufficient, and you know, the challenge is, of course,
Speaker 1: we have to make sure that our own back back
Speaker 1: yards have been sufficiently back vaccinated. And we're still struggling
Speaker 1: with that, you know, in this country. You know, given
Speaker 1: you know, the inequities that we have seen in the
Speaker 1: challenges that remain of getting everyone in this country vaccinated.
Speaker 1: You know, I think that we have we we see,
Speaker 1: you know, the early adopters have come online. We see
Speaker 1: those folks that we knew were going to come on
Speaker 1: earliest come online. Uh now we're starting to be to see,
Speaker 1: you know, a situation where there's probably going to be
Speaker 1: more vaccine available than people to be vaccinated. And so
Speaker 1: we still have a long way to go in this
Speaker 1: this country. But that said, I think this is part
Speaker 1: of the reasons why it's so challenging. The global issue
Speaker 1: is so challenging, especially when it relates to lower income communities. Uh.
Speaker 1: And so you know, I know that KOVAC is trying
Speaker 1: to help, and and we see the w h O
Speaker 1: and all the all the countries that just signed up
Speaker 1: to KOVAC making these vaccines available globally. But quite frankly,
Speaker 1: I think these efforts are insufficient and I don't think
Speaker 1: that they are going to really dent the problems that
Speaker 1: those countries are facing. Well. And I'm glad you also
Speaker 1: brought up what's happening in our own backyard, because You're right,
Speaker 1: depending on the population, the demographic, the locale, the geography,
Speaker 1: some places around the country are doing better than others.
Speaker 1: Within the black community specifically, what are you seeing? Are
Speaker 1: you seeing more individuals want to get the vaccine, able
Speaker 1: to get the vaccine, have the access because um, you know,
Speaker 1: we have seen those stories about millions of Americans, you know,
Speaker 1: skipping their second dose of COVID nineteen vaccine. I think
Speaker 1: nearly eight percent of those who got that initial Fiser
Speaker 1: and Maderna are skipping out on the second one. But
Speaker 1: what are you seeing specifically within the black and minority communities?
Speaker 1: So what I'm seeing in the black community is um,
Speaker 1: I've seen the tremendous progress I've seen the You know,
Speaker 1: if if you will get asked me the same question,
Speaker 1: you actually might have asked me this question. When we
Speaker 1: lost Folk, I was deeply concerned that we weren't going
Speaker 1: to move the needle very quickly. But we actually have.
Speaker 1: In the back community, we've seen a real jump in
Speaker 1: the number of people vaccinated, and we've seen overall vaccination
Speaker 1: coverage increasing the Black comn But I want to say
Speaker 1: that if you look deeper into these numbers, what you're
Speaker 1: seeing it's almost a divergence within the Black communitia, split
Speaker 1: within the Black community where a lot of the vaccine
Speaker 1: acceptance and a lot of the existing coverage is among
Speaker 1: older African American populations, you know, those over the ages
Speaker 1: of sixty five. But as you go lower down that
Speaker 1: ladder of age, you start to see much more resistance,
Speaker 1: much more hesitancy, and greater challenges to vaccination. In fact,
Speaker 1: when we opened our own vaccination center in West Harlem,
Speaker 1: we saw a real search of people in the beginning
Speaker 1: coming to get vaccinated. A lot of those were older
Speaker 1: African American individuals, older people living in the neighborhood. Uh.
Speaker 1: And then the subsequent weeks passed, we started actually a
Speaker 1: struggling to fill out lots because we're now you know,
Speaker 1: dealing with you know, younger populations that really need to
Speaker 1: get vaccinated. Dr Williams. One of the things I was
Speaker 1: thinking about, first of all, what level of reopening are
Speaker 1: you comfortable with? And it's think about the EU saying
Speaker 1: if you're vaccinated, Americans were comfortable with you coming in. Uh,
Speaker 1: there's still debate about schools opening up. I'm seeing some
Speaker 1: schools I'm seeing you know, reopen completely, others waiting till
Speaker 1: till next September. What level of global reopening are you
Speaker 1: comfortable with right now? Yeah, well I think it's um,
Speaker 1: it's gonna be. I think it should be done on
Speaker 1: a region by region basis. UM. I think it should
Speaker 1: be done. It should be local decisions based on uh,
Speaker 1: you know, the infection rates, based on vaccination coverage. UM.
Speaker 1: I think these are the these are the things that
Speaker 1: need to really feed into the decision making. UM. Just
Speaker 1: as an example, you know that many colleges now that
Speaker 1: are requiring uh, you know, COVID vaccination before you can
Speaker 1: return to campus. So you're gonna see whole campuses now,
Speaker 1: uh with you know, covered by you know, filled with
Speaker 1: vaccinated individuals. So I think these types of these types
Speaker 1: of things, uh that we're seeing more and more in
Speaker 1: different communities should really be driving these decisions in addition
Speaker 1: to obviously the infection rates. Does it make you, though,
Speaker 1: a little uncomfortable when he says, okay, you can come
Speaker 1: in because you know, we talked about this a lot.
Speaker 1: I think we probably talked about it with you as well.
Speaker 1: That COVID doesn't know a border, and so if you're traveling,
Speaker 1: I mean there are I feel like there's a lot
Speaker 1: of gray area where things can kind of once again
Speaker 1: quickly get out of control. Yeah, I mean I think
Speaker 1: we we we we do. We do need to be careful,
Speaker 1: and we need to make sure we we we really
Speaker 1: continue to maintain UM real vigilance on these matches. UM.
Speaker 1: But we do also know that vaccinated individuals, um, you know,
Speaker 1: are really uh you know, actually the likelihood of of
Speaker 1: them even transmitting the infection is lower than an unvaccinated individuals.
Speaker 1: And we also know that you know, certainly with the
Speaker 1: ones that we have here in the United States, and
Speaker 1: we know that they're highly protective against infection, hospitalization, and depth.
Speaker 1: So I'm actually I actually welcomed the idea of liberal
Speaker 1: you know of kind of liberalizing UH the UH you know,
Speaker 1: access and opportunities for those who have been vaccinated. And
Speaker 1: I think this also provides incentives to those who haven't
Speaker 1: been vaccinated UH to actually get vaccinated. UM. But while
Speaker 1: while that is said, I think it's also really really
Speaker 1: important to continue to track UH infection rates UH, continue
Speaker 1: to do surveillance, COVID testing UM, and and really continue
Speaker 1: to make sure that we really monitor UM. So you know,
Speaker 1: when I went to Europe recently, I remember I had
Speaker 1: to take a VAT, I had to take the COVID
Speaker 1: test to get into London, and then I had to
Speaker 1: take a COVID test a couple of days after being
Speaker 1: in London. And then I had to take a COVID
Speaker 1: test to get on the plane to get back to America.
Speaker 1: And then I had to take a COVID test after
Speaker 1: I got back to America and I was only away
Speaker 1: for a few days. And so UM, that level of
Speaker 1: that level of scrutiny. UM. You know, while I think
Speaker 1: it's important to scale back, we also must make sure
Speaker 1: we continue to do some surveillance testing and tests, so
Speaker 1: testing stage. It's funny that you say that because we've
Speaker 1: just got about forty five seconds left here. But we
Speaker 1: were having a conversation this morning about what we were
Speaker 1: all getting our vaccines. Do we need to continue we
Speaker 1: get weekly tested here at Bloomberg. That's still an important thing. Well,
Speaker 1: I think that among the vaccinated, I think it's less important. UM.
Speaker 1: I think certainly we still have a lot of unvaccinated
Speaker 1: people around. UM, and I think it's really important to
Speaker 1: continue to make sure that we we at least a minimum,
Speaker 1: continue to do surveillance testing, especially on the unvaccinated, because
Speaker 1: that's where that's where these super mutators emerged, and that's
Speaker 1: where the danger to the breast of the public life.
Speaker 1: All Right, kind of leave it there, UM, thank you
Speaker 1: so much, really appreciate you giving us time again. Dr
Speaker 1: Lja Day Williams. He's Chief of Staff of Neurology at
Speaker 1: Columbia University. He's an nih n I H excuse me,
Speaker 1: funded researcher. He's also the founder, president, and board chair
Speaker 1: of Hip Hop Public Health. Bloomberg Philanthropies, by the Way,
Speaker 1: has provided a grant to Hip Hop Health and of course,
Speaker 1: joining us on the phone in New York City. This
Speaker 1: is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser from Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: In the current double issue of Bloomberg Business Week magazine,
Speaker 1: there is a story about the airline founder who's launching
Speaker 1: another new carrier and he's doing it during the pandemic.
Speaker 1: Talk about timing. Let's get more in this story with
Speaker 1: Drake Bennett. He is Projects and Investigations reporter. He's on
Speaker 1: the phone in New York City along with Bloomberg Business
Speaker 1: Week nitor Jill Webber on the access line in Brooklyn
Speaker 1: and Joel. The man behind it all is the man
Speaker 1: who created Jeff Blue. Yeah, his name is David Neil Anything.
Speaker 1: He's been a serial airline entrepreneur. Um. This new one
Speaker 1: that he's got coming called Breeze, will be his fifth airline.
Speaker 1: So that's pretty impressive. As I think Will Will tell us,
Speaker 1: the the Tarmax are littered with failed attempts at getting
Speaker 1: off the ground once, let alone you know, five times.
Speaker 1: Um so strike what has been his guiding light in
Speaker 1: all of these launches and and what does what do
Speaker 1: we know about Breeze and what he's trying to do there? Um? Well, Uh,
Speaker 1: he has a long I mean the airlines he's started
Speaker 1: have been budget airlines, and Jet Blue was kind of,
Speaker 1: you know, his best known and the idea there was
Speaker 1: to basically create a budget airline that didn't feel like
Speaker 1: a budget airline. So, I mean he's someone that you know,
Speaker 1: early on in his career was obsessed with Southwest UM,
Speaker 1: and you know, set out to create a Southwest like airline,
Speaker 1: but one that didn't you know, South famously served only
Speaker 1: peanuts to people to kind of remind them of the
Speaker 1: peanuts they were paying for their affairs. UM. And so
Speaker 1: with Jeff, he's like, well, we'll put TVs in, it
Speaker 1: will have other seats, the planes will be brand new,
Speaker 1: it'll kind of feel nicer. UM. And the other thing
Speaker 1: he did with Jeflue that was super smart was was
Speaker 1: used JFK. UM. It's weird to think about it, but
Speaker 1: New York City was actually an underserved uh market for
Speaker 1: air travel UM until Jeff flu came in. Uh. JFK
Speaker 1: was really only used for international travel, and it was
Speaker 1: basically a ghost town during the day. So he has
Speaker 1: a long history of being able to find these you know,
Speaker 1: gaps in the market, even in places like a kind
Speaker 1: of a New York UM and Breezes basically another budget carrier. UM.
Speaker 1: It's a little bit modeled on Allegiant UM insofar as
Speaker 1: they're not going to be flying every day. They're gonna
Speaker 1: be concentrating on those days of the week when vacationers
Speaker 1: are more likely to travel. UM, and they're gonna be
Speaker 1: using slightly smaller planes than Southwest and Allegiance flies those guys.
Speaker 1: Why like seven thirty seven or eight, UM Breeze is
Speaker 1: going to be using slightly smaller planes, and they think
Speaker 1: that changes the math for them and the way that
Speaker 1: opens up kind of this whole tranche of smaller markets UM,
Speaker 1: especially once they get this new plan the Airbus, which
Speaker 1: which has really really long range for such a small plane,
Speaker 1: so they'll be able to do what's called these long
Speaker 1: thin routes, so from some sort of smaller city in
Speaker 1: the US all the way to Hawaii if they can
Speaker 1: find people who wanted to take that direct flight. So
Speaker 1: I think what's what's super interesting about all of this
Speaker 1: was like, obviously Jet Blue came at a time UM
Speaker 1: it actually I had forgotten to say, it launched not
Speaker 1: that far ahead of nine eleven, which obviously had significant
Speaker 1: implications for the travel industries and the airlines. Um. Here
Speaker 1: we are with the pandemic, and you know, airline traffic
Speaker 1: has been greatly suppressed for the past year and potentially
Speaker 1: for for the business class traveler, perhaps permanently altered. Right,
Speaker 1: And so what what opportunities get if you can explain
Speaker 1: that a little bit more and sort of like what
Speaker 1: he sees breeze being able to tap into here, I
Speaker 1: mean you mentioned the budget stuff in the smaller airlines
Speaker 1: that like where where does he think the window of
Speaker 1: opportunity sort of lies? Well? Right, I mean, as you
Speaker 1: pointed out, the real question is business travel. UM. And
Speaker 1: he's fortunate in that he's his sort of target customer
Speaker 1: is not a not primarily a kind of someone on
Speaker 1: like a who's who's getting their tickets paid for by
Speaker 1: like a corporate travel department. UM. It's more kind of
Speaker 1: a vacationer or a visiting friends and relatives kind of traveler. UM.
Speaker 1: And in a sense, I mean it's you know, it's
Speaker 1: not a great time to be running an airline. There's
Speaker 1: an enormous amount of uncertainties, but there are ways that
Speaker 1: he's you know, there's been this kind of retrenchment. You know,
Speaker 1: a lot of cities that just lost service, and so
Speaker 1: in a way it kind of opens up some opportunities
Speaker 1: for for for a for a breeze. Um. And also
Speaker 1: you know, he doesn't he hasn't been trying to run
Speaker 1: an airline this whole year when everyone else was like
Speaker 1: hemorrhaging money and basically trying to stay ahead above water.
Speaker 1: So um, you know there are ways in which his
Speaker 1: timing has been fultu Well, you know, this is what's
Speaker 1: fun about your story, Drake is. Yes, there's the business,
Speaker 1: very business story of he's doing, is you know, another airline.
Speaker 1: He has been so successful and kind of you know,
Speaker 1: disrupting the airline industry. But what's really cool is you
Speaker 1: kind of get into who this guy is and if
Speaker 1: you were going to bet on somebody to bring an
Speaker 1: airline during a pandemic to the market, I'd bet on
Speaker 1: David Neilman talked to us a little bit about your
Speaker 1: experience with him, because part of what was fun was
Speaker 1: he's got some pretty strong views on COVID. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean he's he's a little bit of a COVID truther. Uh,
Speaker 1: he really Um, you know, when we've met. He showed
Speaker 1: me the math you were he's not a huge fan
Speaker 1: of maths U and it it sort of it looks
Speaker 1: like a sort of normal black cloth mask. But then
Speaker 1: when he took it off, which he immediately did once
Speaker 1: we sat down at a conference Lable, he showed me
Speaker 1: that it's basically made of like mosquito mash, so it's
Speaker 1: not really a functioning mask in any sense of the words.
Speaker 1: So um, he's you know, for the past year, he's
Speaker 1: been pretty vocal um about kind of what he sees
Speaker 1: as the sort of overreaction to COVID that you know,
Speaker 1: the sort of medical epidemiological establishment has has has sort
Speaker 1: of um presented and so he you know, and I
Speaker 1: think it's linked the way it kind of it's linked
Speaker 1: to his attitude about risk is the attitude of about
Speaker 1: risk that you would expect from someone who multiple times
Speaker 1: has launched these extremely complicated endeavors that are unlikely to succeed.
Speaker 1: He sort of keeps doing this, and so I think
Speaker 1: it sort of shapes the way he feels about the
Speaker 1: risk of getting this disease and the way we should
Speaker 1: kind of um as a society think about that. And
Speaker 1: I think also, you know, it's it's a more unvarnished
Speaker 1: and um well it's extremely unvarnished version of what you
Speaker 1: hear more establishment figures in the airline industry saying like
Speaker 1: it's safe to travel, we should be getting back out there.
Speaker 1: He takes it to kind of a almost fringey extreme,
Speaker 1: but it's not something that's that's foreign to folks in
Speaker 1: the travel industry. Dake, I'm wondering, you know, there's sort
Speaker 1: of like a kernel of of like business management, um
Speaker 1: guru that this guy represents. And I'm wondering the like
Speaker 1: of all the people that you talked to, what are
Speaker 1: the takeaways? What? What? Why has Why has David Neilman's
Speaker 1: airline success? Why has he been so successful again again
Speaker 1: and again? And Drake, you gotta be quick about seconds. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean a lot of There's someone who worked for
Speaker 1: him for a while who's an obviously of a zool.
Speaker 1: Another of David's really successful carriers has basically described him
Speaker 1: as being like an eight year old who's a genius.
Speaker 1: And so there's a way in which he's he's able
Speaker 1: to cut he he oversimplifies things the way they can
Speaker 1: be frustrating for people who work for him. But it
Speaker 1: also allows them to see certain kinds of possibilities that
Speaker 1: are outside they kind of receipt with them. Well. And
Speaker 1: what's fun too is and I forgot herb tell her
Speaker 1: of Southwest legendary in the industry. I forgot that he
Speaker 1: had fired Neilman. It's a great read, and it's in
Speaker 1: the current issue of Bloomberg Business Week magazine. Drake and Joel,
Speaker 1: thank you so much. One are the companies that we've
Speaker 1: been talking about a lot in the newsroom today is
Speaker 1: Apple coming out and saying it's in his increasing it's
Speaker 1: US investments of the next five years, allocating four hundred
Speaker 1: thirty billion dollars to develop next generation silicon and also
Speaker 1: spur five G wireless innovation across nine U S. State.
Speaker 1: That's a lot of money. That's all I'm gonna say.
Speaker 1: So let's get more on what's up at Apple. Bloomberg
Speaker 1: News US Technology Team co leader Molly Shuts is with
Speaker 1: us on the phone in New York City. Molly, nice
Speaker 1: to have you hear. Apple shares, by the way, just
Speaker 1: up a little bit, up about a half a percent.
Speaker 1: But we're going to hear from that company later on
Speaker 1: this week when it comes to uh, earnings. Um, tell
Speaker 1: us about this news put it in respective is this
Speaker 1: new or we surprise? Is that a lot of money?
Speaker 1: What does it say about kind of Apple in the
Speaker 1: United States specifically, right, Carol, Yeah, as you said, it's
Speaker 1: a lot of money. Um, but Apple has a lot
Speaker 1: of money and Apples, you know, only been making more money,
Speaker 1: um every year. Basically, Um, this is you know Apple,
Speaker 1: they have basically a five year spending plan and the
Speaker 1: last time they made an announcement like this was back
Speaker 1: in when they announced three fifty billion dollars of investment
Speaker 1: in the US and saying that at that point that
Speaker 1: they were going to create new jobs also over the
Speaker 1: next five years. So this is kind of an update
Speaker 1: to that. And it's true, this is gonna this is
Speaker 1: you know, now four and thirty billion dollars, So that's
Speaker 1: increase over their last spending plan. But in the meantime,
Speaker 1: you know, Apple shares have you know, grown exponentially in
Speaker 1: the company is now worth more than two trillion dollars,
Speaker 1: so it's sort of keeping in line with that. But
Speaker 1: still it is a lot of money and a lot
Speaker 1: of jobs, and you know they're spreading it around, They're
Speaker 1: they're coming clearly out of you know, the West Coast
Speaker 1: Silicon Valley, and they're they're spreading up this this wealth
Speaker 1: around because there's a lot of different parts of the
Speaker 1: country that have other things to offer. In particular, they're
Speaker 1: they're putting a billion dollars down in North Carolina to
Speaker 1: build a new big research center there that's going to
Speaker 1: really have a lot of engineering and artificial intelligence types
Speaker 1: of jobs located there in that research triangle. Well, and
Speaker 1: that makes a lot of sense, right, because there's so
Speaker 1: much going on there. What is it? Is? It? M
Speaker 1: were they this is what they do, as you said,
Speaker 1: they do these five year plans. How much is a
Speaker 1: little bit of a pr move as well, you know,
Speaker 1: against the backdrop of a president and an administration who
Speaker 1: is looking to raise corporate taxes. Yeah, sure, I mean
Speaker 1: probably this has been you know, in the works for
Speaker 1: a long time before President Biden announced the latest you know,
Speaker 1: new tax plan that's going to you know, really crack
Speaker 1: down on companies that hide a lot of their offshore profits,
Speaker 1: you know, are a lot of their profits in overseas,
Speaker 1: like Apple and many of the other tech company does
Speaker 1: I mean that that law certainly is going to close
Speaker 1: some of the loopholes that the company is were able
Speaker 1: to exploit the under President Trump, and they will have
Speaker 1: to be paying more taxes and and it certainly encourages
Speaker 1: them to bring things back to the US. But again
Speaker 1: probably this was probably in the works a little bit
Speaker 1: before Biden's latest announcement, and you know, Apple does want
Speaker 1: to bring things back to the US. Um, So it's
Speaker 1: probably a little bit of both. Well. And that's a
Speaker 1: good point, Molly, because I do feel like in terms
Speaker 1: of some of the conversations we've been having the CEOs,
Speaker 1: they are thinking, especially after the pandemic, increasingly thinking about
Speaker 1: their supply chain where it is, and just in general,
Speaker 1: it feels like over the last few years people have
Speaker 1: been thinking about having their supply chains closer to where
Speaker 1: they are selling. Yeah, I mean Apple, you know, they
Speaker 1: they have a huge and well developed supply chain in
Speaker 1: China and and in Asia generally, and well, they can't
Speaker 1: bring all of that back to the US. You know,
Speaker 1: as was hoping and had pushed them to do. They
Speaker 1: certainly can't do all that. They have a huge, massive
Speaker 1: organization over there with Fox KHN in particular, and in
Speaker 1: Taiwan as well, but they are increasingly. You know, there
Speaker 1: is a lot of the development, maybe not the manufacturing,
Speaker 1: but a lot of the development. And like we said,
Speaker 1: the research that goes into that is a lot of
Speaker 1: that you know, can be found here in the US.
Speaker 1: Like we said, the research triangle in the Raleigh Durham
Speaker 1: area has been building up for years. They've got a
Speaker 1: lot of um, you know, really high tech companies. They're
Speaker 1: including Glaxo Smith Kleient IBM is there with red hat Um.
Speaker 1: One of Apple's new kind of Nemesis Epic Games is
Speaker 1: also based there. So there's you know, a big concentration
Speaker 1: of tech there. Austin, Texas another big place where you've
Speaker 1: got Tesla, Facebook, Alphabet. They're all putting more staff and
Speaker 1: more you know, bigger offices in cities like that. Boston
Speaker 1: has long attracted a lot of tech talent as well.
Speaker 1: We're seeing it spread around a little bit more here.
Speaker 1: So I'm thinking, Molly, when the company reports earnings this week,
Speaker 1: Apple does, Uh, it'll do it on So they'll do
Speaker 1: it on Wednesday. Is there a question you would want
Speaker 1: to put to Tim Cook and company when it comes
Speaker 1: to this announcement in this news And I do wonder
Speaker 1: about it coming out here on this Monday ahead of earnings. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess what you know people will want
Speaker 1: to know is, yeah, how how much you know are
Speaker 1: can we how much of this can you really put
Speaker 1: in the US and really, you know, high paying jobs,
Speaker 1: not just you know, which it seems like what they're
Speaker 1: doing engineering type jobs, but you know, really putting make
Speaker 1: it made in America by Apple sort of is you
Speaker 1: know what I think a lot of people are hoping
Speaker 1: that they do a little bit more of. And also
Speaker 1: a big thing for Apple too is the environmental impact.
Speaker 1: You know, they are working towards being more carbon neutral
Speaker 1: and have certainly done a lot of that already in
Speaker 1: the US, but it's going to be a bigger question
Speaker 1: for them as more people gobble up iPhones, tablets or iPads. Max.
Speaker 1: You know, Apple, it really isn't under a lot of
Speaker 1: pressure to make that as clean and environmentally friendly as possible.
Speaker 1: All right, good stuff, Thank you so much. You just
Speaker 1: kind of spelled it out so well for us, Molly said.
Speaker 1: She is Bloomberg News US Technology team co leader. I'm
Speaker 1: bloom Maro Journal. Yeah, but you let me drive No
Speaker 1: No's drive home, honey, Please, I'll do the right drivel
Speaker 1: Let me, I want to drive. Just drive, baby, it's
Speaker 1: the question trying. This is the drive to the globe.
Speaker 1: Give me thanks, we'll drive us to dawn. On Bloomberg Radio,
Speaker 1: I just got about eleven minutes left in today's trading session.
Speaker 1: It is time for the drive to the clothes. Ryan
Speaker 1: Jacob is back with us. He's chairman, chief investment officer,
Speaker 1: and portfolio manager at Jacob Asset Management. The Jacob Internet fun,
Speaker 1: by the way, continue to be just about all of
Speaker 1: its peers over the past five years. It's in the
Speaker 1: nineties six percentile according to Bloomberg Data, and it looks
Speaker 1: like it's returning I think on average annually, but I'll
Speaker 1: check that number anyway. Great to have Ryan back with us,
Speaker 1: he joins us on the phone in Los Angeles. Ryan,
Speaker 1: nice to have you here. How are you good? Good? Good,
Speaker 1: glad to be here. Well, listen, it's a big week
Speaker 1: for big tech. Give me an idea if there are
Speaker 1: any companies in particular that on your radar this week. Well,
Speaker 1: for us, we have Google reporting tomorrow night, which is
Speaker 1: a mid sized position for us, and we're expecting a
Speaker 1: continued rebound in the results as we go through this
Speaker 1: reopening and uh, you know it really it's going to
Speaker 1: accelerate as the week goes on the number of our
Speaker 1: our holdings that will be reporting. All right, So let's
Speaker 1: talk about it in terms of positioning here. Remind us,
Speaker 1: you know, how often are you adjusting positions based on
Speaker 1: either some fundamental news or some bets that you see
Speaker 1: in the sector. Uh, well, we are making adjustments pretty rapidly.
Speaker 1: I mean, the market has been fairly volatile lately. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, this is an important earning season. There are
Speaker 1: a lot of companies in our sector that are just
Speaker 1: doing outstandingly well. The question is that you know will
Speaker 1: continue as we kind of get past COVID and that
Speaker 1: huge bump in demand and pull forward that we saw
Speaker 1: last year. Well so, then, so give me an idea
Speaker 1: like Twitter is a name that's going to report on Thursday.
Speaker 1: Stocks up about twenty three percent this year. Have you
Speaker 1: been adding to a position, have you been pulling back
Speaker 1: because it has been gaining or or give us a
Speaker 1: little bit of a take on that one. So Twitter,
Speaker 1: um actually has has done better as we've seen more
Speaker 1: advertising spending, but with Twitter in particular, and we have
Speaker 1: been adding to the position, it's one of our larger holdings. Um,
Speaker 1: what they've really done is cleaned up the platform tremendously well,
Speaker 1: and that's that's engaged more advertisers. They're wanting to spend
Speaker 1: more money on the platform. They've just done a terrific
Speaker 1: job kind of right sizing and and uh you know
Speaker 1: again cleaning up and really making their platform more efficient
Speaker 1: through COVID. So they're going to come out of this period,
Speaker 1: we think in a really strong position. What about something
Speaker 1: like Square, Well, Square is is really kind of a
Speaker 1: to two dimensional situation, and that they have obviously the
Speaker 1: payment services through small businesses that clearly is going to
Speaker 1: see an uptick as the year progresses. And then really
Speaker 1: the cash app, which which is they've really done a
Speaker 1: tremendous job marketing to overtake Venmo and really become kind
Speaker 1: of default cash app that users use across all platforms
Speaker 1: with Android and Apple iOS well. And it's interesting too
Speaker 1: because there's been some very distinct Ryan you know, this
Speaker 1: distinct pandemic plays and then there are ones we're wondering,
Speaker 1: okay now that as the world starts to reopen, do
Speaker 1: we start to see them not so much in demand?
Speaker 1: Is there anybody in particular that you're noticing that because
Speaker 1: it sounds like something like square. I feel like if
Speaker 1: somebody wasn't using square beforehand, you know, and they started
Speaker 1: because of the pandemic, that's going to stay with us.
Speaker 1: But is there something out there that you think in particular,
Speaker 1: you know, might not have such a productive environment post pandemic. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think that a lot of companies last year did
Speaker 1: to have a bit of a sugar high from what
Speaker 1: happened with COVID, and it is going to be hard
Speaker 1: to build on those results. A lot of our top
Speaker 1: holdings were pretty confident, but you know, we've got a
Speaker 1: reminder last week with Netflix, a lot of the subscription
Speaker 1: numbers were too aggressive and uh and they fully admitted
Speaker 1: that they really pulled forward a lot of that subscriber
Speaker 1: growth from last year. Um. I think Zoom is probably
Speaker 1: another company that I'd be a little bit cautious here. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, even a company like Peloton, which has been
Speaker 1: the news lately, saw a huge surgeon demand last year,
Speaker 1: you know, as you moved towards normalization. I mean, those
Speaker 1: are the ones that I'd be concerned about not being
Speaker 1: able to continue to perform, like like we've seen what
Speaker 1: about any of the online companies that play into like
Speaker 1: the housing market or the mortgage market. What's your what's
Speaker 1: your position there? Because we certainly continue to see people
Speaker 1: out there buying homes. In fact that there's you know,
Speaker 1: low supplies and that's creating a lot of bidding wars.
Speaker 1: But um, how do you anticipate that continues to play
Speaker 1: out here? It's a tough one. Zelo is one of
Speaker 1: our larger holdings. Right. You have extremely low interest rates
Speaker 1: that look to stay here for a while. You have
Speaker 1: a reopening economy. Unemployment rates are going to unemployment, unemployment
Speaker 1: rates are going to drop, so that upodes really well
Speaker 1: for the housing market. That being said, we did have
Speaker 1: a huge bump through the COVID period with work at home. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, you know, just for a whole host of reasons.
Speaker 1: We had just a booming housing market over the last
Speaker 1: twelve months. So it's hard. Um what do this hard mean?
Speaker 1: You sell? You know? Because I mean I'm looking at well.
Speaker 1: They peaked kind of in February mid February, they're down
Speaker 1: about since then. Does that mean you continue to have
Speaker 1: a position but you've paired it back a lot? No,
Speaker 1: it's actually it's it's one of our it's paired back
Speaker 1: a little bit, but it's really still one of our
Speaker 1: largest positions. Uh. You know the how the one thing
Speaker 1: that's happened the housing inventory has been so tight, even
Speaker 1: if it cools off a bit, having more inventory in
Speaker 1: the market will probably keep it more robust. So, you
Speaker 1: know something I'd be a little concerned longer term, but
Speaker 1: not really in the short term. All right, So let's
Speaker 1: talk about I think there's a couple of companies in particular,
Speaker 1: UM that you're kind of keen on. Mango dB. Maybe
Speaker 1: not something everybody has heard heard about it. It's down
Speaker 1: about ten and a half percent so far here, uh
Speaker 1: this year. What you're thinking about this one? So it's
Speaker 1: really an open source database company. Um. You can almost
Speaker 1: think about it similar to like a red hat situation
Speaker 1: with Linux in terms of the operating system. You know,
Speaker 1: now into databases, you have traditional relational databases like Oracle, IBM,
Speaker 1: s a P starting to really lose share to these
Speaker 1: open source alternatives, and Mango has done, you know, has
Speaker 1: become a favorite to the developer community, cheaper to use,
Speaker 1: more flexible, and is shown a lot of momentum I've
Speaker 1: been surprised actually this one hasn't got more attention from
Speaker 1: the street. But it's one of our favorites here, all right,
Speaker 1: so you've been adding to it. Yeah, okay, Hey. The
Speaker 1: other one that you like is Voyage or Digital, which
Speaker 1: has been on a tear this year, playing into the
Speaker 1: crypto world. It's been one of our top performers over
Speaker 1: the last three quarters. As you might expect. Um, what
Speaker 1: really attracts this to it was so is it just
Speaker 1: you know, cat catching on all the other momentum. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's kind of crazy when you look at how much
Speaker 1: this particular company has gone up in the last couple
Speaker 1: of years. Is it just riding the waivers or something
Speaker 1: fundamentally that makes sense here? It's both. They had about
Speaker 1: a hundred and fifty million in assets under management the
Speaker 1: end of September last year. They just crossed about two
Speaker 1: point four billion recently, so it's been a tremendous growth story.
Speaker 1: The CEO is a senior veteran from E Trade. Over
Speaker 1: twenty years experience, they put together an impressive platform. It
Speaker 1: is competitive, they're a smaller player, but but they seemed
Speaker 1: to be doing a lot of the right things and Uh,
Speaker 1: we do think they'll be substantially larger over the next
Speaker 1: few years, So you're not so I'm assuming volatility comes
Speaker 1: along with a name like this. It does. It's one
Speaker 1: of our largest positions. It's gotten there through price performance,
Speaker 1: but we're not inclined to cut it back too much
Speaker 1: given the upside potential. Hey, before you go, just got
Speaker 1: about a minute or so here, I mean, what does
Speaker 1: the market environment look like to you? Are you just
Speaker 1: in this kind of economic recovery play and it feels
Speaker 1: pretty good at least for the next six months. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's kind of what you alluded to with the real estate. Obviously,
Speaker 1: we've come a long way so far. The market tends
Speaker 1: to discount sixty nine months in advance. But given the
Speaker 1: fundamental backdrop, given the amount of stimulus and the economy, Uh,
Speaker 1: it's very hard to be too negative. Um Here. That
Speaker 1: being said, the stock market doesn't track the economy. Did,
Speaker 1: our business would be a lot easier. So, um, I
Speaker 1: wouldn't expect kind of games we've seen over the last
Speaker 1: six months, but generally speaking, we're we're still pretty positive.
Speaker 1: All right. Certainly sounds that Hey, Ryan, thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Love walking through all those names with you. I really
Speaker 1: appreciate it. Ryan Jacob, chief investment officer and portfolio manager
Speaker 1: of Jacob Asset Management. As I mentioned, his Internet fund
Speaker 1: consistently beating all of its peers over the past five years.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to Bloomberg Business Week. Download the podcast
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