Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week. I'm Carol Masser. Every day
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Speaker 1: A lot going on, as we know, as there is.
Speaker 1: It feels like almost every day when it comes to
Speaker 1: of course, COVID nineteen UM and we are waiting maybe
Speaker 1: some emergency authorization when it comes to Maderna's vaccine, so
Speaker 1: we're following that. This is on a day when global
Speaker 1: virus cases past seventy four point three million, deaths top
Speaker 1: one point six million, and we're just seeing these numbers
Speaker 1: continue to go higher. I should say that the US
Speaker 1: hit a record three thousand eighty five deaths yesterday. Let's
Speaker 1: check in with carry alt Off. She is Associate Professor
Speaker 1: of epidemiology at Johns Hopkins University Boomberg School of Public Health.
Speaker 1: She's with us on the phone from Baltimore, the Bloomberg
Speaker 1: School of Public Health, supported by Michael R. Bloomberg, founder
Speaker 1: of Bloomberg LP and Bloomberg Philanthropies. UM. Carrie, it's good
Speaker 1: to have you here with Tim and myself. UM. I
Speaker 1: always feel like on every day, I'm not quite sure
Speaker 1: where to start. What is you think first and foremost
Speaker 1: when it comes to COVID in the vaccine today that
Speaker 1: you think our listeners need to be aware of. I
Speaker 1: think everyone needs to know that these hearings are going well.
Speaker 1: The scientific rigor which the investigators and the expert that
Speaker 1: have been brought in from lots of different places, the
Speaker 1: rigor with which they're looking at this data is really important.
Speaker 1: They are asking questions which some of which there are
Speaker 1: answers for right now, some of which there are not
Speaker 1: yet answers for, and so there are ideas about how
Speaker 1: to continue these trials. It's really important to figure that
Speaker 1: piece out because right now, thankfully, so many people want
Speaker 1: this vaccine and we need to keep pushing for that
Speaker 1: because as these vaccines become available, of course, they only
Speaker 1: work if people actually choose vaccination Kerry. We learned also
Speaker 1: in recent days about sort of the first here in
Speaker 1: the US response that that wasn't so great to a vaccine,
Speaker 1: the first allergic response, and this was a healthcare worker
Speaker 1: in Alaska who didn't have a history of allergic reactions,
Speaker 1: but this person was held overnight in the hospital and
Speaker 1: it got a lot of coverage. Is this something that
Speaker 1: should how how should people who want this vaccine think
Speaker 1: about news like this? So I would say this, we
Speaker 1: have to remember that reactions to vaccines, even severe allergic reactions,
Speaker 1: do happen to a number of vaccines. It is something
Speaker 1: that's expected, and that's why when you get a vaccine,
Speaker 1: you're typically doing it in a healthcare setting where those
Speaker 1: individuals who are administering the vaccine are also trained in
Speaker 1: how to essentially give you an eppie shot if you
Speaker 1: need it for anaphalactus or other types of allergic reaction. So,
Speaker 1: first of all, we know that allergic reaction is something
Speaker 1: that happens. Of course, when ever there's a new product,
Speaker 1: we we scrutinize every single one of these events. We
Speaker 1: want to know when it happened, how it happened. We
Speaker 1: want to know all of the information about it, but
Speaker 1: I think we also have to put it in the
Speaker 1: context of we know that these types of reactions happen
Speaker 1: to vaccines and other medical products, and we also know
Speaker 1: that there are a lot of people in these trials
Speaker 1: who have been receiving these vaccines. It's something we will
Speaker 1: definitely be keeping our eye out, but right now, there's
Speaker 1: no reason to believe that the anflexus rate after a
Speaker 1: vaccination is substantially higher with this vaccine than what would
Speaker 1: be accepted. And Carrie helped me out because this is
Speaker 1: something we've asked a lot of UM. You know, your
Speaker 1: colleagues at Johns Hopkins and other members of the medical community.
Speaker 1: Is that my understanding is that if there is a
Speaker 1: severe reaction to a vaccine, that you know it within
Speaker 1: the first month. But again, we're working with new technology,
Speaker 1: new science. UM Is that accurate though? So typically, you know,
Speaker 1: in order to link the actual reactions back to the vaccine,
Speaker 1: there's there's a long process that goes on where you
Speaker 1: really scrutinize everything. Of course, if it happens pretty quickly
Speaker 1: after the vaccination, and some people say one month. UM.
Speaker 1: In some of the Maderna data that was presented Um,
Speaker 1: they were I'm sorry, it was a fiser data that
Speaker 1: was presented that the reaction happened quite a few months later,
Speaker 1: and so, you know, actually tying these reactions to the
Speaker 1: vaccine itself. Sometimes people do put on a timeline like
Speaker 1: one month, but really it comes down to the data
Speaker 1: that are uncovered when that reaction is investigated. Just from
Speaker 1: the standpoint of of of somebody with your background, an
Speaker 1: epidemiologist who studies AIDS and it does AIDS research and
Speaker 1: HIV research, what do you make of the development of
Speaker 1: the vaccines that we're seeing right now. How big of
Speaker 1: a deal is this? It is absolutely scientifically historic. It
Speaker 1: is hours and hours and hours of scientists, you know,
Speaker 1: pouring your hearts and souls into trying to figure out
Speaker 1: how to get this pandemic stopped with one of the
Speaker 1: most important biomedical tools we've will have against coronavirus, which
Speaker 1: is vaccination. We cannot say that it is the prominent
Speaker 1: tool yet in our toolbox. Of course, we only have
Speaker 1: one sectine that's eu AID hopefully will have to probably
Speaker 1: by monday, and um, we're we're moving forward, but we
Speaker 1: still have to wear masks, we still have to social distance,
Speaker 1: we still have to take all of this very very seriously.
Speaker 1: Even um this week there was an interesting analysis looking
Speaker 1: at excess deaths in person forty four. I mean, these
Speaker 1: are these are people that we've been saying, oh, you
Speaker 1: know that they're not at the greatest risk of death.
Speaker 1: And although that might be true, losing someone in that
Speaker 1: age group, someone who is a young mother or a father,
Speaker 1: someone who is someone's brother or sister, a person who
Speaker 1: is a productive member of our society, losing them to
Speaker 1: COVID is really a tragedy, as are all the death
Speaker 1: due to COVID, but this excess death in this age
Speaker 1: group is really it's shocking, it's compelling, and it just
Speaker 1: reminds us that although these vaccines are absolutely scientific history,
Speaker 1: it is also a time where we have to continue
Speaker 1: to rely on all the layers in all the tools
Speaker 1: in our toolbox to keep each other safe. So, Carrie,
Speaker 1: how do you see kind of the next few months
Speaker 1: playing out for our world here in the United States
Speaker 1: in terms of virus numbers and also vaccine rollout. So
Speaker 1: it's important to note that right now, the best tools
Speaker 1: we have to reduce the number of new cases and
Speaker 1: to reduce the number of deaths are the tools that
Speaker 1: we've had since the beginning, really, which is wearing your mask,
Speaker 1: being home unless you absolutely have to, and um, making
Speaker 1: sure that you're you're keeping space from each other when
Speaker 1: when you're in public or in any enclosed environment in particular,
Speaker 1: but even outside. So essentially, what we're trying to do
Speaker 1: is just prevent that virus from transmitting from one person
Speaker 1: to another, right, don't give it a host, so don't
Speaker 1: get too close. It's really the name of the game.
Speaker 1: And we need to put these practices in place and
Speaker 1: continue with these practices until we do have more widely
Speaker 1: distributed vaccine. With the Maderna news today, you know, we
Speaker 1: hopefully will have a number of vaccines rolling out over
Speaker 1: the course of the next couple of months, which not
Speaker 1: only increases the numbers, but also interestingly it could perhaps
Speaker 1: give people some options. Right, so if for example, of
Speaker 1: vaccine works better in older adults versus younger adults. UM.
Speaker 1: One thing I just wanted to correct from earlier was
Speaker 1: that the case that I referenced of an individual developing
Speaker 1: inflexis more than two months after being vaccinated. This actually
Speaker 1: was prompted. It came from m Jacqueline Miller, the vice
Speaker 1: president for Infectious Diseases Development at Maderna during FDA hearings today.
Speaker 1: It was prompted by a question from Mark Sawyer, who's
Speaker 1: the professor of clinical pediatrics at the University of California,
Speaker 1: San Diego, and he said, you know, Maderna has done
Speaker 1: a number of Phase one into clinical trials of m
Speaker 1: R and A vaccines for really eight other pathogens over
Speaker 1: the course of the last few years. And so he said, hey,
Speaker 1: have you gone back into that data and looked to
Speaker 1: see if those earlier trials if there were reports of
Speaker 1: a flaccus among patients. And that's when Jackline Miller said, well,
Speaker 1: there was this one report and a woman with a
Speaker 1: sty allergy and she developed this more than two months
Speaker 1: after being vaccinated. And so it does bring up this
Speaker 1: question of Okay, maybe this this um triggering of anifyl
Speaker 1: acxis it might be different across different vaccines, and we
Speaker 1: shouldn't just take what is happening in one and apply
Speaker 1: it to a different vaccine. And that's what Maderna's chief
Speaker 1: medical officer also noted that, you know, we we have
Speaker 1: to watch each of these vaccines carefully and so we
Speaker 1: know who should be using witch vaccines, So no blanket
Speaker 1: assumptions really along the way. I would be really hesitant
Speaker 1: right now to do a lot of one getting assumptions.
Speaker 1: These these are big trials. We will be following these
Speaker 1: um wonderful volunteers well into the future, and so we'll
Speaker 1: let the data show us what it needs to show us.
Speaker 1: But given that the supply of this is so constrained
Speaker 1: and there are so few vaccines available right now, when
Speaker 1: will people actually have the option to take one vaccine
Speaker 1: over another if they do have concerns about anaphylaxics. Well,
Speaker 1: I think for a lot of people that the choice
Speaker 1: and vaccines of course has to come after at least
Speaker 1: more than one receiving e u A, which hopefully will
Speaker 1: come very soon. But then it will be this rollout
Speaker 1: process coupled with the tearing process. Right So who is
Speaker 1: the top priority right now? It's the healthcare workers and
Speaker 1: the individual to a learning living in long term care facilities.
Speaker 1: And so once we get those populations vaccinated, um hopefully
Speaker 1: we will have higher production of at least two vaccines.
Speaker 1: And so when this vaccine starts to roll out to
Speaker 1: the more generalized population, there may be some more options. Yeah,
Speaker 1: really interesting. Hey, just real quickly, just got about thirty seconds.
Speaker 1: What are your hopes, uh for the incoming Biden administration
Speaker 1: come to Nuary. Um. I hope they stick to the
Speaker 1: science and they let the science lead the way, and
Speaker 1: they are putting together people and teams that are true, um,
Speaker 1: followers of the science. Um. They are empathetic, compassionate people.
Speaker 1: And I think that is the unstoppable combination to have
Speaker 1: empathy and can move forward with the science so that
Speaker 1: this virus gets stopped and we get back to living
Speaker 1: our lives in a healthy way. Yeah. I think that's
Speaker 1: a really good message in terms of really sticking to
Speaker 1: the science because it says so much. UM, Carrie, thank
Speaker 1: you so much. Dr carry alt Off, Associate Professor of
Speaker 1: Epidemiology at Johns Hopkins University, Bloomberg School of Public Health
Speaker 1: with US from Baltimore. The Bloomberg School of Public Health
Speaker 1: supported by Michael R. Bloomberg, founder of Bloomberg LP and
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Philanthropies. But it is so interesting to him, like
Speaker 1: every time, you know, everybody goes back to and it
Speaker 1: makes sense masks, social distancing, Like there's just those basic
Speaker 1: things that still work. This is Bloomberg Business Week with
Speaker 1: Carol Messer from Bloomberg Radio. Well, the cover of Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Business Week this week is the work from Home boom.
Speaker 1: It is here to stay and as a result, get
Speaker 1: ready for some changes, including everyone some pay cuts. It's
Speaker 1: really all about the urban exodus and the implications because
Speaker 1: it has the potential to impact so much in our
Speaker 1: world and economy. That story by Bloomberg News Finance reporter
Speaker 1: no Boo Hire, who joins us on the phone from Seattle,
Speaker 1: along with Bloomberg Business Week editor Joel Webber on the
Speaker 1: access line in Brooklyn, and Joel kick it off for us.
Speaker 1: I mean, I do feel like this working from home
Speaker 1: thing has massive implications, and no one really lays it
Speaker 1: out in the story. Yeah, that's right. I mean we've
Speaker 1: been watching this trend um just evolved throughout the pandemic,
Speaker 1: and and it started with people, you know, basically the
Speaker 1: urban exodus, people leaving cities and going to the suburbs
Speaker 1: or or the country. And then instead of renting some
Speaker 1: of those places, people started buying and and then you know,
Speaker 1: the employers started to catch up with with it eventually,
Speaker 1: and that's really kind of the new element. And I
Speaker 1: think the one that that really distinguishes Noah's story has been.
Speaker 1: You know, the shift was at first it was just
Speaker 1: the real estate implications, but now it's about the pay implications.
Speaker 1: And Noah's reporting actually centers on a store, on a company,
Speaker 1: red Fin, the real estate company, and they actually almost
Speaker 1: become the vehicle for the story. So Noah tells us
Speaker 1: about this trend and what we've learned through red Fin. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: I think you really you really captured it. I mean,
Speaker 1: this is uh, this is a trend in HR policy
Speaker 1: right now. We've we've we've had this massive experiment in
Speaker 1: working from home and I think a lot of companies
Speaker 1: have found that it works for people. Um, it's not perfect.
Speaker 1: There are for sure some drawbacks. UM, but as as
Speaker 1: we've gone through the months, companies, I think, responding to
Speaker 1: what they're hearing from their workforces, have realized that they
Speaker 1: can allow for a much greater UH amount of remote
Speaker 1: work um when the pandemic is finally over. And that's
Speaker 1: forced them to really reckon with UH policies and how
Speaker 1: you how you actually make this work in a way
Speaker 1: that's that's fairer and reasonable for your business. And um,
Speaker 1: really it's just opened up a giant can of worms
Speaker 1: because uh, you know, the cost of labor and the
Speaker 1: cost of living just vary so radically across the US that, um,
Speaker 1: you could create situations where, you know, if someone moved
Speaker 1: from the Bay Area to Phoenix or Atlanta, they um,
Speaker 1: and they carried their salary with them. They just um,
Speaker 1: you create a situation where, um, you were paying way
Speaker 1: above market essentially. Okay, So the Redfin thing that's so
Speaker 1: interesting though, is that once people sort of moved out, uh,
Speaker 1: and the company had to grapple with us, and they
Speaker 1: were actually proactive I think and having a plan basically um.
Speaker 1: And they basically realized that in order to implement this,
Speaker 1: they needed to have some version of like a localized
Speaker 1: pay policy. Right, So, so tell us about how they
Speaker 1: actually went about implementing that. Yeah, so on some levels,
Speaker 1: like companies have been doing this for years, right, it's
Speaker 1: just um uh like they they've thought about, well, if
Speaker 1: we open a new office in a new city, what
Speaker 1: do we pay people that What's interesting is that that
Speaker 1: red Fin and I think a lot of other companies
Speaker 1: you know, had to do this on a mass scale.
Speaker 1: So what red Fin did is they got a bunch
Speaker 1: of data on cost of labor and cost of living.
Speaker 1: UM their their real estate company. They're in the home
Speaker 1: brokerage business, so they're they're pretty attuned to this stuff.
Speaker 1: And I have a lot of in house data, but
Speaker 1: they got external data as well UM to try and
Speaker 1: craft the policy of what's fair and and and you know,
Speaker 1: the data informed their decisions, but there were a lot
Speaker 1: of judgment calls at the end of the day, and
Speaker 1: you know, they're still tweaking and trying to make sure UM,
Speaker 1: you know, their policy works for their people and that
Speaker 1: they can continue to recruit and retain the best people
Speaker 1: because at the end of the day, that's that's really
Speaker 1: what this is about for companies is you know, there's
Speaker 1: even with unemployment where it is today, there for certain
Speaker 1: kinds of jobs, they're still an insatiable appetite UM in
Speaker 1: demand for people and UM you know, as companies compete
Speaker 1: for talent, they want to make sure they're paying the
Speaker 1: right amount in the markets where those people want to be. No,
Speaker 1: there's there's something you explore in the piece, the economic
Speaker 1: applications of this. The idea that people are leaving higher
Speaker 1: cost areas moving to areas than aren't is expensive and
Speaker 1: and with that, of course, if they're leaving a city
Speaker 1: or a state, with them goes tax base, with them,
Speaker 1: goes spending in that local economy. What are the long
Speaker 1: term implications of this migration. Well, I don't think we know, yeah,
Speaker 1: is the short and short non answer. But um, it's
Speaker 1: certainly doesn't seem like it's going to be helpful for
Speaker 1: high cost places like New York and San Francisco as
Speaker 1: they you know, as the whole country tries to uh
Speaker 1: dig itself out of of of the economic implications of
Speaker 1: the pandemic. I mean, it's not helpful when you have
Speaker 1: uh high earners leave your city. But at the same by,
Speaker 1: you know, at the same time, like, we just don't
Speaker 1: know that at this point how extensive this is going
Speaker 1: to be. And and there are some real benefits to
Speaker 1: um living in being near where the action is, where
Speaker 1: there are other people in your industry, and um, you
Speaker 1: know that could be a draw for people to come
Speaker 1: back to some of these high cost places. Well that
Speaker 1: this is the thing we don't know right no yet,
Speaker 1: whether or not this kind of urban boom, you know,
Speaker 1: and away from that urban boom, whether or not that's
Speaker 1: going to stick. Because if you talk to a Jamie Diamond,
Speaker 1: if you talk to the heads of a bunch of
Speaker 1: financial companies, if you talk to the head of Netflix,
Speaker 1: as you put in your story, they're not so on
Speaker 1: board and think that this working from home thing is
Speaker 1: going to stick. Yeah, I mean, I think what we're
Speaker 1: seeing a lot of companies do. I mean Google was
Speaker 1: a recent one. They're gonna They're gonna go towards a
Speaker 1: more hybrid model where people would come back in like
Speaker 1: three days a week. That doesn't necessarily free people up
Speaker 1: to leave the high cost city, but it may encourage
Speaker 1: them to move to a suburb where they might not
Speaker 1: have done that before if they were commuting in five
Speaker 1: days a week. So there's there's both moves across the country,
Speaker 1: but there are moves within metros which have real implications
Speaker 1: for housing costs. I mean we've seen this all year
Speaker 1: that in Redfin has seen this in their business. I
Speaker 1: mean suburban houses. I mean people want single family homes
Speaker 1: with a yard because of the pandemic, but they're also
Speaker 1: looking forward to what life might be like when office
Speaker 1: is reopened. And maybe it's not so bad if you
Speaker 1: have to do that longer commute because you're only going
Speaker 1: into three days a week. So no, you know, you've
Speaker 1: got really good access at redfin And I'm I'm gonna
Speaker 1: ask you to extrapolate here how willing were employees to
Speaker 1: take this pay cut? I mean, it's obviously it's coming
Speaker 1: from HR. You can keep the job, but you can
Speaker 1: have a pay cut. I think that is to me,
Speaker 1: the biggest question here is like if employees are actually
Speaker 1: willing to do this, But that willingness also depends on
Speaker 1: just probably how big the pay cut is. Right, So
Speaker 1: so talk to me about the willingness to participate. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, look, the employees I spoke with who were
Speaker 1: who were making these moves, I think ultimately felt like
Speaker 1: the numbers were fair. Um. And and that's because you know,
Speaker 1: when you moved to some of these places where your
Speaker 1: pay is going to be lower, your cost of living
Speaker 1: goes down, usually by even more. And um. Glenn Colman,
Speaker 1: the CEO of Redman, argued to me, and I think
Speaker 1: it was pretty persuasive on this point. But I think
Speaker 1: it's reasonable to expect that as more employers UH offer
Speaker 1: remote work possibilities, we're going to see wages rise in
Speaker 1: some of these places where the cost of labor is lower,
Speaker 1: so you know, wages in Texas are going up, and
Speaker 1: you might also see housing costs in places like Austin
Speaker 1: golf as well. But but to think that these things
Speaker 1: is not right. It's a great story. We're gonna talk
Speaker 1: a bit more about the migration to textas a little
Speaker 1: bit later on No Boo Higher until Webber. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Cairol Masser
Speaker 1: on Bloomberg Radio BIS Bloomberg Business Week on this Thursday,
Speaker 1: Carol Master along with Bloomberg Quicktake anchor Tim Stenovic and
Speaker 1: top story at this hour. And I guess Tim, I
Speaker 1: think it's gonna be safe to say it's been a
Speaker 1: tough story this weekend. It's going to end up being
Speaker 1: one of the top stories of this year. I think
Speaker 1: that's fair. Right, we're talking bitcoin, right, We're talking bitcoin,
Speaker 1: and we saw cryptocurrency exposed docs soaring today as well.
Speaker 1: We talked about that a little bit earlier, Bitcoin topping
Speaker 1: twenty three thousand dollars per token having only surpassed the
Speaker 1: twenty tho dollar bilestone for the first time. That was yesterday.
Speaker 1: Uh so it is really just moving up as bitcoin
Speaker 1: surges to record high. Scott minored our audience knows and well,
Speaker 1: chief investment officer over at guggen Him Investments, believes there
Speaker 1: was largest cryptocurrencies fair value still has a long way
Speaker 1: to go. He shared this with our colleagues over on
Speaker 1: Bloomberg TV. We made the decision to start allocating towards
Speaker 1: bitcoin when bitcoin with a ten thousand UM it's it's
Speaker 1: a little more challenging with the current price closer to
Speaker 1: twenty thousand. But having said that, our fundamental work shows
Speaker 1: that bitcoin should be worth about four hundred thousand dollars,
Speaker 1: four hundred thousand dollars, four hundred thousand dollars. My understanding
Speaker 1: of Scarlet Food over a Bloomberg TV when she heard
Speaker 1: that was like what she was. We played this on
Speaker 1: on Quick Take this morning because it's just the reaction
Speaker 1: is is really one of you know, whoa four hundred
Speaker 1: thousand dollars? This is something that you know is that
Speaker 1: twenty dollars now? And that's got a lot of people
Speaker 1: scratching their heads exactly. So let's get into what we
Speaker 1: need to know about the rise in bitcoin. Joining us
Speaker 1: as Bloomberg intellige commodity strategist Mike McGlone. He's on the
Speaker 1: phone from Connecticut, Mikes, so good to have you here
Speaker 1: with us. So, first of all, um, what's behind the rise?
Speaker 1: Is it just a basic supply and demand or what's
Speaker 1: going on here? Hi, Hi Carrol. That's a lot of it.
Speaker 1: Bottom line basic supplying demand is this year we cut
Speaker 1: supply by a half, and the last time we did
Speaker 1: that was two thousand sixteen and two thousand seventeen. Bitcoin
Speaker 1: increased from a thousand and twenty thousand, So I think
Speaker 1: we just broke above that twenty threshold. So what was
Speaker 1: resistance is now probably going to be key support for
Speaker 1: next year. And then you're opened. The man is really
Speaker 1: picking up from institutions. It's become a bit of institutional fomo.
Speaker 1: And the factor is the macro. Look at debt to GDP,
Speaker 1: q E, M M T all that it's very positive
Speaker 1: for bitcoin. I think what we're seeing also is there's
Speaker 1: a migration from what a lot of assets that used
Speaker 1: to be more focused on gold going to the new
Speaker 1: digital version. Why is why is it you said that
Speaker 1: what's going on is good for bitcoin? Is it just
Speaker 1: seen as a now new safe haven or what? Yeah, Well,
Speaker 1: it's it's a new safe haven for a future that's
Speaker 1: becoming more digitalized. Let's think of what's really happened this world.
Speaker 1: People don't want to really touch paper money, so everything
Speaker 1: is going digital. We don't really want to play with money.
Speaker 1: And then it's also that store of value, so it's
Speaker 1: got the macroeconomic factors. So I looked at like to
Speaker 1: say it's it's not really a store of value yet
Speaker 1: because it's too young, but it's getting there. So based
Speaker 1: on my projections, the valtili of bitcoin, which is about
Speaker 1: two and a half times that of gold on an
Speaker 1: annualized basis, will probably match the same boutil the gold
Speaker 1: in about four years, so basically by the time we
Speaker 1: get to the next election and next time, that supply
Speaker 1: will be cut in half. Wow. So apart from fomo,
Speaker 1: what our institutional investors seeing as the purpose for bitcoin
Speaker 1: and other cryptocurrencies when they're building portfolios. It's a store
Speaker 1: of value that has not really found its price ship
Speaker 1: it's in that price discovery stage. So it's kind of
Speaker 1: a unique space and it's kind of scary to me.
Speaker 1: It's like it's become almost tu bos. But I don't
Speaker 1: see the bearer's case unless it's something I can't predict,
Speaker 1: like in the technology some kind of failure or some
Speaker 1: kind of hack, or maybe some kind of banning. But
Speaker 1: other than that that this supplying demand and just looking
Speaker 1: forward to this future going digital. It's a way to
Speaker 1: transport them and really hold on to wealth. But on
Speaker 1: the thumb driver in your head or on your phone
Speaker 1: in the past, you know, gold is a little clunky,
Speaker 1: and then you have this world of what's the what
Speaker 1: are the the competition of competitions of stock market and
Speaker 1: all time high and negative or zero bond yields. So
Speaker 1: it sounds like you're saying there's room for this to
Speaker 1: go higher, not necessarily too much concern about it going lower,
Speaker 1: at least long term, because I have friends, you know,
Speaker 1: when when this happens, I always get friends texting me, Hey,
Speaker 1: should I buy bitcoin? Is it too late to buy bitcoin?
Speaker 1: Obviously I'm not giving financial advice. You're not giving financial advice.
Speaker 1: But how would you answer that question? Well, I like
Speaker 1: to say, you have to put yourself in the future.
Speaker 1: If it fails, and everybody's gonna forget about it, doesn't
Speaker 1: care if it succeeds. The question for Grandpa, why didn't
Speaker 1: you buy bitcoin when it was only so or Grandma.
Speaker 1: And I think what Scott Miner's point about four thousand
Speaker 1: is pretty I ThReD it's just a question of time
Speaker 1: because that's about gets too where it's similar on the
Speaker 1: same scale in a market cat basis versus gold. But
Speaker 1: for this year, I'm a little more conservative. I'm looking
Speaker 1: at fifty thousand is the key next resistance because that
Speaker 1: would put the market tamp around um about a trillion
Speaker 1: versus four hundred or so million. Now, but listen, Mike,
Speaker 1: you remember back in seventeen when it hit, was it
Speaker 1: around above eighteen thousand, and then it dropped down in
Speaker 1: early twenty nineteen down to about thirty eight? Yeah, well yeah,
Speaker 1: that was another entry point, right. But I mean we
Speaker 1: have seen you know, tremendous, a tremendous run up and
Speaker 1: another drop in this before. Is there something different about
Speaker 1: the momentum right now? That's the right question to ask, Caroline, sir.
Speaker 1: Is true, it did have a massive draw down, just
Speaker 1: like Amazon drop in the early two thousand's, and the
Speaker 1: big difference this time is that was more speculative excess
Speaker 1: rally for really tech geeks. Now it's the mainstream getting
Speaker 1: in there's futures, there's m central banks potentially, but there's
Speaker 1: corporate treasuries, billionaires and even insurance companies who are just
Speaker 1: looking to buy dips below and the big differences. Now,
Speaker 1: if you look at volatility on bitcoin, it's lowest ever
Speaker 1: versus the stock market and versus gold. So it has
Speaker 1: major fundamental tactical underpinions like I look at it like okay,
Speaker 1: what can go wrong here? And I just try to
Speaker 1: figure it out. Right now, more of the same means
Speaker 1: price it should go higher. What about the emergence of
Speaker 1: other cryptocurrencies and we saw that a few years ago
Speaker 1: when bitcoin got really popular. Doesn't that threaten Bitcoin's rise
Speaker 1: him That's a key point, and it's really survivor bias.
Speaker 1: Last year there was about four thousand tradeable cryptocurrencies. Now
Speaker 1: there's about eight thousand based on coin market sap dot com.
Speaker 1: But it's the survivor bias that matters. So the Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Galaxy Crypto Index traps is tracks about ten of those.
Speaker 1: So it's the survivors. The winners will win and do well.
Speaker 1: But the thing is they don't have the adoption, the
Speaker 1: oth and the robustness, and basically they're just not adopted
Speaker 1: like bitcoin. They might be better, but they're not the
Speaker 1: best store of value. The way I like to describe bitcoin,
Speaker 1: it's basically a collectible. There's only gonna be twenty one
Speaker 1: million over ever created. There's eighteen point five that I
Speaker 1: have already been created, and it's the one that's been
Speaker 1: adopted the market, the world has already said, okay, this
Speaker 1: is the one versus like gold is the one, and
Speaker 1: there's you know, a bunch of other commodities, and there's
Speaker 1: a bunch of other precious medals. So really quickly fifteen seconds.
Speaker 1: Is it a collectible or is it a currency? I
Speaker 1: think it's more of a collectible. And left that is
Speaker 1: really mild. Um. You were the perfect voice. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much. Um, really really appreciate it, because I think
Speaker 1: we were all just we're kind of watching it and
Speaker 1: understanding it, right, Tim, Yeah, we are. And I just
Speaker 1: sent my team a note saying we gotta get Mike
Speaker 1: on quick take talking bit quick great Blueberg Intelligence commodity
Speaker 1: strategist Mike mcclogne bro morow a journal now, but you
Speaker 1: let me drive? Oh no, no, no no, no, oh please,
Speaker 1: I'll do the d I want to drive, just drive
Speaker 1: baby the question try this is the drive to the globe.
Speaker 1: Thanks Radio, it is time for the drive to the
Speaker 1: clothes and joining us this Thursday. Back with us as
Speaker 1: Alan Lance, he has research director at Lance Global dot
Speaker 1: com and president of allenby Lance and Associates. He is
Speaker 1: with us once again on the phone from Toledo, Ohio. Allen,
Speaker 1: nice to have you back with us with Tim and myself. Um,
Speaker 1: how are you. What's Ohio like right now? I'm doing well.
Speaker 1: We got an interest snow compared to your twelve or thirteen,
Speaker 1: I guess, so, yeah, well we'll take that. But everything's
Speaker 1: going well here in Hohow. All right, Um, what's the
Speaker 1: virus with you guys right now? Well, we basically have
Speaker 1: been more open than our neighboring state of Michigan, but
Speaker 1: we do have a ten pm curfew. Uh so businesses
Speaker 1: are closed and restaurants they are still open to uh
Speaker 1: anywhere from fifty percent capacity um and so far everything
Speaker 1: stayed open as opposed to Michigan, which has locked down
Speaker 1: another a few weeks. So yeah, well, we are certainly
Speaker 1: not seeing these concerns play out in the stock market
Speaker 1: on pace to be a record day, as we heard
Speaker 1: from from Charlie earlier. Um, Alan, I want to get
Speaker 1: your thoughts on valuations right now, because our producers tell
Speaker 1: us that, you know, one thing that you see right
Speaker 1: now is that this is a different than two thousand seven,
Speaker 1: despite the fact that we see stocks at highs and
Speaker 1: we see real estate at highs right now. To what's
Speaker 1: your take, Yeah, we get that question. About two thousand
Speaker 1: and seven, we had warned that we couldn't really find
Speaker 1: anything in the international or domestic equity arena or real
Speaker 1: estate arena that that was of in bargain territory. And
Speaker 1: today I think it's different, Like I can see the
Speaker 1: comparisons because we're hitting new all time highs again. But
Speaker 1: you you know, we've had energy that's been down tremendously.
Speaker 1: This year has actually been pretty predictable. We were we were,
Speaker 1: even though it's been a strange year and and the
Speaker 1: volatility has been excessive. We were taking property under January
Speaker 1: early February, the market went up another three weeks and
Speaker 1: then um, obviously we had the John Templeton you know
Speaker 1: by when there's blood on the street type of march
Speaker 1: where you know there are some incredible bargains and then
Speaker 1: you know, the markets recovered h as almost like a
Speaker 1: textbook in textbook fashion, where where uh you saw the
Speaker 1: quality dividend companies moving up, you know, right after the
Speaker 1: stay at home surged, and then uh now you know
Speaker 1: the fourth quarter, we've seen the cyclical small caps and
Speaker 1: internationals catching up, so the rallies broadening out, and and
Speaker 1: you know, I think that's healthy. Uh Well, on two
Speaker 1: thousand seven, what we had is everything moving up from
Speaker 1: you know, utilities in China to write you know, every
Speaker 1: category in the US, and and and then we really
Speaker 1: couldn't find any bargains that we're still finding bargains here,
Speaker 1: all right, don't judge me, don't hate me, But Alan,
Speaker 1: I felt like this was a year where you could
Speaker 1: time the market because I thought about it early this
Speaker 1: year too. It's like we just ran up so quickly
Speaker 1: before kind of the COVID fallout, and I'm like, god,
Speaker 1: you know, if I've kind of just dropped out in February,
Speaker 1: it would have been a pretty decent year. And then
Speaker 1: of course when the market fell off, you knew that
Speaker 1: there was going to be History has taught us that
Speaker 1: the government's going to help us out. The Fed's going
Speaker 1: to help us out. You know, it was almost, as
Speaker 1: you say, kind of textbook predictable. And I do feel
Speaker 1: like we're getting to a market environment where I know
Speaker 1: it goes against everything I've ever learned about timing the market.
Speaker 1: But but we know that when the market drops off,
Speaker 1: the the you know, programmed trading kicks in and then
Speaker 1: the market goes up again, and then when it gets
Speaker 1: too lofty, it sells off a little bit and then
Speaker 1: you know, I mean, I just feel like we're getting
Speaker 1: into that kind of a rhythm. Yeah, And it's a
Speaker 1: supply and demand car. Also, you're totally spot on where
Speaker 1: now you're seeing the I p o s. But again,
Speaker 1: unlike these I p o s are still high quality,
Speaker 1: so I think, you know, you're you're gonna get that
Speaker 1: supply fill you know, filling up the demand, and then
Speaker 1: it's gonna be a situation where less and less quality
Speaker 1: I pos will come out in one and that's the
Speaker 1: time again where you know you hate to do it,
Speaker 1: but you know you've got a time a little bit
Speaker 1: and and take some money off the table. You know.
Speaker 1: The The other thing that that we like is we're
Speaker 1: seeing takeovers. You know, we talk summer about Alexi. You know,
Speaker 1: Alexey and pharmaceuticals, and and that's got a you know,
Speaker 1: a nice premium takeover and and I wouldn't even sell
Speaker 1: it here. I think you could have you know, another
Speaker 1: bid coming in or I don't mind owning the Astra Zeneca,
Speaker 1: you know, because that stock is underperformed, so uh, you
Speaker 1: know we're in, you've got to takeover. Would you run
Speaker 1: with it? Cash it out and and you don't wait
Speaker 1: for it to close now you can still you know,
Speaker 1: say that the stocks trading as historically multiples even being
Speaker 1: taken over. And part of that is, you know, there
Speaker 1: was a two product company, and with astra Zeneca, it's
Speaker 1: going to be you know, higher margins and and uh
Speaker 1: multiple expansion because it was discounted because you know, they
Speaker 1: didn't have the pipeline and they didn't have a broad
Speaker 1: selection of pharmaceuticals. And and there are still other companies
Speaker 1: like that that I think offer opportunity to investors have
Speaker 1: ignored most of the year. So so in that respect,
Speaker 1: it is has been uh, you know, unexpected year from
Speaker 1: the uh you know, volatility standpoint, but really textbook and
Speaker 1: in design all the way through Alan are you getting
Speaker 1: lots of questions from clients about bitcoin right now. It's
Speaker 1: a story we've been talking about all day hitting a
Speaker 1: new record. It's below twenty right now at seven hundred.
Speaker 1: But is that something that clients are showing interest in. Yeah, Bitcoin,
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, we saw that attractive, you know,
Speaker 1: into the sell off again because uh, you know, just
Speaker 1: even Amazon went down, you know, in the early days
Speaker 1: of of March and into the pandemic. Now you know,
Speaker 1: those are one of the areas and and some of
Speaker 1: these cult type stocks that you know, we would not
Speaker 1: you know, we would not be chasing. So so when
Speaker 1: when we get a lot of inquiries from subscribers and
Speaker 1: members about you know, should we be buying Tesla, should
Speaker 1: we buy be buying Bitcoin, it's usually a little late
Speaker 1: in in in the game, and we don't really want
Speaker 1: to partist. Scott Minard says bitcoin's going to four hundred thousand,
Speaker 1: So I'm just gonna tell you Alan, it's way early
Speaker 1: in the game according to him and some other especially
Speaker 1: when if you think about it, I I go back
Speaker 1: to you know, my economics, you know, um work is
Speaker 1: just like supply and demand, there's only going to be
Speaker 1: a limited number of bitcoins that by kind of its
Speaker 1: own essence just creates you know, an entity that's going
Speaker 1: to go up. Yeah. The the problem is the same
Speaker 1: thing with blockchain is everybody has to participate, you know,
Speaker 1: with with the Internet and emails, you had that, Will
Speaker 1: you have that with bitcoin or will something else come out?
Speaker 1: So so bitcoin in itself, you know, if that ends
Speaker 1: up to be the you know, digital cryptocurrency, than than
Speaker 1: all that, uh, you know, hyperbole. You know, well we'll
Speaker 1: come to fruition. But you know, are you willing to
Speaker 1: take that risk that you know, something else, you know
Speaker 1: won't superseded or thinking over so many times when you're
Speaker 1: an industry leader, Uh, you know, you don't uh end
Speaker 1: up you know, ten years from from that day be
Speaker 1: the one that that still is out on the forefront.
Speaker 1: And that's where investors have to realize the risk that
Speaker 1: they're taking. Just wish I bought it when it was
Speaker 1: like you know, you and fraction of a sense you
Speaker 1: could have thrown like twenty bucks at it. You know,
Speaker 1: you've been hundred dollars at it and it just would
Speaker 1: have been. But we'd still be here doing this because
Speaker 1: we love it. Carol, that is actually very very true. Um,
Speaker 1: good stuff, good stuff. Thanks so much for listening to
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Business Week. Download the podcast on iTunes, SoundCloud, or
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