Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bloomberg Markets Podcast. I'm Paul Sweeney. Alongside
Speaker 1: my co host Matt Miller. Every business day we bring
Speaker 1: you interviews from CEOs, market pros, and Bloomberg experts, along
Speaker 1: with essential market moving news. Find the Bloomberg Markets Podcast
Speaker 1: on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts, and
Speaker 1: at Bloomberg dot com slash podcast. All Right, Adam Gold,
Speaker 1: founder and chief investment officer at catam LLLC, joins us. Adam,
Speaker 1: I'm looking at a market the SMP. Let's call it
Speaker 1: a correction off at or about ten percent, yet nastack
Speaker 1: off at or about If I'm gonna buy the dipper?
Speaker 1: Is this my time to buy? Good morning, guys, Thanks
Speaker 1: for having me. Um, that's always the trillion dollar question,
Speaker 1: and the answer is you just never know where the
Speaker 1: bottom is. Um, there's the pendulum is certainly swung wearing
Speaker 1: choppy waters right now. There's there's a lot of issues here.
Speaker 1: Every other guest talks about it. In the long term,
Speaker 1: I think this is an incredible opportunity to be buying
Speaker 1: great companies that are off significantly. But you know, when
Speaker 1: we were went from a correction of a bear market
Speaker 1: in the Nasdack. If you look back to November where
Speaker 1: November twenty two, the market fell three from the highest
Speaker 1: the lows that day, and that's why really sort of
Speaker 1: started this downwards. So now we're almost on the nastac
Speaker 1: We don't know where the low can be, but if
Speaker 1: you look out over time, we think this is a
Speaker 1: great opportunity. So UM a great opportunity though for for
Speaker 1: what is the question? How do you screen for the
Speaker 1: companies that you want to buy? How do you make
Speaker 1: those decisions? Absolutely, fundamentals matter significantly, especially in when you're
Speaker 1: in sort of down markets, and balance sheets get looked at. UM.
Speaker 1: One of my old bosses said in bullmarkets, it's all
Speaker 1: about the income statement revenue, right, you've the sales multiples,
Speaker 1: et cetera. And profits are insignificant when you come on
Speaker 1: the way down. Of course, balance sheets matter, cash positions,
Speaker 1: real profits, and we've seen that. So we think what
Speaker 1: we've done for clients the last few months has moved
Speaker 1: out of which has been very helpful, moving out of
Speaker 1: unprofitable companies. UH. And that's you've seen a lot of
Speaker 1: other guests talk about the Cathy Wood type names, the
Speaker 1: ARC universe, selling profitable positions, the companies like apples the world,
Speaker 1: the mega cap texts that are profitable that can buy
Speaker 1: back stock to buy unprofitable companies, and that's been a
Speaker 1: very bad uh direction the last few months. So we
Speaker 1: think we've we've screened out a lot of those companies.
Speaker 1: We don't know where the lows. Maybe we say that
Speaker 1: again near term where we think long term as a
Speaker 1: secular investor, what are the big trends that are going
Speaker 1: to happen over the next five or ten years. I
Speaker 1: think that the markets gives us our our job is
Speaker 1: that markets are very sort of near term, almost cyclical obsessed,
Speaker 1: and we think that's the real opportunity here. So um,
Speaker 1: we think there's incredible companies and technology. That's the sector
Speaker 1: we've focused on for our entire career twenty plus years.
Speaker 1: It's proven to be a great place to be. We
Speaker 1: think that will be a better place to be in
Speaker 1: the next twenty years than than it is today. There's
Speaker 1: just periods here where certain sectors fall out of favor.
Speaker 1: So on the tech side, you know, when you've got
Speaker 1: a name like Facebook, which has been such a strong
Speaker 1: performer for so many investors, but it's down year to date,
Speaker 1: off about over the trailing twelve months. So when you
Speaker 1: look at a name like that, what do you what
Speaker 1: do you think? Yeah, there's a couple of big issues there. Um,
Speaker 1: we we've been a long term shareholder since the I
Speaker 1: p O. We'll never forget the day that the I
Speaker 1: p O shares locked up UM at the six month mark.
Speaker 1: Peter Deal famously sold every single share. He had about
Speaker 1: a billion dollars worth around eighteen so he caused himself
Speaker 1: ten billion dollars by being somewhat shortsighted there, and he's
Speaker 1: actually just left the board. But um, you know, over time,
Speaker 1: they've done an incredible job growing their business. They're very profitable,
Speaker 1: but they're making a major pivot, and that pivot is
Speaker 1: a couple of areas. One is they're investing UM into
Speaker 1: new products which don't have as much AD units behind them,
Speaker 1: which is something like a TikTok type reels product. So
Speaker 1: they're having a change. They're sort of sort of trying
Speaker 1: to change the engine midflight here, which is always very challenging.
Speaker 1: They're trying to change their AD products on their core business,
Speaker 1: which faces some competition from other apps and time spent,
Speaker 1: and then they're actually literally changed the name of their
Speaker 1: company to focus on the future hardware business, which is
Speaker 1: where they want to go from two D screens to
Speaker 1: three D screens. And they spend ten billion dollars and
Speaker 1: lost a lot of money there, and they finally split
Speaker 1: out that segment, which is their their hardware AI initiatives
Speaker 1: as well as um Oculus, v R, A R and
Speaker 1: And that's a long time away. So you've got a
Speaker 1: really tough combination of slowing growth and rising expenses, and
Speaker 1: that's why you know, the stock has fallen so significantly
Speaker 1: because that's a bad combination for investors. Don't they also,
Speaker 1: I mean, at least in the metaverse, aren't they going
Speaker 1: to have significant competition from companies that haven't happened to
Speaker 1: change their names to meta platforms? Sure well, we we will.
Speaker 1: We own the Video, we own Microsoft, We own a
Speaker 1: lot of the companies that we think are going to
Speaker 1: benefit from a move away from screens. And Apple as well.
Speaker 1: I mean, they're the biggest um They're they're the unknown
Speaker 1: at the moment, but they have the largest one of
Speaker 1: you know, the best, Google, the largest user based and
Speaker 1: mobile devices apples second. But in terms of higher value
Speaker 1: customers and profits, Apples the clear leader. Those two companies
Speaker 1: will make um, you know, potentially incredible moves there and
Speaker 1: given their size and scales, so yes, it's an absolutely
Speaker 1: uh you know, competitive landscape, but an omniverse. So the
Speaker 1: meta versus a concept is a connection of you know,
Speaker 1: a lot of different worlds together um, where people are
Speaker 1: gonna spend more time you know, beyond their screens potentially,
Speaker 1: so and we think there's room for all of them
Speaker 1: to intermix um. But yes, it's definitely they have no
Speaker 1: you know, Zuckerberg has done incredible job growing against with
Speaker 1: you know, without having control of his platforms. And he
Speaker 1: tried to launch a phone a few years ago, did
Speaker 1: not work. Basis did as well, also failed. But he
Speaker 1: wants to control his hardware and his software. That's something
Speaker 1: that Apple has famously done with the software, hardware and
Speaker 1: services connection. Uh, And so he's trying to do that.
Speaker 1: He's making big bowld bets and so he really wanted
Speaker 1: to let us employees know this is the way we're
Speaker 1: going to be moving. So we think over the next
Speaker 1: you know, several years, as more of these products come out,
Speaker 1: we'll get his better sense of what, um, what they're doing.
Speaker 1: They're actually having an ai UH demo day today, so
Speaker 1: we'll see what we'll watch that after this. All right, Adam,
Speaker 1: thanks so much for taking the time out and chatting
Speaker 1: with us. Adam Gold, founder and chief investment officer for
Speaker 1: Catam LLC talking to us about these markets. Still likes
Speaker 1: the text story um as opposed to some of the
Speaker 1: cyclical names, the energies, the banks that have performed well
Speaker 1: on a reopening type of trade. He's sticking with technology
Speaker 1: at that firm. Let's continue that discussion on retail with
Speaker 1: Mary Sure, senior Equity Annals at Columbia Thread Needle. Maury,
Speaker 1: we've come through with most of the earnings here, a
Speaker 1: lot of the earnings. How is the consumer faring? I
Speaker 1: think overall the consumer is is faring much better than expected.
Speaker 1: We d We did see in the retail sales numbers
Speaker 1: and here from the companies. At the very end of
Speaker 1: the holiday was a little bit weaker, but that was
Speaker 1: attributed to oh Macron related traffic pressure. And since the
Speaker 1: middle of January we have seen traffic and sales improve,
Speaker 1: which I think is very encouraging, especially given the very
Speaker 1: tough compares that so many company are up against. I
Speaker 1: think another really big takeaway is given the strong underlying
Speaker 1: health of the consumer, the companies are very confident in
Speaker 1: their ability to continue to take price despite the fact
Speaker 1: that inflation continues to build. Yeah, I was going to
Speaker 1: ask about what, if what effects has that had Mari um.
Speaker 1: The inflation numbers are eye popping. I don't know what,
Speaker 1: um what Paul paid for his Elton John tickets last night,
Speaker 1: but I'm gonna guess it was a lot more than
Speaker 1: he would have paid a couple of years ago. And
Speaker 1: the and the steak before keens at stake as well. Yeah,
Speaker 1: food inflation um as well as uh, you know, experiences
Speaker 1: and stuff. It just costs a lot more. How how
Speaker 1: are consumers dealing with that? Surprisingly well. Speaking to the companies,
Speaker 1: and these are companies with exposure to all different categories,
Speaker 1: everything from food to handbags, the companies are not seeing
Speaker 1: any real pushback to or pricing efforts, or any real
Speaker 1: evidence of trade down. But they are all saying that
Speaker 1: if this level inflation continues, then they would expect to
Speaker 1: see trade down and greater focus of spending on needs
Speaker 1: over wats, But right now we are not seeing that
Speaker 1: in the current sales trends. Mario What are the retailers
Speaker 1: saying about the supply chain? Are they able to get
Speaker 1: stuff on the shelves, do they expect it to get
Speaker 1: better or worse, or what are they saying. I think
Speaker 1: that oh, Macron delayed the normalization of the supply chain
Speaker 1: a little bit um but and and most of the
Speaker 1: companies I think are taking a more conservative view in
Speaker 1: expecting the freight cost pressure to continue through the full year.
Speaker 1: But that really reflects the fact that demand is so
Speaker 1: strong and they are having to um to chase sales
Speaker 1: and that is coming at a greater cost. But as
Speaker 1: it relates to inventory, day have all taken action to
Speaker 1: pull forward inventory receipts and so when it when it
Speaker 1: comes to the inventory that you might see on the
Speaker 1: shelves of the stores, you should see that in a
Speaker 1: very good condition. And I think it could even continue
Speaker 1: to improve further as we moved through the year. All right, Mary,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for joining us getting us an
Speaker 1: update here on all things retail and on the consumer.
Speaker 1: And as Marie was saying, consumer continues to be strong
Speaker 1: in this economy. Mary Shore, senior equity analyst at Columbia
Speaker 1: thread Needle Investments, giving us the latest tier Steve Kane,
Speaker 1: co ce io and general's portfolio manager at TCW Investment Management.
Speaker 1: He went to the University of Chicago, got his NBA there, Matt,
Speaker 1: which means he understands the booth duration, the booth school vexity.
Speaker 1: I'm an equity guy, Steve, so I don'tally don't. I
Speaker 1: didn't pay too much attention to that business school. But
Speaker 1: you're fixed income portfolio manager. What do you do here
Speaker 1: in a rising interest rate environment? Steve? Well, hopefully, uh
Speaker 1: you had your duration short going back a year or so,
Speaker 1: which we were fortunate to do. But I would say that, um,
Speaker 1: you know, things are getting a little bit more interesting
Speaker 1: in the fixed income world from a value perspective, and
Speaker 1: I think where we you know, along the rate environment,
Speaker 1: we uh, we think the front end of the curve
Speaker 1: is starting to look interesting. A one sixty two year
Speaker 1: that discounts eight fed tightenings over the next you know,
Speaker 1: fifteen months or so, it looks reasonable. Now when you
Speaker 1: look out the curve, we're not as excited. You know,
Speaker 1: a sub ten year and uh thirty year just beyond
Speaker 1: your you're just not getting much term premium or really
Speaker 1: getting paid for your risk out the curve. So in general,
Speaker 1: what we tell investors is keep your duration shut, keep
Speaker 1: keep your focus on the on the front end of
Speaker 1: the curve. So, um, if we get eight rate hikes
Speaker 1: or more, would that surprise you then? No, not at all.
Speaker 1: I mean the d is I mean, of course, it
Speaker 1: depends on what happens with inflation and with the economy
Speaker 1: and all that. But you know, our view is inflation
Speaker 1: is going to run hot, certainly for the balance of
Speaker 1: this year and maybe well into next year, given what
Speaker 1: we're seeing in the labor market and with wages. Uh,
Speaker 1: certainly energy prices feeding into that as well. Um. Yeah, No,
Speaker 1: the FED is uh, you know, almost regardless of what
Speaker 1: happens with the you know, Russian Ukraine or even the
Speaker 1: stock market, the fence locked into a tightening path here. Um,
Speaker 1: given the high level of inflation and the fact that
Speaker 1: they really need to begin to get to work to
Speaker 1: address that, Steve, what does history have to tell us
Speaker 1: about the ability of the FED to fight inflation? I
Speaker 1: kind of feel like inflation is just because there's a
Speaker 1: bunch of ships off the port of Long Beach and
Speaker 1: the portrait clogged, and there's nobody to move this stuff,
Speaker 1: and there's no truckers, and what can the FED really
Speaker 1: do there? The FED can do nothing, I think lined up,
Speaker 1: lined up outside of ports, there's there's absolutely nothing they
Speaker 1: can do that The FED can really just through monetary
Speaker 1: policy affect financial conditions and the demand side of the
Speaker 1: economy through through interest rate sensitive sectors of the economy,
Speaker 1: which means there they have a very bluntant instrument. UM
Speaker 1: as we all know in terms of dealing with inflation,
Speaker 1: and inflation works with the lag. So the sort of
Speaker 1: unfortunate thing from an inflation forecasting standpoint is, even though
Speaker 1: they are going to be hiking, the impact of those hikes,
Speaker 1: UM is going to affect the economy with a lag
Speaker 1: and then inflation with even a further lag. So UH,
Speaker 1: it's it's not gonna really have an immediate effect on
Speaker 1: on the supply side of the economy at all. How
Speaker 1: important is it to get the rest of UM the
Speaker 1: f O M c UH confirmed UM, I don't think
Speaker 1: it really matters all that much. I mean that you
Speaker 1: have your big three in place, Paul Brainerd and Williams,
Speaker 1: the UH president of the New York FT, and UH,
Speaker 1: I don't think they need a full slate of Fed
Speaker 1: governors and presidents don't necessarily make decisions, so I think,
Speaker 1: you know, yes, it would be nice, but I don't
Speaker 1: think it's gonna affect in any way there their policy
Speaker 1: making decisions. Steve, you know when the FED made this
Speaker 1: pivot to a more hawkers stance and were I think
Speaker 1: the market was talking about three rate increases now potentially
Speaker 1: as many as seven. How do you feel about that
Speaker 1: discussion point of is the Fed behind the market? Are
Speaker 1: they trying to play catch up? How do you think
Speaker 1: about that? Yeah? I think they are. And I think
Speaker 1: what happened is, you know, they they went with the
Speaker 1: transitory supply bottleneck view for a while, and I think
Speaker 1: what changed as they began to see tightness in the
Speaker 1: labor market and um, you know, unemployment at four percent
Speaker 1: and wages rising very quickly and sort of forward looking
Speaker 1: indicators like the quits rate at historical highs, people leaving
Speaker 1: their job voluntarily, all suggests that this is more than
Speaker 1: a temporary phenomenon, that it's you know, it's affected the
Speaker 1: labor market. And I think the Fed, you is behind
Speaker 1: the curve in fact, and because you know, wages uh
Speaker 1: in the employment market do not react quickly to change
Speaker 1: it an interest rates. So again, it's going to be
Speaker 1: some period of time and some amount of that tightening
Speaker 1: and slowing in the economy before you see an impact
Speaker 1: on the labor market. All right, Steve, thanks so much
Speaker 1: for joining us. To really appreciate it. I always love
Speaker 1: talking to the folks at t c W. Get this
Speaker 1: two billion dollars in fixed income assets. I mean, that
Speaker 1: is a meeting. When you go to l A to
Speaker 1: see clients, you gotta lockdown that tc W meeting first
Speaker 1: and foremost, I want to talk about the workplace here.
Speaker 1: We've we've talked a lot about the great resignation, four
Speaker 1: to five million folks leaving in the workforce. That's got
Speaker 1: to handle on what it means for women. Are they
Speaker 1: a part of that? Are are they representative of part
Speaker 1: of that great resignation? And will they come back to
Speaker 1: the workforce. Tara J. Frank, President and CEO of t
Speaker 1: f J Career Modeling Jo and just Tara, thanks so
Speaker 1: much for joining us talk to us about women in
Speaker 1: the labor force as we enter into year three this pandemic.
Speaker 1: Hi there, thanks for having me. First of all, Um, Yeah,
Speaker 1: very good question. When you ask about whether women are
Speaker 1: engaged in the Great resignation. They're actually leading the Great resignation.
Speaker 1: And to put a finer point on it, women of
Speaker 1: color are actually leading the Great resignation. And there are
Speaker 1: a lot of reasons for that. Um. I think one,
Speaker 1: when we think about the pandemic and the pressure that
Speaker 1: has put on so many people, it also kind of
Speaker 1: enabled especially women of color, to have virtual faith spaces
Speaker 1: right where they weren't necessarily having to deal with some
Speaker 1: of the things microaggressions, etcetera that they may have been
Speaker 1: dealing with in the workplace. Clearly, the last couple of
Speaker 1: years have given people a little bit more flexibility and
Speaker 1: the opportunity to combine work in life in ways that
Speaker 1: gave them a sense of harmony. So yeah, most definitely
Speaker 1: that would explain for sure how it's easier for women
Speaker 1: of color to work from home, um or how it's
Speaker 1: um you know, not as difficult when it comes to
Speaker 1: the kind of racism or sexism that they may face
Speaker 1: in the work place. But I wonder about those who
Speaker 1: have left the workforce. Have they left because you know,
Speaker 1: out of choice, because they wanted to because now you know,
Speaker 1: I don't know, retirement funds One up with the stock market,
Speaker 1: or they found a way to make it work on
Speaker 1: um less pay, or have they left because they had
Speaker 1: to Those who have left, have they left because they
Speaker 1: needed to take care of children, take care of their elders, etcetera. Well,
Speaker 1: some are leaving the workforce as we define it traditionally,
Speaker 1: but they're not necessarily leaving work, right, So I think
Speaker 1: we have a couple of different facets of this. Yes,
Speaker 1: some are leaving the workforce because they're having to manage
Speaker 1: so many more factors um, But others are leaving companies
Speaker 1: not necessarily the workforce or working in general. Right, they're
Speaker 1: creating new avenues of income in partnership with other people
Speaker 1: with their own kind of creativity and ideas. But yeah,
Speaker 1: they're leaving the traditional workforce as we know it um
Speaker 1: and and really just trying to manage life. So what
Speaker 1: are we seeing in kind of the leadership positions terror
Speaker 1: Because I mean, I think whether it's gender diversity or
Speaker 1: other diverse other types of diversity, it really I kind
Speaker 1: of feel like at the lower levels there's pretty decent representation,
Speaker 1: but it is the higher you go, the more difficult
Speaker 1: it becomes. Again, real diversification, is there some solutions that
Speaker 1: the pay gap. If you if it's like for like
Speaker 1: you know, job for job, maybe that pay gap is
Speaker 1: shrinking a little bit. But I think Terra, your your
Speaker 1: point is that if you look at the unadjusted pay gap,
Speaker 1: it's still large because you don't see UM women, you
Speaker 1: don't see people of color in enough, in high enough
Speaker 1: numbers moving into the leadership higher positions. Yes, that is
Speaker 1: absolutely right. So what we're what we have here is
Speaker 1: essentially occupational segregation. Right, You have women in lower paying jobs,
Speaker 1: and you know, to your question about what can we
Speaker 1: do in in order to change that, I think one
Speaker 1: of the things we really need to do that leaders
Speaker 1: and companies need to do UM is certainly start capturing
Speaker 1: UH data at deeper levels UM, but also interspectional data,
Speaker 1: so not just data about women representation, but really looking
Speaker 1: kind of all across all those dimensions of difference. They
Speaker 1: also need to get a much better sense of what's
Speaker 1: happening inside their cultures experientially, because a lot of this
Speaker 1: bias that is keeping women from being able to move
Speaker 1: higher into those higher contributing positions were not necessarily conscious of.
Speaker 1: They have to do with things like women may not
Speaker 1: always get the same kind of coaching. Women may not
Speaker 1: always have the same degree of visibility. Women and especially
Speaker 1: women of color, may not be being sponsored at the
Speaker 1: same rate, and a lot of this is connected to affinity, bias,
Speaker 1: right proximity. When we have power, which is mostly white
Speaker 1: men in these organizations, everything that comes with the power
Speaker 1: flows to the people who are most like us, and
Speaker 1: women are not benefiting from that. Tara, thank you so
Speaker 1: much for joining us. Really fascinating discussion. Tara J. Frank,
Speaker 1: President and CEO of t f J Career Modeling. Thanks
Speaker 1: for listening to the Bloomberg Markets podcast. You can subscribe
Speaker 1: and listen to interviews with Apple Podcasts or whatever podcast
Speaker 1: platform you prefer. I'm Matt Miller. I'm on Twitter at
Speaker 1: Matt Miller. P on false Sweeney I'm on Twitter at
Speaker 1: pt Sweeney. Before the podcast, you can always catch us
Speaker 1: worldwide at Bloomberg Radio.