Speaker 1: Dave Francine.
Speaker 2: Now we usually actually start with a bit of banter
Speaker 2: at the top of the show, but we have such
Speaker 2: a big guest today, we're skipping the banter and just
Speaker 2: getting straight to it.
Speaker 1: That's absolutely right. Let's get started.
Speaker 2: I'm Francine Lacqua.
Speaker 1: And I'm David Merritt, and this is.
Speaker 2: In the City, Bloomberg's podcast, connecting you to the conversations
Speaker 2: at the heart of the City of London.
Speaker 3: And this week our guest is Barklay's chief executive officer,
Speaker 3: cs ven Kata Krishnan, joining us for I think his
Speaker 3: podcast debut.
Speaker 4: It is my podcast debut.
Speaker 3: Yes, thank you, well, we are very honored to have
Speaker 3: you on your podcast. Dut congratulations for joining in the City.
Speaker 3: We're sitting in New York. We have Francine sitting up
Speaker 3: late in London joining the conversation. Let's just start right
Speaker 3: in with the big question. You know, the headlines at
Speaker 3: the moment in the markets are all about nerves. I
Speaker 3: was just reading a headline on Bloomberg jitters in Wall Street,
Speaker 3: whether it's the bomb market, interest rates, the stock market.
Speaker 3: There's a lot of nerves around a recession and if
Speaker 3: it's coming when it's coming.
Speaker 1: How are you feeling at the moment?
Speaker 5: So I do think that of rate moves has caused
Speaker 5: some amount of tension among market participants. I would like
Speaker 5: to take the longer view on this. I think what
Speaker 5: you've seen over the last two years is obviously a
Speaker 5: fairly substantial rise in short term rates and long term
Speaker 5: rates have adjusted accordingly. In the major economies of the world,
Speaker 5: I would say the US has been the most advanced
Speaker 5: in the rate rise. The UK now is not far behind,
Speaker 5: Europe is still lagging. What that has done is addressed
Speaker 5: the immediate headline issue of inflation. The next question, which
Speaker 5: is something many of us have been asking about for
Speaker 5: some time, is how does the real economy, How do
Speaker 5: real businesses adjust to a world in which interest rates
Speaker 5: are higher and higher for longer. Because I think the
Speaker 5: one thing people do not question is that we will
Speaker 5: see call it four and a half ish to five
Speaker 5: percent ten year rates which have a currency you're talking about,
Speaker 5: for some time. And as that settles in, people worry
Speaker 5: about what employment will do, and they're also at the
Speaker 5: same time there's a little bit worry on the long
Speaker 5: term side as to what's going to ultimately happen with inflation.
Speaker 5: I think it's just as six months ago or eight
Speaker 5: months ago, it was too soon to declare victory, it's
Speaker 5: too soon to declare defeat.
Speaker 3: Right, So you're not looking to you jittery. I mean
Speaker 3: you're looking quite relaxed, and you've got an amazing rigul
Speaker 3: side seat in terms of how companies are doing, how
Speaker 3: the consumer is doing. Yeah, you seem fairly sanguine about
Speaker 3: where we're all.
Speaker 5: Look one in as a big bank CEO, you're never
Speaker 5: sanguine because you're always worried about what might go wrong.
Speaker 5: But to think about what might go wrong does not
Speaker 5: mean it will go wrong or it is likely to
Speaker 5: go wrong. I mean we should all worry a little
Speaker 5: about if higher rates do get substantially higher, and what
Speaker 5: happens to business models.
Speaker 4: But at this.
Speaker 5: Stage, I think we have to see employment and watch employment. Employment,
Speaker 5: or rather a low unemployment rate, is the most critical
Speaker 5: measure of consumer health because as long as people have jobs,
Speaker 5: they will spend. And I'm hopeful that employment continues to
Speaker 5: hold up for various structural and other reasons on both
Speaker 5: sides of the Atlantic.
Speaker 2: Venqatte, do you worry a little bit more about the
Speaker 2: US economy. We're talking about a credit crimeter. It's not
Speaker 2: easy out there, and I know, you know, things are
Speaker 2: looking better certainly than they were six months ago, but
Speaker 2: you've been in charge for two years. It's been a
Speaker 2: roller coaster over two years. For the market.
Speaker 5: It has been a roller coaster for two years. I
Speaker 5: think the most important thing coming into this and coming
Speaker 5: into this rate rise is consumers on both sides of
Speaker 5: the Atlantic have been very, very cautious about their spending.
Speaker 5: So one simple statistic in the UK, where obviously it's
Speaker 5: a more densely banked system and we see a fair
Speaker 5: amount of the payments that go in through the system,
Speaker 5: But one simple statistic in the UK is that over
Speaker 5: the last year, whatever the inflation print has been over
Speaker 5: a previous twelve month period as high as a ten
Speaker 5: percent and you know, down to around six percent more recently,
Speaker 5: the trailing twelve months spending growth that we saw in
Speaker 5: our own debit and credit card systems was half the
Speaker 5: rate of inflation. So prices go up ten percent, people
Speaker 5: spending goes up five percent. Part of that is economizing
Speaker 5: going down market in terms of where they shop, what
Speaker 5: they shop for, how they shop, and part of it
Speaker 5: is cutting out certain more expensive kinds of expenditure, so
Speaker 5: discretionary spending on either holidays or big ticket items. They've
Speaker 5: done that while they've kept their jobs. It's a good
Speaker 5: thing now. In part they've had to do that because
Speaker 5: their paycheck has been eaten up by two other things.
Speaker 5: Energy price inflation, which went up very high, came down.
Speaker 5: Of course, oil prices are going up again just a
Speaker 5: little now, and then at the same time, especially in
Speaker 5: the UK, a mortgage rate rise. Now, the US market
Speaker 5: responds less to that. I mean, there's just it affects
Speaker 5: the price of houses here and affects how many people
Speaker 5: buy new homes. But because we have more of a
Speaker 5: fifteen and thirty year rate market in the US, it
Speaker 5: affects individual is less. But people have been adjusting, and
Speaker 5: that is the hopeful sign.
Speaker 2: Do you worry about a credit crunch anywhere, Venkattie. After
Speaker 2: a couple of more months of this, or a couple
Speaker 2: more quarters, people can't afford to pay the bills. People
Speaker 2: are struggling to repay some of their credit card.
Speaker 4: I'm not worried about it.
Speaker 5: As long as energy prices and interest rates remain at
Speaker 5: these rough levels. I think people have adjusted to that.
Speaker 3: So it's sustainable at this sort of level you think
Speaker 3: in terms of credit quality, Yes, it's a very elevated
Speaker 3: level right now.
Speaker 5: Right, it's an elevated level where people have made the
Speaker 5: financial adjustment. The key to it is employment. People have
Speaker 5: to have their jobs. As long as jobs continue to
Speaker 5: be firm, people will adjust their expenditure levels to match this.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 3: You know we look for kind of warning signs, don't
Speaker 3: we read flashing signs in the jobs market. Blimberg has
Speaker 3: an interesting tracker from Reed in terms of job vacancies. Now,
Speaker 3: James Reed has said that their indicators are never wrong
Speaker 3: about recession. It started to flash a bit red. That's
Speaker 3: about employment in Britain and that's a bit of a
Speaker 3: leading indicator postings for things like that. Are you seeing
Speaker 3: in your business any red flashing bulbs that we need
Speaker 3: to be worried about.
Speaker 5: I think what we see in the UK more companies
Speaker 5: are talking about efficiency and they're talking about quote unquote
Speaker 5: right sizing. At the Conservative Party conference in Manchester, the
Speaker 5: Chancellor of the Exchequer spoke about freezing civil service recruitment.
Speaker 5: So those are signs we have to see how they
Speaker 5: build or hear.
Speaker 3: That, and I think, right, okay, the government is putting
Speaker 3: back on hiring. You know, do you think corporate Britain
Speaker 3: and corporate America here those signals and think we've got
Speaker 3: to slow down, are hiring as well.
Speaker 5: But I think people companies have been thinking about it
Speaker 5: for quite some time, and you saw it in tech
Speaker 5: very earlier this year, much earlier this year.
Speaker 1: And you're thinking about our parties, Well.
Speaker 5: We always look at the efficiency of our operations and
Speaker 5: so yes, we do think about it as well.
Speaker 2: You're way too optimistic. I mean, Dave and I speak
Speaker 2: all the time, and I'm usually the optimist, and you're
Speaker 2: even more optimistic than me. I don't see who's hiring
Speaker 2: when you look at businesses. When you look at you
Speaker 2: don't talk about the government maybe hiring less. I just
Speaker 2: don't understand how we're going to grow from here.
Speaker 5: So you're right that as people look at hiring itself,
Speaker 5: that in the very very short term everybody is a
Speaker 5: little more cautious. The two things to keep in mind
Speaker 5: in the UK, to begin with, is that there was
Speaker 5: a real structural supply shock in labor post to Brexit,
Speaker 5: right where the labor four shrunk and it wasn't that
Speaker 5: long ago we were talking about people and in fact
Speaker 5: the Chancellor of the Exchequer spoke about it again in
Speaker 5: the UK. We were talking about people who were retiring
Speaker 5: early and the impact it's having on benefits, people who
Speaker 5: should be able to work but we're not willing.
Speaker 1: To work, resignation and all.
Speaker 5: Yea. So it wasn't that long ago we were talking
Speaker 5: about it. So I think our mood gets amplified one
Speaker 5: way or the other, right, And so I wouldn't sort
Speaker 5: of say so, Francine, I rarely would disagree with you,
Speaker 5: So I wouldn't say that I'm optimistic. Perhaps I'm a
Speaker 5: little calmer than I should be, so.
Speaker 3: Very very calm indeed't it? What about the whole banking
Speaker 3: industry as a whole? In your industry, I mean, as
Speaker 3: Fancy said, it's been an unbelievable couple of years. But
Speaker 3: you know who would have predicted Credit Swiss would cease
Speaker 3: to exist, to've had the SVB de Bacala this year.
Speaker 3: I mean, how does the industry feel for you at
Speaker 3: the moment? It feels a little bit like it's perilous
Speaker 3: times for banks.
Speaker 5: It depends on where in the industry. You asked that question,
Speaker 5: and I think the large banks, the megabanks, banks like Barclay's,
Speaker 5: the gesfees, the money center banks in the US have
Speaker 5: all spent a number of years improving their capital, increasing
Speaker 5: their liquidity, managing their risks more carefully, and we all
Speaker 5: feel in a better place because of that. Now, the
Speaker 5: latest rules on Basel three point one caused some amount
Speaker 5: of nerves among people, but it's coming at a time
Speaker 5: when we are all well capitalized, and none of the
Speaker 5: very big banks were being called into question this year.
Speaker 4: What you had was therefore other pockets.
Speaker 5: One is fintech, where obviously there was a business model
Speaker 5: which was based on cheap money, which is getting tested
Speaker 5: and they've got to show real profitability. And ultimately size
Speaker 5: catches up with you in some of these smaller firms,
Speaker 5: because do you have the ability to put in all
Speaker 5: the systems, do you put in all the checks and
Speaker 5: balances in terms of KYC money laundering and so on?
Speaker 5: And you see that about certain firms. And then in
Speaker 5: the UA regional banks where they were a certain size
Speaker 5: now where if they creep up to about one hundred
Speaker 5: billion dollars, they get caught in the regulatory net, and
Speaker 5: of course there was an acid liability issue which came
Speaker 5: to the fourth in February March. Credit suite occupies a
Speaker 5: different part of this universe. It was a bank that
Speaker 5: was having difficulty coming into this year. And if you
Speaker 5: had said to people in January of this year that
Speaker 5: credit switee might have difficulty in twenty twenty three, I
Speaker 5: think people would have accepted it because we knew that
Speaker 5: they were dealing with deep structural issues.
Speaker 4: The others were more surprising.
Speaker 3: If you think about your business then now as it stands,
Speaker 3: where are you most concerned about? You know, the IPO
Speaker 3: market has been pretty deadly. You did get a great
Speaker 3: mandate on ARM, as we did, but what does the
Speaker 3: pipeline look like? I mean, particularly in investment banking.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean there is a sentimentality or sentiment driven
Speaker 5: aspect to that pipeline. I would have said a month
Speaker 5: ago in early September, especially with ARM Instacart coming, people
Speaker 5: who are a little hopeful. Interest rates have risen since then,
Speaker 5: and those IPOs themselves have traded off a bit from
Speaker 5: their initial peak, so people are cautious about the IPO market.
Speaker 5: Sentiment has to come back for that because it's a
Speaker 5: fundamental driven thing in terms of the build up to
Speaker 5: the decision to do an IPO, but the timing is
Speaker 5: sentiment driven. So I think if you look at it overall,
Speaker 5: there is a challenge in the banking environment. Number One,
Speaker 5: you've got deal flow which increased very slightly at the
Speaker 5: start of September, still looking that the revival is looking
Speaker 5: a little further away. I'm still hopeful by the way
Speaker 5: that if things settle down, deal flows come back. So
Speaker 5: I think you need to look through this period. You've
Speaker 5: got interest rates which are peaking for a bank, it
Speaker 5: would lead to a peaking in net interest margins, and
Speaker 5: then market volatility which is there but less than it
Speaker 5: used to be, which will obviously impact the way you
Speaker 5: think longer term about trading revenues. All this means is,
Speaker 5: I think some stability in bank earnings as opposed to
Speaker 5: a shrinkage or tremendous growth, right, and for growth to
Speaker 5: come back, one of these things has to reverse.
Speaker 2: What does that mean vencav for hiring and firing. So
Speaker 2: I know there's a number of also big Wall Street
Speaker 2: banks that are going through downsizing. I don't know how
Speaker 2: quickly you can see those green shoots coming back into
Speaker 2: hiring for certain parts of the bank.
Speaker 5: So I think again, despends on the part of the
Speaker 5: bank you're looking at. If you're looking at the fundamental expense,
Speaker 5: the fundamental hiring which all of us do in technology,
Speaker 5: in productivity enhancement and investing in our systems and making
Speaker 5: the place run better, that will continue to happen. If
Speaker 5: you look at hiring related to trend actions, especially in
Speaker 5: the investment banking state, it's probably platetered and uh it's
Speaker 5: it's you know, you're going to have to wait to
Speaker 5: see deal volume come before people build that up. And
Speaker 5: I think on the market side it's also going to
Speaker 5: be stable. So I think what I would say is stability,
Speaker 5: not growth.
Speaker 3: So you were telling me earlier you just got back
Speaker 3: from the Tory conference in Manchester. You know a lot
Speaker 3: of talk there, you know about the growth agenda, and
Speaker 3: I read with interest your op ed in the Times
Speaker 3: about a bold agenda being needed for Britain, right, and
Speaker 3: I think, what do we hear for the Prime minister
Speaker 3: this week? We heard a strategy based around scrapping a
Speaker 3: rail line, increasing the smoking age and tweaking a levels.
Speaker 3: Is that the sort of vision that Britain needs to
Speaker 3: kind of match the US levels of growth.
Speaker 4: Well, I think there was other things.
Speaker 5: There were other things that that the Prime Minister and
Speaker 5: the and the Chancellor said, including increasing investment into the UK,
Speaker 5: investment in important technology and sectors where the UK has
Speaker 5: a comparative advantage or a competitive advantage, including the life sciences,
Speaker 5: entertainment and obviously the digital economy. You know, some of
Speaker 5: the important chip companies and AI companies are headquartered in
Speaker 5: Britain and the lifetimes.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so I think.
Speaker 5: But equally so, I think they talk about that investment
Speaker 5: and they talk about the increase or the need to
Speaker 5: increase the equity risk culture in the UK, which is
Speaker 5: I think a very important thing to speak about. I
Speaker 5: should also say we spoke about the Tory conference. I
Speaker 5: think the Labor conference is coming up. The difference between
Speaker 5: Tory and Labor in the UK in these issues is
Speaker 5: not as wide as it used to be. Yeah, I mean,
Speaker 5: I think in our lifetimes we have never seen such
Speaker 5: a small difference between the way labor thinks, the central
Speaker 5: part of the Labor doctrine and the Tory doctrine. And
Speaker 5: that's actually a good thing for the UK. Because it
Speaker 5: diminishes political risk.
Speaker 2: Are you you bullish on the city of London again?
Speaker 2: There has been so much I guess outpouring of downbeat
Speaker 2: news that a lot of people are saying, look, the
Speaker 2: UK is now turning a corner that things can only
Speaker 2: look up. Do you agree with that assessment or were
Speaker 2: we always too tough on the ukn city of London.
Speaker 5: I think there's a natural tendency to be a little
Speaker 5: tough on the city of London. I think certainly there
Speaker 5: was a lot of sentiment that happened with Brexit, and
Speaker 5: you know, there's a natural readjustment of the financial operations
Speaker 5: of companies from London to Europe because they couldn't serve
Speaker 5: Europe from London. But that is not to overlook the
Speaker 5: many advantages that the UK have. Everybody speaks about them
Speaker 5: soft and hard in terms of workforce, education, rule of law,
Speaker 5: and then there's the professional disciplines that support a banking industry.
Speaker 5: Most important to me above all of these things is
Speaker 5: the approach of the UK public, the UK institutions, the UN,
Speaker 5: UK regulators, in the UK government to the financial industry.
Speaker 5: The financial industry in the UK is a source of strength.
Speaker 5: It is a critical competitive advantage to the country. Barclays
Speaker 5: brings in two billion pounds of foreign exchange jarnings every
Speaker 5: year into the UK because we sell UK financial services globally. Now,
Speaker 5: the love hate relationship in the past has been driven
Speaker 5: probably more by bankers not behaving as well as they should.
Speaker 5: I certainly hope the industry has put it far behind
Speaker 5: it and I think a well run, well regulated industry,
Speaker 5: regulated both by the pr in the FCA and the Treasury,
Speaker 5: and well managed by the participants in the industry of
Speaker 5: which we are one should lead to a greater amount
Speaker 5: of cooperation between the City of London and the government,
Speaker 5: working together on common goals to advance growth in the
Speaker 5: country and in investment into the sectors which need them.
Speaker 5: That's what my article in the terms is about.
Speaker 3: Right, right, And when you interviewed the Chancellor, you told
Speaker 3: me sat the other side of the desk in Manchester,
Speaker 3: do you have faith that he has got the right
Speaker 3: agenda for this pro business stances, because you know, the
Speaker 3: last few years have not been great for the relations
Speaker 3: between particular Conservative Party and the city in business more broadly.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, look, I think you always are going
Speaker 5: to have voices on either side of this. But I
Speaker 5: look in two ways. I look in main at what
Speaker 5: the sort of the main part of opinion is and
Speaker 5: the centrality of opinion, if you like, the central part
Speaker 5: of the distribution, and that I think is very friendly,
Speaker 5: and it's friendly on the Tory side and it's friendly
Speaker 5: on the Labor side.
Speaker 1: So that was to a point.
Speaker 3: You know that the convergence of the two parties really
Speaker 3: whoever wins if we get an election yet next year,
Speaker 3: which it seems like we will, the city doesn't really
Speaker 3: mind who wins, just as long as the kind of
Speaker 3: policies are continued.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I think the city should welcome the state of
Speaker 5: affairs on the confluence in thinking on economic policy, the
Speaker 5: role of the financial industry in.
Speaker 4: The UK and the role of growth.
Speaker 5: Now, obviously there are differences in Labor and between Labor
Speaker 5: and Tory on various other things, not my job to
Speaker 5: get into that, but on the central aspect of economic policy,
Speaker 5: financial regulation, the importance of the financial industry, I think
Speaker 5: they're far closer together than they are a part.
Speaker 2: But when kat, what do you need from government right
Speaker 2: now to make your life easier? It must be sometimes frustrating,
Speaker 2: right to see valuations of Barclays or other big banks,
Speaker 2: and then you look at other companies that probably didn't
Speaker 2: even break a sweat or actually did any profit with
Speaker 2: crazy valuations because they're in a different sector. So what
Speaker 2: will make your job easier in two years from now?
Speaker 5: So I actually don't think that's government's job. I think
Speaker 5: it's our job as bankers, as people who run companies,
Speaker 5: to produce good return for our shareholders, to distribute those
Speaker 5: returns and have them believe that we can do so,
Speaker 5: and if we do that job well, they will reward us. Right,
Speaker 5: this is much more in our hands than anybody else's.
Speaker 5: So in that instance, I.
Speaker 2: And are you frustrated? And get are you frustrated about valuations?
Speaker 2: I mean, banks are so complex, especially in regulation, and
Speaker 2: sometimes the valuations may not match up. Is that a frustration?
Speaker 2: Do you think about that?
Speaker 4: Look?
Speaker 5: I spent a lot of time thinking about valuations, certainly
Speaker 5: of Barclays, and of course I look at the industry.
Speaker 5: It's a difficult industry. There is a risk premium attached
Speaker 5: to this industry, both in terms of our exposure to
Speaker 5: the macroeconomy and what people believe, especially parts of our
Speaker 5: business model, the investment banking parts of the business model.
Speaker 5: How they think we are vulnerable to the ups and
Speaker 5: downs of markets. We try to run our business well.
Speaker 5: We try to manage our risk carefully. It's our job
Speaker 5: to continue to great returns reliably, and then shareholders will
Speaker 5: reward us. Will you get frustrated from time to time?
Speaker 5: You can, but you know we've got a job to do,
Speaker 5: and if we do the job, I'm certain over time
Speaker 5: we'll get rewarded.
Speaker 2: Venkette, I know you're focused a lot on green tech,
Speaker 2: and it's something that you know is close to you.
Speaker 2: But how do you see that developing? There's there's seems
Speaker 2: to be a bifurcation about on countries but also companies
Speaker 2: that still want to be ESG friendly and green. Is
Speaker 2: this now more of a difficult question than almost two
Speaker 2: years ago?
Speaker 5: I don't think it is. I think I think the
Speaker 5: train left the station. I think we are moving towards
Speaker 5: a world which will align to net zero. We Barclays
Speaker 5: hope to be aligned by twenty to fifty. Some companies
Speaker 5: will do sooner, some will do later. We think we
Speaker 5: will move towards that world. When that happens, I do
Speaker 5: not know, but the factors that are driving. It will happen.
Speaker 5: People will emit in greenhouse gases. Over time, people will
Speaker 5: use fossil fuels less. Companies will invest more in renewables.
Speaker 5: Companies will invest more in either capturing carbon or making
Speaker 5: more efficient the use of fossil fuel so that less
Speaker 5: carbon is emitted. That's where green tech comes in. It
Speaker 5: will change industries like agriculture. There will be a greater
Speaker 5: use of nature based solutions, both to deal with the
Speaker 5: consequences of climate change and to help mitigate the impact
Speaker 5: of climate change, you know, like mangroves. We're involved across
Speaker 5: all of this. There will be zigs and zags, you know,
Speaker 5: and industries that were out of favor, like nuclear, will
Speaker 5: come back into favor.
Speaker 4: I think.
Speaker 5: So, I think that we are on a path towards
Speaker 5: a cleaner, greener world. There will be zigs and zags,
Speaker 5: and fossil fuel usage may increase before it decreases, but
Speaker 5: ultimately it will decrease.
Speaker 1: Please, as a leader in this transition.
Speaker 5: We are a great advocate for it. I hope you're
Speaker 5: a leader in investing, in financing in companies that do it,
Speaker 5: bringing them to market, and in advocating for them. So yeah,
Speaker 5: I would like to be a leader and this and
Speaker 5: we're trying very hard to be.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, thank you.
Speaker 2: Wait now we have to talk about cricket. Oh yeah,
Speaker 2: this is my one chance. O. Wait, I learned the
Speaker 2: rules for you.
Speaker 1: Hold on, okay, what are you going to get to
Speaker 1: the World Cup?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 5: I'm not going to go to the World Cup, but
Speaker 5: I'm going to watch it intently.
Speaker 2: I know nothing about cricket. I had to learn the
Speaker 2: rules just to make sure that if you told me
Speaker 2: something very complicated, I could keep up. But are you
Speaker 2: a huge cricket fan.
Speaker 5: I am a very very big cricket fan who's going
Speaker 5: to win. So I'm going to get a lot of
Speaker 5: hate mail for this. I'm a very frustrated Indian cricket fan.
Speaker 5: I they have my deep loyalty, but they go up
Speaker 5: and down and my beta to them is very very high.
Speaker 5: I think the Indian team has a real advantage of
Speaker 5: the home pitch. However, this English team is a very
Speaker 5: very good team. Has been performing in a sustained way
Speaker 5: for over a couple of years, certainly in the test
Speaker 5: match test format extremely well. You can never count out
Speaker 5: the Australians and New Zealand's a very good team and
Speaker 5: Pakistan is a team which all always surprised they don't
Speaker 5: get as much cricket exposure as they as the others do.
Speaker 5: So what I'm trying to tell you is it's an
Speaker 5: open field. I'm not trying to hedge. My sad part
Speaker 5: in all of this is that the West Indian team,
Speaker 5: which I grew up watching.
Speaker 4: And loving is not as strong as it used to.
Speaker 4: I would like to see that.
Speaker 3: So I was in Mumbai in twenty eleven the last
Speaker 3: time when India one final and the party erupted in
Speaker 3: the town. And you know, I mean, it's not going
Speaker 3: to be in Mumbai the final this time, right, but
Speaker 3: it's going to be in the Dinamdaba.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's name the Bad and well I watched it
Speaker 5: in twenty eleven on TV and I'll watch it again
Speaker 5: this time.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: I'm also going to ask you because I can't talk cricket.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm better at net interest, margins and cricket.
Speaker 2: So I'm going to ask you, Nkata, how do you
Speaker 2: keep up with the news or how much do you read?
Speaker 4: Do you?
Speaker 2: Is it podcasts? Is it papers? Is it TV? There's
Speaker 2: so much information out there. Yeah, city, there's so much
Speaker 2: information out there, Like how do you filter everything?
Speaker 5: So I this is my first podcast in a champ speaking,
Speaker 5: I actually don't listen much to podcasts.
Speaker 4: I will start now. So you've changed my life. Yeah.
Speaker 5: I read about eight newspapers slash magazines every morning and
Speaker 5: I read them all again at night just before I
Speaker 5: go to sleep.
Speaker 4: Of course, Bloomberg is one of them, and so I
Speaker 4: go through that.
Speaker 5: You know, a couple of UK newspapers, certainly the important
Speaker 5: US news papers, the financial newspapers, one Indian newspaper, just
Speaker 5: to get a sense of everything that's going on. And
Speaker 5: I think it's important to do that.
Speaker 3: But when you when you're absorbing all that news you
Speaker 3: find particularly now you know, talking about the jitters and
Speaker 3: the headlines, does it wash over you or do you?
Speaker 3: For you can assimilate all this stuff without it's very hard.
Speaker 5: It's very hard to assimilate everything. So there are a
Speaker 5: few articles on things which for whatever reason I feel
Speaker 5: close to I read in depth. There are some things
Speaker 5: where I read the headlines, and there are some things
Speaker 5: which I would rather.
Speaker 4: Not admit to reading. But I do like Taylor Swift
Speaker 4: and the Jets.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker 5: Thank you, Transceine, thank you for staying up late in London,
Speaker 5: and David, thank you, and I'll explain the LBW rule
Speaker 5: to you. The next time we're on we will need
Speaker 5: two hours.
Speaker 4: Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to this week's in the City. We
Speaker 1: will be back next week.
Speaker 2: But in the meantime, if you like our show, please
Speaker 2: head on over to Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen
Speaker 2: to podcasts and rate, review and subscribe.
Speaker 1: This episode was hosted by Me, David.
Speaker 2: Merritt and Me Francin Lackward.
Speaker 1: It was produced by Somasadi
Speaker 2: Additional editing by Blake Maples and special thanks to The
Speaker 2: Berkeley's Chief Executive Officer, CS Vankatak Krishna