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Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bloomberg Markets Podcast. I'm Paul Sweeney alongside

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Speaker 1: my co host Matt Miller. Every business day we bring

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Speaker 1: you interviews from CEOs, market pros, and Bloomberg experts, along

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Speaker 1: with essential market moving news. Find the Bloomberg Markets Podcast

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Speaker 1: on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts, and

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Speaker 1: at Bloomberg dot com slash podcast. Well, during this fourteen

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Speaker 1: months of this pandemic we have Bloomberg Radio and television

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Speaker 1: have been so fortunate to have access to a wide

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Speaker 1: range of experts that help us navigate what we need

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Speaker 1: to know, what is important and here uh at Bloomberg

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Speaker 1: Markets on Fridays, we've been chatting with Lawrence Sour. She's

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Speaker 1: the associate Professor of Emergency Medicine at the Johns Hopkins

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Speaker 1: School of Medicine. I should know that the Bloomberg School

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Speaker 1: of Public Health at Johns Hopkins is supported by Michael R.

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Speaker 1: Bloomberg found our Bloomberg LP and Bloomberg Philanthropies. And Lauren,

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Speaker 1: you've been so good to us over these months, kind

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Speaker 1: of keeping us up to date on you know, they're

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Speaker 1: really important news about this virus and the therapeutics and

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Speaker 1: and now the vaccines, and I guess one of the

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Speaker 1: questions is now is I don't have a question. We

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Speaker 1: got a question all TV up, All right, you want

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Speaker 1: to you want to go that route? You go that route? Now? Well,

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Speaker 1: I just we've been talking about it, at least I

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Speaker 1: have Lauren no, so we were. We joke around about

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Speaker 1: this American dream mall all the time in Rutherford, New Jersey,

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Speaker 1: and it just made me think, Um, it's going to

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Speaker 1: be a place where there's a ton of people gathered,

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Speaker 1: and I wonder what an expert would think about going

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Speaker 1: to a place like that right now. I mean, even

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Speaker 1: if you're vaccinated, would you feel comfortable going to it

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Speaker 1: doesn't have to be there an Orioles game, or maybe

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Speaker 1: you're a Nats fan, would you be comfortable going on

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Speaker 1: the t I mean, do you go to these places

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Speaker 1: where a lot of people are gathered, and then I

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Speaker 1: assume you're vaccinated, would you wear a mask or not? Yeah? Well,

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Speaker 1: I want to start by saying, of course I'm an

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Speaker 1: Orioles fan, but um, I think I would feel safe

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Speaker 1: in ball parts, especially if they're maintaining the sort of

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Speaker 1: seat social distancing that they've been doing. So the seat restrictions. UM. Interestingly,

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Speaker 1: you know, I think we're seeing some of the fall

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Speaker 1: sports like football, UM go back to full stadium capacity,

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Speaker 1: and I'm not sure i'd be ready for that my personally,

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Speaker 1: of course i'm speaking, but I think that an outdoor

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Speaker 1: setting where you feel like you're not up against people

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Speaker 1: for long periods of time, where you have that space

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Speaker 1: to move, I'd be comfortable there, but probably would still

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Speaker 1: wear a mask. Maybe not if I was sitting in

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Speaker 1: my seat and felt like I was, you know, six

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Speaker 1: ft away from people, but when I headed back to

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Speaker 1: the concessions or when I went to the bathroom UM

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Speaker 1: or in you know, coming and going from those spaces.

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Speaker 1: So that's like always the biggest challenges when people get

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Speaker 1: sort of crowded together as they're entering or exiting the stadium.

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Speaker 1: UM UM. An indoor mall for an extended period of time,

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Speaker 1: I'm not sure i'd feel comfortable there, and definitely not

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Speaker 1: UM other sort of indoor spaces where you have no

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Speaker 1: control over how close you are to people. Well to continue,

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Speaker 1: I mean, you know, I'm a long suffering New York

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Speaker 1: Knicks fan, Lauren, and but fortunately they are back in

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Speaker 1: the playoffs and they have. They're opening their playoffs this

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Speaker 1: weekend at Madison Square Garden, the world's most famous arena.

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Speaker 1: Of course, they're gonna have fifteen thousand fans there, and

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Speaker 1: I believe the capacity is maybe seventeen or eighteen thousand,

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Speaker 1: so it's pretty darn full indoor arena. But that's apparently,

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Speaker 1: you know, as per the New York and CDC guidelines.

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Speaker 1: That's okay, yeah, I mean it's so it's it's all

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Speaker 1: about what your personal comfort is once you've been vaccinated.

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Speaker 1: I think, you know, we do want to keep as

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Speaker 1: much of the distancing, as much of them asking as

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Speaker 1: they can, just because it protects people who either can't

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Speaker 1: be vaccinated or have chosen not to. And so you know,

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Speaker 1: it is a little bit of that, you know, doing

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Speaker 1: something for someone else piece. But I also think that, um,

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Speaker 1: if you're comfortable and you've been vaccinated, and you've you know,

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Speaker 1: gone your full vaccine schedule, so either one or both

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Speaker 1: doses depending on what you got, and waiting that two

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Speaker 1: week carry it after UM, and you do feel comfortable

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Speaker 1: and you don't feel like, you know, there's maybe another

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Speaker 1: family member in your household or someone that you spend

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Speaker 1: a lot of close time with it is at risk,

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Speaker 1: then I think it's a different it's a different calculus, right,

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Speaker 1: And if you feel comfortable, maybe keep that mask on

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Speaker 1: you in case you find you find yourself in a

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Speaker 1: situation where you'd feel more comfortable having it on, or

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Speaker 1: where you're entering into somewhere where it does feel like

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Speaker 1: masking is more appropriate or even required, because I think

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Speaker 1: one of the outcomes of this new guidances that we're having,

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Speaker 1: you know, patchwork masking with quests, and so you want

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Speaker 1: to have it ready if you need it. But if

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Speaker 1: you feel comfortable and you you feel like you're not

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Speaker 1: gonna put anyone else vulnerable at risk, and I think

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Speaker 1: that that's a different question. I think we're gonna be

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Speaker 1: wearing masks in like five years. You know, I've been

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Speaker 1: thinking a lot about that. Actually, It's it's hard to

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Speaker 1: assess because I do feel like as a country, we've

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Speaker 1: been pretty resistant to masking. Um. I have to say,

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Speaker 1: the drop in some of the other restiratory infections is appealing. Um.

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Speaker 1: You know, some countries have have had a long masking

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Speaker 1: culture and and they you know, it just feels like

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Speaker 1: part of daily life. I think we'll have to see

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Speaker 1: what happens with vaccine coverage and how ventilations laughed. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and if we can make some really good changes to

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Speaker 1: our buildings, take this opportunity to do that. I think.

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Speaker 1: I think that there's a potential that we will see

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Speaker 1: at least sporadic mask wearing for a long time to come.

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Speaker 1: I think it'll be really interesting, Lauren, to see if

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Speaker 1: we really do make ventilation changes building changes. Um. And

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Speaker 1: that is, like you said, that would be great for

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Speaker 1: us on on a whole um number of different disease issues. Uh.

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Speaker 1: I actually like wearing a mask occasionally, but I've recently

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Speaker 1: found that maskne is real that that happens, and it's

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Speaker 1: difficult to get rid of. So I guess you gotta

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Speaker 1: wash your face. I guess a little bit more. Lawrence

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Speaker 1: Hour from the Johns Hopkins School Medicine, thank you very

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Speaker 1: much as usual for joining US. Now. I have been

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Speaker 1: pretty pumped. Talked to Bill Studebaker. He joins US today,

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Speaker 1: President and chief investment officer at robo Globo. Uh, robo

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Speaker 1: globe bull. Sorry, I'm sure people probably make that mistake

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Speaker 1: a lot. Robo globe bull. Um. He is going to

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Speaker 1: talk to us about AI five g autonomous vehicles, robotics,

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Speaker 1: and semi conductors, which is obviously what makes it so cool.

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Speaker 1: But um, Bill, you've got a bunch of E t

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Speaker 1: F s that you have created their UM. The robo

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Speaker 1: et F is the most famous, but you also track

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Speaker 1: AI with TH H and Q and health tech with

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Speaker 1: H T E c UM. I noticed they all seem

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Speaker 1: to be doing equally well this year. If I look

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Speaker 1: back over the past twelve months, each one is gaining

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Speaker 1: UM more than fifty Why do they track each other

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Speaker 1: so closely? Well? I think, uh, good morning, and thanks

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Speaker 1: for having me. I think what you're seeing right now

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Speaker 1: is that you know, these are technologies, particularly with robotics

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Speaker 1: and AI, that are being applied to all industries, in

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Speaker 1: all markets. And these were years ago, you know, viewed

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Speaker 1: as niche applications, where you know, fast forward eight years later,

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Speaker 1: we couldn't be more convicted and how these technologies are

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Speaker 1: changing the way we live and work and in healthcare,

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Speaker 1: the exciting thing now is that we're in the process

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Speaker 1: of beginning to cure chronic disease. I mean, healthcare as

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Speaker 1: we've had it has been really sick care. Someone gets

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Speaker 1: sick and you basically go and you know, try to

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Speaker 1: take a remedy to to uh, you know, prevent it

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Speaker 1: from spreading, not always just curing it. Um. But now

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Speaker 1: we're moving into a completely new, uh digital realm. I mean,

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Speaker 1: healthcare is less than one percent digitized, and people going forward,

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Speaker 1: I'm not going to live until their seven year eighty

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Speaker 1: try one twenty plus because we've left the ability not

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Speaker 1: just to arrest the signs of aging, but in some

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Speaker 1: cases reverse it. So build I'd love to get a

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Speaker 1: sense of you know, one of the key issues throughout

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Speaker 1: anology right now is the real basic building block of

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Speaker 1: technology semi conductors. Can you explain to me and to

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Speaker 1: our listeners how it got to a point where there's

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Speaker 1: this acute shortage of chips out there and how long's

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Speaker 1: it going to take to wind its way through? Well,

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Speaker 1: that's a that's a good question. I think it's pretty

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Speaker 1: similar to most you know, signal industries. They're capital intensive

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Speaker 1: companies are always reluctant to add too much capacity once

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Speaker 1: they have to manage your business, you know, for shareholders, etcetera. Uh,

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Speaker 1: And the industry right now that we're seeing it's going

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Speaker 1: through really unprecedented times with the supply environment and you

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Speaker 1: know meanful inleventory plenishment is not going to happen until

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Speaker 1: very likely the first half of twenty two. UM. And

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Speaker 1: I think what you're seeing now is the need for

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Speaker 1: semiconductors is really exploding as we're having advancements in five

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Speaker 1: G and edge computing and basically all of our assets

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Speaker 1: that are around us UM have seven connectors that are

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Speaker 1: assumed to be, if not now beginning to aggregate data

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Speaker 1: and communicate with US. So, UM, the whole world is

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Speaker 1: becoming tecrified and digital and digitized. What what how did

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Speaker 1: this work out? Because I know you used to be

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Speaker 1: a portfolio manager, right, So, UM, what made you decide

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Speaker 1: to start creating these e t F s at Robo Global?

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Speaker 1: And you know, I'm always fascinated by it because I

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Speaker 1: think this is the way that UM, younger generations are

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Speaker 1: are really investing and going to invest, especially over you know,

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Speaker 1: the mobile phone technology, etcetera. Well, I guess I was

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Speaker 1: fortunate to set my career kind of looking at technologies

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Speaker 1: and industrial companies and was pretty focused on the concept

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Speaker 1: of automation. As I was kind of looking around, you know,

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Speaker 1: UM began to think to myself and my and my

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Speaker 1: partners were you know, we're gonna be increasingly automating everything

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Speaker 1: and we've kind of started up robot We looked around

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Speaker 1: and you know, how can we want to invest in

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Speaker 1: the theme of automation. That weren't any dedicated hedge funds

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Speaker 1: doing anything in automation. UM. You know, how about venture capital,

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Speaker 1: private equity? Very little obviously nothing going on in UH

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Speaker 1: in the mutual fund long only world. So we we

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Speaker 1: knew that there were dedicated pure flight companies you know,

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Speaker 1: likened to sturgical you know, like for Nook, etcetera. But

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Speaker 1: if you would in the classic Wall Street gigs and

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Speaker 1: pulp the word robotics, you know what companies would populate that? Nothing?

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Speaker 1: How about if you pulled up AI that was just

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Speaker 1: kind of an Elon must science fiction term. So we

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Speaker 1: actually were the first company ever to have gone out

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Speaker 1: and created essentially UMU, the SMP, the nasdack UM, which

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Speaker 1: is the robo Global Index to track robotics and AI.

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Speaker 1: And we've done that for healthcare in avay shouldn't um

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Speaker 1: and we've also done this for AI. So that's kind

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Speaker 1: of unique, uh in terms of what we've done. Hey,

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Speaker 1: Bill thirty seconds, what what's the sector that's really getting

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Speaker 1: your attention right now. Well, it's really hard to isolate

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Speaker 1: to just want I mean, I think one thing it

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Speaker 1: stands out. I think a lot of your listeners would

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Speaker 1: understand his e commerce. I mean e commerce because the

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Speaker 1: pandemic before, um, what's sort of a luxury, Well, it's

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Speaker 1: been turbo charged where it's a necessity. E commerce screw

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Speaker 1: for five last year. When you look around into North

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Speaker 1: America warehouses, I would say less than five percent of

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Speaker 1: warehouses are heavily automated. So we're beginning um to see

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Speaker 1: even increasingly more technology that's being put into speed up

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Speaker 1: fulfillment and supply chain. And this is going to go

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Speaker 1: on for years of not decades. Yeah, absolutely fascinating, And

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Speaker 1: I think you're you're definitely right there because everybody has

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Speaker 1: to match Amazon, right have always, They've all got to

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Speaker 1: get it to you in twenty four hours or less.

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Speaker 1: Bill Studebaker, their president, chief investment officer at Robo Global,

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Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg. Yeah, I'm really digging these big takes, Matt.

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Speaker 1: I mean, these are some pretty juicy stories in Bloomberg News.

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Speaker 1: You know, it goes really deep and today is no difference.

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Speaker 1: Tom or like. He's the chief economist for Bloomberg Economics.

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Speaker 1: He joins us Uh And what I like about Tom

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Speaker 1: is he spent over a decade in China, in Beijing,

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Speaker 1: working and living there, so he's got a great global view.

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Speaker 1: And the story that they did today, it's got a

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Speaker 1: really cool headline world dominating superstar firms get bigger, techier,

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Speaker 1: and more Chinese. Tom, tell us what you guys and

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Speaker 1: your team UH looked at here when you looked at

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Speaker 1: some of the really big global companies. Thanks Paul, great

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Speaker 1: to be on the show. Um. So, what we've done

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Speaker 1: if we've taken a grand historical sweep um and kind

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Speaker 1: of look at the evolution of the biggest distis in

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Speaker 1: the world over the last thirty years. We pulled data

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Speaker 1: from the Bloomberg terminal on their market cap, their profit margins,

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Speaker 1: their tax rates, how much cash they've got, where they're from,

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Speaker 1: and what they do and use that to tell a

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Speaker 1: story about what the biggest firms in the world looked

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Speaker 1: like back in and what they look like today. And

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Speaker 1: as you said, the sort of the type of captures

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Speaker 1: some of the big themes we're looking at and move

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Speaker 1: east more Chinese firms at the top of the global rankings.

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Speaker 1: We're looking at a shift from big oil to big tech,

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Speaker 1: and we're also looking at big firms which really just

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Speaker 1: operate in a different way to how they did thirty

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Speaker 1: years ago, doing less capital spending, been employing less workers,

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Speaker 1: and that has some important implications for the way the

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Speaker 1: economy works. You know, so I used to be a

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Speaker 1: big dead Kennedy's fan. Um, I guess I still am

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Speaker 1: a big dead Kennedy's But I used to listen to

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Speaker 1: um Jello Biafrau talk about his social justice concerns and

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Speaker 1: this was one of them. You know that the world

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Speaker 1: was going to be increasingly controlled by a smaller number

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Speaker 1: of consolidating companies. And to me, this story boils down

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Speaker 1: to three um important data points. Number One, the top

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Speaker 1: fifty companies in the world are now worth twenty eight

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Speaker 1: percent of global GDP. Thirty years ago, they were less

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Speaker 1: than five percent of global global GDP. Number two, UM,

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Speaker 1: they're not spending as much money creating jobs. Thirty years ago,

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Speaker 1: they were spending nine percent of revenue on capex. Now

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Speaker 1: it's three percent of revenue on capex. And number three,

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Speaker 1: they're not paying um as much in taxes not nearly

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Speaker 1: as much as tax in taxes as they used to.

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Speaker 1: I think thirty years ago it was like thirty five percent,

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Speaker 1: now at seventent. So I just think, Um, the interesting

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Speaker 1: question raised by this article, which I obviously loved Tom

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Speaker 1: by the way, is, um, what our government it's going

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Speaker 1: to do about it? I mean, are you gonna try

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Speaker 1: and raise taxes in a global way, which we can

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Speaker 1: see is difficult and maybe not even fair. It kind

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Speaker 1: of destroys the idea of competition. Are you going to

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Speaker 1: try and break up these companies because they're too big?

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Speaker 1: Are they you know, have they become oligopolies in some way?

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Speaker 1: I mean, what what? What? What do you think the

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Speaker 1: governments are going to try and do about it? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I think that's a that's a great question. Um. And

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Speaker 1: if you think about sort of the grand sweep of

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Speaker 1: economic history for the last fifty years or so, there

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Speaker 1: was this moment at the beginning of the the Reagan

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Speaker 1: Revolution in the US, the Thatcher Revolution um in the UK,

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Speaker 1: which really tilted the playing field in favor of corporations

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Speaker 1: and against workers, right, And that was the kind of

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Speaker 1: the beginning of this this trend towards bigger and bigger firms,

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Speaker 1: paying smaller and smaller amounts in taxes and keeping more

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Speaker 1: and more profits. It's for their owners. Um. So the

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Speaker 1: question is has the pendulum swung too far? How are

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Speaker 1: we now at a moment when policy is going to

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Speaker 1: start shifting back in favor of in favor of workers,

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Speaker 1: in favor of greater competition. And there are some signs

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Speaker 1: that that's happening. Right. We've got the Biden administration talking

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Speaker 1: about a global minimum tax. Um. We've got different bits

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Speaker 1: of the US government taking aim at some of the

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Speaker 1: big tech platform companies saying you're operating in an unfair way. Um.

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Speaker 1: And globally, we've got China taking a swing at some

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Speaker 1: of its big tech champions, companies like Ali, Baba, ten

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Speaker 1: Cent and ma uanum So. I mean, who knows. The

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Speaker 1: corporate lobby is obviously incredibly powerful. And these films are

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Speaker 1: also big because they're providing things which add value. Right,

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Speaker 1: I like my iPhone, I like being able to order

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Speaker 1: things on Amazon. But there are some indications beginning of

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Speaker 1: a pushback. So true, we want our stuff. We still

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Speaker 1: want our stuff, right, Yeah, we want our stuff. I mean,

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Speaker 1: who could imagine living through the pandemic without the benefits

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Speaker 1: of ordering on Amazon here or Ali Baba in China,

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Speaker 1: who could do their job without searching for information using Google.

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Speaker 1: I mean, right, there's a reason Google has become a

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Speaker 1: verb is because it's an incredibly valuable service. Um. So,

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Speaker 1: even as we think about some of the costs of

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Speaker 1: these superstar firms, we also need to remember that they're

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Speaker 1: superstars for a reason, right, They are providing goods and

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Speaker 1: services that people really value. So, Tom, I think you know,

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Speaker 1: right now we have the Biden administration proposing a kind

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Speaker 1: of minimum tax and maybe taxing foreign profits and things

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Speaker 1: like that. Is taxation one of the areas that can

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Speaker 1: maybe be addressed most quickly or in the nearest term. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: So there was this there was this striking presentation by

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Speaker 1: this academic at Davos a couple of years ago. UM

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Speaker 1: Davos of course the sort of the main gathering point

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Speaker 1: for the world corporate elite, and this academic came in

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Speaker 1: and said, you know what, if we're going to talk

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Speaker 1: about inequality, we need to talk about tax. If we

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Speaker 1: try and have a discussion about inequality without talking about

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Speaker 1: tax it's like we're having a discussion about putting out

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Speaker 1: a fire. Without talking about water. UM. The tax really

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Speaker 1: has to be at the heart of this. UM. Taxes

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Speaker 1: on corporations. UM. That's a challenge for any country in

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Speaker 1: the world. UM. And of course, as the Biden administration

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Speaker 1: is now discovering, if you try and do something globally,

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Speaker 1: if you try and say, you know what, we need

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Speaker 1: a global minimum to prevent companies shifting profits around to

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Speaker 1: dodge paying taxes in the place where they're actually doing business, well,

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Speaker 1: that's an even harder discussion. Yeah. Absolutely, especially when you

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Speaker 1: have you know, a country like Ireland who only charges

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Speaker 1: twelve percent UM and they're happy with it like that. Um,

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Speaker 1: they want they want Apple and Google they're paying their

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Speaker 1: twelve You gotta guess they make a lot of money

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Speaker 1: with that as well. But it's a longer conversation. Tom,

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Speaker 1: thanks so much for joining us. Tom or like there

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Speaker 1: with his look at our big take, This is Bloomberg.

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Speaker 1: I want to get over right now to Kyle Stock

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Speaker 1: and just quickly wrap up something that's been obsessing me

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Speaker 1: of late, and that is the Ford F one Lightning.

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Speaker 1: We first saw the electric pickup truck, I think almost

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Speaker 1: by accident when Joe Biden was hanging out at the

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Speaker 1: rouge on Wednesday, and I was underwhelmed. But the more

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Speaker 1: I look at it, the more stoked I'm getting for

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Speaker 1: this electric truck. And it's got huge ramifications for um,

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Speaker 1: you know, the entire industry. So Kyle, what do you

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Speaker 1: think about it? Yeah, big vehicle for them and everyone.

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Speaker 1: For me, it comes down to two things, whichever else

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Speaker 1: is talking about. Two is the price, which is shockingly low.

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Speaker 1: Starts at forty grand or less. Yeah, and who knows

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Speaker 1: how bare bones that one's going to be. But in

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Speaker 1: terms of to get in like that's cheaper than the

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Speaker 1: new electric Mustang that's you know, after incentives, it's comparable

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Speaker 1: with the regular of one. So everyone was surprised about

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Speaker 1: that count me as well. And then um, the front,

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Speaker 1: the huge it's joking trunk up front, which is just

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Speaker 1: brilliant because normally would have to hold a six point

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Speaker 1: two later v eight and now it's got nothing in

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Speaker 1: there and coolant and spark plugs and all the other

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Speaker 1: things that they don't need to worry about now. So

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Speaker 1: what I love is that, um, if my power fails

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Speaker 1: in some sort of armageddon um or you know, zombie situation,

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Speaker 1: this truck can power my house Paul or yours or

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Speaker 1: if we live together our house for three days, that's awesome. Yeah, Kyle,

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Speaker 1: is this I mean, I mean for the US market,

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Speaker 1: it seems to me this U S market doesn't go

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Speaker 1: electric until the four electric. I mean that's kind of

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Speaker 1: how I feel about it. This is it could be

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Speaker 1: a big, big moment. Well that's what's crazy about this.

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Speaker 1: I mean everyone's talking about how it, you know, competes

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Speaker 1: against other trucks, but honestly, like this thing is going

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Speaker 1: to compete against the Honda Accord, it's going to compete

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Speaker 1: against everything because there's really you know, there's no guilt anymore.

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Speaker 1: Um And I think most people have like a a

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Speaker 1: little bit of a secret truck fetish. So my mom

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Speaker 1: wants one badly, and as we know, she's right about

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Speaker 1: almost everything. I will say, we uh, my wife also

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Speaker 1: wants a truck. And it's like a different truck every

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Speaker 1: couple of days because Kyle does these Instagram reviews of

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Speaker 1: whatever cool vehicle he's driving, and she follows him and

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Speaker 1: then she'll he'll do like a review of the Defender,

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Speaker 1: and then she'll send me his review and be like,

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Speaker 1: we have to get the Defend or look what Kyle

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Speaker 1: did on The Defender, so I recommend you follow Kyle

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Speaker 1: Stock on Instagram to check out his work. You can

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Speaker 1: also get his stories on the Bloomberg terminal. This is Bloomberg.

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Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to the Bloomberg Markets podcast. You can

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Speaker 1: subscribe and listen to interviews of Apple Podcasts or whatever

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Speaker 1: podcast platform you prefer. I'm Matt Miller. I'm on Twitter

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Speaker 1: at Matt Miller three. On Fall Sweeney, I'm on Twitter

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Speaker 1: at pt Sweeney Before the podcast, you can always catch

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Speaker 1: us worldwide