Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bloomberg Penel podcast. I'm Paul Sweene. You,
Speaker 1: along with my co host Lisa Brahma wits each day
Speaker 1: we bring you the most noteworthy and useful interviews for
Speaker 1: you and your money, whether at the grocery store or
Speaker 1: the trading floor. Find a Bloomberg Penl podcast on Apple
Speaker 1: podcast or wherever you listen to podcasts, as well as
Speaker 1: at Bloomberg dot com. Well, we just heard President Trump
Speaker 1: give his prepared remarks to the United Nations. UM to
Speaker 1: get the latest on kind of some feedback on kind
Speaker 1: of what we heard from President Trump's comments, we welcome
Speaker 1: Silia moson u S, Treasury reporter for Bloomberg News, joins
Speaker 1: us on the phone from Washington, d C. Selia, thanks
Speaker 1: so much for joining us. What were your initial thoughts
Speaker 1: of President Trump's speech before the United Nations. Well, he
Speaker 1: talked a lot about giving a anti globalist message there.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's what we heard. We talked. We heard
Speaker 1: about America's unrivaled military might. We heard him talk about
Speaker 1: not accepting a bad deal with China, that globalism has
Speaker 1: caused past leaders to ignore their national interests, and that
Speaker 1: every country has a right to defend their borders and
Speaker 1: that anyone who reaches the US will be turned away.
Speaker 1: So it was a little bit of a divisive message
Speaker 1: to a group of leaders who are trying to work multilaterally.
Speaker 1: I think that it would be important to talk about
Speaker 1: the delivery a little bit, because you're saying that there
Speaker 1: was a divisive message needed to talk about abortion, and
Speaker 1: he talked about a lot of things. Um, But I'm
Speaker 1: just wondering what you thought about his delivery. I mean, look,
Speaker 1: it went on for longer than it was supposed to
Speaker 1: as a lot of u N speeches do. Um. It
Speaker 1: was a little bit stilted. He was reading from a teleprompter,
Speaker 1: and the beginning it was very spirited, talking about China
Speaker 1: and talking about you know, sort of globalism and what
Speaker 1: it's done. But it did sort of towards the end, Um,
Speaker 1: whether he got tired. You know, this is not his
Speaker 1: uh where he naturally tends to um, you know, really
Speaker 1: grab people's attention, and these prepared teleprompter speeches. He's a
Speaker 1: little bit more passionate when he's speaking off the cuff
Speaker 1: and slea just also, he kind of spent a fair
Speaker 1: amount of time on our run kind of making maintaining
Speaker 1: a very strong postures relates to US Iranian relations. It
Speaker 1: was a strong posture, but the threat of war was
Speaker 1: absent from his remarks. He said he wants peace. He
Speaker 1: does not want war with anybody. So to me, it
Speaker 1: did signal that the door to peace is still open.
Speaker 1: He said, the fresh sanctions will not be easy unless
Speaker 1: they change behavior. Rather than saying, you know, we're gonna um,
Speaker 1: you know, lead more into this. Salahmos and thank you
Speaker 1: so much for being with us. Slams is Bloomberg News
Speaker 1: US Treasury reporter joining us from Washington, d C. On
Speaker 1: the phone following the U N addressed, it is a
Speaker 1: climate week. We've seen the protests in New York City
Speaker 1: and world wide cities as people ramp up the pressure
Speaker 1: to fight some of the effects of some of the
Speaker 1: changes that we've been observing. Here in the studio is
Speaker 1: Joey berg Sti, his chief executive officer of Seventh Generation,
Speaker 1: normally headquartered in Burlington, Vermont, but here with us in
Speaker 1: our Bloomberg Interactive Broker Studios in part for these climate
Speaker 1: talks that have been going on. So can you give
Speaker 1: us a sense of what you've been doing this week? Yeah, sure.
Speaker 1: Uh well, first of all, thanks for having me on.
Speaker 1: We kicked off Climate Week probably about a month ago
Speaker 1: when we decided that we really needed to help lift
Speaker 1: up the voices that are are all around the need
Speaker 1: to take urgent and immediate action UM, and decided that
Speaker 1: we would not only close down our offices for the
Speaker 1: climate strike that was on last Friday, the Global Climate Strike,
Speaker 1: and participate in that, but actually donate a whole week
Speaker 1: of our national television advertising time to three FT org
Speaker 1: so that they could really amplify the voices of the
Speaker 1: youth movement, which is absolutely unbelievable the amount of momentum
Speaker 1: they've been able to create around that. So we want
Speaker 1: to amplify the voice around the need to change UM.
Speaker 1: I spent the day yesterday uh at with the U
Speaker 1: N Global Compact. We were honored along with eighty six
Speaker 1: other companies that have so far taken a or made
Speaker 1: a real commitment to take the actions needed to address
Speaker 1: the need to limit climate change to one point five
Speaker 1: percent by and we were so proud to be part
Speaker 1: of that group. UM. But even more importantly, I was
Speaker 1: so impressed with the fact that these companies together represent
Speaker 1: two point three trillion dollars worth of sales. So this
Speaker 1: is not a group of small companies that are raising
Speaker 1: their voices like you might expect. There's a real tipping point,
Speaker 1: and we really want to to continue to help and
Speaker 1: see this movement tip and become real and see the
Speaker 1: same consensus amongst business and amongst policy leaders that we're
Speaker 1: seeing in the world amongst climate scientists for the need
Speaker 1: to to to really address climate change. So it's seventh generation.
Speaker 1: Just give us a sense of kind of the products
Speaker 1: you have and kind of how consumers actually interact with them. Sure,
Speaker 1: so we make a whole range of eco friendly home
Speaker 1: and personal care products. I always say that we do
Speaker 1: much more than just make these products. We're really trying
Speaker 1: to change the way the business is done. So as
Speaker 1: a Proud B corporation, we're committed to the triple bottom
Speaker 1: line of people, planets and profits UM. And we take
Speaker 1: our our philosophy that inspired our name from the great
Speaker 1: law of the Iroquois that in our every deliberation we
Speaker 1: must take into account the impact of our decisions on
Speaker 1: the next seven generations UM into the way that we
Speaker 1: create our products. And so we create products that are
Speaker 1: made from plant based ingredients, and not patrolling based ingredients.
Speaker 1: We ensure that all of our packaging is recite cool,
Speaker 1: not just recyclable, but actually made from recycled content. UM.
Speaker 1: So we think really deeply about every single thing that
Speaker 1: we make. And you know, this company was founded over
Speaker 1: thirty years ago around these principles and have been proudly
Speaker 1: trying to address the needs of the world we find
Speaker 1: ourselves in today. UM. And so everything we designed is
Speaker 1: really designed thinking about the world that's around us and
Speaker 1: how we can lower the our impact on the world
Speaker 1: around us. And have you seen sales increase at a
Speaker 1: rapid pace? Yeah, the business is doing incredibly well, so
Speaker 1: the market's responding. We've been growing really well. We're UM
Speaker 1: in the midst right now of a global expansion, which
Speaker 1: is incredibly exciting. Have you seen a lot of competitors
Speaker 1: try to come in with a similar message that could
Speaker 1: potentially be both a threat to your brand, but I'll
Speaker 1: be it perhaps encouraging on the other side of things. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I would say gratefully. We're seeing a lot of competition
Speaker 1: in the markets that we compete in, which is which
Speaker 1: is really exciting. UM. We were alone for a long time.
Speaker 1: More and more brands are coming in. They are more
Speaker 1: and more the largest players in the markets are introducing
Speaker 1: more eco friendly versions of the major brands, and for sure,
Speaker 1: that creates more competition, but it also pushes us to
Speaker 1: continue to innovate and to identify how can we continue
Speaker 1: to lead forward and drive our sustainability mission more and
Speaker 1: more aggressively over time. How tough is it for you
Speaker 1: guys to get shelf space? UM? Are are the supermarkets
Speaker 1: and other retailers. Are they open to your product that
Speaker 1: they recognize that it's a growth area? Or you, just
Speaker 1: like everybody else, you've gotta fight to the nail for
Speaker 1: self space. Like everybody else, we fight, we fight for
Speaker 1: the space, but we do it through real partnership, and
Speaker 1: we've built great partnerships with a number of the different
Speaker 1: retailers around the country UH and really helping them to
Speaker 1: develop the quote unquote natural business on their store shelves.
Speaker 1: They recognize increasing demand and actually, if you look at
Speaker 1: the categories we compete in, the vast majority of the
Speaker 1: growth in those categories is coming from brands like seventh Generation.
Speaker 1: What's the next innovation in UH? In your business? The
Speaker 1: one I'm the most excited about right now is we
Speaker 1: we just launched a ultra concentrated laundry detergent UM. We
Speaker 1: call it the Easy Dose Laundry because it's super convenient.
Speaker 1: The same number of doses, sixty six doses, but in
Speaker 1: a twenty three ounce bottle instead of a big hundred
Speaker 1: ounce bottle. So it is h lighter, less plastic, f
Speaker 1: less water, so you're not shipping as much UM as
Speaker 1: much around the around the continent UM and for consumers
Speaker 1: that has this automatic dosing future that makes it super
Speaker 1: easy to do your laundry. Jerry Burstein, thanks so much
Speaker 1: for joining us. Jerry Burstein is CEO of Seventh Generation
Speaker 1: based in Burlington, VERMP, joining us here on our Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Interact their broker studio talking to us about environmentally safe
Speaker 1: products and sustainability. Well. In an unprecedented and sweeping rebuke
Speaker 1: to the Premier at the Supreme Court's eleven judges found
Speaker 1: that bars Johnson had given Queen Elizabeth the second called
Speaker 1: unlawful advice to suspend the legislator. To get the latest
Speaker 1: on this every evolving story returned to Edward Evans, European
Speaker 1: calumnist for Bloomberg News. He is in our London studio,
Speaker 1: So Edward, just give our American audience at least a
Speaker 1: sense of how important and how unprecedented, Uh, this move
Speaker 1: is by the Supreme Court of the UK. Well, you
Speaker 1: have to understand the Supreme Court in the UK is
Speaker 1: very different from the Supreme Court in the US. The
Speaker 1: judges here are far more reluctant to get involved in
Speaker 1: overtly political questions and have much more limited powers in
Speaker 1: what they can do. So ready to come out today
Speaker 1: as they have done and say that Johnson's prorogation of
Speaker 1: Parliament was illegal and that it cannot stand is truly unprecedented.
Speaker 1: This is uh, effectively a legal hand grenade thrown very
Speaker 1: directly at Boris Johnson. And he has come out fighting.
Speaker 1: He's vowed to go on and force the UK out
Speaker 1: of the European Union with or without a deal next month.
Speaker 1: And there are note and he has resisted calls so
Speaker 1: far to resign. So the idea of him resigning, the
Speaker 1: argument that Boris Johnson cannot remain as Prime Minister after
Speaker 1: this ruling. Can you explain the logic there? But two things.
Speaker 1: It is unprecedented for a prime minister's advice to the
Speaker 1: Queen to be ruled illegal, effectively misleading the monarch in
Speaker 1: the British system is about as bad as it gets
Speaker 1: for a prime minister, but more practically, without the right
Speaker 1: paroe Parliament, he really has no control over the legislature.
Speaker 1: He doesn't command a majority, he doesn't command control over
Speaker 1: the parliamentary timetable, and he can't now even stop Parliament
Speaker 1: from the city. This is a government in office but
Speaker 1: not in power. Now that his escape route would normally
Speaker 1: be to call an election, but since the fixed turn
Speaker 1: Parliament's Act of eleven, he can't do that without the
Speaker 1: support of at least two thirds of MPs, and so
Speaker 1: far they've said no. So Edward, it appears that Boris
Speaker 1: Janson is going to fly back to London from New
Speaker 1: York this evening, perhaps cutting his trip a little bit,
Speaker 1: sure to deal with this issue when he gets to
Speaker 1: Parliament and tomorrow what happens. Parliament will resume sitting tomorrow morning.
Speaker 1: There won't be Prime Minister's question time as there usually
Speaker 1: is on a Wednesday, but he can expect to face
Speaker 1: urgent questions for lawmakers from lawmakers now over what he
Speaker 1: does for over Brexit. You may also see lawmakers trying
Speaker 1: to put down their own measures to stop a no
Speaker 1: deal brexit. Now, Boris Johnson has of course got a
Speaker 1: site problem in that lawmakers have stopped him essentially legally
Speaker 1: from leaving the European Union on October thirty one without
Speaker 1: a deal. If that's the situation, he'll be forced to
Speaker 1: seek an extension. They're great fear was that by using
Speaker 1: prorogation Boris Johnson would try and stop them from from
Speaker 1: from stopping him essentially from lead to in just that
Speaker 1: leaving without a deal. Now that Parliament is back, you
Speaker 1: can expect them to take a very close interest in
Speaker 1: what he's doing and take every legal trick in the
Speaker 1: book to box him into a corner. Here, what kind
Speaker 1: of support does Boris Johnson have within his own party?
Speaker 1: That's a very good question. And don't forget this is
Speaker 1: a man who lost twenty one MPs after they voted
Speaker 1: against him. He does not. He's forty short of odd
Speaker 1: members short of a majority. This is somebody who is
Speaker 1: commanding a minority government. That said, what you've seen under
Speaker 1: Boris Johnson is the Tory Party turn itself essentially into
Speaker 1: a Brexit party, and with those supporters this appears to
Speaker 1: be popular don't forget that. The whole narrative that he's
Speaker 1: trying to set up is the is the establishment denying you,
Speaker 1: the people, the democratic choice that you made in the referendum.
Speaker 1: So you have this essentially Parliament versus people election. And
Speaker 1: the point here is that this if you look at
Speaker 1: where Boris Johnson is in the polls right now, he's ahead,
Speaker 1: He's you know, corp Ammy Corbyn is trailing him in
Speaker 1: the Posty's about i think three points below former Labor
Speaker 1: leader Michael Foote in which was Labor's worst defeat I
Speaker 1: think in the twentieth century. So that is that is
Speaker 1: the political situation for Boris Edward. It's a you know,
Speaker 1: seems like bars Johnson has lost almost at every single
Speaker 1: turn here, whether it's ruling from the courts or just
Speaker 1: rebukes from Parliament, hasn't really had any material wins. Is
Speaker 1: there a way for him out of this? An election
Speaker 1: is the way out for him in the longer term. Ultimately,
Speaker 1: with this, nothing changes until the parliamentary arithmetic changes, because
Speaker 1: it's Boris Johnson hasn't got control of the situation, but
Speaker 1: he knows what he wants. Parliament has got control of
Speaker 1: the situation. But doesn't know what it wants. It's opposed
Speaker 1: to leaving without a deal, but beyond that there's no agreement.
Speaker 1: So to get out of to asstially resolve this situation,
Speaker 1: Johnson needs to get to an election or he needs
Speaker 1: to get a deal, a deal agreed with other EU leaders.
Speaker 1: Now they've got no incentive to give him any kind
Speaker 1: of concessions given that they can see Parliament is dead
Speaker 1: opposed to Britain leaving without a deal. So it's again
Speaker 1: it all comes down now, I think to an election,
Speaker 1: extension of the negotiations and then an election, and the
Speaker 1: pound is up, which just you know shows that where
Speaker 1: where we're at this point. Edward Evans, thank you so
Speaker 1: much for being with us Edward Evans as European columnists
Speaker 1: and Brexit editor for Bloomberg News, joining us from our
Speaker 1: London studios, and it really is just you know, the
Speaker 1: message deepens and again it seems like perhaps the read
Speaker 1: through in markets is that this could move closer to
Speaker 1: avoiding a no deal Brexit, because Boris Johnson seemed dead
Speaker 1: set on that, right. I mean, that's sort of the
Speaker 1: I'm still holding out to the second referendum. I'm sticking
Speaker 1: to my my guns there, but I don't think so
Speaker 1: you keep you keep doing that mean well. An increasing
Speaker 1: focus on the part of both regulators as well as
Speaker 1: investment managers has been a shift from public to private markets,
Speaker 1: where you have more companies waiting longer or perhaps never
Speaker 1: going public, and private markets are growing at a much
Speaker 1: faster pace. The question being, and this is something SEC
Speaker 1: chair Jake Clayton has been looking into, how do you
Speaker 1: open up private markets to mom and pop investors and
Speaker 1: others who want to get a slice of American dynamism
Speaker 1: at its ground floor? Joining us now, Kenwian uh ken Win,
Speaker 1: chief executive officer and co founder of Republic in our
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Interactive Broker Studios here, Ken thank you so much
Speaker 1: for being with us. Can you just give us a
Speaker 1: sense of how Republic fits into that sort of narrative
Speaker 1: A Lisa, thank you for having me. Republic is a
Speaker 1: full stack investment platform focusing on private booty stage companies
Speaker 1: that are changing how we live and work in the future.
Speaker 1: So it used to be uh not lawful for a
Speaker 1: non millionaire to invest privately. The law changed about three
Speaker 1: years ago and we based on that changed launch Republic.
Speaker 1: So just gives a sense of kind of how your
Speaker 1: company has evolved, how many people use your platform, like
Speaker 1: how many investors are coming to saying hey, we're interested
Speaker 1: in the private market, and and and how do you
Speaker 1: source your deal flow? And just kind of how it
Speaker 1: all plays out there. On the investors side, we've grown
Speaker 1: to be about three and fifty thousand investors on the platform,
Speaker 1: and out of about ten thousand applications from company looking
Speaker 1: to raise, we've vetted and may offer us to about
Speaker 1: two hundred to launch and so far have successfully raised
Speaker 1: for about a hundred and forty of them. And they
Speaker 1: ranged from very early stage companies to women founders building
Speaker 1: the next drone down to company that have already raised
Speaker 1: venture capital but want to engage the consumer. They stakeholders,
Speaker 1: you know, the next uber and lift. The earliest investors
Speaker 1: got to be the drivers that supported the company, and
Speaker 1: currently that's not the case. So I hope that that
Speaker 1: would change. How do you decide what is likely to
Speaker 1: be a successful company. We do have deep heritage to
Speaker 1: the venture space. We came out of angel Lists, one
Speaker 1: of the premier private fundraising platform, so we do apply
Speaker 1: eventual lens looking at domain expertise, looking at whether or
Speaker 1: not the founding team has the maturity, the awareness around
Speaker 1: corporate governance and the resilience to build to be able
Speaker 1: that space to win what they aiming to do, and
Speaker 1: how related how relatable it is to the mainstream audience.
Speaker 1: So what are some of the sectors or types of
Speaker 1: companies that you've been funding recently When it comes to
Speaker 1: the crowd mainstream audience investing, I think it's both marketing
Speaker 1: and fundraising, so naturally it's more appealing to B to
Speaker 1: C companies that consumer folk is. But we have had
Speaker 1: success raising over a million dollars for very early stage
Speaker 1: bt B companies as well. One concern, I mean, there
Speaker 1: are a number of concerns, and opening up private markets
Speaker 1: are certainly the venture capital stage to mom and pop investors.
Speaker 1: But one is liquidity, the idea that you can invest
Speaker 1: in something, but you can't take your money out. You
Speaker 1: gotta wait and pray that your investment is going to
Speaker 1: pay off. So you know, how do you sort of
Speaker 1: address that issue? For sure? The fact that private investing
Speaker 1: is illiquid and highly risky is something that you've got
Speaker 1: to make sure that the investing public is aware of.
Speaker 1: But I view it Slay an asset class, meaning if
Speaker 1: you're gonna put away some money that you don't need
Speaker 1: right away but may need it in twenty years or
Speaker 1: for your children. Private investing maybe a part you should
Speaker 1: consider well. But if you're investing, let's say in an
Speaker 1: equity is basically an equity infusion of these nascent companies,
Speaker 1: you just have to wonder what's your cash out tie frame?
Speaker 1: I mean, is it just an I p O or
Speaker 1: is it just that it gets big enough that you
Speaker 1: can how do you how do you monetize? It used
Speaker 1: to be five to six years that he's unless and
Speaker 1: into the communities, gets acquired or go I p O.
Speaker 1: But nowadays you are seeing secondary market being built equity
Speaker 1: date equities and equitate and Republic itself will have plans
Speaker 1: for a secondary platform in the future. Is so that
Speaker 1: people will have, you know, more ways to to get
Speaker 1: out to liquidate. Has been a year we've had some
Speaker 1: very high profile I p o s, a lot of
Speaker 1: tech I p O s, Uber Lift and some others
Speaker 1: that haven't done well and kind of surprised the market
Speaker 1: with how poorly they've done. And now we're I guess
Speaker 1: the next in the line is we work and It's
Speaker 1: been very controversial because in part because of the valuation
Speaker 1: differentially we've seen between the private market forty seven billion
Speaker 1: dollars that soft Bank recently funded at and what appears
Speaker 1: to be the range in the public market of tendive
Speaker 1: fifteen billion. Is that Does that concern you about maybe
Speaker 1: the valuations in the private market world are just too
Speaker 1: frothy at this moment. In fact, point, I think it
Speaker 1: highlights the value proposition of people being able to invest earlier.
Speaker 1: When you allow people to invest a hundred dollars fifty
Speaker 1: dollars in a company you know, one or two year
Speaker 1: out since inception, if and when the company succeeds, the
Speaker 1: potential return can be a hundred acts or in some
Speaker 1: cases over a thousand acts. They may not and you
Speaker 1: may lose everything. But that ability to invest early up
Speaker 1: until now most people are not even aware of it,
Speaker 1: And the fact that companies take longer, much longer to
Speaker 1: go I p O now means that much of the
Speaker 1: return the wealth the generation the wealth generation potential alreadio
Speaker 1: occurred during the private stage, meaning that those who invest
Speaker 1: after a company has gone IPO typically holds the detail
Speaker 1: end of the bat. So if there is let's say,
Speaker 1: taking this sort of out to its logical conclusion. Here,
Speaker 1: if there is a robust secondary market created for private investments,
Speaker 1: and you have mom and pop investors that can get in,
Speaker 1: what's the difference between that private market and a public market.
Speaker 1: The difference would be that what we're aiming to do
Speaker 1: is to bring the private market public so that it
Speaker 1: resembles more of what the laws and the equosystem intended
Speaker 1: to be back in the sixties and seventies, back when
Speaker 1: company went I p O at fifty millions, a hundred millions,
Speaker 1: Google when I p O at a relatively low price,
Speaker 1: and then rise in with Amazon. But nowadays the private
Speaker 1: market is no longer accessible and the public market is
Speaker 1: also not no longer attractive. So we're aiming to make
Speaker 1: the public market or the private market public again. Can
Speaker 1: when thanks so much for joining us. We really appreciate
Speaker 1: this very interesting. Ken Wins, the chief executive officer and
Speaker 1: co founder of Republic during us here in our Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Interactive Broker Studio, which you know, again it just kind
Speaker 1: of brings up an issue which I think which can
Speaker 1: highlight it a little bit is some of the valuation
Speaker 1: questions and are now being brought up by some of
Speaker 1: these higher profile, bigger deals and can mention you know,
Speaker 1: a lot of these companies are staying private longer. Maybe
Speaker 1: some of that that upside is being uh is not
Speaker 1: available for the public market. But this is so fascinating,
Speaker 1: right because this has been going on for a long time,
Speaker 1: and you've seen record amounts of money going into private
Speaker 1: adventure funds, and you just have to wonder at what
Speaker 1: point these markets are going to challenge some of the
Speaker 1: sort of parameters of public markets saying they're not fitting
Speaker 1: the bill in some way, which is the reason why
Speaker 1: everyone's going to these other markets. I mean, there are
Speaker 1: a lot of really good questions here fasactally a lot
Speaker 1: of the sec to pay attention to. Thanks for listening
Speaker 1: to the Bloomberg P and L podcast. You can subscribe
Speaker 1: and listen to interviews at Apple Podcasts or whatever podcast
Speaker 1: platform you prefer. Paul Sweeney, I'm on Twitter at pt Sweeney.
Speaker 1: I'm Lisa abram Woids. I'm on Twitter at Lisa A.
Speaker 1: Bramwod's one before the podcast. You can always catch us
Speaker 1: worldwide on bloom A Radio. HM