Speaker 1: I read Lovelow in San Francisco. This is Bloomberg Technology
Speaker 1: coming up. The US labor market looks resilient after a
Speaker 1: strong November jobs report, but things aren't so rosy in
Speaker 1: the tech market with a wave of layoffs. We break
Speaker 1: down what this report means for the FED and Silicon
Speaker 1: Valley at large. Plus Elon Musk says he is releasing
Speaker 1: quote what really happened with the Hunter Biden's story suppression
Speaker 1: by Twitter? Two years after Twitter changed its policies in
Speaker 1: the wake of the New York Post report. We have
Speaker 1: the latest and Uber's CEO says the company is ready
Speaker 1: for any economic environment with no plans to cut the workforce,
Speaker 1: as competitors announced layoffs and new names revealed job cuts. First,
Speaker 1: of course, we've got to take a look at how
Speaker 1: markets ended Friday. Major technology into companies mostly lower after
Speaker 1: what was a pretty hot jobs report. There than has
Speaker 1: that one actually pairing most of its losses to close
Speaker 1: down four tenths of one percent, some under performance and
Speaker 1: chip names really interesting out performance in the US listed
Speaker 1: shares of Chinese tech companies. Then as that Golden Dragon
Speaker 1: Index closing up five point four percent, it's highest level
Speaker 1: since September. The story they're really around the idea we
Speaker 1: might see some easing of policy in China that would
Speaker 1: be supportive for the economy. Of course, yields were a
Speaker 1: big story on that hot jobs print, but actually the
Speaker 1: jump we saw on the tenure yield reverse by the
Speaker 1: time we were finished on Friday afternoon. In terms of
Speaker 1: individual names, it was some of the mega caps that
Speaker 1: were hardest hit by that job's report, leading declines on
Speaker 1: the NASA one hundred. But along with the broadest story,
Speaker 1: they two pair those those declined the worst performance than
Speaker 1: has that one hundred Z scaler down as much as percent?
Speaker 1: Friday Cloud Security Company, It's forecast tepid. How often has
Speaker 1: that been the story throughout this earning season, analysts noticing
Speaker 1: that revenue and billings growth decelerating along with macro headwinds.
Speaker 1: But the story of the day, of course, jobs, jobs
Speaker 1: and more jobs. So let's get into all of this
Speaker 1: and recap the data brutal week as well of layoffs
Speaker 1: across the technology industry. His Bloomberg's Katie Gray felt, Katie,
Speaker 1: what was your read on the print we got Friday morning? Well,
Speaker 1: at eight thirty am Eastern was a long time ago.
Speaker 1: So let's just quickly go through the numbers. Hit there.
Speaker 1: You had two hundred sixty thousand jobs added last month,
Speaker 1: just shattering expectations. The unemployment rates stayed put at three
Speaker 1: point seven per cent, that is extremely low. The big
Speaker 1: thing that stuck out to me that was average hourly
Speaker 1: earnings month over month. Those rose by point six percent.
Speaker 1: That was double the estimates. And that's what really spooked
Speaker 1: markets early, particularly when it comes to wages, because snack
Speaker 1: great news for Federal Reserve just trying it's darnedst to
Speaker 1: cool price pressures without having to break the economy in
Speaker 1: the process. With that in mind, I mean, you saw
Speaker 1: a lot of movement early, a big drop the SMP
Speaker 1: five hundred in the NASTAC one hundred. Stocks did clawback
Speaker 1: a lot of those losses, but like you pointed out,
Speaker 1: you look at the NASTAC one hundred still finished down
Speaker 1: about four tenths of a percent. Because ed, I don't
Speaker 1: need to tell you that higher rates typically aren't good
Speaker 1: for the kind of growth tech names that populate that index. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm glad you said that, because I sit here in
Speaker 1: this chair and people say to me, this is a
Speaker 1: technology show. Why are you so focused on the Fed?
Speaker 1: It's always about the Fed, right, I guess you know.
Speaker 1: The outlook for rates is unclear at the best of times.
Speaker 1: What do we learn from that market reaction about what
Speaker 1: we might see from the Fed this month and going forward? Well,
Speaker 1: and you and I speak the same language. It's all
Speaker 1: about the Fed. And in terms of what the Fed
Speaker 1: might do at this month's meeting. I mean, we heard
Speaker 1: from Jerome Peal on Wednesday saying that they could moderate
Speaker 1: the pace of rate hikes this month. It seems like
Speaker 1: that is what markets are sticking with. Because you didn't
Speaker 1: really see bets change on a fifty basis point move
Speaker 1: for this month versus seventy five basis points. You did
Speaker 1: see wagers on how high the terminal rate the end
Speaker 1: destination for the Federal Reserve. That did nudge up a
Speaker 1: little bit, but that's also in line with what we
Speaker 1: heard from Pal on Wednesday, that that could be higher
Speaker 1: than their previous forecasts, which we got back in September. Alright,
Speaker 1: Katy Gray felt happy Friday, get out of there, enjoy
Speaker 1: your weekend, but we will continue the conversation of bringing
Speaker 1: John le chief economist for Decision Intelligence Company morning consult
Speaker 1: for his read on it. John, Welcome to the show
Speaker 1: Data hot Print for Jobs Friday. What's your interpretation? Yeah,
Speaker 1: thanks for having me. I mean, I think the headline
Speaker 1: numbers that things didn't sort of move from the tech
Speaker 1: sector into the broader economy. They remain relatively contained. Um,
Speaker 1: But the twelve month trend is pretty clear at this
Speaker 1: point we are seeing a slowing rate of jobs growth,
Speaker 1: probably not quite as slow as the FED would like,
Speaker 1: but you know, I think going forward there's some room
Speaker 1: for near term optimism in particularly because these tech layoffs
Speaker 1: have yet to trickle over and affect the broader economy.
Speaker 1: I think it's hard to make sense of a lot
Speaker 1: of this, right, The data is incongruous with with with
Speaker 1: the different data points that we're getting every single day,
Speaker 1: how is it that we're seeing very rapid announcements of layoffs.
Speaker 1: So I'm thinking, of course, of the challenge of grade
Speaker 1: data those announcements of layoffs in the tech industry. And
Speaker 1: yet if you take a step back and look at
Speaker 1: the broader picture for the US economy, we see a
Speaker 1: resilient labor market. Where is the disconnected? Yeah, I don't
Speaker 1: see a disconnect. I mean we We track the share
Speaker 1: of tech workers who lost pay or income every week,
Speaker 1: and we've seen that pretty consistently ticked down over the
Speaker 1: course of November. In any of our high frequency unemployment data,
Speaker 1: we don't see dramatic increases in the tech sector. I
Speaker 1: think what's you know the difference is that these folks
Speaker 1: who are being laid off are essentially finding jobs very quickly,
Speaker 1: either in the tech sector or in some other sector
Speaker 1: that requires those type of skills. Those skills are really
Speaker 1: in demand. We still have an imbalance in the economy
Speaker 1: between supply and demand um and that that sort of
Speaker 1: limited supply right now is going to allow companies that
Speaker 1: are underperforming for those workers to be reabsorbed very quickly.
Speaker 1: There's an interesting point of personal finance. Like a lot
Speaker 1: of people that watch this show work in the technology industry,
Speaker 1: and over the course of the pandemic, they worked at
Speaker 1: companies that retain staff, paid bonuses helped offset some of
Speaker 1: the economic hardship. Do you think it's fair to say
Speaker 1: that those workers from the technology sector that even if
Speaker 1: they're being laid off, they have a buffer, that they
Speaker 1: have personal finance cash in the bank that they built
Speaker 1: from the pandemic era. Yeah, that's exactly right. That's what
Speaker 1: all of our research shows that higher income, higher educated
Speaker 1: workers who have been employed over the course of the
Speaker 1: pandemic have stashed away enough savings essentially to last at
Speaker 1: least three months without working um after losing their job.
Speaker 1: And so I think that's really the security that I
Speaker 1: have when I think about how might these tech layoffs
Speaker 1: affect the broader macro economy. We're not seeing it in
Speaker 1: terms of broader layoffs, and I don't think we'll see
Speaker 1: it in terms of a deterioration in spending or consumer
Speaker 1: credit conditions. Hey, John, I want to go back really
Speaker 1: quick to that challenge of grade data. A d two
Speaker 1: thousand or so job cuts announced by the tech sector
Speaker 1: year to date, but fifty three thousand of them in
Speaker 1: the month of November alone. Do you expect that trend
Speaker 1: to continue through the end of this year and into
Speaker 1: the next year or is the worst of it over?
Speaker 1: You know, it's hard to say exactly. I think what
Speaker 1: is certainly going to be the case going forward is
Speaker 1: that you're going to hear about more layoffs in general,
Speaker 1: because we're entering a period in economic environment where you know,
Speaker 1: businesses operating conditions are going to be challenged, and you're
Speaker 1: going to start to see certain companies when in certain
Speaker 1: companies lose. When you've got a rising tide essentially driven
Speaker 1: by very low interest rates, high corporate profits, it's easy,
Speaker 1: essentially for companies to hide some of their underperformance. When
Speaker 1: you move into the operating environment where are currently that's
Speaker 1: going to be exposed and I think that's where you're
Speaker 1: going to see some of this churn in the labor
Speaker 1: market was certainly one to watch that you know, we
Speaker 1: reflected on the screen just then the data that a
Speaker 1: lot of these cuts coming out here on the West Coast,
Speaker 1: and that's kind of correlating with the industries that are here.
Speaker 1: John Lear, chief economist at Morning consult Thank you for
Speaker 1: joining us. All right, stick with us because Bloomberg talked
Speaker 1: to Brooke Jenkins, san Francisco's new d A, about her
Speaker 1: vision for the city and the future of Teking the
Speaker 1: Bay Era. She was appointed after her predecessor was recalled.
Speaker 1: For context, this is the first time a serving d
Speaker 1: A has been recalled in San Francisco's history. Here's what
Speaker 1: she had to say about the work her office will
Speaker 1: do in fighting crime in this city. And how it's
Speaker 1: going to impact the economy. I've said, and I made
Speaker 1: it very clear, all crime is illegal again in San Francisco.
Speaker 1: There will be some level of consequence for the people
Speaker 1: who commit those crimes so that we could protect that
Speaker 1: economic engine that those these retailers, these businesses, they provide jobs,
Speaker 1: jobs that are residents need in order to support their families.
Speaker 1: We can't sit by and allow businesses to feel the
Speaker 1: need to move to other states because crime is too
Speaker 1: much of a problem, not only for their business bottom line,
Speaker 1: but also for their workers who need to be able
Speaker 1: to come safely to work. And so I'm committed to
Speaker 1: making sure that we protect those jobs and these businesses
Speaker 1: because that is what we need in order to remain
Speaker 1: the beautiful city that we are. Coming out, we'll discuss
Speaker 1: the latest news out of Twitter and the future of
Speaker 1: content moderation on the platform. That's next This is bloom Bug.
Speaker 1: Here's what's been going viral today. Even Elon Musk's Twitter,
Speaker 1: there are red lines for permissible content, and Kanye West
Speaker 1: or now known as ye who calls himself Yea, crossed
Speaker 1: one of them with a late Thursday night post that
Speaker 1: prompted the platform to suspend his account. And all of
Speaker 1: this comes as we're awaiting patiently some news from Elon
Speaker 1: Musk regarding Hunter Biden to lots of digests. Let's bring
Speaker 1: in Bloomberg Sarah Fire, who leads our coverage of big
Speaker 1: tech here at Bloomberg, Sarah. This is pretty confusing, but
Speaker 1: let's start with the news of the day. I suppose
Speaker 1: so far an action by Elon Musk that Yea formerly
Speaker 1: known as Kana West, went too far. Give us the details. Well,
Speaker 1: he posted a swastika, and Elon Musk, who had previously
Speaker 1: seemed to embrace him even though he's a controversial figure,
Speaker 1: they have had a history of, you know, semi friendship.
Speaker 1: And then he said, well, listen, you've gone too far.
Speaker 1: This isn't love, he said, and he suspended yea um.
Speaker 1: And I think I think that was certainly shocking for
Speaker 1: everyone who's been a fan of Yea, even though we've
Speaker 1: we've heard these reports of his anti Semitic um comments
Speaker 1: in the past. But I also think that some of
Speaker 1: Elon Musk's supporters who thought, well, you're building this version
Speaker 1: of Twitter where anything goes, where it's a free speech,
Speaker 1: absolutist environment. We're a little. You're surprised that that he
Speaker 1: did end up taking action with Gay's posts as opposed
Speaker 1: to saying, you know, anything goes here on on this
Speaker 1: new version of Twitter. BuzzFeed reported and shared an image
Speaker 1: of a screenshot from his account where appeared to show
Speaker 1: that the suspension was only for twelve hours. Bloom Bugs
Speaker 1: not verified that. We don't know, but but I thought
Speaker 1: that was interesting. The other thing we're waiting for is
Speaker 1: the launch of this new verification system, Twitter Blue color
Speaker 1: codes for different entities and individuals. We don't think it's
Speaker 1: happened quite yet, but it could happen. You know, verification
Speaker 1: is so complicated, right because it it is only something
Speaker 1: that has been available to a select few public official celebrities, journalists,
Speaker 1: sports figures on the internet who are at risk of impersonation.
Speaker 1: And what Musk is trying to do with Twitter Blue
Speaker 1: is let anyone pay for it, and in the process,
Speaker 1: maybe those people will end up impersonating these brands that
Speaker 1: we its just had. The first time they launched it, it
Speaker 1: it was a total mess because we saw all these
Speaker 1: major brands from Lately to Nintendo be impersonated and lose value,
Speaker 1: and we saw advertisers pull their pull their spend. So
Speaker 1: I'm not surprised that it's delayed. It's it's a tough
Speaker 1: thing to get right, and um, you know a hard
Speaker 1: problem to just come at come at this and say
Speaker 1: anyone can have a blue check as long as they
Speaker 1: pay dollars. Bloom bug, Sarahfra stay with us just for
Speaker 1: a minute. Let's carry on the come to station that
Speaker 1: I'm bringing. Claire Diaz or Ti. She was formerly Twitter's
Speaker 1: head of Corporate Social Innovation and Philanthropy two thousand fourteen,
Speaker 1: currently VC scout for Kleiner Perkins in Latin America. You
Speaker 1: also wrote a book about Twitter, Twitter for Good. Um,
Speaker 1: let's start, well, let's start. Let's start on this issue
Speaker 1: of the day. The decision to suspend Yeah's account Musque
Speaker 1: does appear to have redlines. You know, the Twitter platform.
Speaker 1: You were there for many years, although it's been eight
Speaker 1: years since you left the company. What is your read
Speaker 1: on content moderation and policy decisions so far to this point.
Speaker 1: So I think it's really important to reframe kind of
Speaker 1: the language we use a little bit. We hear a
Speaker 1: lot of people talking about content moderation, and I understand
Speaker 1: that is sort of what we call it, but that
Speaker 1: really sits within trust and safety. And safety is really
Speaker 1: important in the connection between free speech and safety. Is
Speaker 1: what On does not seem to understand. Uh, you know,
Speaker 1: I kind of sometimes say, you know, watching Elon building
Speaker 1: public is kind of a mess because he really doesn't
Speaker 1: know what he's doing. Right. He's going back to what
Speaker 1: we thought social media was fifteen years ago and using
Speaker 1: a lot of that language and a lot of those guidelines.
Speaker 1: But we've now seen, you know, those of us who've
Speaker 1: worked at these companies, who've been on these trust and
Speaker 1: safety teams. There's written books about social media, we know
Speaker 1: that those things don't work right. In the early days
Speaker 1: of Twitter of social media in general, we simply didn't
Speaker 1: understand that we were creating information silos, that we were
Speaker 1: a fertile breeding ground for misinformation, and we really didn't
Speaker 1: understand that certain people were more persecuted than others. When
Speaker 1: you talk about it, I mean, it is a problem
Speaker 1: that seems easier to solve from the outside, right. Why
Speaker 1: why won't we just let everyone say whatever they want
Speaker 1: to say? Well, because then it creates a terrible user experience.
Speaker 1: As you see, must sort of rediscover all the things
Speaker 1: that you had discovered when you were on Twitter. You
Speaker 1: know what has been surprising to so far? I'll tell
Speaker 1: you I was surprised today by him um categorizing harassment
Speaker 1: as spam. I thought that that was that was an
Speaker 1: interesting new way of thinking about harassments that maybe actually
Speaker 1: is is positive. What what what do you think is
Speaker 1: is you know, becoming a real to him now in
Speaker 1: a way that maybe it wasn't before. Well, I mean,
Speaker 1: some of these things are coming real to him, right,
Speaker 1: Like he's starting to understand Okay, harassment might actually be
Speaker 1: a problem in a way I didn't understand it because
Speaker 1: I am the richest man in the world, and I
Speaker 1: am a white grow who hasn't had concerns about trust
Speaker 1: and safety in a long time in my life. Right,
Speaker 1: So some of these things maybe he's slowly starting to
Speaker 1: see sort of the light or gained some empathy on
Speaker 1: but ultimately it's way too slow and it's not happening.
Speaker 1: So it's just very concerning for users out there who
Speaker 1: want to actually use the platform and for advertisements you
Speaker 1: want to people to use it. I think I'm right
Speaker 1: in saying many years ago, then known as Kanye West,
Speaker 1: now known as Ya walked into the building and sent
Speaker 1: his first tweet while you were there. Can you give
Speaker 1: us the details of around that and what happened? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I remember in the summer of two thousand ten in California,
Speaker 1: Kanye came in one day, lit up a blunt and
Speaker 1: then sent his first tweet. And the first tweet, if
Speaker 1: you go back and look at it is is him
Speaker 1: spelling Silicon Valley wrong and then following it up with
Speaker 1: a joke about women's breast implanoffs. Okay, we'll move on
Speaker 1: from that subject of of YEA, Generally speaking, you have
Speaker 1: focused your writing and your time at Twitter on on
Speaker 1: the platform as a mechanism for social good, and Musque
Speaker 1: talks about Twitter being the global town square, and he
Speaker 1: has shared data in recent days about the growth of
Speaker 1: the platform but also the decline of what what appears
Speaker 1: to be the decline of hate speech. Are the rainy areas.
Speaker 1: You actually agree with Musk on things that he's done,
Speaker 1: things that he said about the potential for the platform.
Speaker 1: So I do. I mean, if there's one thing I
Speaker 1: won't begrudge elon Musk, it's it's it is that he
Speaker 1: really should be redoing the verification platform and it's good
Speaker 1: to see him try, although he's failing a lot and
Speaker 1: doing things we did ten or fifteen years ago. Verification,
Speaker 1: since it started in two thousand nine, when you know,
Speaker 1: a baseball manager was impersonated on Twitter and then sued
Speaker 1: Twitter as a result, has always been a dumpster fire,
Speaker 1: and it's always been very complicated, and from the beginning
Speaker 1: there were not enough staff to handle it. You know,
Speaker 1: I was one of many people tasked with sort of
Speaker 1: working out some of the guidelines, and it's never really worked.
Speaker 1: So in principle, the idea that people could pay to
Speaker 1: be verified is actually something I think could be a
Speaker 1: good idea. It may not be something I would pay for,
Speaker 1: it may not be something you would pay for, but
Speaker 1: it is something that many people out there would pay for,
Speaker 1: and it certainly will ideally reduce the demand. Right anyone
Speaker 1: who's ever worked at Twitter, ten years later, there's still
Speaker 1: getting d m s in their in their Twitter feed,
Speaker 1: people asking to be verified. Right, So there's a huge
Speaker 1: demand for it that he can ultimately hopefully capture some
Speaker 1: of by charging for. Unfortunately, when he launched Twitter Blue
Speaker 1: last month for the eight dollars seven ninety nine monthly fee,
Speaker 1: he ran into his own problem of content moderation and
Speaker 1: sam bots just going crazy with the service. What do
Speaker 1: you think about his own content and the way that
Speaker 1: he's been posting on Twitter in this in this really
Speaker 1: showman showman like manner, when where every few hours there's
Speaker 1: another bombshell even today that you know, this this teasing
Speaker 1: of a big drop of a story that's about to come.
Speaker 1: I mean, this is this is the way that he's
Speaker 1: been running in and and perhaps is leading to these
Speaker 1: higher user numbers or sign ups that that we're seeing
Speaker 1: or that he was talking about. Is that a sustainable
Speaker 1: way to run Twitter? Is that something that um, you know,
Speaker 1: even if it leads to user growth, would be uh,
Speaker 1: something you would recommend doing long term. It's absolutely not sustainable,
Speaker 1: obviously from the side of user growth, but also from
Speaker 1: the side of advertisers. You know, more than half his
Speaker 1: advertising budget has drops since advertisers are all pulling out.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think it's important to understand what he's
Speaker 1: doing today on Twitter, with this proposed live chat thing
Speaker 1: he's supposed to be going live with right now, is
Speaker 1: really an example of the way he behaves. Um. You know,
Speaker 1: the last time I was on I compared him to
Speaker 1: some of my twin children who don't have prefrontal corps
Speaker 1: cortex is and I feel like he's sort of the
Speaker 1: same way. But I mean, what he's doing today is
Speaker 1: he's trying to get back at the Twitter security and
Speaker 1: Twitter safety and trust head who was just kicked out,
Speaker 1: and so this is sort of a revenge saying he's doing.
Speaker 1: Um you all. Roth went on Kara Switchers podcast and
Speaker 1: basically discussed what had happened during the Hunter Biden laptop
Speaker 1: tweet censoring back in the fall of twenty twenty. And so,
Speaker 1: I mean, now he's just coming out because Rath is
Speaker 1: now quit and now he's going to go against him.
Speaker 1: It's it's the horrible Okay. That was the take from
Speaker 1: Claire diez Ortiz, formerly Twitter's head of Corporate Social Innovation,
Speaker 1: and Flamproby. I'dad you did leave Twitter eight years ago
Speaker 1: and that was your opinion, but you know, many people
Speaker 1: see you long musk as in the end improving the
Speaker 1: companies that he works on. It's a wait and see
Speaker 1: when it comes to Twitter. Also Bloomberg Sarah Fryer, who
Speaker 1: leads big Tech coverage here, thank you both time for
Speaker 1: talking tech and look at what's going on in the
Speaker 1: world of venture capital and startups. Starting with the Asian
Speaker 1: crypto exchange zipmex It's about to get acquired by a
Speaker 1: VC fund for about one billion dollars. Thirty million will
Speaker 1: be in cash, but the remainder will be in crypto tokens.
Speaker 1: This is one of the first rescues in Asia since
Speaker 1: a wave of defaults ripped through the sector and more layoffs.
Speaker 1: Light Street Capital Management just dismissed some staff focused on
Speaker 1: bets in private markets. This comes after a steep drop
Speaker 1: in the hedge funds tech heavy portfolio. That's according to sources.
Speaker 1: The firm already shut down in San Francisco office a
Speaker 1: few months ago. Finally, the defense tech startup and A
Speaker 1: Rill has raised about one point five billion dollars in
Speaker 1: a new round, as reported by The Financial Times. The
Speaker 1: investment values the firm it's seven billion dollars, up from
Speaker 1: four point two billion dollars eighteen months ago. And A
Speaker 1: Hills founder Parmer Lucky plans to use the new funds
Speaker 1: to build a large defense company using new tech like
Speaker 1: AI and drones. I think this is one of the
Speaker 1: most uncertain environments that i've been a part of you know,
Speaker 1: we it's very difficult to tell where things are going
Speaker 1: to wind up. I think Europe is certainly going to
Speaker 1: be weaker and is likely headed into a recession. We're
Speaker 1: preparing for that. In the US, it's unclear recession might happen,
Speaker 1: it might be a soft landing, etcetera. So I think
Speaker 1: from our standpoint, we want to be prepared for any eventuality.
Speaker 1: When you look at our marketplace, we are a marketplace business,
Speaker 1: so we don't have significant fixed costs. UH. In a
Speaker 1: weaker labor environment, our supply position will tend to get better.
Speaker 1: We will be a place where more drivers can come
Speaker 1: to earn real money. On this last quarter, for example,
Speaker 1: UH earners earn more than ten billion dollars on our
Speaker 1: platform up over, So we do think that our marketplace
Speaker 1: gets more attractive to drivers as it gets more traffic
Speaker 1: drivers prices come down, and that in turn attracts riders
Speaker 1: as well. UH. So we think the business model is
Speaker 1: a good model that can you know, do well in
Speaker 1: UH in strong economies and can perform in weaker economies.
Speaker 1: And I think as a company and as a technology company,
Speaker 1: we have been relatively forward thinking in making sure that
Speaker 1: we prepare ourselves for an uncertain world, making sure we're
Speaker 1: conservative in terms of the investments that we're making, and
Speaker 1: an investment isn't paying off, pullback employer money where the
Speaker 1: growth is and I think it's showing in the redls.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Bloomdow Technology IDDO in San Francisco. That
Speaker 1: was Uber CEO Dara Kostrashai last month when asked about
Speaker 1: the impact of the potential recession and now. While Door,
Speaker 1: Dash and Lift slash their staff to reduce costs, Uber
Speaker 1: says it's not making any cutbacks, at least from a
Speaker 1: head count perspective costs. He said this week that the
Speaker 1: company is in a good place and to shift in
Speaker 1: consumer spending from retail to services is helping bloombirds. Jackie
Speaker 1: davl Loss covers all of the ride hailing and delivery
Speaker 1: companies for US. She's out in d C. Run us
Speaker 1: through what Darra had to say in the last couple
Speaker 1: of days, because it's certainly not what we're hearing from
Speaker 1: the rest of the sector. Absolutely, Uber seems to be
Speaker 1: one of the rare safe zones right now in Silicon Valley,
Speaker 1: and the reason for that is because people are still
Speaker 1: ordering marked up burritos and taking rides to work, And
Speaker 1: what that really shows is that their customer demand is
Speaker 1: is keeping them afloat. They've already gone through a lot
Speaker 1: of the difficult decisions to cost cut that a lot
Speaker 1: of companies are having to do now more under the
Speaker 1: gun of, you know, the specter of an economic recession looming. Um.
Speaker 1: But Uber actually did that earlier on in the pandemic.
Speaker 1: If you remember, they had a really tough time cut
Speaker 1: around six thousand jobs in the course of just a
Speaker 1: few months. So I think that cost cutting measures um,
Speaker 1: they largely got ahead of it and now are relying
Speaker 1: on that strong customer demand to kind of see them
Speaker 1: through for for now at least. I want to bring
Speaker 1: up on the screen some of the things that dark
Speaker 1: Costra Shaw he was saying at that event in New York,
Speaker 1: because I find it really interesting. It's it's bullish talk,
Speaker 1: it's fighting talk. But at the same time, Jackie, I
Speaker 1: think I'm right in saying that Uber, you know, all
Speaker 1: being financially disciplined, there is an element of belt tightening
Speaker 1: and being conservative when it comes to herring totally. And look,
Speaker 1: I think when it comes to telegraphing what the potential
Speaker 1: for layoffs might be. He is still taking somewhat of
Speaker 1: a pragmatic approach. Just in the clip that you've played
Speaker 1: right before this, you know he has said earlier this
Speaker 1: year that's he's going to slow hiring, which is something
Speaker 1: that door Dash wasn't considering. UM. You know, back when
Speaker 1: companies really started, you know, thinking about putting a pause
Speaker 1: on on hiring and you know, eliminating parts of their workforce. UM.
Speaker 1: So he was a little bit more cautious even earlier
Speaker 1: this year. Now when you take a look at door
Speaker 1: Dash Tony Shoe, their CEO was very forthcoming when it
Speaker 1: came to, you know, taking accountability for growing too quickly. UM.
Speaker 1: In Southeast Asia, you know, Kassel laid off or plans
Speaker 1: to lay off ten percent of their staff, and their
Speaker 1: CEO as well said, you know, we too quickly. So
Speaker 1: I think Uber's move here, UM it really shows that
Speaker 1: you know, they have been kind of slowing down on
Speaker 1: the hiring front, but there's other ways to cut costs.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, they hived off their autonomous vehicle
Speaker 1: research UM and are now really doubling down on on
Speaker 1: food delivery, which is shown to be pretty profitable for them.
Speaker 1: You're right that there's some nuance in it, right. The
Speaker 1: headlines this week have been layoffs, job cuts. You know,
Speaker 1: in Europe, for example, Intel is movings cut more jobs
Speaker 1: HP last week, six thousand jobs, up to six thousand
Speaker 1: jobs cut over the next three years or so. I
Speaker 1: thought the nuance in your story about door Dash was
Speaker 1: important because even coming out of the pandemic, this is
Speaker 1: a pandemic darling that's continued to grow um and you know,
Speaker 1: the risk, it seems to me, is that door dash
Speaker 1: sees its operating expenses just simply outpacing it's growth on
Speaker 1: the revenue front, on the growth booking fronts. Is that
Speaker 1: the equation that Tony's use thinking about exactly, And it's
Speaker 1: because the market environment and investors focus has really shifted
Speaker 1: and now it's less about growth and it's more about
Speaker 1: the bottom line. And that's why you're seeing executives take
Speaker 1: that tone in earnings calls. They're focused on free cash flow,
Speaker 1: they're focused on um their net income. You know, you
Speaker 1: see a lot of these e commerce companies pointing investors
Speaker 1: to adjusted earnings figures, which strip out a lot of
Speaker 1: the stock based compensation and that's what's been moving up, um,
Speaker 1: these costs you're seeing when you saw a lift cut
Speaker 1: of its workforce. It also mentioned um that it was
Speaker 1: going to shift its strategy when it came to hiring,
Speaker 1: looking more to Canada and East during Europe, which you know,
Speaker 1: they don't have stock based comp in their in their
Speaker 1: packages the way they do here in the US, so
Speaker 1: different strategies there, um, But it it really does show
Speaker 1: that the focus is much more on profitability, and doordesh
Speaker 1: isn't a great example of that. Their customer demand also
Speaker 1: super strong, but I think they're preparing for a much
Speaker 1: rockier period ahead. Okay, Layoffs never a pleasant subject to
Speaker 1: cover in this industry, whether it's here in San Francisco
Speaker 1: or out on the East Coast. Bloomberg's Jackie Davlos, thank
Speaker 1: you for your reporting. Meanwhile, the November job struck a
Speaker 1: very different picture from what's playing out here in Silicon
Speaker 1: Valley and the tech sector. This has been the story
Speaker 1: of the week. What we've been discussing on the show.
Speaker 1: The market now expecting the FED to push rates higher
Speaker 1: and the possibility of a recession is now a much
Speaker 1: real risk. Joining us to discuss what's going on with
Speaker 1: jobs in the tech sector. What the sentiment of tech
Speaker 1: workers is is Carab Brennan a LaMnO, Chief People Officer
Speaker 1: at laticea software management platform for fast growing businesses in
Speaker 1: the US and UK. So you've been crunching some numbers, Car,
Speaker 1: I mean, there's a human side to this story and
Speaker 1: then there's the workforce side to this story. Um let's
Speaker 1: start with the workforce side. You know, what is your
Speaker 1: interpretation of what we're seeing across the technology set to
Speaker 1: from a job caught perspective. Well, what's interesting is is
Speaker 1: what you've been talking about, um in in the past
Speaker 1: half an hour, is that the headlines are interesting, their
Speaker 1: eye catching, but really the devil's in the details when
Speaker 1: you go down a few layers in terms of what's
Speaker 1: happening with the layoffs. Fundamentally, what we know and when
Speaker 1: I'm talking to the other c h R o s
Speaker 1: that are actually executing these layoffs at places like Meta
Speaker 1: and door Dash, the actual makeup of the folks and
Speaker 1: the teams that are being affected tend to be more
Speaker 1: of your front um, frontline support, your recruiters, your HR folks,
Speaker 1: folks that were here during the pandemic to really help
Speaker 1: shore up a level of morale and this this momentum
Speaker 1: toward growth, and as we're looking toward next year, we
Speaker 1: have a lot of people um on the VC side,
Speaker 1: a lot of financial leadership, a lot of CEO s
Speaker 1: saying going into the future, we need to be more conservative.
Speaker 1: I want to send a message around efficiency and effectiveness
Speaker 1: and our priority will be profitability in the next two years.
Speaker 1: And this is the start of the action around those sentiments.
Speaker 1: Is it part of this as well? People just looking
Speaker 1: for something new, new jobs? I know that companies are
Speaker 1: taking that decision out of hands, but there is an
Speaker 1: element as well that within the tech sector there's opportunities,
Speaker 1: people are hiring and they're looking to do something new. Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 1: I think what some folks are missing is that we
Speaker 1: let us did a survey a few months ago, and
Speaker 1: we found that of employees weren't convinced that their company
Speaker 1: was going to grow in the next twelve months and
Speaker 1: half of the half of the employees that are in
Speaker 1: seat don't know if they're going to be able to
Speaker 1: grow in their careers. So those are the bigger questions
Speaker 1: that people are leading with when they're making decisions, and
Speaker 1: leaders are are thinking about that. They're thinking about I
Speaker 1: have employees that potentially could have quiet quit in the
Speaker 1: last year. I want to look back into my org
Speaker 1: and understand really where people's heads are and drive forward
Speaker 1: a level of productivity and performance as we go into
Speaker 1: this potential bear bear environment in the next twelve months.
Speaker 1: Do you have any read on the attitude towards at home,
Speaker 1: hybrid working models, or just simply being in the office. Yeah.
Speaker 1: What we also know from some of our research is
Speaker 1: thirty of tech workers are saying that they would not
Speaker 1: say at their job if they could not be in
Speaker 1: a hybrid or remote first work environment. We're definitely seeing
Speaker 1: that play out UM in technology companies. A c h
Speaker 1: R O often owns the real estate or facilities component,
Speaker 1: and I can tell you talking amongst my colleagues, UM,
Speaker 1: we've already planned for not renewing leases, for reducing our
Speaker 1: real estate footprint. So for us, the debate is over.
Speaker 1: The plans are in place, the strategy is moving forward.
Speaker 1: And I still see headlines where are saying folks are
Speaker 1: battling it out. We're not, because we know that in
Speaker 1: order to get the talent that we need to run
Speaker 1: our businesses, we have to be providing that flexibility. Okay, Lattice,
Speaker 1: Chief People Officer Cara Brennan, Alamanna, thank you. Now let's
Speaker 1: head over. It's a Stanford where Bloomberg spoke Thursday with
Speaker 1: the CEO of General Motors, Mary Barra. She talks about
Speaker 1: whether the company thinks it will be able to sell
Speaker 1: one million e vis in. Here's what she had to say.
Speaker 1: We made that statement and that set that goal for
Speaker 1: ourselves that we'll have the capacity to be able to
Speaker 1: sell a million units in North America and frankly in China.
Speaker 1: And we think with the strong product port Bullier, we're
Speaker 1: going to have at different price points, you know, from
Speaker 1: from the Cadillac Lyric to the Hummer, the Chevy Silverado,
Speaker 1: the Gmccrara down to a Chevy Equinox as a Chevy Blazer.
Speaker 1: We're going to have the products across the market that
Speaker 1: are going to allow us to achieve that matter. So
Speaker 1: we think we've got the right plan. This was all
Speaker 1: in place before the incentive package came as a part
Speaker 1: of I R A. But we're you know, we think
Speaker 1: that will help. But it's doing what it was supposed to.
Speaker 1: We think it was intended to do. Was to drive
Speaker 1: the ev adaption. And you know, we've invested a lot
Speaker 1: in the United States creating jobs, which I think is
Speaker 1: going to create a stronger economy. So I think it's
Speaker 1: gonna accomplish the objectives. And you know what happened to
Speaker 1: be very aligned with the plan we were already execute.
Speaker 1: That was Mary barras CEO of General Motors, coming up,
Speaker 1: the former chair of the f d i C on
Speaker 1: the need for crypto regulation as US or authorities ramp
Speaker 1: up their investigation of f t X. This is bloom bug.
Speaker 1: The reality is like Sam and his cohorts perpetuated a fraud.
Speaker 1: They used customer money to make bets that he poorly
Speaker 1: risk managed after he made them, Like, let's forget about
Speaker 1: the risk management. The problem was he took our money
Speaker 1: and so he needs to get prosecuted. The authorities need
Speaker 1: to dig in and figure out exactly what happened. People
Speaker 1: will go to jail and should go to jail. We've
Speaker 1: taken our exchange balances down as a precaution. We've gone
Speaker 1: through each exchange, talked to the guys that run them,
Speaker 1: look at the auditing, look at proof of reserves, and
Speaker 1: we make our best bet right. When you were putting
Speaker 1: money on exchange, you never expected it to be all
Speaker 1: at risk, right. Exchanges put a lot of your coins
Speaker 1: in cold storage. Uh, and then the rest was left
Speaker 1: on exchange. So you really thought you only had risk
Speaker 1: of hacking. Uh. Very few people thought risk of somebody
Speaker 1: stealing your money. And that's a new risk that people
Speaker 1: are gonna have to look at a lot, a lot closer.
Speaker 1: That was Galaxy Digitals. Mike novegrats his opinion. We should
Speaker 1: know that no formal charges have been filed against Sam
Speaker 1: Bankman Freed, but US authorities have set up their invested
Speaker 1: investigation into his collapse Crypto Exchange f t X. They're
Speaker 1: asking investors and trading firms that works closely with fd
Speaker 1: X to hand over information on the company and its
Speaker 1: key figures, Among them bank Man Freed and the former
Speaker 1: head of his Alameda Research Investment arm, Caroline Ellison. Bloomberg
Speaker 1: spoke with Sheila Bear, former f d i C chair
Speaker 1: and senior fellow at the Center for Financial Stability about
Speaker 1: how we regulate crypto. The current regulatory powers are adequate
Speaker 1: for the best majority of this market, and I would
Speaker 1: tend to agree with care against her that most of
Speaker 1: these tokens are securities. There is a bit of a
Speaker 1: gap with the CFTC's jurisdiction. They have regulatory power of derivatives,
Speaker 1: but the cash market, the actual crypto asset itself, they
Speaker 1: only have enforcement authority, So that is that is a
Speaker 1: gap that could be fulfilled, but that's a very very
Speaker 1: small part of the market. Most of these tokens, most
Speaker 1: of these assets, especially the problematic ones, I think approple
Speaker 1: we follow under the fallow under the SEC jurisdiction, and
Speaker 1: the SEC frankly, just needs to go after them more aggressively. Sheila,
Speaker 1: what about the controls that were in place for banks
Speaker 1: carrying out fat transactions on behalf of cryptocurrent companies like
Speaker 1: f t X. Do you think that they were sufficient?
Speaker 1: Given your experience, of course as as a banking regulator,
Speaker 1: so I think that the exposure to the regulated f
Speaker 1: d i C insured banks was was very very limited. Obviously,
Speaker 1: they had bank accounts. Everybody's a bank account to do,
Speaker 1: you know, your your your regular transactions, payment transactions. But
Speaker 1: it has not appeared that there was any significant exposure.
Speaker 1: There's been a lot of press coverage about f t
Speaker 1: X or news elamated taking a significant investment interest in
Speaker 1: a small bank in Washington State called Moonstone. They renamed
Speaker 1: at Moonstone. But as here as I can tell that
Speaker 1: they hadn't really used the bank for anything, So I
Speaker 1: don't it just looks like to except they were using banks,
Speaker 1: it was regret and better payments. I don't think this
Speaker 1: affects the banking system at all, um and uh so
Speaker 1: that that's a good news that it does not really
Speaker 1: have any kind of impact on mainstream banking or the
Speaker 1: insured banks that we all rely on for them, you know,
Speaker 1: checking and savings accounts. But the banks that did work
Speaker 1: with ft X and alimated, do you think that it
Speaker 1: was a mistake for them to bring f t X
Speaker 1: onto you know? That is that is a really tough
Speaker 1: question because there's been a big controversy generally about whether
Speaker 1: regulators should, you know, tell banks you just can't do
Speaker 1: business with certain entities, you know, certain markets are certain
Speaker 1: you know, and that's hard to do. I think if
Speaker 1: a business is legal, then to tell a bank not
Speaker 1: to do, not to have dealings with them, I think
Speaker 1: is hard. And I am unaware that any of the
Speaker 1: entities doing business with US banks were illegal, So I
Speaker 1: think it's hard, it's it's it's a very controversially, is
Speaker 1: to try to use banks to shut insured banks to
Speaker 1: shut all of this down. That was former fd I
Speaker 1: c chat Sheila Bear. Meanwhile, the lawyer who represented Bernie
Speaker 1: Maddof has this advice for Sam Bankman Freed. Zip It
Speaker 1: Irish Sorkin was lead defense lawyer for Madof seen here,
Speaker 1: who was the mastermind of one of the greatest Ponzi
Speaker 1: schemes of all time. Saukin says SPF is digging himself
Speaker 1: into a hole with his media apology tour. Sorkin says
Speaker 1: Bankman Freed should listen to his lawyers and stopped talking immediately.
Speaker 1: Representatives for bank Man Freed and f t X didn't
Speaker 1: immediately respond to request for comment on this story. Welcome
Speaker 1: to swift Tonomics. That's what happens that when a post
Speaker 1: COVID demand shock causes ticket sales to go up to
Speaker 1: forty thousands of dollars, Many Taylor Swift fans were very
Speaker 1: disappointed when they couldn't get their hands on tickets back
Speaker 1: in November. The demand was so high that it cost
Speaker 1: ticket Master's system to fail, and it raised all sorts
Speaker 1: of questions about the platform's monopoly. But there's more here.
Speaker 1: Swift Ties, or fans of Taylor Swift, represent a particular
Speaker 1: moment in the global economy. They are the supercharged consumer
Speaker 1: that's willing to spend a lot of money on experiences
Speaker 1: that they missed out on during the pandemic. Many in
Speaker 1: this category are gen z s or millennials who come
Speaker 1: out of the pandemic with historically high levels of savings.
Speaker 1: They've waited for four years to see their favorite pop star,
Speaker 1: and they don't mind splurging ten months worth of savings
Speaker 1: to see her. It's all because of you, Thank you
Speaker 1: so som In the early two thousand's, economist Alan Krueger
Speaker 1: came up with a concept called rockconomics. He uses it
Speaker 1: to explain the global economy through the lens of the
Speaker 1: music industry. He often talks about Taylor Swift as somebody
Speaker 1: who's very cleverly playing with strategies to boost ticket sales. Well,
Speaker 1: I think Taylor Swift is an economic genius. But the
Speaker 1: bigger question of how much longer consumers are going to
Speaker 1: spend this much money in an economy of highly alarming
Speaker 1: interest rates is something that swift aconomics can't and for now,
Speaker 1: economists are going to have to shake it off. Thanks
Speaker 1: to Marius Kavash for that one. Some other stories we're
Speaker 1: following In entertainment, Amazon's top media executive is stepping down
Speaker 1: as the company begins a restructuring. Jeff Blackburn is retiring
Speaker 1: at the end of two after twenty four years at Amazon.
Speaker 1: According to a Memo Center staff today, Blackburn helped the
Speaker 1: company pivot into streaming and lead the charge on the
Speaker 1: MGM acquisition as well as the billion dollar Lord of
Speaker 1: the Rings series. Amazon has been in cost cutting mode
Speaker 1: due to a sales slow down, and Meta is urging
Speaker 1: policymakers to wait before new rules governing the metaverse. A
Speaker 1: policy paper released by Meta argues that many of the
Speaker 1: world's existing laws and REGs will also applies activity in
Speaker 1: the metaverse. Regulators could stymy innovation if they act too quickly,
Speaker 1: according to the paper, Well that does it. For this
Speaker 1: edition of Bloomberg Technology, don't forget to check out our podcasts.
Speaker 1: You can find it on the terminal as well as
Speaker 1: online on Apple, Spotify, and I Heart Radio. This is
Speaker 1: bloom Bag h