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Speaker 2: What's been just at work day in the House of Representatives,
Speaker 2: you know, congress Woman, thank you so much for joining
Speaker 2: us here. Can you help put in context what happened
Speaker 2: on the House floor today.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so we got the two thirds vote to remove
Speaker 3: George Santos. We've expelled him, and it was Look, it
Speaker 3: was a solemn day. I mean, he deserved it. He
Speaker 3: deserved to be removed. I voted for the expulsion. But
Speaker 3: the end of the day is it is a sad
Speaker 3: stain on the institution and it was important that we
Speaker 3: had to remove him so his constituents can elect somebody new,
Speaker 3: somebody they can trust and have a relationship with. The
Speaker 3: reality is George Santos had lost the trust of his colleagues,
Speaker 3: his constituents. And the bottom line here is we asked
Speaker 3: the Ethics Committee at the beginning of this year to
Speaker 3: do a thorough investigation, and they had issued thirty eight
Speaker 3: different subpoenas, interviewed forty individual witnesses, They reviewed one hundred
Speaker 3: and seventy thousand pages of documents, and they were able
Speaker 3: to produce use the evidence to the members that warrants
Speaker 3: his expulsion. I mean, he used campaign money on everything
Speaker 3: from luxury items to botox. He even created fictitious loans
Speaker 3: and then he used campaign donors money to reimburse himself
Speaker 3: to those fictitious loans. We even had a colleague, Max Miller,
Speaker 3: one of our colleagues here in Congress, who said that
Speaker 3: he even used his and his mother's credit card to
Speaker 3: make unapproved purchases or donations. And so it is really
Speaker 3: troubling and disturbing that we had this con artist sitting
Speaker 3: in Congress with us, and quite frankly, it's been a
Speaker 3: distraction this entire year. So I'm relieved to see that
Speaker 3: he will no longer be in this institution. And I'm
Speaker 3: hopeful that we will have a special election very soon.
Speaker 3: As you know, the governor does need to call a
Speaker 3: special election within ten days, and the people of the
Speaker 3: third Congressional District in New York, which is a piece
Speaker 3: of Queens and Nassau County, will be able to elect
Speaker 3: someone that they can trust.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Congressman, maybe if you can just elaborate there, tell us,
Speaker 4: you know, what is a special election, How does that
Speaker 4: play out from here? What kind of timeline, who would
Speaker 4: you know elect that kind of a person. Just give
Speaker 4: us a little bit of the lay of the land,
Speaker 4: how we proceed from here.
Speaker 3: But following expulsion, there will be a formal notification to
Speaker 3: the Governor of the State of New York. The governor
Speaker 3: then has ten days to call a set special election,
Speaker 3: and then it would most likely be in February, and
Speaker 3: at that point the people of New York's third district
Speaker 3: will be able to elect someone new and that's how
Speaker 3: the process will play out. So we will that seat
Speaker 3: will be vacant for a couple of months.
Speaker 2: So Congresswoman, will this help or hinder the GOP in
Speaker 2: terms of keeping the House?
Speaker 3: Well, I don't think that we could have based our
Speaker 3: decision on that. We have to do what is right
Speaker 3: in this case to be removed. But what I do
Speaker 3: believe is that the Nasau County organization, led by Chairman
Speaker 3: Joe Cairo, is one of the best in the country,
Speaker 3: and they have flipped because, by the way, not just
Speaker 3: because they're the best in the country, but because the
Speaker 3: Democrats policies in New York are just so ridiculous. Right,
Speaker 3: They've created a crisis, whether it's public safety, migrant crisis,
Speaker 3: the Democrats policies have done that. And because of that
Speaker 3: messaging that Republicans are right they write on policy, they've
Speaker 3: been able to flip not just these congressional seats, but
Speaker 3: they've been able to flip the county executive. You have
Speaker 3: Bruce Blakeman there is doing a great job. You also
Speaker 3: have a Republican district attorney now county legislature. They were
Speaker 3: able to flip all of that because not only are
Speaker 3: they a strong organization, but because the Democrats in New
Speaker 3: York have done such a bad job and are driving
Speaker 3: the city in the state into the ground. So with
Speaker 3: that said, I still believe that Republicans can hold onto
Speaker 3: that seat in a special election. But at the end
Speaker 3: of the day, it's up to the voters. The voters
Speaker 3: get to choose who they want. The bigger challenge for
Speaker 3: Republicans is that our governor is trying to redraw congressional
Speaker 3: maps again. She is trying to tilt the scale once
Speaker 3: again after we had an independent master last year draw
Speaker 3: our maps and we won these four seats. So that
Speaker 3: that corrupt activity that we're seeing from the Democrats trying
Speaker 3: to tilt the scale with and redraw these maps to
Speaker 3: give themselves an advantage is more what jeopardizes the Republican
Speaker 3: majority in Washington.
Speaker 2: Does do you have a candidate that you would like
Speaker 2: to see run.
Speaker 3: I do not have a candidate that is for the
Speaker 3: county organizations to determine. Hopefully they're going to be doing
Speaker 3: their due diligence now, and I know that they will.
Speaker 3: They'll be making sure that they have background checks and
Speaker 3: that they're going.
Speaker 2: Well, well, they don't have the greatest track record, let's
Speaker 2: be honest.
Speaker 3: Well that's why I'm saying. That's exactly what I'm saying.
Speaker 3: We've gotten their word now that they will be doing that,
Speaker 3: and so we could prevent this in the future. But look,
Speaker 3: I think it is it is important for people to
Speaker 3: understand that whether it's a Republican or Democrat, we needed
Speaker 3: to move to do this. The last five expulsions. By
Speaker 3: the way, we're all Democrats in our history. The first
Speaker 3: time a Republican has been expelled from the House of
Speaker 3: Representatives in the history of the United States.
Speaker 2: Equal opportunity.
Speaker 4: I guess so, congress Woman. You did list a whole
Speaker 4: bit of evidence that the Ethics Committee had compiled in
Speaker 4: supporting the expulsion of George Santos, But a lot of
Speaker 4: what the House members who elected to not expel him,
Speaker 4: what they were hung up upon, was that he wasn't
Speaker 4: actually convicted of anything yet. That is But I mean,
Speaker 4: do you think that this potentially could set a dangerous
Speaker 4: president here that if people's you know, skeletons come out
Speaker 4: of the closet and you know, maybe you just don't
Speaker 4: like how somebody's voted, that their seat could be in jeopardy.
Speaker 3: Well, first of all, he will have his day in
Speaker 3: court as it relates to responding to those twenty three
Speaker 3: criminal charges, and that will determine whether he goes to jail, okay,
Speaker 3: But as it relates to remaining in this is we
Speaker 3: referred it to the Ethics Committee and they did their
Speaker 3: they did their investigation where was able to produce the
Speaker 3: evidence that showed that he took from his campaign donations
Speaker 3: and used them for personal gain and enrichment and that
Speaker 3: was just inappropriate and warrants his removal from the institution.
Speaker 2: Congress Woman, as I understand that the Republicans have a
Speaker 2: four seat majority in the House, so that will go
Speaker 2: to three practically, what does that mean for getting legislation through?
Speaker 3: From your perspective, Look, whether it was four or three,
Speaker 3: it was still difficult, right, I mean, it is not
Speaker 3: easy when you have such a slim majority. We're trying to,
Speaker 3: you know, reconcile the differences and see where we can
Speaker 3: find that common ground to move things forward. Despite having
Speaker 3: the slim majority, we've been able to pass a good
Speaker 3: number of these appropriation bills to fund the government. The
Speaker 3: Senate has done zero, by the way, so they have
Speaker 3: a slim majority there too. I think it's by margin
Speaker 3: of one. So it makes governing difficult, which which really
Speaker 3: actually begs for more bipartisanship. I mean, at the end
Speaker 3: of the day, you know, sometimes the extremes try to
Speaker 3: upset the apple card. We see more bipartisanship, more common
Speaker 3: ground and common sense policy moving forward. And so we
Speaker 3: have to work with what we have and we continue
Speaker 3: to push for the things that we believe in, which is,
Speaker 3: we want secure borders, we want to support our law enforcement.
Speaker 3: We want to address this crisis of energy independence. We
Speaker 3: need more energy production, not less, like the president it says.
Speaker 3: And we need to make sure that we are addressing
Speaker 3: our fiscal issues, and that means we need to spend
Speaker 3: less money and be more responsible. And so that's what
Speaker 3: we're going to continue to push with that agenda, and
Speaker 3: we help some Democrats do join us, because those are
Speaker 3: the right things that the American people want to see.
Speaker 3: They want to see you inflation reduced, energy, affordable borders
Speaker 3: being secured, the migroant crisis ending in New York City.
Speaker 3: It would be great if Senator Schumer passes our legislation
Speaker 3: that would do these things, because we've passed them already
Speaker 3: out of the House.
Speaker 2: Right all right, Congresswoman, thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker 2: Really appreciated. Nicole malliotakas Congresswoman Representatives of the US House
Speaker 2: of Representatives representing New York.
Speaker 5: You're listening to the team. Ken's our live program Bloomberg
Speaker 5: Markets weekdays at ten am Eastern on Bloomberg dot Com,
Speaker 5: the iHeartRadio app, and the Bloomberg Business App, or listen
Speaker 5: on demand wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 2: Look at the lay of the land on the markets
Speaker 2: as well as Washington, DC news coming from both places.
Speaker 2: Billy Lipshealty covers of markets for US for Bloomberg News.
Speaker 2: And Joe Matthew, the host of all kinds of stuff
Speaker 2: on radio TV. He's our political go to guy down
Speaker 2: and Washington will tie in with that. George Santos News
Speaker 2: coming out of the House of Representatives. Bailey, let's start
Speaker 2: with you. We've had a little bit of a rally
Speaker 2: here in stocks in the last hour. What's pushing that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, market's picking up the two year yield hitting a
Speaker 6: low of four point five seven percent, lowest since mid June.
Speaker 6: This coming is Powell speaks. The big thing, guys, that
Speaker 6: stands out. Powell a couple of a few weeks ago
Speaker 6: said policy is restrictive. Today he's saying it's well into
Speaker 6: restrictive territory. Investors that I've been talking to, reading between
Speaker 6: the lines, taking that a bit more dubvish than he
Speaker 6: has been, so not completely going full of molly, but
Speaker 6: does seem like he's indicating more that maybe we are
Speaker 6: going to see rates peter out and maybe not see
Speaker 6: the master.
Speaker 4: I can't help sometimes but just have to roll my
Speaker 4: eyes as people's like the traders interpretation of the Fed
Speaker 4: speak it's it's mad libs. Well, I we're literally hanging
Speaker 4: on the removal or edition of one word.
Speaker 6: But I will say that Powell has been very clear
Speaker 6: and he's delivered. That's why I think it's interesting that
Speaker 6: the market's right now pricing in five cuts this year,
Speaker 6: when Powell has continued to beat the drum that higher
Speaker 6: for longer is here and they're not considering cuts anytime soon.
Speaker 2: So Joe, We've had an hour here plus to kind
Speaker 2: of digest the news coming out of Washington, DC. Representative
Speaker 2: Santos from New York expelled from the House of Representatives.
Speaker 2: What are you kind of hearing from your sources down
Speaker 2: in DC, you know, in the last hour.
Speaker 7: So well, I find it compelling that a majority of
Speaker 7: Republicans voted to keep him. Yeah, when we spoke earlier,
Speaker 7: I hadn't seen the breakdowns yet, but a majority of
Speaker 7: the Republican conference voted not to expel George Santos. I'm
Speaker 7: not sure what that means for the narrative of this
Speaker 7: is the principled party that did what needed to be done.
Speaker 7: The entire leadership voted to keep him. And look, we
Speaker 7: got through this before a little bit. Lawmakers see a
Speaker 7: precedent being set here. He's not been convicted of anything.
Speaker 7: While the Ethics Committee did recommend this action and the
Speaker 7: chairman himself brought the resolution, he's not been convicted of
Speaker 7: anything technically, and that makes other lawmakers a little uncomfortable
Speaker 7: knowing they could maybe be in the same position someday.
Speaker 4: I mean, we did kid before that. Perhaps George Santos's
Speaker 4: next big appearance could be dancing with the stars, but
Speaker 4: it's very likely that he probably prison is probably the
Speaker 4: next up.
Speaker 7: Who knows that he's got He's got to go through
Speaker 7: his trial here. But there are a lot of folks
Speaker 7: speculating on what corner of the entertainment world might be
Speaker 7: a home in the meantime for George Sands, because look,
Speaker 7: he's not going to go quietly. He's already, by the
Speaker 7: way on his way out, put up a resolution to
Speaker 7: expel Jamal Bowman, and he says he's going to take
Speaker 7: as many other lawmakers down with him as he can.
Speaker 7: So we'll be hearing from George stands Joe.
Speaker 2: I mean, the Republicans in the House only had a
Speaker 2: four seat majority as it was thin as it was
Speaker 2: now it's even thinner. Does that practically day to day
Speaker 2: going to impact their ability to drive their agenda?
Speaker 5: Not going to help?
Speaker 7: To hear Speaker Johnson say, the whole number of the
Speaker 7: House is now four to thirty four. We just, by
Speaker 7: the way, got to four thirty five for the first
Speaker 7: time in quite a while. Last week a Republican won
Speaker 7: a seat in Utah that brought us back to quorum.
Speaker 7: So now that this has happened, we're just kind of
Speaker 7: back to where we were a couple of weeks ago.
Speaker 7: The fact is, I mean, four seats is nothing, and
Speaker 7: this technically doesn't make much of a difference between it's
Speaker 7: really it's barely a majority.
Speaker 4: Just to come back to the mad libs discussion aka
Speaker 4: interpreting Fed speak, Bailey, So you know, we had Vince
Speaker 4: Agnerella on before on our chief macro strategist here at Bloomberg,
Speaker 4: and he was saying to us that what traders were
Speaker 4: also really hanging on to was this word if in
Speaker 4: the Powell statement. So the full sentence, to take the
Speaker 4: full context here is that Powl said we are prepared
Speaker 4: to tighten policy further if it becomes appropriate to do so.
Speaker 4: That another word that your traders getting hut.
Speaker 6: Up on that is one. But I will say it's
Speaker 6: been well kind of expected that the FED is done,
Speaker 6: and we've seen rates implying that. So I think to
Speaker 6: your point and kind of Vince calling it out that
Speaker 6: if we're not a big if, but they're they're.
Speaker 8: Done, condicate the optionality exactly. And that's the big thing.
Speaker 6: And that's what Powell's messaging from the start has been
Speaker 6: is keeping all doors open and not really trying to
Speaker 6: cheer on the market and just calling out right now
Speaker 6: a two year on pace four its largest drop since
Speaker 6: on a weekly basis since mid March.
Speaker 2: So he just remind us, Joe, kind of how the
Speaker 2: next steps are going to work here in terms of
Speaker 2: I guess calling for special election and all that. It
Speaker 2: happens pretty quickly, right.
Speaker 7: Yeah, this is going to be up to Kathy Hokel.
Speaker 7: There will be a special election. She's got if I
Speaker 7: remember correctly here, it's ten days after the ouster to
Speaker 7: announce the election, and then it'll have to be held
Speaker 7: within seventy to eighty days. So we'll go through this,
Speaker 7: but then we have to go through it all over
Speaker 7: again with the real election. And you know Democrats are
Speaker 7: determined to flip this seat. They think they have the
Speaker 7: votes to do it. You know, you're going to see
Speaker 7: a Swazi campaign that could do very well in that area.
Speaker 7: But Kathy Hockle will make the first move here and
Speaker 7: I suspect we'll hear from her in the coming days.
Speaker 2: All right, Very good, Joe Matthew, thanks for joining us here.
Speaker 2: A host of sound on that is one p M.
Speaker 2: Wall Street Time.
Speaker 8: Check it out.
Speaker 2: He'll have the latest reporting on what's happening in historic
Speaker 2: day in Washington, DC. And Billy Lipschutz, he covers all
Speaker 2: the markets for Bloomberg News, doing a little roundtable there
Speaker 2: on a very unique.
Speaker 4: Day here in both the jeh you know, hand in hand.
Speaker 5: Go figure. You're listening to the tape. Catch a live
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Speaker 5: from our flagship New York station Just Say Alexa, playing
Speaker 5: Bloomberg eleven thirty.
Speaker 2: George Hampton Georges. He's the president and CEO of cure
Speaker 2: Ax Pharmaceuticals. He joined us via zoom. George, your company,
Speaker 2: your cure X Pharmaceuticals. You have I Guess, a prescription
Speaker 2: medicine for overweight and abast patients. What is that and
Speaker 2: how is it playing in this market?
Speaker 9: Sure, we have Contrave. Contreve has been on the market
Speaker 9: in the United States is twenty fifteen. It's very different
Speaker 9: from the other products that you just mentioned. It's not
Speaker 9: a GLP one. It's the only oral non DEA control
Speaker 9: medication approved by the FDA for obese and overweight patients.
Speaker 9: And so it's it's been a pretty exciting year. As
Speaker 9: you mentioned, We've got you surges in our business across
Speaker 9: not just the United States, but across Europe and in
Speaker 9: all forty eight markets that we're currently operating.
Speaker 4: So something Georgia, Paul and I were wondering just as
Speaker 4: you were coming on here, is the obesity crisis in
Speaker 4: America getting any worse?
Speaker 2: Right now?
Speaker 4: Like? Why this year has it been such a breakout
Speaker 4: year for weight loss drugs? And you know, this really
Speaker 4: seemed to be something that was so top of mind
Speaker 4: in the news a couple of years ago. You know,
Speaker 4: is it getting any worse? Is it stabilizing? Like why
Speaker 4: now all this attention on weight loss drugs?
Speaker 9: Well, I think a few things when it was getting
Speaker 9: in a lot of attention a number of years ago,
Speaker 9: and then you know, the pandemic took over as a
Speaker 9: top healthcare news story over the number one epidemic, which.
Speaker 8: Is obesity in the United States. Right And so now.
Speaker 9: We've kind of be able to turn ourselves back to
Speaker 9: you know this this particular situation, obesity is not getting better.
Speaker 9: We are progressing as a society. We have over forty
Speaker 9: three percent of our adult population that's obese, projected to
Speaker 9: be almost fifty percent in the next decade. Our children
Speaker 9: coming behind us are even more obese than we are
Speaker 9: as adults. And so this is we have to intervene.
Speaker 9: And ABC is a you know, kind of a special situation.
Speaker 9: Is it's really the only chronic disease that's reached this
Speaker 9: level without any type of you know, pharmaceutical device or
Speaker 9: service intervention that's that's paid for.
Speaker 2: So but like, hasn't no zempic been in the marketplace
Speaker 2: for a while for and there's been other diabetes pharmaceutical
Speaker 2: solutions in the marketplace. Why are we now saying, hey,
Speaker 2: this can be for weight loss. Wasn't that known for
Speaker 2: a while.
Speaker 9: But I think it was known for a while. Sure,
Speaker 9: you know zepic. Importantly, it doesn't have the indication for
Speaker 9: weight loss.
Speaker 8: It's a sister product, which is.
Speaker 9: The same product at a higher dose, is called wa
Speaker 9: Gobe see commercials for that. Mon Journal from lily Is
Speaker 9: is another another diabete type two diabetes product that will
Speaker 9: also be under zep bound a new name that is
Speaker 9: uh that will be used for for weight loss. But
Speaker 9: they are essentially identical, identical products. We these tools are
Speaker 9: great tools, the g LP ones, you know, with goby
Speaker 9: and and and zep bound they are they're going to
Speaker 9: be great tools that a lot of people will be
Speaker 9: able to lose a significant amount of weight on. And
Speaker 9: they you know, when you get big companies like Novo
Speaker 9: and Lily in the marketplace, they tend to do the
Speaker 9: right thing, right. They tend to bring a great product
Speaker 9: to market and put all the products and services behind
Speaker 9: it to to help help that disease journey.
Speaker 4: So tell us more about what cure Ax offers in
Speaker 4: this space, the drug that you guys have for obesity,
Speaker 4: how somebody can take it, what they should be maybe
Speaker 4: reasonably expecting in terms of the weight loss goals, and
Speaker 4: what the drug can accomplish.
Speaker 9: Sure, so we know the product's been growing, you know,
Speaker 9: significantly over the last decade since it's been launched in
Speaker 9: the United States. We acquired the product in twenty nineteen,
Speaker 9: and we acquired it with a different lens of how
Speaker 9: to grow the product and how to make it available
Speaker 9: to patients. So the first thing we did knowing that
Speaker 9: it was a cash only market, right, so these are
Speaker 9: not covered by private insurance and they're not covered by
Speaker 9: the government yet, although we're I think we're.
Speaker 8: Starting to make some good progress.
Speaker 9: We create a program called Cure Access where any patient
Speaker 9: who's prescribed the product can actually access the product for
Speaker 9: ninety nine dollars and have.
Speaker 8: It shipped directly to their home.
Speaker 9: We put that in place as a bridge to, you know,
Speaker 9: help people start to fight this disease for themselves, until
Speaker 9: such time that that insurance and the government, you know,
Speaker 9: start start covering these products as they as they typically would.
Speaker 8: For all of the chronic diseases.
Speaker 9: We'll do well over five hundred thousand prescriptions this year
Speaker 9: just in the United States, over a million worldwide, and
Speaker 9: as I mentioned, we've got and we've got we're now
Speaker 9: in forty eight countries approved.
Speaker 4: It seems like that could be a huge opportunity for
Speaker 4: you if insurance would cover this kind of a drug.
Speaker 4: I mean, is that something that's likely to happen anytime soon?
Speaker 9: I think so. You know, the tro act, which is
Speaker 9: the treatment reduced O BCD ACTSS, has never had more
Speaker 9: support inside of both both both chambers in Washington, d C.
Speaker 9: We've we've spent a lot of time up there educating
Speaker 9: the different the different groups on exactly what this disease
Speaker 9: is are The biggest barrier really is that for the
Speaker 9: longest time, Americans and Europeans in all First world countries
Speaker 9: that view obesity as a lifestyle and you just can't.
Speaker 9: You just can't tell someone to put the pork down
Speaker 9: and go for a walk. It doesn't it doesn't work.
Speaker 9: They truly have an underlying disease that's driving their obesity.
Speaker 9: And you can see this and in families, you can
Speaker 9: see families who have a beast members and other family
Speaker 9: members who are coming from the same eating habits and
Speaker 9: lifestyles are not obese. And so you know, we finally
Speaker 9: have start, you know, start to have enough medications to
Speaker 9: make a dent in uh and we're striving this.
Speaker 2: George, your company cure Ex Pharmaceuticals. It says here in
Speaker 2: Mike Bloomberg terminal based in Marstown, New Jersey.
Speaker 9: We we were prior to the epidemic, and the epidemic
Speaker 9: we moved to Nashville, Tennessee.
Speaker 2: Okay, all right, question, why do you get if you
Speaker 2: guys are in this space which people are going crazy for,
Speaker 2: why are you still at private company? Why aren't you
Speaker 2: public or why hasn't somebody bigger acquired you?
Speaker 9: Well, our first our first goal was to establish the
Speaker 9: product in a better in a better marketplace, in a
Speaker 9: in a better position than it was in the previous hands. Right,
Speaker 9: So the company that had it before us went went
Speaker 9: bankrupt and yeah, right, and so we we established cure
Speaker 9: acts really to go after two different disease dates, you know,
Speaker 9: obesity and smoking cessation. And so we're doing a great job,
Speaker 9: I think with now the number one Oral branded product
Speaker 9: in the United States. Uh, and we have a nice
Speaker 9: we have a great product in that's phase three ready,
Speaker 9: we're negotiating with the FDA for smoking cessation. So we
Speaker 9: continue to achieve our goals. I think we're you know,
Speaker 9: we're getting we're getting a fair amount of attention now
Speaker 9: now for the obste the epidemics taken off and and
Speaker 9: we've we've yeah.
Speaker 2: All right, Well, I would say, I mean, I like Nashville.
Speaker 2: It's a great town. But there's no Jersey shore down there, dude,
Speaker 2: So I don't know.
Speaker 4: You have to excuse me because we are Jersey people
Speaker 4: in the studio.
Speaker 9: I lived in Philly for a long time. I spent
Speaker 9: a lot of time in Avalon.
Speaker 8: There you go. There's my man.
Speaker 5: All right.
Speaker 2: George Hampton, thank you so much for joining us. George
Speaker 2: is the president and see of cure Ax Pharmaceuticals, giving
Speaker 2: us some more information on these some obesity drugs, the
Speaker 2: weight loss drugs, and kind of where we are in
Speaker 2: that pipeline. A lot of options out there, and it
Speaker 2: seems like it's going to become even more pronounced going
Speaker 2: forward as these companies continue to invest.
Speaker 5: You're listening to the tape cans Are Live program Bloomberg
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Speaker 5: flagship New York station. Just say Alexa, play Bloomberg eleven thirty.
Speaker 8: Let's talk AI.
Speaker 2: Why not because that was a big driver of this
Speaker 2: market performance of this year. I couldn't tell you. I
Speaker 2: wouldn't know AI if I tripped over. But people tell
Speaker 2: me it's going to revolutionize the world. And we've got
Speaker 2: one of those folks here, Charlie Hernandez. He's to see
Speaker 2: of my pocket lawyer who joins us live here in
Speaker 2: our Bloomberg Interactive Brokers Studio. So let's start, really thirty
Speaker 2: thousand foot Charlie, what is MyPocket lawyer dot AI?
Speaker 10: Well, let me start by saying the entire legal profession
Speaker 10: is about to fundamentally change, and wait going to be
Speaker 10: without a little bit of heartburn. Okay, the world doesn't
Speaker 10: like to change, but luckily Silicon Valley is in the
Speaker 10: business of changing world.
Speaker 8: So I hear.
Speaker 10: We've got something very exciting, which is the first time
Speaker 10: AI technology is in the position where it can give reliable,
Speaker 10: high quality, and most importantly affordable legal advice online and
Speaker 10: that's going to change the landscape fundamentally.
Speaker 4: Tell us a little bit about your background, Charlie, and
Speaker 4: how you got into this.
Speaker 8: Absolutely.
Speaker 10: So I started a fintech company about four years ago
Speaker 10: after doing a JDMBA out of Harvard, So my backgrounds
Speaker 10: in business and law.
Speaker 8: But I think the important thing.
Speaker 10: Is that when we were at this fintech company, we
Speaker 10: realize that consumers who are underserved from a financial perspective
Speaker 10: also don't have access to legal resources. And this is
Speaker 10: a huge problem in the US right now, especially when
Speaker 10: you get to low income communities. Almost one hundred percent
Speaker 10: of civil legal issues go completely unaddressed. And so that's
Speaker 10: what this technology is designed to solve for, is that
Speaker 10: we really have a big problem with people not getting
Speaker 10: the legal help that they need in the US, and
Speaker 10: for the first time, we have an ability to use
Speaker 10: technology to get them that legal help.
Speaker 8: How does it work?
Speaker 10: If a beta product out right now which takes a
Speaker 10: contract that you have any sort of legal document, we
Speaker 10: will simplify it, we will summarize it, we will explain
Speaker 10: it for you.
Speaker 8: But that's really just the teaser.
Speaker 10: The real product we're launching a month from now, and
Speaker 10: that's what's going to fundamentally change everything because that is
Speaker 10: a place where you can go. Any legal question you have,
Speaker 10: you can go, you can get it answered in a
Speaker 10: reliable way. But the challenges are there are a lot
Speaker 10: of people who are afraid of this technology. Right you
Speaker 10: can imagine how lawyers would react to this. Most lawyers
Speaker 10: are anywhere between concerned too panicked.
Speaker 8: At the idea of AI.
Speaker 10: And so there are really three reasons why people have
Speaker 10: opposition to this type of technology. The first one is
Speaker 10: people are concerned that if you use AI to give
Speaker 10: legal advice online, it will cause consumer harm if it
Speaker 10: gives the wrong legal advice. Now, the answer to that,
Speaker 10: and it's a really easy one, is that there is
Speaker 10: real consumer harm happening right now every day by people who.
Speaker 8: Do not have access to legal help.
Speaker 10: The second piece of opposition is that people are concerned
Speaker 10: that this will create a two tiered system where some
Speaker 10: people will have access to lawyers wealthy people, and other
Speaker 10: people will only have access to technology. Now that is wrong,
Speaker 10: because there is already a two tiered system. Wealthy people
Speaker 10: have access to lawyers, everybody else doesn't have access to anything.
Speaker 10: And now the third piece of opposition for why people
Speaker 10: are afraid of this technology is lawyers are afraid it
Speaker 10: will take their jobs. And why I'm here to say
Speaker 10: that we've built this technology in a way that all
Speaker 10: it is going to do is get lawyers more work,
Speaker 10: more clients, access to people that never would have had
Speaker 10: access to lawyers before, and more revenue streams.
Speaker 8: So it's really a win for everything.
Speaker 2: How do you see that playing out? How does that
Speaker 2: scenario work?
Speaker 10: So there are millions of people across the country right
Speaker 10: now who don't have access to lawyers at all, and
Speaker 10: these are some of the most entrepreneurial people in our
Speaker 10: workforce right These are immigrancies or people starting businesses and
Speaker 10: they can't afford lawyers, and so in the short term,
Speaker 10: these are people who can go to a lawyer and
Speaker 10: for the first time they will have access to legal
Speaker 10: help in a much more efficient way because by the
Speaker 10: time we send people through our technology to an attorney,
Speaker 10: to our network of attorneys, it is packaged in a
Speaker 10: really efficient way that we have a memo, we have
Speaker 10: a brief put together. They know exactly what the case
Speaker 10: issue is, what the context is. We have a recommendation
Speaker 10: for the course of action. So if it used to
Speaker 10: take them three hours to bring on a new client,
Speaker 10: they can now do it in thirty minutes.
Speaker 4: So give us an example of this, Charlie. Let's say
Speaker 4: maybe I mean you're in a car accident or something
Speaker 4: and you're seeking you know, maybe you're like, oh, could
Speaker 4: I sue? Could I get damages? And so is this
Speaker 4: going to be like a smartphone app? Like what do
Speaker 4: you do?
Speaker 8: It is so easy.
Speaker 10: All you have to do is go to MyPocket Lawyer
Speaker 10: dot AI and you ask your question. It'll guide you
Speaker 10: through a series of prompts that'll say, Okay, where did
Speaker 10: this accident happen?
Speaker 8: Was it in California. Was it in New York? Do
Speaker 8: you have a driver's insurance policy? If so, upload it.
Speaker 8: We'll take a look.
Speaker 10: We'll get I guess of what your damages might be,
Speaker 10: what your liability might be. And if this is something
Speaker 10: that we can solve with the technology alone, we will.
Speaker 10: And that's it, and it's easy. If it's something that
Speaker 10: we need to escalate to a lawyer, we will look
Speaker 10: for you in your local area. We will find a
Speaker 10: lawyer that is specifically focusing on this practice area, and
Speaker 10: we will put you in touch with that person and
Speaker 10: we'll send all that information obviously with your consent to
Speaker 10: that lawyer to put you in the position to get
Speaker 10: your help you need.
Speaker 4: And you have attorneys that are like signed onto the
Speaker 4: network already that this is I mean, I guess do
Speaker 4: they see this as good for their business?
Speaker 10: So the funny thing is most attorneys are really really
Speaker 10: excited about this. There's a movement in the legal profession
Speaker 10: called the Access to Justice movement, which essentially recognizes the
Speaker 10: massive need for this type of help across the US
Speaker 10: right now and by the way, beyond the US too.
Speaker 10: And so we've had tons of attorneys tell us not
Speaker 10: only that they are really excited about this, but that
Speaker 10: they want to invest. And this is everyday attorneys, small
Speaker 10: and medium sized law firm attorneys all the way up
Speaker 10: to massive law firm partners and even some celebrity lawyers.
Speaker 2: Also, how are you funding this thing?
Speaker 8: This is where it gets really exciting.
Speaker 10: So I mentioned earlier that Silicon Valley is in the
Speaker 10: business of changing worlds. This is an eight hundred billion
Speaker 10: dollar industry and Silicon Valley is just dying to disrupt
Speaker 10: this industry. There is no more antiquated industry out there
Speaker 10: than the legal profession right now.
Speaker 8: It is so inefficient.
Speaker 10: There are so many places where we can make changes,
Speaker 10: and Silicon Valley investors are Let me ask you a question,
Speaker 10: when is the do you.
Speaker 8: Remember the first time you took an uber? Sure? Yeah,
Speaker 8: really you do? Sure?
Speaker 2: Tell me a marketing trip in La Okay?
Speaker 4: Wow, I couldn't tell you. Okay, keep going?
Speaker 10: And how much of a better experience for that is
Speaker 10: the experience that we are promising people.
Speaker 8: With my pot It's a big promise, dude, it is.
Speaker 10: And there it's all of the same challenges, right. I mean,
Speaker 10: you have this highly regulated industry. There is not a
Speaker 10: free market open and you have this embedded industry group
Speaker 10: that has access to lobbyists. There's regulatory capture at play,
Speaker 10: and they don't want to give up the revenue stream
Speaker 10: of basically what was the taxi industry group back then.
Speaker 10: That's what the legal profession is right now. That's the
Speaker 10: fight that we're waging, and I'm telling you it is
Speaker 10: going to be a war.
Speaker 2: What kind of competition? Who do you think your competition
Speaker 2: is out there? Is there any technological competition to you
Speaker 2: out there?
Speaker 10: In terms of this, we are the most technologically advanced
Speaker 10: from an AI perspective in the consumer legal tech space.
Speaker 10: Now that said, our competition really isn't other legal tech
Speaker 10: competitors or even incumbents. What the competition is is people
Speaker 10: not seeking out the help that they need. So people
Speaker 10: who don't recognize that they have a legal problem, people
Speaker 10: who don't think that they can afford a.
Speaker 8: Lawyer, people who are scared to go to a lawyer.
Speaker 10: So that can be you know, we have a lot
Speaker 10: of folks who are immigrants who need this type of
Speaker 10: help and they're scared because they're undocumented, they don't want
Speaker 10: to go to a lawyer.
Speaker 8: It can be startups who think they can afford a lawyer.
Speaker 8: It can be.
Speaker 10: Anybody who doesn't get the legal help that they need.
Speaker 10: That is the challenge is that they don't realize yet
Speaker 10: that this type of access is out there.
Speaker 4: How does this make money?
Speaker 10: It's a really good question. So it is a two
Speaker 10: process system.
Speaker 8: Basically. The first one is a subscription model.
Speaker 10: So if you think about how much it costs for
Speaker 10: somebody to go to a lawyer right now, the average
Speaker 10: hourly cost is about three hundred and fifty dollars an
Speaker 10: hour to year.
Speaker 4: It sounds low. Maybe that's my New York mind.
Speaker 8: That's because we're in New York.
Speaker 4: Okay, I'm jaded.
Speaker 10: Yeah, I mean you go in New York market and
Speaker 10: you're talking one thousand dollars twelve hundred dollars an hour,
Speaker 10: especially when you start to get into the areas of
Speaker 10: startup law, real estate law people who are trying to
Speaker 10: close on homes. But when you go to even rural
Speaker 10: areas where people don't really have access to lawyers, it's
Speaker 10: still extremely expensive to get an attorney. And so we
Speaker 10: can charge a small amounts subscription model that really is
Speaker 10: a phenomenal alternative to having to go directly to a lawyer.
Speaker 8: Now that's the first piece.
Speaker 10: The second piece is lawyers spend a ton of money
Speaker 10: every year on trying to acquire new clients, and we
Speaker 10: can make this job so much easier for them. They
Speaker 10: are huge, untapped pool of pools of consumers out there
Speaker 10: that need access to legal help and we can send
Speaker 10: all of those people to lawyers, and lawyers are willing
Speaker 10: to pay us big bucks.
Speaker 8: To do that.
Speaker 2: So where are you in terms of the rollout of
Speaker 2: this product and service.
Speaker 10: So this is where it gets really exciting. A month
Speaker 10: from now, we've got the technology built already. We are
Speaker 10: going to roll it out in about a month, and
Speaker 10: it's going to cause a It's going to ruffle a
Speaker 10: lot of feathers.
Speaker 8: I'll tell you.
Speaker 10: We've already gotten lawsuit threats, We've gotten a cease and
Speaker 10: assist from a competitor. People are not going to be
Speaker 10: happy about this, and it is going to be a big,
Speaker 10: big fight. I mean to use the Uber example again.
Speaker 10: You remember all of the challenges that they had when
Speaker 10: they came into these new cities, and the taxi industry groups,
Speaker 10: taxi and livery, the departments of transportation. They didn't want
Speaker 10: to let their golden goose go. And that is the
Speaker 10: fundamental sea change that has happened in the legal profession
Speaker 10: right now.
Speaker 4: Are there particular areas of law you think that this
Speaker 4: is going to be more successful in than others?
Speaker 10: Absolutely, So let me just give you an example. In
Speaker 10: landlord tenant law, we have an eviction filing happening every
Speaker 10: fifteen seconds here in the US. In those eviction cases,
Speaker 10: ninety percent of the landlords have access to council, only
Speaker 10: ten percent of the tenants due. And you can imagine
Speaker 10: what happens there when you're an unrepresented tenant going up
Speaker 10: against the landlord who has an expensive lawyer, You're not
Speaker 10: going to prevail. So things like landlord tenant law, things
Speaker 10: like family law, employment law, wage garnishment issues, startups who
Speaker 10: don't have access to this, small businesses who don't have
Speaker 10: access to this, debt, consumer debt, bankruptcy. Really, I mean,
Speaker 10: I hate to be so expansive, but that is really
Speaker 10: the scalability of this technology that we're talking about. It's
Speaker 10: phenomenally applicable and it really is going to change the
Speaker 10: game day one.
Speaker 2: How do you start awareness of the build awareness of
Speaker 2: this out there for your target market.
Speaker 10: So we are being as loud as we can be
Speaker 10: about the fact that there is a potential for a
Speaker 10: new world's approach here. The world could look very differently
Speaker 10: when this technology is available, and so we're trying to
Speaker 10: basically communicate it to consumers. We're saying, hey, this could
Speaker 10: be very different. You don't have to take a taxi anymore,
Speaker 10: you can take an uber. You don't have to go
Speaker 10: to an expensive lawyer right away anymore. You can go
Speaker 10: to my pocket lawyer. That's the communication process that we're doing.
Speaker 10: That's why it's really important to talk to folks like you,
Speaker 10: and I think the interesting thing that's been happening is
Speaker 10: that for probably over a decade, lawyers have recognized the
Speaker 10: challenges that the access to justice crisis represents. That lawyers
Speaker 10: are embedded. They don't want to give up the revenue
Speaker 10: streams that they have, and they think they have to.
Speaker 10: We're telling them that you don't. We're telling them that
Speaker 10: we can actually make you more money by serving more clients.
Speaker 10: And the challenge always has been the legal community doesn't
Speaker 10: communicate with the business community. Right I was a JDMBA,
Speaker 10: so I was on both the law side and the
Speaker 10: business side, and there is very little communication. I go
Speaker 10: to these law conferences, I am the only person from
Speaker 10: the business side there, and I'm especially the only person
Speaker 10: from Silicon Valley there. Silicon Valley they didn't used to
Speaker 10: invest in legal tech. That is something new for them
Speaker 10: and it is very exciting.
Speaker 2: Interesting, fascinating story. Charlie, thanks for coming in and sharing
Speaker 2: it with us. Charlee and Hernandez CEO of My Pocket Lawyer.
Speaker 2: Thanks for listening to the Bloomberg Markets podcast. You can
Speaker 2: subscribe and listen to interviews at Apple Podcasts or whatever
Speaker 2: podcast platform you prefer.
Speaker 1: I'm Matt Miller. I'm on Twitter at Matt Miller nineteen
Speaker 1: seventy three.
Speaker 2: And I'm fall Sweeney. I'm on Twitter at pt Sweeney.
Speaker 2: Before the podcast, you can always catch us worldwide at
Speaker 2: Bloomberg Radio.