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Speaker 1: our next guest. He's written about um, the US reaction
Speaker 1: and watching what's going on in Russia and Ukraine. Specifically,
Speaker 1: he's written about why the US cannot allow Russia to
Speaker 1: create a sphere of influence. He's also talking about really basically,
Speaker 1: you know, managing to some extent the information that's going
Speaker 1: out there, and how the US is learning to win
Speaker 1: the information war. How brands is Bloomberg opinion columnist Henry
Speaker 1: As entered Distinguished Professor at Johns Hopkins University School of
Speaker 1: Advanced International Studies. He's a sky all or two at
Speaker 1: the American Enterprise Institute, author of The Twilight Struggle What
Speaker 1: the Cold War teaches us about great power rivalry? Today
Speaker 1: he is on the phone in Baltimore, Maryland. How it
Speaker 1: is great to have you here with Katie and myself,
Speaker 1: So initially as you continue to see this situation in
Speaker 1: full present buying just making some comments about um, some sanctions, Um,
Speaker 1: what's your initial thoughts here? So? I think that the
Speaker 1: Biden administration has tried to strike a balance between being
Speaker 1: strong and its response to what we've seen from Russia
Speaker 1: so far, while also holding and reserve more severe sanctions
Speaker 1: that might be put in place if there's further Russian
Speaker 1: aggression in Ukraine. And so the first tranch has been
Speaker 1: fairly impressive. I think the central measure is basically putting
Speaker 1: the nord Stream two on hold, and we'll see what
Speaker 1: happens if putin goes further. And how I want to
Speaker 1: wrap this into this column that you had out on Friday,
Speaker 1: that the US can't let Russia get a sphere of influence.
Speaker 1: I mean, just listening to President Biden speak, some of
Speaker 1: the headlines coming out saying that you know, Biden still
Speaker 1: believes Russia's poised to go much further, that this is
Speaker 1: the beginning of a Russia invasion. I mean, if you could,
Speaker 1: you know, look inside the President's mind right now, would
Speaker 1: you say that this is the fear, that that's what
Speaker 1: Russia wants to create a sphere of influence. I think
Speaker 1: that's certainly what the Biden administration fears, in part because
Speaker 1: Putin has mobilized a force that is far bigger than
Speaker 1: he need simply send some so called peacekeepers into the
Speaker 1: done boss. If you'll take Putin's rhetoric seriously, He's talked
Speaker 1: about rebuilding the influence of the Soviet Union used to have.
Speaker 1: He's called the collapse of the Soviet Union the great
Speaker 1: geopolitical tragedy of the twentieth century. And so I think
Speaker 1: at this point it's only prudent to expect that his
Speaker 1: objectives are not limited to Eastern Ukraine. Isn't it kind
Speaker 1: of ironic? Though? The U s is okay about it
Speaker 1: being involved in spheres of influence and being the great influencer,
Speaker 1: and yet it's very uncomfortable with others. There is a
Speaker 1: certain irony to the out of of course, there's critics
Speaker 1: might call it hypocrisy. But of course the big difference
Speaker 1: is that most countries want to be part of America's
Speaker 1: sphere of influence with the dynamic that's obviously absent from
Speaker 1: the Russian case. And so there are a very few
Speaker 1: countries that are trying to leave America's system of alliances today.
Speaker 1: There are many many more that would prefer to be
Speaker 1: part of that system. It's the opposite when you look
Speaker 1: at the countries around Russia's periphery. So just to follow then,
Speaker 1: So what's really at stake here? And if Russia is
Speaker 1: allowed to have too much of its way and sway,
Speaker 1: if you will, in the region, what are the implications
Speaker 1: the longer term implications, Well, there would be a sustained
Speaker 1: crisis of security along NATO's eastern frontier as Russia gather
Speaker 1: strength and postures its forces more menacingly in Ukraine and Belarus,
Speaker 1: in addition to on its own territory. And I think
Speaker 1: one of the concerns and American policymakers have always had
Speaker 1: is that when aggressive authoritarian regimes are able to carve
Speaker 1: out a fear of influence, they don't necessarily stop there.
Speaker 1: They might simply use it as a platform to push further.
Speaker 1: And so I think the fear in the in the
Speaker 1: United States and in many European capitals would be that
Speaker 1: Putin would use a strengthened position in Eastern Europe to
Speaker 1: apply greater pressure to the Baltic States or Poland, for instance.
Speaker 1: And how I want to turn to another piece you
Speaker 1: had out for Bloomberg opinion that the US is learning
Speaker 1: to win the information more and you highlight that the
Speaker 1: Biden administration they've been willing to publicly release sensitive intelligence
Speaker 1: on Russia. I was telling Carroll earlier that I was
Speaker 1: listening to Biden speak on Friday, and I was kind
Speaker 1: of shocked to hear him say that he expects invasion
Speaker 1: within the next few days, within the next week, you know,
Speaker 1: to hear that from the President, it's not not something
Speaker 1: we've gotten used to. And I'm curious what you think
Speaker 1: is behind that strategy shift. Well, part of it is
Speaker 1: about forcing Putin to pay as higher price as possible
Speaker 1: for what he's doing in Ukraine, and part by depriving
Speaker 1: him of the ambiguity and s rise in which he
Speaker 1: likes to cloak his actions. And so the United States
Speaker 1: is trying to get out ahead of Russian moves is
Speaker 1: a way of rallying the broadest possible coalition to to
Speaker 1: punish those moves when they occur. I think the other
Speaker 1: thing that's happening those United States has learned that it
Speaker 1: simply has to be faster when it comes to responding
Speaker 1: to disinformation, whether in this or other context. That we've
Speaker 1: seen that the Russians are certainly going to try to
Speaker 1: create a variety of of lies and this truth around
Speaker 1: their role in Ukraine, perhaps inventing Ukrainian provocations. And the
Speaker 1: only way the United States is going to be able
Speaker 1: to push back against that disinformation is by getting its
Speaker 1: own story out more quickly, right. And it also is
Speaker 1: kind of uh, I guess how you could say is hey, guys,
Speaker 1: we know what you're doing even before it is publicly known,
Speaker 1: like we're on it. That's right. I mean, there's certainly
Speaker 1: some messaging going on here that the U. S Intelligence
Speaker 1: has very good information not simply on Russian troop movements
Speaker 1: and military preparations, but on the innermost decision making of
Speaker 1: the regime. And I would imagine that some of these
Speaker 1: releases are meant to create a certain sense of doubt
Speaker 1: or even dissension within the regime by advertising the fact
Speaker 1: that it's intermost communications are presumably compromised. What's the risk
Speaker 1: of doing this though on the part of present vine,
Speaker 1: especially if you get something wrong, well, you you could
Speaker 1: look foolish. If you get something wrong, you could promote
Speaker 1: crisis fatigue. If you're constantly warning about an imminent invasion,
Speaker 1: you can also blow sources and methods, and so of
Speaker 1: the United States too aggressively publicized information that it has
Speaker 1: obtained through sensitive sources, it could make it easier for
Speaker 1: the Kremlin to figure out what the conduit for that
Speaker 1: information is in the first place. And so there's certainly
Speaker 1: a balancing of risks that that that has to be
Speaker 1: involved here. All right, we're gonna leave it on that note. Listen,
Speaker 1: we really appreciate your insight, uh and taking some time
Speaker 1: to chat with us. How brands Henry A. Kiss Into
Speaker 1: a distinguished professor at Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced
Speaker 1: International Studies. He is a Bloomberg opinion columnist, and as
Speaker 1: we mentioned, he's got a book that's very timely right now.
Speaker 1: It is entitled The Twilight Struggle. What the Cold War
Speaker 1: teaches us about great power rivalry today? Joining us on
Speaker 1: the phone from Baltimore. The pandemic really taught us big
Speaker 1: time the importance of connectivity, and for many of us,
Speaker 1: I think Katie, it's saved to say, were kind of
Speaker 1: shocked at how well it worked thanks to advancements and technology, Like,
Speaker 1: it's amazing what everybody was able to get done. Yeah. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: I mean it felt like life as we know. It
Speaker 1: moved online for everyone, for workers, for students, for everyone.
Speaker 1: We did okay, we did okay, We're doing okay, not perfect,
Speaker 1: not equal, but still impressive. Back with us and working
Speaker 1: on creating the connected campus is Transact Campus ces Nancy Linger.
Speaker 1: She joins us once again on the phone in Phoenix, Arizona. Nancy,
Speaker 1: nice to have you here with Katie and myself. How
Speaker 1: are you. I'm good, How are you kill doing okay?
Speaker 1: Doing okay? Managing through and just trying to, you know,
Speaker 1: take take in everything that keeps continually being continuously being
Speaker 1: thrown at us. So remind our audience about what you
Speaker 1: are up to and specifically how you're doing it. Yeah. So,
Speaker 1: Transit Campus, we're we're really in two different business lines.
Speaker 1: One is payments, both tuition payments as well as non
Speaker 1: tuition payments on higher ED generally higher ED campuses. So
Speaker 1: we have the software that UH handles really parents are
Speaker 1: students going into to make all of their tuition, room
Speaker 1: and board type payments integrated deeply into the to the
Speaker 1: university systems. And then we have on campus things like
Speaker 1: point of sales software, mobile ordering KIOSK especially important right
Speaker 1: with kind of where the world's gone with contact lists.
Speaker 1: And then we have UM what we call campus i
Speaker 1: D so those ideas that students used to navigate in
Speaker 1: buildings but also contains UH stored value where they can
Speaker 1: load funds to actually transact on campus and also to
Speaker 1: some extent off campus leveraging those funds. And most of
Speaker 1: that we've really moved to a mobile credentials. So we've
Speaker 1: got about we've got about the universities twelve million plus
Speaker 1: students that we service in some capacity in those in
Speaker 1: those solutions. So twelve million students that you have some
Speaker 1: insight onto. I'm curious, you know this stop and start
Speaker 1: emerging from the pandemic. I mean, one of my in
Speaker 1: laws is still in college and it feels like, I
Speaker 1: don't know, trying to come back from winter break was
Speaker 1: definitely a difficult thing. To do as we as colleges
Speaker 1: try to emerge from the pandemic. What have you noticed
Speaker 1: in how that's affected students spending habits? Yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: I think in you tracked the spending habits, you know,
Speaker 1: tuition is always the largest obviously it's about forty thousand
Speaker 1: over four years, and then comes renting room and board,
Speaker 1: which is about seventeen thousand, and you get into the
Speaker 1: personal spending and I can't tell we have a a
Speaker 1: you know, deep deep knowledge, but I would say we've
Speaker 1: seen most of that trending pretty typical, you know, in
Speaker 1: terms of dining, you know, food being next probably for
Speaker 1: an dollars a month or so that they spend either
Speaker 1: on a meal plan. But you do see definitely an
Speaker 1: up to take no surprise in you know the grub
Speaker 1: hub or eats, you know, kind of restaurant delivery, meal,
Speaker 1: field delivery, kind of expenses that have kind of uh,
Speaker 1: you know, eclipsed what generally students have been been spending on. So, Nancy,
Speaker 1: I always wonder about, like, in terms of college spending,
Speaker 1: what kids are spending on. What does it tell you,
Speaker 1: if anything, about what's going on more broadly in terms
Speaker 1: of consumer spending or the you know kind of economic
Speaker 1: outlook or or sometimes I feel like colleges are just
Speaker 1: some extent insulated maybe from what's more broadly going on economy,
Speaker 1: but but maybe not so. So I'm curious how you
Speaker 1: see it. Yeah, I mean I would say, like I said,
Speaker 1: I think you see the trend in really convenience space
Speaker 1: spending right where where you know, they're spending a little
Speaker 1: more to have kind of contact lists, uh, kind of
Speaker 1: um delivery, whether it's it's food or other items. UM.
Speaker 1: I think that you know that they clearly are spending
Speaker 1: less on you know, kind of academic curriculum stuff, mostly
Speaker 1: because that's fun digital light that used to be a
Speaker 1: fairly high item for them, but that's lower. But they
Speaker 1: are spending more on you know, kind of personal expenses,
Speaker 1: and I think a lot of that goes to convenience
Speaker 1: based and some of that just kind of a trend
Speaker 1: with millennial but some of that I think is tied
Speaker 1: to kind of COVID and just what's gone on with
Speaker 1: you know, how we want to engage and make purchases
Speaker 1: and it's I want to talk a little bit about
Speaker 1: transact campus and uh, some of the deals that you've
Speaker 1: made recently because you've announced some new partnerships with Apple, Google,
Speaker 1: grub Hub. Really the list goes on. Yeah. So so
Speaker 1: when you think about our mobile credential, which today again
Speaker 1: it it holds the stored value that a student would
Speaker 1: use to make purchases, but it's also what they used
Speaker 1: to kind of navigate securely through campus, and it was
Speaker 1: critical that we embedded that and integrated that first into
Speaker 1: both the Apple and Google wallet. So that's that's, that's
Speaker 1: you know, just um kind of table stakes in terms
Speaker 1: of having those kind of partners with you know, with
Speaker 1: the population that that we serve. And then you look
Speaker 1: at you know, we have point of sales software on
Speaker 1: campus and we have mobile ordering, you know, which which
Speaker 1: is in kind of a closed campus environment, but wanting
Speaker 1: to extend that out to where they can leverage that
Speaker 1: outside of campus um at at merchants, but also through
Speaker 1: a grub hub or we're speaking with Uber eat store Dash,
Speaker 1: all of those, Uh, just makes sense in terms of
Speaker 1: how students really want to make perstances and transact right
Speaker 1: a broad array of offerings and the more you can
Speaker 1: kind of load it becomes kind of a full service. Hey, Nancy,
Speaker 1: thanks for the update. Nancy Langer, she's CEO a TRANSAC
Speaker 1: campus on the phone from Phoenix, Arizona. So one of
Speaker 1: the stories that definitely is a must read today. It's
Speaker 1: also among our most righte on the Bloomberg Today. It
Speaker 1: has a line. It's starts with US business is getting
Speaker 1: ready for long inflation. So let's get to it. Sean
Speaker 1: donnin Is Bloomberg New Senior writer for Economics on the
Speaker 1: phone in Maryland. Inflation. Inflation, inflation, Sean, your story is
Speaker 1: so relevant, especially when it comes to our discussions about
Speaker 1: what's going on in the economy and what we might
Speaker 1: get from the Fed. Next. What are you guys hearing?
Speaker 1: What were you reporting on? Yeah? Look, I mean we've
Speaker 1: all been hearing about higher inflation for some time now,
Speaker 1: and I guess when you start calling around to US
Speaker 1: businesses and asking what they're expecting, their answer is you
Speaker 1: should expect to hear about it for a little bit longer.
Speaker 1: Uh maybe longer than a lot of people expect right now.
Speaker 1: And that's you know, this is a big question confronting
Speaker 1: the Federal Reserve at its meeting in March. It's going
Speaker 1: to get to work, and we're expecting it to raise
Speaker 1: interest rates. They really telegraphed that that's the beginning of
Speaker 1: a fight against the inflation. But that's going to take
Speaker 1: some time, economists say, And businesses are still looking at
Speaker 1: this year and think they're gonna have to deal with
Speaker 1: elevated inflation for some time. And sean, where do wage increases,
Speaker 1: you know, the cost of labor factor into this, because
Speaker 1: that's where inflation ticket really sticky, right exactly. And look,
Speaker 1: so already we've seen, uh, you know, a lot of
Speaker 1: people calling last year the you know, the return of
Speaker 1: the power of labor. We saw those strikes of places
Speaker 1: like John Deere that yielded some big wage increases for
Speaker 1: for workers there. But that's not over, if anything, that's
Speaker 1: building speed. And that's a big worry for the FED
Speaker 1: who worry about the kind of wage price spiral in
Speaker 1: other words, that as higher prices cause workers to add
Speaker 1: ask for higher wages, that leads to higher prices as
Speaker 1: companies try to pass on the cost of those higher
Speaker 1: wages and and so on. M you talked to, you know,
Speaker 1: I was talking to a guy called Brian Nelson who
Speaker 1: is works for an agricultural equipment parts maker called hcc UH.
Speaker 1: They're based in Illinois. Uh. They are a big supplier
Speaker 1: to John Deere. Uh, and you know what it's going
Speaker 1: to hurt him this year, he says, is he's going
Speaker 1: into wage negotiations with the U a W who just
Speaker 1: negotiated a new contract with John Deere, and he's expecting
Speaker 1: a lot of the same there. You talked to other folks,
Speaker 1: a lot of small manufacturers, and they're expecting UH to
Speaker 1: have to raise wages again pretty aggressively, just to keep
Speaker 1: up with the competition and to get out ahead of inflation.
Speaker 1: You know, Sean, I can't help but feel, especially coming
Speaker 1: off the financial crisis, we were in such a period
Speaker 1: of low inflation for so long that we were all
Speaker 1: kind of shocked by it, right, And then I wonder
Speaker 1: would we still be in that period of low inflation
Speaker 1: had we not gone through the pandemic, or were we
Speaker 1: starting to see signs that something was changing in our
Speaker 1: inflationary environment that was just different fundamentally. Well, look, I
Speaker 1: mean the big irony is that before the pandemic, the
Speaker 1: FED was really hoping to get a little bit more
Speaker 1: inflation in the economy, right. Uh. We we there was
Speaker 1: a hope that you get running the economy that they
Speaker 1: wanted to run the economy a little bit hotter. And
Speaker 1: President Trump certainly made that point over and over again.
Speaker 1: He wasn't necessarily after higher prices, but he wanted faster growth.
Speaker 1: And we've seen that this time around with the response
Speaker 1: to the to the pandemic, the economic crisis side of
Speaker 1: the pandemic, that everyone has has done their work to
Speaker 1: get the faster growth and it's gotten this higher inflation
Speaker 1: that's there, and the big question now is how long
Speaker 1: that sticks around. One of the really interesting things right
Speaker 1: now is a really interesting note doubt from JP Morgan's
Speaker 1: chief economist UH last week making a point that we
Speaker 1: all of the models that we have now for inflation
Speaker 1: don't really explain what's going on now with inflation. And
Speaker 1: that raises a big question, and that is are we
Speaker 1: entering a new era of higher inflation or are we
Speaker 1: going to go back to what we saw pre pandemic?
Speaker 1: And a lot of economists are are betting that we're
Speaker 1: going to have higher inflation for longer and that's gonna
Speaker 1: have consequences for businesses and consumers and the economy as
Speaker 1: a whole for some time. And if we are heading
Speaker 1: into that environment, I mean you highlight in the piece
Speaker 1: that for some companies actually persistently high inflation, it's not
Speaker 1: so bad, right. I mean, if you're a Walmart and
Speaker 1: competitors are charging higher prices, there's an argument that and
Speaker 1: an argument that executives there make that that's actually good
Speaker 1: for business. It draws more customers uh their way. We
Speaker 1: also talked to the CEO of the price comparison site Trivago.
Speaker 1: He said, look, if people are are spooped by higher
Speaker 1: prices out there, they're going to spend more time on
Speaker 1: price comparison shot fights looking for for bargains. So there's
Speaker 1: always a little bit of an outside, but you know,
Speaker 1: it becomes a grind for for for a lot of families,
Speaker 1: and and that's something that we're going to have to
Speaker 1: get used to thinking to a little bit more about
Speaker 1: the purchases. I think we felt a lot of people
Speaker 1: felt flush through the pandemic. They weren't spending as much
Speaker 1: on commuting. They weren't they were getting the government stimulus
Speaker 1: checks and so on, and they were spending that on
Speaker 1: goods or home renovations, right, and so on. We may
Speaker 1: be entering a period where we have to think a
Speaker 1: little bit more about what we buy. Yeah, gosh, that's
Speaker 1: no no joke. Hey. I do also love in your
Speaker 1: story where you talk about this h c C president
Speaker 1: Brian Nelson and how because of higher inflation he had
Speaker 1: to put off his retirement because the board wanted this
Speaker 1: seven years seventy year old to stay on. Somebody who
Speaker 1: understood an inflationary environment just got twenty seconds. I mean,
Speaker 1: we're seeing this right. We want executives will understand this
Speaker 1: cycle just quickly. Absolutely, And Brian makes the point, Look,
Speaker 1: I went through this in the nineties, and I'm not
Speaker 1: freaking out this time because that's been through it before.
Speaker 1: He also does business in Brazil, and you know what
Speaker 1: he's doing. He's getting his people in Brazil to treating
Speaker 1: these people in the US and how to deal with inflation,
Speaker 1: how to ask customers for higher prices. Alright, good stuff.
Speaker 1: Shawn Donna and senior economics writer up bloom News on
Speaker 1: the phone in Maryland. You're listening to Bloomberg Business Weeek
Speaker 1: Carl Master, Katie Greifeld, and this is Bloomberg Radio. Well,
Speaker 1: the future is schmir so, says our next guest website,
Speaker 1: who founded Better Brand. It's a company that's attracted investments
Speaker 1: from Reddit co founder Alexis o'hanian, also the grandson of
Speaker 1: Wendy's founder excuse me, Dave Thomas, also actress Emmy Rossum
Speaker 1: and more. Here with what she is doing to create
Speaker 1: the Better Bagel is Amy Yang. She's founder of the
Speaker 1: Better Brand and she's on the phone in l A. Amy.
Speaker 1: Nice to have you here with Katie and myself here
Speaker 1: on Bloomberg Radio. So tell us about your company and
Speaker 1: what you're up to. Hey guys, thanks so much for
Speaker 1: having me and thrilled to be here. Um so yeah,
Speaker 1: to share a little bit more about Better Brand. We are,
Speaker 1: you know, a food tech company and leading innovation in
Speaker 1: the refined carb space. Right. So our mission is really
Speaker 1: creates a world where you know, we can eat freely
Speaker 1: without worrying about and weight gain or negative health consequences
Speaker 1: and and without having to compromise is on you know
Speaker 1: what in paste, text, or flavor or basically in any way.
Speaker 1: And you know what better way to showcase that innovation
Speaker 1: and start them by turning the most car heavy food, um,
Speaker 1: you know, a bagel into the carb equivalent of let's say,
Speaker 1: two slices of banana. Sounds sounds really good. Sounds really good. Yeah,
Speaker 1: how exactly do you do that? Walk us through that process, because,
Speaker 1: like you said, to the same net carbs as two
Speaker 1: banana slices seem amount of protein as four eggs. That's
Speaker 1: what really caught my eye. Yeah. Yeah, you know, it
Speaker 1: was a long innovation journey and um, you know a
Speaker 1: lot of people referred to better brand as you know,
Speaker 1: the beyond need of cards, right, And I think that's
Speaker 1: a really great way of thinking about it and understanding
Speaker 1: you know exactly, you know, what we had to do
Speaker 1: to get where we are in terms of you know,
Speaker 1: on the focus on R and D there and so,
Speaker 1: but you know, to dive a little bit deeper, it
Speaker 1: really comes down to you know, um, preparatory ingredient formulation
Speaker 1: and in process. Okay, so I'm going to jump in
Speaker 1: when you say a proprietary ingredient formulation. It's a little
Speaker 1: bit of a red flag for me because I like
Speaker 1: to know what I'm eating and increasingly we're in a
Speaker 1: consumer space. We want to know how are the things
Speaker 1: we wear, who produces it, where it's made, who's manufactured,
Speaker 1: is it fair labor, is it sustainable? When it comes
Speaker 1: to food, we're equally increasingly looking at that. So tell
Speaker 1: me what you can tell us about Yeah, I agree,
Speaker 1: and I would actually think that with food it's even
Speaker 1: more important to be transparent, right because it's something that
Speaker 1: that we consume and expects you know us you know, physically,
Speaker 1: physiologically and everything between. So so when we were focused
Speaker 1: on development of better brand, um, you know, we were
Speaker 1: focused on completely clean label, non GMO ingredients. And what
Speaker 1: I mean by preparatory blend is um. You know, all
Speaker 1: the ingredients are you know, wide listed on the label,
Speaker 1: but just in terms of the specialty ingredients we've really
Speaker 1: been able to develop and use. UM. But you know,
Speaker 1: again completely clean label and non GMO and and transparent
Speaker 1: in every way. UM. So to just kind of dive
Speaker 1: into that a little bit more in terms of specialty ingredients,
Speaker 1: so you know, UM, the first ingredient on on our
Speaker 1: ingredient list is is a modified wheat starch, right, So
Speaker 1: so what is that wheat start? Okay, and so so
Speaker 1: you know what does that really mean? Right? So, so
Speaker 1: it's a Nephew actually approved source of fiber um and
Speaker 1: you know it's classified as an RS for Type of
Speaker 1: Existance search, which means that's actually indigestible in the upper
Speaker 1: gastro intestinal tract um. So so if you think about that,
Speaker 1: you know, in the terms of consumption, right, and so,
Speaker 1: typically you have wheat search that's starggested by you know,
Speaker 1: an enzyme in the body called um alpha amblaise. And
Speaker 1: what that does is then you know, the refined carbs
Speaker 1: and sugars released throughout your body and drives up insulin levels,
Speaker 1: which you know causes the body tostore access calories and
Speaker 1: and so what we've been able to do is actually
Speaker 1: modify that wheat to where that and it's not penetrable
Speaker 1: from the emilyse so and and it's not um, so
Speaker 1: it's not able to be absorbed by the body, is
Speaker 1: indigestible in your gas row intestinal tract and therefore functions
Speaker 1: as a dietary fiber um while retaining all the distal
Speaker 1: laptic properties of the wheat. So you know, it still
Speaker 1: allows us to make all the foods that we crave
Speaker 1: um and the way that we crave them, but you know,
Speaker 1: without any of the negative health side effects or um
Speaker 1: or guilt and so, I mean, you've been compared to
Speaker 1: the beyond meat of grains, but some of the pushback
Speaker 1: that I hear about the Beyond Meat products is that
Speaker 1: the texture is totally off that you know, it's not
Speaker 1: quite like eating real meat. And you know, when you're
Speaker 1: designing the Better Bagel, I mean, are you going for
Speaker 1: you know, something that's if you bite into it, it's
Speaker 1: indistinguishable from a bagel, or are you trying for you know,
Speaker 1: maybe just a different unique taste. We're going for. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, when a consumer bites into that bagel, they
Speaker 1: feel the entire joyous experience of what it's like to
Speaker 1: eat a traditional bagel. You know, there's never that feel
Speaker 1: of oh, I have to compromise, um, but whereas you know,
Speaker 1: rather it's it's kind of that feel of oh wow,
Speaker 1: you know, how is it possible that this entire bagel
Speaker 1: is the carb equivalent of two slices of banana? Um?
Speaker 1: And I can you know, have three bagels and in
Speaker 1: the morning if if I want without ever having to
Speaker 1: worry or feel guilty or feel like I'm doing something
Speaker 1: you know that's that's not great for my body. UM.
Speaker 1: And so that's how that was kind of our goal.
Speaker 1: And we're really really excited about, you know, kind of
Speaker 1: sharing the better bagel with you know the world, um,
Speaker 1: and and kind of stemming forward from from there. You mean,
Speaker 1: you know, if you do a Google start. Guys have
Speaker 1: been raising a bunch of money from certainly some high
Speaker 1: profile individuals. Um, where are you guys in terms of
Speaker 1: product to market? I'm just curious about what's the consumer
Speaker 1: side of this and the consumer ramp up side of this. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So you know, I fundamentally believe as a founder that
Speaker 1: you know, if you believe in your product, in your mission,
Speaker 1: then you should get the product out in the markets
Speaker 1: as soon as you can, right because one that's the
Speaker 1: only way you're able to learn and collect data and
Speaker 1: really run an efficient company. To UM, you know, it's
Speaker 1: important to to take the consumer on on the journey
Speaker 1: with you right as you put your story forgiving because
Speaker 1: we're running out of time. But in thirty seconds, like
Speaker 1: are you placing our who's placing orders with you? What's
Speaker 1: what are we seeing in terms of kind of the
Speaker 1: balance sheet, in terms of top and bottom line? Just
Speaker 1: very quickly. Yeah, so we actually hit a million dollar
Speaker 1: run rate within three months of launch. And I've really
Speaker 1: d to see at eat better dot com um, you know,
Speaker 1: and it's really about this, this transformative vision of creating
Speaker 1: that world where you know, we can eat freely without
Speaker 1: compromise in any way. We'll stay in touch and let
Speaker 1: us know how things are ramping up. Amy Yang, she's
Speaker 1: found her better brand. On the phone from l A. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but you let me drive. No, no, no, I'll do gravels.
Speaker 1: I want to drive. It's a good question, but drive.
Speaker 1: This is the drive to the clothes on Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: All right, just coming up on ten minutes away from
Speaker 1: that closing bell on this Tuesday, as to shortened holiday
Speaker 1: trading week. But nonetheless, it's been kind of a wacky
Speaker 1: Tuesday to say the least, and of course driven by
Speaker 1: geopolitical up concerns. Our next guest notes that the SMP
Speaker 1: is down ten percent. Maybe I think we thought earlier
Speaker 1: wasn't about little We're definitely through. It seems like we've
Speaker 1: bounced back a little bit. Yeah, definitely. And but the
Speaker 1: average stock, he noted, is down or more. So. Let's
Speaker 1: get to it with Walter A. Todd, President and Chief
Speaker 1: investment Officer Greenwood Capital Associates, on the phone from Greenwood,
Speaker 1: South Carolina. Walter, so nice to have you here with
Speaker 1: Kitty Greifeld and myself. So all right, let's just talk
Speaker 1: about the day. First of all, A lot of volatility,
Speaker 1: it seems we know where it's coming from. Uh, I
Speaker 1: don't know, how do you factor in a day like
Speaker 1: today into your longer term thinking about the financial markets? Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: good afternoon, Thanks for having me on. Yeah, you know
Speaker 1: it's going to be an interesting day. When you pull
Speaker 1: up the old G I P on the Bloomberg terminology,
Speaker 1: hundred s and P points on the right hand scale.
Speaker 1: Um so, yeah, it has been very volatile, is very
Speaker 1: fluid situation. UM. I think it's important in times like
Speaker 1: these for us is just to kind of, you know,
Speaker 1: try to step back and look at you know, try
Speaker 1: to maybe dig in on some individual names and you know,
Speaker 1: earning stories that we're still getting despite all these headlines
Speaker 1: kind of whipping things around. And I think, you know,
Speaker 1: it can present opportunities for companies maybe that have just
Speaker 1: reported that maybe don't have that much exposure to this
Speaker 1: situation directly that you are getting caught up in this
Speaker 1: this macro trade. Yeah, and I mean it's interesting to
Speaker 1: hear you say, you know you want to dig in
Speaker 1: on specific companies. I mean Home depot comes to mind,
Speaker 1: because man, their gross margins really didn't look too great
Speaker 1: compared to a year ago. I mean zooming out and
Speaker 1: looking at that at a macro level, I mean, what
Speaker 1: does that tell you in terms of how companies are
Speaker 1: dealing with inflation? What the read through into markets is. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that's you know, the quarters being reported. Of
Speaker 1: course we're looking back are great, right, And to your point,
Speaker 1: they're looking forward. It's the guidance and the issues around
Speaker 1: the supply chain and what that means for margins in
Speaker 1: terms of the input costs, et cetera. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I'm not surprised that time depots down on the guidance.
Speaker 1: I'm a little bit surprised at the magnitude of the move. Um.
Speaker 1: I don't know why. I was a surprise that growth
Speaker 1: is gonna slow after EPs years. But no, I understand
Speaker 1: you know the dynamic there, and I do think it
Speaker 1: speaks to a bigger issue. It's it's a combination of
Speaker 1: the input costs, but also you know, the demand side
Speaker 1: is good, but it's it's moderating. I mean, let's face
Speaker 1: the consumers are having to deal with a lot of
Speaker 1: other you know, input costs, themselves a little the gasoline, food,
Speaker 1: et cetera. That are going to kind of cramp their
Speaker 1: ability to spend on what they've been spending on for
Speaker 1: the past you know, two years or so. So how
Speaker 1: do it make sense though, of the economic data? Is
Speaker 1: that fundamentally something that you think is important? Um? US
Speaker 1: consumer confidence dropping to a five month low on inflation concerns. Um.
Speaker 1: So we see that playing out. Meantime, some decent strong
Speaker 1: pm I data on the manufacturing and servants sector. So,
Speaker 1: you know, when we kind of get rid of all
Speaker 1: of the chaos and the static out there, I mean, fundamentally,
Speaker 1: what kind of backdrop is there for the US economy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's very I would say confusing at this point. I mean,
Speaker 1: aside from the geopolitical headlines, like you said, when you
Speaker 1: look at these various inputs, you know, like you said,
Speaker 1: the p m I is the market numbers this morning,
Speaker 1: we're pretty good, actually pretty strong. But then you look
Speaker 1: at consumer competence conference boards. Okay, but the Michigan number
Speaker 1: you know last week, as you know in recession territory,
Speaker 1: and you know, some of these Federal Reserve surveys or
Speaker 1: week as well. So it's a very mixed, and again
Speaker 1: I think it's important to go back to see what
Speaker 1: companies are telling you, and I would say that the
Speaker 1: message from management teams is not as dire as some
Speaker 1: of the macro headlines or data points that we're getting.
Speaker 1: It still seems pretty healthy. I would point to Walmart's
Speaker 1: quarter um last week, which was pretty upbeat on their
Speaker 1: on their outlook, which is a little bit surprising, quite honestly,
Speaker 1: so I think, man, it speaks to the broader right,
Speaker 1: a wider swath of the US economy. Is that fair
Speaker 1: to say? I would say so definitely, you know, lower
Speaker 1: income kind of dynamic there. But still again the pretty
Speaker 1: upbeat message from the CEO about what they're seeing from
Speaker 1: the consumer. But again it's just a lot of different
Speaker 1: cross currents here flying um from from a macro standpoint,
Speaker 1: that are that are moving individual stocks in the markets
Speaker 1: around pretty ugg resting, and those cross currents from a
Speaker 1: macro perspective, let's just walk through of them. I mean,
Speaker 1: we have the earning season. I mean, again, it was
Speaker 1: pretty strong, but you did start to see, uh, maybe
Speaker 1: some not so great news coming out from companies such
Speaker 1: as Home Depot. You have geopolitical tensions, you also have
Speaker 1: the FED to worry about, and I would love to
Speaker 1: hear your perspective on how you think FED officials are
Speaker 1: looking across the balance of risks right now. And I
Speaker 1: do want to point out the yield curve looks very
Speaker 1: very flat right now through forty basis points on that
Speaker 1: very key two's tense curve. Yeah. Absolutely, Okay, it's a
Speaker 1: great point. And you know, it's funny, we're basically the
Speaker 1: same face on the SMP that we were in the
Speaker 1: first week of October last year from a level standpoint,
Speaker 1: but you look at kind of the changes on the
Speaker 1: FED outlook back then there was one hike estimated today
Speaker 1: six um. You know, the two years at twenty eight
Speaker 1: basis points today as at three UM. So very different
Speaker 1: backdrop from the FEDS. And I don't en be their
Speaker 1: position right now because their growth is clearly slowing. It's
Speaker 1: the question of how much is more permanent versus I'm
Speaker 1: a crime related etcetera. But then at the same time,
Speaker 1: you've got this inflationary event going on geo politically politically,
Speaker 1: spiking energy prices, et cetera. So I don't I don't
Speaker 1: envy their position, but I think they're going to probably
Speaker 1: go slow at first and then speed up if they
Speaker 1: have to, based on the balance of what we've heard
Speaker 1: from from all the individuals, which are which is quite
Speaker 1: a bit of commentary unfortunately from the FED presidents themselves
Speaker 1: and create even more confusion. Walter just quickly just got
Speaker 1: about thirty seconds you you know, shared with us some
Speaker 1: notes about the S and P down from its highs
Speaker 1: average stockdown or more. Does that mean there's some buying
Speaker 1: opportunities in your view? And just quickly yeah, I do.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think it's across sectors. There's a lot
Speaker 1: of focus on on technology have been hit the hardest,
Speaker 1: but I think you can dive into individual sectors across
Speaker 1: the board and look at the opportunities in healthcare and industrials, uh,
Speaker 1: in financials and even you know energy pulling back here
Speaker 1: off of the oil movie. So I think I think
Speaker 1: there are some significant opportunities, particularly on the cap scale,
Speaker 1: smaller cap stocks. If you have some bit harder than
Speaker 1: somebody gives you some new money just twenty seconds, where
Speaker 1: would you put it to work? Right now? Yeah, So
Speaker 1: just some individual names that we hold that we've found
Speaker 1: very trying to have already reported drop Box Cisco qualcom
Speaker 1: in fell J M J. Biogen. All right, that's pretty
Speaker 1: interesting for our client. Okay, good to know. Love specificity.
Speaker 1: 'm Walter Todd, Thank you, Thank you. He is President
Speaker 1: and chief investment Officer at Greenwood Capital Associates. On the
Speaker 1: phone from Greenwood, South Carolina. Thanks for listening to Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Business Week. Download the podcast on iTunes, SoundCloud, or Bloomberg
Speaker 1: dot com. And you can also listen to our radio
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