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Are Americans getting better with their credit cards? · The Financial Exchange Show

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  Speaker 1: Zada and Mike Armstrong.
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  Speaker 2: Chuck, Mike and Tucker with you and taking the look
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  Speaker 2: at equity markets today. They're closed in observance of the
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  Speaker 2: last day of Jimmy.
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  Speaker 3: Carter's state funeral.
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  Speaker 2: Equity index future markets closed at nine thirty am this
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  Speaker 2: morning as well. Agricultural futures close at one point fifteen,
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  Speaker 2: and bond market is going.
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  Speaker 3: To be closing at two pm.
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  Speaker 2: So I guess we could look at the bond market
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  Speaker 2: where yields are down a little bit, the ten years
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  Speaker 2: down two point eight basis points, so that's happening.
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  Speaker 3: But other than that, not really.
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  Speaker 2: Much to report as far as anything that is going on,
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  Speaker 2: simply because honestly, I could read to you about corn futures,
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  Speaker 2: but I don't know what I'm doing.
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  Speaker 4: What do you think the technical feature is of commodity
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  Speaker 4: futures markets where they needed the extra fifteen minutes?
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  Speaker 3: Do you want it right?
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  Speaker 5: Like I get one? I get too.
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  Speaker 4: Maybe you could make the argument that, hey, it's a
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  Speaker 4: half day for most of our traders who are in
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  Speaker 4: the Midwest, because that's where most people.
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  Speaker 5: Pay attention to these commodity futures.
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  Speaker 4: Let's argue the fifteen minutes piece I just I'm having
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  Speaker 4: a tough time wrapping my head around.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't really know.
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  Speaker 4: I hope, I really hope, beyond hope, that it's somebody
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  Speaker 4: out there who just did it to screw with people
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  Speaker 4: a little bit. I really hope that that was the
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  Speaker 4: reason somebody in Chicago said, yeah, you know what, I'm
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  Speaker 4: going to confuse people like Mike and Chuck and just
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  Speaker 4: say we're closing at one fifteen to mess with people.
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  Speaker 2: Mike, I'm looking right now, just at the normal hours.
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  Speaker 2: So this is actually fascinating. Like again, this is why
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  Speaker 2: when people talk about, oh, like do you pay attention
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  Speaker 2: to markets, It's like, there's so many markets, man, it's
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  Speaker 2: just wild. So the Chicago market will exchange, where a
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  Speaker 2: lot of this stuff is actually traded. Trading hours for
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  Speaker 2: agricultural futures are Sunday to Friday from seven pm to
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  Speaker 2: seven forty five am. Remember futures trade overnight first of all,
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  Speaker 2: so seven pm to seven forty five am. There's then
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  Speaker 2: a break in trading from seven forty five to eight thirty,
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  Speaker 2: so everyone who is up all night can get breakfast,
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  Speaker 2: and then they resume from eight thirty to one twenty pm.
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  Speaker 5: So that's even weirder.
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  Speaker 2: That's the normal schedule livestock futures. Remember this is agriculture.
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  Speaker 2: Livestock is a separate bucket. Their hours are eight thirty
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  Speaker 2: am to one oh five pm every weekday.
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  Speaker 5: Yeah, I don't know.
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  Speaker 2: So the question is like, why do you need that
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  Speaker 2: extra five minutes? I don't really know. It's if anyone
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  Speaker 2: is you know, a professional livestock futures trader and wants
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  Speaker 2: to text the show Mike, what's the text line?
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  Speaker 5: Six one seven three six two thirteen eighty five.
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  Speaker 4: If you know more about this than we do, we
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  Speaker 4: would be happy to educate our our listeners to let.
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  Speaker 2: Us know why you need the extra five minutes. By
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  Speaker 2: the way, all the times they gave you were in
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  Speaker 2: Central time. Also remember Chicago Market Exchange Central time, so
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  Speaker 2: really Eastern time. You're talking nine thirty am to two
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  Speaker 2: oh five pm. Four livestock futures.
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  Speaker 4: May I may I just because all the coverage Todays
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  Speaker 4: of Jimmy Carter's funeral, may I voice my favorite part
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  Speaker 4: of his funeral so far? Absolutely two sons of former
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  Speaker 4: presidents are reading their father's Their fathers drafted eulogies for
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  Speaker 4: Jimmy Carter because he outlived all of those presidents. Gerald
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  Speaker 4: Ford and I think Walter Mondale both wrote eulogies for
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  Speaker 4: Jimmy Carter, assuming.
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  Speaker 5: That he would die before them.
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  Speaker 4: He outlived them all, and so their sons are up
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  Speaker 4: there reading speeches, which I just I love it.
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  Speaker 5: That's fantastic.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, It's the other thing I mentioned when he first
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  Speaker 2: passed is until he passed, you had five living ex
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  Speaker 2: presidents him, Clinton, George W. Bush, Obama, and Trump. You
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  Speaker 2: will soon have you know, Biden as well. That gets
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  Speaker 2: added to the list. But obviously Carter has has since passed.
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  Speaker 2: There's a reasonable case to be made that within the
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  Speaker 2: next five to seven years the only living.
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  Speaker 3: One of those might be Obama.
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  Speaker 6: You know, let's just let's just stop talking because we
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  Speaker 6: have trivia related to this.
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  Speaker 4: So we're gonna we're gonna answer our trivia question. Okay,
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  Speaker 4: I didn't mean to blow up your spot, Tucker. I apologize.
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  Speaker 4: In any case, let's talk about artificial intelligence.
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  Speaker 2: Then that's sound good. Artificial intelligence lives forever. So the
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  Speaker 2: Biden administration is again with less than two weeks left
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  Speaker 2: in office now, is trying to issue new regulations to
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  Speaker 2: how artificial intelligence can be used worldwide, and how artificial
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  Speaker 2: intelligence can be shared between the US and US allies
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  Speaker 2: while restricting it from being used by potential adversaries.
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  Speaker 3: What are they doing Effectively?
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  Speaker 4: They are drafting rules that are similar to some that
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  Speaker 4: we have either already seen, but perhaps a little bit
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  Speaker 4: more exclusive, especially when it comes to the distribution of
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  Speaker 4: high tech semiconductors, effectively saying, look, we don't want these
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  Speaker 4: specific chips going anywhere other than specific allies, whereas previously
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  Speaker 4: they had just named a few countries where they couldn't go.
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  Speaker 4: There's also some development of conversations about where these data
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  Speaker 4: where these data processing centers will end up laying, and
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  Speaker 4: again talking about that with our allies and where.
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  Speaker 5: Those should belong.
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  Speaker 4: My question is a why are you issuing all of
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  Speaker 4: this in the last few days of office. It does
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  Speaker 4: not seem to be terribly controversial. I also don't know
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  Speaker 4: that the Biden administration significantly differs within incoming Trump administration
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  Speaker 4: when it comes to all of this, and so I'm
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  Speaker 4: left kind of shaking my head in terms of why
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  Speaker 4: you know you're doing it via executive order as well,
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  Speaker 4: and so therefore it would be fairly easy I assume
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  Speaker 4: for the incoming Trump administration to overturn or change things
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  Speaker 4: they didn't like. But I also don't think that this
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  Speaker 4: is one of the It's one thing for an outgoing
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  Speaker 4: Biden administration to put in place a bunch of things
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  Speaker 4: that are fundamental disagreements with Republicans that they're going to
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  Speaker 4: have to publicly do away with, right like, you know, hey,
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  Speaker 4: we're going to put in all these last minute banking
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  Speaker 4: regulations and then Republicans are going to have to be
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  Speaker 4: seen as doing away with protections for Americans. This isn't that,
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  Speaker 4: And so I'm just interested in your take on why
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  Speaker 4: this might be happening right now.
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  Speaker 3: Well, I don't have a good answers to exactly why.
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  Speaker 2: I I mean, part of this if we just think about,
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  Speaker 2: like the speed of government works. Remember the first the
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  Speaker 2: first generative AI prompts that we really saw were when
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  Speaker 2: Chad GPT released its demo and then live version of
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  Speaker 2: the World at the end of twenty twenty two.
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  Speaker 3: So it's been two years.
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  Speaker 2: So I certainly think that look, you weren't gonna see
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  Speaker 2: anything in twenty twenty three, just because like we didn't
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  Speaker 2: even know what it was at that point. Quite Honestly,
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  Speaker 2: it's kind of like, how do you even decide what
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  Speaker 2: you're trying to do there? So I can understand it
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  Speaker 2: taking a little bit of time, you know, to kind
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  Speaker 2: of get through this.
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  Speaker 3: Why are you doing this the last week you know
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  Speaker 3: in office. I don't have a.
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  Speaker 4: Good answer for that, right but really, to me, there
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  Speaker 4: must be some form of fundamental disagreement that he thinks
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  Speaker 4: that Biden administration has with an incoming Trump administration. And
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  Speaker 4: so again, what you do by putting in these types
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  Speaker 4: of things is require the incoming president to very publicly
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  Speaker 4: disagree with you and override those rules if they so choose.
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  Speaker 4: And so that's what I keep reading into is you're
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  Speaker 4: doing this because you're worried and coming Trump administration is
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  Speaker 4: going to differ in you know, in views on something,
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  Speaker 4: and you don't want them to be able to kind
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  Speaker 4: of sweep it under the rug.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that's potentially fair.
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  Speaker 2: The other things just that I pulled from this this piece, Again,
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  Speaker 2: we don't know any of the specifics because the rule
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  Speaker 2: has not yet been issued. Also, in terms of like
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  Speaker 2: why it takes this long, Mike, we've seen like how
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  Speaker 2: the rulemaking process plays out throughout the financial world. Quite
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  Speaker 2: often it takes like years for them to actually, you know,
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  Speaker 2: make it into the final version.
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  Speaker 4: I mean, we're still debating net neutrality thirty years after
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  Speaker 4: it it was it was issued.
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  Speaker 2: So yeah, yeah, So you got this stuff here. But
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  Speaker 2: a couple of quotes that I want to read from
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  Speaker 2: this here. The rules are largely about national security, given
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  Speaker 2: the way that AI might transform military conflict. The regulations
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  Speaker 2: are designed to keep the most powerful technology in the
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  Speaker 2: hands of allies and prevent China from circumventing US restrictions
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  Speaker 2: by getting access to AI chips through international data centers. Also,
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  Speaker 2: the Biden administration's plan has prompted swift pushback from American
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  Speaker 2: tech companies, which say global regulations could slow their businesses
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  Speaker 2: and create costly compliance requirements. I'm going to jump ahead
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  Speaker 2: then to this party here. California based in Vidia, which
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  Speaker 2: controls ninety percent of the AI chip market, has lobbied
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  Speaker 2: against the rules and meetings with Congress in the White House.
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  Speaker 2: As of Microsoft, Oracle and other companies. They worry their
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  Speaker 2: rules could hurt international sales. So here's the thing, guys,
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  Speaker 2: and this is like why there's so much suck today.
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  Speaker 2: In my opinion, if all you're doing is pursuing dollars
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  Speaker 2: without consideration for anything else. Then you've kind of lost
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  Speaker 2: what it means to be human because for any of
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  Speaker 2: these companies. And again, I'm not saying that you want
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  Speaker 2: to be restricted from doing like anything, but I am
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  Speaker 2: very much saying, guys, you're designing technologies that have the
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  Speaker 2: potential to reshape the world, and if they're in the
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  Speaker 2: wrong hands, reshape it very badly, and to not take
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  Speaker 2: that as an important responsibility and instead worry about, well,
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  Speaker 2: this could hurt our sales, Take your ball and go home, man, Like.
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  Speaker 3: That's grow up.
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  Speaker 2: You're already multi billionaires. Do you really need more by
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  Speaker 2: being able to sell this stuff to countries that are
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  Speaker 2: potentially enemies of the United States?
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  Speaker 3: Really? Yeah?
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  Speaker 4: I think our problem is that we seem to be
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  Speaker 4: viewing this technology in many ways different from something like
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  Speaker 4: nuclear weapons, and it probably needs to be categorized more
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  Speaker 4: similarly to those types of things.
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  Speaker 3: Let's take a quick break here.
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  Speaker 2: When we return, we are going to be joined by
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  Speaker 2: Ted Rossman from bankrat talking about their new credit card
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  Speaker 2: debt survey.
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: Will also do some trivia in just a little bit.
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  Speaker 4: Joining us now is Ted Rossman from Bank Right for
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  Speaker 4: their latest credit card debt survey.
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  Speaker 5: Ted thanks for Joining's appreciate.
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  Speaker 7: It, of course, thanks for having me so.
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  Speaker 4: I had a rough start to the week this week.
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  Speaker 4: Kids sick, I just generally upset all this week. I'm
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  Speaker 4: looking for some optimistic news. Do you have anything to
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  Speaker 4: be optimistic about in this latest survey? Because I gotta
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  Speaker 4: be honest, I didn't see a whole lot for us
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  Speaker 4: to be optimistic about when it comes to Americans credit
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  Speaker 4: card habits.
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  Speaker 7: Yeah, Unfortunately, a lot of people still have a lot
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  Speaker 7: of debt. I'm moving a little bit in the right direction,
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  Speaker 7: just in terms of you know, last year, fifty percent
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  Speaker 7: of credit cardholders carried debt from month to month. Now
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  Speaker 7: it's forty eight. Okay, last year, sixty percent of those
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  Speaker 7: with credit card debt had had it at least a year.
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  Speaker 7: Now it's fifty three. Slight improvements. What's interesting, too, is
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  Speaker 7: the debt to income ratio is still pretty low on
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  Speaker 7: a historical basis, Whereas you know, we could also point
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  Speaker 7: to more negative stats like credit card balances at record
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  Speaker 7: highs and rates near record highs. I mean, all of
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  Speaker 7: this adds up to the proverbial tale of two cities.
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  Speaker 7: You have basically half and half. You know, half of
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  Speaker 7: cardholders pay in full every month, They avoid interest, they
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  Speaker 7: take full advantage of rewards. Life is great for them.
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  Speaker 7: The other half those with debt, that's very expensive.
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  Speaker 4: So when was this survey conducted? Was this pre or
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  Speaker 4: post holiday season?
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  Speaker 7: We did this in mid November, so it was actually
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  Speaker 7: before a lot of the holiday shopping took place. Although
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  Speaker 7: you know, some people started their holiday shopping in October
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  Speaker 7: or earlier, but you know, before kind of the traditional
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  Speaker 7: start to the holiday shopping season.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah.
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  Speaker 4: I think my co host Chuck was done in like
• 14:48
  Speaker 4: early July with his holiday shopping. So yeah, he's in
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  Speaker 4: that strange group. But as you mentioned, the concerning piece
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  Speaker 4: continues to be that half of credit card holders carry
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  Speaker 4: a balanced month to mine. We've talked on the show
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  Speaker 4: about how devastating that is with compounded interest. Talk to
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  Speaker 4: me about generationally where we see this. I know that
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  Speaker 4: baby boomers are the largest cohort of credit card holders,
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  Speaker 4: both numbers wise as well as on a percentage basis.
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  Speaker 4: What do we see the breakdown in terms of credit
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  Speaker 4: card holders, as well as those that carry debt on
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  Speaker 4: a month to month basis.
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  Speaker 7: Gen Xers are the most likely to have credit card debt,
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  Speaker 7: and that makes sense because they're living expensive years, perhaps
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  Speaker 7: sandwiched between heiring for their own kids and also elderly parents.
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  Speaker 7: Perhaps gen xers have had more time to accumulate credit
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  Speaker 7: card debt. They often have higher limits as well. There's
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  Speaker 7: an interesting thing going on with gen z ers, which
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  Speaker 7: is that they actually have considerably more credit card debt
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  Speaker 7: than millennials did at the same age, which is a
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  Speaker 7: potential warning sign. Now, a lot of gen Zers have
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  Speaker 7: lower credit limits and their sheer debt loads are not
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  Speaker 7: as large as people older than them, but this is
• 15:57
  Speaker 7: one to watch. You know. Some of it is just
• 15:59
  Speaker 7: because of the higher cost of everything, whether it's higher
• 16:02
  Speaker 7: education or housing or groceries or you name it. You know,
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  Speaker 7: there's also an interesting thing going on with millennials versus
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  Speaker 7: gen z because millennials were actually slow to adopt credit cards,
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  Speaker 7: and they eventually came on board, but it took a
• 16:17
  Speaker 7: while and one of.
• 16:18
  Speaker 4: The some of that great recession impact. Maybe sorry for
• 16:21
  Speaker 4: interrupting you to you're right about one of.
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  Speaker 7: The theories is millennials came of age right around the
• 16:26
  Speaker 7: Great Recession. Some of the older millennials came of age
• 16:28
  Speaker 7: around the dot com bust. You know, they had a
• 16:31
  Speaker 7: couple of kind of seminal moments in terms of financial troubles.
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  Speaker 7: Gen z ers haven't had quite the same thing. Obviously,
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  Speaker 7: the pandemic was a big deal, but from a financial standpoint,
• 16:42
  Speaker 7: in an odd way, that was actually good for people's
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  Speaker 7: credit card balances because they got stimulus money, they paid
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  Speaker 7: down debt. Credit card balance has actually fell seventeen percent
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  Speaker 7: in the first year of the pandemic. So you know,
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  Speaker 7: we also see a phenomenon where gen zers are perhaps
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  Speaker 7: a bit more likely to take on risk with their investments,
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  Speaker 7: and credit card debt could be part of that. Sometimes
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  Speaker 7: there is a little bit of a devil may care
• 17:06
  Speaker 7: sort of attitude about you know what, I'm going to
• 17:08
  Speaker 7: live for today and I'm going to figure out how
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  Speaker 7: to pay for it later. So gen z is going
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  Speaker 7: to be an interesting one to watch.
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  Speaker 4: Ted, you mentioned this briefly here, and you know, the
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  Speaker 4: way that I've described the credit card market as is
• 17:21
  Speaker 4: concerning for those that carry the debt, but not seemingly
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  Speaker 4: a threat to the overall state of the macro economy,
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  Speaker 4: and you pointed out debt, credit card debt to income
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  Speaker 4: as one of those stats. Is that a reasonable conclusion
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  Speaker 4: to come to at this stage, or you know, is
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  Speaker 4: this total debt load growing to a threatening level in
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  Speaker 4: your view?
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  Speaker 7: It's not a macro threat. Banks are actually feeling pretty
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  Speaker 7: good about things. The delinquency rate has started to dip
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  Speaker 7: a little bit. The rate of growth for credit card
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  Speaker 7: balances has also slowed. What's so interesting is that some
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  Speaker 7: of this is actually a proxy for economic activity, just
• 17:58
  Speaker 7: in the sense that you know, when we talk about
• 18:00
  Speaker 7: credit card balances, those stats don't usually distinguish between what's
• 18:03
  Speaker 7: paid in full and what's not. And we know people
• 18:06
  Speaker 7: are using less cash and they're using more cards, and
• 18:08
  Speaker 7: you know, in a way more credit card balances actually
• 18:12
  Speaker 7: just shows more spending and population growth. We want you
• 18:15
  Speaker 7: at the household level to pay it off so that
• 18:17
  Speaker 7: you're not paying these high interest rates. But actually for
• 18:21
  Speaker 7: banks it's been a little bit of a have their
• 18:22
  Speaker 7: cake and eat it too kind of moment because they
• 18:25
  Speaker 7: are making a lot of money from interest, but yet
• 18:28
  Speaker 7: they're not too worried about delinquencies. Those did go up
• 18:31
  Speaker 7: a lot in the couple of years since the pandemic,
• 18:34
  Speaker 7: but now they've started to level off. Banks view this
• 18:37
  Speaker 7: as kind of normalization. We're finally getting past some of
• 18:41
  Speaker 7: the pandemic weirdness and starting to settle into a more
• 18:44
  Speaker 7: normal theme. So balances are growing, but they're not growing
• 18:48
  Speaker 7: as fast, and delinquencies have probably peaked at this point.
• 18:51
  Speaker 4: It's Ted Rossman from Bankrede joining us for their latest
• 18:54
  Speaker 4: credit card survey, which, like I said, I'm looking for
• 18:57
  Speaker 4: some gleamer, a glimmer of hope on some of this.
• 19:00
  Speaker 4: But Ted joining us again. Thank you, Ted, appreciate it.
• 19:03
  Speaker 4: We'll talk to you again soon.
• 19:04
  Speaker 7: Sounds good, thank you.
• 19:06
  Speaker 4: Uh yeah. The statistics there continue to be concerning. On
• 19:09
  Speaker 4: the household level, more than half of credit card holders,
• 19:12
  Speaker 4: or about half of credit card holders carrying a balance,
• 19:15
  Speaker 4: and by the way, those balances, more than half of
• 19:18
  Speaker 4: them are held for over a year. We got to
• 19:20
  Speaker 4: take a quick break here, but when we come back
• 19:22
  Speaker 4: a little bit more on artificial intelligence here a more
• 19:25
  Speaker 4: long term story about companies hiring plans in regards to AI.
• 19:29
  Speaker 4: That's next, along with Trivia.
• 19:42
  Speaker 8: Bringing the latest financial news straight to your radio every day.
• 19:47
  Speaker 8: It's the Financial Exchange on the Financial Exchange Radio Network.
• 19:53
  Speaker 8: Text us at six one seven three six two one
• 19:55
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• 19:58
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• 20:00
  Speaker 8: we are covering. This is the Financial Exchange Radio Network.
• 20:07
  Speaker 6: Time now for trivia here on the Financial Exchanges we
• 20:10
  Speaker 6: know by now Jimmy Carter State funeral is today. Carter
• 20:13
  Speaker 6: is the longest lived president in US history and the
• 20:17
  Speaker 6: only one to make it to one hundred years old.
• 20:21
  Speaker 6: Trivia question today, how many US presidents lived to at
• 20:25
  Speaker 6: least ninety years old?
• 20:27
  Speaker 3: Once again?
• 20:27
  Speaker 6: How many US presidents live to at least ninety years old?
• 20:32
  Speaker 6: Be the fourth person today it text us at six
• 20:35
  Speaker 6: one seven three six two thirteen eighty five with the
• 20:37
  Speaker 6: correct answer, and you win a Financial Exchange Showed t
• 20:40
  Speaker 6: shirt once again. The fourth correct response to text us
• 20:43
  Speaker 6: at six one seven three six two thirteen eighty five,
• 20:46
  Speaker 6: We'll get that Financial Exchange Show t shirt. See complete
• 20:49
  Speaker 6: contest rules at Financial Exchange Show dot com mike.
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: According to a survey conducted by the World Economic Forum,
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: forty one percent of employers intend to two downsize their
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: workforce as AI automates certain tasks in addition, seventy seven percent,
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: so they were planning to rescale and upscale their existing
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: workers between twenty twenty five and twenty thirty to better
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: work along side AI.
• 21:14
  Speaker 3: Your thoughts, I was.
• 21:17
  Speaker 4: Going to ask, is this a serious threat? Or is
• 21:21
  Speaker 4: it similar to carmakers saying that their entire fleet of
• 21:24
  Speaker 4: vehicles was going to be all electric by twenty thirty.
• 21:27
  Speaker 4: My guess is a bit of both. I do think
• 21:29
  Speaker 4: that companies are determined to reduce headcount here and there
• 21:35
  Speaker 4: as their employees become more efficient, But it is sure
• 21:41
  Speaker 4: tough to understand where that's going to come from and
• 21:42
  Speaker 4: what format it's going to take.
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: At this stage, it's still too early in many cases,
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: I think to talk about having an AI agent that
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: can do the things that an employee does. I think
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: it's far more reasonable to say, hey, can we use
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: like the seventy seven percent that said, hey, can we
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: use AI to make our existing employees more robust and
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: can they do more stuff with it? But look, this
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: survey is, you know, pure wish casting in my opinion, because.
• 22:17
  Speaker 3: Of CEOs have not even used AI.
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: Right, So yeah, like, I'm sure it sounds like good
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: all I could you know, I could use AI, but
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: I also find it kind of and again I'm not
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: I don't think I'm naive about things. But the idea of, hey,
• 22:34
  Speaker 2: we want to use AI to downsize our workforce, I'm
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: gonna tell you what that is. Actually, that is a
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: horribly pessimistic approach to running a company. That's saying that
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: you think your growth is going to be so stagnant
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: that the best way that you can improve things is
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: by getting rid of headcount in order to get costs down.
• 22:57
  Speaker 5: You're right that that is a not terribly optimistic view
• 23:00
  Speaker 5: of your own business.
• 23:00
  Speaker 3: Is Like, I'm not saying don't use AI.
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: I'm more saying, Hey, the optimists are the people that
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: are like, yeah, I'm gonna use this because I have
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: so much growth and my employees can do so much
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: more with this.
• 23:12
  Speaker 4: Right, I think there might be a compelling case to
• 23:14
  Speaker 4: say our pace of our pace of hiring compared to
• 23:19
  Speaker 4: growth will need to be a let's call it a
• 23:23
  Speaker 4: smaller ratio, yeah, in the future, because of the efficiency
• 23:27
  Speaker 4: coming from AI. But that's where the optimists lay is, Hey,
• 23:30
  Speaker 4: I can use AI to become from my employees become
• 23:33
  Speaker 4: far more efficient, which is going to allow us to
• 23:35
  Speaker 4: outgrow our competitors and therefore still add a bunch of headcount,
• 23:39
  Speaker 4: but not as much as we would have otherwise needed
• 23:41
  Speaker 4: to previously. And so look, I don't know until these
• 23:46
  Speaker 4: layoffs start coming, I'm not really willing to accept the
• 23:50
  Speaker 4: overall premise because, like you pointed out, there aren't any
• 23:54
  Speaker 4: companies that have gotten terribly comfortable with, say, replacing an
• 23:59
  Speaker 4: entire call center bunch of AI bots because guess what
• 24:02
  Speaker 4: they are terrible at that.
• 24:04
  Speaker 5: Did you before.
• 24:05
  Speaker 3: We go further?
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: Did did you see from it was like a week
• 24:09
  Speaker 2: ago when Meta released all these AI bots into the wild,
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: so they like on on Instagram and Facebook, they they
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: announced that they were putting these bots out there like
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: pretending to be people and you could chat with them
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: and stuff like not not to do anything, but just
• 24:28
  Speaker 2: like hey, we're users, like just you know, but they're
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: they're not. And the results were just horrifying in terms
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: of the stuff that they were saying. Uh, And so
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: like it's again, it's interesting technology. It has its uses,
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: but right now I am still leaning on the side
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: of it's over promising and under delivering. And I say,
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: this is someone who does use it on a weekly basis.
• 24:54
  Speaker 3: Uh, but it's not there yet.
• 24:56
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I'd be more worried about the the threat from
• 25:00
  Speaker 4: AI than the job loss threat from AI. Folks want
• 25:04
  Speaker 4: to talk to you about a brand new guide that
• 25:06
  Speaker 4: Armstrong is putting out for the month of January. We
• 25:09
  Speaker 4: unfortunately talk a lot about frauds and scams that occur
• 25:14
  Speaker 4: in in our economy these days. We cover them on
• 25:18
  Speaker 4: the show frequently and we have a brand new guide
• 25:20
  Speaker 4: out about that subjects. It's all about seven common financial
• 25:24
  Speaker 4: frauds and scams and really some tips on how to
• 25:28
  Speaker 4: protect yourself from them, how to identify them and button
• 25:32
  Speaker 4: your stuff up. This is a brand new guide that
• 25:36
  Speaker 4: we haven't produced ever before, and it's available for the
• 25:40
  Speaker 4: month of January.
• 25:41
  Speaker 5: Here.
• 25:41
  Speaker 4: But you've heard me say this if you've listened to
• 25:43
  Speaker 4: the show long enough, is in my opinion, one of
• 25:45
  Speaker 4: the best ways you can prevent this from occurring to
• 25:48
  Speaker 4: you is to approach scams and fraud from the perspective
• 25:52
  Speaker 4: of I'm not too smart to let this happen to me.
• 25:56
  Speaker 4: It is complicated enough that I can fall for this,
• 25:59
  Speaker 4: and therefore I need to treat it with seriousness and
• 26:03
  Speaker 4: understand what's being done out there.
• 26:05
  Speaker 5: If you have been.
• 26:06
  Speaker 4: Out of the workforce for a few years, for instance,
• 26:08
  Speaker 4: you are probably not getting the most up to date
• 26:11
  Speaker 4: training that companies provide a lot of their employees. If
• 26:14
  Speaker 4: you work for a smaller corporation, you probably don't get
• 26:17
  Speaker 4: much of any sort of training when it comes to
• 26:19
  Speaker 4: financial frauds and scams.
• 26:21
  Speaker 5: And I would encourage you, if you don't feel perfectly
• 26:25
  Speaker 5: well read on the latest when it comes to these
• 26:28
  Speaker 5: financial frauds and scams, to give us a ring and
• 26:31
  Speaker 5: request a copy of our new guide. I know this
• 26:34
  Speaker 5: is a little bit out of the wheelhouse of the
• 26:36
  Speaker 5: traditional Armstrong Guide, but it's coming from the experience of
• 26:39
  Speaker 5: financial professionals who see it with their own clients every
• 26:43
  Speaker 5: single day, the approaches of scams and fraud attempts that
• 26:48
  Speaker 5: they are getting hit with. To request a copy of
• 26:50
  Speaker 5: our brand new guide. Like I said, it's called the
• 26:52
  Speaker 5: Seven Common Financial Frauds and Scams. You can call our
• 26:56
  Speaker 5: office at eight hundred three nine three four zero zero one.
• 27:00
  Speaker 5: Again that's the office number for the Armstrong Advisory Group
• 27:03
  Speaker 5: to request your free copy of our new guide called
• 27:06
  Speaker 5: seven Common Financial Frauds and Scams. Then number, once again
• 27:09
  Speaker 5: is eight hundred three nine three four zero zero one.
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: The proceeding was paid for by Armstrong Advisory Group, a
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: registered investment advisor. Nothing in the ad or in any
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: Armstrong guide a specific financial, legal, or tax advice. Consult
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: your own financial tax into state planning advisors before making
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: any investment decisions. Armstrong make contact you to offer investment
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: advisory services.
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: Peace to the Wall Street Journal talking about how the
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: job market, which has been slowing over the last six
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: to nine months, may start to pick up a little bit.
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: And basically what we're getting is some survey responses saying, yeah,
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: we're planning on hiring more people in the future. But
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: that's basically what we're seeing to this point.
• 27:49
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I don't see a bunch of evidence to it.
• 27:52
  Speaker 4: I suppose the other data points that I can look
• 27:54
  Speaker 4: at would be the Jolt report that we received on Tuesday, Chuck,
• 27:57
  Speaker 4: where Yep, you did see an expansion to eight point
• 28:00
  Speaker 4: one million job openings in the month of November that
• 28:04
  Speaker 4: was when the survey was conducted, and so you are
• 28:08
  Speaker 4: seeing an uptick there. I think most would agree that
• 28:12
  Speaker 4: you want to see a few months of uptick before
• 28:14
  Speaker 4: you conclude anything about companies revamping hiring.
• 28:17
  Speaker 5: Could I buy it that.
• 28:18
  Speaker 4: Hey, you know, a lot of companies just put hiring
• 28:20
  Speaker 4: off or froze plans for a few months towards the
• 28:24
  Speaker 4: latter half of twenty twenty four with election season and
• 28:27
  Speaker 4: many other political factors going on. Yeah, I could buy
• 28:31
  Speaker 4: that argument, But until it truly shows up in the data,
• 28:34
  Speaker 4: I'm not sure we should jump to any real conclusions
• 28:36
  Speaker 4: about it yet.
• 28:37
  Speaker 3: Let's take a quick break here.
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: When we come back, we've got the trivia answer and
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: we'll do a little bit of stack roulette.
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: Find daily interviews and full shows of the Financial Exchange
• 28:48
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• 28:54
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• 29:01
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• 29:04
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• 29:05
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• 29:07
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• 29:10
  Speaker 1: news in New England and around the country. This is
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: the Financial Exchange Radio Network.
• 29:18
  Speaker 6: Trivia question today was how many US presidents live to
• 29:22
  Speaker 6: at least ninety years old?
• 29:24
  Speaker 3: That will be six.
• 29:25
  Speaker 6: Six US presidents have lived to at least ninety years old,
• 29:28
  Speaker 6: and that would include Carter, bush Ford, Reagan, Adams, and Hoover.
• 29:33
  Speaker 6: Jeff from Sandwich, Mass is our winner today, taking home
• 29:36
  Speaker 6: the Financial Exchange Show t shirt. We play trivia every
• 29:39
  Speaker 6: day here on the Financial Exchange. See complete contest rules
• 29:43
  Speaker 6: at Financial Exchange Show dot com.
• 29:45
  Speaker 3: Can I give just the two of you a bonus
• 29:47
  Speaker 3: trivia question? Please? I would love that. Who's the first
• 29:50
  Speaker 3: US president to be born in a hospital? Don't know?
• 29:57
  Speaker 5: No guesses, Tucker, I.
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: Don't know, Jimmy Carter was really do you know where
• 30:04
  Speaker 2: the most commonplace was to be born in the nineteenth
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: century in the United States?
• 30:10
  Speaker 5: Wagon, I would have assumed in your home.
• 30:13
  Speaker 3: No post office.
• 30:15
  Speaker 5: What's where people had kids?
• 30:19
  Speaker 3: You gotta put them in the mail somehow.
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: Now, basically the big deal was most post offices were
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: at or near the center of most towns, and so
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: it was a central place where people could meet their
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: doctor or midwife or whatever in order to deliver their babies.
• 30:33
  Speaker 3: I think we should bring that back post office babies.
• 30:36
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 30:37
  Speaker 4: Interesting, Yeah, do you get like a stamp when you're born? Actually,
• 30:40
  Speaker 4: I'm gonna take that back. I do not think that
• 30:42
  Speaker 4: the post office rises to my standards of cleanliness. On
• 30:45
  Speaker 4: an average basis to deliver a child. Not that I'm
• 30:48
  Speaker 4: gonna be the one delivering the child, but I'm just
• 30:50
  Speaker 4: not sure I'm on board with that anymore.
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: But yeah, prior to hospitals, post offices were the most
• 30:56
  Speaker 2: commonplaces that babies were born in the United States.
• 30:59
  Speaker 3: So there you go it. What do you got for
• 31:01
  Speaker 3: me for stack rule? Atte Mike?
• 31:03
  Speaker 5: Self driving cars don't do snow.
• 31:06
  Speaker 4: This actually made me think a little bit just about
• 31:09
  Speaker 4: New Englanders and uh, you know, I think everyone around
• 31:12
  Speaker 4: here is if you've lived here, your whole life becomes
• 31:15
  Speaker 4: some sort of expert of driving in ice and snow,
• 31:17
  Speaker 4: and you know certain things like, hey, if I need
• 31:20
  Speaker 4: to break I better not slam on the brakes because
• 31:23
  Speaker 4: if I do, then I'm going to spin out.
• 31:25
  Speaker 5: Of control here.
• 31:26
  Speaker 4: And you know, go look at Tennessee or Virginia every
• 31:29
  Speaker 4: time it snows, and Atlanta is the best example.
• 31:31
  Speaker 5: Atlanta is a great example. Yeah, every time there's.
• 31:33
  Speaker 4: You know, a quarter inch of snow, there's you know,
• 31:36
  Speaker 4: thirty car pile ups all across the city because they
• 31:39
  Speaker 4: don't know how to do it. And guess what, neither
• 31:42
  Speaker 4: does artificial intelligence. A goodyear says that they have the solution.
• 31:46
  Speaker 4: Those who don't worry, they are they're going to put
• 31:48
  Speaker 4: out a smarter tire that's going to be able to,
• 31:51
  Speaker 4: along with data from the vehicle, be able to indicate
• 31:55
  Speaker 4: back to the driving computer just how long they would
• 31:57
  Speaker 4: estimate it takes to break in a certain situation. You know,
• 32:01
  Speaker 4: if you're driving in Phoenix, Arizona, with completely dry roads,
• 32:05
  Speaker 4: you can imagine you can slam on the brakes and
• 32:07
  Speaker 4: come to a stop pretty quickly. That doesn't work when
• 32:09
  Speaker 4: you are in a rural road in northern Maine with
• 32:13
  Speaker 4: a bunch of ice. I don't think that computers are
• 32:16
  Speaker 4: going to be anywhere close to being able to fix
• 32:18
  Speaker 4: figure this problem out anytime in the near future. So
• 32:21
  Speaker 4: if you're worried about self driving cars taking to the Northeast,
• 32:26
  Speaker 4: my takeaway would be you don't have a lot to
• 32:28
  Speaker 4: worry about anytime in the near future. In spite of
• 32:30
  Speaker 4: what good Year has to say.
• 32:31
  Speaker 2: Would I would agree. I think, look, it's a great
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: problem for them to try to solve. But when I
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: think about like the issues that I run into when
• 32:39
  Speaker 2: driving in snow, it's when like, just as an example,
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: I start a turn and the conditions are one way
• 32:47
  Speaker 2: and by the middle of the turn, the conditions are different.
• 32:50
  Speaker 4: So furthermore, you can't I mean during a real snowstorm.
• 32:54
  Speaker 4: It's always that fun game like am am I in
• 32:55
  Speaker 4: a lane? Or is the guy in front of me
• 32:57
  Speaker 4: in a lane? Where am I supposed to be? During
• 33:00
  Speaker 4: this drive? We are a long ways away from self
• 33:05
  Speaker 4: driving cars being able to be there. Don't get me wrong,
• 33:07
  Speaker 4: I'm very impressed with what they can do in some circumstances,
• 33:11
  Speaker 4: but yeah, not not going to be able to tackle
• 33:16
  Speaker 4: the three months of conditions that we get here in
• 33:18
  Speaker 4: the Northeast.
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm a skeptic at this point as well. And
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: it's just as someone who had the football pulled from
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: him and you know, looked at it and said, oh gee,
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: like I bought all the hype back in twenty sixteen
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: and twenty seventeen, And it's a pretty high bar that
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: companies are gonna have to clear in order to convince me, yeah,
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: this is really ready for prime time and we've got
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: it figured out, not just in like local areas where
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: it's yeah, we've mapped you know, this forty square mile
• 33:48
  Speaker 2: area really well and we can do this, but everywhere,
• 33:52
  Speaker 2: because it's most of the time. You're not trying to
• 33:55
  Speaker 2: go just from like one part of San Francisco or
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: Miami to the other. It's no, I'm trying to go
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: from West Palm down to Miami, and you know, can
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: you do that? Can you, like, can you make these
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: things work? Or Hey, I'm trying to go from Malibu
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: to San Diego. Can you You've got to be able
• 34:11
  Speaker 2: to handle that stuff too, not just yeah, I went
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: from you know, Alston to Dorchester.
• 34:18
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 34:18
  Speaker 5: Look, I think the promise is just different.
• 34:20
  Speaker 4: Like the idea that we're all going to not own
• 34:23
  Speaker 4: cars because they're all going to be self driving and
• 34:24
  Speaker 4: be able to get us anywhere. It was a false
• 34:27
  Speaker 4: promise that's just not going to happen for the vast
• 34:29
  Speaker 4: majority of people anytime in the near future. Yeah, the
• 34:32
  Speaker 4: idea that I don't need a personal taxi driver in
• 34:35
  Speaker 4: the city of San Francisco may seem be true, that
• 34:38
  Speaker 4: could soon be true. Same goes for Phoenix, Arizona, and
• 34:41
  Speaker 4: a few other limited cities across the country, or at
• 34:44
  Speaker 4: least far fewer taxi drivers than we currently have.
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: I want to go across the ocean briefly to.
• 34:52
  Speaker 3: Lebanon right now, and I want to talk about.
• 34:56
  Speaker 2: So they're casting ballots right now for a new Lebanese president.
• 35:03
  Speaker 4: Guess who received a vote, Donald Duck Bernie Sanders. I
• 35:11
  Speaker 4: didn't know he was Lebanese.
• 35:13
  Speaker 3: He's not.
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: So literally what I'm picking this up from like Twitter
• 35:18
  Speaker 2: and stuff. So one member of parliament in Lebanon casts
• 35:22
  Speaker 2: a ballot for Bernie Sanders. The Speaker of the parliament
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: is just like what, like, what are you doing? And
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: basically Bernie Sanders is not eligible for multiple reasons, yeah,
• 35:33
  Speaker 2: to be the president of Lebanon. But I just found
• 35:37
  Speaker 2: that kind of humorous in you know, what's been just
• 35:40
  Speaker 2: you know, a tough situation throughout the Middle East that
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: someone's like, yeah, I'm gonna vote for Bernie Sanders.
• 35:44
  Speaker 3: To run Lebanon.
• 35:45
  Speaker 2: Indeed interesting getting back to kind of more normal stuff here.
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: Used car prices, which you remember back in twenty twenty two,
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: I'm sorry, no, twenty twenty one, where we saw used
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: car prices appreciate by forty six percent plus over the
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: course of the year. Normally, use cars are a depreciating acid,
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: just like you know you would expect. The last two years,
• 36:14
  Speaker 2: we have seen seven percent and fifteen percent drops in
• 36:17
  Speaker 2: prices and I'm sorry. In twenty three and twenty two
• 36:20
  Speaker 2: twenty four, prices were basically flat, but according to Cox Automotive,
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: they expect wholesale prices to end the year still up
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: about one point four percent year over year, but not
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: getting back to the types of increases that we saw
• 36:37
  Speaker 2: during the aftermath of the COVID pandemic. And so I
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: think ultimately continued normalization in these markets where they're basically
• 36:47
  Speaker 2: flat to maybe a slight decline in prices. Historically like that,
• 36:51
  Speaker 2: that's kind of the norm. And so after you know,
• 36:55
  Speaker 2: all the fireworks of twenty twenty one through twenty three
• 36:57
  Speaker 2: in the used car market, supplying demand appear to be
• 37:00
  Speaker 2: you know, a much better match, and so not expecting
• 37:04
  Speaker 2: much change in prices again, assuming that you know, we
• 37:08
  Speaker 2: don't have further disruptions or boats getting stuck in the
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: SEUs Canal and stuff like that.
• 37:12
  Speaker 4: I'd be interested to see a stat too on you know,
• 37:15
  Speaker 4: those same price declines on electric vehicles, where we know
• 37:18
  Speaker 4: there's been you know, part because of Elon Musk's pricing strategy,
• 37:21
  Speaker 4: but part just because of waning interest in the EV's
• 37:25
  Speaker 4: and over production by China, but also others. According to
• 37:30
  Speaker 4: CBS News, which I think took it from a data
• 37:33
  Speaker 4: source called ic cars. In May of twenty twenty two,
• 37:36
  Speaker 4: the average electric vehicle was going the new average electric
• 37:40
  Speaker 4: vehicle was going for sixty five grand. By May of
• 37:43
  Speaker 4: twenty twenty four, that was down to fifty six six
• 37:45
  Speaker 4: forty eight, which is what's that a well in either case,
• 37:49
  Speaker 4: a massive decline year over year, and the same likely
• 37:53
  Speaker 4: goes for ev used EV prices as well. So that's
• 37:56
  Speaker 4: one area I'd be interested to see more data on equity.
• 38:00
  Speaker 2: Your markets remain closed as we head towards the top
• 38:03
  Speaker 2: of the hour here, we're done for the day. But
• 38:06
  Speaker 2: tomorrow Jobs Friday. That's right, job support out at eight
• 38:11
  Speaker 2: thirty am tomorrow. We got the whole thing, all the
• 38:14
  Speaker 2: breakdowns right here on the Financial Exchange.
• 38:17
  Speaker 3: We will see you there to round out the week.