Latest / Bloomberg Intelligence / Chances Are High That Bullish Cycle Extends: Authers

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Chances Are High That Bullish Cycle Extends: Authers · Bloomberg Intelligence

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bloomberg PENL podcast. I'm Paul swing you
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: along with my co host Lisa Brahmas. Each day we
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: bring you the most noteworthy and useful interviews for you
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  Speaker 1: and your money, whether at the grocery store or the
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: trading floor. Find a Bloomberg Penl podcast on Apple podcast
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  Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to podcasts, as well as at
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: Bloomberg dot com. Jonathan Farroh speaking with Larry Cudlow, chief
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: economist to President Trump, on a wide ranging interview, talking
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: about jobs, but also talking about trade and the implications there. Uh,
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: and I want to really home in there on that.
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  Speaker 1: And we have our own car Acadana still with us
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  Speaker 1: listening to the interview alongside US chief US economist for
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  Speaker 1: Bloomberg Economics. I just, real quick want to get your
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  Speaker 1: reaction to Larry Cudlow's response on whether the US is
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  Speaker 1: less incentivized to come to some sort of trade deal
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  Speaker 1: with China based on the strength that we're seeing in
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  Speaker 1: the U. S economy, especially since we're not necessarily seeing
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  Speaker 1: commends or at strength in the Chinese economy. Well, I
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  Speaker 1: think if we look back over the last two months
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  Speaker 1: or so, we can see that the most progress in
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  Speaker 1: trade talks occurred during periods where the market was down,
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  Speaker 1: the economic tone was negative. You know, there were questions about,
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  Speaker 1: you know, how weak the U. S economy actually was.
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  Speaker 1: Certainly China continues to slow, so they have incentive to
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  Speaker 1: come to the table. For the US when we've been
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  Speaker 1: in periods of an upmarket and an up tone in
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  Speaker 1: the data, Uh, the trade negotiations have been that much
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  Speaker 1: more cantankerous. And Larry was very cautious, uh, not to
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  Speaker 1: provide any direction to things. And Jonathan is rightly asking,
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  Speaker 1: we really have two levels in the trade talks. One was, uh,
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  Speaker 1: do we pick up where we were in October when
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  Speaker 1: the tariffs were due to go up to or uh,
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  Speaker 1: is October just ancient history. In the next step, if
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  Speaker 1: things deteriorate, would be the December fifteen tariffs, which are
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  Speaker 1: on about a hundred and fifty six billion of products,
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  Speaker 1: many which are consumer goods and things of that nature.
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  Speaker 1: And Larry really didn't and to provide guidance in that
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  Speaker 1: direction at all, and instead only talked about the potential
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  Speaker 1: for a phase one deal just to put some numbers
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  Speaker 1: around that. Very briefly, if we add dusted off October
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  Speaker 1: UH and pending December tariffs together that price tag is
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  Speaker 1: greater than everything put in place in So we're not
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  Speaker 1: talking peanuts here. This is a very consequential levers that
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  Speaker 1: are are looming potentially very close UH in the near
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  Speaker 1: term UH that could dramatically impact economic outlook. December fift
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  Speaker 1: that's a key date. Carl Wicked Donna, thanks so much
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  Speaker 1: for sticking around with this. Carl's the chief US economists
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  Speaker 1: for Bloomberg Economics. Let's shift gears a little bit talk
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  Speaker 1: about the global markets, including the energy markets. Big meeting
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  Speaker 1: just is wrapping up with OPEC in Vienna. Jason Shanker,
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  Speaker 1: President Prestige Economics. He's also the chair of the Futurist
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  Speaker 1: Institute and a Bloomberg Opinion contributor. UH. He is in
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  Speaker 1: Vienna for the OPEC meetings and also joining us here
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  Speaker 1: in our Bloomberg in Active Broker Studios is John Author's
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  Speaker 1: and your editor for a Bloomberg Market. So, Jason, let's
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  Speaker 1: start with you give us your key takeaway from the
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  Speaker 1: OPEC meetings in Vienna this week. Well, I think there's
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  Speaker 1: a couple of things. First, is that the group is
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  Speaker 1: concerned about global growth they're concerned that oil inventories could
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  Speaker 1: weigh on prices, as we saw the last time there
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  Speaker 1: was a Chinese manufacturing recession, which happened between the the
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  Speaker 1: December in middle I think that's a real concern. They're
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  Speaker 1: looking at the macro, they're trying to come up with
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  Speaker 1: a price bullish story and keep the inventories under control.
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  Speaker 1: And I'd say there's extra pressure coming from Saudi Arabia
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  Speaker 1: as they're running up to an I p O. So
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  Speaker 1: just wondering whether you think these cuts that are going
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  Speaker 1: to be implemented are going to make a significant impact
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  Speaker 1: in pricing. In other words, should we expect oil prices
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  Speaker 1: to rise? Well, other commodities probably give us a hint
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  Speaker 1: as to what we might expect. In the last few months,
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  Speaker 1: copper and alumin have been kind of grad Julie rising
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  Speaker 1: oil prices could rise a little bit in the first
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  Speaker 1: half of the year because of the summer driving season.
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  Speaker 1: Right this we look at the jobs number today, the
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  Speaker 1: summer driving season in the United States was the big
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  Speaker 1: driver of global oil prices. Are gonna be the biggest
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  Speaker 1: driving season in history. People have jobs, people have money.
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  Speaker 1: The refineries ramp up in Q one Q two, so
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  Speaker 1: oil prices could see a little bit of upside almost
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  Speaker 1: regardless of what O Peck does today. At the beginning
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  Speaker 1: of Jason, I'm glad you brought that up in John,
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  Speaker 1: I want you to come in here. John, author's about
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  Speaker 1: the demand side of the picture. How we are seeing
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  Speaker 1: optimism grow heading into that we're going to see a
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  Speaker 1: re acceleration of sorts. I'll be a little bit more
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  Speaker 1: tempered than in the past of the global economy. Do
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  Speaker 1: you think that the data supports that shift in view? Yes,
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  Speaker 1: it does support the idea of another reacceleeration after another
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  Speaker 1: midcycle slow down or whatever you want. School that we
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  Speaker 1: had one of those u in fifteen sixteen, which at
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  Speaker 1: that point was the optics certainly were focused on on China.
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  Speaker 1: It looks as though we're having another one now, which
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  Speaker 1: we might in time come to blame on Germany and
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  Speaker 1: the Eurozone. Certainly, German auto manufacturing is in a horrible
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  Speaker 1: states by its own by its own, by its own standards.
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  Speaker 1: If you take a look at the latest IM data
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  Speaker 1: from the beginning of the week, you do see the beginning,
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  Speaker 1: you know, a nascent restocking boom. New orders got cut back,
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  Speaker 1: a lot I suspect in large part forget about other
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  Speaker 1: aspects of demand. But this was another effect of the
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  Speaker 1: trade war. And the perverse effect is that we're now
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  Speaker 1: eighteen months on from people putting their new orders on
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  Speaker 1: hold because they were nervous about the trade war, and
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  Speaker 1: they've really got to buy something. And the inventories have
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  Speaker 1: been winding down during the process, so that the chances
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  Speaker 1: of a re acceleration and another move upwards are quite high.
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  Speaker 1: Whether that means and therefore an extension for a bit
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  Speaker 1: of the longest cycle we're in. Whether I'm happily going
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  Speaker 1: to tell you that we're about to go off on
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  Speaker 1: another major, major rally is another question. And you can
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  Speaker 1: also make the loaded comparisons to Night, which is another
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  Speaker 1: time when the Fed cut rates, when the economy didn't
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  Speaker 1: look so bad um and the economy did do very
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  Speaker 1: well for a year or so after that. The market
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  Speaker 1: didn't unbelievably well for a year or so after that.
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  Speaker 1: But we know what's happened next. Jason, want to go
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  Speaker 1: back to you real quickly. There's something news out this morning.
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  Speaker 1: The Saudia Minister thinks that the Saudi Aramco I p
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  Speaker 1: O or that company will eventually in perhaps and in
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  Speaker 1: your term trade above that to trillion dollar market was
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  Speaker 1: priced earlier this week at one point seven trillion. What's
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  Speaker 1: the latest talk in Vienna about the Saudi Aramco deal
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  Speaker 1: was considered a strong success. Well, I'm not an equity analyst,
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  Speaker 1: but I would say that, you know, it's something that's
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  Speaker 1: hanging and looming large over the meeting because obviously the
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  Speaker 1: Saudis would like to sacrifice maybe have the group sacrifice
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  Speaker 1: a little bit of income, uh to prioritize balance sheet
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  Speaker 1: as they're looking to do the I p O I mean, yesterday,
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  Speaker 1: there's a marathon set of meetings, no decision made. If
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  Speaker 1: a bunch of n O C s were doing I
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  Speaker 1: p O S in in the next year, you probably
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  Speaker 1: would have gotten a deal pretty quickly. But that's kind
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  Speaker 1: of where we're at. And as we look at the
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  Speaker 1: year ahead, there are some risks because the p m
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  Speaker 1: I s the Eurozone plus us I s M plus
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  Speaker 1: scan Chinese manufacturing p m I that's been below a
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  Speaker 1: hundred fifty, which would be the break even for that
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  Speaker 1: sum for six consecutive months. And even though folks are
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  Speaker 1: optimistic about the year ahead, and we've seen that number increase,
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  Speaker 1: it's still below one fifty, and the prospects of a
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  Speaker 1: trade deal are still spotty. I mean, we've just heard
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  Speaker 1: a long interview about that, and it's ended in tears
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  Speaker 1: in the last two throughout the last two years, and
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  Speaker 1: in this time it could very well end in tears
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  Speaker 1: as well. Jason Schenker, thank you so much for joining us.
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  Speaker 1: He is president of Prestige Economics, also a Bloomberg Opinion contributor,
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  Speaker 1: joining us from Vienna at the OPEC meetings. And John Authors,
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  Speaker 1: thanks so much for being with us as well, Senior
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  Speaker 1: editor for Bloomberg Markets, joining us here in our Bloomberg
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  Speaker 1: Interactive Brokers studio. On a very busy morning lista with
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  Speaker 1: a strong job's number, seeing a very strong reaction positive
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  Speaker 1: just under one percent move in equity indices. Here on
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  Speaker 1: the back of that news, let's talk a little Facebook here.
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  Speaker 1: There's a couple of things I want to get to
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: with our guest, Sure Overday, here's a technology columnist for
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: Bloomberg Opinion, joins us here in our Bloomberg Interactive Broker studio. Sure,
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: thanks so much for coming. I want to talk about um,
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: you know, uh, maybe coming to New York and increasing
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  Speaker 1: their presence here, which is very interesting. But I also
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  Speaker 1: want to get to your column because it's one of
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  Speaker 1: the greatest headlines I read today. Mark Zuckerberg isn't always
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: a colorless automaton. Got to get to that first, all right,
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  Speaker 1: coming to New York, Big News going to rent a
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: whole bunch of space. What's going on there? So at
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: least the Wall Street Journal reported that Facebook is talking
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: about leasing a very large space here in the fairly
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: the former fairly post office building. Um. New Yorkers will
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: know this as the former and I guess future home
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: of New Jersey Transit and Amtrak. Yeah, hopefully. Um. But
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: this is a very large and sort of well known
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: building in New York City, and it's just speaks to
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: the expansion of large tech companies, notably Google and Facebook,
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: into New York from their headquarters in the Bay Area.
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  Speaker 1: It raises a question. There was another story on the
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: Bloomberg talking about tech companies increasingly eyeing New York as
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: a as another option in addition to Silicon Valley. Why
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: why is New York becoming more of a hub or
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: is it for tech companies? So I think there's a
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  Speaker 1: few things that play here. One of them is that
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  Speaker 1: UM the large superstar tech companies you know, Facebook, Google, Amazon,
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  Speaker 1: going down the list, they have just grown and expanded
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: you know, revenue and employees both and as they've done so,
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: you know, they in some cases have reached the limits
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: of expansion in the Bay Area. Although if you go
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: to facebooks headquarters in Menlo Park, it basically looks like
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: a perennial construction zone. They have like armies of construction
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: workers building new buildings, so they're not done there yet.
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: I think also these companies realize that not everybody wants
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: to live in the Bay Area. Some people want to
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: live elsewhere. There's been, you know, an increasing push to
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: um letting people work remotely. So if you live in
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: Montana and you want to work for Facebook or Airbnb,
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: that's increasingly an option UM. And I think there's also
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: a phenomenon of tech companies looking for talent in other
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: hubs in the United States and elsewhere. So you've seen Seattle,
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: for example, being um particularly fertile ground for a lot
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: of tech companies who want to associate themselves with people
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: coming out of Microsoft or Amazon or the Universe, University
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: of Washington or other places where there's high quality tech
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: talent in New York as part of that too. So sure,
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: let's get to your column here. Um, we've seen a
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: lot of Markus Zuckerberg. The public has seen a lot
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: of Marcus Zuckerberg increasingly over the last couple of years,
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: oftentimes testifying in front of Congress or others. What's your sense,
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: your takeaway about him as a spokesperson for the industry. Well,
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: I wanted to just point out that there's kind of
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: two different Mark Zuckerberg's. Right, there's the Mark Zuckerberg that
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: we see in media interviews or on occasions when he
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: gives speeches or testifies before Congress. And I think that
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: Mark Zuckerberg is a little bit uncomfortable when he's asked
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: to talk about issues that are broadly about, you know,
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: the role of Internet in the world, and um, the
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: nature of human trust and economic development and and Facebook's
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: own role in all of those big picture questions. So
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: that's the one Mark Zuckerberg. The other Mark Zuckerberg that
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: you see less is in private settings or to employees,
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: where he's talking I think very confidently and capably about
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: strategy and Internet trends, and you know, knee camping competitors metaphorically. Um,
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: And I just wanted to point out that there is
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: this dichotomy that the Mark Zuckerberg that we often see
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: in public is not the same Mark Zuckerberg that people
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: know in more private settings. So do you think this
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: ought to give investors more confidence in the leadership and
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: the understanding that he brings to the company going forward
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: in some of the challenges that it faces. I think
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: that's right. I mean, look, I don't know. Maybe Mark
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: Zuckerberg does not need to prove himself anymore as a
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: capable product and business executive. Right the track record of
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: Facebook in the last ten years speaks fifteen years, I
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: guess since he founded it somewhat speaks for itself. Um.
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: But I also point out that, look, the role of
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: being a CEO of a superstar tech company is probably
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: different than it was five or six years ago. And
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: that's not only true for Mark Zuckerberg, but all these
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: other companies. As technology and as the Internet play a
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: greater role in our lives, in our economies, in our countries,
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: in our personal interactions, these people are understandably asked to
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: think bigger than just their companies, just their products, um
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: and business strategies, and really asked to think about the
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: role of the Internet in public life and the world.
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: And those are really difficult questions and probably not what
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: Mark Zuckerberg anticipated when he started Facebook. Indeed, a lot
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: of people also probably a little blindsided by some of
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: the transformational natures of these technological advancements. And UH and
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: companies share over technology columnist with Bloomberg Opinion, joining us
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: here in our Interactive Broker Studios. Thank you so much
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: for for that. There are a lot of questions around
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: the marijuana industry, namely whether or not the US will
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: legalize it on a broad level. In the meantime, you
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: have states legalizing the product, which raises a question how
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: do you advertise it, especially since it is not legal
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: in so many places. Joining us here in our Interactive
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: Broker Studios Joshua Otten He has chief executive officer of Ronan,
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: which is one of the largest branding agencies for cannabis
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: and health help businesses. So, josh we were just talking
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: about the perception of the industry and how do you
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: first of all, go about marketing a company that is
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: not operating in a universally legal field in the United States. Well,
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: that's a challenge, right. So when we launched rown in
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: about six months ago, our goal was to work with
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: emerging brands who are building products and commodities and helping
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: them to evolve into really real lifestyle and wellness brands
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: and so um, there's a lot of challenges on the
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: cannabis space, specifically because you're only selling in specific dispensaries
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: and local even in a state like California. You know
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: a lot of times you're only operating in Southern California
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: parts of southern California. So the challenges how do you
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: generate campaigns and advertising that generates an r o I immediately?
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: But a lot of times that's short sighted because the
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: reality is if you're building a brand that isn't just
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: a commodity, you can't just talk about ingredients or strains
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: or t H percentages. Those are just what's in it, right,
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: So you have to be able to build a brand
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: that can communicate the consumers. So it's really a lot
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: of content content marketing all the stuff that food and
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: beverage does. It's at a slightly smaller scale, but you
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: have to take those same steps. Do we have any
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: success cases in the busy in this right now, if
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: any brand's kind of broken through a little bit and
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: how did they do it? Absolutely, I think that if
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: you want to kind of categorize them into two different buckets,
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: if you want to look at say recreational or adult
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: use in lifestyle. Cookies is a great example. Uh, it
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: was founded by a rapper named Burner Up in Oakland.
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: Cookies is a lifestyle cannabis brand. They have some really
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: great genetics, but really it comes down to content. And
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: the reason I think they're winning is because they're selling
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: tens of millions of dollars worth of merchandise and T
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: shirts and hats every year. And that's that's what is
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: a brand that's a red bull, right like people who
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: are creating a self identity around it. And then on
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: the wellness side, you can look at someone like a Doss.
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: They're creating these products that have activity groups. Hey, if
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: you take this, it will help you sleep. We're going
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: to consistently dose you. This will help you relax, this
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: will get you excited. So you kind of have these
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: two buckets activity group outcome and wellness and then lifestyle.
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: So it's almost a kin to a red bull. You know,
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: they kind of allude to what it is. Red Bull,
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: Monster Energy. You know, you don't really know what's in
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: those things, but will give you energy. And then there's
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: five Hour Energy. It tells you exactly what it's gonna do.
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: And so we I see the people that are taking
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: lanes and picking specific verticals are going to have success.
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: I got this is this is sort of unprecedented because
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: even with alcohol, there are very few alcohol brands that
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: advertise getting drunk, right, There's there are very few advertising
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: brands that try to sell to that experience of the buzz.
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: And yet you know, essentially you don't take marijuana, you don't,
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: you don't, you don't smoke up to to just taste
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: the flavor, right, I mean it's to get high, So
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: you have to be advertising the high and has ever
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: been done before? I actually disagree, and I actually take
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: I actually look at the food and beverage, alcohol and
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: beer as the as the way we should go, because
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: alcohol doesn't talk about what their proof is, right. I Mean,
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: you go to a tequila bar and there's a thousand
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: tequilas and they all have varying degrees of taste, but
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: you have your outcome. But you know, if you have
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: four shots, no matter what it is, you're gonna go
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: home a little loopy. Um. So my point is that
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: cannabis brands that are advertising how high they get you
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: or their t a chia percentages away from an educational
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: sandpoint because you want to know what you're consuming. UM,
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: that's not gonna last in the market. That's not the
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: point necessarily. Um. Just like it, just like drinking wine isn't.
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: The point isn't to get loaded. You can if you
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: drink an entire bottle, you're you're gonna be wasted. You're
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: but one or two glasses and you're fine. So the
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: same thing. If you smoke half a joint or a
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: couple of hits, depending on what it is, it's going
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: to give you a nice equivalent, um, if you're looking
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: for a recreational outcome. So I guess my point is
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: I think that the cannas industry can learn a lot
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: from from alcohol and beer by not focusing on how
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: high it gets you and focusing on lifestyle. And because
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: because the end of day, it's a commodity, right, wine
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: is wine. Wine is a commodity, it's grapes. What makes
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: it not a commodity is when you bottle it, put
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: in a really nice bottle and start marketing it. Otherwise
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: it's more low or whatever whatever variety it is. So
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: it's I'm wondering how you would advertise or market or
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: promote your brand because but there's a story out just
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: I think today High Times holdings High Times magazines warning
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: investors that they may not be able to continue operations
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: after they didn't get their I p O off. So
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: if I can't, the first thing and the only thing
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: that aim to my mind, if I was marketing uh
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: a cannabis brand, would be High Times magazine, how what
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: I do it? So we were actually launching a network.
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: So so we have about a hundred part part of
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: our agency engine is that we have a hundred fifty
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: hours of original content that I've produced over the last
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: three years that has launched. We even have a partnership
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: with Viacom in Pluto TV, so they have a t
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: C channel. So we have any five or six million
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: minutes watched a month, just owned Viacom and distributed about
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: fifty million homes. And we're now launching another network that's
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: gonna long in January that's going to be in another
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: another forty million homes with about a thousand hours. So
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: our purview is high times has a very specific audience, right,
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: they have in what I call the endemic consumer. These
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: are people who are fans. The product is part of
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: their self identity. It's not just a product they consume.
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: I'm looking for the wider audience. What's the political risk
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: of putting this industry in the limelight? I mean, because
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: on one hand, you know, if if it sort of
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: is within the community that's already devoted to the industry,
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: it's one thing. If it's another if it's trying to
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: cater to the mat passes. Are you worried about blowback?
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: The more visible you make some of these companies um
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: personally you know, again not to sound like Gazella, but
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: you know, when you look at it, you compare it
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: to food and alcohol. I'm not food, alcohol, and and
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: and and even tobacco. There are no positive outcomes from
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: consuming alcohol, right, I mean, no one's deluding themselves and
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: thinking that, you know, having beer and alcoholis has some
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: positive health benefit. Red wine, yeah, but that it's like right,
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: it comes out and then like two months later you
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: guys say it's not so who knows. But but that's
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: not the point. We're consenting adults, and so at the
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: end of the day, we're consuming a beverage that has
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: absolutely been proven to increase domestic violence, have drunk driving deaths,
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: all these terrible outcomes. But that's okay. We're consenting adults.
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: We consume it. So if you want to compare cannabis
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: to you know again, alcohol and the industry, and we
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: realized we can't prohibit it just because it has a
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: lot of negative side effects, I would absolutely argue cannabis
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: has a tenth of those same you know, possible liabilities
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: while still allowing for consumers to you know again, consumer
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: safe product. The safety issues I'm sure you as I've
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: heard of it, right, you have all this sort of
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: like oh my god, the CDC came out and all
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: this you know what it was the black market, and
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: everyone inside the cannabis market knew it. And it was
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: frustrating because we knew that it was vitamini ascetate. We
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: knew that it was coming from illegal operators. And when
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: you have a market like California where two thirds of
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: it two three force is still illegal black market and
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: you have three forces of the city in California, refusing
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: to allow dispensaries and even fighting to allow delivery. All
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: you're doing do You're not reducing consumption, reducing access? Josh Houghton,
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: really fascinating stuff. Thanks for joining us. Josh Outen, the
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: CEO of Ronan based in Culver City, California, joining us
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: live here on our Bloomberg Interactive Broker studio talking about
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: the cannabis industry. Cooper's out with a very interesting report yesterday.
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: They released an eighty four page safety reports seeking to
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: quantify the misconduct and deaths that occur on its system
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: and argue that its service is safer than alternatives. Let's
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: dig into that a little bit with Eric Newcomer. He's
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: a startup reporter for Bloomberg News, joining us on the phone.
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: So Eric tell us about this report. It's pretty interesting. Yeah,
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: So Uber decided to proactively release data on sexual assaults
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: and fatalities UH in its cars and basically found that,
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: you know, last year there were about three thousand sexual assaults,
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: which it defines in behavior ranging from you know, an
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: unwanted kiss to rape. And then on the fatality side,
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: found about fifty fatalities a year. So this is you know,
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: pretty unprecedented transparency for a company to sort of proactively, uh,
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: disclose some of the worst behavior on its platform. Yeah,
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: and I'm trying to understand how to view this reports.
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: On one hand, yes, the transparency is a shift, particularly
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: for Uber, which has been accused of being lacking transparency
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: and has come under fire from UK regulators in particular. Uh,
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: and so this would be a nice departure for them
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: on that. On the other hand, three thousands sexual assault claims,
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: more than fifty row deaths. How can we even frame
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: that in terms of is that worse or better than others?
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: Since this is not a normal report to put out. Yeah,
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: it's stunning. It's hard to process. I mean Uber tries
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: to sort of, you know, position in terms of one
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: point three billion trips that took place last year. But
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: I think it's going to take time for people to
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: compare this. You know, academics are clearly going to pour
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: over these numbers and compare them to what, you know,
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: subway systems disclosed. But on the side of sexual assaults,
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: I mean, it's always been the case that victim advocates
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: have believed that cases were under reported, you know, college
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: colleges have generally sort of had for reporting, and you know,
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: when they put more pressure on students to report, you know,
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: those numbers have gone up in that that's been good.
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: So so in a lot of these cases, there's this
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: tension of wanting more reports because sexual assault is underreported,
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: while at the same time wanting to hold you know,
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: whether it's colleges or companies or government accountable when when
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: these numbers are troubling. So yeah, it's hard I think
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: so far to say, you know, where is three thousand.
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: We haven't seen lifts numbers, We don't have taxi numbers,
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: so so it's I think this is a starting data point.
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: We're gonna have to track it over time. It's interesting
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: about the in the Bloomberg News report, they said here
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: about fifty people have died in uber collisions annually for
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: the past two years. That's a rate about half the
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: national average for automotive automotive fatalities, that's according to the company.
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: So that gives that dynamic a little bit of context
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: on the sexual assault eric is it. Did they have
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: a sense of you know, sexual assault on the part
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: of the driver versus on the part of the passenger
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: because I've heard, you know, bad stories about both scenarios. Yeah, so,
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: I mean it's our actually pretty even. I think it's
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: you know, slightly slightly more allegations against drivers, but but
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: overall it's it's very close to even. So both riders
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: and drivers, you know, are getting attacked by the other,
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: and you know, it's it's important to realize that. I
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: think we talk a lot about rider's safety, but you know,
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: drivers are inviting a stranger into their car as well.
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: It's an important thing to remember that they need to
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: be protected. Also, I'm looking right now, Uber shares down
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: two point one percent. Was this a mistake to put out?
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: You know, yeah, it's it's tough. I think Uber committed
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: themselves to this. You know, they said more than a
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: year ago, I think that they were going to do this,
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: and then they realized how hard it was, you know,
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: and have have really sort of agonized over how to
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: disclose the data. So it's you know, we'll see over
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: the long term if if you know, they want to
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: turn around their reputation, you know, dark Houser show you
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: the CEO said, you know, transparency is you know, on
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: the path to trust basically, So it's a short term harm,
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: but and it draws negative attention to them. But I
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: think if they want to really be seen as good actor,
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: this is the type of disclosure that they need to
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: be making. Eric Newcomer, thank you so much for being
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: with us. Eric Newcomer is a startup reporter for Bloomberg
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: News talking about this report out of Uber. Thanks for
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: listening to the Bloomberg P and L podcast. You can
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: subscribe and listen to interviews at Apple Podcasts or whatever
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: podcast platform you prefer. Paul Sweeney, I'm on Twitter at
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: pt Sweeney. I'm Lisa A. Bram Woit's I'm on Twitter
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: at Lisa Bramwoits one before the podcast. You can always
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: catch us worldwide on Bloomberg Radio