Latest / The Financial Exchange Show / How the Federal Reserve is approaching inflation

Transcript

How the Federal Reserve is approaching inflation · The Financial Exchange Show

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: The Financial Exchange is produced by Money Matters Radio and
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: is hosted by employees of the Armstrong Advisory Group, a
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: registered investment advisor. All opinions expressed are solely those of
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: the hosts. Do not reflect the opinions of Armstrong Advisory
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: or anyone else. Investments can lose money. This program does
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: not offer any specific financial or investment advice. Please consult
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: your own financial, tax, and estate planning advisors before making
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: any investment decisions. Armstrong Advisory and the advertisers heard on
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: this program do not endorse each other or their services.
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: Armstrong and Money Matters Radio do not compensate each other
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: for referrals and are not affiliated. This is the Financial
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: Exchange with Chuck Zada and Mike Armstrong, Your exclusive look
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: at business and financial news affecting your day, your city,
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: your world. Stay informed and up to date about economic
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: and market trends plus breaking business news every day. The
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: Financial Exchange is a proud partner of the Disabled American
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: Veterans Department of Massachusetts. Help us support our great American
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: heroes by visiting dav five K Boston and making a
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: donation today. This is the Financial Exchange with Chuck Zada,
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: and Mike Armstrong.
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: Good morning, Welcome back to the Financial Exchange. We're joined
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: now by a special guest, Jenny Tank. She's the vice
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: president and a research economist with a group over at
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston and is going to
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: be joining us for a few minutes now talk about
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: the work that they're doing and some models that they've developed.
• 1:25
  Speaker 3: Jenny, thanks so much for joining us, appreciate it.
• 1:29
  Speaker 4: Thank you for having me on.
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: So by way of background, Chuck and I talk about
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: the Federal Reserve and meetings and Jay Powell frequently, but
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: I think most people aren't really familiar with the work
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: that say, your group and groups that the that the
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: different regional.
• 1:46
  Speaker 3: Banks do on a day to day basis.
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: So can you kind of talk through your team and
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: the type of research that you do with the Federal
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: Reserve Bank of Boston.
• 1:53
  Speaker 4: Sure, of course. So my team at the Boston side,
• 1:58
  Speaker 4: we support our policy maker, President Susent Collins, in preparations
• 2:04
  Speaker 4: for the deliberations primarily at the F and C meetings.
• 2:09
  Speaker 4: We also do a lot of longer term research projects
• 2:14
  Speaker 4: to understand different topics and economics that are important for
• 2:19
  Speaker 4: policy making as well, and we are part of a
• 2:23
  Speaker 4: department really that has several other groups focusing on different
• 2:27
  Speaker 4: aspects of the economy, all with the goal of generating
• 2:32
  Speaker 4: useful research and supporting the policy.
• 2:34
  Speaker 5: Jenny, when we talk about areas of research that are
• 2:38
  Speaker 5: kind of front of mind for people right now, one
• 2:40
  Speaker 5: of them obviously has to be inflation, and it concerns
• 2:43
  Speaker 5: about where inflation may go given the imposition of tariffs.
• 2:48
  Speaker 3: When we talk about how you actually.
• 2:51
  Speaker 5: Model inflation, can you explain to our listeners kind of
• 2:55
  Speaker 5: what goes into that, just because I think sometimes we
• 2:58
  Speaker 5: get this feeling like inflation is is, you know, something
• 3:00
  Speaker 5: like physics, where there are hard and fast rules, but
• 3:03
  Speaker 5: it's much more nuanced, and I'm curious if you can
• 3:05
  Speaker 5: give some insight into how you're approaching it these days.
• 3:08
  Speaker 4: Sure. So, we've actually in our team recently developed a
• 3:12
  Speaker 4: model of inflation, particularly focusing on the PCE inflation Index,
• 3:20
  Speaker 4: which is the one targeted by the Fire Reserve. And
• 3:23
  Speaker 4: so one thing we saw, especially during the pandemic, and
• 3:27
  Speaker 4: I think it's still very much an issue now in
• 3:31
  Speaker 4: the arena of tariffs, is that you can have inflation
• 3:35
  Speaker 4: coming from different sources, and in particular, I think it's
• 3:40
  Speaker 4: especially important for policy to separate out inflation that's due
• 3:43
  Speaker 4: to demand versus supply. And the reason for this is
• 3:46
  Speaker 4: because demand driven inflation tends to move together with employment,
• 3:50
  Speaker 4: so that the two objective of the fire reserve system,
• 3:54
  Speaker 4: the stable prices of maximum employment, are not at odds.
• 3:58
  Speaker 4: But when you see supply driven inflation, as we did
• 4:02
  Speaker 4: during the pandemic, and as we potentially might due to terrorists,
• 4:07
  Speaker 4: that usually comes with slower activity. So taming this type
• 4:10
  Speaker 4: of inflation to achieve our stable price goal would generally
• 4:15
  Speaker 4: require slowing employment below the maximum employment goal. So this
• 4:19
  Speaker 4: generates a policy trade off, and so we developed a
• 4:22
  Speaker 4: model to kind of separate out the different sources of
• 4:25
  Speaker 4: inflation to help better inform policy.
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: Jenny, when you look at things like expectations, we just
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: got the University of Michigan survey out a little bit
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: over an hour ago. How important do you find consumer
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: expectations for inflation to be these days compared to say,
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: in previous times or are they never really heavily weighted
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: in your models?
• 4:47
  Speaker 4: So they definitely played a much larger role during the
• 4:51
  Speaker 4: high inflation period of the nineteen seventies. Over time, I
• 4:57
  Speaker 4: think you know maybe I'm biased, but I think due
• 5:00
  Speaker 4: to largely due to good policy and the FED being
• 5:04
  Speaker 4: able to establish credibility and controlling inflation, they have played
• 5:10
  Speaker 4: a lesser role they subsided during the pandemic. I think
• 5:14
  Speaker 4: we saw, you know, just a tiny hint of expectations
• 5:20
  Speaker 4: being a little bit wobbly and contributing just like a
• 5:23
  Speaker 4: hair more than in the past. But really like expectations
• 5:29
  Speaker 4: stayed well anchored, they stayed stable, and they're not I
• 5:31
  Speaker 4: think currently a big factor in inflation.
• 5:36
  Speaker 3: Jenny.
• 5:36
  Speaker 5: One of the things that we saw yesterday was the
• 5:39
  Speaker 5: CFO of Walmart indicated that they would start having to
• 5:42
  Speaker 5: pass through terrorf related price increases in the coming week.
• 5:47
  Speaker 5: So obviously, when when the biggest or one of the
• 5:48
  Speaker 5: biggest retailers in the country says that, we take notice,
• 5:53
  Speaker 5: most people don't work for the biggest retailer in the country.
• 5:57
  Speaker 5: Even in the retail space, there's a lot of small
• 5:59
  Speaker 5: and medium sized businesses that still import a ton of
• 6:02
  Speaker 5: their products that they sell here in the US. What
• 6:05
  Speaker 5: kind of insights do you have as to how those
• 6:08
  Speaker 5: smaller businesses may end up either absorbing or passing through
• 6:12
  Speaker 5: the tariff costs to their customers.
• 6:15
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think that's definitely an area that we're very
• 6:18
  Speaker 4: interested in. These smaller businesses. They're an important kind of
• 6:22
  Speaker 4: growth engine in the economy. They generate a lot of employment.
• 6:25
  Speaker 4: They also are a type of business that we don't
• 6:29
  Speaker 4: have a lot of visibility into in terms of publicly
• 6:32
  Speaker 4: available data, and so at the Bank, in collaboration with
• 6:36
  Speaker 4: Morning Console and some other academic researchers, we developed survey
• 6:41
  Speaker 4: some survey questions that we fielded towards the end of
• 6:46
  Speaker 4: last year to try to understand how tariffs were affecting
• 6:51
  Speaker 4: these smaller businesses, and we did indeed see in our
• 6:55
  Speaker 4: survey methodology that there was a causal effect of tariffs
• 7:00
  Speaker 4: on essentially raising the cost expectations of importers and their
• 7:06
  Speaker 4: price expectations as well that they would have to pass
• 7:08
  Speaker 4: along some of these cost increases to their customers, with
• 7:13
  Speaker 4: non importers less so interestingly, there we actually saw that
• 7:17
  Speaker 4: their cost and price expectations were slightly going down, which
• 7:22
  Speaker 4: could reflect an expectation of lower demands possibly.
• 7:26
  Speaker 2: Jenny, When you take a look at the regional economy
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: of the New England area, which the Boston Fed obviously covers,
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: are there any regional differences you're seeing in the state
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: of employment or in the state of inflation and expectations
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: compared to say, for instance, areas where housing inventory is
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: up significantly or unemployment picture might be changing more rapidly
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: than say in the Greater Boston region.
• 7:49
  Speaker 4: I think currently we're seeing a lot of what the
• 7:53
  Speaker 4: same kind of thing that we're seeing across the country,
• 7:56
  Speaker 4: and that could be in part because the you know,
• 8:00
  Speaker 4: the most kind of salient thing affecting the country right
• 8:03
  Speaker 4: now is a more national issue of these impoor terriffs.
• 8:08
  Speaker 4: I think longer term, we might start to see some
• 8:13
  Speaker 4: other dynamics that New England stands out for. In particular,
• 8:18
  Speaker 4: we may see kind of the effects of things going
• 8:22
  Speaker 4: on in the education sector, for example, impacting us more
• 8:27
  Speaker 4: as you know, we're kind of that's a big sector
• 8:31
  Speaker 4: for our economy. Similarly, we may see some immigration policies
• 8:37
  Speaker 4: start to affect some of the sectors that we have
• 8:40
  Speaker 4: here a bit more in terms of like tourism, you
• 8:42
  Speaker 4: think of tape cod places.
• 8:43
  Speaker 3: Like that, yep, yep.
• 8:45
  Speaker 5: I know that inflation obviously is front and center. As
• 8:49
  Speaker 5: you know, we discussed with people, you know, nervous about
• 8:51
  Speaker 5: what could happen from a terriff implementation standpoint. But the
• 8:56
  Speaker 5: other piece that the FED is obviously focused on is employment.
• 9:00
  Speaker 5: And we talked about this idea of full employment fairly
• 9:04
  Speaker 5: often and how it relates to, you know, how the
• 9:07
  Speaker 5: FED may manage policy and what it means for average Americans.
• 9:12
  Speaker 3: Any thoughts as to how the idea.
• 9:14
  Speaker 5: Of full employment may have evolved into where Look, we've
• 9:18
  Speaker 5: been sitting near four percent unemployment for a couple of
• 9:21
  Speaker 5: years now, which is, you know, lower than I think
• 9:23
  Speaker 5: most economists would have been comfortable with for you know,
• 9:25
  Speaker 5: the last forty or fifty years. Any thoughts as to
• 9:28
  Speaker 5: how that may be evolving in the idea of full
• 9:30
  Speaker 5: employment right?
• 9:33
  Speaker 4: I think this example you bring up of we've been
• 9:36
  Speaker 4: sitting with four percent for a long time is a
• 9:38
  Speaker 4: good one. I think the notion of what unemployment rate
• 9:44
  Speaker 4: constitutes full employment is really something that evolves quite a
• 9:48
  Speaker 4: lot over time. And this has to do with more
• 9:51
  Speaker 4: structural factors like how our industries are organized. You know,
• 9:56
  Speaker 4: we used to be much more manufacturing heavy and now
• 9:59
  Speaker 4: we're more service the economy, so things like that. It
• 10:01
  Speaker 4: can also be influenced by demographics, the you know, educational
• 10:07
  Speaker 4: makeup of the workforce, and so this thing, this is
• 10:11
  Speaker 4: something we expect to evolve over time. I think in
• 10:16
  Speaker 4: this notion of maximum employment, a lot of people also
• 10:18
  Speaker 4: like to think of maximum sustainable employment. And so we've
• 10:23
  Speaker 4: learned over time, especially in the time like before the pandemic,
• 10:26
  Speaker 4: that we can be at unemployment levels that are very
• 10:31
  Speaker 4: low relative to historical standards and still have that seem
• 10:36
  Speaker 4: sustainable in the sense that the employment itself, the labor
• 10:39
  Speaker 4: market itself, is not really contributing to inflationary pressures. And
• 10:44
  Speaker 4: so this, this measure of full employment based on unemployment
• 10:49
  Speaker 4: rates is something that we certainly do monitor a lot
• 10:54
  Speaker 4: over time and try to estimate over time.
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: Jenny, that's all the time we have, but want to
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: say we really appreciate you coming on. This was very
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: informative and we'd love to talk to you again sometime soon.
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: So thank you so much for joining us today.
• 11:07
  Speaker 4: Thank you for having me.
• 11:08
  Speaker 3: That's Jenny Tang.
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: She's a vice president and economist in the Federal Reserve
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: Bank of Boston's Research department and is also orders of
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: magnitude more qualified to talk about the state of the
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: economy than Chuck or myself. I found that really, really
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: helpful conversation. We're going to take a quick break. When
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: we come back, a little bit of trivia. Here is
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: next on the Financial Exchange.
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: Miss Any of the Show. Catch up at your convenience
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: by visiting Financial Exchange Show dot com and clicking the
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: on demand icon, where you'll find all of our interviews
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: in full showers. This is your home for the latest
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: business and financial news in New England and around the country.
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: This is the Financial Exchange Radio Network. Miss Any of
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: the Show. The Financial Exchange Show podcast is available on Apple,
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: Spotify and iHeartRadio. Hit the subscribe button and leave us
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: a five star review. This is the Financial Exchange Radio Network.
• 12:01
  Speaker 6: Time for trivia here on the Financial Exchange and Today
• 12:05
  Speaker 6: is Pierce Brosnan's seventy second birthday. The Irish actor is
• 12:10
  Speaker 6: most famous for his four films run as James Bond
• 12:14
  Speaker 6: in the nineties and early two thousands. Brosnen was originally
• 12:17
  Speaker 6: slated to begin his run as Bond in the late eighties,
• 12:21
  Speaker 6: but he couldn't get out of his contract with NBC.
• 12:25
  Speaker 6: Trivia question today What TV Show? Starred Pierce Brosnan from
• 12:30
  Speaker 6: nineteen eighty two to nineteen eighty seven. Once again, What
• 12:33
  Speaker 6: TV show starred Peirece Brosnan from nineteen eighty two to
• 12:38
  Speaker 6: nineteen eighty seven. Be the fifth person today to text
• 12:41
  Speaker 6: us at six one seven three six two thirteen eighty
• 12:45
  Speaker 6: five with the correct answer, and you'll win a Financial
• 12:48
  Speaker 6: Exchange Show t shirt once again. The fifth correct response
• 12:51
  Speaker 6: to text us at six one seven three six two
• 12:55
  Speaker 6: thirteen eighty five will be our winner. See complete contest
• 12:58
  Speaker 6: rules at Financial Exchange Show dot com.
• 13:01
  Speaker 3: Do we have a new James Bond after Daniel Craig
• 13:04
  Speaker 3: yet has not been announced? Has not? Nope.
• 13:07
  Speaker 5: Yeah, it's been a while since we've had a Bond movie.
• 13:12
  Speaker 3: Uh what two years ago? I'm gonna say four or five.
• 13:17
  Speaker 3: They have no time to die? Yeah, wow twenty twenty one.
• 13:20
  Speaker 3: You're right, and.
• 13:21
  Speaker 5: They've been kind of sporadic like it used to be
• 13:22
  Speaker 5: you'd get one every two or three years, and they
• 13:25
  Speaker 5: kind of thinned out after Skyfall. So yeah, I don't know,
• 13:31
  Speaker 5: just uh, just saying, uh, this is a nice segue
• 13:35
  Speaker 5: to our next topic. This is Generation x's biggest retirement worry,
• 13:40
  Speaker 5: and it's not money, it's where are the James Bond movies?
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: They are quite concerned about this. I hear it over
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: and over again from forty five to six year olds.
• 13:48
  Speaker 3: So here's the thing.
• 13:49
  Speaker 5: It says that the the biggest retirement worry is not money,
• 13:53
  Speaker 5: but it's still money.
• 13:54
  Speaker 3: It is money.
• 13:55
  Speaker 5: It's specifically how much is gonna cost? Yeah, so it's
• 13:59
  Speaker 5: like I would say that is a money problem. It
• 14:01
  Speaker 5: seems like, you know, a specific one. What specific health
• 14:04
  Speaker 5: care concerns do gen xers have and are they different
• 14:07
  Speaker 5: from what we've seen from baby No.
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: I think they are of similar concern, which is, hey,
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: you know, where is my health insurance going to come from? Specifically,
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: where is my health insurance going to come from? Before
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: sixty five? But I'm also sure that some of this
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: is just misinformation and misguided. I don't think that most
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: people under the age of sixty have any real idea
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: how Medicare works when it kicks in and just how
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: affordable and happy.
• 14:39
  Speaker 3: People are with it.
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: But a real legitimate concern that you know it definitely
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: exists out there is hey, what if I can't make
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: it to sixty five? What if I get laid off
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: at sixty two years old and suddenly I'm out there
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: shopping for health insurance? And market Watch does an an
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: interview with a sixty year old who named Laura, who
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: is paying thirty three thousand dollars a year for health
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: insurance for it, says his family. So I guess a
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: guy named Laura. But in any case, it can oftentimes
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: be that much, especially if you still have children under
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: the age of what is it twenty six now, where
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: they have to fall off family health insurance. Yeah, this
• 15:21
  Speaker 2: is not irregular, I guess would be. My point is
• 15:23
  Speaker 2: if you are trying to buy your own health insurance
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: plan and it is not being subsidized by Obamacare, these
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: are real costs that people face. I have seen eighteen
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: hundred dollars per month per person on these types of
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: health insurance plans that are out there. I don't think
• 15:40
  Speaker 2: those are their only concerns. I think this generation is
• 15:43
  Speaker 2: also seeing one of the most dramatic increases and costs
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: for long term care for their parents that anyone's ever seen,
• 15:50
  Speaker 2: and so that is also playing into these factors of
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: concern for upcoming retirees.
• 15:55
  Speaker 3: Juck. Yeah, I think it's clearly. And here's the thing.
• 16:01
  Speaker 5: It's something where I think we also have to acknowledge
• 16:06
  Speaker 5: that the trajectory for the US healthcare system is probably
• 16:11
  Speaker 5: not sustainable as it stands right now.
• 16:14
  Speaker 3: Especially an end of life care. Yeah.
• 16:16
  Speaker 5: No, it's like there's no way to make not just
• 16:20
  Speaker 5: the dollars add up, but also just the sheer amount
• 16:24
  Speaker 5: of people that are needed to work in that industry
• 16:29
  Speaker 5: as well. And so as if you're someone who's a
• 16:32
  Speaker 5: gen xer saying, Okay, what does this look like, you know,
• 16:35
  Speaker 5: I'm nervous about what this could be. You know, twenty
• 16:36
  Speaker 5: thirty years from now, there's huge changes that could be
• 16:41
  Speaker 5: a foot by then. So I think it's okay to say, hey,
• 16:44
  Speaker 5: this is what it is now, but by the time
• 16:45
  Speaker 5: you get to the point where some of those things
• 16:47
  Speaker 5: are concerns, it might not be relevant to you in
• 16:50
  Speaker 5: the same way.
• 16:50
  Speaker 3: That it is today. All of that haven't been said.
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: I do think a lot of this concern is misplaced, because,
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: like I mentioned, I don't think most people know how
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: these systems work. If you are in the position where
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: you are close to that let's call it fifty five
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: to sixty five age range, and you are trying to
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: understand how healthcare costs could frankly ruin your financial plan,
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: you are not alone in this fear. But I will
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: also say that once it's gone through, and once you've
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: studied it, and once you've worked with a professional to understand, Hey,
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: this is actually how I can go and get reasonably
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: affordable health insurance and position my assets in a way
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: so that I won't have to pay thirty three thousand
• 17:31
  Speaker 2: dollars a year for health insurance before I hit Medicare.
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: That's all doable. It does require some intentionality to it.
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: You do have to position things and be really goals
• 17:42
  Speaker 2: based with everything. But there are ways to do this,
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: and it's one of the areas that I consistently surprise
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: my clients with on Hey, this is how you can
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: actually afford to retire before sixty five and not get
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: blown away by health insurance costs. If you have questions
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: along those lines and you're trying to understand how this
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: system works, the folks Armstrong Advisory Group have the expertise
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: needed to walk you through that and make sure it
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: fits in with the strategies of your overall plan. Phone
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: number for the Armstrong Advisory Group eight hundred three nine
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: three four zero zero one. There are solutions out there
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: that could let you retire early. Don't work longer than
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: you have to call us at eight hundred three nine
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: three four zero zero one.
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: The proceeding was paid for by Armstrong Advisory Group, a
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: registered investment advisor. Nothing in the ad or in any
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: Armstrong guide a specific financial, legal, or tax advice. Consult
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: your own financial, tax, and estate planning advisors before making
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: any investment decisions. Armstrong may contact you to offer investment
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: advisory services.
• 18:36
  Speaker 5: Mike, we got ice cream prices going up right as
• 18:38
  Speaker 5: summer kicks off.
• 18:39
  Speaker 3: Give me a break. What gives coconut oil?
• 18:43
  Speaker 5: I heard, yes, apparently, So here's the deal, and I'll
• 18:46
  Speaker 5: quote here from Bloomberg. Coconut oil, a key ingredient in
• 18:49
  Speaker 5: industrial made gelatos, is going up in price, and the
• 18:53
  Speaker 5: price has gone parabolic in the wholesale market, setting fresh
• 18:56
  Speaker 5: record highs every month so far in twenty twenty five.
• 18:59
  Speaker 5: Worse for the price gainser likely as demand outstripped supply,
• 19:03
  Speaker 5: making one of my guilty indulgences even more expensive.
• 19:07
  Speaker 2: Can't believe I forgot to renew my coconut oil contracts,
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: futures contracts.
• 19:12
  Speaker 3: Again.
• 19:13
  Speaker 5: This is just one of these things where you're like, Okay,
• 19:15
  Speaker 5: how does this end up, you know, becoming a thing,
• 19:20
  Speaker 5: And basically what it boils down to is Most coconut
• 19:22
  Speaker 5: oil is produced in the Philippines. In Indonesia, about almost
• 19:25
  Speaker 5: seventy five percent is produced there, and you had bad
• 19:29
  Speaker 5: weather plus trade shocks, and that has pushed coconut oil
• 19:33
  Speaker 5: prices through the roof. Let's take a quick break. When
• 19:36
  Speaker 5: we come back, we get the trivia answer after this.
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: Bringing the latest financial news straight to your radio every day,
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: it's the Financial Exchange on the Financial Exchange Radio Network.
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: Find daily interviews and full shows of the Financial Exchange
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: on how Are YouTube page. Get cut up on anything
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: and everything you might have missed. This is the Financial
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: lik Change Radio Network.
• 20:05
  Speaker 6: The Financial Exchange is a proud partner of the Disabled
• 20:08
  Speaker 6: American Veterans Department of Massachusetts. And you can register right
• 20:13
  Speaker 6: now for this year's five K at Castle Island by
• 20:16
  Speaker 6: visiting DAV fivek dot Boston. The event will sell out again,
• 20:20
  Speaker 6: so if you're interested in participating, now's the time to
• 20:24
  Speaker 6: reserve your spot. Come out and help support our great
• 20:27
  Speaker 6: American heroes by joining us for the DAV five K.
• 20:30
  Speaker 6: Visit DAV five k dot Boston to register or to
• 20:34
  Speaker 6: make a donation today. That's DAV five k dot Boston
• 20:39
  Speaker 6: trivia question today was what TV show starred Pierce Brosden
• 20:44
  Speaker 6: from nineteen eighty two to nineteen eighty seven. That would
• 20:47
  Speaker 6: be Remington Steele. James from Rochester, New Hampshire is our
• 20:53
  Speaker 6: winner today, taking home a Financial Exchange Show t shirt.
• 20:56
  Speaker 6: Congrats to James, and we play trivia every day here
• 21:00
  Speaker 6: on the Financial Exchange. See complete contest rules at Financial
• 21:04
  Speaker 6: Exchange Show dot com.
• 21:06
  Speaker 5: Mike, we got a piece of the Wall Street Journal.
• 21:08
  Speaker 5: It's titled travelers are trying their hardest to avoid Newark Airport.
• 21:13
  Speaker 5: Another one in the journal is well an exclusive from them.
• 21:16
  Speaker 5: It's titled this air traffic controller just averted a mid
• 21:19
  Speaker 5: air collision. Now he's speaking out, and this comes on
• 21:22
  Speaker 5: the back of a report I think it was yesterday
• 21:24
  Speaker 5: that Denver air Traffic Control lost contact with a number
• 21:29
  Speaker 5: of planes on Monday for a period of up to
• 21:32
  Speaker 5: six minutes. And it's it's pretty clear that we are
• 21:37
  Speaker 5: at a breaking point with the ability for local air
• 21:45
  Speaker 5: traffic control centers to basically maintain operations the way that
• 21:50
  Speaker 5: they need to. I don't know enough about the system
• 21:53
  Speaker 5: to be able to say it's because of X, Y
• 21:54
  Speaker 5: or Z, so I'm not going to be able to
• 21:58
  Speaker 5: assign blame unfortunately, because I know that's what everyone loves
• 22:01
  Speaker 5: to hear, is like, who's at fall for this? I
• 22:03
  Speaker 5: don't know, but it seems like we're getting to a
• 22:07
  Speaker 5: point where the system is stressed, and you're seeing little
• 22:11
  Speaker 5: cracks appearing here and there, and it almost feels like
• 22:16
  Speaker 5: we're heading towards like an air traffic controller walk out
• 22:18
  Speaker 5: just because I think things are getting untenable there.
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's I was gonna say the word funny. It's
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: not funny, but it's interesting how this happens, you know,
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: very slowly and then all at once, because you've been hearing,
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: you know, rumblings from air traffic controllers about the degree
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: of stress the garbage systems that they have to use.
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: That's been the case across all you know, airport technology
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: and airline technology. I shouldn't say in the planes the
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: technology is quite good, but you know, airline or technology
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: on the ground has been abysmo for quite some time.
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: But you know, we haven't heard about these types of
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: real safety issues until literally twenty twenty five, when several
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: of them have come in the last what thirty days now,
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: So I find that quite alarming. U the interview within
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: the Wall Street Journally, if you have a subscription, I
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: think is worth reading to just the level of stress
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: that these that these individuals endure. I don't know, you know,
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: if you're listening and don't have anyone who's worked in
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: the space. I know Tucker and I kind of independently
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: know the same person that works in this space and
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: has spoken to just the the levels of stress and
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: then follow on abuse, you know, substance abuse and things
• 23:26
  Speaker 2: along that line that can go with this job because
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: you are quite literally responsible for the lives of hundreds
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: of people every single minute, and at the same time
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: have been dealing with decades of short staffing issues and
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: now severe technology issues that leave these people i think,
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: literally walking out of their jobs trembling in many cases.
• 23:46
  Speaker 5: Yeah, it's it's a real problem, especially because the the.
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: Ability to safely use air travel.
• 23:54
  Speaker 5: In the United States forms you know, it's it's kind
• 23:59
  Speaker 5: of the backbone on how a lot of there are
• 24:02
  Speaker 5: two principal backbones on how the US economy works. The
• 24:06
  Speaker 5: first is the shipping industry. And I'm not just talking
• 24:09
  Speaker 5: about like stuff that comes into the country. I'm talking
• 24:11
  Speaker 5: about even you know, all the all the goods and
• 24:14
  Speaker 5: stuff that travels up, you know, and up and down
• 24:16
  Speaker 5: different rivers and things like that. The Mississippi in particular,
• 24:19
  Speaker 5: still is a significant amount of stuff that moves on it,
• 24:22
  Speaker 5: just on you know, smaller ships that don't get necessarily
• 24:24
  Speaker 5: the amount of press.
• 24:27
  Speaker 3: But air travel, when you talk about the ability to.
• 24:31
  Speaker 5: I mean, look, quite honestly, if you use Amazon, it
• 24:35
  Speaker 5: does not exist without air travel being able to be
• 24:38
  Speaker 5: easily accessible and low cost. Yeah, and if that begins
• 24:43
  Speaker 5: to shift, then obviously, you know, things come to a
• 24:47
  Speaker 5: screeching halt. We don't exactly have a fantastic high speed
• 24:51
  Speaker 5: rail system to move people around the country instead.
• 24:54
  Speaker 3: So yeah, this is concerning.
• 24:56
  Speaker 2: I'm interested to hear that people are actually making these
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: decisions of avoiding Newark because you know, other safety issues
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: in the past haven't exactly you know, we didn't exactly
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: see people booking flights and taking a look at the
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: you know, whether or not they were going to be
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: on a seven thirty seven Max or not a few
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: years ago, and so this one's interesting to me that
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: people are intentionally attempting to avoid Newark. But you know,
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: the more of these that I would assume that these
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: are not unique issues to Newark and Denvery. It seems
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: to me that they are quite possibly going to spread
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: and how do consumers react?
• 25:33
  Speaker 5: Yeah, so that is that's kind of what's going on
• 25:36
  Speaker 5: with aviation. And by the way, this already comes into
• 25:39
  Speaker 5: a time where you already have airlines indicating, hey, we're
• 25:44
  Speaker 5: gonna start cutting capacity later this year because of a
• 25:47
  Speaker 5: decrease that we are seeing in bookings. And so you
• 25:50
  Speaker 5: threw this on the pile, and it does raise some
• 25:52
  Speaker 5: questions for what you know, the next six to twelve
• 25:54
  Speaker 5: months look like for airlines, not in terms of you know, hey,
• 25:57
  Speaker 5: are any airlines going out of business? Not talking about that,
• 26:00
  Speaker 5: but just hey, what what does this mean for you know,
• 26:03
  Speaker 5: a larger potential slowdown in commercial aviation and how does
• 26:07
  Speaker 5: that impact the US economy. It's another thing just to
• 26:11
  Speaker 5: wonder about. You don't have to get you know, all
• 26:13
  Speaker 5: pessimistic and say this is going to be you know,
• 26:15
  Speaker 5: some huge problem for the US economy. But you just say, okay,
• 26:18
  Speaker 5: like put it into the throw it on the pile,
• 26:20
  Speaker 5: and you know, see how it all shakes out.
• 26:22
  Speaker 3: But it's something to watch.
• 26:24
  Speaker 5: I think, agreed, Let's see what else do we want
• 26:28
  Speaker 5: to talk about here. Do we want to talk is
• 26:31
  Speaker 5: that everythew if we go back real quick to price
• 26:34
  Speaker 5: increases and just the stay of the consume.
• 26:36
  Speaker 3: Right, No, yeah, that's not okay with you. No, it's okay.
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: There's a couple stats that I just wanted to point
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: out here because we made the point that hey, you know,
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: clearly Walmart is giving cover to many other companies now
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: to be able to go out there and raise prices.
• 26:49
  Speaker 2: But I keep going back to the consumer and their
• 26:52
  Speaker 2: ability to absorb those price increases. A few stats that
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: I want to share right now. According to the Saint
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: Louis Federal Reserve, the percentage of credit card debt that
• 27:02
  Speaker 2: is now thirty days or more delinquent is at the
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: highest level it's been since immediately after the Great Recession. Yep,
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: that's a pretty concerning number. According to the Education Department, also,
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: there are currently five million people in default on their
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: student loans across this country, and they believe that that
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: number is likely to climb to ten million by the
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: next couple of months.
• 27:27
  Speaker 3: When we look at those two.
• 27:28
  Speaker 2: Factors, I just look at this and generally wonder, look,
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: the credit card number that can always go higher and
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: you know, historically people tend to just keep loading up
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: those credit cards until the bank literally tells them no.
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: But these are two numbers that I look at and say, yeah,
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: I just don't know how much price absorption is going
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: to be out there on behalf the consumer.
• 27:50
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 27:51
  Speaker 5: Here's the other thing is there's this again kind of
• 27:54
  Speaker 5: this dichotomy between what we're seeing from what the bottom
• 27:58
  Speaker 5: fifty percent of wager owners are saying and what the
• 28:01
  Speaker 5: top ten percent in particular are saying, not just saying,
• 28:04
  Speaker 5: but doing. And here's one of the things that you
• 28:08
  Speaker 5: may see is, Look, you may see continue to get
• 28:11
  Speaker 5: worse for that low income household, but as long as
• 28:16
  Speaker 5: the high income earner is still spending the amount of
• 28:20
  Speaker 5: money they've been spending previously. And because of the way
• 28:22
  Speaker 5: that you know, wages are disproportionately skewed towards the high
• 28:26
  Speaker 5: end in the US, you may have like the ultimate
• 28:29
  Speaker 5: like cynical like kind of dystopia that you end up with,
• 28:32
  Speaker 5: which is the US doesn't necessarily go into recession, but
• 28:36
  Speaker 5: a lot of people feel like it does because they're
• 28:38
  Speaker 5: not their incomes aren't high enough to offset what's going on.
• 28:42
  Speaker 5: But the high income consumer can still plow through just
• 28:44
  Speaker 5: because their incomes are high enough that it doesn't matter.
• 28:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, just one more stat that I have to share
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: regarding student loans that just terrifies me. There are more
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: than two million people over the age of sixty two
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: with student loans outstanding, and more than four one hundred
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: and fifty thousand of them are in default and will
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: likely have their social securities garnished.
• 29:06
  Speaker 3: Let's take a quick break here.
• 29:07
  Speaker 5: When we return, we're gonna be joined by Paul Lamonica
• 29:09
  Speaker 5: from Barons right after this.
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: This is your home for the most comprehensive coverage of
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: the economy and the trends on Wall Street. This is
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: the Financial Exchange Radio Network. The Financial Exchange streams live
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: on YouTube. Like our page and stay up to date
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: on breaking business news all morning long. This is the
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: Financial Exchange Radio Network.
• 29:32
  Speaker 4: Ladies and gentlemen, the weekend.
• 29:40
  Speaker 5: As promise, we're now joined by Paul Monica from Barons
• 29:44
  Speaker 5: here to chat with us for a little bit today.
• 29:47
  Speaker 3: Paul, how are you doing today?
• 29:48
  Speaker 7: I'm good days.
• 29:49
  Speaker 3: How you guys doing.
• 29:51
  Speaker 5: We're doing pretty well and I want to talk with
• 29:52
  Speaker 5: you today about Coinbase.
• 29:55
  Speaker 3: It's been kind of a wild week for them. I guess, to.
• 30:01
  Speaker 7: Put it mildly, that might be a bit of an understatement.
• 30:06
  Speaker 7: The stock is still up, it looks like more than
• 30:11
  Speaker 7: thirty percent in just the past five days. And that's
• 30:15
  Speaker 7: despite the fact that there is an SEC investigation that
• 30:21
  Speaker 7: the company confirmed, and there was hacking. It looked like,
• 30:26
  Speaker 7: you know, some cyber criminals maybe you know, trying to
• 30:31
  Speaker 7: force coinbase to pay some sort of ransom. But despite that,
• 30:37
  Speaker 7: you know, the stock got added to the SP five
• 30:39
  Speaker 7: hundred earlier this week, and that really seems to be
• 30:43
  Speaker 7: what's driving prices much higher.
• 30:46
  Speaker 3: This notion.
• 30:47
  Speaker 7: I guess that, you know, Coinbase's addition to the SP
• 30:50
  Speaker 7: five hundred inclusion is kind of a validation of you know,
• 30:53
  Speaker 7: the digital assets business and cryptocurrencies rent large, and you
• 30:59
  Speaker 7: know comes shortly after the company announced decent earnings and
• 31:04
  Speaker 7: a big acquisition last week as well. It's a lot
• 31:06
  Speaker 7: going on.
• 31:08
  Speaker 5: Here's what I guess I'm struggling to figure out with
• 31:11
  Speaker 5: regards to to Coinbase.
• 31:12
  Speaker 3: All of the like diehard crypto.
• 31:14
  Speaker 5: People that I know in my world are basically like, hey,
• 31:19
  Speaker 5: keep your crypto away from an exchange so it can't
• 31:22
  Speaker 5: be hacked, and like, you know, you want to hold
• 31:24
  Speaker 5: on to it yourself, you know, and on some kind
• 31:26
  Speaker 5: of disconnected device. Everyone I know who is you know,
• 31:31
  Speaker 5: just like a basic retail trader. Now there's all these
• 31:33
  Speaker 5: you know, bitcoin ETFs in this and that they can
• 31:36
  Speaker 5: access those through regular brokerage platforms. What value does coinbase
• 31:42
  Speaker 5: provide that is unique, I guess, And where's like.
• 31:46
  Speaker 3: The the the.
• 31:48
  Speaker 5: Reason why they have to be the one to exist
• 31:51
  Speaker 5: and grow.
• 31:52
  Speaker 7: No, it's a great question. I mean, obviously, the advent
• 31:56
  Speaker 7: of bitcoin et apps have made it a little bit
• 31:59
  Speaker 7: easier for the average retail investor to buy and have
• 32:03
  Speaker 7: access to crypto without purchasing bitcoin directly or coinbas stock.
• 32:09
  Speaker 7: But you know, I think the coin base counter argument
• 32:12
  Speaker 7: is that they have a big custodial business, which means
• 32:16
  Speaker 7: that you have crypto wallets where Coinbase is helping them
• 32:20
  Speaker 7: manage where they're a little bit more secure. You don't
• 32:24
  Speaker 7: need your you know, the keys and other things for
• 32:28
  Speaker 7: security that make it sometimes a little bit more difficult
• 32:32
  Speaker 7: to buy and sell crypto and manage those those assets.
• 32:37
  Speaker 7: And then the dera bit deal that they just announced
• 32:40
  Speaker 7: last week, this crypto's options company. If investors are really sophisticated,
• 32:47
  Speaker 7: that are you know, vary into crypto. Having a derivatives
• 32:51
  Speaker 7: platform is yet another way for crypto investors to try
• 32:56
  Speaker 7: and profit from what's a very volatile asset still, So,
• 33:01
  Speaker 7: you know, I think you're right. If you are an
• 33:03
  Speaker 7: average kind of buy and hold investor who wants to
• 33:05
  Speaker 7: dabble in crypto, you probably don't need as many of
• 33:09
  Speaker 7: the sophisticated products that point base offers. But you know,
• 33:13
  Speaker 7: there are plenty of people out there that are really,
• 33:17
  Speaker 7: really into digital currencies and see it as the way
• 33:20
  Speaker 7: of the future. Is both a means of you know,
• 33:23
  Speaker 7: commerce as well as an investable asset that could rival
• 33:27
  Speaker 7: the dollar in gold.
• 33:29
  Speaker 3: What's next for coinbase?
• 33:30
  Speaker 5: You mentioned the acquisition that they just made trying to
• 33:32
  Speaker 5: get into that derivative space more heavily.
• 33:34
  Speaker 3: Is there any area that is.
• 33:36
  Speaker 5: Out there that they want to cover that they don't
• 33:38
  Speaker 5: currently have coverage on that they could be a player
• 33:40
  Speaker 5: in for their acquisitions or further development.
• 33:43
  Speaker 7: Yeah, I wouldn't be I wouldn't say that they are
• 33:45
  Speaker 7: not in international markets, but that is an area where
• 33:50
  Speaker 7: I wouldn't be surprised that they look to do a
• 33:53
  Speaker 7: little bit more to broaden out beyond what's you know,
• 33:57
  Speaker 7: a pretty heavy US investor base. Something clearly one of
• 34:01
  Speaker 7: the virtues of cryptocurrencies that you know, bitcoin bowls, would
• 34:07
  Speaker 7: you know, taut is that it is a borderless security
• 34:12
  Speaker 7: or currency if you will, I mean, you can be uh,
• 34:15
  Speaker 7: you know, owning bitcoin around the world, you know, pretty seamlessly,
• 34:20
  Speaker 7: and it you know, is not subject to the whims
• 34:23
  Speaker 7: of central bank interest rate policies for example. So it
• 34:28
  Speaker 7: might be something like gold that is uh, you know,
• 34:32
  Speaker 7: something that you know maybe benefits when you see dollar weakness,
• 34:35
  Speaker 7: for example, but you know, I wouldn't be surprised if
• 34:37
  Speaker 7: they look to do more internationally. That's that's probably an
• 34:41
  Speaker 7: area of focus.
• 34:43
  Speaker 5: Very good, Paul, appreciate you joining us today, and I
• 34:46
  Speaker 5: hope you have a fantastic weekend.
• 34:49
  Speaker 7: I think a lot of it will depend on whether
• 34:51
  Speaker 7: or not tonight is good, and I think we probably
• 34:54
  Speaker 7: have differing views about that.
• 34:56
  Speaker 5: Let me let me ask you, actually, Paul, what do
• 34:58
  Speaker 5: you think happens tonight and that that game.
• 35:01
  Speaker 7: I'm going to be optimistic and think that the Knicks
• 35:04
  Speaker 7: do win it at home, since I hope that they'll
• 35:07
  Speaker 7: play a little bit more their favorite tider defense, you know,
• 35:11
  Speaker 7: particularly on white.
• 35:13
  Speaker 5: Feels to me She's obviously coming off, you know, a
• 35:15
  Speaker 5: big emotional win two nights ago, but I wonder how
• 35:19
  Speaker 5: much of that they can tap into. Again, what I
• 35:21
  Speaker 5: will say if they do win tonight, I think it's
• 35:23
  Speaker 5: season seven.
• 35:24
  Speaker 3: It's either Nickson six or seasons I would agree.
• 35:26
  Speaker 7: I would agree there, and yeah, I mean this is
• 35:28
  Speaker 7: still obviously a very talented team without Tatum and heart
• 35:32
  Speaker 7: goes out. I mean, you'd never want to see that.
• 35:34
  Speaker 7: That was just gutreaching.
• 35:36
  Speaker 6: By the way, the get in BRYCE for Madison Square
• 35:38
  Speaker 6: Garden tonight is about six hundred and thirty five dollars.
• 35:40
  Speaker 3: I saw that. That seems like nice. It does.
• 35:44
  Speaker 7: My son's going to the Yankees Mets game, but I
• 35:46
  Speaker 7: think he's going to be more attuned to his phone
• 35:48
  Speaker 7: for any Knicks updates.
• 35:50
  Speaker 5: Plenty of tickets available for that one, so it should
• 35:53
  Speaker 5: be good. Paul, thanks again for joining us.
• 35:55
  Speaker 7: Thanks a lot of guys have a good one.
• 35:57
  Speaker 5: That is Paul Lamonica from Baron's talking about coinbase. Mike,
• 36:02
  Speaker 5: what else we have that we want to cover?
• 36:03
  Speaker 3: We have minivans, Chuck.
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: I want to talk about minivans because they are having
• 36:08
  Speaker 2: a sales renaissance this year. Finally, people are listening to me.
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: The Kia Carnival is up so far sixty percent in
• 36:16
  Speaker 2: sales in year to date twenty twenty five. The Toyota Sienna,
• 36:20
  Speaker 2: which dominates that market, up fifty four percent through April.
• 36:23
  Speaker 2: The Honda Odyssey up twenty nine percent year over year
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: in sales. The Crisis Pacifica is the only one that
• 36:29
  Speaker 2: is struggling. But just like kind of all of Stilantis
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: right now, go about case of the entire minivan market
• 36:37
  Speaker 2: seems to be having a moment for practicality and just
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: you know how famously good looking these cars are. We
• 36:44
  Speaker 2: just bought our note new Toyota Sienna this week actually,
• 36:48
  Speaker 2: and it might be might be picking it up today,
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: I'm not sure. But they're having their moment, folks, and
• 36:53
  Speaker 2: I'm very excited. I have that everybody else is getting
• 36:57
  Speaker 2: on the minivan bandwagon because it's the best.
• 36:59
  Speaker 5: Car for kids under not even under ten mic over
• 37:04
  Speaker 5: you Like, here's the thing that I come back to about,
• 37:07
  Speaker 5: you know, the mini vans, the like having driven one
• 37:10
  Speaker 5: on like a couple of vacations and stuff like that.
• 37:12
  Speaker 3: Yep.
• 37:13
  Speaker 5: The fact that the floor is so low makes it
• 37:16
  Speaker 5: so easy to access that third row if you need
• 37:18
  Speaker 5: to number like. It's it's just you have so much
• 37:20
  Speaker 5: flexibility as to what you can do. There's just a
• 37:23
  Speaker 5: massive amount of space in there. And look like, here's
• 37:27
  Speaker 5: the thing, and.
• 37:27
  Speaker 3: You look cool driving No, Like, let's be honest, you
• 37:30
  Speaker 3: don't look the coolest.
• 37:32
  Speaker 5: But if we're gonna be completely real with ourselves, you're
• 37:36
  Speaker 5: not the coolest anyways. Correct, it'll be false advertising if
• 37:39
  Speaker 5: you were driving around in a portie.
• 37:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the Portsia isn't gonna make me look cool either,
• 37:45
  Speaker 2: so it will.
• 37:47
  Speaker 5: You know, you open the book and you're like, I
• 37:49
  Speaker 5: was expecting war in peace and I got you know,
• 37:53
  Speaker 5: c spot run right, So it's fine.
• 37:56
  Speaker 3: I'm the same. I'm the same way.
• 37:58
  Speaker 2: Glad that everybody else is finally coming to their senses
• 38:00
  Speaker 2: in buying minivans like me.
• 38:02
  Speaker 5: No, I'm I'm I'm very pro minivan. I do have
• 38:04
  Speaker 5: to uh say, they remember I was gonna get that
• 38:07
  Speaker 5: new uh VW one.
• 38:09
  Speaker 3: The uh hasn't gone so well for them well.
• 38:12
  Speaker 5: And and the pricing features not really up to uh
• 38:15
  Speaker 5: not up to snuff, So I don't think that one's
• 38:17
  Speaker 5: gonna happen for me. We're done for the day, done
• 38:19
  Speaker 5: for the week. Y'all have a great weekend. See you
• 38:22
  Speaker 5: back here on Monday.