Latest / Strictly Business / Shapiroworld by Strictly Business
Transcript
- 0:00You're listening to Strictly Business Podcast with Lindsay Williams.
- 0:05It's Monday afternoon, but it's also morning in Manhattan.
- 0:08So mornings in Manhattan on Mondays are with David Shapiro.
- 0:11It's time for Shapiro World.
- 0:12David is from Sessom Securities.
- 0:14David, markets are starting to split into two camps.
- 0:20One camp that says, we've seen this all before.
- 0:22Come on now, we can go back to normal with a couple of blips here and there.
- 0:25Others say, this may become more prolonged.
- 0:27This may become...
- 0:28more significant and don't be so sanguine about what we're seeing.
- 0:33So I don't know, which camp are you in?
- 0:35I know which one you want to be in, but realistically, which camp do you fall
- 0:39into?
- 0:40Realistically, I'm going into the second camp because, yes, I love the market.
- 0:45I'm very happy that we're up today quite dramatically.
- 0:48But digesting the weekend news and even today's news,
- 0:53this war is going to go on for another.
- 0:56another couple of weeks, maybe even longer than that.
- 0:59And at the moment, it seems that the Iranians, whether they've been destroyed
- 1:05or not, we don't know.
- 1:07You know, they're fighting to the last bullet.
- 1:07They're not going to give up at all because this is almost a religious fight
- 1:12to the end.
- 1:14You know, they're just fighting for survival.
- 1:16And yet the oil prices still remain elevated.
- 1:17They're down today, admittedly.
- 1:20But I think Trump beginning to to swerve a little.
- 1:24you know, calling for allies' help, which he hasn't before, and all of a sudden
- 1:31admitting that he can't do it alone.
- 1:33He can't get the tankers going or sailing on his own, you know,
- 1:37through the Straits of Hormuz.
- 1:39So I would have thought that this would worry investors.
- 1:44And yet today, traders have come in and have pushed all markets higher.
- 1:48The US markets are higher.
- 1:50I'm looking at the JSC, it's higher.
- 1:52And that's That's only in the last few hours.
- 1:55It was down until midday South African time and started to pick up slightly,
- 2:01and it's just been elevated now with the opening of Wall Street.
- 2:06So, Lindsay, I've still got an uncomfortable feeling.
- 2:10I was supposed to go to Israel.
- 2:12That's been canceled.
- 2:14I don't think there are any flights that are going to go there.
- 2:16There might only be a few flights there that bring back stranded.
- 2:21passengers or alternatively allow those stranded in Israel to get home.
- 2:26So, you know, there's still wars going on.
- 2:30The Israelis are attacking the south of Lebanon.
- 2:34There's still plenty of attacks in Iran.
- 2:38And the oil price is steady.
- 2:40So you explain.
- 2:43My logic says just be careful.
- 2:46markets are very strong today.
- 2:47Be very careful, because if you look at the long-term graph of the I say
- 2:53long-term, look at the 2025 graph of oil.
- 2:55It's averaging sort of $65 to $70 a barrel,
- 2:57bumbling along the occasional little blip here and there with the word that Trump
- 3:04says or something that happens somewhere, some skirmish.
- 3:06But then it starts to take off.
- 3:08And you're saying to yourself, OK, it's down today.
- 3:10That's great.
- 3:12It's come down from $106, $107 a barrel down to $99 to $100 a
- 3:15But the new level has been set, David.
- 3:18We're now in the, let's say, $80 to $100 a barrel rather than $60 to $70 a barrel.
- 3:25And if you're used to $60 to $70 with your inelastic demand for oil, I mean, people
- 3:31can't just say, oh,
- 3:33I'll switch to wind today.
- 3:35You can't just do that.
- 3:36It's not easy.
- 3:38So it will, in the longer term, affect the world's economy and therefore the world's
- 3:44stock.
- 3:44markets at the moment.
- 3:46Some people will release barrels like Japan has just announced it's going to do.
- 3:51The International Energy Agency has said, yeah, 400 million barrels we're willing to
- 3:56let go.
- 3:56That's four days worth of consumption, by the way.
- 3:59So it's a tiny amount.
- 4:01But in the long term, they'll have to rebuild those stocks.
- 4:04And so we've got to get used to new oil, a new oil level, in other words.
- 4:09Don't you agree?
- 4:11Well, that's the...
- 4:12This is not the availability of oil.
- 4:14It's what you're paying at the pump.
- 4:17That's the problem.
- 4:18You know, even though there's plentiful amounts of oil in the U.S.,
- 4:23but they take the international price.
- 4:25And I think hoping to release some of the strategic reserves, I think the hope is
- 4:32that you bring the prices down.
- 4:34But they're coming down marginally.
- 4:34They're not coming down to those levels that you've suggested.
- 4:38And remember, this is one of Trump's promises.
- 4:40You know, we will get the oil price down.
- 4:43The oil price will be low and there's going to be, you know, the inflation is
- 4:50going to come down.
- 4:52Those were all parts of his economic plan.
- 4:53Yes, he wanted a weaker dollar, so on.
- 4:56And we're seeing the reverse now.
- 4:58You see, the word plan and Trump don't go in the same sentence together because he's
- 5:03never had a plan in his life.
- 5:05He just wakes up in the morning and says, you know.
- 5:06What should we do today?
- 5:07This latest one is this short-term pain,
- 5:10long-term gain phrase that is being touted by his goons,
- 5:16the White House sycophants that come out and say, well, you know what,
- 5:21you're paying $4 a gallon for it now, but in the future you'll be paying $1.50 and
- 5:27it'll be a safer world.
- 5:29They're not interested in a potential safer world because of regime change in
- 5:33Iran,
- 5:35which of course is not going to happen.
- 5:37not certainly under Trump's war.
- 5:40They want the prices down now, like Mr.
- 5:42Trump told them he would do within a few days of him coming into power.
- 5:49He's just a liar.
- 5:50And now he's spinning it and saying, this is actually good for America, these higher
- 5:55oil prices,
- 5:57because we are a net exporter of oil.
- 5:58We're the world's biggest producer by far, he says.
- 6:00This is a tariff story again.
- 6:02I mean, it's the consumer that pays.
- 6:05the higher.
- 6:05It's the businesses that shift goods that pay the higher oil prices.
- 6:10It's airfares that go up.
- 6:12All of these things put more pressure on the consumer.
- 6:16I don't know whether we use as much oil as we used to,
- 6:19whether it's as important as it used to be in an economic sense.
- 6:24But still,
- 6:25the only discussion that I pick up here on the channels and in the
- 6:32media is all about the price of oil and the cost of this war.
- 6:36There's nothing, there's no support in the sense that he may be eradicating a regime,
- 6:43you know, that spread fear,
- 6:45that spread wars throughout the world and also spread
- 6:52uncertainty and so on.
- 6:55So I think you don't hear that.
- 6:58You know, there's, it's come all around.
- 7:04the price.
- 7:04That's all.
- 7:05That's the only discussion.
- 7:07And look, the Democrats are not winning either.
- 7:11It's just everything seems to be in the middle.
- 7:13What is the Democrat party anyway?
- 7:15If you said, if you said, right, we're going to have a snap election tomorrow,
- 7:19who's going to be the Democrat person running for the presidency and the vice
- 7:25presidency?
- 7:27Who would it be?
- 7:29They don't know.
- 7:31I don't.
- 7:33You've got no one.
- 7:35There's no...
- 7:37strong voices.
- 7:39There are a lot of voices.
- 7:41Look, from a midterm point of view, that's really, you know, city by city,
- 7:43suburb by suburb, district by district.
- 7:45And there might be some very strong kind of almost call them regional councillors
- 7:50or state
- 7:52councillors that win and do well.
- 7:52But from a federal point of view, there's nobody.
- 7:58There are no voices.
- 7:59I see Chuck Schumer.
- 8:00who is the most annoying person you can imagine.
- 8:04He's the Democrat.
- 8:05No, you're forgetting Lindsey Graham, but anyway.
- 8:09No, Listen, let's ignore the Republicans.
- 8:11But I mean, from the Democrats, he puts his hands in his pocket, both hands,
- 8:17and he's got the speech written there, and he kind of, you know,
- 8:21you look at him as like an old granddad at the golf club meeting, you know,
- 8:28giving the chairman's report or something like that.
- 8:31that's about as influential as he is.
- 8:33Just look there.
- 8:33I said, I can't believe this.
- 8:35You know, there's no passion.
- 8:37There's no fight.
- 8:38There's nothing concrete in what he's saying.
- 8:41You know, how did he do this?
- 8:43Why did he do this?
- 8:44How can he expect him to have gone into Iran without thinking about what was going
- 8:51to happen about the
- 8:53oil price?
- 8:55And you look, you say, okay, I don't know.
- 8:57And then you've got the mayor of New York, the same kind of thing, almost not saying
- 9:01anything.
- 9:03Everything here is about putting up more taxes and driving more people out of New
- 9:07York, which is already battling.
- 9:09I mean, New York financially is taking a huge amount of strain because of the
- 9:13enormous
- 9:15amount of people that they've lost in businesses.
- 9:15That started in COVID, you know, started to migrate out there, but also because
- 9:20it's expensive.
- 9:22So a little bit of a mess.
- 9:23Okay, one thing I have noticed, and this is me, there's a horrible phrase,
- 9:30kicking the tires, you know, getting out there and doing what you do.
- 9:33Actually, you go out and see companies occasionally.
- 9:35I remember you driving to the Free State to see a renewable energy company a couple
- 9:41of years ago.
- 9:43I thought, that doesn't sound like Shapiro.
- 9:45But you did it.
- 9:47But anyway, that's the point.
- 9:49You do the work.
- 9:51You do the hard miles.
- 9:53Now, I've done the hard miles by occasionally, very occasionally, David, I
- 9:55like to buy myself a little something, just like you.
- 9:57You go to these smart shops in Manhattan when you're there and you buy Cole Haan
- 10:02shoes and you buy Hugo Boss shirts
- 10:04and all that sort of thing.
- 10:06Admittedly, you say anyway that you only do it when the sales are on.
- 10:08Oh, yeah, oh, yeah.
- 10:09That's your story.
- 10:10Qualified, yes, qualified.
- 10:12So I have qualified it.
- 10:13But what I do is I go and I thought, I saw these shoes being worn by somebody.
- 10:18some famous person.
- 10:19I thought they looked nice, found out what they were.
- 10:21It's a company called Duke & Dexter.
- 10:24They started off in Brixton in South London, and it's a group of chaps that got
- 10:28together,
- 10:29and they made these handcrafted shoes, and then celebrities got a hold of them, and
- 10:35suddenly it's become quite a business,
- 10:37and they've expanded their range.
- 10:39So, of course, I'm on their website, and I have a look at one thing, and I click on
- 10:42this pair of shoes, £320.
- 10:44I'm not going to pay £320 for a pair of shoes.
- 10:45I object to doing that.
- 10:47Last time I bought a pair of shoes, I could get five pairs for that.
- 10:50But that's me.
- 10:53But in the past, that would be the end of it.
- 10:56Now, I keep on getting emails from them saying, you clicked on this item.
- 11:01It is now 10% lower if you order in the next week or something.
- 11:05That would never happen before because it's an exclusive brand.
- 11:08And they didn't need to do it.
- 11:10Suddenly, they're doing it.
- 11:11Then the same thing happened twice.
- 11:13And I thought, hello, this is a trend.
- 11:15A Swiss trainer company, a sportswear company called On.
- 11:19It used to be called On Running.
- 11:20Now it's just called On.
- 11:22Beautiful trainers.
- 11:23Minimum 150 euros going up to 450 euros.
- 11:28And they sell the t-shirts and all the other crap that goes with people like you
- 11:33being fit all day.
- 11:35I did the same thing.
- 11:35I clipped on a pair.
- 11:38And I get pestered again.
- 11:40And I'm just wondering, David, if even at the top end of the market, People are,
- 11:46these companies are starting to suffer and they're not having it their own way.
- 11:49And whether that means that retail sales worldwide or certainly in Europe are
- 11:55starting to suffer because of what we're
- 11:57seeing in the last few weeks and since Trump really went bonkers.
- 12:03I think this is AI.
- 12:05This is it.
- 12:06They know, first of all, you go onto it, you click and search something.
- 12:11I, in fact, hit something by mistake.
- 12:16on Amazon website.
- 12:18Yes.
- 12:19In fact, what happened is I got onto a product that I didn't even want,
- 12:24and I can't get rid of the marketing material now.
- 12:27It just comes all the time.
- 12:29And it keeps saying at the end, unsubscribe.
- 12:32And that seems to actually bring on more people than anything.
- 12:35As soon as you press unsubscribe and I say, please get me off, somehow it just
- 12:41triggers a lot more.
- 12:43You just can't get rid of it.
- 12:45luck.
- 12:47It's like insects, you know, you can't use doom to get rid of them on one of those
- 12:49sprays, they just keep coming.
- 12:51And I can't tell you how, you know, unfortunately,
- 12:55I might have a tidy mind that I like my phone, you know, to be clean, you know, in
- 13:00other words,
- 13:00the worry is that with so much of this material going through your phone on your
- 13:06emails,
- 13:08that you miss the important ones.
- 13:10So you've got to get rid of them, you know, I don't want 200 unread mails on my
- 13:13email.
- 13:15So I get rid of them and you cannot believe it's an exercise every day, two,
- 13:18three times a day.
- 13:20I just have to get rid, You know, I just delete.
- 13:22I don't even read anything anymore.
- 13:24And then when you go and purchase something here and they say, should we
- 13:28send you an email?
- 13:30Should we email the invoice or do you want, you know, the hard copy?
- 13:34Because if I give you my email address, I will never, ever get rid of you.
- 13:40So you're telling me that this is all to do with artificial intelligence,
- 13:44it's nothing to do with the diminished purchasing power of the consumer?
- 13:51Both.
- 13:52Both of the above.
- 13:54In other words, you've got to get ahead of your competitors because everybody else is
- 13:58doing it.
- 13:59You have to do it as well.
- 14:01You know, they're getting this onslaught of marketing material.
- 14:04It's not only an onslaught, but it's also in anything that you watch.
- 14:11If you're watching, if you're not a Pacer subscriber to YouTube or something like
- 14:17that,
- 14:18they hit you with emails.
- 14:20They hit you with, sorry, videos.
- 14:23And if you look...
- 14:24If you go onto X or you go into any social media,
- 14:30you just get advert after advert.
- 14:32And it pops up as you're reading something all the time.
- 14:36And it's just like the most annoying thing on earth,
- 14:40the amount of advertising.
- 14:44or marketing that hits you all the time nonstop.
- 14:46And yet I still can't find a site that can let me buy one football match instead of
- 14:52buying the whole package.
- 14:54I can't buy Barcelona versus Newcastle tomorrow night in the UEFA Champions
- 14:57League.
- 14:59I'll pay £10 for it.
- 15:01I don't mind.
- 15:03That's fine.
- 15:05£10, £12, that's okay.
- 15:07But you can't do it.
- 15:09You have to buy a month, and then you have to that's a month trial at a special
- 15:11price.
- 15:13And if you don't contact them, then they immediately take the money off for a year.
- 15:15I don't want that because I'll forget.
- 15:17I'm like you.
- 15:17Well, I'm not like you.
- 15:18I'm the opposite to you.
- 15:19I'm exactly like that.
- 15:20No, I'm like that because when you go through your bank, you'll just see how
- 15:26many subscriptions you have.
- 15:28And it used to be Netflix and maybe Prime.
- 15:30Now it's Paramount, MGM, wherever you go, just nonstop.
- 15:35Disney, Hula, you name it.
- 15:37All $7, $8 a month in order to subscribe or something.
- 15:41Otherwise, you can get them ads.
- 15:43You've got to get the ads.
- 15:45I've got to tell you something now as well.
- 15:47There are two stories I must share with you.
- 15:49Please do.
- 15:50I love your stories.
- 15:52The first is, as you said, you were going on to buy some fancy shoes.
- 15:59I went down on the weekend to Chelsea, which is down in 14th Street to about the
- 16:0520th. Very upmarket area now.
- 16:09And it's the meatpacking district in that which has been gentrified.
- 16:14Very fancy stores there.
- 16:16But my daughter turns 50 on Friday and she had received from family members a Rolex
- 16:22watch.
- 16:24Nice.
- 16:26Oh, beautiful.
- 16:28You know, I credit to the people in the family and that who treated her to this.
- 16:30And anyway, it was a little big for her, a couple of links.
- 16:36I thought, you know, we're going down there, there's a Rolex store, and I
- 16:43thought, like, all these snooty stores, you know,
- 16:45you'd have to go through a commissioner who would look you up and down.
- 16:47Don't you get intimidated by that, Dave, when you get to those shops?
- 16:50Like Bond Street in London, you think, oh, sorry, I'm not dressed enough for you.
- 16:54I know, I know.
- 16:55What is this?
- 16:56They've got the Society of Commissioners or whatever they're called, and they look
- 17:03down at you, you know, ex-sergeant majors.
- 17:05And anyway, so...
- 17:07I thought, well, this is a Rolex store, you know, who's going to a Rolex store?
- 17:09How many customers can they be getting?
- 17:11Lindsay, it was like an Apple store.
- 17:13It was like an Apple.
- 17:15I have never seen so many people.
- 17:17First of all, I know Tudor, T-U-D-O-R,
- 17:21is kind of maybe a family brand or within the group.
- 17:27Rolex is still privately owned.
- 17:30But the shop was packed.
- 17:33We went in there.
- 17:34the she was told to sit down on the couch and there was no room for me on the couch.
- 17:39That's how full it was.
- 17:40And Linda was there as well.
- 17:42There was a whole counter where they were serving coffee, you know, at least five or
- 17:47six people having coffee.
- 17:49And there are little rooms in which you go and choose your watches and they take out
- 17:53what you want and so on.
- 17:55This is Rolex.
- 17:57Now, I have no idea and I'm dead scared to price what a Rolex would cost.
- 18:00but it's way beyond i have a good idea what it costs is it new or vintage oh you
- 18:07know no it's brand new it's lovely you
- 18:09know it's uh um whatever i i'm certainly not going to buy my daughter a rolex watch
- 18:14i'm not buying
- 18:16my wife a rolex watch so especially especially and again i'll go back to a
- 18:21story from years ago you're a
- 18:23swatch man aren't you you like a swatch i i i don't even wear my swatch if i need
- 18:28the time now i'll go and look at my phone Hmm.
- 18:30But I would be a swatch man if I was really pushed into a position where, you
- 18:34know, I needed to know the time.
- 18:36But Lindsay and the customers there were young.
- 18:39These weren't the old gigolo types or, you know, those who are Botox,
- 18:44these New Yorkers who have been Botoxed out of existence and so on.
- 18:49Or anything like you saw on the Academy Awards.
- 18:52We'll go into that in a second.
- 18:54But I mean, and I was absolutely staggered.
- 18:58by people buying watches.
- 19:01And, you know, we talk about luxury.
- 19:03And here we are in so-called tough times, things as you were saying, you know,
- 19:09when you went onto the internet and that you thought that maybe people are
- 19:15battling, I would imagine they are.
- 19:17But the shops down there, the restaurants, absolutely packed.
- 19:21It's quite astonishing.
- 19:23Well, this must have made you feel quite good about your exposure to the luxury
- 19:28goods market in Europe and wherever else.
- 19:30That's my point.
- 19:32You know, I was saying… Hold on a sec.
- 19:34I'm being very worried about it, particularly in the United States.
- 19:35But I don't know what the starting level is for a Rolex watch,
- 19:40but I imagine it's a lot higher than this watch.
- 19:46And crowded.
- 19:48And youngsters, you know, there was a couple that came.
- 19:50They were speaking French.
- 19:51I don't know why, you know, whether that means they're from France or whatever it
- 19:55is.
- 19:55And young couple, and they took out these watches and looking.
- 19:58No.
- 19:59The wife was choosing.
- 20:01I was just blown away.
- 20:02And I say, just Saturday afternoon, packed, packed Rolex store.
- 20:08And I think wherever I go, the Hermes store as well, you know, which is also
- 20:15down in this area.
- 20:17And there are a lot of other big brands as well.
- 20:18And people have got money.
- 20:19But this is New York.
- 20:20First of all, it's a natural part of America.
- 20:23And secondly, it's a tourist trap.
- 20:24As you said, you heard people speaking French.
- 20:26They're probably over there.
- 20:27And maybe it's cheaper.
- 20:28Maybe they're from Switzerland.
- 20:29Maybe it's cheaper in New York than it is in Switzerland or Paris, wherever they're
- 20:34from.
- 20:35I don't know.
- 20:35But also, it's a destination.
- 20:37They may not buy anything.
- 20:39I mean, if they're confident enough to get past the bloke with the little hat on and
- 20:45the
- 20:45uniform with the gold tassels at the front,
- 20:48then they go in there and they browse around and they string the assistant along
- 20:53for a while.
- 20:55And then they say, thank you very much.
- 20:57I'll think about it and go out.
- 20:59They just want to be part of that.
- 21:01I've done that before.
- 21:03Maybe I'm just being fanciful here.
- 21:05No, I think they're buying.
- 21:07No, the people are buying.
- 21:09There's no doubt that it's buying.
- 21:11When I go down, there's Madison Avenue.
- 21:13There's a whole new LVMH store.
- 21:15They're redoing the store here.
- 21:16They also took over Tiffany's.
- 21:18The other part that also is that going up to the Upper West,
- 21:24you go into restaurants.
- 21:26Lindsay, they're packed.
- 21:29probably people don't do any cooking in their own kitchen, but they go out.
- 21:33Now, these meals are not cheap.
- 21:35You know what I'm saying?
- 21:37This is not McDonald's or KFC or anything like this.
- 21:40And yet the restaurants are absolutely packed.
- 21:44You know, if you don't book for a decent restaurant here, you'll walk in, you're
- 21:49going to wait a long time.
- 21:51And it's quite, you know, there's a very well-known furniture.
- 21:57company called Restoration Hardware.
- 21:58Yes.
- 21:59And they've got four floors.
- 22:01I mean, it's beautiful furniture.
- 22:03And the way that they decorate these stores, it's almost like, you know, it's
- 22:09not like the stores we know.
- 22:11They furnish rooms, you know, that you go in so you can see how the furniture fits.
- 22:15And they've got a restaurant also on the top floor of their building now, which is
- 22:20very close to where we were.
- 22:22It's packed with people.
- 22:23It's almost like a destination place to go to the restaurant there.
- 22:27And you look around, you can't say, well, let's go have a meal at Restorations Cafe
- 22:33upstairs, you know, whatever it is.
- 22:35And the reason I went in, I have to tell you, is that I needed the toilet.
- 22:39And you can't find a toilet.
- 22:40It's got a toilet story as well as a watch story.
- 22:42Fantastic.
- 22:43I get the double.
- 22:44So there's no toilets.
- 22:46Cold weather and good coffee.
- 22:49Bad combination for me.
- 22:51Thank you very much for that.
- 22:52Well, as you've taken this down a different path, David,
- 22:58you've heard the story about what people that don't understand do in IKEA.
- 23:04Have you ever heard this story?
- 23:06No.
- 23:07Well, you know that they have these...
- 23:08I know IKEA, yeah.
- 23:10You know IKEA, and they'll style a room for you.
- 23:13So they'll say, this is the IKEA bedroom that you can have.
- 23:16This is the living room.
- 23:18and here's the bathroom you can have.
- 23:20So there's a toilet there.
- 23:21And the people walk in and go into the bathroom and they see a toilet there.
- 23:25They need to go like Shapiro needed to a couple of days ago.
- 23:29And they go in the toilet.
- 23:32Now, I don't know why I told you that story, and I wish I hadn't.
- 23:35But has it gone into another thing?
- 23:37Starbucks is like that as well.
- 23:40But I think they're becoming cleverer to that as well.
- 23:42It's a big city, and you do a lot of walking.
- 23:46Sure.
- 23:47David.
- 23:48You and I have experienced an internet cutout during our conversation today, so
- 23:55it was truncated.
- 23:57I'm in the Netherlands, and it's never happened before, but it happened with you.
- 24:01I am moving to the countryside in the next two, three months.
- 24:05Deep countryside.
- 24:07And I've signed up for Starlink.
- 24:10Is that a good idea?
- 24:11I mean, it's against all my finer principles because of the owner of this
- 24:16particular company, who I won't name.
- 24:18and I don't want to support him.
- 24:19But it's a fantastic service that they offered.
- 24:23What feedback have you got about Starlink?
- 24:26Any at all?
- 24:27For your situation, it's perfect.
- 24:30I'm just worried about the quality and consistency.
- 24:33That I don't know.
- 24:34You know, is it high speed?
- 24:37Oh, yeah, ultra, ultra high speed.
- 24:39Is that so?
- 24:40Yeah.
- 24:41Well, who cares?
- 24:41It's $30 a month.
- 24:44It's 30 euros a month.
- 24:46It's for nothing.
- 24:49But that's the future, isn't it?
- 24:50I mean, that's the answer.
- 24:52I hope so.
- 24:53That it will be like, yeah, we'll know if we cut out or not.
- 24:57Exactly.
- 24:58But I think, you know, you can't cover.
- 25:00And I know in places like, well, I wouldn't imagine it would work in Europe
- 25:07and that because it's quite built up.
- 25:09But I mean, in South Africa and that, there's so many areas where you can't get
- 25:12decent link.
- 25:14And Lindsay, regard, you know, we talk about this every week.
- 25:16We talk about AI.
- 25:17We talk about connectivity and that.
- 25:20If your country or your business is not embracing
- 25:27technology, embracing digital technology, you're going to fall behind.
- 25:32I know we criticize adverts.
- 25:35We criticize that side of the market.
- 25:37But that's what's happening.
- 25:38Things have changed.
- 25:40The way that we did things years ago are just so incredibly different today.
- 25:45And you have to embrace it.
- 25:47And you have to make sure that everybody can embrace it, even if you're living
- 25:53outside in the country.
- 25:55So it's such an important development.
- 25:57And I can't understate the need,
- 26:01the importance of upgrading your businesses accordingly.
- 26:06Okay, on that note.
- 26:07If it's Trump or not Trump, I mean, if it's Musk, I said Trump, I'm saying, I
- 26:12mean, if it's Musk or not.
- 26:14That doesn't matter.
- 26:16It's the service.
- 26:18He's not going to check, oh, you know, you criticized me on X, therefore I'm going to
- 26:20cut you off.
- 26:22David, no, he's not.
- 26:24David, what is happening in the market now?
- 26:26Because my internet on my laptop is still down.
- 26:30I saw that the oil price when we started talking was $99.93, and that was Brent
- 26:35crude oil.
- 26:35I noticed when I got cast off it was about $100.75 per barrel, so it rallied nearly a
- 26:42dollar.
- 26:42in the space of about six or seven minutes.
- 26:45Is it still that volatile?
- 26:48The markets are strong.
- 26:50They're coming off slightly, which would happen.
- 26:53You know, it's a run-up.
- 26:54It's two steps forward, one back, but so it goes on.
- 26:57And I must admit that the kind of gains that we're seeing today are far beyond
- 27:03what I thought would happen.
- 27:05Even the JSC, which I'm looking at the moment, is up 1.5%.
- 27:07Hmm.
- 27:08having traded for certainly in the morning in negative territory.
- 27:14Just to give you an idea as well, if we go into the US markets, the
- 27:20S&P now is up over 1%.
- 27:23The Nasdaq's up 1.25%.
- 27:25And remember, we were down almost 5%.
- 27:28So I think from top to bottom, the S&P is trading at 6,700, which is probably
- 27:353% or 4% off its top.
- 27:36which is not bad.
- 27:37I mean, if you consider where we are.
- 27:40My commodity prices, I can't trust.
- 27:42I don't know where they are.
- 27:45In other words, I'm a little nervous to quote that unless I...
- 27:48go on to Bloomberg's.
- 27:51But I know that gold, you mentioned earlier in our conversation, gold was
- 27:57below 5,000.
- 27:59It's above 5,000 again.
- 28:01Platinum's picked up.
- 28:03Palladium's picked up.
- 28:05Oil still remains high.
- 28:07I've got Brent here,
- 28:08and that's why it's subject to correction.
- 28:11It's 103-year and West Texas.
- 28:17About 98, but I don't know.
- 28:19I don't know how reliable that is.
- 28:21It's a little bit glamorous.
- 28:25It was much below that, but that doesn't matter.
- 28:27The point is it's quite choppy.
- 28:30David, let's go to football now.
- 28:31You secured the title on the weekend.
- 28:36Come on now.
- 28:37They must be surely.
- 28:39They can't mess it up now.
- 28:41Surely not.
- 28:42Yeah.
- 28:43You know what's interesting?
- 28:45I watched a number of games and teams are tired.
- 28:49You saw that Pep, he told his team not to come to practice today, you know, just to
- 28:54take a rest.
- 28:56Yes.
- 28:58And I think that's a good thing.
- 29:00They looked deflated.
- 29:02They looked as though they'd lost the spirit to win.
- 29:04Yeah.
- 29:06And Haaland looks as though he just wants to go to Ibiza for a couple of months.
- 29:08He was so off his game.
- 29:10Yeah.
- 29:12And it's sad.
- 29:14I think they're tired psychologically.
- 29:16If you look at Arsenal.
- 29:18They've got three different competitions in one week.
- 29:20Now they've got to beat Bayer Leverkusen tomorrow.
- 29:22And then Sunday they play Man City again.
- 29:25In the League Cup final.
- 29:26In the League Cup final.
- 29:27And you can't.
- 29:28You see injury after injury.
- 29:30A hip goes, a knee goes, a little knock here and there.
- 29:34It's very difficult.
- 29:35I think there's too much, Lindsay.
- 29:36I just think these players, their bodies are just going to capitulate.
- 29:42and watching You know, just watching the main teams, watching Liverpool, nowhere,
- 29:48you know,
- 29:50against Spurs, you know, just couldn't score those extra goals and ended up with
- 29:54a draw at Anfield.
- 29:56I mean, this is a fortress.
- 29:58The same thing.
- 30:00So the lesser teams, they know how to frustrate you.
- 30:04You know, they know your game plan and they just camp in the goal.
- 30:07And you've just got to hopefully, like, I watched...
- 30:12Not Fernandes, Bernardo Silva.
- 30:16You know, he tried to chip to Haaland on the far side and managed to chip the
- 30:23goalkeeper, and that's how Man City scored.
- 30:25Yeah, that was a fluke goal, yeah.
- 30:26Yeah, but I mean, that's how you're going to score.
- 30:29Yeah, and the goals have dried up as well.
- 30:31I mean, yesterday Crystal Palace leads 0-0, Nottingham Forest against somebody
- 30:360-0 as well.
- 30:38It was really boring.
- 30:40Anyway, David?
- 30:42We'll speak again on Thursday with Viv Govender, AI and tech, permitting with
- 30:47this internet problem.
- 30:49That was Shapiro World with David Shapiro in Manhattan.
- 30:51The views and opinions expressed in these podcasts are those of Lindsay Williams and
- 30:58various contributors and do not reflect the policy,
- 31:00position, or opinion of any other agency, organization, employer,
- 31:03or company associated with StrictlyBusinessPodcast.com.
- 31:07Assumptions made on the analyses are not reflective of the position of any other
- 31:14entity other than the speaker or the author.
- 31:16And since we are critically thinking human beings, these views are always subject to
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- 31:20revision and rethinking at any time.
- 31:22Please do not hold us to them in perpetuity.