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Musk Commits to Tesla CEO Role and Plans Political Pullback · Bloomberg Intelligence

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  Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news, and Android auto with
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  Speaker 2: Elon Musk speaking with Michel Hussein, Editor at Large for
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  Speaker 2: Bloomberg Weekend at the Cutter Economic Form in a dotime.
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  Speaker 2: We're joined right now by the very same Michelle Hussein.
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  Speaker 2: Michelle Yeoman's duty interviewing Elon Musk. They're not the easiest
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  Speaker 2: subject to converse with. What's your takeaway as to I
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  Speaker 2: guess his kind of evolution back into corporate world away
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  Speaker 2: from some of his government responsibilities. Is that going to
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  Speaker 2: be a smooth transition? Is that going to be an
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  Speaker 2: immediate transition? What was your takeaway?
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  Speaker 3: Hello Paul, Hello Alex to from the Yeah, it's definitely
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  Speaker 3: quite an experience to interview Elon Musk, and for all
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  Speaker 3: your listeners, as anyone who saw it on Bloomberg TV
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  Speaker 3: or elsewhere on the live stream will know that it's
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  Speaker 3: a remote conversation. So I'm in Doha, he's in the US,
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  Speaker 3: but actually it's you know, it's probably a pretty intense
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  Speaker 3: experience interviewing him, whatever the format or the setting. I
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  Speaker 3: was very struck by the fact that he the thing
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  Speaker 3: he wanted to emphasize was very much his corporate world
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  Speaker 3: and his businesses, not his role with DOGE, despite the
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  Speaker 3: fact we know it's ongoing and he said he'll be
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  Speaker 3: at the President's side for the remainder of this administration,
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  Speaker 3: in fact, even though DOGE doesn't last for the whole
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  Speaker 3: duration of the administration. And when I asked him about
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  Speaker 3: whether this year is a pivotal year for that reason,
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  Speaker 3: he was kind of keen to characterize it as like,
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  Speaker 3: you know, he's seen many ups and downs in his time.
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  Speaker 3: But I feel, especially with the fact that he ended
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  Speaker 3: up saying that he is going to do a lot
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  Speaker 3: less political donations and spend a lot less money on
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  Speaker 3: politics in the future, I wonder if, really, as he
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  Speaker 3: said to me, I'm a technologist first and foremost, and
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  Speaker 3: I wonder of this, if if these political endeavors have
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  Speaker 3: not given him exactly what he wanted and have put
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  Speaker 3: him on more on comfortable ground than he never acknowledged.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, I do have to give you a lot of credit.
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  Speaker 4: That was a tough interview. Anything remote like that in
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  Speaker 4: a conference stage is tough, and it was also really
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  Speaker 4: tough You've handled it really well. You didn't miss a beat,
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  Speaker 4: You flawlessly picked up all those questions. So I just
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  Speaker 4: have to give real kudos to you on that. And
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  Speaker 4: you pushed him quite a bit on the in the
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  Speaker 4: EV sales and he seemed to really stand behind.
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  Speaker 5: No.
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  Speaker 4: No, we're doing really well with the exception of Europe.
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  Speaker 4: What was some of your broader takeaway from that part
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  Speaker 4: of the conversation.
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  Speaker 3: Well, look, it's clearly incredibly important to him. You know,
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  Speaker 3: teslaism is a tutemic company, and he's changed the car industry,
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  Speaker 3: not just electric bills. He has changed the car industry
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  Speaker 3: through what he's done there. It's also, of course a
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  Speaker 3: very very significant part of his wealth. So so therefore
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  Speaker 3: you can see that it's important on you know, on
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  Speaker 3: on lots of different factors. Of course, the sales figures
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  Speaker 3: had them right in front of me for Europe and
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  Speaker 3: these are these are big markets and places where people
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  Speaker 3: are you know, very concerned about climate and have have
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  Speaker 3: you know, brought into Tesla and its vision for that reason.
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  Speaker 3: So it'll be very we do get month by month sales,
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  Speaker 3: so I was looking at the April ones. It'll be
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  Speaker 3: very interesting to see what happens in May and but
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  Speaker 3: you know, obviously he's saying Europe is our weakest market
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  Speaker 3: and look at the rest of the world, and he
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  Speaker 3: feels that Tesla has has turned turned a corner and
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  Speaker 3: his commitment to it, you know, the bit you you
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  Speaker 3: played about pay and and the you know, his pay
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  Speaker 3: award is you know, obviously he's kind of like had
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  Speaker 3: the words that everyone heard on the judge who ruled
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  Speaker 3: against him in Delaware. But I think it's clear Tesla
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  Speaker 3: is incredibly important to him. And you know, while he's
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  Speaker 3: got you know, other businesses that are that are at
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  Speaker 3: this point, you know, growing strongly in all markets, Starlin
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  Speaker 3: being a prime example of that, and the number of
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  Speaker 3: countries that are keen to get a slice of Starlink
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  Speaker 3: action and give him access to their jurisdictions for Starlink.
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  Speaker 3: I think there is something too temic about Tesla, and
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  Speaker 3: I think it came out in that how keen he
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  Speaker 3: is for the brand to regain ground everywhere, whether or
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  Speaker 3: not you can do it in Europe, I don't.
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  Speaker 6: Know, Michelle.
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  Speaker 2: Kind of you know, through the election, in the first
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  Speaker 2: couple of weeks of the administration, Elon Musk was everywhere
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  Speaker 2: in every photo op and every video clip, and then
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  Speaker 2: he's really kind of gone radio silent for the last
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  Speaker 2: month or two. Where do you think he's how do
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  Speaker 2: you think this is going to play out over the
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  Speaker 2: coming weeks and months with him in terms of re engaging.
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  Speaker 3: Well, I think those q ON sales figures at Tesla
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  Speaker 3: really forced that. But I wonder if again, you know,
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  Speaker 3: not that he could not that he bit off more
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  Speaker 3: than he could chew. But politics and government is a
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  Speaker 3: very different world, and I think it's probably a mutual
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  Speaker 3: benefit that he and the President have been, you know,
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  Speaker 3: much less visible at each other's side. I'm sure they
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  Speaker 3: are still very close, although Elon Musk is been public
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  Speaker 3: about his differences with Peter Navarro, and in many ways,
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  Speaker 3: you know, where the tariff argument has ended up is
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  Speaker 3: much more in the in the Elon world and to
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  Speaker 3: Elon's worldview on trade rather than the Peter Navarro world.
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  Speaker 3: But I think what he said about political donations and
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  Speaker 3: less political spending in future will be looked at with
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  Speaker 3: interest in other countries as well, in the UK, for example,
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  Speaker 3: where he where Donald Trump is close to Nigel Farage,
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  Speaker 3: though there would have been a lot of interest in
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  Speaker 3: whether at some point Elon Musk finds a way to
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  Speaker 3: donate to a UK political party, he finds a UK
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  Speaker 3: entity to enable that kind of donation to take place.
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  Speaker 3: Remember he's been seen a lot with the AfD leader
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  Speaker 3: in Germany. So I do wonder whether this intent and
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  Speaker 3: this his words on political implications beyond the US.
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  Speaker 4: Hi, Michelle, we got to leave it there. Thank you
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  Speaker 4: so much, really great stuff, Michelle Hussein. Thanks for doing
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  Speaker 4: US editor at Large for Bloomberg Weekend. Also to stay
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  Speaker 4: tuned for Bloomberg for everything from the Cutower Economic Forum,
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  Speaker 4: really wonderful interviews.
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  Speaker 4: Earnings so home Depot coming out that stock up four
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  Speaker 4: tens of one percent. Home Depot maintaining its guidance for
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  Speaker 4: the fiscal year despite a three tenths of one percent
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  Speaker 4: drop in COMP sales and US ticket sales did tick
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  Speaker 4: up because of smaller projects, not the big ones, Drew
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  Speaker 4: writing as Bloomberg Intelligence, US home Building analyst joins us
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  Speaker 4: to discuss, all right, we got the macro, we got
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  Speaker 4: the micro. Let's start with the macro for a moment.
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  Speaker 4: Deferring large projects taking on small projects doesn't sound so bad.
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  Speaker 4: Do we get an idea of when deferring becomes non
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  Speaker 4: existent projects?
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  Speaker 5: So one of the reasons why home improvement and hope
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  Speaker 5: DIPO have been so resilient is because a large portion
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  Speaker 5: of the industry has to do with that maintenance and
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  Speaker 5: repair oriented work. So I think that's where they're seeing
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  Speaker 5: a lot of the lift now. It's homeowners who are
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  Speaker 5: taking care of the things that they need to just
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  Speaker 5: to maintain their home. This really isn't now. It's been
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  Speaker 5: a couple of quarters now where we've heard from them
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  Speaker 5: that big ticket discretionary categories have been relatively weaker. So
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  Speaker 5: think about things like kitchenery models, bathroom models, flooring projects.
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  Speaker 5: These are things that tend to be financed by the consumer,
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  Speaker 5: and with rates as high as they are right now,
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  Speaker 5: it's just become a little bit prohibitive for them to
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  Speaker 5: undertake those projects. So I think in order to see
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  Speaker 5: more robust growth out of these categories, which is really
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  Speaker 5: the missing piece of the story, we need to see
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  Speaker 5: rates start to come back down a little bit.
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  Speaker 2: How about tires. Is that impacting the costs of their
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  Speaker 2: goods like getting lumber from Canada, for example.
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  Speaker 5: So we think home Depots pretty well positioned from a
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  Speaker 5: tariff perspective. They source about fifty percent of the products
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  Speaker 5: they sell from inside the US, and you know, like
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  Speaker 5: a lot of other retailers, over the last decade, they've
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  Speaker 5: done a great job in diversifying their supply chain. They
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  Speaker 5: actually said that over the next twelve months, no single
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  Speaker 5: country outside of the US is going to account for
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  Speaker 5: more than ten percent of their product purchases. So the
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  Speaker 5: fact that they're diversifying their supply chain should help with costs.
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  Speaker 5: At the same time, given their scale the largest home
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  Speaker 5: improvement retailer, they'll have the ability to push back on
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  Speaker 5: some of their suppliers in terms of cost. Now, what
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  Speaker 5: they said is that they're looking to generally maintain their prices,
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  Speaker 5: so I think people took that as a positive. You
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  Speaker 5: have to remember Home Depot sales about thirty thousand to
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  Speaker 5: forty thousand products in their store, so when they talk
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  Speaker 5: about pricing, they take a portfolio approach, so you may
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  Speaker 5: not see them raise the price on a particular item
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  Speaker 5: that was tariffed. But they look at the elasticities of
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  Speaker 5: their various products and they'll take prices they need to
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  Speaker 5: where they can, gotcha.
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  Speaker 4: So they're going to manage that margin, so they're not
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  Speaker 4: going to sacrifice margin.
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  Speaker 5: Then actually guided to an operating margin pretty much in
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  Speaker 5: line with what they were looking for at the end
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  Speaker 5: of last quarter. There are a couple puts in takes.
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  Speaker 5: They're doing better on shrinks, so they're managing their retail
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  Speaker 5: theft a little better, which is always a positive. So
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  Speaker 5: they're also you know, getting some more leverage from productivity,
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  Speaker 5: so you know, I think pricing is going to be
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  Speaker 5: a component of it, but they also have other levers
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  Speaker 5: within the business that are going to help to maintain
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  Speaker 5: their margins, you know, where they expected them.
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  Speaker 2: What's home Depot do with the number of stores? Have
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  Speaker 2: they added stores? Are they fully kind of where they
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  Speaker 2: want to be? What's the store count story?
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  Speaker 5: Yeah? So interestingly, Home Depot over the last year has
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  Speaker 5: actually returned to store growth, which is something we haven't
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  Speaker 5: seen from them in a very long time. They kind
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  Speaker 5: of have had the established footprint in the US, but
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  Speaker 5: as the business has grown so much as they've grown
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  Speaker 5: their pro business, they've started to add new stores in
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  Speaker 5: markets where you know, populations are growing or where they
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  Speaker 5: want to kind of take some of the pressure off
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  Speaker 5: the existing store base to look to drive some additional productivity.
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  Speaker 5: So this year they're adding about thirteen new stores. They're
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  Speaker 5: going to do that. I think their plan was about
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  Speaker 5: eighty over a five year period. So the next couple
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  Speaker 5: of years they'll continue to add new units.
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  Speaker 4: So what does this mean for say Low's Is this
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  Speaker 4: a good signal or is this more of a competitive signal?
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  Speaker 5: So I think the story is pretty much the same
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  Speaker 5: for Home Depot and Lows. I mean, on a relative basis,
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  Speaker 5: home depots exposure to the professional customer at fifty percent
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  Speaker 5: versus only about thirty percent for Lows is driving out performance.
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  Speaker 5: So Low's exposure to softer DIY trends and there's big
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  Speaker 5: ticket discretionary categories, I think we'll drive a little bit
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  Speaker 5: of weakness. But you know, for both retailers, it's it's
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  Speaker 5: pretty much the same thing. You still have a weak
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  Speaker 5: housing market. You know, home sales are in the low
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  Speaker 5: four million range, which is about twenty five percent below
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  Speaker 5: what a normalized level looks like and both retailers, like
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  Speaker 5: many are dealing with just an increasingly cautious consus. You know,
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  Speaker 5: there's a lot of discussion on when does the soft
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  Speaker 5: data start to translate into the hard data, and I
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  Speaker 5: think in the broader housing and home improvement ecosystem, you know,
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  Speaker 5: I would argue that it already has. We heard from
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  Speaker 5: a lot of builders who are getting pushed back on,
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  Speaker 5: you know, buyers who are just reluctant to step into
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  Speaker 5: the market, whether they're concerned about their jobs or the
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  Speaker 5: direction of rates or the direction of home prices. And
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  Speaker 5: then like I mentioned in home improvement, just that financing piece,
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  Speaker 5: you know, and wanting to take undertake such a big
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  Speaker 5: project as giving people caution.
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  Speaker 2: Drew just talking about rates on like the thirty year
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  Speaker 2: mortgage six point eighty six percent is there? What are
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  Speaker 2: your homeboters telling me about consumers and mortgage rates. I mean,
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  Speaker 2: at some point you got to say, hey, this is
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: the new normal, this is where we are, this is
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  Speaker 2: the interest rate environment. If I'm going to buy a
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  Speaker 2: house or sell a house and move down to Florida,
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  Speaker 2: now's the time.
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  Speaker 5: You know, Yeah, You're right, and I think higher for
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  Speaker 5: longer is the new normal. We actually rose back up
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  Speaker 5: above seven percent yesterday. So coming into the year, you know,
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  Speaker 5: there was a lot of expectations at rates were coming down,
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  Speaker 5: maybe we'd see some more momentum in sales. But that
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  Speaker 5: magic number is somewhere with a five handle, maybe five
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  Speaker 5: and a half percent. And you know, as we've discussed previously,
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  Speaker 5: builders have been able to get there through the use
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  Speaker 5: of financing incentives, but they're having to work harder for
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  Speaker 5: each sale, and those incentives get more and more expensive
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  Speaker 5: as rates rise. What we've actually heard from some of
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  Speaker 5: the builders is, you know, maybe now is the time
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  Speaker 5: to not chase volume as hard as we wanted to before,
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  Speaker 5: because we want to preserve a little bit of margin
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  Speaker 5: and get the best return we can on our land assets.
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  Speaker 5: So you're seeing some of them dial back their volume
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  Speaker 5: expectations in favor of margin.
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  Speaker 4: Interesting. All right, Drew, Thanks lot, really appreciate your reading
• 12:45
  Speaker 4: Boomberg Intelligence. You as home building analysts.
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: You're listening to the Bloomberg Intelligence Podcast. Catch us live
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• 13:03
  Speaker 2: John Creekmore joins us. He's chief investment Rofster Creekmore Wealth Advisors.
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: John my notes, say you're from Morton, Illinois. Is that right?
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  Speaker 6: Morton, Illinois, the self brooklamed pumpkin capital of the world.
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  Speaker 6: That's awesome.
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  Speaker 2: Now I have to admit, John, I had no idea
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  Speaker 2: where Morton, Illinois was, so I Google mapped it just
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: a minute ago. You guys are right outside of Peoria, Illinois.
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  Speaker 2: So there's nobody more Middle American than folks from Morton,
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  Speaker 2: Illinois and Peoria, Illinois.
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  Speaker 7: The salt mines.
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  Speaker 2: Exactly did the good folks out there? Do they care
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: about tariffs and stuff like that?
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  Speaker 6: I'll do it cure minally. So Caterpillar Incorporated was actually
• 13:39
  Speaker 6: founded in pure Illinois. There's about eighty five thousand employees
• 13:42
  Speaker 6: of Caterpillar right here, just right across the river from
• 13:45
  Speaker 6: where I sit. And obviously a large portion of our
• 13:47
  Speaker 6: sales come over different parts of the world and over
• 13:50
  Speaker 6: into China, and so obviously we care minally about tariffs
• 13:54
  Speaker 6: and how it plays out as far as as far
• 13:55
  Speaker 6: as our own economic security right here in central Illinois.
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  Speaker 2: How do you, John, then, as you think about when
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  Speaker 2: you talk to your clients, think about putting the tariff
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: discussion and maybe some of the economic concernity that might
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: result from a tariff world. How do you put that
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: into your investment discussion.
• 14:12
  Speaker 6: You know, it's been so interesting to watch over the
• 14:14
  Speaker 6: last year, especially as we saw more discussion even last
• 14:17
  Speaker 6: year in the election cycle about trade and balance, about
• 14:20
  Speaker 6: different methods to utilize and bring this trade and balance
• 14:24
  Speaker 6: into a probably proper perspective. And one of the ones
• 14:27
  Speaker 6: talked about was the blunt instrument of a tariff. And
• 14:29
  Speaker 6: a lot of folks did not have much much knowledge
• 14:32
  Speaker 6: or background of terrorists except for there remembering affairs dealer's
• 14:35
  Speaker 6: day off and as far as the discussion of terroists
• 14:37
  Speaker 6: in that movie, and so not real academic there. But
• 14:40
  Speaker 6: all of a sudden then they recognize this could be
• 14:42
  Speaker 6: a big deal for them as far as inflation. It
• 14:44
  Speaker 6: could be a big deal them as far as overall
• 14:47
  Speaker 6: economic certainty. So we really to hear, what a courage
• 14:49
  Speaker 6: oot to take a step back. Let's go long term
• 14:51
  Speaker 6: goal objectives. Ask yourself are you an investor or are
• 14:55
  Speaker 6: you a trader? And then based upon your answer on
• 14:57
  Speaker 6: that you can make decisions to make money in any
• 14:59
  Speaker 6: invite fair. However, it's a little bit different methodologies. So
• 15:03
  Speaker 6: number one was back in April. We encourage everyone. Actually
• 15:05
  Speaker 6: before that, back in the middle of February, we saw
• 15:07
  Speaker 6: the market hit at all time high and encourage everyone
• 15:10
  Speaker 6: to say, hey, stay holm, there's going to be some
• 15:12
  Speaker 6: uncertainties and the storms coming about. We're going to make
• 15:14
  Speaker 6: sure to make logical decisions based upon facts. And whenever
• 15:18
  Speaker 6: we saw the tariff announcement hit on April the second,
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  Speaker 6: it caused a lot of emotion and a lot of uncertainty.
• 15:23
  Speaker 6: We know the markets do not like uncertainty, so we
• 15:26
  Speaker 6: encourage them. Let's allow this to play out. Let's look
• 15:28
  Speaker 6: for opportunities in the carnage, let's try to find ways
• 15:31
  Speaker 6: to make money in the midst of and sure enough,
• 15:33
  Speaker 6: whenever more information came out, cooler heads prevailed and we
• 15:36
  Speaker 6: saw the markets bounce back, actually up twenty two percent
• 15:38
  Speaker 6: from that low that we saw on April tenth.
• 15:41
  Speaker 4: So what are some of the companies that you like?
• 15:43
  Speaker 4: Top pick to it?
• 15:45
  Speaker 6: Top pick right now is I love Lotos phenomenal company.
• 15:48
  Speaker 6: Relative strength has been moving very mightily there strong mode.
• 15:52
  Speaker 6: As far as the technology space of defense and as
• 15:54
  Speaker 6: far as the medical research and development, and so love
• 15:58
  Speaker 6: Litos and an early on investor in that this year
• 16:00
  Speaker 6: and it's been a strong performer. You know, we actually
• 16:04
  Speaker 6: look for opportunities right now. We saw tremendous opportunities overall
• 16:07
  Speaker 6: in the tech space with the sell off there in
• 16:09
  Speaker 6: April and so big names in there, Snowflake, d Dog.
• 16:13
  Speaker 6: We're a couple that we actually loaded up on early
• 16:15
  Speaker 6: on and very happy for those investments.
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: Hey, John, I have to ask for a friend here. Enbridge.
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: That's a name on one.
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: So talk to us about energy and Enbridge.
• 16:27
  Speaker 6: You know, in Bridge is very interesting and so we
• 16:30
  Speaker 6: look at energy, we look at what part of the
• 16:32
  Speaker 6: energy sector that they are in, and so we know
• 16:35
  Speaker 6: for sure as far as a lot of the oil companies,
• 16:37
  Speaker 6: the shelves, the vps of the world, of the exxons,
• 16:39
  Speaker 6: the mobiles, they all saw some tremendous price pressures as
• 16:42
  Speaker 6: far as on their equity prices whenever we saw the
• 16:45
  Speaker 6: price of oil drop down. And yet at the same
• 16:48
  Speaker 6: time those involved in distribution. So there's Enbridge, they're actually
• 16:51
  Speaker 6: held very well. Their dividend is very strong and so
• 16:54
  Speaker 6: nomemb HAPs in the economy. We know those still be
• 16:56
  Speaker 6: moving oil through pipelines and through other distribution channels, and
• 17:00
  Speaker 6: inn Bridge has been a long term player in that.
• 17:02
  Speaker 6: So we see them as a strong cash position, very
• 17:04
  Speaker 6: low long term debt. It's a great value holding if
• 17:07
  Speaker 6: you have been served to as far as in the economy,
• 17:09
  Speaker 6: those type of companies that does them Bridge really play
• 17:11
  Speaker 6: out well.
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: All right, John, thank you so much, Really appreciate John
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: Creek Moore, Chief Investment Officer, creek More Wealth Advisors, Morton, Illinois.
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: Check it out, folks just outside of Peoria. Again, it
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: doesn't get any more Middle America than that.
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: You're listening to the Bloomberg Intelligence Podcast. Catch us live
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: weekdays at ten am Eastern on Apple, Cocklay and Android
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: Auto with the Bloomberg Business app, Listen on demand wherever
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: you get your podcasts, or watch us live on YouTube.
• 17:41
  Speaker 4: So the big take today is one that terrified me,
• 17:43
  Speaker 4: and I think every woman out there will echo my pain.
• 17:46
  Speaker 4: It's a wonderful piece written by Anna Edney, and it
• 17:49
  Speaker 4: talks about possible cancer and health risks that are lurking
• 17:52
  Speaker 4: in a popular OTC drug. If you've ever had a
• 17:55
  Speaker 4: urinary tract infection and you've ever gone to the drug
• 17:57
  Speaker 4: store and gotten an over the counter medication. This part
• 18:01
  Speaker 4: of the drug is in that and that's what's so
• 18:03
  Speaker 4: scary because UTIs are extremely common and many treat it
• 18:06
  Speaker 4: with these kind of drugs. Anna is national healthcare reporter
• 18:09
  Speaker 4: for Bloomberg News, and she joins us, Now, Anna, walk
• 18:12
  Speaker 4: us through what this drug is. What kind of brands
• 18:15
  Speaker 4: it's in A start there?
• 18:18
  Speaker 8: Yeah, sure, so probably the most popular one.
• 18:21
  Speaker 7: I think a lot of our listeners will recognize as Azo.
• 18:26
  Speaker 7: It's in over the counter drugs, So you can go
• 18:29
  Speaker 7: into most any store, you know, Target, Walmart, anything like
• 18:33
  Speaker 7: that and purchase it. You don't need a prescription. You're
• 18:38
  Speaker 7: a stat Is another brand, but all of these stores
• 18:41
  Speaker 7: also make their own generic version. So it's something that
• 18:46
  Speaker 7: is supposed to treat the pain with your.
• 18:49
  Speaker 8: Airy tract infections.
• 18:51
  Speaker 7: A lot of people seem to think it goes beyond
• 18:54
  Speaker 7: that and it's actually curing their infection. So one of
• 18:57
  Speaker 7: the issues being that, you know, people might need antibiotics,
• 19:01
  Speaker 7: but instead they're they're using this.
• 19:05
  Speaker 4: Now, what's the drug in it that is causing some
• 19:08
  Speaker 4: of the issues and how do we know?
• 19:11
  Speaker 8: Yeah, so this is.
• 19:12
  Speaker 7: The active ingredient in all of these drugs. It's what
• 19:16
  Speaker 7: the generics will go by it. It's called naso purdine.
• 19:20
  Speaker 7: I may still be butchering that name, but it's an
• 19:25
  Speaker 7: unapproved drug, which was really interesting to me and something
• 19:29
  Speaker 7: sort of new to me even though I've covered these
• 19:32
  Speaker 7: issues for a long time that I came across.
• 19:34
  Speaker 8: What it means is the FDA.
• 19:36
  Speaker 7: Has never formally approved this drug, so you know, while
• 19:41
  Speaker 7: millions of women are using it for decades that there's
• 19:45
  Speaker 7: never been a true vetting of, you know, how this
• 19:50
  Speaker 7: drug interacts with our bodies. One of the things that
• 19:53
  Speaker 7: a National Cancer Institute study found, this.
• 19:56
  Speaker 8: Was back in nineteen seventy eight, is that.
• 19:58
  Speaker 7: It caused tumors to form in rats and mice. That's
• 20:03
  Speaker 7: never been looked at in humans because it's never been
• 20:07
  Speaker 7: this drug has never gone through clinical trials or anything
• 20:10
  Speaker 7: like that.
• 20:11
  Speaker 4: That is just that that statement is so insane. And Paul,
• 20:15
  Speaker 4: just let me I'll explain to you a little bit here.
• 20:17
  Speaker 4: So if you have a UTI, it comes on really fast,
• 20:20
  Speaker 4: and if you order to get medication from your doctor,
• 20:22
  Speaker 4: goin to cologists. You have to go in so they
• 20:24
  Speaker 4: can test it. And if you're in pain, and you
• 20:26
  Speaker 4: know what it is because as you've had it before,
• 20:28
  Speaker 4: you just go to the store, pick it up, and
• 20:29
  Speaker 4: you feel better in twenty four hours. Like that's why
• 20:31
  Speaker 4: these drugs are so popular and easy to access.
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: And what I learned and a story, and they're not
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: FDA approved, they are essentially grandfathered in. So if I'm
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: walking down the aisle looking at you know, over the
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: counter drugs, do I have any way of knowing what's
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: been FDA approved and maybe what hasn't been.
• 20:50
  Speaker 8: Yeah, I think that's a really good question.
• 20:52
  Speaker 7: And there were multiple you know, quotes out there from
• 20:56
  Speaker 7: congressional testimony and other places where FDA staff members we're
• 21:01
  Speaker 7: talking about there's you know, there are many such grandfathered
• 21:06
  Speaker 7: in kind of drugs, but the agency did not give
• 21:09
  Speaker 7: me a list, wouldn't even tell me how many might
• 21:12
  Speaker 7: be out there. But there is potentially, you know, this
• 21:17
  Speaker 7: is this takes a little sleuthing. It's not that easy
• 21:20
  Speaker 7: to do in the drugs deile. But if there's a
• 21:22
  Speaker 7: website that the National Institutes of Health runs called Daily
• 21:26
  Speaker 7: Med and people can search by drug there, I wouldn't
• 21:30
  Speaker 7: say it's like the misuser friendly looking piece. But when
• 21:33
  Speaker 7: if you look for azo or you're a stat or
• 21:35
  Speaker 7: Finazo piarody.
• 21:36
  Speaker 8: In any of those, what.
• 21:37
  Speaker 7: Will come up as kind of a disclaimer saying, you know,
• 21:40
  Speaker 7: this hasn't been vetted by the Food and Drug Administration,
• 21:43
  Speaker 7: its safety is not known, and that kind of gives
• 21:45
  Speaker 7: you an indication. You can dive deeper into that data
• 21:48
  Speaker 7: and you can actually see that it's unapproved, But just
• 21:51
  Speaker 7: for the lay person at least with that disclaimer, that
• 21:53
  Speaker 7: would give you a good idea at the top.
• 21:56
  Speaker 4: So what happened then?
• 21:59
  Speaker 8: I think that's a good question.
• 22:00
  Speaker 7: So the FDA is they have a system where they're
• 22:05
  Speaker 7: supposed to have vetted these kind of very old drugs
• 22:08
  Speaker 7: and given them what's called a monograph. This is the
• 22:11
  Speaker 7: agency's instruction book. Here's how this drugs should be made,
• 22:14
  Speaker 7: Here's how the dosing what it should be, Here's how
• 22:17
  Speaker 7: it should be manufactured. They have not done that for
• 22:21
  Speaker 7: Finaeso piaritan. So it's possible that, you know, with this
• 22:25
  Speaker 7: increased attention, that they could decide to look into that.
• 22:29
  Speaker 7: There's you know, they asked in two thousand and three
• 22:32
  Speaker 7: whether this drug should actually be prescription only, just given
• 22:37
  Speaker 7: the risks and that people don't often follow directions on
• 22:42
  Speaker 7: OTC drugs. You know, you're only supposed to take this
• 22:44
  Speaker 7: for two days, and you're not supposed to take it
• 22:46
  Speaker 7: all the time. There are companies, particularly online retailers, that
• 22:52
  Speaker 7: are really pushing this drug on women and girls kind
• 22:55
  Speaker 7: of just to have on hand all the time just
• 22:57
  Speaker 7: in case.
• 22:58
  Speaker 4: And I do so, yeah, why not? Right like you
• 23:02
  Speaker 4: get over the counter, you have it there. You're not
• 23:03
  Speaker 4: going to use the whole thing. That's why it was
• 23:06
  Speaker 4: so scary, and we really appreciate it. It was a
• 23:09
  Speaker 4: great piece everyone. You can read the Big Take story
• 23:11
  Speaker 4: possible cancer and health risks, lurking and a popular OTC drug.
• 23:14
  Speaker 4: You can check it out on Bloomberg dot com slash
• 23:16
  Speaker 4: Big Take. You can also check it out on the Terminal. Anna,
• 23:18
  Speaker 4: thank you so much for writing this. Anna Atney, Bloomberg
• 23:20
  Speaker 4: National healthcare Reporter.
• 23:23
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