Latest / Bloomberg Intelligence / Credit Spread Cushion Is Pretty Much Gone: UBS's Falconio
Transcript
- 0:01Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bloomberg Markets Podcast. I'm Paul Sweeney, along
- 0:04Speaker 1: with my co host of Bonnie Quinn. Every business day
- 0:06Speaker 1: we bring you interviews from CEOs, market pros, and Bloomberg experts,
- 0:10Speaker 1: along with essential market moving news. Kind the Bloomberg Markets
- 0:13Speaker 1: Podcast on Apple podcast or wherever you listen to podcasts,
- 0:17Speaker 1: and on Bloomberg dot com. Let's bring in Leslie Falconio,
- 0:21Speaker 1: senior fixed income strategist at UBS Global Wealth Management. Nearly
- 0:25Speaker 1: a trillion dollars in assets under management firm whide, including
- 0:29Speaker 1: family office assets. So Leslie really has a great view
- 0:34Speaker 1: of where people are putting their money, where flows are going,
- 0:38Speaker 1: and what families are doing versus what institutions are doing.
- 0:42Speaker 1: So Leslie talked to us first about those flows. Have
- 0:44Speaker 1: we seen much of anything change hands recently? Is there
- 0:49Speaker 1: a sort of an area that certain certain um demographics
- 0:54Speaker 1: or what have you are moving towards. Yeah, I mean
- 0:58Speaker 1: right now. Obviously we still have this in our in
- 1:00Speaker 1: our opinion, a little bit too much cash on hands
- 1:02Speaker 1: that we think investors have. But I think to your points,
- 1:05Speaker 1: you know, as we know, especially in the fixed income aside,
- 1:07Speaker 1: it's the search field and in order to really gain
- 1:11Speaker 1: you know, decent yield and decent return going forward, you
- 1:14Speaker 1: have to sort of looking at at the alternatives market,
- 1:17Speaker 1: and that's where right now a lot of people are
- 1:19Speaker 1: sort of allocating because of this stimulus that we've seen,
- 1:22Speaker 1: because of all this central bank support, and because of
- 1:24Speaker 1: the liquidity that people who have a little bit longer
- 1:27Speaker 1: time horizons are really sort of picking their spots that
- 1:30Speaker 1: areas that have been hit due to this crisis. So
- 1:32Speaker 1: although people in our opinios still have a little bit
- 1:34Speaker 1: too much cash, they are starting to allocate to somebody's
- 1:37Speaker 1: alternative investments. When you say alternative investments, give us a
- 1:41Speaker 1: little more detail on where, yeah, absolutely, Like i' let's
- 1:46Speaker 1: just say things like commercial real estate. Okay, we know
- 1:48Speaker 1: that the commercial real estate areas actually has had obviously
- 1:52Speaker 1: you know a lot of points of concern, particularly those
- 1:54Speaker 1: pockets of vulnerability, whether it's office space, you know, hotels,
- 1:59Speaker 1: you know all those all those sort of areas that
- 2:01Speaker 1: have really been a problem, problematic area that have not
- 2:04Speaker 1: recovered yet. But the market is forecasting such high levels
- 2:08Speaker 1: of delinquencies that right now there are alternatives that allow
- 2:12Speaker 1: investors to really get involved for if they have a
- 2:14Speaker 1: longer term of time arising and they're willing to forego
- 2:17Speaker 1: a bit of liquidity. There are these pockets of opportunity
- 2:20Speaker 1: because the market is pressing in such negativity. That's really
- 2:24Speaker 1: interesting because you know, we hear so much about some
- 2:26Speaker 1: of these businesses going going away, you know, hotels in particular,
- 2:30Speaker 1: So is there a big premium to these investments? There are?
- 2:35Speaker 1: I mean, and actually, and you're absolutely right. I mean,
- 2:36Speaker 1: that's why you really need to pick your spots, and
- 2:38Speaker 1: you really need to do your due diligence. But as
- 2:40Speaker 1: as as opportunistic sort of as the opportunity set, particularly
- 2:44Speaker 1: within fixed income and co and has participated, it's really
- 2:47Speaker 1: gotten white. When you look at things like CMBs theory,
- 2:52Speaker 1: those there are pockets of opportunities there if you do
- 2:54Speaker 1: your due diligence, that are actually for the longer term,
- 2:58Speaker 1: we believe, particularly because we do believe it'shistical stateless the summing,
- 3:01Speaker 1: because we do believe there's there's the Fed and the
- 3:04Speaker 1: government is a great backstop. We'll be able to recover,
- 3:07Speaker 1: not not everywhere, but so you really need to pick
- 3:09Speaker 1: your spots. But given you're an environment where you've had
- 3:12Speaker 1: such great returns and equity and even a lot of
- 3:14Speaker 1: recovery and fixed income. The opportunities are very small. So
- 3:17Speaker 1: if you pick your spots, then over the longer term,
- 3:19Speaker 1: you know, you have really good returns. So the market
- 3:25Speaker 1: it's looking like it's anticipating a Biden victory right now.
- 3:28Speaker 1: Is it too complacent? Leslie? You know, honestly, I think
- 3:32Speaker 1: it is a bit too complaced. And and and I'll
- 3:34Speaker 1: tell you why if you look at things like the
- 3:35Speaker 1: credit market. Let's just look at the credit market for example,
- 3:38Speaker 1: triple see how yield spreads are at pre COVID levels. Okay,
- 3:42Speaker 1: the credit markets spreads are right now are incredibly incredibly tight,
- 3:47Speaker 1: and you're really not getting compensated a tremendous amount for
- 3:50Speaker 1: a fact elevent whether it's upboard down. So I do
- 3:53Speaker 1: think the market is a bit complacent. It is just
- 3:55Speaker 1: spooming this Biden suite. And you know, over longer term,
- 3:59Speaker 1: I think with the market really needs to focus on
- 4:01Speaker 1: is the fact that the curvice sea thing. You know,
- 4:03Speaker 1: deals are a bit higher. But more importantly, that cushion
- 4:06Speaker 1: that you once had is pretty much gone. Can you
- 4:11Speaker 1: elaborate a little bit um Yeah? Absolutely, yeah. So for example,
- 4:16Speaker 1: so if you like I seari the trip sea side,
- 4:17Speaker 1: like right, if you have things like you know is
- 4:20Speaker 1: now the pre COVID spreads and a lot of the
- 4:22Speaker 1: issuance that we're seeing are at triple seas and as
- 4:24Speaker 1: we know, you know a lot of these companies have
- 4:26Speaker 1: sort of been riding the hotel of the fed liquidity.
- 4:29Speaker 1: You know, when we look at things like say, for example,
- 4:31Speaker 1: just a basic invest in grade corporate, which has been
- 4:33Speaker 1: a great faccept for the feed the set has bought
- 4:35Speaker 1: invest in grade corporate. It has a lot of powder
- 4:38Speaker 1: drive to do more. But you asn't as a corporate
- 4:41Speaker 1: if you're going to corporate right now, you have only
- 4:44Speaker 1: maybe twenty basis points rise in interest rates where you
- 4:47Speaker 1: wipe out a whole year of income. You don't have
- 4:50Speaker 1: a lot of spread Crishian there to really you know,
- 4:53Speaker 1: compensate you if in fact you get more default in
- 4:55Speaker 1: both investment grade and high you okay, So let's see
- 4:59Speaker 1: can I skill us all about you know outside of
- 5:02Speaker 1: the US. You know, there's a lot of talk about
- 5:04Speaker 1: Asia these days, and I suppose emerging markets more generally
- 5:07Speaker 1: the China we sort of treat a little bit separately.
- 5:10Speaker 1: What are you doing there? Particularly given the the strengthening
- 5:13Speaker 1: in the yuan recently. Yeah, we we do feel for
- 5:17Speaker 1: those investors that are looking for their guild, and then
- 5:19Speaker 1: when we talk about high yield, for example, that we
- 5:22Speaker 1: feel it's a little bit more tight in the US.
- 5:24Speaker 1: You can go over to Asia high yields and actually
- 5:26Speaker 1: took up a nice, a nice yield at like six.
- 5:30Speaker 1: We do think the Asian the Asian market is actually
- 5:32Speaker 1: on a road to recovery. A little bit more inflation
- 5:34Speaker 1: that they have obviously the backstep of the central bank,
- 5:38Speaker 1: and we do think that that p m I is,
- 5:39Speaker 1: although volatile overall, we expect about recovery there. So our
- 5:43Speaker 1: preference for those that are really that are yield speakers
- 5:46Speaker 1: that believe that the US is just simply a bit
- 5:49Speaker 1: too tight. Asia high yield is another alternative that you
- 5:52Speaker 1: can invest it. All right, Leslie, thank you so interesting
- 5:55Speaker 1: to speak with you. One final question, if you don't mind,
- 5:57Speaker 1: families that have great wealth, are they trying to do
- 6:01Speaker 1: something with that before there is a change in administration
- 6:04Speaker 1: assuming that there is, Yeah, I mean list really look,
- 6:08Speaker 1: taxicles harvesting is always, always, always a big thing to do,
- 6:10Speaker 1: and I'm sure that there there there are families that
- 6:13Speaker 1: are trying to allocate in terms of potential changes. But
- 6:17Speaker 1: you know, and frankly, our view is that even if
- 6:20Speaker 1: we do have a democratic suite, it's that's gonna be
- 6:22Speaker 1: the first thing on the agenda to go changing taxes.
- 6:24Speaker 1: It's just not the economy is the first and the
- 6:26Speaker 1: agenda jobs with the first on the agenda, you know,
- 6:29Speaker 1: and make sure and having you know, corporations remain and
- 6:32Speaker 1: sustainability of corporations on the agenda. So although yes, they are,
- 6:35Speaker 1: it's just not going to be on day one, that day.
- 6:37Speaker 1: This change is gonna ocurse, gonna occur over over time. Yeah,
- 6:41Speaker 1: that's for sure. Okay, Leslie, thank you, we'll be talking
- 6:43Speaker 1: to you again. Well before then, Leslie Falconio is senior
- 6:46Speaker 1: strategist at ubs A Global Wealth Management. All right now
- 6:51Speaker 1: it is time to turn to the world of commercial banking,
- 6:53Speaker 1: and for that we bring in a specialist. We have
- 6:56Speaker 1: Done mcque head of commercial banking as Citizens Bank. Don
- 7:00Speaker 1: What does your job involved primarily these days and pandemic times, Well,
- 7:05Speaker 1: it's really taking care of our clients. Fannie um. You know,
- 7:08Speaker 1: right at the beginning of the pandemic, we we actually
- 7:11Speaker 1: said our primary job is to help our clients get
- 7:14Speaker 1: through this really unprecedented events, and that you know, started
- 7:17Speaker 1: with the p PP loans, that started with the provision
- 7:20Speaker 1: of a lot of liquidity lines, some restructuring of credit agreements.
- 7:23Speaker 1: And we're really encouraged by what we're saying. We're seeing
- 7:26Speaker 1: some real bright spots in the portfolio. There's obviously some
- 7:29Speaker 1: real trouble in certain industries, but but so far, so good.
- 7:34Speaker 1: You must have had an internal conversation about what the
- 7:36Speaker 1: criteria might be, what the lines in the sand might be,
- 7:39Speaker 1: what industries you're willing to be more lenient on than others.
- 7:43Speaker 1: How did that conversation go. Well, you know what what
- 7:46Speaker 1: we really did was we immediately undertook what we call
- 7:50Speaker 1: it cash burn analysis on our client base, and we
- 7:53Speaker 1: really throughout history and went to what current cash flow
- 7:56Speaker 1: was versus current cash resources and try to project forwards three, six,
- 8:01Speaker 1: twelve months to see how long the company you know,
- 8:03Speaker 1: had before it ran into a real liquidity problem. And
- 8:06Speaker 1: then we we actually took a ride of different actions
- 8:08Speaker 1: against those different scenarios and and really tried to bolster
- 8:12Speaker 1: the companies to get to the other end of the pandemic.
- 8:15Speaker 1: We we don't. We don't have any redline industries in
- 8:17Speaker 1: terms of things that the places that we won't help.
- 8:19Speaker 1: We certainly have some there in a little bit more
- 8:22Speaker 1: difficulty than others. So anything that's in the hospitality sector
- 8:25Speaker 1: or the restaurants sector, or the leisure sectors obviously experiencing
- 8:29Speaker 1: a fair amount of distress right now. But but the
- 8:32Speaker 1: broad portfolio looks like it's stabilizing. How do you avoid
- 8:37Speaker 1: some of your clients being aided by other, you know,
- 8:40Speaker 1: maybe shadow banking type entities. Is there a way that
- 8:44Speaker 1: you can hold onto them, or are you actually quite
- 8:47Speaker 1: happy for some of these private equity companies or what
- 8:50Speaker 1: have you dig on sometimes that might be underperforming. We haven't.
- 8:53Speaker 1: We haven't seen a lot of that, you know. What
- 8:55Speaker 1: we what we have seen is some distressed investments, for example,
- 8:59Speaker 1: So some clients just needs minority equity and and we'll
- 9:02Speaker 1: try to facilitate that. But we haven't seen the non
- 9:05Speaker 1: banks trying to come in and take our clients away
- 9:07Speaker 1: at the split second. And you know, I think our
- 9:09Speaker 1: general approaches if we do a good job of our
- 9:11Speaker 1: clients and take care of them and are close to them.
- 9:14Speaker 1: And we went on a real communication effort with all
- 9:18Speaker 1: of our CEOs as we went through this to make
- 9:20Speaker 1: sure we understood what was happening with their companies. So
- 9:22Speaker 1: we've seen some refinancing. We we've refanced some people out
- 9:25Speaker 1: of other facilities, but it's nothing very different from usual way. Well,
- 9:30Speaker 1: that's good to hear from your perspective. I suppose how
- 9:33Speaker 1: are you handling the we're in the we're mortgage and
- 9:35Speaker 1: interest rates in general. Well, you know, we we've done
- 9:39Speaker 1: a great job in lowering our costs of deposits um
- 9:42Speaker 1: and so we've held up on our energy margin pretty well.
- 9:46Speaker 1: Can I just intervene and say that that's bank for
- 9:49Speaker 1: not paying anything on deposits. Well, we pail, we pay
- 9:54Speaker 1: a little bit, but but our our our neg interest
- 9:57Speaker 1: margin while under pressure is held up, held up. Okay,
- 10:00Speaker 1: we've benefited from a very strong fee line, so as
- 10:03Speaker 1: you might have seen when we when we reported last
- 10:05Speaker 1: week or pp ANDR line was quite strong, and in
- 10:08Speaker 1: fact it was a record level. So we feel good
- 10:10Speaker 1: about our overall PANO. Well, that's good to hear. And
- 10:13Speaker 1: now there's been a lot of talk about whether there
- 10:15Speaker 1: might be some consolidation. How is citizens faring in terms
- 10:18Speaker 1: of being able to ward off any outside interest or
- 10:23Speaker 1: indeed maybe looking around if if you're in that good
- 10:25Speaker 1: of a position and trying to beef up what you have, well,
- 10:28Speaker 1: we don't. You know, we don't feel like we have
- 10:29Speaker 1: to do a transaction to be successful. And you know,
- 10:33Speaker 1: we're not really in discussions either way with anyone, and
- 10:35Speaker 1: we wouldn't talk about it anyway. So what we have
- 10:38Speaker 1: done is we've we've focused on acquiring smaller companies to
- 10:43Speaker 1: basically beef up our offerings on our solution set. So
- 10:46Speaker 1: I bought three M and A boutiques in the last
- 10:48Speaker 1: two years. We bought a big mortgage company. We brought
- 10:50Speaker 1: a wealth management company. So our our strategy is really
- 10:53Speaker 1: um fill in acquisitions that that that broughten out our
- 10:56Speaker 1: products White. Yeah, so Bolletons. Then, so what are these
- 11:00Speaker 1: t companies on? What do they specialize in mergers? And
- 11:03Speaker 1: actually no, I mean what kinds of mergers rooms? So,
- 11:06Speaker 1: so one is a general industrial UM and we bought
- 11:09Speaker 1: them two years ago. They really do Midwestern industrial companies.
- 11:13Speaker 1: We bought one down in Atlanta, which is really business
- 11:15Speaker 1: services and and other kinds of services. And we bought
- 11:18Speaker 1: one in California, which is restaurants and franchise franchise finance,
- 11:22Speaker 1: so fascinating and why did you land on those particular ones.
- 11:26Speaker 1: We just saw that one day were leaders in their market.
- 11:28Speaker 1: Um and we want to buy M and A boutiques
- 11:32Speaker 1: which are which are really strong and very narrow sectors.
- 11:35Speaker 1: We're not going to compete with Golden Sacks or JP
- 11:37Speaker 1: Morgan in M and can't compete in narrow sectors. And frankly,
- 11:41Speaker 1: we've been incredibly successful through the pandemic. I think we're
- 11:44Speaker 1: closing an M and A deal a week right now,
- 11:46Speaker 1: so it's it's gone quite well. That's really phenomenal. I
- 11:49Speaker 1: want to hear more about these M and A deals.
- 11:51Speaker 1: So one a week is a distress semina or no?
- 11:55Speaker 1: You know. I think the perspective I give you is
- 11:58Speaker 1: they're an awful lot of companies that are doing quite
- 12:00Speaker 1: well and some are actually thriving through the pandemic. And
- 12:04Speaker 1: as long as as long as the company's EBA diesn't
- 12:06Speaker 1: being impacted, we're seeing that people want to complete transactions
- 12:11Speaker 1: that we're in the pipeline. So they're not huge. I mean,
- 12:12Speaker 1: they're anywhere from fifty million to three million in terms
- 12:15Speaker 1: of valuation. So it's not the billion ten billion dollar deals,
- 12:19Speaker 1: but you're seeing some of those happen also. So you know,
- 12:21Speaker 1: we see some that have gone on hold because you've
- 12:24Speaker 1: had cash flows disrupted and we just have to figure
- 12:26Speaker 1: out what a profile looks like on the back end.
- 12:29Speaker 1: But a lot of them have moved forward. We've been
- 12:31Speaker 1: frankly surprised at how many moved forward. Yeah, I mean,
- 12:33Speaker 1: it's the wheels of capitalism, isn't it. They just keep turning,
- 12:36Speaker 1: and it's really really fascinating to watch and also a
- 12:39Speaker 1: very good sign because you do want to, you know,
- 12:42Speaker 1: the wheels of industry to be well oiled and turning,
- 12:46Speaker 1: even at times like this. You just hope that that
- 12:48Speaker 1: can be the case. Well, thank you very much, Don,
- 12:51Speaker 1: very interesting conversation and good look for the next couple
- 12:54Speaker 1: of months. We'll be talking to you again before long.
- 12:56Speaker 1: Don McCree is head of commercial Banking citizens by Ink,
- 13:00Speaker 1: and you heard him. So much going on in the
- 13:02Speaker 1: capital markets these days. It's it's not all just stagnancy
- 13:06Speaker 1: and dooming loom and waiting for stimulus. The fields of
- 13:09Speaker 1: capitalism do continue to turn. So let's bring in George
- 13:16Speaker 1: ferguson our senior aerospace, defense and airlines analysts with Bloomberg Intelligence. George.
- 13:21Speaker 1: What I found interesting about the conversation was that Scary
- 13:24Speaker 1: Kelly seems to be so optimistic that it looks like
- 13:27Speaker 1: he's still almost expecting some kind of targeted stimientos somewhere
- 13:32Speaker 1: he does. I found that interesting as well. It seems
- 13:34Speaker 1: to me I'm in the camp that we probably don't
- 13:36Speaker 1: see a stimulus package for the airline um until next year,
- 13:41Speaker 1: if we get one at all. I really don't see
- 13:43Speaker 1: anything happening in a lame duck session. I sense it
- 13:46Speaker 1: potentially the Republicans don't, you know, don't really see a
- 13:50Speaker 1: need to be stimulating in parts of the economy like
- 13:52Speaker 1: the airlines, and so I think I think the best
- 13:55Speaker 1: case would be a Democratic win for the airlines. Democratic
- 13:58Speaker 1: win in November, and then they could actually gets into
- 14:00Speaker 1: stimulust into into early next year. We'll see. That's funny
- 14:03Speaker 1: because I would have thought that if the Democrats win,
- 14:05Speaker 1: that it would not be politically expedient for them to
- 14:08Speaker 1: be seen to be quote unquote bailing out particular industries,
- 14:11Speaker 1: and that in fact, the Republicans would be more likely
- 14:14Speaker 1: to do targeted some stimulus how do you get to
- 14:17Speaker 1: Democrats bailing out airlines? I just think I think the
- 14:22Speaker 1: unionized labor force is one that they have, you know,
- 14:25Speaker 1: they have a strong support from and they and they
- 14:28Speaker 1: in turn on a continue support and I use some
- 14:31Speaker 1: of the Pat Toomey, Republican from Pennsylvania is on the
- 14:37Speaker 1: record is saying the airline shouldn't be providing any more
- 14:40Speaker 1: stimulus like kind of us. I guess those two, uh,
- 14:44Speaker 1: you know, benchmarks as well as I think Republicans are
- 14:46Speaker 1: more concerned about deficit spending, and I think there's a
- 14:49Speaker 1: little bit less concerned about that. And that's certainly will
- 14:52Speaker 1: come back to the four if indeed there is a
- 14:54Speaker 1: transfer of power. And you know it because right now
- 14:58Speaker 1: it's it's not popular to talk about the deficit, but
- 15:01Speaker 1: it will be soon if the Republicans aren't in power still. So, George,
- 15:06Speaker 1: is Gary Kelly a little bit misguided? Or can he
- 15:10Speaker 1: get enough liquidity? Can he wait until next year until
- 15:13Speaker 1: something comes? Yeah? So you know what, Gary Kelly, he
- 15:17Speaker 1: has plenty of liqudity. I mean he's Southwest is in
- 15:21Speaker 1: one of the best positions of any U S airline
- 15:23Speaker 1: to weather this storm. They have a lot of cash
- 15:26Speaker 1: they would. I think somewhere around fifteen billion cash they
- 15:29Speaker 1: reported this morning. Uh, and they have less debt than that.
- 15:33Speaker 1: You know, when we even we look at all the
- 15:35Speaker 1: US airlines, we see them all able to survive into
- 15:38Speaker 1: into summer. I think they've all sort of targeted that area.
- 15:43Speaker 1: Late next year's being a time when they think demand
- 15:45Speaker 1: is gonna hopefully start to recover. So I think it's
- 15:49Speaker 1: for Gary, it's more a question of whether or not,
- 15:51Speaker 1: you know, as he as he mentioned, whether or not
- 15:52Speaker 1: he's going to push his employees through, you know, taking
- 15:56Speaker 1: pay cuts and things like that and furloughing more employees,
- 15:59Speaker 1: and his role can Sorry, I think about you know,
- 16:02Speaker 1: an unsettled environment at Southwest. It years to make those
- 16:05Speaker 1: moves to drive down, drive down costs and get to
- 16:09Speaker 1: a zero cash man, Georgie, I love to have your
- 16:12Speaker 1: thoughts on Bowing on the seven thirty seven Max getting
- 16:15Speaker 1: back up in the air. We were waiting for it
- 16:17Speaker 1: for so long and so long, and suddenly it's it's
- 16:19Speaker 1: all happening. Yes, I mean I think that you know,
- 16:24Speaker 1: Bowing Bowing, He's had some challenges, but the airplane is
- 16:28Speaker 1: an absolutely viable airplane, and I think Bowing really gets
- 16:31Speaker 1: focused on getting the airplane back in the air. It's
- 16:33Speaker 1: been a while, but we think it's going to be
- 16:36Speaker 1: approved by the f a A, you know, by end
- 16:38Speaker 1: of year this year or early next year. So I
- 16:40Speaker 1: think Gary is going to be having that discussion more
- 16:43Speaker 1: intensely now about when he really wants all those airplanes
- 16:46Speaker 1: that Bowing is built for him. Because it's it's again
- 16:49Speaker 1: we see it's sort of late this year early next
- 16:51Speaker 1: year back in service. Can you give us an update
- 16:54Speaker 1: on orders? So there was a big order book and
- 16:56Speaker 1: then it was slowly you know, lines in that book
- 16:58Speaker 1: we're getting crossed out, as are some airlines a you know,
- 17:01Speaker 1: got hit by the pandemic. But we weren't maybe willing
- 17:05Speaker 1: fully to wait for Boeing. Where are we out now
- 17:07Speaker 1: for Boing? Yeah? I mean the last time we looked
- 17:10Speaker 1: at the set seven max, I'm going to give you
- 17:12Speaker 1: a rough Converns around five thousand. The challenge with the
- 17:14Speaker 1: order book is exactly like you heard this morning, right,
- 17:17Speaker 1: Gary Kelly wouldn't go on record as to what he
- 17:20Speaker 1: was going to do in that order book, and he
- 17:22Speaker 1: said he would continue to talk to Bowing. Now, look,
- 17:25Speaker 1: we know over time, Gary will need airplanes, and he's
- 17:28Speaker 1: a solely he's solely a Bowing shop. And when the
- 17:31Speaker 1: world looks better, Gary will go to Bowing. I need
- 17:33Speaker 1: airplanes and airplanes sooner because I got great demand, and
- 17:36Speaker 1: he'll want Bowing to give him those airplanes. And so
- 17:39Speaker 1: Bowing is going to come to him at this time
- 17:41Speaker 1: and say, look, we have a problem, right, We've got
- 17:44Speaker 1: a lot of airplanes stacked up, we need to deliver,
- 17:47Speaker 1: we need to cash what we need you to support
- 17:49Speaker 1: us through this downturn. So that negotiation and and Gary
- 17:52Speaker 1: Kelly is one of the most important customers for Bowing.
- 17:54Speaker 1: That conversation is going on throughout that Bowing order book,
- 17:58Speaker 1: you know, with this and sort of intensities. So it's
- 18:02Speaker 1: really hard to plumb what portion of those of those
- 18:05Speaker 1: orders could go away or not. We think a lot
- 18:08Speaker 1: of them will just be deferred. And what will happen
- 18:11Speaker 1: is Boweling and Airbus. Airbus will be in the same
- 18:13Speaker 1: boat with their customers, will have to lower build rates
- 18:18Speaker 1: as they manage manage a slower airline recovery, and the
- 18:21Speaker 1: customers say, look, I just can't take those airplanes this year.
- 18:24Speaker 1: So we don't see a lot of unwinding the books,
- 18:26Speaker 1: but we see a lot of deferrals in the books. George,
- 18:30Speaker 1: we went into this thing with you know, close on
- 18:32Speaker 1: twenty airlines were now at what's seventeen? I think, can
- 18:34Speaker 1: you give us an update on on where we are
- 18:36Speaker 1: and who didn't survive? I'm sorry say it again. We
- 18:42Speaker 1: went into the pandemic with a couple of more airlines
- 18:44Speaker 1: than than are in existence now. Basically, you know around
- 18:48Speaker 1: the world, can you give us an update? Well, I
- 18:51Speaker 1: mean right right now, you know, right now, I don't
- 18:53Speaker 1: think we've seen anybody really liquidated and taken out of
- 18:56Speaker 1: the game yet, so you know, there may be or
- 19:00Speaker 1: to I I'm missing, but we know we have hot
- 19:02Speaker 1: spots of problems. You know, down in South America we
- 19:05Speaker 1: had lat Time in Avianca declared bankruptcy and restructure their companies,
- 19:09Speaker 1: which if if demand doesn't improve long term, more airlines
- 19:13Speaker 1: will need to go through that bankruptcy and lay off
- 19:17Speaker 1: their debt and get rid of their airplanes. So we
- 19:20Speaker 1: saw them. We know Norwegian out in Europe is having
- 19:23Speaker 1: challenges and cut operations percent, but is still limping along.
- 19:28Speaker 1: We have a number of airlines around the world that
- 19:31Speaker 1: are kind of limping through. We know air Asia out
- 19:34Speaker 1: in Malaysia's having big problems with they're big buyer of
- 19:37Speaker 1: air A three and A three thirties their Asia X
- 19:42Speaker 1: longer haul um a portion of that airline, so we
- 19:46Speaker 1: see it cropping up. But remember we're now coming into
- 19:48Speaker 1: winter season, and so winter season is the really difficult
- 19:53Speaker 1: travel season, and I think now is where we're going
- 19:55Speaker 1: to start to see even more failures as airlines don't
- 19:59Speaker 1: see this demand come in cash flow this weekend to
- 20:01Speaker 1: go into the weaker season. But again, the airlines have
- 20:05Speaker 1: a great propensity to sort of um limp along, go
- 20:09Speaker 1: to a bankruptcy, restructuring, and continue. I think what we'll
- 20:12Speaker 1: really watch though, is the amount of capacity that comes
- 20:16Speaker 1: out of the marketplace. Right these airplanes have to leave
- 20:18Speaker 1: these airlines because they don't have to they don't have
- 20:21Speaker 1: the demand to fly them. And the question will start
- 20:24Speaker 1: to become what do we do with all these airplanes
- 20:27Speaker 1: and the market up there a bunch of them down.
- 20:29Speaker 1: But we're watching for capacity to come out of these
- 20:31Speaker 1: global airlines. Gosh, those car parks and Phoenix, or those
- 20:34Speaker 1: airplane parks and Phoenix are going to get pretty full
- 20:36Speaker 1: if they're not already. George, thank you so much. George Ferguson,
- 20:39Speaker 1: Senior Aerospace, Defense and Airlines analyst for Bloomberg Intelligence, joining
- 20:44Speaker 1: us there. All right, it is time for our weekly
- 20:48Speaker 1: visit with Barry Whittle's Bloomberg opinion columnists. We're always thrilled
- 20:52Speaker 1: to have them on, and Barry, I want you to
- 20:55Speaker 1: take on things because you're so learned and you also
- 20:58Speaker 1: read just voraciously about the market, and you're also in
- 21:01Speaker 1: the market as well, so you've got people's money and
- 21:03Speaker 1: your money, you know, at risk. We've heard a lot
- 21:05Speaker 1: of different opinions about what's going on here in the
- 21:07Speaker 1: last week. And I'm talking about people like Bill Miller,
- 21:10Speaker 1: for example, talking in his note about it and that
- 21:13Speaker 1: getting disseminated. We had Eric Shatsker talking to bos Weinstein today.
- 21:17Speaker 1: A lot of big names are trying to figure out
- 21:19Speaker 1: the environment. What have you taken away from them? Who
- 21:22Speaker 1: are the best thinkers on this? Wow, that's such a
- 21:26Speaker 1: challenging question. There we go, you know, I think that
- 21:33Speaker 1: and my vantage point is having sat with many of
- 21:36Speaker 1: these people for masters and business interviews for the podcast.
- 21:41Speaker 1: Each of these people have a a somewhat unique um perspective,
- 21:46Speaker 1: but a much more um precise specialty. So when I'm
- 21:53Speaker 1: talking to Howard Marks, I'm talking to him about two things.
- 21:57Speaker 1: I'm talking to him about the thinking pro says, how
- 22:00Speaker 1: do you make decisions? How do you analyze things? As
- 22:03Speaker 1: well as this specifics of distress debt um. This weekend's
- 22:09Speaker 1: guest is Ray Dalio from from Bridgewater Associates. He's a
- 22:13Speaker 1: big macro thinker. So when I'm talking to Ray, I
- 22:17Speaker 1: want to ask him about different asset classes, what do
- 22:20Speaker 1: you do now that rates are so low? What do
- 22:22Speaker 1: you do with gold? What do you do you know,
- 22:24Speaker 1: those sort of questions. But at the same time, I
- 22:26Speaker 1: want to understand how he looks at the world, and
- 22:29Speaker 1: I know he's he's not just an investor, but a
- 22:33Speaker 1: historian and someone who's thought process is really what is
- 22:38Speaker 1: the history tell us about this particular area. Um So,
- 22:43Speaker 1: So we were talking for for this week's show about
- 22:46Speaker 1: the pandemic and the lockdown and how unique this is,
- 22:49Speaker 1: and his answer is, yeah, it's unique in your lifetime,
- 22:52Speaker 1: but you look back a few hundred years and you
- 22:54Speaker 1: could see examples of things that have happened before. We've
- 22:58Speaker 1: had um Central Bank create a lot of um take
- 23:02Speaker 1: rates down to zero. We've had governments have all sorts
- 23:07Speaker 1: of debt be monetized. We've seen the wealth gap expand
- 23:12Speaker 1: in prior cycles, and we've seen um arising power challenge
- 23:17Speaker 1: the established um powers that be. All these things that
- 23:21Speaker 1: we're experiencing today, they've all happened before, sometimes separately, sometimes together,
- 23:27Speaker 1: and and so it's that whole what drives their thought
- 23:30Speaker 1: process before they get to their specific expertise. That really
- 23:35Speaker 1: is quite fast, and I mean very honestly, you know,
- 23:37Speaker 1: wouldn't you argue that not only has it happened before,
- 23:40Speaker 1: but it happens roughly once every ten years. So, I mean,
- 23:42Speaker 1: we had the Great Financial Crisis ten years ago. In
- 23:44Speaker 1: terms of pandemics, we we had one twenty years ago.
- 23:47Speaker 1: And I mean, these things happen. We're very likely to
- 23:50Speaker 1: have a rolling series of these for the rest of
- 23:53Speaker 1: our lifetimes, particularly out of time when global thought systems
- 23:58Speaker 1: are fragmenting and disintegrating, and you know, the world that
- 24:02Speaker 1: worked for a while has not been working for a
- 24:04Speaker 1: long time. So that's why you want these guys's opinions
- 24:08Speaker 1: on things. You want to see how they're thinking about it.
- 24:10Speaker 1: So so that's Ray Dalio. Those who specialize in treasury investing, though,
- 24:15Speaker 1: may have a different opinion on this, because it certainly
- 24:18Speaker 1: is the greatest expansion, even greater than the Great Financial
- 24:21Speaker 1: Crisis of you know, monetary policy tools and um just
- 24:27Speaker 1: the monetary base that we've ever seen across the world. Right,
- 24:30Speaker 1: Dalio says, you have to go back to ninety three
- 24:33Speaker 1: to find a central bank like the US taking rates
- 24:38Speaker 1: now to zero. But when you look at the balance
- 24:41Speaker 1: sheet of the by the joke about that was, I
- 24:45Speaker 1: guess modern monetary theory ain't so modern because the version
- 24:49Speaker 1: of it that that we're sort of experiencing goes back
- 24:53Speaker 1: to UM. But but to your point about how cyclical
- 24:58Speaker 1: all these things are, and how you know, unprecedented is
- 25:02Speaker 1: a bad word because unprecedented things happen all the time.
- 25:06Speaker 1: I think I say the same thing every time I
- 25:09Speaker 1: hear someone say it's a hundred year flood. It's yeah,
- 25:13Speaker 1: we but we get them every ten years. Maybe we
- 25:16Speaker 1: should stop calling these things that come along ten or
- 25:20Speaker 1: more times a century. Maybe we should stop calling them
- 25:22Speaker 1: hundred year floods. Yeah, I mean, honestly, the people that
- 25:26Speaker 1: do do you do you take them seriously? So I
- 25:31Speaker 1: almost think of it as a verbal tick, the phrase
- 25:34Speaker 1: you know, you ever speak to someone who every other sentences?
- 25:37Speaker 1: You know, we have these unthinking, unconscious verbal ticks. Uh.
- 25:43Speaker 1: Market hates uncertainty is probably the one that's most dominance
- 25:47Speaker 1: these days, and I think we should really stop and
- 25:51Speaker 1: carefully consider what we say and and try to avoid cliches.
- 25:57Speaker 1: Market hates uncertainty is a perfect example mark it's thrived
- 26:00Speaker 1: on uncertainty. Anytime there's certainty, there isn't someone to take
- 26:04Speaker 1: the other side of your trade. There there has to
- 26:05Speaker 1: be by definition, uncertainty about the future. It's inherently unknown,
- 26:11Speaker 1: and therefore markets are a mechanism to make sense I
- 26:15Speaker 1: have of uncertainty. Given what's been going on in the
- 26:18Speaker 1: markets lately, UM, I love the narrative that we've been
- 26:23Speaker 1: hearing lately that the possibility of a lack of resolution
- 26:27Speaker 1: of the presidential contest on November three is it has
- 26:32Speaker 1: been all the uncertainty. Let me let me point out
- 26:35Speaker 1: that in two thousand um Bush v. Gore wasn't resolved
- 26:39Speaker 1: until I think it was December twelfth or December thirteenth.
- 26:42Speaker 1: And if you really want to be a story and
- 26:44Speaker 1: you could go back to the election of eighteen hundred,
- 26:47Speaker 1: which was an electoral college tie. It was a dead heat.
- 26:52Speaker 1: When that happens, it gets thrown to the House, and
- 26:55Speaker 1: each state gets a vote in the House of representative
- 27:00Speaker 1: of each state's um congressional delegation gets one vote plus
- 27:04Speaker 1: plus the various um um territories and and non states
- 27:09Speaker 1: and and so that's in the event of an electoral
- 27:13Speaker 1: college tie, the House is the final determiner. So all
- 27:16Speaker 1: these things that look like they're so unique in one off,
- 27:19Speaker 1: we've experienced some form of them in the past. Yeah,
- 27:22Speaker 1: I mean, it's that old joke on Wall Street, right
- 27:24Speaker 1: that the interns or the newies haven't seen this before
- 27:28Speaker 1: and they have no idea what they're in for. But
- 27:31Speaker 1: you know, it really does help to live through a
- 27:33Speaker 1: couple of them, I think, and you see how markets
- 27:35Speaker 1: react and how they work, and and and you have
- 27:37Speaker 1: minor ones, you know, in the meantime. So for example,
- 27:40Speaker 1: when remember when when when the credit rating was was
- 27:43Speaker 1: downgraded for the US, that was a little bit of
- 27:45Speaker 1: a minor shock to the system as well. So it's
- 27:48Speaker 1: all practiced it yet it did nothing to the contractory
- 27:52Speaker 1: market other than the news broke. There was a little
- 27:54Speaker 1: wobble for a couple of minutes, and then the bullmarket
- 27:58Speaker 1: and treasuries continued for they're ongoing. Arguably it still hasn't ended. Barry,
- 28:05Speaker 1: Thank you. Always fun to have a chat Barry Riddles.
- 28:08Speaker 1: Do tune into his Master's in Business podcast. He also
- 28:11Speaker 1: makes frequent appearances here on Bloomberg Radio and of course,
- 28:13Speaker 1: on Bloomberg Television in the mornings. Thanks for listening to
- 28:18Speaker 1: Bloomberg Markets podcast. You can subscribe and listen to interviews
- 28:21Speaker 1: at Apple Podcasts or whatever podcast platform you prefer. I'm
- 28:25Speaker 1: Bonnie Quinn. I'm on Twitter at Bonnie Quinn, and I'm
- 28:28Speaker 1: Paul Sweeney. I'm on Twitter at pt Sweeney. Before the podcast,
- 28:31Speaker 1: you can always catch us worldwide at Bloomberg Radio.