Latest / Bloomberg Intelligence / Auto Icon Carlos Ghosn Could Be Facing A Catastrophic Ending

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Auto Icon Carlos Ghosn Could Be Facing A Catastrophic Ending · Bloomberg Intelligence

0:05
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bloomberg p m L Podcast. I'm Pim Fox.
0:08
Speaker 1: Along with my co host Lisa Brabowitz. Each day we
0:11
Speaker 1: bring you the most important, noteworthy, and useful interviews for
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Speaker 1: you and your money, whether you're at the grocery store
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Speaker 1: or the trading floor. Find the Bloomberg p m L
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Speaker 1: Podcast on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud, and Bloomberg dot Com. One
0:27
Speaker 1: of the biggest stories of the day is that Nissan
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Speaker 1: is removing Carlos Gone as chairman after he was arrested
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Speaker 1: in Tokyo for violations of financial impropriety uh and this,
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Speaker 1: of course has sent the a d r s down
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Speaker 1: by more than five percent. Of Nissan Johnny us down
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Speaker 1: to talk a little bit more about this is David Welch,
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Speaker 1: Detroit bureau trief for Bloomberg News as well as her
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Speaker 1: own Matthew Miller of Bloomberg Television and Bloomberg Radio, who
0:54
Speaker 1: is in New York in our eleven three oh studios.
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Speaker 1: I want to get to Matt, but David, let's start
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Speaker 1: with you. Can you lay out what the most important
1:01
Speaker 1: details are that have come out so far about the
1:03
Speaker 1: financial improprieties and what it means for Nissan going forward? Sure,
1:07
Speaker 1: so what they've accused him of, actually, there hasn't been
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Speaker 1: an official accusation by Japanese authorities, but what they're saying
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Speaker 1: is basically, he understated how much income he was making
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Speaker 1: by about forty four million dollars. And then in a
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Speaker 1: very old, say damning but also a vague press conference,
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Speaker 1: uh Nissan uh CEO psychois said that he has also
1:29
Speaker 1: misappropriated company resources. And from there you have to think
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Speaker 1: he was, you know, could this be overusing the company plane?
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Speaker 1: Is it uh abusing expense accounts and drafting cash resources
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Speaker 1: out of the company. I mean it sort of couldn't
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Speaker 1: encompass all of those things, and they were moving him immediately.
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Speaker 1: Mitsubishi Motors, which is also part of the three way
1:50
Speaker 1: alliance with these three car companies, have done the same thing.
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Speaker 1: And when I was last looking at that, there were
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Speaker 1: no board was reviewing the whole situation and figuring out
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Speaker 1: what they're going to do. This is huge because going
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Speaker 1: is the guy who saved Nissan back in the late
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Speaker 1: nineties when Renault bought a big chunk of the company
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Speaker 1: for six billion dollars, Nissan was really kind of teetering
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Speaker 1: on bankruptcy and with six billion from Renault and Carlos Goings,
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Speaker 1: cost cutting and product plan and factory turnaround. They came
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Speaker 1: roaring back and he has run these three companies as
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Speaker 1: an icon for almost two decades and for it to
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Speaker 1: end this way is uh catastrophic for him and it's
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Speaker 1: going to bring about massive change for the for all
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Speaker 1: three companies involved. Matt Miller, I want to bring you
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Speaker 1: into the conversation. You've met Carlos Going on a number
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Speaker 1: of times. Tell us a little bit about him, his
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Speaker 1: background and what you take away from your personal meetings
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Speaker 1: with him. Well, I mean, David points out that he
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Speaker 1: is an iconic figure. He is known as the rock
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Speaker 1: star of auto CEO and that title sometimes is used
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Speaker 1: for other people. It has been for Alan Moullally in
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Speaker 1: the past. It should have been for Sergio um Marcion
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Speaker 1: as well, but Going is the longest standing, you know,
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Speaker 1: rock in the auto industry. As far as those three
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Speaker 1: kind of biggest turnaround CEOs go um cut his teeth
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Speaker 1: in Australia, I believe, yeah, absolutely, and he's he's one
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Speaker 1: of these just like Sergio was the sort of multinational
3:18
Speaker 1: citizens as well. I mean, I think the biggest problem
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Speaker 1: right now. UM of the three is Renault. You know,
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Speaker 1: their shares fell the furthest in France, and he's still
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Speaker 1: the CEO over No. Remember, he was kind of stepping
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Speaker 1: back from the alliance. He gave up his title as
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Speaker 1: CEO of Nissan UH. He was chairman of the alliance,
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Speaker 1: but was making UH making arrangements to make it permanent.
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Speaker 1: So a lot of investors UM were expecting. I think
3:45
Speaker 1: it's fair to say that all investors were expecting this
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Speaker 1: was headed towards a merger, if not an official UM
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Speaker 1: tie up, at least something more official than it is now.
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Speaker 1: And that's what's up in the air. I think that's
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Speaker 1: the biggest concern for shareholders right now. Although it's important
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Speaker 1: to mention, as David's said, Japanese prosecutors haven't UM filed
4:03
Speaker 1: official charges yet and he's not considered guilty. Although he
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Speaker 1: has been arrested, he has gone with the prosecutors. It's
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Speaker 1: not clear where he is right now, but he is,
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Speaker 1: let's say, being detained. Yeah, he also was removed his chairman,
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Speaker 1: so there's not changing that. Thank you so much both
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Speaker 1: of you for joining us. Matthew Miller, wonderful to see
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Speaker 1: you in person Happy Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving Bloomberg television and radio
4:26
Speaker 1: host as well. Also thanks to David Welt, Detroit bureau chief,
4:31
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. Afford joining us well, you know, Lisa.
4:37
Speaker 1: Just earlier we got to listen to Ray Daio of
4:40
Speaker 1: Bridgewater give his thoughts about the business cycle, about the
4:44
Speaker 1: money management business. He was speaking with Barry Dholts of
4:47
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Opinion, but on the cover of Bloomberg Markets magazine,
4:52
Speaker 1: I dare say is an interview that is of equal weight,
4:56
Speaker 1: and this is an interview with Abby Johnson of Fidelity,
5:00
Speaker 1: and it also includes Kathleen Murphy, who leads their personal
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Speaker 1: investing unit. One of the quotes out of the story
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Speaker 1: is that we're in the midst of quote a twenty
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Speaker 1: two trillion dollars shift in assets to women. And I
5:14
Speaker 1: thought that was fascinating. And here to tell us more
5:17
Speaker 1: about it and how the company is reacting and dealing
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Speaker 1: with this change is Peggy Collins, our expert when it
5:23
Speaker 1: comes to all things investing, our investing team leader for
5:26
Speaker 1: Bloomberg News, and you can follow Peggy at m k
5:31
Speaker 1: M Collins on Twitter and she joins us here in
5:35
Speaker 1: the Bloomberg Interactive broker's studio. Peggy, a pleasure to have
5:38
Speaker 1: you tell us about this interview and particularly about this
5:42
Speaker 1: shift in assets to women. And it coincides also with
5:47
Speaker 1: Fidelity's effort to make sure that a lot of their
5:50
Speaker 1: new hires, particularly at their branch level, are women's right.
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Speaker 1: So essentially, Abby Johnson is the top woman in fund
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Speaker 1: man management in the US. She runs Fidelity. She's the
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Speaker 1: third generation of the Johnson family to run it, and
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Speaker 1: she looked ahead with Kathleen Murphy, who runs personal investing
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Speaker 1: at Fidelity, a giant business unit for them. And basically
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Speaker 1: what they're seeing is this transfer of money into women's
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Speaker 1: hands for one of the first times in our history
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Speaker 1: for several reasons, one of them being the fact that
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Speaker 1: women are just living longer than men. So a lot
6:25
Speaker 1: of women are finding themselves in a position in their
6:27
Speaker 1: life where maybe they didn't run the money earlier in
6:30
Speaker 1: their lives, but they are getting transferred assets later in
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Speaker 1: their life. You're also seeing more women um stay married,
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Speaker 1: not get married. You're also seeing more women get divorced
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Speaker 1: and have to deal with assets at some point in
6:43
Speaker 1: their life as well. So they're just really seeing the
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Speaker 1: whole demographics of who's investing in controlling the pocketbook change.
6:51
Speaker 1: So I have to think that this is a person
6:54
Speaker 1: who has been at the forefront of the move to
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Speaker 1: index funds and two cheaper funds, And when you talk
7:00
Speaker 1: about expertise, I just wonder how did she sort of
7:03
Speaker 1: reconcile the tention right now between active and passive management,
7:07
Speaker 1: especially given their zero fee UH funds that they just
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Speaker 1: recently launched. It's such a great point, Lisa, because Fidelity
7:14
Speaker 1: under her grandfather and father's leadership, was essentially known for
7:19
Speaker 1: its stock pickers active management. You had people like Peter Lynch,
7:22
Speaker 1: one of the most famous investors of all time, who
7:25
Speaker 1: really draw drew a lot of investors to Fidelity. But
7:28
Speaker 1: what Abby's overseeing the company at a time where millions
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Speaker 1: and billions of dollars are going into passive, low fee
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Speaker 1: index one So she really talked about how they've been
7:37
Speaker 1: somewhat late to the index investing game. She admitted that,
7:41
Speaker 1: but she also says she feels like the company is
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Speaker 1: caught up. One of the things that they did is
7:45
Speaker 1: you said, this summer was decided, you know what, We're
7:47
Speaker 1: going to be the first to offer a free index
7:50
Speaker 1: fund to Actually they came out with in August. They
7:53
Speaker 1: now have four, and Abby Johnson was saying, you know what,
7:55
Speaker 1: she's not really a fan so much anymore of traditional advertising,
7:58
Speaker 1: and she thinks in order to get more people to
8:01
Speaker 1: give Fidelity a chance, they have to do things that
8:03
Speaker 1: are even more surprising and splashy. And essentially they did
8:07
Speaker 1: surprise a lot of their competitors when they came out
8:09
Speaker 1: when they were the ones, given that they're known for
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Speaker 1: active management to come out with the first free index fund.
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Speaker 1: One of the other areas that she spoke about, also
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Speaker 1: Kathleen Murphy speaking about is robot advisors. That's right. Fidelity
8:22
Speaker 1: has a robo advisor called Fidelity Go, and we've seen
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Speaker 1: a lot of the asset managers incorporate robots into their
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Speaker 1: investing process, particularly for people who are of middle wealth.
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Speaker 1: You know, the billionaires are still getting the high time,
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Speaker 1: their wealth is not excessive, and they can't make great
8:40
Speaker 1: fees out of those clients, so this might be the
8:42
Speaker 1: way to get them to that very money. Managed it
8:45
Speaker 1: Fidelity right and get it managed earlier. So back in
8:48
Speaker 1: the day, you would wait until you had maybe tens
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Speaker 1: of thousands of dollars to go to some wealth advisor,
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Speaker 1: but Fidelities now saying, look, we can offer you a
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Speaker 1: six multiple choice questionnaire that you can fill out all online,
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Speaker 1: and then we can help you get in invested. One
9:00
Speaker 1: of the interesting things they also said was their designing
9:03
Speaker 1: products and user user interfaces now for millennials, and then
9:08
Speaker 1: they calibrated up to two older people. So that's who
9:11
Speaker 1: they have in mind nowadays when they're thinking about how
9:14
Speaker 1: do we put this product out there. It's really interesting.
9:18
Speaker 1: You know, you're talking about how traditional advertising ones to
9:22
Speaker 1: certainly be the way to attract investors, it also may
9:26
Speaker 1: not be the way to make money. And I just
9:29
Speaker 1: have to wonder. I mean again, when you start talking about, oh,
9:32
Speaker 1: it's a good gimmick to get people to to like Fidelity. Yeah,
9:35
Speaker 1: but they're making nothing on these fun so how do
9:37
Speaker 1: they plan to make money? Well, they essentially are saying,
9:39
Speaker 1: you know what we need to get get people in
9:42
Speaker 1: the door, and once we get them in the door,
9:44
Speaker 1: we can offer them a lot of different things. Fidelity
9:46
Speaker 1: was talking about it's brokerage platform, for example, in terms
9:49
Speaker 1: of more trading. As you get older and potentially have
9:52
Speaker 1: more money, maybe you're not only using the robo advisor
9:55
Speaker 1: maybe you're not only using Fidelity through your four own
9:57
Speaker 1: K plant, but maybe you're going to open up a
9:59
Speaker 1: broker account. Maybe you're going to offer as you get older,
10:03
Speaker 1: a managed that you're going to be offered a managed
10:05
Speaker 1: to count offering where for people with more money, they
10:08
Speaker 1: may have more high touch a wealth advisor involved. So
10:11
Speaker 1: they essentially see it as a way to get people
10:13
Speaker 1: in the door and then offer them different things. Well,
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Speaker 1: it also is a way to beef up the asset
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Speaker 1: management business, which is the most profitable division of Fidelity.
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Speaker 1: That's right. I did ask Abby about whether or not
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Speaker 1: she thought the asset management industry, the mass asset management
10:28
Speaker 1: part of the business would still be the most profitable
10:31
Speaker 1: five years from now, and she said, you know what,
10:34
Speaker 1: A lot of it is dependent on the markets, but
10:36
Speaker 1: it still is their most profitable business line. You know,
10:38
Speaker 1: they have workplace benefits like I mentioned four in case,
10:41
Speaker 1: they have the brokerage unit. They have a number of
10:43
Speaker 1: different business lines of Fidelity, but stock picking, mutual funds,
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Speaker 1: those are still the big engine for them. Peggy Abby
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Speaker 1: Johnson is not known for being a publicity hound in
10:53
Speaker 1: any way. She performed This is a rare interview. Do
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Speaker 1: you get the sense just lastly here that she's changing
11:00
Speaker 1: her approach. Here, it was interesting she acknowledged that she
11:04
Speaker 1: has been speaking out more. The company had issues with
11:07
Speaker 1: a sexual harassment claim last year, and she was out
11:10
Speaker 1: in front very quickly after that talking about zero tolerance
11:13
Speaker 1: in the workplace. She did acknowledge that it doesn't seem
11:17
Speaker 1: like it's her the thing she wants to do. First,
11:20
Speaker 1: she's not a total fan of being out there in
11:22
Speaker 1: public speaking, in part because it takes up a lot
11:24
Speaker 1: of time and travel. But she did acknowledge that investors
11:27
Speaker 1: want to see their leaders out there and talking more.
11:30
Speaker 1: She did also acknowledge that she's not one to make
11:33
Speaker 1: calls on the market. You know, we see a lot
11:35
Speaker 1: of leaders of investing firms who actually do that a lot,
11:37
Speaker 1: and she said, I'm a leader of this company that
11:40
Speaker 1: has to do well whether the markets are doing well
11:42
Speaker 1: or not, and so she feels like making calls in
11:45
Speaker 1: the market is not something that she wants to do.
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Speaker 1: Petty Collins, thank you so much and great story. Thank
11:50
Speaker 1: you for being with us. A topic now are global
11:57
Speaker 1: rates and a foreign exchange strategy, and here to help
12:00
Speaker 1: us understand what's going on in the World is and
12:02
Speaker 1: Matthias Global Rates FX strategist for Vanguard and Matthias, can
12:08
Speaker 1: you tell us whether you believe there is any fallout
12:11
Speaker 1: from the Apack summit, or should we say the a
12:16
Speaker 1: peck of pick of peppers summit where they could not
12:19
Speaker 1: actually put together a common communicate between the United States
12:25
Speaker 1: and a variety of Asian countries. What does this mean
12:29
Speaker 1: for global currencies? Well, I I to keep going with
12:33
Speaker 1: your analogy. I think they picked a peck of pickled peppers,
12:36
Speaker 1: but they didn't know how many pickled peppers they picked.
12:40
Speaker 1: I love it. You get ten points. Good good. Um.
12:46
Speaker 1: You know as an interest rate strategist here at Vanguard,
12:49
Speaker 1: that is, trade is the top um topic for our
12:54
Speaker 1: teams and for um, you know, all of the people
12:57
Speaker 1: that we talked to in the markets right now. The
13:00
Speaker 1: US Treasury gets pushed around by a lot of different
13:03
Speaker 1: factors at different times, but I would say just for
13:05
Speaker 1: the last few weeks for both equities and fix income,
13:09
Speaker 1: the number one mover has been talk on trade. And
13:14
Speaker 1: it's just too early to say. You know, trade is
13:16
Speaker 1: one of those um topics that takes forever. For those
13:21
Speaker 1: of us whore old enough to remember NAFTA. That seems
13:23
Speaker 1: like it took absolutely forever to move from a concept
13:27
Speaker 1: to an actual trade agreement, So any new trade deals
13:30
Speaker 1: just take forever. So it's hard not to react to headlines,
13:34
Speaker 1: but people should try to keep the big picture in view. Well,
13:38
Speaker 1: and I wanted to say our markets responding to the
13:40
Speaker 1: headlines that we got, because they were pretty negative. I mean,
13:43
Speaker 1: Mike Pats came out with a pretty harsh tone and
13:45
Speaker 1: Margaret's are Yeah, they're risk off a little bit, but
13:48
Speaker 1: you're not really seeing a major move today. You're right,
13:52
Speaker 1: You are absolutely right. It's quite interesting. It seems like
13:54
Speaker 1: just just today UM, and maybe even just in the
13:57
Speaker 1: last couple of maybe week or so, you see more
14:00
Speaker 1: potty market reaction to the trade talk UM, and a
14:03
Speaker 1: little bit less fixed income market, a little less treasury
14:06
Speaker 1: reaction UM treasuries maybe taking a little bit more in stride.
14:10
Speaker 1: Maybe maybe those of us in that part of the
14:12
Speaker 1: market have a little bit longer term perspective. Uh, it's
14:15
Speaker 1: definitely rocking the equity markets and and interestingly rocking UM
14:19
Speaker 1: the growth components of those markets. Then does that mean
14:24
Speaker 1: that there's an opportunity here or should you stay away
14:27
Speaker 1: until the dust clears. You know, it's we're in that
14:32
Speaker 1: point of the economic cycle where we're close to uh,
14:36
Speaker 1: sort of close to the end or you know, are
14:38
Speaker 1: we at the beginning of the end or at the
14:40
Speaker 1: end of the beginning? Um. But I think that we
14:43
Speaker 1: are getting to sort of a late stage in the
14:45
Speaker 1: economic cycle. You know, we can almost see over the
14:47
Speaker 1: hump with the Fed to see when they will probably
14:50
Speaker 1: finish hiking rates, which are economics team here at Vanguard
14:54
Speaker 1: thinks is probably middle of next year, the second half
14:57
Speaker 1: of next year. So you're seeing a bit more diffusion
15:02
Speaker 1: in terms of what people think is going to happen.
15:05
Speaker 1: I think that there are some growth undercurrents that are
15:09
Speaker 1: you know, starting to be a little bit more concerning.
15:11
Speaker 1: And if you have growthy parts of the market uh
15:14
Speaker 1: not doing well with trade concerns, it may not be
15:18
Speaker 1: the perfect time to buy the dip. It's you know,
15:21
Speaker 1: probably better to be a little bit more circumspect. And
15:23
Speaker 1: I want to pick up on what you were saying,
15:24
Speaker 1: which is you expect the FED to stop raising rates
15:27
Speaker 1: somewhere around the middle of next year. Recently, we've seen
15:30
Speaker 1: a lot of traders sort of ratcheting back their expectations
15:32
Speaker 1: for just how much the FED will hike rates. Do
15:35
Speaker 1: you think that they are sort of late to the
15:38
Speaker 1: game that's sort of been the play all along, or
15:40
Speaker 1: do you think that something materially has changed that will
15:42
Speaker 1: now slow the FED down more than than than the
15:45
Speaker 1: previous as you thought. I think they're a little bit
15:48
Speaker 1: late to the game. Um. And I think there probably
15:51
Speaker 1: has been a little bit of an overreaction too far
15:54
Speaker 1: the other direction, you know, underpricing the amount that the
15:57
Speaker 1: FED will raise rates over the next year. You know,
16:00
Speaker 1: we see near certainty of a hike in December and
16:04
Speaker 1: then two and probably perhaps three hikes next year. Um.
16:09
Speaker 1: And not enough has changed in the fundamental economic picture
16:13
Speaker 1: to throw us off that track. I think the market
16:15
Speaker 1: has moved swung a little bit too far toward a
16:18
Speaker 1: dovish tilt. Uh. And we could see probably a bit
16:22
Speaker 1: of a reflattening of the yield curve as the shorter
16:25
Speaker 1: dated treasury um sector starts to kind of get a
16:31
Speaker 1: little bit more realistic about what what's likely to happen
16:34
Speaker 1: next year. We haven't seen enough deterioration in economic data
16:38
Speaker 1: to really I think throw the FED that far off
16:41
Speaker 1: well and Matthias, let's be let's sort of conclude a
16:44
Speaker 1: little bit where we began having to do with that
16:46
Speaker 1: APEC meeting and the disagreement over trade between the United
16:50
Speaker 1: States and China. Do you believe the Chinese government will
16:53
Speaker 1: work to reflate their economy and do you believe that
16:55
Speaker 1: they will also try to lower the value of their currency?
17:00
Speaker 1: You know, I think the currency piece is something that
17:03
Speaker 1: just tends to happen when you have a lot of
17:05
Speaker 1: terrorf activity, because the exported items just have to be
17:09
Speaker 1: repriced to remain competitive. But I do think that there
17:13
Speaker 1: was a bit of probably a bit of positioning going
17:15
Speaker 1: on right now because you have the upcoming meeting between
17:18
Speaker 1: the President uh and and She of China coming up,
17:22
Speaker 1: and I think it's you know, it's too early to
17:23
Speaker 1: say that that was, you know, a truly meaningful change
17:27
Speaker 1: in the trade dialogue. We're positioning for the for the
17:29
Speaker 1: real negotiation between the two principles. A Mathias, thank you
17:33
Speaker 1: so much for being with us. A Mathias is a
17:35
Speaker 1: global rates and f X strategist for Vanguard. Thanks for
17:40
Speaker 1: listening to the Bloomberg p m L podcast. You can
17:43
Speaker 1: subscribe and listen to interviews at Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud, or
17:47
Speaker 1: whatever podcast platform you prefer. I'm pim Fox. I'm on
17:50
Speaker 1: Twitter at pim Fox. I'm on Twitter at Lisa Abramo.
17:54
Speaker 1: It's One before the Podcast. You can always catch us
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Speaker 1: worldwide on Bloomberg Radio