Bloomberg Businessweek Weekend-February 5, 2021

week's frenzy over those memes stuff. Yeah right, we did. We even talked about this throughout the week. It felt like things calmed down a little bit. It did, but the story is not over, Carol. No, and one company in particular that was in the spotlight, Amazon on the news that the man who created it all, Jeff Bezos, stepping down a CEO. Look, this left me speechless on Tuesday afternoon, and I wasn't the only one. I uttered

a loud expletive when I saw the news. This hour, we're gonna hear from Bloomberg's Brad Stone, who literally wrote the book about Amazon, on why Now and the new era at the company. He definitely was speechless. Also this hour, Ja and Jays chief scientific officer on their one shot COVID vaccine. We have to stay very vigilant and we have been able to do that for the single dose. Plus speaking of the vaccine continues to be at challenge.

I think it's something that we're going to be working on the first and second quarter of the year, Bishop td Jake's and getting black minorities to actually take it. We begin with this week's cover story, and we've lost count on how many COVID related cover stories Bob Langrath has done for Business Week. As the world continues to try to get COVID nineteen under control, Bob's story this week reminds us that it's never too early to start

planning for the next pandemic. I can't believe already thinking about that, Carol, Yeah, and he's not kidding. We've got to start planning now. Here's Bob Langrath, who is Healthcare report at Bloomberg News, who joined us along with Bloomberg Business Week editor Jill Weber. We need a plan for it, and you know that the cover line they're ready for the next one. It ends with the question mark like ready for the next one, and right now we are not.

And um, what Bob did um and reported out here and I've lost track of how any cover stories Bob's done over the course of the last year for us, it's been truly amazing. UM. But what he really maps

out here is the five point plan. And if we were to get on it and you know, jump all over this five point plan, we might find ourselves, um, in a pretty decent place, certainly a better one than we found ourselves in a year ago right about now, um, and Bob, along the way, you also got some exclusive reporting about you know, how close we were to actually maybe having a leg up on on viruses like this. Um, So walk us through what you learned as you reported

out your cover story. Yeah, so it turns out if they're supporting you know that there were a lot of people thinking about this and interested, you know, years didn't know it was going to be a coronavirus, but everyone knew something was coming eventually the infections of these experts, dude, and there were people that were thinking about how to say on how to do things, but it just wasn't

the WheelPower and energy to get it done. And one company in Gladsow Smith Client I found out the very importing actually proposed a whole uh kind of epidemic preparedness

vaccine research center. They proposed this to the US government TOBARDA, which is what's funding a lot of the vaccines now at a small agency funding a lot of the vaccines now, And they opposed a research center that would have looked in specifically into messenger RNA vaccine that's one of the successful vaccines, and anno virus space sexcin that's the other

type of vaccine has been successful. And the idea was they would have taken like everything uh that you know, looked worrisome and gotten prototype vaccines into early trials so they could be ready to go and invent the next epidemic. But it just didn't happen, so we weren't quite as prepared, you know as we should have been right, and we should have been right, we could have been That's the

whole point. And the cost of this thing, Yeah, it would have been five million over ten years, which I guess sounded like a lot, you know, three or four years ago, but compared to the cost he's had to bear now through this pandemic. Uh you know, it's just you know, nothing like that. Now people are kind of dusting off versions of the proposal and saying, let's let's do it again, let's do something similar, And then some of these ideas are out there is what you know,

we need is the willpower to do it. Another idea that out there is to form me And one of the problems they had is is good you know, data on the right these key moments when epidemics are starting to emerge. You know, it's sort of like a early in a forest fire. You got to identify it and identify the threats really soon and act. And for that you need really really good surveillance and really really really

good data. And one of the ideas of out there is to form a sort of a national weather uh service style agency that would model uh, you know, upcoming emerging viruses and pandemics, to come up with forecasts or more reliable uh you know, to to tell out, to warn people, tell them you know what's coming or what might be coming, and give politicians kind of the fortitude

and cover to act. What about when you find amustriction was looking into what about when it comes to international cooperation and making sure they is international cooperation for the next pandemic. One of the key themes that you highlight

is repairing and augmenting the w h oh. Yeah, and this is probably you know, this is an area that people are talking about and it's probably the twickiest, most difficult area to to to fix or improval reform because the basic problem we have is, you know that the viruses they cross borders, they don't care about you know, countries, and isn't not the national borders or you know which political regime is in power, that they go everywhere. And

that's what we found. Uh And yet uh So we want companies countries to cooperate as much as possible in reporting the early stages of pandemic. But the problem is no one really has the authority uh to do that too. And and and if countries that don't report on time because they don't want to admit the scope of the problem, that might hurt their economy, etcetera. And we've seen this again and again. Then the world isn't step behind. And the w h O, you know, it doesn't have a

lot of teeth. That's just the way structured. So there's there's rumblings and discussions of what else can we do? You know, what can can we give a w HR more teeth? But we can can we add to it to give some other group? Uh sort of it's called like a you know, a NATO for bridging emerging viruses, your biological NATO have you know, a little more of power,

maybe a group of like minded nations to prepare. So that's that's kind of ideas out there that people are trying to formula and trying to figure out what to do. But that's probably a single most difficult area. So five points in that story about how we could start planning

for the next pandemic. That was Bob Langreth, healthcare reporter at Bloomberg News and Bloomberg Business, we get it or Jill Weber, Look, planning for the next pandemic is certainly important, but also getting out of this one is very important to Carol. Yeah, absolutely, we're going to hear from J and J's chief scientific officer on that company's vaccine that has complete protection against hospitalizations and depths. That was something that really cut your attention. Yeah, I mean, it doesn't

get much better than that. You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week. This is Bloomberg. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stellovic from Bloomberg Radio. So the virus and vaccine rollout continue to be front and center toon. We know that this week we saw California, New York announcing plans for new stadium sites for mass inoculations and more. Drug companies continuing to work on their experimental vaccines and also figure out how to take those

existing vaccines to defeat new mutation. Well, just about one week ago, Johnson and Johnson made news by saying that it's one shot vaccine generated strong protection against COVID nineteen in a large late stage trial, including preventing sixty of moderate zero cases of the virus, of severe infections, and of hospitalizations and death. This is great news. And then this week J and J filed with the FDA for

emergency use authorization for their experimental COVID nineteen vaccine. Now one week ago, we caught up with Paul Staffles, he's vice chairman of the Executive Committee and chief scientific officer over Johnson and Johnson to talk about their vaccine findings and production ramp up. We did a very large study of forty five thou people in the US, South America and Latin America in a totally different environment where now

huge transmission but also many variants of presents. And what we saw is that in in the high in the in the severe disease, we've got a very high protection percent against severe disease as well as hundred percent for debt and hospitalization. And that across the entire study, including

the South African study. And why is that important? We did six thousand people in South Africa and we found that the strains where the South African strains, and we've got even a better that We've got an eighty nine percent protection in South Africa against the severe disease, that und percent against hostitalization and under pains percent against debt. So that shows that the vaccine is applications in severe

disease as well as against significant new strains. Given the results of this study, do you expect new and even more powerful variants to emerge in the future. Yeah, we have to stay very vigilant. Uh, there's so much vital virus application in the world, and now new vaccines being used and the viruses following the Darwin principles, the fittest survive and they will take over as in in that race, and so you will see probably more variants, but strong immunity,

antibody immunity and seller immunity probably can overcome that. But we have to stay very vigilant and we have been able to do that with a single dose, and I think that is going to be very effective in faster roll out. As we are making a billion doses in the course of the year. Well let's talk about that, because when you talked with our David weston last fall, Paul, that's exactly what you talked about. A billion doses you anticipated. So that's a real number you expected. And can you

give us an idea of that billion dose rollout? What does it look like over the next few months. So at the moment we are we are setting up many manufacturing plans. In late stage, we are geting approval from different regulators in the world on that. So it's in full up scaling and as we will deliver a billion over the year, it will be region by region, country by country. We work with the government to discuss on how much will be available when and will communicateate that.

But we are confident that we will be able to make to provide a billion in the course of the year. But what does that mean then, I mean, obviously you've got to get the emergency approval. So give you an idea of what the timeline is. I think we're all kind of fixated on getting the vaccines so that our life can get back to normal. So what does the emergency approval process look like? And then when do you actually anticipate getting vaccines into arms? And then at what rate?

So we will submit filing, so we noted the data. Now we are we worked on it, that we finalized, and then the f d A and m I will have to do their work. The European as well as the Use US Agency will start their work and most likely towards the end of February will have an advisory panel spending of course the decision of the f d A, and then we'll see getting approval emergency use approval, and then in March will be able to start the living vaccine.

So you think a realistic timeline for us to actually receive Johnson and Johnson single dose vaccine would be March. It will start in the amount of March. They are also with US government. We have made an agreement over this for several for four hundred million vaccines to start with. I will keep up to that agreement to be able

to deliver that. I'm wondering how you see this shot being used in the context of this as you call pandemic recovery tool kit, you know, especially fitting in with the m R and A vaccines that we see from Derna and Visor as well. The rollout of those has has been really tough here in the United States. There's been a lot of speed bumps. But you don't have to keep this one at a temperature for a very very cold temperature for a significant period of time. I mean,

there are a lot of differences here. How do you see the rollout working in the context of these other vaccines. Well, it's it's your point of the right thing. It's a

single though. So with one shot you get this protection starting day fourteen and and the immune matures at twenty eight and even a lot longer, so that that goes fast and then it um it has two to eight celsius, which is normal refrigeration and temperature for stability for three months, so we can distribute in the country at normal refrigeration which allows to get vaccinated almost in every health care center pharmacy in a very simple way. Um. So, and

that that will help. And the single shot combined with that and the high efficacy for for severe disease, that and hospitalization can have a very important effect. In addition, very short, very clean safety profile. We have we have not observed serious adverse events, no anaplectic shock, so further to be evaluated by the regulators. But that will also be an attractive feature with a very favorable safety profile.

So that means that people who perhaps have not been who had been advised against getting m R and a vaccine, uh, this could be an option for them. It would be an option, but it will be determined by the authorities who will get access first as this is a emergency

use application. It's uh, it will be distributed by the government. Hey, Paul, do you see this as a vaccine that's going to help with some of the logistical challenges that we've seen in the vaccine rollout because there's two dose, you know, often having to be refrigerated at extreme temperatures has has complicated the process. Do you see this che a vaccine

maybe easing those logistical hurdles. It will simplify logistics significantly because it can also for follow normal pharmaceutical distribution centers. We don't need in fact any special, any special circumstance to bring this vaccine to the places where it can be used. So that is going to be good. And then uh, and yeah, the normal refrigeration will make it simple.

Single dose will get simple. So one thing I want to ask it and I just want to go back to because you talked about a billion doses, so um, I'm just curious how many of you guys have already manufactured at this point and that are kind of ready to go once the FDA says go ahead J and J. We have vaccines ready, a lot of upscaling is ongoing, and in the weeks and months to follow, we will be able to to uh communicate all about quantities and deliveries. Well.

It certainly as all hands on deck at Johnson and Johnson and around the world in getting vaccines developed. That was Paul Staffles, vice Chairman of the Executive Committee and Chief Scientific Officer at J and J. That full interview, though you can also hear on our podcast feed you're listening to Bloomberg Business Week, Tim, as pharmaceutical companies work

on getting out those COVID nineteen vaccines. Well, the other battle, Carol, is convincing people to actually get the shots, especially in minority communities. That's next, and a little bit later on Jeff Bezos delivering a shocker as he steps down from the top spot at Amazon. This is Bloomberg. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stenovy from Bloomberg Radio. Carol, we're learning more and more about who's taking the vaccine in different parts of

the country, and we're getting some distressing figures. New York City initial vaccine data show a deep racial disparity. So let's go through some of these numbers here, because they're pretty stark. White residents made up almost half of the people who have received at least one dose, despite consisting of only a third of the population here in New York City. This is according to a great story we

had last week in Bloomberg. Yeah, Tim, I feel like this has been a story that we've been talking about a lot during the pandemic, how it has disproportionately affected certain communities, especially minority and black communities and what you talk about what's going on in New York City, we're

seeing that more broadly around the country. The AP, the Associated Press did an analysis and they found that an early look at the seventeen states and two cities that have released racial breakdowns through the twenty fifth of January found that Black people in all places are getting inoculated at level is below their share of the general population,

and in some cases significantly below. And we know that there have been leaders in the black community that are really trying to reach out to their populations to get the vaccine. And here in New York City, Carol, the lowest ratio, indeed was among black residents, even though they make up almost a quarter of the city's population. In according to this recent data released by the city, they only accounted for eleven percent of those who had been vaccinated.

One of the leaders we caught up with was Bishop TD Jake's. He's a pastor and author, filmmaker. He's got quite a following. He's got some four point four million followers on Twitter. He's chairman of the T. D. Jake's Foundation, and he's really been tim over the last year, been a go to voice for us when it comes to the multiple crises of the past year. We've talked to him about racism in the past, we've talked about the election, and of course we've talked about the pandemic and now

the vaccine and on that. He has been concerned about the disproportionate impact that the pandemic has had on minorities and their access to vaccines. Bishop Jake's recently hosted a conversation that included Dr Anthony Faucci and leading medical professionals

involved directly in COVID vaccine research. We did an extensive conversation with Dr Kisamikia Corba and Dog from your university and she's from the Institute of Biology and Infracious Diseases, and of course Dr Croucy, just to aggregate information and ask some questions that would help to alleviate some concerns or address some of the concerns that are prevalent in the African American community. Do you think those concerns Bishop

Jake's are are being addressed? Are are you hearing that those concerns are are shifting as we learn more and more about the vaccines. I think that they are gradually shifting in certain pockets. Of course, African American community is not a monolith, and so depending on your age and who you congregate or coalesce with, h your perception of the situation might be varied according to your age group of how closely associated you With's a tremendous amount of

deaths that we are saying. Being a pastor, also, I'm abundantly aware of how many funerals were conducting and really have a front row seat on the families behind the numbers. So it's very apparent to me that we are definitely losing live at a much larger rate than our white counterparts. And I so it was really important to maybe use our platform to level the plane for and get out

adequate and accurate information. Right, the CDC did come out and they've talked about Black, Hispanic and Native American people dying from coven nanteen it almost three times the rate of white people. So, Bishop Jakes, do you feel like things are improving, that there's more information out there, maybe education to put the Black community maybe more at ease so that they will up in terms of their numbers

for getting the vaccine. My biggest concern is that even where the attitude is improving, the access is not, but we're only having about ten percent penetration into the like community where it is accessible, particularly to our older citizens, where they can easily get into one and then come back and get the second UH fascination that's necessary to UH secure some relative safety from from being infected, and so that that is a problem. Accessibility is a problem,

and then dispelling miss continues to be at challenge. I think it's something that we're going to be working on all through first and second quarter of the year, probably into the third quarter, getting them comfortable, just due to the fact that they've had so many historical discouraging UH incidents that have occurred between health professionals, government officials, and the black community that have continued to call for and angstent and anxiety amongst people of color and trust associated

with taking the vacilation. I think that the community most trust its own leadership that are various leaders. The faith community is one act by to live, but also personalities of interests that also have coalesced huge followings of people

UH that they trust their motives. I think that's one aspect of the I think people every day tho below off the street influence people more than even personality too, So I think they have to use the multiple approach in order to this film miss And unfortunately, you're also fighting the onslaught of social media and wrong information being pratentuated. Yeah, that fight is a reminder from officials that we really need to focus on the science and medicine when it

comes to the virus and vaccine. That again was Bishop TD Jake's pastor, author, filmmaker, chairman of the TV Jake's Foundation. As we've heard, leaders in the faith based community are integral in reducing COVID vaccine skepticism and hesitancy. But look, Carol, when you think about this in the historical context of like the Tuskegee experiment, the staccine hesitancy absolutely makes sense. Yeah, you understand the fear that's out there totally. You're listening

to Bloomberg Business Week still ahead. Bezos delivers quite a surprise this week. That's next. This is Bloomberg. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Bloomberg Quick Takes. Tim Stellovan from Bloomberg Radio. All right, Tim, let's get to the blockbuster story of the week. It was about the world's largest online retailer. Yeah, it wasn't just that it breached the one billion dollars a day revenue mark. I think about that last year, Amazon every single day

bringing in more than a billion dollars in revenue. It was, of course, the man behind it all, Mr Jeff Bezos, stepping down as CEO of the company. But as we know, listen, he's a busy man, he's a young man. He's got a lot of things still to do. He's not leaving the company he created. He's just stepping down a CEO. And our go to voice on this is Brad Stone. He's senior executive editor of Global Technology. He also literally wrote the book on Amazon, It's The Everything Store, Jeff

Bezos and the Age of Amazon. And he's also working on a sequel, Amazon Unbound. It comes out in May. Really looking forward to that. Brad told us that bezos move seem like the natural next Steppen. It opens up a new age for Amazon. So I gotta say we talked about a lot, but I think what we love most and talking to Brad was that he, like most of us, was really really surprised by this news. I

uttered a loud expletive when I saw the news. Um In some in some ways it is it does feel like a natural progression and the formulation of the formalization of the status quo at Amazon, where he's certainly been working on new things and allowing his deputies to run

the bigger businesses. But it's also surprising. I mean, you know, he is someone who you know, micromanaged his businesses, whose identity is wrapped up in Amazon, who obviously took and deserves, you know, a lot of credit for the remarkable rise of this company over the past twenty five years one point seven dollars at one point seven trillion dollars in market cap um. So it's hard to imagine him moving on.

It's probably gonna be a little bit of a test of of Andy Jasey to see how much room he has and can take to operate with Bezos still there is executive this chairman and placing a lot of these big bets. Were you surprised at all by Andy Josse being the person who was named to Phil Bezos' shoes, Not at all, And in some respects though, you kind of look back and you wonder whether this has been in the works for a while, so there was a lot of speculation about the succession plan and whether it

was Jasse or Jeff Wilkie. You know, Wilkie was another deputy who for many years ran the retail group before that, really architected Amazon supply chain. You know, he he was a possibility to take over as well. And then last year we found out that Wilkie was going to retire in January of two dozen twenty one. So who knows, maybe the writing was on the wall and he saw it.

But where it does make sense is is Jesse has you know, built this amazing business, a ws a fifty billion dollar run rate, you know, really changed the way companies and governments and universities by their technology. You know, now they do it in the cloud rather than vers in the in the back room. Um, he's he's changed the enterprise continuting. You've got Microsoft and Google and iby him and Oracle pursuing Amazon. But Jase also has the you know, the full handle in the full company because

he sat on the s team. He's been a part of major decisions like where to put h G two and whether to buy Whole Foods. And when he started at the company in the late nineties, he worked in the retail group, so he really had the full scope of the company, and it kind of makes sense that he'd be the guy to step up. All right. I have to say that in your story, I was drawn

to this, you say, Bezos. His decision to step down also reflects an uncomfortable reality for one of the wealthiest people in the world, and that is the walls of his highly compartmentalized empire have been crumbling for some time. I don't look at Amazon, Brad typically and think of it as crumbling. But so, what do you mean, right right? Well, actually that's a good point, Carol So and this was

a theme of my upcoming book US. You know, it's the largest shareholder and the outgoing CEO of Amazon, but he also owns The Washington Post. Personally, he has a private space company, Blue Origin. He's got an investment fund in a family office, and he's got these philanthropies now, um, the Day One Fund and the Basos Climate Fund or the Basis Earth Fund, and a lot of there's a lot of pressure on him to give away his money. And over the past few years we've seen a collision

on all these assets. So the Washington Post made life very difficult for Amazon during the Trump administration. Um, you've got um union organizers and and and and workers protesting Amazon's treatment of its of its warehouse workers in front of Bazos, you know, personal properties homes around around the country. Um. And and as he's been trying to give away his money to climate organizations, they've expressed concern about Amazon's climate impact.

And it's it's it's a relationship with organized labor. So that's what I mean by the walls are kind of crumbling. He can't keep everything compartmentalized anymore. You also have this anecdote about him traveling to India in the early part of last year and Prime Minister Norrendrew Moody declining to me with him because of the Post coverage of the country. I guess my question is, can you then, with Jeff Bezos as executive chairman but no longer as CEO, will

that helps solve some of these issues? Or is he like inextricably bound to Amazon. Yeah, that's a great point to him. It's a he can't escape it that easily. Um. You know, for for guidance, we can kind of look to Bill Gates, though right, who who has really seen twenty years ago as a as a monopolist, you know, sharp business elbows. Um the government, the way of the U. S. Government is coming down on Microsoft. And now he's really a roving philanthropist diplomat who has been a leader um

in this in this pandemic crisis. So yeah, in the short term, no, I mean, Jeff obviously can outrun Amazon untill be inextricably linked to the company and all of its political issues. But maybe over the long term, as Bill Gates has done, he can kind of chart a path for himself as a more independent philanthropist. Listen, and Jeff made it very clear, um Brad that he's not retiring. Um So where should he Where will he spend most

of his time going forward? It's only going to be about the geeky inventions and the big and the bets that he thinks could lead to Amazon's next wave of growth. And this is one of those things that I observed reporting the new book. He he loves to micromanage and and really get into the weeds of the new things. Um So I'm gonna mute my alexa before I say the word alexa. But he's really he really micro managed Alexa, the cashierless Amazon ghost stories. He was he was deeply

involved in that, the healthcare initiatives. Amazon is trying Project Typer, which is this very expensive effort to get satellites into space and to sell internet access. He's involved in that, And you know he sees these a big bats. He's really an inventor at heart. Um, I'm sure they'll read them into the big decisions. They call them one way doors, kind of Amazon lingo for decisions that can't be reversed. But I expect that, in addition to all the other stuff,

he's going to continue to basically geek out at Amazon. Brad, I want to talk about space. When it comes to the wealthiest people in the world. Uh, Jeff Bezos is number two, Elon Musk is number one according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. They are both involved in a new kind of space race. Where does Jeff Bezos stack up versus Elon Musk? Right? Well, it's it's not a favorable juxtaposition at least right now. I mean, SpaceX is launching it seems every week the Dragon nine to UM two

orbit to the International Space Station. Um, it's it's uh, it's been it's been testing, I guess the Starship, the larger rocket with kind of kind of entertaining entertainingly exploded upon attempted landing. But UM Space that's also announced that they're gonna be bringing paying astronauts, paying tourists to orbit, and and Blue Origin, you know, frankly hasn't really hasn't really hit any of those benchmarks. It It has always

taken a more step by step approach. UM. The first project is called New Shepherd, and he wants to take like like Richard Branson, Blue Origin wants to take paying tourists to suborbital space at the very edge of space. And they've been working on that for fifteen years and I gathered I reported that they're gonna that they're hoping to take human passengers later this year. But that's gonna be a big test for the CEO, Bob Smith, who joined a couple of years ago UM, to see whether

they can really safely pull that off. And then Blue origins building a rocket called New Glen, which will more directly compete with with SpaceX is launch capacity, but that's delayed and that's probably got a couple of years until it comes out of the factory, so also spends a lot of money on this. I you know, they profess that it's not a competition, that they're taking their time. There's lots of room for many winners in this growing category.

But I know that I suspect and strongly suspect that the mismanagement there and the Solil progress really frustrates Jeff Bezos. I remember when it felt like these space companies, whether it was Branson, whether it was Elon Musk, whether it's Jeff Bezos, that it just seemed like a kind of a fun thing for billionaires. Elon Musk has shown it's a lot more serious than that in a real business um going forward, I do wonder, speaking of fun, the timing of this is it just not as much fun

to run the company. I'm just trying to understand a little bit about Jeff Bezos and his timing. Well, you know, we don't, of course know for sure, because they're being very circumspect in what they say, but we can we can take a couple of guesses as to why Bezos has has moved is moving on later this year from the CEO role to be executive chairman, and I think

you're right. I mean one of it. One of the factors is that the CEO of the company is going to be the guy getting grilled in Washington, getting grilled by the FDC, getting grilled in in Brussels. And as we saw last year when Bezos had to testify in front of the House Anti Pruss Subcommittee, he would probably be rather touring other things. Look, Amazon needs to look for big bets that can keep revenue growing, which it certainly did up in the fourth quarter of the year.

That was Brad Stone. He's Senior executive editor of Global Technology, also the author of the Everything Store, Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon, and the upcoming sequel, Amazon on Bound, comes out in May. Yeah, looking really forward to that book. My understanding is you can already start pre ordering it. Just gonna put in a little plug for Brad Alright. That wraps up the first hour of the weekend edition of Bloomberg Business Week from Bloomberg Radio. I'm Carol Masser

and I'm Tim Staniver. Coming up in our next hour more on Amazon and the CEO who will take over for Jeff Bezos. Plus bitcoin may have recently taken a back to the likes of the meme stocks, but it is still in a tear after last year's search. We've cut one bitcoin slayer that's been buying it up. And women of color only received point six percent of venture capital funding. Why black female entrepreneurs get less than one percent of venture capital funding and what can be done

about it? And buckle up? The CEO of Suber of America on pandemic buying. That's all the next hour Bloomberg Business Week. This is Bloomberg. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Bloomberg Quick Takes. Tim Stinovy from Bloomberg Radio High. Carol Masser and I'm Tim Stanovk of Bloomberg. Quicktake plenty coming up in our second hour of the weekend edition of Bloomberg Business Week, including bitcoin continuing to move higher. Elon Musk now joining the chorus of supporters.

We check in with the CEO and founder of micro Strategy on his buying spree. He's been buying up a lot, and Tim, it's been harder historically from a no already is especially black female founders to get venture capital funding. What can be done to change this? We're going to talk about that and the CEO of Subaru of America on the company's recent record month. I loved this interview, Carol, Well, thank you very much. First up, though, let's get back

to our big business story of the week. We can't stop talking about it. Of course, we're talking about Jeff Bezos of Amazon, not leaving the company, but stepping away from the CEO spot and in his job. A long time Amazonian and someone who is very much in the mold of Mr Jeff Bezos but not yet a household name. Yeah, but I'm guessing to him he probably will. We're talking about Andy Jase. He takes over as Amazon CEO later

on this year. Bloomberg News technology reporter Matt Dave filling us in on the new guy, who is actually not new to Amazons Amazon lifer. He joined in a Harvard business school, so he's been invasis the shadow for for quite a while. He's actually the first sort of chief of staff to Bezos when they first established that role at Amazon. There was very much in the mold of the executive he's been following for for quite some time there.

And what about when it comes to his role with Amazon Web Services, I mean Amazon Web Services is by far the most profitable segment when it comes to Amazon, but it's by no means the biggest. That's right, um, you know, and I think people were surprised. You know, it's five six years ago now when Amazon first broke out the revenue for Amazon Web Services, Anti Jasse led us into inception. Um, it is the biggest profit driver for the company. It's really reshaped how corporations of all

sizes by their own technology. You know, they're far doing the leading cloud computing company. I think it's his promotion really underlines the value of you know, this wonky tech business to a lot of people think of it as a primarily retail company. I love your story and you really get into who this guy is, and I'm curious. You know, it sounds like Jasse understood the potential for

something like Amazon Web Services way before anyone else. I always talked about the time years ago when the Bloomberg story came out and was like, if you were streaming X y Z last night, you probably were doing it through an Amazon Web s from We were like, what, wait, what is this business that Amazon's into? What was it that Jasse saw and that enabled him to kind of just get out there and in many ways own this market. Suggesting and Bezos and a few other Amazon executives fifteen

years ago. Now, they looked at the way that companies by technology run technology and realized it was all, you know, kind of cumbersome and complicated string together. So they worked to simplify it to its simplest parts, right, And that's that's really what they launched with. Here's an online storage service, here's an online you know, the equivalent of of processing power,

raw computer chips for rent essentially um. And by kind of breaking it down into its simplest parts, they made a really really simple case that you know, maybe customers wanted to string all this together themselves, and they were. They were proved right by that. You know, folks did want that kind of simplicity and ease of use. UM. And it's really really shaped thing. What about when it comes to Jeff Bezos is management style? UM? You know you said that Jasse has been at Amazon for as

a lifer. I what does it mean in terms of how he's going to lead Amazon similarly or or different than Jeff Bezos has led it. He's definitely in the Beazos molds in terms of how these structures his team, right, there's these these legendary weekly meetings will have where they dive into data and and try to pick out trends and kind of lead with the customer and lead with the numbers. That's very Bezocene in the way that he

structured it. I think it's treason to tell how he's going to bring, um what changes in my brain rather to the retail side of the business. And he's been been diving into cloud for for a very long time. And though he's been in all the all the top meetings, you know, you haven't been running day to day operations for the company is sprawling other divisions. Um, I think we expectation is for a similar style to Bezos, and maybe something different as he gets his hands into the

other elements of the company. Well, that's what I want to ask you, because you said very much in the mold of Jeff Bezos, which could be an incredible thing and certainly becoming to investors right now. But at the same time, you know, what, do what Amazon need in a CEO going forward, especially then you still have the safety net of Cheff Bezos being around. I think Bezos, which would probably say that Amazon still needs to make

big bets. Um, you know they are. They are a giant company, and I think big as the reputation for sort of winning in every market they enter. Amazon doesn't see it that way. They look around and they see beers competitors in in every area in which they play, whether it's Walmart, retail, Microsoft Cloud, you know, there's plenty

of others down the line. And so I think that the marching orders for him coming, and certainly a Bezos would would rejected to keep making those kind of large bets that can move the needle for you know, it's already a one point seven trillion dollar company. Hey, Matt,

what does this mean for Amazon Web Services now? Because look, since Amazon established a WUS years ago, there's so much more competition and there's also pricing pressure for sure, and that's it's been a little bit of debate in the national analyst community. You know, what threat do uh Microsoft and Google, who are very much you know, following the display book what they present to Amazon's cash cow. You know, I think this elevation certainly answers the you know, does

Amazon want to cleave off Amazon Web Services conversation? It's been a long point of debate about whether it be worthwhile to spin off that unit, just because of the obvious differences from the retail business. Jets taking the top role probably cools that for for a little bit anyway, right because do they in some ways it provides them a bit of a cushion to have that UH company

part of, you know, the Amazon umbrella. At this point, we absolutely but I think there's there's been some drag from the UH if you're sitting in on the AWUS side anyway, just all of the sort of political entanglements that Amazon has found itself in thanks to its its market power and retail and some of the personal views

between foreign President Trump and Jeff Bezos. I think if if Andy were being a little candidate to Jesse, you might admit that, you know, being related to Amazon is maybe hert aws and some sales conversations over the years with a Turkey political line to navigate, well, Jess certainly got his work cut out for him, man, and listen, follow me in some tough footsteps. Just gonna say, yeah,

that's a really good point, Carol. But look, he's been at the company for pretty much his whole career, so he knows how it works inside and out, and knows Jeff Bezos inside and out as well. Well. That was Bloomberg News technology reporter Matt Day coming up. Did you know you can apparently purchase goods on Amazon using bitcoin and a third party service? I did not know that. I did not know that either. I was kind of

googling about this. Bitcoin though increasingly finding its way into many things, And if our next guest has his way, it will become the transactional asset of choice. That's next. This is Bloomberg. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovan from Bloomberg Radio. Okay, so before we were talking about the price of games stop stock every day, we were doing the same thing

with bitcoin, Carol. Remember it ran up three hundred and five percent in the last year and it's rallying again this year. Yeah. Remember in December, it's like every day, it's like, Okay, here's where bitcoin is. Here's where you moved in the last day. And this week, Elon Musk support for bitcoin and a record run up in ether or help take the market value of digital tokens to an all time high, which is why one listener said

to me, you have got to get on. Michael Sailor, chairman, CEO and founder of micro Strategy, who has been, as we know, tim buying a bitcoin in the last year or so, he joined you along with Bloomberg Intelligence commodity strategist Mike mcgloan, who covers bitcoin. Michael Sailor began by

talking about his holdings and that buying spree. We've invested all of our free cash and we've borrowed six hundred fifty million dollars, so I don't know two of our balance sheet something like that, but but we're up about one point two billions since we started buying, so so we have a lot of bitcoin um in terms of our strategy. We were buying it at ten thousand, we were buying it at eleven thousand, we bought it at

nineteen thousand, a one thousand. At one I announced to the world that we bought our last batch of ten million dollars worth of thirty three thousand, eight hundred. I think we'll be buying it forever forever. Where do you see it going buying? Well, yeah, we know, we know you like it, um. Where do you see the value going. We've had, you know, various guests come on and talk about a quarter of a million dollars. Where do you

see it going? Well, I think bitcoin is digital gold on the world's first digital monetary network, and so it represents a high yield savings account to consumers and there's plenty of them that would like to get paid tax free. It represents digital gold for institutions and they've got a big problem. They need a safe haven. It represents a monetary network for Facebook and Google on Amazon investors, and it's a lifeboat for a billion people in the developing

world that have currencies that are collapsing. So if you wonder where's it going, Well, at first it's going to flip gold, which is going to take it to five hundred thousand dollars a point. Then it's going to start to it's going to start to attract capital from weaker safe haven assets like negative yielding sovereign debt, low yielding stock indexes, other types of medals and commodities and uh and the like, and that that'll take it up another

factor of ten. Mike mcgloan, you want to come out, come on in on this conversation, Oh yes, well, Michael, thanks for coming at it. What the key thing that struck me about when I really heard what you were doing last summer and you just nailed the media and you hovered and covered it so well as your your

sense of the history. So think the key question I really want to get out of any I think from you today's how do you think future generations will look back upon you and us and what we're doing now in bitcoin, um, say fifty hundred years from now or maybe even just ten years from now. I think for five thousand years we had the Goal standard, and that

was a non sovereign bearer instrument store value. I think for forty or fifty years we've we've drifted through the Fiance standard, and we've been looking for a new anchor. And I think the bitcoin is going to is the emergent digital monetary protocol for moving money through time and space, and I think it's good for another five thousand years.

Mr mcglow, I think it's I think that fifty years from now people are going to say this was that transition period when the world figured out what a digital monitoring network was and what a protocol for moving money around is and they can't imagine a world without it. Michael, though, let me understand something, because what I keep hearing as though there's going to be a fixed supply, So how can it then become something on par There's a fixed supply of gold as well, but can it be something

that we really put on par with gold? And I'm just curious what your thesis is, you know, behind investing so much in in one asset essentially well, you know, people say fixed supply, but of course what we're really talking about is twenty one million coins infinitely divisible. They're divisible infinitely, so it's only fixed in the sense that

the numbers one through ten are fixed. You have the principles of mathematics or arithmetic and geometry there's three or sixty degrees in a circle, not to fix supply, and fixed supply applies the geometry, arithmetic, and conservation of energy and the laws of physics, like there's a fixed supply of energy and you can't make or eliminate it, so it's not a limitation in fact, In fact, conservation of the laws of physics and energy are critical to the

working of of electrical systems, pneumatic systems, hydraulic systems, every engineering system on the face of the earth. And so when people talk about fixed supply of bitcoin, what they mean is this is a monetary network that works and doesn't leak. Listen, Michael, one thing that we've got to ask you about is risk and um what could go

wrong here when it comes to bitcoin? Yeah, um, well I think that, uh, most of the risk around bitcoin is really just news fund and regulatory fund concerns about how will various governments treated and what will happen. Um, as governments normalize the regulation, they're putting some know your customer and anti money laundering rags in place to normalize it compared to other assets, and sometimes people get a little bit skittish about it. But but ultimately as it normalizes,

that risk will go away. Michael, Mike McGlone. How about any The question I've heard from other people is this is a revolutionary and ary technology. How about another technology improving upon it or replacing it? And that's from a person as who's the markets guy, not really technology guys. There is that a risk? Do you view that as

a potential risk? You know, I think non technologists sometimes think that, But what I don't understand is that it's a monetary protocol, like T C P, I P, or like the English language, Like when everybody agrees to speak English, there might be a better language, but we're not replacing it. When we all agree to use inches and pounds, the metric system comes along, but it's really difficult to get people to replace it. And bitcoin is a monetary protocol.

All the innovations going on on the edge with companies like Square and PayPal, and the underlying protocol has power because of the network effect. And then and the network is not just a function of the hundred million plus people to use it. The other part of the network effect is Newtonian laws of gravity. When you have hundreds of billions of dollars of monetary energy on the network,

there's no way that's moving. Once people decide what's the winning network, they're going to stick with it, just like we stick with Twitter and Facebook and Google and you tube. It's incredibly powerful and new technology like a better YouTube, write better Twitter, isn't gonna win, and everybody knows that they're not winning. We want the network that all of our friends use, where all the money is well all

about access. That was micro Strategy CEO and founder Michael Sailor, along with Bloomberg Intelligence Commodity strategist Mike mcgloan still to come on Bloomberg Business Week. What we're starting to see if that organizations understand that you have to have a system based approach how to create a more equitable playing field in the world of venture capital. From one entrepreneur who found it pretty tough to raise the money, This is Bloomberg. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer

and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovin from Bloomberg Radio. So to. Our next guest is a Harvard Law School grad. She co founded Canaries. It's a feedback platform. It's helping to solve DNI issues and inequities in workplaces. She's also using a personal experience to create more opportunities for people of color in the VC space. We know, we hear about minority entrepreneurs how hard it is to raise money. Yeah,

it's incredibly difficult. And by the way, Carol, her company works with young brands of course, the parent company of Taco Bell and others Neiman Marcus and the Dallas Mavericks. Canary CEO and co founder Mandy Price joined us with more. What we're starting to see is that organizations understand that they have to have a system based approach because for so long, what we heard and what the organization's focus

was was on increasing the pipeline. They felt that, you know, the the entire issue is really around the pipe, on the talent acquisition system. But that's just one uh piece of the pie. And so what we need to do and what research has shown, right when we look at McKenzie in report every year they've been doing it for five I believe it's going to be the sixth year, they see that only a handful of the organizations have the systems and structures in place to actually reduce the

inequities that we see from an organizational standpoint. So I think the fact that we're starting to think about this from an organizational intervention perspective as opposed to rely on only on those individual interventions, which we have typically seen instance of um UH some type of unconscious biased training or other d I compliance training is really based off reducing discrimination, which really doesn't get to the heart of

the issue. As far as our systems and our policies. Carol, I'm going to highlight just a couple of things like I said that organizations can do from a structural standpoint, Mandy, I kind of asked you a loaded question and a big question that, as you said, we could probably talk for hours about it, uh in terms of how do we really get two changes when it comes to D and I UH and equities within the workplace? And you said you had some some points that you wanted to make,

so let me let me toss it back to you. Yeah, So some of these things we do when we're working with our clients, right, because, um, what you hit on exactly the problem that a lot of organizations and leaders have, which is where do we even start right, how do we even start thinking about this from a systems and organizational perspective? And so some of the things we do

is help them with that diagnosis. So we're looking at things like, um, when we when we look at your pay practices, are you they seeing uh pay in someone's salary? Are you looking at prior salary history to determine their current salaries or are you looking at just the job uh and and the experience required for the job. Because we know that these pay disparities and equities exist within

our society. So when we do that common practice that most organizations do, which is using salary history and the interviewing hiring process process, what we see is that organizations have these disparities that are coming into their own workplace that they didn't intend just because of the disparity that existence in society. And so those are the types of analysis and and reviews that we do to ensure that we're having a sad um structure and policy within our

organization to reduce an eliminate even equities as much as possible. Now, I have to say in planning for this interview, um our producer Donnie who was involved in it, and he said, you know what's interesting too, is they've got this platform that basically let's you know, various employees. From what I understand is, you know, if they want to post something on their employer, they can do it anonymously. And that is I think even on your is fairly prominent on

your website. Talk to us about why this is such an important ability to be able to do. Yeah, it's critical because unless employees have a safe way to provide feedback, organizations don't know the and opportunities that exist within their workplace, that safe mechanism to allow employees to provide that feedback

so that organizations can make the need to change. One of the things that's also uh really uh we've had our systems set up is because Talent says that looking for an employeer that values diversity, equity inclusion is one

of the most important things for a potential employer. So we have a lot of potential applicants that come to our platforms looking companies diversity equity inclusion initiatives, which we all track on our platform as well to really learn what are the employers of choice in the companies that values really reflect their own values. The most common problem that we see is that organizations haven't been measuring and

tracting this at all. Um, they measure diversity, but they're not measuring equity and inclusion or looking at their systems from this kind of equity and inclusion lens and so uh, which is really baffling. Right, Um, And they're different, right, they're different. Yeah, they're different. You know, when we think about diversity, diversity is you know, individual's identity, that's gender, that's raised that, you know, your religious background. Those are

all diversity factors. When we think about inclusion, that is, I feel like I belong in this workplace no matter what my identity is. And then when we think about equity, that it is I have the same access as an opportunity no matter what my identity is either. And so it's important for organizations to not only look at diversity into have that measurement around diversity, but to really make sure that they're measuring inclusion and equity within the organization

as well. That was Mandy Price, co founder and CEO of Canaries. You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week. Coming up a frank conversation with the CEO of Suber of America on managing through the pandemic and challenges that's coming up next. This is Bloomberg. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Measure and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovik from Bloomberg Radio. So we did get some news this week from General Motors warning that a global semi conductor shortage will temporarily

shut three plants and reduce production this year. Yeah, that was certainly on our minds as Tom Dahl, President and CEO of Suber of America, joined you to talk about the impact of the pandemic and auto sales for the year. I gotta say it was a pretty conversation, and that is where we began on what that past year, this pandemic year has been like. Plus I spoke to you, I think it was probably last March or early part of Ay, and we were really struggling at that time.

Our business was kind of in shatters like everybody else's was, and in fact, our factory had closed down probably from the end of March through about the middle of May. UH. And then as we reopened, as as the economy started to reopen, as we got into the late spring and early part of the summer, there was a tremendous rebound. And in fact, if you look at our sales from I would say that July period through December, we were actually selling at about a seven hundred thousand sales space,

which for us is pretty good. Uh. And I continued over into January. January we had a record month. We sold forty six thousand foreigner vehicles, best January we ever

had in the history of the company. And we're looking forward to that momentum continuing as we go through the first half of the year and really as we projected into the second half of the year because with all the stimulus that's currently out there, and plus the stimulus that's currently being proposed most or at least talked about at this point anyway, we think the market in the second half of the year could really pop, uh and we need to be prepared for that. That's really interesting.

So the stimulus money is that what you how you account for a lot of the increase in demand. I think a lot of the increase in demand had to do with the fact that, you know, people are really interested in SUVs and trucks. The truck market and suv market, including the small SUVs where we compete heavily with our products like cross Track and Forrester or those segments are

doing extremely well. Um and of course the Sudan market is has taken it on the chin as you know over the past year, because just because of the demographics of that segment, that the demographics are such that that's probably the buyer that would be more impacted by what was happening in the economy, But buyers of trucks and SUVs are probably were less affected, and therefore we're able

to kind of sustain the market. I want to ask you, are you finding that you're getting any kind of new time you know, new or first time buyer is because one of the things that we talked about a lot during the pandemic is people were like, Okay, I can't travel anywhere. I'm limited to where I can go, but I can get in a car and I can drive. And that kind of became such a way of feeling

a little bit of a freedom or normalcy. And I just do wonder in terms of the buyers, where they repeat Subaru buyers, where they first time Superu buyers, and were they first time car buyers? Really good, really good question. Um, I would say it's a combination of both, right. I mean, our our our owner loyal or owner loyal loyalty is quite high. You know, we're number one in the industry

in terms of our owner loyalty. So we know we know based on the on the total number of vehicles that we've sold over the last ten or twelve years, that a certain number of those people have to come back to the market anyway, they just need to have another new car. In addition to that, we were conquesting we're probably one of the few brands that are still able to conquest UH to a fairly strong extent. What does that mean conquest? Well, that means that means they're

leaving other brands to come to us. Got it, Okay, So we're we're able because of our you know, our our great products. You know, you can't do it without strong products, as you know. And as a result, you know, with with our awards and accolades that we get from Automotive Least Guide or Kelly blue Book, you know we've been We've won Kelly blue Book's Most Trusted Brand, I

believe for six years in a row. Um I think out of the last nine years, we've won a LG Automotive Least Guy's Award for best residual using Industry for seven years. In our l Lowest Cost Owned crash tests by the Insurances for Highway Safety, we we kind of

nail and check all the boxes. So as a result, people that are in the market for SUVs and particularly smaller midsize issue vs where we're strong, have a tendency to want to take a look at a superbu where at least they should before they make their final decision. And we're lucky to get some of those customers to come to us. So, Tom, let me ask you. I'm sure you've been asked about it many times and I was.

I did watch or when you were joining our Bloomberg TV colleagues, UM, this GM story to saying that they have some chip shortages and that it was hurting it. You guys, you've been doing okay so far. We have been. Yes, Um, it is going to affect us at some point along the way, but we know that through uh the first quarter of the year March, it's not going to impact

us all that much. Now, we're still waiting to get information from our suppliers about how it might affect us as we get out into April and May in particular, but we're hopeful that the impact isn't going to be that much. What's going on, that's a good question. Um, you would think that there'd be enough to supply given the fact that these electronic devices and five G devices that people are saying is the cause of the shortage.

People were purchasing these things well before the pandemic started, and then coming out of the production was actually for us was very strong and we could get really all the chips we wanted through the period until probably early part of December, and that's when we first started to hear about this potential for a chip shortage. So I know they're working with our suppliers all over the world to try to figure out where we can source additional chips.

And I'll be honest with you, I mean it seems to us anyway, the situation seems to be getting better as opposed to worst. But I can't speak for all of the other manufacturers. I can only kind of speak from us, right right. I do have um one question though, I'm curious, are you concerned or could it lead to higher prices uh down the road potentially, especially if there are shortages. I mean, it could be depending upon what

the chip manufacturers do with their pricing. We all have pricing contracts with the chip suppliers, but in a situation like we're in, and if you've got to somehow find another source for your chip supply, there could be increases in chip prices. But we're not at this point forecasting any significant increase in prices as a result of the chip shortage. Well, and it's interesting to you know, we've been talking a lot about kind of the chip industry.

I feel like um, Tom over the last year. I mean, I look at my car, it's so much a piece of technology ge and the amount of you know technology that's in it running in and as you move towards you know e v S, it becomes I feel like even more so, Um, do we need to as a world, as a country kind of look at our chips supply chains more closely and maybe even as governments be much more active in terms of those businesses and making sure that everybody and anybody who needs them has access to them.

They are they are clearly a vital aspect of our vehicle production. There's no question about it, because they're in so many different components. They're in our head units, they're in our engine control modules, they're in a lot of

the advanced safety equipment that we provide. So I do believe that it is something that governments need to look into and make sure that there's a secure supply of these chips, of the manufacturers such as ourselves, don't get caught in a situation where you can't supply an adequate number of these chips that we meet supply and meet demand, because you know, if if if manufacturers aren't able to

get these ships. It literally does stop the production because you can't produce these vehicles and then insert the chip later. The chip has to be inserted into the device before it gets put into the vehicle. So it really is something that you know, can can really throw our wrenchings at the whole production system. So where it is something

I think it needs to be examined and looked into. Yeah, it just feels like that there's been a fair amount of momentum building, especially over the last twelve months um and maybe it has to do with supply chains and trade deals and so on that we've all just been looking at this U more closely. Tell me what's coming down the pike from you guys, Uh, I feel like that there's been kind of ramped up more attention when it comes to e vs and more players getting more

aggressive with some of their targets. How do you see it playing out? We're just like everybody else, you know, with the way Greenhouse guests, field economy standards and emissions requirements are, we're going to have to come from the market with a full slate of e v s and hybrid vehicles. In fact, our our president at Supercorporation in Japan has said that he's expecting that of our sales by and they'll come from either evs or some type

of highway type vehicles. So the industry is moving in that direction, and the obviously could do faster depending upon what governments do in terms of mandating. But right now the issue is more one of cost, right, how you produced these vehicles at a cost effective manners such that we can keep momentum that we've got going on in the market, um, and keep people employed and making making sure that people can really afford these cars right, Right,

It's interesting. I don't feel like we've hit a tipping point, but I feel like, you know, forgive me, Tesla has definitely changed the trajectory here. No, it's going to I mean it's um and you can see what's what's happening in a lot of countries around the world, including your own, where government is now becoming more actively involved with with with with were these electric vehicles and hybrid vehicles being

produced in the market. Views. Everybody is concerned about global warming, right, and we have to make sure we're good stewards of the environment. Um. But but it's happening at a very quick pace and and what's that sitting point comes. I do believe it will happen fairly quick. Um. I just think, you know, we've got to overcome some of the range anxieties that customers have. UM, make sure that the vehicles, you know, can meet their needs. That's Tom Dahl, President

and CEO of Subaru of America. And the full conversation is available on our podcast feed. And that reps up the weekend edition to Bloomberg Business Week from Bloomberg Radio. Thanks so much for joining us. I'm Carol Masser and I'm Tim Stentivik. Be sure to tune into our Bloomberg Business Week daily show Monday through Friday. It starts at two pm Wall Street time on Bloomberg Radio. You can

also watch our daily broadcast on YouTube. Just search Bloomberg Global News and check out to our Bloomberg Business Week podcast. Find that at Bloomberg dot com, Apple or wherever you get your podcasts. And it's also Tim where you'll find our extra podcast this week, It's Anthony Denier. He's the CEO of the commission free online trading platform we Bowl. He also happens to be in Ali Baba Alum. That also got caught up in the frenzy trading around meme

stocks like game Stop and others. We've been very fortunate to have to be growing at a at a very fast pace over the course of the past year and a half, in particularly coinciding with the whole retail trading world going to zero commission. And you can also see me on Bloomberg Quicktake, available on Bloomberg dot com, slash Qt, and streaming platforms like Roku, Apple TV, Samsung TV and more. Is that what we'll find you? Digging out your car? Still yeah? I still am. It was a lot of snow, Carol.

Good luck with that. Bloomberg Business Week also available on Newsstance Now, at Bloomberg dot com and on the Bloomberg Terminal. Have a great weekend everyone. This is Bloomberg