Bloomberg Businessweek Weekend - June 18th, 2021

edition of Bloomberg Business Week. We are not yet out of the global pandemic, and yet parts of our world continue to find their way back, reopening on, covering and tackling problems, finding solutions, looking forward, in sometimes even looking back for some guidance, as one of our guests this week did specifically to four. We'll have more on the glory days later on Coming up though this hour, we are going to blow your mind truly with a device

that's looking to read your mind. Also, the Bitcoin Slayer is back about a planned stock sale of up to one billion dollars. We're talking about Michael Sailor. He's founder and CEO of micro Strategy. Will hear from him shortly. And we're also going to talk to the individual who brought up the club scene back in the nineteen seventies. He changed the hotel industry. He is now rebooting his own creation, Ian Schrager, he will be with us to talk about hospitality coming back. All of that to come.

We begin with this week's cover story, Airbnb spends millions of dollars to make nightmares go away. This story revealing little known details on a company that's become revered for disrupting the established hospitality industry and is now a more than ninety billion dollar market cap company. Bloomberg Quick Takes, Tim Stanovic and I got the story on Airbnb Safety Team from Bloomberg News technology reporter Olivia Carvil, who is joined by Business Week editor Jill Weber. The real bedrock

of Airbnb's business model is trust. You check into someone else's apartment sometimes or house, sometimes that person maybe occupying that same space or in a different room. Um and the whole thing that makes the business work is is that you have trusted in this system. And what Olivia's reporting revealed was that oftentimes stays don't go well, and that could be uh more run of the mill things of like just a trash department, or it could go

very very very bad. And there have been cases a rape that was previously unreported that Olivia found out about UM murders, violent crimes and when that happens. There is a safety team that ARABIANBU has assembled around the world, UM one agents that basically the worst of the worst

situations end up going to that group of people. And Olivia UM basically was the one that has revealed that this team exists, that they're under mental dress for all the different types of cases that they have to deal with, and that you know, this is the thing that for investors this company is now publicly traded, people haven't known that this is a dark side of this company in quite this way. UM. So, so Olivia, how about you bring us up to speed on on you know, how

how you went about reporting such a remarkable story. The story really the crux of it was to understand, you know, to get inside the safety team and to really get to the bottom of what happens inside air BMB when

things go wrong. So initially when I started reporting this piece is about trying to find insiders at the company who would be willing to talk to me about the stress of the job and just the process of when something happens inside a listing like a violent crime and a call comes through to the Airbnb Customer service rep.

What actually happens, how does the company handle it, who does it get transferred through to, and what do they do about handling you know, public image, reputational risk, brand risk. Given that Airbnb's entire business model really risks on that idea of trust between strangers to them, public image is just so crucially important to you know, gross and revenue. So Olivia, how does it work when things go wrong

and often, as Joel mentioned, horribly wrong? Right, Well, it's the call is to come through to ear B and B related to anything concerning safety. So when I say that, I mean anything involving a child, cases of human trafficking, drug trafficking, kidnappings, hostage scenarios, sexual assaults, rape cases, murder, anything that enters that kind of like significance of a real safety crisis, it will immediately be transferred through to

an internal safety team of agents. And as Joel mentioned, the BnB has about a hundred of these agents based all around the world who are trained in trauma. You know, they specify and specialize in how to handle cases of trauma. Bere taught how to deal with recital ideation being taught to you know how to how to help talk with a sexual assault survivor and the best way to support her in that moment. And UM, for these safety agents, it's all about doing what they can to protect the

individual in crisis. And also they do have a dual role to protect the company's public image. At the same time, Joel referred to the darrest that these safety agents experience. What is the toll that takes on them and how do they deal with it? A lot of the safety agents I talked to UM expressed vicarious trauma. They say that they suffer from PTSD from the job. I mean they willingly walk into it. They want to do this kind of trauma work, and I think it takes a

certain person who's attracted to this particular role. A lot of them comes from that grounds of emergency services work or even from the military. They've you know, as I see, had gone through a lot of trauma based care training. They have count bills on site to help this team. They have specialized call down rooms with dimmed lighting to

help them answer those really tough calls. And for these agents, you know, when you handle a case of an individual who has been assaulted, raped, who has lost a loved one, maybe lost a child in a listing. You form a bond with the individual over the phone, and a lot of these safety agents talked about cases where they're still in touch with those families years after the crime has happened.

You know, it stays with them. One safety agent I talked to handled a case of a missing person who just disappeared from a listing, and three years after that occurred, he was still googling that individual's name to see if there was you know, if they were either found. That was this week's cover story with Bloomberg News technology reporter Olivia Carvil, who was joined by Business Week editor Joel Weber. Coming up the bitcoin slayer who is selling shares to

maybe just maybe by more bitcoin. You're sting to Bloomberg Business Week. This is Bloomberg. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stenovik from Bloomberg Radio. So this week, US regulators have once again punted their decision on whether to approve a bitcoin et F, the SEC saying that it will seek more public comment.

It's not the first time this year that the SEC has delayed giving an answer to the legions of crypto advocates who are pushing for a way to trade the largest cryptocurrency in an exchange traded fund format and possibly catapult the world's most valuable digital token into the mainstream among institutional investors. Well, micro Strategy is definitely keeping an eye on this. It's the software developer that's turning into

a corporate shell for bitcoin purchases. That said just this week that it plans to sell up to one billion dollars of new equity, proceeds of which can be used to buy bitcoin. Michael Sailor's chairman, CEO, and founder of micro Strategy. He's sometimes referred to as the Bitcoin slayer and his company as the face of institutional crypto adoption. And we were joined by Mike mcleouan Commodity Alice for

Bloomberg Intelligence. I think this is like the year when they invented electricity, and every company and every government on Earth needs to figure out what does electricity mean to my country? And I figured it'll take a decade of education. I mean, the facts are right now. If you buy the modern bitcoin minor, uh, you can generate about thirty five to forty cents to kill a law our off of any intermittent energy source or stranded energy source, I mean,

no matter where it is on Earth. And that's four times better than than uh, you know, the developed world high in commercial energy rate. So as people figure that out, I think anybody that's got a volcano or a waterfall or a wind farm away from a big city is thinking, this is the solution to my energy problem. It's in The key fact I find very positive forward looking is the ability to kind of solve the problem of gas flaring.

I the quote I heard up in Canada might be ten thousand wells that are just leaking methane gas or methane as they say in London, and this is a way to help solve that. And it seems to me that's a lot of stranded resources that can be put to use. Yeah. I mean, I think people to understand bitcoin. They realize that bitcoin is recycling wasted energy, it's rescuing

stranded energy, and it's avoiding capital destruction. I actually have a friend that owns a bunch of natural gas fields, and if you've got a situation where you can't immediately monetize the natural gas, it's an awful, awful choice you have to make a Hobson's choice. You're either flaring it, which is awful for the environment, or you shut the well in and its destruction of the capital. It's it's horrifically bad. And bitcoin, what do you need to solve it?

You need to be able to monetize the energy wherever it is, and you need to do it with like low bandwidth at any scale. And bitcoin mining is Bitcoin mining is probably twenty times more energy efficient than a Google data center or a Netflix data center for monetizing energy. So it's a gift just sitting out there for people that have a problem with regard to stranded energy or intimate and energy where they they just waste it and they don't know what to do about. Why is the

narrative so different though? Then? And maybe I'm just a little naive and a little stupid when it comes to this, But why is the narrative so differently when it comes to the impact of UH mining crypto on the environment? You're saying, why is there sometimes a negative environmental narrative around? Correct? Well, I think it's because it's the first year in the decade when bitcoin is emerging as an issue. It's the most disruptive technology in the world for money, and it's

the most disruptive technology in the world for energy. And if you imagine the first year we invented electricity. And if you went and put a microphone in front of every mayor, every governor, every politician, every senator, every CEO, and every journalist and said what do you think about this? And you gave them like five minutes to respond, and they could do an hour of research, you would get

a wide variety of answers. You know what I say about bitcoin is it takes you ten hours to scratch the surface, a hundred hours to have an informed opinion, a thousand hours to have an intelligent opinion, and ten thousand hours to understand it. And everybody when you asked the CEO of General Motors, okay, what do you think about bitcoin? And they've studied it for an hour? Or you asked the governor, the mayor or whomember it is, or a journalist, everybody has to have an opinion because

they're being forced. It's in their face, right, Like I watched these four ceo is going television and they asked them, all are you what do you do we think about bitcoin? What do you think about bitcoin? Bitcoin? Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin, And they have to answer, but the truth is they don't have a thousand hours to figure out what the answer is. So the knee jerk reaction is either hey, it seems so good it's too good to be true, or the other answer is all I know is that

uses a lot of energy. Michael, talk to me about the plan to sell as much as a billion dollars in shares. You also did uh close the sale of junk bond? Is it all about buying bitcoin? Is that what the proceeds are for? You know, it's a standing program that's good over the course of several years, and it gives us the option, if the market conditions are correct, to sell equity from time to time. We have a standing share buy back program too, that gives us the

option to buy the shares back. So generally our policy is do a creative financings. If we see an opportunity to sell dead or equity, it's a created to the rest of the security holders, we would do that. So that's a yes. Yeah, you know, I can't really say when it gets to that specific the question. All right, I'm just gonna make a general assumption. All right, Mike McGlenn, you take it well. Michael, I want to ask you a key thing about how do you think history is

going to look at you? Because I view you as a good example of the of a bastion of free market capitalism adopting this new digitalized internet money or digital currency versus China. It's cracking down in China. Is that repressive um society that doesn't even allow we need a pool? I mean, where do you think this is going to end? Because I have a sense you you're making a place in history here. I think that bigcoin is uh, it's America.

It's American dream in cyberspace. People came to America for property and for freedom hundreds of years ago because they couldn't get those in Europe. And I think there's a general sentiment around the world of frustration and that people are frustrated with regard to their property rights and their freedoms. And and bitcoin is the highest form of property right. And if you don't have property in the third world

of developing nation, the bitcoin's your only hope. And if you have property in the first world, and then US and Europe and you're watching it get debased as the currency weekends, then bitcoin, you know, is your way to get some control over your property rights. And so I think we're the first public company that took a serious position. Uh. It's a paradigm shift, and I think everybody else is gradually coming to realize that it's a pretty good idea.

It'll take a decade, I think before the entire world comes to accommodation to understand what this really means for civilization. That's Michael Sailor, CEO and founder micro Strategy, along with our own Michael Clane of Bloomberg Intelligence. Still ahead on Bloomberg Business Week. Get ready to blow your mind thanks

to the Colonel Helmet. This is Bloomberg broadcasting from the financial capital of the world, Bloomberg eleven Frio in New York to Washington, d C. Bloomberg to Boston, Bloomberg one O six one to San Francisco, Bloomberg nine sixty to the country Sirius xm Chado one nine team and around the globe the Bloomberg Business app and Bloomberg Radio dot com.

This is Bloomberg Business Week Trending on social media this week, you might have noticed a Bloomberg tweet about a Business Week story on a company called Colonel that will begin sending dozens of customers across the United States a fifty thousand dollar helmet that can kind of crudely speaking, read

their mind. That helmet weighs a couple of pounds. It contains nests of sensors and other electronics that measure and analyze the brain's electrical impulses and blood flow at the speed of thought, providing a window into have the organ responds to the world. Bloomberg Business Week feature writer in New York Times bestselling author Ashley Vance. He's been tracking this company for a few years. Actually is also a host of Hello World. He's also author of Elon Musk, Tesla, SpaceX,

and The Quest for a Fantastic Future. We caught up with Ashley along with Bloomberg Business We getutor Joel Weber to talk about this story in this week's magazine. So, Ashley, who are we talking about and what does this brain scanning helmet that he's developed too. There's a guy named Brian Johnson who's who's kind of the main character of the story. He's not super well known, but he is

very rich. He sold a company called Braintree to PayPal for several hundred million dollars a few years ago, and then he took all that money and started this new company called Colonel, which is, like you said, they've built these helmets that compear through your skulls, see all the electric electrical activities, see all the blood flow, and basically

watch your neurons fire in real time. And and you know, the big breakthrough really is, um we have machines that do some of the stuff like F M R I machines and M E g s and things that you would find at a hospital or a research center. And you know, he's found a way to boil all this down into a helmet that anybody could wear. I'm gonna put this on, and what's it gonna do for me? Exactly? Yeah,

I mean there's a few things going on. His basic his kind of driving thesis is this idea that for mental health, if you went to the doctor and you had you were worried about your heart, they would run all these tests on you, you know, obviously do some blood work, and we just don't have anything like that for the brain. And so he wants, uh, you know, partly because these things have been expensive and hard to use.

We just don't have much data on the brain, and so he wants to make these affordable enough that thousands, tens of thousands, maybe even millions of people would be using these machines to see their brain activity as they go through their day, as they try to recover from an illness like a stroke or Parkinson's disease, and that we would just learn a lot more about how the

mind works. Well. And that's the point, actually, right, I mean we oh, so we do know a lot about the body, we do know a fair amount about the brain, but there's so much that is unknown. And he thinks about it kind of juxtaposed against artificial intelligence to you know, he started this company. I've been following him for a

few years. He really started when he thought that AI was getting so powerful that that humans would not stand a chance against it, and that our only hope was to kind of, you know, merge with machines and create this brain machine interface. It's a way that that really you could add computing horsepower to your own brain and vice versa, so that that's kind of the root of all this over time. Brian, he's an interesting character. He's

really into kind of the quantified self movement. He has all these tests done on his body, and he's very particular about how much he sleeps and what he eats and how he exercises and all this stuff and so um. You know. The other part of this is like for him on this personal journey, is that he wants to know everything about himself in the brain was like this last bit that he couldn't measure or understand. Can we

talk about his apps? When I when I started this story, I mean, so Brian and I are almost exactly at the same age. We're both with the calendars as we're both forty three, about to turn forty four, and and you know, we probably looked like somewhat similar three years ago when I first started talking to him. And I've gone, you know, one way, or I'm stayed sort of the same, And this guy has gotten totally repped. I mean, he he eats one meal a day at very early in

the morning. He eats like twenty three hundred calories and this one go and picks out all the food and he does his work out in the morning. And you know, to the extent you believe in all this stuff. He he there's different ways you can kind of measure your your biological age. And you know, so he's gone from forty three to the doctors saying he's got like body basically like a twenty five year old. Yeah, okay, okay, go for that. Forget the helmet, I want that right. So,

how he he has snorted stem cells? Does that help? I've seen him snorts snorts stem cells before. Yeah. I mean he goes to this wellness clinic in Colorado, this Grossman Wellness Center, and they like, take out some of your blood and they spin it in a centrifuge and get the plasma and then some kind of magic happens to the plasma that turns it into these stem cells. And the doctor I saw him do it, he snorted

them right up his nose. It's supposed to improve your memory, your kind of attitude, your your general disposition and towards life. And uh, he said it worked. He did it quite a few times, although he stopped doing it. Now. That was feature writer Ashley Vance, along with the editor of the magazine, Joel Webber. You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week. Up next, he brought us Studio fifty four and the boutique Hotel. What does Ian Schrager have to say about

the hospitality industry? Now, this is Bloomberg. You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovik from Bloomberg Radio. We'll check it out everyone. If you walk around New York City, you can tell it has reopened. We see it more and more each day. The broader us is increasingly moving toward a post pandemic life. The rest of the world also moving forward, but at an uneven pace, with COVID still taking a heavy toll.

One area that took an incredibly hard hit during the health crisis hotels and hospitality. And we've leaned on the next guest to tell us how things were going and what happens next. He's been involved in the hospitality industry for five decades, from Studio fifty four and Palladium nightclubs back in the nineties seventies to challenging and upending the hotel industry with the introduction and creation of the boutique

hotel in the nineteen eighties. He created the Public brand, and he did a reboot before reopening from the coronavirus just recently. Let's get more from Ian Schrager, hotelier and founder and chairman of the Ian Schrager Company. I think people who live live in New York City, uh, around the world are ready to go mad, and they're looking for a place, a platform going to do that. I think, uh in New York in particular, or a very funny situation. But I think that all the signs arrived, the demands

are definitely there. Will take a little while to ramp up. I can't kill exactly how fast, but I am confidence it will ramp up. Labor has been an issue. I think that, uh, there's a scaphony of the lay too. And I think until the benefits stop, until the support that the government has really been giving everybody, uh, people will have to go back to work and they will

so well. It's interesting that you say that because when we look at the labor statistics, you know, at those monthly jobs reports and job numbers, it is to be the hospitality industry where you are seeing the big moves up in terms of hiring. So you know, I do wonder whether or not it really is benefits that are holding people back. It does look like a lot of people who work in that industry are coming back. But you're saying that's not the case. Well, they're not coming

back yet. We can't keep pace with the command. Okay, the demand is out there, but the labor of supply is uh is uh, very very restricted. And I think you know, you have to remember the hotel in the shut down a year ago, and so everybody was kind of laid off on that working so they were building on a base of zero. So that's why they may be having a bigger employment games. But you know, we the label pool, there's a real shortage and uh, I

don't look at as a paradigm shift. Uh, you know, I think, but there is a labor shortage and I think everybody restaurants can't even open it with the camp on the labor. So are you having to pay to pay more in to get workers to come back? Is that is that something that's actually helping you get workers the needed workers that are necessary. We are offering high at pay, but it's not always very convincing. You know, people are able to insist on the benefits that they

have received. H And I'll continue toward see and when a minute that that that the completely diminishes. Uh, people will be obliged to come back to work periods. Kind of very simple as far as I'm concerned, Well, is that inability to get the workers maybe you need? Is that slowing your ability to come back as strongly as you would like? Is that holding you back in terms of meeting the demand at your properties? Yes? It is.

I we have to we have to restrict. We have a lot of rest a new restaurant, and like I couldn't do the normal opening that I usually do, which is like the day of the locusts. Uh. You know, I had to be restricted because we didn't have the staff to be able to execute. H I said, we want to execute, and we had to cut back, and we had to come up with a new playbook. And I think restaurants to out New York, I know, I happen to be restrictive on how much, how how bad

you can open. I what do you want our audience? What do you want the world at large to kind of understand? When it comes to the hotel and hospitality industry. Right now, after that's you know, twelve fourteen, fifteen months that we've just endured, I think the industry is alive and well. It took a real shot. It's shut down for almost a year. There were was tough. We ad

to survive a lot of shot. Uh. They were taking care of your employees and fulfilling your financial responsibilities and obligations. But I think it is alive and well, and it is coming back, uh, and you will come back a strongments that ever wasn't enter by. What I think is that every time we go to a recession, we always recover and we always exceed the previous times that and I expect the same to happen now. And sometimes we

learn a few things along the way. And I do wonder the past year, we've all done a lot of soul searching and maybe rethinking, and you've done a little bit of a reboot on public. Tell us what's changed. It's so funny that, uh, you know, people always have

a resistance and progress and trying something new. Uh. And I think that one of the funny results of the pandemic is is that because of your health concerns, people who became more open to technology uh and using it and en effort to stay healthy and avoid contact and so on and so for But I just wonder it takes people a while to get used to new things. But you don't mind getting your direction over your iPhone

rather than asking somebody personally. You don't mind ordering things over Amazon rather than dealing with a personal sales person. You don't mind getting in the self driving cause uh ex etcetera, etcetera. You know we order take out right? We do? Menuse for takeout constantly exactly. I think that progress. And I think everything that technology can do to make it either cheaper or make it even quicker and easier

to you is uh. And I think the hotels are gonna be h taking advantage of that, and that it's a very heart of what public is about in luxury for all, it's kind of combining the select service um uh, ferocious exercise and execution and providing value with the magical lunx we experience to create a new John which well and listen, you got you have constantly rethought about what somebody who stays at a hotel, what, what's the experience they want? What do they want? What? You know, amenities

are pointless? What doesn't matter anymore? What's the rethink? In addition to is it all about technology? Just kind of having a bigger role, whether it's opening your room or ordering food or what have you. Is it is that the real big difference and takeaway from the past year. Well, except what should we need an update? Needs a revision. Uh, there's a lot more access to wealth than have been in prior years. We've been dealing with the same quite

joyous for luxury to the last few wanted years. And it needs to be updated the way everything else needs to be updated. People just don't care about the same things they care about today. It's the same. The ultimate luxury to me is freedom up time being created with dignity and humanity. Uh. And what's important and not having you call off deserved and fine bone china by a guy in white gloves and cold buttons, and waiting forty five minutes for a breakfast delivery and paying thirty five

dollars for a pot of coffee. That's not luxury to me, that's potential. Uh. And so I think we'd stripped down and got rid of all old things that people don't care about and just focused on making them feel good. Because lunchery is a state of mind. It's not a

price point or or back in the past. It's good to hear you say that, you know, because I do think from some of the conversations that we've had over the last year, especially people in the restaurant space, who saw their workers a lot of them don't make a lot of money, who were just struggling to get by, um, really rethink about their model, especially some of the higher

end you know, restaurants and places. And I do wonder, you know, the inequalities, the inequities that have been shown again not new, but we saw them again big time over the past year. How that has kind of invaded your psyche once again. Well it has. I mean, you can't have half the people in this country being upset and activated, well the other half is not to something

wrong about that. So we have to rethink the way we're doing things, and we have to provide access to the system and access to the benefits of the system. You know, everybody has to be more egalitarian, you know, it has to be more democratized. And I think not the problem with business, and that's also a problem with society. And I think we're just responding. You know, we don't make the rules. We just respond to what we think

is going on. And there's no reason you can provide value to people without dumbing down the product and providing less as no reason, you can have just as good a product, justisticated the less well very well well said, well said. And if I may just to end on kind of a lighter note, my understanding is, um, you public actually hosted a party for Elon Musk and his guests. I think you opened up public for the first time in fourteen months for his after party when he was

on Saturday Night Live. It sounds like it was a pretty wild party cryptocurrency theme. I think I heard doge coin, cookies and cupcakes. Um, yeah, yeah. We love we love Elon Musk. We love everything he stands for. We love the conventiveness and innovativeness. We think he's having a positive effect on society as a whole. So we were closed. We opened up just to him because there was a thrill for us to have him and all his guests uh there that night didn't so it was it was

a favorite of odds. It was a thrill for us. Who We're happy to do it. That's Ian Schrager Hotel. You're and founder and chairman of the Ian Schrager Company. A great go to voice on all things hospitality. Well, that wraps up the first hour of the weekend edition of Bloomberg Business Week from Bloomberg Radio. I'm Carol Masser. Head in our next hour, Sports trading Cards, the ninety

days in four that changed sports and culture forever. Also June tenth becoming an official federal holiday in the United States by way of the U. S. Congress, and many others like singer, songwriter and producer Pharrell Williams who joined us on his efforts to get it done. Plus how to cool down big data centers, farm fish on land and pump up p production. It's all in our solution section. Coming right up in the next hour. Bloomberg Business Week.

This is Bloomberg. This is Bloomberg Business Week inside from the reporters and editors who bring you America's most trusted business magazine, plus global business, finance and tech news as it happened. Sloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovic on Bloomberg Radio. Hi everyone, I'm

Carol Masser. Plenty ahead in our second hour of the weekend edition of Bloomberg Business Week, including singer, songwriter and producer Pharrell Williams and making Juneteenth a US federal holiday. Also the market maker, evangelist, therapist who is cashing in on priceless pieces of cardboard business. We call him the King of Cards and glory Days. We take you back too, and the ninety days that changed sports and culture Forever.

Sports illustrated in sixty minutes contributor John Wortheim on his new book. First Up This Hour a special solution section in Bloomberg Business Week magazine looking at hot data centers, fish, farming, on land, and popular peas. My co host and Bloomberg Quick Takes, Tim Stanovic and I got a round up from the editor of the solution section, Rebecca Penty. She

joined us from our London bureau in offices. That's right, all the data that's flowing through your phone, whether it's bank statements, YouTube videos, you name it, that goes through a data center. And actually data centers consumed two to four of the entire world's electricity. And that's because they require air conditioning to cool all of these servers that

are superheated with all this data flowing through them. Now we take a look at a new way to cool these servers that consumes far less energy and is more effective, and that's using a liquid. So we talked to a

UK company called Isotope. They're based in Sheffield, a few hours north of London, and they have a technology where they put they actually put the box, their server box into this liquid that's non conductive to cool it down and this saves a vast amount of water as well as electricity, and this is They're one of many startups that are in this space, working with companies like Microsoft and Lenovo to find a better way to cool these

data centers. Venture capital funding has really gone towards finding a solution to this, and I'm wondering what the promises

economically from a business perspective if somebody can crack this nut. Yeah, I think if you think about the clients that these these startups are servicing, it's it's companies like Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook, all of these major companies are focused on this problem because remember um, you know E s G investing is becoming more and more important and companies have to worry about their environmental impact and so they're answering to investors.

So I think I think there's money in this space, particularly if one of these companies because one of these technologies becomes a real winner. Um, you know, investors could make quite a bit of money, alright, Rebecca from Chips. In demand of fish and demand, we are eating an awful lot of fish globally, and that's a problem. And as a result, we're talking about now doing actually fish

farming on land. Yeah, that's right. You think about diets that emphasize Omega three, fatty acids, and all of the salmon that people are consuming in order to meet those dietary needs. We are eating more and more fish just as the wild populations are declining. And what that means is that aquaculture is stepping in. Seafood farming has been stepping in for years, but the problem is it's inherently dirty.

The fish are kept in pens in marine environments near wild fish, near near native species, and disease and parasites spreads to those native species, even if the farmed fish don't escape because the water is flowing in and out of these pens. So for years, um, you know, what's kind of been the holy grail of aquaculture is is

thinking about could we raise salmon on land? And remember, these are fish in the wild that um have epic life cycles where they spawn in rivers, they go you know, they make their way to the ocean, they come back into the river to to lay eggs again. So, um, these land based farms face extreme challenges and trying to mimic this environment, trying to make sure their power sources are sustainable, and doing it all in tanks where they're

trying to make sure that the fish stay alive. But actually we're nearing a potential major turning point where two companies in this space, one in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia and another near Miami, are saying that they're in your profitability. Um, So there's a massive test next year. If these companies can scale up, we'll be able to find out whether this is a real solution to you know,

green up our food supply. Well, speaking of our food supply from fish to peas, because P protein is the hot ingredient when it comes to fake meat that we've all come to well, so many of us have come to love. But that also means supply constraints. So how is the war for fake meat leaning into P protein and how are they actually improving supply constraints? Yeah, that's right. So everyone, if you're an investor, you'll think about Beyond Meat and their I P O in which was you know,

the most successful I P O since UM. But you know what that did was allowed Beyond Meat to expand at a at a rapid pace, and a bunch of copycat acts followed. So you know, the main ingredient and Beyond meat burger is a yellow P protein. Um. It's it's high in protein, it doesn't have a strong taste um and and it's malleable. It's really easy to turn it into fake fish, fake chicken, fake you know, you

name it, fake cheese. So the food industry has gone gaga over yellow peas and that's created a real supply crunch, meaning that prices have swored. So we've talked to Purists, which is um the biggest supplier of yellow P protein in the US, about their expansion plans and how they're handling that crunch and UH, and how they're also trying to make yellow P protein taste better by masking the

flavor with various spices and improving the processing. To love your face that you're making because there is off flavor, right, I mean, it's good for the soil, P production right and P farming. But you do talk about this off flavor. Yeah. Absolutely. The editor of the Solution section of Bloomberg Business Week, Rebecca Penty, you're listening to Bloomberg Business Week. Still to come for all Williams. I'm making Juneteenth a US federal holiday.

This is Bloomberg. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovik from Bloomberg Radio. Jun Team Mark's both a long, hard night of slavery and subjugation and a promise We're Bradie morning to come. This is a day of profound in my view, of profound weight and profound power, to day which you remember the moral stain, the terrible toll that slavery took on

the country and continues to take. This week, President Biden signed into law the eleventh national annual federal holiday in the United States. We're talking about Juneteenth, also known as the Emancipation Day. It's a reference to June nineteenth, eighteen sixty five. That's the day when a Union general arrived in Galveston, Texas, telling African American slaves that the Civil

War was over. That they were now free under the Emancipation Proclamation, which had been signed two years earlier, back in eighteen sixty three by President Abraham Lincoln. Many have stepped forward in support of Juneteenth. That includes singer, songwriter, producer, entrepreneur Pharrell Williams, who joined US along with Bloomberg New York Deputy Bureau Chief Shirtier Brantley. Well. Of course, as an African American and African diaspora, all of our DNA

is excited. We're very grateful to be recognized on a federal level, but there's a lot of there's there's so much more work to do. Um. I'm not sure, but I think our state was first. Man um, it would be the first state to do it. But man, it's been a long time coming, you know, and for so long people have debated as to whether you know, it's

an either or situation with you know, Independence Day. But my ancestors, uh, most like everybody else who's African American and people of color here, our ancestors had to fight in the war, whether it was on either side, they had to do it. Um. But they were not free, and nor were white women, and nor were lgbt Q I A like essentially no one was free, accept our our white brothers at the time, you know, but this was America and America was trying to figure out what

it wanted to be. And once they made that decision, Um, it took a very long time for us to be emancipated. And for so long that day of emancipation for us, which was such a joyous day, Uh, we go ignored like it was something that was seen as like some sort of like divisive thing, but it's really not. It happens to be our history. And for us to be free, everybody's free. It's like we talk about liberty and our pledge.

You if we're really going to use that word, then everyone in this nation needs to be free for all. Why has our history become so controversial as of late? And what does President Biden signing this into law? Does it increase the much needed conversations we need to bring us all together, because you can't move forward if you don't know where you've been. I mean, there are those who just don't know the history, and there are people who know the history but don't want to hear about it.

And then there are people who would like for other people to not know the history, and then there's a lot of people who want people to really understand the history. Are you concerned that in terms of as you said, this was an important day, but you don't want this to be necessarily a distraction, right, There's still a lot of work to do. Chartie and I were talking before we got going with you for all, is that we look around corporate boardrooms and they're still not really diverse,

or the C suite isn't still really diverse. So we've had a lot of conversations again in the past year. What do you see from some of the work that you're doing, are having an understanding of being a black American that what really needs to be done to make significant change, so that there you know, we're not talking about d n I, we're actually having it done and

seeing it done well. So firstly, we have a Joe teenth pledge um, and it would be great to have all of the Fortune five hundred and you know, uh, you know, all of the bigger corporations assignment um and make sure people have a pay holiday or at least like a skeleton they go stay where they can figure out what they want to do with the day. But still um, paid for it. They're Americans, right, and doing

teeth is now an American federal holiday. But what we're what I'm doing specifically as it pertains to like the disparity and the disproportion access to education, health UH and healthcare and legislation is black ambition and Black ambition. It's a prize that we put together a five or one C three that we work in partnerships with the historic black colleges and universities to find more um, Black and

Latin X entrepreneurs. Now, why did we do that because if you look at the American pie chart, like, we don't own enough things out there where you find people and communities that own things their children actually have great act healthcare, education and legislation. So in order for us to have a voice, we've got to own more things. Um. And it wasn't just Tulsa, Oklahoma that this that this happened too, It's happened many, many, many many times. Right.

So what we want to do is create a level playing field because we think that HBCUs have the most fertile grounds to launch such a prize in such as search UM and then and then once you win, the coolest part is there is mentorship. If you ask the less than three percent of the private equity and VC founders UM, you know, of color, what was their biggest hurdle? You think it was the capital. Capital is hard, but

what's even harder as mentorship. It's like, you know, it's like giving a dirt, you know, a motorcycle to you know, a really excited twelve year old without training wheels or any kind of practice or any kind of um schooling or tutelage. That's so, what we want to do is make sure that like when these people who have a good idea but may not have like the business acumen, this has given them the advice to make sure that

like their idea actually can take off. I know that you launched this initiative back in December and you're targeting you know, startups and black and Latin X entrepreneurs within consumer products and services, design, healthcare, UH and tech. UM. I was on your website and it said that National Demo Day is scheduled for next month. How many of these entrepreneurs will be making presentations. There's a lot. There's a whole whole whole lot. I can also tell you

the numbers were crazy. What I've tried to do is get out of the way. I'm a galvanizer. This is

something that I I knew needed. Um, But I'm not one of those like, you know, celebrity people who are like, man, I'm like right in the middle in the front of this because one, yes, I'm an entrepreneur, but as it pertains to like training these people and mentoring these people for what it is that they need, we wanted to make sure that like, um, this was in a true real partner with the b c U S because there's a lot of talent that come out of there and

they don't really get the love and the light and the shine that they deserve. So this is not like something where like I am like the Griffin on the ship. Um. If anything, it is just the black ambition that is. That's Pharrell Williams. He joined us along with Bloomberg New York Deputy Bureau Chief Shuretier Brantley. Still to come on Bloomberg Business Week will introduce you to the King of Cards, who can tell you what a Michael Jordan Rookie card

is really worth. This is Bloomberg Broadcasting from the financial capital of the world. Bloomberg Eleve in Frio in New York to Washington, d C. Bloomberg to Boston, Bloomberg one O six one does San Francisco, Bloomberg nine sixty to the country Sirius XM Chado one nineteen and around the globe the Bloomberg Business app and Bloomberg Radio dot Com. This is Bloomberg Business Week, the story of the magazine.

It's about the King of Cards, and by that we mean Ken Golden and his universe of sports trading cards and sports memorabilia. Bloomberg Quick Takes, Tim Stanovic and I got together with Bloomberg News Entertainment reporter Lucas Shaw and Bloomberg Business Week editor Joe Weber to hear more. N Golden is a lifelong sports collectibles enthusiast hobbyist who started collecting cards and other collectibles when he was a twelve

year old kid in South New Jersey. He now runs what is the largest independent auction house for sports collectibles and trading cards, uh and the house that, so far this year has broken a new record for sales just about every month. He's been doing this for some time, correct, Yeah, he started Golden Auctions in two thousand twelve. He saw

coming out of the global recession in No. Seven or oh eight that there was an interest in investing in alternative assets and that trading cards would be one of those places that that all these people with excess cash would put their money. But the business has really taken off over the last of twelve eighteen months, so much so that they had a recent auction right and crashed the site. Is that right? Yeah, there has been. He

works with this company called simple Auctions dot com. And because Golden is such kind of a shameless self promoter and has attracted so much attention, there are hackers that frequently have attacked the site during his auctions. Let's bring in Bloomberg Business Week editor Joel Weber, who joins us now on the access line from Brooklyn. Joel, why do you think that that that this type of asset right now? I mean, look, Lucas said, it's it's been having a

moment over the last twelve years. But why over the last year, over the last sixteen months, has it really been having a moment. I think people are craving um assets that are are slightly alternative, right, and I think like even things like memestock sort of have shown that, so as we did in that cover story, Um, just a couple of months ago about sneakers being yet another place if you if you can flip something and make

a buck, have fun doing it. I think all of that stuff suddenly starts to resonate in newfound ways when you know many people have too much time on their hands. Um. You know, the question I have for you, Lucas is, um, how much are all these baseball cards from my childhood worth film? You know? It depends on what kind of condition they're in? Are if are they? Have you had them graded? Are the eight or above? No? I have

not had them graded? Um, and I think there's um, it's a lot of like maybe don notting Ly Nighties seven tops cards. Okay, So a grade ten is in the example in your piece from Michael Jordan's Michael Michael Jordan example, a grade ten is four hundred and eighty thousand dollars versus a grade eight that would be just eleven thousand, six hundred to twelve thousand dollars. Not to mention if you go all the way down to a

grade one, which is poor condition d to three thousand dollars. Lucas, Yeah, there's a huge range in prices, uh, you know, all of which is determined by these third party grading companies. P s A is the number one, but there's also back at those others. They have been so overwhelmed by demand this year because of people probably like Joel, trying to get their cars graded, that they stopped grading new cards for a period. P s A has sworn to me that they're hoping by July to be back up

and running fully. Hey listen, I want to understand how this story came to be, so Joel, what was the pics or how did the late how did it come especially like this with a character like this, As with so many things, it starts with Lucas and I talking about something else, and then he and then he would he emailed me a little bit later and he goes, by the way, what are you doing about trading cards? And I was like, nothing, tell me more, tell me everything.

And he was like, well, there's this character that that we should profile and and and thus began his reporting. Um uh so, So Lucas, I'm curious, like, you know, the there's the cards that I grew up with, and then which are let's just be honest, worth nothing and then there are the cards that um are are truly collectibles, and they I think they might even they might even push the envelope of like what a card means. Right, So talk to us about where the market has gone

on that front. Yeah, one of the things that happened

a long time ago. There used to be people would manufacture tons of different cards, and now all the card manufacturers have gotten a lot smarter about it, and so there are going to be just kind of engineering a rookie cards which can be really valuable, but they also make of one off cards or limited sets of ten, Like there's this Luca don Chech card that that sold earlier this year for more than four million dollars, and it's because it's one of one, and he's this guy

who everybody thinks is going to be, you know, the next Lebron the next Michael Jordan's. So there's been a lot of a lot of efforts to restrict supply and create special editions to kind of create scarcity, because that's like any market, it booms based on scarcity. There's also the added wrinkle sort of where do n f t s fit into this, because they're kind of like trading cards, but they're not like trading cards, and even Ken Golden

has started to sell them in his auctions. None of them have generated as much money as the top of the top of the line trading cards, but they still go for ten thousands of dollars. Check out that full conversation. Yes, there is more with Bloomberg News Entertainment reporter Lucas Sewan Bloomberg Business Week editor Joe Webber. That can all be found on our podcast feed at Bloomberg dot com or on Apple. You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week, So where

were you in. There's a new book out that writes about that summer and the ninety days in nine eight four that changed sports and culture forever. While we're on the glory days. This is Bloomberg. You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovy from Bloomberg Radio nine four. Well, our next guest

was thirteen years old at the time. He was living in his hometown of Bloomington, Indiana, and something remarkable was happening unbeknownst to everyone that would contribute to really making that summer and that year one for the record books when it came to sports and culture writing about it all, John Wortheim, He's executive editor and senior writer for Sports Illustrated,

contributing correspondent for CBS sixty Minutes. His new book, Just at Glory Days, The Summer of nineteen eighty four and the ninety days that changed Sports and culture Forever. John

takes us back to that year. Was a young kid then, but the tryouts for the Olympics team were held in my small town in Indiana, and I wrote a piece about it and sort of developed this piece into the book, and it sort of struck me that, you know, I used Michael Jordan's as sort of the symbolic figure who at the beginning of the summer was the sort of sheepish college kid whose coach was making him go to the NBA. Michael Jordan would rather have stayed in college.

And uh, by the end of the summer, Michael Jordan was a millionaire many times over, hit an Olympic medal, he had a signature shoe. And it struck me that that pretty much mirrored the ark of sports that summer, that it started in one place and a very short amount of time, it sort of had had blossomed into the big business, uh, you know, big media property that it that it is today. That a lot a lot happened in that summer, and a lot happened in a

very short amount of time. Well, we've had some fun talking about it in the newsroom, go through some of the things, because there are things that we in the sports world to some extent right on take for granted today. But as you said, that summer was pivotal for something like an ESPN. Yeah, exactly. I mean some of this was just you know, the Michael Jordan's uh, one of

my favorites. The NBA got a new commissioner, a guy named David Stern's lawyer who made people who worked with him miserable and had all sorts of ideas of events, media and globalization. So Michael, so, David Start is on the job for you know, a few months, and he gets his first NBA Final and it's magic in the Lakers against Larry Bird and the Celtics. We get this dream NBA Finals, it goes seven games, it's on network TV,

which wasn't always a given for the NBA. And then a few days later he presides over his first draft when Michael Jordan gets selected. So that's a pretty good week for for David Stern. And then you just sort of go down the list and it's you know, Wayne Gretzky won his first Stanley Cup, and there was an Olympics that was profitable, and you know, dot Donald Trump entered the scene through sports buying a football team. But

so so you had all these coincidences. But I think what what really became clear to me when I did the reporting two things. The eightis was the summer you mentioned ESPN. This was the summer of cable, and cable really turned a corner, whether it was MTV or whether it's CNN or whether ESPN was sold to ABC that summer, and smart people in ESPN realized, wait a second, we shouldn't be paying the cable systems to get on their offering of channels. They should be paying us a subscriber fee.

And the cable you know, it was a game of chicken, and basically the ESPN wasn't the one that blaked. And so the subscriber fee that started out with a few pennies and would then grow to about seven dollars a month. You know, that's really the secret sauce behind ESPN success, that they fell their thirty second commercial blocks, that they make most of their money from these subscriber fees, and the other thing that happened that summer. And again, I

think Michael Jordan's examplar. Athletes recognized their platform and their value. And it wasn't really political, you know, so sort of Reagan eighties. This was not about activism him and then social and political activism. But athletes realized, wait a second, I shouldn't be doing that for free, or wait, wait a second. If Nike wants to give me a shoot, they should be paying me to And I think that Michael Jordan doesn't get enough credit for that. He's not

a political activist. He's not you know, Muhammad Ali or Bill Russell or Colin Kaepernick. But what he did to empower athletes starting in that summer of n I think he doesn't get enough credit for that. Well, there's a line in your introduction you said most of Bloomington looked at Michael Jordan's somewhat indifferently in the summer of nineteen

eight four. Is he ordered a smoothie at the Chocolate Moose ice cream joint I lost eighteen holes of pet pet only to shoot the winner a scalding stair and demand an immediate rematch. But it's just interesting. Let write someone incredibly unknown and then almost in the snap of the fingers was a game changer, a lasting one in

terms of sports overall. Certainly you know when it comes to basketball, but even more broadly, Yeah, I mean, Michael Gordon was running around my hometown and it wasn't the big deal. You didn't have an entreage and the security, he didn't have an agent. Some of that is cute and nostalgic, and oh sports were so much more pure, But part of that is athletes were really undervalued. In the notion that Michael Jordan was sort of at the mercy of of the coaches and didn't have an entourage,

I think says something in itself. You talk about David Stern kind of projecting kind of where things were going and forecasting where things were going. You also talk about and we you know today tech technology for granted and everything we do, but you go back to the l A Olympics again, family members who went there, and technology

was really having its impact on Olympics as well. The Olympics. Yeah, I mean also was the year that you had this this cube like it looked like a food processor and it was a computer and they called it the Mac, and everyone uh sort of trying to figure out and if computers finally we're here to stay. Um, you know, the personal computer was something I only used at the office, so it was it was sort of the Summer of Mac.

But also you're right that the eighty four Olympics they really sort of redefined what it meant to be an Olympics sponsor. And p Peter you Broth ran this very successful Olympics, and one thing he did he had these these technology firms, what was both both AT and T and IBM, and they had something called the e m S, the Electronic Messaging Servant, and they told the athletes, you

don't need to pick up a phone. You could send a message to someone electronically if you put in your password and get on one of our get on one of our monitors, get on one of our computer terminals. You can send messages electronically. And very few athletes took advantage of it, but you know, you look back and it was one of the very first email networks and uh, sort of like they basically demoted in at the Olympics Motorola.

Distributing pages like that takes us back right. Hey, listen, um, we'd be remiss if we didn't ask you about tennis. I know it's something you write so eloquently about. You are passionate about the US Open is coming up. What are your expectation it's going to be back? Will are willing not with it now? I think? I mean, honestly, I think so if they're you know, we're packing Madison Square Garden, I think we'll be okay for an outdoor tennis event. I mean, I think, I think we talked

about this last year. I mean, the the interesting part of this is, you know, part of it as the fan experience again, I mean I think, uh, I think, especially since we're outdoors, will be okay. I think the really interesting thing is going to be our companies ready to use the US Open for hospitality, which is a huge source of revenue and it's a huge part of the U s Open experience for a lot of firms.

Are we at a point where you know, the fans will be in the stands and the fans will be on the grounds, but Are we at a point where these companies that historically have rented these suites and used the tennis as entertainment, are they going to be ready to take clients back to suits? Is it appropriate both health standards and also sort of optics And you know, I I hope the answers yes. I think the answers yes. But I just got back for the French Open, right,

and there was very little hospitality. Part of that was protocol, you know, part of that was Western Europe. They are not where we are in terms of getting out of this thing. But I also think some firms said, you know what, I'm not sure it's a great look after what we've been through the last sixteen months. I'm not sure it's a great look to have everybody, you know, eating Canna pass and drinking champagne in this field suite. Um.

But I think I think that's the question. I mean, the US Open, it it will happen, it won't be like last year. We'll all get to go to say as if we watch to But I think it'll be interesting to see how many of these suits get sold. Naomi Osaka, she withdrew from the French Open, uh and she talked about reasons related to mental health. You know, you've covered the sport, You've covered a lot of athletes. She's not the first one, you know, to talk about

either depression or anxiety. UM, there's a lot of stress and pressure on these athletes. And she even talked about, you know how hard it is just to speak to the media. It makes her nervous. You know, what are your thoughts on that? UM? I mean I think, um, you know you you you say she's not the first, and you're and you're right. I do think it was sort of significant that an athlete at the peak of her powers, highest paid female athlete, she's won the last

two majors she entered. I mean, she was really sort of uh, this is peak Naomi point and for her to sort of have this sort of revelation at this stage, I thought was I thought it was courageous. I also thought it was sort of culturally fascinating. I mean, this is not the way of athletes behaved or characterize their conditions twenty years ago when I started covering sports. I do think if you're in tennis, you knew that she's had these challenges. She's talked about it, she's she's pretty

upfront about it. I thought it was really at best tone death and it worth something, you know more, you know, malicious, even that the tournaments responded the way they did. This was not about an athlete that was trying to pay her way out of something that was inconvenient. This was not about an athlete who was grandstanding or being self righteous.

This wasn't you know, the bian. This was. This was a broken this is a broken human being, right And I thought the you know, I mean, she probably for the handled this better. But I think really more of the blame rest on the adults who were not very um sensitive or empathetic and read the room particularly well and sort of castor as a over this rebellious troublemaker.

And that wasn't when it was at all. John Wortheim he's executive editor and senior writer for Sports Illustrated, contributing correspondent for Sixty Minutes, and his new book It's called Glory Days, The Summer of nine four and the ninety Days That Change Sports and Culture Forever. And that wraps up the weekend edition to Bloomberg Business Week from Bloomberg Radio. Thanks so much for joining us. I'm Carol Masster for

Tim Stanovic and the whole team. Be sure to tune into our Bloomberg Business Week daily show Monday through Friday, starting at two pm Wall Street Time on Bloomberg Radio. You could also watch our daily broadcast on YouTube. Just searched Bloomberg Global News and check out our Bloomberg Business Week podcast. Find that at Bloomberg dot com, Apple, or

wherever you download your podcast. Bloomberg Business Week is also available on newsstands now at Bloomberg dot com and always on the Bloomberg terminal, and you can also catch Tim on Bloomberg Quick Take. It's available on Bloomberg dot com, Slash q T and streaming platforms like Roku, Apple t V, Samsung TV, and Moore. Have a great week, in everybody, This is Bloomberg