Global Virus Resurgence Tied to Delta Variant

or Bloomberg dot Com. You can also listen to our radio show at two pm Eastern Time on Bloomberg Radio or watch us on YouTube search Bloomberg Clovel News. Well a lot of virus headlines to get to on this Friday afternoon. Visor shots halting severe illness but still allowing infection in Israel, Fiser also supplying the US with millions of shots for young kids, and then l A's fully vaccinated people. They are making up one in five infections

right now. And I do want to get an update to the global tracker that we follow here at Bloomberg, cases topping one point five million and death succeeding four point one million. At the same time, more than three seven billion doses of the vaccine have been administered. We should note that many of those vaccine doses do require two shots to have someone considered fully vaccinated. Well, let's get to all that and more with Dr Ian LUs Beder, clinical Professor of Medicine at n y u's Lango and

Medical Center. He joins us now on the phone from Long Island. Dr LUs Beder, how are you good? Good? Thank you Tim. Happy Friday. Yeah, Happy Friday. It's good to talk to you. Um. I want to talk a little bit about what we learned from Israel earlier today. Fiser's COVID nineteen vaccine provided a strong shield against hospitalization and more severe diseases in cases caused by the contagious deltavrean in Israel in recent weeks, even though it was

just thirty nine percent effective in preventing infections. That's according to the country's health ministry. What do you what do you make of that third nine percent figure? So I think we're seeing UH Orwinian behavior in action than UH more aggressive viral escape or these breakthrough infections. The good news is that the antibodies that are produced by the vaccines still seem to provide some good protection in reducing

hospitalizations in depths. Unfortunately, is becoming less effective over time for acquiring the delta infection, and there are a number of articles. There's a recent article in Nature from July of one that does show the delta variant is less resistant to not only monoclonal antibodies, but also to endogenous antibodies from vaccines. So, you know, unfortunately the delta variant spike has changed enough that it is escaping in part

the antibodies that we've produced from the vaccine. And hopefully it really is a race. It's a race between getting enough people vaccinated versus the spread of the delta. And at this point it looks like Delta's women. What does that look like if Delta wins, not just if it's win, but if Delta wins, well, I think it really will mean uh more widespread infections and widespread deaths. You know, in the United States, you have to sort of compare

a country to country because they're not all similar. For example, Mexico is seeing a big outbreak. Um they're only about vaccinated, where over fifty percent vaccinated. India is a little over

ten percent with a much bigger population. So the substrate a number of people who can get sick with Delta or any other variant for that matter, is much greater in certain countries, but in the United States, I think what that means at this point is that we're probably looking at another hundred million people at this point who have not been vaccinated or may slowly get vaccinated, probably acquiring DELTA, and that will probably mean, by my guestimate,

another one hundred or maybe two hundred thousand deaths, which will bring us to the you know, seven to eight hundred thousand deaths, which is unfortunate that but that's those are the numbers are the way the numbers are looking at this time. Well, speaking of numbers, I do want to make sure to include these numbers for Viser's vaccine. We did mention that it was just thirty effective in

preventing infections. UH. That's according to the Health Ministry and Israel. UH. The Health Ministry also saying that it provided protection against hospitalization against severe illness for an unspecified number of people. Those people were studied between June and July seventeenth. That's according to report They came out Thursday from the Health Ministry. So that's that's pretty good news. Because it still is very effective in providing against hospitalization and severe illness, right,

I agree completely. Look, the uh the vaccine over time is becoming a little less effective in preventing the acquisition of of COVID, but it certainly seems to be pretty effective in in preventing severe disease hospitalization, and which is really what we want. Unfortunately, Delta has relatively mild symptoms, running nose, headache, really common cold symptoms. Some people may

not even know it. Obviously, if you've had two vaccines and you're coughing a lot or short of breath, get retested, get a swab, and if you have COVID present on the PCR nasal swab, contact your doctor. We do have some treatments like monoclone land of bodies which can still be effective. They're a little less effective, but this also highlights where we do need to look for better treatments.

Whether and you know, people talk about a variety of things that really or very early studies, whether it's hybermettin or other anti viral drugs. Mark is working on an anti viral you know. Unfortunately, by the time studies come around, we will have a lot more infections but fortunately we're not seeing uh, greater deaths. It doesn't seem to be a more lethal strain, which is good. Yeah, it's good to get a little bit of good news in here.

I do want to get your thoughts on just in the last minute that we have, and then we're gonna come back to you. Dr Lusbader, los Angeles County's top health officials, saying that fully vaccinated people made up one in five COVID nineteen infections in June and warned that the figure may rise in July with a higher level of community transmission. Does this mean that even if we're vaccinated, we should be wearing masks? That's a good question, you know,

Masks or questionably effective. Certainly the N ninety five masks are are much more effective. Masks tend to protect other people. When you wear a mask, you have COVID, you're coughing, it contains those secretions. The virus can really get around all normal surgical masks and kind of these barrier masks. You know, I think it's something if you have an underlying disease or if you're worried, definitely wear a mask. There's no harm to that. How beneficial that will be

is unclear. Well, let's get right back to the latest on the virus with Dr Ea must Beader, clinical professor of Medicine at n y US Lango and Medical Center. He joins us on the phone from Long Island. Dr Lusbader, here we are It's July. We are in the thick of summer travel season. I traveled for work last week over the weekend, and then this week. Airports were absolutely packed. There was not an open seat on any of the

flights that I took. This is happening at a time where we are seeing hotspots emerged, not just here in the United States among unvaccinated, but in other parts of

the world too. You mentioned Mexico when we were talking earlier today, an article on the Bloomberg by our own Andrean Varro writing that COVID's exploding in Camcoon Los Cabos as a new wave has hit Mexico and Kancun, for example, cases have stored to a point where the hard Rock Hotel has set aside two floors for guests with symptoms, and some hotels are saying they're offering discounts for those

who are in quarantine until they're no longer contagious. It raises the question should people, even if they're vaccinated, be traveling right now? You know that I think has to be a very individual decision based on your underlying health and when you got the vaccine. We are periodically checking antibody levels and most hey and said, I've just randomly checked if they're traveling and concerned. Some countries require antibody proof. Most antibodies are high, very high from spike protein. But

now we're seeing that that alone doesn't really fully protect you. Um. I think it's going to be very hard to get the genie back in the bottle. You know, we're really only vaccinating globally a very small percent. It is likely this is just going to continue to spread because it's so highly contagious and uh fortunately not more lethal, but totally you will have an increased number of deaths. Um. I think people have to be careful to go to hot spots like Mexico or only people are vaccinated and

they're having outbreaks. You know, I would think twice about putting myself in that environment if I could avoid it, or uh to be very careful and distance and try and get an N ninety masks. Did you say that you were able to test for antibody levels ahead of

people going to hot spots. Yeah. I don't want to encourage everyone running to their doctors saying please send antibody levels, but just randomly in some patients because when they do travel, they're they're required to not only show proof of vaccination, but actually antibodies, and so randomly. When I've checked people for spike protein, they're very, very high, which is good.

In other words, it shows the vaccines are working. You know, when there's a debate as to vaccinating younger and younger kids. There are pros and cons to that, obviously, But the problem, unfortunately is even if you have high antibodies, that doesn't seem to prevent the escape. In other words, that delta you may get that infection. It does seem to be partially controlled, but it doesn't guarantee that you will not

get that adulta infection for sure. Dr LUs Vader, I just wonder, and this is a question that we've we've talked about before, with the delta variants spreading so rapidly among unvaccinated populations here in the United States. Outside of the United States, do we get to a point where we think about being on the other side of this

vaccine are the other side of the pandemic. Rather, is just a question of how quickly people can get infected and either recover or not recover, And that's how the virus dies out right, That's how the that's how the pandemic spread. It took three years. Uh large percent of it was about a ten percent death rate. We fortunately are are much lower than that, somewhere, you know, one percent or below, but that varies from country to country.

There are some countries that have a very high percent, whether or not that student poor hospital facilities or underlying medical illness is obesity diabetes. Brazil, for example, is a very high percent death rate. But yeah, what you're saying is, unless we can get vaccines distributed, we're really looking at eight billion people. So we're in that, you know, the global population getting infected, and most will do well and recover. The problem is we're seeing um post covid or long

hole symptoms. So even though most people do well, their COVID leaves a mark. There's some brain issues, the brain fog and long hole symptoms. So if you can avoid it, it would be good, which is an argument for vaccinating young kids. We vaccinated you know, young kids for hepatitis B, but in kindergarten, long before they're going to have any exposure or possible exposure. So it's something to think about. We need, you know, good safety data. But uh, we're

playing catch up at this point. The virus is really outrunning us, and all we can do is try and yeah, block and tackle as best as convey. It's too bad because a few weeks ago, I don't think we would have been having the same conversation. Dr Iain LUs Bader, thank you so much for taking the time as you do. On Friday's clinical professor of Medicine at n y U Lango's Medical Center, he joins us on the phone from Long Island. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser

and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovic on Bloomberg Radio. Well. The new issue of Bloomberg Business Week is out on newsstands now. All of the articles are also available online. Joining me now is Joel Webber, editor at Bloomberg Business Week. He's with me in the Bloomberg Interactive Broker Studio. Joel, I got my hands on the new issue. The cover story the Border, the builder, the Border, and the thirty million dollar boondoggle Tommy Fisher. We went through his story yesterday.

How did you choose it for the cover. We had this amazing photo shoot and you know, you get to see his wall and it is not ugly, it is striking. And we also photographed the very end of it, which speaks to the project because he built uh only he's only built three miles of it. Uh. It looks highly secure because of that. You can just walk around the

end of it if you mean to. Um. But I once up, we kind of saw all the artwork, um, and have this great untold story of this guy who was bolded up to drop thirty million dollars building a wall. I was like, that's an untold story that I want on the cover this week. I gotta tell you too. Just scrolling through Twitter yesterday and today, this story has absolutely taken on wildfire. It totally gone viral. Yeah, why do you think that is? I mean, what is that

not the secret sauce? Because I think that that's kind of impossible to answer. But this story seems to kind of touch every little list when we think about what makes a story work. Well, the I think the backdrop to the story is that keep in mind, we have a crisis on the southern American border right now, right so, and I think wherever your politics are on on immigration, UM, on the wall itself, UM, there are elements of the

story we're going to resonate with you. UM. And I think we we told it kind of a bigger story UM about the business guy sort of at the center of this particular wall, and it's you know, it's really we don't go into the the immigration one, we're another. So I think it ends up resonating with a lot of different odds is because of that, and at the at the very center of it is this you know, businessman who made a choice to put thirty million dollars into a project that he has not made that money

back on yet. One part of the story that I found absolutely fascinating was the idea that the state of Texas could actually be the one potentially to continue this wall project now that President Trump is no longer in office. We have no real intelligence behind that, but Governor Abbott has indicated that he is interested in building a wall. If you're a Texan and someone's already solved the problem for you like Tommy Fisher could have could could have done.

I think that puts him sort of at the at the front of the list, right. Uh, what Tommy Fisher accomplished his was the bigger was the bigger thing here, which was that he built a wall on private land. This is a private project, right, It's not federal land, which is what has allowed the wall a wall to

exist elsewhere on the board. Um, the fact that Texas is all privately held along the Rio Grand that's a huge problem if you're going to do any sort of building like this, and why uh you know, it's sort of an unlikely success story for for him, although again I will mention that he's still million dollars. Yeah, he's still he'll still waiting to get paid. Well, let's move a little further west to West Texas. That was the site Tuesday of Jeff Bezos taking off from near Van Horne, Texas.

You were there, I was there. That's how I know with miss geography so well. I did a lot of driving in West Texas. And by the way, did you know that eighty miles an hour? I think I mean advisable. I think you can go as fast as you want in this teeny little Nissan that I'm hoping I could barely make it to eighty miles an hour, but I nonetheless was able to Ashley Vance had a great piece and has a great piece and the current issue of the magazine arguing that the future of space is much

bigger than just Bezos, Brandson or Musk. It was a great read to to really dig into ahead of my visit there. Yeah, so actually wrote this story. Um, he knows a lot about space and sort of the space economy, and what his ultimate takeaway I think in this story was like, you know, it's for all the billionaires in space. All of a sudden, that is just a very small amount of the bigger space story. The space economy, in

part helped by SPACs, actually has really caught fire. We're talking like what the economy of the future is really going to be powered by this? And I think, you know what Musk, the Musk angle here is. You know, obviously, um he's in the rocket business, but starlink and the internet potential is also on a lot of people's minds. Now, as as as that becomes potentially a really viable way to get cheap broadband to places that haven't had it yet. Um but he also found this kid, And this is

what I love about what's happened with space. He found a kid who's basically just been able to use satellites that have amazing imaging capabilities. And and this kid who's like just graduating college was the one who found what ends up being, um you know, nuclear a nuclears, a new nuclear site in China that here too, four was previously unknown. Um so actually goes a lot of different places. But it's like, forget about the billionaires. There's a lot

of other really interesting things happening in space. I think it's such an important point, and I think it's a really good way to think about billionaires going to space, because they've said that space torment tourism is just a small part of this. And if we were to think back to sixty years ago when Alan Shepard was the first American to go into space, we didn't know there

was going to be such thing as an Internet. We didn't know that there could be satellites who could deploy that Elon Musk could deploy and get Internet to millions of people who don't actually have Internet. So I think that the opportunities here are ones that we don't even know about, and it's potentially the breakthroughs are just going

to be coming with increasing speed. So the cost of getting up there, uh, still beyond my budget, but the the other effects that will come out of this stuff is going to be I think it's for the next five to ten years is gonna be really fascinating space to watch. I see what you did there, um, Joel, I do want to get to a couple more stories. Uh, this one by Kelly Gilblam product placement finds new relevance

and add free streaming. I think this is really interesting story because the part of the reason, and Kelly goes into this in the story. You know, because of the rivalry and the shake out between Apple and Facebook, there is this sort of new dawn that I think everyone's trying to figure out what it's gonna look like. How are advertisers going to spend that money when suddenly you can't Facebook maybe doesn't track them as well now that users have the ability to opt out with iPhones and whatnot.

So Kelly had this great little insight which was like, product placement has already been boom me and it's because people are getting out of Obviously the linear version of this on traditional shows and the streaming era makes it way more competitive because there's so much more opportunity and you can also digitally change the product part is unbelievable. The image that you have here like a green screen, take your pick? What what your brand here? Right? Well

thereos free lay you name. It could be Ruffles next week, That's what I mean. When can they change it based on who's watching? Yeah, I think it's tied to how much money you're willing to spend, maybe the length of the contract, but you know, I think the takeaway here is um is that we don't know how big this could get. But even a retro space like products, it could be on fire. Again. Well, it's a fantastic issue full of great stories. Joe Weber, Editor Bloomberg Business Week,

with me in the Bloomberg in Active Broker Studio. Check out the new issue of Bloomberg Business Week online and on news stands. Now, this is Bloomberg. You're listening to Bloomberg b This Week with Carol Master and Bloomberg Quick Takes. Tim Stinovic on Bloomberg Radio's Well Happy Friday, Everybody, tim Stenavig live in the Interactive Broker's studio in New York.

Carol Master is off today. The price of bitcoin right now pretty much flat, trading at just over one and fifty dollars, still down more than fifty from its high of nearly sixty five thousand dollars back in April. Well, let's get into all things bitcoin, cryptocurrency, decentralized finance a k a d FI and more with Michael Son and Shine, the CEO of Gray Scale Investments. It's the world's largest digital currency asset manager. Michael, it's so great to chat

with you. How you doing on this Friday afternoon. I am doing excellent. Thank you so much for having me excited to chat with you. Well, I'm excited as well. I want to start with the big picture here, just the price of bitcoin. I think still when people think cryptocurrency, bitcoin is the number one thing that comes to mind, and you can't help but think about that more than fifty to client that we have seen in recent months struggling to get back to anywhere close to where it

was back in April. Well, what do you make of the volatility that we've seen and sort of the struggle for it to get higher. I think investors are used to this kind of volatility UM in the digital currency asset class as a whole um that certainly includes bitcoin UM. It has been a very interesting market. I think we've seen a couple of UM exchanges UM have some leverage come out of them, which we generally think is something

that's healthy for the overall ecosystem. But when we do see pullbacks and prices like this, which is not a new phenomenon within crypto, we tend to see these kinds of corrections see the asset class form a stronger base to only eventually go on to take out higher highs over time. And so when investors do think the pullbacks, they will often use them opportunistically to add to their positions and be able to form you know, a larger position in digital assets like bitcoin and others. What about

the next positive catalyst for for bitcoin? I I can clearly remember the biggest negative catalysts that we recently heard about, and I think it's fair to say that Elon Musk expressing concerns a few months ago over the environmental cost associated with cryptocurrencies and and bitcoin, but that came after he said that Tesla would accept bitcoin is payment for Testlas cars, and that seems like a really big positive catalyst. What are you thinking is the next actual positive catalyst

for for bitcoin. We heard comments from Jack Dorsey yesterday about Twitter's future and bitcoin. They didn't seem to help bitcoins price much. I think you're going to continue to see more announcements of both bitcoin and the cryptoastic class as a whole continuing to being folded into the traditional financial services space. So even just yesterday you saw banks like JP Morgan announcing that they were going to give their clients the ability to invest in cryptocurrency funds, including

you know, great scale products. And I think that in the near term you're going to con and new to see wins for the asset class overall, whether some of those announcements do come from banks like JP Morgan and others, or you're continuing to see companies like Twitter and Square and Tesla and micro Strategy, you know, continuing to see bitcoin and other assets move onto corporate balance sheets, and now even seeing nation states looking at adopting bitcoin as

legal tender. These are the types of winds that I think helped to not only you know, solidify the role that crypto has with an investment community, but also really begins to shift perception. So exciting stuff from our point of view. Now that JP Morgan has made this announcement, who, in your opinion, do you think is the next bank to do something similar. Well, I think you're certainly going

to see that. And you know, it's already been the case that gray scale products have been available to be bought and sold through many of the online brokerage firms, but now moving into some of the wire houses like JP Morgan, would not surprise us to see some of the other wire houses and bulge bracted banks begin to

follow suit. We kind of seen a similar trend amongst many of them as they built out, either they're blockching working groups or even just made direct investments into digital asset related businesses so they can continue to not only learn about the asset class, but also demonstrate had just how fervently they're responding to investors preferences and and uh

wanting to get exposure to the A class. So when you're Michael speaking with these banks and getting an idea for what they want in the services that that they want to be able to provide their clients. JP Morgan Chase, for example, their wealth management clients are going to be allowed to invest in a selection of crypto funds, including gray Skill, Bitcoin Trust from you guys among others as well. Um, what are the what are the they trying to provide

their clients with? Like, what are the clients coming to them and saying that they need That's that's causing a bank like JPMorgan to come to you and say, we want our clients to get exposure to this. Well, as an investor today, there is a general appreciation that cryptocurrency as an asset class is not going to go a way. It's something that is here to stay and investors want

access to it now. The reason that JP Morgan and other banks have to make these policies or amend these policies is because they don't offer the ability for their investors to get access to bitcoin or other digital assets directly through their platforms. Their platforms are typically providing services that allow them to access lending and credit and buying stocks and bonds and ets, but not yet crypto, and so their clients are typically doing that type of business

away from the banks themselves. So if JP Morgan and others continue to open themselves up to having the ability for their clients to access cryptocurrency funds like gray Scale on their platform, but then they continue to have a more holistic picture of their clients investible assets, and not only that but also demonstrates to their clients that they're really listening to their preferences. What is the role that that you believe that bitcoin plays and a traditional portfolio

right now? Well, I think it depends on the kind of investor that you are. Um. I'd say the first is, you know, many investors look at bitcoin as a digital gold or a digital store of value. So they look at it as an asset that kind of maybe help, you know, curb inflation pressures that their portfolio may experience. So whereas investors maybe when to gold their bonds or other flights to safety, um, now they also have bitcoin

as an option in their portfolios. I think other investors may look at it as a technology investment more akin to maybe payment for some of the technology investments that

they may have in their portfolio. And then I think other investors may look at bitcoin um not only either as a payment mechanism, and so it maybe is something that you know, is more akin to remittance than some of the money transfer mechanisms that may be out there, and for some investors it's just an entirely new asset in their portfolios, and where they make room for it will vary depending on how they're allocated. I want to get right back to Michael Sonenshein, chief executive officer at

Gray Scale, joining us some phone from New York City. Michael, I want to get further into Gray Scales products and talk a little bit about GPTC and others. GBTC is the ticker for Gray Scales Bitcoin Trust. Uh, it's still trading at a discount to bitcoin. The idea here is that it does give investors exposure to bitcoin, but it's trading at a significant discount to the cryptocurrency right now. What's it going to take to to get those things

on par Well, that's that's exactly right. So Great Scale Bitcoin Trust ticker GBTC is solely impassively invested in bitcoin UM, the product trade you know as the world largest digital currency UM investment vehicle were the largest bitcoin funds hundreds of millions of dollars a day in notional trading volumes, and what we have seen over the last few months

is the product trading at a discount to navs. And so what we've seen is many investors, particular smart money and institutions, stepping into the product and buying shares of g BTC at a discount because is that actually allows them to own or control and have exposure to more bitcoin buying shares of GBTC at a discount than it would if they take that same amount of capital and

bought bitcoin in the super market. So you're arguing that that it's been a good thing for at least investors who have recently bought into it, because they're essentially if they were to buy today, get get a ten point three discount on the price of bitcoin. It has definitely been an interesting opportunity for investors who are looking for bitcoin exposure in the form of a security in a

brokerage account, retirement account, you name it. Over time, we do believe that the product will converge its price back towards its net asset value, or perhaps maybe even reverts to trading at a premium. But ultimately we are a hundred percent converting this product into an e t F when the sec is ready to make that kind of an approval, in which case the arbitrage mechanism is built in there to move the products back towards net asset value every day. When when do you think the SEC

will allow that? Well, I think the timeline around it is really tough to speculate on. I think the SEC is very encouraged and engaged with you know, participants like Gray Scale and others, but they're really looking to see the market lead to a point of maturation that's just not there yet, and looking for things like, you know, more regulation around the spot exchanges, surveillance sharing agreements between

the exchanges are really larger, significantly regulated market. So over time we'll get there, but when that will be is tough to speculate on. What has interests been like in some of the other products as cryptocurrency prices have been falling, Gray Scales Ethereum Trust, for example, it's been very robust. I think if you had asked me that question a couple of years ago, I'd tell you that investors were really only interested in bitcoin or interested in the ethereum

you know. Today, Great Scale maintains a family of fifteen different investment products, and that's really been built out in response to rising investor demand for access to either other digital assets or even certain subsets or themes within the

digital currency universe. So back to the idea of regulatory approval for bitcoin e t F. So what's a realist I know you don't want to make a prediction as far as the timeline goes, but what's a realistic way for investors to think about the actually getting exposure to bitcoin in any t F? Is it months as eight years? Well, I'd focus less on timelines and focus more on the opportunity.

I think that certainly products like g BTC and their success and liquidity and how widely traded and utilized they are, is really the empirical data that investors need to recognize that today investors are accessing bitcoin every single day through products like g BTC, and they're in fact not waiting for an EPF to come along, which certainly begs the question, well, then why do you guys even care about an e t S And the answer is that we do believe in et F will broaden us as to a wider

audience of investors, and ECPs have been a very popular way for investors to access all kinds of investment opportunities. So um, moral of the story is investors certainly aren't waiting, but we also know in e t F will brought in access even further. And Michael, what kind of flows are you you seeing right now, notably versus six months ago versus a year ago. Well, I think flows continue

to be really robust. Um. When we look at the ways in which investors have been wanting to deploy capital, they again really do often look at these pullbacks and prices at as opportunistic time to add to their positions.

I'd say we're also seeing an increased appetite amongst our investors to diversify that they don't want to just have bitcoin or just have a theorium exposure, but they're now looking at other areas to have exposure to things like you know, Defy we just launched the Great Scale D five fund, or looking at you know, protocols like file a coin and others that are really showing the other use cases for digital assets. Just in the fifteen seconds

we have left. What are you thinking in terms of product pipeline, Well, I'll tell you that we're not done the fifteen products gray Scale has today or all products we're proud of and are excited to bring to our investors um but certainly as market growth, our product lineup will grow with it. Well, there you have at Michael Sonensheine, chief executive Officer at Gray Scale, joining us on the phone from New York City. Thanks for listening to Bloomberg

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