U.S. Insurrection Clearing the Way for Coups

You can also listen to our radio show at two pm Eastern Time on Bloomberg Radio, or watch us on YouTube search Bloomberg Global News Listen. We've already talked about it a lot, and rightfully so, because this too is among our most right on the Bloomberg. It's all over social media as well, and we're talking about bitcoin. We're talking about Elon Musk, and Tim we're talking about Tesla. It's been hovering out about ten percent higher all day today.

Since about seven thirty this morning, when we learned that Tesla had make it at one point five billion dollar investment in bitcoin and also said, hey, we're going to start accepting bitcoin for Tesla's caught our attention. To right in the news room. Hey, let's get into it with Bloomberg News Markets editor Joe Wise and all co host of Big Amiss, Coming your Way at four thirty pm Wall Street Time on Bloomberg TV. Joe is socially distanced on the phone in our New York here. Hey, Joe

was in thought. Good to have you here. I mean, it's a Bitcoin story, but it's also a testless story. How do you see this? Like when you heard the news this morning, I mean I wasn't really surprised. It's interesting because I feel like in this market environment, Tesla and Bitcoin have been like coleinked, even when they weren't

officially linked, if you know what I mean. It's like their charts look similar, the stories look similar, something that seems completely different than the sort of mainstream, sort of iconoclastic. So I feel like there was something like inevitable, like only a matter of time. But I'm sure like be like the crossover of like Bitcoin holders and Elon fanboys is a you know, it was a Venn diagram would be very close to a circle, and so it almost feels like perfect now that like this makes it a

this makes the marriage official. Well, you said something really interesting on our Quick Take livestream this morning, um that I hadn't thought of, but it was this idea when a company starts to accept bitcoin, like Tesla announced today, it's actually not that big of a deal. Why is that? I think? You know, like in the end, it's like when when when Tesla is telling a car for like forty dollars, say, or fifty dollars as you can buy

this in bitcoin. All that's really happening is they're letting you enter in money into a sort of like bitcoin transaction processor then converted into dollars or vice versa, or the other way around. So it's as if they're saying, okay, we accepted in euros and then somewhere in the background they do a conversion. I thought, really that powerful. What's powerful in fury and we haven't seen this is when we started to see transactions that are really denominated in bitcoin.

And so in other words of a company like say Tesla word to say, here's our car and for the next year is going to be priced one bit coin each or two bitcoin each, and then if the price of bitcoin fluctuates, it's still priceding that bitcoin. And so that Therefore, let's say even bigcoin were to fall in half, which is very possible because if very volatile, then you would still be able to buy it for one bitcoin.

Then you start to see a system of uh um obligations and payments that are truly denominated in bitcoin as it is. It's more like a dollar transaction that's converted. So it's kind of cool, it's kind of fun, but it doesn't really mean that the item is priced in bigcoin as such. Bitcoin. Is it really then a unit of account? All right, Joe, but you can and you can buy other things in bitcoin. We know that. But it's Elon musk and and and it's Tesla doing it.

Because is there something we should read into it in terms of the company that's doing it in the brand? I mean, I would say this, Why would think if you look at a lot of like bitcoin holders, they're very reluctant to spend their bitcoin because they all think it's gonna go way higher in the future, and so no matter what it is, even if it's available, they're

probably not going to do it. On the other hand, they might make an exception for Tesla because Elen is cool, because he's made a point of putting some of the company's treasury into um into bitcoin itself, then that could be the kind of thing where it's like I could imagine some small subset of the bitcoin holding population that's like, you know what, I always said, I wasn't going to spend my bitcoin until you know, bitcoin was the new global unit of account, or until bitcoin is worth more

than gold. But for Elan in this case, because I get to be part of the story, because I get to be part of validating someone who's, you know, the richest guy in the world, maybe I'll buy a bitcoin with my Tesla and I suspect some people will do that, even if they sort of don't really feel like they should be spending it. A billion and a half dollars. It's it's not actually that much money for Tesla or of course Elon Musk either. What do you make of

the figure that they announced this morning. I mean, that's the thing, it's not like even that much really, so like, given Tesla's market cab, given that Elan the richest person in the world, UM, it's not that much. On the other hand, you know, it's like as big as Big Point is, and I think like the total value is something like three quarters of a trillion dollars. You know,

you still can't make that big purchases without making waves. So, you know, I think it's like, I think what I said this morning is like, I think Ellen is having a lot of fun right now, and I think when it's not exactly so we're in the stage. We're part of having fun. If you're like a rich billionaire is having fun with like cryptocurrencies, and this is his way of doing it. It's not a huge risk for Tesla's balance sheet one way or another, but it's kind of

like him being part of the story. And Tesla has got cars, and he's got rockets, and now he's got cryptocurrencies, and it's all part of the it's all part of the fun. Having said that, you know, and we've been talking with you about bitcoin for a while and several years, I feel like at this point, but is there something different about kind of the conversation and the stories that we're seeing surrounding bitcoin at this point, does it feel like it's becoming a little bit more legit? I think so.

I think so. I mean, look, you definitely have institutions that are willing to put at least some small allocation of their wealth into it. We think a lot of the story of was this idea of like bitcoin emerging as a as a store of wealth. And that's sort of like the new meme, which is that it's a savings vehicle, kind of like gold is. It's like, yes, it's not really great for spending, but just like goal is not great for spending. But bitcoin kind of is a sort of, uh, you know, a save sort of

wealth type of vehicle. So then naturally you have a few institutions at ultimately very small levels like dipping their toe in from that perspective, Alright, good stuff, always good, Thank you so much. And you've got a busy day, busy afternoon. Joe Wizenthal markets that are at Bloomberg News, co host of which miss come in your way at four thirty pm Wall Street Tom on Bloomberg TV. So be sure to check him out. He's always got smartcast,

smart conversations. Uh, and you've got to I always read this Five things to read that You've got to know. Who does the morning? I know, right, it's just like bam, bam bam everything I need to know. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Bloomberg Quick takes Tim Stinovich from Bloomberg Radio. So a bunch of things going on when it comes to the virus and vaccine too. Mentioned about Astra Zenica South Africa temporary halting the rollout there.

New York City indoor dining is going to resume on Friday, two days earlier than plan. And we are seeing tim coronavirus infections continuing to slow across the globe. India though, um some good news reporting fewer than a hundred fatalities for the third day in a row, and I know they've been struggling. Yeah, and even more locally here in New York. Indoor dining is going to resume Friday at capacity. In middle schools are going to reopen on February, which

is really really good. I know a lot of parents have been hoping kids could get back to school. Global cases though exceeding a hundred and six million deaths, passing two point three million, more than a hundred and thirty one million shots that have been given around the globe. Let's get back to UH. A guest, someone who has come to us several times throughout the pandemic is dr Iman Abuse ag is CEO and co founder at Incredible Health h and her company, Just a Reminder, connects hospitals

with nurses and other healthcare worker. She is with us once again on the phone in San Francisco. Doctor abuzaid, nice to have you back here on Bloomberg. How are you? And tell me what you're seeing from day to day when it comes to the virus and cases and hospitalizations, and then what you're seeing in terms of the vaccine rollout. Have have most of the folks UM that you've seen that our healthcare workers gotten vaccinated? Yeah? I'm doing well.

Thank you so much for having me. Yeah. So what we're seeing in our in our data and with you know, interacting with our customers. Uh. You know, over three hundred hospitals and health systems use our software to hire nurses and permanent roles UM across the country. And what we seem is actually the majority over seventy you know, over seventy of the nurses in these permanent roles have already been vaccinated, which is great news. But the real question

is like, how come I haven't been yet? Right, Because that's what we really need to get to UM, and it's me two factors. One is a supply shortage that your team has already had has just mentioned. The second factor, which is a little bit more um nuanced, is there is still some fear among healthcare workers about taking the

vaccine UM. A lot of that has to has to do with you know, quite a quite a lot of distrust has built up between healthcare workers and their employers and healthcare workers in the government when it comes to management of the pandemic. Um there's still a subset of workers that are pretty resistant to mandates and um there's

just some distrust out there. And so I think probably the biggest factor we can do over the next few weeks is explaining clearly the research behind the vaccine um, just kind of just a little bit more detail on it to get more healthcare workers comfortable with it so we can get to be of them vaccinated. How are

the nurses doing in terms of of workload? And we heard so much early on in the pandemic about so many of these health care workers just being over worked and exhausted, and there were so many stories about that. Has that eased up as as hospitals have, I don't want to say, you know, gotten better, because in different parts of the country. At any given moment, different hospitals are experiencing different things. But as the pandemic has worn on, Yeah, no, unfortunately,

that has not gotten better anything more widespread throughout the country. UM. In the beginning of the pandemic, you know, March last year, you know, the emphasis was really on the on the northeast.

But now at this point, you know, we're talking February, the pandemic is widespread throughout many states, and so every single hospital and help us and we work with is reporting staff shortages that your staff shortages, difficulties and getting enough staff um to fill these units because you know, there's a high, very high patient demand that's been caused

by the pandemic. Uh. And then what nurses are reporting is like you know, over two thirds of them are reporting high anxiety, high stress related to the pandemic and related to being overworked. UM. So unfortunately, and it has not eased up yet. But hopefully have cases go down and a number of hostilizations go down over the next few months. You know, we're hopeful that things will get a little bit better. Are you feeling just kind about twenty five seconds left that you are you feeling like

maybe by summer things start to feel quote unquote more normal. UM. That really that really just depends on how the you know, community um reacts to the vaccine and and and how quickly the vaccine rollout can be UM. Right now, there is a lot of frustration from healthcare workers towards their local communities who are not necessarily following guidelines, UM, you know, mandates, maths, so on, and it's just putting more healthcare workers at risk.

So hopefully the public health messaging will get better and we'll be accepted by by communities. And that's really what this is going to hinge on. All right, Gon, I'll leave it on that note. Hey, Emon, nice to have you back with us. Dr Iman Abuse, aid CEO and co founder at Incredible Health joining us on the phone from San Francisco. You know, it definitely feels like we're making progress and but yeah, it was really surprising for me to hear that it hasn't the workload hasn't het

up heased up for these healthcare workers. Yeah, it's still pretty tough on them. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovic from Bloomberg Radio. It's a real world illustration of a venture capitalist fantasy about the future of media. We're talking about the tiny tech startups sub stack that's reaching existential scale in the media industry. So writes Ellen Hewett. This story is really interesting.

I didn't know about them, You didn't know about it. It's it's We're gonna let Ellen and Joel talk about it. But yeah, it's mind blowing. How much some of these writers make over a million dollars a year. Pretty remarkable. So she writes about it for Bloomberg business Week. Let's get into her story. She has startups reporter Ellen Hewett on the phone in San Francisco, along a Bloomberg Business Week nitor Jill Weber on the access line in Brooklyn.

First of all, how did I mean, how did this come to your attention or how did you guys think about you wanted to put this in the magazine. Well, it's been a business that has really caught a lot of people, a lot of people's attention very quickly. Um in part because of those numbers that you just mentioned, because of the disruptive potential. Um And this is you know what I like love about it? Is that it's

this company that's effectively invisible UM. And that was one that we sort of just asked Ellen to kind of take a look at, and her, she being the amazing reporter that she has, like came back to us with like a fully realized idea. You know, which is the best part about working with people like Ellen and Bloomberg UM.

But the thing that you know has really struck everyone with it is like, you know, this invisible company that is basically taking over the software that generates a lot of the emails that you probably receive UM without even realizing that they're really the company underpinning at all. Uh So, so Ellen like rewind the clock. What was the opportunity

that that sub stack saw and and set out to capture. Yeah, they launched in seen and it's been actually kind of a really slow growth until I would say early twenty or EGN mid They did exactly what you were explaining.

They saw that there were some a few independent writers out there, including a guy named Ben Thompson runs a very popular UM tech strategy analysis blog, who were doing writing UM independently, and they had an audience as people who were willing to pay for access to you know this writing, so really prescribing to individual rather writers rather than subscribing to like the Washington Post or to Bloomberg.

And they thought, okay, well, if we just make the tools to build these sorts of individual independent writer mini businesses, UM, we can make it easier for any writer to make that jump, and then we'll just take ten percent. So it's really simple. And then basically what they've had to

do since then it's recruiting. They've been, um, in some cases aggressively recruiting some of these top writers who have um, you know, kind of distinct and very engaged followings and trying to convince them, hey, you should leave your cushy magazine job and come right for subject for your own boss, run your own newsletter, and and you can make a lot of money, and in some cases from these writers are doing so, although in my estimation many are also

not going to make that much money doing it. But but it is this very interesting kind of unbundling of writers, individual writers and bylines that you might follow away from the legacy publications that they might work at. So Ellen, as you note in your story, uh, other companies have taken note of of sub stack and are trying to do what sub stack is doing. Twitter bought Review recently. We learned recently that Facebook is working on newsletter tools.

According to the New York Times, can substack survive that kind of competition, Well, it's a great question. And and yes, there were even rumors in the fall that Twitter was maybe going to buy a sub stack, and substack co founders were like, that's not true at all, and then of course they bought the competitor, and and as mentioned, Facebook looking into this and and look, this this isn't um this isn't that hard to wrap. Okay, Like what

substact is selling is the convenience. They're saying, basically, just come to us, give us ten percent, but we'll make it so easy for you to set this up and maybe we'll send you know, some new readers your way.

But that that part hasn't really been realized yet. So they're big concern as I imagine they think about all the time, is that if you run a news letter on sub stack and you have, you know, tons of followers who are paying you money, at some point you're gonna stop and think, like, man, there are three versions of this out there that require more work to set up, then I would get that last ten percent for myself

rather than handing it over to a platform. So they're going to have to make sure that they make it valuable enough that people are going to stay, especially when their following is get really big. So what what's what to me is most interesting about the sub stect story is not only you know, suddenly it was like a business model that like was in the right place at the exact right time, and here we are in the pandemic and and they're able to monetize and scale really quickly.

But also I mean it's a little bit of a throwback we're talking about mel and newsletters, like is email really the future of media? Because that's effectively what sub spects that is. Yeah, and they have this very interesting take on all this, which is there if you look at the way that they present their business, they're very

anti engagement. They feel like the reason that we have all this horrible like misinformation polarization, um like like horrible strift division in our country from you know that's expanded on the internet is because of the social network desire for engagement that they're always looking for people who are going to engage more with content and that most engaging content is divisive or misleading or anything like that. And they're like, look, we're kind of like the Zen Quiet alternative,

like you just pay for quality. No part of our algorithm that's based on engagement. You're just signing up for these writers. And so so I think they would probably embrace this idea that they're going back to something older, because in many ways they're trying to position themselves as different from what has led, um, you know, what has led to our our current climate. So when they said, when they saw that Facebook and Twitter, we're dipping their

toes into the newsletter business. Um. You know, one of the co founders, Hamish Mackenzie, who we kind of profile in the story, he said, you know, this is kind of like Shell trying to say that they're going to build um, you know, like renewable energy plants, or they're just saying he's just trying to say that it's not in their DNA to build something that's doesn't rely on engagement. And so so my guess is they would actually kind

of embrace, embrace sex characterization. I don't know if people are ready to have their inbox the the place where they're getting all this news and in fact, um my understanding is that one of the features that people really want from subtext is actually a way to read your sub sect newsletters not in your inbox because you're used to using your inbox for like to do items and annoying emails that you don't want to look at. Maybe a bundle of a publication. That's what I love about.

Just one of the people I interviewed, there's a woman named Anne Helen Peterson, very mus writer, and she just this is going to end up looking at like because I want to hire him an editor and so old media of them good stuff. As always, Ellen Hewittt, thank you so much startups. Reporter of Bloomberg News, Del Weber, or thanks to you as well, editor of Bloomberg Business Week as well. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovich from Bloomberg Radio

earlier today. Red sticky, as we like to refer to at Bloomberg when an important headline crosses the Bloomberg well. That happened earlier this morning when me and Moore imposed martial law in its biggest cities following a third day of massive street protests opposing the February one military coup.

So that just happened about a week ago. So we're continuing to watch this situation, as does Bloomberg New Economy editorial director Andy Brown, who in his weekly column writes that after insurrectionists stormed the US capital, it shouldn't be a surprise at the General's and me and Moore decided to stage a coup. Let's bring in Andy for more, He joins us on the phone in New Hamps. You're Andy,

happy Monday. Nice to have you here. Make the connection, um, because I know you say it's not a causal link, but nonetheless, what were you thinking about when you put this column together? And what was the connection here between what happened in the capital and what what happened in Myanmar. Yes, so, as I say that there is no causal link, the connection is that democracy all over the world is in

full retreat. Last year was just a shocking year for democracy everywhere, and hardly it's because of the way the government's responded to the coronavirus pandemic UM using high tech surveillance techniques UM limiting travel, basically poking and prodding around into the personal lives of their citizens, which is you know what authoritarian regimes have been doing in response to public health crisis now, um, for hundreds of years. Uh. It's not the high tech bit, but certainly UM, the

power of the state advances with epidemics. UM. There is a link between those two. And you know, as I say so, so the the the the coup in in in Myanma didn't come out of nowhere. We're seeing this in the Middle East, We're seeing it in Africa, and of course we're seeing it in in Western countries which pride themselves as being these bastions of of of liberal democracy and freedoms. That's kind of a dismal thing to hear that over the last year we've seen democracies in retreat.

Is this the direction that things will continue or or are there indications that this can be reversed? Um? Look, this is the the Economist Intelligence unit which comes up with this Democracy Index has been tracking UM the advance of authoritarianism and the retreat of democracy since two thousand and six, and last year was the worst year on record. Only eight point four percent of the global population, they say, now live in what they call a full fledged democracy,

about one third living authoritarian regimes. The US is deemed under this index a flawed democracy. And the worst of it is, they don't really see a way back to full democracy because of the way that society has fragmented. They don't see the social solidarity there that is necessary

to rebuild a full democracy in the United States. Well, and that's what complicates it, right Andy, because you know, the US, you know, it's hard to be an arbiter of good democracy when your own democracy is flawed, right and if you're trying to kind of help other places around the world that are struggling with democracy, it doesn't put the US in a great leadership role right now. Well,

that's exactly right. So, you know, President Biden has has of course denounced the coup has Um, demanded a return to democracy, and has said that he wants to work with like minded democracies around the world to put pressure on the two leaders in Myanmar to uh to reverse themselves. Well, the problem, the problem is that right now the United States is not in a position, um to lead a a a democratic comeback in Myama, given that its own

democracy is right now so so flawed. Um, you know, so the the you know, the the generals in Myanmar essentially taking all this in their in their stride and and you know, have every reason to believe that they're

going to get away with it. And to the extent that that Biden and allies managed to punish the generals, it will only push them further into into the arms of of of China, thus advancing China's great strategy, which of course is to make the world safe for the kind of authoritarian regime that it is very much become. And as you were reporting on this story, what has to change the United States? For what did you learn

about what has to change in the United States? For you know, the social cohesion here needed to get closer to a full democracy and not a flawed democracy. Yeah, you know, um, the the the the the the prescriptions uh from at least from from the index, um really

are quite nebulous on on what America has to do. Um. The the real focus is, you know, the consequences of failure to revive a full democracy, which is that the United States won't be able to you know, be the shining beacon on the hill as it you know, the shining city on the hill, the beacon of democracy that

has dolvanized democratic forces all over the world. And East Asia of course, is where liberal democracy as advanced by the United States its World War two has recorded some of its greatest successes, from the Philippines to Indonesia, and of course South Korea, Japan and and and and so on. And it's really tragic to see the United States position now in these countries so much, very much in in

in retreat. Yeah, and it just you also get into just the difficult positions that whether it's Tokyo, whether it's Singapore, whether it's India, it's just gotten a lot more complicated as um. You know, these countries have gotten involved two more in uh ME and more so it's it's interesting, Andy, Um, thank you so much. I think this is an important story that we've got to keep a watch on uh in terms of what's going on there and what might

happen next. Andy Brown is editorial director at Bloomberg New Economy. Check out all of their work in Andy's work at new econ Forum that you can find on Twitter, and of course Andy joining us on the phone from New Hampshire Road Journal. Yeah, but you let me drive, no, no, no, who's going drug home. Honey, please, I'll do the riding revel lets me. I want to drive, just drive baby, question try this is the drive to the globe. Comm thanks,

we'll drying us Dawn on Bloomberg Radio ALR. I get ready to wrap up the first trading day of the week. Let's get to the drive to the close. Larry Pittkowski is back with us co founder, or i should say, managing partner in portfolio manager good Haven Capital Management. They've got roughly a hundred and sixty million in assets under management, based in Milburn, New Jersey, and that's where we find Larry on this Monday. Good to have you here. How are you, Carol? I'm doing okay. How are you doing

all right? Hanging in there. It's a little cold, there's a lot of snow on the ground, but yeah, it's a lot of snow. Um. I don't know, how do you feel about this market environment right now? You know, Carol, I think it's very important in investing to know where your circle of competence begins and ends. And I don't think you know, making macro predictions or you know, having a strongly held view about the level of the market and where it's going is within mind. But you know,

clearly we have pockets of a lot of speculation. You have the market's overall selling it, uh, you know, higher than average multiples, and you know, but you can either sit around and and philosophies about that all day, or as I said recently in writing to uh, you know, to my investors, I can get up a little earlier and go to bed a little bit later in search of mispriced securities for us, rather than sitting around and ranting about what are obvious excesses in certain areas. And

so that's how I choose to spend the day. Okay, so what are some of those miss of securities that you're finding? Well, a couple of a couple of areas that we have found as of late. Uh. First of all, you know, I also recently wrote a bit over the last year or so about how I've I think the terms valuing growth and value investing have been somewhat misused, and so I've over the last year or so wrote a bit about how being a value investor, UH, does

not mean you can't own good quality, growing companies. It does not mean you have to have a draconian negative view of the future, and it does not mean you need to own crummy, shrinking businesses and those things. And I think growth is a part of value, and I think that's all gone a little bit uh misused from a nomenclature standpoint in the past, and I've tried to

address it, and you know, I think it's important. In the past, I have written about how I thought there were some interesting opportunities in the property and casualty insurance area, which was a sector that I thought had some tail winds. You know, there aren't that many advantages to not being twenty five years old, but one of them is you've seen a bunch of different cycles and this to me looks like one of those periods in property and casual

the insurance where it's a hard market. As they say, prices and terms are rising to favor the insurance and I think that vodes well for well run companies in that sector. And so we have some exposure there and we recently added chub, which has been well run by Evan Greenberg for many years and had some very solid earnings recently, and I think they should benefit from what looks like a healthy environment for the next couple of years.

So you know, when in the context of of property and casualty insurance, a lot of people like to talk about the disruptor Lemonade um is that do you see that as competition to chub or or you know in that sense, I think it's important. You know, I have read the Lemonade stuff. I think it is important to look at some of the new companies which have in many as is. You know, there's there's often an underlying you know, reinsurance company underneath the surface who's taking on

a lot of the risk. But I think digitization is important in especially you know insurance and you know the primaries who faced the consumer. I think it's very important. Another holding we have in the sector's Progressive insurance, which has been one of the you know, I think leaders and using big data to price well and auto insurance. Those auto insurance is seeing not seeing the same positive pricing momentum you're seeing in a lot of other lines

of property and casualty insurance. But I think it's important to pay attention. If you're a business analyst like I consider myself to any new entrant in any new form of technology and decide if you think it could be materially disruptive or if you think the companies that you're invested in can also harness technology to their benefits. So I'm comfortable with our companies and how they're awake to

some of the friends that are changing. But I'm always looking at everybody, knew, who shows up that I am aware of. Yeah, interesting, Um, I know. And like you said, I think the price increases is a key right because there's been year after year of kind of fierce industry wide price competition. So if that's changing that that fundamentally then maybe changes the prospect and outlook for CHAP. Correct. I think it does, and I think, you know, we'll

see how long it lasts. But I think you are seeing, you know, you look at the results from you know, across UH that sector, and you're seeing much better results than you've seen over the last couple of years. That they still have claims to deal with from you know, natural disasters and the COVID claims. But I think the well run ones, which are the ones that we own, should be able to do just fine for a while,

to say the least. Okay, so you guys recently bought p G and E, which is a surprising thing for for me to read. Um, it's filed Chapter eleven bankruptcy twice because of exposure to wildfire uh abilities. Um, what's the argument there, T. G and E is I think a remade company now that it has come out of bankruptcy, there is a wildfire fund. They have articulated they think earnings are going to be about a buck and then grow back ten per cent a year on a go

forward basis. I think there had been terrible mismanagement in the past from a standpoint of how to think about safety, and I think they have done their best to try and wipe the slate clean and start over with some real protection from a liability perspective and with a go forward earnings growth profile that looks decent, and with a share price most importantly that looked very undervalued compared to where the peers trade. And they were also searching at

the time that we bought it for new management. And it turns out they hired the very well respected Patty Poppy who came from CMS Energy, and then just recently hired Adam right Away from Berkshire Hathaway Energies. Those are really credible and impressive leaders that should be able to I hope, over time return the company to really good standing in the growth profile over in your term looks above average and the share price looks much cheaper than

the peers. Yeah, a whole new risk modeling and fire spread technology that they've been deploying and laying out to further reduce wildfire risk, among other things. Um, Larry good to check in with you. Stay, stay warm and take care. Larry Pitkowski, he's managing partner portfolio manager at good Haven Capital Management. On the phone from Bilbourg, New Jersey. Thanks

for listening to Bloomberg Business Week. Download the podcast on iTunes, SoundCloud, or Bloomberg dot com, and you can also listen to our radio show at two pm Eastern on Bloomberg Radio or watch us on YouTube. Search to Bloomberg Global News