White House Eyeing $1T Stimulus Package

Week on iTunes, SoundCloud, bl Bloomberg dot com. You can also listen to our radio show at two pm Eastern on Bloomberg Radio every weekday, or watch us on YouTube by searching Bloomberg Global News. Let's get right into the Business Week agenda. Now, as Charlie mentioned, we have a lot to talk about. Jina Martin Adams is with this, chief equity strategist for Bloomberg Intelligence, joining us on the phone from New Jersey. Also in New Jersey is where

we find Dave Wilson, stocks editor for Bloomberg. He is there in the Garden State. So Dave give us the brief contours of this market. We heard some of the top line numbers from Charlie, what do we need to know about this? Trade? Technology stocks holding up relatively well on the broader market not so much. I mean, Charlie

didn't talk about airlines, so I will. I mean, you got United to the leading of decline in the group, you know, warning employees that what's happening with the coronavirus in the South and West is going to be an issue in terms of people getting on planes. Uh. The airline said it seen dropping bookings, especially in Newark, New Jersey, just up the road from yours, truly, So you know, you've got United shares at the moment the worst performers in the SMP five hundred down more than six percent.

And you see the other carriers going along for the ride, American Delta and Southwest all lower here, So you know that's a concern, you know. On the other hand, I mean you see as some stories related to the coronavirus in terms of UH, potential vaccines that are really getting attention. UH. Front and center in that score is Novavax starts up thirty five percent after where the company got a billion six from the US government to develop it's a prob

nineteen vaccine, so that that definitely gets your attention. Yeah, that definitely gets a stock moving. Let's bring in Gina because Gina I feel like things that might get the markets moving, maybe in a good way, maybe in a bad way, depends on how the earning season comes out. We've got to get ready for earnings again. Yeah, I totally agree that earnings is a potential catalyst for stocks.

In addition to potential policy changes coming at the end of July in the form of maybe another fiscal package or at least an extension of unemployment benefits. UM, the earning season is absolutely top of mind for US as the next potential catalyst for stocks. You know, I will say this, it's hard to get much lower in terms of expectations. Analysts are forecasting a drop in earnings on a year ago basis, which is just an extraordinary decline in history. I don't think you'd find a single quarter

in which we've seen such an extended, extensive decline. UM. Nonetheless, US uh that that low bar should make for a relatively easy beat. The question is whether or not beating such a low bar will be enough for stock prices, and I happen to think that it may not be enough. What you actually probably need to see is also a little bit of visibility emerge from company management and with

respect to the outlook. Uh, you know, one of the most devastating impacts of the first quarter with companies just absolutely splashed all guidance and just that we're not even going to tell you anything because we don't know anything. So to the extent that some of these cyclically oriented companies, some of the high volatility type of stocks, can come out with some commentary to suggest that hey, maybe we

will survive. We have enough liquidity to get through the next couple of quarters, and we'll move into one and things will start to look better. That could be really positive for the equity market. Well, and Gina to to that exact point, I mean, you start to wonder whether some CEOs are going to want to start to differentiate themselves right to say, look, we've made the right moves, or we have the right liquidity, We've tapped the right sources.

Because I think this is just my opinion that investors are gonna maybe not put up much longer with this idea of like, yeah, we just don't know what's going to happen. It's like, well, yeah, well we don't know what's going to happen, but it's kind of your job to tell us what you think is going to happen, right, Yeah, exactly, And I think that the smart managements will actually take the opportunity to kitchen sink as much as they can

in the second quarter. So you know, you've got a lot of potential volatility with Yeah, maybe things weren't as bad as we thought, but hey, we can take the opportunity to take this charge and kind of move past the second quarter. Everybody's expecting so much weakness anyway, things will inevitably get better in the second half. Well, now maybe we can disclose just how much better they think,

you know, we think they'll get. And even if companies are saying, you know, we're not anticipating a huge improvement in economic growth, well okay, but you are anticipating at least some improvement right relative to second quarter. We know that second quarter was when all the shutdowns happen, were no longer completely shut down. What does your reality look like in a not completely shut down a outomy and

can we extrapolate that out into the future. So I do think the expectations bar is very different, right, And I think in that expectation is really about more than anything, right, And I think it's fair to ask CEOs because they've got to make decisions whether they need money, whether they need to let go workers. So they've got to be having some kind of forecasting going on because they've got

to make decisions. So well, absolutely, and even for the companies that are really strong, what are you doing with all that cash? Because one of the interesting things that happened in the first quarter is cash stores built tremendously. We talk a lot about cash flow declines, but cash stores also built up. What are you going to do with that going forward is a huge question that nobody's talking about. All right, Gina Martin Adams, thank you so much,

Chief Equity Status of course for Bloomberg Intelligence. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason Kelly on Bloomberg Radio. Well, this is one of those rub your hands together interviews, Carroll, because I'm so excited to catch up again with Craig Gordon Washington Burr, chief executive editor for Bloomberg, join us on the phone from the nation's

capital and its environs. So, Craig, I am tempted to just talk about YouTube radio and the return to serious XM that both you and I are so happy about. But we have other business to discuss, and I guess I would start by asking you, as you look across all that your reporters are working on, all the inputs you're getting, what's the most important story in Washington right now?

I think the most important story right now actually is Donald Trump's um handling of the current situation regarding things like the Confederate flag and some of these racial issues. Obviously, uh, there's the simulus, there's the virus. There's a lot going on. But we are seeing a real window into Trump's psyche um as he starts to look at the same phone numbers we're looking at that showed him kind of uh,

you know, blinking red across the board. Most of the swing states right now suggested to be going to biden the country right track wrong track number, which is one of the main numbers that people look at, you know, in terms of President's prospects and re election, are all going the arrows are all in the wrong direction for Trump, and instead of you know, finding a message to try to either unite the country during COVID or Uh, you know, some of the some of the racial here and healing

that might be availed to him, he's actually going in the complete opposite direction. He talked, he talked again this morning a little bit about the Confederate flag. That was a tweet from yesterday. Actually he said, Kelly and Conway

out to defend his comments on that. Um, obviously we all saw the speeches from Friday and Saturday night where he's standing him out rushmore a real chance again to kind of try to have some unifying words, you know, standing under the visages of our our greatest presidents, and really went went pretty pretty negative. So I think a lot of times with Trump, what you see is what you get. Um, he's not a man who has a pretty good has a very good poker face. And I

think he's worried about losing. And I think the more he's worried about losing, he's gonna start lashing out in these you know, and he's frankly pretty ugly ways. Uh, as he tries to keep Joe Biden down, does he not want to be president? Oh? You know, I won't put him on cosh quite that far. That's always done.

The question right now a surprised than Donald Trump on election. UM, but he definitely I feel like, you know, he's he's a politician who kind of one with sort of one good trick, and that trick was Muslim ban it was the wall, it was us versus them. It was sort of, you know, speaking to the so called downtrodden Americans and kind of stoking some of those darker impulses in the American psyche. I think that's how he got to be the president the first time he's the president. Now, a

president has a lot of tools at their disposal. There could be virus things, or against some of the racial hearing, even just economic economic message I'm gonna bring the economy back, which he sort of says a lot but doesn't do much. UM. And instead he's kind of going back to that one trick over and over. And I would expectfully argue, even perhaps in an even slightly darker way. UM. The problem for Trump is a lot of the country's not really with him. I mean, you know, he won by this

limits of majorities. Wasn't even a majority plurality last time. UM. And even some of those people are scared about the virus. They don't like the way things are going with the economy. We know the seniors who were pretty strong for him in are kind of starting to drift away. And so, I mean, you know, we all know Donald Trump's advisors have a pretty poor record of getting them to change his ways. But boy, this does not feel like he's playing a winning hand right now. And yet he keeps

doubling down and doubling down and doubling down. Well, Craig, you know, we just have a headline crossing the Bloomberg about California seeing six thousand nine virus cases versus about sixty for the fourteen day average. You know, we constantly are watching these virus headlines and a lot of states that are very important to the president. You know, we're seeing cases spike in, the problem getting bigger and bigger. How problematic is his handling of the virus ultimately to

him come November? Yeah, and this to me is a but it was sort of the mystery of it. We had a trific story up by Gray recording of Mike Dorning just yesterday on the Bloomberg terminal talking about how in the in the very states where the cases are up, Trump's numbers are down. It's almost like a one to one correlation, where the cases are up, the numbers are down. This is in blue states like California, what you mentioned, New York, New Jersey, which obviously had his share of problems.

This is Florida, This is Aaron's owner. This is places he won and and really needs to win again, um if he has any chance of all of getting back into the White House. So again, it does seem to sort of even run counter to that. These are his voters, these are his states, this is Trump country, and they are suffering right now with the virus, and yet they look to the White House, they look to the president and they're really I mean, Trump almost barely mentions the

virus anymore. Obviously we went from the extreme of those nightly two and three hour long briefings too. Now he barely will say the word, you know, v I R U, s UM, and I'm sorry. I think some of the voters in those places, again, maybe they don't want to wear a mask, and maybe they wish they could go back to the barn. Whatever people are feeling right now, we're all little anty. I'm in week seventeen or work

from home. You know, I feel their pain, but I do think they're looking to the White House and looking to the leader of the country for some answers to help their states and their friends and neighbors, and they're seeing nothing. And that's a problem for Trump well and Craig. It's also interesting to see a shift in tone, it feels like, over the last week from whether it's Mitch McConnell or even Vice President Pence saying where a mask? I mean, it sounds so ridiculous to point that out.

And at the same time it's notable that, yeah, we we have spreading the work right now on pensis comments because I picked up a little bit on that, just as you did over the weekend, that even Mike Pence is the loyalist. Loyalist obviously carried a lot of water for this president. Is is kind of, ever so slightly edging away from him on the question of a mask, and it's okay to wear a mask. He and Mitch McConnell no one's idea of flaming liberal is out there

saying the same thing. So right, It's like, that's what strikes me, and I think that we made me answer your question the way I did at the top the

top here what's the most important thing. It's both the Trump is doubling Donna what feels to me, and I think the poll suggests kind of a losing message, but he's starting to lose his loyalist when Mike Pence is starting to talk a little differently in the Donald Trump boy, that's that's a pretty notable day, Mitch McConnell, some of these other folks, and that's where the trouble really is right now for President Trump. So, Craig, we've got a new tell all book from a Trump insider. What do

we know about this book? So right? This is this just got about today or is being released today. Eric Larson, one of our legal team reporters, managed to get his hands on it, so good for him. This is Mary Trump is the President Trump's niece, so she got to see a lot of up close and personal. Uh. The interaction mostly between the book seems to center fork a lot on the interaction between Trump and his father, obviously a queen's um real estate developer, just like the President

turned into um. And really it's it's hard to read um. Obviously we all feel everybody always feel like you know the president a little bit, you know, just because you see the person so often. But boy, you're getting a very ugly, um look inside the family dynamic here where Fred Trump his father just drove Donald very hard. Um. You know, she accuses them essentially withholding his love and

support and turning turning Donald Trump. One of the ones that left out of me was she's a she herself as a clinical syche top collegist, so she's not just you know, sort of an armchair person here assarch that her uncle has all nine clinical criteria for being a narcissist. So um, for anyone who might have thought that about the president, Uh, there's a clinical psychologist who got to live with them, you know, off and on for many many years making that same diagnosis. It's pretty it's pretty

chilling stuff. And even the idea and this sits a little uh in the in the zeitgeist right now, this notion that he paid someone to take the s a t for I mean, all these things just you know, it's a little bit of a drip, drip drip that turns into something more than that. It feels like, yeah, that's how I tend to view these books, Like, I'm not sure how many people sort of sit and read the whole canon of Donald Trump from you know, the Woodward's first book all the way up to Bolton and

now and now this book. But I do think they tend to, like you say, little details of them sort of break through the zeitgeist. In this case, maybe as he paid someone to take the s A T and to get into Warden, which he's bragged about almost every day of his life since. Then with the Bolton book, I think it was you know that he had asked uh, the Chinese president g to buy a bunch of agricultural

products to help and get reelected. You know, again, a very sort of picture of a president literally bartering his own re election with the leader of a of a country that is certainly no friend of the United States, certainly arrival UM. So So I don't know that they you know, like again, you have to read the whole library of them to form an opinion about Trump, but the little pieces that come out, it's another brick on the pile for people who again are already looking at

the president with questions about UM. I think that I think the virus specifically damaging to Donald Trump in this way, and that UM presidents expected of Americans expect the presidence to be sort of empathetic. You know, Clinton got became

a little bit of a punchline. You know, I feel you're paying, but I do think that's what Americans look to the presidents to do at a time of a national crisis or a disaster, uh in Clint's case, the Oklahoma City bombing, you know, more recently obviously for Trump,

the virus. I think you could put right. I mean, I think we all remember those images and that video of George W. Bush at Ground zero, perfect example, and and that is that moment when the president becomes bigger than the person, bigger than the job, becomes a national you know, figure, a national healer and national consoler. And I think you could take every word Donald Trump said and sympath need to people who call COVID and put

it on a single page. I mean, I remember watching those briefings and just being struck, night after night ter night of how he just even the most cursory, sort of perfunctory words of sympathy or empathy or concern almost did not pass his lips. And again, I guess if if Mary Trump were here, she tells he's he's a narcissist. So that's you know, that's they tend to only see

themselves and not the rest of the world. But I really do think the virus in that way exposed Trump just in a really sort of brutal way that the person that he is. You know, again, sometimes you want the president to be a tough guy and different things. Well, I think right now people are looking for a little bit of empathy, a little bit of human compassion. They're

not finding it in Donald Trump. Yeah, considering that, you know, the nation has been in lockdown and everybody kind of experiencing all of this together, you certainly probably can make the case for saying you want a president who understands that if you put it all together, though, it takes me craig to another story that's among the most read

by Jonathan Bernstein about um, oh, not that one. I'm sorry, it's another story, but it talks about Nick Wadham about the pandemic response turning America first into America lest I do wonder how if you add all of this up, what it does for the United States on a global state. Yeah, that was I'm really proud of that story. In the State Department reporter and he um, he kind of he kind of observed, you know, again, Trump came to office

on a travel band keeping on some of the Muslim nations. Well, now the US is so the subject of a travel band of sorts. The youth says Americans can't travel there because of our high rates of the virus. And he kind of goes to the story and lay that all the examples of how again a time of a global crisis, the United States often to be the leader, sort of

pulling the rest of the world along and something. In this case, we're kind of the laggered um and people are you know, the suspicion of Trump grows ever deeper. I think this is actually an issue that would happen even if Joe Biden gets elected, that the world has learned we were, you know, they're always just one election away from the United States turning inward in the way that Donald Trump did, and Joe Biden would try to reverse that. But I don't think feeling way quickly, Greg

got to leave it there, unfortunately. Great to catch up to the u DC Bureau Chief and Executive Vedor Craig Gordon. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason Kelly on Bloomberg Radio. Now we Jason have turned to her before to hear about her firsthand experiences of dealing with COVID nineteen. Her stories have been featured in the magazine. Back with Us is Bloomberg News Financial Investigations Senior writer

Stephanie Baker. She's joining us once again on the phone from London, and she has taken several antibody tests before she could trust the results. So let's get into her experience here. Stephanie, is good to have you back with us. Tell us about this latest story. You had five antibody tests that you've taken before you could really kind of

trust the results, right, that's right. UM. A couple of months ago, I took four antibody tests a finger prick antibody tests that were on the market at the time that many people had questioned their reliability, UM, and I got conflicting results. I got two positives and two negatives and sort of gave up, even though I had cross checked them with various other doctors and nurses who had tested positive for COVID. So I was left a bit

confused about my status. When UM, some of the newer tests came out that are based on an intravenous blood draw UM. They appear to be more accurate and more sensitive. So I finally got around to taking one of these tests, the Abbot tests, which is does have some pretty good data behind it, and I wasn't depositive, and I was somewhat relieved that I figured I have three positives versus two negatives, and one of the positives seems to be more reliable and has some pretty hard science behind it.

So having studied this, Stephanie, I have to ask you, why is this so hard? I I agree it shouldn't be this hard, and I think it's hard because we are still learning so much about this virus UM. You know. I think some of the tests were trying to figure out what is the best way to go about UM, you know, finding the most effective antibodies, you know, is it against the spike protein or is against the nucleo capsid which is another kind of antibody that the COVID

nineteen generates UM. And I think there was a lot of time wasted on these finger protests, which some of them can be good and reliable, but they're just not as sensitive as the intravenous blood draw. The blood draw is a hard thing to roll out on a mass scale. It's more expensive, it's more time consuming, um, you know, but the data seems to indicate that this is the better approach. We still don't know what it means to

have antibodies, and I think that's the biggest problem. There's indications that it does provide some protection, we don't know how long that lasts, um, And I think that's the real question mark over these tests. What do it What does it really mean to be positive? That's such a good point because I think Stephanie when we first started talking about the antibody tests, were like, Okay, this is the holy grail. We're going to find out if you had it and then you're okay, and then you've got

and immunity and go back out into the world. And now we're realizing it's not so easy. And I do wonder how did it kind of change your psyche in terms of Okay, you know or you think you know right, because you've done five tests and the majority of saying one thing. I mean, how has it impacted your world in terms of how you go back and re enter. I think it has made me more relaxed about the

risk of contracting it for sure. Um. You know, I'm I'm still being cautious because I think that's the responsible thing to do. UM, but I do look at my risks of say, contracting it by going into a store or um even a restaurant as less than it would have done otherwise. UM. So you know, but I think I think I do have a responsibility to be careful because we just don't have those long term studies showing what it means. We don't know how long it lasts.

I you know, my antibodies might fade. We don't know. And until those studies are done, I need to be the sort of responsible pandemic citizen and and be careful and cautious around social distancing. So, Stephanie, in your real life as a Bloomberg reporter, I know that you are very knowledgeable about Wall Street and the city there in London and all of the gymnastics that these big firms, especially the financial firms, are going through in terms of

getting people back to work. Look at this through that lens for us, if you can, because you do that so nicely in your story, And what role the antibody tests and sort of testing in general is going to play in terms of getting back to office. Yeah, so I thought I would check with some of the big banks and figure out if if they were using these antibody tests. UM. I only found credit Swiss Group is one who is offering antibody testing to its employees in Switzerland.

It's looking at rolling it out to other hubs, but it's not it's only for people coming back to the office and they're not requiring them to disclo as the results. It's more of a sort of peace of mind perk for employees. UM. Other banks have been more cautious. And you know, I think there are some you know, potential legal issues that maybe they're they're wary of. UM. You know, I think it's I think it's um, you know, not

exactly the silver bullet to get people back in the office. UM. And you know, I think it's a sort of they're taking a sort of weight and see approach, um, you know, to see what kind of data comes out. I mean, we do need to remember antibody testing is used to to take blood plasma from people that can be used to treat patients with those antibodies. So they're not. It's not a meaningless test. It does tell us something. I do wish we would know more about what it tells us,

and I think we will find out in the coming month. Well, were you approached? I am curious after you know you're testing. I mean, I wonder what that process is to do Hospitals approach people once they know about somebody who's had it and has potentially the antibodies. I'm just curious about kind of that supply chain, if you will. Yeah, in the UK, I know that there are various researchers advertising

for people to come in and donate blood plasma. Some people are using it as a backdoor way of getting an antibody test for free. Um. And you know, others are I think offering it, are looking for potential donors amongst healthcare workers, you know, where infections have been higher. UM.

So I mean it's still an evolving science. Um. And you know, I think, you know, I think they'll will probably see more research coming out about that and the effects of using antibodies to treat patients and in the future. I do feel like it's a piece of the puzzle totally. Yeah, an important piece for sure, and we really appreciate your reporting and candidly, your candor, and your willingness to sort of share this not just with us but with all

of our readers and viewers and listeners. Stephanie Baker really appreciated Financial Investigation. Senior writer for Bloomberg joining us on the phone from London. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason Kelly on Bloomberg Radio. Well, Jason, we know American Express has been involved big time in helping out the small business owner for years. They created that Small Business Saturday. I think back in UM Today's Business Week Small Business Urvival Guide. We've got AMEX at

it again with a perk to its cardholders. Let's bring in Kate Crater. She's food editor at Bloomberg Pursuit. She's on the phone in New York City with a little bit more on what's going on. Kate Crater, Jason and I love when you join us. How are you me too? How you guys? Very happy to hear your voices. Likewise, so tell us what's going on. We want to talk about restaurants in a moment, but tell us about what AMEX is up to. Yeah, AMEX is doing something nice.

They have committed over two hundred million dollars to a perk for cardholders, all car holders, and it's up to a fifty dollar benefit if you stop small. So for every ten dollars you spend, um you get, you get, not fifty. That would be great. For everything dollars to spend, you get five dollars back up to ten times, so it could be a fifty dollar perk um for using your American Express cards to support small businesses including restaurants, and um, that's a good thing. And so what's the idea?

I mean, I think I understand the idea, but I mean the idea is that restaurants they need help. Here, Kate, yeah, boy, they need all the help. They really need all the help you can give them. And so there are and most of them are so many of them are independently

owned and small. And so if you use your American Express card, including including RESI which is now American Expressive Restaurant Reservation Platform, they have sort of moved to doing at home delivery packages and you can use your cards and ordering food and get a five dollar discounts. I think it's great. I think it's great because I think you know, it's something Kate. Jason and I've talked about

this since we've been in Lockdown. We've we've thought about the local businesses, whether especially in terms of restaurants who deliver, to really try and reach out to them, to support them because it's really been tough for them in terms of lifelines. UM, and we forget I think as a community that you know, so many of those restaurants that are out there, they are truly you know, small businesses, they really are. And you know, I got to do

actually a story about how Chinese restaurants I go. One small bit of good news in UM in all the bad news about restaurants is how how well neighborhood Chinese restaurants are coming back, in part because neighborhood supports delivery. And one place doing Fong on the Upper West Side was doing a hundreds percent of the business they did UM on a rainy night that they would have done if there's dining room had been opened. So it makes

it difference. Ordering from restaurants makes a difference. Yeah, And so that help us understand that, not but but and help us understand that, Kate, because how sustainable is that for the broad restaurant industry or is it really just limited to a certain segment. I know you that we can't give specific numbers or predictions about that, but I do wonder, knowing the mechanics of food and restaurants as well as you do. I mean, how much hope is there for people that that that really can be at

least a lifeline. It's some I mean it's a lifeline. That's exactly the right word. It doesn't it's not going to support every restaurant. And if you weren't in good shape going into the pandemic, it's not you are probably not going to be in better shape on the other

side of it. But I think the best restaurants and the and the ones that are really gonna go on word are the ones to have figured out a sort of hybrid model where you know, where you have like a food delivery system that works maybe a grocery or three delivery thing as well. And in some cases outdoor dining does seem to be making a little bit of

a different couple. We're having very crazy weather in New York, so you think you're going to go out to eat at six o'clock and then it pours rain, at four, So it couldn't be harder for restaurants right now. Um, but some things like this American Express benefit for small businesses, Does I really think it's going to encoach me to order an extra one or two times? I think, yeah, I agree with you, um Kate, because we talked about it at home all the time. I also do wonder.

I know we've had some conversations with you know, some chefs and well known chefs that even like the high end is is embracing that takeout community when that wasn't something they did before. No, they haven't. You know, Danny Meyers certainly, you know he was so as you know he did. He told us sort of dramatically he didn't think he would reopen UM before there was a bad scene. And now he's really though he's decided that, Um probably it was part of his master plan all along. But

he's um crafting some really cool delivery options. And he's also said, um actually on Bloomberg that he sees like hospitality. He thinks people can consider hospitality in a new way that can include how you pick up food from Union Square cafe. You know, if that if you used to define hospitality is being within four walls, it can now be outside those four walls. Yeah, I mean it is interesting that sort of different way that you react, um or that you can interact. I should say, Kate, only

about forty seconds left. So what's the outlook for fine dining at this point? We're still going to see a lot of restaurants closed. Um I I'm afraid the answer to that is going to be yes, because they're not. You know, like Daniel Hohome told us, it's not it didn't make sense people there wasn't like a huge hunger for eleven Madison Park delivery or was he interested in it.

But I am. I think some of these restaurants, in fact and working on a story, um, I think some of these rests finding a different way or a different model that might at least help them help them like try and make a go of it. Well, fingers cross, Kate, and we'll look forward to that story as we look forward to all of your reporting that you put out there for Bloomberg pursuits in Bloomberg Terminal and Bloomberg dot com. Kit Crater some socially distance Kate Crater time. I know,

I'm like, I'll go to a Park. I'll sit six ft away and I just want to find with her and sit and be kick crater food at Blomberg Perces. Check out all of her great work on the Bloomberg Terminal and Bloomberg dot Com journal. Now, but you let me drive, no, no, no no, honey, please, I'll do the right vel. I want to dry, just drive the questions trying. This is the Drive to the Globe Community. Thanks. We'll

drying us Dawn on Bloomberg Radio. It is time for the Drive to the Clothes Manhannah is with US portfolio manager and Managing director of E s G Investing at Summit Global Investments. They are based in Salt Lake City, and that's exactly where we find Matt on this Tuesday. Matt, nice to have you here on Bloomberg Radio with Jason and myself. First of all, how's it going in Salt Lake City. I have a niece there who's a doctor, and so we've been hearing stories. But I'm just curious

how your your world is going. It's going quite uh, you know, well overall COVID cases are picking up, but the weather's nice. Uh you know. I actually just made it to some national parks and Utah recently and got to see some of the sites and some of the beauty kind of grounds you a little bit to see, you you know, what mother nature can do. So now Utah and Salt Lake City is a fantastic place, and you're not feeling maybe some of the effects that some some other places kind of south of you and and

west of you are seeing. In terms of a search, it's not quite as bad to say what you're seeing like in in Arizona in California, but we've definitely seen you know, pick up and say mask usage caps. Not as much as I would like to see, but you know, people are taking as serious. But you know, I think, you know, as country, we still have our ways to go,

but hopefully we can you know, band together and overcome. Yeah, I guess, you know, and we hope so, certainly for your case, having lived through it all here in the New York metro area, I do wonder Matt, how some of this um shade your view on the economic bounce back, especially as we get ready to move into earning season and we'll start to hear from ceo is about their

business and hopefully we'll hear more about their outlooks yeah, certainly. So, you know, the COVID nineteen world is certainly a new world for all of us, and we believe it's gonna institute some aromatic consumer you know shift and just the workplace shifts as well. But for example, work from home is is not going anywhere, and what does that mean? That means people are gonna drive lets. Commercial real estate

demand is going to be hit. Industrials in terms of sector is going to be weaker, and you know, things like restaurants, entertainment that that's gonna be weaker. And just in terms of just kind of a longer term secular shifts coming out of some of these behavioral shifts, but more in the near term or we gonna bounce back. That's you know, we all hope for a V shaped recovery, but the volt room history doesn't really provide such a recovery.

For example, even the global financial crisis, it took five years ago from ten percent unemployment to six. Uh, you know, we're sitting at eleven. So you know, we're you know, thinking years, not not months, maybe not five years, but certainly if you know, we're not going to be back down to where we were anytime soon, well, matt one place where folks have not had to wait long. We really didn't have to wait at all for a rebound

WI in tech stocks. Talk to us about some of the names that you like there because the legs of Amazon, Microsoft, Uh, you know, they've done great generally speaking, and you know this has been an area we talk a lot about it with our stock experts internally and with smart investors like you. I mean, this has just been a phenomenon in a lot of ways. Yeah. So one thing both Microsoft to Amazon have a common is cloud. That's certainly

going to be picking up. Kind of the initial hit with covid kind of delayed some cloud adoptions, but in the long term, the COVID world certainly going to bring additional cloud adoption, not sort of thinking benefit big players such as Microsoft and Amazon. In fact, Microsoft actualsoft your year growth uh in March, so we only expect that to accelerate. You have that aspect, and then they both have other things going for him as well. Pick Microsoft

what they call their productivity and Business process segment. So thank Microsoft Office, Microsoft Teams. I don't know about you, guys, but I'm using that type stuff a lot more than average. For example, my firm. Since we've been working from home, we've been using Microsoft Teams, and I know we're not alone in that adoption. That's certainly making to be helping, you know, Microsoft, then Amazon. I think we all know once you go prime, you don't really go back just

the shipping. Uh. And they're bringing in a lot of new customers, so I'm really anxious to see prime numbers and what they're going to be doing. Uh. You know they have they have a lot of COVID expenses. So I'm not necessarily as concerned about uh kind of near term quarter, but much more anxious to see are they really bringing in new customers and they converting uh you know, trials and whatnot. And I think they are, you know,

I have It's funny. I was I had to pop in to pick up a prescription over the weekend in one of the I think it was Done Read or Walgreens or something, and I did think about it was interesting a lot of the shelves were empty. But I don't know if you think about this, Jason, like because of the lockdown, Like I don't do any of that

impulse buying, right. You know, you go in and you go in for a bottle of shampoo when you come out with a ton of more things that I do wonder, But part of me kind of loves that just Okay, I need this, I'll buy it right when I need it. It's very much like inventory, you know, you know, just in time, and I like kind of buying things that way.

And I do wonder Matt, you know how you think about how consumers change going forward and what might be some of those lasting trends that ultimately either benefit or hurt an Amazon in the long term. Well, I don't know about you, but I've been doing those impulse buys on Amazon, taking a look at my own try to card statements and seeing Amazon Amazon, Amazon, Amazon doing uh,

these small you know, impulse buys. But from a kind of you know, brick and mortar retail standpoint, overall, we like the bigger players, so I think more like your balmarts and targets and costcos of the world much more

than your smaller niche retailers. Uh. And you know, ultimately we think those smaller retailers you're gonna have a quite a bit of trouble both compete against the bigger boxes and you know, e commerce, but also just and Puy you know, the COVID world, and they're just they don't have to scale to ship the way Walmart's and Amazons to. So uh, they might be in quite a bit of trouble. But the bigger box retailers, you know, Walmart's up quite a bit today. Last at check too, was about six percent.

They should do quite well. Yeah, absolutely, all right, Well, interesting discussion. Thank you so much for your insights. Matt Hannah, portfolio manager Managing director of E s G Investing for SEMIT Global Investments. Johnny is on the phone from beautiful Salt Lake City. Thanks so much for listening to Bloomberg Business Week. Download the podcast on iTunes, South Cloud, Bloomberg

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