Good morning.
It's Thursday, the twenty eighth of September here in London. This is the Bloomberg Day ba Q podcast. I'm Caroline Hepki.
And I'm Stephen Carroll. Coming up today, exclusive reporting on the ousted hedge fund manager chrispin Odi, who's been joking about his accusers in taped conversations.
The US Department of Justice steps up it's probe into ubs over suspected sanctions, breaches by credit sweets.
And taking a walk on the wild side. We look at one investor's bid to make rewilding a multi billion dollar trade.
Let's start with a round up of our top stories.
The ousted Headphones manager chrispin Ody had told a private investigator he was being targeted by the quote woke brigade when thirteen women first accused him of sexual misconduct. Bloomberg's Will Shaw obtained a recording of that conversation.
In late June, a couple of weeks after the allegations began, he contacted a private investigator called Steph Friedman, who previously done work for Harvey U. Weinstein. Crispin Odi speaks very frankly about the case against him. He says Harvey had access to a lot of so much more attractive girls. I have to tell you. During that call, he says, if you lose an arm, you only get ten grand. You know, if someone touches you on the bottom, you
might be able to get one hundred grand. He also complains about his treatment by the media and says he's been targeted by the woke brigade.
Speaking to Will Shaw about the recording, Crispin Odi said, quote, it was very early in that journey, but I still think reducing seventeen minutes to three soundbites is mean. He declined to discuss the situation further with Bloomberg. Two of the hedge fund managers alleged victims have filed a lawsuit against him and his former firm. Odi refutes those claims and the other allegations that have been leveled against him.
The US Department of Justice has stepped up its probe into credit suiteson ubs over suspected compliance failures that allowed Russian clients to evade sanctions. Bloomberg's Hugo Miller broke the story.
When you're onboard to use the bank jargon a client, or when you off board a client, you have to make sure that you're doing the necessary compliance and in this case, as we've seen in a number of other cases with credit suites, in this case, what the DOJ suspects is that there were just some fundamental failures of due diligence that allowed the bank, primarily Credit Squeze, to continue to provide banking services for sanctioned Russians.
Hugo Miller says that the probe is still at an early stage and may not result in charges or a settlement. However, that wasn't enough to prevent volatile moves in UBS's share price, which dropped by close to eight percent before recovering some of those losses.
The world's most indebted property developer, the China Evergrand Group, has suspended trading in Hong Kong with more here's Bloomberg's Brian Curtis.
No reason given for the halt. It comes a day after sources told us Evergrant's chairman Hui Kai Jan was taken away by police, where he is said to be under residential surveillance. It comes at a delicate time for the big developer. Evergrand has scrapped key creditor meetings and revealed that it cannot issue new bonds. That's a setback to a planned restructuring and would seem to suggest an existential crisis in Hong Kong. Brian Curtis, Bloomberg Radio.
The SEC is reportedly finalizing settlements with about two dozen Wall Street firms to resolve investigations into lapses in record keeping. Reuter's site sources saying that these settlements are with the investment advisors and broker dealers. Fines have already topped two point five billion dollars over the regulators two year crackdown on traders uses of WhatsApp and other unofficial messaging apps.
A shutdown of the US government looks increasingly likely, with Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy calling for major changes to border policy to appease his rebels. Even his Senate ally, Mitch McConnell drew a line.
But we're focusing on on here in the Senate is to try to keep the government open, to try to continue to pay the people who are essential to our security, like air traffic controllers at a border patrol. Capital belize.
McConnell's and McCarthy's lack of unity makes any deal with the President unlikely the government will start to run out of funding on Sunday. Unlike the deathlimit crisis earlier this year, the economic damage is initially mild and builds over time.
Now a report suggests that UK home buyers are grabbing the biggest discounts in five years as the market reels from high interest rates.
Bloomberg's U and Potts has more The.
Average discount to asking price for newly agreed home sales is now nearly five percent in London and Southeast England as buyas flexen negotiating power. According to property website Zuopler. That's the highest in the country and compares with the discount of two point eight percent for sales elsewhere. Separate survey data from KPMG suggests more than twenty percent of UK mortgage helders are now considering selling up off the
rapid rise in borrowing costs in London. I'm une pots Bloomberg Radio.
Apple iPhone fifteen pro users are complaining that the device can get too hot to handle, setting a potential setback for the company's flagship product. Consumers say that the high temperatures and the newest iPhone fifteen models happened during use or while charging. Apple says the issue could stem from
the iPhone's intensive setup process. Now, we haven't had pandas in the news for a while, which I think is a terrible shame, frankly, But our colleagues have a fascinating story about how all of the pandas in American zoos are going back to China because they're all there on loan, part of panda diplomacy, as it was known. But their time essentially is up, and by December, the likes of the three pandas that are in the Washington National Zoo are going to be going back to China.
Yeah.
I mean, if you are a panda lover, of course you'll know that the Edinburgh Zoo has the same is it's going to send back two pandas at the end of this year. Also, I mean basically it's there is a question mark about I mean, we know that panda diplomacy is used by China to sort of reward friends and perhaps punish foes. So how much is this about US China relations and how much is it simply you know,
part of the contractual agreement. I did not actually understand that all pandas in the world actually belonged to China and all of their offspring, and they're effectively sort of given to zoos around the world because they're a huge attraction for visitors, you know, that cuddly and lovable as they are, but actually and yes, huge merchandising opportunities, but they're effectively rented. The zoos have to pay China, you know, for the pleasure of hosting them.
And so yeah.
Although of course, when the producer this morning asked me about pandas or we discussed, I just thought he was talking about panda bombs.
I didn't.
I clearly am too deep into finance.
This is to come back to Caroline. You've gone over the cliff. Come back right. Let's start to the story that we're following for you this morning, and this is the news around Ubs, their shares declining by as much as seven point nine percent after Bloomberg reported that the US Department of Justice had stepped up its probe into Credit Suite and Ubs over suspected compliance failures that allowed
Russian clients to evade sanctions. Joining US now to explain the story is Boomberg Swiss banking reporter Marion have Tomorrow. Marion Great to have you with us on this story. Explain to us how did the Department of Justice probe begin morning.
Yes, So, basically, back in the spring of this year, the Department of Justice had been already looking into the Swiss banks and their roles with Russian assets and whether there was potential breaches of excasions at the time, and so essentially at the time they sent a series of subpoenas just to get more information. And what we understand is that that now has developed into a big, your wider scale investigation and more specifically into Credits Suite.
So what do we know about it so far? What are the risks attached?
So at the moment, it looks like it's just information gathering. UBS has been briefed by the DOJ in the US because of course UBS now owns Credit Suite, and so it's just an ongoing inquiry.
We're not sure.
Exactly what parts of the businesses are looking at and what exactly they've found so far, but we do know that they're looking into possible compliance failures at both banks and that would obviously come with.
With very serious consequences if they had been find that.
Marrying this news under lines read the legal headaches that UBS has after its hasty merger with Credit Suit.
It does in some instances.
So UBS has had a good look at the dockets so to speak, of Credit Suite legal cases and potential legal cases, and so part of when they bought Credit Suite they did do some provisioning for some of these legal cases. From from what I expect, UBS is somewhat aware of the high risk here. That being said, since this is an ongoing inquiry, they don't necessarily have an idea of the size and scale of what this means for credits wesed legally and what it means for themselves legally.
So it does underscore one of the challenges of this very complicated merger.
What about government relations. You report some frustration actually on a government level, more around the Swiss authorities.
Yeah, so historically the US and Swiss geopolitically have not always seen eye to eye when it comes to the banks. You'll you'll remember, you know, there was a series of tax of Asian settlements with the Swiss banks over US
citizens hiding money in Switzerland to US taxes. So there have been frustrations in the past on Swiss Swiss banks sort of cooperating with authorities in the US over issues like this, and so it looks like there's targeting bilateral conversations with the banks directly for the moment rather than
going through government government routes. And you know, the Swiss haven't necessarily done everything that the US could expect them of them to, you know, make sure these sanctions against Russia have been enforced.
What has the Bank said about all of this?
So the bank.
Doesn't generally comment on these these types of investigations, but generally, from what we understand, UBS has been cooperating with any request that GJ has had. And you know they'll be quite keen to make sure that they that they come to a good resolution on this, because that would be problematic otherwise.
Yeah.
Absolutely, Marian, thank you so much for being with us this morning. Bloomberg Swiss Banking reporter Marian Health Tamaire the on the latest when it comes to the UBS credit Swies merger.
Now you've probably heard of Rewilding. The successful entrepreneur behind solar centry, Jeremy Leggett, is now betting on the nascent nature recovery or rewild doing industry. On a three thousand five hundred acre estate in Scotland now joining us stage to discuss as Bloomberg's ESG reporter and Natasha White. Natasha, great to have you with us. This project is attracted quite a bit of attention. Can you explain exactly what it is?
We kind of delve into legates one man's venture to make money out of nature restoration or kind of rewilding, and this is something that's historically been in the domain
of governments and NGOs. But like you said, Leggot, who's the founder of one of the UK's most successful solo firm, Solo Century, has kind of set his sights on this what he calls nascent nature recovery industry, and so he's been buying up a states across Scotland, most recently Taviaalk earlier this year, with a view to kind of return them to their to their form former glory. And he sort of sees this nature recovery, this rewilding industry as a kin to kind of well he calls it groundhog Day.
So he witnessed the boom and renewables in the nineteen nineties and he's looking at this sector and saying, you know, kind of betting that's this is the next big thing, but we kind of delve into the tensions that he's experiencing and doing.
So, yeah, I suppose what if you're on Earth, about why he's pursuing this, what his bet is about.
Yes, I think what's different here is he's this is all about biodiversity. So we all know about the climate crisis, but I think less is known or less airtime is given to the crisis in nature of the biodiversity crisis. You know, we all know there's less bugs on our
windscreen and there's less bees on our flowers. But there was a report that just came out today on the state of nature in the UK and in Scotland which had some really kind of abysmal statistics, and so governments globally are are, you know, increasingly looking at this problem.
There was a big pact, the Nature Packed in December last year in Montreal that's kind of been dubbed Uck into the Paris Agreement, whereby representatives from almost two hundred countries committed to halting and reversing biodiversity loss by twenty thirty and are starting to put in in the groundwork for doing so. In one aspect, there of course, is the money. So there's not enough money coming from governments to address this problem, and so the private CEA has
been called called upon to play its parts. But it's also you know, it's historically been quite a tricky problem about how how do you make money out of nature protection and restoration. And what Legate's eyeing with his venture is this nascent biodiversity credits market.
Okay, and how I mean how lacent is that market? Where is the opportunities that lie within it At the moment.
It's it's very small. There are regulated what's called biodiversity offset markets in a number of countries. England is due to has one that's due to enter inter force. Well it was due to enter into force in November. It's just recently been delayed until I think early in the new year. So these are BUI diversity offset markets where for example, if you're looking to build build houses or dig a mine, you have to you're regulated to compensate at least one hundred percent, if not more, for your
impact on nature. So those exist at national levels and you know, Legate is besting that Scotland will soon introduce a similar law there and is in kind of conversations with policymakers about that, but he's also looking at this international market for bio diversity credits, where you know, if a company wants to build a mining kenure, it can go and buy credits from legate in Scotland to compensate
for those impacts. And that's that's nascent, but there's you know, there's statistics out that suggest it could reach thirty five billion by twenty fifty, which is, you know, fifteen times the size of the carbon market right now. So some people are eyeing this market and are quite bullish about its potential.
Briefly, though domestically within Scotland legs up against some opposition though.
There's like broad different or brushes of issues here. First is that you know, people are pushing back about on whether nature conservation and restoration is really the domain in the private sector, is whether it's something that's best at delve with by governments.
This is Bloomberg Daybreak Europe, your morning brief on the stories making news from London to Wall Street and beyond.
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