Bloomberg Businessweek Weekend - March 21st, 2025 - Bloomberg Businessweek

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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
This is Bloomberg Business Week Insight from the reporters and
editors that bring you America's most trusted business magazine, plus
global business, finance and tech news. The Bloomberg Business Week
Podcast with Carol Masser and Tim Stenoveek on Bloomberg Radio.

Speaker 3 (00:26):
Hi, everyone, Welcome to the Bloomberg Business Week Weekend Podcast.
This past week, big macro issues certainly on the minds
of investors.

Speaker 4 (00:34):
This is Fedhair J.

Speaker 3 (00:35):
Powell, in the latest FOMC meeting and decision downplayed growth
concerns in the impact of President Trump's trade war on prices,
even calling the inflationary effect transitory. The President responded by
suggesting the FED should cut interest rates. Still, the US
Central Bank said that two rate cuts are on the table.

Speaker 1 (00:54):
This year, the war in Ukraine entered a new chapter
after Donald Trump's calls with both Russian and Ukrainian president
cidents led to a thirty day truce preventing strikes on
each other's power infrastructure. So this hour we tackled nearly
three year war with the two leading experts on Russia
and whether these talks have any.

Speaker 3 (01:11):
Merit, Plus all things Elon from SpaceX to Tesla to
Doje and x. It's been quite a week for the
world's richest person. And in our next hour, a read
on the consumer with Carnival CEO Josh Weinstein, plus the
affordability crisis at US colleges and how some of the
nation's top schools are addressing it. Also we do it
all by the way, in case you haven't noticed, we're

(01:33):
going to talk about protein packed, low carb meals with
Mediterranean flair from a self taught cook who you probably
know from Instagram.

Speaker 1 (01:40):
All that to come. We begin, though, with the latest
in the Russia Ukraine conflict. A voice that we've turned
to often is doctor Angela Sten, a senior fellow at
the Brookings Institution at a former National Intelligence officer for
Russia and Eurasia at the National Intelligence Council who also
served in the Office of Policy Planning at the US
Department of State. She's the author of the twenty nineteen
book Putin's World, Russia Against the West and with the Rest.

Speaker 5 (02:04):
And the way we got here is right. The President
Trump said during the campaign that he was going to
end this war in twenty four hours. It would never
have started had he been president at the time. It
took a little more than twenty four hours to get
this particular phone call with Putin, although we know that
he had previous ones after his election. And so he

(02:27):
got the Ukrainians by putting pressure on them to agree
to a thirty day total cease fire, and that's what
he said he wants from the Russians. I've just been
reading the Russian readout, the Kremlins readout of the talks.
It's a little different from the one that we got
from the US side, and it mentions that Trump asked

(02:47):
Putin for a cease fire on hitting energy and infrastructure targets,
and it said that, you know, Putin was favorably inclined
to it, It didn't actually necessarily say that he agreed
with it. And a lot of it had to do
with the restoration of US Russian relations, and apparently they're
going to organize hockey games between Russia and the United States.

(03:10):
But the thing that's most notable in the Russian one,
and I think your correspondent already alluded to it, is
that Putin's saying that they have to get to the
fundamental causes, the root causes of why this war broke out,
and that's going to go right back to NATO to
Ukraine wanting to be part of the West and to

(03:32):
putin essentially saying that can happen. So I will be
curious to see how this works out. I'd also like
to know how they're going to enforce this very limited
but still important ceasefire. Don't forget Russia has destroyed seventy
percent of Ukraine's electricity production during this war. How are
they going to monitor this and then what comes after it?

Speaker 1 (03:55):
But Angela doesn't seem like to you that it is
indeed the beginning of the end of this war.

Speaker 5 (04:00):
Maybe I think what it's certainly the beginning of the
US and Russia established, re establishing relations, and we've heard
that from President Trump. Is it the beginning of the
end of this war? I'm still I think the jury's
out on that. I think we have to see how
long Houghton drags out the negotiations before he agrees to

(04:22):
a total cease fire. And again, he hasn't really shown
that he's interested in ending this war anytime soon. He's
much more interested in restoring these relations with the US
and ending his isolation.

Speaker 4 (04:35):
That's interesting.

Speaker 3 (04:36):
The other thing, I wonder Angelain something that we've talked
about with you before. I mean, are there ever really
any guarantees that President Pulton won't try to invade Ukraine
or another country again? And how does the outcome of
this negotiate negotiation for an end to the war kind
of determine the likelihood of that happening again.

Speaker 5 (04:55):
So, as President Zelenski, unfortunately for him, pointed out in
the overval Office when he then got the president, the
vice president very angry with him, Russia has violated every
cease fire it's signed with Ukraine, certainly since the annexation
of Primeiere in twenty fourteen. And Russia has also violated
every treaty it's signed with Ukraine since its independence. So

(05:18):
I think one has to be very skeptical. And this
is of course why President Zelenski, again unfortunately for him,
in the Oval Office, wanted to talk about security guarantees,
because without very robust security guarantees, there's absolutely no reason
to believe that Russia wouldn't try and invade Ukraine again.

(05:40):
The best security guarantee we know would be Ukraine joining NATO.
That's been taken off the cards now by the Trump administration,
but it needs these guarantees. And the Europeans, the French,
the British, and other European countries have said they're willing
to provide security guarantees, boots on the ground to be

(06:02):
a stabilizing force, stabilization force once the war ends, but
they say they need American backup for this, and that's
something which the Trump administration has not committed itself to.

Speaker 6 (06:14):
Angela.

Speaker 1 (06:15):
Let's say this is the beginning of the end of
the war and it does end, what does Russia look
like on the other side of this. Is it stronger
or weaker than it was?

Speaker 7 (06:27):
Is it more?

Speaker 1 (06:27):
Is Putin more emboldened than he was pre invasion?

Speaker 5 (06:32):
Yeah, so what it looks like is, I mean, the
economy is not in good shape and it's going to
get worse the longer this war goes on for Putin.
So if the war ends, that would and obviously if
the sanctions are removed, which they would be if the
war ends at some point, then that would be very
beneficial for Putin. But yes, he comes out of this
looking stronger. He invaded another country and provoked and presumably,

(06:59):
I mean, we have to see if Ukraine has to
make territorial concessions to Russia. He will then, you know,
have taken twenty percent of Ukraine. And unless there are
these very robust security guarantees, he could invade again. And
now he'll be in you know, he'll be invited back
to the United States. Maybe the Europeans won't want to

(07:20):
deal with him for any time soon. But Russia's actually
strengthened its international position in many ways while it's been
fighting this war.

Speaker 3 (07:30):
But is there some credibility Angela in President Trump trying
to create some kind of economic cooperation or more economic
cooperation between the US and Russia to create a different
future and relationship with Russia going forwoting and is there
some good to that.

Speaker 5 (07:49):
Well, in the nineteen nineties, there were a lot of
American firms that were very active in Russia, energy companies,
large firms, small firms. They were making money and they
were doing quite well. And yet the political relationship between
the US and Russia was very difficult. There were a
couple of high points after nine to eleven when the

(08:09):
US and Russia with Putin, you know, worked together in
terms of the beginning of the US campaign in Afghanistan. Also,
I should point out that there were thousands of American
business people in Ukraine when Russia invaded. That didn't stop
Russia from invading. So of course there are arguments to
build up economic ties with Russia. But I think history

(08:33):
shows us and even the experience of the last thirty years.
Putin always likes to separate economics from politics, and you
can have a good or a strong economic relationship with
Russia and it doesn't seem to have that much impact
on what Russia does politically or militarily, particularly under Putin.

Speaker 1 (08:51):
You know, I asked what Russia would look like after this,
but what about Ukraine? Because this is the country that
three years ago we were talking to you and so
many other people thought this war would be over just
in a matter of hours, a matter of days, a
matter of weeks. But look what Ukraine has been able
to do to defend itself. What does Ukraine look like
on the other side, You know, on.

Speaker 5 (09:11):
The good side, Ukraine now has the strongest and largest
army in Europe. It's developed very sophisticated technical technological capabilities.
It's been using electronic warfare. It's much more sophisticated than that.
On the other hand, of course, its economy has suffered greatly,

(09:33):
and you know, it's had cities and villages obliterated by
the Russians, so it's going to need an enormous amount
of economic assistance and investment if it is to recover.
It's also lost a large number of soldiers. We don't
quite know, but I think for both Ukraine and Russia
it's in the hundreds of thousands. And it also has

(09:56):
millions of Ukrainians are now living abroad because of the war.
They need to come back and they need to help
rebuild the country. So economically it's it's you know, in
very poor shape, even though other aspects militarily it's better off,
but it will still be in a very fragile state
at the end of the war.

Speaker 3 (10:15):
Angela, you know, I was thinking about this a lot,
like what is the relationship between President Putin and President Trump?
And I know what we've talked with you about this before,
And is Russia a great power? Is it a great economy?
You already referenced that it wasn't. They're businesses, their alliances,
their leadership.

Speaker 4 (10:31):
I mean, is.

Speaker 3 (10:32):
It an economic and political model to emulate?

Speaker 5 (10:36):
Well, it's not an economic model to emulate because it's
essentially a hydrocarbon exporter. It doesn't have a very modern economy.
You know, I always when I teach my students, I say,
tell me how many products in your home are from
China and how many from Russia. Well, you know the
answers to that there many of them from China, then
on from Russia. So it earns a lot of money

(10:59):
by selling hydro carbons, but it doesn't have really a
modern economy. It has a shrinking population. It has a
major demographic problem, and it's had that ever since the
fall of the Soviet Union and even before then. But
militarily it is a superpower, and that's in history. Russia
has always been a great power because of its military,

(11:20):
not because of its economy. And so it is you know,
I think the largest nuclear power, the US and Russia,
the two nuclear superpowers. The Russians have more warheads than
we do, and so in that sense, it's a great power.
And because of the hydrocarbons, and of course its location.
It's the largest country in the world sitting astride Europe

(11:41):
and Asia, so it has many strong endowments. But it economically,
it really does need to modernize.

Speaker 1 (11:50):
Hey, just thirty seconds left, doctor sten. It does raise
the question, though, how the rest of the world keeps
putin in check, given the strength of its military and
given his ambitions, how does that happen?

Speaker 8 (12:02):
Well, we know that he.

Speaker 5 (12:04):
Has ambitions that go beyond Ukraine, and that's why the
Europeans are very worried about it. And now you see
France offering you a nuclear umbrella to the rest of Europe.
You see some European countries, even Poland, talking about should
they acquire nuclear weapons. So this is one of the
impacts of this brutal war is at least country countries

(12:25):
in Europe reminding themselves that they're still vulnerable to a
potential Russian invasion, and some of them are talking about
the possibility of a war with Russia within the next
five years.

Speaker 3 (12:35):
Bottom line ten seconds. This is a good this is
a good move. This is some progress on the call.

Speaker 5 (12:43):
Yes it is, I mean hopefully if they implement this
for a cease file, of course it's a good move.

Speaker 3 (12:48):
All right. My guess is we're going to be coming
back to you a lot more still on this and
we so appreciate that we can. Angela, thank you so much,
doctor Angela stant Senior, fellow at the Brookings Institution, a
member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and her book
author of Putin's World.

Speaker 4 (13:03):
Be sure to check it out.

Speaker 2 (13:04):
You're listening to the Bloomberg Business Week podcast. Catch us
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Speaker 3 (13:18):
A new book out notes when the hammer and sickle
came down in late nineteen ninety one, Russia's new market
opened for business. From banking to brewery, sectors emerged out
of nowhere, and for the next three decades this proto
capitalism transformed Russian society. But as this book also notes
in its own words, everything changed once Russia launched the

(13:39):
full scale invasion of Ukraine in twenty twenty two.

Speaker 1 (13:42):
Someone with distinct knowledge in the dynamics between Russia and
the companies that do business there is Charles Hecker. Charles
is a journalist and risk management consultant. He's also the
author of the new book Zero Sum, The Arc of
International Business in Russia. Charles has spent forty years working
in the Soviet Union and in RUSSA I think.

Speaker 9 (14:00):
Right now somewhere we're between sort of two steps forward,
one step back, or maybe even one step forward two
steps back, I mean from President Trump from President Zelenski.
We can at least draw the conclusion that the two
presidents are once again sort of speaking regularly, speaking normally,
and without the anger and the hostility that we saw
of a couple of weeks ago that really set this
process back dramatically. So we have a bit of a

(14:23):
victory there in that the two presidents are communicating. As
far as the actual peace agreement or the cease fire
between Russia and Ukraine, both sides are already accusing each
other of violating that. So there were attacks allegedly from
Russia on Ukrainian energy installations, and Russia says that Ukraine
is doing the exact same thing back.

Speaker 3 (14:43):
So when Steve Woodkoff says he believes that I think
he said to some extent, well, some of these attacks
were already happening, or I don't know. I guess the
devil and timing is always in the detail, or the
devil's in the details. He believes that President Putin is
acting in good faith. Your knowledge of President Putin and
how he does things, do you think he is.

Speaker 8 (15:06):
Well.

Speaker 9 (15:07):
One of President Trump's predecessors in the White House when
talking about Russia, always said trust, but verify, And you know,
there hasn't been a whole lot of verification going on lately.
And what we do know is that President Putin has
in the past gone back on his word when it
comes to holding off on attacking Ukraine. And so with
the fact that the timing, as you suggest, is still

(15:28):
incredibly vague on when this is all going to start
and when the ceasefire will kick off, we still don't
know first of all, what Putin's word is and when
or if he'll start to obey it.

Speaker 1 (15:39):
So I just want to get your thoughts about where
we are in your view, if this actually is the
beginning of the end of the war. You mentioned that
both sides are already not agreeing to what had been
agreed upon, but you also said that it's good news
that the US is speaking to both of these parties.
Do you actually think this is the beginning the end

(16:00):
of the war.

Speaker 8 (16:01):
It might be.

Speaker 9 (16:02):
I mean, I think if this is the beginning of
the end of the war, it's going to take a
lot longer than any of us anticipate. And a lot
longer than any of the actors in these negotiations are
telling us. I mean, we know, look that the strategic
driver for Putin behind all of this is to keep fighting.
So when he says that he's engaged in ceasefire negotiations,
when he says this he's interested in a ceasefire, he's

(16:25):
really not being entirely genuine with his counterparties, because really
what Putin wants to do is to continue to press on.
He thinks he's winning on the ground in Ukraine. His
progress has been a little bit better than previously, and
right now there's very little incentive for him to stop.

Speaker 1 (16:40):
So that's the perfect place to sort of transition to
business in Russia over the last few decades, something that
you've been writing about and that you know a lot about.
If we were talking to you three years ago, we'd
be talking to you about all the American businesses that
have announced that they've stopped doing business in Russia as
a result of Russia's invasion of you. I think a

(17:01):
lot of people then would have thought this is going
to have huge economic consequences and effects on the country
and might cause Russia to think twice about what it's
doing militarily that obviously didn't happen, right.

Speaker 8 (17:14):
Well, exactly right.

Speaker 9 (17:15):
I mean, if we were talking about this precisely three
years ago, what we would be talking about is absolute
sort of streams of Western executives stampeding towards Moscow's airports,
among other places, trying to get out of the country.
And this was exactly three years ago, a time when
international offices, European and American offices were physically emptying out

(17:39):
of expats and of Russian employees who were desperate to
leave the country because the full scale engage invasion was
kicking off. And so if we look at it now,
you know, the US business community is looking at the
negotiations between Trump and Putin and they sense that sanctions
relief is in the air. And there are active conversations

(18:04):
now in the companies that left Russia three years ago
about going back. Not everyone will do it, but everyone
is talking about it.

Speaker 3 (18:12):
Yet you know, you're right, or you note that in
like one generation, we saw Russia open its doors and
then close them again. So I mean what ultimately rules
in Russia? Is it money, is it business? Is it politics?

Speaker 9 (18:27):
Well, you're right, I mean the last generation in Russia
was one of the biggest experiments in global capitalism ever.
You had this emerging market opening up during a time
when companies were globalizing rapidly, and everyone rushed in to
Russia following the collapse of the Soviet Union. You know,
for companies to go back, it is partially all about money,

(18:49):
but it's about that and a lot more. It's about
a change to the risk reward equation. And in the
nineteen nineties, just about anything that you'd did in Russia,
almost any kind of Western business activity made money. It
was really like, you know, plant any seed and.

Speaker 7 (19:06):
It would grow right.

Speaker 9 (19:08):
That is no longer the case. Companies that want to
go back to Russia or are thinking about going back,
are not going back to the Russia of the nineteen nineties,
not going back to the real go go days of
the two thousands. It's very different now.

Speaker 3 (19:20):
Well talk to us about this, and this is something
Tim and I talked about with Angela Stent, who has
understands Putin, understands Russia too, And I said, you know,
what is today's Russia? What is Putin's Russia? Is it
a great power? Is it a great economy? You know,
what are their businesses, their alliances, like what do we
need to know? And some of it I asked facetiously
when I said, is it a great economy?

Speaker 4 (19:40):
But I mean, what is it today?

Speaker 9 (19:42):
Well, you know, there were a lot of people, not
Angelus Stentt, who's one of my idols in the field
of Soviet and Russian studies, from way back in the day.
You know, there were people that said that Russia was
a gas station with nukes, and you know, that is
a vast underestimation of Russia's role in the global economy.
And we understood that Russia and gas and oil and
all of that came under sanctions, or oil came under sanctions,

(20:05):
and when the Europeans tried to chase gas out of
their pipelines, we understood what happened to prices. We also
understood what happened on global grain markets after the start
of the full scale invasion. So Russia is a lot
more plugged into the global economy than we ever thought,
and perhaps even more than we think, particularly an area
of precious metals, rare earth metals, critical minerals. These are

(20:28):
places where Russia has significant strategic deposits that are useful
not just to Russia, but to everybody else around the world,
So you know there is reason to go back in
There are companies that are thinking about it. But but
the war lasted a lot longer and is lasting a
lot longer than anybody ever thought, and enormous changes have

(20:48):
taken place on the ground politically and economically in Russia.
And if you're thinking of going about going back, you
have to be thinking, well, what kind of Russia is
waiting for us?

Speaker 1 (20:57):
Well, what kind of what did Russia businesses, Charles do
to replace American businesses and Western businesses that left. We
all saw stories of McDonald's, for example, pulling out. That
was such a prominent example because of what happened when
the fall of the Soviet Union happened, and that first
McDonald's opened up in Russia. But we saw this sort
of Russian version of McDonald's come in. What has been

(21:22):
what has happened on the ground since American and Western
businesses have left.

Speaker 9 (21:25):
Yeah, a lot of different things have happened since since
Western and American companies left, and that is that you're
absolutely right to point out that a number of significant
Western brands, including McDonald's, which everybody loves to look at
when we're talking about Russia. But other companies like Starbucks,
for example, had a massive presence in Russia and they're
gone too. They've been taken over by local Russian owners.

(21:47):
They were sold when those two companies decided that they
wanted out. And so what those companies have been doing
has been winning, growing and maintaining market share and trying
to sort of run businesses. And right now it's very
difficult to understand whether the current owners of McDonald's or
Starbucks or any of the other companies that left, you know,

(22:09):
how keen they are to sell those back to the
people that they bought them for just a couple of
years ago. The other thing that's happened on the market
is that companies from non sanctioning countries have moved in,
and that includes countries like Turkey and China. They've taken
over market share, they've moved in, and it's going to
be difficult for returning companies to dislodge them.

Speaker 1 (22:31):
So it raises the question about initially why the companies
left during the invasion. In your view, was it because
it was seen as not ethical to do business and
support a country that had this invasion? Was it because
of American regulations or was it an actual business decision.

Speaker 9 (22:52):
There were a few different decisions. In some cases, sanctions
made it illegal to do business in Russia, and there
were companies that just had to get out because there
was no way that they could transact in Russia at
all without violating sanctions. Other companies looked at the reputational
risk of doing business in Russia, and you had significant
external pressure on these companies saying, why are you still

(23:14):
in Russia. You're paying taxes to the Russian government. The
Russian government is using that money to buy weapons to
kill Ukrainians, So what are you doing there? Companies felt
that reputational pressure and they left.

Speaker 8 (23:26):
And then there were companies that.

Speaker 9 (23:27):
For whom it was easier to leave because maybe Russia
wasn't that big a market, maybe they weren't doing all
that well there anyway, and why bother with all of
the difficulty of doing business in this kind of environment,
and so they also packed up and left.

Speaker 3 (23:40):
You know, I think we think that introduce capitalism, introduce
Western businesses, whether it's China, whether it's Russia, that these countries,
these places will become liberal democracies. And here we are
again seeing that it really doesn't work. So is it
not going to work? If we can continue to get

(24:01):
what's what's wrong with our thinking or why is it
not working.

Speaker 9 (24:05):
One of the lessons that we have to have learned
on exiting Russia is that the assumption we made, just
as you said, Carol, the assumption that we made on
the way in that engaging with Russia economically and commercially
and sending Big Max to Russia would transform the country
somehow into a mirror image of the West, or into

(24:27):
at least a sort of liberal democracy that we could
get along with. And you know, I think we've learned
over the years, whether we're talking about Russia or we're
talking about China for example, or other countries, that you know,
eating Big Max doesn't make you a democrat, you know,
little d democrat. And so you know, if companies once
again go back to Russia and think, look, you know,

(24:49):
we're going to be on the ground and we're going
to give this a chance, and we think that Russia
may reform, that's a mistaken assumption. And you know, we
realize that perhaps a little bit too slowly. I don't
want to be too judgmental about our experience in Russia
over the past generation, but it was a flawed assumption.

Speaker 3 (25:06):
So President Trump seems to want to create economic ties
between the US and Russia. Some say, you know, the
diplomacy or lack thereof, or whatever you want to call
it that we've had between the US and Russia and
President Putin so far has not created a better relationship.

Speaker 4 (25:22):
So maybe this.

Speaker 3 (25:25):
Could Is that even possible with your knowledge of President Putin,
how he runs the country, his type of leadership, I mean,
is there some good that could come out of this?

Speaker 9 (25:36):
I think President Putin is going to remain resolutely hostile
to the West going through.

Speaker 4 (25:41):
The United States included.

Speaker 9 (25:42):
Yes, absolutely, capitol W boldface letters. He is going to
remain hostile to the West and the United States, and
he will see them as enemy nations, and he will
take a very skeptical view towards companies that come from
those countries.

Speaker 4 (25:58):
And so he.

Speaker 9 (25:59):
Certainly doesn't believe eve that allowing Western companies into Russia
or American companies into Russia is an overwhelming good for
the Russian economy or certainly for the Russian political system.
And that's something that companies are going to have to
manage and overcome and be extremely acutely aware of if
or when they go back in to mine.

Speaker 4 (26:21):
You get a quick one last question.

Speaker 1 (26:23):
Y, Yeah, Charles, would you recommend that companies just don't
go back to Russia.

Speaker 9 (26:32):
Companies are going to make up their minds about this
based on how they view their risk reward decision. And look,
there are companies out there in for example, the energy sector,
in natural resources, in metals and minerals and mining that
have really robust appetites for risk and cast iron stomachs
for managing it. They will probably go back, and they're

(26:52):
going to do it carefully. They've done this before. They're
doing business in places like ire Rock right now. So
they'll go back to Russia and we'll see how they listen.

Speaker 4 (27:01):
So love this.

Speaker 3 (27:01):
Hope you can get you back real soon because we
know that this is going to be certainly an ongoing
and kind of story.

Speaker 4 (27:06):
That will probably go on for a while. Charles, thank
you so much. Collect with the book.

Speaker 9 (27:10):
It's a pleasure.

Speaker 6 (27:11):
Thank you.

Speaker 3 (27:11):
Pleasure is ours as well. Charles Hecker, journalist, risk management consultant.
Book just out It is called Zero Sum The Arch
of International Business in Russia.

Speaker 2 (27:24):
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Speaker 4 (27:42):
And Splashdown Crew nine Back on Earth.

Speaker 3 (27:47):
Yes, indeed, everybody, Yes, those two NASA astronauts whose planned
short trip to space became one that left them in
orbit for nine months. Yes, you know, they are back
on planet Earth. But Wilmore and Sonny Williams coming home
to a the United States, though, that is a bit
differently are different, I should say, It's got a new president,
a new Republican controlled Congress, and a world that some
would say is being turned upside down by new US policies. Now,

(28:11):
those two NASA astronauts also returned to Earth in a
SpaceX craft, which is, of course, you know, SpaceX a
part of the Elon Musk Empire. So too is DOGE,
the entity that is tasked with an ever widening mission
to seemingly remake the US government, and that includes cuts
and spending and in the federal workforce. So we thought
it was time to do kind of a checkout all

(28:31):
things Elon and Tesla and SpaceX and Doge and more
to do that we have back with us Bloomberg Business
Week columnist Max Chafkin. He is co host of the
elon Ing podcast, author of The Contrarian Peter Thiel and
Silicon Valley's Pursuit of Power. Max is here in our
Bloomberg Interactive Broker studio. Of course Tim out there in
our San Francisco bureau. Max, good to have you here.

(28:52):
We were talking going on, well, you know, we find
we were thinking about Elon today and like he's in
this kind of funny spot. He finally brings these two
astronauts that I know NASA doesn't want us to use
the word stranded, but we're stranded up in space.

Speaker 4 (29:05):
They were safe, but SpaceX brings him home.

Speaker 3 (29:08):
At the same time, you've got a judge, a federal
judge ruling that must likely exercise unconstitutional power in the
Trump administration's efforts to shutter the US agency that manages
for an AID. I mean, there's so much going on,
the highs and lows that seem to be Elon. How
do you because you continually have to kind of put
it all together, makes sense.

Speaker 4 (29:29):
How do you put it all together?

Speaker 8 (29:30):
Well, I think, of course, this SpaceX mission is a
demonstration of all that that company has achieved. They are
the main way that America gets its astronauts to and
from and cargo to and from the International Space Station.
There was this there is this competing effort that the

(29:51):
Boeing craft that is going slower and Elon Musk, as
you said, stepping in now. I think the problem here
is Musk think in his mind and when you look
at like some of the things he said about what
he wants out of the Trump administration, he just sort
of expects Trump to essentially give a bunch more contracts
to SpaceX. I think in these court rulings and in

(30:14):
some of the pushback, we're seeing political pushback as well
as pushback from consumers, like some of this these d
you know, vandalistic acts on Tesla stores and so on.
We're seeing that that may prove to be more difficult
than I think maybe the Elon Musk uh, you know,
super fans would have believed.

Speaker 1 (30:32):
What do you mean by that, Max, How is that
more difficult?

Speaker 8 (30:35):
Well, I think there's political Well sort of we're a
couple of things. One is we're starting to see sustained
political opposition, not just to Donald Trump, right, whose poll
numbers have have dipped a little bit in most polls
since he took office, but also, but even more so,
to Elon Musk. Elon Musk's has gone from being a
very popular, uh public figure to being an unpopular public figure,

(30:57):
even even more unpopular than Donald Trump were like a
typical Republican politician. And so so that is going to
be a challenge. That's a challenge because you know, Democrats
and Republicans are consumers, and if people are generally mad
at Elon Musk, they may not buy Tesla's. We're seeing
that show up in some of the Tesla's sales data.
I think it's also a challenge if we're talking about

(31:18):
some sort of effort to hand SpaceX another contract. Now,
of course NASA did use SpaceX to bring these astronauts back,
but as he said, Carol, they didn't really have an option.
And and what Elon Musk is going to be talking
about and is talking about to some extent, are are
contracts where there are other options. So this rural broadband program,

(31:39):
where Musk and his supporters would very much like the
emphasis to go away from fiber optic to satellite. That
is going to have political opposition. We're seeing opposition in
Italy where Georgia Maloney, who's of course a Musk ally
there's been talk of giving SpaceX a starlink, the satellite
division of SpaceX a big contract opposition there, and then

(32:01):
I think you're even starting to see little hints of
opposition to know what you might see as a more
transactional thing in the US, where if Elon Musk were
to get what he wants, he would get like a
giant Mars contract. Now, I think that is going to
be as I said, it's going to be difficult. They're
going to be senators, congressmen who are who are in
the States where these other legacy aerospace contractors are, who

(32:24):
are not going to be happy about that.

Speaker 1 (32:25):
There's also business challenges too, Max, and I'm curious about
your thoughts on this. We got news this week that
Shalmi is actually raising its target for a number of
vehicles that it plans to deliver this year. Byd comes
out with this five minute charging essentially equivalent of going
into a gas station filling up your gas tank. Tesla
doesn't have that technology. In the US, you can't get

(32:47):
these Chinese autos, but around the world you certainly can.

Speaker 7 (32:50):
It seems like there are some.

Speaker 1 (32:51):
Real business realities that the Tesla empire is running into.

Speaker 8 (32:54):
Yes, I mean we would be talking about these challenges
even if the politics were working perfectly for Elon Musk
you talked about China. We've seen Chinese automakers make huge strides.
And you're right, Tesla is protected to some extent because
these Chinese companies are not in the US, But Tesla
gets about forty percent of its sales from China, so

(33:15):
this is like a direct threat to its business. Also,
these companies are operating in other regions where Tesla, you know,
collects a percentage of its sales, so even today this
is a problem. And then the other thing you're seeing
is a lot of these Chinese automakers are offering basically
their own versions of what Tesla calls full self driving.
This is an advanced driver assistance software suite, and they're

(33:37):
effectively giving this software away. The Tesla bulls had been
expecting that they would be able to charge huge sums
of money for Tesla Full self driving. Right now coast
about one hundred bucks a month now, and when Musk
has talked about he said, it's going to get even
more expensive because if you could, you know, take a
nap in your car, that would be worth even more
what we're now. I think there are reasons to be skeptical.

(33:59):
I would, you know, if you're driving down the highway
right now, wouldn't take any sleeping pills and trust the Tesla.
But that said, even if that technology were to pan out,
even if it were to do exactly what Elon Musk
says it's going to do, there are potentially other companies
doing the same thing for less money, and that's a challenge.

Speaker 3 (34:17):
I feel like the million, billion, trillion dollar question though, Max,
is is there information that Elon Musk is getting working
within the government that is going to give him this
incredible advantage or access to data? I think about you know,
the AI you know startup that he's involved in, and
like all this stuff, is there stuff or do we
not even know that he is getting access that even

(34:39):
if he leaves tomorrow, that he has an advantage in
some way, I mean.

Speaker 8 (34:43):
He has I think that in theory, yes, you know,
AI systems rely on huge sums of data. If Elon
Musk were able to like funnel a bunch of if
data were to leak from the federal government into Grock,
you know, Elon Musk's large language model that in theory
helped Grock. But I think there are a number of reasons,

(35:05):
not that I don't know that that's the most likely
scenario or the most concerning scenario. There would be ethical issues,
legal issues, uh, issues of personal privacy, and also I
just think that the political advantages he has by being
close to Trump probably vastly outweigh whatever. You know, you know,
incremental data. There are a lot of data sets, a

(35:27):
lot of financial data sets out there. I do think
some of these agencies that are being you know, as
you know the Trump administration and supporter see it reformed,
as its critics would say, gutted, were agencies that were
investigating Elon Musk. We're holding Elon Musk companies backs, you know,
x Elon Musk's you know, the new name for Twitter

(35:48):
has been trying to launch these payment services, effectively mobile
banking through you know, the company that you use to
send memes and and and the CFPB has been one
of the there like CFPB, you know, is it has
been you know, it's it's in the courts now, but
the Trump administration is essentially attempting to shut it down. NITSA,

(36:10):
the Highway regulators, they have been investigating Tesla. There are
ways in which must could sort of clear a path
in terms of from a regulatory perspective. But again, all
these things are going to create political consequences downstream, political consequences,
and that those it's going to be primarily Democrats, that's
who we're seeing protesting in front of Tesla stores, but

(36:30):
I would not be surprised if you also see some
Republicans with concerns about this stuff as well.

Speaker 1 (36:35):
Well, it seems like now Max, the courts are really,
as Carol mentioned, not rained in, but they've certainly said
that some of what Elon Musk has done is not allowed,
especially with regard to us AI D. You know, there
are questions whether or not these employees can actually go
back to work and if they're going to be reinstated

(36:56):
full time. We don't know the answer to that yet,
But do are the courts that raining him in?

Speaker 8 (37:02):
Yes, the courts are reigning in Doge and or at
least maybe creating a situation where the what Musk is
doing is not going to have a huge long term
effect or even that it may end up costing more money,
because of course, if you have to if you lay
a bunch of people off, you spend a bunch of people,
spend a bunch of money laying people off, and then
you have to spend a bunch of money bringing them

(37:24):
back online. That ends up costing more money. So there
is a situation, there's a way in which some of
the some of this stuff that's working its way through
the courts ends up sort of blunting the impact of DOGE.
I mean, it's important to remember Musk is not the
only actor within the Trump administration who's or within the
Republican Party who is trying to rein in parts of
the federal government. And so so Trump is trying to

(37:46):
do this as well. Congress will certainly, I think, at
least attempt to put some of this into law. So
there will be you know, the Musk will have some support.
It's not just going to be Musk versus the courts.

Speaker 3 (37:58):
Should we assume that as long as Elon's deep pockets
are around to support the Republicans and Trump's doings.

Speaker 4 (38:07):
That he's going to stick around.

Speaker 3 (38:09):
I think there's a lot of discussion about, you know,
when does the president get tired of Elon?

Speaker 8 (38:13):
Right, Yes, that's the conventional wisdom is at some point
Trump will get tired of seeing Elon Musk's you know face,
you know, on TV or newspapers, hearing people talk about
it when when they should be talking about all the
great things he's done, get frustrated, and he'll get sort
of iced out. I think that is not very likely,
and it's for the exact reason you just said, Carol.

(38:35):
Musk is a major donor to Republican campaigns. He will
be a major force by his own account anyway, in
the midterm elections. And really he is is a very
important ally for President Trump because if Trump is trying
to do something and there's opposition from Congress, he has
this very very very very wealthy friend, Elon Musk, who
can fund a primary challenge. The other thing is we

(38:57):
saw this infomercial you know at the House where Trump
you know, talked about all the wonderful things about Tesla
and in fact bought a Tesla you know, on the
south lawn of the White House, you know, potentially very
helpful to Tesla. You know, that seemed to be the goal.
Around the same time, New York Times reported that Musk
had promised to put one hundred million dollars into Trump's

(39:18):
own packs. So Musk is still donating money on top
of the roughly three hundred million he put into the
twenty twenty four cycle. He said he's going to put
more into his own packs. He in fact is funding
this Wisconsin State Supreme Court race. Right there are going
to be more races, and he's giving Trump money. I mean,
he is a very, very important la. I think the

(39:39):
real question is does Musk get tired of this? Does
Musk start to wonder do I really want to have
a day to day role? And how much is that
day to day role hurting my companies? Because you look
at a stock price, investors are not super.

Speaker 3 (39:51):
Happy, all right, Always a lot going on and so
appreciate it keeps us busy.

Speaker 4 (39:55):
I'm always confused.

Speaker 3 (39:56):
How many more headlines is it Trump versus Zylla? Like
we get in any Max Chafkin, thank you so much.
Calmness with Bloomberg Business be co host of the Elon Inc. Podcast,
which you can find wherever you get your podcast. Also
on the Bloomberg and at Bloomberg dot com and Max
also the author of the contrarian Peter Teel and Silicon
Valley's Pursuit of Power. Max.

Speaker 2 (40:14):
Thank you you're listening to the Bloomberg Business Week podcast.
Catch us live weekday afternoons from two to five pm Eastern.
Listen on Applecarplay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business app,
or watch us live on YouTube.

Speaker 3 (40:30):
Well, Carnival reported earnings, and the stock at one point
sold off more than six percent on the news. This
after our key quarterly earnings forecast trailed estimates, adding to
worries that a travel slowdown has spread to even the
most robust corner of the market. However, Carnival did boost
full year profit expectations, beating Wall Streets view, suggesting any
slow down may prove transitory. Do you want to point

(40:52):
out too? The stock is down about fifteen percent so
far here in twenty twenty five.

Speaker 4 (40:56):
Let's get some context and more detail around the company's
quarterly update. Great to have back with us. Josh Weinstein.

Speaker 3 (41:02):
He's president, CEO, and Chief Climate Officer of Carnival Corporation,
and he joins us from Carnival's headquarters in Miami.

Speaker 4 (41:09):
Josh great to be talking with you.

Speaker 8 (41:11):
How are you very well?

Speaker 6 (41:13):
Thank you?

Speaker 8 (41:14):
How are you doing doing okay?

Speaker 3 (41:15):
Trying to keep up with everything that's coming at us
on a daily basis, And I kind of want to
start there, because there is a lot coming at anyone
who's running a big company like yours today, whether it's
out of Washington, whether it's out of.

Speaker 4 (41:29):
How the consumer is feeling.

Speaker 3 (41:30):
How would you describe the crew's business and how it
compares from your last quarterly update?

Speaker 4 (41:35):
What has changed at all?

Speaker 3 (41:36):
Because I know you have been very optimistic, and it
seems like you're still optimistic about the business based on
the releases.

Speaker 10 (41:43):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So the thing that's changed from December
to today is, well, we just completed our first quarter
and instead of yields being up four point seven percent,
which is what we guided to, they were up seven
point three percent. And so clearly things went very very
well in the first order. Consumers love to cruise, and
we've got eight brands that are purposely tied to particular demographics,

(42:07):
particular national markets, and it serves us very very well.
And so what we see is enough strength in that
first quarter that we can raise our yields for the
year for our full year guidance, and that's basically saying
that we're content to keep four percent plus.

Speaker 6 (42:26):
Yields for the remaining three.

Speaker 10 (42:28):
Quarters of the year, despite the fact that there is
you know, geopolitical and macroeconomic uncertainty which certainly wasn't on
the radar when we came up with our guidance to
begin with in December.

Speaker 3 (42:39):
And yet investors seem to be at least initially disappointed
over your second quarter even a forecast. Your forecast was
one point three to two billion in the second quarter
and as it expected one point three to five billion,
should they be disappointed?

Speaker 10 (42:54):
You know what, I guess I'll answer by saying our
December guidance was basically saying we're going to be about
was it a buck seventy give or take for the
year on EPs we just came out with guidance.

Speaker 6 (43:06):
Said buck eighty three.

Speaker 10 (43:07):
We all performed on revenue yields on board. On board
trends are really really healthy with our with our consumers.
So I would argue that we should be higher than
where we were in December since our results are better
than where we were in December, But that's really up
to up to the Street. Our job is to deliver
and hopefully over deliver, which is what we did in
the first quarter.

Speaker 1 (43:28):
So Josh, let's talk a little bit more about that
consumer because in the press release you noted that Carnival's
not completely immune from heightened macroeconomic and geopolitical volatility, and
you're still taking up earnings expectations for the year. You
remain on track to have another stellar year across the
entire brand of cruises. Why are we hearing then from
airlines that consumers are pulling back? Why are we not

(43:51):
seeing that in your business?

Speaker 10 (43:54):
Well, I think there's a couple of things to differentiate.
First of all, airlines aren't just for or holidays. Airlines
are business travel. It is holidays, it's conferences, it's government travel.
We are really holidays, we are vacations. So we're in
a different bucket than where than where airlines are. You know,
we came in to twenty twenty five the best book

(44:17):
position we've ever been in at higher prices. We came
out at the end of the first quarter still being
in line with record occupancy percentage and price is still
nicely higher. We're eighty percent book for the year, and
so we have relatively limited inventory to sell when it
comes to twenty twenty five. At the same time, our

(44:39):
guests and our brands aren't just focused on in year.
You know, we just came out of the first quart
of the wave period, which is considered the traditional big
push for selling, and we set a record for the
most volume we've ever done during.

Speaker 6 (44:51):
Wave for future years out.

Speaker 10 (44:53):
So people aren't just thinking about the short term, they're
thinking about the long term, which is exactly what we're
doing as a company.

Speaker 1 (44:59):
But are you noticed any change in the tone of
the bookings, the pace of the bookings, or perhaps even
people canceling because of their own uncertainty. I understand there's
this difference between discretionary spend and business spend, but after all,
discretionary is discretionary, and that's often the first thing to
go if people are feeling uncertain.

Speaker 10 (45:15):
Yeah, you know, we haven't seen any noticeable change in
trends on cancelations, certainly, as we mentioned on the call,
you know, there were ups and downs over the first quarter.
There's ups and downs all the time, but we got
through our period exactly at pretty much the highest point
that you can get at at least for us in
our history, and we feel good about the position that

(45:37):
puts us in. Like I said, onboard spending, you know,
it's up about ten percent year over year in the
first quarter. That's an acceleration of year over year performance
versus where we were in the fourth quarter, and at
least into the first couple of weeks of March. With
cruises that have ended, we really haven't seen a slowdown
in that consumer behavior that onboard spending. And so you know,

(45:57):
at the end of the day, people in good time
and bad times, they take holiday, they.

Speaker 6 (46:02):
Take a break. They need a break.

Speaker 10 (46:03):
You could argue in bad times they need that break
even more than they do in the good times.

Speaker 6 (46:09):
And that's what cruising is. It's a break.

Speaker 10 (46:11):
It's a way to relax, to get away from things,
enjoy time with friends and family.

Speaker 6 (46:15):
That's what people pay for now.

Speaker 10 (46:16):
And when you line up cruise versus other vacation alternatives,
frustrating as it is for me as a CEO of
a cruise company, we're a great value. And the fact
is if people are getting concerned, if there's uncertainty, if
there's noise in the background, people are searching for more
value for their money. And that's exactly what we do,
so it plays very well into our strength.

Speaker 3 (46:38):
So just for the record, I could go on a
cruise for about a month right now because I need
a break.

Speaker 6 (46:43):
But we'd love to have you. We'd love to have you.

Speaker 3 (46:46):
Having said that, what about in terms of pricing, are
you guys able to maintain pricing? Nothing changing in that
regard either for the first quarter or even for the
outlook for the second quarter.

Speaker 10 (46:58):
Yeah, you know, so, like I said, the first quarter,
you know, our yields year over year, we're up over
seven percent and over a two year period, we're talking
about twenty four percent higher yields.

Speaker 6 (47:08):
Yeah, for the first quarter.

Speaker 10 (47:10):
When we look at the rest of the year Ques
two through four, we're projecting a little bit over four
percent yield improvement year over year for that nine month
period remainder of the year. So you know, look, it's
hard going right, It's not like anything is easy, and
we got to work hard.

Speaker 6 (47:26):
Our brands work hard to make that become a reality.

Speaker 10 (47:29):
And they do it through good revenue management techniques, through
the great advertising that they're doing, and then ultimately delivering
onboard experiences that people want to pay for. And then
they get off of our ships and they tell their
friends and family how amazing it is, and we get more.

Speaker 3 (47:44):
Hey, one of the things we wanted to ask you
is something that in late February, the US Commerce Secretary
of Howard Lutnik, he made some comments about how US
based cruise companies Josh should be paying taxes even on
ships that are registered abroad. We saw your stock, along
with everybody in the major crew space sell off on
his words. Even though analysts indicated the worry may be overblown.

Speaker 4 (48:05):
They said, we've heard this before over the years. Is
it overblown? Are you talking with a Trump administration about this?

Speaker 3 (48:10):
And if there was a US registration change, what would
that mean for you guys.

Speaker 10 (48:16):
So clearly we're operating in the confines of US laws
as well we should shipping. International shipping is based on
very specific tax regimes that are set up in the
US and all over the world, and effectively it's based
on reciprocity. So we feel like we're in a good place.
We're doing what we should be doing. Having said that,
anything out of the administration, including Secretary Lutnik, we certainly

(48:39):
take seriously and we're working hard to understand what the
concerns are and how we can address them if any
there's really nothing, there's nothing to report on from my
perspective as far as you know what that.

Speaker 6 (48:51):
Means or where things could be going.

Speaker 10 (48:53):
But we'll stay on our guard and do whatever we
need to do to make sure we're staying on the
right side of of policy.

Speaker 1 (49:03):
Josh, why don't you register in the US? Is it
regulatory reasons? Is it tax reasons? Is it labor reasons?
Is it all of the above? Why don't you register
in the US.

Speaker 6 (49:14):
Yeah, it's just not that simple.

Speaker 10 (49:16):
You don't just take a ship and all of a
sudden ship you can't just switch to US registry.

Speaker 6 (49:20):
It's it's just not that simple.

Speaker 10 (49:21):
And and really it's a it's a it's a people
to go to school for classes for this right about
international shipping and what what it means, how it works.

Speaker 11 (49:30):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (49:30):
And it's been in place for much longer than I've
been alive.

Speaker 8 (49:34):
Uh.

Speaker 10 (49:34):
And and so you know, we could we can do
a separate session on that, but but suffice it to say,
it's a regime that is that is well founded and
and it's where we are right now.

Speaker 3 (49:45):
All right, So it's not something that we should think about.
I mean, it can be done, though.

Speaker 6 (49:50):
Right, what what is the it.

Speaker 4 (49:54):
In terms of registering in the United States?

Speaker 10 (49:57):
It's honestly not that simple based on how you law works.

Speaker 6 (50:00):
It's just not that simple.

Speaker 4 (50:02):
Okay.

Speaker 3 (50:03):
Would that be a conversation though, then to have with
the Trump administration Josh and say, listen, guys, if it
was simpler, I mean, they're all about making things simpler,
right efficient?

Speaker 4 (50:12):
Is there a conversation to be had?

Speaker 6 (50:15):
Oh, We're happy to talk to the administration truly.

Speaker 4 (50:17):
Okay, Okay, Hey, listen.

Speaker 3 (50:19):
One of the things we wanted to talk to you
about in a big way, and I've seen it firsthand,
is the island destinations that you guys have and it
seems to be a continued, you know, move for you
guys and expansion. You open Celebration Key this July. This
is in Grand Bahama Island. How do these island destinations?
We've talked to you about it, but it continues to
be something we find really interesting. How does it fit

(50:40):
into the North American crew strategy and how important it
is I always think about to the top line of
the profitability picture.

Speaker 10 (50:47):
Yeah, So for us, what we're doing with Celebration Key,
which opens in July, it's a bit of a first
for us. Even though we have a wonderful footprint around
the Caribbean, we've really, we've we've built and created these
destinations really as a service to our brands and something
that's supportive of and really supplemental to what brands are
doing and leading with with a cruise experience that makes

(51:10):
them so loved. What we're doing with Celebration Key, which
doesn't even exist yet and yet it's captivated the audience
and captivated the imagination of Carnival cruisers and others, is
we want to also lead with destination as a driver
of consideration, of a driver for people saying I need
to go on Carnival Cruise Line because I'll get to

(51:32):
go to Celebration Key or because I'll get to go
to relax Away Half Moon Key, because it's the only
way to get there.

Speaker 6 (51:39):
And so we believe that.

Speaker 10 (51:40):
There's a tremendous amount of untapped value there in revenue generation,
as well as the fact that these destinations are built
close to the United States, hence we consume less fuel
in order to get there, which saves money is obviously
good for the planet.

Speaker 3 (51:54):
Hey listen, twenty seconds left here what is your most
popular destination?

Speaker 4 (51:57):
Where do most people want to go and what it?

Speaker 10 (52:01):
Wow, we carry thirteen million people last year. They want
they want to go to a lot of places. I'd say,
if you're going to ask me, what's my top that
I've ever been to, I got to say, you got
to go on a cruise to Alaska, and you gotta
go with Princess Hall in America or Carnival because they
do it in an amazing way and QNR for those
who are looking for the for the luxury end.

Speaker 6 (52:18):
But if you want to see the.

Speaker 10 (52:19):
Great State, the only way to do it is with
a great brand that can take you on both c
and with our land experiences. Because we've got hotels and
motor coaches and Glasstone railcars and you name it, we
got it up in Alaska.

Speaker 3 (52:30):
I just want to go somewherehere I get a cocktail
with like a little umbrella in it.

Speaker 10 (52:34):
I just I'm that we also serve cocktails with to
go to Alaska.

Speaker 4 (52:38):
Josh, thank you so much. I always appreciate the time
you give us.

Speaker 6 (52:42):
Be well.

Speaker 3 (52:42):
Be well, Josh Weinstein, President, CEO and Chief Climate Office
of Carnival Corporation, joining us from Carnival's headquarters in Miami.

Speaker 2 (52:55):
You're listening to the Bloomberg Business Week podcast. Catch us
live weekday afternoon from two to five pm Eastern. Listen
on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business app,
or watch us live on YouTube.

Speaker 3 (53:09):
Harvard University this past week announced that students whose families
earned two hundred thousand dollars or less annually will be
able to attend the college tuition free, while at the
same time, some of America's most prestigious colleges are issuing
bonds at a record pace.

Speaker 1 (53:24):
As public opinion on higher education continues to sour and
the Trump administration threatens huge spending cuts, American universities are
facing some serious challenges.

Speaker 3 (53:33):
Bloomberg BusinessWeek editor Bradstone sat down with some university presidents
to hear how they are navigating a potential funding crisis
while also selling the value of a degree. He talked
with Tim and Bloomberg's Emily Graffeo.

Speaker 8 (53:46):
We actually interviewed five.

Speaker 11 (53:47):
We brought together five university presidents at the end of February,
and that was one week before the federal government, before
the Trump administration threatened to withdraw four hundred million dollars
in funding from Columbia University.

Speaker 8 (54:00):
So yes, in some ways the timing was.

Speaker 11 (54:02):
Great because there was these these clouds were on the horizon.
In other ways, this publishing this package on higher education
is like trying to jump onto a moving horse, and
things are moving very quickly.

Speaker 1 (54:14):
Yeah, I mean, the news is happening very quick. Decision
makers you spoke to at these top universities, they were
public and private schools, they were large schools and small schools.
They were liberal arts schools and state schools. It really
runs the gamut.

Speaker 7 (54:29):
Who were these people?

Speaker 8 (54:30):
And they're the brave few.

Speaker 11 (54:32):
We put out the core far in line, and look,
I mean, this is a tough time for university presidents,
maybe the hardest job in America right now, not only
the pre Trump factors of rising tuition costs, dropping mail enrollment,
the ambiguity around test scores, protests in twenty three and
twenty four, and then the kind of post Trump factors,

(54:53):
the specter of an endowment tax NIH cutting funding, and
now the threats around the EI and anti Semitism. But
really it's the administration viewing universities as a source of
elitism and something of the enemy. So yes, we got
the presidents of New York University, Marist University, Grinnell College,
the University of Colorado A Boulder, and the University of

(55:16):
Rhode Island all together in a room in New York
City to hash out these issues.

Speaker 12 (55:21):
Rad I found it interesting that this word crisis came
up multiple times in your article. I mean, how much
of the job of being a college president is now
a job of crisis management?

Speaker 8 (55:37):
I don't think historically it was one.

Speaker 11 (55:39):
I mean I think this was, you know, this used
to be the statesman role. I don't know if we
could say it was ever particularly easy. But the thing
that has really happened, I think, probably starting with October seventh,
twenty twenty three, and the attack on Israel from Hamas,
there have been a set of constituencies at universities that
are all whose interests are all diametrically kind of opposed.

(56:03):
You have students, particularly at some of these elite universities,
particularly of my alma mater, Columbia, inheriting the mantle of
student activism and protest, and then you have alumni that
are very much against us on campus activism, that feel
like the college community.

Speaker 8 (56:21):
Experience has been co opted.

Speaker 11 (56:23):
You've got the federal government now with its agenda saying
that the campus has moved too far left. These are
places of liberal thought and anti conservative thought. You know,
take those arguments or leave them. But if you're a
university president right now, you're kind of buffeted by all
these different wins. And I think it was on display
when the presidents of Harvard and Yale and eventually Columbia

(56:46):
were asked to testify in twenty twenty four and basically
ended up all losing their jobs because there's really not
an easy way out of all this conflict.

Speaker 1 (56:55):
Yeah, it's been pretty remarkable to watch, and I guess
when you explain it that way, it makes sense to
why university presidents were a little reticent to get in
a room and speak with the editor of Bloomberg BusinessWeek.
It goes beyond though protests, Brad, because there are questions
you raise and hear about shifting demographics, things that have
been playing out over the long term, but also recently

(57:17):
of funding losses for these schools and the importance of
these universities providing employees and leaders for the next generation
of American businesses. And there seems to be this tension
right now that's playing out with maybe a lack of
understanding of the importance of that federal funding going into

(57:39):
training those people who make the next innovations.

Speaker 11 (57:41):
And that's where I think the roundtable really really was
an excellent exercise. I mean, they came together and they
really made the argument that universities matter, that these are
drivers of scientific and medical research, that this is a
magnet bringing the best and brightest from around the world
to the United States in the case for knowledge for research,

(58:02):
and saying this strengthens the United.

Speaker 8 (58:05):
States and why would you ever kneecap it? And you
know so yes.

Speaker 11 (58:11):
There was also the private industry argument, Justin Schwartz, the
chancellor of University of Colorado a Boulder, saying that business
needs a human capital supply chain and that is the
role of universities. And then if you undermine that, talent
gets cut and you handicap the US in its direct
competition with China and other countries. They also made the

(58:31):
point that, you know, the US is already kind of
lagging a little bit. We used to lead in patents
in the number of research papers published, We're not number
one anymore. So they're making the argument this should be
a time of reinvestment and not curtailing for political reasons.
The financial foundation of these universities.

Speaker 12 (58:50):
You asked a very short and pointed question, is college
too expensive? What did the presidents have to say to
that question.

Speaker 11 (58:58):
I think they all agreed, you know, that there are
investments that they have had to make to keep up
with rising expenses and the quality of life for students.
They also make the point, maybe somewhat cheapishly, that this
is still a great ROI that college is one of
the best investments a young person can make. But they
talked about alternative things are trying to do, like no

(59:22):
loan financing for students and making sure their students aren't
graduating with a load of debt that weighs them down
in their careers. But I think it's sort of an
unsolved problem, and it's you know, interesting to me that
these are the best minds in the country and the
challenge of rising tuition is one that has yet to

(59:43):
be solved.

Speaker 1 (59:43):
Linda Mills, when asked about the increasing number of people
questioning the value of college, she referred to the college
as a whole in universities as a whole, as an
industry and I'm wondering how you view that word is
higher education and industry.

Speaker 11 (59:57):
So, yes, Linna Mills is the president NYU, it is
an industry, right. I mean, these are massive, massive institutions
with incredible endowments and investment arms, and particularly in New
York City, great real estate holdings, and they are corporations
under themselves. They operate with a very unusual set of circumstances.

(01:00:18):
They're generally nonprofit institutions, and as we've been really finding out,
they get an enormous amount of their income from the
federal government, and I think in some cases it's almost
like one one third. And so they're also they serve
a high profile public purpose, and they're quite politically vulnerable
in this in this environment, and so I think what

(01:00:40):
we're seeing now is a lot of these universities really
try to get on the right side of the Trump administration,
as many companies are doing. Perhaps that's the best evidence
that it is in industry. Just like many companies are
scrubbing their websites and they're all their public communication of
the phrase DEI, you know a lot of universities are

(01:01:01):
doing that as well.

Speaker 12 (01:01:01):
Brad, what were the presidents hopeful about they are obviously
working with, you know, the future generations of America. What
jumped out to you in their responses, Yeah.

Speaker 11 (01:01:11):
We did, We did ask that. But look, I'm not
going to pull any punches here. I think that you know,
this is a tough time for them. You know, there
were things that we talked to them about, like declining
mail enrollment that they you know, it's sixty forty on
some college campuses, that they just don't have an answer
to right now. They say, you know, these problems are
starting in early education, that men lack role models right now,

(01:01:36):
you know, the political situation is becoming increasingly difficult for them.
You know, we did ask them what they were hopeful
about the fact that you know, they still have you know,
dynamic campuses and tens of thousands of students engaged in
you know, cancer research and finding the next drug and
understanding you know, maternal health and all those topics that

(01:02:00):
so important that that keeps him going. But you know,
by and large, their attention has had to be diverted
to some of these much more difficult issues.

Speaker 1 (01:02:09):
Bradstone he's the editor of Bloomberg a BusinessWeek. Check out
everything in at Bloomberg Business Week at Bloomberg dot com,
slash BusinessWeek, and of course, on the Bloomberg terminal. You're
listening to and watching Bloomberg BusinessWeek.

Speaker 2 (01:02:22):
This is the Bloomberg Business Week Podcast. Listen live each
weekday starting at two pm Eastern on Applecarplay and the
Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business app. You can also
listen live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship New York station,
Just Say Alexa played Bloomberg eleven thirty.

Speaker 3 (01:02:39):
As we just heard, university presidents are finding college degrees
a bit of a tough sell through. On top of
that skyrocketing tuition costs and artificial intelligence in the classroom,
and college will likely not be the same in the
years to come.

Speaker 1 (01:02:53):
Kathleen Alaski has thoughts on the future of college. She's
founder of the nonprofit Education Design Lab. She's also the
author of the book Who Needs College Anymore? Imagining a
future where degrees won't matter.

Speaker 13 (01:03:04):
The problem even for eighteen year olds right now, is
that they really see still a kind of college or
bust narrative going on in the country. We have we
say college is too expensive, it's maybe not worth it,
and so we have a lot of people, you know,
enrollment is down in the degree form and it's to
drop pretty quite a lot since twenty ten. It's starting

(01:03:28):
to it's starting to shift up a little bit. But
what's interesting is the way that enrollment is improving right
now is because of short term certificates and other forms
of enrollment that colleges are starting to offer. You know,
they're competing with like the boot camps and apprenticeships that
are that are having trouble getting to scale, and colleges

(01:03:49):
themselves are starting to offer alternatives. And so wrote I
wrote the book really to raise the argument that we
need a better fund and remove the stigmas from alternatives
to college, because only thirty eight percent of Americans have
a four year degree, and yet we tell all of
our kids, you know, that they have to either go

(01:04:11):
into debt or figure out how to get that four
year degree. That's starting to change. It hasn't changed yet,
So I still, you know, I think you have to
give a lot of caveats when you're giving advice today.

Speaker 14 (01:04:22):
So can you speak a bit more to those alternatives
in terms of we think about a traditional four year
university or maybe a two year community college. Can you
just dive a bit deeper into what those alternatives could
look like and what that could mean like for could
mean for the future.

Speaker 13 (01:04:34):
Absolutely, and I describe in the book that probably the
two most successful alternatives right now, I mean, if you're
looking to go for a professional pathway career, would be
apprenticeships and industry certifications. And the problem with these two
wonderful alternatives to a four year degree is that they

(01:04:56):
are not evenly available, Like you can find them in
some cities and states and some professions, but not not widely.
But they are being looked to as the models that
we need to create, that we need to create more of,
and either colleges can develop and offer them or you know,
independent organizations. A lot of entrepreneurs have been you know,

(01:05:17):
looking in these spaces too. But we have to we
have to get off this idea that that that the
government should only fund the degree programs for people who
are going, you know, at least half time into a
degree program. That's how the funding follows.

Speaker 7 (01:05:32):
You.

Speaker 1 (01:05:32):
Now, how disruptive do you think AI is going to be?

Speaker 13 (01:05:35):
That's a great question. There's already reports coming out that
AI is starting to impinge on and shrink the number
of entry level white collar jobs right because expertise that
you can you know, use chat, GBT or other other
options to to try to get answers to questions that
may not be within your realm of expertise, those that

(01:05:58):
it tends to why about an entry level white collar job?
You know that doesn't that doesn't require a physical interaction,
And so we're already seeing some of that new reports
are coming out. But on the flip side, for a
college student or a learner or a job app again
there's also they're also able to use AI to to

(01:06:22):
find out about more jobs, to help them write their
resume to potentially uh learn learn the bits of expertise
that they need to even you know, sound good in
their job interview. So you know, it's a there's a
there's a positive and negative side to AI from the
standpoint of of of the future of work. But you know,
probably the nature of jobs and the speed at which

(01:06:43):
they'll change will continue to accelerate.

Speaker 14 (01:06:46):
I really want to just keep an eye on There's
been this conversation about AI picking up plagiarism. What is
your standpoint as a teacher as to how to actually
figure out if students are plagiarizing using AI? But there's
also been some situations where AI fossely to texts plagiarism
from students.

Speaker 8 (01:07:03):
Falsely to text.

Speaker 13 (01:07:04):
I have heard a little bit, a little bit about
that there are apps that that you know, usually most
colleges and schools are you are you know where you
can you know, run you run the kids papers through these, uh,
these applications. Yes, I mean I think that's happening maybe
a little bit.

Speaker 4 (01:07:20):
But I mean you can.

Speaker 13 (01:07:22):
Usually tell without the without the apps, uh, whether whether
the students came up with the argument right not necessarily
supporting facts. I mean I don't I don't hear my
colleagues having much trouble in that regard. But but yeah,
I mean you can you can go back to the
student and use prompts prompts to figure that out.

Speaker 14 (01:07:43):
We have a lot of students who are sitting here,
you know, everyone's looking at chat GPT. But it's also
a really good tool for teachers and people in the
education field to utilize AI to better uh you know, educate.
What has been your take on AI and just what
the implications can be from uh teaching perspective.

Speaker 13 (01:08:01):
Yeah, I teach at the college level at George Mason
University here in Virginia, and I, you know, I've tried
to It's interesting, we haven't been given a lot of
you know, policies about how we're supposed to, uh, you know,
whether whether we're supposed to allow students to use it
to write their papers, for example, And so a lot
of us are just kind of you know, we're just
kind of forging into our own territory.

Speaker 6 (01:08:20):
And deciding how to use it.

Speaker 13 (01:08:22):
And I've I have been treating it as my friend
right to say, to have students use it to basically
like pressure test the ideas that we might come up
with the in the classroom. I teach design thinking, and
so I have the students use it to pressure test
the ideas that we do live in the classroom. And
then they're supposed to, you know, go and and see, well,

(01:08:44):
you know what, what is what does the rest of
the landscape say about this? About this point that that's
one example, But it does mean that we can't really
assign papers in the way that we used to. You know,
we have to figure out how to projectize things that
are that that create unique responses from the students or
require unique responses from the students. And that's been that's
been really difficult, but kind of exhilarating.

Speaker 6 (01:09:06):
Really Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:09:08):
I mean I just I might be old or a
lud Eite or I don't know.

Speaker 6 (01:09:14):
I don't know.

Speaker 1 (01:09:15):
I just I worry about what this does to critical thinking.
I mean I remember when I was in college and
I would be working on a paper and I would
have some sort of breakthrough with the thesis, and it
would have required me to sort of go through all
the notes and really come to a conclusion and distill
an argument, and I don't And I learned so much

(01:09:36):
by doing that, and it required me exercising a part
of my brain that I don't know would need to
be exercised if I had chat GPT, right.

Speaker 13 (01:09:45):
I mean, it's the same. I mean, I'm old enough
to remember when the calculator came out and we were
worried about, you know that doing the math problem and
if you're not doing yourself, like do you learn? Do
you learn enough? And I think the you know, the
argument now is okay the calculator, Like, yes, we don't
have to know long division anymore, but you still, you know,
so you have to use math in different you know,
you have to learn it in different ways or learn

(01:10:08):
the applied version of it. So what I try and
do in my classroom is force those aha moments that
you had writing your paper. I forced them in a
live setting, in a you know where we're where, we're
creatively problem solving together, and that that does help. I mean,
it doesn't work for a history paper, but it works
if you take the history lesson and try to apply

(01:10:29):
it to a real world situation that you have your
students work on together. Because they want, you know this today,
they want they want school or college to be an
engaging experience, not a you know, not if it's something
they can read and learn or even write a paper about.
They they want to be able to get that at
the you know, drop of a hat. So learning has

(01:10:50):
to become a whole lot more of an engagement practice
experience for students to even care or stay engaged. That's
what I'm seeing my classroom and many of my colleagues too.

Speaker 1 (01:11:02):
Kathleen, we got to get you back, We got to
go everywhere with you at the end of our program,
and we do really appreciate it. Kathleen Alaski, she's the
founder of the Education Design Lab.

Speaker 2 (01:11:16):
This is the Bloomberg Business Week Podcast. Listen live each
weekday starting at two pm Eastern on Apple car Play
and the Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business App. You
can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship
New York station Just Say Alexa played Bloomberg eleven thirty.

Speaker 9 (01:11:35):
Well.

Speaker 3 (01:11:35):
Our next guest is a self talkt cook who you
may know from Instagram Shred Happens, where he has more
than four million followers. It's there that he's documented his
journey from being out of shape and unhealthy to losing
over one hundred pounds, which he attributes to cooking and
eating healthy foods. Now he's got a food company and
a cookbook. Arashtashemi is a creator and the co founder

(01:11:55):
of Kazan Food Company, which makes look hard about high
protein rice and pasta Pasta pasta. It's like I'm from
New Jersey or something, which I am.

Speaker 4 (01:12:04):
Pasta.

Speaker 3 (01:12:05):
Is also the author of the new cookbooks she read Happened,
So Easy, So Goodie.

Speaker 4 (01:12:08):
Joins us here in the Bloomberg Interactive Brokers Studio, A
beautiful book.

Speaker 3 (01:12:13):
Did I say your food company correctly?

Speaker 7 (01:12:15):
Kaisen?

Speaker 4 (01:12:15):
Yeah, Kaisen? I had a feeling not how are you.

Speaker 7 (01:12:18):
I'm doing great. How are you?

Speaker 4 (01:12:19):
I'm good good.

Speaker 3 (01:12:21):
Everybody always has a journey, I feel like to get
to something.

Speaker 4 (01:12:24):
This is your first cookbook, your first book. Tell us
a little bit about the journey and how you did
get to this.

Speaker 15 (01:12:30):
Yeah, well, I mean the story starts from a young age.
My parents immigranted to this country. And you know, I
was always focused on success, in chasing a better life
and making them proud. And so the majority of my
life I was really professionally driven, and I was doing really,
really great in the corporate world. But in like twenty seventeen,

(01:12:52):
I just kind of looked at my wife Madeline. I'd
always struggled with my weight, and at one point I
was over three hundred and thirty pounds. I was pre diabetic,
I had high cholesterol triglystrides.

Speaker 3 (01:13:04):
And so you're the stay in radio. You're in like,
you don't look like somebody who was three hundred pounds.

Speaker 7 (01:13:08):
Oh, thank you, but anyway.

Speaker 8 (01:13:09):
Go ahead, go ahead.

Speaker 15 (01:13:10):
Yeah, And so I knew I needed to do something
to kind of change things up, otherwise this was going
to get too late. And so I looked at my
wife Madeline at the time, and we decided that, you know,
it was going to leave my corporate career. It wasn't
an easy transition, but we made certain sacrifices. We adjusted
our lifestyle, and I set out to kind of change
the direction of my life and refocus my relationship with food.

Speaker 1 (01:13:34):
How were you able to do it a rash, as
Carol mentioned, everybody has different stories, but you did it
through cooking yourself, through eating differently. We talk a lot
about GLP ones on the program and the business opportunity
there in the way people are using them, But how
specifically were you able to do this?

Speaker 6 (01:13:56):
Yeah?

Speaker 15 (01:13:56):
Look, I think similar to many Americans, I was eating
the wrong foods and the wrong quantities, and over time
that just kind of, you know, I couldn't outrun that.
I always had a gym membership, I had personal trainers,
but you know, you can very quickly, you know, eat
the five hundred calories that you're going to burn with
an hour at the gym, and so for me, I

(01:14:17):
really needed to shape focus on making foods that I
was actually excited about eating. You know, I tried every
single diet out there, from Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig, the
Zone Atkins, you name it.

Speaker 7 (01:14:27):
I've tried them all, and you know, I.

Speaker 15 (01:14:29):
Think they're They're great for people, depending on whatever their
circumstances are. For me, they felt a little bit more restrictive.
I wasn't really excited about what.

Speaker 4 (01:14:38):
I don't want to count points.

Speaker 8 (01:14:40):
Hey, that could be useful.

Speaker 7 (01:14:41):
I'm not judging.

Speaker 4 (01:14:42):
I'm not judging.

Speaker 15 (01:14:43):
But and I did for a while, and actually it
has worked for some people, right absolutely. And fun fact,
I was on Weight Watchers for a number of years
and I always remember, you know that there was a
four pm weekly weigh ins and so starting Tuesday, I
was always trying to figure out how do I game
the system so I can actually you know, show a
loss for the week. And so but look, I think
for me it was really you know, all those diets.

(01:15:05):
While they didn't work in many respects, they did work
in the sense that they helped me understand what I needed.
And for me was I love food and I wanted
it to be an adventure. I wanted to be mentally
stimulated as I was eating. I really enjoyed the process
of food, and so you know, I had to figure
out how to do that for myself.

Speaker 7 (01:15:22):
Well, yeah, I think.

Speaker 3 (01:15:24):
What's interesting too, is your book is so much like
Mediterranean food. Yeah, And was that because that's what kind
of got you to a healthier place, a better way,
just a better kind of relationship and existence with food.

Speaker 5 (01:15:38):
Yeah.

Speaker 15 (01:15:38):
I think the big thing for me was, you know,
I'm Persian and so we use a lot of spices
in our in our home cooking and our and our culture,
and so those played a huge part in adding flavor
to the different types of meals that I was making
for myself. You know, we use a lot of fresh
herbs that had just a burst of flavor and every bite,
you know, whether that's fresh mint, deal parsleygon and so

(01:16:01):
you know, I started kind of experimenting with those things.
And the great thing is they also don't have a
lot of calories, and so you know, I was adding
a ton of those to my meals. I was using
a lot of citrus, and I was able to get
a lot of flavor out of those very simple changes,
and that got me excited about eating. It was more
calorically friendly, and you know kind of started from there.

Speaker 1 (01:16:21):
Did you have to be really precise about measuring out ingredients,
counting calories and really or could you be more could
you be less formal?

Speaker 7 (01:16:33):
About it. Could you be more relaxed about it?

Speaker 15 (01:16:35):
I am much more relaxed now, But at the beginning, yeah,
I absolutely had to take inventory of what I was eating.
And one of the first things that I did was
actually I started just documenting what I was eating, just
on a sheet of paper at the time, because I
didn't really realize how many times throughout the day I
was actually reaching for something. And for me, those little nibbles,
those little bites, licks, the snacking really caught up to me,

(01:16:56):
and that was really an opportunity in of itself for me.
I was cutting out about five hundred calories a day
just by kind of monitoring that or if I knew
that I had to actually, you know, write something down,
it gave me a second to kind of just pause
and question, do I really want to be.

Speaker 7 (01:17:10):
Eating this right now? Is this the right choice?

Speaker 15 (01:17:12):
And that helped me be much more mindful because before
that I was just eating without really any sort of
you know, concern for the ramifications or the consequences.

Speaker 1 (01:17:22):
How does physical activity play a part in your journey?

Speaker 7 (01:17:27):
For me, it's played a role.

Speaker 15 (01:17:28):
I'd say the bigger thing for me has been changing
the dynamic with food and eating foods that keep me satiated,
keep me full, deliver a ton of protein with the
right levels of fiber to kind of keep me going
throughout the day. One of the biggest, bigger things that
I set out to do at the beginning of my
journey was, you know, I didn't really know how to

(01:17:48):
swim or run really a mile. But you know, I said, hey,
I'm going to do a half iron Man and train
for a triathlon, and so you know, that was an
interesting process, and so I actually ran in two half marathons.
I completed one I ran and two half marathons, completed
two half triathlons or half ironman's, and then did a
full marathon as well. But for me, the bigger opportunity

(01:18:10):
was really around food because you know, as they say,
you know, you really can't outrun a bad diet.

Speaker 7 (01:18:16):
And that's where I really struggled previously.

Speaker 3 (01:18:18):
How did you think about I mean, I think there
are a ton of cookbooks out there, as you know,
but how do you like the balance of creating something
that's really tasty and appetizing and kind of attractive looking,
and then but not making it so complicated that people
like forget this you know, let me just order in.

Speaker 4 (01:18:37):
So, like, how did you think about it when you
put this book together?

Speaker 15 (01:18:40):
Yeah, I think for me the biggest thing again was I,
you know, through all the diets that I had done,
you know, they were either boring and so I knew
I didn't want to do the typical you know, brown rice,
boiled chicken and broccoli, because I always that led to
me kind of falling off because I was always chasing excitement. Yeah,
and so for me, the biggest thing was finding ways
to incorporate flavor in simple ways to doing you know,

(01:19:02):
to what I'm eating in order to be able to
kind of be excited about it, be mentally stimulated and
look forward to eating. And so you know, I achieved
that through the spices, through the herbs. I also have
a full chapter of sauces, because that's really what helps
elevate really any dish. And so as long as you've
got different flavors and textures going on in colors in
your meal, because we also eat with our eyes and

(01:19:23):
so for me, the biggest thing was taking time to
really plate things instead of just standing up putting something
together and eating at the kitchen counter. For me, actually
taking the time to plate it up in a beautiful
way really made a difference.

Speaker 6 (01:19:34):
Rush.

Speaker 3 (01:19:34):
I just have to tell you if Tim was here
in studio, this is when he usually breaks out of sandwich, right,
or it would have been what it would have been,
probably the break beforehand.

Speaker 1 (01:19:41):
Tim, Yeah, I got don't worry, I got my banana
and my carrots.

Speaker 7 (01:19:44):
All right.

Speaker 4 (01:19:46):
It's usually though a full on sandwich.

Speaker 1 (01:19:49):
But anyway, I would Hey, I do want to ask you.
I'm getting an urgent email from a colleague, Emily Grafeo.
She anchored with me yesterday when Carol was out. I'm
so jealous. I misshred happens by one day. OMG. I
like his content a lot. I've made his recipes. Oh
that's amazing. Raises it raises the question though about this.

(01:20:11):
It's not a side hustle for you anymore. This is
this is what you're doing now. Yeah, it was a
more send you an accounting So you said you scaled
back on your lifestyle back in twenty seventeen as a
result of your health. You made some adjustments to your lifestyle.
Have you been able to offset and more the salary
you earned in the corporate world by doing what you're
doing now.

Speaker 15 (01:20:31):
Yeah, I have, and I think, look in the corporate world,
obviously it's a salary. You don't have overhead, you don't
have expenses, you're not investing for the future. So you know,
it took me a while. When I initially set out,
I was begging companies to send me, you know, a
free jar of peanut butter and if any of them wooded.
And you know, it took me almost two three years

(01:20:51):
to monetize on the content that it was making. You know,
and I was in corporate finance before, at a pretty
large company GE at the time, and so you know,
when I left, it was aizable gap in our income.
We put our house on the market, I started renting
my car out on Touro and app. I started selling
and flipping things on eBay. So I was trying to
figure out how to make it work for me. At
the beginning, it wasn't really about making money. It was

(01:21:13):
really about changing my life.

Speaker 7 (01:21:15):
And a few.

Speaker 15 (01:21:16):
Years in I was able to completely offset the income
that I was making. But with my corporate job. Now
I did create a high protein, low car pasta and
rice company, Kaisen, and so to develop that, you know,
that required a lot of capital and so at some
point I did have to go back to the corporate
world to kind of fund the R and D of that.
But yeah, it was tough. But now we've I've been

(01:21:39):
able to completely offset it.

Speaker 8 (01:21:40):
Just got about thirty seconds.

Speaker 3 (01:21:41):
So what's your focus to build that, Kaisen or what's
your next step?

Speaker 6 (01:21:45):
Yeah?

Speaker 15 (01:21:45):
I think, you know, continue to share content. You know,
nothing makes me prouder than seeing families around the world
enjoying my meals and make my recipes. And with Kaisen,
we're able to deliver people high protein, low car pasta.

Speaker 7 (01:21:55):
So we're going to continue on that trend.

Speaker 15 (01:21:57):
And hopefully allow people to eat a healthier version of
their favorite meal without the calories, without the carbs, with
much more protein.

Speaker 4 (01:22:03):
I'm starving. If you're cooking for Timm and me, what
would you cook tonight?

Speaker 7 (01:22:06):
Chris chicken and rice bull? No question?

Speaker 4 (01:22:08):
All right, deal, deal, deal, We get dessert too.

Speaker 15 (01:22:11):
I'll see you whipped Greek whet, whipped Greek yogurt and berries.

Speaker 7 (01:22:16):
Its delicious.

Speaker 4 (01:22:16):
Oh my god, I'm starving. Good luck, stay in touch,
love to hear how things are going.

Speaker 3 (01:22:21):
Versa shemy creator and co founder of Cousin Food Company,
and of course his new book, Shred Happens, So Easy,
So Good, one hundred plus protein pac Mediterranean favorites.

Speaker 4 (01:22:30):
With a low carved twist.

Speaker 6 (01:22:31):
Good luckies.

Speaker 4 (01:22:32):
All right, you're listening and watching Bloomberg BusinessWeek.

Speaker 7 (01:22:35):
This is Bloomberg.

Speaker 2 (01:22:39):
This is the Bloomberg Business Week podcast, available on Apple, Spotify,
and anywhere else you get your podcasts. Listen live weekday
afternoons from two to five pm Eastern on Bloomberg dot com,
the iHeartRadio app tune In, and the Bloomberg Business App.
You can also watch us live every weekday on YouTube
and always on the Bloomberg terminal

Speaker 8 (01:23:09):
MHM

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Bloomberg Businessweek Weekend - March 21st, 2025

Episode Transcript

Hosts And Creators

Tim Stenovec

Carol Massar

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