♪ haidi: welcome to daybreak australia. i'm haidi stroud-watts in sydney. paul: we are counting down to major trading opens this hour with u.s. stocks at all-time highs in the run-up to friday's drop support with jay powell saying the fed is not far from the confidence needed to cut rates. >> dovish signals too from the ecb with christine lagarde suggesting lowering borrowing costs us soon as june. paul: president biden to deliver his state if the union election pitch making the case for his second term and a likely rematch with donald trump yet haidi: a right decision crossing the bloomberg now with perot central bank leaving the reference rate on hold at 6.25%. the forecast from bloomberg economics was a cut. nearly all analysts in the survey saw the key rate falling to 6%.

we saw inflation speeding to 3.29% in february still above target. that expectation still that they would cut to the lowest level, more than 1.5 years, that has not been carried through from the peru central bank. they left rates on hold at 6.25%. it is looking to the significance of the recent uptick in inflation to overcome concerns over a more feebly performing economy there. more of a hawkish tone when it comes to inflation. annual cpi unexpectedly rose last months to 3.29% above the official ceiling. there has been extreme weather and political uncertainty as well. a myriad of risks faced peru's economy. but inflation by the central bank has been priority. paul: breaking out of south korea. the current account balance for the month of january. shrinking dramatically from what we saw in december.

narrowing to $3.05 billion there about. it is a reduction of more than 50% of what we saw. a services deficit widening to $2.66 billion. the goods surplus contracting sharply. we saw that number hit a high at the end of 2023 on a very strong export bid recovery particularly around semiconductors and semiconductor prices. we just open for trade in australia. let's look how it's going. it is a staggered open, hard to read things but modestly positive. the a sx is kind of crowd walking sideways most of the week. nikkei futures. the aussie dollar showing a little strength. $.66 at the moment. yields, not a great deal of movement. futures for the nikkei. we had the nikkei off more than 1% tuesday.

perhaps, a function of a stronger yen hovering at the 148 level of the moment. new zealand has been trading a while now better by .25 percent. u.s. stocks closing higher led by tech again. it could be a positive day to close out the week and the asia-pacific. haidi: a little optimism despite renewed focus on fed speak from fed chair jay powell. the outlook when it comes to some of these five flyers in the market as well. technology, a little question over how big the valuations can really continue going to improve from here. this is s&p futures. there's a little weakness there after the rally in the previous session. about .1% lower for the s&p rate. nasdaq futures off .3%. there are broadly positive signs from central banks. perhaps unsurprisingly we are seeing a bit of caution ahead of key jobs data. another data point in their journey to identifying a more

certain path forward for the fed. crude in particular as well in this session, we saw a rally in oil continuing to pick up pace. a segment of the keystone pipeline shutting down. paul: two major central banks delivering fresh signals interest rate cuts are on the way. fed chair jerome powell telling the u.s. senate banking committee that policymakers are getting closer to the confidence they need to start easing. >> we are in the right place. we are waiting to become more confident inflation is moving sustainably at 2%. when we get that confidence, and we aren't far from it, it will be appropriate to dial back the level of restriction so we don't drive the economy into recession rather than normalizing policy as the economy gets back to normal. paul: bloomberg's global economic correspondent enda curran joins us now. we heard from jay powell and loretta mester of the cleveland fed's and she also wants to see

a couple more data points, more evidence of inflation cooling further. the question is timing. when will we see the fed move? into --enda: we had a signal from chair powell today saying you need to be very confident inflation is heading back towards target. then is he thinks that is not far away now. what constitutes not far off course will be the great game over the next few weeks but it suggests something like 20 months. it is worth noting at the hearing today, mr. powell was really getting it in the neck from lawmakers at both sides of the aisle about the impact of high prices among their constituents. we are talking about the rate of inflation. we all know that that has been slowing down. there were talking about the level of prices compared to a few years ago. it is a very hot political issue. it was in that context, under

the grilling from the lawmakers that mr. powell seemed to be conscious of acknowledging that pain and made the point he does not want to push the economy to recession or call a soft landing. he is very careful about that. in terms of throwing a dog a bone, as we said earlier, not far off the point where they would be cutting rates. the question now becomes when that will be. haidi: christine lagarde also throwing a bone. we have a better idea of what the end trajectory will be? ken: very similar --enda: very similar language from the ecb making the point she is not confident they are fully there yet. s she wants to see data signaling out april. then making the point that may be around summertime, maybe june may the ecb might be in a space to bring down rates. it is important to recognize that interest rates are fairly restrictive in both western europe and the u.s..

even if they start cutting rates, the next part of the debate will become the pace and depth of the cuts before small businesses, households, etc., start to feel real relief on the ground. nonetheless, the message from both authorities today is that inflation is at least heading broadly in the right direction. they just need a few more report cards to take that off. then at the ecb will be cutting sometime in december and perhaps the fed in and around that time as well. haidi: enda curran they're looking at the fed and ecb. let's get analysis on integrations for the markets. the head of market and cohead of apex cip from wells fargo. mountie -- mandy wan good to have you with us. the change from the fed, the ecb, a number of other central banks globally. are you comfortable with the way markets have repositioned now

after a lot of exuberant expectations to start out the year? mandy: definitely. i think currently the market is pricing in around 3.5 rate cuts. starting from june and july. i tend to agree with that. there has been a fair bit of repricing at the start of the year. i think the market is betting on what will happen. i think if you look at the interest rates in the u.s. they continue to be very data-dependent. tonight we will have a non-foreign payroll coming up. that will be key important data to watch and definitely next week we have cpi coming from the u.s.. that is another really key data point people should be looking out for. haidi: when it comes to the boj, though, do you think the expectations -- some of these, obviously, japanese banks have to position more aggressively. positioning for potentially left off this must -- month.

do you think that is a little bit earlier on the timeline? mandy: i think so. we definitely had a very healthy rally in the yen on the back of more positive wage growth. what we are looking at is probably the boj well do one rate hike in april. once and done just to get the interest rate out of the negative territory. i think inflation is pretty welcome in japan. we don't really see much of a large dollar-yen move at this point from here. when we look at the currencies i really think it is more driven by the dollar than the end for the rest of the year. enda: in terms of currencies i know you like the aussie dollar. how reliant is that on the china growth story for 2024? mandy: we expect the australian dollar to out form -- outperform its g10. .

recently december jobs data is a little soft. but we think that the job data still healthy and that i premarket is still very tight. you really give the rba the opportunity to remain more hawkish compared to the rest of the g10 peers. we think they will pre-much cut later unless versus the rest of g10. thus, that is the main reason we are quite positive in the australian dollar at the moment. as you mentioned, dollar cny has been very stable. that also gives a little support to the australian dollar. paul: as we have a strengthening in, what does that mean for japanese equities? the nikkei has had an amazing few months. would there be a temptation here to take some profits? mandy: i would think that the nikkei will probably continue to do quite well.

the yen i think it will remain a little bit under 150 for a good period of time. it really depends on where dollars go and the biggest question is when the fed will start easing interest rates. this is one of the top questions the market is asking. whether that will happen in june or maybe later in the year given the u.s. economy is still staying quite strong in recent data. paul: mandy wan cohead of aipac cib at wells fargo. coming up an interview with a key player in the chinese energy transition. wise abbas of the sea and pc institute thinks the country's oil demand has entered a low growth phase. president biden prepares to deliver his third estate of the union ahead of a likely rematch with donald trump. we look at what to watch on that address next. this is bloomberg.

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haidi: president biden is expected to make his 2024 reelection pitched during his state of the address in a few hours. his speech will offer clues as to bidens legislative priorities if he manages to secure a second term in november.

bloomberg's political news director dodie -- jodi schneider is with us now and this is a key state of the union for joe biden the first before the 2024 general election. where will the emphasis fall? jodi: i think he will really try to show he is capable. that he should deserve a second term. in some ways, this will be a campaign speech. he cannot make it seem too much that way, but he cannot just do a wandering list of proposals like most state of the unions are. this one has to be, trust me, you can trust me for four more years. i have delivered and i will deliver more. that will be essentially what he will talk about. he will do that with the economy. he will try to show what he has done and also he will have to really let the audience know he realizes a lot of people don't necessarily feel that the economy is as good as it is. that is a big thing he will have to do.

that is a hard needle to thread. he will also have to talk about the israel-hamas war. and, trying to reassure the audience that he does understand the humanitarian crisis in gaza. something that a lot of americans have been concerned about. he has gotten those uncommitted votes in some of these primaries because of that. so, those are some of the things. then the other thing's presentation. so many poles and it so many voters have said that they think he is too old. at 81 years old he is too old to be 82 when he would take office again. and he really has to seem vigorous, seem in control. not have any flubs. that will be extremely important tonight. paul: with one eye on the election, are we expecting any announcements, any sorts of sweetness? jodi: tonight we are quite certain he will talk a fair bit

about the administration's plans . we have this from people familiar who have told us that he will be talking about this. the administration's plans to open up this, to try to get the humanitarian aid into gaza via this new initiative of seaport off of gaza where they will be able to try to set this up so they can get the equivalent of truckloads of supplies, food, medicine, water in on a regular basis. this will not be able to happen right away. they will have to build this. but, this looks like it will be there initiative to try to show that they are trying to do something to help the millions of people in gaza and to deal with the humanitarian crisis there. we will certainly hear from him on that. we will probably hear more about drug costs. they are trying to lower the costs of prescription drugs for many people and that will be an

initiative that you would like to hear from them about tonight as well. haidi: we have some excerpts shared from the white house. some of the themes that will be addressed in the state of the union. one of them, in fact, the first one in this extraction is some commentary around roe v. wade. his promise to restore roe v. wade as law of the land again. how important is the women's vote? the reproductive vote, if you will, going to the ballot for president biden? jodi: very important. he will be emphasizing that. he will be trying to do draw -- to draw a contrast between himself and donald and this will be one of the issues he will do it on. this has pulled well from him and been something the democrats have been able to score points on in special elections and at the midterms since roe v. wade was overturned. but, the question is, does it work in the general election?

so, he will be making that case to voters. again, trying to show that contrast. this, in some ways, again, is a campaign speech, as much as it is the typical, the traditional state of the union. but, it will have all of the pomp and circumstance. he is still the sitting president giving this to a joint session of congress walking in with all those chairs and all the hugs and high fives and all that. and plenty of applause. we will see if there are any boos tonight. there have been in some past speeches. paul: we will bring you president biden's state of the union address when it happens later. special coverage starts at 12:30 p.m. sydney time, 9:30 am hong kong, 8:30 p.m. in new york. sweden has officially become the 32nd member of nato. that completes the alliance's historic enlargement into the nordic region. the swedish fly will be raised

monday over the organization's headquarters in brussels. sweden's addition comes at 21 months after a bid for membership following russia's invasion of ukraine. with a hold of due to objections from both turkey and hungry. the u.s. is preparing a un security council resolution warning against deploying nuclear weapons in space. the plan is to introduce it this month while japan holds the councils rotating presidency. the u.s. wants to dissuade russia from potential plans to put a warhead in orbit, something the kremlin says it has no intention of doing. bloomberg learned kristalina georgieva is poised to score support for a second five-year term as imf managing director and needs the backing of major european nations and in the u.s. to ensure the success of any potential bid. sources say her pursuit of a second term would come with the understanding she has the support of france and germany. haidi: a key player in china's energy transition says electric

vehicles and lng trucking will replace about 20 million tons of gasoline and diesel consumption this year. he heads the economics and technology research institute at the china national petroleum corporation then told us exclusively how china can back -- balanced economic growth goals with a green agenda. what's 5% of the economic growth -- >> 5% of the economic growth is the new normal situation and condition in china recently. over the last couple years, we think that is still a normal speed for china's growth. however, only from the perspective of oil consumption, our countries oil consumption last year increased by 11%. that's very high. so, that is of course, a recovery from covid-19. this year, because of the energy transition, electrical vehicles,

especially, for gasoline transportation, according to our research and studies, we project about 1% increase in gasoline because of the ev and the economy. >> the transition, yes. that number. 1% growth. basically, from, when i look at your research, that would be the lowest increase from your research in at least a decade. is that a concern or is that just of a function of the energy transition? does it represent that the economy does not have end demand? or is it more because there is an energy transition, at least in the new energy vehicles? website think it is more from the energy transition from traditional fossil fuel to ev. that we reduce. it needs at least 20 million tons of crude oil.

at least every year, year by year. that's a huge number. stephen: through the energy transition will it be the long-term trend? a very low single-digit oil demand growth? >> in the long run of course. we have is -- entered the year of low growth rates for crude oil. especially gasoline. because of the transportation, volumes should be replaced by the electrical vehicles and other areas. paul: speaking exclusively to bloomberg's stephen beijing. get a roundup of the stories you need to know to get your day going in today edition of daybreak. terminal subscribers go to dayb . it is available on mobile in the bloomberg anywhere out. customize your settings so you are only getting news on the industries and assets you care about.

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♪ haidi: the latest corporate headlines. rivian shares up after it announced it is holding plans to build a new multibillion-dollar factory in georgia. this move oil lead to more than 2.25 dollars in savings with the production of the forthcoming r2 model substation -- shifting to an existing plant in illinois. the r2 is a soft cheaper model and will compete with cars sold by tesla. broadcom chose fluctuating in extended trading after disappointing results from the chip business. first quarter revenue of 7.39 billion dollars missed estimates. the ai computing spending boom might not be lifting company chip sales as much as investors hoped. broadcom supplies chips to apple and other big tech firms. paul: let's look at the broadcom

story after hours. not too bad. better than it was a moment ago. we could then about -- by about 1.5 percent. ai spending will help offset weakness elsewhere. it pointed to slower sales on some of its units. marbella is another stock we watch as well. -- marvel is another stop there. another sales outlook missed. marvel sees a trough in non-ai parts of the business of setting a brother good day for tech stocks in the u.s.. not all tech stocks are created people -- people. still to come, why the economy is likely to be a key focus for president biden as he prepares to deliver his estate o

i think he's having a midlife crisis i'm not. you got us t-mobile home internet lite. after a week of streaming they knocked us down... ...to dial up speeds. like from the 90s. great times. all i can do say is that my life is pre-- i like watching the puddles gather rain. -hey, your mom and i procreated to that song. oh, ew! i think you've said enough. why don't we just switch to xfinity like everyone else? then you would know what year it was. i know what year it is. before i started playing basketball, i was kind of quiet. i wasn't really that confident or outgoing. but now, with basketball, i feel like a leader. yo, cayden!

sport for good means to me that i'll be able to give back to my family and my community. goals can be accomplished, dreams can be accomplished, but dreams are just dreams if you don't go out and try to achieve them. learn more about sport for good at laureususa.com. paul: ok.

let's get you some burkinis out of japan. big contraction -- breaking news out of japan. big contraction in housing. 6.6 percent, substantially worse than the 4% we were anticipating. it marks 11 months in a row now of contraction in households pending. the backdrop for this is also japan biggest unions demanding the biggest increase since 1993, 5.85% if you are keeping score, at the bank considers tightening at the march meeting. you tighten one household spending is contracting at that rate. to recap, a contraction of 6.3% in january, much worse than what was expected. a bigger acceleration from december. the yen is strengthening as well, 147.84. haidi: a lot of anticipation into how the speeds into the bank of japan. look at how we are trading, 30 minutes or so into the start of the session and need this friday

looking good, about 0.5% that is next is trading above the 78 hundred level, close to the record highs we have seen recently. that fresh record high in fact was really boosted by the trading in financials and industrials in the previous session. do we see that into slightly higher? things are pointing in the right direction. we have also been watching a bit of weakness when it comes to new zealand. kiwi stocks following the path, 0.3 percent higher. nikkei futures also looking like we will see some nice gains in half an hour's time as well. a bit of new ted trading for s&p futures. nasdaq futures a bit lower there as well-, of course going into friday session. we have a bit of political aspect to watch as well with the state of the union address.

paul: yes, president biden is due to deliver that the state of the union in a few hours and it comes as he looks to face a presidential rematch with donald trump later this year. for more, let's get to alexis crow, global head of geopolitical investing at pwc. let's talk about the state of the union, it is an unusual one and it is happening in an election year as well. oh well as the present -- how well has the president been selling his political achievements, and what do you expect to hear tonight? dr. crow: thanks for having me. i think economics will be front and center, a hyper acute sensitivity on the president's of performance and his economic agenda. there is this very discernible spread between sentiment and actual economic data. the american consumer is very much in the recessionary mindset, and so how the president held the future and his take on the future i think so will absolutely come in

tonight paul: how do you explain the disconnect? because, as you say, the economy is performing really well but there is this week sentiment and not a great deal of enthusiasm for this president. where does the disconnect coming ? alexis: we look at confidence and actual spending. in europe you can look at consumer and household confidence and spending. what is interesting is there has been a discernible spread between these two over the last for years. instead official recently referred to that as vibes, separating the vibes from the actual bending. the key driving force behind this is that the consumer in the united states and other advanced economies in europe as well has just suffered to pull inflation shocks. if you think about a bowl of younger consumers, they have never experienced inflation before, and that is stuck in the

mindset of many voters who will be watching the state of the union address tonight. added to that, even though we have seen -- barring january data, we have seen core inflation comfortably coming down in the u.s., added to that, one-third of cpi is represented by shelter. . and even though we have had more than a doubling of mortgage rates in story 20, the price of owned equivalent of shelter -- mortgage rates since 2020, the price of owned equivalent of shelter continues to be higher. that is on the minds of households. haidi: haidi: and when it comes to geopolitics president biden continues to try to absolute curbs on china being able to get its hands on advanced tech. we know this is a tough stance on china, largely a partisan issue in the u.s. but is a lack of uncertainty if there is a change back to a trump presidency, should that concern global investors? alexis: if we think about the change in the shift from the trump administration to the biden administration, our

forecast was that he would have a change of tone but not a change in stance with regard to policy directed towards beijing. that is certainly what has played out. as you note, it's very much a bipartisan, shared suspicion of china at best, but actual almost animosity, which is very, very clear. and i don't expect that to disappear. so you might again, see a change in tone back to the kind of more hawkish tones that we had coming out of the white house previously, but i think again,, no change. how does that work for investors? thinking about countries, you do have these third nations, or smaller countries that are caught in the middle but actually have extraordinary agency. thinking here of germany and japan. as far as companies, it does continue to contribute to an elevated outlook of uncertainty with regard to deploying capital and allocating capital to

mainland china. will that ever come under section, i think, is an open question that we get from many clients. again, it is also creating opportunities elsewhere if you think about the diversion of capital within asia to other emerging asian countries. even japan, i noticed some of the japan data shared earlier in the program, many investors looking at japan. and then also with the trade diversion, looking to latin america, countries like brazil where companies are positioning themselves to capitalize on the workarounds with regards to segregating elements of china out of the trading system with the united statesm it is interesting that you talk about trade diversion. has the onshoring, the friend-shoring, the localization played out the way you expected, and do you expect that to take a different direction depending on what happens in november? alexis: i do think it has been somewhat overblown. if we go back to the pandemic

economy years, that cessation of mobility, there were pacific sectors that came under the ire of specific governments, food security in the u.k., farmer security in france, and the jolts to our semiconductor industry in the united states has been notable. but if you look at something as complex as the semiconductor industry, you need inputs and r&d from industries and companies around the world. so the reality of the complexity of the supply chains, the need for manufacturers to build out greater resilience, so moving from just in time, to just in case, which will increasingly see from a manufacturing standpoint, all of that, i think, flies in the face of the fact that we are in this phase of complete onshoring or friend-shoring. we have seen mexico and brazil, and we are also seeing other countries and companies position themselves in the middle east as

a sort of linchpin between europe and asia. i see that as growing in prevalence. with the new administration, with the next administration, we will see how this plays out. paul: just want to get your thoughts on the growth targets set by china's national people's congress for 2025 of 5%. do you see that as achievable or perhaps the messaging around it needing some massage in some way? is it a realistic one? alexis: thanks, paul. it comes in just under with the imf had recently put forward, predicated upon the assumption and recommendations that you would have strong policy support measures, both from physical as well as monetary policy to be able to support a near-5% target. i think it looks slightly bullish, if we come from looking at growth last year, obviously, you had stronger growth coming from the base effects of 2022. i would be focused more on what

happens with regard to the plenum when it actually unfolds, as to what kind of measures will be put into place to address the property rout, to address that stockmarket rapper, to address deflation, and also the number put forward by the npc to create 12 million jobs and a focus on youth unemployment, i am wondering where those jobs are going to come from. there are certain bright sectors, of course, like cleantech and electronics to support the cleantech revolution. the ev's. i think it will focus on that going forward. haidi: you talk about china's role as a cls provider of low-cost and increasingly high-quality cleantech that alongside with beijing's clear priorities to invest in tech including ai as a key priority but then also washington's efforts to try to curtail not the ultimate achievement, but

certainly, to try and slow china down. do you think that will be successful or will it create a bifurcated set of markets? alexis: it's a great question. here is where you callout and what is important to note is to what extent are the elements of the cleantech space deemed to be of national security and, therefore, of concern by certain governments? we have seen that play out with regard to europe and looking to china's role in the european energy transition. with the united states, what happens -- solar production, when we slept tariffs on solar panels coming from china, the cost of solar production ratcheted up. so when governments are trying to navigate inflationary environments and return to price stability amidst other shops in the system potentially even coming into the committee, basket i would say it's very difficult -- very difficult to segregate china out of the no-cost part of the green tech solution. so that will be a challenge for

many governments. nevertheless, chinese exports continue to find their ways to other countries around the world. it's not just the u.s. and europe that remained robust export markets. so i think that the bifurcation that you referred to, is one that we certainly see playing out with regard to elements of the high-tech system and, of course, semiconductor. haidi: really great to have you with us as always, alexis crow global head of geopolitical investing at pwc. of course, it is international women's day. coming up next, we will be sticking to our guest about where they think progress has been made in australia in recent years. they are one of the few funds in asserted that invest using the gender lens. this is bloomberg. ♪

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paul: and bloomberg intelligence report found that higher female board presidents might give etfs a better edge. rebecca sin joins us. he found they perform better. by how much? rebecca: the short answer is yes. to celebrate international women's day, we decided to look at etfs globally from an esg angle, specifically boards with

more female for more female fund managers and be found they perform better. we analyzed what he 600 etfs globally and specifically --4600 etfs globally and looked at how many female board members they had. we found that with companies that had more than 25% of their boards having females, they on average, performed better by 2.2%, down those who didn't. you might be wondering how did we come up with this number? we ran an a/b statistical analysis, a very common analysis invented by ronald fisher in the 1960's. it compares two different things and oculus the outcome, and what the probability of the outcome is. for instance, the lower the p value, which is outcome, the more unlikely that is to by chance. when we ran this analysis across

the 4600 etfs the value was 0.008. this told us that having more females on board is not just by chance that the performance increased significantly. we found that by looking at all the ats last year in 2023, if you had more than 25% of your board members being female, your find on average performed 2.2% better, which we've thought to be very interesting. haidi: what about the other side of the equation what is the landscape like for women actually working in the funds industry. it is rebecca: still a very low number. women account for just 12% of etf portfolio managers and this equates to only 8% of assets under management. if you think of a female portfolio manager, someone like kathy woods, there aren't that many of them, only 12% of them -- someone like cathie wood.

in the asia-pacific, mainland china has one of the highest rates globally. in mainland china, roughly 12 25% of the managers are female. there is potential for growth globally, but we think the number is growing and we are seeing more and more females enter into the space, weather on the port for the management side, in trading. but the number still lags globally. assets under management by female management is only 8%. haidi: bloomberg intelligence etf analyst rebecca sin there with us. melior investment management is one of the first austrian equity funds to apply a gender lens to their investment approach. they have been tracking exposure in the asx 200 since 2021 unfortunately they believe that gender diversity companies can achieve competitive long-term financial returns. let's bring in the ceo lucy steed. i was going to say unfortunately you haven't seen in the temi

have been, tracking this since 2021, sufficient progress being made. lucy: when we started tracking gender pay gap, it was plus or -5%. that was in 2021. the amount was 13%. sadly it is only 12%. 88% of asx 200 companies are not focused of gender pay gap targets of plus or minus 5%. it's an issue, back to your previous speaker's points, it is important for a performance perspective. we have seen increasing political and academic evidence that increasing the number of women in management teams significantly improves performance. haidi: does this kind of data help when it comes to esg investing, which has traditionally been less focused on this? lucy: that's right, for us, we have been tracking gender metrics for some time, but a lot

of the esg managers really focus on environmental, so you will have factors such as weighted average carbon intensity, forms comparing their portfolio with the asx 300. we have extended that to social metrics so we are looking at gender as a key indicator of our ability to perform. we look at a number of different metrics with regard to that, things like females on the board which we were just talking about and that indicates to better performance. we have been looking at executive leadership teams and the percentage of women in management because it is also about the pipeline. it's not just the 30% club that has been a key focus and we have seen in improvement in the metrics there, but really looking at the ceo and leadership team pipeline. it is really important. we tracks our credential versus that asx 300 and these issues and as you can see from the statistics up there, the gender

pickup target, only 12% of companies have been focusing on that. for the public availability of this data, i think it is really focusing companies' attention on driving forward better metrics in terms of gender pay and making that more of a focus. paul: to zero in on that last point there, melior is advocating for a gender pickup of 5% or -- plus or -5% by 2030. lucy: 30% companies are actually achieving a plus or minus 5% gender pay gap. it is achievable. some of the industries that are male-dominated and have hundred traditionally difficult to attract women need to start thinking about a cultural shift in the way they work. flexible work is important, and parental leave, we should be encouraging better shared care environment.

at the moment there is a lot of paid parental leave policies out there but a lot of men don't feel comfortable to take those policies, to take that paid parental leave, we need to think about this shift in terms of culture and enabling women to when they are looking at these types of senior roles, areas like financial services, we need to enable women a much better environment to enable them to thrive. haidi: lucy, the reaction to the data was interesting to me, because obviously one of the first responses from a lot of people is you wanted to look at like for, like data roles compared to similar rules, and that ended up not being terribly flattering either when you crunched the numbers that way. particularly in finance. there is a lot of criticism saying women in leadership are being paid the same as men in leadership, it is just that there are fewer women in leadership. surely that points out an equally troubling

problem. lucy: absolutely. the reality is that equal pay for equal work has been a legal requirement since 1969. i think a lot of people are clinging on to say, well, they are in the same job and thus they are getting the same pay. it is deeper than that. we are trying to enable the pipeline up and it hasn't been successful we need to, think more deeply about what are some of the inhibitors preventing women from getting to those positions and wanting to be in those positions. because the percentage of women in leadership positions in the financial services companies is not flattering. we want to think about more open-minded ways, for instance, role modeling flexible work at the top is an important part of that and at the moment, i think late nights, unexpected travel-type expectations is still there and i think it is also that clients are expecting

the truth so there is significant complexity in this in terms of that being addressed in those companies. haidi: lucy, always is great to chat with you lucy steed, ceo of melior investment management. more japan data crossing the bloomberg. current-account surplus just becoming available. adjusted current-account surplus coming in at ¥2.728 trillion. trade deficit of ¥1.43 trillion. when it comes to the current-account surplus, it was a surplus of just over ¥438 million, contrasting expectations of a current-account trade deficit i should say. we'll foreign travel spending rising aa percent in january, according to that balance of immense data -- rising 88% in january. this is bloomberg. ♪

paul: the latest corporate stories we are following, this company is facing a court hearing in hong kong on friday over a liquidation petition, kaisa needs to show it is making progress on restructuring top taken aboard

the potential dissolution of its business and the fire sale of assets. the company was of the country's biggest issuers of dollar bonds during the debt boom. this company is adding customers for its ai tools in the include cbs broadcasting, general mills, and aramark. speaking with bloomberg, the parenteral ceo also talked about a growing interest in the company that has helped more than tripled the company's stock over the past year. >> we have not been able to meet demand. we have had to tell people we couldn't accommodate them. i have hundreds of people coming, not just people, but leaders of industry. >> coming up in the next-hour loop hear why pgim says 2025 will be a year for active investing across public and private markets. >> so many choices on booking.com.

daybreak asia. were counting down to asia's major market opens. looking like a pretty good set up so far, data from japan has been interesting this morning and a drumbeat for the bank of japan, as the expectations continue. paul: it was a mixed bag, the backdrop to it all the stronger yen as well. >> the geopolitical risk keeps building and the focus will be back on the u.s. and the fed has given some comfort when it comes to investors this week. watching for some of the key themes coming out of president biden's address, a campaign state of the union in terms of being able to address the nation before the november election which is looking like a rerun