tom: good morning, this is bloomberg "daybreak: europe", i'm tom mackenzie in london. these are the stories that set your agenda. iranian news agencies confirm the country's president ebrahim raisi and the foreign minister have died in a helicopter crash. the death of hardliner raisi adding further uncertainty to a region already in turmoil. taiwan's new leader urges china to end the threat of war, as he assumes the presidency of the democratic island. asia stocks rise in european futures point higher as copper and gold both hit fresh records. investors bracing for another busy week of earnings headlined by ai heavyweight nvidia. before we get there, the earnings front crossing the terminal, ryanair a beat in full-year earnings, full revenue at 13.4 4 billion euros.

above the estimates of 13.3 8 billion. ryanair approving a 700 million euros share buyback. the final dividend per share is coming in at 0.178 euros. they saw customers coming in at a modest beat on the customer level. in terms of their forecast, they see a range of 198 million to 200 million, slightly above the estimates of 199 million. in terms of the full-year load factor, that was a beat, 94% was the load factor, the estimate had been 93.6%. too early in terms of providing accurate full-year 2025 profit guidance. that is the line, it is too early to provide accurate profit guidance, and they say the remains a risk that boeing deliveries could slip. that is key with that 737 max.

and of the constraints around delivering those aircraft to ryanair. analysts are watching that very carefully indeed. the remains a risk that boeing deliveries could slip further. we will be speaking to the cfo of ryanair in the next 25 minutes or so. stay tuned for that conversation on the back of earnings and a question about boeing deliveries will be front and center. broadly it is risk on across the equity space. commodities getting a lift as well. some of that is tied to the geopolitics of iran. some of that tied to the measures from china. consequential measures to prop up the real estate market, whether there will be enough remains an open question. european stocks looking to gains of 0.3%, ending last week higher. ftse 100 futures pointing to gains of 0.2%, s&p futures adding a 10th. 5335, morgan stanley upgrading

their forecast to 5400 on last few minutes. nasdaq futures another big week when it comes to the nvidia story. those earnings cross on wednesday. let's look cross assets. euro-dollar getting a bit of a lift, 1.27. the pound, i should say. euro-dollar is higher by a 10th. copper up 3%. it crossed above 11,000. a fresh record for that industrial metal, the short squeeze around new york continues, and gold also hitting a fresh record, gaining 0.9%, 2437, part of that is uncertainty around around, part of that expectations the fed can cut on the back of softer inflation last week. let's go to the iranian story because news agencies have confirmed that the president ebrahim raisi and foreign minister have died in a helicopter crash.

search teams located the wreckage in iran's mountainous northwest region pay let's go to joumanna who has been covering this in dubai for a. what are the latest details and what next for this country and its leadership? >> huge news out of iran overnight. it was only an hour ago that the state official agency mehr confirmed that the president raisi, alongside the foreign minister, who was also on that helicopter, have been pronounced dead. there had been a search effort underway throughout the evening. towards evening yesterday we found out a helicopter that had nine passengers on board was engaged in a hard landing situation. red crescents were sent to the location but due to weather conditions, very dense fog, in addition to the mountainous terrain, it was difficult to get access to the crash site. it was only early hours of this morning that we got confirmation

that the iranian president was on board and had been killed. a very shocking development within iran. in terms of what happens next, the vice president is going to be taking over in 50 days as the next president. they are following constitutional procedure. what is meant to happen is iran should be holding elections within the next year after that 50 days is done. it is very important to stress it is unclear who will be up for those presidential elections. as per prior elections in iran, every candidate needs to be cleared by the religious establishment, and we have not had commentary out of those leaders. we did get commentary out of the ayatollah khomeini yesterday evening, saying the iranian nation should not be anxious, as no disruption will occur in the

country's affairs. yet to hear from him this morning but they are trying to emphasize that there will be continuity despite the loss of their leader. tom: on the religious leadership , a top that stands the ayatollah khomeini, as you mentioned, there was an excitation that raisi was in the running to take over as the supreme ayatollah of iran. what does it mean for the leadership of this country in the years ahead and potential ramifications of that disruption? >> president raisi also one of the more hard leaning presidents in iran over the last couple years was seen as a potential successor to the ayatollah, who is in his 80's, so there are questions about who his successor could be. in the race there was president raisi and the ayatollah's son,

so people are saying within iran that the most likely successor could be khamenei's actual son. given the resistance from some of the clerics, there is a lot of hoops to get moved through for that to be confirmed. yet to be decided once those presidential elections take place but as of now it seems the direct line of successorship would move down to the sun. -- son. people are asking what this means for iran's foreign policy. could we see huge change? at the end of the day, most of the decision-making when it comes to foreign-policy and national security was taken by the supreme leader. domestic decisions were taken by the president but when it comes to matters of foreign policy. things like engagement with saudi arabia, the relationship with israel, the uranium enrichment program, a lot of that will still lie in the hands of the ayatollah. in terms of foreign policy, we

were speaking to people earlier in the show, they do not expect major change. tom: joumanna with the update on the story that continues to unfold in iran. you can track that of elements in this story on our website and on the terminal. go to tliv to get commentary from our expert editors. let's cross over to singapore. every long-standing by with a check on asian markets. it is risk on? >> it is, but it is worth noting how the developments in the middle east are starting to weigh on the risk appetite in the region, and the stock age is pulling away from gains earlier of 0.7%. the nikkei with gains of 1.7 percent earlier erasing some of that at the moment. to your point about risk on, it was a good hand over got from u.s. stocks, we also got,

remember that china rescue package for the property sector to put a floor. there were tailwinds coming into today's session. it might explain why the hang seng is 0.7% higher pay let's look at specific sectors we are keeping an eye on today. infotech earlier clocked gains of 0.5%. it is among those underperforming. it can give us a sense of how risk appetite is waning. materials is outperforming today. think about how copper, gold, and iron ore have been performing. no wonder that these asian materials stocks are surging, even energy counters are well in the green, even though the commodity is just slightly higher as traders adopt a more defensive posture. let's look at these chinese developers in hong kong. we have been seeing policy support on friday and still the

gauge today is down. there are questions swirling about whether the size of the rescue package will be enough. how will it be implemented? think about which developers will be allocated these funds. a bit more cautious on the gauge of developers. let's take a look at japan. we did get an auction for inflation-linked bonds that showed strong demand. it looks like these investors are still worried about inflation. there are expectations the boj will work towards normalizing monetary policy. we are seeing the two-year and 10-year coming under pressure, bucking a global trend we are seeing. tom: avril hong in singapore. that's a nice touch point because we want to do a deep dive on global bond markets. japan a bit of an outlier. if you put japan to one side, their best month of the year ignited by slower u.s. inflation, here in europe though

investors are warning the downward path for u.k. prices is not so clear. we get important inflation data out of the u.k. cpi crossing wednesday. let's bring in mark cranfield. global bonds having a good month. you are looking at the 10-year. there is more money moving in, very modest today, four point 41. a number of head speakers this week. how comfortable are you with the repricing in the bond market and what are the risks ahead? >> already the biggest risk is that investors get too far ahead of themselves. we have seen it a few times the past couple of years when people think the inflationary path is declining fast enough to have several interest-rate cuts, whether it is from the fed or the ecb, or in general across the g10 space. it looks as though we are getting into the same realms again where several rate cuts are being priced in. maybe a little too much. yields possibly discounting more

then will really come on the table from central banks. the first real test will be in under two weeks. the european central bank fully expected to deliver their first interest-rate cut in this cycle. but there are considerable doubts about how many more, and when the next rate cuts will be coming after that, we are already hearing pushback from several ecb people saying don't expect consecutive rate cuts from the european central bank. clearly, that market may be getting ahead of itself. they have to discuss the timetable for winding down their balance sheet, which could be quicker than is currently price of the market, so certainly the european market is one that could be too far. the u.k. as well. again, bank of england may cut interest rates in june, but the pace of cuts this year could be relatively slow and the bond market may have overdone it in terms of expecting three or four rate cuts. that's definitely a major risk fraid then there is treasuries, where how many times have we

priced in a whole series of rate cuts, and we haven't even had the first one yet? we will get the june fomc where most likely the dot plots will have to change possibly to just one rate cut. wherever you look in the g10 space, there is a risk of too much exuberance as far as investors are concerned. tom: is there too much exuberance when it comes to equity markets? further gains today, a solid week last week, nvidia with earnings later on wednesday, how significant is goldman sachs describes this company is the most important in the world, what's your take on how significant nvidia will be? >> it is hard to argue that. there are very few single companies in the globe who can influence the macro markets. there are only one or two and nvidia is right up there. last time they did earnings was in february this year. since then, nvidia's stock is up

more than 30%, it has driven significant gains across the tech really not just in the states but globally. when you think of a company with a couple of trillion dollars worth of market cap rising 30%, that is a significant amount of global money which has been sucked into just one company, into the whole tech and ai narrative. if they were to wobble, if they disappoint or do not meet outlook expectations, earnings they may well be able to, but it is where they are able to go in the months ahead. if they don't meet expectations there, that stock could reverse very quickly. we have seen periods this year when $200 billion of market cap has changed in one day, which is a significant amount by any standards. if we had any reversal like that, we could track down global equities for a few days, so there is no underestimating it is by far the major event in equity markets this week.

probably for several weeks to come. tom: another fantastic set up with an important week, particular when it comes to the stoxx story. it is a big week in terms of that geopolitics and finance. the ministerial meeting is taking place thursday in italy. on wednesday, it is the u.k. inflation print, cpi crossing. on wednesday, the big one mark was setting us up for, nvidia earnings crossing on wednesday. we will be across the story of course. i once new leader is sworn in. -- taiwan's new leader is sworn in pre-how the president will sit at the center of that u.s.-china rivalry. this is bloomberg. ♪

tom: i'll come back to "bloomberg daybreak europe." lai ching-te has been sworn in as taiwan's new president, putting him at the heart of the u.s. china rivalry, in his inaugural address he urged china to stop its intimidation. i'm pleased to be joined by stephen engle, bloomberg's chief north asian correspondent in taipei, what tone did president lai strike in this speech? >> as i have talked to some people since the speech, they said not many surprises. he reaffirmed the prowess of taiwan's democracy, he said they are an m.v.p. in the world of democratic processes. as you rightly said, he did make that appeal to beijing by urging china to stop military intimidation of the island.

and that they should work together to promote regional stability and peace. again, beijing views taiwan is a renegade province and they see lai ching-te as, in their words, an instigator of separatism, of war i should say, working towards independence. that is not something beijing wants braid it is why tensions have ramped up. let's look at the political situation in taiwan. lai ching-te only won 40% of the vote in january, because the vote was split three ways. his party lost control of legislation by one vote to the opposition kmt. he starts this term on the backfoot. increased pressure from beijing in that rhetoric. he did not get a strong mandate as president. and he has lost the legislature.

he is going against a stiff headwind right now. tom: what is potentially at stake? you have covered this story many a year, in terms of cross strait relations with beijing? >> there is strategic importance, obviously, with beijing ramping up its rhetoric that it will not allow and tolerate a separatist taiwan. keep in mind this is the third consecutive term of an independence-minded party dpp winning the presidential election. their favorite party is the kmt, they have not won since three terms ago, and she went to beijing and met with xi jinping. on a highly polarized island, you have one party going to beijing and meeting with xi jinping, talking about how to cooperate. then the other side of the island is saying we're in

essence independent of beijing and china. that's what he said, lai ching-te said neither china nor taiwan are subordinate of each other. those are fighting words to beijing. i did speak to a kmt special advisor to the chairman earlier this morning, he essentially said, don't provoke beijing with this kind of talk because militarily taiwan is not ready to defend itself yet. you asked at the beginning, what is at stake? so much, geopolitically, as well as economically with all the high-end chips. we talked about nvidia. tsmc, the world's biggest foundry. it is all here. tom: stephen engle, thank you very much, in taipei.

a check on the commodities rally. the tech space and we will be speaking to the ryanair cfo. this is bloomberg. ♪

tom: bhp, the world's biggest mining company, has until wednesday to make a firm offer for rival anglo american. or walk away from that potential deal. musk more with martin richie. topline, what are we watching for in terms of how this bid could evolve? is bhp likely to come back with more to take over anglo before the deadline? >> the deadline of 5 p.m. london time on wednesday. we have had this big mining drama the past few weeks with bhp ruling out two informal

bids, which have been knocked back by anglo. anglo then setting out its own proposals to radically restructure his company. bhp now decide whether it's going to make a renewed bid. as we understand, there has been, as of the weekend, when we published an article overviewing what was going to do, it had not made a decision yet. it has to weigh whether it can get engagement from anglo's board. people we have spoken to suggest it wants anglo's management to enter discussions. bhp needs to put pressure on the board perhaps via the shareholders to get involved in a discussion. that's one way of looking at it. they could table a higher offer just to stimulate that

discussion. also, with this radical restructuring of anglo proposed by the anglo board itself, that's going to give bhp some pause. it has taken some of the wind out of the bhp bid because the proposal is so similar to bhp's. all of this comes against the background of record copper price. reaching above $11,000 earlier today. as we know, the whole motivation behind this bid was for those copper mines, so it's been an interesting week in the metals and mining space. tom: we count down to that deadline and they have to make that decision by 5 p.m. wednesday time. martin richie with the details on the bhp-anglo american potential takeover saga. martin was talking about the cover price. that is the gem at the heart of

the anglo business that bhp are angling for. copper is now at 10,900 81, of 3% in the session, year to date it is up 20%. the short squeeze in new york leading to many of the shipments being re-diverted to new york, that is putting further pressure on the upside. 10,981 on cover. gold breaking through fresh records, of 1%, part of it is geopolitics, part of it is expectations around cuts from the fed. iron ore rallying link to the property story in china. property story in china. we will be speaking nvidia, food isn't just fuel to live. it's fuel to grow. my family relied on public assistance to help provide meals for us. these meals fueled my involvement in theater and the arts as a child, which fostered my love for acting. the feeding america network of food banks helps millions of people put food on the table. when people are fed, futures are nourished.

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tom: good morning. this is "bloomberg daybreak: europe." i am tom mackenzie in london. iran's president and foreign minister have died in a helicopter crash. the death of the hardliner adding further uncertainty to a region already in turmoil. taiwan's new leader urges to china to end the threat of war as he assumes the presidency of the democratic island. asia stocks rise in european futures point higher as copper and gold both hit records. investors bracing for another busy week of earnings. headlines by ai heavyweight nvidia. let's check in on the markets. in the equities space, it is risk-on. earnings crossing on wednesday with inflation data out of the u.k. on wednesday as well but for now, the focus seems to be on expectations that the fed can possibly go twice with cuts

later this year after the software inflation print. gains of .3%. the ftse 100 looking to add 16 points. s&p futures currently pointing higher by .1%. morgan stanley updating their 12 month view, looking at 5100. nasdaq futures looking to gains of 38 points. let's look cross-asset. in terms of the treasury space, not a huge amount of movement in the session but the pound is currently at 127. they continue to tumble around copper and gold. copper, the story around the short squeeze in new york. shipments back above 11,000, up 20% year-to-date, up 3% in the session. part of that is down to the geopolitical risk and we will get more on that story right now because our top story of the day of course, the iranian news agencies confirming the country's president and foreign minister have died in that helicopter crash.

search teams located the wreckage in iran's mountainous northwest region. let's get the latest with bloomberg news director. thank you for joining us in the studio. what more do we know about the crash? what details have crossed in the last hour or so? >> the crash happened yesterday in very poor weather and the footage shows just how bad the fog was he was returning from this meeting where they were inaugurating a joint dam on the border area and returning in the helicopter crash, nine people were killed in this crash. his foreign minister, his security chief, a number of local officials, and of course the pilot and the crew and that has all just been confirmed in the last couple of hours. what does this mean is the real question both for iran and the region. to have been questions for both of those in that. the first vice president, his deputy will take over temporarily. he was in -- he will be a continuity figure for about 50

days until there is likely to be an election. the question is, does this change anything for iran at home? does it mean anything for succession? of course, he was talked about as the main person in line to succeed the supreme leader who is in his 80's. tom: thank with an important update on this story. we continue to bring you the latest details following the confirmation that the iranian president did die and that helicopter crash. you can check all of the developments on the terminal. go to tliv to get commentary and analysis from our experts. now to some other stories making news today, saudi crown prince mohammad bin salman has postponed a planned four day trip to japan due to concerns over the king's health. news of the cancellation came after the saudi press agency reported that king salman is suffering from inflammation of the long and will be treated with an antibiotic.

the trip to japan would have been the crown prince's first visit since 2019. benny gantz says he will quit the israeli government if prime minister benjamin netanyahu does not offer any plan to bring back hostages and to end hamas rule in gaza by june eighth. the ultimatum from the opposition leader in the three men of war cabinet comes days after the other member, the defense minister, bitterly accused netanyahu elle fanning to have a postwar plan. analysts say the war cabinet might collapse but netanyahu would continue to rule with his far right partners. turning to tech now, and markets are standing by of course for those nvidia earnings on wednesday. results from the third most valuable company in the world will be a key test for the so-called everything rally. for the details on what to think about within the tech space and how to invest, arguably, within the ai ecosystem, let's bring in

the founder and ceo of international vc firm and vc market. let's start on the nvidia question. to what extent is it a catalyst for the kind of growth expectations that you are seeing across the tech ecosystem or is it something of a suffocating presence? how difficult is it to invest right now in the startup space given the dominance of some of these big ai firms? >> is one of the biggest opportunities in the world right now. the way we look at it, there are three big opportunities within the space with infrastructure they operate. it is infrastructure in the way that you have -- they are going to build the infrastructure of the future. discovering new medicines for science or infrastructure. also data centers and so on so

is general infrastructure. it's where are you going to see the next trillion dollar companies? there are not going to be that many of them. they need the best people in the world in that space. the secondary is the appc built on top of the infrastructure and they are you will see way more companies, hundreds if not thousands of billion dollar plus companies building on top of this infrastructure which is currently being laid out and the third big bucket is ai enablement. any start of these days needs to have part of their business being ai enabled so those are the three big buckets. we look forward in the next few years. this is an extent of 20 years. >> the models, the infrastructure, the hardware, or indeed the applications being

built on top of those foundation models. you want to be investing in all those different components or is there a particular part of the ecosystem that you think has the most opportunity at least right now? >> investing in new businesses, you won't be able to compete. it's a great opportunity to invest in both of them. we got to approach it differently. you need to have people who are really deep. ai experts who spent many years researching, leaving in the world that what they are doing. you can founders who doesn't necessarily have the ai background but they are building applications on top of the infrastructure in the same way as you saw with cloud, with mobile, over the internet.

there are infrastructure players who are the best at the world and what they are doing. you can really back tremendous founders in operational experience to build on top of this infrastructure. very interesting opportunity to have -- probably the biggest one. tom: i was speaking to the ceo couple weeks ago and he said ai is overhyped in the short term, overhyped in the short-term but underappreciated in the long term. does that ring true to you? magnus: there is a fourth category where there's a lot of founders who just throw it i in. that always happens in environments. it's the biggest opportunity of our generation. it's going to take time and

overtime, it will be much bigger than any of us think. tom: i wonder what your take is on the concerns from some regulators and others that big tech is a stifling presence in terms of potential innovation in competition with the likes of microsoft investing in not just openai but mistrial over in france. nvidia themselves have become vc like in terms of their investments. amazon investing in anthropic, for example. is that a potential threat to competition or does it provide you with the opportunity for valuable exits? >> it creates tremendous opportunities. western governments -- good regulations. there are not dominance of big players. we don't want to stop in these investments.

i think people tend to overestimate the resilience of really big conflicts. if you go 30 years back in time, -- ibm, for example, they are not dominating the industry. you will see the same with apple, google, and these players. somebody is going to come and disrupt them now and ai is enabling that he and away we have not seen before. it is good for the ecosystem. as long as they are not breaking any existing rules -- innovation. tom: what are you seeing in terms of axis this year? do you see a pickup in this pipeline of exits? magnus: you are seeing vc activity pickup.

that would spread to the rest of the world. definitely not seeing that in the data. data for the next quarters. it would take a bit of time before that comes back to normalcy. you are seeing asset managers buying from each other. that activity has really picked up. for great companies out there, there is still greater opportunities. they were speaking about the potential rate cuts. coming up later. it would add fuel to the fire. tom: ok, and when it comes to

your lps, you have some good names and limited partners. is there a sense -- are they cautious at this point? what is their mood? what is the funding environment more broadly within your ecosystem looking like? magnus: compare it to the past. if you look at 2001 and after the.com boom and the global financial crisis, if you look in that period of time, compared to the average of the last 30 years, it's two extra turns so always better to deploy capital in these times so 2022, 2024, if you look at it in retrospect, it's probably going to be some of the best years ever but at the same time, there is a tendency at this time for capital to go to more you'll generating assets. that is obviously still the case with the rates being so high. there are great opportunities.

at the same time, we have seen a tremendous amount of interest at the early stage. we are in the process of closing -- they tend to be three to five times the size of it so there is still a lot of capital out there that are seeking to back the next generation of founders and historically, these types of periods just after peak tend to be the best time to do that. i really encourage everyone to look. tom: magnus, founder and ceo of antler, joining us out of sydney on the funding environment. the catalytic effect of nvidia and of course's the shift to all things ai. later today, ed ludlow will sit down for an exclusive cross-platform joint interview with michael dell and the nvidia ceo and service now ceo in las vegas. catch that 25 minute conversation from the dell will

conference at 7:15 p.m. u.k. time. there is plenty more coming up. stay with us. this is bloomberg. ♪

tom: welcome back to "bloomberg daybreak: europe." now to some of the other stories making news this monday, the u.k. government says it will use

a major summit on ai regulation in south korea this week to make a fresh push on reducing the risks around the technology. the move by the u.k. follows the government cost summit on ai safety. last year, the u.k. sought to take a position of global leadership on managing the risks and opportunities around the development of the emerging technology. a survey by ernst & young says london leads european cities and attracting foreign direct investment in financial services for the u.k.'s share of new projects has reached the highest level in a decade with london securing 81 projects to 2023 and that is 76% more than the previous air and more than double that of second-place paris. the report by the consultancy said the french capital is likely to challenge london's dominance in the coming years. jeff bezos's blue origin has resumed sending tourists to space, launching six private passengers on a short flight

more than 100 kilometers above the earth. the passengers included aged white -- ed white who was selected as the first black astronaut candidate. the company plans to debut a much larger and more powerful rocket later this year, capable of launching cargo to orbit. let's check in now on the markets with a particular lens on commodities because the price action is continuing to be quite eyebrow raising, particularly around copper, crossing back of -- above 11,000, shy of 3.5 percent. copper is up 20% or thereabouts your today. the shortselling, short squeeze a story that continues to focus on new york means that a lot of the deliveries around asia are being diverted to the u.s. to new york to make up of course for that short squeeze. they have had to get those inventories on board and that is leading to price pressures continuing and of course, the expectation that a renewable shift longer-term will demand pressure and putting a floor on

prices. gold is at 2449, currently up on .4%. that is tied partly to what is happening in iran. it concerns uncertainty but also expectations that the fed could cuts and a weaker dollar is helpful for the gold picture. iron ore at 100 19 pathan, up 1.5%. and that is at least partly as a consequence of the additional measures around the property sector in china supporting demand for iron ore. there is plenty more coming up. stay with us. this is bloomberg. ♪

tom: ryanair says ticket prices in the european summer travel season may be flat to modestly higher. the irish airline announcing a

700 million euros share buyback and i'm pleased as i am joined by the cfo. tell us about the summer pricing picture. we know there capacity constraints so on some lines, it's unusual to see a forecast around flat to marginally higher pricing. why is that and when do you see that story turning around? >> you are right, tom. the issue is that it will take a lot to market. boeing and airbus are running behind on deliveries and will likely continue to do so out into the 20 30's so one would anticipate that pricing would maybe be a bit ahead of where it is at the moment. that said, you know, we are going to grow traffic by 9% this year to almost 200 million passengers and we are guiding in the peak summer months flat to modestly up. that is a 21% fare increase last year but at the moment, we are having to simulate midweek traffic a bit more than we would have anticipated.

weekends, very strong but i would anticipate that you know, with the schools closing in the next few weeks, that we will start to see the midweek's close out as well. we are taking in over 600,000 bookings and night so demand is huge and my advice would be to yourself and everybody else, focusing a rather than later because fares are only going to go in one direction. tom: for a bit more detail on that, where do you see more positive price pressure coming through for you in the business and the quarters ahead? when does that become more substantial? neil: the peak months for us our july, august, september, and they are booking well at the moment, albeit, we would have only 30% of those bookings in place at this point in time which is not unusual for the time of year but we would anticipate that they will be very strong into the summer so that is why we are saying flat to modestly up into the peak summer months. tom: you are booking just about 30% for the summer season so far for ryanair. we were speaking to easyjet and

they said 35% for the summer season. in terms of the deliveries, there is another line around ryanair saying there is a risk. there is a risk that there is a further slowdown in deliveries of the aircraft. give us a bit more detail on that. we had heard that you had maybe two or three that could be delivered by june. is that still on track? neil: as things stand, we would hope to have 158, maybe 161 game changers in the fleet by the end of july. that is roughly 23 aircraft shy of where we had hoped to be at that point in time but we are very pleased with how things are going with boeing at the moment. the new management team by stephanie pope in seattle are producing higher quality aircraft and the consistency of deliveries is getting better so you know, i would be hopeful that we would be close to 160 aircraft by the end of july and we will catch up the shortfall of 20 aircraft by novembers timeframe which means there's

only 29 aircraft left in our 210 aircraft order and they will come in ahead of summer of 2025 and then hopefully by 2027, we start taking delivery for the next tens. tom: is that where you are leaning in the quarters ahead as well, returning more cash to shareholders rather than looking at mna? talk to us about the rationale behind that area neil: we have been very -- behind that. neil: we have been very clear. first priority was to restore pay for our people after covid and then introduce -- pay down lots of data. we paid to fund ourselves out of our own cash resources and capital expenditure out of cash so to the extent that we have served the cash thereafter, we said we would return it to the shareholders and we implemented a regular dividend policy last november and this morning, we are delighted to say we will be

buying back $700 million worth of shares. ryanair traditionally participates in buying low aircraft at the right time. we have a very good order books, the game changers which will underpin our growth to 200 billion passengers over the next decade and we don't tend to participate in mna unless it brings something that we can't necessarily achieve quickly ourselves. tom: we are going to leave it there. really appreciate your time. the cfo of ryanair. i'm next, it is markets today. stay with us. this is bloomberg. ♪

>> this is markets today.