news from the white house comes fast and furious. >> i think canada is getting a softer truck -- softer touch on trade. >> democrats rallied against puzder's nomination. >> it does seem a bit chaotic. jonathan: janet yellen speaks on capitol hill. stanley fischer brings insight to bloomberg. >> we had a target of 2% inflation, and we are headed in that direction. jonathan: u.s. equities stay on a record role.

experts offer broader views on what is hot and what is not. >> it is always difficult to actually predict returns. >> we see there is a delay in the of facts of brexit. jonathan: plus, we sought through earnings reports with reaction from the c-suite. >> all our businesses are making progress. >> our focus on organic growth will remain. jonathan: it is all straight ahead on "bloomberg best." jonathan: hello and welcome. i'm jonathan ferro. this is "bloomberg best". for much of the week, the focus of the business world has been on washington, d.c., as the active and embattled trump administration continues to dominate the headlines. reporter: president trump and canadian prime minister justin trudeau concluding their news conference, where they discussed

the need to tweak terms of the trade agreement with canada. >> tweaking is a far cry from what he described on nafta, a tearing up of nafta. they obviously covered mostly trade, as you expected. was there anything here that was surprising to you? reporter: there was what finally came at the end, tweaking a trade deal with canada, not necessarily ripping it up, not border tax-type talk we have heard with mexico. a lot more auto production is done in canada than in mexico, by far. if trump actually really wanted to increase u.s. auto manufacturing, he could go after the automakers in canada and say, stop investing in those plants and start investing in the u.s. i am not sure why he is doing that, but because the relationship is so strong and

close between the u.s. and canada, i think canada is continuing to get a softer touch on trade than mexico certainly is. >> there is a lot of news out of washington today, from national security advisor flynn leaving and treasury secretary steven mnuchin arriving. what happened? >> he quit, and obviously people in the white house forced his hand. if you can't trust your national security advisor, you don't have a job. so he is out. >> so what do we read into this? is this a story of disarray or a story of decisiveness on the part of our new president? guest: it is a little bit of both. the washington post has a front

page piece on chaos being the modus operandi for this administration, and i can't disagree with that. hours before michael flynn quit, kellyanne conway said he had the president's total support. so, it does seem a bit chaotic. >> i know a lot of people in europe, a lot of finance ministers, will be relieved that steve mnuchin has finally been appointed, because they know who to call if they want to talk about currencies. do they know what his priority over the next week will be? reporter: behind the scenes, he is working on capitol hill to get some of these de-regulatory processes on dodd-frank in motion. he is also working with the president on tax reforms. he has emerged as the go-to person to craft tax reform. >> janet yellen testifying on capitol hill. ms. yellen: as i noted on previous occasions, waiting too long to remove accommodation would be unwise. potentially requiring the fomc to eventually raise rates rapidly. >> we went into this hearing today anticipating we might hear something about a march rate hike. what did we hear from the fed chair today? >> she did confirm the fed is going to be raising rates this year based on the information they have now on the economy. too early to note what the

fiscal impact would be of any proposals from congress or the administration. and she said all meetings are live. the fed does not want to take march off the table. they want the possibility of raising rates there. so while she would not commit to it, she did try to stress that you should not give up on it. >> a hiccup for the trump administration. cke restaurants ceo andrew puzder is out for labor secretary. in the tweet, he said, i am withdrawing my nomination for secretary of labor. i am honored to be considered. why could he not get confirmed? >> republicans. republicans support was deteriorating and the upper chamber. yesterday, i spoke with tim scott of south carolina, and he was still having reservations about his nomination for the department of labor. democrats cohesively rallied

against puzder's nomination. they said he was someone who was out of touch with the american people, and despite having the support of ceos, such as mcdonald's and other fast food chains, they were not able to get this over the finish line, a devastating blow quite frankly for the trump administration. >> the highest level of face-to-face contact between the u.s. and russia since president trump took office. secretary of state rex tillerson met with his russian counterpart sergei lavrov today in germany. >> people have been very keen to see whether he speaks for trump and what the space of the u.s. administration would look like. it was a little bit awkward, because it is customary when you do a joint statement or kind of bilateral with another leader, in this case sergey lavrov, his russian counterpart, to do a handshake, a couple of words. and as he started speaking, all

the press were ushered out, which caused the russian foreign to ask why the press was being hushed, which is surely a little bit ironic. tillerson made a statement to the press shortly afterwards where one important point he mentioned was the u.s. is backing the minsk agreement. that will go down well with a lot of european countries. pres. trump: the nominee for the secretary of the department of labor will be mr. alex acosta. he has a law degree from harvard law school, a great student, former clerk for justice samuel alito. he has had a tremendous career. >> who is he, and where does he come from? >> mr. acosta is the dean of the florida international university law school. he served on the labor relations board under george bush. he has gone on to have prominent

jobs at the justice department. there are many published opinions we will be taking a look at. he also would be the first hispanic, would alleviate some of the criticisms of president trump not nominating any to cabinet positions. jonathan: in the u.k., prime minister tony blair making a series of headlines as he urged those opposed to brexit to stand up and fight back. >> the people voted without knowledge of the terms of brexit. as these terms become clear, it is their right to change their mind. our mission is to persuade them to do so. >> what is he doing? >> i think what he thinks is that nobody is making the opposite case. and to a certain extent, john,

he has a point. there is very little that represents the people who voted remain in the political discourse. i think he is hoping that there is a group of people out there not standing up, the silent remainers, that are not making their voices heard. he is hoping that maybe some within that group -- and i asked him if it would be him, he dismissed that quickly -- that somebody stands up and delivers. as you know, john, the joke at the moment is the pound is the only opposition to theresa may's administration. i think he is hoping that somebody other than the british currency is going to stand up. jonathan: still ahead on "bloomberg best", highlights from the week's top interviews. the case that regulation is still a good thing, and tom keene sits down with stanley fischer. plus, we march through another parade of earnings reports. up next, more of the week's

biggest stories. softbank makes an expensive acquisition. the question is, why? >> it is not clear if it is in his vision of the future. jonathan: this is bloomberg. ♪ jonathan: this is "bloomberg

best." i am jonathan ferro. let's continue all global tour of the week's top stories. in europe, swiss voters have their say in a referendum on corporate tax breaks. >> swiss voters have rejected a bid to reform corporate taxes, a plan to keep the country internationally competitive. >> that comes as switzerland plans to end its current practice of giving tax breaks to multinationals, due to international pressure. >> the finance minister committed yesterday to convene a

task force that will meet in coming days, and in a best case scenario, they might have a draft bill in parliament by the individual year, but exactly what the new plan will consist of, nobody knows. >> what does this mean for multinationals in switzerland? more uncertainty? >> tax experts say companies will probably be postponing investments or moving investments from switzerland to other countries. >> the saudi government telling opec it has cut production by the most in eight years, going beyond its obligations under a deal to balance world markets. is this one of the problems of this deal struck by opec and non-opec members, to cut production and elsewhere, other producing nations trying to fill in the gap? >> i think that is definitely the big concern for opec right now. one thing we have seen in the

early part of this year is that shale production is coming back very strongly with these high prices above $50 a barrel. american producers are drilling again. they are producing more oil, and clearly that is limiting the price impact of opec's cut. it is the same story we were talking about, saudi arabia versus shale, and i think we will be talking about that for the rest of the year. >> the big story and nation has been softbank could it has agreed to buy fortress investment group for $3.3 billion. give us some background on this acquisition. why is this happening right now? guest: just as investors and analysts begin to wrap their mind around masayoshi son's investment thesis, you have a deal like this. fortress is a fairly traditional asset management company. they have about $70 billion of

assets in their portfolio, half of that is fixed income, basically bonds. in addition, they have a rather eclectic collection of investments that includes a tv company, wireless spectrum, as well as some distressed assets like a railway company in florida as well as hotels in japan. it is not clear how it fits within masayoshi son's vision of the future. fortress has the distinction of being the first private equity fund to go public, back in 2007, but the shares are about a third of that price, so perhaps it is a good deal. >> breaking economic news, read on consumer inflation coming up on terror than forecast. check it out. up .6%. economists surveyed were looking for an increase of half that, .3%, so it is a sign of inflation. retail sales for january, consumers out there spending. >> how much should we read into the cpi numbers, and how much

should we not? >> i think this is significantly stronger than people expected on a headline, and also a bit more on the call. i think the call is significant because it is the core inflation number that the fed looks at. the uptick in inflation that the fed is looking for is coming. and maybe coming sooner than expected. >> what does it tell us about consumers right now? >> people expected it to be a gift back in january, and that did not happen. in fact, december was revised up to a 1% increase. so what it looks like if you take the two months together, this surge in consumer confidence we have seen since the election does seem to be translating into higher spending and maybe a lower savings ratio. taking the two things together, it looks like consumers are spending heavily, and retailers are taking the opportunity to

raise prices. >> money managers certainly and focus this wednesday, out with their latest polling from the fourth quarter. 13 f filings are revealing some interesting themes, starting with warren buffett. buffett was busy, apparently, during this period. one of the more interesting moves he made was buying some monsanto shares. the reason that is interesting is because we think of buffett as a long-term investor, but he bought monsanto after a bayer agreed to purchase monsanto. and southwest, he is doubling down on the airline. i want to talk about procter & gamble. nelson peltz's company took a stake there. bank of america, if you look across all the holdings, was the company saw the single biggest increase in investment from these money managers. >> gm ceo mary barra is in

germany on something of a charm offensive in order to win support for the sale of opel. >> it would be a real win if she could get rid of these divisions. they have been losing money for general motors for almost two decades now. last year, they would have been profitable if it had not then for brexit, so she wants to unload opel and vauxhall. they can become the second-biggest carmaker in europe and hopefully use those economies of scale to boost margins. >> snap inc. wants to raise as much as $3.2 billion in its ipo. that would give snap a market value of about $18.5 billion. it would be the first social media company to go public since twitter more than three years ago. what is the message from this company?

>> please don't treat us like twitter. please see us as alibaba. when you think back on ipo's, there are not been a lot of big high profile ipos. this is one of a few. this content consumption from millennials, is that going to work? is it going to grow? obviously it is popular, but is it a trend that goes away in six months? that is the real question. is this something that has long-term potential? >> samsung's de facto leader jay y. lee is in detention in seoul, arrested on allegations of bribery, perjury, and embezzlement. the company has issued a statement saying it will do its best to ensure that the truth will come out. this seems like a big deal. >> it is. i was there. i was in front of the district court when the first appeal for the arrest warrant was made by

special prosecutors. and the feeding outside the court was like, this is business as usual. they will reject it, and sure enough, the court did reject it. but special prosecutors have come back with more evidence, and in the last couple of hours, the court has ruled in favor of issuing the arrest warrant, perjury, embezzlement. >> shares of unilver surging, a proposal for craft and time to combine, unilever rejecting it, but the company is not giving up. is this round one? >> it seems like it is, but it is interesting that those shareholders are optimistic. unilever does not seem to be optimistic at all. they are saying there is no

strategic benefit to this proposal, no equity rationale for this proposal. they are almost saying, please, go away. >> is that reflected in the u.s. shares? do they doubt this is going to be successful? >> yes, and also with the u.k. regime, you need to remember that they have until the 17th of next month, because you have 28 days, a put up or shut up period, by which time kraft needs to come back with a better offer or go away. we could see further negotiations, but right now unilever does not look like it wants to sit at the table. ♪ jonathan: you are watching

"bloomberg best." i am jonathan ferro. just last week, federal reserve governor daniel tarullo announced he would be stepping down a month from now. he was appointed by president

obama and became the fed's point person for designing regulatory structures in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis. he talked about regulation and more in an exclusive interview this week on daybreak america. >> you came in and a lot of things were broken. i think almost everyone would agree. what remains broken after eight years, in terms of the regulatory structure? >> i don't know that there is anything so severely broken that we should worry about immediate consequences, but i think two areas on which we tried to concentrate over the last eight years still need attention, and the first of those is the largest firms that have been characterized as too big to fail. there has been a lot of progress, but there is more work needed. and secondly, the nature of the crisis in 2007 and 2008 reminded us that the nature of funding in a financial system in which traditional lending and capital markets are so integrated is just as runnable as in the 1920's, when big deposits were not insured. it is a different form of

funding now, repo, securities transactions, but the runability of that funding combined with the big drop in key asset price housing was what produced the crisis, and we need to be constantly on the lookout for vulnerabilities with runnable funding. and i think that, by the way, is an ongoing exercise. you are not going to get to the point where we say, now it's done, we move on. one thing i will say, david, is when someone comes to you with the too big to fail problem, that's when you should get worried. >> it is almost insoluble by definition. >> because the financial system adapts so readily and so expertly and a lot of ways to create new opportunities for making money, the financial regulatory system needs to be attentive to those changes and

to evolve with it. by the way, that is what did not happen in the precrisis period. >> i do wonder if we are getting into a cycle where people are forgetting the financial crisis? mr. tarullo: that is an excellent point. if we go back to a decade or 12 years ago, what was the state of the financial system, including some of our biggest firms then? one, even though capital markets and traditional lending had been integrated, when firms priced for risk a lot of the instruments in which they traded, they did not take into account the credit risk embedded in those instruments. mortgage backed securities are the best example. two, they were not attuned to the possibility you could have a liquidity squeeze. three, in many instances, they did not know what their own risk was. in 2009 when we ran that first set of stress tests on the fly,

as it were, we sent out requests for information, and more firms than one would have expected were not able in anything like a reasonable period of time were not able to aggregate risk to the same counterparties from across their big firm. those are the things that produce the regulatory changes that we put in place, and those are the things that should not be forgotten as a historical matter, but as i said a moment ago, a kind of adaptation in the financial system may mean that new risks are created along the way. jonathan: coming up on "bloomberg best", david solomon of goldman sachs sees a lot of confidence in the tech sector, and luke ellis sees reasons to be optimistic about hedge funds. the week's top interviews are next, including tom keene's exclusive conversation with funds. the week's top interviews are next, including tom keene's exclusive conversation with stanley fischer. you could call it a live meeting. >> our target is 2%. significantly above, you would begin to worry, and you begin to act.

jonathan: this is bloomberg. ♪ ♪

jonathan: welcome back to "bloomberg best". i am jonathan ferro. it is time now to revisit some of the week's most compelling interviews with investors and policy makers. let's begin here, speaking about adjustments to his forecast for u.k. growth as a result of brexit. >> it is true that we have adapted our forecast for the u.k. we thought the growth which was previously forecast at 2% would be up 1% in 2017, and we see there is a delay in the effects of brexit as far as investment is concerned. this is why we now say 1.5%, which is in line with other

institutions around the world. that mistake, if i may say so, was common to everybody, and 1.2% in 2019, so we believe there will be a significant effect from brexit, but that will be longer in time, and lucky for everybody may be weaker. >> you said it would be a tragedy if france were to leave the single currency. do you not worry that by suggesting to the next french president that the first thing that should be done is austerity? that you're playing into the hands of marine le pen? >> there was never a authority in france. there is no authority and france. france is reducing their deficit slowly. they are right under 3%. they must go on. why? is a question of credibility. getting more debt is not

a factor of strengthening an economy. marine le pen are attached to the euro. they know that getting out would be tragedy and a suicide. >> you are still going to pursue tpp minus the united states, why do this? >> obviously a lot of work was put into that deal and there are 12 countries involved. obviously the united states is the biggest, but there are still 11 countries keen to do more business with each other. over time, we believe the united states will want to have a bigger piece of the action in the fastest-growing part of the world, which is the asia-pacific. >> right. >> we think the tpp agreement provides a good framework to boost trade. while the united states might have made a decision at this point, when these things are put

into place for the medium and long-term, things change. >> you could have made that argument when the u.s. was involved, but now that it is not, perhaps it does not have as much teeth as it did before, so why not abandon it and move on to regional trade pacts that either exist are can be created? >> the thing is we can do both of course. firstly, it would be preferable for the united states to be part of the tpp agreement from the word go, but president trump has made his views very clear. we do understand that there is quite a bit of support among senior republicans otherwise, so this might well evolve in the years ahead. so much effort has been put into the tpp agreement as a means of boosting trade, boosting the capacity of businesses in our region to do business with each other and remove trade barriers, better integrate our economies, it would be a shame to throw all

of that work overboard. >> it is a fascinating time for hedge funds. obviously, there has not been a lot of confidence. have we seen the bottom there? >> i think we have had a period where active management generally and hedge funds particularly have found life difficult. they have found it difficult because there is increased competition. every day, there is gradually more competition and you have to get better at what you do, but we have also had an unprecedented environment where the central banks agreed on what to do. they all did the same thing, and basically they drove down risk risk premiums, which just makes a difficult environment for anything in active management. whatever you think of the policies, it looks pretty clear that last year's political moves started to start the breakdown

of that global consensus and that creates a good opportunity for making returns. and the hedge fund business, look, you can't justify fees unless you make returns, so as an industry, we have to concentrate on making returns. >> i mean you have noted that returns have not even matched a pretty vanilla stocks and bonds portfolio. where do they go from here? where did they go in 2017? are they going up? >> i hope so, but i run a load of hedge funds, so of course i hope so. it is always difficult to predict returns. it is easy to come on and say next year will be out there, but there is a great descriptor for hedge funds. a descriptor for macro-type strategies, across correlations, when they are elevated, people don't make money. when they are back to more historic normal levels, discretionary or quantum macro hedge funds make good money. in the same way, stockpicking funds, credit picking funds, make money when the stock

correlations are low and when stock correlations are elevated, they struggle to make money. looking today, both correlations have all dropped down to more normal historical level since the trump election and it has been a good period of hedge funds returned. if you tell me the correlations, i will tell you what the returns will be. >> what are ceos in the technology industry telling you right now? net positive? net negative? >> there is an awful lot of optimism and it comes from the fact that a lot of these companies are having a really significant impact on businesses, industries, a lot of change, a lot of disruption, and and a lot of growth. so this is a part of the economy where there is significant growth and growth generally leads to optimism. so when you are out here, sure

there is a lot going on in the world, but when you talk to companies in the tech sector because of growth in that space, you tend to get an optimistic view than you might in other slices of the economy. >> as that growth perpetuates, are they wanting to seize the opportunity for companies coming to market. will the doors open why? -- open wide? where we see the rest of the tech community, the private sector, come to market? >> there is certainly a lot of capital for companies growing. there is a good amount of capital available, privately, away from the public market. last year, certainly, was a historically low year in terms of ipo activity. i am a big believer that these things ebb and flow, but ultimately gravitate back to mean. so we are hopeful and optimistic that we will see more activity this year, but when you look at the world these companies operate in, if they are able to grow and access capital privately and there aren't other

pressures from shareholders and venture capitalists, these companies are putting off the opportunity to come to public market longer and the reason they can is because capital for growth is available privately, so i would expect to see more companies coming back to the public markets than last year, but i think that process will be very thoughtful and methodical process for these companies. jonathan: u.s. monetary policy was another central topic of discussion this week and after janet yellen's two days of testimony on capitol hill, we set down with an exclusive conversation with federal reserve vice chair stanley fischer. >> the economy is an extremely complicated mechanism. are we getting more complicated because of rising inflation, rising inflation in germany, for different reasons in the united kingdom, and suddenly a lift in inflation in america? >> it was very complicated when the inflation rate was negative

and very low. this is -- we have a target of 2% inflation, and we are heading in that direction, and so it is not making life more complicated at the moment. very high inflation, which of course we will do what we have to to prevent, could complicate the situation, but we are not there by any means. tom: how do you define high inflation? you have the atlanta fed numbers, sticky inflation, the dallas inflation, the cleveland inflation? what is the number, this statistic, that begins to suggest high inflation? >> our target is 2%. obviously you don't hit it exactly. you hope to be very close to 2%. we are as worried about being below as above. and, you know, it is something that if you are close to 2%, it is not a problem. if it is significantly above,

you begin to worry and you begin to act. tom: part of our relationship over the years at davos and other important meetings is that i really don't talk to you about the parlor game, but i fortunately have to. i believe there is an ides of march meeting, a march 15 meeting, we saw goldman sachs changing their probability of what the fed will do, not specifically what will you do at the march meeting, but does this new inflation dynamic changed -- change the cadence of two or three rate increases as we go to the end of the year? >> i don't want to give you numbers on two or three, but we, this is consistent with what we have thought should be happening around now. that is that we would be moving closer to the 2% inflation rate and that the labor market would continue to strengthen. if those two things happen, we will be on the path that we more

or less expected. ♪

♪ jonathan: you are watching "bloomberg best". i am jonathan ferro. it has been another busy week for corporate earnings reserves, and we start our roundup with quarter results from credit suisse. >> credit suisse posted a fourth-quarter loss of $2.3 billion. that was after taking a litigation charge. the setback resulted in a second consecutive annual loss for the swiss lender, but there is good news below the surface. >> overall positive. we think the frontier pendulum has swung. so it is hard to call a turning point, but we think the pendulum has swung, climate is better for banks, market sentiment better, and it looks like we are getting towards more constructive

solutions in terms of regulation really. >> are you worried that deregulation in the u.s. does not make you as competitive? >> we have a strong franchise in the americas. if you take one of our targets, which is to get to 10% to 15% in america, so we are at target. it is a positive, not a negative, for us. >> toshiba shares after an absolutely nasty tuesday, another bad day of it, 11% down after that $6 billion write-down and questions about the company's very future. we were this time yesterday looking forward to toshiba coming out with its earnings report. they did not come out and they said they would not give us an idea when they would, but then they did release those results. >> that's right. we got that $6.3 billion write-down connected to its

nuclear unit. we heard that the chairman is going to step down as well. one thing they may be concerned about are the plans that toshiba may have for its chip unit. >> to secure resources for further growth, we are taking a very flexible stance on the memory chip business. we do not insist on securing our majority stake in this business. >> the french bank credit agricole reported a slump in fourth-quarter profits for the french bank. the french consumer banking unit was an issue, a decline in trading issues, underlying performance is good, and shares are rising. are you happy? >> we are happy to see all of our business units making progress in commercial terms and that is on the background of a very strict monitoring of costs.

our cost-income ratio is falling markedly and also we maintain a low and stable cost of risk. i don't want to single out any business unit. it is rather very strong commercial activity in all parts. >> mitsubishi shares falling in back in singapore. the bank missing fourth-quarter estimates. we have got continued stress when it comes to the oil and gas industry, leading to higher provisions here. it has been all of the banks, a challenging environment, not just ocbc here. >> it is hard to make money when you have to put aside more for bad loans. for the fourth quarter, ocbc provisions jumped almost 60%. it has got to do with the energy sector. to date, at least four companies have defaulted, and the fallout

is not over. it is coming at a bad time. singapore's economy is slowing, loan demand is easing. >> shares in commonwealth bank are higher in sydney after posting it a consecutive record quarter annual profit. >> future earnings growth is now starting to become pretty muted. >> we are a function of the australian economy, so the rate of growth and the rate of revenue growth has come down a bit, and that is reflective of the fact that the austrian -- australian economy has been slower recently. so we are a function of that economy, but we have great faith in the longer term strength of the australian economy and will move mainly in line with that. we do see that there is opportunity to become more efficient, and frankly, to better serve our base of customers and to continue to grow our revenue ahead of underlying inflation in australia, which we have been doing consistently. >> german industrial services

firm bilfinger, reported a decline in group output, but an improved earnings margin. the result comes as activist shareholders campaign for the company to downsize. let me ask you about this activist investor. are your goals aligned? it seems as if you also want to shrink the company, split it into two divisions, and then focus on growing output and margins into 2020. >> that is a good question. we have spent quite a while developing our strategy, we call this 2-4-6, two division lines, focuses ins, and six the street. then we shared it with the supervisory board, where we have a permanent place. in other words, we are aligned with the general strategy and all parties are facing in the right direction.

>> nestle sees 2017 sales and profitability below its long-term target. this as its new ceo steps up efforts to restructure the company and reignite growth. >> generally it is somewhat volatile and somewhat still deflationary environment. we are better served with straightforward annual growth and earnings guidance. and this is what we gave you for 2017. >> is the long-term gain of 6% growth, model for growth for nestle over? >> what we have said is our focus on organic growth will remain and we do believe that with good internal initiatives that we can achieve good organic growth in the mid-single-digit range by 2020. so that is basically what we are attempting to do. >> duke energy reported fourth-quarter earnings, largely in line with estimates, the largest regulated utility in the u.s. it is also pursuing growth through the utility and pipeline

business. i know you have invested a lot in solar over the last few years, a lot of that due to tax incentives at the state and federal level. do you expect changes there and do you expect the business strategy to change it all? >> regarding incentives for renewables, i'm not hearing a lot about changes to the current tracking of those tax incentives. they are set to expire over the next several years as tax incentives are typically designed to do and i have not heard a lot about changing any of that. the issues of tax reform that affect us are involved with the deductibility of interest expense, critical to a capital-intensive this is like our own, so that is one of the issues we are looking at very closely. >> cisco shares popping slightly now in after-hours trading, revenue over $11.5 billion, just beating estimates, but the forecast for third-quarter sales

now in after-hours trading, and profit may fall short of projections. >> and cisco is the poster child for managing earnings. if you go to my bloomberg terminal, we have this command, surp , short for surprise. this column shows the percentage of surprise. if i scroll back to 2016, 2015, 2013, 2011, all green. as far back as we can see, cisco has "beaten" it's eps estimate when it comes to adjusted earnings, so the fact it has beaten by a penny is so meaningless because they manage expectations, guidance, and wall street really well. ♪

♪

>> what you are looking at here are bearish bets on the euro. options investors are now the most bearish on the euro since june. this is the euro-dollar reversal. the spikes show the extent of bearish bets. jonathan: there are about 30,000 functions on the bloomberg and we always enjoy showing you our favorites right here on bloomberg tv. maybe they will become your favorites as well. here is another function quic . it will take you to our quick takes, where you can get important insights on topics. here is a quick take from last week. ♪ >> protecting the nation from foreign terrorists entering into the united states. >> after president trump's executive order suspended the entry of refugees and travelers from seven predominantly muslim countries, leaders from around

silicon valley rallied against the move, saying it violated the country's principles and risked disrupting its engine of innovation. google's sergey brin showed up at san francisco airport to join the protest. >> we are seeing tech standup unified in anger it seems. >> silicon valley derives enormous strength from immigrants. >> trump's next steps could strike closer to home. >> i know the h-1b very well. that is something i frankly use and should not be allowed to use. we should end it. >> following his tough campaign rhetoric, trump's administration has dropped an executive order aimed at overhauling the work visa program that technology companies depend on to higher tens of thousands of employees each year. here is the situation. in 2016, it took less than a

week to exhaust the provisions. with facebook doubling the amount of money it spent on lobbying in 2016 as compared to 2012. the h-1b is popular with tech companies because it is designed to bring in specialists in science, technology, engineering, and math to work for three-year terms. in recent years, outsourcing companies from india have snapped up more of these h-1b visas even as tech companies in silicon valley complain they cannot get enough to meet the demand. now here is the argument. changes to the h-1b program could shift silicon valley's bottom line. one bill before congress would prioritize visa requests willing to pay h-1b hires twice the prevailing wage. this could address one of the complaints by opponents of the program, that companies have replaced higher paid americans with lower paid h-1b workers. the u.s. tech companies argued that universities are not producing enough mathematicians or engineers to keep pace with

the jobs in the field each year. opponents of the h-1b visa point to an increase in u.s. students seeking degrees and science and technology and they say the program leads to job loss in the u.s. since outsourcing firms receive half of the h-1b visas, they are can taken workers those jobs back to their country. >> from this day forward, a new vision will govern our land. from this day forward, it is going to be only america first, america first. ♪ jonathan: that was just one of the many quick takes you can find on the bloomberg. you can also find them at bloomberg.com along with the latest business news and analysis 24 hours a day. that will be all for "bloomberg best" this week. thank you very much for watching at home. i am jonathan ferro. this is bloomberg. ♪ ♪

david: did you think you would grow up to be the ceo of a large company like pepsi? indra: it is a dream come true. everyday.self david: when you get advice do you ever listen to it? indra: you never know if a nugget can translate into a success for the company. david: not long ago an activist showed up. indra: my job is to make sure the company is performing very well. not to keep an activist happy. david: suppose somebody has a product from a company that is based in atlanta and you see it in their refrigerator, what do you do? indra: i let it be known i'm very unhappy. >> would you fix your tie, please? david: people wouldn't recognize me if my tie was fixed. let's leave it this way.