♪ emily: coming up on bloomberg best, the stories that shaped the week in business around the world. another staffing change rocks the trump west wing. apple stores are seeing bright times ahead, the barrels of oil keeps rates low, and a stronger job report. >> the u.s. has a strong economic report but i do not think it moves markets much. alix: the dow breaks through 22,000, so, where are stocks going from here? >> dow 30,000 is going to happen. next the time to sound the warning is when everybody is making a lot of money. alix: from financials to commodities, it is a peak week

for earnings season. >> we are comfortable that there is a profit earning stream that is going very well. >> we have the momentum, it is working. blankfeini ask lloyd how to fix a sick problem. >> there are several reasons in retrospect that we can look at and say, gee, we may have messed up. alix: all of that ahead on bloomberg best. ♪ alix: hello and welcome, i'm alix steel and this is bloomberg best. your weekly review of the most important business news, analysis and interviews from bloomberg television around the world. the week again with a spotlight, once again, on the white house and a high-level shakeup in the trump administration. >> anthony scaramucci has been removed from his job as white house communications director just 10 days after he joined the team.

president trump removed him from his post on the recommendation of his new chief of staff, john kelly. >> it is certainly high drama, but on general john kelly's first day on the job as chief of staff, he seems to have decided that a little bit of drama on the front end will save him a lot of drama on the backend. a pretty swift and decisive decision prompting the exit of mr. anthony scaramucci after an incredibly short and tumultous time on the job. >> i think that the scaramucci, the supernova over the past week has been a huge distraction on capitol hill. i remember when the drama was going down, on the health care bill, senators were reading his comments in the new yorker and shaking their heads. if john kelly comes in and actually has the authority to run the white house, that would be a change that i think would

be welcomed, frankly by both parties on capitol hill. >> apple reporting third-quarter results a moment ago let's call it up the. coming in at $1.67. the consensus was $1.57. fourth-quarter revenue estimate numbers, the estimates are coming in as $49 billion to $52 billion. the estimate, $49.1 billion, and this gives us a flavor of what they are expecting in times in terms of sales. >> i just got off the phone with apple ceo tim cook, and everybody wants to know about the next iphone, why the guidance of $49.52 billion is important that it is more above consensus. he would not talk about future products of course, but when it comes to the guidance, he said that we are happy with it. we like with for the beginning

of the back to school season. services setting an all-time quarterly record. he told me that over the last few months, this is a milestone that we had projected. he said this is an objective to meet, but not this soon, but we are thrilled, that we have achieved that. we could not be happier. >> let's talk about china. i asked him, are the winds changing in china, are you starting to see a turnaround? he told me, the results are very encouraging in china, and we thought we would improve him, -- some, but we improved a bit more. he mentioned my sales, they were strong. they had a record june quarter in china, ipads business is really strong. iphone sales are best are flat in mainland china, but in line with projections and ultimately, he said that they feel really good. ♪ >> president trump has signed a russia sanctions bill into law. the president says that he has many concerns about him, writing, the bill remains flawed

, particularly because it encroaches on the executive branch's authority to negotiate. congress could not even negotiate a health care bill after seven years of talking. by limiting the executive flexibility, this bill makes it harder for the united is to make -- united states to make a good deal for the american people. >> really, his complaints are categories. one is encroaching on executive authority, and the second is that everyone from afghanistan, to germany in the eu, could be impacted by this downstream of the application of the russian sanctions. and that the u.s., as a result , could be impacted in its ability to work with allies, and to work in a multilateral fashion with allies. the president is making this argument, particularly that germany has also spoken up. in the longer term, the president is doing two things. he is trying to give a pass to congress to rescind this and

revert to a version of the sanctions legislation that gives them a little more wiggle room on waivers. he is also trying to send a signal to u.s. allies and russia that this was not his idea. and that he is stuck with it. jonathan: the bank of england keeping rates low, a record low of 0.25%. the vote was 6-2. the program remains unchanged, at 435 billion pounds sterling. the corporate bond program remains unchanged. in terms of the forecast, the cut their growth forecast and their wage forecast aggressively , as well. >> in the forecast, uncertainty about the eventual shape of the uk's economic relationship with the eu, weighs on the decisions of businesses and households and grow down both demand and supply. >> they cut the growth forecast and the wage growth forecast, which was perhaps a bit more surprising out of the two.

carneyre, you had mark saying that they have the new material evidence really, from households and businesses. if they were expecting anything but a smooth brexit. then, of course, you would assume that if they were expecting these cuts to the forecast that that would indicate a perhaps more dovish different stance on policy, but instead, we could see more tightening than what the current pricing in is of the market. david: independent counsel robert mueller has convened a grand jury in washington in his investigation on the connections between the trump campaign and russian government. >> it is a sign this investigation is intensifying, expanding. it is looking at president trump's businesses, the businesses of his son-in-law jared kushner, as well as his campaign manager paul manafort. it is a sign that this investigation will continue, and there is going to be a cloud over the trump administration for several months to come. >> this is a really big deal,

obviously. you are crowding out some really important policy decisions. the question will be, will there be any leaks from this? what else are we going to hear going forward? the question will be, how does the president respond to all of this? >> the job report as follows, headline numbers are -- 209,000. 180,000 was the estimate. 4.3% on unemployment. the forecast for the unemployment was 4.3%. in 2.5%.arnings comes >> a little bit of enthusiasm in wage growth. is it a wage growth that is enough to change janet yellen's dialogue into the september meeting? >> maybe not, .3, as opposed to point to, but why did it not change? obviously, that is a positive but not much.

jobs above as you mentioned, but it is more than was expected at this point in time. it does show a rather strong economic report, but i do not think that it moves markets much. >> we would obviously like to see some wage inflation and the -- in the system. wage inflation means we are putting more income in consumers pockets. and then we would lower their tax rates, and on top of that , they would have more money to spend, driving more economic growth. that is what we want to see. we need to create jobs. we need to create jobs by getting rid of the regulations that are bogging down industry. we need to reform the tax code so that we can incentivize companies to invest in america. that is what we are trying to do. we are committed to doing it and we feel confident that we can get that done between now and the end of the year. alix: still ahead as we review the week on bloomberg best, exclusive interviews. a ceo explains how his company is bracing for brexit. also, italy's banking system,

and my conversation with goldman sachs chairman, and ceo, lloyd blankfein. coming up, more of the top business headlines. july was another slow month for u.s. auto sales. >> we do not see double-digit drops very often. alix: this is bloomberg. ♪

♪ alix: this is bloomberg best. i am alix steel. let's continue our top business headlines with the announcement of a media merger long time in the making. >> discovery communications has agreed to buy scripps networks. the deal is valued at $14.6 billion, including debt. their negotiating leverage and

will expand internationally. they tried to get this deal done three years ago and they cannot get together on price. >> the scripps family probably said this cord cutting thing is a risk to our business and the benefits of getting scale with another player x more sense and clear to us now than three years ago. i think that was a big issue. price helps, too. they are getting a full and fair value here, from the discovery and stocks.cash this is a great transaction, i believe, for both companies. >> softbank's ceo is said to be continuing his pursuit of charter communications, after proposal to merge the cable provider with sprint was rebuffed. he is considering a plan to buy charter outright. he really wants it to work. >> he does. he wants to do something with sprint. he failed to turn it around in the years he has had it, and he

fails to invest in the company, as i said before. he is refusing to put money into and building it out. really, it shows that he is dressing it up for sale, than anything else. his plan has been to merge it with t-mobile's usa, but that has not gone anywhere, so the next plan, would be to merge with charter but charter rebuffed them. then, the idea would be to use the merger with charter, to then go on and merge with t-mobile usa or do another deal from there. sprint, alone, does not do much for anybody really. he needs to bundle it with a company, and that idea would be charter. >> china's official factory gauge, dialing back a notch in july. this is after authorities are -- urged to curb financial risks. >> 51.4 was the number, a

pmi manufacturing number, as you said, missing marginally. this is down from the june number which was 51.7. these numbers so far suggest that the momentum moving into the second half is growth falling to some degree, but not any major red flags at this stage. >> the u.s. has sanctioned venezuela's president, nicolas maduro. it is the office of foreign assets control within the treasury making this announcement here. personallys seeing sanctioned by the united states. it freezes any of his assets that are subject to u.s. jurisdiction. it prevents u.s. businesses from dealing with him. >> this is an individual sanctioned versus what a lot of people had been speculating about the possibility of broader economic sanctions, it is a sanction of a president of another country and at the same

time, so far, we have not seen any broader economic sanctions specifically against venezuela's oil sector and that is what had a lot of people worried with the rising default possibility, for example. >> whether or not the u.s. will do anything about oil imports, is that where there could be a shift in economy and what effect would that have for foreign investors? >> would it be a complication? yes. would it be a hit to the administration? not necessarily. i think maduro can portray this as an attack against the country, so that is why i think the government has replied well with the sanctions because it is showing that he is concerned about the sanctions, but attacking and giving maduro even more arguments, would be not the rational. >> the saudi led alliance that

severed ties with qatar, and reinstating a list of 13 demands it says must he met. -- must be met. this comes after fresh economic data highlights the impact of the boycott of the gulf nation. qatar has been forced to open new and more expensive trade routes, dropping 40% from the same day a year ago. it seems that they are going backwards and forwards, but there was no resolution in sight. >> yes, francine, at first glance, the latest news causes confusion because you had the original 13 demands on the list, which were boiled down to six, and people thought the in mediation effort was getting traction. wait, scratch that, throw it out and we're back to the original 13 demands originally envisioned. that is continuing to take control on the u.s. to take a toll on qatar's economy. it was down 30% in june and one of the first real cue in terms of what has happened in the last

few weeks. vonnie: automakers could be facing a tougher second half, u.s. auto sales in july came down for detroit automakers, but japanese automakers like toyota and mazda all beat estimates. >> the overall demand is good, and the rates are pretty good, but these are the worst declines we have seen in about a year for some of these companies, so it was definitely a big surprise. we do not see double-digit drops very often and for gm to see it on their silverado, and the sierra, full-size pickups which are money machines, was very surprising. maybe it is a blip, but this is a pretty ugly month for the detroit automakers, while everyone else is doing ok. >> bloomberg has learned that wall street regulators will rewrite the volcker rule. the five agencies that originally wrote it with their own capitals working together on a revision, worked did you learn about what they're planning as part of the volcker rule?

>> as i said, they are about to start rewriting what has been one of the major thorns on the side of wall street banks, ever since the enactment of the dodd frank act in 2010. and the subsequent writing of rule, which bans banks basically from investing with their own money, and investing in hedge funds, and private equities. this marks the beginning of financial deregulation movement that the trump administration has long been promising. >> let's turn to brexit, deutsche bank set to be considering a plan that would shift half of its uk's workforce to the european continent. most of the 4000 positions would move to frankfurt and berlin. this seems to be more dramatic than the other banks who are moving employees, such as jpmorgan, why is that? >> it seems like it will be half of deutsche bank's workforce, in

future be is in the the trading heart of deutsche bank. this is a huge change, apparently, and i think the reason behind that is they have a new strategy in place focusing more on the german home market and the european continent. so it seems like they are using the brexit changes to trigger and implement further strategic adjustments, which is why it is a bigger change than for many other banks. >> toyota and mazda arts acquired stakes in one another and build a 1.6 alien dollar factory in the u.s. and create 4000 new jobs. is the mazda deal, does it make strategic sense? why are they doing that? >> yes, i think it makes strategic sense. we have been seeing over a number of years, a big industry trend where manufacturers are teaming up and building

alliances, basically due to cost and due to stringent regulations across the globe. it enables them to share more costs, and make a wider range of vehicles. matt: it seems an interesting time to invest and build new factories. why now? >> it is an interesting time, the market had been going down and i think they are just using the opportunity now to prepare for a stronger market recovery, when demand starts to pick up again. they will have additional production capacity in place. ♪

♪ alix: welcome back to bloomberg best. i am alix steel. they banks reported earnings

this week and we'll have a roundup of the results later on in the show. we sat down for an exclusive conversations with several bank ceos, including one from intesa sanpaolo, and ceo of societe generale. is ceo told us how he positioning his bank for brexit. >> we have a strong presence in both countries, and i do not think the adaptation to a brexit scenario, which is still very unclear, is a significant change. -- significant challenge. what we said is that we are seeing between 300 and 400 people, might have to move to paris, and we have said that we would choose paris for relocating these people. i don't think it is a big expanse, but let us wait for the real scenario. we have time to decide when and

how, so we will see when we have more clarity from the negotiation point of view. >> the bank is putting costs at about $300,000 per job, is that something that would be similar for your bank? >> we have not really discussed it. as i said, we are still working on the pricing and systems. want to talk to you about your bank, when you bought them, there was a lot of speculation about this putting you in a huge advantage compared to your other competitors. do you believe that that is the case? >> the point of the veneto bank, is to avoid systemic risk within the country. >> sao paulo was the only one aolo was thesanp only one that can remove the

toll risk within the country. when you are told that you can move on and increase that income or reducing cost of equity, and that is related to systemic risk. in the case of these banks, we were able to reduce the cost of equity, in italy, and that was in my view, an example of teamwork within a bank. the european situation and the government of italy as well. because you know we need the approval of parliament to finalize transactions. >> it was not a bad deal, it was a good deal are you? >> it was a deal that allowed us to have capital neutral, giving earnings and the point of the deal was, for sure it was a good deal, a deal that can allow us

to change part of the story, and into a structuring, growing revenues, transforming business models and now we can add the story of reducing cost and restructuring. so, i think that in the end, it is a good deal for shareholders and for the customers of veneto banks and also for europe as well. because the systemic risk in italy could be considered systemic risk in europe. alix: up next, more of the week's most compelling conversations. with twoesented different forecast for equities. and, i talked to lloyd blankfein this week about big picture topics. we also got into the details of goldman's trading troubles. >> the expectation is that we

will do better, because historically, we have, and we really haven't. alix: this is bloomberg. ♪

♪ alix: this is bloomberg best, i'm alix steel. the dow keeps hitting new heights, breaking 22,000 for the first time on wednesday. but how long will double run bullll the wilbull run -- run continue? we talk to professor jeremy and billionaire investor howard marks. marks preached caution in a conversation with erik schatzker. >> the time to sound the warning is when everybody is making a lot of money, it means that the market is going up and enthusiasm is incorporated in pricing and behavior. you cannot sound a warning after the thing has turned over and died, so, i think that we see

a market in which there are lots of uncertainties, prospective returns are low, asset prices are high and people are engaging in risky behavior. that is the kind of climate in which we should take a hard look at what we're doing, and i think, reduce risk. you have -- erik: you have rung the alarm bell before. in 2000, as well as in 2000 -- 2005, which as you yourself has acknowledged, was a bit early. >> right. they really looked off the in those days. -- looked off beat in those days. in 2005, it was not quite that urgent but the market had

another two years to run, in which it became urgent. i would not describe it as urgent today. the economy is going along at a modest pace unlikely to do so. there is not been an economic balloon, so i do not think there has to be a bust anytime soon. i am commenting -- i'm commenting not so much on fundamentals but investor behavior and asset prices. dow 30,000 is going to happen, whether before the end of this decade? i tend to doubt it. not impossible, but i think we are looking at the early 20 20's for a dow 30,000. vonnie: what is your near-term forecast that you are working from? >> well, you know, at the

beginning of the year, i did say that 10% was possible. we are very close to that. most of it has been on the back, the trumpt fro agenda, not on good earnings and a lower dow, that has been very important for boosting earnings. i still think that a corporate tax cut is coming this year. i think that that could raise after-tax earnings another 10%. i know there is a lot of pessimism after the fiasco with the health care, but i actually think that makes the republicans more determined than ever to say, well, let's get something on taxes, and actually corporate taxes, is where i think there is more agreement. so i think, that if we get a corporate tax cut, and i think 2017 is still possible, that is another 10% in the market.

alix: this week, i had the opportunity to sit down with goldman sachs chairman and ceo lloyd blankfein, goldman's lackluster performance lately has worried investors over the last couple of quarters. i asked him to address those concerns. how can something not be wrong with it after the last two quarters? >> well, we did not make as much money, so that was wrong. first of all, we are diversified, and everyone performed very well, so well that we actually did well as a firm. weak return on equity has doubled. that being said, we did not perform well in risk. sik is a risk business, that we don't always perform well in. that being said, some people performing in the same

environment and are better than us, and we are on the balls of our feet. we are concerned about it. in my 35 years of doing this, there have been periods, a lot longer than this one, where we have underperformed, only to outperform. it has been newsworthy, not because we are a chronic underperformer, but a chronic over performer. that being said, we know what we have to do and we are doing it. it is an execution matter for us and guess what? that is what we do. alix: so, execution seems to me is cyclical. there are people saying that there are structural problems in the commodity business. what do you think of the view? had to cut back a lot, but the fact of the matter is that if we were simply bigger and had more assets, we would have made more money. that is why it is an execution

issued because we should have done better and the expectation is that we would do better, because historically we have, and we really have not. we know that there are several reasons, in retrospect, that we can look back and say we may have slipped up. we have a terrific client base, which we will never abandon, but we were disproportionately involved in trading clients who trade a lot, such as hedge funds and others things. again, we are an investment bank. the more corporate banks tend to have more business with corporate's and others. that is something we should fix, and we should not have let it get that disproportionate. but we did, and we will fix it. some of the products we tend to focus on were in the commodities business. commodities has been in recession and not very many banks compared to us are in that business. commodity firms, oil companies, that has been in a bit of a recession. that is a cyclical matter. do i think that oil will always

be this price, within three dollars of this price, for a long time? i do not think so. but still, we have to scale it to the environment we are in. whether it is profiting with the kinds of things that we trade, whether it is the people that we serve, we should be serving everybody, and not a disproportionately more focused base, but we are working on it. i cannot say that we are right all the time, because we obviously are not, but i will tell you that we have a good reputation the resilience and adaptation and that is our core skill set. alix: i also discussed the current regulatory climate with lloyd blankfein, president trump has promised major policy changes, but will they fulfill the high expectations of the business community? lloyd blankfein told us what he thinks washington can deliver. >> the one thing that people are talking about, the

administration -- there are some things already getting done that you have to say, a bit of a change in sentiment, and attitude. i think that the way rules are implemented, the attitude of the new class of regulators that are coming in, and again, we operate within the financial services, but we are big corporate advisors in mergers and acquisitions, so we get involved in every industry. every industry is regulated, and to tell you the truth, more highly regulated than they ever have been in this day. instantaneous thing, and in some cases, it does not need approval, in sum, it does. it does not need legislation, and that is the way regulations are implemented. and attitude towards it. i think we are already witnessing, in some of these industries, a change in sentiment. alix: we heard the office of the

comptroller of the agency is starting a process on where people like you can comment on where you want to see rollbacks. us what you profits would be and what you would like to roll back? >> when going through financial regulation, you could regulate the amount of capital, you could regulate processes, leverage, and you could regulate activities. you can do this transaction, you cannot do that kind of transaction. what the volcker rule did, was it imposed a state of mind test. you could take positions, but they wanted to damp down speculation. but the line between speculation, which as a word, seems very easily that we should marketk off of, and making, facilitating other people's trading, taking the

other side of what your client wants to do, is also a risk-taking principal activity. the line between the two is very blurry and indistinct. the volcker rule says in effect, taking positions, point of view, in anticipation, or in connection with a specific client operation, that is good, and if you are doing it, away from that specific, it is not good. but if you are a market maker sitting at a desk, it is hard to know where that distinction is. because what really makes a market is a million people, all at the same time, buying and selling because someone thinks it is going to go down, up, and clients joining that process, which is called a moving market. it is cumbersome, and mix people -- makes people who were sitting on trading desks very nervous, and i think what it has done is added dampening effect on liquidity in the marketplace.

i think regulators did not cause that. they were going in regulation statutes, but i think that now that it has been in place for a while, and we see how it operates, i think there is a consensus that it has to be re-examined. ♪

♪ alix: you are watching bloomberg best. i am alix steel. it has been a busy evening for corporate reports. let's review the biggest headlines. had a report for european banks. >> hsbc second-quarter profits beat estimates and the bank said it will spend up to $2 billion buying back stock. >> with the first half of 2017's performance, we have revenues heading in the right direction across all major businesses and

regions, good credit control, and good cost control. another $2 billion worth of buyback we are announcing today, which over the last 12 months to 15 months we will make a $1.5 billion buyback. >> it is shifting to a growth story, with two quarters of good numbers now. they performed well on the advisory side. not on the trading side. they suffered a bad quarter. but also, you had the pivoting to asia, where markets are getting higher and loan growth is there. they are fewer below the line items, fewer misconduct charges. a few other issues. so, we are really a much better quarter than this time last year, but they are still not totally out of the woods. >> we have had these numbers from another french banking institution. they posted a net revenue increase of about 20% in the second quarter. one of the few investment banks that had growth in trading -- bond trading revenue in the

second quarter. how did you manage to achieve that? >> we had a 13% rise in revenues in the second quarter in a m hadt where most of the decreased revenues. i think it is an illustration of a change in our business model. we have moved from a traditional house to a much more solution focused house, and we have been able to develop our relationship with our clients all over the world, from the asian client base to the u.s., and it has been very successful quarters on quarters, and this is another illustration of that success. >> the litigation issues have weighed on shares, the third-largest bank saw a 20% drop in profit, with $350 million of extra provisions.

also, since 2014, when it struggled to make money from new clients. >> definitely a very interesting set of results for commerce bank. frankly, nothing positive on revenues, but again the markets showing you that there are still interests in the banking sector. if you look at it, nothing really wrong with the results, a bit lackluster, but momentum is stalling, i think. >> is this expectation? i am thinking, is it just dividends? do shareholders want dividends in banks more than they ever have? >> topline growth is what it is about. banks will continue to relatively outperform, but certainly, this is all right for investors. >> let's go to standard charts, they seem an uncertain future. chief executive winters says that the overhaul of the bank is imperative.

shares falling for a third straight day after it reported revenue gains. give me probabilities on earnings this year, 50, about 50, below 50? >> we said really that there would be two things important for us, one is that we are comfortable that there is a profit stream and an earning stream, which is going very well, we announced nearly double profits. the second one was making sure that there is enough capital for other banks who have been paying their dividends. their decision is the continuance of a dividend. our situation is a little different. we stopped paying the dividends a while ago, and the decision to recommence, is one that we hope to make confidently and when we do, we hope to be able to pay it going forward. raising in business per share, bringing it to a stable

place in 2017. they beat the second quarter estimates and the sale of all of the vaccines and ms drugs that had previously been expected to roll over. my question is, how do you keep the momentum going and drove newer drugs help you do that? >> we are expecting some new things. we have a new drug which is the first antibiotic made available for epidemic diseases. we started with a strong start, 26 million euros. a bit low of course, but looking forward, we think it could be a very significant driver and drug buster in our system. >> we will see how bp will open s this morning, second-quarter numbers from the company it beat -- did beat estimates. but analysts will be sharply reducing expectations for the company over the last couple of weeks. they hopped over the bar, but it

is a lower r. meanwhile, debt continues to cash ow their cannot cover dividends with payments to the u.s.-gulf of mexico oil spill. >> it is a mixed bag, good news. they are generating a bit of cash, but, the payments continued to be a drag for the company, and it is starting to show it in the rest of the european oil majors. we had some upbeat statements from shell, and others, but it is harder to get excited about these numbers. most importantly, debt continues to rise. they have added $10 billion of net debt in the last 12 months. there are reasons to think they can cap better in the second half, but it does leave them vulnerable to another slump in oil prices. >> rio tinto reaping the benefits of a rally, and its investors will get bigger rewards. the world's second-largest mining company is beginning a billion dollar share buyback this year. plus, they will pay two dollars

into dividends. the company reported earnings of more than double from a year ago. >> a very strong set of returns today, $3 billion of cash returns for shareholders and $2 billion of dividends. it means that in practical terms, it is one of the largest dividend returns in the history of rio tinto. on top of it, we did put another buyback, so we did do well in the environment. where we are today, he have the value of our volume. the entire company is focused on continuing to develop the cash returns for investors, day in and day out. >> tesla shares are swinging in late trading, after reporting second-quarter earnings. the electric carmaker dropped in shares per -- dollars per share, far less than analysts had expected. revenue was also a little bit less than expected. the big question now, is how much cash the ceo, elon musk am

-- elon musk's company burned through before unveiling its most affordable car yet? the model is going to start at three $35,000, and has racked up more than 500,000 reservations. what are the highlights? >> it was a beat across the board. they spent less, they said they but theynd a lot, spent less than investors feared. model three reservations are installing the roof, through the roof, and it looks like the spirit of cannibalization, is not as others have been can -- concerned about. shareholders said that they have seen an increase in reservations since the model three was revealed. >> also out with earnings, and shares. -- >> also out with earnings, square. its quarterly results topped earnings estimates, thanks to what platform on increasing sales of its business services. >> they beat extremely high

expectations, on the bottom line, the top line, and they continue to contribute to their platform. they added more sellers as well. the other sellers have more money to buy into the software services, ranging from loans to food-delivery to instant deposits and employee management services. >> we have a business that is scaling, reaching more of our small businesses, and more of our independent contractors. we realized that, recently, we are not really competing with financial institutions, and banks and traditional lenders. our average loan size is $6,000, so we are competing with people going to their friends and families and asking for a loan. that is a massive market. ♪

♪ >> i brought the ccrb screen up . we do have a slight dip now from the first month to the second month. urve the of the cruv sharply up. and if we go five years backwards, and compare the charts, this is the current growth here. we are down, down, down. >> this is a great function, srsk looking at venezuela.

probability of a miss payment over the next few years has risen to 64%. the government's $3 billion of bonds are due in 2022. following to a 15 month low. >> this is the sd ag function, and i will click over here, a cool function, a new one we have been using an useful. i will set the period to 20 years. it is showing us the degree which the vix moves in any given year over the past 20 years. alix: they are over functions on 30,000 the bloomberg and we always enjoy showing you our favorites. maybe they will become your favorite. here's another function you will find useful, quic-go, which will give you important context and insight into timely topics. here is a quick take from this week. ♪ ♪

alix: that was just one of the many quick takes that you can find on bloomberg. you can also find them on bloomberg.com, along with all of the latest business news, and analysis 24 hours a day. that will be all for bloomberg best this week. thank you much for watching, i'm alix steel. this is bloomberg. ♪ ♪

what should i watch? show me sports. it's so fluffy! look at that fluffy unicorn! he's so fluffy i'm gonna die! your voice is awesome. the x1 voice remote. xfinity. the future of awesome.

♪ david: what was the strategy that you used? paul: i was completely determined to recapture my parents' money. david: how does somebody raise $5 billion in 24 hours? paul: it was first come, first serve. david: you have the image of striking fear into ceos. some people are probably afraid they will get a call from paul singer. paul: it does not bother me. david: if somebody invested in the very beginning, what would the rate of return that would have been compounded? paul: one dollar became $160. david: is it too late to invest retroactively in that? [laughter] >> would you fix your tie, please? david: well, people wouldn't recognize me if my tie was fixed, but ok. just leave it this way. alright. ♪