carol: welcome to "bloomberg businessweek." jason: we are in bloomberg's global headquarters. carol: we have a look at the topics facing the business leaders in the coming year. it's all leading up to our summit hosted in new york city. we will be there. jason: we are looking at big themes. carol: we will also talk about

the trade war and brexit and the slowdown in china. jason: and a look at publicly traded companies with special mention in 2019. carol: and what is next for u.s. politics? it's never too early to start talking about 2020. jason: we start with josh green in washington dc, author of "the devil's bargain." the campaign for the presidency has begun, which makes things tricky for democrats. josh: we will have a big clash between trump and democrats. i'm looking at pressures that will fall on the democratic party. they have fodder for two years in the minority -- fought for two years in the minority. now they have oversight and control the house. that will bring pressure. the party will begin to spilt

into the -- split into the governing wing, and then as many as two dozen democratic presidential candidates jockeying for primary voters. it looks to me like those groups could go in different directions. carol: this makes it difficult. josh: democrats have been saying, for two years, we will be a check on trump. that's largely why we got elected -- they got elected. if you are a presidential candidate, you are worried about standing out from the crowd of presidential contenders. one way to do that is to be the most vocally anti-trump. you have people like tom steyer,

who has already spent $100 million running cable ads. that is a direction at the elected democrats -- that the elected democrats in washington do not want to go because they think they will be backlash -- there will be backlash. but people like michael avenatti want that attention. that puts pressures on the democratic party that they will have to grapple with in 2019. carol: you mention polls when it comes to the issues of putting forth impeachment proceedings when it comes to the president. if you look at democratic voters, they want democrats to go after the president. josh: nancy pelosi has been out

for the past couple of months. she doesn't think impeaching trump is where they should go. but a poll this morning showed only 33% of americans want to impeach trump. when you look at the subsample of only democrats, a majority do want to impeach him, 61%. a lot of democratic voters want to rush to that extreme. this is the tightrope democrats will have to walk. if they're not ccareful, -- careful, they could lose the majority they just won. carol: what is next for president trump in the year ahead, trade. the biggest threat to the world

economy in 2019 is an escalation of the trade war with china. jason: president trump is meeting with president xi in argentina later this month. here is what we can expect. >> there is a best case and worst-case scenario. the best-case scenario is that we get some kind ceasefire -- okay, we've gone to war, let's pause, maybe we pause on tariffs, the $200 billion on products hit with tariffs in september. that's due to go up to 25% in january. but there could be an exchange for some concessions from the chinese. then you have months of talks about complicated things that

drag on. the worst-case scenario, no ceasefire, guns are blazing, you go up to 25% on the $200 billion in trade. the presidents have started talking to hundred $57 billion -- $257 billion, all of the trade reamining -- remaining. the g20 summit will set the stage for 2019. jason: what about the president's long phone call with president xi? he seemed optimistic. markets rallied a bit on that. is there something there?

>> one of the things we have always heard about president trump, always pay attention to the last person he talks to. he always comes out of a meeting with xi optimistic about the possibility of doing a deal. he huddles with his advisers. among his advisers are the pro-deal crowd, steve mnuchin and larry kudlow. on the wall street side of things, they are worried about the potential for a trade war that gets out of hand. then you have peter navarro and bob lighthizer, the china hawks. the u.s. is fighting an epochal battle about the existential future of the u.s. economy. jason: are there any lessons to be drawn from the nafta negotiations, anything about the

u.s.'s astrazeneca relates to trade -- posture as it relates to trade? shawn: china is different in terms of size and scale of the problem, and the view here in washington on both sides of congress is that it is a problem, the u.s. needs to get tough. that's a different story. we had a lot of bluster going into these nafta negotiations. there are some interesting tweets. this is a tweet trade agreement. jason: still ahead, the global economy in 2019. carol: brexit aftermath. when the headlines fade, governor mark carney will be in the hot seat. jason: this is part of the special issue on the year ahead, were we focus on the leaders and

the most urgent topics in the coming year. carol: this is "bloomberg businessweek." ♪

carol: welcome back to "bloomberg businessweek." jason: join us for bloomberg businessweek every day on the radio at 2 p.m.-5 p.m. wall street time. carol: you can also find us online and on the mobile app. in the year ahead, global growth should be strong in 2019. but it may be imbalanced. jason: rising tariffs in the united states could make for trouble. i caught up with peter for our

special year ahead issue. peter: there are so many things to worry about, with the stock market and trade tensions. even the public tends to worry, what is going to happen next? if you look at the performance of the global economy, according to the imf, it's been remarkably steady. we had 3.7 percent growth in 2017 and we will keep the same number in 2018. we will keep the same number in 2019, for good, solid, steady growth. jason: one of the reasons people worry is because it has been so good for so long. peter: we think this can't last

forever. the u.s. is the biggest economy in the world. the u.s. economy, if it gets past june 2019, still growing, will be the longest expansion in u.s. history, going back to 1857. it has not been a strong recovery, but steady. jason: the duration is unprecedented. peter: i fwe make it. if the u.s. continues to grow well, that will help ull along the rest of the world. -- pull along the rest of the world. that's the reason the imf is pegging the 3.7% global growth.

jason: if carol were here, she would talk about synchronized global growth. peter: it is less of a real thing in the sense the u.s. has been outpacing a lot of the other rich countries. it is further along in tightening financial conditions because of the worry of becoming inflationary. what happens when you raise your interest rates? : money from elsewhere -- you pull in money from elsewhere. that is one of the downsides of u.s. growth. there are certain countries vulnerable to that. if the chairman of the fed raises the federal funds rate in the united states and the entire range of rates goes up, global investors can pull money out of

those developing markets, which need the money because they are running on a deficit. they can only respond by driving their interest rate set to punishing way high levels -- rates up to punishingly high levels. jason: what do you think will happen? peter: there will be constant pressure on these weaker, developing nations. another good for bad is that the u.s. runs bigger trade deficits. a lot of people don't like that. whom do we expect trump to blame? he tends to perceive these

countries that have a trade surplus with the united states as a sign of malfeasance. uae wrecked higher trade barriers to stop that from -- you erect higher trade barriers to stop that from happening. this could result in stronger trade friction in 2019. carol: trade and brexit and the slowdown of the economy could impact 2019. jason: here is our editor on next year's most urgent topics. joel: it is all about the future. what does the future hold? when we looked at our crystal ball, we were able to break it out to the themes you see.

we felt like these are the things people would be talking about going into next year. carol: we talked about china going into 2018. we will continue talking about it. joel: the one element we wanted to talk about was slow down. carol: that is something we don't normally talk about when it comes to china. joel: the government is trying to grapple with the shift. we have seen it with the stock market there. it's cooled. there is a lot of debt. that has led everyone to believe there is another variable that has consequences for the global economy. it will be one of those stories we hear about throughout 2019. carol: brexit cap us busy this year and will next year. -- kept us busy this year and will next year. joel: there is a deadline. something will happen.

what does it mean for the rest of europe? there is a brexit story. what are the ramifications, for the politics? they are drifting towards the right. marcon is pushing -- macron is pushing back on the left. will there be more referendums? will there be harmony, finally? carol: a lot of business people in london were polled about what they thought about brexit. they thought, we will figure something out, and that there won't be a lot of change. joel: we know which will define the year.

carol: this is a great lead up that we do at bloomberg to the next year. joel: it is a franchise moment at bloomberg. carol: coming up, draghi will end his eight-year term as the president of the european central bank. jason: and more from bloomberg's special look at the year ahead. carol: this is "bloomberg businessweek." ♪

jason: welcome back to "bloomberg businessweek." carol: you can listen to us on the radio on sirius xm, and in new york, boston, washington,

d.c. -- >> and in the bay area and in london and the app. carol: we turn to mario draghi. he is in his final stretch as the president of the ecb. he may raise interest rates, something he has never done. jason: undoing more than half a decade of stimulus might come

for the situation that the bank of england faces. we saw a bit of a preview after the referendum, from the international reaction. there was a drop in the pound. there was a small market panic. if there isn't a deal that specifies some sort of transition, i think by the time the march 2019 deadline rolls around, the bank of england will be a first responder in any crisis that happens. carol: the economy starts to wobble in the u.k., he might have to cut rates. cristina: he will raise rates if he needs to shore up the pound. he will have to take different

tools to stimulate the economy. it's going to be difficult. if there is a deal, he may have to raise rates. pressures relating to inflation may need to be tempted down. -- tamped down. carol: he is due to step down in 2020? cristina: he may not. carol: we shall see. jason: coming up, cars and cannabis in the year ahead. carol: and investors expect more ipos in any year the century. jason: akhtar summit, we will be speaking with industry leaders on the most urgent topics in the coming year. carol: this is "bloomberg businessweek." ♪

jason: welcome back to "bloomberg businessweek." carol: still ahead, people in the hot seat in 2019. that includes softbank's ipo. jason: and why next year is expected to be a mega year for mecca listings -- mega listings. carol: our global data team sifted through 2000 companies.

jason: we caught up with the person behind the list. >> it is a list, not a ranking. lists can sometimes be offputting. but you will learn a lot. energy companies, not surprisingly. every year we will see a good batch of energy companies. we have several, like marathon. there was a huge acquisition. the $28 billion merger with endeavor. -- $23 billion merger with an endeavor. heading in 2019, it will be the largest u.s. oil refinery. that introduces factors for the of attention.

-- worthy of attention. carol: we spend so much time thinking about the companies that disrupt our world. energy companies are still big players globally. dimitra: there is so much happening with them. those are the reliable companies year after year. carol: we saw that going on in 2018. restructuring will still be the story next year. dimitra: ford has been on our list a few years in a row. has the story fundamentally changed?

should we include it again? the consensus in detroit is , yes. -- is ,yes. him in this restructuring plan is not delivering as quickly as investors might -- this restructuring plan is not delivering as quickly as investors might like. there is a lot of stock in their pickups. into moving away from the -- and moving away from the sedan. their interest in the sedan is not what it used to be. they are playing catch-up. they are developing an autonomous vehicle for groceries. will this fundamentally bring about the changes investors are looking at? the ceo is not one of ours to watch, but he is still under a bit of pressure. carol: cannabis industry we've talked about this year. dimitra: one of our sections focused on cannabis about a month ago.

that was on the eve of canada legalizing it recreationally. one of our companies on our list is canopy. it's doing really well. it's a canadian company. we also have a tobacco company that is seriously moving into cannabis because of the opportunities there. carol: the cannabis industry is growing big time. we have the world's largest cannabis producer. we have a chart. canopy, we talk about growth,

almost 557%. these numbers are off the charts. jason: is this translating into the stock price? yes. for more, let's go to taylor riggs. we count on you for complicated charts. this is pretty straightforward. taylor: the bloomberg terminal is great for everything. over the last year, the stock is really picking up. you have almost 200% returns over the last year. share growth, recently 30%. 87% is another story.

marijuana has started to become more socially acceptable. carol: it's amazing the run this stock has had. jason: thanks. carol: runs like that is why canopy growth is one of our 50 companies to watch. jason: here is our editor, jim ellis. jim: the big driver has been legalization in canada. you saw constellation brands, the company that makes corona. it started with a small investment of $150 million, and now its invested $3 billion in a big cannabis company.

the real money in this is going to be putting cannabis in as an ingredient. that will take off. canada so far, only allows you to smoke it. it will allow you to put it inside edibles next year. carol: in china, we talk about what american manufacturers are doing. jim: it's the biggest market for electric vehicles, and cars. the way the u.s. used to drive the global auto market, china is doing that in the future. in january, they are adopting a system on emissions.

to get them down, you will have to have what is called new energy vehicles, and a certain percentage of output that's the cars you import into china -- they have to be that way. if you don't have that, you have to buy credits from other companies that have extra credits, like tesla. all of the global automakers are saying, i will commit to more electric vehicles, because i have to do it for china. california sets rules for emissions because it isn't so big. it forces those companies to green the rest of the u.s.. carol: another hot topic is diversity, impacting global businesses in the year ahead. we talked to someone at the global diversity summit in london this past week who said diversity is good for business.

>> in running our business, we probably pour over the numbers from a diversity point of view. we really make this an objective to achieve. jason: still ahead, uber and lyft and slack are done with waiting to go public. they top a record-breaking lineup of 2019 listings. carol: we will be speaking with industry leaders at our your ahead of summit on the most urgent issues -- year ahead summit on the most urgent issues in the coming year. this is "bloomberg businessweek." ♪

jason: welcome back to "bloomberg businessweek." carol: join us every day on the radio at 2 p.m.-5 p.m. wall street time. you can also check us out on itunes and soundcloud. jason: and our mobile app. carol: startups have been spending more time on a questionable road to profitability.

jason: uber, lyft, slack all top a record-breaking lineup of 2019 listings. tracking this lineup is our reporter, alex. alex: when you run the numbers, there hasn't been more than three companies that have a valuation of bigger than $10 billion since 2000, when palm pilot was listing. it has been a long time since we have had such a group of large companies, looking in the public market. carol: what are we talking about in terms of valuation for uber? alex: their valued at more than $70 billion. i think there should be a little bit of skepticism around those exact numbers. it gives you a decent range, frankly huge. softbank mobile in japan is

going public, may be the biggest deal ever. they are in that range. uber may be bigger than alibaba in terms of listings. carol: you mentioned we haven't seen three or four big tech companies go public in some time. you would have to go back to 1999 or 2000. alex: what some remember as the bubble days. the private funding environment has been so rife with cash,

poured in from funds throwing money at these private startups. now you have the likes of softbank and their $100 billion vision fund. companies have been able to get the capital they need to exist. when you think about why a company goes public, they want the visibility, they have the capital, or this is a good recruiting tool. they got the capital from the private markets. these are really sexy places to work for employees. that last bucket of visibility, they have that. this becomes about being mature and to run a mature company, you need to recruit this public listing. jas the softbankon: -- jason:

the softbank founder is also in the hot seat for the year ahead. carol: also because his biggest investor in his $100 billion vision fund is saudi arabia. >> he was best known for killing it on alibaba. they made is career. they gave him the credibility to come up with this new work and even more grandiose idea, a $100 billion vision fund that would invest in technology, internet technology, telecommunications, startups, with this idea he

could build a cohesive set of investments that would span the technology universe. carol: he also has some outside money in this fund. erik: $45 billion from the saudi arabia sovereign wealth fund and $15 billion from abu dhabi. carol: let's go back to saudi arabia. an interesting relationship, considering everything that has gone on in the news. erik: it was only a number of weeks ago that jamal khashoggi, self-exiled critic of the kingdom, was murdered in the saudi consulate in turkey. the fact that he was murdered has been established. who is responsible for that murder and possibly the assassination is a question mark. there is a lot of skepticism about that investigation. the turks are pointing their

fingers at the saudi crown prince, who they believe is most likely responsible. that is why there is this issue with masayoshi son and the vision fund, because of these closely backed ties to the crown prince. carol: but this has not changed the relationship. erik: on october 23, he backed out of davos in the desert. carol: everyone was there a year ago. erik: son was there -- masayoshi son was there. he was supposed to be a participant this year. because of the khashoggi killing, many high profile names had backed out.

october 23rd was the morning the conference was supposed to begin. at the very last minute, masayoshi son backed out. that raised questions about what sort of fallout there would be. with the saudi's backed out of the vision fund -- would the saudis back out of the vision fund? this was the kind of thinking engendered by that decision. two weeks transpired when no one knew what was going to happen. on november 5th, as he was reporting earnings at a press conference, masayoshi sons put those -- masayoshi son put those concerns to rest by saying he had a responsibility to the saudi people. as a result, softbank could accept and invest saudi cash. jason: coming up, the most exciting new technologies in motorsports. carol: and more on our your ahead summit on november 28. jason: this is "bloomberg

businessweek." ♪

jason: welcome -- carol: welcome back to "bloomberg businessweek." jason: you can also listen to us on the radio on sirius xm, new york, boston, washington, dc -- >> in the bay area and in london and on the bloomberg business app.

i sat down with someone at the bloomberg breakaway summit in london for a fascinating conversation. >> perfume can be so much more than a scented candle. the world is saying, show me the world your product is. i want to hear its language. i want to see its color. the -- hear the music. they are demanding that human touch. that feel of someone caring about you buying a product. it is easy to sell a million bottles. it is much harder to sell half a million to those same people.

jason: what i loved about that, jo malone knows to keep them coming back, you have to take it to the next level. formula e is kicking off its fifth racing season in saudi arabia. a lot of hype has been centered on the unique design and engineering of the cars. carol: here is our editor on that. >> formula e has been around for a few years. people were not sure it was going to become popular. formula e has really grown in popularity. they are starting a new season in december. everyone uses the same car in the formula e.

they would run out of batteries halfway through a race, previously. now, the battery is strong enough it can go for teh whole -- the whole 45 minute race. the cars look totally different, insane. each company is allowed to trick it out a bit, but they are mostly the same car. carol: does it some like a typical racecar? chris: it does not. our writer compares it to buzzing hornets. it has a whizzing sound. it's a bit more raw. it doesn't have that throaty roar. carol: how fast does this new version go? jason: it's capped out at 170 miles an hour.

carol: this sets the trend for what we might see in the rest of the world. chris: some of this technology might make its way into mass market cars. we are far away from luxury cars being made for the mass market. but the more people think this is cool, the more they will expected in their own cars. carol: talk to me about this trend of being able to do it in your home. chris: tonal make s a screen, and two handles that attach to the dvice on the wall, an the resistance changes with the handle so you don't need all of that equipment. it's incredible. carol: bloomberg businessweek is available on newsstands now. jason: the whole issue is a must read this week.

it's the year ahead. we have a novel idea about self-regulating the tech industry. carol: taking cues from the financial industry. jason: you talked to larry kudlow for this issue? carol: he thinks he can get the presidential agenda done. jason: the president of blackstone and i will have a conversation on stage at the november 28 conference. he has big ideas about the economy and investing next year.

carol: more bloomberg television starts right now. ♪ [ phone rings ] what?!

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