sophia: coming on "bloomberg best," the stories that shaped the week in business around the world. the drama deepens on trade as presidents trump and xi prepare to meet at the g20 summit. >> trump wants to project an era of uncertainty in these discussions. >> which version of trump will show up remains to be seen. sophia: the eu signs off on the brexit plan, but that is just the first step for theresa may. >> i cannot see any way she gets this deal through parliament. sophia: the fed releases minutes and takes heat from the white house. >> powell is trying to create a little bit more wiggle room for

the fed. >> the president is not happy with anyone who does not do what he wants to do. sophia: strength as the holiday season gets underway. gm announces cutbacks. this as the auto industry copes with headwinds. >> the focus right now is on business as usual. >> the conversations around tarrifs, trade wars bring in uncertainty. sophia: despite fears of a global oil glut, the ceo of saudi aramco sees opportunities. >> we are not only looking at oil, but gas, energy, and that chemicals. sophia: and as investors navigate volatile markets, they tell us what they see on the horizon. >> the inflation rate one year from now is going to be exactly where it is today. >> i joke around, both internally and externally, i don't even know what i am rooting for every day. sophia: that's all straight ahead on "bloomberg best." hello and welcome.

i'm sophie kamaruddin. this is "bloomberg best," your review of the most important business news and analysis from bloomberg television. let's start with a day by day look at the top headlines. over the weekend, the u.k. and the european union agreed to terms of separation from the bloc, but persuading parliament to approve the deal remains a challenge. >> theresa may is urging u.k. lawmakers to embrace her brexit plan. the prime minister announced that parliament will hold a vote on whether to accept or reject the deal before christmas. this after eu leaders finally signed off on the agreement over weekend. but challenges lie ahead, as the bloc warns there will be no renegotiation. >> i cannot see any way she gets this deal through parliament. people who have committed to vote for her are 230, roughly. she needs 320. so she is not even in the neighborhood of being close.

cheney 320. >> she is winning a bit of grudging admiration from the public, who on paper are more in favor of brexit than these mps. if that endures, her ability to hang on through this process starts to be a grudging acceptance of the deal. a bit of pressure from their constituencies and from the public. but i don't see it anymore than rob does. >> a major announcement today from general motors, the automaker saying they will close seven factories worldwide, including five in north america by the end of next year. this means 14,000 jobs will be cut. what sparked of this? >> gm has a problem in its factories that it has far too much capacity to build the slow selling sedans that can is no longer want. so these factories make things like the chevy impala and the chevy cruz. they don't want these. these are dogs in market now.

the ceo is saying, if there is a problem, fix it now. so she is trying to get out in front of this problem rather than letting it fester. >> ahead of the g20 summit in buenos aires, president trump saying he is pushing forward with plans to increase tariffs on $200 billion worth of goods. his flagging duties on all remaining imports from china if negotiations with president xi jinping fail. >> given we are days way from g20, will this impact the talks there? >> no. i think president trump wants to inject an air of uncertainty. he always likes to take the approach he is unpredictable. so he is going to keep his chinese adversaries guessing. as well as people within his own administration. this is the way he operates. when you have the president of the united states saying he is prepared to slap 25% tariffs on chinese imports, you would think the markets would be in a meltdown and they are not. and i think they are beginning

to discount this rhetoric. >> apple shares moved sharply down yesterday after president trump said in an interview with the wall street journal that he might include iphones in the next round of tariffs on chinese imports. >> there are a lot of things the president has said about a variety of industries. in this case, it was a response to a question. i don't think we have to rush out and think there is going to be a 10% tariff on iphones. it is always important to watch this, and the many tea leaves that appear during any apple quarter, but i'm not sure that there is going to be a new tariff on the iphone. >> president trump and xi have agreed to meet over dinner in a pivotal moment in the tariff war between the world's two biggest economies. there is some optimism and we are all kind of wondering what is going to be on the menu for this dinner date. >> right now there is no lowering of expectations at the white house. the president's chief economic adviser, larry kudlow, came out

and said this was a very important meeting with very high-stakes. and despite the fact that monday, trump was setting a pessimistic tone, saying he was very unlikely to back off, tebow -- to back off of his threats to continue tariffs, kudlow was saying a deal might come out of this meeting. which version of trump will show up saturday night remains to be seen. >> president trump gave an interview with the washington post. he said, i am not even a little bit happy with my selection of jay, referring to jay powell, not even a little bit. i am not blaming anybody but i think the fed is way off base with what they are doing. how to you response to that? >> with trump nominated jay powell, he is not a dove, and we knew that. we did not think he was when he was nominated. the fact that the president is

unhappy with him is not a surprise. the president is not happy with anyone who does not do exactly what he wants to do. so i think jay is going to exert the fed's independence and say, this is why we have an independent fed, so we don't have politicians making monetary policy for the country. >> a solid gains day for u.s. stocks. this after jay powell seemed to have walked back some of this is a early comments and suggested we are below the neutral rate. >>'s are based on our best assessments of the outlook. there is no preset policy path. >> there are a few things i took away from powell's remarks. most strikingly, the idea that rates are not that far from neutral. and then the follow-up, we need to wait and see what the impact of rate hikes is going to be. we only see that impact coming through over a period of a year or more. and the idea there is no preset path for policy could be obvious anticipation.

the idea that powell is trying to create a little more wiggle room for the fed in 2019. as the market interpretation suggests, that wiggle room is most likely to be used to put a shallower path for rate hikes into place. >> federal reserve officials have signaled a more flexible approach in their gradual interest rate increases. that after a likely december hike. >> the fomc signaling that a rate hike is likely december, they will slamdunk that, and then they are going to make meeting by meeting decisions. let's start with one of the key phrases, off the list. almost all persons expressed a view that an increase in the target for the federal funds rate, now at 2.2%, would likely be warranted soon. ok, december.

so if incoming information on the labor market and inflation was in line with or stronger than current expectations. some said some upcoming meetings could be appropriate to transition to policy statement language that places greater emphasis on the evaluation of incoming data -- data dependency -- in assessing the economic and policy outlook. such a change would help make the committee more flexible. >> the g20 summit in buenos aires, world leaders have touched down. a meeting to be dominated by the escalating trade war. it all comes down to those bilaterals over there. >> the focus is back on the strong man. president trump. president xi. president putin, and of course, mohammad bin salman of saudi arabia. it is all about that bilateral. >> president trump with mexican president pena nieto as well as prime minister trudeau. what do we have coming up next? >> in terms of nafta, the u.s.

to get it ratified. u.s. trade representative robert lighthizer saying they are going to talk about that next week. they are going to have new negotiations, but the tariffs remain in place for right now. justin trudeau, noting it in the signing ceremony, telling the u.s. president donald, we need to do something about that. >> the u.s. raising the bar ahead of the g20. expecting dinner with xi to be a success. a few minutes ago, markets cheered by the fact that the u.s. trade secretary robert lighthizer asked about it. he expects the dinner to be a success, but he did not say what success actually is. here is what he went on to say. in the part of the quote that gets left out that may mean a lot at the end -- there will be a positive dealing on behalf of both presidents.

in terms of doing a deal, that is up to the president of the united states and the president of china. saying it is going to be a success but not saying what that is. if the two presidents came out and said it was a success and we are going to keep talking, that may be enough to keep people happy for a couple of months until we see where all of this goes. sophie: still ahead, as we review the week on "bloomberg best," an exclusive interview with the saudi aramco ceo. the eu's competition commissioner talks trade, and glenn august shares his thoughts on brexit. next, more of the business headlines. president trump threatens to close the u.s. southern border, but bluster barely moving markets. >> traders are taking it with a grain of salt. sophie: this is bloomberg. ♪

sophie: this is "bloomberg best." i'm sophie kamaruddin. let's pick up on our global tour of the week's top business stories in europe, where brexit and the status of italy's budget continue to cause concern for investors. >> mark carney has never shied away from doomsday brexit warnings, but the analysis has gone further than before. he says the economy could shrink 8% in a year and house prices could fall 30%, and the pound could fall below parity with the dollar. i know this was sort of a doomsday scenario, not a base case, but your take? >> it is pretty extreme. the no brexit, the no deal brexit scenario, the range of possible outcomes is enormous. that means it is very hard to

tell, but i would put carney's estimates and the bank of england's estimates at very low, the bottom end of the spectrum of outcomes. you can understand why they have done it. the point was to test the banking sector, if it was resilient enough to resist that shock. it turns out, by at least their assessment, is that it is. the bottom line is it is pretty extreme. >> sterling remains under pressure as theresa may launched her back brexit tour. this on signs it will be increasingly difficult for the deal to pass in the house of commons. the prime minister is said to caved into pressure from parliament, trying to change the terms of the brussels accord or demand a second referendum. the fact that now mps can choose whether to attach conditions or not, does it mean it is more likely the vote gets passed december 11 or not? >> it gives more sway to mps on the outcome of that vote.

ms. may has conceded that point. the government is betting there will be no majority in the house of commons for these amendments. it does open the door for something more dramatic to happen in terms of the outcome of exit. but diving back, the big vote, the numbers are still looking pretty difficult. it is a massive mountain for mrs. may to climb. nevertheless, we are not hearing that many mps are changing their mind, particularly on her own side, said they are going to block the steel. -- block this deal. >> italian officials signaling new openness for a lower 2019 budget deficit target after weeks of pressure from the eu. the prime minister says no one is fixated on this. if there is a budget that makes the country grow, it could be

2.2% or 2.6%. >> they said we are not hung up on decimals. the deficit does not have to be 2.4%, but they have also said in the same breath, they are spending all the money they plan on spending. on the big things, which is what makes up the deficit. so they still want pension reform, they still want to cut taxes, and they still want citizen income. what are they saying? at some point, if they do not make any changes, the eu is going to call their bluff. >> america's annual spending spree. black friday sales included 23% on the year, totaling $22 billion. how good or bad was thanksgiving shopping? >> what i would say is it is a good time to be a consumer. i think for the past year, we started getting trained that deals were not going to be as prolific as we thought over the past several years. and they are back. i think the deals were flat or better for the shopper, which

means flat or worse for the retailers. >> we have new data that confirms over the weekend, beat e-commerce or brick and mortar, a lot of spending was going on. and a few of us contributed to those numbers as well. >> no doubt. what you can see is the retail industry group very happy with the numbers, getting off to "a very strong start." the national retail federation saying 41 million people shopped online during that five-day period from thanksgiving to cyber monday. many people say that is because the deals have been spread out not only just over the five days, but through the week. that may have impacted traffic. a big boost for the retail stocks, as you can see. >> president trump resuming his tweets on america's border security today, urging mexico to support what he calls "flag-waving migrants." why is the president re-upping this rhetoric right now? >> vonnie, more than 40 migrants were arrested along the

u.s.-mexico border over the weekend. some 8000 migrants that are part of the so-called caravan. over the 19,054 mile u.s. border, a small portion was 1,954 mile u.s. border, a small portion was closed between tijuana and san diego. and border control agents using tear gas, according to the associated press. >> when the president threatened to close the entire u.s. border with mexico, it registered more as a blip for the peso. >> traders are taking this with a grain of salt. in reality check -- they don't expect the full border to be closed. and actually, even the area where there were problems over the weekend yesterday, some temporary closings at the san pedro entry points -- san isidro entry points, things are coming back to normal.

>> president trump is said to have asked federal agencies to find ways to cut subsidies to general motors, following the automakers plans to close factories and lay off workers across north america. the president said earlier on twitter, the reason the small trucks business is a go to the root is that for many years, tariffs have been put onto small trucks coming into our country. it is called the chicken tax. if we did that with cars coming in, many more would be told here. how much does gm have to worry about tariff action in the wake of production changes? >> what trump is threatening so far, gm does not have too much to worry about. the first thing he threatened was cutting the ev credit. it is not clear that he can do that unilaterally, or just to gm and not other automakers. trump has made his case. he is not going to change the

tariffs all that much. you know, he cut a deal with canada and mexico. gm doesn't bring in much from other countries, so there is not much you can do there. >> a surprise plea in the mueller investigation, today president trump's former lawyer michael cohen pleading guilty to a new federal charge. what exactly is this new charge and why is he pleading guilty now? >> the new charge is different from the charts three months ago insofar as it pertains to russia -- the charge three months ago insofar as it pertains to russia. all the allegations and the reason robert mueller was appointed special counsel, to look at ties between the trump campaign and russia. from the beginning, trump has said there was a real estate development project discussed in 2015, but it all stopped before the iowa caucuses. today's plea is that michael cohen admits or said that it's false, discussions continued into june 2016 after trump had secured the nomination.

so this is a significant development in the russia story. president trump: what he is trying to do is get a reduced sentence. no, he is lying a project everybody knew about. we were very open about it, and we were thinking about building a building. we had an option, i don't know what you would call it. we decided -- i decided ultimately not to do it. there would have been nothing wrong if i did do it. ♪

sophie: you are watching "bloomberg best." i'm sophie kamaruddin. crude oil prices fell more than 20% in the month of november, and rising output has raised new concerns of a supply glut. this week, we sat down with an exclusive interview with the

saudi aramco ceo, who says he is confident energy demand will remain strong. >> there is a lot of healthy demand in our industry. we are not looking only at oil, we are also looking at gas, lng, chemicals. so there is a lot of potential for saudi aramco as we are trying to balance this. there is a lot of growth potential for saudi aramco. >> there is a bit of skepticism among investors about your ipo ambitions. because it has been delayed a couple times now. 2020, 2021, is that date now firm, or could it happen sooner if the transaction closes? >> his royal highness, the crown prince highlighted --, and we are committed. the ipo, we are committed to the ipo.

so the government is committed for the ipo for sure. it is about timing. now, the talk before the discussion, before that the ipo would have happened. >> the second half of 2018? >> second half of 2018. the first half, we talked about acquisitions of a major stake through a public investment fund, and these two cannot go concurrently. you cannot list while you are going through a major acquisition. the acquisition makes a lot of sense for us and we have do it right now, because we have strategy of shifting 2 million barrels to 3 million barrels of crude to chemicals. >> the recent murder of jamal khashoggi has dampened investment sentiment. what is your message to foreign investors? >> well, i think there is a lot of investment that is coming

into the kingdom. during the fii, we saw $54 billion worth of business with our partners. tomorrow, you will be attending a program, a forum. and we are signing more than 30 deals worth $27 billion. so if you put the two together, we spent two months, more than $60 billion of agreements and investments that we have signed between us and our partners. sophie: coming up on "bloomberg best," we will look at more of the top business stories, including some rare setbacks for apple. we will revisit compelling conversations. an eu regulator says it is essential not to get into the crossfire of trade wars. >> we cannot let ourselves be

kidnapped by one side of the aisle or the other. sophie: this is bloomberg. ♪ i am a family man.

i am a techie dad. i believe the best technology should feel effortless. like magic. at comcast, it's my job to develop, apps and tools that simplify your experience. my name is mike, i'm in product development at comcast. we're working to make things simple, easy and awesome.

sophie: welcome back to "bloomberg best." i'm sophie kamaruddin. this week was full of news regarding the automobile industry. among the many hot topics, cutbacks at general motors, the prospect of higher tariffs, and the ongoing investigation of carlos ghosn. against this act drop, bloomberg interviewed a number of executives at the los angeles auto show, beginning with the bmw ceo harold kruger, who spoke exclusively with bloomberg about whether his company may need to follow gm's path and recall some of its less profitable models. >> no, because if you are [inaudible] the next seventh generation, we will show to the public tomorrow here at the only motor show.

the series is always a very successful car in the united states. we did fall of it already. we invested heavily into suv's, and that is why the new s seven oh come to the market next year and why we are seeing more of s70 come to the market next year and why we are seeing more of these products. our product offensive was one big prospect, a lecture -- electrification, and the other was suv's. so if you think about products like the eight series convertible, we are working on the super luxury segment, like the coupe and convertible, and on electrification. but for sure, you need heavy investments into the future for all of this. on the other side, we are always focused on efficiency and reducing the complexity of the products, saving costs to invest into more electrification.

>> would you consider opening a production plant in the united states of america? have you looked at that option, oliver? >> we didn't think about it, because production in the u.s. depends on the volume. it is selling about 60,000 units per year in the u.s., and profitable production in the u.s., you need normally around about 50,000 units. the 60,000 we do with all of our model ranges, therefore it is difficult to talk about production in the u.s. bigger volume manufacturers, it is much easier to do that. >> for north america, if look at our footprint with our plant in mexico and the big client in tennessee, which we have been expanding, if you at least look at the initial feedback from from what we have got from nafta 2.0, we feel we are in a good

position. the overwhelming majority of the cars we sell of the north american market are made in the north american market, so we are in a pretty decent position. now, we have to get into the fine details of the agreement and local content and all of that, but we feel we are in a decent position. the truth is this -- it makes sense to sell the cars and make the cars in the same marketplace. and for the most part, that is what volkswagen does. >> does that mean if president trump proposed tariffs on autos being imported from europe, it would not materially affect your business in the united states, provided the new nafta 2.0 or the usmca goes through? >> as of right now, for volkswagen, 95% plus of our sales come from the nafta marketplace. so that would not have a direct, big impact. but look -- let's go back to the top of the question. we think even the conversation of tariffs and trade wars and all these debates ring -- bring instability and bring unknowns, and i think the lack of

stability and knowns is not a good thing for business. we believe in free trade, we believe in fair trade, we believe in an open marketplace. that's what we need. we made investment that are 15, 20 year cycles, as you know. you can't have the chess pieces moving all the time. do i feel we are in a good position to navigate what's happening? yes. but more importantly, our point of view was quite clear. free, open trade, transparency, and an absolute must on stability. >> the focus right now is business as usual. the alliance is intact, in direction from the mothership in japan and the direction we are giving to our dealers and employees here in the united states, stay focused on the business at hand, selling cars and taking care of consumers. >> how important are subsidies? this is something we hear being fired at gm in terms of electric subsidies. is this something you need as part of the industry? is it something you depend on? >> it is not something we depend

on. it is clearly something that the consumers depend on, and it makes these vehicles much more intriguing. with the synergies we have with the alliance, and as we continue to make more vehicles that can bring the cost down, we will be able to get the manufacturing cost to a point where we might be able to operate without these subsidies, and the consumers won't need these subsidies. they are important as electrification becomes something consumers are more and more comfortable with, and avoiding any of the range anxiety issues that are quickly becoming not an issue anymore. so i think we are in good shape going forward. >> the eu commissioner for competition joined bloomberg this week to discuss trade and regulation. she told guy johnson she shares some of the frustration linked to global trade tensions. >> we have been proposing reforms of the double veto system, because we share the view that it is not working well enough.

and in that, of course, we work with our u.s. counterpart, our chinese counterpart, and we see many countries are coming on board to see if we can make our multilateral system work better. and that, for us, is a key priority. we are still increasing tariffs, which puts businesses in a very difficult situation. >> it's interesting to see what is transpiring here. because increasingly, antitrust authorities -- we certainly see this in the united states and to a certain extent, in europe -- are being used as weapons in this global trade war. is that a situation you are comfortable with? >> well, that cannot be the case. because antitrust is about the

evidence of the case, the fact of the case, the behavior of the company, whether it is illegal due to competition or not. and for us, the standard of proof is always that our cases will have to stand up in court. we cannot let ourselves be kidnapped by one court or another court, by one side of the aisle or another. because we serve the european consumers so they have the benefit of free and fair competition. this is very important to us for any business, no matter the flag they are flying when they do business in europe. >> it is now december, and wall street leaders are developing their economic forecast and investment strategies for 2019. bloomberg television spoke exclusively with several prominent asset managers about their outlook. let's begin with jpmorgan asset management's chief global strategist, who set down with vonnie quinn. >> throughout this long economic expansion, we have described it as a healthy tortoise, the idea for 2018 was a tortoise on sugar.

that picked up. i think the image for 2019 is a marathon tortoise. it is going to slow down to about 2% growth again, but we think it will just keep going. if this expansion makes it past next july, it will be beyond all the u.s. economic expansions going back going to the civil war. a record long expansion, that we think is sustained. what that downshift to 2% growth has interesting implications for asset prices. >> if it begins to happen the way you are forecasting that it will, and you are an economist, wouldn't we get a stronger response from the fed? >> well, so long as we have a slowdown in the economy rather than a stall out, i think the fed will still raise rates in december, but also in march and in june of next year. so that takes us up to 2.75% to 3%.

at that point, i think they will stall -- they will suspend further rate hikes. we are told they might come back in december. but what i think is going to happen is we are not going to see inflation take over. i think the inflation rate will be exactly where it is today. and without higher inflation, i think the federal reserve may stop. so to some extent, yes, it is a power-play. they will stop at neutral and won't go beyond neutral anyway, and then if the economy were to weaken, you can take those march and june rate hikes out. but that is not our base case. the base case is rate hikes in march and june, and the economy slows down to 2% growth and holds at that pace. >> we start the year with global synchronized growth, the tail of tax cuts, and now the global synchronized growth is not there and tax cuts were spent. but in europe, some of the capital goods companies are getting hurt, some of the chemical companies getting hurt. where we are spending a lot of our time is on shipping, which has been affected. more people have lost money but we think there is an interesting opportunity today in some of the debt that german banks in particular have been selling, because it is closer to maturity and we think it's an opportunity to take the collateral or work it out.

there are real estate opportunities in spain, which has been doing reasonably well. italy is still challenged and there are some selective opportunities we are looking at, but that script is still being written. >> what about across the channel? what if theresa may can't get a brexit deal done, with her own parliament? >> i think that would be to me an event that would cause some this location. although it had some dislocation. although it is pretty

remarkable, if you look at all the dislocating events over the last decade, people ended up buying the market rallied back -- look, i think the market by and large still expects there would be a deal and if there truly was a hard brexit that was devastating, i think the markets would react negatively. >> does that create opportunities for you? >> sure -- no, look. i joke around internally and externally, i don't know what i'm rooting for every day. ♪

sophie: this is "bloomberg best." i'm sophie kamaruddin. let's resume our roundup of the week's top business stories with a focus on company news. facebook is facing hearings before european lawmakers this week, as it turns into another

pr debacle. >> where is mark zuckerberg? that's the question that lawmakers from the u.k. and other nations asked today in various parliaments. the department of digital culture, media, and sport, the u.k. version, tweeted this image of an empty chair after facebook failed to show up for an international hearing on fake news and privacy concerns. there was a certain amount of theater around all of this, so how seriously should we take what is happening? >> there is no chance of zuckerberg was ever going to turn up. the way this was convened, it was jointly connected by selective committees in the u.k. parliament, but but we also had representatives from belgium, france, argentina, brazil, singapore -- they claimed they represented the interests the 400 million people. mark zuckerberg is never going to turn out because the format is such that you can really be held accountable here. >> when you look at apple, it is giving up its crown as the world's most valuable company -- at least for a few minutes today, after a steep decline in

the share price last month, the blue line there. microsoft, the yellow line, took the top spot for the first time in eight years. microsoft is kind of back in favor among investors, seen as safer and insulated from a lot of the headwinds the faang stocks face. is that justified or is that a knee-jerk reaction? >> it is also focused on the cloud. with the secular trend in the cloud, microsoft is as well positioned as any company out there. dell has slowly but surely building this behemoth and we are seeing microsoft give white knuckles to apple and other names across the faang stocks in particular. >> apple is also facing an antitrust case in the supreme court which could have wide-ranging applications for the entire tech industry. they accuse apple of maintaining a monopoly on app distribution on the iphone and jacking up prices. the u.s. supreme court justices

allowed the lawsuit to continue. what did the supreme court justices signal about their position on this apple case? >> the general sense was that they would let the lawsuit against apple go forward. i counted only one real vote on apple's side, and that was chief justice john roberts. as many as seven justices are taking their perspectives might be inclined to let the lawsuit go forward. if so, that is bad news for apple obviously, it adds a source of pressure on them to reduce the 30% conditions they charged app store developers. >> deutsche bank is said to be considering a major shakeup in its top ranks. this comes as regulators are expressing frustration with the firm's efforts to prevent financial crime. bloomberg has learned that the bank's chief regulatory officer and tom patrick, who runs u.s. operations, may leave the company, but any final decision has yet to be made. do regulators think deutsche

bank is not on top of the issues? >> i think so, and this is serving as the second ceo that had previously been associated with the associations of the bank and still have struggled to regain the confidence of regulators, they are still not shown to be making significant progress in tackling the prevention of crime. in particular, it has been reprimanded for its failings and not preventing money laundering, for example, both by u.s. regulators and german regulators. >> prosecutors in germany have raided deutsche bank's offices in a money laundering investigation. the bank headquarters in frankfurt has been searched today. what do we know about this investigation the scale of it, and how serious it could be for deutsche bank? >> what we know is that police

officers were deployed, about 170 law enforcement officials who rated six different locations, including a private home. one suspect in the raid felt the scale of the operation was quite big. what it means for deutsche bank is hard to say. obviously, everything that sort of smells like a legal problem can cause nervousness among deutsche bank investors because of deutsche bank's past, and this is no exception today. but we don't know how much it will expand into a bigger problem for deutsche bank. there's no fine involved yet, so we will still need to figure that out. >> the board of mitsubishi motors has followed in the steps of nissan by asking its chairman as well. mitsubishi cited reputational risks for following suit. >> mitsubishi motors -- not too surprisingly, the board of directors late yesterday in tokyo voted unanimously -- i believe there were eight board members there -- to oust carlos ghosn as its chairman. mitsubishi motors was bailed out

by ghosn in 2016 after some scandals and profitability issues. so they are tied to nissan and they did follow the steps, and this really does set the stage for a possible power struggle going forward. >> struggling commodity trader noble group has extended the deadline for its restructuring until december 11. that as it tries to address regulator concerns over a multiagency investigation into its accounting practices. where does this leave the restructuring now? >> i don't think this waiver will be long enough to be long enough to allow noble to satisfy all the questions that have come from the regulators. they are quite extensive. noble has had to hire technical experts to pursue some of them. so it is hard to see that this will be resolved in two weeks.

i think there might be a backstop, they could go to the end of december, but it is still touch and go. we don't really know will happen to this restructuring. >> a three-way split at united technologies. the company is streamlining on three businesses -- the aerospace business spinning off the elevator into climate controlled units. it seemed like everybody from the activists to the shareholders were saying to do this, split into three, and yet the market isn't really appreciating what has been done this morning, is it? >> basically last night, united technologies announced it would split into three companies and that includes that $23 billion acquisition approved last week by chinese regulators. and the markets -- i mean, the stock is down as much as 6% or 7% this morning, and that is mostly because of the free cash flow estimate.

so that is where you are seeing the negative reaction. >> the federal reserve is deepening its investigation into goldman sachs's involvement in the 1mdb scandal. give us the update -- what is new here? >> essentially you can add another headache into the mix for goldman sachs. the department of justice is an advanced stage of the probe into the 1mdb scandal, and malaysian authorities want their dues back. and now with the fed at this advanced stage, or a stage where they are getting to the business end of the probe, it means a whole heap of trouble for goldman sachs, and it does not look like it will be resolved anytime soon. to be clear, the bank has been saying -- and that remains the defense -- that this whole scandal is because of one or two crooked individuals at the bank. blame the individuals, not the firm. but it remains to be seen if the regulators will accept that defense. ♪

>> if you look at the ecpr screen, you can choose from the drop-down box, you can choose total trade, surplus, deficit -- i have deficit here and we have a massive one that the u.s. does with china. sophie: there are about 30,000 functions on the bloomberg, and we always enjoy showing you our favorites on bloomberg television. maybe they will become your favorites. here's another function you'll find useful, quic , which will lead you to our quick takes, where you can get important context and fast insight into timely topics. here's a quick take from this week. >> among the top 10 most valuable tech companies globally are two china tech giants. with many more up and coming startups making their presence

felt. the industry has become a serious rival to silicon valley, but there are political hurdles ahead. this is your bloomberg quick take on china's tech giants. early on, chinese companies like tencent had a reputation for being copycats. its qq instant messaging app initially looked a lot like icq. that's a popular messaging app used in the u.s.. >> 90% of them all got their original aspiration from a u.s. equivalent. their portal business was an equivalent of yahoo!, weibo was an equivalent of twitter. alibaba -- people were saying it was a hybrid of ebay and amazon. the list goes on. >> comparisons are no harder to make. tencent's messaging app wechat has grown from a texting at to a platform for shopping, flirting, dating, watching videos, playing games, and ordering food in taxis. -- food and taxis.

there's no u.s. equivalent. since the introduction of the internet in china, the government has controlled the web with a complex systems of sensors and gateways known as the great firewall. this has effectively quarantined china's technology ecosystem, blocking access to the likes of facebook, twitter, and instagram. that has has enabled locals to develop services without competition from abroad, and build platforms with a uniquely chinese flavor. due to china's large population, the internet users double the entire u.s. population, so the companies grew to be massive. they became so successful that some u.s. companies are taking note. >> i think a lot of people are pointing to facebook trying to copy the wechat model, where they are allowing third parties to open e-commerce stores, third-party games being introduced. >> but there's increasing push back. president trump: china. they are draining us, taking our money, the are rebuilding themselves. >> president donald trump says china is stealing overseas know-how and has imposed

tariffs. bloomberg businessweek uncovered that the chinese even implanted chips in computers for potential hardware hacks. >> two years ago we were seeing a lot of investment and m&a activity into technology and silicon valley from chinese companies. that has all been put on the brakes ever since the trade war. >> yet chinese tech company names that only recently drew blank stares outside china are becoming increasingly familiar. take huawei, which the pinnacle a pinnacle ined 2018 by overtaking apple globally, but the chinese big tech companies keep expanding and will need to convince other nations they mean no harm. sophie: 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 all the latest business news and analysis, 24 hours a day. that's it for "bloomberg best" this week. thank you for watching. i'm sophie kamaruddin. this is bloomberg. ♪

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argh! i'm trying... ♪ yippiekiyay. ♪ mom. ♪

carol: welcome to "bloomberg businessweek." i'm carol massar. jason: and i'm jason kelly. we are here at bloomberg global headquarters in new york. carol: coming up, we zero in on conversations from bloomberg's annual the year -- ahead summit. jason: some of the world's most respected figures in business and politics spoke at this invitation-only event right here at bloomberg. we heard from iac's joey lever and also karen weaver in the